Agen Tiket Pesawat di Kutai Hubungi 021-9929-2337 atau 0821-2406-5740 Alhijaz Indowisata adalah perusahaan swasta nasional yang bergerak di bidang tour dan travel. Nama Alhijaz terinspirasi dari istilah dua kota suci bagi umat islam pada zaman nabi Muhammad saw. yaitu Makkah dan Madinah. Dua kota yang penuh berkah sehingga diharapkan menular dalam kinerja perusahaan. Sedangkan Indowisata merupakan akronim dari kata indo yang berarti negara Indonesia dan wisata yang menjadi fokus usaha bisnis kami.
Agen Tiket Pesawat di Malang Hubungi 021-9929-2337 atau 0821-2406-5740 Alhijaz Indowisata adalah perusahaan swasta nasional yang bergerak di bidang tour dan travel. Nama Alhijaz terinspirasi dari istilah dua kota suci bagi umat islam pada zaman nabi Muhammad saw. yaitu Makkah dan Madinah. Dua kota yang penuh berkah sehingga diharapkan menular dalam kinerja perusahaan. Sedangkan Indowisata merupakan akronim dari kata indo yang berarti negara Indonesia dan wisata yang menjadi fokus usaha bisnis kami.
Agen Tiket Pesawat di Yogyakarta Hubungi 021-9929-2337 atau 0821-2406-5740 Alhijaz Indowisata adalah perusahaan swasta nasional yang bergerak di bidang tour dan travel. Nama Alhijaz terinspirasi dari istilah dua kota suci bagi umat islam pada zaman nabi Muhammad saw. yaitu Makkah dan Madinah. Dua kota yang penuh berkah sehingga diharapkan menular dalam kinerja perusahaan. Sedangkan Indowisata merupakan akronim dari kata indo yang berarti negara Indonesia dan wisata yang menjadi fokus usaha bisnis kami.
Agen Tiket Pesawat di Bandung Hubungi 021-9929-2337 atau 0821-2406-5740 Alhijaz Indowisata adalah perusahaan swasta nasional yang bergerak di bidang tour dan travel. Nama Alhijaz terinspirasi dari istilah dua kota suci bagi umat islam pada zaman nabi Muhammad saw. yaitu Makkah dan Madinah. Dua kota yang penuh berkah sehingga diharapkan menular dalam kinerja perusahaan. Sedangkan Indowisata merupakan akronim dari kata indo yang berarti negara Indonesia dan wisata yang menjadi fokus usaha bisnis kami.
Agen Tiket Pesawat di Pontianak Hubungi 021-9929-2337 atau 0821-2406-5740 Alhijaz Indowisata adalah perusahaan swasta nasional yang bergerak di bidang tour dan travel. Nama Alhijaz terinspirasi dari istilah dua kota suci bagi umat islam pada zaman nabi Muhammad saw. yaitu Makkah dan Madinah. Dua kota yang penuh berkah sehingga diharapkan menular dalam kinerja perusahaan. Sedangkan Indowisata merupakan akronim dari kata indo yang berarti negara Indonesia dan wisata yang menjadi fokus usaha bisnis kami.
Agen Tiket Pesawat di Samarinda Hubungi 021-9929-2337 atau 0821-2406-5740 Alhijaz Indowisata adalah perusahaan swasta nasional yang bergerak di bidang tour dan travel. Nama Alhijaz terinspirasi dari istilah dua kota suci bagi umat islam pada zaman nabi Muhammad saw. yaitu Makkah dan Madinah. Dua kota yang penuh berkah sehingga diharapkan menular dalam kinerja perusahaan. Sedangkan Indowisata merupakan akronim dari kata indo yang berarti negara Indonesia dan wisata yang menjadi fokus usaha bisnis kami.
Agen Tiket Pesawat di Palembang Hubungi 021-9929-2337 atau 0821-2406-5740 Alhijaz Indowisata adalah perusahaan swasta nasional yang bergerak di bidang tour dan travel. Nama Alhijaz terinspirasi dari istilah dua kota suci bagi umat islam pada zaman nabi Muhammad saw. yaitu Makkah dan Madinah. Dua kota yang penuh berkah sehingga diharapkan menular dalam kinerja perusahaan. Sedangkan Indowisata merupakan akronim dari kata indo yang berarti negara Indonesia dan wisata yang menjadi fokus usaha bisnis kami.
Aku awali pesan ini dengan kata bismillah, berharap agar semua berjalan mudah.
Tapi kenyataanya, tak ada cara mudah untuk menyampaikn ini semua.
Dari pada aku berbasa basi banyak alasan, lebih baik ku sampaikan saja secara mengalir laksana sebuah cerita.
Semalam waktu aku berkumpul bersama keluarga ku, bapak, ibu, dan adik-adik ku, aku bercerita tentang kamu.
tentang hubungan kita.
Tentang asal usul dan juga setatus mu.
Tapi.. respon yang ku dapat jauh di luar perkiraan yang ku harap.
Bahkan harus berahir dengan penyesalan.
mengapa aku tadi bercerita?
kenapa tadi ku tak diam saja?
Aku menggerutu dalam hati yang di penuhi sesal.
Tapi begitulah takdir berperan, mengalir bagai arus air.
Tak akan bisa di tahan walau dengan membentang kedua tangan.
Apa kamu tau apa respon mereka?
Ibunda ku berkata..
“Le..mbok kamu itu tau diri.
Lihat dulu dari kalangan mana kamu berasal.
Dia itu orang yang berpendidikan.
Kuliah, jadi mahasiswi, pasti orang tuanya mengharap masa depan cerah untuk dia.
Mereka ingin hidup anak mereka terjamin, berkecukupan, dan bisa jadi “orang”.
Lha kamu ini apa to le?
Kamu cuma lulusan SD, lulusan pesantren.
Jangankan kuliah le, SMP saja kamu ga’ pernah.
Lha kok berani-beraninya pacaran sama mahasiswa, yang cerah masa depanya.
Lebih baik kamu “lepas” saja dia.
Sebelum semua terlambat terlalu jauh.
Sebelum kamu mengecewakanya terlalu dalam.
Ngomong pelan-pelan sama dia.
Yang halus..yang sopan.
Kalo dia marah sama kamu, itu memang haknya dia.
Karena itu memang salah kamu.
Tapi ibu nasehatkan sama kamu, itu semua juga demi kebaikan dia.
Dia ga’ pantes sama kamu.
Dia berhak dapat yang lebih baik dari pada kamu.
Kita ini orang kecil le.
Berfikiran yang sederhana.
Yang penting hidup tentram dan mensyukuri apa yang ada.
