Winning Friends And Influencing People
Nice warm day today. For a change. Last night about midnight, I got up and turned the ceiling fan on, as it was actually getting warmer as the night progressed. The overnight low only dropped to 71 well before sunrise, and it made it all the way to 82 this afternoon, even with a mostly overcast afternoon. But I am not going to be a silly boy again and say that the hot dry-season weather has begun. Oh no, not me. We'll wait and see what tomorrow brings. The satellite image didn't look good - like maybe yet another cold front is on its way.
Well, the electioneering here in Costa Rica continues. Full bore. With the elections only eight days away, the parties and their candidates are out there in force, doing whatever they can to drum up last minute support. Often as not, that means sound trucks. Technically illegal here, especially in residential areas. But that never stopped an ambitious politician, not in this country.
Today it was a two-bit provincial party I had never heard of. A sound truck drove around the streets of Arenal, more or less continuously all afternoon, blasting out the same political message for a group calling itself the Partido Guanacaste Ambiental, or Guanacaste Environmental Party. Not much of a message, just "Friends from Arenal, it is important to protect the environment in which we live, vote for the Partido Guanacaste Ambiental." Then a two-second blast of warbly music, and the message was then repeated. Again and again.
The guy drove up and down the streets of town without stopping, over and over again - and believe me, it doesn't take long to drive up and down all the streets in the town of Arenal, even idling in low gear. The lousy P.A. system he was using wasn't helping get his message across - one had to listen carefully to the badly muffled, rapid-fire Spanish to decipher just what the rather wobbly cassette player was spewing out. The message was short enough that one could hear it at least three times on every pass. After about the fifth pass, I kinda wanted to go out and break the sad news to the fellow that I am a gringo and can't vote here, so there's no point in blasting me with his message over and over. And even if I was a Tico, I'm not sure I'd be swayed by the highly sophisticated message that was totally devoid of any reason why the PGA has any particular environmental credentials. And the endless repetition at high decibel levels was hardly likely to win friends and influence people - on and on, all afternoon.
But the barrios throughout Costa Rica will suffer through more of this nonsense in the coming days, to be sure. Then, after two days of legally enforced sobriety leading up to election day - during which Costa Rica will temporarily become a "dry" nation - it will all be over, and I'm told that the partying will begin. Serious partying, making up for lost time - loud, noisy partying.
Gee, I can hardly wait.
More Reasons Why I Am Glad I Am Out Of The States: American officials in Iraq are in face-to-face talks with high-level Iraqi Sunni insurgents, NEWSWEEK has learned. Americans are sitting down with "senior members of the leadership" of the Iraqi insurgency, according to Americans and Iraqis with knowledge of the talks (who did not want to be identified when discussing a sensitive and ongoing matter). The talks are taking place at U.S. military bases in Anbar province, as well as in Jordan and Syria. "Now we have won over the Sunni political leadership," says U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad. "The next step is to win over the insurgents." The groups include Baathist cells and religious Islamic factions, as well as former Special Republican Guards and intelligence agents, according to a U.S. official with knowledge of the talks. Iraq's insurgent groups are reaching back. "We want things from the U.S. side, stopping misconduct by U.S. forces, preventing Iranian intervention," said one prominent insurgent leader from a group called the Army of the Mujahedin, who refused to be named because of the delicacy of the discussions. "We can't achieve that without actual meetings."
A White House leak revealing astonishing details of how Tony Blair and George Bush lied about the Iraq war is set to cause a worldwide political storm. Tony Blair knew that George Bush was only "going through the motions" of offering support for a second UN resolution in the run-up to the Iraq war, it was claimed last night. According to reports in The Mail on Sunday, the Prime Minister and the US President decided to go to war regardless of whether they obtained UN backing. The allegations will undermine claims that the final decision to go to war was not made until MPs voted in the Commons a day before military action. It will also bolster claims that the President and Mr Blair decided to go to war months before military action began. The book is expected to produce fresh evidence that President Bush only went through the motions of giving a wholehearted endorsement to Mr Blair's attempts to gain full UN approval for military action. The revelations make a nonsense of Mr Blair's claim that the final decision was not made until MPs voted in the Commons 24 hours before the war - and could revive the risk of him being charged with war crimes or impeached by Parliament itself.
As President Bush prepares for next week's State of the Union address, he faces widespread discontent over his job performance and the nation's direction that could threaten his party in the 2006 election, a Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll has found. In the survey, 43% of Americans said they approved of Bush's performance as president - his weakest showing ever in a Times poll. He received even lower marks for his handling of the economy, healthcare and Iraq - especially from women, who the poll found had turned against him on several fronts. And by a 2-1 ratio, those surveyed said the nation needed to change direction from the overall course Bush had set.
They fought a quiet battle to rein in the president's power in the war on terror. And they paid a price for it. One of those people, NEWSWEEK reports, was former assistant attorney general Jack Goldsmith. Goldsmith and other Justice Department lawyers, backed by their intrepid boss James Comey, had stood up to the hard-liners, centered in the office of the vice president, who wanted to give the president virtually unlimited powers in the war on terror. Demanding that the White House stop using what they saw as farfetched rationales for riding rough-shod over the law and the Constitution, Goldsmith and the others fought to bring government spying and interrogation methods within the law. They did so at their peril; ostracized, some were denied promotions, while others left for more comfortable climes in private law firms and academia. Some went so far as to line up private lawyers in 2004, anticipating that the president's eavesdropping program would draw scrutiny from Congress, if not prosecutors.
Surging oil and gas prices have helped Exxon Mobil to unveil the highest quarterly profits reported by a publicly-traded US company. Fourth-quarter earnings jumped to $10.7bn from $8.4bn in the same period last year. The results drove Exxon's annual profit to $36.13bn - 42% up on last year. In the past year, oil prices have soared on concerns about supplies prompted by tensions in oil producing countries and hurricanes in the US. Meanwhile, Exxon also got a boost from a one-off $390m payment to settle a lawsuit in the last three months of the financial year. Without the exceptional item, earnings for the quarter came in at $1.65 per share, still significantly better than analyst forecasts of $1.45. On Thursday Shell will top record-setting results with an estimated profit of $23 billion for 2005. This is up nearly a third from 2004, when its profits were $17.6 billion, at the time the biggest by a British company. BP is expected to continue the trend on February 7 by revealing full-year profits estimated at $21.7 billion. This contrasts with earnings of $16.4 billion in 2004. Oil-company profits, driven by the surging price of oil and gas, have drawn criticism as the cost of petrol remains high and domestic-heating bills soar. Meanwhile, the saber-rattling over Iran has caused oil prices to surge. Kona Haque, commodities editor at the Economist Intelligence Unit, said the worst case scenario of a shutdown of supplies from Iran would be 'absolutely devastating ... I wouldn't be surprised to see the price go over $90 a barrel'. She said fears about Iran are already adding a $10 risk premium to oil prices, which could remain in place for months as the crisis escalates. Davoud Danesh-Jafari, Iran's oil minister, has warned that the result of punitive action against his country would be 'the unleashing of a crisis in the oil sector'.
