FILE - In this Jan. 29, 2012 file photo, a fan rides a zip line during the NFL Experience for Super Bowl XLVI in Indianapolis. Kids ROFL and OMG all the livelong day, but ask them to decipher the XLVI of this year's Super Bowl and you might as well be talking Greek. Roman numerals beyond the basics have largely gone the way of cursive and penmanship as a subject in the nation's schools. The New England Patriots will play the New York Giants in the Super Bowl on Feb. 5 in Indianapolis. (AP Photo/Eric Gay, File)
FILE - In this Jan. 29, 2012 file photo, a fan rides a zip line during the NFL Experience for Super Bowl XLVI in Indianapolis. Kids ROFL and OMG all the livelong day, but ask them to decipher the XLVI of this year's Super Bowl and you might as well be talking Greek. Roman numerals beyond the basics have largely gone the way of cursive and penmanship as a subject in the nation's schools. The New England Patriots will play the New York Giants in the Super Bowl on Feb. 5 in Indianapolis. (AP Photo/Eric Gay, File)
FILE - This Jan. 24, 2012 file photo shows the official football for the NFL Super Bowl XLVI, in Cleveland. Kids ROFL and OMG all the livelong day, but ask them to decipher the XLVI of this year's Super Bowl and you might as well be talking Greek. Roman numerals beyond the basics have largely gone the way of cursive and penmanship as a subject in the nation's schools. The New England Patriots will play the New York Giants in the Super Bowl on Feb. 5 in Indianapolis. (AP Photo/Tony Dejak, File)
FILE- This Wednesday, Jan. 25, 2012 file photo shows Roman numerals for Super bowl XLVI framing the Soldiers and Sailors Monument at Monument Circle as preparations continue for Super Bowl XLVI NFL football game in downtown Indianapolis. Kids ROFL all the livelong day, but ask them to decipher the XLVI of this year's Super Bowl and you might as well be talking Greek. They may know what X means, or V and I, but teaching Roman numerals beyond the basics has largely gone the way of cursive and penmanship as an in-depth endeavor at school. (AP Photo/Michael Conroy, FILE)
NEW YORK (AP) ? Kids LOL and OMG each other all the livelong day, but ask them to decipher the XLVI of this year's Super Bowl and you might as well be talking Greek.
They may know what X means, or V and I, but Roman numerals beyond the basics have largely gone the way of cursive and penmanship as a subject taught in the nation's schools.
Students in high school and junior high get a taste of the Roman system during Latin (where Latin is still taught, anyway). And they learn a few Roman numerals in history class when they study the monarchs of Europe.
But in elementary school, "Roman numerals are a minor topic," said Jeanine Brownell of the early mathematics development program at Erickson Institute, a child-development graduate school in Chicago.
That's not how Joe Horrigan remembers it.
"I went to Catholic school. I still have bruised knuckles from not learning them," said the NFL historian and spokesman for the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio.
What's wrong with good ol' 46 to describe this year's Super Bowl between the Giants and the Patriots on Sunday?
"'Number 46,' it just kind of sounds like an inventory. 'Inspected by Joe,'" said Joe, who is LX years old. "Those Roman numerals, they're almost like trophies."
Any football fan worth his weight in nachos will find a way to figure out the Super Bowl number from one year to the next, but shouldn't kids have some sense of the Romans as an actual numbering system?
"My son is in first grade and this recently came up when we were clock shopping," said Eileen Wolter of Summit, N.J. "He couldn't believe they were real numbers. They only ever get used for things like copyrights or sporting events, which in my humble opinion harkens even further back to the gladiatorial barbaric nature of things like the Super Bowl."
Gerard Michon isn't much of a football fan, either, but he keeps a close eye on Super Bowls over at Numericana.com, where he dissects math and physics and discusses the Roman system ad nauseam.
Starting with Super Bowl XLI in 2007, he has been getting an abnormal number of game-day visits from football fans with a sudden interest in Roman numerals. On the day of last year's Super Bowl XLV, so many people visited that Michon's little server crashed. When the dust cleared, he had logged 15,278 hits, more than 90 percent landing on "XLV."
"Last year was total madness," Michon said, in part "because so many people were wondering why VL isn't a correct replacement for XLV." When the Super Bowl started, the games were assigned simple Roman numerals "that everybody knows," he said. Now "it looks kind of mysterious."
The use of Roman numerals to designate Super Bowls began with game V in 1971, won by the Baltimore Colts over the Dallas Cowboys 16-13 on Jim O'Brien's 32-yard field goal with five seconds remaining. Numerals I through IV were added later for the first four Super Bowls.
"The NFL didn't model after the Olympics," said Dan Masonson, director of the league's corporate communications. Instead, he said, the Roman system was adopted to avoid any confusion that might occur because of the way the Super Bowl is held in a different year from the one in which most of the regular season is played.
Bob Moore, historian for the Kansas City Chiefs, credits the idea of using Roman numerals to Lamar Hunt, the late Chiefs owner and one of the godfathers of the modern NFL. (History also credits Hunt with coming up with the name "Super Bowl" for the big game.)
"The Roman numerals made it much more important," Moore said. "It's much more magisterial."
Or as Michon put it: Quid quid latine dictum sit, altum videtur ? "Anything stated in Latin looks important."
Linsey Knerl, who is homeschooling her five children in Tekamah, Neb., is teaching them Roman numerals, showing her oldest ? who is 13 ? how to decipher chapter numbers while reading "Oliver Twist."
"I realize that it may not seem to be the most culturally relevant thing you can teach kids these days," she said. "But if kids can get what LOL and ROFL mean, things like XXII should be a piece of cake."
NEW YORK ? In its quest to spread its stores around the world, Apple is reaching over the Atlantic to snatch the CEO of a British electronics chain to head its retail operations.
Apple Inc. said Tuesday that Dixons Retail PLC's John Browett will become its top retail executive on April 20. He will report directly to CEO Tim Cook.
Browett, 48, fills a job that opened when Ron Johnson left to become the CEO of J.C. Penney Co. in November. Johnson pioneered Apple's highly successful retail stores, known for their stark design and their Genius Bar, where Apple customers get technology advice and support.
About two-thirds of Apple's 361 stores are in the U.S. However, of the 40 stores Apple expects to open this fiscal year, three-quarters will be outside the U.S., with China being a major focus. Apple currently has stores in only 12 countries, including the U.S.
Browett has served as CEO of Dixons since 2007. During his tenure, the company continued an aggressive expansion in Europe. It has about 1,200 stores and is Europe's second-largest electronics retailer, after Germany's Media Markt.
