”Zero Dark Thirty” screenplay among Writers Guild nominees

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – The writers of controversial Osama bin Laden thriller “Zero Dark Thirty” and of the presidential drama “Lincoln” won nominations on Friday for the Writers Guild Awards, as momentum built in Hollywood ahead of the Oscars in February.

The screenplays for Iran hostage drama “Argo,” cult movie “The Master,” quirky comedy “Silver Linings Playbook,” and shipwreck tale “Life of Pi” also won nods from the Writers Guild of America for honors either as adapted or original movie screenplays.

The field of 10 feature film screenplays was rounded out by “Flight,” “Looper,” Wes Anderson‘s “Moonrise Kingdom,” and coming of age movie “The Perks of Being a Wallflower.”

“Zero Dark Thirty” screenplay writer Mark Boal has come under fire from some U.S. politicians over the film’s depiction of the role torture may have played in the hunt for the al Qaeda leader, and for the origins of his source material in reconstructing the 10-year effort to track down and kill bin Laden in May 2011 by U.S. special forces.

The film makers have denied being leaked classified material and say the film shows that no single method was responsible for leading to the capture of bin Laden.

The Writers Guild Awards, a key indication of Hollywood sentiment ahead of the Oscars, will be handed out at simultaneous ceremonies in Los Angeles and New York on February 17, one week before the February 24 Academy Awards ceremony.

(Reporting By Jill Serjeant; Editing by Vicki Allen)

Movies News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Despite New Health Law, Some See Sharp Rise in Premiums

Health insurance companies across the country are seeking and winning double-digit increases in premiums for some customers, even though one of the biggest objectives of the Obama administration’s health care law was to stem the rapid rise in insurance costs for consumers.

Bob Chamberlin/Los Angeles Times

Dave Jones, the California insurance commissioner, said some insurance companies could raise rates as much as they did before the law was enacted.

Particularly vulnerable to the high rates are small businesses and people who do not have employer-provided insurance and must buy it on their own.

In California, Aetna is proposing rate increases of as much as 22 percent, Anthem Blue Cross 26 percent and Blue Shield of California 20 percent for some of those policy holders, according to the insurers’ filings with the state for 2013. These rate requests are all the more striking after a 39 percent rise sought by Anthem Blue Cross in 2010 helped give impetus to the law, known as the Affordable Care Act, which was passed the same year and will not be fully in effect until 2014.

 In other states, like Florida and Ohio, insurers have been able to raise rates by at least 20 percent for some policy holders. The rate increases can amount to several hundred dollars a month.

The proposed increases compare with about 4 percent for families with employer-based policies.

Under the health care law, regulators are now required to review any request for a rate increase of 10 percent or more; the requests are posted on a federal Web site, healthcare.gov, along with regulators’ evaluations.

The review process not only reveals the sharp disparity in the rates themselves, it also demonstrates the striking difference between places like New York, one of the 37 states where legislatures have given regulators some authority to deny or roll back rates deemed excessive, and California, which is among the states that do not have that ability.

New York, for example, recently used its sweeping powers to hold rate increases for 2013 in the individual and small group markets to under 10 percent. California can review rate requests for technical errors but cannot deny rate increases.

The double-digit requests in some states are being made despite evidence that overall health care costs appear to have slowed in recent years, increasing in the single digits annually as many people put off treatment because of the weak economy. PricewaterhouseCoopers estimates that costs may increase just 7.5 percent next year, well below the rate increases being sought by some insurers. But the companies counter that medical costs for some policy holders are rising much faster than the average, suggesting they are in a sicker population. Federal regulators contend that premiums would be higher still without the law, which also sets limits on profits and administrative costs and provides for rebates if insurers exceed those limits.

Critics, like Dave Jones, the California insurance commissioner and one of two health plan regulators in that state, said that without a federal provision giving all regulators the ability to deny excessive rate increases, some insurance companies can raise rates as much as they did before the law was enacted.

