pimblr.com

December 20 – Property taxes triple after wrongful-termination suit. “The Delaware County [Oklahoma] Excise Board voted Monday to impose a tax levy that will triple property taxes for Kenwood’s 128 residents to pay off a court judgment against the school system.
“Board members voted to set the levy after Kenwood school board members agreed Thursday to use $75,000 in federal Impact Aid funds to pay Garland Lane, the former school superintendent, who won a $305,600 judgment against the district in 1998 for wrongful termination.
“The school district still owes Lane $179,000. The federal trial judge ordered that Lane and his Tulsa attorney would be allowed to collect an additional 10 percent interest on the outstanding debt until it was paid.
“A Kenwood taxpayer who normally pays $224 in taxes for the year will now have to pay $763, under the levy approved Monday.” (Jann Clark, “Property tax triples in Kenwood”, Tulsa World, Dec. 12).
December 20 – Obese fliers. A judge has ruled that Southwest Airlines did not unlawfully discriminate against Cynthia Luther, whose weight exceeds 300 pounds, when it required her to buy a second seat on a flight from Reno to Burbank (”Large Passenger Has Suit Dismissed”, Yahoo/AP, Dec. 14) (via Drudge). Days earlier, a confidential report from an official agency in Canada recommended that airlines be forbidden to charge highly obese passengers for a second seat, on the grounds that their condition should count as a disability entitled to accommodation. The opinion from the Canadian Transportation Agency promptly came under fire from both directions, with the Air Transport Association of Canada charging that such a rule would be unacceptably expensive, and Helena Spring, founder of the Canadian Association for Fat Acceptance, saying that obesity should be viewed as a healthy condition rather than a disability (Glen McGregor, “Treat the obese as disabled, airlines told”, Ottawa Citizen, Dec. 10). Update Oct. 25-27, 2002: complaint by obese Canadian passenger fails.

overlawyered.com

Lawyer Weiss Deserves 33-Month Term, Prosecutors Say (Update1)
By Edvard Pettersson
May 24 (Bloomberg) — Melvyn Weiss, co-founder of securities law firm Milberg, should serve the maximum 33-month prison sentence allowed under his plea agreement for illegally paying clients to file shareholder complaints, prosecutors said.
The government believes a 33-month sentence is “necessary and appropriate,'' because Weiss continued paying illegal kickbacks after he knew that the firm was under investigation and he tried to obstruct investigators by not providing subpoenaed documents, prosecutors said yesterday in papers filed in federal court in Los Angeles.
Weiss, 72, pleaded guilty on April 2 to one racketeering conspiracy charge. He became the fourth name partner of the New York firm, previously called Milberg Weiss Bershad & Schulman, to plead guilty in a nine-year investigation. Former partner Bill Lerach was sentenced to 2 years in prison after pleading guilty to one count of conspiracy.
“A sentence that is greater than 33 months would tend to create an unwarranted and impermissible disparity, particularly given Weiss's more advanced age and more substantial philanthropic activities as compared with Lerach,'' Assistant U.S. Attorney Douglas Axel said in the sentencing memorandum.
Prosecutors claim the firm reaped $251 million in fees from cases in which the lawyers illegally paid clients to file suits.
U.S. District Judge John F. Walter is scheduled to sentence Weiss on June 2.
Benjamin Brafman, Weiss's lawyer, asked in a filing for a sentence of no more than 18 months, the low end of his plea agreement, with at least half of it served in home confinement or community service.
More than 250 people wrote letters on Weiss's behalf, Brafman said. They include legal scholars, lawyers, family members, former UBS PaineWebber Inc. Chief Executive Officer Joseph Grano Jr. and former U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Arthur Levitt Jr. Levitt is now a senior adviser to the Carlyle Group and a board member of Bloomberg LP.

bloomberg.com

To stop or not to stop?
The American Idol judges couldn't agree if Brooke White did the right—or wrong—thing last night by rebooting her performance of "You Must Love Me."
And there's not quite a consensus among outside singing experts, either.
"Unless it's a total trainwreck, I think you try to make it through," James Lugo, a record producer and vocal coach, said today. "Personally, I think starting and stopping is kind of hack."
To Gina Eckstine, a singer and vocal teacher, going forward is the only way to go. Most of the time.
"If there's no more, and you can't move ahead, sometimes you just have to admit it," said Eckstine.
White opted for the latter route on Tuesday. Some 13 seconds into her performance, she turned to the house band and said, "I'm sorry." Taking the hint, the band restarted the song. White made it through the number, introduced by Madonna in the movie version of Evita, without further incident.
After the song ended, Paula Abdul, the nice Idol judge, looked pained as she considered her words. Firmly but gently, she offered White the following edict: "You must never start and stop."
In a twist, Simon Cowell, the non-nice Idol judge, gave White a pass on the do-over, apparently because it entertained him. "This is why I love live TV," he said. "It was so dramatic—the beginning, you know."
Under questioning from host Ryan Seacrest, White said she restarted because "I lost the lyric."
Cowell claimed he would have done the same thing, and called White's decision "brave." Abdul persisted, telling White she should have vamped until she found the words. Cowell and Randy Jackson, the wild-card Idol judge, disagreed.
On the matter of to vamp or not to vamp, Abdul offered the best advice, the singing experts said.

