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Football: Four sites under consideration to host City Section finals

Written By kolimtiga on Senin, 29 September 2014 | 23.50

City Section Commissioner John Aguirre said he was finally able to make contact with USC officials in trying to see if the Coliseum might be available to host the City Section football finals on Dec. 6.

The Coliseum, Valley College, Southwest College and Cerritos College are the four sites Aguirre said he's evaluating.

The City Section wants to hold its Division I, II and III finals on the same day at the same site. Stadium costs will be an important factor. A decision should be finalized by next month, Aguirre said.

Twitter:@LATSondheimer

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
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Erotica publisher Ellora's Cave sues Dear Author book blog

Erotica publisher Ellora's Cave has sued the Dear Author book blog and its proprietor Jane Little, alleging defamation. The publisher is seeking injunctive relief, monetary damages of $25,000 or more and the identity of the blog's commenters.

The blog post in question, "The Curious Case of Ellora's Cave," recounts the rise of Ohio-based Ellora's Cave from email distributor of racy PDF files to successful erotica e-book publisher. By 2006, the company's revenue was reported at $6.5 million.

However, the company has faced problems recently. The Dear Author post notes late royalty payments for authors and a "drastic drop in sales." The Dear Author blog is not the only place these issues have been reported.

Ellora's Cave sales at Amazon have dropped as much as 75%, the company's chief executive told Publishers Weekly in August. Publishers Weekly also reported on delays of royalty payments to authors -- in May, the publisher told the trade magazine that royalty payments had not been made because of problems with a new software system.

Perhaps more controversially, the Dear Author post reported a number of tax liens filed against Ellora's Cave founder Tina Engler and Jasmine Jade Enterprises by the Ohio Department of Taxation. The 2014 lien is for more than $105,000.

The post contrasts this with what appears to be a less-than-frugal lifestyle by Engler, writing, "In the meantime, Engler boasts of her Rodeo Drive shopping trips and her new property purchase in West Hollywood on her Facebook page."

"I'm going to fight this," Little wrote Saturday. "While I don't want to spend my savings on legal bills, I believe strongly in the pursuit of truth. Unfortunately because I'm involved in the suit, it wouldn't be appropriate for me to analyze it or provide commentary, but I'll provide status updates as best I can."

Little has retained attorney Marc Randazza to fight the case.

Book news and more; I'm @paperhaus on Twitter

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
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Erotica publisher Ellora's Cave sues Dear Author book blog

Erotica publisher Ellora's Cave has sued the Dear Author book blog and its proprietor Jane Little, alleging defamation. The publisher is seeking injunctive relief, monetary damages of $25,000 or more and the identity of the blog's commenters.

The blog post in question, "The Curious Case of Ellora's Cave," recounts the rise of Ohio-based Ellora's Cave from email distributor of racy PDF files to successful erotica e-book publisher. By 2006, the company's revenue was reported at $6.5 million.

However, the company has faced problems recently. The Dear Author post notes late royalty payments for authors and a "drastic drop in sales." The Dear Author blog is not the only place these issues have been reported.

Ellora's Cave sales at Amazon have dropped as much as 75%, the company's chief executive told Publishers Weekly in August. Publishers Weekly also reported on delays of royalty payments to authors -- in May, the publisher told the trade magazine that royalty payments had not been made because of problems with a new software system.

Perhaps more controversially, the Dear Author post reported a number of tax liens filed against Ellora's Cave founder Tina Engler and Jasmine Jade Enterprises by the Ohio Department of Taxation. The 2014 lien is for more than $105,000.

The post contrasts this with what appears to be a less-than-frugal lifestyle by Engler, writing, "In the meantime, Engler boasts of her Rodeo Drive shopping trips and her new property purchase in West Hollywood on her Facebook page."

"I'm going to fight this," Little wrote Saturday. "While I don't want to spend my savings on legal bills, I believe strongly in the pursuit of truth. Unfortunately because I'm involved in the suit, it wouldn't be appropriate for me to analyze it or provide commentary, but I'll provide status updates as best I can."

Little has retained attorney Marc Randazza to fight the case.

Book news and more; I'm @paperhaus on Twitter

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
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Football: Four sites under consideration to host City Section finals

City Section Commissioner John Aguirre said he was finally able to make contact with USC officials in trying to see if the Coliseum might be available to host the City Section football finals on Dec. 6.

The Coliseum, Valley College, Southwest College and Cerritos College are the four sites Aguirre said he's evaluating.

The City Section wants to hold its Division I, II and III finals on the same day at the same site. Stadium costs will be an important factor. A decision should be finalized by next month, Aguirre said.

Twitter:@LATSondheimer

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
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U.S. troops to stay in Afghanistan after historic transfer of power

Afghanistan's new government plans to sign a strategic agreement Tuesday with the United States that would allow for approximately 10,000 U.S. troops to remain in the country after the U.S.-led NATO coalition's mandate expires in December.

U.S. officials say the extended troop presence is needed to continue training Afghanistan's 350,000 soldiers and police, and to conduct counter-terrorism operations.

The pact – which outgoing Afghan President Hamid Karzai refused to sign in his final months in office, fueling tensions with Washington – is expected to be signed by U.S. Ambassador James Cunningham and a senior member of the Afghan government.

Ashraf Ghani was inaugurated Monday as the country's new president, ending a months-long election dispute with the first democratic transfer of power in the nation's modern history.

In his inaugural speech, Ghani pledged to fight corruption and called on the Taliban and its allies to join the political process and end more than a decade of war.

But the occasion was marred by a Taliban suicide bombing elsewhere in the capital, underscoring the challenges Ghani will face. Seven people were killed in the incident, which took place at a security checkpoint near Kabul's international airport shortly before Ghani was sworn in.

"I am your leader, but I am no better than you," Ghani said, quoting Islam's first caliph, Abu Bakr Seddiq. "I err; hold me to account."

Ghani, a former Afghan finance minister and World Bank official, thanked Karzai for his role in the transition -- including helping to broker a compromise after a disputed runoff election marred by fraud-- and for respecting Afghanistan's constitution during his 13 years as president.

"Our people have shown that they desire peace and order," Karzai said at a ceremony at the presidential palace in Kabul.

As president, Ghani will head a government of national unity that will see Abdullah Abdullah, his election rival, take the new post of chief executive. Ghani said the unity government would be one of "representation" and thanked Abdullah for joining in the leadership.

Secretary of State John F. Kerry, who struck the deal to form a unity government in an urgent visit to Kabul in July, praised both men as "patriots" committed to the success of their country.

"Afghans have taken a moment of challenge and turned it into a moment of real opportunity," Kerry said in a statement.

Following the oaths of office, Ghani signed an executive order naming Abdullah as chief executive and Ahmad Zia Massoud as special representative to the presidency. Massoud is the brother of slain former militia commander Ahmed Shah Massoud, who fought the Taliban and was close to Abdullah.

Until Monday morning it remained unclear whether Abdullah would participate in the inauguration. Members of his team were reportedly angered by the Ghani campaign's decision last week to release results of the runoff election, which Abdullah maintains was marred by widespread fraud. The results, following a United Nations-supervised audit of all 8 million ballots, showed Ghani winning 55% of the vote.

Mohammad Khan and Mohammad Mohaqeq, who will take on the roles of deputies to the chief executive, were also sworn in by Ghani.

President Obama dispatched a delegation headed by John Podesta, his special counselor, to the inauguration. Other dignitaries attending included India's foreign minister, the president of Pakistan and representatives from Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, the Maldives and China.

Latifi is a special correspondent. Staff writer Shashank Bengali contributed to this report from Mumbai, India.

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times

9:05 a.m: This story was updated with the new Afghan government to sign a strategic agreement with the U.S., reaction from Secretary of State John F. Kerry.

This story was originally published at 12:10 a.m.


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31 hikers presumed dead after Japanese volcano erupts

Written By kolimtiga on Minggu, 28 September 2014 | 23.50

Four hikers were confirmed dead Sunday and another 27 were presumed to have perished after their lifeless bodies were found on Japan's volcanic Mt. Ontake, which erupted Saturday morning without warning.

At least 30 more people were injured, and a search and rescue crew including helicopters and about 300 people was dispatched to the mountain 180 miles west of Tokyo.

Naofumi Miyagi, spokesman with the Nagano Prefecture police, said all 31 victims found lifeless showed signs of cardiopulmonary arrest; autopsies were  conducted on four hikers who were brought down from the mountain Sunday afternoon. Police refused to answer further questions on the possible causes of death.

Rescue workers have been scaling the 10,000-foot peak via hiking trails, and it was unclear how many trips it may take to bring down the other 27 victims, said an official at the crisis management and disaster prevention division in Nagano, who requested anonymity because he was not authorized to make comments.

Kiyomi Ando, a press officer for Kiso Town in Nagano, said 151 hikers were able to escape. Of those, about 40 descended from the area near the top of the mountain and another 120 people made it down after sheltering in a large cabin.

Of the 30 injured, one person was in critical condition and 29 had moderate to light injuries, according to Nagano authorities.

Further searches are planned for Monday, Ando said.

Mt. Ontake rumbled to life at 11:52 a.m. Saturday, spewing huge plumes of ash into the sky and blanketing its slopes. As one of the highest volcanoes in Japan, the mountain is a popular hiking destination, particularly for fall foliage. It is a relatively short three-hour hike to the top after a ride up a ropeway. "Beginners can do the hike," Ando said.

Amateur video uploaded by hikers on the mountain showed a huge cloud of noxious ash suddenly pouring forth from the top of the peak.

Mt. Ontake had a minor eruption in 2007, but that caused no fatalities. A more major eruption occurred in 1979. 

Toshihiko Sawada, an advisor to the ropeway, said it was ideal weather for hiking Saturday with clear skies. "We had more than the usual number of tourists and hikers," he said.  

Sawada said 660 people used the ropeway services on Saturday morning before the eruption occurred and ropeway operations have been halted since due to safety concerns. 

Some tourists climb to the top from the ropeway stop while others just walk around the top of the ropeway station area and then come down, Ando said.

