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fires, not starting them.
• Yet the agency set off alarms in Congress and state capitols across the West by citing the automatic spending cuts as the basis for demanding that dozens of states return $17.9 million in federal subsidies. And it's all come down to a bureaucratic squabble over whether the money is subject to so-called sequestration because of the year it was paid -- 2013 -- as the Obama administration contends, or exempt from the cuts because of the year it was generated -- 2012 -- as the states insist.
• Right now, it's a standoff heightened by history and hard fiscal realities. But with taxpayer cash scarce, both sides are digging in: The Forest Service has to slash 5 percent of its budget under sequestration. The states, meanwhile, have depended for decades on a share of revenue from timber cut on federal land. Perhaps least willing to compromise are members of Congress who are up for re-election next year and are loath to let go of money that benefits potential voters back home.
• It's not clear who gets to decide or whether the question ends up in court. But lines have been drawn.
• "We regret having to take this action, but we have no alternative under sequestration," Forest Service Chief Tom Tidwell wrote in March to governors in 41 states,

explaining that since the payments were issued in the 2013 budget year, the money would be subject to sequestration.
• ___

• MEXICO CITY (AP) -- President Barack Obama and Mexico's new president, Enrique Pena Nieto, are stepping gingerly to avoid any suggestion of meddling in each other's most contentious issues. Instead, Obama is drawing attention to the cultural ties that have linked the two nations and the economic bonds that have begun to take hold more recently.
• Obama was to deliver a speech Friday to an audience made up primarily of students, highlighting the role they can play in deciding Mexico's future and promoting the type of broad exchanges he envisions under a new immigration regime in the United States. After his speech, Obama was to meet privately with Mexican businessmen, where he would stress the commercial ties between the two countries. Mexico is the second-largest export market for U.S. goods and services.
• Later, he was to travel to Costa Rica, where he planned to deliver a blunter mes

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