Mexico: Rivera’s plane hit with ‘terrible’ impact

MEXICO CITY (AP) — The plane carrying Mexican-American music superstar Jenni Rivera plunged almost vertically from more than 28,000 feet and hit the ground in a nose-dive at a speed that may have exceeded 600 miles per hour, Mexico‘s top transportation official said Tuesday.

In the first detailed account of the moments leading up to the crash that killed Rivera and six other people, Secretary of Communications and Transportation Gerardo Ruiz Esparza told Radio Formula that the twin-engine turbojet hit the ground 1.2 miles from where it began falling.

“The plane practically nose-dived,” he said. “The impact must have been terrible.”

Ruiz did not offer any explanation of what may have caused the plane to plummet, saying only that “The plane fell from an altitude of 28,000 feet … It may have hit a speed higher than 1,000 kph (621 mph).”

Ruiz said the pilot of the plane, Miguel Perez Soto, had a valid Mexican pilot’s license that would have expired in January. Photos of a temporary pilot’s certificate issued by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration and found amid the wreckage said that Perez was 78.

Ruiz said there is no age limit for flying a civil aviation aircraft, though for commercial it’s 65.

Mexican authorities were performing DNA tests Tuesday on remains believed to belong to Rivera and the others killed when her plane went down in northern Mexico early Sunday morning.

Investigators said it would take days to piece together the wreckage of the plane carrying Rivera and find out why it went down.

The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board said it was sending a team to help investigate the crash of the Learjet 25, which disintegrated on impact in the rugged terrain in Nuevo Leon state in northern Mexico.

Human remains found in the wreckage were moved to a hospital in Monterrey, the closest major city to the crash, and Rivera’s brother Lupillo was driven past a crowd of reporters to the area where the remains were being kept. He did not speak to the press.

A state official, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the ongoing investigation, said investigators were testing DNA from the remains in order to provide families with definitive confirmation of the deaths of their loved ones.

“We’re in the process of picking up the fragments and we have to find all the parts,” Argudin told reporters on Monday. “Depending on weather conditions it would take us at least 10 days to have a first report and many more days to have a report by experts.”

In an interview on Radio Formula, Alejandro Argudin, head of Mexico’s civil aviation agency, said Mexican investigators weren’t sure yet if the Learjet had been equipped with flight data recorders. He also said there had been no emergency call from the plane before the crash.

Fans of Rivera, who sold 15 million records and was loved on both sides of the border for her down-to-earth style and songs about heartbreak and overcoming pain, put up shrines to her with burning candles, flowers and photographs in cities from Hermosillo, Mexico to Los Angeles.

Some Spanish-language radio stations played her songs nonstop.

A brother, Juan Rivera, as well as mother Rosa Saavedra, still held on to hope that she would be found alive.

“I still trust God that perhaps the body isn’t hers,” Saavedra said in a press conference Tuesday, adding that she could have been kidnapped and another woman was at the crash site. “We’re hoping it’s not true, that perhaps someone took her and left another woman there.”

The 43-year-old California-born Rivera known as the “Diva de la Banda” died as her career peaked. She was perhaps the most successful female singer in grupero, a male-dominated Mexico regional style, and had branched out into acting and reality television.

Besides being a singer, she appeared in the indie film Filly Brown, which was shown at the Sundance Film Festival, and was filming the third season of “I love Jenni,” which followed her as she shared special moments with her children and as she toured through Mexico and the United States.

The Learjet 25, number N345MC, with Rivera aboard was en route from Monterrey to Toluca, outside Mexico City, when it was reported missing about 10 minutes after takeoff.

Ruiz said Mexican officials are investigating why the U.S. plane was carrying passengers between two Mexican destinations, something that’s against regulation. U.S- registered planes can only fly paying passengers internationally into Mexico. He said the plane’s owner, Starwood Management of Las Vegas, said Rivera was not renting the jet, but was receiving a free flight because Starwood thought it would promote the aircraft, which was for sale.

That would be allowed under Mexican law, Ruiz said.

“The Civil Aviation Department has instructions to investigate this point specifically,” he said, adding that he’s also asking other authorities to verify the company’s story about why one of its planes was flying between Mexican destinations.

