Casey Kasem, king of the Top 40 countdown, dead

LOS ANGELES — Casey Kasem, the internationally famous radio host with the cheerful manner and gentle voice who became the king of the top 40 countdown with a syndicated show that ran for decades, died Sunday. He was 82.

Danny Deraney, publicist for Kasem's daughter, Kerri, says Kasem died Sunday morning. A statement issued by the family says he died at 3:23 a.m. on Father's Day morning surrounded by family and friends at a Washington state hospital.

"Even though we know he is in a better place and no longer suffering, we are heartbroken," wrote his daughter Kerri Kasem on Twitter and Facebook from the family. "The world will miss Casey Kasem, an incredible talent and humanitarian; we will miss our dad."

Kasem's "American Top 40" began on July 4, 1970, in Los Angeles. The No. 1 song on his list then was "Mama Told Me Not to Come," by Three Dog Night.

In his signoff, he would tell viewers: "And don't forget: keep your feet on the ground and keep reaching for the stars."

Media personality Ryan Seacrest, who took over the countdown from Kasem in 2004, said in a statement that Kasem's death is a loss for radio listeners worldwide. Seacrest said that as a child he'd listen to Kasem's show every weekend "and dream about someday becoming a radio DJ."

"When decades later I took over his AT40 countdown show, it was a surreal moment," Seacrest said. "Casey had a distinctive friendly on-air voice, and he was just as affable and nice if you had the privilege to be in his company. He'll be greatly missed by all of us."

In recent years, Kasem was trapped in a feud between his three adult children and his second wife, former actress Jean Kasem. In 2013, his children filed a legal petition to gain control of his health care, alleging that Kasem was suffering from advanced Parkinson's disease and that his wife was isolating him from friends and family members. Kasem also suffered from Lewy Body Disease, a form of dementia.

A judge in May temporarily stripped his wife of her caretaker role after she moved him from a medical facility in Los Angeles to a friend's home in Washington state. Jean Kasem said she moved her husband to protect his privacy and to consult with doctors. Casey Kasem developed a severe bedsore while in Washington and was in critical condition by the time he was hospitalized in early June.

It was a sad, startling end for a man whose voice had entertained and informed music lovers worldwide.

Kasem's "American Top 40" expanded to hundreds of stations, including Armed Forces Radio, and continued in varying forms — and for varying syndicators — into the 21st century. He stepped down from "American Top 40" in 2004 and retired altogether in 2009, completing his musical journey with Shinedown's "Second Chance."

While many DJs convulsed their listeners with stunts and "morning zoo" snarkiness, Kasem would read "long distance dedications" of songs sent in by readers and introduce countdown records with sympathetic background anecdotes about the singers.

"The idea from the beginning was to do the type of thing on radio that Ed Sullivan did on television, good, honest stories with human interest," he told the Los Angeles Times in 1975.

Kasem's legacy reached well beyond music. His voice was heard in TV cartoons such as "Scooby-Doo" (he was Shaggy) and in numerous commercials.

"They are going to be playing Shaggy and Scooby-Doo for eons and eons," Kasem told The New York Times in 2004. "And they're going to forget Casey Kasem — unless they happen to step on his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. I'll be one of those guys people say 'Who's that?' about. And someone else will say, 'He's just some guy who used to be on the radio.'"

The son of Lebanese immigrants, Kasem was active in speaking out for greater understanding of Arab-Americans — both on political issues involving the Mideast and on arts and media issues.

"Arab-Americans are coming out of the closet," Kasem told The Associated Press in 1990. "They are more outspoken now than ever before. People are beginning to realize who they really are, that they are not the people who yell and scream on their nightly newscast."

Kasem was born Kemal Amin Kasem in 1932 in Detroit. He began his broadcasting career in the radio club at Detroit's Northwestern High School and was soon a disc jockey on WJBK radio in Detroit, initially calling himself Kemal Kasem.

In a 1997 visit with high school students in Dearborn, Michigan, home to a large Arab-American community, he was asked why he changed his name to Casey.