"We are still seeing ashes falling" and columns of smoke plumes were still spewing out, Sawada said. 

"There was no warning of a volcanic eruption," added Sawada. In the wake of the explosion, authorities have raised the alert level from 1, or "normal," to 3,  meaning "restricted access."   

Two types of toxic fumes - hydrogen sulfide and sulfur dioxide - have been detected in the summit area, said Tomoyuki Kanno of the earthquake and volcano department at the Japan Meteorological Agency.

Kanno said Mt. Otake had a phreatic eruption, which happens when underground water is heated by magma and then hits a boiling point, at which point the mountain explodes. 

"It's often the case, there's no warning signs with those types of eruptions," Kanno said.

Nagano is a special correspondent.

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
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Paris Fashion Week: At Kenzo, a skate park but no skaters

Kenzo designers Carol Lim and Humberto Leon coaxed the fashion crowd to a skateboard park in the 17th arrondissement bright and early Sunday during Paris Fashion Week. But curiously, the collection they sent down the ramps wasn't worn by skaters and didn't seem to have much to do with skate clothes, except maybe for the supersized pants. (Baggy jeans, they're coming back!)

The crowd was filled with fashion groupies — I spotted a woman in a cherry-red circle skirt covered in tiny Mickey Mouse cutouts, and another in a ginormous, jet black Nanook of the North hooded fur jacket, which is apparently how you do a 75-degree day at Paris Fashion Week.

And the scenery was impressive — large-scale screens set up amidst the ramps, animated with female androids repeating the line, "There is no planet B. Protect what's precious." Although it wasn't clear what the conservation message had to do with the proceedings either.

On the runway, there were some cute pieces — romantic dresses in an eyelet that had a graphic grid look; longer-length trumpet skirts in an athletic-foam material worn with airy tops, really baggy jeans and printed palazzo pants; shoe booties. The palette was all sugary pastels — ice blues, peaches and pinks, plus navy and white.

What I didn't see was a strong point of view. I guess they were leaving it to us to figure out what to wear. Obviously, their Mickey Mouse and Nanook of the North-wearing fans won't have any trouble.

For the latest in fashion and style news, follow me @Booth1.

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
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Five things we learned in USC's victory over Oregon State

Eighteenth-ranked USC defeated Oregon State, 35-10, on Saturday at the Coliseum.

USC improved to 3-1 overall and 2-0 in the Pac-12 Conference.

Here are five things we learned about the Trojans:

Ability to bounce back

USC proved in its 35-10 victory over Oregon State that it has the ability to bounce back from a disappointing loss.

The Trojans were embarrassed on Sept. 13 when they were defeated, 37-31, by Boston College — a 17-point underdog.

After an abysmal performance in Boston, USC's defense held Oregon State to 181 yards — the fewest by a USC opponent since 2009, when San Jose State had 121.

And USC's offense started to find its stride too. USC Coach Steve Sarkisian's up-tempo offense hit its plays-per-game goal, running 81 plays for 461 yards of total offense.

Offensive identity

Sarkisian remains dedicated to the running game, despite the Trojans' inability to run the football at Boston College.

USC rushed for 200 yards in 48 carries against Oregon State.

Javorius Allen has become the focal point of the offense. He rushed for 117 yards in 20 carries and a touchdown. Allen also had five receptions for 23 yards. He has a team-best 14 receptions, as a tailback, in the last two games.

Quarterback Cody Kessler completed passes to nine players against Oregon State.

Four games into the season, Sarkisian's passing game involves spreading the ball around to multiple players (with exception of the victory at Stanford, when only four players had receptions).

Eight players had receptions in the defeat at Boston College and 10 players caught passes in the opener against Fresno State.

Su'a Cravens is a linebacker

Sophomore Su'a Cravens insisted he was a safety — until this week — when his coach told him he was needed at linebacker.

Cravens made his first start as a strongside linebacker against Oregon State and the results were impressive.

Cravens made a team-best six tackles — two for a loss — and intercepted a pass and returned it 31 yards for a touchdown. It was Cravens' first career touchdown.

Cravens said this week that he weighed 230 pounds and that his weight would determine if he continued to play linebacker or returned to safety.

After his performance against Oregon State, it would be hard to justify moving him back to the secondary.

Tight end sightings

USC finally got its tight ends involved in the offense against Oregon State and it was effective.

Freshman Bryce Dixon and fifth-year senior Randall Telfer had a combined four receptions for 73 yards.

In USC's first three games of the season, Dixon and Telfer had four receptions for 82 yards and a touchdown.

Aundrey Walker is ready to play

Much has been made over the absence of senior offensive lineman Aundrey Walker from USC's lineup.

Center Max Tuerk has the most career starts, but Walker is a close second and could provide the team with needed experience on the line.

Walker broke his ankle last season against UCLA and his recovery has taken longer than expected.

But on Saturday, he was rotated in on the offensive line. Some of USC's most effective running plays against Oregon State came when Walker was in blocking.

Walker said after the game that he was ready to play and is competing for a starting job on the offensive line.

Questions about USC? Email me at LNThiry@gmail.com or tweet @LindseyThiry and I will answer questions in a weekly USC Now mailbag.

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
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Members of Congress agree on this: No cellphone calls on planes

If passengers can divert a commercial plane by feuding over reclining seats, imagine the squabbles that will erupt if fliers are allowed to make loud telephone calls while crammed together in an airline cabin.

That was one of the arguments more than 75 members of Congress made in a letter to the Federal Communications Commission and other federal regulators, urging the government to continue to ban voice calls on commercial flights.

The FCC took the first step toward allowing cellphone calls on planes in December when it began to consider adopting a rule to reverse its long-held ban on inflight calls. The FCC finished accepting public comments on the proposed new rule in February but has yet to schedule further hearings.

Even if the FCC adopts the proposed rule, each airline would have the choice to install the technology needed to allow cellphone calls that do not interrupt cellphone communications on the ground.

The members of Congress who signed the letter last week said the FCC needs to consider how cellphone calls might cause disruptions in a crowded cabin.

"Arguments in an aircraft cabin already start over mundane issues, like seat selection, reclining seats and overhead bin space, and the volume and pervasiveness of voice communications would only serve to exacerbate and escalate these disputes," according to the letter signed by dozens of Republicans and Democrats, including David B. McKinley (R-W.Va.) and Dan Lipinski (D-Ill.).

The feuds over reclining seats mentioned in the letter refers to three incidents in late August and early September when onboard squabbles among passengers over intrusions into their seat space forced the pilots to divert the flights.

To read more about travel, tourism and the airline industry, follow me on Twitter at @hugomartin.

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
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31 hikers presumed dead after Japanese volcano erupts

Four hikers were confirmed dead Sunday and another 27 were presumed to have perished after their lifeless bodies were found on Japan's volcanic Mt. Ontake, which erupted Saturday morning without warning.

At least 30 more people were injured, and a search and rescue crew including helicopters and about 300 people was dispatched to the mountain 180 miles west of Tokyo.

Naofumi Miyagi, spokesman with the Nagano Prefecture police, said all 31 victims found lifeless showed signs of cardiopulmonary arrest; autopsies were  conducted on four hikers who were brought down from the mountain Sunday afternoon. Police refused to answer further questions on the possible causes of death.

Rescue workers have been scaling the 10,000-foot peak via hiking trails, and it was unclear how many trips it may take to bring down the other 27 victims, said an official at the crisis management and disaster prevention division in Nagano, who requested anonymity because he was not authorized to make comments.

Kiyomi Ando, a press officer for Kiso Town in Nagano, said 151 hikers were able to escape. Of those, about 40 descended from the area near the top of the mountain and another 120 people made it down after sheltering in a large cabin.

Of the 30 injured, one person was in critical condition and 29 had moderate to light injuries, according to Nagano authorities.

Further searches are planned for Monday, Ando said.

Mt. Ontake rumbled to life at 11:52 a.m. Saturday, spewing huge plumes of ash into the sky and blanketing its slopes. As one of the highest volcanoes in Japan, the mountain is a popular hiking destination, particularly for fall foliage. It is a relatively short three-hour hike to the top after a ride up a ropeway. "Beginners can do the hike," Ando said.

Amateur video uploaded by hikers on the mountain showed a huge cloud of noxious ash suddenly pouring forth from the top of the peak.

Mt. Ontake had a minor eruption in 2007, but that caused no fatalities. A more major eruption occurred in 1979. 

Toshihiko Sawada, an advisor to the ropeway, said it was ideal weather for hiking Saturday with clear skies. "We had more than the usual number of tourists and hikers," he said.  

Sawada said 660 people used the ropeway services on Saturday morning before the eruption occurred and ropeway operations have been halted since due to safety concerns. 

Some tourists climb to the top from the ropeway stop while others just walk around the top of the ropeway station area and then come down, Ando said.

"We are still seeing ashes falling" and columns of smoke plumes were still spewing out, Sawada said. 

"There was no warning of a volcanic eruption," added Sawada. In the wake of the explosion, authorities have raised the alert level from 1, or "normal," to 3,  meaning "restricted access."   

Two types of toxic fumes - hydrogen sulfide and sulfur dioxide - have been detected in the summit area, said Tomoyuki Kanno of the earthquake and volcano department at the Japan Meteorological Agency.

Kanno said Mt. Otake had a phreatic eruption, which happens when underground water is heated by magma and then hits a boiling point, at which point the mountain explodes. 

"It's often the case, there's no warning signs with those types of eruptions," Kanno said.

Nagano is a special correspondent.

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
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How did UnitedHealth let so many questionable claims slip past?

Written By kolimtiga on Sabtu, 27 September 2014 | 23.50

Here's how the nation's largest health insurance company aided and abetted what it says was a $43-million healthcare fraud.

In a lawsuit filed recently in federal court in Los Angeles, UnitedHealth Group says it paid out the $43 million to an interconnected group of doctors and medical clinics, mostly associated with the notorious 1-800-GET-THIN advertising campaign, for weight-loss surgeries and procedures. The company alleges that the providers submitted charges for procedures that were unnecessary or never performed, and inflated bills threefold or more. United is demanding refunds.

