 |
| A.M.
Costa Rica Your daily English-language news source Monday through Friday |
||
 |
 |
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| What we published this week: | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Earlier |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
Jo
Stuart |
|
Abstracts and fair use are permitted. Check HERE for more details |
 |
| A.M. Costa Rica's Second news page | |
|
San
José, Costa Rica, Friday, Feb. 7, 2014, Vol. 14, No. 27
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
 |
|
but it sure has its troubles By
the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The economics ministry's consumer division came out Thursday with a warning about a Florida travel firm that is making telephone calls into Costa Rica. The firm offers trip packages to Florida's South Beach and also cruise deals that may range up to several thousand dollars. The Oficina de Apoyo al Consumidor said that the firm is not registered with the ministry and that the Internet suggested that the travel offer is fraudulent. The consumer office said that callers were seeking credit card numbers and security codes. The firm is Millennium International, which has at least three attractive videos on YouTube. There also are a few negative postings, including one from a man in Argentina who said he was trying to get his money back without success. The CEO of the firm has a different story. He is Carlos Rodriguez, who said on his Facebook page that he is the founder of the company. He reports a tale that would ring true to anyone in the travel business whether it is true or not. Rodríguez said that an employee absconded with the confidential data of the firm, went into business for himself and had employees call customers and brand the former employer as a fraud. But it gets worse. The ex-employee, according to Rodriguez, urged customers to dispute charges already posted to credit cards. This resulted in credit card companies reversing some $300,000 in payments and nearly bankrupting Millennium, said the CEO. The company operates on a margin of about 20 percent for the travel deals and commissions already had been paid on the transactions being disputed, said the CEO. Instead of closing the door, the firm decided to move its reservation operation to México to save money, he said. But it gets worse. Through lack of leadership, the Mexican reservation operations had serious problems and about 2 percent of the reservations had not been processed, he said. Rodriguez said that the firm has been hammered on the social networks and that he is struggling to maintain the firm's name and goodwill. His explanation was undated. The warning from the Ministerio de Economía, Industria y Comercio and the travails of the Florida firm provide good reasons to seek tour packages and tickets from local agencies. Our readers' opinions
Farming is expensive here,and income isn't great either Dear A.M. Costa Rica: I thought I would give my opinion to Robert Woodrow's comments. First I think the title you gave it was misleading “Drop food subsidies to help poor reduce grocery outlay.” I, as one of the “rich farmers,” want to see food subsidies dropped. Most farmers here in Costa Rica (with some exceptions) don’t get subsidies, but we have to compete with farmers in other countries, especially the U.S.A., who do or countries that have very low labor costs. We also have higher costs here for many things such as fuel, vehicles, tractors and those who farm conventionally, fertilizers and agrochemicals. The terrain in many parts of Costa Rica doesn’t allow the large farms that they have in other areas, and much of the work has to be done by manual labor. Getting rid of the tariffs on the food items that Robert mentioned would open the farmers here to subsidized competition from other countries and make it impossible for them to make a living. So we would be helping those now poor by making another larger group poor. It would also make Costa Rica more reliant on other countries to feed itself and open to the dangers that brings. As far as the tariffs making the rich farmers richer, I have a small farm that I’ve invested over $200,000 in and several years of work before even starting to see any type of income. At the present time I’m lucky to make a few dollars per hour for the 70 or 80 hours a week I work. In the farming community where I live, this is very much the norm not the exception. I invite Robert to come and work in my community for a few weeks and see if he still feels the same way. I would love to see the poor be able to have food security but not at making another hard working group poor. And not at the expense of making Costa Rica less food secure. Another answer needs to be found. Those who find food expensive here in Costa Rica may wish to visit more farmers markets, eat more of the local foods and stay away from much of the imported processed food. It always amazes me when I leave the Zapote farmers market on Sundays just how full the mall next door is, usually with lines of cars waiting to get in, many heading to the food courts there. Robert
Anthony Warren Hainline
La Cima de Dota Cuba blockade is failure and also hypocritical Dear A.M. Costa Rica: Aside from being an abject failure that has done nothing to affect the Cuban government and only punishes innocent Cubans, the Cuban embargo is an insult to American people's intelligence, a roadblock to our economic growth, and an international embarrassment. What could be more hypocritical than this half century of punitive action against a tiny, island nation, when China, one of the most oppressive regimes on the planet and an ongoing threat to America's national security, is a monster trading partner to the U.S.? We have even reestablished trade with Vietnam, (another Communist country), where the war cost 58,000 Americans their lives and where 300,000 of our troops were wounded? If we can trade with China and Vietnam, and if tourists can go to both countries freely, why can't we have the same kind of relationship with Cuba? We look stupid and petty in the extreme! The Cuban American community in south Florida represents a miniscule fraction of the United States population, but their virulent hatred of Fidel Castro combined with their ability to influence the outcome of presidential voting in the state, has given them 800-pound gorilla status when their opinions should carry no more weight than the proverbial flea on an elephant's backside. Both political parties need to drop their perennial cowardice on this issue and end the embargo that benefits nobody in this country, but continues to be a gift to America's international competitors who freely and successfully trade with Cuba. Dean
