New Tack in Preventing Hospital Infections

Germ-Killing Soap-Ointment Treatment for all ICU Patients Shown to Be More Effective Than Isolating Some After Screening

 

By LAURA LANDRO

To prevent deadly infections in intensive-care units, hospitals often screen all patients for the drug-resistant bacteria MRSA, then isolate or treat those found to carry it with germ-killing soap and ointment.

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Tampa Bay Times/Zuma Press

A nurse in Largo, Fla., helps a patient use chlorhexidine wipes, which have been found to protect against MRSA.

But the largest prevention study of its kind has shown it is far more effective to treat every patient in the ICU with the regimen, without any prior testing.
In the study of nearly 75,000 patients at 74 adult ICUs in 43 Hospital Corp. of America HCA -0.73% facilities, the protocol, known as universal decolonization, reduced all bloodstream infections, including those caused by other germs, by 44%, and reduced the incidence of MRSA-positive cultures in the ICU by 37%. Patients were washed with cloths containing antimicrobial soap chlorhexidine and received a nasal antibiotic ointment, mupirocin.
In contrast, there was no significant decrease in infections in a group of patients who were first screened and then isolated if they were found to carry MRSA. And in a third group in which all patients were tested and then isolated and treated with the soap-ointment combination if they tested positive for MRSA, there was only a 22% reduction in infections.
"This will save lives, and sets a new standard for preventing bloodstream infections in the intensive-care unit," says Jonathan Perlin, president, clinical and physician services group and chief medical officer at HCA. HCA is now implementing the protocol in all of its hospital ICUs. The study was published online Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine.
MRSA, for methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, has become resistant to a host of drugs used to treat infection. About 1% to 2% of people carry MRSA on their skin or in their nose, but they have no symptoms or signs of infection. Once they are hospitalized, however, it can enter their bloodstream during invasive procedures or spread to other patients on health workers' hands.
Though health-care-associated infections from MRSA have declined in recent years, thanks to precautions such as hand-washing and infection-prevention programs in hospitals, they still struck 62,500 patients in 2011 and killed more than 9,000.

John Jernigan, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Office of Prevention Research and Evaluation and a co-author of the new study, says it fills important gaps in the science of prevention, which has been "murky to date." Most important, he adds, universal decolonization "reduces all bloodstream infections, not just MRSA." The CDC is in the process of determining how the findings of the study might be used in its infection-prevention recommendations. The agency doesn't now recommend screening all ICU patients but does recommend screening and isolation in certain circumstances when the incidence of MRSA in a facility isn't decreasing with more basic infection-control measures.
The cost effectiveness of the different approaches and questions about whether universal decolonization might increase resistance to the germ-killing agents are being investigated in a second phase of the study. HCA's experience is that universal decolonization is less-expensive than the other two approaches, Dr. Perlin says, and the cost of treating hospital infections is of far greater concern.
Several states now require screening all ICU patients for MRSA. But the cultures used to detect MRSA can be costly, and in the time it takes for them to come back from the lab, carriers can infect others or themselves, Dr. Perlin says. Isolating MRSA carriers also is difficult for patients and families.
The study included investigators from Harvard University and other academic institutions, as well as the CDC and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. Carolyn Clancy, director of AHRQ, says because MRSA screening has been adopted by many hospitals, "it may take some time for the medical community to assess the degree to which the study findings should eliminate this practice." The state laws requiring screening also are a complicating factor, Dr. Clancy says, as are questions of cost and resistance.
The study noted that widespread use of chlorhexidine and mupirocin could possibly engender resistance, and the CDC's Dr. Jernigan acknowledges that "any health-care organization that chooses to use this approach will need to be very vigilant." At present, however, there is no strong evidence of resistance, Dr. Perlin says, "and right now we have a real-world concern about infections that can be catastrophic for patients."

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Online Currency Exchange Accused of Laundering $6 Billion

By MARC SANTORA, WILLIAM K. RASHBAUM and NICOLE PERLROTH

¶ The operators of a global currency exchange ran a $6 billion money-laundering operation online, a central hub for criminals trafficking in everything from stolen identities to child pornography, federal prosecutors in New York said on Tuesday.

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Robert Stolarik for The New York Times

“The coin of its realm was anonymity,” Preet Bharara, the United States attorney in Manhattan, said of Liberty Reserve.

¶ The currency exchange, Liberty Reserve, operated beyond the traditional confines of United States and international banking regulations in what prosecutors called a shadowy netherworld of cyberfinance. It traded in virtual currency and provided the kind of anonymous and easily accessible banking infrastructure increasingly sought by criminal networks, law enforcement officials said.

¶ The charges announced at a news conference by Preet Bharara, the United States attorney in Manhattan, and other law enforcement officials, mark what officials said was believed to be the largest online money-laundering case in history. Over seven years, Liberty Reserve was responsible for laundering billions of dollars, conducting 55 million transactions that involved millions of customers around the world, including about 200,000 in the United States, according to prosecutors.

¶ Richard Weber, who heads the Internal Revenue Service’s criminal investigation division in Washington, said at the news conference that the case heralds the arrival of “the cyber age of money laundering,” in which criminals “are gravitating toward digital currency alternatives as a means to move, conceal and enjoy their ill-gotten gains.”

¶ “If Al Capone were alive today, this is how he would be hiding his money,” Mr. Weber said. “Our efforts today shatter the belief among high-tech money launderers that what happens in cyberspace stays in cyberspace.”

¶ Just as PayPal revolutionized how people shop online, making it possible to buy a microwave oven or concert tickets with the click of a button, Liberty Reserve sought to create a similarly convenient way for criminals to make financial transactions, law enforcement officials said.

¶ The charges detailed a complicated system designed to allow people to move sums large and small around the world with virtual anonymity, according to an indictment, which was unsealed in federal court in Manhattan.

