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BORDER REGION
BORDER PATROL
Annual fashion show set
Pot bundles seized
Theme to focus on Texas towns By PHILIP BALLI THE ZAPATA TIMES
A date has been set for Border Region Behavioral Health Center’s biggest and only fundraiser of the year. The 24th annual Administrative Professional Style Show Luncheon will be held at the Laredo Country Club on April 27 from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. The theme for this year’s fashion show is ‘Too Many Little Towns in Texas,’ according to Jo-Ann Kahn, president of the volunteer services council for Border Region. “This year’s them is going to focus on the state of Texas and all of the wonderful little towns we have,” Kahn said. “We have a group of ladies who always put on fantastic shows.” Last year, the council organized a glitzy show entitled, ‘Movie Classics at the Oscars,’ which featured themes from ‘Breakfast at Tiffany’s,’ ‘Casablanca,’ ‘The Good, The Bad and The Ugly,’ ‘Gentlemen Prefer Blondes,’ ‘Goldfinger’ and ‘The Great Gatsby.’ More than 300 people attended the event. “Our primary purpose with the fashion show event is to raise money for things we want to be able to fund for our clients, such as the Border Olympics, parties during the holidays and school supply drives,” Kahn said. “Any thing the state does not fund, we try to raise the money ourselves.” Texas lacks the funds to fully support state mental health center, so the volunteer services council creates activities to raise funds to assist people who otherwise would have no access. There will be a raffle in addition to this year’s fashion show and luncheon. Prizes include a weeklong stay at the Silverleaf Seaside Resort in Galveston, a gold and diamond bracelet, a framed wildlife photograph by local photographer Butch Ramirez and more. An array of paintings done by Border Region clients will also be up for sale during the luncheon. Paty C. Orduña, head of the Art in Health Program Border Region offers all its clients said the bigger paintings will be sold for up to $60 and the smaller paintings will range between $25 and $40.
Contraband weighed 1,779 pounds and valued at $1.4M SPECIAL TO THE TIMES
Border Patrol said Monday that agents and Texas Parks and Wildlife have seized about 1,780 pounds of marijuana in the Zapata area. Agents assigned to the Zapata Station responded to a location Thursday where they saw a suspicious truck leaving the area, Border Patrol said. When they conducted a search of the location, they recovered 64 bundles abandoned in the brush. An additional 15 bundles were recovered from the vehicle leaving the area. A total of 79 bundles were recovered. The bundles tested positive for marijuana. The contraband weighed 1,779 pounds and has a street value of $1,429,921. The narcotics were turned over to DEA and the vehicle was seized by Border Patrol. “We encourage everyone to report any suspicious activity in their community. Together, we can continue to disrupt these criminal organizations,” said Chief Patrol Agent Mario Martinez.
Courtesy photo
These marijuana bundles were recovered by Border Patrol in Zapata. The narcotics were turned over to DEA and the vehicle was seized by Border Patrol.
BAD BREED 4-H PROSPECT SHOW FOR LAMBS AND GOATS
GRAND CHAMPION GOATS From left: Carlos Barrera, Gaby Salinas, Elicia Perez, Tori Perez, and Chelsea Cremar pose for a photo Saturday morning during the Bad Breed 4-H Prospect Show for Lambs and Goats at LIFE Downs Pavilion. Carlos Barrera, of Zapata, placed first, taking the Class V Grand Champion Goat title. Cremar placed second with the Class V Reserve Grand Champion Goat title.
Photo by Victor Strife | The Zapata Times
See SHOW PAGE 9A
IMMIGRATION LAWS
Terrorism affects criminal immigrant focus and policy By JAY ROOT THE TEXAS TRIBUNE
Photo by Martin do Nascimento | Texas Tribune
A group of undocumented Mexican national ex-offenders enter Mexico at the USMexico border crossing at Brownsville/Matamoros after being deported.
Juan Francisco de Luna Vasquez passed through the Webb County jail at least four times on more than a half dozen charges before allegedly beating his wife to death with a hammer last year in Laredo. Victor Reyes had already spent three months in the Hidalgo County Jail, four months
in state custody and six years in federal prison for multiple felony offenses by the time he went on a random shooting spree in Houston, killing two people and injuring three more in January 2015. And before Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez allegedly shot Kate Steinle to death on Pier 14 in San Francisco last summer, authorities say he had racked up a criminal record including
seven felonies, mostly drug related, and a 1997 arrest for assault. There are peculiarities to each case, but they have something in common: all three men were thrown out of the country multiple times by federal immigration authorities but returned illegally — through the Texas-Mexico border — before com-
See CRIMINAL PAGE 9A
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Zin brief CALENDAR
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2016
AROUND THE NATION
TODAY IN HISTORY
Thursday, February 11
ASSOCIATED PRESS
The Laredo Area Retired School Employees Association will be holding its monthly meeting at Blessed Sacrament Parish Hall at 2219 Galveston at 11 a.m. A volunteers fair will be held. Preschool Read & Play at McKendrick Ochoa Salinas Branch Library, 1920 Palo Blanco St., from 11 a.m.–12 p.m. Story time and crafts for preschoolers. For more information, contact Priscilla Garcia at priscilla@laredolibrary.org or 795-2400 x2403. Family Story Time & Crafts at McKendrick Ochoa Salinas Branch Library, 1920 Palo Blanco St., from 4-5 p.m. For more information, contact Priscilla Garcia at priscilla@laredolibrary.org or 795-2400 x2403.
Today is Ash Wednesday, Feb. 10, the 41st day of 2016. There are 325 days left in the year. Today’s Highlight in History: On Feb. 10, 1996, world chess champion Garry Kasparov lost the first game of a match in Philadelphia against an IBM computer dubbed “Deep Blue.” (Kasparov ended up winning the match, 4 games to 2; he was defeated by Deep Blue in a rematch the following year.) On this date: In 1763, Britain, Spain and France signed the Treaty of Paris, ending the Seven Years’ War (also known as the French and Indian War in North America). In 1840, Britain’s Queen Victoria married Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. In 1936, Nazi Germany’s Reichstag passed a law investing the Gestapo secret police with absolute authority exempt from any legal review. In 1949, Arthur Miller’s play “Death of a Salesman” opened at Broadway’s Morosco Theater with Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman. In 1959, a major tornado tore through the St. Louis area, killing 21 people and causing heavy damage. In 1966, the Jacqueline Susann novel “Valley of the Dolls” was published by Bernard Geis Associates. In 1967, the 25th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, dealing with presidential disability and succession, was ratified as Minnesota and Nevada adopted it. In 1998, Dr. David Satcher was confirmed by the Senate to be surgeon general. In 2005, playwright Arthur Miller died in Roxbury, Connecticut, at age 89 on the 56th anniversary of the Broadway opening of “Death of a Salesman.” Ten years ago: Former federal disaster chief Michael Brown told a Senate committee he had alerted the White House to how bad things were in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, and agreed with senators who said he’d been made a scapegoat for government failures. One year ago: Three Muslim college students were shot to death at a condominium complex near the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; a neighbor, Craig Stephen Hicks, is charged with murder. Today’s Birthdays: Cinematographer Douglas Slocombe is 103. Actor Robert Wagner is 86. Singer Roberta Flack is 79. Olympic gold-medal swimmer Mark Spitz is 66. Walt Disney Co. chairman and chief executive Robert Iger is 65. Rock musician and composer Cory Lerios (Pablo Cruise) is 65. World Golf Hall of Famer Greg Norman is 61. Country singer Lionel Cartwright is 56. ABC News correspondent George Stephanopoulos is 55. Political commentator Glenn Beck is 52. Actress Laura Dern is 49. Actress Elizabeth Banks is 42. Reggaeton singer Don Omar is 38. Actor Barry Sloane is 35. Rock singer Eric Dill is 34. Rock musician Ben Romans (The Click Five) is 34. Actress Emma Roberts is 25. Actress Chloe Grace Moretz is 19. Thought for Today: “People, even more than things, have to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed, and redeemed; never throw out anyone.” — Audrey Hepburn, Belgian-born British actress (1929-1993).
Friday, February 12 A Fresh Start to a Healthier You. Learn practical cooking and shopping tips and recipes for success in the kitchen at McKendrick Ochoa Salinas Branch Library, 1920 Palo Blanco St., from 4:30-5:30 p.m. For more information, contact Angie Sifuentes, Webb County Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service, 956-523-5290, angelica.sifuentes@ag.tamu.edu. Enjoy an evening of romance under the stars at the TAMIU Lamar Bruni Vergara Planetarium, 5201 University Blvd. There will be music, food and legends of our stars. Show starts at 7 p.m. $25 per person or $45 per couple. Includes beer and/or wine, chocolates, light hors d’oeuvres and one rose per couple. For tickets call 956-3262463
Saturday, February 13 Operation Feed the Homeless hosted by the Laredo Free Thinkers will be from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. at Jarvis Plaza. Please volunteer your time to serve food or pass out clothing. Or donate much needed food, toiletry or clothing items. For more information visit the Laredo Free Thinker’s Facebook page or call 744-5674. Enjoy an evening of romance under the stars at the TAMIU Lamar Bruni Vergara Planetarium, 5201 University Blvd. There will be music, food and legends of our stars. There will be two showings, one at 5 p.m. and one at 7 p.m. $25 per person or $45 per couple. Includes beer and/or wine, chocolates, light hors d’oeuvres and one rose per couple. For tickets call 956-3262463.
Tuesday, February 16 Join the MOS Library Knitting Circle at McKendrick Ochoa Salinas Branch Library, 1920 Palo Blanco St., from 1-3 p.m. Please bring yarn and knitting needles. For more information, contact Analiza Perez-Gomez at analiza@laredolibrary.org or 795-2400 x2403. Crochet for Kids at McKendrick Ochoa Salinas Branch Library, 1920 Palo Blanco St., from 4-5 p.m. Please bring yarn and a crochet needle. For more information, contact Analiza Perez-Gomez at analiza@laredolibrary.org or 795-2400 x2403.
Thursday, February 18 Shayne Murphy paintings exhibit reception at TAMIU’s CFPA Art Gallery from 6–7:30 p.m. The exhibit is open through April 7. Preschool Read & Play at McKendrick Ochoa Salinas Branch Library, 1920 Palo Blanco St., from 11 a.m.–12 p.m. Story time and crafts for preschoolers. For more information, contact Priscilla Garcia at priscilla@laredolibrary.org or 795-2400 x2403. Family Story Time & Crafts at McKendrick Ochoa Salinas Branch Library, 1920 Palo Blanco St., from 4-5 p.m. For more information, contact Priscilla Garcia at priscilla@laredolibrary.org or 795-2400 x2403.
