ABC’s “Zero Hour” Will Conclude Conspiracies After Each Season






LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) – Paul Scheuring, the executive producer of ABC’s “Zero Hour,” says the conspiracy driving the new ABC drama will “100 percent” wrap up at the end of its first season.


Premeiring February 14, the show follows Anthony Edwards (“ER”) as the publisher of a magazine that investigates conspiracy theories. But after his wife (Jacinda Barrett) is abducted from her antique clock shop, Edwards’ character is pulled into one of the most compelling mysteries in human history. We don’t know exactly what that mystery is yet, but it involves clocks and Nazis.






Despite the massive scale of the tale, which stretches across the globe and back in time several centuries, season one’s storyline won’t be stretched across future seasons — a practice that Scheuring says leads to writers “flapping” their wings.


“One of the things I learned from ‘Prison Break’ and making a serialized show is that if you’re a single conceived show, like ‘Prison Break’ or ‘Lost,’” he said Thursday at the Television Critics Association winter press tour. “Sooner or later you start flapping your wings because a story needs to end.”


So instead of trying to “stretch, stretch, stretch, stretch” the narrative, Scheuring modeled the series like “24.”


“It’s like the ’24′ model where you reset every year,” he continued. “This entire Nazi conspiracy thing will be done by episode 13 this year.”


But just like Jack Bauer’s addiction to danger in “24,” the characters in “Zero Hour” will dive into another conspiracy if they’re lucky enough to return for a second season.


“We have a group of investigators, headed by Anthony, at the magazine which can then apply those skills to the next investigation,” Scheuring concluded.


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Personal Health: Keeping Firearms Away From Children

I doubt that our forebears who ratified the Second Amendment in 1791 ever imagined how carelessly and callously firearms would be used centuries later. Witness the senseless slaughter of 20 innocent children and 6 adults last month in Newtown, Conn. As a mother of two and grandmother of four, I can’t imagine a more painful loss.

If you are as concerned as I am about the safety of your children and grandchildren, consider that it may be time for a grass-roots movement, comparable to Mothers Against Drunk Driving, to help break the stranglehold the National Rifle Association seems to have on our elected officials. Do you really want, as the association proposed, an armed guard in every school?

The Connecticut massacre occurred just two months after the American Academy of Pediatrics issued a new policy statement on firearm-related injuries to children. Murder and accidental shootings were not the academy’s only concerns. “Suicides among the young are typically impulsive,” the statement noted, “and easy access to lethal weapons largely determines outcome.”

In an article published online last month in The New England Journal of Medicine, Dr. Judith S. Palfrey, a pediatrician at Boston Children’s Hospital, and her husband, Dr. Sean Palfrey, also a pediatrician in Boston, highlighted the shocking statistics.

Every day in the United States, 18 children and young adults between the ages of 1 and 24 die from gun-related injuries. That makes guns the second leading cause of death in young people — twice the number of deaths from cancer, five times the deaths from heart disease and 15 times the deaths from infections.

Dr. Judith S. Palfrey has seen this heartbreak up close. “My niece, who was sad about something, might be alive today if she hadn’t had such easy access to a handgun at age 18,” she told me.

The United States has the dubious distinction of leading high-income countries in firearm homicides, suicides and unintentional deaths among young people. Among American children ages 5 to 14, an international study showed that firearm suicide rates were six times higher, and death rates from unintentional firearm injuries 10 times higher, than in other high-income countries.

Innocent Victims

The Palfreys said they were haunted by the death of one of their patients, a 12-year-old boy who went on an errand for his mother and was caught in the cross-fire of a gun battle. The boy had shortly before written a letter to his mother expressing his desire to become a doctor.

And Dr. Sean Palfrey recalls “with horror” picking up a loaded .22-caliber rifle, at age 11 or 12, and threatening his baby sitter with it. “This scared the hell out of me and remains seared in my memory. I could have killed this person.”

In explaining why he had a gun, he said, “I’m a great-grandson of Theodore Roosevelt, who was a hunter as well as a naturalist, and when I grew up guns were an acceptable part of youth. I took target practice and was an N.R.A. member myself as a child. We had guns for hunting, not automatic weapons that can shoot hundreds of rounds within seconds.”

Now, he said, “I do all my shooting with a camera. This is not the same world it was when the Second Amendment was written. Guns have to be removed so that they can’t be accessed by those who are immature, impulsive or mentally ill.”

In their article, the Palfreys pointed out that “little children explore their worlds without understanding danger, and in one unsupervised moment, an encounter with a gun can end in fatality.” School-age children who see guns used on television, in movies or video games “don’t necessarily understand that people who are really shot may really die,” they said.

Among teenagers, who may fight over girlfriends or sneakers, or have their judgment impaired by drugs or alcohol, “a fistfight may cause transient injuries, but a gunfight can kill rivals, friends, or innocent bystanders,” the pediatricians wrote. Among depressed adolescents, they said, “less than 5 percent of suicide attempts involving drugs are lethal, but 90 percent of those involving guns are.”

Preventing Access

In a 2006 study of gun-owning Americans with children under age 18, 21.7 percent stored a gun loaded, 31.5 percent stored one unlocked, and 8.3 percent stored at least one gun unlocked and loaded. And in households with adolescents ages 13 to 17, firearms were left unlocked 41.7 percent of the time.