The company says it got rooked because it placed "justifiable reliance upon ... this false billing." It implies it had no choice but to "rely on the veracity" of the bills, and woke up belatedly.

But is it plausible that a leading health insurance company — if it were on its game — would allow $43 million to go out the door without realizing that it was being systematically cheated? Or is it more likely that United took the easy way out — not scrutinizing the medical claims until too late?

Either way, United utterly failed in its role, fundamental to the entire commercial health insurance business, of ferreting out and blocking improper charges. When fraud happens, the costs get footed by customers through higher premiums.

United's apparent dereliction raises an important question relevant to the future of healthcare reform: What use are health insurance companies?

The health insurance industry, which is cemented into a central role in our healthcare system via the Affordable Care Act, brags about its indispensable role in fighting fraud. But let's contrast its PR pitch with UnitedHealth's lawsuit.

America's Health Insurance Plans, or AHIP, the industry's lobbying arm, says this: "Health plans have prioritized reducing healthcare fraud and use cutting edge technology and sophisticated data analysis to prevent fraud from occurring in the first place rather than 'paying and chasing' after the fact."

UnitedHealth, in its lawsuit, says this: "By practical necessity, United reasonably relies in good faith on the claims submitted to it by providers....United receives nearly 2 million healthcare claims per day and must comply with various laws and regulations mandating that such claims be paid within a short period of time.... United reasonably relied on the misrepresentations contained on the claim forms."

Either the insurers truly have "prioritized" fighting fraud or they've prioritized meeting a deadline. Either they use "cutting edge technology" to combat fraud or they rely "in good faith" on submitted claims. Either they nip fraud in the bud or they file lawsuits to chase down money they've already paid "after the fact."

Paying suspect claims merely to meet the deadline? That's not required by law.

If resources were the problem, the company certainly had the money to spare: From 2010 through 2013, it collected nearly $387 billion in premiums and recorded profits of nearly $21 billion. In that period its chief executive, Stephen J. Hemsley, collected more than $50 million in compensation. United spent $3.2 billion to repurchase its own shares in 2013 alone.

United doesn't look like a company so overwhelmed by 2 million claims a day that it had to outsource the oversight process to "good faith." It looks like one that "prioritized" outlays to its shareholders and CEO ahead of "reducing healthcare fraud."

United had ample warning about 1-800-GET-THIN and its weight-loss business.

We started raising questions in early 2010 about the people behind the campaign. They were brothers Julian and Michael Omidi, both of whom had disciplinary records with the Medical Board of California — Julian's license has been revoked, and Michael's was under probation for the three years that ended Oct. 3, 2011. Michael Omidi is currently facing an accusation of negligence by the state medical board, according to information on the board's website.

United alleges in the lawsuit that much of the billing at issue arose from Lap-Band procedures, in which a flexible silicone collar is placed around the stomach to suppress appetite. The Lap-Band, which was GET-THIN's stock in trade, is indicated only for morbidly obese patients who have failed to lose weight by conventional means. United further contends it rejected many of the defendants' requests for authorization for the procedure, only to learn later that they concealed the operation within bills for other procedures, such as repairs of esophageal hernias.

United asserts that what it identifies as "the Omidi network" waived the patients' co-pays and then surreptitiously added them back into the insurance claims. Under the terms of its coverage, United says, waiving co-pays can invalidate the entire claim. United declined to answer my questions about why it wasn't more vigilant about billings from the Lap-Band clinics. The company also wouldn't say whether it had referred its allegations to law enforcement agencies or government regulators.

As my colleague Stuart Pfeifer reported last week, United's allegations come two years after several law enforcement agencies opened an investigation of the Omidis for "potential violations of federal law, including conspiracy, healthcare fraud, wire fraud, mail fraud, tax violations, identity theft [and] money laundering," according to a statement by a Food and Drug Administration criminal agent in a court filing in an unrelated criminal case. No charges have been filed.

The 1-800-GET-THIN campaign was pulled in 2012 after the FDA warned the companies that the advertisements failed to include adequate warnings about the potential risks of Lap-Band surgery.

Five patients died between 2009 and 2011 after Lap-Band surgeries at clinics affiliated with the ad campaign, according to lawsuits, autopsy reports and other public records.

United's lawsuit is a response to a case filed by several of the surgery centers, alleging that United had stopped paying their claims. "Nothing [United's] alleged is illegal or improper," says the clinics' attorney, Daron Tooch. "There's nothing illegal about charging a lot for a service."

At least through the beginning of 2011, United kept paying claims from "the Omidi network."

The core of United's business as a health insurer is to make judgments about bills submitted by doctors, hospitals and clinics — whether the charges are reasonable, the procedures necessary and proper, the providers competent. According to its own lawsuit, United failed to do that with respect to some $43 million in billings.

United's lawsuit against "the Omidi network" resembles a lawsuit it filed in Northern California in 2012, accusing a group of surgical centers of fleecing it out of $39 million through kickbacks and inflated claims, such as a bill for kidney stone treatment on which the insurer paid $97,000, though the average regional price for the procedure was $6,851. In that lawsuit, too, United pleaded that because of its volume of claims, it was "not in a position to specifically investigate the veracity of each claim." The case has been scheduled for trial in October 2015.

That's the reality of the health insurance business in a nutshell. The consequences of letting fraud go unaddressed can be laid on the premium payers. The shareholders and CEO, meanwhile, will do just fine.

Michael Hiltzik's column appears Sundays and Wednesdays. Read his blog, the Economy Hub, at latimes.com/business/hiltzik, reach him at mhiltzik@latimes.com, check out facebook.com/hiltzik and follow @hiltzikm on Twitter.

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times

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How did UnitedHealth let so many questionable claims slip past?

Here's how the nation's largest health insurance company aided and abetted what it says was a $43-million healthcare fraud.

In a lawsuit filed recently in federal court in Los Angeles, UnitedHealth Group says it paid out the $43 million to an interconnected group of doctors and medical clinics, mostly associated with the notorious 1-800-GET-THIN advertising campaign, for weight-loss surgeries and procedures. The company alleges that the providers submitted charges for procedures that were unnecessary or never performed, and inflated bills threefold or more. United is demanding refunds.

The company says it got rooked because it placed "justifiable reliance upon ... this false billing." It implies it had no choice but to "rely on the veracity" of the bills, and woke up belatedly.

But is it plausible that a leading health insurance company — if it were on its game — would allow $43 million to go out the door without realizing that it was being systematically cheated? Or is it more likely that United took the easy way out — not scrutinizing the medical claims until too late?

Either way, United utterly failed in its role, fundamental to the entire commercial health insurance business, of ferreting out and blocking improper charges. When fraud happens, the costs get footed by customers through higher premiums.

United's apparent dereliction raises an important question relevant to the future of healthcare reform: What use are health insurance companies?

The health insurance industry, which is cemented into a central role in our healthcare system via the Affordable Care Act, brags about its indispensable role in fighting fraud. But let's contrast its PR pitch with UnitedHealth's lawsuit.

America's Health Insurance Plans, or AHIP, the industry's lobbying arm, says this: "Health plans have prioritized reducing healthcare fraud and use cutting edge technology and sophisticated data analysis to prevent fraud from occurring in the first place rather than 'paying and chasing' after the fact."

UnitedHealth, in its lawsuit, says this: "By practical necessity, United reasonably relies in good faith on the claims submitted to it by providers....United receives nearly 2 million healthcare claims per day and must comply with various laws and regulations mandating that such claims be paid within a short period of time.... United reasonably relied on the misrepresentations contained on the claim forms."

Either the insurers truly have "prioritized" fighting fraud or they've prioritized meeting a deadline. Either they use "cutting edge technology" to combat fraud or they rely "in good faith" on submitted claims. Either they nip fraud in the bud or they file lawsuits to chase down money they've already paid "after the fact."

Paying suspect claims merely to meet the deadline? That's not required by law.

If resources were the problem, the company certainly had the money to spare: From 2010 through 2013, it collected nearly $387 billion in premiums and recorded profits of nearly $21 billion. In that period its chief executive, Stephen J. Hemsley, collected more than $50 million in compensation. United spent $3.2 billion to repurchase its own shares in 2013 alone.

United doesn't look like a company so overwhelmed by 2 million claims a day that it had to outsource the oversight process to "good faith." It looks like one that "prioritized" outlays to its shareholders and CEO ahead of "reducing healthcare fraud."

United had ample warning about 1-800-GET-THIN and its weight-loss business.

We started raising questions in early 2010 about the people behind the campaign. They were brothers Julian and Michael Omidi, both of whom had disciplinary records with the Medical Board of California — Julian's license has been revoked, and Michael's was under probation for the three years that ended Oct. 3, 2011. Michael Omidi is currently facing an accusation of negligence by the state medical board, according to information on the board's website.

United alleges in the lawsuit that much of the billing at issue arose from Lap-Band procedures, in which a flexible silicone collar is placed around the stomach to suppress appetite. The Lap-Band, which was GET-THIN's stock in trade, is indicated only for morbidly obese patients who have failed to lose weight by conventional means. United further contends it rejected many of the defendants' requests for authorization for the procedure, only to learn later that they concealed the operation within bills for other procedures, such as repairs of esophageal hernias.

United asserts that what it identifies as "the Omidi network" waived the patients' co-pays and then surreptitiously added them back into the insurance claims. Under the terms of its coverage, United says, waiving co-pays can invalidate the entire claim. United declined to answer my questions about why it wasn't more vigilant about billings from the Lap-Band clinics. The company also wouldn't say whether it had referred its allegations to law enforcement agencies or government regulators.

As my colleague Stuart Pfeifer reported last week, United's allegations come two years after several law enforcement agencies opened an investigation of the Omidis for "potential violations of federal law, including conspiracy, healthcare fraud, wire fraud, mail fraud, tax violations, identity theft [and] money laundering," according to a statement by a Food and Drug Administration criminal agent in a court filing in an unrelated criminal case. No charges have been filed.