Friday, February 19 A Fresh Start to a Healthier You. Learn practical cooking and shopping tips and recipes for success in the kitchen at McKendrick Ochoa Salinas Branch Library, 1920 Palo Blanco St., from 4:30-5:30 p.m. For more information, contact Angie Sifuentes, Webb County Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service, 956-523-5290, angelica.sifuentes@ag.tamu.edu.
Saturday, February 20 The first of the Laredo Free Thinkers Lecture series with Professor Shawn Miller will be held at the Holding Institute at 5:30 p.m. This lecture’s theme will be economics and budgeting. It is free and open to the public.
Photo by Gregory Bull | AP
Erika Colligan poses with a painting made by her father Tuesday, in San Diego. After three decades searching for her father’s artwork — paintings the South Vietnam pilot made for the U.S. Air Force aviators who trained him during the Vietnam war, Colligan recently found one. The painting gave her the first tangible sliver of the father she never got the chance to know.
Woman finds lost art By JULIE WATSON ASSOCIATED PRESS
SAN DIEGO — Erika Colligan spent three decades searching for her father’s artwork — paintings the South Vietnam pilot made for the U.S. Air Force aviators who trained him during the Vietnam war. The 50-year-old San Diego software consultant was only 1 when her father died in a plane crash in his native country in 1966. At age 10, her family fled Vietnam and came to the United States, leaving behind their belongings and his artwork. Colligan believes most of his paintings were destroyed after the Communist government took power, but she kept faith some of the artwork Phan Khoi made for his American friends was still out there, offering a tangible sliver of the father she never got the chance to know.
For decades she showed veterans a faded photograph of Khoi sitting with a paintbrush and two portraits in his room at a U.S. Air Force base. She posted the image repeatedly online, asking if anyone recognized the American pilot in one of the portraits. Her search paid off about three months ago when it led her to Khoi’s former Air Force instructor, retired Col. Billy Mobley. Mobley told her in an email that Khoi had given him a painting — a serene landscape that has hung on his wall for more than 50 years. Colligan immediately drove to Mobley’s house in Stephenville, Texas. “He grabbed hold of my face and said, ‘Yep, you’re Phan Khoi’s daughter all right,”’ Colligan said. He then handed her the painting. She ran her finger over her father’s signature on the back.
Some Republicans support marijuana bill
Alpha says lenders offer $500M for coal assets
Judge urges president to commute harsh sentence
DES MOINES, Iowa — Some Republican House lawmakers are supporting legislation that would create a system for manufacturing, distributing and possessing some forms of medical marijuana in Iowa, though it’s unclear what type of support the bill will get from party leaders. The bill would expand the state’s current law on medical marijuana, which allows some epilepsy patients to use cannabis oil. The new legislation would expand it to include more products and patients, though it would prohibit the smoking of medical marijuana. Rep. Peter Cownie, chairman of the House Commerce Committee, discussed the bill during a press conference Tuesday while surrounded by a handful of Republican lawmakers. The West Des Moines Republican was vague when asked about the bill’s support within his caucus. He asked to keep an open mind.
CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Alpha Natural Resources said it has received a $500 million offer from existing lenders for the potential sale of the bankrupt coal producer’s core assets. Bristol, Virginia-based Alpha announced the offer in a filing Monday in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Richmond, Virginia. The filing said the unspecified lenders have agreed to serve as the lead bidder. The offer would set the floor for an auction process that lets competitors make higher bids. Alpha filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in August. Since the filing, the company has announced plans to lay off hundreds of workers in central Appalachia, citing tough market conditions. “We believe this process will provide the best chance of preserving jobs and maximizing the value of the broader enterprise for all stakeholders,” Alpha said.
SALT LAKE CITY — A former federal judge who gave a Utah music producer 55 years in prison for bringing guns to marijuana deals asked the president to commute the sentence Tuesday, the latest appeal in a case held up as an example of problems with mandatory minimum sentencing laws. Paul Cassell, now a law professor, said in a clemency petition letter that he was deeply troubled by the lengthy sentence he was forced to hand down in 2004 to Weldon Angelos, then a 24year-old father of two. The sentence he called “unjust, cruel, and even irrational” was the main reason Cassell stepped down from the bench after five years. Angelos got a longer prison term than people convicted of crimes such as kidnapping, rape and second-degree murder, Cassell said. — Compiled from AP reports
AROUND TEXAS Teen kills mom, two neighbors, then himself McALLEN — A 19-year-old killed his mother and two neighbors before turning his gun on himself in a shooting that brought SWAT and various emergency vehicles to a rural area in Texas, authorities said Sunday. Uvalde County Sheriff Charlie Mendeke said Dylan Westerburg gunned down his mother Friday afternoon in their home near Uvalde, about 85 miles west of San Antonio. He then went next door and killed two brothers, Arthur and Phinny Norton, Mendeke said. Mendeke said investigators haven’t determined a clear motive for the shootings. Westerburg lived with his mother in a small cabin about 20 yards from the Nortons’ mobile home on the brothers’ property. Phinny Norton, 60, had some “sort of romantic relationship”
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In this photo, Uvalde County Sheriffs Deputies guard the intersection to a neighborhood several miles outside of Uvalde, Texas. A 19-year-old killed his mother and two neighbors before turning his gun on himself, authorities said Sunday. with Westerburg’s mother, 42year-old Jennifer Diane Jacques, Mendeke said. Deputies had been called out to the property in the past because of domestic disputes but “nothing violent,” Mendeke said. Authorities arrived at the
scene after a teenage witness called them. The teenage boy was with Arthur Norton, 58, when they saw shotgun shells and broken glass as they approached the Nortons’ mobile home, Mendeke said. — Compiled from AP reports
SUBSCRIPTIONS/DELIVERY (956) 728-2555 The Zapata Times is distributed on Saturdays to 4,000 households in Zapata County. For subscribers of the Laredo Morning Times and for those who buy the Laredo Morning Times at newsstands, the Zapata Times is inserted. The Zapata Times is free. The Zapata Times is published by the Laredo Morning Times, a division of The Hearst Corporation, P.O. Box 2129, Laredo, Texas 78044. Phone (956) 728-2500. The Zapata office is at 1309 N. U.S. Hwy. 83 at 14th Avenue, Suite 2, Zapata, TX 78076. Call (956) 765-5113 or e-mail thezapatatimes.net
Local & State
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2016
Mexican man held 10 people By CÉSAR G. RODRIGUEZ THE ZAPATA TIMES
A Mexican citizen was arrested in Zapata County for harboring 10 people who had entered the country illegally, according to court documents. On Thursday, Eduardo Salinas Gonzalez was charged with attempt to conceal, harbor or shield illegal immigrants from detection. He was illegally present in this country, records state. At 8:23 a.m., U.S. Border Patrol agents responded to suspicious activity near Falcon Lake in Zapata County. Upon arrival, agents said they began tracking down footprints headed toward U.S. 83. Agents later discovered additional footprints leading to a trailer house on U.S. 83, records state. Authorities said they encountered Salinas Gonzalez on the east side of the trailer washing a Chevrolet Silverado.
Salinas Gonzalez allegedly gave agents consent to search the trailer and the Silverado. Agents said they discovered six people inside the trailer and four more under the bed cover of the Silverado, states the criminal complaint filed Monday. All had entered the country illegally, court documents state. The case was referred to Homeland Security Investigations. Salinas Gonzalez allegedly opted to give special agents a custodial interview. In court statements, Salinas-Gonzalez said he agreed to harbor the 10 undocumented immigrants until they another individual would pick up the group, the complaint states. Salinas-Gonzalez expected a payment of $50 per person, HSI said. (César G. Rodriguez may be reached at 7282568 or cesar@lmtonline.com)
Forced labor charge Man set By JUAN A. LOZANO ASSOCIATED PRESS
HOUSTON — A Houston-area couple is accused of forcing a Nigerian woman to care for their five children and home without pay during a twoyear period in which she was physically and verbally abused, made to work nearly 20 hours a day and told to sleep on the floor, federal authorities say. Chudy and Sandra Nsobundu were arrested Monday on charges of forced labor, withholding documents, conspiracy to harbor an illegal immigrant and visa fraud. Authorities say the couple seized the nanny’s passport, so she was unable to leave. The 38-year-old nanny, whose full name is not given in the criminal complaint, told authorities she was promised $100 per month but has never been paid in her two years working for the Nsobundus in their home in the Houston suburb of Katy. “She regularly endured physical and verbal abuse and was not treated like a
human being,” the criminal complaint said. Sandra Nsobundu, 50, made her initial court appearance Tuesday morning in federal court in Houston. She was granted an unsecured bond by U.S. Magistrate Judge Nancy Johnson and was set to be released later Tuesday. Her attorney, Joan Nwuli, declined to comment after the court hearing. Chudy Nsobundu, 56, was set to appear in court Tuesday afternoon. Court records did not list an attorney for him. The Nsobundus each face up to 25 years in prison if convicted. Ruben Perez, one of the federal prosecutors handling the case, said after the hearing that the nanny was “enslaved” by her employers. Perez said cases in which immigrants and others are forced to work in homes in harsh conditions as nannies or caretakers are more common than people think. “We know they are out there. When it comes to our attention we’ll act on
3 busted for illegal transport By CÉSAR G. RODRIGUEZ THE ZAPATA TIMES
Three men were recently arrested in Zapata County for their alleged involvement in human smuggling activity, states an affidavit. A criminal complaint filed Friday identified them as Maria Alicia Herrera, Javier Erlado GarzaRocha and Arturo Flores. All were charged with transporting 15 illegal immigrants with a motor vehicle. Herrera and Garza-Rocha waived their rights and agreed to make state-
ments to Homeland Security Investigations without an attorney present. Both allegedly admitted to transporting immigrants for money. “(Special agents) did not take a statement from Arturo Flores because he stated he was under the influence of heroin,” states the complaint. U.S. Border Patrol said they came across the trio Feb. 3. At 5:30 p.m., agents assigned to Zapata spotted a red Pontiac Grand Am parked on the northbound shoulder of U.S. 83 along with a gold Dodge Ram.
