PAKET UMROH BULAN FEBRUARI MARET APRIL MEI 2017

Saco-Indonesia.com – Suasana atau Suhu dingin dan kelembaban tinggi di musim hujan membuat aneka mikroorganisme berkembang dengan cepat. Mikroorganisme inilah yang menginfeksi orang di sekitarnya. Bila daya tahan tubuh sedang menurun bisa dipastikan serangan virus dan bakteri akan menyebabkan sakit.

Salah satu penyakit yang banyak menyerang saat musim hujan adalah sakit tenggorokan. Sakit tenggorokan menimbulkan sensasi panas dan kesulitan menelan. Namun jangan khawatir, sakit tenggorokan bisa diatasi dengan pengobatan alami, berikut caranya:

1. Berkumur air garam.
Walaupun terkesan kuno, berkumur air garam sangat efektif dan cepat melegakan sakit tenggorokan. Selain sebagai antiseptik, garam membantu membersihkan lendir di tenggorokan dan mengurangi rasa sakit yang timbul.

Sebelum berkumur pastikan air dalam suhu hangat dan cukup nyaman. Kemudian tambahkan setengah sendok teh garam dan aduk hingga rata. Kumur air garam sebaiknya dilakukan tiga kali sehari.

2. Madu.Madu adalah pengobatan alami sakit tenggorokan, yang paling sering ditemukan dan akrab dengan kehidupan masyarakat. Madu kerap digunakan karena kemampuan anti bakterialnya membantu proses pengobatan. Madu bisa dikonsumsi bersama secangkir air hangat atau teh herbal.

3. Teh jahe.Walau menimbulkan sensasi panas dan pedas, kualitas jahe sebagai pengobatan alami untuk sakit tenggorokan tak lagi diragukan. Kandungan zingiberin pada jahe membantu menghilangkan racun dari dalam tubuh, dan meningkatkan sirkulasi darah. Khasiat anti-inflamasi dalam jahe juga membantu membunuh bakteri jahat dalam tubuh. Untuk menikmati minuman berkhasiat ini, cukup iris beberapa ruas jahe dan nikmati dengan secangkir teh hangat.

