TGIF Edition 19 Dec 08

NZTONIGHT

FILM

HEALTH

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Goodnight, Mr Holmes

The darkness of Kate

Foot found in baby’s brain

The idea that could save Earth

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Auckland

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Two ministers of Internal Affairs have approved nearly 400 citizenship applications against the explicit advice of officials, over the past three years.

Figures released under the Official Information Act to TGIF Edition this morning disclose Labour’s George Hawkins, Rick Barker and Shane Jones between them approved 378 applicants for New Zealand citizenship, despite being warned by Internal Affairs officials that the migrants did not meet citizenship criteria and should not be approved.

In contrast,the ministers exercised the benefit of the doubt in the opposite direction – declining applicants despite official approval – in only nine cases.

The interferences show one in six individual submissions to the Minister of Internal Affairs were decided in defiance of departmental advice.

Staggeringly, 66 of those approved by the ministers had been declined by the Internal Affairs Department because they failed to meet the good character test.That means the applicants may have had serious criminal convictions or the department had other evidence that their applications or pasts were dodgy.

The figures show Hawkins and Barker were responsible for 377 of the applications, with Shane Jones brought in on one – that of Chinese fugitive Yang Liu, whose real name is Yongming Yan. Even more surprising, Labour’s George Hawkins managed to approve 30 of the bad character applicants in the few months of 2005 prior to the election that year,whilst Rick Barker took three years to rack up the next 35 approvals to applicants of bad character.

The issue shot to prominence during this year’s election campaign when TGIF Edition revealed Shane Jones had given New Zealand citizenship to a Chinese fugitive, despite his department warning

ISSN 1172-4153 | Volume 1 | Issue 20 |

| 19 December 2008

that the man’s name was false and his New Zealand identity was false.Yang Liu was a donor to the New Zealand Labour Party.

Nearly a quarter of those granted kiwi citizenship, despite failing the good character test, were Indian nationals (15), while a further nine were Chinese. A further quarter (16) of the successful bad character applicants were from Islamic countries, with the balance from Asia,Africa and Britain (3), with four from Fiji.

There is no data on whether any of these suc-

cessful applicants were donors to the Labour party, because Internal Affairs has refused to release the identities of any of the applicants, but there is no obvious reason why the Ministers would approve 66 people who failed to meet the good character test for New Zealand citizenship.

In total, 2,395 people made direct application to the Minister of Internal Affairs between 2005 and November this year, of whom 378 were approved against the advice of the Department, and nine were declined against the advice of the department.

on the

INSIDE

FISH PIRACY Airforce hunts trawler Page 3

Mahia’s dolphin summer underway

By Jessica Wauchop

Gisborne, Dec 19 – When the sun beats down on Mahia Beach and the sea is calm, Moko the friendly bottlenose dolphin cuts a familiar shape against the horizon. Read more, page 2

OLDEST CAKE Baked Christmas 1911 Page 10

TIGER ‘N STEVE

A better 2009?

Page 12

Children charged with brutal Opotiki murder Wellington, Dec 19 – Two girls aged 15 and 17 have been jointly charged with the murder of elderly Opotiki man John Rowe.

Mr Rowe, 78, was beaten to death in his home overnight on November 24.

The 17-year-old was arrested this afternoon in Auckland and Detective Inspector Rob Jones said she would face a murder charge in Auckland District Court tomorrow.

Soon afterwards, police arrested the 15-year-old from Opotiki, who faces the same charge in Tauranga Youth Court tomorrow.

Sat: 13°/7° Sun: 13°/9°

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The Ministers who couldn’t say ‘No’

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A third person, a 21-year-old Opotiki man, was also arrested today and charged with being an accessory after the fact to the murder of Mr Rowe, and attempting to defeat the course of justice.

He was due inWhakatane District Court tomorrow.

Mr Jones told Radio New Zealand the sex and age of those arrested was shocking.

“It must be incredibly distressing both for the community and for the family of Mr Rowe.”

Mr Jones said he was not able to discuss when or how police got the breakthrough they needed .

He said there was still a long way to go with the

investigation and that police believed people who had information about the case had been stonewalling.

“I was frustrated and did comment that we believed there were close friends and family that were really protecting this group of people,”he said.

Mr Jones said the case’s high-profile may have put pressure on those people and assisted the investigation.

He said he was aware that Mr Jones’family were relieved at the news of arrests, but were also“deeply saddened”.

– NZPA

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NEW ZEALAND

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Fisherman lands 300kg hammerhead shark DAYTONA BEACH, Fla., Dec. 19 (UPI) – A fisherman seeking out marine life off the coast of Volusia County, Fla., said he caught a 300-kg hammerhead shark.

The commercial fisherman said the shark, which measured more than 13 feet in length, was reeled in yesterday, WESH-TV, Orlando, Fla., reported today.

Experts said hammerhead sharks can grow to reach lengths of more than 20 feet (6.5 metres).

Police: Recession hitting burglars DORAL, Fla., Dec. 19 (UPI) – The police chief in Doral, Florida, says thieves apparently dumped more than US$1.2 million in stolen goods after being unable to sell them in today’s economy.

Ricardo Gomez said an anonymous tip led police to stolen electronics items, including flat-screen televisions and computers, which apparently were simply left behind by the thieves, The Miami Herald said Thursday.

“We surmised that the thieves have had a tough time selling the goods, so they dumped them,’’ the police chief said.

An FBI spokeswoman said the merchandise was stolen in Georgia, Tennessee and Texas.

Gomez said the economy has not limited all criminals, telling the Herald that Doral property crimes have increased substantially.

Sweden foists Canadian status on woman STOCKHOLM, Sweden, Dec. 19 (UPI) – Bureaucratic mistakes that made a dual-citizenship Swedish citizen a Canadian will cost the Swedish government $130, a government chancellor ruled.

The Local reported the unidentified woman had a Canadian father and Swedish mother, and was born in Sweden a dual citizen in 1984.

In 1992, her father applied for a Canadian passport for his daughter, and documents were filed with the Swedish consulate in Vancouver as part of the process, the report said.

Somehow, Swedish tax authorities used the information to strip the woman’s Swedish citizenship, making her solely Canadian.

In 2003, the woman was told as a foreigner she couldn’t stay in Sweden because she lacked a residence permit. It took a year of bureaucratic wrangling, but the woman had her Swedish citizenship reinstated in 2005, the report said.

The country’s Chancellor of Justice denied the woman’s claim for retribution for paying foreign studentrate tuition fees, but awarded her the $130 cost of reinstating her citizenship, the newspaper said.

FROM FRONT PAGE

The three-year-old dolphin has made Mahia Beach her home for more than a year-and-a-half, and now the summer holidays bring a new batch of eager children to entertain.

Many a bodyboard, crayfish buoy and rugby ball have been taken out to sea, never to be seen again, as the cheeky dolphin continues to play on her own.

Others have been on the receiving end of Moko’s generosity, said Department of Conservation programme manager Jamie Quirk.

“She has actually been bringing fish to people.

People have had kahawai and gurnard brought to

19 December 2008

“This was the Paul Holmes breakfast…”

Auckland, Dec 19 – Clattering plates and laughter filled the air at Auckland’s Sails Restaurant this morning, as 120 guests gathered to listen to Paul Holmes broadcast his last breakfast show at radio station NewstalkZB. Friends, clients, and colleagues past and present enjoyed a leisurely breakfast looking over the sparkling waters of Auckland’s Waitemata Harbour.

Holmes’mother Chrissy,his wife Deborah and son Ruben were also there to wish him the best, along with Prime Minister John Key,former Labour prime minister Helen Clark and Labour leader Phil Goff.

It was a show packed with emotion and memories.

After 22 years in one of the most high pressure jobs in the industry, Holmes reminisced about good times and bad.

He reflected back to March 1987 soon after the new talk concept began and the ratings went through the floor to the times when the ratings soared from mid 1989.

Between news breaks, Holmes took a moment to munch down a Danish, while colleagues and friends dashed up to give him a congratulatory kiss and a hug.

He was joined by his successor Mike Hosking and regular guest Wendyl Nissen, who said she would miss waking up to Holmes every morning.

She joked that Hosking won’t even talk to her off air.

Holmes said he was leaving the programme with no regrets, and was looking forward to continuing on the Saturday morning show.

He took telephone calls from various well-wishers, including former Olympic equestrian champion Mark Todd, former world squash champion Dame Susan Devoy and America’s Cup yachtie Brad Butterworth.

Brooke Fraser flew in from Sydney to sing live with acoustic guitar.

NewstalkZB general manager Bill Francis said

working with Holmes had been a rollercoaster ride.

“The main thing about it has been the fun we’ve had.We survived the scrapes and just put our heads down and had fun,”Francis said.

“Paul has ultimately been a great team player and always encourages up and coming talent.”

Holmes said he was deeply humbled about being touted as the “greatest broadcaster of our time”.

And he had this message for young broadcasters trying to make it in the industry.

“If you believe you’ll get there, you’ll get there.If the opportunity comes, take it,”Holmes said.

“Work hard and opportunities will present themselves. Timing is everything. Break some rules on air. Be daring and try new things.”

He thanked rival broadcasters who had passed on their good wishes over the past few days.

As Holmes looked around the restaurant at the smiling faces beaming back at him, he thanked Veteran broadcaster Paul Holmes during his last breakfast show on Newstalk ZB at everyone for coming and making Sails Restaurant, Auckland. / NZPA / Wayne Drought it such a special occasion.

He left his last breakfast show on NewstalkZB to a standing ovation, and with his you very much for listening and thank you very voice slightly quavering as he said:“This was the much for coming.

Paul Holmes breakfast at NewstalkZB.Thank you “Four minutes to nine with NewstalkZB.This was so much for listening to us. the Paul Holmes breakfast.”

“I hope you have enjoyed the programme.Thank –NZPA

Union spits dummy at police Wellington, Dec 19 – The backlash from unions against revelations police used an informer to spy on them increased today.

The National Distribution Union (NDU) lodged an Official Information Act request for information the police hold on it, while the Maritime Union said it may call a national work stoppage to hold meetings of its members to discuss the spying.

Yesterday the Engineering Printing and Manufacturing Union (EPMU) said it backed a call by Unite Union for a full public inquiry into the activities of the police Special Investigation Group (SIG), following revelations a paid informant for the unit was spying on union industrial and political campaigns.

Prime Minister John Key this week ruled out an inquiry and said police assurances had been given to the Government that covert investigations were justified.

NDU national secretary Laila Harre said she was angry that police informant Rob Gilchrist was being paid to gather information about legitimate union activity and wants details of reports he made about the union.

“The public need to know why the police think they

need to use valuable resources and taxpayer money on spying on unions when they say they are too stretched to do the rest of their job properly,”she said.

Maritime Union general secretary Trevor Hanson said today the union was supporting calls for a high level commission of inquiry into the SIG. The union was demanding an apology, would seek damages from police, and was calling its branches to prepare for industrial action unless a full apology and explanation was made.

“If the police are serious about tracking groups who threaten the wellbeing of ordinary New Zealanders, would they pay informers to spy on employer groups wanting to attack wages and conditions?”Mr Hanson asked.

“Who exactly decides who goes on the spy list,who authorises these decisions, and what accountability and procedures do such special investigations have to ensure they are not corrupt or politically biased?”

Ms Harre said the police activities looked “as if they are using public money to indulge in a bit of old fashioned right wing paranoia.

“I would be interested in whether they are spying on employer organisations, and business lobby groups,”she said.

“After all some of them hold far more extreme views than any of the other organisations that Mr

Gilchrist is reported to have spied on.”

Yesterday the EPMU said emails it had obtained showed Mr Gilchrist forwarded to police meeting times and venues for the union’s campaign against the National Party’s original bill in 2006 to allow workers in small businesses to be sacked within 90 days of starting work.

Mr Gilchrist also sent the schedule for union pickets during the Progressive Enterprises lockout, which involved 120 EPMU members, it said.

The emails also showed the SIG received information on at least seven other union groups – Unite, the Service and Food Workers Union, the National Distribution Union, the Maritime Union, the National Union of Public Employees, theYouth Union Movement and the Council of Trade Unions.

Reports of police spying on protest groups broke at the weekend. Rochelle Rees, an animal rights and Labour Party activist,told the Sunday Star-Times she had discovered her former partner, Mr Gilchrist, had been paid by counter-terrorism police to spy on the protest groups when she helped him fix his computer.

Green MP Keith Locke called for an inquiry when the story first broke, and yesterday his party was furious that Mr Gilchrist had infiltrated its offices and was used to report on the party’s activities.

them and some lucky people have had her bring them seahorses,”he said.

Mahia local Bill Shortt has been watching Moko’s movements since she first came to the region during Easter 2007.

“Moko is getting tamer than ever,”he said.

“It’s really amusing. She comes right into the shore now, into only a few feet of water to play with the children.

“She certainly hasn’t gone anywhere. She follows boats in and out of the bay and plays havoc with my cray pots. She bunts the buoys and drags the pots together, tangling them.”

Moko gained international attention when she saved two pygmy sperm whales from certain death after they stranded themselves.

A large sandbar just offshore confused the whales, who kept turning back and stranding again, until Moko appeared out of nowhere to lead the whales through the boat channel and out to sea and safety.

Moko’s fame had brought even more visitors to the region, said Mr Shortt.

“Ever since that rescue she has been in virtually every newspaper and on every TV screen across the world but she just continues to cruise around here and wait for people to come play with her.

“We had a group of girls from France and Germany not long ago.After swimming with Moko they were so excited and called home straight away.

“She has certainly grown over winter,so it is timely to warn people that she is not a pet or a play thing.

“People can have amazing experiences with her but they need to remember she is now even more capable of inflicting injuries on people, should they do something she doesn’t particularly like.

“People need to treat her with dignity that a wild animal like her deserves.”

– NZPA

– NZPA Back to the front page

NEW ZEALAND

19 December 2008

Air force pings Spanish fishing ‘pirates’ Wellington, Dec 19 – A blacklisted fishing boat has been spotted in the Southern Ocean by an air force surveillance aircraft, Foreign Minister Murray McCully said today.

He said the Togo-flagged Bigaro was blacklisted for illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing.

It was seen inside an international management area which was under the authority of the Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR).

Mr McCully said the owners of Bigaro, which was spotted by an air force Orion, were based in Spain.

“Spain is a CCAMLR member and is obliged to take action against the Spanish company,”he said.

“Illegal toothfish fishing in the Southern Ocean is a scourge, destroying fish stocks and killing thousands of seabirds including albatrosses.”

Mr McCully said another Spanish-owned fishing boat was caught and blacklisted by CCAMLR last month. Sierra Leone removed its flag.

CCAMLR is part of the Antarctic Treaty system and carries out surveillance of the Ross Sea and the Southern Ocean under a multi-agency operation.

New Zealand is the current chair of CCAMLR. – NZPA

Supreme Court outlaws Trinity Wellington, Dec 19 – In a majority decision the Supreme Court has dismissed appeals brought by investors in the Trinity tax avoidance case more than 11 years after the forestry scheme was first designed.

Both the High Court and Court of Appeal had previously ruled the scheme was tax avoidance.

Inland Revenue has said the case involved potential tax losses of about $3.7 billion.

Investors in Trinity bought a 50-year licence to grow Douglas fir trees on land owned by the Trinity Foundation companies and agreed to pay a licence

fee of $2 million a hectare in 2047 when the trees were harvested.

Investors depreciated the $2 million a hectare fee, and deducted the cost of an insurance policy with a British Virgin Islands-based company.

Justices Andrew Tipping, John McGrath and Thomas Gault found that although the claimed deductions complied with the ordinary specific provisions in income tax legislation under which they were claimed, the Trinity scheme involved tax avoidance arrangements which were void under the legislation.

The claims for allowances were disallowed.

Body in river could be missing woman Wellington, Dec 19 – Police have confirmed the body found in Christchurch’s Avon River this morning is that of a young female.

The body was seen near Dallington Terrace east of the city centre at about 6.50am by a passerby who reported it to police.

“Police have identified the body as that of a young female, but do not have any identification as to who it is,”Detective Inspector Greg Williams said.

A forensic investigation of the scene was being carried out and part of Dallington Terrace would remain cordoned off in the meantime, he said.

“Any members of the public who have concerns

In a separate decision Chief Justice Sian Elias and Justice Noel Anderson agreed the deductions must be disallowed on the basis that they were part of a wider tax avoidance arrangement.

The two justices noted however that they had reservations on the aspects of the reasoning of the majority.

The court upheld penalties which include repaying the tax, plus pay interest on that money and 100 per cent shortfall penalties.

Costs of $75,000 were awarded to the Commissioner of Inland Revenue.

– NZPA

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about missing female family members or friends are asked to contact the inquiry base with the person’s details and descriptions of clothing etc.”

The body was found in the area where local woman Tisha Lowry went missing nearly three months ago but police said there didn’t appear to be any connection.

The body has been taken away for a post mortem and police have been scanning the riverbed with the use of a hydraulic platform.

More information about the discovery was expected to be released later today.

– NZPA

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NEW ZEALAND

19 December 2008

New lifejacket rule supported by Maritime NZ Wellington, Dec 19 – Maritime New Zealand has moved to clarify lifejacket rules after some regional councils took steps to draft compulsory bylaws for vessels under six metres.

The National Pleasure Boat Forum recently recommended that it be compulsory for all people on boats under six metres to wear their lifejacket, unless the skipper deemed it unnecessary due to low risk.

The recommendation was in response to research showing around 70 percent of boating fatalities over the last year would most likely be prevented had those involved been wearing their lifejackets, with almost all of these fatalities occurring in the under six metre category.

Maritime NZ recreational boating manager Jim Lott said if the proposal was adopted into law, it would mean that a skipper of a boat smaller than six metres would be responsible for ensuring all on board wear their wear lifejackets, but

the skipper would still have the right to decide that they could be taken off when the risk was low.

Mr Lott said regional authorities were required to consult with Maritime NZ on any proposed bylaws relating to navigational safety, to ensure consistency with existing rules under the Maritime Transport Act (1994).

EnvironmentWaikato,Wellington Regional Council and Queenstown Lakes District Council had drafted compulsory lifejacket bylaws, in anticipation of the forum’s recommendation becoming law next year.

The current law made it compulsory for all skippers to carry lifejackets of the right size and number

for everyone on board.

People might choose not to wear them, unless the skipper deemed it necessary in situations where there was increased risk – for example in rough seas or while crossing bars.

Mr Lott said Maritime NZ supported moves by regional councils to include the NPBSF recommendation in their draft bylaws but any change to rules under the Maritime Transport Act would still need to be signed off by the Ministry of Transport and go through further public consultation before being considered by Cabinet.

– NZPA

Geneva Finance beats suspension, just Wellington, Dec 19 – Under threat of a share ing covenants. In November, it said its banker had trading suspension Geneva Finance today filed its reconfirmed a $35m funding facility. late interim result which reveals a $7.7 million loss Geneva said today that since the capital reconfor the six months to September 30. struction it has met all its obligations, including The loss was due to $9.4m of additional provi- repayment of $33m principal to stockholders sioning for loans on the company’s old ledger.The together with interest at each month end. company has $2.9m of tax losses but cannot use The company said it has lowered annual overhead them until it makes a profit. costs by $15m per annum.

