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Zapata County faces wa-ter quality issues.

The Rio Grande in thecounty hasn’t been foundto have exorbitant bacterialevels like it has near In-ternational Bridge No. 2 inLaredo. The problem is

that water quality is un-der-studied, said MariciaPerez Rodriguez, a nativeZapatan who does consult-ing work for the TexasCommission on Environ-mental Quality — whichregulates water quality,among other things, in thestate.

Perez Rodriguez said

there are two samplingssites on the river in thecounty. One test site sam-ples twice a year; the othertests bacteria levels once ayear.

“We need to keep a bet-ter eye on it,” she said.“Somebody’s got to bemonitoring it.”

She said more testing

would require funding,which can be obtainedthrough grants from theTCEQ.

In San Ygnacio, melonand onion farmers drawtheir water directly fromthe river, Perez Rodriguezsaid.

RIO GRANDE

River bacteriaZapata native says water quality needs study

By JJ VELASQUEZTHE ZAPATA TIMES

See RIVER PAGE 9A

A man accused of call-ing in three differentbomb threats around thecounty was arrested May17.

Zapata County sheriff ’sofficials identified the al-leged offender as 29-year-old Ely Alaniz Jr. Investi-gators served him withwarrants charging himwith two counts of falsealarm and one count ofhoax bomb, both Class Amisdemeanors; one countof false alarm, a state jail

felony; and three counts ofterroristic threat by inter-rupting a public service, athird-degree felony.

Alaniz is out on bondfrom Zapata Regional Jail.

Sgt. Mario Elizondo saidinvestigators were busyfor the last two weeks pin-pointing the suspect whocalled in bomb threatsaround town. Deputies say

CRIME

Authorities say this artifact was made of PVC pipe, duct tape,wires and batteries, but lacked an explosive element.

Courtesy photo

Deputies sayman called inbomb threats

By CÉSAR G. RODRIGUEZTHE ZAPATA TIMES

ELY ALANIZ JR.:Facing charges re-lated to allegedbomb threats.

See THREATS PAGE 9A

REMEMBERINGVETERANS

Gold Star Mother Francisca Martinez sits next to a framed image of her son Guadalupe Martinez, killed in action during the Viet-nam War, during a Memorial Day ceremony held Friday at Memorial Middle School in Laredo. Area residents as well as Amer-icans everywhere will honor military veterans on Memorial Day, on Monday.

Photo by Cuate Santos | The Zapata Times

Four men were arrestedthis week in connectionwith a string of thefts ofmotor vehicle parts and ac-cessories within ZapataCounty.

Ruben Campos, 18, andAristo A. Villarreal, 18,were charged with theft, astate jail felony which car-ries a punishment of 180days to two years in jailand $10,000 fines. Both menwere at Zapata County Re-gional Jail as of Friday eve-ning.

Sgt. Mario Elizondo said

investigators have had theireyes on thefts of vehicle em-blems. According to Elizon-do, the thefts had been on-going for the past six

This pickup truck, deputies say, had parts stolen from it for resale.

Courtesy photo

Four facingtheft charges

Shown are emblems allegedlytaken in a series of thefts.

Courtesy photo

See ARRESTS PAGE 9A

CRIME

By CÉSAR G. RODRIGUEZTHE ZAPATA TIMES

PAGE 2A Zin brief SATURDAY, MAY 26, 2012

SATURDAY, MAY 26Day One for the BLT Open

Team Tournament.The ninth annual Juvencio de

Anda Memorial Day Golf Tournamentis today at 8 a.m. at the LaredoCountry Club. The tournament honorsthe late Bill Powell and Horace Wat-son. For more information, contactNancy de Anda at 763-9960.

SUNDAY, MAY 27Day Two for the BLT Open

Team Tournament.The LULAC No. 12 Bowling Tour-

nament is today at noon at Jett BowlNorth, 701 Gale St. The entry fee is$150 per team of five bowlers. Thetournament will raise funds for theLULAC No. 12 Scholarships and Gener-al Fund. For more information, contactBobby Treviño at 693-0019 or vtrevi-no9@stx.rr.com.

MONDAY, MAY 28Kindergarten graduation at 9

a.m. at Villarreal Elementary School.

THURSDAY, MAY 31Awards Day at 8:30 a.m. at Vil-

larreal Elementary School.The API Fishing Tournament be-

gins today and continues through Fri-day.

FRIDAY, JUNE 1Vidal M. Treviño School of Com-

munications and Fine Arts music de-partment’s 2012 Ballroom Gala-Danceis today from 7:30 p.m. to 11 p.m. atthe Laredo Civic Center (meetingrooms), 2400 San Bernardo Ave.VMT’s jazz ensemble SoundTown willbe featured. Tickets are $10 per per-son and are available at the VMT of-fice, located at 820 Main St. For moreinformation, contact Robert M. Lopezat 956-273-7811 or rmlopez@elisd.org.

MONDAY, JUNE 4The deadline for organizations

and businesses to submit an applica-tion for the City of Laredo’s Fourth ofJuly parade is today. This year’stheme is “Symbols of a Free Nation.”An entry fee is required by each unitpayable upon submission of the appli-cations. Entry fee for non-profit andtax-exempt organizations is $25 and$60 for commercial entries. Each en-try, float or nonfloat with a generatormust pay an additional fee of $20 forthe Laredo Fire Department for thefire extinguisher. For more parade en-try information, contact 210-588-9206or vparaderentals@yahoo.com.

TUESDAY, JUNE 5The Alzheimer’s support group

will meet today at 7 p.m. in meetingroom 2, Building B of the LaredoMedical Center, 1700 E. Saunders St.The support group is for family mem-bers and caregivers taking care ofsomeone who has Alzheimer’s. Formore information, call Melissa L.Guerra at 693-9991.

MONDAY, JUNE 11The Zapata Commissioners Court

will have its regular meeting today at9 a.m.

SATURDAY, JUNE 16Infinity Kill returns to Laredo

with special guest Signal Fist for aone-night engagement from 9 p.m. to2 a.m. at Cold Brew Rock Bar, 4520San Bernardo Ave. For more informa-tion, contact Christian Lee at 210-374-3165 or cksfrecords@gmail.com.

FRIDAY, JUNE 22Registration for the Second An-

nual Classic Bass Fishing Tournamentis from 3-7 p.m. at the boat ramp.

SATURDAY, JUNE 23The Second Annual Classic

Bass Fishing Tournament begins withweigh-in at 2:30 p.m. There will betwo person teams. Entry fee is $150per boat. First place is guaranteed$3,000.

MONDAY, JULY 9The Zapata Commissioners Court

will have its regular meeting today at9 a.m.

SATURDAY, AUG. 11The Back To School Kids Fish-

ing Tournament takes place today.To submit an item for the calendar,

send the name of the event, the date,time, location and contact phonenumber to editorial@lmtonline.com

CALENDARASSOCIATED PRESS

Today is Saturday, May 26,the 147th day of 2012. Thereare 219 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlights inHistory:

On May 26, 1942, the U.S.War Department formally es-tablished the Armed ForcesRadio Service (AFRS) duringWorld War II as a way ofboosting morale among Amer-ican troops overseas. Thatsame day, Radio Tokyo boastedof recent victories in the Pacif-ic War and declared that “theJapanese people can look for-ward to a triumphal march in-to London and a victorymarch in New York.” The Tule(TOO’-lee) Lake SegregationCenter, which held Japanese-American wartime internees,opened in northern Califor-nia.

On this date:In 1521, Martin Luther was

banned by the Edict of Wormsbecause of his religious beliefsand writings.

In 1868, the impeachmenttrial of President AndrewJohnson ended with his ac-quittal on the remainingcharges.

In 1938, the House Un-American Activities Commit-tee was established by Con-gress.

In 1940, the evacuation ofmore than 338,000 Alliedtroops from Dunkirk, France,began during World War II.

In 1941, the American FlagHouse, where Betsy Ross oncelived, was donated to the cityof Philadelphia.

In 1952, representatives ofthe United States, Britain,France and West Germanysigned the Bonn Conventiongranting conditional sover-eignty to, and ending the Al-lied occupation of, West Ger-many.

In 1960, U.N. AmbassadorHenry Cabot Lodge accusedthe Soviets of hiding a micro-phone inside a wood carvingof the Great Seal of the UnitedStates that had been presentedto the U.S. Embassy in Mos-cow.

In 1969, the Apollo 10 astro-nauts returned to Earth aftera successful eight-day dress re-hearsal for the first mannedmoon landing.

In 1972, President RichardM. Nixon and Soviet leaderLeonid Brezhnev signed theAnti-Ballistic Missile Treatyin Moscow. In 1981, 14 peoplewere killed when a Marine jetcrashed onto the flight deck ofthe aircraft carrier USS Ni-mitz off Florida.

In 1992, Charles Geschke,president and chief operatingofficer of Adobe Systems Inc.,was kidnapped in the compa-ny’s parking lot in MountainView, Calif., and held for ran-som. (Geschke was rescuedfour days later; his kidnapperswere arrested.)

Ten years ago: Fourteenpeople were killed when barg-es being pushed by a towboatcrashed into the piers of theInterstate 40 bridge in Oklaho-ma, causing part of the struc-ture to fall into the ArkansasRiver.

Today’s Birthdays: Rockmusician Garry Peterson(Guess Who) is 67. Singer Ste-vie Nicks is 64. Actress PamGrier is 63. Actor Philip Mi-chael Thomas is 63. Countrysinger Hank Williams Jr. is 63.Former astronaut Sally K.Ride is 61. Comedian BobcatGoldthwait is 50. Singer LennyKravitz is 48. Actress HelenaBonham Carter is 46. ActorJoseph Fiennes is 42.

Thought for Today: “I amnever afraid of what I know.”— Anna Sewell, English au-thor (1820-1878).

TODAY IN HISTORY

AUSTIN — The Republican primary battlefor a U.S. Senate seat turned nastier Fridaywhen Texas Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst impliedthat tea party favorite Ted Cruz supportsamnesty for illegal immigrants and Cruz re-taliated by saying Dewhurst is “race-baiting”and making generalities about Hispanics.

Dewhurst and Cruz, an attorney and for-mer state solicitor general, are seeking theGOP nomination to replace retiring Repub-lican Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, as are for-mer Dallas Mayor Tom Leppert and CraigJames, an EPSN commentator. If no one getsat least 50 percent of the votes in Tuesday’sprimary, a runoff is set for July 31.

Dewhurst’s television ads have long at-tacked Cruz for his firm representing a Chi-nese tire manufacturer in an intellectual

property dispute with an American compa-ny. But Cruz has won the support of nationallimited-government groups, such as the Clubfor Growth, which have organized mediacampaigns claiming Dewhurst has been toomoderate during his nearly nine years over-seeing the Texas Senate.

Tensions spiked over a Dewhurst radiospot featuring two women talking whilebirds chirp and children play in the back-ground. It says Cruz “helps run two nationalorganizations that have been leading thepush to give amnesty to illegal immigrants.”

Cruz hasn’t denied being involved with theHispanic Alliance for Prosperity Instituteand the Hispanic Leadership Fund, but sayshe’s always opposed amnesty. He denouncedthe ad on a Dallas radio station as “designedto say anyone who is Hispanic must supportamnesty.”

AROUND TEXAS

U.S. Senate candidates, from left, Republican Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, Democrat Sean Hubbard, Republican Tom Leppert,Democrat Paul Sadler, Republican Craig James, and Republican Ted Cruz, participate in a debate on May 3 in Houston.

Photo by Mayra Beltran/Houston Chronicle | AP

‘Amnesty’ ad jolts raceBy WILL WEISSERTASSOCIATED PRESS

Lawmakers hoping topromote diverse juriesHOUSTON — Several lawmak-

ers upset by an all-white jury’sacquittal of a former Houston po-lice officer in the alleged beatingof a teenage burglary suspect saythey plan to present a bill at nextyear’s state legislative session topromote diverse juries.

U.S. Reps. Al Green and SheilaJackson Lee said Friday theywill work with state Rep. Sylves-ter Turner on legislation to re-view the number of single-racejuries that have decided trialsaround the state.

SEC bars Dallas man frompracticing before agency

DALLAS — A former officialwith the Securities and Ex-change Commission has beenbarred from representing clientsbefore the agency for a year dueto federal conflict of interest vio-lations.

The SEC imposed the ban onDallas attorney Spencer Barasch.

Texas deputy arrested ondrug charge

McALLEN — A judge inMcAllen has ordered a sheriff ’sdeputy held for his alleged rolein a drug trafficking conspiracy.

Federal prosecutors say DuvalCounty deputy Ruben Silva took$5,000 and planned to smugglecocaine in his sheriff ’s depart-ment vehicle from the RioGrande Valley through the Bor-der Patrol inland checkpoint. Hewas arrested Thursday.

Customs officer in Texasarrested for gun buys

BROWNSVILLE — A U.S. cus-toms officer has been arrested inSouth Texas on federal chargesof illegally buying guns for an-other person.

Federal prosecutors say 38-year-old Manuel Eduardo Peñatwice bought hunting rifles at aBrownsville sporting goods storeand then accepted reimburse-ment from a legal permanentresident.

Undercover police fatallyshoot knife-wielding man

HOUSTON — A Houston manis dead after undercover policeofficers say they shot him whenhe began attacking them with abox cutter.

Police say 51-year-old KevinHunter stabbed one of the Hous-ton officers during the confronta-tion Thursday night. Homicideofficers say the two were in anunmarked car parked in a vacantlot when Hunter and anotherman approached them.

State: Texas alligatorkilling wasn’t self-defense

FORT WORTH — A fisher-man is facing a $5,300 penalty forshooting an 11-foot alligator hethought was attacking him andhis fishing buddy.

The Fort Worth Star-Telegramreports Friday that state gamewardens have determined the al-ligator killing was not in self-de-fense.

— Composed from AP reports

Churches raising moneyto fight gay marriage

PORTLAND, Maine — Scoresof Maine churches will pass thecollection plate a second time atSunday services on Father’s Dayto kick off a fundraising cam-paign for the lead oppositiongroup to November’s ballot ques-tion asking voters to legalizesame-sex marriages.

