For the past week, a series of realities unstated by the White House or the State Department has driven American diplomacy in regards to the momentous events in Egypt, according to high-level sources familiar with the process.
First and foremost, The United States—in concert increasingly with other governments—is seeking an immediate transition to democratic pluralism and procedures that, simultaneously, will prevent the Muslim Brotherhood from overwhelming or co-opting the process to become the dominant political force in Egypt’s post-Mubarak future.
To accomplish this, President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, while sympathetic to the desire of Egyptian democratic forces that want Mubarak step down immediately, in fact have been working toward a solution that would permit him to stay for a brief period as a powerless, defacto head of state.
He would remain as such until new mechanisms, and perhaps a new Egyptian constitution, are in place for a stable transition that would also prevent authoritarian and corrupt Mubarak apparatchiks from controlling the process of succession.
This is particularly true in terms of the speaker of the Egyptian parliament, Fathi Surur, who has been speaker of the People's Assembly since 1990, described by someone familiar with his record as “a corrupt, venal man,” who under the existing constitution would become president of the country if Mubarak should abruptly resign or be removed from office.
Thus, Obama and Clinton, with help from other world leaders, including figures in the Arab world, have been trying to achieve a consensus among prominent Egyptian politicians, academics, bankers, cultural leaders, and representatives of the fledging democracy movement personified by young people in Tahrir Square, that Mubarak should be effectively stripped of his power and convinced to cede his presidential powers while briefly retaining the title of president. Ideally under ths scenario, Mubarak would leave the presidential palace in the next few days, but retain the presidency as a means of keeping it from passing—under the existing constitution—to the Parliamentary speaker, Surur.
State Department officials and anti-Mubarak forces in Egypt consider Surur inimical to the interests of both the United States and advocates of democracy in Egypt, as well as other Arab leaders who fear that further chaos there could feed radical Islamic influence in their own countries.
A powerless but constitutionally present Mubarak--for another few weeks, at least—would be consistent with the intricate dance that the White House and Secretary Clinton have been trying to encourage.
These underlying realities are what have driven the events described in Saturday morning’s New York Times report, that Egypt’s new vice president Omar Suleiman and military leaders have begun discussions to strip Mubarak of his decision-making powers and perhaps have him taken from the presidential palace in Cairo—while still remaining president.
Then, a “transition government” led by Suleiman would begin negotiating with various factions that have opposed Mubarak to amend the constitution, end the “emergency” under which Mubarak has governed with an iron fist since 1981, and draft a series of democratic reforms including rights to assembly, free speech, religious freedom (particularly for Egypt’s million-plus Christians), presidential term limits, and the rules for the next presidential election, scheduled for September.
These same underlying realities explain the urgency of Secretary Clinton’s comments Saturday morning on the need to support Suleiman in brokering agreements with opposition groups while Mubarak remains in office.
Such a solution—a powerless but constitutionally present Mubarak for another few weeks, at least—would be consistent with the intricate dance that the White House and Secretary Clinton have been trying to encourage, according to aides, and one that has prevented them from playing their cards in the open—i.e., from enunciating publicly that one of the primary objectives is to prevent the Brotherhood from walking through the door or power to be ceded to the Speaker of the Parliament. “He is ghastly, and there could be no consensus if he were to govern,” said one American diplomat.
Similarly, there is fear among top players in the national security apparatus in Washington and among democracy advocates in Cairo that if too much authority is claimed by the Egyptian military in formulating a post-Mubarak future, another authoritarian era could ensue.
“Part of the difficulty is the perception that the problems will all be solved if Mubarak simply is pushed out… and resigns,” said a source familiar the American strategy. “Mubarak is already history, but the real issue is how you build a bridge to the future and get a stable outcome that protects democratic principles and gets a decent, participatory system and doesn’t leave the door wide open for the Muslim Brotherhood to walk in. Our focus is a stable outcome where the great mass of responsible Egypt is able to express itself.”
“That’s why you don’t actually want Mubarak to leave right away, though on the surface it might seem the case,” said a source familiar with the U.S. strategy. “What you want to do is have him go off to his home at Sharm el Sheik [a seaside resort], or take one of his medical holidays in Europe. Meanwhile, we are hearing too much from some [American] political scientists blathering that we have nothing to fear from the Muslim brothers. The people saying this are full of shit.”
In the White House, there is hope that, by Monday, the strategy now being discussed sotto vocce in Cairo and Washington will be in place, and that a gathering of prominent politicians, bankers, young democracy advocates and others will meet to sort out the next steps: what kind of constitution, the date that the Mubarak “emergency” will be declared ended—“all the rules of the road ahead,” as an American official put it. “But until then, Mubarak is president, but you don’t hear from him, he’s the umbrella but not the CEO."
Carl Bernstein shared a Pulitzer Prize with Bob Woodward for his coverage of Watergate for The Washington Post
Saturday, February 05, 2011
Egypt Officials Seek to Nudge Mubarak Out (Progessive update?)
CAIRO — President Hosni Mubarak appeared increasingly isolated on Friday, as hundreds of thousands of protesters returned to Tahrir Square and the Obama administration and some members of the Egyptian military and civilian elite pursued plans to nudge him from power.
The country’s newly named vice president, Omar Suleiman, and other top military leaders were discussing steps to limit Mr. Mubarak’s decision-making authority and possibly remove him from the presidential palace in Cairo — though not to strip him of his presidency immediately, Egyptian and American officials said. A transitional government headed by Mr. Suleiman would then negotiate with opposition figures to amend Egypt’s Constitution and begin a process of democratic changes.
Administration officials said that among the ideas that had been discussed were suggesting to Mr. Mubarak that he move to his home at Sharm el Sheik, the seaside resort, or that he embark on one of his annual medical leaves to Germany for an extended checkup. Such steps would provide him with a graceful exit and effectively remove him as the central political player, going partway toward addressing a central demand of protesters on the streets of Cairo.
Meanwhile, Mr. Suleiman and top military officers are being encouraged to have detailed discussions with opposition groups, conversations that would ultimately include how to open up the political system, establish term limits for the president and enshrine some key democratic principles ahead of elections scheduled for September.
“None of this can happen if Mubarak is at the center of the process,” said one senior administration official. “But it doesn’t necessarily require the president to leave office right now.”
Opposition leaders, however, have insisted that they will not negotiate with Mr. Suleiman until Mr. Mubarak is out of office. They have been counting on the impact of his resignation, should it occur, to ensure that senior Egyptian officials do not try to derail the movement toward a constitutional democracy.
At a news conference with Prime Minister Stephen Harper of Canada, President Obama said he believed that the Egyptian president had already made a “psychological break” from his hold on office by announcing that he would not run again. Mr. Obama again stopped short of declaring that Mr. Mubarak should leave office sooner, but he set out a series of steps that the Egyptian government must meet to assure an “orderly transition” that seemed to all but require that the Egyptian leader step out of the way, if not resign.
Mr. Mubarak said in an interview Thursday with ABC that he was eager to step down, but that if he did, “Egypt would sink into chaos.”
Leaders of the country’s opposition movements are already warning of the risk of another military-backed president for life if the military elite currently negotiating a transition from Mr. Mubarak were to block broader change.
But several groups of prominent intellectuals and political analysts are pushing plans to endorse an initial transfer of power to Mr. Suleiman, who already appears to be governing in Mr. Mubarak’s place, they said.
“The reality on the ground is that the vice president is the one managing the situation and what we want to do is legalize it,” said Wahid Abdel Neguid, the deputy director of the Al Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies and one of the figures working on the plans. “Given the current situation, the president really can’t do anything, not here and not abroad, given the amount of pressure that is on him.”
The groups putting forward the proposal include Nabil Fahmy, former Egyptian ambassador to the United States; Naguib Sawiris, one of the most prominent businessmen in Egypt; Ahmed Kamal Aboul Magd, a lawyer and influential Islamic thinker; and Ahmed Zewail, a Nobel Prize-winning chemist. One group met Friday at the office of Amr Moussa, the head of the Arab League and perhaps the most popular political figure in Egypt.
Mr. Suleiman, a former military officer, appears to share power with two close allies, Field Marshal Mohamed Tantawi, the defense minister, and Ahmed Shafiq, the prime minister, a retired general who previously ran the country’s national airline, said Abdel Moneim Qattou, a retired Army general close to all three.
But the three find themselves squeezed between their loyalties to Mr. Mubarak on one side and the military on the other, Mr. Qattou said. They have been unwilling to push Mr. Mubarak out, he said. But they are also unwilling or unable to deploy the military against the protesters — a move that would cut deeply against its self-image and prestige.
“The three of them are military men,” Mr. Qattou said. “They know each other very well and they are together trying to find a way out of this crisis. They want to do this without spilling blood and without hurting the dignity of Egypt or Mubarak while fulfilling the demands of the masses.”
There appeared to be signs on Friday that the three men may be recalibrating their positions. Mr. Shafiq announced for the first time that the government would make no effort to clear Tahrir Square, allowing the protesters to remain indefinitely.
Field Marshal Tantawi, meanwhile, visited the square himself in the morning to inspect the troops stationed around the Egyptian Museum. It was the first appearance there by any of the country’s top officials, and protesters and military experts took it as a signal to Mr. Mubarak’s plainclothes supporters not to assault the square again.
A cheer rose from the protesters as soon as Field Marshal Tantawi appeared, and they clasped hands to form a barrier around the area where he was walking. Several said they wanted to ensure that no Mubarak-supporting provocateur tried to incite violence.
Mr. Obama repeated twice at his news conference that exactly how the transition would occur is “not a decision ultimately the United States makes or any country outside of Egypt makes.” But he laid out a series of principles that seemed designed to hem Mr. Mubarak in, and reduce his options.
“Going back to the old ways is not going to work,” he said. One official said that these messages were being reinforced in what he called an effort to “flood the zone” with calls to military leaders, members of the Egyptian elite, and legislators. Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates made another call to his Egyptian counterpart on Friday, part of the effort to assure that the military kept enough peace on the streets for serious discussions with the opposition to begin.
But administration officials remain concerned that removing Mr. Mubarak too early could create constitutional problems that would establish a political void. Under the existing Constitution, the speaker of the Parliament would take power, at least in name, if Mr. Mubarak resigned.
Opposition leaders contend that the existing Constitution so favors the governing party that it should be thrown out immediately and that Parliament, which is dominated by Mr. Mubarak’s party, should be disbanded.
