I know something about Blackwater USA. This opinion is both intellectually driven as well as moderately emotional. You see, during my own yearlong tour in Iraq, the bad boys of Blackwater twice came closer to killing me than did any of the insurgents or Al Qaeda types. That sort of thing sticks with you. One story will suffice to make my point.

The first time it happened was in the spring of 2005. For various reasons, none of which bear repeating, I was moving through downtown Baghdad in an unmarked civilian sedan. I was with two other men, but they had the native look, while I was in my uniform, hunched in the back seat and partially covered by a blanket, hoping that the curtains on the window were enough to conceal my incongruous presence, not to mention my weapons. It was not the normal manner in which an Army infantry major moved around the city, but it was what the situation called for, so there I was. We were in normal Baghdad traffic, with the flow such as it was, in the hubbub of confusion that is generated when you suddenly introduce more than 1 million extra vehicles in the course of two years into a city that previously had only a few hundred thousand vehicles, and no real licensing authority.

As we approached one semi-infamous intersection along the main route used by Blackwater between the International Zone (a.k.a. the Green Zone) and the Ministry of Interior, one of Blackwater's convoys roared through. Apparently, Blackwater's agents did not like the look of us, the main body of cars in front of them. Their response was, to say the least, contrary to the best interests of the United States effort in Iraq. Barreling through in their huge, black armored Suburbans and Expeditions, they drove other cars onto the sidewalk even as they popped off rounds from at least one weapon, though I cannot say if the shots were aimed at us or fired into the sky as a warning. I do know one thing: It enraged me ... and Blackwater is, at least nominally, on our side.

But imagining that incident from an Iraqi perspective made it clear to me that though Blackwater USA draws its paycheck from Uncle Sam, it's not working in Uncle Sam's best interests. If I was this angry, I can only imagine the reactions of the tens of thousands of Iraqis who encounter Blackwater personnel on a regular basis.

Iraq operates on the basis of an honor culture. Honor is, arguably, more important than Islam. Being dishonored, in word or deed, or even by implication, is enough to set the average Iraqi man to plotting his revenge. This is a culture in which political assassinations (usually based on honor issues) are not an abstraction but an everyday occurrence. Every time one of those Blackwater convoys drives an Iraqi civilian off the road because the most important thing in the world is the protection of their "principal," they make a new enemy for the United States. Every time they ram another car to clear the way (and, yes, I've seen them do that), so that they could maintain their own speed and thereby minimize their exposure to "improvised explosive devices," they make another enemy. Every time they kill innocent civilians, or wound them, they make whole families of new enemies.

This understanding of the backlash effect from dishonoring an Iraqi is included in a past military counterinsurgency manual, "Instructions for American Servicemen in Iraq during World War II," recently re-published by the University of Chicago Press. But the reality is that Blackwater USA, from top to bottom, just does not care.

What employees of the private security firm care about, and I have heard this from the Blackwaters with whom I interacted in Iraq, is their paycheck. They care about their huge compensation packages, and about getting home alive to spend them. Blackwater USA has already taken in more than $1 billion from the public coffers.

All in all, that's not a bad take for Erik Prince, the founder of Blackwater and a Naval Academy dropout who served less time under the colors of the nation, in uniform, than my most recent pair of boots.

Robert Bateman is a historian and U.S. Army infantry officer. He served in Iraq in 2005 and 2006. His most recent book is "No Gun Ri: A Military History of the Korean War Incident."

Summary: I know something about Blackwater USA. This opinion is both intellectually driven as well as moderately emotional. You see, during my own yearlong tour in Iraq , the bad boys of Blackwater twice came closer to killing me than did any of the insurgents or Al Qaeda types. That sort of thing sticks with you. One story will suffice to make my point.


If you’ve got it, flaunt it!

Hilary Duff recently hit the beaches of Puerto Vallarta, Mexico with her boyfriend Jason Walsh — and let’s just say dating a personal trainer is certainly paying off.

The Younger star took to Instagram to document the tropical getaway, sharing a close-up of an iguana and a picture of herself beaming while holding up two fish she caught spearfishing.

“Caught this today spear fishing!!!” she captioned the stunning shot of herself in a burgundy ViX bikini. “The only reason I don’t feel terrible is because I’m eating it for lunch.”

She also shared a shot of hammock on the beach, simply writing: “Yes.”

RELATED VIDEO: Hilary Duff Calls Out Nico Tortorella for Being Naked on the Set of Younger

Duff and Walsh were first linked in summer 2015 after they partied together to celebrate the grand opening event for his Rise Nation Fitness Studio in West Hollywood. Romance rumors continued to buzz throughout 2016, and Duff eventually confirmed the two were dating by posting a sweet picture of them kissing on Instagram last month.

Duff finalized her divorce from former NHL player Mike Comrie, 36, in February. The two had been married since August 2010 and share 4-year-old son Luca together.

Summary: Duff and Walsh took a trip to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico


A legendary school for pickpockets and thieves may exist somewhere in the misty heights of the Andes Mountains outside Bogota, Colombia.

It's known as the School of the Seven Bells, and although no U.S. police officer is known to have been there, many people believe it's real.

Their belief is underscored by the skill and stealth of some slick South American pickpockets who snatch wallets from victims on subways and at airports.

According to Paul Higdon, an expert with the international police agency Interpol, the mysterious school for thieves got its name from the colorful final exam its graduates must pass.

In the test, the teacher poses as a mark, his body booby-trapped with seven small bells, each strategically placed. The students must slip valuables from each of seven pockets without ringing any of the attached bells.

There is no big secret to picking a pocket - it's all a matter of practicing the moves until they're as smooth as silk, and learning to distract the mark's attention at a critical moment.

Bob Arno, a Las Vegas performer whose act consists of calling up volunteers from the audience and removing wallets and wrist watches, said many pickpockets are taught the skill. Even though Arno's marks know what's coming, they never feel a thing.

Arno and his wife, Bambi, have traveled the world, performing and studying the art. In the former Soviet Union, they saw thieves who slice open their victims' pockets with razor blades clenched in their teeth. In Rome, they saw groups of men surrounding their victims on crowded buses, using the jouncing motion to cover their thievery.

And everywhere they went, they heard about the School of the Seven Bells. "It may be the reason the best pickpockets in the world are in South America," Arno later told a Nevada newspaper.

NYPD Inspector Louis Croce, who worked on the pickpocket squad in the early 1980s, said he'd heard about the School of the Seven Bells.

But asked whether he thought the school was merely a legend or a real place, he said, "If I had to bet money on it, I'd say it's a myth."

Summary: By DON SINGLETON DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER A legendary school for pickpockets and thieves may exist somewhere in the misty heights of the Andes Mountains outside Bogota, Colombia. It's known as the School of the Seven Bells, and although no U.S. police officer is known to have been there, many people believe it's real. Their belief is underscored by the skill and stealth of some slick South American pickpockets who snatch wallets from victims


Sunday, May 4th 2003, 1:14AM

The party season is upon us and the good news is you don't need to spend a bundle for an elaborately decorated cake to cap your celebration. You can do it yourself, says Juan Arache, an award-winning designer who teaches the art of cake decorating at the Sugar Room, his shop and school in Sunnyside, Queens.

Those whimsical figures and three-dimensional decorations on graduation and birthday cakes, the stars and ribbons on Mother's and Father's Day cakes, even the scrolls, flowers and lacy designs on wedding cakes are possible with just a few simple tools. A metal spatula (for applying icing smoothly), pastry bag and a couple of piping nozzles (for making flowers, petals, stars, shells and the like), and some tubes of colorful decorating gel will get you started, says the teacher.

Arache became aware of the interest in do-it-yourself decorating while turning out work-of-art cakes at Manhattan's Cupcake Cafe. "Customers were always asking where they could learn to decorate cakes," he recalls. The problem, he says, is that courses at professional schools are lengthy and expensive, and stores selling cake-decorating supplies are few and far between. An idea was born and the Sugar Room, where a mind-boggling array of decorating tools is sold and classes given, was the result.

Although Arache teaches the art of gum paste flowers and advanced work with fondant, he's just as happy showing a novice how easy it is to make beautiful cakes, so we challenged him to come up with three designs that a reader could do without any training. Here are Arache's suggestions.

Even wedding cakes are possible for the novice, with the aid of a few simple tools. This cake is covered with white fondant rather than buttercream for a more formal look. You can make your own or buy packages of the sugar paste (about $6, enough for a 10-inch cake). With a rolling pin, roll it to the size you need, just as you would a pie crust. (To prevent sticking, roll fondant on confectioner's sugar.) Apply a thin layer of buttercream to the cake, refrigerate briefly, then apply the fondant, pressing gently and trimming the edges at the cake's base.

1 Arache used a silicon mold and more fondant to create the lacy triangles on the cake. Add coloring if you wish to fondant and roll the fondant flat. Sprinkle mold with cornstarch, put the fondant between the two layers of the mold, and press the mold together. Pull excess fondant away.

2 Gently lift the pressed fondant off mold; use a small brush to brush away cornstarch; moisten edges of the triangle with water and a brush, and pressing lightly, apply "lace" to cake.

3 For the quilting pattern, use a metal diamond quilting marker (about $20), pressing it into the sides of the cake where desired. Apply dots of royal icing to the points of the diamonds to act as glue for the silver dragÃ©es (little balls) placed at each point of the diamond.

4 Apply a row of silver dragÃ©es at the base of the cake, or use a no. 3 tip and pipe tiny dots of icing to create a row of "pearls" on the base.

For the top of the cake, a gum paste bouquet (this one cost about $27) is the perfect - and easiest - finishing touch.

You don't need to be an artist to draw balloons or simple, amusing pictures for a child's birthday cake.

1 Apply thin base coat and second final coat of buttercream icing as directed on right. Outline the balloons in black or a dark color buttercream icing using a piping bag fitted with a no. 3 piping tip. The outline defines the design and keeps the colored decorating gel used to color the balloons from spreading.

Fill in the center of each balloon using tubes of decorating gel (available in supermarkets and cake-decorating supply stores) in your choice of colors.