Dixons' brands include Currys in the U.K., Elkjop in Norway, Kotsovolos in Greece, Unieuro in Italy and Electro World in Turkey and the Czech Republic.
Analysts give Browett credit for improving customer service at Dixons.
"Our retail stores are all about customer service, and John shares that commitment like no one else we've met," Cook said in a statement Tuesday.
The chain hasn't seen much financial success during his tenure, however, as it has been undercut by the recession and subsequent belt-tightening in Europe.
Dixons' sales have risen only 8 percent in the past five years, and profits are down sharply. Its stock has lost more than 90 percent of its value in that time. It fell 7.6 percent further in London trading Tuesday after news of Browett's departure.
Before Dixons, Browett held several positions at the British retailer Tesco PLC and headed its online operations.
Dixons named Sebastian James as Group CEO and Katie Bickerstaffe to the newly created role of CEO-U.K. and Ireland.
Apple's stock rose 46 cents to $453.47 in midday trading Tuesday. The day's high of $458.24 was yet another all-time high.
Apple's stores accounted for about 13 percent of the Cupertino, Calif.-based company's revenue in the fiscal year that ended in September, but employed about 60 percent of the total number of Apple workers.
Dixons has a very similar number of employees ? about 39,000 ? but has far more stores: 1,200.
ISLAMABAD ? Pakistan's former envoy to Washington says a court commision probing his alleged role in a controversial memo sent to Washington has dropped a travel ban imposed upon him.
Husain Haqqani said Monday he intended to travel to the United States to join family there.
Haqqani resigned in November and returned to Islamabad to answer allegations that he masterminded a memo sent to Washington that requested its help in reining in the Pakistani army.
The memo outraged the country's powerful army, and at the height of the scandal led to speculations it could lead to the demise of the government.
Official estimates of how much oil leaked into the Gulf of Mexico during the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster turned out to be well below the mark. Now an advocacy group has filed a complaint of misconduct to the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) against the scientist who compiled the estimates, alleging he "lowballed" the numbers after political pressure from the White House, among others.
Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) alleges that Bill Lehr of NOAA edited his report to stress estimates from a technique called particle image velocimetry, even though three scientists on the team had already concluded that the technique was seriously underestimating the flow.
Their much higher estimates were later confirmed to be roughly correct.
Lehr denies the allegation. "Absolutely nothing was done in any way to change these numbers or fudge any data," he told New Scientist.
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NASHVILLE, Tenn. ? It's time for a new stage at Ryman Auditorium, a significant moment in the history of a building known for its significant moments.
Scuffed by the heels of "The King," `'The Queen of Soul" and thousands of singers in cowboy boots, scarred by an uncountable stream of road cases and worn by six decades of music history, the Ryman's oak floorboards have reached the end of a very long, very successful run.
"That stage has had a wonderful life," said Steve Buchanan, senior vice president of media and entertainment for Gaylord Entertainment, owners of the Ryman.
The current stage is just the second in the 120-year history of the "Mother Church" after the original was installed in 1901 for a performance of the Metropolitan Opera. It was laid down in 1951 and has lasted far longer than expected. The stage was refinished during a renovation in 1993-94 and even then officials knew it would be the last resurfacing. Today it's heavily scuffed and scarred, its age easily visible from the Ryman's balcony.
The Ryman is still the building most associated with The Grand Ole Opry, though it moved to the Opry House in 1974, and has hosted a number of significant moments in American culture.
Bob Dylan and Johnny Cash stood together on those boards and changed music. Cultures clashed there too when the boo birds took on country rockers The Byrds. Today the Ryman is a much sought-after destination point for musicians of all genres and many shows take on a unique aura.
Dylan recently returned, more than 40 years after "Nashville Skyline." Taylor Swift sang there recently with her good friends, The Civil Wars. Even the heaviest of rockers get a little nostalgic, like Josh Homme of Queens of the Stone Age, who said it was an honor to get drunk while performing in the building last year.
Keith Urban, making his return from vocal surgery, will be among the last performers on the stage when the Opry plays its final winter date Friday at The Ryman. Dierks Bentley will play the last standalone concert Thursday.
As a young, aspiring performer in Nashville more than a decade ago, Bentley would run his fingers along the building's brickwork late at night as he walked home from performing on Lower Broadway, daydreaming of playing on that stage. He calls it "one of the most precious places in Nashville and in country music to me."
"The significance of that stage and who played there before me will definitely be in the back of my head all night," Bentley said in an email. "As a member of the Grand Ole Opry, I couldn't be any prouder."
That a busy venue needs a new stage is not necessarily news. The stage at the Opry's permanent home, for instance, has been changed multiple times over the years with little comment. But when the Ryman stage is replaced, officials in some sense are altering an icon that is closely watched by sometimes vocal guardians of its cultural significance.
Officials are prepared for questions. They point out the building has gone through many upgrades over the years and that each step was vital to preserving the building. Most recently the roof was replaced in 2009.
"We're not in the business of getting rid of old things just to get rid of them," Ryman general manager Sally Williams said.
They will retain an 18-inch lip of the blonde oak at the front of the stage, similar to the way the Ryman stage was commemorated in a circle of wood at the new Opry House. The rest of the stage will be stored and replaced with a medium brown Brazilian teak that will be far more durable and camera friendly.
Beneath the stage, the original hickory support beams will be kept and reinforced with concrete foundations, crossbeams and joist work that will help triple the stage's load capacity.
Work will begin Feb. 4 and continue seven days a week until Feb. 20, when rising country stars The Band Perry will make its Ryman debut with a sold-out show. Tours will continue throughout the work, allowing members of the public to watch.
Williams says she's gotten no negative feedback as word has spread because everyone understands the importance of the project.
"I think it will be interesting because I think it's obvious we're doing something ensuring that people will be coming here and having those Ryman moments in 120 years," she said.
KABUL, Afghanistan ? An Afghan woman has been strangled death, apparently by her husband, who was upset that she gave birth to a second daughter rather than the son he had hoped for, police said Monday.
It was the latest in a series of grisly examples of subjugation of women that have made headlines in Afghanistan in the past few months ? including a 15-year-old tortured and forced into prostitution by in-laws and a female rape victim who was imprisoned for adultery.
The episodes have raised the question of what will happen to the push for women's rights in Afghanistan as the international presence here shrinks along with the military drawdown. NATO forces are scheduled to pull out by the end of 2014.
In the 10 years since the ouster of the Taliban, great strides have been made for women in Afghanistan, with many attending school, working in offices and even sometimes marching in protests. But abuse and repression of women are still common, particularly in rural areas where women are still unlikely to set foot outside of the house without a burqa robe that covers them from head to toe.