“This is business as usual,” Mr. Jones said. “It’s a huge loophole in the Affordable Care Act,” he said.

While Mr. Jones has not yet weighed in on the insurers’ most recent requests, he is pushing for a state law that will give him that authority. Without legislative action, the state can only question the basis for the high rates, sometimes resulting in the insurer withdrawing or modifying the proposed rate increase.

The California insurers say they have no choice but to raise premiums if their underlying medical costs have increased. “We need these rates to even come reasonably close to covering the expenses of this population,” said Tom Epstein, a spokesman for Blue Shield of California. The insurer is requesting a range of increases, which average about 12 percent for 2013.

Although rates paid by employers are more closely tracked than rates for individuals and small businesses, policy experts say the law has probably kept at least some rates lower than they otherwise would have been.

“There’s no question that review of rates makes a difference, that it results in lower rates paid by consumers and small businesses,” said Larry Levitt, an executive at the Kaiser Family Foundation, which estimated in an October report that rate review was responsible for lowering premiums for one out of every five filings.

Federal officials say the law has resulted in significant savings. “The health care law includes new tools to hold insurers accountable for premium hikes and give rebates to consumers,” said Brian Cook, a spokesman for Medicare, which is helping to oversee the insurance reforms.

“Insurers have already paid $1.1 billion in rebates, and rate review programs have helped save consumers an additional $1 billion in lower premiums,” he said. If insurers collect premiums and do not spend at least 80 cents out of every dollar on care for their customers, the law requires them to refund the excess.

As a result of the review process, federal officials say, rates were reduced, on average, by nearly three percentage points, according to a report issued last September.

Read More..

Despite New Health Law, Some See Sharp Rise in Premiums

Health insurance companies across the country are seeking and winning double-digit increases in premiums for some customers, even though one of the biggest objectives of the Obama administration’s health care law was to stem the rapid rise in insurance costs for consumers.

Bob Chamberlin/Los Angeles Times

Dave Jones, the California insurance commissioner, said some insurance companies could raise rates as much as they did before the law was enacted.

Particularly vulnerable to the high rates are small businesses and people who do not have employer-provided insurance and must buy it on their own.

In California, Aetna is proposing rate increases of as much as 22 percent, Anthem Blue Cross 26 percent and Blue Shield of California 20 percent for some of those policy holders, according to the insurers’ filings with the state for 2013. These rate requests are all the more striking after a 39 percent rise sought by Anthem Blue Cross in 2010 helped give impetus to the law, known as the Affordable Care Act, which was passed the same year and will not be fully in effect until 2014.

 In other states, like Florida and Ohio, insurers have been able to raise rates by at least 20 percent for some policy holders. The rate increases can amount to several hundred dollars a month.

The proposed increases compare with about 4 percent for families with employer-based policies.

Under the health care law, regulators are now required to review any request for a rate increase of 10 percent or more; the requests are posted on a federal Web site, healthcare.gov, along with regulators’ evaluations.

The review process not only reveals the sharp disparity in the rates themselves, it also demonstrates the striking difference between places like New York, one of the 37 states where legislatures have given regulators some authority to deny or roll back rates deemed excessive, and California, which is among the states that do not have that ability.

New York, for example, recently used its sweeping powers to hold rate increases for 2013 in the individual and small group markets to under 10 percent. California can review rate requests for technical errors but cannot deny rate increases.

The double-digit requests in some states are being made despite evidence that overall health care costs appear to have slowed in recent years, increasing in the single digits annually as many people put off treatment because of the weak economy. PricewaterhouseCoopers estimates that costs may increase just 7.5 percent next year, well below the rate increases being sought by some insurers. But the companies counter that medical costs for some policy holders are rising much faster than the average, suggesting they are in a sicker population. Federal regulators contend that premiums would be higher still without the law, which also sets limits on profits and administrative costs and provides for rebates if insurers exceed those limits.