These are accidents, or worse, waiting to happen, and the pediatrics academy reiterated its earlier recommendations that pediatricians talk to parents about guns in the home and their safe storage, and follow up by distributing cable locks.

To limit unauthorized access to guns, the academy recommended the use of trigger locks, lockboxes, personalized safety mechanisms, and trigger pressures that are too high for young children.

Still, the academy emphasized, “the safest home for a child or adolescent is one without firearms.”

The Palfreys said that when one of their colleagues asked a mother about guns in her home, she responded, “Why, yes, I have a loaded gun in the drawer of my bedside table.” It was only then the woman realized that this could be a danger to her child, Dr. Judith Palfrey said.

The academy also called for restoring the federal ban, in effect from 1994 to 2004, on the sale of assault weapons to the general public. None of the many attempts to renew it have succeeded in Congress.

The Supreme Court ruled in 2010, in the case of McDonald v. the City of Chicago, that the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment applied to provisions of the Second Amendment, and prevented states and localities from restricting citizens’ right to bear arms. The academy stated that the ruling “set the stage for Second Amendment legal challenges to local and state gun laws, including laws requiring the safe storage of firearms and trigger locks, as well as laws aimed at protecting children from firearms.”

In 2011, Florida passed legislation that raised First Amendment questions by forbidding doctors to ask families about guns in the home. Although a permanent injunction against the law was issued, Gov. Rick Scott has appealed the ruling. At the federal level, wording introduced into the Affordable Care Act restricts collection of data on guns in the home.


This post has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: January 11, 2013

The Personal Health column on Tuesday, about firearms and children, using information from The New England Journal of Medicine, misstated the number of children and young adults between the ages of 1 and 24 who die each day in the United States from gun-related injuries. Eighteen people between the ages of 1 and 24 die every day — not seven people between those ages. (Seven deaths a day is the number for children and young adults between the ages of 1 and 19.) And the article misstated part of a Supreme Court ruling. In the case of McDonald v. the City of Chicago in 2010, the court ruled that the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment — not the equal protection clause — applied to provisions of the Second Amendment, which guarantees the right to keep and bear arms.

This post has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: January 11, 2013

A chart posted with an earlier version of this article also misstated the number of children and young adults between the ages of 1 and 24 killed every day in the United States by gun injuries. It is 18, not seven.

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U.S. to review Boeing 787 design, safety

Two new incidents involving the Boeing 787 Dreamliner have been reported in Japan -- a crack in the cockpit and an oil leak. Norah O'Donnell reports.









The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration said Friday it will launch a high-priority and comprehensive review of Chicago-based Boeing's new 787's critical systems, following a rash of malfunctions this week, such as a battery fire and fuel leaks. However, federal transportation officials also supported Boeing, saying repeatedly that the plane is safe.

"We are confident about the safety of this aircraft," said Federal Aviation Administrator Michael Huerta, adding that a priority in the review will be the plane's electrical systems. He said he would not speculate on how long the review would take.


The review, an unusual move for the FAA that will not ground planes or halt production of new 787s, will examine the plane's design, manufacture and assembly, said U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood.








"Through it, we will look for the root causes of recent events and do everything we can to make sure these events don't happen again," he said. "I believe this plane is safe and I would have absolutely no reservation of boarding one of these planes and taking a flight."


Boeing shares were down 2.5 percent in midday trading to $75.15.


The announcement comes amid yet more reports Friday of problems with the highly anticipated "Dreamliner" jet, including a cracked cockpit window and another oil leak on a Japanese carrier. They add to a rash of other reported problems this week, most seriously a battery fire on a parked 787 in Boston, an incident under investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board.


The plane model is in use in Chicago for temporary United Airlines flights between Chicago O'Hare and Houston. Chicago-based United has five other 787s in service domestically. "We continue to have complete confidence in the 787 and in the ability of Boeing, with the support of the FAA, to resolve these early operational issues," a United spokeswoman said. "We will support Boeing and the FAA throughout their review."


Next week, LOT Polish Airlines plans to begin operating the region's first regular flight on a 787 between O'Hare and Warsaw, Poland. That inaugural flight is still planned for Wednesday, a spokeswoman said. All told, Boeing has delivered 50 Dreamliners to customers around the world, many to Japanese carriers.


Aviation experts have said the planes are safe and that glitches are common on new models of planes, especially ones as revolutionary as the 787, which uses mostly composite materials instead of metals to create an aircraft that's more lighter, more fuel-efficient and more comfortable for passengers. However, other observers have said the concentration of problems in a short period and the media attention they garner is damaging the reputation of Boeing, which was already under scrutiny for delivering the Dreamliner to customers more than three years late. The plane's list price is about $207 million.


The latest problems came Friday, when Japanese carrier All Nippon Airways said a domestic flight from Tokyo landed safely at Matsuyama airport in western Japan after a crack developed on the cockpit windscreen, and the plane's return to Tokyo was cancelled.


