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Sunday, June 30, 2013
Kerry pushes effort to restart peace talks
RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) ? U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry is in the West Bank to meet Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas for the third time in three days, trying to press the restart button on talks between Israel and the Palestinians to end their long-running conflict.
Sunday is the fourth day of Mideast shuttle diplomacy for Kerry.
He met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his advisers until after 3 a.m. Sunday in a hotel suite in Jerusalem.
There is deep skepticism that Kerry can get the two sides to agree on a two-state solution. It's something that's eluded presidents and diplomats for years. But the flurry of meetings has heightened expectations the two sides can be persuaded to restart talks, which broke down in 2008.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/kerry-pushes-effort-restart-peace-talks-073724175.html
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Cavs coach Mike Brown said Bennett will have to compete for playing time
INDEPENDENCE ? No. 1 overall draft pick Anthony Bennett and young Cavaliers veteran Tristan Thompson are both from Toronto and both play power forward.
Coach Mike Brown doesn?t care.
?They?ve got to go out and compete,? Brown said Friday afternoon during Bennett?s introductory press conference at Cleveland Clinic Courts. ?They?re both competitors.
?They might be buddies, but at the end of the day, when they cross that line, they?ve got to get after it, not only to make themselves better as individuals, but to make the team better.?
Thompson, the No. 4 overall pick in 2011, looked like a possible bust as a rookie, but came on strong in 2012-13 when Anderson Varejao went down with an injury a third of the way through the season.
The long-limbed, 6-foot-9 left-hander, who is not a close friend of Bennett?s, wound up averaging 11.7 points and 9.4 rebounds. He also developed an unorthodox but highly effective right-handed push shot from 10 to 12 feet while appearing in all 82 games and shooting .488 from the field and .608 at the line.
?We?re going to become best friends,? Bennett said. ?He?s my go-to guy because he?s from Canada.?
Bennett, who is 6-7 or 6-8 depending on who is asked and currently heavier than his listed 240 pounds, is a much better shooter than Thompson and can put the ball on the floor a bit, but the knock on him is he?s a bit of a tweener (too small for power forward and not athletic enough to play small forward).
General manager Chris Grant said Thursday night after drafting the UNLV freshman that Bennett could see some time at small forward, but confirmed his best and most natural position is power forward.
That?s OK with Brown, who loves competition in practice.
?It?s great to be able to have depth in all areas on the floor,? the second-time Cavs coach said. ?Anthony is a guy who has definitely added that for us.
?I like the fact he is versatile. He?s different than the bigs we have, so we can use him in a lot of different ways.?
Bennett averaged 16.1 points and 8.1 rebounds in his one season at UNLV, where he earned first-team All-Mountain West Conference honors.
Not bad, considering he didn?t start to embrace the game until he was a teenager.
?I was just playing around, wasting time,? said Bennett, adding he started taking the game more seriously when his family moved from Toronto to Brampton, an undeveloped suburb.
?I just started growing. Everybody was like, ?You should play basketball.? I was like, ?All right, I?ll give it a shot.? Look at me now.?
Bennett didn?t look much taller than 6-6 Arizona State swingman and No. 33 pick Carrick Felix when they stood side by side at the press conference, but the 20-year-old?s long arms, strength and offensive skills made him a dominant player in college.
?I?m versatile,? he said. ?I can go inside and out. I can rebound. I?m unselfish. I don?t play with agendas. I just want to help the team get wins.
?The one point of my game I need to get better at is defense.?
Bennett will have to do that under Brown, as will No. 19 overall pick Sergey Karasev (6-8, 202), a 19-year-old swingman who was not at Cleveland Clinic Courts because he returned to his native Russia for a game.
Brown, who coached the Cavs for five seasons before being fired in 2010, preaches defense first, second and third, as his newest players will quickly learn.
Asked about Bennett and Karasev?s lack of prowess in that area, Brown referenced two former Cleveland players also not noted for their abilities on that end of the floor.
?I?m not trying to throw these guys under the bus ? I?d say it to their face,? the coach said. ?We had Damon Jones and Donyell Marshall here and we were one of the top defensive teams in the league.?
