The plan recommends forcing more hospitals to merge or to cut beds, according to people briefed on the report.

Panel Said to Call for Closing 9 New York Hospitals

Baltimore Ravens have 9-2 record and could clinch American Football Conference North title; photo (M)

Balancing Act Helps Ravens Straighten Out Their Season

Ford mortgaged nearly all its domestic assets to raise $18 billion to pay for several more years of restructuring.

Ford Pledges Major Assets in Financing

Ian McEwan has been accused of copying sentences from Lucilla Andrews memoir No Time for Romance for his 2001 best seller Atonement; McEwan says that he acknowledged that he used Andrews book for research in note at conclusion of his book and asserts that he did not copy her work; Andrews passed away recently at age 86; photo (M)

Eyebrows Are Raised Over Passages in a Best Seller by Ian McEwan

New York State Assembly reluctantly produces full list of favored legislative projects, providing public with detailed view of 'member items,' local initiatives totaling $85 million per year and often derided as pork-barrel spending; list is released under order from State Supreme Court Judge Robert A Sackett in lawsuit brought by Times Union of Albany; Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, extremely reluctant to see list released, doled out far more money for member projects than any of his colleagues, directing money to groups that are key constituents in his Manhattan district; examples of Silver's spending listed (M)

Assembly Lists Recipients of Funds for Pet Projects

Clyde Haberman NYC column on startling difference in tone of press conferences held by Mayor Michael R Bloomberg and then-Mayor Rudolph W Giuliani in response to police shootings of unarmed black citizens; observes that when Amadou Diallo was shot 41 times by police in 1999, Giuliani failed to grasp New Yorkers' concerns about excessive force and instead lashed out at critics; contrasts Bloomberg's reaction to shooting of unarmed Sean Bell, killed by 50 shots from police officers, saying that Bloomberg articulated feelings of many New Yorkers when he said 'It's hard to understand why 50-odd shots should be taken'; photo (M)

Scenes From the Blue Room: A More Flexible Tone Is Heard

Boeing is adopting a new strategy as it faces a new wave of orders that, if not managed right, could swamp the company again.

Boeing Not Afraid to Say ‘Sold Out’

Douglas Martin, revolutionary maker of musical instruments, discusses his prototype violin designs at annual workshop of violin design at Oberlin College; new materials and techniques have broadened design of stringed instruments; designers strive to create highly resonate soundboard, which is instrument's voice; describes how individual performance style can also change design; photos; drawing (M)

String Theory: New Approaches to Instrument Design

Rudolph W. Giuliani, in every respect, was absent from Monday’s press conference about a police shooting and in his place stood Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg.

Pope Benedict XVI's visit to Turkey highlights deep divide festering within Turkish society between its Muslims and West; Turkey--democratic Muslim country with rigidly secular state--is at pivot point; it is trying to navigate between forces seeking to pull it closer to Islam and institutions that safeguard its secularism; its pro-Islamic government is constrained by rules dictating secularism established by country's revered founder Mustafa Kemal Ataturk; pope's visit comes at time when Turkey is feeling its Muslim identity more and more, trend that worries secular Turkish politicians; Turks are said to feel pushed eastward by pressures from America and Europe; Pew Foundation poll finds 53 percent of Turks have positive views of Iran, while public opinion of Europe and US has slipped sharply and Turkey's hopes of entering European Union have dimmed; photos (M)

Allure of Islam Signals a Shift Within Turkey

Carnegie Hall and Juilliard School have joined forces to form music academy whose fellows will propagate musicianship in New York City public schools; under program, elite musicians will receive high-level musical training, performance opportunities at Carnegie Hall and guidance from New York City school teachers in how to teach music; musicians will teach at city schools one and half days per week; photo (M)

New Project to Send Musicians Into Schools

Surge in cases of asthma in United States and across world have researchers stymied as to cause; smoke, air pollution and pets have all been blamed, but research does not support assertion that they are reason for increase; hygiene hypothesis, which says that many young people today do not develop fully functioning immune systems because they are not exposed to enough germs as babies, is supported by some evidence, but is not regarded as primary cause of recent rise in asthma cases; drawings; graph (M)

An Epidemic No One Understands

One of Britain’s most lauded authors has been accused in newspaper articles of copying phrases for his best-selling novel “Atonement” in 2001 from a memoir published in 1977.

Wild fish, whose living conditions are not controlled, are not likely to meet the requirements for an “organic” label.

Free or Farmed, When Is a Fish Really Organic?

In Watts and many other once predominantly black neighborhoods in Los Angeles, black families are moving out and Latinos are moving in.

Watts Changes, and a Mainstay Bids It Farewell

Janet Maslin reviews book Next by Michael Crichton; photos (M)

Geneticists Gone Wild. What’s the World to Do?

Coach Brian Billilck fired his offensive coordinator, assumed play-calling duties himself, and has led the Ravens to a 9-2 record with five consecutive victories.