Critics, like Dave Jones, the California insurance commissioner and one of two health plan regulators in that state, said that without a federal provision giving all regulators the ability to deny excessive rate increases, some insurance companies can raise rates as much as they did before the law was enacted.

“This is business as usual,” Mr. Jones said. “It’s a huge loophole in the Affordable Care Act,” he said.

While Mr. Jones has not yet weighed in on the insurers’ most recent requests, he is pushing for a state law that will give him that authority. Without legislative action, the state can only question the basis for the high rates, sometimes resulting in the insurer withdrawing or modifying the proposed rate increase.

The California insurers say they have no choice but to raise premiums if their underlying medical costs have increased. “We need these rates to even come reasonably close to covering the expenses of this population,” said Tom Epstein, a spokesman for Blue Shield of California. The insurer is requesting a range of increases, which average about 12 percent for 2013.

Although rates paid by employers are more closely tracked than rates for individuals and small businesses, policy experts say the law has probably kept at least some rates lower than they otherwise would have been.

“There’s no question that review of rates makes a difference, that it results in lower rates paid by consumers and small businesses,” said Larry Levitt, an executive at the Kaiser Family Foundation, which estimated in an October report that rate review was responsible for lowering premiums for one out of every five filings.

Federal officials say the law has resulted in significant savings. “The health care law includes new tools to hold insurers accountable for premium hikes and give rebates to consumers,” said Brian Cook, a spokesman for Medicare, which is helping to oversee the insurance reforms.

“Insurers have already paid $1.1 billion in rebates, and rate review programs have helped save consumers an additional $1 billion in lower premiums,” he said. If insurers collect premiums and do not spend at least 80 cents out of every dollar on care for their customers, the law requires them to refund the excess.

As a result of the review process, federal officials say, rates were reduced, on average, by nearly three percentage points, according to a report issued last September.

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Tsunami warning canceled for Alaska, Canada

JUNEAU, Alaska—

A powerful earthquake sparked a tsunami warning for hundreds of miles of Alaskan and Canadian coastline, but the alert was canceled when no damaging waves were generated.

The magnitude 7.5 quake did generate a tsunami, but the Alaska Tsunami Warning Center said the waves didn't pose a threat.

The temblor struck at midnight Friday (1 a.m. PST Saturday) and was centered about 60 miles west of Craig, Alaska, the U.S. Geological Survey said.

The tsunami followed minutes later and was eventually expanded to include coastal areas from Cape Fairweather, Alaska, to the northern tip of Vancouver Island, Canada — an area extending more than 700 miles.

A center had warned that “significant widespread inundation of land is expected,” adding that dangerous coastal flooding was possible.

In its cancellation statement, the center said that some areas were seeing just small sea level changes.

“A tsunami was generated during this event but no longer poses a threat,” the center said.

After one community reported seeing just a small wave, the police in the coastal town of Cordova said they had no reports of any problems.

The Alaska Earthquake Information Center said the quake was widely felt but it received no reports of any damage.

In addition to the warning, a tsunami advisory was briefly in effect for some Alaska coastal areas to the north of the warning zone, as well as to the south of the zone, from the Washington state border to the northern tip of Vancouver Island.

A tsunami warning means an area is likely to be hit by a wave, while an advisory means there may be strong currents, but that widespread inundation is not expected to occur.

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Wired Science Space Photo of the Day: Colorful Lunar Mare

Galileo false-color image of the Mare Tranquillitatis and Mare Serenitatis areas of the Moon. The picture was made from four exposures taken during Galileo's second Earth/Moon flyby.

The colors are enhanced to highlight compositional differences.

Mare Tranquillitatis at left appears blue due to titanium enrichment. Orange soil in Mare Sarenitatis at lower right indicates lower titanium. Dark purple areas at left center mark the Apollo 17 landing site, composed of explosive volcanic deposits.

