The Zapata Times 3/28/2015

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UNITED STATES CONGRESS

TEXAS SENATE

Zapatans recognized

In-state tuition law eyed

Rep. Cuellar honors Treviño family in D.C. SPECIAL TO THE TIMES

On Wednesday, Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Laredo, gave the following speech in an open session of Congress in Washington, D.C.: “Mister Speaker, I rise today to honor the Treviño family of Zapata, Texas. Six brothers — Teodoro, Antonio, Anselmo, Filiberto, Jr., Leopoldo, and Jose Manuel — proudly served the United States of America in World War II. Combined, the brothers served a total of fifteen and a half years, and by

the end of the war, each was honorably discharged.

“The Treviño brothers were born to the late Filiberto Treviño and Luisa Cuellar Treviño. During World War II, Teodoro, the eldest, served in the Medical Corps; Antonio served in the Coastal Artillery; Anselmo served in the Engineer Corps; Filiberto, Jr. served in the U.S. Army Air Corps; Leopoldo served in the Field Artillery; and Jose Manuel, the youngest of the brothers, served in the Infantry. Despite the distance between

them, the brothers were miraculously able to meet with one another over the course of their service; Antonio was fortunate enough to see each of his brothers.

“Despite the many hardships the brothers faced during their service, each was able to overcome whatever obstacles were presented. With support from their loved ones back home — as well as one another — the Treviño

See FAMILY PAGE 11A

Undocumented students at risk

By JULIÁN AGUILAR TEXAS TRIBUNE

CUELLAR

rected to automated phone lines and bland bureaucratic responses from the State Department.

"With all due respect," Forbes wrote a State Department official on Wednesday. "Your reply is an absolute abomination."

"Will the State Department kill or help this young man?" he asked.

The push to repeal a 2001 law that allows some undocumented students to pay instate tuition at public colleges and universities is returning to the legislative spotlight, but on an unusual stage.

On Monday, the border security subcommittee of the Senate’s Veteran Affairs and Military Installations Committee is scheduled to hear Senate Bill 1819, by state Sen. Donna Campbell, RNew Braunfels, which would do away with the in-state tuition provision.

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick’s decision to send the bill to the border security panel — instead of the education or state affairs committees — strikes some lawmakers as a signal that the deck is being stacked in its favor.

State Sen. José Rodríguez, D-El Paso, said treating tuition rates as a question of border security was also an affront to undocumented students pursuing college degrees.

“Referring in-state tuition repeal to border security is implying these students are threats to the country, when in fact they are trying to contribute to the country,” he said. “It is a disservice for this bill to be heard in border security.”

Monday’s hearing was scheduled on Wednesday, a week after a similar bill, SB 1429 by state Sen. Bob Hall, R-Edgewood, was referred to the Senate’s State Affairs Committee. But as of Thursday, Hall’s bill hadn’t been scheduled for a hearing. (Patrick’s office declined to shed light on why Campbell’s bill was referred to the subcommittee and immediately considered.)

But while the measure is likely to easily pass the Senate, it may meet more resistance in the House.

Current law — approved with near unanimous legis-

See VISA PAGE 11A

See TUITION PAGE 11A

STATE DEPARTMENT

DYING AND DENIED A VISA

Photo courtesy of El Imparcial | AP

In this May 2, 2014 photo, Jose Chua Lopez, left, holds hands with his mother, Myra Lopez Martinez, during a news conference in Hermosillo, Mexico. Family and friends raised thousands of dollars to send Jose Chua Lopez to the prestigious Mayo Clinic for an urgently needed heart and liver transplant, but he has been denied a U.S. visa.

20-year-old requires a procedure not available in Mexico

By JOSHUA PARTLOW THE WASHINGTON POST

MEXICO CITY — The case was urgent: doctors believed that without heart and liver transplants, Jose Chua Lopez, a sickly 20-year-old Mexican man born with a heart defect, might not survive.

The procedures weren’t available in Mexico, but the prestigious Mayo Clinic in Rochester,

Minn., had approved Chua for an appointment, as long as he could get a U.S. visa to cross the border. Family and friends had raised $18,000 for travel and the first stages of his treatment.

Chua, his mother, and two younger brothers have all traveled in the past on tourist visas to the United States, and his father is a resident who lives in Tucson, Ariz. Chua’s health was deteriorating.

"Each day, I get a little worse," Chua said.

But this week the American consulate in Chua’s hometown of Hermosillo denied him a tourist visa — for the second time.

When he tried to find out why, Kevin Forbes, whose charity organization, Consejo de Latinos Unidos, had been working since last year to push along Chua’s case, could only get redi-

TEXAS-MEXICO BORDER

Abbott noncommital on pulling Guard from border

By PAUL J. WEBER ASSOCIATED PRESS

Photo by Nathan Lambrecht/The Monitor | AP

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott talks about his border security plan during a news conference as Texas Department of Public Safety Director Steve McCraw stands behind him Friday at DPS’ Region 3 Headquarters in Weslaco. Abbott remains noncommittal on a timeline for pulling the National Guard off the border.

WESLACO — Republican Gov. Greg Abbott remained noncommittal Friday on a timeline for pulling the National Guard off the Texas-Mexico border after hundreds of police officers recently applied for jobs to effectively replace those troops.

“We can’t just snap our finger and have them all start at once,” Abbott said. “It does take a while to ramp up.”

His refusal again to offer a

time frame followed a tour of the border with Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, a likely Republican presidential contender. But Walker was invisible to reporters after arriving in Texas amid questions about his stance on immigration.

Abbott has not endorsed anyone for the White House in 2016.

The crowded Republican field already includes Texas Sen. Ted Cruz , who is Abbott’s one-time protege and formally kicked off his campaign this week. Former Gov. Rick Perry likely isn’t far behind, having spent months

gearing up for a second run at the White House.

Perry deployed 1,000 National Guard troops to the border last summer, and a few hundred have remained in the Rio Grande Valley as the mission scaled down.

But Abbott says the last troops can’t leave until Texas hires hundreds of state troopers to replace them.

More than 700 law enforcement officers in the past two months applied for fast-tracked

See BORDER PAGE 11A

PAGE 2A

Zin brief CALENDAR

SATURDAY, MARCH 28, 2015

AROUND TEXAS

TODAY IN HISTORY

SATURDAY, MARCH 28

ASSOCIATED PRESS

66th annual Flower and Art Show. Fellowship Hall, First United Methodist Church. 1 to 6 p.m. Public invited; admission fee.

Texas Food Bank-TAMIU Big Event at 1907 Freight at Riverside, 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. More than 200 TAMIU students called the Love Committee will bag and sort for STFB clients and paint STFB offices. Erasmo Villarreal 763-4408 or 726-3120.

Today is Saturday, March 28, the 87th day of 2015. There are 278 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlight in History: On March 28, 1979, America’s worst commercial nuclear accident occurred with a partial meltdown inside the Unit 2 reactor at the Three Mile Island plant near Middletown, Pennsylvania.

On this date: In 1515, St. Teresa of Avila was born Teresa de Cepeda y Ahumada.

In 1898, the Supreme Court, in United States v. Wong Kim Ark, ruled that a child born in the United States to Chinese immigrants was a U.S. citizen.

In 1930, the names of the Turkish cities of Constantinople and Angora were changed to Istanbul and Ankara.

In 1935, the notorious Nazi propaganda film “Triumph des Willens” (Triumph of the Will), directed by Leni Riefenstahl, premiered in Berlin with Adolf Hitler present.

In 1941, novelist and critic Virginia Woolf, 59, drowned herself near her home in Lewes, East Sussex, England.

In 1965, an earthquake of magnitude 7.4 struck La Ligua, Chile, leaving about 400 people dead or missing, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

In 1969, the 34th president of the United States, Dwight D. Eisenhower, died in Washington D.C. at age 78.

In 1987, Maria von Trapp, whose life story inspired the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical “The Sound of Music,” died in Morrisville, Vermont, at age 82.

Ten years ago: The Colorado Supreme Court threw out the death penalty in a rapeand-murder case because five of the trial jurors had consulted the Bible and quoted Scripture during deliberations.

(The U.S. Supreme Court refused to consider reinstating the death sentence of Robert Harlan, who ended up being resentenced to life in prison for the murder of cocktail waitress Rhonda Maloney.)

Five years ago: President Barack Obama secretly visited Afghanistan near the front lines of the increasingly bloody 8-year-old war.

One year ago: Russian President Vladimir Putin called President Barack Obama to discuss a solution to the crisis in Ukraine; the leaders agreed that top U.S. and Russian diplomats should work on the details.

Today’s Birthdays: Former White House national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski is 87. Author Mario Vargas Llosa is 79. Country musician Charlie McCoy is 74.

Movie director Mike Newell is 73. Actress Conchata Ferrell is 72. Country singer Reba McEntire is 60. Olympic gold medal gymnast Bart Conner is 57. Rapper Salt (Salt-N-Pepa) is 49. Actress Tracey Needham is 48. Actor Max Perlich is 47.

Movie director Brett Ratner is 46. Country singer Rodney Atkins is 46. Actor Vince Vaughn is 45. Rapper Mr. Cheeks (Lost Boyz) is 44. Actor Ken L. is 42.

Singer/songwriter Matt Nathanson is 42. Rock musician Dave Keuning is 39. Actress Annie Wersching is 38. Actress Julia Stiles is 34. Singer Lady Gaga is 29.

Thought for Today: “Those who say they give the public what it wants begin by underestimating public taste and end by debauching it.” — T.S. Eliot, American-Anglo poet and critic (1888-1965).

SUNDAY, MARCH 29 66th annual Flower and Art Show. Fellowship Hall, First United Methodist Church. 1 to 6 p.m. Public invited; admission fee.

Women’s City Club presents Sundaes with Style, 2:30 p.m. to 5 p.m. at the Laredo Country Club. For reservations call Nancy at 763-9960.

TUESDAY, MARCH 31 Photo by Ralph Barrera/Austin American-Statesman | AP

TAMIU Lamar Bruni Vergara Science Center Planetarium. The Secret of the Cardboard Rocket, 5 p.m.

Extreme Planets, 6 p.m. Admission is $4 for children and $5 for adults.

Admission is $4 for TAMIU students, faculty and staff. Call 956-326-DOME (3663).

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 1 Used Book Sale, 10 a.m. to noon. Widener Book Room, First United Methodist Church. Public invited; no admission fee.

SATURDAY, APRIL 4 Used book and magazine sale at First United Methodist Church.

Widener Book Room. 8:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. Public invited; no admission fee.

TUESDAY, APRIL 7 The Alzheimer’s support group. Meeting room 2, building B of the Laredo Medical Center. The support group is for family members and caregivers taking care of someone who has Alzheimer’s. For information, please call 693-9991.

Les Amies Birthday Club’s monthly meeting at 11:30 a.m. at the Ramada Plaza, honoring Leonor “Noni” Daves.

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 8 Used book sale. First United Methodist Church. 10 a.m. to noon.

Come join us at the Laredo Human Resource Management Association Meeting. Embassy Suites at 12:00 noon. Mr. Rodney Klein the Education and Training Manager for the U. S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission will be presenting on: Harassment and Bullying in the workplace. Please register on-line at LAHRM.org .

SATURDAY, APRIL 11 “Larry Hernandez Memorial 7th Annual Crime Stoppers 5-K Run/ Walk Against Crime at the entrance of Lake Casa Blanca State Park.

Registration is 7 a.m. Race starts 8 a.m. Pre-registration fee is $15 through April 10. Day of the event on April 11, $20. Kids’ run for ages 10 years and under. Proceeds benefit Laredo Crime Stoppers. The first 100 paid entries will receive T-shirt and goody bag. Registration forms at Laredo Crime Stoppers office, 1200 Washington St., from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., or at Laredo Ciclo Mania at 611 Shiloh, Ste. #2 from 11 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Call 956- 724-1876 for information; applications at www.laredocrimestoppers.org.

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 15 Used Book Sale, 10 a.m. to noon. Widener Book Room, First United Methodist Church. Public invited; no admission fee.

SATURDAY, APRIL 18 Garage sale at Holy Redeemer Church, 1602 Garcia St., from 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. There will be clothes, toys, furniture and more. For more information, call Amparo Elegarte at 286-0862.

(Submit calendar items at lmtonline.com/calendar/submit or by emailing editorial@lmtonline.com with the event’s name, date and time, location and purpose and contact information for a representative. Items will run as space is available.)

Workers are at the scene after a tractor-trailer slammed into construction beams being used to build a bridge across Interstate 35 in Salado, Texas, about 40 miles north of Austin, on Thursday. Debris then toppled onto the interstate and was struck by other vehicles, Department of Transportation spokeswoman Becky Ozuna said.

I-35 reopens after crash ASSOCIATED PRESS

SALADO — Interstate 35 in Central Texas reopened Friday as engineers examined debris to determine what led an oversized tractor-trailer to slam into a bridge beam in a construction zone.

Texas Department of Transportation spokesman David Glessner says engineers checked damage to a highway bridge, on which construction was nearly complete before Thursday morning’s accident closed a section of the main north-south highway through the state.

The driver of a pickup truck was killed and three other people were hurt, including the driver of the 18-wheeler blamed for the accident. His semi hit a construction beam and brought it down, according to the Texas Department of Public Safety.

