Sunday, January 15, 2012
Wednesday, November 3, 2010
'Fiddler On the Roof' composer Jerry Bock dies
and "Fiorello!" has died. He was 81.Richard M. Ticktin, Bock's attorney and family friend, said the composer died Wednesday morning at Northern Westchester Hospital in Mount Kisco, N.Y., of heart failure.
Together with lyricist Sheldon Harnick, Bock wrote the powerful score to "Fiddler on the Roof," one of the most successful productions in the history of the American musical theater, having an initial run of eight years. It earned the two men Tony Awards in 1965.
Bock had recently spoken at a memorial service for "Fiddler" playwright Joseph Stein, who died Oct. 24. "So now two of the three creators of 'Fiddler on the Roof' have passed away within three weeks of each other," said Ticktin.
Bock and Harnick also took home Tonys and a Pulitzer Prize for the music and lyrics to "Fiorello!" in 1960. In addition, Bock was nominated for Tonys in 1967 for "The Apple Tree" and in 1971 for "The Rothschilds."
"The world will remember him as a gentle human being with great talent who was a collaborator in musical theater. Jerry believed that the essence of musical theater was the collaboration — working with your colleagues, trying to make a unified whole out of disparate parts," Ticktin said.
Bock's other works include "The Body Beautiful," "Mr. Wonderful" and "She Loves Me."
In 2004, Bock said his favorite moment in the creation of a song was playing it with his collaborator. "If it works, we say, 'Wow!'" Bock said. "There's no reward like it — to finish a song and celebrate it with your partner."
Survivors include his wife, Patti, daughter Portia Bock, son George Bock and granddaughter Edie Mae Shipler. Funeral services will be private, his lawyer said.
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
Oregon tourist town considers dumping 'Detroit'
is giving it a bad name.Voters in the 300-resident village of Detroit, Ore., will decide Tuesday whether to dump the moniker it shares with the Motor City.
The ballot proposal would change the name of the town nestled in the Cascades foothills, and best known for its boating and skiing, to Detroit Lake.
Builder Doug DeGeorge tells The Detroit News that "Detroit" carries an unsavory image. He expects the measure that he helped get on the ballot will pass, but says the village means no offense to the Rust Belt city often associated with crime, corruption, failing schools and a shaky auto industry.
Detroit City Councilman Gary Brown said Oregonians are making a big mistake because the Motor City will one day return to previous glory.
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Information from: The Detroit News, http://detnews.com/
Thursday, March 18, 2010
Body found under Memphis hotel bed
hotel bed which had been rented out five times since she was last seen in the room six weeks earlier, police said Wednesday.The body was discovered on Monday "after a report of bad odor was reported in the room" according to a police press release posted online by WCMTV news.
"The room had been rented approximately five times and cleaned by the hotel staff numerous times" since she was reported missing on January 27, the statement said.
The bed's mattress and box spring are encased by a metal frame which sits directly on the floor, police said. The release did not specify exactly where in the bed the body was found.
A spokeswoman for the Memphis, Tennessee police department did not immediately return a request for comment.
Sony Millbrook was reported missing on January 27 after she failed to pick her children up from school.
Her family told police that they had checked the hotel where she had been living and Millbrook wasn't there.
A hotel employee told police that Millbrook had been seen around 7:00 am and that while she had been locked out of the room for failing to pay her belongings were still inside the apartment.
The case was transferred from missing persons to the homicide department a week later and detectives interviewed two clerks and a security guard at the hotel, the press release said. It did not indicate whether police examined the hotel room.
Millbrook's boyfriend was subsequently arrested on a gun violation and "remains a person of interest in this case," police said.
Thursday, February 4, 2010
Obama aides defend handling of Christmas plot
Republican lawmakers took aim at late-Tuesday revelations at the White House that US counter-terrorism officials enlisted some of accused bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab's relatives in a successful bid to get him to talk.
The briefing "let America, and our friends, and our enemies in the Middle East know that he's now singing like a canary," said Pete Hoekstra, the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee.
During the session, senior US officials told reporters that the alleged bomber had been cooperating with interrogators in response to an appeal from members of his family flown specially to the United States.
Two FBI counter-terrorism agents traveled to his homeland of Nigeria, found relatives critical of his plans, and brought them back to the United States on January 17th, the officials told reporters on condition of anonymity.
"With the family, the FBI approached the subject and gained his cooperation. He has been cooperating for days," one of them said. "The intelligence gained has been disseminated throughout the intelligence community."
The relatives helped because "they had complete trust in the US system of justice and believed that Umar Farouk will be treated fairly and appropriately," they said.
