| Review: 'Tir na nÓg' a bumpy ride
It's a disappointing outing for both Smith, directing his last play as the Magic's outgoing artistic director, and O'Brien. Her inventively constructed and tantalizingly oblique "Triptych" in '03 remains one of the highlights of Smith's five-year tenure. "Girls" and the succeeding novels that make up "The Country Girls Trilogy" ("The Lonely Girl" and "Girls in Their Married Bliss") were the books that established O'Brien as one of Ireland's leading contemporary writers (getting banned in Ireland didn't hurt). But the lack of descriptive clarity that haunts the novels carries over into the dramatization in ways that will frustrate those who know the books and perplex those who don't. Characters who play important roles in young Kate's life are reduced to broad caricatures - or, in the case of Michael Louis Wells' Hickey, touching anomalies - whose relationship to her or purpose in the story is left unexplained.
Board sets $378 million school-bond vote June 3
Palo Alto schools will be getting bigger and better, school board members said Tuesday as they unanimously approved putting a $378 million bond measure on the June 3 ballot. The bond measure would extend to 2042 the current property tax of $44.50 per $100,000 assessed valuation established under a 1995 bond measure. That means a continuation of about $445 in yearly taxes for a home assessed at $1 million. The bond measure requires 55 percent voter approval under state Proposition 39, which also requires the formation of a citizens' oversight committee. The bond measure would expand and improve crowded, run-down schools, school officials said, echoing concerns presented at meetings in the months leading up to the final Tuesday vote.
EFF Lawsuit Demands Records of Contacts Between Former Justice ...
Washington, D.C. - The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) filed suit against the Department of Justice (DOJ) today, demanding information about communications between the DOJ's former top privacy official and Google, the official's current employer. Jane C. Horvath was named the DOJ's first Chief Privacy and Civil Liberties Officer in February of 2006. At that time, Google was fighting a massive DOJ subpoena asking for the text of every query entered into the search engine over a one-week period. The DOJ request -- part of a court battle over the constitutionality of a law regulating adult materials on the Internet -- ignited a national debate about Internet privacy. The DOJ later scaled back its request, and a judge eventually allowed access to only 5000 random Google search queries.
Wave of anarchy blamed on Kenya's 'General Coward'
In the town of Kericho in the Rift Valley, hundreds of homes belonging to people of Kibaki's Kikuyu tribe were being set alight by gangs of youths. Kibaki's handling of the crisis, so far limited to one brief visit to displaced people and reading out a few pre-written statements insisting he won fairly, has invited fierce criticism. The normally pro-government Daily Nation newspaper warned Kibaki: 'If Kenya disintegrates, history books will record that the collapse of a once great, united and prosperous country happened on your watch'. The Nairobi Star was headlined: 'Where is Kibaki? ... as Kenya slips into anarchy'. Other questions come from millions of Kenyans struggling to understand what is happening in their country. How could people have misread a man who has been in government since independence, regarded as the gentleman of Kenyan politics? What motivated an already wealthy President, with little apparent ego, caricatured in newspapers as enjoying afternoon naps, to stage what the opposition has called a 'civilian coup'? 'I have spoken to nearly every prominent columnist in this country and asked "Did you see this coming?"' said Wycliffe Muga, one of Kenya's best-known journalists.
Store shootings may be connected 1:48 PM
ROCK HILL, S.C. -- Four people shot at three different crime scenes has investigators looking into whether the shootings are tied to the same person. They haven't confirmed the connection, but say they are concerned that is the case. The most recent shooting happened Thursday afternoon at Cash On The Spot check cashing in York County. The suspect is still on the loose. The shooter was caught on surveillance video. Investigators hope someone recognizes him and has information that could lead to his arrest. .
Bureaucracy makes a mockery of RTI
The bureaucracy in Haryana has virtually reduced the Right to Information Act to a toothless law, which is being observed more in its breach than observance. The most common ploy used by bureaucrats is to supply misleading or contradictory information to those seeking information under the Act. The other standard gambit is to force the applicant to move the appellate authority, thus passing the buck upwards. RTI activists allege that the dilatory tactics of the senior bureaucrats has over a period shown the way to junior officers to follow suit and harass applicants. This has led to a sharp increase in the cost of seeking information. An avid RTI activist, Anil Bhatia, says he has been fighting against the control being exercised by the DAV Colleges Management Committee based in New Delhi over its colleges in Haryana for the past 20 years.