Three advisory signs were posted along I-35 leading to the bridge in Salado, about 40 miles north of Austin, indicating clearance of 13 feet, 6 inches, according to Glessner.

The actual vertical clearance was slightly over 14 feet, he said.

Authorities believe the truck or its cargo was too tall to pass under the bridge. Several government and law enforcement agencies are investigating, Glessner said.

“Basically the truck was oversized compared to the posted warning signs,” Glessner said. Authorities were trying to determine whether the truck or the cargo hooked the beam.

“With regard to the structure that was hit, obviously there will be some inspections and we will move forward with trying to correct any damage and move forward with that construction project,” Glessner said.

Small plane crashes near Stephenville, 2 injured

Texas unemployment rate declines for 6th month

Fort Bliss spokesman: 11 hurt in vehicle accident

STEPHENVILLE — Two people have been seriously hurt when their small plane crashed after takeoff from a North Texas airport on a flight to the Houston area. The accident happened Friday morning. The Piper Saratoga II was bound for Wharton when the pilot reported engine trouble and tried to land on a highway. Traffic prevented the landing and the plane crashed into a ditch and fence, then flipped.

AUSTIN — Texas unemployment fell to 4.3 percent during February for the sixth straight month of declines, the Texas Workforce Commission reported Friday.

The Midland area had the lowest unemployment rate statewide in February at 2.8 percent. The McAllen-Edinburg-Mission area recorded the highest jobless rate at 7.7 percent, according to the commission’s monthly figures.

EL PASO — A Fort Bliss spokesman says 11 airmen were injured in an accident involving several Humvees at the Army post. Lt. Col. Lee Peters tells the El Paso Times that all of the injured airmen were expected to be released from a hospital Thursday night.

Officials say six vehicles were in a convoy when the accident occurred in a training area.

Student stabbed at school; boy, 15, charged FRIENDSWOOD — One South Texas boy, 15, has been charged with stabbing another five times after they bumped while leaving a school classroom. The Galveston County Sheriff ’s Office says the wounded boy was hospitalized Friday in stable condition with injuries that are not lifethreatening.

Central Texas taxidermist pleads guilty in rhino case WACO — A Central Texas taxidermist has pleaded guilty to illegally selling horns from an endangered black rhinoceros. The John A. Brommel, 53, who awaits sentencing, also admitted falsifying the bill of sale to hide that the buyers weren’t from Texas.

Brommel has owned and operated the Corner Shoppe taxidermy shop for more than 25 years.

Faith leaders demand end to family detention DILLEY — Faith leaders from around the country have signed a letter to President Barack Obama asking that the government stop detaining immigrant women and children at family detention facilities.

More than 80 religious figures signed the letter which calls the practice of detaining immigrants inhumane and harmful.

— Compiled from AP reports

AROUND THE NATION NYC Mayor: Someone may have tapped gas line NEW YORK — Someone may have improperly tapped a gas line before an explosion that leveled three apartment buildings and injured nearly two dozen people, Mayor Bill de Blasio said Friday as firefighters soaked the still-smoldering buildings and police searched for at least two missing people.

“There is a possibility here that the gas line was inappropriately accessed internally” by people in one of the destroyed buildings, but officials need to get access to its basement to explore it further, de Blasio said.

The number of people injured in Thursday’s blast rose from 19 to 22, with four critically injured.

NASA launches longestever manned mission NASA’s Friday launch went off without a hitch. At 3:42 p.m.

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A pile of debris remains at the site of a building explosion in the East Village neighborhood of New York, Friday. Nineteen people were injured, four critically, after the powerful blast and fire sent flames soaring and debris flying Thursday.

Eastern time, U.S. astronaut Scott Kelly left the ground at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan and headed to the International Space Station in a Soyuz rocket.

With no delays and all systems working perfectly, NASA’s mis-

sion control seemed calm and pleased throughout live broadcasting of the launch.

Along with Russian Mikhail Kornienko, Kelly will spend nearly a full year aboard the International Space Station (ISS).

— Compiled from AP reports

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State

SATURDAY, MARCH 28, 2015

UT president approved

THE ZAPATA TIMES 3A

Filming bill doomed

By EVA RUTH MORAVEC

By JIM VERTUNO ASSOCIATED PRESS

AUSTIN — The University of Texas System Board of Regents named Austin campus Provost Gary Fenves as the sole finalist to be school president on Friday.

Fenves was approved on a 5-3 vote after a monthslong search to replace Bill Powers, who leaves office June 1 after a decade in the job. Powers was pressured to resign from one of the nation’s largest and wealthiest public universities after years of clashes with several board members and former Chancellor Francisco Cigarroa.

State law requires the board to name a finalist, then wait at least 21 days for make a formal hire.

Fenves, 58, is the university’s chief academic officer and ranked No. 2 behind Powers. He also would come to the job as the perceived second choice. The board had appeared to favor Oxford Vice Chancellor An-

drew Hamilton, but he instead took the job as president of New York University last week.

Voting against Fenves on Friday were regents Wallace Hall, Brenda Pejovich and Alex Cranberg, who were three vocal critics of Powers over admissions practices, tuition rates and graduation rates at the flagship campus of the 15-institution system.

A report released last month found that Powers had ordered a small number of students admitted each year despite the objections of the admissions office. Some of them had subpar academic credentials but were recommended by donors, regents or state lawmakers. The admissions office reports to Fenves.

New Chancellor William McRaven said he recommended Fenves for the job.

“Greg brings a formidable intellect and charismatic and strategic leadership to the position,” McRaven said.

Board chairman Paul

Foster did not vote but said he would have supported Fenves if needed to break a tie. Foster said that despite the split vote, he is confident the board will be able to work with Fenves. Foster would not comment on the board’s private deliberations before the vote.

Fenves, a structural engineer and former dean of the Texas engineering school, has been at he university since 2007.

“UT Austin is unmatched in its potential to educate and inspire leaders. I would be honored to lead this university,” Fenves said in a statement released by the school.

Hall had been outspoken about his desire to find someone outside the current administration. After the vote, he appeared frustrated by the selection and mocked the school motto of “What starts here changes the world.”

“Our new tagline should be ‘What starts here stays the same,”’ Hall said.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

AUSTIN — A Republican lawmaker’s bill limiting bloggers who film police looks to be on life support after reaping strong opposition from the state’s largest police officers’ union.

The proposal would incriminate people who film police activity within 25 feet, or within 100 feet if the person is carrying a handgun.

Traditional news media would be exempted from the Class B misdemeanor charge, said Dallas Rep. Jason Villalba, who has said that the bill targets “independent bloggers who are focused on keeping law enforcement accountable.”

Villalba’s bill was set to have a hearing Thursday, his 44th birthday, but he withdrew the bill from the committee agenda. That came a day after he heard complaints from the Combined Law Enforcement

Associations of Texas.

Villalba insists he withdrew the bill because it’s being amended and the hearing would run very late. But the association’s executive director, Charley Wilkison, said Villalba suggested he was pulling the bill permanently during a phone call Wednesday after both of them appeared on FOX News.

“His indication was that he wasn’t going to go forward with it,” Wilkison said Friday. “We would have been opposed in the hearing, but we didn’t even get that far.”

Jordan Hunter, Villalba’s spokeswoman, said the legislator is working with Wilkison’s group to finesse the bill “to where they might be able to support it a little more.”

If scrapped, it’d be the second failed Villalba proposal session — he killed another bill amid pressure from Texas businesses.

Wilkison, whose group boasts more than 18,500

members, said the proposal is unnecessary and dangerous. Now, he said, Texas’ 76,000 licensed peace officers have discretion on where to cordon off a crime scene.

Setting limits as Villalba has proposed would be “worse for the rank-andfile,” and hard to enforce, Wilkison said, quipping, “so the officer’s going to have a tape measure at the scene?”

As news of Villalba’s bill spread, so did the opposition. Groups like the Freedom of Information Foundation of Texas raised concerns about violating constitutional rights. The vitriol was especially apparent on Facebook, where someone created a “Recall Jason Villalba” page days after the proposal was filed; the page now has about 4,500 “likes.”

But Villalba maintains that his bill is to promote police accountability, and came at the urging of his hometown police.

Texas eyes private campus police records

By DAVID WARREN ASSOCIATED PRESS

DALLAS — A violent arrest involving campus police at Rice University in Houston prompted a bill that would force private universities’ police departments to release more information to the public.

Sen. John Whitmire said efforts to learn more about the 2013 arrest of a man who stole a bicycle were stymied by the university, which initially refused to release information on the case or a full video that showed officers beating the suspect with batons.

Whitmire said Rice “hid behind their private university status” in not releasing timely information about

the arrest.

“If you’re going to be a licensed police department, public or private, you have to be held accountable and have to disclose your records,” said Whitmire, a Houston Democrat who introduced the bill.

In an effort to bring greater transparency of campus police investigations, the Texas Senate this week unanimously approved a bill that applies open-records laws for public police agencies to private campus police. The legislation now moves to the full House for consideration.

Texas would become the fourth state — behind Georgia, North Carolina and Virginia — with a law re-

quiring private campus police to disclose the facts and circumstances of the crimes reported to them, according to Frank LoMonte, executive director of the Student Press Law Center in Washington, D.C. Lawsuits are pending in Indiana and Ohio seeking the same access, he said.

Whitmire said the Texas bill so far has received no opposition, with the Austinbased Independent Colleges and Universities of Texas providing its support. Rice University spokesman B.J. Almond said the school also has offered its backing.

Almond addressed the arrest in question in a statement this week, saying the suspect had an extensive criminal record and re-

sisted arrest.

“The officers used batons to gain control of the suspect and handcuff him,” Almond said. “An internal investigation concluded that the use of force was justified, and the Harris County grand jury reaffirmed that finding by not returning an indictment.”

But criticism of the Rice campus police’s actions echo complaints directed at University of the Incarnate Word in San Antonio, another private institution, after unarmed student Cameron Redus, 23, was shot five times and killed by a university officer in December 2013.

Brent Perry, an attorney for the family of Redus, said the school initially de-

clined to release video from the officer’s patrol vehicle that would have offered insight into what led the encounter to turn violent.

“I don’t know how a recording of two people yelling at each other in a public parking lot is confidential, but that was their position,” Perry said.

The officer had stopped Redus’ vehicle on suspicion of drunken driving. A grand jury in San Antonio earlier this week declined to indict the officer, but Redus’ family has filed a wrongful death lawsuit.

UIW spokeswoman Debra Del Toro said the university provided the Redus family an explanation of police policies and procedures and a one-page police re-

port, but was told not to release more until the Bexar County district attorney approved it. Earlier this week, an audio recording of the incident was released.

LoMonte said too many private campuses today just offer bare-bone reports of a crime or offense that don’t serve their students, or the public, well.

“Police agencies have the ultimate governmental authority,” he said. “They can take your freedom away and in extreme situations they’re even allowed to take your life.”

Several national incidents in recent years show it’s possible for police to overreact in heated situations and go too far, he said.

PAGE 4A

Zopinion

SATURDAY, MARCH 28, 2015

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR SEND YOUR SIGNED LETTER TO EDITORIAL@LMTONLINE.COM

COMMENTARY

OTHER VIEWS

Last thoughts while falling to your death WASHINGTON — The apparently intentional downing of a Germanwings airliner by the co-pilot has us riveted, as commercial plane crashes usually do.

In each terrible instance, we put ourselves in the cabin, imagining what our last thoughts or actions would be. Would we close our eyes and pray? Would we scream?

Would we seize the person next to us, desperately grasping at one last human connection?

What is it like to realize your plane is out of control and there’s nothing to be done? Or that, inconceivably, your pilot or, in this case, your copilot, is out of control?

Such dark thoughts capture our imaginations briefly before we shove them back into some remote recess of the mind never again, we hope, to be retrieved. This conscious act of self-defense protects us from the horrifying possibility that someday we, too, might find ourselves strapped into a missile on a suicidal mission.

Unthinkable is the word for it.

We remind ourselves that these are, indeed, rare events. And though this is not the first apparent suicide crash, we might hope it’s the last.

After all, as we’ve heard countless times, you’re more likely to die in a car crash than a plane crash. And the most convincing rationale for flying without fear is the eye-rolling reminder that no one talks about all the safe landings every day.

We do, however, remark when a pilot makes a heroic landing, bringing his mammoth flying machine to a safe halt — in a river, no less. Nearly every American knows about Capt. Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger and his “Miracle on the Hudson.”

We love the lifesavers and worship the heroes whose awesome competence reassures us that the end is not yet here.

Sully was John Wayne of the skies — a good man, solid and true, reliable, brave and cool under fire. Contrast him to the Germanwings co-pilot, Andreas Lubitz, who is every bit the monster the terrorist is. Perhaps worse.

The latter-day, knifewielding infidel-slayer kills an innocent in a brutal, hands-on act of extreme human interaction. The co-pilot bars himself from the people he intends to destroy, methodically resetting the jet’s autopilot to an altitude that will ensure death to 149 strangers.

Rod Serling’s gremlin on the wing, ripping out the guts of one of the plane’s engines, is a bedtime story compared to

“

KATHLEEN PARKER

the cool detachment of the co-pilot apparently flipping a switch to lock out all others and begin his self-imposed descent into smithereens.

