President for hire -- aka Martin Sheen
on
Live from Iran, Film88
·
· Score: -1, Offtopic
MIAMI (Reuters) -
How do you compete with a political rival whose brother just happens to be the president of the United States? -- You do
the next best thing, and hire your own presidential connections: Actor Martin Sheen, who plays president in "The West Wing " television show.
Sheen is lending some star power to former U.S. attorney general Janet Reno 's campaign to unseat Florida Governor Jeb Bush, whose
own campaign is getting a little help from his brother.
Sheen will join Reno for three days of campaigning and fundraising in West Palm Beach, Miami, Tampa and Orlando starting on Friday,
Reno's campaign spokeswoman said.
Sheen plays President Josiah Bartlet on the Emmy Award-winning White House drama "The West Wing" and has been a longtime
supporter of Democratic candidates and liberal causes.
"This is what you have to do when you can't get a real president for your campaign," Jeb Bush's campaign spokesman Todd Harris said,
calling U.S. President George. W. Bush an "invaluable" asset to his brother's campaign.
Polls show Reno leading the race to become Florida's Democratic candidate. If she wins the September primary she will face the popular
Republican incumbent in the November general election.
The governor has been given some high-profile help from the president, who has appeared at several fundraisers in recent months for the
governor and for the Florida Republican Party.
"The fact that Janet Reno is being supported by the Hollywood liberal elite should not come as a surprise to anyone who has studied her
record," Harris said.
BEIJING (Reuters) -
Beijing's most popular newspaper has unwittingly republished a bogus story about U.S. Congress threats to
relocate to Memphis or Charlotte unless Washington builds them a new Capitol building with a retractable dome.
The source? America's celebrated spoof tabloid, the Onion.
The Beijing Evening News, which claims a circulation of 1.25 million, translated portions of the Onion's tall tale word-for-word in
the international news page of its June 3 edition.
The reprinted version of the May 29 article, which parodies Congress as a Major League Baseball squad, also copied the Onion's
would-be blueprint for a new legislative home that resembles a ballpark.
"Don't get us wrong: We love the draughty old building," the Onion jestingly quoted House Speaker Dennis Hastert saying.
"But the hard reality is, it's no longer suitable for a world-class legislative branch. The sight lines are bad, there aren't enough
concession stands or bathrooms, and the parking is miserable."
The spoof from the brazen entertainment tabloid, which dubs itself "America's finest news source", apparently took in the Evening
News.
"The story was written by one of our freelance writers," an editor at the Evening News told Reuters on Friday. "His stuff has been
pretty much reliable before."
The editor said he had received other calls from readers about the article. "They were also suspicious of the contents."
Told the story came from the Onion and was not true, the editor said, "We would first have to check that out. If it's indeed fake, I'm
sure there will be some form of correction."
OSLO (Reuters) -
A Norwegian taxi firm is scoring an offbeat success for safe sex by handing out free condoms to any client who asks.
"We've had an incredible demand. People are not shy," Paul Erik Bergmann, chairman at Horten & Borre taxi firm in south Norway, told
Reuters on Wednesday.
A sign on the back of the driver's seat reads: "Forgot condom? Ask the driver!". Bergmann said his company's 20 taxis had handed out 300
condoms in two weeks. There are no age limits and no questions asked.
"Some want to have a condom in their pocket just in case. Others need one right away," he said, adding: "They have to wait until they get
home."
Jon Hilmar Iversen, health promotion director at the Norwegian health authorities, said taxis were one of several untraditional initiatives to
crack down on sexually transmitted diseases and unwanted pregnancies.
"We want to give easy access to condoms to people where they are when they need it," Iversen said.
HONG KONG (Reuters) -
A giant goldfish which has clinched a place in the Guinness Book of Records is
about to take up ambassadorial duties, his Hong Kong breeder has said.
Bruce, who at 40 cms (15.7 inches) has been recognised by Guinness as the world's longest goldfish, is
likely to be moved from his home in southern China to a Hong Kong aquarium and then be put on display
elsewhere in the world.
Showing off the Guinness certificate, breeder Jackie Chan said the fish -- as big as a domestic cat -- has
grown more since his statistics were first lodged with the world's record keepers.
But what he tips the scales at remains a mystery. Bruce has never been weighed and Guinness discourages
weight category records for pets for fear of force-feeding.
Bruce has never left his specially designed stone tank at the fish farm owned by Chan and his brother Louis
in Dongguan, southern China, but he may soon be joining the piscine jet set.
Ornamental fish enthusiasts in Beijing, Hong Kong and Singapore have been clamouring to exhibit Bruce
since flaming orange bundle of muscle first shot to fame in January.
FISH MAY WANDER
"He will probably go first to Ocean Park, where visitors are international," said Jackie, referring to a Hong
Kong amusement park with large aquariums and a special section on goldfish.
"He won't go to Singapore so soon. There is definitely less risk involved if he is just moved to Hong Kong."
His owners, meanwhile, are scratching their heads over how best to put a financial value on the prized fish
-- especially if he should travel overseas in the future.
"It's very difficult to get insurance for him. Most insurers here are not too aware of his true value," Jackie
said.
The brothers first conceived of the plan to breed the world's longest goldfish about five years ago.
Their first experiment proved a failure after the goldfish stopped growing at about age two. Bruce, now six
months older than that, is their second try -- and his owners intend to breed him next spring.
Goldfish are believed to have originated in China, where records dating back to 300 A.D. contain references
to them. The Chinese in particular prize the brightly coloured fish as a symbol of wealth and abundance.
Goldfish breeding later spread to Japan around 1500 and then to Britain, Portugal, France and the
Netherlands in the 18th century with the flourishing of international trade.
The only other Guinness record involving goldfish is for the oldest, held by a fish called Tish.
Tish was won by a couple living in north Yorkshire, England, at a fairground stall in 1956, died at the grand
old age of 43.
Enron Field becomes Minute Maid Park
on
'Unbreakable Linux'
·
· Score: -1, Offtopic
HOUSTON (Reuters) -
What was once Enron Field has became Minute Maid Park after the Houston Astros
signed a naming rights deal aimed at shining up their image and putting money in their coffer.
Juice maker Minute Maid, a unit of soft drink giant Coca-Cola Co. of Atlanta, Georgia, agreed to pay more
than 100 million for a 28-year deal to have its brand on the downtown stadium where the Astros play baseball.
The three-year-old ballpark has now had three names.
Astros owner Drayton McLane said Minute Maid, based in Houston, met two important criteria for the team
that got burned when previous naming partner Enron Corp. went down in flames in a huge financial scandal.
"They're very stable. This was an important decision for the Astros, to have a company that represents the
values... but also has great financial stability," he told reporters in a news conference at the stadium.
And, he said, "This company is about what we represent -- it's a wholesome company."
Three years ago, Enron signed a 30-year deal worth 100 million to have the then-newly built stadium
named Enron Field.
Its name was plastered all over the ballpark until February when the Astros paid 2.1 million to buy out
Enron's contract after the energy trading giant's name became synonymous with corporate corruption and
financial failure.
