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647992_2 | Hail the Instant Coursepack! | to corporate finance. A paper catalogue is available, and all the selections can also be found electronically through the Internet computer network. Robert D. Lynch, the vice president of Primis, said these custom-designed textbooks were being used on more than 800 campuses in the United States, Canada and Australia. Most Sell Coursepacks Some university bookstores say custom publishing accounts for 20 percent of course material, which includes textbook sales. The National Association of College Stores, a trade group based in Oberlin, Ohio, said a majority of its 3,000 members sold coursepacks, and at least a third of all college students had used them in at least one class. For as long as there has been photocopying, students have brought home copies of reading materials, after pumping coins into a machine in the library. As copying became more widespread, with departments installing machines and copy shops opening near campuses, faculty members began assembling their own "books." Now the coursepack has become institutionalized. At many campuses the bookstore circulates forms, asking faculty members for reading materials they would like to use. They then contact the publishers to obtain permission to copy the materials -- in return for a royalty -- and assemble the "books." "The principle of asking for permission is now widely accepted by bookstores and copy shops," said Carol Risher, vice president for copyrights at the Association of American Publishers. In suits over illegal copying and copyright violations over the years, the association has bludgeoned professors, university administrators and copy shops into compliance with copyright law. In a 1991 case in Federal District Court in Manhattan, for instance, Kinko's copy shops were ordered to pay $1.875 million in damages and costs for violating copyrights; in an earlier case against New York University and eight faculty members there, the university administration agreed to accept responsibility for educating professors about copyright and copying procedures. If students generally like the more personalized and diverse readings of the coursepack, as well as the lower price, and if teachers welcome the opportunity to shape their materials, publishers surely have mixed feelings. Even when royalties are paid, the packets cut directly into textbook sales. 'Their Own Appeal' "The build-your-own-textbook phenomenon is here to stay," said Michael V. Needham, president of the college division at McGraw-Hill. "There will always be people who want to use textbooks, but coursepacks have their own appeal." If coursepacks cut into textbook |
648159_3 | Mutual Funds; Value Line Steps Into the Data Ring | service, Mr. Ogorek said, is probably a feature showing a fund's performance in the last bull and bear markets. But data covering one cycle is less reliable than data over two or more, and Morningstar's quarterly return data give similar results by showing performance in tough markets like the fourth quarter of 1987 or the third quarter of 1990, he said. Value Line also provides its stock rankings -- a feature of its equity analyses that predicts how well a stock will perform in the next 12 months -- for fund portfolio holdings. But that, Mr. Ogorek said, "can be misleading." For example, of Fidelity Magellan's 16 ranked stock holdings, 12 are ranked average or below, but Magellan is still an outstanding fund, Mr. Ogorek said. In addition to the 3-, 5- and 10-year performance figures offered by Morningstar, Value Line provides 20-year performance, which both advisers called too long to be relevant. Value Line and Morningstar also offer a "style box," or grid, to show whether a fund invests in small- or large-capitalization stocks and uses growth or value approaches to stockpicking; both advisers called Morningstar's grid, which includes medium-cap stocks and a blended growth-value approach, more useful than Value Line's. Morningstar has a new feature that Mr. Ogorek also found useful: a portfolio breakdown showing what percentage of stocks are traded on the New York Stock Exchange and other exchanges, and what percentage of a fund's assets are in the Standard & Poor's 500 and other market indexes. He also likes Morningstar's division of total return into income and capital appreciation. Mr. Evensky said the most important difference between the two services is that Morningstar attaches a date and analyst's name to the commentary on its data. Value Line calls its analysis a "team effort," though Mr. Savage said "our research people are available to talk" to subscribers. Mr. Evensky also judges the Morningstar commentary to be more analytical and Value Line's more descriptive. While the documents used to evaluate Value Line's service were not marked as preliminary, Mr. Savage later said they were, explaining errors found by the advisers in data for two of three randomly selected funds. An incorrect total return and net asset value figure were listed for the American Heritage fund, and the listing for AIM Weingarten showed the wrong inception date and omitted a co-manager. Mr. Savage said the errors would be corrected. |
648125_0 | Dana I. Ruben, Gregory T. Rogers | Mrs. Leon B. Ruben of Bethesda, Md., has announced April wedding plans for her daughter, Dana Ilene Ruben, and Gregory Todd Rogers, a son of Mr. and Mrs. Stephen Rogers of Armonk, N.Y. Miss Ruben, 28, is also the daughter of the late Mr. Ruben. She graduated from Emory University and is now the assistant director of the Barbara Mathes Gallery in New York. Mr. Rogers, 27, graduated from Brown University and is the director of fixed-income research at Rogers, Casey & Associates, an investment consulting firm in Darien, Conn. ENGAGEMENTS |
647832_3 | THE WORLD: Urger to Splurge; Mexico's Hunger for U.S. Goods Is Helping to Sell the Trade Pact | weak imitations. Under President Carlos Salinas de Gortari, Mexico has been intent on dismantling its import-substitution economy and opening its markets. The doors were cracked ajar in the mid-1980's by lowered tariffs on imported goods. Nafta, which would end tariffs and other trade barriers among the United States, Canada and Mexico over 15 years, would complete the opening of Mexico's economy to the north. Tariffs act as taxes, artificially pushing up prices. Reduce them, as happened in the 1980's, and suddenly imports start showing up on store shelves. At first, Mexicans couldn't get their fill of imported products like Coca-Cola in cans, which until then had been unavailable. But when the novelty died down, people realized they were paying two and three times what it cost for a Mexican-made Coke, and the American-made version didn't even taste as good. North of the border Coca-Cola is made with corn syrup, while Mexican Coke uses sugar, and Mexicans say they can taste the difference. "Mexicans are willing to try something new," said Francisco Sanchez-Loaeza, president of Panamerican Beverages, the largest Coca-Cola bottler outside the United States. "But they are becoming more and more demanding." Coca-Cola was one of a limited number of American products available even when the Mexican economy was closed. Mexicans drink more soda than any other people except those in the United States, in part because drinking water here is so risky. Coca-Cola controls 55 percent of the market and, with Government restrictions lifted, is flooding the market with previously unavailable flavors and bottle sizes, including non-returnable two-liter monsters. Changing Habits A big question is how much and how quickly Mexicans will change their shopping habits. Most Mexicans still shop at small stores and street stands -- not surprising in a country where street vending has been well established since Aztec times. They go to the store on average eight times a week, while shoppers in the United States go twice. Tortillas, the Mexican staple, are a big factor, because fresh tortillas, made without preservatives, are considered inedible after a day. But habits are changing. Enrique Legoretta, commercial director in Mexico City for the A.C. Nielsen market-research concern, said that once Mexican consumers glimpse the new consumer world, small stores just don't hold their attention any more. In some ways, Mexicans have shown themselves willing to change their whole concept of shopping. The Price Club has opened two successful |
648029_6 | Years of Neglect Raise Cost Of Restoring a High School | former Mayor Edward I. Koch pledged to reverse the decline: "Whatever is required to be done, let us commit ourselves to do it." 'Didn't Do Their Homework' Commitments followed. In the School Construction Authority's first five-year capital plan, written for the construction authority by the board in 1989, the Erasmus Hall modernization was budgeted for $22 million. Ms. Linden said the estimate was based on a 1985 board survey of the school. But officials at the authority said they were puzzled from the start about how the board could have estimated so little for the work. "Somebody didn't do their homework," said Daniel Millman, a senior project officer at the authority. To conduct an adequate survey of the Gothic towers, board officials needed to erect scaffolding and ladders, he said. Instead, "Somebody stood on the roof with a pair of binoculars and tried to estimate the work that way," Mr. Millman said. Mr. Light said that after new surveys and an open bidding process between 1990 and 1992, the construction agency produced its own early estimate of the project's cost -- $62 million -- which the board approved. But the construction that began last year brought a series of unsettling surprises. Last fall, masons discovered that the school's tile facade was not tied to the building with steel rods, as is normal, but only with flaking cement. Months later, workmen on scaffolding to repair the Gothic towers removed a series of tiles and, to their horror, felt the entire tower shift. Later investigation showed that the 88-year-old towers, too, lacked any metal skeleton that could provide stability. Errors on Blueprints Last spring, the construction authority discovered that holding rooms built to keep handicapped people safe until evacuation during a fire had been incorrectly located on blueprints, requiring extensive design changes. Authority officials attributed the error to the Fire Department; a deputy fire commissioner, Harry G. Ryttenberg, said the authority was at fault. Despite repeated inspections of the school by both the board and the construction agency, discoveries of asbestos have twice caused costly disruptions. Earlier this year, workmen tearing up a basement floor churned up clouds of cement dust, and tests later proved that the cement contained asbestos. The dust, billowing upward, contaminated everything in four stories of Erasmus Hall's east wing. Contractors said they were forced to discard vast quantities of tools and building materials, and the cleanup was |
647989_0 | China Lacks Water to Meet Its Mighty Thirst | Heaven River dried up 20 years ago. Canals no longer bring water from Beijing's reservoirs. And it has been more than a decade since anyone could afford to fill a rice paddy. But 53-year-old Xing Shuqin gestured over her donkey to the wheat field beyond and said: "We don't have a water problem, because we have a well. See, the wheat is growing just fine." But in the same breath she conceded that her confidence in the future water supplies in this county was beginning to waver, as it is for millions of peasants in northern China where even the wells are drying up. The country's Water Resources Minister, Niu Maosheng, said recently in Beijing that "in rural areas, over 82 million people find it difficult to procure water." And more and more water supplies are suffering from industrial pollution or contamination by pesticides. In urban areas, shortages are worse. More than 300 Chinese cities are short of water and 100 of those are very short, Mr. Niu said. At a time when China's population of 1.1 billion is enjoying a harvest of plenty relative to any other time in its history, a growing number of environmental scientists are concerned that the country's water resources and farmlands will not be able to keep up with the demands being placed on them to feed ever more robust expansion. "What is at stake here is the ecological underpinning of Chinese society," warned a physicist who is spending a year in China studying scientific issues for the United States State Department. China's water predicament is not unique. Dozens of countries, particularly in the Middle East and Africa, face diminishing water resources and fast-growing populations. Even in the United States, a large aquifer that irrigates the wheat and corn belt in the Midwest has suffered serious depletion. But as in everything, China's size magnifies any shortage. With 22 percent of the population of the world, China has just 8 percent of its resources and 7 percent of its arable land. A study by World Bank scientists last year warned that "the increasing pressure on this limited resource base to feed, house and meet the energy needs" of the Chinese was rapidly destroying "whole ecosystems" and threatening to put the brakes on China's current economic boom. Two Major Issues Soil quality and water scarcity are major issues in these new analyses. In Daxing County, about |
648012_7 | At Kennedy Airport, the Wary Keep the Eyes on the Luggage | cart, Mrs. Zarrouck said she never thought that anything might be stolen from it. Fortunately nothing had been, including the five giant boxes of disposable diapers she brought from Morocco. The Preferred Flights Mrs. Zarrouck and her diapers were waiting in the International Arrivals Building. The building covers three acres. "We've got 46 foreign-flag carriers in there," Inspector Fox said. It's a favorite grazing area for the professional baggage thieves. "They're not going to target something like Air Jamaica," the inspector said. "But the Paris and London trips or the Asian flights they pay attention to. Plus they look at how you're attired and whether you have nice-looking luggage." Woeful luggage tales are heard every day at the Travelers Aid office in the International Arrivals Building. More than 65 volunteers from Nassau County and Queens aid travelers, and their bags, said the director, Lucy Ferguson of Woodside. The office hands out a "Dos and Don'ts" brochure advising tourists to obtain help with their luggage from a uniformed porter or airline employee. Who Is Checking the Claim Checks? Travelers should also make sure that they and their luggage leave the claim area together. Checking bags at the exit is the responsibility of the airline, not the airport, and not every airline has employees matching claim tickets to luggage. That is why the insurance-selling Mr. Greenfield has his own theory of why there has been such an increase in stolen luggage at Kennedy. "I think it's like Green Acres Shopping Center," he said, "with the stolen cars." The inference being that people are saying their luggage was stolen, so they can get the insurance money. That could be part of the problem. But the police warn that thieves are definitely about. Many, in fact, have been caught. "But probably only 1 in 100 does time," Detective Rossano said. "The inn is full, and this is not a violent crime. So in no time they're back on the streets." Or back in the terminals. Don't forget that when plunking $1.50 into the Smarte Carte machine and taking out one of those carts that have printed on them: "Welcome to New York. Enjoy your stay." And don't forget to push. "I always do," said the savvy safari-seeking Mr. Ballsanky. "I learned that in France." Because of thefts? "No," he said. "Because if you pull, the cart keeps banging into your leg." ABOUT LONG ISLAND |
647987_1 | Soviet Atom Test Used Thousands As Guinea Pigs, Archives Show | A committee of Soviet veterans is seeking Government compensation and special medical treatment for what the veterans say are years of radiation-induced illnesses, and the film provides the first public documentary proof that the test took place. Veterans were recently told by Russian generals that the explosion was an "imitation" atomic blast. The Soviet newspaper Pravda first reported the secret test in October 1991 and since then veterans have discussed it openly. The explosion took place near the village of Totskoye. The military's cameras recorded the explosion as it happened, 1,150 feet in the air, with the mushroom cloud forming almost directly above troops in makeshift shelters less than two miles from the blast's center. The film documents both the cataclysm in the air and, up close, the aftermath on the ground, with images of flaming houses, scorched animals and mangled military equipment. Soon after the shock waves subsided, troops with little or no protective gear were filmed storming through an inferno of dust, heat and radiation. During the cold war, all the nuclear powers deliberately exposed some troops to radiation in atmospheric tests to see how soldiers would function, even though many of the effects of radioactivity were already known. Records show that the United States carried out such experiments in Nevada and the South Pacific, France did so in the Algerian desert and the Soviet Union in the Arctic and Kazakhstan. And on all sides, it is now known, tests also sent radioactive fallout into inhabited areas. The Soviet Union is believed to have made 137 atmospheric tests. American and European nuclear experts say no other nuclear test anywhere has come to light that matches the scale of the 1954 Totskoye exercise. According to the United States Defense Nuclear Agency, the United States conducted 235 atmospheric tests of nuclear weapons from 1944 to 1962, exposing some 200,000 military and civilian personnel of the Department of Defense to some degree of radiation. Degrees of Exposure United States officials say that the amount of exposure varied because the 200,000 included support staff and other workers and that the Americans' exposure to radiation was far shorter and lower in intensity than what people were exposed to at Totskoye. The officials add that the Defense Department has been trying to identify and contact the Americans who were exposed for a medical study under the auspices of the National Academy of Sciences. A |
650945_0 | Time to Warm Up to New Zealand | President Clinton's meeting with Pacific heads of government today gives him a superb opportunity to end one of the oddest and most painful diplomatic anomalies of the cold war: the 10-year chill between the U.S. and New Zealand, two countries that by all rights should be the warmest of friends. Until yesterday, it was unclear who Mr. Clinton's opposite number from New Zealand would be. But with the final counting in a very close parliamentary election now complete, Prime Minister Jim Bolger has emerged as the winner. Mr. Bolger will represent his country at the APEC conference and presumably Mr. Clinton will shake his hand. But Mr. Clinton should go further, by offering to begin discussions aimed at ending the impasse. The chill began in 1984, when New Zealand's Labor Party campaigned on a promise to bar nuclear vessels from New Zealand ports. Labor won that election, and in 1986 Parliament, with broad public support, passed legislation barring nuclear-armed and nuclear-powered ships. That provoked outrage in Washington -- and criticism on this page -- partly because it was felt that New Zealand's action would encourage anti-nuclear protests in West Germany, Japan and Britain, and weaken allied resolve. The result is that since the mid-80's no New Zealand prime minister has been officially invited to Washington, and very little serious business has been transacted between the Secretary of State and New Zealand's foreign minister. Such pique seems badly misplaced in a world in which nuclear "resolve" is no longer a big priority. Furthermore, it's time Washington paid attention to what unites the two countries. New Zealand is an exemplary democracy whose soldiers served beside Americans in Korea and Vietnam. Its nuclear allergy is bipartisan and stems in large part from its special cultural and historic ties to the small Pacific islands where the West has conducted many of its nuclear tests. New Zealand may someday be prepared to modify its nuclear-free-zone legislation. But Mr. Clinton and his Secretary of State, Warren Christopher, should not make that a condition for ending an anachronistic quarrel and bringing an old friend in from the cold. |
649495_2 | NATIONS BACK BAN ON ATOMIC DUMPING | which has been dumping nuclear wastes into the ocean for decades, said it would have to resume dumping low-level radioactive garbage after 18 months unless it receives assistance from the West to build more land-based storage areas. The plea for aid was dismissed as unconvincing by the chief American delegate, David A. Colson, who noted that Russia spends "enormous sums of money" on its nuclear fleet. "You will not convince me, and you will not convince the American people, that if the Russian Government so chose, it could not reallocate its priorities and immediately build and quickly have in place adequate storage and processing facilities," Mr. Colson told delegates on Thursday. Adoption of the ban comes less than a month after a Russian tanker, shadowed by a Greenpeace vessel, pumped more than 900 tons of low-level waste into a squid-fishing ground in the Sea of Japan. The episode, days after the Japanese and Russian Governments had pledged a new era of cooperation, set off a storm of protest. Soon after, on Oct. 21, Japan announced that it would support a permanent ban. Clinton Shifts U.S. Policy On Nov. 1, a Clinton Administration official disclosed that, after nearly a year of deliberations, it had decided to reverse American policy and also support such a ban. Participants in the London meeting said the shift, championed by the Environmental Protection Agency and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, was a decisive factor in yesterday's vote. The decision in London follows years of controversy over the suspected -- but still largely unproven -- dangers of dumping of low-level radioactive wastes on marine ecosystems. Proponents of the ban argued that the wastes could be retransmitted to humans through the food chain. They also warned that it was risky to dump radioactive material without means to monitor and, if necessary, retrieve it. The ban, originally proposed by Denmark, is in line with a measure approved at the so-called Earth Summit in Brazil last year, when 172 governments urged the treaty signatories to consider banning low-level dumping as a precaution. But Britain and France, which fought an 11th-hour battle for a compromise short of a permanent ban, questioned whether low-level waste dumping posed a real danger, and complained that a permanent prohibition would complicate the problem of what to do with growing accumulations of low-level wastes, much of it from decommissioned submarines, nuclear power plants and hospitals. |
651229_4 | U.S. Aid Hasn't Stopped Drug Flow From South America, Experts Say | routes. Today the lion's share of South America's cocaine exports slips through countries that are not significant producers, including Argentina, Brazil, Ecuador, Mexico and Venezuela. On Nov. 6, the Venezuelan police broke up a trafficking ring that was reported to be shipping one ton of Colombian cocaine a month to the United States. Underscoring Venezuela's role as a transit country, United States officials acknowledged on Friday that a C.I.A. anti-drug program there accidently allowed a ton of nearly pure cocaine to be shipped to the United States in 1990. Similarly, coca leaf cultivation in Peru has shifted out of helicopter range of Santa Lucia, which is in the Upper Huallaga River Valley. Moving into the central and lower valley, about 200,000 farmers now grow coca in an area that was largely rain forest only four years ago. New coca cultivation destroys 500,000 acres of Peru's Amazon rain forest every year, according to Peru's National Institute of Natural Resources, a Government agency. "You can win in some areas, but then they are replaced by other areas," said Dr. Lerner, a Peruvian psychologist who studies drug issues here. "Supply depends on the consumer market." Next month American drug advisers are to leave the Santa Lucia base as part of a 50 percent cut in total anti-drug aid to Peru. "By the end of the year we have to wrap it up," said one American official here. "We are already moving out equipment." Peruvian Criticizes U.S. Mr. Fujimori, the Peruvian President, has bluntly criticized the Americans' anti-drug strategies. An agronomist by training, Mr. Fujimori has long argued that the best aid would be economic incentives to persuade coca leaf growers move to alternative crops. "Many people would accept alternative crops, but there are no loans," Mr. Fujimori said in a recent news conference here. "For weapons, there's money. But to develop agriculture, there's no money." In Colombia, which has the strongest economy of the Andean countries, President Cesar Gaviria recently told President Clinton that Colombia would make up any cuts in American aid from its own budget. One of the American-financed programs, an effort to reform and protect Colombia's judiciary, is highly popular with the public. But, in Bolivia, the poorest nation of the region, officials warn that American aid is essential for maintaining anti-drug efforts. Because Bolivian cocaine is also exported to Europe, Bolivia's new Minister of Government, German Quiroga, said in |
651518_0 | SUNDAY, November 21, 1993; TOMATOGATE | It's not quite clear what happened in Chicago. One possibility is that the City Council realized it wouldn't be good for appearances if the city of the big shoulders, hog butcher to the world, seemed to be afraid of vegetables. Another possibility is that Council members remembered the old eggplant scare (the eggplant did not actually eat Chicago) and wondered how bad the new gene-spliced tomatoes could be. This much is known: This fall, Chicago became the first city in the nation to require the labeling of genetically engineered produce. In early November, John Madrzyk, the Chicago alderman who proposed the ordinance, explained why: "My people said, 'Don't force it down my throat.' " ("It" being an engineered vegetable.) "The Federal Government tells us how good a product is, and 10 years later they tell you you've got 5 years to live." Two days after the conversation, the City Council rescinded the ordinance, at Madrzyk's request. Richard Godown, of the Industrial Biotechnology Association, says an intense letter-writing campaign by the biotech and food processing industries may have done the trick. Madrzyk was unavailable for comment. But there were clues, even while he was decrying the brave new veggies, that his heart wasn't in it: he was eating vegetables during his earlier telephone interview -- raw scallions, broccoli and carrots. Asked about their provenance, he seemed strangely unconcerned, saying, "I just wash them and eat them." The pressure cooker of politics is the only one he requires. |