Did he enjoy the agony of the pilot flailing hopelessly against the locked door? Did the screaming of passengers moments before death bring him satisfaction?

According to French investigators, the last words the pilot uttered to his 27-year-old co-pilot as he stepped out of the cockpit, apparently for a restroom break, were: “You are in control.” In fiction, these now-chilling words would be a notso-subtle foreshadowing of doom. For the passengers and crew, they were a death sentence.

Alone in the cockpit for the eight minutes it took to crash, Lubitz’s breathing was captured on the voice recorder.

Breathing in, out, in, out, in, out. What a vile soundtrack, what evil commentary on the soonto-be breathless.

His poor parents. But not, please, poor Andreas Lubitz. He may have been depressed, they tell us.

He may have broken up with his girlfriend. Oh, too bad. He seems to have suffered an “illness” on the very day he flew, according to torn up “medical leave” notes found in his home.

All. Too. Bad. It wasn’t enough that air travel has become near torturous. Squished in seats too small for the petite, passengers try to retract their fleshy edifices into cocoons of personal space, praying for an uneventful journey and a slender seatmate. To such discomforts, we’ve now added the possibility that the pilot might have had a bad day.

Most are familiar with the old fatalist saw: Hey, when it’s your time, it’s your time. May as well have a drink and enjoy the ride, says the jovial frequent flyer, his breath a mix of whiskey and weariness.

In his bravado, we find consolation — and pray for contagion. Yes, of course, bring on the Fates! But we also know the end of the joke: Yeah, but what if it’s the pilot’s time?

Thanks to Lubitz, travelers will give this question more serious consideration. With a second glance into the cockpit as they board, passengers are bound to wonder: Who, really, is in control?

Kathleen Parker’s email address is kathleenparker@washpost.com.

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WORST WEEK IN WASHINGTON

Carlsons had a rough week

By CHRIS CILLIZZA THE WASHINGTON POST

Look, I get it. Like everyone else, I’ve accidentally replied-all to an email conversation, sending a message meant for one set of eyes to a whole bunch of eyes. But my usual response — that is, the normal human response — is abject apology, throwing myself at the feet of the digital gods and begging for forgiveness.

Tucker Carlson and his brother, Buckley, are not most humans. Witness how they reacted after they accidentally copied a

subject of their derision in a hideous reply-all episode.

The scene: Amy Spitalnick, a spokeswoman for New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, asked for a correction to a Daily Caller piece — that’s the conservative website Tucker founded and runs — that suggested the mayor wanted an even larger highway spending bill than the $80 billion behemoth put forward by President Barack Obama.

When the complaint eventually made its way up the chain to Carlson, he responded by telling Spitalnick that she was “whiny and annoying,”

adding: “Outside of New York City, adults generally write polite, cheerful emails to one another, even when asking for corrections.” For good measure, he appears to have blind-copied his brother on that email.

Then came Buckley’s answer — inadvertently sent not just to Carlson but to Spitalnick, too — which unleashed a string of obscenities, blue language related to her last name and crude speculation about her sexual habits that we wouldn’t publish here.

BuzzFeed’s Rosie Gray, who first reported on the

email, got in touch with Tucker to see if he might, you know, be slightly remorseful or apologetic.

Nope! “I just talked to my brother about his response, and he assures me he meant it in the nicest way,” Tucker told Gray.

Tucker and Buckley Carlson, for forgetting that being decent is both easy and important (especially when you scold someone else for a lapse in decorum), you had the worst week in Washington. Congrats, or something.

Cillizza covers the White House for The Washington Post and writes The Fix, its politics blog.

EDITORIAL

The mystery of Flight 9525 CHICAGO TRIBUNE

Anyone who boards a commercial jetliner knows the safety risks. Passengers buckle up and sometimes fortify themselves with a drink and the assurance that, statistically, flying gets safer and safer because planes are better engineered and pilots are better trained.

That assurance has been shaken by a spate of mysterious air crashes. Last year, a Malaysia Airlines jet carrying 239 people disappeared between Kuala Lumpur and Beijing, without a trace. This week came the crash of Germanwings Flight 9525 in the French Alps. On Thursday, a chilling assertion: A French prosecutor said the co-pilot of Flight 9525 locked himself in the cockpit and deliberately slammed the plane into a mountainside.

How did it happen? Authorities said that, based

on cockpit flight recordings, they believe the pilot left the cockpit, then later knocked on the door to gain re-entry. The co-pilot, identified as Andreas Lubitz, ignored that plea. The pilot pounded on the door and then tried to break it down. Investigators said Lubitz didn’t respond, but his steady breathing was heard as the plane plummeted from 38,000 feet in a terrifying eight minutes.

Since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, jet cockpit doors have been reinforced to be all but impregnable to keep terrorists out. Now we learn that they can also be electronically secured from the inside so that even a pilot can’t quickly and easily re-enter.

We emphasize: This is what authorities think they know now about the cause of the crash. These conclusions are tentative. Much is likely to change as the investigation deepens.

People savor mysteries

in books and movies because they know the clues will lead to a solution by the end. A plane crash offers no such guarantees.

Case in point: that Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 en route to Beijing last March.

The plane veered off its planned course but sent no distress signal. There was no evidence of technical failures or weather trouble.

The jet wreckage is thought to be resting on the Indian Ocean floor.

Mysteries These two mysterious disasters leave families in terrible grief and leave the rest of us impatient for answers. What happened inside the Germanwings cockpit? The natural instinct is to want to pinpoint the cause of a crash and then pinpoint a remedy to prevent the next one — more reliable equipment, more layers of secu-

rity.

But there is often little protection against a determined assailant, whether on the streets of a city or at 38,000 feet.

If Lubitz deliberately doomed the plane, it would be among only a handful of such incidents since the mid-1970s. Among the most recent: the 1999 crash of EgyptAir Flight 990, en route from Los Angeles to Cairo. In 2002, the National Transportation Safety Board said co-pilot Gameel el-Batouti cut power to the engines and chanted "I rely on God" in Arabic for almost a minute and a half.

All 217 people aboard died.

Perhaps there’s still room to wonder if the crash of Flight 9525 was an accident, that Lubitz was somehow incapacitated.

Deliberate or not, the final story will be cold comfort to families and friends of those who died. And flying will give a little more pause to every traveler.

CLASSIC DOONESBURY | GARRY TRUDEAU

Nation

SATURDAY, MARCH 28, 2015

THE ZAPATA TIMES 5A

Minority Leader Reid to retire

By CHARLES BABINGTON AND ERICA WERNER ASSOCIATED PRESS

WASHINGTON — Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, a pugnacious and glamouraverse tactician who united Democrats to help deliver tough victories for President Barack Obama, said Friday he’s retiring next year. He immediately endorsed brash New York Sen. Chuck Schumer to succeed him as leader of a party desperate to regain the Senate majority.

Reid, 75, rose from hardscrabble beginnings in Nevada, and brought his amateur boxer’s tenacity to the pinnacle of congressional politics.

Friends said his doggedness and indifference to popularity helped rebuff Republicans who fiercely oppose Obama on health care, spending, immigration and other issues.

But critics say Reid added to Washington’s poisonous partisanship, particularly by changing Senate filibuster rules in 2013 to enable Obama to appoint more judges.

On Friday, Schumer seized the inside track to succeed Reid as the Democratic Senate leader after next year’s elections. Potential rival Dick Durbin of Illinois said he would back Schumer. Durbin is currently Reid’s No. 2; Schumer is No. 3.

Stylistically, Reid and Schumer are miles apart.

Schumer is voluble, outgoing, eager to talk campaign strategy, on TV or anywhere else.

He sometimes works with Republicans, including an ultimately unsuccessful effort to overhaul immigration laws in 2013.

But Schumer, 64, is a partisan fighter too, hailed by colleagues as a top fundraiser and strategist. He headed the party’s Senate campaign operations in 2006 and 2008, when Democrats made sizable gains. Colleagues’ gratitude helped him surpass Durbin as Reid’s likely successor.

Schumer, who spent much of Friday phoning fellow Democratic senators, said in a statement he was “humbled to

Photo by J. Scott Applewhite/file | AP

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada announced Friday he will not seek re-election to another term in office. have the support of so many of my colleagues.”

Durbin said he hopes to retain the second-ranking leadership post, known as party whip. Allies of Sen. Patty Murray of Washington said she might also seek that job.

Reid, who came to Congress in 1982, lost his role as Senate majority leader when last fall’s elections swept Republicans into power. He suffered serious eye and facial injuries on New Year’s Day while exercising at his Nevada home.

He typically has won Nevada elections by narrow margins, and Republicans were heavily targeting him in 2016.

Both parties now plan all-out bids for his open seat.

In a video statement Friday, Reid said Democrats must retake the Senate majority and “it is inappropriate for me to soak up all those resources” while remaining the caucus leader.

Obama called Reid “a fighter” who pushed for jobs, better health care and a safer environment. He also called the senator a friend, but the two aren’t exactly cozy.

Obama has circumvented Reid to negotiate some tough budget deals with Republicans. In a break with protocol, Reid’s chief of staff publicly suggested Obama’s low popularity hurt Democrats in the 2014 elections.

Reid, however, saves his sharpest barbs for Republicans. After calling then-President George W. Bush “a liar”

and “a loser,” Reid apologized for the “loser” comment but not the “liar.”

He once told Bush, “Your dog is fat.”

Reid grew up in the tiny town of Searchlight, Nevada.

His mother sometimes took in laundry for pay. His father, a miner, committed suicide when Reid was 32.

Seemingly best-suited for black-and-white photos, Reid rarely appears at Washington dinners or on TV talk shows.

His voice is so mumbling and low that reporters strain to hear him.

Fellow Democrats chose him as their leader for his institutional knowledge, listening skills and tenacity.

Briefly holding a 60-seat, filibuster-proof majority after the 2008 elections, congressional Democrats — led by Rep. Nancy Pelosi in the House, and Reid in the Senate — muscled Obama’s Affordable Care Act to enactment, without a single Republican vote.

Other times, however, Obama and Pelosi worked around Reid. That was largely the case in resolving the 2013 “fiscal cliff ” dilemma. When negotiations ground to a halt, raising the possibility of tax hikes on nearly all working Americans, Vice President Joe Biden and Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky crafted a compromise with minimal input from Reid.

While never wildly popular with voters, Reid is a canny

campaign strategist. Facing a potentially potent GOP opponent in 2000, Reid helped a less experienced tea party-affiliated Republican win the nomination. Then he comfortably beat her in the general election.

On Friday, Reid endorsed former Nevada attorney general Catherine Cortez Masto to run for his seat next year.

Democratic Rep. Dina Titus said she also is weighing a bid.

Unworried about picking favorites, Reid told KNPR radio, “I’ve never been a shrinking violent.”

Many Nevada Republicans would like to see Gov. Brian Sandoval run for the Senate seat, but he gave little encouragement Friday. Other GOP possibilities are Rep. Joe Heck and former Lt. Gov. Brian Krolicki.

Most tributes to Reid on Friday, regardless of political party, used words like “fighter” to describe him.

“Harry Reid has always been a tough advocate for the people of Nevada, and I have always appreciated the candid and straightforward nature of our relationship,” said House Speaker John Boehner, ROhio.

Reid’s brusqueness has hit many targets over the years.

Acquaintances say he often ends phone calls without “goodbye.”

In 2013 he clashed with his leadership predecessor — Tom Daschle of South Dakota — over an open Senate seat in that state. Reid wanted a former congresswoman to run, while Daschle wanted a former aide. Daschle’s choice prevailed but lost the general election last November to Republican Mike Rounds in a strongly pro-GOP year.

Despite the tension, Daschle praised Reid on Friday.

“He had a very, very difficult job,” Daschle said in an interview. “This is a challenging time for anyone in political leadership.”

Daschle said Reid was justified in changing the filibuster rules in 2013, calling it “probably inevitable.”

Court overturns conviction

By CHRIS GRYGIEL ASSOCIATED PRESS

SEATTLE — Amanda Knox says she’s “tremendously relieved and grateful” that Italy’s highest court overturned her murder conviction in the slaying of her roommate.

Knox said in a statement Friday that knowing she was innocent gave her “strength in the darkest times of this ordeal.” She said she relied on support from her family and friends and thanked her supporters.

Despite the murder case hanging over her head, Amanda Knox has tried to lead a normal life in the more than KNOX three years since she was freed from an Italian prison: She recently got engaged and has started writing theater reviews and other articles for a weekly paper in her hometown.

An appeals court in 2011 cleared Knox in the 2007 slaying of British roommate Meredith Kercher in Perugia, Italy, and ordered her released after she had spent four years in prison.

Her acquittal was overturned. She was convicted in absentia in 2014. On Friday, Italy’s highest court overturned that murder conviction, finally closing Knox’s long legal saga.

In a separate statement, Knox’s family expressed their “profound gratitude” to people who helped the 27-yearold Seattle resident.

Mostly left alone by the media in Seattle since her return from Italy, the 27-year-old former exchange student completed her studies at the University of Washington and spends time with family and friends.

Knox graduated from the University of Washington last year with a degree in creative writing. She recently started working as a freelance reporter for the West Seattle Herald.