Despite protests from other countries, the United States is expanding a top-secret effort to kill suspected terrorists with drone-fired missiles as it pursues an increasingly decentralized al-Qaida, U.S. officials say. The CIA's failed attempt to assassinate al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahri in Pakistan on Jan. 13 was the latest strike in the government's "targeted killing" program, a highly classified initiative that officials say has broadened as the terrorist network splintered into smaller cells and fled its haven in Afghanistan. A British technology company and a secretive air force base in Cambridgeshire are playing a key role in the CIA's use of robot Predator planes, deployed to assassinate suspected terrorists overseas,The Observer can reveal. A missile fired from a Predator killed more than 20 innocent people in Pakistan earlier this month in a botched US bid to kill Ayman al Zawahiri, the deputy leader of al-Qaeda, and similar attacks have been made in Iraq, Yemen and on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border. The attacks have been condemned by humanitarian organizations, which argue that extra-judicial killings break international law and have led to the deaths of innocent civilians. The revelation that Britain is involved in the Predator program is likely to prove controversial. Amnesty International and the Liberal Democrats said they would press the government to uncover the truth about the UK's role in the program and whether or not British firms should be allowed to supply components for the weapon. 'These kinds of targeted attacks - with air-to-surface missiles taking the place of judicial process - appear to be in breach of international law,' said Amnesty International's UK campaigns director, Stephen Bowen. 'That up to 22 civilians were also killed in a recent attack makes it all the more worrying.
Senior Iranian officials further raised tensions with the West yesterday, implicitly warning that Tehran would use missiles to strike Israel or Western forces stationed in the Gulf if attacked. The statements came as world leaders met at the annual World Economic Forum in Davos, with the Middle East high on the agenda. The hardline Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has pressed ahead with a controversial nuclear program since his election last year. 'The world knows Iran has a ballistic missile power with a range of 2,000km (1,300 miles),' General Yahya Rahim Safavi said on state-run television. 'We have no intention to invade any country [but] we will take effective defence measures if attacked.' Meanwhile, despite persistent disillusionment with the war in Iraq, a majority of Americans supports taking military action against Iran if that country continues to produce material that can be used to develop nuclear weapons, a Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll has found. The poll, conducted Sunday through Wednesday, found that 57% of Americans favor military intervention if Iran's Islamic government pursues a program that could enable it to build nuclear arms.
The American space program's leading climate scientist has accused the White House of trying to gag him after he called last month for urgent cuts in the emissions of greenhouse gases linked to global warming. James Hansen, director of Nasa's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, is reported in today's New York Times as saying that officials at Nasa headquarters ordered staff to review his forthcoming lectures, papers and media interviews. He said he intended to ignore the restrictions. Dean Acosta, Nasa's deputy assistant administrator for public affairs, denied that there had been any specific effort to silence Hansen. The scientist said in an interview that officials at NASA headquarters had ordered the public affairs staff to review his coming lectures, papers, postings on the Goddard Web site and requests for interviews from journalists. Dr. Hansen said he would ignore the restrictions. "They feel their job is to be this censor of information going out to the public," he said. Dean Acosta, deputy assistant administrator for public affairs at the space agency, said there was no effort to silence Dr. Hansen. "That's not the way we operate here at NASA," Mr. Acosta said. "We promote openness and we speak with the facts." He said scientists were free to discuss scientific findings, but that policy statements could be made only by official spokesmen.
For more than a decade, Osama bin Laden had few soldiers more devoted than Abdallah Tabarak. A former Moroccan transit worker, Tabarak served as a bodyguard for the al Qaeda leader, worked on his farm in Sudan and helped run a gemstone smuggling racket in Afghanistan, court records here show. During the battle of Tora Bora in December 2001, when al Qaeda leaders were pinned down by U.S. forces, Tabarak sacrificed himself to engineer their escape. He headed toward the Pakistani border while making calls on Osama bin Laden's satellite phone as bin Laden and the others fled in the other direction. Tabarak was captured and taken to the U.S. Navy base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where he was classified as such a high-value prisoner that the Pentagon repeatedly denied requests by the International Committee of the Red Cross to see him. Then, after spending almost three years at the base, he was suddenly released. Today, the al Qaeda loyalist known locally as the "emir" of Guantanamo walks the streets of his old neighborhood near Casablanca, more or less a free man. In a decision that neither the Pentagon nor Moroccan officials will explain publicly, Tabarak was transferred to Morocco in August 2004 and released from police custody four months later. His case also highlights mysteries of U.S. priorities in deciding who to keep and who to let go. As the Pentagon gears up to hold its first military tribunals at Guantanamo after four years of preparations, it has released a prisoner it called a key operative. At the same time, it retains under heavy guard men whose background and significance are never discussed.
The U.S. Army has forced about 50,000 soldiers to continue serving after their voluntary stints ended under a policy called "stop-loss," but while some dispute its fairness, court challenges have fallen flat. The policy applies to soldiers in units due to deploy for the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. The Army said stop-loss is vital to maintain units that are cohesive and ready to fight. But some experts said it shows how badly the Army is stretched and could further complicate efforts to attract new recruits. "As the war in Iraq drags on, the Army is accumulating a collection of problems that cumulatively could call into question the viability of an all-volunteer force," said defence analyst Loren Thompson of the Lexington Institute think tank. "When a service has to repeatedly resort to compelling the retention of people who want to leave, you're edging away from the whole notion of volunteerism." When soldiers enlist, they sign a contract to serve for a certain number of years, and know precisely when their service obligation ends so they can return to civilian life. But stop-loss allows the Army, mindful of having fully manned units, to keep soldiers on the verge of leaving the military.
