Think local, former U.N. leader Kofi Annan tells Miami forum

In the Ritz-Carlton ballroom in Coconut Grove on Monday, Kofi Annan, the former Secretary-General of the United Nations, addressed a crowd of well-dressed world savers to open the Continuity Forum of the Americas Business Council (abc*). In a speech that touched on the environment, the Arab awakening, democracy in Latin America, the spiraling conflict in Syria, nuclear war and resource scarcity, Annan encouraged attendees to address these and other problems by thinking local.

“People ask me all the time, ‘what should one do to become a global citizen?’ I tell them, get involved with your community, your city, your town, your village,” Annan said.

For abc*, a think tank dedicated to “people, planet and philanthropy” in the Americas, Miami is the center of that community. Smack dab in the middle of the hemisphere, for two years Miami has hosted the annual Continuity Forum that attracts more than 300 people from all over North and South America. Rebecca Mandelman, senior director of the abc* based in Miami Beach, said she has recently seen more and more of these would-be world changers coming to Miami to stay.

“There’s this intellectual thirst in Miami that brings a lot of these forces together,” Mandelman said. Referring to the co-sponsoring organizations — many of them local, like the Knight Foundation, Univision, PODER magazine and technology company Ico Group — she said, “Miami is like the fulcrum, the center for people in our community.”

The three-day conference, which sold tickets in advance, features a full roster of impressive speakers, including Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes. But the main focus is the competition between 32 “social entrepreneurs” who will present their projects to be judged by the five chairman of abc* and the foundation’s 23 fellows. The best three projects will receive $100,000 grants, media support and business connections for two years.

“We evaluate them by their potential to make the greatest impact,” said Mario Scarpetta, director of Colombian cement and energy company Inversiones Argos and co-chairman of abc*. To evaluate their effectiveness, he said abc* would review each project’s “strategic business plans and economic models of their impact.”

The projects range from a museum of sacred Peruvian plants and an indigenous tourism agency in Mexico to a Nicaraguan organization dedicated to fighting cancer and a “green roof” sustainable building company. The presentations, videos and question-and-answer sessions took place in English and Spanish, and Mandelman said she hoped the casual conversations between sessions would lead to future ideas and organizations.

Even entrepreneurs whose projects are not chosen for the abc* grant have the opportunity this week to interact with investors and leaders of the industries they seek to influence. Pati Ruiz of Grupo Ecológico Sierra Gorda in Mexico said her alliance of five conservation organizations is already active in central Mexico, but if awarded the grant she would use it to expand to the rest of the country and into South America.

“The strength of our project is that it’s already up and running,” Ruiz said in Spanish after her presentation. “We have the tools to expand and reproduce what we’re doing.”

Although most of the conference attendees were excited about the ideas, some expressed frustration with the lack of avenues for individuals to get involved.

“I think that’s the problem with a lot of these conferences: There are no action items, nothing you can really do if you’re not a big-time donor,” said one attendee who didn’t want to be named because he works for one of the co-sponsors of the conference. “We come, watch, applaud and leave.”

Still, abc* continues to connect some of the most creative innovators in a younger generation to current political and business leaders who have the resources to give their ideas wings, Mandelman said, and the rest of the Continuity Forum promises to help make this happen.

“We believe that collective engagement can advance the Americas,” she said.

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Crime Watch: Public corruption is a priority for Miami FBI office

Well, the elections are over and I want to thank all of those that participated in the most important process of our country. With that said, over the last couple of months I have received emails from many of you, regarding some of the articles that were printed regarding public corruption and what is being done about it.

Therefore, as in the past, I turned to our FBI partners to give us a synopsis of how they handle these situations, what is done and what you as a resident can do. This is not an easy task, but I hope after you read this you will have a better understanding.

I want to thank Supervisory Special Agent John Bernardo, a 13-year veteran of the FBI, who leads one of FBI Miami’s public corruption squads, for providing the information below.

* * *

One of the highest priorities of the FBI is investigating public corruption. This type of crime is a breach of the public’s trust by government officials and/or private individuals who use their public office for personal gain. Without this trust, our belief in a democratic society wanes and the fabric of our community begins to break down.

Our society entrusts government agencies to perform many vital functions, such as securing our borders, protecting our neighborhoods and handing down verdicts in court cases. During fiscal year 2012, FBI Miami’s public corruption task forces arrested 50 individuals, indicted 42, and assisted with the conviction of 45 people on public corruption charges. Many of these cases were brought to the attention of the FBI by tips from the public.