The New Zealand ShareIt was difficult holders Association has to know the extent The consumer been critical of Geneva for to which the curfinance company keeping a lending team rent recession would on. impact on collecting froze deposits worth The consumer finance money owed and on company froze deposits $138 million from more new lending, the comworth $138 million from than 4000 investors pany said. more than 4000 investors.

NZX said the report In April, investors backed a share-for-debt swap for the six months to the end of September was due reconstruction to keep the company trading. by last Sunday.

In October, it increased provisioning, increasIf it was not provided by next Monday, trading in ing its forecast loss for the year to March 31, 2009 the company’s securities would be suspended from to $4.4m, compared to the $2.7m in the capital the start of trading next Tuesday. reconstruction document and breaching its bank– NZPA

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Wellington, Dec 19 – The New Zealand dollar hit a six-week high against the greenback, bursting above US60c in offshore trading on Thursday night, but by the close on Friday had fallen to US58.25c.

BNZ currency strategist Danica Hampton said Thursday night’s price action would have “many a London trader heading home shirtless” as they battled a 2.5-3 percent rally in the major currencies and a subsequent 3.5-4 percent collapse.

The US dollar has fallen to its weakest level in 13 years against the yen this week on the Federal Reserve’s big rate cut but there has been profit-taking on that move.

Today, the NZ dollar declined as the US dollar reversed some of its recent losses.

Expectations that the Bank of Japan would cut interest rates on Friday were tempered by reports that it would opt instead for other steps to ease the yen’s sharp rise.

Still, the NZ dollar is expected by some analysts

to rally over the Christmas holiday period then resume its downward ride in 2009.

The NZ dollar has been reflecting moves in the US dollar but that may change next week with September quarter current account data due on Monday and gross domestic product data due on Tuesday.

A Reuters poll of 12 economists forecast that gdp fell 0.5 percent in the September quarter, meaning the recession that began at the start of the year deepened in the third quarter.

Against the euro, the NZ dollar was 0.4077 from 0.4110 yesterday.

Against the yen the NZ dollar reached a month high around 54.10, but it closed at 51.95 yen from 51.90 yesterday.

The NZ dollar was at A84.30c at 5pm from A84.20c yesterday. The trade weighted index was up to 56.17 at 5pm from 56.58.

– NZPA

EDITORIAL

19 December 2008

Editorial

The dignity of life As we were putting this issue of TGIF together, debate has been raging over a proposal to allow parents to “donate” unused IVF embryos for the purposes of scientific experiments.

There are many things scientists would “like”to do, in the interests of pure science. Stripped of any moral obligations, a case can be made that scientists should pursue scientific experimentation wherever it leads – to get to the objective data.

If we can find a cure for cancer,doesn’t science have a duty to pursue that? If we can find how Down Syndrome is caused and prevent it,shouldn’t scientists be allowed to do that without any outside interference?

On the face of it,such requests seem perfectly valid.

Except for one grinding flaw: every one of the arguments made for science being allowed to do what it likes is founded on a moral argument itself.

Example:“Curing”cancer implies a value judgement that cancer is bad. Sure, we believe it is, because collectively we have a vested interest. But it’s still a value judgement, not an objective one as far as the universe is concerned. Likewise preventing Down Syndrome. The question presupposes that Down

Syndrome is “bad” and something to be avoided, rather than something to be accepted.

It doesn’t matter what disease or condition you pick, you’ve picked it for a moral reason.

Therefore, science in this area is always carried out in the shadow of a morality debate. To strip morality from scientific research is to remove any reason to do the research in the first place.

So how should the National Government react to the poisoned chalice its predecessors obviously dodged for a year?

Humans have always been weak when it comes to moral judgements.We are suckers for sob stories, and practically any evil can and has been justified in the past by appeal to the greater good.

When Hitler authorised his scientists to conduct experiments on children in the Nazi death camps, they justified it on the basis of the information they would discover for “science”, and therefore the greater good of humanity.

Medical notes from Nazi experiments have proved useful to science, but none of that removes the stain of evil from the process.

The bioethics committee in New Zealand that considered the embryo experiments issue admitted it was rolling with the“greater good”argument,which illustrates that – stripped of objective moral codes (thou shalt not murder) – we are well on the slippery slope to essentially justifying the Nazi atrocities.

The bioethics committee also makes the point that the unused embryos will be destroyed anyway.

Yes, that’s true, and it forms a fairly solid argument about the morality of IVF treatment if you have to kill ten to create one life.

Even so, that doesn’t mean we should submit a tiny life on death row to the added indignity of being ripped apart in the name of scientific experiments, or to have its organs harvested.

The “experiments” being practiced overseas in this area include creating part human/part animal hybrids,or“chimeras”,just for the hell of it.Once you lift the lid on this Pandora’s Box,as history repeatedly shows in other areas, there’s no going back.

The Government should turn this line of research down, regardless of the treacle-covered scientific pleas and pressure group sob stories, simply because

Comment

Is Ahmadinejad in trouble?

By Alireza Nader

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad may lose the June 2009 presidential election. And a more pragmatic figure, one willing to engage the United States and the international community on Iran’s nuclear programme, may assume power.

But no one, especially in the United States, should count on a dramatic change in Iran’s policies, even if Ahmadinejad loses.

Ahmadinejad has been routinely and harshly criticized by many of his countrymen for his performance of the past three years, especially his handling of the economy. Inflation hovers around 30 percent (officially), unemployment continues to climb, and rolling blackouts and energy shortages make everyday life more difficult throughout the country.

The Iranian Parliament’s recent impeachment of Interior Minister Ali Kordan for forging a Ph.D. from Oxford University dealt another blow to Ahmadinejad’s prestige and his prospects for re-election in 2009. Leading Iranian political figures, including some within Ahmadinejad’s own political camp, are disillusioned by what they see as his economic and foreign policy failures. They may hope that Ahmadinejad’s defeat in the presidential election could lead to a softer approach on issues ranging from the economy to U.S.-Iranian relations.

Domestic criticism of Ahmadinejad is nothing new.

He has been attacked by a number of senior Iranian figures,ranging from the reformist former President Mohammad Khatami to the pragmatic conservative and powerful chief of the Expediency Discernment Council,Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani.

But Rafsanjani recently took the gloves off.“We have tolerated the (Ahmadinejad) government for the past three years,”Rafsanjani told Iranian journalists.“Now we can say this is over.”

There are reports that Khatami, Rafsanjani and other reformist and pragmatic conservative figures have put aside their differences in order to defeat Ahmadinejad, their common foe.Yet Ahmadinejad should not worry only about attacks from the left or center.The real challenge may come from fellow rightwing principlists,those who claim adherence to the true principles and ideology of the Islamic revolution.

Ahmadinejad has managed to navigate and survive Iran’s labyrinthine system of political power through the support of three key players: the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei; the Army of the Guardians of the Islamic Revolution;

There are reports that Khatami, Rafsanjani and other reformist and pragmatic conservative figures have put aside their differences in order to defeat Ahmadinejad, their common foe

and the Basij, a reactionary paramilitary force under the Guards that claims to command 10 million men and women.

The Revolutionary Guards and the Basij, who are the self-appointed guardians of revolutionary principles, have also formed a joint force of 12,000 political guides who likely will play an important role in the upcoming election. The influential and principlist Kayhan daily newspaper recently reported that the Basij had been the most essential voting bloc in the 2005 presidential election and certainly would be influential in the 2009 election.

Kordan’s impeachment by the Iranian Parliament shows the growing strength of the principlist faction opposed to Ahmadinejad.

The faction is led by former national security adviser Ali Larijani, who handled negotiations with the European Union and International Atomic Energy Agency on the nuclear issue and who at times is viewed as a moderate by his interlocutors. Larijani is reportedly unhappy with Ahmadinejad’s bellicose rhetoric and his aggressive style of domestic politics. A former Guards officer and current speaker of Parliament, Larijani is also a potential presidential candidate.

It is too early to predict who will become Iran’s next president.Ahmadinejad, for all the challenges and complexities that confront him, appears to have received Khamenei’s endorsement and may yet garner sufficient support from the principlists and the Guards/Basij to emerge as the winner.Yet even if he loses, the hard-liners, including the Guards, will still have a major role, especially on the nuclear issue.

Iran’s political class, faced with a dire economy and increasing international isolation, may opt for a change of style in 2009. But all of the contending factions see Iran’s nuclear program as a point of national pride.The United States and the European nations that have been attempting to negotiate an end to Tehran’s nuclear programs should not delude themselves that the election will trigger a change in course.

Alireza Nader is an analyst at the RAND Corp., a non-profit institution that helps improve policy and decision-making through research and analysis.

moral judgements can’t be made by committees.

Either something is inherently wrong, or it isn’t, and majority opinion has nothing to do with it. A majority of southern Americans supported slavery.

Didn’t make it right.

Forget the religious argument, this is a human rights issue, not a religious one. Science has now confirmed that human life begins at conception.The embryo is a developing human,in the same way that a newborn baby is.Both lack self-awareness,both are completely dependent on their mother.But we don’t approve of people who experiment on babies,nor are parents permitted to“donate”them to scientists.

Kids are not fashion accessories for the Me generation, nor are they fodder for organ-farms to support the health of ageing baby-boomers.

On a final note, thanks for all your support of TGIF Edition since it launched in August. This is the final issue this year, although we may send out a stripped-down summer edition at some point over the break. Full service resumes in mid January.

Enjoy the break and have a fantastic Christmas.

SUBSCRIBE TO TGIF!

Letters -Censor Bans Suicide Video Right to Life welcomes the decision of the Chief Censor, Bill Hastings of the Office of Film & Literature Classification to classify the Dr Nitschke’s suicide video shown on the internet as Objectionable.

The decision was made on 24 November 2008. The decision followed a written complaint against the video by Right to Life New Zealand made on 26 June 2008 and by The Society for the Protection of Community Standards.

The video was titled “The Peaceful Pill: Single Shot.”

The video described how to manufacture the drug Nembutal a Class C drug contrary to the Misuse of Drugs Act 1975. The Censor stated in his judgment; “that the film promotes and encourages criminal acts by making them seem a completely normal and positive part of everyday life.” The judgment went on to say; “Any use of the film as a basis on which to manufacture a drug said to induce a peaceful death is more likely to cause a violent injury or death by accident.”

This historic decision of the Chief Censor is a victory for a culture of life and is the first time in New Zealand that a complaint has been upheld against Dr Philip Nitschke for promoting suicide through film or literature.

Right to Life is disappointed that the Chief Censor has rejected a similar complaint against the suicide video, “Doing it with Betty.” The decision states that the film is classified as “unrestricted” This video demonstrates how a person may commit suicide with a plastic bag. The Censor in his decision stated that; “The innocuous nature of this film’s content is unlikely to make its unrestricted availability injurious to the public good.”

Right to Life challenges this decision and will seek permission to have the decision reviewed by the Classification Review Office. It is understood that Dr Nitschke proposes to produce a further 14 suicide promotional videos. It is the intention of Right to Life to challenge these videos at the appropriate time by presenting a written complaint with the Office of Film and Literature Classification seeking to have them banned as “objectionable.”

The videos promote suicide as an option for the seriously ill and elderly. The videos promote a culture of death, attack our inalienable right to life and undermines the common good. It should be noted that Dr Nitschke has previously stated, that the knowledge he provides should be readily available to “anyone who wants it including the depressed the elderly bereaved, and the troubled teen.” Dr Nitschke seeks to promote suicide as a human right and a right to choose. Right to Life is committed to opposing the culture of death promoted by Dr Nitschke which is a threat to our whole community.

Our Society is committed to promoting a culture of life that upholds the right to life of every person from conception to natural death.

Ken Orr, Right to Life New Zealand Inc.

ANALYSIS

19 December 2008

The new colonialism: buying farms

By Peter Curson

Today’s food and financial crisis has produced a new global land grab in the developing world. Food insecure governments, particularly in the Middle East and Asia, are investing heavily in vast areas of agricultural land abroad while big business – concerned for profits in an ever deepening economic crisis – sees investment in foreign agricultural land as a way of protecting profits in an insecure world.

Is history repeating itself? Up until the 1950s many European powers shamelessly exploited the natural resources of their colonies. Now a new and subtle form of neo-colonialism is emerging whereby countries like China,Japan,India,Kuwait,Qatar and South Korea are snapping up vast tracts of agricultural land in developing countries to produce biofuels and food for themselves. At the last count at least 14 countries were controlling or actively seeking farmland in the developing world. So significant has this land grab become that it bears comparison with the mad scramble for territory in Africa by the European powers during the latter part of the 19th century. Qatar, has for example, approached Kenya to lease 40,000 acres to grow crops as well as made overtures to Cambodia for access to rice fields, while other Gulf States have been negotiating leases of large tracts of agricultural land in countries like the Sudan and Senegal. More recently, South Korea, through its company Daewoo Logistics, is taking a 99 year lease on 3.2 million acres of land in Madagascar – 50 percent of all the cultivated land on the island – and an area equivalent to almost half the size of Belgium!

The intention is to produce about 5 million metric tonnes of maize and 500,000 tonnes of palm oil (for biofuel) every year. China, with 20 percent of the world’s population but only 9 percent of the world’s agricultural land,has not been far behind,and is said to have recently announced a commitment of $US 5 billion for Chinese corporations to invest in African agriculture over the next 50 years, even despatching its own nationals to oversee and join the local labour force.Everyone it seems wants to be a part of the act and African countries are either actively courting possible suitors or reacting to requests from Asia and Europe.

The greatest irony in this land grab is that poor states with very limited food supples will be producing food for rich countries. Who said history doesn’t repeat itself? It is like we are re-living the height of the colonial period again with its large scale transfer of food and other natural resources from colony to motherland.

Land grabbing is not new. It has been going on

for centuries. Historically one only has to think of how white Europeans dispossessed the Maori in New Zealand, the native Indians in North America or the Zulu in South Africa. Today, it remains very much alive and hardly a day goes by without reports of multi-nationals dispossessing peasant farmers in Central America, so as to grow pet food for the US market, or of huge development projects which threaten deforestation and the livelihood of indigenous populations. In many instances, land has become a battleground between foreign countries and ‘outside’business interests, ranged against local peasants and indigenous ethnic groups.

Two agendas are driving the current grab for land. Firstly, the concern over food security.The circumstances behind this land grab differ between prospective suitors. China, for example, with its huge population and dwindling farmlands and water resources is thinking of the future and has deep pockets to invest in overseas food sources with the long-term in mind. By comparison, the Gulf States with scarce soil and water resources on which to grow crops, but vast oil and cash reserves, have watched their dependence on imported food supplies from Europe become increasingly expensive and uncertain. In the case of Japan and South Korea, both countries have for long had a dependence on imported food to feed their populations.

Faced with such circumstances it is perhaps understandable that many countries are seeking to outsource their food supplies by taking over farmland in other parts of the world. Secondly, the current financial downturn has also forced the big end of town to search out safe havens and find new ways of delivering secure financial returns by investing in land for food and fuel production. Japanese and Arab corporations are currently the most involved in the overseas land grab. Many of Japan’s major conglomerates like Mitsubishi and Mitsui have been involved in large overseas land deals, buying into huge facilities in Latin America and elsewhere. But the list also includes many major European and US corporations including, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, Lonrho and Morgan Stanley.

Defenders of the land grab argue that many poor countries will benefit by trading off land and labour for foreign investment and technology,both vital for developing their nation’s infrastructure. Others see the process as simply siphoning off food and profits to other countries and foreign elites, triggering more poverty, disadvantage and dispossession, and decreasing local access to critical food supplies.If left unchecked land grabs could ultimately spell the end of many rural livelihoods and small-scale subsistence

farming throughout the world and threaten millions with starvation. But the land grab also illustrates other truths,in particular the way the global food crisis is exposing the fact that climate change,increasing soil depletion and loss of water resources,and falling crop yields will all bear down heavily on future world food supplies. What this may well mean is tighter markets,higher prices,pressure on farmlands,and for the developing world, more poverty and hunger.

Peter Curson is Professor in Population & Security, at the Centre for International Security Studies, Faculty of Economics & Business, the University of Sydney. He is also a TGIF Edition subscribe

The greatest irony in this land grab is that poor states with very limited food supples will be producing food for rich countries. Who said history doesn’t repeat itself?

ANALYSIS

19 December 2008

Walker’s World

Could U.S. go bankrupt?

By Martin Walker

Is the Fed running out of firepower? Or, to rephrase the question,is it possible that the central bank of the world’s biggest economy is becoming overstretched and overwhelmed by the costs of the crisis?

If so, does that mean the United States could go bankrupt?

The question is becoming urgent, because Wednesday the Fed cut the federal funds rate from an extraordinarily low 1 percent to an unprecedented 0.25 percent, with a prospect of going down to zero.

But even such unheard-of steps might not, on recent experience, revive the animal spirits of entrepreneurs and get bankers lending again. Fear still rules the markets.

Ben Bernanke, the chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, is trying desperately to keep the good ship capitalism afloat and is deploying heroic, innovative and risky measures to do so.

The costs are becoming astronomic. Over the course of the last year the Fed’s balance sheet has tripled to US$2.2 trillion. Like Atlas of the Greek myths, who bore the world pressed down on his shoulders, the Fed is currently holding up the U.S. financial system.

It has launched new credit facilities,accepted dubious collateral for loans to banks, arranged currency swaps and generally done things it has never done before in its 95-year history.Under the Term Auction Facility,it has issued $448 billion in liquidity to banks against various securities including Treasury bonds, municipal bonds,AAA securities and so on.

Under the Term Securities Lending Facility it has issued $185 billion in Treasury securities to guarantee inter-bank loans, backed by vaguely defined collateral that includes the now-notorious mortgage-backed securities.

Since Oct. 29, when it decided to intervene to unblock the commercial paper market, on which many U.S. corporations depend for operating funds, it has issued $349 billion in net liquidity. Under the Commercial Paper Funding Facility it has issued $309 billion and a further $41 billion under the

It is also allowing banks to turn a neat arbitraging profit on the funds it lends out to commercial banks at an interest rate of 0.49 percent.The banks then deposit these funds back with the Fed as reserves, on which they receive 1 percent interest.

In theory, the Fed’s ability to issue credit and supply funds is limitless; they can simply continue to print money or extend guarantees, and they will be backed up by the full faith and credit of the United States.

In practice, there will come a limit when the mar-

there will come a limit when the markets, foreign or domestic, start questioning the value of that credit and demand much higher interest rates to hold dollars that are visibly declining in value Asset-backed Commercial Paper Money Market Mutual Fund Liquidity Facility.

The Fed’s balance sheet also shows another $628 billion in assets, much of it in the form of currency swaps, like the special agreement on Oct. 29 to extend $120 billion to Mexico, Singapore, Brazil and South Korea. This followed the $180 billion swap agreement the previous month with the Bank of England and the Japanese, the European, the Canadian and the Swiss central banks.