The man in the latest case, Sher Mohammad, fled the Khanabad district in Kunduz province last week, about the time a neighbor found his 22-year-old wife dead in their house, said District Police Chief Sufi Habibullah. Medical examiners whom police brought to check the body said she had been strangled, Habibullah said.
The woman, named Estorai, had warned family members that her husband had repeatedly reproached her for giving birth to a daughter rather than a son and had threatened to kill her if it happened again, said Provincial women's affairs chief Nadira Ghya, who traveled to Khanabad to deal with the case. Estorai gave birth to her second daughter between two and three months ago, Ghya said. Officials did not have a family name for either Sher Mohammad or Estorai.
Police took the man's mother into custody because she appears to have collaborated in a plot to kill her daughter-in-law, Habibullah said. Ghya, who visited the man's mother in jail, said that she swears that Estorai committed suicide by hanging. Police said they found no rope and no evidence of hanging from the woman's wounds.
Boy babies are traditionally prized much more highly than girls in Afghanistan, where a son means a breadwinner and a daughter is seen as a drain on the family until she is married off. Even so, a murder over the gender of a baby would be rare and shocking if proved true.
The U.S. Embassy issued a statement Monday praising the Afghan government for recent declarations supporting women's rights in the wake of the latest abuse cases that have garnered media attention.
"The rights of women cannot be relegated to the margins of international affairs, as this issue is at the core of our national security and the security of people everywhere," the statement said. It did not address the killing of the young woman in Kunduz.
Contact: Rachel Champeau rchampeau@mednet.ucla.edu 310-794-2270 University of California - Los Angeles Health Sciences
UCLA findings point to new treatment pathways for infectious diseases
A team of UCLA scientists has found that the pathogen that causes leprosy has a remarkable ability to avoid the human immune system by inhibiting the antimicrobial responses important to our defenses.
In one of the first laboratory studies of its kind, researchers discovered that the leprosy pathogen Mycobacterium leprae was able to reduce and evade immune activity that is dependent on vitamin D, a natural hormone that plays an essential role in the body's fight against infections.
The pathogen manipulated micro-RNAs, tiny molecules made of ribonucleic acids that carry information and that help regulate genes to direct cell activity, including immune system defenses. Micro-RNAs are short RNAs that do not code information for proteins, which carry out all cell activity; rather, they bind to the RNAs that do code for proteins and block them.
Published in the Jan. 29 online edition of the journal Nature Medicine, the findings demonstrate how an infectious disease pathogen like M. leprae can use micro-RNAs to impact the immune system's fight response.
"We may find that these tiny micro-RNAs can be exploited by pathogens to weaken our immune response," said the study's first author, Dr. Philip T. Liu, an assistant professor of medicine at the Orthopaedic Hospital Research Center and in the department of dermatology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. "By better understanding how pathogens can escape our immune cells, we can design more effective therapies to boost our immune responses to these difficult to treat infections like leprosy."
Leprosy, one of the world's oldest known diseases, is a chronic infectious disease that affects the skin, the peripheral nerves, the upper respiratory tract and the eyes and can lead to disfigurement of the hands, face and feet. In 2008, approximately 249,000 new cases of leprosy were reported worldwide, according to the World Health Organization.
For the study, researchers compared the micro-RNAs in human skin lesions from two types of leprosy: tuberloid leprosy, a milder infection that is more easily contained, and lepromatous leprosy, which is more serious and causes widespread infection throughout the body.
In the lab, the scientists identified 13 micro-RNAs that differed between the two types of leprosy. The micro-RNAs that were found to be more common in lepromatous leprosy seemed to target the genes important for directing key immune system cells, including macrophages and T cells.
The team found that a particular micro-RNA, hsa-mir-21, inhibited the gene activity of the vitamin Ddependent immune pathway used to help fight infection. When researchers neutralized the activity of hsa-mir-21 in macrophages, the cells were able to kill the bacteria again.
"The leprosy pathogen was able to effectively evade the host's immune response by regulating critical immune system genes," said senior investigator Dr. Robert Modlin, UCLA's Klein Professor of Dermatology and chief of dermatology at the Geffen School of Medicine. "It's like having the enemy sending a decoy message to your combat troops and telling them to lower their weapons."
To test the significance of this micro-RNA with other infectious diseases, the researchers also introduced hsa-mir-21 to human macrophages that were then infected with tuberculosis in the lab. Researchers found that the micro-RNA similarly blocked the ability of the macrophages to kill the bacteria.
Researchers also demonstrated that immune activation of the leprosy-infected immune cells decreased the leprosy bacteria's viability four-fold but only when hsa-mir-21 activity was silenced. In fact, an over-expression of this micro-RNA blocked immune activity, resulting in a five-fold increase in bacterial viability.
"We were surprised at the devastating effects that even a single micro-RNA had on the ability of immune cells to fight the infections," Liu said.
In addition, the team showed that this micro-RNA was found in human immune cells only 18 hours after the onset of leprosy infection. The presence of the micro-RNA so early in the infection suggests it might play a role in actual disease development, the researchers said.
Further investigation of this single micro-RNA in leprosy may provide a framework for analyzing other micro-RNAs to help determine their cumulative role in regulating the immune response.
The micro-RNAs are small, and therefore it is possible to develop treatments which neutralize them, the researchers said.
"We may find that a combination of vitamin D supplementation with a genetically targeted therapy could provide an optimal treatment approach to leprosy and possibly other chronic infectious diseases," said Modlin, who also serves as vice chair for cutaneous medicine and dermatological research at UCLA and is a distinguished professor of medicine and of microbiology, immunology and molecular genetics.
"Vitamin D insufficiency has been associated with a number of infectious and autoimmune diseases, cardiovascular disease and cancers," Modlin added. "Our study indicates that micro-RNAs can alter human vitamin D responses and contribute to disease pathology."
Dr. Barry Bloom of Harvard University, who was not an author of this study but is part of the research team studying this field, agreed.
"Such a novel approach may be especially worth exploring in treatment of drug-resistant pathogens such as some forms of tuberculosis, where antimicrobial therapy is becoming increasingly problematic," Bloom said.
###
Bloom, the former dean of the faculty at Harvard's School of Public Health, is Harvard's Distinguished University Service Professor and the Jack and Joan Jacobson Professor of Public Health in the School of Public Health's department of immunology and infectious diseases and department of global health and population.
The study was funded by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and the National Institute of Arthritis, Skin and Musculoskeletal Diseases, both parts of the National Institutes of Health.