After the laughter had subsided, he added, ?These guys will figure out how to get on the floor. If they can?t figure out they?ve got to play defense, they?ll be doing what they?re doing now (sitting next to the coach).?
Contact Rick Noland at (330) 721-4061 or rnoland@medina-gazette.com. Fan him on Facebook and follow him @RickNoland on Twitter.
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Monday, June 24, 2013
Apple Releases iOS 7 Beta 2 With Support For iPads
Apple has released beta 2 of its mobile OS for developers just two weeks after WWDC where the company showed off iOS 7. This release also supports iPads and iPad minis.
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Friday, June 21, 2013
FBI pick: Obama poised to name Bush appointee James Comey
The White House announced today that on Friday, President Obama will nominate Bush's Deputy Attorney General James Comey to head the FBI.
Deputy Attorney General James Comey gestures during a news conference in Washington. President Barack Obama is preparing to nominate former Bush administration official James Comey to head the FBI, people familiar with the decision said Wednesday, May 29, 2013.
Evan Vucci/AP/File
EnlargePresident Barack Obama on Friday plans to nominate President George W. Bush's former No. 2 at the Justice Department, James Comey, to lead the FBI as the agency grapples with privacy debates over a host of recently exposed investigative tactics.
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Comey is perhaps best known for a remarkable 2004 standoff over a no-warrant wiretapping program at the hospital bed of Attorney General John Ashcroft. Comey rushed to the side of his bedridden boss to physically stop White House officials in their attempt to get an ailing Ashcroft to reauthorize the program.
If confirmed by the Senate, Comey would serve a 10-year tenure and replace Robert Mueller, who has held the job since the week before the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. Mueller is set to resign on Sept. 4 after overseeing the bureau's transformation into one the country's chief weapons against terrorism.
The White House said in a statement that Obama would announce his choice of Comey on Friday afternoon.
Comey was a federal prosecutor who served for several years as the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York before coming to Washington after the Sept. 11 attacks as deputy attorney general. In recent years he's been an executive at defense company Lockheed Martin, general counsel to a hedge fund, board member at HSBC Holdings, and lecturer on national security law at Columbia Law School.
The White House may hope that Comey's Republican background and strong credentials will help him through Senate confirmation at a time when some of Obama's nominees have been facing tough battles. Republicans have said they see no major obstacles to his confirmation, although he is certain to face tough questions about his hedge fund work, his ties to Wall Street as well as how he would handle current, high-profile FBI investigations.
The FBI is responsible for both intelligence and law enforcement with more than 36,000 employees. It has faced questions in recent weeks over media leak probes involving The Associated Press and Fox News; the Boston Marathon bombings; the attack at Benghazi, Libya, that killed four Americans; and two vast government surveillance programs into phone records and online communications.
The leaker of those National Security Agency programs, former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, also is the subject of an ongoing criminal investigation. And just this week Mueller revealed the FBI uses drones for surveillance of stationary subjects and said the privacy implications of such operations are worthy of debate.
Comey played a central role in holding up Bush's warrantless wiretapping program, one of the administration's great controversies and an episode that focused attention on the administration's controversial tactics in the war on terror.
In dramatic testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee in 2007, Comey said he thought the no-warrant wiretapping program was so questionable that he refused to reauthorize it while serving as acting attorney general during Ashcroft's hospitalization. Comey said when he learned that the White House chief of staff and counsel were heading to Ashcroft's room despite his wife's instructions that there be no visitors, Comey beat them there and watched as Ashcroft turned them away.
"That night was probably the most difficult night of my professional life," Comey testified. He said he and Ashcroft had reservations about the program's legality, but he would not discuss details since the program was classified.
Thursday, June 20, 2013
Just Mobile AluFrame iPhone 5 case review
I recently purchased a new iPhone 5 to use as my personal/work phone. I did a lot of research before I made the financial commitment to purchase that phone. One of the first things I did after deciding to buy my new phone was to research ways to protect it. There are a lot of [...]