Between 150 and 200 churchesare expected to raise money forthe Protect Marriage Maine po-litical action committee, saidCarroll Conley Jr. of the Chris-tian Civic League of Maine. Con-ley is also trying to drum up sup-port for the Maine campaignfrom religious leaders fromaround the country.

Senators seek to namebison ‘national mammal’

BILLINGS, Mont. — Westernlawmakers want to elevate thePlains bison to a status similar

to that of the iconic bald eaglewith legislation to declare theburly beasts America’s “nationalmammal.”

Bison advocates launched a“vote bison” public relationscampaign Friday to coincidewith the bill.

The National Bison LegacyAct introduced in the Senate isbacked by lawmakers fromWyoming, Colorado, Nebraska,Kansas, New Mexico, North Da-kota, South Dakota and Rhode Is-land.

— Compiled from AP reports

AROUND THE NATION

This 2012 photo taken on the Fort Peck Reservation near Polar, Mont., shows aheard of bison. Western lawmakers are seeking to elevate the plains bison to astatus similar to that of the iconic bald eagle.

Photo by Matthew Brown | AP

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CONTACT US

BurglaryA man reported at 12:14

a.m. Sunday in the 400 block ofMiraflores Avenue that someoneburglarized his two Ford pickups. Anincident report states the suspectsstole two cell phones and a gamingconsole. The items had an estimat-ed value of $930.

A burglary of a habitationwas reported at 1:54 p.m. Mondaynear the San Ygnacio landfill, offU.S. 83. An incident report statessomeone stole a desktop computerand some antiques from a ranchhouse. The stolen items had an es-timated value of $8,000.

A 38-year-old woman report-ed a burglary of a building at 7a.m. Wednesday in the 1900 blockof Miraflores Avenue.

A 61-year-old man reportedat 8:25 p.m. Thursday in the 1500block of Falcon Avenue that some-one burglarized his truck and stolea battery valued at $90.

PossessionGilberto Sanchez, 34, was ar-

rested and charged with possessionof drug paraphernalia at about12:15 a.m. Monday at 13th Streetand Medina Avenue. He was at Za-pata Regional Jail as of Friday after-noon.

A 14-year-old male juvenile

was detained and charged withdrug paraphernalia at about 4:15p.m. Tuesday in the 2400 block ofFresno Street. He was turned overto juvenile probation.

Homero Resendez, 24, wasarrested and charged with posses-sion of a controlled substance atabout 1 a.m. Wednesday at FourthStreet and Medina Avenue. He hada $5,000 bond at Zapata RegionalJail.

Jaime Javier Buentello, 18,was arrested and a 15-year-old malejuvenile detained at about 11:45a.m. Wednesday in the 5200 blockof Carrizo Lane. Both were chargedwith possession of a controlled sub-stance. Buentello was at Zapata Re-gional Jail as of Friday evening. Thejuvenile was turned over to theWebb County Youth Village.

Public intoxicationRoberto Saldivar Jr., 18, was

arrested and charged with public in-toxication at about 5:30 a.m. Sun-day in the 5200 block of CuellarLane after an argument was report-ed in the vicinity. He is out on bail.

TheftA person reported at 8:30

a.m. May 19 in the 100 block ofTrinity Lane that someone stole his2011 Chevy flatbed truck.

THE BLOTTER

WASHINGTON — Agriculture Sec-retary Tom Vilsack recently an-nounced the U.S. Department of Agri-culture will accept 3.9 million acresoffered under the 43rd ConservationReserve Program general sign-up.

During the extended five-week sig-nup, the Department received nearly48,000 offers on more than 4.5 millionacres of land. USDA has now enrollednearly 12 million acres in the CRPsince 2009. There are more than 29.6million acres enrolled on more than736,000 contracts.

“For more than 25 years, lands in

CRP have helped to support strongincomes for our farmers and ranch-ers and produce good middle-classjobs throughout the country relatedto outdoor recreation, hunting, andfishing,” said Vilsack.

Enrollment of the new 3.9 millionacres will allow USDA to continueimportant targeting of CRP acresthrough continuous sign-up initia-tives — including those announcedearlier this year for highly-erodibleland, as well as grasslands and wet-lands. The two continuous sign-upsannounced earlier this year will tar-get an additional 1.75 million acres intotal.

For the first continuous sign-upprogram, USDA encourages landown-ers with land that has an Erosion In-dex (EI) of 20 or greater to considerparticipating in the Highly ErodibleLand initiative. Lands eligible for thisprogram are typically the least pro-ductive land on the farm.

For the second continuous sign-upprogram, landowners with sensitivegrasslands, wetlands and wildlifehabitat are encouraged to participate.The grasslands and wetlands initia-tive increases acres set aside for spe-cific enrollments that benefit ducknesting habitat, upland birds, wet-lands and wildlife.

12M acres now in programSPECIAL TO THE TIMES

A Mexican nationalwas sentenced to federalprison for moving and at-tempting to distribute 600pounds of marijuana, theU.S. Attorney’s Office an-nounced this week.

Visiting U.S. DistrictJudge Joseph Hood sen-tenced 25-year-old Joel Hu-go Robles Perez to 33months in federal prisonWednesday.

The judge further or-

dered Robles Perez toserve three years of post-prison supervised release.Robles Perez remains infederal custody pendingtransfer to a U.S. Bureauof Prisons facility.

Robles Perez pled guiltyFeb. 3.

An ongoing investiga-tion led Immigration andCustoms Enforcement

agents to believe that nar-cotics were being stored ata residence in ZapataCounty.

On Dec. 9, ICE agents,assisted by U.S. Border Pa-trol and Zapata CountySheriff ’s Office deputies,met with Robles Perez at aZapata residence not dis-closed in the criminalcomplaint.

The complaint statesRobles Perez stated therewas marijuana in a white2000 Chevy pickup bear-ing Tamaulipas plates

parked in the back of thehouse.

A complaint statesagents found 52 bundles ofmarijuana, which weighedapproximately 270 kilo-grams. Robles Perez saidhe had picked up the mar-ijuana the night before ata boat landing near Vele-ño Bridge in Zapata. Themarijuana, he said, was tobe transported to Laredo,a complaint states.

(César G. Rodriguezmay be reached at 728-2568or cesar@lmtonline.com)

Pot gets man 33 monthsBy CÉSAR G. RODRIGUEZ

THE ZAPATA TIMESJOEL ROBLESPEREZ: Sentencedon marijuanaconviction.

SATURDAY, MAY 26, 2012 Local THE ZAPATA TIMES 3A

Texas A&M Internation-al University WesternHemisphere Trade CenterRoom 104-TTVN Auditori-um will be the only site forthis month’s small busi-ness video conferencesponsored by Rep. HenryCuellar.

The video conference isscheduled for 10 a.m.Thursday.

The conference hadbeen planned for viewing

in Zapata at the educationcenter, but that plan had tobe scrapped due to techni-cal difficulties.

The Zapata location willbe ready for next month’svideo conference, accord-ing to Cuellar’s office.

Due to limited seatingfor the May video confer-ence, Cuellar’s office askedthat those interesting inattending RSVP by Tues-day to Pete Arguello atpete.arguel-lo@mail.house.gov.

Small businesstarget of talk

SPECIAL TO THE TIMES

FIRST GRADE TOP READERS

Courtesy photo

Villarreal Elementaryfirst grade studentsparticipated in a silentauction for being thetop accelerated readersearning the mostpoints. Their readingpaid off in the form ofgreat prizes. Top pointreader was Daniel Ro-driguez, followed byClaudia Garza, Kassan-dra Ibarra, Steven Gon-zalez, Uriel Alaniz, Ar-turo Navarro, HugoMartinez, Mariana Nino,Alyssa Ramirez, AbelLara and Javier Garza.

PAGE 4A Zopinion SATURDAY, MAY 26, 2012

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR SEND YOUR SIGNED LETTER TO EDITORIAL@LMTONLINE.COM

AUSTIN — We’re notquite to the finish lineyet, and the best may beyet to come, but pleaseallow me to recommendthree Texas primary sea-son campaign ads foryour perusal.

Two make the list forentertainment value. Asyou recall, the First Ruleof Politics is, if you ex-pect anything more thanentertainment, you’reheaded for disappoint-ment.

The third made the listbecause you’ll scratchyour head and say,“Hmm.”

Let’s have some funFirst, entertainment.

Go to GlennAddison.comto see GOP U.S. Senatecandidate Glenn Addi-son’s spot showing ani-mated versions of hisfoes David Dewhurst be-ing chased by a TSAagent and Ted Cruz get-ting money pumped intohis hand by a Chineseguy. I’m not sure wherethis ad fits into thelarger scheme for ad-vancing democracy, butyou’ll smile.

And go to tinyurl.com/sledgefence to see GOPRailroad Commissioncandidate RolandSledge’s video in whichhe makes a point, Ithink, by showing a mangetting a charge (simulat-ed, I hope) out of urinat-ing on an electric fence.Delightful, though per-haps a harbinger of theend times.

Nothing new withchild actors

The head-scratcher isone in which state Rep.J.M. Lozano, R-Kings-ville, turns his son intoperhaps the youngest hu-man ever used as a cam-paign ad prop. I’vestashed it at tinyurl.com/lozanobaby.

Lozano, seeking a sec-ond House term, was aDemocrat until March 8.“I didn’t leave the Demo-cratic Party; the Demo-cratic Party left me,” hesaid. That’s what they al-ways say.

Party-switching, if sin-cere, is OK. And Lozanodid it the right way,which is prior to electionseason. Reps. Aaron Peñaof Edinburg and AllanRitter of Nederland did itthe wrong way in Decem-ber 2010 by announcingthey had become Repub-licans a few weeks aftergetting re-elected asDemocrats.

Camping in thewomb

At his announcement,Lozano was accompaniedby wife Abby, then eightmonths pregnant.

“We will keep you inour prayers as you haveyour third little Republi-can,” Gov. Rick Perrysaid. Lozano said “ourupcoming son Carlos”was “campaigning as wespeak.”

It was a joke, but notfor long. Carlos nowstars in dad’s campaignad, which starts with atight shot of the sleepingbaby.

“Dear Carlos,” Lozanosays in a comfortingtone, “I know you’re too

young to understand, butI want you to know whyI’m running for state rep-resentative.”

Piano music tinkles inthe background as Loza-no walks to the crib.

“A man named BarackObama is ruining ourcountry,” Lozano tells hissleeping son as we moveto a tighter shot of Car-los. “If we don’t stand upand fight, he’ll take awayyour future. It’s going tobe tough, but we have todo it.”

Lozano then picks uphis son and says, “Yousleep now and know thatDaddy’s doing everythinghe can.”

A creepy feelingI don’t know. This one

seems awfully close toCreepyville. It has kindof a president-as-a-scary-thing-under-the-bed feelto it. But I guess it’s rea-sonable for Republicans— even new ones whountil recently were onObama’s team — to be-lieve the president’s poli-cies are ruinous.

In a 2010 Democraticprimary, future Republi-can Lozano ousted SouthPadre Island Rep. TaraRios Ybarra, whom hebranded as a “closet Re-publican.” There was noGOP nominee in theheavily Democratic dis-trict, and Lozano easilybeat a Libertarian foe towin the South Texas seat.

Now, post-redistrict-ing, Lozano faces twoGOP primary foes in aGOP-friendly district.Rep. Jose Aliseda, R-Bee-ville, the district’s in-cumbent, is not seekingre-election.

Nothing newUsing kids — a candi-

date’s and other people’s— is not new in cam-paign ads. Among thegenre’s most famous isLyndon Johnson’s 1964ad showing a young girlcounting petals pulledfrom a daisy and transi-tioning into a countdownto a mushroom cloud.

“These are the stakes,”LBJ says on the ad aimedat making GOP challen-ger Barry Goldwaterlook dangerous. “Tomake a world in whichall of God’s children canlive or to go into thedark. We must eitherlove each other or wemust die.”

“The stakes are toohigh for you to stayhome,” a narrator thensaid.

Unansweredquestions

Would Goldwater haveled to intergalactic atom-ic obliteration? We’ll nev-er know. Will Obama bethe ruination of thiscountry? We might findout.

It’s an important possi-bility we must discuss,but it seems it’s a discus-sion we can have withouthaving a candidate let uswatch him tell his new-born about the bad manin the White House.

On the other hand, Ifind myself oddly in fa-vor or more ads involv-ing electric fences.

(Ken Herman is a col-umnist for the AustinAmerican-Statesman. E-mail: kherman@states-man.com.)

Ad fun inthe primary

season

OTHER VIEWS

The Zapata Times doesnot publish anonymousletters.

To be published, lettersmust include the writer’sfirst and last names aswell as a phone numberto verify identity. The

phone number IS NOTpublished; it is used sole-ly to verify identity andto clarify content, if nec-essary. Identity of the let-ter writer must be veri-fied before publication.

We want to assure our

readers that a letter iswritten by the person whosigns the letter. The Zapa-ta Times does not allowthe use of pseudonyms.

Letters are edited forstyle, grammar, lengthand civility. No name-call-

ing or gratuitous abuse isallowed.

Via e-mail, send lettersto editorial@lmton-line.com or mail them toLetters to the Editor, 111Esperanza Drive, Laredo,TX 78041.

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR POLICY

DOONESBURY | GARRY TRUDEAU

Several years ago, theinvestment banks and con-sulting firms decided itwas better to hire a su-premely gifted 22-year-oldthan a moderately gifted40-year-old who wanted togo home to his family. Toattract these young super-stars, the firms set uptraining programs that of-fered recent college gradu-ates great salaries, practi-cal skills and interestinglife experiences.

Top students at eliteuniversities are nowshowered with these op-portunities. Before the fi-nancial crisis, nearly halfthe graduates at some col-leges went to work at in-vestment banks, consul-tancies, hedge funds andthe like.

But students are nowlooking at these programsmore skeptically. Thisyear, Rob Reich, a Stan-ford political science pro-fessor (not the former la-bor secretary, the otherone), held a terrific onlinediscussion on why somany elite students go in-to finance and consultingand whether this is a goodthing.

Many recent Stanfordgrads ardently defendedthe finance path. One newinvestment banker wrotethat he’s learning how thecrude oil market works,meaning he now knowsabout Iran’s relationshipto Russia, the cultural dy-namics in Nigeria andmany other things.