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Contact: Rachel Champeau rchampeau@mednet.ucla.edu 310-794-2270 University of California - Los Angeles Health Sciences
UCLA findings point to new treatment pathways for infectious diseases
A team of UCLA scientists has found that the pathogen that causes leprosy has a remarkable ability to avoid the human immune system by inhibiting the antimicrobial responses important to our defenses.
In one of the first laboratory studies of its kind, researchers discovered that the leprosy pathogen Mycobacterium leprae was able to reduce and evade immune activity that is dependent on vitamin D, a natural hormone that plays an essential role in the body's fight against infections.
The pathogen manipulated micro-RNAs, tiny molecules made of ribonucleic acids that carry information and that help regulate genes to direct cell activity, including immune system defenses. Micro-RNAs are short RNAs that do not code information for proteins, which carry out all cell activity; rather, they bind to the RNAs that do code for proteins and block them.
Published in the Jan. 29 online edition of the journal Nature Medicine, the findings demonstrate how an infectious disease pathogen like M. leprae can use micro-RNAs to impact the immune system's fight response.
"We may find that these tiny micro-RNAs can be exploited by pathogens to weaken our immune response," said the study's first author, Dr. Philip T. Liu, an assistant professor of medicine at the Orthopaedic Hospital Research Center and in the department of dermatology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. "By better understanding how pathogens can escape our immune cells, we can design more effective therapies to boost our immune responses to these difficult to treat infections like leprosy."
Leprosy, one of the world's oldest known diseases, is a chronic infectious disease that affects the skin, the peripheral nerves, the upper respiratory tract and the eyes and can lead to disfigurement of the hands, face and feet. In 2008, approximately 249,000 new cases of leprosy were reported worldwide, according to the World Health Organization.
For the study, researchers compared the micro-RNAs in human skin lesions from two types of leprosy: tuberloid leprosy, a milder infection that is more easily contained, and lepromatous leprosy, which is more serious and causes widespread infection throughout the body.
In the lab, the scientists identified 13 micro-RNAs that differed between the two types of leprosy. The micro-RNAs that were found to be more common in lepromatous leprosy seemed to target the genes important for directing key immune system cells, including macrophages and T cells.
The team found that a particular micro-RNA, hsa-mir-21, inhibited the gene activity of the vitamin Ddependent immune pathway used to help fight infection. When researchers neutralized the activity of hsa-mir-21 in macrophages, the cells were able to kill the bacteria again.
"The leprosy pathogen was able to effectively evade the host's immune response by regulating critical immune system genes," said senior investigator Dr. Robert Modlin, UCLA's Klein Professor of Dermatology and chief of dermatology at the Geffen School of Medicine. "It's like having the enemy sending a decoy message to your combat troops and telling them to lower their weapons."
To test the significance of this micro-RNA with other infectious diseases, the researchers also introduced hsa-mir-21 to human macrophages that were then infected with tuberculosis in the lab. Researchers found that the micro-RNA similarly blocked the ability of the macrophages to kill the bacteria.
Researchers also demonstrated that immune activation of the leprosy-infected immune cells decreased the leprosy bacteria's viability four-fold but only when hsa-mir-21 activity was silenced. In fact, an over-expression of this micro-RNA blocked immune activity, resulting in a five-fold increase in bacterial viability.
"We were surprised at the devastating effects that even a single micro-RNA had on the ability of immune cells to fight the infections," Liu said.
In addition, the team showed that this micro-RNA was found in human immune cells only 18 hours after the onset of leprosy infection. The presence of the micro-RNA so early in the infection suggests it might play a role in actual disease development, the researchers said.
Further investigation of this single micro-RNA in leprosy may provide a framework for analyzing other micro-RNAs to help determine their cumulative role in regulating the immune response.
The micro-RNAs are small, and therefore it is possible to develop treatments which neutralize them, the researchers said.
"We may find that a combination of vitamin D supplementation with a genetically targeted therapy could provide an optimal treatment approach to leprosy and possibly other chronic infectious diseases," said Modlin, who also serves as vice chair for cutaneous medicine and dermatological research at UCLA and is a distinguished professor of medicine and of microbiology, immunology and molecular genetics.
"Vitamin D insufficiency has been associated with a number of infectious and autoimmune diseases, cardiovascular disease and cancers," Modlin added. "Our study indicates that micro-RNAs can alter human vitamin D responses and contribute to disease pathology."
Dr. Barry Bloom of Harvard University, who was not an author of this study but is part of the research team studying this field, agreed.
"Such a novel approach may be especially worth exploring in treatment of drug-resistant pathogens such as some forms of tuberculosis, where antimicrobial therapy is becoming increasingly problematic," Bloom said.
###
Bloom, the former dean of the faculty at Harvard's School of Public Health, is Harvard's Distinguished University Service Professor and the Jack and Joan Jacobson Professor of Public Health in the School of Public Health's department of immunology and infectious diseases and department of global health and population.
The study was funded by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and the National Institute of Arthritis, Skin and Musculoskeletal Diseases, both parts of the National Institutes of Health.
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
MELBOURNE, Australia ? Victoria Azarenka started celebrating, then suddenly did a double-take to ask her coach, "What happened?"
The answer: She had just produced one of the most lopsided Australian Open final victories to capture a Grand Slam title and the No. 1 ranking for the first time.
Azarenka routed three-time Grand Slam winner Maria Sharapova 6-3, 6-0 in 1 hour, 22 minutes on Saturday night, winning 12 of the last 13 games after dropping her first service game and falling behind 2-0.
"It's a dream come true," she said. "I have been dreaming and working so hard to win the Grand Slam, and being No. 1 is pretty good bonus. Just the perfect ending and the perfect position to be in."
Azarenka had won 11 straight matches, including a run to the Sydney International title, and reached her first Grand Slam final. Her previous best performance at a major was a semifinal loss to Petra Kvitova at Wimbledon last year. Sharapova had all the experience, being in her sixth major final and having won three ? dating to her 2004 Wimbledon title.
But it didn't unnerve the 22-year-old Azarenka, the first woman from Belarus to win a singles major. She's also the seventh different woman to win a Grand Slam since Francesca Schiavone won the 2010 French Open, and the fifth different winner in as many majors.
Azarenka became only the third woman to earn the No. 1 spot after winning her first major title. She moved from No. 3 to No. 1 in the rankings, helped by Caroline Wozniacki's loss in the quarterfinals.
The third-seeded Azarenka set up championship point with a stunning forehand, her 14th clean winner, and sealed it when Sharapova netted a backhand.
She dropped to her knees at the baseline with her hands over her face. She got up, held her hands up and jogged over to her coach, Sam Sumyk, in the stands to celebrate.