So far, Iran's mullahs aren't feeling much pain from the Americans next door. In fact, officials at all levels of government here say they see the American presence as a source of strength for themselves as they face the Bush administration. In almost every conversation about Iran's nuclear showdown with the United States and Europe, they cite the Iraq war as a factor Iran can play to its own advantage. "America is extremely vulnerable right now," said Akbar Alami, a member of the Iran's Parliament often critical of the government but on this point hewing to the government line. "If the U.S. takes any unwise action" to punish Iran for pursuing its nuclear program, he said, "certainly the U.S. and other countries will share the harm." Iranians know that American forces, now stretched thin, are unlikely to invade Iran. And if the United States or Europe were to try a small-scale, targeted attack, the proximity of American forces makes them potential targets for retaliation. Iranians also know the fighting in Iraq has helped raise oil prices, and any attempt to impose sanctions could push prices higher.
Two FEMA disaster assistance employees working in New Orleans were arrested yesterday on federal bribery charges, accused of accepting $10,000 each in exchange for letting a contractor submit inflated reports on the number of meals it was serving at a Hurricane Katrina relief base camp there. The charges against Andrew Rose and Loyd Hollman, both of Colorado, came after they told a contractor hired on a $1 million deal to provide meals in Algiers, La., that he could submit falsified invoices for extra meals, a Justice Department statement said. The two were arrested hours after accepting envelopes containing $10,000 apiece. These were supposed to be down payments in what the two had said should be a $2,500 weekly bribe for each, officials said. "No one - whether citizen or public official - will be permitted to illegally profit at the expense of the communities and citizens who so desperately need FEMA funds and assistance in the wake of this region's terrible disaster," said Jim Letten, the United States attorney. Since the storm, dozens of would-be Hurricane Katrina victims who inappropriately applied for assistance from the Federal Emergency Management Agency have been arrested on charges of making fraudulent claims. A group of contract workers at the American Red Cross in Bakersfield, Calif., were arrested late last year, accused of creating fictitious victims and then cashing benefits the group provided.
Army officials are investigating allegations that members of the celebrated 82nd Airborne Division appear on a gay pornography Web site, a spokeswoman said Friday. Authorities at Fort Bragg have begun an inquiry into whether the paratroopers' actions violated the military conduct code. Division spokeswoman Maj. Amy Hannah declined to say how many paratroopers are involved or identify their unit within the division. A defense official speaking on condition of anonymity said up to seven soldiers are involved. Hannah said soldiers questioned will be allowed to seek legal assistance, but she declined to say if any one had been charged. "Once the investigation is complete, the chain of command will take appropriate action," Hannah said. The military-themed Web site does not appear to make any direct reference to the 82nd Airborne or Fort Bragg. The registered owner of the Web site's domain name lists an address in Fayetteville, the city that adjoins Fort Bragg.
U.S. Jewish leaders are considering providing financial support to Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman, two former American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) employees on trial for espionage for their entanglement in a high-profile affair involving the possession and transfer of classified information. Former Pentagon official Larry Franklin was sentenced 10 days ago to 12 years in prison for providing classified information to AIPAC - via Rosen and Weissman - and to Israel via an Israeli Embassy employee in Washington. As a result of increasing concern over the possible outcome of Rosen and Weissman's trial, a number of U.S. Jewish leaders consulted via telephone this past week to formulate a response to the trial of the former AIPAC employees.
Why I Am Embarrassed To Show My Passport: President Bush's $15 billion effort to fight AIDS has handed out nearly one-quarter of its grants to religious groups, and officials are aggressively pursuing new church partners that often emphasize disease prevention through abstinence and fidelity over condom use. Award recipients include a Christian relief organization famous for its televised appeals to feed hungry children, a well-known Catholic charity and a group run by the son of evangelist Billy Graham, according to the State Department. The outreach to nontraditional AIDS players comes in the midst of a debate over how best to prevent the spread of HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. The debate has activated groups on both ends of the political spectrum and created a vast competition for money. Conservative Christian allies of the president are pressing the U.S. foreign aid agency to give fewer dollars to groups that distribute condoms or work with prostitutes. The Bush administration provided more than 560 million condoms abroad last year, compared with some 350 million in 2001. Secular organizations in Africa are raising concerns that new money to groups without AIDS experience may dilute the impact of Bush's historic three-year-old program.
Republicans Believe In Honest, Open, And Accountable Government: Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) announced today that it has sued the US Department of Homeland Security for allegedly refusing to respond to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request regarding FEMA's preparedness before Hurricane Katrina. On September 7, 2005, CREW filed a FOIA request for records and communication of FEMA. A request for expedited response was denied by DHS on September 20, 2005. CREW appealed the decision on October 24, 2005, and was again denied on December 21, 2005. According to a CREW release, they are requesting 1) Communications between the White House and FEMA regarding the preparation for and response to the damage caused by Hurricane Katrina; 2) Communications regarding offers by corporations and foreign governments to assist the victims of Katrina, and FEMA's response to such offers; 3) Information regarding the portion of the $3.1 billion 2005 DHS budget for emergency preparedness that was used to prepare for hurricanes on the Gulf Coast and for potential flooding in New Orleans; 4) Information regarding the amount of money that was diverted from natural disaster emergency preparedness to terrorism emergency preparedness and the rationale for any such diversion; and 5) Studies, assessments, presentations and scenarios created demonstrating the potential impact of a powerful hurricane on the Gulf Coast and proposed responses to such scenarios.
Fourth Amendment Death Watch: A program that was supposed to help the National Security Agency identify electronic data crucial to the nation's safety is not up and running more than six years and $1.2 billion after it was launched, according to current and former government officials. The classified project, code-named Trailblazer, was promoted as the NSA's state-of-the art tool for sifting through an ocean of modern-day digital communications and uncovering key nuggets to protect the nation against an ever-changing collection of enemies. Its main goal when it was launched in 1999 was to allow NSA analysts to connect the 2 million bits of data the agency collects every hour -- a task that has grown increasingly complex with the advent of the Internet, cell phones and instant messaging -- and enable them quickly to identify the most important information.