Enron filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in December amid disclosures it had hidden debt and inflated profits
through shady off-the-books transactions.
The Astros dismantled the Enron signs, renamed the park Astros Field and searched for another corporate
partner to fork over big bucks to put its name in lights.
Minute Maid president Donald Knauss said the Astros deal was a first for a Coca-Cola unit.
"This is the first time the Coca-Cola Company has allowed one of its brands to be put on a stadium, so it's
big news for our organisation across the world," he said.
The contract also gives Coca-Cola "pouring rights," meaning that its soft drinks and juices will be the only
ones sold at Minute Maid Park.
The stadium is the second in big league baseball to carry a juice company's name, the other being Tropicana
Field in Tampa Bay, Florida, sponsored by Tropicana Products Inc. and home to the Tampa Bay Devil Rays.
Tropicana, a unit of Coca-Cola rival PepsiCo Inc., is the nation's largest juice maker, followed by number
two Minute Maid.
RUDYARD, Mont. (AP) -
This small town is hoping to discover which resident is downright nasty.
This summer, the north-central Montana town with the welcome sign that reads, in part, "596 nice people -- One Old Sore Head" will vote to decide who is -- officially -- the grumpiest person in town.
Results are expected to be announced in late June.
"There are some old farmers around here who have a pretty good shot at it," Jaye Dee Han, one of the event's organizers, said Tuesday. "But I think it's up for grabs."
The "election" is a good-natured effort to raise money for a local museum and memorial park. To vote, residents must pay 5, which also entitles them to a quirky pin with the town's motto on it. Additional votes, which are encouraged in this race, cost only 1.
The last official "old sore head" was Tommy Wilson, who won the title in 1985. Wilson, who Han said died about 10 years ago, took great pride in the recognition.
"He enjoyed it," Han said. "He knew it was meant in fun."
NEW YORK (Reuters) -
Philip Michael Thomas, a co-star on
the 1980s TV police drama "Miami Vice," was awarded 2.3
million by an arbitrator over the use of his likeness by a
direct marketer, the company said Wednesday.
The award ended an 8-year-old dispute with Direct marketer
Traffix Inc. over the rights to use his name and likeness.
The American Arbitration Association ordered Traffix to pay
Thomas a total of 2.3 million, the company said. Traffix said
it was reviewing the decision and its options.
Thomas portrayed Det. Ricardo Tubbs opposite actor Don
Johnson on the TV show. He later became a pitchman for a
telephone psychic network, leading to the dispute over
payments.
Traffix said Thomas claimed he was owed over 12 million,
based on a 1994 agreement over how his name and likeness were
used on television "infomercials."
A Thomas spokesperson could not immediately be reached.
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) -
For a while it looked like the
court jester was going to get the last laugh and a payday fit
for a king.
But the Kingdom of Tonga was not amused, and has now
launched a U.S. suit accusing the jester -- a former U.S. bank
employee who doubled as a royal investment adviser -- with
defrauding the government out of some 26 million.
"I hope we can get some of that money back," attorney Bruce
Ericson, Tonga's lead attorney in its suit, said on Wednesday.
Tonga's unfunny run-in with its royal jester has been big
news in the tiny Pacific island kingdom, a constitutional
monarchy where the government's annual revenue was just 41
million last year.
At the center of the controversy is Jesse Bogdonoff, a
former employee of the Bank of America who struck up a close
relationship with Tonga's King Taufa'ahau Tupou IV after
noticing that the kingdom had millions of dollars sitting in a
low-interest checking account.
Tongan officials say that Bogdonoff -- who asked for and
received the appointment as Tonga's court jester -- persuaded
the government to put him in charge of the 26.5 million Tongan
Trust Fund, which was established largely with money earned
through the sales of Tongan passports to foreigners.
FUNDS EARNED FROM SELLING PASSPORTS
Tonga, which has a population of 100,000 spread over 170
coral islands in the South Pacific around 1,250 miles (2,000
km) north of New Zealand, sold citizenship in the late 1980s to
Hong Kong residents worried about their future under Chinese
rule.
In its suit filed in U.S. District Court in San Francisco
this week, Tonga claims that Bogdonoff beat out bidders
including Wells Fargo and Merrill Lynch by promising higher
returns and lower management costs to build a fund intended to
benefit the kingdom's impoverished population.
In 1999, Bogdonoff and his company Wellness Technologies,
recommended that the fund invest some 24.5 million in three
companies: a Nevada-based purchaser of life insurance policies,
an energy start-up company and a dot-com.
But it soon became clear that the investments were not
performing as expected. The Nevada company, Millennium Asset
Management, has been dissolved, the energy company Trinity
Flywheel Power is struggling and the dot-com FilmAxis.com is in
Chapter 11 bankruptcy -- its name up for auction on the
Internet at a starting price of just 1.
"As a proximate result of Bogdonoff's negligence, the Tonga
Trust Fund has been damaged in an amount...that, at minimum,
exceeds 24.5 million," the lawsuit says.
The suit further charges Bogdonoff -- who has been
identified variously as a musician, a poet, a follower of
Japan's Soka Gakkai Buddhist organization and a peddler of
"healing" magnets -- colluded with executives in the U.S.
companies to squeeze the Tongan fund dry.
"Defendants paid themselves and their friends and business
associates millions of dollars in charges, commission and fees
which they did not disclose" to the fund, the suit said.
Altogether, the Tongan fund is seeking restitution of at
least 26.5 million along with possible punitive damages.
The sudden disappearance of so much money has sparked a
political scandal in Tonga, where officials say the fund is now
left with just 2.2 million in the till.
Two Tongan government ministers who acted as fund
trustees -- Deputy Prime Minister Tevita Tupou and Education
Minister Tutoatasi Fakafanua -- resigned after government
auditors started investigating the trust fund and the
investment.
Officials at Tonga's Consulate General in San Francisco did
not return calls Wednesday seeking comment on the scandal or
the lawsuit.
But acting Deputy Prime Minister Clive Edwards has told
Tonga's parliament that he now fears the kingdom will be a
laughing stock following its decision to plunk so much money
into such shady investment vehicles.
Bogdonoff -- who, after his royal appointment, claimed to
be the only official court jester in the world -- has kept a
low profile and did not return calls Wednesday to his northern
California home seeking comment on the case.
CLEVELAND (AP) -
The Republican Party mistakenly invited an Ohio prison inmate to a 2,500-a-plate fund-raising dinner with President Bush.
The invitation, complete with a letter from Vice President Dick Cheney , was sent to Robert Kirkpatrick at the Belmont Correctional Institution in eastern Ohio.
The letter asked Kirkpatrick to "join the president and Mrs. Bush for a private dinner here in Washington, D.C." on June 19.
Kirkpatrick, 35, was sentenced last year in Canton to nearly three years for drug possession and escape.
"I'm going to tell him that I'd be happy to attend, but he's going to have to pull some strings to get me there," Kirkpatrick said.
Spokesman Carl Forti of the National Republican Congressional Committee acknowledged Monday that the mailing was a mistake.
