• Patrick Witt's choice: was it real?

    By Anne Thompson
    NBC News

    Last year, we brought you a story about the choice Yale University quarterback Patrick Witt had to make ... go to the final round of interviews for the Rhodes Scholarship or lead the Bulldogs against the Harvard Crimson in what is known as "the Game."  Many of you watched our story and weighed in on what choice Witt should make. 

    Today, the New York Times reports that in the end Witt didn't have a choice.

    Based on talking to a half dozen anonymous sources, the Times says the Rhodes Committee told Witt and Yale that his candidacy had been suspended because of an accusation of sexual assault and it would not go forward unless the university re-endorsed Witt.

    In a statement released this afternoon Witt's agent says the Times incorrectly connects the two issues. Mark Magazu writes "To be clear, Patrick's Rhodes candidacy was never "suspended," as the article suggests, and his official record at Yale contains no disciplinary issues."

    At issue is the timeline of events.  Witt announced his decision to play against Harvard on November 13th.  The question is when did he and Yale know that the Rhodes Committee knew about the accusation.

    Witt's agent says as late as November 8th, Witt received an email from the Rhodes Committee asking him to make a choice.  On November 10th, Witt gets an email from Yale officials remarking that if he withdraws he will still have a chance to re-apply for the scholarship. 

    The agent's statement says by the time Witt learned that the Rhodes Committee had been told of the accusation and wanted an additional reference letter from Yale, "Patrick had already informed Athletic Department officials that he intended to withdraw his candidacy due to the inability to reschedule his final interview, and that he would issue a statement to this effect following the Princeton game on November 12."

    As for the young woman in this case,  Witt says he knew her for many months and had "on-again, off-again relationship beginning in the Spring of 2011 and ending about two months before the informal complaint was filed."

    At Yale, those who believe they are victims of some kind of sexual assault have two options beyond going to the police.  They can make an informal or formal complaint to the university. Witt's accuser chose an informal complaint only and never went to the police.   Under this process, Yale says there is no investigation, no taking of testimony, and no determination of guilt or innocence.  While there could be an informal resolution, no one is disciplined because there is no determination of what happened.   The informal complaint does not go on a student's record.  And in this case, it is not on Witt's record.

    Witt's agent says the quarterback requested a a formal inquiry but was denied "because, he was told, there was nothing to defend against since no formal complaint was ever filed.  Further, while the committee can refer an informal complaint into a formal process if more substantial disciplinary action may be warranted, it did not do so in Patrick's case. At that time, all parties, including the University and Patrick, considered the matter ended."

    This is a disconcerting turn in a story that attracted us all because of the enviable choice Patrick Witt had.  It now has us all discussing the very difficult subject of allegations of sexual assault and how you talk about them when very little is on the record.  So much about the accusation is protected by federal law, designed to shield the accuser and the accused.  Remember, this accusation and its resolution were confidential. 

    When I last wrote about Patrick Witt, I told you how I brought my 11-year-old nephew Drew on the shoot.  I hoped Witt would be a role model for Drew, someone who excels in both academics and athletics.

    Honestly, I don't know what to say to Drew now.  The Patrick Witt I met, and who Drew and I have seen since the shoot, has always been a gentleman, kind and courteous. The only way I know how to do this is keep searching for the truth.  I promise to keep you updated. 

  • The twisty road to US-Pakistan re-engagement

    Pakistan has closed crucial roads used to ferry supplies to U.S and NATO troops in Afghanistan -- leaving Pakistani drivers stranded and driving up the U.S. price tag for the war. NBC's Amna Nawaz reports from Peshawar.

    By Amna Nawaz, NBC News correspondent in Pakistan writes

      
    PESHAWAR, Pakistan – The ring road in Peshawar is a rough ride: navigating certain stretches means dodging enormous potholes, steering clear of steep ditches and swerving to avoid the occasional brave soul who darts from one side of the road to the other.