Managing Editor Ken Robinson told The Associated Press that Knox has completed pieces on local theater productions and “the occasional feature story.”

Knox also wrote a memoir about her life and her experiences in Italy.

Nation

6A THE ZAPATA TIMES

University unveils chant probe findings

By SEAN MURPHY ASSOCIATED PRESS

NORMAN, Okla.

— Members of a University of Oklahoma fraternity apparently learned a racist chant that recently got their chapter disbanded during a national leadership cruise four years ago that was sponsored by the fraternity’s national administration, the university’s president said Friday.

President David Boren said the school interviewed more than 160 people during its investigation into members of its now-defunct Sigma Alpha Epsilon chapter who were captured on video taking part in the chant, which included references to lynching, a racial slur and the promise that the fraternity would never accept a black member.

“That chant was learned and brought back to the local chapter,” Boren said at a news conference in which he disclosed the school investigation’s findings. “Over time, the chant was formalized by the local chapter and was taught to pledges as part of the formal and informal pledgeship process.”

A statement released Friday by the Evanston, Illinois-based national Sigma Alpha Epsilon Fraternity said its own investigation is ongoing but confirmed the chant likely was shared during its annual six-day retreat. SAE’s Executive Director Blaine Ayers said in the statement he believes some members shared the chant during an informal “social gathering” outside of the normal slate of classes, seminars and other educational functions.

“But our investigation to date shows no evidence the song was widely shared across the broader organization,” Ayers said.

Boren said about 25

Photo by Sue Ogrocki | AP

Levi Pettit, center, is a former University of Oklahoma fraternity member caught on video leading a racist chant. members of the school’s SAE chapter will face punishment ranging from two expulsions the school announced previously to mandatory community service and cultural sensitivity training. The video, which surfaced earlier this month, showed fraternity members yelling the chant on a chartered bus while headed to a formal event at an Oklahoma City country club with their dates, Boren said.

Boren said the investigation found alcohol was “readily available” at the fraternity house before the start of the event, and that about a dozen high school students whom he described as “potential recruits” were also on the bus.

Beginning in the fall, Boren said all current and future OU students will be required to take diversity training.

After the video surfaced, Boren immediately severed ties with the local chapter, shuttered the fraternity house and expelled two members who led the chant.

One of those students, Levi Pettit, publicly apologized at a news conference Wednesday in which he was flanked by black community leaders. Pettit, who is from the Dallas enclave of Highland Park, answered a few questions from reporters but declined to say who taught him the

chant.

“The truth is what was said in that chant is disgusting ... and after meeting with these people I’ve learned these words should never be repeated,” Pettit said.

A second student from the Dallas area, Parker Rice, also issued a statement apologizing for his role in the chant.

Isaac Hill, the president of the university’s Black Student Association, met earlier Friday with Boren and seven student leaders from the defunct OU chapter, along with some student athletes and members of historically black fraternities. Hill, a junior from Midwest City, said each of the fraternity members apologized personally for their role in the chant.

“I believe the students were very sincere in their apologies, and we are all good with that,” Hill said.

Also on Friday, Boren sent a letter to Ayers asking the national fraternity director what steps he was taking to investigate the origin of the chant. In the letter, Boren wrote that while there is no indication the chant was part of the formal teaching of the national organization, “it does appear that the chant was widely known and informally shared amongst members on the leadership cruise.”

SAE began collecting racial and ethnic data in 2013.

SATURDAY, MARCH 28, 2015

Fiancee testifies at trial

By MICHELLE R. SMITH ASSOCIATED PRESS

FALL RIVER, Mass. — Former New England Patriots player Aaron Hernandez and his fiancee traded expressionless glances Friday as she took the witness stand to testify in his murder trial.

Shayanna Jenkins was called by prosecutors after being granted immunity, which means she was ordered to testify by the court or face time behind bars.

Jenkins, Hernandez’s high school sweetheart and the mother of his 2-year-old daughter, appeared to be a reluctant and careful witness, pausing for long periods before answering and saying she couldn’t remember details of the time surrounding the June 17, 2013, killing of Odin Lloyd, who was dating her younger sister. Lloyd’s bullet-riddled

body was found in an industrial park near the home Hernandez and Jenkins JENKINS shared.

But some of what Jenkins said could hurt Hernandez, including that minutes after she dropped him off at a police station to be questioned about Lloyd’s death he directed her to give money to one of his co-defendants.

“He told me to meet up with Bo and give him money,” Jenkins said, referring to Ernest Wallace.

Wallace and a third man, Carlos Ortiz, have pleaded not guilty in the killing and will be tried later.

Hernandez, 25, watched Jenkins intently during her testimony, which lasted much of the day. She will return Monday to continue

testifying. She previously pleaded not guilty to perjury in connection with the case. Prosecutors say she lied to a grand jury investigating the killing.

Jenkins, also 25, mostly avoided looking at Hernandez while she testified.

During a sidebar, she looked at jurors and around the courtroom but not in his direction. It was a change from earlier in the trial, when she would sit behind Hernandez, whispering “I love you” and joking with him.

But she had not appeared in court for the past three weeks. On Friday, she was wearing the large diamond engagement ring she typically wears on her left ring finger.

She first appeared in court Friday morning outside the presence of jurors and was asked about what she would say on the witness stand.

International

SATURDAY, MARCH 28, 2015

About 4K fishermen stranded in Indonesia

By MARGIE MASON AND ROBIN MCDOWELL ASSOCIATED PRESS

JAKARTA, Indonesia — The number of foreign fishermen stranded on several remote eastern Indonesian islands has spiraled to 4,000, including some revealed in an Associated Press investigation to have been enslaved.

Many are migrant workers abandoned by their boat captains after the Indonesian government passed a moratorium on foreign fishing five months ago, according to the International Organization for Migration in Indonesia, which released the number Friday. However, others have been trapped on the islands for years, after being dumped by fishing boats or escaping into the jungle.

“This is the worst moment in our life right now,” one former slave told the AP, which is not releasing the names of the men for their safety. “It is even worse than being in hell.

We have to work every day to survive. ... There is no hope for us anymore.”

The AP reported earlier this week that slaves — some of them beaten and locked in cages — are forced to fish, and their catch ends up in the supply chains of American supermarkets and restaurants.

The IOM said Friday that the report follows several years of close work with Indonesian authorities to rescue hundreds of fisherman identified as victims of trafficking in Indonesia.

However, for every man they’ve rescued, many more now need help. With the fishing ban, boats have docked or fled, ditching their crews.

“It is reasonable to expect many are victims of trafficking, if not outright slavery,” said Steve Hamilton, IOM’s deputy chief of mission in Indonesia. “But for the first time in possi-

bly several years their feet are touching dry land and there is a real possibility for them to go home, once we and the authorities locate and process them.”

About a quarter of the men are in Benjina, a town that straddles two islands in the Maluku chain, according to an Indonesian official who recently visited the area. These men, some abandoned five, 10, even 20 years ago, load and unload fish off boats for food and pocket money, or cut and sell logs in the forest.

“We want to go back home,” one dockworker chimed in. “Our body is here but our mind is at home. If there is the possible way to walk back home, we would do it right away.”

Another wiped away tears as he spoke, his voice quivering.

“If someone died here, they don’t even value people’s life as a dog,” he said.

The moratorium was declared by Indonesia’s new Fisheries Minister, Susi Pudjiastuti, to determine which ships are not properly licensed and crack down on illegal foreign boats. Illegal fishing drains billions of dollars from the country, and Pudjiastuti said Friday that stamping it out is key to addressing labor abuses.

“We are not letting this happen,” she said. “In the past, it’s been a normal practice. Not now. I’m not allowing it.”

The Indonesian government has pledged to take legal measures to address what is happening on Benjina and other islands. Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha also acknowledged the AP story and said his government was stepping up efforts to prosecute those responsible.

“If they still continue to exploit their fellow human beings, they should not be given any licenses to operate businesses in Thailand, and they must receive the punishment they deserve,” Prayuth said in a written

response to questions submitted by the Bangkok Post.

However, earlier this week, Prayuth urged journalists not to report on human trafficking without considering how the news would affect the country’s seafood industry and reputation abroad. He also sarcastically suggested that journalists who ignored him might be executed; State Department spokesman Jeff Rathke said from Washington that the U.S. was troubled by the comment.

The U.S. State Department last year blacklisted Thailand for its handling of labor abuses, putting it on par with countries including North Korea and Iran.

The Thai government says it is cleaning up the problem and has laid out a plan, including new laws that mandate wages, sick leave and shifts of no more than 14 hours. On Thursday, Thai lawmakers voted unanimously to create tougher penalties for violating the country’s anti-human trafficking law, including the death penalty.

Major leaders in the U.S. seafood and retail industries sent a letter to the ambassadors of Thailand and Indonesia this week, demanding to know what will be done to free slaves in the seafood industry. Phil Robertson, deputy director of Human Rights Watch’s Asia division, also urged Thai authorities to tackle the scourge.

“The Thailand government has made repeated verbal commitments to get tough with traffickers but every time real follow-up has been lacking,” Robertson said in an email. “The question now is whether the revelations in AP’s article will finally be enough to push Thailand to take long overdue action against fishing vessels that are systematically using slave labor to catch the seafood ending up in America’s kitchens.”

THE ZAPATA TIMES 7A

International

8A THE ZAPATA TIMES

SATURDAY, MARCH 28, 2015

Nigerian president urges peaceful election

By MICHELLE FAUL ASSOCIATED PRESS

ABUJA, Nigeria — Nigeria’s President Goodluck Jonathan urged his nation to vote peacefully and accept the results of Saturday’s presidential elections, which analysts say will be the most tightly contested in the history of Africa’s richest nation and its largest democracy.

“No political ambition can justify violence or the shedding of the blood of our people,” Jonathan said Friday in a televised broadcast.

In a country steeped in a history of coups, bloodshed caused by politics, ethnicity, land disputes and, lately, the Boko Haram Islamic uprising, the election is important as Africa’s most populous nation consolidates its democracy.

“It’s just healthy that they approach this as an exercise of the rights of Nigerians to choose their government and not as a war,” the U.N. Secretary General’s special envoy to West Africa, Mohammed Ibn Cham-

bas, told The Associated Press in an interview.

However Chidi Odinkalu, chairman of the National Human Rights Commission, said the high-stakes contest in Africa’s biggest oil producer where patronage and corruption are rife has spawned “the most extraordinary form of hate speech, incendiary vituperations, ethnic bating; all the things you are not supposed to do.”

His state-sponsored but independent organization reported at least 58 killings

by Feb. 13 and there have been many more since then, Odinkalu told AP. He also complained that politicians have done little to dampen tensions.

Meanwhile, Nigeria’s military announced it had destroyed the headquarters of Boko Haram’s so-called Islamic caliphate, the northeastern town of Gwoza, in fighting Friday that left several extremists dead. There was no way to verify the report. Critics of Jonathan have said recent military victories after months of ceding territory to the Is-

Photo by Ben Curtis | AP

Nigeria’s President Goodluck Jonathan, left, and opposition candidate Muhammadu Buhari, right, on Thursday urge countrymen to hold peaceful “free, fair, and credible” elections. lamic extremists are a ploy to win votes — a charge the presidential campaign denies.

“Wage peace not war,” is a campaign long promoted by the National Orientation Agency which is working with bloggers and other social media popular among millions of Nigerians, according its director general, Mike Omeri. The idea is to “create a lot of buzz” and build “a community of people that will be driven by a passion for peace.”

Entertainment star and

musician 2Face Idibia wrote a song aimed at young voters called “Vote not Fight: Election no be war” in Nigerian colloquial English.

But some people are so fearful of election violence that they are leaving for a while, going as far as the United States and Canada.

Flights are packed, with airlines turning away standby passengers this week at Lagos international airport.

Army chief Lt. Gen. Kenneth Minimah said he will not tolerate any disruptions, warning this week that

“whoever wants to invoke or provoke violence will meet organized violence” from security forces.

Jonathan in his broadcast reminded Nigerians that the world is watching. Chambas, the U.N. envoy, said Nigeria’s elections are especially important on a continent where contested results brought Ivory Coast to the brink of civil war and led to hundreds of deaths after Kenya’s 2007 elections.

U.S. President Barack Obama sent a video message this week, saying “Today, I urge all Nigerians — from all religions, all ethnic groups and all regions — to come together and keep Nigeria one.”

Nigeria’s political landscape was transformed when the main opposition parties formed a coalition two years ago and for the first time united behind one candidate, former military dictator Muhammadu Buhari, who is running for president for the fourth time.

Jonathan’s party has governed since decades of military dictatorship ended in

1999. His insistence on running has caused many defections to the opposition by politicians who say Jonathan is breaking an unwritten party rule to rotate power between the mainly Christian south, where he is from, and the predominantly Muslim north that is Buhari’s stronghold.

Buhari’s loss to Jonathan in 2011 elections sparked riots in his northern stronghold that killed more than 1,000 people, according to the human rights commission. A complaint before the International Criminal Court at The Hague accuses Buhari of instigating the violence, a charge the retired general denies.

