plus 3, March 2010 Archives - News/Talk 750 WSB |
- March 2010 Archives - News/Talk 750 WSB
- A Second Opinion: Office politics resolved - Thehill.com
- Family Keeps Hope Alive For Poway Teen's Return - CBS 2 KCAL 9
- New Detroit company provides prep courses for state insurance ... - MLive.com
| March 2010 Archives - News/Talk 750 WSB Posted: 02 Mar 2010 06:09 AM PST PORTLAND, Maine (AP) Nearly 200,000 homes and businesses were still without power Monday as restoration efforts continued days after a slow-moving storm battered the Northeast with heavy snow, rain and high winds. More than 83,000 utility customers still lacked electricity early Monday in New Hampshire, the hardest-hit state. New York had about 87,000 outages, and Maine had about 16,000. At the peak of the storm, more than a million utility customers throughout the region had lost power. Hundreds of utility crews from as far away as Michigan and Maryland continued removing trees that knocked down power lines and replacing utility poles that snapped during last week's storm. Dozens of shelters provided warmth and food at fire departments, schools and other places. Even after spending three nights at a shelter in New Paltz, N.Y., 28-year-old Keith Crum of Marlboro, N.Y., said he was understanding of the ongoing power outage. He recently moved back to the area from South Carolina, where he worked cutting trees away from power lines. ``They're trying to do the best they can with the power,'' he said. ``You got to take into account there are a lot of lines down.'' Bryan Bush lost electricity Thursday, but he used a power generator he owns to turn the lights back on in his home in Kittery, Maine. Neighbors without that option have been stopping in for showers, warmth and cups of coffee. But with three utility poles still down in front of his house and wires crossing his driveway, he wasn't too confident about getting power back anytime soon. ``I wouldn't expect much before the middle or the end of the week,'' he said. Deep snow in New York has made it hard for people to get around. ``A lot of people cannot honestly get out of their house and get to the shelters,'' said John-Anthony Bruno, executive director of the Ulster County, N.Y., chapter of the American Red Cross. ``A lot of people are resourceful,'' she added. ``If their neighbor has power, they go down the street rather than shelter with us.'' In southern New York, the weather was linked to a death in Warwick, where a 60-year-old man was found dead after he went outside to shovel snow on Friday, said Walter Koury, the Orange County emergency services commissioner. Governors in New Hampshire, Maine and Massachusetts visited storm-struck areas Sunday to meet with emergency responders and view storm damage. Officials said it could be several days before power is fully restored in New Hampshire, while Maine's largest utility hoped to restore power to all of its customers by the end of Monday. In New Hampshire, Gov. John Lynch activated 50 National Guard members who went door-to-door in Allenstown on Sunday to check on residents without power. ``This continues to be a difficult situation for many New Hampshire families and I continue to urge people to put their safety first,'' Lynch said. The storm dumped more than 2 feet of snow in New York, dropped 8 inches of rain in southern Maine and brought wind gusts of up to 92 mph off the New Hampshire coast. Another storm, this one from the east, was expected to bring more snow and rain into parts of New England on Sunday night into Monday. Maine stood to get the brunt of the latest front with 3 to 6 inches of snow expected in much of the state, and lesser amounts in New Hampshire and Massachusetts, said Michael Cempa, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Gray, Maine. Associated Press writers Cristian Salazar in New York City; Stephen Singer in Hartford, Conn.; and Glenn Adams in Augusta, Maine, contributed to this report. (Copyright 2010 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.) Five Filters featured article: Chilcot Inquiry. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction. This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| A Second Opinion: Office politics resolved - Thehill.com Posted: 02 Mar 2010 06:23 AM PST Today I begin my role, among others, as an advice columnist for The Hill. In A Second Opinion, I hope to help readers confront complicated office politics, think through ethical dilemmas and weigh potential career moves as they carve their paths in Washington. This city offers an almost overwhelming number of professional possibilities (even now, when other parts of the country languish in high unemployment rates). There's congressional work, executive-branch posts, policy analysis, lobbying. Lawyering, campaigning, communications, consulting. Advocacy, international affairs, associations, think tanks. And on and on. And with the versatile skill sets many people bring with them to Washington, one single candidate could conceivably be qualified for jobs in any of these areas. Yet there are pitfalls, roadblocks, unforeseen circumstances and false leads that people can also run into. I expect to discuss both the good and the bad in this column. A member of Congress who unexpectedly retires, leaving his staff without jobs. A "one-upping" colleague who overshadows his officemates' accomplishments. The dream job attained, but the paltry salary that goes along with it. Inappropriate work attire. And issues yet undiscovered. I won't pretend to be the final word on any of these. The best I can do is hear you out, weigh both sides of an issue, add context, devote thought and find outside expertise. I reached out to several readers and contacts to create the first couple of columns. But future columns, which will run weekly, depend on you. Send your questions to This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .
I.P., You can, and it's been done before, but I can almost guarantee that you will have to answer for that decision for the rest of your professional life in Washington. The longer answer is this: The circumstances under which you switch will largely dictate both the smoothness of the transition and the future consequences. If you have experienced an ideological epiphany and no longer believe in your party's platforms, your explanation to future employers should come naturally and will be heartfelt. Or if you are a policy specialist, party affiliation may be secondary, and a switch from a committee's minority staff to its majority staff, for instance, would be easily defensible. (I would say this is more the exception than the rule and more applicable in certain policy areas — agriculture, for instance — than in others.) The dicier switch is the one that smacks of insincerity. You simply want more money or more power, so you metamorphose. That's a big difference between working in Congress and working in the private sector. (You'll notice that lobbyists navigate questions of party affiliation with more ease and much lower stakes.) Such a switch, and a return to your original position, will chip away at your credibility. You might want to ask Sen. Arlen Specter (D-Pa.), for instance, how well his April 2009 party switch is working for him in light of his diminishing prospects for reelection. That said, it's been done here before without much consequence. Former George W. Bush White House press secretary Dana Perino said in a recent interview that Washington is the least partisan place in the country, and she's on to something. In front of the cameras, of course, Washington is hyper-partisan, many Americans would argue today. But overall, Washington, I think, has a more fluid and broader understanding of political parties and where its people fit in. Republicans and Democrats talk to each other during the work day (and after, for that matter) with both regularity and unremarkable outcomes. But before you make that switch, think long and hard about your ultimate professional goal and whether it'll help get you there. A question I get a lot from younger-20s folks just breaking into D.C. is: Should I start in the private side, or nonprofit world, or the government side? How would you answer this? Starlight, I would first respond to this question with a question: Where do you want to end up? I realize most people won't have an answer to that. But it should get them thinking more concretely about their goals. The other impulse answer I have is: Go wherever you can get a job. Though this city's job market is more isolated from the woeful unemployment problems in other parts of the country, certain sectors of D.C.'s economy have felt the squeeze as well. But that aside, Washington is a place where people hold four different jobs in four different sectors in four years. Look at Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who has also been a senator and presidential candidate in the past two years and who was the first lady a few years before that. On a more reality-based scale (who among you is the next Hillary?), congressional staffers often move on and off Capitol Hill — to nonprofit organizations, lobby groups, campaign jobs and other spots — without much of a problem. The research that the Congressional Management Foundation has done shows that congressional staffers stay in positions an average of about three years. In my opinion, each stop is a building block for the next. You learn something at Job X and are able to apply it in Job Y — even if you conclude, "That worked there but won't work here." That's valuable experience. You'll also make dumb mistakes in your 20s, from which you can recover as your career progresses. Just don't pull a Jessica Cutler if you plan on staying here for a while. Sure, the staffer for former Sen. Mike DeWine (R-Ohio) got a book deal out of her intra-Congress sexual adventures, but you'll also notice that she now lives in New York and works as a blogger. The better question for people in their 20s who want to make it here is: What do I like most about D.C. industry? Do I want to become a policy specialist, burrowing into environmental issues (or any other topic)? Do I like the personalities and the politics here and want to be a foot soldier for a bigger name? Am I attracted to a cause, like universal pre-kindergarten? These and other, similar questions, I think, will better guide a young professional in this city. Do you have a question for A Second Opinion? Send it to This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it Five Filters featured article: Chilcot Inquiry. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction. |
| Family Keeps Hope Alive For Poway Teen's Return - CBS 2 KCAL 9 Posted: 02 Mar 2010 06:45 AM PST Family Keeps Hope Alive For Poway Teen's Return