    Yet this has been, for the last decade, one of the main arteries on which convoys of trucks carrying supplies for U.S. and NATO forces have made their way into Afghanistan. Those ground lines of communication that run from Karachi's ports to two border crossings in Pakistan have been a fundamental part of the U.S.-Pakistan relationship, as has the air line of communication.

    When the U.S.-Pakistan alliance was tested once again in late November after a U.S. cross-border air strike that killed 24 Pakistani soldiers, Pakistan reacted by shutting down the ground supply routes – a step they've taken before in protest to U.S. actions. The air lines of communication remain open.

    But access to those crucial land routes has never been denied to the U.S. for this long, and the two accounts from the U.S. and the Pakistan military of the cross-border strike that prompted their closure are so starkly different that it's hard to see how they can be reconciled.

    Even though the Americans have reduced their dependence on Pakistan's roads over the last few years by using alternative routes running through Russia and Central Asia, the cost of moving goods via air and on that northern route is much greater – reportedly six times more a month – than using Pakistan's routes.

    Asif Hassan / AFP - Getty Images

    This photograph taken on Dec. 18, 2011 shows a general view of the NATO supply of oil tankers stand parked near oil terminals in Pakistan's port city of Karachi.

    It now costs about $104 million per month to send supplies through the longer northern route, according to Pentagon figures shown to the Associated Press. That is $87 million more than when the cargo was shipped through Pakistan.

    Pakistan's government is conducting its own internal review of the alliance with the U.S., and officials here say no decision will be made about the supply lines until that review is complete and recommendations have been discussed by the government. Already, however, there are forces at work within Pakistan's religious and political parties to prevent the government from reopening those lines and re-engaging on the same level with the U.S.

    Issue of nationalism
    At a recent rally in Rawalpindi for the Pakistan Defense Council, made up of dozens of religious and political parties, leaders mentioned the NATO supply lines with the same fervor as they did deeply nationalistic issues such as divided Kashmir and the country’s nuclear weapons. The crowd of thousands cheered as speaker after speaker threatened that there could be countrywide protests should the government decide to reopen the supply lines.

    "The NATO supply lines should not be restored at any cost," said Mohammad Abdullah Gul, chairman of the National Youth Conference and a member of the Pakistan Defense Council.

    "Even if the government restores (them), we are not going to accept it. The people of Pakistan, we are going to mobilize. From Khyber to Karachi, they will be mobilized and they will stop the NATO supply lines," he said.

    Retired Col. Nazir Ahmed is the spokesman for Jamaat-ud-Dawa, an organization which he describes as having a "purely Islamic platform."

    He said that the NATO supply lines were "rightly" blocked, and should stay blocked "forever," unless the U.S. "comes to us on the basis of equality."

    He was particularly outraged by the recent cross-border attack.

    Asif Hassan / AFP - Getty Images

    This photograph taken on Dec. 18, 2011 shows NATO's supply of oil tankers stand parked near oil terminals in Pakistan's port city of Karachi.

    "After the aggression that the Americans committed on the Pakistan Army?  They slaughtered and killed so many Muslim soldiers," said Nazir. "Every country has the right to defend its borders and its ideology."

    For this segment of the population – frustrated by what they see as a decade of subservience to American policy in a deeply unpopular war here – a decision to reopen the supply lines is tantamount to a decision to put U.S. interests ahead of Pakistan's.

    That sentiment felt by a growing number of Pakistanis who think the relationship with the U.S. has not benefitted their own country will make it difficult for Pakistan's leaders to publicly re-engage with the U.S., and reopen the supply lines in the same manner and under the same conditions as before.

    Both U.S. and Pakistani officials say they remain committed to their alliance. How the NATO supply routes will fit into that alliance, however, is yet to be seen.