"The best feeling, for sure," Azarenka said. "I don't know about the game. I don't know what I was doing out there. It's just pure joy what happened. I can't believe it's over."
And she paid special credit to her grandmother, "the person who inspires me the most in my life."
Azarenka has been a distinctive presence at Melbourne Park as much for her shrieks and hoots with each shot and seemingly boundless energy as for her white shorts, blue singlet and lime green head and wrist bands.
Against Sharapova, she maintained the frenetic movement that has been the hallmark of her performance in Australia, her 25th consecutive major. She won the Sydney International title last weekend and is on a 12-match winning streak ? the first player since 2004 to win a WTA tour event the week before winning a major.
"She did everything better than I did today. I had a good first couple of games, and that was about it," Sharapova said. "Then she was the one that was taking the first ball and hitting it deep and aggressive. I was always the one running around like a rabbit, you know, trying to play catch-up all the time."
Sharapova also won only three games in a 2007 final loss to Serena Williams, who also conceded only three games in the 2009 final against Dinara Safina.
When Sharapova won the first two games, there was no indication of how lopsided the match would be. Azarenka took control after holding for the first time, breaking Sharapova at love and then holding again on a three-game roll.
Sharapova held, finishing off with an ace, to level the score at 3-3 in the first set but then didn't win another game.
Azarenka started dictating the points, coming to the net at times, hitting winners from the baseline and forcing the 24-year-old Russian to the extremes on both sides of the court. Sharapova seemed barely able to move by comparison, and had 30 unforced errors in the match.
The second set was completely lopsided and lasted only 36 minutes, with Sharapova winning only 12 points.
"As in any sport, you have your good days, you have your tough days and you have days where things just don't work out," said Sharapova, who has now been on the losing end of two of the most lopsided scorelines in a final at Melbourne Park.
In the men's doubles final, Leander Paes and Radek Stepanek denied Bob and Mike Bryan their record 12th Grand Slam title, beating the American twins 7-6 (1), 6-2.
The 33-year-old Bryans were attempting to secure their place as the most decorated doubles team since the Open Era began in 1968. They remain tied at 11 major titles with Australian duo Mark Woodforde and Todd Woodbridge.
On Sunday, defending champion Novak Djokovic takes on Rafael Nadal in a men's singles final featuring the top two players in the rankings. Djokovic won three of the four majors last year and beat Nadal in six finals in 2011 among his 70 match wins for the season.
Azarenka had her best season in 2011, winning 55 of 72 matches to finish the year at No. 3.
There was a time when she'd momentarily flirted with the idea of quitting the sport during a quick trip home to Minsk after a loss at Doha. But she was quickly set straight by her family, including her grandmother, who had reportedly worked three jobs until the age of 71.
She couldn't get through to her family immediately "because my phone is freaking out right now," but she texted them from the court.
"I made a pretty smart decision, not walking out, right? That was pretty special," she said. "There's always ups and downs, now I'm up."
ORLANDO, Fla. ? Republican insiders are rising up to cut Newt Gingrich down to size, testament to the GOP establishment's fear that the mercurial candidate could lead the party to disaster this fall.
The gathering criticisms are bitingly sharp, as if edged by a touch of panic, a remarkable development considering the target once was speaker of the House and will go down in history as leader of the Republicans' 1994 return to power in Congress. The intended beneficiary is Mitt Romney, a once-moderate Massachusetts governor whom many rank-and-file Republicans view with suspicion.
"The Republican establishment might not be wild about Mitt Romney, but they're terrified by Newt Gingrich," said Dan Schnur, a former GOP campaign strategist who teaches politics at the University of Southern California.
The anti-Gingrich statements have come from conservative columnists, talk show hosts including Ann Coulter, former Reagan administration officials and others. One of the harshest was written by former Sen. Bob Dole, the party's 1996 presidential nominee.
"I have not been critical of Newt Gingrich but it is now time to take a stand before it is too late," Dole wrote in the conservative magazine National Review. "If Gingrich is the nominee it will have an adverse impact on Republican candidates running for county, state, and federal offices."
As speaker from 1995 through 1998, Gingrich "had a new idea every minute and most of them were off the wall," Dole wrote. He said he struggled against Democrats' TV attacks in his 1996 campaign, "and in every one of them, Newt was in the ad."
Gingrich has reacted unevenly to the accusations, sometimes denouncing them, other times wearing them like a badge of honor.
"The Republican establishment is just as much as an establishment as the Democratic establishment, and they are just as determined to stop us," he told a tea party rally Thursday in central Florida.
The crowd cheered. But lingering near the back was an example of how the Romney campaign is taking advantage of the whacks at Gingrich: GOP Rep. Jason Chaffetz of Utah. Chaffetz is beloved by many conservatives, and he goes from one Gingrich event to another to tell reporters why he thinks Romney would be a stronger challenger against President Barack Obama in the fall.
Gingrich aide R.C. Hammond confronted Chaffetz on Friday at an event in Del Ray, Fla., noting that some Republican officials criticize such shadowing tactics. Chaffetz defended his presence, saying Gingrich has vowed to show up everywhere Obama campaigns this fall, if several hours later.
Romney has drawn other high-ranking surrogates, with mixed results. South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley annoyed some of her tea party supporters when she campaigned throughout her state for Romney, who lost to Gingrich by 12 percentage points.
It's unclear whether the anti-Gingrich push is driving a new wedge between establishment Republicans and anti-establishment insurgents such as the tea partyers.
"We don't like the Republican establishment anyway," said Mark Meckler, a Californian and co-founder of Tea Party Patriots. He said tea partyers are heavily focused on state and local races, and are wary of getting drawn into the presidential quarrels.
After all, Meckler said, "it's not as though Newt Gingrich hasn't been part of the Republican establishment."
Many other conservative activists also noted Gingrich's long history as a Washington insider, including 20 years in Congress and 13 as a well-paid consultant, writer and Fox News commentator. His history complicates his efforts to rally angry, working-class Republicans who feel that an "elite" cadre of officials, journalists and others look down on them.
"He's in one sense attacking the establishment he says he helped lead," said John Feehery, a former top House GOP aide who contends the tea party's influence is often overstated. The chief complaints about Gingrich focus more on his personality than his politics, which are hard to nail down, Feehery said.
The most damaging criticisms have come from former friends and colleagues who worked closely with him in Congress. It's Gingrich's egotistic behavior, more than ideology, that is driving the attacks, Feehery said.
Among those defending Gingrich are Sarah Palin, the 2008 vice presidential nominee who is admired by many tea partyers.
"Look at Newt Gingrich, what's going on with him via the establishment's attacks," Palin said this week on Fox Business Network. "They're trying to crucify this man and rewrite history and rewrite what it is that he has stood for all these years."