Kalo kamu memang cinta sama dia, seharusnya kamu ga’ egois.
Kamu juga harus mikir masa depan dia juga.
Kalo dia sama kamu yang orang kampung ini, mau jadi apa dia?
Lagi pula dia jauh juga kan?
Ibu ga’ pengen nanti punya menantu yang jauh.
Apa lagi sampai nyebrang laut.
Kamu ga’ lihat sekarang kapal pada tenggelam?
Pesawat juga pada jatuh?
Kalo memang terpaksa dapat yang jauh, yang penting ga’ nyebrang laut”.
Bapak ku juga mendukung kata-kata ibu ku..
“Mumpung belum kenal lebih dalam, mending sudahi skrg.
Dari pada kamu malah lebih membuat dia kecewa nantinya”.
Aku berfikir semalaman.
Galau, kecewa, dan marah, karena merasa aku ga’ pernah di anggap benar dalam melangkah.
Tapi.. setelah ku berfikir panjang, kata-kata mereka benar juga.
Kamu ga’ pantas dengan aku.
Kamu berhak mendapat yang lebih baik dari aku.
Aku hanya ingin.. jika hubungan ini harus berahir, ku ingin di ahiri dengan baik-baik..
Sebagaimana kita memulai semua ini dengan baik-baik pula.
Ku ingin kau mengerti sayang, ku meninggalkan mu bukan karena rasa benci ku.
Tapi.. Ku ingin kau tau, beginilah cara ku dalam mencintai mu.
Bukankah cinta itu bukan tentang bagaimana cara kita memiliki?
Tapi bagaimana cara kita berkorban demi orang yang paling kita cintai..
Dan dalam kisah ku ini, orang itu adalah kamu..
Richa..
Baik-baiklah kau di batas cakrawala sana..
Dan dari belahan bumi yang jauh ini, aku kan selalu mendo’akan untuk kebahagiaan mu..
Dari ku..
Cinta mu di ujung bumi .....
cerita romantis di atas adalah sebuah cerita yang diambil dari kisah perjalanan yang nyata. Begitu romantis dan menyentuh hati...untuk se sengkap nya klik di sini
Jamu tradisional untuk sapi, mungkin sebagian orang akan merasa heran karena  umumnya yang dikenal orang adalah jamu untuk diko
Jamu tradisional untuk sapi, mungkin sebagian orang akan merasa heran karena  umumnya yang dikenal orang adalah jamu untuk dikonsumsi oleh manusia, seperti jamu tolak angin dan berbagai jenis dengan khasiat tertentu termasuk penambah nafsu makan. Sedangkan jamu untuk ternak sebagian masyarakat Lombok mengenalnya dengan sebutan Loloh. Jamu ini terbuat dari berbagai macam bahan rempah-rempah dan bumbu masakan yang biasa digunakan oleh para ibu rumah tangga sebagai penyedap rasa. Mungkin setiap wilayah memiliki ramuan jamu yang berbeda-beda tergantung pembuatnya.
Parapembuat jamu ini sebagian besar masih merahasiakan resepnya, karena mereka memproduksi dan kemudian menjual kepada para peternak. Jamu ini dipercaya memiliki khasiat untuk menambah nafsu makan ternak. Sementara ini lebih banyak diberikan pada ternak sapi yang digemukkan. Peternak menginginkan sapi-sapi yang dipelihara bisa cepat besar dalam waktu yang singkat agar mereka bisa mendapatkan harga yang tinggi setelah dipelihara selama beberapa waktu.
Pada  usaha penggemukan, sapi dipelihara untuk menghasilkan daging, dan hal ini  ditentukan oleh peningkatan berat badan ternak selama kurun waktu tertentu. Pertambahan berat badan diketahui dipengaruhi oleh beberapa faktor yaitu  genetis ternak dan lingkungan termasuk pakan yang diberikan (kuantitas maupun kualitasnya). Ternak sapi yang dipelihara peternak di NTB sebagian besar adalah bangsa sapi Bali, sebagian lainnya merupakan  sapi potong unggul seperti Simental, Limousine dan Bangus (keturunan Brahman-Angus). Jelas pada kondisi yang sama pertambahan berat badan harian (PBBH) sapi lokal (sapi Bali) lebih rendah dibandingkan sapi-sapi potong unggul.
Agar ternak dapat hidup dan berproduksi maka perlu diberikan makanan yang cukup sesuai kebutuhannya. Kebutuhan pakan ternak ruminansia seperti sapi, kerbau, kambing/domba biasanya diperhitungkan berdasarkan berat badannya yaitu seberat 3% dari berat badan ternak dalam bentuk bahan kering (BK). Mengapa demikian? Karena hijauan makanan ternak memiliki berat kering yang berbeda maka yang digunakan sebagai patokan perhitungan adalah dalam bentuk bahan kering. Dengan pemberian jamu dimaksudkan agar nafsu makan ternak meningkat sehingga terjadi peningkatan PBBH. Jika ternak lekas gemuk, maka bisa lebih cepat dijual dan dapat memberikan keuntungan yang maksimal.
Di  Desa Tebaban, Kecamatan Suralaga Kabupaten Lombok Timur, sedang dilaksanakan kegiatan untuk menguji pengaruh jamu tradisional terhadap pertambahan berat badan harian ternak sapi jantan yang digemukan. Kegiatan tersebut merupakan Pengkajian dan Pemberdayaan Potensi Sumberdaya Lokal 2009 yang dibiayai oleh Proyek Peningkatan Pendapatan Petani Melalui Inovasi (P4MI).  Obyeknya adalah sapi Simental jantan berumur sekitar 1 tahun, dan sapi Bali dengan beberapa tingkatan umur. Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk : 1) mengetahui jumlah konsumsi pakan pada ternak-ternak sapi yang diberikan jamu tradisional; 2) mengetahui efektifitas jamu tradisional terhadap peningkatan berat badan harian ternak sapi pada beberapa tingkatan umur dan bangsa ternak potong. Jamu diberikan seminggu sekali, sebanyak 10 butir/ekor. Untuk mengetahui efek jamu tersebut dilakukan penimbangan ternak secara berkala. Juga dilakukan pengukuran jumlah pakan yang dikonsumsi per hari.
Kegiatan telah dilaksanakan mulai bulan Mei 2009 dan pengamatan akan berakhir pada bulan September 2009, didanai oleh program P4MI pada BPTP NTB. Hasil penelitian ini diharapkan bisa mendapatkan informasi tentang efek jamu tradisional (Loloh) pada penggemukan ternak sapi. Selama ini jamu semacam itu hanya bisa diasumsikan dapat menambah nafsu makan ternak dan mempersingkat waktu penggemukan. Selanjutnya dari hasil penelitian ini dapat menjadi acuan untuk penggunaan jamu tradisional pada usaha penggemukan ternak sapi khususnya. Sementara ini hasil pengamatan belum bisa dipublikasikan karena penelitian masih berjalan.