And all this is being done under a veil of secrecy.

Citing banking confidentiality,it has rejected a Freedom of Information act request from Bloomberg Television to detail precisely the kinds of collateral it is now accepting and the credit it is issuing.

kets, foreign or domestic, start questioning the value of that credit and demand much higher interest rates to hold dollars that are visibly declining in value.That has not happened yet, and given the need of the rest of the world’s central banks for the U.S. economy to remain afloat, it may never do so.

But we are getting into risky and uncharted territory.This expansion of the Fed’s balance sheet is but a fraction of the overall exposure.The Fed has said it is prepared to put as much as $2.4 trillion into the commercial paper market (the $349 billion listed above on the balance sheet is the current net position).

And at the end of the day, the Fed also stands behind the $1.55 trillion issued by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, and the $950 billion

by the Treasury and the $300 billion by the Federal Housing Administration and the $200 billion that has been pledged to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Altogether, more than $7 trillion (or about the wealth that the entire U.S. economy produces in six months) has been committed to the financial crisis by the U.S. government and its agencies.And so far, it has probably stopped a banking collapse, but it can hardly be said to have saved the system.

Currently shrinking at an annual rate of more than 4 percent, the economy is sliding down the slope from recession toward depression. Consumers are on strike.The housing market continues to sink, with new housing starts falling another 19 percent in November. And the world is following the United States down this grim slope, with China reporting drops in exports last week.And now this week China reports that its output of electricity, a reliable indicator of economic activity, fell 9.6 percent in November.

The measures currently being taken by the Fed are historic. It never did anything like this during the Great Depression, and the only comparison is with the emergency measures it took to finance World War II. But we are only in the initial stages of this recession, and already the federal debt is heading toward 80 percent of GDP. Back in 1980, it was just over 30 percent of GDP.The last time it was as high as this was the aftermath of World War II, when the debt peaked at 120 percent of GDP. Forget about the war on terror; for the Fed, this is now the war to save the economy.

– UPI

The edge of capitalism’s abyss

By Arnaud de Borchgrave

During the Cold War democratic capitalism had competitors breathing down its neck in the form of socialism and communism, which kept it on the straight and narrow.But no sooner was the Cold War over than all restraints were abandoned.In the 1990s Russia’s new capitalist system quickly morphed into Russian organized crime, which went global.

In the United States, democratic capitalism gradually morphed into casino capitalism and, more recently, bandit capitalism, which scored some spectacular successes. Fortune magazine named Enron America’s most innovative company for six consecutive years. In just 15 years Enron grew from nowhere to be America’s seventh-largest company, employing 21,000 in more than 40 countries. But Enron’s success was an elaborate scam that drove it into the biggest bankruptcy case in U.S. history and brought down the auditing giant Arthur Andersen for destroying evidence of its relationship with Enron – and left all its employees sans savings or pension plans.

Enron,WorldCom,Tyco, Qwest, Computer Associates, Global Crossing – and the sordid beat went on and on. Tyco Chief Executive Officer Dennis Kozlowski and others had used their companies to join the lifestyles of the rich and famous, throwing multimillion-dollar birthday parties, trading corporate jets and boats for bigger ones.With each passing ‘biggest-ever’scandal came a bigger one.

Bernard Madoff, a former Nasdaq stock chairman and trusted by some of the wealthiest private investors in the United States, Europe, the Middle East and Asia, was turned in by his two sons in a US$50 billion swindle, the largest in Wall Street history.

Shock waves reverberated through country clubs from Palm Beach to the Hamptons, as well as in private banks in Switzerland and Monte Carlo.

Madoff was producing yearly returns of between 8 percent and 10 percent, year in and year out, irrespective of market downturns. It was a gigantic Ponzi scheme that he personally ran on a different

skyscraper floor from the one used by his two sons, Andrew and Mark, who have worked for their father for two decades. He ran his operation separately from the one managed by his two sons. The sons showed up at his apartment to ask questions about the company’s solvency. Madoff then conceded he was finished and that it’s all one big lie.

Named after the swindler emeritus Charles Ponzi, a Ponzi scheme is an investment operation that pays abnormally high returns to investors out of money paid in by subsequent investors, rather than from real profits generated by share trading.

Madoff, 70, managed to keep the swindle going for years by drawing in more and more wealthy people on the strength of his social contacts. Charged with a single count of securities fraud, he was released on $10 million bail. He faces up to 20 years in jail.

The bandit capitalism engendered since the end of the Cold War led inexorably to the subprime mortgage scandal that wound its way around the globe before the powers that be at the Fed and the Treasury Department realized this was the big enchilada that brought the United States to its financial knees – Lehman belly up; J.P. Morgan swallowed Bear Stearns;AIG saved by the government (i.e., the taxpayer) to the tune of $150 billion; Merrill saved by Bank of America; Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac saved by the government in what was tantamount to nationalization at an estimated cost of $200 billion.Thus, some $2 trillion was shovelled out by Treasury to save financial institutions that had been managed by CEOs making tens of millions a year.

The mighty Citigroup, hit by huge subprime losses, decided to shed 75,000 jobs and qualify for a government bailout.

But we’re only halfway through the carnage, according to a CBS 60 Minutes exclusive on the next humongous mortgage bubble yet to burst.

This second wave of mortgages is known as AltA and Option ARMS, somewhat better risks than subprime, but 8 million homes are still expected to be foreclosed during 2009-2011. These mortgages

originally were offered at teaser rates as low as 1 percent, and experts are watching how the monthly payments are being reset so that $850 suddenly becomes $1,500. More than $1 trillion worth of these mortgages are scheduled to be reset at a much higher rate beginning next month.

Hundreds of thousands did not expect to be laid off without resources when they signed their mortgages.

Most of them won’t be able to meet monthly payments of $1,500.The government will have to step in again to make sure millions more don’t go homeless.

A loophole in government bailouts also will have to be closed. It allows executive compensation packages to dodge government scrutiny in firms that don’t benefit from the mint’s printing presses.

As long as hedge funds and derivatives are protected against transparency, greed in the 21st century will continue to stampede democratic capitalism.This could be America’s last wake-up call before a repeat of the Great Depression.

Arnaud de Borchgrave is Editor-at-large of The Washington Times and United Press International

Media and investors gather outside Madoff’s New York headquarters this week. UPI/Ezio Petersen

WORLD

19 December 2008

Obama plans to hit hard Washington – President-elect Barack Obama vowed to restore confidence in the US financial system as he announced his choice to head the government’s top regulator this morning.

Obama named Mary Schapiro, a long-time regulator, to lead the Securities and Exchange Commission, which has come under sharp criticism for failing to foresee the massive financial crisis striking US banks.

Obama’s first task when he enters office in January will be stabilizing the economy. His transition team is drawing up plans for a more than US$500billion stimulus package.

But Obama said fixing the financial system would be one of his top legislative priorities. Schapiro would help close the loopholes in regulation that helped spark the crisis in the first place.

“Just as important to our long-term economic stability is a 21st- century regulatory framework to ensure that a crisis like this can never happen again,” Obama said at a press conference in Chicago.

It was the latest in a series of cabinet and White House staff announcements Obama has made in the past few weeks as he rushes to put a team in place before leaving for a two-week holiday on Sunday.

Obama has moved faster than any modern-day president in unveiling his administration. He faces the first wartime transition of power since the Vietnam War and will also enter office in the midst of

an economic recession.

“The regulators who were assigned to oversee Wall Street dropped the ball,”Obama said. Schapiro would help“crack down on a culture of greed”that had spread through the financial industry, he said.

Obama pledged to restore“openness,accountability and transparency”to the financial sector. Last week’s news of a 50- billion-dollar fraud allegedly orchestrated

by Wall Street investor Bernard Madoff“reminded us yet again of how badly reform is needed.”

Schapiro said reforms were crucial if the SEC was to fulfil its primary role of protecting investors, many of whom have lost millions as US stocks plummeted over the year.

“Investor trust is the lifeblood of our financial markets,”Schapiro said.

Schapiro currently leads the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, an arm of the SEC that watches over securities.

She will replace SEC chairman Christopher Cox, an appointee of President George W Bush whose term officially runs through 2009. Cox has said he will step down at the end of Bush’s term.

Some US politicians, including former Republican presidential candidate John McCain, had called on Cox to resign after the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers Holdings in September nearly brought down the US financial industry.

Obama also filled two other financial positions today. Former Treasury official Gary Gensler will become chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, which regulates the commodity futures market.

Long-time advisor DanielTarullo was nominated to be one of 12 regional governors of the Federal Reserve, the US central bank. Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke’s term does not expire until January 2010.

– DPA

He faces the first wartime transition of power since the Vietnam War and will also enter office in the midst of an economic recession

Financial domino theory Washington – The world’s financial firms are expecting the global economy to contract in 2009 as the effects of a massive financial crisis spread from wealthy nations to developing countries.

The Institute of International Finance, the sector’s largest lobby group, today predicted a 0.4-percent decline in world growth next year in one of the starkest global forecasts made by any economic institution.

The current economic crisis was “shaping up to be the most severe globally synchronized recession in modern history,”warned Charles Dallara, managing director of the IIF, which counts more than 390 financial firms among its members.

There has been no case of a global contraction since World War II, the IIF said. Some economists have rated the current crisis as the worst since the Great Depression of the 1930s.

Both the International Monetary Fund and World Bank have predicted a global recession in 2009 – defined as world growth of less than 3 per cent – but

still expect positive growth over the year.

The global downturn has been led by a near-collapse of the financial sectors in US and Europe, where risky investments in the US mortgage market have cost banks more than 500 billion dollars and led to a series of bankruptcies and government takeovers.

Dallara admitted “serious mistakes”were made by financial firms in the run-up to the industry’s collapse. He repeated calls for better regulation and “structural reforms”in the industry.

Leaders of the world’s 20 largest economies plan to meet in April in London to agree on an overhaul of global regulations, including the creation of a “college of supervisors” that will watch over individual banks.

Banks were working “mightily hard to address the weaknesses”in the sector and some measure of stability has been restored since September’s nearcollapse, Dallara said, but it could still take two years before the industry recovers.

Dallara also called for more coordination as countries unveil hundreds of billions of dollars in stimulus packages to boost their flagging economies. President-elect Barack Obama’s plans for a US stimulus of at least 500 billion dollars were “impressive,”he said, though the US is still likely to remain in recession for much of 2009.

The US, Europe and Japan are already in a recession and will continue to struggle through at least the first half of 2009.Advanced economies as a whole will contract by 1.4 per cent next year, the IIF said.

But the IIF’s more pessimistic outlook is largely the result of a sharper downturn in the developing world, where a drop in foreign investment and sharp decline in commodity prices have threatened private companies and even entire countries.

The drop in energy and metals prices over the past few months has caused a “shift”in the downturn to the Middle East, Russia and Latin America, according to Philip Suttle, the IIF’s macroeconomic policy director.

The price of crude oil has fallen by some twothirds since topping 140 dollars per barrel in July.

Latin American growth will fall from 4.5 per cent this year to 1 per cent in 2009,as the continent suffers from falling commodity prices and the ripple effects of the financial crisis in the US, the IIF said.

Some Latin American and Eastern European countries could follow Ecuador in defaulting on their debt, Dallara said, though he would not name specific countries at risk.

While Asia has weathered the financial turmoil better than some regions, China’s growth will still drop from 11.9 per cent in 2007 and 9.3 per cent this year to 6.5 per cent in 2009.

Dallara said heavy government intervention has prevented the collapse of the financial industry after the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc in September, but he warned “another round” of intervention in banks may be necessary in the coming months.

– DPA

Goodnight, good luck, from Guantanamo Bay Washington – US Defence Secretary Robert Gates has ordered aides to begin drawing up a plan to close the prison for suspects in the war on terrorism at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the Pentagon said today.

Gates wants to be prepared to move quickly if president-elect Barack Obama, who has pledged to close Guantanamo, makes it an earlier priority after taking office on January 20, spokesman Geoff Morrell said.

“He has asked his team for a proposal on how to shut it down, what would be required specifically to close it and move the detainees from that facility,” Morrell said.

Gates has agreed to stay on as Pentagon chief under Obama and has also expressed a desire to close Guantanamo as soon as possible. Gates has said, however, there are complicated legal issues that would have to be worked out, including a law the would ban the detainees from seeking asylum in the United States.

“One of the requirements of closure is, you know, constructing legislation that will provide some sort of comprehensive framework, statutory framework for the detention of this population outside of the confines of Gitmo,” Morrell said, using the nick-

name for the naval installation in the remote part of Cuba.

There are about 250 detainees still held at the prison, which opened in 2002 to hold terrorism suspects, most of whom were captured during fighting in Afghanistan. It also houses the alleged mastermind of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and other senior alQa’ida figures.

“The motivation for the secretary in this ... is not just the fact that he believes closure is the right thing, but that the president- elect has made it perfectly clear throughout the course of the campaign that ... he wishes to address this issue early on in his administration,”Morrell said.

Guantanamo is also the site of the military prisons for trying suspects in the war on terrorism.The process has so far produced only three convictions, and most of the prisoners have not been formally charged but are held as“enemy combatants.”

The Pentagon has identified 60 detainees for release, but they remain there because Washington has been unable to find countries willing to take them.Yemenis make up the largest group of the prisoners.

Obama has said he will order reviews of all of the cases in Guantanamo, and has hinted at preferring trials in US federal civilian courts. He said he wants to close the facility responsibly.

Guantanamo has been severely criticized by human rights groups and has been the subject of torture and abuse allegations during interrogation of the prisoners, including the use of waterboarding.

Guantanamo has also been a symbol of international criticism of President George W Bush’s

policies in the war on terrorism. Bush has expressed a desire to shutter the facility as well, but has been unable to come up with an acceptable plan.

The Bush administration maintains that it does not transfer detainees to other countries without first getting assurances they will not be tortured or abused.

Australian David Hicks, who was captured fighting with the Taliban in Afghanistan, pleaded guilty under the military commissions in 2007 to one count of providing material support for terrorism, and served out his nine-month sentence in his home country.

In August, Osama bin Laden’s driver and bodyguard, Salim Hamdan, was convicted and received a five-and-a-half year prison sentence, which included his time already served. He was transferred to his nativeYemen to complete the remainder of his sentence. He is due for release in January.

A propagandist for bin Laden, Ali Hamza alBahlul, also Yemeni, was convicted in November of conspiracy, providing material support for terrorism and soliciting murder as an al-Qa’ida propagandist who made videos designed to recruit suicide bomber. He received a life sentence.

– DPA

WORLD

19 December 2008

Obama nominee could be good news for NZ

By Todd J. Gillman The Dallas Morning News

WASHINGTON – Ron Kirk emerged this morning as the frontrunner for an Obama cabinet post handling international trade, thrusting the pro-trade former Dallas mayor into a sensitive balancing act between unions and business interests.

High-level Democrats confirmed that Kirk is a leading contender, and there were reports his nomination would be announced as early as tomorrow.

Reached by phone, Kirk declined to comment.

But talk about him in the job was“more prevalent today and a little bit more emphatic,” said John Murphy, vice president for international affairs at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. He added that Kirk isn’t well-known nationally but seemed to have a “heartening” record of support for free trade and its benefits in Texas.

“Trade has been one of the only bright spots for the U.S. economy, and the Obama team is going to need every tool in its tool box,”he said.

The trade representative is an ambassador-level post with a staff of more than 200 and offices in Washington, Geneva and Brussels. Since the Ford administration, it has come with Cabinet rank.

If confirmed by the Senate, Kirk would probably spend much of his time overseas hammering out trade deals, persuading foreign leaders to drop tariffs and other trade barriers, curb movie piracy, and open new markets for U.S. goods.

In New Zealand,Trade Minister Tim Groser told TGIF Edition little was known here of Ron Kirk, but reports of his support for international free trade were a good sign.

Leaders of trade unions in the US, a key ally in Obama’s victory last month, are anxious about the trade appointment. Some aren’t sure what to make of Kirk.

“The jury’s out,”said the AFL-CIO’s Texas president, Becky Moeller.

As mayor,Kirk touted the merits of free trade during his years. In a series of overseas trips, he pitched the Dallas region as an ideal trading partner.

The top Republican on the Senate panel that will confirm the next trade representative, Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley, questioned Kirk’s qualifications.

Aides noted that while most of Obama’s Cabinet picks have deep experience in their fields – the energy secretary-designate even won a Nobel Prize – Kirk has little background on trade issues.

Kirk, 54, was the city’s first black mayor, serving from 1995 to 2002. He helped win approval for two controversial projects, the Trinity River overhaul and the American Airlines Centre, and was considered an ally of business interests.

He left office to run for the Senate in 2002 but lost to Republican John Cornyn. Since, he’s been a lawyer and lobbyist, and this year, he was a surrogate campaigner for Obama, traveling to other states and helping to introduce the candidate at a big Reunion Arena rally before the Texas primary in March.

Trade sits at the intersection of foreign relations and domestic economic policy. With debates over financial bailouts and stimulus packages looming in Congress, many experts agree that trade talks won’t be front-and-centre for Obama.

Three trade deals are pending in Congress.

Obama opposes a pact with Colombia, echoing U.S. unions’ complaints about anti-labour violence. A South Korea pact is stalled amid fears for the U.S. auto industry. A deal with Panama is considered less controversial.

The next trade representative would face stalled World Trade Organization talks known as the Doha Round, and would be charged with confronting China and others on export subsidies, tariffs and copyright issues,and fighting to keep markets open to U.S.goods.

“There are a lot of opportunities,” said William Krist at the Woodrow Wilson Center.

Like other experts on international trade, Krist wasn’t familiar with Kirk, but said the next trade representative’s work could be critical:“Anytime that you have a lot of economic problems, there’s a real tendency for a growth of trade protectionism, and that could be a disaster for the world economy.”

Frank Vargo, vice president for international economic affairs at the National Association of Manu-

OBAMA TRANSITION

Ron Kirk

U.S. Trade Representative • Born 1954; father worked 35 years for the U.S. Postal Service • Breakthrough First AfricanAmerican mayor of Dallas in 1995; won with 62 percent of vote; re-elected with 74 percent • Politically connected Worked for Senator Lloyd Bentson, Texas governor Ann Richards • Coalition builder As mayor, helped jump-start Dallas’ faltering economy; known for his outgoing personality • Obama fan Said Clinton would be too divisive to govern Source: Reuters, Online NewsHour

facturers, likewise said he wasn’t familiar with Kirk but said Obama has lined up an“impressive”cabinet and an appointment to the cabinet implies that Kirk would have his trust.

“Being mayor (in) a border state certainly he’s going to be familiar with the benefits of trade, particularly NAFTA, which has benefited Texas a lot,”he said.

And he predicted that as Obama wrestles with the economy and foreign relations,“trade will inevitably become a priority.”

Kirk’s chances for the job got a boost Tuesday when the leading contender, Rep. Xavier Becerra of Los Angeles, announced he would stay in Congress.

