Copyright 2008 The New York Sun Wed, 18 Jun 2008 16:31:38 -0400 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Alec Magnet :: Stories from The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/authors/Alec+Magnet istoll@nysun.com (Ira Stoll) webmaster@nysun.com en-us ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/arts/taking-opera-off-the-stage-and-into-the-bar/35835/ Tue, 11 Jul 2006 00:00:00 EST Most music fans are free to have a drink while they listen to live performances. Jazz-clubbers routinely have to buy — though not necessarily drink — two cocktails as part of the price of entry. Indie rockers don't feel dressed without a can of Pabst in one hand. But classical music fans can't so much as bring a bottle of water with them to their seats. Not so at Opera on Tap, a raucous and sublime opera recital held each month in the back room of the Park Slope bar Freddy's. Its next... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/pure-mayhem-and-screaming-at-medical-student/29332/ Fri, 17 Mar 2006 00:00:00 EST Medical students across New York City and America gathered in groups yesterday at noon to open what for many of them is one of the most important envelopes of their lives. Inside was information about where they would be residents next year. "It was pure mayhem," the president of the graduating class at the SUNY Downstate Medical Center in Brooklyn, Tamara Dunn, said of the fateful hour. "You heard a lot of screaming." Graduating seniors from American schools mostly received the residencies... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/match-day-arrives-and-med-students-meet-their/29251/ Thu, 16 Mar 2006 00:00:00 EST It's Match Day! After months of applications and interviews and weeks of fretful waiting, graduating medical students in New York and elsewhere will gather at their schools at noon to open envelopes and learn what hospital program they have been "matched" with - where they will be residents for the next two to six years, studying and practicing to learn their specialization. "This is really a big deal for everybody," the president of the graduating class at the SUNY Downstate Medical Center in... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/business/lure-of-big-money-draws-grads-to-hedge-funds/29141/ Wed, 15 Mar 2006 00:00:00 EST Private equity, venture capital firms, and hedge funds are replacing more traditional investment banks as the most coveted destinations for Harvard Business School students this recruiting season. "Almost 75% of HBS students want to do private equity or venture capital. Only about 10% get to do it," a student in Harvard Business School's class of 2006 and member of the student senate, Abhishek Agrawal, said in a telephone interview. Mr. Agrawal has taken a job in private equity for next year. A... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/sinn-fein-calls-on-irish-americans-to-push-us/29149/ Wed, 15 Mar 2006 00:00:00 EST The president of the Northern Irish nationalist party Sinn Fein, Gerry Adams, yesterday called on Irish Americans in New York City to encourage the Bush administration to press the British government to follow through with provisions in the Good Friday Agreement of 1998 and convene the Northern Ireland Assembly, which has not met since October 2002. He said he would seek the president's help at a meeting at the White House later this week. Last year, Mr. Adams was not invited to the White House... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/college-boards-release-of-incorrectly-low-sat/28934/ Fri, 10 Mar 2006 00:00:00 EST The College Board's admission this week that it released incorrectly low SAT test scores for about 4,000 college applicants could spark lawsuits, though colleges and universities contacted yesterday said their admissions decisions would not be affected by the mistake. A litigation partner at the New York law firm Dreier LLP, Richard Friedman, said possible grounds for lawsuits against the College Board include claims for the negligent infliction of emotional distress. The question, he said, was... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/in-this-subway-series-nyu-law-vies-with-columbia/28713/ Wed, 8 Mar 2006 00:00:00 EST Each side is scoring points in New York City's other subway series - the sporting rivalry between the law schools at Columbia and New York University. NYU has quietly lured away three top professors from New York's Ivy League law school, while Columbia's law school is in the quiet phase of a more than $300 million capital campaign to grow its 75-person faculty by half over 10 years, without increasing its student body. NYU School of Law announced yesterday that one of the world's top professors... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/national/high-court-opens-campuses-to-military/28640/ Tue, 7 Mar 2006 00:00:00 EST The Reserve Officers' Training Corps and other military bodies expelled from university grounds during the Vietnam War may make their return to campuses following a Supreme Court decision yesterday to uphold a law requiring higher education bodies receiving federal funding to allow military recruiters on school premises. In an 8-0 decision yesterday in the case of Rumsfeld v. Forum for Academic and Institutional Rights, the Supreme Court declared constitutional a law known as the Solomon... