Indiana Gazette from Indiana, Pennsylvania • 11

CLASSlFlEDSi Elsewhere Sunday. June 18. 2(106 News from the nation, world Gazette 'sf Classifieds 93rLX inside Og-i BRIEFS Ex-security officials thrive lic offering in the stock market." Scott Amcy, general counsel at the Project on (-ovemmeni Oversight, based in Washington, said of the booming domestic security market. What troubles Amey are nut the lucrative paychecks earned by former officials, but what he sees as an effort to disregard the spirit of the lobbying ban in pursuit of those rewards. "It is a dirty way to get around the conflict-of-interest and ethics rules." Amey said.

"It is legal. But is it appropriate? I don't think so." By EMC UPTON New York Times News Service WASHINGTON Dozens of members of the Bush administration's domestic security team, assembled after the 2001 terrorist attacks, are now collecting bigger paychecks in different roles: working on behalf of companies that sett domestic security products, many directly to the federal agencies the officials once helped run. At least 90 officials at the Department of Homeland Security or the White House Office of former, officials. federal law prohibits senior executive branch officials from lob-hying former government colleagues or subordinates for at least a year after leaving public service. But by exploiting loopholes in the law including one provision drawn up by department executives to facilitate their entry into the business world it is often easy for former officials to do just that.

Ridge, the former secretary, was appointed to the Savi board three months after resigning from the department and has Homeland Security including the department's former secretary. Tom Ridge; the former deputy secretary. Adm. lames M. Loy: and the former undersecretary (and current candidate for the governorship of Arkansas).

Asa Hutchinson are executives, consultants or lohbyists for companies that collectively do billions of dollars' worth of domestic security business. More than two-thirds of the department's most senior executives in its first years have moved through the revolving door That pattern raises questions for some been compensated with an undisclosed number of stock options. The shift to the private sector is hardly without precedent in Washington, where generations of former administration officials have sought higher-paying jobs in industries they once regulated. But veteran Washington lobby -isrs and watchdog groups say the exodus of such a sizable share of an agency's senior management before the end of an administration has few modern parallels. "It ts almost like an initial pub Soldiers point fingi at superiors WASHINGTON A new criminal investigation into the killings of three Iraqis by U.S.

servicemen north of Baghdad last month has been set in motion by soldiers who alerted military officials that higher-ranking soldiers had caused the deaths of the men. who were being held in custody, according to government officials. The deaths, which occurred on May 9, are being investigated by the Army's Criminal Investigation Command on the orders of the U.S. military's second-highest officer in Iraq, Lt. Gen.

Peter W. Chiarelli. The three Iraqis allegedly were killed by U.S. troops in Salahaddin Province, a restive Sunni Arab region north of Baghdad. The deaths of the Iraqi men occurred during the same incident, officials said.

The soldiers whose conduct is being investigated asserted after the deaths that they had acted because they believed the three men were trying to escape. Sew York Times Newsservice Violence erupts in Sri Lanka MANNAR. Sri Lanka (AP) Sri Lankan troops in boats and helicopters battled Tamil rebels Saturday, and witnesses accused government forces of opening Tire in a fishing village, killing five people one inside a church and wounding dozens. The surging violence heightened feare that the island nation was moving toward a return to all-out civil war. The past several days have seen the worst violence since a 2002 cease-fire between the government and the Tamil Tigers, who control much of Sri Lanka's north and east.

Tamil Tiger rebels said they had killed 12 soldiers; the navy said three sailors were killed and eight were missing. The military said up to 30 rebels were killed in the fighting, but rebels acknowledged only two wounded. Five teens killed in New Orleans NEW ORLEANS (AP) Five people ranging in age from 16 to 19 were killed in a street shooting early Saturday, the most violent crime reported in this slowly re-populating city since Hurricane Katrina hit last August. All were believed to have been gunned down in a vol ley of bullets on a street in the Central City neighbor hood just outside the central business district. Three of the victims were found in a sport utility vehicle rammed against a utility pole and two were found on the street.

Authorities said they were looking for one or more suspects but did not elaborate. Capt. John Bryson said police think the shootings were either drug-related or some type of retaliation attack. A semiautomatic weapon was used and "multiple, multiple rounds" were fired, he said. Pomp marks queen's birthday LONDON (AP) British soldiers in tall bearskin hats marched before Queen Elizabeth I) and military jets saluted her with a flyby over Buckingham Palace on Saturday in the second round of celebrations of her 80th birthday.

Thousands of Londoners and tourists many waving small Union Jack flags yelled "Happy Birthday!" to the queen, who waved back with a white-gloved hand. Elizabeth, wearing a deep purple coat and hat, rode down the mall near the palace in an ivory carriage built for Queen Victoria in 1842 for the ceremony at the Horseguards Parade ground in central London. Mounted members of the Household Carvary rode before her. dad in golden armor. JBSFHMBUKAssoriaecl Press KRISTER WONG listened to proceedings during commencement at Dartmouth College June 11 in Hanover, N.H.

Wong, the class day speaker at the college, is one ot more than 10 percent of graduating seniors at Dartmouth who applied tor the rapidly expanding Teach tor America program. Teach for America catches on with more and more graduates Officials struggle with Iran nuke talks ly ELAINE SCtOURO New York Times News Service PARIS The success or failure of the international initiative to curb Iran's nuclear program hinges largely on an ostensibly clear-cut request: before talks can begin. Tehran must freeze all activities related to the enrichment of uranium. But while that demand seems surgically precise, what it actually means is unclear. It has become the subject of anxious diplomacy around the world a sort ol prenegotia-tion negotiation centered on finding a definition that the Iranians and the six countries behind the initiative can accept.