651331_0 | Yangtze Gorges | To the Editor: Overbooking of tourist facilities in China, particularly in the busier seasons, spring and fall, continues to be a maddening problem. The better Yangtze River cruise ships are no exception, as our recent experience from Sept. 14 to 22, will illustrate. The travel agency that put together our independent one-month trip to China, which included trips both down and up the river between Chongqing and Wuhan, stressed the necessity of booking space on the Yangtze Pearl, mentioned in your article, as it was supposedly one of the two or three newest and most comfortable vessels. Space was requested in June and presumably confirmed in August by the China Travel Service-Xian, which handled our arrangements inside China. After some initial confusion when we first boarded in Chongqing, our downriver cruise was fine. We had been booked under the wrong tour number but were nonetheless given our appropriate room. The Yangtze Pearl, though new, already had a stained carpet and only marginally functional bathrooms. Coming back upriver was a different story. We had been told that we could simply keep the same room and left most of our luggage in the cabin while we overnighted in a Wuhan hotel. When we returned the next day, we were told that the cruise had been overbooked by approximately 30 rooms and we were being bumped. We were to take a bus to Yichang, upriver from Wuhan, where we should spend the night and board an alternate ship, the Emei, the next morning. We speak no Chinese. At that moment we had neither a guide nor a voucher for the other boat, much less a bus ticket to Yichang or any clue as to where we might find either the bus or a hotel. After considerable argument, with no help from our local C.T.S. guide in Wuhan, we refused to leave the boat. Fortunately, the cruise director interceded on our behalf. The quarters offered to us were two sagging cots set up in the ship's telephone room. We would have to share a public bathroom with the crew. We reluctantly accepted. We then had to endure periodic arrivals of five or six people at a time wishing to place time-consuming long distance calls. The staff would walk in without knocking. All in all, we probably fared better than a British tour guide whose cot was squeezed into the video control room, which she |
651329_0 | Yangtze Gorges | To the Editor: Having long admired the journalistic talents of Nicholas D. Kristof, we grabbed eagerly at his account, "The Yangtze's Gorges" (Oct. 10). He seemed to miss the sights that we most enjoyed on a similar voyage in September: tiny farms terraced high along narrow ridges on the deep-walled gorges; ancient paths carved into the sheer rock cliffs for the teams of "trackers" who strained to pull loaded junks up river in the days before powered craft; the whirling eddies of cafe au lait waters; the reflected glow of sunset and moonrise on sparkling waterfalls tracing deep crevasses in lush, green mountains. As members of an excellent 60-member Smithsonian Study Tour, we were particularly lucky to have the Bashan just for our group. But passengers on other trips would surely appreciate the Bashan's decor, four observation decks (open and enclosed), large cocktail lounge, excellent food (including fine coffee), and comfortable, clean cabins, with neither stains nor rodents! Our side trips included a thrilling ride in peapod sampans through Dragon Gorge, and the colorful mountaintop ghost city at Fengdu. Yes, we also saw all the "bleak and ugly" aspects Mr. Kristof mentions. But we saw those in China's cities, too. And, for us, the spectacular natural scenery of the Yangtze gorges complemented the manmade treasures of the Forbidden City, the Great Wall, and the warriors of Xian, well worth "traveling halfway around the world" to see! ETHAN AND JUDITH DAVIS Mountainside, N.J. |
651297_0 | Outlook for Cuba Grim, Study for State Dept. Says | A new report on Cuba paints a grim picture of the island's future, saying that attempts at economic reform now under way will probably lead to civil strife before the end of the decade. The report, which was commissioned by the State Department, says President Fidel Castro and Cuba's Communist Party leadership are attempting limited free-market reforms modeled after those undertaken in China. It concludes, however, that a number of factors, from Mr. Castro's highly centralized rule to a reluctance by the Communist leadership to unleash market forces "will deny Cuba the economic benefits of the China scenario." The 674 page report, titled "Transition in Cuba, New Challenges for U.S. Policy," is the product of nearly two years of work by a team of 17 academics. It was produced under the supervision of Lisandro Perez, a specialist in Cuban affairs at Florida International University in Miami. Cuba's economy has stumbled badly since the demise of the former Soviet Union two years ago, shrinking more than half by some estimates. Hoping to arrest that decline, Havana has accelerated the pace of its own economic reforms, allowing citizens to form small private businesses, legally possess foreign currency and form their own agricultural cooperatives. "Cuba's future will be grim, no matter what is the name of its ruler or the form of its political regime," the report says. "The most optimistic conclusions set the date for an appreciably more liberal, more democratic, and more prosperous Cuba no sooner than the beginning of the millennium." In what the report describes as the two most likely scenarios for Cuba's immediate future, the island's leadership, unwilling to undertake bolder political and economic reforms for fear they would threaten their hold on power, will attempt to muddle through the present crisis, tinkering around the edges of a collapsing system. In the first scenario, the Government faces a challenge, such as a coup attempt or food riots, perhaps as early as next year, and is able to survive. The repressive measures needed to put down the challenge, however, spark civil conflict that quickly draws the involvement of the large Cuban American community in Florida. As the strife spreads, the report says, the United States may feel obliged to become militarily involved to help end the crisis and remove the Castro Government. Under the second scenario, the Castro Government is able to hang on until late in the decade, |
651340_1 | To Each Museum, Its Own Most-Likely-to-Befall | in research on disaster control for museums. (Given the Getty's location -- a mudslide-prone, fire-prone canyon not far from a branch of the San Andreas fault -- it ought to be.) Natural calamities, museum experts say, are least friendly to the arrogant. When the violent 1989 earthquake struck San Francisco, the Stanford University Museum was showing bronzes and ceramics by Jose Vermeersch, a Belgian artist. Mr. Vermeersch had rebuffed efforts to secure his work. "He felt it would ruin the esthetic experience," said Jerry Podany, the Getty's conservator of antiquities. "Now there is no esthetic experience." He exaggerates -- only 14 of Mr. Vermeersch's 69 pieces were smashed -- but many more were damaged. Relatively little damage occurred at nearby museums. Prevention may be as simple as packing little sandbags around delicate pieces or slipping lead weights inside them. It is far less expensive than repair -- and can cut insurance premiums dramatically. Here is how staffs at a few museums said they try to ward off disaster. J. Paul Getty Museum The $4.1 billion endowment of the J. Paul Getty Trust allows the Malibu, Calif., museum to remain a world leader in disaster mitigation, doing extensive research and employing a crew of "mounters" whose job is to make sure that works are safely presented, stored or moved. To protect a fragile piece from an earthquake, said Mr. Podany, its conservator of antiquities, there are essentially two choices: secure it so it vibrates in synch with the building, or cushion it so it does not vibrate at all. Wax, fishing line and metal braces are the kind of low-tech equipment that Brian Considine, the museum's conservator of decorative arts and sculpture, uses to tie works down. Every item is supposed to be secured 24 hours a day, even if it's being worked on. "One of the things we learned from 1989," he said, "was that when someone steps away to get a cup of coffee or take a phone call, that's where the danger is." For a few special pieces, like its statue of Aphrodite from the fifth century B.C., the Getty creates a "base isolator," a finely tuned shock absorber that allows the statue to slide almost imperceptibly from side to side on its marble display table. By rolling with wave after wave of jolts, the statue can remain almost still. The museum now has six such isolators, each |
649152_1 | U.S. and Others Press Fight for U.N. Rights Chief | freedoms around the world was the main recommendation to come out of a governmental conference on human rights that was organized by the United Nations in Vienna last summer. But many developing countries are opposed to the new post, seeing it as another attempt by Western countries to impose their political values on the rest of the world. And on Monday they forced the General Assembly's third committee, which deals with social, humanitarian and cultural affairs, to say it cannot agree how to translate that recommendation into a concrete General Assembly decision. As a result of this deadlock, the group of countries that support creation of the post have circulated a draft resolution that they want a majority of countries to adopt before the end of this year's General Assembly next month. Countries in the group besides the United States include the 12 European Community members, Canada, Australia, Russia and Japan as well as Costa Rica, Mali and Mauritius. The Clinton Administration has made the creation of a High Commissioner for Human Rights one of its major objectives at this assembly. James P. Rubin, the spokesman at the United States Mission to the United Nations, said on Tuesday that America's representative, Madeleine K. Albright, "remains determined to do all she can to secure a positive decision." Last week two leading human rights organizations, Amnesty International and the International League for Human Rights, protested publicly that Asian countries, frightened they may find themselves targeted for rights abuses by the High Commissioner, have succeeded in blocking substantive discussion of the issue so far. In a statement, Amnesty International said that "progress toward setting up the High Commissioner seems bogged down in endless procedural discussions." The new draft proposal says the High Commissioner should promote "protection of all human rights and fundamental freedoms" and coordinate United Nations work in the human rights field. It also says the High Commissioner may "initiate measures, contact governments and take other appropriate action to prevent serious violations of human rights, or to respond to them wherever they occur, including, with the consent of governments, through the dispatch of fact-finding missions." At present the Geneva-based United Nations Human Rights Commission meets only once a year to hear complaints against governments accused of violations. And although it regularly sends investigators to countries accused of abuses, it lacks the ability to respond rapidly to any sudden major human rights crisis. |
652966_0 | Family Planning for All Families | By giving $13.2 million to the International Planned Parenthood Federation last week, and by resuming funding for the United Nations Population Fund next January, the Clinton Administration has retrieved a banner America dropped in 1984. Once more the United States has a chance to make a deep impact on family planning all over the world. The $13.2 million is only the first installment on a five-year, $75 million commitment to International Planned Parenthood, which, like the U.N. Population Fund, has been denied Federal funding ever since certain Reagan Administration supporters promulgated the so-called Mexico City policy. The policy, continued by the Bush Administration, banned Federal aid to any family planning agencies that so much as mentioned abortion -- despite the fact that American foreign aid has been sequestered, by law, from any abortion-related activities since 1985. When population experts protested that such a ban held poor countries' population efforts hostage to America's abortion controversy, Mr. Reagan's advisers had a blithe, and unnervingly sexist, answer. Population growth, they said, was a "natural phenomenon" that could stimulate economic growth, in that more people meant more ideas, more productivity and more consumers. It also meant that countless women would continue to be condemned to a lifetime of childbearing -- but hey! who was thinking about that? Ironically, America's retreat from leadership of the campaign to make family planning possible for all people came just as the world's developing countries had begun to embrace it. Now more than half the couples in such countries use some form of birth control; and in Africa, where the fertility rate is highest and contraceptive use lowest, births are beginning to decline. Even so, world population -- now 5.2 billion and increasing by 90 million each year -- remains awesome, as awesome as the plight of millions of the world's women is tragic. If Mr. Clinton's reversal of a cruel, ill-considered policy is intelligent, it is also profoundly humane. |
652960_0 | World Economies | |
652987_4 | BRITAIN CONCEDES IT SECRETLY MADE CONTACT WITH I.R.A. | in Northern Ireland and loses about $3 billion there a year. The daily lives of Londoners are fraught with bomb searches in theaters, office buildings and subways and, sometimes, by explosions themselves. An official close to the Prime Minister, speaking before the weekend and insisting upon not being quoted by name in exchange for candor, said that trying to bring peace to Northern Ireland had become "the Prime Minister's No. 1 priority." "There's a right wing of the Tory party that doesn't want us to get into the area," he said. "But the Prime Minister wants to get in it. We are in it. And the Unionists are extremely nervous. We need to work with the Irish Government to reassure the Unionists." The effect of this weekend's disclosures on various efforts to get peace talks off the ground is unclear. Mr. Major will clearly have difficulty rebuilding bridges to the Unionists. An alliance in the House of Commons between the Conservatives, who have only a 17-seat majority, and 9 Ulster Unionist Members of Parliament led by James Molyneaux could be in jeopardy. Mr. Molyneaux offered no public reaction to the disclosures and could not be reached for comment today. Mr. Major needs the support of the Ulster Unionists to get some legislation passed because of rebellious back-benchers in his own party. On the other hand, if the Unionists withdrew their support altogether, Mr. Major might feel less constrained about joining in a joint peace initiative with the Irish Government. The Irish Prime Minister, Albert Reynolds, was also quiet today. The British Government's line of defense in dampening the repercussions of its acknowledgement emerged in statements and appearances on talk shows today. Exchange of Views The contacts with the I.R.A. were not negotiations but simply an exchange of views carried on through intermediaries who were not high officials, it was said. At first the Government implied that the process began in February. At that time the I.R.A. sent out a message that it regarded the conflict as over "but needed our advice as to the means of bringing it to a close," the Government statement said. Thus the Government merely "responded to the I.R.A.'s request for advice" and spelled out in private what it had been saying in public -- that the organization had to cease violence to enter into negotiations. This version was strongly denied by Mr. Adams, the Sinn |
651777_0 | Scientists Seek Warnings of Environmental Problems in Seas | SCIENTISTS say the world's oceans could serve as natural alarm systems for warning of impending climate changes, pollution crises and other global hazards, and they have urged the speedy development of new technologies to monitor the seas. At a meeting of the Acoustical Society of America last month, scientists from several nations, including Russia, outlined new techniques for using the oceans, particularly the Arctic Ocean, to find clues to the approach of environmental trouble. They presented evidence that the chaotic underwater sounds of cracking polar sea ice may contain a signal that could be used to predict potentially catastrophic global temperature changes. Transient temperature changes in the atmosphere seem to increase polar ice noise, and several research groups hope that long-term measurements of this noise will settle the controversy as to whether increasing levels of carbon dioxide are causing a greenhouse effect, raising the world's temperature. Scientists have long been frustrated in efforts to estimate overall atmospheric and oceanic temperatures because it is not practical to monitor tens or hundreds of thousands of sites individually. If temperature changes over wide areas could be calculated from ice noise, the problem would be greatly simplified. Another international project may shed light on climate changes by clocking the speed at which sounds traverse thousands of miles of ocean water. Work on such research has been significantly helped by the end of the cold war, scientists said. American oceanographers and acousticians said that formerly secret oceanographic data collected by Soviet observations, including many made by Soviet nuclear submarines, have become increasingly available to Western scientists. These data fill important gaps in Western knowledge of Arctic water temperatures, salinity, noise levels and other properties. Noises Signal Temperature Shifts Research conducted by Dr. Aleksandar N. Gavrilov and his colleagues at the Institute of Ocean Acoustics and Information in Moscow seeks links between the sounds the oceans make and the state of the world's climate. "Our goal is to identify such relationships and make use of them," he said in an interview. "I believe it is possible to do this despite the scientific obstacles. The sharing of research and observations in such work with our American colleagues has become much easier since the end of the cold war." Dr. James F. Lynch of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute in Woods Hole, Mass., agreed. "On some of the Russian papers presented at this meeting we can see places |
651778_0 | Space-Age Techniques Find New Meaning in Dead Sea Scroll | ISAIAH'S hopeful prophecy that nations would beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks was an early expression of what today is called technology transfer. Now some cold war technologies, transferred to scholarly pursuits, are being applied to the study of people of biblical times -- and could become important tools in all archeology. These tools are advanced infrared imaging systems enhanced by highly sensitive electronic cameras and computer image-processing technology. Many of these technologies were developed at the height of the cold war, some for aerial and space reconnaissance, and have since been extended to civilian earth surveys and improved methods of observing the planets and stars. In the most recent applications, these sensing technologies have revealed previously invisible writing on a tiny fragment of the Dead Sea Scrolls. The carbon-black inch had not been distinguishable in visible light from the background of an age-blackened parchment. Even conventional film-based infrared photography, useful in deciphering so many ancient manuscripts, had failed to illuminate the single line of writing. Then, examining the fragment in longer wavelengths beyond the sensitivity of ordinary infrared film, Dr. Gregory Bearman, a physicist and remote-sensing specialist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., was able to use the advanced technologies to distinguish the Hebrew letters. These spelled out the sentence, "He wrote the words of Noah." Dr. Bearman reported the results for the first time on Saturday at a joint meeting of the American Academy of Religion and the Society of Biblical Literature in Washington. In interviews, he and colleagues described the techniques and prospects for future research. "Archeology is just beginning to learn about digital imaging technology, and it should prove to be a very powerful tool," Dr. Bearman said. Dr. James Sanders, a Dead Sea Scrolls scholar at the Ancient Biblical Manuscript Center in Claremont, Calif., said: "It's rather stunning. Everybody will be wanting to try this on other things." Dr. Bruce Zuckerman, a scholar of Semitic languages at the University of Southern California School of Religion, who worked closely with Dr. Bearman in the experiment, said the techniques would soon be applied in the study of other fragments from the same manuscript, known as the Genesis Apocryphon. This popular retelling of stories from the Book of Genesis, including the one about Noah and the flood, was one of the hundreds of manuscripts written on scrolls more than 2,000 years |
646713_0 | A Voyage Into the Abyss: Gloom, Gold and Godzilla | FLASHES of light from luminescent creatures swirled in the darkness past our windows as we descended a mile and a half to a fiery gash on the ocean floor, to what scientists increasingly see as a colossal, hidden engine of creation. After falling for more than an hour, we switched on the lights of our tiny, three-person submarine. There, barely illuminated in the gloom, some 250 miles off the Oregon coast, lay endless fields of gnarled lava, frozen in the midst of an eruptive frenzy by the icy sea water. A string of scientific discoveries have revealed that over the eons such rocks have played a major role in shaping the planet. Volcanic fissures in the ocean floor gird the earth like seams on a baseball. All told, they measure some 40,000 miles. Though hidden from sight, zigging this way and that through the deep, often veiled by undersea mountains, they make up one of the planet's dominant and most dynamic features. Spewing molten lava and blistering hot water, these rifts of fire are the place where planetary crust is formed, where oceans and continents are created, where the sea gets much of its chemical identity, where precious metals like gold are concentrated and where bizarre creatures that never see sunlight feast on chemicals made by the earth's inner heat. Perhaps most important, they are the place where life itself may have begun billions of years ago. Our tiny submarine, Alvin, was just ending a 16-day voyage of discovery to one corner of this alien world, the Juan de Fuca ridge off the West Coast of the United States. The effort was prompted by a recent undersea eruption here, which, in an oceanographic first, was monitored by scientists as the sea floor shook and then studied by six expeditions from the United States and Canada. The last and largest of these featured Alvin, whose mission was to probe deeper than ever before into the heart of undersea creation. Among other things, we found the sea floor alive with fresh flows of lava and blizzards of white bacteria surging upward on hot-water plumes. After days of frustration caused by bad weather and enigmatic clues of deep activity in one area, we discovered a field of towering chimneys spewing super-hot water and surrounded by strange forms of life, some apparently never before seen. There were thickets of tiny tube worms, odd growths |
646613_2 | Study of Women's Health Criticized by Review Panel | in its report, "Thus, the diet-breast-cancer hypothesis is considered to be quite weak." The report also criticized the project's procedures for obtaining the informed consent of participants, describing them as "inadequate.". The National Institutes of Health said it disagreed with some of the report's conclusions about the diet-breast cancer study, saying the project had "the clear potential to produce much-needed information about the role of diet in preventing breast cancer." The health agency said it would improve the informed consent procedure of all clinical trials. Dr. Healy said the overall study was designed to answer many questions at the same time and would be worthwhile even if it did not provide conclusive answers in every case. For instance, she said, the link between dietary fat and breast cancer was far from certain, but even if the study could not confirm it, the trial should still provide good data on the relationship between diet and heart disease or colon-rectal cancer. "Billions of dollars have been spent to do research in men, and now a relatively modest study comes along to do studies in women, and it is subject to this kind of scrutiny," Dr. Healy said. "However, when this study is over, we will know a lot more about women's health than we do today.' The House Appropriations Committee requested the review by the Institute of Medicine, an arm of the National Academy of Sciences, because of concern that the initiative's anticipated cost of $625 million could increase, a staff member said. The committee will study the report, but has no immediate plans for hearings on its conclusions, she said. The Women's Health Initiative, announced last spring, is the largest research study ever sponsored by the health institutes, the Government's main agency for supporting biomedical research. The project was planned as a 14-year study involving more than 160,000 women between the ages of 50 and 79. The study, which is to be conducted at 45 medical centers, will emphasize research on the causes of cancer, heart disease and osteoporosis, the bone-thinning disease that particularly afflicts women as they age. The effort will evaluate the risks and benefits of estrogen-replacement therapy in menopausal women and examine the effects of calcium and vitamin D supplements on osteoporosis and other diseases. It was also planned to determine the effect of a low-fat diet in preventing heart disease, as well as breast and rectal cancer. |
