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Today's Topics:
1. LA Newscaster suspended over affair (Williams, Gregory S.)
2. NASA delays shuttle launch one day (Williams, Gregory S.)
3. For Bob Hoskins there is no 'curse of the actor'
(Williams, Gregory S.)
4. AT&T Reports 2Q07 Earnings 10-Q (Monty Solomon)
5. U.S. spy satellite declared loss, to drop from orbit (Dishnut)
6. Lead Paint Prompts Mattel to Recall 967,000 Toys (Dishnut)
7. Delta 2 / Phoenix Lander Upcoming Launch Coverage Saturday
(08-04) @3:15am ET. NASA DVB (Dishnut)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Message: 1
Date: Fri, 3 Aug 2007 16:07:15 -0400
From: "Williams, Gregory S." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: [Medianews] LA Newscaster suspended over affair
To: <medianews@twiar.org>
Message-ID:
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
By Duke Helfand and Meg James, Times Staff Writers
August 3, 2007
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-salinas3aug03,0,857901,full.story?coll=la-home-local
Los Angeles television newscaster Mirthala Salinas was suspended without pay
for two months - but not dismissed - Thursday from KVEA-TV Channel 52 for
covering Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa while they were romantically involved, a
relationship that journalism experts said damaged the station's credibility.
Three of Salinas' superiors with the Telemundo network also were disciplined,
including the top two station officials. KVEA General Manager Manuel Abud was
reassigned to another position, and News Director Al Corral was suspended for
two months without pay.
The highest-ranking executive, Ibra Morales, who oversees the network's 16
Spanish-language stations, was reprimanded in the unfolding scandal that
Telemundo President Don Browne said flagrantly violated Telemundo's
journalistic standards.
In an internal memo to Telemundo staff members, Browne said that "while the
content and accuracy of KVEA's newscasts were not compromised, our news policy
standards with respect to conflict of interest were clearly violated."
Salinas, 35, could not be reached for comment. She had been suspended with pay
since the scandal erupted three weeks ago.
Villaraigosa, 54, did not comment on the merit of Telemundo's decision, saying
only that he wanted to concentrate on his job in its aftermath.
"I regret that decisions I have made in my personal life have been a
distraction for the city, and I am deeply sorry that I have let so many people
down, especially my family," he said in a statement.
It is unclear when Villaraigosa and Salinas became romantically involved, but
The Times traced their relationship to at least November of 2005. Salinas
covered the mayor for an extended period while she was dating him.
Media watchdogs assailed not only Salinas for her conflict of interest but her
superiors for allowing her to continue reporting on the mayor after they knew
of the relationship. One analyst predicted that the scandal would tarnish
Salinas' career.
"People will always remember her as the reporter who had an affair with the
mayor, and that she got in trouble for that," said Judy Muller, a former ABC
network news correspondent and current NPR commentator who now teaches
journalism at USC.
"That damages her credibility, and I don't know where she goes from Telemundo,"
Muller added. "A reporter only has her credibility, and once that's sullied you
have lost your value to your news organization."
Telemundo is owned by NBC Universal, and that connection raised another thorny
issue for the company and the mayor. Villaraigosa has been supporting a
$3-billion development that NBC Universal is planning near its Universal
Studios, and opponents have questioned whether that would color Telemundo's
decision on Salinas.
In his memo, Browne said that KVEA management and Salinas agreed at the end of
2006 to reassign her from the political beat so that her job would not involve
stories about the mayor because of "a friendship that had developed between the
reporter and the mayor."
Browne said that in April, Salinas was given the role of temporary news anchor,
reading lead-ins and other material involving stories about the mayor and
politics.
Seated in the anchor's chair, Salinas reported on the 6 p.m. news June 8 that
Villaraigosa and his wife, Corina, were separating after 20 years of marriage.
Three days later, Salinas was again in the anchor's spot when the newscast
reported on a Villaraigosa news conference in which he said he felt a "personal
sense of failure" about the breakup of his marriage. His wife filed for divorce
the next day.