STEVENS POINT, Wis. (AP) -
Brandi Chastain, beware.
A Wisconsin track team could become as synonymous with the sports bra as the soccer player who stripped off her shirt at the World Cup.
The Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association disqualified the Stevens Point Area Senior High School's 800-meter relay team after one of the runners wore an illegal sports bra. The association later reinstated the team.
The team of Jackie Kropp, Molly Sprouse and Emma and Kara Tauchman won the race at Thursday's sectional meet in Ashwaubenon by 9 seconds. But a meet official disqualified them because a runner had a sports bra that was white with one-quarter-inch black trim on the straps.
WIAA rules stipulate a visible sports bra must be one solid color, either black, gray or white.
WIAA executive director Doug Chickering said the association was served with an injunction Tuesday filed on behalf of the girls' parents, who wanted to stop the state meet unless the team was reinstated.
The association's legal counsel determined the rule will need to be rewritten because it is more restrictive for girls than boys, Chickering said.
HONG KONG (Reuters) -
A Hong Kong woman lost her case for
compensation against a hair salon which she claimed made her
look like Osama bin Laden when she wanted a hairstyle like
Hollywood actress Julia Roberts.
After the judgement was handed down, she refused to leave
the Small Claims Tribunal and had to be taken away by ambulance
following a standoff of more than an hour with court staff, the
South China Morning Post reported on Thursday.
Chu Ieu complained her hair was seriously damaged by two
perms she had done at the New Idol Hair Salon last July and
August.
"Do you mean you did not get the Julia Roberts look after
the perm?" adjudicator Yuen Chun-kau asked her during the
Wednesday hearing.
"Not just that. It was like a broom. Every hair struck out
and it looked like an open umbrella which could not be shut. It
was horrible. I looked like Osama bin Laden," Chu replied.
Yuen dismissed her claim for HK50,000 (US6,410) in
compensation as she had offered no evidence to prove her hair
had been damaged. "You've only shown the court that the
hairstyle did not look good," he said.
But Chu said that Yuen was not sympathetic to her claim.
"He's bald. Of course he would not know the pain of having
damaged hair," Chu fretted, sitting on the floor of the
courtroom in protest against the judgement.
TOKYO (Reuters) -
Japanese police on Thursday arrested a
woman on the northernmost island of Hokkaido after the body of
her husband, who had been missing for five years, was found in
a discarded freezer, a police spokesman said.
The decomposed body of civil servant Hidenori Iinuma was
found the previous day by employees of a real estate company
who were trying to move the freezer, apparently abandoned on
the firm's property.
The body was clothed, doubled over to fit into the small
freezer and covered with a blanket, police said.
Police arrested Akemi Iinuma, 40, on suspicion of murder.
She had reported her husband missing in 1997.
TIRANA (Reuters) -
A revenge killing at a funeral in
Albania has angered the Roman Catholic Church for desecrating
hallowed ground but, worse, has outraged many for violating the
country's centuries-old code of blood feuds.
Army colonel Gjergj Fierza was shot dead last month at the
funeral of Geg Tollozi, a convicted killer who escaped from
prison during the anarchy of 1997 and was gunned down two weeks
ago while trying to avoid recapture.
Witnesses were quoted as saying Fierza was killed by Gjon
Tollozi to avenge the colonel's role in the killing of his
brother in the course of the police chase.
Now, the Catholic Church is refusing services to the
Tollozi family until the killer comes forward.
"Killing a man who had come to express condolences after
the funeral has never been heard of in the history of our
people. The sin of one blots us all and damages us all,"
Archbishop Angelo Massafra said in a statement from the
northern diocese of Shkoder, which includes perhaps 200,000
believers.
The fatal shots were fired moments after Tollozi's coffin
was lowered in Rrmaj cemetery, sacred not only to Catholics
because priests were executed there by the communists, but also
to Muslims and Orthdox Christians, who revere its central place
in the rebirth of worship in 1990 after 40 years of Stalinism.
VIOLATED ALL CODES
Albania is a mainly Muslim country where organized religion
was almost obliterated by official atheism during the long,
isolationist rule of the late communist dictator, Enver Hoxha.
But even under Albania's ancient cannon of laws permitting
blood feuds, a killing at a funeral is an outrage.
The code permits taking the life of a killer in revenge, under
specific circumstances, but never when the target is in a
family home or at a family gathering.
But it has been so distorted during Albania's riotous first
decade of democracy that nowadays even the children of families
involved in a feuds cannot escape the threat of death.
In the region of Shkoder alone, some 250 families are
confined within the walls of their compounds because they may
be liable to revenge for crimes committed by their kin.
LEE, Maine (AP) -
With a dozen rolls of duct tape and more than 20 hours of creative hard work, Spencer Stacey and Samantha Braziller were outfitted for the Lee Academy senior prom.
The pair's home-tailored formal wear for the dance was made entirely from the heavy-duty tape often found in toolboxes and utility drawers.
Stacey, a senior, had a three-piece black tuxedo with tails and a top hat, all trimmed in shiny silver. Every detail, down to the silver bow tie and red rose boutonniere, was made of duct tape.
Braziller, a junior, chose a long, white gown with swirling lines of silvery, sequinlike details that could pass for satin from a distance.
With the help of Braziller's parents and a friend, it took the pair more than 20 hours to make the two outfits. They estimate the cost at 75.
Stacey said they overlapped strips of duct tape and then covered the sticky backside with a layer of tape to make a sheet about the size of each pattern piece. They cut out each piece and then taped them together.
"It's a little harder to fit them (the pieces) together because they don't mold like cloth does, but it's a littler easier because there is no sewing involved," Stacey said. "If you make a mistake, you rip it out, cut it and tape it up."
Braziller figures her duct tape dress should really come in handy if it rains at the dance.
"Everyone will be complaining and I can wipe the water right off," she said.
MODESTO, Calif. (AP) -
A man landed in jail after his grandchildren showed up at school with 1,100 in counterfeit bills their grandfather had allegedly made.
School officials called police after a 7-year-old girl showed a handful of 100 bills to classmates, Stanislaus County sheriff's spokesman Tom Letras said.
The second grader and her 5-year-old brother told police they took only a few 100 bills from the pile stored in grandpa's van.
Police said they found Jose Luis Landeras on Tuesday stuffing moneymaking material down his pants.
Landeras, 42, was arrested on suspicion of making counterfeit money and spending it over the past seven months. Police said they confiscated 2,000 in phony bills.
The boy originally didn't want to talk to police because he thought he and his sister were in trouble for stealing. But police coaxed him into telling them about the money when they asked what games he and his grandfather liked to play.
The boy said his favorite game was Frogger. And his grandpa's? The "moneymaking game."
OSLO, Norway (Reuters) -
A Norwegian taxi company is
scoring an offbeat success for safe sex by handing out free
condoms to any client who asks.
"We've had an incredible demand. People are not shy," Paul
Erik Bergmann, chairman at Horten & Borre taxi firm in south
Norway, told Reuters Wednesday.