THE ZAPATA TIMES 3A
Agents said they observed the driver of the Pontiac waving his arms as if calling someone over to his location. “Agents then observed about 15 (undocumented immigrants) come out of the brush, run across U.S. 83 and load into both the Grand Am and the Dodge Ram,” records state. The Pontiac turned right abruptly and pulled over at the fence line of La Perla Ranch, according to court documents. Agents said they saw the driver, Flores, and a passenger running out of the vehicle toward the
brush inside La Perla. Both were detained following a brief foot pursuit. Authorities discovered seven immigrants inside the Pontiac. A vehicle stop on the Dodge Ram yielded more immigrants who had entered the country illegally. Agents identified the suspects as Herrera, GarzaRocha and Flores. The immigrants were from El Salvador, Guatemala or Mexico, records state. (César G. Rodriguez may be reached at 7282568 or cesar@lmtonline.com)
them,” he said. The nanny, who was living in Lagos, Nigeria, moved to Texas to live with the Nsobundus in September 2013, according to the criminal complaint. The Nsobundus are naturalized U.S. citizens originally from Nigeria. The complaint said the nanny would work every day from 5:30 a.m. to 1 a.m., couldn’t take breaks and had to eat leftovers and not fresh food, including being forced to only drink milk left in bowls in which the children had eaten cereal. She also couldn’t take hot showers, according to the complaint. The nanny alleged Sandra Nsobundu repeatedly hit her if she thought the nanny wasn’t doing her job correctly. The complaint said Sandra Nsobundu is accused of once striking the nanny across the face with a slipper and threatening to “shoot her and kill her” after not liking the socks the woman had put on one of the younger children.
to die in May ASSOCIATED PRESS
HUNTSVILLE, Texas — A 42-year-old man sent to death row for a fatal shooting during a Dallas-area sandwich shop robbery in 2002 has received an execution date. Texas Department of Criminal Justice spokesman Jason Clark said Tuesday convicted killer Terry Darnell Edwards is scheduled for lethal injection May 11. The U.S. Supreme Court in November refused to review his case. Edwards was convicted of killing 26-year-old Mickell Goodwin at a Balch Springs Subway store where she worked. The store manager, 34-year-old Tommy Walker, also was gunned down. Evidence showed Edwards had been fired from the sandwich store a few weeks before the July 2002 shootings. About $3,000 was taken in the holdup.
SUV rear-ends jail van ASSOCIATED PRESS
FORT WORTH, Texas — A sport utility vehicle slammed into the rear of a jail van in a chain collision on a North Texas expressway, sending 13 people to hospitals, four of them with serious injuries. The accident happened just before 1:30 p.m. Tuesday on Interstate 35W northbound in far northern Fort Worth. Sgt. Steven Enright, a police spokesman, says the chain collision pushed the SUV
into the rear of the Tarrant County Jail van carrying 10 inmates and a driver. MedStar spokesman Matt Zavadsky says both SUV occupants, the van driver and one of the inmates were the most severely injured, although none of the injuries appeared to be life-threatening. They were taken to Harris Methodist Fort Worth hospital, while the nine other inmates were taken to John Peter Smith Hospital for examinations.
PAGE 4A
Zopinion
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2016
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR SEND YOUR SIGNED LETTER TO EDITORIAL@LMTONLINE.COM
COLUMN
OTHER VIEWS
Where’s the voice of reason? Upon retirement from more than half a century of active editing and publishing community newspapers, all I wanted to do was relax. After a year, I realized that what I missed most was writing my column, which I’d done since 1958. So, I began to write again, discovered it was more fulfilling than ever, particularly since I didn’t have to be bothered with the daily chores, routines and headaches of producing a newspaper. Therefore, I could concentrate and give my full attention to writing as well as I am capable of doing and would be permitted the great arbiter of most treatises: research. In determining to continue writing a weekly column, I figured self-syndicating would offer me a far greater readership than I’d ever had. Also appealing was the exposure and the input from dozens of communities. I surmised that I had to do something I’d learned from folks as I grew up and during the various sojourns to publish papers in towns very similar to where I’d grown up. Basically, that involves not sticking my nose in other people’s business. Expanding from that, an old country saw allows that you never talk money, religion or politics. My cowboy daddy was particularly keen on that. Reasonable, huh? It seems to me that a whole bunch of people in this country didn’t have practical cowboy dads (and the necessarily complementary moms) raising them. Now, I don’t know about you, but I like reading material — newspapers, books, magazines — that give me as many views and experiences as possible, so that I can assimilate that information and make reasoned decisions in my life. Of course, those decisions are tempered by faith and by living a lot of years. In newspapers, if there are opinion-editorial-commentary pages, I expect them to be labeled as such. And just FYI, by definition, an editorial is the opinion/position of the newspaper and its owners (It’s their money, so it’s their right). A column represents the views of the writer only. Letters to the editor are printed to give the views of the readers and subscribers to that
newspaper. As to whether you agree with an editorial of with a columnist’s point of view, that’s why the balance of letters is offered. Predominantly, I believe America’s newspapers are conservative to moderate, with a few here and there that are consistently liberal. Everyone needs to understand, that people of extremes — far left and far right — are going to preach from their own especially designed litanies. There is little in any purely political undertaking that is, in this day and time, balanced and reasonable with appeal to all Americans. That’s okay. We’ve fallen into a great trap or, perhaps, quagmire is in the refusal by most of us to consider any other position — in other words, we seemed to have lost the ability to accept reason no matter the source. “If you are on the left, I hate you, because nothing you say makes sense and you want to give away everything.” “If you’re on the right, I despise you because you’re money hungry war mongers.” Silly. Right? Unreasonable. Yep. Aha! Now we’re getting somewhere. Whether editing and publishing a paper or writing an editorial or column, I’ve always had a golden rule (for want of a more defining term): Is it good for most people? …or for the particular groups it is supposed to guide, govern or assist? Today, our elected officials seem hell-bent on following a particular party manifesto and compromise is out of the question. Reason and a desire to act beneficially for all are essential to the kind of government called for in our Declaration of Independence and our Constitution. Political propaganda, pontificating, posturing and pandering to special interests to gain a voice is anathema to reasonable governing. Set examples. Reason. Lead. Willis Webb is a retired community newspaper editor-publisher with more than 50 years experience. He can be reached by email at wwebb1937@att.net.
COLUMN
Why I miss Barack Obama By DAVID BROOKS NEW YORK TIMES
As this primary season has gone along, a strange sensation has come over me: I miss Barack Obama. Now, obviously I disagree with a lot of Obama’s policy decisions. I’ve been disappointed by aspects of his presidency. I hope the next presidency is a philosophic departure. But over the course of this campaign it feels as if there’s been a decline in behavioral standards across the board. Many of the traits of character and leadership that Obama possesses, and that maybe we have taken too much for granted, have suddenly gone missing or are in short supply.
The first and most important of these is basic integrity. The Obama administration has been remarkably scandal-free. Think of the way IranContra or the Lewinsky scandals swallowed years from Reagan and Clinton. We’ve had very little of that from Obama. He and his staff have generally behaved with basic rectitude. Hillary Clinton is constantly having to hold these defensive press conferences when she’s trying to explain away some vaguely shady shortcut she’s taken, or decision she has made, but Obama has not had to do that. He and his wife have not only displayed superior integrity themselves, they hired people with high personal standards.
COLUMN
The wit of Ted Cruz By KEN HERMAN COX NEWSPAPERS
You learn to expect the unexpected on the presidential campaign trail. CubanAmerican Republicans running well in Iowa. A guy with really odd hair leading the GOP pack. Roadside signs like this on a 22-degree New Hampshire morning: “Cedar Waters Nudist Park.” These people might be even hardier than I thought. Here’s something else you might find unexpected. Ted Cruz, comedian. Yes, I know some of you are laughing at him and not with him, but Cruz’s campaign events -- town hall meetings sometimes in actual town halls or meet-andgreets in places like Pedraza’s Mexican Restaurant in Keene (decent enchiladas, but New Hampshire-Mex isn’t Tex-Mex) — show off the Texas U.S. senator’s ability to deliver a one-liner. There’s no doubt this guy has a nasty side (in shutting down a heckler who invoked God at a Monday event in Raymond, Cruz said he thought “lefties” don’t believe in God), but in a state like New Hampshire, where Tuesday’s primary ends months of campaigning, humor helps make the personal connection that voters here demand. Humor also helps a candidate facing a likability gap. “Reaganomics: You start a business in your parents’ garage,” Cruz tells crowds. “Obamanomics: You move into your parents’ garage.” Cruz always wraps up by urging folks to get other folks out to vote for him.
“Commit right now to pick up the phone and call your mom,” he says. “It’s actually a good idea to call your mom anyway.” It draws smiles and laughs every time, as does this line about a Democratic debate: “They’re hosting it at Leavenworth. They wanted to make it easier for Hillary to attend.” In another pointed jab at Clinton, Cruz says, “The Democrats have a wild-eyed socialist with ideas that are dangerous for America and the world ... and Bernie Sanders.” Guns? “Y’all define gun control the same way we do in Texas,” he says, “hitting what you aim at.” Government snoopery? “Please leave your cellphones on,” Cruz tells crowds. “I want to make sure President Obama hears every word we say today.” To an English teacher Monday in Barrington: “A dangling preposition is something up with which I will not put.” On Sunday in Peterborough (the real-world inspiration for Thornton Wilder’s “Our Town”), Cruz courted danger by inviting 9-year-old Hank Suprun to the stage to ask his question. Hank, reading from prepared remarks, asked Cruz, “In 1992, Hillary Clinton said she wasn’t going to the White House to make cookies; why does she have so many waffles now?” Cruz laughed and then gave the kid a serious answer as Hank nervously shuffled his left foot while
the candidate went into full anti-Clinton attack mode. “I remember at your age standing by the television with my mom and dad, watching Ronald Reagan debate Jimmy Carter,” Cruz told Hank. “I was kind of a weird kid.” Another Cruz works-every-time quip is: “What’s the difference between regulators and locusts? You can’t use pesticide on the regulators.” Not that he’s the first politician (or columnist) to use borrowed humor, but it turns out this is a permutation of an old Canadian joke, as recently pointed out by Canadian newspaper The Globe and Mail. “If that quip sounds familiar it’s because it’s cribbed from former Alberta Premier Ralph Klein,” the paper’s Adrian Morrow wrote. “In 1990 Mr. Klein, then a first-term member of the Legislative Assembly from Calgary, described Edmonton: ‘A fine city with too many socialists and mosquitoes. At least you can spray the mosquitoes.’” Cruz was born in Calgary, Alberta, but was gone long before Klein was in office. Nevertheless, Morrow noted that Klein and Cruz are “ideological soul mates.” “Mr. Klein slashed Alberta’s budget, paid off the province’s debt and even once blew up a hospital to cut health care costs,” Morrow wrote. Washington Post columnist Ruth Marcus is among those who seemed surprised by the Cruz stump show. She recently wrote that she knew Cruz was
smart -- “dangerously so from my ideological perspective” -- but was surprised by what she discovered about him as a campaigner. “Donald Trump says Ted Cruz is a ‘nasty guy,’” Marcus wrote. “The Texan’s Senate colleagues agree. Yet here’s the surprise from watching Cruz on the campaign trail: Ideology aside, he comes off as rather likable.” Likability, like conservatism and progressivism, is relative. And, Marcus wrote, Cruz is relatively far more likable on the stump than is Trump. “With apologies to the artists, Trump is Jackson Pollock to Cruz’s Rembrandt,” she wrote. “One splatters paint with no coherent pattern, the other dabs with evident skill, albeit in notably dark tones.” The pre-primary polls show New Hampshire Republicans leaning heavily toward Pollock, with Rembrandt struggling to finish in the top three. Cruz on Monday refused to set an expectation for himself in the Tuesday voting. He said he feels “very good about where we stand right now.” But he acknowledged, “There’s no doubt that Donald has had a lot of support, there’s no doubt that Marco (Rubio) has had a lot of support” in New Hampshire. “I hope and believe we’ll do well here,” he said, “but I also know we’ve got an incredible team on the ground in South Carolina” and beyond. By all accounts, he’s not joking about that.
