http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2011/03/newark_airport_in_line_for_upg.

html

Newark airport in line for upgrades in time for 2014 Super Bowl in East Rutherford

Published: Tuesday, March 29, 2011, 8:53 PM

Steve Strunsky/The Star-Ledger By Steve Strunsky/The Star-Ledger

NEWARK — Well-healed football fans flying in for Super Bowl XLVIII in 2014 — and
maybe even the players themselves — will have a new, $9 million private jet
terminal at Newark Liberty International Airport, under a deal approved by the Port
Authority of New York and New Jersey today.

Signature Flight Support Corp., which provides fueling, limousines, lounges and
other services for private jets and passengers at 104 locations in 14 countries, will
replace its current terminal at Newark with a more upscale, state-of-the art facility
under a deal to extend its lease on 11 acres and hanger space through 2024.

Signature handled players from the New Orleans Saints and Indianapolis Colts who
flew into Miami International Airport in 2010 for Super Bowl XLIV, said Patrick
Sniffen, a spokesman for the Orlando, Fla., company, whose jet-setting clients also
include business executives and wealthy individuals.

"One of the things we’re keenly experienced at is handling Super Bowl traffic, and
we’ve done that at a number of locations around the country, most recently in
Dallas," last February, Sniffen said. "We’ve had some serious VIP traffic coming in
from the Middle East as well."

Sniffen said travellers using the new terminal would enjoy plush seating, wi-fi
access, hi-definition television and other amenities.

State officials have cheered Super Bowl XLVIII, scheduled for February 2014 at the
New Meadowlands Stadium in East Rutherford, as an investment and employment
boon to the state. The new terminal for Signature is the latest in a series of Super
Bowl-related improvements at the airport, including a $34 million facelift for the
Newark Liberty International Airport Marriott announced last month.

The Port Authority’s aviation director, Susan Baer, told agency commissioners at
their meeting in Manhattan today that Signature would spend another $2 million to
upgrade its ramps before the big game, and make another $4 million in
improvements afterward. She said the project would create 80 temporary jobs,
including 30 for construction workers and generate $19.5 million in economic
activity.
^I focused first on the fact that the 2014 Super Bowl will be held in NJ, which many
people (including myself) probably did not yet know. I included the emphasis on
how good that will be for the state, and then discussed the key features of the
planned renovations to the airport which were inspired by the Super Bowl news. The
article was written so succinctly that I didn’t have to reword anything extensively.

http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2011/03/verizon_offers_5k_reward_for_i.html

Verizon offers $5K reward for information on robbery, shooting of employee in

Irvington

Published: Tuesday, March 29, 2011, 7:53 PM

Aliza Appelbaum/The Star-Ledger By Aliza Appelbaum/The Star-Ledger

IRVINGTON — Verizon is offering a $5,000 reward for information leading to the

arrest of the person who robbed and shot a company employee in Irvington, Essex
County Sheriff Armando Fontoura said.

The employee, Rasheed Deans, 33, was repairing a utility pole on Montrose Terrace
about 9:50 a.m. Monday, Fontoura said, when he was approached by a teenager
wearing a black face mask, light-colored jeans and a white hooded sweatshirt.

The teen had a gun and demanded that Deans turn over his wallet. Deans did so
and attempted to run away, but the robber fired the gun, a semi-automatic, and hit
him once in the lower back. He was taken to University Hospital in Newark, where
he was treated and released.

Having a company offer to pay the reward for an employee is unusual, but not
unheard of, said Kevin Lynch, a spokesman for the sheriff’s office.

Anyone with information about the crime is asked to call Irvington police at (973)
399-6600 or the anonymous Crime Stoppers Hotline at (973) 877-8477.

^This was a simple and straightforward crime story that is still open and requesting
assistance, as well as offering a reward for helping lead to the criminal’s capture. I
had to deliver almost all of the details in a very similar order because they were
pertinent to gaining a clear understanding of the event, except for a few
unnecessary things such as the Sheriff’s name, the exact time and street on which
the shooting occurred, or the spokesman’s quote.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/28/education/30paddle.html?ref=us

Schools Under Pressure to Spare the Rod Forever

Ben Sklar for The New York Times

By DAN FROSCH

Published: March 29, 2011

When Tyler Anastopoulos got in trouble for skipping detention at his high school
recently, he received the same punishment that students in parts of rural Texas
have been getting for generations.

Jennifer Zdon for The New York Times

Faculty and students from St. Augustine High School in New Orleans demanded that
Archbishop Gregory Aymond reverse his ban on corporal punishment.