A sign on the back of the driver's seat reads: "Forgot
condom? Ask the driver!" Bergmann said his company's 20 taxis
had handed out 300 condoms in two weeks. There are no age
limits and no questions asked.
"Some want to have a condom in their pocket just in case.
Others need one right away," he said, adding: "They have to
wait until they get home."
Jon Hilmar Iversen, health promotion director at the
Norwegian health authorities, said taxis were one of several
untraditional initiatives to crack down on sexually transmitted
diseases and unwanted pregnancies.
"We want to give easy access to condoms to people where
they are when they need it," Iversen said.
OKLAHOMA CITY (Reuters) -
Oklahoma Gov. Frank Keating
Wednesday vetoed a bill that would have made the state the
first in the nation to sentence certain rapists to surgical
castration.
Keating, a Republican, said the legislation would violate
the U.S. Constitution's prohibition on cruel and unusual
punishment.
"This bill provides an unnecessary and arguably
unconstitutional punishment of surgical castration for second
offenses of the type covered by the bill," Keating said in a
brief statement to the legislators. "A more effective way of
dealing with these offenders is to make certain they remain
incarcerated."
Last month, the state's Legislature sent Keating the
measure that would have allowed judges to sentence certain
rapists to surgical castration or to "chemical castration" in
which they are forced to take medication that greatly
suppresses their sex drive.
The measure would have called for chemical castration of
sex offenders for rapes proven by DNA evidence. Under the bill,
offenders who commit sex crimes a second time could be
sentenced by a judge to the surgical removal of the testicles
by a physician.
In his response to the Legislature about the veto, Keating
noted that he had signed a bill that allowed for repeat sex
offenders to be given life in prison without parole.
"With this legislation Oklahoma is making a very strong
statement that those who rape and prey and commit repeated
sexual offenses will spend the rest of their lives in prison,"
Keating said, adding that was a more sensible measure than the
castration legislation.
MEXICO CITY (Reuters) -
It was a tasty heist while it
lasted.
For four straight mornings, a thief with a sweet tooth
rushed into a pastry shop in Mexico City and held up the duty
employee at knifepoint before making off with a chocolate cake.
His mistake, however, was to pounce every day at 8 a.m.
sharp. So, on Tuesday, the "Azteca" pastry shop's manager
called in the police a few minutes ahead of time and they
nabbed the thief as he tried to pull off the cake heist for a
fifth straight day.
"He arrived at the pastry shop armed with a knife and again
demanded his cake from the employee, but when he tried to
escape he was arrested by the police," Mexico City's police
department said in a statement.
It said the thief, identified as Evaristo Perez, and the
chocolate cake were then both handed over to judicial
authorities.
SMELTERVILLE, Idaho (AP) -
The alleged burglar of the Lookout Ski Shop in Kellogg forgot a key element that made the investigation easy, Shoshone County authorities said.
He left behind the key to his post office box.
Jesse W. Murphy, 21, was booked into jail Tuesday on a charge of burglary in the break-in early that morning, sheriff's Detective Mitch Alexander said.
A backpack left at the scene contained a set of keys, including one for the post office box.
Alexander and Pinehurst Police Chief Brad Kitchen determined who had the box and headed to Murphy's home in Smelterville. Alexander said the next clue was at their feet.
"There was a price tag for a snowboard with the regular price and sale price laying right at the foot of the front door," Alexander said. "It was the same type of tag I had seen in the shop while we were processing the scene."
A group of graduating high school students came up with a senior prank that really threw everyone for a loop -- they decided to be nice to people.
Several seniors at Holland Christian High School took over lawn-maintenance duties from school employees Tuesday, washing windows and planting flowers. They also handed out Kool-Aid and lollipops to bewildered fellow students.
About a dozen seniors arrived at the school riding lawn tractors, armed with weed trimmers and hoses, The Holland Sentinel reported. They drove a ceremonial lap around the school grounds before the got down to the mowing.
"For the past so many years, it's been the same thing -- water balloons and being mean to underclassmen. Nothing real original," said Chad Brouwer from atop his tractor. "We're just trying to do a nice senior prank, but something that will get us noticed."
The anti-prank was a surprise to most of the school's staff members, including principal Tim Hoeksema, who found it to be a refreshing change. Schools routinely suffered thousands of dollars worth of damage from overzealous seniors whose ideas for pranks include vandalism.
"I thought it was pretty awesome what these kids did," Hoeksema said. "It's a pretty good reflection of what these students have done here for four years.
Cheese-flavored Yasser Arafat potato chips -- five cents a bag.
Vendors report brisk sales of the new product. The maker of the chips says it donates five cents -- 25 pisaters -- to the "Palestinian cause" for every 50 packages sold.
The chips are bagged in Palestinian colors -- green, red, black and white -- and carry the likeness of a rotund and wide-eyed Arafat, saluting with one hand and holding a Palestinian flag in the other. He's dressed in his trademark military fatigues and black-and-white checked headgear.
Shopkeepers say the Arafat chips, named Abu Ammar -- the Palestinian leader's nom de guerre, are considerably outselling another new brand, The Hero, which hit store shelves earlier this month. The packaging for that brand pictures a schoolboy holding a stone in his right hand and books in the other as he confronts an Israeli tank.
"There's no one who doesn't love Abu Ammar," said Iman Mohammed Darwish, a 12-year-old girl. "I like the taste, and I want to help the Palestinians."
"I sell at least three boxes (150 bags) of Abu Ammar daily," said Fatma Abdel-Ghani, a shopkeeper in the Cairo suburb of Thakanat Al-Maadi as she carefully placed boxes of Abu Ammar above those containing The Hero and other brands of chips.
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict that erupted 20 months ago has captivated Egyptians of all social classes and has spawned movies and songs by pop stars in support of Arafat's cause. Most trade and professional unions have collected money, food and medicine for Palestinians.
As newspapers and television broadcasts have been dominated by the conflict, university students staged anti-Israeli demonstrations nearly every day and called on President Hosni Mubarak's government to break diplomatic relations with Israel.
The Arafat brand chips are produced by Al-Jawhara Co. for International Industries. The back of each bag reads: "The more you buy, the more you build."
CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) -
A former Sissonville High School student who was suspended for trying to start an anarchy club is dropping her lawsuit against the Kanawha County Board of Education.
Katie Sierra, 15, plans to travel and is considering moving out of state. She will not be in Charleston when her case is scheduled to go to trial this summer in Kanawha County Circuit Court, Erik Engle, the school board's lawyer, said Wednesday.
Sierra's lawyer, Roger Forman, said he could not comment on her whereabouts.
Engle said board members are glad that Forman filed a petition to dismiss the lawsuit. However, Engle said board members are disappointed they will not be able to present their side to a jury.
Sierra was suspended in October for trying to start the anarchy club and for wearing T-shirts with messages opposing U.S. military action in Afghanistan.
Sierra's mother, Amy Sierra, withdrew her daughter from school last fall after the girl reported being shoved and elbowed in the back. Sierra has been studying at home through a computer-learning program paid for by the county school system.
