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Chinese traffic jam in Xiamen, south China

Why We're 'Not Winning': The Bush administration made lots of mistakes in 2006. Can it correct them in 2007?

Lessons of Vietnam: How to avoid a repeat, and why it's crucial to do so.

Is Conservatism Finished?

#3 Michigan vs. #5 USC

Monday, Jan. 1 • 5 p.m. EST
Rose Bowl • Pasadena, CA
ABC Sports

Rose Bowl History

Past Game Scores

• Michigan (11-1; 7-1 vs. Big 10); USC (10-2; 7-2 vs. Pac 10)
• USC leads the series 5-4-0
• Series Streak: USC has won last two
  

Michigan's Rose Bowl History
Record in Rose Bowl: 8-11
Record vs. USC in Rose Bowl: 2-5
First Game: January 1, 1902 (Michigan 49, Stanford 0)
Last Appearance: January 1, 2005 (Texas 38, Michigan 37)

Michigan's BCS Bowl History
Record in BCS Bowls: 1-2
Previous BCS Bowl Results:
January 1, 2000 - Orange Bowl (Michigan 35, Alabama 34, OT)
January 1, 2004 - Rose Bowl (Southern Cal 28, Michigan 14)
January 1, 2005 - Rose Bowl (Texas 38, Michigan 37)

Michigan Key Stats:

• U-M will go for its third 12-win season against USC.
• Woodley Wins Hendricks Award as Top Defensive End
• Woodley Wins 37th Annual Lombardi Award
• Former U.S. President, U-M Alum Gerald R. Ford Dies
  

AP: Preview
ESPN: Pressure Release
USC, Michigan look to take out frustration in Rose Bowl
Google News: U-M vs. USC

ESPN: Michigan Clubhouse
Yahoo!: Michigan Team Page
Detroit Free-Press: Michigan Team Page
Detroit News: Michigan Clubhouse

Michigan Stats

• Michigan is #3 in the BCS, #3 in the AP Poll, #3 in the USA Today Coaches' Poll and #3 in the Sagarin rankings
  
• Michigan has more wins that any football program in NCAA history, 860.
• Michigan has the highest winning percentage of any team in NCAA history 860-281-36 (.7465xxx).
• Michigan will play its 366th game (271-84-10, .75x) when ranked in the Top 10 in the AP Poll. They are 8-0 this year. They are 18-6-1 all-time when ranked #2 and 4-0 this year.
  
• Michigan ranks #1 all-time in composite AP final football polls (1936-2005)
• Michigan has 42 Big 10 titles which is the most conference titles of any NCAA school and is 456-164-18 (.73x) in Big 10 play.
  
• Michigan has the most weekly appearances in the AP poll, appearing 735 times since 1936.
  
• Michigan has led the nation in attendance 31 of the last 32 years
• Michigan has had 200 consecutive crowds of 100,000+ fan at "The Big House" - a streak started Nov. 8, 1975
  
• Michigan has compiled a 368-106-15 record (.768) at "The Big House"
• Michigan has appeared in 32 straight bowls, the longest current streak in NCAA history.
• 368 Michigan football games have been televised (248-112-8), which leads the NCAA.
  
• The Michigan football program is the only Big 10 team in any sport to win a conference title in each decade. It is the winningest overall athletic program in Big 10 Conference history
• Michigan has appeared in more Rose Bowls (20) than any other Big 10 Conference school
• Michigan has 11 national championships (5th all-time) to OSU's 7
• Michigan's five current NFL quarterback's are more than any other school in the country.

Lloyd Carr Stats

• Head coach Lloyd Carr has a career winning percentage of .76x (113-35), ranking him fifth among active Division I coaches.
  
• He is 41-7 (.841) against Big 10 foes at Michigan Stadium and 34-14 on the road. He has the best winning percentage (69-9 .885) of any U-M coach at Michigan Stadium.
• Coach Carr is 47-19 while ranked in the Top 10.
• Michigan has a 39-22 overall record against nationally ranked teams under Carr. They are 16-7 against Top 10 opponents; 8-3 against teams in the Top 5; 4-1 against No. 2 ranked teams; and 0-2 against opponents ranked #1. He is 4-4 against OSU teams ranked in the Top 10 and 1-3 against OSU at Ohio Stadium when U-M is ranked in the Top 10.
  