Tyler, an 11th grader from Wichita Falls, was sent to the assistant principal and
given three swift swats to the backside with a paddle, recalled Angie Herring, his
mother. The blows were so severe that they caused deep bruises and the boy
wound up in the hospital, Ms. Herring said.

While the image of the high school principal patrolling the halls with paddle in hand
is largely of the past, corporal punishment is still alive in 20 states, according to the
Center for Effective Discipline, a group that tracks its use in schools around the
country and advocates for its end. Most of those states are in the South, where
paddling remains ingrained in the social and family fabric of some communities.

Each year, prodded by child safety advocates, state legislatures debate whether
corporal punishment amounts to an archaic form of child abuse or an effective
means of discipline.

This month, Tyler, who attends City View Junior/Senior High School, told his story to
lawmakers in Texas, which is considering a ban on corporal punishment. The same
week, legislators in New Mexico voted to end the practice there.

Texas schools, Ms. Herring fumed, appear to have free rein in disciplining a student,
“as long as you don’t kill him.”

“If I did that to my son,” she said, “I’d go to jail.”

Steve Harris, superintendent of the City View Independent School District in Wichita
Falls, declined to comment in detail on the case, but noted that his investigation of
the school had found no wrongdoing. Corporal punishment, Mr. Harris pointed out,
has long been “one of the tools in the tool box we use for discipline.”

Indeed, up until about 25 years ago, corporal punishment in public schools could be
found in all but a handful of states, said Nadine Block, the Center for Effective
Discipline’s founder.

Prompted by the threat of lawsuits and research that questioned its effectiveness,
states gradually started banning the practice.

According to estimates by the federal Department of Education, 223,190 children

were subject to corporal punishment in schools in the 2005-6 school year. That was
nearly a 20 percent drop from data gathered a few years earlier, Ms. Block said.

In Texas, at least 27 out of about 1,000 school districts still use corporal
punishment, said Jimmy Dunne, founder and president of another group that is
against the practice, People Opposed to Paddling Students.

That is enough to prompt advocates like Mr. Dunne to push to end the practice
there. One bill being considered would permit corporal punishment only if parents
specifically consent to it for their children. Another would ban corporal punishment
in schools outright.

“Hitting children in our schools with boards is child abuse, and it promotes child
abuse at home,” said Mr. Dunne, a former math teacher in Houston. “Parents see
it’s legal in schools and think it’s O.K. to do at home.”

In New Mexico, where more than a third of the state’s school districts permit
corporal punishment, according to a local children’s legal services group, legislators
approved a paddling ban this month. Gov. Susana Martinez has not indicated
whether she will sign the bill.

Opponents of the measure, like State Senator Vernon D. Asbill, worried that a ban
would tie teachers’ hands and make it harder for them to control students.
“With parental supervision and parental approval, I believe it’s appropriate,” said
Mr. Asbill, a longtime teacher and school administrator from southern New Mexico.
“The threat of it keeps many of our kids in line so they can learn.”

But Senator Cynthia Nava, a school superintendent from Las Cruces and proponent
of the ban, said schools were no place for violence of any sort. “It’s shocking to me
that people got up on the floor and argued passionately to preserve it,” she said.
“We should be educating kids that they can’t solve problems with violence.”

Calls to end corporal punishment have gotten louder of late, even in states unlikely
to pass a paddling ban. In Mississippi, the family of a teenager paddled in school
filed a federal lawsuit last year over the incident. The lawsuit, filed against the Tate
County School District, claims that corporal punishment is unconstitutional because
it is applied disproportionately to boys.

The teenager’s lawyer, Joe Murray, is also representing the family of another
student who was paddled at the same high school this month. In that case, the boy
was struck so hard that he passed out and broke his jaw, Mr. Murray said.

An administrator who oversees the school district, James Malone, would not
comment on either case, but said boys typically got into trouble more often than
girls.

In Louisiana, where corporal punishment is also legal, controversy erupted this year
after the board of trustees for St. Augustine High School, the only Catholic school in
New Orleans -- and perhaps the country -- that still paddled its students, decided to
ban the practice. St. Augustine was under pressure from Archbishop Gregory
Aymond of New Orleans, who has said that paddling promotes violence.

But the predominantly African-American school’s administration and alumni want

the practice reinstated. They argue that paddling for minor offenses has been
instrumental in helping St. Augustine build character and achieve high graduation
rates.

The school’s students have also voiced their support, holding a march in New
Orleans to demand that the archbishop reverse his position.
Jacob Washington, a senior and the student body president, helped organize the
march.

“This is a tradition for the school,” he said on the eve of the rally. “It’s how the
school has been run for 60 years. Just the seniors alone — we can tell the difference
between our class and some of the newer students who didn’t receive the same
discipline.”