     

  • What we can all learn from formerly homeless teen Samantha Garvey

    By Rehema Ellis
    NBC News

     

    Samantha Garvey, the homeless teen who was a semifinalist in the prestigious Intel Science competition, told me this week her mother "has been crying a lot."  But unlike when the family was evicted from their home on New Year’s Eve, now she says it’s tears of happiness. After the news broke about how Samantha, 18, was able to stay focused on her studies even as her family was mired in turmoil, there has been an outpouring of admiration for her.  She attended the State of the Union address, appeared on “The Ellen DeGeneres Show,” and on “TODAY.”  Plus, there have been several offers to help her pay for college expenses. 

    What I learned this week from Samantha’s teachers and guidance counselors, however, is that this young woman who seems so poised in front of all the cameras did have moments when she struggled. 

    “She was always worried about her family.  She was always worried about her brother and sister and the stress it was putting on them,” said Karin Feil, Samantha’s Brentwood High School guidance counselor.

    Like any other senior, Feil told me, Samantha wondered, “‘How am I going to pay for prom? How am I going to get my yearbook? What about my class ring? What about my school pictures?”

    Feil said there were times when Samantha wanted to cut back on her studies and just get a job to help support her family. She  decided to stick with her first job, which is school,  hoping that somehow her needs would be answered. 

    Still, it’s been tough. 

    Despite the fact that both her parents have jobs (Samatha's father is a cab driver, and her mother is a hospital worker), they’re part of America’s working poor.  A few family hardships left them unable to keep up with the bills and they ended up homeless.  

    “My parents, they always said, ‘Keep your head up. If you look down and you just keep moping, nothing’s gonna come out of it.’ And I always took that to heart. And I just kept a positive mentality,” Samantha told me.

    It’s a remarkable story of perseverance. 

    But even as we’ve celebrated Samantha, we haven’t heard much about the many other families who are just like hers.  According to the latest figures from the Department of Housing and Urban Development an estimated 567,340 families were living in shelters in 2010. More than 141,600 children were in shelters on a single night.

    Once a family loses its home, finding another one can be difficult. Often landlords want the first month’s rent along with the last month and a security deposit. 

    Samantha’s family, however, has gotten help from New York’s Suffolk County Office of Social Services.  The agency offered them an affordable house through a regular county program that helps about 40 families every month move out of shelters.  County officials say the need is growing every day.  At some point, Samantha’s family will move on, and the county will use their space to help someone else. But it’s not clear how long it will take the Garveys to regain their footing. 

    While there have been offers to help Samantha pay for college, scholarship money cannot be used to pay old family bills. The Garveys have got to figure out a way to clear their debt if they hope to really get back on their feet. 

    Meanwhile, Samantha learned this week she was not chosen as a finalist in the science competition.  But the attention showered on this 18-year-old  has given her and her family a much needed boost and every reason to believe they’ve got a winning future ahead.

     

     

  • Economy picked up pace at the end of 2011

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    - Economy picked up pace at the end of 2011

    - Secret Service to investigate bullet-ridden image of President Obama

    - Gingrich, Romney battle in final Florida debate

    And did you see...

    - Blast outside Baghdad hospital kills 26

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    - Thailand elephants now being poached for meat

     

     

     

  • President Obama and AZ Governor Brewer have testy exchange

    What we're following: 

    - U.S. Army chief says he is comfortable with plans to shrink the size of his force

    - President Obama and Arizona Governor Brewer have testy talk

    - Egypt stops U.S. Transportation Secretary's son from leaving

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  • 'One more thing ...': George Lewis on 42 years at NBC News

    After 42 years with NBC News, George Lewis has retired. NBC's Brian Williams reports.

    George Lewis, NBC News correspondent writes

    “One more thing.”  It’s something the late Steve Jobs used to say as he was introducing Apple’s latest gadgets, always saving the big surprise for the end of his presentation.

    As I end 42 years at NBC News, they’ve asked me to write “one more thing” about my incredible journey — a career that’s taken me to all 50 states, 30-some countries and all of Earth’s continents with the exception of Antarctica.  (Going there is on my bucket list of places to see.)

    I’m often asked what’s the most memorable story of my career and, after thousands of stories, that’s difficult to answer.