A Ph.D. student arguedthat these private sector

firms do a lot more to alle-viate poverty than non-governmental organiza-tions. Look at how globalinvestment has reducedpoverty in China.

An undergrad arguedthat these firms serve asgreat signaling devices.An altruistic nongovern-mental organization ismore likely to hire you ifyou did a stint at GoldmanSachs. You’ll be better atending hunger later be-cause you learned to be ananalyst today.

Considered wasteOther students argued

that the flood of talent in-to finance and consultingis a giant waste. Too manystudents slide into the fi-nance job application pro-cess by default because itfeels comfortably like ap-plying to college. There’s acertain automatic prestigeto it. It’s competitive, so itmust be good.

These critics lament thebrain drain into financeand consulting. Thesmartest people should befighting poverty, endingdisease and serving oth-ers, not themselves.

The student discussionwas smart, civil and illu-minating. But I wasstruck by the unspokenassumptions. Many ofthese students seem tohave a blinkered view oftheir options. There’scrass but affluent invest-ment banking. There’s thepoor but noble nonprofitworld. And then there isthe world of high techstartups, which magically

provides money and cool-ness simultaneously. Butthere was little interest inor awareness of the minis-try, the military, the acade-my, government service orthe zillion other sectors.

Furthermore, few stu-dents showed any interestin working for a companythat actually makes prod-ucts. It sometimes seemsthat good students atschools in blue states gointo service capitalism(consulting and finance)while good students in redstates go into productioncapitalism (Procter &Gamble, John Deere, Auto-Zone).

The discussion also re-inforced a thought I’vehad in many other con-texts: that community ser-vice has become a patchfor morality. Many peopletoday have not been givenvocabularies to talk aboutwhat virtue is, what char-acter consists of, and inwhich way excellence lies,so they just talk aboutcommunity service, figur-ing that if you are doingthe sort of work that Bonocelebrates, then you mustbe a good person.

Let’s put it differently.Many people today find iteasy to use the vocabularyof entrepreneurialism,whether they are in busi-ness or social entrepre-neurs. This is a utilitarianvocabulary. How can Iserve the greatest num-ber? How can I most pro-ductively apply my talentsto the problems of theworld? It’s about resourceallocation.

People are less good atusing the vocabulary of

moral evaluation, which isless about what sort of ca-reer path you choose thanwhat sort of person youare.

In whatever field you gointo, you will face greed,frustration and failure.You may find your lifechallenged by depression,alcoholism, infidelity, yourown stupidity and self-in-dulgence. So how shouldyou structure your soul toprepare for this? Simplyworking at Amnesty Inter-national instead of McKin-sey is not necessarily go-ing to help you with theseprimal character tests.

Furthermore, how doyou achieve excellence?Around what ultimatepurpose should your liferevolve? Are you capableof heroic self-sacrifice oris life just a series ofachievement hoops?These, too, are not analyt-ic questions about what todo. They require literarydistinctions and moralevaluations.

When I read the Stan-ford discussion thread, Isaw young people withdeep moral yearnings. Butthey tended to convertmoral questions into re-source allocation ques-tions; questions abouthow to be into questionsabout what to do.

It’s worth noting thatyou can devote your life tocommunity service and bea total schmuck. You canspend your life on WallStreet and be a hero. Un-derstanding heroism andschmuckdom requiresfewer Excel spreadsheets,more Dostoyevsky and theBook of Job.

COLUMN

Banking careers take 2 pathsBy DAVID BROOKSNEW YORK TIMES

By KEN HERMANCOX NEWSPAPERS

COLUMN

SATURDAY, MAY 26, 2012 THE ZAPATA TIMES 5A

TOP OF THE CLASS OF 2012

Courtesy photos

Zapata High School administrators have announced the top seniors in the Class of 2012. Salutator-ian is Edgar Hernandez, and Valadictorian is Rebecca Aimee Gonzalez.

PITTSBURGH — A well-known expert on the natu-ral gas boom is again fac-ing criticism over his tiesto industry and a lack oftransparency in how hepresents work to the public,fueling debates over re-search that’s been publish-ed by major universities.

Timothy Considine waslead author on a shale gasreport recently issued bythe University at Buffaloand a previous report fromPenn State University. Crit-ics say both reports pre-sented research in mislead-ing ways and failed to fullydisclose funding sources.

Considine, now at theUniversity of Wyoming, hasgotten funding from indus-try groups such as the Mar-cellus Shale Coalition, theWyoming Mining Associ-ation, the American Ironand Steel Institute, and theAmerican Petroleum Insti-tute.

On Thursday, the PublicAccountability Initiative, aBuffalo nonprofit, issued acritique of the UB study.

“Taken together, the seri-ous flaws in the report, in-dustry-friendly spin, strongindustry ties, and fundrais-ing plans raise seriousquestions about the ShaleResources and Society In-stitute’s independence andthe University at Buffalo’sdecision to lend its inde-pendent, academic author-ity to the Institute’s work,”the critique said.

Some say Considine andthe University at Buffalocould easily have avoidedthe controversies overtransparency.

“It sounds like a moralblind spot,” said StephenSatris, a professor of phi-losophy at the ClemsonUniversity Rutland Insti-tute for Ethics.

In 2010, Penn State ad-

ministrators retracted theoriginal version of a reporton the economic impact ofMarcellus Shale naturalgas, noting that Considineand his co-authors made “aclear error” in not disclos-ing that the report wasfunded by an industrygroup, as well as “flaws inthe way the report waswritten and presented tothe public.”

This week, the Universi-ty at Buffalo published acorrection to Considine’sreport on environmentalregulations involving theMarcellus Shale, notingthat an initial claim that itwent through an independ-ent peer-review process“may have given readersan incorrect impression.”

The University at Buffa-lo also said the report “wasnot funded or commis-sioned by external sourc-es.” But Considine told TheAssociated Press in anemail that the University ofWyoming paid him and twoother lead authors.

Considine said theWyoming funding was dis-closed in a conference callwith reporters, and that hewas just doing work as atenured professor. But thatfunding link wasn’t ac-knowledged in the actualpublished report.

Considine is the directorof the UW Center for Ener-gy Economics & Public Pol-icy, and the group’s websiteincludes a page called“Outside Organizations.” Itcontains links to the Amer-ican Gas Association, theAmerican Petroleum Insti-tute, the Natural Gas Sup-ply Association and the In-ternational Society for In-

dustrial Ecology.Asked about industry-

funded research, Considinereplied that “two plus twoshould always equal four,no matter who paid for thepencil.” He added that hedoesn’t see how the shaleinstitute “could provideany more transparencythan it already has.”

Satris said the suggesti-on that more transparencywasn’t possible is flat-outwrong.

The University at Buffa-lo didn’t respond to repeat-ed requests from the AP forcomment about the Wyom-ing funding.

Though some criticizeConsidine for accepting re-search funding from indus-try, that practice is wide-spread in academia. Wyom-ing spokesman ChadBaldwin said the school“does not prohibit profes-sors from doing privateconsulting work” andwouldn’t have informationon private contractual ar-rangements.

“I think that’s behindthe times,” Satris said ofthe school policy, notingthat the medical communi-ty has moved to embracefull disclosure of researchfunding after scandals overhow the tobacco industrysecretly funded pro-smok-ing studies for decades.

University at Buffalo ad-ministrators weren’t clearabout the origin and statusof funding for the shale in-stitute. Artvoice, a localpublication, first reportedthat the school said fund-ing came through a sepa-rate foundation, whose do-nors aren’t publicly dis-closed.

Researcher is againtarget of critics

By KEVIN BEGOSASSOCIATED PRESS The Wyoming funding was

disclosed in a conference call withreporters.

AUSTIN — The story line on the Re-publican Senate race in Texas is a nowfamiliar one: A veteran politician sup-ported by the GOP establishment is chal-lenged by a young insurgent backed bynational conservative groups.

In this distinctly Texas episode in thesaga for control of the Senate, DavidDewhurst is the reserved, self-made mil-lionaire and lieutenant governor facingoff against Ted Cruz, the feisty son of aCuban exile who calls himself “a provenfighter for liberty because his familyknows what it means to lose it.”

The underdog is former Dallas mayorand businessman Tom Leppert, who of-fers himself as the no-nonsense alterna-tive to politics as usual.

In heavily Republican Texas, whoeverwins the GOP primary on Tuesday is al-most sure to replace retiring Sen. KayBailey Hutchison.

Cruz and Leppert acknowledge thatDewhurst is more familiar with votersand has more cash — he’s spent $9.2 mil-lion of his $200 million fortune on theprimary. But both hope to force a runoff,and if one succeeds, the runner-up couldwin in July. While there have been no re-liable, independent polls in the nine-can-didate race, those released by partisansshow Dewhurst on the cusp of getting the50 percent-plus-one he needs to avoid arunoff, with Cruz in second place.

Conservative groups that complainmany Senate Republicans now in officeare too quick to compromise have spentmore than $4 million trying to help Cruz.The benefactors include South CarolinaSen. Jim DeMint’s Senate ConservativesFund, the anti-tax Club for Growth andformer Texas Rep. Dick Armey’s Free-domWorks.

Similar Senate primary battles are tak-ing place in Wisconsin, where tea partyfavorite Mark Neuman is runningagainst former Gov. Tommy Thompson,and in Arizona, where six-term Rep. JeffFlake is being challenged by Wil Cardon,who also casts himself as a tea party can-didate.

Cruz is drawing comparisons betweenTexas and Indiana, where state Treasur-er Richard Mourdock defeated incum-bent Sen. Richard Lugar in the Republi-can primary. Leppert looks for inspira-tion from Nebraska, where Deb Fischer, astate legislator, rose up from third placeto become the GOP’s Senate nomineethere.

Cruz, 41, made his name representing

Texas before the Supreme Court in high-profile cases. He has endorsements fromformer GOP presidential hopeful RickSantorum and former Alaska Gov. SarahPalin in addition to several tea partygroups.

Dewhurst, 66, has the backing of Gov.Rick Perry and former Arkansas Gov.Mike Huckabee as well as support fromthe state’s most influential Republicanclubs, anti-abortion organizations andpolitical action committees.

There are few significant policy differ-ences between the top three candidates:All oppose abortion rights, amnesty forillegal immigrants and tax increases ofany kind. That has forced their cam-paigns to focus on personality and re-cords with often harsh attack ads.

Tall, reserved and impeccably dressed,Dewhurst was raised by a single motherafter his father was killed by a drunkendriver. He served in the Air Force and asa CIA officer in Bolivia before returningto Houston, where he started a natural

gas business and made his fortune.Cruz’s father fought against Cuba’s Ba-

tista regime in the late 1950s before get-ting a student visa to attend the Universi-ty of Texas. Cruz was born in Alberta,Canada, where his dad worked in the oilfields before moving back to Houston. Achampion debater, Cruz attended Prince-ton University and Harvard Law Schooland has spent most of his career in politi-cally appointed positions in the Bush ad-ministration or working for the Texas at-torney general.

Leppert, 57, has been CEO of severalcompanies, including the Turner Corp.,the nation’s largest construction compa-ny. He ran for Dallas mayor as a reformerand balanced the city’s budget.

The competition between Dewhurstand Cruz turned ugly early. Each hasspent more than $4 million on TV and ra-dio attack ads.

Dewhurst has derided Cruz as a triallawyer even though Cruz has specializedin handling appeals. His campaign also

pilloried Cruz for representing a Chinesetire company appealing a $26 millionjudgment that it had stolen intellectualproperty from a U.S. company. Cruz re-plied he was only doing his job as an at-torney for an international law firm.

Cruz, meanwhile, attacks Dewhurst asa “timid, moderate politician” who too of-ten has compromised with Democrats.

“Enough of these little kitty cats wekeep sending to Washington,” Cruz said.“David Dewhurst will compromise everyday in the U.S. Senate. ... It’s what he’sdone every day in state government.”

Boasting about his experience as a topbusiness executive, Leppert calls Dew-hurst a career politician and Cruz a gov-ernment staffer. Dewhurst says Leppert’srecord as Dallas mayor is too liberal forTexas Republicans.

Whoever wins the GOP nominationwill face one of two Democrats, formerstate Rep. Paul Sadler and party activistSean Hubbard. No Democrat has won astatewide office in Texas since 1994.

Race a new test for GOP establishmentBy CHRIS TOMLINSON

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Texas Lt. Governor David Dewhurst, the reserved,self-made millionaire, is facing off against TedCruz, the feisty son of a Cuban exile who callshimself “a proven fighter for liberty because hisfamily knows what it means to lose it.”

Photo by Laura Skelding/file | AP

Ted Cruz, former Texas Solicitor General, startedpreparing for a U.S. Senate race almost 30 yearsago, and for many of the state’s Republicans, he’sthe candidate they’ve sought after for almost aslong.

Photo by Deborah Cannon/Austin American-Statesman/file | AP

Republican primary candidate for the U.S. SenateCraig James is backed by supporters at a pressconference Thursday, in Houston. Also vying forthe party’s nomination are Lt. Gov. David Dew-hurst, ex-Dallas Mayor Tom Leppert and Ted Cruz.

Photo by Pat Sullivan | AP

CAPE CANAVERAL,Fla. — The privately bank-rolled Dragon capsulemade a historic arrival atthe International SpaceStation on Friday, trium-phantly captured by astro-nauts wielding a giant ro-bot arm.

SpaceX is the first pri-vate company to accom-plish such a feat: a com-mercial cargo delivery intothe cosmos.

“There’s so much thatcould have gone wrong andit went right,” said an elat-ed Elon Musk, the billio-naire maestro of SpaceX.

“This really is, I think,going to be recognized as asignificantly historical stepforward in space travel —and hopefully the first ofmany to come.”

NASA astronaut DonaldPettit used the space sta-tion’s 58-foot robot arm tosnare the gleaming whiteDragon after a few hours ofextra checks and maneu-vers. The two vessels cametogether while sailingabove Australia.

“Looks like we’ve got usa dragon by the tail,” Pettitannounced from 250 milesup once he locked ontoDragon’s docking mecha-nism.

NASA controllers ap-plauded as their counter-parts at SpaceX’s controlcenter in Hawthorne, Calif.— including Musk — liftedtheir arms in triumph andjumped out of their seats toexchange high fives. Thetwo control rooms workedtogether, as equal partners,to pull off the feat.