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CLASSIC DOONESBURY | GARRY TRUDEAU
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2016
ON THE WEB: THEZAPATATIMES.COM
Sports&Outdoors NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE: CAROLINA PANTHERS
Newton plays ‘D’ QB defends actions after Super Bowl By STEVE REED ASSOCIATED PRESS
CHARLOTTE — Cam Newton isn’t apologizing for acting like a “sore loser” after the Super Bowl. The league’s MVP has been widely criticized for walking out of a three-minute press conference after a 24-10 loss to the Denver Broncos on Sunday in which he answered questions with mostly one- and two-word responses while sulking in his chair wearing a black Carolina Panthers hoodie over his head. “Show me a good loser and I’ll show you a loser,” Newton said Tuesday as players cleaned out their lockers at the team’s downtown stadium. Newton said he believes the situation is being overblown by the media, and added he doesn’t plan to change how he reacts to losing just to appease his critics. “If I offended anybody that’s cool, but I know who I am and I’m not about to conform nor bend for anybody’s expectations because yours or anybody’s expectations would never exceed mine,” Newton said. The quarterback went on to say, “Who are you to say that your way is right? I have all of these people who are condemning and saying this, that and the third, but what makes your way right?” At one point during Newton’s nearly seven-minute interview, his teammates walked behind the media gathered three-deep around his locker and starting saying, “We love you, Cam,” and even sang him a song lightning the mood. Newton said his emotions were raw after the game and he simply didn’t want to talk to the media. “When you invest so much time and sacrifice so much and things don’t go as planned, I think emotions take over,” Newton said. “I think that is what happens.” Panthers coach Ron Rivera said while he prefers his fifth-year quarterback would have handled the situation a little better, he understands where he is coming from and what he felt at the time. “That’s who he is. He hates to lose, that’s the bottom line,” Rivera said. “That is what you love in
Photo by Charlie Riedel | AP
Denver end Von Miller stripped Panthers quarterback Cam Newton twice at the Super Bowl leading to 15 points in a 24-10 Broncos win. him. I would much rather have a guy who hates to lose than a guy who accepts it. The guy who accepts it, you might as well just push him out of your locker room because you don’t want him around. “That is a beauty of a guy like that — he wants to win and his teammates know it. That is what it is about. We don’t play this game for a participation trophy. We want to win.” Newton takes losing harder than most. In some past Carolina defeats, he’s sat distraught at his locker still in his uniform for more than 30 minutes after the conclusion of the game. There are times it has taken him more than an hour before addressing the media.
Because this was the Super Bowl, Newton was forced into the interview room a little sooner than normal. At one point, his attention appeared to drift to listening to Broncos players who were celebrating and talking about their win on the other side of the interview room. Rivera suggested in the future Newton may need more time before addressing the media to get his emotions in check. “There are a lot of young people out there looking at who we are, and we are role models for them,” Rivera said. “I think again we know who he is and he does take it hard. Quite honestly if he is going to take it hard, as a public ser-
vice, we should avoid having him talk right away. People take losses, not just football losses, but personal losses different ways. Time is probably the best thing.” Teammates rallied behind Newton on Tuesday. They said they know how badly he wanted to win and how hard he takes losing games. “He’s a competitor just like everybody else,” fullback Mike Tolbert said. “He’s not happy at all about what happened. I’m not happy about what happened. I think everyone on our team is not happy, so why should we be all smiles after? I can’t expect anybody to be laughing and joking and ecstatic about losing a football game.” Panthers general manager Dave Gettleman refused to criticize his franchise quarterback for the way he acted after the game. “I want players that hate to lose,” Gettleman said. “I want players that I know when the game is over they are crawling into the locker room and they need help getting their gear off and they are going to need time getting into the shower. I want the buses to be late to the airport if we’re traveling. We all handle defeat differently.”
Photo by Marcio Jose Sanchez | AP
Carolina reigning MVP Cam Newton walked out of his press conference following the Panthers’ loss to Denver.
Saturday, February 13 12 - 5pm Ft. McIntosh Campus Fr Admisese ion
National
6A THE ZAPATA TIMES
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2016
Harsh charges possible By DAVID EGGERT ASSOCIATED PRESS
LANSING, Mich. — Flint’s water crisis, after a switch in the source allowed dangerous levels of lead and potentially caused deadly cases of Legionnaires’ disease, could result in criminal charges as serious as involuntary manslaughter, a top investigator said Tuesday. The emergency will prompt Gov. Rick Snyder to propose another $195 million in aid in his annual budget proposal on Wednesday, including $25 million to potentially replace old lead and copper pipes. Snyder also plans to call for $165 million in funding for infrastructure needs across Michigan in the 2016-17 budget. If approved by lawmakers, state spending on the Flint water disaster will top $232 million over this fiscal year and next. Todd Flood, who was appointed as special counsel by Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette last month because Schuette’s office is defending the state in civil lawsuits, said manslaughter charges could be on the table if government officials were grossly negligent in their handling of the city’s water change and the aftermath. The maximum prison sentence is 15 years. “It’s not far-fetched,” Flood told reporters, pointing to similar charges against people for deaths on construction sites. He also reiterated the possibility of charges for misconduct in office. Flood said it is possible no crimes were committed — instead just “honest mistakes” — unless authorities breached their duty in a “grossly negligent way.” Another factor is what officials did or failed to do after their mistakes. “If I knew something bad was going on ... and I just want to turn my blind eye, that could be a problem,”
Photo by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission | AP
This Oct. 12, 2015 photo shows an alligator in the kitchen of a Wendy’s Restaurant in Loxahatchee, Fla.
Gator tossed into drive-thru Photo by Rachel Woolf/The Flint Journal | AP
By TERRY SPENCER
Rex Robinson and Raymond Lavigne unload cases of bottled water from Thornton Township on Saturday. The Flint water crisis could result in criminal charges such as involuntary manslaughter.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
said Flood, a former Wayne County assistant prosecutor who spoke at a news conference with the Republican attorney general and investigators. Flint is under a state of emergency because of leadtainted water. Outside experts also have suggested a link between the Flint River and a Legionnaires’ disease outbreak. There were at least 87 cases across Genesee County during a 17month period, including nine deaths. The city’s water supply was switched from the Detroit system to the Flint River as a cost-saving measure in 2014, when Flint was under state emergency financial management. It was an interim measure while a new pipeline to Lake Huron is being built. But the improperly treated river water caused lead to leach from old pipes. If consumed, lead can cause developmental delays and learning disabilities. Flint has since moved back to the Detroit system; officials hope anti-corrosion chemicals will recoat the pipes so it is safe to drink without filters within months. Republican Gov. Rick Snyder, under fire for his administration’s role in the emergency, has accepted responsibility while also blaming local officials and
federal environmental regulators. U.S. regulators say Michigan officials ignored federal advice to treat Flint water for corrosion-causing elements last year and delayed for months before telling the public about the health risks. State officials counter that while the state should have required Flint to treat its water, the EPA did not display appropriate urgency and allowed the problem to fester for months. “If you think about it, this is the biggest case in the history of the state of Michigan, right? And that’s what draws us to this is to get these people their answers,” said Andy Arena, the lead investigator who once led Detroit’s FBI office. He said at least 10 outside investigators are working on the probe. Schuette said Tuesday that Michigan’s public-records law should be expanded to include the governor’s office because of the Flint disaster. Snyder has voluntarily released his personal emails related to Flint from 2014 and 2015, but not his staff’s correspondence. Flint’s mayor said Tuesday that a plan to remove and replace all lead water pipes in city homes will cost $55 million. Mayor Karen Weaver said households where residents are deemed
Farmers reap record sales in drought By ELLEN KNICKMEYER AND SCOTT SMITH ASSOCIATED PRESS
FRESNO, Calif. — A new state report shows California farmers reaping record sales despite the epic drought, thriving even as city-dwellers have been forced to conserve water, household wells have run dry and fish have died. California’s 76,400 farms recorded $53.5 billion in sales in 2014, the year Gov. Jerry Brown declared the state in a drought emergency and launched what in 2015 became mandatory conservation for cities and towns. The sales figures are the most recent annual ones released by the state agriculture department. With the punishing drought entering its fifth year, the figures are sure to stoke tensions between farmers on one side and, on the other, city-dwellers and environmentalists, who complain they are being forced to make greater sacrifices than growers. Experts cite two key reasons for California farms’ strong showing even in dry times: a California almond boom fed by surging demand from China and elsewhere, and farmers’ ability to dig deeper, bigger wells to pump up more groundwater when other sources run out. The state report tracked sales, not profits. Higher costs for water and other expenses of the drought outstripped sales for some farmers, but experts said it is clear many others made strong profits, as evidenced by the rush by growers and corporate investors to get into the almond business and take advantage of a run-up in prices. Jay Lund, a water-resources researcher at the University of California at Davis and an influential voice in water policy in the state that is America’s agri-
cultural powerhouse, said the sales figures show that California farmers are doing what they should be doing in a dry spell. “To me it illustrates that you can actually have a fairly good job in managing water,” Lund said. Some of those who consider themselves the losers in California’s water wars see it differently. “The water they’re taking, they’re also taking from communities around them — like us,” said Guillermo Lopez, a resident of Fresno County, the state’s thirdmost productive farming county, who was forced to haul water when his family taps ran dry. “We’re the ones left with no water.” Lopez’s family well was one of 2,520 household wells around the state to run out
of water because of the drought and overpumping of the state’s underground water reserves, according to state figures. Wells in Lopez’s neighborhood outside the city of Fresno began running dry a year ago, and his family was forced to buy bottled water until a state relief fund paid to have a large water tank installed next to the home. Lopez said that was about the same time he also noticed farmers nearby pumping heavily from deep wells to irrigate their crops. Wildlife has also suffered, including endangered fish. Federal and state water managers, trying to balance competing demands from farms, cities and the environment, were unable to keep enough water in rivers.
to be high-risk will be given priority. “We’re going to restore safe drinking water one house at a time, one child at a time,” she said. “All lead pipes need to be replaced. We deserve new pipes because we did not deserve what happened.” No funding has been dedicated to pay for the work, with Weaver calling for the state and federal governments for financial help. Weaver also said the “Fast Start” plan requires coordination between city, state and federal officials. Snyder will deliver his annual budget proposal to lawmakers on Wednesday. “I invite Gov. Snyder and his team to pledge their full cooperation to help us get this done,” Weaver said. “And I call on the Legislature and Congress to appropriate the necessary funds so we can get started as soon as possible. The people of Flint have already paid with their lives, health and quality of life.” The work would be similar to ongoing lead pipe removal in Lansing. The Lansing Board of Water & Light has removed 13,500 lead pipes over a dozen years at a cost of $42 million. Technical experts with the utility met Monday with Flint officials..
