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The Gowanus Canal in Brooklyn is notoriously toxic. Since 1869, the mile-long waterway has been a dumping ground for garbage, industrial waste, guns and body parts—its waters once too dirty to search. Today you can still stand on a bridge over the canal and see underwear floating on the water. The odor, once almost unbearable, has softened into an occasional summerstink, thanks to a flushing tunnel installed 10 years ago.A growing number of artists and young people have moved into the industrial lofts and row houses nearby. Some of the most oblivious have been spotted on the canal in canoes, their paddles stirring 140 years worth of detritus (small pieces of rubbish) from leather factories, chemical plants and more. Now, these Gowanus pioneers want somebody to finally detoxify their hazardous neighborhood. They imagine it as Brooklyn"s little Venice, although a bit cleaner. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is considering naming the Gowanus an official Superfund site. That would bring in a slow but steady federal cleanup with money and the legal influence to force polluters to help pay. The present Mayor of the New York City also wants a cleaner Gowanus, but he wants to do it his way. At a community board meeting Tuesday night, about 200 people listened as the mayor"s experts argued against a Superfund listing. It was a hard crowd to move. Many wore a button that said it all: "Gowanus Canal: Superfund Me." The mayor and his team are particularly worried about how a Superfund site would affect the real estate market, especially a few possibilities for larger developments in the area. Instead of being "stigmatized" by the Superfund label, as they put it, they favor the "Superfund Alternative" plan. Although there are few details at this point, that effort would be run by the city and overseen by the EPA Every year, the city would rush to collect funds from the Corps of Engineers and other agencies to help clean up the area to the EPA"s satisfaction. The city could only plead with polluters to help pay. With so many pollutants and so many polluters, this looks like a job for Superfund. Brooklyn can handle the label. Residents already enjoy boasting about their survival or joking about living near the canal"s dark humors. Why else have a popular bar called the Gowanus Yacht Club They just want the cleanup done and done right. The present New York mayor would be most likely to agree that _____.
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How stupid does one need to be to get a job reading the television news Is it actually beneficial for TV newsreaders to have, instead of a brain, a plate of lemon jelly Last week the debate was raging once again about the controversial and important point as to whether the newsreaders write their own copy, read someone else"s or simply make it up as they go along. Angela Rippon reckonedthat she had never heard of a newsreader writing stuff, but her modern counterpart, the beautiful Sophie Raworth, claims that they do the writing and adds that she has a postgraduate degree in journalism. This is the core of the issue: what on earth is there to learn about journalism at postgraduate level The point and purpose of our lowly, occasionally useful, trade could be scribbled on the back of a postage stamp and would easily be comprehended by a 14-year-old boy with ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder). Who has decided that it must be dignified with a doctoral thesis Nor is reading the news even what one might call "journalism". It is an even simpler business called "reading". All that the BBC demands of its female newsreaders is an ability to read in an impartial way words like "Israel has murdered more Lebanese children again today" from the teleprompter without belching or lisping. It helps if they have the eminently presentable manner of a girl guide leader from Esher. They are forbidden to express an opinion. They are not required to go undercover, analyze the news or add witty asides. They are required to be that which they are known as in the trade—"a gob on a stick".A penetrating intelligence is not merely unnecessary, it is counterproductive. Newsreaders who are too intelligent soon stop being newsreaders, much as John Humphrys did, stifled by the commonplace of their duties. Or they give the game away by doing what that German newsreader did and end the programme, shaking their heads sadly, muttering, "it"s all lies, all lies". Which is not to say BBC newsreaders are bad at their jobs: quite the reverse. But we should not confuse competence with intelligence. Newsreaders believe that because they are reading out serious stuff and everybody is listening to them, they must therefore be creatures possessed of a high IQ. They are confusing the message with the medium. It can be inferred from the last paragraph that_____.