646627_0 | U.S. to Press for Ban on Nuclear Dumping at Sea | After nearly a year of policy wrangling, the United States has decided to press for a legally binding, worldwide ban on the dumping of low-level radioactive waste at sea, a senior Clinton Administration official said today. The decision, less than three weeks after a Russian tanker touched off a wave of international protest by pumping 900 tons of liquid radioactive waste into the Sea of Japan, is a major step toward adoption of a global ban by the 71 nations that are party to the 1972 treaty known as the London Convention, which regulates ocean dumping. The signers are to open a five-day meeting in London next Monday to consider a proposal by Denmark and more than 20 other countries to impose a total ban, which would replace a voluntary moratorium that has been in place since 1983. Proponents of a blanket prohibition on all forms of radioactive waste disposal point to the Russian episode as the latest example of the inadequacy of voluntary measures. The London treaty already explicitly forbids dumping of highly radioactive waste. The idea of a comprehensive ban had been vigorously opposed by the Navy, which has argued that the United States should not omit the possibility that new technologies might eventually insure the safety of disposing low-level waste at sea. France has been strongly opposed to a global ban, along with Britain. Japan's Environment Ministry, however, expressed support for a ban after the Russian dumping incident on Oct. 17. In National Security Council deliberations last week, the Defense Department was said to have pressed for a flexible moratorium, with provisions for any party to withdraw at any time. But after more negotiations, it was said to have given grudging support to the ban. "This is a pretty significant departure from the past," the Administration official said. The decision is a victory for Carol M. Browner, Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, who argued that support of a ban would not only be an important step toward protection of the oceans, but an opportunity for the United States to assert its commitment to environmental protection beyond its own borders. The United States effectively ended dumping of all types of radioactive waste in its own waters in 1970. "We will support an international legal prohibition on the disposal of low-level radioactive waste in the ocean," said the Administration official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "We will |
646551_5 | Foreigners Find New Ally in U.S. Industry | got bashed for that." What is more, he added, Japanese executives have all but given up on the idea of directly influencing American government decisions. What they look for instead, he said, "are the chances to ally themselves with American political entities that have clout." As a result, members of Congress say they rarely see lobbyists representing Japan or most other foreign countries any longer. "I got a little lobbying from Mexico," said one Senator, Paul Simon, Democrat of Illinois. "But that's it." The ties to American allies have worked to the advantage of Japanese companies in several recent disputes. Plans by the Bush Administration from 1989 to 1991 to impose tariffs on displays for laptop computers were dropped after complaints from Apple Computer and other American customers that relied on the Japanese parts for its products. Strengthening the Ties Chilling Effects Of Japan's Power As part of their lobbying strategy, Japanese corporations and Government agencies hire dozens of American law firms and consulting agencies to represent them here, and American analysts endlessly debate what is really behind the practice. Some analysts say the Japanese hire so many firms because they want to tie up the country's most talented trade lawyers; others say Japan is wasting its money. But Jiro Murase, a New York lawyer whose firm represents several hundred Japanese companies, has his own view. Born in New York City, he grew up in Japan during World War II and returned here to attend college and build a legal practice. Mr. Murase said the Japanese take a long view of their relationship with Washington and are well aware that today's lawyer may be tomorrow's senior official. He listed several Clinton Administration officials from law firms with significant Japanese contracts, including Samuel R. Berger, the Deputy National Security Adviser, and Secretary of State Warren Christopher. Other prominent Administration officials from firms with Japanese lobbying contracts include Commerce Secretary Ronald H. Brown and Howard Paster, the White House's chief Congressional lobbyist. "When you represent the Japanese, and your source of income is Japanese, your perceptions change," Mr. Murase said, adding: "With so many companies now doing business with the Japanese, making profits with the Japanese, I always say we're like one Siamese twin. If you hit too hard on one, pain will come to the other side." U.S. Suppliers Back Clients Some Washington law firms now rely on Japanese clients, and |
648395_0 | World Economies | |
648302_1 | Patents; From a Culinary Mistake Comes the Latest in Healthy Snack Food; Baked Pasta Chips | cooking. "Jerusalem artichoke flour can clog pasta machines because it's so glutinous," Mr. Lohan said, "but its nutritional value is very high. It's low in fat and good for people who can't eat wheat." And nutrition was the essence of the snack, which Mr. Lohan named Denata's Pasta Chips, after his wife. "We could have come out with barbecue chips or fried chips, but we wanted to cater to people who want a healthy product," he said. The chips come in tomato Parmesan and spinach pesto flavors, and there are plans for an Alfredo sauce version. "To keep the fat content below one gram, we use nonfat dry milk in the seasonings, and low- or nonfat cheeses," Mr. Lohan said. The chips, which are cut in small squares, are laid on racks in a special oven developed by Mr. Lohan's company, Pasta Pasta Inc. They are boiled, steamed and then baked. "We had to come out with a method to extrude the starch and season the pasta," he said. Too much starch made the chips gummy, as well as higher in calories. "So we boil and steam the pasta, and most of the starch comes out. Then it's baked in an oven, and seasoned again afterwards." So far, Mr. Lohan is producing bulk quantities for test sales in several Manhattan restaurants. Retail packaging should be ready by the end of the year, he said. The pasta chips received patent 5,258,196. New Doll Designed For Tiny Keepsakes Many parents have a difficult time throwing away mementos of baby firsts: locks of hair from a child's first haircut, the first tooth to fall out, the first pair of shoes. But sentimental tokens usually end up tucked away in drawer or attic box. A North Carolina inventor said he thought that was a shame, and has patented a porcelain doll designed to be adorned with baby keepsakes. The doll's mouth is slightly ajar, so parents can glue their child's first tooth or two into the doll's gums. Locks of baby hair can be attached to its head, and the doll can be dressed in clothing from early childhood. "Every mother has these mementos," said Mrs. Jones, a receptionist who has two adult sons. "I collect porcelain dolls, and I thought it would be wonderful and really personal to have a doll to display it all. "The doll will hold as much baby memorabilia |
648430_3 | In Poland, Gerber Learns Lessons of Tradition | control. The first rule: no more smoking on the production line. Safety is a primary issue in baby- food preparation, and while the Polish factory had quality control, it was not systemized in a way that allowed codes on a jar label that identified the grower of the fruit or vegetable. "This is one of the biggest achievements we've been able to implement -- Gerber's standards of traceability," Wieslawa B. Sznajdrowska, Gerber's new product development manager, said as she held up a jar of apple-blueberry sauce with numbers typed on the label. Mrs. Sznajdrowska is familiar with United States Food and Drug Administration rulings through a two-year fellowship at Rutgers University in New Jersey. She was lured to Gerber from a professorship in food technology at a Polish university. Before Gerber bought the plant, the company's food-supply experts carefully combed the surrounding countryside for produce. Now, many of the vegetables and fruits for Gerber's products come from the small nearby farms. The local carrots were found to be excellent -- the farmers had long ago been introduced to Dutch seeds. "Polish carrots look wonderful and are wonderful," Mr. Piergallini said. But the nitrate levels in the carrots were too high. To reduce them, farmers were taught new fertilizing techniques, Mrs. Sznajdrowska said. Then there was the problem of the apples. Some growers have converted to the sweeter golden delicious variety, allowing the factory to make a mild applesauce from a mixture that includes the traditional Polish varieties. There was no problem with blueberries and strawberries. "Polish strawberries retain their freshness and color better than those from California," Mr. Piergallini said. But apricots and oranges are brought in from the Netherlands, and bananas, until recently an exotic fruit in Poland, are imported in frozen puree form from a Gerber's plant in Costa Rica. Finding satisfactory chicken was more difficult. "We've had to work with the local poultry people to get them up to sanitary standards," Mr. Piergallini said. "This is a more serious problem, and we have to be very careful. We sent some technical help." The first chicken products will start in the next few months. 'An Educational Issue' After tackling the manufacturing problems, Gerber turned to distribution. "Hair raising," Mr. Piergallini said. "This country reminds me a lot of the United States in the 1920's, when there were lots and lots of stores." There also are few distribution companies |
653163_1 | Mission to Correct Hubble's Flawed Vision Faces Many Pitfalls | much is at stake. The shuttle must rendezvous with the Hubble 360 miles out in space two days after liftoff, and haul it into its cargo bay. Then in a sequence of at least five arduous space walks of six hours each, beginning the following day, which will be Saturday if liftoff goes as planned, astronauts working in pairs must replace the main camera with an upgraded model, insert a system of corrective lenses for other instruments and install new gyroscopes and solar-energy panels. One fear is that, in trying to fix things, the astronauts might blunder and leave the telescope in worse shape than before. "We've got a good shot at success, but we've got to be realistic: this is not like going to grandma's to fix a leaky faucet," said Dr. Edward J. Weiler, the Hubble program scientist. After more than 400 hours of underwater training simulating space conditions, the astronauts say they are ready and cautiously optimistic about the chances for success. But they warn of the possibility of surprises and setbacks that could prevent the spacewalkers from completing their tasks. "All it takes is one bolt to stick," said Dr. Kathryn Thornton, one of the seven astronauts, who like the others is worried about little things that could jeopardize the whole repair job. Dr. Jeffrey A. Hoffman, another member of the crew, said: "It's a very ambitious schedule, and if we can get even part of it done, I'll consider the mission a success." But will others? Although top NASA officials have sought to play down the stakes involved, nearly everyone else looks upon this as virtually a do-or-die mission for the space agency. Its credibility is on the line. The discovery of the flawed mirror soon after Hubble's launching was only one in a string of space setbacks, beginning with the Challenger disaster in January 1986, which killed the shuttle's crew of seven. There have also been hair-raising shuttle launching delays, troubles developing new weather satellites, antenna problems with the Jupiter-bound Galileo spacecraft and the inexplicable loss in August of the $1 billion Mars Observer. Only a clear-cut success in fixing Hubble, it is thought, could restore some of the old luster to NASA's tarnished image. "NASA can't afford another highly visible failure," said Dr. John M. Logsdon, a space-policy specialist at George Washington University in Washington. The political fallout, he said, could erode the |
653181_0 | Eddy Off the Coast | Using satellite images and measuring instruments in the sea, researchers have tracked a large eddy that carried an estimated 100,000 metric tons of sediment from the continental shelf into the ocean off the coast of California in two months. Although eddies in the ocean are common, and it was known that they carried such sediment, this appears to be the first observation of a large eddy actually carrying the material off the continental shelf, the researchers said. The sediment includes carbon from phytoplankton, microscopic plant life that falls to the the ocean floor. Findings like this shed light on the way that carbon cycles through the ecosystem, an issue that is important to calculations of global climate. An author of the study, Dr. Libe Washburn of the University of California at Santa Barbara, said the eddy was about 60 miles long and 30 miles wide, and rotated clockwise near Point Reyes and Point Arena on the coast north of San Francisco. It moved about three feet per second. He said the eddy formed as a result of instability in larger flows in the ocean. Dr. Washburn and his colleagues from the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, Calif.; the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, Calif.; the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and Oregon State University reported their study recently in the journal Science. SCIENCE WATCH |
653061_5 | BRITAIN RELEASES NOTES EXPLORING PEACE WITH I.R.A. | only record is a note provided by the Government of what it says Mr. McGuinness said. Both Mr. McGuinness and Mr. Adams denied their organization had ever said the conflict was over, though they do not deny an interest in a cease-fire that could have led to substantive talks. Mr. Adams insisted today, "Never at any time was there any communication from the I.R.A. that the conflict was over. That's a lie, a blatant attempt to misinform." There followed a series of exchanges as each side felt out the other. The Government messages often complained about "the continued violence" and insisted that the I.R.A. match its deeds to its words. As the Ulster Unionists attacking the Government pointed out today, the exchanges continued through a period in which the I.R.A. set off three major explosions -- the one in Warrington in March, one in London's financial center in April and one on Shankill Road in West Belfast in October. At one point in the exchange of messages, on March 19, the Government set out major points for "the dialogue" to occur, including an end to organized violence. At first the violence could be ended without a public announcement, the message said, but once the talks became public, the Government would have to say it had received the assurance in private. 'Consent of the People' The message also repeated the Government's basic position: that London could accept a united Ireland "only on the basis of consent of the people of Northern Ireland." On May 10, the British said, the I.R.A. proposed a meeting by the two sides. But, Sir Patrick said today, the reply "did not constitute the unequivocal assurance of a genuine end to violence on which we had insisted." Finally, in early November, the Government suggested that if all went well, and the I.R.A. gave an "unequivocal assurance" that violence had ended completely, "a first meeting for exploratory dialogue will take place within a week of Parliament's return in January." Mr. Reynolds, the Irish Prime Minister, said tonight that the disclosures about the contacts "have certainly been unhelpful to the peace process." He said "malign forces" were out to damage the prospects for a settlement, adding: "This is the time for all political leaders to exercise calm, clear thinking and courage to insure that we continue to pursue what most people across this country want, and that is peace." |
653042_0 | Tell the Truth About the I.R.A. | Judging from secret messages made public yesterday, the British Government has no reason to apologize for exploring a peace overture from the outlawed Irish Republican Army. But Prime Minister John Major blundered gratuitously by denying that such contacts had taken place. Now there is a cloud of confusion over what was apparently a sensible effort to end the violence in British-ruled Northern Ireland. In recent years it has been the policy of British Governments to shun any contacts with the I.R.A. until it convincingly disavows violence. A startled Parliament and public now learn that Mr. Major's senior aides were secretly engaged in talks that conflicted with the declared policy. However defensible the purpose, the past denials left the country unprepared for a 180-degree turn in British policy. If details divulged yesterday tell the whole story, then Mr. Major has a good chance to contain the damage. Sir Patrick Mayhew, the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, is not known for deviousness. By his account, the British Government in February received the first of a series of written and oral messages from the I.R.A. signaling a serious readiness for a cease-fire. In Sir Patrick's words, "The Government had a duty to respond to that message. Peace properly attained is a prize worth risks." The Government's published response cannot reasonably be faulted. Sir Patrick insisted on private assurances that the violence had been brought to an end, reiterating that any political objective had to be achieved by constitutional means in which all parties would have a voice. Whether peace on these terms would be possible with the I.R.A. is open to argument, but undeniably, there can be no peace without engaging its leaders. The problem was less substance than the pretense that the widely rumored talks had not taken place. No doubt Mr. Major's political vulnerabilities led him to say that meeting face to face with the I.R.A. would "turn my stomach." His Conservative Party relies on the parliamentary votes of nine members from Northern Ireland committed to permanent union with Britain. Though the Rev. Ian Paisley, speaking for the North's hard-line Protestants, assailed Mr. Major as a liar, the calmer response of the mainstream Unionists bodes well for the Prime Minister, and the peace initiative. Notwithstanding Mr. Major's stomach, previous Prime Ministers, both Conservative and Labor, have treated with the I.R.A. There were contacts in 1972 and 1975, which proved fruitless. |
647307_0 | Radio Dispatchers Set to Rival Cellular Phones | Offering a potentially cheap and quick way to compete in the cellular telephone market, companies with radio licenses to link taxi and truck fleets have suddenly become hotly sought properties. The trend continued yesterday when Vanguard Cellular Systems Inc., the nation's 14th-largest cellular telephone company, with operations from Maine to Florida, agreed to invest as much as $197 million in Geotek Industries, a small radio-dispatch company based in Montvale, N.J. That stake followed a $40 million investment in Geotek on Tuesday by a partnership led by the money manager George Soros. And in recent weeks, the leader in the field, Nextel Communications Inc. of Rutherford, N.J., has acquired several properties in stock deals adding up to more than $1 billion. Alternative to Cellular Systems As unglamorous as they seem, these taxi and truck dispatching services are being snapped up because new digital technology promises to let them offer mobile telephone service at least as good as -- and possibly better than -- cellular systems. For Nextel, Geotek and other radio-dispatch companies, the key to growth has been obtaining enough radio licenses to offer services in metropolitan markets. The Federal Government allots only two cellular licenses for each metropolitan market. But frequencies for "specialized mobile radio" services like Geotek's have been carved up into dozens of licenses that each cover only a tiny sliver of the radio spectrum. Geotek is banking on a technology developed by the Israeli military, which the company says allows it to serve 25 times as many customers on a given frequency as today's cellular systems. Unlike Nextel, which plans to compete directly against cellular companies, Geotek means to use its service to broaden the fleet-vehicle market to businesses beyond its traditional clientele of trucks and taxis. On word of Vanguard Cellular's investment yesterday, Geotek's stock rose $1.625 a share, closing at $15.25 in Nasdaq trading. Two weeks ago, the shares traded in the $8 range. Founded by Morgan E. O'Brien, a lawyer who once served as chief of the Federal Communications Commission's private radio bureau, Nextel has spent several years buying enough licenses to prepare for competition against cellular services in the 10 largest cities in the nation. In the last three weeks, Nextel has announced several deals that greatly expand its reach. On Oct. 18, it said it would acquire two companies with extensive licenses in San Diego and in Las Vegas, Nev., in stock |
651966_1 | From the Ashes, a Plus for a Utility | of which still stands. The fine particles of silica and alumina improve cement's strength and resist penetration by water and salt. When water penetrates concrete and freezes, it expands and breaks some of the cement bonds that hold the mixture of sand and gravel together. Chloride ions from the salt that is slathered on roads each winter move through these cracks and corrode the steel reinforcement bars in roadway concrete, explaining why most highway bridges need to have their decks replaced every 20 years or so. As it comes from a utility's boiler, however, coal ash is anything but pure, with 18 percent to 19 percent contamination by unburned carbon. And as utilities are forced by clean-air laws to install burners that reduce emissions of oxides of nitrogen gases, the quantity of unburned carbon is expected to nearly double. That much carbon troubles cement makers and users. Concrete used in areas with frequent periods of freezing weather is deliberately mixed with tiny bubbles of air -- about 8 percent of total volume -- to provide space for expansion and contraction of the other components. But the unburned carbon acts like activated charcoal, absorbing the bubbles and producing less durable material. Early Testing To deal with the disposal problem and to create a useful material, the two companies are beginning an effort to separate the ash into carbon-rich and carbon-poor streams. In early testing on Venezuelan coal burned at the Salem Harbor Station, ash with an 18.5 percent carbon content was separated into one product with an 83.7 percent carbon content and a second with only 2.97 percent carbon. The process has been tested by Separation Technologies in small-scale operations, but the installation at Salem Harbor is the first commercial-scale application of the technology. Equipment is being installed and large-scale testing is scheduled to begin after Thanksgiving and continue for about six months. "Ash is not trash" is the slogan on T-shirts worn by project members in warmer weather. If the separation works as planned, it will have a double-barreled economic impact. The carbon-rich material has more than 50 percent of the energy value of the original coal, and can be fed back into the boilers to decrease the need for fuel or used as a carbon black substitute in making plastics. The carbon-poor stream can be sold to cement makers at $10 to $15 a ton, as long as the |
652044_1 | Workplace Bias Tied to Obesity Is Ruled Illegal | group home run by the state. But the Rhode Island Department of Mental Health, Retardation and Hospitals appealed the case, arguing that obesity should not be covered by the law because it was caused by voluntary conduct and was not immutable. Both at trial and in its appeal, the state argued that Ms. Cook was not protected by the laws prohibiting discrimination against those with disabilities because she could lose weight and rid herself of any disability arising from her obesity at any time. But the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit rejected that reasoning, saying in its opinion, "This suggestion is as insubstantial as a pitchman's promise." The opinion added that there was credible evidence that the metabolic dysfunction causing weight gain in the morbidly obese lingered even after weight loss. People are deemed morbidly obese if they are at least 100 pounds overweight or twice their desirable weight. "In a society that all too often confuses 'slim' with 'beautiful' or 'good,' morbid obesity can present formidable barriers to employment," Judge Bruce M. Selya, who was appointed by President Ronald Reagan, wrote in the opinion. "Where, as here, the barriers transgress Federal law, those who erect and seek to preserve them must suffer the consequences." The opinion, which was joined by Judge Frank M. Coffin, who was nominated by President Lyndon B. Johnson, and District Judge Paul Barbadoro, who was nominated by President George Bush, did not say that Ms. Cook's obesity was necessarily a disability in itself. Rather, it said, there was ample evidence to support the jury's finding that she was discriminated against, either because her obesity limited her activities or because it was perceived as a disability even though it did not limit her activities. Kathleen Spangler, chief of staff at the Rhode Island Department of Mental Health, Retardation and Hospitals, said the department had not yet had time to review the decision or decide whether to appeal it. Ms. Cook has always maintained that she is not disabled by her weight. But under the law, discrimination based on a perceived disability is illegal, too. "The Federal law and most of the state laws based on it say you must have a physical or mental impairment or condition that substantially impairs your ability to perform major life activities," said Lynette Labinger, the lawyer who represented Ms. Cook, in cooperation with the Rhode Island |
651980_1 | Swedes Fear a Russian Invasion: Crime Gangs | raised the specter that the breakdown of authority in Russia will allow criminal networks there to reach out and prey upon Sweden's well-ordered society. "For years now we've been talking about the Russian mafia, but it's the first time that we've had a crime like this -- well-financed and well-planned," said Rolf Hansson, chief of the detective squad in the suburb of Nacka that investigated the plot. From his vantage, little that comes from the East is good. In July, he said during a recent interview in Stockholm, three Russians pulled an armed heist at a post office nearby and were caught when they were spotted switching cars. In Stockholm, the police say Russian and Latvian gangsters have brought a new tide of drugs. In the kidnap case, the defendant who was convicted, Marek Salamandra, 44, a Pole who became a Swedish citizen in 1977, admitted plotting an abduction. But he said he was forced into it by a "Russian mafia leader." Somehow, he obtained classified items from Soviet military stocks, including a yard-long torpedo-shaped underwater transport vehicle and special equipment for breathing underwater. Three Russians came on the ferry from Helsinki. One was a diver. The other two were truck drivers who insisted before the court that they had been recruited as chauffeurs and that they had no idea that they were being drafted into a criminal enterprise. Soon, the plot went awry. The three Russians, joined by a fourth, stayed in a tent on an empty island. At one point they took a boat past the vast Wallenberg estate at Brevik on an island outside Stockholm and were flabbergasted by what they saw. Policemen were everywhere -- in boats, patrolling on foot, even in a helicopter. A unit of Swedish marines plied the water in kayaks. Mr. Wallenberg had a visitor, former President George Bush. "We think they didn't realize what was going on," said Detective Hansson. "They couldn't read Swedish; they didn't follow public events. We think that when they passed Mr. Wallenberg's place and saw all those policemen everywhere, they realized they couldn't do it. They panicked." The men turned up at the gate to Mr. Wallenberg's estate the following day and asked to see him. The police were called, and when they arrived, the Russians handed over the Polish Swede, who was in handcuffs, along with two pistols and a hand grenade. All were arrested. |