The 1-800-GET-THIN campaign was pulled in 2012 after the FDA warned the companies that the advertisements failed to include adequate warnings about the potential risks of Lap-Band surgery.

Five patients died between 2009 and 2011 after Lap-Band surgeries at clinics affiliated with the ad campaign, according to lawsuits, autopsy reports and other public records.

United's lawsuit is a response to a case filed by several of the surgery centers, alleging that United had stopped paying their claims. "Nothing [United's] alleged is illegal or improper," says the clinics' attorney, Daron Tooch. "There's nothing illegal about charging a lot for a service."

At least through the beginning of 2011, United kept paying claims from "the Omidi network."

The core of United's business as a health insurer is to make judgments about bills submitted by doctors, hospitals and clinics — whether the charges are reasonable, the procedures necessary and proper, the providers competent. According to its own lawsuit, United failed to do that with respect to some $43 million in billings.

United's lawsuit against "the Omidi network" resembles a lawsuit it filed in Northern California in 2012, accusing a group of surgical centers of fleecing it out of $39 million through kickbacks and inflated claims, such as a bill for kidney stone treatment on which the insurer paid $97,000, though the average regional price for the procedure was $6,851. In that lawsuit, too, United pleaded that because of its volume of claims, it was "not in a position to specifically investigate the veracity of each claim." The case has been scheduled for trial in October 2015.

That's the reality of the health insurance business in a nutshell. The consequences of letting fraud go unaddressed can be laid on the premium payers. The shareholders and CEO, meanwhile, will do just fine.

Michael Hiltzik's column appears Sundays and Wednesdays. Read his blog, the Economy Hub, at latimes.com/business/hiltzik, reach him at mhiltzik@latimes.com, check out facebook.com/hiltzik and follow @hiltzikm on Twitter.

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times

23.50 | 0 komentar | Read More

Marine held in Mexican jail losing hope he'll be freed, mother says

A Marine held in a Mexican prison for six months is set for a court hearing Monday amid concern by his mother that he has become "highly despondent."

"He's definitely losing hope and confidence he will be able to get out of jail," Jill Tahmooressi told Bill O'Reilly of Fox News.

Tahmooressi's son, Sgt. Andrew Tahmooressi, is set for his fourth hearing Monday on weapons charges. He has been behind bars since April 1 after being arrested on the Mexican side of the San Ysidro border crossing with weapons in his pickup truck.

His mother, who lives in Florida, said that she talks frequently with her son by telephone. In his prison cell, she said, he is allowed only two books: the Bible and Dallas minister T.D. Jakes' "Let It Go: Forgive So You Can Be Forgiven."

Tahmooressi, 25, a reservist who served two deployments to Afghanistan, insists that he crossed the border by mistake.

Dozens of U.S. politicians have called on President Obama and Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto to free Tahmooressi so he can return to San Diego and receive treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder.

Mexican officials, however, have said that the case will be decided by the court system, not by political involvement from Washington or Mexico City.

On Wednesday, a hearing in Washington of the House subcommittee on the Western hemisphere is set to take up the Tahmooressi case. The hearing was called by the subcommittee chairman, Rep. Matt Salmon (R-Ariz.), who has visited Tahmooressi in his prison cell and called for his release.

Set to testify are Jill Tahmooressi and talk-show host Montel Williams, who served in the Marine Corps and Navy. Also scheduled as witnesses are  Robert Buchanan, a Marine who served with Tahmooressi in Afghanistan, and Pete Hegseth, chief executive officer of Concerned Veterans for America.

Williams sent a Twitter message that he agrees with O'Reilly that there has been a "lack of political courage in both presidents" to free Tahmooressi.

On Sept. 9, an eight-hour hearing was held so a federal judge could view video from 18 surveillance cameras from the night that Tahmooressi was detained and then arrested.

Tahmooressi's attorney, Fernando Benitez, argues that his client's rights were violated by Mexican customs agents who arrested him.

Benitez said a forensic photo and video report ordered by the judge will prove a central part of Tahmooressi's defense: that he mistakenly drove into Mexico after missing the last turn to remain in the United States.

Tahmooressi had three weapons and several hundred rounds of ammunition in his pickup truck when he drove into Mexico. In a 911 call after being detained, he told the operator that he had mistakenly driven across the border.

Tahmooressi remains without bail in a prison outside Tecate in the Baja California state. Initially after his arrest, he was held in the notoriously dangerous La Mesa prison outside Tijuana.

Benitez said customs agents who arrested Tahmooressi violated Mexican procedure by not providing him with a translator and not getting a judge's approval before searching his truck. There are also irregularities with the paperwork documenting the arrest, he said.

Under the Mexican legal system, a judge holds multiple hearings to hear all sides of the case before deciding, without an American-style trial by jury, whether the defendant is guilty. If convicted, Tahmooressi could face up to 21 years in prison.

A psychiatrist has been retained to provide a report to the judge about Tahmooressi's PTSD. Benitez argues that the Mexican legal system is not equipped to give his client proper care.

tony.perry@latimes.com

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
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How did UnitedHealth let so many questionable claims slip past?

Here's how the nation's largest health insurance company aided and abetted what it says was a $43-million healthcare fraud.

In a lawsuit filed recently in federal court in Los Angeles, UnitedHealth Group says it paid out the $43 million to an interconnected group of doctors and medical clinics, mostly associated with the notorious 1-800-GET-THIN advertising campaign, for weight-loss surgeries and procedures. The company alleges that the providers submitted charges for procedures that were unnecessary or never performed, and inflated bills threefold or more. United is demanding refunds.

The company says it got rooked because it placed "justifiable reliance upon ... this false billing." It implies it had no choice but to "rely on the veracity" of the bills, and woke up belatedly.

But is it plausible that a leading health insurance company — if it were on its game — would allow $43 million to go out the door without realizing that it was being systematically cheated? Or is it more likely that United took the easy way out — not scrutinizing the medical claims until too late?

Either way, United utterly failed in its role, fundamental to the entire commercial health insurance business, of ferreting out and blocking improper charges. When fraud happens, the costs get footed by customers through higher premiums.

United's apparent dereliction raises an important question relevant to the future of healthcare reform: What use are health insurance companies?

The health insurance industry, which is cemented into a central role in our healthcare system via the Affordable Care Act, brags about its indispensable role in fighting fraud. But let's contrast its PR pitch with UnitedHealth's lawsuit.

America's Health Insurance Plans, or AHIP, the industry's lobbying arm, says this: "Health plans have prioritized reducing healthcare fraud and use cutting edge technology and sophisticated data analysis to prevent fraud from occurring in the first place rather than 'paying and chasing' after the fact."

UnitedHealth, in its lawsuit, says this: "By practical necessity, United reasonably relies in good faith on the claims submitted to it by providers....United receives nearly 2 million healthcare claims per day and must comply with various laws and regulations mandating that such claims be paid within a short period of time.... United reasonably relied on the misrepresentations contained on the claim forms."

Either the insurers truly have "prioritized" fighting fraud or they've prioritized meeting a deadline. Either they use "cutting edge technology" to combat fraud or they rely "in good faith" on submitted claims. Either they nip fraud in the bud or they file lawsuits to chase down money they've already paid "after the fact."

Paying suspect claims merely to meet the deadline? That's not required by law.

If resources were the problem, the company certainly had the money to spare: From 2010 through 2013, it collected nearly $387 billion in premiums and recorded profits of nearly $21 billion. In that period its chief executive, Stephen J. Hemsley, collected more than $50 million in compensation. United spent $3.2 billion to repurchase its own shares in 2013 alone.

United doesn't look like a company so overwhelmed by 2 million claims a day that it had to outsource the oversight process to "good faith." It looks like one that "prioritized" outlays to its shareholders and CEO ahead of "reducing healthcare fraud."

United had ample warning about 1-800-GET-THIN and its weight-loss business.

We started raising questions in early 2010 about the people behind the campaign. They were brothers Julian and Michael Omidi, both of whom had disciplinary records with the Medical Board of California — Julian's license has been revoked, and Michael's was under probation for the three years that ended Oct. 3, 2011. Michael Omidi is currently facing an accusation of negligence by the state medical board, according to information on the board's website.

United alleges in the lawsuit that much of the billing at issue arose from Lap-Band procedures, in which a flexible silicone collar is placed around the stomach to suppress appetite. The Lap-Band, which was GET-THIN's stock in trade, is indicated only for morbidly obese patients who have failed to lose weight by conventional means. United further contends it rejected many of the defendants' requests for authorization for the procedure, only to learn later that they concealed the operation within bills for other procedures, such as repairs of esophageal hernias.

United asserts that what it identifies as "the Omidi network" waived the patients' co-pays and then surreptitiously added them back into the insurance claims. Under the terms of its coverage, United says, waiving co-pays can invalidate the entire claim. United declined to answer my questions about why it wasn't more vigilant about billings from the Lap-Band clinics. The company also wouldn't say whether it had referred its allegations to law enforcement agencies or government regulators.

As my colleague Stuart Pfeifer reported last week, United's allegations come two years after several law enforcement agencies opened an investigation of the Omidis for "potential violations of federal law, including conspiracy, healthcare fraud, wire fraud, mail fraud, tax violations, identity theft [and] money laundering," according to a statement by a Food and Drug Administration criminal agent in a court filing in an unrelated criminal case. No charges have been filed.

The 1-800-GET-THIN campaign was pulled in 2012 after the FDA warned the companies that the advertisements failed to include adequate warnings about the potential risks of Lap-Band surgery.

Five patients died between 2009 and 2011 after Lap-Band surgeries at clinics affiliated with the ad campaign, according to lawsuits, autopsy reports and other public records.

United's lawsuit is a response to a case filed by several of the surgery centers, alleging that United had stopped paying their claims. "Nothing [United's] alleged is illegal or improper," says the clinics' attorney, Daron Tooch. "There's nothing illegal about charging a lot for a service."

At least through the beginning of 2011, United kept paying claims from "the Omidi network."