Jual Obat Tidur / Jual Obat Bius Cair Jual Obat Bius Hirup Jual Obat Bius Serbuk Jual Obat Tidur Aman Obat Bius Manjur Harga Obat Bius Murah Cs :085200654999 Pemesanan dan Konsultasi Pin BB: 21C7DA51 TELPON / SMS: 085 200 654 999 (T-SEL) 087 836 866 999 (IND XL) 085 740 740 810 (INDOSAT) Www.jualobatbiusherbal.blogspot.com Online 24Hours Kami Buka & Melayani Konsomen 24jam. Termasuk Hari Sabtu & Minggu Obat Bius/Obat Tidur Merk Liquid Sex LiQuid Sex adalah Obat Bius Yang Berbentuk Cair, Cair Buatan German Ini Bisa bikin Wanita Langsung Pingsan Dalam Beberapa Menit Saja ( 2-3 Menit ). Dan itu Walau Anda apa - apain pun Target Anda gak bakalan bangun Selama 4 - 5 jam, kadang lebih, selain itu bisa juga untuk membius orang yang mau diperkosa ( gue cuma ngomongin, bukan nyuruh Lo ! Hhehe ... ). Obat Bius Ini Berbentuk Cair tidak berbau, tidak berasa, tidak berwarna Dan tidak beracun, ( So It Safely ). 1 botol bisa di pakai untuk berkali kali, cukup ditaruh di air minum apa saja kecuali susu dan air kelapa muda , lebih baik dalam air mineral, teh, jus, sirup atau di minuman yang bersoda. dan dalam waktu 2 - 3 menit setelah di minum maka langsung bereaksi pada target anda seperti tepar dan terkapar . AWAS ! ! ! .Tolong Jangan gunakan Obat Bius Cair ini pada orang yang baru dikenal atau penyalah gunaan obat ini. Baik di gunakan untuk Teman Dekat atau Pacar Sendiri ….. LiQuid Sex Obat Bius Cair . NEGARA ASAL : German Netto : 15ml HARGA : Rp 250.000, - "Dan Juga Tersedia Produc-Produc Terbaik" Jual Obat Tidur / Jual Obat Bius Cair Jual Obat Bius Hirup Jual Obat Bius Serbuk Jual Obat Tidur Aman Obat Bius Manjur Harga Obat Bius Murah Cs :085200654999 CHLOROFORM FOR SALE DIJUAL OBAT BIUS KLOROFORM! HARGA TERBARU CEK ! Permisi agan-agan, saya menjual OBAT BIUS chloroform (trichloromethane / CHCl3) buatan Merck Jerman. Botolnya 2,5 Liter, ane biasanya pake buat pelarut organik di lab. Punya saya kemurniannya diatas 99%! Dan ini merupakan kloroform termurni yang dibikin buat pasar, jadi jangan tanya "gan apa ada campurannya?" dll, ini sudah laboratory grade / standar laboratorium dan dibikin buat standar penelitian. Jadi bukan kloroform abal-abal murahan yang dicampuri, dll. Lihat aja gambarnya ya! Chloroform ini bisa digunakan untuk ekstraksi (misalkan alkaloid, dan zat-zat organik lainnya) mungkin yang jurusan biologi / kimia / farmasi, selain itu bisa juga membius orang yang mau diperkosa (gue cuma ngomongin, bukan nyuruh lo! hehe), trus juga bisa buat keperluan rekreasi (nidurin diri di malam hari). Ingat, ini bukan permainan. Sekali dua kali boleh aja pake, jangan keterusan. Chloroform bukan dimakan, tapi dihirup uapnya. Ane prihatin di kaskus ada seller yang mengatakan chloroform dapat dimakan. 10 ml sudah cukup untuk menimbulkan cardiac arrest / henti jantung pada manusia 70 kg. Thanks UNTUK 50, 100 ML HARGA SUDAH NETT, 500 ML, 1000 ML, 2500 ML BISA NEGO dan BELUM ONGKIR, pertanyaan mengenai "berapa harga nett gan?" tidak akan dibalas. Mohon maaf. 50 ml = Rp 750.000,- 100 ml = Rp 1300.000,- 500 ml = Rp 3.250.000,- 1000 ml = Rp 6.000.000,- Botol 2,5 Liter SEGEL Pure Analysis Merck Germany = Rp 12.000.000,- (murah abis reseller!) "Dan Juga Tersedia Produc-Produc Terbaik" Jual Obat Tidur / Jual Obat Bius Cair Jual Obat Bius Hirup Jual Obat Bius Serbuk Jual Obat Tidur Aman Obat Bius Manjur Harga Obat Bius Murah Cs :085200654999 Obat Bius Serbuk Soporific Jual Obat Bius Serbuk, Serbuk Ini Bisa bikin ( PINGSAN ) Dalam Beberapa Detik Saja, Dan itu Walau Anda apa - apain pun Target Anda gak bakalan bangun Selama 4 - 5 jam, kadang lebih, selain itu bisa juga untuk membius orang yang mau diperkosa ( gue cuma ngomongin, bukan nyuruh Lo ! Hhehe ... ) Obat Bius Ini Berbentuk Serbuk tidak berbau, tidak berasa, tapi berwarna ( putih Aman ). 1 saset bisa di pakai cukup untuk 2 - 3 kali pemakaian, cukup ditaruh di air minum apa saja KECUALI SUSU & KELAPA MUDA ,dan dalam waktu singkat setelah di minum maka obat itu langsung bereaksi pada target anda . AWAS ! ! ! .Tolong Jangan gunakan Obat Bius Serbuk ini pada orang yang baru dikenal atau penyalah gunaan obat ini. Baik di gunakan untuk Teman Dekat atau Pacar Sendiri ….. Obat Bius Serbuk 1 Paket Isi 4 Sachet Harga : Rp 300.000,- Tersedia Produk Terbaik Agen Tempat Penjualan Obat Tidur Dan Obat Bius, Obat Tidur Wanita, Obat Tidur Cair, Obat Tidur Jual Obat Bius Aman, Toko Obat Bius Ampuh, Obat Tidur, Bius Wanita, Obat Penenang, Obat Bius Cair,Agen Resmi Jual Obat bius, obat tidur, obat penenang termurah dan terpercaya @ Www.jualobatbiusherbal.blogspot.com, Toko Pria ,Wanita Dewasa , Obat Bius, Jual Obat Bius, Obat Bius, Obat Bius Wanita, Solusi Keharmonisan Pasutri Harga Paling Murah Se iNdonesia,Jual Obat Bius, Toko Obat Bius, Pusat Obat Bius, obat bius cair, obat bius hirup, obat bius serbuk. liquid , chloroform hirup, sleeping beauty,obat bius ,bius hirup,bius cair,bius serbuk,obat tidur,obat bius,bius hirup, bius cair,bius serbuk,bius capsule dan bius tablet,jenis obat bius, obat susah tidur,obat tidur bagus,obat bius manjur,obat tidur joss, Tentang obat tidur,harga obat tidur,paling ampuh,herbal alami,harga bius terjangkau ,mengatasi susah tidur,tidur lelap,atasi insomnia,gejala susah tidur, menenangkan pikiran,tidur nyaman,depresi,obat bikin ngantuk,jenis obat tidur, resep bikin tidur pulas,obat bius joss,harga obat bius,obat bius manjur, obat bius topcer,Obat Bius Hirup, Obat Bius Cair, Obat Bius Capsule, Obat Bius Tablet, Obat Bius Ampuh,Obat Bius Jos obat tidur,obat bius,bius hirup,bius cair,bius serbuk,bius capsule dan bius tablet,jenis obat bius, obat susah tidur,obat tidur bagus,obat bius manjur,obat tidur joss, tentang obat tidur,harga obat tidur,paling ampuh,herbal alami, harga bius terjangkau,mengatasi susah tidur,tidur lelap,atasi insomnia, gejala susah tidur,menenangkan pikiran,tidur nyaman,depresi,obat bikin ngantuk, jenis obat tidur,resep bikin tidur pulas,obat bius joss,harga obat bius, obat bius manjur,obat bius topcer,obat bius,bius hirup,bius cair,bius serbuk, obat tidur,obat bius,bius hirup,bius cair,bius serbuk,bius capsule dan bius tablet, jenis obat bius,obat susah tidur,obat tidur bagus,obat bius manjur,obat tidur joss. Tentang obat tidur,harga obat tidur,paling ampuh,herbal alami,harga bius terjangkau ,mengatasi susah tidur,tidur lelap,atasi insomnia,gejala susah tidur,menenangkan pikiran, tidur nyaman,depresi,obat bikin ngantuk,jenis obat tidur,resep bikin tidur pulas, obat bius joss,harga obat bius,obat bius manjur,obat bius topcer,Jual Obat Bius Aman, Toko Obat Bius Ampuh, Obat Tidur, Bius Wanita, Obat Penenang, Obat Bius Cair, Agen Resmi Jual Obat bius, obat tidur, obat penenang termurah dan terpercaya @ Www.jualobatbiusherbal.blogspot.com , Toko Pria ,Wanita Dewasa , Obat Bius, Jual Obat Bius, Obat Bius, Obat Bius Wanita, Solusi Keharmonisan Pasutri Harga Paling Murah Se iNdonesia, Jual Obat Bius, Toko Obat Bius, Pusat Obat Bius, obat bius cair, obat bius hirup,obat bius serbuk. liquid , chloroform hirup, sleeping beauty, Obat Bius Hirup, Obat Bius Cair, Obat Bius Capsule, Obat Bius Tablet, Obat Bius Ampuh, Obat Bius Joss,obat tidur,obat bius,bius hirup,bius cair,bius serbuk,bius capsule dan bius tablet, jenis obat bius,obat susah tidur,obat tidur bagus,obat bius manjur,obat tidur joss,tentang obat tidur, harga obat tidur,paling ampuh,herbal alami,harga bius terjangkau,mengatasi susah tidur, tidur lelap,atasi insomnia,gejala susah tidur,menenangkan pikiran,tidur nyaman,depresi, obat bikin ngantuk,jenis obat tidur,resep bikin tidur pulas,obat bius joss,harga obat bius,obat bius manjur,obat bius topcer, Jual Obat Bius Jual Obat Bius Wanita Jual Obat Bius Cair Jual Obat Bius SerbukJual Obat Bius Hirup Jual Obat Bius Aman Jual Obat Bius Ampuh Jual Obat Bius Topcer Jual Obat Bius Wanita Jual Obat Bius Sex Jual Obat Tidur Jual Obat Tidur Cair Jual Obat Tidur Wanita Jual Obat Tidur Pria Jual Obat Tidur Murah Jual Obat Tidur Ampuh Jual Obat Tidur Obat Tidur Obat Tidur Cair Obat Tidur Serbuk Obat Tidur Wanita Obat Tidur Pria Obat Tidur Herbal Obat Tidur Aman Pusat Obat Tidur Pusat Obat Bius Agen Obat Bius Agen Obat Tidur Obat Bius Hirup, Obat Bius Cair, Obat Bius Capsule, Obat Bius Tablet, Obat Bius Ampuh,Obat Bius Joss obat tidur,obat bius,bius hirup,bius cair,bius serbuk,bius capsule dan bius tablet,jenis obat bius,obat susah tidur,obat tidur bagus,obat bius manjur,obat tidur joss,tentang obat tidur,harga obat tidur,paling ampuh,herbal alami,harga bius terjangkau,mengatasi susah tidur,tidur lelap,atasi insomnia,gejala susah tidur,menenangkan pikiran,tidur nyaman,depresi,obat bikin ngantuk,jenis obat tidur,resep bikin tidur pulas,obat bius joss,harga obat bius,obat bius manjur,obat bius topcer, Harga Obat Bius Kamu Super Murah. Harga bisa Dibandingkan. Minta Call/SMS kami. Jual Obat Bius Aman, Toko Obat Bius Ampuh, Obat Tidur, Bius Wanita, Obat Penenang, Obat Bius Cair. Agen Resmi Jual Obat bius, obat tidur, obat penenang termurah dan terpercaya @ Www.jualobatbiusherbal.blogspot.com. Toko Pria ,Wanita Dewasa , Obat Bius, Jual Obat Bius, Obat Bius, Obat Bius Wanita, Solusi Keharmonisan Pasutri Harga Paling Murah Se iNdonesia. Obat Bius Cair, Cairan Buatan dari German Ini Bisa bikin Horny Dan Tolong Jangan gunakan Obat bius Cair ini pada wanita yang baru dikenal. Jual Obat Bius, Toko Obat Bius, Pusat Obat Bius, obat bius cair, obat bius hirup,obat bius serbuk. liquid sex, chloroform hirup, sleeping beauty. Obat Bius, Obat Perangsang Sexdrop cair, perangsang khusus untuk di gunakan wanita yang kurang gairah dalam berhubungan intim, sexdrop cair germany. obat bius,bius hirup,bius cair,bius serbuk obat tidur,obat bius,bius hirup,bius cair,bius serbuk,bius capsule dan bius tablet,jenis obat bius,obat susah tidur,obat tidur bagus,obat bius manjur,obat tidur joss. Tentang obat tidur,harga obat tidur,paling ampuh,herbal alami,harga bius terjangkau,mengatasi susah tidur,tidur lelap,atasi insomnia,gejala susah tidur,menenangkan pikiran,tidur nyaman,depresi,obat bikin ngantuk,jenis obat tidur,resep bikin tidur pulas,obat bius joss,harga obat bius,obat bius manjur,obat bius topcer, Obat Kuat Obat Pembesar Penis Obat Perangsang Wanita Alat Bantu Sex Pria Dan Wanita Aneka Kosmetic/Kecantikan DLL.

saco-indonesia.com,

allahumma shalli 'alaa Muhammad
ya rabbi shalli 'alaihi wa saliim
allahumma shalli 'alaa Muhammad
ya rabbi baalighul wasila

oh Tuhanku
yang slalu kuserukan dalam doa selamanya
seumur hidupku

dan napasku
yang slalu kuhirup di setiap waktu
hanya pada-Mu
kupasrahkan hidupku

di bawah langit biru
kusebutkan nama-Mu
karena ku tahu
engkaulah Tuhanku

di bawah rumput hijau
ku bersujud padaMu
karena ku tahu
akulah hamba-Mu ya Allah

oh Tuhanku
yang slalu kuserukan dalam doa selamanya
seumur hidupku

di bawah langit biru
kusebutkan nama-Mu
karena ku tahu
engkaulah Tuhanku

di bawah rumput hijau
ku bersujud pada-Mu
karena ku tahu
akulah hamba-Mu ya Allah

allahumma shalli 'alaa Muhammad
ya rabbi shalli 'alaihi wa saliim
allahumma shalli 'alaa Muhammad
ya rabbi baalighul wasila

Editor : dian sukmawati

saco-indonesia.com, Meskipun masih berstatus awas, sebagian warga yang berdampak letusan Gunung Kelud sudah kembali pulang meninggalkan posko pengungsian. Para warga telah meyakini, kondisi Gunung Kelud kini sudah aman dan tidak akan meletus kembali.