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/former-sudanese-slave-tells-his-story-to-gather/28613/ Mon, 6 Mar 2006 00:00:00 EST When Simon Deng was eight years old, Arab marauders from the north of his native Sudan sacked his village and burned the tribal elders alive. The next year he was kidnapped and given to a Muslim family as their slave. His masters beat Mr. Deng, a black man from southern Sudan, forcing him to sleep with animals and overworking him to exhaustion. They promised him they would stop if he forsook Christianity, converted to Islam, and took an Arab name. But he never did. "You are looking at a human... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/remove-paradise-now-petition-to-arrive-at-academy/28488/ Fri, 3 Mar 2006 00:00:00 EST A petition demanding that the Oscar nomination of a film widely regarded as sympathetic to terrorists be revoked will be delivered to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences today. Directed by an Israeli-born Palestinian, Hany Abu-Assad, "Paradise Now" is one of the five films nominated for this year's Best Foreign Language Film Award. It depicts what may be the last 48 hours in the lives of two young Palestinian men as they contemplate committing a suicide bombing, weighing their... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/pataki-makes-surprise-appearance-at-press/28437/ Thu, 2 Mar 2006 00:00:00 EST Governor Pataki yesterday sought to reassure New Yorkers concerned about his health by appearing - unannounced and fully dressed - before the cameras at a news conference at NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia Hospital, where his doctors were updating reporters on his condition. "I came in feeling strong as an ox. Maybe I'm not quite as strong as an ox right now, but I'm feeling a lot better than I did a few days ago," Mr. Pataki said, looking hearty and cheerful, if a little worn. One of the... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/former-taliban-ambassador-a-yale-student-provokes/28342/ Wed, 1 Mar 2006 00:00:00 EST A press report that a former "roving ambassador" for the Taliban is now a student at Yale University has provoked a degree of "consternation" among the Ivy League school's students and affiliates. Sayed Rahmatullah Hashemi, a 28-year-old Afghan who in 2001 toured America to defend the Taliban regime, was admitted to Yale as a non-degree student in January 2005 and has been taking classes there since the summer semester. He can apply to study for a regular undergraduate degree at the college... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/adl-to-memorialize-parisian-man-slain-by-muslim/28243/ Tue, 28 Feb 2006 00:00:00 EST The Anti-Defamation League on Thursday will host a memorial for a 23-year-old Jewish Parisian, Ilan Halimi, who was brutally murdered by a gang led by Muslim immigrants. The associate national director of the Anti-Defamation League, Kenneth Jacobson, who will speak at the event, told The New York Sun in a telephone interview that the primary purpose of the service was "to stand in solidarity and sympathy with the family and Jewish community in France." Peter Yarrow of Peter, Paul, and Mary fame... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/national/three-senators-want-port-investigation-moved/28272/ Tue, 28 Feb 2006 00:00:00 EST Senators Schumer, Clinton, and Menendez, a Democrat of New Jersey, are staging a fight over whether the executive or legislative branch of government should have final say on a deal by which a company owned by the government of the United Arab Emirates would take over operations at six American Ports. New York's City Council also sought to exercise its influence over the deal yesterday, as several members said they would introduce a resolution condemning the arrangement. The Coast Guard, in the... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/national/dubai-ports-world-agrees-to-security-review/28193/ Mon, 27 Feb 2006 00:00:00 EST President Bush yesterday ordered a second security review of a United Arab Emirates-based company set to take over operation at six American ports after the firm, Dubai Ports World, offered to submit to further investigation. Opponents of the deal, who come from both the Democratic and Republican parties, were encouraged by a report that the Department of Homeland Security at first objected to the takeover, though its objections were settled before the Bush administration on January 17 approved... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/national/port-authority-balks-at-foreign-government/28144/ Fri, 24 Feb 2006 00:00:00 EST The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey yesterday decided to take prompt legal action to halt the ports deal through the courts. The suit, which will be filed in the Essex County Superior Court on Friday, will attempt to void the Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company deal by citing the contract under which P&O operate in the two states. According to the agreement, the Port Authority must approve any change of ownership of companies in the ports and apply for a... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/petition-to-oust-paradise-now-from-oscars-gathers/28036/ Thu, 23 Feb 2006 00:00:00 EST Whether an Oscar-nominated movie depicting 48 hours in the lives of two Palestinian men contemplating a suicide bomb attack wins the Academy Award could come down to just a few votes. The number of signatures on a petition requesting the film's nomination be withdrawn has surpassed 25,000. Directed by an Israeli-born Palestinian, Hany Abu-Assad, "Paradise Now" is one of the five films nominated by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for this year's Best Foreign Language Film Award... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/national/bush-vows-to-fight-for-sale-of-ports/27932/ Wed, 22 Feb 2006 00:00:00 EST President Bush is vowing to veto any effort by Congress to stop or delay a deal his administration has approved to allow a company owned by the United Arab Emirates to operate ports in New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, Philadelphia, New Orleans, and Miami. Senators Clinton and Schumer have offered competing pieces of legislation to address the deal. Mr. Schumer's would require delay and further investigation of the deal, by which Dubai Ports World would acquire control over operations at... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/nine-professors-at-columbia-are-deemed-dangerous/27850/ Tue, 21 Feb 2006 00:00:00 EST Nine of the "101 Most Dangerous Academics in America" teach at Columbia University, according to a new book by conservative activist David Horowitz. The book, "The Professors: The 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America," published by Regnery, profiles 101 professors from campuses across the country. "Columbia is a national scandal," Mr. Horowitz told The New York Sun in a telephone interview. "That a serious, top-tier university ... is an ideological fortress is an emblem of the utter... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/tide-of-opposition-to-port-deal-swells-despite/27800/ Fri, 17 Feb 2006 00:00:00 EST The Bush administration yesterday failed to quell the swelling tide of opposition to the deal that would give a company owned by the government of Dubai in the United Arab Emirates control over six American ports. The board of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey promptly made public their demand to the federal government for information and documents related to the decision in preparation for its own review of the implications of the deal next week. The Port Authority oversees one of... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/national/opposition-to-dubai-control-of-port-grows-among/27690/ Thu, 16 Feb 2006 00:00:00 EST Members of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey's board of commissioners will meet next Wednesday to discuss the proposed deal that would grant control of significant operations at one of their ports to a company owned by the Dubai government in the United Arab Emirates, a country with ties to terrorism. Opposition to the proposed deal, which would give Dubai Ports World operational control at six American seaports - including one in Manhattan and one in New Jersey - is gathering steam... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/dubai-companys-control-of-six-ports-boggles/27635/ Wed, 15 Feb 2006 00:00:00 EST Local lawmakers and terrorism specialists yesterday denounced the federal government's approval of a deal that would give operational control of six American sea ports - including one in New York City - to a company owned by the government of Dubai in the United Arab Emirates, a country that has had ties to terrorism. "On its face, this looks like f- insanity to me," the Republican minority leader of the City Council, James Oddo, told The New York Sun. He said he was not aware of the specifics... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/schumer-calls-for-probe-of-arab-port-deal/27530/ Tue, 14 Feb 2006 00:00:00 EST Senator Schumer yesterday called on the Department of Homeland Security to review a federal committee's decision to allow Dubai Ports World, a company owned by the government of the United Arab Emirates, to buy six American ports, including one in New York. "Foreign control of our ports, which are vital to homeland security, is a risky proposition. Riskier yet is that we are turning it over to a country that has been linked to terrorism previously," Mr. Schumer said at a news conference. One of... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/national/ohio-company-implants-security-chips-into/27551/ Tue, 14 Feb 2006 00:00:00 EST The decision of two employees and the chief executive of an Ohio-based video surveillance company to implant into their forearms electronic tags that control access to the secure room that holds their highly confidential video footage has prompted considerable debate over surveillance and civil liberties. The Financial Times yesterday reported that the company, CityWatcher.com, was the first private company in America known to have implanted such technology in its employees for security... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/parley-on-academic-boycotts-seen-as-anti-israel/27291/ Thu, 9 Feb 2006 00:00:00 EST The American Association of University Professors yesterday evening decided to postpone its widely criticized conference on academic boycotts after the three major New York-based foundations sponsoring it publicly stated their loss of confidence. In a statement issued yesterday, the professors' association said, "After careful deliberation and consultation, the AAUP has decided to postpone its conference on academic boycotts, originally scheduled for February 13 to 17 in Bellagio, Italy. The... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/delay-sought-of-parley-seen-as-anti-israel/27186/ Wed, 8 Feb 2006 00:00:00 EST Three major New York-based foundations sponsoring an academic conference in Italy that was scheduled to begin Monday are now calling for its postponement after the conference came under criticism as a forum for critics of Israel and after one of the articles circulated in advance of the meeting was found to have been what executives of two of the foundations called "an anti-Semitic paper by a Holocaust denier." The New York Sun yesterday reported that eight of the 21 participants in the... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/national/ford-foundation-will-pay-for-parley-of-anti/27123/ Tue, 7 Feb 2006 00:00:00 EST Less than three years after reports of Ford Foundation funding of anti-Semitic and anti-Israel activity prompted an international uproar, the Manhattan based philanthropic giant is at it again, paying for at least eight scholars who favored a boycott of Israeli academics to attend a conference scheduled for Monday at a villa on the shore of Lake Como in Italy. In November of 2003, the president of the Ford Foundation, Susan Berresford, announced that the foundation "deeply" regretted some of... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/massad-wins-promotion-at-columbia/27126/ Tue, 7 Feb 2006 00:00:00 EST A Columbia University professor who emerged as the central figure in a series of student complaints over anti-Israel bias and classroom bullying, Joseph Massad, has been promoted to a position from which he can receive tenure. Mr. Massad last month returned to Columbia's department of Middle East and Asian Languages and Cultures after a semester-long sabbatical. Last week he was promoted to associate professor from assistant professor, making it possible for him to receive tenure. According to... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/world-jewish-congress-critics-claim-victory-after/26923/ Thu, 2 Feb 2006 00:00:00 EST The agreement announced Tuesday by the New York attorney general, Eliot Spitzer, concluding an investigation of the World Jewish Congress is providing both the congress and its critics an opportunity to claim victory. The investigation found no evidence of criminal behavior, though it concluded that the group's finances "lacked any oversight ... by its governing bodies." In the 34-page agreement, Mr. Spitzer's office barred Rabbi Israel Singer, who resigned as the chairman of the World Jewish... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/veterans-take-grievances-to-columbia-provost/26823/ Wed, 1 Feb 2006 00:00:00 EST Members of a Columbia University student group made up of military veterans will meet today with the provost of the university, Alan Brinkley, to discuss the organization's allegations of anti-military discrimination at the university. "A lot of veterans and military-affiliated students feel vulnerable on campus," a veteran who is a student at Columbia's school of general studies, Oscar Escano, told The New York Sun. He described a "permissive atmosphere" in which anti-military bias and... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/levine-defends-plans-for-yankee-stadium/26735/ Tue, 31 Jan 2006 00:00:00 EST The president of the Yankees, Randy Levine, yesterday defended plans for a new Yankee Stadium, saying its proposed site is the only one available. "We need a new stadium," he said in a speech before a 300-person lunch audience at the New Bronx Chamber of Commerce, saying the old one "is just not functional." Mr. Levine promised to use Bronx businesses and employ Bronx residents during and after construction. The president of the Bronx, Adolfo Carrion, and members of the borough's New Chamber of... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/lawmakers-make-tax-break-on-clothing-permanent/26691/ Mon, 30 Jan 2006 00:00:00 EST A weeklong tax break on shoe and clothing purchases starts today, but some local officials say that's not enough - that all clothing purchases of less than $110 should always be free of state sales tax. A member of the City Council, David Weprin, and the New York City comptroller, William Thompson Jr., joined several other lawmakers and officials yesterday at a news conference outside City Hall to urge Governor Pataki not to reverse himself and make permanent a 4% state sales tax on clothing... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/dinowitz-moves-to-ban-sale-of-cell-phone-logs/26697/ Mon, 30 Jan 2006 00:00:00 EST Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz plans to introduce legislation to prohibit Web sites in New York State from acquiring and selling cellular telephone users' phone logs. "Right now I can buy your cell phone records. ... For about $100 I can find out every person you've called and everyone who's called you," Mr. Dinowitz said yesterday at a news conference outside City Hall, where he was joined by City Council Member David Weprin and representatives of the Consumers Union, NYPIRG, and the NYCLU... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/police-may-construct-network-of-cameras-in-city/26616/ Fri, 27 Jan 2006 00:00:00 EST Camera shy? New York may not be the city for you. With the Police Department reportedly considering a plan to blanket parts of Manhattan with closed-circuit surveillance cameras and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority working to double the number of cameras in the subway system, Mayor Bloomberg said in his State of the City address yesterday that he would seek to install cameras that automatically swivel at the sound of a gunshot. The Wall Street Journal on Wednesday reported that the... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/lawyers-waivers-causing-clients-to-be-less-candid/26535/ Thu, 26 Jan 2006 00:00:00 EST Corporations are less likely to seek legal counsel and corporate lawyers are less likely to take notes or keep a paper trail because of increasing pressure - even coercion - from prosecutors to waive their attorney-client privilege during investigations, panelists at yesterday's annual meeting of the New York State Bar Association said. "As a practical matter, corporations who are under threat of indictment if they don't cooperate are making essentially a compelled disclosure of privileged... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/dinkins-beseeches-city-to-reconsider-decision/26449/ Wed, 25 Jan 2006 00:00:00 EST In a last-ditch effort to save the ailing Boys Choir of Harlem, its new chairman, Mayor Dinkins, along with Rep. Charles Rangel and members of the choir's board yesterday asked the city to reconsider its decision to evict the choir from its home on Madison Avenue and 127th Street at the end of the month - or at least to postpone the eviction until the end of the school year. During a meeting yesterday at the Tweed Courthouse, the vice chairman of the choir's board, Skip Wyatt, and a new board... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/blackberry-jam-thumbing-new-yorkers-rue-a-ruling/26353/ Tue, 24 Jan 2006 00:00:00 EST What do New Yorkers think of yesterday's Supreme Court decision not to review a patent case that could force the shutdown of service for users of the BlackBerry handheld e-mail device? Whether the news was greeted with panic or joy depended, it seemed, on what users of the device think of the service that has so many fast-paced New Yorkers typing away at their e-mails as they travel to work or lunch or a meeting or home. Or anywhere else, for that matter. "I live by it," a 31-year-old banker... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/lawmakers-call-on-mayor-to-resist-closing-more/26272/ Mon, 23 Jan 2006 00:00:00 EST Armed with a report showing another increase in response times since six city firehouses were shuttered in 2003, three Democratic lawmakers of the Bronx yesterday called on Mayor Bloomberg to resist the idea of closing any more. Joined by Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz and City Council Member Oliver Koppel, state Senator Jeff Klein released a report showing that the Fire Department's average response to distress calls increased by six seconds in 2005, following an 11-second jump in 2004, the year... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/state-agency-approves-ballparks/26132/ Thu, 19 Jan 2006 00:00:00 EST The Yankees and the Mets moved a step closer to building their new stadiums yesterday when the board of directors of the Empire State Development Corporation approved infrastructure plans for the projects. The state proposed to contribute $74.7 million to each project, though both await the agency's final approval. The total cost of the new 51,800-seat Yankee Stadium is estimated at $1.2 billion. The Yankees will pay about $800 million. The total cost of the new Shea Stadium, which will have... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/arts/libraries-vs-the-internet/26120/ Thu, 19 Jan 2006 00:00:00 EST John Willinsky's new book begins - quite effectively - by describing how rising prices and a fluctuating currency have forced the Kenya Medical Research Institute to cancel most of its subscriptions to medical journals. The true shame, the institute's librarian told Mr. Willinsky, is that that the five titles the library could still afford did not include any leading journals on the institute's prime research focus, tropical diseases. Libraries, publishers, and the contributors to the journals... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/50-million-bronx-library-opens/26069/ Wed, 18 Jan 2006 00:00:00 EST The New York Public Library's largest new construction in recent memory, the Bronx Library Center, opened its doors to the public for the first time yesterday after a ribbon-cutting ceremony attended by Mayor Bloomberg, top library officials, local politicians, and the philanthropists Susan and Roger Hertog, whose donation helped make the library possible. "Public libraries are everybody's portal to growth and fulfillment in a democratic society," the president of the New York Public Library... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/legislators-call-for-stiffer-penalties-for-child/25907/ Mon, 16 Jan 2006 00:00:00 EST In the wake of the slaying of 7-year-old Nixzmary Brown, state legislators yesterday called for stiffer penalties for child murderers and demanded the reform of the Administration for Children's Services. "What happened to little Nixzmary Brown is an abomination," Assemblywoman Naomi Rivera said at a news conference in the Bronx. "I am not sure who is to be held more at fault - her parents, whose repeated abuse of their own daughter is a reprehensible crime beyond belief, or the Administration... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/former-columbia-student-massads-bullying-anti/25831/ Fri, 13 Jan 2006 00:00:00 EST A former Columbia University graduate student, Anat Malkin, is alleging that Joseph Massad, who emerged as a leading subject in the investigation of a series of student complaints at the school, bullied her in class and contributed to a biased, anti-Israel atmosphere that led her to withdraw from her Middle Eastern studies program after two years. Mr. Massad, an assistant professor of Middle Eastern studies at Columbia, is slated to return from a sabbatical in time for the first day of spring... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/one-columbia-faculty-vetoed-saudi-junket/25721/ Thu, 12 Jan 2006 00:00:00 EST The faculty of Columbia's Graduate School of Journalism voted not to send a professor along on a trip to Saudi Arabia largely paid for by the kingdom's state-owned oil company, viewing it as a "propaganda junket" that would have set a poor ethical example for students. Other Columbia professors and schools apparently had a different standard. As The New York Sun reported yesterday, the dean of Columbia's School of International and Public Affairs, Lisa Anderson, went along on the trip, just... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/columbia-dean-admits-taking-saudi-junket/25658/ Wed, 11 Jan 2006 00:00:00 EST Months before a Columbia University dean was named to a special committee convened to investigate student complaints about professors' hostility to Israel, the dean took a trip to Saudi Arabia that she acknowledges was "largely" paid for by Saudi Aramco, the kingdom-owned oil company. The dean, Lisa Anderson of Columbia's School of International and Public Affairs, was one of five members of the committee named in December 2004. The committee for the most part cleared the accused scholars of... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/weiner-to-introduce-bill-to-limit-areas-eligible/25354/ Thu, 5 Jan 2006 00:00:00 EST More than half of all Americans now live in areas eligible to apply for federal grants originally meant to protect high-threat urban areas from terrorism, Rep. Anthony Weiner said yesterday. He pledged to introduce legislation to reduce the number of areas eligible. "What we need to do is get this high threat urban area initiative back to focusing on high-threat urban areas," Mr. Weiner, a Democrat who represents parts of Brooklyn and Queens, said at a news conference in Manhattan yesterday... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/council-members-push-for-more-individual/25302/ Wed, 4 Jan 2006 00:00:00 EST With the support of more than a dozen City Council members, the Citizens Union yesterday released a report proposing reforms that it said would make the council's actions more transparent and shift power to individual members and committees. Council members David Yassky and Gale Brewer joined the watchdog group's president, Dick Dadey, and its director of public policy and advocacy, Douglas Israel, in announcing the report yesterday at a press conference at City Hall. "While there have been... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/faction-of-twu-urges-members-to-vote-against-new/25195/ Tue, 3 Jan 2006 00:00:00 EST A dissident faction on the executive board of the Transport Workers Union Local 100 broke ranks with the union president, Roger Toussaint, and urged union members to vote against the recent tentative contract agreement, which they called "a complete betrayal to labor." Two union vice presidents, Ainsley Stewart and John Mooney, and one executive board member, Martin Goodman, denounced the agreement yesterday at a press conference, saying a "secret deal" Mr. Toussaint made with the Metropolitan... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/donations-spike-after-hurricane-produced-a-lull/25094/ Thu, 29 Dec 2005 00:00:00 EST Whether it's end-of-year bookkeeping or just plain generosity around the holidays, donations to New York City's social service charities have picked up in the last few weeks. The surge follows the lull in the wake Hurricane Katrina, which caused one of the worst autumns in memory for local fund raising. "When the big mailbags came in last week, we said, 'We're back!' People around here were just jumping up and down," the executive director of City-meals-on-Wheels, Marcia Stein, told The New... ALEC MAGNET http://www.nysun.com/new-york/iraq-war-veteran-is-home-in-new-york-for-christmas/24893/ Fri, 23 Dec 2005 00:00:00 EST The Bronx is a long way from Balad, Iraq, where Staff Sergeant Janice Santiago of the Army's 77th Regional Support Command spent her last Christmas. This year she's home in New York for the holiday, to spend her first true Christmas with her 5-year-old son, Jonathan. "I cannot wait to see my son's face when he wakes up on Christmas morning and screams 'Santa!' It's like Santa Claus is going to come for me, too," she said. Sergeant Santiago, 29, returned in October from her second tour of duty...