Public corruption involves illegal activity conducted at all levels of government. It can include corruption within law enforcement, legislative bodies, city or town governments, the judicial system, with contracts or regulatory issues, or the prison system. These types of corruption typically involve the payment of bribes or kickbacks in exchange for official action or inaction.

The FBI also investigates election fraud and campaign finance fraud. Election fraud entails interfering with a citizen’s right to vote or ballot tampering. Campaign finance fraud involves individuals who attempt to circumvent the limits individuals can contribute to election campaigns.

The FBI is singularly situated to combat this corruption with the skills and capabilities to run complex undercover operations and surveillance. Further, FBI Miami has established several public corruption task forces in partnership with many state and local law-enforcement agencies.

It is a violation of federal law for any federal or state government official to ask for or receive anything of value for or because of any official act. Under federal law, the person who offers or pays a bribe is also guilty. Because of the secretive nature of bribes, such crimes are often difficult to detect and even more difficult to prove without the assistance of concerned citizens. As a result, the FBI has set up a public corruption hotline for public tips at 877-628-2533. You also can contact the local FBI office by phone at 305-944-9101 or via email PublicCorruptionMiami@ic.fbi.gov.

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In closing I want us to remember our veterans today, those that are still with us and those who gave their lives for us to be free!

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Eddie Murphy's Famous Friends Honor Funnyman

From Coming to America to The Nutty Professor, Eddie Murphy has become a comedic icon -- and on Nov. 14 on Spike TV, the funnyman's funny friends, including Chris Rock, Arsenio Hall and Tracy Morgan, pay tribute to the actor.

On Eddie Murphy: One Night Only, the scantily-clad Morgan reveals how Murphy showed how to be both funny and sexy, Murphy revives his impression of Stevie Wonder and Arsenio attempts to get the comedian to do a bit of stand-up.

Check out the hilarious clips from the evening and let us know: What's your favorite Murphy movie?

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Accused mom-killing Harlem man Daniel Elias held without bail

An alleged matricidal maniac was ordered held without bail in Manhattan today, charged with fatally stabbing his mother in the chest and nearly fatally slashing and incinerating his brother in their East Harlem apartment Saturday afteroon.

Accused mom-murderer and arsonist Daniel Elias, 31, was led from Manhattan Criminal Court to jail, staggering and swaying as if drugged in his handcuffs and leg chains. He wore a hospital gown, gym shorts and socks, replacements for his blood soaked sweater, pants and shoes.

Elias, 31, has confessed to the attack on his mother, Ruth Montano, 55, and his brother, William, 32, prosecutors said.

"This is a very serious case -- one of the most serious crimes a defendant can commit," assistant district attorney Shawn McMahon told Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Charles Solomon in asking successfully for no bail.

"He attacked his brother with a kitchen knife," the prosecutor told the judge. "He stabbed his mother at least twice in the chest."

Elias then allegedly set fire to a couch in the living room, a fire that quickly spread, trapping the injured brother in a back bedroom, the prosecutor said.

As he left the building, which is on Park Avenue near 135th Street, "The defendant's face was covered in blood," as were his sweatshirt, sneakers, pants and shoes, the prosecutor said.

Mom Ruth Montano, 55, had asked her emotionally-disturbed son to leave the apartment as the family members argued, and died trying to save her other son as Elias stabbed him in the head and torso, a law enforcement source told The Post.

"The mother tried to stop him from stabbing the brother," the source said. "That's when she got killed."

Elias, who has been treated for mental illness in the past and did not live at the mother's home, was arrested soon after the attack as he walked in his blood-soaked clothes into 125th Street subway station on Lexington Avenue.

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Noven’s niche: The Miami company is key producer of transdermal patches

At the Noven Pharmaceuticals plant in southwest Miami, scientists and technicians use highly specialized machinery to blend prescription medications and adhesives to make layered transdermal patches that release precise quantities of drugs over time after being applied to a patient’s skin.

Noven, a subsidiary of Japan’s Hisamitsu Pharmaceutical, has about 700 employees nationwide and ranks as a relatively small player among pharma giants. Nonetheless, the company, a leading research and development center for medicinal patches, produces a line of specialty pharmaceuticals and is the U.S. market leader in sales of estrogen patches for women.