Source: http://the-gadgeteer.com/2013/06/19/just-mobile-aluframe-iphone-5-case-review/
Wednesday, June 19, 2013
Beckham 'cheats' to beat Chinese kids at football
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Thursday, June 13, 2013
Homes burned near Colo. Springs could approach 100
A slurry bomber flies over homes as it prepares to drop fire retardant on the Black Forest Fire in northeast of Colorado Springs on Tuesday, June 11, 2013. The fire consumed an estimated 7500 acres. It damaged 40-60 structures and forced the evacuation of thousands of people. As of Tuesday night the fire was reported as zero percent contained. (AP Photo/BryanOller)
A slurry bomber flies over homes as it prepares to drop fire retardant on the Black Forest Fire in northeast of Colorado Springs on Tuesday, June 11, 2013. The fire consumed an estimated 7500 acres. It damaged 40-60 structures and forced the evacuation of thousands of people. As of Tuesday night the fire was reported as zero percent contained. (AP Photo/BryanOller)
Plumes of smoke from the Big Meadows Fire in Rocky Mountain National Park rise above Longs Peak, as seen from just east of Boulder, Colo., Tuesday June 11, 2013. A National Park crew assessed the fire that has been confirmed on the north end of Big Meadows on the west side of the park. (AP Photo/Brennan Linsley)
A U.S. Army helicopter drops a load of water on a wildfire in the Black Forest area north of Colorado Springs, Colo., on Tuesday, June 11, 2013. At least four major wildfires broke out along the front of the Rocky Mountains in Colorado Tuesday, burning a handful of houses and chasing people from thousands of homes in hot, gusty weather. (AP Photo/Ed Andrieski)
El Paso County Sheriff's Deputy Dan Cukowski helps evacuee Linda Davies walk her livestock out from the evacuated area on Tuesday, June 11, 2013. A wildfire in a heavily wooded residential area northeast of Colorado Springs led to the mandatory evacuations of more than 1,000 homes, including some worth more than $1 million, El Paso County Sheriff Terry Maketa said. (AP Photo/The Gazette, Jerilee Bennett)
Smoke from the Black Forest fire billows north of downtown Colorado Springs, Colo. on Tuesday, June 11, 2013. A wildfire in the Black Forest area northeast of Colorado Springs is burning homes, and another fire that led to the evacuation of Royal Gorge Bridge & Park has burned three structures. (AP Photo/The Colorado Springs Gazette, Mark Reis) MAGS OUT
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (AP) ? The number of houses destroyed by a wildfire near Colorado Springs could grow to around 100, and authorities fear it's possible that some people who stayed behind might have died.
Authorities initially estimated that between 40 and 60 houses were destroyed in Black Forest, a heavily wooded residential area northeast of Colorado Springs, but they are still surveying the damage. El Paso County Sheriff Terry Maketa said Wednesday he believes around 80 have been lost and he wouldn't be surprised if the figure reaches or tops 100.
Maketa said there are no reports of anyone missing in the fire, however he fears for those who chose to ignore evacuation orders and stay behind.
"One of my worst fears is that people took their chances and it may have cost them their life," he said.
Maketa said gusty winds expected later in the day could cause the fire to spread unpredictably.
The fire was one of several that broke out along Colorado's Front Range Tuesday and quickly spread in high winds and record heat. The fire has burned about 12 square miles and forced the evacuation of more than 7,000 people in an area over 47 square miles. The area is not far from last summer's devastating Waldo Canyon Fire that destroyed 346 homes and killed two.
"Everywhere you looked, you saw scattered fires, almost like there was a huge convention of campfires everywhere, and periodically you'd see trees just pop into a fireball," Maketa said.
Wildfires were also burning in New Mexico and California, where a smokejumper was killed fighting one of dozens of lightning-sparked fires. Luke Sheehy, of Susanville, Calif., was fatally injured by part of a falling tree in Modoc National Forest.
In Colorado, about 60 miles to the southwest of the Black Forest Fire, a 6-square-mile wildfire near Royal Gorge Bridge Park remains 0 percent contained Wednesday morning, but winds are pushing the fire away from Canon City and structures.
The Royal Gorge Fire has destroyed three structures near Canon City, but the soaring suspension bridge spanning a canyon across the Arkansas River appears undamaged.