2 For a nice decorative edge around the cake, fill a piping bag (fitted with a no. 32 piping tip) with buttercream in a pastel shade. To create the star edging, position the tip on the edge, squeeze some icing out and then pull up the tip. Repeat around the cake, on the top and bottom edges. If you wish, add a circle of red and blue dots around the inner edge of the cake using tubes of decorating gel.

General directions: Whether working with buttercream icing (one of the easiest icings to make and work with) or elegant fondant, always apply a thin

layer of buttercream to the cake first and refrigerate it for 20 to 30 minutes so the icing will harden. This seals in crumbs so that when you apply the second,

final coat of icing, it will be smooth and crumb-less.

A "gift-wrapped cake" is the perfect finishing touch to a Mother's or Father's Day party or a graduation celebration.

1 Apply a final coat of buttercream frosting, using a metal spatula. Frost the sides of the cake first, then the top. Smooth the surface with the long edge of the spatula.

2 If you have difficulty creating a smooth surface, use a decorating comb (a metal triangle with serrated edges) over the surface, creating wavy lines as you drag it through the icing.

3 For the "ribbon," fill a piping bag fitted with a large ribbon tip (Arache used tip no. 790 for this ridged ribbon) with buttercream icing in your choice of color. Pipe ribbon up the sides and over the top of the cake by squeezing on the bag as you drag it across the cake. Release pressure on the bag before lifting the tip from the surface.

4 Finish the ribbon design with a diagonal "bow"

applied in the same manner as the ribbon.

You'll find the basics for cake decorating at these stores:

-Sugar Room, 43-46 40th St., Sunnyside, Queens, (718) 707-2900

-N.Y. Cake & Baking Distributor, 56 W. 22d St., Manhattan, (212)

-Broadway Panhandler, 477 Broome St., Manhattan, (212) 966-3434

-Bridge Kitchenware, 214 E. 52d St., Manhattan, (212) 688-4220

Summary: PIECE OF CAKE Do-it-yourself decorating for works of edible art ICE & EASY Simple steps to true confections BY ISABEL FORGANG The party season is upon us and the good news is you don't need to spend a bundle for an elaborately decorated cake to cap your celebration. You can do it yourself, says Juan Arache, an award-winning designer who teaches the art of cake decorating at the Sugar Room, his shop and school in Sunnyside,


Saturday, October 24th 1998, 2:05AM

IT MAY COME AS a surprise to some that a child of the broken-glass streets of a Bronx housing project could rise to become a judge in the polished-wood chambers of the 2nd Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals.

The former Bronxdale Houses girl who'll take a prestigious spot on the appeals court in Manhattan next month has believed for a long, long time that one day she would find herself at the top of her profession.

"I was going to college and I was going to become an attorney, and I knew that when I was 10," she says. "Ten. That's no jest."

And though the destination was predictable, the journey was anything but simple.

Her nomination to the federal appeals court was held up for a year and her name turned into a national symbol of liberal excess. She became a target for conservatives who worried that the appointment to 2nd Circuit was just a cover for her eventual elevation to the very top the U.S. Supreme Court.

Some Republican senators jammed her nomination and prompted much talk-show jousting about the role of judges in society. It took until Oct. 2, more than a year after President Clinton nominated her, for the Senate to approve her promotion. In the end, the vote was 68 to 28.

To those who know Sotomayor, that day came not as a terrific surprise. It was, in fact, even a bit predictable given her longstanding ambition.

"She has a very clear-cut idea of where she wants to go," says Hugh Mo, a Manhattan lawyer who once served with her in the Manhattan district attorney's office in the early 1980s. "She wants to reach the highest level of the legal profession," Mo said. "A Supreme Court justice is not far-fetched."

During a recent interview in her large Manhattan Federal Court office, where she is winding down her final days as a District Court judge, Sotomayor recalled with precision the precocious year she decided to go into law.

Back in 1964, she lived in the Bronxdale Houses, walked 2 miles to Catholic school and read enough Nancy Drew mysteries to decide she would definitely be a detective when she grew up.

That year, she was diagnosed with diabetes and told being a cop was out of the question.

"I became very disappointed about not having a life plan," she said. "At the time, 'Perry Mason' had become a very popular show, and I loved Perry Mason. If I couldn't do detective work as a police officer, I could do it as a lawyer."

Thus began a rapid and steady climb. Like F. Scott Fitzgerald's Jay Gatsby, who at age 10 sketched out a daily planner with time set aside to "improve myself," Sotomayor set about winning scholarships, first to Princeton, then to Yale Law School.

The daughter of Puerto Rican parents who came to the U.S. during World War II, she became editor of the Yale Law Review, and after graduation in 1979 landed a prestigious job with Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau.

Her job was her life. She was divorced in 1983, never had children, immersed herself in the law and kept an eye out for powerful people who could help her up the ladder.

In the district attorney's office, she learned criminal law, and even her opponents admired her discipline and sense of fair play.

Steven Kimelman, who defended a man Sotomayor prosecuted for trafficking in child pornography, recalled, "She handled it very well. She didn't pander to the jury. She was very methodical and well prepared."

Openly preparing a resume for a potential judgeship, she switched from criminal to civil law in 1984, becoming an associate at a small firm, Pavia & Harcourt. She made partner in three years.

"I wanted to complete myself as an attorney," she recalls.

She also began swimming with the big Democrats, persuading Mayor Ed Koch to appoint her to the city Campaign Finance Board in 1985, and getting Gov. Mario Cuomo to put her on the state's Mortgage Agency in 1987.

The schmoozing paid off. In 1991, one of the state's senior Democrats, Sen. Daniel Moynihan, nominated her for a District Court judgeship in Manhattan. She began serving in October 1992 at age 38.

She remained low-profile, except for her applauded handling of the 1994-95 baseball strike that resulted in owners and players putting aside months of bitterness to settle.

The newly crowned Baseball Judge (a long-time Yankee fan) won praise from fans across the nation, and by September 1997, she was nominated for a spot on the 2nd Circuit. Her elevation was expected to come off with nary a speed bump.

Then one morning last June, Judge Sotomayor picked up The Wall Street Journal and learned on that paper's conservative Op-Ed page that she was now a lefty judicial activist.

The Journal blasted two rulings: one in which she required a midtown business district to pay the minimum wage to homeless people, and another ordering the New York Bar Association to accommodate a law student with reading problems who wanted help taking the bar exam.

Conservative radio talk-show host Rush Limbaugh picked up the paper and ran with it.

Soon her nomination was in peril. Some Republicans were convinced Clinton was promoting her to the 2nd Circuit so he could later move her and her allegedly liberal views to the Supreme Court.

It got to the point where during her Sept. 30, 1997, Judiciary Committee questioning, Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) mentioned rumors that she refused to stand when Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas addressed a 1992 meeting with 2nd Circuit judges.

"Did you see fit to stand and applaud?" Sessions demanded.

"He was Supreme Court justice for our circuit," she said. "I stood."

Today, even after she won Senate approval and is prepared to begin work in the 2nd Circuit, she remains angry at what she says was the Republican stereotype of her: she's a woman, she's Latina, she must be a bleeding-heart liberal.

"That series of questions, I think, were symbolic of a set of expectations that some people had [that] I must be liberal," she said. "It is stereotyping, and stereotyping is perhaps the most insidious of all problems in our society today."

Summary: IT MAY COME AS a surprise to some that a child of the broken-glass streets of a Bronx housing project could rise to become a judge in the polished-wood chambers of the 2nd Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals. Not to Sonia Sotomayor. The former Bronxdale Houses girl who'll take a prestigious spot on the appeals court in Manhattan next month has believed for a long, long time that one day she would find herself at


Friday, February 17th 1995, 3:72AM

Promotions, appointments and new positions on the local business scene:

Ginny Pittarelli, apointed senior vice president and managing director/Retail Services Group in New York City, at CB Commercial Real Estate Group, Inc.

Kathy Behrens, named executive director of New York Cares, a not-for-profit volunteer corps performing community service projects throughout New York City.

Alfred Edmond Jr., named executive editor; Mark Lowery, named senior editor, at Black Enterprise magazine.

Amy Rubenstein, named vice president/management supervisor; Daisy Cruz, named vice president/office manager; William Capodanno, named account executive; Dan Sylvester, named copywriter; Richard Muehlberg, named associate creative director, at Wunderman Cato Johnson.

Randy Sabiston, named senior creative director, at PolyGram Music Publishing Group USA.

Carol Greer, joins as president and chief executive officer of newly formed Specialty Footwear division; William DeVries, named president and chief executive officer of newly formed Athletic Footwear and Apparel division, at Woolworth Corp.

Paul Cavota, joins as director/Field Operations, at Gandhi Engineering, P.C.

J. Terry Flores; Reginald Henry; Albert Lucas, named partners, at Mitchell, Titus & Co., the nation's largest African-American controlled certified public accounting and consulting firm.

Laird Criner 2d, named assistant vice president, at U.S. RE Corp.

Aldo Roldan, joins as senior vice president and head of Fixed Income Sales, at Santander Investment Securities Inc.

Neil Allen, joins as head of newly formed Latin American Business Group; Pierre Durand, named to oversee sales and trading activities; Carlos Garcia, named to manage mergers and acquisitions and merchant banking activities; Alejandro Catania, named to head derivatives business, at Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette.

Molly Hudson Rosen, named executive vice president and director/Business Development, at Wells Rich Greene BDDP Advertising, Inc.

Abbe Murray, appointed director/Multimedia Sales and Marketing, at General Media International Group.

Robert Bain, appointed president and general manager of Payroll 1 Greater New York and Payroll 1 Manhattan, Inc.

Patti Pruett; Jennifer Riordan Newall; Matthew Pressman, named account managers/New York advertising sales office, at Weider Publications, Inc.

Robert Butler, appointed to newly created manager/Group Sales, at The Four Seasons.

Send promotions, appointments and new positions, with pictures if possible, to: On the Move, Business News Dept., 7th Floor, New York Daily News, 220 E. 42d, N.Y.C., NY 10017.