• He leads active Big 10 coaches with 75 conference wins, 75-21 (.78x), a mark he grabbed in 2003.
  
• Carr is 6-6 against OSU and 2-4 in Columbus.
  
• He is the 8th coach in conference history to claim five or more Big 10 championships.

Michigan Blogs:

• Big House Football
• Blah Me To Death
• The Blog That Yost Built
• Champions Of The West
• The Diag
• iBlog For Cookies
• Maize 'n' Brew
• The M Zone
• MGoBlog
• Michigan Sports Center
• Michigan Football Saturdays
• Mr. Wolverine
• Ron Bellamy's Underachieving All Stars
• Schembechler Hall
• Stadium And Main
• Westsider Rider

Bono to Receive Honorary Knighthood

The British Ambassador to Ireland, Mr David Reddaway, announced today that Bono is being awarded an honorary knighthood.

As Bono is Irish he is not entitled to the 'Sir' title, as a British national would be, and he can receive the award in a ceremony in Dublin. The award is being granted for his services to music and for his activism.

In 2003 Bono was presented with the Legion D'Honneur by President Jacques Chirac on behalf of the French Government, for his contribution to music and his campaigning work. Also in recognition of his work promoting justice and equality, Bono was awarded the Time Person of the Year 2005, along with Bill and Melinda Gates.

British honours are granted by The Queen, on advice from the British Government and previous non-British recipients include Bill Gates, Placido Domingo, Rudolf Giuliani, Steven Spielberg and Simon Wiesenthal.

We understand that Bono is 'very flattered' to be honoured, particularly if the honour - like its French counterpart - opens doors for his long standing campaigning work against extreme poverty in Africa.

U2charist on Nightline

Window In The Skies video

Book Review: U2 & Philosophy: How to Decipher an Atomic Band

U2 fans will find that the book is riddled with errors about U2's history. While the writers took great care to provide correct information regarding the philosophers they quote from and cite, the same is not true about their information gathering about U2. Some examples of these errors include when the band first formed, when albums were released, and stating that songs like "Acrobat" and "Always" were performed live during the Zooropa tour, which they weren't. There are too many historical errors to list here, but the bottom line is that it makes the reader think that these essayists are not familiar enough with U2's work to make a solid case for their argument.

What is also troubling about this book is that the majority of the authors make sweeping generalizations about U2's fans, the band themselves, and U2's music without offering any support...

This book is not designed for a casual U2 fan. It is also not designed for someone with no background in philosophy. For the U2 fan who has read every book available on the band and found John Waters' Race of Angels a tough read, you are in for a similar experience. You'll be challenged in many ways, but not in the ways a U2 fan would hope to be. I found myself questioning if some of the authors even listened to U2's music, or even if they were fans?

If the book's intention was to show me "how to decipher an atomic band," it left me wondering how on Earth the authors would think that Bono had Descartes, Derrida, Aristotle or Plato in mind whilst writing a lyric. I'm sure Bono's familiar with some of the philosophers, but to actually believe that Bono's writing of "Vertigo" was a direct correlation to the works of Aristotle is a tough pill to swallow.

Letter from China: The sex industry is everywhere but nowhere

SHANGHAI: What's the fastest-growing industry in China? Mobile phones? Computer components? Toys? The last wouldn't be too far off, but not in the sense that the word toys is conventionally understood. Call them playthings.

Anecdotal evidence is the best one can do for a field such as this, but a bet could be placed on the sex industry. Yes, prostitution.

It is scarcely possible to walk for 10 minutes in any big Chinese city without coming across the sex trade in one of its many guises. Prostitutes work in most hotels, and are indeed employed by the hotels, including the state- owned ones. They work the streets, the clubs, and massage and sauna parlors, which range from monstrously gaudy to grimy holes in the wall.