Browne singled out the two occasions as the most egregious examples of the
conflict of interest, saying those involved showed a "lack of leadership and
vigilance required to protect the credibility and reputation of our news
product ...."
He added: "Her reading of copy during newscasts on June 8 and June 11 regarding
the mayor's separation from his wife was a flagrant violation of these
guidelines. The failure to respond appropriately in the following weeks further
compounded these errors."
Until the scandal surfaced, Salinas had enjoyed a successful 10-year run at one
of Los Angeles' best-known Spanish-language stations. She anchored a newscast
that won two local Emmy Awards and earned a Golden Mike broadcasting award as
well. She started her broadcast journalism career in 1990 at a Phoenix radio
station and eventually made her way to the Univision TV affiliate there before
arriving at KVEA in 1997.
Her affair with Villaraigosa was an open secret in KVEA's Burbank newsroom and
in the mayor's office at City Hall. Salinas also had dated Assembly Speaker
Fabian Nu?ez (D-Los Angeles) when he was divorced - and before he remarried his
wife - as well as former Los Angeles City Council President Alex Padilla, now a
state senator.
Telemundo network executives conducted the three-week internal review that
culminated in Thursday's discipline. But several employees at the Burbank
headquarters of KVEA and KNBC-TV Channel 4 criticized the network, saying it
let Salinas off too easy.
"There is a violation of job integrity," one worker said as he pulled out of
the Telemundo parking lot.
An NBC employee who works in technical operations predicted that the scandal
would enhance Salinas' career.
"It will probably make her more successful, ultimately," he said. "It's just
publicity for her career."
Another Telemundo worker contacted by phone was more cynical: "They were trying
to save face, and this way they don't have to spend any money," said the
worker, who declined to be named for fear of retaliation. "They are just
waiting for people to leave on their own.... They don't like lawsuits, they
don't like to go to court, and they don't like to spend money."
Telemundo's drawn-out review of Salinas created a form of political water
torture for Villaraigosa, prolonging the life of a news story that began July
3, the day he confirmed that he had been seeing the anchor romantically.
Each day that the investigation dragged on turned into another day that
Villaraigosa had to answer questions about Telemundo's review, his long-term
plans with Salinas (he was asked whether he intended to marry her) and the
potential damage done to both of their careers.
With so much uncertainty, Villaraigosa, a man known for enthusiastically facing
the camera, scaled back his public appearances. He did not fly up to Sacramento
recently to speak out against proposed cuts in transit funding - an issue dear
to his heart and crucial to his public agenda. When Villaraigosa did venture
out publicly to discuss traffic or even the opening of a new restaurant in
Universal City, he faced persistent questions from reporters about his
relationship with Salinas.
The affair became the subject of monologues delivered by NBC comedian Jay Leno
on national television. And it even became a punch line in a new play performed
in Hollywood by the comedy trio Culture Clash - a group that includes one
member who serves as an appointee of Villaraigosa on the city's Cultural
Affairs Commission.
By the end of July, supporters of Villaraigosa privately wished that Telemundo
would quickly wrap up its review. Some current and former aides to Villaraigosa
voiced despair over the situation, saying the mayor's administration had lost
momentum and focus.
The problem has carried over to one of his signature public initiatives -
education. Villaraigosa was scheduled to appear with leaders from the Los
Angeles Unified School District on Monday to announce a new partnership. But
both sides agreed earlier this week to postpone the announcement.
Gregory S. Williams
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
?
?
------------------------------
Message: 2
Date: Fri, 3 Aug 2007 17:20:10 -0400
From: "Williams, Gregory S." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: [Medianews] NASA delays shuttle launch one day
To: <medianews@twiar.org>
Message-ID:
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
By MARCIA DUNN, AP Aerospace Writer
1 hour, 42 minutes ago
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070803/ap_on_sc/space_shuttle;_ylt=Av5hxRNA9v7Z0Cge1cDJG.YPLBIF
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - NASA has delayed next week's launch of space shuttle
Endeavour by one day because of unexpected work to fix a leak in the crew
cabin, officials said Friday.