If We Ignore Global Warming Long Enough, Maybe It Will Go Away: Rising concentrations of greenhouse gases may have more serious impacts than previously believed, a major scientific report has said. The report, published by the UK government, says there is only a small chance of greenhouse gas emissions being kept below "dangerous" levels. It fears the Greenland ice sheet is likely to melt, leading sea levels to rise by seven metres over 1,000 years. The poorest countries will be most vulnerable to these effects, it adds. The report, Avoiding Dangerous Climate Change, collates evidence presented by scientists at a conference hosted by the UK Meteorological Office in February 2005. The conference set two principal objectives: to ask what level of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere was too much, and what the options were for avoiding such a level.
Scandals Du Jour: A California congressman who accepted campaign cash from disgraced ex-lobbyist Jack Abramoff and used his sports box for a fundraiser interceded on behalf of two American Indian tribes that were represented by Abramoff's firm, documents show. GOP Rep. John Doolittle (news, bio, voting record) wrote Interior Secretary Gale Norton in June 2003 criticizing the Bush administration's response to a tribal government dispute involving the Sac & Fox Tribe of the Mississippi in Iowa. In October 2003, Doolittle appealed in a letter to the secretary for quicker action for a Massachusetts tribe, the Mashpee Wampanoag, that was seeking federal recognition. Both tribes signed on with Abramoff's lobbying firm, Greenberg Traurig, that year. Sac & Fox hired the firm in May, the Wampanoags in November. Neither tribe appears tied to Doolittle's rural Northern California district, and Doolittle is not on the House committee that handles Indian issues.
We Conservatives Are More Moral Than You: The staff of U.S. Rep Marty Meehan wiped out references to his broken term-limits pledge as well as information about his huge campaign war chest in an independent biography on a Web site that bills itself as the "world's largest encyclopedia." The Meehan alterations on Wikipedia.com represent just two of more than 1,000 changes made by congressional staffers at the U.S. House of Representatives in the past six months. Wikipedia is a global reference that relies on its Internet users to add credible information to entries on millions of topics. Matt Vogel, Meehan's chief of staff, said he authorized an intern in July to replace existing Wikipedia content with a staff-written biography of the lawmaker. The change deleted a reference to Meehan's campaign promise to surrender his seat after serving eight years, a pledge Meehan later eschewed. It also deleted a reference to the size of Meehan's campaign account, the largest of any House member at $4.8 million, according to the latest data available from the Federal Election Commission.
News Of The Weird: One registered Republican won't be able to vote in the next election unless he appears at a Berks County (PA) Elections Board to explain the signature on his registration form. The man is registered as Paul S. Sewell, but his form is signed "God." County Solicitor Alan S. Miller said Sewell claims his "God" signature is merely a legal mark like the "X" used by people who are illiterate. Sewell, 40, said he will be happy to explain. As the owner of a bail enforcement agency, he finds fugitives, he said. "Whenever I go to arrest somebody, they say, 'Oh, God, give me another chance. Oh, God, let me go. I'll turn myself in tomorrow,'" Sewell said. He said he thinks his designated mark is legal. "PennDOT accepted it on my driver's license. I have a credit card with it," he said. "It shouldn't be a problem."
Whenever I get the idea that the Arenal rainy season is about to end, it comes back to let me know just what a silly boy I am. Yesterday there were periods of sun in the afternoon, but not many, and it was chilly and windy all day. Never made it out of the low 70's all day, getting up to only 74. Not terribly cold overnight, as it only dropped to 69, but the fog this morning was thick enough to cut with a knife, and the rain, wind and fog together made for a pretty miserable day all day. It was just too nasty to be outside, so today ended up being laundry and watch-TV day.
Other than editing today's blog entry, I didn't really get much of anything done. I had a serious arthritis flare up in my right ankle late yesterday, and that made getting around a bit difficult, so I wasn't up to a whole lot today, particularly anything that required a lot of walking around. Other than laundry, I did not get any work done around the place. Sat in front of the computer instead, and did a lot of research I had been putting off.
But yesterday, before the flare up had begun, I went into town on my weekly grocery run, and to the bank to have some cash to pay the gardener. He hadn't had a raise since he had been working for me, and with the depreciation in the colon since I hired him, I knew that he was overdue for one, and so I wasn't all that surprised when he brought that up yesterday, as he finished up his work. I had already given it some thought and told him what I had felt was fair, and he seemed quite satisfied with that. He told me about some of his other clients who had been really cheap - some had offered him only a 5% raise after nearly 30% depreciation in the colon. Needless to say, he had gotten a much better raise than that out of me.
While in town, I noted that the election flags and banners are everywhere, and every telephone pole and retaining wall is adequately covered in campaign posters. The elections are the first week in February, so the country is all geared up for it, but there doesn't seem much excitement about it. The election of former president Oscar Arias seems pretty much assured, as he is almost 20 points ahead in the polls, enough that he can likely avoid a runoff, and the campaign has been polite almost to the point of being perfunctory. So the usual election buzz that is a feature of Costa Rican life seems to be pretty much missing this time. Not to say that the usual party-flag draped sound trucks aren't making the rounds, making of nuisance of themselves, but there just doesn't seem to be much enthusiasm, cheering or otherwise. The elections will all be over in a bit more than a week, and it seems like everyone, Ticos and foreigners alike, will be glad.
More Reasons Why I Am Glad I Am Out Of The States: A majority of Americans said the presidency of George W. Bush has been a failure and that they would be more likely to vote for congressional candidates who oppose him, according to a CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll. Fifty-two percent of adults said Bush's administration since 2001 has been a failure, down from 55 percent in October. Fifty- eight percent described his second term as a failure. At the same point in former President Bill Clinton's presidency, 70 percent of those surveyed by Gallup said they considered it a success and 20 percent a failure. In a poll conducted in January of 2002, after Bush was president for one year, 83 percent of those surveyed said his presidency was a success. In the new poll, conducted Jan. 20-22, fifty-one percent of those surveyed said they would be more likely to vote for congressional candidates who do not support Bush's policies. The percentage of Americans who called Bush "honest and trustworthy" fell 7 percentage points in the last year to 49 percent, the poll found. A strong bipartisan majority of the public believes Smirkey should disclose contacts between disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff and White House staff members despite administration assertions that media requests for details about those contacts amount to a "fishing expedition," according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll. The survey found that three in four -- 76 percent -- of Americans said Bush should release lists of all meetings between aides and Abramoff; 18 percent disagreed. Two in three Republicans joined with eight in 10 Democrats and political independents in favoring disclosure, according to the poll.