Oleh : Sasongk WR dan Farida Sukmawati M, peneliti dan penyuluh pada BPTP NTB
RIBERY INGIN JAJAL BENUA BARU
saco-indonesia.com, Franck Ribery rupanya juga sudah menetapkan hati untuk bisa mengakhir karirnya di Bayern Munich. Pemain asal
saco-indonesia.com, Franck Ribery rupanya juga sudah menetapkan hati untuk bisa mengakhir karirnya di Bayern Munich. Pemain asal Prancis itu sebelumnya juga sempat dikabarkan akan mencoba bertualang di Inggris bersama salah satu klub Premier League.
Namun baru-baru ini, The Scarface telah menyatakan bahwa ia akan terus bermain untuk Bayern. Namun ia sendiri juga tidak menutup kemungkinan untuk pindah, namun hanya untuk bisa menuju klub yang berada di benua berbeda.
"Saya juga tidak akan bergabung dengan klub lain di belahan Eropa manapun. Saya adalah pemain Bayern Munich dan tidak akan ada klub Eropa lainnya yang bakal mewarnai karir saya," tuturnya pada Kicker.
"Saya juga akan tersanjung apabila mendapatkan kesempatan untuk bermain di negara lain seperti Amerika Serikat atau Uni Emirat Arab suatu hari nanti," pungkas Ribery.
Pemain yang kini suda berusia 30 tahun itu telah memenangkan tiga titel juara Bundesliga selama memperkuat Bayern dari tahun 2007.
Editor : Dian Sukmawati
PULUHAN RUMAH DI BLITAR AMBLES
saco-indonesia.com, Tanah rekat yang telah terjadi di Desa Kalitengah, Kecamatan Panggungrejo, Kabupaten Blitar, Jawa Timur, tel
saco-indonesia.com, Tanah rekat yang telah terjadi di Desa Kalitengah, Kecamatan Panggungrejo, Kabupaten Blitar, Jawa Timur, telah mengakibatkan puluhan rumah rusak. Para warga yang rumahnya rusak langsung mengungsi ke tempat yang lebih aman.
"Mereka mengungsi ke rumah tetangga. Tadi, warga juga sudah melakukan kerja bakti, dan akan dilanjutkan besok (Kamis)," kata Kepala Pelaksana Badan Penanggulangan Bencana Daerah (BPBD) Kabupaten Blitar Heru Irawan di Blitar.
Ia juga mengatakan, ada sekitar 20 rumah yang terkena dampak akibat retakan tanah tersebut. Dari jumlah itu, delapan unit di antaranya kondisinya rusak parah, sehingga pemilik rumah tidak berani menempatinya lagi.
Sementara itu, anggota RAPI Kabupaten Blitar Heru telah mengatakan tim juga sudah memantau lokasi bencana tersebut. Ia juga mengatakan, sejumlah rumah warga kondisinya memang mengkhawatirkan. Retakan di tanah itu telah membuat rumah mereka ambles dan sebagian ambruk, sehingga berbahaya jika digunakan untuk tempat tinggal.
"Beberapa hari ini hujan terus, dan melihat struktur tanah mirip tanah liat, itu yang kami prediksi menjadi pemicu tanah retak," katanya.
Sejumlah bencana telah terjadi di Kabupaten Blitar. Sampai saat ini, banjir yang telah terjadi di Kecamatan Sukorejo, belum surut. Sejumlah daerah lain juga telah mengalami bencana seperti di Kecamatan Panggungrejo ini.
Editor : Dian Sukmawati
99,48 % SISWA SMA SEDERAJAT DINYATAKAN
LULUS
Sebanyak 99,48% siswa sekolah menengah atas (SMA) sederajat atau 1.573.036 siswa
dinyatakan lulus Ujian Nasional (UN) untu
Sebanyak 99,48% siswa sekolah menengah atas (SMA)
sederajat atau 1.573.036 siswa dinyatakan lulus Ujian Nasional (UN) untuk tahun ajaran
2012/2013, sedangkan yang tidak lulus sebanyak 8.260 siswa atau 0,52 persen. Adapun total seluruh
peserta UN SMA sederajat 1.581.286 siswa.
“Hasil kelulusan dan dan tidak
lulusnya siswa ditentukan dari kombinasi hasil nilai UN sebanyak 60 persen dan 40 persen dari
nilai sekolah,” kata Mendikbud M Nuh pada konferensi pers pengumuman hasil UN Tahun Ajaran
2012/2013 SMA/MA/SMK sederajat di Jakarta, Kamis (23/5).Turut hadir Ketua Badan Standar Nasional
Pendidikan (BSNP) Aman Wirakartakusumah dan anggota Jemari Mardapi.
Menurut Nuh,
dibandingkan tahun lalu prosentase kelulusan 99.50 persen, sehingga terjadi penurunan 0,02 persen
pada tahun ini.”Terjadinya penurunan kelulusan dimungkinkan karena adanya variasi soal
tahun ini menjadi 20 soal UN dan tingkat kerumitan soal,” ungkapnya.
Adapun
peserta UN yang paling banyak tidak lulus adalah pertama,Nanggro Aceh Darussalam (NAD) dengan
3,11 persen atau 1.754 siswa dari 65 ribu peserta UN. “Kedua, Papua dan ketiga Sulawesi
Tengah (Sulteng),” kata M Nuh.
Sedangkan Provinsi Nusa Tenggara Timur (NTT)
tidak lagi menjadi provinsi yang tingkat ketidaklulusannya tertinggi. “Hal ini karena
Kemendikbud melakukan intervensi terhadap provinsi itu berupa penambahan guru serta perbaikan
sarana dan prasarana,” ujar mantan Rektor ITS Surabaya itu.
Dijelaskan, untuk
tahun ini masih ada sekolah dengan angka ketidaklulusan sebesar 100 persen. Tercatat, sebanyak 24
sekolah atau sebesar 0,16 persen dengan tingkat ketidaklulusan 100 persen dengan jumlah 899
siswa.Namun lebih banyak sekolah yang 100 persen lulus, yaitu 15.476 sekolah atau sebesar 87
persen dengan jumlah 1,3 juta siswa.
