Slate

PoliceWestminster: A resident of Stacey Lee Drive told police Monday that property was stolen from her vehicle. Loss was estimated at $100.Westminster: An employee of Masonry Contractors told police Monday that someone damaged windows in a house under construction on Slate Drive. Loss was estimated at $300.FireWestminster: Units responded at 7: 17 a.m. Tuesday to a fire alarm in the 100 block of E. Green St. Units were out 22 minutes.

After complaining for years about aggressive fund-raising by the General Assembly's Democratic leadership, Maryland's Republican legislators said yesterday that they will follow suit and attempt to raise an unprecedented $1 million for GOP candidates in 2002.The Republican lawmakers, who have raised no more than about $100,000 in past campaigns, said they had no choice if they are to remain competitive. Democrats waged a concerted fund-raising drive last year and added six legislative seats.

BRADENTON, Fla. -- Venator Group Inc., the biggest U.S. athletic shoe retailer, said yesterday that shareholders defeated a dissident slate of board nominees proposed by its largest shareholder.The operator of the Foot Locker and Champs sporting-goods chains, formerly known as Woolworth Corp., said holders voted 70 percent for its slate, rejecting the four nominees from Greenway Partners LP, which holds about 14 percent of Venator's shares.The shareholders also defeated separate proposals from Greenway to change Venator's name back to Woolworth and to revoke its "poison pill" anti-takeover measure, by 70 percent and 80 percent margins, respectively.

After Information Resource Engineering Inc.'s stock tumbled, Steven N. Bronson didn't sell his 150,000 shares and search for another high-tech company promising to take off.Instead, he tried a coup, proposing to overthrow IRE's board and replace it with his own candidates.Whether the attempt succeeds will become clear Friday. At IRE's White Marsh headquarters, shareholders will choose between the company's nominees -- four incumbents and one new member -- and Bronson's.Bronson, 32, president of Barber & Bronson Inc., a Miami-based brokerage, said his attempt follows a long series of disappointments.

With a hint of tension hanging in the air, Information Resource Engineering Inc. investors yesterday rejected a shareholder's attempt to oust the company's board and install his own slate of candidates.By a margin of approximately 3-to-1, shareholders elected Anthony A. Caputo, the chairman and chief executive officer, and four other management nominees -- three of them current directors -- to one-year terms on the board. About 80 percent of the 5.5 million shares were voted, Caputo said.

Republicans in the General Assembly said yesterday they want to close a loophole that Senate Democrats hope to exploit to steer unlimited amounts of campaign money to candidates they support.The 31 incumbent Democrats, led by Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller, have created the Maryland Democratic Senatorial Committee -- a so-called "slate" -- in an attempt to raise and shift hundreds of thousands of dollars to candidates who might need it, particularly nine incumbents targeted by the GOP.Under Maryland election law, a candidate is limited to transferring $6,000 through his or her campaign committee to any other committee.

A controversial campaign committee formed by Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller to protect Democratic control of Maryland's upper chamber has more than $430,000 on hand to defend against Republican challenges, campaign finance records show.In a report filed this week, the Maryland Democratic Senatorial Committee reported that it has raised $636,298 and has spent $200,387 -- most of it on polling.That leaves a campaign fund of about $436,000 from which Miller can direct large sums to the most embattled of his party's incumbents.

Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller has found an apparent loophole that permits him to avoid disclosing which candidates his "super-slate" of Democratic senators is supporting with $240,000 in direct-mail spending.In a campaign finance report filed Friday, the Maryland Democratic Senatorial Committee showed the slate has spent $240,000 of the $643,334 it has collected on payments to a direct-mail company, Sheingold Associates of Sacramento, Calif.The slate has been controversial since the Senate president formed it last year to defend Democratic control of the upper chamber of the General Assembly.

One day after Ron Carey stepped down as president of the Teamsters, supporters of James P. Hoffa say they would ask the federal government to remove the rest of Carey's slate of officers from their elected union posts.Richard Leebove, a Hoffa aide based in Detroit, said yesterday his office would ask Mary Jo White, U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, to form a coalition government to run the union until a new election is held."Basically, we are saying that the people who are currently in office and running the union really shouldn't be there," he said.

Among the growing clan of "webzines" -- online magazines -- Slate is the geeky new kid, someone extremely easy to pick on. It has been savaged in print, television and, most effectively, on the Internet. Upright for barely 90 days, Slate (www.slate.com) seems to have a "kick-me" sign posted on its back.The latest boot comes from a brilliant parody called, appropriately, Stale (www.stale.com). It's a direct hit, a devastating mimicry of Slate's been-there, litigated-that attitude.As with all good parody, nothing is sacred.