¶ “As alleged, the only liberty that Liberty Reserve gave many of its users was the freedom to commit crimes — the coin of its realm was anonymity, and it became a popular hub for fraudsters, hackers and traffickers,” Mr. Bharara said at the news conference, where officials from the Justice and Treasury Departments, as well as the Secret Service and Homeland Security Investigations, also spoke. “The global enforcement action we announce today is an important step toward reining in the ‘Wild West’ of illicit Internet banking. As crime goes increasingly global, the long arm of the law has to get even longer, and in this case, it encircled the earth.”

¶ Liberty Reserve surfaced as a preferred vehicle to transfer money between parties in a number of recent high-profile cybercrimes, including the indictment of eight New Yorkers accused of helping to loot $45 million from bank machines in 27 countries, officials said.

¶ Liberty Reserve was incorporated in Costa Rica in 2006 by Arthur Budovsky, who renounced his United States citizenship in 2011, and was arrested in Spain on Friday. He was among seven people charged in the case; five of them were under arrest, while two remained at large in Costa Rica. All were charged with conspiracy to commit money laundering, conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money-transmitting business, and operating an unlicensed money-transmitting business. The money laundering count carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison, and the other two charges carry a maximum of 5 years each.

¶ In addition to the criminal charges, five domain names were seized, including the one used by Liberty Reserve. Officials also seized or restricted the activity of 45 bank accounts.

¶ The closing of Liberty Reserve last week seemed to have an immediate chilling effect on its customers, who were suddenly unable to access their funds and who posted anxious comments in underground forums, according to law enforcement officials. Mr. Bharara said the exchange’s clientele was largely made up of criminals, but he invited any legitimate users to contact his office to get their money back.

The charges outlined how the money transfer system operated, offering a glimpse into the murky world of online financial transactions where money bounces between accounts from Cyprus to New York in the blink of an eye.

To transfer money using Liberty Reserve, a user needed only to provide a name, address and date of birth. But users were not required to validate their identity.

“Accounts could therefore be opened easily using fictitious or anonymous identities,” the indictment states. Prosecutors cited “blatantly criminal monikers” used by Liberty Reserve clients, like “Russia Hackers.”

Essentially, all a customer needed to open an account was an e-mail address.

One undercover agent was able to register accounts under names like “Joe Bogus” and describe the purpose of the account as “for cocaine” without being questioned, officials said. That no-questions-asked verification system made Liberty Reserve the premier bank for cybercriminals, prosecutors said.

The case is significant, prosecutors said, because it attacks the financial infrastructure used by many cybercriminals in much the same way that drug-money-laundering prosecutions unravel the financial underpinnings of the narcotics trade.

Dismantling the Liberty Reserve operation was “critical because transnational criminal organizations can succeed only so long as they can funnel their illicit proceeds freely and without detection,” said James T. Hayes Jr., the special-agent-in-charge for Immigration and Customs Enforcement Homeland Security Investigations.

While Liberty Reserve was incorporated outside the United States, federal officials used a provision in the Patriot Act to target the organization and other financial institutions with whom they conducted business. It was the first time the provision had been used to prosecute a virtual currency provider, officials said.

Liberty Reserve did not take or make cash payments directly and instead used “third-party ‘exchangers,’ ” according to the indictment. These exchangers would take and make payments, and then credit or debit the Liberty Reserve account, allowing Liberty Reserve to avoid collecting any banking information on its clients and not leave a “centralized financial paper trail,” the indictment said.

The exchangers, the indictment said, “tended to be unlicensed money-transmitting businesses without significant government oversight or regulation, concentrated in Malaysia, Russia, Nigeria and Vietnam.”

The people who accepted Liberty Reserve’s currency were “overwhelmingly criminal in nature,” according to the indictment.

“They included, for example: traffickers of stolen credit card data and personal identity information; peddlers of various types of online Ponzi and get-rich-quick schemes; computer hackers for hire; unregulated gambling enterprises; and underground drug-dealing Web sites,” according to the indictment.

Despite the case against Liberty Reserve, security experts said, there were plenty of online payment systems that allow users to move money without verifying their identities.

“Organized crime and terrorist groups are now financing their operations through these anonymous payment systems,” said Tom Kellermann, a vice president at Trend Micro, a security firm. “The financial sector no longer has a monopoly on moving capital around the world.” 

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Counting on an Inheritance? Count Again.

The bad news: Many baby boomers are likely to get less money from Mom and Dad than they thought. The worse news: They may have to help their parents financially instead. 

By ANNE TERGESEN

Counting on an inheritance? Count again. Baby boomers may not only be getting less money than they thought, they also may have to help out their parents financially, as Anne Tergesen explains on Lunch Break. Photo: Getty Images.

Baby boomers: Get ready for a double whammy.
For years now, there's been a lot of talk about boomers getting tremendous windfalls as their parents pass on. Many boomers, in fact, have been lagging behind in their savings, betting on—hoping for—big bequests, especially since many of them suffered big losses in 2008.

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But for a growing number of boomers, things aren't going according to plan. The postwar generation is living longer—and many are spending their savings along the way. And, of course, many of them also took a hit in 2008.
The result is that, as a group, boomers likely won't be getting as much of an inheritance as they hoped. Even worse, far from receiving a bequest, a growing number are tapping some of their own savings to help their cash-strapped parents make ends meet.
For families, the result is often a lot of scrambling, dashed dreams, and conflict and angst as parents and children try to come to grips with the lean new reality—and divide up a smaller pie.