Sementara provinsi dengan tingkat kelulusan
100 persen adalah Jawa Barat. Secara nasional, tambah Nuh, nilai UN tingkat SMA sederajat tahun
ini juga mengalami penurunan dibandingkan tahun sebelumnya. Jika tahun lalu rata-rata nilai UN
7,7, tahun ini hanya mencapai 6,35.
“Untuk rata-rata nilai UN tertinggi tahun
ini 9,87 dan yang terendah 0,33,” ungkap Nuh. Yang menarik,lanjut dia, dalam hasil evaluasi
UN 2013 di sejumlah sekolah, rata-rata nilai UN lebih tinggi dibandingkan dengan rata rata nilai
Ujian Sekolah.(Bangkit wibisono)
Pele Mengentak Dunia di Tahun 1958
Saco-Indonesia.com, Dipiala Dunia 1958 masih tetap berlangsung di Eropa, dan Swedia mendapat kehormatan untuk pertama kalinya menjadi tuan rumah. Di sini pula, turnamen empat tahunan ini diliput oleh televisi dan disiarkan secara internasional.
Saco-Indonesia.com, Dipiala Dunia 1958 masih tetap berlangsung di Eropa, dan Swedia mendapat kehormatan untuk pertama kalinya menjadi tuan rumah. Di sini pula, turnamen empat tahunan ini diliput oleh televisi dan disiarkan secara internasional.
Format kompetisi pun berganti lagi. 16 tim dibagi dalam empat grup seperti pada tahun 1954, tetapi sekarang semua tim yang tergabung dalam satu grup harus saling berhadapan, tetapi tim yang berada di peringkat dua dan ketiga harus melewati babak play-off. Pada fase grup ini tak ada perpanjangan waktu. Dua tim teratas akan melaju ke perempat final, dan setelah itu formatnya menggunakan sistem knock-out.
Pada tahun ini, tak ada lagi sistem unggulan seperti pada 1954, tetapi setiap grup dihuni satu tim dari Eropa Barat, satu dari Eropa Timur, satu dari Inggris dan satu dari Amerika Latin. Dengan format ini, Inggris harus menerima kenyataan pahit karena satu grup dengan Brasil, Rusia dan peraih medali perunggu 1954, Austria.
Sementara itu, kekuatan Hungaria sudah sangat keropos menyusul kepergian pemain-pemain topnya seperti Puskas, Kacsis dan Czibor, yang meninggalkan negara ini pada tahun 1956 akibat invasi Uni Soviet ke negera mereka. Tak heran jika Hungaria yang di Piala Dunia sebelumnya sangat perkasa dan menakutkan, kini tak berdaya sehingga langsung tersingkir di fase grup.
Sebaliknya, Uni Soviet yang untuk pertama kalinya ikut Piala Dunia, langsung menebar ancaman. Negara "Beruang Merah" ini menjadi favorit.
Di ajang ini, muncul sosok baru bernama Pele, yang menghentak dunia. Pemain Brasil ini sangat menarik perhatian karena aksi-aksinya yang menawan. Sempat absen di pertandingan pertama, Pele mulai membuat kejutan ketika membawa Brasil menahan imbang Inggris dengan skor 0-0. Hasil imbang tanpa gol ini merupakan yang pertama kalinya di Piala Dunia. Dari sini, Brasil sangat difavoritkan menjadi juara, apalagi mereka melakukan inovasi dengan mengusung skema 4-2-4.
Striker Perancis Juste Fontaine juga membuat sensasi karena menjadi top skor Piala Dunia ini setelah mengoleksi 13 gol. Dia sukses membawa "Les Bleus" dengan mudah melewati babak penyisihan grup dan mereka merupakan tim paling produktif dengan torehan 11 gol.
Sukses juga diraih tuan rumah, Swedia, yang didampingi Wales untuk melewati penyisihan grup. Sedangkan Inggris dan Skotlandia tak bisa melanjutkan kiprahnya, karena tak mampu melewati fase grup.
Di perempat final, tak ada kejutan. Seperti yang diperkirakan, Jerman Barat menyingkirkan Yugoslavia dengan skor tipis 1-0, tuan rumah mengeliminasi Uni Soviet berkat kemenangan 2-0, kemudian Fontaine membawa Perancis membantai Irlandia Utara 4-0. Di partai lain, Pele menjadi pahlawan Brasil karena gol pertamanya di Piala Dunia membawa "Selecao" menembus semifinal meskipun hanya menang 1-0 atas Wales.
Memasuki babak-babak selanjutnya, pesta gol terjadi. Bayangkan, mulai semifinal hingga final, tercipta 27 gol! Pada babak empat besar Swedia menggulung Jerman Barat yang merupakan juara bertahan, dengan skor 3-1. Sedangkan pada partai lain, Pele memukau publik lewat hat-trick untuk menghentikan laju Fontaine dan kawan-kawan. Brasil menang 5-2 atas Perancis. Alhasil, Brasil bertemu Swedia di final.
Namun sebelum dunia menyaksikan pertai seru antara Brasil dan Swedia, para pecinta sepak bola dunia lebih dulu disuguhkan pertai sembilan gol antara Perancis dan Jerman Barat, untuk memperebutkan medali perunggu. Di sini Fontaine melengkapi prestasinya sebagai top skor (13 gol) berkat empat gol yang dihasilkannya untuk membawa Perancis menang 6-3. Fontaine juga menorehkan sejarah sebagai pencetak gol terbanyak dalam satu Piala Dunia.
Pada partai puncak, Pele lagi-lagi menunjukkan tajinya sebagai pemain bintang. "Si Mutiara Hitam" ini membawa Brasil menjadi juara setelah menekuk tuan rumah 5-2. Hasil tersebut membuat Brasil sebagai satu-satunya negara dari benua Amerika yang menjadi juara di Eropa dan sampai sekarang belum ada negara yang mampu menyamai prestasi tersebut--dalam sejarah, ketika Piala Dunia dilangsungkan di Eropa, maka negara dari benua Eropa yang menjadi juara, begitu juga sebaliknya, ketika diadakan di benua Amerika maka negara dari benua ini yang menjadi juara. Kecuali pada Piala Dunia 2002, di mana Brasil menjadi juara untuk kelima kalinya ketika Piala Dunia diselenggarakan di Korea-Jepang.
Sumber : Kompas.com
Editor : Maulana Lee
PELAKU BAKAR KORBAN DI ATAS TEMPAT TIDUR SAAT MELAKUKAN PENCURIAN SEPEDA MOTOR
saco-indonesia.com, Pencurian sepeda motor sekaligus pembunuhan sadis telah terjadi di Desa Sungai Pinang kecamatan Tambang kabu
saco-indonesia.com, Pencurian sepeda motor sekaligus pembunuhan sadis telah terjadi di Desa Sungai Pinang kecamatan Tambang kabupaten Kampar Riau. Korban yang bernama Nurhayati yang berusia (38) tahun telah dibunuh lalu dibakar di atas kasur tempat tidur di rumahnya oleh pencuri.