    April 30, 1975: NBC's George Lewis reports on the fall of Saigon from the USS Blue Ridge as evacuation efforts are underway.

    It was certainly memorable when I got assigned to cover the U.S. Embassy hostage crisis in Tehran in 1979, a crisis that dragged on for 444 days as 52 Americans were held by Iranian extremists.

    At one point, correspondent Fred Francis, producer Walter Millis and I were ushered into the embassy for an exclusive interview with one of the hostages, William Gallegos. On the way in, Fred and I both harbored fears that we, too, would be added to the roster of hostages, but that didn’t happen.

    Instead, Gallegos gave us a compelling account of what life was like for the hostages, an interview that was aired in prime time back in the USA.

    George Lewis reports on the legacy of Steve Jobs.

    It was certainly memorable when, in the middle of the Tiananmen Square revolt of 1989, Chinese authorities let us set up our cameras near the balcony overlooking the square, a spot where, 40 years earlier, Chairman Mao had proclaimed the birth of a new, communist China. Looking down on the thousands and thousands of young people camped out there, I asked my colleague, Keith Miller, “Have you ever seen anything like this?”

    He allowed as how he hadn’t. A few weeks later, the government decided the demonstrators were a threat to the People’s Republic and ordered the tanks into the square to crush the revolt. We had worn out our welcome by that time and had to keep our cameras hidden in order to record the deadly crackdown.

    It was certainly memorable when, in 1993, we launched an NBC Nightly News series called “almost 2001” to explain the impending revolution in information technology. My producers and I discovered that NBC actually had Internet capability that had gone totally unused up to that point.

    Nightly News

    George Lewis on a story.

    “We’re going to ask viewers hooked up to the Internet to send us email,” I explained to one of the executives in New York.

    “What’s email?” he asked.

    “It’s a system that allows people to send and receive messages on the Internet,” I replied.

    “What’s the Internet?”

    The conversation seems silly now, but remember, this was 1993.

    April 18, 2006: The estimated 7.8 magnitude San Francisco earthquake struck without the faintest whisper of a warning 100 years ago today. NBC's George Lewis reports.

    “We’re going to use the series to explain this Internet thing,” I said, “and we’re going to invite people to take it for a spin.”

    Then we had to explain to anchor Stone Phillips how to tell people where to send their email.

    “You want them to send it to ‘nightly’ at — that’s the little ‘a’ with a circle around it — nbc-dot-com. ‘Dot’ is Internet speak for a period.”

    And with that, we launched the Peacock into the Internet age. Within moments of the airing of the first segment, our little email server was abuzz with responses from far and wide -- 8,000-plus by the time the series ended in Christmas week of 1993.  And we didn’t get any spam at all. It hadn’t been invented yet.

    Dec. 7, 2001: NBC's Tom Brokaw and George Lewis on the 60th anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor and the emotional connection with 9/11.

    It was certainly memorable when I climbed aboard an evacuation helicopter manned by U.S. Marines as South Vietnam fell to the communists in 1975. Vietnam had been my first assignment for NBC News, and I had returned to help write the final chapter. At that point, it was the biggest story I had covered since joining the network.

    ‘It's 105 degrees in Saigon and rising’; correspondent recalls final days before end of the Vietnam War

    I was brought back down to Earth rapidly when, a few weeks later, I was vacationing in San Diego and a toll taker at the Coronado Bridge quizzed me:

    “Aren’t you George Lewis?” the toll taker asked.

    “Yes I am,” I replied.

    “Didn’t you use to work here in local TV in San Diego?”

    “Yes, I did,” I said, my ego swelling.

    “What happened?” the guy asked. “Did you get out of the business?”

    “Uhhh ...,” I muttered, searching for a comeback, “I’ve been out of the country.”

    Moral of the story and advice to budding TV journalists: Never get too full of yourself, no matter how short or how long your career lasts.

    And one more thing. Since I can’t completely hang up my spurs, I’ll return in six months as a part-timer. Having a backstage pass to history is a lifelong addiction, I fear.