In the opening stages of what promises to be a protracted round of negotiations, the diplomat Mohamed ElBaradei said in a news conference at his home near Cairo that opposition lawyers were preparing an interim Constitution. He said the opposition was calling on Mr. Mubarak to turn over power to a council of two to five members who would run the country until elections within a year.
Only one member would come from the military, Mr. ElBaradei said, adding that the armed forces’ most important task now was to “protect Egypt’s transition period in a smooth manner.”
“We have no interest in retribution,” he said. “Mubarak must leave in dignity and save his country.”
Mohamed el-Beltagui, a leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, the outlawed Islamist group that had been the major opposition in Egypt until the secular youth revolt, said that the organization would not run a candidate in any election to succeed Mr. Mubarak as president.
He said his members wanted to rebut Mr. Mubarak’s argument to the West that his iron-fisted rule was a crucial bulwark against Islamic extremism. “It is not a retreat,” he said in an interview at the group’s informal headquarters in the square. “It is to take away the scare tactics that Hosni Mubarak uses to deceive the people here and abroad that he should stay in power.”
Mr. Beltagui, who represents the Brotherhood on an opposition committee to negotiate a transitional government, said the group wanted a “civil state,” not a religious one. “We are standing for a real democracy, with general freedom and a real sense of social justice.”
Like many others in the square, Mr. Beltagui said he was not worried that the military might back a new dictator to succeed Mr. Mubarak. He said the determination of the protesters would forestall that, and noted that a religious leader who appeared to back away from some of the protesters’ democratic demands was booed from a makeshift stage in Tahrir Square.
Nor was he worried about new violence from Mubarak supporters. “They would be crazy,” he said.
The atmosphere in Tahrir Square reverted from embattled to jubilant. The protesters abandoned their makeshift barriers to chant, pray and sing the national anthem around the center of the square, where newcomers carried in bags of bread and water. Tens of thousands of others demonstrated in Alexandria and Suez.
Enthusiastic cheers rose several times at the appearance of Mr. Moussa, a straight-talking, charismatic foreign minister here in the 1990s whom Mr. Mubarak moved to the less-threatening position as head of the Arab League.
Mohamed Rafah Tahtawy, the public spokesman for Al Azhar — the center of Sunni Muslim learning and Egypt’s highest, state-run religious authority — said he was resigning to join the revolt.
“My position is a position of support to the revolution all the way,” he said. “I am part of it till the last drop of my blood.”
David D. Kirkpatrick reported from Cairo, and David E. Sanger from Washington. Kareem Fahim, Mona El-Naggar and Liam Stack contributed reporting from Cairo.
The country’s newly named vice president, Omar Suleiman, and other top military leaders were discussing steps to limit Mr. Mubarak’s decision-making authority and possibly remove him from the presidential palace in Cairo — though not to strip him of his presidency immediately, Egyptian and American officials said. A transitional government headed by Mr. Suleiman would then negotiate with opposition figures to amend Egypt’s Constitution and begin a process of democratic changes.
Administration officials said that among the ideas that had been discussed were suggesting to Mr. Mubarak that he move to his home at Sharm el Sheik, the seaside resort, or that he embark on one of his annual medical leaves to Germany for an extended checkup. Such steps would provide him with a graceful exit and effectively remove him as the central political player, going partway toward addressing a central demand of protesters on the streets of Cairo.
Meanwhile, Mr. Suleiman and top military officers are being encouraged to have detailed discussions with opposition groups, conversations that would ultimately include how to open up the political system, establish term limits for the president and enshrine some key democratic principles ahead of elections scheduled for September.
“None of this can happen if Mubarak is at the center of the process,” said one senior administration official. “But it doesn’t necessarily require the president to leave office right now.”
Opposition leaders, however, have insisted that they will not negotiate with Mr. Suleiman until Mr. Mubarak is out of office. They have been counting on the impact of his resignation, should it occur, to ensure that senior Egyptian officials do not try to derail the movement toward a constitutional democracy.
At a news conference with Prime Minister Stephen Harper of Canada, President Obama said he believed that the Egyptian president had already made a “psychological break” from his hold on office by announcing that he would not run again. Mr. Obama again stopped short of declaring that Mr. Mubarak should leave office sooner, but he set out a series of steps that the Egyptian government must meet to assure an “orderly transition” that seemed to all but require that the Egyptian leader step out of the way, if not resign.
Mr. Mubarak said in an interview Thursday with ABC that he was eager to step down, but that if he did, “Egypt would sink into chaos.”
Leaders of the country’s opposition movements are already warning of the risk of another military-backed president for life if the military elite currently negotiating a transition from Mr. Mubarak were to block broader change.
But several groups of prominent intellectuals and political analysts are pushing plans to endorse an initial transfer of power to Mr. Suleiman, who already appears to be governing in Mr. Mubarak’s place, they said.
“The reality on the ground is that the vice president is the one managing the situation and what we want to do is legalize it,” said Wahid Abdel Neguid, the deputy director of the Al Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies and one of the figures working on the plans. “Given the current situation, the president really can’t do anything, not here and not abroad, given the amount of pressure that is on him.”
The groups putting forward the proposal include Nabil Fahmy, former Egyptian ambassador to the United States; Naguib Sawiris, one of the most prominent businessmen in Egypt; Ahmed Kamal Aboul Magd, a lawyer and influential Islamic thinker; and Ahmed Zewail, a Nobel Prize-winning chemist. One group met Friday at the office of Amr Moussa, the head of the Arab League and perhaps the most popular political figure in Egypt.
Mr. Suleiman, a former military officer, appears to share power with two close allies, Field Marshal Mohamed Tantawi, the defense minister, and Ahmed Shafiq, the prime minister, a retired general who previously ran the country’s national airline, said Abdel Moneim Qattou, a retired Army general close to all three.
But the three find themselves squeezed between their loyalties to Mr. Mubarak on one side and the military on the other, Mr. Qattou said. They have been unwilling to push Mr. Mubarak out, he said. But they are also unwilling or unable to deploy the military against the protesters — a move that would cut deeply against its self-image and prestige.
“The three of them are military men,” Mr. Qattou said. “They know each other very well and they are together trying to find a way out of this crisis. They want to do this without spilling blood and without hurting the dignity of Egypt or Mubarak while fulfilling the demands of the masses.”
There appeared to be signs on Friday that the three men may be recalibrating their positions. Mr. Shafiq announced for the first time that the government would make no effort to clear Tahrir Square, allowing the protesters to remain indefinitely.
Field Marshal Tantawi, meanwhile, visited the square himself in the morning to inspect the troops stationed around the Egyptian Museum. It was the first appearance there by any of the country’s top officials, and protesters and military experts took it as a signal to Mr. Mubarak’s plainclothes supporters not to assault the square again.
A cheer rose from the protesters as soon as Field Marshal Tantawi appeared, and they clasped hands to form a barrier around the area where he was walking. Several said they wanted to ensure that no Mubarak-supporting provocateur tried to incite violence.
Mr. Obama repeated twice at his news conference that exactly how the transition would occur is “not a decision ultimately the United States makes or any country outside of Egypt makes.” But he laid out a series of principles that seemed designed to hem Mr. Mubarak in, and reduce his options.
“Going back to the old ways is not going to work,” he said. One official said that these messages were being reinforced in what he called an effort to “flood the zone” with calls to military leaders, members of the Egyptian elite, and legislators. Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates made another call to his Egyptian counterpart on Friday, part of the effort to assure that the military kept enough peace on the streets for serious discussions with the opposition to begin.
But administration officials remain concerned that removing Mr. Mubarak too early could create constitutional problems that would establish a political void. Under the existing Constitution, the speaker of the Parliament would take power, at least in name, if Mr. Mubarak resigned.
Opposition leaders contend that the existing Constitution so favors the governing party that it should be thrown out immediately and that Parliament, which is dominated by Mr. Mubarak’s party, should be disbanded.
In the opening stages of what promises to be a protracted round of negotiations, the diplomat Mohamed ElBaradei said in a news conference at his home near Cairo that opposition lawyers were preparing an interim Constitution. He said the opposition was calling on Mr. Mubarak to turn over power to a council of two to five members who would run the country until elections within a year.
Only one member would come from the military, Mr. ElBaradei said, adding that the armed forces’ most important task now was to “protect Egypt’s transition period in a smooth manner.”
“We have no interest in retribution,” he said. “Mubarak must leave in dignity and save his country.”
Mohamed el-Beltagui, a leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, the outlawed Islamist group that had been the major opposition in Egypt until the secular youth revolt, said that the organization would not run a candidate in any election to succeed Mr. Mubarak as president.
He said his members wanted to rebut Mr. Mubarak’s argument to the West that his iron-fisted rule was a crucial bulwark against Islamic extremism. “It is not a retreat,” he said in an interview at the group’s informal headquarters in the square. “It is to take away the scare tactics that Hosni Mubarak uses to deceive the people here and abroad that he should stay in power.”
Mr. Beltagui, who represents the Brotherhood on an opposition committee to negotiate a transitional government, said the group wanted a “civil state,” not a religious one. “We are standing for a real democracy, with general freedom and a real sense of social justice.”
Like many others in the square, Mr. Beltagui said he was not worried that the military might back a new dictator to succeed Mr. Mubarak. He said the determination of the protesters would forestall that, and noted that a religious leader who appeared to back away from some of the protesters’ democratic demands was booed from a makeshift stage in Tahrir Square.
Nor was he worried about new violence from Mubarak supporters. “They would be crazy,” he said.
The atmosphere in Tahrir Square reverted from embattled to jubilant. The protesters abandoned their makeshift barriers to chant, pray and sing the national anthem around the center of the square, where newcomers carried in bags of bread and water. Tens of thousands of others demonstrated in Alexandria and Suez.
Enthusiastic cheers rose several times at the appearance of Mr. Moussa, a straight-talking, charismatic foreign minister here in the 1990s whom Mr. Mubarak moved to the less-threatening position as head of the Arab League.
Mohamed Rafah Tahtawy, the public spokesman for Al Azhar — the center of Sunni Muslim learning and Egypt’s highest, state-run religious authority — said he was resigning to join the revolt.
“My position is a position of support to the revolution all the way,” he said. “I am part of it till the last drop of my blood.”
David D. Kirkpatrick reported from Cairo, and David E. Sanger from Washington. Kareem Fahim, Mona El-Naggar and Liam Stack contributed reporting from Cairo.
How Washington Avoids an "Adult Conversation" on the Budget
Politicians in Washington like to talk about talking about the budget deficit. They acknowledge it. They emphasize the importance of talking about it.