According to the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board, the same plane was substantially damaged in a 2005 landing mishap at Amarillo International Airport in Texas. It hit a runway distance marker after losing directional control. There were four aboard but no injuries. It was registered to a company in Houston, Texas, as the time.

Starwood has been the subject of a lawsuit and investigations, though none so far have centered on the plane that carried Rivera.

Another of its planes was seized in September by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration in McAllen, Texas.

A federal lawsuit in Nevada filed by QBE Insurance Corp. alleges that a Starwood aircraft was ordered seized by the DEA when it landed in McAllen, Texas, from Mexico on Sept. 12. The New York-based insurer sued in October to rescind coverage for the Hawker 700 jet.

Starwood, in a court filing, acknowledged that the DEA was involved in the seizure of the aircraft.

QBE, based in New York, said the DEA also seized a Starwood-owned Gulfstream G-1159A — insured by another company — when it landed in Tucson from Mexico in February. Starwood said in its court filing that it didn’t have enough information to address the allegation.

Nevada secretary of state records list only one Starwood officer — Norma Gonzalez — but QBE alleges that the company is owned and managed by Ed Nunez, who, according to the lawsuit, is also known as Christian Esquino and had a long criminal history.

Starwood rejected the insurer’s description of Nunez’s role at the company.

According to QBE’s lawsuit, Esquino pleaded guilty in federal court in Orlando, Florida, in 1993 to conspiracy to possess and distribute cocaine.

QBE said Esquino also served two years in prison after pleading guilty to conspiracy to commit fraud involving an aircraft in Southern California in 2004. QBE said Esquino’s attorney stated in court back then that his client had been under investigation by the DEA for more than a year.

Starwood said in its court filing that it didn’t have enough information to address either the Florida or Southern California case against Esquino.

George Crow, an attorney for Starwood, did not immediately respond to phone and email messages left after business hours Monday.

___

Ibarra reported from Monterrey, Mexico. Raquel Dillon in Los Angeles and Elliot Spagat in San Diego contributed to this report.

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Rate of Childhood Obesity Falls in Several Cities

Jessica Kourkounis for The New York Times

At William H. Ziegler Elementary in Northeast Philadelphia, students are getting acquainted with vegetables and healthy snacks.

PHILADELPHIA — After decades of rising childhood obesity rates, several American cities are reporting their first declines.

The trend has emerged in big cities like New York and Los Angeles, as well as smaller places like Anchorage, Alaska, and Kearney, Neb. The state of Mississippi has also registered a drop, but only among white students.

“It’s been nothing but bad news for 30 years, so the fact that we have any good news is a big story,” said Dr. Thomas Farley, the health commissioner in New York City, which reported a 5.5 percent decline in the number of obese schoolchildren from 2007 to 2011.

The drops are small, just 5 percent here in Philadelphia and 3 percent in Los Angeles. But experts say they are significant because they offer the first indication that the obesity epidemic, one of the nation’s most intractable health problems, may actually be reversing course.

The first dips — noted in a September report by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation — were so surprising that some researchers did not believe them.

Deanna M. Hoelscher, a researcher at the University of Texas, who in 2010 recorded one of the earliest declines — among mostly poor Hispanic fourth graders in the El Paso area — did a double-take. “We reran the numbers a couple of times,” she said. “I kept saying, ‘Will you please check that again for me?’ ”

Researchers say they are not sure what is behind the declines. They may be an early sign of a national shift that is visible only in cities that routinely measure the height and weight of schoolchildren. The decline in Los Angeles, for instance, was for fifth, seventh and ninth graders — the grades that are measured each year — between 2005 and 2010. Nor is it clear whether the drops have more to do with fewer obese children entering school or currently enrolled children losing weight. But researchers note that declines occurred in cities that have had obesity reduction policies in place for a number of years.

Though obesity is now part of the national conversation, with aggressive advertising campaigns in major cities and a push by Michelle Obama, many scientists doubt that anti-obesity programs actually work. Individual efforts like one-time exercise programs have rarely produced results. Researchers say that it will take a broad set of policies applied systematically to effectively reverse the trend, a conclusion underscored by an Institute of Medicine report released in May.