"Kita juga sudah melakukan olah tempat kejadian perkara (TKP) dan memeriksa beberapa saksi," ujar Kapolsek Tambang AKP Sumarno, Senin (30/12).
Dari hasil penyelidikan sementara, Sumarno juga mengatakan belum ada titik terang mengenai indikasi pelaku pembunuhan sadis yang sekaligus pencurian sepeda motor Honda Vario di rumah korban. "Keterangan empat saksi yang telah diperiksa belum ada yang jelas," kata Sumarno.
Sumarno juga telah menduga motif pelaku adalah pencurian membunuh korban mungkin karena ketahuan, "Karena itulah bisa saja pelaku nekat untuk menghabisi nyawa korban," ucap Sumarno.
Selain itu, berdasarkan penuturan empat saksi, korban yang merupakan warga yang baik dan tidak punya musuh. Bahkan, sehari-harinya, korban tergolong ibu rumah tangga yang tak pernah keluar dari rumah. "Makanya para saksi juga bingung mengapa korban bisa dibunuh dengan cara yang sangat sadis," tambah Sumarno.
Walaupun belum ada keterangan saksi yang begitu jelas, Sumarno telah menegaskan, pihaknya juga akan serius mengungkap peristiwa perampokan dan pembunuhan itu. "Saat ini anggota kita masih berada melacak dan memburu pelakunya," pungkas Sumarno.
Seperti diberitakan sebelumnya, Nurhayati yang berusia (38) tahun warga Desa Sungai Pinang, Kampar, Minggu (29/12) sekitar pukul 03.00 dini hari telah ditemukan tewas terbakar di atas kasus dalam kamar oleh kedua anaknya Tri Riski (16) dan Bayu (20).
Pada subuh itu, Riski dan Bayu tersentak bangun dari tidurnya karena telah merasakan asap yang keluar dari kamar orangtuanya. Merasa penasaran kedua anak Nurhayati langsung membuka pintu kamar ibunya yang sedang tidur dalam kamar.
Alangkah terkejutnya Bayu saat melihat ibunya yang tidur di atas kasur sudah terbakar. Melihat peristiwa tragis itu Bayu dan Tri Riski langsung menjerit histeris dan minta pertolongan warga sekitar.
Warga yang terkejut dengan teriakan anak korban berhamburan ke rumah korban. Selanjutnya warga berusaha untuk memadamkan api, setelah api berhasil dipadamkan warga curiga sebab di kamar korban tidak ditemukan bercak darah.
Warga pun bergegas melaporkannya ke Polsek Tambang. Mendapat laporan dari warga Kapolsek Tambang AKP Sumarno bersama anggotanya bergegas datang ke lokasi untuk dapat melakukan olah tempat kejadian perkara (TKP).
Paman korban Ilut kepada wartawan juga mengatakan, korban tinggal di rumah bersama 2 orang anaknya. Sedangkan suami korban bekerja sebagai TKI di Malaysia.
"Tempat tinggal Nurhayati jauh dari keramaian, sebab di situ cuma hanya ada 4 petak rumah," ujar Ilut.
Menurut IIut, ia telah mendapat informasi Nurhayati tewas terbakar dari kedua anak Nurhayati. "Mendapat kabar itu saya bergegas ke lokasi, dan ternyata kondisi Nurhayati sudah hangus terbakar," tuturnya.
Editor : Dian Sukmawati
Gene Fullmer, a Brawling Middleweight Champion, Dies at 83
Fullmer, who reigned when fight clubs abounded and Friday night fights were a television staple, was known for his title bouts with Sugar Ray Robinson and Carmen Basilio.
Ex-C.I.A. Official Rebuts Republican Claims on Benghazi Attack in ‘The Great War of Our Time’
WASHINGTON — The former deputy director of the C.I.A. asserts in a forthcoming book that Republicans, in their eagerness to politicize the killing of the American ambassador to Libya, repeatedly distorted the agency’s analysis of events. But he also argues that the C.I.A. should get out of the business of providing “talking points” for administration officials in national security events that quickly become partisan, as happened after the Benghazi attack in 2012.
The official, Michael J. Morell, dismisses the allegation that the United States military and C.I.A. officers “were ordered to stand down and not come to the rescue of their comrades,” and he says there is “no evidence” to support the charge that “there was a conspiracy between C.I.A. and the White House to spin the Benghazi story in a way that would protect the political interests of the president and Secretary Clinton,” referring to the secretary of state at the time, Hillary Rodham Clinton.
But he also concludes that the White House itself embellished some of the talking points provided by the Central Intelligence Agency and had blocked him from sending an internal study of agency conclusions to Congress.
“I finally did so without asking,” just before leaving government, he writes, and after the White House released internal emails to a committee investigating the State Department’s handling of the issue.
A lengthy congressional investigation remains underway, one that many Republicans hope to use against Mrs. Clinton in the 2016 election cycle.
In parts of the book, “The Great War of Our Time” (Twelve), Mr. Morell praises his C.I.A. colleagues for many successes in stopping terrorist attacks, but he is surprisingly critical of other C.I.A. failings — and those of the National Security Agency.
Soon after Mr. Morell retired in 2013 after 33 years in the agency, President Obama appointed him to a commission reviewing the actions of the National Security Agency after the disclosures of Edward J. Snowden, a former intelligence contractor who released classified documents about the government’s eavesdropping abilities. Mr. Morell writes that he was surprised by what he found.
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“You would have thought that of all the government entities on the planet, the one least vulnerable to such grand theft would have been the N.S.A.,” he writes. “But it turned out that the N.S.A. had left itself vulnerable.”
He concludes that most Wall Street firms had better cybersecurity than the N.S.A. had when Mr. Snowden swept information from its systems in 2013. While he said he found himself “chagrined by how well the N.S.A. was doing” compared with the C.I.A. in stepping up its collection of data on intelligence targets, he also sensed that the N.S.A., which specializes in electronic spying, was operating without considering the implications of its methods.
“The N.S.A. had largely been collecting information because it could, not necessarily in all cases because it should,” he says.
Mr. Morell was a career analyst who rose through the ranks of the agency, and he ended up in the No. 2 post. He served as President George W. Bush’s personal intelligence briefer in the first months of his presidency — in those days, he could often be spotted at the Starbucks in Waco, Tex., catching up on his reading — and was with him in the schoolhouse in Florida on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, when the Bush presidency changed in an instant.