They suggest they have strong feelings about it. But when it comes to details, they get vague. Not since Bill Clinton's second term has there been a topic people talk about so much without wanting to be specific.
On Wednesday, senior White House officials offered an example of this phenomenon. They held a briefing for reporters about the president's new energy initiative. Part of his "Win the Future" campaign, there were the requisite new slogans.
The "Better Building Initiative" sets goals for improvements in energy efficiency. "Race to Green" offers grants to state and local governments that make it easier to retrofit buildings to install energy-saving technology. But when asked how much it would all cost, there were no numbers.
The Wall Street Journal's Laura Meckler asked why, since the president's budget--which will be released in two weeks--has been completed. The senior administration officials should know exactly how much the initiatives cost. After all, they are senior.
There were three possible answers to her question: a) We are spending a lot and don't want criticism of how much we're spending to overshadow coverage of the president's exciting new initiative; b) We're spending very little and don't want the headline on the president's exciting new initiative to be "Big Whoop"; or c) We really don't know because we're making this up.
Meckler got d) No answer at all: "There's a lot of information in the budget. It will be out in due course. There'll be plenty of details about these proposals and lots of other proposals when the budget actually comes out." It was a phone briefing, but I imagined lots of waving of senior hands as this was being said.
This is typical, and just one of the ways to stay unspecific about how to reduce the deficit that this year is estimated to be $1.5 trillion. Here are some other ways, ranked in rough order from most embarrassing to most courageous:
Diet Tomorrow: Suggest new programs but don't say how you'll pay for them.
Blue Ribbon Duck: Call for a commission to study the deficit, or entitlement spending, or whatever it is about the budget you don't want to talk about.
Blue Ribbon Dodge: Call for a commission and when it offers suggestions, ignore them. (This is the president's present posture toward his deficit commission.)
Spinach Some Day: Declare that pruning entitlements is necessary but suggest no way to do so.
The Big Empty: Call for a balanced budget amendment or a spending cap, with no specifics about how to implement either.
Fear: Say that any spending reductions beyond those you like will shut down the government.
Lafferable: Declaring that the budget must be shrunk by spending cuts alone.
Fish Story: Boast about tiny cuts that address only a fraction of the problem.
Young Adult: Support a tough deficit commission report even though you don't like some provisions. Sens. Dick Durbin and Tom Coburn did this.
There is one man who likes to get specific about spending cuts. Rep. Paul Ryan, the House budget chairman, is the Kenneth Starr of budgets: When he gets specific about the deficit, even his allies wince. He's got a deficit reduction plan that few of his Republican colleagues will sign on to. The cuts are too big and the changes to programs like Medicare and Social Security are too politically potent. Democrats won't sign on because he doesn't account for lost revenue from tax cuts. ( Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., delivers the GOP response to the State of the Union.
On Thursday, Ryan introduced a smaller version that he says is just the start of a programmatic attack on federal spending. He proposed a $74 billion discretionary reduction for this spending year, the largest single year cut in decades. It included a $16 billion cut in defense spending that Majority Leader Eric Cantor had been telegraphing for weeks.
Ryan has company in his specificity. There are several bipartisan groups of lawmakers. My colleague David Weigel writes about Sens. Claire McCaskill and Bob Corker. Sens. Mark Warner and Saxby Chambliss are also trying to work out budget deficit proposals. There are even hints that the White House is trying to work out a quiet deal on entitlements with Republicans like the secret one they hatched with Minority Leader Mitch McConnell on continuing the Bush tax cuts.
In two weeks the president will offer his own budget, making the conversation more specific. Gauzy deficit talk will continue, of course. But it may turn out to be a lot like the deficit itself: In a few months, we might see a net reduction.
They suggest they have strong feelings about it. But when it comes to details, they get vague. Not since Bill Clinton's second term has there been a topic people talk about so much without wanting to be specific.
On Wednesday, senior White House officials offered an example of this phenomenon. They held a briefing for reporters about the president's new energy initiative. Part of his "Win the Future" campaign, there were the requisite new slogans.
The "Better Building Initiative" sets goals for improvements in energy efficiency. "Race to Green" offers grants to state and local governments that make it easier to retrofit buildings to install energy-saving technology. But when asked how much it would all cost, there were no numbers.
The Wall Street Journal's Laura Meckler asked why, since the president's budget--which will be released in two weeks--has been completed. The senior administration officials should know exactly how much the initiatives cost. After all, they are senior.
There were three possible answers to her question: a) We are spending a lot and don't want criticism of how much we're spending to overshadow coverage of the president's exciting new initiative; b) We're spending very little and don't want the headline on the president's exciting new initiative to be "Big Whoop"; or c) We really don't know because we're making this up.
Meckler got d) No answer at all: "There's a lot of information in the budget. It will be out in due course. There'll be plenty of details about these proposals and lots of other proposals when the budget actually comes out." It was a phone briefing, but I imagined lots of waving of senior hands as this was being said.
This is typical, and just one of the ways to stay unspecific about how to reduce the deficit that this year is estimated to be $1.5 trillion. Here are some other ways, ranked in rough order from most embarrassing to most courageous:
Diet Tomorrow: Suggest new programs but don't say how you'll pay for them.
Blue Ribbon Duck: Call for a commission to study the deficit, or entitlement spending, or whatever it is about the budget you don't want to talk about.
Blue Ribbon Dodge: Call for a commission and when it offers suggestions, ignore them. (This is the president's present posture toward his deficit commission.)
Spinach Some Day: Declare that pruning entitlements is necessary but suggest no way to do so.
The Big Empty: Call for a balanced budget amendment or a spending cap, with no specifics about how to implement either.
Fear: Say that any spending reductions beyond those you like will shut down the government.
Lafferable: Declaring that the budget must be shrunk by spending cuts alone.
Fish Story: Boast about tiny cuts that address only a fraction of the problem.
Young Adult: Support a tough deficit commission report even though you don't like some provisions. Sens. Dick Durbin and Tom Coburn did this.
There is one man who likes to get specific about spending cuts. Rep. Paul Ryan, the House budget chairman, is the Kenneth Starr of budgets: When he gets specific about the deficit, even his allies wince. He's got a deficit reduction plan that few of his Republican colleagues will sign on to. The cuts are too big and the changes to programs like Medicare and Social Security are too politically potent. Democrats won't sign on because he doesn't account for lost revenue from tax cuts. ( Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., delivers the GOP response to the State of the Union.
On Thursday, Ryan introduced a smaller version that he says is just the start of a programmatic attack on federal spending. He proposed a $74 billion discretionary reduction for this spending year, the largest single year cut in decades. It included a $16 billion cut in defense spending that Majority Leader Eric Cantor had been telegraphing for weeks.
Ryan has company in his specificity. There are several bipartisan groups of lawmakers. My colleague David Weigel writes about Sens. Claire McCaskill and Bob Corker. Sens. Mark Warner and Saxby Chambliss are also trying to work out budget deficit proposals. There are even hints that the White House is trying to work out a quiet deal on entitlements with Republicans like the secret one they hatched with Minority Leader Mitch McConnell on continuing the Bush tax cuts.
In two weeks the president will offer his own budget, making the conversation more specific. Gauzy deficit talk will continue, of course. But it may turn out to be a lot like the deficit itself: In a few months, we might see a net reduction.
Study: Rise in some cancers linked to oral sex
There's a worrisome uptick in the incidence of certain head and neck cancers among middle-aged and even younger Americans, and some experts link the trend to a rise in the popularity of oral sex over the past few decades.
The silver lining is that the HPV-related head and neck cancers are eminently more treatable than those attributable to smoking or drinking, even though they tend to be diagnosed at a later stage.
That's because the human papillomavirus (HPV) is a major trigger for these cancers, and HPV can be transmitted through this type of sexual activity.
"It seems like a pretty good link that more sexual activity, particularly oral sex, is associated with increased HPV infection," said Dr. Greg Hartig, professor of otolaryngology — head and neck surgery at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health in Madison.
According to Dr. William Lydiatt, professor and chief of head and neck surgical oncology at the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha, the overall incidence of head and neck cancers is going down, largely because fewer people are smoking (tobacco and drinking are the major traditional risk factors).
But the incidence of cancers of the tonsil and base of the tongue have been going up over the past decades, he said. And those are the ones that are more likely to test positive for HPV.
"It's gotten to the point now where 60 to 70% of all tonsil cancers in the U.S. are HPV-related," Lydiatt said.
Although the link between HPV and these types of cancers is indisputable, the association with oral sex is strong but a little more speculative, experts say.
A 2007 study in the New England Journal of Medicine found that younger people with head and neck cancers who tested positive for oral HPV infection were more likely to have had multiple vaginal and oral sex partners in their lifetime.
In the study, having six or more oral sex partners over a lifetime was associated with a 3.4 times higher risk for oropharyngeal cancer — cancers of the base of the tongue, back of the throat or tonsils. Having 26 or more vaginal-sex partners tripled the risk.
And the association increased as the number of partners — in either category — increased.
The researchers also reported that cancers of the tonsil and base of the tongue have been increasing every year since 1973, and wrote that "widespread oral sex practices among adolescents may be a contributing factor in this increase."
The researchers concluded that in their study, oral sex was "strongly associated" with oropharyngeal cancer, but noted that they could not "rule out transmission through direct mouth-to-mouth contact" such as French kissing.
In 90% of cases of HPV infection in the body, the immune system clears HPV naturally within two years, according to federal health agencies, but in some cases, certain types of HPV can lead to cervical cancer or less common malignancies, such as oropharyngeal cancer. A 2010 Swedish study, in fact, suggested that the rise in oropharyngeal squamous cell cancer in a number of countries "is caused by a slow epidemic of HPV infection-induced (cancers)."
HPV tends to be site specific, explained Dr. Amesh A. Adalja, an adjunct instructor in the division of infectious diseases at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. In other words, it tends to stay wherever it first enters the body, be it the vagina (which in some cases could lead to cervical cancer), or the mouth and throat.
So does the increase in incidence mean that recent generations are having more sex than their grandparents?
"The general consensus on the street is that because people's (sexual) practices have changed over time, we're seeing an increase in these cancers," said Hartig. "I don't know why they're having more oral sex (but) the concept of having oral sex is something that seems less obscure to you than it did to your parents or grandparents."
"The thought would be that the baby boomers — the '60s and early '70s generation — probably had more freedom in sexual relationships in general, including oral sex," added Dr. Bert W. O'Malley Jr., chair of otorhinolaryngology — head and neck surgery at the University of Pennsylvania.
