This is the archive for April 2009
By Steven Thomma and Margaret Talev
McClatchy Newspapers (MCT)
WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama marked his first 100 days in office Wednesday with a broad assurance that the country is on the road to recovery and that there is no cause for panic on threats ranging from the swine flu to nuclear weapons in Pakistan.
In an evening news conference, Obama defended his formal ban of extreme techniques the Bush administration used to question terrorism suspects, and his decision to declassify memos outlining the tactics. He said there have been "no circumstances" so far "that would make me second-guess the decision that I've made."
Posted by courier at 09:57 AM. Filed under: News
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By Kevin G. Hall and Margaret Talev
McClatchy Newspapers (MCT)
WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama announced Thursday that Italian carmaker Fiat would buy Chrysler and that Chrysler would enter a surgical bankruptcy that would let the storied American carmaker shed debts that it could not negotiate away.
"For too long Chrysler moved too slowly to adapt to the future. My job as president is to ensure that if tax dollars are being put on the line they are being invested in a real fix that will make Chrysler competitive," Obama said.
Posted by courier at 09:46 AM. Filed under: News
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Swine flu refers to influenza
caused by viruses endemic to pigs
CDC photo
MEXICO CITY — Schools closed Friday for 6.1 million students across Mexico City and its suburbs, along with public museums and libraries, due to an unusually fierce swine flu outbreak that has killed at least 20 people. Another 40 deaths are being investigated for a connection to the virus.
Authorities in the capital — home to about half of the 18 million people in the metropolitan area — planned to hand out surgical-type masks on the crowded subway and public bus system, prohibit mass events and perhaps even cancel professional soccer matches in an attempt to contain the outbreak.
Posted by courier at 08:59 AM. Filed under: News
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Courier Staff Report
The process of nominating teachers and counselors for the annual House Teacher of the Year awards has already resulted in dozens of nominations being turned in, and hundreds more of the nominating forms are expected to be turned in when phase one of the process of choosing the winners ends, the nomination phase, ends Wednesday afternoon.
This is the 14th year of the program, according to organizers, through which parents, students, staff and administrators are invited to participate in choosing teachers for the honor of House Teacher-of-the-Year.
This year, there will be four winners, one for each "house," said Language Arts teacher Tim Campbell, one of the event’s organizers.
Posted by courier at 07:26 AM. Filed under: News
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By Jenelle Gallardo,
Courier Staff Writer
While most students were spending their time relaxing and enjoying spring break's weather, James Logan's Show Choir and Jazz Singers were competing at the Heritage Festival in Anaheim.
Led by teacher Erin McShane and choreographed by Jeremiah Delacruz, Logan's singers won first place gold for both divisions, the Adjudicator award, and the Choral Sweepstakes.
Posted by courier at 09:40 AM. Filed under: News
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A prisoner in Abu Ghraib prison
LONDON — The chief justice of the British High Court on Wednesday gave the British government one week to obtain the U.S. release of classified information about the alleged torture of a British resident who had been detained at the U.S. military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
The court indicated that it would issue its own order if the government doesn't respond or justify why continued secrecy is warranted.
Posted by courier at 12:25 PM. Filed under: News
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By Tearra Webb,
Courier Staff Writer
Ever since the controversy with Chris brown and Rihanna, many women, men and television shows are opening up about abusive relationships, sharing their personal feelings about abusive relationships.
I feel abusive relationships are one of the most harmful things happening to woman today. But it’s not only men that do it—women can be the abusers in the relationship, too. There are many men and women who are physically and emotionally hurt from abusive relationships.
Posted by courier at 06:23 AM. Filed under: News
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By Rick La Plante, New Haven Schools Public Information Officer
All students will perform at grade level in core academic subjects according to the new District Goal formally approved Tuesday night by the Board of Education.
The Board also approved two Superintendent’s Goals: 1) to create a set of Planning Policies, including vision, philosophy, District goals and comprehensive plans; and 2) to create a Comprehensive Planning Framework including a systemic theory of action to guide all District work in answering three questions regarding student performance:
• Where are we?
• Where do we need to be?
• What will get us there?
Posted by courier at 10:07 AM. Filed under: News
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Tribute by Nora Roberts
Hardcover: 464 pages
Publisher: Putnam Adult; First Edition edition (July 8, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0399154914
ISBN-13: 978-0399154911,
Courier Editor-in-Chief
”Standing, she scanned the ruined lawns, the sagging fences, the sad old barn that stood soot gray and scarred from weather. There had been chickens once--or so she’d been told--a couple of pretty horses, tidy fields of crops, a small, thriving grove of fruit trees. She wanted to believe--maybe needed to believe--she could bring all that back. That by the next spring, and all the springs after, she could stand here and look at the budding, the blooming, the business of what had been her grandmother’s.