Obama reportedly offered the Californian the job

© 2008 MCT

two weeks ago. But Becerra recently won a House Democratic leadership post, and was apparently loathe to give that up after concluding – as he told Los Angeles-based La Opinion – that trade“would not be priority No. 1, and perhaps, not even priority No. 2 or 3”for Obama.

Grassley finds that “extremely disappointing,” aides said, given how critical exports will be to economic recovery.

Among others mentioned for the trade job recently: Dan Tarullo, a Georgetown University law professor who served in the Clinton administration, and former Rep. Harold Ford of Tennessee, head of the centrist Democratic Leadership Council.

Britain’s pound tanking against euro London – As planeloads of tourists armed with at Currencies Direct. empty suitcases roam London’s Oxford Street for Martin Slaney, head of derivatives of GFT Global cheap Christmas bargains,the Labour government of Markets, agreed:“The euro is becoming the darling Gordon Brown is keeping a stiff upper lip on the British of the currency markets and there’s no confidence pound’s relentless slide towards parity with the euro. in the pound. I would not be surprised if it hit parity “We have never had a policy of targeting the with the euro and even fall below that.” pound,”Yvette Cooper, a cabinet minister and close The government has so far reacted calmly to signs adviser of Brown told journalists curtly. that there could be a full-blown run on the pound, She recalled that attempts by previous British saying that it believed the downward trend could governments to meddle with exchange rates had not be sustained. Officials also point at evidence that been“unsuccessful,”in what was a clear reference to the pound had, for a long time, been“overvalued.” sterling’s ejection from However, the British the European Exchange currency’s decline has, Officials also point inevitably, reignited the Rate Mechanism (ERM) in 1992. at evidence that the debate about whether or Now,as then,currency not Britain should join speculators had stoked pound had, for a long the euro. the fire by seeking to time, been “overvalued” Speculation was make hefty gains from fuelled by EU Commisbets they had placed against the pound. sion chief Jose Manuel Barroso who said recently that Sterling,which this week hit an exchange rate of 1.06 Britain was now“closer to the euro than ever before.” against the euro, has lost a quarter of its value against “I’m not going to break the confidentiality of certain the euro – and the US dollar – since midyear. conversations,but some British politicians have already Analysts predict that parity could be reached told me,‘If we had the euro,we would have been better against the eurozone currency early in the new year. off’,”Barroso said in an interview with French radio.

While tourists, exporters and hoteliers rejoice His remarks provoked an angry response from at the trend, British holidaymakers wince at their Downing Street.“Our position on the euro is the same. currency’s near-parity with the euro, which Britain We have no plans to join the euro,”a statement said. refused to join in 1999.

Officials have revealed that Brown, who is a longWhile the government maintains that sterling’s standing opponent of introduction of the euro in downward trend will be halted as European econo- Britain, had made it clear to ministers that he would mies weaken further, analysts believe that there is “not tolerate”a debate on the euro at present. worse to come for the stricken currency.

“Officially, the euro debate is off the agenda, but “This is likely to get worse as more investors lose unofficially, it’s in the anteroom,”said leading British confidence in the pound amid fears about the UK economist Will Hutton. economy,”said Mark O’Sullivan, a dealing director – DPA

WORLD

10

19 December 2008

The largest donations to Bill Clinton of more than 25 million dollars were from charities – Children’s Investment Fund Foundation and UNITAID, an international group that fights HIV/AIDS

Bill Clinton exposes his private funding The 97 year old Christmas cake

By Bill Ward Star Tribune

MINNEAPOLIS – It’s hard as a rock, has a slight scent of spice and looks like Frankenstein, with knob-like mints protruding from its sides. But, hey, will any of us look any better than Pierre Girard’s fruitcake when we’re 97 years old?

“Most people won’t touch it,” said Girard with a chuckle.“Others say,‘I wouldn’t have that in my house. I’m afraid of it.’I think I’m the only one that really loves it.”

Ya think? Especially when even a young fruitcake, like many holiday traditions, evokes decidedly mixed feelings.

“My first reaction was ‘Eww, I don’t want to eat that one,’”said Sue Riley, a neighbour who first encountered the cake at Girard’s Christmas party last year.“It’s really ugly.”

The cake’s history, aside from its being baked a few months before the Titanic sank, is shrouded in mystery.Two of Girard’s friends,Audrey Staber and Dick Scheimo, found it on a St. Louis Park, Minn., closet shelf while doing an estate-sale assessment in 1992.The elderly resident had died with no heirs, and Girard never learned her name before Staber and Scheimo subsequently passed away.

But the cake came in a box with cryptic inscriptions:“Xmas cake Baked in Dec. 1911”on top,“Xmas Cake baked by my mother’s brother Alex died Dec. 27.Was operated on Xmas day”on the bottom.

Staber and Scheimo gave Girard the cake at a holiday gathering at T.K. Nick’s in Golden Valley.

Hilarity ensued. But when Girard decided to keep the cake, his friends “were amazed,” he said. They shouldn’t have been: Girard said he always has had a well-known weakness for“old things and castoffs ... and I’ve always had a reputation for keeping old food around.”

Since he loves a good yarn as much as he does antiques, Girard baked up one for this cake.“I got to thinking, there’s a story here.This is somebody’s life, and she valued this.”

He first learned that his new possession was part of a Victorian-era holiday tradition in which a family would make a spice cake, soak it in brandy and rum, eat part of it and put it away for the next year, adding a new layer when it got small. Girard took that bit of history and ran with it. His concoction: “Alex was cooking a new top for the cake. So he was frosting the cake, and while doing that, the knife touched the bottom and got contaminated.And the last thing he did was lick the knife, and he got sick.

Once he got sick, his family decided,‘We won’t eat

the cake ‘til Alex comes home.’And when he never came home, they felt bad and put it away and never ate it again.

“So for that family in 1911, that old Victorian tradition stopped.”

With crumbling pecans and a motley, uneven frosting streaked with curvy pinkish lines –“I don’t think that’s blood veins,”Girard quipped – the cake, like most things nearly a century old, looks every bit its age. It might be the oldest baked good in the state.

“Nobody around here has heard of any kind of food nearly that old,”said Bill Belknap,spokesman for Hennepin County Public Health Protection.“It does beg the question: How long does a fruitcake last?”

Up to 25 years, according to“The Joy of Cooking,” “when they are well-saturated with alcoholic liquors, which raise the spirits and keep down moulds.”

There’s no question, then, that the cake was soaked in booze, which has served lo these many years as a preservative and kept it from disintegrating or being eaten by critters. Girard says dogs generally take a whiff and quickly turn away.

Humans, on the other hand, have taken much more interest in at least checking out the cake.

Before he retired, Girard would take it to work at Qwest; his co-workers and fellow bus riders would marvel at this chunk of history.

His partner of the last six years, Dennis Borrel, was a bit more nonplussed.“I thought,‘Why in the world would anybody keep this?’ But somebody kept it all those years before Pierre got it,”he said.

“It doesn’t mean much to me one way or the other.

But it’s the only Christmas decoration that gets stored upstairs; all the rest go to the basement. So I do give it its place of honour.”

But its real place of honour comes at this time of year. Last December, it was displayed at the neighbourhood party alongside a barrel of Nouveau Beaujolais that Borrel had won, marking perhaps the first time anywhere that a wine was 96 years younger than the “food”accompanying it.

“I had one woman say,‘I think I’m getting sick from that, having an allergic reaction.’But knowing her, I think she was probably just trying to get a day off of work,”Girard said.“We used to joke that it was the origin of the Ebola virus, or that there is a cure for every known disease in there.

“And of course,‘A fruitcake for the fruitcake,’I’ve had that comment several times.”

The comments will continue, especially as Girard prepares for a gala 100th birthday party three years hence. But rather than a Nouveau Beaujolais, might we suggest a 1911 Port?

Washington – The William J Clinton Foundation released thousands of pages today documenting governments, individuals and businesses who contributed to the former president’s charitable causes around the world.

Bill Clinton agreed to publicize the information after President- elect Barack Obama nominated his wife, Senator Hillary Clinton, as secretary of state.

In her position, Clinton will be in charge of foreign policy toward the countries who gave money to the foundation.

The top national contributor was Saudi Arabia, which has given 10 to 25 million dollars to the foundation, which runs programmes to fight AIDS, reduce greenhouse gas emissions and promote education.

Norway provided 5 to 10 million dollars and millions more came from Brunei, Kuwait, Oman and Qatar.The foundation has raised a total of 500 million dollars, according to information released on its website.

The largest donations to Bill Clinton of more than 25 million dollars were from charities – Children’s

Investment Fund Foundation and UNITAID, an international group that fights HIV/AIDS. The security firm Blackwater, contracted by the State Department to provide diplomatic security in Iraq, has provided more than 10,000 dollars to Clinton’s foundation.

Blackwater has come under scrutiny for alleged unnecessary use of force. Five of its security guards were charged earlier this month with voluntary manslaughter related to September 2007 shootings in Baghdad that killed at least 17 civilians.

The State Department is reviewing whether to retain Blackwater’s services and there is an ongoing investigation by federal authorities and a review by the US embassy in Baghdad. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said today that a final decision on whether to continue with Blackwater will likely fall into Hillary Clinton’s lap.

“I would expect that all of these various things ... will probably happen after January 20,”when the Bush administration departs and,if confirmed by the Senate, Clinton takes up her post, McCormack said.

– DPA

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SPORT

19 December 2008

11

NZ shades test despite Chanderpaul century

By Chris Barclay of NZPA

Napier, Dec 19 – Centurion Shivnarine Chanderpaul occupied his customary role as batting saviour though New Zealand still held the upper hand after a fluctuating first day of the second cricket test at McLean Park here today.

Chanderpaul, his side’s designated man for a crisis, shored up an innings in strife at 74 for four, crafting his first hundred against New Zealand and his 20th of a 14-year test career shortly before the close.

The unconventional left-hander reached three figures with a deftly placed single behind square from the 214th ball he faced, a typically assured knock that has so far contained nine boundaries and a trio of sixes.

He was unbeaten on 100 at stumps while first-test century-maker Jerome Taylor will be on one when the West Indies resume tomorrow on 258 for six.

Aside from eclipsing his previous best against New Zealand -- the 82 scored at Bridgetown in 1996 -- Chanderpaul also figured in a face-saving partnership with adopted West Indian Brendan Nash.

Chanderpaul and Nash added a crucial 163 runs for the fifth wicket, a liaison instrumental in lifting the tourists spirits though the gloss was taken off by the concession of two late wickets.

West Australian-born Nash, who made his debut in last week’s drawn test in Dunedin, compiled an unruffled 74, notching his maiden fifty in his just his second test innings.

The pair came together shortly before lunch with the West Indies having lost four of 31, and safely negotiated the middle session, battening down to accumulate a patient 80.

Chanderpaul and Nash were more expressive in the final session as New Zealand’s attack tired.

After toiling for 54 overs without reward,the home side had late cause for celebration when a Nash chipped James Franklin to Daniel Flynn at short cover to depart angrily for 74 from 162 balls.

Franklin struck with the fifth over of the new ball,

the highlight of the left-armer’s day after he seemed to struggle for pace when opening the bowling.

The momentum shifted the home side’s way again in the shadow of stumps when wicketkeeper Denesh Ramdin was bowled by Daniel Vettori for six, shouldering arms to a ball that cannoned into middle and off stumps.

Chanderpaul’s 269 minutes of resolve was hardly unexpected.

His vigil is simply a continuation of the form that has seen him average a staggering 103.15 from 21 innings.

Conservative from the outset,Chanderpaul slowly set about blunting a New Zealand attack that got off to a better than anticipated start after Chris Gayle won the toss and chose to bat in perfect conditions.

Chanderpaul required 147 balls to post his second fifty of the series while Nash, the former Queensland representative who qualifies for the West Indies through his Jamaican-born parents, followed Chanderpaul’s blueprint.

He raised his bat when he uppercutting a Franklin short ball to the third man fence for his 10th boundary.

Chanderpaul rarely set the pulse racing but neither did he experience any palpitations -- his only mild concern was a forlorn attempt to reverse a rejected leg before wicket appeal when on 28.

Vettori’s request for a second opinion from third umpire Mark Benson smacked of desperation -- the Englishman only needed one replay to determine the ball was clearing the stumps after Chanderpaul shouldered arms to Kyle Mills.

The loss of Nash and Ramdin tilts the balance in New Zealand’s favour although the West Indies were still satisfied after they crumbled alarmingly once Gayle was dismissed by Iain O’Brien’s first delivery.

Gayle,who made a fluent 34,was squared up by a ball that nipped off the seam to give wicketkeeper Brendon McCullum the first of two catches at the wicket.

Patel also had early success, having Ramnaresh Sarwan caught behind for 11.

West Indies Shivnarine Chanderpaul celebrates a centruy against New Zealand on the first day of the second international cricket test, McLean Park, Napier. NZPA / Ross Setford

Xavier Marshall continued the West Indies’slide when he was brilliantly caught at slip by Jesse Ryder, low down to his right for six.

Vettori then chimed in to remove opener Sewnar-

ine Chattergoon for a paintaking 13 from 72 balls.

Patel was the workhorse today, taking one for 41 from 25 overs that included 12 maidens.

Vettori had two for 58 and O’Brien two for 59.

Breakers expect tough test in Perth

By Alastair Bull of NZPA

Auckland, Dec 19 – The New Zealand Breakers expect the Perth Wildcats to give them a much tougher basketball test tomorrow night than they got from the Sydney Spirit last night.

The Breakers flew to Perth today bouyed by their crushing 114-70 win over the financially embattled Sydney Spirit at North Shore Events Centre, the biggest win in the club’s history.

Sydney had come to Auckland with four wins in their previous five Australian National Basketball League matches, including victories over title contenders the Melbourne Tigers and South Dragons, but they had little to offer in the second half.

The Wildcats in Perth, however, are a different proposition, especially given what seems to be a hostile relationship between the teams.

Both Breakers-Wildcats matches in Auckland

this year were fiery affairs.

The Breakers won both, though they only won in the last minute of their first match after a highlycontroversial last-second foul call against the Wildcats when the teams were tied.

Breakers guard Phill Jones was suspended for one match for striking Perth forward Shawn Redhage in that match, and there was some push and shove at halftime in the second match as the teams left for the dressing rooms.

Tomorrow’s match will be the first in Perth since the two Auckland clashes and follows a long flight to Perth today “It’s going to be a real cracker,” coach Andrej Lemanis said.

“That place is a real cauldron – the crowd sits on top of you and screams abuse.They have a tremendous home record.

“We have been around long enough to know you

don’t put too much on a single regular season game, but they will be up for us and we are looking forward to it.”

The Breakers have yet to win in Perth but they will be aided by the fact they were able to rest most of their big names in the final quarter against the Spirit.

With the game sewn up following a dominant third quarter, Lemanis was able to leave Kirk Penney, Tony Ronaldson and Oscar Forman on the bench, while CJ Bruton did not spend much time on court in the final quarter either.

“It’s a tough trip to Perth but our group hasn’t made that sort of excuse for any away game this year,”Lemanis said.

“But it will be good to be able to keep the guys fresh.”

The Breakers looked a little rusty on offence in the first half but their defence on top Spirit scorers Jason

Smith and Matthew Knight helped the home team go into the halftime break with a 46-41 lead.

They exploded out of the blocks in the quarter, scoring the first 18 points and eventually taking the third quarter 38-12.

Despite fielding a largely second-string team in the final quarter they still dominated the Spirit 3017.There were strong performances from youngster Tom Abercrombie and forward Adam Tanner, the latter on the comeback trail following a string of injuries.

“I was pleased there was no let-up in intensity once those guys were on court,”Lemanis said.

“The defence remained solid and we kept executing on offence.”

A win over the Wildcats would put the Breakers level at the top of the ANBL with the South Dragons as they go into a two-week Christmas break.

– NZPA

Pursuiters target more success in Beijing Wellington, Dec 19 – The New Zealand Olympic track cycling team will return to the scene of their Beijing triumph for a World Cup meet next month.

A squad containing several newcomers have been selected for the World Cup meet on January 16-18, a shakedown for the world championships in March.

The teams pursuit bronze medal-winning squad have been named along with fellow Olympians Alison Shanks and Catherine Cheatley.

Sam Bewley,Westley Gough, Peter Latham, Marc Ryan and Jesse Sergent, the bronze medal-winning teams pursuit combination from Beijing, will head the BikeNZ team.

Missing is individual pursuit medallist Hayden Roulston, who has signed a professional contract to ride in Europe.

The other men in the team for Beijing include world omnium champion Hayden Godfrey and sprinter Simon van Velthoven, who has won selection after impressive performances at the recent Oceania championships and World Cup meet in Melbourne.

Shanks, fourth in the Olympic individual pursuit, will return to track action in that event and will anchor the women’s teams pursuit combination.

She will be joined by world junior championship pursuit medallist Lauren Ellis and Kaytee Boyd.

Cheatley, who will also be considered for the pursuit team, will also compete in the scratch and points races.

BikeNZ national track coach Tim Carswell is delighted with the squad.

“Obviously it’s great to have our pursuit combination back together,”Carswell said.

“They had a break after Beijing and then have been riding the road and worked really well in training at our recent camp.”

New Zealand squads:World Cup, Beijing, January 16-18: Sam Bewley (Rotorua), Westley Gough (Waipukurau), Peter Latham (Te Awamutu), Marc Ryan (Timaru), Jesse

Sergent (Palmerston North), Simon van Velthoven (Palmerston North), Haydn Godfrey (Christchurch), Alison Shanks (Dunedin), Kaytee Boyd (Auckland), Lauren Ellis (Ashburton), Catherine Cheatley (Invercargill).

AustralianYouth Olympics,Sydney,January 14-17: : Chad Adair (Christchurch), Josh Atkins (Christchurch), Ruaraidh McLeod (Christchurch), Ethan Mitchell (Auckland),Henrietta Mitchell (Au ckland), MichaelVink (Christchurch),SamWebster (Auckland), Charlotte Kelly (Dunedin),Cara Smith (Christchurch), Elizabeth Steel (Christchurch), Matthew Vermunt (Invercargill), Georgia Wight (Alexandra).

– NZPA

SPORT

12

19 December 2008

Tiger out of the woods for 2009

By Mark Whicker The Orange County Register

We cringed. We gasped. We shook our heads. We did everything but quit watching. But Tiger Woods won’t watch himself win the U.S. Open at Torrey Pines on a shattered leg.

He remembers his own pain. He doesn’t want to feel ours.

“I’ve watched highlight packages,” he said this week.“I haven’t watched the full network coverage yet. I really don’t want to. Just some of the highlights will suffice.

“I really don’t want to watch shot after shot.

Some of the bad ones, with my leg, they didn’t really feel good.”

He smiled.“The highlight packages were mostly putts.Which was totally cool.You don’t have to move that much on putting.”

Well, actually Woods did.

He bellowed out his most primal emotions after rolling in so many tilt-a-whirl putts, following himself into the hole, all through the weekend and into a Monday playoff.