"Cracks appear a few times every year in other planes. We don't see this as a sign of a fundamental problem" with Boeing aircraft, a spokesman for the airline said. The same airline later on Friday said oil was found leaking from an engine of a 787 Dreamliner after the plane landed at Miyazaki airport in southern Japan. An airline spokeswoman said it later returned to Tokyo after some delay. No one was injured in either incident.


Boeing said Friday the 787 logged 50,000 hours of flight, with more than 150 flights occurring daily, and that its performance has been on par with the Boeing 777, which it calls "the industry's best-ever introduction" of a new airplane. "More than a year ago, the 787 completed the most robust and rigorous certification process in the history of the FAA," Boeing said in a statement. "We remain fully confident in the airplane's design and production system."


Ray Conner, president and chief executive officer of Boeing Commercial Airplanes, said Friday that the recent problems were not caused by Boeing's outsourcing of production or by ramping up production too quickly.


"We are fully committed to resolving any issue that affects the reliability of our airlines," he said.


gkarp@tribune.com

Reuters contributed
 
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'Lincoln' leads Academy Award contenders with 12 nominations








With a conspicuous diss of Kathryn Bigelow, the un-nominated director of “Zero Dark Thirty,” the Academy Awards nominations were announced Thursday morning.


“Zero Dark Thirty” was one of nine films given the best picture nomination nod. The others: “Beasts of the Southern Wild”; “Silver Linings Playbook”; “Lincoln”; “Les Miserables”; “Life of Pi”; “Amour”; “Django Unchained”; and “Argo.” With 12 nominations total, director Steven Spielberg’s “Lincoln” led this year’s pack, unusually full of films that have reached a broad mainstream audience. “Life of Pi” came in with 11 nominations; “Silver Linings Playbook” and “Les Miserables” received eight.


The best actress Oscar nominees include the oldest-ever performer in that category (Emmanuelle Riva, 85, for “Amour”) as well as the youngest (Quvenzhane Wallis, 9, “Beasts of the Southern Wild”). They’ll compete for the Feb. 24 Oscars against Naomi Watts (“The Impossible”), Jessica Chastain (“Zero Dark Thirty”) and Jennifer Lawrence (“Silver Linings Playbook”).






To the surprise of no one on this planet or any other, Daniel Day-Lewis led the best actor competition for “Lincoln.” His fellow nominees: Denzel Washington, “Flight”; Hugh Jackman, “Les Miserables”; Bradley Cooper, “Silver Linings Playbook”; and in the year’s most unsettling performance, Joaquin Phoenix, “The Master.”


“Silver Linings Playbook” fared well, against some predictions, scoring a supporting actor nomination for Robert De Niro and a supporting actress nod for Jacki Weaver. Other supporting actors nominated include Christoph Waltz for “Django Unchained”; Philip Seymour Hoffman, “The Master”; Alan Arkin, “Argo”; and Tommy Lee Jones,” Lincoln.” All have won Oscars before.


Along with Weaver, Sally Field received a supporting actress nomination, hers for “Lincoln.” The competition: Anne Hathaway, singing her guts out all the way to the podium on Feb. 24 (I’m guessing) for “Les Miserables”; Helen Hunt for “The Sessions” (more of a leading role, in fact); and Amy Adams as the Lady Macbeth of the action in “The Master.”


It’s a huge showing for “Beasts of the Southern Wild,” whose director, Benh Zeitlin, goes toe to toe against his fellow directing nominees David O. Russell (“Silver Linings Playbook”), Ang Lee (“Life of Pi”), Michael Haneke (“Amour”) and Spielberg. Along with “Zero Dark Thirty” director Bigelow, “Argo” helmer Ben Affleck, widely expected to be nominated ... wasn’t.






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Jimmy Dushku: The 25-year-old who is North Korea’s one true Twitter friend






Mother Jones takes a look at a globetrotting young investor who’s the only American — and the only human being — Pyongyang follows


Google Chairman Eric Schmidt capped a controversial four-day visit to North Korea on Thursday with a call for the country’s censorship-happy communist government to give its people access to the internet, or face further economic decline due to the country’s global isolation. It was a strong message from one of the web’s most powerful figures, although North Korea watchers seem pretty confident the country’s young leader, Kim Jong Un, will ignore it. There’s one American, however, Pyongyang does appear to listen to. That would be Jimmy Dushku, a young investor who is one of exactly three Twitter users Kim’s government follows on Twitter. What’s the story behind this unlikely online bromance? Here, a guide:






Who is Jimmy Dushku?
He’s a 25-year-old financial whiz kid from Austin, Texas. Dushku, who also goes by the nicknames “Jimmer” and “Jammy,” started a website development business when he was 14, according to Mother Jones, and he parlayed his early earnings into investments that now include everything from construction projects in Europe to real estate in Texas to mines in South America. He’s also a rabid Coldplay fan, and when he isn’t jetting around the world, he says he likes to play Rachmaninoff on his piano and zoom around on his Ducati Monster motorcycle.