In recent days, the church of a pastor who backed Jonathan has been burned down in northern Kaduna state, the opposition governor of a southern state was shot at as he campaigned, and nightly gunfire in Lagos, the commercial capital in the southwest where Odinkalu said there is an “arms race” getting weapons to ethnic militias.

Greece downgraded amid bailout uncertainty

By DEREK GATOPOULOS AND ELENA BECATOROS ASSOCIATED PRESS

ATHENS, Greece — The ratings agency Fitch has downgraded Greece’s sovereign rating amid growing uncertainty over the new government’s pledge to overhaul reforms needed to restart bailout loan payments and avoid default.

The agency late Friday said it had lowered the country’s rating deeper into non-investment grade status from B to CCC, citing “extreme pressure on Greek government funding.”

Rescue lenders are expected this weekend to start reviewing reforms over-

hauled by Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras’ new leftwing government.

The government has promised to ax austerity measures that cut chronic deficits but kept Greece in a punishing recession for six years.

“Lack of market access, uncertain prospects of timely disbursement from official institutions, and tight liquidity conditions in the domestic banking sector have put extreme pressure on Greek government funding,” Fitch said.

“We expect that the government will survive the current liquidity squeeze without running arrears on debt obligations, but ... the

damage to investor, consumer, and depositor confidence has almost certainly derailed Greece’s incipient economic recovery. " Greece has been unable to borrow on international markets since 2010 due to high borrowing rates that reflect a lack of investor confidence in the country. It has relied since then on funds from a 240 billion euro ($260 billion) bailout from other eurozone countries and the International Monetary Fund.

But creditors are refusing to release the last installments, worth more than 7 billion euros, unless the government produces a list by Monday of reforms aiming

to restore the country’s tattered economy.

The country faces a credit crunch, with estimates it will run out of cash sometime in April.

Earlier Friday, a government official said Greece has made clear during negotiations with the eurozone and International Monetary Fund that the country “will not continue servicing its public debt through its own means, if the creditors don’t proceed directly with the disbursement of (bailout) installments delayed since 2014.”

The official spoke only on condition of anonymity in line with government rules.

Euclid Tsakalotos, a min-

ister for international economic relations, added that if negotiations don’t go well, the government is prepared to risk confrontation with its partners.

“We create ambiguity with our partners about our intentions, deliberately, because they must know that we are ready for a rupture,” he told the private Star television. “Otherwise you don’t negotiate.”

Lead lender Germany has been the most vocal critic of Athens’ handling of its financial crisis.

“It is hard to know whether the (Greek) government’s claim that it cannot continue servicing its debt without more bailout funds

is a threat or just a statement of fact,” said Megan Greene, an economist.

“Either way, the German response will be the same as always: Implement reforms and you will get bailout funding, otherwise forget it.”

With a severe credit crunch looming, “the only option for Greece to get money relatively quickly is to propose serious reforms on Monday and begin implementing them immediately,” said Greene.

German central bank president Jens Weidmann told Germany’s Focus magazine that not paying creditors would inevitably lead to default.

SÁBADO 28 DE MARZO DE 2015

Ribereña en Breve DECOMISO Policías estatales de Fuerza Tamaulipas decomisaron 87 kilos y 400 gramos de marihuana, 56 bolsitas de droga, tres vehículos, un arma larga y detuvieron a Gerardo Arias Hernández en el municipio de Miguel Alemán, México.

En las acciones realizadas, no fue necesario el uso de armas de fuego.

La tarde del martes 24 de marzo, al realizar recorrido de vigilancia en las márgenes de la ribera del Río Bravo, a la altura del poblado Los Guerra, con dirección hacia el municipio de Mier, México, los policías estatales encontraron entre la maleza nueve paquetes conteniendo 87 kilos con 400 gramos de marihuana.

En el segundo operativo realizado el miércoles 25 de marzo, en seguimiento a una denuncia ciudadana y posterior trabajo de investigación, los elementos de Fuerza Tamaulipas detuvieron en el Fraccionamiento Nuevo Santander a Gerardo Arias Hernández, quien traía un arma larga, dos cargadores y 45 cartuchos. Conducía un vehículo sin placas.

Otros cómplices de Arias Hernández lograron escapar, abandonando una camioneta de donde se aseguraron 35 bolsas pequeñas con cocaína en piedra, 21 bolsas con cocaína en polvo y 14 bolsas con marihuana.

Zfrontera

PÁGINA 9A

GUARDIA NACIONAL

Sin fecha límite POR PAUL J. WEBER ASSOCIATED PRESS

WESLACO— El gobernador Greg Abbott se mostró evasivo sobre una fecha límite para retirar la Guardia Nacional de la frontera de Texas con México, después que cientos de policías solicitaron empleo para reemplazar a los soldados.

“No podemos solamente tronar los dedos y hacer que todo comience”, dijo Abbott. “Toma un tiempo comenzar”.

Abbott recorrió la frontera el viernes con el gobernador de Wisconsin, Scott Walker, un probable aspirante republicano a la presidencia. Pero Walker no esta-

ba a la vista de los reporteros tras llegar a Texas, perseguido por incómodas nuevas preguntas sobre su postura ante el tema de la inmigración.

Abbott no ha respaldado a ningún candidato de cara a los comicios de 2016.

El nutrido campo republicano de posibles candidatos ya incluye al senador tejano Ted Cruz, que fue protegido de Abbott. El ex gobernador tejano Rick Perry se prepara para un posible anuncio de postulación.

Perry desplegó 1.000 elementos de la Guardia Nacional a lo largo de la frontera, el verano pasado y unos pocos cientos han permanecido en el Valle del Río Grande

conforme la misión se fue reduciendo. Pero Abbott dice que las últimas tropas no pueden salir hasta que Texas contrate a cientos de policías estatales para reemplazarlos.

Más de 700 policías han solicitado empleo en la patrulla estatal.

En declaraciones a la prensa el viernes, Abbott dijo que su plan fronterizo generalizado, que ya ha sido aprobado por la Cámara de Representantes de Texas, añadiría “al menos 500 oficiales más”. Pero el presupuesto actual de la Cámara ha asignado dinero suficiente para financiar sólo un adicional de 300 oficiales.

Abbott se jactó sobre represen-

tantes demócratas que respaldan su plan de seguridad fronteriza, pero que el bipartidismo podría verse amenazado en la Legislatura, si las medidas más divisivas avanzan, en los últimos dos meses, de la sesión de 140 días. La próxima semana, un comité del Senado se establecerá para avanzar en una medida que eliminaría la llamada Ley DREAM de Texas que permite a los estudiantes que están ilegalmente en el país recibir una inscripción estatal.

Perry firmó la medida en ley en 2001. Abbott favorece la derogación.

“La forma en que la ley está escrita es defectuosa y debe arreglarse”, dijo Abbott.

MIGUEL ALEMÁN, MÉXICO

HISTORIA DE UNA MISIÓN

FESTIVAL INTERNACIONAL DE CINE A partir del 26 de marzo y hasta el 29 de marzo tendrá lugar el segundo Festival Internacional de Cine de Tamaulipas (FICTAM) 2015, en las ciudades de Nuevo Laredo, Reynosa, Victoria y Tampico, México.

Durante el festival se proyectarán los filmes mexicanos: “Los Hámsters” del director Gilberto González Penilla; “Llévate mis amores” dirigida por Arturo González Villaseñor; y se estrenará “González: Falsos profetas” bajo la dirección de Christian Díaz Pardo.

Las producciones, que conforman el FICTAM, se podrán apreciar en el teatro experimental del Centro Cultural Nuevo Laredo, del Parque Cultural Reynosa, del Espacio Cultural Metropolitano, en Tampico, y en la Cineteca del Centro Cultural Tamaulipas, en Ciudad Victoria.

Las proyecciones son gratuitas. Cada centro cultural ha establecido un horario de proyección, para más información puede ponerse en contacto con el centro de su interés.

CARRERA CONTRA AUTISMO El 4 de abril tendrá lugar la Primera Carrera para Concientizar sobre el Autismo del Condado de Zapata. La carrera comenzará a las 8 a.m. en el Palacio de Justicia del Condado de Zapata. La preinscripción tiene un costo de 10 dólares en active.com o en la Cámara de Comercio del Condado de Zapata en 800 de North Hwy 83 Zapata.

El costo de inscripción el día del evento será de 20 dólares.

Las categorías para la carrera de 5K son: 14 años y menores; de 15 años a 19 años; de 20 a 29 años; de 30 a 39 años; de 40 a 49 años; de 50 a 59 años; y de 60 en adelante.

CAMPAÑA MÉDICO-ASISTENCIAL MIGUEL ALEMAN — Se implementará la primer campaña médico asistencial propuesta por miembros de los ministerios nacionales “Betel” el 11 de junio, de 8 a.m. a 5 p.m.

El grupo de 15 personas, entre médicos y enfermeros, estarán representados por la misionera Deana Gatlin. Además traerán consigo ropa, medicamentos y despensas.

Foto de cortesía

En la imagen de archivo se observa a estudiantes de la escuela de educación especial de Miguel Alemán, México, durante una celebración por el "Día de Brujas".

Maestra recuerda inicio de escuela de educación especial POR MALENA CHARUR TIEMPO DE ZAPATA

Una mañana de julio de 1980, una joven de 18 años, con una especialización en deficiencia mental, se encontraba en la plaza principal de Miguel Alemán, México, con la misión de iniciar una escuela de educación especial en la región, proyecto que le había sido encomendado por la ARREDONDO jefa del departamento en el estado de Tamaulipas.

María Lorena Arredondo Arredondo, maestra de jardín de niños, con especialización en deficiencia mental y maestría en desarrollo humano, recuerda el día que llegó a esa ciudad sólo con el deseo de brindar herramientas para enriquecer la vida de estas personas especiales.

“Hazme el favor de abrir Miguel Alemán. No hay nada. Es desde tocar puertas, hacer publicidad, haz lo que se te ocurra para tener alumnos, me dijo la jefa del departamento”, relató Arredondo. “Siempre te voy a apoyar y procura hacer las cosas bien.

En una semana vengo a ver cómo vas”.

La inquietud de Arredondo por

Foto de cortesía

En la imagen de archivo se observa a personal y estudiantes de la escuela de educación especial de Miguel Alemán, México, presentan una tabla rítmica durante un desfile. especializarse en esta área surgió de la experiencia personal de tener una hermana con Síndrome Down y el deseo de conocer alternativas para ayudar a la familia y a los niños que requieren este tipo de educación.

“Fui a la presidencia y afortunadamente el presidente municipal era Amaro Guerra, quien es un maestro de profesión y eso era algo a mi favor porque podía comprender mi situación”, expresó Arredondo.

Agregó que le manifestó a Guerra su necesidad de conseguir un espacio y que la acompañara a buscar alumnos con necesidades especiales para dar servicio des-

de Guerrero hasta Camargo.

“Empecé por la calle 1 y me fui tocando puertas. Algunos me cerraron la puerta, otros me dijeron que estaba loca y otros más me dijeron que sus hijos no estaban locos”, indicó. “A los dos meses de tocar puertas y de realizar una labor de convencimiento, el 1 de Septiembre de 1980, empecé con 22 alumnos en dos aulas que nos prestaron donde iba a ser el CBTIS”.

Sus primeros alumnos provenían de Guerrero, Los Guerra, Mier, Miguel Alemán, Guardados de Arriba y Guardados de Abajo, México. Llegaron a tener alumnos desde 2 años hasta 45 años.

No fue sino hasta marzo que llegó la primera maestra a ayudarle.

“Llevábamos a los alumnos a Brownsville, al zoológico. Después conseguimos una camioneta y los recogíamos y los llevábamos de regreso a sus casas. Era una jornada de trabajo de 8 a.m. a 1 p.m. pero después decidimos darles dos horas más pues necesitaban desarrollar habilidades y ser funcionales como darles clases de belleza y de cocina entre otras cosas”, manifestó Arredondo.

A Arredondo le tocó escoger el terreno y estar en la colocación de la primera piedra en donde ahora se encuentra la Escuela de Educación Especial Juanita Balderas López que cuenta con cerca de 200 alumnos.

“Yo le digo a los padres vean quién el día de mañana se va a quedar con sus hijos. Denle armas a ellos para que puedan enfrentar la vida. Creo que hemos avanzado pero creo que falta mucho por hacer en sensibilizar a las personas, a la comunidad en general, a los maestros para atenderlos y a los papás”, expresó.

Arredondo es maestra orientadora en el Centro de Recursos e Información para la Integración Educativa (CRIE) en Nuevo Laredo.

FRONTERA

Cuellar pide acelerar fondos para sur de EU TIEMPO DE ZAPATA

Aprobar gastos con celeridad para la frontera sur de EU, de la misma manera en que se hace para su frontera norte, es el llamado que hizo el Congresista Henry Cuellar (D-Laredo).

La oficina del congresista hizo llegar su comentario a través de una publicación del servicio de noticias Notimex.

En el artículo, Cuellar

asegura que por Laredo pasan 12.000 trailers diariamente, por lo cual, aunque no se opone a la inversión en la frontera que comparten Estados Unidos y Canadá, sostuvo que existen necesidades.

Lo anterior sucedió durante la comparecencia del Secretario de Seguridad Nacional de EU, Jeh Johnson, ante el comité para defender el presupuesto del DHS para el

año fiscal del 2016.

