An Israeli court on Thursday convicted former President Moshe Katsav of rape, in the most serious charges ever to be leveled against a high-ranking
power balance Israeli official.
The conviction on two counts of rape of a former employee means the 65-year-old Katsav will face a minimum of four years in prison. The Tel Aviv District Court also convicted him on lesser counts of indecent acts and sexual harassment involving two other women that worked for him. The court completely rejected Katsav's denials.
The verdict caps a four-and-a-half year saga that shocked the nation. The complaints were filed by four women who worked for Katsav in the 1990s when he was tourism minister. He was found guilty of raping an employee in 1998, two years before he was elected president.
Although the post in Israel is largely ceremonial, the president is head of state, representing the country at ceremonies around the world.
Katsav resigned in 2007, two weeks before his seven-year term expired, under a plea bargain that would have required him to admit to lesser charges of sexual misconduct. He was replaced by elder statesman and Nobel peace laureate Shimon Peres.
But in a dramatic reversal in April 2009, Katsav rejected the summer fashion 2011 deal and said he wanted to clear his name in court. Katsav contends he is innocent and a victim of a political witch hunt, implying he was a target because he represents Jews of Middle Eastern origin. For decades, Middle Eastern, or Sephardic Jews, were an underclass in Israeli society.
2010年12月30日星期四
2010年12月29日星期三
Holiday Spending Spree
In closing the books on 2010, the best that might be said was that it was better than 2009. This was a year that cemented a certain narrative of the past decade, one that has coalesced since the fall of 2008 and could be heard from the lips of everyone from Oprah to Obama: Americans had been living beyond their means, using their homes and cheap credit as a piggy bank, and with the Great Recession, the bill of
summer fashion 2011 has come due. What lies ahead is years of belt tightening to compensate for those years of excess.
The online figure is telling, and the percentage was especially high in apparel, such as clothing and shoes. Buying apparel used to require going out and trying stuff on. But in a period when we have scolded ourselves with tales of inappropriate spending, the availability of online shoes (Zappos, anyone?) and clothing means you can escape the quandary of shopping when the cultural message is not to.
The belief that Americans overconsumed and are now tightening their collective belts has, of course, some basis in fact. In the two decades before 2008, the amount of debt carried by Americans did go up significantly, and in the two years since, the savings rate has gone from a low of 1% to nearly 6%. And in the past two years, millions have suffered for the debts they took on in the flush years. Mortgage delinquencies soared and are now nearly 10% of outstanding loans. Credit-card default rates went up as well, to more than 9%.
How then to explain why so many of us think otherwise? There is a strong strain of modest Puritanism in our culture, one that has always been uncomfortable with the material excesses that erupt from era to era: consumption is a vice and has a price.
But it's also important to note that this bout of self-flagellation is taking place against a different global backdrop, one that sees countries from China to Brazil blazing their own trails while the U.S. seemingly plods along. It's been shown that people assess themselves in relative terms, by how much they have compared with their neighbors more than by how much they have. Today, Americans have a
power balance surfeit, but relative to the world as a whole, the slice is shrinking.
summer fashion 2011 has come due. What lies ahead is years of belt tightening to compensate for those years of excess.
The online figure is telling, and the percentage was especially high in apparel, such as clothing and shoes. Buying apparel used to require going out and trying stuff on. But in a period when we have scolded ourselves with tales of inappropriate spending, the availability of online shoes (Zappos, anyone?) and clothing means you can escape the quandary of shopping when the cultural message is not to.
The belief that Americans overconsumed and are now tightening their collective belts has, of course, some basis in fact. In the two decades before 2008, the amount of debt carried by Americans did go up significantly, and in the two years since, the savings rate has gone from a low of 1% to nearly 6%. And in the past two years, millions have suffered for the debts they took on in the flush years. Mortgage delinquencies soared and are now nearly 10% of outstanding loans. Credit-card default rates went up as well, to more than 9%.
How then to explain why so many of us think otherwise? There is a strong strain of modest Puritanism in our culture, one that has always been uncomfortable with the material excesses that erupt from era to era: consumption is a vice and has a price.
But it's also important to note that this bout of self-flagellation is taking place against a different global backdrop, one that sees countries from China to Brazil blazing their own trails while the U.S. seemingly plods along. It's been shown that people assess themselves in relative terms, by how much they have compared with their neighbors more than by how much they have. Today, Americans have a
power balance surfeit, but relative to the world as a whole, the slice is shrinking.
2010年12月28日星期二
The average price of U.S. gasoline rose above $3 a gallon over the past week
The average price of U.S. power balance gasoline rose above $3 a gallon over the past week,reaching its highest level since October 2008, the Energy Department said on Monday.
The national price for regular gasoline increased 7 cents from the previous week to an average of $3.05 per gallon, as rising crude oil prices bolstered fuel costs.
Crude oil settled down 51 cents at $91 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange on Monday as a major blizzard in the U.S. Northeast cut down on already thin holiday trading volume.
Diesel fuel prices at summer fashion 2011increased 4.6 cents to $3.29 a gallon, the department said in its weekly survey of service stations.
The national price for regular gasoline increased 7 cents from the previous week to an average of $3.05 per gallon, as rising crude oil prices bolstered fuel costs.
Crude oil settled down 51 cents at $91 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange on Monday as a major blizzard in the U.S. Northeast cut down on already thin holiday trading volume.
Diesel fuel prices at summer fashion 2011increased 4.6 cents to $3.29 a gallon, the department said in its weekly survey of service stations.
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