New York Times Upfront articles from October 2006

New York Times Upfront archives from October 2006

A man basked.(news & TRENDS)(Brief article)
October 9, 2006... A MAN BASKED in a pool of tomato pulp during the annual "Tomatina" tomato fight in Bunol, Spain. Every August, thousands of people come from all over the world to pelt each other with tons of overripe tomatoes. To avoid serious injuries,...

Frogs airlifted to safety.(SCIENCE)(Brief article)
October 9, 2006... In a race to rescue amphibians threatened by a lethal fungus, two biologists from Atlanta recently boarded a plane carrying several suitcases filled with frogs gathered from a Central American rain forest. The waterborne fungus was making its...

Skull overkill.(FASHION)(Brief article)
October 9, 2006... With the full force of American consumer marketing behind it, the skull is a hot item--but it's losing much of its fearsome "outsider". meaning. Beyond the sea of skull wear like belts, T-shirts, ties, sneakers, cashmere sweaters, and...

Shooting some spice into space.(FASHION)(Brief article)
October 9, 2006... Meats served in orbit have come a tong way from the gelatin-coated food cubes and aluminum tubes of applesauce that sustained Gemini astronauts in the 1960s. NASA food scientists now know to add tots of spice to space fare because the senses of...

Numbers in the news.(news & TRENDS)
October 9, 2006... $250,000 Cost of a fully implantable artificial heart approved by the FDA in September for patients with severe congestive heart failure. SOURCE: THE NEW YORK TIMES 103 Screen size, in inches, of a plasma TV--the largest to...

Noted & quoted.(SOUNDBITES)
October 9, 2006... 'I want to fight in a war like World War II. I want to fight an enemy. And this, out here... it's a faceless enemy.' * SERGEANT CHRISTOPHER DUGGER on fighting insurgents in Iraq. (The Washington Post) 'SAT scores are way down this...

Judge turns to child's play.(LAW)(Brief article)
October 9, 2006... A federal judge in Florida recently borrowed from the culture of the schoolyard to resolve a dispute between two lawyers in an insurance lawsuit: He ordered them to "convene at a neutral location" and "engage in one game of rock, paper,...

Reducing road rage, one sign at a time.(Q & A)(Brief article)
October 9, 2006... When Chestina Perry, 18, of Columbia, S.C., first got behind the wheel, she felt intimidated by the impatient and aggressive drivers around her. So she came up with the idea for Drive Safe, a company she started with her mother in 2004 that...

Looking for a few big stars.(MOVIES)(Brief article)
October 9, 2006... With video games starting to outsell movie tickets, Hollywood will need a new generation of actors with enough "star quality" to draw crowds back into theaters. Top 16 stars by total film grosses since 1965 In billions of U.S. dollars ...

Banking for their future.(EDUCATION)(Brief article)
October 9, 2006... For students at Theodore Roosevelt High School in the Bronx, N.Y., remembering their lunch money may never be easier. This fall, North Fork Bank plans to open a full-service branch in the school lobby. It will be staffed by 17 students in the...

Downloading a slice of America.(EDUCATION)(Brief article)
October 9, 2006... By day, Ding Chentai, 23, works for a large bank in Shanghai. By night, he is obsessed with TV shows, like lost and CSI, that cannot be seen on Chinese television. So Ding spends his evenings adding Chinese subtitles to American sitcoms and...

Iraq what we're not seeing: more than 2,600 American soldiers have died in Iraq since 2003. Chances are, you haven't seen many photos like this one. David Carr explores some of the reasons why.(NEWS ANALYSIS)
October 9, 2006... When it comes to war photography, Vietnam remains the bloody yardstick. During the Tet Offensive in 1968 (weeks of intense battle which turned many Americans against the war), Time magazine ran a story with photos showing dozens of dead...

Nine-year-old alone Banda works six days a week: he's one of 49 million children in sub-Saharan Africa who are forced to work for a living. While child-labor rates are falling in most of the world, they're still on the rise in Africa.(Cover story)
October 9, 2006... In an abandoned quarry south of Lusaka, the capital of Zambia, children spend their days beating pieces of rock, slowly reducing them to gravel and powder. The output is I on display beside many of Zambia's highways--waist-high piles of gravel,...

The Reporter's Dilemma: when you're interviewing starving children, is it ethical to give them money?
October 9, 2006... I recently bought an elaborate dinner for some of my sources. If that sounds corrupt, so be it. These particular sources are stone-crushers who live in Zambia. Their lives are as miserable as any I have seen in three years covering Africa for...

