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Week 50, 2005
THE BEST SELLERS (recent popular articles):
1) AUDIO/On the Media: Quel revolt! [Emission radio avec transcription, cette fois-ci sur les violences urbaines en France.]

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THE REGULARS: Summary
2) Le texte plus abordable de la semaine/Scholastic: Interview with Daniel Radcliffe [Entretien avec l'acteur qui joue Harry Pottier.]
3) The Puzzler: Liber-T [Un casse-tête.]
4) Smart Money/10 Things They Won't Tell You: Child Tutoring Services [10 secrets des services d'aide aux devoirs.]
5) AUDIO/On the Media: Wal-Mart Warriors [Emission radio avec transcription, cette fois-ci sur un documentaire sur les méfaits des hypermarchés Wal-Mart.]

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1) AUDIO/On the Media: Quel revolt! [Emission radio avec transcription, cette fois-ci sur les violences urbaines en France.]
http://www.onthemedia.org/transcripts/transcripts_111105_revolt.html

"QUEL REVOLT!"

November 11, 2005

BOB GARFIELD: From WNYC in New York, this is NPR's On the Media. I'm Bob Garfield.

DALJIT DHALIWAL: And I'm Daljit Dhaliwal, sitting in for Brooke Gladstone. For the past two weeks, the growing tally of burnt-out cars in France, like a war zone body count, has been repeated in the media like a mantra. The riots began in the Paris suburbs but then spread throughout France and initiated copycat attacks in Germany and Belgium. The anger is blamed on the deaths of two Parisian youths who died while being chased by police. Susan Caskie has been looking at the coverage from around the world for The Week magazine and she joins me now. Susan, welcome back to OTM.

SUSAN CASKIE: Thank you. It's nice to be here.

DALJIT DHALIWAL: Well, let's start with the coverage in France. How were French papers reacting to the violence at the beginning of the week, and how did the coverage actually evolve?

SUSAN CASKIE: There was very little commentary initially, it was all news coverage. And then when the commentary started to come out, it focused on the political ramifications of the riots. Le Figaro, Liberation and Le Monde were talking about the rivalry between the Prime Minister, Dominique de Villepin, and the Interior Minister, Nicolas Sarkozy. So it really seemed like they were treating it as just another kind of kind of theater on which this political rivalry could play out. One commentary in a German paper, in the Frankfurter Rundschau, took the French media to task. A commentary there said, "It is as if the intra-party quarrel over who should succeed Chirac were really more significant than the socio-political catastrophe, the material and moral misery that has found symbolic expression in flaming cars." And then we started seeing French commentary about international commentary, so still not so much French commentary about what was happening but about how it was negatively affecting France's image.

DALJIT DHALIWAL: So by the end of the week, was the French press tackling the problems?

SUSAN CASKIE: Yes. They seem now to have really awakened to the fact that this is an enormous crisis, that it reaches deeply into French society. There was a commentary in the Charente Libre, which is a newspaper out of Cognac, where the commentator Jacques Guyon said, "We've been blind. We must open our eyes." And then he went on to say, "We have believed that repeating, 'liberte, equality, fraternity' often enough would integrate our immigrants. But that is not the case."

DALJIT DHALIWAL: And what about other European countries, how did they cover it?

SUSAN CASKIE: One thing that I found that was very interesting was that countries that have large immigrant populations, but not Muslim immigrants, are just as nervous about the prospect of rioting or of unrest as the countries with Muslim populations. And I think in the U.S. coverage, it tended to focus on oh, these are Muslim immigrants and it's the big clash of civilizations. But in Europe they're really not seeing it that way. There are editorials in Estonian newspapers talking about the Russian minority, which is a very large minority there, and they've had lots of trouble [LAUGHS] integrating the Russians into Estonia. And they're taking the French model as an example and saying look, look what happens when you ignore your minority.

DALJIT DHALIWAL: And in the Muslim world, how did it play out there?

SUSAN CASKIE: Well, there's quite a diversity of opinion in the Muslim world, which is interesting. It was more diverse, really, than the European reactions. In Algeria, papers are concentrating mostly on criticizing the security measures that are now being taken, the state of emergency that's been called in France. Liberte, which is from the capital, and also Le Quotidien D'Oran -- they are criticizing the resurrection of a French law from 1955. It allows enormous crackdowns. It allows police to fire on rioters if they need to. And this was last done when France was at war with Algeria, and so the Algerian papers are saying this is an outrage and you're treating these French citizens, who are no longer Algerian, you're treating them the way you treated us back in the colonial period, and it's going to backfire. But then over in other Muslim countries, in Iran-- there are fewer Iranian immigrants in France, so Iran is really looking at this as an outsider-- Iran had the harshest criticisms of France in the entire Muslim world that I saw, lots of calls for boycotts saying "In the name of God, the compassionate, the merciful, France will be struck down for its response," things like that.

DALJIT DHALIWAL: Okay. What about the United States, Susan? There we tended to see two dueling narratives that seemed to divide along party lines. From the right, the riots were seen as part of the clash of civilizations and at one point it was even called the Ramadan offensive. And then the left, the rioters were seen as a disenfranchised population fighting for liberty, fraternity and equality. Is this what you observed as well?

SUSAN CASKIE: In the U.S. press, definitely there was that split. And it's very different from the European press because Europe is not splitting in a left/right way that way. The Washington Post had an editorial saying this isn't terrorism, this is venting. They're venting frustration at years of high unemployment and racism. And that was really the main thesis, that it's not about jihadis, it's not about an Islamist ideology. It has very little to do with Islam; it's about unemployment. And then you go over to some papers on the right. The Chicago Sun-Times ran a column by Mark Steyn. He said, "No, no, no. This is the first skirmish in the Eurabian civil war."

DALJIT DHALIWAL: Thanks very much, Susan.

SUSAN CASKIE: Thanks. It's good to be here.

DALJIT DHALIWAL: Susan Caskie rounds up the world's papers for The Week.

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2) Le texte plus abordable de la semaine/Scholastic: Interview with Daniel Radcliffe [Entretien avec l'acteur qui joue Harry Pottier.]
http://teacher.scholastic.com/scholasticnews/

Daniel Radcliffe as Harry Potter in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
By Marie Morreale

Q: Have you read all of the Harry Potter books?

