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By Jonathan Comey
Standard-Times staff writer
ACUSHNET -- Ten years ago, Brian Rose was just another talented baseball player in the South End Youth Athletic Association league.
Yesterday, he returned as an example of what hard work can produce, speaking to a new generation of kids hoping to follow in his footsteps.
The Red Sox prospect had his jersey retired and was the first inductee into the SEYAA Hall of Fame yesterday at the league banquet at the Century House.
SWANSEA -- The bond connecting more than 1,300 people attending a reunion yesterday included something deeper than having gone to the same high school or college.
They share a homeland.
So when the people of Bretanha, a region of Sao Miguel, Azores, came together for a first-time reunion at Venus De Milo restaurant, hearty handshakes, hugs and tears abounded as families and friends were reunited.
"There are more people here than in some of the villages of Bretanha," said Father Henry S. Arruda, who has the largest Portuguese parish outside of Portugal at Our Lady of Mount Carmel in New Bedford.
By Joe Beaird, Standard-Times staff writer
FALL RIVER -- With the lead investigator in the O.J. Simpson case present to mark the occasion, a four-year campaign to collect and melt down 1,000 guns ended successfully yesterday at the First Congregational Church.
Retired Los Angeles police detective Tom Lange extolled gun buy-back programs as a way to prevent accidents and crime, stressing that even a single gun can do great harm.
"One gun can kill the president of the United States," he said to the sparse morning worship audience. "That's all it takes. Or, worse yet, it could kill a loved one."
DARTMOUTH -- The vote on a $12.7 million sewer extension plan that will protect town groundwater, but strain the finances of the 700 households assessed to pay for it, tops the agenda for the special town meeting Tuesday night.
The sewer plan is part of a 44-article package to be decided by town meeting members at the Dartmouth High School Auditorium.
The Board of Health recommends the sewer extension through northwest Dartmouth -- including much of Reed Road, State Road, Lake Noquochoke, and Morton Park -- to cut septic pollution in surface water and the underground aquifer.
By Leedia Catello Macomber, Standard-Times Correspondent
WAREHAM-- More than 5,000 people in the Wareham area should sleep a little easier these days.
"That's the number of individuals in the Wareham area who have had no access to health insurance," said Kerry Mello, spokeswoman for Southcoast Hospitals Group. As of last week, all that has changed.
Free health care now is available at the Southcoast Mobile Health Van for those who are sick and have no other medical care.
"The van has been available in the area for health screening for over a year," Ms. Mello said Thursday, "but the addition of two physicians and a physician's assistant gives us the ability to expand our services to the truly ill, as well.
U.S. Rep. Barney Frank says he will continue to fight for visa waivers for residents of Portugal to travel to America.
Although such visas have been denied for the moment, Rep. Frank said he will press for them again in six months.
Congress adjourned for this legislative year Thursday without passing a visa waiver program urged by Rep. Frank to deal with Portuguese concerns.
According to the United States' policy, in all of Europe, only citizens of Portugal and Greece are required to apply for a visa before visiting this country.
If Jim Simmons sounds like a broken record, maybe it's because no one seems to be listening.
The head of the Hands Across the River Coalition has been crusading to rid the outer New Bedford Harbor of illegal lobster pots for several years, but they keep showing up.
On a recent weekend cruise, he saw some again.
"I was totally, totally amazed to find at the entrance to the hurricane barrier, there were four pots on each side of the channel. Then as you go toward Fort Phoenix, there must have been 65 to 75 lobster pots."
FALL RIVER -- Manuel Rodrigues, owner of Plourdes Bakery, soon will be untying his apron strings.
After 35 years of baking everything from codfish cakes to the famous strawberry parfait cakes, Mr. Rodrigues hopes someone will come along to carry on the reputation he spent a lifetime building.
"Plourdes has been famous for over 100 years," he said recently. "I am very proud of the business and am willing to teach and help out the next person."
His shop is on North Main Street in the heart of downtown.
WASHINGTON -- Despite the outward opposition of Arab countries to a military strike against Iraq, the White House is confident the Arabs won't stand in the way of any U.S. action, President Clinton's top security adviser said yesterday.
Sandy Berger said that in any case, the United States is ready to go it alone if necessary.
The Arab nations, Berger said on NBC's "Meet the Press," understand the threat posed by Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. "In the end of the day, they are not going to impede our ability to do what's necessary," Berger said.