"It didn't sound like a deejay; it wasn't hip. So we decided I'd be 'Casey at the Mike' — and I have been since," Kasem said.

In the 1975 Los Angeles Times interview, he said he had been doing "a regular screaming DJ show" in San Francisco in the early 1960s when his boss suggested he talk about the records instead.

He was unconvinced, since his screaming routine had brought him top ratings. But he said he had learned "after a particularly unpleasant situation in Buffalo never to argue with general managers."

___

Associated Press writer Tami Abdollah contributed to this report. Biographical material in this story was written by former AP staffer Polly Anderson.

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Income gap widens as American factories shut down

READING, Pa. — For decades, American manufacturing was a surefire path to the middle class, especially for workers without college degrees.

No more.

Globalization, automation and recession destroyed nearly 6 million manufacturing jobs between 2000 and 2009, casting many displaced workers out of the middle class and, consequently, widening the income gap between the rich and everyone else.

Laid-off factory workers often find their skills outdated or no longer in demand, forcing them into lower-paying, lifestyle-crimping jobs in retail, warehousing, food service, health care and other fields.

That has played out in Reading (REH'-ding), an old Pennsylvania manufacturing hub where factories once made everything from hats to hardware.

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The Ticker

New Hub flagship for Liberty Travel

Liberty Travel's new Boston flagship location will open this week.

Called the Boston Travel Center, the three-floor, 10,000-plus square-foot space on Washington Street in Downtown Crossing is anchored by Liberty Travel and includes its sister brands specializing in business/corporate travel, Corporate Traveler and FCM.

TOMORROW

• Federal Reserve releases industrial production for May.
• National Association of Home Builders releases housing market index for June.

TUESDAY

• Labor Department releases Consumer Price Index for May.
• Commerce Department releases housing starts for May.
• Federal Reserve policy makers begin a two-day meeting to set interest rates.

WEDNESDAY

• Commerce Department releases current account trade deficit for the first quarter.

THURSDAY

• Labor Department releases weekly jobless claims.
• Freddie Mac releases weekly mortgage rates.
• Conference Board releases leading indicators for May.

Florence Savings Bank, a mutually owned savings bank serving the Pioneer Valley through 9 branch locations, announced that Susan M. Seaver has joined the bank as vice president/mortgage originator.

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Should new Mustang tires go on the front or back?

I have a 2011 Mustang GT 5.0-liter with 36,000 miles. It has the Brembo brake package and Goodyear F1 tires on it. I'm ready to replace the worn rear tires again with the new OE Goodyears. Last time I replaced the rear tires, I placed the new tires on the front and moved the older front tires to the rear. Now people are telling me that I should place the new tires on the rear drive-axle to reduce the chance of oversteer that might be induced by having too much fun in a curve. With an everyday car I believe that understeer would be the greatest concern, but with 412 horsepower and almost 400 pound-feet of torque, maybe the new tires should be on the back. Which end of the car should the two new tires be placed on my Mustang and is a nitrogen fill worthwhile?

On the back. Like you, my first thought was that new tires should be mounted on the front and the older, worn front tires moved to the rear. Because the front tires do a far higher percentage of braking and, of course, steer the vehicle, my instincts said put the best tires on the front.

However, since loss of traction from the front tires — the "understeer" you mention — is easier to correct than "oversteer" — loss of traction from the rear tires — the recommendation for replacing just two tires is to mount the new ones on the rear.

In short, correcting understeer involves "breathing" back the throttle or modulating brake pressure to help the front tires regain traction. Oversteer, on the other hand, requires an instantaneous steering correction in the direction the back end is trying to go in order to keep the front tires pointed where the vehicle is headed, while at the same time neutralizing the throttle — not accelerating and not decelerating — to stop any wheelspin. If and when the rear end regains traction and wants to snap back — so-called "overcorrecting," a complete misnomer — the steering must be straightened in time with the rear end snapping back to keep the front wheels pointed where the vehicle is traveling.

In the racing schools I teach, we label the correction for oversteer as a three-step process: correct/pause/recover, CPR for short, an easy acronym to remember.