Daniel: Yes, I have—and the ones I really like, I've read twice. I read the third one twice, the fourth one twice, and the fifth one twice.

Q: Is there one that you would even consider your very favorite?

Daniel: I really like the fifth one, but my favorite is actually the third.

Q: Other than Harry, do you have a favorite character from the books?

Daniel: I love Lupin and I love Sirius.

Q: Why?

Daniel: It's not so much any aspects of their particular characters, but it's just their relationship with Harry that I love so much. They're both so important to Harry. I think their relationships with him very strongly influence the person that he is, because they're all linked to his father.

Q: What new side of Harry are we going to see in Goblet of Fire?

Daniel: Well, more than before you see Harry losing the plot slightly, because he's not in control of his own life anymore. Not many people are in control of their own lives as teenagers anyway, but particularly now, not only is Harry not in control of his life, but also someone is trying to kill him, which is an added stress. As a result of that loss of control, he's a lot more hostile, I'd say.

Q: You've obviously changed in some ways since you started playing Harry. Other than physical growth, what do you think are the major changes that you have personally gone through?

Daniel: That's a very good question. It's weird, but I think I've just gone through everything that every teenager has gone through, nothing really out of the ordinary. A lot of people would expect me to say everything out of the ordinary, because I'm filming, but I don't think it's really that different.

Q: When you're not filming, do you go back to your regular school?

Daniel: Yep, I do.

Q: Your classmates must be incredibly supportive of you in terms of being an actor. What do they usually ask you when you get back to school?

Daniel: Not everyone at school is supportive. Don't make that mistake. With the ones that are supportive, generally it's weird, because their support has manifested itself in a way so that they don't end up asking me many questions, which is actually really nice, because it's like "well, I just got back." Some people are really interested. I met one boy who really wanted to be an actor. A lot of people who I hang around with generally don't ask me many questions. I don't think many of them care that much. Also, I think a lot of people don't want to ask questions because they want to seem really cool and be like, "Who? Harry who?" I think it's partly a cool thing not wanting to seem over-eager.

Q: And the ones who aren't supportive, how does that get manifested?

Daniel: Just in stupid comments, like "where's your broomstick?" The thing is, I wouldn't mind any of the comments if they were funny or witty, but they're all so horribly inane that they just grate on you.

Q: What did you enjoy most about Goblet of Fire? Do you have any favorite scenes or lines from that movie?

Daniel: I love the graveyard scene. I have to admit that I haven't actually seen the final version yet, but from what I read in the script and how it was filmed, it promises to be really, really good. And I loved working with Mike [Newell—the new director]. I also loved being able to watch Ralph Fiennes act. It was very interesting to see, because I think there is a certain amount of pressure in coming in to play Voldemort and it did not show at all. I know I would have been terrified, because he's supposed to be ultimate evil, and I wouldn't know where to begin with playing ultimate evil, because I'm so nice! Although I'm not implying Ralph Fiennes is evil—that is not the implication at all—because he seemed really nice. I enjoyed watching that, and I just really enjoyed the experience as a whole.

Q: If you could use a portakey to go anywhere, where would you go?

Daniel: One place that no one else has ever been to on Earth. I'd like to stand there. I don't know where that place is, though.

Q: Well, only a portakey could find that!

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4) Smart Money/10 Things They Won't Tell You: Child Tutoring Services [10 secrets des services d'aide aux devoirs.]
http://www.smartmoney.com/10things/index.cfm?story=september2004

10 Things Your Child's Tutoring Service Won't Tell You

By Erika Rasmussen Janes
August 11, 2004

1. "We don't have to stick to any educational standards."
News of failing schools and the increasing competitiveness of colleges have made education a big concern for parents. To the rescue, perhaps, comes the "supplemental education" business, an estimated $2 billion-and-growing industry that includes private tutors, retail tutoring centers and test-preparation centers.

While schools must now meet federally mandated standards, these criteria don't apply to supplemental education companies. "You could end up with an excellent tutor who put up a flier at the grocery store, or a crummy tutor from a national organization," says David Hollingsworth, a private tutor in New York City who trained with test-prep powerhouse Kaplan.

To get the best help possible, start with a reliable referral — say, a favorite teacher at your child's school — then focus on credentials and experience. Ask learning centers where they find tutors and if they do background checks; if tutors are certified teachers, that's a good sign. Then get references: Ask past clients if the child's grades went up, if the tutor was reliable and, most important, if the tutor and child had a good rapport. As Hollingsworth says, "You need someone who's good with kids."

2. "Our rates aren't always pinned to quality."
Costs for tutoring can vary wildly, depending on whether your child gets private or group tutoring, and whether he receives it in-home or at a center. "In general, anywhere from $35 to $65 an hour is what you're going to be paying for good tutoring," says Gene Wade, CEO of Platform Learning, a New York-based firm that develops tutoring programs for public schools. But if you're looking for specialized tutoring, including SAT test prep, or live in a big city, the costs can multiply. In Boston rates can range from $50 to $125 an hour; in New York City they can go as high as $400 an hour.

So how do you choose where to send your kid and how much to pay? Steven Shapiro, director of Pinnacle Learning Center, a Canton, Mass.-based tutoring company, believes it's a "you get what you pay for" market — up to a certain amount. "When you start getting over the $100-per-session range, I think you have to start asking what you're trying to achieve," he says. Trying to raise a C average to a B, for instance, shouldn't merit a higher rate. Meanwhile, make sure you understand the company's pricing methodology — beware of centers that require a minimum purchase up front — and cancellation policies.

3. "Our 'guarantees' are worthless."
If you're going to sink potentially thousands of dollars into tutoring for your child, you want some assurance that it will pay off academically. Some companies seem happy to oblige. North American franchisor Sylvan Learning Center, for one, guarantees that students will improve at least one full grade-level equivalent in reading or basic math skills after 36 hours of instruction or you get an additional 12 hours free. But be careful. The fine print on Sylvan's Web site1, which also touts the guarantee, shows that not all centers have to participate.