Bloggers beware: The US military's plan to make war on the internet (PDF) have been revealed. In a declassified but heavily redacted document recently released to the National Security Archive, the plan to censor the internet and fight against web sites and their owners it does not like, has been made public. As the world turns networked, the Pentagon is calculating the military opportunities that computer networks, wireless technologies and the modern media offer. From influencing public opinion through new media to designing "computer network attack" weapons, the US military is learning to fight an electronic war. The declassified document is called "Information Operations Roadmap". It was obtained by the National Security Archive at George Washington University using the Freedom of Information Act. Officials in the Pentagon wrote it in 2003. The Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, signed it. An alarming amount of the "psyops" disinformation that it is already known to be creating, is making its way into American newspapers and onto American computer and television screens as "news" reports quoted uncritically by domestic news services in the U.S. The source of much of this news is picked up from the "TV Marti" propaganda operations directed at Cuba and the military information offices in Iraq as major sources. And, in a grand finale, the document recommends that the United States should seek the ability to "provide maximum control of the entire electromagnetic spectrum". US forces should be able to "disrupt or destroy the full spectrum of globally emerging communications systems, sensors, and weapons systems dependent on the electromagnetic spectrum". Consider that for a moment. The US military seeks the capability to knock out every telephone, every networked computer, every radar system on the planet.
The US may resolve its publicity problems with Guantanamo Naval Base, in a Cuban territory occupied against the will of the Cuban people, by turning it into death row. A revision of regulations for Ft. Lauderdale will now allow the US Army to execute people in its custody outside that detention center, extending the license-to-kill to all military detention centers. The news did not catch anyone by surprise, since torture and abuse of the over 500 prisoners from different countries illegally held there have earned international condemnation for a long time. The media and prominent politicians, like ex President Jimmy Carter and German Foreign Minister Angela Merkel, have urged for the immediate end of such gross human rights violations and closing of the base.
Frustrated by slow action in Congress, state legislatures are debating whether to increase border enforcement at their own expense, fine employers who use undocumented workers and get local police involved in deporting them. It's unclear how far the proposals would go because, like Congress, legislatures are divided on what to do about the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants who provide a low-wage workforce in the USA. Federal law may limit state power on actions such as penalizing employers, says Ann Morse, an analyst at the National Conference of State Legislatures. (Related: City puts itself on immigration watch)
Ron Nehring, protege of conservative strategist Grover Norquist, Vice-Chairman of the California Republican Party and former colleague of disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff, has introduced a proposal to convert all east San Diego County schools in the Grossmont Union High School District into charter schools. Some educators believe Grossmont is being used as a petri dish to test privatization of public education as part of a national GOP strategy. "Ron Nehring ... is an important piece on Norquist's chessboard," states a report titled Target San Diego: The Right Wing Assault on Urban Democracy and Smart Government. Prepared for the Center on Policy Initiatives, a progressive think tank, the report reveals how the National GOP has targeted San Diego as a "battleground" and model for an alleged agenda of radically cutting government funding, permanently weakening organized labor, and aggressively moving to privatize public services.
Democrats continued to warn that Alito's nomination would put individual rights and liberties in danger. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., the only woman on the Senate Judiciary Committee, said Alito will join justices Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia in the court's conservative wing and apply "originalist" interpretations to court decisions. "If an originalist analysis was applied to the Fourteenth Amendment, women would not be provided equal protection under the Constitution, interracial marriages could be outlawed, schools could still be segregated and the principle of one man, one vote would not govern the way we elect our representatives," Feinstein said. Even though Democrats like Landrieu and Ken Salazar of Colorado won't support a filibuster, that doesn't mean that liberals aren't working to get the largest vote against Alito possible. Twenty-nine senators - including Democratic Sens. Blanche Lincoln, Carl Levin, Daniel Inouye, Joesph Lieberman and Jeff Bingaman as well as independent Sen. Jim Jeffords of Vermont - have said they will vote against Alito. Twenty-two Democrats voted against conservative Chief Justice John Roberts last year. If the pattern continues, Alito may be on his way to the most partisan Senate victory for a Supreme Court nominee in years. The closest vote in modern history is Justice Clarence Thomas' 52-48 victory in 1991, when 11 Democrats broke with their party and voted for President George H.W. Bush's nominee.
Google will be called to task in Washington next month following a controversial decision by the internet search engine to launch a China-based version of its website that will censor results to avoid angering the country’s Communist government. The decision by Chris Smith, a Republican congressman from New Jersey who chairs a House subcommittee on Human Rights, to call for a February 16 hearing to examine the operating procedures of US internet companies in China, represents the first signs of what could become a serious backlash against Google and other internet companies in Washington that are perceived as capitulating to the Chinese government. Mr. Smith on Wednesday accused Google of "collaborating... with persecutors" who imprison and torture Chinese citizens "in the service of truth."
Porn-on-the-go - porn delivered to your cell phone - was the focus of a two-day Mobile Adult Content Congress that wrapped up in Miami on Thursday amid expectations, according to at least some participants, that it will soon catch on in the United States. Consumers already spend tens of millions of dollars a year on cell-phone-based adult content in Europe where companies such as mobile-phone giant Vodafone Group Plc (VOD.L) -- or "Vodafilth" as it was dubbed by one British newspaper -- are among the distributors. Leading American cellular carriers have been reluctant to jump onto the bandwagon, however, fearing a backlash from the conservatives and the religious right if they provide U.S. consumers easy access to hand-held X-rated theater. The Miami conference, aimed at allaying some of those concerns, was sponsored by Waat Media, a California-based company that represents some of the leading so-called late-night U.S. entertainment brands. Rather than focusing on steamy content or images, such as video footage featuring conference attendee Ron Jeremy -- a porn star who has licensed his name to RJ Mobile -- industry officials focused here on issues such as content rating and filtering devices or age verification mechanisms, meant to prevent underage consumers from buying adult content. It was all a bit staid and very business-like, but one speaker, an executive identified as James Walz of West Management, did seem to get worked up as he talked about features like "personalized strip teases" and unbridled U.S. market potential.