The director of the state chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union , which championed Sierra's cause, praised Sierra's efforts.
"We continue to believe that the school violated Katie's First Amendment rights," ACLU Executive Director Andrew Schneider said Wednesday. "But we understand and respect the Sierra family's wishes in this very personal decision."
Forman's petition asks Kanawha County Circuit Judge James Stucky to dismiss the lawsuit without prejudice, which would allow the case to be reopened. The school board has asked that the case be dismissed with prejudice, which would bar further action.
Stucky is set to hear arguments on the petition June 21.
"This issue is one that can and will recur. This isn't a problem that is by any means resolved," Forman said. "We are talking about some very fundamental constitutional issues of free speech here."
Engle said the board does not want the case revived.
"After what they've gone through to bring this case along, it doesn't seem fair that it would be dismissed just so they could just bring it back when it was more convenient," Engle said. "This needs to be put to rest."
NEW BLOOMFIELD, Pa. (AP) -
Dave Gaskell is so finicky about how his hair is cut that he commutes 500 miles to his barber.
About once a month since he started working for US Airways in September, Gaskell boards a plane in Cincinnati, rents a car and gets a haircut from Donald Stoops Jr. in New Bloomfield in central Pennsylvania.
"Why not?" said Gaskell, 54. "He gives a great haircut. I'm kind of particular about haircuts."
Gaskell, who retired from a 30-year teaching career last year, left Cincinnati around 6 a.m. Tuesday. Four hours later, his gray locks were being snipped at Stoops Barber Shop.
He's been going to Stoops for decades. Stoops' father, Donald Sr., cut Gaskell's hair when Gaskell was a cadet at Carson Long Military Institute in New Bloomfield.
"I have yet to find another place that cuts hair like I like it," said Gaskell, who served 17 years in the military and likes his hair cropped just a certain way.
As a US Airways ramp agent, Gaskell's plane travel is cheap -- he pays just 80 a year for unlimited flights. He said he's flown to Orlando, Fla., and Seattle just for lunch.
To Stoops, who has been cutting hair since 1955, Gaskell's trips aren't unusual. Customers return from South Carolina and California for haircuts and good conversation -- all for 5, he said.
"You'd be surprised where people come from," Stoops said.
Slashdot Mirror
Sheen is lending some star power to former U.S. attorney general Janet Reno 's campaign to unseat Florida Governor Jeb Bush, whose own campaign is getting a little help from his brother.
Sheen will join Reno for three days of campaigning and fundraising in West Palm Beach, Miami, Tampa and Orlando starting on Friday, Reno's campaign spokeswoman said.
Sheen plays President Josiah Bartlet on the Emmy Award-winning White House drama "The West Wing" and has been a longtime supporter of Democratic candidates and liberal causes.
"This is what you have to do when you can't get a real president for your campaign," Jeb Bush's campaign spokesman Todd Harris said, calling U.S. President George. W. Bush an "invaluable" asset to his brother's campaign.
Polls show Reno leading the race to become Florida's Democratic candidate. If she wins the September primary she will face the popular Republican incumbent in the November general election.
The governor has been given some high-profile help from the president, who has appeared at several fundraisers in recent months for the governor and for the Florida Republican Party.
"The fact that Janet Reno is being supported by the Hollywood liberal elite should not come as a surprise to anyone who has studied her record," Harris said.
The source? America's celebrated spoof tabloid, the Onion.
The Beijing Evening News, which claims a circulation of 1.25 million, translated portions of the Onion's tall tale word-for-word in the international news page of its June 3 edition.
The reprinted version of the May 29 article, which parodies Congress as a Major League Baseball squad, also copied the Onion's would-be blueprint for a new legislative home that resembles a ballpark.
"Don't get us wrong: We love the draughty old building," the Onion jestingly quoted House Speaker Dennis Hastert saying.
"But the hard reality is, it's no longer suitable for a world-class legislative branch. The sight lines are bad, there aren't enough concession stands or bathrooms, and the parking is miserable."
The spoof from the brazen entertainment tabloid, which dubs itself "America's finest news source", apparently took in the Evening News.
"The story was written by one of our freelance writers," an editor at the Evening News told Reuters on Friday. "His stuff has been pretty much reliable before."
The editor said he had received other calls from readers about the article. "They were also suspicious of the contents."
Told the story came from the Onion and was not true, the editor said, "We would first have to check that out. If it's indeed fake, I'm sure there will be some form of correction."
"We've had an incredible demand. People are not shy," Paul Erik Bergmann, chairman at Horten & Borre taxi firm in south Norway, told Reuters on Wednesday.
A sign on the back of the driver's seat reads: "Forgot condom? Ask the driver!". Bergmann said his company's 20 taxis had handed out 300 condoms in two weeks. There are no age limits and no questions asked.
"Some want to have a condom in their pocket just in case. Others need one right away," he said, adding: "They have to wait until they get home."
Jon Hilmar Iversen, health promotion director at the Norwegian health authorities, said taxis were one of several untraditional initiatives to crack down on sexually transmitted diseases and unwanted pregnancies.
"We want to give easy access to condoms to people where they are when they need it," Iversen said.
Bruce, who at 40 cms (15.7 inches) has been recognised by Guinness as the world's longest goldfish, is likely to be moved from his home in southern China to a Hong Kong aquarium and then be put on display elsewhere in the world.
Showing off the Guinness certificate, breeder Jackie Chan said the fish -- as big as a domestic cat -- has grown more since his statistics were first lodged with the world's record keepers.
But what he tips the scales at remains a mystery. Bruce has never been weighed and Guinness discourages weight category records for pets for fear of force-feeding.
Bruce has never left his specially designed stone tank at the fish farm owned by Chan and his brother Louis in Dongguan, southern China, but he may soon be joining the piscine jet set.
Ornamental fish enthusiasts in Beijing, Hong Kong and Singapore have been clamouring to exhibit Bruce since flaming orange bundle of muscle first shot to fame in January.
FISH MAY WANDER
"He will probably go first to Ocean Park, where visitors are international," said Jackie, referring to a Hong Kong amusement park with large aquariums and a special section on goldfish.
"He won't go to Singapore so soon. There is definitely less risk involved if he is just moved to Hong Kong."
His owners, meanwhile, are scratching their heads over how best to put a financial value on the prized fish -- especially if he should travel overseas in the future.
"It's very difficult to get insurance for him. Most insurers here are not too aware of his true value," Jackie said.
The brothers first conceived of the plan to breed the world's longest goldfish about five years ago.
Their first experiment proved a failure after the goldfish stopped growing at about age two. Bruce, now six months older than that, is their second try -- and his owners intend to breed him next spring.
Goldfish are believed to have originated in China, where records dating back to 300 A.D. contain references to them. The Chinese in particular prize the brightly coloured fish as a symbol of wealth and abundance.
Goldfish breeding later spread to Japan around 1500 and then to Britain, Portugal, France and the Netherlands in the 18th century with the flourishing of international trade.
The only other Guinness record involving goldfish is for the oldest, held by a fish called Tish.