Stocks tumble in their steepest slide since July; dollar weakens somewhat further against euro and British pound and price of crude oil bounces back up over $60 per barrel, adding concerns for investors; Standard & Poor's 500-stock index falls 1.36 percent, to 1,381.90; Dow Jones industrial average drops 1.29 percent, to 12,121.71; Nasdaq composite index falls 2.21 percent, closing at 2,405.92; Russell 2000 index loses 2.55 percent, ending at 772.10; dollar continues decline against euro, as concerns by some that US economy might falter while economies in Europe grow stronger pushes up euro to $1.3128 from $1.3079; graph; chart; photo (L)

Stocks Drop Steeply After a Bull Run

Mayor Michael R Bloomberg, meeting with black religious leaders and politicians at City Hall, says it seems 'excessive force was used' in police shooting of unarmed man in Queens; Sean Bell was killed in hail of 50 police bullets; mayor's blunt assessment of events still under investigation is striking, although he takes pains to point out that facts are not all in; lawyer representing four police officers says they will appear before grand jury voluntarily without immunity; police have not released their names, seeking to protect them from retaliation or harassment; Queens district attorney Richard A Brown says he will convene grand jury to hear evidence in case; Bloomberg's decision to meet with Rev Al Sharpton and other black leaders is stark turnabout from approach of his predecessor Rudolph W Giuliani after police shooting of unarmed man Amadou Diallo in 1999; Bloomberg's efforts to reach out to community leaders leave some unconvinced that underlying conflicts between police and predominantly black communities are being addressed; photos (M)

Mayor Calls 50 Shots by the Police ‘Unacceptable’

Stocks tumbled after a weak sales estimate by Wal-Mart spurred concerns about the holiday shopping season.

Ford Motor Co executives mortgage nearly all of Ford's domestic assets--its plants, office buildings, patents and trademarks--along with stakes in Ford Credit and Volvo, to raise $18 billion for its restructuring; Ford expects to eliminate more than 40,000 jobs and close more than dozen plants; structure of debt, which it has arranged with J P Morgan Chase, Citigroup and Goldman Sachs Group, signals that Ford is not planning to sell stake in Ford Credit, as had been speculated earlier in year, and that it plans to keep Volvo, among most successful of its foreign brands; other brands are up for sale, including Aston Martin; Ford is also expected to seek deals to sell Jaguar and Land Rover; Standard & Poor's Corp and Moody's lower their rating of Ford's unsecured debt (M)

Whitney Museum of American Art has reached conditional agreement with New York City's Economic Development Corp to buy site by entrance to High Line in meatpacking district; plans call for museum to be twice size of current home on Madison Avenue and to be finished within next five years; deal, which is still pending public review, puts end to Whitney's plan for nine-story addition by architect Renzo Piano that has been highly contested by residents of Upper East Side; having museum location downtown will attract broader audience and give museum space to build larger galleries without constraints of building in historic district; map (M)

Whitney’s Expansion Plans Are Shifting South, to the Meatpacking District

Undercover police work in the city’s nightclubs is a dangerous and vulnerable assignment, the sort of work assigned to the new citywide Club Enforcement Initiative.

When the Undercover Beat Is a Nightclub

The income Americans reported to the tax collector in 2004 totaled $7.044 trillion, down from more than $7.143 trillion in 2000.

’04 Income in U.S. Was Below 2000 Level

New government data shows total income of Americans reported to tax collector in 2004, adjusted for inflation, was still below its peak in 2000 despite significant gains in 2004; Internal Revenue Service data shows reported income totaled $7.044 trillion in 2004, down from more than $7.143 trillion in 2000; total reported income, in 2004 dollars, fell 1.4 percent, but because population grew during period average real incomes declined more than twice as much, falling $1,641, or 3 percent, to $53,974; IRS says individual income receipts were 21.6 percent smaller in 2004 than in 2000 and smaller than they were in 1997; government collected $831.8 billion in individual income taxes in 2004, down from $980.4 billion in 2000 and $848.6 billion in 1997; White House spokesman Tony Fratto says decline in income through 2004 was predictable result of 'what we all know now was a bubble economy with inflated asset values, which is why $7 trillion of equity in stock markets evaporated'; official poverty line in 2004 was $27 per day for single adult below retirement age and $42 per day for household with one child; IRS data does not include value of government benefits like food stamps, earned-income tax credit for working families and subsidized medical care; graph (M)

November 28, 2006

Headlines from November 28, 2006

Panel Said to Call for Closing 9 New York Hospitals

Balancing Act Helps Ravens Straighten Out Their Season

Ford Pledges Major Assets in Financing

Eyebrows Are Raised Over Passages in a Best Seller by Ian McEwan

Assembly Lists Recipients of Funds for Pet Projects

Billboard 200

NOW 23

Awake

Love; Pain & The Whole Crazy Thing

Enjoy The Ride

Hannah Montana

Historical Context for November 28, 2006