The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com
Wednesday, February 14, 2007 - 3A
NEWS BRIEFS
BAGHDAD
* Iraq to seal borders
with Syria and Iran
in crackdown
The Iraqi commander of the
Baghdad security crackdown
announced yesterday that Iraq
will close its borders with Syria
and Iran and ordered the return of
unlawfully seized homes, as part of
the drive to end the violence that
has threatened to divide the capital
along sectarian lines.
Ahead of the crackdown, anti-
American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr
fled Iraq for Iran some weeks ago
and is believed to be in Tehren
where he has family, a senior U.S.
official said yesterday.
Addressing the nation on behalf
of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki,
Lt. Gen. Abboud Gambar also said
Baghdad's nighttime curfew would
be expanded by an hour and permits
allowing civilians to carry weapons
in public would be suspended dur-
ing all of the operation, which he
suggested could last weeks.
WASHINGTON
North Korea agrees
to dismantle its
nuclear weapons
The Bush administration called
a deal to begin dismantling North
Korea's nuclear weapons program
a breakthrough, but the North's
history of broken promises kept the
celebrations to a minimum.
There was worry, too, that
accommodation of North Korea
would encourage brinksmanship
by Iran or other would-be nuclear
states.
The bargain among six nations
gives North Korea energy, food and
other aid in exchange for shutter-
ing its main nuclear reactor. It does
not expressly require the North to
give up existing weapons or test-
ing now, and the agreement does
not spell out how negotiators will
resolve issues that have derailed
previous pacts.
President Bush, who once
labeled North Korea part of an
"axis of evil," said the bargain is
a promising first step toward get-
ting rid of the North's nuclear
weapons.
DETROIT
Delphi Corp. posts
dramatic losses
Delphi Corp. said yesterday it
lost $2 billion in the third quarter,
blaming half the loss on the cost
of paying about 20,000 unionized
workers to leave the struggling
auto parts maker.
The net loss of $3.51 per share
was worse than the $788 million,
or $1.40 per share, that Delphi lost
in the same period of 2005.
The Troy-based company, which
is operating under Chapter 11 bank-
ruptcy protection, said it lost about
$1 billion to charges associated
with shrinkingits U.S. hourly work
force.
Delphi, in a filing with the Secu-
rities and Exchange Commission,
also said it lost $4.6 billion during
the first nine months of 2006, and
the company attributed $2.9 billion
of that to costs associated with the
work force reduction.
The nine-month loss was worse
than the $1.5 billion it lost in the
first nine months of 2005, accord-
ing to its filing.
NEW ORLEANS
Tornado ravages
recovering city
Eighteen months after Hur-
ricane Katrina, Stella Chambers'
modest red-brick house had finally
been repaired, and she was wait-
ing for one last utility hookup to
move back in. But the 85-year-old
woman never made it.
A tornado tore through her
neighborhood in the city's Gentil-
ly neighborhood before daybreak
yesterday, flattening her house,
ripping apartthe front-yard FEMA
trailer in which she was living, and
killing her.
At least 29 people were injured,
including Chambers' daughter,
Gail, as the twister heaped more
misery on neighborhoods still try-
ing to recover from Katrina. The
storm destroyed at least 50 FEMA
trailers and dozens of homes.
- Compiled from
Daily wire reports
200
Number of media members cre-
dentialed to cover former Mas-
sachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney's
presidential announcement in
Dearborn yesterday, The New York
Times political blog reported. More
than 600 reporters and pundits
were credentialed by Sen. Barack
Obama's staff for his presidential
announcement on Saturday.
A SHELTERED PATH
k -3
PETER SCHOTTENFELS/Daily
A stream of people makes their way from the Medical Campus across an overpass across Glen Street to a parking structure dur-
ing a snowstorm yesterday.
Al- Qaida number two
calls Bush an 'alcoholic'
CAIRO, Egypt (AP) - Al-Qaida's Bush, who is now 60, has
No. 2 said President Bush was an acknowledged he had a problem
alcoholic and a lying gambler who with drinking but gave up alcohol
wagered on Iraq and lost, accord- when he was 40 years old.
ing to a new audiotape released The 41-minute audiotape could
yesterday. not immediately be authenticated
Ayman al-Zawahri said in the but was seen by The Associated
tape that Bush has been forced to Press on a Web site commonly used
admit his failure in Iraq after he by insurgent groups and carried
was "stubborn" and repeated the the logo of the multimedia arm of
"lie, which he became addicted al-Qaida, as-Sahab.
to, that he is winning" in Iraq and The audio was accompanied by
Afghanistan. a video that showed a still picture
"Bush suffers from an addictive of al-Zawahri and featured an Eng-
personality, and was an alcoholic. lish translation of the audio at the
I don't know his present condition' bottom of the screen.
... but the one who examines his Transcripts of the audiotape
personality finds that he is addict- were first released by two U.S.
ed to two other faults _ lying and groups that track extremist mes-
gambling," al-Zawahri said in the sages, the SITE Institute and the
audiotape. IntelCenter.
university unions-
almost as good as
[remember your sweetheart!]