Philadelphia has undertaken a broad assault on childhood obesity for years. Sugary drinks like sweetened iced tea, fruit punch and sports drinks started to disappear from school vending machines in 2004. A year later, new snack guidelines set calorie and fat limits, which reduced the size of snack foods like potato chips to single servings. By 2009, deep fryers were gone from cafeterias and whole milk had been replaced by one percent and skim.

Change has been slow. Schools made money on sugary drinks, and some set up rogue drink machines that had to be hunted down. Deep fat fryers, favored by school administrators who did not want to lose popular items like French fries, were unplugged only after Wayne T. Grasela, the head of food services for the school district, stopped buying oil to fill them.

But the message seems to be getting through, even if acting on it is daunting. Josh Monserrat, an eighth grader at John Welsh Elementary, uses words like “carbs,” and “portion size.” He is part of a student group that promotes healthy eating. He has even dressed as an orange to try to get other children to eat better. Still, he struggles with his own weight. He is 5-foot-3 but weighed nearly 200 pounds at his last doctor’s visit.

“I was thinking, ‘Wow, I’m obese for my age,’ ” said Josh, who is 13. “I set a goal for myself to lose 50 pounds.”

Nationally, about 17 percent of children under 20 are obese, or about 12.5 million people, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which defines childhood obesity as a body mass index at or above the 95th percentile for children of the same age and sex. That rate, which has tripled since 1980, has leveled off in recent years but has remained at historical highs, and public health experts warn that it could bring long-term health risks.

Obese children are more likely to be obese as adults, creating a higher risk of heart disease and stroke. The American Cancer Society says that being overweight or obese is the culprit in one of seven cancer deaths. Diabetes in children is up by a fifth since 2000, according to federal data.

“I’m deeply worried about it,” said Francis S. Collins, the director of the National Institutes of Health, who added that obesity is “almost certain to result in a serious downturn in longevity based on the risks people are taking on.”

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Michigan Governor Signs Laws Limiting Unions

Fabrizio Costantini for The New York Times

Protesters argued on the steps of the Michigan Capitol on Tuesday as state lawmakers considered right to work legislation. More Photos »

LANSING, Mich. — With Democrats and labor leaders vowing retribution at the ballot box and beyond, the Republican-dominated Michigan Legislature on Tuesday approved sweeping, statewide changes to the way unions will be financed, substantially reducing their power in a state that has long been a symbol of union might and an incubator for the American labor movement.

As thousands of incensed union members filled the Capitol rotunda and poured out onto its lawn chanting “shame, shame,” labor leaders and Democrats said they would immediately mount an intense, unceasing campaign to regain control of the state Legislature and governor’s office by 2015. But advocates of legislation, which outlaws requirements that workers pay fees to unions as a condition of employment, lauded the day as a historic turning point for economic health in Michigan, and some Republicans predicted their victory here would embolden other states to enact similar measures.

The measure, which Gov. Rick Snyder, a Republican, signed almost immediately, is the latest in series of setbacks to organized labor in states, like Indiana and Wisconsin, where it has traditionally been strong. National labor leaders predicted a backlash and said they were weighing options in the courts or future election campaigns.

“We are not going to end it today,” said Lee Saunders, the president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. “We will be in the streets,” he said, adding later, “If we have to work it through 2014 and change the makeup of the legislatures, that’s what we’ll do.”

 Some were talking about the potential of calling for some sort of ballot initiative, aimed at bringing the issue before voters as union supporters had successfully done in Ohio in 2011 after efforts to sharply limit collective bargaining there, though other recent history suggests such efforts can be difficult. In Wisconsin, an effort to recall the governor over his cuts to collective bargaining failed this year.

Though Republicans control the state Capitol, Mr. Snyder, a former businessman who had not held public office before his election in 2010, had regularly sidestepped the most divisive issues — including so-called right to work legislation — with talk of “relentless positive action.” This chapter came as a surprise to many here and seemed to open a new, wide gulf. Some lawmakers grew tearful, choked with emotion, as they argued over the matter on the House floor. Outside, exchanges between people turned tense, leaving some screaming curses at one another and jabbing fingers into the air.