Red lunar highlands indicate low iron and titanium. Mare Serenitatis is roughly 1300 km across and North is at 5:00. The 95 km diameter crater Posidonius, centered at 32 N, 30 E, is at the middle of the bottom of the frame.

Image: NASA [high-resolution]

Caption: NASA

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LA sisters Haim lead hopes of pop revival in 2013

LONDON (Reuters) – Three sisters from Los Angeles producing fun and infectious folk-pop could be the tonic that chart music needs to lift it from what some experts are calling a creative slump.

As music channels, journalists and record labels step up their search for the “next big thing” in 2013, the Fleetwood Mac-inspired Haim sisters have appeared in a growing number of lists produced at the start of each year.

They include MTV‘s “Brand New for 2013″ survey, the band topped BBC’s “Sound of 2013″ poll on Friday decided by over 200 experts and also appeared on the cover of music magazine NME’s new music edition out this week.

Matt Wilkinson, New Bands Editor at NME, was upbeat about indie music in 2013 because up-and-coming acts like Haim had the attitude to succeed unlike more “reluctant” stars of the past.

“The difference (from recent times) is that they want to be pop stars, want to be on the front of NME, want to create their own scene and want to be No. 1,” he told Reuters. “It’s been quite a long time since bands really wanted to do that.”

Haim is made up of Este, Alana and Danielle, all in their early- to mid-20s – as energetic as they are photogenic and signed to the Polydor label in Britain.

Dorian Lynskey of the Guardian praised their “fantastic, inventive songs”, and said they were part of a revival from “the current sickly condition of chart pop” dominated by familiar faces like Rihanna and producers David Guetta and Calvin Harris.

RETURN OF GUITAR HEROES?

Sharing NME’s new music cover with Haim is Palma Violets, a London-based indie quartet also longlisted on the BBC’s annual survey whose past winners include chart queen Adele and 50 Cent.

The death or otherwise of indie guitar rock has been discussed almost obsessively by the British music press over the years, but George Ergatoudis, head of music on BBC’s Radio 1, bravely predicted: “Rock and alternative guitar acts are going to find public taste swinging their way” in 2013.

If that is true, those set to benefit include two Birmingham acts – quartets Peace and Swim Deep – two London bands – female post-punk foursome Savages and alternative rockers Bastille, and two Irish acts, Kodaline and Little Green Cars.

As in previous years, one area with the biggest potential for topping charts around the globe is the single female act.

Whether or not inspired by the likes of Gaga, Rihanna, Nicki Minaj and beyond, a new crop of female performers-with-attitude has emerged ready to take on the world.

Creating the biggest stir so far is Angel Haze, a U.S. rapper whose sexually explicit lyrics and self assertive manner have put her on a path to stardom, helped by the success of her EP “Reservation” which draws on her Native American heritage.

“I will say to anyone’s face I am the best out there right now,” she said in a recent interview, with typical bluntness.

At the other end of the musical spectrum comes Gabrielle Aplin, a singer-songwriter who built up an online following by posting acoustic covers before signing to a major label.

Underlining the increasing crossover between merchandising and musical success, Aplin has already scored a No. 1 single hit in Britain with her cover of Frankie Goes to Hollywood’s “The Power of Love” which was used in a John Lewis commercial.

Somewhere in between falls Laura Mvula, whose powerful voice has earned comparisons from acts as diverse as Billie Holiday and Adele, and MTV has selected Ebony Day as its unsigned artist to watch this year.

There are precious few single male artists on the radar in early 2013.

Tom Odell appears on MTV‘s Brand New list, the BBC’s Sound Of survey and won the BRITs Critics’ Choice award for up-and-coming talent, while London rapper K Koke is included on Digital Spy’s “Ones to Watch” column and MTV.

ACCENT ON AUTHENTICITY

Duos are de rigueur in 2013 with British brothers Guy and Howard Lawrence of Disclosure delighting with their house music including new single “Latch”, and MS MR from New York the enigmatic pair who have music critics drooling.

