Refuses contributions
Walker ends a tradition by refusing to accept contributions to his reelection campaign from county employees. He will return any contributions already given and he does not expect them to attend his fund-raising events. He wants to evaluate his employees on their merits, not on their political loyalty.
I’ve seen too many times in government where the expectation to give comes with the job.
Passes second review
The team completes its second major system-level evaluation. Experts study the mission plan and spacecraft design and conclude that the project is ready to proceed. Review panel:
New Horizons has validated its preliminary design and the team can move ahead with more detailed design activities.
Tells daughter to seek mental help
Voight announces publicly that he thinks Jolie should seek help for her serious mental problems after learning she adopted a son from Cambodia. Jolie insists that she is fine and doesn’t want to make it more than it is.
I’m a desperate father. I’m trying to reach her. I just pray to God she hears me.
Defends increased BBC web spending
Highfield defends the previous year’s decision by the BBC to almost double the amount invested in the corporation’s websites. The corporation spent £100.4m on the internet last year, compared with £54.2m the year before. Including interactive television, the total expenditure rises to £111.6m. Highfield says future spending will be capped at 3%. Commercial rivals and some MPs have criticised the BBC’s spending, arguing it is using licence fee-payers’ money to provide online services already offered by the commercial sector.
Having arrived from the commercial sector, I’m always acutely aware of this. Whenever I think about where we’re going to put our money, I always carefully consider the consequences for the private sector. I trebled the amount we spend on nations and regions, increasing the number of Where I Live regional sites from 13 to 37. It doesn’t block out any commercial interest because most existing regional sites are heavily based on classified advertising.
A large proportion of the extra money was spent on upgrading the BBC’s server technology to cope with the increase in users following September 11.
Part of our original commitment was to encourage people to come on to the web and I think we’re doing that. Of the 500,000 visitors who used the Test the Nation site on the day of the broadcast, 300,000 had never visited the BBC site before.
Passes first review
The mission passes its first major review by technical experts who say that it is on track.
The Systems Requirements Review confirmed that New Horizons is making progress on spacecraft and scientific instrument design, and that we are ready to proceed toward the mission confirmation reviews that NASA is requesting.
Faster arrival
As the New Horizons team studies the mission and their launch window, they realize that they can get the probe to Pluto a year earlier than anticipated.
This [is] a great opportunity to improve our scientific return while reducing mission risks and costs. We’ll get a better look at Pluto itself, since more of the surface will be sunlit and the atmosphere will be another year away from freezing onto the planet’s surface. We’ll have more fuel for the journey into the Kuiper Belt after exploring Pluto-Charon, and the shorter cruise time reduces some of the costs associated with flight operations.
Mission approved
NASA selects the New Horizons proposal from Southwest Research Institute for a mission to Pluto and the Kuiper Belt System. Director of SRI space studies:
We’ll be exploring frontier worlds near the edge of the planetary system. This mission is likely to rewrite textbooks regarding the origin of the planets, the nature of the outer solar system, and even the origin of primitive materials that may have played a role in the development of life.
Sign Wye Agreement
Netanyahu and Arafat sign the Wye River Agreement. The agreement is a land-for-peace deal which is signed after a 21-hour discussion between the two parties mediated by US president Bill Clinton. Jordan’s King Hussein, is also in attendance, assisting in the negotiations. Netanyahu:
The agreement benefits both sides and leaves me brimming with some confidence that Israel and the Palestinians could reach a final accord, though I guarantee you it will not be easy.
Decides to sell Trump Plaza casino
Trump decides to sell Trump Plaza, one of his Atlantic City casinos, saying it could sell for as much as $1 billion. He says he will use the money to decrease his company’s $1.7 billion debt. The company’s stock has fallen 59 percent in the last year as casino revenues have remained stagnant. He says the decision is not a sign that he is losing interest in Atlantic City.
There is a thirst to come into Atlantic City, but it’s very hard to get land and it takes a long time to build from the ground up. I just feel, in a nutshell, that Atlantic City is hot, that I have the best properties and this is a good time to sell…We don’t need other markets. A lot of the Las Vegas developers, they now want to come into Atlantic City.
Michaelangelo Virus
McAfee tells journalists that a virus dubbed “Michelangelo,” which completely wipes the hard drive of infected computers, will be activated on as many as five million PCs. His declaration causes a near-panic in the computer-using world. But by March 7, nothing has happened. He is blamed for creating a false threat to sell more of his anti-virus software. Sales reportedly “skyrocket” with more than half of the companies in the Fortune 100 having purchased McAfee software.
Pollard boasted of working for Israeli Intelligence
Marshall, a friend of Pollard’s and co-graduate from Stanford, says that Pollard bragged about working for Israeli Intelligence, although his claims seemed contradictory. Pollard claimed frequently to be a colonel in the Israeli military and to have worked for Mossad, Israel’s foreign intelligence agency. However, while still in college, Pollard also said he was a captain in the Mossad.
That discrepancy indicated he wasn’t telling the truth all the time. [He] was unusually well-informed and quite articulate and made what might otherwise have been an outlandish series of claims quite convincing.
Marshall says he concluded at the time that Mr. Pollard might indeed have some connections with Israeli intelligence but that he probably had ”embroidered” his role. He also says Pollard was ”a committed Zionist, but fairly liberal” on certain questions of Middle East politics.
He described himself as part of an Israeli officers’ group that favored more open channels of communication with Egypt.
Establishes ACLU Women’s Rights Project
Ginsburg establishes the ACLU Women’s Rights Project. This was the major, and sometimes the only, national legal arm of the growing movement for gender equality, recognized as the spokesperson for women’s interests in the Supreme Court, and the “premier” representative of women’s rights interests in that forum. The Project works to enforce women’s statutory rights, including the rights to equal employment opportunities guaranteed under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act6 and the Equal Pay Act. Early cases challenge the constitutionality of sex discrimination, specifically measuring the constitutionality of sex-based classifications and striking down discriminatory Social Security regulations.
Escapes slavery
Truth escapes with her infant daughter, Sophia, leaving behind her other children because a New York emancipation order did not permit their freedom until they had served as bound servants into their twenties.
I did not run off, for I thought that wicked, but I walked off, believing that to be all right.
A family lets Truth move in with them and settles her remaining one year service account with her master, Dumont, for $20.
Sold
Truth’s master, Hardenbergh, dies and her family are separated. Neely, whom Truth remembered as harsh and violent, buysTruth at an auction with a flock of sheep for $100.
By then my father, Bomefree, who had been tall and straight in his youth, had grown old and sickly. No one wanted to buy him. Although my mother could have been sold, they decided to free her so that she could care for my father. The people who bought the hotel allowed my parents to continue to live in the cellar…As the enslaved became old and infirm, they became less useful to their owners, and too expensive to be kept and cared for. They were often, therefore, set free and left to care for themselves. This was especially heartless when their children had also been sold away and were not around to help look after them.