eonline.com

It had to come to this. It’s almost a dirty secret for American Idol that former contestants are way more likely to find a second life on Broadway than they are to become honest-to-God pop-stars. For plenty of this season’s early eliminations, the show was obviously just a stopgap on the way to being a name at the top of one of those subway posters. Broadway musical producers seem to look at the show as a farm-league even more than Nashville studio execs do. And so this week, the show came just shy of acknowledging its Broadway ties by recruiting giggling toffy frog-man Andrew Lloyd Webber as this week’s guest-mentor. As someone who’s successfully avoided ever seen an Andrew Lloyd Webber play, this was not a good week for me. The standard Idol quavery saccharine ballads were already broad and hammy enough, you know? Do we need to see these poor kids leaning any harder on their stage-smiles? Syesha Mercado, for one, bought into the exercise wholeheartedly. At the beginning of the show, she listed her occupation as actress, even though her acting experience apparently consisted of one line in a cheesed-out Florida lottery commercial. But her “One Rock ‘n Roll Too Many” was a straight-up Broadway audition, a bid for niche-market acceptance even more naked than Phil Stacey’s asskissy performance during country week last year. Also gunning hard for that Broadway money, weirdly, was David Cook, previously the show’s resident rock dude. His inner drama-nerd came out swinging last night on an eerily poised rendition of “Music of the Night,” and he didn’t even do one of those wobbly Layne Staley gurgle-yowls. Shit creeped me out.
For some reason, this was also the week everyone forgot their words. I didn’t notice Carly Smithson losing her way, but apparently it happened. It was pretty impossible not to notice Brooke White’s fuckup, though. She started the song, froze, asked the band to start over, and then finished up her “You Must Love Me” looking totally shaken and dead inside. Last week, I called Brooke this show’s Cat Power; the more she projects her wilting wallflower image, the more protective the show’s voters get. Since every one of my results-show predictions has turned out wrong, I’m not going to precog her exit, but I will say that if she does go home, it’ll be because she pushed that vulnerability thing way too far. Even Paula visibly struggled to find anything nice to say. The judges remained all over David Archuleta’s dick, even though he shanked his lyrics almost as hard. He didn’t actually stop the song, though; he just sort of inaudibly mumbled for a couple of lines. Nobody pointed it out, and I’m wondering whether Randy Jackson is just so afraid of getting booed that nothing could make him really go in on this kid. It doesn’t even really bother me that Archuleta forgot his words as much as it does that he’s pretty much sung the exact same song every single week on this show. Time pretty much stops when he walks on; those godawful dull two-minute warble-fests just stretch on into infinity. I can’t believe he’s winning this shit. David Archuleta is boring and he sucks and I hate him.

blogs.villagevoice.com

1 A real, honest-to-goodness closer. Francisco Cordero will fill that role after David Weathers served as its steward. Weathers did have some success, but everyone knew he was not the long-term answer. Granted, eighth-inning meltdowns decreased some Weathers chances, but everyone likes an All-Star, as Cordero was last season with the Brewers.
2 A manager who knows winning. True, Dusty Baker doesn’t have a World Series ring as a manager, but his résumé is much more impressive than those of Bob Boone, Dave Miley and Jerry Narron combined. Many argue about the impact of a manager, but it’s easier to produce when you trust your boss knows what he’s doing.
3 Non-retread starting pitching. The top of the rotation was already set with Aaron Harang and Bronson Arroyo, but now you’ll be hopeful through the fourth starter after Johnny Cueto and Edinson Volquez have opened eyes this spring. The fifth starter is a question mark, but really, when in recent Reds history have you only complained about one of the starting five?
4 The regulars are producing. Ken Griffey Jr. is hitting .353 this spring with 11 RBIs in 16 games. Scott Hatteberg has a .415 average. Corey Patterson, the new center fielder, is at .407. Second baseman Brandon Phillips has 15 RBIs. OK, so Adam Dunn has a .184 average, but he has struck out only nine times.
5 The NL Central is weak. The weakened St. Louis Cardinals have opened the door to the division title. Cross your fingers.
Those are some great reasons factoring into the Red’s increased odds of success this year. Cueto’s last outing however brought me back to earth. The Reds probably won’t get a combined 20 wins out their two rookie pitchers. If they are over 25 then their is no way this team misses the playoffs but I would say chances are only at 15 - 20% of that happening.