The administration campaigned hard among allies over the weekend for support of strong sanctions, and possibly military retaliation, against Iraq for expelling American members of the U.N. weapons inspection team.
By The Associated Press
BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Saddam Hussein stressed yesterday that Iraq "does not seek conflict" with the United States and expressed hope that a solution to the crisis could be worked out, even as officials ordered citizens to be prepared for a possible U.S. air attack.
Saddam, who provoked the standoff by expelling American members of the U.N. weapons inspection team, met with his Cabinet on Sunday and said he hoped a conflict could be averted.
He praised other Arab countries for opposing the use of military action in the crisis. He did not, however, signal any willingness to compromise on the controversy over American inspectors.
"Iraq does not seek conflict with the United States and if there is a solution to this crisis ... we would be happy," he said in a statement carried by the Iraqi News Agency.
DETROIT -- China's most prominent pro-democracy campaigner was freed on medical parole yesterday after nearly 18 years in prison and flown to the United States, where he was hospitalized immediately.
Wei Jingsheng, first arrested in March 1979 during the crackdown on the Democracy Wall movement, suffers from heart problems, high blood pressure and other ailments made worse during his prison term.
After his arrival at Detroit Metropolitan Airport yesterday morning, the 47-year-old Wei was admitted to Henry Ford Hospital, hospital spokeswoman Meg Leonard said.
WASHINGTON -- In the fall of 1991, months after the allied victory in the Persian Gulf War, David Huxsoll led a team of U.N. inspectors into the Iraqi desert to Al Hakam, an abandoned outpost west of Baghdad with a terrifying secret to protect.
From the start, Huxsoll was suspicious. But Iraqi officials deflected his questions with wide-eyed innocence. Al Hakam, they told him, had simply been used to produce single-cell proteins -- a primary ingredient in animal feed.
"When you find something like that, you know it can be converted from making animal feed, if they indeed did make animal feed, to the production of another agent," he said Friday.
U.S. Ambassador Pete Peterson and Vietnamese Ambassador Le Van Bang will share the stage at Brown University this afternoon in their first joint public forum since the two nations normalized relations in 1994.
Peterson, a former congressman from Florida and Air Force pilot who was shot down near Hanoi while flying his 67th combat mission over Vietnam in 1966, spent 6-1/2 years as a prisoner of war before returning to Hanoi this year as U.S. ambassador.
This afternoon's session is open to the public and is free of charge. It will be held at Brown's Salomon Center for Teaching on the university's main campus green off Angell Street at 4 p.m. and will be moderated by Ralph Begleiter, world affairs correspondent for CNN.
By George Jahn, Associated Press writer
CHRUDIM, Czech Republic -- At West Point, they taught him to be all he could be. Back home with his country preparing for NATO, the young officer found that in today's Czech army that's precious little.
After four years at America's famous military academy, Lt. Petr Vohralik reported home for duty in July, wanting to make a difference. NATO was about to make history by issuing invitations to former Soviet bloc enemies Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic.
Now, the 25-year-old scorns the Czech NATO aspirations he once espoused. The cash-starved and ill-motivated army is not ready to join the high-tech NATO club, he says. He has filed to resign his commission.
ROME -- Center-left mayors in Rome, Naples and Venice won big victories in local elections yesterday, exit polls showed, giving a boost to Premier Romano Prodi's governing coalition and leaving the opposition in tatters.
The polls showed all three incumbents winning more than 50 percent of the votes cast, thus avoiding run-offs in two weeks.
"It's an extraordinary success," said Rome Mayor Francesco Rutelli, his eyes tearing. His center-right opponent, first-time candidate Pierluigi Borghini, conceded defeat even before the polls closed.
The contests in Rome, Naples and Venice were just three of the 421 mayoral races decided in yesterday's elections. Ballots were also cast for seats in five provincial assemblies in the north. Nearly 10 million Italians were eligible to vote.
MEXICO CITY -- A stone frieze uncovered at a 1,500-year-old Mayan temple complex is evidence that a book of Mayan history and cosmology written after the Spanish conquest may indeed be authentic, archeologists say.
The bas-relief stone carving was found near the Acropolis, a 226-foot main pyramid at Tonina, in the southern state of Chiapas. The 15-acre temple complex is believed to have been the last capital of the Mayan empire.