DHS autorizó 100 millones de dólares para construir un puente entre Michigan y Canadá, además de 50 millones anuales en salarios para el personal, de acuerdo a lo publicado por Notimex.

“Quiero ve más puentes y no muros o cercas en la frontera norte o sur, pero no entiendo”, dijo Cuellar, en la publicación. “No quiero poner a competir al

sur con el norte, esa no es mi intención ... (pero) debemos atender a la frontera sur cuando se trata de comercio”.

Johnson dijo ante los congresistas que el nuevo puente en Michigan se construye debido a que el cruce actual entre Detroit y Windsor no es suficiente. Esto conllevará la ubicación de una plaza aduanal.

Según Notimex, Cuellar

comprende la justificación del nuevo cruce internacional en el norte de EU, pero agregó que es necesario invertir más en la infraestructura del sur.

En reportes del Banco Norteamericano de Desarrollo (NADBANK) son necesarios mil millones de dólares anuales, durante un periodo de 10 años, para poder modernizar la infraestructura fronteriza, indica la nota.

PAGE 10A

Zentertainment

SATURDAY, MARCH 28, 2015

So long, ‘Suze Orman Show’

By HANK STUEVER THE WASHINGTON POST

Saturday night’s final episode, after 13 years, of CNBC’s "The Suze Orman Show" might be viewed as one more positive indicator of an economic recovery. If Suze is moving on, could this somehow mean that Americans finally got their acts together and are back on the job, above water on their mortgages and storing adequate nuts away for the bitter financial winters that will surely come?

If you watch her financial advice show then you know this is certainly not the case.

In recent episodes, callers and on-camera guests have had the nerve to tell Suze (it feels almost wrong to refer to her by her last name, especially since she refers to most everyone as "girlfriend" and "boyfriend") that they’re considering borrowing from their 401(k) bal-

Photo by Barbara Nike/CNBC | Washington Post

Suze Orman sits at the desk of the show she helmed for a dozen years on CNBC. ances to pay off other debts.

They’re still mentioning car leases — one of Suze’s biggest no-no’s. They’ve cosigned student loans and car loans for children and grandchildren, which breaks her heart. Worst of all, they’re thinking about investing in whole-life insurance policies. That always sets her off.

"Really, people, are you kidding me?" she will vent

at some point in almost every episode. "How long have you been watching ‘The Suze Orman Show?’"

Forever, it seems.

"I’m worried about them," Suze said earlier this week in a phone interview, and by "them" she means, well, all of us. "At the end of this (final) show, I make a statement that I wasn’t expecting to, that I am genuinely worried about everyone — what

will they do now? Who will listen to them when they have no money, when they are desperate to find ways to get (out of debt)? There’s nobody out there who cares about them."

For a brief moment that coincided with corporate bailouts and stimulus plans, TV seemed eager to connect to Americans’ personal anxieties about the economy, with shows about extreme coupon clippers and gold hunters and a number of documentaries about the working poor.

The Great Recession faded, either on paper or in memory, and now, if you keep channel-surfing, it’s clear that certain fantasies are back firmly in place: On HGTV, people shop for vacation homes in the high six figures. On Bravo and Lifetime, quasi-celebrities surround themselves in the latest iterations of bling. "People first," goes Suze’s motto.

"Then money. Then things."

Diesel: Oscars ignore action

By LOUISE WATT ASSOCIATED PRESS

BEIJING — Vin Diesel said Friday that the latest “Fast & Furious” film deserves a best picture Oscar but has two strikes against it when it comes to the Academy — it’s an action flick and it’s a sequel.

“Do I shy away from aiming high? No, I don’t,” said the 47-year-old actor, who has appeared in virtually all of the “Fast & Furious” action films based around fast cars. He spoke to The Associated Press while in Beijing to promote the new film.

“And yet we all know that there’s a little stigma towards action films, we know it, we’ve heard people complain about it, we’ve heard Marvel complain

Photo by Andrew Medichini | AP file

In this April 29, 2011, file photo, Actor Vin Diesel poses during the photo call of the movie "Fast and Furious 5" in Rome. about it, we’ve heard DC complain about it, and now Harry Potter, Hunger Games, Batman has never gotten a shot at that,” he said.

Alluding to the fact that many of the recent Oscar best picture winners haven’t fared well at the box office, Diesel said: “The Oscars have been somewhat criti-

cized in the last couple of years for maybe not being as populist as they could be, but we have a very powerful movie here.”

He said that “Fast & Furious 7” has an “emotional toll,” which may make people argue that it is more directed toward women.

“We’re actually responding to the fact that our woman

audience has just increased and has either eclipsed or threatening to eclipse our male audience, we’ve seen that across the board,” said Diesel, who also produces the Universal Pictures’ movie. Diesel said that the Academy hasn’t given a best picture Oscar to a sequel since a 1974 movie — “The Godfather: Part II.” However, the nod has gone more recently to the final film in a trilogy, “The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King” in 2004.

In “Fast & Furious 7,” Diesel plays street racer Dominic Toretto, whose family is threatened by Jason Statham’s character, who is out for revenge for the death of his brother. Statham said audiences will be able to relate to the fact that both men are standing up for their family.

Photo by Mark Runnacles | AP file

In this May 24, 2014, file photo, Zayn Malik of boy band One Direction sings during a performance, in Glasgow, Scotland.

Malik worried he let fans down ASSOCIATED PRESS

LONDON — Zayn Malik says he worries that he’s let One Direction fans down by leaving the worldconquering boy band, but couldn’t carry on in a role that made him unhappy.

Malik quit the group this week, saying he wanted “to be a normal 22-yearold.” He had earlier pulled out of One Direction’s world tour, citing stress.

He told Friday’s edition of Britain’s Sun newspaper that “I did try to do something that I wasn’t happy doing for a while” to keep fans happy.

“I only ever tried to do it for the fans, and it was only ever for them,” he said.

He said he felt upset that “I may have let them down in some sort of way.”

“It’s not that I’ve turned my back on them or any-

thing, it’s just that I can’t do that anymore because it’s not real to me,” he said.

And he said his bandmates had been “really supportive” of his decision.

One Direction formed in 2010 after five teenagers — Harry Styles, Liam Payne, Niall Horan, Louis Tomlinson and Malik — auditioned individually for the British TV talent show “The X Factor.” Simon Cowell had the idea of putting them together as a boy band.

They didn’t win the competition, but they went on to top charts and win young hearts around the world.

The four remaining members say they will carry on as One Direction.

“They still want to do it for a while,” Malik said. “I think they’re going to be cool.”

SATURDAY, MARCH 28, 2015

THE ZAPATA TIMES 11A

Monsanto denies Roundup cancer concerns

By ANDREW POLLACK NEW YORK TIMES

Thirty years ago, an Environmental Protection Agency committee determined that the popular weed killer Roundup might cause cancer. Six years later, in 1991, the agency reversed itself after re-evaluating the mouse study that had been the basis for the original conclusion.

Now the issue is back again, in an even bigger way. An agency of the World Health Organization has declared that glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup, "probably" causes cancer in people. One piece of evidence the agency cites is that same mouse study.

The declaration drew an angry response from Monsanto, the maker of Roundup, which has accused the agency of having an "agenda" and "cherry picking" the data to support its case.

The conclusion is "starkly at odds" with the findings of "every credible scientific body that has examined glyphosate safety," Philip Miller, Monsanto’s vice presi-

dent for global regulatory affairs, told reporters Tuesday. That includes a recent review by German regulators on behalf of the European Union.

The new controversy and the reversal by the EPA decades ago demonstrate how the same data can be interpreted differently and how complicated and politically perilous such a decision can be. But the discrepancy between Monsanto and the health organization can be partly explained by the way its agency analyzes the data.

Officials at the agency, the International Agency for Research on Cancer, said they had no agenda other than to inform the World Health Organization. They said the conclusion was based on studies of people, laboratory animals and cells.

"All three lines of evidence sort of said the same thing, which is we ought to be concerned about this," said Aaron Blair, a retired epidemiologist from the National Cancer Institute who was chairman of the group

Photo by Dan Gill | AP file

This July 5, 2008, file photo shows a farmer holding Monsanto’s Roundup Ready Soy Bean seeds at his family farm in Bunceton, Mo. of 17 reviewers from around the world; agreement on the classification was unanimous.

Glyphosate, introduced in the 1970s, is the most widely used herbicide in the world, sprayed on farms, in forests, on roadsides and in gardens, and has a reputation for being benign, as pesticides go. It is now generic and used in many products, not only Roundup.

Use of glyphosate has soared in the past two decades because of Monsanto’s Roundup Ready crops,

which account for most corn and soybeans grown in the United States. These crops are genetically engineered to withstand glyphosate, allowing farmers to spray their fields to kill weeds without harming the crops.

Monsanto executives said this week that they did not expect the agency’s action to affect sales. But that could depend on whether regulators around the world impose restrictions on glyphosate use after the WHO pronouncement. A spokes-

FAMILY Continued from Page 1A brothers dutifully served their county. They were brave, fearlessly taking down enemy planes and saving fellow soldiers by covering them with their own bodies to shield them from incoming enemy fire.

“After four and half years of wartime, the Treviño family was finally reunited. By June of 1946, all six of the brothers had returned home to Zapata, Texas. They were proud of

man for the California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment said it was evaluating whether products containing glyphosate might have to be labeled as posing a cancer hazard under the state’s Proposition 65.

Some consumer and environmental groups said Friday that the findings strengthen the case for the labeling of genetically modified foods. They also called upon the EPA to re-evaluate glyphosate and a newer weed killer from Dow Chemical that combines glyphosate and another herbicide, 2,4-D. The EPA said it would consider the WHO agency’s finding in a review it was doing of glyphosate. The EPA has maintained its classification of glyphosate as having "evidence of noncarcinogenicity for humans" since 1991, including through a review last year.

The International Agency for Research on Cancer looks at a very narrow question: whether a substance or behavior might cause cancer under some

circumstances, even if those circumstances might be unlikely to occur. It does not weigh the benefit versus the risks of a chemical, leaving that up to national regulators.

The agency classifies alcoholic beverages as human carcinogens, along with tobacco, arsenic and asbestos.

Working the night shift or being a hairdresser are classified as probably cancercausing, the same as glyphosate, because one job disrupts the body’s circadian rhythms and the other involves exposure to dyes.

Coffee is a "possible" carcinogen, a lower level.

Overall, the agency has reviewed 983 things like chemicals and occupations.

About half could not be classified based on the evidence. Only one compound, caprolactam, which is used to make a type of nylon, had enough evidence in its favor to be judged "probably not" carcinogenic.

Monsanto and some regulators say the preponderance of studies shows no cancer risk from glyphosate.

BORDER Continued from Page 1A

their service, and it is with great pleasure that they share their experiences with their children and grandchildren.

“Mister Speaker, I am honored to have the opportunity to recognize the Treviño family for their incredible service to our great nation and their fellow countrymen during World War II. I thank you for this time.”

trooper jobs.

Speaking to reporters Friday, Abbott said his sweeping border plan that has already been approved by the Texas House would add “at least 500 more” troopers.

But the current House budget set aside enough money to only fund an additional 300 troopers.

Abbott bragged over House Democrats backing his border security plan, but that bipartisanship could be threatened in the Legislature if more divisive measures advance in the final two months of the 140day session. Next week, a Senate committee is set to advance a measure that

would eliminate the socalled Texas DREAM Act, which allows students who are in the country illegally to receive in-state tuition.

Perry signed the measure into law in 2001. Abbott favors a repeal.

“The way the law is written is flawed and must be fixed,” Abbott said.

VISA Continued from Page 1A Forbes, who had worked in public relations and on political campaigns, turned to the media with his problem. Once the Associated Press queried the State Department spokeswoman and wrote about the case, the response to Chua’s request changed quickly, Forbes said.

"It put a firecracker where we needed one," he said.

The State Department is now working with the Department of

Homeland Security on his application for a "humanitarian parole" to enter the country, Forbes said. State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said that "our team is looking into it," according to the AP. Born with a single heart ventricle that inhibited circulation, Chua has already undergone several heart surgeries. His condition worsened when he turned 18, according to his doctor, Er-

nesto Duarte Tagles, and the "only treatment option" was a double heart-liver transplant, a procedure not available in Mexico. Chua cannot attend school or even stand up for long stretches.

In November he went to the consulate to apply for his visa and the U.S. officials asked for a letter from the hospital and evidence that he could pay for the medical procedures, he said. He

supplied those things, but he was told his application had been denied.

"They didn’t give me any explanation, they only told me they were sorry about my situation but they couldn’t give me a visa," Chua said in a telephone interview. "This is my life we’re talking about."

Chua has still not received permission to travel, but he hopes the growing public aware-

ness of his case will help.

"There are many people who are upset by what they’re doing to me," he said. "I don’t know what motives they have to deny me the visa. I’m very sad. I’m desperate. Because it’s very difficult to be sick like this. I couldn’t explain to you in words how it feels to be in bed and not be able to do anything."

"They have to give me this visa to save my life," he said.

TUITION Continued from Page 1A lative consent 14 years ago — allows undocumented students who have lived in Texas for at least three years and pledge to apply for legal status as soon as they can under federal law to pay in-state tuition rates.