The revelations seemed designed to blunt weeks of Republican charges that the decision to charge Abdulmutallab as a criminal and inform him of his right to remain silent had led the Nigerian, 23, to clam up, denying potentially vital intelligence to US interrogators.
At the White House, spokesman Bill Burton told reporters that "nothing came out last night that compromises any of the investigations or any of the interrogations that are currently ongoing."
"Before, there was criticism from Republicans that what we were doing wasn't working. Now that people find out that what we're doing is working, they're criticizing the fact that we're saying that what's working is working," he said.
US Attorney General Eric Holder, long in Republican crosshairs, defiantly declared that he had made the decision to charge the attempted bomber in civilian court "with no objection" from any relevant government agency.
Holder, in a letter to Senate Republican Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, also dismissed the lawmaker's contention that Abdulmutallab should face a military trial, saying suspected terrorists caught on US soil since September 11, 2001 had "without a single exception" faced criminal charges.
"No agency supported the use of law of war detention for Abdulmutallab, and no agency has since advised the Department of Justice that an alternative course of action should have been, or should now be, pursued," said Holder.
As the pitched political battle raged, US Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair warned that the partisan jockeying was having a negative impact on efforts to protect the United States from extremist attacks.
"The political dimension of what, to me, ought to be a national security issue has been quite high," he told the House of Representatives Intelligence Committee.
"I don't think it's been particularly good, I will tell you, from the inside, in terms of us trying to get the right job done to try to protect the United States," he said.
Republican Representative Mac Thornberry accused the White House of leaking information that he said should have stayed secret in order to gain "political cover" and "help squash the political controversy."
Blair sidestepped a question from Thornberry on whether there could be an intelligence-gathering purpose to the briefing.
"I have been surprised by the combination of reality and politics having to do with this issue. I just try to do the job to do the right thing for the country and I just can't control all of the politics," said Blair.
US officials accuse Abdulmutallab, allegedly trained in Yemen by Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, of trying to detonate explosives hidden in his underwear on a Northwest Airlines plane approaching Detroit on December 25.
Sunday, January 10, 2010
Chavez vows clampdown on post-devaluation speculators
"To those gentlemen, let's call them looters of the people... If they want to, go ahead and do it, but we'll take their business and hand it over to the workers," Chavez said on his weekly radio and television talk show "Alo Presidente."
The firebrand leftist president was tackling fallout from his announcement Friday to devalue the local currency for non-essential imports to 4.30 bolivars per dollar -- double the present rate -- but to just 2.60 bolivars for basic goods to help poorer Venezuelans.
"If tomorrow a butcher shop opens its doors with a price increase, report it and let the National Guard step in," Chavez said.
"I'm even capable of taking the butcher shop away (from its owner) and turn it over to the people working in it."
Economists predict a devaluation-induced spike in inflation, which last year already hit 25 percent. Thousands of people descended on local shops Saturday, hoping to buy imported goods ahead of imminent price increases.
"There's no reason prices should go up," Chavez said, warning Venezuelans to beware of scammers.
"We're going to launch an offensive against speculation... I want the National Guard to help people on the street fight speculation."
Chavez gave a special warning to banks who fail to serve their customers properly.
"There's a bank out there that's treading dangerous ground. It knows who I'm talking about. They're not going to blackmail me. Any banker who slips up, I'll take the bank away from him, no matter how big it is," Chavez said without naming the institution.
The bolivar's devaluation was the first since 2005, and was designed to aid public finances that have withered amid dwindling oil revenues and a rapidly contracting economy.
Critics said the move would allow Chavez to boost public spending ahead of elections in September, but would severely damage the health of the economy.
Since coming to office, Chavez has sought to remake the Venezuelan economy, vowing to create a more equitable, socialist model.
He has initiated a string of nationalizations of foreign firms, banks and measures that have sent inflation soaring.
Monday, December 28, 2009
Israel PM in Cairo for talks on peace process
The discussions were to focus on "ways to advance peace efforts," Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit said.
"We will listen to his points of view and we will inform him that a fair settlement must be reached on the Palestinian refugee problem and east Jerusalem," he said, referring to two key issues in the peace talks.
Abul Gheit said he would visit Washington in January for talks on the process as US President Barack Obama's administration was said to be drafting letters of guarantee for Israel and the Palestinians to serve as a basis for relaunching the talks which have been stalled for almost a year.
"US special envoy George Mitchell will present two draft letters of guarantee, one for Israel and one to the Palestinian Authority during his next visit to the region," one Arab diplomat in Cairo told AFP.
"The United States is hoping that the two letters will serve as a basis for the relaunch of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations but we don't know if they will satisfy the Palestinians, who want a complete freeze of settlement activity before talks resume," the diplomat said.
Washington was currently in talks with the Palestinians and Egypt -- a key US ally in the region -- over the letters, a Western diplomat said.