The bridge has wood planking but is suspended by steel supports. It's normally a tourist attraction but firefighters are now using it to access the fire.
More than 900 prisoners at the nearby Colorado Territorial Correctional Facility were taken to other prisons overnight because of the danger from heavy smoke, she said. The fire has not reached the prison, built in 1871 and the oldest in the state's system.
"This was done as a precaution because it takes a lot of time to move the prisoners," Adrienne Jacobson said.
The medium- and low-risk prisoners were evacuated by bus, including 24 from an infirmary who were taken to a Denver facility, some in wheelchairs.
A third wildfire in southern Colorado erupted Tuesday in rural Huerfano County. The Klikus Fire had burned an estimated 45 to 50 acres west of La Veta, prompting evacuation orders for about 200 residences.
The causes of those fires weren't immediately confirmed.
Another fire sparked by lightning Monday in Rocky Mountain National Park has now grown to an estimated 300 to 400 acres. No structures were threatened. Naturally started fires are usually allowed to burn in the park, but fire managers are working to suppress it because of drought conditions and reduced resources, park spokeswoman Kyle Patterson said.
Cindy Winemiller, of Black Forest, was driving back from Austin, Texas, with her boyfriend after visiting her son when a friend called to tell them the forest was on fire. They saw the big plume of smoke from Pueblo, about 30 miles away. After arriving home, they gathered insurance information and a few photos but didn't have time to get anything else because of the smoke and glow of the fire to the north.
"I'm hoping that it's OK. Probably smoke damage, but who knows. The winds are picking up," Winemiller said Wednesday.
Last year she volunteered to help victims of the Waldo Canyon fire sift through the rubble and find personal belongings. Winemiller said she will do the same this time around "and hope it's not my home."
___
Associated Press writer Steven K. Paulson in Denver contributed to this report.
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the daily howler: TWO KINDS OF FACTS: Amazing errors ...
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 12, 2013
Part 3?A nation whose highest-ranking professors and newspapers can?t get basic facts right: On the most basic level, adopting some sort of national educational ?standards? makes a lot of sense.
Math in Nebraska is amazingly similar to math in Maine. In a highly mobile nation, it has never really made much sense to have the fifty different states inventing fifty different math curriculums?along with fifty sets of year-end tests, which can?t be compared with each other.
This practice has never exactly made sense. Then again, it has never exactly made sense to have a single set of ?standards? for all kids in a certain grade?some of whom may be years ahead of standard grade level, some of whom may be barely functioning.
Should all fifth-graders be taught the same things? We?ll discuss this point by the end of the week. But as a matter of basic logic, we have no idea why.
In their piece in the New York Times Sunday Review, Professors Hacker and Dreifus seemed to poke at this latter point. Should all students be required to take the same curriculum and pass the same sets of tests? Hacker and Dreifus seemed to say no, especially since the new Common Core State Standards have been designed to make our curriculum ?more rigorous??harder.
Twenty-five percent of kids can?t get through high school as matters stand now. How are those students helped if we make the curriculum harder? We took that be the (very good) basic question the professors asked in their jumbled piece.
That said, Hacker and Dreifus aren?t specialists in public school education. This may help explain their opaque prose and their wandering, scattershot focus. Beyond that, it may explain the nonsense they countenanced at the end of their piece?this sign of the times, for example:
HACKER AND DREIFUS (6/9/13): Debate is now stirring within partisan circles. Glenn Beck sees the Common Core as ?leftist indoctrination.? The Republican National Committee calls it ?an inappropriate overreach to standardize and control the education of our children.? Republican governors and legislators in Indiana, Kansas, Georgia and several other states are talking about reconsidering their participation. Yet conservative scholars at the Manhattan and Fordham institutes laud it as promising ?a far more rigorous, content-rich, cohesive K-12 education.? Some corporate C.E.O.?s favor it because they say it will upgrade the work force. Mr. Duncan is one of the lone liberal voices in support of the program. Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, supports the plan, which she calls ?revolutionary.? That said, she has called for a moratorium on judging teachers and schools by the first round of assessments, which she fears are sometimes being implemented hastily and without needed support.In recent years, the Common Core Standards have been adopted for future use by 45 different states. Given our growing tribal divide, it will hardly be surprising if Republican pols in various states rethink participation in the Common Core, especially in response to crackpot claims by crackpot figures like Beck.