And at least in terms of oral sex, that appears true for those younger than boomers.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that, in 2002, some 90% of males and 88% of females aged 25 to 44 reported ever having oral sex with a partner of the opposite sex.
Comparable figures from 1992 showed that about three-quarters of men aged 20 to 39 and closer to 70% of women aged 18 to 59 having ever given or received oral sex.
The silver lining is that the HPV-related head and neck cancers are eminently more treatable than those attributable to smoking or drinking, even though they tend to be diagnosed at a later stage.
"(HPV-related head-and-neck cancers) have been a lot easier to treat. You can use less-intensive radiation," said Dr. D.J. Verret, clinical assistant professor at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School and a facial plastic surgeon in Plano, Texas.
About 85% of non-smoking people with HPV-positive tumors survive. That number drops to 45 or 50% in people who smoke and are HPV-negative, Lydiatt said.
And tongue and tonsil cancers remain relatively rare in the United States. The other good news — at least for the younger set — is that there is a relatively new vaccine to prevent against HPV infection. It's not going to help those who are already infected, but it "absolutely" could help those who aren't yet infected with the ubiquitous virus, Verret said.
Meanwhile, people, especially younger people, need to realize that smoking is not the only risk factor for head and neck cancer. If you find a lump in your neck, even if you're only 20 or 30, "pay attention to it," Lydiatt said.
Amanda Gardner, HealthDay
The silver lining is that the HPV-related head and neck cancers are eminently more treatable than those attributable to smoking or drinking, even though they tend to be diagnosed at a later stage.
That's because the human papillomavirus (HPV) is a major trigger for these cancers, and HPV can be transmitted through this type of sexual activity.
"It seems like a pretty good link that more sexual activity, particularly oral sex, is associated with increased HPV infection," said Dr. Greg Hartig, professor of otolaryngology — head and neck surgery at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health in Madison.
According to Dr. William Lydiatt, professor and chief of head and neck surgical oncology at the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha, the overall incidence of head and neck cancers is going down, largely because fewer people are smoking (tobacco and drinking are the major traditional risk factors).
But the incidence of cancers of the tonsil and base of the tongue have been going up over the past decades, he said. And those are the ones that are more likely to test positive for HPV.
"It's gotten to the point now where 60 to 70% of all tonsil cancers in the U.S. are HPV-related," Lydiatt said.
Although the link between HPV and these types of cancers is indisputable, the association with oral sex is strong but a little more speculative, experts say.
A 2007 study in the New England Journal of Medicine found that younger people with head and neck cancers who tested positive for oral HPV infection were more likely to have had multiple vaginal and oral sex partners in their lifetime.
In the study, having six or more oral sex partners over a lifetime was associated with a 3.4 times higher risk for oropharyngeal cancer — cancers of the base of the tongue, back of the throat or tonsils. Having 26 or more vaginal-sex partners tripled the risk.
And the association increased as the number of partners — in either category — increased.
The researchers also reported that cancers of the tonsil and base of the tongue have been increasing every year since 1973, and wrote that "widespread oral sex practices among adolescents may be a contributing factor in this increase."
The researchers concluded that in their study, oral sex was "strongly associated" with oropharyngeal cancer, but noted that they could not "rule out transmission through direct mouth-to-mouth contact" such as French kissing.
In 90% of cases of HPV infection in the body, the immune system clears HPV naturally within two years, according to federal health agencies, but in some cases, certain types of HPV can lead to cervical cancer or less common malignancies, such as oropharyngeal cancer. A 2010 Swedish study, in fact, suggested that the rise in oropharyngeal squamous cell cancer in a number of countries "is caused by a slow epidemic of HPV infection-induced (cancers)."
HPV tends to be site specific, explained Dr. Amesh A. Adalja, an adjunct instructor in the division of infectious diseases at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. In other words, it tends to stay wherever it first enters the body, be it the vagina (which in some cases could lead to cervical cancer), or the mouth and throat.
So does the increase in incidence mean that recent generations are having more sex than their grandparents?
"The general consensus on the street is that because people's (sexual) practices have changed over time, we're seeing an increase in these cancers," said Hartig. "I don't know why they're having more oral sex (but) the concept of having oral sex is something that seems less obscure to you than it did to your parents or grandparents."
"The thought would be that the baby boomers — the '60s and early '70s generation — probably had more freedom in sexual relationships in general, including oral sex," added Dr. Bert W. O'Malley Jr., chair of otorhinolaryngology — head and neck surgery at the University of Pennsylvania.
And at least in terms of oral sex, that appears true for those younger than boomers.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that, in 2002, some 90% of males and 88% of females aged 25 to 44 reported ever having oral sex with a partner of the opposite sex.
Comparable figures from 1992 showed that about three-quarters of men aged 20 to 39 and closer to 70% of women aged 18 to 59 having ever given or received oral sex.
The silver lining is that the HPV-related head and neck cancers are eminently more treatable than those attributable to smoking or drinking, even though they tend to be diagnosed at a later stage.
"(HPV-related head-and-neck cancers) have been a lot easier to treat. You can use less-intensive radiation," said Dr. D.J. Verret, clinical assistant professor at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School and a facial plastic surgeon in Plano, Texas.
About 85% of non-smoking people with HPV-positive tumors survive. That number drops to 45 or 50% in people who smoke and are HPV-negative, Lydiatt said.
And tongue and tonsil cancers remain relatively rare in the United States. The other good news — at least for the younger set — is that there is a relatively new vaccine to prevent against HPV infection. It's not going to help those who are already infected, but it "absolutely" could help those who aren't yet infected with the ubiquitous virus, Verret said.
Meanwhile, people, especially younger people, need to realize that smoking is not the only risk factor for head and neck cancer. If you find a lump in your neck, even if you're only 20 or 30, "pay attention to it," Lydiatt said.
Amanda Gardner, HealthDay
Friday, February 04, 2011
Ronald Reagan Myth Doesn't Square with Reality
About 10,000 people will gather this weekend at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in California to honor what would have been the 100th birthday of former President Ronald Reagan -- among them Dick Cheney, the Beach Boys and Sarah Palin.
Reagan, who served as president from 1981 -1989 and died in 2004 at the age of 93, is widely considered the patron saint of conservatives; ask a prominent conservative their hero, and odds are they'll point to the Gipper. (The adulation is so widespread that candidates at a debate last month among the candidates to be RNC chairman were asked their hero - "aside from President Reagan.")
Reagan is perhaps most often invoked by those who cast him as having held the line against tax increases. Americans for Tax Reform President Grover Norquist, for example, often points to Reagan when calling for lower taxes and spending cuts; he says, by contrast, "tax hikes are what politicians do when they don't have the determination or the competence to govern." Conservatives also hail Reagan as a budget cutter willing to make hard choices to keep spending in line.
It's certainly true that Reagan entered office in 1980 as a full-throated conservative vowing to cut both spending and taxes. And he quickly followed through on part of that promise, passing a major reduction in marginal tax rates. (According to author Lou Cannon, the top marginal rate fell from 70 percent when he came into office to 28 percent when he left.)
But following his party's losses in the 1982 election, Reagan largely backed off his efforts at spending cuts even as he continued to offer the small-government rhetoric that helped get him elected. In fact, he went in the opposite direction: His creation of the department of veterans affairs contributed to an increase in the federal workforce of more than 60,000 people during his presidency.
And while Reagan somewhat slowed the marginal rate of growth in the budget, it continued to increase during his time in office. So did the debt, skyrocketing from $700 billion to $3 trillion. Then there's the fact that after first pushing to cut Social Security benefits - and being stymied by Congress - Reagan in 1983 agreed to a $165 billion bailout of the program. He also massively expanded the Pentagon budget.
Meanwhile, following that initial tax cut, Reagan actually ended up raising taxes - eleven times. That's according to former Republican Sen. Alan Simpson, a longtime Reagan friend who co-chaired President Obama's fiscal commission that last year offered a deficit reduction proposal.
"Ronald Reagan was never afraid to raise taxes," historian Douglas Brinkley, who edited Reagan's diaries, told NPR. "He knew that it was necessary at times. And so there's a false mythology out there about Reagan as this conservative president who came in and just cut taxes and trimmed federal spending in a dramatic way. It didn't happen that way. It's false."
It's important to note that Reagan's tax increases did not wipe out the effects of that initial tax cut. But they did eat up about half of it. And as Peter Beinart points out, the 1983 payroll tax hike went to pay for Social Security and Medicare. ("Reagan raised taxes to pay for government-run health care," Beinart writes.) Reagan also raised the gas tax and signed the largest corporate tax increase in history, an act Joshua Green writes would be "utterly unimaginable for any conservative to support today."
Reagan was not happy about raising taxes or expanding government, and we certainly shouldn't forget that he had to work within the constraints placed upon him by a non-compliant Congress. But that doesn't change the fact that Reagan both increased spending and, after the initial cut, showed a willingness to raise taxes - exactly the sort of policy prescriptions so widely condemned by today's Reagan-reverent conservatives.
These facts have largely been lost as the right has enshrined Reagan as its patron saint, and they may fade further amid the speeches at this weekend's centennial celebration. But the reality is that Reagan was a president who held firm beliefs but was also willing to work with his ideological opponents. And that's the sort of thing that doesn't much lend itself to mythmaking.
Brian Montopoli CBS News
Reagan, who served as president from 1981 -1989 and died in 2004 at the age of 93, is widely considered the patron saint of conservatives; ask a prominent conservative their hero, and odds are they'll point to the Gipper. (The adulation is so widespread that candidates at a debate last month among the candidates to be RNC chairman were asked their hero - "aside from President Reagan.")
Reagan is perhaps most often invoked by those who cast him as having held the line against tax increases. Americans for Tax Reform President Grover Norquist, for example, often points to Reagan when calling for lower taxes and spending cuts; he says, by contrast, "tax hikes are what politicians do when they don't have the determination or the competence to govern." Conservatives also hail Reagan as a budget cutter willing to make hard choices to keep spending in line.
It's certainly true that Reagan entered office in 1980 as a full-throated conservative vowing to cut both spending and taxes. And he quickly followed through on part of that promise, passing a major reduction in marginal tax rates. (According to author Lou Cannon, the top marginal rate fell from 70 percent when he came into office to 28 percent when he left.)
But following his party's losses in the 1982 election, Reagan largely backed off his efforts at spending cuts even as he continued to offer the small-government rhetoric that helped get him elected. In fact, he went in the opposite direction: His creation of the department of veterans affairs contributed to an increase in the federal workforce of more than 60,000 people during his presidency.