By evening, two large canopies — that had belonged to supporters on opposite sides of the debate — lay crumpled on the Capitol lawn, the police said, and at least two people were arrested, said to have tried to press past one of the large clusters of state troopers that stood guard at the door to the George W. Romney building, which houses the governor’s office. And at least one police officer had used a substance similar to pepper spray during the protests.

“Today is a game changer for Michigan, for its workers, and for our future,” said Jase Bolger, the Republican House speaker, who had helped lead efforts to make Michigan the nation’s 24th state — and only the second one, along with Indiana, in the traditional Midwestern manufacturing belt — to ban requirements that workers pay fees for union representation.

The legislation here, which will go into effect next year, bans any requirement that most public- and private-sector employees at unionized workplaces be made to pay dues or other fees to unions. In the past, those who opted not to be union members were often required to pay fees to unions that bargained contracts for all employees at their workplace.

But the change means vastly different things depending on whom you talk to. Advocates say it is attractive to businesses looking to relocate companies and allows workers to make their own choices about unions. “This is the day when Michigan freed its workers,” Lisa Posthumus Lyons, a state House Republican, who said her family included union members, told colleagues during the intense debate on Tuesday which ended with votes along mostly party lines.

Steven Greenhouse contributed reporting from New York, Mary M. Chapman from Lansing and Steven Yaccino from Chicago.

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In Venice, a new business bloom on Rose Avenue

Step inside the Rose Market near the corner of Rose and 5th avenues in Venice, and make your way to the refrigerator in the back. Small orange price stickers say that $3.50 will get you 40 ounces of Bud Light.

To pay, slide your money through a slot to a cashier who sits behind bulletproof glass.

Take 10 steps west and you're staring at a funky building that looks as if it's been covered with moon rocks. At Moon Juice, $3.50 will buy you just a two-ounce shot of a detoxifying acid mineral complex called "Liquid Light" and a bit of change for the tip jar. If you want a full glass of organic cold-pressed "Gracious Greens" juice, it'll cost you $12.

To pay, hand your money to young workers who give each other massages behind the counter while serving their customers.

Skid Rose, meet Restaurant Rose.

Urban planners say Rose Avenue is unlikely to become the next Abbott Kinney — the nearby boulevard recently dubbed "The Coolest Block in America" by GQ magazine — but the breakneck pace of change along these once shabby blocks connecting Lincoln Boulevard to Pacific Avenue suggests that the down-and-out bohemian days of this countercultural beach neighborhood are numbered.

If Rose Avenue could turn white-hot overnight, other Venice streets could soon follow.

"The tipping point," said former City Councilwoman Ruth Galanter, "has been tipped."

::

When he created his "Venice-of-America" in 1905, Abbott Kinney envisioned a showcase of art and culture. Instead, said Betsy Goldman, Venice Historical Society co-founder, the public insisted on a "honky-tonk" carnival atmosphere with gondola excursions and camel rides.

For decades that carnival vibe was reincarnated: In the 1950s and '60s, Goldman said, Venice served as a gathering place for hippies, homeless people and beatnik intellectuals and musicians like Jim Morrison. Beach life and an atmosphere of permissiveness drew motorcycle gang members and drug addicts as well. Pawn shops and liquor stores sprouted.

Venice gained a reputation as a rough outpost among beach communities. Occasional violence and the presence of homeless people deterred business owners for years. By the early 1990s, police say, area crime had hit an all-time high.

But Rose Avenue rents were cheap. A few retailers thought they might draw shoppers from Santa Monica. So Alan Schniderman opened his DNA Clothing store on the block in the 1980s.

People slept in a nearby parking lot, he said. Cockroaches scuttled across the asphalt. Schniderman recalls a red curtain that marked a peep show just off Rose Avenue on Main Street.

The rehabilitation of the Venice Canals in the early 1990s made the surrounding property in the south part of the neighborhood more attractive but largely left Rose Avenue and adjoining Oakwood behind.

Schniderman was shocked when a tiny wine shop opened two blocks down in 2006.

"When they opened," he said, "I thought, 'They're never going to make it.'"

::

"Hey, hey, good to see ya!" Oscar Hermosillo shouted over the chatter, clapping a friend on the back. The owner of Venice Beach Wines couldn't even walk out the back of his wine bar one recent Friday night. The 500-square-foot space was packed tighter than standing room only.