Liftoff is now set for Wednesday evening.
Engineers installed a new valve Thursday to replace a leaky one in Endeavour's
crew cabin. Although the unit tested fine, NASA ran out of time to meet a
Tuesday launch, said NASA spokesman George Diller.
Combined with thunderstorms that disrupted work at the launch pad earlier this
week, "it just didn't translate into enough time to get there," Diller said.
"They were literally trying to put 25 pounds of work in a 10-pound bag."
The replacement valve was taken from Atlantis. NASA has yet to determine what
was wrong with the one removed from Endeavour.
Endeavour's one-day postponement gives a little extra breathing room for NASA's
Phoenix Mars lander, set to blast off aboard an unmanned rocket Saturday. The
space agency has only three weeks to launch the lander before being forced to
wait two years, and officials have indicated they would probably put that
flight ahead of Endeavour's.
NASA needs at least two days between rocket launches.
Among Endeavour's seven-member crew to the international space station is
Barbara Morgan, the first schoolteacher-turned-astronaut, who was Christa
McAuliffe's backup in 1986. McAuliffe was killed aboard Challenger along with
six others.
___
On the Net:
NASA: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov
Gregory S. Williams
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
?
?
------------------------------
Message: 3
Date: Fri, 3 Aug 2007 17:35:12 -0400
From: "Williams, Gregory S." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: [Medianews] For Bob Hoskins there is no 'curse of the actor'
To: <medianews@twiar.org>
Message-ID:
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
WARNING: LANGUAGE!
'The Method? Living it out? Cobblers!'
http://film.guardian.co.uk/interview/interviewpages/0,,2140160,00.html
For Bob Hoskins there is no 'curse of the actor'. You just go in, enjoy
yourself and bosh - job done. The problem, he tells Simon Hattenstone, is
knowing when to stop acting in real life
Friday August 3, 2007
The Guardian
Bob Hoskins says he's still waiting to be found out. He hasn't got a clue what
he's doing in this business. "I feel I'm the wrong name on the right list," he
says. "Keep going, keep prodding, and nobody'll notice. When I told my
relations I'm gonna be an actor, they said: 'Don't be fucking daft. Forget it!
You've got to be kidding, aintcha?'"
He's got a point. A bullfrog of a man with a boxer's nose and a right gob on
him, he's hardly your conventional lead. But he's been working for 40 years
now, and in that time has created some of the most memorable characters in
television and film - Arthur Parker, the frustrated songsheet salesman in
Pennies from Heaven, Harold Shand, the psychotic gangster in The Long Good
Friday, lovelorn George in Mona Lisa, the eye-popping private eye Eddie Valiant
in Who Framed Roger Rabbit. He does hard bastard and soft bastard equally well.
In his new film, Sparkle, he is playing one of his touching - and touched -
softies.
Not surprisingly, acting wasn't his first job - it came along by accident one
evening in London in the late 1960s. Hoskins turned up with his mate for an
audition at the old trade union theatre, the Unity. He was just there for a
drink, it was his friend who wanted the part. Right, next, said the casting
director, pointing to Hoskins. Before he knew it, he found himself on the stage
reading from the script of a play about a young thug. He got the lead, and that
was that. He didn't have any training or theory behind him, but he was good at
pretending to be other people. "There's two things I love about this business.
One's acting and the other one's getting paid for it. The rest of it is a
mystery to me. But I ain't got the faintest idea what the fuck is goin' on, you
know. I've read Stanislavsky, and I thought, well, this is obvious."
Ignorant sod that I am, I ask if he means the Method, as thesps like to call
it. "Nah! Nah, that's Lee Strasberg, that's bollocks! Like how to look busy.
It's just looking busy, impressing the boss. That's bollocks, going through all
this cobblers. Living it out and all that. Bollocks. Total cobblers!"
I think I know what you mean, I tell him - for example, with The Long Good
Friday it's pointless killing a few people just to get into character.