Indeed, experts say that guarantees, and even vague promises, shouldn't carry too much weight. "If [a center] says their median SAT score increase is 150 points, what that means is half the kids are below that, and half are above," says Lisa Jacobson, CEO of Inspirica, a tutoring and test-prep firm in Boston and New York. "But when parents see a number or a grade, that's what they expect."

A better way to measure success is to address specific goals, like improving studying habits, says Thomas Redicks, president of the National Tutoring Association2, which offers voluntary certification for tutors. Also, make sure the center keeps parents informed through regular meetings.

4. "We award scholarships-but we're not up front about it."
"Nobody says they offer financial aid or scholarships, but they do," says Inspirica's Jacobson. "If you can't afford it, you should ask anyway." Each year, she says, Inspirica tutors volunteer at a variety of schools in New York, but the company also gives a 10 percent discount for families that enroll in 40 hours of tutoring. Pinnacle also offers a 10 percent discount when 32 sessions are purchased.

Andrea Salvador, a Victoria, Minn., homemaker whose son Robert was tutored at a local Huntington Learning Center, received a discount from the center when she purchased his tutoring hours up front. While she still found the cost to be high, it dropped the per-hour fee from $54 to about $50. Huntington also offers tuition loan programs through Sallie Mae.

Not surprisingly, private tutors often offer even more room for discounts and negotiation. Jacobson says she has given discounts herself, based on clients' ability to pay, when she did private tutoring. The important thing, she says, "is to always ask. People just don't advertise it." David Hollingsworth agrees, but argues that negotiating a discount goes more smoothly when the parent "has a respect for the fact that the tutor is trying to make a living."

5. "We teach English and math, but we specialize in sales."
Take your child to any tutoring center and she'll be barraged with assessment tests to pinpoint strengths and weaknesses — usually carrying a bill of upwards of $150. NTA's Redicks believes such tests are "absolutely unnecessary" because parents can get that information from their children's school offices. Many parents, in fact, already receive results from similar state achievement tests in the mail. That's what Julie Zemanick, an Excelsior, Minn., homemaker, discovered when she took her son to a local learning center. After paying $250, she says, "I found out from his school that they do that, and I thought, gosh, if I'd known, I wouldn't have put him through that."

Learning centers say those pricey assessments are crucial to helping center directors determine how many tutoring hours a student needs. But one former Sylvan franchise director says, "The estimate is always high. It's a computerized system that typically [estimates] 100-plus hours." A Sylvan spokesperson says estimates are "based on each student's individual assessment," averaging at about 72 hours. Regardless, before you agree to have your kid tested, ask which school tests can substitute for some or all of the center's assessments.

6. "Junior needs help cramming for the SAT? Good luck."
Fall and spring are the hot seasons for college-bound kids to take the SAT and ACT aptitude tests. But don't assume you can book a tutor for help a few weeks or even a couple months beforehand. Private tutors and test-prep centers book up long before the test-taking crunch in the spring. One northern New Jersey mom discovered that the hard way when her daughter wanted to switch tutoring companies while prepping for the SAT and SAT II. When the mother mentioned that she was considering hiring another tutor, the company declined to continue working with the girl — a mere two months before the SAT II. The owner "put me in a terrible situation," the mother says, adding that she called several already booked tutors before finding an available center — which, unfortunately, charged a per-session rate $70 higher than she had paid before. A friend of hers, she says, has already reserved a tutor for when her eighth-grade son takes the SAT — in two years.

"Tutors get booked up early," Inspirica's Jacobson says, but booking two years ahead of time "is overkill." Instead, she recommends booking a test tutor the way you do a summer camp — at least three months in advance.

7. "It's cheaper to do this online."
Tutoring services are no longer touted simply for kids who are seriously struggling in school, but also for kids who just need a nudge. A growing number of clients are like 14-year-old T.J. Frier, son of Tara Goodwin Frier, who owns a PR firm in Sharon, Mass. She hired Pinnacle Learning Center to help her son raise his B-minus in Advanced Placement math. T.J.'s teachers "recommended that he drop back down to regular, but our son really wanted to stay in advanced," she says, "so we got him a tutor." Last September he started private sessions twice a week, and Frier is pleased with his progress, saying that T.J. has developed a good rapport with his tutor and his grades are steady.

Even so, NTA's Thomas Redicks says that good students like T.J. can often benefit from peer tutoring at schools, or from free or low-cost online tutoring. "There are a few good services available for occasional help if you have a question," he says. One example is Tutor.com, whose "Live Homework Help" function lets kids connect daily with an online, prescreened and trained tutor for help with everything from algebra to science. It's free at more than 600 libraries across the nation (log on to the site to find one near you), or via subscription for $100 a month for unlimited use.

8. "We can't handle learning disabilities."
Few tutoring centers are equipped to handle students with actual disabilities such as dyslexia or even mild developmental disorders, but parents may seek them out anyway, to diagnose or even "fix" problems the child is experiencing at school. While certain tutors may be adept at recognizing blocks in a child's learning process, it's not a tutor's place to diagnose a disability. If you suspect a problem exists, ask your pediatrician to refer you to a specialist.

If your child has already been diagnosed with a learning disability, look for a tutor who is a credentialed special-education teacher. "You have to ask the company if they actually have an academic tutor who's a learning specialist with degrees, and they usually don't," Jacobson says. Beyond that, says Lynda Covey, a private tutor in Redwood City, Calif., who specializes in disabilities, ask the tutor or center director how he approaches learning disabilities; she says she likes to point out examples of famous people with learning disabilities, such as Albert Einstein, to her students. "If it's handled in a negative fashion, it can be damaging and hurt their self-esteem," she says. When you ask the center for references, be sure to ask that they come from parents whose children have faced similar hurdles.

9. "We specialize in small-group sessions, but one-to-one is best."
Many supplemental education centers specialize in small-group tutoring, where two to four students work with one tutor. That's not necessarily a bad thing: A group setting can allow for independent study time, and it can be a lot cheaper. At Pinnacle Learning Center, private tutoring is $65 a session, while a "semiprivate" session with two students per tutor is $45 to $50.