SEE MORE: North Korea’s rocket launch: 3 consequences


So how did he become buddies with North Korea?
Dushku tells Asawin Suebsaeng at Mother Jones he’s not really sure. “People always ask me how it happened, and I honestly can’t remember,” he says. “It started sometime back in 2010. I was initially surprised.” North Korea followed him, he followed North Korea “out of courtesy.” He tweeted back, “Hello my friend,” and a relationship was born. Then, the North Korean government, which has piled up some 11,000 followers in two-and-a-half years on Twitter, abruptly whittled down the number of accounts it follows, leaving just three. Dushku made the cut (along with a Vietnam account and another official North Korean handle).


What has Dushku gotten from the relationship?
Death threats, for one thing. Not long after he linked up with North Korea’s account, which goes by @uriminzok (or “our nation”), Dushku says he started getting angry messages from exiles and South Koreans. Since then, he has mostly kept a low profile, just to be safe, although he does occasionally grant interviews to foreign publications. For its part, North Korea gets a rare glimpse at the outside world through Dushku, as his is the only account North Korea follows that is regularly updated — the other two haven’t tweeted in months. He’s also the only human being in the bunch.


Will @JimmyDushku and @uriminzok ever meet in real life?
That’s always the question for acquaintances who meet online, isn’t it? Dushku says his friendly relationship has won him a standing offer to visit North Korea. Casual observers, however, advise him to proceed with caution. “Am I the only one thinking they picked some random guy so they can lure him into North Korea and use him as a political prisoner/bargaining chip?” one commenter at Gizmodo said. Another suggests that Dushku play it cool, without making Pyongyang angry, saying, “Never unfollow anybody with nuclear weapons.”


Sources: Austinist, CNN, Gizmodo, Mother Jones


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Depardieu skips court to set up Strauss-Kahn role






PARIS (Reuters) – French film star Gerard Depardieu skipped a court hearing on drink-driving charges on Tuesday as he pursued a headline-grabbing world tour that has seen him set up an alleged tax haven home in Belgium and pick up a passport in Russia.


The garrulous actor’s lawyer said he had missed the hearing in Paris because he was now in Montenegro for meetings about a film in which he will play disgraced former IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn.






He was not obliged to attend the pre-trial hearing, but the no-show means the case will turn into a full trial, guaranteeing another day in the spotlight for Depardieu, already caught up in a public row with French authorities over his tax status.


It could also lead to the 64-year-old star of “Cyrano de Bergerac” and “Asterix and Obelix” getting a tougher sentence if convicted – in theory up to two years in prison.


“Despite wanting to be there and meet the judges and in no way to escape justice, Gerard Depardieu absolutely could not be present,” his lawyer Eric de Caumont told a scrum of reporters outside the Paris courtroom on Tuesday.


He said Depardieu was in Montenegro negotiating a deal for the film about Strauss-Kahn, who was seen as the next president of France until a U.S. sex scandal ended his career.


Depardieu also met Montenegrin Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic, who suggested he might become a cultural ambassador for Montenegro.


Asked if that meant he planned to add Montenegrin citizenship to his growing list, Depardieu said: “I’m not collecting passports …


“If I got a Montenegrin passport it would be without personal gain. But … I’m honored by the idea that I could be a Montenegrin cultural ambassador to the world.”


HIGH TAX POLICY


Depardieu’s actions have guaranteed international coverage of a high-tax policy by France‘s Socialist government that has seen a stream of wealthy citizens seek exile.


His purchase of a house in Belgium last month spurred accusations that he was trying to avoid tax.


Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault called the move “pathetic” and unpatriotic, and Depardieu’s acceptance of a Russian passport last week provoked even fiercer charges that he had abandoned his homeland.


Russia has a flat income tax rate of 13 percent, compared to the 75 percent on income over 1 million euros ($ 1.32 million) that President Francois Hollande wants to levy in France.


Actor-director Mathieu Kassovitz, best known abroad for his role in the whimsical movie romance “Amelie”, said on Monday he understood those fleeing high taxes and that he also planned to quit France because of a lack of financing for films.


Depardieu denied on Monday that he was leaving France for tax reasons.


“I have a Russian passport, but I remain French and I will probably have dual Belgian nationality. But if I’d wanted to escape the taxman, as the French press say, I would have done it a long time ago,” he said.


Depardieu is a larger-than-life figure who began his long career playing thugs and drop-outs before moving on to leading-man roles in films like the romantic comedy “Green Card”.


The actor is accused of crashing his scooter in Paris with more than three times the legal limit of alcohol in his blood. No one else was injured in the accident.


By skipping the pre-trial hearing, he missed out on the chance to strike a bargain with prosecutors.


A few months before the scooter incident, a car driver accused Depardieu of assault and battery during an altercation in Paris. Last year, the actor outraged passengers on an Air France flight by urinating into a bottle in the aisle.


(Additional Reporting by Thierry Leveque and Catherine Bremer in Paris and Petar Komnenic in Podgorica; Editing by Mark John and Kevin Liffey)


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Flu Widespread, Leading a Range of Winter’s Ills





It is not your imagination — more people you know are sick this winter, even people who have had flu shots.




The country is in the grip of three emerging flu or flulike epidemics: an early start to the annual flu season with an unusually aggressive virus, a surge in a new type of norovirus, and the worst whooping cough outbreak in 60 years. And these are all developing amid the normal winter highs for the many viruses that cause symptoms on the “colds and flu” spectrum.