Stephen Webster

"There are way too many adult children I see who are looking at Mom and Dad's estate as their ticket to a secure retirement," says M. Holly Isdale, an estate planner in Bryn Mawr, Pa. "But with people living longer, much of the money is likely to be spent."
How much longer? Thanks to medical gains, a 65-year-old man has a 60% chance of living to age 80 and a 40% chance of reaching 85. For women, the odds are 71% and 53%, respectively. All of this has made the 85-and-over age bracket the fastest-growing segment of the population. In an era of low interest rates, volatile financial markets, and rising costs for health and long-term care, finding money to cover those years isn't always easy.
Consider the case of Nancy Becker, the co-owner of a small business in Waterbury, Conn. Her parents, Morris and Dorothy Stein, were diligent savers. "But they didn't imagine living well into their 90s," says Ms. Becker, whose father died in 2006 at 92 and whose mother died in 2011 at 97.
Ms. Becker and her two brothers inherited a house in Vermont from their father. But they spent about $180,000 of their own money—an amount that exceeds the value of the Vermont property—to cover living expenses for their mother in the final three years of her long life.
Ms. Becker, now 63, says she certainly doesn't begrudge her parents for outliving their savings. The Steins built a thriving plumbing and heating business that now employs Ms. Becker and her husband, among other family members. Still, as Ms. Becker's in-laws enter their 90s, she worries that "their money is running out, too."

Financial losses can also put a dent in the older generation's reserves. Donald Hoeller, 86, of Glendale, Wis., says he and his wife, Bernadette, 85, had hoped to bequeath "several hundred thousand dollars" to each of their six children. But an office complex in which the couple invested 60% of their retirement savings recently landed in foreclosure and litigation.
So, Mr. Hoeller says, "I don't know if they will get anything."
His daughter, Mary Hoeller, 58, says that while she never counted on an inheritance, "times are tough"—and she now has the added worry that her parents may run out of money. A divorcee who is paying college-tuition bills for the youngest of her three children and wants to help another child with medical-school tuition, Ms. Hoeller says her income has declined substantially since 2008.
"I am very frugal," says Ms, Hoeller, a mediator in Indianapolis. But "who wouldn't want an inheritance from their parents? It would be a good thing."

Scaling Back Bequests

Many parents, of course, won't exhaust their savings. The Center on Wealth and Philanthropy at Boston College estimates that baby boomers and their offspring could inherit as much as $27 trillion over the next four decades, with the progeny of the wealthiest pocketing much of the windfall.

But there are signs that expected bequests are under pressure. According to Boston College's Center for Retirement Research, from June 2006 to June 2010, falling asset values reduced projected inheritances for baby boomers an estimated 13%. Stock prices have since recovered, although house prices in most markets have not.
Even the affluent are pulling back. Among those with $250,000 or more in investible assets, only 41% said preserving inheritances was a top concern, down from 54% in 2009, according to a Merrill Lynch survey released earlier this year. Due in large part to a 22% decline in projected future bequests of $500,000 or more, the amount individuals expect to transfer fell by 19% from 2008 to 2009, according to Michael Hurd, director of the Center for the Study of Aging at Rand Corp., a nonprofit research organization.
Just as telling is a recent study from Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Co. in Milwaukee. When asked how prepared they feel to live to various ages, one in three surveyed adults age 60-plus said they didn't feel prepared financially to live to age 85; almost one in two said the same with regard to age 95.

Suffering in Silence

Not surprisingly, many families are loath to discuss these issues.

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In addition to serving as a reminder of the older generation's mortality, a conversation about inheritance or Mom and Dad running out of money can provoke anxiety in parents. Many are uncomfortable disclosing the details of their finances in the first place, even more so when they're worried about disappointing their children.
Adult children, in turn, aren't eager to ask their parents about money for fear of coming across as greedy. Some feel guilty for thinking about their own financial needs at a time when parents could be facing steep medical or long-term-care expenses.
"Due to the new realities of longevity, adult children—who have rightfully assumed they would inherit something substantial from their parents and have lived their lives accordingly—can no longer count on that," says Lillian Rubin, a sociologist, psychologist and author. Adult children, she adds, "often feel guilty for even thinking about" inheritance.
Nonetheless, financial advisers say, it is important for families to talk—if only to establish realistic expectations.
Peter Bell, 59, says he and his parents "have always been very open about talking about finances." That frankness has helped them through some tough choices in the past few years.
Mr. Bell, the president of the National Reverse Mortgage Lenders Association in Washington, D.C., "always assumed" his father, Jerry, 87, and mother, Florence, 88, would leave a substantial inheritance.
After his parents lent his brother money several years ago, Mr. Bell says, they "decided I would get the house and everything else would be split."
But when the elder Bells decided almost two years ago to move into a continuing-care retirement community, it became apparent they would need the proceeds from the sale of their home to finance the community's $425,000 entry fee. Worse, because the depressed Florida real-estate market hindered their efforts to sell their home in Delray Beach, the couple had to borrow the $425,000 entry fee from their son.
"We have always considered our money as family money," says Jerry Bell, who anticipates repaying 85% of the loan from the proceeds of the home's recent sale. "When the kids needed help, we were there for them. And when we needed help, they were there for us."

Measures to Take

If parents anticipate running short of money—and if they and adult children are able to start a dialogue—there are several steps families should consider, financial planners say. Among them: Have parents recalibrate their budgets, downsize to a smaller residence, buy an annuity or longevity insurance to lock in a lifelong income, or take out a reverse mortgage.
In situations where children have adequate financial resources, some advisers recommend the children pay a parent's health-insurance premiums, purchase a long-term-care insurance policy for him or her, give a set amount of money each month or purchase the parent's home to generate cash for living expenses. (Before implementing a strategy, talk with your financial and tax advisers.)
The process can lead to conflict, although the tension typically remains beneath the surface, says Claudia Fine, an executive vice president at SeniorBridge, a New York-based company that provides care-management services.
Very often, she adds, she sees conflict arise over expenditures on caregiving. "Because feelings about inheritance are not expressed, families have a hard time sorting out their differences."