The company’s youthful-looking employees — theaverage age is 30 — werestill in a frenzy when Musktook part in a televisednews conference. Theyscreamed with excitementas if it were at a pep rallyand chanted, “E-lon, E-lon,E-lon,” as the 40-year-oldMusk, wearing a black ath-letic jacket with the SpaceXlogo, described the day’sevents.

Alcohol was banned

from the premises duringthe crucial flight operation,Musk noted, “but now thatthings are good, I thinkwe’ll probably have a bit ofchampagne and have somefun.” The crowd roared inapproval.

Although cargo haulshave become routine, Fri-day’s linkup was signifi-cant in that an individualcompany pulled it off. Thatchore was previously re-served for a small, elitegroup of government agen-cies.

Not only that, the reusa-ble SpaceX Dragon is de-signed to safely returnitems, a huge benefit thatdisappeared with NASA’sspace shuttles. It’s the firstU.S. craft to visit the sta-tion since the final shuttleflight last summer.

Two hours after the cap-ture, the crew attached theDragon to the space stationas the congratulationspoured in.

“Now that a U.S. compa-ny has proven its ability toresupply the space station,it opens a new frontier forcommercial opportunitiesin space — and new jobcreation opportunitiesright here in the U.S.,” NA-SA Administrator CharlesBolden said in a statement.

“Nearly 43 years after wefirst walked on the moon,we have taken another stepin demonstrating contin-ued American leadershipin space,” said Apollo 11’sBuzz Aldrin, the secondman to step onto the moon.

The bell-shaped cap-sule— 19 feet tall and 12feet across — is carrying1,000 pounds of supplies onthis unprecedented testflight. The crew starts un-packing Saturday and willhave just under a week tounload the food, clothesand other contents.

After this test flight,SpaceX — officially known

as Space Exploration Tech-nologies Corp. — has a con-tract to make a dozen deliv-ery runs. It is one of sever-al companies vying forNASA’s cargo business anda chance to launch Ameri-cans from U.S. soil.

SpaceX launched thecapsule from Cape Canav-eral on Tuesday with itsFalcon 9 rocket. On Thurs-day, the Dragon capsulecame within 1-1/2 miles ofthe space station in a prac-tice fly-by. It returned tothe neighborhood early Fri-day so Pettit, along withDutch astronaut AndreKuipers, could capture itwith the station’s robotarm.

First, the capsule wentthrough a series of stop-and-go demonstrations toprove it was under good op-erating control.

NASA ordered extrachecks of the Dragon’simaging systems as thecapsule drew ever closer tothe space station, puttingthe entire operation slight-ly behind schedule. At onepoint, SpaceX controllersordered a retreat becauseof a problem with on-boardtracking sensors.

Given that the Dragon is

a brand new type of vehicleand this is a test flight, thespace agency insisted onproceeding cautiously. Acollision by vehicles travel-ing at orbital speed —17,500 mph — could provedisastrous for the space sta-tion. NASA’s space stationprogram manager, MikeSuffredini, said the way theSpaceX team handled theproblem and the entire op-eration was “remarkable.”

Dragon arrives at space station in historic firstBy MARCIA DUNNASSOCIATED PRESS

The SpaceX Dragon commercial cargo craft is seen after being grappled by the Canadarm2 roboticarm and connected to the International Space Station, on Friday. Dragon is scheduled to spend about aweek docked with the station before returning to Earth on Thursday for retrieval.

Photo by NASA-TV | AP

6A THE ZAPATA TIMES SATURDAY, MAY 26, 2012

LAREDO05/26 — El Concilio In-

do-Americano de Laredo in-vita a su Pow Wow por elDía de los Caídos, de 12p.m. a 10 p.m. en Laredo Ci-vic Center.

05/26 — La Fundacióndel Patrimonio del Condadode Webb invita a su comidapor el Día de los Fundadoresa las 12 p.m. en el StudentCenter Ballroom de TAMIU.El evento presentará la inau-guración del nuevo Presiden-te de la República del RioGrande, Renato Ramírez, asícomo la entrega de los Pre-mios Anuales del Patrimonio.Evento abierto al público engeneral. Para obtener bole-tos de entrada llame al(956) 727-0977 o escriba aheritage@webbheritage.org.

05/26 — Planetario La-mar Bruni Vergara de TexasA&M International Universitypresenta “One World, OneSky Big Bird’s Adventure” alas 4 p.m., “Starsof the Pha-raohs” a las 5 p.m., “2012:Ancient Skies, AncientMysteries” a las 6 p.m., y“Pink Floyd’s Dark Side ofthe Moon” a las 7 p.m. Cos-to: 5 dólares, adultos; 4 dó-lares, menores.

05/27 — Hoy a las 12p.m. es el Primer TorneoAnual de Boliche organizadopor LULAC #12 en Jett BowlNorth, 701 Gale St. Costo:150 dólares por equipo (5personas por equipo). El ob-jetivo es recaudar fondos pa-ra becas. Informes en el693-0019.

05/27 — El Recital deDanza Juvenil 2012 se pre-senta hoy en el teatro delCenter for the Fine and Per-forming Arts de TAMIU a las3 p.m. Evento gratuito.

06/01 — El Departa-mento de Música de la Es-cuela de Comunicaciones yBellas Artes Vidal M. Treviñopresenta su Gala-Danza Sa-lón de Baile 2012 de 7:30p.m. a 11 p.m. en las salasde junta de Laredo CivicCenter, 2400 avenida SanBernardo. Se presenta elgrupo de Jazz de VMT. Cos-to: 10 dólares. Informes en(956) 273-7811.

06/07 — El ex Lareden-se, Jack Strunk, se presenta-rá en la Sala de Usos Múlti-ples H-E-B de Laredo Mor-ning Times, de 2 p.m. a3:30 p.m. para discutir susexperiencias personales y sulibro. Otra presentación es el9 de junio a las 6 p.m.

NUEVO LAREDO, MÉXICO05/26 — Estación Pala-

bra presenta “Bazar de Arte”a las 12 p.m.; “Lecturas an-tes de abordar: Homenaje aCarlos Fuentes” a la 1 p.m.;Festival Infantil “Día Mundialde la Diversidad” a las 2p.m.; Taller de Creación Lite-raria con Jacobo Mina a las3 p.m. Eventos gratuitos.

05/26 — Museo paraNiños proyectará la caricatu-ra “Rapunzel” a las 4 p.m.en la Sala de Servicios Edu-cativos del Centro Cultural.Evento gratuito.

05/26 — Compañía deDanza Nuevo Laredo presen-ta “Prácticas Escénicas” alas 5 p.m. en el Teatro Expe-rimental del Centro Cultural.Evento gratuito.

05/27 — Laberintus Ar-te y Cultura, A.C. presenta“Historia del Otro Lado” deÁngel Hernández, a las 12p.m. en el Teatro del IMSS,Reynosa y Belden. Costo: 20dólares.

05/29 — Laberintus Ar-te y Cultura, A.C. presenta“Rapaz” de Edoardo Torres,a las 8 p.m. en el Teatro delIMSS, Reynosa y Belden.Costo: 20 dólares. Apta solopara adultos. Cupo limitado.

06/03 — Laberintus Ar-te y Cultura, A.C. presenta“Historia del Otro Lado” deÁngel Hernández, a las 12p.m. en Teatro del IMSS,Reynosa y Belden. Costo: 20dólares.

Agendaen Breve

Durante este fin de semana delDía de los Caídos (Memorial Day),miles de policías estatales, oficia-les de policía y ayudantes del Al-guacil de todo Texas, estarán alacecho de conductores y pasajerosque no estén usando el cinturónde seguridad y también si los ni-ños no lo están usando apropiada-mente.

La campaña “Click it or Ticket”del Departamento de Transporta-ción de Texas (TxDOT), indicaque conductores y pasajeros quedecidan no ajustar sus cinturonesde seguridad podrían ser deteni-dos por la policía y recibir unamulta hasta 250 dólares, más cos-tos de corte.

La ley de Texas requiere quetanto conductores y pasajeros es-tén usando sus cinturones de se-guridad. Niños menores de 8 añosde edad, deben pasearse en unasiento de seguridad para niños ouna silla de seguridad para bebés

al menos que rebasen los 4 pies ynueve pulgadas de alto.

TxDOT hace uso de la campaña“Click it or Ticket” para hacerconciencia acerca de la ley que ro-dea el uso del cinturón de seguri-dad y de la importancia de siem-pre abrocharse.

“Solo toma un minuto abro-charse el cinturón de seguridad yasegurarse que todos los demásen el vehículo estén apropiada-mente abrochados”, dijo en un co-municado de prensa la directorade la división de operaciones detráfico de TxDOT, Menciona CarolRawson. “Ese minuto puede sal-var una vida”.

Aunque Rawson sostuvo que nose debe estar recordando a la gen-

te el uso del cinturón de seguri-dad, “en este caso, los oficiales depolicía alrededor del estado esta-rán sancionando a las personasque no han entendido el mensaje”.

Accidentes automovilísticosson la principal causa de muerteen el estado de Texas. En el 2011,alrededor de 3,000 personas mu-rieron en choques fatales en lascalles y carreteras de Texas debi-do a que casi la mitad de esos con-ductores y pasajeros no teníanpuesto el cinturón de seguridad.Usar un cinturón de seguridad re-duciría el riesgo de lesiones mor-tales de un porcentaje de 45 porciento en accidentes automovilís-ticos y un 60 por ciento en acci-dentes de camión ligero.

“Click it or Ticket no solamentese dedica a multar, también se de-dica a salvar vidas”, mencionóRawson. “El uso del cinturón deseguridad en Texas es mucho másalto de lo que era antes que empe-záramos con este esfuerzo hace 11años, pero todavía tenemos oposi-ción.

“Queremos que todos se acos-tumbren al hábito de abrocharseel cinturón de seguridad”.

De hecho, Texas esta en la sép-tima posición en la nación en eluso general de cinturón de seguri-dad.

Según al Texas TransportationInstitute, expertos en el NationalHighway Traffic Safety Adminis-tration estiman que el incrementofijo en el uso de cinturón de segu-ridad en el estado de Texas en losúltimos 10 años han resultado enmenos de 2,843 victimas mortalesen accidentes automovilísticos ymenos de 48,000 lesiones seriascon un ahorro al estado de mas de10 billones en costos asociados.

CAMPAÑA ESTATAL BUSCA MINIMIZAR MUERTES EN ACCIDENTES

Viajeros segurosESPECIAL PARA TIEMPO DE ZAPATA

La ley de Texas requiere que tantoconductores y pasajeros estén usando suscinturones de seguridad.

MÚSICA PARA ZAPATA

Foto de cortesía

Paul Foster, Maestro del Coro de la Preparatoria United, a la iz-quierda, es visto junto a Mary y Amador Zapata, madre y padredel agente del U.S. ICE, Jaime Zapata, quien falleciera en México.El Coro de la Preparatoria United interpretó temas patrióticos yde inspiración durante la develación del busto de bronce dedi-cado a Jaime Zapata dentro del Edificio Federal en Laredo.

Hoy inicia la SegundaSemana Nacional de Sa-lud en México, y la mismacontinuará hasta el vier-nes 1 de junio.

El objetivo de la sema-na es reforzar las accionespreventivas de salud en lacomunidad, principalmen-te buscando fortalecer lacartilla de vacunación demenores.

“Madres de familia hanmostrado una importantecooperación para inmuni-zar a sus hijos, lo que per-mite que Nuevo Laredo,México, y la frontera ribe-reña, quede acorazada porlas enfermedades de losniños”, dijo el Jefe de laJurisdicción Sanitaria No.V, Jaime Emilio GutiérrezSerrano.

En la Segunda SemanaNacional de Salud se darála aplicación de la vacunaanti poliomielítica tipoSabin en el universo demenores de 5 años.

En infantes menores de

un año de edad, se aplica-rá a quienes habrían reci-bido dos dosis de vacunainactivada de polio virusa través de la vacuna pen-tavalente.

Personal de salud tienecontemplado complemen-tar y distribuir los sobresde Vida Suero Oral, y bus-carán reforzar la adminis-tración de suplementos yvitaminas, minerales, hie-rro y ácido fólico, espe-cialmente con la pobla-ción de alto riesgo.

En esta acción con elDepartamento de Saludcolabora directamentepersonal de los Sistemaspara el Desarrollo Inte-gral de la Familia.

En Nuevo Laredo, la

Presidenta del SistemaDIF, Martha Alicia Aldapade Galván, sostuvo que es-tarán impulsando el bie-nestar y mejores condicio-nes de salud a los infan-tes.

Tan solo en Nuevo La-redo esperan cubrir aunos 15,000 niños meno-res de 5 años, dijo Aldapa.

La Primera SemanaNacional de Salud tuvo lu-gar en febrero, donde selogró cubrir al 97 porciento de la meta.

“El trabajo del sectorsalud ha sido excelente”,dijo Gutiérrez.

(Localice a Miguel Ti-moshenkov en el (956) 728-2583 o en mrami-rez@lmtonline.com)

MÉXICO

SEMANA DE SALUD

El Sector Salud y el Sistema DIF invita a familias, especialmente a aquellas con hijos menores de 5años, a que participen del 26 de mayo al 1 de junio en la Segunda Semana Nacional de Salud.

Foto de cortesía | Secretaría de Salud

Campaña busca reforzar vacunasPOR MIGUEL TIMOSHENKOV

TIEMPO DE ZAPATA “El trabajo del sector salud hasido excelente”.JEFE DE LA JURISDICCIÓN SANITARIA NO. V, JAIME EMILIOGUTIÉRREZ SERRANO.

Zfrontera PÁGINA 7ASÁBADO 26 DE MAYO DE 2012

Celebrando el 257 aniver-sario de la fundación de La-redo, la Fundación para elPatrimonio del Condado deWebb, celebrará el Día delos Fundadores hoy al me-diodía, rindiendo homenajea los descendientes del fun-dador de la ciudad Don To-más Sánchez y a todas lasfamilias fundadoras de La-redo.

El evento se realizará enel Student Center Ballroomde Texas A&M Internation-al University. Es abierto alpúblico; todos los descend-ientes de familias funda-dores, así como todos losamigos de preservación, es-tán invitados a asistir.