Influenza is widespread, and causing local crises. On Wednesday, Boston’s mayor declared a public health emergency as cases flooded hospital emergency rooms.


Google’s national flu trend maps, which track flu-related searches, are almost solid red (for “intense activity”) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s weekly FluView maps, which track confirmed cases, are nearly solid brown (for “widespread activity”).


“Yesterday, I saw a construction worker, a big strong guy in his Carhartts who looked like he could fall off a roof without noticing it,” said Dr. Beth Zeeman, an emergency room doctor for MetroWest Medical Center in Framingham, Mass., just outside Boston. “He was in a fetal position with fever and chills, like a wet rag. When I see one of those cases, I just tighten up my mask a little.”


Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston started asking visitors with even mild cold symptoms to wear masks and to avoid maternity wards. The hospital has treated 532 confirmed influenza patients this season and admitted 167, even more than it did by this date during the 2009-10 swine flu pandemic.


At Brigham and Women’s Hospital, 100 patients were crowded into spaces licensed for 53. Beds lined halls and pressed against vending machines. Overflow patients sat on benches in the lobby wearing surgical masks.


“Today was the first time I think I was experiencing my first pandemic,” said Heidi Crim, the nursing director, who saw both the swine flu and SARS outbreaks here. Adding to the problem, she said, many staff members were at home sick and supplies like flu test swabs were running out.


Nationally, deaths and hospitalizations are still below epidemic thresholds. But experts do not expect that to remain true. Pneumonia usually shows up in national statistics only a week or two after emergency rooms report surges in cases, and deaths start rising a week or two after that, said Dr. Gregory A. Poland, a vaccine specialist at the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota. The predominant flu strain circulating is an H3N2, which typically kills more people than the H1N1 strains that usually predominate; the relatively lethal 2003-4 “Fujian flu” season was overwhelmingly H3N2.


No cases have been resistant to Tamiflu, which can ease symptoms if taken within 48 hours, and this year’s flu shot is well-matched to the H3N2 strain, the C.D.C. said. Flu shots are imperfect, especially in the elderly, whose immune systems may not be strong enough to produce enough antibodies.


Simultaneously, the country is seeing a large and early outbreak of norovirus, the “cruise ship flu” or “stomach flu,” said Dr. Aron J. Hall of the C.D.C.’s viral gastroenterology branch. It includes a new strain, which first appeared in Australia and is known as the Sydney 2012 variant.


This week, Maine’s health department said that state was seeing a large spike in cases. Cities across Canada reported norovirus outbreaks so serious that hospitals were shutting down whole wards for disinfection because patients were getting infected after moving into the rooms of those who had just recovered. The classic symptoms of norovirus are “explosive” diarrhea and “projectile” vomiting, which can send infectious particles flying yards away.


“I also saw a woman I’m sure had norovirus,” Dr. Zeeman said. “She said she’d gone to the bathroom 14 times at home and 4 times since she came into the E.R. You can get dehydrated really quickly that way.”


This month, the C.D.C. said the United States was having its biggest outbreak of pertussis in 60 years; there were about 42,000 confirmed cases, the highest total since 1955. The disease is unrelated to flu but causes a hacking, constant cough and breathlessness. While it is unpleasant, adults almost always survive; the greatest danger is to infants, especially premature ones with undeveloped lungs. Of the 18 recorded deaths in 2012, all but three were of infants under age 1.


That outbreak is worst in cold-weather states, including Colorado, Washington, Wisconsin, Minnesota and Vermont.


Although most children are vaccinated several times against pertussis, those shots wear off with age. It is possible, the authorities said, that a new, safer vaccine introduced in the 1990s gives protection that does not last as long, so more teenagers and adults are vulnerable.


And, Dr. Poland said, if many New Yorkers are catching laryngitis, as has been reported, it is probably a rhinovirus. “It’s typically a sore, really scratchy throat, and you sometimes lose your voice,” he said.


Though flu cases in New York City are rising rapidly, the city health department has no plans to declare an emergency, largely because of concern that doing so would drive mildly sick people to emergency rooms, said Dr. Jay K. Varma, deputy director for disease control. The city would prefer people went to private doctors or, if still healthy, to pharmacies for flu shots. Nursing homes have had worrisome outbreaks, he said, and nine elderly patients have died. Homes need to be more alert, vaccinate patients, separate those who fall ill and treat them faster with antivirals, he said.


Dr. Susan I. Gerber of the C.D.C.’s respiratory diseases branch, said her agency has not seen any unusual spike of rhinovirus, parainfluenza, adenovirus, coronavirus or the dozens of other causes of the “common cold,” but the country is having its typical winter surge of some, like respiratory syncytial virus “that can mimic flulike symptoms, especially in young children.”


The C.D.C. and the local health authorities continue to advocate getting flu shots. Although it takes up to two weeks to build immunity, “we don’t know if the season has peaked yet,” said Dr. Joseph Bresee, chief of prevention in the agency’s flu division.


Flu shots and nasal mists contain vaccines against three strains, the H3N2, the H1N1 and a B. Thus far this season, Dr. Bresee said, H1N1 cases have been rare, and the H3N2 component has been a good match against almost all the confirmed H3N2 samples the agency has tested.