Siblings Sort It Out

Linda Fodrini-Johnson, 67, suspects inheritance calculations play a role in differences she and her three brothers have over managing the finances of their mother, Bernice Bidwell, 90.
Ms. Fodrini-Johnson says she and one brother, 60-year-old Craig Bidwell, "don't need to inherit" from their mother, who recently had a stroke and suffers from congestive heart failure. But disabilities have prevented the other brothers from working in recent years.
"There is tension," says Ms. Fodrini-Johnson, who lives in Walnut Creek, Calif., and runs a company that provides care-management services. "You hear it and feel it, but nobody articulates it because it would be disrespectful to Mom."
She points to a recent disagreement over her mother's hair. She wanted to take her mother to a hairdresser instead of using the one at her mother's assisted-living facility. But other siblings resisted.
No one came out and said it was about the cost, Ms. Fodrini-Johnson says, but that seemed to her to be the motivation. The siblings also debated whether to remodel and rent their mother's San Francisco home—so it could bring in some money—or allow a grandchild to serve as temporary caretaker of the place.
To avoid conflict, Ms. Fodrini-Johnson says, she solicits her brothers' opinions and explains the reasons for her decisions as well as the details of her mother's finances. But as her mother's power of attorney, she has the final say.
Her three brothers declined to comment on the hairstylist incident, or said they didn't know about it. Two brothers, Craig and 63-year-old Gary Bidwell of San Francisco, say they discussed renting their mother's house to bring in extra income to offset her expenses.

No Expectations

When it comes to the idea of an inheritance, the three brothers are of similar minds.
Robin Bidwell, a 59-year-old in Colfax, Calif., says he sustained an injury at age 48 that has prevented him from working. While he receives a pension and Social Security, "I wasn't able to put money away. I don't live the life I want to live, but I don't look to my mother's inheritance to be on top of things," he says. "I believe my mother's care is first and foremost. That, to me, is more important than anything."
"An inheritance would help, but I am not looking forward to it," says his brother Gary, a 63-year-old who retired on a disability pension in 1998. "I don't want an inheritance if I have to lose someone I love."
Like many adult children, the third brother, Craig, says he hopes to receive an inheritance—in his case to help pay for a new home he and his wife plan to build. However, the retiree says he is grateful that his mother is able to afford the high-quality care she receives.
"Whatever my mother has is hers," he says. "It's not my inheritance. I didn't work for it. My brothers didn't work for it. My parents worked for it."

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In Terror Shift, Obama Took a Long Path

By PETER BAKER

¶ WASHINGTON — The pivot in counterterrorism policy that President Obama announced last week was nearly two years in the making, but perhaps the most critical moment came last spring during a White House meeting as he talked about the future of the nation’s long-running terrorism war. Underlying the discussion was a simple fact: It was an election year. And Mr. Obama might lose.

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Pool photo by Kristoffer Tripplaar

¶ For nearly four years, the president had waged a relentless war from the skies against Al Qaeda and its allies, and he trusted that he had found what he considered a reasonable balance even if his critics did not see it that way. But now, he told his aides, he wanted to institutionalize what in effect had been an ad hoc war, effectively shaping the parameters for years to come “whether he was re-elected or somebody else became president,” as one aide said.

¶ Ultimately, he would decide to write a new playbook that would scale back the use of drones, target only those who really threatened the United States, eventually get the C.I.A. out of the targeted killing business and, more generally, begin moving the United States past the “perpetual war” it had waged since Sept. 11, 2001. Whether the policy shifts will actually accomplish that remains to be seen, given vague language and compromises forced by internal debate, but they represent an effort to set the rules even after he leaves office.

¶ “We’ve got this technology, and we’re not going to be the only ones to use it,” said a senior White House official who, like others involved, declined to be identified talking about internal deliberations. “We have to set standards so it doesn’t get abused in the future.”

¶ While part of the re-evaluation was aimed at the next president, it was also about Mr. Obama’s own legacy. What became an exercise lasting months, aides said, forced him to confront his deep conflicts as commander in chief: the Nobel Peace Prize winner with a “kill list,” the antiwar candidate turned war president, the avowed champion of transparency ordering operations over secret battlegrounds. He wanted to be known for healing the rift with the Muslim world, not raining down death from above.

¶ Over the past year, aides said, Mr. Obama spent more time on the subject than on any other national security issue, including the civil war in Syria. The speech he would eventually deliver at the National Defense University became what one aide called “a window into the presidential mind” as Mr. Obama essentially thought out loud about the trade-offs he sees in confronting national security threats.

¶ “Americans are deeply ambivalent about war,” the president said in his speech, and he seemed to be talking about himself as well. Mr. Obama said the seeming precision and remote nature of modern warfare can “lead a president and his team to view drone strikes as a cure-all for terrorism,” and it was not hard to imagine which president he had in mind.

¶ “We must define the nature and scope of this struggle,” Mr. Obama said, “or else it will define us.”

¶ In a sense, that had already happened to Mr. Obama. Somehow he had gone from the candidate who criticized what he saw as President George W. Bush’s excesses to the president who expanded the drone program his predecessor had left him. The killing he authorized in September 2011 of Anwar al-Awlaki, an American citizen tied to terrorist attacks, brought home the disparity between how he had envisioned his presidency and what it had become. Suddenly, a liberal Democratic president was being criticized by his own political base for waging what some called an illegal war and asserting unchecked power.

¶ The Awlaki strike also killed another American, Samir Khan, who officials say was not intentionally targeted. A subsequent strike killed Mr. Awlaki’s 16-year-old American son, a death that officials say was an accident. A furor over the American deaths convinced Mr. Obama that it was time to lay out clearer standards and practices for drone warfare.

¶ Under the stewardship of John O. Brennan, then the president’s counterterrorism adviser, officials spent months discussing how to be more transparent about a program that was still officially secret and how to define its limits. After last spring’s discussion with the president, Mr. Brennan began a more intensive, formalized interagency process to rewrite the rules. He also took a first step in explaining the administration’s drone policy to the public with a speech in which he said strikes targeted only those who posed “a significant threat to U.S. interests.” But even then he did not directly acknowledge American involvement in Mr. Awlaki’s killing.

