More parents are asking children who choose expensive institutions to cover the balance with loans.

Some Parents Let Children Choose College, and Pay

Brazil is meeting its growing fuel demand by increasing production not only of petroleum, but also ethanol.

With Big Boost From Sugar Cane, Brazil Is Satisfying Its Fuel Needs

Like many political campaigns, the presidential election depicted on "The West Wing" would have had a different ending had it been held four months ago.

'West Wing' Writers' Novel Way of Picking the President

Young Army officers, including growing numbers of captains who leave as soon as their initial commitment is fulfilled, are bailing out of active-duty service at rates that have alarmed senior officers. Last year, more than a third of the West Point class of 2000 left active duty at the earliest possible moment, after completing their five-year obligation.     It was the second year in a row of worsening retention numbers, apparently marking the end of a burst of patriotic fervor during which junior officers chose continued military service at unusually high rates.  

Young Officers Leaving Army at a High Rate

Ask Internet users here what they think of Orkut, the two-year-old Google social networking service, and you may get a blank stare. But pronounce it ''or-KOO-chee,'' as they do in Portuguese, and watch faces light up.      ''We were just talking about it!'' said Suellen Monteiro, approached by a reporter as she gossiped with four girlfriends at a bar in the New York City Center mall here. The topic was the guy whom 18-year-old Aline Makray had met over the weekend at a Brazilian funk dance, who had since found her on Orkut and asked her to join his network.  

A Web Site Born in U.S. Finds Fans in Brazil

Blurry line between gossip and public relations is illustrated by New York Post's Page Six, where Richard Johnson has been been editor for two decades; Johnson's protege Jared Paul Stern is accused of $220,000 shakedown of billionaire Ronald W Burkle; Johnson himself has flown first class and stayed in luxury hotels paid for by companies he covers; he has also had business dealings with them, as has his new wife, Sessa von Richthofen; Post's editor-in-chief Col Allan does believe conflicts have affected Johnson's coverage of subjects; photo (M)

Behind Gossip, There's Often a Relationship

Forest City Ratner's Atlantic Yards project uproots many living on 22-acre site in Brooklyn; most say developer is fair but savvy negotiator, offering apartment owners profits ranging from 90 to 100 percent; renters are offered moving money and rent subsidies for first three years; threat that offers would be reduced if properties were handed over to Empire State Development Corp, which could use eminent domain, caused many to consider Forest City bid; photos (M)

Forced to Move, Some Find Greener Grass

Kelefa Sanneh reviews new CD by Rascal Flatts; photo (M)

Critics' Choice: New CD's; These Guys Don't Grin And Bear It. They Cry.

Outcome of presidential election on show The West Wing is altered by writers after death of actor John Spencer, who played Democratic running mate of Jimmy Smits character; until Spencer's death, writers had Alan Alda's Republican character as victor, but executive producer Lawrence O'Donnell determined it would be too sad for viewers to see Jimmy Smits character lose both his running mate and election; show has not been renewed and its last episode will air in May; photo (M)

Pork built the New York State Museum of Cheese here.     Twenty years ago, the state spent $175,000 to help reconstruct and move a 19th-century cheddar cheese factory in the upstate community of Verona to Rome, a few miles away, and turn it into a shrine dedicated to the state's pioneering cheese industry.  

Is One Museum Honoring Cheese Really Enough?

For Ivan G. Seidenberg, chief executive of Verizon Communications, 2005 was a very good year. As head of the telecommunications giant, Mr. Seidenberg received $19.4 million in salary, bonus, restricted stock and other compensation, 48 percent more than in the previous year.      Others with a stake in Verizon did not fare so well. Shareholders watched their stock fall 26 percent, bondholders lost value as credit agencies downgraded the company's debt and pensions for 50,000 managers were frozen at year-end. When Verizon closed the books last year, it reported an earnings decline of 5.5 percent.  

For Consultants, It Can Pay to Back the Boss's Big Raise

Home is a black hole in ''Festen,'' the intensely staged, indifferently acted domestic shocker that opened last night at the Music Box Theater. As conceived by the director Rufus Norris and a design team of inspired austerity, David Eldridge's adaptation of a 1998 Danish film about a family reunion seems to exist entirely on the edge of an unconditional darkness, a magnetic maw just waiting to suck you in. Rendered in a sea of shadow in which light feels wan and provisional, this is home as it appears in the most unforgiving nightmares of adults about their childhoods -- a place that saps will, courage and any semblance of an autonomous self.     Such, in any case, were my impressions after watching ''Festen'' a year and a half ago in London, where it was enjoying the enviably fashionable status of the play that had to be seen that season by anyone who cared about theater. It wasn't that Mr. Eldridge's lucid, efficient reworking of Thomas Vinterberg's movie of the same title was in itself so compelling. As dramatic literature, ''Festen'' is merely a lesser descendant of more titanic dramas of homecoming by Pinter, Shepard and O'Neill. But Mr. Norris's production was so uncompromising and poetic in its spareness that it tapped into primal territory where the script alone didn't go.  