Nitrogen contains no moisture and is less prone to pressure changes with temperature changes, so filling tires with nitrogen makes some sense, but only if you continue to use nitrogen to top up tire pressures.

I own a 2001 Dodge Dakota and would like to clean the engine. Is it OK to take it to a self-service car wash and power-wash it?

It must be. Ever seen a used car on a dealer lot with a dirty engine? It's OK to clean the engine and engine compartment as long as you cover any sensitive wiring and electronics and don't aim the high-pressure spray directly at these components. Remember, engines and drivetrains get wet when vehicles are driven in the rain. The wiring harnesses and connectors used on modern automobiles are designed to be relatively weatherproof.

Motoring Note: Regarding white smoke from the 2003 Honda, reader Paul Harvey offered a good suggestion. "I had a similar problem involving my 2002 Toyota Sienna. One mechanic told me it was caused by a sludge problem and would require an engine replacement. I had thought it was a head gasket problem and took the van to another mechanic, who diagnosed a bad PCV valve. After he replaced it, the problem was solved."

A stuck or clogged PCV valve typically forces oil into the combustion chamber, where it is burned, creating a bluish smoke. So checking the PCV system for proper function is a simple step to possibly explain the sudden appearance of smoke from the tailpipe. Thanks for the suggestion, Paul.

Paul Brand, author of "How to Repair Your Car," is an automotive troubleshooter, driving instructor and former race -car driver. Readers may write to him at: Star Tribune, 425 Portland Ave. S., Minneapolis, Minn. 55488 or via email at paulbrand@startribune.com. Please explain the problem in detail and include a daytime phone number.

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With prices rising, home equity makes a comeback

WASHINGTON — If you're like most homeowners, it's your biggest asset. You can't track it online or check monthly statements sent to you by a bank, but it's crucially important for your personal financial well-being and your retirement planning.

It's your home equity — the difference between the market value of your house and whatever debt you've got on it. Equity for most of us is a big deal and, based on data released last week by the Federal Reserve, Americans' home-equity holdings are booming.

That's great news for most owners — though not all — and for the economy as a whole. The more equity we have, the more likely we are to spend money on goods and services that create more jobs — the so-called "wealth effect."

Now consider these brain-bending big numbers: Thanks to rising prices and substantial continuing pay-downs of mortgage debt, owners' combined 
equity holdings increased by 
$795 billion during the three months between the end of last December and March 31 of this year. Homeowners' equity holdings at the end of the first quarter totaled $10.8 trillion, the highest amount since late 2007 — but still well below the bubble-era record of $13.4 trillion reached in early 2006.

The ongoing boom is also pulling thousands of owners across the country out of real estate purgatory — they've been stuck in negative equity positions, but are now transitioning to positive. According to new estimates from mortgage and housing analytics firm CoreLogic, the owners of 312,000 houses moved out of negative territory during the first three months of 2014.

Now for the sobering side of the home-equity story: Despite the boom in housing wealth underway, many owners are still not able to join the party. About 6.3 million of them remain underwater on their loans. The average amount of negative equity they're carrying is often significant — they owe an average 33 percent more than their house could command in a sale today. That gives you an idea of the widespread pain still being felt in the wake of the bust and recession.

The impact is especially severe for owners who bought with little or nothing down and then loaded on additional debt with second mortgages. The average negative equity balance for owners with two mortgages is about $75,000, according to CoreLogic. For households with one mortgage, the average negative equity is around $52,000.

Also on the sobering side, millions of owners continue to have less equity than they'll need if they want to sell or even refinance. At the end of March, 10 million owners had less than 20 percent equity in their properties and 1.6 million of them had less than 5 percent. Given real estate transaction costs, most people with less than 5 percent equity would have to bring money to the table to pay off the debt on their house when they sell.

Equity holdings are closely linked to market segments — higher-cost houses are less likely to be in negative equity positions than lower-cost homes — and geography. According to CoreLogic, only about 3 percent of homes costing more than $500,000 have negative equity. By contrast, 17 percent of homes costing less than $200,000 are in negative positions.

