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Summer days drifting away: Savor it while you can. The days of dry-season sunsets such as this one at the central Pacific Manuel Antonio beach are numbered. Costa Rican meteorologists say the rainy season will come some time in April, a good fortnight earlier than normal. |
Alex Leff | Tico Times |
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| Costa Rica's 'green' season to clock in early |
After spurts of rain in February, meteorologists forecast this month will likely remain “dry” as the temporada seca, or dry season, dictates. |
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| Students attack police after raid on pizza vendors |
A group of 150 students from Costa Rica High School attacked police yesterday with pipes, wood, rocks and food. |
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| Costa Rica consul in Nicaragua accused of smuggling foreigners |
The Costa Rican consul in Nicaragua will step down March 15 as a government ethics panel investigates charges that he smuggled foreigners into Costa Rica, Presidency Minister Rodrigo Arias said yesterday. |
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Nicaraguan leader's 'potentially nefarious'
allies attract U.S. lawmaker's attention |
Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega's recent comments supporting FARC's fallen second-in-command have “brought further anxiety” to Nicaraguans living in the United States, said Arthur Estopinan, chief of staff of U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen. |
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| The Secret of Life |
Shelby, my science adviser, came racing down from his hilltop laboratory yesterday to boast that he had discovered the “secret of life.” Reluctantly, because I hate to discourage enthusiasm, I pointed out that there is no secret to life.
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Costa Rica's 'green' season to clock in early |
By Alex Leff
Tico Times Staff | aleff@ticotimes.net |
After spurts of rain in February, meteorologists forecast this month will likely remain “dry” as the temporada seca, or dry season, dictates.
But come April, residents in the Pacific region and Central Valley are in for a little surprise: an early rainy season.
The rainy season, also known as “green” season, could begin between April 21 and 25 in the north Pacific and April 26 and 30 in the central Pacific and Central Valley regions, according to Rebeca Morera, of the National Meteorological Institute (IMN). “That's at least 15 days earlier than normal,” she said.
In the southern Pacific region, which normally sees the first of the showers, rain could begin as early as March 12, she said.
An official IMN seasonal forecast is due later this month.
As for the early green season, Morera said La Niña is to blame. La Niña (The Girl) is a phenomenon characterized by unusually cold sea-surface temperatures in the eastern equatorial Pacific.
La Niña began dragging down temperatures during the last quarter of 2007, according to Costa Rican meteorologists and weather analysts worldwide.
IMN weather analysts note that temperatures this year – particularly the lows – have hovered 1 to 2 degrees Celsius below average, dipping as far down as 7 degrees Celsius (44.5 Fahrenheit) at times. |
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| Students attack police after raid on pizza vendors |
By Nick Wilkinson
Tico Times Staff | nwilkinson@ticotimes.net |
A group of 150 students from Costa Rica High School attacked police yesterday with pipes, wood, rocks and food.
Municipal police said the students attacked officers in the morning after they attempted to shut down vendors selling pizza out of their cars without permits.
“Some citizens had asked us to do something about these vendors,” Police Chief Isidro Calvo said. “The students started with a threatening posture and before long the situation was out of control, with them pegging us with wood, rocks and pipes. Who the heck knows where they got the pipes from?”
Calvo said one officer, Marcos Garcia, remained in the hospital after sustaining kidney injuries. He said two other officers – Gonzalo Segura and Miguel Mora – were also seriously injured.
The chief said that after the initial confrontation, students attacked a nearby soda, which they believed was responsible for the complaint against the street vendors. Four officers tried to defend the soda but retreated when they realized they weren't enough. Calvo said nobody at the soda was injured but the building was damaged.
“This event shows we are in a profound crisis in our schools,” he said.
Calvo said his department plans to file an official complaint against the students and their director, Javier Jara. He said Jara took no action against his students and a press release from the municipality states he “applauded their havoc, congratulated them and told police he had no authority to give them instructions because they were outside school grounds.” |
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Costa Rica consul in Nicaragua
accused of smuggling foreigners |
By Gillian Gillers
Tico Times Staff | ggillers@ticotimes.net |
The Costa Rican consul in Nicaragua will step down March 15 as a government ethics panel investigates charges that he smuggled foreigners into Costa Rica, Presidency Minister Rodrigo Arias said yesterday.
The consul, Víctor Láscarez, is suspected of escorting a Jordanian and a Lebanese man through Costa Rica's northern border in a diplomatic car in September, according to reports in the daily La Nación.
The Foreign Ministry recently finished an investigation into Láscarez's behavior and will present a report to the three-member ethics panel.