At several points in their piece, Hacker and Dreifus seemed to gloss the crackpot nature of modern ?conservative? politics. But then, as they ended their piece, they endorsed and accepted a crackpot rant from a high-profile modern ?liberal:?
HACKER AND DREIFUS (continuing directly): For Diane Ravitch, a historian of education and former assistant education secretary, the program is predicated on ?the idea that you can?t trust teachers.? If we want our children taught from standardized scripts, she told us, let?s say so and accept the consequences.We?re tired of seeing public school teachers cast as scapegoats too. On the other hand, is it federal law that crackpot claims from Ravitch must be endorsed in every piece about the public schools?For our part, we?re tired of seeing teachers cast as scapegoats, of all the carping over unions and tenure. It is time teachers are as revered in society as doctors or scientists, and allowed to work professionally without being bound by reams of rules.
Still, there?s an upside to the Common Core?s arrival. As the public better appreciates its sweep, there is likely to be much discussion about schools and what we want them to do. Ideally, this will involve a reconsideration of the contours of knowledge and the question of how we can become a better-educated nation.
For years, Ravitch crazily beat the drums in favor of testing and standards. Now she crazily beats the drums against the regime she created. In this instance, the craziness consists in this:
Public school teachers have always been required to teach the curriculum of their school systems. This has nothing to do with ?standardized scripts? or with the idea that teachers ?can?t be trusted.?
Such claims represent more of the craziness at which Ravitch is expert. Swept up in the moment, though, Hacker and Dreifus go a bit crazy too, suggesting that teachers should be ?revered in society? in the same way doctors are.
Of course, doctors have to follow ?reams of rules? too. If not, how do they manage to get sued so often?
If teachers don?t want to be bound by any rules, they can of course open their own private schools. The notion that teachers should be ?revered? and left on their own is, to coin a term, crazy.
Alas! As this high-profile piece come to an end, our two professors go a bit crazy too. But this is the typicalway public schools get discussed in our biggest and dumbest newspaper.
In this country, we rarely have serious public discussions. In place of such discussions, we tend to repeat standardized tales built from two kinds of facts?invented and withheld.
Midway through their jumbled piece, the professors repeat such a tale. More precisely, they repeat the bogus standardized tale which rules all current discussion of our public schools, especially those in which our teachers get cast as hideous scapegoats.
This highly familiar, bogus story is built from two kinds of facts?invented and withheld. To this standardized witches? brew, the professors weirdly decided to add their own puzzling errors:
HACKER AND DREIFUS: On its surface, the case for the Common Core is compelling. It is widely known that American students score well below their European and Asian peers in reading and math, an alarming shortfall in a competitive era. According to the 2009 Program for International Student Assessment, the United States ranks 24th out of 34 countries in ?mathematics literacy,? trailing Sweden and the Czech Republic, and 11th in ?reading literacy,? behind Estonia and Poland. (South Korea ranks first in both categories.) Under the Common Core, students in participating states will immediately face more demanding assignments. Supporters are confident that students will rise to these challenges and make up for our country?s lag in the global education race. We are not so sure.Gack!
?It is widely known that American students score well below their European and Asian peers in reading and math.? That is the premier standard story, the ur-narrative, which rules almost all discussion of our public schools.
That story is built upon two kinds of facts?invented and withheld. For starters, though, let?s examine the puzzling errors the professors dreamed up on their own.
Two puzzling errors of fact: No, Virginia! It doesn?t hugely matter, but the United States didn?t rank 11th and 24th on the 2009 PISA tests.Those puzzling errors of fact and logic seem to belong to these professors alone. That said, they are telling our nation?s controlling Ur-Story: ?American students score well below their peers in reading and math.?It doesn?t hugely matter. But by all accounts, the United States ranked 14th in reading and 25th in math among those 34 nations.
Try as we might, we can?t find a way to explain the professors? alternate rankings, which actually improve the U.S. position. If you look at the basic PISA charts, it?s clear that at least eleven nations outscored the U.S. in reading. (Click here, scroll down to page 8.)