^This was a good article, but so long and drawing from so many individual sources
and cases that I had to distill it to the most basic establishment of the issue,
mentions of places in which the punishments remain legal, the main arguments on
both the pro and con sides, and then a few specific examples of controversial new
bills and bans on paddling.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704471904576230764121359864.
html?mod=WSJ_WSJ_US_News_5

Court Weighs Bias Claim

Justices Skeptical of Arguments to Allow Class-Action Status in Wal-Mart Suit

By JESS BRAVIN And ANN ZIMMERMAN

WASHINGTON—A class-action lawsuit against Wal-Mart Stores Inc. appeared

unlikely to survive after Tuesday's Supreme Court arguments, where justices
suggested the suit was unfair both to the nation's largest retailer and many of the
women who allegedly were victimized.

The lawsuit accused Wal-Mart of systematically paying as many as three million

current and former female workers less than men and providing them fewer
opportunities for promotion. Wal-Mart denies the claims, which could total billions of
dollars in back pay and punitive damages, and says it has a strict antidiscrimination
policy.

The case potentially could set new standards for future employment class action.
Much of corporate America, including Altria Group Inc., General Electric Co.,
Microsoft Corp. and Tyson Foods Inc., has backed Wal-Mart, arguing that a plaintiff
victory could open the door to unprecedented liability.
But civil rights, women's rights and labor rights groups have sided with the
plaintiffs, contending that a sweeping class action is one of few effective tools
against ingrained discrimination in the workplace.

The issue before the Supreme Court was whether the suit, filed in 2001, could
proceed in its current form. It has yet to go to trial because Wal-Mart contends the
alleged victims, who worked in 170 job classifications across 3,400 stores, have too
little in common to qualify for a single class action suit.

The plaintiffs allege that regardless of the varying job classifications and store
locations, the women all suffered from the same discriminatory practices in a
corporate culture "rife with gender stereotypes."

On average, each woman who worked at Wal-Mart would be entitled to about

$1,100 in back pay, according the plaintiffs' brief filed with the Court.

At Tuesday arguments, conservative justices challenged the lawsuit's premise,

which alleges that Wal-Mart maintained a "pattern and practice" of discrimination—
a legal standard for liability—by granting local managers wide discretion in
employment decisions.

Justices Antonin Scalia and Anthony Kennedy pressed Joseph Sellers, the attorney
representing a half-dozen women who seek to represent the massive class. On the
one hand, the plaintiffs allege that "Arkansas knows everything," Kennedy said,
referring to Wal-Mart's home state. But on the other, individual managers have too
much autonomy.

Mr. Sellers argued the two pieces fit together. He said corporate policy gave local
managers unfettered discretion to underpay women. And prejudice against women,
was part of what he contended was a centralized corporate culture the company
calls "the Wal-Mart Way."

Because the plaintiffs' claims are based on statistical evidence of pay and
promotions that favor men over women, Justice Samuel Alito asked if that meant
"every single company" in the country could potentially be in violation of the Civil
Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits employment discrimination.

Possibly so, Mr. Sellers said.

Liberal justices were more open to the plaintiffs' theory. The common policy, Justice
Elena Kagan said, permitted "excessive subjectivity," allowing gender discrimination
to influence employment decisions.

To qualify as a class action, Justice Kagan said, plaintiffs need only show "that there
is a practice, a policy of subjectivity that on the whole results in discrimination
against women, not that each one of those women in the class were themselves
discriminated against."

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg questioned whether the plaintiffs, seeking a procedural
advantage, had cut thousands of alleged victims out of potential remedies. The suit
was filed under a provision that makes it easier to certify a class action, but limits
compensatory damages.

Justice Ginsburg said that for women who no longer work at Wal-Mart, those
compensatory damages for past wrongs are more important than ensuring future
opportunities at the company. "They're not interested in" an injunction against
future discrimination, "but everyone's interested in money," she said.

The plaintiffs say their statistical and anecdotal evidence should be enough to get
their case before a jury. They say, for instance, that while women outnumber men
2-1 in Wal-Mart's hourly positions, the ratio is reversed in management ranks. And
they say that such practices as holding staff meetings at Hooters restaurants
supports their claim regarding the company's allegedly discriminatory culture.

Wal-Mart responds that the plaintiffs' statistics don't show that disparities between
men and women are caused by discrimination, and dismisses the anecdotes as
"widely divergent, and often entirely unique, events."