And while Reagan somewhat slowed the marginal rate of growth in the budget, it continued to increase during his time in office. So did the debt, skyrocketing from $700 billion to $3 trillion. Then there's the fact that after first pushing to cut Social Security benefits - and being stymied by Congress - Reagan in 1983 agreed to a $165 billion bailout of the program. He also massively expanded the Pentagon budget.
Meanwhile, following that initial tax cut, Reagan actually ended up raising taxes - eleven times. That's according to former Republican Sen. Alan Simpson, a longtime Reagan friend who co-chaired President Obama's fiscal commission that last year offered a deficit reduction proposal.
"Ronald Reagan was never afraid to raise taxes," historian Douglas Brinkley, who edited Reagan's diaries, told NPR. "He knew that it was necessary at times. And so there's a false mythology out there about Reagan as this conservative president who came in and just cut taxes and trimmed federal spending in a dramatic way. It didn't happen that way. It's false."
It's important to note that Reagan's tax increases did not wipe out the effects of that initial tax cut. But they did eat up about half of it. And as Peter Beinart points out, the 1983 payroll tax hike went to pay for Social Security and Medicare. ("Reagan raised taxes to pay for government-run health care," Beinart writes.) Reagan also raised the gas tax and signed the largest corporate tax increase in history, an act Joshua Green writes would be "utterly unimaginable for any conservative to support today."
Reagan was not happy about raising taxes or expanding government, and we certainly shouldn't forget that he had to work within the constraints placed upon him by a non-compliant Congress. But that doesn't change the fact that Reagan both increased spending and, after the initial cut, showed a willingness to raise taxes - exactly the sort of policy prescriptions so widely condemned by today's Reagan-reverent conservatives.
These facts have largely been lost as the right has enshrined Reagan as its patron saint, and they may fade further amid the speeches at this weekend's centennial celebration. But the reality is that Reagan was a president who held firm beliefs but was also willing to work with his ideological opponents. And that's the sort of thing that doesn't much lend itself to mythmaking.
Brian Montopoli CBS News
Mets Owners Ignored Warnings on Madoff
A lawsuit brought by the trustee for the victims of Bernard L. Madoff’s multibillion-dollar Ponzi scheme accuses the owners of the Mets of being so enamored of the enormous profits they earned while investing over decades with Mr. Madoff that they ignored repeated and specific warnings that he might have been operating a fraud.
The lawsuit, unsealed in federal bankruptcy court in Manhattan on Friday morning, contends that the team’s owners, Fred Wilpon and Saul Katz, used the profits from their investments in Madoff to establish personal fortunes, create dozens of family trusts and financially fuel their array of businesses, from the Mets to real estate to the creation of a cable sports network.
At various times over the years, as their investments only widened and deepened, they were blind to what the lawsuit calls a litany of alarms sounded by those close to them, by fellow investors and by financial institutions.
Among the warnings, which the lawsuit says the two owners “consciously disregarded,” are these:
¶The chief investment officer at Sterling Stamos, a hedge fund independent of Madoff in which Wilpon and Katz invested, said he repeatedly warned the men and their families that Madoff’s returns were “too good to be true.” However, the suit says, the warnings were ignored. Other personnel at the Stamos fund expressed similar concerns about Madoff.
¶Merrill Lynch, the investment bank that acquired 50 percent of Sterling Stamos in 2007, had a prohibition on investing with Madoff and told Katz that Madoff’s operations would not pass its standards.
¶Ivy Asset Management, which was approached in 2002 to back Sterling Stamos, told Katz and two of his partners of its suspicions about Madoff’s investment business.
¶A consultant to Sterling Stamos told Katz in 2003, “He couldn’t make Bernie’s math work.”
But throughout, according to the trustee, Irving H. Picard, Wilpon and Katz kept investing with Madoff, in what the lawsuit calls a “cycle of dependency.”
The lawsuit says that across the decades of investing, and in the face of the warnings, Mr. Wilpon and Mr. Katz, and their partners at Sterling Entities, the corporate parent of their businesses, never had basic due diligence done on Mr. Madoff and his investment firm.
“There are thousands of victims of Madoff’s massive fraud,” states the lawsuit. “But Saul Katz is not one of them. Neither is Fred Wilpon.”
The lawsuit says that the two men, their families and their businesses “made so much easy money from Madoff for so long” that despite the many warnings they “chose to simply look the other way.”
Mr. Wilpon, since Mr. Madoff’s arrest in 2008, has portrayed himself as a victim of the fraud, one he conceded was carried off by a man who had been his friend for many years.
“The trustee’s lawsuit is an outrageous strong-arm effort to try to force a settlement by threatening to ruin our reputations and businesses, which we have built for over 50 years,” Mr. Wilpon and Mr. Katz said in a statement Friday.
This week lawyers for Mr. Wilpon said the trustee’s lawsuit was without merit.
The suit is seeking the return of what it calls $300 million in “fictitious profits,” a net gain from some 200 accounts held by Mr. Wilpon, Mr. Katz, their real estate business and the Mets organization that over the years Wilpon and Katz used to build and sustain their multimillion-dollar empire.
The trustee is also seeking hundreds of millions beyond those “profits,” in part because of what he alleges was the willful negligence by the team’s owners and their officers with the Mets and their real estate businesses. That total could reach beyond $1 billion, according to a lawyer working for the trustee.
Steady returns from Madoff “flowed through every aspect of Sterling’s business,” the lawsuit says: through the Mets and SNY, their regional sports, its commercial real estate ventures and its investment funds. Among nearly 500 internal accounts invested with Madoff, 16 were for the benefit of the Mets, through which Sterling withdrew $90 million in fictitious profits, the suit says.
Picard called the Mets’ owners sophisticated investors who should have known better but were “simply in too deep” to act on any warnings.
“They are a team of sophisticated professionals who built a business empire spanning four major industries, including real estate, professional baseball and sports media, private equity and hedge funds,” the lawsuit says. “Notably, very early on in their almost quarter-century-long business relationship with Madoff, the Sterling Partners discovered Madoff’s anomalous and implausibly high and consistent returns, and then found endless ways to exploit those returns.”
The lawsuit, and the hundreds of millions it seeks, clearly imperils the owners’ possession of the Mets, and perhaps the rest of their holdings. Last week Mr. Wilpon announced that he was seeking a partner to buy a 25 percent stake in the team. Mr. Wilpon, Mr. Katz and Mr. Wilpon’s son, Jeff, met with baseball’s commissioner, Bud Selig, in New York this week to discuss the suit and their financial situation.
NYTimes
The lawsuit, unsealed in federal bankruptcy court in Manhattan on Friday morning, contends that the team’s owners, Fred Wilpon and Saul Katz, used the profits from their investments in Madoff to establish personal fortunes, create dozens of family trusts and financially fuel their array of businesses, from the Mets to real estate to the creation of a cable sports network.
At various times over the years, as their investments only widened and deepened, they were blind to what the lawsuit calls a litany of alarms sounded by those close to them, by fellow investors and by financial institutions.
Among the warnings, which the lawsuit says the two owners “consciously disregarded,” are these:
¶The chief investment officer at Sterling Stamos, a hedge fund independent of Madoff in which Wilpon and Katz invested, said he repeatedly warned the men and their families that Madoff’s returns were “too good to be true.” However, the suit says, the warnings were ignored. Other personnel at the Stamos fund expressed similar concerns about Madoff.
¶Merrill Lynch, the investment bank that acquired 50 percent of Sterling Stamos in 2007, had a prohibition on investing with Madoff and told Katz that Madoff’s operations would not pass its standards.
¶Ivy Asset Management, which was approached in 2002 to back Sterling Stamos, told Katz and two of his partners of its suspicions about Madoff’s investment business.
¶A consultant to Sterling Stamos told Katz in 2003, “He couldn’t make Bernie’s math work.”
But throughout, according to the trustee, Irving H. Picard, Wilpon and Katz kept investing with Madoff, in what the lawsuit calls a “cycle of dependency.”
The lawsuit says that across the decades of investing, and in the face of the warnings, Mr. Wilpon and Mr. Katz, and their partners at Sterling Entities, the corporate parent of their businesses, never had basic due diligence done on Mr. Madoff and his investment firm.
“There are thousands of victims of Madoff’s massive fraud,” states the lawsuit. “But Saul Katz is not one of them. Neither is Fred Wilpon.”
The lawsuit says that the two men, their families and their businesses “made so much easy money from Madoff for so long” that despite the many warnings they “chose to simply look the other way.”
Mr. Wilpon, since Mr. Madoff’s arrest in 2008, has portrayed himself as a victim of the fraud, one he conceded was carried off by a man who had been his friend for many years.
“The trustee’s lawsuit is an outrageous strong-arm effort to try to force a settlement by threatening to ruin our reputations and businesses, which we have built for over 50 years,” Mr. Wilpon and Mr. Katz said in a statement Friday.
This week lawyers for Mr. Wilpon said the trustee’s lawsuit was without merit.
The suit is seeking the return of what it calls $300 million in “fictitious profits,” a net gain from some 200 accounts held by Mr. Wilpon, Mr. Katz, their real estate business and the Mets organization that over the years Wilpon and Katz used to build and sustain their multimillion-dollar empire.
The trustee is also seeking hundreds of millions beyond those “profits,” in part because of what he alleges was the willful negligence by the team’s owners and their officers with the Mets and their real estate businesses. That total could reach beyond $1 billion, according to a lawyer working for the trustee.
Steady returns from Madoff “flowed through every aspect of Sterling’s business,” the lawsuit says: through the Mets and SNY, their regional sports, its commercial real estate ventures and its investment funds. Among nearly 500 internal accounts invested with Madoff, 16 were for the benefit of the Mets, through which Sterling withdrew $90 million in fictitious profits, the suit says.
Picard called the Mets’ owners sophisticated investors who should have known better but were “simply in too deep” to act on any warnings.
“They are a team of sophisticated professionals who built a business empire spanning four major industries, including real estate, professional baseball and sports media, private equity and hedge funds,” the lawsuit says. “Notably, very early on in their almost quarter-century-long business relationship with Madoff, the Sterling Partners discovered Madoff’s anomalous and implausibly high and consistent returns, and then found endless ways to exploit those returns.”
The lawsuit, and the hundreds of millions it seeks, clearly imperils the owners’ possession of the Mets, and perhaps the rest of their holdings. Last week Mr. Wilpon announced that he was seeking a partner to buy a 25 percent stake in the team. Mr. Wilpon, Mr. Katz and Mr. Wilpon’s son, Jeff, met with baseball’s commissioner, Bud Selig, in New York this week to discuss the suit and their financial situation.