Saharjo yang berusia (47) tahun , salah satu warga Laharpang, Kecamatan Puncu, Kabupaten Kediri, ini juga mengaku tidak betah berlama-lama di pengungsian. Ia pun telah memutuskan untuk membawa istri dan tiga anaknya kembali ke rumah.

"Sudah aman mas, biasanya kalau Gunung Kelud itu meletus hanya sekali. Sesudahnya tidak akan ada letusan lagi," katanya, Selasa (18/2) .

Saharjo juga mengaku, jarak rumahnya dan Gunung Kelud sekitar 6 kilometer. Tentu saja hal itu telah masih mendapat larangan. Sebab radius amannya adalah 10 kilometer. "Yang lain sudah pada pulang soalnya. Habisnya kan harus beres-beres rumah," ucapnya.

Selain Sahrjo, Puji yang berusia (24) tahun juga mengaku sudah balik ke rumah sejak Minggu (16/2) malam lalu. Puji juga menjelaskan, ia diminta orangtuanya untuk membersihkan pasir yang telah menimbun pekarangan dan genteng rumah.

"Minggu udah pulang, disuruh sama orangtua buat beres-beres rumah. Sekarang keluarga sudah pulang semua. Habis kalau di pengungsian bosan," ucapnya.

hampir seluruh warga RT 4/2 Laharpang, Kecamatan Puncu, Kabupaten Kediri, telah terlihat sibuk melakukan perbaikan rumah-rumah yang hancur diterjang erupsi Gunung Kelud.

Namun demikian, warga Laharpang ini, masih membutuhkan bantuan berupa pakaian dan selimut lantaran barang-barang di dalam rumah tidak sempat diselamatkan pada saat gunung dengan tinggi 1.731 mdpl itu meletus.

Editor : Dian Sukmawati

BUKIT TINGGI– Kantor Kementerian Agam Bukittinggi membolehkan jamaah calon haji  dan umrah membawa uang selain biaya hidup (living cost) yang akan diberikan sebesar 1.500 real Saudi. “Jamaah dibolehkan membawa uang selain biaya hidup yang diberikan itu, bisa saja untuk keperluan lainnya,” kata Kasi Haji dan Umroh Kantor Kementerian Agama Bukittinggi, Khamidir, Selasa (3/9).

Hanya saja, imbuhnya, pada saat ibadah di Masjidil Haram agar tidak membawanya mengingat kemungkinan kehilangan uang di tempat itu sangat besar. Kepada jamaah yang membawa uang banyak hendaknya tetap menyimpan uang di dalam tas dan kamar terkunci di pemondokannya, kata dia.

Menurut dia, menyimpan uang dalam tas dan kamar terkunci di pemondokan akan paling aman dibanding membawa uang kemana-mana.

Dia menyebutkan ada 252 calon jamaah haji asal Kota Bukittinggi berangkat menuju Mekkah Al-Mukarramah. Mereka tergabung kloter dua pada gelombang pertama melalui Bandara Internasional Minangkabau.

Pemberangkatan itu kata dia, dilakukan pada 10 September 2013 dari Bukittinggi menuju embarkasi Padang. Di embarkasi Padang, jamaah calon haji menginap semalam, menjalani pemeriksaan kesehatan dan pemberian gelang.

“Sebelum keberangkatan masing-masing jamaah calon haji akan memperoleh biaya hidup (living cost) selama di Arab Saudi sebesar 1.500 real Saudi atau setara dengan Rp3,7 juta,” kata dia. Ia menyebutkan, jamaah calon haji asal Kota Bukittinggi itu telah siap menuju Mekkah karena semuanya telah melakukan pelunasan ongkos naik haji (ONH).

Sebelum adanya pengurangan 20 persen, kata dia, awalnya jamaah calon haji asal Kota Bukittinggi yang akan diberangkatkan tahun ini berjumlah 343 orang. “Karena terjadinya pengurangan 20 persen atau sebanyak 21 orang tersebut, maka jamaah calon haji yang akan diberangkatkan tahun ini menjadi 252 orang,” kata dia.

Sebenarnya, kata dia, jamaah calon haji awalnya 343 orang tersebut semuanya telah melunasi ONH, terjadinya pengurangan terpaksa penundaan pemberangkatan dilakukan bagi mereka yang porsi tinggi.
“Porsi jamaah calon haji Sumatera Barat 3.700 sehingga mereka yang lewat dari porsi tersebut ditunda pemberangkatannya,” kata dia.

Satu kloter CJH berjumlah 374, maka jamaah calon haji Bukittinggi 252 orang itu digabung dengan jemaah calon haji Solok 113 orang dan Padang sebanyak empat orang untuk memenuhi satu kloter, katanya.

Sumber : http://www.jurnalhaji.com

Baca Artikel Lainnya : TIPS MEMILIH AGEN TRAVEL

Imagine an elite professional services firm with a high-performing, workaholic culture. Everyone is expected to turn on a dime to serve a client, travel at a moment’s notice, and be available pretty much every evening and weekend. It can make for a grueling work life, but at the highest levels of accounting, law, investment banking and consulting firms, it is just the way things are.

Except for one dirty little secret: Some of the people ostensibly turning in those 80- or 90-hour workweeks, particularly men, may just be faking it.

Many of them were, at least, at one elite consulting firm studied by Erin Reid, a professor at Boston University’s Questrom School of Business. It’s impossible to know if what she learned at that unidentified consulting firm applies across the world of work more broadly. But her research, published in the academic journal Organization Science, offers a way to understand how the professional world differs between men and women, and some of the ways a hard-charging culture that emphasizes long hours above all can make some companies worse off.

Photo

 

Ms. Reid interviewed more than 100 people in the American offices of a global consulting firm and had access to performance reviews and internal human resources documents. At the firm there was a strong culture around long hours and responding to clients promptly.

“When the client needs me to be somewhere, I just have to be there,” said one of the consultants Ms. Reid interviewed. “And if you can’t be there, it’s probably because you’ve got another client meeting at the same time. You know it’s tough to say I can’t be there because my son had a Cub Scout meeting.”

Some people fully embraced this culture and put in the long hours, and they tended to be top performers. Others openly pushed back against it, insisting upon lighter and more flexible work hours, or less travel; they were punished in their performance reviews.

The third group is most interesting. Some 31 percent of the men and 11 percent of the women whose records Ms. Reid examined managed to achieve the benefits of a more moderate work schedule without explicitly asking for it.

They made an effort to line up clients who were local, reducing the need for travel. When they skipped work to spend time with their children or spouse, they didn’t call attention to it. One team on which several members had small children agreed among themselves to cover for one another so that everyone could have more flexible hours.

A male junior manager described working to have repeat consulting engagements with a company near enough to his home that he could take care of it with day trips. “I try to head out by 5, get home at 5:30, have dinner, play with my daughter,” he said, adding that he generally kept weekend work down to two hours of catching up on email.

Despite the limited hours, he said: “I know what clients are expecting. So I deliver above that.” He received a high performance review and a promotion.