Tish was won by a couple living in north Yorkshire, England, at a fairground stall in 1956, died at the grand old age of 43.
Juice maker Minute Maid, a unit of soft drink giant Coca-Cola Co. of Atlanta, Georgia, agreed to pay more than 100 million for a 28-year deal to have its brand on the downtown stadium where the Astros play baseball.
The three-year-old ballpark has now had three names.
Astros owner Drayton McLane said Minute Maid, based in Houston, met two important criteria for the team that got burned when previous naming partner Enron Corp. went down in flames in a huge financial scandal.
"They're very stable. This was an important decision for the Astros, to have a company that represents the values ... but also has great financial stability," he told reporters in a news conference at the stadium.
And, he said, "This company is about what we represent -- it's a wholesome company."
Three years ago, Enron signed a 30-year deal worth 100 million to have the then-newly built stadium named Enron Field.
Its name was plastered all over the ballpark until February when the Astros paid 2.1 million to buy out Enron's contract after the energy trading giant's name became synonymous with corporate corruption and financial failure.
Enron filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in December amid disclosures it had hidden debt and inflated profits through shady off-the-books transactions.
The Astros dismantled the Enron signs, renamed the park Astros Field and searched for another corporate partner to fork over big bucks to put its name in lights.
Minute Maid president Donald Knauss said the Astros deal was a first for a Coca-Cola unit.
"This is the first time the Coca-Cola Company has allowed one of its brands to be put on a stadium, so it's big news for our organisation across the world," he said.
The contract also gives Coca-Cola "pouring rights," meaning that its soft drinks and juices will be the only ones sold at Minute Maid Park.
The stadium is the second in big league baseball to carry a juice company's name, the other being Tropicana Field in Tampa Bay, Florida, sponsored by Tropicana Products Inc. and home to the Tampa Bay Devil Rays.
Tropicana, a unit of Coca-Cola rival PepsiCo Inc., is the nation's largest juice maker, followed by number two Minute Maid.
This summer, the north-central Montana town with the welcome sign that reads, in part, "596 nice people -- One Old Sore Head" will vote to decide who is -- officially -- the grumpiest person in town.
Results are expected to be announced in late June.
"There are some old farmers around here who have a pretty good shot at it," Jaye Dee Han, one of the event's organizers, said Tuesday. "But I think it's up for grabs."
The "election" is a good-natured effort to raise money for a local museum and memorial park. To vote, residents must pay 5, which also entitles them to a quirky pin with the town's motto on it. Additional votes, which are encouraged in this race, cost only 1.
The last official "old sore head" was Tommy Wilson, who won the title in 1985. Wilson, who Han said died about 10 years ago, took great pride in the recognition.
"He enjoyed it," Han said. "He knew it was meant in fun."
And if his predecessor doesn't share that?
"Well, that would just seal it," Han said.
The American Arbitration Association ordered Traffix to pay Thomas a total of 2.3 million, the company said. Traffix said it was reviewing the decision and its options.
Thomas portrayed Det. Ricardo Tubbs opposite actor Don Johnson on the TV show. He later became a pitchman for a telephone psychic network, leading to the dispute over payments.
Traffix said Thomas claimed he was owed over 12 million, based on a 1994 agreement over how his name and likeness were used on television "infomercials."
A Thomas spokesperson could not immediately be reached.
But the Kingdom of Tonga was not amused, and has now launched a U.S. suit accusing the jester -- a former U.S. bank employee who doubled as a royal investment adviser -- with defrauding the government out of some 26 million.
"I hope we can get some of that money back," attorney Bruce Ericson, Tonga's lead attorney in its suit, said on Wednesday.
Tonga's unfunny run-in with its royal jester has been big news in the tiny Pacific island kingdom, a constitutional monarchy where the government's annual revenue was just 41 million last year.
At the center of the controversy is Jesse Bogdonoff, a former employee of the Bank of America who struck up a close relationship with Tonga's King Taufa'ahau Tupou IV after noticing that the kingdom had millions of dollars sitting in a low-interest checking account.
Tongan officials say that Bogdonoff -- who asked for and received the appointment as Tonga's court jester -- persuaded the government to put him in charge of the 26.5 million Tongan Trust Fund, which was established largely with money earned through the sales of Tongan passports to foreigners.
FUNDS EARNED FROM SELLING PASSPORTS
Tonga, which has a population of 100,000 spread over 170 coral islands in the South Pacific around 1,250 miles (2,000 km) north of New Zealand, sold citizenship in the late 1980s to Hong Kong residents worried about their future under Chinese rule.
In its suit filed in U.S. District Court in San Francisco this week, Tonga claims that Bogdonoff beat out bidders including Wells Fargo and Merrill Lynch by promising higher returns and lower management costs to build a fund intended to benefit the kingdom's impoverished population.
In 1999, Bogdonoff and his company Wellness Technologies, recommended that the fund invest some 24.5 million in three companies: a Nevada-based purchaser of life insurance policies, an energy start-up company and a dot-com.
But it soon became clear that the investments were not performing as expected. The Nevada company, Millennium Asset Management, has been dissolved, the energy company Trinity Flywheel Power is struggling and the dot-com FilmAxis.com is in Chapter 11 bankruptcy -- its name up for auction on the Internet at a starting price of just 1.
"As a proximate result of Bogdonoff's negligence, the Tonga Trust Fund has been damaged in an amount...that, at minimum, exceeds 24.5 million," the lawsuit says.
The suit further charges Bogdonoff -- who has been identified variously as a musician, a poet, a follower of Japan's Soka Gakkai Buddhist organization and a peddler of "healing" magnets -- colluded with executives in the U.S. companies to squeeze the Tongan fund dry.
"Defendants paid themselves and their friends and business associates millions of dollars in charges, commission and fees which they did not disclose" to the fund, the suit said.
Altogether, the Tongan fund is seeking restitution of at least 26.5 million along with possible punitive damages.
The sudden disappearance of so much money has sparked a political scandal in Tonga, where officials say the fund is now left with just 2.2 million in the till.
Two Tongan government ministers who acted as fund trustees -- Deputy Prime Minister Tevita Tupou and Education Minister Tutoatasi Fakafanua -- resigned after government auditors started investigating the trust fund and the investment.
Officials at Tonga's Consulate General in San Francisco did not return calls Wednesday seeking comment on the scandal or the lawsuit.
But acting Deputy Prime Minister Clive Edwards has told Tonga's parliament that he now fears the kingdom will be a laughing stock following its decision to plunk so much money into such shady investment vehicles.
Bogdonoff -- who, after his royal appointment, claimed to be the only official court jester in the world -- has kept a low profile and did not return calls Wednesday to his northern California home seeking comment on the case.
The invitation, complete with a letter from Vice President Dick Cheney , was sent to Robert Kirkpatrick at the Belmont Correctional Institution in eastern Ohio.
The letter asked Kirkpatrick to "join the president and Mrs. Bush for a private dinner here in Washington, D.C." on June 19.
Kirkpatrick, 35, was sentenced last year in Canton to nearly three years for drug possession and escape.