Baltimore County Executive James T. Smith Jr. has been raising money for months for an all-but-declared campaign for state comptroller. But this week he announced he's not going to run. That surely must be an annoyance for the donors who pushed his account to well upward of $1 million, but it has the potential to do much more damage to the integrity (using the word loosely) of Maryland's campaign finance system. Mr. Smith is the charter member of the Baltimore County Victory Slate, an entity under Maryland campaign finance law designed to allow like-minded candidates to pool their resources.

Colonial Players has just completed its One-Act Festival, providing in two weekends what its producer called "a learning lab for aspiring directors." The combination of nine plays produced by Beth Terranova was called "Fun and Mind Games," consisting of old and new comedies and dramas to please casual theater-goers. Different slates were offered on different evenings: Slate 1 featured six short plays and Slate 2 had three plays, including a 45-minute comedy, Civilization and Its Malcontents.

College basketball Men's NCAA tournament NOON, 7 P.M. [CHS. 13, 9] More madness. Today's 16-game first-round slate features our two local teams, with No. 15 seed UMBC facing No. 2 seed Georgetown at 2:55 p.m. (approximately), and No. 16 seed Mount St. Mary's tipping off against No. 1 seed North Carolina at 7:10.

2006 Clean Slate Riesling From: Mosel-Saar-Ruwer, Germany Price: $11 Serve with: Asian cuisine, pork and sauerkraut Years ago, you had this choice with German wines: incomprehensible label and potentially fine wine or simple label and assuredly awful wine. This wine offers both simplicity and exciting quality. It's a dry riesling - nothing cloying about it, with intense flavors of slate, pears, sweet peas and peach. And it's topped off with a sophisticated, freshness-preserving screw cap.

From: Mendocino, Calif. Price: $15 Serve with: Grilled seafood This is not a flashy wine. It's just a very pure, fresh, penetrating sauvignon blanc that is true to its varietal character without going overboard in any way. It's pleasingly herbal without straying into shrillness. There are attractive notes of slate, juniper and citrus fruit. The finish is clean and satisfying.

Baltimore County Executive James T. Smith Jr.'s campaign contributed more than $300,000 to a fundraising committee that in turn gave most of the money to fellow Democrat Scott D. Shellenberger's campaign for county state's attorney, prompting a complaint to state prosecutors. State prosecutors "found no criminal violation of the election laws," according to a letter dated yesterday and provided by Smith's campaign. Shellenberger received the contributions, reported last night by WBAL-TV, from the Baltimore County Victory Slate last month and this month, according to state campaign finance reports.

On October 28, 2006, ELEANOR H. (nee Heaps) THOMPSON, of Delta, PA; beloved wife of the late Curtis V. "Dick" Thompson; loving mother of Linda M. Thompson, David V. Thompson and Marian T. Koegel; dear sister of Marshall T. Heaps, Jr. Viewing on Wednesday from 2 to 4 and 6 to 9 P.M. at Harkins Funeral Home, 600 Main Street, Delta, PA. Funeral Service on Thursday at 11 A.M. at Slate Ridge Presbyterian Church, 1630 Chestnut Street, Cardiff, MD. Interment in...

"The Democratic County Council slate backed by Executive J. Hugh Nichols and state senator James Clark, Jr., made a showing in Tuesday's primary election. "Incumbent Council members Elizabeth Bobo, Ruth Keeton and Lloyd Knowles rolled up victories, with C. Vernon Gray, a member of their slate, placing fourth. Nichols-backed James H. Clark took the fifth place. "In the general election, they will face Republican Charles C. Feaga. "Angela M. Beltram, an independent Democrat, ran sixth.

The Senate is expected to vote on a constitutional amendment next week to allow laws punishing the burning of the American flag. The House approved it last year, and the Senate Judiciary Committee has sent the measure to the floor. It needs 67 votes if all senators participate, and supporters are within striking distance of that number. It would be the first time in the nation's history that Congress has proposed an amendment to curtail First Amendment rights. Freedom of speech is a bedrock principle of our constitutional system and should be restricted only after careful deliberation.

JERUSALEM -- The Fatah movement that dominates Palestinian politics was immersed in turmoil yesterday as leaders sought to avert a potentially damaging party split five weeks before elections to parliament. Members of Fatah's so-called young guard insisted they had no intention of backing down after submitting a list of candidates to rival the official Fatah slate. The renegades offered a candidate roster, under the name of a new party called The Future, with jailed uprising leader Marwan Barghouti at the top. The official Fatah slate also placed Barghouti in the top slot.