Rogue

PARIS -- Saddam Hussein's latest exercise in provocation again raises the problem of Washington's preoccupation with ''rogue states.''''Standing up'' to these easily condemnable enemies is self-satisfying but does not accomplish much. President Saddam has outlasted George Bush and is likely to outlast President Clinton. In his last defiance of Mr. Clinton, in 1996, his troops moved into Iraqi Kurdistan to overrun a costly CIA operation. The United States launched some missiles in retaliation, to no practical effect.

Four patients treated at Johns Hopkins Hospital are likely to have contracted hepatitis C from a rogue medical technician accused of stealing drugs and leaving contaminated needles behind, lab tests have confirmed. Special molecular testing on blood specimens done by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that the patients were infected with strains of hepatitis C closely related to infections linked to David Kwiatkowski, state health officials said Friday. The new cases bring to five the number of people in Maryland believed infected by Kwiatkowski.

Berkeley, California. -- The White House insistence on branding Iran as a ''rogue'' state undid Conoco's oil-drilling deal with Tehran. But it also threatens to undo a century of Anglo-American control over Mideast oil -- a control that has allowed American consumers in particular to enjoy low prices at the gasoline pump for that same long stretch of time.Two forces in particular are now challenging that control. One, well documented in the U.S. press, is the Islamic revolution. The second, much less known, is the emergence of France and Russia as contenders vying for their own access to Mideast oil. Both forces stand to benefit from the Middle Eastern power vacuum created by Washington's policy of branding certain oil-rich Middle Eastern nations as rogues largely because of their opposition to the U.S.-initiated Israeli-Palestinian peace process.

Here we go -- second week with these All-Stars. I hate Brooke's dress from mid-thigh down. It's like a cute dress got attacked by an unraveled loofah. Tom jokes that Pamela went home and left behind a "trail of body glitter. " Melissa Rycroft &  Tony Dovolani -- Jive In rehearsal, Melissa says that everyone is dancing now at the level they dance in finals during a regular season. Melissa and Tony didn't get to perform the jive during her regular season because of a rib injury -- the judges had to judge based on rehearsal footage.

Baltimore City's liquor trade is on the threshold of a major change. Under an emergency bill recently signed into law by Gov. William Donald Schaefer, all liquor stores masquerading as taverns will have to adjust their legal status by next March.This crackdown will affect 150 to 200 of the 625 establishments with 7-day tavern licenses, mostly in inner-city neighborhoods.As the middle class has moved to the suburbs and fear of crime has diminished night-time trade, many once-thriving corner taverns have abolished their bars and seating areas altogether but continue operating as package-goods stores from behind bullet-proof partitions.

THE MISSILE that North Korea shot over Japan advertised that starving country's steady improvement in weapons. Lunatic as the regime of Kim Jong Il often appears, its dependence on food aid from the democracies and nuclear reactors as a bribe to avoid developing weapons-grade fuel do not guarantee good behavior.The country that is perpetually threatening to disintegrate just demonstrated its new capability to inflict severe damage to targets more than 1,000 miles away, that is, in Russia, China, South Korea and Japan.

SUNDAY, when the highway through Israel opens to link Gaza and the West Bank, Palestinians will gain tangible results long promised by the peace process.There's another in store, too: An Israeli Cabinet committee authorized Prime Minister Ehud Barak to dismantle any of 42 rogue Israeli settlements planted without legal authority in the West Bank. This is a token of what must come.On the other side, the Palestinian Authority has timidly begun to crack down on the illegal weapons trade in the West Bank.

Working to clean up the damage to its finances and its image left behind by an alleged "rogue trader" who cost it $750 million, Allfirst Financial Inc. has enlisted a former Clinton banking official with the more staid reputation as a "rogue regulator." Eugene A. Ludwig was once the top banking regulator in the nation. From 1993 to 1998, he implemented broad reforms and rewrote the country's community banking regulations. And showing a quality that no doubt led to his latest endeavor, Ludwig did so while remaining in the banking industry's good favor.

ASHEVILLE, N.C. - The billboard worker owed money he didn't have, so he found a way to erase his debt: He let his creditor cover six billboards with a biblical passage condemning homosexuality. That deal backfired spectacularly, at least for the employee. Billboards are meant to be seen, after all. When sign company executives saw them a few weeks ago, they promptly fired the worker and papered over the unauthorized messages. But many people couldn't get over the sight of a half-dozen billboards in Buncombe County coated with the Old Testament words of Leviticus 20:13: "If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be put upon them."

The State of the Union is frigid, slippery and to be taken with huge gobs of salt. What happened over the weekend was a foretaste. One day the Potomac will rise up and drown Washington. Yasser Arafat is no longer an unelected terrorist rogue. He is a duly elected, legitimized rogue. Don't count Yeltsin out. He is running for re-election against the Yeltsin reforms.