Search, the holy grail that pushed Google into global Internet domination, is still coveted by many. The fact that most users don’t even consider switching Google for anything else doesn’t mean that there’s no innovation going on in the field of search. Quite the contrary; which can also be seen from the list below.

Google – Does it need any explanation? In case you haven’t been online in the last 10 years, this is the largest, most popular and widely used search engine on the planet.

Yahoo – Much like Google above. Also a widely used general information search engine.

DogPile – Compiles results from some of the major search engines such as Google, Yahoo and Windows Live Search.

AltaVista – Search the web, audio, images, videos and news. You can also search WorldWide or narrow your results to U.S. Only.

Windows Live Search – Search the web and get your own personalized page filled with information you love.

Zuula – Search the web with results from all of the major search engines, you can also specify which search engines you want results from. You can also add the Zuula search to your Firefox search box.

Mamma.com – A meta search engine. Not only can you search the web for information and videos you can also search the white and yellow pages.

Ask.com – Find whatever you are looking for quickly and easily. You can search the web for images, blogs, news and much more. Ask has recently had a redesign and some reports have been very positive about it.

WebCrawler – Why settle for one search engine when you can have them all. Get your results mixed together from Google, Yahoo, Windows Live and more.

Netscape Search – Search the web for your favorite information with Netscape. Not the best search engine out there by any means, but solid; mostly used by Netscape users.

MetaCrawler – Search the web, yellow pages and white pages from one place.

Clusty – A twist on typical search engines. Clusty not only lists your results like you are used to seeing, but it also breaks them into clusters, or categories, making finding the desired results a little easier.

Excite – A search engine and much more. Get your own customized page with news, horoscopes, local weather and more.

MozDex – A search engine seeded from the Dmoz Directory, it is powered by open source technology.

Kanoodle – This is a pay-per-click sponsored search engine. This means you can pay for inclusion, if you are trying to drive traffic to your site.

ExactSeek – Large online search engine, you can search the web, blogs, news and articles. You can include your site for free or featured/paid inclusion.

AlltheWeb – Search results are provided by Yahoo. You can also search specifically for news, audio and video all in 36 different languages.

Lycos – Lycos search results are powered by Ask.com and much like Excite you can customize the homepage to suit your interests.

ScrubtheWeb – On top of searching the web, this site is also a host to many great web developer tools, like the meta tag builder and analyzer.

LemmeFind – Meta search engine that pulls results from Google. Yahoo and MSN.

KartOO – A fun flash based metasearch engine with a unique visual interface. Rather than displaying long boring lists of results, KartOO displays an interactive map for finding results.

AOL Search – Search the web with AOL. Search results are enhanced by Google.

HotBot – Search the web using Ask.com or MSN and you can create custom filters to block out all of that unwanted information.

SearchMaze – Nice clean search engine, with some useful tools and features like their toolbar with the ability search from over 150 search engines.

IxQuick – A very powerful meta search engine, not only can you find what you want on the web, you can also find phone numbers and addresses through their international phone directory search.

MSN.com – Search the web with MSN, there are so many other resources available.

GigaBlast – Nice search engine with lots of features. You can restrict search results to specific sites, add search features to your own site and more.

Seekz – Meta search engine with site clustering and duplicate removal.

Zippy – Great all around search engine with a special emphasis on webmasters. You can compare top 10 results for SEO purposes, compare two sites against each other and other great features.

Iboogie – Meta search engine that clusters results so they can be broken down into the most relevant information related to your criteria.

Irazoo – Get points which can earn you prizes by simply using the search engine.

WebFetch – Query results from U.K based sites only or search internationally.

Human Edited Search Engines and Directories

Mahalo – Jason Calacanis’ baby, a very serious contender with lots of funding, is best described as a cross between Wikipedia and Google. If a human edit result for your query doesn’t exist, you’ll be transfered to standard Google results.

Dmoz – Probably the most popular and largest human edited search engine directory. All sites must be submitted and approved for placement in the directory.

Sproose – A user powered search engine. Users vote on the results and then the sites are ranked accordingly. This allows them to provide quality results, without all of the junk that you find in a typical search engine.

Directory Hound – Human edited directory modeled after Dmoz. All sites must be submitted and approved before entry. Covers all general categories.

Yoofindit.com – General information directory, all sites are reviewed by staff members.

Best of the Web – Very popular directory, with strict submission guidelines. Also have an award program for the best ranked sites.

10 Directory – Nice, clean looking categorized web directory.

Ajdee.com – All submitted sites are reviewed and approved by editors before inclusion is granted. They cover all general categories and do not allow adult related websites.

Search Turtle – A human edited web directory and search engine. Make claims of having the most rigorous submission guidelines, to allow for the best spam-free results.

GoGuides.org – Community guides review all site submissions for inclusion within the directory. Very clean look, easy to use.

JoeAnt – A very large directory portal operated by volunteer guides. You can find a little bit of everything here and you can apply to become a guide yourself.

ChaCha – Suppose you can’t find what you are searching for. One click on ChaCha will get you in touch with a live guide to help you find what you want.

Book and Library Search Engines

Librarians Internet Index – A publicly funded search engine and directory of information and resources for librarians.

BookFinder – Searches over 125 million books from several online catalogs. You are sure to find your favorite.

AddAll – Search for your favorite book from over forty different stores and 20,000 different sellers, including Amazon.com.

UsedBookSearch – Search thousands of online shops for used, rare and out of print books.

ComicSeeker.com – If comic books are more your style, search the web for rare and collectible comics here.

Business Search Engines and Directories

Bpubs.com – A business search engine and directory for business and trade related publications.

BizEurope – Extensive directory and trade portal for European businesses.

Business.com – Large business search engine and directory.

HongKong Business Directory – Directory of information for over 100,000 HongKong based businesses.

World Trade Search – Search engine and trade directory for businesses in North America, Europe and Asia.

Jayde – Popular business to business search engine. Find businesses in many different markets.

AardvarkBusiness.net – Find thousands of business websites around the web with this search engine.

Cyber TradeZone – Global directory of importers and exporters.

Zibb – A global search engine for finding businesses on the web.

Made-in-China.com – Trade directory of products from Chinese Suppliers.

MasterSeek – Find businesses and contact information from companies in 75 countries. Filter results to specific countries.

BusinesSeek – Global business directory and search engine.

KellySearch.com – Directory of over 2 million businesses and products from around the globe.

SmallBizSearch.com – Small business search engine provided by Entrepreneur.com.

BusinessCrawler – Large business search engine and directory.

BizAhead – International business to business directory.

Alibaba.com – Extensive Global trade directory, many different products and manufacturers available.

Music and Video Related Search Engines

Project Playlist – Generates results from record labels, artist websites music blogs and other publicly available websites. Search by Artist name, song title or both.

PodNova – A podcast and video blog search engine. You can search the directory or browse by tag, you can also add your own feed for others to find.

Truveo – Searches through millions of videos across the web each day. Purchased by AOL in 2006 this is one of the largest sources for finding videos.

Espew – An Mp3 search engine that aggregates results from around the web. This is a completely free and legal service, they pay a percentage to the record labels every time a song is played.

SkreemR – Search engine that indexes publicly accessible audio files from across the web.

EveryZing – A media search engine for finding audio and video files across multiple channels.

Blinkx – Very large search engine for finding videos across the web. They have millions of results in their database are considered to be one of the largest video search engines in the world.

ScoopVid! – Track down the most popular videos by the hour, day or even month. You can also search the web for video results.

MusicIP – Discover new artists through their digital music search engine. You can also sign-up to include your own recordings in the index.

MusicHits – Find everything from musician homepages to music on sale to music news sites. Very extensive directory.

Mp3Realm – Search for Mp3 files artist, title, genre and album. You can also filter results by duration.

Musicians-Search.net – A user updated directory of music related sites. You can browse by genre or even instruments or search the directory. You can also add your own music site.

MusicSearcher – Search or browse by your favorite artist or music genre. They also aggregate breaking news in the music industry.

Vdoogle – This search engine indexes results from sites like YouTube and Google Video, to bring you shared and viral videos.

The Brass Band Portal – If brass bands are your thing, this is a search engine dedicated to finding related information for brass fans.

Artist Direct – A network of music related sites and services. You can find sites that offer multi-media content, music related e-commerce, music news and more.

PodScope – The first of its kind, PodScope is an audio and video search engine that allows you to search and find podcasts by the words that are spoken within them.

MusicRobot – Search the Internet for MIDI files of your favorite music.

Pixsy – Very nice media search engine. You can find plenty of images and videos here to suit your fancy.

Music Crawler – One of the leading U.S. Based search engines. Find your favorite music anywhere on the web.

LyricsPoint.com – Looking for song lyrics? This search engine pulls over 100,000 song lyrics to match your criteria.

Mu-Seek – Search the web for your favorite music, by words in the title or words in the song lyrics. Just in case you can’t remember what the song was called.

Ulinkx – A social video search engine. Browse popular videos by tags or perform a search for your favorites.

MELE.com – A specialty search engine for finding Hawaiian music by artist name, album name or song title.

SeeqPod – Search engine aggregates music from all over the web, and displays the results in a clean interface. You can also play the music right from the search results to see if it is what you are looking for.

MusicVideos4All – Search the web for your favorite music videos or browse through what others are searching for.

VidSea – Beta search engine for video hunters.

Blog and RSS Search Engines and Directories

BlogSearchEngine – Search engine queries results from over 10 million blogs around the web.

Google Blog Search – Search Google’s index to find blogs on your favorite topic.

Bloogz – Blog search engine.

Total Blog Directory – Categorized directory of blogs.

BritBlog.com – Searchable directory of British based blogs.

Real Estate Blogs – A large directory of blogs affiliated with the real estate market.

Technorati – One of the most popular blog directories, they currently index over 100 million blogs on virtually every topic.

BlogDigger – Search engine for finding blogs and RSS feeds.

BlogHub – Online directory of blogs and resources for bloggers.

Blog-Search – Find your favorite blogs and RSS feeds.