This would mean that, at best, the United States finished 12th out of 34. But because Poland and Iceland apparently outscored the U.S. by a fraction of a point, the final ranking ends up at 14th out of 34?although the NCES says the U.S. was outscored by only six of those 34 nations in a ?measurably different? way.
A puzzling error of logic: We don?t know where the professors got their alternate rankings. Even more puzzling is their logic. To wit:
According to the professors, the United States finished 11th out of 34 nations in reading. If that?s true, why would they say, as they plainly do, that ?American students score well below their European and Asian peers in reading??
If you rank 11th out of 34, you are outscoring the bulk of their peers. Why did the professors present that puzzling piece of logic?
Later in their jumbled report, the professors complain about the way our public school teachers keep getting scapegoated. But this bogus Ur-Story is the principle basis on which that mugging occurs!
?It is widely known that American students score well below their European and Asian peers in reading and math.? That story rules our public debate, but it?s largely built upon two kinds of facts?invented and withheld.
Let?s examine some basic facts which were withheld by Hacker and Dreifus:
Did American students ?score well below their European and Asian peers in reading? on the 2009 PISA? Plainly, the professors make that assertion. But here are the average reading scores for U.S. students on those tests, as compared to the average scores from our principle European counterparts:
Average scores, 2009 PISA, reading literacyThat chart compares the U.S. average score to those of the five largest Euro nations. In the most direct sense, those five nations are this country?s European peers.
United States 500
Germany 497
France 496
United Kingdom 494
(Average for OECD nations 493)
Italy 486
Spain 481
Despite what the professors wrote, American students outscored their peers in all five of those large European nations. What led the professors to say that they scored ?well below? their peers?
What causes people like Hacker and Dreifus to keep repeating such claims, claims from that standardized story? We can?t answer that question. But their tendency to withhold facts doesn?t end at this point:
Of the three major international test batteries, the PISA is the one on which American students have scored most poorly in the past decade. On the 2011 TIMSS and PIRLS, American students scored and ranked better than on the 2009 PISA.
Result? Slaves to script like these professors cherry-pick the worst international scores. The better, more recent rankings and scores are, in a word, withheld.
In that passage, the professors pounded ahead with a bogus Standard Story. What explains the intellectual sickness which produces this endless pattern? We can?t tell you that.
But if you finish 11th out of 34, you plainly aren?t ?scoring well below your peers.? Except within that Standard Story, the one every hack will recite.
American students don?t lead the world on international tests. They also don?t perform in the hapless ways the hacks go out of their way to describe, repeating the bogus Standard Tale which rules our public school discourse.
Where has this Standard Story come from? We can?t tell you that. But tomorrow, we'll show you more of the facts Hacker and Dreifus withheld from their piece.
And how strange! These remarkable facts, which they withheld, actually reinforce their main point! But by the rules of this sick, corrupt game, those facts had to be withheld.
Tomorrow: The horrifying, uplifting facts which emerge from disaggregation
Where we ranked on the PISA: Truly, we can?t figure out where Hacker and Dreifus got their rankings for the 2009 PISA. There?s more than one way to think about rankings. But we can?t find a way to end up with their rankings.
As a point of reference, here?s the way Arne Duncan described our rankings:
DUNCAN (12/7/10): The basic findings of the 2009 PISA for the United States are as follows. In reading literacy, 15-year old American students were average performers among 34 OECD nations. The U.S. effectively showed no change in reading skills since 2000. Overall, the OECD's rankings have U.S. students in 14th place in reading literacy among OECD nations.According to Duncan, we ranked 14th and 25th out of the 34 nations. And that is surely the way it looks on the basic PISA charts.In mathematics, U.S. 15-year olds are below-average performers among OECD nations.
After a dip in our 2006 math scores, U.S. students returned to the same level of performance in 2009 as six years earlier, in 2003. Still, we rank a lowly 25th in math.
Many countries which outscored the U.S. did so in ways which weren?t ?measurably different.? But where did the professors get their rankings?
We can?t find a way to get there from here. The New York Times tends to be like this.