NYTimes
Poll reveals striking divide on Obama
President Barack Obama’s approval ratings during his second year in office were the most partisan and polarized they’ve ever been at two years into a presidency, with a nearly 70 percentage point gap between how Republicans and Democrats evaluated his performance.
Obama’s approval among Republicans averaged just 13 percent, while Democrats’ approval of Obama’s second year averaged 81 percent.
The 68-point differential is the fourth-largest on record, behind years four, five and six of George W. Bush’s presidency, when the partisan gap was between 70 and 76 points. Gallup’s data reaches back to 1954-1955, Dwight D. Eisenhower’s second year in office.
Before Obama, only Presidents Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton saw gaps of more than 50 percentage points between Republicans’ and Democrats’ approval during their second years in office. Between January 1982 and January 1983, Reagan’s approval averaged 79 percent among Republicans and 23 percent among Democrats – a 56 percentage point difference. Clinton’s approval averaged 19 percent among Republicans and 73 percent among Democrats between January 1994 and January 1995, a 54-point margin.
Just as a large partisan divide didn’t stop Reagan and Clinton from winning second terms, small gaps between Democrats’ and Republicans’ approval of a president haven’t guaranteed reelection.
The smallest partisan gap during a president’s second year came for Jimmy Carter, when his approval was 28 percent among Republicans and 57 percent among Democrats – a 29-point difference.
Gallup’s analysis of Obama’s second year is based on its daily tracking polls conducted between Jan. 20, 2010, and Jan. 19, 2011. It’s based on a random sample of 178,864 adults, and the error margin is plus or minus 1 percentage point.
© 2011 Capitol News
Obama’s approval among Republicans averaged just 13 percent, while Democrats’ approval of Obama’s second year averaged 81 percent.
The 68-point differential is the fourth-largest on record, behind years four, five and six of George W. Bush’s presidency, when the partisan gap was between 70 and 76 points. Gallup’s data reaches back to 1954-1955, Dwight D. Eisenhower’s second year in office.
Before Obama, only Presidents Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton saw gaps of more than 50 percentage points between Republicans’ and Democrats’ approval during their second years in office. Between January 1982 and January 1983, Reagan’s approval averaged 79 percent among Republicans and 23 percent among Democrats – a 56 percentage point difference. Clinton’s approval averaged 19 percent among Republicans and 73 percent among Democrats between January 1994 and January 1995, a 54-point margin.
Just as a large partisan divide didn’t stop Reagan and Clinton from winning second terms, small gaps between Democrats’ and Republicans’ approval of a president haven’t guaranteed reelection.
The smallest partisan gap during a president’s second year came for Jimmy Carter, when his approval was 28 percent among Republicans and 57 percent among Democrats – a 29-point difference.
Gallup’s analysis of Obama’s second year is based on its daily tracking polls conducted between Jan. 20, 2010, and Jan. 19, 2011. It’s based on a random sample of 178,864 adults, and the error margin is plus or minus 1 percentage point.
© 2011 Capitol News
Las Vegas Bellagio suspect was a talker
Anthony Carleo's gambling losses were almost as big as his mouth.
Both drew the attention of authorities and eventually cost him his freedom 50 days after the Bellagio casino was robbed of $1.5 million in gambling chips in one of the largest heists in recent Southern Nevada history.
Las Vegas police arrested the 29-year-old son of a city judge Wednesday night in the Bellagio's casino -- literally the scene of the crime. In recent weeks he stayed there, a comped high roller who lost more than $100,000 gambling away chips the police say were stolen in the gutsy Dec. 14 robbery.
All the while, Las Vegas police and Bellagio security were watching him. In fact, police had his name and were on his trail about eight days after the brazen robbery that made headlines worldwide.
They knew he was a suspect because Carleo -- aka Anthony Assad, aka a "made man" from Denver, aka the son of Las Vegas Municipal Court Judge George Assad -- told lots of people he was the robber, according to a police report released Thursday.
Carleo even detailed his plan to a Bellagio poker dealer three days before the robbery, police said.
"All you need is a black mask and a motorcycle, and I have a motorcycle," Carleo reportedly told the dealer, who later recounted it to police.
The dealer told Carleo that a real-life heist wouldn't be as easy as it was in the movie "Ocean's Eleven."
But the real-life Bellagio robbery played out exactly as Carleo said it could be done.
At 3:50 a.m. on a sleepy Tuesday, Dec. 14, a man parked a late-model black motorcycle at the casino's north valet entrance. Leaving it running, he walked into the casino wearing a white, full-face motorcycle helmet and a leather jacket. Walking past slot machines, he stopped at the table games closest to the door. He pulled a pistol and demanded money from the craps dealer, and ran out with an estimated $1.5 million in Bellagio chips in denominations from $100 to $25,000.
No one was hurt, and no shots were fired, police said. Security officers did not try to stop the man out of concern that a shootout might injure casino patrons. In and out of the casino in a matter of minutes, the robber was last seen riding the motorcycle west on Flamingo Road, police said.
Because of the large denominations of the chips, police and gaming industry insiders speculated the robber would never be able to cash them without giving himself away.
Eight days later, the Bellagio dealer went to police. Others would do the same as Carleo threw caution to the wind.
Before it was scrubbed early Thursday, Carleo's Facebook page indicated that he was enjoying life on the Strip.
His favorite quote: "Money isn't everything, but it's right up there next to oxygen."
On the Web page, he wrote about moving to Las Vegas from Colorado last summer, his dream of being a high-stakes poker player and his fondness for the charms of the Bellagio.
"Never have I seen as many beautiful women in one place on a Sunday evening as I am humbly observing at Bellagio in Fabulous Las Vegas Nevada," he posted on Nov. 28. "My neck is getting a great stretch and my zippers elasticity is being challenged! Viva Vegas!!"
Carleo had dreamed of medical school after college, according to his page.
"I am a Junior at UNLV and cannot wait to get to Med School to start a profession that I can be proud of," he wrote.
He was officially a student, but most of his Facebook posts dealt with his gambling exploits rather than his classes.
On Nov. 22, Carleo detailed his play in a poker tournament with a cash prize of $127,000.
"Today will be a life changing day if all goes well and God answers my prayers," he wrote before losing big.
Carleo's last Facebook entry was on Dec. 3.
On Dec. 8, a motorcyclist wearing a helmet entered the poker cage at the Suncoast casino on the northwest side of Las Vegas, pulled a gun and walked away with $20,000 in cash. Carleo has not been charged in connection with that holdup, and police have declined comment when asked whether he might be.
On Dec. 14, the Bellagio was hit.
Soon, Carleo was making casino transactions of tens of thousands of dollars at a time. One of the largest was on Dec. 19, when he cashed out nearly $26,000 in Bellagio chips.
The next day, another poker player told Bellagio Vice President of Security Raymond Brown that he had played with an Italian buddy who knew a "Tony" who was looking to sell "cranberry chips,'' slang for the $25,000 denominations. Brown alerted the police.
Soon others told police Carleo was getting desperate because he was running out of small-denomination chips that could be cashed in without attracting attention. Several players also said the man with the chips bragged of ties to organized crime.
"Tony was trying to unload some $25,000 chips,'' the report reads. "He said the guy is supposed to be a made guy in Denver and connected to the mob."
Carleo kept playing. He also kept losing. On New Year's Eve alone, he dropped $72,000 at his favorite casino. By Jan. 22, Carleo's losses at the Bellagio topped $107,000, as documented by the Nevada Gaming Control Commission.
All the while he, like any high roller, was a pampered guest of the world-class hotel and resort.
"He is receiving full complementary rooms, meals and beverages," the report said. He was at the casino every day from Jan. 19 through Jan. 26, and left it only eight to 10 times for short periods.
On Jan. 25, an undercover officer and an informant went to the Bellagio to identify associates of Carleo. They found one man who had bought a $25,000 chip from Carleo, paying $10,000.
On Jan. 30, Carleo sold an undercover detective a cranberry. Two days later, four more cranberries changed hands.
The undercover cop told Carleo he wanted to partner up and start a robbery crew that could even take the Bellagio.
Carleo's response: "He already robbed this place."
While watching Carleo, detectives looked into his background. Although he is the son of a longtime Las Vegas lawyer and judge, he went to high school and lived much of his life in Pueblo, Colo., with his mother and stepfather, Gino Carleo. The elder Carleo owns a tavern, and with his brother, Louie, develops real estate.
Colorado DMV confirmed he owned a 2007 Suzuki GSX-R motorcycle, the same make and model ridden by the Bellagio Bandit.
Carleo had no criminal record or a gun registered in his name, though he had access to five pistols in Las Vegas.
Police also determined he was addicted to and was selling oxycontin. He was prescribed the pills from August to December, they found, but the number and frequency of the pills are described in the report as "an excess."
The report doesn't elaborate on rumored mob ties. It notes that in Pueblo, he was a real estate broker and owned two businesses ---- a mobile disc jockey service and a limousine service co-owned with his stepfather. It also noted that Carleo filed bankruptcy in Colorado in September 2009.
Bankruptcy papers in Denver list a .40-caliber pistol among Carleo's possessions. The records also show that he lost four properties, including his $330,000 home in the 800 block of Kalispell Avenue in Pueblo.
Contractor Bob Steinmetz told The Denver Post he bought the attractive, 3,000-square-foot home from a bank and never met Carleo. The house, he said, was battered with a hatchet and a hammer, and the appliances were long gone.
It's unclear when Carleo moved to Las Vegas or exactly where he lived, but his Nevada driver's license bears the address of his biological father's home in Summerlin.
At 9:20 p.m. on Wednesday, officers arrested Carleo without incident in the Bellagio casino. Sources said he thought he was there to pass more cranberries. According to the police report, he admitted his involvement in the Bellagio robbery. He was booked at the Clark County Detention Center on Thursday morning on robbery and burglary charges and remains there without bail.
Detectives searched Carleo's room at the Bellagio, his father's home, the home of a woman found to have seven cranberries and that of his girlfriend, Layla Loeung, where another 16 cranberries were found in a bedroom closet.
Loeung told police that the chips were Carleo's and that he had given her $5,000 in cash. Police left with all of it.
The report doesn't mention anything seized at the home of the judge.
Assad wasn't at work Thursday. In a statement distributed Thursday by consulting group Rogich Communications, he said he was "devastated and heartbroken to see my son arrested under these circumstances, as is the rest of his family."
He said he cannot discuss the matter because of judicial ethics.
"I can say that as a prosecutor and a judge, I have always felt people who break the law need to be held accountable," Assad said.