They can be found in barber shops and beauty salons; sometimes they are the only people working in such establishments. And they are present — no, ubiquitous — at every class level of society, down to the poorest neighborhoods of Shanghai and the lowliest villages.

Numbers range all over the board, from the official estimates one sees from time to time of 3 million prostitutes nationwide, to U.S. State Department reports that have placed the figure at 10 million, to a Chinese economist, Yang Fan, who has estimated there are 20 million sex workers in the country, accounting for fully 6 percent of the country's gross domestic product.

EyePress/AP

Police raid

Coming back to anecdotal impressions, it would not surprise this writer if all of these figures were low. Beyond the numbers, though, it is when one considers that before economic changes were introduced a quarter- century ago, there was essentially no open prostitution in China at all — none — that one is most astounded.

Ordinarily, a phenomenon that had grown so fast and become this vast would be grist for all manner of conversation, from the public health implications of near-universal prostitution, to the social causes of gender inequality, high unemployment and blossoming organized crime, just for a start. From there one might move on to a discussion of profound changes in social values to the need for legal reform.

One of the most basic notions in law is that an unenforceable law is a bad law. The existence of millions of prostitutes makes a mockery of China's legal code, whose formal banning of a deeply entrenched activity forces women into the hands of organized crime and furthers their vulnerability and marginalization.

Perhaps the most striking feature of China's booming prostitution industry, though, is how little ink is expended on it, how seldom its extent is even acknowledged.

In a relaxed moment the other day, a Chinese official made this startling confession: "I read the foreign press to learn about things that are happening in China. The Chinese press doesn't write about bad news."

When I moved to object to categorizing news as "good" or "bad," he waved me off, saying: "Don't worry. When there are problems, I think it is good to focus on them."

Although generally invisible in polite society, two very different kinds of prostitution have managed to work their way into China's national consciousness in the last few weeks, and they speak volumes about a huge and yawning class divide here.

At the end of November, officials in Shenzhen, the southern boomtown, got the bright idea of reviving the Cultural Revolution for the purposes of temporarily cracking down on its prostitutes.

This came to pass as a face-preserving measure after a regional television station broke with decorum by mentioning the existence of this industry in a city famous throughout Asia for its sex trade.

To send the message that Shenzhen was actually a clean and proper place, the police dressed several dozen prostitutes in identical yellow smocks and marched them through the streets of Futian district, to be shamed by a jeering crowd and have their names and hometowns announced to all.

A few weeks earlier, beginning with the still unfolding political corruption scandal in Shanghai, Chinese newspaper readers were treated to stories detailing the sex lives of public officials, including the city's party leader, Chen Liangyu, who is said to have maintained 11 "mistresses."

The quotation marks are warranted because in its apparently most common, high-level Chinese form, such relationships are typically as money- based as an hour with a sauna girl, only more elaborately contractual, sometimes including the frequency of sex, and are, of course, incomparably more lucrative.

Soon, Chinese blogs and Internet forums were competing to reveal the details — albeit rumored details — of public officials and their kept women from one end of the country to the other.

In parts of Africa, another region of the world where such practices are rife, these women are known as "second offices." Journalists who work on that continent learn that one usually reliable gauge of corruption is the flamboyance with which politicians bring new women aboard.

For a long time, the late leader of Zaire, Mobutu Sese Seko, was a dubious champion in such matters, establishing families with both his wife and her identical twin, among many other liaisons.

China's governing class may have something even on Mobutu, though. According to press reports, when he was caught up in a corruption scandal in 2000, the head of the Jiangsu Province Construction Bureau, Xu Qiyao, was found to have had relations with over 100 women, including a mother and her daughter. Lin Longfei, the former Communist Party secretary of Zhouning County, in Fujian Province, reportedly kept 22 mistresses simultaneously and held a banquet for them all in May 2002.

The mistresses of officials don't get dragged through the streets. Indeed, their easy path to wealth is envied by many. Low and high, there is degradation for all women, though, in this commerce, and nowhere so much as in the silence that surrounds it.