There is no doubt that Woods’Open victory, executed on a knee that needed reconstructive surgery and achieved over the fearless Rocco Mediate, was the essential sporting event of 2008.

Woods rated it just below the 1997 Masters, his first major, and the 2000 U.S. Open, which he won by 15 strokes.

“As an athlete you always push it a little bit, even if you’re hurt,”he said.“At Torrey Pines I just said I’m playing.As far as everyone else having doubts, yeah, they did - ‘you really shouldn’t be doing this.’

Blah, blah, blah, whatever. But at night it wasn’t a whole lot of fun.”

Woods joined trainer Keith Kleven after every round for therapy that often lasted past midnight.

He estimated“there was about 20 percent kneecap left”and that it took long, agonizing hours for the swelling to disappear, for the screaming ligament to quiet down long enough for Woods to get a bit of sleep and run back out for 18 holes in the 7,600-yard cooker of Torrey Pines.

“I’m still trying to figure out how I did it,” he said.

Woods was kicking off this weekend’s Chevron World Challenge, in which 16 hungry pros slip and

Tiger Woods (R) and his caddie Steve Williams celebrate after Woods sunk a birdie putt during the fourth round of the US Open at Torrey Pines Golf Course in San Diego. / UPI

slide around Sherwood Country Club and try to win real, if unofficial, money in a tournament that doesn’t include Tiger.

Their haste is understandable.Woods will be back, although he wouldn’t say when. Unofficial guesses range from the PGA Tour event at Torrey Pines in February to Bay Hill in Orlando in March, to maybe not until the Masters in April. Maybe even later.This was ACL surgery with all the trimmings, and it’s usually a 12-month deal.

He has started hitting full shots with irons, but he hasn’t emptied the bag yet.

“The ball is not going very far, so I know how you guys (writers) feel,”Woods said.

Baloney. Tiger never has known and never will know the thrill of nailing a 3-iron to within 10 metres of the cup on a 150-yard par 3.

“That 100 yards is a long way off,” he said.“My

game is not ready for public consumption. I don’t want you guys seeing me play like this.”

He said it eagerly. He has something to anticipate now. He has a strong left knee for the first time since maybe the early 1990’s, and stability when he loads up and drives through. He has been putting and chipping all along. He will not need a how-to book, or an instructional video, to get there.

But he does look for mileposts, and every day of distance since his operation is a day worth embracing. As are all these weeks and months Woods has spent in repose with wife Elin and daughter Sam Alexis.

“The first few weeks (after the operation) were brutal,”Woods said.“I can’t even describe the pain, and then trying to move in, and all the atrophy there.

I didn’t really feel good, like I could do some activities, until three and a half months post-op.

“Was there hesitancy when I started full shots?

No doubt.The last time I took a full shot was at the Open. It didn’t feel very good. Now I hit a full shot and say, OK, I felt nothing there.That’s good.”

Ski racers, who fit in their careers between knee surgeries, have told Woods they never feel they’re ready until they crash, then pop back up. Every swing for Woods is a crash. He goes back and takes another one.

Since Woods disappeared in late June, Padraig Harrington,Anthony Kim, Camilo Villegas and Sergio Garcia have taken varying degrees of advantage.

Maybe Woods will face new, confident challengers in 2009. Maybe they’ll keep frolicking while Tiger tries to find the same game.

Or maybe Woods is bringing more highlights to come, after this brief but strong message: “I don’t want to be the same,”he said.

UEFA’s final 32 almost sorted Hamburg – Two-time winners Sevilla and fellow Spanish side Racing Santander both crashed out of the UEFA Cup, while England’s Tottenham Hotspur were among teams to advance to the last 32 this morning.

Sevilla, winners of the competition in 2006 and 2007, slipped to a 1-0 Group C defeat at Italy’s Sampdoria who earn a place in the draw for the knockout stages this weekend.

Germany’s VfB Stuttgart clinched the third spot in the group by downing group winners Standard Liege 3-0 to bag one of the six remaining places at stake on the night.

Tottenham, another two-time winner, advanced after coming from two goals down to draw 2-2 with Spartak Moscow in Group D. It proved a disappointing evening for the Russians as Dutch side Nijmegen defeated group winners Udinese 2-0 to book their place in the knockout stage.

Paris St Germain progressed with a 4-0 win over FC Twente in Group A, while Santander lost out despite a 3-1 defeat of Manchester City.

Olympiakos thrashed Germany’s Hertha Berlin 4-0 to win third place in Group B. Stuttgart’s win confirmed a coaching job for Marcus Babbel until the end of the season as well as second spot in Group C. “We’re pleased we can continue. It means we’ve done a good job so far,”said Babbel, who replaced the sacked Armin Veh four weeks ago.

“We’ve taken a few small steps forward but the journey is not over.We have big aims and we want to continue along the path we’ve taken.”

Goals from Sami Khedira in the fifth minute, Roberto Hilbert four minutes after the break and Romanian Ciprian Marica in the 72nd earned a comprehensive victory for the Bundesliga side.

Two late goals helped Paris St Germain power through in Group A with a 4-0 defeat of alreadyqualified FC Twente, with a brace from Peguy Luyindula, in the eighth and 86th minutes, and one apiece from Stephane Sessegnon (24) and Mateja Kezman (84).

Racing Santander lost out on goal difference despite a 3-1 win over already-qualified Manchester City, who finished top of the group.

First-half strikes from Jonathan Pereira (18) and Oscar Serrano (30) and a Juan Valera goal 10 minutes after the interval gave the Spanish side every chance of progressing, but PSG’s late goal surge and a late City consolation from Felipe Caicedo ended their hopes.

Both overtook Germany’s Schalke 04 who ended bottom of the group.

Hertha Berlin were another German casualty after going down 4-0 at Olympiakos who secured third spot in Group B behind Galatasaray and Ukrainian outfit Metalist Kharkiv.

Brazilian midfielder Dudu headed Olympiakos ahead in the 54th minute, Argentinian midfielder

Luciano Galletti converted a 76th-minute penalty and Vassilis Torosidis (86) and Diogo (89) completed the rout to give the Greek side a ninth consecutive home win in European football.

Metalist finished top of the group after earning a 1-0 win at Benfica.

Tottenham Hotspur, winners of the competition in 1972 and 1984 earned a 2-2 draw at home to Spartak Moscow but still advanced.

Striker Artyom Dzuyba stunned a weakened Spurs side, who had key players injured or cuptied, with goals in the 23rd and 33rd minutes but the home side pulled one back in the 67th through Croatia midfielder Luka Modric and Tom Huddlestone in the 74th.

They were joined in the next round by Nijmegen who defeated Group D winners Udinese 2-0, with goals from Collins John and Jhonny van Beukering in the 75th and 78th minutes.

Spain’s Deportivo La Coruna, Poland’s Lech Poznan and Danish side Copenhagen secured places in the last 32 on Wednesday.

The draw will be made at UEFA headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland tonight for both the Round of 32 and Round of 16.

The top teams in the groups will have a theoretical advantage in the last 32 where the opponents will be a third-place finisher, with the second leg match at home.

– DPA

F1 cars unveiled Jan 19 Hamburg – Williams will unveil its car for the 2009 Formula One season on January 19 in Portugal, the British team said today.

The rollout of the FW31 car with drivers Nico Rosberg of Germany and Kazuki Nakajima of Japan will take place on the Algarve Motor Park Circuit near the town of Portimao.

But the 2009 colours won’t be unveiled until February 27,Williams said.The January rollout will see a car with a winter test painting.

The 2009 season starts on March 29 with the Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne.

Williams is the fifth team to announce its 2009 presentation. Toyota start on January 15, world champion Lewis Hamilton and his McLaren-Mercedes team follow the next day, Renault will unveil their car on the same January 19 and the same track in Portugal as Williams, and BMW’s rollout is January 20.

– DPA

WEEKEND

19 December 2008

13

TV & Film Sensibility, Sue Bridehead in Michael Winterbottom’s underappreciated Jude, and played Ophelia in Kenneth Branagh’s Hamlet.And then came Titanic, James Cameron’s box-office behemoth, a movie that made Winslet and DiCaprio not just A-list stars, but pop-cult icons to boot. Much of Winslet’s career since the 1997 blockbuster has fought against that image: little, eccentric films like Hideous Kinky and Holy Smoke, lit-based period pieces like Iris and Finding Neverland, the sublime Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, and the profoundly unsettling, sexually superheated Little Children.

She and Mendes, the director behind the Oscarwinning American Beauty, have been together seven years. Winslet’s 8-year-old daughter, Mia, from a first, short-lived marriage, and Joe, Mendes and Winslet’s son, live together in lower Manhattan, with a country house outside of London.

A few years back, when director Daldry first offered Winslet the job in The Reader – based on Bernhard Schlink’s bestselling novel – she had to decline.At that point, the shooting conflicted with Revolutionary Road’s. Nicole Kidman was going to be Hanna Schmitz instead.

“But then that became impossible for her because she was having a child,”Winslet explains.“And then, when it came back to me, the schedule had changed and I was able to do it. Fate had worked in my favour – and Nicole’s – in these wonderful ways.”

So Winslet had to wrap her head around the role of an uneducated and emotionally repressed woman who sent Jews to their deaths during World War II, who teaches a curious youth about sex and love, and then falls in love herself.

“I was terrified, because I had nothing of my own life experience that I could use to play Hanna,”Winslet says.“All I knew I could do was ... understand her.You know, she’s an ordinary person, and at the end of the day the Holocaust was created by ordinary people.And I never viewed her as a monster.

“She was a woman who had limited choices in life, and through a choice that she made in becoming an SS guard, she ended up contributing to some of the greatest crimes committed against humanity.And it was very difficult to play that.

“But as I say, I had to understand her, and I had to embrace her. I didn’t necessarily have to sympathize with her. Nor did I have to forgive her.”

“But I am interested in the human condition, As for Revolutionary Road,Winslet says that there and the emotional journeys that we all have to go was no downside to having her husband on board, on in order to figure out who the hell we are. ... It’s even if it meant going home at the end of the day the actor’s privilege to be able to play those roles and talking shop. and to try and find out how complex and sometimes “The only thing that Sam and I had to deal with messed-up people are.” very early on was – and this was really more for him Last week, the Hollywood Foreign Press Asso- than for me – was that he realized that I live it and ciation announced its nominees for the Golden breathe it 24/7. And whilst he knew that about me Globes – the forerunner (and often the forecaster) – because on films I would come home and I would of the Academy Award nominations. Winslet was just get the kids to bed and then I would rant until I named in two categories: best actress in a drama passed out – he had sort of forgotten that. ... So we’d for Revolutionary Road, and supporting actress for walk through the door having had an exhausting The Reader. day of shooting and I would still be going on, and That’s one way to avoid the problem of competing he would say,‘Babe, babe, let me take my shoes off. against yourself, but the supporting actress nod does Let me have a cup of tea.’ a disservice to her work in The Reader, directed by “And I would say,‘No! I don’t have time for that, The Hours’ Stephen Daldry.This is a lead role, and I have to say this now. Now now now! Because if I a rich, morally tricky one. wait to say it tomorrow ... the thought won’t come With studios strategizing about Oscar campaigns, out the same. And I really want to know what you how is Winslet grappling with the dually lauded think right now about this.’”

– and competitive – performances?

Winslet had to explain to Mendes that if they “Look, I’m going to be lucky if I get there at all,” weren’t living together she’d still be on the phone, she says about the possibility of a sixth,and perhaps firing questions at him at all hours. seventh,Oscar nod.(Winslet has never won.)“It is out “I had to remind him: ‘Don’t you remember on of my hands. I don’t know how those things work, I Jarhead? Because I was there when Jake (Gyllenreally don’t. All I can do is what I would always do haal) would call you in the evening and you’d talk for when I have a film coming out,which is to support it. two hours on the phone,’”she says.“Even if we were But in this case I’m supporting both because they’re in the middle of a dinner that I’d spent hours cookcoming out within weeks of each other. ing, he would take the call.And quite right, too.

“The only issue for me is physically creating the “And so I just had to remind him: ‘Sorry, pal. ‘ space and the time to be able to give that commit- And ultimately, he was very happy that we had that, ment to both of these films.Yeah, in equal measure. because it made a big difference to the preparation Because I’m not backing a horse at all.” we could do, the work, the forward thinking that Commitment is a big deal for Winslet. She grew we could do, and the constant debate about April up in a financially strapped family of actors and Wheeler and these characters and what was going artists, and she’s been making her own way since to happen tomorrow.” landing that key role in Heavenly Creatures. She The Reader was Marianne Dashwood in Ang Lee’s Sense and Revolutionary Road

Kate Winslet double-dips Actress remarkable in two more dark roles

By Steven Rea The Philadelphia Inquirer

Look at Kate Winslet’s film credits – a list that includes five Oscar-nominated performances and began when she was 17, with Peter Jackson’s trippy tale of true-life matricide, Heavenly Creatures – and you won’t see much that’s light and breezy.

There’s only one romantic comedy in the bunch (2006’s The Holiday). There is much tortured, thwarted love, and a fair amount of doom and death.

(Glug-glug, there goes Titanic.)

And now, just in time for the holidays, comes the British actress in two extremely tough, troubling roles: Hanna Schmitz, a onetime SS guard who initiates a vigorous affair with a 15-year-old boy in post-war Germany, in The Reader; and April Wheeler, a 1950s wife and mother trapped in a bum marriage in Revolutionary Road.

The Reader co-stars Ralph Fiennes (and David Kross as the teen seductee). Revolutionary Road, with Titanic shipmate Leonardo DiCaprio as the callow spouse, was directed by Winslet’s husband, Sam Mendes, from an adaptation of the Richard Yates novel.

Winslet, 33, did the two projects back-to-back – it’s hard to say which is the more disturbing. Her choices down the years make one wonder whether there’s some serious angst at work. Does Kate sit around smoking cigarettes, pondering the bleak nothingness of it all? (Yes on the cigs, and no on the rest, it turns out.)

“I am asked this question and I always find myself almost struggling to answer it,”says Winslet, sounding spry, on the phone from her adopted hometown, New York.“And I think the truth is I don’t know. I really don’t know why. I don’t have a darkness in my soul – no, I don’t.

Yes Man

0Director: Peyton Reed 0Cast: Jim Carrey, Zooey Deschanel, Terence Stamp, John Michael Higgins 0Length: 105 minutes 0Rated: M ( for offensive language & sexual references “Yes is the new ‘no’” in Yes Man, a Jim Carrey comedy that has him covering much the same ground he did in Liar Liar. It’s an often engaging romance shot through with sweetness, a movie that hangs on a handful of simple, magical scenes.

The first comes when Carl Allen, a morose divorced loner of a loan officer who has let “no” rule his life, lets himself be talked into attending a self-help seminar. In a room full of delirious “YES!” shouting cultists, Carl is confronted by The Yes Man himself, Terrence Bundley. The great Terence Stamp – and his menacing, owlish eyes of many a movie villain – hurls himself at Carl, urging/ordering him to “embrace the possible. Say ‘yes’ to everything!”

And the movie, based on a Danny Wallace book, written by Carrey collaborators and directed by the klutz who botched The Break-Up, proceeds to show us the wondrous possibilities in that free-spirited philosophy, and its limitations.

Carl says “yes” to giving a bum a lift. He lets the guy use his phone (John Michael Higgins is the yes “sponsor” who nags Carl into this). That leads to running out of gas with a dead phone and a sparks-flying first meeting with Allison, a real free spirit played by Zooey Deschanel.

Phony free-spirit Carl signs up for guitar lessons and Korean language classes. He responds to spam from Persianwifefinder.com. He says “yes” to a Harry Potter theme party thrown by his needy, nerdy boss (Rhys Darby). And he approves loans, every harebrained business or personal loan pitch that crosses his desk.

All this spontaneity leads to another magic moment – a “Let’s sneak into the Hollywood Bowl and sing” scene with Allison that climaxes with an adorable Beatles duet sung on an empty stage.

Everything Carl embraces pays personal dividends. Well, almost everything. And every time he says “no” the karma goes bad.

Deschanel, she of the quirky timing and quirkier bangs, is perfectly cast as a scooter-driving flake who fronts a band named Munchausen by Proxy and leads a jogging photography club (they shoot pictures while they run). She gives the movie a shot at being as romantic as Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

It isn’t, sadly. Yes Man attempts to update the 46-year-old comic genius for a ruder, cruder Judd Apatow-Frat Pack comedy universe. The film surrounds him with less funny “pals” (Bradley Cooper of Wedding Crashers and Danny Masterson of That 70s Show), injects one funny but off-key sex-with-the-elderly joke and tries to make Carrey, a brilliant soloist, an ensemble player.

The script caves in on itself when the multiple writers (one an Apatow alum) conjure up artificial obstacles to the romance and the pitfalls of living your life through self-help slogans. And there aren’t enough Bruce Almighty/Liar Liar Carrey set-pieces to give this the zing of those, his last wholly formed comedies.

But it’s great to see the funnyman switch off the glum and the grim – The Number 23, anyone? – and embrace the comically possible again. Let’s hope he says “yes” to a few more funny films before he ages out of them altogether.

Watch the trailer – By Roger Moore

REVIEWS

14

19 December 2008

Music

Manhattan Transfer, singers Laurel Masse, Janis Siegel, Alan Paul, and Tim Hauser (L-R) perform in B1 Maximum club, Moscow, Russia.

ITAR-TASS/ Valery Sharifulin

After 30 years, The Manhattan Transfer just keeps rolling along

By Walter Tunis

The most humbling aspect of The Manhattan Transfer’s international ­popularity is that its members initially counted themselves lucky just to have a fan base in their home town.

Take singer Tim Hauser, the onetime Madison Avenue marketing executive who started the first incarnation of The Manhattan Transfer in 1969.

That ensemble didn’t last long. But when a second lineup began to establish itself with a blend of robust jazz harmonies, pop appeal and, eventually, scores of stylistic inspirations and variations, the world came calling.

When we caught up with Hauser earlier this month to discuss The Manhattan Transfer’s final concert of the year – a performance of holiday music and more this weekend that will team the group with 25 members of the University of Kentucky Orchestra – he was out of town. He was way out of town. Hauser, in fact, had just arrived at his hotel in Tallinn, Estonia, after a flight from the group’s previous destination,Tel Aviv, Israel.

Before making its way to Kentucky this weekend, The Manhattan Transfer will have played Finland, Slovakia and Russia.

“It never occurred to me when we started that we would be an international band. Never,”Hauser said.“My visions back then as far as popularity went were very limited. Now musically, they weren’t limited at all.

“What I was looking at then musically was what we’re doing now. It’s grown since then. But the various styles we address were already there – vocalese,

rhythm and blues, swing, big band, four-part harmonies and gospel harmony. I thought it would be great just to get steady work in the United States with that.”

The second Manhattan Transfer was formed in 1972, when Hauser was paying bills as much by driving taxis in New York as he was through performance work. Save for one lineup change – Cheryl Bentyne in for Laurel Masse in 1978 – the membership of The Manhattan Transfer has remained consistent through the years. Janis Siegel and Alan Paul complete the group.