BlogCatalog – Very large social blog directory, find a blog or add your own to the list.

Bloglines – Search or share your favorite news feeds, blogs and rich web content.

BlogExplosion – Directory of blogs covering virtually every category.

Peace Corps Journals – Directory of over 3000 blogs written by Peace Corps volunteers from around the world.

Find That Feed – search the web for feeds by keyword.

Plazoo – Blog and feed search engine. You have the option to search in several different languages.

Othx – Personal blog search engine, human edited for quality results.

SplogSpot – Search engine for finding spam blogs, link farms and more spam related content.

Syndic8 – RSS and Atom news feed search engine.

BlogDumps – Directory of blogs from around the web.

Bloggapedia – Directory of blogs , blog news and more. Add your blog to the directory.

BlogHop – Search through nearly 30,000 blogs in this directory, you can find them by tags or keyword search.

PhotoBlogs.org – Search through more than 26,000 photoblogs in their directory.

Blo.gs – Blog search engine owned by Yahoo. Add your own blog to the directory.

Postami.com – RSS and Atom search engine.

BlogFlux – Extensive directory of blogs, and blogging tools and resources.

Blogarama – Searchable blog directory, can also browse by category.

PoemHunter.com – Search for poets, poems, quotations and music.

DriverSearch.com – Have a device that requires a driver? Here you can search the web for thousands of device drivers.

Hawaii Search – A directory committed to indexing every website with relation to the Hawaiin Islands. You can get hotel accommodations or just check out the local shops.

FindSounds – A free search engine for finding audio clips and sound effects. You can get files in Wave, AU and AIFF formats.

AllofMaine.com – A large search directory of Maine only websites.

AardvarkTravel.net – If you are in the need of a good vacation, you can go here and search through over 20 thousand travel sites from around the world.

First Nations Seeker – Extensive directory of North American Indian websites.

HomePageSeek – Some webmasters just don’t have a knack for being found. This search engine and directory, tries to help you find those sites you wouldn’t ordinarily come across.

Black Business Planet – A directory filled with links to African American related websites and content.

WebWombat – Search through over 20 million results from Australian based websites, and customize the homepage to fit your needs.

Social Work Search – Searchable directory of information in the social worker profession.

Teddy Bear Search – A search engine for finding teddy bears around the world. Searches are customizable and you can search in English or French.

StarLink – Search for Astronomy related information, institutions, and addresses.

Krugle – This is a search engine for open source code, projects and technical information for developers.

Scirus – Search engine for scientists. Searches and indexes over 450 million science related websites, to keep scientific information at your fingertips.

Healia – Search engine for health related information.

EscapeArtist.com – A search engine developed to give you calling codes to and from any country in the world.

SFAHQ – Search for results of related interests to the Special Forces. A non-profit project ran by ex-military.

WorthyLinks – A Christian search engine. Find Christian stores and resources from around the web.

FinderSeeker – A search engine for finding other search engines.

ParaSeek – A search engine and directory for those of you interested in the paranormal.

Summary: Search, the holy grail that pushed Google into global Internet domination, is still coveted by many. The fact that most users don't even consider switching Google for anything else doesn't mean t


TO his slight surprise Bagehot was recently asked to review all the new biographies of Queen Elizabeth II being published to mark 2012, her 60th year on the throne. It was a bit like asking an agnostic to be Vatican correspondent, but five books, 1500 pages and a lot of corgi anecdotes later, I finally surfaced. At moments it felt a bit like eating a banquet entirely consisting of cakes and pudding, with Turkish delight to finish. But in amongst the cloying fluff there were some good stories. It was striking to be reminded how shabby and poor war-broken Britain was (there were nice details about peers of the realm at the queen's coronation in 1953, assured that they could substitute rabbit fur for ermine and told they could hide sandwiches in their coronets).

I think my favourite anecdote involved John Prescott, a curmudgeonly lefty who served as deputy prime minister to Tony Blair. Early on in the era of New Labour, it is claimed, Mr Prescott was due at a palace reception to meet his sovereign. Among his Labour colleagues there was much speculation as to whether he would bow to the queen or defy what he surely considered the snobbish, southern tomfoolery of court etiquette. The moment arrived, the pair were introduced, and the queen politely greeted her deputy prime minister... in a suddenly tiny voice. Straining to hear, Mr Prescott bent down. Oh, so John's bowed then, murmured his colleagues. He's Lord Prescott now, so he clearly got over it.

Here's the review, published in this week's print edition:

BEING on show is a serious business for Queen Elizabeth II who acceded to the throne 60 years ago next month. On royal tours and walkabouts, she is careful to choose bright colours and small-brimmed hats, glides through crowds “like a liner” and seemingly never tires. “Oh look! She’s keeled over again,” the queen once noted at a stifling-hot palace reception, spotting her then prime minister, Margaret Thatcher, pale and slumped in a chair.

On several occasions she has been urged to retreat behind more obtrusive layers of security. Each time she has refused with something between a joke and a motto for her six decades on the throne, telling aides: “I have to be seen to be believed.”

Yet for the 85-year-old monarch, pictured above with Prince Charles shortly before her coronation, belief requires distance, too. Younger generations of royals have kissed and told. But the queen has never given an interview. Though some of her 12 British prime ministers were convinced they forged a special bond during weekly audiences with their sovereign, her personal politics remain unknown.

Over the years, various aristocrats, cousins and horse-racing grandees have been more or less plausibly identified as her friends. Even among such intimates, boundaries are observed, for fear of crossing an unseen line and triggering a stare of blank, silent rebuke. “She is never—you know—not the Queen,” advises an unnamed friend, quoted in the opening lines of a new biography by the BBC’s senior political interviewer, Andrew Marr.

Yet as a constitutional monarch, ruling with the tacit consent of the majority, she is not the only judge of the trade-off between necessary display and indispensable discretion. The public have a say as well. Some of the queen’s closest brushes with disaster have involved a lack of visibility, most painfully in 1997 when she remained in Scotland with the royal family after the death of Diana, Princess of Wales. She only returned to London after pleas from her new, young prime minister, Tony Blair (and lynch-mob demands to “Show Us You Care” from the tabloids).

The double nature of the queen—an unusually private woman with extraordinary public duties—poses a test for all who try to write about her. Including Mr Marr’s book, five new biographies have been prepared for 2012, the queen’s diamond jubilee year. The authors boast of watching the queen at work, interviewing officials from the royal household and of trawling through archives. They quote family members, friends and people with a claim to know the queen.

In the process, all five biographers wrestle with the question neatly framed by their subject herself: if to see the queen is to believe in her, what vantage point allows the most authentic experience of faith? Which queen is the most “real”, the private woman or the public figure? Each offers a different answer.

Two of the authors, Sarah Bradford and Robert Lacey, are veteran royal historians, whose 2012 biographies draw on previously published work. With the frankness of an old pro, at one point Ms Bradford names different schools of royal-watching. There is the “work of the Queen” genre, as pioneered by the 1969 television film “Royal Family”, which showed the monarch working through boxes of state papers, preparing state visits or relaxing with her family. Alas, she explains, once the public had seen inside royal drawing rooms, they soon wanted to peer into the bedroom. Thus arose the “royal soap opera” genre. Ms Bradford takes readers on a brisk, assured canter through the familiar landmarks of both genres, adding a dose of history as she goes. Mr Lacey, who has been writing about the queen for nearly 40 years, advertises his slim volume as a “pleasant afternoon’s reading”, which it is not. At once knowledgeable and jaundiced, Mr Lacey seems slightly sick of his royal subjects, as do the unnamed courtiers and insiders whom he quotes.

Robert Hardman, a royal correspondent for the Daily Mail, offers a convincing tour of the British monarchy as an institution, apeing the vantage point of the fly-on-the-wall documentary. His access produces an interview with Prince William and several lesser scoops—a rarity in the world of royal biography, in which the same anecdotes turn up in each book. But access has its limitations. The young prince is more loyal than revelatory about his grandmother, explaining that her “gravitas” awes even her family, that she offers good advice and was “so excited” by her 2011 state visit to Ireland. Some lesser sources appear to be quoted largely to thank them for their time.

Sally Bedell Smith, an American society biographer, offers her readers the illusion of knowing the queen as a friend. Ms Bedell Smith brightly describes her own brief chats with the monarch at a Washington garden party and a London reception, before sprinkling her account with minute indiscretions from other people who have met her. The elder President Bush reveals that Elizabeth II is “rather formal” but not “standoffish”. A witness describes how a puppy defecated in front of the queen during a visit to a Kentucky horse-breeder, breaking the ice. Nancy Reagan recalls a breakfast with the queen, Prince Philip and Prince Charles at Windsor Castle; she was surprised that everyone poured their own cereal from the box. It is reported that the queen likes a travel rug round her knees and used to wear a hard hat when watching stallions cover her mares (now she stands on a viewing platform, after health and safety advice). This footling stuff is only of any interest because it is about the queen. But—fatally—those same domestic details have nothing to do with why Elizabeth II, as queen, is interesting.

Mr Marr, a former political editor of the BBC and author of some shrewd books on modern Britain, sets himself a more ambitious task: to explain what the queen’s role and position tell us about her subjects. It is an admiring portrait, of an unfashionably dutiful monarch who in her weekly audiences offers prime ministers what he calls “a kind of higher therapy”—a chance to share anxieties or explanations which will never leak, with someone who has read almost every state secret of the past 60 years (and so has heard worse before). He describes the queen and her strong sense of vocation, as a monarch “God-called” to give her life to her people as a sacrifice. Only by understanding that calling, he writes, can the queen be understood.

In perhaps a claim too far, Mr Marr emphasises the comfort offered by the queen as a symbol of the continuing British state. By representing those who did not vote for the current government or did not vote at all, she strengthens democracy, he suggests. It is a clever thought, but may overstate the degree to which most Britons suffer from constitutional angst.

But a symbol she certainly is. And in modern Britain—a restless, exhibitionist place—Mr Marr’s Queen Elizabeth stands out for her discretion, and for understanding that symbols are “better off keeping mostly quiet”. There is a lesson there for her heir, the Prince of Wales, Mr Marr suggests sharply.

