-
At Airports, More Delays, More Lost Luggage--And Don't Blame the Weather
Tweet Share on Facebook April 2, 2007 CommentMaybe it's just a sign of resignation. While cases of baggage mishandling, bumped flights, and delays at airports increased last year over 2005, a report out today found, ironically, rates of consumer complaints have decreased marginally. The 2007 Airline Quality Rating report (pdf) noted that overall quality of the industry has declined since 2005, based on scores in three of four categories tracked.
One of the report's coauthors, Dean E. Headley, tells News Desk he thinks "airlines should take a deep breath and decide what to do about it."
-
New DHS Regulations Won't Automatically Trump State Laws
Tweet Share on Facebook April 2, 2007 CommentThe Department of Homeland Security released its long-awaited chemical-plant security regulations this afternoon, offering some clarity about what will happen when state security laws and federal ones conflict, an issue that had many states worried, reports associate editor Angie C. Marek.
The regulations, which many states--especially New Jersey--feared would completely preempt tougher state laws, reserve the right for the department only to exercise "conflict preemption," the right to preempt state laws in direct conflict with the federal regulations. The department doesn't give itself "field preemption," a much broader authority.
-
Before Dancing, Rove Offered a Different Kind of Act
Tweet Share on Facebook April 2, 2007 CommentLost in the fracas over Karl Rove's attempt to dance (video) at the Radio and TV Correspondents' Dinner last week was a peculiar comment he made beforehand. After being called on stage by the comedians emceeing the event and being asked to give his name, Rove responded: "Peter Fitzgerald." He then corrected himself to say: "Patrick Fitzgerald." See video here, or below.
Patrick Fitzgerald, of course, is the special prosecutor who led the investigation into the leaked identity of covert CIA agent Valerie Plame Wilson. Peter Fitzgerald is a former Republican senator from Illinois. During proceedings, Patrick Fitzgerald called Rove to testify several times before a grand jury. Some Democrats, at the time, were salivating over the possible indictment of Bush's top adviser.
-
Plan For Longer GREs Gets Axed
Tweet Share on Facebook April 2, 2007 CommentEducation reporter Alex Kingsbury reports:
Students concerned about plans to drastically revamp the Graduate Record Exam this year have nothing to worry about after all. Test administrators have nixed plans for a longer, more analytical test, which was to have started with students sitting for the GRE in September.
The GRE is required for admission to many of the country's graduate school programs. Students sit for the exam at a network of testing centers around the world, and ETS, the nonprofit organization that administers the test, says the new test would have required students to take the exam on one of 35 testing days, a concentration that ETS says its facilities could not handle.
"We had concerns about the capacity demands for having to serve up to 20,000 students per day worldwide," says David Payne, executive director of the GRE Program at ETS.
The new test would have been an hour and a half longer, and the verbal section would have featured different questions designed to test students' analytical skills. Payne said that some elements of the canceled test will be gradually incorporated into the GRE in coming years, including abandoning analogy and antonym sections.
The GRE features an "adaptive model," which means that students are asked different questions based on how they answer each question. The new exam was designed to ask all students the same question, a so-called "linear model." Payne says ETS has abandoned plans to switch to that linear model in the future.
Both the April 9 issue of U.S.News & World Report and the 2008 edition of America's Best Graduate Schools were published before ETS's announcement and contain articles anticipating the aborted debut of the new GRE.
-
Second U.N. Climate Report Makes Dire Predictions
Tweet Share on Facebook April 2, 2007 CommentThe United Nations' second of four reports on global warming debuts Friday. The last made worldwide headlines with the decree that global warming is a fact, and that the odds humankind is to blame are 90 percent. This second report, a copy of which was obtained by the Associated Press, looks at the impacts of global warming, which include dire predictions of widespread drought, killer floods, and massive extinction of sensitive species.
Last summer, U.S. News associate editor Bret Schulte examined how life on earth will have to adapt to future changes, regardless of how successful we are at reducing greenhouse gases. The full text is available here.
-
Supreme Court Delivers Double Blow to Administration
Tweet Share on Facebook April 2, 2007 CommentThe Supreme Court ruled this morning that the federal government has the authority to regulate greenhouse gases, report U.S. News reporters Bret Schulte and Liz Halloran. The groundbreaking 5-4 decision offers a direct rebuke of the Bush administration's position on the subject.
The Court on Monday also issued a second significant environmental decision, requiring that power plant operators obtain a federal permit if they plan to increase annual emissions at their facilities. The ruling largely affects older, coal-burning power plants.
But it is the global warming decision that is drawing the most attention. Not only is the decision a stinging setback for the White House, which has rejected participation in the international Kyoto Protocol to reduce greenhouse gases, but a watershed moment in the nation's debate over global warming.
-
Amish School Reopens as Normalcy Slowly Returns
Tweet Share on Facebook April 2, 2007 CommentThe New Hope Amish School opens today in Nickel Mines, Pa., just a few hundred yards from the site of the gruesome shooting of 10 schoolgirls on Oct. 2, 2006. U.S. News & World Report Senior Editor Liz Halloran recently spent time in Nickel Mines, reporting on how the Lancaster County community is trying to heal, and has this to tell us about that experience:
"When I visited in late February and again in early March," Halloran says, "people in Bart Township, where tiny Nickel Mines is located, were anticipating two events: The opening of a new Amish schoolhouse not far from the old one, which had been razed 10 days after the shooting, and the Bart Township Fire Company's 43rd annual 'Mud Sale'. The annual sale is the township's social event of the year during which everything from horses and Amish buggies to gazebos and quilts would be auctioned, and shoo-fly pie, corn soup, and Dutch pretzels consumed."
-
Who's Where on the Trail
Tweet Share on Facebook April 2, 2007 CommentDemocrats:
- Barack Obama travels to New Hampshire, where he will attend a closed party in Manchester and then hold a town hall meeting in Keene.
- John Edwards is also scheduled to hold a town hall meeting tonight at the University of New Hampshire in Durham.
- Dennis Kucinich attends a breakfast fundraiser in Eugene, Ore.
- Hillary Clinton plans to make three stops in Iowa.
Republicans:
- The Republican Party in Saline, Ark., is hosting a fundraiser for Mike Huckabee.
- Rudy Giuliani plans campaign appearances in Iowa.
- Update: Giuliani tosses out the first pitch at the Yankees home opener.
- Update: John McCain is in Iraq today, according to the Democratic National Committee's candidate tracking report, touring Baghdad in an unarmed Humvee wearing a bullet-proof vest.
-
Morning Buzz: April 2, 2007
Tweet Share on Facebook April 2, 2007 Comment (1)This morning's top stories:
- A bomber targeted a police station in the northern city of Kirkuk today, killing at least 13 people and wounding dozens, including many children from a nearby school, police said.
- Humans can identify the gender, race, and age from simple black-and-white silhouettes of faces, a Stanford study finds.
- The Airline Quality Rating report finds that delayed flights and lost baggage at airports were higher in 2006 than the previous year.
- House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who is currently visiting Jerusalem, plans to discuss the kidnapped Israeli soldier being held by Hezbollah during her visit with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.