“There is a very high level of communication when the four of us are onstage,” Hauser said.“Of course, it helps that we really like each other.We’re friends offstage. But when we’re onstage, the communication becomes pretty linear. By that, I mean, we don’t falter. It’s a sacred place for us.”

The Manhattan Transfer’s music might be rooted in jazz, but undercurrents of pop, in ­almost every sense of the term, are strong. Hauser absorbed the music of vocal greats Sarah Vaughan, Dinah Washington and Frank Sinatra in his youth. But it took a voice from his generation to make the prospect of a professional singing career seem possible.That voice belonged to Frankie Lymon, the African-American soprano from Harlem who found stardom at age 14 with the 1956 Teenagers hit “Why Do Fools Fall in Love?”

“I listened to Frank Sinatra and Dinah Washington. But they were adults when I was a kid. I couldn’t grasp the idea of singing like them, because they were just on another level,”he said.“But when you’re a kid listening to another kid, you go,‘I can

do that.’I mean, it’s all still incredible, but at least you can aspire to it.

“Frankie Lymon was one of the greatest singers I ever heard. At his age, he was ­ singing and phrasing like (swing era bandleader and vocalist) Billy Eckstine. He was remarkable.”

The links between jazz and pop quickly became a multigenerational – and, in some cases, multicultural – journey for The Manhattan Transfer. The group brought lyrics and vocal life to a celebrated jazz-fusion instrumental (Weather Report’s“Birdland”) and crafted pop hits out of everything from vintage doo-wop (a cover of the Ad Libs’“The Boy From New York City”) to TV themes (Paul’s Twilight Zone/Twilight Tone). It revived standards (a 1981 a cappella version of “A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square”), devoted entire albums to specific jazz styles (1985’s Grammy-winning“Vocalese”and 1997’s “Swing”) and even diverted into Brazilian music (the 1987 album “Brasil”) and children’s songs (1994’s“The Manhattan Transfer Meet Tubby the Tuba”).

So it should follow that The Manhattan Transfer would visit holiday music on 1992’s“The Christmas Album”and 2005’s“An Acapella Christmas.”The latter, true to its title, put exclusive emphasis on the intimacy, playfulness and swing of the group’s har-

monies.The odd sleigh bells and finger snaps served as the only accompaniment.

“Music is always a ­ challenge,” Hauser said.“I mean, that is certainly true when it comes to performance. But that’s a given.You also have to develop arrangements that are either fresh enough to put a new spin on a tune or, by virtue of the voicings, are able to make it sound so rich that someone might say, ‘This is the one of the best versions of that tune I’ve ever heard.’ No matter how good you sing, if you don’t have a good arrangement, nothing else will make any difference.”

The challenge awaiting The Manhattan Transfer in 2009 will be a recording devoted to the music of jazz keyboardist and composer Chick Corea. Hauser hinted that Corea might even make an ­appearance on the project.

“You know, I never used to think about how far this band would go,”Hauser said.“That just never occurred to me. I was always thinking of it in the now, if you will. It wasn’t until we became really successful that we started wondering how long all this would last.”

Watch the videos: The Boy From New York City Java Jive

– MCT

REVIEWS

19 December 2008

NEW CD RELEASES

Books

Shakedown bargain basement book publishing

The Killers

0Day & Age From the beginning, the Killers have always wanted to be epic, and they’ve equated sounding important with being important.“Day & Age,”the band’s third album, is their most epic-sounding yet. It’s also a drag. New frontier aside,“Day & Age” plods too much, relying on dreamy synthesizers and flat atmosphere to convey some bigger meaning.

In “Losing Touch” and “A Dustland Fairytale,” the crescendos feel like ripples, rather than the big splashes they’re meant to be, and you get the feeling that without a blueprint– without some other band’s known quantity– the Killers can’t get the formula right.

–Michael Pollock

Barry Manilow

0The Greatest Songs of the Eighties After pillaging the middle-of-the-road ruins of the ‘50s, ‘60s and ‘70s with varying degrees of bathos and success, Barry Manilow– the Clay Aiken of his generation– goes for the slow fizz of the ‘80s and its genuinely dullest hits.

Woe to the epoch so lamely defined by “Arthur’s Theme.”Pity the man who makes Reba McEntire sound dispirited, as Manilow does on “Islands in the Stream.”

No sexuality or sensuality? That’s Manilow’s schtick. He’s done OK by death-mush– “Mandy” still makes me cry. But even Manilow’s usual melodramas are tamed here; irritating dramas such as “Against All Odds (Take a Look at Me Now)” are rendered into such treacherous treacle I forgot I was listening to anything at all.

– A.D. Amorosi

The James Moody And Hank Jones Quartet 0Our Delight

Pianist Hank Jones and tenor saxophonist (and flutist) James Moody have both in spades. Their quartet with bassist Todd Coolman and drummer Adam Nussbaum is an impeccable affair.

Not an unstylish note is heard.

The tunes are choice. Moody, whose career was for a long time entwined with that of Dizzy Gillespie, runs through two of the trumpeter’s tunes,“Con Alma”and“Birk’s Works,”with fervor and style.

The group also turns to the tunes of Tadd Dameron, bop’s leading arranger. The quartet’s “Ladybird”makes for good hearth music– it’s warm– while “Good Bait”makes for an elegant launching pad.

Moody, 78, is full of finely-turned ideas that never run amiss. His “Body and Soul” here is a clinic on how to treat a ballad. Jones, 90, the elder of an amazing jazz family, treats Moody like a vocalist and concentrates on making the sound better. His solos still glow.

The session could use more spice and surprise.

But the title sums it up.

–Karl Stark

15

Women ahead of their times THE WIDOW CLICQUOT: The Story of a Champagne Empire and the Woman Who Ruled It 0By Tilar J. Mazzeo 0Collins (US$17.13 via Amazon)

MADAME DE STAEL: The First Modern Woman

0By Francis du Plessix Gray 0Atlas & Co. (US$16.32 via Amazon) Before the glass ceiling, there was one clearer and hard as a diamond. Barbe-Nicole Clicquot Ponsardin and Germaine de Stael, French revolutionaries, found their way through it.

These two books tell their tales in different ways. Both provide sympathetic portraits of these remarkable women who were of their times and beyond them.

Although the economy seems poised to imbibe Moonshine or Night Train Express instead of Champagne, this time of year still belongs to bubbles.Yes, effervescent wines are made around the world. But Champagne is the one that sparkles brightest.

It wasn’t always like that.

Dom Perignon, cellarmaster of the Abbey of Hautvillers, is revered for bringing the world Champagne. But in many ways, Barbe-Nicole Clicquot was equally important. In French, the word for widow is veuve.And Veuve Clicquot Ponsardin still ranks among the great Champagnes.

Tilar J. Mazzeo’s informed and enlightening biography of Madame Clicquot, the widow and, more important, the businesswoman, retrieves her vintage story as if looking for a rare bottle in one of the Champagne region’s deepest caves. Not much has been written about her.

What you should know is found in a letter to Madame Clicquot’s great-grandchild:“The world is in perpetual motion and we must invent the things of tomorrow. One must go before others, be determined and exacting,and let your intelligence direct your life.

Act with audacity. Perhaps you too will be famous!!”

She certainly was, and for anyone who has had a glass of her namesake wine, still is. Born in 1777 to a wealthy family, Barbe-Nicole’s life winds around and through the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars, crises financial and political, decisions disastrous and wise.After the death of her husband, Francois, from typhoid, the gutsy 21-year old eventually ran the wine company and turned Champagne into the wine of high-end partying, a beverage adopted by the aristocracy.

Along the way, she discovered remuage, a system that removes sediment from the bottle after secondary fermentation. No more pouring wine from bottle to bottle or filtering to get rid of the junk.

The result: clarity. And riddling, or turning bottles daily to trap the debris, is practiced today, either by hand or by machine.

She was shrewd at politics and at marketing, too: an entrepreneur defined by persistence and drive.

The Widow Clicquot is, in part, about surviving in a harsh economy and against tough odds.Today, the

finest wine made at Veuve Clicquot is called “La Grande Dame.” Mazzeo, an assistant professor at Colby College, shows why.

Madame de Stael tries to live up to its subtitle – The First Modern Woman – and generally succeeds. Francine du Plessix Gray, whose nonfiction topics have ranged from Simone Weil to the Marquis de Sade, writes a leisurely, reflective work about the “mistress of the mind,”political and cultural influence, society shaker and salon overseer.

De Stael was the daughter of Louis XVI’s director of finance. She’d become anti-Royalist, antiNapoleon, and a voice for liberation of all kinds.

The author, however, could use more of her novelist’s skill to convey what de Stael the powerhouse was about. Her observations are often as passionless as her subject was passionate.

Gray describes de Stael’s battle against provincialism, and advocacy for women.“Stael was the first French writer to emphasize the general injustices plaguing women. ... She particularly deplored the plight of gifted, superior women, who inevitably find frustration and dejection in their romantic lives.”

De Stael led a vivid, compelling life.You should toast it with a flute of Veuve Clicquot.

– By Peter M. Gianotti

Boer War comes alive in A Matter of Justice A Matter of Justice

0By Charles Todd 0Morrow (US$16.49 via Amazon) In Charles Todd’s exquisitely plotted series, everything echoes back to war. For ScotlandYard Inspector Ian Rutledge, it’s World War I that continues to haunt him and wear at his soul.Flashbacks to horrific battles and the voice of a dead soldier who acts as his conscience are his constant reminders of“The Great War.”But in riveting A Matter of Justice, it’s the Boer War and how it set the life course for two soldiers that jumpstarts Todd’s 11th novel in this series.

Todd melds an exciting plot with in-depth character studies in A Matter of Justice.

The murder of a London financier draws Ian to the man’s country home in a small Somerset village.

While the man was respected and well liked by his London colleagues and clients, he was despised by virtually everyone in the village. Ian finds a bounty of suspects from a local police detective, virtually every shopkeeper and the man’s wife – each of whom was humiliated and berated by the deceased. But did the man’s tour of duty in the Boer War, vividly recounted in the first chapter, seal his fate?

Todd turns the spotlight on the smallest detail of post-WWI life in Britain, such as how battles ended a flower business but allowed the cottage industry of glove making to thrive.

Todd, a pseudonym for a mother and son writing team, continues to provide a superior look at people and a country recovering from the devastation of war. Although it is set in the early 20th century, Todd’s novels are timeless.

– By Oline H. Cogdill

So what’s it worth to you – in dollars and cents – to retire to a comfy chair with a book with pages you can turn? We’re about to find out, as even some of the most commercially successful authors experiment with free digital downloads.

Just this week, the trade newsletter Publishers Lunch reported that Suze Orman’s upcoming book, Suze Orman’s 2009 Action Plan, will be launched with an appearance on “The Oprah Winfrey Show,” and a free download of the book for a week, from Jan. 9 to Jan. 15. A Spanish version also will be available.

Paperback print editions go on sale Dec. 20 for a suggested retail price of US$9.99. According to publisher Spiegel & Grau, the book covers such topics as credit, real estate, investing for retirement, paying for college, spending, saving and protecting your family. Orman’s Website, www.suzeorman.com, will also feature updates on the new policies of the new Obama administration.

Last February, during an “Oprah” show, Orman offered free downloads of Women & Money: Owning the Power to ControlYour Destiny, which at the time had been on the market nearly a year. In less than two days, there were more than a million downloads.

And that was without so much economic trouble.

Spiegel & Grau, by the way, is part of Doubleday, which is being eliminated as a division of Random House Inc. Another free promotion of a book on finances, Robert Kiyosaki’s new title Conspiracy of the Rich: The New Rules of Money, will be available for free online, a chapter at a time, at some point this winter before a print edition later in the year.

As for slacking standards amid economic turmoil in the publishing industry: This week, questions arose over representations in a new biography on media tycoon Rupert Murdoch, published by Doubleday.

Author Michael Wolff’s The Man Who Owns the News: Inside the Secret World of Rupert Murdoch includes several jabs at Judith Regan, a controversial former editor at Murdoch-owned HarperCollins.

Regan was fired over plans to publish the original release of O.J. Simpson’s If I Did It. There is a long-standing spat between Wolff and Regan, and their personal issues don’t matter to the reading public. However, nonfiction is supposed to carry the stamp of reasonable reporting and editing.

Wolff’s book reports that a top Murdoch lawyer accused Regan of making anti-Semitic remarks. Far less prominently, in an endnote,Wolff acknowledges that parent company News Corp. later apologized to Regan and accepted that she didn’t make the remarks.

In another reference,Wolff says that Roger Ailes, Fox News Channel president and Regan’s nemesis in the Murdoch empire, once went on a date that Ailes later described as“the scariest three hours of my life.”Both Regan and Ailes told Newsday that they never dated, but once had dinner to discuss business.

According to Ailes, Wolff’s book is “laced with inaccuracies, and you can add this one to the list.”

In an interview with a blogger on the Web site of the NewYork Observer,Wolff questioned Regan for commenting publicly now and not earlier.

If Regan (or Ailes) is an easy target, it doesn’t matter. Regan didn’t owe Wolff an interview. However, authors of nonfiction – and their publishers – do owe readers a reasonable effort to tell a true story.

What can we expect as more book editors get laid off?

– By Diane Evans Diane Evans is a former Knight Ridder columnist and is now president of DelMio.com, a new interactive online magazine on books for writers and readers.

HEALTH

16

19 December 2008

Foot found in baby’s brain ‘I’ve never seen anything like it,’ doctor says

By Brian Newsome

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. – Dr. Paul Grabb peered into the microscope at Sam Esquibel’s 3-dayold brain, set on removing a tumour that threatened the infant’s life.

What the paediatric neurosurgeon saw made him spring back in shock.

A foot!

As he surgically removed it, Grabb also found other partially formed appendages and what appeared to be ropes of an intestine tucked within the folds.

Sam survived the Oct. 3 brain surgery at Memorial Hospital for Children and is home with his parents and doing well. But his introduction to the world marks one of the strangest moments in medical history.

“It looked like the breach delivery of a baby,”the paediatric neurosurgeon said last week,“coming out of the brain.”

An exact diagnosis is unknown.The growth might have been a teratoma, a congenital brain tumour composed of foreign tissue such as muscle, hair or teeth. But such tumours typically are not as complex as a foot or hand.

It might have been a case of fetus in fetu, a developmental abnormality in which a fetal twin begins to form within another, but those have most often occurred in the torso and not the brain.

“You show those pictures (of Sam) to the most experienced paediatric neurosurgeons in the world, and they’ve never seen anything like it,”Grabb said.

Tiffnie and Manuel Esquibel had little reason to worry Oct. 1 when they went to the doctor. At 41 weeks, it appeared Tiffnie would need to be induced, but otherwise the pregnancy had gone smoothly.

Then an ultrasound revealed trouble in the baby’s brain, and the delivery was planned immediately after the doctor’s appointment.

After four hours of labour at Memorial Hospital

North, Sam’s health was failing.Tiffnie underwent an emergency C-section and Sam was taken to the neonatal intensive-care unit downtown.

By the next day, the couple encountered a doctor no parent wants to have to meet: the brain surgeon. Grabb asked them if they were religious, and they responded they were Catholic.

“He said,‘If I were you, I’d get your baby baptized before you go in,’”Tiffnie said.

An MRI had revealed a tumour, but its extent or possible malignancy was unknown. Babies cannot survive chemotherapy and death would be almost certain if the tumour was cancerous.

Even if benign, a tumour could wreak havoc on the baby’s brain.

Grabb, southern Colorado’s only paediatric brain surgeon, has seen a lot in the operating room. But in Sam’s case,“I’ve never seen anything like it before.”

About 37 percent of congenital brain tumours are teratomas, but they are still rare. Grabb sees a teratoma once every few years. And none, he said, would compare to Sam’s.

Fetus in fetu is even rarer. Fewer than 90 have been officially reported in the world, according to literature, and Grabb said there have only been about 10 of them in the brain.

An analysis was not done at the time, Grabb said, because it would not have changed Sam’s care and could have created unnecessary stress for the family.

On Thursday, at Memorial’s Paediatric Rehabilitation Centre, occupational therapist Jeanine Noll helped a seemingly sleepy Sam turn his head. He’s shown weakness on one side and some trouble with

It might have been a case of fetus in fetu, a developmental abnormality in which a fetal twin begins to form within another, but those have most often occurred in the torso and not the brain higher level eye functions, she said, but is making great strides.

The Esquibels, who had given up on the idea of having any children after years of trying, watch him with wide smiles.

The pudgy baby, nicknamed the Michelin Man by his mom, wears a striped shirt, brown pants, and booties decorated to look like work boots. He seems irritated that his therapy is cutting into a nap.

He faces monthly blood tests to check for signs of cancer or regrowth, and MRIs to help monitor his health. But his parents don’t seem to mind.

Nor haveTiffnie and Manuel spent much time thinking of the medical mark they’ve made.They’re just happy to have a healthy son and hoping he will stay that way.

Manuel touches his finger to Sam’s hand.“Hi, baby,”he whispers.

– MCT

New research may strengthen antibiotics

By Robert Mitchum Chicago Tribune

For hospital patients with weakened immune systems, a growing worry is potentially deadly infection by drugresistant bacteria such as MRSA or tuberculosis.

But by examining bacteria’s own primitive immune systems, two Northwestern University researchers may have found a way to prevent or slow the development of drug resistance.

If applied clinically, the method could prolong the effectiveness of antibiotic drugs at a time when many doctors worry that many are losing their power to fight bacterial infections.

Like students passing around the answers to a test, bacteria can share the genes necessary for drug resistance through a process called horizontal gene transfer - rendering infections untreatable by common antibiotics such as penicillin and methicillin.

But in the journal Science today, microbiologists Luciano Marraffini and Erik Sontheimer describe a gene sequence, called CRISPR, that protects bacteria against the transmission of harmful genes by attacking invading DNA.The scientists suggest that this natural defence system could be modified to trick bacteria into thinking antibiotic resistance was an unwelcome visitor to fight off, rather than a gift to embrace.

Sontheimer cautions that any clinical application is still in the distant future. He also does not know whether it would be possible to fight an acute infection in this way, returning resistant bacteria to a vulnerable state.

Still, he said, the system shows promise as a means

of treating dangerous bacteria strains to prevent them from developing new resistance.

“We’ll never have the killer drug that just ends bacterial infections; it will be an ongoing arms race,” Sontheimer said.“But if we can extend the useful life of antibiotics that are already out there, that will be one more arrow in our quiver in this fight against infectious disease.”

Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, or MRSA, causes serious infections in almost 100,000 people and kills nearly 20,000 each year in the U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.There is also concern over drug-resistant strains of other diseases, such as tuberculosis and Clostridium difficile, or C. diff.

With little promise of new antibiotics from pharmaceutical companies, many infectious-disease doctors are worried about a continued resurgence of bacterial disease unless strategies like Marrafini and Sontheimer’s bear fruit.