650285_3 | The Free Trade Accord: The Mood; Americans Split on Free Trade Pact, Survey Finds | And 67 percent said that buying and selling products through trade with other countries "is good for the U.S. economy," suggesting strong support for the President's arguments against economic isolationism. The White House has emphasized the Nobel Prize winners, economists and former Presidents who support the trade agreement, while opponents have denounced it as a plan that would endanger the livelihood of workers. As a result, support for the accord has broken down along lines of social class rather than on the traditional party divisions that typically define policy debates. College graduates, people with annual household incomes above of $75,000 and those who were optimistic about the economy typically support the agreement. But those with a high school diploma or less, adults under 30, blue-collar workers and those with union members in their households as well as those who were pessimistic about the economy typically oppose it. And although many black members of Congress and black leaders like the Rev. Jesse Jackson oppose the trade agreement, the poll found no clear division along racial lines. Confusion on the Impact More than two-thirds of Americans now know that Mr. Clinton, who has appeared in advertisements and delivered speeches on behalf of the agreement, supports the trade agreement. But more than two-thirds also said they did not know whether the lawmaker who represents them in Congress was for or against it. And there was no evidence of partisan division on the accord. Democrats and Republicans split evenly in their support. Unlike other issues like health care, the economy and taxes, opinions about the trade agreement are not rooted in personal interest for most Americans, the poll found, and the merits of the pact stir little emotion. Only 1 person in 6 said his or her household would be economically affected by the agreement. Fewer still said they would cast a vote for or against an elected representative solely because of the lawmaker's vote on the accord. These findings suggest that opponents and proponents of the pact may find it hard to deliver on threats to defeat legislators who defy them. No Strong Sentiments Absent The absence of strong public sentiment also confirms Mr. Clinton's strategy to sway votes by appealing directlyto individual legislators rather than to their constituents. In addition, it may give an advantage to organized groups that support and raise money for members of Congress. Many legislators are also being |
650446_0 | Britain Said to Confer With I.R.A. Political Wing | British Government officials and officials of Sinn Fein, the political wing of the Irish Republican Army, have met to discuss ways of ending the violence in Northern Ireland, The Belfast Telegraph reported today. The front-page article in the Telegraph, a vehement opponent of the I.R.A. and Sinn Fein, was supported by a report from an independent news service headed by Eamon Mallie, a journalist who wrote one of the standard reference books on the I.R.A. The report was denied by the Northern Ireland Office, which administers this British province. But officials of Sinn Fein, including its president, Gerry Adams, declined to deny that the meetings had taken place. "I don't want to be either confirming or denying that there has been contact," Mr. Adams said. "I will go so far as to say maybe one should take Government denials with a pinch of salt." If the reports are true, the contacts could help accelerate, or complicate, other new initiatives toward a peaceful settlement that have been advanced in the last month. These initiatives involve the Irish and British Governments, Mr. Adams and the most influential Roman Catholic political leader in the north, John Hume, an opponent of I.R.A. violence who has advanced a peace proposal jointly with Mr. Adams. While such contacts might win the cautious praise of the Dublin Government and the Roman Catholic minority in the north, they are certain to be deplored by leaders of the Protestant majority unionist parties, which want the province to remain part of Britain. If British officials have been speaking to Sinn Fein officials, that would constitute a change in British policy, or a violation of it. Britain has insisted that it would not talk to Sinn Fein until Mr. Adams publicly renounced the I.R.A. campaign of violence, which seeks to end British power here. Mr. Adams says that he and his party are for a peaceful settlement, but that he understands the I.R.A. need for "the armed struggle." The Telegraph said "a number of meetings took place between high-ranking representatives of the party and senior officials acting with the knowledge of Downing Street." They were held in the spring, the paper said, and suspended in June. The Mallie service said, "Sinn Fein Republican sources admitted last night members of its leadership had direct contact on a number of occasions this year with representatives of the British Government." |
650759_0 | U.S. Bishops Urge Men to Share in Work at Home | The nation's Roman Catholic bishops today unanimously voted to urge husbands and wives to treat one another as equals and men to share fully in child rearing and household duties. The bishops also voted to ask the Vatican to make it easier to dismiss priests who sexually molest minors and passed a lengthy document on the moral responsibilities of the United States in the post-cold-war world. The bishops said they sympathized with families in their struggles to cope with economic pressures and the unforeseen traumas of divorce, illness, alcoholism, neighborhood violence and AIDS, as well as the daily frictions of "different temperaments and opposing points of views." The letter to families, titled "Follow the Way of Love," was approved by a unanimous vote. Its wording is practical and direct, avoiding the often difficult style of church documents that address questions of doctrine. Aware of their status as celibate clergy, the bishops said that, nonetheless, "We have known the commitment and sacrifices of a mother and father, the warmth of a family's care, the happiness and pain that are part of loving." And they noted that they, too, "are sons and brothers and uncles." Addressing their words primarily to Catholic families but adding that they might be useful to others, the bishops said, "The story of family life is a story about love -- shared, nurtured, and sometimes rejected or lost." The bishops asked men and women to look beyond the familiar sexual roles. For many men, they said, "sharing feelings and a willingness to be vulnerable can be difficult, especially for those of us raised in the 'strong and silent' tradition." The bishops urged men to view "their traditional role as 'provider' for a family in more than an economic sense. "Physical care of children, discipline, training in religious values and practices, helping with school work and other activities, all these and more can be provided by fathers as well as mothers," they said. The message recognized that rapid social change and the hectic pace of American life were taking a toll on families. "We urge you to take time to be together: making shared meals a priority (even if you gather at a fast-food restaurant), praying and worshiping together, especially at the Sunday Eucharist," the bishops said, and "building family traditions and rituals." The message also develops the concept of the family as a "domestic church" that carries out |
650797_0 | MCI Joins Wireless Telephone Venture | The MCI Communications Corporation said today that it had joined four wireless communications suppliers and a leading research laboratory in the development of what are known as "personal communications services" using new kinds of wireless phone devices. The companies said they plan to establish specifications for systems in the United States that would be compatible with the so-called global system for mobile communications platform. This wireless communications standard, or G.S.M., was developed in Europe and is expected to be in use by more than 60 communications carriers around the world. Officials at MCI, the second-largest long-distance carrier in the United States, said such compatibility is needed so consumers can eventually conduct "seamless" voice and data communications around the world. Such a system could use one universal phone number and small, sophisticated hand-held devices similar to mobile telephones. The other companies in the group include Northern Telecom, which had been working with MCI on technical trials of personal communications services in the Washington, D.C., area and in Dallas, as well as Ericsson GE Mobile Communications, a joint venture between the General Electric Company and the Swedish telecommunications giant LM Ericsson. Modular Design MCI will also work with Nokia Inc., a United States subsidiary of Oy Nokia Finland, a large manufacturer of mobile telephones; the Telular Corporation of Wilmette, Ill., which develops technology that lets standard telephone equipment operate over wireless networks, and Lincoln Laboratory, a federally financed research and development center operated by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. "There's a modular design for these systems," said Steven Zecola, MCI's vice president of personal communications services. "You could buy a switch from Northern Telecom and radios from Ericsson. We're trying to make sure they all work together." MCI also said it would set up a personal communications services laboratory in Richardson, Tex., where the company already has major operations. The lab will employ 50 to 75 people, some of which MCI will hire from outside because it needs expertise in radio frequency engineering, Mr. Zecola said. Industry Standard MCI's effort to set an industry standard comes as other phone and cable-television companies are scrambling to position themselves for the Federal Communications Commission's scheduled auction of new wireless frequencies next May or June. Mr. Zecola said he expected MCI to publicly release the findings from the cooperative research effort early next year. Then the company plans to send requests for proposals to wireless |
650667_1 | Economic Scene; Evidence contradicts common sense in the trade tug-of-war. | at current exchange rates between the yen and the franc, Toyota may be able to sell cars profitably in France for fewer francs than Renault can. But at the end of the day (well, year or decade) French exports must equal French imports, unless foreigners are willing to hold French i.o.u.'s indefinitely. And consumers in both Japan and France will be better off if they are given the choice of goods from either country. That is not quite the whole story. If an economy is lucky enough to specialize in exports that the world particularly values, the foreign currency it earns will buy more imports. And what is loosely called the New Trade Theory suggests that smart countries may be able to make their own luck. If, for example, there is room in the world market for only one low-cost producer of computer microprocessors, being first in the market with a decent product may generate a financial windfall that will not be blown away by competition. But theories that appeal to common sense (and serve special interests) have a way of thriving without much factual underpinning. Mr. Krugman calculates that changes in America's terms of trade -- how much our export earnings will buy abroad -- have accounted for a trivial percentage of the change in American living standards over the last half-century. Thus America's success (failure?) in trade "competition" is virtually irrelevant to the average American's income. Averages, of course, are not everything. Doesn't international trade stir the pot, raising some people's incomes and lowering others'? Yes, but so does domestic competition. If there is an intuitive truth to the populist suspicion about international trade, it must be that the burdens are systematically borne by people in no position to take the hit -- namely, unskilled workers. And, at least until the last few years, many economists assumed that the intuition was correct -- that the rapid opening of trade in manufactured goods had effectively forced blue-collar Americans to compete with their poorly paid counterparts in South Korea, Taiwan and -- dare we say it? -- Mexico. The catch once more, though, is that the evidence does not support the self-evident truth. Lawrence Katz, the Labor Department's senior economist, estimates that competition with the bowl-of-rice-a-day crowd accounts for just a tenth of the change in the gap between the wages of America's skilled and unskilled workers in the 1980's. |
650767_3 | Manama Journal; The Old Men and the Sea, Still Lusting for Pearls | left." The divers can see what relics they have become by glancing ashore. The gleaming skyline of glass and concrete, the highway ramps and gaudy neon signs that beckon families to doughnut, hamburger and pizza shops are all reminders, if ones were needed, that this is a new world. Many grumble that, despite the wealth, the society has lost as much as it has gained. "There was none of this junk that fills lives now," said Ali Othman Bin Darai, an old diver who, like many of his generation, is unsure of his age. "While we were poor, and while life was hard, even dangerous, we knew what it meant to sacrifice. We had integrity." 'I Miss the Old Life' The old divers, pullers, riggers and captains gather every morning in the seedy coffeehouses on the island of Muharraq. They wear white robes, embroidered leather sandals and white skullcaps. Over coffee or tea they play cards and dominoes until the humidity and heat drives them home. "I began to go out on the pearl boats when I was a young boy with my father," said Mohammed Hussein Khalifa as he sat one morning with friends. "There was no other work. It was what the men had done for generations. But when the oil exports began I gave it up to work for the state oil company. I measured the petroleum in storage tanks." "Our families were pleased when the oil came because the diving was dangerous and many men died," he said. "We suddenly had money. But I tell you I miss the old life, the sense of community we had, the strength and power men have when they work." The men drifted into stories of legendary divers who were killed by sharks, evil boat captains who refused to pay compensation to new widows and gales that sent dozens of wooden pearling vessels to the bottom of the gulf. At night the men frequently return to the coffeehouses by the water's edge with bass drums, lutes and finger cymbals. And the old seafaring songs drift out once more over the water. But the voices are now choked with age and the words do not come as easily as before. "It is over for us," said Salah Abdullah, whose beefy arms give evidence of a man who once spent his days pulling divers to the surface. "Perhaps the sea will remember." |
650784_0 | Hard Words for China in Seattle | Insisting that China has yet to make enough progress on human rights to insure the renewal of preferential trade tariffs, Administration officials said today that they had told China time is running out. Senior State Department officials said that during four hours of talks today, John Shattuck, the Assistant Secretary of State for Human Rights, told Chinese officials that Congress would be looking for significant progress from the Chinese early in 1994, and that if there is none, sentiment will harden against extending China's trade status for a year. The State Department officials, who spoke on the condition they not be identified, said they expect a Congressional hearing to be held in January on how much progress China has made in talks with the Red Cross on visits to political prisoners, freer emigration and the end to repression in Tibet. Last June Mr. Clinton renewed China's preferential trade status for one year but made further extensions conditional on improvements in China's human rights record. But in recent weeks, State Department officials have said that so far Beijing has not taken enough steps to ensure that its trade status will be renewed. Lawmakers released a letter to Mr. Clinton today, urging him to take a tough line with President Jiang Zemin when they meet this week. "Unfortunately there have been no signs of improvement in human rights in China and Tibet over the past five months, and in many respects, conditions have deteriorated," said the letter, signed by 270 members of Congress. |
651013_1 | American Airlines' Pilots Decide To Fly Empty Jets to Back Strike | passengers. American workers who were certified as flight attendants in shortened 10-day courses were helping to staff flights, sometimes without uniforms, a company spokesman said. The Federal Aviation Administration said nearly 500 workers graduated from the course a week ago, and nearly 1,000 more are taking the course now. The aviation agency periodically puts inspectors on flights to monitor safety, and an F.A.A. spokesman said the number of inspections had been tripled for American flights. "The F.A.A. has found the attendants are qualified and on proper aircraft," the spokesman, Paul Steucke, told the Reuters news agency. "This level of surveillance will continue" until the end of the strike, he added. Like a coast-to-coast blizzard, the strike by flight attendants has hamstrung travel throughout the nation, upending plans for business meetings, family reunions, vacations, even weddings. "We've been planning this vacation forever," said Sue Karnes, whose flight to San Juan, P.R., had been delayed for five hours, and counting, as fellow would-be passengers slept in chairs. "We're supposed to be on a cruise that leaves tomorrow. We paid $2,600, and it's nonrefundable." 'I Feel Really Helpless' In Chicago, a woman trying to get home to Switzerland stood in O'Hare International Airport, feeling lost. "I have no idea what I shall do and how I will ever get to Zurich," said Pia Sangiorgio. "I get no information and no help. I feel really helpless." In Boston, a businessman, Steve Dreffer, walked wearily through Logan International Airport, trying to recover from a 20-hour journey from Phoenix, via Chicago. "The flight left with the luggage but no passengers because there were no flight attendants to take care of them," he said. "And we couldn't get the luggage back." The president of the Allied Pilots Association, Rich LaVoy, said the board had decided not to count votes on making a sympathy strike because the flight attendants had been so successful themselves at crippling the airline. While the pilots left open the possibility that they might change their mind, their decision answered an important question for passengers around the country. If the pilots had struck, they would have grounded the airline. Because American has trained many other employees to replace the striking attendants, American will be able to fulfill at least a portion of its flight schedule over the Thanksgiving holiday period. The strike is intended to hurt American during one of the busiest travel periods |
651052_2 | Religion Notes | a generation, Orthodox schools have taught women Jewish texts and Jewish law, known as halacha. Many of these students have become major teachers of Jewish law but teach without the title rabbi. "Having opened to them the learning enterprise -- interpretive keys to the tradition -- ordination will come as a natural halachic consequence of this powerful revolution," Ms. Greenberg writes. "Orthodox women should be ordained," she states, and goes on to list a series of reasons, including a need for female role models and a need for a women's perspective on the interpretation of Jewish law. "And because of the justice of it all," she concludes. Technically, Ms. Greenberg adds, there is "no formal ban" that would keep women from becoming rabbis, although she acknowledges that there are other major impediments, including the Orthodox tradition of having women sit in a separate area of the synagogue and excluding them from being counted in the quorum of 10 needed for communal prayer. But she adds: "If they will it, contemporary rabbinic authorities can find halachic means to open the system more widely to learned women." As if to test Ms. Greenberg's thesis in the real world, the magazine, an independent Jewish monthly published in Washington, follows her article with an essay by a young woman who is applying to the Orthodox rabbinical seminary affiliated with Yeshiva University. The woman, Haviva Krasner-Davidson, is not holding her breath for acceptance, but she likens herself to the old man who plants a tree, not for his own benefit but for the benefit of generations to come. One day, she predicts, the Orthodox will ordain women. New Ecumenical Leader The Rev. Gordon L. Sommers was installed on Nov. 10 as president of the National Council of Churches, the umbrella group for 32 Christian denominations that focuses on social advocacy and dialogue between religious groups. Dr. Sommers, 58, of Bethlehem, Pa. is a top official of the 56,000-member Moravian Church in America, one of the smallest denominations in the national council. He is the first Moravian to serve in the post and succeeds the Rev. Syngman Rhee, an official of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). The new president is a strong proponent of the ecumenical movement that the council represents. "Ecumenism is not optional for the church," he said. "We must be one, even as Jesus is one with God and we are one in Him." |
646335_0 | World Economies | |
647633_2 | Job Seekers Outpace Hiring Rise | of 20,000 in finance, insurance and real estate and 29,000 in health services, the Labor Department's survey of payrolls found. Largely offsetting these gains, however, were declines in military aircraft and instruments and in various industries producing nondurables, particularly apparel. Traditionally, ever-rising amounts of overtime have been considered good omens for the labor market, and President Clinton's chief economic adviser, Laura D'Andrea Tyson, expressed this hope again today. "As the recovery continues to pick up pace a bit," she said in an interview, "one would anticipate that employers in manufacturing will go from increasing hours to increasing jobs." But the length of the factory workweek has been flirting with record levels all year, and many economists remain doubtful that a burst of fresh hiring is imminent. They cite, among other things, fierce competition that continues to spur corporate cost-cutting and risks from various Government policy actions, particularly the overhaul of the health care system. "We're substituting capital for labor here," said Lincoln F. Anderson, a former Washington economist who is now with Fidelity Management and Research, the Boston-based mutual fund giant. "The real strength in the economy has been centered in capital-goods spending," with businesses investing in new equipment rather than expanding their payrolls. Today's labor-market report showed the work force expanding by a huge 739,000 last month. The rise is only slightly less if no adjustment is made for recurring seasonal variation. Nearly two-thirds of the extra workers found jobs, but about a third did not, and as a result the ranks of the jobless swelled by 269,000, the biggest increase in 16 months. The one-tenth of a point rise in the unemployment rate, however, is considered by the department to be statistically insignificant. Katharine G. Abraham, the newly installed Commissioner of Labor Statistics, told the Joint Economic Committee of Congress that the increase in the labor force could not be fully explained. While some people "may have perceived a recent improvement in job opportunities," she said, others may have entered the work force for other reasons, and fewer people than usual may have decided to leave the labor force. The jobless rate among teen-agers and Hispanic workers climbed by 2 percent and 1.8 percent, respectively, while the rate for blacks eased nine-tenths of a percent, the department's survey of households also showed. Longer Workweeks The number of part-time workers who said they would have preferred to work full |
647610_0 | French Workers Protest Layoffs | |
647771_1 | Religion Notes | Republicans are somewhat more likely to be church members than Democrats (79 percent to 71 percent), and members of both parties were about equal in their agreement with the statement that religion is "very important" in their lives (65 to 63 percent). Republicans and Democrats had roughly the same number of people who profess no religious belief (6 percent to 7 percent), but independents had the largest proportion, with 13 percent. Based on the analysis, politicians would be wise to stay away from narrow religious appeals, said the author of the study, Robert Bezilla. "They should not charge that they have the moral high ground and that their opponents are irreligious or nonreligious," he said. "The voters are interested in moral issues, such as abortion, but not on whether a candidate is a Methodist or a Catholic or a 'born again.' To most voters, that is irrelevant." Aptly, in the Queen's Hands In London this week, Parliament gave its final approval to a measure that will open the priesthood to women in the Church of England. The House of Lords gave its overwhelming approval on Tuesday after a similar vote last week in the House of Commons. The measure, which was initiated by the church leadership, requires government approval because it involves the state-sanctioned church. The measure now goes to Queen Elizabeth II, whose approval will make it law. Then the church's General Synod will put the change into effect. The move to ordain women has prompted strong protests from some church conservatives, who see it as a violation of Scripture and as dividing the Church of England from the Catholic Church, which does not ordain women. Some members of the Church of England have left and joined the Catholic Church, including a former Bishop of London, Graham Leonard. Other members say they will leave after the first women are ordained. Among the supporters of the ordination of women are the Archbishop of Canterbury, George L. Carey, who said in arguing for passage in the House of Lords: "We have well over 1,000 women deacons who are offering their skills and gifts to the service of Christ and many of them see this legislation as offering the fulfillment of their ministry." The first women are expected to be ordained into the Church of England in April, after the Easter holiday, since ordinations do not take place in the pre-Easter Lenten |
