Most Recent Posts: 2014-10-19

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No Small Feat: The NBA's Shortest Player Never Gave Up

At 5 feet 3 inches, Tyrone Bogues, better known as Muggsy Bogues, holds the record as the shortest player in NBA history.

He was drafted by the Washington Bullets in 1987, but he's best known for playing with the Charlotte Hornets alongside Alonzo Mourning and Larry Johnson.

Bogues says he comes from a family of "five-footers," so when he stopped growing, it was no surprise.

"I always tell people, I think my mom had me when I was 5' 3" — I don't remember ever growing," Bogues says.

'Little Ty'

Raised in Baltimore's Lafayette projects, Bogues loved to play basketball — but he always had to prove himself. The other kids didn't take him seriously on the court, saying he was too short to play.

Tyrone Bogues had a passion for basketball at an early age. Growing up in Baltimore's Lafayette projects, he earned the nickname "Muggsy" for his scrappy, aggressive defense. Courtesy of Tyrone Bogues hide caption

itoggle caption Courtesy of Tyrone Bogues

"I was Little Ty, Little Tyrone. I always got this negative feedback from the game of basketball," he says. People told him he was wasting his time; he'd never play basketball. He remembers thinking, " 'Why were these people saying this? I know I could play.' "

When the team captains picked their players, Bogues was always left out.

"The game is being played and we got to sit over there and watch," he says. "You get tired of just watching."

So he and his friends found empty milk crates and cut the bottoms out to make baskets.

"We tied the milk crates on each end of the fence and we had our own milk crate basketball pickup game and it was a good time cause we could jump off the fence and dunk the basketball," he says. "You had to be creative in order to play and I wanted to play."

Even back then, Bogues was an aggressive defender.

"I had to play that way because I was small," he says. "A little kid that just was out there trying to create havoc, just trying to disrupt a lot of things."

That's when the older kids started to notice him.

"All of a sudden, little Muggsy started getting a little reputation in the neighborhood," he says.

Rolling With The Punches

Throughout his teenage years, Bogues continued to build that reputation on the court. He even became a star player on the Dunbar High School basketball team.

"We were the No. 1 team in the nation," he says.

Yet he still overheard his skeptics in the crowd questioning his ability to play.

"People still didn't believe: 'Well, he played in high school, he had success in high school, but it's a whole other world when you get to college.' "

Luckily, not everyone saw it that way.

Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, a school that's produced several NBA players, offered Bogues a four-year basketball scholarship.

"Wake Forest came knocking on the door and I accepted that offer," he says. "It changed my life completely."

Still, his critics were relentless.

Even the commentators at games openly criticized Wake Forest for taking a chance on Bogues.

" [They would say] 'Why did they waste a four year scholarship on a little kid that's only 5 foot 3, who can barely see over a table?' " Bogues says. "All this negativity started coming from so many directions."

It was almost too much to handle, but Bogues' talent was undeniable.

"We had the chance to play a national televised game against [North Carolina State University]," he says.

Finally, this was his chance to shine at Wake Forest. And it was one of his best games.

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Chicago Bulls' Michael Jordan (left) looks down on Muggsy Bogues during a game in 1995. Bogues, who stands at 5' 3", is the shortest player in NBA history. Ruth Fremson/AP hide caption

itoggle caption Ruth Fremson/AP

Chicago Bulls' Michael Jordan (left) looks down on Muggsy Bogues during a game in 1995. Bogues, who stands at 5' 3", is the shortest player in NBA history.

Ruth Fremson/AP

"I had 20 points, 10 assists," Bogues says. "From that moment on, I continued to keep building that reputation."

The stage was set for Bogues' professional career. By the time he graduated, he had a real shot at the NBA.

The Draft

On the night of the 1987 NBA Draft, Bogues was one of the many prospective players sitting in the crowd in New York. He had no idea what his future in basketball would look like.

NBA Commissioner David Stern said from his podium, "The Washington Bullets select" — pause — "Tyrone Bogues of Wake Forest."

"It felt like the whole world was lifted off your shoulders," Bogues says. "You felt like, 'I have arrived.' "

The 22-year-old, 140-pound, 5-foot-3 Tyrone "Muggsy" Bogues became the shortest player in league history — a record he still holds.

"All the naysayers, the people saying that you'll never [play]. Why are you even thinking about it? A guy my size wanting to pursue a game that was supposed to be meant for the big guys," Bogues says. "That was a special, special moment."

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40 Years Later, Diane Von Furstenberg's Wrap Dress Still Wears Well

Diane von Furstenberg was a young socialite when she first started showing her designs to New York boutiques and magazine editors in the late 1960s. The dresses she created weren't very expensive and they definitely weren't couture. They were wrap dresses — made of gentle jersey, gorgeously patterned, with a deep-cut V-neck and light belt.

"It's a dress that was practical and pretty and sexy," von Furstenberg tells NPR's Audie Cornish. It's been described, she says, as "a dress that you get the men with ... but he doesn't mind taking you to his mother."

It sold by the millions.

In her new memoir, The Woman I Wanted to Be, von Furstenberg tells her unlikely story of success. Her mother was a Belgian Holocaust survivor — a history von Furstenberg was always aware of, though her mother didn't speak of it often.

"She had tattooed numbers on her arm, but she had it removed because people kept on looking at it," von Furstenberg remembers. "And when she did talk about it, she protected me. ... She didn't want to burden me with the heaviness of it all."

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Cartoonist Looks Back On Career Built On Unnerving Visions

Interview Highlights

On one significant hallucination he had as a young man

That was a big one for me. I was taking an art history class. And when the screen went white, I hallucinated a huge, green, rubbery amphibious creature coming up from the bottom of the screen and it shocked me so badly that I can still feel it in the soles of my feet and my hands. ... It happened at a time when I was actively sort of looking for a sign. I needed direction in my life and I didn't have a lot of self-confidence and I didn't know where I was going to go or what I was going to do. And this frog provided me with the answers to that by way of making me feel that I had within me everything that I needed to go forth and make myself a productive life.

On the odd jobs he worked to supplement his income when he couldn't support himself by cartooning

For one thing, I worked at an advertising agency. And then for most of the '80s, a good friend of mine got me a job at a studio that made animated cartoons for children. And they weren't the kind of animated cartoons that you could take a lot of pride in. ... I don't want to badmouth my employers. They were awfully good to me. But the company was called Ruby-Spears. And the cartoons that I worked on were things like the Mister T show, Rubik the Amazing Cube, which was launched five years after the [Rubik's cube] fad was dead. ... I worked on the storyboards for those things and other things.

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A page from Jim.

On the frequency of his "apparitions" later in life

I haven't [seen any] for a couple of years now, actually. Last one I saw, I came up the stairs of my house to the second floor landing and I saw a guy standing at the end of the hall ... wearing a leather harness on his face and grimacing and staring at me. And at first I thought it was my reflection in the mirror until I realized there was no mirror there. And then I just lingered long enough for me to scrutinize it. And, as I usually do, I drew it. I made a picture of it. And it's a scary image.

On his reactions to hallucinations

It isn't frightening because something in me knows that it's not threatening. I don't know what it is. It's hard to explain how easily I can accept these things even though they're completely irrational. The one that I had before this, which was about four years ago, I looked out my window and I saw Thomson and Thompson from the Herg stories, the Tintin stories, in black and white walking down the street behind a 9-foot-tall hooker in red hot pants. When it resolved into what it was, it was just a woman and her two kids walking down the street but for about 10 seconds, I saw the aforementioned group in completely lifelike detail. It was as if they were really there.

A Black Cosmetic Company Sells, Or Sells Out?

Cosmetics giant L'Oral purchased Carol's Daughter, a beauty company that sells natural hair and skin products for black women, earlier this week. It may seem like an unlikely chapter in the story of a business that began in a Brooklyn kitchen.

That story began in 1993, when Lisa Price began blending body butters, oils and natural fragrances in her Brooklyn home. At her mother's urging, Price brought the goods to craft fairs and began to sell them. Those products sold well and did even better when she added hair care for black women who, like her, wore their hair in its natural, unstraightened state.

Two decades later, that kitchen-born brand has a devoted following among African-American women. Carol's Daughter items now sit on shelves at Target, Sephora and Ulta and are sometimes sold on the Home Shopping Network. At one point, Price even expanded to seven brick-and-mortar boutiques, where customers could get advice and demonstrations on how to use the products. Carol's Daughter earned an estimated $27 million in sales last year and claims celebrity fans including Jada Pinkett Smith, Gabrielle Union and Mary J. Blige.

A Beloved Brand, A Troubled Business

Somewhere between 2010 and 2011, Carol's Daughter began to struggle. Sales were down in the boutiques, and a passel of competitors also began to flourish by servicing the burgeoning natural hair care market. According to BusinessWeek, Price eventually sold to Pegasus Capital Advisors, although she remained the face of the company.

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Still, store sales faltered. In May, five of the seven boutiques were closed and Carol's Daughter Stores LLC filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Fans worried that their favorite products would disappear.

Then on Monday, company founder Lisa Price posted a video that quickly got passed around on Facebook.