At Poway High School, photos adorn the walls with the caption, "Last seen 2-25 at RB Community Park wearing running clothes." The 17-year-old's family and authorities are holding out hope that she will return safely. She disappeared Thursday, and a search for her has spread over an area of about four square miles, covered with rocks and heavy vegetation. The focus of the search has been on the waters and shore of Lake Hodges, a popular area for trail runners. John Gardner III, 30, remained in custody without bail after his arrest outside a Mexican restaurant in suburban Escondido on Sunday. Steve Walker, a spokesman for the San Diego County district attorney's office, said a decision would be made by Wednesday about filing charges against the registered sex offender. Gardner, of Lake Elsinore, pleaded guilty in May 2000 to molesting a 13-year-old female neighbor and was sentenced to six years in prison. Prosecutors say he lured the victim to his home with an offer to watch "Patch Adams," a 1998 movie starring Robin Williams. Sheriff Bill Gore told ABC's "Good Morning America" on Monday that the questioning of Gardner hadn't produced any leads. Sheriff's spokeswoman, Jan Caldwell, declined to say if searches of Gardner's home and his mother's San Diego home yielded evidence. Brent King, Chelsea's father, pleaded for anyone with information about Gardner to come forward. Investigators suspect Gardner could be tied to a Dec. 27 assault on a female jogger from Colorado who fended off her attacker in the same park. "Anybody who knows anything about the person they have in custody -- whatever you want to call him, I can't even put a word to it -- please let us know," he said. In an interview Monday, the Kings, who also have a 13-year-old son, recounted their daughter's disappearance. Brent, 47, returned from the gym around 5:30 p.m. Thursday, the same time his wife, Kelly, 48, came home with groceries. Their daughter, who always kept them abreast of her whereabouts, wasn't home. First, they called her cell phone, then her friends. A friend's mother suggested an AT&T Web site, which led them to her cell phone that was left inside her 1994 BMW parked near the tennis courts at the park. "Because it was so out of character for Chelsea not to tell us or call us and say I'm going to be late ... we just had that feeling," Brent King said. Kelly called 911 as her husband drove to the park. Brent looked first at the tennis courts, then saw a trail headed into the woods. "I took off and ran down the trail as far as I could run, calling out for my daughter at the top of my voice in every direction," he said. Chelsea was born in Poway, a well-to-do suburb of homes and office parks northeast of San Diego. The family followed Brent King's job in mortgage banking to the San Francisco Bay area and to the Chicago area before returning to San Diego. Their home was badly damaged in 2007 wildfires that ravaged Southern California. Chelsea is taking four Advanced Placement courses and applied to 11 colleges, with an eye toward a career that would combine her interests in writing and environmental protection. She has been accepted to two schools, University of Washington and University of British Columbia. "She is one of the most driven, personable, caring people that you could ever meet," Brent King said. "Her goal in life is to brighten everyone's day. That's what she does, and when she walks into the room, you know she's there." She often stays up studying past midnight, working so hard that her parents urge her to ease off and spend more time with friends. Long-distance running was her escape. "That was her outlet when she was stressed about a test or needed to just clear her head," Kelly King said. (© 2010 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.) Five Filters featured article: Chilcot Inquiry. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction. |
| New Detroit company provides prep courses for state insurance ... - MLive.com Posted: 02 Mar 2010 06:31 AM PST By Jackie HeadapohlMarch 02, 2010, 9:28AM Michigan has insurance jobs to fill and many adults looking for a career in the industry have trouble passing the licensing exam -- up to half fail on their first try.Launch Learning Group LLC, a new business in Detroit that provides interactive prep courses for people taking state insurance licensing exams, will debut its first 40-hour course on March 15. The company was founded by Antonella Solomon and Roger Williams met as students at Bizdom U, the entrepreneurial boot camp founded by Dan Gilbert. Courses will be held in Detroit, Farmington Hills and Livonia and range from $180 for 20 hours to $275 for 40. Register online or call 313-202-6700 for more information.
Five Filters featured article: Chilcot Inquiry. Available tools: PDF Newspaper, Full Text RSS, Term Extraction. This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
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