Mr Marr palpably likes the queen, whether for touring the country to greet and thank people mostly ignored by “London power brokers”, or for relaxing when her work is done with “a glass of something cheerful”. Yet liking is not really the point. In Mr Marr’s words, there is only a little space, though “an interesting space”, between the queen and the woman who lives her life. Her calling gives her meaning. She “is what she does”.

Mr Marr’s sober conclusion feels right. To adapt the queen’s one-liner: for all that the spectacle and unattainable glamour of royalty still fascinates (and helps sell books), for Britain’s jubilee monarch the show is a means to an end. Being seen is about being believed.


Nov 2nd 2012, 22:21 by M.H. | KAMPALA

THE walls are wooden planks, nailed to wooden poles. The roof is made of corrugated iron sheets. The inside is decorated with posters of England’s premier-league footballers, World Wrestling Entertainment stars, and an outdated calendar of Ugandan musicians. Rows of benches fill the space. At the front, a television screen is mounted on a raised desk. Entangled cables connect the screen, DVD player, and multiple decks and speakers placed in different corners of the hall. The floor is well-trodden earth.

This is Relax Movie and Sports Centre, a video hall in Kyebando, a suburb of Kampala, the Ugandan capital. The audience is gathering fast. They pay the entrance fee of 300 Ugandan shillings ($0.12), and take up their seats. Some bring roasted maize and water; one holds a steaming cup of porridge.

Once the ticket collector is satisfied with attendance, he dashes to the control area, and replaces the music DVD that was playing with that of the film advertised on the small blackboard hanging at the entrance. As the credits begin scrolling down the screen, an overlapping recorded voice reads them out in Luganda, a local language, and reminds viewers that this is the beginning of one of today’s films. Adjusting the volume of the soundtrack, actions and conversations, the video jockey (VJ) interprets and narrates the entire film. The audience then files out and checks the blackboard outside to see what will be shown next, before disappearing off, or lounging around.

At times during the film, the translator bestows the actors with local nicknames, and reminds the audience of other movies they have appeared in. DVD copies of such films are available for rent or to buy from the many film rental kiosks and shops peppered around the city. They sell for around 2,000 shillings each, but as with the cinema entrance fees, prices are determined by the individual business owner.

Action movies from Hollywood, love stories from Bollywood, Latin American soap operas and Nollywood family dramas are being screened in cinema halls around the country. According to Uganda’s Communications Commission, about 666 video libraries and 374 video halls have been registered in Kampala and the surrounding districts. Increasingly, these translated movies are shown not only in makeshift cinema halls, but are also broadcast on local television stations during prime-time programming. For Jennifer, a shop attendant at Eddie Soft Productions, a film rental and sale shop, “most people don’t want to concentrate and follow the movie, so the translator interprets the movie, making it easier for them to follow.”

Some VJs have gained national fame: customers seek out films translated by their favourites. Many more translate the films “live” in the cinema halls, becoming local stars. With a microphone in hand, the VJ takes the front seat and as the film plays, he narrates and interprets. “I watch translated movies because of the dramatic expressions the guys add in their descriptions, making them fun to watch,” says Mukiibi Nathan, a fan of translated films, and budding documentary producer.

Summary: THE walls are wooden planks, nailed to wooden poles. The roof is made of corrugated iron sheets. The inside is decorated with posters of England’s premier-league...


ATLANTA — When Jennifer Williams walked into the Nalley Lexus dealership, all she needed was a sales person to provide her a good deal on her trade-in, the keys to her RX 350 SUV, and a wave goodbye.

Thanks to the Internet, Williams had done research ahead of time and knew what cars were on the lot, their features, prices, and ownership and mileage records. She also pre-investigated interest rates, her credit score and, most importantly, what Nalley’s competitors were offering.

‘’I just needed to know what you’re going to give me for my trade, talk interest rates, and see if they could take a little bit off the car,’’ she said.

Williams is the epitome of the new car shopper. Unlike a decade ago, today’s buyers walk in the door with almost as much knowledge about what’s on a lot as the sales staff. And they won’t spend hours negotiating or being wooed into costly upgrades.

That has made it more difficult for dealerships to make the same profits of yesteryear and pushed some to change how they compensate employees. Lexus South Atlanta, for instance, switched from a traditional commission to an hourly salary plus incentives.

‘‘The opportunity to negotiate has almost been eliminated,’’ said Sid Barron, general manager at Lexus South — especially among young buyers.

But the industry is making up the lost revenue through volume — car sales have surged since 2009 — and by capturing more of the service business. Cars have become so technologically complicated that independent mechanics are being cut out because they either lack the skills or can’ afford the diagnostic machinery, said Rick Nelson, an analyst at the research firm Stephens.

‘‘Dealers are also getting more aggressive on pricing, such as oil changes,’’ Nelson said. ‘‘They also throw in loaner cars of the quality that customers expect.’’

Consumer advocates advise buyers to stay vigilant. Rebates, zero percent financing, and other offers often come with strings attached, said Ellen Schloemer, a spokeswoman for the Center for Responsible Lending.

Buyers also should first consider their banks or credit unions for financing, she said. Some dealerships get a cut if customers go through dealer-aligned loan institutions, who often charge higher interest rates.

“That is often completely invisible to the consumer,’’ she said.

It’s all a far cry from the days when sales people had the upper hand. They would walk a buyer around a lot and point out variations of a particular model with the hope of convincing the customer to purchase a higher-priced make. The pressure would continue in the sales office with add-ons such as undercoating.

But that era ended when dealerships realized they could improve one-on-one relationships with customers through the Internet. The average consumer spends 19 hours researching before a purchase, with 11.4 hours (60 percent) spent online, according to a JD Powers study.

As in other industries, dealers accumulate e-mail lists to blast out news of bargains, new shipments, and updated models to past and future buyers. Service departments are more savvy about updating motorists on scheduled maintenance through e-mails.

And dealerships’ efforts to gain an edge over their competitors have led to more transparency about inventory and pricing, giving consumers more information than they had in the past.

As a consequence, online car shopping has almost eliminated the need to go from lot to lot searching for the right vehicle.

“Prior to 2006, customers visited an average of 4.1 dealerships before purchasing a vehicle,’’ said Craig Monaghan, chief executive of Duluth, Ga.-based Asbury Automotive Group, the nation’s fifth-largest public car dealership franchise.

‘‘Now, customers only visit an average of 1.3 dealerships prior to purchasing a vehicle,’’ he said. ‘‘The reduction in dealership visits makes it more important than ever to meet the consumer’s needs and expectations well in advance of them visiting our stores.’’

What consumers can’t get online, they can request via e-mail. But dealerships have to act fast. When almost everyone has a smartphone and expects instant communication, a dealership’s failure to respond quickly is almost the equivalent of showing a lack of interest, experts say.

‘‘You have to get back to them in an hour or, better, less than an hour,’’ said Steve Mader, owner of SouthTowne, a General Motors dealership in Newnan, Ga. ‘‘And you need to get back with a transaction price that is realistic and other options, in case you need them.’’

Despite taking a hit on profits, car lot owners said they like the new, more informed customer.

‘‘Asbury believes this up-front education is good for both the dealership and the consumer,’’ Monaghan said. ‘‘It allows us to build an open, honest, long-term relationship. Another benefit to such an extensive amount of research beforehand is that it can lead to a quicker purchasing process, which is mutually beneficial.’’

Jennifer Williams agreed. Williams, who said she loves cars, increased her understanding of how the industry negotiates deals because she was burned in past purchases. Now, she often knows more than the sales people and has little patience for staff who try to pressure her.

“I like to leave thinking that I got a good deal and that they didn’t lose money,’’ she said.

Summary: When Jennifer Williams walked into the Nalley Lexus dealership, all she needed was a sales person to provide her a good deal on her trade-in, the keys to her RX 350 SUV, and a happy wave goodbye. Thanks to the Internet, Williams had done research ahead of time and already knew what cars were available on the lot, their features, prices, and ownership and mileage records. She also pre-investigated available interest rates, her credit score and, most importantly, what Nalley’s competitors were offering. Williams epitomizes the new car shopper, experts say. Unlike a decade ago, today’s buyers walk in with almost as much knowledge about what’s on a lot as the sales staff. And they don’t want to spend hours negotiating or being wooed into costly upgrades.


When Osvaldo Golijov’s “St. Mark Passion” began receiving performances in this country in 2001, the piece seemed to blow in — to dance in? — from another world. Yes there was the visual spectacle, the charismatic drummers, the sight of a whirling capoeira artist just to the left of the conductor’s podium, and Jesus crucified before our eyes. But the piece’s now well-documented capacity to electrify its first audiences was about something much deeper than that.

The music of Latin America had of course long since found its way to the European-styled concert halls, but only after handing over its passport and dressing up in its Sunday finest. No one would mistake Copland’s “El Salon Mexico” for the actual music of the dance hall that inspired it.

But Golijov’s work had different aims and a different genealogy. It aspired to retell the Passion as a story lived and felt today on the Latin American streets. Golijov, who grew up in Argentina, brings in the music of those streets directly, often without a heavy authorial stamp.

The piece interweaves a kaleidoscopic range of Afro-Latin music but Golijov largely preserves the integrity of his sources while forging them into a dramatic arc, a kind of Passion parade that boils over at times into an unalloyed carnival.

The “St. Mark Passion” returned to Symphony Hall on Thursday night for the first time since Robert Spano led the BSO in the work’s American premiere in 2001. The shock of the new cannot be easily reprised, and this performance, also under Spano’s baton, did not carry quite the same electric charge that coursed through the piece’s earliest outings. But the sense of visceral rhythmic drive at this work’s core still retained its enthralling power, especially as attended to by Mikael Ringquist, Gonzalo Grau, and other guest artists performing here as Orquesta La Pasión.