Barbour
Manuel Antonio
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
| What we published this week: | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Earlier |
| The contents of this page and this Web site are copyrighted by A.M. Costa Rica.com Ltda. 2014 and may not be reproduced anywhere without permission. Abstracts and fair use are permitted. Check HERE for details | ||||||
A.M. Costa Rica Third News Page |
|
| San José, Costa Rica, Friday, Feb. 7, 2014, Vol. 14, No. 27 | |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
|
Fire fighters
honor comrades
killed in Argentine blaze By the A.M. Costa Rica staff The camaraderie of being a fire fighter transcends national boundaries, and those in this profession take it seriously when tragedy befalls comrades elsewhere. That is why the Cuerpo de Bomberos de Costa Rica presented a flora; offering Thursday in honor of the nine fire fighters in Argentina who died in a blaze there. The scene was at the Argentine Embassy here. Participating were Costa Rican bomberos including Héctor Chaves, director of the agency, and Martín Antonio Balza, the ambassador. The fire fighters came from the central station in San José, and the department band was there, too. Long-time expats will remember the line of fire fighters and trucks that rendered the same honors in 2001 at the U.S. Embassy two days after many in the New York City department died in the collapse of the twin towers. |
 Cuerpo de Bomberos photo
Fire fighter and ambassador
render honors |
| This weekend is for surfing, chili and
even a BMX contest |
|
|
By
the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Expats need not become bored this weekend. In Atenas the Atenas Charity Chili Cook Off will be held in the Quinta Roma Vista park Sunday. The event benefits a local children's shelter called Hogar de Vida, and visitors get to sample the chili entries. More information is available here: www.atenaschilicookoff.com. At Playa Garza de Nosara on the far Pacific coast, there is the |
Triple Corona de Surf de Nosara and
a masters tournament. The events start at 7 a.m. both Saturday and
Sunday. At the Polideportivo de Nicoya Sunday, some 60 cyclists from five countries will be engaged in BMX WAR 2014. They will jump, spin, surmount obstacles and do any number of bicycle tricks. This weekend is the last before public school starts, so the parks will be full. The weather is expected to be warm during the day. |
| Food is getting much too expensive to just throw away |
|||
| My Italian grandmother was what I
used to call a dumpster shopper. Occasionally I would go with her
to the local A&P, and she would lead me around back. I asked
her once why she did that when we could shop inside. She said
that the store threw away food, especially fruits and vegetables, which
were perfectly good but just “not pretty.” Today there are people who,
as dumpster divers, find still good food thrown out by supermarkets. Recently in the news and public service ads we are learning that one third of the food grown and made is wasted. And a large percentage of that is wasted merely because of the sale dates on packaged and canned goods and a few blemishes on the produce that customers won’t buy. In the United States, Doug Rauch, former president of Trader Joe’s, a food market that everyone loves, is starting something that I hope becomes a trend and is very possible in Costa Rica. He is calling it Daily Table, a different kind of supermarket and restaurant that will buy the produce and out-of-date packaged and canned goods discarded by first line supermarkets and sell them at prices within the reach of the poor in whose neighborhoods he will establish these stores. He plans to have cooks on hand to prepare healthy dish starters so people can take home half-ready meals (like tomato sauce) and even finished dishes. These are perfectly good products. In downtown San José, on the corner of Seventh Avenue and the street that goes north to the Children’s Museum, there used to be an indoor feria. Eventually it closed, but it could be set up as a daily table, a place to sell still edible and nutritious produce and canned goods greatly marked down. The feria on 10th Avenue could do the same. Or perhaps they already do. It has been a while since I have visited there. My feria is in Pavas, but even there it gets more and more expensive. Perhaps it is because of the tariffs added to so many basic foods that a writer mentioned in a letter to the editor this week. Meanwhile, I had lunch this week with Deborah, a visitor from Oregon and a pen pal whom I met through my column. I suggested Il Ritorno. It has been a while since I have been |