When Hermosillo got some wiggle room, he greeted three more people on the way to the door and then stopped to chat with two men outside. A few steps away, a woman bundled in layers of shirts and jackets emerged from Rose Market with a beer and retrieved a shopping cart filled with her belongings. Two couples wrapped in peacoats and sweater vests strutted past her in the other direction.

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Supreme Court Asked to Review $222K Landmark File-Sharing Case

Infamous file-sharer Jammie Thomas-Rasset asked the Supreme Court on Monday to review a jury’s conclusion that she pay the recording industry $222,000 for downloading and sharing two dozen copyrighted songs on the now-defunct file-sharing service Kazaa.

Thomas-Rasset, the first person to defend herself against a Recording Industry Association of America file-sharing case, said the damages were unconstitutionally excessive and were not rationally related to the harm she caused to the music labels.

“Put more plainly: In a civil case, Thomas–Rasset cannot be punished for the harm inflicted on the recording industry by file sharing in general; while that would no doubt help accomplish the industry’s and Congress’s goal of deterring copyright infringement, singling out and punishing an individual in a civil case to a degree entirely out of proportion with her individual offense is not a constitutional means of achieving that goal,” the petition said.

The Supreme Court has never heard an RIAA file-sharing case and has previously declined the two other file-sharing cases brought before it.

Thomas-Rasset’s case concerns an 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decision in September that upheld a jury’s award against Thomas-Rasset. (.pdf)

The case dates back to 2007, and has a tortuous history involving a mistrial and three separate verdicts for the same offense — $222,000, $1.92 million and $1.5 million. Under the case’s latest iteration, a jury last year awarded the RIAA the $1.5 million, which the court reduced to $54,000, ruling that the jury’s award for “stealing 24 songs for personal use is appalling.”

The convoluted decision of the appeals court in September, however, found that the original $222,000 verdict from the first case should stand, and that U.S. District Judge Michael Davis of Minnesota should not have declared a mistrial in the first trial over a flawed jury instruction.

In her appeal to the Supreme Court, Thomas-Rasset argues that the Copyright Act, which allows damages of up to $150,000 per infringement, is unconstitutionally excessive. But the Obama administration, which weighed in on the case when it was in the appellate courts, said the large damages award was allowed because it “is reasonably related to furthering the public interest (.pdf) in protecting original works of artistic literary, and musical expression.”

The only other file-sharer to challenge an RIAA lawsuit at trial was Joel Tenenbaum, a Massachusetts college student, whose case followed Thomas-Rasset’s. The Supreme Court declined, without comment, to hear his case in May, however, letting stand a Boston federal jury’s award of $675,000 against him for sharing 30 songs.

In the third RIAA file-sharing case against an individual to go before the Supreme Court’s justices, the high court declined to review a petition that would have tested the so-called “innocent infringer” defense to copyright infringement.

Generally, an innocent infringer is someone who does not know she or he is committing copyright infringement. Such downloaders get a $200 innocent-infringer fine.

Most of the thousands of RIAA file-sharing cases against individuals have settled out of court for a few thousand dollars. In 2008, the RIAA ceased a five-year campaign it had launched to sue individual file sharers and, with the Motion Picture Association of America, has since convinced internet service providers to begin taking punitive action against copyright scofflaws, including possibly terminating their service.

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Andy Serkis plays dual role in ‘Hobbit’ – Gollum and director

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Andy Serkis reprises his role as Gollum in “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey,” to be released worldwide this week, but his main role this time was as a second unit director, shooting battle sequences in 3D for director Peter Jackson.

The British-born actor, 48, who rose to fame as the obsessive Gollum in Jackson’s “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy, spoke with Reuters about playing the popular CGI character, and his role behind the camera in New Zealand for “The Hobbit.”

Q: Was it nice to get re-acquainted with Gollum after almost 10 years?

A: “Yes, but he’s never been that far away from me. Not a day goes by where I’m not reminded of Gollum by some person in the street who asks me to do his voice or wants to talk to me about him. But because ‘The Hobbit’ has been talked about as a project for many years, I knew that at some point I’d have to reengage with him.”

Q: Martin Freeman (Bilbo Baggins) is new to the franchise and so are many other actors. As a veteran, did they come to you for advice?