Palin and Rep. Michele Bachmann, who dropped out of the presidential race, are tea party favorites with minimal experience in Washington and in top GOP circles. Gingrich is trying to tap the sense of resentment among their followers. But his long and complicated Washington record and reputation for intra-party quarrels seem to leave some tea partyers unimpressed.
"It's truly a shame that this is where the Republican establishment has chosen to focus their energy," said Marianne Gasiecki, a tea party activist in Ohio. She added, however, that political activists should focus on congressional races. "If we have a conservative House and Senate," she said, "the power of the president is really insignificant."
As Gingrich's broadcast ads in Florida become more pointed, prominent Republicans are chiding him without endorsing Romney or any other candidates. Gingrich stopped running a radio ad that called Romney anti-immigrant after Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., said it was unfair and damaging to the party.
So long as party insiders' complaints about Gingrich focus on his personality and quirks, the GOP can postpone a more wrenching debate about ideology, which may be in store if the once-moderate Romney is nominated. For now, conservative stalwarts seem determined to depict Gingrich as too erratic to be the party's standard bearer, let alone president.
Columnist Charles Krauthammer told Fox News: "Gingrich isn't after victory, he's after vengeance." He added: "This is Captain Ahab on the loose."
Some Republican voters are pushing back. "I want so badly to be for Gingrich, and I'm not going to be bullied out of my vote," said Barb Johnson, 52, who attended the tea party rally in Mount Dora, Fla., on Thursday. "I like his strong presence."
Florida's primary is Tuesday.
___
Associated Press writer Brian Bakst contributed to this report from Del Ray, Fla.
The Squawk on the Street news team breaks down today's market moving headlines including the Q4 GDP numbers coming in at 2.8 percent but short of expectations, Starbucks earnings disappointing investors, signs of stress coming out of Portugal, and inve...
CHICAGO -- In a bout to decide the next light heavyweight title contender, Rashad Evans controlled Phil Davis on his way to a unanimous decision at the United Center on Saturday night. The judges saw it 50-45 on all three cards for Evans.
Davis landed a spinning leg kick, then ducked low into a takedown. Evans pushed him into the fence and fended off the takedown attempt. Every time Davis came in to try to get the takedown, Evans made him pay with a punch or two. Evans got a takedown at the 1:30 point of the first round, then moved to side control. From there, he put Davis into a crucifix hold and landed a bevy of short punches.
In the second round, Evans was aggressive, landing several punches early in the round. They clinched, but things slowed down considerably. They had a few striking exchanges, with Evans coming out on top. In the last 30 seconds, Evans took Davis down and again landed punches from side control.
Davis shot in for a takedown to start the third round. Davis drove him against the fence until he finally got the takedown. Evans reversed position and landed several lefts to Davis' face. They returned to their feet, and Davis got another takedown, and Evans returned to his feet while Davis held on for dear life.
Early in the fourth round, Davis landed a punishing rib kick, but Evans did not slow down. He continued to move forward, stalking Davis around the cage. When Davis shot in for a takedown, Evans fended him off before getting a takedown of his own.
Evans started the fifth round with a huge strike, and then held off Davis' attack. Evans caught a kick, then as he held the single leg, punched Davis until he went down. He stretched Davis into side control, and continued to land punches even as Davis worked to his feet. Evans controlled the rest of the round the way he controlled the whole fight.
With this win, Evans should punch his ticket for a fight with Jon Jones. The UFC announced Saturday that Jones' next bout will be in April in Atlanta. As long as Evans is healthy, the bout should be his.
On Christmas Eve, a massive, Chinese-made maritime oil rig, the Scarabeo 9, arrived at Trinidad and Tobago for inspection. The Spanish oil company Repsol YPF, which keeps regional headquarters in Trinidad, ferried it to the Caribbean to perform deep-ocean drilling off Cuba -- whose communist government believes as much as 20 billion barrels of crude may lie near the island's northwest coast. But it wasn't Cuban authorities who came aboard the Scarabeo 9 to give it the once-over: officials from the U.S. Coast Guard and Interior Department did, even though the rig won't be operating in U.S. waters.
On any other occasion that might have raised the ire of the Cubans, who consider Washington their imperialista enemy. But the U.S. examination of the Scarabeo 9, which Repsol agreed to and Cuba abided, was part of an unusual choreography of cooperation between the two countries. Their otherwise bitter cold-war feud (they haven't had diplomatic relations since 1961) is best known for a 50-year-long trade embargo and history's scariest nuclear standoff. Now, Cuba's commitment to offshore oil exploration -- drilling may start this weekend -- raises a specter that haunts both nations: an oil spill in the Florida Straits like the BP calamity that tarred the nearby Gulf of Mexico two years ago and left $40 billion in U.S. damages.
The Straits, an equally vital body of water that's home to some of the world's most precious coral reefs, separates Havana and Key West, Florida, by a mere 90 miles. As a result, the U.S. has tacitly loosened its embargo against Cuba to give firms like Repsol easier access to the U.S. equipment they need to help avoid or contain possible spills. "Preventing drilling off Cuba better protects our interests than preparing for [a disaster] does," U.S. Senator Bill Nelson of Florida tells TIME, noting the U.S. would prefer to stop the Cuban drilling -- but can't. "But the two are not mutually exclusive, and that's why we should aim to do both."
(MORE: Cuba Set to Begin Offshore Drilling: Is Florida In Eco-Straits?)
Cuba meanwhile has tacitly agreed to ensure that its safety measures meet U.S. standards (not that U.S. standards proved all that golden during the 2010 BP disaster) and is letting unofficial U.S. delegations in to discuss the precautions being taken by Havana and the international oil companies it is contracting. No Cuban official would discuss the matter, but Dan Whittle, senior attorney for the Environmental Defense Fund in New York, who was part of one recent delegation, says the Cubans "seem very motivated to do the right thing."
It's also the right business thing to do. Cuba's threadbare economy -- President Ra?l Castro currently has to lay off more than 500,000 state workers -- is acutely energy-dependent on allies like Venezuela, which ships the island 120,000 barrels of oil per day. So Havana is eager to drill for the major offshore reserves geologists discovered eight years ago (which the U.S. Geological Survey estimates at closer to 10 billion bbl.). Cuba has signed or is negotiating leases with Repsol and companies from eight other nations -- Norway, India, Malaysia, Vietnam, Brazil, Venezuela, Angola and China -- for 59 drilling blocks inside a 43,000-sq.-mile (112,000 sq km) zone. Eventually, the government hopes to extract half a million bpd or more.