647567_2 | U.S. APPROVES USE OF DRUG TO RAISE MILK PRODUCTION | future on inventing other biotechnology products. "This is really a banner day for agricultural biotechnology," said Richard J. Mahoney, the chairman and chief executive of the chemical company, which is based in St. Louis. "This is the first of the major new products that has been approved. A lot of people in this field will take heart. The approval process was extensive and the market is waiting." Monsanto is the first of four companies that have produced the bovine hormone to win approval. It would not say how much it would charge farmers for the drug, but the retail price of milk, which is tightly regulated, was considered unlikely to change. Jeremy Rifkin, the head of the Foundation on Economic Trends in Washington, and the most influential and persistent critic of biotechnology, said yesterday that the Government's decision would be protested next week in demonstrations at Monsanto's headquarters, and at food companies in 60 other cities. 'Beginning of Food Politics' "We have said since 1986 that if the F.D.A. ever approved this drug that the final battleground would be the grocery stores, restaurants and convenience stores," said Mr. Rifkin, who last year was among the most vocal opponents to the Flavr Savr tomato, developed by Calgene Inc., which was genetically altered to retard spoilage. The F.D.A. is still considering whether to approve the tomato. Mr. Rifkin added: "This is the beginning of food politics in this country. If Monsanto succeeds with this product, they open the flood gates on the biotechnology age. If we succeed, it will send a chilling message through the agricultural business that people don't want genetically engineered foods." The drug, bovine somatotropin or BST, has been under development by the company since 1982, and under review by the F.D.A. since 1984. The hormone produced by Monsanto is almost identical to the natural growth hormone produced by the pituitary glands of cows, which helps to control milk production, said scientists at the F.D.A. Monsanto developed its product by inserting a gene from cows into bacteria, which then multiplied in fermentation tanks, producing a liquid that is purified. Farmers who buy the drug will inject it once every two weeks into a spot at the base of a cow's tail, said a Monsanto spokeswoman. Studies at universities and at dairy farms have found that the drug increases milk production 10 percent to 20 percent in well-managed herds. The |
652365_3 | Belfast Journal; British Soldiers: Friend or Enemy and to Whom? | it different, it is still a war." His sergeant and fellow soldiers agreed. "Sometimes you don't know who you're fighting," said Sgt. Peter Woods. "One day you may speak to a guy in the streets; the next day he will try to kill you. It's very frustrating. We have been blown up three times, had one wounded so he can't patrol any more." 3,000 Killed Since 1969 The status of the British Army is at the heart of the latest political initiatives toward a peaceful settlement of the strife that has killed more than 3,000 people since 1969. The British and Irish Prime Ministers are to meet in Dublin in December to discuss proposals on the role of the army. The two Prime Ministers -- Albert Reynolds of Ireland and John Major of Britain -- will have to deal eventually with the primary demand by the I.R.A. that before there can be peace, Britain must promise to withdraw its troops, which now number about 17,700, including 12,000 regular army soldiers and others from the Royal Irish Regiment, a kind of national guard. The I.R.A., estimated to have about 400 active guerrillas, has killed about 900 members of the British security forces, including 643 soldiers. The I.R.A. says about 300 of its own have been killed, some by their own bombs. On the Crumlin Road in West Belfast, Major Everard got out of his Land-Rover and, carrying his rifle, ordered a foot patrol to make a spot check of cars moving toward the city center. With the help of a police officer, they stopped several cars, then allowed them to pass. Bomb Signals Can Be Jammed When they are suspicious, they radio the car's license plate number and driver's identity to a central intelligence unit. Each patrol has equipment to jam transmission of radio signals that might detonate an I.R.A. bomb set in its path. Lieut. Kieron Russell, in charge of the patrol, said of the I.R.A. in the area: "We know all the name players. When a terrorist is sighted, we note where he goes, who he talks to." At army headquarters in Lisburn, south of Belfast, Maj. Nick Sharples, the chief of staff of the 39 Brigade, which includes the Lancers, said he was aware of the "Brits Out" slogan of the I.R.A. and their supporters around the world. He is also aware that the policy of the I.R.A. |
652450_0 | Come Monday, Hunters Add to Black Bears' Woes | When hunting season opens on Nov. 29 for the Florida black bear -- "the biggest, meanest animal on the face of the earth," says the state's top game commissioner -- hunters will be pursuing an animal that has been listed as threatened in most of the state since 1974. Although hunters say the woods here in the heart of bear country on the Florida Panhandle have never been so flush with prey, that is not the case everywhere, biologists note; statewide, the bear population is endangered. Opposition to the hunt is growing. In addition to conservation groups, the opponents include Gov. Lawton Chiles, the Legislature, the Congressional delegation and, according to a telephone survey by the Florida Game and Fresh Water Fish Commission, 61 percent of the public. The five members of the game commission -- four longtime hunters and a former chairman of the state Sierra Club -- recently voted to suspend bear hunting in the state indefinitely with the close of the season on Jan. 23. Threatened Yet Hunted "It was a very difficult public policy position that we had," a commissioner, Julie Morris, said. "Having a species that is threatened in part of the state and hunted in another part of the state is just too hard for people to grasp." Despite his vote to suspend the hunt, Ben Rowe, the chairman of the commission and by his own account a "consumptive user of wildlife," has led a campaign to continue bear hunting. In an interview, he called bears both "the biggest, meanest animal on the face of the earth" and "the pawn of the animal protectionists." "Deep down in my heart of hearts, I believe that hunting isn't hurting the bear," Mr. Rowe said. A black bear is typically five to six feet long and weighs 265 to 330 pounds, although a few have exceeded 650 pounds. Biologists believe that before unchecked hunting, Florida was home to more than 11,000 black bears. Now, they estimate, only 1,000 to 1,500 remain in habitats that are shrinking as the state grows by 143 people a day and more and more roads divide the remaining woods. "Habitat loss is happening at a rate that can be measured daily," said David S. Maehr, a wildlife biologist for the commission. "We see it every time we go up in an airplane." Increases in Five Areas Bears are now largely confined to |
650219_0 | Piracy or Just Insolvency? Women's Saga Continues | The crew shake-up last week aboard the 60-foot sailboat, U.S. Women's Challenge, was as brutal as it gets in yacht racing. But the real hardships are likelier to surface during the next few weeks as the fragmented crew tries to regain its sea legs. The newly named boat, Women's Challenge, left Punta del Este, Uruguay, Saturday in the start of the second leg of the Whitbread Round the World Race. Thirteen other competitors are in the fleet, including Dennis Conner's yacht, Winston, and Odessa, the Ukrainian-United States entry. Conner sailed in the first leg of the race, but decided against being aboard for the second stint. The winner next June receives the Whitbread's Heineken Trophy rather than a cash prize. The coming voyage, a 7,558-mile mile slog through the treacherous waters of the southern oceans -- the South Atlantic Ocean and the Indian Ocean -- is apt to bring freezing temperatures, icebergs and storms. Riley's Southern Challenge For Dawn Riley, the skipper replacing Nance Frank of Key West, Fla., past experience in those waters is far from reassuring. "Going to the Southern Ocean is always a bit intimidating," Riley said from Uruguay last week. "But on the other side, I have sailed with half the crew extensively. I'm not going to lie and say I'm relaxed going into this, but we're getting it all together." The 29-year-old Riley, who lives in Detroit, is a competent inshore racer as well as ocean competitor. She sailed as watch captain in 1989-90 aboard Maiden, the British boat that was first to compete in a Whitbread race with an all-female crew. Riley also sailed as the only female crew member during Bill Koch's 1992 America's Cup effort in San Diego. For 45-year-old Nance Frank, there was never clear sailing. Within a day of her boat's leaving Southampton, England, Sept. 25, trouble started. During the 28-day voyage to Punta del Este, the yacht's only mainsail, a second-hand sail, ripped many times and had to be restitched. The computer system broke down, and gear wore out. "It was so psychologically depressing to everybody to have trouble in the beginning with the mainsail," Frank said from Key West. "Certainly, it was a tough voyage. We worked so hard starting out, we were exhausted." Susan Chiu, the cook and medic who left the yacht in concert with Frank, charged that Frank's authority was being undermined at sea. She |
650215_0 | World Economies | |
650128_0 | LAND MINES CALLED A WORLD MENACE | Thousands of men, women and children in more than 60 countries are killed or maimed each month by land mines, a panel of experts has reported, and unless drastic international action is taken, the casualty rate promises to grow far worse. According to a 510-page report published last week by the Arms Project, a branch of the research organization Human Rights Watch, some 100 million mines around the world threaten civilians. Moreover, far more mines are being planted each day than are deactivated in mine-clearing operations, so the casualty toll is steadily increasing. In Cambodia alone, where reasonably comprehensive statistics are available, some 30,000 people have lost limbs, most of them because of mines, according to the report. Although Italy, China and the former Soviet Union have been the major recent suppliers of land mines to a market that pays up to $200 million annually for the devices, some 100 companies and government agencies in 48 countries have been exporting 340 different types of antipersonnel mines. Senator Seeks U.N. Action Senator Patrick J. Leahy, Democrat of Vermont, a leader in the movement to curb or abolish the use of these mines, introduced an American resolution in the United Nations on Thursday that would bind nations to halting the export of these weapons. He said in an interview that the measure appeared to have strong, but not unanimous, international backing. While most of Western Europe seems likely to endorse the resolution, several nations, including Britain, have withheld support. Britain is believed to be reluctant because of contractual obligations it may have to supply arms to countries in the Middle East. The Senate has agreed to an initiative by Senator Leahy to include a $10 million appropriation in the current defense bill to advise and assist other nations in efforts to clear minefields. The Senate is also expected to approve a three-year extension of a moratorium, in effect for a year, that bans American export of land mines. But specialists agree that no international agreement will halt the production and use of land mines altogether. "What we hope to do is to portray antipersonnel mines as even worse than chemical or biological weapons," said Stephen D. Goose, director of the Washington office of the Arms Project. "Mines have certainly killed and maimed far more people than all the victims of chemical, biological and nuclear warfare put together." Economic Impact Cited Senator Leahy, |
632619_4 | CONNECTICUT GUIDE | jamboree will be held, and woodchopping contests are slated for Saturday at 3 P.M. Saturday, Sunday at 1 P.M. The fair will also feature the traditional array of horse, pony and ox pulls; livestock and produce exhibits; baked goods, maple syrup, dairy products and canned goods to buy. A midway, rides and machinery displays will also be available both days. Admission is $4, less for children. CHILDREN'S TRIATHLON A triathlon for children 7 to 14 years old has been organized by the Westport-Weston YMCA tomorrow at 9 A.M. Registration costs $14 from 7 A.M. to 8:30 A.M. at Staples High School in Westport, where the race will begin and end. Depending on age, boys and girls will first bike for 3 to 6 miles, then run for one-half to 1 mile, and finally swim in the Staples pool for 50 to 200 meters. T-shirts and water bottles will be distributed to all participants, and every one who finishes will get a medal. Awards for the top three winners in each age category will be presented in ceremonies at the end of the day. Everyone is required to wear a helmet and provide his or her own bike. The event was held for the first time last year, attracting 200 children from Connecticut and New York. Proceeds are used to benefit the Y's programs for physically or mentally impaired children and adults. For more information call 226-8981 or 226-4672. RAPTORS IN FLIGHT Migrating raptors will have an audience at the Greenwich Audubon Center next weekend, as birdwatchers monitor the cruising hawks all day Saturday and Sunday. The society participates in the New England sector of the Hawk Migration Association of North America count. An average of 25,000 hawks have been recorded flying over each year since 1985. A hawk identification program will be held at the center on Saturday at 10:30 A.M., and a live owl demonstration will take place on Sunday at 2 P.M. Hawk watchers should bring something to sit on, something to eat, and binoculars if they have them. The center is at 613 Riversville Road in Greenwich, and the phone number for more information is 661-9200. TOUR OF BROOKLYN A tour of old buildings in Brooklyn and a lunch are offered on Saturday by the Eastern Connecticut Community Foundation of Norwich, which awards grants to a variety of nonprofit groups, including Literacy Volunteers, the Antiquarian Landmarks Society, |
632888_3 | Perhaps This Universe Is Only a Test | on their own discipline but on other sciences as well. In the 19th century, Lord Kelvin (William Thomson) declared that the world was only 100 million years old, much to the consternation of the geologists and biologists who thought the world needed much more time than that for the development of continents and the animals that roamed them. The 100-million-year figure, based on newly formulated principles of energy conservation and thermodynamics, was of course absurd, but Kelvin spoke math and the opposition didn't, and he thus prevailed. Imagine the plight of poor Charles Darwin, given a mere scintilla of time in which to explain how the great apes evolved from primordial ooze, when the rocks upon which the ooze first slithered had already used up Kelvin's meager allotment of years. Mr. Lindley next attacks the idea of "beautiful" mathematics, the belief, held by Mr. Weinberg, Paul Dirac, Einstein and many other theorists, that one should be guided by esthetics, that the beautiful, symmetrical theory is probably the right theory. Isn't it pretty to think so, Mr. Lindley replies, and then proceeds to rip this idea to shreds, pointing out that the Pythagoreans felt the same way and produced a pile of lovely but useless theories (reincarnation, for one), and that Johannes Kepler worked for years to keep the orbits of the planets circular -- the circle was a sacred form -- before he accepted that the dowdier ellipse was what the data called for. The image of the theoretician that emerges from "The End of Physics" is of a surprisingly unsophisticated individual who must anthropomorphize nature to understand it: I like symmetry and beauty; ergo, nature likes symmetry and beauty. It reminds one of the Parisian animal trainer who teaches his bear to respond to voice commands and concludes that bears speak French. Mr. Lindley is kindest to the theory called the standard model, the bizarre array of particles named leptons and quarks combined with their antiparticles and then further combined with the three forces of the universe -- electromagnetism, strong and weak forces -- and their subsequent particles, called bosons. The standard model is thus far the best summary of all the data that have come out of all the experiments physicists have done since Galileo dropped his two weights from the Leaning Tower of Pisa. But it has often been criticized as overcomplicated (too many particles), clumsy and |
634905_0 | Coffee Group's Export Curb | Latin American, African and Asian coffee producers completed their ambitious plans today to hold back up to 20 percent of their coffee exports to push up depressed prices. Jorge Cardenas, general manager of Colombia's National Coffee Growers Federation, said at a news conference that the retention plan, as it is known, would be administered by a new Association of Coffee Producing Countries based in Brazil, the world's largest coffee producer. The members will be Brazil, Colombia, five Central American nations, Kenya, Ivory Coast, Indonesia and Uganda, which together account for more than 85 percent of the world's coffee exports. All the producers at the Bogota meeting said that they would start holding back coffee exports on Oct. 1, and Ecuador, previously an observer, said it would join formally. Mr. Cardenas said the plan would respond to the International Coffee Organization's 15-day moving average of the combined price for arabica and robusta -- the world's two main coffee varieties. Producing nations will retain 20 percent of their exports until the organization's price exceeds 75 cents a pound for 20 consecutive days, he said. When this happens, retention will fall to 10 percent until prices exceed 80 cents. The group will cease holding back coffee from the market when the price exceeds 80 cents a pound. When it rises above 85 cents, coffee supplies will be increased. September coffee closed today at 79.65 cents a pound on the New York Coffee, Sugar and Cocoa Exchange. |
634861_2 | Rome Journal; They Still Try to Make a Turbulent Tiber Behave | now call the Ponte Cestio, but also the Ponte Fabricio, spanning the Tiber's opposite channel. That bridge was first erected by the consul Lucius Fabricius in 62 B.C. Troubled too are what, by Rome's standards, may be called modern structures: the ruined chunk of a 16th-century bridge that Romans call the Ponte Rotto, or broken bridge, and a black iron 19th-century viaduct, the Ponte Palatino. In recent years, Mr. Linetti said, engineers have sunk steel and concrete piles deep into the subsoil on the island's perimeter, in effect stitching it to its present site. In 1965 engineers at Rome University developed a hydraulic model of the Isola and its surroundings to enable them to test the consequences of human intervention. Technically the model showed that the best way to insure the island's stability was to provide for an even distribution of water through both channels of the river that sweep past it. To this end the early Romans had reinforced the river bottom to right and left of the island, protecting it and the bridges that afforded access to it. Recently, however, the general deterioration of the river bed in the Trastevere channel has upset the balance, pouring roughly 70 percent of the river's water past that side of the island, and withering the opposite channel. The force of the water has gradually created a cataract of nearly six feet just below the Ponte Cestio, and its turbulence is not only carving out the ground under the bridge's massive foundations, but also digging a hole under the island, threatening the 10th-century church of San Bartolomeo that graces its southern tip. Essentially the modern solution parallels the ancient. Vincenzo Angeloro, who oversees work on the river bed, said the dam had been constructed to allow workers to sink dozens of steel and concrete piles in the river bed. In the high-water winter months, he said, the channel will be reopened. It will be closed again in the spring, when a computer-designed reinforced concrete slab, like a giant airplane wing, will be set on the piles just downstream from the Ponte Cestio. This will create a backup of silt and gravel that will reinforce the bridge's imperiled foundation. It is an ingenious idea at first sight, but Romans have always tampered with their river at their peril. The rule of thumb used to be, Mr. Linetti said, a flood every 25 years, |
634867_0 | Eye on Olympics, China Pursues Air Safety | Worried that its effort to become the host to the 2000 Olympic Games could be undermined by safety concerns among foreigners who fly on China's airlines, Chinese aviation authorities have announced a major crackdown on safety violations. For anyone who has flown in China, the new safety drive is much overdue. China's economic takeoff has produced a boom in air travel -- and accidents -- with the increase in new domestic airlines last year allowed by the breakup of the state air monopoly in 1988. At Beijing International Airport, British Airways has banned the boarding of passengers during refueling operations because the local ground crews refuse to put out their cigarettes. "Can you imagine the fumes from 100 tons of fuel in the air and a guy is sitting there with a butt in his mouth?" a manager of an international airline said. "I tell off about four people a week, but it doesn't do any good." On many flights, seat belts are optional, flight crews and cabin staff invisible and, in one noted accident in Hong Kong harbor in 1988, life jackets nonexistent. Chinese travelers seldom check bags because they will get lost, so the aisles of China's airliners are often so clogged with luggage, not to mention standing passengers, as to make a speedy exit impossible. At a recent news conference, Yan Zhixiang, deputy director general of the Civil Aviation Administration of China, told reporters, "The aviation sector, which is undergoing rapid expansion, has failed to carry through rules on air safety and security." Lax safety and security standards prompted one passenger association in the United States to quip in its newsletter that flying in China was more dangerous than strolling through the streets of Sarajevo. An exaggeration, to be sure, but the barbs from abroad have been reinforced by so many scare stories from China's frequent fliers that the leadership was forced to crack down before the country's air safety record was thrown onto the list of reasons China's critics have been compiling to keep the 2000 Games away from here, airline industry officials say. International aviation officials are loath to say China's air fatality record is worse than that of other developing countries, in part because China still does not report its safety data to industry organizations. But China's aviation authorities themselves said last week that the total of 331 deaths in commercial airliner crashes in |
634834_4 | Environment Groups Are Split on Support For Free-Trade Pact | oversee each country's enforcement of its own laws. And the White House has agreed to establish a $4 billion fund for environmental cleanup along the border with Mexico. The plan's critics in the environmental movement said the provisions were too vaguely worded to have real impact if a dispute over environmental issues arose between two countries. They also argued that the public is not allowed to participate fully in resolving disputes between nations and that the overall effect of the agreement would be to lower standards to accommodate the Mexican economy. "It's perplexing to me how any environmental group could support this agreement," said Lori M. Wallach, director of the trade program for Public Citizen in Washington. John H. Adams, the executive director of the Natural Resources Defense Council, said he had anticipated such criticism from colleagues in his movement. "I recognize that this is a complex and difficult issue on which reasonable people with the same values and objectives can differ," he said. Supporters Helped Devise Plan Mr. Adams said that members of his staff had spent thousands of hours participating with Administration officials in the development of the environmental provisions of the agreement and that they had provided a "solid institutional framework" that would protect Mexico without weakening American environmental and health statutes. Kathryn Fuller, the president of the World Wildlife Fund, noted that Mexico has more biological resources than almost any other country and that by acquiring greater economic opportunities through the trade agreement, Mexico would also have more money available to protect valuable species of plants and animals. Peter Berle, the president of the National Audubon Society, Fred Krupp, the executive director of the Environmental Defense Fund, and Dr. Russell Mittermeier, the president of Conservation International, also said they had no doubt that approving the trade agreement was better for the environment. Legal and scientific experts who have reviewed the text of the environmental agreements or followed the debate in the environmental community, said today they agreed with environmental leaders who support the pact. "The trade agreement provides a context for dealing with the environment in Mexico and a way to cooperate to take better care of our environment," said Dr. Peter H. Raven, a botanist and director of the Missouri Botanical Garden in St. Louis. "Mexico has to have the resources to deal with these problems. You can't deal with these issues if you're poor." |