“By industry standards, Noven is a small company,” said Jeffrey F. Eisenberg, Noven’s Miami-based president and CEO. “But we have a line of specialized products that competes successfully in the U.S. and overseas. We are experts in developing transdermal patches and produce other pharmaceutical products.”

In one key market — estrogen patches for women — Noven holds about a 68 percent share, he added. And the company has a robust research and development department in Miami at work on a variety of new drugs.

Medications may be delivered to patients orally, via injection or through transdermal patches, which can administer drugs slowly over an extended period of time. While Noven makes products other than medicinal patches, it devotes an important share of resources to transdermal patch technology.

“We have a talented group of scientists who are at the forefront of this specialty,” Eisenberg said. “We have M.D.s, PhDs in biology and chemistry and chemical engineers who specialize in pressure-sensitive adhesives and polymer chemistry.”

Noven has won more than 30 U.S. and 100 international patents and is developing several new drugs. The company recently announced it is making progress on studies to evaluate a new, amphetamine-based transdermal patch for treating Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in children and adolescents. Currently, there is no such patch approved for use with ADHD, the company said.

Noven also has applied to the U.S. Food & Drug Administration for approval of a new oral, non-hormonal medication to treat menopausal hot flashes.

Making patches is a complex process that requires the design and development of an ideal combination of drug, adhesive and backing, Eisenberg said. Patches must be formulated so that they will deliver a safe and effective dose of medication over a period of time and adhere to the skin as required.

At the Noven patch facility, which has the capacity for making 500 million patches per year, active drug compounds are mixed with custom adhesives in large, specialized kettles. The mix of drug and adhesive is then applied to sheets of release liner material under very precise tolerances. Noven removes a blending solvent from the compound and applies the backing material, making a three-layer patch. Laminate rolls subsequently are sent to punching, pouching and packing machines (Patches are punched into different sizes.). All of this occurs under strict quality control procedures and is not open to the public.

Noven was founded in 1987 by Steven Sablotsky, a chemical engineer, who had worked for another pharmaceutical firm and was an expert in transdermal patches. Noven went public in 1988 and operated as a publicly-traded company until it was taken over in 2009 by Hisamitsu, a Japanese pharmaceutical company that also manufactures and markets transdermal patches. (Salonpas, an over-the-counter analgesic patch widely advertised in South Florida, is made by Hisamitsu.)

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Voter suppression and Florida’s butterfly effect

MiamiHerald.com/columnists

Edgar Oliva waited to vote at Shenandoah Elementary School and fretted.

The line was too long. The clock was ticking. He had to get to work across town.

Twice before, during in-person early voting, he tried to vote but he had to leave because lines were even longer. Tuesday was his third try at voting in between one of his two jobs, cleaning carpets in Doral and working at an airport hotel.

About 4 p.m. on Election Day, he gave up.

“I had the intention of voting but there were always a lot of people,” Oliva, a native of Guatemala, told a Miami Herald reporter as he left the scene.

Oliva had so much company on Tuesday.

Voter after voter who spoke to Herald reporters on Election Day said the longer early voting lines dissuaded them from casting early ballots in person. And then the unexpected long lines on Election Day just compounded the sense of frustration in some places. Many dropped out of line.

The experience played out across the state. Data show the 71.13 percent turnout percentage in 2012 fell well short of the rates in 2008 (75 percent) and 2004 (74 percent).

In 38 of 67 counties, fewer people cast a ballot for president this time than in 2008.

Only 80,351 more people voted now than in 2008 even though the voter rolls increased by 686,812, according to the latest numbers from the state’s elections division. The vote totals will change slightly as provisional ballots are counted.

Relatively speaking, Florida in 2012 moved backward when it came to voting.

If the statistics and the experience of voters like Oliva are not evidence of voter suppression, then we’ll need to change the definition of “suppressant” in Webster’s dictionary: “an agent (as a drug) that tends to suppress or reduce in intensity rather than eliminate something (as appetite).”

Tuesday showed the appetite was there.

But the government wasn’t.

The chief suppressant: HB1355, signed into law by Gov. Rick Scott in 2011.

The law shortened early voting periods. And it created a longer ballot by giving lawmakers the ability to print the entire text of proposed constitutional amendments because the courts kept rejecting the Legislature’s ballot summaries as misleading.

Early voting was shortened to prevent a repeat of 2008, when Barack Obama won Florida, largely on the strength of early voting. So Republicans cut early voting days from 14 to eight. And they loaded amendments on the ballot, which stretched for at least 10 pages in Miami-Dade.