The long road back: New Orleans and the Gulf Coast are on the mend, but recovering from the wrath of Katrina will clearly take years.(NATIONAL)
October 9, 2006... Although it has been more than a year since Hurricane Katrina slammed into the Gulf Coast, its aftermath is still difficult to grasp. Katrina killed more than 1,700 people in the Gulf area, left hundreds of thousands of others displaced, and...

Vicodin and OxyContin.(HEADS UP REAL NEWS ABOUT DRUGS AND YOUR BODY: A Message from Scholastic and The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA))(Brief article)
October 9, 2006... Legal but Dangerous Addiction can occur with many drugs, not just "street drugs" like heroin. Painkilling drugs such as Vicodin and OxyContin may seem safe because they're available by prescription, but many teens don't realize that they...

The science of addiction: what brain research tells us about drug addiction.(HEADS UP REAL NEWS ABOUT DRUGS AND YOUR BODY: A Message from Scholastic and The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA))
October 9, 2006... The impact of addiction can be far-reaching: * Cardiovascular disease * Stroke * Cancer * HIV/AIDS * Hepatitis C * Lung disease * Obesity * Mental disorders How serious is drug addiction? According...

The science of "Dread".(LATEST Research)(Brief article)
October 9, 2006... New research shows that people who substantially dread an adverse experience have a different biology than those who better tolerate the experience. Dr. Gregory Berns of Emory University School of Medicine and his colleagues used MRI...

It's all in the DNA: as DNA testing becomes more available, some people are checking into their ancestry and asking, What's in it for me?(NATIONAL)
October 9, 2006... Alan Moldawer's adopted twin boys had always thought of themselves as white. But when it came time for them to apply to college last year, Moldawer thought it might be worth investigating the origins of their slightly tan skin. He used a new...

The first amendment: a user's guide the most famous words in the constitution protect a host of rights for Americans--and still spur debate after 215 years.
October 9, 2006... Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise there of; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peacebly to assemble, and to petition the Government...

1791: The bill of rights: the constitution might never have been ratified without a promise to add safeguards of fundamental, rights.(TIMES PAST)
October 9, 2006... The Constitution, John Adams once said, was the result of "the greatest single effort of national deliberation that the world has ever seen." Indeed, it created a wonderfully calibrated structure for the new American nation, balancing the...

Should the records of ballplayers who used steroids count? As the baseball season winds down, the debate over steroid use continues to heat up.(DEBATE)
October 9, 2006... YES In 1998, Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa broke baseball's single-season home-run record. In 2001, Barry Bonds set the current record of 73 home runs in a season. All three men have been accused of using steroids or other drugs to...

An American in Tehran: a 19-year-old from the Midwest who spends summers with his family in Iran talks about how Iranian teens bend the rules to have fun.(VOICES)
October 9, 2006... The writer, a college sophomore in the United States, is not using his name out of concern for the safety of his family. Since I was born, my family has traveled to Iran every other summer to visit relatives. My parents were born there and,...

A college town back on its feet.(OPINION)(Brief article)
October 9, 2006... Before Hurricane Katrina, it was no secret that New Orleans's good-time reputation was part of what drew students to this precariously situated college town: You could get a quality education and stilt let the good times roll. But the...

Hot shoes, cool price.(OPINION)(Brief article)
October 9, 2006... The N.B.A. season won't begin until the end of this month, but New York Knicks point guard Stephon Marbury is already scoring points, at least with parents. In August, he introduced a high-performance sneaker--the Starbury One--that costs $15....

Why the Darfur genocide isn't just another human tragedy.(OPINION)(Brief article)
October 9, 2006... When I spoke at Cornell University recently, a woman asked why I always harp on Darfur. It's a fair question: You can make the argument that the genocide in Darfur is simply one of many world tragedies and that it would be more cost-effective...

Cartoons.(Brief article)(Cartoon)
October 9, 2006... JOE HELLER * Green Bay [Wis.] Press-Gazette MIKE LUCKOVICH * TheAtlanta Journal-Constitution GARY MARKSTEIN * Milwaukee Journal Sentinel * COPLEY NEWS SERVICE CHIP BOK * Akron [Ohio] Beacon Journal * CREATORS SYNDICATE STEVE...

Letter from the editor.(Letter to the editor)
October 9, 2006... In this issue, we focus on the Constitution. Our First Amendment "user's guide" explains what those 45 words mean in everyday life, and in Times Past, we look at the entire Bill of Rights and how it came to be. In both pieces, we examine why...