Mr. Morell twice took over as acting C.I.A. director, first when Leon E. Panetta was appointed secretary of defense and then when retired Gen. David H. Petraeus resigned over an extramarital affair with his biographer, a relationship that included his handing her classified notes of his time as America’s best-known military commander.
Mr. Morell says he first learned of the affair from Mr. Petraeus only the night before he resigned, and just as the Benghazi events were turning into a political firestorm. While praising Mr. Petraeus, who had told his deputy “I am very lucky” to run the C.I.A., Mr. Morell writes that “the organization did not feel the same way about him.” The former general “created the impression through the tone of his voice and his body language that he did not want people to disagree with him (which was not true in my own interaction with him),” he says.
But it is his account of the Benghazi attacks — and how the C.I.A. was drawn into the debate over whether the Obama White House deliberately distorted its account of the death of Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens — that is bound to attract attention, at least partly because of its relevance to the coming presidential election. The initial assessments that the C.I.A. gave to the White House said demonstrations had preceded the attack. By the time analysts reversed their opinion, Susan E. Rice, now the national security adviser, had made a series of statements on Sunday talk shows describing the initial assessment. The controversy and other comments Ms. Rice made derailed Mr. Obama’s plan to appoint her as secretary of state.
The experience prompted Mr. Morell to write that the C.I.A. should stay out of the business of preparing talking points — especially on issues that are being seized upon for “political purposes.” He is critical of the State Department for not beefing up security in Libya for its diplomats, as the C.I.A., he said, did for its employees.
But he concludes that the assault in which the ambassador was killed took place “with little or no advance planning” and “was not well organized.” He says the attackers “did not appear to be looking for Americans to harm. They appeared intent on looting and conducting some vandalism,” setting fires that killed Mr. Stevens and a security official, Sean Smith.
Mr. Morell paints a picture of an agency that was struggling, largely unsuccessfully, to understand dynamics in the Middle East and North Africa when the Arab Spring broke out in late 2011 in Tunisia. The agency’s analysts failed to see the forces of revolution coming — and then failed again, he writes, when they told Mr. Obama that the uprisings would undercut Al Qaeda by showing there was a democratic pathway to change.
“There is no good explanation for our not being able to see the pressures growing to dangerous levels across the region,” he writes. The agency had again relied too heavily “on a handful of strong leaders in the countries of concern to help us understand what was going on in the Arab street,” he says, and those leaders themselves were clueless.
Moreover, an agency that has always overvalued secretly gathered intelligence and undervalued “open source” material “was not doing enough to mine the wealth of information available through social media,” he writes. “We thought and told policy makers that this outburst of popular revolt would damage Al Qaeda by undermining the group’s narrative,” he writes.
Instead, weak governments in Egypt, and the absence of governance from Libya to Yemen, were “a boon to Islamic extremists across both the Middle East and North Africa.”
Mr. Morell is gentle about most of the politicians he dealt with — he expresses admiration for both Mr. Bush and Mr. Obama, though he accuses former Vice President Dick Cheney of deliberately implying a connection between Al Qaeda and Iraq that the C.I.A. had concluded probably did not exist. But when it comes to the events leading up to the Bush administration’s decision to go to war in Iraq, he is critical of his own agency.
Mr. Morell concludes that the Bush White House did not have to twist intelligence on Saddam Hussein’s alleged effort to rekindle the country’s work on weapons of mass destruction.
“The view that hard-liners in the Bush administration forced the intelligence community into its position on W.M.D. is just flat wrong,” he writes. “No one pushed. The analysts were already there and they had been there for years, long before Bush came to office.”
Top News China’s Intents Are Questioned as It Builds in Antarctica
HOBART, Tasmania — Few places seem out of reach for China’s leader, Xi Jinping, who has traveled from European capitals to obscure Pacific and Caribbean islands in pursuit of his nation’s strategic interests.
So perhaps it was not surprising when he turned up last fall in this city on the edge of the Southern Ocean to put down a long-distance marker in another faraway region, Antarctica, 2,000 miles south of this Australian port.
Standing on the deck of an icebreaker that ferries Chinese scientists from this last stop before the frozen continent, Mr. Xi pledged that China would continue to expand in one of the few places on earth that remain unexploited by humans.
He signed a five-year accord with the Australian government that allows Chinese vessels and, in the future, aircraft to resupply for fuel and food before heading south. That will help secure easier access to a region that is believed to have vast oil and mineral resources; huge quantities of high-protein sea life; and for times of possible future dire need, fresh water contained in icebergs.
It was not until 1985, about seven decades after Robert Scott and Roald Amundsen raced to the South Pole, that a team representing Beijing hoisted the Chinese flag over the nation’s first Antarctic research base, the Great Wall Station on King George Island.
But now China seems determined to catch up. As it has bolstered spending on Antarctic research, and as the early explorers, especially the United States and Australia, confront stagnant budgets, there is growing concern about its intentions.
China’s operations on the continent — it opened its fourth research station last year, chose a site for a fifth, and is investing in a second icebreaker and new ice-capable planes and helicopters — are already the fastest growing of the 52 signatories to the Antarctic Treaty. That gentlemen’s agreement reached in 1959 bans military activity on the continent and aims to preserve it as one of the world’s last wildernesses; a related pact prohibits mining.
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But Mr. Xi’s visit was another sign that China is positioning itself to take advantage of the continent’s resource potential when the treaty expires in 2048 — or in the event that it is ripped up before, Chinese and Australian experts say.
“So far, our research is natural-science based, but we know there is more and more concern about resource security,” said Yang Huigen, director general of the Polar Research Institute of China, who accompanied Mr. Xi last November on his visit to Hobart and stood with him on the icebreaker, Xue Long, or Snow Dragon.
With that in mind, the polar institute recently opened a new division devoted to the study of resources, law, geopolitics and governance in Antarctica and the Arctic, Mr. Yang said.
Australia, a strategic ally of the United States that has strong economic relations with China, is watching China’s buildup in the Antarctic with a mix of gratitude — China’s presence offers support for Australia’s Antarctic science program, which is short of cash — and wariness.
“We should have no illusions about the deeper agenda — one that has not even been agreed to by Chinese scientists but is driven by Xi, and most likely his successors,” said Peter Jennings, executive director of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute and a former senior official in the Australian Department of Defense.
“This is part of a broader pattern of a mercantilist approach all around the world,” Mr. Jennings added. “A big driver of Chinese policy is to secure long-term energy supply and food supply.”
That approach was evident last month when a large Chinese agriculture enterprise announced an expansion of its fishing operations around Antarctica to catch more krill — small, protein-rich crustaceans that are abundant in Antarctic waters.