What is fascinating about the firm Ms. Reid studied is that these people, who in her terminology were “passing” as workaholics, received performance reviews that were as strong as their hyper-ambitious colleagues. For people who were good at faking it, there was no real damage done by their lighter workloads.

It calls to mind the episode of “Seinfeld” in which George Costanza leaves his car in the parking lot at Yankee Stadium, where he works, and gets a promotion because his boss sees the car and thinks he is getting to work earlier and staying later than anyone else. (The strategy goes awry for him, and is not recommended for any aspiring partners in a consulting firm.)

A second finding is that women, particularly those with young children, were much more likely to request greater flexibility through more formal means, such as returning from maternity leave with an explicitly reduced schedule. Men who requested a paternity leave seemed to be punished come review time, and so may have felt more need to take time to spend with their families through those unofficial methods.

The result of this is easy to see: Those specifically requesting a lighter workload, who were disproportionately women, suffered in their performance reviews; those who took a lighter workload more discreetly didn’t suffer. The maxim of “ask forgiveness, not permission” seemed to apply.

It would be dangerous to extrapolate too much from a study at one firm, but Ms. Reid said in an interview that since publishing a summary of her research in Harvard Business Review she has heard from people in a variety of industries describing the same dynamic.

High-octane professional service firms are that way for a reason, and no one would doubt that insane hours and lots of travel can be necessary if you’re a lawyer on the verge of a big trial, an accountant right before tax day or an investment banker advising on a huge merger.

But the fact that the consultants who quietly lightened their workload did just as well in their performance reviews as those who were truly working 80 or more hours a week suggests that in normal times, heavy workloads may be more about signaling devotion to a firm than really being more productive. The person working 80 hours isn’t necessarily serving clients any better than the person working 50.

In other words, maybe the real problem isn’t men faking greater devotion to their jobs. Maybe it’s that too many companies reward the wrong things, favoring the illusion of extraordinary effort over actual productivity.

Ms. Rendell was a prolific writer of intricately plotted mystery novels that combined psychological insight, social conscience and teeth-chattering terror.

WASHINGTON — A decade after emergency trailers meant to shelter Hurricane Katrina victims instead caused burning eyes, sore throats and other more serious ailments, the Environmental Protection Agency is on the verge of regulating the culprit: formaldehyde, a chemical that can be found in commonplace things like clothes and furniture.

But an unusual assortment of players, including furniture makers, the Chinese government, Republicans from states with a large base of furniture manufacturing and even some Democrats who championed early regulatory efforts, have questioned the E.P.A. proposal. The sustained opposition has held sway, as the agency is now preparing to ease key testing requirements before it releases the landmark federal health standard.

The E.P.A.’s five-year effort to adopt this rule offers another example of how industry opposition can delay and hamper attempts by the federal government to issue regulations, even to control substances known to be harmful to human health.

Continue reading the main story

 

Document: The Formaldehyde Fight

Formaldehyde is a known carcinogen that can also cause respiratory ailments like asthma, but the potential of long-term exposure to cause cancers like myeloid leukemia is less well understood.

The E.P.A.’s decision would be the first time that the federal government has regulated formaldehyde inside most American homes.

“The stakes are high for public health,” said Tom Neltner, senior adviser for regulatory affairs at the National Center for Healthy Housing, who has closely monitored the debate over the rules. “What we can’t have here is an outcome that fails to confront the health threat we all know exists.”

The proposal would not ban formaldehyde — commonly used as an ingredient in wood glue in furniture and flooring — but it would impose rules that prevent dangerous levels of the chemical’s vapors from those products, and would set testing standards to ensure that products sold in the United States comply with those limits. The debate has sharpened in the face of growing concern about the safety of formaldehyde-treated flooring imported from Asia, especially China.

What is certain is that a lot of money is at stake: American companies sell billions of dollars’ worth of wood products each year that contain formaldehyde, and some argue that the proposed regulation would impose unfair costs and restrictions.

Determined to block the agency’s rule as proposed, these industry players have turned to the White House, members of Congress and top E.P.A. officials, pressing them to roll back the testing requirements in particular, calling them redundant and too expensive.

“There are potentially over a million manufacturing jobs that will be impacted if the proposed rule is finalized without changes,” wrote Bill Perdue, the chief lobbyist at the American Home Furnishings Alliance, a leading critic of the testing requirements in the proposed regulation, in one letter to the E.P.A.

Industry opposition helped create an odd alignment of forces working to thwart the rule. The White House moved to strike out key aspects of the proposal. Subsequent appeals for more changes were voiced by players as varied as Senator Barbara Boxer, Democrat of California, and Senator Roger Wicker, Republican of Mississippi, as well as furniture industry lobbyists.

Hurricane Katrina in 2005 helped ignite the public debate over formaldehyde, after the deadly storm destroyed or damaged hundreds of thousands of homes along the Gulf of Mexico, forcing families into temporary trailers provided by the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

The displaced storm victims quickly began reporting respiratory problems, burning eyes and other issues, and tests then confirmed high levels of formaldehyde fumes leaking into the air inside the trailers, which in many cases had been hastily constructed.

Public health advocates petitioned the E.P.A. to issue limits on formaldehyde in building materials and furniture used in homes, given that limits already existed for exposure in workplaces. But three years after the storm, only California had issued such limits.

Industry groups like the American Chemistry Council have repeatedly challenged the science linking formaldehyde to cancer, a position championed by David Vitter, the Republican senator from Louisiana, who is a major recipient of chemical industry campaign contributions, and whom environmental groups have mockingly nicknamed “Senator Formaldehyde.”

Continue reading the main story

Typical

laminate

flooring

CLEAR FINISH LAYER

Often made of melamine resin

PATTERN LAYER

Paper printed to resemble wood,

or a thin wood veneer

GLUE

Layers may be bound using

formaldehyde-based glues

CORE LAYER

Fiberboard or other

composite, formed using

formaldehyde-based adhesives

BASE LAYER

Moisture-resistant vapor barrier

What is formaldehyde?

Formaldehyde is a common chemical used in many industrial and household products as an adhesive, bonding agent or preservative. It is classified as a volatile organic compound. The term volatile means that, at room temperature, formaldehyde will vaporize, or become a gas. Products made with formaldehyde tend to release this gas into the air. If breathed in large quantities, it may cause health problems.

WHERE IT IS COMMONLY FOUND

POTENTIAL HEALTH RISKS

Pressed-wood and composite wood products

Wallpaper and paints

Spray foam insulation used in construction

Commercial wood floor finishes

Crease-resistant fabrics

In cigarette smoke, or in the fumes from combustion of other materials, including wood, oil and gasoline.

Exposure to formaldehyde in sufficient amounts may cause eye, throat or skin irritation, allergic reactions, and respiratory problems like coughing, wheezing or asthma.

Long-term exposure to high levels has been associated with cancer in humans and laboratory animals.

Exposure to formaldehyde may affect some people more severely than others.

Sources: Consumer Product Safety Commission; Minnesota Department of Health

 

By The New York Times

By 2010, public health advocates and some industry groups secured bipartisan support in Congress for legislation that ordered the E.P.A. to issue federal rules that largely mirrored California’s restrictions. At the time, concerns were rising over the growing number of lower-priced furniture imports from Asia that might include contaminated products, while also hurting sales of American-made products.

Maneuvering began almost immediately after the E.P.A. prepared draft rules to formally enact the new standards.

White House records show at least five meetings in mid-2012 with industry executives — kitchen cabinet makers, chemical manufacturers, furniture trade associations and their lobbyists, like Brock R. Landry, of the Venable law firm. These parties, along with Senator Vitter’s office, appealed to top administration officials, asking them to intervene to roll back the E.P.A. proposal.

The White House Office of Management and Budget, which reviews major federal regulations before they are adopted, apparently agreed. After the White House review, the E.P.A. “redlined” many of the estimates of the monetary benefits that would be gained by reductions in related health ailments, like asthma and fertility issues, documents reviewed by The New York Times show.

As a result, the estimated benefit of the proposed rule dropped to $48 million a year, from as much as $278 million a year. The much-reduced amount deeply weakened the agency’s justification for the sometimes costly new testing that would be required under the new rules, a federal official involved in the effort said.