¶ In seemingly endless meetings, including a dozen or more with the president, Mr. Brennan and other administration officials grappled with the issue. Concluding that Al Qaeda’s core leadership had been decimated, some officials wanted tighter restrictions on the use of drone strikes, but the Central Intelligence Agency and the Pentagon balked. The C.I.A.’s counterterrorism center resisted another proposal to take its drones away and put them under Pentagon control.

¶ While the agencies argued, Mr. Obama focused on winning a second term, boasting about the same aggressive approach he was privately rethinking. “Ask Osama bin Laden and the 22 out of 30 top Al Qaeda leaders who’ve been taken off the field whether I engage in appeasement,” he said in response to campaign criticism.

¶ Days after his victory, he told his staff he wanted to conclude the review with a major speech, although there would no longer be pressure to complete it before the next inauguration, since he would be staying. Around the White House, it became known as Archives 2, a reference to the president’s May 2009 speech at the National Archives on counterterrorism issues.

¶ “What he said repeatedly is he felt when he took office it wasn’t clear how we used this tool,” said Benjamin J. Rhodes, the deputy national security adviser assigned to write the speech. “Part of this frankly is laying out for the American people but also for the next president: here’s how we do this.”

¶ The first outlines of the speech came together in February. But there were critical debates to resolve. As Mr. Brennan departed to become C.I.A. director, his replacement, Lisa Monaco, and the top White House national security lawyer, Avril D. Haines, ushered the process to a conclusion.

¶ Ultimately, the president and his team decided to tighten the standard for striking targets outside overt war zones. Instead of being authorized for any “significant threat to U.S. interests,” drone strikes would be used only in cases of a “continuing, imminent threat to U.S. persons.” They would also be limited to cases with a “near certainty” of avoiding civilian casualties.

¶ The C.I.A.’s opposition to shifting responsibility for drones entirely to the Pentagon resulted in a compromise: There would be a transition period for the program in Pakistan, which would be reviewed every six months to determine if it was ready to be moved to military control. Administration officials suggest that the transfer of the Pakistan drone program may coincide with the withdrawal of combat troops from Afghanistan in 2014.

¶ “The hawks may be grumbling about it, but that’s to be expected,” said a senior government official who supported the strategy shift. “This is a big change. But no one is screaming.”

¶ The hawks proposed a change of their own, suggesting, as The Daily Beast has reported, that the president leave individual strike decisions in authorized areas outside overt war zones to the Pentagon and the C.I.A. But the White House rejected that. Mr. Obama felt those decisions were the president’s responsibility: he wanted to keep his own finger on the trigger.

¶ All of that was codified in a Presidential Policy Guidance that remains classified. To address drone policy, though, meant owning up to the killings of Mr. Awlaki and other Americans, officials concluded. The C.I.A. and others resisted, but Mr. Obama decided to declassify information about not just Mr. Awlaki’s killing, but the killings of three other Americans who officials say had not been intentionally targeted.

¶ Mr. Obama was also interested in instituting an independent review of how and when drone strikes would be conducted. Multiple papers were prepared and multiple options evaluated. Among them was a special court to oversee targeted killings, but the discussion became tied up in knots about how it would work. Would a judge have to approve such strikes in advance or after the fact? What about an independent board within the executive branch instead? Administration lawyers argued against surrendering presidential authority, and defense policy makers argued against giving up operational control.

¶ That proved to be a debate Mr. Obama could not resolve. In his speech, he invited Congress to come up with ideas. He also thought it was time to review the authorization of force that Congress passed in the days after Sept. 11, 2001, and that has been the legal foundation for the war on terrorism. But after a two-hour discussion just days before the speech, he could not decide exactly how to do that, either.

¶ In the midst of the White House debate, two bombs went off at the Boston Marathon in an attack attributed to two ethnic Chechens living legally in the United States, reaffirming the continuing threat of terrorism. For Mr. Obama, it was another pivot point. The Boston attack, he thought, typified the new terrorist threat more than 11 years after Sept. 11, 2001: smaller-scale attacks that have fewer casualties but are harder to stop and often conducted by people radicalized while already living in the United States.

¶ At the beginning of May, Mr. Obama was given a first draft of the speech but tossed it out and wrote out a detailed outline by hand over several pages. He expanded it from drones to include a renewal of his failed promise to close the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. He also wanted fresh emphasis on nonmilitary tools like diplomacy, foreign aid and help for other countries dealing with threats inside their borders, although he made sure the word “patiently” was added to reflect the difficulty.

¶ Some Pentagon and State Department officials learned only the day before the speech that Mr. Obama would lift his moratorium on repatriating Guantánamo detainees to Yemen and appoint a new official at the Defense Department to oversee transfer efforts.

¶ Mr. Obama’s eventual speech, at 59 minutes one of the longest of his presidency other than a State of the Union address, reflected the process that developed it. Even as he set new standards, a debate broke out about what they actually meant and what would actually change. For now, officials said, “signature strikes” targeting groups of unidentified armed men presumed to be extremists will continue in the Pakistani tribal areas.

¶ Even as he talked about transparency, he never uttered the word “C.I.A.” or acknowledged he was redefining its role. He made no mention that a drone strike had killed an American teenager in error. While he pledged again to close the Guantánamo prison, he offered little reason to think he might be more successful this time.

¶ Yet even the promise of change left some people scathingly critical. “At the end of the day,” said Senator Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican, “this is the most tone-deaf president I ever could imagine, making such a speech at a time when our homeland is trying to be attacked literally every day.”