Not surprisingly, areas of the country that performed worst during the bust — where easy-money financing was most common during the boom — continue to have high rates of negative equity, even well into the housing rebound. But there's one dazzling exception: California. In some inland counties during the recession, toxic financing contributed to home value losses of
50 percent and higher. Yet today, thanks to the most vigorous marketplace rebound of any state, just above 11 percent of California homes are in negative equity. Compare that with 29 percent in Nevada, 27 percent in Florida, 20 percent in Arizona.

Where are average equity levels highest? Texas, where home prices remained modest and affordable during the boom, is at the top. Just 
3.3 percent of Texas homes have debt exceeding their resale values. Rounding out the top five, Montana, Alaska, North Dakota and Hawaii all have less than 5 percent negative equity on average. The District of Columbia, a high-cost market that has seen significant home-price appreciation in the past several years, ranks sixth best in the country with a 5.1 percent negative equity rate.

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Obama order forces Philly rail workers back on job

PHILADELPHIA — President Barack Obama on Saturday forced union workers in Philadelphia's commuter rail strike to return to the job, granting Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett's request to create a presidential emergency board to mediate the contract dispute.

Obama ordered the establishment of the three-member board effective at 12:01 a.m. Sunday. He called for "a swift and smooth resolution" of the dispute between the Southeast Pennsylvania Transportation Authority and its engineers and electricians unions.

Workers will have to return to the job when the board goes into effect after midnight, however SEPTA said rail service wouldn't be up and running until around 6 a.m. Sunday. They don't have to resume direct talks with each other, but they do have to participate with the board's process, which typically involves written submissions and hearings.

Obama is giving the board 30 days to deliver a report recommending how the dispute should be resolved.

More than 400 workers went on strike at midnight Saturday.

"As long as these workers show up for their regularly scheduled Sunday shifts, Regional Rail service will restored to full Sunday operations in the morning, starting with the first scheduled service trains runs on all of our 13 commuter rail lines," said SEPTA spokeswoman Jerri Williams. First trains on Sundays start running at around 6 a.m., she said.

Stephen Bruno, vice president of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen, said his union's members will comply with the order and be back on duty at 12:01 a.m.

The move shut down train lines that carry commuters from Philadelphia to the suburbs, Philadelphia International Airport and New Jersey. The agency's subways, trolleys and buses continued to run.

Terry Gallagher, president and local chairman of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, said the presidential intervention was "what we were waiting for."

"We have been five years without an agreement, trying to get to this point and we're happy we're here now," he said. Gallagher said employees will be notified to report to their next scheduled shifts.

"The people of Philadelphia and the surrounding region expect and deserve a safe and efficient rail system to get them to work, medical appointments, school and recreation," Corbett, a Republican, said in a statement. "I call on both parties to work together, find common ground and place the riders at the forefront of mind in their discussions."

The unions said the strike was designed to force SEPTA to agree to their demands or accept binding arbitration. Workers are seeking raises of at least 14.5 percent over five years — or about 3 percentage points more than SEPTA has offered.

"My head's going to hurt by the end of this day," said volunteer Rusty Schwendeman of the Traveler's Aid Society, who had helped reroute about two dozen rail travelers Saturday morning at 30th Street Station.

They often involved several connections, longer routes or a significantly higher fare on Amtrak.

Carolyn Tola, of Hamilton Square, New Jersey, and three friends paid $40 apiece to take Amtrak from central New Jersey to Philadelphia to see the Pennsylvania Ballet instead of $9 on Septa.

"We're here," Tola said, noting that the ballet tickets were nonrefundable. "We're going to relax and enjoy it."

The strike began after negotiations between the transit agency and two unions failed to reach a new contract deal Friday. The last regional rail strike, in 1983, lasted more than three months.

The labor conflict came to a head this week after SEPTA announced it would impose a deal beginning Sunday. Terms include raising electrical workers' pay immediately by an average of about $3 per hour; the top wage rate for locomotive engineers would rise by $2.64 per hour.

The strike added to the commuting headaches in the region, where major construction projects are making it more difficult than usual to get around.