At a news conference Thursday, Robbery Lt. Ray Steiber said a total of $1.2 million in chips and cash had been recovered. Carleo also might face drug trafficking charges, but Steiber would say little about the investigation.
But Steiber said anyone thinking they can take down a Las Vegas casino is "sadly mistaken."
"You will be caught,'' he said.
Antonio Planas and Mike Blasky
LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL
Both drew the attention of authorities and eventually cost him his freedom 50 days after the Bellagio casino was robbed of $1.5 million in gambling chips in one of the largest heists in recent Southern Nevada history.
Las Vegas police arrested the 29-year-old son of a city judge Wednesday night in the Bellagio's casino -- literally the scene of the crime. In recent weeks he stayed there, a comped high roller who lost more than $100,000 gambling away chips the police say were stolen in the gutsy Dec. 14 robbery.
All the while, Las Vegas police and Bellagio security were watching him. In fact, police had his name and were on his trail about eight days after the brazen robbery that made headlines worldwide.
They knew he was a suspect because Carleo -- aka Anthony Assad, aka a "made man" from Denver, aka the son of Las Vegas Municipal Court Judge George Assad -- told lots of people he was the robber, according to a police report released Thursday.
Carleo even detailed his plan to a Bellagio poker dealer three days before the robbery, police said.
"All you need is a black mask and a motorcycle, and I have a motorcycle," Carleo reportedly told the dealer, who later recounted it to police.
The dealer told Carleo that a real-life heist wouldn't be as easy as it was in the movie "Ocean's Eleven."
But the real-life Bellagio robbery played out exactly as Carleo said it could be done.
At 3:50 a.m. on a sleepy Tuesday, Dec. 14, a man parked a late-model black motorcycle at the casino's north valet entrance. Leaving it running, he walked into the casino wearing a white, full-face motorcycle helmet and a leather jacket. Walking past slot machines, he stopped at the table games closest to the door. He pulled a pistol and demanded money from the craps dealer, and ran out with an estimated $1.5 million in Bellagio chips in denominations from $100 to $25,000.
No one was hurt, and no shots were fired, police said. Security officers did not try to stop the man out of concern that a shootout might injure casino patrons. In and out of the casino in a matter of minutes, the robber was last seen riding the motorcycle west on Flamingo Road, police said.
Because of the large denominations of the chips, police and gaming industry insiders speculated the robber would never be able to cash them without giving himself away.
Eight days later, the Bellagio dealer went to police. Others would do the same as Carleo threw caution to the wind.
Before it was scrubbed early Thursday, Carleo's Facebook page indicated that he was enjoying life on the Strip.
His favorite quote: "Money isn't everything, but it's right up there next to oxygen."
On the Web page, he wrote about moving to Las Vegas from Colorado last summer, his dream of being a high-stakes poker player and his fondness for the charms of the Bellagio.
"Never have I seen as many beautiful women in one place on a Sunday evening as I am humbly observing at Bellagio in Fabulous Las Vegas Nevada," he posted on Nov. 28. "My neck is getting a great stretch and my zippers elasticity is being challenged! Viva Vegas!!"
Carleo had dreamed of medical school after college, according to his page.
"I am a Junior at UNLV and cannot wait to get to Med School to start a profession that I can be proud of," he wrote.
He was officially a student, but most of his Facebook posts dealt with his gambling exploits rather than his classes.
On Nov. 22, Carleo detailed his play in a poker tournament with a cash prize of $127,000.
"Today will be a life changing day if all goes well and God answers my prayers," he wrote before losing big.
Carleo's last Facebook entry was on Dec. 3.
On Dec. 8, a motorcyclist wearing a helmet entered the poker cage at the Suncoast casino on the northwest side of Las Vegas, pulled a gun and walked away with $20,000 in cash. Carleo has not been charged in connection with that holdup, and police have declined comment when asked whether he might be.
On Dec. 14, the Bellagio was hit.
Soon, Carleo was making casino transactions of tens of thousands of dollars at a time. One of the largest was on Dec. 19, when he cashed out nearly $26,000 in Bellagio chips.
The next day, another poker player told Bellagio Vice President of Security Raymond Brown that he had played with an Italian buddy who knew a "Tony" who was looking to sell "cranberry chips,'' slang for the $25,000 denominations. Brown alerted the police.
Soon others told police Carleo was getting desperate because he was running out of small-denomination chips that could be cashed in without attracting attention. Several players also said the man with the chips bragged of ties to organized crime.
"Tony was trying to unload some $25,000 chips,'' the report reads. "He said the guy is supposed to be a made guy in Denver and connected to the mob."
Carleo kept playing. He also kept losing. On New Year's Eve alone, he dropped $72,000 at his favorite casino. By Jan. 22, Carleo's losses at the Bellagio topped $107,000, as documented by the Nevada Gaming Control Commission.
All the while he, like any high roller, was a pampered guest of the world-class hotel and resort.
"He is receiving full complementary rooms, meals and beverages," the report said. He was at the casino every day from Jan. 19 through Jan. 26, and left it only eight to 10 times for short periods.
On Jan. 25, an undercover officer and an informant went to the Bellagio to identify associates of Carleo. They found one man who had bought a $25,000 chip from Carleo, paying $10,000.
On Jan. 30, Carleo sold an undercover detective a cranberry. Two days later, four more cranberries changed hands.
The undercover cop told Carleo he wanted to partner up and start a robbery crew that could even take the Bellagio.
Carleo's response: "He already robbed this place."
While watching Carleo, detectives looked into his background. Although he is the son of a longtime Las Vegas lawyer and judge, he went to high school and lived much of his life in Pueblo, Colo., with his mother and stepfather, Gino Carleo. The elder Carleo owns a tavern, and with his brother, Louie, develops real estate.
Colorado DMV confirmed he owned a 2007 Suzuki GSX-R motorcycle, the same make and model ridden by the Bellagio Bandit.
Carleo had no criminal record or a gun registered in his name, though he had access to five pistols in Las Vegas.
Police also determined he was addicted to and was selling oxycontin. He was prescribed the pills from August to December, they found, but the number and frequency of the pills are described in the report as "an excess."
The report doesn't elaborate on rumored mob ties. It notes that in Pueblo, he was a real estate broker and owned two businesses ---- a mobile disc jockey service and a limousine service co-owned with his stepfather. It also noted that Carleo filed bankruptcy in Colorado in September 2009.
Bankruptcy papers in Denver list a .40-caliber pistol among Carleo's possessions. The records also show that he lost four properties, including his $330,000 home in the 800 block of Kalispell Avenue in Pueblo.
Contractor Bob Steinmetz told The Denver Post he bought the attractive, 3,000-square-foot home from a bank and never met Carleo. The house, he said, was battered with a hatchet and a hammer, and the appliances were long gone.
It's unclear when Carleo moved to Las Vegas or exactly where he lived, but his Nevada driver's license bears the address of his biological father's home in Summerlin.
At 9:20 p.m. on Wednesday, officers arrested Carleo without incident in the Bellagio casino. Sources said he thought he was there to pass more cranberries. According to the police report, he admitted his involvement in the Bellagio robbery. He was booked at the Clark County Detention Center on Thursday morning on robbery and burglary charges and remains there without bail.
Detectives searched Carleo's room at the Bellagio, his father's home, the home of a woman found to have seven cranberries and that of his girlfriend, Layla Loeung, where another 16 cranberries were found in a bedroom closet.
Loeung told police that the chips were Carleo's and that he had given her $5,000 in cash. Police left with all of it.
The report doesn't mention anything seized at the home of the judge.
Assad wasn't at work Thursday. In a statement distributed Thursday by consulting group Rogich Communications, he said he was "devastated and heartbroken to see my son arrested under these circumstances, as is the rest of his family."
He said he cannot discuss the matter because of judicial ethics.
"I can say that as a prosecutor and a judge, I have always felt people who break the law need to be held accountable," Assad said.
At a news conference Thursday, Robbery Lt. Ray Steiber said a total of $1.2 million in chips and cash had been recovered. Carleo also might face drug trafficking charges, but Steiber would say little about the investigation.
But Steiber said anyone thinking they can take down a Las Vegas casino is "sadly mistaken."
"You will be caught,'' he said.
Antonio Planas and Mike Blasky
LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL
Study: Global Obesity Rates Double Since 1980
Three New Studies Find While Global Blood Pressure and Cholesterol Levels have Dropped, Obesity Rates Have Doubled
Obesity rates worldwide have doubled in the last three decades even as blood pressure and cholesterol levels have dropped, according to three new studies.
People in Pacific Island nations like American Samoa are the heaviest, one of the studies shows. Among developed countries, Americans are the fattest and the Japanese are the slimmest.
"Being obese is no longer just a Western problem," said Majid Ezzati, a professor of public health at Imperial College London, one of the study's authors.
In 1980, about 5 percent of men and 8 percent of women worldwide were obese. By 2008, the rates were nearly 10 percent for men and 14 percent for women.
That means 205 million men and 297 million women weighed in as obese. Another 1.5 billion adults were overweight, according to the obesity study.
Though richer countries did a better job of keeping blood pressure and cholesterol levels under control, researchers said people nearly everywhere are piling on the pounds, except in a few places including central Africa and South Asia. The studies were published Friday in the medical journal, Lancet.
The research confirms earlier trends about mounting obesity and the three papers provide the most comprehensive, recent global look at body mass index, cholesterol and blood pressure. Body mass index is a measurement based on weight and height.
Experts warned the increasing numbers of obese people could lead to a "global tsunami of cardiovascular disease." Obesity is also linked to higher rates of cancer, diabetes and is estimated to cause about 3 million deaths worldwide every year.
In an accompanying commentary, Sonia Anand and Salim Yusuf of McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, said the global forecast for heart disease was "dismal and comprises a population emergency that will cost tens of millions of preventable deaths" unless countries take quick action.
Even without the encroaching empire of Western fast food, Ezzati said waistlines are already expanding in parts of Latin America, the Middle East, and Western and Southern Africa.
Among rich countries, the U.S. had the highest average body mass Index, at 28. Rates were the lowest in Japan, ranging between 22 for women and 24 for men. Women in Belgium, France, Finland, Italy and Switzerland also stayed trim, with virtually no change in their BMI.
People with a BMI of 18-24 are considered to have a healthy weight. Those with a BMI of 25 or above are overweight and people with a BMI of 30 or more are classified as obese.