About a fifth of all flus this year thus far are from B strains. That part of the vaccine is a good match only 70 percent of the time, because two B’s are circulating.


For that reason, he said, flu shots are being reformulated. Within two years, they said, most will contain vaccines against both B strains.


Joanna Constantine, 28, a stylist at the Guy Thomas Hair Salon on West 56th Street in Manhattan, said she recently was so sick that she was off work and in bed for five days — and silenced by laryngitis for four of them.


She did not have the classic flu symptoms — a high fever, aches and chills — so she knew it was probably something else.


Still, she said, it scared her enough that she will get a flu shot next year. She had not bothered to get one since her last pregnancy, she said. But she has a 7-year-old son and a 5-year-old daughter, “and my little guys get theirs every year.”


Jess Bidgood contributed reporting.



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Jewel-Osco stores to be sold to Cerberus group

Jewel-Osco stores will be sold to a consortium of investors led by Cerberus Capital Management, Jewel's parent Supervalu said today. (WGN - Chicago)









Jewel-Osco stores will be sold to a consortium of investors led by Cerberus Capital Management, Jewel's parent Supervalu said Thursday.

The deal, valued at $3.3 billion, also includes the Albertsons, Acme, and Shaw stores.






The announcement ends months of speculation that all or parts of the troubled grocery chain would be sold to New York-based Cerberus, an investment firm. Supervalu acquired Jewel in 2006 as part of a larger, complex acquisition of the Albertsons company.

Supervalu also reported earnings of $16 million, or 8 cents per share, in the third quarter ended on Dec. 1, compared with a year-earlier loss of $750 million, or $3.54 per share.

Excluding an after-tax gain related to a cash settlement from credit card companies and after-tax charges primarily related to store closures, it earned $5 million, or 3 cents per share.

As part of the deal, which includes $100 million in cash and $3.2 billion in debt, the five grocery chains will be acquired by AB Acquisition, an affiliate of Cerberus. Other investors in the deal include Kimco Realty Corp, Klaff Realty, Lubert-Adler Partners and Schottenstein Real Estate Group.

Following the sale, which is expected to close in the spring, a newly formed entity called Symphony Investors, led by Cerberus, will purchase up to 30 percent of Supervalu's outstanding shares for $4 each, representing a 50 percent premium over the stock's 30-day average. If Symphony cannot acquire at least 19.9 percent of the outstanding shares at that price, Supervalu must issue additional stock.

Wall Street has long expected Eden Prairie, Minn.-based Supervalu to sell some or all of its assets.

Following the deal, Supervalu will consist of its wholesale grocery business, the Save-A-Lot discount chain, and traditional grocery chains like Cub, Shop N' Save and Hornbacher's.

In a call with investors, outgoing CEO Wayne Sales said the deal brings Supervalu "a very strong balance sheet," and the ability to focus on investments in price reductions, fresh produce, and customer experience at its remaining chains. 

The new company is smaller, "with more bandwidth and leadership" to focus on its wholesale business, Save-A-Lot, and its traditional grocery stores, he said.

Sam Duncan, 61, will replace Wayne Sales as CEO. Duncan was CEO of Office Max from 2005 to 2011, and prior to that, was CEO of ShopKo, a Midwestern grocery chain. Five unidentified board members will resign as part of the deal, making room for Duncan, Albertsons CEO Robert Miller, and three new appointees. The size of the board will shrink from 10 to seven.

Concurrent with the announcement, Supervalu announced that it has secured access to a $900 million asset-based credit facility, and a $1.5 billion loan.

This deal ends a long and difficult year for one of the country's largest grocers.

Last April, Supervalu reported a loss of $1.04 billion for fiscal 2012, which included a $519 million operating loss and $509 million in interest expense. Sales also declined 3 percent, to $27.9 billion. In July, the company said it was exploring strategic alternatives, including a sale. Soon after, the company dismissed CEO Craig Herkert, with Chairman Wayne Sales stepping in to helm the troubled grocer.

Cerberus, an investor in the deal to acquire Albertsons in 2006 was long seen as the leading candidate. Last week, rumors that Supervalu was near a deal with Cerberus sent stock soaring nearly 15 percent.

In September, Supervalu said it would 60 underperforming stores, primarily from the Save-A-Lot and Albertsons chains. No Jewel locations were identified at the time. The announcement was particularly troubling to investment community because Save-A-Lot, a hard discount chain, has been Supervalu's primary growth vehicle.

Supervalu has long acknowledged that many of its stores are not price competitive. In 2012, it homed in on Jewel-Osco and the Chicago market. Supervalu surveyed customers and lowered prices throughout the store. When the company reported results for its second fiscal quarter in September, (Supervalu CEO Wayne) Sales said that Jewel had been "competitively priced throughout the store" for about six weeks.

Sales said that the initiative had resulted in "dramatic improvement" in how consumers "think about the quality of products we sell, how they feel about the service they get in various departments" and that the company was pleased with increased unit sales.

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Hall of Fame pitches a shutout: No players elected

Steroid-tainted stars Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens and Sammy Sosa have been denied entry to baseball's Hall of Fame with voters failing to elect any candidates for only the second time in four decades. (Jan. 9)









Sammy Sosa, Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens finally faced a jury Wednesday that would decide whether they are worthy of the Hall of Fame, and the verdict was a resounding no: For the first time since 1996, no players were selected for induction.