A: “It sort of manifested itself more in a way where (as a vet) you understand the scale and scope of what’s required stamina-wise. It’s a different rhythm than most movies. For a lot of the actors, you’re 12,000 miles away from home. It becomes a way of life – getting up at five in the morning, shooting every day, day in day out, for 270 days. The new cast playing the dwarves were carrying incredibly heavy weights in their suits, they sat through hours of make-up every day. So it’s quite challenging from a stamina point of view.”

Q: Playing Gollum was not your only job. You were also doing second unit directing. What did that entail?

A: “Directing was my main job this time – more than playing Gollum. I worked 200 days with a huge team shooting battle sequences, aerials. It was an amazing experience and one which I was very, very thankful to Peter for asking me to do.”

Q: How did that come about?

A: “I’d already started directing short films when we were doing ‘Lord of the Rings,’ then videogame projects. So Peter’s known that I’ve been heading towards directing for a long time. But I always thought my first outing would be a couple of people and a digital camera in the back streets of London somewhere!”

Q: Why do you think Peter let you do it?

A: “I think because the second unit was going to have a lot of principal cast, Peter wanted someone that could take care of the performances and create an atmosphere where the actors felt safe. Obviously I was briefed closely by Peter. But it was a huge challenge – mental, technological. I’d never shot with 3D. Plus the day to day logistics of dealing with such an enormous operation.”

Q: Any plans to direct again?

A: “Just before I headed off to New Zealand to work on ‘The Hobbit,’ I was in the process of setting up (my new company) The Imaginarium (with producer Jonathan Cavendish), which is a performance-capture studio and a development company. We are developing our own slate of film projects, one of which is George Orwell’s ‘Animal Farm.’ It’s going to be the first film that I’ll be directing.”

Q: Where does acting fit in to your newfound career?

A: “At the moment, my trajectory isn’t to think about acting. I’m absolutely devoted to The Imaginarium, our projects and directing. And watching and enabling other actors do their thing in our studio is hugely rewarding. I expect at some point I’ll probably want to go back on stage and do some theater, because I’ve not done theater in 10 years.”

Q: With two more installments of “The Hobbit” still to come over the next few years, you’ll be the voice of Gollum for fans for many more years. Are your kids proud or embarrassed when you’re asked do his distinctive raspy voice?

A: “I’m probably running out of credits in terms of my kids enjoying me do the Gollum voice for others. Especially my older ones (Ruby, 14, Sonny, 12). It was cool when they were younger. But my youngest (Louie, 8) absolutely revels in it. He would have me do it all day long for his friends at school. So I still have great currency there!”

(Reporting By Zorianna Kit; Editing by Jill Serjeant and Nick Zieminski)

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Rate of Childhood Obesity Falls in Several Cities

PHILADELPHIA — After decades of rising childhood obesity rates, several American cities are reporting their first declines.

The trend has emerged in big cities like New York and Los Angeles, as well as smaller places like Anchorage, Alaska, and Kearney, Neb. The state of Mississippi has also registered a drop, but only among white students.

“It’s been nothing but bad news for 30 years, so the fact that we have any good news is a big story,” said Dr. Thomas Farley, the health commissioner in New York City, which reported a 5.5 percent decline in the number of obese schoolchildren from 2007 to 2011.

The drops are small, just 5 percent here in Philadelphia and 3 percent in Los Angeles. But experts say they are significant because they offer the first indication that the obesity epidemic, one of the nation’s most intractable health problems, may actually be reversing course.

The first dips — noted in a September report by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation — were so surprising that some researchers did not believe them.

Deanna M. Hoelscher, a researcher at the University of Texas, who in 2010 recorded one of the earliest declines — among mostly poor Hispanic fourth graders in the El Paso area — did a double-take. “We reran the numbers a couple of times,” she said. “I kept saying, ‘Will you please check that again for me?’ ”

Researchers say they are not sure what is behind the declines. They may be an early sign of a national shift that is visible only in cities that routinely measure the height and weight of schoolchildren. The decline in Los Angeles, for instance, was for fifth, seventh and ninth graders — the grades that are measured each year — between 2005 and 2010. Nor is it clear whether the drops have more to do with fewer obese children entering school or currently enrolled children losing weight. But researchers note that declines occurred in cities that have had obesity reduction policies in place for a number of years.