"Exactly!" he says. "I'm out the door in a flash. Gone. Let's face it, some of
the characters I've played you can't take home to the wife and kids."
Hoskins grew up in Finsbury Park in north London, his father a lorry driver,
his mother a nurse. He left school at 15. Was he as hard as he seems? "Naaaah.
You don't end up with a face like this if you're hard, do ya? This comes from
having too much mouth and nothing to back it up with. The nose has been broken
so many times." Was he mouthy? "Oh yeah, plenty of courage. I'm the soppy sod
who got up again."
It was in the late 1970s and early 80s that he produced his most outstanding
work, partly because he was more fussy with his choices, and partly because
Britain was rich in writers and directors. On television, Dennis Potter mingled
genres and explored the subconscious in ways that hadn't been seen before. Was
he aware that Pennies from Heaven was special when he was making it? "Nah. The
thing was at the time the BBC were quite frightened of it. Whasisname, Piers
Haggard, the director, asked me to take me clothes off - I come home, take me
clothes off, put me pyjamas on and go to bed, about as sexy as a bag of
Brussels sprouts. But he says, 'I want full frontal.' Well, Bill Cotton [then
controller of BBC1] went fuckin' bananas. 'We can't have that,' he says, 'If
you show Hoskins' cock on the television we will get letters of complaint.'
Dennis, without a beat, says, 'No Bill, you'll get letters of sympathy.'
Hahahahaha!" Hoskins roars.
What happened to the golden age of TV drama? "Gawd knows. It's all fucking live
television, isn't it? It's all bollocks. Living television is the cheapest way
to make TV and the cheaper they make it, the more money for the executives."
Hoskins is now 64, but has no plans to retire. The thing is, he says, an actor
can be in an iron lung and you can still give him a part. And now, with his age
and status, he's enjoying himself more than ever. "You reach a point where the
cameo is the governor. You go in there for a couple of weeks, you're paid a lot
of money, everybody treats you like the crown jewels, you're in and out, and if
the film's a load of shit, nobody blames you, y'knowwhadimean. It's wonderful."
Maybe for you Bob, I say, but not always so wonderful for us. The cameos can
frustrate the viewer, and unbalance a film. In Sparkle, for example, you wish
he was in the film longer. He laughs off the criticism. "Always leave 'em
wanting more, son!"
Hoskins has always liked his money. He is probably better known these days for
the irritating British Telecom campaign than for his movies. For years, people
stopped him in the street and told him: "It's good to talk." He was paid a huge
amount by BT, but was it worth it? "You're joking, intcha? I couldn't believe
it. It was un-be-lie-va-ble." So little work, so much money. Of course, he'd do
it again if he was asked. "The worst thing that happened to me was Madonna
getting stalked by a fella called Bob Hoskins, and I had fuckin' hundreds of
people come up to me, and say 'It's good to stalk.' Bastards! Hahaha!"
He accepts there have been flops, and films he's detested, but that's the
nature of the game. "The worst thing I ever did? Super Mario Brothers. It was a
fuckin' nightmare. The whole experience was a nightmare. It had a
husband-and-wife team directing, whose arrogance had been mistaken for talent.
After so many weeks their own agent told them to get off the set! Fuckin'
nightmare. Fuckin' idiots."
Hoskins insists that acting is about having a good time, getting paid, getting
home and getting the role out of his head. Bosh. The one time he found this
difficult was playing Hilditch, the sex abuser, in Atom Egoyan's Felicia's
Journey. "I'd finished and two weeks later Linda [his wife] said to me, 'Bob,
you do realise you are behaving very strangely at the moment.' I went
fuccccccck! Had a triple flush." Was he aware of it? "No." Had he gone quiet?
"Very quiet."
Dig a little deeper, and you begin to realise that his attitude to acting is
not quite so glib after all. His father recently died, and this was when he
truly realised that acting is anything but a nine-to-five job - that it is more
deeply rooted in his psyche than he'd like to admit. For the first time all
afternoon, he talks quietly - about his love for his dad, how he drove him
round Regent's Park when he was dying because that's all his dad wanted to do.