The other star of the evening was the Schola Cantorum de Venezuela, whose singers also danced, shouted, crouched, stomped, and generally inhabited this music like a second skin. Unfortunately, they were not always optimally served by the amplification used in this performance, which made certain sections sound thin and at other moments provided an overdone sonic halo effect.

The moving “Lúa descolorida,” a setting of a Galician poem at the heart of this score, was delivered by soprano Jessica Rivera with just the right mix of interiority and tonal radiance. Biella Da Costa and Reynaldo Gonzalez-Fernandez also performed well as featured vocal soloists. The BSO brass section stepped up when called upon.

And Spano, for his part, led the work with sympathy and swagger, at one point joining the percussion players by slapping the rail of the podium.

Summary: When Osvaldo Golijov’s “St. Mark Passion” first began receiving performances in this country in 2001, the piece seemed to blow in — to dance in? — from another world. Yes there was the visual spectacle, the charismatic drummers, the sight of a whirling capuera artist just to the left of the conductor’s podium, and Jesus crucified before our eyes. But the piece’s now well-documented capacity to electrify its first audiences was about something much deeper than that. The music of Latin America had of course long since found its way to the European-styled concert halls, but only after handing over its passport and dressing up in its Sunday finest. No one would mistake Copland’s “El Salon Mexico” for the actual music of the dance hall that inspired it. But Golijov’s work had different aims and a different genealogy.


It's been more than 10 years since former Arizona Cardinal and Army Ranger Pat Tillman was killed serving his country in Afghanistan. But Tillman's legacy lives on, both in Glendale, where the Cardinals retired Tillman's No. 40, and in Tempe, where his number is retired and his name is revered at Arizona State.

On Thursday, Tillman would have turned 38 years old, a painful reminder of just how early his life was cut short. But over the past decade, the Pat Tillman Foundation and countless others have done great work to honor Tillman's name, ensuring that his inspiration is never forgotten.

The latest example of that commitment to saluting Tillman's sacrifice will come Saturday, when Arizona State grad John Eddy and his wife, Tracy, will make a $700,000 donation to the university during the Sun Devils' game against Notre Dame. The money will fund the endowment of a scholarship in Tillman's name, to be given annually to an Arizona State linebacker, starting next season.

For Eddy, who went to school with Tillman, the gesture was the least he could do. Because if anything, Eddy credits Tillman for getting his own life on track.

"When I graduated, I was kind of going along in life and he up and left the NFL, and I think, for me, it really caused me to look at my life and the world in which we lived," Eddy said in a phone interview Thursday with FOX Sports.

"He was motivated not by fame or money, but by trying to do the right thing, and it really helped inspire me at a young age to pursue things that are worthwhile and that help your community and are selfless. And so as the years have gone by ... I've sort of tried to live up to that ethos that he lived fully."

“He was motivated not by fame or money, but by trying to do the right thing, and it really helped inspire me at a young age to pursue things that are worthwhile and that help your community and are selfless.”

Now a partner at a private equity company in Denver, Eddy grew up in Arizona, not far from where Arizona State plays. And as a kid "of modest means," he reveled in the opportunity to go to the occasional Sun Devils game with his father, who suffered from multiple sclerosis but would still scrimp and save to be able to take his son to see the team.

"We couldn't go all the time, but when we did, it was a huge event," Eddy said. "So when we would come to these games, I was just sort of in awe of all the students. And you know, you're a young kid, and it's like, 'Wow, what is this?' The stadium provided this area of community that I got to know, and my dad would push that a college education is incredibly important."

Motivated by his experience with his dad at Arizona State games as a kid, Eddy would go on to attend the school, starting classes a few months after his father passed away. And when Eddy got to school, he says he did so, in a way, hoping to honor his dad.

"I really believe in the redemptive nature of suffering," Eddy said. "You go through these hard things and you can either reject the lessons that you learn from them, or you can internalize them and realize how much it means. So when he passed, it was really hard, but it also gives you the motivation to do well for yourself and to do the best you can for those around you."

Afterward, Eddy became acquainted with Tillman -- the two initially met at legendary Tempe burger hotspot Chuckbox -- and though the two were never particularly close friends, Eddy followed Tillman's career and was in awe of the way the hulking linebacker lived his life.

"When you met him, he was one of those rugged spirits that just walked a different path -- and anyone that's met him knows what I'm talking about," Eddy said of Tillman. "So he sort of reoriented my view of how the world worked and what passion is, and dedication. And then he was just this incredible player on the football field."

That talent would eventually take Tillman to the NFL, where he was drafted in the seventh round in 1998. But it was Tillman's decision to leave for the Army after 9/11 that had the most profound impact on Eddy and eventually inspired him and his wife to make the endowment that he did in Tillman's name.

"I want the scholarship to last forever ... Long after we're all gone, I want people to know the kind of person that Pat Tillman was, and as these young 17- and 18-year-old men come to Arizona State, I want them to know what they're expected to live up to," Eddy said. "Because it's not about the fame, it's not about the money, it's about living a quality, heart-filled, passionate life and doing the right thing, and if they can pursue their dream and get a college education, that's going to matter a lot more in the long term than just what they do on a Saturday."

At the game Saturday, Arizona State also will be honoring the military by giving away all of the seats in the Honor Row -- a row of seats behind the Sun Devils bench reserved for military members -- to Purple Heart recipients, in addition to some 300 other tickets given away to service members around the stadium

But when Eddy and his wife take the field to present a check during the second quarter, it's Tillman's legacy that will once again be front and center -- as it always has been, will be and should be.

"You like to think that we all just kind of hurtle through this world without any sort of happenstance, but the fact that we really thought about this and the fact that his inspiration (impacted) my life and some of the very personal decisions in my life and how I look at my life and what matters to me and my wife -- just to come here today ... it kind of gave me goosebumps," Eddy said.

"It's such a small world, and we all are so interconnected whether we realize it or not. It's easy to live in a social media world where we're all so disjointed from one another, but we really are community and all of us matter, and we all have to take care of one another."

You can follow Sam Gardner on Twitter or email him at samgardnerfox@gmail.com.

Summary: John Eddy was touched by Pat Tillman during their time at Arizona State. So much so that the businessman has made a major donation to the school.


11/17/2014 AT 06:50 PM EST

Hard to believe, but there are

corners of the world the well-traveled former President Bill Clinton hasn't seen.

At a weekend celebration of the 10th anniversary of the

asked the former President, 68, for a peek at his bucket list.

"I would like to ride a horse across the Gobi Desert to the place where people think Genghis Khan is buried in Mongolia," Clinton said, just warming up.

"I would like to climb Kilimanjaro before it has no snow because of climate change. That's something I'd really like to do," he added.

And, finally, Namibia made the cut. That's where daughter Chelsea and son-in-law Marc Mezvinsky honeymooned after

. Its appeal to Clinton? "I would like to go and see the oldest desert on Earth."

Now, if his wife, Hillary, decides to

in 2016, he may just have to settle in the short term for the snows of Iowa and New Hampshire.

Summary: Giddyup! The former president – and possible future First Gentleman – wants to ride through Mongolia


Switzerland stunned global financial markets Thursday, slashing its official interest rate to -0.75% and abandoning its attempts to cap the franc’s exchange rate against the euro, against a broader backdrop of central bank alarm at the slowing world economy.

The Swiss National Bank’s move is nothing short of a revolution in the world of finance: no central bank has ever set its official interest so low. In pushing rates so far into negative territory, it is consciously destroying the value of investments in the franc in an effort to scare off ‘hot money’ that has flooded the country in search of a ‘safe haven’ from turbulent global markets.

Such flows have been the bane of Switzerland since the start of the Eurozone debt crisis in 2010, pushing the franc up to a level that makes life near-impossible for the Swiss economy.

But the SNB’s move is also part of a broader wave of anxiety about deflation in large parts of the world economy, an anxiety that is growing as the collapse in oil prices drives prices relentlessly lower both at the factory gate and on Main St.

China’s producer prices fell for the 34th month in a row in December, dropping 3.3% on the year, while prices for industrial commodities such as iron ore performed even worse than oil last year. Fears for its economy rose again Thursday after data showing banks lent far less than expected in December.

India’s central bank also surprised markets Thursday by cutting its official interest rate by 0.25% to 7.75%, mainly because of the effect of falling energy prices. Analysts there expect further rate cuts to support growth soon.

Central banks usually like to ‘look through’ the impact of changes in commodity prices, which are historically volatile and notoriously difficult to predict. But European Central Bank board member Benoit Coeuré had admitted this week that such a strategy was no longer possible.

“In the current environment, the continuous decline in oil prices increases the danger that people will lose confidence” that the ECB can stop deflation,” Coeuré said in an interview with the German paper Die Welt.

ECB President Mario Draghi, meanwhile, said in a separate interview Wednesday that the ECB was now ready to begin a program of “quantitative easing”, driving market interest rates (and the euro) lower by purchasing government bonds the Fed has done for the last six year.

The Fed is standing out from the rest of the crowd because it’s trying to tighten its policy this year, rather than loosen it. But even there, officials have taken fright at market movements so far this year and Chicago Fed Charles Evans stressed last week that “I don’t think we should be in a hurry to raise rates,” given that inflation is still running below the Fed’s target.

The SNB had previously tried to stop the euro falling below CHF1.20 with massive interventions on the currency markets. As it removed the floor Thursday, the euro fell 14% against the franc to trade at CHF1.03.

The SNB said in its statement that it would continue to intervene in the forex markets if necessary to stop the franc from rising too far, but noted that the dollar’s rise in recent months mean that the franc isn’t as generally overvalued as it was.

Summary: India also cuts interest rates as central banks across the world take fright at signs of deflation.


Weak currencies in Europe and Japan are creating repercussions for automakers, forcing them to adjust to new fiscal realities created by a stronger dollar.

Autoworkers are restive, as are forecasters and planners. Since the auto industry requires long lead times, the forecasts for currency values represent a dangerous wild card – which can abruptly alter scenarios when they deviate too far from assumptions.