More than 20 Cherry Hill residents have filed a $25 million lawsuit against a Cleveland-based security company, claiming the company's officers routinely overstep their authority and abuse citizens' rights. "They act like cowboy-wannabe cops," William H. "Billy" Murphy Jr., the residents' attorney, said at a news conference Tuesday at a community church. "We're tired of it, and we're going to put them in their place. " The suit names three officers employed by Tenable Protective Services, two of whom have been appointed as "special police officers," a little-known classification for security guards in Maryland that grants them limited police powers within specific areas.

Under Armour, a company that angles to outfit the country's most prominent sports stars, has managed to get in on one of the most highly anticipated movies of the year -- "The Dark Knight Rises. " The Baltimore sportswear maker has declared itself the "official outfitter" of the movie's football team, the Gotham Rogues. Under Armour made the team's uniforms featured in the movie. And they're making the fanwear that people can buy. There are jerseys, jackets and hats, all in the team colors that look suspiciously similar to a certain team from Pittsburgh.

Mention valet parking in Little Italy to Justin Duvall, and he'll rattle off stories of valet drivers clogging traffic, parking cars in residential spots and blocking off public spaces with cones. "I've moved cones before," said Duvall, 29, a lifelong resident of the neighborhood. "If it's not their spot, if the street signs don't say 'No parking,' it's fair game. " In Little Italy, Fells Point and other city neighborhoods where restaurants and clubs commingle with houses and apartments, complaints about valet parking companies have grown common.

The investigation of a Baltimore homicide detective, accused of conducting an unauthorized search at an apartment while looking for his missing teenage daughter, has broadened as authorities seek to determine whether other law enforcement resources were used to aid the search. According to law enforcement sources, city investigators are trying to determine whether officers improperly used phone-tracking technology to help find Detective Daniel T. Nicholson IV's 15-year-old daughter, who ran away from home Friday.

A Baltimore police detective who was thrust into the national spotlight while leading the investigation into a teenager who disappeared has been suspended after authorities said he allegedly went on a rogue hunt for his own missing daughter. Law enforcement sources — one within the city police department, another affiliated with police who has information on the case — said Tuesday that investigators are probing allegations that detective Daniel Thomas Nicholson IV used his badge while off duty to gain entry to homes in an unauthorized search.

In its own special way, my Xbox 360 let me know it was time for some spring cleaning this week. I could've danced with Bill Gates' minions and mailed in my system for service. Instead, like Sarah Palin, I went rogue.  Before we begin, let's get something straight: Microsoft didn't want me to do what I did to my Xbox. I had to break at least three different sticker seals that clearly stated that I was voiding any and all warranties by doing what I did. If you ever plan on sending your system to Microsoft for service or reselling it as a "pure" system, do not do what I'm about to describe.

Gaetano "Tom" Vella, 100, who was credited with developing the Italian-style cheese industry in Northern California and southern Oregon more than 60 years ago, died Tuesday in Sonoma, Calif.He was founder and owner of Vella Cheese Co. in Sonoma and the Rogue River Valley Cheese factory in Central Point, Ore.Pub Date: 12/29/98

The way the captain of the Norwegian Dawn tells the story, the sea was calming after a storm when a 70-foot wave seemed to come out of nowhere and hammer the ship carrying 2,200 passengers on a Bahamas cruise this month. The wave swept over the 10th deck, smashing windows, flooding 62 cabins and injuring four people. Like others before him, the captain was bewildered by the watery hammer that struck his ship. In fact, rogue waves, rising high out of the sea to surprise captains and smash ships, have been part of maritime lore for as long as ships have sailed.

The bloody mayhem allegedly committed by a U.S. soldier in Afghanistan Sunday couldn't have come at a worse time. The killings, which left up to 16 Afghan civilians dead, are likely to inflame an already tense situation fueled by growing Afghan resentment over the presence of U.S. and NATO troops in their country. Recent weeks have seen an upsurge in anti-American protests erupting into violence againstU.S. military and diplomatic personnel. American officials need to find out the circumstances of the latest killings as quickly as possible and make the results public.

A Washington D.C. restaurant is getting by with a little help from the chef's friends. When R.J. Cooper, the chef/owner of Rogue 24, underwent planned open-heart surgery at Johns Hopkins earlier this week, the Washington D.C. restaurant didn't temporarily close. Instead, 12 of Cooper's friends are stepping in -- each for a week -- to lend a hand while Cooper recovers. The restaurant is calling the series of collaborations the Rogue Sessions. Each evening features a 24-course dinner consisting of 12 of the visiting chef's dishes and 12 Rogue 24 favorites.