TGIF Edition 24 April 2009

NZTONIGHT

ANALYSIS

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Climate scientist sacked by NZ

Obama, the first hundred days

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ISSN 1172-4153 | Volume 2 | Issue 34 |

| 24 April 2009

Taliban now within 100km of controlling nukes

As everyone knows, President Obama inherited a multitude of domestic and international problems.

But of all the foreign dilemmas right now, none rivals Pakistan. It is in serious danger of falling to the Taliban.

Can you imagine – a large, nuclear-armed state in Central Asia, ruled by cousins of the people who governed Afghanistan when it served as a congenial home for Osama bin Laden and all his murderous minions.

But the warnings are coming fast and thick from the highest officials, including General David Petraeus, commander of American forces in that part of the world. The Taliban and allied extremists, he told the Senate this month,“could literally take down their state.”Asif Ali Zardari, Pakistan’s president, reflecting on American proposals for saving his nation, told a group of reporters:“It’s a long walk.And in that long walk, I am losing the people of Pakistan.”

In February, Taliban extremists fought the Pakistani army to a draw and won an agreement to establish a safe haven in the Swat valley, just 100 kilometres from Islamabad. At that time, I.E. Rehman, head of Pakistan’s Human Right Commission, said the Taliban and their militant allies were poised to take over the Punjab province, home to 60 percent of the population.

That has begun. Militants are taking control, one by one, of poor villages in northwest Punjab – beginning the spread of an insidious fungus that could eat the state.

The Pakistani police and military seem powerless

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Taliban fingers on nuke buttons

By Joel Brinkley McClatchy-Tribune News Service

Dunedin

to stop it. They lack the will to take on this fight, Sen. Carl Levin, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, has been arguing in recent days.

“They’re in denial,” said Marvin Weinbaum, a former State Department intelligence analyst for Pakistan and Afghanistan. “There’s no sense of urgency,”even though Pakistan is staring down the

barrel “of a full blown, indigenous insurgency.”

Even now, with the state’s very existence at stake, military leaders continue their feckless debate over whether their central mission should be to prepare for a war with India – or take on these domestic threats. At the same time, American officials have begun urgently warning (what everyone already

on the

INSIDE

NZPA

Continue reading

Clinton: ‘existential threat’ in Pakistan

DRAGON RISING

China’s Pacific fleet Page 5

By Paul Richter Tribune Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON – In an assessment that raised questions about the future of Pakistan, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton warns that the country’s fragile government is facing an “existential threat” from militants who are now operating within a few hours’ travel of the capital.

Clinton told the House Foreign Affairs Committee that the government in Islamabad is ceding more and more territory to the militants and is “basically abdicating to the Taliban and the extremists” in signing a deal with militants that limits the government’s involvement in the war-torn Swat Valley.

“I think we cannot underscore (enough) the seriousness of the existential threat posed to the state of Pakistan by the continuing advances,” Clinton said, adding the nuclear-armed nation also poses a “mortal threat” to the United States and other countries.

VICTIM NAILED

Police release X-ray Page 8

BOYLEMANIA What’s Cowell up to?

Page 14

Continue reading

Anzac Poppy Scandal hits veteran fundraising

By Ian Wishart

Disgruntled members of the public are angry they purchased white poppies from street sellers this Anzac week, without realizing the money was going into the pockets of the peace movement, not towards the welfare of Returned Servicemen.

Peace Movement Aotearoa, picking up on a British publicity stunt, has this year been offering white poppies to the public to promote“peace”instead of Anzac commemoration.

Normally, white poppies have been sold in August to mark Hiroshima Day, but according to the Peace Movement website a decision was made to shift their own fundraising drive to Anzac week for 2009 onwards, ostensibly to capitalize on poppy awareness.

TGIF Edition has been contacted by Christchurch residents who became annoyed after realizing the white poppies they purchased this week were a private fundraising

initiative of the left wing Peace Movement group.

A spokesman for the Returned Services Association, Robin Klitscher, told TGIF the RSA had become aware the Peace Movement was muscling in on their patch only recently, but presumed it had been done in accordance with the industry body that coordinates street appeals, the Fundraising Institute of New Zealand.

However, a check of the FINZ website’s calendar

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of 2009 street appeals doesn’t mention the white poppy drive, and the RSA’s Klitscher says he’d be “disappointed”if people wanting to support elderly war veterans felt they’d been duped by the Peace Movement’s white poppy sellers.

Klitscher says he’d like to think the red poppy brand was strong enough that people knew not to buy pale imitations. He noted wryly that the RSA “has no argument with groups expressing a freedom that old warriors fought and died to preserve in New Zealand”.

NEW ZEALAND

off BEAT Cat gets mouth to mouth LAGUNA WOODS, Calif., April 24 (UPI) – Authorities in California said firefighters performed artificial respiration on a cat rescued from a blaze until it began to breathe on its own.

Capt. Marc Stone of the Orange County Fire Authority said about 20 firefighters responded to the fire in Laguna Woods just after 3 p.m. Thursday and found only the cat inside the house, the Orange County (Calif.)

Register reported today.

“The cat wasn’t doing so well,” Stone said.

Stone said firefighters performed artificial respiration on the feline and then returned the animal to its owner, who had fled the house through a back door before firefighters arrived.

Wrong turn: Scooter flagged on motorway CHERITON, England, April 24 (UPI) – British police said an 89-year-old man took a wrong turn on his mobility scooter and wound up on a 70 mph motorway.

Officers said they took the man home Tuesday after maintenance workers found him travelling 8 mph on the shoulder of the M20 in Cheriton, England, the Daily Mail reported today.

“I could not believe it when I saw him casually driving towards us. It was frightening, but when we stopped him he was determined to carry on along the M20,” said a maintenance worker who asked not to be named. He said he had been shopping in Cheriton, but mistakenly taken the wrong junction and ended up on the motorway.

Couple wed as ‘Shrek’ characters BARNSTAPLE, England, April 24 (UPI) – A British couple said they spent three hours in makeup before their wedding so they could walk down the aisle as characters from the Shrek films.

Christine England, 40, and Keith Green, 44, of Barnstaple, England, used green paint and costumes to turn themselves into Princess Fiona and Shrek while guests at the wedding dressed as other characters from the animated films, including Donkey and the Gingerbread Man, the Daily Mail reported.

“Every girl wants a fairytale wedding and I got one – with a bit of a twist. It was a real laugh,” England said.

“The idea just came to me. I knew what we would go as them because Keith looks just like Shrek.”

The couple said they hired a makeup artist to design their wedding getup.

“It was a very strange experience to say the least, but a thoroughly enjoyable one. We love the films and my wife tells me I have resemblance to Shrek,” Green said.

Ghost-hunting teens encounter live robbers EXETER, R.I., April 24 (UPI) – Five Rhode Island men have been charged with giving ghost-hunting teenagers a real scare by robbing them in an abandoned state school.

State police said the suspects were students in the Job Corps at a building on the grounds of the Ladd School, The Providence Journal-Bulletin reported. They were allegedly armed with knives, clubs, BB guns and axes when they held up a total of 12 teenagers over the past three months.

They allegedly stole cell phones, money and credit cards from their victims.

State Police Capt. David Neill said the Ladd School, which opened in 1907 for people with mental disabilities, is closed to the public. But he said ghost hunters manage to get in.

Visitors claim they have heard voices and have been touched or hit by invisible hands. Some have reported cameras malfunctioning for no apparent reason.

The defendants were identified as two brothers, Kou Xiong, 21, and Benjamin Xiong, 19, of Warwick; Sidney Chay, 19, of Providence; Anthony Deloge, 18, of Warwick; and Jonathan Wilson, 25, of Charlestown.

They were ordered held without bail pending a hearing May 6 on charges of armed robbery and conspiracy.

24 April 2009

niwa sacks top climate scientist Wellington, April 24 – One of New Zealand’s top climate scientists, Jim Salinger, has been fired from his job at the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (Niwa).

The high-profile scientist,whose work contributed to a Nobel prize, is reported to have been sacked for ignoring a new Niwa policy against speaking publicly without prior approval.

“I can’t understand it, it’s not as though I’m doing bad science, it’s not as though I’m under-performing, so I’m really astounded,” Dr Salinger said on TV One News tonight.

TV One said Niwa had accused Dr Salinger of serious misconduct after he took part in a programme the channel produced about glaciers.

The Green Party said Dr Salinger was dismissed earlier this week for helping TVNZ weatherman Jim Hickey with climate-related inquiries.

The scientist has frequently appeared in TV climate reports and has spoken in the media about climate change.

“Niwa’s actions will make all government scientists nervous about their jobs,”said Green Party co-leader Jeanette Fitzsimons.

“New Zealand is on a slippery slope when trying to provide Kiwis with a greater understanding of our climate is a sackable offence.”

Ms Fitzsimons said scientists should be able to help the public and the media with scientific problems, particularly around issues like climate change.

“An investigation is needed into how it came to be that one of New Zealand’s foremost scientists was frog-marched out of his job for what appears to be trivial and petty reasons.”

Ms Fitzsimons said the Minister of Research, Science and Technology, Wayne Mapp, should call in Niwa and tell them to“get to the bottom of this messy matter”.

Greenpeace said it wanted answers from Niwa and the Government.

“Dr Salinger has done some amazing work to educate New Zealanders about climate change and he is highly respected internationally,”said Greenpeace senior climate campaigner Simon Boxer.

“He was very clear about the need for urgent climate action in New Zealand.”

All that Dr Mapp would say tonight was:“The matter is an employment dispute, which must be handled by the chief executive and the board.”

TV One reported Dr Salinger was considering claiming unjustified dismissal.

NZPA / Wayne Drought

– NZPA

Warning on Bonjela

Wellington, April 24 NZPA – New Zealand health authorities are considering whether to take action after a British health warning yesterday that children under 16 should not be given Bonjela mouth pain relief gels.

Britain’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) issued the warning over treatments containing salicylate salts, which

have the same effect on the body as aspirin.Aspirin is already not recommended for those under 16.

Three children had been hospitalised with suspected Reye’s syndrome, a rare but serious condition, after using oral gels like Bonjela, but it was not confirmed.

There had been no reports of Reye’s syndrome in New Zealand following the use of oral salicylate

gels such as Bonjela, which had been used for over 30 years, Medsafe group manager Stewart Jessamine said.

The MHRA decision was a precaution based on a theoretical risk of developing Reye’s syndrome.

Medsafe will review the MHRA data before making a decision about whether any action was needed in New Zealand.

Parents were advised to follow the instructions provided on the product packaging.

Bonjela manufacturer Reckitt Benckiser said the MHRA decision was prompted by a review of a report on a suspected case of Reye’s syndrome.

The review concluded that the symptoms in the case were more likely to reflect high levels of salicylate, either due to misuse or an overdose.

In Britain, there had also been four reports of vomiting or diarrhoea in children following Bonjela use. In three of the cases the gel had been given for teething pain, and all four children recovered.

Manufacturer Reckitt Benckiser said Bonjela and Bonjela Cool would now be clearly labelled as adult brands.