Two other studies also published in the Lancet on Friday surveyed blood pressure rates and cholesterol levels. Western countries including Canada, South Korea and the U.S. had some of the lowest blood pressure rates thanks to medication, while rates are highest in Portugal, Finland and Norway.
Cholesterol levels were highest in countries like Iceland and Germany and lowest in Africa.
Ezzati said national measures like reducing salt content in prepared foods or banning transfats could make a big dent in lowering blood pressure and cholesterol rates.
He added that it was uncertain if the world's obesity rates had peaked and predicted other health complications would soon follow. "We don't know how much worse the obesity problem will get," he said. "While we can manage blood pressure and cholesterol with medication, diabetes will be a lot harder."
Obesity rates worldwide have doubled in the last three decades even as blood pressure and cholesterol levels have dropped, according to three new studies.
People in Pacific Island nations like American Samoa are the heaviest, one of the studies shows. Among developed countries, Americans are the fattest and the Japanese are the slimmest.
"Being obese is no longer just a Western problem," said Majid Ezzati, a professor of public health at Imperial College London, one of the study's authors.
In 1980, about 5 percent of men and 8 percent of women worldwide were obese. By 2008, the rates were nearly 10 percent for men and 14 percent for women.
That means 205 million men and 297 million women weighed in as obese. Another 1.5 billion adults were overweight, according to the obesity study.
Though richer countries did a better job of keeping blood pressure and cholesterol levels under control, researchers said people nearly everywhere are piling on the pounds, except in a few places including central Africa and South Asia. The studies were published Friday in the medical journal, Lancet.
The research confirms earlier trends about mounting obesity and the three papers provide the most comprehensive, recent global look at body mass index, cholesterol and blood pressure. Body mass index is a measurement based on weight and height.
Experts warned the increasing numbers of obese people could lead to a "global tsunami of cardiovascular disease." Obesity is also linked to higher rates of cancer, diabetes and is estimated to cause about 3 million deaths worldwide every year.
In an accompanying commentary, Sonia Anand and Salim Yusuf of McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, said the global forecast for heart disease was "dismal and comprises a population emergency that will cost tens of millions of preventable deaths" unless countries take quick action.
Even without the encroaching empire of Western fast food, Ezzati said waistlines are already expanding in parts of Latin America, the Middle East, and Western and Southern Africa.
Among rich countries, the U.S. had the highest average body mass Index, at 28. Rates were the lowest in Japan, ranging between 22 for women and 24 for men. Women in Belgium, France, Finland, Italy and Switzerland also stayed trim, with virtually no change in their BMI.
People with a BMI of 18-24 are considered to have a healthy weight. Those with a BMI of 25 or above are overweight and people with a BMI of 30 or more are classified as obese.
Two other studies also published in the Lancet on Friday surveyed blood pressure rates and cholesterol levels. Western countries including Canada, South Korea and the U.S. had some of the lowest blood pressure rates thanks to medication, while rates are highest in Portugal, Finland and Norway.
Cholesterol levels were highest in countries like Iceland and Germany and lowest in Africa.
Ezzati said national measures like reducing salt content in prepared foods or banning transfats could make a big dent in lowering blood pressure and cholesterol rates.
He added that it was uncertain if the world's obesity rates had peaked and predicted other health complications would soon follow. "We don't know how much worse the obesity problem will get," he said. "While we can manage blood pressure and cholesterol with medication, diabetes will be a lot harder."
JPMorgan Complicit in Madoff's Fraud
E-mails and other internal documents show that executives at JPMorgan Chase were complicit in Bernard Madoff's massive fraud, lawyers seeking to recover funds for his victims said Thursday.
The lawyers work for a court-appointed trustee who filed a $6.4 billion complaint under seal late last year against JPMorgan, the disgraced financier's primary bank for two decades. The parties agreed to make portions of it public on Thursday.
Among the e-mails cited is one in 2007 in which an unidentified JPMorgan Chase employee recounts being told "there is a well-known cloud over the head of Madoff and that his returns are speculated to be part of a (P)onzi scheme."
The material supports allegations that "the bank's top executives were warned in blunt terms about speculation that Madoff was running a Ponzi scheme," attorney Deborah Renner said in a statement. "Yet the bank appears to have been more concerned only with protecting its own investments in (the Madoff firm's) feeder funds."
In a statement on Thursday, JPMorgan said the complaint "is meritless and is based on distortions of both the relevant facts and the governing law."
It added that the bank "intends to defend itself vigorously against the unfounded claims brought by the trustee."
The bank has denied having any suspicions about Madoff, saying it followed all commercial banking regulations in its dealings with him.
Trustee Irving Picard is in the midst of a two-year campaign to recover funds for Madoff's burned clients with a flurry of lawsuits against financial institutions and brokers. Last year, he filed multibillion-dollar suits against HSBC and UBS AG over similar allegations the banks deny.
Madoff, 72, is serving a 150-year sentence in a federal prison in North Carolina after admitting that he ran his scheme for at least two decades, using his investment advisory service to cheat thousands of individuals, charities, celebrities and institutional investors.
Losses are estimated at around $20 billion, making it the biggest investment fraud in U.S. history.
Picard's lawyers have accused JPMorgan and its affiliates of being "willfully blind" to "numerous red flags surrounding Madoff," including the unwavering double-digit returns he reported to wealthy investors on fictitious account statements.
According to the lawsuit, JPMorgan initiated a thorough investigation of Madoff in 2008 after the nation's financial crisis had begun - and that the inquiry was frustrated at every turn.
Madoff feeder funds "repeatedly found creative ways to dodge questions" about their knowledge of his investment schemes, the suit says. Bank Medici, one of Madoff's biggest partners, promised to provide various risk reports, but then balked.
By October, a member of the bank's due diligence team was questioning claims by a big feeder fund, Fairfield Greenwich, that it had access to the secretive office suite where Madoff did business.
"Judging from the lack of thoroughness of some of their other due diligence I am not entirely convinced that Madoff allowed them to actually enter the trading area," the employee wrote.
Another bank official expressed amazement that the bank and hedge fund executives who were funneling money to Madoff had asked so few questions about his strategy, and observed that some seemed afraid to confront him.
"It's almost a cult (Madoff) seems to have fostered," the official wrote.
The complaint also cites a suspicious activity report JPMorgan sent to the Serious Organised Crime Agency in London on Oct. 28, 2008, less than two months before Madoff revealed himself to be a fraud.
The suit says the report concluded Madoff's balance sheet appears "too good to be true - meaning it probably is."
The report was triggered in part by a strange conversation that a bank employee had with one of its Madoff investment partners, Aurelia Finance. During that conversation, according to the suit, "Aurelia Finance representatives made threats ... referring to 'Colombian friends' who could 'cause havoc' if the bank went ahead with a plan to redeem some of its Madoff investments."
The JPMorgan employee, the suit says, took that to mean that Colombian drug dealers were somehow involved in the investment deal, and would be angered if the bank dropped out.
JPMorgan began trying to pull more Madoff investments in October, including $167 million placed through Fairfield, according to the suit.
By the time Madoff was arrested in December, it had managed to sell off all but $35 million of its stakes in his feeder funds.
The lawyers work for a court-appointed trustee who filed a $6.4 billion complaint under seal late last year against JPMorgan, the disgraced financier's primary bank for two decades. The parties agreed to make portions of it public on Thursday.
Among the e-mails cited is one in 2007 in which an unidentified JPMorgan Chase employee recounts being told "there is a well-known cloud over the head of Madoff and that his returns are speculated to be part of a (P)onzi scheme."
The material supports allegations that "the bank's top executives were warned in blunt terms about speculation that Madoff was running a Ponzi scheme," attorney Deborah Renner said in a statement. "Yet the bank appears to have been more concerned only with protecting its own investments in (the Madoff firm's) feeder funds."
In a statement on Thursday, JPMorgan said the complaint "is meritless and is based on distortions of both the relevant facts and the governing law."
It added that the bank "intends to defend itself vigorously against the unfounded claims brought by the trustee."
The bank has denied having any suspicions about Madoff, saying it followed all commercial banking regulations in its dealings with him.
Trustee Irving Picard is in the midst of a two-year campaign to recover funds for Madoff's burned clients with a flurry of lawsuits against financial institutions and brokers. Last year, he filed multibillion-dollar suits against HSBC and UBS AG over similar allegations the banks deny.
Madoff, 72, is serving a 150-year sentence in a federal prison in North Carolina after admitting that he ran his scheme for at least two decades, using his investment advisory service to cheat thousands of individuals, charities, celebrities and institutional investors.
Losses are estimated at around $20 billion, making it the biggest investment fraud in U.S. history.
Picard's lawyers have accused JPMorgan and its affiliates of being "willfully blind" to "numerous red flags surrounding Madoff," including the unwavering double-digit returns he reported to wealthy investors on fictitious account statements.
According to the lawsuit, JPMorgan initiated a thorough investigation of Madoff in 2008 after the nation's financial crisis had begun - and that the inquiry was frustrated at every turn.
Madoff feeder funds "repeatedly found creative ways to dodge questions" about their knowledge of his investment schemes, the suit says. Bank Medici, one of Madoff's biggest partners, promised to provide various risk reports, but then balked.
By October, a member of the bank's due diligence team was questioning claims by a big feeder fund, Fairfield Greenwich, that it had access to the secretive office suite where Madoff did business.
"Judging from the lack of thoroughness of some of their other due diligence I am not entirely convinced that Madoff allowed them to actually enter the trading area," the employee wrote.
Another bank official expressed amazement that the bank and hedge fund executives who were funneling money to Madoff had asked so few questions about his strategy, and observed that some seemed afraid to confront him.
"It's almost a cult (Madoff) seems to have fostered," the official wrote.
The complaint also cites a suspicious activity report JPMorgan sent to the Serious Organised Crime Agency in London on Oct. 28, 2008, less than two months before Madoff revealed himself to be a fraud.
The suit says the report concluded Madoff's balance sheet appears "too good to be true - meaning it probably is."
The report was triggered in part by a strange conversation that a bank employee had with one of its Madoff investment partners, Aurelia Finance. During that conversation, according to the suit, "Aurelia Finance representatives made threats ... referring to 'Colombian friends' who could 'cause havoc' if the bank went ahead with a plan to redeem some of its Madoff investments."
The JPMorgan employee, the suit says, took that to mean that Colombian drug dealers were somehow involved in the investment deal, and would be angered if the bank dropped out.
JPMorgan began trying to pull more Madoff investments in October, including $167 million placed through Fairfield, according to the suit.
By the time Madoff was arrested in December, it had managed to sell off all but $35 million of its stakes in his feeder funds.
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