In it, she explained that Carol's Daughter would be "joining the L'Oral family." Price said the French cosmetics giant would "take what I built and solidify its place in history and beauty and I don't have to wonder if in 20 years from now, 30 years, from now, if there'll still be a Carol's Daughter brand." In a statement, a L'Oral spokesperson said that "Lisa Price will remain in her role, serving as the creative visionary and spokesperson for the brand and will continue to lead product development."

Will Customers Follow Carol's Daughter?

Even if the Carol's Daughter brand moves forward, some wonder if the customers will follow, since it's no longer a black-owned business. Noliwe Rooks, a professor at Cornell University specializing in black women and image and gender issues, says the intense interest in the future of Carol's Daughter comes from customers' deep emotional attachment to the brand — and that the attachment begins with Price.

"Her love for that community, and love for black women and economic possibility for black people is as much a part of her creation story and her narrative as whatever her products would do for your hair," Rooks says.

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Lisa Price, the founder of Carol's Daughter, at its pop-up store in New Orleans in 2011. Johnny Nunez/Getty Images hide caption

itoggle caption Johnny Nunez/Getty Images

Lisa Price, the founder of Carol's Daughter, at its pop-up store in New Orleans in 2011.

Johnny Nunez/Getty Images

Rooks points out that Price founded Carol's Daughter at a time when many black women were starting to wear their hair in its natural state, and many had difficulty finding products that would work for their hair's unique texture.

Now there are several beauty bloggers posting how-to videos using homemade products that mimic Carol's Daughter. Hair care companies like Mixed Chicks and Miss Jessie's, both founded by biracial women, serve curly-haired women of all ethnicities. Carol's Daughter has also vied for customers outside the black community, leaving some of the company's early fans feeling alienated.

A blogger who goes by the name Honey Bii noted one Carol's Daughter ad campaign that featured several racially ambiguous women — as opposed to the African-American ones who helped to launch the brand.

"I'm not fair-complected," Honey Bii says, "and by no means do I feel that they [the ads] have to have this Afro-centric feel to it. But I feel like she sold us out." The thinking was that, in reaching for a broader demographic, Price was overlooking her original base.

"She really was, specifically, aiming at black women, who have a variety of hair textures," Rooks says. "But I'm not sure that's a niche that's as lucrative today." Hence the multicultural approach.

Ken Smikle, president of Chicago-based Target Market News, which monitors black consumer patterns, says the sale of Carol's Daughter to L'Oral makes sense: "Cosmetics is tough," he notes, "and it would be more logical for a company already engaged in the market to want to make a purchase and extend their ability to serve black customers."

L'Oral has a mixed track record with that.

Missteps In The African-American Market

On one hand, in 1998, L'Oral bought the "SoftSheen" line from Carson Products, a black-owned hair care firm, and it has maintained the line without a problem. On the other, in 2008, it featured Beyonce Knowles in its Feria hair color ads — and endured a storm of outrage on black social media sites. Bloggers were convinced the company had lightened Knowles' skin to appeal to a more mainstream aesthetic. L'Oral emphatically denied that, saying in a statement that "it is categorically untrue that L'Oral Paris altered Ms. Knowles' features or skin tone." But suspicion continued.

Smikle says L'Oral will have to master its learning curve as it reaches out to new customers, but — to paraphrase the company's motto — it'll be worth it. There are women of color here and beyond the U.S. who are just waiting for cosmetics made with them in mind.

"This is a good deal," Smikle asserts. "It's a good deal for the industry and it's certainly a good deal for those who are loyal customers of Carol's Daughter."

And probably a good deal for Lisa Price, who, L'Oral says, will still have a role in the company. Now the brand that she started in her kitchen will reach women around the world, and her products will be on shelves for a long time to come.

Correction Oct. 24, 2014

A previous Web version of this story incorrectly said that Carol's Daughter filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. It was actually Carol's Daughter Stores LLC that filed.

Cigarette-Maker Reynolds American To Ban Smoking At Work

Reynolds American, the country's second-largest cigarette-maker, is changing its policy on smoking in the office. Until now, Reynolds employees have been able to light up at their desks, but come January, workers will have to either go outside or use specially equipped smoking rooms.

"We allowed smoking of cigarettes, cigars, pipes, traditional tobacco products throughout our facilities," says David Howard, a spokesman for Reynolds American. He says it's not as though his co-workers chain-smoke at work.

Smoking in the workplace is still legally permitted in some parts of the country, including in Reynolds' home state of North Carolina. But on Wednesday, as the Associated Press first reported, Reynolds said it would build designated smoking areas and prohibit smoking everywhere else.

E-cigarettes and smokeless products like snuff will still be allowed. But Howard says the policy will apply to all its subsidiaries. He says the company made the change to adapt to the times.

"Indoor smoking restrictions certainly are the norm today and most people expect a smoke-free business environment," Howard says.

Cynthia Hallett, executive director for Americans for Nonsmokers' Rights, says she finds the new policy "ironic."

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"Reynolds and other tobacco companies have been the leading opponents to the passage of these smoke-free-workplace laws at the state and local level," she says.

And yet here the company seems to be acknowledging that there is damage from secondhand smoke to its own workers. But Hallett isn't appeased.

"This feels like a lovely PR stunt by Reynolds to say, 'Oh, we're trying to come up to modern times and offer a smoke-free workplace to our employees,' when in fact, it's not 100 percent smoke-free," she says.

Hallett says smoke escapes from designated smoking areas, and e-cigarettes emit harmful chemicals and compounds as well.

Reynolds says its new policy will start taking effect on Jan. 1.

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Ranting And Throwing Papers: An Angry Candidate Runs For Congress

The anger of Illinois Republican state Rep. Mike Bost is spontaneous and raw.

In 2013, for example, he raged against a floor amendment to a concealed carry gun bill.

"Once again, your side of the aisle is trying to make ploys instead of dealing with the real issue!" a YouTube video shows him bellowing. "Keep playing games," he says. "Keep playing games."

YouTube

Now, Bost is running for a seat in Congress against first-term Rep. Bill Enyart, a retired general and Democrat, and Bost's anger has become a campaign issue.

Voters in the 12th Congressional District in southern Illinois are hearing a lot of another Bost rant, a furious harangue from 2012 about language inserted into a pension reform bill on the final day of the House session.

YouTube

"Enough! I feel like somebody trying to be released from Egypt! Let my people go!" he hollers. "These damn bills that come out of here all the damn time come out here at the last second and I've got to try figure out how to vote for my people!"

The video of those remarks went viral that year. In it, Bost is seen throwing the bill into the air. He whiffs at the pages as they fall, then picks up the papers and throws them again.

YouTube

Enyart is running ads that point to Bost's rant as proof that he doesn't belong in Congress. Using footage of the lawmaker's outbursts, the announcer says, "Mike Bost. Twenty years yelling. Twenty years being the problem."

YouTube

Bost has represented small towns in rural, conservative southern Illinois for nearly two decades. Many voters here see his fury as well-placed.

"I think this was appropriate," says Bost supporter Jill Bunyan of Bost's pension rant. "You can get angry, and that's OK. And I think at that time, for that few moments, that was an appropriate response."

Bunyan lives in the tiny town of Cobden, in southernmost Illinois, population 1,100. People in Bunyan's part of the district, which hugs the Mississippi River, are frustrated with the state's fiscal troubles and weak local economy.

But head north to some of the district's larger cities, like Belleville, population 44,000, and Bost's anger is embraced less and criticized more. Interviewed on Main Street, Richard Rockwell thinks "the rant" is all political theater.

"I'm hoping that's the reason, and not that he's acting the fool in a deliberative chamber," Rockwell says. "That would be rather disconcerting to me."

Bost, in his own ad, refers to a video of the rant and embraces it. He half smiles and explains in folksy fashion that he's angry about the direction his opponents are taking the country.

"What the Chicago politicians and Gov. Quinn have done really made me mad," Bost says. "And what Bill Enyart and President Obama are doing to our country upsets me as well."

YouTube

Novelist Nuruddin Farah: Facing A Blank Page Is 'Bravest Thing' A Writer Does

On the power dynamic between a photographer and his or her subject

Just as there is a power structure between the novelist and the subject the novelist is writing about — it's the novelist who decides who gets the power of speech. So, whoever puts their finger on the button that ultimately decides what happens with the camera is the one who has the power. And anyone sitting outside of that power zone is turned into a subject. So, I could see parallel between the novelist's writing, and therefore, deciding, ultimately, the destiny of his or her characters — in the same way that the photographer decides what position to take, what light to use.

On whether he could live in Somalia

Mogadishu has stopped being a cosmopolitan city; it was a cosmopolitan city many years ago — one of the most celebrated cosmopolitan cities. I can imagine living in Somalia, but Somalia has to change. I have changed and therefore Somalia must change. And that would be the case if: one, there was peace. Two, if I could live anonymously — which is not possible all the time, but it could be. And then, [three], if there are book shops and cultural stuff that one can do and get involved in. There is no such thing now. Civil war dominates everything in one's everyday life in Somalia, which is quite tragic.