La fundación dará untributo especial a las per-sonas responsables por lo-grar la colocación del Mon-umento Tejano en el Capi-tolio. El MonumentoTejano, creado por el artis-ta local Armando Hinojosa,es un testamento de los pio-neros hispanos y mexica-nos de Texas, de acuerdo ala fundación.

Continuando con ese te-ma, la fundación ha selec-cionado a Renato Ramírez,CEO de International Bankof Commerce en Zapata yvice presidente del Consejode Directores del Monu-mento Tejano, como elPresidente de la Republicadel Río Grande 2012. Ramí-rez será inaugurado du-rante la comida y se pre-sentará su gabinete ese día.

La presentación de losPremios del Patrimoniorendirá homenaje a organi-zaciones y personasquienes han mostrado uncompromiso para preser-var la historia y herenciacomunitaria.

Anualmente, la Funda-ción para el Patrimonio delCondado de Webb reconoce

a personas, empresas, orga-nizaciones y familiasquienes han contribuido ala herencia arquitectónicay cultural del Condado deWebb.

La Fundación para elPatrimonio del Condado deWebb ha seleccionado aocho homenajeados pararecibir los Premios del Pat-rimonio durante el mismoevento de hoy.

Este año los Premios delPatrimonio reconocerán aun grupo diverso de preser-vasionistas de la historiade todo el estado.

PREVIO AL SERVICIO MERITORIO:Consejo de Directores delMonumento Tejano: Caye-tano E. Barrera III, RenatoRamírez, Homero Vera, An-drés Tijerina, Richard Sán-chez y Jaime Beaman.

PREMIO LUCIANO GUAJARDO:Jerry Thompson, editor, yJosé Roberto Juárez, tra-ductor, por “Tejanos inGray: Civil War Letters ofCaptains Joseph Rafael dela Garza and Manuel Ytur-ri”; Arnoldo de León por“War Along the Border:The Mexican Revolutionand Tejano Communities”;e, Hildegardo Flores, direc-tor del Museo de Historiadel Condado de Zapata, queabrió el año pasado.

PREMIO RICARDO HERNÁNDEZ:educador de Martin HighSchool, Luis R. González.

PREMIO A LA PRESERVACIÓNDEL FOLKLORE/COSTUMBRES/TRAD-ICIONES: Laredo Main Street(Mercado Agrícola Centrode Laredo).

PREMIO PARA LA PRESERVACIÓNDEL MEDIO AMBIENTE: Eric Ell-man de Big River Founda-tionReserve su espacio lla-mando a la Fundación al(956) 727-0977.

CONDADO DE WEBB

Ceremoniahonrará a

ciudadanosESPECIAL PARA TIEMPO DE ZAPATA RENATO RAMÍREZ:

Nuevo Presidentede la Repúblicadel Río Grande

La batalla entre el presidente BarackObama y el republicano Mitt Romney se-rá la campaña presidencial más costosade la historia nacional.

Sin oposición en las primarias demó-cratas, Obama tuvo gran ventaja al prin-cipio.

Pero Romney, que casi seguramente so-brepasará el martes los 1.144 delegadosque necesita para oficializar su candidat-ura en las primarias de Texas, se acercagracias a la generosidad de grandes do-nantes conservadores.

Hasta abril, Obama y los grupos demó-cratas que lo apoyan habían recaudadocasi 450 millones de dólares y tienen más

de 150 millones en el banco. Romney ylos republicanos que lo respaldan han re-caudado más de 400 millones de dólaresen el mismo tramo y disponen de unos 80millones.

Ambos candidatos buscan redondearunos 800 millones, que elevaría los gastosen las dos campañas sumadas a unos1.600 millones de dólares. A esa suma sepodrían agregar otros centenares de mil-lones de gastos de Supercomités y las re-spectivas convenciones.

Obama rechazó la financiación públicaen el 2008 y recaudó 750 millones de dó-lares. Sus gastos superaron los de su ri-val, el senador John McCain, limitado alos 84 millones que recibió de los contri-buyentes. En esas elecciones no existíanlos Supercomités.

ELECCIONES

Campañas cierran en costosPOR TOM RAUM

ASSOCIATED PRESS

8A THE ZAPATA TIMES National SATURDAY, MAY 26, 2012

NEW YORK — Thirty-three yearsto the day after 6-year-old Etan Patzvanished without a trace whilewalking to catch a school bus, a manaccused of strangling him anddumping his body with the trashwas arraigned on a murder chargeon Friday in a locked hospital wardwhere he was being held as a sui-cide risk.

A lawyer for Pedro Hernandez,who was a teenage conveniencestore stock clerk at the time of theboy’s disappearance, told the judgethat his client is mentally ill and hasa history of hallucinations.

Hernandez, now 51, appeared incourt on Friday evening via videocamera from a conference room atBellevue Hospital, where he was ad-mitted earlier in the day after mak-ing comments about wanting to killhimself.

The legal proceeding lasted onlyaround 4 minutes. Hernandez didn’tspeak or enter a plea, but his court-appointed lawyer, Harvey Fishbein,told the judge that his client was bi-polar and schizophrenic and has a“history of hallucinations, both vi-sual and auditory.”

A judge ordered Hernandez heldwithout bail and authorized a psy-chological examination to see if heis fit to stand trial.

Hernandez was expressionlessduring the hearing. He wore an or-ange jumpsuit and handcuffs. A po-lice officer stood behind him.

The prosecutor who appeared incourt, Assistant District AttorneyArmand Durastanti, said it was “33years ago today that 6-year-old EtanPatz left his home on Prince Streetto catch his school bus. He has notbeen seen or heard from since. It’sbeen 33 years, and justice has notbeen done in this case.”

Hernandez, a churchgoing fathernow living in Maple Shade, N.J., wasarrested Thursday after making asurprise confession in a case thathas bedeviled investigators and in-spired dread in generations of NewYork City parents for three decades.

Etan disappeared on May 25, 1979,on his two-block walk to his bus stopin Manhattan. It was the first timehis parents had let him walk theroute by himself.

Next to the bus stop was a conve-nience store, where Hernandez, then18, worked as a clerk. When police,

acting on a tip, interviewed him thisweek, he said he lured Etan into thebasement with a promise of a soda,choked him to death, then stuffedhis body in a bag and left it withtrash on the street a block away, po-lice said.

Etan’s remains were never found,even after a massive search and amedia campaign that made parentsafraid to let their children out oftheir sight and sparked a movementto publicize the cases of missingyoungsters. Etan was one of the firstmissing children to be pictured on amilk carton.

Hernandez’s confession put inves-tigators in the unusual position ofbringing the case to court beforethey had amassed any physical evi-dence or had time to fully corrobo-rate his story or investigate his psy-chiatric condition.

Police spokesman Paul Brownesaid investigators were retracinggarbage truck routes from the late1970s and deciding whether tosearch landfills for the boy’s re-mains, a daunting prospect.

Crime scene investigators also ar-rived Friday morning at the build-ing in Manhattan’s SoHo sectionthat once held the bodega whereHernandez worked. Authorities wereconsidering excavating the basementfor evidence.

They were also looking intowhether Hernandez has a history ofmental illness or pedophilia.

Browne said letting Hernandez re-main free until the investigation wascomplete was not an option: “Therewas no way we could release theman who had just confessed to kill-ing Etan Patz.”

Legal experts said that eventhough police have a confession inhand, they are likely to work hard tomake certain Hernandez isn’t delu-sional or simply making the storyup.

“There’s always a concern wheth-er or not someone is falsely confess-ing,” said former prosecutor PaulDerOhannesian.

As Fishbein arrived at the court-house, he asked reporters to be re-spectful of some of Hernandez’s rela-tives there, including his wife anddaughter.

“It’s a tough day. The family is ve-ry upset. Please give them somespace,” Fishbein said.

Etan’s father, Stanley Patz, avoid-ed journalists gathered outside thefamily’s Manhattan apartment, thesame one the family was living inwhen his son vanished.

Former SoHo resident RobertoMonticello, a filmmaker who was ateenager when Patz disappeared,said he remembered Hernandez ascivil but reserved and “pent-up.”

“You always got the sense that ifyou crossed him really bad, hewould hurt you,” Monticello said, al-though he added that he never sawhim hit anyone.

Man arraigned in murderBy COLLEEN LONG AND LARRY NEUMEISTER

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Stan Patz, right, father of missing child Etan Patz, left, arrives at his home in SoHo, onFriday, in New York. New life has been breathed into the case after Pedro Hernandez im-plicated himself in the death of 6-year-old Etan, whose disappearance 33 years ago on hisway to school helped launch a missing children’s movement that put kids’ faces on milkcartons.

AP photos

JACKSON, Miss. — Jack-son public schools will nolonger handcuff students topoles or other objects andwill train staff at its alter-native school on bettermethods of discipline.

Mississippi’s second-largest school districtagreed Friday to the settle-ment with the SouthernPoverty Law Center, whichhad sued over the practiceof shackling students to apole at the district’s CapitalCity Alternative School.

The suit was filed inJune 2011 by Jeanette Mur-ry on behalf of her then-16-year-old son, who has beendiagnosed with attentiondeficit hyperactivity disor-der. It said staffers routine-ly restrained students forhours for offenses as minoras dress code violations,forcing them to eat lunchwhile chained to a stairrailing and to shout forhelp when they needed togo to the bathroom.

The settlement, approvedby U.S. District Judge TomLee, says all district em-ployees will stop handcuff-ing students younger than13, and can only handcuffolder students for crimes.In no case will employeesshackle a student to a fixedobject such as a railing, apole, a desk or a chair.

“It’s apparent there weresevere problems that wehope are being addressedand will be alleviated,” Leetold lawyers in court Fri-day, just before signing thesettlement order.

Troubles at the alterna-tive school helped sparkthe proceedings that havejeopardized the accredita-tion of the entire 30,000-stu-

dent district. Nationwide, a report

from the U.S. Departmentof Education showed tensof thousands of students, 70percent of them disabled,were strapped down orphysically restrained inschool in 2009-10. Advocatesfor disabled students sayrestraints are often abused,causing injury and some-times death.

Currently there are nofederal standards, althoughlegislation is pending inCongress. The U.S. Depart-ment of Education saysMississippi is one of 13states with no statewiderules governing restraints.

The law center’s VanessaCarroll said after Friday’shearing that she hoped thesettlement would improve a“profoundly dysfunctionalschool culture.”

“We hope with this set-tlement agreement, the dis-trict and school will bothtake a more positive ap-proach to student disci-pline,” she said.

Carroll said the execu-tive director of MississippiFamilies as Allies for Chil-dren’s Mental Health willserve as a district-paidmonitor as part of the set-tlement. Joy Hogge willcheck compliance for twoyears. Under the settle-ment, the district alsoagreed to record every timehandcuffs or other re-straints are used.

Jackson schools’ chieflawyer JoAnne Shepherdtold Lee that the districthas told employees at thealternative school to stopusing restraints.

“We’re looking forwardto improving that environ-ment,” she said. “We thinkthe agreement will helpus.”

Handcuffingstudents stops:

settlementBy JEFF AMY

ASSOCIATED PRESS

SATURDAY, MAY 26, 2012 THE ZAPATA TIMES 9A

the sheriff ’s office received reports ofbomb threats on three different occa-sions.

On April 28, a hoax bomb was locatedat 1:48 a.m. within the vicinity of theBoys and Girls Club, 302 Sixth Ave. Lare-do police’s bomb squad assisted deputiesin the case. Investigator Joe E. Baeza, La-redo police spokesman, said at the timethat the artifact was not a threat to thecommunity.

According to Baeza, the artifact wasmade of PVC pipe, duct tape, wires andbatteries. However, investigators did notfind an explosive component. Bomb

squad experts disabled the item using ahigh pressure water jet system that helpsbreak apart the outer shell of a bombwithout detonating it.

Two more bomb threats followed. OnMay 6, deputies responded to an emer-gency call at 4:25 a.m. at Zapata HighSchool. On May 13, the Boys and GirlsClub was targeted again at 12:04 a.m.

Following leads and evidence, Elizondosaid investigators were able to piece to-gether the case and identify Alaniz asthe person responsible.

(César G. Rodriguez may be reached at728-2568 or cesar@lmtonline.com)

THREATS Continued from Page 1A

months. A Zapata CountySheriff ’s Office news re-lease states the suspectswould tear off the emblemsfrom parked vehicles.

Buying an emblem froma dealership is expensive.Prices range from $300 to$600, Elizondo said. He add-ed that criminals prefer tosteal emblems and sellthose at a cheap price.

“It’s an easy profit forthem,” the sergeant said.

More people were arrest-ed in connection to theft ofmotor vehicle parts and ac-cessories.

Rogelio Valadez Jr., 39,was arrested and chargedwith burglary of a vehicle.A sheriff ’s office news re-lease states a string of bur-glaries were occurring atGordo’s Auto Sales JunkYard at 128 Garcia Road.

Elizondo said the partswere being taken from usedand junk vehicles to be sold

around town. Investigatorsrecovered about $20,000 inused parts. Parts includedseats, transmissions, hoods,differentials, dashboards,and rear view mirrors,among other parts.

“They were making a bigprofit,” Elizondo said.

Valadez was also impli-cated on another chargewith Francisco M. Rios, 24.They face theft charges. Ifconvicted for the state jailfelony, both men could face180 days to two years in jailand $10,000 fines. A sheriff ’soffice news release statesthe charge stems from a2003 Chevrolet Silverado be-ing taken from the Aqua

Restaurant and Bar parkinglot at 178 S. U.S. 83 on April21. Investigators later foundthe vehicle burned and to-taled in the Falcon Mezasubdivision. Rios and Vala-dez were at Zapata RegionalJail as of Friday evening.

Elizondo encouragesmembers of the public tocome forward with infor-mation about other theftsand burglaries. To reportsuspicious activity, callCrime Stoppers at 765-TIPS(8477). Callers may remainanonymous and could qual-ify for rewards.

(César G. Rodriguez maybe reached at 728-2568 or ce-sar@lmtonline.com)

ARRESTS Continued from Page 1A

VILLARREAL RIOS VALADEZ CAMPOS

“Who’s to say theircrops (aren’t) affected?”she asked.

The Texas Clean RiversProgram, a partnershipbetween the state’s regula-tory agency on water qual-ity and regional waterquality entities, releasedpreliminary results from a2011 study of bacteria lev-els in the Rio Grande.