633750_3 | Adrift in the Market for Health Insurance | his affiliation with the American Association of Retired Persons. Membership costs $8 a year. The quarterly premium for his new policy is $355, versus $400 for his employer's plan, and Mr. Kelly managed to lower his deductible to $100 from $1,200. As the low cost indicates, both policies are supplemental to his Medicare coverage, which is available to anyone 65 years and older. Also, consider paying a visit to a local insurance agent who specializes in medical coverage (listed in the Yellow Pages). But beware that many agents concentrate on serving businesses and may not be knowledgeable about individual policies. Joel Shapiro, president of Bartmon, Shapiro & Associates, a health insurance agency in Manhattan, warns clients that individual coverage can be extremely limited and costly, especially in New York, where the community rating system has taken effect. Because these agents may not mention alternative approaches, like plans through associations, Mr. Edwards recommends finding an independent agent who specializes in independent workers. The agency should be local because many plans -- and most H.M.O.'s -- are regional, and opportunities vary from place to place. If coverage is available through a spouse's employer, compare the price with what is available elsewhere. The experts suggest that people working for themselves inquire about coverage available to small businesses. This option should be open to anyone who files a Schedule C with a Federal income tax return, whether or not he has employees. Better still, try to qualify through membership in a local small-business group. The Small Business Service Bureau, based in Worcester, Mass., has more than 35,000 member businesses nationwide, and will provide insurance to businesses with just a proprietor and no employees. For a sole proprietor, membership costs about $100 annually (800 222-5678). Ms. Bissell took advantage of group rates available through her local Chamber of Commerce. Membership in the chamber costs her $150 a year. Her quarterly insurance premium is now $612, versus the $270 she paid for insurance when still employed. After her job was terminated, the same insurance through Cobra cost her $768 a quarter. Had she been willing to switch to an H.M.O. for her new insurance plan, she could have gotten more comprehensive coverage. Instead, she chose a bare-bones plan and a high deductible, $1,000. But she can add coverage as income permits. Annual premiums for individuals and groups vary widely -- possibly $1,200 to $6,000 a person, |
636238_2 | New Gun Takes Aim at Tailpipe Pollution | Md., offers the RSD 1000 van, with a little hatch that swings open for the infrared beam and a video camera on a boom on the back. The Hughes Corporation, of Santa Barbara, sells the Smog Dog, with components that are transportable by van but designed to be operated from outside the vehicle. New York has not put the project out for bid, but city officials said that the plan was to lease the equipment, which they could do from Remote Sensing Technologies for $129,000 for a year. The equipment has been tried out in Los Angeles and Provo, Utah, and the two manufacturers are now competing for additional business. Nationally, air pollution experts are divided over whether to try to make all cars a little bit cleaner, by enforcing stricter requirements on the auto manufacturers and on cars brought in for inspection, or whether to target "super-polluters" with spot checks from roadside monitors. The city, Ms. Bryson said, did not believe in roadside monitoring as a substitute for cleaner new cars, but she added, "We subscribe to the theory you do have to have at a minimum some kind of audit program." She said the infrared program would do that, as a real-world check on the effects of stricter standards on manufacturing and inspection. Not everyone likes the idea. Simulating Conditions "It's double jeopardy," said William Berman, a lobbyist for the American Automobile Association in Washington. "You've already put that motorist through a periodic inspection, which he's already passed." In addition, Mr. Berman said, the testing equipment is often set up on highway entrance ramps or exit ramps, which is unfair, because auto makers design cars to meet a treadmill test designed by the Environmental Protection Agency. That test simulates many conditions but not rapid acceleration and deceleration. Mark Simon, a vehicle specialist at the city's Department of Environmental Protection, said this second objection may be valid, although by comparing data from many cars in the same condition -- for instance, driving up a ramp to the Queensboro Bridge, which is one location the city is considering -- useful data could still be gained. The money will come to the city under a Federal program called Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality. Other grants, announced by Mayor David N. Dinkins last week, will be used to convert 375 taxis to natural gas, and to extend bicycle lanes and bicycle paths. |
637488_0 | Welcoming Fall With Peak-Season Flavor | SEPTEMBER is usually the month when tomatoes are most plentiful in the Northeast and, therefore, at their lowest price. They have also reached peak flavor and are at their nutritional best. Understandably, then, the first course, a cold tomato soup, takes advantage of the market. Likewise, hake, my choice for a main dish, is still abundant and inexpensive. To round out the menu, you may be lucky enough to find fresh new potatoes for a good price at your supermarket or at a farm stand, if you happen to live in the country. The tomato soup is a quick recipe consisting primarily of garlic and fresh tomatoes that are first processed together until pureed; then seasoned with salt, pepper, Tabasco, peanut oil and a dash of vinegar, and finally, sprinkled with shredded basil at serving time. Although it is acceptable to process all the ingredients in a food processor and to serve the mixture as such, I find the result smoother and more appealing if the pureed garlic and tomatoes are pushed through a food mill or a conventional strainer to remove tomato peels and seeds before the remaining ingredients are added. After the soup comes hake in vegetable and lemon broth. Hake is a type of large whiting that is abundant and inexpensive from July to September. Soft, flaky, moist and mild flavored, hake is very good baked, sauteed or poached, as it is here. If hake is not available in your area, it can be replaced in this recipe by another inexpensive fish -- anything from haddock to cod to ocean whitefish. I cook the fish here with a julienne of lemon peel and lemon juice along with carrots, scallions and red onion to produce a slightly acidic, vibrant, but very light dish. The hake is served with its vegetable accompaniments and with sauteed potatoes in parsley. Fresh fruit makes a good finish to this meal. A chardonnay would go well with it, and many are relatively inexpensive. One good choice is a Santa Rita, from the Maipo Valley in Chile. It has a concentrated, spicy taste that stands up well to this type of menu. Savory Soup, Fish and Potatoes Cold Tomato Soup Total time: 15 minutes 5 cloves garlic, peeled 2 1/2pounds very ripe tomatoes, cut into 1-inch pieces (6 cups) 1 teaspoon salt 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper 1/2 teaspoon Tabasco sauce 1/3 cup |
637556_1 | Defying President, Senate Votes To Keep Medicaid Abortion Limit | who favors abortion rights appear not to have changed the temper in Congress as much as some proponents of such rights had hoped. "Certainly I will oppose having abortion offered in any standard health benefit package," said Senator Don Nickles, Republican of Oklahoma. Senator Barbara Boxer, Democrat of California, said she was confident that Congress would make sure abortions were covered under national health insurance. Medicaid, the Federal-state program that pays the medical expenses of poor people, would be phased out under the Clinton health proposal, and the poor would have the same insurance policies as everyone else. Abortion rights proponents say that would make it difficult and possibly even unconstitutional to write a law curbing abortions financed by the Government. But if the Government subsidizes the insurance premiums of the poor, as Mr. Clinton proposes, Congress might find a way to limit those subsidies to policies that did not include abortion coverage. In his Presidential campaign last year, Mr. Clinton favored lifting Federal restrictions on abortions and said he wanted abortions to be legal, safe and rare. Although his budget proposed dropping the ban on Federally financed abortions, Mr. Clinton has not taken an active role in the debate this year. The measure the Senate approved today is called the Hyde Amendment after Representative Henry J. Hyde, a Republican from Illinois who has successfully sponsored similar legislation since 1977. Easing of Abortion Curbs The new restrictions on abortion, to go into effect Oct. 1 as part of the appropriation for the Department of Health and Human Services in the new fiscal year, are somewhat looser than those now on the books in that they would allow a woman to have an abortion under Medicaid if she said she was pregnant because of rape or incest. Since 1981, Government-financed abortions have been legal only if the pregnancy threatened the woman's life. The way the measure is written, there might be no way to challenge a woman who said she had been raped or been the victim of incest. Supporters of the Hyde Amendment said it was offensive to many Americans to have their tax money used for what they considered to be an immoral purpose. But those favoring abortion rights said that since the Government already subsidized most abortions by making private health insurance tax deductible, it was unfair to single out poor women covered by Medicaid. CLINTON'S HEALTH PLAN |
637540_2 | A Curb on Imported Tobacco Aids Farms and Philip Morris | support on the budget measure when the Federal cigarette tax of 24 cents a pack could quadruple. A Link Is Seen The budget squeaked by both in the Senate and the House by one-vote margins. Among the 34 Democrats from House districts dependent on the tobacco industry, 30 supported the budget package. So did the five Democratic Senators from states in which tobacco is a leading crop -- Kentucky, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia. The White House, Senator Ford and others insisted there was no deal made. But Representative Rose, during a July 28 House-Senate conference committee in which the content provision was approved, acknowledged a clear link between that law and the prospect of using higher cigarette taxes to finance health care. "Those who are drafting the health care proposals for this country have singled out tobacco for special treatment," he said. "And we are working very closely with the White House in an effort to find a middle ground where we can be helpful." Or, as Mr. Gibbons said in an interview: "They're going to tax the hell out of tobacco. This was a kiss-off." Representative Rose failed to respond to repeated attempts over a two-week period to reach him for comment. For years, growers have pushed for a domestic-content law to slow the growth of imported tobacco, the bulk of which has been coming from Brazil, Zimbabwe, Argentina, Thailand and Malawi. Imports more than doubled from 1989 to 1992, according to the Agriculture Department, while domestic tobacco output rose only 26 percent. Law Is Divisive "Imports have been killing us," said Danny McKinney, chief executive of the Burley Tobacco Growers Cooperative Association in Lexington, Ky. "The playing field was not level. So the growers sat around and decided what had to be done." Yet unlike most issues facing the tobacco industry, including attacks by antismoking groups, which tend to unify all segments, the domestic-content law has been divisive. Philip Morris, which made Senator Ford and Representative Rose its No. 1 and No. 3 recipients of political contributions in the last election campaign, supported the idea. But the R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company and other, smaller cigarette makers favored an alternative plan that would have relaxed the regulation for American-made products for export. The regulation, as written, gives Philip Morris a decided advantage because of its ability to shift production offshore to a worldwide network of |
637478_0 | Return Of Booty Protested In France | It seemed like a reasonable exchange. After France won a multi-billion-dollar contract to supply its high-speed train to South Korea, President Francois Mitterrand this month made the good-will gesture of returning a 19th-century Korean manuscript seized by French troops in 1866. For the guardians of France's national treasures, however, the President's gift was neither reasonable nor legal. The country's museums and cultural institutions may be weighed down by the booty of imperial wars and conquests but, by law, these paintings, sculptures and documents are now French. As a result, a fierce dispute has focused anew on the perennial question of who owns plundered art objects, a question that more than one European government would rather not pursue. "Once you get into the game of restitutions, the list is opened and it is endless," warned Monique Cohen, a curator at the National Library, where the Korean manuscript was kept. The document itself is not considered of great value except to Koreans. Seized during a punitive raid after the massacre of nine French missionaries in 1866, it is one of three copies of correspondence describing construction of a funeral temple for the mother of the King of Korea in 1822. The other two copies are in Seoul. 'An Endless Chain' The issue that has provoked a storm here, however, is whether the President broke the law by handing over what is considered French property, and whether, in the process, he set a precedent that might come to haunt the country's cultural institutions and museums for years to come. "Demands for restitutions of all kinds will now be presented by many countries, and there will be no justification for refusing them," said a letter to the Culture Minister, Jacques Toubon, signed by 700 members of the National Library's staff. "It will set off an endless chain of events." South Korean newspapers and institutions had in fact been campaigning for return of the manuscript since 1991. While the library had provided a microfilm copy of the document, it was only as Mr. Mitterrand set off for Seoul this month that he indicated he planned to hand the manuscript back. At first, the library refused to surrender it, but its administrator, Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie, said he eventually ordered Miss Cohen and another curator, Jacqueline Samson, to take the manuscript to Seoul because he was assured that it would only be shown to South Korea's |
633284_2 | Eating Well | that there is a link, because animal studies and epidemiological evidence indicate it: women who live in countries where total fat and saturated-fat consumption are low -- less than 20 percent of total calories -- have much less risk of breast cancer than women in America, where fat consumption is high. Bolstering the connection is research that shows that estgrogen levels increase as fat intake increases. Estrogens have been implicated in the promotion of breast cancer. Questions are also now being raised about the roles of pesticides, herbicides and pollutants like polychlorinated byphenyls (PCB's), which are stored in body fat and have estrogen-like effects. Other unanswered dietary questions relate to the roles of fiber; vitamins A, C and E, and beta carotene and soybean products. "We are all fairly convinced that diet has some effect on breast cancer," said Dr. David J. Hunter, an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and the author of the breast cancer portion of the Nurses Health Study. "But is it dietary fat?" Dr. Hunter was the only panel member who strongly believed that fat played no role. He suggested that those who believed fat levels had to be lowered to 20 percent to see a difference in breast cancer risk were "moving the goal posts." Dr. Hunter called a low-fat diet one with 30 percent fat. The other panelists, all cancer researchers, believe the definition of a low-fat diet is 20 percent of calories or less. Dr. Hunter said the Nurses Health study showed no evidence that fiber or vitamins C or E reduced the risk of breast cancer but said there appeared to be some protective effect from vitamin A and from vegetables. Of course there are other risk factors for breast cancer, but they are ones women cannot necessarily control: early onset of menstruation, late age at first full-term pregnancy, late menopause, single marital status and a family history of breast cancer. To try to solve some of the puzzle, the Women's Health Initiative, sponsored by the National Institutes of Health, is testing several of the most promising hypotheses on 70,000 postmenopausal women, including whether a diet with 20 percent of calories from fat that is high in fruits, vegetables and grains can reduce the risk of breast cancer. Whether or not it proves to be effective in this area, such a diet may reduce the risk of heart disease |
633166_2 | In America; No Job, No Dream | The study confirms previous findings that "an unprecedented number of the new jobs created in the recovery have been either temporary or part-time," and that "well over 60 percent of the new jobs created between January and July 1993 were part-time jobs." The job crisis has been brutal to the poor and is putting a tremendous squeeze on the middle class. But so far it has provoked no sense of urgency in Washington. Neither the President nor Congress has acted as if this were something we need to do something about fast. For awhile the President seemed to be saying that continued low interest rates would go a long way toward solving the problem. That was nonsense. Now there are reports that Clinton Administration aides are taking a look at job-stimulation measures similar to those used by President Bush during his re-election campaign. That doesn't sound like a good idea. It's as if a new baseball manager turned to his predecessor and asked, "O.K., how do I get this team out of the cellar?" Meanwhile, Vice President Gore's proposal for restructuring the Government would more than double the 100,000 Federal jobs already targeted for elimination. And we are told that the North American Free Trade Agreement would cost jobs, at least in the short run; and that health care reform would cost jobs, at least in the short run. Lawrence Mishel was a co-author of the Policy Institute study. In an interview he said, "The most depressing part about my research is that if you look at the [ real ] wages of just about every education group over the last 20 years among men -- college graduates, two years of college, high school graduates, dropouts -- the wages are down." The fall in wages has been more precipitous among non-college-educated workers. Women have achieved some wage growth but the growth is concentrated among those with college or graduate degrees. Over all, the wage of the average college graduate has already fallen by 1 percent since early 1992. More dreams are about to vanish. "The only reason the male wage just hasn't plummeted tremendously on average is that more people are educated," Mr. Mishel said. "So education is almost like inoculating us against a just horrific decline. It's sort of like everybody is on a down escalator and we're busy getting more educated so as not to fall as fast." |
637674_0 | Why Women Need U.S. Estrogen Study | To the Editor: As a medical journalist completing a book on gender bias in health care and health research, I take issue with "Estrogen Trials -- and Errors" (Op-Ed, Sept. 17) by Carol Ann Rinzler. Ms. Rinzler makes it sound as if researchers are secretly and intentionally exposing thousands of women to cancer risks in the Women's Health Initiative study, a Federal research project under the National Institutes of Health. Nothing could be further from the truth. This belief -- that women need to be protected from a callous and insensitive medical establishment -- is one reason that women have long been left out of clinical trials. And this misplaced and overzealous paternalism has resulted in a body of medical knowledge that is largely based on men's bodies. The Women's Health Initiative is one very important step to remedying this imbalance. Even physicians are uncertain about what -- if any -- hormonal regimen is best for postmenopausal women. Women who take estrogen alone may indeed run a higher risk of endometrial cancer, but advocates of this therapy say that, with frequent screening, any cases can be caught -- and cured -- early. Women who take progesterone along with estrogen to negate this risk may lose some of estrogen's heart-protective benefits, and heart disease is the No. 1 killer of American women. The Women's Health Initiative -- with its 10-page comprehensive consent form -- is crucial for determining which therapy is best. The women in the trial will receive frequent health screening. This trial is considered so important, and the women who participate in it will receive such good care, that several researchers I've spoken with have encouraged their mothers to participate. It's scare-mongering like Ms. Rinzler's that threatens the gains women have won in medical research participation. BETH WEINHOUSE Oxford, Miss., Sept. 22, 1993 |
637699_4 | Government Dream Car; Washington and Detroit Pool Resources To Devise a New Approach to Technology | Washington shown a remarkable ability to choose which technologies will pan out for commercial use. "Washington has never ridden to the rescue of anybody," said one skeptic, Maryann N. Keller, an auto industry analyst at the investment bank Furman Selz Inc. and the author of a recent book, "Collision: G.M., Toyota, Volkswagen; The Race to Own the 21st Century" (Doubleday). The biggest result of the collaboration, she said, would be to show Government bureaucrats how difficult it is to make cars cleaner or more fuel efficient. One key element of the fuel efficiency question has nothing to do with technology: it is price. The average American car uses 500 gallons of gasoline a year, which these days costs less than $600. A car that used two-thirds less gasoline would save $400 a year, a benefit for which the typical car buyer would be willing to pay a premium, but not a large one. If the new fuel were even slightly exotic, like compressed natural gas or hydrogen, the dollar savings might be even smaller. But if the goal is to leapfrog to a new technology, experts say Washington could fill a blind spot for Detroit. The car companies are largely staffed by mechanical engineers, people who have spent lifetimes perfecting the internal combustion engine and the steel body. The car that Mr. Clinton and Mr. Gore are talking about, while only vaguely sketched, would have a body built of new lightweight materials and would use fuel cells, flywheels or some other technology with which Washington has some acquaintance. At the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory in Berkeley, Calif., Lee J. Schipper, an expert on energy consumption patterns around the world, said, "This is really going to require a lot of fundamental materials advances." At the moment, in fact, Washington is not even certain what in its cold war-era bag of military tricks would be useful to Detroit. But it intends to look. Dr. Schipper, for example, said that coatings developed to make a Stealth bomber invisible to radar might be adapted to coat auto windows, keeping out some of the sun's heat and reducing the air-conditioning burden. At the White House briefing, a senior official said high-speed rotors developed for the Star Wars strategic defense initiative could be used to store energy in a car. There are no silver bullets, Government and industry officials say, but there might be some silver ore. |
632911_0 | World Economies | |
637230_1 | Asking for Asylum in U.S., Women Tread New Territory | Lawyers and immigration officers often follow their standard line of questioning about politics, and the personal stories of the women never come out. Many judges and immigration officers treat rape and battery -- even at the hands of government officials -- as private acts. And many interpret a woman's transgression of social mores, the refusal of an Iranian woman to cover her head, for instance, as wardrobe choices rather than political expression. But change is afoot. Even though many countries have grown less tolerant of refugees in general, international sympathy has grown for the traumas of women fleeing persecution. The rapes of Muslim and Croat women in Bosnia have been portrayed worldwide as war crimes, not just sexual violence. The United Nations High Commission on Refugees has issued guidelines for evaluating women's applications for asylum, and Canada's Immigration and Refugee Board has started granting asylum to women persecuted because of their sex. In the United States, advocates for immigrants are using scores of test cases, involving rape, domestic violence and defiance of state restrictions on women's activities, to try to expand the grounds for granting asylum. The Immigration and Naturalization Service is also studying Canada's new policy to see if it will revamp its own handling of such cases, said Gregg A. Beyer, director of asylum. Although some critics of the asylum system worry about opening the door to yet another category of applicants, Mr. Beyer said there would be no blanket admissions policies. 'It's Case by Case' "There's always a fear that anything, even a new nationality or a new category like women or gay people, will open up the floodgates," he said. "There's a perception that if a woman from a Muslim country got asylum, many might come thinking they're now all eligible. But they wouldn't be. It's case by case, individual by individual." The test cases brought by advocates for immigrants vary from that of a Honduran woman in New York City whom Honduran police repeatedly refused to protect from her severely abusive husband to that of an Iranian feminist in Boston, an artist who was forced underground in the early 1980's for painting women in nontraditional roles. "It was a very hard period of my life," the Iranian artist, now an art teacher at a day-care center, said in an interview. "First, the authorities insisted that we must cover our heads and bodies to protect us |
637203_0 | World Economies | |
634729_2 | Campus Journal; For Learning Disabled, a Door Opens | a 22-year-old from Kenosha, Wis., was a junior at Morehouse College in Atlanta when his condition was diagnosed as dyslexia after he had seen a guidance counselor about poor grades. He came to Landmark for a summer session and is staying on this fall. "With the tutors and the small classes I'm finally able to zoom in on the things I did not get when I was going through the system," he said. "I really had an anxiety about writing, but I feel that it has receded." Instead of requiring its applicants to take the Scholastic Aptitude Test, Landmark College asks them for their scores on the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale, a series of oral examinations that assesses students' strengths and weaknesses and measures their potential. The average class at Landmark has six or seven students, and each student meets with a tutor for four and a half hours a week. Students are required to live in dormitories, where quiet hours and curfews are strictly enforced. For example, doors are locked at 11 P.M. on weeknights. "It's very structured, and that's difficult sometimes," Mr. Harmon said. "But it's good because if you ever see yourself falling you know you're in a perimeter and someone else is watching you. They won't let you fall." Mr. Harmon received a scholarship that enabled him to go to Landmark. Tuition is $22,400 this year, and room and board cost $5,200. Chad Wilson, 23, was a philosophy major at the New School in Manhattan when he decided that he needed help for his attention-deficit disorder. "I led discussions but couldn't produce on paper," he said. "I'd have a simple five-page essay assigned, and I'd come in with 75 pages that I could not organize and pull together." Mr. Wilson said that at Landmark he is not only learning to focus his thoughts and organize his time but also finding out more about learning disabilities. He said he may pursue a career in educational psychology. Landmark has had a busy first decade. It bought the campus -- a dozen buildings on 125 green acres here in the Connecticut River Valley -- for $600,000 in 1984. The campus previously belonged to Windham College, which closed in 1978. Gene S. Cesari, the current president, said: "We know our mission. There are 3,500 colleges and universities in the United States, and very few of them can make that statement." |