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U.S. Oil Boom Divides OPEC

Cartel Struggles to Respond to Rise of Shale Drilling

By BENOÎT FAUCON, SARAH KENT and HASSAN HAFIDH

The American energy boom is deepening splits within the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, threatening to drive a wedge between African and Arab members as OPEC grapples with a revolution in the global oil trade.
OPEC members gathering on Friday in Vienna will confront a disagreement over the impact of rising U.S. shale-oil production, with the most vulnerable countries arguing that the group should prepare for production cuts to prop up prices if they fall any lower.

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A drilling operation in Texas's Eagle Ford Shale. U.S. supply is expected to grow faster because of shale-oil output.

"We are heading toward some problems," said a Persian Gulf OPEC delegate.
African OPEC members such as Algeria and Nigeria—which produce oil of similar grade to shale oil—are suffering the worst effects from the North American oil boom. Nigeria Oil Minister Diezani Alison-Madueke deemed U.S. shale oil a "grave concern."
Gulf countries, notably Saudi Arabia, pass relatively unscathed—and are the only OPEC members with the flexibility to cut production. But they are unlikely to let that happen at Friday's meeting, several OPEC delegates said.
That would deepen power struggles that have dominated the organization in recent years. Iran, Venezuela and Algeria, who need high oil prices to cover domestic spending and offset falling production, have regularly clashed with Gulf countries led by Saudi Arabia, who have the financial strength to withstand lower prices.
OPEC has overcome past rivalries to rally against an external threat, most notably in 2008 when it agreed to a production cut of more than four million barrels a day to stem a price crash during the financial crisis. But the uneven impact of the North American supply surge makes a collective response—such as a coordinated production cut to support prices—more difficult, said delegates on both sides of the divide.
The U.S. and Canada are set to produce about 21% more oil by 2018 than from this year, according to data from the International Energy Agency.
This marks a historic and largely unexpected reversal. U.S. crude-oil production peaked in 1970 and had declined continuously for more than 20 years when shale oil first began to flow after 2008. U.S. crude production has risen to a 21-year high as hydraulic fracturing, known as fracking, and other technologies have unlocked large resources of oil previously trapped in shale rock in North Dakota and Texas. Shale deposits in other areas, such as Pennsylvania, are yielding mostly natural gas.
OPEC, the source of around one-third of the world's oil, has clearly been taken aback by the shift in U.S. production. In 2010, the organization forecast U.S. and Canadian oil production of 2014 at 11.8 million barrels a day. Just two years later, that forecast had risen to 14.5 million barrels a day.
A rebound in U.S. production would have been unexpected just five years ago because shale oil production requires an oil price that has rarely proved sustainable—typically $70 a barrel or above. But oil prices have remained much higher in the past two years, thanks in part to persistent geopolitical tensions in OPEC producers, such as the Libyan civil war and Persian Gulf tensions.

 

As U.S. production has grown, exports to the U.S. from three of OPEC's African members, Nigeria, Algeria and Angola, have fallen to their lowest levels in decades, dropping 41% in 2012 from 2011, largely because of shale oil, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. In contrast, Saudi shipments of oil to the U.S. increased 14% in 2012. Saudi Oil Minister Ali al-Naimi said recently that the rise of unconventional energy sources doesn't threaten his country's dominant role in world oil supply because demand also is increasing. "I don't think anyone should fear new supplies…. The pie is getting bigger, and there is enough to go around," he said.
But the Nigerian oil minister, Ms. Alison-Madueke, sees danger for her country. "Shale oil has been identified as one of the most serious threats for African producers," she said in the U.K. this month. Those producers, she said, could lose 25% of their oil revenue as they are edged out of the U.S.
Nigeria has been hardest hit because its light and low-sulfur crudes compete directly with shale oil, unlike Saudi Arabia's heavier and more sulfurous crude. Other OPEC members who don't serve the U.S. market, such as Iran, are also complaining. Muhammad Ali Khatibi, Iran's envoy to OPEC, told The Wall Street Journal that a combination of rising U.S. shale production and tepid demand is bringing "the price down."
While Saudi Arabia can tolerate lower prices, "there will be some members, like Venezuela, Iran who will struggle at $90," said Amrita Sen, chief oil analyst at London-based Energy Aspects Ltd. The front month Brent contract for July settled at $102.62 a barrel Monday. Venezuela's oil minister said on Monday that he would push for a cut in OPEC production if oil falls below $100 a barrel.
Iran needs high prices to offset the loss of $26 billion of oil revenue last year from tough Western sanctions on its exports, according to estimates from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
Algeria, which has been rattled by riots over food and housing, needs an oil price of $121 a barrel to cover planned domestic spending—including for roads, jobs and housing—according to the International Monetary Fund.
The country's oil and gas revenue fell by 9% in the first four months of 2012, according to government figures. Algerian Finance Minister Karim Djoudi has said that lower revenue tied to mounting U.S. shale production could force the government to cut domestic spending.
"Cutting subsidies without increasing wages could bring tremendous political animosity," and instability, said Geoff Porter, head of security consultancy North Africa Risk Inc.
OPEC officials said the group is preparing studies to evaluate the impact of U.S. shale oil on demand for its crude. "Definitely, we will review nonconventional shale oil from the U.S.," said Mr. Khatibi, the Iranian envoy.
However, there is no agreement on the size of the challenge. Mr. Khatibi said the North American oil boom has created a global oversupply of 1.5 million barrels a day. Delegates from Gulf nations see the excess at no more than 500,000 barrels a day.
In the past, Saudi Arabia has simply ignored more hawkish members such as Iran and increased oil production when they failed to reach an agreement—as was the case during an acrimonious split two years ago. Saudi Arabia is the only country with sizable flexible production, giving it some influence on prices.
But the group can ill afford new divisions. In 2008, Saudi Arabia was forced to backpedal from a unilateral supply boost after prices crashed by $100 a barrel.
—Summer Said
contributed to this article

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To the Horror of Global Warming Alarmists, Global Cooling Is Here