But at some chain-based centers, economic factors outweigh individual attention, and your kid may not get his fair share of help — or may just waste time listening to a tutor explain things he has already mastered. "There was pressure to always keep the student-teacher ratio at a certain number — 3 to 1 or 2 to 1," says the former Sylvan center director. "We were instructed not to leave one teacher and one student together." Sylvan's vice president of education, Richard Bavaria, defends the company's approach. "Each [student] gets individual attention," he says. Plus, he adds, "a social aspect to learning can make it more compelling." By and large, however, many experts say one-to-one tutoring is more effective. "Research overwhelmingly states that one-to-one tutoring with a structured session is required for students to do better in school," Redicks says.

10. "Your kid won't always have the same tutor."
Even if your child does go the one-on-one route, it doesn't always mean personalized care. That's too bad. A good rapport can make the help seem more like fun and less like punishment.

In fact, many learning centers can't guarantee that your child will always have the same tutor. Andrea Salvador's son, Robert, received one-to-one tutoring at the learning center he attended, but over the course of seven months, "he probably had five or six different tutors," she says. Sylvan's Bavaria says that the center can't guarantee tutor continuity, and besides, with multiple tutors, kids are exposed to different teaching styles.

To increase your child's chances of success, let the center director know you want a specific tutor, and ask about how best to accommodate such scheduling. Otherwise, make sure all the tutors are familiar with your child's curriculum, and ask centers if they'll meet with your child's teacher to discuss problems and progress. "Schools are always trying new programs," says Lisa Mlinar, a vice president at Huntington Learning Center, "and tutors need to be aware of what those programs are."

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Links in this article:
1http://www.educate.com
2http://www.ntatutor.org
3http://ccare.hearstmags.com/cgi-bin/absplit.cgi?SplitFile=smy_artfoot.urls

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5) AUDIO/On the Media: Wal-Mart Warriors [Emission radio avec transcription, cette fois-ci sur un documentaire sur les méfaits des hypermarchés Wal-Mart.]
http://www.onthemedia.org/transcripts/transcripts_111105_walmart.html

"WAL-MART WARRIORS"
November 11, 2005

BOB GARFIELD: This is On the Media. I'm Bob Garfield.

DALJIT DHALIWAL: And I'm Daljit Dhaliwal. Being the world's largest retailer and North America's largest private employer has advantages and disadvantages. At Wal-Mart, everyday low prices have also translated into everyday bad publicity. For years it has been accused of destroying Main Street, exploiting employees, and raping the labor markets of the developing world. With the premiere this week of an anti-WalMart documentary film, the company's PR challenges are going to the next level, and so too is the PR response, a war room staffed with political operatives and public relations specialists to get out good news and confront the bad. Apart from the short-term urgency, says Steven Greenhouse, workplace and labor reporter for the New York Times, the goal is to win the hearts and minds of middle-class consumers the company is increasingly anxious to win over. And he joins us now. Steven, welcome to the show.

STEVEN GREENHOUSE: Happy to be here.

DALJIT DHALIWAL: Okay. Well, let's talk about some of these people who are in the political war room. Who are the heavy-hitters behind Wal-Mart's makeover?

STEVEN GREENHOUSE: There are some very heavy hitters, including one of the heaviest of all, Michael Deaver, who was one of Ronald Reagan's key image advisors, and then there's Leslie Dach, who was a media advisor to Bill Clinton, and Jonathan Adashek, who was head of national delegate strategy for the Kerry campaign. They've hired the Edelman public relations firm, one of the most respected public relations firms in the country, and they have many other operatives from Republican campaigns and Democratic campaigns. I think in ways what Wal-Mart's doing is it's often viewed as a red-state company and is hiring some blue-staters to help them especially with the opposition they face in blue states and, you know, some of the bluest of cities, like L.A., Chicago and New York. And they're hoping that some of these Democratic operatives will have ties to Democrats and labor unions.

DALJIT DHALIWAL: So why is Wal-Mart going down this route?

STEVEN GREENHOUSE: For many years Wal-Mart was growing slowly and the cultural lead, the news media did not pay much attention to them. And now Wal-Mart's getting criticized by a movie, by several groups supported by unions that are seeking to pound Wal-Mart very hard to pressure Wal-Mart to improve its wages and benefits. The largest class action employment lawsuit in American history is pending against Wal-Mart, and the lawsuit alleges that Wal-Mart discriminated against women in promotions and pay, more than one and a half million women, and Wal-Mart's very, very worried that the lawsuit could alienate a lot of its customer base and discourage some consumers from shopping at Wal-Mart.

DALJIT DHALIWAL: And you wrote about an internal Wal-Mart memo leaked to the New York Times a few weeks ago detailing the company's plans to aggressively keep down employee health benefits while minimizing damage to the company's reputation. Now, that was a particularly high-profile embarrassment. Given this, do you see their P.R. effort then as a charm offensive or are they really talking about making more substantive changes to their business practices?

STEVEN GREENHOUSE: I would think it's mainly a charm offensive, and this memo makes very clear that they're extremely image-conscious. And I think if you read the memo closely, it appears that they're trying to improve their image on the cheap. They say they're increasing their benefits but they plan to pare their benefits spending by about a billion dollars over the next few years, or they hope to, at least.

DALJIT DHALIWAL: And they're also offering things like journalism scholarships. What's that about?

STEVEN GREENHOUSE: I think that's very smart of them. About a year ago they decided, "we're going to go out into the public forum and we're going to improve our image and we're going to give money to many African-American groups, to Hispanic groups" and, miracle of miracles, they're also sponsoring these journalism fellowships.

DALJIT DHALIWAL: There was a recent article in the New York Times which said that Wal-Mart had taken a page essentially out of the political playbook and that it was chasing the swing voter.

STEVEN GREENHOUSE: Wal-Mart realizes that it has many very loyal consumers. You know, 80, 85 percent of the American people shop at Wal-Mart each year. It also realizes that there are naysayers, liberals, you know, folks who live in New York City or Vermont who just aren't going to shop at Wal-Mart. But Wal-Mart also realizes that there's a group of swing shoppers, or swing voters, who could perhaps be swayed to stop shopping at Wal-Mart if they see these negative movies, read these negative articles. Wal-Mart hired McKinsey and Company, the consulting firm, and McKinsey found that somewhere between two and eight percent of shoppers have decided to stop shopping at the company because they've been affected by negative information about Wal-Mart.