Source: http://dailyhowler.blogspot.com/2013/06/two-kinds-of-facts-amazing-errors.html
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Wednesday, June 5, 2013
Djokovic, Nadal on course for semifinal in Paris
Serbia's Novak Djokovic reacts after defeating Germany's Philipp Kohlschreiber during their fourth round match of the French Open tennis tournament at the Roland Garros stadium Monday, June 3, 2013 in Paris. (AP Photo/Michel Euler)
Serbia's Novak Djokovic reacts after defeating Germany's Philipp Kohlschreiber during their fourth round match of the French Open tennis tournament at the Roland Garros stadium Monday, June 3, 2013 in Paris. (AP Photo/Michel Euler)
Spain's Rafael Nadal blows out the candles on his birthday cake as he celebrates his 27th birthday on center court after defeating Japan's Kei Nishikori in three sets 6-4, 6-1, 6-3, in their fourth round match at the French Open tennis tournament, at Roland Garros stadium in Paris, Monday June 3, 2013. (AP Photo/Michel Euler)
Spain's Rafael Nadal returns against Japan's Kei Nishikori in their fourth round match at the French Open tennis tournament, at Roland Garros stadium in Paris, Monday June 3, 2013. (AP Photo/Michel Euler)
Serbia's Novak Djokovic returns against Germany's Philipp Kohlschreiber defeating Kohlschreiber in four sets 4-6, 6-3, 6-4, 6-4, in their fourth round match at the French Open tennis tournament, at Roland Garros stadium in Paris, Monday June 3, 2013. (AP Photo/Michel Spingler)
Spain's Rafael Nadal returns the ball to Japan's Kei Nishikori during their fourth round match of the French Open tennis tournament at the Roland Garros stadium Monday, June 3, 2013 in Paris. (AP Photo/Michel Euler)
PARIS (AP) ? Less than 48 hours after learning of the death of his childhood coach, Novak Djokovic was on court at the French Open, determined to complete a career Grand Slam in honor of the woman he likened to a "second mother."
Still grieving, Djokovic began shakily Monday. Six of the match's first seven unforced errors were his. After one poor exchange, he chucked his racket hard enough to break it. He dropped a set for the only time in four matches so far.
After recovering quickly to dispatch 16th-seeded Philipp Kohlschreiber of Germany 4-6, 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 and reach the quarterfinals at a 16th consecutive major tournament, Djokovic spoke from the heart about the passing of Jelena Gencic, who was 76.
"It hasn't been easy, but this is life. You know, life gives you things (but also) takes away close people," Djokovic said. "We were very close throughout my whole life, and she taught me a lot of things that are part of me, part of my character."
Gencic connected with a 6-year-old Novak at a tennis camp, then worked with him for five years.
"I feel even more responsible now to go all the way in this tournament," said the No. 1-ranked Djokovic, who owns six Grand Slam titles but none from Roland Garros. "I want to do it for her."
He'll need to beat three more opponents to accomplish that, starting with 12th-seeded Tommy Haas, who at 35 became the oldest French Open quarterfinalist since 1971 by eliminating Mikhail Youzhny 6-1, 6-1, 6-3 in less than 1? hours.
By the second set, Youzhny was so out of sorts he destroyed a racket by slamming it nine times against his sideline seat.
Haas is a four-time Grand Slam semifinalist who climbed to No. 2 in the rankings at age 24. But recent times have been difficult because of serious injuries and operations, including to his right shoulder and hip, and he missed more than a full season.
"Who would have thought two years ago I'd be in this position today?" Haas asked. "I wouldn't have."
He's certainly persistent.
The 12 French Open appearances it took Haas to reach his first quarterfinal in Paris is a record. And he needed 13 match points in the third round to get past John Isner in five sets.
"It's easy sometimes to ... throw the white towel and say, 'I'm done. I have achieved a lot of things. I don't really have to worry so much financially and I can live a good life.' But at the same time," Haas explained, "maybe there was something in me still that said, 'You know what? I can maybe still do something.'"