to this Italian restaurant, one of my favorites, which is in Casa Italia. Like just about every restaurant in town, instead of a nice little menu, they now have what I call a magazine with their, I suppose, expanded menu, and the prices, even there, where they once were so reasonable, have gone up. As visitors have said, Costa Rica is becoming one of the most expensive places in the world to eat out. I wondered what the restaurants here do with their leftovers still on the stove at the end of the day? Have any of them formed a daily table where they can give to the hungry what they needlessly throw away? Just wondering. This little country has more than one harvest season every year and can grow just about anything. What is happening to the food here? Is this the result of globalization? Are there many countries exporting their home-grown produce and importing that from another country, much of it carefully sealed in plastic bags, and quick to spoil once it is out of the bag? On the one hand, the news is full of people who are going hungry, from the victims of war to young children going to school without breakfast. And we continue to waste food, which seldom makes headlines. And while I am going on about the habits of supermarkets and restaurants, I cannot escape my own participation in wasting food. I let leftovers sit in the refrigerator until they qualify as spoiled, and then I throw them out with a clear conscience. Before I cast the next stone, I think I better think about how I can change my own habits. |
||
 |
| You need to see Costa Rican tourism information HERE! |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
| What we published this week: | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Earlier |
| The contents of this page and this Web site are copyrighted by A.M. Costa Rica.com Ltda. 2014 and may not be reproduced anywhere without permission. Abstracts and fair use are permitted. Check HERE for details | ||||||
 |
|
||||
| A.M. Costa Rica's Fourth News page | |||||
| San José, Costa Rica, Friday, Feb. 7, 2014, Vol. 14, No. 27 | |||||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
| Native property rights seem to be under more pressure from
development |
|
|
By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Two new reports say there’s been a dramatic slowdown in recognizing the rights of native people to tropical forest land and resources. The Rights and Resources Initiative says it’s happening despite favorable court rulings and statements by corporations and governments. The Rights and Resources Initiative says the slowdown comes “as the global hunger for food, fuel, water and mineral wealth continues.” “Our main concern is that there are indigenous peoples and local communities around the world who have customary rights before us – but often those rights are not recognized legally by governments. And we have seen some progress over time in the legal recognition of those rights, but in fact our most recent research is showing that there’s been a slowdown in the recognition of rights since about 2008,” said Jenny Springer, the group’s director of global programs. The reports find that land tenure laws passed since 2008 are “weaker and recognize fewer rights than those passed before.” Ms. Springer said over the last 20 years or so, Latin America has led the way in recognizing native land rights in tropical forest nations. “At this point, about 39-percent of the forests in Latin America are either owned or designated for use by indigenous peoples and local communities.” Native people have not fared as well in some other regions. “A couple of the areas that our analysis shows where the forests are still largely controlled and administered directly by governments are Central Africa," Ms. Springer said. "About 99 percent of the forests are directly administered by government and also peninsular Southeast Asia.” More countries are discovering they’re rich in natural resources, such as oil and minerals. But Ms. Springer said that does not mean those countries automatically will be exploited. In some cases, she says, there’s been a positive effect, adding: |
“Local
communities, including in Africa, are often the best stewards of their
forests and the wildlife in them. So, for example, I spent some time in
the Democratic Republic of Congo. There’s an area around a place called
Malabo where there are still very well functioning and traditional
governance systems of the local communities. They have done a very good
job in conserving the forests in their area and also a species of
bonobos – a primate species that at this point is only found in DRC.” But the global demand for resources, she said, does increase pressure on tropical forest land. “So we see a lot of corporations, a lot of investors, moving into rural areas in developing countries -- and the governments want to encourage foreign investment. They want to have revenues and have a means for economic development. But often these large-scale land acquisitions – these industrial concessions – are overlaid right on top of indigenous peoples and community lands.” The Rights and Resources Initiative reports that “At least one out of every three hectares licensed to natural resource development overlaps with land inhabited by indigenous peoples and local communities.” Ms. Springer is encouraged, though, that some corporations are making statements about protecting rights: “We think it’s really just the beginning – that there’s a lot more that needs to be done. There’s more that needs to be done in terms of turning verbal commitments into real action – into implementation. And there’s more that needs to be done in terms of spreading these kinds of approaches more broadly across global and local private sector actors.” The issue of land rights is expected to be addressed in September at the World Conference on Indigenous People at the U.N. Also, the next climate change conference, COP 20, will be held in December in Perú, where there are disputes over land rights in the eastern Amazon. |
Here's reasonable medical care
Costa Rica's world class medical specialists are at your command. Get the top care for much less than U.S. prices. It is really a great way to spend a vacation. See our list of recommended professionals HERE!amcr-prom
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
| What we published this week: | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Earlier |
| The contents of this page and this Web site are copyrighted by A.M. Costa Rica.com Ltda. 2014 and may not be reproduced anywhere without permission. Abstracts and fair use are permitted. Check HERE for details | ||||||