DALJIT DHALIWAL: Well, one place where the company did get a lot of brownie points was the way in which they swung into action with their Katrina relief efforts. It's no secret that Wal-Mart has legions of critics, but are they getting credit where credit is due?

STEVEN GREENHOUSE: I think Wal-Mart did a marvelous job on Katrina. CEO Lee Scott is brilliant at distribution and logistics. Someone wrote an article saying that Lee Scott should have been hired as head of FEMA. Wal-Mart certainly did a better job than FEMA in getting important materials out to its stores when FEMA lagged behind, and Wal-Mart really then tried to milk that to get some good publicity.

DALJIT DHALIWAL: And you've also written that Wal-Mart has these designs on the middle-class urban taste-makers, so to speak, and that is a consumer base that's different from the one that they've built their business around essentially. How has this changed their message then and their ads, and also their image?

STEVEN GREENHOUSE: Wal-Mart traditionally focused on the low-income shopper, especially in the South. And it's seeing that income, wages for the bottom half of American society, is not growing very rapidly. The top half has been doing better in terms of earnings. And Wal-Mart sees Target and Neiman-Marcus and Saks doing better than Wal-Mart in terms of comparable store sales and it says, hey, we want some of that, we want more of that. So it's moving upscale and it's going after a more sophisticated market, people who read papers like the Washington Post and the New York Times and BusinessWeek and see negative stories about Wal-Mart.

DALJIT DHALIWAL: Steven, thanks very much for joining us on the program.

STEVEN GREENHOUSE: Thank you very much. Happy to be here.

DALJIT DHALIWAL: Steven Greenhouse is a labor and workplace reporter for the New York Times.

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6) Albany Democrat Herald: Church creates drive-thru Christmas story [Une église américaine installe une présentation de la vie de Jesus pour les accros de leur bagnole.]

http://www.democratherald.com/articles/2005/11/25/news/religion/religion01.txt
Church creates drive-thru Christmas story

By Patrick Lair
Albany Democrat-Herald

LEBANON — The Church of the Nazarene will use some modern technology to tell an ancient story this holiday season. Starting Sunday, the church will have a drive-through Christmas Alley. It’s free and open to the public. The alley will depict the life of Christ, the real reason for the season, according to the church.

The alley is actually a path that winds around the church’s property with 10 illuminated biblical scenes. At the first scene, visitors will be directed to tune their radio to a certain frequency. Each scene will then feature a short narration transmitted by a low frequency radio transmitter. Driving the entire loop will take about 20 minutes.

Some of the scenes will be a straw village of Bethlehem, silhouettes of the wise men on camels looking up toward a star mounted on a pole, and three crosses. The Straw Palace donated hay bales for the project and all other materials have been paid for by the church, which is located at 600 W. D St. Volunteers at the church are working hard to finish the project by Sunday, Pastor Sheridan Lehman said.

This the first year for the event and Lehman said the church plans to build up the display a little more each year. Lehman said he is hoping to see 1,000 cars come through the alley this holiday season. The alley will be open from 6 to 10 p.m. each night through Christmas day.

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7) New York Times: No need to stew [Quelques armes dans la guerre contre les embêtements de tous les jours.]
A RADIO STORY IS AVAILABLE HERE: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5028242

http://www.nytimes.com
March 15, 2005
No Need to Stew: A Few Tips to Cope With Life's Annoyances
By IAN URBINA

When Seth Shepsle goes to Starbucks, he orders a "medium" because "grande" - as the coffee company calls the size, the one between big and small - annoys him.

Meg Daniel presses zero whenever she hears a computerized operator on the telephone so that she can talk to a real person. "Just because they want a computer to handle me doesn't mean I have to play along," she said.

When subscription cards fall from magazines Andrew Kirk is reading, he stacks them in a pile at the corner of his desk. At the end of each month, he puts them in the mail but leaves them blank so that the advertiser is forced to pay the business reply postage without gaining a new subscriber.

Life can involve big hardships, like being fired or smashing up your car. There is only so much you can do about them. But far more prevalent - and perhaps in the long run just as insidious - are life's many little annoyances.

These, you can do something about.

To examine the little weapons people use for everyday survival is to be given a free guidebook on getting by, created by the millions who feel that they must. It is a case study in human inventiveness, with occasional juvenile and petty passages, and the originators of these tips are happy to share them.

"They're an integral part of how people cope," said Prof. James C. Scott, who teaches anthropology and political science at Yale University, and the author of "Weapons of the Weak," about the feigned ignorance, foot-dragging and other techniques Malaysian peasants used to avoid cooperating with the arrival of new technology in the 1970's. "All societies have them, but they're successful only to the extent that they avoid open confrontation."

The slow driver in fast traffic, the shopper with 50 coupons at the front of the checkout line and the telemarketer calling at dinner all inflict life's thousand little lashes. But some see these infractions as precious opportunities, rare chances for retribution in the face of forces beyond our control.

Wesley A. Williams spent more than a year exacting his revenge against junk mailers. When signing up for a no-junk-mail list failed to stem the flow, he resorted to writing at the top of each unwanted item: "Not at this address. Return to sender." But the mail kept coming because the envelopes had "or current resident" on them, obligating mail carriers to deliver it, he said.

Next, he began stuffing the mail back into the "business reply" envelope and sending it back so that the mailer would have to pay the postage. "That wasn't exacting a heavy enough cost from them for bothering me," said Mr. Williams, 35, a middle school science teacher who lives in Melrose, N.Y., near Albany.

After checking with a postal clerk about the legality of stepping up his efforts, he began cutting up magazines, heavy bond paper, and small strips of sheet metal and stuffing them into the business reply envelopes that came with the junk packages.

"You wouldn't believe how heavy I got some of these envelopes to weigh," said Mr. Williams, who added that he saw an immediate drop in the amount of arriving junk mail. A spokesman for the United States Postal Service, Gerald McKiernan, said that Mr. Williams's actions sounded legal, as long as the envelope was properly sealed.

Sometimes, small acts of rebellion offer big doses of relief.