“Prepare to be blown away,” wrote Paul Lester in the Guardian. “This duo could be the first superstars of chillwave.”

London electro pop pair AlunaGeorge have been championed by the same newspaper and were runner-up in BBC’s poll this year.

The surveys have a patchy track record in predicting chart success, and are crammed with dozens of acts already signed to record labels and so well on the way to success.

But they are closely watched by a music industry facing falling sales and desperate to spot the next Rihanna, Lady Gaga or One Direction.

While no one is suggesting the chart reign of Katy Perry, Justin Bieber and Taylor Swift is over, there is growing optimism about a new crop of acts who have commercial ambition as well as musical ability and originality.

“I think across all genres there is a thirst from the audience for authenticity, whether it’s from folk acts or rappers or dance artists,” said David Mogendorff, digital media director of talent and music at MTV International.

He was involved in drawing up the music channel’s “Brand New” list of 10 artists destined for greatness overseen by Anna Karatziva, head of talent and music at MTV UK. Voting for the winner is open at www.mtv.co.uk/brandnew from January 14-31.

Outside Britain and North America, K-pop sensation Psy will seek to build on his global hit “Gangnam Style” which became the first video on YouTube to reach one billion views last month.

Whether he can prove more than a one-hit wonder in the West remains to be seen, while other South Korean acts including Girls’ Generation are gearing up to follow in his footsteps.

NME has singled out Australia’s indie-dance duo Jagwar Ma for special attention, while Russian-German dance music producer Zedd has begun to make inroads in the U.S. market.

(Reporting by Mike Collett-White, editing by Paul Casciato)

Music News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Scare Amplifies Fears That Clinton’s Work Has Taken Heavy Toll

Pool photo by Brendan Smialowski

Hillary Rodham Clinton with Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi in Cairo in July.

WASHINGTON — When Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton fractured her right elbow after slipping in a State Department garage in June 2009, she returned to work in just a few days. Her arm in a sling, she juggled speeches and a trip to India and Thailand with physical therapy, rebuilding a joint held together with wire and pins.

It was vivid evidence of Mrs. Clinton’s indomitable stamina and work ethic — as a first lady, senator, presidential candidate and, for the past four years, the most widely traveled secretary of state in American history.

But after a fall at home in December that caused a concussion, and a subsequent diagnosis of a blood clot in her head, it has taken much longer for Mrs. Clinton to bounce back. She was released from a hospital in New York on Wednesday, accompanied by her daughter, Chelsea, and her husband, former President Bill Clinton. On Thursday, she told colleagues that she hoped to be in the office next week.

Her health scare, though, has reinforced the concerns of friends and colleagues that the years of punishing work and travel have taken a heavy toll. Even among her peers at the highest levels of government, Mrs. Clinton, 65, is renowned for her grueling schedule. Over the past four years, she was on the road for 401 days and spent the equivalent of 87 full days on a plane, according to the State Department’s Web site.

In one 48-hour marathon in 2009 that her aides still talk about, she traveled from talks with Palestinian leaders in Abu Dhabi to a midnight meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem, then boarded a plane for Morocco, staying up all night to work on other issues, before going straight to a meeting of Arab leaders the next morning.

“So many people who know her have urged me to tell her not to work so hard,” said Melanne S. Verveer, who was Mrs. Clinton’s chief of staff when she was first lady and is now the State Department’s ambassador at large for women’s issues. “Well, that’s not easy to do when you’re Hillary Clinton. She doesn’t spare herself.”

It is not just a matter of duty, Ms. Verveer and others said. Mrs. Clinton genuinely relishes the work, pursuing a brand of personal diplomacy that, she argues, requires her to travel to more places than her predecessors.

While there is no medical evidence that Mrs. Clinton’s clot was caused by her herculean work habits, her cascade of recent health problems, beginning with a stomach virus, has prompted those who know her best to say that she desperately needs a long rest. Her first order of business after leaving the State Department in the coming weeks, they say, should be to take care of herself.