• The allegation: The six named plaintiffs allege that they and potentially more than
a million other female Wal-Mart workers were paid less than men and were offered
fewer opportunities for promotion, the result of a a corporate culture "rife with
gender stereotypes." They are seeking back pay and punitive damages.

• Wal-Mart's response: The retailer says it has a strict antidiscrimination policy and
that the claims are too diverse to qualify as a single class-action suit. "Wal-Mart is
working hard every day to ensure more women are represented in our
management ranks," Gisel Ruiz, a company executive vice president, said in a
statement.

"Our theory is that WalMart provided to its managers unchecked discretion…that

was used to pay women less than men who were doing the same work in the same
facilities at the same time, even though those women had more seniority and
higher performance."

Joseph Sellers, plaintiffs' lawyer

"I'm getting whipsawed here. On the one hand, you say the problem is that they
were utterly subjective, and on the other hand you say there is a strong corporate
culture that guides all of this. Well, which is it?"

Justice Antonin Scalia

Wal-Mart also claims that its statistical study done on a store-by-store basis shows
no pay disparity between male and and female workers.

"The case doesn't look promising for plaintiffs based on the questions the justices
asked," said Alexandra Lahav, a professor of law at the University of Connecticut
School of Law.

The justices also are considering whether back pay can be awarded in class action
suits where injunctive relief is sought. Until now, all courts have agreed that it can.
"Removing back pay would be a huge change," Ms. Lahav said.

U.S. District Judge Martin Jenkins, in San Francisco, granted the case class status in
June 2004. The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco voted 6-5 to
permit the class action to proceed, with some modifications.

The appeals court said women who left Wal-Mart before the original suit was filed in
June 2001 shouldn't be considered part of the class, but left it up to a trial judge to
consider whether to certify their claims under a different legal standard. It also
ruled that the trial judge must use new legal standards in considering whether the
women could pursue punitive damages.
More than 100 women gave depositions telling similar stories to the named
plaintiffs. "We talked to hundreds more, but many were too scared to stand up,"
said Betty Lawrence, a plaintiff’s lawyer.

More

"Wal-Mart is working hard every day to ensure more women are represented in our
management ranks," Gisel Ruiz, a company executive vice president, said in a
statement. "We continue to have strong anti-discrimination policies in place, a
strong record of advancement of women and we are always looking to be better."

^This was another interesting, but long and complex, story. It came out rather long
even in my own wording, but I did highlight only about half of the article at first to
narrow it down to the most crucial information. I then pulled the key facts out of
that half and blended them together in a logical flow so that people will understand
what’s happening and why, what the plaintiffs seek, and what Wal-Mart’s rebuttals
are to their accusations. I wanted to include some specifics, such as the Hooters
meetings, in order to add some color, but also point out that as confident as the
plaintiffs may feel about their case, it’s definitely in jeopardy of not even qualifying
as a class-action suit, let alone being awarded to them.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703739204576229053002458270.
html?mod=WSJ_WSJ_US_News_5

Colorado Abuzz Over Beer Bill

Groceries, Convenience Stores Push to End Sales Rules Based on Alcohol Content

By STEPHANIE SIMON

DENVER—A fight brewing in the Colorado legislature has lawmakers bitterly divided
over beer.

The state House of Representatives is expected to begin debate soon on a bill that
would dismantle Colorado's great beer divide, which since 1933 has limited the sale
of beer with higher alcohol content to liquor stores, restaurants and bars.

Supermarkets and convenience stores, meanwhile, have had a monopoly on beer

with less than 3.2% alcohol by weight, which is equivalent to 4% by volume. Now,
they want the opportunity to cash in on sales of the stronger stuff.
In 2010, Coloradans purchased nearly six million gallons of lower-alcohol beer,
compared with 104 million gallons of higher-alcohol brews.

Colorado's beer laws, enacted after Prohibition to keep the most intoxicating brews
away from teens, have created unusual situations. The Coors Light sold in
supermarkets is made with a shorter fermentation period, which produces a lower
alcohol content, than the Coors Light sold in liquor stores—though the brewer says
there is no difference in taste, and the packaging is nearly identical.

Only four other states—Utah, Oklahoma, Indiana and Kansas—have similar rules.

Groups representing supermarkets and convenience stores are planning petition

drives, newspaper ads and automated phone calls to drum up public support for
their push to eliminate the beer divide, said Mark Larson, who runs a trade
association for Colorado convenience-store owners. Their rallying cry: "Let beer be
beer!" Mr. Larson said.

He and others maintain that the 78-year-old rules are anachronistic and confusing
to shoppers.