Read an excerpt of Hiding in Plain Sight

After Loss, Marine's Parents 'Gained 20-Something Other Sons'

Parrello asked about the day that her son died.

"We took fire that day. We heard a large explosion, and we could feel it," Powell says. "I see that Brian's laying there with his shirt cut open. His rifle had been blown in half from the IED that he hit.

"I grabbed his hand. He looked at me, and he wasn't yelling and he wasn't upset. I can still picture him, and I picture him all the time," Powell says, his voice thick with emotion. "I spend a lot of time laying in bed, not being able to go to sleep, just thinking, 'What could I have done differently. What could I have done better?'

"I still have those thoughts."

"I wanted to make sure that none of you guys felt as if we blamed anybody for what happened, and that I know you guys did the best you could," Parrello says. "I'm just happy he was with his other family — even though we couldn't be there with him, he was with people that love him."

After Brian Parrello's death, his parents met his fellow Marines — the 4th Platoon, Small Craft Company, Headquarters Battalion, 2nd Marine Division. Later this year, the entire platoon will join the Parrello family in West Milford to mark 10 years since Brian's death.

"I couldn't wait to meet you and give you a hug," says Powell, remembering the day they first met. "I remember running through my head what I'd say to you. I walked up to you, I gave you a hug, and I didn't say anything — because I couldn't. And I'm sorry for that."

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Shirley Parrello's son, Brian, died in Iraq almost ten years ago. Sgt. Kevin Powell was with him that day, and he says he can still picture Brian Parello in the moments after the IED exploded. Storycorps hide caption

itoggle caption Storycorps

Shirley Parrello's son, Brian, died in Iraq almost ten years ago. Sgt. Kevin Powell was with him that day, and he says he can still picture Brian Parello in the moments after the IED exploded.

Storycorps

"The hug was enough," Parrello says, telling Powell there's no need for an apology. "As a little boy when [Brian] would go to bed at night I would tuck him in and give him a kiss and a hug and then I'd walk out of the room and he'd say, 'One more hug, Mom.' This would go on — I mean, it was like 10 times. I'd have to go back and forth. And at the time you're thinking, 'Come on, Brian. Please? You know, it's late.' Now I would give anything to have one more hug."

"The day that you lost Brian you gained 20-something other sons, and we'll always be your sons," Powell tells her. "It never ceases to amaze me ... how strong you are. The things that we talk about, that I can hardly talk about, and he was your son. I want to tell you that I know you're hurting, and I'll always be there for you, for as long as I'm alive."

Audio produced for Weekend Edition by Andres Caballero.

StoryCorps is a national nonprofit that gives people the chance to interview friends and loved ones about their lives. These conversations are archived at the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress, allowing participants to leave a legacy for future generations. Learn more, including how to interview someone in your life, at StoryCorps.org.

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Tech Week: Voice Mail Hang-Ups, Apple Pay And Zuckerberg's Chinese

It's the weekend, which means it's time to look back on the week in technology that was. As your handy NPR One listening app says, here we go...

ICYMI

Please Do Not Leave Voice Mail: As part of our ongoing #newboom series, Rachel Rood reports on how annoying voice mail is to millennials. If it's important enough, just text me, younger generations say.

Online Gaming And Women: The Pew Research Center released its first ever study on online harassment and found that there's one online space where people don't perceive women and men are treated equally — gaming. In light of the ongoing, sprawling #Gamergate crisis, it probably surprises no one.

The Big Conversation

Apple Pay Debuts: With Apple's new mobile payment system, a major shift away from credit cards and wallets could be happening. But as Aarti Shahani noted on Morning Edition, other vendors have tried this before and failed.

iCloud And The Chinese?: A group claims the Chinese government supported an attack against users of Apple's iCloud service, and experts fear it may be a harbinger of more attacks to come.

Curiosities

BuzzFeed: Facebook Rebukes DEA For Impersonating Woman Online

The company isn't happy the Drug Enforcement Administration created a phony Facebook page using a real woman's name, without her knowledge.

Wired: New Tablet Case Recognizes Sign Language and Translates It Into Text

A California startup is developing a case for tablets that can serve as a virtual interpreter for deaf people.

NPR: Mark Zuckerberg Shows Off His Mandarin Chinese Skills

During a visit to a Beijing university, the Facebook co-founder and CEO conducted a full Q&A in Mandarin Chinese. It's tonally cringe worthy, but he got a lot of props for his commitment.

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For U.S. Queen Of Alligator-Skin Goods, Business Is Booming

Christy Redd remembers seeing a video by PETA, the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, and frankly being pretty grossed out. It showed an alligator being skinned alive, presumably for a tannery, and Redd watched the beast twist and writhe in agony. "I was so upset," she says.

At 35 years old, Redd is the co-owner of America's largest alligator leather tannery. Based in the small Atlanta suburb of Griffin, Ga., American Tanning & Leather treats and sells the canvas that produces some of the finest luxury handbags, shoes and other products featured in high-end stores across the globe. You can find them in Prada, Ralph Lauren and Louis Vuitton, priced as high as $50,000.

According to Redd, a typical bag requires the skins of about three gators, and in a year, her firm will use the skins of some 25,000 alligators, a point of some serious contention among animal rights groups. Yet the "Alligator Queen," as some know her, makes the case that the alligator leather industry is actually one of the reasons the gator population is thriving, incentivizing landowners' protection of the animal's habitat — and environmental experts agree.

Animal rights groups don't. Most farms treat alligators cruelly, says Danielle Katz, a campaign manager at PETA. She paints a harrowing picture of animals being kept in crowded cages brimming with feces and urine, then being killed by a bludgeon or chisel to the head — and sometimes being skinned while still alive for up to 45 minutes.

With so many vegan options, there is no reason to buy and wear the skin of an animal, Katz says. "Alligators should not have to suffer for our vanity."

But Redd says that people who hear about the skinning of gators and have an emotional response, like the one she had watching the PETA video, "don't have the same response at the supermarket in the chicken nugget section."

Redd also says that the conditions Katz describes would ruin her business, saying that if alligators aren't given abundant space and a quick death, the quality of their skin suffers.

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Chris Plott, Christy's father, holds up alligator skins in the 1960s. Courtesy of Christy Redd/Ozy.com hide caption

itoggle caption Courtesy of Christy Redd/Ozy.com

Chris Plott, Christy's father, holds up alligator skins in the 1960s.

Courtesy of Christy Redd/Ozy.com

The family firm is no stranger to controversy, though. Redd's great-grandfather started buying and selling fur in 1923. Her grandfather and father continued the business: buying otters, minks, foxes and the like from trappers, flipping the animals inside out and then stretching the skins out to dry.

When Redd's father, Chris, bought 12,000 gator skins in the first auction after legalization of the trade in 1978, he didn't know what he was doing. "It was either the dumbest or luckiest decision I ever made," he told her.

For 10 years, the alligator leather business lost money, supported only by the thriving fur trade. When fur became taboo, Redd and company had to make gator leather profitable, and fast.

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One of the $35,000 luxury bags made with genuine American alligator leather produced by Christy Redd's company. James Hickey/Courtesy of Christy Redd hide caption

itoggle caption James Hickey/Courtesy of Christy Redd

One of the $35,000 luxury bags made with genuine American alligator leather produced by Christy Redd's company.

James Hickey/Courtesy of Christy Redd

The co-owner, who wears a custom-made-in-Istanbul python coat, started full-time with the tannery when she was 22, fresh out of the University of Georgia. She's talked her way into a profitable spot in a thriving luxury goods market, which has tripled in less than 20 years to $300 billion in 2013.

To match demand, American Tanning & Leather cut out the middle man in 2006 and started buying skins straight from alligator hunters in Louisiana. Since then, output has doubled from 10,000-plus to approximately 25,000 skins, though the company declines to release exact revenue figures.

The key to its growth strategy has been finding customers who want lesser-quality skins — which is the majority of those produced in the wild. Last year, AmTan and its Italian partner, Whiteline, opened a warehouse in Milan aimed at selling to small-scale craftsmen who buy and improve lesser-quality skins. Already they've sold 3,000 skins.

Redd says she isn't worried about animal rights groups slowing her business, and biologist Lance Campbell of the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries hopes she is right. The alligator leather industry provides substantial incentive to private landowners, $150 to $200 per gator, to maintain the habitat. Out of an alligator population of approximately 2 million, an average of 35,000 are legally hunted, which has no effect on the overall population but provides millions of dollars to landowners, he says.

"I hope alligator leather doesn't go the same way as fur," says Redd, confident it won't. PETA and other animal rights groups, meanwhile, will keep the pressure on.

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Alabama's Darius Foster Wants To Bring Back 'Fight For The People' GOP

Republicans are trying to make inroads with African-Americans in the Deep South, who have voted overwhelmingly Democrat since the civil rights era. In Alabama, the GOP is fielding more black candidates this cycle than ever before. One of them is Darius Foster, who gained national attention with this viral video challenging racial and political expectations:

YouTube

In the video, a diverse group of men and women mouth the candidate's introduction: "Did you know while growing up we went half the winter without heat, or that I think best while listening to Frank Sinatra? The last concert I attended was Lil Wayne. Yes, Lil Wayne." It ends, "Do I really fit in a box? See you on the campaign trail."