It said the warning did not apply to its Bonjela Teething Gel, which does not contain salicylate salts and remains safe for children from just two months old.

– NZPA

NEW ZEALAND

24 April 2009

Businessman paroled despite no remorse Wellington, April 24 – A prominent Christchurch businessman who was jailed last year for the historic rape of a young girl will be released having served a third of his sentence.

Peter Maxwell Stewart, 63, son of PDL founder Sir Robertson Stewart and husband of New Zealand Fashion Week owner Pieter Stewart, was sentenced to 3-1/2 years in prison in February 2008 after being found guilty of five charges of indecency, one of sodomy and one of rape.

His offending took place from 1968 to 1974 when Stewart was in his 20s and the victim was aged eight to 14 years.

Following the trial Stewart and his family main-

tained his innocence, which led to clashes with his victim’s family and supporters, with both sides complaining of harassment.

His family said in December they had suffered “countless slurs”by the victim’s family, who in turn said Stewart should accept the guilty verdicts.

The victim herself told the parole board on Monday she believed Stewart should be held until he was prepared to acknowledge his offending.

The board, however, said Stewart amassed no other convictions over the 35 years since his offending and had been “a model prisoner”.

Additionally, two psychological assessments deemed him a low risk of reoffending against children.

As such, the board was required by the Parole Act to approve his release on the conditions he did not have any unsupervised contact with children aged under 16 and did not approach the victim.

No public vote on super city

Wellington, April 24 – Local Government Minister Rodney Hide wants Aucklanders to have“maximum input”into the Government’s super city proposals but he has ruled out holding a referendum.

Labour leader Phil Goff today called for a referen– NZPA dum to give Aucklanders a voice rather than“ramming changes through by special legislation”.

He said the Royal Commission consulted widely and undertook extensive analysis over 18 months before making its recommendations, but the Government had fundamentally changed them without any further consultation.

Mr Goff said the proposals looked like a“jack-up” between National,ACT,Auckland City Mayor John for saying such a thing, but often there’s a sort of Banks and a “small but powerful business elite”.

The Greens also want a referendum, and MP Sue ‘rednecky’ element ... The people who get on talkback (radio) and stuff haven’t had time to think Kedgley said Mr Hide had effectively thrown the through a bit more deeply how the other person Royal Commission’s report into the bin.

“The Local Government Act stipulates very might feel.”

Most reaction was in support of keeping the clearly that before any significant local body reorname, and Cadbury/Pascall says it will not make ganisation can be made, an extensive public consultation process must take place,”she said. any change.

“This must include consultation with stakehold“That sounds a wee bit hard-hearted, but, as I say, this particular candy has been around for so long,” ers, notification of the draft proposal, a public submission process and a poll of electors to determine Ms Lackey said.

“I think New Zealanders would have had absolutely no idea that it might cause offence to another people.”

The controversy was unlikely to cause a political rift between New Zealand and Canada, she said.

“You could hardly have two countries closer together in attitudes and values than Canada and New Zealand.”

NZ diplomat criticises “eskimo” reaction Wellington, April 24 – New Zealand’s high commissioner to Canada has expressed disappointment about her compatriots’ reactions to a complaint from a Canadian tourist that Eskimo sweets are racist.

Seeka LeeVeevee Parsons,21,an Inuit of the Nunavut Territory in Canada, said she was shocked when she found the Eskimo marshmallows for sale last week, saying they were an insult to her people.

The correct term was Inuit or Inuk, Ms Parsons said.

High Commissioner Kate Lackey told Canadian media that New Zealanders were loyal to Eskimo sweets, but she criticised rude radio comments, online insults and calls for the 21-year-old tourist to head back home.

“I would hope New Zealanders would be a bit more courteous and understanding,” Ms Lackey said.

“I’ll probably get into trouble in New Zealand

– NZPA

Some like it hot…

– NZPA

Strata Finance defaults, crown guarantee

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Wellington, April 24 – Another finance company covered by the Government’s retail deposit guarantee has defaulted.

It is Strata Finance Ltd, which had just 21 customers and deposits of $448,000 as of April 20.

All eligible depositors will get 100 percent of the money they are entitled to under the Crown retail deposit guarantee scheme,Treasury Secretary John Whitehead said.

Strata was unable to pay one of its depositors on the maturity date of that deposit on April 16, which constituted a default. Strata has been in the process of winding down.

“The Crown stands fully behind its guarantee commitments, and we expect an orderly process of payment to eligible Strata Finance depositors,” said Mr Whitehead.

The Crown retail deposit guarantee will not cover any new deposits or the roll-over of existing deposits after April 16.

The Crown will seek to recover the value of any payouts the Crown makes under the guarantee.

The guarantee scheme has been criticised for accepting finance companies on the brink of failure and for distorting investment flows.

by simple majority whether the proposal should proceed or not.”

Mr Hide told NZPA he wanted Aucklanders to have a bigger say than just a `yes’or `no’to a super city.

“The difficulty with a referendum is it would cost a million dollars and it would just ask `yes’ or `no’,”he said.

“What I’m picking up, very clearly, is that a lot of people favour a super city but they’ve got particular views about how it should be structured and run – it’s not just a `yes’or `no’question, that’s why I’ve been so actively engaged with the mayors.”

Mr Hide said he was going to move fast with legislation, which would go to a select committee for public submissions.

That would allow Aucklanders to have their say, in detail, about the proposals.

Mr Hide met Auckland’s mayors this morning and said good progress was made.

“Everyone has left their differences at the door and they’re working in the best interests of Auckland,”he said.

“We’re continuing to meet with the mayors, we’ve set up a process for that.”

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NEW ZEALAND

24 April 2009

Police: Safety onus still on boaties Wellington, April 24 – Central Districts police have changed their search and rescue procedures following the death of a teenage fisherman off the coast of Wanganui last year, but say the first responsibility for safety still lies with boaties themselves.

A coronial report released today found a combination of errors by police,Wanganui Coastguard and three fishermen led to the death of Geoffrey Hampton, 19, who drowned after spending the night in the water.

The 5m boat Hard Out sank off the coast of Wanganui on February 23 last year after being hit by a freak wave.

The three men on board only had time to grab their lifejackets and a mobile phone, which did not work.

They were found nearly 11 hours after authorities became aware they were overdue. Mr Hampton’s father Alan and a friend Duncan Powell survived.

Alan Hampton criticised the bungled rescue, say-

ing “petty attitudes” and dysfunctional relationships between agencies had killed his son.

Central District police commander Superintendent Russell Gibson said the police’s own inquiry made seven recommendations, all of which had been adopted by police and endorsed in today’s coroner’s report.

Lessons had been learnt from the Wanganui incident and a search and rescue operation last month, which found two dead fishermen whose boat had sunk off Waitarere Beach, had been conducted as every such operation should be run, he said.

Unfortunately it could not stop a tragic outcome.

“The coroner raised the issue,” Mr Gibson said.

“No matter how fantastic the search and rescue, it’s incumbent on boaties to have the best protection they can.”

That meant boaties having personal locator bea-

cons and beacons that were set off on contact with water.

In her report, coroner Carla na Nagara noted that none of the lifejackets was suitable for open waters. The men had also tried to swim to shore which hadn’t helped them conserve energy.

She found that police failed to follow best practice in their search and rescue operation.

There was also a lack of inter-agency training and a“subculture of poor/distrustful relationships” between the local agencies.

A combination of factors led to Mr Hampton’s death but if the boaties had carried emergency personal locator beacons Mr Hampton would have had a much greater chance of surviving, Ms Nagara said.

The coroner endorsed recommendations in the Maritime NZ report and the police peer review report.

She made six recommendations:

• It should be compulsory for boaties to carry emergency locator beacons.

• The Wanganui Coastguard operating procedure for overdue boats be amended so that if trip reports are not closed within two hours of dusk, that time is of the essence in establishing whether boaties are overdue.

• Boaties be educated about what can happen if trip reports are not closed.

• Central Districts police review its arrangement regarding police officers who are SAR volunteers so that the incident controller can have a team of at least two trained SAR officers.

• Police appoint an family liaison officer for every SAR operation.

• There should be a review of information highlighting the importance of using the correct lifejacket so it is easily understood.

– NZPA

NZ dollar fate hinges on rate decision Wellington, April 24 NZPA – The New Zealand dollar was slightly firmer today as market attention turned to next week’s interest rate decision by the Reserve Bank of New Zealand.

Around 5pm the kiwi was buying US56.20c, little changed from US56.09c at the open. It climbed from US55.73c at 5pm yesterday.

Currency strategists said trends today reflected trading in the US dollar,which has been weaker,but attention is turning to next week’s interest rate decision.

The Reserve Bank of New Zealand is expected to cut its official cash rate by 50 basis points to 2.5 percent next Thursday.

Sentiment today was helped by a firm performance byWall Street on Thursday but investors are reluctant

Glider crash cause answer possibly weeks away Wellington, April 24 – The cause of yesterday’s glider crash in the Waikato, in which a 14-year-old trainee pilot was seriously injured, will probably not be known for weeks.

Christchurch boy Ryan Hodgkinson, flying with 77-year-old instructor Thomas Orr, landed short of the runway at Matamata Aerodome in Waharoa around 5pm.

Ryan was in a critical but stable condition in Waikato Hospital today. He had sustained“multiple severe multisystem injuries”, said Waikato Hospital trauma specialist Dr Grant Christey.

Mr Orr, from Taupo, suffered moderate back injuries and was also taken to hospital for treatment.

A student at Christchurch’s Middleton Grange School, Ryan was taking part in an Air Training Corps (ATC) camp which employed civilian instructors from local clubs.

Matamata police Sergeant Graham McGurk said a number of people witnessed the crash which hap-

pened about one kilometre away from the southern end of the airfield.

Gliding New Zealand is investigating the accident for the Civil Aviation Authority.

There was no time limit on the investigation, although investigators should get some idea of what happened in two to three weeks, Gliding NZ national operations manager Doug Hamilton said.

An incident at a gliding camp at Waipukurau earlier this year, in which a glider clipped some wires as it came into land, is still being investigated. No one was hurt, although the glider was damaged.

The ATC runs two gliding training camps a year, one in Waikato and another at Waipukurau in January, said Wing Commander Guy Bendall, Commandant New Zealand Cadet Forces.

Cadets aged 14 and older have the opportunity to reach solo flying status on camp if they reach the required level.

– NZPA

to take on too much risk until US authorities release the stress test methodology for US banks.

The yen was firm in Asia, which traders attributed to unwinding of positions.

The NZ dollar slipped against the rising yen to 54.55 yen from 54.92 at 8am but was little changed from 54.50 yesterday.

The euro had been firm overnight on positive economic data and the NZ dollar slipped to 0.4275 euro from 0.4285 yesterday.

The NZ dollar was little changed against the Australian dollar at A78.86c from A78.85 yesterday.

The trade weighted index rose to 55.93 from 55.83 yesterday.

– NZPA

EDITORIAL

24 April 2009

Editorial

Te Ika a Maui & Te Wai Pounamu magazine When I first heard the Geographic Board proposition this week, I chuckled. The idea of renaming North & South magazine with the traditional monikers for the North and South islands held mischievous appeal.