“It’s a redlining blood bath,” said Lisa Heinzerling, a Georgetown University Law School professor and a former E.P.A. official, using the Washington phrase to describe when language is stricken from a proposed rule. “Almost the entire discussion of these potential benefits was excised.”

Senator Vitter’s staff was pleased.

“That’s a huge difference,” said Luke Bolar, a spokesman for Mr. Vitter, of the reduced estimated financial benefits, saying the change was “clearly highlighting more mismanagement” at the E.P.A.

The review’s outcome galvanized opponents in the furniture industry. They then targeted a provision that mandated new testing of laminated wood, a cheaper alternative to hardwood. (The California standard on which the law was based did not require such testing.)

But E.P.A. scientists had concluded that these laminate products — millions of which are sold annually in the United States — posed a particular risk. They said that when thin layers of wood, also known as laminate or veneer, are added to furniture or flooring in the final stages of manufacturing, the resulting product can generate dangerous levels of fumes from often-used formaldehyde-based glues.

Industry executives, outraged by what they considered an unnecessary and financially burdensome level of testing, turned every lever within reach to get the requirement removed. It would be particularly onerous, they argued, for small manufacturers that would have to repeatedly interrupt their work to do expensive new testing. The E.P.A. estimated that the expanded requirements for laminate products would cost the furniture industry tens of millions of dollars annually, while the industry said that the proposed rule over all would cost its 7,000 American manufacturing facilities over $200 million each year.

“A lot of people don’t seem to appreciate what a lot of these requirements do to a small operation,” said Dick Titus, executive vice president of the Kitchen Cabinet Manufacturers Association, whose members are predominantly small businesses. “A 10-person shop, for example, just really isn’t equipped to handle that type of thing.”

Photo

 

Big industry players also weighed in. Executives from companies including La-Z-Boy, Hooker Furniture and Ashley Furniture all flew to Washington for a series of meetings with the offices of lawmakers including House Speaker John Boehner, Republican of Ohio, and about a dozen other lawmakers, asking several of them to sign a letter prepared by the industry to press the E.P.A. to back down, according to an industry report describing the lobbying visit.

Within a matter of weeks, two letters — using nearly identical language — were sent by House and Senate lawmakers to the E.P.A. — with the industry group forwarding copies of the letters to the agency as well, and then posting them on its website.

The industry lobbyists also held their own meeting at E.P.A. headquarters, and they urged Jim Jones, who oversaw the rule-making process as the assistant administrator for the agency’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention, to visit a North Carolina furniture manufacturing plant. According to the trade group, Mr. Jones told them that the visit had “helped the agency shift its thinking” about the rules and how laminated products should be treated.

The resistance was particularly intense from lawmakers like Mr. Wicker of Mississippi, whose state is home to major manufacturing plants owned by Ashley Furniture Industries, the world’s largest furniture maker, and who is one of the biggest recipients in Congress of donations from the industry’s trade association. Asked if the political support played a role, a spokesman for Mr. Wicker replied: “Thousands of Mississippians depend on the furniture manufacturing industry for their livelihoods. Senator Wicker is committed to defending all Mississippians from government overreach.”

Individual companies like Ikea also intervened, as did the Chinese government, which claimed that the new rule would create a “great barrier” to the import of Chinese products because of higher costs.

Perhaps the most surprising objection came from Senator Boxer, of California, a longtime environmental advocate, whose office questioned why the E.P.A.’s rule went further than her home state’s in seeking testing on laminated products. “We did not advocate an outcome, other than safety,” her office said in a statement about why the senator raised concerns. “We said ‘Take a look to see if you have it right.’ ”

Safety advocates say that tighter restrictions — like the ones Ms. Boxer and Mr. Wicker, along with Representative Doris Matsui, a California Democrat, have questioned — are necessary, particularly for products coming from China, where items as varied as toys and Christmas lights have been found to violate American safety standards.

While Mr. Neltner, the environmental advocate who has been most involved in the review process, has been open to compromise, he has pressed the E.P.A. not to back down entirely, and to maintain a requirement that laminators verify that their products are safe.

An episode of CBS’s “60 Minutes” in March brought attention to the issue when it accused Lumber Liquidators, the discount flooring retailer, of selling laminate products with dangerous levels of formaldehyde. The company has disputed the show’s findings and test methods, maintaining that its products are safe.

“People think that just because Congress passed the legislation five years ago, the problem has been fixed,” said Becky Gillette, who then lived in coastal Mississippi, in the area hit by Hurricane Katrina, and was among the first to notice a pattern of complaints from people living in the trailers. “Real people’s faces and names come up in front of me when I think of the thousands of people who could get sick if this rule is not done right.”

An aide to Ms. Matsui rejected any suggestion that she was bending to industry pressure.

“From the beginning the public health has been our No. 1 concern,” said Kyle J. Victor, an aide to Ms. Matsui.

But further changes to the rule are likely, agency officials concede, as they say they are searching for a way to reduce the cost of complying with any final rule while maintaining public health goals. The question is just how radically the agency will revamp the testing requirement for laminated products — if it keeps it at all.

“It’s not a secret to anybody that is the most challenging issue,” said Mr. Jones, the E.P.A. official overseeing the process, adding that the health consequences from formaldehyde are real. “We have to reduce those exposures so that people can live healthy lives and not have to worry about being in their homes.”

A 2-minute-42-second demo recording captured in one take turned out to be a one-hit wonder for Mr. Ely, who was 19 when he sang the garage-band classic.

Hockey is not exactly known as a city game, but played on roller skates, it once held sway as the sport of choice in many New York neighborhoods.

“City kids had no rinks, no ice, but they would do anything to play hockey,” said Edward Moffett, former director of the Long Island City Y.M.C.A. Roller Hockey League, in Queens, whose games were played in city playgrounds going back to the 1940s.

From the 1960s through the 1980s, the league had more than 60 teams, he said. Players included the Mullen brothers of Hell’s Kitchen and Dan Dorion of Astoria, Queens, who would later play on ice for the National Hockey League.

One street legend from the heyday of New York roller hockey was Craig Allen, who lived in the Woodside Houses projects and became one of the city’s hardest hitters and top scorers.

“Craig was a warrior, one of the best roller hockey players in the city in the ’70s,” said Dave Garmendia, 60, a retired New York police officer who grew up playing with Mr. Allen. “His teammates loved him and his opponents feared him.”

Young Craig took up hockey on the streets of Queens in the 1960s, playing pickup games between sewer covers, wearing steel-wheeled skates clamped onto school shoes and using a roll of electrical tape as the puck.

His skill and ferocity drew attention, Mr. Garmendia said, but so did his skin color. He was black, in a sport made up almost entirely by white players.

“Roller hockey was a white kid’s game, plain and simple, but Craig broke the color barrier,” Mr. Garmendia said. “We used to say Craig did more for race relations than the N.A.A.C.P.”

Mr. Allen went on to coach and referee roller hockey in New York before moving several years ago to South Carolina. But he continued to organize an annual alumni game at Dutch Kills Playground in Long Island City, the same site that held the local championship games.

The reunion this year was on Saturday, but Mr. Allen never made it. On April 26, just before boarding the bus to New York, he died of an asthma attack at age 61.

Word of his death spread rapidly among hundreds of his old hockey colleagues who resolved to continue with the event, now renamed the Craig Allen Memorial Roller Hockey Reunion.

The turnout on Saturday was the largest ever, with players pulling on their old equipment, choosing sides and taking once again to the rink of cracked blacktop with faded lines and circles. They wore no helmets, although one player wore a fedora.

Another, Vinnie Juliano, 77, of Long Island City, wore his hearing aids, along with his 50-year-old taped-up quads, or four-wheeled skates with a leather boot. Many players here never converted to in-line skates, and neither did Mr. Allen, whose photograph appeared on a poster hanging behind the players’ bench.

“I’m seeing people walking by wondering why all these rusty, grizzly old guys are here playing hockey,” one player, Tommy Dominguez, said. “We’re here for Craig, and let me tell you, these old guys still play hard.”

Everyone seemed to have a Craig Allen story, from his earliest teams at Public School 151 to the Bryant Rangers, the Woodside Wings, the Woodside Blues and more.

