The Lede Blog: Malala Yousafzai, Pakistani Girl Shot by Taliban Militants, Speaks in New Videos

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Last Updated, 12:09 p.m. Speaking on camera for the first time since she survived an assassination attempt by the Pakistani Taliban last year, the young activist Malala Yousafzai began with the words, “Today you can see that I’m alive.” The 15-year-old, who was shot in the head as she left school in the Pakistan’s Swat Valley four months ago, promised that she would continue to be an outspoken advocate of the right for “every girl, every child, to be educated.”

In the brief statement, the young advocate attributed her survival to the prayers of her supporters and urged them to contribute to a fund established in her name to further the cause of education for girls. “Because of these prayers, God has given me this new life,” Ms. Yousafzai said. “And this is a second life; this is a new life. And I want to serve, I want to serve the people.”

A video statement from Malala Yousafzai, a young Pakistani activist who was shot in the head by Taliban militants.

According BBC News, the English-language statement was recorded before Ms. Yousafzai underwent surgery at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham, England, over the weekend to repair damage to her skull caused by the bullet fired into her head at point-blank range in October.

On Monday, the hospital released more video of the young patient, speaking to one of her doctors after the five-hour operation to reconstruct her skull and implant a device to restore hearing to her left ear.

Video of Malala Yousafzai speaking to a doctor in Birmingham, England after an operation on Saturday.

“I’m feeling alright and I’m happy that the operations, both the operations, were successful,” she told Dr. Mav Manji, a critical care specialist at Queen Elizabeth Hospital. Asked about the future, she said, “My mission is the same, to help people, and I will do that.” She also expressed her gratitude to the doctors in Pakistan and Britain who cared for her. “God gave me a new life,” she said, “because of the prayers of people and because of the talent of doctors.”

As Fatima Manji of Britain’s Channel 4 News reports, the activist also recorded statements in Urdu and Pashto, languages spoken in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The video statement was produced for the Vital Voices Global Partnership, a nongovernmental organization based in Washington “that identifies, trains and empowers emerging women leaders,” which will administer the new “Malala Fund,” in cooperation with the young activist and her family.

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Ravens edge 49ers 34-31 in electric Super Bowl

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NEW ORLEANS (AP) — For a Super Bowl with so many story lines, this game came up with quite a twist.


Try a blackout that turned a blowout into a shootout — capped by a brilliant defensive stand.


The Baltimore Ravens survived a frenzied comeback by the San Francisco 49ers following a 34-minute delay in the third quarter for a power outage Sunday night, winning their second championship 34-31. Super Bowl MVP Joe Flacco threw three first-half touchdown passes, Jacoby Jones ran back the second-half kickoff a record 108 yards for a score, and star linebacker Ray Lewis' last play fittingly was part of a defensive effort that saved the victory.


"To me, that was one of the most amazing goal-line stands I've ever been a part of in my career," said Lewis, who announced a month ago he would retire when the Ravens were done playing.


They are done now, with another Vince Lombardi Trophy headed for the display case.


"What better way to do it," Lewis said, "than on the Super Bowl stage?"


That stage already was loaded with plots:


—The coaching Harbaughs sibling rivalry, won by older brother John, who said the postgame greeting with Jim was "painful."


—Flacco's emergence as a top-level quarterback, and his impending free agency.


—Colin Kaepernick's rapid rise in the last two months as 49ers QB.


—The big game's return to the Big Easy for the first time in 11 years, and the first time since Hurricane Katrina ravaged the city in 2005.


—Lewis' self-proclaimed "last ride."


But when the Superdome lost power, well, that wasn't in anyone's scenario.


Flacco and the Ravens (14-6) were turning the game into a rout, leading 28-6 when, without even a flicker of warning, several banks of lights and the scoreboards went dark. Players from both sides stretched and chatted with each other in as bizarre a scene as any Super Bowl has witnessed.


"The bad part was we started talking about it," said safety Ed Reed, who had the game's only interception. "That was mentioned. It was like they were trying to kill our momentum."


After power was restored, the 49ers began playing lights out.


San Francisco (13-5-1), in search of its sixth Lombardi Trophy in as many tries, got back in the game almost immediately.


Michael Crabtree's 31-yard touchdown reception, on which he broke two tackles, made it 28-13. A few minutes later, Frank Gore's 6-yard run followed a 32-yard punt return by Ted Ginn Jr., and the 49ers were within eight.


Ray Rice's fumble at his 24 led to David Akers' 34-yard field goal, but Baltimore woke up for a long drive leading to rookie Justin Tucker's 19-yard field goal.


San Francisco wasn't done challenging, though, and Kaepernick's 15-yard TD run, the longest for a quarterback in a Super Bowl, made it 31-29. A 2-point conversion pass failed when the Ravens blitzed.