"I've come to realize that I'm almost addicted to the sick little pleasure I get from lashing out at these things," said Mr. Kirk, 24, a freelance writer from Brooklyn who collects and returns magazine inserts.

When ordering a pizza from Domino's, Mr. Kirk says he always requests a "small," knowing that he will be corrected and told that medium is the smallest available size. "It makes me feel better to point out that their word games aren't fooling anyone," he said.

The Internet offers a booming trade to help with this type of annoyance-fighting behavior. For example, shared passwords to free Web sites are available at www.bugmenot.com to help people avoid dealing with long registration forms. To coexist with loud cellphone talkers, the Web offers hand-held jammers that, although illegal in the United States, can block all signals within a 45-foot radius.

Mitch Altman, a 48-year old inventor living in San Francisco, said that in the last three months he has sold about 30,000 of his key-chain-size zappers called TV-B-Gone, which can be used discreetly to switch off televisions in public places. "When you go to a restaurant to talk with friends, why should you have to deal with the distraction of a ceiling-mounted television?" Mr. Altman said.

Some Web sites specialize in arming people against online annoyances. The site www.slashdot.org posted the name and the mailing address of one of the worst known spammers, encouraging people to sign the spammer up for catalogs and other junk mail to be sent to the spammer's home. Mr. McKiernan of the Postal Service said that this tactic also appeared to be legal, but might constitute harassment.

Some groups are more frustrated than others. In 2002, Harris Interactive, a market research group based in Rochester, conducted a phone survey called the Daily Hassle Scale that asked 1,010 people to rank the aggravations they faced in a typical day. The survey found that poor people and African-Americans suffer the most stress from the everyday annoyances such as noisy neighbors, telemarketers and pressure at work, but it did not explain why.

Sometimes, the resistance to these frustrations is organized.

Work slowdowns are methods commonly used by labor unions to apply pressure without actually striking. During the Solidarity movement in Poland, people expressed their disapproval of the government-run news media by taking a walk with their hats on backward at exactly 6 p.m. when the state news program started. When the government noticed the trend, it issued curfews, but people then put their televisions in their windows facing outward so that only the police walking the streets would see the broadcasts.

"You have to remember, in Poland during those years showing up drunk at work was seen as a patriotic act because people hated the bosses so much," Professor Scott said.

But even on less coordinated levels, shared frustration is often the augur of countercultural trends. Mr. Shepsle said he took great solace in discovering his irritations with Starbucks' lingo summed up on a popular T-shirt in Chicago. The shirt, which mocks the pretentiousness of a certain Chicago neighborhood, features two names. Next to Lincoln Park it says "Tall, Grande, Venti." Next to Wicker Park it says "Small, Medium, Large."

"It's nice to know I'm not alone," said Mr. Shepsle, 28, who works for a theater company in Manhattan.

Most people participate in this sort of behavior on some level, Professor Scott said, adding that his own habit was to write "England" rather than "United Kingdom" on letters he sends to his British friends. He described this as his way of disregarding British claims to Wales and Scotland.

"As a tactic, it doesn't amount to much except a way to provide a tiny and private sense of satisfaction," he said. "But that's something."

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8) Slate: The global failures index [Un indicateur économique méconnu : le nombre de faillites d'entreprises.]
http://www.slate.com/id/2131571/

Obscure Economic Indicator: The Global Failures Index
The bad news: It's going way up in 2006.
By Daniel Gross
Posted Monday, Dec. 5, 2005, at 5:18 PM ET

Signs don't bode well for 2006 Click image to expand.

Signs don't bode well for 2006
Rosy economic news is everywhere these days. Last week, the Commerce Department reported that the gross domestic product rose at a 4.3 percent annual rate in the third quarter. There was a nice jobs report on Friday. The folks at CNBC are busting out the "Dow 11,000" hats again (though the "Dow 36,000" Windbreakers remain in deep storage). And the next few weeks will bring sunny forecasts for 2006—not whether the economy and stock market will rise, but by how much.

But one often-overlooked source suggests dark times ahead for the U.S. economy. The source is Euler Hermes, a France-based company that may sound like a fashion house but is far, far less glamorous. It provides credit insurance to businesses. As such, Euler Hermes is the Michelin Guide of business failure. Its researchers constantly scan the globe for the latest in bankruptcy and liquidation to compile the Global Failures Index. And lately Euler Hermes doesn't like what it's seeing in the United States. The firm predicts that in 2006, U.S. business failures will rise for the first time in the 21st century.

The last four years have been traumatic times for the U.S. economy—a stock market crash, the attacks of Sept. 11, a brief recession, a war, and a spike in commodity and energy prices. But American businesses have weathered them all quite well, thanks in large part to low interest rates. Contrary to what one might expect, and despite scores of high-profile bankruptcies, the number of business failures—businesses filing for either Chapter 7 or Chapter 11—has fallen in each of the last four years. U.S. business failures fell from 39,885 in 2001 to 34,167 in 2004, according to Euler Hermes. And through the first half of 2005, when 16,799 businesses failed, corporate fiascoes were running at their lowest annual rate for 25 years.

Bankruptcies in ailing industries like airlines and the technology sectors may have garnered big headlines. But Dan North, chief economist at Euler Hermes, notes that business failure numbers are correlated with two factors: low interest rates and GDP growth. And for much of the last two decades, with interest rates generally falling and recessions rare, the macroeconomic climate has been favorably disposed toward business survival.

But now, North believes that both trends are working against American businesses large and small. First, interest rates have been rising. The Federal Reserve has increased the federal funds rate from 1 percent in 2004 to 4 percent today and shows no sign of stopping. Long-term rates on instruments like mortgages and government bonds have been rising, albeit at a slower rate. Just as lower interest rates can extend the life of a struggling business—refinancing helps companies, not just strapped homeowners—a climate of rising rates can cut them short. If you're financing a startup on credit cards, the margin for error declines when the interest rate goes from 16 percent to 20 percent.

Second, North believes the pace of GDP growth will slow, which will lead to business failures. When the economy has been growing at a steady clip, businesses tend to invest and build up their infrastructures to accommodate continued robust growth. When growth fails to materialize as expected, they can easily get caught short, with too much capacity, too many employees, and too much debt. "In a way, the fact that GDP growth was 4.3 percent in the third quarter works against us," said North. The more sharply the brakes are applied, the more people go crashing into the dashboard.