Haunting Memories of Daddy Dearest in 'Festen'

At the dawn of the automobile age, Henry Ford predicted that ''ethyl alcohol is the fuel of the future.'' With petroleum about $65 a barrel, President Bush has now embraced that view, too. But Brazil is already there.     This country expects to become energy self-sufficient this year, meeting its growing demand for fuel by increasing production from petroleum and ethanol. Already the use of ethanol, derived in Brazil from sugar cane, is so widespread that some gas stations have two sets of pumps, marked A for alcohol and G for gas.  

Steps toward democracy in the Arab world, a crucial American goal that just months ago was cause for optimism -- with elections held in Iraq, Egypt and the Palestinian areas -- are slowing, blocked by legal maneuvers and official changes of heart throughout the Middle East.     Analysts and officials say the political rise of Islamists, the chaos in Iraq, the newfound Shiite power in Iraq with its implication for growing Iranian influence, and the sense among some rulers that they can wait out the end of the Bush administration have put the brakes on democratization.  

Democracy in the Arab World, a U.S. Goal, Falters

Glenn Currie, an architect, slid 50 cents into a coin box here the other morning and pulled out a copy of The Sun Herald, the local daily published in nearby Gulfport.     ''I read it every day,'' he said. ''They report what we need to know.''  

As Katrina Recedes, Newspapers Still Float

As Steve Capus, the president of NBC News, watched his network install Meredith Vieira as the successor to the departing Katie Couric last week, completing a transition at the ''Today'' show with the smooth elegance of Fred Astaire changing partners in midstep, he acknowledged one likely outcome of a tumultuous week.     ''I think with Katie going to CBS, people are going to be talking about the evening news again,'' Mr. Capus said.  

Will Couric as Anchor Revive News at Night?

Architect Paulo Mendes da Rocha of Brazil, known for his provacative use of concrete and steel, wins 2006 Pritzker Architecture Prize, profession's highest honor; he comments; photos (M)

Paulo Mendes da Rocha of Brazil Wins the Pritzker Architecture Prize

HOLLYWOOD is constantly seeking the next big thing by mugging the past. But sometimes the kernel of an idea is found in the cracks, a move that, properly executed, turns subculture into mass entertainment.      Amid the bland, reliable retreads -- neither the financial nor the dramatic arc of ''Mission Impossible III'' is tough to predict -- New Line Cinema is betting that ''Hairspray,'' a musical fable about a chubby girl with a dream and a cross-dressing co-star, can triumph anew.  

'Hairspray' Gets Ready for Next Life

Dave Anderson Sports of The Times column discusses Fred Couples's third-place finish at Masters' touranment; photos (M)

Until Putter Faltered, Couples Was All Smiles

New York Mets defeat Florida Marlins, 3-2; photos (M)

Wright's Fast Start at the Plate Has the Mets Off and Running

Joyce Purnick Metro Matters column in which she gives notice that this is her final column; admits that after ten years writing Metro Matters she still has not figured city out; says that it is more idea than place, the ultimate urban myth; concludes that it exists only because we all think it does (M)

Adventures in the City of Dreams

Alexandra Baldari and her parents have talked a good deal over the past year about how to pay for her college education, and the upshot is this: If she enrolls at the University of Miami in the fall, she will bear much of the cost, which could total $40,000 or more a year, on her own.     ''The problem here,'' said Ms. Baldari, who lives in Parkland, Fla. ''is I'm 18 and looking to go to college, and my parents are looking to retire.''  

Gov George E Pataki of New York plans to block nearly $2 billion in spending and proposed tax cuts from budget passed in March by State Legislature; budget is between $112.4 billion and $115.5 billion; Pataki will use powers of office recently strengthened in court decisions that limit how much Legislature can alter governor's budget proposals and hold that executives do not have to enforce laws they deem illegal; will also use his veto power (M)

Pataki Plans to Block $2 Billion in Budget Items, Aide Says

Phil Mickelson wins Masters Tournament; photos (M)

Mickelson Works Magic for Second Masters

If some architects feel a twinge of envy at the mention of Renzo Piano, who can blame them? In the United States alone, the Italian architect is working on or has just finished major museum projects in New York, Los Angeles, Atlanta, Boston, Chicago and San Francisco. And two decades after its completion, the art world still speaks reverently of the serene, muted light in his Menil Collection building in Houston.      As if that weren't enough, Mr. Piano divides his time between Paris and Genoa and often spends summers sailing off the coast of Sardinia.  

Renzo Piano's Expansion of the Morgan Library Transforms a World of Robber Barons and Scholars

Kleitos-Dimitrios Kyrou was a Greek poet and translator. He was born in Thessaloniki and he studied at Anatolia College. In 1939, he entered the Law School of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. He worked in banking between 1951 and 1983, and he was General Secretary of the National Theatre of Northern Greece between 1974 and 1976.

April 10, 2006

Headlines from April 10, 2006

Some Parents Let Children Choose College, and Pay

With Big Boost From Sugar Cane, Brazil Is Satisfying Its Fuel Needs

'West Wing' Writers' Novel Way of Picking the President

Young Officers Leaving Army at a High Rate

A Web Site Born in U.S. Finds Fans in Brazil

Billboard 200

3121

High School Musical

Back To Bedlam

The Greatest Songs Of The Fifties

In My Own Words

Notable Deaths

Historical Context for April 10, 2006