To be honest though, it’s hard to get worked up over.

I know talkback has been running hot, and I know letters to the editor have been scornful, but to me it’s a quaint – albeit politically correct – bureaucratic solution to a minor problem.

No one is making it compulsory to stutter out“Te Ika a Maui”when “North Island”will do perfectly, just as no-one in their right mind refers to Taumata in the Hawkes Bay as“Taumatawhakatangihanga-

koauauotamateaturipukakapikimaungahoronukupokaiwhenuakitanatahu”.

It’s true that there’s been a sly liberal push to Maorify as many placenames as possible and erase the English names given by the pioneers who, for the most part, actually built the country we call New Zealand. It’s true that the Geographic Board has been part of this linguistic “ethnic cleansing”, and I guess at one level such moves must be fought and it’s all hands to the barricades.

Except, I still can’t get worked up about Te Ika a Maui etc. It’s a distraction and a waste of mental energy. If it becomes compulsory, or if the ex-Green Bay High principal who now runs the Ministry of Education (how on earth did the head of one of the

country’s worst performing schools get the top job in education under Labour?) tries to start calling the North and South Islands only by their native names in school projects, then by all means let’s storm the relevant government agencies and nail the culprits to a tree somewhere.

Until then, let’s take a deep breath, acknowledge that there may be some tourism merit in the explanation that the islands have older names rooted in ancient Pacific legends, and get worked up about something else, like the way officials and the media are lying to us about climate change.

Now that’s something worth fighting in the here and now.

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Friday Briefing

China’s Pacific expansion a warning Beijing – The expansion of China’s naval power, including the future building of aircraft carriers, reflects a change in emphasis from basic self-defence to a more assertive“forward defence,”a leading Chinese international relations analyst said today.

The growth of China’s economic and strategic interests has prompted the apparent shift in naval strategy by the ruling Communist Party, Shi Yinhong of People’s University in Beijing told the German Press Agency dpa.

“Before we called it self-defence, now I call it forward defence,”Shi said of China’s naval policy.

Thursday’s fleet parade to mark the 60th anniversary of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Navy reflected China’s growing self-confidence, he said.

Shi said the first public viewing of Chinese nuclear-powered submarines during the parade should be seen as a sign of greater openness rather than a growing threat.

“To show the nuclear submarines enhances the transparency of the Chinese military,”he said.

“It’s also good for raising the prestige of the Chinese navy with the Chinese public,”Shi said.

The ruling Communist Party acquired its first nine warships in April 1949, six months before it took power, when soldiers from the rival Nationalist Party (Kuomintang) defected.

It launched its first nuclear-powered submarine in December 1970, putting it into operation four years later, according to state media.

The PLA Navy reached another landmark in October 1982 with the firing of its first submarine-launched ballistic missile, in a move that the official China Daily on Thursday said had proved the nation’s “submarine-based nuclear retaliatory attack capability.”

Speculation resurfaced this week that China will soon formally announce plans to launch its first aircraft carrier, marking its emergence as a major naval power.

“All evidence shows that the central government has made a political decision or is very close to doing so,”Shi said of the plans to build an aircraft carrier.

“China can’t develop without aircraft carriers,” the official China Daily quoted Li Daguang, a military expert at the PLA’s National Defence University, as saying.

“The (carrier) ship is part of China’s plan to reach further into the high seas in the near future,” Li said.

The newspaper said more than 90 per cent of some 40,000 Chinese internet users who took part in a recent survey were“concerned with the disputes over maritime interests.”

In another online survey by Chinese websites, about 80 per cent of respondents said they were willing to donate money towards the building of an aircraft carrier, reflecting huge public support for naval expansion, it said.

Many concerns are linked to maritime disputes over resource-rich islands in the South China Sea and the East China Sea.

The Communist Party also has a long-term goal of gaining sovereignty over Taiwan, the island that it regards as a “renegade province.”

The United States supplies arms to Taiwan and has promised to consider helping the island if it is attacked by China.

The issue of the US presence in the area was raised last month when China said a US naval surveillance ship had violated international maritime law by operating inside its exclusive waters.

US officials said five Chinese ships shadowed and manoeuvred dangerously close to the US vessel in the South China Sea about 120 kilometres south of China’s Hainan Island.

China rejected US claims of“aggressive conduct” by the Chinese navy were “totally unacceptable.”

China last month also said it planned to send more naval vessels to patrol disputed areas of the South China Sea to counter illegal fishing and“other countries’ unfounded territorial claims.”

At the naval parade on Thursday, President Hu Jintao reiterated China’s commitment to “peaceful development” of its armed forces for defensive purposes.

But Shi said the disputes with countries including the United States, Japan, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam make more sophisticated weaponry, such as aircraft carriers, essential.

“The interests of China have been growing so China needs an aircraft carrier,”he said.

“It’s a symbol of national prestige,”he said.

– DPA

Family Matters

By Bob McCoskrie -Three Strikes’ will put protection of families first Family First supports the intent of the Sentencing and Parole Reform Bill (also dubbed the “Three Strikes Law”).

This law will prevent repeat violent offenders the ability to put families at risk.

Here’s just one recent example of the current situation “Police Killer had history of violence” As stated in our submission • The purpose of this law would be to warn ‘career criminals’ to find a new job or else they will become ‘career inmates’ – they are given two chances to stop their violent behaviour • This law would allow police, prosecutors and judges to intervene early enough to save lives instead of waiting for a violent offender to victimise another person .

• Supporters of this bill do not want ‘revenge’ – they simply wish to be able to live unmolested and not in the fear of violent criminals. This is called ‘justice.’

• The consequences for persistent offending should be sufficiently severe to ensure that the benefits of the crime are outweighed by the punishment • If a repeat offender is incapacitated, then the crime reduction will be great • Addressing the ‘underlying causes’ is relevant, but it doesn’t solve the immediate problem – protecting the public from persistent offenders There is further debate to be had on the role of prisons and how we tackle the drug, alcohol and educational needs of inmates. Recent experience in the United States has shown that enhanced sentencing measures work best when combined with other types of programs that can help reintegrate offenders back into the community.

Government re-entry assistance in the form of temporary housing, vocational training, and counseling can help to reduce the incidents of re-offending and encourage offenders to seek productive and useful lives.

But that is a separate debate. This particular bill is about protecting your family and mine from repeat violent offenders.

There have also been recent claims that the ‘Three Strikes’ proposed law would lead to increased family violence and desperate criminals killing to avoid arrest.

But the study referred to is fundamentally flawed. It found no increase in violence in California, which is the state that has the broadest and most liberal application of the three strikes law. However, the study did acknowledge a significant deterrent effect and that many potential 3-Strikers had moved to states with more lenient sentencing laws.

In fact, 15 years after the Three Strikes was passed in 1994 in California, a recently released report shows that homicides decreased from 3,699 in 1994 to 2,258 in 2007, despite a 25-30% increase in the population.

Rape also decreased as did assaults. In contrast, NZ’s rate of violent crime is on the up and up.

Experts say that persistent abusers are never persuaded by public relations campaigns to stop their bad behavior. The only way to protect women, children, and the elderly from repeat violent offenders is to incapacitate them. Additionally, numerous studies from the U.S. have found that mandatory arrest and jail sentences for domestic abusers have not affected police reporting rates and they have worked very well to lower repeat instances of domestic violence.

The Three Strikes law will reinforce the “Its Not OK” message by taking victimisations seriously. A slap on the wrist for domestic violence undermines our efforts to reduce tolerance for violence and the career choice of repeat violent offenders.

It is time the law acted to place the protection and wellbeing of families first.

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ANALYSIS

24 April 2009

OBAMA: The first hundred days

By Steven Thomma McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON – As he entered office, President Barack Obama made a symbolic bow to frugality, putting off the costly redecorating of the Oval Office that his predecessors had done.

But if the furnishings have remained largely the same – right down to the stain on the big oval rug

– the way Obama looks and acts there is decidedly different from his predecessor, not to mention all those who went before.

At the 100-day mark, he’s putting his own style on the presidency. Opportunistic. Pragmatic. Confident.

Deliberate. Polite to friend and foe alike. Partisan.

Polarizing. A better talker than George W. Bush. A more disciplined manager than Bill Clinton.

Some traits he’ll maintain throughout his presi-

dency. Some could change over his term. John F. Kennedy grew sceptical after a disastrous invasion of Cuba early in his presidency, learning to challenge aides and adopting an executive style that saw him and the country through a nuclear showdown with the Soviet Union.

“He’s flexible,”George Edwards, a scholar of the presidency and currently a visiting fellow at Oxford University, said of Obama.“He’s still learning.”

Nothing defines his early days as much as the way he’s seized the political opportunity provided by economic crisis to push forward an ambitious liberal agenda that otherwise would have little chance of getting through Congress. It includes an explosion of federal spending, the groundwork for universal health care and broad regulation of the environment, and soaring deficits and debt.

Even before he took office, Obama knew he faced a rare moment of crisis – one when a president could push through an agenda dramatically changing the government, and perhaps the country itself.

Franklin D. Roosevelt did it in 1933 at the height of the Great Depression. Lyndon Johnson did it in 1964-65 in the aftermath of Kennedy’s assassination.

Ronald Reagan did it in the early 1980s at a peak of the Cold War and economic stagflation. George W. Bush did it after the 2001 terrorist attacks.

Shifting priorities to push through his massive package of spending surges and tax cuts – many already on his or the Democratic agenda – was pivotal, because it’s unclear how much Obama could get through Congress absent the crisis. Those who counselled him to wait on the big programmatic priorities and focus first only on fighting the economic downturn misunderstood that, but Obama got it.

As he seeks to get his way, at home and abroad, Obama’s demonstrated a penchant for working people one on one, apparently confident that he can win over anyone.

While he may be laying the groundwork for more civil relations with Republicans and legislative successes later, he won only three Republican Senate votes for his stimulus package and none in the House of Representatives, none from either chamber for his budget, and he also failed to convince European leaders to send combat troops to help in Afghanistan.

“He has a difficult time persuading people,”Edwards said.“He’s been very good at maintaining his coalition.

What he can’t do is bring other people in.”

A careful and deliberate communicator, Obama relies on the teleprompter more than any other president. When he speaks off the cuff, such as at town hall meetings, he often pauses as though he’s searching for precisely the right words.

Obama, like most who come to the office, is sure of himself. One example is his willingness to admit a mistake, such as when Tom Daschle, his nominee to be secretary of health and human services, was forced to withdraw after being caught in a tax mess.

“I screwed up,”Obama said.

Another is his recent speech at Georgetown University explaining why he was trying to do so many things at once, using a biblical metaphor to say he wanted to make sure the nation’s house was built on a solid foundation, on rock instead of sand.

“The Obama team sensed that the message of him trying to do too much was starting to catch on,”said Bruce Buchanan, a political scientist at the University of Texas.“He’s very quick at damage control.”

Yet doubts about the size of Obama’s agenda persist, and he’s governing as a partisan, depending on party-line votes in Congress and particularly support from liberal allies such as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.