From the perspective of business failures, the United States will be worse off than the rest of the world next year. While Euler Hermes expects business failures to rise 3 percent in the U.S. in 2006, the Global Failure Index is expected to rise just 1 percent. (Word to the wise: Avoid investing in that Slovakian chain of photo shops your brother-in-law is touting. Euler Hermes expects business failures to rise 24 percent next year in Slovakia.)

Of course, the rise in failures isn't necessarily a bad sign for the economy at large. The U.S. economy runs on a variety of fuels, the most powerful of which is our collective capacity for risk-taking. As North notes, "Good times make people feel like they're very strong and able to start businesses and take risks." Remember 1999, when everybody was somehow involved in a dot-com startup? U.S. businesses have a high mortality rate precisely because of the widespread tendency to entrepreneurship. So many businesses fail because so many are created. Ohio State University Professor H.G. Parsa found that about 60 percent of restaurants failed in three years, for example. If Euler Hermes is correct, the increase in the rate of business failures will surely prove difficult for owners, employees, and creditors. But we should probably be more worried if the economy grew at 3 percent, interest rates rose—and business failures continued to drop. It would mean Americans had stopped trying to get rich.

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9) Newsweek: Google's ten golden rules [Les dix règles d'or pour la réussite de Google.]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10296177/site/newsweek/

Google: Ten Golden Rules
Getting the most out of knowledge workers will be the key to business success for the next quarter century. Here's how we do it at google.
By Eric Schmidt and Hal Varian

Updated: 11:33 a.m. ET Dec. 2, 2005

Issues 2006 - At google, we think business guru Peter Drucker well understood how to manage the new breed of "knowledge workers." After all, Drucker invented the term in 1959. He says knowledge workers believe they are paid to be effective, not to work 9 to 5, and that smart businesses will "strip away everything that gets in their knowledge workers' way." Those that succeed will attract the best performers, securing "the single biggest factor for competitive advantage in the next 25 years."

At Google, we seek that advantage. The ongoing debate about whether big corporations are mismanaging knowledge workers is one we take very seriously, because those who don't get it right will be gone. We've drawn on good ideas we've seen elsewhere and come up with a few of our own. What follows are seven key principles we use to make knowledge workers most effective. As in most technology companies, many of our employees are engineers, so we will focus on that particular group, but many of the policies apply to all sorts of knowledge workers.
# Hire by committee. Virtually every person who interviews at Google talks to at least half-a-dozen interviewers, drawn from both management and potential colleagues. Everyone's opinion counts, making the hiring process more fair and pushing standards higher. Yes, it takes longer, but we think it's worth it. If you hire great people and involve them intensively in the hiring process, you'll get more great people. We started building this positive feedback loop when the company was founded, and it has had a huge payoff.
# Cater to their every need. As Drucker says, the goal is to "strip away everything that gets in their way." We provide a standard package of fringe benefits, but on top of that are first-class dining facilities, gyms, laundry rooms, massage rooms, haircuts, carwashes, dry cleaning, commuting buses—just about anything a hardworking engineer might want. Let's face it: programmers want to program, they don't want to do their laundry. So we make it easy for them to do both.
# Pack them in. Almost every project at Google is a team project, and teams have to communicate. The best way to make communication easy is to put team members within a few feet of each other. The result is that virtually everyone at Google shares an office. This way, when a programmer needs to confer with a colleague, there is immediate access: no telephone tag, no e-mail delay, no waiting for a reply. Of course, there are many conference rooms that people can use for detailed discussion so that they don't disturb their office mates. Even the CEO shared an office at Google for several months after he arrived. Sitting next to a knowledgeable employee was an incredibly effective educational experience.
# Make coordination easy. Because all members of a team are within a few feet of one another, it is relatively easy to coordinate projects. In addition to physical proximity, each Googler e-mails a snippet once a week to his work group describing what he has done in the last week. This gives everyone an easy way to track what everyone else is up to, making it much easier to monitor progress and synchronize work flow.
# Eat your own dog food. Google workers use the company's tools intensively. The most obvious tool is the Web, with an internal Web page for virtually every project and every task. They are all indexed and available to project participants on an as-needed basis. We also make extensive use of other information-management tools, some of which are eventually rolled out as products. For example, one of the reasons for Gmail's success is that it was beta tested within the company for many months. The use of e-mail is critical within the organization, so Gmail had to be tuned to satisfy the needs of some of our most demanding customers—our knowledge workers.
# Encourage creativity. Google engineers can spend up to 20 percent of their time on a project of their choice. There is, of course, an approval process and some oversight, but basically we want to allow creative people to be creative. One of our not-so-secret weapons is our ideas mailing list: a companywide suggestion box where people can post ideas ranging from parking procedures to the next killer app. The software allows for everyone to comment on and rate ideas, permitting the best ideas to percolate to the top.
# Strive to reach consensus. Modern corporate mythology has the unique decision maker as hero. We adhere to the view that the "many are smarter than the few," and solicit a broad base of views before reaching any decision. At Google, the role of the manager is that of an aggregator of viewpoints, not the dictator of decisions. Building a consensus sometimes takes longer, but always produces a more committed team and better decisions
# Don't be evil. Much has been written about Google's slogan, but we really try to live by it, particularly in the ranks of management. As in every organization, people are passionate about their views. But nobody throws chairs at Google, unlike management practices used at some other well-known technology companies. We foster to create an atmosphere of tolerance and respect, not a company full of yes men.
# Data drive decisions. At Google, almost every decision is based on quantitative analysis. We've built systems to manage information, not only on the Internet at large, but also internally. We have dozens of analysts who plow through the data, analyze performance metrics and plot trends to keep us as up to date as possible. We have a raft of online "dashboards" for every business we work in that provide up-to-the-minute snapshots of where we are.
# Communicate effectively. Every Friday we have an all-hands assembly with announcements, introductions and questions and answers. (Oh, yes, and some food and drink.) This allows management to stay in touch with what our knowledge workers are thinking and vice versa. Google has remarkably broad dissemination of information within the organization and remarkably few serious leaks. Contrary to what some might think, we believe it is the first fact that causes the second: a trusted work force is a loyal work force.