On the other side, liquor-store owners predict financial disaster if they lose their
monopoly on stronger brews. Beer accounts for 60% to 70% of sales at most liquor
stores in the state, said Jeanne McEvoy, who runs an industry trade group. She
predicts that as many as 700 of Colorado's 1,660 liquor stores would go out of
business if the rules were changed, throwing thousands of people out of work.

Colorado's 130 craft breweries are also fighting to keep the status quo. The
proposal would greatly expand their potential market, by letting them sell their full-
strength beers to chain groceries. But the brewers prefer to market their beer to
independently owned liquor stores, some of which are enormous—50,000 square
feet—and stock scores of niche brands and seasonal brews. Supermarkets don't
have the shelf space, so if big grocery chains came to dominate the beer market,
consumers might have less exposure to local products, said John Carlson, executive
director of the Colorado Brewers Guild.

"I'm not saying it will be Armageddon," said John Bryant, president of Oskar Blues
Brewery in Longmont, Colo. "But it would change the dynamics of craft breweries in
Colorado."
The beer-sales debate has been complicated by Gov. John Hickenlooper's
intervention on a related issue.

Convenience- and grocery-store owners have long complained that pubs and
restaurants, which are supposed to serve only stronger beers, routinely (and
illegally) serve lighter offerings as well. So state officials spent six months drafting
rules that, for the first time, required brewers to report the alcohol content of each
product.

At the last minute, Mr. Hickenlooper, a former brew-pub owner, struck down the
regulation, calling it too much red tape.

Outraged convenience- and grocery-store lobbyists accused Mr. Hickenlooper of

backing up his brew-pub buddies. The governor, a Democrat, said he would do the
same for any industry snarled in excessive regulation.

State Rep. Larry Liston, a Republican who is spearheading the drive to change the
beer rules, says debate in the House is likely to be intense. "This is a monumental
undertaking," he said. And no, he won't be knocking back a cold one to help him
through the coming floor flight.

"Ironically, I'm not really a beer drinker," he said. "I prefer a nice glass of wine."

^I presented the case of the convenience store and supermarket owners first,
followed by that of the other groups who oppose changing the rules. This way the
story doesn’t confuse people too much by jumping back and forth between both
sides of the debate. I think my condensation of the original piece effectively
summarizes it. As a conclusion to emphasize the unusualness of Colorado’s beer
law, I tossed in the fact about the other four states that such legislation.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704559904576230254215149020.
html?mod=WSJ_World_LeadStory

Allies Intensify Call for Gadhafi to Step Down

By JAY SOLOMON
LONDON—U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton met with the political leader of
Libya's rebel movement Tuesday in a bid to further strengthen the coalition seeking
to oust Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi.

Mrs. Clinton's Monday engagement with Mahmoud Jibril, a former head of Libya's
economic planning office, marked their second meeting in a little more than a week.

A senior U.S. official who took part in the meeting said Mrs. Clinton is seeking to
gain a "clearer picture" of Libya's opposition leadership and gain a sense of how a
post-Gadhafi government might look.

Hillary Clinton, at a London summit with U.K. leader David Cameron, left, said the
U.S. hasn't made a decision about arming the Libyan opposition.

Mrs. Clinton is in London to take part in a 40-nation summit Tuesday that will look
into ways to better implement a United Nations resolution aimed at protecting
Libyan civilians from Col. Gadhafi's violent crackdown on antigovernment
protesters.

The meeting also is seeking to strengthen the unity and profile of the Libyan
National Council, an umbrella political organization representing the rebel forces.
Mr. Jibril was recently chosen as the de facto prime minister of the Council.

Mr. Jibril also met with U.K. Foreign Secretary William Hague ahead of the
conference. Mr. Hague said that he discussed logistics over humanitarian and
"priorities for international assistance," according to a Foreign & Commonwealth
Office statement.

Mrs. Clinton will meet with U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron and Mr. Hague before
taking part in the conference.

The Obama administration has taken a relatively cautious approach toward

embracing Libya's opposition leadership since the rebellion against Col. Gadhafi
broke out last month.

France and Qatar have already formally recognized the Libyan National Council as
the legitimate leadership of Libya. And a number of foreign governments have
openly called for the arming of the rebel movement.
U.S. officials have said in recent days that Washington is still studying both the
issue of the formal recognition of the Council as well as the possibility of armed
support. U.S. President Barack Obama also said in a Monday speech on Libya that
his administration is seeking ways to make available to the Council more than $30
billion in Col. Gadhafi's funds recently frozen by the U.S. Treasury Department.

"This is one of the issues that still needs to be sorted out" legally and logistically,
said a senior U.S. official traveling with Mrs. Clinton Tuesday. "We have an
increasingly clear sense of a number of the Libyan [opposition's] leaders."