At ease with congressional Democrats, Obama defers to them to work out the details. He also set up staff to fire off e-mails to generate grassroots support from 13 million backers and to attack foes such as Rush Limbaugh. Then he hits the road himself about once a week to sell the broader message.

“It still has the look and feel of the campaign,” said Michael Franc, a vice president of the Heritage Foundation, a conservative research organization.

While Obama talks plenty of policy at his town hall meetings, he also uses a public relations strategy to sell the softer side, chatting amiably with Jay Leno, appearing on ESPN to reveal his college basketball picks, and walking the new dog, Bo, on the White House lawn.

The effect? His base loves him. Republicans, however, still aren’t buying his agenda. In fact, a recent survey by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center found him with high approval from Democrats and independents, but dismally low approval from Republicans.

“For all of his hopes about bipartisanship,”Pew said,“Barack Obama has the most polarized early job approval ratings of any president in the past four decades.”

Al-Qaida now targeting Israel?

By Claude Salhani

WASHINGTON – A recent communique from alQaida calls on its supporters and followers in the Middle East to make their way to Jordan,and from there to launch attacks on Israel,this reporter learned from high-level and well-informed Middle East sources.

This news comes on the heels of a visit to Washington by King Abdullah of Jordan to press the point with U.S. President Barack Obama that time is quickly running out to reach a viable solution to the longstanding Middle East problem.A Jordanian official said that while the Jordanian king was pleased by what he has seen of the new U.S.administration,a lot of people were losing faith in the peace process.

“We are very, very encouraged by the early signs from the administration to solve the Palestinian issue,”the Jordanian official said. Several Arab diplomats believe that unless the United States plays a leading role in the Middle East, there will be no progress. Indeed, there are fears among some officials in the Middle East that this stagnation could lead to a new war in the region unless there is a breakthrough in the deadlocked process.

The Jordanians are trying to convince the Americans that the situation in the region is at a critical point and that the only way forward in the peace process is if the United States puts all its weight and prestige behind the process.

While this may well be the case, there is not going to be any headway in the Middle East, no matter how great the pressure from the White House, unless the protagonists show some flexibility.That does not seem to be the case at the moment.

The Israelis must be willing to evict a certain number of settlers from outposts in the West Bank and facilitate daily activities for the Palestinians by easing some of the roadblocks that hamper travel

by Palestinians throughout the West Bank.

The only way any of this is likely to come about is if the United States decides to apply pressure on Israel to get the government of Binyamin Netanyahu to agree to move forward in negotiations with the Palestinians.

Obama may be serious in promoting the peace talks, but he will not want to upset the Jewish vote if he is thinking about re-election in 2012, which undoubtedly he is.

Then again, the onus is also on the Palestinians to get their act together and unite around the Palestinian Authority under the leadership of Mahmoud Abbas.

A division within the Palestinian leadership between Hamas and Fatah only hurts the Palestinians in the long run.

The new directive issued by al-Qaida, asking its members to begin planning raids on Israel from Jordan, emphasizes Jordan’s preoccupation and strong desire to have the peace initiative revived.

It also places the Hashemite Kingdom in an unenviable situation – one that Jordan knows only too well, having already experienced a similar situation in the late 1960s when the Palestine Liberation Organization and its offshoots based themselves in Jordan.The PLO and other Palestinian organizations conducted raids into Israel that brought retaliation from the Jewish state against the Jordanians.

The situation eventually led to serious deterioration between the government and the Palestinian

moderate Arab states, such as Jordan, is to convince both the Israelis and the Palestinians of Hamas that time is indeed running out.

And as long as Hamas and the Iranians continue to pursue their current policies, chances of anything really working in the Middle East are slim.

It is now a race against the clock with the trends in the Middle East slowly changing – and not for the better. Jordan’s king, one of the most moderate leaders in the Arab world, clearly understands that and

Obama may be serious in promoting the peace talks, but he will not want to upset the Jewish vote if he is thinking about re-election in 2012, which undoubtedly he is resistance and in September 1970 degenerated into a full-scale civil war and the expulsion of the resistance from Jordan. Jordan has since learned the lesson of Black September and will not likely allow the repetition of those dreadful events of 1970.

In addition to the threats from the Islamists, Jordan also worries over Iran’s role in the Arab world.

Some Arab officials say Iran is positioning itself as the champion of Islamic and Arab causes – a move most Arab countries look at with great mistrust.

The challenge to the administration and to the

will take that message to President Obama. He will help convey to the American president the urgency of finally pushing and prodding the principal players in the conflict toward a final settlement.

Trends are changing, but they are changing into threats.

As one Arab official told this correspondent last week,“People have started to lose faith in the peace process.And that is a very dangerous development.”

Claude Salhani is editor of the Middle East Times.

– UPI

ANALYSIS

24 April 2009

Something to bug you with

By Peter Curson

There is little doubt that antibiotics have changed the world. Since their discovery about 80 years ago and their widespread use from the 1960s, they have revolutionised our health and the treatment of once life-threatening infections. Such was their impact that health experts in the 1960s could claim that the era of infectious disease was coming to a close and societies could redirect their attention to other more pressing health issues such as heart disease, cancers and stroke. Nothing could have been further from the truth.

If anything the world is now poised on the brink of a new era of infectious disease, confronted on one hand by a wide range of emerging and re-emerging infections, and on the other, by increasing antibacterial resistance, against which our arsenal of antibiotics and antivirals may prove totally useless. It is a chilling prospect, and one that holds tremendous implications for life as we know it.

For a number of years we have been warned about the looming perils associated with our overuse of antibiotics and increasing antibiotic resistance.

Largely we ignored such warnings and continued to use antibiotics with wilful abandon – in ourselves, in our livestock, in our domestic animals, and in our food stocks.Nearly all the bacteria that we have come into contact with over the last 50 or so years have now attained some degree of resistance to the drugs we have developed to confront them.Many have become totally resistant and the list grows daily.

Today, 70% of all infections are resistant to at least one antibiotic requiring doctors to fall back on the use of multiple drug treatments. For some infections we really have no effective treatment at all. MRSA is rapidly approaching this situation.

MRSA kills at least 19,000 Americans a year, more than HIV/AIDS, and the number of MRSA infections in US hospitals has tripled since 2000. In New Zealand there at least 8,000 MRSA cases a year and in Australia CA-MRSA or community acquired MRSA, causes approximately 40,000 infections a year, mainly in young healthy adults, producing a range of symptoms ranging from minor skin eruptions to the loss of limbs and death. Many other infections such as Clostridium difficile, a range of streptococcus, enterococcus and pneumococcus infections continue to present extraordinary problems of resistance.

The reality is made worse by the fact that the number of new antibiotic drugs in development is very limited and Big Pharma, the giant international drug consortiums, see more profits to be made in producing drugs that address chronic and

lifestyle disorders such as high cholesterol, high blood pressure, and hypertension and arthritis for an affluent Western clientele. There is little doubt that within a few years we may well be facing a situation where our health systems will be unable to cope effectively with patients presenting with infectious disease. We are thus on the brink of a major period of antibiotic resistance and may even face the prospect of returning to a pre-antibiotic era.

How did we get into this situation? Well, basically by our inappropriate and overuse of antibiotic drugs plus poor standards of hygiene and infection control in our hospitals.While the use of antibiotics has declined somewhat in recent years, the drugs continue to be prescribed at an alarming rate. In the US, physicians probably write more than two million such prescriptions every week and if you add another 1.5 million prescribed by doctors in hospitals, you get some idea of their overuse.

Just consider the following scenario.You visit your family GP with a bad head cold. Not an uncommon event these days. The infection that you are suffering from is most probably viral and antibiotics will do no good at all.Yet many doctors will give you a script for antibiotics saying that if you happened to cough up yellow phlegm you may have developed a bacterial infection, so then take the antibiotics. I suspect that most people take the antibiotics anyway. Although some people clearly need antibiotics, many have developed an expectation that when they are sick, antibiotics are automatically the answer and place pressure on their family GP to deliver them. It is part of the patient-doctor relationship. If you leave the surgery without some magic bullet cure in your hand, in this case a script for antibiotics, you feel somehow cheated and that the system hasn’t delivered.

There is little doubt in my mind that doctors overprescribe antibiotics for a wide range of common complaints and have been doing so for over 40 years.Add this to our use of antibiotics in our food, in chickens, livestock etc and it is small wonder that we are in the situation we find ourselves in. Antibiotics are frequently used on animals that are in our food chain for much the same reasons as on us – to treat illness and improve health. Australia, for example, imports hundreds of tonnes of antibiotics for stock feed every year.The banning of antibiotics as growth promoters in animal feeds really only came into effect in many countries about 3 or 4 years ago and even now some antibiotics continue to be used in poultry feed and in animal husbandry through parts of Asia.

In addition, we are now being exposed to antibiotic drugs at a much younger age than ever before.

there is little doubt that within a few years we may well be facing a situation where our health systems will be unable to cope effectively with patients presenting with infectious disease Take childhood middle ear infections. Now that children start to socialise with other children at a much younger age in childcare situations, such infections have become commonplace. In the US today, at least three out of every four kids have had at least one such infection before they reach the age of three. Once you had to wait until children started formal schooling at age 5 or 6 before they came into contact with large numbers of other children and were exposed to common childhood infections.

Now this happens from the age of two and above and despite many limitations and fears, antibiotics continue to remain the treatment of choice for middle ear infections. The internet has added another dimension and provides a way of obtaining antibiotics without a prescription and in the US it is also possible to obtain antibiotics from some pet shops as well as from driving down into Mexico.

We seem to ignore the obvious. Whenever and

wherever we use antibiotics, resistance will inevitably develop. Then with poor hygiene and infection control measures these resistant bacteria will spread.What then is the answer? Well, we need to understand that antibiotic resistance is inevitable and that it is our behaviour which is making it worse.

There are probably a number of things that we can do to slow down the process. Improving hygiene and infection control, particularly in our hospitals is critical, developing new antibiotics equally so, and finally we need to use antibiotic drugs more appropriately, in ourselves, in our animals and in the food we eat. If we do not embrace such things we are probably facing a pandemic of antibiotic resistance with widespread implications for our health and wellbeing.

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

Germany fears social unrest

By Stefan Nicola

BERLIN – Observers fear that Germany, Europe’s largest economy, could be gripped by social unrest this year because of mass layoffs sparked by the worst recession since the end of World War II. In France, frustrated workers are blocking factories and holding top managers hostage. The economy of neighbouring Germany, experts say, is much more vulnerable to the negative effects of the global economic crisis because it is largely export-driven.

Germany’s main customers, such as the United States, the large European nations and Russia, will definitely pull back on imports. This will only increase the woes of German companies, which are already suffering because of a credit crunch on the international banking market, Germany’s leading economic experts said overnight in Berlin.

A joint statement drawn up by several leading economic institutes predicted the German gross domestic product would plunge by 6 percent in 2009, the biggest recession since the end of World War II. “And there won’t be a stabilization until mid-

2010,” Kai Carstensen, of the Munich-based Ifo Institute for Economic Research, said today in Berlin.