A serious oil spill could scuttle those drilling operations -- especially since Cuba hasn't the technology, infrastructure or means, like a clean-up fund similar to the $1 billion the U.S. keeps on reserve, to confront such an emergency. And there is another big economic anxiety: Cuba's $2 billion tourism industry. "The dilemma for Cuba is that as much as they want the oil, they care as much if not more about their ocean resources," says Billy Causey, southeast regional director for the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's marine sanctuary program. Cuba's pristine beaches and reefs attract sunbathers and scuba divers the world over, and a quarter of its coastal environment is set aside as protected.
So is much of coastal Florida, where tourism generates $60 billion annually -- which is why the state keeps oil rigs out of its waters. The Florida Keys lie as close as 50 miles from where Repsol is drilling; and they run roughly parallel to the 350-mile-long (560 km) Florida Reef Tract (FRT), the world's third largest barrier reef and one of its most valuable ocean eco-systems. The FRT is already under assault from global warming, ocean acidification and overfishing of symbiotic species like parrotfish that keep coral pruned of corrosive algae. If a spill were to damage the FRT, which draws $2 billion from tourism each year and supports 33,000 jobs, "it would be a catastrophic event," says David Vaughan, director of Florida's private Mote Marine Laboratory.
(MORE: Will BP Spill Lower Risk of Deepwater Drilling?)
Which means America has its own dilemma. As much as the U.S. would like to thwart Cuban petro-profits -- Cuban-American leaders like U.S. Representative and House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairwoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Miami say the oil will throw a lifeline to the Castro dictatorship -- it needs to care as much if not more about its own environment. Because fewer than a tenth of the Scarabeo 9's components were made in America, Washington can't wield the embargo cudgel and fine Repsol, which has interests in the U.S., for doing business with Cuba. (Most of the other firms don't have U.S. interests.) Nor can it in good conscience use the embargo in this case to keep U.S. companies from offering spill prevention/containment hardware and services to Repsol and other drilling contractors.
One of those U.S. firms is Helix Energy Solutions in Houston. Amid the Gulf disaster, Helix engineered a "capping stack" to plug damaged blow-out preventers like the one that failed on BP's Deepwater Horizon rig. (It later contained the spill.) Having that technology at hand -- especially since the Cuba rigs will often operate in deeper waters than the Deepwater rig was mining -- will be critical if a spill occurs off Cuba.
Helix has applied to the Treasury Department for a special license to lease its equipment, and speedily deliver it, to Cuba's contractors when needed. The license is still pending, but Helix spokesman Cameron Wallace says the company is confident it will come through since Cuba won't benefit economically from the arrangement. "This is a reasonable approach," says Wallace. "We can't just say we'll figure out what to do if a spill happens. We need this kind of preparation." Eco-advocates like Whittle agree: "It's a no-brainer for the U.S."
(MORE: U.S. Fails to Respond to Cuba's Freeing of Dissidents)
Preparation includes something the U.S.-Cuba cold-war time warp rarely allows: dialogue. Nelson has introduced legislation that would require federal agencies to consult Congress on how to work with countries like Cuba on offshore drilling safety and spill response, but the Administration has already shown some flexibility. Last month U.S. officials and scientists had contact with Cuban counterparts at a regional forum on drilling hazards. That's important because they need to be in synch, for example, about how to attack a spill without exacerbating the damage to coral reefs. Scientists like Vaughan worry that chemical dispersants used to fight the spill in the Gulf, where coral wasn't as prevalent, could be lethal to reefs in the Straits. That would breed more marine catastrophe, since coral reefs, though they make up only 1% of the world's sea bottoms, account for up to 40% of natural fisheries. "They're our underwater oases," says Vaughan, whose tests so far with dispersants and FRT species like Elkhorn coral don't augur well.
A rigid U.S. reluctance to engage communist Cuba is of course only half the problem. Another is Havana's notorious, Soviet-style secrecy -- which some fear "could override the need to immediately pick up the phone," as one environmentalist confides, if and when a spill occurs. As a result, some are also petitioning Washington to fund AUVs (autonomous underwater vehicles) that marine biologists use to detect red tides, and which could also be used to sniff out oil spills in the Straits.
What experts on both sides of the Straits hope is that sea currents will carry any oil slick directly out into the Atlantic Ocean. But that's wishful thinking. So probably is the notion that U.S.-Cuba cooperation on offshore drilling can be duplicated on other fronts. Among them are the embargo, including the arguably unconstitutional ban on U.S. travel to Cuba, which has utterly failed to dislodge the Castro regime but which Washington keeps in place for fear of offending Cuban-American voters in swing-state Florida; and cases like that of Alan Gross, a U.S. aid worker imprisoned in Cuba since 2009 on what many call questionable spying charges.
U.S. inspectors this month gave the Scarabeo 9 the thumbs-up. Meanwhile, U.S. pols hope they can still dissuade foreign oil companies from operating off Cuba. Last month Nelson and Cuban-American Senator Bob Menendez of New Jersey introduced a bill to hold firms financially responsible for spills that affect the U.S. even if they originate outside U.S. waters. (It would also lift a $75 million liability cap.) Others in Congress say Big Oil should be exempted from the embargo to let the U.S. benefit from the Cuba oil find too. Either way, the only thing likely to stop the drilling now would be the discovery that there's not as much crude there as anticipated. That, or a major spill.
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PARIS ? President Nicolas Sarkozy says France and Afghan President Hamid Karzai will ask NATO to hand over all combat missions in Afghanistan to Afghan troops in 2013 ? a year earlier than planned.
Sarkozy also says France has informed U.S. President Barack Obama of the proposal and will present it at a meeting of NATO defense ministers early next month.
The move, if confirmed, comes at a time of widespread fatigue among European contributors to the 10-year allied intervention in Afghanistan, and would accelerate a gradual drawdown of NATO troops that Obama planned to see through until the end of 2014.
"We have decided in a common accord with President Karzai to ask NATO to consider a total handling of NATO combat missions to the Afghan army over the course of 2013," Sarkozy said.
News of the French-Afghan proposal comes one week after Sarkozy abruptly suspended France's training missions and joint military patrols with Afghan forces following the shooting death of four unarmed French troops by an Afghan soldier on Jan. 20.
Sarkozy announced that the French will resume their training mission as of Saturday and withdraw its own troops by the end of 2013.
With Karzai at his side, Sarkozy also said authority in the strategic province of Kapisa east of Kabul, where nearly all French troops are deployed, will be handed over to the Afghans in March.
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HARASTA, Syria (Reuters) ? The U.N. Security Council meets on Friday to discuss the next move on Syria and council envoys said members will be given a new Western-Arab draft resolution, as fighting between troops and rebels edged closer to Syria's capital Damascus.