If Djokovic can get past Haas, he'll find a familiar foe in the semifinals: seven-time French Open champion Rafael Nadal, who played his first relatively routine opening set of the tournament and put together a 6-4, 6-1, 6-3 victory over No. 13 Kei Nishikori of Japan.
Nadal, who beat Djokovic in last year's final and is 56-1 in his French Open career, declared: "I played much better today than the first three matches. No doubt about that."
Consider that something of a warning for No. 9 Stanislas Wawrinka, who was trailing by two sets when he got into an extended and animated argument with the chair umpire, demanding that a line judge be replaced. Wawrinka slowly, steadily turned the match around and edged No. 7 Richard Gasquet 6-7 (5), 4-6, 6-4, 7-5, 8-6.
Gasquet tired as the match stretched past four hours. Asked afterward where he felt pain, he replied: "In the soul, for sure. A little bit in the leg, too. But more in the soul."
Nadal began the first round by losing the first set. Did the same in the second round. In the third, he was taken to an opening tiebreaker. On Monday, Nishikori started well, winning each of the first five points that lasted at least 10 strokes, no easy feat against Nadal.
Ahead 2-1, Nishikori earned two break points with a forehand winner that had Nadal rolling his eyes. That, though, is when Nadal really got going. A short return set up a backhand winner to erase one break point, and a 121 mph ace took of the other. Nadal broke in the next game, helped by Nishikori's three unforced errors.
"One bad game for me," Nishikori said, "and he (started) playing well."
Nadal was in control the rest of the way on the day he turned 27. The crowd helped him celebrate by singing "Happy Birthday" in French as he was presented with an enormous layered cake festooned with rackets and yellow tennis balls.
"That," said the tournament's other defending champion, Maria Sharapova, "was a pretty cool cake."
She moved into the quarterfinals by beating 17th-seeded Sloane Stephens of the United States 6-4, 6-3, part of a rough day for Americans.
The other two in action also exited in straight sets: 54th-ranked Jamie Hampton lost to 18th-seeded Jelena Jankovic 6-0, 6-2, and 67th-ranked Bethanie Mattek-Sands was beaten by 12th-seeded Maria Kirilenko 7-5, 6-4. Kirilenko, who's engaged to two-time NHL MVP Alex Ovechkin of the Washington Capitals, now meets two-time Australian Open champion Victoria Azarenka, a 6-3, 6-0 winner over 2010 French Open titlist Francesca Schiavone.
Fifteen-time major champion Serena Williams, the only U.S. singles player left, plays her quarterfinal against 2009 French Open champion Svetlana Kuznetsova on Tuesday, when No. 4 Agnieszka Radwanska faces No. 5 Sara Errani. The men's quarterfinals Tuesday are 17-time major champion Roger Federer against No. 6 Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, and No. 4 David Ferrer against No. 32 Tommy Robredo, the first man in 86 years to win three consecutive Grand Slam matches after dropping the opening two sets.
For Federer, this is the 36th Grand Slam quarterfinal in a row, a record for the 45-year Open era. Djokovic's streak isn't even half as long, but it ranks third.
The last time the Serb failed to get that far at a major tournament was the 2009 French Open, where he lost to Kohlschreiber in the third round. Once out of Monday's tricky first set, Djokovic found his strokes and, most of all, his serve, which erased 11 of 13 break points.
His former coach, Gencic, died Saturday, when Djokovic played his third-round match, but his entourage kept the news from him until after that victory. In April 2012, during a tournament at Monte Carlo, Djokovic found out hours before playing a match that his grandfather died.
That experience, Djokovic said, "helped me a little bit to kind of stay tough this time because it took me a long time last year to recover. It was very emotional. This year, of course, again, very close person, so another shock for me. But I'm handling it better. I'm trying to focus my thoughts on the nicest memories."
Djokovic last spent time with Gencic when he visited Belgrade a couple of months ago. Their final phone conversation, he said, was two weeks ago, shortly before the French Open.
"She was honest and open," Djokovic recounted. "She told me, 'Listen, you have to focus. You have to give your attention to this tournament. This is a tournament you need to win.' She was giving me this kind of inspiration and motivation."
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Follow Howard Fendrich on Twitter at http://twitter.com/HowardFendrich
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