“Germany will lose 1 million jobs this year, with just under 5 million people unemployed by the end of 2009,”Carstensen said.

The gloomy outlook for the German job market has observers worried that social tensions may grip the country.

“It could be that social peace, which is important for the stability in Europe, is in danger,” the head economic expert of Deutsche Bank, Norbert Walter, said in an interview with German public broadcaster ZDF. Michael Sommer, Germany’s top union official, told German television station ARD he fears social unrest because the economic crisis is about to affect the core of Germany’s society -- workers, employees and the middle class.

He added that the most recent predictions could be compared to the economic situation in the early 1930s, which helped bring Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Party to power.

“You know how people react when they are losing their livelihood,”Sommer said.

Politicians are equally worried.

“I can imagine that in two or three months, people’s anger could grow significantly,”Gesine Schwan, a candidate for the largely ceremonial German presidency, told the Munich-based newspaper Merkur.

German Labour Minister Olaf Scholz meanwhile urged companies not to lay off people but instead expand the so-called Kurzarbeit, a programme relying on government-subsidized short working hours, similar to one just introduced in New Zealand.

Placing workers on short hours, however, makes sense only for a certain amount of time; if the economy doesn’t recover soon, Kurzarbeit would be too expensive, some experts say.

German car maker Daimler, which has some 70,000 workers on short hours, said recently that it could no longer rule out job cuts. Bosch, the world’s largest car-parts maker, on Thursday said its net gains plummeted by 87 percent to $485 million, adding that it was mulling layoffs.

To soften the impact of the crisis, the German government already launched two economic aid packages. Despite international and domestic pressure, Chancellor Angela Merkel has resisted calls for a third one. The economic experts today

in Berlin backed Merkel’s position, arguing that a third package would be too costly at the moment.

“We should wait for the first two packages to take effect before we start proposing new measures,” Carstensen said.

Because of the aid packages that include infrastructure investments and tax breaks, Germany’s federal deficit is expected to jump to 3.7 percent of GDP in 2009 and 5.5 percent in 2010.This is still fiscally conservative compared with the 13 percent deficit forecast for the United States this year, but the Germans are notorious for their uneasiness over amassing large amounts of debt.

Meanwhile, the experts said Berlin should concentrate its efforts on repairing the root of the crisis -- bad banks.

They said the German government should provide embattled financial institutions with cash to avoid a second, potentially catastrophic credit crunch when more and more midsize companies file for bankruptcy.

“Berlin may then have to force banks to accept state aid or even nationalize some banks in order to contain the worst damages,”Carstensen said.

– UPI

WORLD

update

in 60 seconds US BANK REIMBURSES DAME KIRI Wellington (dpa) – New Zealand opera diva Dame Kiri Te Kanawa, 65, suffered the theft of more than 650,000 US dollars by a bank manager who handled her retirement account in California, news reports said Friday.

The manager, Sokvoeun “Cindy” Sou, 27, admitted embezzlement and five fraud charges when she appeared in court Thursday, police detective Greg Ella, of Alameda, in San Francisco Bay, told Radio New Zealand.

He said that Sou was remanded in custody until a bail hearing before being sentenced.

Ella said that Sou was arrested Tuesday at the Bank of Alameda, where she worked as a manager and confessed to making five withdrawals from Dame Kiri’s account between May 2008 and this month, saying that she had financial difficulties.

He said the bank had reimbursed Dame Kiri, who lives most of the time in England and still sings at occasional concerts, though she officially retired from her opera career four years ago.

MURDERER NAILS VICTIM Sydney (dpa) – Australian police are investigating the slaying of Sydney man Chen Liu, who was killed by 27 nails fired into his head with a high-powered nail gun normally used on construction sites.

“Similar types of nail guns can fire nails up to 85 millimetres long,” homicide squad detective Inspector Mark Newham said Friday.

Liu’s decomposed body was found by schoolboys in marshland in October in Sydney, but police have only just released an X-ray showing the nails embedded in the 27-year-old’s head.

FIJI GIVES AWARD FOR DICTATION Wellington (dpa) – Fiji’s military strongman Voreqe Bainimarama, who took control in a coup 29 months ago, was given one of the Pacific island nation’s highest awards on Friday for service to humanity, according to reports from the capital Suva.

Bainimarama was honoured by President Ratu Josefa Iloilo, who reappointed him as prime minister two weeks ago, after sacking judges of the Court of Appeal who had declared the post-coup government illegal.

In a ceremony at Government House, Bainimarama was made a Companion of the Order of Fiji for his “eminent achievement and merit of highest degree and service to Fiji and to humanity at large,” the Fijilive website reported.

When he sacked the judges, Iloilo revoked Fiji’s constitution and decreed that elections to restore democracy would not be held before September 2014.

Spain OK’s pre-embryonic screening MADRID, April 24 (UPI) – Spanish health officials have cleared the way for human embryos to be screened for cancer-causing genes before implantation.

The authorization of pre-embryonic cancer screening followed the decision by health officials this week to allow two women to undergo the screening, El Pais reported today.

Spain’s Health Secretary Jose Martinez Olmos said it was a historic day for the country’s health sector. The Catholic Church has condemned pre-embryonic screening for some genetic diseases.

TOURIST FLEECES SHOP Wellington (dpa) – New Zealand police chased a tour bus for 160 kilometres before arresting a 75year-old Taiwanese woman who walked out of a gift shop wearing a fleece jacket without paying for it, a newspaper reported Friday.

The woman made her getaway from the shop at the South Island lakeside resort Te Anau, and police called by the owner could not stop the bus until it neared Queenstown, the Southland Times reported.

Police said the woman had been released without a conviction providing she did not re-offend.

24 April 2009

Obama promises radical climate policy Syracuse, Italy – Top United States environment officials today reassured Group of Eight (G8) governments that US President Barack Obama would push for a “meaningful” global response to climate change.

“The US government now fully acknowledges the urgency and complexity of climate change challenges, and we know full well that a meaningful US response to this challenge is absolutely essential,” Lisa Jackson, head of the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), said after talks in Syracuse, Italy, with G8 environment ministers.

Jackson’s “message of hope” and “common purpose for the environment,”delivered to G8 delegates on behalf of Obama, marked a radical departure from the stance of former president George W Bush, who had refused to ratify the Kyoto Protocol on emission cuts on the grounds that it would endanger American jobs.

The current administration insists that the protection of the environment can actually help economic recovery.

“I am hopeful, and the president is hopeful, that we are on the verge of entering a clean energy economy that will supply the US economy and economies around the world with new jobs and a new future,”said Jackson, whose elderly mother lost her home in New Orleans to Hurricane Katrina four years ago.

The EPA chief also cautioned business lobbyists against using “horror stories”to “pull us back.”

“I believe the president shares a sense of urgency with those who would say that the time is now,”she said.

The US Congress is currently debating a Democratic-led bill that seeks to cut the country’s carbon emissions by 20 per cent from their 2005 levels by 2020.The Obama administration is also pushing for the introduction of a carbon trading system similar to the one already in place in Europe.

Jackson was taking part in this year’s first G8 environment meeting, one of a series of high-level talks leading up to end-of-year United Nations negotiations in Copenhagen, where world leaders will seek to approve a successor to the Kyoto Protocol.

During the meeting in Sicily, Jackson’s European colleagues repeatedly urged the US to show leadership and spell out its plans for cutting greenhouse gas emission.

Danish Climate and Energy Minister Connie Hedegaard, who will chair the talks in Copenha-

gen, said such a move would encourage other big polluters like China to follow suit.

“The sooner the US can specify, and be concrete in its position, the sooner we can expect some signals coming out of Beijing,” Hedegaard told German news agency dpa.

Jackson, however, declined to say when the US would spell out its position for the Copenhagen meeting.

Sweden’s Andreas Carlgren, who will hold the European Union presidency during the second half of this year, had earlier reinforced Denmark’s message, telling journalists“we are still waiting for other big developed countries to deliver ambitious emission targets.”

European Union governments have already agreed to cut their emissions by 20 per cent below 1990 levels by 2020. And the 27-member bloc is ready to increase the cuts to 30 per cent if other economic powerhouses do the same.

The talks in Syracuse were also attended by officials from big developing countries such as China, India and Brazil. Many of these have said they will not commit themselves to emission targets until the US does so.

The US Congress is currently debating a Democraticled bill that seeks to cut the country’s carbon emissions by 20 per cent from their 2005 levels by 2020 In Sicily, ministers spent the day discussing climate change and ways to preserve the planet’s biodiversity.A“Syracuse Charter”designed to slow the rate of extinction of species was expected to be adopted by the time the talks were over tonight.

As ministers met, hundreds of left-wing protesters held a peaceful protest march on the streets of Syracuse, prompting the police to close access to the meeting’s venue at the seafront medieval Castello Maniace.

– DPA

Zuma zooms into presidency Johannesburg – Champagne flowed on the streets of Johannesburg this morning as South Africa’s ruling African National Congress (ANC) celebrated its expected victory in Thursday’s general elections with a huge street party, even as votes were still being counted.

ANC leader Jacob Zuma, clad in a black-and-yellow ANC leather jacket, was in a festive mood as he took to a stage outside party headquarters to entertain his supporters with some dancing and a few verses from his trademark revolutionary song,Awulethu Umshini Wami (bring me my machine gun).

“The people have spoken with their vote,” the 67-year-old likely next president of South Africa told a cheering crowd of about 4,000 supporters in Zulu, as results trickling in showed the party was poised for a decisive win in the country’s fourth multi-racial polls.

“We’re not yet celebrating victory,”he said, despite the top brass popping two magnums of champagne on either side of him and spraying the crowd.

With 10.8 million votes counted by Thursday night, a little over half of the estimated votes cast, the ANC was polling 66.9 per cent, well ahead of the Democratic Alliance of Cape Town mayor Helen Zille, which had 16 per cent, the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) announced.

A new party of ANC dissidents,the Congress of the People (COPE), was stuck at just under 8 per cent.

More than 23 million people, a little under half the population of 48 million, had registered to elect members to the 400-seat National Assembly and nine provincial legislatures. No figure for overall turnout was available, but the IEC predicted about 20 million voters had made their mark.

Final results were not expected until tomorrow morning.

While ANC spokeswoman Jessie Duarte talked of a landslide, the party was poised for a dip compared to its 2004 score of 70 per cent under ex-president Thabo Mbeki and a possible erosion of its more-than-two-thirds majority.

“This (65-66 per cent so far) is a landslide, whatever way you look at it,”Duarte insisted.

Zille, whose liberal Democratic Alliance has tried to shed the image of being the party of the white and mixed-race minority, was also in a jubilant mood as the Democratic Alliance looked set to improve on its 2004 performance of 12 per cent and take control of Western Cape province, where Cape Town is located.

Zille said the partial results were a vindication of the party’s controversial“Stop Zuma”campaign.

Zille had been urging voters to erode the ANC’s majority, saying she feared Zuma might use it to stifle dissent.