Michael Brecht, Daimler AG’s labor chief who sits on the automaker’s supervisory board, is questioning publicly whether his company should be expanding production in the U.S. instead of exporting more vehicles. Last year Daimler said it will move some production of Sprinter vans from Dusseldorf, Germany to a new plant to be located in North America. The U.S. is Sprinter’s No. 2 market after Germany.

Daimler also has announced a manufacturing venture to build engines for Mercedes-Benz and a future Infiniti luxury car in Aguascalientes, Mexico. The German automaker operates a Mercede-Benz assembly complex in Vance, Alabama.

Brecht and other German labor leaders want to keep manufacturing and employment in home. The trend has been in the opposite direction as the euro rose in value starting in 2002, reaching a peak of about $1.60 per euro since mid-2008 and making exports less competitive from Europe. But in response to economic troubles of the past year, the euro has lost more than 17% against the dollar and now is worth about $1.13.

An exceptional run up in the value of the yen versus the dollar following the global financial crisis suddenly made exports from Japan, including vehicles, less competitive. Plants began closing. But since the beginning of 2012 the yen has weakened by about 50% in value, moving from about 77 to the dollar to the current level of about 120. Japanese automakers, especially Toyota, have benefitted as their profits, which are made mostly in the U.S., have soared in value.

Toyota, the world’s No. 1 automaker in terms of profit, forecast a second straight year of record net income that could top $18 billion for the fiscal year ending in March. Consequently, the automaker’s labor union wants a raise. Tatsuro Ueda, Toyota managing officer, today rejected a demand for an average 6,000 yen ($50) a month wage increase.

Japan’s Prime Minister Abe is pushing Japanese automakers to grant wage increases after pursuing economic and monetary policies that gave advantages to exporters. The country’s government and central bank have been struggling with a weak economy that’s been in recession four times since 2008.

Automotive exports from the U.S., which had grown in the face of strong currencies in Europe and Japan, are now less competitive and probably will fall in volume.

An optimistic footnote to the trends and counter-trends of international currencies was sounded this week by Ratan Tata, the retired chief executive officer of the Indian automaker that owns Jaguar and Land Rover.

Speaking at an automotive round table in South Carolina, Tata said his company is still considering North America for a new assembly plant for the manufacture of JLR models. He hasn’t said where or when an announcement will be made—but rumors are circulating that Georgia is a possible site.

For the moment, automakers continue to gain in size and in global breadth, with more locations far from home markets. Along with forward delivery contracts and other financial hedges against unstable currency values, overseas plants defend against uncertainty.

Summary: The luxury automaker is questioning whether to continue to ramp up U.S. production. Blame it on currency.


A Facebook photo of Kam Brock. (supplied)

A woman held in a New York psychiatric ward and told she was delusional for claiming Barack Obama followed her on Twitter is suing the hospital as evidence emerges that she was telling the truth.

Long Island resident Kam Brock, 32, was forced to endure eight days in the Harlem Hospital mental facility, after police seized her car last September and claimed she was high on marijuana despite finding nothing in the vehicle.

When Brock went to pick up the car the next day she was forcibly sedated and sent to the hospital as an "emotionally disturbed" person.

Brock admitted in an interview that she was "emotional" but denied being "disturbed" and claimed that she only mentioned her link to the President to try and demonstrate her character.

Kam Brock claims she was held in a NY psych ward for claiming Barack Obama followed her on Twitter. (supplied)

"I told (the doctor) Obama follows me on Twitter to show her the type of person I am. I'm a good person, a positive person. Obama follows positive people," Brock said.

But documents filed in Manhattan Federal Court indicate that hospital staff refused to believe her, with medical records showing Brock underwent forced injections of powerful sedatives.

It is also understood doctors were sceptical that Brock worked at a bank.

According to the New York Daily News, a hospital treatment plan for Brock corroborates the 32-year-old's claims.

"Objective: Patient will verbalize the importance of education for employment and will state that Obama is not following her on Twitter," the document reads.

But a check of the President's Twitter account @BarackObama, which is following more than 640,00 accounts, has shown that Brock's @AkilahBrock handle is one of them.

Barack Obama follows more than 640,000 accounts on Twitter. (supplied)

Brock claimed that she wasn't given a reason for her release after eight days, but was hit with a hospital bill of more than $13,000.

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LONDON ''Coronation Street,'' which is Britain's most popular television program by far, is coming to the United States - actually, for a second try at becoming as popular with American viewers as it is with Britons.

Starting Saturday afternoon, viewers of the U.S.A. Cable Network will be able to follow - every single day of the week, if they want - the affairs of the friendly little group that frequents the Rovers Return, a working-class pub in the north of England. And as millions of Britons have done over the past 21 years, they can lose themselves in the soap opera's apparently endless saga of births and deaths, petty evils and minor triumphs, all portrayed so realistically that it is easy to forget that it is just a television program.

Some 50-odd episodes of ''Coronation Street'' were telecast on American public television back in the early 1970's, to only lukewarm critical reaction. The serial's reappearance in the United States is a reflection of how wide a net cable television is casting to fill its air time. The U.S.A. Cable Network, which reaches more than 10 million homes around America, including 700,000 in the metropolitan New York City area, will broadcast ''Coronation Street'' seven days a week from 2 to 3 in the afternoon, Eastern Time. (The weekend presentations will be rebroadcasts of episodes shown on weekdays.) Manhattan Cable will be carrying the programs in Manhattan.

Unlike American soap operas, ''Coronation Street'' does not dwell on the seamier side of the lives of its inhabitants, though the serial does have its share of love affairs and such. Its characters are not glamorous, but simply ordinary people. Through a combination of believable scripts performed by a convincing cast, it becomes easy for a viewer to feel that these people are who they purport to be, in that pub talking about the same kinds of ordinary problems that concern everyone.

Indeed, five years ago, when Elsie Tanner, one of the program's main characters, decided to get divorced, she received letters of advice from viewers all over Britain. When another character named Ena Sharples lost her job, there was another flood of letters, many of them containing ''help wanted'' advertisements.

Whether or not the serial will get the same grip on audiences in the United States this time around remains to be seen. But it will, in any case, serve as a reminder to American viewers that not everything broadcast on this side of the Atlantic is set in the elegant drawing rooms of Belgravia and Mayfair. The very antithesis of the English aristocrats portrayed in such popular television productions as ''Brideshead Revisited'' and ''Upstairs, Downstairs,'' the people of ''Coronation Street'' are the kind you might see riding on a bus in Manchester or, indeed, sipping gin or beer in a place like the Rovers Return, a typical English pub at one end of a mean little row of brick houses.

For the American audience, the series will open with a special episode in which Annie Walker, the proprietor of the pub, introduces the leading characters, giving what she regards as essential information about each of them, such as the fact that ''Len Fairclough's wife left him for an insurance man and took the son with her.''

Viewers will also quickly learn that Elsie, who has worked as manager of a launderette and then a flower shop, is having trouble with her marriage to Alan. Stan and Hilda Ogden, who live at number 13 Coronation Street, are going to Chesterfield to visit their son Trevor, who left town years ago under a cloud. They will be surprised to find that he has married and had a son. Ken Barlow, whose first wife was electrocuted by a faulty hairdryer plug three years ago, has just remarried, and everyone hopes it will work out (sadly, it will not). Albert Tatlock, a pensioner, is considering marrying Minnie Caldwell, but she will not say yes unless her friend Ena approves, and Ena is the type who approves of very little.

And so it goes, on and on, avidly followed by about 17 million Britons every Monday and Wednesday evening. When the weekly ratings are published, it is not at all unusual for the two episodes of ''Coronation Street,'' broadcast on the independent, commercial television network, to rank first and second, or second and third. Sir John Betjeman, Britain's poet laureate, once compared the show to ''The Pickwick Papers,'' which also first appeared as a serial, though, of course, in print.

Yet, it is fashionable, especially in London, to swear that you have simply never seen the program, not even once. When former Prime Minister Harold Wilson sent congratulations on the occasion of the serial's 2,000th episode, it was typical that he said that his wife - rather than he himself -had been a fan from the beginning of the program in 1960.

Besides finding the program too purposefully lowbrow, some Londoners have a view of it that reflects the snobbish attitude that people in this part of England often show toward the North, with its rough accents and its less refined ways. Asked the other day whether he ever watched ''Coronation Street,'' an office worker in London immediately began derisively imitating the vowel sounds of the Northern accent, in which ''bus'' becomes ''boos'' and ''enough'' becomes ''enoof.''

Because these accents are less familiar to American ears than the way Londoners speak, and because the characters in the serial often use such regionalisms as ''nowt,'' meaning ''nothing,'' there is some fear here about comprehension in the United States. Indeed, when ''Coronation Street'' was broadcast for a while in the early 70's on New York's Channel 13, the television critic for The New York Times had much praise for ''a cast whose acting is so good it's hardly noticeable,'' but, like some other critics, he noted the difficulty Americans might have in understanding the dialogue.

Asked recently why the serial might succeed in the United States this time, when it did not before, a spokesman for Granada Television, which produces it, pointed out that American audiences have been exposed to 10 more years' worth of British programs and comedians since then. And besides, ''Coronation Street'' has been successfully telecast in more than a dozen other countries, including Greece, Nigeria and Thailand.

The reason the U.S.A. Network will be showing episodes dating back to 1974 is that the cable service will be using up episodes of ''Coronation Street'' much more rapidly than they are produced in Britain. Here, there are just two half-hour episodes a week. In the United States, they will be broadcast at the rate of 10 half-hour episodes a week, at least initially.

Doris Speed, who plays the slightly pretentious but good-hearted Mrs. Walker, is one of five members of the cast who have been with the serial since its first episode, broadcast on Dec. 9, 1960. Of course, they have noticeably grown older in those 21 years, which the producers believe is one of the strengths of the show.

In a book about the serial, H.V. Kershaw, who was its first script editor, put it this way: ''Len Fairclough is as convincing in 1980 as he was in 1960, not in spite of - but because of - having aged 20 years. The serial, by its inexorability, gains in respect and credibility as it keeps pace with the life of the viewer.''