Peter Ferrara, Contributor

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Around 1250 A.D., historical records show, ice packs began showing up farther south in the North Atlantic. Glaciers also began expanding on Greenland, soon to threaten Norse settlements on the island. From 1275 to 1300 A.D., glaciers began expanding more broadly, according to radiocarbon dating of plants killed by the glacier growth. The period known today as the Little Ice Age was just starting to poke through.
Summers began cooling in Northern Europe after 1300 A.D., negatively impacting growing seasons, as reflected in the Great Famine of 1315 to 1317. Expanding glaciers and ice cover spreading across Greenland began driving the Norse settlers out. The last, surviving, written records of the Norse Greenland settlements, which had persisted for centuries, concern a marriage in 1408 A.D. in the church of Hvalsey, today the best preserved Norse ruin.
Colder winters began regularly freezing rivers and canals in Great Britain, the Netherlands and Northern France, with both the Thames in London and the Seine in Paris frozen solid annually. The first River Thames Frost Fair was held in 1607. In 1607-1608, early European settlers in North America reported ice persisting on Lake Superior until June. In January, 1658, a Swedish army marched across the ice to invade Copenhagen. By the end of the 17th century, famines had spread from northern France, across Norway and Sweden, to Finland and Estonia.
Reflecting its global scope, evidence of the Little Ice Age appears in the Southern Hemisphere as well. Sediment cores from Lake Malawi in southern Africa show colder weather from 1570 to 1820. A 3,000 year temperature reconstruction based on varying rates of stalagmite growth in a cave in South Africa also indicates a colder period from 1500 to 1800. A 1997 study comparing West Antarctic ice cores with the results of the Greenland Ice Sheet Project Two (GISP2) indicate a global Little Ice Age affecting the two ice sheets in tandem.
The Siple Dome, an ice dome roughly 100 km long and 100 km wide, about 100 km east of the Siple Coast of Antartica, also reflects effects of the Little Ice Age synchronously with the GISP2 record, as do sediment cores from the Bransfield Basin of the Antarctic Peninsula. Oxygen/isotope analysis from the Pacific Islands indicates a 1.5 degree Celsius temperature decline between 1270 and 1475 A.D.
The Franz Josef glacier on the west side of the Southern Alps of New Zealand advanced sharply during the period of the Little Ice Age, actually invading a rain forest at its maximum extent in the early 1700s. The Mueller glacier on the east side of New Zealand’s Southern Alps expanded to its maximum extent at roughly the same time.
Ice cores from the Andeas mountains in South America show a colder period from 1600 to 1800. Tree ring data from Patagonia in South America show cold periods from 1270 to 1380 and from 1520 to 1670. Spanish explorers noted the expansion of the San Rafael Glacier in Chile from 1675 to 1766, which continued into the 19th century.
The height of the Little Ice Age is generally dated as 1650 to 1850 A.D. The American Revolutionary Army under General George Washington shivered at Valley Forge in the winter of 1777-78, and New York harbor was frozen in the winter of 1780. Historic snowstorms struck Lisbon, Portugal in 1665, 1744 and 1886. Glaciers in Glacier National Park in Montana advanced until the late 18th or early 19th centuries. The last River Thames Frost Fair was held in 1814. The Little Ice Age phased out during the middle to late 19th century.
The Little Ice Age, following the historically warm temperatures of the Medieval Warm Period, which lasted from about AD 950 to 1250, has been attributed to natural cycles in solar activity, particularly sunspots. A period of sharply lower sunspot activity known as the Wolf Minimum began in 1280 and persisted for 70 years until 1350. That was followed by a period of even lower sunspot activity that lasted 90 years from 1460 to 1550 known as the Sporer Minimum. During the period 1645 to 1715, the low point of the Little Ice Age, the number of sunspots declined to zero for the entire time. This is known as the Maunder Minimum, named after English astronomer Walter Maunder. That was followed by the Dalton Minimum from 1790 to 1830, another period of well below normal sunspot activity.
The increase in global temperatures since the late 19th century just reflects the end of the Little Ice Age. The global temperature trends since then have followed not rising CO2 trends but the ocean temperature cycles of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) and the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO). Every 20 to 30 years, the much colder water near the bottom of the oceans cycles up to the top, where it has a slight cooling effect on global temperatures until the sun warms that water. That warmed water then contributes to slightly warmer global temperatures, until the next churning cycle.
Those ocean temperature cycles, and the continued recovery from the Little Ice Age, are primarily why global temperatures rose from 1915 until 1945, when CO2 emissions were much lower than in recent years. The change to a cold ocean temperature cycle, primarily the PDO, is the main reason that global temperatures declined from 1945 until the late 1970s, despite the soaring CO2 emissions during that time from the postwar industrialization spreading across the globe.
The 20 to 30 year ocean temperature cycles turned back to warm from the late 1970s until the late 1990s, which is the primary reason that global temperatures warmed during this period. But that warming ended 15 years ago, and global temperatures have stopped increasing since then, if not actually cooled, even though global CO2 emissions have soared over this period. As The Economist magazine reported in March, “The world added roughly 100 billion tonnes of carbon to the atmosphere between 2000 and 2010. That is about a quarter of all the CO2 put there by humanity since 1750.” Yet, still no warming during that time. That is because the CO2 greenhouse effect is weak and marginal compared to natural causes of global temperature changes.
At first the current stall out of global warming was due to the ocean cycles turning back to cold. But something much more ominous has developed over this period. Sunspots run in 11 year short term cycles, with longer cyclical trends of 90 and even 200 years. The number of sunspots declined substantially in the last 11 year cycle, after flattening out over the previous 20 years. But in the current cycle, sunspot activity has collapsed. NASA’s Science News report for January 8, 2013 states,
“Indeed, the sun could be on the threshold of a mini-Maunder event right now. Ongoing Solar Cycle 24 [the current short term 11 year cycle] is the weakest in more than 50 years. Moreover, there is (controversial) evidence of a long-term weakening trend in the magnetic field strength of sunspots. Matt Penn and William Livingston of the National Solar Observatory predict that by the time Solar Cycle 25 arrives, magnetic fields on the sun will be so weak that few if any sunspots will be formed. Independent lines of research involving helioseismology and surface polar fields tend to support their conclusion.”