    Nightly News

    George Lewis on assignment in Vietnam during the early days of his career.

  • Egyptians see remarkable year not living up to its potential

    On the first anniversary of the uprising that toppled Hosni Mubarak's regime, hundreds of thousands poured into the revolution's symbolic center, Cairo's Tahrir Square. NBC's Ayman Mohyeldin reports.

    Ayman Mohyeldin, NBC News correspondent writes

    Jeff J Mitchell / Getty Images

    Temporary monuments are erected in Tahrir Square on Wednesday as thousands of Egyptians gather to mark the one year anniversary of the uprising that toppled President Hosni Mubarak.

     

    They are scenes reminiscent of Egypt's 18-day revolution that toppled the 30-year rule of Hosni Mubarak.

    Men and women, young and old, Muslim and Christian, rich and poor, secular and conservative … all back in the symbolic heart of Egypt’s revolution, Tahrir Square. They are also in cities all across the country.

    But the unity seen during Egypt's revolution in 2011 has been replaced by widening differences over where the country stands one year later.

    The difference revolves around the transition to democracy. Is it on the right path? Led by the right people? Genuine or simply cosmetic? Actions versus promises. Accomplishments versus rhetoric.

    Wednesday marked the one-year anniversary of the beginning of the uprising that ousted Mubarak.

    Some gathered in the square to celebrate that revolution. They said the past year had been one of transformation. They cited a newly elected lower house of parliament, new individual freedoms and an explosion of political parties running the gamut.

    Those gathered Wednesday celebrated the accomplishments of the revolution. Those accomplishments cannot simply be dismissed. The pace of reform may be slow, but change has been tangible.

    Those here commemorating the revolution argued change has been cosmetic. One regime has simply been replaced by another.

    "We have changed the driver in the car, but you have not changed the car or its direction," one protester told me. "Only when the direction of the car changes will the revolution be considered successful," he added.

    Related: Obama wants to boost Egypt aid quickly

    Those commemorating the revolution said the anniversary should serve as a reminder of what Egyptians can accomplish when they are united. The past year has not lived up to its potential. They cited thousands of civilians in military trials as evidence that the ruling military council -- all appointed by Mubarak coincidentally -- has resorted to the same draconian measures as its predecessor. They said that in the past year, not a single senior officer of the internal security forces or minister has been convicted in the killings of around 800 protesters. So for them, Wednesday was about renewing demonstrations against the ruling military council.

    The military council said it's holding the ship steady on the course to democracy. And while it has changed the timetable to elections a few times, it has done so only when events on the ground rapidly deteriorated and protests flared up. On one hand that showed it had been responsive to public sentiments and street protests; but on the other hand, it continued to act unilaterally when it came to fundamental issues concerning the process of reform. It retained exclusive power over the security services and the judiciary. It has refused to delegate powers and authority to the military-appointed prime minister or the newly elected lower house of parliament. At the same time, the military has issued a declaration of constitutional principles that many interpret as an attempt to retain powers after a new government is directly elected.

    Related: Huge crowd in Cairo

    And of course… there are the new democratic realities that have emerged in post-revolution Egypt. New political parties, but not necessarily new political voices. The loudest so far has been that of the Muslim Brotherhood and the ultra-conservative Salafist movement. Between the two of them, they overwhelmingly won the majority of seats in parliament. Will their mandate from the people be seen as a direct order to challenge the military? Some argue the Islamists are content with the democratic process undertaken by the military because it has paved their way to power. They fear the two have cut backroom deals. The military will move the democratic process at a pace and under conditions favorable to Islamist parties at the expense of the lesser and weaker secular and liberal forces. In exchange, the Islamists will not mobilize their massive street support against the military or hold them accountable for past misdoings going forward.

    So whether Egyptians celebrate, commemorate or reinvigorate their January 25 Revolution, one thing is for certain, it has been a remarkable year in the history of this country.

    More from msnbc.com and NBC News:

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    - American hostage in Somalia rescued by U.S. Navy SEALs

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