Drexel University dance team members Beverly and Angela Tomita, 18-year-old twins, had planned to take the airport line for a 2 p.m. flight home to Laguna Beach, California, for the summer.

"That's so not convenient!" Angela Tomita said when she found the region rail entrance closed at 30th Street Station. Schwendeman soon directed them to a subway-and-bus route.

"They're not the best answers, but they're the best answers I can come up with," Schwendeman told another teenager about her three-bus route home to suburban Blue Bell. "I don't want to send anybody to the middle of nowhere, either."

___

Associated Press writer Peter Jackson in Harrisburg contributed to this report.

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Boston connects to Beijing

New direct air service between Boston and China starts Friday, the latest in a string of nonstop international flights landed by Logan International Airport and perhaps the biggest coup to date.

"Of all the international flights, this is probably the biggest milestone," Massport CEO Thomas Glynn said. "In the global economy, China is the biggest player. Many nonprofit and for-profit businesses in Boston have activity in China."

Chinese carrier Hainan Airlines will start Boston-Beijing service four times per week — on Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays. It will switch to daily flights from July 21 through August — peak China travel season amid strong demand, according to Joel Chusid, Hainan's U.S. executive director.

Hainan already has sold well more than half of the seats for its July and August flights on the 213-passenger Boeing 787 Dreamliner.

"Our bookings are coming in steady," Chusid said, noting Hainan started reservations "pretty early" and has an interline agreement for connections with JetBlue Airways. "It's met our expectations.."

Hainan has set up a Boston office with a general manager and sales, finance and customer support staff.

At Hainan's request, Massport is planning a June 23 meeting for airline officials with local business leaders on Massport's Asia task force that worked toward landing the China service and the nonstop Toyko flights that started in 2012. It will be followed by a luncheon with Gov. Deval Patrick.

"Lasting growth in the 21st-century global economy will come from our competitiveness in global markets," Patrick said in a statement. "Hainan's new flight will better serve our international passengers and build upon our growth strategy to open up Massachusetts to new markets to ensure that we remain competitive for many years to come."

Massport has rebated $540,000 in landing fees and will provide $350,000 in marketing support over two years to Hainan as incentives for starting the Boston service.

"This gives them a little cushion if it takes a while for them to build up their load factor," Glynn said.

Hainan's 36 business-class seats have 74-inch pitches — the space between a point on one seat and the same point on the seat in front of it. The lie-flat seats turn into beds with turn-down service, mattress pad, duvet, sheets, pillows, pajamas and slippers provided.

Menus rotate monthly and include Western and Chinese choices. Recent Chinese dinner selections for the a la carte business-class service from Beijing to Seattle included fried pork stuffed with water chestnut in sweet and sour lychee sauce, pan-fried shrimp mousse with tofu, and sauteed bitter gourd with pickle.

"It's not Panda Express," Chusid said.

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Youth get sage advice at Hub site

For six years, Jared Chung was a consultant at McKinsey & Company, the elite adviser to many of the world's most influential businesses and institutions, but his true passion was moonlighting as an adviser to low-income kids.

"I saw that disadvantaged youth were feeling uninformed and alone in planning for their futures," Chung said. "I also saw that I wasn't the only one who wanted to help. The challenge in America is there just aren't enough people who are willing or able to do one-to-one mentoring."

So in 2012, he gathered a hundred volunteers and launched CareerVillage.org, a website that crowdsources career advice for low-income high school students.

"Our program is simple: We promise students the answer to any question about any career, anytime," Chung said. "And we deliver on that promise with a website that automatically matches student questions to volunteers with relevant experience."

Today, CareerVillage has more than 1,300 online volunteers and has served more than 6,000 students at schools including Match Charter Public School and Codman Academy Charter Public School, both in Boston, as well as KIPP Academy Lynn Collegiate High School.

CareerVillage offers teachers training on how to use the website, as well as lesson plans, presentation slides, work sheets and group activities to help students figure out their interests and create a plan for how to get answers to their questions about careers.

"We found the website to be student-friendly, thoughtfully simple and a tool that provides an easy entry point for conversation that can be awkward or difficult to start for teenagers," said Jerre Maynor, KIPP Academy's director of college counseling.