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — Alligators have been used as shoes, briefcases, university mascots, lunch and now, authorities say, a deadly weapon. Joshua James, 24, was arrested Monday and charged with assault with a deadly weapon without intent to kill after Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation officials say he threw a 3.5-foot alligator through a Palm Beach County Wendy’s drive-thru window in October. He’s also charged with illegally possessing an alligator and petty theft. Jail records show he was released on $6,000 bail Tuesday. He was ordered to have no contact with animals. Wildlife officer Nicholas Guerin said in his report that James drove his pickup truck to the window at about 1:20 a.m. Oct. 11. After an employee handed James his drink, he threw the alligator through the window and drove off. No one was hurt. Guerin captured the alligator and released it into the wild. Guerin said James was tracked down through video surveillance and a purchase at a neighboring convenience store. Guerin wrote that James admitted throwing the alligator in a December interview. He said James told him he had
found the alligator on the side of the road and put it in his truck. James’ mother, Linda James, told WPTV that her son’s actions were a “stupid prank.” “He does stuff like this because he thinks it’s funny,” she said. She said he meant no harm and had “no problem turning himself in.” No one answered the door at homes listed to the James family. Phones listed to the family were disconnected. James P. Ross, a retired scientist at the University of Florida’s Department of Wildlife Ecology and Conservation, said a 3.5-foot alligator would likely weigh about 20 to 30 pounds, and its hard body could deliver quite a jolt if it struck someone. He said the gator’s bite would be comparable to a dog’s and would be unlikely to cause serious injury or snap off a finger, although it could tear tendons. Perhaps the biggest concern would be infection if a bite went untreated, he said. “The alligator would be unlikely to ‘attack’ people and more likely to be in a highly traumatized and frightened defensive mode,” he said. “It could, and quite likely would, snap and lunge at anyone approaching it closely and could project its head and jaws 12 to 18 inches in most any direction.”
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2016
Zentertainment
Garner urges funding for early education ASSOCIATED PRESS
FRANKFORT, Ky. — Hollywood actress Jennifer Garner is asking Kentucky lawmakers to spend $1 million on an early-childhood education program. The star of the TV show “Alias” and movies including “Juno” and “Dallas Buyers Club” testified before the House budget committee on Tuesday on behalf of Save The Children. Garner said the program works well in Kentucky, offering literacy and other development pro-
grams for children. Lawmakers said they support the program but noted the GARNER state does not have much money to spend because of shortfalls in public pension programs. Garner is from West Virginia. She testified along with Mark Shriver, Save The Children Action Network president and a nephew of the late President John F. Kennedy. She is also scheduled to meet with Gov. Matt Bevin.
Seafood chain thanks singer ASSOCIATED PRESS
NEW YORK — Red Lobster says it’s feeling the “Beyonce Bounce.” The seafood chain known for its cheddar biscuits says sales surged 33 percent on Sunday, compared with last year’s Super Bowl Sunday. The increase came after the release of “Formation,” in which Beyonce says she took a man to Red Lobster after sex. It’s hard to imagine hordes of people rushing to Red Lobster after hearing the song, but the chain says it’s sure the mention is responsible for at least part of its sales jump. Other factors also likely helped. Red Lobster notes this year’s winter wasn’t as harsh, meaning people were likely more willing to
Actor Ken Watanabe battles stomach cancer By MARK KENNEDY ASSOCIATED PRESS
NEW YORK — A publicist for Ken Watanabe says the Tony- and Oscar-nominated actor has been forced to delay his return to Broadway’s “The King and I” while he battles stomach cancer. The 56-year-old Japanese actor, who made his American stage debut last year opposite Kelli O’Hara in the revival of “The King and I,” was due to return to the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical from March 1-April 17. Craig Bankey, Watanabe’s press agent, said Tuesday the actor has undergone endoscopic surgery and is re-
Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision | AP file
Actor Ken Watanabe has undergone endoscopic surgery and is recuperating at a hospital in Japan. cuperating at a hospital in Japan. In a statement, the actor said: “I would like to ask for your understanding that the start of my per-
PAGE 7A
formance in New York will be a little delayed.” Watanabe, who has been in Christopher Nolan’s “Batman Begins” and “Inception,” also starred in the reboot of “Godzilla” and “Letters From Iwo Jima” and lent his voice to the fourth installment of the Transformers franchise, “Transformers: Age of Extinction.” He earned an Academy Award nomination for best supporting actor in the Tom Cruise-led film “The Last Samurai.” The “King and I” is also nominated for a Grammy Award for best musical theater album. Word of the diagnosis was first reported by Kyodo News service.
Photo by Matt Slocum | AP
In this Sunday photo, Beyonce performs during halftime of the NFL Super Bowl 50 football game in Santa Clara, Calif. head out to restaurants. And the chain is running a “Lobsterfest” promotion that it didn’t last year. The pop culture spotlight from Beyonce is nevertheless a welcome change for Red Lobster, which was sold by Darden Restaurants in July of 2014 after it suffered ongoing declines in sales. The chain, which is now privately held by in-
vestment firm Golden Gate Capital, says it has posted sales gains every quarter since the separation. And after the mention by Beyonce, it says it was also a trending topic on Twitter for the first time. “It’s clear that Beyonce has helped create some Red Lobster fans, and we are very grateful to her for that,” Red Lobster CEO Kim Lop-
drup said in a statement. Erica Ettori, a Red Lobster representative, said she could not “confirm or deny” whether the chain has reached out to superstar, but noted that things were “moving fast.” Regardless, the chain is already trying to make the most of its moment, noting that lobster is considered a romantic food. The chain also tweeted that, “Cheddar Bey Biscuits” has a nice ring to it, don’t you think?” The tweet had more than 14,000 retweets as of Tuesday afternoon, but some mocked Red Lobster for taking several hours to respond, only to come up with something they deemed underwhelming. Red Lobster, based in Orlando, Florida, has more than 700 locations in the U.S. and Canada.
International
8A THE ZAPATA TIMES
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2016
Train crash kills at least 10, injures 80 By DAVID RISING, KIRSTEN GRIESHABER AND MATTHIAS SCHRADER ASSOCIATED PRESS
BAD AIBLING, Germany — Crews using helicopters and boats rescued dozens of people from the wreckage of two German commuter trains that crashed head-on Tuesday in an isolated part of Bavaria, killing at least 10 and leaving authorities trying to determine why multiple safety measures failed. The trains crashed on a stretch of track running between a river and a forest about 40 miles (60 kilometers) southeast of Munich. Though the first rescue crews were on the scene in minutes, it took hours for all survivors to be airlifted and shuttled by boat across the river to waiting ambulances. Nine people were reported dead immediately while a tenth died later in a hospital, police
spokesman Stefan Sonntag said. The two train engineers were thought to be among the dead and one person was still missing in the wreckage. “The missing person is in the part of the train where there’s little hope of finding anyone alive,” Sonntag said. “This is the biggest accident we have had in years in this region.” Investigators called off their search through the rubble after night fell, but Sonntag said they would resume at first light as they tried to determine why safety measures failed to stop the crash. Two black boxes have been recovered and are being analyzed, which should show what went wrong, Transport Minister Alexander Dobrindt said. “We need to determine immediately whether it was a technical problem or a human mistake,” he said, adding that crews are still searching.
Photo by Matthias Schrader | AP
Aerial view of rescue teams at the site where two trains collided head-on near Bad Aibling, Germany, Tuesday. Several people have been killed and dozens were injured.
Students not burned
Ramadi recaptured
By E. EDUARDO CASTILLO
By SUSANNAH GEORGE
ASSOCIATED PRESS
ASSOCIATED PRESS
MEXICO CITY — A group of Argentine forensic experts says it has determined there’s no biological or physical evidence to conclude that 43 students who disappeared in southern Mexico in 2014 were incinerated at a trash dump as government investigators initially claimed. The report released Tuesday by the Argentine Forensic Anthropology Team signaled that the dump in Cocula, Guerrero state, was the site of multiple fires at various times, but while the remains of at least 19 people were found near there, there’s no evidence they belong to the missing students. The government has said the students were killed by a drug gang, their remains incinerated, and their charred bone fragments gathered up
BAGHDAD — Iraqi government forces have regained full control of Ramadi after pushing Islamic State group fighters out of the city’s outskirts, according to Iraqi security forces and the U.S.-led coalition. The announcement, more than a month after Ramadi was first declared liberated in December, underscores the slow nature of Iraqi ground operations despite heavy backing from U.S.-led coalition airstrikes. The governor of Anbar province praised Iraqi security forces and the U.S.led coalition for their work to “liberate Ramadi completely,” but was quick to emphasize that critical security and humanitarian issues remained. Violence has emptied Ramadi of civilians and much of the city remains blanketed in
Photo by Marco Ugarte | AP file
In this file photo, relatives of the 43 missing students from the Isidro Burgos college march holding pictures of the missing. and tossed in bags in a nearby river. Some of those bone fragments have been linked by DNA testing — in one case positively, and in another case, tentatively — to two of the missing students. But because the forensics team was not present when a bag containing the fragments was recovered, they cannot vouch that those fragments came from the dump. The team also said that largely un-
damaged plants found at the supposed site of the pyre would have been killed or been severely damaged by a fire of such intensity. It is the second independent report to reject the Mexican government’s main finding from a little over a year ago about what happened to the students, who were taken by police in the nearby city of Iguala on Sept. 26, 2014.