Of what was now hers.”
Unfortunately, bringing her grandmother’s house back to life will also bring back to life a hatred that has been buried for decades. This is a fantastic book. Nora Roberts does a beautiful job of combining romance and mystery, reality and imagination, character development and plot. It is the perfect length, not so short that it skimps on details and not so long that it bores the reader. It has a satisfying conclusion that ties up all of the loose ends. I was not left wanting more of the story, but I was definitely left wanting more of Roberts’s books.
Posted by courier at 06:11 AM. Filed under: News
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By Rick La Plante, New Haven Schools Public Information Officer
Full-day kindergarten, successfully implemented at four New Haven Unified School District elementary schools during the past two years, will be in place at Searles Elementary in 2009-10, Superintendent Kari McVeigh announced today.
Acting on studies showing that full-day kindergarten can lead to increased student achievement and accelerated behavioral and social development, the District instituted full-day kindergarten as a pilot program at Pioneer Elementary in 2007-08. Three other schools – Alvarado Elementary, Hillview Crest Elementary and Kitayama Elementary – implemented it in 2008-09.
Posted by courier at 04:56 AM. Filed under: News
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By Peter Nicholas
Chicago Tribune (MCT)
PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad and Tobago — Rebuffing criticism of the warm greetings he exchanged with Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez, President Barack Obama said Sunday the United States, with its overwhelming military superiority and need to improve its global image, can afford to extend such diplomatic "courtesy."
Posted by courier at 09:26 AM. Filed under: News
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By Joel Brinkley
McClatchy-Tribune News Service (MCT)
In France, newspapers are in trouble, just as they are in the United States. Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, wants to give 18-year-olds a free subscription to the paper of their choice.
In America, the news media don't take financial aid from the government, even when it's indirect. Still, major newspapers are shutting down, and owners are telling others that the end is nigh. As they say, pending death tends to focus the mind. So let's focus on this: How can an industry survive if it allows other companies, like Google News, to use its content without any compensation?
Posted by courier at 05:24 AM. Filed under: News
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By Sandy Bauers and John Shiffman
The Philadelphia Inquirer (MCT)
PHILADELPHIA — In a landmark move that counters eight years of inaction by the Bush administration, the Environmental Protection Agency on Friday determined that greenhouse gases threaten public health because they contribute to climate change.
The ruling sets the stage for the agency to regulate emissions from a spectrum of sources, including automobiles, ships, airplanes, power plants, oil refineries, steel mills and more.
Supporters and critics alike agreed that the finding was a game-changer with potentially profound consequences, though the latter warned that implementing new rules would have devastating impacts on the economy.
Posted by courier at 11:17 PM. Filed under: News
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Night Shadow by Nora Roberts
Mass Market Paperback: 496 pages
Publisher: Silhouette; Other Printing edition (July 1, 2005)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0373285108
ISBN-13: 978-0373285105,
Courier Editor-in-Chief
“He was watchful, always, for those who preyed on the helpless and vulnerable. Unknown, unseen, unwanted, he stalked the hunters in the steaming jungle that was the city. He moved unchallenged in the dark spaces, the blind alleys and violent streets. Like smoke, he drifted along towering rooftops and down into dank cellars.”
He is Nemesis, a masked vigilante with the power to blend into walls and take the criminals he hunts by surprise. What with all of the superhero movies that have been coming out over the last few years, this book is excellent because it shows yet another side of a superhero’s life without all of the special effects and glamour to mask it. I really enjoyed reading it and, surprisingly, have no complaints about it.
Posted by courier at 08:40 PM. Filed under: News
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By Wahida Paykan
The Institute for War & Peace Reporting (MCT)
MAZAR-E-SHARIF, Afghanistan — At age 2, Nilab has no idea that her family has just given her away as compensation in a dispute with another family.
And rather than being outraged, most here would applaud the transaction as a peaceful way of settling what could have become a bloody conflict.
The practice is called baad, which usually means settling disagreements between families by the guilty party compensating the perceived victim with a young female child.
Posted by courier at 04:21 PM. Filed under: News
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By Shashank Bengali And Jonathan S. Landay
McClatchy Newspapers (MCT)
NAIROBI, Kenya — Pirates holding an American ship captain hostage in a lifeboat off the coast of East Africa on Friday demanded $2 million for his release, maritime officials said, hours after the captain attempted a daring escape from his captors.
The American, Richard Phillips, jumped overboard into shark-infested waters but was quickly recaptured and brought back onto the lifeboat, a U.S. official said. In a statement released after the incident, the owner of Phillips' ship, the Maersk Alabama, said that Phillips remained in contact with U.S. warships on the scene and appeared unharmed.
