Balance Sheet

Assets

Dressed to Kill

The Pentagon reverses a policy that forced women on duty in Saudi Arabia to don native dress. Still in place: restrictions on leaving the base without a male escort, driving a vehicle, or even riding in the front seat.

Buzz Cut

The city of Charlotte refuses to spend tax money to keep the NBA's Hornets from moving to New Orleans. The Big Easy promised the team's owners several million dollars a year in subsidies to guarantee a profit. "Stop-gapping the Hornets' financial losses…is not a taxpayers' expense," a Charlotte official explains.

Enron Effect

Markets punish any whiff of corporate accounting wackiness. Firms with questionable numbers see their stock prices fall by double-digit percentages.

Plugged In

Virtual charter schools spring up in 12 states, melding home schooling with technology to bring outside lesson plans and experts into homes. A KPMG Consulting audit finds the schools help students "in need of a non-traditional setting due to medical conditions or other mental or physical health related circumstances."

Differently Abled

The amorphous Americans with Disabilities Act gets a little structure from a Supreme Court decision. Simple inability to do a specific job doesn't automatically trigger ADA protection, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor writes. A protected disability is one that "severely restricts the individual from doing activities that are of central importance to most people's daily lives."

Liabilities

Time Cop

AOL Time Warner files its own antitrust suit against Microsoft, alleging that the company set out to ruin rival browser Netscape in 1995. Yet AOL paid $10 billion for Netscape in 1999, meaning somebody still thought it was worth something four years into the alleged plot.

Half-Time Show

The Office of National Drug Control Policy spends $3.2 million on Super Bowl ads to inform sports fans that buying drugs helps fund terrorism. Of course, it is the War on Drugs that makes drugs so profitable.

Poor Sport

National Football League player Terry Glenn sues the league under the Americans with Disabilities Act. He claims that his depression makes it impossible to comply with his contract's substance abuse clause. He wants reimbursement for salary lost during a four-game suspension.

Sombertown

Tony and Angelica Flores spend a few hours in jail for failing to remove their Christmas lights in a timely manner. A Peoria, Arizona, law requires residents to remove decorations within 19 days after the holiday. The couple ignored a court date and got a letter saying the case had been dismissed. Then police officers showed up at their door.

Star Billing

Several states lobby for federal money to give moviemakers tax breaks. Canadian subsidies must be matched in the U.S., they say, or shows set in Chicago or Pittsburgh will continue to be shot in Toronto. But even with subsidies, the cheap Canadian dollar will pull productions north.