Crime may be down in New Orleans, but many of the city's bad guys seem to be turning up in Houston, which finds itself caught in the crosshairs of an apparent gang war between Hurricane Katrina evacuees from two rival housing projects. On Friday, Houston's newly formed Gang Murder Squad announced the arrest of eight men from New Orleans suspected in 11 murders in the Houston area over the past three months. "These guys are hooking up with friends and old rivalries are beginning again," Sgt. Brian Harris, a Gang Murder Squad investigator and the top detective on the case, told TIME. Unlike gangs in Houston, which are usually affiliated with the Bloods and the Crips and deal in crack, the New Orleans groups are strictly based on local fault lines, formed around housing projects, and deal mostly in heroin, he said.
Why I Am Embarrassed To Show My Passport: Smirkey continues the saber-rattling in Syria - he has told the son of murdered Lebanese ex-PM Rafik Hariri that he wants to see an end to "Syrian intimidation" in Lebanon. Mr Bush also told Saad Hariri during a visit to Washington that his father's assassins "need to be held to account". Saad Hariri led anti-Syrian parties to victory in Lebanese polls held after his father was killed in February 2005. International pressure and street protests followed the assassination, forcing Syria to withdraw troops it had stationed in Lebanon for more than a decade. There are persistent rumors and accusations that the assassination was a CIA false-flag operation designed to discredit Syria, and the UN investigation of it was stacked.
The U.S. Army in Iraq has at least twice seized and jailed the wives of suspected insurgents in hopes of "leveraging" their husbands into surrender, U.S. military documents show. In one case, a secretive task force locked up the young mother of a nursing baby, a U.S. intelligence officer reported. In the case of a second detainee, one American colonel suggested to another that they catch her husband by tacking a note to the family's door telling him "to come get his wife." The issue of female detentions in Iraq has taken on a higher profile since kidnappers seized American journalist Jill Carroll on Jan. 7 and threatened to kill her unless all Iraqi women detainees are freed. The U.S. military on Thursday freed five of what it said were 11 women among the 14,000 detainees currently held in the 2 1/2-year-old insurgency. All were accused of "aiding terrorists or planting explosives," but an Iraqi government commission found that evidence was lacking.
"Extraordinary Rendition" Watch: On Tuesday, Jan. 24, the Council of Europe announced the results of its long-awaited, months-long investigation into the possibility that torture victims have been shuttled around Europe to clandestine torture centers. The Council's investigations were led by Sen. Dick Marty of Switzerland, who, in the final report, excoriated European leaders for their complicity. Marty's findings also undermine U.S. denials that it does not practice torture overseas. Marty's report is a zinger. He finds that the CIA conducted illegal activities in Europe by transporting and detaining prisoners while European governments looked on: "What was shocking was the passivity with which we all, in Europe, have welcomed these things. Europeans should be less hypocritical and not turn a blind eye. There are those who do the dirty work abroad, but there are also those who know when they should close their eyes when that dirty work is being done."
Dick Cheney, the American vice-president, and Donald Rumsfeld, the defense secretary, should be called to testify before the European Parliament on allegations of secret CIA prisons and torture of detainees, MEPs said yesterday. MEPs heading an investigation into the claims vowed to "name and shame" American and European leaders who declined invitations to appear before them. The committee was set up by the parliament to examine reports that CIA detainees were held in secret "black sites" in central and eastern Europe or flown through European Union airports on their way to countries where they may have faced torture. The panel has four months to complete its work and is backed by the European Commission and some member states but has no legal powers. Baroness Ludford, a Liberal Democrat MEP and one of its vice-chairmen, acknowledged that the committee could not force anyone to appear. But she said that Mr Cheney, Mr Rumsfeld, Condoleezza Rice, the American secretary of state, Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, and Javier Solana, the EU's foreign policy chief, should all be invited to testify.
Compassionate Conservatism Watch: Lives are being put at risk by the Deficit Reduction Act - it turns out that it puts a 36-month limit on the subsidies for supplimental oxygen supplies required by many respiratory patients. In other words, if you need oxygen for more than three years, they're pulling the plug on you. The Evil Ones, led by DOCTOR "First Do No Harm To Wealthy Contributors" Frist, are in the process of doing genuine - potentially fatal - harm to untold thousands of U.S. citizens suffering from emphysema, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), cystic fibrosis, and other chronic/degenerative respiratory diseases that require the use of portable oxygen tanks, oxygen concentrators, and tubing and other supplies. To wit: You get 36 months of oxygen therapy and if you're still alive after that, you're on your friggin' own.
Republican Policies Are Good For America: The economy slowed to a near crawl in the final quarter of 2005, a listless showing that was the worst in three years. Gross domestic product clocked in at an annual rate of just 1.1 percent from October through December. That marked a loss of speed compared with the third's quarter's brisk 4.1 percent pace, the Commerce Department reported Friday. Belt tightening by consumers, businesses and the government figured into the fourth-quarter's slowdown. GDP, which measures the value of all goods and services produced within the United States, is the best barometer of the economy's fitness. Experts said two main factors had driven the drop - a overall slowdown in consumer spending, from 4.1% to 1.1%, and a sharp 17.5% fall in spending on big-ticket goods, particularly cars. The fall marked the steepest drop in spending on so-called "durable goods" since the first quarter of 1987.
United Airlines' parent company made a $21bn loss last year due to charges arising from its bankruptcy. It suffered pre-tax losses of $16.6bn alone in the last quarter after it recognized many unsecured claims. But UAL Corp said its underlying losses had fallen and that it would emerge from bankruptcy protection next month with a "sound financial platform". United is one of several US carriers under bankruptcy protection due to soaring costs and flagging demand.
General Motors Corp., which is planning big job cuts and plant closings as it fights to avoid bankruptcy, said Thursday it lost $4.8 billion in the fourth quarter and $8.6 billion in all of 2005, dragged down by losses and charges in its North American division. It was the fifth-straight quarterly loss for the world's largest automaker and the worst annual loss since 1992. GM's North American operations alone posted adjusted losses of $1.5 billion for the quarter and $5.6 billion for the full year, as unit sales fell 3 percent in North America in 2005. The dismal results were far worse than Wall Street expected. GM's stock price, which had already fallen about 36 percent since July, slumped another 80 cents, or 3.4 percent, to close at $23.05 on the New York Stock Exchange. GM Chairman and CEO Rick Wagoner said 2005 "was one of the most difficult years in GM's history. Two significant fundamental weaknesses in our North American operations were fully exposed - our huge legacy cost burden and our inability to adjust structural costs in line with falling revenue," Wagoner said in a statement.