Photo is uncredited | AP file
Iraqi security forces and the U.S.-led coalition say the government has regained full control of Ramadi after pushing IS out of the city. homemade bombs, also called improvised explosive devices or IEDs, which IS laid in retreat. Col. Steve Warren, a spokesman for the coalition, told The Associated Press that Iraqi security forces have control of the whole city but “untold thousands” of improvised explosive devices were left behind.
Iraqi government troops, led by the country’s elite counterterrorism forces, pushed IS out of the center of Ramadi in December, but struggled to take control of the city’s outskirts. Explosives were a main factor that slowed the clearing of neighborhoods. Now, bombs are preventing civilians from returning home.
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2016
LAREDO MORNING TIMES 9A
Charge dropped against militant By ROD MCGUIRK ASSOCIATED PRESS
CANBERRA, Australia — The government has dropped a charge against an Australian man accused of preparing to fight with Kurdish militants against the Islamic State movement. Jamie Williams, 28, was stopped by customs agents as he was boarding a flight to Qatar at Melbourne airport in December 2014 after military-style equipment and clothing were allegedly found in his luggage. He was charged with preparing for an incursion into a foreign country for the purpose of engaging in hostile activities. Attorney-General George Brandis said in a statement Wednesday that he had decided that prosecutors should drop the charge. He did not explain why he declined to give the consent needed for the prosecution to proceed. “In considering giving his consent, the Attorney-General has a broad discretion and is able to take into account a number of factors,” Brandis’ office said in a statement, without elaborating. Williams walked free from the Melbourne Magistrates Court on Tuesday after prosecutors withdrew the charge. He had faced a potential life prison sentence if convicted. Australian Federal Police say they will continue to pursue foreign incursion cases, regardless of whether a suspect is
for or against the Islamic State movement. Two Australians were questioned by police on arrival at Australian airports in April and December last year over suspected involvement with Kurdish militias in Syria. Neither was charged. A third Australian, Reece Harding, 23, died in June when he stepped on a land mine in Syria where he had been fighting with Kurdish forces. An Australian nurse was charged in July with supporting a terrorist group. Adam Brookman, 39, had voluntarily returned to Australia from Turkey after he said he was forced by Islamic State militants to work as a medic in Syria. Secret service boss Duncan Lewis, director general of the Australian Security Intelligence Organization, told a Senate committee on Tuesday that 110 Australians were fighting with “terrorist groups” in Iraq and Syria. At least 45 Australians had been killed in the conflict, he said. About 190 people in Australia supported extremists in Syria and Iraq through fundraising or attempting to join these groups in the Middle East. About 40 Australians have returned from the conflict. Most were involved in the Syrian civil war before the Islamic State movement became involved, he said. Charges are rare because of a lack of evidence.
Sanders wins big in NH By KEN THOMAS AND LISA LERER ASSOCIATED PRESS
MANCHESTER, N.H. — Sen. Bernie Sanders won a commanding victory Tuesday over Hillary Clinton in New Hampshire, giving him a crucial win over the onetime front-runner who narrowly beat him in Iowa last week. Sanders garnered a majority of support from men, women and independents and surged past Clinton in a state she won eight years ago against then-candidate Barack Obama. Near-record turnout and a recent shift in political ideology among Democrats helped buoy Sanders’ early electoral feat. His win will likely prompt rank-and-file Democrats — and some major campaign donors — to give his candidacy a second look as the race shifts to contests in Clinton-friendly states like Nevada and South Carolina. Most polls in the state closed at 8 p.m. EST, except for a handful in a few tiny towns. “We started off here in New Hampshire 30, 40 points behind. That’s not the case today,” the Vermont senator told cheering supporters in Derry, New Hampshire, earlier in the day. He said a “good night” from his campaign would “show the American people that the voters in New Hampshire understand that this country needs a political revolution.” Once labeled a “fringe candidate” by his detractors, Sanders received majority support from younger voters and those who called themselves moderate or political liberal. He was also narrowly favored by women. Clinton, meanwhile, was
Photo by John Minchillo | AP
Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., grimaces as he delivers his stump speech during a campaign stop at the University of New Hampshire Whittemore Center Arena. backed by a majority of voters 65 and older, according to preliminary exit poll data compiled by Edison Research for The Associated Press and the television networks. Clinton had braced for a potential loss in New Hampshire, the site of her 2008 comeback. She traversed the state’s snow-covered highways with her husband, former President Bill Clinton, and their daughter, Chelsea Clinton, in a push to maintain her edge in national polls and reassure the Democratic establishment backing her campaign. “This is a great process and as I have said over the last couple of days we’re going to keep working literally until the last vote is cast and counted,” she said Tuesday morning while visiting a Manchester polling
SHOW Continued from Page 1A “This is our seventh year offering the art program,” Orduña said. “We use art therapy to help our clients develop their self-esteem and well-being. For many of them, the class is the highlight of the week.” Border Region employs 270 people and serves about 3,600 clients. The facility mainly treats those with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and depression. The facility also provides services for children and adolescents who have been diagnosed with a mental illness and who are experiencing emotional disorders, behavioral problems or are at risk of expulsion from school. It also offers a 24/7 hotline: 1-800-643-1102. (Philip Balli may be reached at 728-2528 or pballi@lmtonline.com)
station. In the week since her slim victory in the leadoff Iowa caucuses, Clinton’s campaign has tried to lower expectations for New Hampshire, where Sanders has maintained a steady lead despite her family’s longstanding ties. Sanders’ gains come amid shifting political ideologies in the state, with twothirds of Democratic voters on Tuesday identifying as politically liberal. During the 2008 primary, only 56 percent of Democratic voters said the same, exit poll data show. Sanders, well-known to voters along the state’s Vermont border, stuck to core campaign themes this week in an effort to avoid upsetting a race trending his way. “I felt like he was the most honest,” said Nicole
Reitano, a 24-year-old from Nashua, New Hampshire, who voted for Sanders on Tuesday. “He’s had the same views forever, and he’s never budged. That makes me feel confident in him.” Clinton, meanwhile, was shouldering renewed troubles amid talk of a potential campaign reshuffling — talk that the former secretary of state dismissed. “I have no idea what they’re talking about or who they are talking to,” Clinton said on MSNBC. “We’re going to take stock, but it’s going to be the campaign that I’ve got.” Clinton’s campaign had sought to manage expectations with a circular to her supporters, noting that “whatever happens tonight, we’re ready to get back out there and fight twice as hard tomorrow.”
Man, woman out on bond ASSOCIATED PRESS
Photo by Cuate Santos | The Zapata Times
Members of the Border Region Behavioral Health Center Volunteer Services Council held a membership tea Tuesday to announce their upcoming "Too Many Little Towns in Texas" Administrative Professional Style Show set for Wednesday, April 27. Members attending Tuesday’s event were, Pam Badovinac, Cassia Jantz, Jo-Ann Kahn, Marilyn DeLlano. Standing, Marcia Jovel, Zita Guerra-Ramirez, Ardith Epstein, Roseann Potts, Carol G. Berler, Ellen Tadros and Paty Orduna.
LAS VEGAS — Las Vegas police say a man and woman accused of harboring a murder suspect who was mistakenly released from a Los Angeles jail last month are out on bond. Authorities arrested 37-year-old fugitive Steven Lawrence Wright at a Boulder City, Nevada, hotel on Monday, along with 39-year-old Bruce Oliver and 39-year-old Lavera Wilson. Wright had been hiding out for days after being released in January due to a paperwork mistake. He was facing a new trial after an over-
turned murder conviction. He’s being held at the Henderson city jail WRIGHT awaiting extradition, with no additional charges expected. Oliver and Wilson are accused of harboring, concealing or aiding a felony offender. Police haven’t detailed their relationship with Wright. They were released on bond Tuesday, and it’s not clear if they have attorneys.
CRIMINAL Continued from Page 1A mitting new crimes in the United States, records obtained by The Texas Tribune show. Their crimes put them at the center of a red-hot political debate about illegal immigration, the revolving door at the southern border and controversial immigrant catch-and-release policies that pit deportation-fixated conservatives against liberal immigrant advocates. How to deal with, or talk about, foreigners who commit crimes in the United States — the government’s term for them is the politically incorrect “criminal aliens” — has laid bare a bitter divide in the electorate and has prompted heated calls for vastly different solutions. A Texas Tribune analysis found that undocumented immigrants make up a smaller share of those imprisoned in Texas — including on Death Row — than of the general population. However, a veil of government secrecy and inconsistent record-keeping make it difficult to accurately determine how many criminal immigrants are in the country or how many crimes they have commit-
ted. Fear, outrage and political jockeying have largely filled the information void. “This is an issue that tears this country apart, and we’re refusing to work on it because we’re so busy pointing fingers at each other.”— Sarah Saldaña, director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Billionaire Donald Trump kicked off his smash-talking presidential campaign last year with criminal immigrants in his crosshairs, saying Mexico was sending its “rapists” and drug dealers to the United States and promising to build a gigantic border wall to keep them out. Closer to home, liberal activists in San Antonio, Austin and Dallas are pressuring local law enforcement officials to build a different kind of wall— procedural barricades to block local officials from cooperating and coordinating with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to remove people. Their concern: In the rush to deport unwanted criminals from the ranks of the undocumented, a lot of otherwise hard-
working and law-abiding foreign nationals are caught up in the dragnet — people like Raul Zamora,a University of Texas student who found himself facing removal after getting pulled over for a broken tail-light. Or Max Villaroto, a popular Iowa pastor deported last summer for minor crimes (DWI and using fraudulent documents) committed in the late 1990s. Civil liberties organizations also argue that federal authorities are violating the constitutional rights of some inmates, and in some cases those groups have successfully sued jails that hand inmates over to federal authorities. No one is more aware of the schizophrenic impulses in immigration policy than Sarah Saldaña, the Texas-born director of ICE, which has a $6 billion budget and 20,000 employees spread across all 50 states and several dozen foreign countries. Many Democrats think she’s “heartless” when it comes to deporting and detaining immigrants, as one Democratic Congressional aide put it. Republicans think she’s not tough enough.
“What we’re doing now is not satisfying to anybody — the left or the right,” Saldaña told The Texas Tribune in December. “This is an issue that tears this country apart, and we’re refusing to work on it because we’re so busy pointing fingers at each other."