E-mail: pagetwo@iht.com

Download U2 concert bootlegs in mp3

Rumsfeld Honored at Pentagon, Bids Farewell

Farewell Parade As Delivered by Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld, The Pentagon, Washington, DC, Friday, December 15, 2006 WASHINGTON, Dec. 15, 2006 – The Defense Department bid farewell to the 21st secretary of defense, Donald H. Rumsfeld, in a full honors parade at the Pentagon today. Story › Cheney, Pace Praise Rumsfeld at Farewell Ceremony › Bush Praises Rumsfeld’s Transformation Efforts › Rumsfeld Interview with Brit Hume of Fox News Channel

Rumsfeld Sends Out Final 'Snowflake' WASHINGTON, Dec. 15, 2006 – In his six years in the Pentagon, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was infamous for his "snowflakes" -- memos that flew from his fingers giving various staff members and sections sometimes short-notice and short-suspense tasks. Today he sent out a final snowflake, thanking the men and women of the Pentagon for their long hours and multitude of missions. And he granted amnesty for all outstanding snowflakes. Story

Rumsfeld: U.S. at ‘Time of Great Consequence’ WASHINGTON, Dec. 15, 2006 – The war on terrorism is a difficult task, but it is not hopeless or without purpose, outgoing Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said here today. Story

Truman gives Bush hope for a legacy

Dictatorships & Double Standards, by Jeane Kirkpatrick

Why the New Right Lost February 1977

U.S. Security & Latin America January 1981

How the PLO Was Legitimized July 1989

LAMAR HUNT: 1932-2006

Chiefs owner Lamar Hunt dies
Hunt's Chiefs won Super Bowl IV. (AP)		Kansas City owner Lamar Hunt, who came up with the term "Super Bowl," died Wednesday night from prostate cancer. He was 74. Story Reaction: Remembered as an innovator Snapshot: The man through the years

Stories
• Pioneering Chiefs owner Lamar Hunt dies at 74
• Clayton: Hunt always had common touch
• Luksa: Humble Hunt never afraid to think big
• Dell'Apa: Hunt a quiet pioneer of U.S. soccer
• Thoughts and reactions on Lamar Hunt

Video
• Lamar Hunt passes away at age 74

Timeline
• Lamar Hunt through the years

Marriage and Caste in America

The eschatology of U2

Rattle & Hum

Previous albums

The Power of the Press

The media is in need of some mending.

BY PETER R. KANN
Wednesday, December 13, 2006 12:01 a.m. EST

Thomas Jefferson, a better president than we've had in a very long time, penned a line back in 1787: "Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without government, I would not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter." By 1807, in his seventh year as president and after seven years of being subjected to severe press criticism, he wrote: "I deplore the putrid state into which our newspapers have passed, and the malignity, the vulgarity and the mendacious spirit of those who write them."

You'll be relieved to know that Jefferson did remain true to his primary principle: "The press," he concluded, "is an evil for which there is no remedy. Liberty depends upon freedom of the press and that cannot be limited without being lost." He was right then, and we are right now, to prefer a free press, however flawed, to any controlled alternative. Still, as we watched CNN flashing its pre-election logos each day--"Broken Borders," "Broken Government," "Broken Politics," Broken Everything--I can't help thinking the media, too, is in need of some mending.

At its best news informs and enlightens the citizens of a free society and thereby safeguards and strengthens our democracy. At its worst--dishonest, unfair, irresponsible--the media has potential to erode the public trust on which its own success depends and to corrode the democratic system of which it is so indispensably a part. So, let me touch on 10 current trends in the mass media that ought to disturb us.

The blurring of the lines between journalism and entertainment. Journalism that puts too high a priority on entertaining is almost destined to distort and mislead. Compounding this confusion is a diffusing definition of "journalist." When political operatives moonlight at moderating news shows, when people alternate between being political editors and political consultants, when celebrity newspeople pocket $20,000 fees speaking at corporate conventions while criticizing congressman for conflicts of interest--we jumble public perceptions of newspeople as well as news.