Of course, we're not the only company that follows these practices. Many of them are common around Silicon Valley. And we recognize that our management techniques have to evolve as the company grows. There are several problems that we (and other companies like us) face.

One is "techno arrogance." Engineers are competitive by nature and they have low tolerance for those who aren't as driven or as knowledgeable as they are. But almost all engineering projects are team projects; having a smart but inflexible person on a team can be deadly. If we see a recommendation that says "smartest person I've ever known" combined with "I wouldn't ever want to work with them again," we decline to make them an offer. One reason for extensive peer interviews is to make sure that teams are enthused about the new team member. Many of our best people are terrific role models in terms of team building, and we want to keep it that way.

A related problem is the not-invented-here syndrome. A good engineer is always convinced that he can build a better system than the existing ones, leading to the refrain "Don't buy it, build it." Well, they may be right, but we have to focus on those projects with the biggest payoff. Sometimes this means going outside the company for products and services.

Another issue that we will face in the coming years is the maturation of the company, the industry and our work force. We, along with other firms in this industry, are in a rapid growth stage now, but that won't go on forever. Some of our new workers are fresh out of college; others have families and extensive job experience. Their interests and needs are different. We need to provide benefits and a work environment that will be attractive to all ages.

A final issue is making sure that as Google grows, communication procedures keep pace with our increasing scale. The Friday meetings are great for the Mountain View team, but Google is now a global organization.

We have focused on managing creativity and innovation, but that's not the only thing that matters at Google. We also have to manage day-to-day operations, and it's not an easy task. We are building technology infrastructure that is dramatically larger, more complex and more demanding than anything that has been built in history. Those who plan, implement and maintain these systems, which are growing to meet a constantly rising set of demands, have to have strong incentives, too. At Google, operations are not just an afterthought: they are critical to the company's success, and we want to have just as much effort and creativity in this domain as in new product development.

Schmidt is CEO of Google. Varian is a Berkeley professor and consultant with Google.

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http://www.azcentral.com/business/articles/1129wsj-badboss29-ON.html
How to spot the signs of a bad boss ahead

Joann S. Lublin
Wall Street Journal
Nov. 29, 2005 11:10 AM

Twice in the past two years, advertising professional Melissa Dantz missed signs that a hiring manager would be a bad boss.

In 2003, she accepted a job at a Boston-area ad agency, even though its owners failed to divulge their marriage to each other until after her job interview. She left after nine months, largely because she was expected to cover for the owners when they fabricated staffer names to show potential clients the tiny agency was larger than it was.

The following year, Dantz took a job with a suburban Boston event-production firm even though the official interviewing her disparaged the prior incumbent. At work, that supervisor acted condescending toward everyone. Dantz quit after seven months.

"The toll on my self-confidence from these bad boss experiences was tremendous, and in retrospect, avoidable," she says.

Many applicants ignore warning signs about their boss-to-be. Yet recognizing the type of person you will be working for is one of the most important factors that should be considered when deciding whether to accept an offer. In today's buoyant job market, "you have the choice of picking your boss as much as your boss has the choice of picking you," observes Beverly Kaye, a retention consultant in Sherman Oaks, Calif.

So, keep a sharp lookout during a company's courtship for hints that your hiring manager will morph into Ivan the Terrible Boss. Here are some common warning signs:

Easily distracted: He arrives late for your twice-postponed interview. He can't find your resume in his huge pile. He frequently interrupts you to take calls, check email or glance at his watch. Clearly, you or your coveted position isn't his highest priority.

Poor Interaction: She offers a limp handshake, scant eye contact and shallow answers to your detailed questions about the business. She stays seated behind a huge desk, arms folded across her chest, and relegates you to a lower couch. This isn't exactly someone committed to collaboration.

Me, Me, Me: The hiring manager talks solely about himself, giving current and former associates no credit for their accomplishments.

The head of one major Philadelphia nonprofit organization spent much of his 30 minutes with a prospective fund-raising manager bragging about his feats there. The new hire soon found he was abusive. "He would scream at me in the middle of meetings in front of board members," she says. "I went into a very bad depression while I was working there."

Negative Buzz: The fund-raising manager had checked out her would-be boss with other community groups, but ignored their hesitant responses. She now believes that "if references aren't effusive, that's a warning sign."

It helps just to look around the office. The twice-burned Dantz subsequently withdrew applications when no one seemed happy at a potential employer.

Wrong line of Inquiry: Your interviewer wants to know your marital status, but he doesn't ask much about your relevant skills.

Intrusive personal questions could signal problems ahead with discrimination or workplace harassment. Meanwhile, a lack of serious talk might mean an aloof boss.

A man seeking a public-relations vice presidency at a big Florida company earlier this year was surprised when the chief executive never asked about his communications-strategy plans. The CEO was distant, then eliminated the new VP's position three months later.

Stress Overload: How well a boss-to-be copes with stress during your interview speaks volumes about what it would be like on the job.

Melissa Payner once turned down a middle-management post with a New York retailer because the frazzled hiring manager repeatedly barked orders to his assistant. "I felt as if he was looking to me to be the solution to his stress - almost to be his savior," recalls Ms. Payner, president and CEO of Bluefly.com, an online fashion, accessories and home furnishings concern in New York.

There are ways to hone your bad-boss detection radar. If job seekers "were just a little more attentive, they could save themselves a lot of grief," suggests Dory Hollander, president of WiseWorkplaces, an executive-coaching firm in Arlington, Va.

Prepare a list of ideal traits you'd want in your next supervisor, and a second list of what bothers you most about your current one. Keep both in mind while quizzing present and past staffers about the boss-to-be. During your hiring interviews, ask direct questions about the boss's leadership style and philosophy.

Trust your gut. If your stomach aches throughout the interview, share your feelings afterward with a coach or friend so you can separate bad-boss anxiety from routine job jitters.

Don't let job-hunt desperation cloud your radar screen. Dantz, now an international marketing manager for a shoe manufacturer, vows to never again let financial pressure "dictate the necessity of accepting any job offer."