North Carolina legislature leaders on Wednesday began forming a study committee to attack the growing problem of home foreclosures in Charlotte and across the state. Their aim is to propose actions for the General Assembly to consider when it convenes this spring. Rep. Walter Church, who will chair the committee, says the effort was spurred by the Observer's series last week on the rising number of foreclosures in the Charlotte area. "We want to see what can be done to help save people's homes," said Church, a Burke County Democrat. The problem of foreclosures is racing out of control, he says. In almost two decades as head of a savings and loan in Valdese, Church said he foreclosed on only five or six loans. The Observer reported that on average, 11 Mecklenburg County homes are now sold in foreclosure auctions every business day.
Halliburton Co. swung to a profit in its fourth quarter on robust sales, and called last year the best in its 86-year history. The results, $1.03 per share excluding the gain, widely beat Wall Street's projections of 89 cents a share on revenue of $5.24 billion, according to Thomson Financial. Net income for the year 2005 was $2.4 billion, or $4.54 per share, compared to a loss of $1 billion, or $2.22 per share, from 2004. The 2004 loss included a $1.4 billion, or $3.09 per share, loss related to the settlement of asbestos and silica liabilities. Revenue for 2005 reached nearly $21 billion, a record that also beat analysts expectations of $20.4 billion.
The White House budget office is preventing the government from enrolling farmers in a program that pays them to be good stewards of their land, the leaders of the Senate Agriculture Committee said on Friday. In a letter, the leaders said "unnecessary, bureaucratic" delays will frustrate farmers and ranchers while making it harder for Congress to assess the value of the Conservation Security Program (CSP). The letter to Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns urged that enrollment be held during winter, when farmers plan their operations for the growing season. It was signed by chairman Saxby Chambliss, Georgia Republican, and Tom Harkin of Iowa, the Democratic leader on the panel. They said an Agriculture Department agency "is ready to begin enrollment but is being prohibited by the Office of Management and Budget from doing so." It was the second letter to Johanns this month to urge a timely enrollment for CSP, created in 2002 and given $259 million for fiscal 2006.
Habeas Corpus Death Watch: Despite force feeding by the American military, several hunger strikers at Guantanamo Bay may be close to death, according to lawyers acting for the detainees. The condition of two emaciated Yemeni hunger strikers who have been refusing solid food since August is causing particular concern. There are also fears for the life of a hospitalised Saudi prisoner. The wife of a British resident and hunger striker, Shaker Aamer, visited the Commons last week to appeal to MPs for help. Aamer’s wife, 31, who lives in London with her four children and has asked for her name to be withheld, said: "This is the time to do something. My husband is not going to last." Aamer has been on hunger strike since November 2. Although he has lost weight, he is stronger than some other prisoners taking part in the protest at their detention without trial. According to a report to be released tomorrow by the prisoners’ rights group Reprieve, the Yemenis, identified as Abu Bakah al-Shamrani and Abu Anas, are said by detainees to be gravely weak. Shamrani weighs only 70lb (5 stone). Reprieve claims Camp Echo, which is comprised of isolation cells, has been turned into a "force feeding institution" away from other prisoners and its gravel path paved with concrete so the hunger strikers can be moved around in wheelchairs.
Fourth Amendment Death Watch: The Bush administration rejected a 2002 Senate proposal that would have made it easier for FBI agents to obtain surveillance warrants in terrorism cases, concluding that the system was working well and that it would likely be unconstitutional to lower the legal standard. The proposed legislation by Sen. Mike DeWine (R-Ohio) would have allowed the FBI to obtain surveillance warrants for non-U.S. citizens if they had a "reasonable suspicion" they were connected to terrorism - a lower standard than the "probable cause" requirement in the statute that governs the warrants. The administration has contended that it launched a secret program of warrantless domestic eavesdropping by the National Security Agency in part because of the time it takes to obtain such secret warrants from federal judges under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), in spite of the fact that under FISA, they are allowed to conduct surveillance first and go back for a warrant after the fact.
Legislation drafted by Justice Department lawyers in 2003 to strengthen the USA Patriot Act would have provided legal backing for several aspects of the administration's warrantless eavesdropping program. But officials said yesterday that was not the intent. Most lawmakers and the public were not aware at the time that President Bush had already issued a secret order allowing the National Security Agency to intercept international calls involving U.S. citizens and legal residents. Some critics of the NSA program said the draft legislation raises questions about recent administration claims that Bush had clear legal authority to order warrantless domestic spying in late 2001 and had no need to go to Congress for explicit approval. "It's rather damning to their current view that they didn't need legislation," said Timothy H. Edgar, a national security lawyer at the American Civil Liberties Union. "Clearly the lawyers at the Justice Department, or some of them, felt that legislation was needed to allow the government to do what it was doing."
Fourteenth Amendment Death Watch: The Alaska Legislature could soon be deliberating a proposed amendment to the state Constitution to nullify a court decision ordering the state to pay benefits to the same-sex partners of its employees. Senate Judiciary Chairman Ralph Seekins, R-Fairbanks, told the Legislative Council Thursday evening he has a draft constitutional amendment that could be introduced by his committee as early as next week. A constitutional change would require approval by two-thirds of the House and Senate and approval by a majority of voters in November's election. The Alaska Supreme Court ruled in October that denying gay couples the same public employee benefits as married couples - life and health insurance, plus retirement and death benefits - violates the Alaska Constitution's equal-protection clause. The court noted that unmarried straight couples also are denied benefits, but they - unlike gay couples - have the option to legally marry. Following that ruling, Gov. Frank Murkowski and state Sen. Fred Dyson, R-Eagle River, separately called for changing the state's Constitution to strike the ruling.