"He didn't want to look at the roses or have a cup of tea or anything, he just
wanted to be driven around. The police stopped us a few times and said what are
you doing, and I said I'm driving him around ..."
When his dad finally died, he was bereft, but left with a horrible numbness.
"People talk of the curse of the actor ..." He stops and starts again. "Acting
is like therapy, expressing the most extreme emotions and passions that a human
being's capable of. Then inevitably tragedy hits your own life, and all your
family and friends gather round quite sincerely and openly show their pain,
share their grief and comfort each other.
"But you immediately click into acting mode, and you know that you're fucking
acting." He sounds distraught as he tries to explain the emotional vacuum. "You
just can't help going into it, and it's dishonest. It is really fucking
dishonest. You're starting to act, not expressing yourself properly. So you
close down, and then you wind up on the outside. So fucking lonely. People cry,
and you start doing that and you know it's a technique, this is bullshit. It
really struck home."
Has he been able to get beyond this yet? "No, not yet. The point is you're
stuck with it. I've still got it. It's still there. It's like a big fucking
knot in there. I've got no way of expressing it."
Big bollocksy Bob Hoskins now seems so small and vulnerable - and all the more
likeble for it. He once said acting had saved his life. I ask him what he
meant. "Well, it's given me everything I've ever wanted. It's given me a job
that gives me a buzz, it's paid me a fortune, I live the life of a rich man,
it's given me a chance to educate my kids, given them the education I never
had." What does he think would have happened to him if he'd not become an
actor? "Probably rob banks or something." He pauses. "I'd probably be dead."
? Sparkle is released on August 17
Gregory S. Williams
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
?
?
------------------------------
Message: 4
Date: Fri, 3 Aug 2007 19:06:20 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: [Medianews] AT&T Reports 2Q07 Earnings 10-Q
To: undisclosed-recipient:;
Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
http://library.corporate-ir.net/library/11/113/113088/items/256939/832007SBCCOMMUNICATIO10Q.pdf
------------------------------
Message: 5
Date: Fri, 03 Aug 2007 16:38:22 -0700
From: Dishnut <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: [Medianews] U.S. spy satellite declared loss, to drop from
orbit
To: Medianews <medianews@twiar.org>, [EMAIL PROTECTED], Tom &
Darryl Mail List <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/02/AR2007080202208_2.html
U.S. spy satellite declared loss, to drop from orbit
By Andrea Shalal-Esa
Reuters
Thursday, August 2, 2007; 8:24 PM
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The National Reconnaissance Office has deemed an
experimental U.S. spy satellite a total loss and will allow it to slowly
drop from orbit and burn up in the atmosphere, two defense officials
told Reuters this week.
The classified L-21, built by Lockheed Martin Corp at a cost of hundreds
of millions of dollars, was launched on December 14 but has been out of
touch since reaching its low-earth orbit, put by satellite watchers at
about 220 miles above the earth.
It will now gradually fall out of orbit over the coming decades, said
the officials, who asked not to be named. At some later date, it will
burn up as it enters the earth's atmosphere, posing no danger to people
below, they said.
Meanwhile, the Pentagon will likely now have to test aspects of new
technologies that were on the L-21 by piggybacking them onto other
satellites over the next four to five years, the officials said.
For instance, the military could put the new sensors aboard TacSat 3,
the latest in a series of smaller satellites, when it launches later
this year.
The NRO could still try to build a new spacecraft to test the
technology, but it would take several years to get the funding for such
a satellite and build it, one official said.
The two officials declined to identify what exactly the experimental
Lockheed satellite was meant to test, but said its failure was
troubling, given that other countries were rapidly plowing ahead with
development and launch of new capabilities, especially in the area of
synthetic aperture radars.
Synthetic aperture radars offer high-resolution and can pierce darkness
and thick clouds to identify targets, even peering below the surface of
the ground or peeking into foliage that might obstruct the view of
photo-based sensors.