The carving, about a square-yard in size, depicts four Mayan 'governors' representing the lords of the underworld just as they are described in the Popol Vuh, a book that long was believed to describe the Mayan version of their history.
WASHINGTON -- The bullet that killed Abraham Lincoln lies in a glass display case alongside his doctor's bloodstained shirt cuffs. Around the corner, dental instruments thought to belong to Paul Revere hang from a wall.
Nearby is the leg bone of Dan Sickles, a Civil War general who preserved his shot-off limb for posterity at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center and visited it occasionally.
It's a museum where such quirkiness is commonplace but rarely seen by the millions who visit Washington every year.
LONDON -- The butler to Diana, Princess of Wales, has been appointed to a Government committee set up to agree a permanent national memorial to mark her life.
Paul Burrell, a truck driver's son with a mining background, will be joined by Diana's brother, Earl Spencer. The committee is headed by Chancellor Gordon Brown.
A government spokesman said Burrell was close to Diana and was probably better placed than anyone else to suggest what kind of memorial she would have liked, and how she would have wanted to spend the millions raised to help the charities with which she was associated.
BOSTON -- Metropolitan Boston has always prided itself on being a sports town, with its dynasty of professional teams and knowledgeable fans.
But a new survey shows the city is seriously negligent in offering sports opportunities to children.
The study, conducted as a joint effort by Northeastern University's Center for The Study of Sport in Society and Center for Criminal Justice Policy Research, concluded that only one third of Boston schoolchildren participate in sports, compared to 90 percent in the suburbs.
BOSTON -- Not since O.J. Simpson's murder trial has there been a trial as hotly debated as Louise Woodward's.
Both cases were followed closely around the world. And after both trials, a large percentage of the public thought the juries got it wrong, fueling a backlash against the jury system that has been under way for some time.
"The jury always rests on a fragile base of public opinion," said Jeffrey Abramson, a visiting professor at Harvard and author of "We, the Jury," a book critical of juries.
BOSTON -- For all its explosive public twists and turns, the case of Louise Woodward remains a mystery.
The lingering question: Could an 8-month-old child, as the defense maintained, sustain a mortal blow to the head and continue for weeks to appear as if nothing had happened?
No, a majority of doctors say.
One group of doctors from San Diego looked at 15 years of medical records of children who died of injuries similar to those suffered by Matthew Eappen, the child Woodward stands convicted of killing, and concluded that such a serious injury would not go unnoticed for long.
BOSTON -- White-collar crime remains a persistent, costly problem in Massachusetts, fueled by the sense that it will not be punished with the jail time usually given for violent offenses, according to a new report.
Attorney General Scott Harshbarger, whose office produced the report, now wants the Legislature to pass laws that increase the penalties for white-collar crime and replace administrative reprimands with incarceration.
"The tolls of these crimes are felt by each one of us in the form of what I have termed the 'fraud tax,"' Harshbarger said in the opening message of the report, a copy of which was obtained by The Associated Press.
Question: If you have an older parent, of retirement age, should you convince them to set up a trust for their investments? -- A.S. Wareham
Answer: Trusts offer many advantages, and your parent may want to consider a revocable living trust as part of his or her overall estate plan. One advantage that could be critically important to both you and an older parent is the protection trusts offer in the event of incapacity.
WASHINGTON -- They are known as "cats and dogs," the legislative equivalent of small domestic animals, and they were running freely through Congress during the final days of this year's session.
These are not the show horses of Capitol Hill, like the balanced-budget law enacted earlier this year. Nor are they the legislative beasts of burden, like the 13 annual appropriations bills that carry the money to keep government agencies operating each year.
No, these are the bills so insignificant, in the eyes of members, that they are passed by voice vote in both chambers, with little or no debate. Renewal of commercial fishing restrictions for East Coast striped bass. Revised appeals procedures for veterans fighting a denial of benefits. Expansion of Boys and Girls Club facilities nationwide.
Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light. (Romans 13:12.)
In so many words, accompanied by spirited music, rhythmic body English, prayers of praise and entreaty, and slayings in the spirit (anointings resulting in collapsed bodies), that's what the "soldiers of light" at New Bedford's Redeeming Family Church did last weekend.