Though obesity is now part of the national conversation, with aggressive advertising campaigns in major cities and a push by Michelle Obama, many scientists doubt that anti-obesity programs actually work. Individual efforts like one-time exercise programs have rarely produced results. Researchers say that it will take a broad set of policies applied systematically to effectively reverse the trend, a conclusion underscored by an Institute of Medicine report released in May.

Philadelphia has undertaken a broad assault on childhood obesity for years. Sugary drinks like sweetened iced tea, fruit punch and sports drinks started to disappear from school vending machines in 2004. A year later, new snack guidelines set calorie and fat limits, which reduced the size of snack foods like potato chips to single servings. By 2009, deep fryers were gone from cafeterias and whole milk had been replaced by one percent and skim.

Change has been slow. Schools made money on sugary drinks, and some set up rogue drink machines that had to be hunted down. Deep fat fryers, favored by school administrators who did not want to lose popular items like French fries, were unplugged only after Wayne T. Grasela, the head of food services for the school district, stopped buying oil to fill them.

But the message seems to be getting through, even if acting on it is daunting. Josh Monserrat, an eighth grader at John Welsh Elementary, uses words like “carbs,” and “portion size.” He is part of a student group that promotes healthy eating. He has even dressed as an orange to try to get other children to eat better. Still, he struggles with his own weight. He is 5-foot-3 but weighed nearly 200 pounds at his last doctor’s visit.

“I was thinking, ‘Wow, I’m obese for my age,’ ” said Josh, who is 13. “I set a goal for myself to lose 50 pounds.”

Nationally, about 17 percent of children under 20 are obese, or about 12.5 million people, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which defines childhood obesity as a body mass index at or above the 95th percentile for children of the same age and sex. That rate, which has tripled since 1980, has leveled off in recent years but has remained at historical highs, and public health experts warn that it could bring long-term health risks.

Obese children are more likely to be obese as adults, creating a higher risk of heart disease and stroke. The American Cancer Society says that being overweight or obese is the culprit in one of seven cancer deaths. Diabetes in children is up by a fifth since 2000, according to federal data.

“I’m deeply worried about it,” said Francis S. Collins, the director of the National Institutes of Health, who added that obesity is “almost certain to result in a serious downturn in longevity based on the risks people are taking on.”

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European Union Officials Accept Nobel Peace Prize

OSLO — Besieged by economic woes and insistent questions about its future, the European Union accepted the Nobel Peace Prize on Monday with calls for further integration and a plea to remember the words of Abraham Lincoln as he addressed a divided nation at Gettysburg.

Suzanne Plunkett/Reuters

Leaders of the European Union member countries attended the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony at City Hall in Oslo on Monday.

The prize ceremony, held in Oslo’s City Hall and attended by 20 European leaders as well as Norway’s royal family, brought a rare respite from the gloom that has settled on the European Union since the Greek debt crisis exploded three years ago, unleashing doubt about the long-term viability of the euro and about an edifice of European institutions built up over more than half a century to promote an ever closer union.

Unemployment — now at over 25 percent in Greece and Spain — and sputtering economic growth across the 27-nation bloc are “putting the political bonds of our union to the test,” Herman Van Rompuy, president of the European Council, said in his acceptance speech. “If I can borrow the words of Abraham Lincoln at the time of another continental test, what is being assessed today is whether that union, or any union so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure.”

The European Union, said Mr. Van Rompuy, will “answer with our deeds, confident we will succeed.”

“We are working very hard to overcome the difficulties, to restore growth and jobs,” he continued.

Aside from economic misery, the most serious threat to the bloc so far is growing pressure in Britain for a referendum on whether to pull out of the union. The British prime minister, David Cameron, did not attend the ceremony, but most other European leaders showed up, including Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany and the French president, François Hollande, who sat next to each other and whose countries, once bitter enemies, have been the main motors driving European integration.

Mr. Van Rompuy’s comparison of the European Union to the United States is likely to irritate critics of the European Union, who reject efforts to push European nations to surrender more sovereignty in pursuit of what champions of a federal European state hope will one day be a United States of Europe.