Tucker added a 38-yarder with 4:19 remaining, setting up the frantic finish.


Kaepernick couldn't get the 49ers into the end zone on the final three plays. The last was a pass into the right corner of the end zone to Crabtree that involved some incidental bumping. Jim Harbaugh insisted a flag should have been thrown.


"There's no question in my mind that there was a pass interference and then a hold," Jim Harbaugh said.


Ravens punter Sam Koch took a safety for the final score with 4 seconds left. Koch's free kick was returned by Ginn to midfield as time ran out.


"How could it be any other way? It's never pretty. It's never perfect. But it's us," John Harbaugh said of his Ravens. "It was us today."


Barely.


"Yeah, I think that last drive when we got the ball and had time to go down and score a touchdown," Kaepernick said, "we thought it was our game."


But the championship is Baltimore's.


As for the foul-up at America's biggest sporting event, officials revealed that an "abnormality" in the power system triggered an automatic shutdown, forcing backup systems to kick in. But no one was sure what caused the initial problem.


Everything changed after that until Lewis and Co. shut it down. But there were plenty of white-knuckle moments and the Ravens had to make four stops inside their 7 at the end.


"I think it speaks to our resolve, speaks to our determination, speaks to our mental toughness," John Harbaugh said. "That is what wins and loses games."


At 4 hours, 14 minutes, it was the longest Super Bowl ever.


Flacco's arrival as a championship quarterback — he had 11 postseason TD passes, tying a league mark, and no interceptions — coincides with Lewis' retirement. The win capped a sensational four games since Lewis announced he was leaving the game after 17 Hall of Fame-caliber years.


The Ravens will become Flacco's team now, provided he reaches agreement on a new contract.


Flacco's three TD passes in the opening half tied a Super Bowl record. They covered 13 yards to Anquan Boldin, 1 to Dennis Pitta and 56 to Jones.


That start boosted him to the MVP award.


"They have to give it to one guy and I'm not going to complain that I got it," Flacco said.


John Harbaugh had no complaints about getting that other trophy named after that Green Bay coach. But he struggled to balance it with the disappointment his brother was feeling.


"The meeting with Jim in the middle (of the field for the postgame handshake) was probably the most difficult thing I have ever been associated with in my life," the Ravens coach said.


The wild scoring made this the second championship in the NFL's 80-year title game history in which both teams scored at least 30 points. Pittsburgh's 35-31 win over Dallas in 1979 was the other.


The Ravens stumbled into the playoffs with four defeats in its last five regular-season games as Lewis recovered from a torn right triceps and Flacco struggled. Harbaugh even fired his offensive coordinator in December, a stunning move with the postseason so close.


But that — and every other move Harbaugh, Flacco and the Ravens made since — were right on target.


New Orleans native Jones, one of the stars in a double-overtime playoff win at Denver, seemed to put the game away with his record 108-yard sprint with the second-half kickoff.


Soon after, the lights went out — and when they came back on, the Ravens were almost powerless to slow the 49ers.


Until the final moments.


"The final series of Ray Lewis' career was a goal-line stand," Harbaugh said.


Lewis was sprawled on all fours, face-down on the turf, after the end zone incompletion.


"It's no greater way, as a champ, to go out on your last ride with the men that I went out with, with my teammates," Lewis said. "And you looked around this stadium and Baltimore! Baltimore! We coming home, baby! We did it!"


Jim Harbaugh, the coach who turned around the Niners in the last two years and brought them to their first Super Bowl in 18 years, had seen his team make a similarly stunning comeback in the NFC championship at Atlanta, but couldn't finish it off against Baltimore.


"Our guys battled back to get back in," the 49ers coach said. "I thought we battled right to the brink of winning."


The 49ers couldn't have been sloppier in the first half, damaging their chances with penalties — including one on their first play that negated a 20-yard gain — poor tackling and turnovers. Rookie LaMichael James fumbled at the Baltimore 25 to ruin an impressive drive, and the Ravens converted that with Flacco's 1-yard pass to Pitta for a 14-3 lead.


On San Francisco's next offensive play, Kaepernick threw behind Randy Moss and always dependable Reed picked it off. A huge scuffle followed that brought both Harbaughs onto the field and saw both sides penalized 15 yards for unnecessary roughness.


Reed, also a New Orleans native, tied the NFL record for postseason picks with his ninth.


Baltimore didn't pounce on that mistake for points. Instead, Tucker's fake field goal run on fourth-and-9 came up a yard short when Chris Culliver slammed him out of bounds.


The Ravens simply shrugged, forced a three-and-out, and then unleashed Jones deep. Just as he did to Denver, he flashed past the secondary and caught Flacco's fling. He had to wait for the ball, fell to the ground to grab it, but was untouched by a Niner. Up he sprang, cutting left and using his speed to outrun two defenders to the end zone.