| A.M. Costa Rica's Fifth news page |
 |
||||
| San José, Costa Rica, Friday, Feb. 7, 2014, Vol. 14, No. 27 | |||||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
 |
|
| U.S. officials are irked now because they are being bugged By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
The U.S. State Department is firing back at Russia for its role in the alleged leak of an apparently bugged telephone conversation, about Ukraine, between two senior American diplomats, in which they are said to make disparaging comments about the European Union. A recording has been posted to YouTube of voices resembling those of Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt. The people on the alleged call discuss international efforts to resolve Ukraine's ongoing political crisis, and at one point, the voice resembling Nuland's uses vulgar wording to suggest the European Union's position should be ignored. State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki spoke Thursday in Washington: "This is a new low in Russian trade craft in terms of publicizing, posting. I don't have any other independent details about the origin of the YouTube video, you're right. This has clearly happened overnight and is relatively new. But this is something they've been actively promoting, posting on, tweeting about, and certainly we feel that represents a new low," said Ms. Psaki. Both Ms. Psaki and White House spokesman Jay Carney pointed to a tweet by an aide to Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin, which Ms. Psaki says was the first to promote the video. Carney said Thursday the official's tweet, some seven hours before the video was publicly noticed, "says something about Russia's role'' in the matter. The YouTube video is subtitled in Russian, raising suspicions that it was posted by a Russia-friendly source. Neither U.S. official would comment on the source of the audio. Ms. Nuland arrived in Kyiv Thursday to meet with Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych amid ongoing protests in the capital. Ms. Psaki says Ms. Nuland has contacted her EU counterparts and apologized. Cyberspace becomes category for evaluating press freedom By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
For the first time, the Committee to Protect Journalists has added cyberspace as a category on its yearly risk list, which highlights places where press freedom is on the decline. The committee says while violence and repression continue to threaten the work of journalists worldwide, online censorship and surveillance are also starting to affect the flow of information. The committee's list of countries with the biggest decline in media freedom includes Egypt, Bangladesh, Syria, Ecuador, Liberia, Zambia, Russia, Vietnam and Turkey where hundreds recently protested against planned new restrictions on the Internet. “Turkey is the leading jailer of journalists in the world. People have been shot with less lethal rounds and tear-gassed around and sprayed with high-pressure water cannon in the streets in protest of this bill," said Geoffrey King of the Committee to Protect Journalists. King is the Internet advocacy coordinator for the organization. King says new amendments to Turkey's restrictive Internet law, which the parliament passed Thursday, will make it even worse. “It would make it much easier for the government to block URLs in some cases without court authorization," he said. Responding to the allegations, Turkish officials said the amendments were made to improve the law and strike a balance between freedom of expression, individual rights and privacy protections. In Egypt, the committee says that, since the military takeover last year, five journalists have been killed, 30 assaulted and 11 news outlets raided. 20 journalists have recently been arrested, including four from Al Jazeera. Anna Therese Day, a freelance journalist, says via Skype that the situation in Egypt today is very different from what it was during the revolution. “I worked there freely. I worked by myself. I worked with short sleeves on; I didn’t cover my hair most of the time. Now, that would be unheard of for someone like me," said Ms. Day. She said she left Egypt because it was no longer safe. Wars remain the biggest threat to journalists' lives, but the committee warns that governments' efforts to monitor digital communications could become more damaging to their work. “Not just targeted surveillance of individual suspects but mass surveillance across society in many countries. That’s why it’s cyberspace and not one particular country being named. Different countries do it with varying levels of rule of law and due process, but it’s quickly becoming very easy for governments to spy on their critics," said King. The Committee to Protect Journalists says that recent revelations by former security contractor Edward Snowden about U.S. cyberspace surveillance could chill news gathering, by frightening away news sources who need to be protected from retribution.  A.M. Costa Rica archive
photo
Chronic pain is more than just a
