December 3, 2002

Dr Ben Daitz Doctor's Journal essay describes examination and treatments offered to patients at interdisciplinary chronic pain clinic in Albuquerque, NM; photo (M)

AOL Time Warner is expected to disclose radical shift in strategy for its flagging AOL division, switching emphasis away from selling Internet access and toward selling add-on high-speed version of its service to customers who may buy high-speed Internet access from phone or cable companies; AOL chairman Jonathan Miller will describe plan; graph; photo (M)

Supreme Court will review two cases challenging Univ of Michigan's consideration of race to ensure diverse student body for its law school and undergraduate program; decision to revisit heated topic of affirmative action comes generation after Bakke decision in 1978 invalidated use of fixed racial quotas but upheld diversity as goal; new cases are certain to attract enormous attention and to renew debate that has never completely died down; court could prohibit use of race in university admissions, allow its current widespread use to continue, or pronounce new standards for evaluating affirmative action case by case; Center for Individual Rights, public interest group that opposes affirmative action, has waged long litigation campaign to get issue back on Supreme Court's docket; it helped recruit three unsuccessful white applicants who are plaintiffs in two cases: Barbara Grutter, who was denied admission to Univ of Michigan Law School, and Jennifer Gratz and Patrick Hamacher, who were denied admission to university's main undergraduate program; Gratz and Hamacher argue that admission of black and Hispanic applicants with similar or lesser academic records is violation of constitutional guarantee of equal protection; photo (M)

Sarah Boxer Critic's Notebook column on Bill Morrison's film Decasia, made of deteriorating reels of film; describes current interest in deterioration of objects and aesthetics of deformity and breakdown; photo (M)

Use of cellphones to do business may make companies liable if employees using them are involved in car accident; Smith Barney paid $500,000 to settle suit brought by family of motorcyclist killed by one of its brokers who was talking on phone while driving; in another such case, jury concluded otherwise; resulting confusion over law is one reason employers and their lawyers will be closely observing outcome of suit filed in Virginia against law firm whose associate was allegedly talking to clients on cellphone when she killed teenage girl in 2000; cases like these are plowing new legal ground in determining ways companies will be responsible for events outside traditional workplace and outside traditional work hours; no one is sure what kind of policy will shield companies against liability (M)