The Holy Ghost (whose more politically correct "Holy Spirit" has yet to catch the fancy of our Redeeming Family) thereupon took over the assembly, summarily dismissing the Prince of Darkness and causing hearts and souls and feet to dance with joy in the dazzling light.
The opening hymn set the tone. In sprightly tempo, the lead singers sparked the congregation, massed cheek by jowl from door to rafters, to full-throated participation in praising the "somebody" who "picked me up and turned me around" and delivered "my feet to higher ground."
Did you know that 'Mike's angel' was photographed on the Feast of the Guardian Angels? No? Well, that's just the first of some interesting convergences
In the air space over and around Padanaram, angels are nothing new.
Nor are the conjunctions, experiential or mythical, that connect angelic encounters with biblical history and ecclesiastical observance.
For instance, it was not lost on some of The Standard-Times' more perspicacious readers that October 2, the day photographer Mike Valeri took his now-famous angel picture over Padanaram harbor, was the Feast of the Guardian Angels on the church calendar.
The late Cardinal Joseph Bernardin of Chicago asked to be called "your brother Joseph." Some priests have taken to calling his replacement "Francis the Corrector."
Priests are complaining that the leader of the nation's second-largest archdiocese injects himself into everything from the color of funeral vestments to the placement of kneelers.
"We want you to lead us, but not micromanage us," said the letter to Archbishop Francis George from 43 priests. "We do not want to bully you nor do we want you to bully us."
The priests -- among 958 in the diocese -- complained about "a series of issues which have led to the unfortunate nickname Francis the Corrector."
Hannah School students in Beverly, Mass., won't be the only ones busy with homework this year. Their parents will also be working hard to raise $30,000, the most ambitious goal to date for Beverly's PTA.
"What we're really trying to do is give teachers more money to spend in the classrooms," says PTA co-president Jennifer Gilardi. "Some teachers end up spending $500 of their own money."
While parents have always organized bake sales and car washes to earn extra money for their child's school, the fund raising these days has grown more organized, more profitable, and in many cases, more savvy than years past.
Violence committed by teen-age boys and girls, against their peers or others, has become all-too-commonplace. No community is immune.
Such violence stems from multiple causes rooted in normal adolescence. During that time, a teen-ager gradually detaches from childlike ways of thinking, feeling and behaving to become an individual less dependent on adults.
Ideally, healthy development encourages the teen to incorporate positive values of home and community while allowing constructive expression of self.
Eight-year-old Anna looked forward to saying hello to her art teacher, as her classmates bunched and competed for first on line.
Then she waited for the teacher's OK before she entered the cafeteria; when she got there, there was no space left at the girl's table. She stood, looking very alone, as three classes of second-graders began to loudly trade lunches. Anna looked sad as she timidly looked for a place to sit. Once again second-grade lunch was a huge disappointment.
An hour later, 10-year-old Darren also looked alone and ignored on the playground. The other boys played basketball, pushing and yelling at each other.
The wheeling and dealing that remains one of Major League Baseball's most endearing features will be on center stage Tuesday in Phoenix.
The three-round expansion draft starts at 4 p.m., but there's more at stake than just stocking the Arizona Diamondbacks and Tampa Bay Devil Rays.
The Florida Marlins are holding a patio sale on most of their high-priced talent, and pitchers like Pedro Martinez and Randy Johnson are on the market.
The Red Sox are a central player in this tornado, with pitcher Jeff Suppan a possible high draft pick and veterans Tim Naehring and Reggie Jefferson also possible expansion picks. The Sox also have been linked to trades for Pedro Martinez, Robb Nen, Gary Sheffield and Matt Williams. Brian Rose or Carl Pavano could be part of the bait.
TAMPA -- They thought they had turned around a disappointing season last weekend in Buffalo.
They were wrong.
Dead wrong.
Because the New England Patriots didn't just get beaten by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers yesterday at Houlihan's Stadium.
They got run over, splattered, flattened silly in a 27-7 loss that may well have been their most inept and pathetic performance since the early days of the Dick MacPherson era.
TAMPA -- Quarterback Drew Bledsoe probably suspected he might be in for a long afternoon when he was dropped for a 10-yard loss on the Patriots' first possession yesterday.
But if the inability of the offensive line to keep Chidi Ahanotu, Brad Culpepper, Regan Upshaw and Warren Sapp out of his face wasn't bad enough, the fact wide receiver Terry Glenn wasn't around didn't help.