headachePower of mind begin used to treat chronic pain victims By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Utah researchers say they’ve developed a technique that allows patients to use the power of their minds to help treat chronic pain. One in five people worldwide suffers from daily chronic pain, according to a 2004 report. A 2011 paper from the Institute of Medicine showed that one in three U.S. adults is affected by this condition. The University of Utah’s Eric Garland said his team’s technique not only helps relieve pain, but can also decrease prescription misuse among chronic pain patients. A variety of therapies are used to treat chronic pain including over-the-counter pain relievers, exercise and diet, alternative medical therapies such as acupuncture and prescription opiate-based pain medications, which can have serious side effects and lead to dependency. Garland calls his new intervention technique Mindfulness-Oriented Recovery Enhancement and said it is designed to train people to react differently to pain, stress and opioid-related cues. “Mental interventions can address physical problems, like pain, on both psychological and biological levels because the mind and body are interconnected,” Garland said. “Anything that happens in the brain happens in the body — so by changing brain functioning, you alter the functioning of the body.” In a study published online in the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, Garland said the new treatment method led to a 63- percent reduction in the misuse of opioids, as compared to a 32-percent decrease among those who took part in a conventional support group. Patients who were a part of the new treatment group also reported a 22 percent drop in pain-related impairment, something that the researchers said continued for three months after the end of their treatment period. According to Garland, the technique zeroes in on the basic processes involved in both chronic pain and the abuse of opioids, by combining three therapeutic components: mindfulness training, reappraisal and savoring. The mindfulness training component consists of training the patient’s mind to increase its awareness, gain control over their attention, and learn to control automatic habits. The reappraisal module is the process of taking the meaning of a stressful or negative experience and turning it around in such a way that it is seen as something positive and promotes growth. Savoring is a method of learning that teaches patients to center their attention on positive events in their lives, heightening their sensitivity to naturally occurring positive experiences, such as enjoying a beautiful sunset or the special feeling of closeness with a loved one. Right now, Garland’s technique is being tested in a preliminary brain imaging trial as a way to help smokers quit the habit. Plans for further testing include working with those who have mental health problems or are addicted to alcohol. If these trials are successful, the research team plans to work with active-duty soldiers suffering with chronic pain while also conducting a larger trial among the general population. Garland and his team envision the technique as something that could be prescribed by doctors as an addition to traditional pain management methods. Advocates for illegals seek to pressure Congress, president By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Advocates for immigrant rights are calling on President Barack Obama to suspend deportations of otherwise law-abiding residents who are illegal while Congress considers reforming the nation's immigration laws. Allies of the president are criticizing the Obama administration for deporting more than 1.9 million illegal immigrants. Immigrant rights groups are increasingly frustrated by the Obama administration's crackdown. Two of those groups hosted an event on Capitol Hill, calling on Congress and the president to suspend deportations they say are tearing families apart. Maria Perez is a U.S. citizen who never thought she would see her husband deported to México. She came to the event. "Even though my husband was undocumented, I always believed President Obama that the focus of deportations were violent criminals and felons," she said. "My husband is neither. He’s a good father, a good husband who provided for his family. But on October 16, three officers came to our house . . ." Perez says the arrest traumatized their children. "They handcuffed him, they arrested him, in front of my children," she said. "To this day, my son goes white when he sees officers." Many families face the same fate, including U.S. citizen Seleste Wisniewski, whose husband has been granted a one-year reprieve from deportation. He's the primary caregiver of four American children, including her adult son who has cerebral palsy. "I can speak firsthand that the family life is not taken into consideration," she said. "What goes on in the home — if they would have just listened and seen, I was begging them – put two ankle bracelets on every member of my household, don’t take this man, please. Don’t take my husband!" Advocates for reform say the Republican-controlled House of Representatives should act. The Senate passed immigration reform last year. "Too many voices on the other side of the aisle are saying ‘go slow’ or ‘not now’ and it’s up to all of us who know that reform is urgent to say that’s not good enough," said Rep. Zoe Lofgren, a Democrat. "The time is now to move forward." But Speaker of the House John Boehner was pessimistic about immigration reform passing this year. He said Republicans don't trust the president. "... I think the president is going to have to demonstrate to the American people and to my colleagues that he can be trusted to enforce the law as it is written," he said. Republicans say border security should be the priority before any talk of legalizing the illegals. Immigration rights activists vow to keep up the pressure on the president and Congress. Sniper attack at power site has been industry wake-up call By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