Some even wonder whether this setback will — or should — temper the feverish speculation that she will make another run for the White House in 2016.

“I am amazed at the number of women who come up to me and tell me she must run for president,” said Ellen Chesler, a New York author and a friend of Mrs. Clinton’s. “But perhaps this episode will alter things a bit.”

Given Mrs. Clinton’s enduring status as a role model, Ms. Chesler said women would be watching which path she decides to take, as they plan their own transitions out of the working world.

“Do remember that women of our generation are really the first to have worked through the life cycle in large numbers,” she added. “Many seem to be approaching retirement with dread.”

For now, aides say, Mrs. Clinton’s focus is on wrapping up her work at the State Department. She would like to take part in a town hall-style meeting, thank her staff and sit for some interviews. But first she has to get clearance from her doctors, who are watching her to make sure that the blood thinners they have prescribed for her clot are working.

Speaking to a meeting of a foreign policy advisory board from her home in Chappaqua, N.Y., on Thursday, Mrs. Clinton said she was crossing her fingers and encouraging her doctors to let her return next week. “I’m trying to be a compliant patient,” she said, according to a person who was in the room. “But that does require a certain level of patience, which I’ve had to cultivate over the last three and a half weeks.”

While convalescing, Mrs. Clinton has spoken with President Obama and has held a 30-minute call with Senator John Kerry, Democrat of Massachusetts, whom Mr. Obama nominated as her successor.

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After Fiscal Deal, Tax Code May Be Most Progressive Since 1979

WASHINGTON — With 2013 bringing tax increases on the incomes of a small sliver of the richest Americans, the country’s top earners now face a heavier tax burden than at any time since Jimmy Carter was president.

The last-minute deal struck by the departing 112th Congress raised taxes on a handful of the highest-earning Americans, with about 99.3 percent of households experiencing no change in their income taxes. But the Tax Policy Center estimates that the average family in the top 1 percent will pay a federal tax rate of more than 36 percent this year, up from 28 percent in 2008. That is the highest rate since 1979, at least.

By some measures, the tax code might now be the most progressive in a generation, tax economists said, while noting that every American is paying a lower burden currently than they did then. In fact, the total federal tax rate is still vastly lower for the very rich than it was at any point in the 1940s through 1970s. It has risen from historical lows, but is still closer to those lows than where it was in the postwar decades.

“We made the system more progressive by raising rates at the top and leaving them for everyone else,” said Roberton Williams of the Tax Policy Center, a research group based in Washington. “The offsetting issue is that the rich have gotten a lot richer.”

Indeed, over the last three decades the bulk of pretax income gains have gone to the wealthy — and the higher up on the income scale, the bigger the gains, with billionaires outpacing millionaires who outpaced the merely rich. Economists doubted that the tax increases would do much to reverse that trend.

With the recovery failing to improve incomes for millions of average Americans and the country running trillion-dollar deficits, President Obama made “tax fairness” a centerpiece of his re-election campaign. In the heated negotiations with House Speaker John A. Boehner, that translated into the White House’s insistence on tax increases for the top 2 percent of households and a continuation of tax breaks and cuts for a vast number of taxpayers.

Republicans resisted increasing tax rates and aimed for lower revenue targets, arguing that spending was the budget’s primary problem and that no American should see his or her taxes go up too much in such a sluggish economy. But ultimately they relented, and Congress cut a last-minute deal.

“A central promise of my campaign for president was to change the tax code that was too skewed towards the wealthy at the expense of working middle-class Americans,” Mr. Obama said after Congress reached an agreement.

That deal includes a host of tax increases on the rich. It raises the tax rate to 39.6 percent from 35 percent on income above $400,000 for individuals, and $450,000 for couples. The rate on dividends and capital gains for those same taxpayers was bumped up 5 percentage points, to 20 percent. Congress also reinstated limits on the amount households with more than $300,000 in income can deduct. On top of that, two new surcharges — a 3.8 percent tax on investment income and a 0.9 percent tax on regular income — hit those same wealthy households.