The official said the State Department is seeing to dispatch its special envoy to
Libya's opposition movement, Christopher Stevens, to Benghazi in the coming days.
Mr. Stevens "will establish a systematic channel" to the Libyan National Council, the
American official said.

—Alistair MacDonald contributed to this article.

^As usual, I wound up highlighting passages throughout the article that struck me
as being necessary and then arranging the information from those passages into
my radio news story, changing the order of fact presentation when I saw fit. It was
very difficult to rephrase most of the sentences in a way that would make more
sense than they already did or sound even more appropriate to the different format,
but I tried to do so, rather than simply copying and pasting the abridged article.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704471904576229854179642220.
html?mod=WSJ_World_MIDDLENews

At Plant, a Choice Between Bad, Worse

Japan Vows to Keep Dousing Reactors, at Risk of Spillover of Toxic Runoff; Flooded
Pump Rooms

By ANDREW MORSE And MITSURU OBE

TOKYO—Workers at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant positioned sandbags

and concrete barriers around drains leading from contaminated reactors Tuesday,
setting a last line of defense against highly radioactive water that has flooded
reactor buildings and threatens to spill into the ocean.
Plutonium was found in soil samples from the Fukushima Daiichi power plant,
signaling that a reactor core may have partly melted.

Workers at the Fukushima nuclear plant are battling to keep pools of radioactive
water from flooding into the ocean. Meanwhile, small amounts of plutonium have
been found in the soil around the plant.

At the same time, Japanese officials said Tuesday they would keep dousing the
plant's stricken reactors with water—a course of action that could raise those water
levels further.

At the heart of the day's official moves lies a calculated choice between bad and
worse: To meet their goal of keeping reactors cool enough to forestall a nuclear
catastrophe, officials appear willing to risk letting some highly radioactive water
spill out of vents that are positioned some 50 to 70 yards from the sea.

The efforts by the government and plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co., or
Tepco, underscore how the 18-day crisis is moving into a new phase that could take
months to resolve. Workers have largely stabilized the temperatures of nuclear
material at the plant, and reduced the possibility of a catastrophic event such as
significant melting, in part by spraying facilities with vast amounts of water.

Workers are still probing for the source of the plutonium found Monday at the
Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.

Possible scenarios:

1. Some of the plutonium found is believed to have been there before the nuclear
crisis started and is unconnected to the current situation. Tokyo Electric Power Co.
says three of five samples are "equivalent to the fallout observed in Japan when the
atmospheric nuclear test was conducted in the past."

2. Heating of spent fuel rods

A likely source of the plutonium, experts say. As it decays, uranium in fuel rods
produces some plutonium, which might have been borne aloft by steam in spent-
fuel containment pools, or in water that splashed out as workers doused the spent
fuel rods to keep them cool.

3. Partial melting of fuel in reactors 1 or 2

Decaying uranium in the fuel rods of reactors 1 and 2 would also produce
plutonium. A partial melting in No. 2 is already considered the likely source of the
strong radiation readings there and could also account for the plutonium. However,
experts say that if partially burned fuel accounted for the plutonium found on the
site, radioactivity levels would likely be much higher than they now are

4. Partial melting of fuel in reactor No. 3.

Reactor No. 3's mixed-oxide, or MOX, fuel contains plutonium, and any breach in
the reactor's containment unit might account for a plutonium release. Government
and company officials say they don't have indications of such a breach, though, and
experts say this is among the least likely scenarios.

That water has flooded the turbine buildings of three of the complex's six reactors
and is filling trenches that lead outside the buildings—and stand, in one case, within
a few inches of running over. At two of the reactor units, there is currently nowhere
to relocate the water.

The plant's cooling pumps, too, are located within these flooded zones. Workers will
continue to face difficulties in their all-important goal of starting the pumps as long
as the areas are flooded with radioactive water.

Of particular concern is the runoff at reactor No. 2, which has risen to within about
three feet of spilling out of an outside shaft. Readings of radiation in this water are
at least 1,000 millisieverts an hour—four times the level emergency work crews at
the site are allowed to experience in a full year. Those levels may be higher still, but
authorities say 1,000 millisieverts is the upper limit of their measuring devices. It
isn't clear why meters that are available to measure higher concentrations haven't
been used.

Officials from Japan's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, or NISA, say the water-
filled trench at reactor No. 2 has a capacity of about 6,000 cubic meters, the
equivalent of more than two Olympic-sized swimming pools.
Despite concerns over spillage, officials said their main goal lies elsewhere. "Our No.
1 priority is to cool the fuel to prevent any more damage" to the complex's fuel
rods, said senior NISA regulator Hidehiko Nishiyama. "Within the limitation of that
priority, we can adjust the amount of cooling water to reduce the amount of
contaminated water spilling out."