Campbell’s bill would end that, and allow universities to establish a policy to “verify to the satisfaction of the institution” that a student is a legal resident or citizen.

Eliminating in-state tuition was a hallmark of Patrick’s campaign. The Houston Republican’s campaign literature proudly boasted of his attempt to eliminate the provision in 2011. Other Republicans have argued that the policy acts as a “magnet” that lures undocumented youths to Texas.

Supporters of the tuition rule argue that it makes sense economically,

since the state invests thousands of dollars to educate the children in public schools. Shutting off their opportunities to excel in college, the supporters say, hinders their potential contributions to the state’s economy.

As of 2013, about 2 percent of the state’s college students — 24,770 — were taking advantage of the policy, according to data from the Texas Higher Education Coordinating

Board analyzed by the Center for Public Policy Priorities, an Austin-based liberal think tank. The CPPP also estimates that in 2010, undocumented immigrants paid $1.6 billion in taxes, which helped support higher education institutions in Texas.

Those statistics, in part, could underlie a showdown on the issue between the House and Senate.

When the session began

in January, state Rep. John Zerwas, R-Richmond, said he supports the current policy despite the political firestorm it’s caused. On Wednesday, Zerwas, chairman of the House Higher Education Committee, said debating the policy is healthy, but he still stands behind it.

If SB 1819 passes the Senate, Zerwas said it likely won’t be referred to his committee but instead the House Committee on State

Affairs. The chairman of that committee, state Rep. Byron Cook, R-Corsicana, said his support for the current policy is doubletiered.

“Number one, Texas made a commitment to these students, and as Texans we should honor our word,” he said. “Additionally, it would seem to me that having educated young people is much more productive for the economy of the state.”

12A THE ZAPATA TIMES

SATURDAY, MARCH 28, 2015

Jail illegally keeping juveniles in solitary

By JULIET LINDERMAN ASSOCIATED PRESS

BALTIMORE — Teenagers awaiting trial on adult charges in Baltimore are being kept in solitary confinement for far too long — up to 143 days in one case, according to a highly critical review by the U.S. Justice Department’s Division of Civil Rights.

Federal prosecutors say being isolated for more than a few days can damage a person’s mental health — especially if it’s a teenager whose brain is still developing. But teenagers accused of breaking rules inside the Baltimore City Detention Center are being isolated for 13 days on average, and in some cases, far longer.

The latest federal review found some improvements, but concluded that eight years after the state of Maryland entered into an agreement with the Justice Department, the embattled jail is still vio-

lating state laws and the U.S. Constitution when it comes to handling teens in custody: — Very few staffers have any training in adolescent development, trauma, and mental health and developmental disabilities, the review found.

— The jail is failing to consistently provide its teens with drug treatment, anger management programs, education, rehabilitation or even exercise, which the federal prosecutors described as their constitutional right.

— One minor, RC, spent 143 days in seclusion. Another, EM, spent 53 of his 105 days in solitary confinement at the detention center.

— When juveniles are accused of breaking a rule, they are put into seclusion for 7 to 14 days for a first offense, and must wait roughly 80 days before a disciplinary hearing is held.

“This is grossly exces-

Photo by Patrick Semansky | AP file

In this June 6, 2013, file photo, a prisoner transport van departs from the Baltimore City Detention Center in Baltimore. sive and violates basic principles of Due Process,” the Justice Department concludes. “It is even more troubling for the 24 percent of juveniles in seclusion who are ultimately found not guilty under the disciplinary process.”

The letter was based in part on a site visit last August and delivered just as Stephen Moyer, a police veteran who served as deputy Juvenile Services secretary in Maryland,

Jury rules against Pao in sex-bias lawsuit

By HEATHER SOMERVILLE AND JULIA LOVE SAN JOSE MERCURY NEWS

SAN FRANCISCO — Ellen Pao lost her three-year battle with one of the world’s most prestigious venture capital firms on Friday when a jury found that Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers did not discriminate against her because of her gender.

A jury of 12 found that Kleiner Perkins did not discriminate or retaliate against Pao when firm leaders chose not to promote her, and then fired her after a tumultuous seven-year career.

On the third day of deliberation, which followed four weeks of testimony, the jury reached its verdict: That Pao’s gender had not been a substantial factor in Kleiner Perkins’ decisions not to promote her and, ultimately, to fire her.

By siding with Kleiner Perkins, the jury validated the argument the venture firm spent a month building: Pao failed to make it because she was difficult to work with and, despite being given mentorship and "every opportunity to succeed," she didn’t have the skills to be an investor — and had no interest in following advice to improve, Kleiner attorney Lynne Hermle said.

Nine of the 12 jurors had to agree to reach a verdict.

The panel was half men, half women, and included a mix of races and professions — a prison nurse, teacher’s aide, Genentech manager and painter among them.

Pao sued for $16 million in lost wages; because the jury found Kleiner did not harm her, she will walk away with nothing. The ju-

ry’s verdict also spares Kleiner from paying punitive damages, which could have amounted to close to $150 million.

Pao sued Kleiner Perkins in May 2012, just five months before top male partners at the firm told her to pack up and leave. She made four claims against the firm: Kleiner Perkins discriminated against Pao because of her gender by failing to promote her and eventually firing her; the firm retaliated against her because she complained about discrimination both in conversations and in a memo to partners; the firm failed to take all reasonable steps to prevent discrimination against her; and Kleiner Perkins retaliated against her by firing her because she filed the lawsuit while she was still employed.

The trial rocked the small and insular venture capital world, and the larger tech industry it funds, which has in the last year has been under intensifying scrutiny for the lack of women in senior management and tech roles. Pao’s case captured the attention of media across the globe, spotlighting Silicon Valley — usually hailed for its forward-thinking innovation and an enviable entrepreneurial spirit — for its entrenched sexism that has resulted in a woeful lack of diversity.

But the verdict suggested that Pao may not become the crusader for gender equality many women in the tech industry hoped for.

The defense tried to paint a portrait of Pao as entitled, selfish, uncooperative and widely disliked by entrepreneurs and fellow venture capitalists.

Pao had alleged in her suit that she had an intim-

ate relationship with colleague Ajit Nazre, who had lied to her about being separated from his wife. After Pao ended the on-and-off relationship - which she originally said she was forced into - he retaliated against her but cutting her out of email discussions and excluding her from meetings, she testified. But Kleiner showed in court dozens of text messages and emails that suggested a loving relationship between Pao and Nazre, and she ultimately intervened to prevent him from being fired after their relationship ended. Nazre was eventually dismissed in 2012 after making sexual advances toward another female partner.

Kleiner won the case, but it did not emerge unscathed. Throughout the trial, Kleiner was portrayed as a boys’ club in which a male partner tried to force his way into the hotel room of a female colleague and business associates talked of the Playboy Mansion and porn stars on business trips.

The case will almost certainly force Kleiner to change how it hires and deals with employee complaints, experts say.

"I don’t think that this will encourage Kleiner to focus on hiring more women, but I bet there will be more of a care not just around documentation (of HR issues) but also about culture fit when hiring into the company," said Jason Hanold, an expert on HR issues and chief executive of Hanold Associates.

Other firms, too, are likely taking a hard look at themselves. Many venture firms do not have formal HR departments, and one Kleiner partner testified during the trial that "policies" of any sort were uncommon at venture firms.

was confirmed to run the state’s jails and prisons.

Moyer pledged to make juvenile detention reforms a top priority.

State prisons spokesman Gerard Shields told The Associated Press on Friday that even juveniles held in seclusion are let out of their cells from 9 a.m.-2 p.m. to attend school, and that 30 guards have completed new training with the state Department of Juvenile Services.

Many jails routinely

isolate teenagers — the American Civil Liberties Union estimates that of the roughly 100,000 juveniles incarcerated, 17,000 have been in solitary confinement. This often happens so that adult jails can comply with the “sight and sound separation” required by the federal Prison Rape Elimination Act since 2012.

But in Baltimore’s jail, which already keeps juveniles separate from adults, isolation is used primarily to punish alleged rule-breakers, they found.

Federal investigators concluded nearly 15 years ago that isolating youths in cells for lengthy periods was “excessive and potentially harmful.”

Eight years have passed since the jail promised it would change.

“It’s really disturbing to know these kids are being held in isolation, and that the department is continuing to use solitary confinement,” said Kara

Aanenson, director of advocacy for Just Kids Partnership. “I see the ramifications: pacing back and forth, having a hard time being in a room with the door closed. These things impact them for the rest of their lives.”

Jabriera Handy, now 23, said she spent 11 months at the Baltimore City Detention Center when she was 17 after she was charged with second-degree murder in the death of her grandmother. She said she’s still haunted by the 36 days she spent in seclusion.

“Now I pace the floor all the time. I’m always pacing because that’s all I did when I was in there,” Handy said. “After that, when I was assigned to a room by myself I hurt myself because I didn’t want to be there anymore. I scratched my arms up. I broke my own pinkie because I punched a wall. I bit my tongue. Solitary confinement took a toll on my mental state.”

SATURDAY, MARCH 28, 2015

ON THE WEB: THEZAPATATIMES.COM

Sports&Outdoors MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL

Rangers’ rebound Photo by David J. Phillip | AP

Houston Astros designated hitter Chris Carter tied for second in the league with 37 home runs last season.

Astros eye continued improvement Houston looking to take next step after climbing out of basement last season

By KRISTIE RIEKEN Photo by Charlie Riedel | AP

ASSOCIATED PRESS

With ace Yu Darvish sidelined for the season, Yovani Gallardo will be the opening day starter for the Texas Rangers.

HOUSTON — The Houston Astros moved out of the major league basement last season.

Now the question is whether Jose Altuve and his teammates are ready to contend this year or if they still need a couple of seasons to complete their rebuild and get back to the postseason.

Owner Jim Crane is confident the time is now.

“This is our year,” he said, adding that their goal is to make the playoffs.

The Astros made a 19game improvement in

Texas attempts bounce back from last season

By STEPHEN HAWKINS ASSOCIATED PRESS

When Yu Darvish pitched only one inning this spring before seasonending elbow surgery, the Texas Rangers were already off to an ominous start.

The Rangers lost their ace even before what they are still hoping will be a comeback season.

“There is no way to spin that, other than it’s a tough deal for us. He’s

one of the best pitchers in the game,” general manager Jon Daniels said this spring. “That being said, it’s one guy. It’s not 17.

Good teams and good organizations have had similar news at similar times before and found a way.

That’s got to be our mentality.”

Texas had 22 different players spend time on the disabled list last season, including Darvish missing the final seven weeks with elbow inflammation

before needing Tommy John ligament-replacement surgery this spring.

The aching result for the Rangers was the American League’s worst record (67-95) and their most losses since 1985, ending an impressive four-year run of 90-win seasons with their only two World Series appearances (2010-11).

Darvish was 10-7 and an All-Star again before getting sidelined last season.

As for the top of the rotation without him, the January trade to get local pitcher Yovani Gallardo proved even more important. Gallardo, who can be a free agent after this season, started the last five season openers for Milwaukee.

Derek Holland, who didn’t pitch until September last season after knee surgery, had a strong finish. Shoulder soreness

See RANGERS PAGE 2B

NBA: OKLAHOMA CITY THUNDER

2014 to win 70 games and snap a streak of three straight 100-loss seasons. They beefed up a bullpen that struggled last year and added more pop to a lineup that was fourth in the majors with 163 homers in 2014 in an attempt to take another step in 2015.

“These guys are all professional baseball players and they all want to win,” general manager Jeff Luhnow said. “We’re not going to set any limitations on them. It’s up to them at this point. We’ve done our work for the offsea-

See ASTROS PAGE 2B

NCAA FOOTBALL: VANDERBILT

Photo by Sue Ogrocki | AP

Photo by Eric Christian Smith | AP

The Oklahoma City Thunder announced Friday that Kevin Durant will have bone graft surgery next week to deal with a fractured bone in his right foot and he will miss the rest of the season.

Vanderbilt quarterback Patton Robinette is quitting football to focus on medical school and cited past injuries as contributing to the decision.

Durant to miss season QB gives up football after another surgery ASSOCIATED PRESS

By CLIFF BRUNT ASSOCIATED PRESS

OKLAHOMA CITY — NBA MVP Kevin Durant will miss the rest of the season and have bone graft surgery next week to treat a fractured bone in his right foot.

The Oklahoma City Thunder had said last week he likely would be shut down for the season.

The team was trying to figure out why his pain remained long after he was supposed to be able to play.

General manager Sam Presti said Friday the team expects Durant to return to basketball activ-

ities within the four to six months.

He said this decision was aimed at Durant’s “long-term health and stability” and represented a consensus of Durant and his representatives, specialists and the team. The procedure was termed the “most proactive and recommended approach.”

The Thunder are in position to make the playoffs without Durant, but they clearly will miss one of the game’s most dynamic players.

Durant last played Feb. 19 before the discomfort became too much to bear. He has played in just 27 games, averaging 25.4 points, 6.6

rebounds and 4.1 assists.

Durant had his initial surgery in October and had been healing well. But in late February, he had a procedure to replace a screw that was rubbing against another bone. After that second surgery, the Thunder expected him to return in one to two weeks.