As a result of the taxes added in both the deal and the 2010 health care law, which came into effect this year, taxpayers with $1 million in income and up will pay on average $168,000 more in taxes. Millionaires’ share of the overall federal tax burden will climb to 23 percent from 20 percent.

The result is a tax code that squeezes hundreds of billions of dollars more from the very well off — about $600 billion more over 10 years — while leaving the tax burden on everyone else mostly as it was. And the changes come after 30 years of both Republican and Democratic administrations doing the converse: zeroing out federal income taxes for many poor working families while also reducing the tax burden for households on the higher end of the income scale.

“Back at the end of the Carter and beginning of the Reagan administrations, we had a pretty severe income-tax burden for people at a low level of income. It was actually kind of appalling,” said Alan D. Viard, a tax expert at the American Enterprise Institute, a right-of-center research group in Washington. “Policy makers in both parties realized that was bad policy and started whittling away at it” by expanding credits and tinkering with tax rates.

After those changes and the new law, comparing average tax rates for poor households and wealthy households, 2013 might be the most progressive tax code since 1979. But economists cautioned that measuring progressivity is tricky. “It’s not like there is some scientific measure of progressivity all economists agreed upon,” said Leonard E. Burman, a professor of public affairs at Syracuse University. “People look at different numerical measures and they’ve changed in different ways at different income levels.”

Mr. Viard said that over time the code had become markedly more progressive for the poor compared with the middle class. But it arguably did not become much more progressive for the rich compared with the middle class, or the very rich compared with the rich, in part because of the George W. Bush-era tax cuts on investment income.

An anesthesiologist who earns a $500,000 salary subject to payroll and income taxes might pay a higher tax rate than a hedge fund manager making $1 billion subject mostly to capital-gains taxes, for instance.

Economists are also divided on the ultimate effect of those tax increases on the wealthy to income growth and income inequality in the United States. The recession hit the incomes of the rich hard, but they have snapped back much more strongly than those for middle or low-income workers.

“I’d still rather be really rich, even if I’m getting taxed much more than a low-income person” would be, Mr. Williams of the Tax Policy Center added.

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Legislators want Army Corps to explain habitat removal decision

Two state senators on Thursday called on the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to explain its decision to plow under 43 acres of lush wildlife habitat at the Sepulveda Basin without prior notice or coordination with community leaders and environmentalists.

Sens. Kevin de Leon (D-Los Angeles) and Fran Pavley (D-Agoura Hills) asked for details about what led to the agency's declaration in August that its "vegetation management plan" for the area did not require an environmental impact report because it would not significantly disturb wildlife and habitat.

On Dec. 10, Army Corps bulldozers, mowers and mulching machines stripped nearly all the greenery from the swath of Los Angeles River flood plain just west of Interstate 405 and north of Burbank Boulevard, wiping out habitat for mammals, reptiles and hundreds of species of birds.

"When a clunky federal bureaucracy doesn't collaborate with state and local officials and community leaders, you create a real mess, which is what we have right now at the Sepulveda Basin," De Leon said in an interview.

He noted that although the corps is not subject to state environmental laws, protections from the federal National Environmental Policy Act may apply.

"If the Army Corps doesn't cooperate, the next step is to engage members of Congress to exercise their powers, or have the state attorney general notify the U.S. district attorney's office," De Leon said.

Pavley, whose district includes the Sepulveda Basin, said she wants to know the extent of damage caused to trails, markers and signs funded with "state and local park monies" and installed and maintained "by thousands of hours of volunteer work."

Army Corps of Engineers District Cmdr. Col. Mark Toy was unavailable for comment. But corps spokesman Jay Field said the agency will cooperate fully with the senators.