Fecal coliform and E. co-li levels at the stretch ofthe river that starts atdowntown Laredo andruns to InternationalBridge No. 2 exceed feder-al standards for swim-ming, fishing and boating,the study finds.

Swim in the water ordare eat the fish that in-habit that stretch of theRio Grande, and you’relikely to get sick — at leastfrom diarrhea, but expo-sure to the high bacterialevels can increase one’srisk of contracting hepati-tis or dysentery.

Water drawn for drink-ing, of course, is taken towater treatment plantsand made suitable for hu-man consumption.

But the livelihood of theriver and its ecosystemare at stake, said TriciaCortez, executive directorof the Rio Grande Interna-tional Study Center.

Cortez recently wrote anopinion article urging gov-ernment entities on theU.S. and Mexican sides toaddress the issue.

The onus for high bacte-ria levels lies partly onMexico’s shoulders, shesaid.

Nuevo Laredo has twowastewater treatmentplants. The first was builtin 1996 and the second in2009.

But not all of the city’sstorm drains are connect-ed to the plants. Instead,165 liters of raw sewagegets dumped into the riverby the second, a represen-tative from Nuevo Laredo’smunicipal water utility of-fice said in January at alocal conference.

While Cortez called onelected officials to take ac-tion, she said it would takesupport from the commu-nity to effect change.

“As a community, wehave to take a big-pictureapproach … to make surethat we do all that we canto make sure (the river is)healthy and safe,” shesaid.

Jorge Vera, a Laredocity councilman whosedistrict runs along the riv-er, said the city’s primaryconcern is producing pota-ble drinking water for its

citizens.“At our level, we just

want to make sure that La-redo has the best qualitydrinking water possible,”he said.

He said the city haspressed the issue before intrips to the nation’s capitalas well as with variousstate and federal electedofficials representing thearea.

Until Mexico addressesthe problem, there isn’tmuch the local govern-ment can do to make theriver safe for recreationaluse, according to Vera.

He has spoken withCounty CommissionerJaime Canales about pos-sibly taking treated waterout of Lake Casa Blancaand into the Rio Grande.

For Laredoans, poor wa-ter quality in the riverhas, for several decadesnow, been par for thecourse.

In her op-ed, Cortez saidit is time for that to end.

“The lack of politicalwill by the U.S. and Mex-ico to deal with this prob-lem has been a source ofshame and embarrass-ment for our communityfor far too long,” she said.

(JJ Velasquez may bereached at 728-2567 or jjve-lasquez@lmtonline.com)

RIVER Continued from Page 1A

RICHMOND, Va. — Twowomen in the Army Re-serve have sued the U.S.Department of Defense andthe Army in a bid to re-verse military policies ban-ning women from servingin combat roles.

The lawsuit filed in U.S.District Court for the Dis-trict of Columbia accusesthe government of violat-ing the constitutionalrights of servicewomen byexcluding them from cer-tain ground combat unitsand other positions solelyon the basis of their gender.It seeks to end such poli-cies by the Defense Depart-ment and Army and to re-quire the military to makeall assignments and train-ing decisions without re-gard to a service member’sgender.

The lawsuit, filedWednesday, names Secreta-ry of Defense Leon Panetta,Secretary of the ArmyJohn McHugh, DeputyChief of Staff Lt. GenThomas Bostick and Assist-ant Army Secretary Thom-as Lamont. It is the firstlawsuit to challenge thecombat ban, according toUniversity of Virginia LawSchool professor AnneCoughlin, who led an effortto look into the policies.

Command Sgt. Maj. JaneBaldwin and Col. EllenHaring allege the policieshave hindered their careeradvancement, and that con-tinued enforcement of thepolicy unconstitutionallybars women from certainpositions available to men,restricts current and futureearnings, their opportuni-

ties for advancement andtheir future retirementbenefits.

The lawsuit also notesthat women are alreadyserving in combat in Iraqand Afghanistan, and in-stead of assigning them tocombat units, the militaryis purposefully and deliber-ately circumventing the ex-clusion by “attaching”them to such units. In do-ing so, however, the poli-cies put the women inmore danger than theirmale counterparts becausethey’re barred from receiv-ing combat-arms trainingnecessary for engagingwith hostile forces.

Haring has held posi-tions as platoon leader,commander, executive offi-cer and bridge commanderover a 28-year Army career.She currently serves as aJoint Concept Officer forthe Joint and CoalitionWarfighting Center in Suf-folk, Va. The lawsuit ar-gues that Haring’s options

“were limited to supportpositions with no possibili-ty to compete within thecombat arms.”

The ban also has causedBaldwin and Haring to“suffer invidious discrimi-natory treatment in a workenvironment that institu-tionalizes the unequaltreatment of women solelybecause of their sex andnotwithstanding their indi-vidual abilities,” the law-suit said.

Department of Defensespokesman Todd Breas-seale declined to commentspecifically Friday aboutthe lawsuit. But he said Pa-netta “remains stronglycommitted to examiningthe roles of women in theU.S. military, as evidencedby the recent step of open-ing up thousands more as-signments to women.”

Under that change, fe-male officers and non-com-missioned officers will beassigned to combat unitsbelow the brigade level.

2 officers sue overfemale combat ban

By ZINIE CHEN SAMPSONASSOCIATED PRESS

Capt. Sara Rodriguez of the 101st Airborne Division walks throughthe woods during the field medical badge testing at Fort Campbell,Ky., on May 9. Female soldiers are moving into new jobs in once all-male units as the U.S. Army breaks down barriers in recognition ofwhat’s already happened in wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Photo by Kristin M. Hall | AP

SEATTLE — From theair, the Arctic drill shipKulluk looks like a giantbowling pin seated on ashallow bowl.

With the centerpiece ofthe ship, the 160-foot der-rick, Shell Oil hopes tosend down drill bits andpipe to tap vast oil re-serves below the BeaufortSea off Alaska’s northcoast. But it’s the funnel-shape hull, with its flaredsides, that makes the shipappropriate for ArcticOcean waters, accordingto the company.

“This conical shape isdesigned so that if icestarts to run under it —ice moves in the Arctic —if that ice starts to run un-

der it, what that cone doesis deflect the ice down-ward and breaks the iceup into pieces,” said BrentRoss, Shell Offshore Wellsmanager. “So in essence,you have a big drilling rigon a hull that’s shapedlike an ice-breaker.”

If the oil giant gets itsfinal federal permits andovercomes court challeng-es by environmentalgroups, the Kulluk and asecond drill ship, the No-ble Discover, will be inAlaska waters this year.

The U.S. Geological Sur-vey estimates Arctic wa-ters hold 26 billion barrelsof recoverable oil and 130trillion cubic feet of natu-ral gas. The United Statesconsumed 18.8 millionbarrels per day of petro-leum products during

2011, according to the U.S.Energy Information Ad-ministration.

Shell’s drilling plancalls for two exploratorywells by the Kulluk in theBeaufort Sea and three ex-ploratory wells by the No-ble Discoverer in theChukchi Sea and, some-time in the future, a pipe-line link to the trans-Alas-ka pipeline.

Shell in 2008 spent $2.1billion on leases in theChukchi but has yet todrill a well. The companyestimates it has spentmore than $4 billion pre-paring for Arctic offshoredrilling, including about$100 million for the latestmodifications to the Kul-luk, which has beenberthed in Seattle forabout 10 months.

Drill ship nearly doneBy TED WARREN AND DAN JOLING

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Zapata County ISDPK-4 Pre-Registrations

ZCISD will be registeringall new PK-4 students,

for the school year 2012-2013. Registrations will be held

on the week ofMay 28 - June 1, 2012,from 8:00 am - 3:00 pm.

All elementary schools will be holding their registrations

at their own campus.

Documentation needed for registra-tions:

Proof of residency (utility bill),birth certificate, ssn card,

Immunizationcard, and parent photo id.

For more information,please call your school.

Zapata North Elementary(956-765-6917)

Zapata South Elementary(956-765-4332)

Fidel & Andrea R. VillarrealElementary

(956-765-4321)

10A THE ZAPATA TIMES SATURDAY, MAY 26, 2012

ARLINGTON — Whenofficer Zhivonni McDon-nell reported for a shiftearlier this year, she wasarmed with one of the Po-lice Department’s newesttools: a smartphoneequipped with Twitter.

As she accompanied aCitizens on Patrol memberthat night, McDonnell, thedepartment’s social mediaspecialist, tweeted updateson what they were seeingand doing, giving followersa taste of what the volun-teer group does.

Think social networkingis just a frivolous time-waster for celebrities, kidsand the weak-minded? Lawenforcement agencies fromArlington to Zurich in-creasingly see Facebook,Twitter and other plat-forms as 21st-century waysto walk the beat, preventcrime and bust the badguys.

The key, said Chyng-Yang Jang, an associateprofessor in the Universityof Texas at Arlington’s de-partment of communica-tion, is having personnelwho are trained in theiruse.

“If you’re going to use itto just post information,then I don’t think it will betoo effective,” he said.“The real powerful thing isthe two-way communica-tion.”

Cleveland police used itduring an Amber Alert inApril and received a tipwithin a few hours thatled to the children’s res-cue. In Pennsylvania, a po-lice department madethree arrests in one weekoff leads generated by so-cial media. Recently, one ofDenton’s most-wanted mis-demeanor fugitives sawhis mug shot on the PoliceDepartment’s Facebookpage and turned himselfin, hoping to keep his fam-ily and friends from find-ing out.

Social media “is here.It’s going to stay,” said offi-cer Ryan Grelle, spokes-man for the Denton Police

Department and one of thefirst in North Texas to usethe tool aggressively. “Mycaptain told me, ‘Just do it.Don’t embarrass us, but dowhat you think we shoulddo.’”

Arlington police, whohave also made arrests offinformation distributedvia social media, use theplatforms to publicizegood work by officers thatthe traditional media maynot cover, to provide safetytips and to keep the com-munity posted on emer-gencies like the April 3tornado outbreak. Goingto the Rangers game? Fol-low @arlingtonpd for re-ports on traffic and park-ing — and to see who’shaving fun tailgating.

With 4,160 Facebookfans and 3,101 Twitter fol-lowers one day recently,the department is gainingon the top five U.S. law en-forcement agencies for itssize, according to the mostrecent numbers reportedby the International Asso-ciation of Chiefs of Police’sCenter for Social Media.

The outreach is not sim-ply a public-relations moveto control the message andput a smiley face on every-body who wears a gun andbadge.

“If it were,” said Sgt.Christopher Cook, supervi-sor of the department’scommunications team,“then we would never postabout murders. Wewouldn’t want anybody tothink their communitywasn’t safe.”

The desire to add anoth-er layer of transparencyand accountability startsat the top. “By being there,engaging in dialogue withour citizens through socialmedia,” said Police ChiefTheron Bowman, now aninterim assistant city man-ager, “we are able to havecandid and personable con-versations, thereby facili-tating legitimacy, thebuilding block of thrivingcommunities.”

Cook took charge of thecommunications staff inJuly after about two yearsin which former Dallas

Morning News reporterTiara Richard was oftenthe lone departmentspokeswoman. Now theteam also includes McDon-nell, who focuses on socialmedia, and Cheryel Car-penter, who came overfrom the city staff to han-dle the department’s com-munity relations.

All four share the dutyof monitoring and updat-ing the department’s Face-book, Twitter, YouTubeand Nixle platforms.

“We found that you real-ly have to have the staff tohandle that stuff,” Cooksaid. “There’s just no wayto keep up with it other-wise.”

Last fall, the staff at-tended a Social Media, theInternet and Law Enforce-ment — or SMILE — con-ference in Dallas, where itlearned what departmentselsewhere in the countrywere doing in cyberspace,including the idea of vir-tual ride-alongs.

The “tweetalong” — aTwitter hashtag that theArlington department be-lieves it was the first touse — has proved popular,in one case helping the de-partment attract hundredsof followers in mid-Decem-ber when Bowman tweetedwhile accompanying adrunken-driving task forcepatrol shift.

Law enforcement agen-cies across North Texasare feeling their wayaround how to best use theplatforms. Dallas policeare posting official newsreleases on Facebook.

Fort Worth police, whodrew criticism two yearsago for questionabletweets, now use Facebookand Twitter in much thesame way as Arlington.Tarrant County SheriffDee Anderson has hiredan administrative assist-

ant who is knowledgeableabout social networking toguide him.

“We’ve tried to be care-ful in disseminating infor-mation,” he said. “Most ofwhat we do is very serious,and not everything can beput out to the public.We’re going to operate asmuch on a transparencylevel as we can. I thinkthat in the right times andin the right ways, it can bea good channel to commu-nicate, but we’re not goingto force it on anybody.”

Properly used, socialmedia platforms can putthe police and the averagecitizen on equal footing,fostering a casual ex-change in a comfortablemanner. That can be reas-suring for many whowould normally encounterofficers only during a traf-fic stop or other stressful

situation.“It shows that there’s a

real person behind thebadge,” Grelle said. “Policeofficers are human, too.”

In February, Denton po-lice began posting theirmost-wanted felony andmisdemeanor lists onFacebook. The tips they re-ceived have led to eight ar-rests, including the embar-rassed fugitive who turnedhimself in.

On April 18, the Cleve-land Police Departmentposted an Amber Alert onits new Facebook andTwitter accounts, whichhad about 2,000 followers.Some 200 of them quicklyshared the informationwith their own followers,and so on. Within hours,the suspect and missingchildren had been spotted,according to a May 5 storyon cleveland.com.

Police like social networking as a toolBy PATRICK M. WALKER

FORT WORTH STAR-TELEGRAM

Arlington Police Officer Zhivonni McDonnel tweets on her iPhone at the Parks Mall in Arlington on Feb. 10 during a ride-along with Citizenson Patrol Mobile, as part of the department’s first Street Tweet. Law enforcement agencies world-wide increasingly see Facebook, Twitterand other platforms as 21st-century ways to walk the beat, prevent crime and bust the bad guys.

Photo by Richard W. Rodriguez/Fort Worth Star-Telegram | AP

Sports&OutdoorsSATURDAY, MAY 26, 2012 ON THE WEB: THEZAPATATIMES.COM

The 11th annual Mercy-BosomBuddies all-star games are in thebooks as the stars came out to playTuesday and Wednesday nights.