Former Israeli left-wing MP Yossi Beilin told AFP that Netanyahu was nearing an agreement with the US administration on the principles of the negotiations.
These principles include "a real, albeit indirect commitment by Netanyahu to negotiate Palestinian demands to return to the 1967 borders," including the thorny question of the future status of Jerusalem, according to Beilin.
Netanyahu was also ready to accept the US demand that the peace negotiations would be limited to 24 months, said Beilin, who was among the initiators of the 1993 Oslo accords.
Netanyahu's spokeman Mark Regev said in reaction that "Mr. Beilin only speaks for Mr. Beilin."
The hawkish Israeli premier said in a speech before Israeli diplomats on Monday that he wanted to resume negotiations in the near future.
"We want to make progress and advance the negotiations in the near future."
Egypt had already asked for written US guarantees before peace talks resume, in order to ensure their aim is the establishment of a Palestinian state within 1967 borders.
"The beginning of negotiations must come either with a complete freeze of settlement activity, which we continue to demand, or if we receive unequivocal guarantees that a Palestinian state will be established along the borders of 1967 including Jerusalem," Abul Gheit said in November.
Netanyahu announced last month a 10-month moratorium on new housing projects in Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank in a move he said was aimed at helping to kick-start the peace talks suspended during the Gaza war at the turn of the year.
The moratorium does not include public buildings or construction under way and does not apply to occupied and annexed east Jerusalem, which Israelis consider part of their capital. The government has reportedly invited tenders for building hundreds of new homes in annexed east Jerusalem.
The Palestinians have rejected the moratorium, saying it fell far short of their demand for a complete halt of settlement activity in the whole West Bank, including annexed east Jerusalem, which they want as the capital of their promised state.
Monday, December 21, 2009
Australian nun may become nation's first saint
SYDNEY — An Australian nun who died 100 years ago looks set to become the nation's first saint, after the Pope recognised a miracle in which she apparently cured a woman of cancer, officials said Sunday.
The miracle, in which a woman who prayed to nun Mary MacKillop was said to have been healed of inoperable lung cancer in the 1990s, opens the way for the Vatican to canonise a woman already revered in Australia as a national icon.
"Today is a special day not only for the Sisters but also for Australia and the universal Church," said Anne Derwin, a nun with the Sisters of St Joseph order founded by MacKillop.
"It is a day to acknowledge Mary who is not only truly saintly but also one of Australia's true heroes."
MacKillop passed the first stage to sainthood when she was beatified by the previous Pope John Paul II in 1995 after having another miracle, in which a woman was said to have been cured of terminal leukaemia, attributed to her.
Melbourne-born MacKillop, who established her first school in a disused stable and founded her order of nuns at the age of 24, is already known as "the Australian people's saint," said Archbishop Philip Wilson.
"She was one of us," said Wilson, who is president of the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference. "Mary was an ordinary person who lived a holy life."
MacKillop, whose parents came to Australia from Scotland, spent her life educating the poor, taking learning to the harsh Outback and to former female prisoners and ex-prostitutes.
But the pioneering educator and social reformer was not without controversy -- MacKillop was excommunicated in 1871 for alleged insubordination before being welcomed back to the Church four months later.
She later sought Pope Pius IX's approval to continue her work with her order and by the time of her death aged 67 in 1909, MacKillop led 750 nuns and had 117 schools and had opened orphanages and refuges for the needy.
Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard said the development was a "deeply significant announcement for the five million Australians of Catholic faith and for all Australians whether of Catholic faith or not."
"In a time when poverty was common and educational opportunities for young Australians very limited, Mary MacKillop worked to improve the lives of the marginalised, the homeless and the destitute throughout her life," she said.
MacKillop's supporters are now awaiting a decision from the Vatican on when she can be canonised, hoping the ceremony will take place in Rome next year.
Sister Derwin said while MacKillop would not have expected the limelight, "it makes us feel excited that the gift she was given for the Church, for the world, is being recognised as valuable".
"She was bold and tenacious and let nothing stand in the way of her care for others," she said. "Her strength, humour and egalitarian vision have important relevance in today's busy and complex times," she said.
The woman whose survival of terminal lung cancer has been acknowledged as the second miracle said she felt personally humbled and grateful to MacKillop.
"I hope this news today provides others, especially younger Australians, with inspiration and encouragement to live as generously and as compassionately as Mary did," the unnamed woman said in a statement read by Derwin.
Derwin said Pope Benedict XVI, who made visiting MacKillop's memorial chapel in North Sydney a priority during his stay in Australia for youth celebrations in 2008, admitted to a great love for the Australian.
He was the third Pope to pray at the tomb.