Slipping through the cracks The political focus on criminal immigrants flows directly from official U.S. policy: Terrorists and public safety threats are the top priorities of the nation’s border security and immigration enforcement apparatus. President Obama famously said in 2014 that he wants to deport “felons, not families.” ICE insists it focuses on removing the “worst of the worst.” Even immigration hard-liners who say they want to deport everyone here illegally agree the bad guys should go first. The problem is that criminals take advantage of the same porous border as otherwise law-abiding job seekers. And if they are apprehended in this country, sometimes they
are set free by ICE or an immigration judge. Other times, they slip through the cracks of systematic communication breakdowns among local, state and federal law enforcement. Some of them end up committing more crimes. In the late 1990s, infamous “railway killer” Rafael Resendez-Ramirez took advantage of the leaky border and law enforcement failures to repeatedly elude authorities, often using fake names, even though he was wanted by the FBI, was a suspect in several murders and had criminal records in at least seven states. A damning federal report in 2000 highlighted poor training and interbureaucratic fumbling behind the decision giving Resendez a “voluntary return” to his native Mexico, for the eighth time, in the summer of 1999. He came back to the United States almost immediately and killed four more people over two weeks. Fallout from the case helped prompt reforms and better sharing of criminal databases among law enforcement agencies, but weaknesses endured-
.That became clear a few months after Resendez was put to death by lethal injection in Huntsville, Texas, in 2006, when Juan Leonardo Quintero,a deported sex offender with multiple previous criminal convictions, shot and killed Houston Police Officer Rodney Johnson in the back of his patrol car. His case, like Resendez’s, sparked a series of reforms. The Texas Department of Public Safety had removed Quintero and more than 2,000 other sex offenders from its public registry, though not from the criminal database law enforcement uses internally, after they were deported — despite the possibility of their return to Texas. That practice stopped after Johnson’s murder. After the high-profile murder, the city of Houston also changed its policy to allow more police cooperation with ICE to ensure that wanted criminal immigrants are handed over to federal authorities, recalls Robert Rutt, the agency’s special agent in charge at the time of the incident. “It took the tragedy of Rodney Johnson being killed,” Rutt said.
PÁGINA 10A
Zfrontera
MIÉRCOLES 03 DE FEBRERO DE 2016
LEY DE AJUSTE CUBANO
Ribereña en Breve
Arriban 113
JUNTA DE PADRES Zapata County Independent School District invita a la Junta del Comité Asesor para padres de educación especial, que se realizará hoy, de 11:30 a.m. a 1 p.m. en Administration Meeting Room del ZCISD.
ALERTA SOBRE MURCIÉLAGOS Zapata County Independent School District alerta a la comunidad sobre murciélagos en la escuela Fidel y Andrea R. Villarreal. Informan que en caso de ver un murciélago, no se debe intentar tocarlo, sino que se debe contactar a un empleado del distrito inmediatamente.
VALLE HERMOSO, MÉXICO Un hombre murió tras una balacera entre militares e integrantes de un presunto grupo criminal, el 8 de febrero en Valle Hermoso, México, dijeron autoridades tamaulipecas. Los hechos ocurrieron en la Brecha 94 del municipio. De acuerdo al reporte, civiles armados a bordo de un vehículo Jeep Grand Cherokee comenzaron a disparar contra dos unidades de Fuerza Tamaulipas realizando labores de reconocimiento terrestre. El sospechoso falleció tras que militares repelieran la agresión. Otros hombres huyeron del lugar, en tanto que la camioneta fue abandonada, añade el reporte. La víctima no ha sido identificada, aunque autoridades creen que tenía unos 25 años de edad o menos. Militares aseguraron un arma larga con cargador abastecido, el vehículo, entre otros objetos.
MIGUEL ALEMÁN, MÉXICO El departamento de finanzas en Miguel Alemán, México, laborará los sábados de los meses de febrero y marzo, en horario de 9 a.m. a 1 p.m. La idea es que empleados atiendan a los contribuyentes que deseen pagar el impuesto predial. En un comunicado, el gobierno informó que durante febrero se aplica un 15 por ciento de descuento; en tanto que en marzo y abril habrá un 8 por ciento de descuento en pagos mayores a 219 pesos. “Las personas que realicen sus pagos recibirán un boleto para la rifa de un refrigerador, una televisión y un horno de micro ondas, que se realizará el 2 de mayo”, agrega el comunicado. El horario regular del departamento es de lunes a viernes de 8:30 a.m. a 3:30 p.m.
MATAMOROS, MÉXICO El Instituto Tamaulipeco para la Cultura y las Artes (ITCA) ofrecerá un taller de de ilustración Cosas 3-D en el Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Tamaulipas (MACT) en Matamoros, México, 22 al 26 de febrero de 4 p.m. a 8 p.m.. El objetivo del taller, a cargo de Aarón Martínez, es aprender las bases de modelado en tercera dimensión.Se busca que los asistentes comprendan el proceso de creación en el sistema operativo Cinema 4D así como la exportación de trazos del programa Ilustrador. El curso está dirigido a personas de 16 años en adelante y es recomendado específicamente para diseñadores, animadores e ilustradores que quieran profundizar en Cinema 4D y a todas las personas entusiastas del 3D. El taller es gratuito. Informes en el (868) 8131499 y (868) 8137730. — amachorro@lmtonline.com
Foto de cortesía | Gobierno de Tamaulipas
Entre el grupo de 113 personas se incluían 48 familias, 41 mujeres embarazadas y 10 menores de edad.
Seguirá llegada de inmigrantes cubanos desde Costa Rica TIEMPO DE LAREDO
Ciento trece personas de origen cubano que fueron acogidas en Estados Unidos bajo asilo político bajo la Ley de Ajuste Cubano, cruzaron por el Puerto Internacional I entre Laredo y Nuevo Laredo, México, la mañana del martes. Un grupo de 113 cubanos llegó en un avión “chárter” de la empresa Easy Sky, al Aeropuerto “Quetzalcóatl” en Nuevo Laredo, la mañana del martes. Dos horas después, oficiales de la Policía Federal los trasladaron al Centro de Internación e Importación Temporal de Vehículos (CIITEV), a bordo de tres autobuses. Ahí fueron documentados por personal del Instituto Nacional de Migración (INM). El grupo fue compuesto por 48 familias, 41 mujeres embarazadas, con hasta siete meses de gestación; 10 menores de edad y un hombre con problemas de hipertensión arterial, señaló INM.
Los 113 inmigrantes cruzaron a Laredo en tres grupos— dos de 40 y uno de 33— y solicitaron asilo político a personal de Aduanas y Protección Fronteriza de Estados Unidos. Los gobiernos de México y Costa Rica las acciones humanitarias para garantizar la seguridad e integridad física de los extranjeros vulnerables; así como para agilizar el traslado de los inmigrantes cubanos varados desde el 15 de noviembre del 2015 en Costa Rica, señala un comunicado de prensa de INM. De acuerdo con INM, el día de hoy se tiene previsto recibir a otros dos grupos más de extranjeros cubanos, cada grupo estará constituido por 118 personas. En total se recibirán 349 inmigrantes cubanos. Ellos llegarán directamente a Nuevo Laredo desde Costa Rica. Igualmente, el viernes 12 de febrero el INM recibirá a 328 extranjeros cubanos en la frontera de Ciudad Hidalgo, Chiapas, que inte-
gran el tercer y cuarto grupo proveniente de Costa Rica. Su proceso de traslado será similar a los anteriores, es decir, viajarán vía aérea desde Liberia, Costa Rica, a San Salvador, El Salvador; y de ahí en ómnibus serán llevados hasta la frontera en Tecún Umán, Guatemala, y luego al municipio de Ciudad Hidalgo. Una vez en Laredo, la organización sin fines de lucro “Cubanos en Libertad” recibió a los isleños para darles apoyo. A quienes no tienen familia en Estados Unidos, se les ayuda para tramitar los documentos pertinentes para vivir, trabajar y recibir ayuda gubernamental. Javier Claudio de Peralta viajó con su familia, su esposa Oribel López y sus hijos, las gemelas Karla y Camila, y Giancarlo, de 7 y 13 años, quienes se dirigen a Miami, donde ya los esperan sus familiares. “Nuestro objetivo es cambiar la
vida y cambiar el futuro de mis hijos, en un país donde tengan libertad y oportunidades”, dijo el padre. Otro de los cubanos, Cristóbal Sayas, de 52 años, pasó años luchando por salir de la isla gobernada por los hermanos Fidel y Raúl Castro “Desde que tenía 20 años estoy tratando de huir de Cuba, por fin lo logré, ahora voy a Miami donde tengo familiares y buscaré como traer a Estados Unidos a mi familia que se quedó en la isla”, señaló Cristóbal. Una vez en territorio norteamericano, los cubanos fueron procesados en migración, en diferentes lapsos de varias horas para ser admitidos en Estados Unidos, de acuerdo a la Ley de Ajuste Cubano, que otorga a los isleños permiso para residir y trabajar en forma inmediata, una vez que pisen territorio de la Unión Americana. (Con información de Agencia de Noticias-Oficina de Corresponsales)
PATRULLA FRONTERIZA
REYNOSA, MX
Anuncian decomiso millonario
Explosión da paso a rescate
ESPECIAL PARA TIEMPO DE ZAPATA
Agentes de la Patrulla Fronteriza, además de personal de Parques y Vida Salvaje de Texas, lograron el decomiso de alrededor de 1.780 libras de marihuana en el área de Zapata. El jueves, agentes asignados a la Estación de Za-
pata respondieron al reporte de que un trailer sospechoso se alejaba de un área, indica el reporte de Patrulla Fronteriza. En total, fueron recuperados 79 paquetes, de los cuales 64 estaban abandonados en la maleza, y 15 fueron encontrados dentro del vehículo que salía del
lugar. En el reporte, Patrulla Fronteriza indica que el contenido de los paquetes dio positivo a marihuana, con peso estimado de 1.779 libras y valor aproximado a los 1.429.921 dólares. Los narcóticos fueron entregados a la DEA y el vehículo fue decomisado
por Patrulla Fronteriza, de acuerdo con el reporte. “Exhortamos al público a reportar cualquier actividad sospechosa en su comunidad. Juntos podremos continuar destruyendo estas organizaciones criminales”, dijo el Agente en Jefe de Patrulla Fronteriza, Mario Martínez.
COLUMNA
Industria petrolera impactó Estado Nota del Editor: El autor narra la manera en que la industria del petróleo impactó en Tamaulipas.