The results will determine if the talks move ahead or fail before they formally Start. Iran has long insisted that it will never give up its "right" to enrich uranium. At the other end of the spectrum, the Bush administration and some nuclear experts have maintained that Iran should not he allowed to spin a single centrifuge the machines that in large clusters can enrich, or concentrate, uranium into a form that can fuel nuclear reactors or atom bombs. Hut in interviews and statements, officials from several countries have begun to show signs of optimism and flexibility, suggesting that players on both sides are struggling to create momentum for talks by finding common ground and avoiding a clash over the issue. The question is whether some low level of enrichment activity, couched as will be deemed permissible and whether the objections to such a move will yield to compromise.

"The definition of enrichment is very important." a senior Iranian official said. "The words in the package are not holy words. This will he a political decision. V.ach side will have to meet the other halfway." Despite its Longstanding objections to Iranian enrichment, the Bush administration recently relented and agreed to leave open in the offer the possibility that Tehran could one day enrich uranium if it proved beyond a reasonable doubt that its program was peaceful. That show of flexibility, diplomats said, might presage a compromise on what Washington would now define as suspension.

Defined narrowly. Iran's suspension of enrichment might consist of nnthing more complex than stopping the injection of uranium gas into its centrifuges, while leaving the machines running. (This is standard practice, as slowing the spinning rotors is a risky procedure that can cause them to wobble and crash, destroying the centrifuges.) Defined broadly, suspension could include halting the spinning machines at Natanz, ending the production of centrifuges and their pans at factories across Iran, stopping the letting of such machines, stopping the import of centrifuge materials and ending the con versionof uranium at Isfahan. Diplomats said the six nations had agreed in let Iran continue to convert uranium. The question now is where to draw the line on enrichment.

"I TOLO THEM right up front that I was going to go to med school. They liked that even better. one-third stay in the classroom following their two-year stints. But TFA says about two-thirds haw remained directly involved in education if not as teachers, then in research, policy and in many cases starting charter schools. TFA counts 10 alumni in elective office, including Natasha kamrani, recently elected to Houston's school board.

The goal is 100 alumni in public office by 2010. "(liven our theory of change," Kopp said in a phone interview, "numbers are everything." The growth plan is ambitious. TFA's budget will have to grow from $40 million to $100 million a year, the vast majority from private donors. But Kopp says recruiting is what she worries most about. The challenge is both quantity and quality.

TFA spends about $1 2.000 on each corps member per year, and about $4,000 of that goes into recruiting applicants, then evaluating whom to hire through a rigorous interview process. fti JUSTIN POPE AP Education Writer It's the strongest job market in years for new college graduates, with salaries and perks rising accordingly. But one of the country's hottest recruiters this spring promised low wages, exhausting labor and only a brief break before the work begins. Teach for America is surging in popularity. At sites around the country, the 17-yeai-old nonprofit has begun training about 2,400 recent graduates for two-year teaching stints in disadvantaged schools, nearly triple the figure in 2000.

Nearly 19,000 college seniors applied and more than four in five were turned down. At Notre Dame. Spelman, Dartmouth and Yale, more than 10 percent of seniors applied. TFA has come a long way since founder Wendy Kopp used fliers to recruit her first corps of 500 teachers, a year after outlining the idea in her 1989 Princeton senior thesis. Today she has full lime recruiters.

By 2010. TFA plans to expand the number of Buffalo regions where it places teachers from 22 to 33, and nearly double in size. It hopes to call itself the No. I employer of recent college graduates in the country. Driving the growth is savvy and aggressive recruiting that students say exudes competence and reminds them of Wall Street firms.

But there's also straight talk about how hard it can be to leach in low-income schools. The combination seems to appeal to high-achieving students who relish a challenge and want to be in the trenches as long as they have help. "It sounds like it's going to take all your energy for two years." said lida Storch. a former University of Minnesota rower who will teach this fall at an elementary school in the Bronx. 'But I just graduated from college.

I've KristMl Dartmouth graduate got lots of energy." recruits, trains and helps get the new teachers alternative certification, then schools pay their salaries. The organizat km says il has proved the model can work. Now it is trying to build a critical mass of alumni who even if they move onto other fields like law or politics share the experience of having taught in low-income areas and may use those experiences to influence education policy. "I loki i hem right upfront that I was going to go to med school." said recent Dartmouth graduate Kristen Wong, who starts (his fall on a new site in Hawaii. "They liked that even better.

They pick people who become leaders in the community, who make policy, who vote." Some critics note fewer than Associated Press looking lames The a brief one of the 200th expedition. Mint Buffalo to roam again as pure gold coin Indian chief on the other side, duplicating the images created by famed artist Farle Fraser for the 1913 nickel. buffalo without the Indian chief made comeback on the nickel last year as the designs used to commemorate anniversary of the Lewis and Clark officials are hoping the new American gold coin will he a hit not only in this country bur around the world. The government already produces a 22-karat American Ragle gold coin. This is the first time the Mint has produced a 24 -karat coin, a designation that means the coin contains 99.99 percent gold as opposed to 91.67 percent gold content in the 22 -karat coins.

MAITTW CRUTfltta AP Economics Writer WASHINGTON The golden buffalo, the legendary symbol of the American West, will soon roam again this time as the nation's first pure gold coin. The U.S. Mint will start taking orders in the coming week for the coins. Officials believe they have found a winning combination that will appeal to nostalgia buffs and investors. The coin will be slightly larger and thicker than a Kennedy half dollar, will contain one ounce of gold and will be designated a $50 gold piece.

The actual price will depend on the mar- ket price of an ounce of gold, plus markups. The design is a replica of the popular buffalo nickel that was minted from 1913 to I93B. The golden buffalo has a buffalo standing on a grassy mound on one side and a stem-.