Morocco was expected to distribute at the meeting the new draft resolution that supports the Arab League's call for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to transfer his powers to his deputy to set up a unity government and prepare for elections after a ten-month crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators.
"The UN Security Council will meet in closed consultations this Friday (at) 3:00 p.m. in New York to discuss steps to take on the situation in Syria," France's U.N. mission said on its Twitter page (@FranceONU).
The Security Council could vote as early as next week on the resolution, which diplomats from Britain and France are crafting in consultation with Qatar, Morocco, the United States, Germany and Portugal, envoys said. It replaces a Russian text that Western diplomats say is too weak.
The Moroccan delegation met on Thursday with Russian and Chinese diplomats to present them with the latest version of the draft, council diplomats told Reuters. It was not immediately clear what their initial response was.
The draft, obtained by Reuters, calls for a "political transition" but not for U.N. sanctions against Damascus, something Moscow has said it would not support.
Russia, together with China, vetoed a European-drafted resolution in October that condemned Syria and threatened it with sanctions. It is unclear whether Russia is ready to wield its veto again to block council action on Syria.
Several Western envoys told Reuters that Russia might find it difficult to veto a resolution that is simply intended to provide support for the Arab League.
FIGHTING NEARS DAMASCUS
Clashes between rebels and security forces in the Damascus suburb of Douma, a hotbed of protests and armed rebellion against Assad, raged throughout the day on Thursday, and gunfire was heard from central Damascus during the night.
Activists said army deployment and clashes in townships around Damascus were a response to insurgents' growing strength.
"The Free Syrian Army (FSA) has almost complete control of some areas of the Damascus countryside and some control in Douma and Harasta," an activist said by telephone from Harasta.
Other activists in Douma, Harasta and Irbin said security forces had gathered in their towns after rebels retreated because they could not fight pitched battles with the army.
Arab League monitors, now without 55 Gulf Arab colleagues withdrawn by their governments this week in protest at continued bloodshed, were resuming work after a one-week gap during which the Arab League prolonged their mission by another month.
A group of Arab observers stopped at an entrance to the Damascus suburb of Irbin, where a dozen soldiers stood guard. Beyond them a crowd of about 100 anti-Assad protesters shouted slogans. The troops showed the monitors the bodies of a soldier and another person they said had been killed in the morning.
The observers drove away without going into the township.
Elsewhere, three people were killed in Homs, a sniper killed a 58-year-old woman in Hama and a 14-year-old boy was killed in the southern city of Deraa, the British-based opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
State news agency SANA said "terrorists" had assassinated a colonel in Homs and detonated a bomb in Deraa province, killing an army lieutenant as he tried to defuse it.
Also in Homs, militiamen loyal to Assad killed 14 members of a Sunni family on Thursday in one of the grizzliest sectarian attacks of the uprising, activists and residents said.
Eight children, aged eight months to nine years old were among 14 Bahader family members shot or hacked to death in a building in the mixed Karm al-Zeitoun neighborhood, they said.
The militiamen, known as 'shabbiha', entered the district after loyalist forces fired heavy mortar rounds on the area, killing another 16 people, residents and activists in the city told Reuters by phone.
Tit-for-tat sectarian killings began in Homs, 140 km (88 miles north of Damascus, four months ago, following armored military assaults on Sunni areas of the city by forces led by members of Assad's minority Alawite sect.
The killings have raised the prospect of the pro-democracy protest movement against Assad turning into a civil war, as his opponents take up arms and fight back against loyalist forces.
The Alawite community, an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam, has dominated politics and the security apparatus in Syria, a mostly Sunni country of 20 million people, for the last five decades.
(Additional reporting by Erika Solomon in Beirut, Khaled Yacoub Oweis in Amman, John Irish in Paris, Tom Perry in Cairo and Louis Charbonneau at the United Nations; Writing by Alistair Lyon; Editing by Louise Ireland, Mark Heinrich and Sanjeev Miglani)
TRENTON, N.J. ? Gov. Chris Christie on Wednesday proposed turning a former teacher's college into New Jersey's second major public research university in a shake-up of the state's higher education system that's intended to raise the standing of Rutgers University and other institutions from "good to great."
The first-term Republican governor has long been concerned that top high school graduates go elsewhere for college ? and often stay there ? rather than staying put in New Jersey, one of the few states where the flagship public university doesn't contain the state name.
Part of the problem is a shortage of slots for students, and part is the reputation of Rutgers, a school of 58,000 students spread across three campuses.
Under the governor's plan, fast-growing Rowan University, which 20 years ago was largely a teacher's college known as Glassboro State College, would take over the Rutgers-Camden campus, including its law school, in suburban Philadelphia.
Rutgers, whose main campuses are 30 miles from New York City, would absorb parts of the scandal-stained University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, gaining a medical school. The remaining parts of the University of Medicine and Dentistry would be renamed the New Jersey Health Sciences University.
"We cannot compete economically in this state with good but not great institutions at any level," Christie said at a news conference. "We need to make the steps happen to allow us to go from good to great."
Officials at Rowan are excited about the idea, but it's causing consternation at Rutgers-Camden. Rutgers officials at other campuses say they need more time to study the plan.
Christie said the moves would strengthen New Jersey's entire higher education system, giving southern New Jersey a major research university, improving the links between research and patient treatment, and strengthening ties to the state's pharmaceutical industry at Rutgers' main campus in New Brunswick and Piscataway.
He said they would also give a new start and more focused mission to the University of Medicine and Dentistry, which spent years mired in scandal related to no- or low-show jobs being given in exchange for steering patients or taxpayer money to the school, billing irregularities and employees accepting favors from contractors.
The idea of major university reconfiguration has been around for a decade, but university officials and politicians have never mustered the will to make it happen.
The strong-willed governor cited one major difference this time around that he said will result in real change: "It's me."
Christie said that the cost has not yet been calculated but that most of it would be absorbed by the current university budgets. He said there would not need to be deep layoffs anywhere, as long as the universities as constituted now aren't overstaffed ? but he said there might be.
At Rutgers-Camden, third-year law student Wali Rushdan said many students were concerned about whether losing the Rutgers brand would make it harder to attract top faculty or make it more difficult for graduates to get jobs.
"The general mood is that people are completely against it and we wonder where the authority for it even comes from," said Rushdan, 29.
____
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CHICAGO -- In a bout to decide the next light heavyweight title contender, Rashad Evans controlled Phil Davis on his way to a unanimous decision at the United Center on Saturday night. The judges saw it 50-45 on all three cards for Evans.