“The news is bad, which is why alternate strategies like this that attempt to target or limit the emergence of resistance are exciting,”said Dr. Neil Fishman,director of the Antimicrobial Management Program for the University of Pennsylvania.“If it would prevent the emergence of further resistance or the spread of resistance, that would be helpful.”

Perhaps a drug could be administered with a new antibiotic to prolong its usefulness,doctors said,or given to patients not yet colonized by resistant bacteria.

“It’d be like a second line of defence,”said Laurie Tompkins,chief of the genetic mechanisms branch at the National Institute of General Medical Sciences, “and we need all the lines of defence we can get.”

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SCIENCE & TECH 17

19 December 2008

Ron Ace has studied the Earth’s climate cycles for three years and has filed for a patent on a way to prevent global warming that his computer models show is effective, but others question his work. / George Bridges/MCT

A solution to climate change?

Earth-in-a-fridge concept

warming scientist suggests that Ace’s giant humidifier might just work.

Kenneth Caldeira, a climate scientist at the CarnWASHINGTON – Ron Ace says that his break- egie Institution’s Department of Global Ecology at through moments have come at unexpected times Stanford University, roughly simulated Ace’s idea in – while he lay in bed, eased his aging Cadillac across recent months on a model that’s used extensively by the Chesapeake Bay Bridge or steered a tractor top scientists to study global warming. around his rustic, five-acre property.

The simulated evaporation of about one-centiIn the seclusion of his Maryland home,Ace has spent metre of additional water everywhere in the world three years glued to the Internet,studying the Earth’s produced immediate planetary cooling effects that climate cycles and careening from one epiphany to were projected to reach nearly 1 degree Fahrenheit another – a 69-year-old loner with the moxie to try to (0.66 C) within 20 or 30 years, Caldeira said. solve one of the greatest threats to mankind.

“In the computer simulation,evaporating water was Now, backed by a computer model, the little- almost as effective as directly transferring ...energy to known inventor is making public a U.S. patent peti- space, which was surprising to me,”he said. tion for what he calls the most“practical, nontoxic, Ace said that the cooling effect would be several affordable, rapidly achievable”and beneficial way to times greater if the model were refined to spray the curb global warming and a resulting catastrophic same amount of seawater at strategic locations. ocean rise.

He proposes to install 1,000 or more devices that Spray gigatons of seawater into the air, mainly in spray water 7 to 70 metres into the air, depending the Northern Hemisphere, and let Mother Nature on conditions, from barren stretches of the West do the rest, he says.

African coast, bluffs on deserted Atlantic Ocean The evaporating water, Ace said, would cool the isles, deserts adjoining the African, South American Earth in multiple ways: First, the sprayed droplets and Mediterranean coasts and other arid or windy would transform to water vapour, a change that sites. To maximize cloud formation, he’d avoid the absorbs thermal energy near ground level; then the already humid tropics, where most water vapour rising vapour would condense into sunlight-reflecting quickly turns to rain. clouds and cooling rain,releasing much of the stored “It does seem like evaporating water outside the energy into space in the form of infrared radiation. tropics would be more effective,”Caldeira said.

McClatchy Newspapers has followed Ace’s work The spraying would be targeted mainly at higher, for three years and obtained a copy of his 2007 northern latitudes,where Ace thinks that air currents patent petition for what he calls “a colossal refrig- known as Ferrel Cells could deliver heavy snow to the eration system with a 100,000-fold performance Arctic, offsetting the melting of the polar icecap. multiplier.”

It stretches the imagination – and perhaps cre“The Earth has a giant air-conditioning problem,” dulity – to suggest that a solitary inventor with no he said.“I’m proposing to put a thermostat on the government support could solve global warming, planet.” especially a man who never earned a degree despite Although it might sound preposterous, a compu- studying physics for much of a decade at the Uniter model run by an internationally known global versity of Maryland.

By Greg Gordon McClatchy Newspapers

Several scientists who reviewed Ace’s patent petition for McClatchy reacted with caution to outright derision over its possibilities, but some softened their views upon learning of the computer model.

Ace’s invention rests on some unconventional theories.

He contends that the planet is 5 to 6 degrees Fahrenheit (nearly 3 degrees C) too hot to stop the meltdown from the last ice age 20,000 years ago, not a couple of degrees too warm, as government scientists say. He proposes to lower the temperature by 3.5 degrees to 4 degrees F, leaving a cushion to avoid tipping toward another ice age and always retaining the option of turning the sprayers down or off, if needed.

He suspects that deforestation is a major cause of global warming, not just because trees absorb carbon dioxide, but also because a large-leaf tree can wick up and evaporate hundreds of gallons of water in a single day. Ace said that the absence of tens of billions of trees, destroyed by southward-creeping glaciers thousands of years ago and again by man’s recent timber cutting, has left the planet “slightly dehumidified,”reducing cloud cover.

Ace points to recent research that found snow cover is shrinking even at below-freezing altitudes on Africa’s Mount Kilimanjaro and other mountaintops, a change that’s attributed to declining snowfall.

It would be relatively easy to design spraying equipment to carry out his plan to fill that water vapour deficit, but it would take a major international effort to install 1,000 large spraying devices, or thousands of smaller ones. If fully deployed, the 15,800 cubic meters of sprayed water per second would be equivalent to the flow at the mouth of the Mississippi River and would require enough energy to power a medium-sized city.

However, spraying only a portion of that amount for a decade would be enough to cool the equivalent of current man-made global warming, estimated to range up to 0.76 degrees Fahrenheit,Ace said. Such cooling, he said, could buy mankind decades of time for more research and precision.

Depending on its scale, the water evaporation scheme would cost anywhere from hundreds of millions of dollars to billions of dollars a year, but Ace said it still would have“a net positive financial effect.”

It would prevent global warming-related damage, he said, and the extra rainfall would provide the cheapest way to transport water to drought-stricken regions, counteract desert expansions, increase natural irrigation for crops and boost the output of hydroelectric power plants.

Added rainfall also would reduce atmospheric greenhouse gas levels, because cold raindrops carry more carbon dioxide back to the oceans than is released when water evaporates, he said.

Caldeira’s computer results could surprise many scientists because water vapour is a greenhouse gas widely recognized to be more powerful than carbon dioxide.The simulation suggests, however, that water vapour’s cooling effects overwhelm its heat-trapping properties.

Ace has his doubters, partly because he took the patent route rather than submitting his idea for scientific peer review. A patent certifies that an invention is unique, not that it would work.

Douglas Davis,an atmospheric chemist at Georgia Tech University who’s known Ace for years, lauded some of his inventions but called his global cooling idea“big-time speculation”because so little is known about the behaviour of water in the atmosphere.

“In the case of the computer models that are used for global warming, I know that the hydrological cycle is a critical component of those models, and the hydrological cycle is not well understood,”Davis said, stressing that he’s not a climate expert.

David Travis, a University of Wisconsin-Whitewater professor who’s studied clouds extensively, praised Ace’s innovation, but said he’s “generally opposed to geo-engineering” solutions and can’t imagine evaporating water on a large enough scale to have a near-term effect.

Caldeira, who plans to submit his computer findings in the spring for peer-reviewed publication, is among scientists so concerned about sluggish progress in curbing greenhouse gases that they met last year to consider geo-engineering options.

It would be relatively easy to design spraying equipment to carry out his plan to fill that water vapour deficit, but it would take a major international effort to install 1,000 large spraying devices, or thousands of smaller ones “Ideas such as Ron Ace’s should be carefully and impartially evaluated,” Caldeira told McClatchy.

“Every brilliant innovation in the history of technology looked a little bit loony when first proposed.”

Ace’s invention looks less loony when compared to some others. NASA scientists conceived the multitrillion-dollar idea of orbiting megaton mirrors in space to deflect sunlight. Other scientists have proposed reflecting solar energy by placing mirrors on thousands of high-altitude balloons, by foaming the oceans’surfaces or by filling the upper atmosphere with tiny sulphates or inert particles, or by adding water droplets to low-level ocean clouds from 1,500 unmanned boats.

Ace said he thinks that mankind is “headed straight for a disaster.”

By focusing solely on solutions that deal with carbon in the atmosphere,Ace thinks that mankind won’t prevent a“big glacier melt”that could lift ocean levels 7 metres and wipe out the world’s seaports.

One thing is certain: Ace is dead serious. He’s tenaciously compiled more than a thousand pages of research, sometimes during all-night binges despite a fight with cancer. He said he’s invested large sums in patenting his global-warming inventions.

Ace said he’s created more than 700 inventions, starting with a gravity-measuring machine he built in seventh grade to record passes of the sun and moon on cloudy days. He’s won nearly 70 U.S. and foreign patents, but said he’s lacked the time and money to submit petitions for all but about two dozen of his inventions. None has led to big commercial success.

Ace said that his unusual blend of expertise in physics, optics and heat transfer has helped him understand the role of light-scattering clouds and water’s influence on climate.

Maintaining a hermitlike existence during the past three years, he’s churned out more than half a dozen inventions that could help curb global warming, including several that he said would cut energy use.

He often speaks in professorial tones, but can quickly morph into a cynic or a feisty debater over the laws of physics, always mindful of the role of “the big heater”– the sun.

Ace said that he gradually steeped himself in the science of global warming because of “curiosity, nothing more.”

“I never saw myself making a dime on it,” said Ace, who said he’d donate his patent to the U.S. government if he gets one.“It’s mostly that the data seemed to be incorrect, and I wanted to know what is right.”

DISCOVERY

18

19 December 2008

Tunisia: beaches, cities and the desert on a budget

By Jason George

TUNIS,Tunisia – Within an hour of arriving in Tunisia, my girlfriend and I wanted to dance – and it wasn’t because we heard the blasting beats of Rai, North Africa’s infectious music.

We wanted to dance after seeing the bill that the waiter dropped on our table at our first Tunisian meal: lunch of fresh vegetables and grilled chicken panini at an outdoor cafe.

The cost of the entire meal for two?

US$6.

Cheap by any standards, but to better explain our celebratory mood, let me back up a couple of days before our Tunisia arrival, when we sat at a similar cafe, this time in Paris. There too, we had ordered some food and drink, yet far less: two coffees and one order of buttered bread.

That bill totalled $29.

That was $29 for what amounts to basically bread and flavoured water.

Our jaws dropped.

Then and there, on that small Parisian street, we realized that we had joined the ranks of those who are presently priced out of Western Europe,even with some recovery of the dollar.We can no longer afford to travel there with any great luxury because of the euro’s strength and general European price hikes.

Enter our saviour,Tunisia.

Tunisia, which sits on a stretch of land about the

IF YOU GO GETTING AROUND Taxicabs are plentiful, and negotiating a fair fare doesn’t require the barking or United Nationscalibre skills required in some other Arab countries.

Cars can be rented from easyCar (http://www.easycar. com ) and Auto Europe (http://www.autoeurope.com ) at the airport and in Tunis and Carthage. A car is not necessary unless you plan to trek long distances off the beaten path.

Intercity buses and shared taxis also are available. The national rail (http://www.sncft.com.tn ) has spartan trains, but they run on time, and it’s an efficient way to get around the country.

While there are three classes of service – First Deluxe, First and Second – the First Deluxe is not worth the extra money, because its claim to give you an “assigned seat” means little; everyone in First Class sits where they want.

Perhaps the best way to get between cities is TunisAir’s budget airline for internal flights, SevenAir (http://www.sevenair.com.tn ). Like the national rail Web site, the one for

size of Wisconsin, sports about 1200 km of Mediterranean Sea coast and is sandwiched between Algeria and Libya. While those two neighbours could cause you to think twice about the North African gem, don’t let this deter you from visiting Tunisia, which shares its borders but few problems with the other two.As someone who has lived and extensively travelled in the Arab world, I’ve never felt more at ease in the region or more welcomed as a tourist than I did in Tunisia.

And we had a blast – at a bargain.

Perhaps the best way to think of a trip to Tunisia is to divide the country into three geographic categories: beaches, cities and the desert. And those beaches, while lovely, are perhaps best skipped outright, as they are crowded with all-inclusive resorts and thus packed with European package tourists looking to enjoy a Mediterranean vacation on the cheap. (Even some Europeans are not exempt from being priced out of their own continent.) Same can be said for Djerba, a popular island playground – you didn’t come this far to hang at a Mediterranean Cancun.

We started our trip in Tunis, the capital, which is a short flight from several European cites: an hour from Rome, less than two from Paris; London is about 2.5. One can even travel by ferry from several European ports, including Sicily, which lies less than 160 km from Tunisia’s northern tip.

An estimated one-fifth of Tunisia’s 10 million

residents live in the Tunis area, and you should, too, at least at the beginning of a trip, as the city is a great hub for visiting surrounding sites and locales. It also has strong attractions in its own right, including a great museum or two, restaurants and a lively market. As a former French colonial capital, it exudes European chic – the main boulevard is Avenue de Paris – and its mix of cathedrals and mosques, smart boutiques and butcher shops, hint just how much this city straddles two worlds.

Our favourite museum in town was the National Bardo Museum, which houses a stunning collection of mosaics from the 3rd and 4th century. Many were collected at nearby Carthage, which was part of the Roman Empire during that period, and the tiled works of art feature subjects such as soldiers, elephants and battle scenes.

One fact you’ll notice right away at the museum is how few signs are in English, although there often are English-speaking guides on-site during Tunisia’s peak tourist season, which runs October through April. (Tunisian summers, from June to September, should be avoided unless you enjoy allday saunas.)

French and Arabic are both national languages in Tunisia, and knowing some of either is critical here.

Even if its high school or guidebook French, a little goes a long way, and you’ll struggle here without some basic French or Arabic vocabulary. (One plus is that Tunisia, unlike, say, Egypt has few aggressive

SevenAir features several languages but not English. You can buy tickets at TunisAir offices around the country (http://www. tunisair.com ).

In Tozeur, we used, and were pleased with, Agence DEX Desert Explorers for our desert trip and loved our guide, Muhammed Becher. No need to book more than a day in advance unless you plan to spend several weeks on a major Sahara excursion. (00216-95-27-1888) Tozeur itself is worth an afternoon of exploring too. We learned a lot from Jamel Hadfeiguid, a local guide, who speaks several languages, including English. (00216-21-88-7017) STAYING THERE In addition to the Dar El Medina, Tunis has several other good hotels, such as the Carlton Hotel (http:// www.hotelcarltontunis.com ), the Tunisia Palace Hotel (www. goldenyasmin.com) and the Africa Hotel. Rooms at those places run from US$100 to $200 a night. Tunisia hotels love star inflation – subtract a star for whatever the place claims.

For a quieter, albeit more boring location, try a night or two at Les Berges du Lac Concord (http://tunis.concorde-hotels. com), which is 15 minutes from downtown on the shores of

Lake Tunis. With amenities such as room service and TV speakers in the bathroom, it aims more for the high-end business traveller, but we enjoyed its plush beds and strong showers after a few days in the desert. Average price is about US$270 a night.

DINING AROUND Like most former French colonies, the food in Tunisia is superb. Make sure to try brik, a pastry often filled with tuna, capers and onions, and tajine, which in Tunisia is a casserole of meats, eggs and cheese. If in/near the desert, don’t miss the chance to try matabga, “Berber pizza,” which the Berbers cook in the sand. In Tozeur they make the calzone-like pie in a traditional, wood-fired oven.

Our favourite place was El Ehem Gemella, just south of La Palmeraie hotel.

ABOUT MONEY ATMs exist in all major cities. U.S. currency can be used, but merchants do prefer the euro, and you’ll get better deals in the markets with the European currency.

INFORMATION A good place to start is the official tourism Web site (http://www.tourismtunisia.com ).

cabbies and vendors, so you won’t need to learn the phrase:“Leave me alone! I don’t need any perfume/ saffron/water pipe!”)

A place where you need neither language is the ruins of Carthage, because taking in the magnitude of the destroyed city needs no translation. Sacked in 136 B.C. and A.D. 698, Carthage exists today as an overflow of crumbling mosaics, columns and statues. It’s stuff that an ancient Roman, time-travelled into the future, might see, shrug at and label “housing rubble,”but the remains of the city, whose peak population grew to 700,000 or so, are impressive. Add in the turquoise-hued Mediterranean in the background, and the 8-dinar taxi from Tunis seems like a steal. (One dinar equals US$0.76 cents (NZ$1.33) at the current exchange rate.)

And it can be even cheaper: If you take the lightrail from Tunis, it’s only 2 dinars. Plus, you can stop in Sidi Bou Said, the closest town to Carthage and only about 15 minutes from Tunis. Located on the coast, Sidi Bou Said clings to mountain cliffs, and with its blue and whitewashed walls and cobblestone streets, it resembles the more famous Santorini, Greece. It’s a great place for a day trip of shopping and al-fresco dining, cooled by a steady sea breeze.

One place that is worth as much time as you have is Tunisia’s desert, a region that makes a trip to this country unlike anything you’ll find on the European side of the Mediterranean. In fact, nearly 70 percent of Tunisia’s land area is desert, which means you won’t have any trouble finding sand. Several companies in Tunis offer day trips or 24-hour, overland excursions to desert towns and ruins in places such as Dougga or El Djem, a breathtaking Roman amphitheatre in all its“Gladiator”glory.

You’ll be better served, though, to push farther south, if your time allows.Tozeur, a 45-minute flight or an overnight train ride from Tunis, is in the heart of the desert and proves a great city base for visiting the surrounding Sahara.We took several day trips from there, enjoying sights such as the waterfalldotted oasis at Chabekia or a sunset over the dunes as we sat perched high atop camels. Perhaps one of the most interesting places was the “ghost village” from one of the recent“Star Wars”films.There, miles from any settlement, sat this abandoned film set, a fake (and free to visit) village and one of the most unusual tourist spots on this planet.

Of course, this area looks like another planet: with a Martian vista of mountains and dry lake beds, with sparse sounds of wild camel grunts and the desert wind.

Try to find a place like this near Paris – even with a pocketful of euros.

NZ CLASSIC

19 December 2008

19

The sacred mountain, part 1

Acclaimed science fiction writer Jules Verne didn’t just write Around the World in 80 Days, he also wrote an epic about New Zealand and Australia called In Search of the Castaways, published in 1867. If you missed the previous instalment of this serial, you can download it here.

The summit of the mountain was still a hundred feet above them.The fugitives were anxious to reach it that they might continue their flight on the eastern slope out of the view of their pursuers. They hoped then to find some practicable ridge that would allow of a passage to the neighbouring peaks that were thrown together in an orographic maze, to which poor Paganel’s genius would doubtless have found the clew.

They hastened up the slope, spurred on by the loud cries that drew nearer and nearer.The avenging crowd had already reached the foot of the mountain.

“Courage! my friends,”cried Glenarvan, urging his companions by voice and look.

In less than five minutes they were at the top of the mountain, and then they turned to judge of their position, and decide on a route that would baffle their pursuers.