Sosa, the former Chicago Cubs slugger, received only 12.5 percent of the vote, which keeps him on the ballot for at least one more year. Players with fewer than five percent fall off the ballot. Clemens was named on 37.6 percent of ballots and Bonds on 36.2 percent.


A Sosa representative said her client's only comment was that "it was an honor to be nominated" and he would be doing no interviews Wednesday.

The inclusion of the Steroids Era players on this year’s ballot overshadowed those who were thought to have the best chance of being voted into baseball’s hallowed shrine in Cooperstown: former Chicago White Sox outfielder Tim Raines, the Houston Astros’ long-time duo of Craig Biggio and Jeff Bagwell and All-Star pitcher Jack Morris.








Biggio was the top vote-getter with 68.2 percent, followed by Morris at 67.7, Bagwell at 59.6, Mike Piazza at 57.8 and Raines at 52.2. Induction requires 75 percent of the vote.


Also in contention was former Cubs closer Lee Smith, who was on the ballot for the 11th time but received only 47.8 percent of the vote.

This Hall of Fame eligible class had received more attention than most because of the inclusion of Bonds, who won seven MVP awards; Clemens, who won seven Cy Young awards; and Sosa, who won a National League MVP award after his famous 1998 home run duel with the Cardinals’ Mark McGwire.


In a statement, Players Association Executive Director Michael Weiner called the results of the balloting "unfortunate, if not sad."

"Those empowered to help the Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum document the history of the game failed to recognize the contributions of several Hall of Fame worthy players," Weiner's statement read. "To ignore the historic accomplishments of Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens, for example, is hard to justify. Moreover, to penalize players exonerated in legal proceedings -- and others never even implicated -- is simply unfair.

"The Hall of Fame is supposed to be for the best players to have ever played the game. Several such players  were denied access to the Hall today. Hopefully this will be rectified by future voting.”


McGwire, the only one of those who publicly has acknowledged using performance-enhancing drugs, has failed seven times in his Hall of Fame election bid. Former Cub Rafael Palmeiro, who tested positive for a drug, has failed three times and received only 8.8 percent of the votes Wednesday.

The so-called Steroids Era has caused division within the electorate, comprised of 10-year members of the Baseball Writers Association. They historically have been very stingy with their votes, especially considering it takes 75 percent to be included in the summer induction ceremonies.


Here were the vote totals:

Craig Biggio 388 (68.2%), Jack Morris 385 (67.7%), Jeff Bagwell 339 (59.6%), Mike Piazza 329 (57.8%), Tim Raines 297 (52.2%), Lee Smith 272 (47.8%), Curt Schilling 221 (38.8%), Roger Clemens 214 (37.6%), Barry Bonds 206 (36.2%), Edgar Martinez 204 (35.9%), Alan Trammell 191 (33.6%), Larry Walker 123 (21.6%), Fred McGriff 118 (20.7%), Dale Murphy 106 (18.6%), Mark McGwire 96 (16.9%), Don Mattingly 75 (13.2%), Sammy Sosa 71 (12.5%), Rafael Palmeiro 50 (8.8%), Bernie Williams 19 (3.3%), Kenny Lofton 18 (3.2%), Sandy Alomar Jr. 16 (2.8%), Julio Franco 6 (1.1%), David Wells 5 (0.9%), Steve Finley 4 (0.7%), Shawn Green 2 (0.4%), Aaron Sele 1 (0.2%), Jeff Cirillo 0, Royce Clayton 0, Jeff Conine 0, Roberto Hernandez 0, Ryan Klesko 0, Jose Mesa 0, Reggie Sanders 0, Mike Stanton 0, Todd Walker 0, Rondell White 0, Woody Williams 0.


 dvandyck@tribune.com

Twitter @davandyck





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Men and Women of (Limited) Letters: Must-Follow Twitter Accounts of 2013






Scientific American editors voted in recent weeks on the 20 most informative Twitter accounts to stay abreast of the latest ideas, issues and developments in science and technology. We weeded through hundreds of lists and feeds to select the most brilliant and engaging, as well as the quirkiest of the bunch.Our picks are often witty, sometimes eccentric and occasionally silly, but each brings valuable insights to his or her area of expertise. For the latest, greatest tweets on science, technology, journalism, astronomy, physics, mathematics and more, check out these top 20 Twitter accounts of 2013, listed here in alphabetical order.





 Must-Follow Twitter Accounts of 2013Next »
BBC Science
@BBCscience

 Pay attention to BBC Science for breaking science and environmental news from a global perspective. Tweets are most often serious, with the occasional story about whether a toilet seat really is the dirtiest item in the house. The BBC offers variety suitable to both the casual consumer and the diehard nerd.









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Intro
Must-Follow Twitter Accounts of 2013Next »
Deborah Blum
@DeborahBlum

Deborah Blum’s tweets about poison, murder and other interesting articles and quips aren’t all that make her Twitter feed unique. It also stands out for her insights into science journalism. Blum often posts jobs, tips and tricks of the trade that will motivate any aspiring science blogger to break out the laptop and start posting.
By day, Sean Carroll is a theoretical physicist. By night he’s a “truth vigilante.” The Caltech researcher writes lofty pieces about eternity and dark matter, and tweets fascinating facts about his field.