Those fears were sparked partly by the state’s decision to abruptly drop its eight-year corruption case against Zuma on the eve of his becoming president.

“There was nothing negative about that (the“Stop Zuma”campaign). Zuma is negative,” Zille told the German news agency dpa today.

Meanwhile, COPE, which was poised to become the official opposition in four of nine provinces, was already acknowledging strategic errors.

The party had focused too much on corruption within the ANC and too little on bread-and-butter issues, such as the shortage of low- cost housing and other basic services, Palesa Morudu, a COPE spokeswoman told dpa.

As the first opposition party of anti-apartheid stalwarts to take on the ANC, COPE’s presence made this the most hotly-contested election since the ANC came to power under the iconic Nelson Mandela in 1994.

– DPA

WORLD

24 April 2009

Malaria becoming resistant to drugs Manila – The World Health Organization (WHO) vowed on Friday to intensify the fight against malaria in Asia and the Pacific amid growing signs of the disease developing greater resistance to commonly used drugs.

The Manila-based WHO Western Pacific Office expressed concern over the situation in theThai-Cambodian border where a strain of malaria that is increasingly resistant to artemisinin, the most effective drug available to fight the disease, has proliferated.

“Time is of the essence here.We have to act now to contain this problem within the Mekong region. It must not be allowed to spread and become a regional and international threat,”said ShinYoung-Soo,WHO regional director for the Western Pacific.

“Measures such as early malaria diagnosis, effective treatment and high quality surveillance need to be maintained and funding sustained,”Shin added.

“New tools will need to be developed if malaria elimination is to be achieved through the region.”

WHO also expressed concern over the rampant use of low-quality and counterfeit drugs in some

countries in the Mekong region and the improper use of medicines such as antibiotics and antimalarials, including arteminisin.

WHO said it is closely working with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and other donor agencies to contain the drug-resistant malaria in the Mekong region.

The initiative is part of a global anti-malaria programme called “Counting Malaria Out” which will kick off Saturday with the aim of achieving near-zero deaths from the mosquito-borne disease by 2015.

Among the malaria-endemic countries in Asia and the Pacific are Cambodia, China, South Korea, Malaysia, Laos, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, the Solomon Islands,Vanuatu and Vietnam.

WHO said that every year, there are 250 million cases of malaria infections around the world, causing nearly one million deaths. In the Western Pacific region, more than 300,000 malaria cases were confirmed in 2007, with 939 deaths.

– DPA

G7 see breathing space emerging Washington – Less than one month after London’s G20 summit aimed to pull the world out of recession,the world’s top finance ministers descended on the US capital Friday to review their success.

The United States and other countries are pointing to some signs that the global downturn may be slowing, even as the International Monetary Fund on Wednesday forecast a 1.3-per-cent contraction of the world economy in 2009, the one-year performance since World War II. US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner was hosting ministers and central bank heads from the world’s 20 leading economies tomorrow NZ-time.

He will hold a separate meeting with ministers from the seven wealthiest nations, known as the G7, whose financial sectors share most of the blame for starting

the global downturn. rity to become the top venue for The flurry of talks comes ahead governments to coordinate efforts of a broader gathering this weekto revive their economies. end in Washington of the InternaThe G7, by contrast, has lost tional Monetary Fund and World some of its past significance as Bank’s 185 members. emerging powers like China and Finance ministers are billing the India are helping to keep the meetings as a chance to take stock world’s economy running with of the world’s progress – or contintheir cooling but continued expanued descent – since G20 leaders met sion. on April 2 in London, where they Top of the G7’s agenda is an agreed on a massive boost to the unfinished effort to stabilize the Timothy Geithner resources of international financial financial sector. Most of the atteninstitutions. tion is still on the United States, With the crisis spreading to all corners of the globe, which has yet to get a strong grip on a housing the G20 has risen over the last six months from obscu- downturn that has threatened the world’s finan-

FROM FRONT PAGE

At a conference in Tokyo last Friday, a dozen nations pledged $5 billion in aid to Pakistan.At the same time, a prominent radical leader in Islamabad made a loud public call demanding imposition of Islamic Law nationwide.Which, I wonder, had the greatest impact inside Pakistan?

Pakistan’s oligarchy is beginning to realize it cannot rely on the military for protection; the generals now know that they cannot assume all of their men are on their side.

Soon, as the situation deteriorates, we could begin to see wealthy political and business leaders pack up and move out of the country.The Pentagon may have to pull up its contingency plans for safeguarding Pakistan’s nuclear weapons.

Get ready.

knew) that Inter-Services Intelligence agency officers are actually aiding the militants.

Meantime, Zardari provided a powerful symbol of his government’s impotence. Earlier this month, a cell-phone video showed a Taliban enforcer flogging a 17-year-old girl lying face down in the dirt. Her crime: refusing a marriage proposal.The video made its way onto the Web and spawned outrage across the nation and the world; Pakistan’s Supreme Court opened an investigation.

Well, amid all of this, Zardari signed an order last week codifying the Taliban’s right to extend Islamic law across the Swat valley.A Taliban spokesman said that if the order had been signed earlier, the Taliban would not have merely whipped that unfortunate girl.They would have shot her.

Haven’t we seen this play before – in Cuba, Cambodia, Nicaragua? In all three states, richly corrupt governments that were ill-serving the people still received unqualified support from Washington.

American patronage of corrupt leaders fed enthusiasm for Fidel Castro’s guerrilla army in Cuba, the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia and the Sandinista rebels in Nicaragua.

Certainly each of these previous revolutions had its own unique dynamics, but in each case,Washington and the threatened foreign leaders remained in denial until it was too late.

This time,Washington is waking up. But there’s not much the U.S. can do. As Weinbaum put it,“if we put our hands on it, it’s not helpful.”He also told me that he used to discount the doomsayers who prophesied Pakistan’s downfall.

“This is not Afghanistan,”he would say.

“Pakistan has institutions and people advantaged by them who won’t let Pakistan fall apart.”

But he has changed his mind.“It’s a feudal conflict now, class warfare.We weren’t thinking of it in the terms that we are today.”

Joel Brinkley is a former Pulitzer Prize-winning foreign correspondent for The New York Times and now a professor of journalism at Stanford University.

Back to the front page

FROM FRONT PAGE

The unusually bleak warning came as militants expanded into territory adjacent to the Swat Valley and as Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, arrived in Pakistan for meetings following a visit earlier this month with U.S. envoy Richard Holbrooke.

Clinton’s comments underscored increasing U.S. alarm at how the militants’strength has grown even as the Obama administration has begun trying to implement a strategy for stabilizing the country.

U.S. officials have grown increasingly critical about the deal giving control in Swat to militants, who intend to impose Islamic sharia law.

U.S. officials are concerned as well about other developments, including a recent decision by Pakistani’s supreme court to release Maulana Abdul Aziz, an anti-American cleric accused of having Back to the front page ties to terrorists.

cial powerhouses.

Geithner will brief on Washington’s latest efforts to stabilize US financial firms, an administration official said, including the so- called “stress tests” being carried out on a series of top banks to evaluate just how solid their finances really are.

IMF Managing Director Dominique StraussKahn warned today that efforts to remove the toxic mortgage assets at the centre of the US crisis are still“far from what we need.”

The IMF itself is hoping the gathering will secure more pledges from countries for its own lending efforts.The G20 promised to triple the IMF’s lending resources to 750 billion dollars.About two thirds of the money has been committed so far.

– DPA

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SPORT

24 April 2009

Warriors looking to throw first punch

By Robert Lowe of NZPA

Auckland, April 24 – The New Zealand Warriors want to “throw the first punch”against Melbourne tomorrow night as they look to turn around their slow starts in the National Rugby League.

Utility Lance Hohaia said the Warriors had talked about the need to hit the ground running away to the Storm at Olympic Park.

“We spoke about being a bit more pro-active in the way we start our matches and not waiting to see what other sides do – throwing the first punch, you could say,”he said.

“It’s hard if you let any team be two or three tries ahead at halftime.”

The Warriors have fallen behind early in four of the six rounds so far.

In two of those matches,they have managed to complete notable late comebacks – against Manly in round two and against the Sydney Roosters last weekend.

The 17-16 home victory over the Roosters featured a particularly remarkable turnaround, with the Warriors down 16-0 at halftime before winning in extra time.

Hohaia said it was difficult to say why the Warriors had let others sides get the jump on them.

One reason could be the injury toll, which hadn’t allowed for settled team selections.

Against the Roosters, Hohaia was himself returning from a spell on the sidelines to replace injured fullback Wade McKinnon.

He turned in a busy performance, making 23 runs, gaining 179m and playing a crucial hand at the death.

It was a break from near his own goalline that gave the Warriors the field position from which veteran halfback Stacey Jones slotted the goldenpoint field goal.

The Warriors have happy memories about Olympic Park, their last trip there having turned out to be an historic one.

Their dramatic 18-15 victory over Melbourne last September marked the first time since the present

Warriors Captain Steve Price is tackled by Roosters Mark O’Meley during the NRL rugby league match, Mount Smart Stadium, Auckland. NZPA / David Rowland

playoff format was adopted that the bottom-ranked qualifiers had beaten the minor premiers.

Hohaia said the events of that afternoon hadn’t really been brought up in preparations this week.

Both the Melbourne and the Warriors, who sit seventh and eighth on the table,had made changes to their roster since then and it was also a new competition.

“So it’s hard to go back an re-live those sorts of things,”he said.

“But we can take confidence out of having played well there.”

Silver Ferns eye former Tall Fern

By Cathy Walshe of NZPA

Wellington, April 24 – A deteriorating Achilles injury to Tall Ferns basketballer Jess McCormack has turned into a bonus for New Zealand netball.

The multi-talented 19year-old, who played for the Tall Ferns at last year’s Beijing Olympics, returned home to Auckland earlier this year after spending two years in the United States playing college basketball.

A former national secondary schools netball representative, McCormack was today named as an addition to Netball New Zealand’s accelerant squad, the high performance backup group to the Silver Ferns.

Players selected in the accelerant group, overseen

by Silver Ferns coach Ruth Aitken,are considered by the national selectors as having the potential to be included in the Silver Ferns programme by 2011.

However, McCormack said today her main focus at the moment was on recovering from a recent Achilles tendon operation.

“I had surgery on it nearly two months ago and at the moment I’m just rehabbing that, trying to get it into playing form,”she told NZPA. McCormack said the problem, an ongoing and progressively worsening injury from basketball, had been“looked at and cleaned out”.

After two weeks in plaster, and four weeks in a moon boot, she was enjoying the chance to get moving again.

“Right now I’m making sure it’s lengthening out, not getting stuck, doing pool work and what not.

“It’s a little while away until I can start running, a few months at least,”she said.“I’m just taking it day by day and giving it a lot of time – I don’t want to rush back into things.”

McCormack has racked up 45 caps playing for the Tall Ferns, since she became the youngest player ever selected to the team at age 15 in 2005.

As well as playing at the Beijing Olympics,she was also part of the New Zealand team which won silver at the 2006 Melbourne Commonwealth Games.

