Looking Ahead

April 14

Hook-handed radical cleric Abu Hamza al-Masri goes on trial today in a Manhattan federal court on charges that he conspired to set up a terror cell in Oregon and for participating in a 1998 abduction in Yemen that resulted in the deaths of four Westerners. Al-Masri has indicated he will testify in his own defense for the sake of historians recording the event.

April 15

This year, the taxman came after wealthier Americans a bit more vigorously. Couples making more than $450,000 or individuals making more than $400,000 in 2013 saw their top marginal income tax rate jump to 39.6 percent. The deadline to file last year’s taxes is today.

April 20

Churches around the world that adhere to either the Gregorian or Julian calendar will celebrate Easter today. The coincidence occurs in 2014 because of the peculiarities of the calendars used by Western and Eastern churches to calculate Easter’s date. East and West will celebrate Easter on the same day only one other time (2017) in the next 10 years.

April 22

To listen to the complaints of broadcast television networks and stations, the Supreme Court on April 22 will hear a case that could condemn their industry to certain doom. At issue in American Broadcasting Companies v. Aereo, Inc. is whether Aereo’s practice of using antennae to pick up broadcast television and then streaming it over the internet to paying customers violates copyright law.

April 22

Earth Day arrives as a leading American scientific organization is reviewing its statement that man-made global warming is “incontrovertible.” It is standard practice for the American Physical Society to review its scientific statements, but the process for its current review of climate change includes a workshop with balanced viewpoints tasked to address questions very critical of computer models used by climate scientists.