“The Antarctic is a treasure house for all human beings, and China should go there and share,” Liu Shenli, the chairman of the China National Agricultural Development Group, told China Daily, a state-owned newspaper. China would aim to fish up to two million tons of krill a year, he said, a substantial increase from what it currently harvests.
Because sovereignty over Antarctica is unclear, nations have sought to strengthen their claims over the ice-covered land by building research bases and naming geographic features. China’s fifth station will put it within reach of the six American facilities, and ahead of Australia’s three.
Chinese mappers have also given Chinese names to more than 300 sites, compared with the thousands of locations on the continent with English names.
In the unspoken competition for Antarctica’s future, scientific achievement can also translate into influence. Chinese scientists are driving to be the first to drill and recover an ice core containing tiny air bubbles that provide a record of climate change stretching as far back as 1.5 million years. It is an expensive and delicate effort at which others, including the European Union and Australia, have failed.
In a breakthrough a decade ago, European scientists extracted an ice core nearly two miles long that revealed 800,000 years of climate history. But finding an ice core going back further would allow scientists to examine a change in the earth’s climate cycles believed to have occurred 900,000 to 1.2 million years ago.
China is betting it has found the best location to drill, at an area called Dome A, or Dome Argus, the highest point on the East Antarctic Ice Sheet. Though it is considered one of the coldest places on the planet, with temperatures of 130 degrees below zero Fahrenheit, a Chinese expedition explored the area in 2005 and established a research station in 2009.
“The international community has drilled in lots of places, but no luck so far,” said Xiao Cunde, a member of the first party to reach the site and the deputy director of the Institute for Climate Change at the Chinese Academy of Meteorological Sciences. “We think at Dome A we will have a straight shot at the one-million-year ice core.”
Mr. Xiao said China had already begun drilling and hoped to find what scientists are looking for in four to five years.
To support its Antarctic aspirations, China is building a sophisticated $300 million icebreaker that is expected to be ready in a few years, said Xia Limin, deputy director of the Chinese Arctic and Antarctic Administration in Beijing. It has also bought a high-tech fixed-wing aircraft, outfitted in the United States, for taking sensitive scientific soundings from the ice.
China has chosen the site for its fifth research station at Inexpressible Island, named by a group of British explorers who were stranded at the desolate site in 1912 and survived the winter by excavating a small ice cave.
Mr. Xia said the inhospitable spot was ideal because China did not have a presence in that part of Antarctica, and because the rocky site did not have much snow, making it relatively cheap to build there.
Anne-Marie Brady, a professor of political science at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand and the author of a soon-to-be-released book, “China as a Polar Great Power,” said Chinese scientists also believed they had a good chance of finding mineral and energy resources near the site.
“China is playing a long game in Antarctica and keeping other states guessing about its true intentions and interests are part of its poker hand,” she said. But she noted that China’s interest in finding minerals was presented “loud and clear to domestic audiences” as the main reason it was investing in Antarctica.
Because commercial drilling is banned, estimates of energy and mineral resources in Antarctica rely on remote sensing data and comparisons with similar geological environments elsewhere, said Millard F. Coffin, executive director of the Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies in Hobart.
But the difficulty of extraction in such severe conditions and uncertainty about future commodity prices make it unlikely that China or any country would defy the ban on mining anytime soon.
Tourism, however, is already booming. Travelers from China are still a relatively small contingent in the Antarctic compared with the more than 13,000 Americans who visited in 2013, and as yet there are no licensed Chinese tour operators.
But that is about to change, said Anthony Bergin, deputy director of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute. “I understand very soon there will be Chinese tourists on Chinese vessels with all-Chinese crew in the Antarctic,” he said.
William Pfaff, Critic of American Foreign Policy, Dies at 86
Mr. Pfaff was an international affairs columnist and author who found Washington’s intervention in world affairs often misguided.
Dave Goldberg Was Lifelong Women’s Advocate
Even as a high school student, Dave Goldberg was urging female classmates to speak up. As a young dot-com executive, he had one girlfriend after another, but fell hard for a driven friend named Sheryl Sandberg, pining after her for years. After they wed, Mr. Goldberg pushed her to negotiate hard for high compensation and arranged his schedule so that he could be home with their children when she was traveling for work.
Mr. Goldberg, who died unexpectedly on Friday, was a genial, 47-year-old Silicon Valley entrepreneur who built his latest company, SurveyMonkey, from a modest enterprise to one recently valued by investors at $2 billion. But he was also perhaps the signature male feminist of his era: the first major chief executive in memory to spur his wife to become as successful in business as he was, and an essential figure in “Lean In,” Ms. Sandberg’s blockbuster guide to female achievement.
Over the weekend, even strangers were shocked at his death, both because of his relatively young age and because they knew of him as the living, breathing, car-pooling center of a new philosophy of two-career marriage.
“They were very much the role models for what this next generation wants to grapple with,” said Debora L. Spar, the president of Barnard College. In a 2011 commencement speech there, Ms. Sandberg told the graduates that whom they married would be their most important career decision.
In the play “The Heidi Chronicles,” revived on Broadway this spring, a male character who is the founder of a media company says that “I don’t want to come home to an A-plus,” explaining that his ambitions require him to marry an unthreatening helpmeet. Mr. Goldberg grew up to hold the opposite view, starting with his upbringing in progressive Minneapolis circles where “there was woman power in every aspect of our lives,” Jeffrey Dachis, a childhood friend, said in an interview.
The Goldberg parents read “The Feminine Mystique” together — in fact, Mr. Goldberg’s father introduced it to his wife, according to Ms. Sandberg’s book. In 1976, Paula Goldberg helped found a nonprofit to aid children with disabilities. Her husband, Mel, a law professor who taught at night, made the family breakfast at home.
Later, when Dave Goldberg was in high school and his prom date, Jill Chessen, stayed silent in a politics class, he chastised her afterward. He said, “You need to speak up,” Ms. Chessen recalled in an interview. “They need to hear your voice.”
Years later, when Karin Gilford, an early employee at Launch Media, Mr. Goldberg’s digital music company, became a mother, he knew exactly what to do. He kept giving her challenging assignments, she recalled, but also let her work from home one day a week. After Yahoo acquired Launch, Mr. Goldberg became known for distributing roses to all the women in the office on Valentine’s Day.
Ms. Sandberg, who often describes herself as bossy-in-a-good-way, enchanted him when they became friendly in the mid-1990s. He “was smitten with her,” Ms. Chessen remembered. Ms. Sandberg was dating someone else, but Mr. Goldberg still hung around, even helping her and her then-boyfriend move, recalled Bob Roback, a friend and co-founder of Launch. When they finally married in 2004, friends remember thinking how similar the two were, and that the qualities that might have made Ms. Sandberg intimidating to some men drew Mr. Goldberg to her even more.