The area existed as a wildlife preserve adjacent to the Sepulveda Dam for more than three decades. In 2010, it was reclassified as a corps "vegetation management area" with a new five-year mission of replacing trees and shrubs with native grasses as part of an effort to improve access for corps staffers, increase public safety and discourage crime, lewd activity, drug abuse and homeless camps.

Environmental groups led by the San Fernando Valley Audubon Society interpreted the plan to suggest the agency would avoid removal of native willow and cotton groves, elderberries, coyote brush and mule fat. Much of that vegetation was planted decades ago under a corps program to create the wildlife preserve.

Kris Ohlenkamp, conservation chairman of the San Fernando Valley Audubon Society, said the corps' management plan was vague. "But this much is clear: What the corps actually did to that land is not represented anywhere in the plan."

Army Corps Deputy District Cmdr. Alexander Deraney has said his agency's actions were "more or less in line with the plan." He said the corps wanted to preserve the native vegetation but discovered that "the native brush was so grown into non-native brush that it would be impossible to separate them."

The corps has ceased operations on the property pending consultations and meetings with environmental and community groups.

louis.sahagun@latimes.com

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Extinction Tourism: Work at a Newspaper While You Still Can

Why on earth would a seasoned, decorated photographer take a job at a local, small-town newspaper in the northern reaches of Norway?

That’s what we asked Jonas Bendiksen after he announced on Magnum’s blog that he’d be working at the Bladet Vesterålen newspaper, with a circulation of only 8,000, in the town of Sortland. In his blog post, Bendiksen writes, “We’ve heard it repeated countless times over the last decade: Newspapers are dying. I don’t know if it’s true or not, but I do know I don’t want to die without ever having worked for one of these fine purveyors of information.”

But it turns out his decision is not simply a bout of extinction tourism brought on by nostalgia – it’s a personal challenge.

“I’ve fantasized for a long time about doing something like this,” says Bendiksen. “In much of my work, I’m often drawn to global, epic-scale issues – things that affect millions of people. I found that I was inspired to spend some time scaling down, and trying to look over time at a really small area, where nothing too obvious or dramatic was going on and to just see daily life in a fairly quiet place, one day at a time.”

So far Bendiksen has photographed everything from a street in Sortland that finally got a new tarmac to town council meetings – from fisheries to immigrants and asylum seekers. Online you can view his images of moose hunting and winter sports.

“I think up some of the stories, and the editor comes up with others,” says Bendiksen. “I want to do everything, to get a sampling of daily life of various people here.”

Bendiksen’s barnstorming career includes being a member of the prestigious Magnum photo agency since 2008, working across the globe, winning plaudits and international solo shows for his long-term documentary projects, contributing regularly to big publications such as National Geographic and securing almost every major award a photographer could hope to rack up before his 35th birthday.

The Places We Live(2005-2008), a project on urban slums worldwide that became both a multimedia installation and a book, is typical of Bendiksen’s broad scope and the type of work he’s stepped away from. He thinks of his work at Bladet Vesterålen as in some way redressing his lack of past work in his native Norway. It’s a leap of faith – he’d never set foot in Vesterålen offices before his first day.

“I went and met the newspaper editor for the first time when I got off the airport bus,” he says.

With a son in Oslo who stays with him half the time, Bendiksen splits his time between the capital and Sortland.

“I run up and down, roughly every other week,” he says.

The change has been a sort of homecoming. After beginning the work he discovered that his great grandfather was born in Myre, the same village where he stays. It’s a big coincidence since the town only has a population of 2,000. His father also grew up just a two-hour drive from Sortland. He says the northern exposure has been illuminating.

“I have a lot of respect for people who work in daily journalism, and local news in particular. These are guys who go out every day and find new stories or angles in the same tiny village for 25 years. That’s not easy,” says Bendiksen. ”This is all very good experience for me to apply to all my photography. Sharpening my eyes a bit for finding images in the everyday. This I’ll definitely take with me.”

All images: Jonas Bendiksen

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