That is even more significant because NASA’s climate science has been controlled for years by global warming hysteric James Hansen, who recently announced his retirement.
But this same concern is increasingly being echoed worldwide. The Voice of Russia reported on April 22, 2013,
“Global warming which has been the subject of so many discussions in recent years, may give way to global cooling. According to scientists from the Pulkovo Observatory in St.Petersburg, solar activity is waning, so the average yearly temperature will begin to decline as well. Scientists from Britain and the US chime in saying that forecasts for global cooling are far from groundless.”
That report quoted Yuri Nagovitsyn of the Pulkovo Observatory saying, “Evidently, solar activity is on the decrease. The 11-year cycle doesn’t bring about considerable climate change – only 1-2%. The impact of the 200-year cycle is greater – up to 50%. In this respect, we could be in for a cooling period that lasts 200-250 years.” In other words, another Little Ice Age.
The German Herald reported on March 31, 2013,
“German meteorologists say that the start of 2013 is now the coldest in 208 years – and now German media has quoted Russian scientist Dr Habibullo Abdussamatov from the St. Petersburg Pulkovo Astronomical Observatory [saying this] is proof as he said earlier that we are heading for a “Mini Ice Age.” Talking to German media the scientist who first made his prediction in 2005 said that after studying sunspots and their relationship with climate change on Earth, we are now on an ‘unavoidable advance towards a deep temperature drop.’”
Faith in Global Warming is collapsing in formerly staunch Europe following increasingly severe winters which have now started continuing into spring. Christopher Booker explained in The Sunday Telegraph on April 27, 2013,
“Here in Britain, where we had our fifth freezing winter in a row, the Central England Temperature record – according to an expert analysis on the US science blog Watts Up With That – shows that in this century, average winter temperatures have dropped by 1.45C, more than twice as much as their rise between 1850 and 1999, and twice as much as the entire net rise in global temperatures recorded in the 20th century.”
A news report from India (The Hindu April 22, 2013) stated, “March in Russia saw the harshest frosts in 50 years, with temperatures dropping to –25° Celsius in central parts of the country and –45° in the north. It was the coldest spring month in Moscow in half a century….Weathermen say spring is a full month behind schedule in Russia.” The news report summarized,
“Russia is famous for its biting frosts but this year, abnormally icy weather also hit much of Europe, the United States, China and India. Record snowfalls brought Kiev, capital of Ukraine, to a standstill for several days in late March, closed roads across many parts of Britain, buried thousands of sheep beneath six-metre deep snowdrifts in Northern Ireland, and left more than 1,000,000 homes without electricity in Poland. British authorities said March was the second coldest in its records dating back to 1910. China experienced the severest winter weather in 30 years and New Delhi in January recorded the lowest temperature in 44 years.”
Booker adds, “Last week it was reported that 3,318 places in the USA had recorded their lowest temperatures for this time of year since records began. Similar record cold was experienced by places in every province of Canada. So cold has the Russian winter been that Moscow had its deepest snowfall in 134 years of observations.”
Britain’s Met Office, an international cheerleading headquarters for global warming hysteria, did concede last December that there would be no further warming at least through 2017, which would make 20 years with no global warming. That reflects grudging recognition of the newly developing trends. But that reflects as well growing divergence between the reality of real world temperatures and the projections of the climate models at the foundation of the global warming alarmism of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Since those models have never been validated, they are not science at this point, but just made up fantasies. That is why, “In the 12 years to 2011, 11 out of 12 [global temperature]forecasts [of the Met Office] were too high — and… none were colder than [resulted],” as BBC climate correspondent Paul Hudson wrote in January.
Global warming was never going to be the problem that the Lysenkoists who have brought down western science made it out to be. Human emissions of CO2 are only 4 to 5% of total global emissions, counting natural causes. Much was made of the total atmospheric concentration of CO2 exceeding 400 parts per million. But if you asked the daffy NBC correspondent who hysterically reported on that what portion of the atmosphere 400 parts per million is, she transparently wouldn’t be able to tell you. One percent of the atmosphere would be 10,000 parts per million. The atmospheric concentrations of CO2 deep in the geologic past were much, much greater than today, yet life survived, and we have no record of any of the catastrophes the hysterics have claimed. Maybe that is because the temperature impact of increased concentrations of CO2 declines logarithmically. That means there is a natural limit to how much increased CO2 can effectively warm the planet, which would be well before any of the supposed climate catastrophes the warming hysterics have tried to use to shut down capitalist prosperity.
Yet, just last week, there was Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson telling us, by way of attempting to tutor Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX), Chairman of the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology, “For the record, and for the umpteenth time, there is no ‘great amount of uncertainty’ about whether the planet is warming and why.” If you can read, and you have gotten this far in my column, you know why Robinson’s ignorance is just another Washington Post abuse of the First Amendment. Mr. Robinson, let me introduce you to the British Met Office, stalwart of Global Warming “science,” such as it is, which has already publicly confessed that we are already three quarters through 20 years of No Global Warming!
Booker could have been writing about Robinson when he concluded his Sunday Telegraph commentary by writing, “Has there ever in history been such an almighty disconnect between observable reality and the delusions of a political class that is quite impervious to any rational discussion?”
But there is a fundamental problem with the temperature records from this contentious period, when climate science crashed into political science. The land based records, which have been under the control of global warming alarmists at the British Met Office and the Hadley Centre Climate Research Unit, and at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in the U.S., show much more warming during this period than the incorruptible satellite atmosphere temperature records. Those satellite records have been further confirmed by atmospheric weather balloons. But the land based records can be subject to tampering and falsification.

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