One official said Germany in June launched TerraSAR-X, a sophisticated
new satellite armed with a synthetic aperture radar that analysts say
marks the start of a new level of quality in the mapping of the earth.
Canada is also working on this technology.
The NRO, which designs, builds and operates reconnaissance satellites
for the U.S. military and intelligence communities, declined to comment,
as did Lockheed.
RUNAWAY COSTS, DELAYS
The failure of the L-21 comes amid a spate of issues with other NRO and
military satellites, and as the Pentagon tries to rein in runaway costs
and schedule delays on space programs.
NRO Director Donald Kerr, nominated to be principal deputy director of
national intelligence, told the Senate Intelligence Committee on
Wednesday that he recommended ending two multibillion-dollar classified
intelligence programs because they could not be successfully completed.
Kerr said one of the contractors had been put on "a watch list," and
could only bid on new work if granted a waiver.
He did not name the programs or companies involved, but said he told the
contractor on the list it could be removed only when it showed that it
could build hardware that worked.
Analysts and one official familiar with the issue said Kerr was
referring to a major revamp of the Future Imagery Architecture program,
initially run by Boeing Co, and a Lockheed satellite program dubbed
"Misty." The official said the company on the watchlist was Boeing.
Boeing declined to comment.
Separately, two U.S. military satellites used to monitor ship movements
failed to reach their correct orbit when they were launched several
months ago aboard an Atlas V rocket.
Officials are now trying to "nudge" the satellites into the correct
orbit by using small amounts of the fuel onboard, but the effort is
still ongoing, one defense official said.
--
Dishnut-P
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Message: 6
Date: Fri, 03 Aug 2007 17:01:19 -0700
From: Dishnut <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: [Medianews] Lead Paint Prompts Mattel to Recall 967,000 Toys
To: Medianews <medianews@twiar.org>, [EMAIL PROTECTED], Tom &
Darryl Mail List <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=windows-1252; format=flowed
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/02/business/02toy.html?em&ex=1186286400&en=0b7ae64201a1152a&ei=5087%0A
Lead Paint Prompts Mattel to Recall 967,000 Toys
By LOUISE STORY
Mattel, the maker of Barbie dolls and Hot Wheels cars, is recalling
nearly one million toys in the United States today because the products
are covered in lead paint.
According to Mattel, all the toys were made by a contract manufacturer
in China.
The recall, the second biggest this year involving toys, covers 83
products made from April 19 to July 6. Many of them feature Sesame
Street and Nickelodeon characters ? including the Elmo Tub Sub, the Dora
the Explorer Backpack, and the Giggle Gabber, a toy shaped like Elmo or
Cookie Monster that toddlers shake to hear giggles and funny noises.
Mattel says it prevented more than two-thirds of the 967,000 affected
toys from reaching consumers by stopping the products in its
distribution centers and contacting retailers, like Wal-Mart, Target and
Toys ?R? Us, late last week. But more than 300,000 of the tainted toys
have been bought by consumers in the United States. According to the
Consumer Product Safety Commission, the toys may have a date code from
109-7LF to 187-7LF on the product or packaging.
A complete list can be found at nytimes.com, mattel.com or cpsc.gov.
Mattel is hardly the first manufacturer to encounter a breakdown in the
Chinese production chain. In recent months, factories in China have been
sources of poisonous pet food sold in stores in the United States,
dangerous car tires, and lead paint on the popular Thomas & Friends
wooden toys.
The Chinese government has said it is working to improve its product
regulations, even as members of Congress have called for legislation
requiring more inspections of imports from China.
This is Mattel?s 17th recall in 10 years. Most recently, an infant swing
made by its Fisher-Price division was taken off the market because of a
risk children could be trapped in its moving parts. And in its largest
consumer action involving toy safety, in 1998, the company recalled more
than 10 million Power Wheels cars.
Speaking of the new recall, Nancy A. Nord, acting Consumer Product
Safety Commission chairwoman, said in a statement, ?These recalled toys
have accessible lead in the paint, and parents should not hesitate in
taking them away from children.?