“That is the best way to give him the chance that he wants to explain his behavior and give his defense,” said Arias, who met with Láscarez yesterday in Costa Rica.
Foreign Minister Bruno Stagno said Láscarez would be replaced by another member of the consular staff. |
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Nicaraguan leader's 'potentially nefarious'
allies attract U.S. lawmaker's attention |
By Blake Schmidt
Nica Times Staff | bschmidt@ticotimes.net |
Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega's recent comments supporting FARC's fallen second-in-command have “brought further anxiety” to Nicaraguans living in the United States, said Arthur Estopinan, chief of staff of U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen.
As regional tensions escalated amid disputes between Colombia and her neighbors Venezuela and Ecuador, Ortega's support of Colombia's most powerful rebel group adds to the Sandinista leader's list of “potentially nefarious” allies, which already includes the presidents of Venezuela and Iran.
Ortega on Monday criticized Colombian President Alvaro Uribe for “assassinating” Raul Reyes, who was the No. 2 commander of Colombia's oldest guerilla group, the Armed Revolutionary Forces of Colombia (FARC), in an attack on Ecuadorian soil near the Colombian border that killed at least 21 other FARC members. Ortega's comments come as Ecuador's president, Rafael Correa, plans to visit with Ortega in attempt to gather support to condemn Colombia's attack in Ecuador.
Yesterday, the Organization of American States stopped short of condemning Colombia for crossing into Ecuador to kill Reyes and his rebel force members, but said Colombia had violated international law, Reuters reported.
The organization's Permanent Council agreed in a resolution to set up a commission to visit Ecuador and Colombia to investigate the raid against FARC.
Meanwhile, members of the Fraternidad Americana-Nicaragüense, a group of Nicaraguans living in the United States, are trying to ratchet up U.S. awareness of Ortega's alliances.
“At this stage it's an educational process. Washington is not really aware of the extent to which the Ortega administration is supporting Chávez or Iran,” Estopinan said, adding that Rep. Ros-Lehtinen is trying to get a meeting with U.S. Deputy National Security Advisor Elliot Abrams to bring attention to Ortega's “dangerous alliances.” Fraternidad members also plan to speak at the right-wing Washington think tank The Heritage Foundation this week on the issue.
Ros-Lehtinen, a Republican who represents South Florida's 18th District, “shares the concern of the Nicaraguan exile community in South Florida of the alliances between Ortega, Chávez and the Iranian government,” Estopinan said. |
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| The Secret of Life |
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Shelby, my science adviser, came racing down from his hilltop laboratory yesterday to boast that he had discovered the “secret of life.” Reluctantly, because I hate to discourage enthusiasm, I pointed out that there is no secret to life.
A few common organic chemicals found in every puddle and a bolt of lightning to get things started creates the necessary nucleotides after every thunderstorm, and from then on it's simply a matter of luck whether they hit on the double helix and start reproducing. Aristotle was right, in a sense, though 23 centuries ago he couldn't possibly have known it. Shelby looked so crestfallen that I tried to soften the blow by asking his advice on how to create a frog, but it seems he hadn't got that far, so I shut up.
To me it seems a bit weird that anyone would want to create life in a laboratory, when the time-tested procedure can so easily be enjoyed in the comfort of your own home. And anyway, if you'll just try planting late in the day when the gnats are biting, there's too darned much life around here already.
But no doubt Shelby's aim was to create artificial soldiers to fight our wars without having to resort to the immensely unpopular draft. My own view is that we should quit declaring war as a means of reviving a listless economy, and think of some other way to make people start spending money again.
Which raises the question of why they aren't spending at the required rate, and the answer, of course, is that for people, unlike governments, there comes a level of debt at which they hesitate to acquire more, thereby automatically setting the stage for a recession. But the Keynesian solution is now old hat, and we must try something else.
So my daring contribution is not to just keep reducing interest rates so as to encourage more borrowing, but to declare a moratorium on all personal debt, reimbursing creditors out of tax funds that would otherwise go to prosecuting war. If, instead of worrying about how in the world you're going to pay off your debts, you get told that come Monday you don't have any, I guarantee you'll be off to the super the same day.
The reasoning behind this seemingly absurd proposition is that the current arrangements for creating wealth benefit the wrong people: the manufacturers of material intentionally scheduled for destruction, who are not the ones who keep the economy humming. We need to benefit the ordinary consumer who isn't pulling his weight for the reason stated.
I am aware that the concept of debt forgiveness runs counter to the principles of nonconformist morality, not to mention those of creditors who would hate to be paid off in government funds, but now is the time to strike, while the opposition is at its weakest. Anyway, have a go at it on a small scale at first, and if it doesn't work, I'll think of something else.
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