Mike Wallace dies at age 93
NEW YORK (AP) — CBS newsman Mike Wallace, the dogged, merciless reporter and interviewer who took on politicians, celebrities and other public figures in a 60-year career highlighted by the on-air confrontations that helped make “60 Minutes” the most successful prime-time television news program ever, has died. He was 93.
Wallace died Saturday night, CBS spokesman Kevin Tedesco said. On CBS’ “Face the Nation,” host Bob Schieffer said Wallace died at a care facility in New Haven, Conn., where he had lived in recent years.
Until he was slowed by heart surgery as he neared his 90th birthday in 2008, Wallace continued making news, doing “60 Minutes” interviews with such subjects as Jack Kevorkian and Roger Clemens.
He had promised to still do occasional reports when he announced his retirement as a regular correspondent in March 2006.
Wallace said then that he had long vowed to retire “when my toes turn up” and “they’re just beginning to curl a trifle. … It’s become apparent to me that my eyes and ears, among other appurtenances, aren’t quite what they used to be.”
Among his later contributions, after bowing out as a regular, was a May 2007 profile of GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney, and an interview with Kevorkian, the assisted suicide doctor released from prison in June 2007 who died June 3, 2011, at age 83.
In December 2007, Wallace landed the first interview with Clemens after the star pitcher was implicated in the Mitchell report on performance enhancing drugs in baseball. The interview, in which Clemens maintained his innocence, was broadcast in early January 2008.
Oil, gas industry
tied to quakes
NEW YORK (AP) — Oil and gas production may explain a sharp increase in small earthquakes in the nation’s midsection, a new study from the U.S. Geological Survey suggests.
The rate has jumped six-fold from the late 20th century through last year, the team reports, and the changes are “almost certainly man-made.”
Outside experts were split in their opinions about the report, which is not yet published but is due to be presented at a meeting later this month.
The study said a relatively mild increase starting in 2001 comes from increased quake activity in a methane production area along the state line between Colorado and New Mexico.
The increase began about the time that methane production began there, so there’s a “clear possibility” of a link, says lead author William Ellsworth of the USGS.
The increase over the nation’s midsection has gotten steeper since 2009, due to more quakes in a variety of oil and gas production areas, including some in Arkansas and Oklahoma, the researchers say.
It’s not clear how the earthquake rates might be related to oil and gas production, the study authors said. They note that others have linked earthquakes to injecting huge amounts of leftover wastewater deep into the earth.
Gingrich is not ready to drop out
WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich once led his rivals for the nomination in polls. Today, he’s millions in debt and describing Mitt Romney as “far and away the most likely” GOP nominee.
Running for president “turned out to be much harder than I thought it would be,” he said Sunday.
“I do think there’s a desire for a more idea-oriented Republican Party, but that doesn’t translate necessarily to being able to take on the Romney machine,” Gingrich told “Fox News Sunday” in a reflective interview.
After his Jan. 21 victory in the South Carolina primary, the former House Speaker said the Florida primary he lost in the following days turned into a “real brawl.” He said Romney did a good job building a substantial machine, adding he has no regrets.
“Unfortunately, our guys tried to match Romney,” Gingrich said of the Florida match-up. “It turned out, we didn’t have anything like his capacity to raise money.”
Gingrich said he has a little less than $4.5 million in campaign debt, and he’s operating on a shoestring budget.
Despite Gingrich’s acknowledgment of what appears to be his inevitable defeat, the former House speaker Gingrich isn’t ready to drop out.