 This NASA Twitter account gained notoriety when the car-size rover Curiosity landed on Mars in August 2012. With its witty persona, pop culture references and updates on its forays across the surface of the Red Planet, @MarsCuriosity is a must-follow for 2013—and the rest of its multiyear tour. Also check out the “Curiosity Explorer” badge on Foursquare and watch the rover’s New Year’s Eve message on YouTube
David Dobbs is an accomplished science journalist who is big on audience engagement in the new media milieu. His Twitter feed is punctuated with responses to readers weighing in on a wide variety of topics, especially cognitive science. Dobbs also tweets sporadically about his personal life and his work for Wired. He’s working on his fifth book.
Maryn McKenna, a specialist on food policy, public health and infectious disease, has built and cultivated a dedicated online following. Her tweets and posts are smart, quirky and highly informative. A seasoned science journalist, she uses social media to nerd out on a daily basis, so join in the geeky fun.
Former Scientific American special projects guru Christopher Mims isn’t shy. Opinionated and straightforward, the technology and sustainability journalist, now at QuartzNews, stays ahead of the pack. Mims frequently engages with his audience and uses crowd-sourcing to gather material for many of his stories.
Scientific American editors enjoy checking in on Nature News‘s hard-nosed, clever twitter feed.  One might suspect that our favor for it derives from the fact that Scientific American is also part of Nature Publishing Group, but we actually operate as editorially independent units. Follow Nature News especially for investigative reporting on science scandals and international science policy, as well as the latest important biomedical and physics news.


 Founder and CEO of O’Reilly Media Tim O’Reilly reports technology trends and comments on advocacy issues. His Twitter feed is dominated by references to Silicon Valley and e-book deals. Follow his tweets for insightful coverage of the technical world.
John Allen Paulos is a PhD with character. He’s wearing a bow tie in his profile picture, and his favored emoticon is a winking smiley face. Paulos’s tweets can be a tad cryptic for the layperson, but the mathematician has such a great sense of humor that you’re sure to laugh out loud at some point—even if you don’t quite understand the joke.
Accomplished blogger Phil Plait has just migrated his popular “Bad Astronomy” blog to Slate. The author, skeptic, father and punster primarily covers the ins and outs of the solar system. The best part about Plait’s Twitter feed is his daily #BAFact, wherein he throws strange-but-true scraps of science to his curious followers.


 Veteran science journalist Paul Raeburn has turned his eye in recent years to good-natured meta-media, covering science reporting itself for the Knight Science Journalism Tracker while also covering reseach on fatherhood. Raeburn takes reporters to task for sloppy thinking, points out inaccuracies and addresses ethical dilemmas. Follow his account just to read the back-and-forth between him and his targets.
Andy Revkin is a leader in the environmental reporting field, covering everything from fracking to global warming. Check out Revkin’s DotEarth blog in The New York Times too for his breaking news coverage—it’s all the environmental news that’s fit to cover.


 Science Friday, part of National Public Radio’s Talk of the Nation radio program, packs its Twitter feed with tantalizing links that just beg to be clicked on. @SciFri looks at daily news through a scientific lens, including live tweets to provide context during the weekly broadcast. The result is an entertaining bundle of scientific discoveries, intrigues and debunkings.
Scientific American‘s contributors are a brilliant group of reporters, bloggers and commentators, if you’ll pardon this moment of pride. Creativity, skepticism and authoritative context are a big part of what makes our coverage so engaging and worthwhile. Check out this Twitter list and follow your favorites.
Nate Silver, the most celebrated political statistician of the 2012 election, started out as a forecaster of baseball player performance. When he turned his attention to U.S. presidential elections, using statistical models to accurately predict what was thought to be unpredictable, he became a sensation. Although this past year’s electoral frenzy is behind us, Silver is still at work making predictions we’d be foolish to ignore.
Steven Strogatz holds the esteem of math wunderkinds as well as those who are iffy on formulas. He’s hardly a typical numbers-cruncher. The Cornell University professor has a knack for taking on complex topics and making them interesting, even to full-on mathphobes. In his recent book, The Joy of X, discussions range from the number of people one should date before settling down to how HBO’s The Sopranos can help us understand calculus. His Twitter account is similarly entertaining.
Not following Neil DeGrasse Tyson on Twitter? Beware: science nerds who don’t wake up each morning to the rational witticisms of NGT in their feed risk losing all geek cred. If you fit this description, please remedy that situation—now.
Blogger Ed Yong diligantly weaves a love of data into his prose, while still managing to craft posts that are accessible to readers with little to no science background. By covering new findings skeptically and tweeting prolifically, he has built a readership that relies on him for science news. Join the club.
A self-described “champion of underappreciated life-forms,” Carl Zimmer tends to tackle stories about parasites, viruses and quantum earthworms. Follow his feed, probably the most followed of any science writer, for solid reporting and captivating writing.





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Ed Yong
@EdYong209
Must-Follow Twitter Accounts of 2013Restart the list »
Introduction

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