Desperate for some points, the 49ers completed four passes and got a 15-yard roughing penalty against Haloti Ngata, who later left with a knee injury. But again they couldn't cross the goal line, Paul Kruger got his second sack of the half on third down, forcing a second field goal by Akers, from 27 yards.


When Jones began the second half by sprinting up the middle virtually untouched — he is the second player with two TDs of 50 yards or more in a Super Bowl, tying Washington's Ricky Sanders in 1988 — the rout was on.


Then it wasn't.


"Everybody had their hand on this game," 49ers All-Pro linebacker Patrick Willis said. "We point the fingers at nobody. We win together and we lose together, and today we lost it."


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Recipes for Health: Quick One-Dish Meals, Some Cooking Required — Recipes for Health

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Andrew Scrivani for The New York Times







This week, in response to readers’ requests on the Recipes for Health Facebook page, I focused on quick one-dish dinners. You may have a different opinion than I do about what constitutes a quick meal. There are quick meals that involve little or no cooking – paninis and sandwiches, uncomplicated omelets, scrambled eggs, and meals that combine prepared items with foods that you cook -- but I chose to focus on dishes that are made from scratch. I bought a cabbage and a generous bunch of kale at the farmers’ market, some sliced mushrooms and bagged baby spinach at Trader Joe’s, and used them in conjunction with items I had on hand in the pantry and refrigerator.




I decided to use the same rule of thumb that a close French friend uses. She refuses to spend more than a half hour on prep but always turns out spectacular dinners and lunches. My goal was to make one-dish meals that would put us at the table no more than 45 minutes after I started cooking (the soup this week went over by 5 or 10 minutes but I left it in because it is so good). For each recipe test I set the timer for 30 minutes, then let it count up once it went off. All of the meals are vegetarian and the only prepared foods I used were canned beans.


I do believe that it is healthy – and enjoyable -- to take time to prepare meals for the family (or just for yourself), even when you are juggling one child’s afterschool soccer practice and homework with another child’s dance recitals and homework. Sometimes it is hard to find that half hour, but everybody benefits when you do.


Soft Black Bean Tacos With Salsa and Cabbage


Canned black beans and lots of cabbage combine in a quick, utterly satisfying one-dish taco dinner. They can be served open-faced or folded over.


1 tablespoon canola or grape seed oil


1 teaspoon medium-hot chili powder (more to taste)


1 teaspoon ground lightly toasted cumin seeds (more to taste)


2 cans black beans, with liquid


Salt to taste


8 corn tortillas


1 cup fresh or bottled salsa*


3 ounces either queso fresco, feta, or sharp cheddar, grated or crumbled


2 cups shredded cabbage


*Make fresh salsa with 2 or 3 chopped roma tomatoes, 1 or 2 jalapeños or serrano chiles, a little chopped onion or shallot if desired, salt, a squeeze of lime juice, and chopped fresh cilantro


1. Heat the oil in a large, heavy skillet over medium-high heat and add the chili powder and ground cumin. Allow the spices to sizzle for about half a minute, until very fragrant, and stir in the black beans and 1/2 cup water. Cook, stirring and mashing the beans with the back of your spoon, for 5 to 10 minutes, until thick and fragrant. Be careful that you don’t let the beans dry out too much. If they do, add a little more water. Remove from the heat.


2. Heat the tortillas, two or three at a time, in a dry skillet over medium-high heat, or in a microwave. Top with the black beans, salsa, cheese and cabbage. Fold the filled tortillas over if desired and serve. Alternatively, one at a time, place a tortilla on a plate, top with the beans and cheese and heat through for 30 seconds to a minute in a microwave. Then top with salsa and a generous handful of cabbage, and serve.


Yield: Serves 4


Advance preparation: The refried black beans will keep for three days in the refrigerator. You will have to moisten and thin them out with water when you reheat them.


Nutritional information per serving: 398 calories; 11 grams fat; 3 grams saturated fat; 3 grams polyunsaturated fat; 4 grams monounsaturated fat; 15 milligrams cholesterol; 56 grams carbohydrates; 13 gram dietary fiber; 887 milligrams sodium (does not include salt to taste); 17 grams protein


Martha Rose Shulman is the author of “The Very Best of Recipes for Health.”


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Bucks Blog: The Question You Should Be Asking About the Stock Market

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Carl Richards is a financial planner in Park City, Utah, and is the director of investor education at the BAM Alliance. His book, “The Behavior Gap,” was published last year. His sketches are archived on the Bucks blog.

With the stock market up more than 100 percent from those scary days in early 2009 and up 16 percent in 2012 alone, we’re now hearing plenty about how small investors are getting back into the market. Andrew Wilkinson, the chief economic strategist at Miller Tabak Associates, referred to it as a “a real sea change in investor outlook.”