An unsolved sniper attack last year on an electrical power substation in California that knocked out 17 giant transformers has mobilized industry leaders to beef up physical security at these vital installations. The incident also has some experts worried that parts of the U.S. power grid are similarly vulnerable. On April 16, 2013, attackers cut fiber optic cables in an underground vault and then fired more than 100 rounds from at least two high-powered rifles on Pacific Gas and Electric's Metcalf power transmission station near San Jose, California. The attack did not cause major power disruptions because officials were able to reroute electricity remotely during the 27 days it took to repair the installation and get it back on line, according to PG&E spokesman Brian Swanson. The California power utility had never previously experienced such a large-scale act of aggression. "Ever since, we've been working very aggressively to improve substation security, not just at Metcalf but throughout our system," Swanson said. "Its not just PG&E acting alone. The utility industry as a whole is working with stakeholders like the Edison Electric Institute, with policy makers, with government and law enforcement officials at all levels," he added. An FBI investigation is ongoing, but has so far resulted in no arrests. Swanson declined to speculate on the perpetrators' identity or possible motive. Security experts said the incident was most likely either a criminal act committed by a disgruntled employee or a far more dangerous example of domestic terrorism. "This was likely either a former, or even a current employee, possibly an insider, someone that's left who's disgruntled, on the criminal side," said Daryl Johnson, a consultant with DT Analytics, a Washington, DC-based security firm. A disparate array of domestic groups ranging from green anarchists and environmental extremists that oppose the use of fossil fuels to anti-government militias hoping to sow terror and undermine federal authority could have been responsible, said Johnson. "We've seen chatter on both of those movements that indicate they're interested in targeting infrastructure," he said. "And we've actually had cases where people in both the militia-anti-government movements as well as the anarchist-environmental extremist movements have been arrested for targeting critical infrastructure or actually sabotaging the electrical grid," Johnson said. In December, Rep. Henry Waxman a California Democrat, told a Federal Energy Regulatory Commission oversight hearing that the April incident was hardly the only threat facing America’s electricity grid. "A few months ago in Arkansas, there were multiple attacks on power lines and grid infrastructure that led to millions of dollars in damage and brief power outages. Independent engineers recently discovered a new cyber vulnerability in the software used by many electric grid control systems," Waxman said. As part of its detailed investigation of the Metcalf attack published Wednesday, the Wall Street Journal quoted former Federal Energy Regulatory chairman Jon Wellinghoff as saying it was "the most significant incident of domestic terrorism involving the grid that has ever occurred" in the United States. The event has received little public attention until now, although as word of the attack spread through the utility industry, some companies moved to review their security policies. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission also has initiated an unusual public awareness campaign, holding briefings on the physical security of electricity substations in cities throughout the U.S. Obama praises Haitian progress after meeting with Martelly By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
President Barack Obama has praised Haiti's progress toward long-delayed elections, and pledged renewed American help on the continuing cleanup from the 2010 earthquake. Obama said he was encouraged about Haiti's future after a meeting Thursday with Haitian President Michel Martelly at the White House. Obama said the good news' is that because of international aid that flowed to Haiti after the January 2010 earthquake, "We've begun to see progress,'' with security improving, infrastructure being repaired, and schools and businesses reopening. The magnitude 7.0 earthquake, centered just west of the capital of Port-au-Prince, killed an estimated 300,000 people and left 1.5 million others without permanent homes. Boehner pledges no default but does not give details By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
The speaker of the Republican-led House of Representatives said the United States will not default on its $17-trillion national debt, but he is declining comment on legislation needed to raise the U.S. borrowing limit. Uncertainty is mounting weeks before the U.S. Treasury is expected to exhaust its ability to meet federal obligations. At a news conference, House Speaker John Boehner sought to reassure Americans and global investors that the United States will remain financially solvent. “Listen, we do not want to default on our debt, and we are not going to default on our debt,” he said. But to avert default, both houses of Congress will have to approve an increase in the federal borrowing limit by the end of the month. “We have got time to do this. We are going to continue to work at it,” said Boehner. The speaker is attempting to manage a widely reported rift among Republican legislators as to whether to demand concessions from Democrats on Republican agenda items from amending the new health care law and approving a controversial pipeline for Canadian oil, to federal spending cuts. News reports say Republicans have abandoned most of these ideas, but that some retain a desire to use the debt ceiling as a bargaining chip with Democrats in some still-undefined fashion. President Barack Obama repeatedly has stated he will not negotiate on the debt ceiling, and that Congress must fulfill its duty to allow the federal government to pay its bills. Democrats in Congress are backing the president, including House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. “This is not a matter of negotiation. This is the full faith and credit of the United States of America,” she said. Ms. Pelosi compared Republicans to diners demanding “a cookie in their lunch. And that is just not right.” During President Obama’s first term, Republicans succeeded in extracting budgetary concessions from Democrats in return for continued federal spending authority and debt ceiling increases. Last year, however, the president and congressional Democrats announced an end to such negotiations, triggering a partisan stand-off and a 16-day partial government shutdown that ended with Republicans dropping nearly all