Foster says he needs no reminder that he stands out. "With me, unfortunately, everything is black Republican. Not Darius did this, but the black Republican did that. So, you know."

With the bulky frame of a former linebacker and a warm, hearty laugh, Foster fashions himself as a Lincoln or Teddy Roosevelt Republican.

"The fight-for-the-people Republican. That's what they were. I'm not sure where the Democratic Party was able to hijack that narrative from us. But they did. And they have it. I'm trying to bring it back," he says.

Foster is a 33-year-old business consultant. He's been active in the GOP since he founded a lonely chapter of College Republicans at the historically black Miles College in Birmingham. He's been tapped by the Republican National Committee as a future leader.

Foster was raised by his grandmother, who forced him to vote a straight Democratic ticket the first time she took him to the polls. He says he went home and looked up political parties in the family's Encyclopaedia Britannica.

"I read through and went through all of them, I got to the Republican Party and I was just reading through the principles. My grandmother hates taxes. She doesn't do gay marriage," he says. "She's always taking about defending yourself and strong defense. And I said, 'Mom — you may be a Republican.' And she looked at me and walked off."

She's still a Democrat but has endorsed her grandson in his race for a state House seat representing part of suburban Birmingham. It includes the predominantly black city of Bessemer, where Foster spends a lot of time going door to door introducing himself.

Democrats have long represented this Alabama House district, which is about two-thirds African-American, giving his opponent, Louise Alexander, the advantage.

Foster knows he's up against some strong notions about the Republican Party. "I think they hear Republican they think of white men. And people who don't care about them and ... who don't understand them," he says.

What he calls "TV Republicans" — conservative pundits — are a thorn in his side, Foster says. And some of his fellow Alabamians haven't helped. Like the Republican state senator who referred to blacks as aborigines, or the congressman who declared that there was a war on whites.

Foster says he doesn't have to defend Republican principles — only Republicans. Especially those who are hostile to President Obama, who got 95 percent of the black vote in Alabama two years ago.

"And it's not saying that I agree with President Obama. I'm just saying that I can show somebody and talk to them about what it means to be a Republican and not mention President Obama's name at all. This is what being a Republican is. This is what being a conservative is," he says.

Over breakfast at their neighborhood IHOP, his wife, 28-year-old Setara Foster, a lawyer, talks about growing up black in Houston where her parents were union members and loyal Democrats.

She now identifies more closely with the GOP. But she says she tends to split her ticket.

"I think that when we as a group identify with one party, for one thing, all the time, that party never has to earn our vote. Ever. And so I think that by having a diversity of political ideology within ethnic, racial, gender, age groups, we force politicians to work," she says.

On the campaign trail, you won't hear Foster talk about Republicans or Democrats. Instead, he talks about how he's invested some of his campaign funds in community initiatives — technology for schools, shoes for a basketball team, hosting a local job fair.

The strategy has won some converts like Juanita Graham. "When this gentleman came along, I was a die-hard Democrat," she says. Graham owns a firm that offers inner-city students enhanced engineering and math courses. She first met Foster while she was working for his Democratic opponent.

"There were some preconceived notions; I will not lie. Because when you say Republican African-American, the first thing pops in most African-American minds is Uncle Tom, butt-kisser. I'm honest. That is the mindset," she says.

But when Foster helped her with startup funds, and talked about tackling Bessemer's low high school graduation rate, he earned her vote.

Graham says she's still a Democrat, though. And that's the real challenge for Foster and Republican leaders who hope to position the party for the future.

Outside Group Sends Blunt Message In N.C. Senate Race

"More weed, less war."

That's the latest campaign slogan in the North Carolina Senate race advertising wars. And no, neither Democratic incumbent Kay Hagan nor Republican challenger Thom Tillis is jumping on the state's marijuana legalization effort.

A quarter-million dollars in online ads is now supporting a third-party Senate challenger — Libertarian candidate and pizza delivery guy Sean Haugh. The ads are coming from an unlikely source: the American Future Fund, a secret-donor political group backed by the billionaire industrialist Koch brothers.

The spots are aimed at young voters who typically support Democrats. One features a 20-something who criticizes Hagan for opposing legalization and supporting President Obama's war efforts in Afghanistan.

"Vote Sean Haugh," she says. "He shares our progressive values. Pro-legalization, pro-environment. More weed, less war."

Libertarian North Carolina Senate candidate Sean Haugh tweets his views on his support from American Future Fund. Twitter/Sean Haugh hide caption

itoggle caption Twitter/Sean Haugh

In a tweet, Haugh says he now has "a whole new reason to despise Koch brothers & their dark money."

"It's all kind of surreal, frankly," Haugh told NPR. "Obviously they want to try to use me to siphon votes away from Kay Hagan and maybe swing the election to Thom Tillis."

Neither American Future Fund nor Koch Industries responded to queries about their strategy. But Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee spokesman Justin Barasky said: "The Koch brothers are doing everything they can to elect Speaker Tillis because no one has gone to the mat for the Koch brothers more than he has."

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Pizza delivery man Sean Haugh is in single digits in the polls. But he could have a significant impact on the close Senate race. Tamara Keith/NPR hide caption

itoggle caption Tamara Keith/NPR

Pizza delivery man Sean Haugh is in single digits in the polls. But he could have a significant impact on the close Senate race.

Tamara Keith/NPR

Haugh is drawing about 6 percent in public polls, with some analysts believing his support is coming equally from those who would otherwise vote for Hagan or Tillis.

The $225,000 is nearly 30 times more than the $7,744 Haugh said he has spent for himself.

To put that in perspective, the two main party candidates and outside groups have already spent $85 million on the North Carolina Senate race in advertising that directly tells voters to support or oppose a candidate. Nonprofit political groups that are allowed to keep their donors secret, including the Koch brothers-founded Americans for Prosperity, have spent tens of millions of dollars more in so-called "issue" ads attacking Hagan.

"You have to wonder why people are willing to spend up to $100 million to elect somebody to a job that only pays $174,000 a year," Haugh said.

2014 North Carolina Senate race

Koch Brothers

Democratic Climate Activist Is Election's Biggest Donor — That We Know Of

Liberal billionaire Tom Steyer has spent an astonishing $58 million this election cycle, more than any other donor in the traditional, fully disclosed part of the political system. He recently gave $15 million to a superPAC.

This latest contribution, like most of Steyer's others, went to NextGen Climate Action. It's pretty much Steyer's personal superPAC; he's supplied 70 percent of its money.

In a video last month, Steyer talked about his reasons for launching NextGen: "Together, we're sending an unmistakable message to Washington. Climate change is not just an important issue, it's the issue. And we need leaders who will take it seriously." Put more bluntly, the superPAC is using climate change as a wedge issue in battleground states.

Its biggest fight is the gubernatorial race in Florida. Republican incumbent Rick Scott is seeking a second term. NextGen calls him "a climate change denier." And — as in six states where NextGen is involved in Senate races — it links Scott to billionaire industrialists David and Charles Koch, who oversee a network of conservative political groups.

YouTube

NextGen just put this message on TV in the Jacksonville market, where the Koch-owned company Georgia Pacific has a plant: "Who owns Georgia Pacific? The Koch brothers, spending $6 million on Scott and his allies. Rick Scott, for the powerful few, and sometimes just the powerful two."

The Scott campaign tags Steyer as an ally of Scott's Democratic challenger, former Gov. Charlie Crist. Scott made millions as a health care executive, but he isn't as wealthy as Steyer or the Koch brothers. He self-financed his first run for governor and now says he's considering putting money into his re-election campaign.

Earlier this week, he told reporters, "If I put in money, it will be nothing compared to what Tom Steyer — the radical, left-wing billionaire from the West Coast — is helping Charlie with, to bring these policies to Florida."

In this new world of billionaire-against-billionaire politics, Steyer's operation and the Kochs' look similar. Both produce ads that pack a roundhouse punch. Both spend heavily on ground operations. In Florida alone, NextGen runs 21 field offices and has spent $12 million.

But in another way, Steyer and the Kochs represent polar opposites.

Chris Lehane, Steyer's political adviser, says, "We do think it's a competitive advantage to be clear about where the money's coming from and why it's being injected into the system." So NextGen Climate Action files public reports listing its donors. Steyer's spending on the Senate and gubernatorial campaigns is not a secret.

Of the dozen or so groups in the Koch network, just one discloses its donors: the superPAC Freedom Partners Action Fund. The others are 501(c) tax-exempt organizations, which operate outside the federal campaign finance laws. This kind of political activity was made possible by the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision of 2012 and other recent court rulings. The upshot: David and Charles Koch have, on the public record, contributed only $2 million apiece this cycle to the network they built.

Whether Steyer's money is making a difference — that's another matter.

"They've put up two 30-second attack ads, both of which contained significant errors of fact," says political scientist Rick Foglesong of Rollins College, in Winter Park, Fla. "And these were errors that the other side seized upon in counter-ads, which probably blunted the message that NextGen was trying to communicate."