Mr. Allen, who became a yellow-cab driver, was always recruiting new talent. He gained the nickname Cabby for his habit of stopping at playgrounds all over the city to scout players.

Teams were organized around neighborhoods and churches, and often sponsored by local bars. Mr. Allen, for one, played for bars, including Garry Owen’s and on the Fiddler’s Green Jokers team in Inwood, Manhattan.

Play was tough and fights were frequent.

“We were basically street gangs on skates,” said Steve Rogg, 56, a mail clerk who grew up in Jackson Heights, Queens, and who on Saturday wore his Riedell Classic quads from 1972. “If another team caught up with you the night before a game, they tossed you a beating so you couldn’t play the next day.”

Mr. Garmendia said Mr. Allen’s skin color provoked many fights.

“When we’d go to some ignorant neighborhoods, a lot of players would use slurs,” Mr. Garmendia said, recalling a game in Ozone Park, Queens, where local fans parked motorcycles in a lineup next to the blacktop and taunted Mr. Allen. Mr. Garmendia said he checked a player into the motorcycles, “and the bikes went down like dominoes, which started a serious brawl.”

A group of fans at a game in Brooklyn once stuck a pole through the rink fence as Mr. Allen skated by and broke his jaw, Mr. Garmendia said, adding that carloads of reinforcements soon arrived to defend Mr. Allen.

And at another racially incited brawl, the police responded with six patrol cars and a helicopter.

Before play began on Saturday, the players gathered at center rink to honor Mr. Allen. Billy Barnwell, 59, of Woodside, recalled once how an all-white, all-star squad snubbed Mr. Allen by playing him third string. He scored seven goals in the first game and made first string immediately.

“He’d always hear racial stuff before the game, and I’d ask him, ‘How do you put up with that?’” Mr. Barnwell recalled. “Craig would say, ‘We’ll take care of it,’ and by the end of the game, he’d win guys over. They’d say, ‘This guy’s good.’”

The magical quality Mr. Lesnie created in shooting the “Babe” films caught the eye of the director Peter Jackson, who chose him to film the fantasy epic.

The bottle Mr. Sokolin famously broke was a 1787 Château Margaux, which was said to have belonged to Thomas Jefferson. Mr. Sokolin had been hoping to sell it for $519,750.

Public perceptions of race relations in America have grown substantially more negative in the aftermath of the death of a young black man who was injured while in police custody in Baltimore and the subsequent unrest, far eclipsing the sentiment recorded in the wake of turmoil in Ferguson, Mo., last summer.

Americans are also increasingly likely to say that the police are more apt to use deadly force against a black person, the latest New York Times/CBS News poll finds.

The poll findings highlight the challenges for local leaders and police officials in trying to maintain order while sustaining faith in the criminal justice system in a racially polarized nation.

Sixty-one percent of Americans now say race relations in this country are generally bad. That figure is up sharply from 44 percent after the fatal police shooting of Michael Brown and the unrest that followed in Ferguson in August, and 43 percent in December. In a CBS News poll just two months ago, 38 percent said race relations were generally bad. Current views are by far the worst of Barack Obama’s presidency.

The negative sentiment is echoed by broad majorities of blacks and whites alike, a stark change from earlier this year, when 58 percent of blacks thought race relations were bad, but just 35 percent of whites agreed. In August, 48 percent of blacks and 41 percent of whites said they felt that way.

Looking ahead, 44 percent of Americans think race relations are worsening, up from 36 percent in December. Forty-one percent of blacks and 46 percent of whites think so. Pessimism among whites has increased 10 points since December.

Continue reading the main story

Do you think race relations in the United States are generally good or generally bad?

60

40

20

0

White

Black

May '14

May '15

Generally bad

 

 

Continue reading the main story

Do you think race relations in the United States are getting better, getting worse or staying about the same?

Getting worse

Staying the same

Getting better

Don't know/No answer

All adults

Whites

Blacks

44%

37

17

46

36

16

41

42

15

 

 

The poll finds that profound racial divisions in views of how the police use deadly force remain. Blacks are more than twice as likely to say police in most communities are more apt to use deadly force against a black person — 79 percent of blacks say so compared with 37 percent of whites. A slim majority of whites say race is not a factor in a police officer’s decision to use deadly force.

Overall, 44 percent of Americans say deadly force is more likely to be used against a black person, up from 37 percent in August and 40 percent in December.

Blacks also remain far more likely than whites to say they feel mostly anxious about the police in their community. Forty-two percent say so, while 51 percent feel mostly safe. Among whites, 8 in 10 feel mostly safe.

One proposal to address the matter — having on-duty police officers wear body cameras — receives overwhelming support. More than 9 in 10 whites and blacks alike favor it.

Continue reading the main story

How would you describe your feelings about the police in your community? Would you say they make you feel mostly safe or mostly anxious?

Mostly safe

Mostly anxious

Don't know/No answer

All adults

Whites

Blacks

75%

21

3

81

16

3

51

42

7

 

 

Continue reading the main story

In general, do you think the police in most communities are more likely to use deadly force against a black person, or more likely to use it against a white person, or don’t you think race affects police use of deadly force?

Police more likely to use deadly force against a black person

Police more likely to use deadly force against a white person

Race DOES NOT affect police use of deadly force

Don't know/No answer

All adults

Whites

Blacks

44%

37%

79%

2%

2%

1%

46%

53%

16%

9%

8%

4%

 

 

Continue reading the main story

Do you favor or oppose on-duty police officers wearing video cameras that would record events and actions as they occur?

Favor

Oppose

Don't know/No answer

All adults

Whites

Blacks

92%

93%

93%

6%

5%

5%

2%

2%

2%

 

 

Asked specifically about the situation in Baltimore, most Americans expressed at least some confidence that the investigation by local authorities would be conducted fairly. But while nearly two-thirds of whites think so, fewer than half of blacks agree. Still, more blacks are confident now than were in August regarding the investigation in Ferguson. On Friday, six members of the police force involved in the arrest of Mr. Gray were charged with serious offenses, including manslaughter. The poll was conducted Thursday through Sunday; results from before charges were announced are similar to those from after.

Reaction to the recent turmoil in Baltimore, however, is similar among blacks and whites. Most Americans, 61 percent, say the unrest after Mr. Gray’s death was not justified. That includes 64 percent of whites and 57 percent of blacks.

Continue reading the main story

As you may know, a Baltimore man, Freddie Gray, recently died after being in the custody of the Baltimore police. How much confidence do you have that the investigation by local authorities into this matter will be conducted fairly?

A lot

Some

Not much

None at all

Don't know/No answer

All adults

Whites

Blacks

29%

31

22

14

5

31

33

20

11

5

20

26

30

22

 

 

In general, do you think the unrest in Baltimore after the death of Freddie Gray was justified, or do you think the unrest was not justified?

Justified

Not justified

Don't know/No answer

All adults

Whites

Blacks

28%

61

11

26

64

11

37

57

6

 

 

WASHINGTON — The last three men to win the Republican nomination have been the prosperous son of a president (George W. Bush), a senator who could not recall how many homes his family owned (John McCain of Arizona; it was seven) and a private equity executive worth an estimated $200 million (Mitt Romney).

The candidates hoping to be the party’s nominee in 2016 are trying to create a very different set of associations. On Sunday, Ben Carson, a retired neurosurgeon, joined the presidential field.

Senator Marco Rubio of Florida praises his parents, a bartender and a Kmart stock clerk, as he urges audiences not to forget “the workers in our hotel kitchens, the landscaping crews in our neighborhoods, the late-night janitorial staff that clean our offices.”

Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin, a preacher’s son, posts on Twitter about his ham-and-cheese sandwiches and boasts of his coupon-clipping frugality. His $1 Kohl’s sweater has become a campaign celebrity in its own right.

Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky laments the existence of “two Americas,” borrowing the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s phrase to describe economically and racially troubled communities like Ferguson, Mo., and Detroit.

Photo

 

“Some say, ‘But Democrats care more about the poor,’ ” Mr. Paul likes to say. “If that’s true, why is black unemployment still twice white unemployment? Why has household income declined by $3,500 over the past six years?”