634793_5 | YACHT RACING: Sailing on Troubled Waters; First U.S. All-Female Crew Is Challenged by a High-Tech Boat and a Low Budget | City for Southampton July 3 in the Gold Cup Trans-Atlantic Race, on the boat's transom, in bold letters, was: "Florida Keys & Key West." Frank says she doesn't know why Annapolis is sniveling. "We have done millions of dollars worth of top-notch press for Maryland," she said. In the end, all the money problems come down to the basics: Frank is unable to pay her crew -- they're doing it for the experience -- or to buy spare equipment. The team lost an $8,000 spinnaker pole overboard on the way to England,and blew out five sails. The team has an inventory of 12 sails; other Whitbread teams have 40 or more. Despite the shortfalls, Field says the team is competitive. The yacht had been sailed about 12,000 miles before being leased to Frank. Since taking over the boat, the women have gone aground at least twice, apparently with minor impact. Barbara Span, the yacht's sail trimmer, said from England that she is thrilled with the boat. "It's really wild," she said. "The Whitbread 60's are just so fast and so light. On other boats, it's a thrill to get to 12 knots. On these boats, by the time it gets to 20 knots, it's really fun." Not everyone shares her enthusiasm. Amanda Swan, a crew member from Maiden, the British group that in 1989-90 became the first women's team to sail a Whitbread race, joined Frank's crew for the transatlantic competition in July. She left the boat afterwards. Swan said from New Zealand that the Whitbread 60's, a new class this year, are more complicated than previous boats of its size. "The new 60-footers are so much lighter, faster and more technologically advanced," she said. "Maiden had an international crew, but it was sailing we had to do, not figuring out about water ballast systems and asymmetrical sails." An Unforgiving Boat Swan's concern is that Frank's crew, which has fewer than 6,000 miles in training on the new boat, lacks enough pre-race experience. So far, only one woman, Mikaela Von Koskull of Finland, has sailed in the Whitbread before. "Anyone, given the right crew, should come through as long as they don't push it until something breaks," said the 28-year-old Swan. "But there is no forgiving in a 60-footer, and you can't win that race if you play it safe. You have to take risks, but you still have to |
634637_5 | AT LUNCH WITH: Betty Friedan; Trying to Dispel 'The Mystique Of Age,' at 72 | she began testing her new feminist theories by talking to older women who had combined motherhood and career to see how they had fared. "The few women who had been able to combine those things were in their 50's or 60's, and they looked wonderful and were very vital," she says. "When I asked them about menopause, they said they hadn't had the menopause, and I thought to myself, 'Why was I finding these biological freaks when I was just looking for women who had gone beyond the feminine mystique?' "Well, of course, it turned out that they had ceased their menstrual cycle, but since it hadn't been traumatic and they hadn't taken to their beds, they thought they hadn't had menopause. And it occurred to me then that the way you define yourself and see yourself as a person has a real effect on the aging process and even the biology of it." The years went by. Ms. Friedan became one of the leaders in the battle for women and then, later, found herself in battle with some of her co-leaders, who disagreed with her view that the movement should be more inclusive of family life. The split was worsened by the 1983 publication of her book, "The Second Stage," in which she said that the women's movement was being distorted by feminists who wanted to put down men and marriage and the family. Radical feminists accused Ms. Friedan of selling out. Then one day, to her horror, friends gave her a surprise 60th birthday party, while she was still, in her words, "locked in my own denial about age." "Age to me was just dreary, and I didn't want to think about it," she says with a grimace. "It had nothing to do with me personally." But she was, as she says, "looking for a new question." She remembered her observations about the women she had interviewed years before who had been too involved in what they were doing to pay much attention to menopause. She began to wonder whether women whose lives had been changed by the women's movement might be experiencing a different kind of aging than those before them. She had a similar question about aging in men. So she started in on "The Fountain of Age." If, as she has concluded, an involved life is the secret to aging successfully, Betty Friedan should be |
634674_0 | Public Lands Belong to All Americans, Pardner; Maligned Black Bear | To the Editor: While hunters routinely kill about 21,000 black bears a year in the United States for the frivolous purpose of sport or trophy collection, in "Too Many Bears" (Op-Ed, Sept. 2), Alston Chase blames the victim and argues that bears are guilty of an invasion into human-occupied areas In noting two nonfatal bear attacks on people in California and one fatal attack in Colorado, Mr. Chase concedes that black bear attacks on people are extremely rare. In the 20th century, according to Lynn Rogers, a 25-year Forest Service bear biologist, there have been only 30 fatal black bear attacks on people. For every person killed by a black bear in the United States, 12 people have been killed by spiders, 20 by poisonous snakes, 67 by domestic dogs, 160 by tornadoes, 180 by bees, 374 by lightning, 90,000 by other people (homicides) and 190,000 in traffic accidents. Mr. Chase argues that Colorado's newly won ban on spring bear hunting -- because the shooting of lactating female bears in the spring is a death sentence for orphaned cubs -- is the cause of this alleged crisis. That argument could hardly be more baseless. Of the 28 states that allow black bear hunting in the United States, only 6 allow hunting in spring. Bear attacks are equally uncommon in states with and without spring hunting seasons. Last year's sole fatal black bear attack on a person occurred in a state with spring hunting. If there are increasing bear-human encounters, it is because of a human invasion, not a bear invasion. As our population grows and expands, we encroach on wildlife. The challenge is to live with these animals, not to snuff them out. WAYNE PACELLE Natl. Director, The Fund for Animals New York, Sept. 2, 1993 |
633820_0 | Finding Better Health on Horseback | Karoline Martin saddled her horse and rode into the indoor arena for a class in dressage, the equivalent of ballet on horseback. As she and her horse danced around, the only hint that the 29-year-old woman was blind was her instructor's occasional warning about the location of other horses. Ms. Martin's performance was just one of many on a summer day at the Thorncroft Equestrian Center, a stable with 70 acres of pastures and trails in this western suburb of Philadelphia and an unusual specialty: therapeutic horseback riding. "It's probably safe to say that no other therapy is so effective over such a wide range of disabilities," said Saunders Dixon, who owns Thorncroft and its 40 horses. Half of the center's 300 riding students are children and adults with crippling disabilities, ranging from autism to mental retardation to cerebral palsy to quadriplegia. From Basic to Expert The center has specialized in therapeutic horseback riding for almost 22 years, offering it as part of a nonprofit program that depends on gifts, grants and many volunteers. Mr. Dixon sees the therapy as not only physically beneficial but emotionally uplifting and educational as well. Essentially, the therapy means riding under the supervision of an instructor who has been trained to work with the disabled. Their equestrian skills can range up to the expert level, but a severely impaired rider may simply sit on the horse and hold on for a half-hour walk while a therapist teaches riding techniques and exercises. Two or three volunteers walk beside the horse to make sure the rider does not fall off. There may be no objective measures by which to prove that equestrian therapy works. But William Scebbi, executive director of the North American Riding for the Handicapped Association in Denver, said no such scientific proof is needed. "You can see the success stories in the eyes and voices of the patients, the parents, the instructors, the physical therapists," he said. Greater Confidence Ms. Martin, the dressage performer, is an engineer who was blinded in a chemical accident three years ago. Now riding has become her passion, she said. The lessons have also given her more confidence and skill in getting around in a dark world. "The horse moves so fast, I have to be a lot more attuned to the environment, and I apply that elsewhere," she said as she sat in the saddle. The handicapped |
634105_0 | Putting Tomatoes to the Taste Test | THE Brandywine tomato is what started the whole thing. "That is the ugliest tomato," said Cousin Janice the last time she dropped by with a couple melons, a jar of pickles, three zukes, some peppers and a bag of her favorites. "Celebrity," she said, pulling a perfectly round red tomato out of the bag. It was big, too. "Now that's what a tomato is supposed to look like." I tasted it. It was pretty good, though the skin was a little tough, and I like my tomatoes tangier. Janice peered at the bulbous Brandywine, whose fragile pink skin blushes almost violet-red if allowed to ripen on the vine. "Look at how it splits," she said. "And it's not even round." True. Its lumpy protuberances remind some of Karl Malden's nose. Its thin skin tends to break apart, sending the juice oozing through your fingers if you dare to carry it three blocks to a friend's house. But the taste. It's got that old-time flavor. "Yeah, it tastes good," Janice allowed. "But it's ugly. I like my tomatoes to look like tomatoes." See how Big Boy has entered our collective unconscious? When the first tomato poked its head out of the Peruvian Andes, it was a wizened little fruit no bigger than a marble. But as ancient gardeners cultivated it, selecting out the biggest and tastiest fruit, the tomatl, as it was called in the Yucatan, grew in size and varied in color. Long before Celebrity rolled out of the field, the world was wallowing in tomatoes that were not only pink, red and yellow, but purple, white, green with yellow stripes, yellow with pink stripes and orange splashed with red. They were lobed or ridged or smooth. I've heard some gardeners swear that a red tomato with a tough green top is one sign of a great-tasting tomato. Are green genes linked to flavor? Is a thin skin? Or is it just that when botanists keep crossing tomatoes to find a hybrid that will ship as well as a tennis ball, flavor flies out of the window? Last week, I asked a few friends at the office to taste some heirloom tomatoes I'd picked up at the Greenmarket in Union Square. Heirlooms are varieties that have been treasured for generations because of great flavor or some other trait. They are often lost to commerce, then reappear when some home gardener |
633771_3 | CLINTON SCRAMBLES TO FIND FINANCING FOR HEALTH PLAN | say the proposed cutbacks in the growth of Medicare and Medicaid are too big, and lobbyists for the elderly note that Medicare was already trimmed in the budget package just enacted. On Thursday, Hillary Rodham Clinton told Congress that the White House was willing to reconsider these proposals. Capping Health Costs The premise for many of the numbers in the plan is the assumption that the Federal Government can, by law, curb the growth of health spending. The Clinton plan includes a formula that would put a tight lid on the growth of private health spending, as well as Medicare and Medicaid. Under this formula, in the year 2000, the Government would not allow any increase in medical spending beyond that needed to keep pace with inflation and population growth. Hospital officials say the health-care industry probably cannot curb costs so fast, and many Administration officials agree. In recent weeks, Laura D'Andrea Tyson, chairwoman of the President's Council of Economic Advisers, and her staff have raised questions about the validity of numbers being used in the President's plan. But Hillary Rodham Clinton and Mr. Magaziner insist that Medicare, Medicaid and private insurers can save huge sums by cutting waste and limiting payments to doctors and hospitals. Some Administration officials say they worry that abrupt cutbacks could have devastating effects on the quality of care and access to care. Other officials say such concerns are unfounded and cite the experience of manufacturing companies that have become stronger after cutting costs. James D. Bentley, senior vice president of the American Hospital Association, said his group was willing to consider a national budget that set limits for spending on the standard package of health benefits to be guaranteed to all Americans under Mr. Clinton's plan. But, he said, the budget should not be fixed in advance by a rigid formula. Rather, he said, the budget should be set annually, "in view of actual experience, the state of the economy and the needs of the population." Robert D. Reischauer, director of the Congressional Budget Office, said, "We should focus first and foremost on total national health expenditures, not on the share of health expenditures that flows through the Federal budget." Premium Cap or Price Control? Under Mr. Clinton's plan, the Government would control health spending by limiting the premiums that could be paid for private health insurance. Insurers, he assumes, would then have to |
635760_0 | Cuba Gives U.S. 2 Drug Suspects | Two Americans suspected of trying to smuggle cocaine were handed over by Cuba to the United States Drug Enforcement Administration this weekend and flown to Miami for prosecution. United States law enforcement officials said the case marked the first time that the Cuban authorities had handed over suspected drug traffickers to their American counterparts. The case began last month, drug agency officials said, after the two suspects picked up several bales of cocaine that were dropped into the Straits of Florida by a plane that was tracked from Colombia. The suspects, Cuban immigrants from the Miami area, fled in their speedboat, whose presumed destination was Florida. As a United States helicopter chased the boat, the two were seen tossing the bales over board. Their vessel, the Thief of Hearts, crossed into Cuban waters, where they were arrested after the boat ran out of fuel, agency officials said. The suspects, identified as Jorge Roberto Lam Rojas, 33, and Jose Angel Clemente Alvarez, 31, were returned to the United States on Saturday evening by drug agency officials. The United States Coast Guard recovered 720 pounds of cocaine in nine bales, and American officials offered the drugs to Cuba to aid its prosecution of the two men. But the Cubans , seeking to highlight a rare instance of cooperation between Washington and Havana, said they preferred that prosecution be conducted by the United States. Since Cuban officials were accused of involvement in shipping Colombian cocaine to the United States in the late 1980's, the authorities of both countries say cooperation in anti-drug efforts has grown quietly but steadily. In one example last year, United States law enforcement officials provided Cuba with evidence that was used to convict a smuggler caught in its waters. |
635702_0 | World Economies | |
635730_7 | America Unplugged: Entering a Wireless Era -- A special report; F.C.C. Clearing Airwaves For Phones of the Future | handle voice, video and data." The Technology Computer Clarity From Cell to Cell Like today's cellular telephone systems, P.C.S. networks will consist of radio relay stations or "cell sites" -- each typically a few short antennas and a receiver-transmitter -- scattered across many locations in a city. These antennas pick up signals from wireless telephones, and they are linked together by wires or microwave transmissions into a network that can route calls from one place to another. The networks are connected directly to the local telephone company, which can then link a wireless caller to a person speaking on a conventional plug-in phone. As with cellular systems, the key for personal communications networks is to set up a number of different cell sites that each cover a different part of the city. Using many cell sites makes it possible to use the same frequencies in several places at the same time. But the P.C.S. systems will be different in several respects. While cellular systems employ a few huge antennas that are almost as big as television towers, the new networks will scatter hundreds of antennas in a large city like New York that are small enough to fit on a window ledge or even on a lamppost. Better Sound Quality Because wireless signals will travel much shorter distances, customers can use handheld units that are cheaper and lower powered than cellular phones. The greater number of cell sites will also enable the carriers to re-use the same radio frequencies throughout the city, allowing for more customers. And because the P.C.S. networks will transmit signals in digital form, the quality of the sound should be better for voice conversations and the transmission of computer data will be much more efficient than with today's analog wireless systems. Although the cellular companies are slowly converting to digital systems as well, they cannot stop serving customers that use telephones based on older analog technology. In the meantime, however, they are trying to roll out a new technique for sending computer data by mixing it in between the voice-signals of cellular traffic. The Impact Why No Company Can Go It Alone Almost every communications company has something to gain or something to fear with the expansion of wireless and next week's new rules. "This will shake the foundations of the entire telecommunications industry," remarked Alfred C. Sikes, who served as the chairman of the F.C.C. |
632074_1 | A Cancer Drug May Help Heart Ills | in more than 1.5 million American women in this decade, the National Cancer Institute estimates. In the study, scientists examined the medical records of 2,365 postmenopausal breast-cancer patients taking part in a randomized trial of tamoxifen. The researchers, from the Stockholm Breast Cancer Study Group, found a significantly lower number of hospital admissions for heart disease among women who received long-term treatment with the drug. Drop in 'Bad Cholesterol' Results of the study, which was led by Dr. Lars E. Rutqvist and Dr. Anders Mattsson of the Karolinska Hospital in Stockholm, are reported in today's issue of The Journal of the National Cancer Institute. Dr. Susan G. Nayfield, program director for the Division of Cancer Prevention at the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, Md., said, "In women who take tamoxifen following surgery for breast cancer, we have observed a drop in low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, or bad cholesterol, that begins within about two weeks of initiating the drug." "What this study does," she said, "is tell us that in women taking tamoxifen, there are fewer hospitalizations due to heart disease, which essentially means less suffering from heart disease. And it makes us confident that the cardiovascular benefits are more than just a laboratory finding, that they translate into real experiences of real women." Women in the study group were followed for up to 13 years, with a median follow-up period of six years. Those who received tamoxifen for two years had almost one-third fewer hospital admissions for heart disease than those in a comparison group. Those who took the drug for five years had almost two-thirds fewer admissions than those who took tamoxifen for only two years. More than one million women worldwide are believed to be taking tamoxifen to reduce the risk of breast cancer recurrence, and some women have taken the drug for more than 10 years. Nevertheless, researchers want to determine the long-term effects of tamoxifen use. Several previous studies have hinted at increased risk of uterine, liver and other cancers. Dr. Bernard Fisher, chairman of the National Surgical Adjuvant Breast and Bowel Project and a professor at the University of Pittsburgh, has begun recruiting women for the national Breast Cancer Prevention Trial. The five-year study will examine the preventive benefits of tamoxifen in 16,000 women over the age of 35 who are considered at high risk of developing breast cancer. So far 9,000 women have been recruited. |
632064_1 | Tribe Cautioned on Request for U.S. Recognition | authority over its members. The documentation of all three points -- historical continuity, community life and political authority -- is required for Federal recognition. Recognition a First Step But a lawyer for the Paugussetts, Bernard Wishnia, said much of the information had already been collected, including genealogical records linking William Sherman, a Paugussett who re-established a reservation in 1875 by buying a quarter-acre of land in Trumbull, to the tribe known when Connecticut was a colony. Under the Federal Indian Gaming Act of 1988, sovereign Indian nations can operate gaming casinos, and the Paugussetts have said they want to develop a casino as an economic development project for their tribe. In addition to their casino plans, the Paugussetts need Federal recognition to qualify for health, housing and other aid provided by the Bureau of Indian Affairs and to pursue the land claims in Bridgeport and surrounding towns that they have filed in Federal District Court. In July the judge in those cases, Peter C. Dorsey, ruled that the Federal courts did not have jurisdiction until a tribe was recognized by the Federal Government. Some of the land claims have now been filed in state courts. The director of the bureau's Office of Tribal Services, Carol A. Bacon, stressed in a letter to the Paugussett chief, Aurelius H. Piper Jr., that the review's purpose was only to note areas that need more documentation before the application was formally judged, a process that could take years. One challenge for the Paugussetts, is to show a continuous link between the tribe that existed in colonial times and the tribe that has been recognized by the State of Connecticut in the 20th century; any break in continuity would make the Paugussetts ineligible for recognition. "A lack of continuity is suggested," Ms. Bacon wrote, "by the almost complete absence in your supporting material of documentation from the century between 1817 and 1927." Opposition From the State The review also said that the application lacked proof that the Paugussetts have functioned as a tribal community beyond the reservation in Trumbull, where its chiefs have lived, or that people identified as Paugussetts have acknowledged the tribe's political authority over them. State officials have joined local communities in opposing the Paugussetts' land claims. Today the Connecticut Attorney General, Richard Blumenthal, intervened in State Superior Court to support Southbury, Shelton and Trumbull against suits claiming land in those towns. |
632236_0 | Agency to End Use of Drug That Halts Breast Milk Flow | The Food and Drug Administration responded to a petition it received from a consumer health group today by saying that it would begin steps to end use of a prescription drug to treat breast engorgement after childbirth. The group, the Public Citizen Health Research Group, which is affiliated with Ralph Nader's Public Citizen consumer organization, sent a letter today to the Drug Commissioner, Dr. David A. Kessler, asking that the agency stop any maker from recommending the drug, bromocriptine mesylate. The drug is designed to stop milk production for women who do not plan to nurse after childbirth, thus preventing postpartum breast engorgement. Bromocriptine is also used to treat Parkinson's disease and overly active pituitary glands, among other conditions. The health group said the drug had been shown to be useful in treating these problems. Dr. Sidney M. Wolfe, director of the health group, said that the drug remained on the market for treating breast engorgement four years after a drug agency panel recommended that the agency withdraw its approval because few women appeared to benefit from the drug. In the time since this recommendation, Dr. Wolfe said, the agency has received more than 220 reports of adverse reactions linked to the drug's use, including heart attacks, strokes, seizures and 13 deaths. About 300,000 women each year still receive bromocriptine to reduce engorgement, he said. An agency spokeswoman, June Wyman, said that agency officials held a meeting today after receiving the 11-page letter and that they decided to begin action to remove breast engorgement from the approved uses listed on the label of bromocriptine. The agency will publish its intentions in the Federal Register and allow for a hearing for companies who want to appeal the action, she said. The Sandoz Pharmaceuticals Corporation of East Hanover, N.J., the principal maker of bromocriptine, which it markets under the name Parlodel, said today that it believed the drug was safe. The company has yearly sales of about $12.5 million for Parlodel used to treat breast engorgement. |