The statement said that the commission had stated an investigation and
that ?ensuring that Chinese made toys are safe for U.S. consumers is one
of my highest priorities and is the subject of vital talks currently in
place between C.P.S.C. and the Chinese government.?
Earlier this summer, RC2, the maker of Thomas trains, recalled 1.5
million trains and accessories because a Chinese supplier had coated
them in lead paint. At that time, consumer safety experts and toy
industry analysts said that Mattel was unlikely to face such a problem.
?There are companies that live up to their obligations to the government
as well as to consumers, and they are one of them,? Julie Vallese, a
spokeswoman for the Consumer Product Safety Commission, said of Mattel
in mid-July.
But Mattel?s safety checks ? which include independent audits of
facilities and ownership of many of its own factories in China ? did not
prevent the chain of events that led to today?s recall.
In early July, according to Mattel executives, one of the European
retailers that sells Mattel toys discovered the lead on some products.
On July 6, Mattel stopped operations at the factory that produced the
toys and initiated an investigation.
On July 18, Mattel took a reporter for The New York Times on a tour of a
factory in Guanyao, China, and of Mattel?s toy safety lab in Shenzhen.
At that time, Mattel executives say, it was unclear whether Mattel was
facing a widespread lead paint problem, or if the European case was an
anomaly.
Last Thursday, the same day The Times ran an article about Mattel?s toy
safety procedures, the company?s executives say they received conclusive
data that persuaded them to recall the 83 products. Then, the company
contacted retailers who stocked the toys.
?This is a vendor plant with whom we?ve worked for 15 years; this isn?t
somebody that just started making toys for us,? Robert A. Eckert, the
chief executive of Mattel, said in an interview. ?They understand our
regulations, they understand our program, and something went wrong. That
hurts.?
Mattel requires the factories it contracts with to use paint and other
materials provided by certified suppliers. Mattel executives said they
did not know if the contract manufacturer substituted paint from a
noncertified supplier or if a certified supplier caused the problem.
Mr. Eckert said Mattel was considering various ways to overcome the
problem, including reducing the amount of toys it makes through contract
factories. About 50 percent of Mattel?s revenue comes from toys made in
11 factories it owns and operates. That is a high share for the toy
industry.
But the other half comes from toys that it outsources to up to 50
manufacturers in China. Those toys tend to be short-term products that
feature characters from movies and television shows rather than Barbie
dolls or other Mattel brands.
In light of the recalls, Nickelodeon ? which owns the characters Dora
the Explorer and Diego ? has decided to introduce a third-party monitor
to check up on all of the companies that make toys under its brands,
including Mattel.
Sesame Workshop, the nonprofit organization behind the ?Sesame Street?
program, is considering adding third-party testing, Gary E. Knell,
president and chief executive of Sesame Workshop, said in a statement.
This summer, the Toy Industry Association has been working with the
Consumer Product Safety Commission on new regulations to require more
stringent safety checks. Carter Keithley, president of the association,
said the federal government needed to help the industry block China from
using lead paint.
?We don?t have lead paint in this country any more, and they shouldn?t
either,? Mr. Keithley said of China. ?If there was no lead paint, then
we wouldn?t have this problem.?
Thomas G. Rawski, an economics professor at the University of
Pittsburgh, who has visited factories in China regularly since 1975,
though not toy factories, said companies there are trying to check
product quality, but more improvements are needed.
?The mechanisms for preventing this stuff don?t leap out of a tree,? Mr.
Rawski said. ?They have to be built up carefully, and I think it?s very
clear this process of building is going on in China right now. That
means there are lots of things happening that in an ideal world
shouldn?t be happening, including things that wouldn?t happen in Japan
or the U.S.?