Foglesong says the ads were "counterproductive."

Lehane says that overall, NextGen is executing its game plan. "Any objective analysis of the seven states that we're in, it's abundantly clear that Democrats, really for the first time, are playing offense on the issue of climate and environment, and Republicans are playing defense. "

Lehane says Steyer is in it not just for two more weeks but for the long haul.

Just like David and Charles Koch.

Another Man Jumps White House Fence, But Is Stopped On The Lawn

A month after a man armed with a knife leapt the White House fence and got deep into the first floor of the building, another man made a run across the North Lawn Wednesday night.

His unannounced visit ended much sooner. NPR's Tamara Keith reports via Secret Service spokesman Ed Donovan that security dogs — which weren't deployed Sept. 19 when Omar Gonzalez trespassed — brought him down while he was still on the lawn. The apprehended man is being transported to a hospital for evaluation, Donovan said in a release.

U.S.

How Can The Secret Service Recover Its Reputation?

The earlier intrusion resulted in the Oct. 1 resignation of Secret Service Director Julia Pierson, who herself had only been on the job since 2013, when she replaced the retiring director following a scandal involving agents and prostitutes in Colombia.

Update at 10:10 p.m. ET: In an updated release, Donovan identified the arrested man as Dominic Adesanya, a 23-year-old from Bel Air, Md., northeast of Baltimore. The Secret Service spokesman also said two of the agency's dogs were taken to a veterinarian "for injuries sustained during the incident."

Omar Gonzalez

Secret Service

White House

Another Man Jumps White House Fence, But Is Stopped On The Lawn

A month after a man armed with a knife leapt the White House fence and got deep into the first floor of the building, another man made a run across the North Lawn Wednesday night.

U.S.

How Can The Secret Service Recover Its Reputation?

Omar Gonzalez

Secret Service

White House

Justice Ginsburg Revises Texas Voter ID Dissent, Then Announces It

Once again the U.S. Supreme Court is correcting its own record, but Wednesday marks the first time that the court has called attention to its own mistake with a public announcement. And it was the erring justice herself, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who asked the court's public information office to announce the error.

Last Friday Ginsburg pulled an all-nighter to write a dissent from the court's decision to allow the Texas voter ID law to go into effect while the case is on appeal. The dissent, released Saturday at 5 a.m. and joined by Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, listed a variety of photo ID forms not accepted for purposes of voting under the Texas law. Among those listed in the Ginsburg dissent as unacceptable was a U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs photo ID.

Three days after the opinion was released, professor Richard Hasen of the University of California, Irvine said on his election law blog that the state does in fact accept the Veterans Affairs IDs. Upon confirmation of that fact by the Texas secretary of state's office, Ginsburg amended her opinion.

Not surprising. What was surprising is that, according to Supreme Court spokeswoman Kathy Arberg, Justice Ginsburg instructed the press office to announce that the opinion had "contained an error" and that it was being corrected.

On Wednesday, the court announced the mistake and the correction.

Texas Can Enforce Voter ID Law For November Election Oct. 18, 2014

The Two-Way

Supreme Court Lets Texas Enforce Voter ID Law For Nov. Election

Errors of this sort are not exactly rare. In this case, it appears that Ginsburg may have gotten the Wisconsin and Texas voter ID provisions, both before the court, mixed up.

Until the era of the blogosphere, however, this sort of mistake was the stuff of academic gossip. Now it is the stuff of academic blogs, which sometimes get picked up in the popular press. A more embarrassing mistake by Justice Antonin Scalia was caught by Harvard Law professor Richard Lazarus last spring; the error was quickly fixed, but it was not announced. Nor was another error made and corrected by Justice Kagan.

Ginsburg is the first justice to call the public's attention to her own mistake.

Web Resources

Revised Dissent

пятница

No Quick Fixes For Drivers Affected By Air Bag Recall

Most auto recalls usually involve one carmaker at a time, but a massive recall this week affects not just one, but 10, ranging from BMWs to Toyotas.

At the center of it is Takata, a little-known, but extremely important, auto parts maker. The company makes more than one-third of the air bags in all cars.

Nearly 8 million vehicles have been recalled to have defective air bags fixed, and Congress is now opening an investigation into the problems.

Another big issue that sets this recall apart, says Karl Brauer, an analyst with Kelley Blue Book, "is that there's essentially nothing you can do to kind of mitigate the potential damage or danger from these air bags if they fail" — there's no big habit you can change or quick fix you can make.

The other thing that makes this different, Brauer says, is the basic fact of what happens when the air bags fail. They're supposed to cushion you during an accident, but instead the defective ones send metal shrapnel flying.

"So if you're in an unavoidable or an unpredictable accident, in the blink of an eye an air bag fires, and in that firing, it throws shrapnel at you at a high rate of speed, there's really nothing you can do about it," he says.

The Two-Way

NHTSA Adds More Than 3 Million Vehicles To Air Bag Recall

"One minute you're driving, the next minute, there's an accident — 'Bang, boom! — An air bag pops and there's shrapnel thrown."

Takata, a Japanese auto supplier that serves the global auto industry, is responsible for more than 30 percent of car air bags. It's one of only three big air bag suppliers.

"If one of those three suddenly needs to recall and replace a whole bunch — like, tens of millions of air bags that they've already produced — plus keep up with ongoing new vehicle air bags that they're already kind of at capacity producing, there ... isn't a solution," Brauer says. "There's no pressure relief valve that they can turn to easily to make the old air bag replacements, while continuing to make the new air bags for new cars."

Four deaths have been linked to the defect. The problem seems to be triggered by humid conditions. The Department of Transportation has taken the unusual step of urging owners of millions of vehicles who live in areas with high humidity — such as Florida, other Gulf states and Hawaii — to act immediately.

The warning cautions drivers not to use their vehicles until they are serviced by a dealer.

Ellen Bloom, senior director of federal policy with Consumers Union, says she's worried that drivers have grown too apathetic about recalls.

For instance, in the big General Motors recall that affects tens of millions of cars, only about half have been brought in to be fixed.

"The idea that air bag can explode and send pieces of metal into your flesh is troubling to say the least," Bloom says. "Again, while no one should panic, we think it's a serious safety issue and that people should address it."

Bloom says the government and carmakers need to do a much better job of informing the public about and resolving recall issues — and urges consumers to check on recalls at safercar.gov.

David Whiston, an equity analyst with Morningstar, says car companies' stock prices or sales are unlikely to be affected, as most of the vehicles covered under the recall are older models.

The background to this recall, Whiston says, is a movement to standardize parts across the globe. That's helpful for carmakers, "but, when something goes wrong, it will now go wrong across a much wider number of vehicles than people are used to hearing about in the news for a recall," he says.

The main pressure in today's auto industry is to realize economies of scale, he says.

"It's a viciously competitive industry; there really aren't a lot of weak players anymore. So, because of that, I think ... it's worth the automakers taking the risk of having more recall volume in exchange for getting more economies of scale," he says.

Whiston expects high-volume car recalls to continue — but you really need to pay attention to this one.

Takata

air bags

crash safety

auto accidents

recalls

auto industry

In 'Force Majeure,' Society Crumbles Under An Avalanche

Off to the side of the wickedly funny Swedish black comedy Force Majeure lurks a minor but significant figure with a sour, slightly saturnine face. The man is a cleaner in a fancy French Alps ski hotel and he hardly says a word. But his wordless hovering inspires dread, nervous laughter or both. Which pretty much sums up Force Majeure's adroit shifts of tone, and quite possibly its director's take on the ways of the hip urban bourgeoisie.

Cleaners dig for dirt, and this expressionless snooper keeps popping up to intrude on the unraveling of a seemingly perfect couple. They're so wrapped up in their bickering efforts to restore equilibrium, they fail to notice that they've locked their two young children in a room with a creepy stranger who could pass for an ax murderer.

A successful businessman who seems equally pleased with his good looks and his cell phone, Tomas (Johannes Bah Kuhnke) has come to this pricy resort to relax with his trophy wife, Ebba (Lisa Loven Kingsli), and their two children. They make a sleek, perfect domestic unit in a perfect, smooth-running hotel, all clean lines and blond wood.

Well, forget that: Force Majeure is framed around the fast-moving degradation of the couple's week-long vacation, which heads south after a supposedly controlled explosion backfires, setting off an avalanche that bears down on the family's patio lunch. Instead of protecting his family, Tomas snatches up his phone and takes off. So much for alpha males, and it's not over yet.

Physically, everyone's fine, but a shocked Ebba can't stop repeating the story of her husband's escape to anyone who will listen, as well as some who'd rather not. The couple's unease quickly infects the friends who join them: a red-headed, hyper-masculine Viking type (Kristofer Hivju) who looks a bit like an escapee from the set of Brave, and his pert, much younger girlfriend (Fanni Metelius). Here, writer-director Ruben Ostlund pauses to poke more fun at patriarchy, but no one in this increasingly unpleasant, hapless crew gets off unscathed.