632288_4 | CLINTON CUTS AIMS ON MENTAL HEALTH AND DENTAL COSTS | care in that year, and hospital coverage for mental illness would be increased to 90 days, from 60 days. In addition, the documents say, the Administration hopes to eliminate limits on the number of outpatient psychotherapy visits in the year 2000. But such improvements are contingent on "savings from reform" of the health care system and on of Mr. Clinton's efforts to reduce the Federal budget deficit, the documents say. In a letter to the White House this week, Senator Paul Wellstone of Minnesota and 14 other Democratic senators argued against "artificial caps on the length of treatment" for people with mental disorders. "For too long," the senators said, "standard health insurance plans have imposed arbitrary restrictions on treatment for mental and addictive disorders. Such discriminatory policies are based on stigma and outmoded assumptions about these illnesses." White House documents show that Mr. Clinton's plan would require all insurers and employers to cover some mental health services. For treatment in a hospital or a group home, the required coverage would be "30 days per episode," or spell of mental illness, up to a total of 60 days a year. Limits would be stricter for services outside a hospital. Insurance provided in the basic benefits package would cover part of the cost for 30 visits to a psychotherapist; White House documents say that in many cases the patient would have to pay half the cost. A patient's initial visit to a psychotherapist would not be subject to this limit. Dental Service for Children Under Mr. Clinton's plan, the initial package of benefits would include dental services for children under 18 years old. In the year 2000, when dental benefits may be extended to adults, low-income people may pay as little as $20 for each visit to a dentist. Other patients would be expected to pay 40 percent of each dental bill, up to a total of $1,500 a year. But even in the year 2000, patients would generally be expected to pay 20 percent of the cost of the first 12 sessions with a psychotherapist and 50 percent for subsequent visits. The documents list routine physical examinations among the services that may not be covered till the year 2000. In that year, the documents say, the Government may require employers and insurers to cover "periodic medical examinations: every three years for individuals age 20 to 39, every two years for adults |
633335_2 | Study Says Half of Adults in U.S. Lack Reading and Math Abilities | schooling and even in fundamental literacy. But the demands of the workplace simultaneously have vastly increased. We simply are not keeping pace with the kinds of skills required in today's economy." The study found that older people tended to have lower test scores and attributed this trend to the fact that they generally had less education than younger people. New Efforts Expected At a minimum, the findings are certain to prompt renewed efforts to bolster adult education and literacy programs across the country, which typically are run by community colleges, churches or service organizations in a fragmented way, reaching only a small fraction of adults who have trouble reading. Until now, corporations have taken the lead in literacy programs through worker retraining programs. "This is a national problem," Ms. Kunin said. 'We cannot be competitive as a nation or improve the standard of living unless we are able to improve the literacy rate." Perhaps not surprisingly, the study found that participants with higher incomes did better on the test. Those with the lowest scores earned median weekly salaries of $230 to $245; those with the highest scores had median incomes of $620 to $680. Businesses estimate they lose $25 billion to $30 billion a year nationwide in lost productivity, errors and accidents attributable to poor literacy. "We have estimated that only about 25 percent of the adult population is highly literate," said Brenda Bell, vice president of marketing for the National Alliance of Business, a group of 3,000 businesses engaged in training and education issues. A growing number of companies, she said, have put together programs with local community colleges in which professors come to offices and factories to help workers with a variety of skills from basic tasks to more complicated computer skills. Businesses Try to Help But corporate efforts to date, as well as those sponsored by local community groups, pale given the size of the problem. "This is clearly disappointing in terms of where we are and where we want to be as a society," said Irwin Kirsch of the Educational Testing Service, who led the project. "It is not a singular problem and points to a complexity of literacy problems and challenges we face as a nation as we move into the next century." The test takers were measured in three different areas of literacy: reading comprehension, filling out documents and answering questions that require simple |
633544_0 | Women Notably Absent At Religions Parliament | To the Editor: I was fascinated (and disheartened) to read about the Parliament of the World's Religions held in Chicago (news article, Aug. 30). Surely, a few women might have attended, if only to put up a good front. And if there were women in attendance, they were certainly in the silent minority, since you didn't mention even one. Presumably, males dominate and operate most of the religions of the world, while women quietly observe the rules and regulations, perform their tasks, teach the faith to their children, contribute their time, money and lives. Women support the faith as much as men do, but apparently don't deserve an invitation to the ball in Chicago. They are rarely if ever to be counted among the elders, leaders, clergy and hierarchy, where the power lies and where the decision making takes place. With all due respect to the cardinals, Buddhist monks, Muslim leaders, Orthodox prelates, Hindus, rabbis, swamis -- indeed all the gentlemen present -- they represent barely 50 percent of the constituency. Surely, they must feel uncomfortable in the limelight while the other 50 percent is unseen, unheard and largely forgotten. MARY RODGERS BOTTIGLIERI Ossining, N.Y., Sept. 1, 1993 |
637367_1 | Pollution in China Sets Off a Battle Fatal to Two | "frightened and moved" by its intensity. The incident is notable because it reflects the seeming powerlessness of China's environmental authorities to respond to public health hazards created by industrial concerns with substantial local backing. In this case, a chemical factory subsidized by the Lanzhou Chemical Company on land provided by a small village on the outskirts of Lanzhou, Gansu's capital, went into business last year producing sulfuric acid and carbon disulfide without obtaining any of the required environmental permits. The sulfurous stench from the plant immediately set off an uproar, with residents complaining of dizziness, fatigue and respiratory ailments. Some parents fitted children with gas masks. In addition, the plant fouled the Yellow River, the region's most important water supply, with untreated waste products described as "blues, greens and yellows," the newspaper, Nan Cai Zhou Mo (Southern Skill Weekend), said. Among the reported effluents was hydrogen sulfide, a toxic and flammable gas. The newspaper said that because the chemical factory was just upstream of the former nuclear plant, called Factory No. 471, the waste contaminated the plant's water supply and that of the adjoining households of its workers. The water was so contaminated, local officials said, that it was unsafe for industrial use even after it passed through the former nuclear plant's purification system. Factory No. 471, now engaged in unspecified "civilian" production, appealed June 5 to local authorities to shut down the chemical factory, citing increased disease, the death of "all fish and frogs" in the vicinity and the death of a number of goats who drank from an irrigation ditch near the plant. Skirmishes Begin Some 200 factory workers presented their petition to the provincial leaders, but nothing happened. On June 28, as many as 300 workers held a demonstration in which 3 were injured in an unspecified skirmish. Finally, in early July, the newspaper reported, the plant was shut down on the order of the local authorities, but it defiantly resumed operations on July 24. The provincial authorities then issued a stronger warning, saying the chemical factory's managers would be held responsible for ignoring the order. But this, too, was ignored. Several clashes followed and in one a 60-year-old man was beaten to death, suffering 17 compound fractures, local officials reported. A youth also died from multiple wounds, including severed genitals, the newspaper reported. A dozen others were injured before riot policemen arrived to disperse the crowds. |
637266_0 | Migrating Birds Set Compasses By Sunlight and Stars | SCIENTISTS have known for more than two decades that birds and many other animals navigate with help from the earth's magnetic field. It now appears, however, that birds must frequently calibrate their sense of magnetic direction using many nonmagnetic cues, including the natural polarization of daylight. New research, moreover, suggests that in at least one species, the bird's eye detects the earth's magnetic field using the energy of daylight to sensitize a chemical in the retina to the earth's magnetic polarity. The navigating skills of birds, amphibians, reptiles, fish and even mammals seem to depend on complex arrays of sensory cues, including magnetic fields, visual patterns, sounds and even smells, interacting in subtle ways. Some scientists say the latest investigations support their contention that magnetic fields have biological effects on human beings, as well, a suggestion that has been discounted by many physicists and physiologists. In any case, two recent papers in the British journal Nature imply that biological navigation systems are even more complex and subtle than many investigators had believed. In the first paper, Dr. Kenneth P. Able and his wife, Mary A. Able, both of the State University of New York at Albany, presented experimental evidence that Savannah sparrows, which migrate between the Northeast and the Deep South or Mexico, not only see patterns of polarization in the daylight sky, but use the orientation of these patterns as a navigation aid for calibrating their magnetic directional sense. Surprisingly, the birds are not influenced by the position of the sun itself, but by the directional polarization of sunlight scattered by the atmosphere -- the "Rayleigh scattering" responsible for the blue color of the sky. "Probably, these birds see a very dark polarized band in the sky 90 degrees from the sun," said Dr. James L. Gould, a biologist at Princeton University. "The tilt of this band, which is invisible to human eyes, would tell a bird the position of the sun and his orientation on earth." The polarization would be visible to a bird only under a clear sky; an overcast would block it completely. Many fish, including tuna and salmon, are also excellent navigators, but to use polarized light as an aid to calibrating their magnetic sense they would have to swim very close to the surface, because polarization is filtered out by water at depths greater than a few inches, Dr. Able said. Although most human |
637266_6 | Migrating Birds Set Compasses By Sunlight and Stars | "Seeing" Magnetic Fields In a comment published in Nature about this paper, Dr. Gould said the experiment provided "dramatic evidence" supporting a theory advanced in 1977 by M. J. M. Leask of Oxford University in England, which was widely discounted at the time. Dr. Leask proposed that in some birds, at least, visible light enters the eye, impinges on the retina, and excites electrons in a pigment called rhodopsin, which is known to be essential to vision. If some of these electrons happen to remain in an excited state, according to the Leask theory, the pigment becomes "paramagnetic," a state in which it could be affected by magnetic fields. The experiments conducted by Dr. Wiltschko and his colleagues do not prove this theory, but they seem to show that there is a link between vision and the magnetic sense, at least in Australian silvereye birds. For most creatures capable of orienting themselves with respect to magnetic fields, however, the mineral magnetite is still believed to be the major sensory agent. It is present in bacteria that navigate by magnetic fields, as well as in the many vertebrates known to feel magnetic fields. Dr. Joseph L. Kirschvink of the California Institute of Technology has determined that the human brain, like the brains of many other animals, contains tiny crystals of magnetite, a naturally magnetic mineral. He believes that this supports the controversial theory that magnetic fields may cause physical or chemical changes in the brain, including, possibly, cancer or other diseases. "There is no reproducible evidence that human beings can sense the earth's magnetic field or orient themselves by magnetic cues," he said. "No one has replicated experiments conducted during the late 1970's by Dr. R. Robin Baker of the University of Manchester, England, in which he claimed that human subjects could orient themselves magnetically. "On the other hand," Dr. Kirschvink said, "that doesn't necessarily mean that magnetic fields cannot be felt at some subconscious level, or that they have no biological effects." Harm from Power Lines? In an interview, Dr. Kirschvink took no stand on the issue of whether magnetic fields emanating from power lines and electric appliances could be harmful to human health, but said, "you can't rule such effects out a priori on a physical basis." The ion channels of the nervous system, which control many physiological functions, may be influenced by magnetic fields of the kind generated |
636128_1 | Scientists Trace 'Voices' in Schizophrenia | in a living person with schizophrenia." The study used single photon emission computed tomography, an imaging technique that offers a snapshot of blood flow in the brain of a person who has been injected with a brew of short-lived radioactive isotopes. The isotopes, swept along with the blood, quickly flow to the parts of the brain that are most active at that moment, lighting up those areas in X-ray images. This was the first study to use the method with patients while they were hearing voices, thus offering a picture of the parts of the brain most active during auditory hallucinations. The test was done on 12 men with schizophrenia who reported hearing voices, and was repeated an average of five months later, after a course of medication had reduced their symptoms, including the auditory hallucinations. In the first test, the men were trained to raise a finger to signal they were hearing voices so that the brain imaging could capture activity while they were hallucinating. None of the men reported having the auditory hallucinations during the second test, which allowed a comparison with brain activity in the first test. "Broca's area is a surprise, since that's where you make sounds, not where you hear them," said Dr. Jerome Engel, a neurologist at the medical school of the University of California at Los Angeles. "I would have expected more brain activity in Wernicke's area, which is where you hear; the usual assumption is that people are listening to thoughts during auditory hallucinations. But this finding suggests that, in terms of unusual brain activity, auditory hallucinations have more to do with the generation of words in the brain than listening to them." The new findings support those of a 1992 American study that used less precise brain imaging techniques with patients who reported auditory hallucinations. That study, reported in The American Journal of Psychiatry, found reduced activity in Wernicke's area and increased activity in Broca's area. In the new study, there were also slightly elevated levels in the left temporal lobe, the site of the auditory cortex, where the meanings of sounds are recognized. The left temporal lobe is the most common site of epileptic seizures that produce auditory hallucinations, and it is also the area where direct electrical stimulation produces the experience of hearing voices. Several researchers, using autopsies and other techniques, have found abnormalities in the left temporal lobe |
634996_1 | U.S. Altering Tactics in Drug War | Legal Action Center, a national drug policy organization based in New York. The preoccupation, she said, is "What do we do about the supply of drugs?" as opposed to "What are we doing about demand, consumption?" She added, "Prevention and treatment must be equal partners with law enforcement." Senior Administration officials say the National Security Council has been arguing that Washington should be spending most of its overseas anti-drug budget not on stopping smuggling, as is now the case, but on programs and police investigations that would dovetail with the D.E.A.'s new strategy. The National Security Council's concerns were first reported in The Washington Post yesterday. The Government now spends about $1 billion a year on anti-drug operations overseas, with nearly 70 percent of that used to combat smugglers. But the council's effort has been meeting stiff opposition, the officials said, from the Pentagon, Coast Guard and Customs Service, whose air, sea and border patrols receive most of the money allocated to catch smugglers. In policy meetings that are expected to be concluded in the next few weeks, the National Security Council has agreed with nearly all anti-drug officials and most independent experts that efforts to intercept drugs have been a failure and have wasted hundreds of millions of dollars. Congress Changing Budget Mr. Clinton has agreed to a Congressional proposal to cut $143 million in the budget for the next fiscal year that had been earmarked for treatment and anti-drug education. In the last few weeks, appropriations subcommittees in both the House and the Senate have approved reductions of about a third in the State Department's $147 million budget for international anti-drug operations, mainly in Latin America and Asia. State Department officials said these cuts were likely to force sharp reductions in the unit of helicopters and light planes that it operates in Latin America. Robert C. Bonner, the head of the Drug Enforcement Administration, said those cuts might lead to the closing of a heavily fortified base at Santa Lucia, in the heart of Peru's main coca growing region. D.E.A. agents and the Peruvian police use the base to stage raids on jungle laboratories used in the first steps of refining cocaine. Later this month, Dr. Lee P. Brown, the head of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, is expected to make public the Administration's overall drug strategy. "But it is so general," said one |
635082_0 | At the Airport, Immigration Wants to See Your Palm | In an experiment under way at Kennedy and Newark International Airports, Immigration and Naturalization Service inspectors are asking a growing number of travelers to, one might say, lend them a hand. The experimental program, called Inspass, is meant eventually to automate the immigration inspections that every traveler from abroad, United States citizen or not, undergoes. The heart of the program is a device that measures hands. It produces neither handprints nor fingerprints, but a series of measurements -- length, width, thickness -- that, the Immigration Service says, is different for every hand. The traveler fills out a standard form, giving name, age, address, passport number and the now-routine assurances that he has never engaged in espionage, terrorism or genocide, among other things. Then he is invited to visit an Immigration Service enrollment center, where an electronic reader performs the hand measurement. The measurements are encoded and entered into a data bank, and entered, too, on a wallet-size "smart card" the traveler will carry. The Hybrid Machine When a traveler who is already enrolled in the voluntary program arrives from overseas, he bypasses the frequently long lines at immigration inspection counters and goes instead to an Inspass kiosk, a brightly lighted device that seems like a cross between a soft-drink-can dispenser and a bank's automatic teller machine. He slips the Inspass card into a slot, and Immigration Service computers check to make sure that the holder is entering the country legally and is not being sought by law-enforcement agencies. The traveler then thrusts his right hand into a larger slot -- the hand reader -- where small metal pins fit snugly between his fingers. The machine takes his hand measurements and compares them with the digitalized measurements embedded in the smart card to certify that he is who the card says he is. Next, he punches his flight number into the kiosk's key pad. The machine whirs and dispenses what is, in effect, a pass to enter the United States. In fact it says, "Welcome to the United States." Foreigners enrolled in the program get something called a Form I-94 Departure Record, which they must keep until they leave the country. Finally, a gate next to the kiosk swings open and the traveler moves on to the baggage-claim area and then to Customs. With practice, the immigration part of the process can take 35 seconds, less than half the time an |
635076_0 | Zanzibar Journal; Where Ghosts Dwell, Free Enterprise Moves In | In the last few years, multiparty democracy, freedom of speech and plenty of tourists have come to Zanzibar, but in the town's twisting narrow alleys and crumbling buildings the ghosts still refuse to rest. Like many Zanzibaris, Ahmed S. Ahmed says he has seen people possessed. His uncle died of a mysterious illness -- a ghost's revenge, he says. And thousands of ghosts are said to roam the town still. But if Mr. Ahmed, director of conservation and development of Zanzibar's historic district, acknowledges the power of ghosts and of the past, he is also very conscious that the future of this island is closely tied to the wave of democracy and economic change that is sweeping through East Africa and to its gradual disengagement from the strict socialist dogma that prevailed in Tanzania for more than 20 years. "There have been 20 years of decay in Zanzibar," said Mr. Ahmed, who oversees several million dollars of foreign investment to rebuild the old city. "Twenty years of absolutely nothing. Now the private sector is increasing." Once the main trading center of East Africa and the largest grower of cloves in the world, Zanzibar, part of the United Republic of Tanzania, had long since fallen on desperate times. Now, ever so slowly, change is coming to this sleepy tropical island lapped by cobalt blue waters. Tourists Flooding In Many of the antique clocks in Zanzibar's old town still do not work, some old buildings have collapsed and sewage seeps up through the streets, but the island is struggling back. There is a very active political opposition. Major hotel projects are being proposed and tourists -- from shoestring travelers to princes and millionaires -- are flooding in. Private investment is allowed. And as in past centuries, Zanzibar (several small islands, the largest of which is called Zanzibar, as is the capital) thrives off a pirate economy. Traders bring in mostly electronic goods from Dubai and smuggle them to the mainland. And Zanzibaris say the island has become a haven for money-laundering and a way station for Asian heroin shipments. Zanzibar has at times had a shameful position in Africa. For over a century, more than 10,000 African slaves were sent every year to Arabia and India. The island's ties to the Arab world date back to the ninth century and as Zanzibaris became the trade link between Africa and the Arab world, |
632484_0 | Observer; Besides The Pencil Box | For children about to start school here are words of wisdom to ease the long path toward living happily ever after: First, because the Michael Jackson matter is dramatizing the American press's descent into swinishness, hear the French poet Baudelaire's thought on journalism: "I am unable to understand how a man of honor can take a newspaper in his hands without a shudder of disgust." Or consider H. L. Mencken on the ideal tabloid: "It should be printed throughout, as First Readers are printed, in words of one syllable. It should avoid every idea that is beyond the understanding of a boy of ten. It should print no news about anything that morons are not interested in." Mencken on success is worth remembering too: "No one in this world, so far as I know -- and I have searched the records for years, and employed agents to help me -- has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people." And here is George Bernard Shaw describing a journalist: ". . . a cheerful, affable young man who is disabled for ordinary business pursuits by a congenital erroneousness which renders him incapable of describing accurately anything he sees, or understanding or reporting accurately anything he hears. As the only employment in which these defects do not matter is journalism (for a newspaper, not having to act on its descriptions and reports, but only to sell them to idly curious people, has nothing but honor to lose by inaccuracy and unveracity), he has perforce become a journalist, and has to keep up an air of high spirits through a daily struggle with his own illiteracy and the precariousness of his employment." Though it was 1930 Sinclair Lewis seemed to be talking about today's attack on Eurocentric education as an oppressive glorification of dead white males: ". . . 'humanism' means so many things that it means nothing. It may infer anything from a belief that Greek and Latin are more inspiring than the dialect of contemporary peasants to a belief that any living peasant is more interesting than a dead Greek." Tom Stoppard's "Travesties" has James Joyce cite the dead Greek Homer to explain why art is humanity's most precious asset: "An artist is the magician put among men to gratify -- capriciously -- their urge for immortality. The temples are built and brought down |
632421_0 | Brazil Shows Concern For Indigenous People | To the Editor: "Brazil's Guilt in the Amazon Massacre" (Op-Ed, Aug. 26) by Terence Turner, professor of anthropology at the University of Chicago, is grossly misleading, to say the least. The investigations of the alleged massacre of Yanomami Indians are still under way, and not a single corpse has been found so far that could be convincingly tied to the denounced events. Notwithstanding this, Professor Turner, a member of the human rights commission of the American Anthropological Association, mentions 70 victims "shot, hacked to pieces and burned" somewhere in the Amazon, and he accuses Brazilians of an "increasingly hostile attitude toward the indigenous people." Brazil is a complex multiracial democratic country, as Professor Turner should know, and the kind of bigotry that he describes has never been prevalent in our society. The simple fact that the rights of indigenous people were consecrated by a Constitution written only five years ago indicates our concern over our underprivileged minorities. We, of course, enjoy freedom of opinion, like all democratic societies, but there is no "widespread backing" for a repeal of the constitutional protections granted to the Indians, as Professor Turner states. In fact, we have nothing in our recent history that we should be ashamed of in relation to official attitudes toward the Indians. Our army never fought indigenous tribes, and we never took pride in such actions in our movies or in other cultural manifestations. FRANCISCO BAKER Press Secretary of the President Republic of Brazil Brasilia, Aug. 26, 1993 |
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