M University
llil Unions
TICKETS
From page IA
DEALING WITH DRIVERS
Writing tickets does not always
make Rogers the most popular per-
son on the street.
"It's not personal," she said. "I
don't know whose car I'm writing
a ticket to."
Rogers said that if she is
approached while writing a ticket,
she isn't going to tear it up.
"I don't want to make them feel
bad," she said. "I just am doing my
job."
There are some who don't appre-
ciate her line of work. Frustrated
and angry drivers often insult her.
"I have been called everything
but a child of God," she said with a
laugh. "They don't know what kind
of person Ilam. They think we're all
just parking Nazis."
Rogers said she is not out to get
anyone, though. She doesn't wait for
meters to expire or hide behind cars
to catch someone down ontheir luck.
"I have people say that I'm hid-
ing behind a meter, and if you look
at me you can see that's very hard to
do," she said with a smile.
THE REWARD
"My favorite part is some of the
people I meet," Rogers said.
Trade gap
breaks
record
again
WASHINGTON (AP) - The U.S.
trade deficit set a record for a fifth
straight year, and the imbalance
with China soared to an all-time
high as well.
TheBush administration pledged
to keep pursuing its free-trade poli-
cies, while Democrats now control-
ling Congress demanded a change
in course.
The gap between what the U.S.
sells abroad and what it imports
rose to a record $763.6 billion last
year, up 6.5 percent from the previ-
ous record of $716.7 billion in 2005,
the Commerce Department report-
ed yesterday.
For December, the deficit jumped
a bigger-than-expected 5.3 percent
to $61.2 billion.
Bush administration officials
said the wider deficits were pri-
marily a factor of faster growth
in the United States and warned
against pursuing policies that
would erect protectionist trade
barriers in this country.
"Our focus is on growing our
exports, growing our economy,
reducing our unemployment and
keeping inflation in check," Com-
merce Secretary Carlos Gutier-
rez said in an interview from New
Delhi, India.
Treasury Secretary Henry Paul-
son announced he was naming
Alan F. Holmer, a pharmaceutical
company executive and a former
trade official during the Reagan
administration, to be his deputy in
charge of a newhigh-level strategic
dialogue with China that he insti-
tuted in December.
Paulson said the next meetings
would be May 23-24 in Washington
and that he was in frequent contact
with the head of the Chinese dele-
gation, Vice Chairman Wu Yi, in an
effort to achieve results to lessen
trade tensions.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi
and 13 other top House Demo-
crats sent Bush a letter saying the
new trade figures underscored
the urgency for a course change
on trade.
"The consequences of these
persistent and massive trade defi-
cits include not only failed busi-
nesses, displaced workers, lower
real wages and rising inequality,
but also permanent devastation of
our communities," the Democrats
said.
They noted that more than 3 mil-
lion manufacturing jobs have been
lost since Bush took office, with
about one-third of those losses
attributed to the rising deficit in
manufactured goods.
The Democrats urged Bush to
pursue more cases against unfair
trade practices including a chal-
lenge before the World Trade Orga-
nization against currency practices
of both China and Japan.
Rogers has several stories about
the kind people in Ann Arbor, espe-
cially University athletes.
A few years ago, she almost towed
the car of Chris Perry, then a star
Michigan running back who now
plays for the Cincinnati Bengals. He
came running out of the building
right before his car would have been
towed but kept his cool. He called
his mom for help paying the ticket
before the car was towed.
"He was just so nice about it,"
Rogers said.
ALL IN A DAY'S WORK
Rogers writes about 100 tickets
each day.
The most she has ever written in
a day is more than 200.
Officers patrolling areas with
time-limited parking keep track
of violators by marking tires with
chalk. When an officer returns
after the posted limit, tires that are
still marked receive tickets.
Rogers prefers using sidewalk
chalk because it is bigger and easier
to see. If she runs out, though, there
is a stash of yellow Crayola black-
board chalk in the center console of
the blue Dodge Neon car that the city
provides her while she's on duty.
Chalk is also used to mark tick-
eted cars whose owners don't move
them in time.
When Rogers returns from her
rounds, she may mark certain tick-
eted cars that haven't been moved
since she wrote the citation.
If the car hasn't relocated by the
time she checks back, she can issue
another ticket for exceeding the
allowed time limit. Meters explic-
itly state that even if more coins
are added, a car may not stay in the
same spot over its given time,
Cars on city streets can't be left
in the same spot for more than 48
hours or they can be towed.
TOOLS OF THE TRADE
Officers use handheld ticket
machines made by Casio, which
replaced an antiquated version of
the machine a few months ago.
To issue a ticket, an officer enters
a vehicle's license plate number, the
make of the vehicle, the street, the
meter number and the violation
into the machine. Depending on the
violation, the officer can choose to
enter comments as well.
The handheld machine also has a
camera. An officer can take a photo
of an infraction and produce it if the
ticket is appealed.
Despite being perhaps one of
the most unwelcome sights on city
streets, Rogers said she doesn't
mind her work.
"People think I'm crazy taking
this job. But it's worked out. I like
it," Rogers said.
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