The core of United's business as a health insurer is to make judgments about bills submitted by doctors, hospitals and clinics — whether the charges are reasonable, the procedures necessary and proper, the providers competent. According to its own lawsuit, United failed to do that with respect to some $43 million in billings.

United's lawsuit against "the Omidi network" resembles a lawsuit it filed in Northern California in 2012, accusing a group of surgical centers of fleecing it out of $39 million through kickbacks and inflated claims, such as a bill for kidney stone treatment on which the insurer paid $97,000, though the average regional price for the procedure was $6,851. In that lawsuit, too, United pleaded that because of its volume of claims, it was "not in a position to specifically investigate the veracity of each claim." The case has been scheduled for trial in October 2015.

That's the reality of the health insurance business in a nutshell. The consequences of letting fraud go unaddressed can be laid on the premium payers. The shareholders and CEO, meanwhile, will do just fine.

Michael Hiltzik's column appears Sundays and Wednesdays. Read his blog, the Economy Hub, at latimes.com/business/hiltzik, reach him at mhiltzik@latimes.com, check out facebook.com/hiltzik and follow @hiltzikm on Twitter.

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times

23.50 | 0 komentar | Read More

How did UnitedHealth let so many questionable claims slip past?

Here's how the nation's largest health insurance company aided and abetted what it says was a $43-million healthcare fraud.

In a lawsuit filed recently in federal court in Los Angeles, UnitedHealth Group says it paid out the $43 million to an interconnected group of doctors and medical clinics, mostly associated with the notorious 1-800-GET-THIN advertising campaign, for weight-loss surgeries and procedures. The company alleges that the providers submitted charges for procedures that were unnecessary or never performed, and inflated bills threefold or more. United is demanding refunds.

The company says it got rooked because it placed "justifiable reliance upon ... this false billing." It implies it had no choice but to "rely on the veracity" of the bills, and woke up belatedly.

But is it plausible that a leading health insurance company — if it were on its game — would allow $43 million to go out the door without realizing that it was being systematically cheated? Or is it more likely that United took the easy way out — not scrutinizing the medical claims until too late?

Either way, United utterly failed in its role, fundamental to the entire commercial health insurance business, of ferreting out and blocking improper charges. When fraud happens, the costs get footed by customers through higher premiums.

United's apparent dereliction raises an important question relevant to the future of healthcare reform: What use are health insurance companies?

The health insurance industry, which is cemented into a central role in our healthcare system via the Affordable Care Act, brags about its indispensable role in fighting fraud. But let's contrast its PR pitch with UnitedHealth's lawsuit.

America's Health Insurance Plans, or AHIP, the industry's lobbying arm, says this: "Health plans have prioritized reducing healthcare fraud and use cutting edge technology and sophisticated data analysis to prevent fraud from occurring in the first place rather than 'paying and chasing' after the fact."

UnitedHealth, in its lawsuit, says this: "By practical necessity, United reasonably relies in good faith on the claims submitted to it by providers....United receives nearly 2 million healthcare claims per day and must comply with various laws and regulations mandating that such claims be paid within a short period of time.... United reasonably relied on the misrepresentations contained on the claim forms."

Either the insurers truly have "prioritized" fighting fraud or they've prioritized meeting a deadline. Either they use "cutting edge technology" to combat fraud or they rely "in good faith" on submitted claims. Either they nip fraud in the bud or they file lawsuits to chase down money they've already paid "after the fact."

Paying suspect claims merely to meet the deadline? That's not required by law.

If resources were the problem, the company certainly had the money to spare: From 2010 through 2013, it collected nearly $387 billion in premiums and recorded profits of nearly $21 billion. In that period its chief executive, Stephen J. Hemsley, collected more than $50 million in compensation. United spent $3.2 billion to repurchase its own shares in 2013 alone.

United doesn't look like a company so overwhelmed by 2 million claims a day that it had to outsource the oversight process to "good faith." It looks like one that "prioritized" outlays to its shareholders and CEO ahead of "reducing healthcare fraud."

United had ample warning about 1-800-GET-THIN and its weight-loss business.

We started raising questions in early 2010 about the people behind the campaign. They were brothers Julian and Michael Omidi, both of whom had disciplinary records with the Medical Board of California — Julian's license has been revoked, and Michael's was under probation for the three years that ended Oct. 3, 2011. Michael Omidi is currently facing an accusation of negligence by the state medical board, according to information on the board's website.

United alleges in the lawsuit that much of the billing at issue arose from Lap-Band procedures, in which a flexible silicone collar is placed around the stomach to suppress appetite. The Lap-Band, which was GET-THIN's stock in trade, is indicated only for morbidly obese patients who have failed to lose weight by conventional means. United further contends it rejected many of the defendants' requests for authorization for the procedure, only to learn later that they concealed the operation within bills for other procedures, such as repairs of esophageal hernias.

United asserts that what it identifies as "the Omidi network" waived the patients' co-pays and then surreptitiously added them back into the insurance claims. Under the terms of its coverage, United says, waiving co-pays can invalidate the entire claim. United declined to answer my questions about why it wasn't more vigilant about billings from the Lap-Band clinics. The company also wouldn't say whether it had referred its allegations to law enforcement agencies or government regulators.

As my colleague Stuart Pfeifer reported last week, United's allegations come two years after several law enforcement agencies opened an investigation of the Omidis for "potential violations of federal law, including conspiracy, healthcare fraud, wire fraud, mail fraud, tax violations, identity theft [and] money laundering," according to a statement by a Food and Drug Administration criminal agent in a court filing in an unrelated criminal case. No charges have been filed.

The 1-800-GET-THIN campaign was pulled in 2012 after the FDA warned the companies that the advertisements failed to include adequate warnings about the potential risks of Lap-Band surgery.

Five patients died between 2009 and 2011 after Lap-Band surgeries at clinics affiliated with the ad campaign, according to lawsuits, autopsy reports and other public records.

United's lawsuit is a response to a case filed by several of the surgery centers, alleging that United had stopped paying their claims. "Nothing [United's] alleged is illegal or improper," says the clinics' attorney, Daron Tooch. "There's nothing illegal about charging a lot for a service."

At least through the beginning of 2011, United kept paying claims from "the Omidi network."

The core of United's business as a health insurer is to make judgments about bills submitted by doctors, hospitals and clinics — whether the charges are reasonable, the procedures necessary and proper, the providers competent. According to its own lawsuit, United failed to do that with respect to some $43 million in billings.

United's lawsuit against "the Omidi network" resembles a lawsuit it filed in Northern California in 2012, accusing a group of surgical centers of fleecing it out of $39 million through kickbacks and inflated claims, such as a bill for kidney stone treatment on which the insurer paid $97,000, though the average regional price for the procedure was $6,851. In that lawsuit, too, United pleaded that because of its volume of claims, it was "not in a position to specifically investigate the veracity of each claim." The case has been scheduled for trial in October 2015.

That's the reality of the health insurance business in a nutshell. The consequences of letting fraud go unaddressed can be laid on the premium payers. The shareholders and CEO, meanwhile, will do just fine.

Michael Hiltzik's column appears Sundays and Wednesdays. Read his blog, the Economy Hub, at latimes.com/business/hiltzik, reach him at mhiltzik@latimes.com, check out facebook.com/hiltzik and follow @hiltzikm on Twitter.

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times

23.50 | 0 komentar | Read More

Meg Wolitzer's 'Belzhar' nurses its teens back to emotional health

Written By kolimtiga on Jumat, 26 September 2014 | 23.50

Meg Wolitzer's fiction has attracted a great many superlatives over the last three decades. "The Interestings," published last year, prompted a reviewer for the Guardian to declare Wolitzer a "writer of prodigious energy and detail." The New York Times' reviewer placed the novel "in the ranks of books like Jonathan Franzen's 'Freedom' and Jeffrey Eugenides' 'Marriage Plot.'"

From the start of her career, Wolitzer has specialized in women and their densely tangled relationships with their friends and mothers and their sometimes tortured paths into adulthood. "Sleepwalking," written while she was an undergraduate, centered on three college girls who were absorbed in poetry and death. In "The Ten-Year Nap," Wolitzer wrote about women grappling with motherhood versus career.

In "Belzhar," her first foray into young adult fiction, Wolitzer's narrator and ringleader is a girl called Jam (short for Jamaica) Gallahue. Jam is one of five teenage protagonists attending the Wooden Barn, a New England boarding school for "emotionally fragile, highly intelligent students," who encounter one another in a class called "Special Topics in English." On the first day, their teacher announces they will read "The Bell Jar" and other works by Sylvia Plath, surprising choices for those who are easily bruised. The students are also instructed to write in a journal twice at week.

"Everyone," Mrs. Q. says, "has something to say. But not everyone can bear to say it. Your job is to find a way."

Jam, we learn at the start, has shut down after the death of her boyfriend: "I loved him and then he died and almost a year passed and no one knew what to do with me." For much of Special Topics in English, Jam shares only superficial details about the relationship, but the reader is allowed to relive parts of her romance with Reeve Maxwell as she imagines their moments together. Their attraction seems intense but not unhealthy; their devotion, complete.

Jam's classmates include Griffin, good-looking "but in a hostile way"; Sierra, an African American girl who dances and looks model perfect; Marc, president of the student council and captain of the debate team; and Casey, new to a wheelchair. It will not surprise you to learn that they gradually share their stories of pain.

But first, the Special Topics students must somehow self-navigate to a different level of consciousness, a hypnotic trance of sorts where they start to relive the events that led to their trauma. Admission to this parallel universe comes only when the students are writing in their journals. "I feel like I went to a place where people go when they can't take reality, because it's just too depressing," Jam says and, agreeing their group needs a code name, suggests "Maybe we could do a riff on 'Bell Jar.'" And so "Belzhar" is born.

Their stories feel as though they were ripped from the headlines (or perhaps a script for an after-school special). Sierra's little brother goes missing, perhaps kidnapped after she sends him to the store for cookie dough. Griffin is blamed for a fire that destroys the family business. Marc discovers his father's infidelity. Casey is crippled when her mother, driving drunk, hits a wall. And Jam loses her boyfriend, although the circumstances that surround his death remain murky.