We are in the midst of the Empathy Primary — the rhetorical battleground shaping the Republican presidential field of 2016.

Harmed by the perception that they favor the wealthy at the expense of middle-of-the-road Americans, the party’s contenders are each trying their hardest to get across what the elder George Bush once inelegantly told recession-battered voters in 1992: “Message: I care.”

Their ability to do so — less bluntly, more sincerely — could prove decisive in an election year when power, privilege and family connections will loom large for both parties.

Questions of understanding and compassion cost Republicans in the last election. Mr. Romney, who memorably dismissed the “47 percent” of Americans as freeloaders, lost to President Obama by 63 percentage points among voters who cast their ballots for the candidate who “cares about people like me,” according to exit polls.

And a Pew poll from February showed that people still believe Republicans are indifferent to working Americans: 54 percent said the Republican Party does not care about the middle class.

That taint of callousness explains why Senator Ted Cruz of Texas declared last week that Republicans “are and should be the party of the 47 percent” — and why another son of a president, Jeb Bush, has made economic opportunity the centerpiece of his message.

With his pedigree and considerable wealth — since he left the Florida governor’s office almost a decade ago he has earned millions of dollars sitting on corporate boards and advising banks — Mr. Bush probably has the most complicated task making the argument to voters that he understands their concerns.

On a visit last week to Puerto Rico, Mr. Bush sounded every bit the populist, railing against “elites” who have stifled economic growth and innovation. In the kind of economy he envisions leading, he said: “We wouldn’t have the middle being squeezed. People in poverty would have a chance to rise up. And the social strains that exist — because the haves and have-nots is the big debate in our country today — would subside.”

Continue reading the main story

 

Who Is Running for President (and Who’s Not)?

Republicans’ emphasis on poorer and working-class Americans now represents a shift from the party’s longstanding focus on business owners and “job creators” as the drivers of economic opportunity.

This is intentional, Republican operatives said.

In the last presidential election, Republicans rushed to defend business owners against what they saw as hostility by Democrats to successful, wealthy entrepreneurs.

“Part of what you had was a reaction to the Democrats’ dehumanization of business owners: ‘Oh, you think you started your plumbing company? No you didn’t,’ ” said Grover Norquist, the conservative activist and president of Americans for Tax Reform.

But now, Mr. Norquist said, Republicans should move past that. “Focus on the people in the room who know someone who couldn’t get a job, or a promotion, or a raise because taxes are too high or regulations eat up companies’ time,” he said. “The rich guy can take care of himself.”

Democrats argue that the public will ultimately see through such an approach because Republican positions like opposing a minimum-wage increase and giving private banks a larger role in student loans would hurt working Americans.

“If Republican candidates are just repeating the same tired policies, I’m not sure that smiling while saying it is going to be enough,” said Guy Cecil, a Democratic strategist who is joining a “super PAC” working on behalf of Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Republicans have already attacked Mrs. Clinton over the wealth and power she and her husband have accumulated, caricaturing her as an out-of-touch multimillionaire who earns hundreds of thousands of dollars per speech and has not driven a car since 1996.

Mr. Walker hit this theme recently on Fox News, pointing to Mrs. Clinton’s lucrative book deals and her multiple residences. “This is not someone who is connected with everyday Americans,” he said. His own net worth, according to The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, is less than a half-million dollars; Mr. Walker also owes tens of thousands of dollars on his credit cards.

But showing off a cheap sweater or boasting of a bootstraps family background not only helps draw a contrast with Mrs. Clinton’s latter-day affluence, it is also an implicit argument against Mr. Bush.

Mr. Walker, who featured a 1998 Saturn with more than 100,000 miles on the odometer in a 2010 campaign ad during his first run for governor, likes to talk about flipping burgers at McDonald’s as a young person. His mother, he has said, grew up on a farm with no indoor plumbing until she was in high school.

Mr. Rubio, among the least wealthy members of the Senate, with an estimated net worth of around a half-million dollars, uses his working-class upbringing as evidence of the “exceptionalism” of America, “where even the son of a bartender and a maid can have the same dreams and the same future as those who come from power and privilege.”

Mr. Cruz alludes to his family’s dysfunction — his parents, he says, were heavy drinkers — and recounts his father’s tale of fleeing Cuba with $100 sewn into his underwear.

Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey notes that his father paid his way through college working nights at an ice cream plant.

But sometimes the attempts at projecting authenticity can seem forced. Mr. Christie recently found himself on the defensive after telling a New Hampshire audience, “I don’t consider myself a wealthy man.” Tax returns showed that he and his wife, a longtime Wall Street executive, earned nearly $700,000 in 2013.

The story of success against the odds is a political classic, even if it is one the Republican Party has not been able to tell for a long time. Ronald Reagan liked to say that while he had not been born on the wrong side of the tracks, he could always hear the whistle. Richard Nixon was fond of reminding voters how he was born in a house his father had built.

“Probably the idea that is most attractive to an average voter, and an idea that both Republicans and Democrats try to craft into their messages, is this idea that you can rise from nothing,” said Charles C. W. Cooke, a writer for National Review.

There is a certain delight Republicans take in turning that message to their advantage now.

“That’s what Obama did with Hillary,” Mr. Cooke said. “He acknowledged it openly: ‘This is ridiculous. Look at me, this one-term senator with dark skin and all of America’s unsolved racial problems, running against the wife of the last Democratic president.”

Mr. King sang for the Drifters and found success as a solo performer with hits like “Spanish Harlem.”

Mr. Alger, who served five terms from Texas, led Republican women in a confrontation with Lyndon B. Johnson that may have cost Richard M. Nixon the 1960 presidential election.

Mr. Miller, of the firm Weil, Gotshal & Manges, represented companies including Lehman Brothers, General Motors and American Airlines, and mentored many of the top Chapter 11 practitioners today.

Mr. Tepper was not a musical child and had no formal training, but he grew up to write both lyrics and tunes, trading off duties with the other member of the team, Roy C. Bennett.

From sea to shining sea, or at least from one side of the Hudson to the other, politicians you have barely heard of are being accused of wrongdoing. There were so many court proceedings involving public officials on Monday that it was hard to keep up.

In Newark, two underlings of Gov. Chris Christie were arraigned on charges that they were in on the truly deranged plot to block traffic leading onto the George Washington Bridge.

Ten miles away, in Lower Manhattan, Dean G. Skelos, the leader of the New York State Senate, and his son, Adam B. Skelos, were arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation on accusations of far more conventional political larceny, involving a job with a sewer company for the son and commissions on title insurance and bond work.

The younger man managed to receive a 150 percent pay increase from the sewer company even though, as he said on tape, he “literally knew nothing about water or, you know, any of that stuff,” according to a criminal complaint the United States attorney’s office filed.

The success of Adam Skelos, 32, was attributed by prosecutors to his father’s influence as the leader of the Senate and as a potentate among state Republicans. The indictment can also be read as one of those unfailingly sad tales of a father who cannot stop indulging a grown son. The senator himself is not alleged to have profited from the schemes, except by being relieved of the burden of underwriting Adam.

The bridge traffic caper is its own species of crazy; what distinguishes the charges against the two Skeloses is the apparent absence of a survival instinct. It is one thing not to know anything about water or that stuff. More remarkable, if true, is the fact that the sewer machinations continued even after the former New York Assembly speaker, Sheldon Silver, was charged in January with taking bribes disguised as fees.

It was by then common gossip in political and news media circles that Senator Skelos, a Republican, the counterpart in the Senate to Mr. Silver, a Democrat, in the Assembly, could be next in line for the criminal dock. “Stay tuned,” the United States attorney, Preet Bharara said, leaving not much to the imagination.

Even though the cat had been unmistakably belled, Skelos father and son continued to talk about how to advance the interests of the sewer company, though the son did begin to use a burner cellphone, the kind people pay for in cash, with no traceable contracts.

That was indeed prudent, as prosecutors had been wiretapping the cellphones of both men. But it would seem that the burner was of limited value, because by then the prosecutors had managed to secure the help of a business executive who agreed to record calls with the Skeloses. It would further seem that the business executive was more attentive to the perils of pending investigations than the politician.