It seems we’re in danger of repeating the same old cycle of swearing off stocks forever during scary markets, missing a huge rally and then deciding it’s time to buy when stocks are high again. On the flip side, I’ve had a number of conversations with Main Street investors who are asking if now is the time to sell because the Dow Jones Industrial Average is hovering near 14,000 and the S&P 500 stock index is around 1,500 again.

So which one is it? Should everyday investors be buying or selling?

Do you see the problem here?

If we’re investing based on what the market has done, it’s a recipe for disaster. Recent market performance tells us almost nothing useful about what the market will do in the near future. Logically it seems like it should, but a quick review of the market’s performance during the last six years should be evidence enough to convince us that it doesn’t.

Remember how you felt in March, 2009? I bet you didn’t feel like investing, and you weren’t alone. Almost no one did. It was a scary time. But it turns out that it would have been a brilliant time to invest. Again, not because of what the market had done, but what it was about to do.

But there was no way to know that in March 2009.

Did anyone expect (or feel) like 2012 was going to turn into a 16 percent year? In fact, almost all the unfortunate souls that make their living predicting the markets got 2012 wrong.

Here’s the thing we need to remember: we have no idea if now is the time to be buying or selling. But the good news is that it’s not even the question we should be asking. Instead we should be asking, “How can we avoid making the big behavioral mistake of selling low and buying high (again!) in the future?”

Instead of worrying about getting in or out of the market at the right time, take that time to focus on crafting a portfolio based on your goals. Start by taking out a piece of paper and writing a personal investment policy statement that addresses the following:

  1. Why are you investing this money in the first place? What are your goals?
  2. How much do you need in cash, bonds and stocks to give you the best chance of meeting those goals while taking the least amount of risk?
  3. What actual investments will you buy to populate that plan and why? Make sure you address issues like diversification and expenses.
  4. How often will you revisit this plan to make sure you’re doing what you said you would do and to make changes to your investments to get them back in line with what you said in number 2?

A personal investment policy statement can be one of the most important guardrails against the emotional investment decisions that we all regret in hindsight. So, when you get worried about the markets and are tempted to sell everything you own that has anything to do with stocks, go back to that piece of paper. If your goals haven’t changed, forget about it.

And when you get excited about that initial public offering that your brother-in-law says he can “get you in on,” pull out that piece of paper. If your goals haven’t changed, forget about it.

When your neighbors are all wrapped up in how the latest apocalypse du jour is going to ruin everyone’s retirement, pull out that piece of paper. If your goals haven’t changed, forget about it.

I know this might not work all the time. In fact, it might not work at all when we’re scared and dead set on getting out. But my hope is that having something we wrote when we weren’t scared will give us a little time to pause and ask a few questions before we do something that might end up being a mistake.

As a result, maybe, just maybe, we can shift the focus away from whether now is the right time to buy or sell and place it squarely on whether that decision fits into our own, personal investment plans.

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IHT Rendezvous: Doctors to Prescribe Self-Help Books, Poetry for Mental Health Ills

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LONDON — Doctors in England will soon be prescribing books as well as pills to patients suffering from anxiety and depression.

In a government-endorsed initiative supported by medical associations and librarians, physicians will be sending patients to their local libraries for a range of approved self-help titles targeted at those suffering from mild to moderate mental health problems.

Patients are also being encouraged to turn to what The Bookseller magazine described as “uplifting novels and poetry.”

Extolling the potentially curative powers of literature, the Reading Agency charity quoted research that showed reading reduced stress levels by 67 percent.

The charity, which is a partner in the new Books on Prescription program announced this week, quoted the New England Journal of Medicine as saying reading also cut the risk of dementia by more than a third.

The list of 30 approved self-help titles available on prescription from May includes page-turners like “The Feeling Good Handbook,” “How to Stop Worrying” and “Overcoming Anger and Irritability.”

“There’s growing evidence that shows that self-help reading can help people with certain mental health issues get better,” Miranda McKearney, the Reading Agency’s director said.

The sick often rely on the Internet to search for advice on symptoms and cures that can turn out to be unreliable. Doctors will now be able to write a prescription that gives patients immediate membership to their local library and access to recommended titles.

It is the first so-called bibliotherapy initiative to have received such high-level official backing from health authorities and librarians.

Campaigners for public libraries have applauded the program but worry that not enough is being done to protect the libraries themselves. Last year, 200 libraries were closed and another 300 are reportedly facing closure or being handed over to volunteers this year.

The Reading Agency meanwhile has come up with a core list of Mood-boosting Books designed to promote feeling good.