The other voter suppressant was local: a lack of enough voting booths and ballot scanners in some precincts. That’s controlled by each county’s supervisor of elections.

Bottom line: there was less time to vote a longer ballot without adequate equipment this election.

There were a significant number of early votes — 2.4 million — and almost as many absentee ballots, 2.35 million. Together, the early and absentee ballots account for about 56 percent of those cast this election.

Republicans typically prefer absentee ballot voting. So it wasn’t touched by HB 1355. Democrats prefer in-person early voting. That’s what the Republican Legislature and Scott cut.

Some Republicans have said that those who complain about long lines have no excuse, that they should have voted by absentee ballot.

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Exclusive New Mike and Molly Clip for Yard Sale Episode

It's never too late for a bit of spring cleaning.

Related: Melissa McCarthy Happy at Any Size

Molly (Melissa McCarthy) decides a yard sale is in order when she realizes her house is too crowded, but it isn't long before the move proves more trouble than it's worth.

Watch an exclusive sneak peek in the player above!

You can catch this new episode of Mike & Molly tonight on CBS.

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Obama honors sacrifice made by nation's veterans (VIDEO)

REUTERS

President Barack Obama pauses after placing a Veterans Day wreath at the Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Va., today.

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama paid tribute at a Veterans Day ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery to "the heroes over the generations who have served this country of ours with distinction."

He said the wreath he laid earlier at Tomb of the Unknowns was intended to remember every service member who has worn a uniform and served the nation.

In a speech at the Memorial Amphitheater during the brisk, sunny morning, Obama said America will never forget the sacrifice made by its veterans and their families.

"No ceremony or parade, no hug or handshake is enough to truly honor that service," the president said, adding that the country must commit every day "to serving you as well as you've served us."

He spoke of the Sept. 11 generation, "who stepped forward when the Towers fell, and in the years since have stepped into history, writing one of the greatest chapters in military service our country has ever known. You've toppled a dictator and battled an insurgency in Iraq. You pushed back the Taliban and decimated al-Qaida in Afghanistan. You delivered justice to Osama bin Laden."

Obama also said this was the first Veterans Day in a decade with no American troops fighting and dying in Iraq, and that a decade of war in Afghanistan is coming to a close.

Over the next few years, he said, more than 1 million service members will make the transition to civilian life. As they come home, Obama urged their fellow citizens to always be there for them and their families.

Later, the president and his wife, first lady Michelle Obama, and Vice President Joe Biden and his wife, Jill, greeted families in the cemetery's Section 60, home to graves of service members killed in Afghanistan and Iraq.

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Gov. Rick Scott may shift stance on health reform law

With the reelection of President Barack Obama, Florida’s Republican leaders are reconsidering their fervent opposition to federal healthcare reform, triggering a discussion that could have huge repercussions for South Florida.

At stake is more than $6 billion in federal funding for Miami-Dade and Broward over the next decade and the possibility of health insurance for a large percentage of the 1.4 million people in the two counties who now lack coverage.

After the defeat of Mitt Romney, who vowed to halt Obama’s healthcare overhaul, the Republican leaders of the Florida House and Senate quickly said the Legislature needed to reexamine the federal act. On Friday evening, Gov. Rick Scott said he agreed there needed to be a discussion.

“Just saying ‘no’ is not an answer,” Scott said in a statement that repeated exactly what Sen. Don Gaetz, R-Destin, the incoming Senate president, told The Miami Herald on Thursday.

“I don’t like this law,” Gaetz also said, “but this is the law, and I believe I have a constitutional obligation to carry it out.” He added that he thinks “there needs to be some adult debate between Republicans and Democrats” on finding ways to make the law work.

Still, Gaetz, Scott and others in the Republican leadership, which controls both the Florida House and Senate, have many criticisms of what both parties now call “Obamacare.” Some are searching for compromises on how it is carried out in the state. What this means for patients and the healthcare industry in Florida — particularly South Florida — remains an enormous question mark.

Time is running short for decisions as the once-distant consequences of the Affordable Care Act are scheduled to kick in during the next 14 months.

The first deadline is Friday. That’s when states must tell Washington whether they plan to set up exchanges — marketplaces where individuals can purchase insurance at discounted group rates and cannot be denied because of pre-existing conditions.