Zapata was well-represented inthe all-star games, as three athletesand two coaches, along with theircoaching staffs, made their way toLaredo’s St. Augustine HighSchool.

On Tuesday night, Zapata se-niors Shelby Bigler, Estella Molinaand Jackie Salinas played in thegirls’ basketball all-star game.

Bigler and Molina played for theWest All-Star team, while Salinaswas on the East All-Star team.

The West team took a huge leadand never looked back, winning 55-34.

In the second game of the night,the boys’ all-stars took the floorwith Zapata coach Juan Villarrealat the helm for the East, composedof players from Laredo.

The game was evenly matched,giving fans excitement throughfour quarters of play.

“It was awesome coaching agreat group of talented guys,” Vil-larreal said. “It was close to theend. My coaching staff and I en-joyed the seesaw battle, and theguys battled till the end. Ultimate-ly I just tried to make sure every-one had enough playing time and(was) hoping they had as much fun

as we did.”In the end, LBJ’s Bill Groogan,

the West All-Star coach, who is re-tiring this year, won the last gameof his coaching career and now hascalled it quits after 47 years on thesidelines.

The West prevailed, 73-68, as theEast was forced to foul down thestretch.

“We had to start fouling at theend, and they made most of theirfree throws,” Villarreal said.“That’s where they pulled away. Italso didn’t hurt that they had closeto 70 years of coaching experienceon their bench and we had only 10.They kinda out-coached us.”

MERCY-BOSOM BUDDIES ALL-STAR GAMES

Flying away

The girls’ and boys’ all-star teams pose for a photo at St. Augustine Gym last weekend.

Courtesy Photo

Three Lady Hawks play their last gamesBy CLARA SANDOVAL

THE ZAPATA TIMES

See ALL-STARS PAGE 2B

Next week is grad-uation for ZapataHigh School, andit is time to say

good-bye to some great ath-letes who have worn theschool colors with prideand joy.

These athletes wentthrough something moststudents could not endure— four years of highschool athletics.

Being an athlete takesdedication to a sport andsometimes two or threesports.

Some athletes will get toexperience their first sum-mer off in years becausethey are not in open gym,in the weight room or inthe summer conditioningprogram.

These athletes are goingto have so much time ontheir hands that they willnot know what to do withthis extra time, so theirparents might suggest theywork.

The Zapata athletes havehad to miss many thingsduring their high schoolcareers because they havea passion for their sports.

Many people cannot dis-tinguish between loving asport and just liking toplay it once in a while.

If you have no desire to

win, then maybe PE is theclass for you because ath-letes always want to winand make sure they puttheir best forward everytime they step on the field,court or course.

Being a high school ath-lete means you might misssome family events whenyou are in season or youmay miss so many familydinners that the micro-wave becomes your bestfriend.

Athletes sacrifice somany things that someplayers figure sports arenot for them, so they dropout of athletics.

Every year, more andmore of those players whostarted off will drop out.By the time they are se-niors, only a handful havemade it through.

I would like for all of theZapata seniors to thinkback to when they were inseventh grade and howmany people were on theteam. Now, how many of

Zapata seniorclass one toremember

“CLARA SANDOVALOVAL

See SANDOVAL PAGE 2B

WASHINGTON — A nee-dle stored with a beer canappeared to contain an ex-tremely tiny amount ofRoger Clemens’ DNA,which turned out to begood news and bad newsfor both sides in the perju-ry trial of the seven-timeCy Young Award winner.

A forensic scientist onFriday linked Clemens tocotton balls and a syringe

needle saved from an al-leged steroids injection 11years ago. His testimony,laced with statistics andprobabilities, was one ofthe last pieces of the gov-ernment’s case in its effortto prove that the pitcherlied to Congress in 2008when he denied using per-formance-enhancing sub-stances.

Under cross-examin-ation, Clemens’ lawyer

CLEMENS TRIAL

Former Houston Astros pitcher Roger Clemens, who is accused oflying to Congress in 2008 when he denied using performance-enhancing drugs, leaves federal court in Washington, D.C., on Fri-day.

Photo by Manuel Balce Ceneta | AP

Key evidencediscussed in

Clemens trialBy JOSEPH WHITEASSOCIATED PRESS

See CLEMENS PAGE 2B

OKLAHOMA CITY —When Clay Bennett wasseeking a leader for histeam that would one daybecome the OklahomaCity Thunder, he picked arising star from a San An-tonio franchise on theverge of winning itsfourth NBA champion-ship in a decade.

It was the start of a pro-cess that would modelBennett’s franchise afterthe Spurs, leading up totheir meeting in the West-ern Conference finalsstarting Sunday night.

The standards that ledto San Antonio’s successrubbed off on Sam Presti,who got his start as a vid-eo intern for the Spurs be-fore rising through thatorganization and eventu-ally getting hired by Ben-nett as general managerof the relocating SeattleSuperSonics.

He recognized the im-portance San Antonioplaced on humility, sacri-fice and a family atmo-sphere and has tried to in-

still those standards inthe Thunder.

“I think everyone with-in the NBA has great re-spect for what the Spurshave accomplished andthe standards that theyhave established in recentyears, but I think everyorganization has to have

their own identity,” Prestisaid Thursday.

“Certainly, we’re al-ways going to look to tryto pull from organizationssuch as the Spurs in oureffort to build an identityand a foundation for anorganization in OklahomaCity that has great endu-

rance.” The similarities are nu-

merous. Each team playsin a smaller NBA marketand has a nucleus ofhomegrown players ac-quired through the draft,including hidden gems

NBA PLAYOFFS

Spurs a model of NBA successBy JEFF LATZKE

ASSOCIATED PRESS

San Antonio Spurs center Tim Duncan puts up a shot as Los Angeles Clippers center DeAndre Jor-dan defends during Game 4 of the Western Conference semifinals last Sunday in Los Angeles. TheSpurs won 102-99.

Photo by Mark J. Terrill | AP

See SPURS PAGE 2B

PAGE 2B Zscores SATURDAY, MAY 26, 2012

those players made it all the way through high schoolsports? If you are lucky, maybe a third became Hawksor Lady Hawks and were able to stick with it for fouryears.

People started dropping out for a variety of reasons,and many do regret leaving the sport, while some wit-nessed the writing on the wall and knew they were notup to par with the rest.

Some wanted to contribute and instead became theteam managers — very important jobs.

I feel that a varsity jacket is to be given only to ath-letes who have made it through all four years of hardwork and sweat.

Zapata gives letterman jackets only to seniors, and Ienjoy that notion. It’s unlike in Laredo, where someplayers play only their freshman year and can get a let-terman jacket and quit the team.

I am glad to hear that in Zapata, you have to earn

that jacket for four years of representing the schoolpositively. And yes, only seniors should wear the jack-ets — no one else.

During my playing days, no underclassman was al-lowed to have a jacket on, even if it belonged to an old-er brother or sister who got one and passed it down.

Only seniors were allowed to wear the jackets. Asense of accomplishment and pride accompanied thejackets.

I wore my jacket only during my senior of highschool, and then it went back in the closet because Iwas not about to wear it in college.

So with graduation around the corner, I would like totake this time to thank all the Zapata athletes for fourmemorable years. Though I have not met many of you,I have watched you grow from afar and have enjoyedwriting about you every week.

Hawks pride forever.

SANDOVAL Continued from Page 1B

On Wednesday night, Zapata vol-leyball coach Rosie Villarreal andher staff, along with Molina, Bi-gler and Salinas, took the court inthe volleyball all-star game.

Villarreal and her team had tocome from behind after losing thefirst two games to take home thevictory, 3-2.

“I really had a lot of fun coach-ing the West team with the talent-ed seniors,” Villarreal said. “It’sneat to sit there and have the girlsthemselves help each other out. Ialso enjoyed one of the girls on thebench saying how they were allfrom different schools and howwell they had gelled. They all com-

mented on how much fun theyhad. As much fun as (I had) coach-ing them.”

The East All-Stars took controlof the first two matches and wonwhile the West was warming up.The West then took games three,four and five to make it a Westsweep in the all-star games.

ALL-STARS Continued from Page 1B

tried to poke holes in thephysical evidence. He gotthe expert to acknowledgethere were “hundreds ofthousands” of white malesin the United States whocould be a match for thescant amount of DNAfound on the needle, andthat it’s “conceivable” thecotton balls could havebeen contaminated by beerand saliva.

Prosecutors had hoped towrap up their case headinginto the long holiday week-end as the trial reached theend of its sixth week, butthe DNA expert’s testimonytook much longer than ex-pected. U.S. District JudgeReggie Walton then endedthe session a half-hourearly when one of the ju-rors learned that her moth-er had died.

The judge said he doesn’texpect the juror, a womanwho works in law enforce-ment with the local publictransportation authority, toreturn. Two jurors havepreviously been dismissedfor sleeping, and anotherdeparture would leave onlyone alternate in a trial ex-pected to last at least twomore weeks.

The government’s keywitness, longtime Clemensstrength coach BrianMcNamee, says he injectedClemens with steroids in1998, 2000 and 2001 andwith human growth hor-mone in 2000. He said hekept the needle and otherwaste from a 2001 injectionand stored it in and arounda beer can in a FedEx boxin his home for more thansix years before turning itover to federal investiga-tors.

Alan Keel of ForensicScience Associates told ju-rors that the DNA found ontwo cotton balls was“unique to one person whohas ever lived on the plan-et” — Clemens. He saidthat one of the cotton ballshad a random match possi-bility of one in 15.4 trillionfor Clemens’ DNA, and theother was one in 173 tril-lion, when compared to thepopulation of white peoplein the U.S.

But the needle was notas conclusive. Keel wasable to detect only six to 12cells for testing when heexamined it. A drop ofblood, by comparison, con-tains up to 30,000 cells.

The match: one in 449 forClemens.

“That means that Mr.Clemens is the likelysource of that biology,”Keel said.

Knowing that the defensewould attempt to under-mine the integrity of theevidence, prosecutor Court-ney Saleski asked: “Is thereany way to fake this?”

“No,” said Keel, shakinghis head. “If this were con-trived, I would expect to ob-tain much more biologicalmaterial.”

In other words, it wouldhave been extremely diffi-cult for anyone, includingMcNamee, to purposelycontaminate the needle be-cause it contained such aminute amount of humanresidue.

During cross-examin-ation, Clemens lawyer Mi-chael Attanasio attacked

the findings in severalways. He pointed out thatKeel was being paid by thegovernment. He pointedout that Keel didn’t test allof the items available. Hepointed out that the DNAhad degraded over time. Henoted that 449 was a “far,far smaller number” thanthe other numbers in thetrillions, and it thereforecan’t be said with uncon-tested certainty that theDNA on the needle belongsto Clemens.

Attanasio got Keel toagree that the Clemensblood found on one cottonball appeared to be fromthe aftermath of an injec-tion, but that the Clemenspuss on the other cottonball “is not from an imme-diate injection site.” Thelawyer also suggested theblood on the cotton ballmight not have come froman injection at all: “Is it notat all uncommon for apitcher to have a littleblood blister at the end ofhis finger when he waspitching?”

Attanasio further im-plied that residue beer andsaliva inside the can couldhave soaked the cottonballs. Keel said that was“conceivable” and “not im-plausible,” but he addedthat the appearance of thecotton balls would have re-flected the contamination.

“You would have a big,diffuse mess,” Keel said.

Saleski picked up on thatpoint in her follow-up ques-tioning.

“Did you see any evi-dence that these cottonballs were exposed to abunch of beer?” she askedthe witness.

“Not really, no,” Keelsaid.

Keel also re-emphasizedhis opinion that the minutesample of DNA on the nee-dle could not have beenmanipulated or put there“by design.”

“It would be virtually im-possible,” Keel said.

The needle naturallycaught the attention of thejurors, who submitted mul-tiple questions for thejudge to ask the witnessabout the one-in-449 ratio.

“There’s the rub,” saidKeel as he explained againthat the results were com-patible with Clemens —but couldn’t be considereda conclusive match.

Clemens’ lawyers havemaintained all along that abeer can is no way to storeevidence. During the ques-tioning of Keel, the govern-ment decided to emphasizethat point, too, inferringthat if McNamee had trulyintended to keep the needleand cotton balls with theintention of implicatingClemens, he would havefound a more sterile placefor it. McNamee has saidhe kept the evidence to pla-cate his wife, who was con-cerned he would take thefall if his involvement inperformance-enhancingdrugs ever came to light,and that he had no plans tomake it public.

Keel also found a gauzepad and tissue thatmatched McNamee’s DNAto an even greater probabil-ity than the Clemensmatches.

CLEMENS Continued from Page 1B

plucked from overseas. But more than the basketball product,

the franchises have a reputation for howthey handle their business: no bad-mouthing other teams or players, fewscrapes with the law or other incidentsand no sense of entitlement.

“I tell guys all the time: Not every guycan come here and play. This isn’t for ev-erybody,” said Nazr Mohammed, whowon an NBA title with San Antonio in2005 and is now a backup for the Thun-der.

“The same in San Antonio. That isn’tfor everybody. ... It’s not even the player,more so the person.”

It may not be no-nonsense, but therecertainly isn’t much of it.

“It starts at the top, the way Sam hasbuilt the organization and then the play-ers he’s brung in to match that system.It’s amazing to have these young guysaround here that understand just thehard work, the family atmosphere,” Mo-hammed said.

“I’ve been on some teams where you’vegot a bunch of young guys. Family atmo-sphere is the furthest thing from guys’

minds. Guys are thinking about, ‘Whenam I going to get my opportunity to getout there and show the world what I cando and get my second contract?’ Here,it’s nothing like that. Guys just want towork, win, get better and they know andunderstand like veterans that the restwill take care of itself.”

While Presti has tried to foster thatSan Antonio-style atmosphere, he creditshis players and coaches for carrying itout and putting in the work that has ledto consecutive Western Conference finalsappearances for the second time in fran-chise history.

The attitude filters down from owner-ship — Bennett used to represent theSpurs on the NBA’s board of governors— and through the front office, but Mo-hammed said the key is the franchises’ability to find players who buy into it.