Ostlund is a gifted creator of malignant ambience, which he masterfully uses to keep his audience wound tight and unsure whether the payoff in catastrophe will be physical, emotional or both. He bathes us in pervasive unease (electric toothbrushes play a recurring role) rendered all the more sinister by a snowy backdrop of breathtaking blues and grays.

Of course, nature is no more authentic than anything else in this fiendishly contrived movie, in which natural beauty is CG-enhanced to the point of hysteria: The heavy silence is disturbed only by the soft swish of skis on pristine snow or the brittle chatter of ski-suited hotel guests seeking hookups. Those man-made explosions elicit jumps, but in no way prepare you for the feral misbehavior that disrupts this borderline fascistic milieu, only to disappear into white fog — then reappear for encores.

In one of the film most entertaining moments, an unhinged Tomas sinks to the floor and launches into a confession like a fearful 8-year-old. Yet Ostlund isn't just getting under the skin of a smug bourgeois marriage. Force Majeure is about the paper-thin fragility of civilization itself.

That's not a terribly original insight, but it's cunningly driven home by a crucial turn of the screw when a crowd of homeward-bound vacationers walks down a mountain in a kind of ecstatic silence, aware of precisely how much human frailty they share in common. Metaphorically speaking, one in particular has just been dragged from a very high horse. Let's just say that that person's consort is quite pleased.

Iraq's Abu Ghraib Is Back In The News, Now As A Front-Line Town

To get to Abu Ghraib, I hitch a ride with an Iraqi military patrol. We start in Baghdad, where the convoy of battered Humvees weaves through heavy traffic. But as we head out west of the capital, the roads empty and we hardly see any civilian cars.

Mushtaq Talib, a soldier, is driving. He's been serving around Abu Ghraib for four years now. As we pass a low gray building, he points out the town's prison, which first gained notoriety as the place where Saddam Hussein locked up his opponents. After Saddam was toppled, American soldiers abused detainees there a decade ago. Now the prison is empty because the Islamic State freed the prisoners.

The Islamic State has been advancing from the west throughout much of this year, capturing a large part of Anbar, where many of Iraq's Sunni Muslims live.

"There's secure places and there are areas of unrest," Talib says of the region. It's worse a little farther west, near Fallujah. Most of that city and surrounding areas fell to the self-declared Islamic State (also called ISIS or ISIL) and its supporters early this year. He says morale there is low among the remaining Iraqi soldiers, who are short of food and ammunition.

And there are insurgents everywhere.

We visit a huge reinforced checkpoint in the Hamid Chaban neighborhood on the edge of Abu Ghraib. A watchtower looms. Soldiers check cars — only people who live here are allowed in and out.

Lt. Col. Issam Mohammed Ali says they've beefed up these checkpoints as security has deteriorated. He and other officials are keen to blame all the violence on the Islamic State's militants, citing their thousands of foreign fighters.

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Iraqi security forces rest on a sidewalk following clashes with militants last month in Ramadi, the capital of Anbar province. So far, the Iraqi forces have not been able to recapture cities and towns in western Iraq that the Islamic State seized earlier this year. Azhar Shallal/AFP/Getty Images hide caption

itoggle caption Azhar Shallal/AFP/Getty Images

Azhar Shallal/AFP/Getty Images

But traveling around Abu Ghraib is a reminder that the Islamic State is not the only source of the violence and that this insurgency has deep roots.

Way back in 2008, a spate of attacks against American troops in this neighborhood were blamed on a local extremist group.

Back in the Humvee, Talib, the driver, says there aren't really Islamic State fighters here in Abu Ghraib. It's local tribal rebels, who are supported by the Islamic State and may be sympathetic to them, he says.

But he reckons they're really fighting because the mostly Sunni people in western Iraq have been marginalized for years by Shiite-led governments.

That certainly doesn't mean everyone here likes the Islamic State.

Related NPR Stories

Parallels

Understanding The Kurds' Different Roles In Different Conflicts

Parallels

The Artificial Boundary That Divides Iraq

In a flyblown market in Abu Ghraib, with just a few tattered stalls open, few people are around. Some are buying fruit and vegetables, and a small number of merchants are wheeling carts around or selling clothes.

"We're afraid, we don't know what's going to happen," says Ali Mohammad, who works close by. He and his friends tell me Abu Ghraib is teeming with displaced people from Anbar province. Most every house has four or five families, he says.

Parallels

Kurds Leave Life In Europe To Fight ISIS In Their Iraqi Homeland

The Islamic State may be unpopular among many local residents, but so too is the Iraqi army. The Iraqi military is being supported by the United States, but it's not winning over all the local people.

"They put military garrisons among us, they stormed our house in the night. Who gave them permission?" says a furious Khadouja Sihel, a local resident.

Her daughter is with her, carrying a tray of eggs.

Ignoring the soldiers standing a few feet away, Sihel says, "I've got seven daughters, and they harass them in a filthy way. Why are they doing this? Aren't we Iraqis like them?"

Iraq's new government has been discussing ways to bring marginalized Sunnis, like her, back on board.

Even the soldiers in the Hummer agree. As Talib drives along, he says that if the residents felt they had more sway in government, they could drive out the Islamic State tomorrow. But as things stand, no one thinks that's going to happen anytime soon.

Alice Fordham, who is based in Beirut, has reported extensively from Iraq. Follow her @AliceFordham.

Fashion Police: Why Are You Wearing Rubber Boots In Liberia?

Working in Ebola hotspots is old hat for NPR. We've had reporters and photographers at the epidemic since April. Our global health correspondent Jason Beaubien has been to West Africa three times during the crisis.

This week it's my turn.

When I left the U.S. last week, I brought a list of tips from veteran Ebola reporters for keeping myself safe. Many of them are proving to be quite useful:

Wash your hands every chance you get: This isn't difficult. Shops, bars, restaurants and businesses all have "Ebola" buckets sitting outside their doors. The buckets are filled with a mix of water and bleach and have a little spigot at the bottom . You wash going into the shop. Sometimes you wash going out.

It all adds up to about a dozen hand washings each day. The result is the cleanest hands I've ever had. Seriously, my nails are gleaming white, and my skin is starting to dry out. But my hands are Ebola-free.

Don't touch your face, especially not those eyes: Man, this one took me a while to get used to. But I think it's an important one. Ebola spreads through direct contact of your bodily fluids with an infected person's fluids — and there are a lot of fluids in your eyes.

I've done a good job of keeping my face "hands free" while walking around Monrovia or interviewing health workers. My colleagues Jon Hamilton and Rolando Arrieta even remind me.

But those eyes can itch! So when I get back to the hotel, I wash my hands and itch as much as I want.

No shaking hands, no hugs: Monrovians have this down. Each time you meet someone new, they never put out their hand. If you go to pat a shoulder or accidentally brush up against someone, you'll hear a gentle warning: "No touching." Even kids reprimand you.

Keep the spit off the equipment: In radio reporting, we get pretty close to people. And we do a lot of talking. So this can involve another bodily fluid: saliva.

We haven't talked to or been near anyone who might have Ebola. But, out of an abundance of caution, we wipe down all our equipment (hands) after doing each interview with Clorox wipes. We also give our phones and computers a quick wipe.

Booting up: One safety tip, I'm having a hard time following: Wear big, brown rubber boots everywhere.

We even wore the eyesores to report at a church service. Rubber boots in church! I was embarrassed. Everyone else was dressed impeccably. Women were wearing bright yellow, red and blue dresses. And the men were in perfectly tailored suits.

The idea behind the boots is great. The rubber protects your feet from any bodily fluids on the ground.

Plus, they're easy to clean. Many shops and business have shoe-cleaning stations out front. And the bleach doesn't hurt the rubber.

But man, wearing these boots, pulled up knee high, makes me feel crazy while walking around Monrovia. Everyone else is wearing sandals, flip flops or fresh, white sneakers. They're have on little sundresses, colorful polo shirts and cute shorts. And I'm wearing long selves, long pants and ... giant, brown boots. People stare at my feet. Many just give me the strangest look.

Rightfully so. Monrovia is close to the equator. It's 90 degrees Fahrenheit outside with 100 percent humidity. My feet are sweating in these rubber boots. And my feet are getting more and more stinky by the minute. (Thank goodness for those Clorox wipes).

I understand wearing the boots at hospitals or places where there might be people with Ebola. But at the market or a government building? Nobody else seems to be worried about getting Ebola on their feet.

rubber boots

hand washing

ebola

TLC's 'Honey Boo Boo' Cancellation Shows Dangers of Exploitative TV

It's easy to slip into gloating mode, now that TLC has finally canceled a show so many of us critics have hated for so long: Here Comes Honey Boo Boo.

Unfortunately, the cancellation comes following a horrifying moment; gossip site TMZ reported Thursday that June "Mama June" Shannon, the mother of child beauty pageant contestant Alana "Honey Boo Boo" Thompson, has resumed dating an old boyfriend who was convicted of molesting an 8-year-old related to Shannon.

Shannon has denied the allegations, saying in a video on her Facebook page that "I have not seen that person in 10 years." But TMZ posted a photo it says depicts Thompson and the man, 53-year-old Mark McDaniel, recently hanging out with friends in a hotel room.