Oren Falkowitz, CEO of Area 1 Security, a Menlo Park, Calif., computer security firm, became a CareerVillage volunteer more than a year ago after he was introduced to Chung while he was living in Boston.

"It's a simple way to make a big difference," said Falkowitz, who has answered dozens of questions — mostly about what it's like to be an entrepreneur — with help from colleagues and friends. "I've always had mentors in my life who have helped me. Without that kind of insight, it's very difficult."

This summer, CareerVillage will get free office space in Boston as one of the MassChallenge startup accelerator's 128 finalists, and it will begin recruiting more staff and volunteers for the upcoming school year.

"We have an incredibly ambitious goal," Chung said. "There are 8 million high school kids living in high-poverty communities in America. We're not resting until we put a real dent in career readiness.

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Supreme Court has 17 cases to decide by June's end

WASHINGTON — It's crunch time at the Supreme Court, where the justices are racing to issue opinions in 17 cases over the next two weeks.

The religious rights of corporations, the speech rights of abortion protesters and the privacy rights of people under arrest are among the significant issues that are so far unresolved.

Summer travel, European teaching gigs and relaxation beckon, but only after the court hands down decisions in all the cases it has heard since October.

In rare instances, the justices will put off decisions and order a case to be argued again in the next term.

This is also the time of the year when a justice could announce a retirement. But the oldest of the justices, 81-year-old Ruth Bader Ginsburg, has signaled she will serve at least one more year, and maybe longer.

The justices will meet Monday and again on Thursday to issue opinions, and could wind up their work by the end of the month.

A look at some of the cases that remain:

— Contraceptive coverage: Corporations are claiming the right to exercise religious objections to covering women's contraceptives under their employee health insurance plans, despite the new health law's requirement that birth control be among a range of no-cost preventive services included in health plans.

— Abortion clinic buffer zones: Abortion opponents are challenging as a violation of their speech rights a Massachusetts law mandating a 35-foot protest-free zone on public sidewalks outside abortion clinics.

— Cellphone searches: Two cases weigh the power of police to search the cellphones of people they place under arrest without first obtaining a warrant from a judge.

— Recess presidential appointments: A federal appeals court said President Barack Obama misused the Constitution's recess power when he temporarily filled positions on the National Labor Relations Board in 2012.

— TV on the Internet: Broadcasters are fighting Internet startup Aereo's practice of taking television their programming for free and providing it to subscribers who can then watch on smartphones and other portable devices.

— Greenhouse gases: Industry groups assert that environmental regulators overstepped their bounds by trying to apply a provision of the Clean Air Act to control emissions of greenhouse gases from power plants and factories. This case is unlikely to affect the recent proposal from the Environmental Protection Agency to slash carbon dioxide emissions from power plants by nearly one-third by 2030; that plan involves a different part of the same law.

— Union fees: Home health care workers in Illinois want the court to rule that public sector unions cannot collect fees from workers who object to being affiliated with a union.

—Securities fraud: Investors could find it harder to bring class-action lawsuits over securities fraud at publicly traded companies in a case involving Halliburton Co., a provider of energy services.

— "False" campaign claims: An anti-abortion group says state laws that try to police false statements during political campaigns runs afoul of the First Amendment.

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Seacrest: Kasem's death a loss for radio listeners

LOS ANGELES — Ryan Seacrest says the death of his radio role model, Casey Kasem, is a loss for radio listeners worldwide.

Kasem, an internationally famous radio broadcaster with a cheerful manner and gentle voice, died Sunday at age 82.

He became the king of the top 40 countdown with a syndicated show that ran for decades.

Seacrest, who took over the countdown from Kasem in 2004, said in a statement that as a child, he'd listen to Kasem's show every weekend "and dream about someday becoming a radio DJ."

He says Kasem had a distinctive friendly on-air voice and will be greatly missed.

Kasem's legacy reached well beyond music. His voice was heard in TV cartoons such as "Scooby-Doo," where he was Shaggy, and in numerous commercials.

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