"He's a major part of our offense and any time you take a weapon like him away, you may have problems," said tailback Curtis Martin. "He's a definite asset and we missed having him out there, making plays."
Glenn, the AFC's offensive rookie of the year last season, sat out yesterday's mismatch against the Tampa Bay Bucs with a strained hamstring. He had missed two earlier games and been used sparingly in a third after spraining an ankle.
By Steve Herman, Associated Press writer
INDIANAPOLIS -- The Indianapolis Colts finally found a team they could beat and it turned out to be the defending Super Bowl champions.
Cary Blanchard kicked a 20-yard field goal as time expired as the Colts beat the Green Bay Packers 41-38 yesterday. It was the Colts' first victory this season but the third game-winning field goal by Blanchard against the defending Super Bowl champion in three years.
"At the end, I was kind of thinking on the sideline, 'Get me a little closer, a little closer, run the time down,'" Blanchard said.
With the Colts lined up at the Packers' 3-yard line, the game-winner was nothing more than an extra-point kick, a gimme.
By The Associated Press
Hold the talk about Carolina being a budding dynasty in the NFC West. The old one is back.
Treating Carolina as a one-year wonder, the San Francisco 49ers reclaimed the division title from the team that took it from them, defeating Carolina 27-19.
Getting an electrifying kickoff return for a touchdown from Terry Kirby and surviving a blocked field goal late in the game, the 49ers (10-1) won their 10th straight to wrap up their 13th division title in 17 years and sixth in the 1990s.
"It feels great to take it back from the team that had taken it away from us so boldly," said Steve Young, who threw for a score and ran for another while completing 17 of 22 passes for 221 yards.
Dartmouth's sewer problems are not unique. The Standard-Times' suggestion on Nov. 12 that "there are two basic directions for the town to go, a piecemeal and expensive rebuilding of ... septic systems or ... equally expensive sewers" is incorrect. In April this year, the EPA endorsed "decentralized wastewater treatment" in a report to Congress. Decentralization is a hybrid approach that involves the formation of management districts within which a number of properties share a small flow advanced wastewater treatment system designed specifically for their location and waste stream. Just as we have moved from mainframe computer systems to PCs, so will wastewater treatment become distributed and decentralized.
The New Bedford City Council is tying itself in knots over a "dilemma": whether to wait until Frederick Kalisz Jr. takes over as mayor in January, or act now to appoint 18 people to various city boards and commissions -- appointments made by outgoing Mayor Rosemary Tierney. For the mayor's part, the deed is done and the reason is transparent: This is her last chance to stack various boards with her own people before Mr. Kalisz takes the helm. If, in the process, Mr. Kalisz has trouble dealing with any of these boards because of a difference of opinion -- or, heaven forbid, political bad blood -- well, that's just a nasty bonus from the previous administration. It's "routine," as the mayor's spokesman put it, as if messing with a new mayor's agenda is routine and therefore acceptable.
Excerpts of a speech on Oct. 24 in the House of Representatives by Congressman Barney Frank presents one view of the failure of U.S. trade policy in light of "fast track" legislation ("U.S. trade policy is no friend of Southeastern Massachusetts workers," Nov. 7). Certainly, there is no disagreement with Congressman Frank's perspective on my part; however, there is an equally pertinent argument as to the deleterious effects of trade policy and "fast track" authority. There is a major difference between trade treaties such as NAFTA and GATT and fast track authority. NAFTA and GATT are negotiated trade treaties with real and implied intent. Fast track authority gives the Executive Branch of government the right to negotiate those treaties but not transfer constitutional power, mandated to Congress to advise and consent. It's an all or nothing vote, thank you, no advice necessary.
It would have been the perfect November "sweeps" ratings-getter: "Bill Cosby and the Olsen Twins Salute 50 Years of TV Sitcoms ... with Special Guests Mary Kay and Johnny Stearns!"
Or maybe, "A Golden Sitcom Celebration, Starring Kelsey Grammer and Roseanne ... with Special Guests Mary Kay and Johnny Stearns!"
The sitcom's big Five-O arrives just weeks into a TV season gorged with more sitcoms than ever before. Consider: 62, on top of the half-century of sitcoms that preceded them. If you had a dollar for every one, you'd have almost as much money as Jerry Seinfeld earns from his.
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