Through the end of the New York State budget negotiations in March, the hopes of the younger Skelos rested on his father’s ability to devise legislation that would benefit the sewer company. That did not pan out. But Senator Skelos did boast that he had haggled with Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, a Democrat, in a successful effort to raise a $150 million allocation for Long Island to $550 million, for what the budget called “transformative economic development projects.” It included money for the kind of work done by the sewer company.

The lawyer for Adam Skelos said he was not guilty and would win in court. Senator Skelos issued a ringing declaration that he was unequivocally innocent.

THIS was also the approach taken in New Jersey by Bill Baroni, a man of great presence and eloquence who stopped outside the federal courthouse to note that he had taken risks as a Republican by bucking his party to support paid family leave, medical marijuana and marriage equality. “I would never risk my career, my job, my reputation for something like this,” Mr. Baroni said. “I am an innocent man.”

The lawyer for his co-defendant, Bridget Anne Kelly, the former deputy chief of staff to Mr. Christie, a Republican, said that she would strongly rebut the charges.

Perhaps they had nothing to do with the lane closings. But neither Mr. Baroni nor Ms. Kelly addressed the question of why they did not return repeated calls from the mayor of Fort Lee, N.J., begging them to stop the traffic tie-ups, over three days.

That silence was a low moment. But perhaps New York hit bottom faster. Senator Skelos, the prosecutors charged, arranged to meet Long Island politicians at the wake of Wenjian Liu, a New York City police officer shot dead in December, to press for payments to the company employing his son.

Sometimes it seems as though for some people, the only thing to be ashamed of is shame itself.

HOBART, Tasmania — Few places seem out of reach for China’s leader, Xi Jinping, who has traveled from European capitals to obscure Pacific and Caribbean islands in pursuit of his nation’s strategic interests.

So perhaps it was not surprising when he turned up last fall in this city on the edge of the Southern Ocean to put down a long-distance marker in another faraway region, Antarctica, 2,000 miles south of this Australian port.

Standing on the deck of an icebreaker that ferries Chinese scientists from this last stop before the frozen continent, Mr. Xi pledged that China would continue to expand in one of the few places on earth that remain unexploited by humans.

He signed a five-year accord with the Australian government that allows Chinese vessels and, in the future, aircraft to resupply for fuel and food before heading south. That will help secure easier access to a region that is believed to have vast oil and mineral resources; huge quantities of high-protein sea life; and for times of possible future dire need, fresh water contained in icebergs.

It was not until 1985, about seven decades after Robert Scott and Roald Amundsen raced to the South Pole, that a team representing Beijing hoisted the Chinese flag over the nation’s first Antarctic research base, the Great Wall Station on King George Island.

But now China seems determined to catch up. As it has bolstered spending on Antarctic research, and as the early explorers, especially the United States and Australia, confront stagnant budgets, there is growing concern about its intentions.

China’s operations on the continent — it opened its fourth research station last year, chose a site for a fifth, and is investing in a second icebreaker and new ice-capable planes and helicopters — are already the fastest growing of the 52 signatories to the Antarctic Treaty. That gentlemen’s agreement reached in 1959 bans military activity on the continent and aims to preserve it as one of the world’s last wildernesses; a related pact prohibits mining.

But Mr. Xi’s visit was another sign that China is positioning itself to take advantage of the continent’s resource potential when the treaty expires in 2048 — or in the event that it is ripped up before, Chinese and Australian experts say.

“So far, our research is natural-science based, but we know there is more and more concern about resource security,” said Yang Huigen, director general of the Polar Research Institute of China, who accompanied Mr. Xi last November on his visit to Hobart and stood with him on the icebreaker, Xue Long, or Snow Dragon.

With that in mind, the polar institute recently opened a new division devoted to the study of resources, law, geopolitics and governance in Antarctica and the Arctic, Mr. Yang said.

Australia, a strategic ally of the United States that has strong economic relations with China, is watching China’s buildup in the Antarctic with a mix of gratitude — China’s presence offers support for Australia’s Antarctic science program, which is short of cash — and wariness.

“We should have no illusions about the deeper agenda — one that has not even been agreed to by Chinese scientists but is driven by Xi, and most likely his successors,” said Peter Jennings, executive director of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute and a former senior official in the Australian Department of Defense.

“This is part of a broader pattern of a mercantilist approach all around the world,” Mr. Jennings added. “A big driver of Chinese policy is to secure long-term energy supply and food supply.”

That approach was evident last month when a large Chinese agriculture enterprise announced an expansion of its fishing operations around Antarctica to catch more krill — small, protein-rich crustaceans that are abundant in Antarctic waters.

“The Antarctic is a treasure house for all human beings, and China should go there and share,” Liu Shenli, the chairman of the China National Agricultural Development Group, told China Daily, a state-owned newspaper. China would aim to fish up to two million tons of krill a year, he said, a substantial increase from what it currently harvests.

Because sovereignty over Antarctica is unclear, nations have sought to strengthen their claims over the ice-covered land by building research bases and naming geographic features. China’s fifth station will put it within reach of the six American facilities, and ahead of Australia’s three.

Chinese mappers have also given Chinese names to more than 300 sites, compared with the thousands of locations on the continent with English names.

In the unspoken competition for Antarctica’s future, scientific achievement can also translate into influence. Chinese scientists are driving to be the first to drill and recover an ice core containing tiny air bubbles that provide a record of climate change stretching as far back as 1.5 million years. It is an expensive and delicate effort at which others, including the European Union and Australia, have failed.

In a breakthrough a decade ago, European scientists extracted an ice core nearly two miles long that revealed 800,000 years of climate history. But finding an ice core going back further would allow scientists to examine a change in the earth’s climate cycles believed to have occurred 900,000 to 1.2 million years ago.

China is betting it has found the best location to drill, at an area called Dome A, or Dome Argus, the highest point on the East Antarctic Ice Sheet. Though it is considered one of the coldest places on the planet, with temperatures of 130 degrees below zero Fahrenheit, a Chinese expedition explored the area in 2005 and established a research station in 2009.

“The international community has drilled in lots of places, but no luck so far,” said Xiao Cunde, a member of the first party to reach the site and the deputy director of the Institute for Climate Change at the Chinese Academy of Meteorological Sciences. “We think at Dome A we will have a straight shot at the one-million-year ice core.”

Mr. Xiao said China had already begun drilling and hoped to find what scientists are looking for in four to five years.

To support its Antarctic aspirations, China is building a sophisticated $300 million icebreaker that is expected to be ready in a few years, said Xia Limin, deputy director of the Chinese Arctic and Antarctic Administration in Beijing. It has also bought a high-tech fixed-wing aircraft, outfitted in the United States, for taking sensitive scientific soundings from the ice.

China has chosen the site for its fifth research station at Inexpressible Island, named by a group of British explorers who were stranded at the desolate site in 1912 and survived the winter by excavating a small ice cave.

Mr. Xia said the inhospitable spot was ideal because China did not have a presence in that part of Antarctica, and because the rocky site did not have much snow, making it relatively cheap to build there.

Anne-Marie Brady, a professor of political science at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand and the author of a soon-to-be-released book, “China as a Polar Great Power,” said Chinese scientists also believed they had a good chance of finding mineral and energy resources near the site.

“China is playing a long game in Antarctica and keeping other states guessing about its true intentions and interests are part of its poker hand,” she said. But she noted that China’s interest in finding minerals was presented “loud and clear to domestic audiences” as the main reason it was investing in Antarctica.

Because commercial drilling is banned, estimates of energy and mineral resources in Antarctica rely on remote sensing data and comparisons with similar geological environments elsewhere, said Millard F. Coffin, executive director of the Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies in Hobart.

But the difficulty of extraction in such severe conditions and uncertainty about future commodity prices make it unlikely that China or any country would defy the ban on mining anytime soon.

Tourism, however, is already booming. Travelers from China are still a relatively small contingent in the Antarctic compared with the more than 13,000 Americans who visited in 2013, and as yet there are no licensed Chinese tour operators.

But that is about to change, said Anthony Bergin, deputy director of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute. “I understand very soon there will be Chinese tourists on Chinese vessels with all-Chinese crew in the Antarctic,” he said.