The tradeoffs were already apparent Tuesday, as the government said it pulled
back its use of cooling water to the troubled No. 2 unit. The temperature in that
reactor rose to about 150 degrees Celsius on Tuesday morning, from 130 degrees
early Monday.

Chief government spokesman Yukio Edano said a drop in water use was likely the
reason. Later Tuesday, temperatures at reactors Nos. 1, 2 and 3 all fell slightly, with
the No. 2 reactor at about 142 degrees, Tepco said. Temperatures at all three
reactors remained well below the 1,000-plus-degree level at which radioactive
material can be damaged to a dangerous degree.

Separately on Tuesday, government and utility officials continued to hunt for

additional signs of plutonium isotopes at the Fukushima Daiiichi site, as well as their
source. Mr. Edano, the government spokesman, said the presence of plutonium
offered further proof for previous speculation that fuel in at least some of the
reactors had melted. But experts said the amounts of plutonium remained low.

In a sign the country's partisan rancor is returning, Prime Minister Naoto Kan faced
questions from Japan's Parliament on Tuesday over whether his visit to the complex
on March 12 delayed vital repair efforts.

Government officials dismissed the claims, saying the trip was brief, Mr. Kan met
with only two people at the plant and didn't divert resources from the repair effort.
"This quake, tsunami and the nuclear accident are the biggest crises for Japan'' in
decades, he said, reiterating a line he has used many times in recent days. "We will
continue to handle it in a state of maximum alert."

The U.S. Department of Energy said Tuesday it has shipped a robot to Japan, along
with several "radiation hardened cameras" as test of whether such devices could be
helpful to the Fukushima workers trying to survey areas of the complex where
radiation levels are too high for them to go.
An Energy Department spokesman said the U.S. the first robot is a test to see if the
Japanese workers can make use of U.S. designed remote controlled machines
designed to conduct environmental cleanup "in environments that are obviously
quite different than the nuclear reactor in Japan."

The plant's troubles came on a day when fears eased in other parts of the nation
over nuclear contamination. Findings of radiation in food and water have dropped
after a series of low-level findings last week that extended worries over the nation's
food supplies. Atmospheric radiation has also dropped.

The Japanese government monitors radiation levels around the country.

The ocean surrounding the stricken plant also appeared to be clearing of radiation.
Tepco said Tuesday that a sample of seawater taken Monday from a nearby
discharged outlet showed the concentration of radioactive iodine-131 stood at 27.9
times the allowable limit, down from 250 times on Sunday and 1,850.5 times on
Saturday. About 1.5 kilometers north, the level of concentration fell to 665.8 times
the allowable limit, from 1,150 times on Sunday.

Officials are now turning to the question of where to store radioactive water.

At reactor No. 1 on Tuesday, three pumps pushed water into the condensation unit
—a vessel housed within the unit's turbine building, which usually serves to convert
the steam that powers turbines back into water.

Plant operators can't do the same at reactors 2 and 3, however, because those
condensation units are already full. Until those can be safely drained, officials have
nowhere to sluice the radioactive water.

—Rebecca Smith, Stephen Power and Juro Osawa contributed to this article.

^This was a very important and involved article that wound up being my longest
story yet (I hope that a page is an acceptable length for the station or that, if not,
they will simply cross out the lines that need to be removed in the interest of time.
The stories will remain informative even if a portion or even half of each one is cut
out. I first addressed, for most of the write-up, the facts about the nuclear reactors
and the dangers of all the flooding and potential spillage versus those of failing to
cool down the fuel (causing a nuclear meltdown.) I then briefly mentioned the
discovery of plutonium, and the reduction in various other radiation levels being
found throughout the country. Organizing the story into those three sections was
the best way to maintain control of it. I did my best to omit unnecessary details and
simplify the scientific language as much as possible, and utilized numerous points
that stress the serious danger of the situation.

JGR unsure of root cause with engines

By David Newton

ESPN.com

CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Joe Gibbs Racing officials are scrambling to uncover the cause
of an unusually high number of engine issues during the first five races of the Sprint
Cup season.

JGR had two issues this past weekend at Auto Club Speedway in California. The
engine in Joey Logano's Toyota had to be replaced on Saturday when valve leakage
was discovered following the final practice.

Denny Hamlin's engine failed 105 laps into the race due to an unrelated value train
issue, leaving last year's Chase runner-up with a 39th-place finish that dropped him
to 21st in points.