POR RAÚL SINENCIO ESPECIAL PARA TIEMPO DE ZAPATA
La máxima industria del país tiene 10 años de nacionalización. Hablamos del Congreso de Trabajadores Petroleros de América Latina. Con este motivo Tamaulipas adquiere renovada presencia dentro y fuera de sus fronteras, recién concluida la Segunda Guerra Mundial. Transcurre por aquellas fechas el sexenio del presidente Miguel Alemán Valdés. Abre con la tentativa de imponerle el corporativismo posrevolucionario al Sindicato de Trabajadores Petroleros de la República Mexicana (STPRM). Consigue recuperarse de momento y, dirigido por Eulalio Ibáñez de 1948 a 1949, retoma sus combativos ideales. El gremio forma de la Confederación de Trabajadores de América Latina. Esta última escoge Cali,
Colombia, para el segundo congreso, verificado hacia 1944. Entre los resolutivos emitidos figura celebrar magno encuentro obrero de la rama subcontinental del oro negro. Anfitrión idóneo resulta México. Respaldado por el aludido sindicato, Lázaro Cárdenas rescata ahí la riqueza del subsuelo en 1938. Fresco aún, en materia de soberanía el histórico acto marca un ejemplo a seguir desde el río Bravo hasta la Patagonia. De modo particular, esto se advierte claro tratándose de Venezuela, con ricos yacimientos de crudo y cuyo gobierno está a cargo del novelista Rómulo Gallegos, electo democráticamente tras larga dictadura. Respecto a los hidrocarburos mexicanos, el principal encave fabril lo aloja Ciudad Madero, al sureste de Tamaulipas. Posee gigantesco complejo refinador, antaño de la Compañía El Águila, firma inglesa que mediante tenaz huelga acepta en 1924 las primeras bases contractuales del área relativa. Dicho municipio encabeza asimismo
las secciones fundadoras del STPRM, correspondiéndole la 1, a que pertenece Eulalio Ibáñez. Con tales antecedentes, Ciudad Madero atiende la referida cita. En números redondos, los gastos suman 55.000 pesos, cifra a la sazón nada irrelevante. El STPRM costea todo, incluso sin gozar de canonjías que después lo postran sobre las cenizas de su antiguo prestigio. El Comité Ejecutivo General a medio año comienza los preparativos. Lo refuerzan dirigentes progresistas, como Jesús Chiñas Corón, titular de la Secretaría del Exterior, y Gregorio Guerrero Mexicano, secretario de Previsión Social. En consecuencia, se tramita con oportunidad el transporte aéreo que los delegados requieren. Bajo contrato, transmitiría la asamblea una radiodifusora de Tampico. Faltaba mucho para que operaran los canales televisivos. A solicitud expresa, el Taller de Gráfica Popular elabora carteles alusivos, con el lema “Petróleo para
la paz”. El Congreso de Trabajadores Petroleros de América Latina arranca el miércoles 22 de septiembre de 1948 y cierra el posterior domingo 26. Sirve de sede el viejo edificio de la Sección 1, ya demolido. Asisten varias delegaciones, incluida la de Colombia, donde sostienen firme lucha a favor de los derechos laborales, atropellados por monopolios extranjeros. Al finalizar, los participantes integran el Consejo Internacional del Petróleo, confiándole la presidencia a Eulalio Ibáñez. Fue el primer y único congreso de su tipo, descompuesta la escena semanas adelante por el golpe militar en Venezuela, que tarda casi tres décadas en nacionalizar los carburantes. El STPRM acaba también descarrillado. A punto de instalarse en la Ciudad de México la VI Convención General, el 1 de septiembre de 1949 personeros del oficialismo asaltan los puestos directivos, protegiéndolos genízaros y hamponcetes.
TIEMPO DE ZAPATA
Una explosión por acumulamiento de gas puso al descubierto una casa de seguridad donde se mantenían cautivos a más de 60 inmigrantes centroamericanos, en Reynosa, México, anunciaron autoridades de Tamaulipas, México, el lunes. Dentro de la vivienda se encontraron a por lo menos 60 inmigrantes centroamericanos quienes dijeron estaban ahí retenidos por integrantes de un grupo delincuencial, de acuerdo con el Grupo de Coordinación Tamaulipas. Los hechos fueron reportados alrededor de las 3:30 p.m. en un domicilio ubicado en la cuadra 120 de calle Paseo Primavera, colonia Bermúdez, informó el GCT. Debido a la explosión, cinco inmigrantes resultaron con quemaduras. De las cinco personas, tres fueron internados en el Hospital General de Reynosa al presentar quemaduras de primer grado en diversas partes de su cuerpo. Al menos dos se encuentran en estado crítico. Los lesionados fueron identificados como Domingo Mastum, de 36 años de edad; Ángel Diego Valdo Chois, de 16 años; y Pascual Izet Guachia, de 31 años, todos originarios de Guatemala. Autoridades indicaron que fue un inmigrante quien señaló a las autoridades que habían estado privados de su libertad por más de una semana.
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2016
THE ZAPATA TIMES 11A
Stocks move modestly higher By ALEX VEIGA ASSOCIATED PRESS
The major U.S. stock indexes moved modestly higher in lateafternoon trading Monday after spending much of the day veering between gains and losses. Materials and health care stocks were among the biggest gainers, while energy stocks fell the most following another steep slump in crude oil prices. Investors were weighing the latest batch of company earnings news and looking ahead to the beginning on Wednesday of two days of testimony before Congress by Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen. KEEPING SCORE: The Dow Jones industrial average was up 38 points, or 0.2 percent, to 16,061 as of 3:21 p.m. Eastern Time. The Standard & Poor’s 500 gained five points, or 0.3 percent, to 1,858. The Nasdaq composite added six points, or 0.1 percent, to 4,289. Stocks posted steep slides Monday and Friday. THE QUOTE: “The market has been trying to define a direction, leadership,” said Quincy Krosby, market strategist for Prudential Financial. “But the pockets of uncertainty continue. That’s part of what’s holding the market back.” SECTOR TALLY: Six of the 10 sectors in the S&P 500 index moved higher, with materials stocks leading the gainers. Energy stocks posted the biggest decline, 2.3 percent. RIDING HIGH: Martin Marietta Materials vaulted 11.1 percent after the construction materials company reported a sharp increase in earnings. The stock was the biggest gainer in the S&P 500 index, climbing $13.11 to $130.96. A BOOST: Boston Scientific climbed 4.7 percent after the medical device maker said the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid will cover an additional key treatment for its Watchman device. The stock added 75 cents to $16.83. SALES CONCERNS: Viacom tumbled 18 percent after the owner of Nickelodeon, MTV, Comedy Central and Paramount Pictures reported a worse-thanexpected drop in fourth-quarter revenue on lower ad sales. The
Photo by Mark Lennihan | AP
Jonathan Niles, works at the New York Stock Exchange, Tuesday. Stock markets have been in a slump so far this year after a lackluster 2015. Several factors have kept investors in a selling mood, including falling crude oil prices, waning growth in major economies and the prospect of Federal Reserve rate hikes.
Materials and health care stocks were among the biggest gainers, while energy stocks fell the most following another steep slump in crude oil prices. stock dropped $7.54 to $34.31. OIL EFFECT: Several energy sector companies slumped as the slide in crude oil prices deepened. Consol Energy lost 88 cents, or 10.2 percent, to $7.68, while Southwestern Energy fell $1.08, or 13.6 percent, to $8.26. Murphy Oil slid $1.30, or 6.8 percent, to $17.93. MIXED RESULTS: Bristow Group tumbled 26.5 percent after the helicopter services company reported better-than-expected fiscal third-quarter profit, but revenue fell short of forecasts. The stock lost $4.90 to $13.58. ROUGH GOING: Stock markets have endured a torrid start to the year as investors have fretted over a number of issues, including the fall in the price of oil to multi-year lows, a slowdown in China and whether many parts of the global econo-
my will fall into recession and suffer a debilitating period of deflation, or falling prices. Global equities have now lost about $6 trillion since the start of the year. In January, that was largely due to worries over the slowdown in China and the slump in the price of oil. EYES ON THE FED: Yellen is scheduled to addresses Congress over two days Wednesday. Yellen will outline the central bank’s outlook on the economy. Investors will be watching for hints about when the Fed will make its next move to raise its key interest rate. Most analysts and investors think the Fed will raise rates fewer than four times this year, if at all. EUROPEAN MARKETS: Stocks managed to eke out early gains in Europe before succumbing to another bout of selling.
The FTSE 100 index of leading British shares was down 1 percent, while Germany’s DAX fell 1.1 percent. The CAC-40 in France was 1.7 percent lower. ASIA’S DAY: Japan’s Nikkei index tumbled 5.4 percent and the interest rate on the country’s benchmark bond dropped into negative territory for the first time. The yields on Japan’s bonds have been low for years as the country kept its interest rates at or near zero. ENERGY: Crude oil prices fell sharply for the second day in a row Tuesday. Benchmark U.S. crude oil dropped $1.75, or 5.6 percent, to close at $27.94 a barrel in New York. Brent crude, a benchmark for international oils, fell $2.56, or 7.8 percent, to close at $30.21 a barrel in London. The International Energy Agency, which advises countries
on energy policy, said oil prices will continue to come under pressure as supply is set to outpace demand this year. METALS: Precious metals prices were mixed. Gold rose 70 cents, or 0.1 percent, to $1,198.60 an ounce and silver inched up 2 cents, or 0.1 percent, to $15.44 an ounce. Copper, an industrial metal that will often rise and fall along with investor’s optimism about the global economy, fell 5 cents, or 2.4 percent, to $2.04 a pound. BONDS AND CURRENCIES: Bond prices rose. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note fell to 1.73 percent from 1.75 percent late Monday. The dollar was down at 114.99 yen from 115.58 yen. As recently as the end of January, the dollar was trading above 121 yen. The euro up $1.1286 from $1.1186.
Toyota recalls Scion FR-S ASSOCIATED PRESS
DETROIT — Toyota’s youthoriented Scion brand is recalling about 28,000 FR-S sports cars in North America because drivers can take the keys out of the ignition without the car being in park. The recall covers cars with automatic transmissions from the 2013 through 2016 model years. Toyota says in some cases, the
mechanism that holds the key until the ignition unless the cars are in park may not have been connected before delivery. That makes it possible to remove the key while the cars are in gear, which could increase the risk of cars rolling away unexpectedly. Toyota wouldn’t say if the problem has caused any crashes or injuries. The company says dealers will check the key lock mechanism. If it doesn’t work, they’ll activate it.
Photo by Shuji Kajiyama | AP file
In this file photo, Toyota Motor Corp.’s booth is crowded with visitors in the media preview of the Tokyo Motor Show in Tokyo. Toyota’s youth-oriented Scion brand is recalling about 28,000 FR-S sports cars in North America.
12A THE ZAPATA TIMES
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2016