Posted by courier at 05:13 AM. Filed under: News
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By Jonathan S. Landay
McClatchy Newspapers (MCT)
WASHINGTON — The CIA is decommissioning the secret overseas prisons where top al-Qaida suspects were subjected to interrogation methods, including simulated drowning, that Attorney General Eric Holder, allied governments, the Red Cross and numerous other experts consider torture, the agency said Thursday.
In an e-mail to the agency's work force outlining current interrogation and detention policies, CIA Director Leon Panetta also announced agreements with the private security firms guarding the so-called black sites will be "promptly terminated," and contractors no longer will be used to conduct interrogations.
Posted by courier at 04:56 PM. Filed under: News
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The Empire State Building
wikipedia photo
MELVILLE, N.Y. — The Empire State Building is being converted into an eco-friendly skyscraper, transforming the landmark into a "green" architectural marvel as part of a multimillion-dollar upgrade, officials said Monday.
Former President Bill Clinton said the skyscraper will bring more attention to the need to convert structures into energy-efficient buildings.
Posted by courier at 12:14 PM. Filed under: News
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By Jamey Padojino, Courier Staff Writer
Students of the Filipino Heritage Studies class held an assembly to collect sign-ups for next year’s classes Thursday.
With these sign ups, the class hopes to show the administration just how important ethnic studies are to Logan.
Senior Jorge Ayala says, “Logan is so diverse that the needs of each color are not met. These classes help students know their roots, or else history has no relevancy to them. Diversity has needs it needs to met for culture to be kept alive.”
Posted by courier at 09:13 AM. Filed under: News
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By Cait Baca,
Courier Staff Writer
Logan's Marketing & Management Academy traveled across the country to New York to compete at the Virtual Enterprises' International Trade Fair last month.
This particular Trade Fair is considered the biggest trade fair that the members of the M&M Academy would ever attend. It was their first, and only trade fair in which not only were there numerous schools based from USA, but there were schools around the world in attendance, as well.
Posted by courier at 09:12 AM. Filed under: News
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President Obama addresses a meeting
in Turkey. Pete Souza/White House Photo
STRASBOURG, France — In a variation on his message to Europe, President Barack Obama on Friday described an America that needs to change as he arrived for the NATO summit but appealed to Europeans to set aside their own "insidious" anti-U.S. bias in return.
It was a twist on the conciliatory approach Obama has relied on over the past four days as he travels through Europe, spelling out a new American foreign policy and attitude that differs sharply from his that of his predecessor.
Posted by courier at 09:40 AM. Filed under: News
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By David Lightman
McClatchy Newspapers (MCT)
WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama boasts that he'll reduce spending on key domestic nondefense programs to their lowest levels since the 1960s, but he and Democrats in Congress are on a spending spree not seen since then.
Few analysts or members of Congress expect Obama to meet his cost-cutting goal, which he projects he won't meet for 10 years.
"Projections for future years rarely come true," said Marc Goldwein, policy director at the nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.
Some Democratic lawmakers agreed.
Posted by courier at 02:50 AM. Filed under: News
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By Herb Jackson
The Record (Hackensack N.J.) (MCT)
WASHINGTON — The mysterious death of a Teaneck, N.J., teenager on a school-sponsored trip could prompt a change in federal law, her parents said after meeting with the nation's top education official and a House committee chairman.
"It's a blessing," said Lola Moore, mother of Phylicia Moore, the namesake of the proposed Phylicia's Law, which would require schools to have written safety practices before overnight trips.
Posted by courier at 02:45 AM. Filed under: News
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San Jose Mercury News (MCT)
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Here is a glance at measures that are on the May 19 special election ballot in California:
—Prop. 1A: Would limit state spending based on the previous decade's revenues and place unexpected revenues during flush years in a "rainy day" reserve. Passage would extend a series of recently approved tax increases by one or two years, generating $16 billion.
—Prop. 1B: To make up for recent budget cuts, would set aside 1.5 percent of state revenues each year (about $1.5 billion) for public schools. Payments would continue until schools received $9.3 billion.
Posted by courier at 04:37 PM. Filed under: News
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By Aman Batheja
McClatchy Newspapers (MCT)
FORT WORTH, Texas — April Fools' Day pranksters may find themselves outmatched this year.
A cunning computer infection that is believed to have infiltrated millions of computers is expected to receive a set of instructions from its creator on April 1.
"Everybody is a little bit nervous about it," said Mike Stute of Dallas-based Global DataGuard, a network security firm. "It could be nothing. It could be very dangerous."
Either way, the anonymous creator of the Conficker virus has caught the attention of computer security experts around the world, with Microsoft going so far as to issue a $250,000 bounty on those who created it.
Posted by courier at 06:37 AM. Filed under: News
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