Teenage steroid use.(GRAPH > DEBATE/NATIONAL)(Brief article)
October 9, 2006... The use of illegal, performance enhancing drugs has become a scandal in professional sports like baseball, cycling, and track and field (see p. 27). The problem, however, is hardly limited to the pros. Surveys have found that tens of...

Game show.(Brief article)
October 9, 2006... Use with articles identified. The statements are answers to questions (modeled after the TV show Jeopardy!). Students must answer in the form of questions. Divide the class into teams. Read the statements. Call on the first...

The science of addiction.
October 9, 2006... --A message from Dr. Nora Volkow, Director of NIDA Dear Teacher: The National Institute on Drug Abuse and Scholastic realize that teachers can have a major impact on protecting children from becoming addicted to drugs of abuse. That is...

Lesson plan & reproducible.(Brief article)
October 9, 2006... Lesson Plan & Reproducible Preparation: Before displaying the lesson, make two photocopies of the Student Activity Reproducible for a pre- and post-lesson quiz. Lesson 1: Heads Up: What Do You Know About the Science of Addiction? ...

What do you know about the science of addiction?(HEADS UP REAL NEWS ABOUT DRUGS AND YOUR BODY)(Brief article)
October 9, 2006... Answer the questions below to find out what you know about drugs and drug addiction. For multiple choice questions, there may be more than one answer. 1. Drug addiction can be defined as a. a bad habit. b. the use of illegal...

Letter from the editor.(Editorial)
October 23, 2006... At the risk of sounding like a TV commercial, I'm happy to introduce Upfront's "new and improved" World Affairs issue. We've "renovated" the almanac and atlas, with "teen friendly" graphics and "news boxes" on events to watch for in 2007....

Chocolate: who makes it, who eats it.
October 23, 2006... Chocolate is one of the most popular foods in the world. It has been traded internationally for centuries, mostly from the underdeveloped to the developed world. Today, the biggest producers are in West Africa. Chocolate, made from cocoa...

Game show.
October 23, 2006... Use with articles identified. The statements are answers to questions (modeled after the TV show Jeopardy!). Students must answer in the form of questions. Divide the class into teams. Read the statements. Call on the first team...

Two champion.(beetle-fight season in Thailand)(Brief article)
October 23, 2006... TWO CHAMPION competitors duked it out last month in Thailand, where beetle-fight season is in full swing. Spectators place bets of up to 100 baht ($2.68) on the fights, in which the beetle that lifts its opponent up by its horns wins. Owners...

Kenyans greet Obama.(Barack Obama from Illinois)(Brief article)
October 23, 2006... If Senator Barack Obama ever wants to run for President--or become a rock star--he got excellent practice when he visited Kenya in August. Thousands of people lined the streets of Nairobi, Kenya's capital, just to get a glimpse of him. Obama, a...

Numbers in the news.(3.3 million Age, in years of a fossil discovered in Ethiopia)(9305 number of users watching YouTube)(50% increase in prices of pumpkin)(Brief article)
October 23, 2006... 50% Percentage increase in pumpkin prices in parts of the U.S. due to a shortage caused by heavy spring rains and an unusually hot summer. SOURCE: TIME 4,457 Number of American girls born in 2005 who were named Nevaeh--Heaven...

Horses to horsepower.(bikes are in use among Tibetan nomads)(Brief article)
October 23, 2006... Some of western China's Tibetan nomads are trading in their horses for motorcycles. They're using their new wheels--which cost less than horses--not only for traditional, tasks like herding livestock, but also for long-distance travel. Some...

Torturing pants for profit.(used, worn, or beat-up look jeans in trend)(Brief article)
October 23, 2006... Jeans with the used, worn, or beat-up look have become a major object of desire in America's $15 billion jeans market. At the heart of this trend are artificially aged garments engineered by Giovanni Petrin of Vedelago, Italy, whose factories...

Midterms: a tough test for Congress: polls show most Americans are unhappy with President Bush and even less happy with Congress. Will next month's midterm elections produce a big shake-up in Washington?(George W. Bush )
October 23, 2006... To some extent, the person many voters will be casting their ballots for or against on November 7 is not even running for office. "This election is a referendum on the President and his party, as mid-terms often are," says Andrew Kohut,...

Out of the jungle: what happens when a Stone Age people leaves the South American wilderness for the modern world?(INTERNATIONAL)
October 23, 2006... The Nukak-Maktu have lived a Stone Age life for eons, roaming across hundreds of miles of isolated and pristine Amazon jungle, killing monkeys with poison-tipped darts, and scouring the forest floor for berries. But recently, and rather...