Durant then consulted with three foot and ankle specialists. It was determined there still was pain from the rubbing, plus regression in the initial break. It was then decided to proceed with the bone graft, Presti said.

See DURANT PAGE 2B

NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Vanderbilt quarterback Patton Robinette has decided to end his football career early to concentrate on medical school.

Robinette, a junior, said in a statement released by the school he informed his teammates of his decision Friday morning after letting Vanderbilt coach Derek Mason know on Thursday. Robinette said his history of injuries contributed to his choice.

“This has been a very difficult decision to make,” Robinette said.

“This team means the world to me and I love playing football more than anything. It’s been tough coming to a decision that is right for my family and

(me), and protects my health and future.

Robinette plans to enter the Vanderbilt School of Medicine this summer to study orthopedics.

“I’ve been very deliberate in coming to this decision,” Robinette said. “it’s difficult, but I’m really excited to move forward to the next chapter of my life and really to see what the field of medicine has in store for me.”

Robinette was Vanderbilt’s most experienced quarterback and was expected to compete for the starting job. His departure leaves Wade Freebeck, Johnny McCrary, Shawn Stankavage and Kyle Shurmur as the remaining candidates.

Robinette who opened last season as Vanderbilt’s

starter before being hampered by injuries. He sprained his knee in the season opener and later sustained a concussion that sidelined him for six weeks.

In two seasons, Robinette went 89 of 155 for 1,096 yards passing with seven touchdowns and eight interceptions. He also rushed for 277 yards and nine touchdowns, including a game-winning 5yard score with 16 seconds left in a 14-10 victory at Tennessee in 2013.

“Patton Robinette is one of the most fierce competitors that I’ve ever had the pleasure to coach,” Mason said in a statement. “He’s been a winner on every level and a guy that others look to for leadership.”

PAGE 2B

Zscores

SATURDAY, MARCH 28, 2015

Sam says he’s not NFL’s only gay player

By CHAREAN WILLIAMS FORT WORTH STAR-TELEGRAM

DALLAS - Michael Sam made history in becoming the first openly gay player drafted into the NFL. But he insists he does not stand alone.

Sam declined to estimate how many gay athletes play in the NFL. But he said Thursday that several players contacted him after the St. Louis Rams made Sam a seventh-round draft pick last year.

"I am not the only gay person in the NFL," Sam said Thursday.

"I’m just saying there 1/8are3/8 a lot of us. I respect the players that did reach out to me and had the courage to tell me that they were also gay, but they do not have the same courage as I do to come out before I even played a down in the NFL. "Was it a risky move? Yes. But at that moment, the reason why I came out is I thought it wasn’t going to be a big deal. Maybe I was naive. Maybe I thought it was 2014, and people will understand that there’s gay NFL players. There’s gay athletes everywhere. But I was clearly wrong.

It was a huge deal.

"The players who have reached out to me and told me about their sexual orientation, it just means a lot. But I will never say anything about who they are, what teams they are 1/8on3/8. I’m just saying there’s some famous people, and I’m not the only one."

Sam, who spent seven weeks on the Dallas Cowboys’ practice squad, spoke at the 2015 Dallas Holocaust Museum Upstander

Photo by Rick Scuteri | AP

Defensive end Michael Sam spoke at an event Thursday and said he is not the only gay player in the NFL. Speaker series. He gave an 11minute prepared speech, which he said his publicist helped write, before a 35-minute Q&A. The defensive end never got another chance in the NFL after the Cowboys released him Oct. 21. He worked out at the veterans combine over the weekend but ran a 4.99 in the 40-yard dash. He had run a 4.91 at the NFL Scouting Combine a year

ago.

"Hopefully I’m not being discriminated 1/8against3/8 because I’m gay," Sam said. "I don’t believe that I’m being discriminated 1/8against3/8 because I’m gay. I just want to know if I’m truly not in the NFL, it’s because of talent. Let it be because of my talents. But you’ve got to prove that I can’t play this game. If you look at the film, clearly I can. So,

I’ll leave it at that."

Sam, 25, has made a living as a celebrity. He has 9-1 odds to win Dancing with the Stars Season 20, trailing only Nastia Liukin, Rumer Willis and Riker Lynch, according to gambling website Bovada.

He cited his NFL unemployment as a reason other players haven’t come out.

"Dancing with the Stars is my

employer," Sam said. "That’s my main source of income. . I’m unemployed, and I don’t believe I’m out of the NFL because I’m gay.

But if it was a reason, it can hurt their livelihood, and you don’t want to take that chance."

Sam was adamant that all he wants to do "is to be a football player." But he later was asked about a Google search of his name, which mentions several other things before getting to his football career.

"What," the questioner asks, "would you rather a Google search say for you?"

"That’s a good question," Sam said. "I don’t really Google myself. I would rather it says, ’Michael Sam did something very historic. Michael Sam is changing history. Michael Sam is changing lives.’ I’d rather it not even say, ’Michael Sam the football player,’ as long as it says, ’Michael Sam is changing lives.

Michael Sam is making a difference. Michael Sam is standing for others who can’t stand for themselves.’ " Sam, the 2014 ESPY’s winner of the Arthur Ashe Courage Award and the 2015 Human Campaign’s Upstander Award, talked of the price he has paid as a gay man.

He revealed he has not talked to his father since Michael Sam Sr. criticized his son’s lifestyle in an interview with The New York Times in February. It came shortly after Sam texted his father news of his homosexuality.

The quotes by his father, Sam said, were "unforgivable."

"I still love him, but I can love him from afar," he said.

RANGERS Continued from Page 1B slowed the left-hander this spring, but that likely set him up to start the home opener April 10 against Houston, in the fifth game of the season.

Also among the injured in 2014 were slugger Prince Fielder and Shin-Soo Choo, the big offensive additions before last season.

Fielder had missed only one game the previous five seasons with Detroit and Milwaukee before being limited to only 42 games and three home runs in his Rangers debut because a herniated disk in his neck that required surgery. Choo played 123 games, but his on-base percentage dipped from .423 in 2013 for Cincinnati to .340 before operations late last season for a bone spur in his left elbow and torn cartilage in his left ankle.

“There’s no telling what this ballclub can do,” new manager Jeff Banister said.

“They’ve yet to have an opportunity to play together.

Let’s hope they get a really strong shot of playing together for 162-plus

Photo by Tony Gutierrez | AP

Texas Rangers third baseman Adrian Beltre hit .324 last season with 79 runs and 77 RBI. (games).”

Here are a few things to know about the Rangers, who open the season April 6 at Oakland: CLOSING TIME Neftali Feliz is back in his World Series role for the Rangers as their closer after an ill-fated and injuryplagued attempt to be a starter. The right-hander was 3-1 with a 3.16 ERA in

eight games (seven starts) in 2012 before Tommy John surgery. Feliz was 2-1 with 13 saves in 14 chances with a 1.99 ERA in 30 relief appearances after rejoining the Rangers last July, just before Joakim Soria was traded.

BELTRE’S IMPACT Third baseman Adrian Beltre is going into his 17th major league season, his

fifth with the Rangers and signed through next season. “He’s the heart and soul of this club,” Banister said. “A shining light in the storm, that’s what he was last year. ... Do yourself a favor and watch that last atbat he put together in 2014.” Determined not to be the final out of the season, Beltre went from an 0-2 count to getting a single on

DURANT the third straight slider thrown after that.

LEFT OF CENTER With pretty much every other defensive position set, Jake Smolinski and Ryan Ruo entered spring as candidates in left field. Both showed promising glimpses in short stints in their major league debuts the second half of last season.

Ryan Ludwick, who made his major league debut with Texas in 2002 and played for five other teams the past decade, was a nonroster invitee who could play left. Michael Choice, who got 35 of his 55 outfield starts in left last year, was the early man out when optioned to the minors in mid-March. Choo moves from left to right after Alex Rios departed in free agency.

MISSING WORK The 26 different DL stints for the Rangers last season amounted to 2,281 days lost.

That was 833 more than Arizona, who had the second most, and more than double any other American League team.

Continued from Page 1B A week ago, Presti said Durant was struggling and the team did not want to rush him back. When asked if it would be best to end Durant’s season, Presti said: “Essentially, that’s the direction that we’re taking right now.”

Presti said the bone graft is a common procedure to fix the less than 10 percent of such foot operations that don’t work out.

“While everyone is disappointed that Kevin falls into that group, we are encouraged that the bone graft procedure has historically demonstrated long-term health and stability,” Presti said.

The Thunder entered Friday three games ahead of Phoenix for the No. 8 spot in the Western Conference standings. Point guard Russell Westbrook has emerged as an MVP candidate. He leads the league with 27.3 points per game while averaging 8.7 assists and 7.1 rebounds.

ASTROS Continued from Page 1B son.”

The Astros blew 25 saves last season, a statistic that troubled Crane more than any other number associated with his team. His first order of business this offseason was to bring in players to get that number down this year.

To that end, Houston added relievers Luke Gregerson and Pat Neshek. Gregerson appeared in 72 games for the Athletics last season and posted a 2.12 ERA and Neshek saw action in 71 games for St. Louis in 2014 with a 1.87 ERA. A lineup that already had power aplenty with Chris Carter, whose 37 homers tied for second in the majors last season, and George Springer, who hit 20 in just 78 games, now has more sluggers with the addition of Evan Gattis and Colby Rasmus. Gattis has hit 43 homers combined in his first two major league seasons and Rasmus has hit at least 22 home runs in two of the last three years.

That power is what excites first-year manager A.J. Hinch most about his team.

“We have a chance to be a dangerous lineup,” Hinch

Photo by David Goldman | AP

Houston Astros second baseman Jose Altuve set a team record with 225 hits last season and won the batting title with a .341 average. said with a smile.

Some things to know about the 2015 Astros: EXPECTATIONS FOR ALTUVE Altuve became the first Astros player to win a batting title by hitting .341 last season. He set a team record with 225 hits, was third in the majors with 47 doubles, had 59 RBIs and tied for second in the

league with 56 stolen bases.

So what does Luhnow expect the 24-year-old second baseman to do for an encore?

“He’s going to be a .300 career hitter, which are few and far between,” Luhnow said. “So there’s going to be years like with most of these great hitters where they hit .340 and years that

they hit .305. In my mind Altuve is an elite major league hitter and we’re going to see it year in and year out.”

SPRINGER’S SECOND YEAR Springer, the 11th overall pick in the 2011 draft, hit .231 with 20 homers and 51 RBIs in 78 games as a rookie. He injured his left quadriceps on July 20 and he

didn’t play again. The Astros are eager to see what the right fielder can do in a full season.

“He’s got a ton of potential,” Hinch said. “He’s a dynamic player. He can do a lot of different things in a lot of different ways. Everybody sort of sits up in their seats when he comes up to bat. I think there’s a chance

for him to have impact in all (areas) of the game, which is hard to come by.”

CAN ROTATION BE CONSISTENT? Dallas Keuchel (12-9, 2.93 ERA) and Collin McHugh (11-9, 2.73) had breakout seasons in 2014, but can they perform at that level in a second year to lead the rotation? Keuchel posted ERAs of over 5.00 in both of his first two seasons before being chosen this year’s opening day starter with his work last year, and McHugh had ERAs of 7.59 and 10.04 in his first two years before his success in 2014.

ANOTHER NEW SKIPPER Counting interim managers, Hinch is the seventh manager the Astros have had since 2009. He was hired just after last season following the firing of Bo Porter, who was let go near the end of his second season.

This is the second time the 40-year-old Hinch has led a team after he managed Arizona from May 2009 until July 2010, when he was fired after 31-48 start. He was the vice president of professional scouting for San Diego from 2010 until August.

SATURDAY, MARCH 28, 2015

Dear Readers: Hopefully by now, everyone is thawed out and dug out from this season’s heavy snow in many parts of the country.

But what condition is your CAR in? Let’s get it in good shape for spring and summer! A good thing to focus on is the tires.

Did you use snow tires in the heavy snow? Check with your car-care specialist to change them to other tires more suitable for the dry, hot pavement of summertime. Snow tires typically are less adept at stopping on hot, dry (and rainy) roads.

Potholes, which can develop from the roads freezing and thawing, can wreak havoc on your car’s suspension. You may need your wheels aligned and rotated. This will help with tire wear.

Stay on top of your tire pressure. Learn to check the pressure, and have a pro help you. Underinflated tires can be very dangerous in the heat. -- Heloise VIDEO VOLUNTEER Dear Heloise: I am on

THE ZAPATA TIMES 3B

“

HELOISE

one of the popular socialmedia sites, and I also am a huge animal lover and animal-adoption advocate.

Lots of volunteers go into the shelters and photograph the dogs and cats (and other animals, like rabbits) that are available for adoption, and post the pictures so that they have a better chance of being adopted.

What if the volunteers made videos instead of still pictures? You’d be able to see the animal’s mannerisms, size, activity level, temperament, etc. Take the animal outside, away from the cold bars and the noise of the shelter, and shoot a short video (about a minute is enough) and post it on social media. Let’s empty out the shelters and put these loving animals in great homes! -- Elizabeth in San Antonio

4B THE ZAPATA TIMES

SATURDAY, MARCH 28, 2015