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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...effect, the Senate is already putting the brakes on some of the more innovative ideas. Under its version of the bill, three of the pilot programs that have the most potential to transform health care would require congressional approval before the Secretary could apply them to Medicare nationally. The first is known as "accountable care organizations," an arrangement in which hospitals, primary-care doctors and potentially other medical professionals would have to coordinate care for their shared Medicare patients. All would be held accountable for the results and share in any cost savings. The second is the concept of "bundling...
While enthusiastic about the district's reform plans, Boasberg is the first to admit that some of its turnarounds - and, by extension, some of the turnarounds across the country - will not succeed. "If we had a magic formula for school success, we wouldn't be lagging behind other countries like we are right now," he says. "We have to be prepared that some of these efforts will fail, but I'm confident that on the whole, they'll do far better than what they are replacing...
...Denver public-school system, which for more than a year has been utilizing such a growth model, is one of the first districts to adopt school turnaround plans that mimic those favored by the Education Department. On Nov. 30, the city's school board approved measures that would have the district employ each of the four turnaround strategies at various schools across the district. "We can't pretend that modest changes to the status quo are going to deliver significantly different results," says Denver superintendent Tom Boasberg, who has been on the job for a year since replacing former superintendent...
Wastewater treatment is much more energy-intensive than composting, which needs little more than time (about a year) for complete decomposition and pathogen elimination. In Austin, Texas, a sustainably minded nonprofit called the Rhizome Collective succeeded this year in getting the city to approve what may be the first legal composting toilet in the U.S. "The hypocrisy is amazing," says Lauren Ross, 54, a civil engineer involved in Rhizome's four-year battle to get a permit. "The city will buy you a low-flow toilet, but they'll fight you all the way if you want to build...
...alas, Berlusconi is back to spending his downtime with a well-paid cadre of more than a dozen avvocati, who have been successful so far in keeping their biggest client clear of criminal convictions. Not that the lawyers have ever really gone away. Since the media baron first ran for office 15 years ago, his legal advisers have doubled as political consiglieri, key members of Parliament and even important Cabinet Ministers. Indeed, while some critics have spoken of Berlusconi's reign as a kind of sultanate of showgirls or government by gaffe, others have described it as a republic...