It includes proven classics such as “The Secret Garden,” by Frances Hodgson Burnett, but also upbeat titles from the likes of Bill Bryson, the best-selling U.S. humorist.

Development of the book prescription idea was paid for by the Arts Council England, which distributes public money to arts projects.

The Reading Agency has applied for funding from the government, which it says spends £14 billion, or $22 billion, a year treating mental health.

So, should sufferers of depression or panic attacks be advised to curl up with a good book? Or is this just a new health fad to find an alternative to costly medication and therapy.

The Reading Project is soliciting suggestions for stress-relieving books at the Twitter hashtag #moodboosting.

If you think there might be something in it, send us your own suggestions for therapeutic reading. And, while you’re at it, let us know any titles that are best avoided when we’re feeling low.

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Goodell: 'Absolutely' would let son play football

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NEW ORLEANS (AP) — NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell would "absolutely" want his own child to play football.


After President Barack Obama recently said he'd "have to think long and hard" about allowing a son to take part in the sport, Goodell was asked the same question hours before Sunday's Super Bowl during an interview on CBS's "Face the Nation."


Like the president, Goodell has two daughters. The commissioner deflected the question about allowing a son to play football by noting the high incidence of concussions in girls soccer.


In an interview with The New Republic, Obama had said he loved football but worried about the long-term effects on players of the game's hard hits. Thousands of former players have sued the NFL, alleging that not enough was done to inform them about the dangers of concussions and not enough is being done today to take care of them.


Asked by Bob Schieffer on Sunday whether the league hid the risks of head injuries, Goodell said, "No."


Goodell declined to confirm that there is a proven connection between the sport and medical problems in retired players. He emphasized that the NFL is funding research to learn more about the risks and changing rules to make the game safer.


Goodell said he had no concerns that football could go the way of boxing, a sport now far less popular than in its heyday.


"I couldn't be more optimistic about it because the game of football has always evolved," the commissioner said. "Through the years, through the decades, we've made changes to our game, to make it safer, to make it more exciting, to make it a better game for the players, for the fans, and we have done that in a very calculated fashion."


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Concerns About A.D.H.D. Practices and Amphetamine Addiction

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Before his addiction, Richard Fee was a popular college class president and aspiring medical student. "You keep giving Adderall to my son, you're going to kill him," said Rick Fee, Richard's father, to one of his son's doctors.







VIRGINIA BEACH — Every morning on her way to work, Kathy Fee holds her breath as she drives past the squat brick building that houses Dominion Psychiatric Associates.










Matt Eich for The New York Times

MENTAL HEALTH CLINIC Dominion Psychiatric Associates in Virginia Beach, where Richard Fee was treated by Dr. Waldo M. Ellison. After observing Richard and hearing his complaints about concentration, Dr. Ellison diagnosed attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and prescribed the stimulant Adderall.






It was there that her son, Richard, visited a doctor and received prescriptions for Adderall, an amphetamine-based medication for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. It was in the parking lot that she insisted to Richard that he did not have A.D.H.D., not as a child and not now as a 24-year-old college graduate, and that he was getting dangerously addicted to the medication. It was inside the building that her husband, Rick, implored Richard’s doctor to stop prescribing him Adderall, warning, “You’re going to kill him.”


It was where, after becoming violently delusional and spending a week in a psychiatric hospital in 2011, Richard met with his doctor and received prescriptions for 90 more days of Adderall. He hanged himself in his bedroom closet two weeks after they expired.


The story of Richard Fee, an athletic, personable college class president and aspiring medical student, highlights widespread failings in the system through which five million Americans take medication for A.D.H.D., doctors and other experts said.


Medications like Adderall can markedly improve the lives of children and others with the disorder. But the tunnel-like focus the medicines provide has led growing numbers of teenagers and young adults to fake symptoms to obtain steady prescriptions for highly addictive medications that carry serious psychological dangers. These efforts are facilitated by a segment of doctors who skip established diagnostic procedures, renew prescriptions reflexively and spend too little time with patients to accurately monitor side effects.


Richard Fee’s experience included it all. Conversations with friends and family members and a review of detailed medical records depict an intelligent and articulate young man lying to doctor after doctor, physicians issuing hasty diagnoses, and psychiatrists continuing to prescribe medication — even increasing dosages — despite evidence of his growing addiction and psychiatric breakdown.


Very few people who misuse stimulants devolve into psychotic or suicidal addicts. But even one of Richard’s own physicians, Dr. Charles Parker, characterized his case as a virtual textbook for ways that A.D.H.D. practices can fail patients, particularly young adults. “We have a significant travesty being done in this country with how the diagnosis is being made and the meds are being administered,” said Dr. Parker, a psychiatrist in Virginia Beach. “I think it’s an abnegation of trust. The public needs to say this is totally unacceptable and walk out.”