In all, JGR has had three engine failures in races and three more engines replaced
prior to a race because problems arose. Last season, the organization had only two
DNFs due to engine failure between Hamlin, Logano and Kyle Busch.

"Is there concern? Of course," said Jimmy Makar, JGR's senior vice president of race
operations. "We've had a lot more issues than we'd like to see, this early in the
season especially.

"Probably the bigger issue is for the most part they are non-related. That makes
things harder to figure out. If you had the same thing happening over and over
again you could focus on it."

Makar said only Hamlin's failure on Sunday showed signs of a potential bad part. He
said the batch that the part came from would be quarantined for this weekend's
race at Martinsville Speedway to see if any issues arise.
"It seems like every weekend there is something going on," Makar said. "It's very,
very odd. We've been through cycles before where we've had valve springs and
things that you come to expect to fail. We really haven't had these kinds of issues,
certainly not this time of the year."

More alarming, Makar said there were very few changes made to the engines during
the offseason. He said the organization purposely left things the way they were,
with minor adjustments to improve fuel mileage that may have cost Hamlin the
championship last season, before experimenting with new ideas.

"The few small changes we made you wouldn't have thought would have caused
any of these problems," Makar said.

Hamlin's California engine was pulled and taken to Toyota Racing Development in
Costa Mesa, Calif., as part of an agreement with TRD even though JGR builds its own
engines.

TRD and JGR officials huddled over Hamlin's car for a long time after it was taken to
the garage. Makar said JGR is working closely with TRD on the issues.

Richard Childress, the owner of Richard Childress Racing, said his Chevrolet
organization likely would share what it learned from several engine issues earlier
this year. Makar said it is not unusual for different manufacturers to do that when
common engine components are involved.

Hamlin said the problems concern him because they impact his position in the
standings.

"I'm worried a little bit more," said Hamlin, who had to have an engine replaced
before one of the qualifying races at Daytona. "It's frustrating because you want to
do the best you can each week ... and the team did a great job setting up the car
and we had a fast car.

"It doesn't matter in the end if you can't finish the way you're supposed to."
Busch was the only JGR driver who didn't experience engine problems at California.
He led a race-high 151 laps and appeared headed for victory before a late caution
allowed Kevin Harvick to take the win.

But Busch had an engine failure at Las Vegas that left him 38th.

"That's the weird thing about it," Makar said. "You come with three engines, one
blows up, one has other issues in practice and one comes back with no problems
whatsoever. How do you make rhyme or reason with that? I wish it was an easy
thing finding out what it is."

Makar also wishes he could guarantee this isn't a long-term problem.

"That's the million-dollar question," he said. "At this point, we still don't know. Every
week it seems to be a different problem."

^This one was fairly easy. I pulled out the facts that would give someone the most
concise picture of what is taking place, and combined them into one paragraph.
They were mostly near and the beginning and already in a good logical order; I only
needed to reword it slightly to be comprehensible to a radio audience that might
not follow NASCAR but would probably not mind hearing about a problem like this.

'Mad Men' delayed until 2012 due to ongoing contract negotiations

March 29, 2011 | 9:06 am

Latimes.com: Entertainment news

Weiner Due to continuing contract negotiations between "Mad Men" creator Matt
Weiner and AMC, the series will not return until early 2012, the network said on
Tuesday. AMC announced that it has officially authorized production of the show's
fifth season, triggering its option with "Mad Men's" production company, Lionsgate,
but confirmed that the show won't be back until next year. "While we are getting a
later start than in years past due to ongoing, key non-cast negotiations, 'Mad Men'
will be back for a fifth season in early 2012," the network said in a statement.

But according to The Daily and Deadline Hollywood, many issues have yet to be
resolved between the parties, including AMC's desire to integrate more product
placement into the series, add more commercials and trim the running time by two
minutes. Two years ago, Weiner had a similar dispute with AMC over those two
minutes, and both sides eventually agreed to let the episodes run over into the 11
p.m. time slot so that extra commerical time could be added without making the
scripts any shorter. AMC has been using product placement in the series since its
first season.

Sources tell Deadline Hollywood that Weiner is threatening that negotiations may
collapse as a result of AMC's demands. Poised to become the highest-paid
showrunner on basic cable, he is also looking for a deal that would pay him $15
million a year, or more than $1 million per episode.

Someone call Don Draper in to buy everyone a dry martini and help them broker
this deal!

^I decided to simply convey the demands of both parties and let the listeners know
the basic facts about the successful show’s current status (i.e., that it’s entering its
fifth season but won’t return until next year, and that according to entertainment
news sources, the contract between AMC and the creator is in danger.)