Just how far Europe is from such a goal, however, was made clear by the presence of three Union presidents in Oslo. In addition to Mr. Van Rompuy, whose European Council represents the leaders of the union’s member states, there was José Manuel Barroso, president of the European Commission, the bloc’s main administrative and policy-making arm, and Martin Schulz, president of the European Parliament.

Instead of the customary Nobel lecture delivered by the winner, Mr. Van Rompuy and Mr. Barroso each read parts of what Thorbjorn Jagland, chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, described as “one speech but two chapters.”

Hailing the European Union for helping bring peace to Europe after repeated wars, Mr. Jagland said, “What this continent has achieved is truly fantastic, from being a continent of war to becoming a continent of peace.”

Mr. Barroso spoke of the horrors of past wars and tyranny and Europe’s efforts to overcome them through the building of supranational institutions, which began in 1951 with the establishment of the European Coal and Steel Community by France, Germany and four other countries. But he also cited the current conflict in Syria, describing it as a “stain on the world’s conscience” that other nations have “a moral duty” to address. The European Union’s member states are themselves divided about how far to go in supporting opponents of Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian president.

The decision to honor the European Union with the Nobel Peace Prize stirred widespread criticism in Norway, whose citizens have twice voted not to join the union. On the eve of Monday’s award ceremony, peace activists and supporters of left-wing political groups paraded through the streets of Oslo, carrying flaming torches and chanting, “The E.U. is not a worthy winner.”

Many peace activists say they have no problem with European integration but question whether the union has lived up to conditions laid down by Alfred Nobel, the 19th-century Swedish industrialist who bequeathed the peace prize and four other Nobel Prizes.

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Cal State San Bernardino police kill student during struggle

Three Cal State San Bernardino police officers struggled with an unarmed graduate student for about seven minutes Saturday evening at an off-campus housing complex before growing fearful for their own safety and fatally shooting him, authorities said.

Bartholomew Williams, 38, exhibited "super-human-type strength" during the tussle, using the officers' pepper spray against them and grabbing one of their batons, said a spokesman for the San Bernardino Police Department, which is investigating the shooting.

Two of the officers fired at Williams after he wrestled the third officer to the ground and began kicking him in the head and torso, said spokesman Lt. Paul Williams. None of the officers was carrying a Taser.

"This became a prolonged, violent struggle," the spokesman said.

One of the officers was hospitalized after the incident and treated for minor injuries, he said.

The shooting occurred about 6:30 p.m. at University Village, a student housing complex on Northpark Boulevard where Bartholomew Williams lived.

The officers were responding to a report from a dorm staff member regarding Williams' alleged irrational behavior. Upon making contact with Williams in the hallway, the officers determined that he was a threat to himself and others and tried to arrest him. But they were unable to handcuff him.

The police spokesman described Williams as a muscular male who weighed more than 200 pounds. Family members told police he had suffered from a mental disorder and had stopped taking his medication, the spokesman said.

School officials said that Williams was pursuing a master's degree in educational instructional technology, and that he had first enrolled in summer 2011.

"This is a tragic day for the Cal State San Bernardino community," university President Tomás Morales said in a statement. "Words cannot express how truly saddened we are at this time. We extend our deepest sympathies to his family, and our thoughts and prayers go out to all who knew him."

Morales also said the officers "performed their best to assure the safety of the campus community."

But civil rights activists called on the San Bernardino County district attorney's office to conduct an immediate investigation into the shooting.

"A fast-track, transparent probe by the D.A.'s office is the only way to ensure that all the facts in the tragedy are known and justice is done," said Earl Ofari Hutchinson, president of the Los Angeles Urban Policy Roundtable.

sam.allen@latimes.com

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Wired Science Space Photo of the Day: Star Formation in Carina

The spectacular star-forming Carina Nebula has been captured in great detail by the VLT Survey Telescope at ESO’s Paranal Observatory. This picture was taken with the help of Sebastián Piñera, President of Chile, during his visit to the observatory on 5 June 2012 and released on the occasion of the new telescope’s inauguration in Naples on 6 December 2012.

Image: ESO. Acknowledgement: VPHAS+ Consortium/Cambridge Astronomical Survey Unit [high-resolution]

Caption: ESO

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