At the forefront, he sees San Antonio’sTim Duncan and Oklahoma City’s KevinDurant — both superstars who don’tcare about the limelight and only want“to work hard and play basketball.”

“You can preach it around but it’s stillgot to come from the player because you

can get a young guy now who’s unbeliev-able but if he doesn’t buy into it, he’s go-ing to think his own way and do his ownthing no matter what,” Mohammed said.

Spurs general manager R.C. Bufordsaid he knew within a week of hiringPresti that he wouldn’t be an internlong. Presti ended up helping persuadethe franchise to draft point guard TonyParker, who has developed into an All-Star and the Spurs’ leading scorer, on hisrise through the organization.

Coach Gregg Popovich joked that SanAntonio “tried to keep him in a closetfor a while so no one would know abouthim” but word eventually got out. Andnow some of the Spurs’ secrets may beworking against them.

“I don’t have the intimate details ofwhat Sam’s culture is. But from an out-sider’s perspective, the things that areimportant to the Thunder’s culture as es-tablished by Sam are similar to what’simportant to the Spurs culture,” Bufordsaid.

Bennett, who declined commentthrough a spokesman, said upon hiringthe 30-year-old Presti in 2007 that he

viewed the Spurs “as the premier fran-chise in our business” but he was hiringthe GM on his own merits and not be-cause he worked for San Antonio.

Presti has said from the beginningthat he wasn’t trying to re-create theSpurs.

“No two places are the same andyou’re going to have different circum-stances and different approaches. That’swhat makes the NBA great,” Presti said.“We have a lot of respect for them but wealso have to build our own identity, butwe’re also certainly using some of thecore values that are in place there, thatare also in place in other successful andsustainable sports franchises.”

And there are still four major differ-ences between the franchises: The Spurs’championships in 1999, 2003, 2005 and2007.

“I’d like to think that as we continueto grow and build our organization thatwe’ll establish an identity for the Okla-homa City Thunder but that doesn’t hap-pen in four years,” Presti said, “and wehave to embrace the fact that we have along road ahead of us.”

SPURS Continued from Page 1B

MIAMI — Dwyane Wade has beenbattling knee soreness. LeBronJames was hobbling after a fallinginto a courtside cameraman. ChrisBosh remains sidelined indefinitelywith an abdominal strain. MikeMiller looks to be in agony whenev-er he moves.

An extra day of rest doesn’t soundlike much, but it means plenty rightnow to the Miami Heat.

Now halfway to their goal of anNBA championship, the Heat took awelcomed — and needed — day offFriday after closing out their East-ern Conference semifinal matchupwith the Indiana Pacers.

The East finals open Monday inMiami against either Philadelphiaor Boston, teams that will settletheir second-round series with aGame 7 on Saturday night.

“We can use it,” James said afterthe Heat ousted the Pacers with aGame 6 win in Indianapolis onThursday. “Any team in the postsea-son, any extra day that you can get,it definitely helps us. So we’re goingto take advantage of it.”

It’s not like the Heat were plan-ning to sit at home all day, sincemost players at this time of yeartend to hit the training room on offdays. Still, for the first time in awhile, Friday provided a chance forthe reigning East champs to relax abit, especially after three hard-fought wins in five days allowedMiami to claw back from what wasa soon-forgotten 2-1 series deficit tothe Pacers.

Wade and James combined toscore 197 points in the final threegames of the Indiana series, whilethe Pacers’ starters collectively man-aged 184. Other Heat players steppedup along the way — Udonis Haslemwith 14 points in Game 4, ShaneBattier with 13 in Game 5, Millerwith 12 in Game 6 — but with Boshsidelined, it was Wade and Jameswho welcomed the challenge of hav-ing to handle much of the offensiveresponsibility.

“I don’t know if they’ve been re-quired to shoulder as much respon-sibility as they’ve had to now, partic-ularly now that Chris is out,” Heatcoach Erik Spoelstra said. “Andwe’re making no excuses. We haveenough. But they have to give us

more and that’s what competitionwill do. You play against good com-petition in this league and it bringsout the best in you — you hope.”

Bosh told ESPN.com this weekthat he is improving, but stoppedshort of offering a date for his pos-sible return.

He was hurt midway throughGame 1 of the Indiana series, mean-ing nearly two full weeks havepassed since he was diagnosed witha strained lower abdominal muscle.The best-case scenario for recoveryfor someone with that type of injuryis typically 2-3 weeks, though theHeat have never deviated from say-ing Bosh is out indefinitely.

“I appreciate extra rest,” Wadesaid. “I’m never going to cross myeye on that at all. I feel like it’s well-deserved. I think also it gives us anopportunity to get Chris more ther-apy, more treatment the days thatwe’re off and he moves that muchcloser to being able to rejoin thisballclub. I thought this was a veryphysical series ... so the rest will dous some (good).”

The Pacers probably would sug-gest Wade couldn’t get much betterthan he was in the last 10 quartersof their series.

Wade was awful — 2 for 13 shoot-ing, five points, five turnovers — inGame 3, an Indiana blowout thatmany thought put the Pacers in con-trol of the series. He started Game 4by missing seven of his first eightshots. And from there, the 2006 fi-nals MVP was in 2006 finals MVPform again: Wade shot 39 for 57 therest of the series, putting up 41points and 10 rebounds in Thurs-day’s clincher.

Since 1992, according to STATSLLC, there’s been 52 instances ofsomeone having at least 40 pointsand 10 rebounds in a playoff game.Of those, 50 came from players listedto be at least 6-foot-6. The other twoare by Wade, perhaps generouslylisted at 6-foot-4.

“Spectacular, from the beginningto the end,” James said of Wade’sGame 6 effort. “He got in a rhythmearly and just kept going.”

Miller scored 12 on Thursday.

Rest important for HeatBy TIM REYNOLDSASSOCIATED PRESS

Miami’s Mike Miller grabs a ball that was going out of bounds during Game 6 of the East-ern Conference semifinals at the Bankers Life Field House in Indianapolis on Thursday.

Photo by Charles Trainor | AP

DENNISTHE MENACE

PARDON MY PLANET

DAILY CRYPTOQUOTES | HERE’S HOW TO WORK IT:

JUDGE PARKER

REXMORGAN M.D.

FOR BETTER OR WORSE

HINTS | BY HELOISE

SATURDAY, MAY 26, 2012 THE ZAPATA TIMES 3B

Dear Readers: JEWEL-RY BOXES can hold onlyso much, so try displayingyour jewelry in a decora-tive way:

Pick up vases from acrafts store or resale shopwith different-size necks.Shepherd-hook and clip-onearrings can hang aroundthe opening, and braceletsand necklaces can danglearound the neck.

Try hanging up somelengths of wire or ribbonalong your closet wall tomake a cute, space-savingdisplay with all your jewel-ry.

Have a dress form sit-ting in the attic or garage?Decorate it with necklacesto add a vintage touch to avanity area. I have onethat I use to hold lots ofhats.

Glue some lace in thewindow of a pretty pictureframe to store stud anddangle earrings.

— HeloisePET PAL

Dear Readers: Avalon I.in Grapeland, Texas, sent apicture of her “ChickenNugget,” a bird that foundits way into her home andhas laid an egg inside achicken-motif planter, sur-rounded by other ceramic

chickens! It is a very cuteand comical sight, all thosechickens! To see ChickenNugget and our other PetPals, visit www.Heloise-.com and click on “Pets.”— Heloise

SMALL PORTIONHi, Heloise: When din-

ing out, if you are not hun-gry enough to eat a maindish, order an appetizer,which usually is enoughfood for a small eater likeme. Often my husband andI share a dinner and a sal-ad. If there are leftovers, Itake them home for lunchthe next day. — Sharyn inRockville, Md.

EASILY TIDYDear Heloise: I have

back trouble, and I reallydon’t like to bend over toput every little pull-strip orbit of paper in the waste-basket under the sink.

My solution? I keep anice-looking pottery jar onthe counter for smalltrash. Then I empty it atthe end of the week. — Sal-ly C., Sacramento, Calif.

“HELOISE

4B THE ZAPATA TIMES Sports SATURDAY, MAY 26, 2012

KISSIMMEE, Fla. —Forward Juan Agudelo,defender Alfredo Moralesand midfielders DannyWilliams and Graham Zu-si were cut Friday as U.S.coach Jurgen Klinsmannpicked his 23-man rosterfor upcoming exhibitiongames and World Cupqualifiers.

The moves leave theU.S. with seven defenders,seven midfielders and sixforwards for their fivematches.

“We have chosen the 23players who are in thebest form right now andready to get the job done,”Klinsmann said. “Theseguys have put in a tre-mendous amount of hardwork in the last 10 days,and they are hungry toget started with thematches.”

Corona is the only play-er on the roster for thefirst time. He scored fourgoals in qualifying as theU.S. under-23 team failed

to make the London Olym-pics.

Five players are fromMajor League Soccer.Four each are based inGermany and Mexico,three in England, twoeach in Scotland and Den-mark, one apiece in Italy,the Netherlands and Por-tugal.

The Americans have ex-hibitions against Scotlandon Saturday at Jackson-ville, Fla., Brazil onWednesday at Landover,Md., and Canada on June3 at Toronto. Seekingtheir seventh straightWorld Cup berth, theAmericans open qualify-ing on June 8 against An-tigua and Barbuda atTampa, Fla., then play atGuatemala on June 12.

THE ROSTERGOALKEEPERS: Brad Gu-

zan (Aston Villa, Eng-land), Tim Howard (Ever-ton, England), Nick Ri-mando (Real Salt Lake)

DEFENDERS: Carlos Boca-negra (Glasgow Rangers,Scotland), Geoff Cameron(Houston), Edgar Castillo(Tijuana, Mexico), SteveCherundolo (Hannover,Germany), Clarence Good-son (Brondby, Denmark),Oguchi Onyewu (SportingLisbon, Portugal), Mi-chael Parkhurst (Nords-jaelland, Denmark)

MIDFIELDERS: Kyle Beck-erman (Salt Lake), Mi-chael Bradley (Chievo Ve-rona, Italy), Joe Corona(Tijuana, Mexico), Maur-ice Edu (Glasgow Rang-ers, Scotland), FabianJohnson (Hoffenheim,Germany), JermaineJones (Schalke, Germa-ny), Jose Torres (Pachuca,Mexico)

FORWARDS: Jozy Altidore(AZ Alkmaar, Nether-lands), Terrence Boyd (Bo-russia Dortmund, Germa-ny), Clint Dempsey (Ful-ham, England), LandonDonovan (Los Angeles),Herculez Gomez (SantosLaguna, Mexico), ChrisWondolowski (San Jose).

Clint Dempsey, shown here in a file photo, was named one of 23 players on the U.S. national team.

Photo by Clara Sandoval | The Zapata Times

U.S. soccer roster isset after Friday cuts

ASSOCIATED PRESS

PARIS — Between bitesof some “frites” at theplayers’ restaurant, Ora-cene Price smiled at thethought of being back atthe French Open with herdaughters, Serena andVenus Williams.

The family wasn’t at Ro-land Garros a year ago,making it the first GrandSlam tournament since2003 without either Wil-liams. Serena was stillworking her way backfrom a series of healthscares, including two footoperations and blood clots.Venus revealed in Augustshe’d been diagnosed withan autoimmune diseasethat causes fatigue.

Now they’ve returned.“I’m happy about it.

They’re happy about it,”Price said Friday. “Sere-na’s thanking God thatshe’s able to play at all.And so is Venus, with herillness; it’s still there.They’re doing the bestthey can do.”

Which tends to be pret-ty good, of course.

Both have been rankedNo. 1. Serena’s 13 GrandSlam titles are by far themost among active wom-en; Venus comes next withseven. None of the otherentrants in the FrenchOpen, which begins Sun-day, owns more careerGrand Slam match winsthan Serena’s 211 or Ven-us’ 210.

And it’s certainly toughto match Serena’s self-con-fidence on a tennis court.

When it was pointedout to her Friday that fivewomen divvied up thepast five Grand Slam titles— Kim Clijsters at the2011 Australian Open, fol-lowed by Li Na at theFrench Open, Petra Kvito-va at Wimbledon, Sam Sto-

sur at the U.S. Open, andcurrent No. 1 VictoriaAzarenka at January’sAustralian Open — Serenaneeded only a second ortwo to formulate a re-sponse.

“Hopefully it will be sixthis time — with me,” Wil-liams, who won the 2002French Open, said.

What would a second ti-tle, a decade later, mean toher?

“It would be really in-tense and really crazy,” Se-rena said. “I mean, obvi-ously there are severalpeople here that want towin. I think I’m one ofthose people.”

Price said a champion-ship at Roland Garros“would be huge” for Sere-na, because it would makeclear that “it doesn’t looklike she’s ready to quit” at30 years old.

Asked whether heryounger daughter is readyto get her name etched onanother Grand Slam tro-phy, Price chuckled.

“For sure,” she said.“You know Serena. She’sgot to be on the list atleast once a year, right?”

One challenging stepalong the way over thenext two weeks couldcome in the quarterfinals,where Serena might haveto face three-time majorchampion Maria Sharapo-

va, who is seeded secondand also a popular pick.

“She’s such an experi-enced player that has beenunder so many differentcircumstances andachieved so much in hercareer,” Sharapova said.“When she’s fit, she’s ex-tremely strong on thecourt and hits a very pow-erful ball. That makes hervery dangerous.”

That sounds like a rath-er fair scouting report forSharapova, too, even onclay these days. Havingonce described her move-ment on the slow red sur-face as something akin toa “cow on ice,” the Rus-sian can get around wellon the stuff.

“I’m much more com-fortable on this surface.Even though I don’t playtoo many tournaments onit throughout the year, Ifeel like with every yearthat has come, and theclay-court season that ar-rives, I feel physicallystronger,” Sharapova said.“That’s definitely helpedme in the recovery pro-cess, as well. I’m enjoyingit a bit more. Before, I feltlike in matches I was sav-ing myself a little bit be-cause I didn’t always be-lieve that physically Icould play seven matchesin difficult, heavy condi-tions in Europe.”

Williams sistersready to compete

Serena Williams returns the ball to Italy’s Flavia Pennetta duringtheir quarterfinal match at the Italian Open tournament in Romelast week.

Photo by Alessandra Tarantino | AP

By HOWARD FENDRICHASSOCIATED PRESS