Over the course of the novel, these five teenagers become a unit, allied in the exploration of their inner lives. And, it will not surprise you, they grow in emotional maturity, groping their way to defining, and sometimes conquering, their grief.

Inspirational? Perhaps. But the kids of "Belzhar" do for the most part seem to find the path back to emotional good health in a manner that might be construed as convenient. Their sullenness begins to fade, their delusions recede, their confidence grows. If only we could send all of our surly, freaked-out adolescents to Belzhar and wait for semester's end and that moderately happy ending.

alice.short@latimes.com

Follow me on Twitter: @AliceShort3

Belzhar

Meg Wolitzer
Dutton: 266 pp., $17.99, age 14+

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
23.50 | 0 komentar | Read More

Meg Wolitzer's 'Belzhar' nurses its teens back to emotional health

Meg Wolitzer's fiction has attracted a great many superlatives over the last three decades. "The Interestings," published last year, prompted a reviewer for the Guardian to declare Wolitzer a "writer of prodigious energy and detail." The New York Times' reviewer placed the novel "in the ranks of books like Jonathan Franzen's 'Freedom' and Jeffrey Eugenides' 'Marriage Plot.'"

From the start of her career, Wolitzer has specialized in women and their densely tangled relationships with their friends and mothers and their sometimes tortured paths into adulthood. "Sleepwalking," written while she was an undergraduate, centered on three college girls who were absorbed in poetry and death. In "The Ten-Year Nap," Wolitzer wrote about women grappling with motherhood versus career.

In "Belzhar," her first foray into young adult fiction, Wolitzer's narrator and ringleader is a girl called Jam (short for Jamaica) Gallahue. Jam is one of five teenage protagonists attending the Wooden Barn, a New England boarding school for "emotionally fragile, highly intelligent students," who encounter one another in a class called "Special Topics in English." On the first day, their teacher announces they will read "The Bell Jar" and other works by Sylvia Plath, surprising choices for those who are easily bruised. The students are also instructed to write in a journal twice at week.

"Everyone," Mrs. Q. says, "has something to say. But not everyone can bear to say it. Your job is to find a way."

Jam, we learn at the start, has shut down after the death of her boyfriend: "I loved him and then he died and almost a year passed and no one knew what to do with me." For much of Special Topics in English, Jam shares only superficial details about the relationship, but the reader is allowed to relive parts of her romance with Reeve Maxwell as she imagines their moments together. Their attraction seems intense but not unhealthy; their devotion, complete.

Jam's classmates include Griffin, good-looking "but in a hostile way"; Sierra, an African American girl who dances and looks model perfect; Marc, president of the student council and captain of the debate team; and Casey, new to a wheelchair. It will not surprise you to learn that they gradually share their stories of pain.

But first, the Special Topics students must somehow self-navigate to a different level of consciousness, a hypnotic trance of sorts where they start to relive the events that led to their trauma. Admission to this parallel universe comes only when the students are writing in their journals. "I feel like I went to a place where people go when they can't take reality, because it's just too depressing," Jam says and, agreeing their group needs a code name, suggests "Maybe we could do a riff on 'Bell Jar.'" And so "Belzhar" is born.

Their stories feel as though they were ripped from the headlines (or perhaps a script for an after-school special). Sierra's little brother goes missing, perhaps kidnapped after she sends him to the store for cookie dough. Griffin is blamed for a fire that destroys the family business. Marc discovers his father's infidelity. Casey is crippled when her mother, driving drunk, hits a wall. And Jam loses her boyfriend, although the circumstances that surround his death remain murky.

Over the course of the novel, these five teenagers become a unit, allied in the exploration of their inner lives. And, it will not surprise you, they grow in emotional maturity, groping their way to defining, and sometimes conquering, their grief.

Inspirational? Perhaps. But the kids of "Belzhar" do for the most part seem to find the path back to emotional good health in a manner that might be construed as convenient. Their sullenness begins to fade, their delusions recede, their confidence grows. If only we could send all of our surly, freaked-out adolescents to Belzhar and wait for semester's end and that moderately happy ending.

alice.short@latimes.com

Follow me on Twitter: @AliceShort3

Belzhar

Meg Wolitzer
Dutton: 266 pp., $17.99, age 14+

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
23.50 | 0 komentar | Read More

Lodrick M. Cook Rotunda a gem of the Los Angeles Central Library

The Central Library in downtown Los Angeles might not have the historical gravitas of the New York Public Library's lion-flanked headquarters. Or the architectural edge of Seattle's angular Central Library (completed 2004). Or the rooftop splendor of San Diego's dome-topped Central Library (completed 2013). But it does have one truly cool room upstairs.

And since this is the last day of Banned Books Week, why not celebrate that room (and all libraries) with a one-minute video journey?

On the way in, you'll see that wacky pyramid on top of the library, some of the handsome fountains in the garden, a horn player on the sidewalk and a few scenes from the stacks. The climax is the cool room: the Lodrick M. Cook Rotunda on the second floor, where murals from the 1930s surround you, an interior dome arches high above and a globe chandelier dangles brilliantly.

The murals by Dean Cornwell depict four key eras in state history, including the arrival of European immigrants, the construction of the missions and the beginnings of modern arts and industry here. 

The chandelier, designed by Goodhue Associates in 1926, got a major restoration as part of the library's rebirth and expansion after a major arson fire in 1986. If you stand right under the globe, you'll see 48 lights around the rim (there were 48 U.S. states at the time) and the signs of the zodiac.

Naturally, the L.A. library people themselves have more details. The same goes for those libraries in New York, Seattle and San Diego.

"A Minute Away" is a video series in which nothing much happens -- except you see the world, and hear it, and get a minute's respite from workaday life. (Actually, some are as long as 1:40.) These are casual moments without talking heads or narration -- just natural sound from Machu Picchu, Red Square, the Yucatan, an Alaska float plane or the reading room of the New York Public Library. We add new ones weekly, and we've got more than 60 of them now, so if you'd prefer a full hour away …

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
23.50 | 0 komentar | Read More

Lodrick M. Cook Rotunda a gem of the Los Angeles Central Library

The Central Library in downtown Los Angeles might not have the historical gravitas of the New York Public Library's lion-flanked headquarters. Or the architectural edge of Seattle's angular Central Library (completed 2004). Or the rooftop splendor of San Diego's dome-topped Central Library (completed 2013). But it does have one truly cool room upstairs.

And since this is the last day of Banned Books Week, why not celebrate that room (and all libraries) with a one-minute video journey?

On the way in, you'll see that wacky pyramid on top of the library, some of the handsome fountains in the garden, a horn player on the sidewalk and a few scenes from the stacks. The climax is the cool room: the Lodrick M. Cook Rotunda on the second floor, where murals from the 1930s surround you, an interior dome arches high above and a globe chandelier dangles brilliantly.

The murals by Dean Cornwell depict four key eras in state history, including the arrival of European immigrants, the construction of the missions and the beginnings of modern arts and industry here. 

The chandelier, designed by Goodhue Associates in 1926, got a major restoration as part of the library's rebirth and expansion after a major arson fire in 1986. If you stand right under the globe, you'll see 48 lights around the rim (there were 48 U.S. states at the time) and the signs of the zodiac.

Naturally, the L.A. library people themselves have more details. The same goes for those libraries in New York, Seattle and San Diego.

"A Minute Away" is a video series in which nothing much happens -- except you see the world, and hear it, and get a minute's respite from workaday life. (Actually, some are as long as 1:40.) These are casual moments without talking heads or narration -- just natural sound from Machu Picchu, Red Square, the Yucatan, an Alaska float plane or the reading room of the New York Public Library. We add new ones weekly, and we've got more than 60 of them now, so if you'd prefer a full hour away …

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
23.50 | 0 komentar | Read More

Meg Wolitzer's 'Belzhar' nurses its teens back to emotional health

Meg Wolitzer's fiction has attracted a great many superlatives over the last three decades. "The Interestings," published last year, prompted a reviewer for the Guardian to declare Wolitzer a "writer of prodigious energy and detail." The New York Times' reviewer placed the novel "in the ranks of books like Jonathan Franzen's 'Freedom' and Jeffrey Eugenides' 'Marriage Plot.'"

From the start of her career, Wolitzer has specialized in women and their densely tangled relationships with their friends and mothers and their sometimes tortured paths into adulthood. "Sleepwalking," written while she was an undergraduate, centered on three college girls who were absorbed in poetry and death. In "The Ten-Year Nap," Wolitzer wrote about women grappling with motherhood versus career.

In "Belzhar," her first foray into young adult fiction, Wolitzer's narrator and ringleader is a girl called Jam (short for Jamaica) Gallahue. Jam is one of five teenage protagonists attending the Wooden Barn, a New England boarding school for "emotionally fragile, highly intelligent students," who encounter one another in a class called "Special Topics in English." On the first day, their teacher announces they will read "The Bell Jar" and other works by Sylvia Plath, surprising choices for those who are easily bruised. The students are also instructed to write in a journal twice at week.

"Everyone," Mrs. Q. says, "has something to say. But not everyone can bear to say it. Your job is to find a way."

Jam, we learn at the start, has shut down after the death of her boyfriend: "I loved him and then he died and almost a year passed and no one knew what to do with me." For much of Special Topics in English, Jam shares only superficial details about the relationship, but the reader is allowed to relive parts of her romance with Reeve Maxwell as she imagines their moments together. Their attraction seems intense but not unhealthy; their devotion, complete.

Jam's classmates include Griffin, good-looking "but in a hostile way"; Sierra, an African American girl who dances and looks model perfect; Marc, president of the student council and captain of the debate team; and Casey, new to a wheelchair. It will not surprise you to learn that they gradually share their stories of pain.