demands. Americans mostly blamed Republicans for the shutdown, and Boehner is not eager for another stand-off on the debt ceiling today. At Thursday’s news conference, though, he gave no hints on a path forward. “No decisions have been made. We are continuing to talk to our members,” he said. One of those members, Rep. Raul Labrador, recently made headlines when he urged fellow Republicans to acknowledge that the debt ceiling would yield no concessions from Democrats. Big changes are predicted with rapid tech developments By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Technology is permeating everyday life like never before. Computers, smartphones, 3D printers, new medical devices, sophisticated software, electric cars are now accessible, not only to residents of industrialized nations but to almost everybody else. Will these rapid changes make people’s lives overall better or worse? Internet giant Google says it is in the final stages of the development of autonomous vehicles. Technology giant IBM is developing a computer called Watson, capable not only of processing raw data but of learning. Retail firm Amazon has already automated several of its giant warehouses and is making plans to deliver packages with flying drones. As the machines get better in what they can do and how they think, what effect will it have on the lives of humans? Andrew McAfee, co-author of ‘The Second Machine Age,’ says this technological progress will have two main economic consequences. First, new possibilities: “More options, higher quality, more variety, lower prices, not just for consumer goods but for health care, for entertainment, for communication, for food, for leisure, for everything that we want to do with our lives," said McAfee. McAfee admits that the other major consequence will be much less positive. In the not-too-distant-future, intelligent machines may start replacing people in more types of jobs, displacing many less-skilled workers. “Technology tends to favor some kinds of winners and they are pulling ahead and leaving a lot of people behind. So we see inequality in income, inequality in wealth, inequality in opportunity, in mobility, and these are very serious challenges that we have to confront," he said. McAfee says people who feel threatened by these challenges should take advantage of new opportunities technology provides, such as connectivity and accessibility to quality education. “The educational resources available via the Internet, via technology, these days are absolutely fantastic. We have some of the best teachers in the world giving their courses away for free for anybody who wants to take them. This is a very positive development," he said. Besides individual initiative, McAfee says governments could help the transition by creating not just new training programs, but an environment receptive to entrepreneurship, innovation and the creation of new opportunities.  A.M. Costa Rica file photo
"I am not the playful type!'Fangs make cat
bites bad,
Mayo Clinic data confirms By
the Mayo Clinic news staff
Dogs aren’t the only pets who sometimes bite the hands that feed them. Cats do too, and when they strike a hand, can inject bacteria deep into joints and tissue, perfect breeding grounds for infection. Cat bites to the hand are so dangerous that one in three patients with such wounds had to be hospitalized, a Mayo Clinic study covering three years showed. Two-thirds of those hospitalized needed surgery. Middle-aged women were the most common bite victims, according to the research, published in the Journal of Hand Surgery. Why are cat bites to the hand so dangerous? It’s not that their mouths have more germs than dogs’ mouths or people’s, for that matter. Actually, it’s all in the fangs. “The dogs’ teeth are blunter, so they don’t tend to penetrate as deeply and they tend to leave a larger wound after they bite. The cats’ teeth are sharp and they can penetrate very deeply, they can seed bacteria in the joint and tendon sheaths,” says senior author Brian Carlsen, a Mayo Clinic plastic surgeon and orthopedic hand surgeon. “It can be just a pinpoint bite mark that can cause a real problem, because the bacteria get into the tendon sheath or into the joint where they can grow with relative protection from the blood and immune system,” Carlsen adds. The bacteria injected by a cat bite can include a strain common in animals and particularly hard to fight with antibiotics, he says. In the study, researchers identified 193 Mayo Clinic patients with cat bites to the hand from Jan. 1, 2009, through 2011. Of those, 57 were hospitalized. On average, they were in the hospital three days. Of those hospitalized, 38 needed to have their wounds surgically irrigated or flushed out and infected tissue removed, a procedure known as debridement. Eight patients needed more than one operation, and some needed reconstructive surgery. Of the 193 patients, 69 percent were female, and the mean age was 49. About half of the patients first went to the emergency room, and the others went to primary care. The mean time between the bite and medical care was 27 hours. Patients with bites directly over the wrist or any joint in the hand had a higher risk of hospitalization than people with bites over soft tissue, the study found. Thirty-six of the 193 patients were hospitalized immediately when they sought medical care, while 154 were treated with oral antibiotics as outpatients and three weren’t treated. The outpatient antibiotic treatment failed in 21 patients, a 14 percent failure rate, and those patients needed to be hospitalized. The bottom line: Physicians and victims of cat bites to the hand need to take the wounds seriously and carefully evaluate them, Carlsen says. When patients have inflamed skin and swelling, aggressive treatment should be pursued, he and the other researchers say. People tend to be more dismissive of cat bites than dog bites, in part because cat bites often look like a pinprick, and dog bites look much worse, Carlsen says. That’s a mistake, he says: “Cat bites look very benign, but as we know and as the study shows, they are not. They can be very serious.” Sense of being in control helps some to live longer, study says By