--
Dishnut-P
====================================================================
Operator of RadioFree Dishnuts - Producer of The Dishnut News
heard Saturdays at 10pm ET. on:
RFD, W0KIE Satellite Radio Network Galaxy-26 (Telstar 6) @93? W -
Transponder 1 / 6.2 & 6.8Mhz (4DTV T6-999) also via Digicipher on AMC 3
@87? W - Transponder 7 4DTV (DSR-922) W3 958 (Stereo) - WTND-LP 106.3,
and many micro LPFM stations.
http://dishnuts.net
RFD Listen Links: http://dishnuts.net/#Listen
Show Archives: (Partly Up) http://dishnuts.net/archive/
**In Loving Memory of Mom (Dishnut Gerry)**
------------------------------
Message: 7
Date: Fri, 03 Aug 2007 18:58:19 -0700
From: Dishnut <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: [Medianews] Delta 2 / Phoenix Lander Upcoming Launch Coverage
Saturday (08-04) @3:15am ET. NASA DVB
To: Medianews <medianews@twiar.org>, [EMAIL PROTECTED], Satellite
TV Wild Feeds List <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, Tom & Darryl Mail
List <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, TVRO Newsgroup
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, TVRO Talk Newsgroup
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, WildFeeds List <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
Saturday morning (8-4) United Launch Alliance is scheduled to launch the
Mars Phoenix Lander for NASA on a Delta II rocket (7925 configuration)
from SLC-17A, Cape Canaveral, Florida. This will be the 326th flight
of a Delta rocket.
Launch is scheduled for 5:26 a.m. EDT. and a second attempt at 6:02 a.m.
EDT. both windows are 1 second long.
Phoenix Lander separation occurs approximately 84 minutes after liftoff.
The Phoenix Lander will investigate a site in the far north of Mars for
water
The landing region has water ice in soil close to the surface, which
NASA's Mars Odyssey orbiter found to be the case for much of the
high-latitude terrain in both the north and south hemispheres of Mars.
Phoenix will dig down to the icy layer. It will examine soil in place at
the surface, at the icy layer and in between, and it will scoop up
samples for analysis by its onboard instruments. One key instrument will
check for water and carbon-containing compounds by heating soil samples
in tiny ovens and examining the vapors that are given off. Another will
test soil samples by adding water and analyzing the dissolution
products. Cameras and microscopes will provide information on scales
spanning 10 powers of 10, from features that could fit by the hundreds
into the period at the end of this sentence to an aerial view taken
during descent. A weather station will provide information about
atmospheric processes in an arctic region where a coating of carbon-
dioxide ice comes and goes with the seasons.
Broadcast coverage:
Coverage starts at 3:15 am EDT.
NASA TV MPEG2 available on AMC-6 at 72? W, transponder 17C (4040 V)
SR: 26665 VPID: 273 APID: 276 PCR: 273 (public channel)
VPID: 4145 APID: 4148 PCR: 4145 (media channel)
NASA TV MPEG2 available on AMC-7 at 137? W, transponder 18 (4060 V)
SR: 26665 VPID: 273 APID: 276 PCR: 273 (public channel)
VPID: 4145 APID: 4148 PCR: 4145 (media channel)
Don't have a dish? Webcast is available at:
http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv/
Additional coverage at:
http://www.spaceflightnow.com/mars/phoenix/status.html
http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/launches/next_launch.html
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/phoenix/main/index.html
--
Dishnut-P
====================================================================
Operator of RadioFree Dishnuts - Producer of The Dishnut News
heard Saturdays at 10pm ET. on:
RFD, W0KIE Satellite Radio Network Galaxy-26 (Telstar 6) @93? W -
Transponder 1 / 6.2 & 6.8Mhz (4DTV T6-999) also via Digicipher on AMC 3
@87? W - Transponder 7 4DTV (DSR-922) W3 958 (Stereo) - WTND-LP 106.3,
and many micro LPFM stations.
http://dishnuts.net
RFD Listen Links: http://dishnuts.net/#Listen
Show Archives: (Partly Up) http://dishnuts.net/archive/
**In Loving Memory of Mom (Dishnut Gerry)**
------------------------------
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End of Medianews Digest, Vol 344, Issue 1
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