For the past two years, her focus has been solely on basketball and education, with stints at the University of Washington and the University of Connecticut slotting in nicely with studies for a journalism degree.

But now, McCormack said, she was looking forward immersing herself in netball again.

“I wanted to come back to New Zealand – I wanted to finish my education here, and get that sorted,”McCormack said.

“It’s nice being home with the family, and netball just sort of came back into the picture. It wasn’t my main thought coming back here, it wasn’t really part of that decision, but it’s just kind of come back.”

Forced into inactivity after the surgery, the 1.94m former goal keep has been enjoying watching the trans-Tasman netball league unfold on television.

“I’ve been watching a lot of the ANZ Championship, trying to get back into netball mode. It’s definitely a goal to get back into form for that, but I’m not putting any time constraints on myself.”

Nor is she committing herself to any specific position.

“I was goal keep before, but until I get back on the court I’m kind of leaving it open, just see where I fit in once I start playing again. I don’t really want to specify just yet.”

Hohaia was again named at fullback for McKinnon when the 17 to face Melbourne were announced on Tuesday.

However, McKinnon travelled to Australia with the squad yesterday, although coach Ivan Cleary said it was unlikely he would be a late call-up against the Storm.

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While Cleary was dampening down McKinnon’s prospects, he was expecting Melbourne to make a late change to their published line-up by fielding new-signing Brett Finch.

“I think he’s probably a good chance,”he said of the former Parramatta half.

“They’ve bought him and they haven’t bought him to sit and watch. I guess it’s going to be pretty soon, and it wouldn’t surprise me if he plays.”

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13

TV & Film

My name, is Michael Caine

By Joseph V. Amodio Newsday

NEW YORK – When Maurice Micklewhite, an aspiring

The Soloist

0Cast Robert Downey Jr., Jamie Foxx 0Director: Joe Wright 0Length:109 minutes 0Rated: PG-13 for thematic elements, some drug use and language

By Colin Covert Star Tribune (Minneapolis)

The Soloist is pitch-perfect, a sensitive rendering of challenging social and emotional themes.What could have been a maudlin exercise in sentimentality – the unlikely relationship between a homeless street musician and a Los Angeles Times metro columnist – becomes a soul-stirring tribute to the power of music and the importance of friendship.

Steve Lopez (Robert Downey, Jr.) first sees Nathaniel Ayers (Jamie Foxx) dressed in rags, patiently coaxing Beethoven out of a beat-up violin that looks like it was pulled from a garbage bin. He sees a human interest story about beautiful music competing with the din of L.A.’s busy streets. Eight hundred words and on to the next one. His instincts are solid:The story draws a big reader response. But as he delves into the curbside musician’s past, Lopez begins to see Nathaniel in full.

He learns that his acquaintance was a brilliant Juilliard-trained cellist who suffered a mental breakdown partway through his studies. He refuses medication and therapy, finding comfort in music alone.

Lopez begins to see Nathaniel as an individual, not

a column topic, and begins a relationship with the damaged man that alters both their lives.

Once subjects become people, things get tricky.

The writer begins to question his motives.Will drawing attention to Nathaniel help him get better? Is he exploiting him? Will his articles about life on Skid Row bring more city services to L.A.’s 90,000 homeless derelicts? Can he connect Nathaniel to the classical music world in L.A.? Does he, a career-driven professional, have the commitment to maintain a relationship with an erratic vagrant?

The Soloist is a superbly crafted film.Director Joe Wright (Pride and Prejudice, Atonement), working from a sensitive script by Susannah Grant (Erin Brockovich),deals in honest sentiment,not emotional manipulation.In an inspired sequence,the film shows us what music means to Nathaniel with a vibrant abstract light show scored to Beethoven.The voices in Nathaniel’s head rise to a din when he’s agitated, and we hear Lopez’s internal monologues as he works out his stories.Without hammering us,the film reveals how alike these very different men are.

The film sees serious mental illness in all its complex reality. It’s not a germ that goes away with a dose of therapy or drugs.This is a story of redemption shot through with setbacks and disappointments.Time and again, Lopez’s efforts are dashed.

Moving Nathaniel into an apartment should be a straightforward process, but he lashes out in a violent meltdown.Then he remorsefully apologizes to Lopez, who he calls his “God.” The film is wise enough to recognize that there are two soloists in this story. In his middle-class

The film sees serious mental illness in all its complex reality. It’s not a germ that goes away with a dose of therapy or drugs way, Lopez is as cut off as Nathaniel. He’s a workaholic, divorced, with no friends outside the office. He doesn’t know his next-door neighbour’s name. He has resigned from the messy business of humanity, except in the vicarious world of his writing.When this loner sees his reflection in an isolated street musician, the two men become a tentative duo.

There are subtle reminders throughout that anyone could wind up on the street, through downsizing, a brain-jarring tumble off a bike or natural disaster.

Foxx and Downey are breathtakingly good.

Downey gives Lopez a rueful intelligence and the sort of abstract social conscience that doesn’t extend to sticking his neck out for strangers.When he recognizes the challenge that Nathaniel represents and accepts it, it is a moment of honestly earned uplift.

Foxx is in his own world as Nathaniel, sad, frightening and inspirational by turns. He evolves from a curiosity to a human being, puzzling to outsiders but fully worthy of love.

Like all of us.

Watch the trailer

actor from South London, chose a stage name, he came up with Michael, then ... Caine, after glancing at a movie marquee for The Caine Mutiny. Still, he never relinquished Maurice – it remains his legal name, and it’s what friends and family call him.

Caine, 76, is one of film’s busiest actors, appearing in 100-plus movies (hits like Alfie, Educating Rita, Batman Begins, The Dark Knight – plus Hannah and Her Sisters and The Cider House Rules, for which he won Academy Awards for best supporting actor). There’ve been clunkers (Jaws: The Revenge), he admits, but they gave him the financial independence to do smaller, important films (like 2002’s The Quiet American) – and to buy homes for himself and relatives.

Is Anybody There? stars Bill Milner as a lonely 11-yearold whose parents run a nursing home, and Caine, as a cantankerous retired magician forced to live there. Joseph V. Amodio sat down recently with Caine – aka Sir Maurice Micklewhite (he was knighted in 2000) – to discuss war, romance and walking five k’s a day.

Q. Have you always walked a lot?

A. I started in the army (in Korea). You walk three or four miles a day with a pack on your back. So it’s easy to walk without it.

Q. My dad fought in Korea.

A. Korea is the most terrifying thing I’ve ever done. It defined me as a person for the rest of my life. Because I thought I was going to die – and I didn’t – and I faced up to it. Young men often wonder, will I be a coward in a terrible situation? Well, I got in a terrible situation, and I wasn’t. I wasn’t brave. (He laughs again.) I (blanked) me’self, but at least I didn’t run away.

Q. This film deals with mortality, too. Were you eager to delve into that?

A. I was. There were other things, not the least of which, my best friend was dying of Alzheimer’s, and did so during the film. But that wasn’t the only reason. To me, it was a chance to do something I found very difficult – to push myself further than ever. Other actors could do it better. But it’s the best I’ve ever been ... in my opinion.

Q. Did you give your young colleague any advice?

A. Nooo. This boy is extraordinary. We became friends on a sort of equal basis. It was like working with Sean Connery.

He’s one of the most natural child actors I’ve ever seen.

Q. How did you meet your wife, Shakira?

A. I saw her in a coffee commercial. Tracked her down through the ad agency. But she wouldn’t go out with me for weeks. I had a very bad reputation in those days, sorta Alfieish. And all her girlfriends told her not to go out with me.

Q. So how did you win her over?

A. I don’t know. I just kept ringing ... and ringing ... and ringing. I think she got fed up. (He smiles.) She said, “All right, but we go in my car, not yours.” She drove, so there wouldn’t be any trouble. But there was. (Big laugh.) Later.

Q. An actor – married 36 years. What’s your secret?

A. Two bathrooms. (Smiling again.) I mean, it’s a minor thing, but I always say it’s the first thing you need. But also ... you must be equal partners. I’m not this big film star with the little woman. She’s my guide, my mentor. She’s always there for me, always. And I’m there for her. You just ... reach a stage of intimacy where I’ll order a drink and she’ll start drinking it, without thinking or anything. We’re so intertwined. And, of course, I’m very family-oriented. So is my wife. She’s Indian – Kashmiri, and they’re extremely family-oriented, more so than the English.

REVIEWS

14

24 April 2009

Music

Susansational!

Has a Brit knocked American Idol off its pedestal?

By Amy S. Rosenberg The Philadelphia Inquirer

Does Simon even love us anymore? Look at his face as he watches Susan Boyle, the dowdy never-beenkissed global singing sensation, on stage in Britain’s Got Talent(about 80 million have already).

No smirk. No sneer. No boredom. He believes. He is nearly transcendent. He is not wondering why he is sitting there. He is not doing anyone a favour.

He likes“Les Miz.” Whereas we in the US, American Idol nation, are like cynics in the headlights, caught mid-snark, yukking it up over the blind guy, voting for the worst, clucking over our tattoo Barbie Megan Joy, choosing from a pool of people who seemed to have already formed their backstory on YouTube.

We were still living for Simon Cowell’s next witty takedown, the next Idol train wreck (tejano disco, anyone?), while over in Britain, nurtured in the proverbial small and remote, what’s the word – oh yes, dear Susan,“village”– a lonely but chipper, dowdy but defiant, ordinary but extraordinary 47- (“and that’s just one side of me”) year-old-woman, Boyle, was changing all the rules, rewriting the fairy tale.

Could it be that American Idol, for years the zeitgeisty show of the moment, has fallen out of step, left behind like a haughty stepsister (and registering on Tuesday night its lowest ratings since 2002)? Since when did looks cease to matter? Since when did we value innocence over experience? Success over train wreck? Were we really supposed to be having a singing competition all along?

A devotee known as“Artistboynyc,”the 191,975th commenter on one version of the video, that one

viewed 39 million times, wrote yesterday:“I don’t care what anyone else thinks, I’ve been listening to this every day since first heard of it. It gives me chills – such joy on her behalf.”

Susan Boyle backlash, where are you already?

(The makeover has apparently begun, with the Daily Mail reporting Boyle’s upgrade from matronly to patterned dress, leather-look jacket and high heels, headlined:“And you said you wouldn’t change, Susan Boyle!)

And already, the public hype had moved on to “the next Susan Boyle”on Britain’s Got Talent – 12year-old Shaheen Jafargholi, a little Stevie Wonder type, with a meagre two million-plus views. Paging Adam Lambert.

Boyle is “either campy or an extraordinary sign of hope in our times,”said Henry Jenkins, director of the Comparative Media Studies Program at MIT, who is writing about Boyle both as a global“spreadable media” phenomenon that has raced ahead of broadcast television’s outdated protectionist policies and as an example of differing“genre expectations”between Idol and “Britain’s Got Talent.”

“American Idol this season has seemed conservative,”he said.“They look like pop stars already. Idol has just become a star factory. Susan Boyle wouldn’t qualify because of her age.And if she did, they’d play it for laughs for a couple of weeks and cut her out.”