Cashing in on pollution
The New Jersey landfill redevelopment deal has been more problematic. Plans stalled as Cherokee, state officials and politicians wrangled over who should fund the cleanup costs. New Jersey's inspector general is now investigating a Cherokee partner called EnCap Golf Holdings, and the state's Sierra Club branch says putting housing atop unstable landfills is a bad idea. "It's been an interesting learning experience," says Darden, who brought Trump into the deal last fall in hope of moving the project along. Cherokee and Darden are also working to help rebuild New Orleans' Lower Ninth Ward with the actor Brad Pitt and the "green" architect William McDonough. Their joint project, called Make It Right, calls for building 150 affordable, environmentally-friendly homes. Like all real estate firms, Cherokee has been affected by the subprime mortgage crisis, the resulting credit crunch and declining home prices.
Aramis Ramirez declines to discuss cockfighting
MESA, Ariz. – Aramis Ramirez arrived at spring training Tuesday and gladly talked about last season when he led the Cubs in RBIs and helped them win the NL Central.But the team’s star third baseman had little to say on a report about his passion for cockfighting in his native Dominican Republic.Ramirez batted .310, hit 26 homers and led the Cubs with 101 RBIs but struggled in the first round of the playoffs. He was 0-for-12 as the Cubs were swept by the Arizona Diamondbacks."You know, it happens," he said. "They were hot and played good. That wasn’t the reason we lost. We didn’t play well."The New York Times reported this month that Ramirez was featured in an issue of a Dominican cockfighting magazine, En La Traba, and is pictured with some roosters."When I’m in the Dominican Republic, I’m dedicated entirely to them," he was quoted as saying.Click here to read the rest at Chicago Baseball 365.
Mercury in New Jersey Day-Care Center 3,000 Times Standard
During the past three weeks, PEER has released a series of internal e-mails from current and former Interior scientists raising troubling questions about how badly environmental assessments of Arctic offshore oil development were skewed. These e-mails have fueled two new lawsuits in the past week that threaten to stymie new lease sales and lend further support to ongoing litigation against earlier lease sales. Reflecting mounting concern about the legal consequences of this growing stream of internal e-mails that contradict official pronouncements, Jeffery Loman, the Deputy Regional Director for Interiors Minerals Management Service, in a January 31, 2008 e-mail to all employees sought to limit further damage: we have been directed to refrain from discussing the PEER press releases and the e-mail messages with anyone outside our organization including any representative with the media.
The Surrender Lobby's Tet Offensive
General David Petraeus, letter to the troops December 28, 2007. It has been a bad year for al-Qaeda in Iraq, and the Jihadis' allies in America are feeling their pain. Speaking to The Politico January 17, John Isaacs, executive director of the misnamed Council for a Livable World, explained: "last year was not productive. Our expectations were dashed." The year 2007 began promisingly for the Democrats, who had taken control of the House and Senate after faking out voters with a squad of seemingly pro-military candidates. The "new" Democrats immediately showed their true colors, installing Rep. Nancy Pelosi, a pro-surrender member of the socialist "Progressive Caucus," as Speaker of the House. By May, Rep. Jim McGovern, D-MA, was pledging, "Those of us who oppose this war will be back again and again and again and again until this war has ended." But it didn't work out that way.
Pro-Life Activists Arrested at Cypress College for 3rd Time
CYPRESS, Calif., Feb. 22 /Christian Newswire/ -- On February 21, 2008, Cypress College in California once again unlawfully arrested pro-life activists for being outside the school's "free speech zone." From the time of their arrival on campus, members of the pro-life group Survivors of the Abortion Holocaust quietly held signs, distributed literature and dialogued with students about abortion, but because they refused to be confined to an area, they were arrested for failing to leave private property not open to the general public (trespassing). "How educated police officers and college administration can claim that a public school is private property is beyond me. Then they make a mockery of free speech by providing inadequate 'zones' in which they allow First Amendment rights to occur." says Kortney Blythe, Director of Campus Life Tours (CLT) for Survivors.
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