But first, the Special Topics students must somehow self-navigate to a different level of consciousness, a hypnotic trance of sorts where they start to relive the events that led to their trauma. Admission to this parallel universe comes only when the students are writing in their journals. "I feel like I went to a place where people go when they can't take reality, because it's just too depressing," Jam says and, agreeing their group needs a code name, suggests "Maybe we could do a riff on 'Bell Jar.'" And so "Belzhar" is born.

Their stories feel as though they were ripped from the headlines (or perhaps a script for an after-school special). Sierra's little brother goes missing, perhaps kidnapped after she sends him to the store for cookie dough. Griffin is blamed for a fire that destroys the family business. Marc discovers his father's infidelity. Casey is crippled when her mother, driving drunk, hits a wall. And Jam loses her boyfriend, although the circumstances that surround his death remain murky.

Over the course of the novel, these five teenagers become a unit, allied in the exploration of their inner lives. And, it will not surprise you, they grow in emotional maturity, groping their way to defining, and sometimes conquering, their grief.

Inspirational? Perhaps. But the kids of "Belzhar" do for the most part seem to find the path back to emotional good health in a manner that might be construed as convenient. Their sullenness begins to fade, their delusions recede, their confidence grows. If only we could send all of our surly, freaked-out adolescents to Belzhar and wait for semester's end and that moderately happy ending.

alice.short@latimes.com

Follow me on Twitter: @AliceShort3

Belzhar

Meg Wolitzer
Dutton: 266 pp., $17.99, age 14+

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
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Late-night text may have landed Webb Simpson on Ryder Cup team

Written By kolimtiga on Kamis, 25 September 2014 | 23.50

Now the story can be told -- Webb Simpson may have talked his way onto the U.S. Ryder Cup team by way of a post-midnight text to captain Tom Watson.

Speaking to reporters on Thursday, Simpson discussed failing to qualify for one of the first nine spots on the squad and having to rely on Watson's three wild-card picks.

He said that lying awake in the early morning hours of Sept. 2, the day Watson was scheduled to finalize the U.S. roster, he grew anxious.

"I thought, I had not heard from him. I probably would have heard from him by now, and I've got nothing to lose," he recalled.

The player said he texted something along the lines of "I know it's a really tough decision." To his surprise, he said, Watson not only texted right back, acknowledging the difficulty of the decision, but also called about 30 minutes later.

"He asked me why I thought he should put me on the team," Simpson said. "And 4:30 in the morning, it's a tough question to be asked."

Simpson said he talked about his passion and experience. Later that day, Watson added him to the squad along with Keegan Bradley and Hunter Mahan.

"I kind of snuck in there," Simpson said. "So whatever it was, whatever he saw, it worked."

Follow David Wharton on Twitter: @LATimesWharton

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
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Woman beaten by CHP officer settles, but activists 'want him in prison'

Civil rights activists plan to launch a new campaign Thursday for the criminal prosecution of a California Highway Patrol officer caught on video repeatedly punching a woman on the 10 Freeway in Los Angeles, saying the officer's resignation and a $1.5-million settlement do not go far enough.

The CHP announced Wednesday that Officer Daniel Andrew was stepping down and that the agency had agreed to pay $1.5 million to settle a civil rights lawsuit brought by the woman, Marlene Pinnock, 51.

The settlement will establish a special-needs trust for Pinnock to "provide a mechanism for her long-term care," according to a statement released by CHP Commissioner Joe Farrow.

But the CHP announcement did little to quell civil rights activists, who have called the incident a horrifying case of excessive force.

"Our call has always been for L.A. County District Attorney Jackie Lacey to prosecute Andrew for beating Pinnock," Project Islamic Hope Director Najee Ali said in a statement. "The settlement with her changes nothing. If anything it makes a prosecution more urgent now than ever." 

Pinnock's attorney, Caree Harper, said there were two conditions that were key to the negotiations: That her client be taken care of "for life," and that the officer who hit her lose his job.

"If they did not do that, the case was not going to settle yesterday," Harper said. "It's important that the community be protected against that officer."

Andrew's attorney could not be reached for comment late Wednesday. 

The settlement, Harper added, was finalized Wednesday night after about 10 hours of negotiations.

Prosecutors are determining whether to charge Andrew in connection with the July 1 incident. Last month, the CHP announced he had been stripped of his duties and could face "potentially serious charges."

Harper said Thursday that she would continue to push for criminal charges to be filed, adding that prosecutors have reached out to interview her client.

"We want him in prison," Harper said. "I'm not done."

Civil rights activists plan to announce their new campaign to have Andrew prosecuted at a news conference Thursday at the site of the beating, which occurred at the 10 Freeway near LaBrea and Adams boulevards.

The July 1 altercation generated national attention after a video shot by a passing motorist surfaced.

It shows a uniformed CHP officer pinning the woman to the ground and repeatedly punching her, landing at least nine blows.

There has been some dispute about what prompted the altercation. The CHP has said the officer was trying to keep the woman from walking into traffic. CHP logs state that she ignored commands and became "physically combative."

But Pinnock said in an interview last month that she did nothing to provoke the officer. Pinnock said she was walking to a place to sleep that night when the officer came up behind her. She said that as she then screamed, he "pulled me back and threw me on the ground."

Pinnock was hospitalized after the incident and placed on a mental-health hold.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson, president of the Los Angeles Urban Policy Roundtable, said shortly after the video surfaced that he and others were "horrified by what we saw" and had scheduled meetings with top CHP officials seeking a commitment of "zero tolerance by any officers in the use of excessive force against civilians."

In a statement announcing Andrew's resignation and the $1.5-million settlement, Farrow said that when the incident occurred, he promised a full investigation and "swift resolution."

"Today, we have worked constructively to reach a settlement agreement that is satisfactory to all parties involved," he said.

Follow the reporters on Twitter: @lacrimes, @katemather, @theryanparker

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times

9:05 a.m.: This story was updated to include comments from Pinnock's attorney, Caree Harper.

This story was first published at 6:49 a.m.


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Woman beaten by CHP officer settles, but activists 'want him in prison'

Civil rights activists plan to launch a new campaign Thursday for the criminal prosecution of a California Highway Patrol officer caught on video repeatedly punching a woman on the 10 Freeway in Los Angeles, saying the officer's resignation and a $1.5-million settlement do not go far enough.

The CHP announced Wednesday that Officer Daniel Andrew was stepping down and that the agency had agreed to pay $1.5 million to settle a civil rights lawsuit brought by the woman, Marlene Pinnock, 51.

The settlement will establish a special-needs trust for Pinnock to "provide a mechanism for her long-term care," according to a statement released by CHP Commissioner Joe Farrow.

But the CHP announcement did little to quell civil rights activists, who have called the incident a horrifying case of excessive force.

"Our call has always been for L.A. County District Attorney Jackie Lacey to prosecute Andrew for beating Pinnock," Project Islamic Hope Director Najee Ali said in a statement. "The settlement with her changes nothing. If anything it makes a prosecution more urgent now than ever." 

Pinnock's attorney, Caree Harper, said there were two conditions that were key to the negotiations: That her client be taken care of "for life," and that the officer who hit her lose his job.

"If they did not do that, the case was not going to settle yesterday," Harper said. "It's important that the community be protected against that officer."

Andrew's attorney could not be reached for comment late Wednesday. 

The settlement, Harper added, was finalized Wednesday night after about 10 hours of negotiations.

Prosecutors are determining whether to charge Andrew in connection with the July 1 incident. Last month, the CHP announced he had been stripped of his duties and could face "potentially serious charges."

Harper said Thursday that she would continue to push for criminal charges to be filed, adding that prosecutors have reached out to interview her client.

"We want him in prison," Harper said. "I'm not done."

Civil rights activists plan to announce their new campaign to have Andrew prosecuted at a news conference Thursday at the site of the beating, which occurred at the 10 Freeway near LaBrea and Adams boulevards.

The July 1 altercation generated national attention after a video shot by a passing motorist surfaced.

It shows a uniformed CHP officer pinning the woman to the ground and repeatedly punching her, landing at least nine blows.

There has been some dispute about what prompted the altercation. The CHP has said the officer was trying to keep the woman from walking into traffic. CHP logs state that she ignored commands and became "physically combative."

But Pinnock said in an interview last month that she did nothing to provoke the officer. Pinnock said she was walking to a place to sleep that night when the officer came up behind her. She said that as she then screamed, he "pulled me back and threw me on the ground."

Pinnock was hospitalized after the incident and placed on a mental-health hold.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson, president of the Los Angeles Urban Policy Roundtable, said shortly after the video surfaced that he and others were "horrified by what we saw" and had scheduled meetings with top CHP officials seeking a commitment of "zero tolerance by any officers in the use of excessive force against civilians."

In a statement announcing Andrew's resignation and the $1.5-million settlement, Farrow said that when the incident occurred, he promised a full investigation and "swift resolution."

"Today, we have worked constructively to reach a settlement agreement that is satisfactory to all parties involved," he said.

Follow the reporters on Twitter: @lacrimes, @katemather, @theryanparker

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times

9:05 a.m.: This story was updated to include comments from Pinnock's attorney, Caree Harper.

This story was first published at 6:49 a.m.


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Woman beaten by CHP officer settles, but activists 'want him in prison'

Civil rights activists plan to launch a new campaign Thursday for the criminal prosecution of a California Highway Patrol officer caught on video repeatedly punching a woman on the 10 Freeway in Los Angeles, saying the officer's resignation and a $1.5-million settlement do not go far enough.

The CHP announced Wednesday that Officer Daniel Andrew was stepping down and that the agency had agreed to pay $1.5 million to settle a civil rights lawsuit brought by the woman, Marlene Pinnock, 51.

The settlement will establish a special-needs trust for Pinnock to "provide a mechanism for her long-term care," according to a statement released by CHP Commissioner Joe Farrow.

But the CHP announcement did little to quell civil rights activists, who have called the incident a horrifying case of excessive force.

"Our call has always been for L.A. County District Attorney Jackie Lacey to prosecute Andrew for beating Pinnock," Project Islamic Hope Director Najee Ali said in a statement. "The settlement with her changes nothing. If anything it makes a prosecution more urgent now than ever." 