From their elevated position they could see over Lake Taupo, which stretched toward the west in its setting of picturesque mountains. On the north the peaks of Pirongia; on the south the burning crater of Tongariro. But eastward nothing but the rocky barrier of peaks and ridges that formed the Wahiti ranges, the great chain whose unbroken links stretch from the East Cape to Cook’s Straits. They had no alternative but to descend the opposite slope and enter the narrow gorges, uncertain whether any outlet existed.

Glenarvan could not prolong the halt for a moment. Wearied as they might be, they must fly or be discovered.

“Let us go down!”cried he,“before our passage is cut off.”

But just as the ladies had risen with a despairing effort, McNabbs stopped them and said: “Glenarvan, it is useless. Look!”

And then they all perceived the inexplicable change that had taken place in the movements of the Maoris.

Their pursuit had suddenly stopped. The ascent of the mountain had ceased by an imperious command.The natives had paused in their career, and surged like the sea waves against an opposing rock.All the crowd, thirsting for blood, stood at the foot of the mountain yelling and gesticulating, brandishing guns and hatchets, but not advancing a foot.

Their dogs, rooted to the spot like themselves, barked with rage.

What stayed them? What occult power controlled these savages?

The fugitives looked without understanding, fearing lest the charm that enchained Kai-Koumou’s tribe should be broken.

Suddenly John Mangles uttered an exclamation which attracted the attention of his companions. He pointed to a little enclosure on the summit of the cone.

“The tomb of Kara-Tete!”said Robert.

“Are you sure, Robert?”said Glenarvan.

“Yes, my Lord, it is the tomb; I recognize it.”

Robert was right. Fifty feet above, at the extreme peak of the mountain, freshly painted posts formed a small palisade enclosure, and Glenarvan too was convinced that it was the chief’s burial place.The chances of their flight had led them to the crest of Maunganamu.

Glenarvan, followed by the rest, climbed to the foot of the tomb.A large opening, covered with mats, led into it. Glenarvan was about to invade the sanctity of the “urupa,”when he reeled backward.

“A savage!”said he.

“In the tomb?”inquired the Major.

“Yes, McNabbs.”

“No matter; go in.”

Glenarvan, the Major, Robert and John Mangles entered. There sat a Maori, wrapped in a large flax mat; the darkness of the “urupa” preventing them from distinguishing his features. He was very quiet, and was eating his breakfast quite coolly.

Glenarvan was about to speak to him when the native forestalled him by saying gayly and in good English: “Sit down, my Lord; breakfast is ready.”

It was Paganel. At the sound of his voice they all rushed into the “urupa,”and he was cordially embraced all round. Paganel was found again. He was their salvation.They wanted to question him; to know how and why he was here on the summit of Maunganamu; but Glenarvan stopped this misplaced curiosity.

“The savages?”said he.

“The savages,”said Paganel, shrugging his shoulders.“I have a contempt for those people! Come and look at them.”

They all followed Paganel out of the “urupa.”The Maoris were still in the same position round the base of the mountain, uttering fearful cries.

“Shout! yell! till your lungs are gone, stupid wretches!”said Paganel.

“I dare you to come here!”

From their elevated position they could see over Lake Taupo, which stretched toward the west in its setting of picturesque mountains

“But why?”said Glenarvan.

“Because the chief is buried here, and the tomb protects us, because the mountain is tabooed.”

“Tabooed?”

“Yes, my friends! and that is why I took refuge here, as the malefactors used to flee to the sanctuaries in the middle ages.”

“God be praised!”said Lady Helena, lifting her hands to heaven.

The fugitives were not yet out of danger, but they had a moment’s respite, which was very welcome in their exhausted state.

Glenarvan was too much overcome to speak, and the Major nodded his head with an air of perfect content.

“And now, my friends,”said Paganel,“if these brutes think to exercise their patience on us, they are mistaken. In two days we shall be out of their reach.”

“By flight!”said Glenarvan.“But how?”

“That I do not know,”answered Paganel,“but we shall manage it.”

And now everybody wanted to know about their friend’s adventures.

They were puzzled by the reserve of a man generally so talkative; on this occasion they had to drag the words out of his mouth; usually he was a ready story-teller, now he gave only evasive answers to the questions of the rest.

“Paganel is another man!”thought McNabbs.

His face was really altered. He wrapped himself closely in his great flax mat and seemed to deprecate observation. Everyone noticed his embarrassment, when he was the subject of conversation, though nobody appeared to remark it; when other topics were under discussion, Paganel resumed his usual gayety.

Of his adventures all that could be extracted from him at this time was as follows: After the murder of Kara-Tete, Paganel took advantage, like Robert, of the commotion among the natives, and got out of the enclosure. But less fortunate than young Grant, he walked straight into a Maori camp, where he met a tall, intelligent-looking chief, evidently of higher rank than all the warriors of his tribe. The chief spoke excellent English, and he saluted the new-comer by rubbing the end of his nose against the end of the geographer’s nose.

Paganel wondered whether he was to consider himself a prisoner or not. But perceiving that he could not stir without the polite escort of the chief, he soon made up his mind on that point.

This chief, Hihi, or Sunbeam, was not a bad fellow. Paganel’s spectacles and telescope seemed to give him a great idea of Paganel’s importance, and he manifested great attachment to him, not only by kindness, but by a strong flax rope, especially at night.

This lasted for three days; to the inquiry whether he was well treated, he said “Yes and no!”without further answer; he was a prisoner, and except that he expected immediate execution, his state seemed to him no better than that in which he had left his unfortunate friends.

One night, however, he managed to break his rope and escape. He had seen from afar the burial of the chief, and knew that he was buried on the top of Maunganamu, and he was well acquainted with the fact that the mountain would be therefore tabooed. He resolved to take refuge there, being unwilling to leave the region where his compan-

ions were in durance. He succeeded in his dangerous attempt, and had arrived the previous night at the tomb of Kara-Tete, and there proposed to recruit his strength while he waited in the hope that his friends might, by Divine mercy, find the means of escape.

Such was Paganel’s story. Did he designedly conceal some incident of his captivity? More than once his embarrassment led them to that conclusion. But however that might be, he was heartily congratulated on all sides. And then the present emergency came on for serious discussion. The natives dare not climb Maunganamu, but they, of course, calculated that hunger and thirst would restore them their prey. It was only a question of time, and patience is one of the virtues of all savages. Glenarvan was fully alive to the difficulty, but made up his mind to watch for an opportunity, or make one. First of all he made a thorough survey of Maunganamu, their present fortress; not for the purpose of defence, but of escape. The Major, John, Robert, Paganel, and himself, made an exact map of the mountain.They noted the direction, outlet and inclination of the paths. The ridge, a mile in length, which united Maunganamu to the Wahiti chain had a downward inclination. Its slope, narrow and jagged though it was, appeared the only practicable route, if they made good their escape at all. If they could do this without observation, under cover of night, they might possibly reach the deep valleys of the Range and put the Maoris off the scent.

But there were dangers in this route; the last part of it was within pistol shot of natives posted on the lower slopes. Already when they ventured on the exposed part of the crest, they were saluted with a hail of shot which did not reach them. Some gun wads, carried by the wind, fell beside them; they were made of printed paper, which Paganel picked up out of curiosity, and with some trouble deciphered.

“That is a good idea! My friends, do you know what those creatures use for wads?”

“No, Paganel!”said Glenarvan.

“Pages of the Bible! If that is the use they make of the Holy Book, I pity the missionaries! It will be rather difficult to establish a Maori library.”

“And what text of scripture did they aim at us?”

“A message from God Himself!”exclaimed John Mangles, who was in the act of reading the scorched fragment of paper.“It bids us hope in Him,”added the young captain, firm in the faith of his Scotch convictions.

“Read it, John!”said Glenarvan.

And John read what the powder had left visible:“I will deliver him, for he hath trusted in me.”

“My friends,”said Glenarvan,“we must carry these words of hope to our dear, brave ladies.The sound will bring comfort to their hearts.”

Glenarvan and his companions hastened up the steep path to the cone, and went toward the tomb. As they climbed they were astonished to perceive every few moments a kind of vibration in the soil.

It was not a movement like earthquake, but that peculiar tremor that affects the metal of a boiler under high pressure. It was clear the mountain was the outer covering of a body of vapour, the product of subterranean fires.

CHRISTMAS

20

19 December 2008

Blessed are the meek

Letters to Santa reflect the reality of today’s rocky economy In notes addressed to the North Pole, children– and adults– share stories of lost jobs, home foreclosures, When Ronisha Moseley’s stepmother gently told skyrocketing heating bills and evictions. her the family might not have Christmas presents Traditionally optimistic requests for video games this year, the 10-year-old turned to the one person and bikes are often supplanted by pleas for basic she believed could help: Santa Claus. necessities such as pyjamas and socks.

Pencil in hand, Ronisha wrote him a one-page “In lighter times, you have kids asking for everyletter on poinsettia stationery left over from last thing they see,”said Archie Culberson, a postal clerk year.The girl explained that her stepmother had lost who has sorted Santa letters for 28 years.“But now, her job and she hoped Santa could come through some kids are worried they won’t have Christmas at with a gift for the whole family. all and they’re turning to Santa because they don’t “What I want for Christmas is for my stepmother know who else to ask.” and me and my sister to go away somewhere nice,” Postal employees and volunteers log 10-hour days she wrote. separating letters into piles based on gender and For the fourth-grader,“somewhere nice”would be one family size. The notes are placed in the post office of the downtown hotels she saw on a recent sightseeing lobby, so customers can read them and, if interested, trip with her stepmum.Ronisha has never stayed in a select a child to help. hotel and has been obsessed with them since the family The wish lists available for perusal offer a heartouting, her stepmother, Carolyn Finley, said. breaking look at childlike faith amid a faltering “She wants to go someplace where she gets to economy.A 10-year-old boy is sure Santa will bring pack a suitcase and sleep somewhere else for a night,” nappies for his baby sister.A girl in year three asks said Finley, who lost her job as a teaching assistant for slippers to keep her feet warm.Two brothers say in August and is raising Ronisha and her sister on their mum needs help making the rent. her own.“She thinks Santa will help, but I tried to Some kids staple report cards to their letters in hopes explain that times are tough right now.” of securing a spot on the scroll of good girls and boys.

Her letter, like many sent through Chicago’s main Others provide character references, urging Santa to post office, reflects the reality of today’s economy. check with teachers, grandmothers or baby sitters

By Stacy St. Clair

should he have any doubts about their behaviour.

“I just want what any regular girl would want,” writes 9-year-old Annisha from Chicago, promising to give Santa unlimited milk and cookies if he doesn’t skip over her house like he did last year.

Brothers Crishon Kane, 7, and Christian Carter, 6, are seeking Santa’s help after a year in which their mother lost her job and they were evicted from their apartment because the landlord defaulted on the mortgage. As part of the foreclosure process, the family’s belongings were removed from the dwelling and left on the sidewalk.

Neighbours tried to save the possessions, but looters took most of them, including the boys’toys, their mother, Christina Kane, said.

“My mum doesn’t have any money this year, but we’re good boys,”Crishon wrote on behalf of himself and his brother.“We like Batman.”

Christina Kane sadly mailed the letter last month, knowing her sons and their 19-month-old sister will most likely be disappointed Christmas morning.The boys talked nonstop about Santa as they decorated the family’s artificial tree in their new apartment last week, repeatedly asking their mother what she thought he would bring them this year.

“I told them that our love for one another is more important than any toy,”said Christina Kane, who’s also caring for her teenage sister.“They looked at me and said,‘What does that mean?’“ – Chicago Tribune.

Do you hear what I hear?

25 songs for holiday cheer

What’s to love: This tale of a lonely Christmas meal redeemed by convenience store romance sounds as cute as that other Waitresses hit,“I Know What Boys Like,”does annoying.

By Louis R. Carlozo Chicago Tribune

So you chug-a-lugged some spiked egg nog, passed out and had nightmares of hearing “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer” for the gajillionth time.

Then ... you got lost in a megamall, only to be mauled by a gaudy Mannheim Steamroller.

Afraid this could happen to you? Well, take heart – and don’t leave your holiday music in the hands of deejays, in-laws and other evil elves who serve you the sonic equivalent of brick-hard fruitcake.

Here are 25 songs for a holiday playlist. Burn a mix of these tunes and consider wrapping up the CD as a thoughtful hostess gift or stocking stuffer.

12) “You Gotta Get Up (Christmas Song),” Rich Mullins

What’s to love: A Christian singer-songwriter compared to Paul Simon and Don Henley, Mullins sings from the perspective of a little boy waiting to open his holiday gifts. No sticky-sweet sentiment or cutesy artifice here: It’s heartfelt.

13) “Merry Christmas (I Don’t Want to Fight Tonight),” The Ramones

What’s to love: Punk godfather Joey Ramone’s appeal for a little break from the family dysfunction gives a whole new spin to the phrase “peace on Earth.”

1) “Monsters’ Holiday,” Bobby “Boris” Pickett

What’s to love:This 1962 sequel to“Monster Mash” is a bit more sublime but even more fun. Song ends with Igor going ape over St. Nick:“Ooooooh, Santa GOOOOOOD!”Scary Christmas!

14) “The Twelve Days of Christmas,” Bob and Doug McKenzie

What’s to love:“SCTV”stars Rick Moranis and Dave Thomas improvised this holiday spoof,complete with beer,toques and back bacon,and a drum machine that must’ve been salvaged from a disco fire sale.

2) “Do You Hear What I Hear?” Keola Beamer

What’s to love:Simply a gorgeous,gorgeous rendering of the Christmas carol by a Hawaiian slack key guitar master, from the highly recommended 1996 album “Ki Ho’alu Christmas”(Dancing Cat). Will calm your shopping angst quicker than a hot toddy.

3) “Santa Claus Go Straight to the Ghetto,” James Brown

What’s to love: Says more than 1,000 holiday charity appeals combined, and with a much funkier backbeat.

4) “Happy Xmas (War Is Over),” John Lennon

What’s to love:True, this song nearly got ruined when the“Make It Jamaica”ad campaign blatantly stole Lennon’s melody. Still,“Happy Xmas”endures by fusing Beatlesque appeal with beautiful Christmas spirit. Even Yoko Ono’s caterwauling, ever offkey, sounds charming.

5) “Father Christmas,” The Kinks

7) “Holly Jolly Christmas,” Burl Ives

What’s to love:Scripted by Johnny Marks (who wrote “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer”),“Holly Jolly”suggests roly-poly images of Ives as the avuncular snowman on those Rankin-Bass Christmas specials.

8) “You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch,” Thurl Ravenscroft

What’s to love:With a basso profundo to inspire Yuletide fright, Ravenscroft (the voice of Tony the Tiger) sings of a vomit-green beast with garlic in his soul. Come on: Garlic and arsenic sauce ... in a Christmas song? What’s not to love?

9) “Baby, It’s Cold Outside,” Dean Martin

What’s to love:You can see lounge lizard Deano puttin’ the moves on the female vocalist who’s just trying to get home before she’s snowed in:either by the weather or by Martin’s ridiculous, delicious flattery.

What’s to love: No Christmas ditty (save “Run Rudolph Run”) rocks as hard. Plus Ray Davies’ 10) “Peace on Earth/Little Drummer Boy,” Bing rapier wit yields a lyric pairing holiday need and Crosby and David Bowie rotten-kid greed.

What’s to love: In the most surreal pairing since 6) “Run Rudolph Run,” Chuck Berry pickles and ice cream, show-biz stalwart Crosby What’s to love: Listen to that guitar and Berry’s teamed with glitter god Ziggy Stardust to conjure a semi-yodeled vocal. Can’t you just see Rudolph and little Christmas magic.In a sad postscript,Crosby died Santa doing the duckwalk with a chorus line of elves in October 1977, a month after recording the duet. raising their teeny little fists in the air?

11) “Christmas Wrapping,” The Waitresses

15) “Christmastime Is Here Again,” The Beatles

What’s to love: Heard in bits over the years, this psychedelic ‘67 song (part of a Beatles Fan Club Christmas message) finally came out three decades later as a B-side to“Free as a Bird.”A sly rewrite of the “Sgt. Pepper”cut “Lovely Rita.”

16) “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town,” Bruce Springsteen

What’s to love: The punchy mix of sleigh bells, Clarence Clemons’ upbeat sax and Springsteen’s gruff baritone will make you think Santa – clad in black leather, of course – landed his sleigh on a wind-whipped Jersey Shore boardwalk.

17) “The Man With All the Toys,” Beach Boys

What’s to love:This 1964 Beach Boys cut boils it down to surfer-dude essentials:Santa’s cool, you see,‘cause he’s the man with all the toys!Who cares if he cruises in a big ol’sleigh instead of a little deuce coupe?

18) “Christmastime Is Here,” Vince Guaraldi

What’s to love: Lee Men-

delson, producer of “A Charlie Brown Christmas,” wrote the lyrics in 10 minutes on an envelope, because he couldn’t find a lyricist for hire. Four decades later it remains a holiday staple.

19) “The Christmas Song,” Nat King Cole

What’s to love:Cole’s got a voice warmer than a mug of mulled cider in a sub-zero snowstorm – and more comfy than your favourite Christmas slippers.

20) “My Favourite Things,” Tony Bennett

What’s to love: Not originally a holiday song, but in the hands of Bennett (who recorded it in 1968 for his classic album“Snowfall”) it somehow gives you the shivers and makes you feel warm inside.

21) “I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day,” Frank Sinatra

What’s to love: This 1964 Sinatra track dishes a cornucopia of delights: tubular bells, timpani rolls, a loft full of choir singers, and a stirring lead vocal sealed with the kiss of a harp. Schmaltzy? You bet.

But in the best possible sense.

22) “Boas Festas,” Two for Brazil

What’s to love:Chicago’s Paulinho Garcia ranks as the best Brazilian guitarist in the Midwest.One listen to this song (from his“Two for Noel”disc) and you’re spending Christmas on the beach in Rio.Ahhh.

23) “Sleigh Ride,” Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass

What’s to love:A minute-long, somber vocal prelude melts into hip, horn-driven instrumental pop that’ll throw you back to the Swingin’‘60s.Think of it as “The Dating Game”theme with tinsel draped all over it.

24) “Riu Riu Chiu,” Sixpence None the Richer

What’s to love: Leigh Nash established her appeal with the irresistible hit“Kiss Me.”Here, she sings in Spanish and you’d swear she’s spent every Christmas of her life in a sandstone Mexican cathedral.

25) “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” Band Aid

What’s to love:The cause behind this 1984 song, Ethiopian famine relief, might be reason enough.

But its carolling-bell melody in the key of C carries a shining message of hope amid midwinter darkness.

A quarter-century later, African famine has not vanished. Then again, neither has the hope.

HAPPY NEW YEAR

sPEciAl gifts WitH subscRiPtioNs

INVESTIGATE January 2009:

Sinner? or Saint the unauthorised

Obama – the unauthorised biography • Youth Crime • Bond of Brothers

biography of Barack Hussein Obama: Who is he, really?

Crime Youth What does it say about our society? $7.99 January 2009

Issue 96

A Bond Of Brothers Two men, separated by destiny

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