springfieldnewssun.com

San Vicente school wins Academic Challenge Bowl
By Moneth G. Deposa
Variety News Staff
THE five-member team of San Vicente Elementary School won the 13th Academic Bee Challenge on Saturday at the multi-purpose center in Susupe.
Besting 14 other school teams, the new champions said they were grateful for the patience and dedication of their mentors during the short-period of preparation for the competition.
SVES, which got an overall 430 points, also to pped the contest in 2006.
“It’s overwhelming and we’re very happy that we did it,” sixth grader Niki Teregeyo told Variety after the awarding ceremony.
The other members of the team were Hyeyoung Oh, Kristine Batacm Jesus M. Sablan Jr. and Jill Ann Arada.
They said they were thankful to their teacher coach Cristina Yohannan and principal Joaquina Salas.
Oh said the prepared for a month by practicing for several hours during weekends.
“All our hard work paid off,” Oh said. “It’s a good feeling and we’re very proud of this achievement.”
Salas said their school’s victory was a demonstration of their students’ patience, hard work and determination.
“We congratulate and thank them for all their hard work,” she said. “They were able to excel in this competition and I want them to continue to do a good job in their education. This is really good because they’re really going out to expose themselves and show to the people that they can be at the top of any competition — our school is very proud of them,” Salas said.
Sponsored and organized by Marianas High School’s National Honor Society, the contest has three categories for questions that come from various subjects such as math, English, history and social studies.
Ann Rochell Ermitanio, the honor society’s president, said every year, they see progress in terms of student participation and involvement.

mvariety.com

FRESHMEN: Michelle Boivin, David Boretti, Monica Capella, Scott Clevenger, Amy Domby, Erin Dustin, Maura Henry, Amelia Liberati, Danielle Makarsky, Rachel Ostrow, Nicholas Pajerowski, Courtney Shelsby, Josephine St. Denis, Kevin Sullivan, Carolyn Wessel.
SOPHOMORES: Sarah Backof, Christopher Barrazotto, Daniel Brady, Marilyn Carney, Zachary Dale, Leyan deBorja, Margaret Dozier, Megan Dustin, Julie Faust, Sarah Garland, Michele Hall, Elaine Healy, Hannah Huber, George Andrew Inglis, Mackenzie Mahr, Taylor McCaffrey, Sidney Mejia, Kyle Milligan, Elizabeth Pandya, Brian Petrosky, Alexandra Rize, Mark Schneider, Emma Spencer, Meghan Sprankle, John Vernon, Nikolas Vreeland, Jennifer Wcislo.
JUNIORS: Stephanie Green, Michael Jones, Kelly Krueger, Keegan Merkert.
SENIORS: Peter Barna, Patrick Cornell, Paul Devlin, Amarissa Kalliongis, Abigail Lynch, David Marrero Danza, Nicholas Marshalik, Mallory Newbrough, Shannon Patro, Christina Ross, Abigail Wagner, Christine Walsh.
The following students have received first honors for the second marking period:
FRESHMEN: Alexander Aiello, Isabel Aldunate, Sarah Arndt, Grace Aucella, Zachary Auld, Samantha Ballard, Eryk Bapisteller, Danielle Beard, Brendan Born, Briana Bracey, Thomas Byrnes, Diana Caruso, Allison Chambers, Nicholas Chao, Jennifer Chisholm, Michael Collins, Lauren Cortese, Sean Cottington, Matthew D'Ambrosi, Kyle Daelemans, Lisa Dang, Jennifer Daniels, Brittany deGail, Lauren Dise, Peter Doley, Jordan Dugan, Alexander Eaker, Ahren Ernest, Karina Faust, Megan Fortman, Brya Freeland, Brynn Freeland, Christine Galligan, Katherine Ghiardi, Colleen Gordon, Alyson Groff, Kelly Harris, Kathleen Hoban, Kerry Huntzberry, Andrew Jaklitsch, Sarah Jenks, Justin Klimczyk, Gillian Knoble, Amber Kolb, Colin Kossa, Melissa Kral, Julianna Laboy, Connor Lane, Bethany Lerch, Nicole Logan, Judeth Lucas, Daniel Lupold, Jodie Manganelli, Nicholas Mangubat, John Mann, Ryan Mast, Jocelyn McCoy, Christina McDonald, Max McDonnell, Ryan Metzler, Camille Moore, Jessica Mucci, Elizabeth Mulry, Melissa Olmert, Stephanie Pazulski, Meghan Petersen, Emily Quinn, Jonathan Raeder, Olivia Renaldo, Kyra Rouse, Michael Shandor, Matthew Shields, Adam Sullivan, Sherae Swinson, William Thompson, Tyler Tippett, Aivy Tsin, Jessica van der Westhuizen, Jessica Varipapa, Vincent Varipapa, Krystal Welsh, Brandon Whisman, Victoria Willis, Remi Winston.

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