TLC on Friday issued a statement without addressing the allegations directly: "TLC has cancelled the series HERE COMES HONEY BOO BOO and ended all activities around the series, effective immediately. Supporting the health and welfare of these remarkable children is our only priority. TLC is faithfully committed to the children's ongoing comfort and well-being."

Related NPR Stories

Television

From 'Good Times' To 'Honey Boo Boo': Who Is Poor On TV?

Reality TV Has Become Honey Boo Boo-ified

Is Honey Boo Boo Hazardous?

This is where you would typically insert lots of commentary referencing early questions of whether the show exploits its young star (it was developed as a spinoff of the child beauty pageant series Toddlers and Tiaras). Or you could note how such "hicksploitation TV" shows stereotype rural, Southern families with little regard for the impact of turning their lives into national punchlines.

And you could comment on how all the justifications from Mama June insisting participation in the show wouldn't seriously damage her daughter — echoed by TLC as it raked in the ratings, of course — feels bitterly hollow now.

But this is something we've seen in a less alarming way before. When Duck Dynasty star Phil Robertson let his inner homophobe fly in a GQ magazine interview, A&E suspended him, then unsuspended him and saw ratings plummet nearly 50 percent from the show's heights.

Bravo's Real Housewives franchise just saw two of its stars, Joe and Teresa Giudice, sent to jail on conspiracy and bankruptcy fraud charges, leading some critics to wonder if such activities were connected to maintaining the wealthy lifestyle showcased on the program. (Bravo, of course, turned a post-sentencing interview into a TV special).

Too often, it seems reality TV producers have been in business of handing worldwide platforms to dubious people in questionable circumstances. They shrug off criticisms of their high-wire TV acts and cross their fingers, hopeful that their "stars" won't implode until — like the bitter divorce between Jon and Kate Plus 8 stars Jon and Kate Gosselin — their shows are already in decline. (Honey Boo Boo's recent ratings have also been lower than previous highs)

According to TMZ, the cable channel TLC has a season's worth of Honey Boo Boo episodes it is shelving. But the website also reported that Thompson was sneaking off during filming to spend time with McDaniel, raising questions about what the cable channel knew and whether it should have called off the series before allegations about this relationship were made public.

Often, the consequences for creating these kinds of shows TV shows can seem ephemeral and academic. But even if Thompson's denials about dating McDaniel are true, the entire episode has become national news in the most brutal way — possibly leaving vulnerable children and a fractured family in its wake.

Wonder if anyone will think of this when the next exploitative TV concept comes up?

Tobacco Farmers Lose Longtime Safety Net

Tobacco growers are about to face a completely free market. This month, they'll receive their last checks from a government program meant to ease them out of a Depression-era tobacco price fixing system.

That has left Stanley Smith, who grows about 60 acres of tobacco on his farm not far from Winston-Salem, N.C., feeling a little unsettled.

"I've farmed all my life," Smith says. "I think the best way to sum it up is our safety net now is gone."

Food

Some U.S. Farms Trade Tobacco For A Taste Of Africa

StoryCorps

No More Livelihood: Tobacco Auctions' Last Call

The safety net is the Transitional Tobacco Payment Program, also known as the buyout. Since the 1930s, the government regulated the tobacco market with a quota system. It limited how much a farmer could grow in order to control supply and demand and farmers profited. That ended in 2004 with the $9.6 billion buyout program that paid growers yearly sums to help them adapt to the free market.

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Tobacco Farmers Feel The Pinch Of Rising Taxes

"Twenty-five, 30, 40 years ago tobacco was clearly the most profitable thing you could do on the farm," says Tim Hambrick with the agricultural extension office in Winston-Salem. He says back then farmers could get $1,000 an acre. Now it's more like $200. So they have to grow more tobacco to make the same money. Farms get bigger, or they get squeezed out. And everyone is trying new things.

"You see guys invest heavier into the grain market. You see guys put up chicken houses. You see guys retire and just get out of the business. They look for other things to do. They encourage their kids to look for other things to do," Hambrick says.

But tobacco is still big business. The U.S. tobacco crop has been steadily bringing in about $1.5 billion a year and may even grow, given the global nature of the market. Blake Brown, an agricultural economist at North Carolina State University, says even though Americans are smoking less, overseas markets are promising. And there's still demand for the highly prized North Carolina leaf.

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Marvin Eaton owns a farm in Belew's Creek, N.C., where he grows 200 acres of tobacco. He bought the farm from his grandfather and plans to pass it down to his son. Emily McCord/WFDD hide caption

itoggle caption Emily McCord/WFDD

Marvin Eaton owns a farm in Belew's Creek, N.C., where he grows 200 acres of tobacco. He bought the farm from his grandfather and plans to pass it down to his son.

Emily McCord/WFDD

"So I think for the next five years, demand for U.S. tobacco may be stable and could actually increase a little bit because of the export demand, but we don't know exactly whether the growth in China will offset the decline in demand in the U.S. and Europe," Brown says.

And another unknown: how e-cigarettes will affect the demand for tobacco leaf.

It's the growers at larger farms that have a little more breathing room. Marvin Eaton grows 200 acres of tobacco, along with grain and strawberries, in Belew's Creek, N.C. He has a contract with Phillip Morris and R.J. Reynolds. Right now, that's paying Marvin Eaton's bills.

"The companies, they're in control, and if they don't want Marvin Eaton raising tobacco and I can't make a living on what they say they're going to pay me for, then I, Marvin Eaton needs to get him something else he enjoys doing," Eaton says.

For now, Eaton is hopeful. He points to his son, who's finished college and is back home to help his dad and learn the family business. Buck Eaton stands watch over a giant conveyer belt that's sorting tobacco leaves. Someday this farm will be his.

tobacco

Winston Salem

North Carolina

For U.S. Queen Of Alligator-Skin Goods, Business Is Booming

With so many vegan options, there is no reason to buy and wear the skin of an animal, Katz says. "Alligators should not have to suffer for our vanity."

Redd also says that the conditions Katz describes would ruin her business, saying that if alligators aren't given abundant space and a quick death, the quality of their skin suffers.

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Chris Plott, Christy's father, holds up alligator skins in the 1960s. Courtesy of Christy Redd/Ozy.com hide caption

itoggle caption Courtesy of Christy Redd/Ozy.com

Chris Plott, Christy's father, holds up alligator skins in the 1960s.

Courtesy of Christy Redd/Ozy.com

For 10 years, the alligator leather business lost money, supported only by the thriving fur trade. When fur became taboo, Redd and company had to make gator leather profitable, and fast.

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One of the $35,000 luxury bags made with genuine American alligator leather produced by Christy Redd's company. James Hickey/Courtesy of Christy Redd hide caption

itoggle caption James Hickey/Courtesy of Christy Redd

One of the $35,000 luxury bags made with genuine American alligator leather produced by Christy Redd's company.

James Hickey/Courtesy of Christy Redd

"I hope alligator leather doesn't go the same way as fur," says Redd, confident it won't. PETA and other animal rights groups, meanwhile, will keep the pressure on.

alligator

animal rights

Fashion

Georgia

PETA

No Mere Merry-Go-Round: Ohio Carousel Maker Carves From Scratch

Wooden carousels with carved and painted animals seem like a relic of the past. But Carousel Works in Mansfield, Ohio, is still making them to order.

"Our biggest trade secret is we've got this big barrel of elbow grease. You've gotta come in here and work every day," says co-owner Art Ritchie.

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Say Bye-Bye To A Beloved Kiddie Amusement Park

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As The Atlantic recently reported, few companies still take time to make old-fashioned carousels with hand-carved animals. So when Ritchie says they make these carousels from scratch, it is no exaggeration.

"We make our own castings and do our own machine work. We've got a woodworking shop that blocks the figures together, and then we've got a carving department. Then we've got a group that does all the sanding and the priming and preparing them for painting. And then we've got a whole group of painters that do all the artwork," Ritchie explains.

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The National Zoo's carousel is among dozens that Carousel Works has installed around the U.S., each made to fit in with its surroundings. James Clark/NPR hide caption

itoggle caption James Clark/NPR

The National Zoo's carousel is among dozens that Carousel Works has installed around the U.S., each made to fit in with its surroundings.

James Clark/NPR

The finished product is no mere merry-go-round.

"Ours are finished pieces of furniture. They're sculpture," Ritchie says.

The company has been restoring carousels in Mansfield since the late 1980s. And it has created 30 new carousels that have been installed around the U.S., each made to fit in with its surroundings. For example, the company created the carousel at the National Zoo in Washington, D.C. Instead of horses to ride, it's full of animals that visitors would have just seen in real life at the park: zebras, cheetahs, pandas, Komodo dragons.

"We just talked to a group that saves pit bulls. We're talking about building a carousel that's all dogs. Now, what else can you put on there? We were fooling around with it. Can we do a big dog bone with a rug on the top so one of the dogs could ride, too?" Ritchie says. "That's the fun part about it. If you're not laughing and giggling while you're designing these things, you're in the wrong place."