Young adults are by far the fastest-growing segment of people taking A.D.H.D medications. Nearly 14 million monthly prescriptions for the condition were written for Americans ages 20 to 39 in 2011, two and a half times the 5.6 million just four years before, according to the data company I.M.S. Health. While this rise is generally attributed to the maturing of adolescents who have A.D.H.D. into young adults — combined with a greater recognition of adult A.D.H.D. in general — many experts caution that savvy college graduates, freed of parental oversight, can legally and easily obtain stimulant prescriptions from obliging doctors.


“Any step along the way, someone could have helped him — they were just handing out drugs,” said Richard’s father. Emphasizing that he had no intention of bringing legal action against any of the doctors involved, Mr. Fee said: “People have to know that kids are out there getting these drugs and getting addicted to them. And doctors are helping them do it.”


“...when he was in elementary school he fidgeted, daydreamed and got A’s. he has been an A-B student until mid college when he became scattered and he wandered while reading He never had to study. Presently without medication, his mind thinks most of the time, he procrastinated, he multitasks not finishing in a timely manner.”


Dr. Waldo M. Ellison


Richard Fee initial evaluation


Feb. 5, 2010


Richard began acting strangely soon after moving back home in late 2009, his parents said. He stayed up for days at a time, went from gregarious to grumpy and back, and scrawled compulsively in notebooks. His father, while trying to add Richard to his health insurance policy, learned that he was taking Vyvanse for A.D.H.D.


Richard explained to him that he had been having trouble concentrating while studying for medical school entrance exams the previous year and that he had seen a doctor and received a diagnosis. His father reacted with surprise. Richard had never shown any A.D.H.D. symptoms his entire life, from nursery school through high school, when he was awarded a full academic scholarship to Greensboro College in North Carolina. Mr. Fee also expressed concerns about the safety of his son’s taking daily amphetamines for a condition he might not have.


“The doctor wouldn’t give me anything that’s bad for me,” Mr. Fee recalled his son saying that day. “I’m not buying it on the street corner.”


This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: February 3, 2013

An earlier version of a quote appearing with the home page presentation of this article misspelled the name of a medication. It is Adderall, not Aderall.



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Iceland, Prosecutor of Bankers, Sees Meager Returns

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Ilvy Njiokiktjien for The New York Times


"Greed is not a crime. But the question is: where does greed lead?" said Olafur Hauksson, a special prosecutor in Reykjavik.







REYKJAVIK, Iceland — As chief of police in a tiny fishing town for 11 years, Olafur Hauksson developed what he thought was a basic understanding of the criminal mind. The typical lawbreaker, he said, recalling his many encounters with small-time criminals, “clearly knows that he crossed the line” and generally sees “the difference between right and wrong.”




Today, the burly, 48-year-old former policeman is struggling with a very different sort of suspect. Reassigned to Reykjavik, the Icelandic capital, to lead what has become one of the world’s most sweeping investigation into the bankers whose actions contributed to the global financial crisis in 2008, Mr. Hauksson now faces suspects who “are not aware of when they crossed the line” and “defend their actions every step of the way.”


With the global economy still struggling to recover from the financial maelstrom five years ago, governments around the world have been criticized for largely failing to punish the bankers who were responsible for the calamity. But even here in Iceland, a country of just 320,000 that has gone after financiers with far more vigor than the United States and other countries hit by the crisis, obtaining criminal convictions has proved devilishly difficult.


Public hostility toward bankers is so strong in Iceland that “it is easier to say you are dealing drugs than to say you’re a banker,” said Thorvaldur Sigurjonsson, the former head of trading for Kaupthing, a once high-flying bank that crumbled. He has been called in for questioning by Mr. Hauksson’s office but has not been charged with any wrongdoing.


Yet, in the four years since the Icelandic Parliament passed a law ordering the appointment of an unnamed special prosecutor to investigate those blamed for the country’s spectacular meltdown in 2008, only a handful of bankers have been convicted.


Ministers in a left-leaning coalition government elected after the crash agree that the wheels of justice have ground slowly, but they call for patience, explaining that the process must follow the law, not vengeful passions.


“We are not going after people just to satisfy public anger,” said Steingrimur J. Sigfusson, Iceland’s minister of industry, a former finance minister and leader of the Left-Green Movement that is part of the governing coalition.


Hordur Torfa, a popular singer-songwriter who helped organize protests that forced the previous conservative government to resign, acknowledged that “people are getting impatient” but said they needed to accept that “this is not the French Revolution. I don’t believe in taking bankers out and hanging them or shooting them.”


Others are less patient. “The whole process is far too slow,” said Thorarinn Einarsson, a left-wing activist. “It only shows that ‘banksters’ can get away with doing whatever they want.”