Parents of children who happily eat what"s put in front of them might assume their kids are well nourished. But two new studies drive home the importance of varying that diet. Deficiencies of vitamin D, omega-3 fats, and other healthful compounds are common; it turns out—and consequential. Growing evidence links vitamin D deficiency not only to weak bones but al-so to impaired immunity, asthma, and diabetes among other problems. And some of the latest research finds that rates of asthma and related respiratory problems climb in kids who are short on other commonly missing essentials, including vitamins C and E and omega-3 fatty acids. A team at the Harvard School of Public Health evaluated the diet and respiratory (relating to the process of breathing) health of some 2,000 North American high school seniors and found that teens who lack of fruit, vegetables, and other healthful foods were most likely to have problems such as coughing, panting, episodes of bronchitis, and asthma. Vitamins C and E, which are abundant in fruit and dark-green vegetables, may "protect the lung from stress," says Harvard research fellow and study leader Jane Burns. Omega-3 reduces inflammation, a key feature of asthma, in which airways swell and make breathing difficult. Oily fish like salmon, mackerel, and tuna—as well as cod-liver oil—are rich in both omega-3 and vitaminD Vitamin D can also be obtained from multivitamin milk and sunshine—and many kids should be getting more of both. In another new study, researchers found that 55 percent of outwardly healthy children and teenagers they tested didn"t have enough vitamin D to grow healthy bones. Dark-skinned children were particularly likely to be short of the bone-building vitamin, according to Babette Zemel, an author of the study and director of the Nutrition and Growth Laboratory at Children"s Hospital of Philadelphia. The melanin (a natural dark brown colour in human skin, hair, and eyes) that makes their skin dark also blocks ultraviolet rays, which the body uses to make vitaminD In winter, when the sun was weakest, more than 90 percent of blacks in the study were vitamin D deficient. Researchers suggest pointing kids outside, and waiting a few minutes before putting on sun block; 10 minutes of midday summer sun provides 10,000 international units of the vitamin—more than enough for a day. Like melanin, sunblock prevents the skin from making vitamin D, so a bit of lotion-free exposure is necessary to grab the benefit. Which of the following would be the best title for the text
The clean-energy business is turning into the next big investment boom, in which risks are lightly ignored. Until recently, recalls Charlie Gay, a 30-year veteran of the solar-power business, venture capitalists were far too busy catering to captains of the information-technology industry to waste time on "hippy-dippy tree-huggers" like himself. But now the tree-huggers are in the ascendant and theIT barons are busy investing in clean-energy technology. Investors are falling over themselves to finance start-ups in clean technology, especially in energy. Venture Business Research reckons that investment in the field by venture capitalists and private-equity firms has quadrupled in the past two years, from some $500m in 2004 to almost $2 billion so far this year. The share of venture capital going into clean energy is rising rapidly. Clean-energy fever is being fuelled by three things: high oil prices, fears over energy security and a growing concern about global warming. The provision of energy, the industry"s cheerleaders say, will change radically over the coming decades. Polluting coal- and gas-fired power stations will give way to cleaner alternatives such as solar and wind; fuels derived from plants and waste will replace petrol and diesel; and small, local forms of electricity generation will replace big power stations feeding far-flung grids. Eventually, it is hoped, fuel cells running on hydrogen will take the place of the internal combustion engine which is available everywhere. It is a bold vision, but if it happens very slowly, or only to a limited extent, boosters argue that it will still prompt tremendous growth for firms in the business. Analysts confidently predict the clean-energy business will grow by 20-30% a year for a decade. Jef-feries, an investment bank that organized a recent conference on the industry in London, asked participants how soon solar power would become competitive with old-fashioned generation technologies: in 2010, 2015 or 2020. About three-quarters of those present, one visitor happily observed, were "cheque-writers". This "megatrend", the keynote speaker advocated, "may be the biggest job- and wealth-creation opportunity of the 21st century." Such exaggeration might remind people of dotcom bubble. But clean-energy advocates insist growth is sustainable because of the likes of Mr. Schwarzenegger. The Governor is a hero in green circles because of his enthusiasm for environmental regulation. He easily won re-election partly because he seized on global warming as a concern and signed into law—America"s first wide-ranging scheme to cap greenhouse-gas emissions. What is the author"s attitude towards clean energy business
A few years back, many hospitals in America were embarrassed by revelations that some of their neediest patients, the uninsured, were being charged the most. These patients were getting slammed with the full list price for health care while those with insurance got negotiated discounts. The outcry prompted congressional hearings and state inquiries. All not-for-profit hospitals in Illinois haveadopted voluntary guidelines, set by the Illinois Hospital Association, to dole out free or discounted care. But Illinois attorney general Lisa Madigan says that"s not nearly enough. Madigan announced recently that most Illinois hospitals spend less than 1 percent on charitable care. She proposed that hospitals be required by law to spend at least 8 percent of their operating costs on charity: free health care, community clinics. This is a terrible idea. For starters—amazing as this may sound—Madigan hasn"t calculated how much this law would cost hospitals. No overall cost, nor the cost to any single hospital in the state. The Illinois Hospital Association says her bill would require 133 hospitals to spend $739 million more a year on charity care. That, the IHA says, would push 45 of those hospitals into the red, and 28 hospitals that already operate at a loss would be pushed closer to bankruptcy. Madigan disputes those figures. How did Madigan settle on the magic 8 percent She cites her office"s investigation of hospitals and a task force she convened. But the task force didn"t issue a report and may never do so. She all but acknowledges that her claim that Illinois hospitals provide a miserly 1 percent in charitable care isn"t the whole story. That figure excludes much of what hospitals absorb, including the gap between what they spend on Medicaid patients and what they receive for that care. The IHA argues convincingly that mandating a high percentage of revenues to be spent on free care ignores the reality that many hospitals operate in the red. Draining more money would weaken hospitals—and encourage cost-cutting in nursing care, equipment or other essentials. Why are we talking about charitable giving by hospitals, as opposed to muffler shops, fast-food restaurants or beauty salons Because most hospitals are tax-exempt by law: They don"t pay any federal, state or local taxes. In return, they"re required to provide services to the needy. But the law doesn"t say exactly how much. So they do have a charitable obligation. And some hospitals—even some not-for-profit hospitals-have hefty revenues. It"s useful to see how much they"re giving back to their communities. But the hospitals also have an obligation to stay solvent. No one profits when a hospital closes its doors. Madigan"s proposed mandate carries too much risk. IHA objected to Madigan"s proposal based on the argument that _____.
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