Lost boy found: a young man whose childhood was shattered by a brutal civil war in Africa celebrates an achievement in America.(INTERNATIONAL)(Biography)
October 23, 2006... The Lost Boy arrived in Philadelphia in December 2000 with a name that was not quite his own: Joseph Malual Thuc. He was shivering in a white T-shirt and had never seen snow before. But Joseph's arrival in the United States marked an important...

Can Afghanistan stay the course? Five years after the overthrow of the Taliban, a fragile democracy is struggling to survive, even with the help of U.S. troops.(INTERNATIONAL)
October 23, 2006... Afghans used to call Lashkar Gah "Little America." The capital of Afghanistan's Helmand Province was a modern city, built up by the United States during the Cold War, with suburban-style houses and a hydroelectric dam. In 2001, it seemed like...

Should English be declared America's national language? A nation of immigrants considers the pros and cons of giving English official status.(DEBATE)
October 23, 2006... YES English is the official language of 51 nations and 27 states in the United States. Last year, a Zogby International Poll found that 85 percent of Americans supported making English the official language of all government operations. Among...

World affairs annual 2007.(international relations of different countries and regions using maps)
October 23, 2006... In the 22 pages that follow, you'll find maps and the latest data on air 194 countries in the world--everything from capital cities and languages to leaders and literacy rates. To better understand the data, read the explanations accompanying...

Economic map of the world.(using statistics)
October 23, 2006... LESSON PLAN 4: INTERNATIONAL BACKGROUND Statistics can tell an awful lot about countries, which is why many governments and aid organizations rely so heavily on them as assessment tools. Life expectancy, the age of a country's...

Europe.(population, head of governmnet and political system followed)(Table)
October 23, 2006... Tony Blair has said that he will step down as Prime Minister of the UNITED KINGDOM within the next year. Blair has been a close ally of President Bush, sending British troops to Afghanistan and Iraq--and earning him a good deal of criticism at...

Africa.(population, head of governmnet and political system followed)(Geographic overview)(Table)
October 23, 2006... Ethnic conflict in the Darfur region of SUDAN, where Arab militias are attacking black villages, has led to the deaths of 200,000 civilian and turned 2 million more into refugees. The Arab-dominated government has refused to allow U.N. troops...

Middle East.(population, head of governmnet and political system followed)(Table)
October 23, 2006... Three years after the American-led invasion that outsted Saddam Hussein, IRAQ is still largely in a state of upheaval, with Shiites and Sunnis killing each other on a daily basis. Many fear the country is on the verge of civil war, with 141,000...

Asia.(population, head of governmnet and political system followed)(Geographic overview)(Table)
October 23, 2006... U.S. and NATO forces are helping President Hamid Karzai of AFGHANISTAN battle a growing challenge from Taliban rebels. The Taliban, hard-line Islamists who let Afghanistan become a training ground for Al Qaeda, were overthrown in December 2001...

Oceania.(population, head of governmnet and political system followed)(Geographic overview)(Table)
October 23, 2006... The UNITED STATES continues its post-9/11 focus on security issues, including the struggle against Islamic terrorism and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Even the immigration debate has a security component, with Congress considering the...

North America.(population, head of governmnet and political system followed)(Geographic overview)(Table)
October 23, 2006... NORTH AMERICA URBAN AREA (SQ MI) POP. % POP. RISE COUNTRY POPULATION %/YEAR CAPITAL ANTIGUA...

South America.(population, head of government and political system followed )(Geographic overview)(Table)
October 23, 2006... At home in VENEZUELA or addressing the U.N. in New York, President Hugo Chavez continues to rail against the U.S., attempting to stoke anti-American feeling in the rest of Latin American. Chavez has been using oil revenue--Venezuela is the...

Snapshots.(countries with most cars, most people chewing bubble gum, religions dominating the world)(Table)
October 23, 2006... TOP 5 GUM CHEWERS (NON-BUBBLE) Consumption per capita in pounds, 2006 est. U.S. 1.3 DENMARK 1.3 UNITED KINGDOM 1.1 FINLAND 0.9 GREECE 0.9 ...

Cartoons.(Cartoon)
October 23, 2006... SO DO YOU AGREE WITH PRESIDENT BUSH THAT WE'RE A NATION AT WAR? WITH THE TERRORISTS, OR WITH EACH OTHER? BOB GORRELL GORRELLART.COM [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] AS NEAR AS I CAN TELL, THEY'RE FIGHTING OVER WHICH RELIGION IS THE...