Mr. Hauksson, the special prosecutor, said he was frustrated by the slow pace but thought it vital that his office scrupulously follow legal procedure. “Revenge is not something we want as our main driver in this process. Our work must be proper today and be seen as proper in the future,” he said.


Part of the difficulty in prosecuting bankers, he said, is that the law is often unclear on what constitutes a criminal offense in high finance. “Greed is not a crime,” he noted. “But the question is: where does greed lead?”


Mr. Hauksson said it was often easy to show that bankers violated their own internal rules for lending and other activities, but “as in all cases involving theft or fraud, the most difficult thing is proving intent.”


And there are the bankers themselves. Those who have been brought in for questioning often bristle at being asked to account for their actions. “They are not used to being questioned. These people are not used to finding themselves in this situation,” Mr. Hauksson said. They also hire expensive lawyers.


The special prosecutor’s office initially had only five staff members but now has more than 100 investigators, lawyers and financial experts, and it has relocated to a big new office. It has opened about 100 cases, with more than 120 people now under investigation for possible crimes relating to an Icelandic financial sector that grew so big it dwarfed the rest of the economy.


To help ease Mr. Hauksson’s task, legislators amended the law to allow investigators easy access to confidential bank information, something that previously required a court order.


Parliament also voted to put the country’s prime minister at the time of the banking debacle on trial for negligence before a special tribunal. (A proposal to try his cabinet failed.) Mr. Hauksson was not involved in the case against the former leader, Geir H. Haarde, who last year was found guilty of failing to keep ministers properly informed about the 2008 crisis but was acquitted on more serious charges that could have resulted in a prison sentence.


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As Self-Immolations Near 100, Some Tibetans Ask, Is It Worth It?

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NEW DELHI — A crowd of Tibetans came here to India’s capital last week, bearing flags and political banners and a bittersweet admixture of hope and despair. A grim countdown was under way: The number of Tibetans who have set themselves on fire to protest Chinese rule in Tibet had reached 99, one short of an anguished milestone.




Yet as that milestone hung over the estimated 5,000 Tibetans who gathered in a small stadium, so did an uncertainty about whether the rest of the world was paying attention at all. In speeches, Tibetan leaders described the self-immolations as the desperate acts of a people left with no other way to draw global attention to Chinese policies in Tibet.


“What is forcing these self-immolations?” Lobsang Sangay, prime minister of the Tibetan government-in-exile, asked in an interview. “There is no freedom of speech. There is no form of political protest allowed in Tibet.”


Billed as the Tibetan People’s Solidarity Campaign, the four-day gathering featured protests, marches, Buddhist prayer sessions and political speeches in an attempt to push Tibet back onto a crowded international agenda. If the Arab Spring has inspired hope among some Tibetans that political change is always possible, it has also offered a sobering reminder that no two situations are the same, nor will the international community respond in the same fashion.


“The world is paying attention, but not enough,” Mr. Sangay added. “There was a self-immolation in Tunisia which was labeled the catalyst for the Arab Spring. We’ve been committed to nonviolence for many decades. And how come we have been given less support than what we witnessed in the Arab world?”


Yet even as the self-immolations have become central to the Tibetan protest movement, a quiet debate has been under way among Tibetans who are anguished over the deaths of their young men and who question how the acts reconcile with Buddhist teachings. Again and again, speakers emphasized that the Tibetan movement remains nonviolent and that the people who have self-immolated harmed only themselves.


“None of them have tried to harm anybody else,” said Penpa Tsering, the speaker of the Tibetan Parliament, which is based in Dharamsala, the Indian city that is host to the exiled Tibetan government. “None of the 99 people have tried to harm any Chinese.”


The Tibetan self-immolations began in 2009 as protests against China’s rule in Tibetan regions of the country. At least 81 Tibetans have died after their acts, and nearly all the self-immolations have occurred inside Tibet, with news smuggled out via e-mail or through networks of advocacy groups.


The Chinese authorities have responded by taking a harder line. Last week, a Chinese court handed down stiff sentences to a Tibetan monk and his nephew on charges that they had urged eight people to set themselves on fire, according to Chinese state news media. The monk was given a suspended death sentence, usually equivalent to life in prison, and the authorities have made it clear that committing or encouraging the act will be treated as intentional homicide. (Mr. Sangay said that six others in a different area of Tibet were also given harsh sentences.)


The Chinese government has blamed the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan spiritual leader, for inciting ordinary Tibetans to carry out self-immolations. Tibetans rebut the claim, saying the cause is Chinese repression.


“What are you left with?” Mr. Penpa asked. “The only thing you can do is sacrifice your life.”