Over the next decade, Mr. Goldberg and Ms. Sandberg pioneered new ways of capturing information online, had a son and then a daughter, became immensely wealthy, and hashed out their who-does-what-in-this-marriage issues. Mr. Goldberg’s commute from the Bay Area to Los Angeles became a strain, so he relocated, later joking that he “lost the coin flip” of where they would live. He paid the bills, she planned the birthday parties, and both often left their offices at 5:30 so they could eat dinner with their children before resuming work afterward.
Friends in Silicon Valley say they were careful to conduct their careers separately, politely refusing when outsiders would ask one about the other’s work: Ms. Sandberg’s role building Facebook into an information and advertising powerhouse, and Mr. Goldberg at SurveyMonkey, which made polling faster and cheaper. But privately, their work was intertwined. He often began statements to his team with the phrase “Well, Sheryl said” sharing her business advice. He counseled her, too, starting with her salary negotiations with Mark Zuckerberg.
“I wanted Mark to really feel he stretched to get Sheryl, because she was worth it,” Mr. Goldberg explained in a 2013 “60 Minutes” interview, his Minnesota accent and his smile intact as he offered a rare peek of the intersection of marriage and money at the top of corporate life.
While his wife grew increasingly outspoken about women’s advancement, Mr. Goldberg quietly advised the men in the office on family and partnership matters, an associate said. Six out of 16 members of SurveyMonkey’s management team are female, an almost unheard-of ratio among Silicon Valley “unicorns,” or companies valued at over $1 billion.
When Mellody Hobson, a friend and finance executive, wrote a chapter of “Lean In” about women of color for the college edition of the book, Mr. Goldberg gave her feedback on the draft, a clue to his deep involvement. He joked with Ms. Hobson that she was too long-winded, like Ms. Sandberg, but aside from that, he said he loved the chapter, she said in an interview.
By then, Mr. Goldberg was a figure of fascination who inspired a “where can I get one of those?” reaction among many of the women who had read the best seller “Lean In.” Some lamented that Ms. Sandberg’s advice hinged too much on marrying a Dave Goldberg, who was humble enough to plan around his wife, attentive enough to worry about which shoes his young daughter would wear, and rich enough to help pay for the help that made the family’s balancing act manageable.
Now that he is gone, and Ms. Sandberg goes from being half of a celebrated partnership to perhaps the business world’s most prominent single mother, the pages of “Lean In” carry a new sting of loss.
“We are never at 50-50 at any given moment — perfect equality is hard to define or sustain — but we allow the pendulum to swing back and forth between us,” she wrote in 2013, adding that they were looking forward to raising teenagers together.
“Fortunately, I have Dave to figure it out with me,” she wrote.
Jim Fanning, 87, Dies; Lifted Baseball in Canada With Expos
Hired in 1968, a year before their first season, Mr. Fanning spent 25 years with the team, managing them to their only playoff appearance in Canada.
Finding Scandal in New York and New Jersey, but No Shame
From sea to shining sea, or at least from one side of the Hudson to the other, politicians you have barely heard of are being accused of wrongdoing. There were so many court proceedings involving public officials on Monday that it was hard to keep up.
In Newark, two underlings of Gov. Chris Christie were arraigned on charges that they were in on the truly deranged plot to block traffic leading onto the George Washington Bridge.
Ten miles away, in Lower Manhattan, Dean G. Skelos, the leader of the New York State Senate, and his son, Adam B. Skelos, were arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation on accusations of far more conventional political larceny, involving a job with a sewer company for the son and commissions on title insurance and bond work.
The younger man managed to receive a 150 percent pay increase from the sewer company even though, as he said on tape, he “literally knew nothing about water or, you know, any of that stuff,” according to a criminal complaint the United States attorney’s office filed.
The bridge traffic caper is its own species of crazy; what distinguishes the charges against the two Skeloses is the apparent absence of a survival instinct. It is one thing not to know anything about water or that stuff. More remarkable, if true, is the fact that the sewer machinations continued even after the former New York Assembly speaker, Sheldon Silver, was charged in January with taking bribes disguised as fees.
It was by then common gossip in political and news media circles that Senator Skelos, a Republican, the counterpart in the Senate to Mr. Silver, a Democrat, in the Assembly, could be next in line for the criminal dock. “Stay tuned,” the United States attorney, Preet Bharara said, leaving not much to the imagination.
Even though the cat had been unmistakably belled, Skelos father and son continued to talk about how to advance the interests of the sewer company, though the son did begin to use a burner cellphone, the kind people pay for in cash, with no traceable contracts.
That was indeed prudent, as prosecutors had been wiretapping the cellphones of both men. But it would seem that the burner was of limited value, because by then the prosecutors had managed to secure the help of a business executive who agreed to record calls with the Skeloses. It would further seem that the business executive was more attentive to the perils of pending investigations than the politician.
Through the end of the New York State budget negotiations in March, the hopes of the younger Skelos rested on his father’s ability to devise legislation that would benefit the sewer company. That did not pan out. But Senator Skelos did boast that he had haggled with Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, a Democrat, in a successful effort to raise a $150 million allocation for Long Island to $550 million, for what the budget called “transformative economic development projects.” It included money for the kind of work done by the sewer company.
The lawyer for Adam Skelos said he was not guilty and would win in court. Senator Skelos issued a ringing declaration that he was unequivocally innocent.
THIS was also the approach taken in New Jersey by Bill Baroni, a man of great presence and eloquence who stopped outside the federal courthouse to note that he had taken risks as a Republican by bucking his party to support paid family leave, medical marijuana and marriage equality. “I would never risk my career, my job, my reputation for something like this,” Mr. Baroni said. “I am an innocent man.”
The lawyer for his co-defendant, Bridget Anne Kelly, the former deputy chief of staff to Mr. Christie, a Republican, said that she would strongly rebut the charges.
Perhaps they had nothing to do with the lane closings. But neither Mr. Baroni nor Ms. Kelly addressed the question of why they did not return repeated calls from the mayor of Fort Lee, N.J., begging them to stop the traffic tie-ups, over three days.
That silence was a low moment. But perhaps New York hit bottom faster. Senator Skelos, the prosecutors charged, arranged to meet Long Island politicians at the wake of Wenjian Liu, a New York City police officer shot dead in December, to press for payments to the company employing his son.
Sometimes it seems as though for some people, the only thing to be ashamed of is shame itself.