Florida’s political leaders acknowledge they won’t make the deadline. The exchanges are scheduled to start Jan. 1, 2014, and if a state doesn’t set up an exchange, its residents can participate in a federal exchange.

The next provision starts Jan. 1 with an increase in Medicaid fees for primary care physicians. Primary care physicians, who have long complained about low rates for Medicaid, which provides coverage for the poor, are scheduled to be paid at considerably higher Medicare rates — with the feds picking up all of the added cost. But such a pay hike can only happen with the approval of the governor and Legislature, and it’s unclear whether that will happen.

The following year, on Jan. 1, 2014, the biggest changes are slated to start, including a major expansion of people covered by Medicaid. An analysis from the Safety Net Hospital Alliance of Florida shows that if the state doesn’t expand coverage, Florida will lose $27.9 billion in federal funds over 10 years.

That breaks down to a $4.5 billion loss for Miami-Dade during that time, and a $2.3 billion loss for Broward, according to the alliance’s analysis.

Under the law, Washington will pay all Medicaid expansion costs for the first three years, but then the states would have to pay up to 10 percent of the costs in following years — an expense that the Safety Net Alliance calculates will come to $1.7 billion over 10 years in Florida. The expansion could provide coverage to an additional million-plus Floridians. Reform supporters say the expansion would provide cheaper basic care that would help prevent serious illnesses that lead to expensive hospital stays.

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With each stitch, two South Florida soldiers are honored

By now, they should have been veterans.

Tech Sgt. Tim Weiner should be 41, retired from the Air Force, living near his brothers — also veterans — in Colorado.

Sgt. Adam Cann should be 30, out of the U.S. Marines, back home in Broward County, perhaps settled down with one of his many pretty girlfriends and working as a chef.

Instead, they are the lost sons of parents whose pain has hardly abated since their combat deaths in Iraq: Cann in 2006, Weiner in 2007, both after multiple deployments.

Over the years, Leigh and Carol Cann of Davie, Marcia Weiner Fenster and Pierre Fenster of Lauderhill, have sought emotional comfort in projects dedicated to their sons’ memories.

This Veterans Day, they can add the physical comfort of handmade quilts created in their sons’ honor by a national network called Home of the Brave Quilts.

So far, the group has created and presented 5,365 quilts, based on a Civil War-era pattern, to families of the fallen.

On Thursday, the Canns and Fensters met, for the first time, at Holman Honda in Fort Lauderdale, where Home of Brave presented their quilts. They embraced and cried, bonding over a loss unique to those who have seen somber military officers on their front porches and known, without being told, that their lives would never be the same.

Also on hand: Angela Adkins and Dana Rankin, the Holman Automotive Group employees who crafted the quilts, square by square, for heartbroken strangers.

Sgt. Adam Leigh Cann was the middle of three boys, born Jan. 25, 1982. He died 20 days shy of his 24th birthday, on Jan. 6, 2006, when a suicide bomber detonated outside a police recruiting center in Ramadi, Iraq.

He was assigned to Security Battalion, Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton, in California. His unit was attached to the 2nd Marine Division, II Marine Expeditionary Force.

Adam and his bomb-detecting dog Bruno were patrolling a crowd when Bruno alerted to the bomber. Adam placed himself against the man, forcing the explosion sideways.

He’s credited with saving Bruno, fellow U.S. fighters and police headquarters. It’s believed that the bomber planned to detonate inside the building.

A U.S. Army officer died, along with 37 Iraqis. Bruno, a German shepherd, later retired to California, where he died at age 7.

Tech Sgt. Timothy R. Weiner was one of four brothers in the active-duty military in the mid-2000s. They have a civilian sister. He was born May 27, 1971, and left a wife and son.

He served in an elite EOD unit: Explosive Ordnance Disposal (bomb disposal). In addition to his work in war zones, Tim was part of top-secret security details.

He joked to his mother that the president of the United States couldn’t use a restroom until he’d declared it safe.

“That’s power!’’ he crowed.

He and two other EODS from the 775th Civil Engineer Squadron, based at Hill Air Force Base in Utah, died Jan. 7, 2007, near Camp Liberty, trying to disarm a car bomb.

“I think they would have been good buddies,’’ Marcia Fenster told Leigh Cann.

Adam Cann “was always active and spirited,’’ said his father, who raised his children alone, after a divorce, then remarried. “He was really funny. He had this laugh to make you smile. And he was leader among his friends. A lot of people were attracted to him.’’

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