the University of Rochester news staff
The less education you have, the more your attitude counts when it comes to staying alive and well. That’s the finding of a new study conducted by personality researchers from the University of Rochester and Brandeis University. They found that adults without college degrees live longer if they feel like they’re in control of their lives. Those who feel little control are three times as likely to die. “Being uneducated and poor doesn’t mean you’re doomed, despite all of the studies showing people with less education are more likely to experience disease, disability, and premature death,” says lead author Nicholas Turiano, a postdoctoral-fellow in Psychiatry at the University of Rochester. The study, published by the American Psychological Association’s Health Psychology journal, followed 6,135 people, ages 25 to 75, for 14 years. The respondents were part of an ongoing, national questionnaire called the National Survey of Midlife in the United States. It collects a variety of data, including an assessment of each subject’s perceived ability to exert influence over life circumstances. Researchers adjusted for socioeconomic factors such as income and the education level of the subjects’ parents. Turiano says that even after these other variables are taken into account, the findings held. Sense of control did not have the same affect on mortality rates for people who have higher levels of education. Turiano cautions more research is needed to find out why or how people develop a strong sense of control, or when this development occurs. Researchers suspect numerous innate and external factors contribute to perceived control. Turiano says further study could lead to interventions that help this population feel more positive and, ultimately, live longer. |
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
| What we published this week: | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Earlier |
| The contents of this page and this Web site are copyrighted by A.M. Costa Rica.com Ltda. 2014 and may not be reproduced anywhere without permission. Abstracts and fair use are permitted. Check HERE for details | ||||||
| A.M. Costa
Rica's sixth news page |
|
||||||||
| San José, Costa Rica, Friday, Feb. 7, 2014, Vol. 14, No. 27 | |||||||||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
||
|
Heredia educational
facility now offers technical courses By
the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Applications from prospective students are piling up for the country's first private technological school. Centro Educativo Nueva Esperanza in San Juan de Santa Bárbara in Heredia will soon begin its first year of offering courses and the program consists of 105 students and 17 teachers. The School administration said high priority will be placed on preparing its students for the competitive job market. General director Jeanette Cortés García said that a Nueva Esperanza education should allow graduates to fluidly transition to a highly-skilled labor position. “We are the first private school to offer a technical discipline in the education system of Costa Rica with the objective of preparing successful youth with values, skills, knowledge, and ability,” Ms. Cortés said. “We are motivated in having our students achieve effective job placement and with a strong desire to have them obtain professional career success or be managers of their own businesses.” Those wanting to apply must have already passed their ninth year. Students will be able to graduate with two degrees: bachelor's of secondary education and bachelor's of technical studies. These studies can include focuses of accounting, computer science in software development and telecommunications electronics. Keilor Rojas, the vice minister of the Ministerio de Ciencia y Tecnología said the school provides a crucial opportunity for the economy's most valuable assets: its workers. “Congratulations to all of those apart of this pioneering team that usher in a new type of education today,” said Rojas. “We have always aspired to have more technically trained workers, and we have positioned our principal resource within all of you and your capabilities.” As part of their schooling, the students will go through more than just workshops and seminars. Major emphasis is placed on bilingual ability and core values that involve leadership, entrepreneurship, and innovation. All of these are stated with the ultimate purpose of securing a job and succeeding in the workplace. The school's allure represents an increase of Costa Rican youth who are looking for high-ranking jobs right out of high school. The institute has offered schooling for students in preschool, primary, and secondary school since 1993. |
| Costa Rican News |
AMCostaRicaArchives.com |
Retire NOW in Costa Rica |
CostaRicaReport.com |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
|
| What we published this week: | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Earlier |
| The contents of this page and this Web site are copyrighted by A.M. Costa Rica.com Ltda. 2014 and may not be reproduced anywhere without permission. Abstracts and fair use are permitted. Check HERE for details | ||||||
| From Page 7: Country charts its route steps to Pacific alliance By
the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The country is charting the way it must take to become a member of the Pacific Alliance. This is a goal
The alliance is much more than a trade agreement, because Costa Rica already has this type of pact with México, Chile and Perú. An agreement with Colombia is awaiting legislative approval. The alliance wants to have visa-free travel among members, a common exchange for stocks and other joint operations that may not find agreement by all Costa Ricans |