"I'm going to tell him that I'd be happy to attend, but he's going to have to pull some strings to get me there," Kirkpatrick said.
Spokesman Carl Forti of the National Republican Congressional Committee acknowledged Monday that the mailing was a mistake.
A Wisconsin track team could become as synonymous with the sports bra as the soccer player who stripped off her shirt at the World Cup.
The Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association disqualified the Stevens Point Area Senior High School's 800-meter relay team after one of the runners wore an illegal sports bra. The association later reinstated the team.
The team of Jackie Kropp, Molly Sprouse and Emma and Kara Tauchman won the race at Thursday's sectional meet in Ashwaubenon by 9 seconds. But a meet official disqualified them because a runner had a sports bra that was white with one-quarter-inch black trim on the straps.
WIAA rules stipulate a visible sports bra must be one solid color, either black, gray or white.
WIAA executive director Doug Chickering said the association was served with an injunction Tuesday filed on behalf of the girls' parents, who wanted to stop the state meet unless the team was reinstated.
The association's legal counsel determined the rule will need to be rewritten because it is more restrictive for girls than boys, Chickering said.
After the judgement was handed down, she refused to leave the Small Claims Tribunal and had to be taken away by ambulance following a standoff of more than an hour with court staff, the South China Morning Post reported on Thursday.
Chu Ieu complained her hair was seriously damaged by two perms she had done at the New Idol Hair Salon last July and August.
"Do you mean you did not get the Julia Roberts look after the perm?" adjudicator Yuen Chun-kau asked her during the Wednesday hearing.
"Not just that. It was like a broom. Every hair struck out and it looked like an open umbrella which could not be shut. It was horrible. I looked like Osama bin Laden," Chu replied.
Yuen dismissed her claim for HK50,000 (US6,410) in compensation as she had offered no evidence to prove her hair had been damaged. "You've only shown the court that the hairstyle did not look good," he said.
But Chu said that Yuen was not sympathetic to her claim.
"He's bald. Of course he would not know the pain of having damaged hair," Chu fretted, sitting on the floor of the courtroom in protest against the judgement.
The decomposed body of civil servant Hidenori Iinuma was found the previous day by employees of a real estate company who were trying to move the freezer, apparently abandoned on the firm's property.
The body was clothed, doubled over to fit into the small freezer and covered with a blanket, police said.
Police arrested Akemi Iinuma, 40, on suspicion of murder. She had reported her husband missing in 1997.
Army colonel Gjergj Fierza was shot dead last month at the funeral of Geg Tollozi, a convicted killer who escaped from prison during the anarchy of 1997 and was gunned down two weeks ago while trying to avoid recapture.
Witnesses were quoted as saying Fierza was killed by Gjon Tollozi to avenge the colonel's role in the killing of his brother in the course of the police chase.
Now, the Catholic Church is refusing services to the Tollozi family until the killer comes forward.
"Killing a man who had come to express condolences after the funeral has never been heard of in the history of our people. The sin of one blots us all and damages us all," Archbishop Angelo Massafra said in a statement from the northern diocese of Shkoder, which includes perhaps 200,000 believers.
The fatal shots were fired moments after Tollozi's coffin was lowered in Rrmaj cemetery, sacred not only to Catholics because priests were executed there by the communists, but also to Muslims and Orthdox Christians, who revere its central place in the rebirth of worship in 1990 after 40 years of Stalinism.
VIOLATED ALL CODES
Albania is a mainly Muslim country where organized religion was almost obliterated by official atheism during the long, isolationist rule of the late communist dictator, Enver Hoxha.
But even under Albania's ancient cannon of laws permitting blood feuds, a killing at a funeral is an outrage. The code permits taking the life of a killer in revenge, under specific circumstances, but never when the target is in a family home or at a family gathering.
But it has been so distorted during Albania's riotous first decade of democracy that nowadays even the children of families involved in a feuds cannot escape the threat of death.
In the region of Shkoder alone, some 250 families are confined within the walls of their compounds because they may be liable to revenge for crimes committed by their kin.
The pair's home-tailored formal wear for the dance was made entirely from the heavy-duty tape often found in toolboxes and utility drawers.
Stacey, a senior, had a three-piece black tuxedo with tails and a top hat, all trimmed in shiny silver. Every detail, down to the silver bow tie and red rose boutonniere, was made of duct tape.
Braziller, a junior, chose a long, white gown with swirling lines of silvery, sequinlike details that could pass for satin from a distance.
With the help of Braziller's parents and a friend, it took the pair more than 20 hours to make the two outfits. They estimate the cost at 75.
Stacey said they overlapped strips of duct tape and then covered the sticky backside with a layer of tape to make a sheet about the size of each pattern piece. They cut out each piece and then taped them together.
"It's a little harder to fit them (the pieces) together because they don't mold like cloth does, but it's a littler easier because there is no sewing involved," Stacey said. "If you make a mistake, you rip it out, cut it and tape it up."
Braziller figures her duct tape dress should really come in handy if it rains at the dance.
"Everyone will be complaining and I can wipe the water right off," she said.
School officials called police after a 7-year-old girl showed a handful of 100 bills to classmates, Stanislaus County sheriff's spokesman Tom Letras said.
The second grader and her 5-year-old brother told police they took only a few 100 bills from the pile stored in grandpa's van.
Police said they found Jose Luis Landeras on Tuesday stuffing moneymaking material down his pants.
Landeras, 42, was arrested on suspicion of making counterfeit money and spending it over the past seven months. Police said they confiscated 2,000 in phony bills.
The boy originally didn't want to talk to police because he thought he and his sister were in trouble for stealing. But police coaxed him into telling them about the money when they asked what games he and his grandfather liked to play.
The boy said his favorite game was Frogger. And his grandpa's? The "moneymaking game."
"We've had an incredible demand. People are not shy," Paul Erik Bergmann, chairman at Horten & Borre taxi firm in south Norway, told Reuters Wednesday.
A sign on the back of the driver's seat reads: "Forgot condom? Ask the driver!" Bergmann said his company's 20 taxis had handed out 300 condoms in two weeks. There are no age limits and no questions asked.
"Some want to have a condom in their pocket just in case. Others need one right away," he said, adding: "They have to wait until they get home."
Jon Hilmar Iversen, health promotion director at the Norwegian health authorities, said taxis were one of several untraditional initiatives to crack down on sexually transmitted diseases and unwanted pregnancies.
"We want to give easy access to condoms to people where they are when they need it," Iversen said.
Keating, a Republican, said the legislation would violate the U.S. Constitution's prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment.
"This bill provides an unnecessary and arguably unconstitutional punishment of surgical castration for second offenses of the type covered by the bill," Keating said in a brief statement to the legislators. "A more effective way of dealing with these offenders is to make certain they remain incarcerated."
Last month, the state's Legislature sent Keating the measure that would have allowed judges to sentence certain rapists to surgical castration or to "chemical castration" in which they are forced to take medication that greatly suppresses their sex drive.