And it's not just dogs. The Bronx Zoo is home to the Bug Carousel. "The only thing we didn't put on there was a cockroach because ... everyone would walk up and say, 'I got a bigger one than that in my kitchen,' " Ritchie says.

He says kids love the bugs — especially if their parents don't. "Ten-year-old boys — any animal that grosses their mother out has gotta be the one they gotta ride."

carousels

National Zoo

Mark Zuckerberg Shows Off His Mandarin Chinese Skills

Mark Zuckerberg is a man of many accomplishments. A computer programming whiz who famously co-founded "The Facebook" in his Harvard University dorm. An entrepreneur. A philanthropist. A person who warranted a wax sculpture. And now, he's a conversant Mandarin Chinese speaker.

As he explained in a question-and-answer session conducted entirely in Mandarin, so many of his Chinese-American wife's family members speak only Mandarin that he decided to learn. He has studied it since 2010 and this week felt confident enough in his skills to take questions in Mandarin Chinese at a forum at a Beijing university often called "the MIT of China," Tsinghua University.

The audience gasped and broke into applause when Zuckerberg took the microphone and greeted them in Mandarin, saying "Da jia hao!" (Hello, everyone.)

If you haven't seen it, check it out:

YouTube

Zuckerberg went on to explain — in Mandarin — that his wife's grandma loved it when he was able to ask in Chinese for her blessing to marry his wife, Priscilla Chan. And that he loves a challenge. Mandarin is a good one — it is considered one of the most difficult languages for an English speaker to learn.

And we should mention that while Zuckerberg is impressive in his ability to answer questions and speak in full sentences, he is actually not a good Chinese speaker. That's because the language is tonal. For example, "ma" could mean horse, hemp, mom or scold, depending on which tone you use. Zuckerberg's tones are all off, but since he can speak in sentences, the context made him intelligible.

Zuckerberg, in fact, opened his Tsinghua talk with how his Mandarin is lousy. And he joked in Washington, D.C., last year that he told his wife he was a terrible listener in Chinese. She replied, "Your listening is bad in English, too."

tsinghua university

mandarin chinese

Facebook

Mark Zuckerberg

FDA Cracks Down On Fake Ebola Cures Sold Online

Snake venom, vitamin C, Nano Silver and herbs have all been pitched online as a treatment or cure for Ebola. None has the backing of the FDA.

"Unfortunately during public health threats such as Ebola, fraudulent products that claim to prevent, treat, cure disease often appear on the market almost overnight," says Gary Coody, the FDA's national health fraud coordinator. In particular, the FDA wants consumers to beware Ebola "cures" peddled online.

“ It's like storm-chasing roofers, who go and try to defraud people after a big storm. Some of them may be making an honest mistake; other companies are trying to rip people off.

- Nathan Cortez, law professor, Southern Methodist University

The problem isn't just that such products are worthless. "Consumers who are misled by false claims may delay seeking the medical care they need, such as proper diagnosis and supportive care," Coody says. Or they may have a false sense that the product will protect them from the virus.

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The FDA has sent warning letters to three companies it says are making fraudulent claims about Ebola cures. The letters threaten property seizure and even criminal prosecution if the firms don't respond appropriately.

The strategy amounts to "public shaming," says Nathan Cortez, who teaches law at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. "It's one mechanism that the FDA uses to lean on companies in a very public way. It's also meant as a warning to other firms, he says, "to say we know companies are trying to defraud the public with fake Ebola tests and treatments and we're on the case."

Two of the firms that got the FDA warning letters didn't respond to my emailed messages. But Ralph Fucetola of the New Jersey-based company Natural Solutions Foundation says he heard the FDA's message loud and clear. Natural Solutions received the warning for its claims that a product known as Nano Silver can effectively kill Ebola.

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"We understand that there is no approved treatment for Ebola," Fucetola says. "Since we are in the middle of negotiating with the government with regard to how we can best describe what we believe is a very important health breakthrough, we are not using the legal term of art 'treatment of disease.' "

Even if the company doesn't explicitly say that Nano Silver "treats" Ebola, it has claimed on its website, Twitter and Facebook that Ebola has a cure — a statement not borne out by the evidence so far, according to the FDA, CDC and other health officials.

While there are experimental drugs and vaccines being tested in the current Ebola outbreak, nothing yet has been proved to work.

Online, other companies tout clove oil, oregano and homeopathic treatments to prevent the virus. There's even a tutorial that was up on YouTube for a do-it-yourself vaccine.

Some businesses, Cortez says, take advantage of fear.

"It's like storm-chasing roofers, who go and try to defraud people after a big storm," he says. "Some of them may be making an honest mistake; other companies are trying to rip people off."

Mistake or not, the FDA says Ebola cures advertised on the Internet are misleading and dangerous. The agency encourages consumers who have seen such claims to report them.

health fraud

ebola

FDA

Cloud Data Security Concerns Raised After Reported Attack In China

Apple CEO Tim Cook on Wednesday spoke with officials in China about data security and privacy. This meeting comes on the heels of a reported attack against users of Apple's iCloud service in China. Hackers allegedly were able to get hold of users' data by intercepting traffic on the Internet. They did not break into Apple servers.

The attack coincided with the launch in China of the new iPhone 6. As for the perpetrator: A nonprofit watchdog called GreatFire.org alleges the Chinese government was behind it. China denies that. And Apple, in a statement, does not name a culprit.

The attack has a name: man in the middle.

"Imagine someone running a post office and they're managing all of the letters that go in and out of that post office," says Zackary Allen, lead researcher at the security firm ZeroFox. "A man-in the-middle attack is someone ... taking over one of those post offices. And they can take your envelopes that you're sending out to your family or your friends and put them somewhere else. ...

"Or they can open up the letter, change it, reseal it and then send it back out," he says.

And the sender wouldn't have a clue.

The end goal could be to steal information or to change information. The perpetrator could be one person or many people.

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With Tech Outsourcing, The Internet Can Be 'A Scary Place'

"We've seen criminal organizations; we've seen disgruntled employees. It can also be nation-state actors," Allen says.

The attack is really different from, say, a virus that gets into a single document. It's more sophisticated.

The Internet is a bunch of interconnected routers. With man in the middle, the attacker takes over a router and can watch all the traffic — text messages, emails, iCloud logins — to decide what's worth stealing.

"These routers help get you from where you are to a destination," Allen says. "If you manage to compromise one of those routers, any traffic that flows through that, you control."

Apple's new iPhone is in fact more secure than previous ones. The physical hardware itself is harder to hack into. So these kinds of attacks that target weak links in the transfer of data on the cloud will become more common, experts say.

Apple is advising concerned customers to read the warnings that pop up in Web browsers — so if you see a strange request for permission or a certificate at the iCloud login, don't just click OK.

icloud

China

iPhone

No Mere Merry-Go-Round: Ohio Carousel Maker Carves From Scratch

Wooden carousels with carved and painted animals seem like a relic of the past. But Carousel Works in Mansfield, Ohio, is still making them to order.

"Our biggest trade secret is we've got this big barrel of elbow grease. You've gotta come in here and work every day," says co-owner Art Ritchie.

Related NPR Stories

Around the Nation

Say Bye-Bye To A Beloved Kiddie Amusement Park

What The New Factory Worker Should Know Oct. 23, 2014

i i

The National Zoo's carousel is among dozens that Carousel Works has installed around the U.S., each made to fit in with its surroundings. James Clark/NPR hide caption

itoggle caption James Clark/NPR

The National Zoo's carousel is among dozens that Carousel Works has installed around the U.S., each made to fit in with its surroundings.

James Clark/NPR

The finished product is no mere merry-go-round.

"Ours are finished pieces of furniture. They're sculpture," Ritchie says.

He says kids love the bugs — especially if their parents don't. "Ten-year-old boys — any animal that grosses their mother out has gotta be the one they gotta ride."

carousels

National Zoo

No Mere Merry-Go-Round: Ohio Carousel Maker Carves From Scratch

Wooden carousels with carved and painted animals seem like a relic of the past. But Carousel Works in Mansfield, Ohio, is still making them to order.

"Our biggest trade secret is we've got this big barrel of elbow grease. You've gotta come in here and work every day," says co-owner Art Ritchie.

Related NPR Stories

Around the Nation

Say Bye-Bye To A Beloved Kiddie Amusement Park

What The New Factory Worker Should Know Oct. 23, 2014

i i

The National Zoo's carousel is among dozens that Carousel Works has installed around the U.S., each made to fit in with its surroundings. James Clark/NPR hide caption

itoggle caption James Clark/NPR

The National Zoo's carousel is among dozens that Carousel Works has installed around the U.S., each made to fit in with its surroundings.

James Clark/NPR

The finished product is no mere merry-go-round.

"Ours are finished pieces of furniture. They're sculpture," Ritchie says.

He says kids love the bugs — especially if their parents don't. "Ten-year-old boys — any animal that grosses their mother out has gotta be the one they gotta ride."

carousels

National Zoo

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No Mere Merry-Go-Round: Ohio Carousel Maker Carves From Scratch

No Mere Merry-Go-Round: Ohio Carousel Maker Carves From Scratch

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