Illustrations: photos of Violet Carson, Jack Howarth, Jean Alexander and Bernard Youens


OTTAWA, Feb. 28— Former Prime Minister Joe Clark, who broke 16 years of Liberal Party control of the federal Government in 1979 only to be defeated six months later, has received qualified support from his Progressive Conservative Party.

Two-thirds of the 2,100 delegates at a party convention here voted last night to reject a convention to choose a new leader and thus expressed confidence in Mr. Clark as party chief. But the one-third that supported a leadership convention, described by Mr. Clark himself as ''a significant minority,'' was enough to cast doubt on the future of a man who at the age of 40 was Canada's youngest Prime Minister.

Looking drawn and disappointed after the less than overwhelming support he received, Mr. Clark rose to say firmly that while he respected the minority, he expected it to respect the majority decision.

Mr. Clark said the Progressive Conservatives had an obligation to move forward as ''as a strong, united party,'' but among political experts there was almost universal agreement that both Mr. Clark and the party had been weakened by the vote in the steamy, overcrowded basement hall of Ottawa's Civic Center. Described as 'On Probation'

Mr. Clark was described by several commentators today as ''on probation'' and liable to face renewed challenges if the party's standing in the country does not improve in the next 12 months. Mr. Clark is trying to spearhead national opposition to moves by Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau and his Liberal Party Government to impose constitutional change and new energy policies on resisting provinces. But opinion polls, while indicating a drop in Mr. Trudeau's popularity, have not shown any marked shift toward Mr. Clark.

The dissidence in Conservative ranks reflected not only doubts about Mr. Clark's leadership but also the long frustration of a party that in this century has led the Government for only a little more than 17 years.

In February 1976 Mr. Clark became the party's leader almost by default. He was a second choice among delegates who were having trouble breaking a deadlock among the leading candidates. Gave Trudeau His First Defeat

In 1979 he inflicted on Mr. Trudeau his first electoral defeat, mostly because voters, particularly in the key province of Ontario, appeared to dislike the Liberal Prime Minister more than they liked the Conservative leader.

Mr. Clark took office in June at the head of a minority Government, but in December he was defeated when he incautiously ignored his relatively weak position and introduced measures in the House of Commons to establish high energy prices. In the election in February of last year, Mr. Trudeau made a spectacular comeback with a majority Government that can legally stay in office until 1985.

Mr. Clark was handicapped in the election by the public perception of him as an inadequate leader. For many Conservatives who were dismayed when their Government could hold power for only six months, Mr. Clark is still an inadequate standard-bearer who cannot attract enough voters to win an election. Despite his efforts to speak French and to sympathize with Quebec's aspirations, for example, his party was virtually shut out in that province last year. Campaigned for Delegates

Mr. Clark had fought hard to close ranks behind him in an effort to end what some have called Canada's one-party state. For months before this week's convention, he devoted weekends to strenuous campaigning for delegates to support him. At the convention he made speeches denouncing the Trudeau Government for splitting the country over its constitutional and energy policies and for endangering the federal system by its conflict with eight of the 10 provinces.

''We are the only instrument Canadians have to change a Government and an ideology that destroys the very spirit of Canada,'' he said last night at the convention. He warned that the Canadian people ''are watching us to see if we can provide the positive and united instrument of change Canadians want and need.''


NEWARK, Sept. 7— President Reagan brought a formal endorsement and a prediction of victory today to Thomas H. Kean, the R epublican candidate for Governor of New Jersey.

Mr. Reagan asked Mr. Kean how the campaign was going when the candidate visited him on his airplane, parked at Newark International Airport. Mr. Kean said he was enjoying it.

''And you'll enjoy the job, too,'' Mr. Reagan told him. ''Some days when you're finished and you've been able to do something,'' the President said, looking back on his own days as Governor of California, ''you feel 10 feet tall.''

Then the two posed, grinning, in front of the Presidential seal on the side of the airplane, along with Secretary of Labor Raymond J. Donovan of Short Hills. Kean Assesses Campaign

And then, while the President's helicopter clattered away toward New York City, Mr. Kean stood on the gritty grass at the side of the runway and assessed the brief visit and the campaign itself, one of two state elections in this post-Presidential year. Virginia has the other gubernatorial race.

The visit was nice, he said, but the state election is not a referendum on the Reagan Administration. ''The campaign's going to be decided by New Jersey people on New Jersey issues,'' he said. President Reagan promised to campaign in New Jersey, and his aides authorized Mr. Kean's to distribute a statement that read in part: ''My Labor Day travel plans take me through New Jersey, and I would be delighted to personally endorse your candidacy for Governor at that time. I am p leased with the progress of your campaign to bring real ec onomic growth to New Jersey.''

After the Presidential jet landed in an out-of-the-way corner near the Port Authority Administration Building, Mr. Donovan led Mr. Kean up the steps to meet the President, their second session. Mr. Kean had visited the White House after winning the primary in May. Good Reports on Campaign

''He said that all the reports from New Jersey were that we were doing real well,'' Mr. Kean said later. ''That was very good to hear.''

The President was on his way to Gracie Mansion in New York City with a check for the Westway project to present to Mayor Koch. ''He told us that a substantial number of the Westway construction jobs would go to New Jersey people,'' Mr. Kean went on. ''And that was also good to hear.''

Then the two men, Mr. Reagan in a dark blue suit, Mr. Kean in a light gray one, marched down the steps and posed.Both before and after the photo session, Mr. Kean talked a bit about New Jersey politics. He conceded that Federal budget cuts might have some negative impact on the vote. ''But there's two impacts,'' he said, ''the Reagan budget cuts and the Reagan tax cuts.''

He said that he was ''surprised and pleased'' that his Democratic opponent, James J. Florio, was using ''negative'' broadcast commercials that attack Mr. Kean.

''All the political professionals say that when a campaign uses negative ads, that's a sign that it's in trouble,'' he said.


Prophets can be an inconvenience to their followers, especially if they commit their thoughts to paper. Thus, the Mormon church last week was mildly discomfited by a document, apparently the work of the original Mormon prophet in 1844, which threw doubt on the divinely mandated succession of the church's leaders.

In the recently discovered text, Joseph Smith Jr. referred to his son, Joseph 3d, as ''my sucessor in the Presidency of the High Priesthood and a Seer and a Revelator and a Prophet.'' This is glad tidings for the Missouri-based Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which followed in Joseph 3d's footsteps to create its branch of Mormonism.

It is less joyful news for the larger Utah branch, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which traces its lineage to Brigham Young, who assumed church leadership in 1847. But Earl E. Olson, a Utah church official, said that the manuscript would not ''change our belief'' in the correctness of ''apostolic succession.'' The church has also noted that Joseph 3d said ''it is not necessarily a birthright to be president of the church.''


WASHINGTON, Nov. 14— The United States has banned the import of certain steel products made by a French company that recently agreed to build a $350 million electric steel plant in the Soviet Union.

The Treasury order was aimed at Creusot-Loire, a giant steel producer that signed its Soviet pact after Washington imposed export controls against the Soviet Union following the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan, forcing the cancellation of a contract involving Armco Inc., a leading American steelmaker.

In early January, President Carter announced a ban on strategic exports and a reduction of grain shipments. The United States had received assurances from France and other allies that they would not move to fill the breach caused by suspension or cancellation of projects undertaken by American companies.

American officials, in their rounds in European capitals, specifically cited the steel project at Novolipetsk, 350 miles south of Moscow, as an example where substitution would undermine Western interests.

A month before President Carter imposed the sanctions, Armco, of Middletown, Ohio, and the Nippon Steel Company of Japan won the steel contract from the Russians in a joint undertaking. Creusot-Loire had also bid, and the Russians turned to the French company once the American-Japanese avenue was closed.

Creusot-Loire officials have denied that they have undercut Western sanctions against the Soviet Union, asserting that the Russian plant they are building is completely different from the Armco project in that it is smaller and less sophisticated and does not involve any significant transfer of Western technology.

One high American official said that President Valery Giscard d'Estaing of France had personally approved the participation of Creusot-Loire. The announcement that it would build the plant was made in late summer and drew vocal United States remonstrances.

A State Department spokesman, John Trattner, said in an official reaction on Sept. 18 that the United States was ''very disappointed.''

As an illustration of the distress that the Creusot-Loire contract has caused here, one Commerce Department official said that the wife of President Giscard d'Estaing was a leading stockholder of the holding company that controls the French steelmaker.

Officially, however, the Treasury notice, which was filed yesterday and will be published in the Federal Register next Monday, was not a retaliation against the French company for participating in the Russian project. Nickel Content a Factor

The order bans the import of alloy steel containing more than 2.5 percent nickel. The legal justification is that the nickel in the French steel comes from Cuba, against which the United States maintains a trade embargo.

Last year, such nickel-bearing steel imports from France totaled $60 million. Creusot-Loire is a leading producer, but a precise breakdown on the amount supplied by individual producers was not available.

A French Embassy official said he was unaware of the action taken by the United States and would be unable to comment anyway until the order was published in the Federal Register. The steel plant would produce so-called cold-rolled, nonoriented steel for use in small electric motors.

Like the American steel industry, the French industry is in a deep recession, with any additional business welcome. Criticism After Brezhnev Meeting

After a meeting last May in Warsaw between President Giscard d'Estaing and Leonid I. Brezhnev, the Soviet leader, France was also criticized by the United States for not having consulted its allies beforehand.

The French Foreign Minister, Jean Francois-Pon,cet reacted by saying that France would pursue its independent policy and meet with Moscow without seeking ''anyone's prior approval.''

Armco was described by Government officials as ''terribly upset'' by the Creusot-Loire pact, which raises basic questions about the effectiveness of any trade actions against the Russians. The Russians have also managed to purchase grain from other suppliers, although at a higher price.

The use of trade as an economic weapon is expected to be one of the major issues to be faced by the incoming Reagan administration. Armco was to supply the technology for the Russian plant, laboratory testing equipment and general engineering skills. Nippon Steel was to build the rolling mill. Had the American-Japanese project gone ahead, about $100 million would have flowed into the United States.