With the Dalai Lama having ceded political control of the Tibetan government — and having encouraged the elections that elevated Mr. Sangay, a former lecturer at Harvard, to prime minister — the Tibetan movement is in flux. To some degree, last week’s events were part of continued efforts to establish Mr. Sangay and other democratically elected Tibetan members of Parliament as figures capable of rallying political support for a movement long dependent on the charisma and stature of the Dalai Lama. (He did not attend the gathering.)


For more than a half century, India has been the primary host of exiled Tibetans, and many of the people who flocked to New Delhi came from special Tibetan villages elsewhere in the country. Lobsang Thai, 28, who came from Mundgod, a Tibetan village in the Indian state of Karnataka, said the self-immolations reflected the desperate situation in Tibet. “I don’t think it is about right or wrong,” he said. “That is the only thing we can do without hurting other people. That’s the best way to get the world’s attention.”


Tenzin Losec, 42, who is from Mainpat, a Tibetan village in the Indian state of Chhattisgarh, agreed. “This is very sad for us,” he said. “But people inside Tibet, they have no other way. They have no rights. Outside Tibet, we are trying to raise awareness around the world.”


Tibetan leaders were determined to portray the week’s events as evidence that the global community, especially India, supported their aspirations. Lawmakers and other political figures from India’s leading political parties appeared at different events, though the government’s top leaders stayed away.


Mr. Sangay and others want the United Nations to push China to improve conditions in Tibet and also to allow inspectors to tour the region. “The Chinese government should feel pressure to do something,” he said. “This is leading to a vicious cycle: hard-line policies, protests, repression, more hard-line policies, more protests, more repression.”


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NFL's Goodell aims to share blame on player safety

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NEW ORLEANS (AP) — NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell wants to share the blame.


"Safety," he said at his annual Super Bowl news conference, "is all of our responsibilities."


Not surprisingly, given that thousands of former players are suing the league about its handling of concussions, the topics of player health and improved safety dominated Goodell's 45-minute session Friday. And he often sounded like someone seeking to point out that players or others are at fault for some of the sport's problems — and need to help fix them.


"I'll stand up. I'll be accountable. It's part of my responsibility. I'll do everything," Goodell said. "But the players have to do it. The coaches have to do it. Our officials have to do it. Our medical professionals have to do it."


Injuries from hits to the head or to the knees, Goodell noted, can result from improper tackling techniques used by players and taught by coaches. The NFL Players Association needs to allow testing for human growth hormone to go forward so it can finally start next season, which Goodell hopes will happen. He said prices for Super Bowl tickets have soared in part because fans re-sell them above face value.


And asked what he most rues about the New Orleans Saints bounty investigation — a particularly sensitive issue around these parts, of course — Goodell replied: "My biggest regret is that we aren't all recognizing that this is a collective responsibility to get (bounties) out of the game, to make the game safer. Clearly the team, the NFL, the coaching staffs, executives and players, we all share that responsibility. That's what I regret, that I wasn't able to make that point clearly enough with the union."


He addressed other subjects, such as a "new generation of the Rooney Rule" after none of 15 recently open coach or general manager jobs went to a minority candidate, meaning "we didn't have the outcomes we wanted"; using next year's Super Bowl in New Jersey as a test for future cold-weather, outdoor championship games; and saying he welcomed President Barack Obama's recent comments expressing concern about football's violence because "we want to make sure that people understand what we're doing to make our game safer."


Also:


— New Orleans will not get back the second-round draft pick Goodell stripped in his bounty ruling;


— Goodell would not give a time frame for when the NFL could hold a game in Mexico;


— next season's games in London — 49ers-Jaguars and Steelers-Vikings — are sellouts.


Goodell mentioned some upcoming changes, including the plan to add independent neurologists to sidelines to help with concussion care during games — something players have asked for and the league opposed until now.


"The No. 1 issue is: Take the head out of the game," Goodell said. "I think we've seen in the last several decades that players are using their head more than they had when you go back several decades."


He said one tool the league can use to cut down on helmet-to-helmet hits is suspending players who keep doing it.


"We're going to have to continue to see discipline escalate, particularly on repeat offenders," Goodell said. "We're going to have to take them off the field. Suspension gets through to them."


The league will add "expanded physicals at the end of each season ... to review players from a physical, mental and life skills standpoint so that we can support them in a more comprehensive fashion," Goodell said.


With question after question about less-than-light matters, one reporter drew a chuckle from Goodell by asking how he's been treated this week in a city filled with supporters of the Saints who are angry about the way the club was punished for the bounty system the NFL said existed from 2009-11.


"My picture, as you point out, is in every restaurant. I had a float in the Mardi Gras parade. We got a voodoo doll," Goodell said.


But he added that he can "appreciate the passion" of the fans and, actually, "couldn't feel more welcome here."


___


Follow Howard Fendrich on Twitter at http://twitter.com/HowardFendrich


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