trying to strip out non ascii.. or rather convert non ascii

[bruce]

hi..

getting some files via curl, and want to convert them from what i'm
guessing to be unicode.

I'd like to convert a string like this::
<div class="profName"><a href="ShowRatings.jsp?tid=1312168">Alcántar,
Iliana</a></div>

to::
<div class="profName"><a href="ShowRatings.jsp?tid=1312168">Alcantar,
Iliana</a></div>

where I convert the
" á " to " a"

which appears to be a shift of 128, but I'm not sure how to accomplish this..

I've tested using the different decode/encode functions using
utf-8/ascii with no luck.

I've reviewed stack overflow, as well as a few other sites, but
haven't hit the aha moment.

pointers/comments would be welcome.

thanks