Jason Mittell,associate professor of American Studies and Film & Media Culture at Middlebury College, isn’t buying the moment as a genuine shock to the judges.But he knows the global public is.Indeed,Simon looks like a Simon transformed,glimpsed in his home country, no longer the cynical outsider, hands-overcheeks adulation over a true undiscovered talent.

“Do you want my cynical take on the whole thing?” Mittell asks.“The Susan Boyle thing was a setup narrative, 100 percent consistent with how these shows are produced. Everybody has fallen for it. I am unmoved.”

Mittell points out that to be truly surprised by her singing, you have to first buy into the idea that Boyle’s unstyled appearance somehow is a predictor of her singing ability, which is ridiculous.

But the clip has obviously struck a (very vibrato kind of) chord, pointing up as it does its American counterpart’s obsession with star packaging, youth (“Idol” won’t even consider anyone over 28), and all the superficial elements the public supposedly requires to anoint a “Pop Idol,”as the British version is called.

Television critics are calling for a return to the simple pleasures of the undiscovered gems in the rough of the earlier Clay Aiken era. Feminists are charmed.

Priests are seeing God’s work. As for age, Barack Obama already made 47 sexy and powerful;now Susan Boyle is standing up for the unlucky-at-love set.

“It plays into a narrative that seems authentic,” says Mittell.“The idea that she is just a real person, following her dreams. There’s a sense of discovery of something authentic. It tweaks that pleasure. It plays especially well in the U.S. because our frame for the genre is ‘American Idol.’‘American Idol’ is about young people who look the part, act the way in which we expect a pop star to act.”

Nonetheless, American Idol, with its 20-something-million viewers, is still outpacing its closest rival by 12 million viewers. Representatives for the show did not want to publicly compare“Idol”with the Susan Boyle phenomenon, though they were

quick to defend the show’s rags-to-riches, out-ofthe-woodwork bona fides.

Still, AI judge Randy Jackson seemed cognizant of the shifting paradigm of reality talent shows this week when he told KrisAllen – (after a typically bizarre Paula Abdul comment about his choice of a Donna Summer song being like shopping in the women’s section) –“We’re looking for the best undiscovered talent.”

Thanks for reminding us, Randy.

And newly sentimental Simon seemed saddened

by Lil Rounds’sadness, and no longer dismissed her as“Little”when her name is Lillian.

Jenkins, of MIT, says translating the Susan Boyle formula to“American Idol”is not that simple – and let’s face it, it’s still the most popular show on television, even if we’re stuck on snark.

He says Boyle plays right into a British myth of the working class hero bursting into stardom, territory well worn by “The Full Monty,”the calendar girls and“Billy Elliott,”among others.

“USA Today said (the Boyle clip) looked like a Disney movie waiting to happen, but it doesn’t. It looks like a British movie waiting to happen.”

Mittell sees this summer’s America’s Got Talent as the show to be most affected by the Boyle story.

“If I were in the production suite for America’s Got Talent, at this point, I’m scouring churches looking for singers. I’m scouring community theatre. I’m scouring the small-town world where there may be an equivalent to Susan Boyle. She will have to transcend region and race; the narrative of black inner-city church mother will not play the same way, nor will the Nebraska housewife.”

Susan Boyle Shaheen Jafarghol

15

24 April 2009

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15/12/08 5:41:56 PM

SCIENCE & TECH 16

24 April 2009

Brace yourself for Seven Washington (dpa) – Windows 7 is coming to a PC near you – and faster than previously thought.

Rumours are flying that Microsoft is putting the finishing touches on Windows 7, the successor to Windows Vista. The “release candidate”of the new operating system is expected in early May, and those eager to test out the new operating system will likely be able to download this all-but-final version by early July.

The well-publicised features of Windows 7 are that it’s faster, less resource intensive, and more compatible than Windows Vista. But a look at a recent build of the operating system reveals that there’s a lot more to look forward to than those headline features. Here’s a look at some of the less publicised features that are likely to make a good impression.

Driver heaven If you’re installing Windows 7 from scratch, you’re in for a treat. Unlike virtually every other version of Windows,Windows 7 has an uncanny ability to recognise and find drivers for most many – if not all – of the components of your computer. Graphics cards, printers, scanners, chipsets, sound cards, and wireless cards – many current models are recognized during the course of the installation. That means you can probably say good-bye to what used to be the inevitable hunt for driver disks required to get all of your PC’s parts working together.

Aero Peek An enduring complaint of Windows users has been that the contents of the Windows desktop are soon obscured – either by a single maximised application or a multitude of open windows.The Windows Key+D keyboard shortcut addressed this by allowing users to quickly minimise all running applications to see the desktop again. Pressing Windows Key+D again restored all applications. But the problem was that Windows+D sometimes changes the active window.

Aero Peek is Windows 7’s answer to this dilemma.

A narrow horizontal bar at the far end of the Windows task bar,Aero Peek displays the contents of the Windows desktop whenever you move your mouse cursor over the Aero Peek bar. Mouse the mouse cur-

Configurable annoyances Aside from slowing down your computer, there was one major reason to hate Windows Vista: its user account control (UAC) feature annoyed you at every turn. Confirmation dialog boxes popped up whenever you wanted to install a program, install a device driver, configure aspects of the operating system, run the task scheduler, or perform dozens of other tasks that previously went without a hitch.

Windows 7 does not do away with user account control, but it does give you more control over UAC, reduce the number of UAC dialog boxes, and make the dialog boxes themselves more intelligible.That’s a step forward.

sor away, and the contents of your desktop reappear just as they were. Clearly Aero Peek will be most useful to those who have one or more gadgets fixed to their Windows desktops.To actually click anything on the desktop, you will still need to minimise one or more applications.

Taskbar previews If you have five browser windows open and minimised, what’s the best way to find out which one you’d like to call up again? Previously, the best solution was to Alt-Tab your way through all of those windows. Unfortunately, alt-tabbing still left you guessing, as you had only small icons and part of the text that appeared in title bars to assist you in finding the instance you wanted.Windows 7 adds a nifty taskbar preview feature that will put an end to the guessing. With taskbar preview, if you have five browser windows open and minimised, all of those browsers will be condensed onto one icon on the taskbar, and when you mouse your mouse to that icon, you’ll see a long vertical strip containing very legible previews of the contents of all five browser windows. Move to the one you want, click, and you’re done.

Antivirus Windows 7 is going to allow you to do away with a range of programs that you previously had to purchase separately, and antivirus is just the first – but probably the most significant – of these.

Microsoft’s first foray into the antivirus arena came with Windows Live OneCare, a capable antivirus utility that was remarkable for its unobtrusiveness and its small footprint.Windows 7, however, will not support OneCare, and the reason is code-named Morro, Microsoft’s new comprehensive anti-malware software.

Still under development, Morro will do what most people look for in antivirus programs – protect your computer against spyware, viruses, and Trojans – and it will do it for no charge. When Microsoft first announced Morro, the stock prices of antivirus makers Symantec and McAfee took a dive.

But Microsoft claims that Morro is not designed to replace the more comprehensive security suites offered by these companies.

Still, Morro will be free, and it will be delivered with the shipping version of Windows 7. It’s probably safe to assume that it will offer protection that’s good enough for the masses.

Integrated imaging Windows 7 will be the first version of Windows to include not just system backup but full-fledged system imaging. Imaging differs from a backup in that a system image backs up everything on your PC – including hidden system and boot files – so that you can easily restore the contents of a failed hard drive or upgrade an existing system drive, without having to reinstall all of your applications.

This alone is a valuable feature that previously you would have needed a third-party utility to handle.

Along with the new system image feature comes a system repair disk utility.The system repair disk creates a bootable CD, DVD, or USB drive so that you can easily access your previously-created disk image without first having to install Windows.The system repair disk also provides easy access to other system repair features that can help you to restore an unresponsive system.

The final word Windows 7 is poised to be what Windows Vista promised: a slicker, more attractive interface combined with functionality that does not leave you pining for the faster, simpler way of Windows XP. When the release candidate version of Windows 7 appears, secure yourself a copy - and perhaps reserve a machine on which to run it. Windows 7 will probably be the version that finally weans you away from XP. – DPA

Typical lost laptop costs companies nearly $50,000

By Steve Johnson San Jose Mercury News

SAN JOSE, Calif. – A typical lost or stolen laptop costs employers $49,246, mostly due to the value of the missing intellectual property or other sensitive data, according to an Intel-commissioned study made public this week.

“It is the information age, and employees are carrying more information on their laptops than ever before,”according to an analysis done for Intel by the Michigan-based Ponemon Institute, which studies organizational data-management practices.

“With each lost laptop there is the risk that sensitive data about customers, employees and business operations will end up in the wrong hands.”

The five-month study examined 138 laptop-loss cases suffered over a recent 12-month period by 29 organizations, mostly businesses but also a few government agencies. It said laptops frequently are lost or stolen at airports, conferences and in taxis, rental cars and hotels.

About 80 percent of the typical cost – or a little more than $39,000 – was attributed to what the report called a data breach,which can involve everything from hardto-replace company information to data on individuals.

Companies then often incur major expenses to prevent others from misusing the data.

Lost intellectual property added nearly $5,000 more to the average cost.The rest of the estimated expense was associated with such things as investigative costs, lost productivity and physically replacing the laptop.

Larry Ponemon, the institute’s chairman and founder, said he came up with the cost figure based on his discussions with the employers who lost the laptops.When he later shared his findings with the companies and government agencies, he said, some of their executives expressed surprise at the size of the average loss. But he noted that one of the employers thought the amount could have been even higher.

Indeed, a study several years ago by the FBI and the Computer Security Institute placed the average cost of a company’s laptop at $89,000. FBI officials could not be reached Wednesday to discuss the Ponemon study.

The individual losses associated with stolen or otherwise missing laptops in the Ponemon study varied from $1,213 to $975,527.

“The faster the company learns that a laptop is lost, the lower the average cost,”the study said.“If a company discovers the loss in the same day, the average cost is $8,950. If it takes more than one week, the average cost rises significantly to approximately $115,849.”

Santa Clara, Calif.-based Intel, the world’s biggest maker of computer chips, had several reasons to do the study, said George Thangadurai, an Intel strategic planning director and general manager of its anti-theft program.

For one thing, Intel has recently introduced technology that companies can use to make notebooks harder to steal.That technology, among other capabilities, can help make a laptop inoperative when it is lost or stolen.

Thangadurai said Intel also wants to make laptops more secure so that businesses and individual consumers will be more inclined to use the devices, which depend on Intel’s chips for a variety of functions.

“The more people feel comfortable buying notebooks ... they win, we win and everybody wins,”he said.

John Girard, an analyst who studies mobile dataprotection products with the research organization

Gartner, agreed that there is a flourishing market for making laptops more secure.

“It is a growing industry,”he said.“There’s a sizable number of systems used in business that have no data protection at all.There’s quite a bit of opportunity to sell in this space.”

Although the Ponemon study didn’t endorse any particular brand of notebook protection gear, it noted that “encryption on average can reduce the cost of a lost laptop by more than $20,000.”