The blurring of lines between news and opinion. Newspapers have a format that helps maintain the distinction. The Internet, TV and most magazines have neither that format nor that tradition. The result is a blending of news and views. The two are not ingredients to mix together for a tastier meal, they are different courses. Part of the problem here lies in fashionable new philosophies that argue there are no basic values of right and wrong, that news is merely a matter of views. It's a dangerous philosophy for our society and a dagger at the heart of genuine journalism.

The blending of news and advertising, sponsorships or other commercial relationships. The resulting porridges may be called "advertorials" or "infomercials"; they may be special sections masquerading as news, news pages driven by commercial interests, or Web pages where everything somehow is selling something. Without clear distinctions between news and advertising, readers or viewers lose confidence in the veracity of a news medium. And advertisers lose the business benefit of an environment of trust.

The problems and pitfalls inherent in pack journalism. Individually, most reporters are decent, dedicated, fair-minded people. But the press, en masse, tends to lose its common sense and its sense of fairness and independence and what we see all too often is the spectacle of a pack of hounds in pursuit of a quarry. We frequently see this phenomenon in political reporting, where the faintest whiff of scandal, or even of weakness, can send the pack in pursuit. At its worst, the pack, not finding a real problem, proclaims the "perception" of one and this perception becomes self-fulfilling.

The issue of conflict and context. On most issues most Americans are not on polar extremes. On abortion, for example, most seek a sensible center. Where is that center reflected in media coverage that mainly portrays rabid feminists or irate pro-life activists? Balance is not achieved by the talk show format of two extremists yelling at each other. And how many of us recognize our own communities from their depiction on local TV news shows--a nonstop montage of mayhem, murder, rape, arson, child molestation and more?

The exaggerated tendency toward pessimism. Just look back a few years over much of the media coverage of "American competitiveness." All those news magazine covers on the coming "Japanese Century." And along with it, all the pessimism about the ability of U.S. industry to compete globally. It was nonsense. Similarly, it's one thing--and an appropriate one--for the press to probe particular instances of political corruption. It's quite another thing to jump to the cynical conclusion that our political process, and all politicians, are corrupted--that "they all do it." They don't, and they aren't. Skepticism and criticism are essential to the media's role; reflexive pessimism is not.

The growing media fascination with the bizarre, the perverse and the pathological--John Mark Karr journalism. Such so-called journalism helps instantly legitimize crackpot ideas, deviant behavior, or alleged victimization in our society. My point is not to argue for "good news" vs. "bad news," but to ask whether much of this amounts to news at all?

Social orthodoxy, or political correctness. These are reflected in a media whose job is not to parrot prevailing fashions, but to question, probe and thereby challenge them. Businessmen are not, by definition, greedy, and environmentalists, by definition, saintly. Third World poverty is not, by definition, a result of overpopulation as opposed to inane economic policies. And so on.

The media's short attention span. As the press hops from Baghdad to Beirut, Natalee Holloway to Valerie Plame, Super Bowls to Super Tuesdays, it justifiably can blame some combination of the nature of the news and the short attention span of the public. The public, meanwhile, bombarded and bewildered can blame a fickle and shallow press. There are too many instant celebrities. Too many two-day crises. Too many "defining moments" from people in search of instant history. In a world where everything is considered critical, nothing needs to be taken very seriously.

The matter of power. The press is at least partially responsible for greater public skepticism toward traditional institutions in America. But the truth, not lost on our public, is that the press is a large and powerful institution, too: "60 Minutes" is more powerful than almost all of the subjects it exposes. This newspaper, arguably, has more influence on national economic policy than do most corporations. Networks are owned by giant industrial corporations, magazines by entertainment conglomerates, and most newspapers by national chains. Given these realties, we cannot plausibly pretend to be a David out there smiting Goliaths and expect the public to believe it.

Mr. Kann, a Pulitzer-winning journalist, is chairman of Dow Jones.

Donald Rumsfeld: The Exit Interview