Pinnock's attorney, Caree Harper, said there were two conditions that were key to the negotiations: That her client be taken care of "for life," and that the officer who hit her lose his job.

"If they did not do that, the case was not going to settle yesterday," Harper said. "It's important that the community be protected against that officer."

Andrew's attorney could not be reached for comment late Wednesday. 

The settlement, Harper added, was finalized Wednesday night after about 10 hours of negotiations.

Prosecutors are determining whether to charge Andrew in connection with the July 1 incident. Last month, the CHP announced he had been stripped of his duties and could face "potentially serious charges."

Harper said Thursday that she would continue to push for criminal charges to be filed, adding that prosecutors have reached out to interview her client.

"We want him in prison," Harper said. "I'm not done."

Civil rights activists plan to announce their new campaign to have Andrew prosecuted at a news conference Thursday at the site of the beating, which occurred at the 10 Freeway near LaBrea and Adams boulevards.

The July 1 altercation generated national attention after a video shot by a passing motorist surfaced.

It shows a uniformed CHP officer pinning the woman to the ground and repeatedly punching her, landing at least nine blows.

There has been some dispute about what prompted the altercation. The CHP has said the officer was trying to keep the woman from walking into traffic. CHP logs state that she ignored commands and became "physically combative."

But Pinnock said in an interview last month that she did nothing to provoke the officer. Pinnock said she was walking to a place to sleep that night when the officer came up behind her. She said that as she then screamed, he "pulled me back and threw me on the ground."

Pinnock was hospitalized after the incident and placed on a mental-health hold.

Earl Ofari Hutchinson, president of the Los Angeles Urban Policy Roundtable, said shortly after the video surfaced that he and others were "horrified by what we saw" and had scheduled meetings with top CHP officials seeking a commitment of "zero tolerance by any officers in the use of excessive force against civilians."

In a statement announcing Andrew's resignation and the $1.5-million settlement, Farrow said that when the incident occurred, he promised a full investigation and "swift resolution."

"Today, we have worked constructively to reach a settlement agreement that is satisfactory to all parties involved," he said.

Follow the reporters on Twitter: @lacrimes, @katemather, @theryanparker

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times

9:05 a.m.: This story was updated to include comments from Pinnock's attorney, Caree Harper.

This story was first published at 6:49 a.m.


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Baseball: If it's Thursday, it's time for a Ping Pong tournament at JSerra

They've played Bubble Soccer, dressed up as medieval warriors for larping and engaged in Slip-N-Slide, rolling around in water.

If it's Thursday, it's time for a new off-season activitiy for the JSerra baseball team.

A 64-team table tennis bracket has been put together by Coach Brett Kay, who has been going around picking up tables that will be placed in the outfield for Thursday's tournament.

There's been lots of smack going around, with the freshmen apparently confident about knocking off some of the seniors.

There's no top seed for the tournament. It's a random draw, but if someone shows up with his own paddle that has battery-operated blinking lights, beware.

I'll be sure to update tonight with the name of the JSerra Ping Pong champion.

Twitter:@LATSondheimer

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
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Wild architecture makes German cinema come alive at LACMA

Written By kolimtiga on Rabu, 24 September 2014 | 23.50

Movies can be great. Art can be great. But put them together in a museum exhibition, and the combination can be not-so-great. In fact, it can be downright tedious: acres of wall space jammed with photos and film posters, all punctuated by dim projection rooms displaying bits of film. Enter the screening areas and you often find yourself groping around in pitch darkness. Leave them, and you're blinded by the glare of museum lighting.

A new exhibition of early 20th-century cinema at the L.A. County Museum of Art (LACMA), however, rethinks that equation. Certainly, "Haunted Screens: German Cinema in the 1920s" features all the standard-issue bits: photography, concept sketches and film clips from some of the most iconic films ever made, from early horror movies like "The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari" to the industrial sci-fi of Fritz Lang's "Metropolis."

But it does so in a meticulously designed architectural installation that evokes the feeling of entering the gritty, surreal universe of the German Expressionist movies, complete with sloping walls, jagged forms and geometric cone structures that descend from the ceiling.

"That was really something that we asked ourselves during this whole process," says Britt Salvesen, who heads up LACMA's prints and drawings department, and curated the show. "How do you get away from all of the expected spatial relationships: the dark room, the black curtain, the row of framed objects that seem to stretch into infinity?"

Well, they did it. Designed by Amy Murphy, a professor of architecture at USC, and Michael Maltzan of Michael Maltzan Architecture, the exhibition design is the antithesis of the traditional framed-stuff-on-a-wall model.

A single undulating form, like a series of rolling hills, connects the space — as if a gigantic carpet had been bunched up to create a set of waves. The top of the form is white and holds all of the ephemera: photos, concept drawings and various film-related objects. The under-layer is dark, and it is in these tunnels where clips of the various movies are screened at sharp angles, giving the whole thing a hallucinatory effect.

Arched cut-outs pierce the carpet, allowing viewers to migrate from light to dark and dark to light; moving picture to still ones, and back again.

"We wanted to engage the dramatic juxtapositions you see in these films," says Murphy, a designer who has studied the relationship between cinema and the field of architecture. "The chiaroscuro of the dark and light, as well as the anxiety that is present in the work."

"When you see 'The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari,' you know what that feels like and looks like," says Maltzan, who has done exhibition design in the past. "Instead of replicating those forms in space, we were looking to take the same spirit and the same motivations and reinterpret them in a contemporary way."

In this regard, they've been wildly successful. The installation is cinematic without drawing attention away from the work. Case in point: the stair-like structure that is lined with pieces that explore the psychological ways in which stairs were used in the cinema of the time.

And there's the final curved form, at the rear of the gallery, which features a replica of the robot from "Metropolis," a figure meant to incite the masses, looking down upon us from her elevated perch. The architecture suits her filmic role perfectly.

These types of features also allowed the museum to play with the lighting.

"It liberated us to create more unconventional sharp angles," Salvesen says. "We talked about the types of shadows that could be cast by the architectural forms, which is not the sort of discussion you have with a typical art show. It worked out better than we could have hoped for with the 'Metropolis' statue. Her hands cast this incredible shadow on the structure below her."

To be certain, the show isn't a one-off for LACMA. Over the last couple of years the museum has begun to rethink the experience of exhibitions about cinema, and it's made for some pretty engrossing shows. 

A retrospective on the work of director Stanley Kubrick in 2012 seamlessly wove in works of art in between the film ephemera — including a shiny black sculpture by John McCracken that bore an uncanny resemblance to the monolith from the director's "2001: A Space Odyssey."

And last year's (seriously underrated) exhibition on cinematographer Gabriel Figueroa created viewing chambers centered around themes. One piece of the exhibit contained a whole sequence of clips that focused on the way Figueroa presented death in his movies; another emphasized landscape; yet another dealt exclusively with the surreal qualities of the human eye. Rather than just dabbling in Figueroa's work, the viewer became immersed in it.

In the current show, it is the architecture that makes this period of filmmaking in Germany come to life. 

"Germany was such a petri dish of culture during that period," Murphy says. "It was isolated after World War I. It had closed off its film industry and stopped allowing the importation of foreign film. So these films came about in this very unique time and space in terms of creativity, but also anxiety about Germany's place in the world."

"The collaboration between painters and sculptors and set designers and filmmakers and composers, it just created this cultural and social richness," concurs Maltzan. "I think we both felt that this was something that you had to spend time immersed in so that it would begin to reveal itself. You needed a longer engagement."

With its daring architectural installation, LACMA is certain to encourage viewers to linger, to take another look at a drawing, examine that photo a bit more closely or review that scene from the murderous "M" once again.


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Renewed vandalism, arrests mar the night in Ferguson, Mo.

Tensions again boiled over in Ferguson, Mo., as a crowd of people smashed the windows of at least one store and three people were arrested in the suburb that has become the latest symbol of the continuing racial woes in the United States.

Tuesday's demonstrations, which spilled into Wednesday, are part of a series that wracked the city, though violence had lessened in recent weeks. The protests come as the nation awaits grand jury action on the case that touched off the summer of discontent. On Aug. 9, Michael Brown, an unarmed young black man, was shot by a white policeman, leading to riots, protests and national attention to the problems of racial friction.

The issue took on a global dimension on Wednesday when President Obama took time in his speech at the United Nations to mention Ferguson and how the United States through democratic means is trying to heal its own wounds. After calling for new global cooperation to fight terrorism, Ebola and other woes, Obama urged the world to find common ground in shared principles to fight for a better world.

"I realize that America's critics will be quick to point out that at times we too have failed to live up to our ideals; that America has plenty of problems within our own borders," Obama said. "This is true.

"In a summer marked by instability in the Middle East and Eastern Europe, I know the world also took notice of the small American city of Ferguson, Mo. – where a young man was killed, and a community was divided. So yes, we have our own racial and ethnic tensions. And like every country, we continually wrestle with how to reconcile the vast changes wrought by globalization and greater diversity with the traditions that we hold dear," the president said.

On Tuesday, a fire destroyed one of two memorials to Brown near the site where he was shot. People gathered and rebuilt it Tuesday morning, but many remained angry, according to social media and local media reports.

By Tuesday night, a crowd estimated at about 200 had gathered and rocks and bricks were thrown at police. Windows at Beauty Town, on West Florissant Avenue, were broken and a fire was reported at another store.

Police officials, including Missouri Highway Patrol Capt. Ronald S. Johnson, St. Louis County Police Chief Jon Belmar and St. Louis Police Chief Sam Dotson, went to the scene to calm the crowd, which had dwindled to about 50 to 75 before midnight, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

Juan Santos, manager of Beauty Town, told the newspaper that this was the third time the store has been broken into since the fatal shooting. Santos said the windows had been replaced just a week ago at a cost of $1,300. He got the boards from the basement and put them back on the newly smashed windows, saying he "will probably leave them up for a while now."

Follow @latimesmuskal for national news

Copyright © 2014, Los Angeles Times
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