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Three believed dead after cyclone hits Fiji: police
SUVA — At least three people were believed dead after Cyclone Mick swept over Fiji's main island of Viti Levu, causing widespread flooding and damage, police said Tuesday.
The cyclone was still causing gale-force winds in Fiji's Lau group of islands on Tuesday, a day after sweeping over Viti Levu, where extensive flooding was affecting many parts of the island.
Police said a 19-year-old man was reported to have been swept away while crossing a river in the Ra region in northern Viti Levu on Monday and a 23-year-old had drowned in the Sigatoka area in the southwest of the island.
A school student was also reported killed in the northwestern highlands region of the island when he was struck by a falling tree, police said.
As it crossed Viti Levu the cyclone was estimated near its centre to have average winds of 90 to 110 kilometres (56 miles to 68 miles) an hour, with gusts of up to 150 kilometres an hour, the Fiji Meteorological Service said.
Up to 700 people spent Monday night in evacuation centres due to flooding in low-lying areas.
Many roads remained closed Tuesday due to damage or lingering flood waters, police said.
A gale-force wind warning remained in force for the southern Lau group of islands Tuesday and a strong wind warning continued for the southeastern half of Viti Levu.
Cyclone Mick was estimated to have average winds of 80 kilometres an hour with gusts of up to 100 kilometres an hour by Tuesday, the meteorological service said.
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Surge to break Taliban momentum in a year: US general
WASHINGTON — The NATO commander in Afghanistan on Tuesday predicted a surge of US troops will reverse the momentum of Taliban insurgents within a year and ensure their ultimate defeat.
The additional 30,000 troops ordered by President Barack Obama will turn back insurgent momentum "by this time next year" and cut off the Taliban from the population, General Stanley McChrystal, head of US and allied forces in Afghanistan, told US lawmakers.
The general, testifying before the House and Senate armed services committees, said that "by the summer of 2011, it will be clear to the Afghan people that the insurgency will not win, giving them the chance to side with their government."
McChrystal, who stands at the center of a renewed push in the Afghan war, said he was confident of success because the Taliban remained unpopular and that Afghans did not see foreign troops as occupiers but as a "necessary bridge to future security and stability."
The Taliban "are not a national liberation front that people inside are just waiting for their success," the general said. "They succeed largely on their coercion."
McChrystal presented a united front at the hearing with US ambassador to Kabul, Karl Eikenberry, despite public clashes between the two over war strategy that had played out in leaked newspaper reports.
Obama's plan combines a troop buildup with a target date of July 2011 for the start of a gradual US withdrawal, a provision that has drawn criticism from Republicans who say it plays into the hands of the enemy.
Though McChrystal told lawmakers he did not propose the target date for the start of a withdrawal, he said setting a timeline for a handover to Afghans posed no military problem.
But he acknowledged that the insurgents could try to misrepresent the date for propaganda purposes.
Obama's promise to begin withdrawing troops in mid-2011 has sparked concern in Afghanistan and neighboring Pakistan that insurgents could wait out the surge and attack a pared down force in 18 months' time.
Despite his optimistic forecast, McChrystal warned that coalition forces faced "a complex and resilient insurgency" and that the most difficult task would be improving the credibility of local and national government.
Pressed by lawmakers, the general said he was satisfied with the reinforcements approved by Obama and said he did not expect to ask for more forces within a year.
The testimony comes a week after Obama announced the deployment of additional forces, a risky decision with many of the president's fellow Democrats increasingly anxious about the costly eight-year-old war.
A new survey released Tuesday showed more Americans backing the war since Obama presented his plan last week. Support for the mission jumped nine points to 57 percent against 37 percent opposed, according to the Quinnipiac University poll.
As a first step in the troop buildup, a contingent of 1,500 Marines will begin arriving next week in the southern Helmand province, where commanders hope to turn the tide against Islamist insurgents.
With thousands of troops due to pour into the country's south, the insurgents will face long-odds in combat and likely be forced to turn to more attacks using homemade bombs, a senior military official told reporters.
"If they try to contest with any kind of head-on-head forces, they'll get swamped in the south, and they'll just get hammered," said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
At the congressional hearings, both McChrystal and Eikenberry sought to play down their differences over the war.
Eikenberry, a retired general and former commander in Afghanistan, acknowledged he had questioned the size of a planned troop surge but said he supported the final decision.
"It was not a question of additional troops. It was the question as we all had about the number of troops," he said.
During the policy debate, Eikenberry said he had concerns about the timeline for the troop deployments and "what would be the context that those troops would operate in."
He said he was now "unequivocally" in support of the mission.
During the White House debate, Eikenberry reportedly wrote cables saying corruption in the Afghan government had to be addressed first before a big troop surge.