The measure would have called for chemical castration of sex offenders for rapes proven by DNA evidence. Under the bill, offenders who commit sex crimes a second time could be sentenced by a judge to the surgical removal of the testicles by a physician.
In his response to the Legislature about the veto, Keating noted that he had signed a bill that allowed for repeat sex offenders to be given life in prison without parole.
"With this legislation Oklahoma is making a very strong statement that those who rape and prey and commit repeated sexual offenses will spend the rest of their lives in prison," Keating said, adding that was a more sensible measure than the castration legislation.
For four straight mornings, a thief with a sweet tooth rushed into a pastry shop in Mexico City and held up the duty employee at knifepoint before making off with a chocolate cake.
His mistake, however, was to pounce every day at 8 a.m. sharp. So, on Tuesday, the "Azteca" pastry shop's manager called in the police a few minutes ahead of time and they nabbed the thief as he tried to pull off the cake heist for a fifth straight day.
"He arrived at the pastry shop armed with a knife and again demanded his cake from the employee, but when he tried to escape he was arrested by the police," Mexico City's police department said in a statement.
It said the thief, identified as Evaristo Perez, and the chocolate cake were then both handed over to judicial authorities.
He left behind the key to his post office box.
Jesse W. Murphy, 21, was booked into jail Tuesday on a charge of burglary in the break-in early that morning, sheriff's Detective Mitch Alexander said.
A backpack left at the scene contained a set of keys, including one for the post office box.
Alexander and Pinehurst Police Chief Brad Kitchen determined who had the box and headed to Murphy's home in Smelterville. Alexander said the next clue was at their feet.
"There was a price tag for a snowboard with the regular price and sale price laying right at the foot of the front door," Alexander said. "It was the same type of tag I had seen in the shop while we were processing the scene."
Several seniors at Holland Christian High School took over lawn-maintenance duties from school employees Tuesday, washing windows and planting flowers. They also handed out Kool-Aid and lollipops to bewildered fellow students.
About a dozen seniors arrived at the school riding lawn tractors, armed with weed trimmers and hoses, The Holland Sentinel reported. They drove a ceremonial lap around the school grounds before the got down to the mowing.
"For the past so many years, it's been the same thing -- water balloons and being mean to underclassmen. Nothing real original," said Chad Brouwer from atop his tractor. "We're just trying to do a nice senior prank, but something that will get us noticed."
The anti-prank was a surprise to most of the school's staff members, including principal Tim Hoeksema, who found it to be a refreshing change. Schools routinely suffered thousands of dollars worth of damage from overzealous seniors whose ideas for pranks include vandalism.
"I thought it was pretty awesome what these kids did," Hoeksema said. "It's a pretty good reflection of what these students have done here for four years.
Vendors report brisk sales of the new product. The maker of the chips says it donates five cents -- 25 pisaters -- to the "Palestinian cause" for every 50 packages sold.
The chips are bagged in Palestinian colors -- green, red, black and white -- and carry the likeness of a rotund and wide-eyed Arafat, saluting with one hand and holding a Palestinian flag in the other. He's dressed in his trademark military fatigues and black-and-white checked headgear.
Shopkeepers say the Arafat chips, named Abu Ammar -- the Palestinian leader's nom de guerre, are considerably outselling another new brand, The Hero, which hit store shelves earlier this month. The packaging for that brand pictures a schoolboy holding a stone in his right hand and books in the other as he confronts an Israeli tank.
"There's no one who doesn't love Abu Ammar," said Iman Mohammed Darwish, a 12-year-old girl. "I like the taste, and I want to help the Palestinians."
"I sell at least three boxes (150 bags) of Abu Ammar daily," said Fatma Abdel-Ghani, a shopkeeper in the Cairo suburb of Thakanat Al-Maadi as she carefully placed boxes of Abu Ammar above those containing The Hero and other brands of chips.
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict that erupted 20 months ago has captivated Egyptians of all social classes and has spawned movies and songs by pop stars in support of Arafat's cause. Most trade and professional unions have collected money, food and medicine for Palestinians.
As newspapers and television broadcasts have been dominated by the conflict, university students staged anti-Israeli demonstrations nearly every day and called on President Hosni Mubarak's government to break diplomatic relations with Israel.
The Arafat brand chips are produced by Al-Jawhara Co. for International Industries. The back of each bag reads: "The more you buy, the more you build."
Katie Sierra, 15, plans to travel and is considering moving out of state. She will not be in Charleston when her case is scheduled to go to trial this summer in Kanawha County Circuit Court, Erik Engle, the school board's lawyer, said Wednesday.
Sierra's lawyer, Roger Forman, said he could not comment on her whereabouts.
Engle said board members are glad that Forman filed a petition to dismiss the lawsuit. However, Engle said board members are disappointed they will not be able to present their side to a jury.
Sierra was suspended in October for trying to start the anarchy club and for wearing T-shirts with messages opposing U.S. military action in Afghanistan .
Sierra's mother, Amy Sierra, withdrew her daughter from school last fall after the girl reported being shoved and elbowed in the back. Sierra has been studying at home through a computer-learning program paid for by the county school system.
The director of the state chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union , which championed Sierra's cause, praised Sierra's efforts.
"We continue to believe that the school violated Katie's First Amendment rights," ACLU Executive Director Andrew Schneider said Wednesday. "But we understand and respect the Sierra family's wishes in this very personal decision."
Forman's petition asks Kanawha County Circuit Judge James Stucky to dismiss the lawsuit without prejudice, which would allow the case to be reopened. The school board has asked that the case be dismissed with prejudice, which would bar further action.
Stucky is set to hear arguments on the petition June 21.
"This issue is one that can and will recur. This isn't a problem that is by any means resolved," Forman said. "We are talking about some very fundamental constitutional issues of free speech here."
Engle said the board does not want the case revived.
"After what they've gone through to bring this case along, it doesn't seem fair that it would be dismissed just so they could just bring it back when it was more convenient," Engle said. "This needs to be put to rest."
About once a month since he started working for US Airways in September, Gaskell boards a plane in Cincinnati, rents a car and gets a haircut from Donald Stoops Jr. in New Bloomfield in central Pennsylvania.
"Why not?" said Gaskell, 54. "He gives a great haircut. I'm kind of particular about haircuts."
Gaskell, who retired from a 30-year teaching career last year, left Cincinnati around 6 a.m. Tuesday. Four hours later, his gray locks were being snipped at Stoops Barber Shop.
He's been going to Stoops for decades. Stoops' father, Donald Sr., cut Gaskell's hair when Gaskell was a cadet at Carson Long Military Institute in New Bloomfield.
"I have yet to find another place that cuts hair like I like it," said Gaskell, who served 17 years in the military and likes his hair cropped just a certain way.
As a US Airways ramp agent, Gaskell's plane travel is cheap -- he pays just 80 a year for unlimited flights. He said he's flown to Orlando, Fla., and Seattle just for lunch.
To Stoops, who has been cutting hair since 1955, Gaskell's trips aren't unusual. Customers return from South Carolina and California for haircuts and good conversation -- all for 5, he said.
"You'd be surprised where people come from," Stoops said.