Liberal-Biased Media: A FoxNews.com columnist who repeatedly attacked scientists for linking smoking to disease was on the payroll of big tobacco, according to The New Republic. On March 9, 2001, he wrote a column for the website headlined "secondhand smokescreen." The piece attacked a study by researcher Stephen Hecht, who found that women living with smokers had higher levels of chemicals associated with risk of lung cancer. "If spin were science, Hecht would win a Nobel Prize," Milloy wrote. For good measure, he heaped scorn on a 1993 Environmental Protection Agency report that also linked health risks and secondhand smoke. Later that spring, he authored another smoking-related piece for FoxNews.com. You might chalk it up to Milloy's contrarian nature. Or to his libertarian tendencies. Except, all the while, he was on the payroll of big tobacco. According to Lisa Gonzalez, manager of external communications for Altria, the parent company of Philip Morris, Milloy was under contract there through the end of last year. "In 2000 and 2001, some of the work he did was to monitor studies, and then we would distribute this information within to our different companies," Gonzalez said. Although she couldn't comment on fees paid to Milloy, a January 2001 Philip Morris budget report lists Milloy as a consultant and shows that he was budgeted for $92,500 in fees and expenses in both 2000 and 2001. Asked about Milloy's tobacco ties, Paul Schur, director of media relations for Fox News, said, "Fox News is unaware of Milloy's connection with Philip Morris. Any affiliation he had should have been disclosed." Milloy could not be reached for comment.
Just in case you were wondering whether Robert Novak's departure from CNN for Fox was, you know, bitter, the cable network threw a big farewell for him last night at Charlie Palmer steakhouse in Washington, with the likes of Pat Buchanan, Donna Brazile, Kate O'Beirne and CNN Worldwide's president, Jim Walton, attending.
Maybe If We Ignore Global Warming, It Will Go Away: Global sea levels could rise by about 30cm during this century if current trends continue, and the rate of rise is accelerating, a new study warns. Australian researchers found that sea levels rose by 19.5cm between 1870 and 2004, with accelerated rates in the final 50 years of that period. The research, published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters, used data from tide gauges around the world. The findings fit within predictions made by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
Scandals Du Jour: Two Senate Democrats called Thursday for the appointment of a special counsel to take over investigation of the corruption scandal spawned by lobbyist Jack Abramoff. The switch "would ensure that the investigation and prosecution will proceed without fear or favor and provide the public with full confidence that no one in this country is above the law," Sens. Chuck Schumer of New York and Ken Salazar of Colorado wrote Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. The two Democrats said that so far, the public integrity section of the Justice Department, which is in charge of the probe, has "pursued this case appropriately." Justice Department spokesman Brian Roehrkasse said "there is no legal or ethical reason why the attorney general would need to recuse himself from this investigation as it continues to move forward successfully with a career prosecution team."
Four days after U.S. Rep. Tom DeLay's stunning indictment last September in Travis County, the political talk show "Fox News Sunday" trumpeted an exclusive interview with the combative Texas Republican. Unsaid, but revealed in documents DeLay later filed in the U.S. House, was that DeLay's Oct. 2 appearance cost Fox News $14,000. The money rented a private jet to ferry DeLay from a small airport near his Sugar Land home to Fox studios in Washington. The next day, after engaging in a give and take with host Chris Wallace, DeLay and his Capitol Police security detail were flown back to suburban Houston. It's a great way to travel - no security lines, no connecting flights and awesome legroom. And in the often pampered world of Congress, private jets are the ultimate status symbol - most commonly provided by corporations to curry favor and let ride-along lobbyists bend the ear of a captive, and in theory appreciative, audience. Three weeks after DeLay's Fox appearance, for example, the former House majority leader traveled to his mugshot-and-fingerprint appointment in Houston aboard an R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. jet - one of 100 trips DeLay has taken on corporate jets in the past six years, tops in Congress, The Associated Press has reported.
With Democrats comparing his ties to lobbyists with "organized crime," Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., yesterday swung back, saying the Democratic criticism amounted to libel and unequivocally denying that he helped shape the GOP's controversial "K Street Project." The problem with that is that there is video of him meeting with Norquist. The "K Street Project," which was led by conservative activist Grover Norquist and then-House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, was an effort to press Washington's lobbying firms and trade associations to hire Republicans who share their agenda. It gets its name from the street where many of the firms are based. Democrat have criticized the project as an attempt to funnel millions of dollars in lobbying money to the GOP.
Lobbyist and confessed felon Jack Abramoff gave his client Tyco International an early warning in 2003 that the government was about to suspend Tyco's federal contracts - inside information he received from a General Services Administration official now under indictment, federal prosecutors alleged yesterday. David H. Safavian, who has been charged with obstructing the Abramoff corruption investigation, alerted Abramoff in November 2003 that the GSA was about to suspend the contracts of four Tyco subsidiaries, prosecutors said in court papers. Safavian provided "sensitive and confidential information" about internal GSA deliberations, as well as advice about how to get around the suspension, the prosecutors said. George Terwilliger, Tyco's attorney, said yesterday that Abramoff's tip was of substantial benefit to Tyco but was unsolicited. Tyco's senior lawyer, Timothy Flanigan, contacted the GSA and "asked for an opportunity to address the suspension issue on the merits," Tyco said in a statement yesterday.
We Conservatives Are More Moral Than You: Deep in Rolling Stone's 7,000-word profile of Republican Sen. Sam Brownback , the conservative Kansan picked a startling bit of Scripture to explain his opposition to homosexuality. "You look at the social impact of the countries that have engaged in homosexual marriage," he said, citing the example of Sweden to writer Jeff Sharlet before adding: "You'll know 'em by their fruits." An awkward silence followed, in Sharlet's telling. It's a reference to Matthew 7:16 -- often interpreted to mean that one can judge a prophet's sincerity by his deeds - but, Sharlet noted, it kinda sounded like the senator was calling gay Swedes "fruits." A spokesman in Brownback's office said someone would return our calls to discuss this, but no one did yesterday.
Conservative commentator Ann Coulter, speaking at a traditionally black college, joked that Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens should be poisoned.Coulter had told the Philander Smith College audience Thursday that more conservative justices were needed on the Supreme Court to change the current law on abortion. Stevens is one of the court's most liberal members. "We need somebody to put rat poisoning in Justice Stevens' creme brulee," Coulter said. "That's just a joke, for you in the media." Coulter has made a career of writing and lecturing on her strongly conservative views. At one point during her address, which was part of a lecture series, some audience members booed when she cut off two questioners. "I'm not going to be lectured to," Coulter told one man in a raised voice. She drew more boos when she said the crack cocaine problem "has pretty much gone away."
What a lovely day yesterday. Bright sun in the morning with just enough clouds to break the heat of the afternoon. The temperature hit a lovely 82 yesterday afternoon, and dropped to 69 overnight. And this afternoon, between brief but sometimes intense rains, the temperature rose to 79. But all that balminess was about to change. This afternoon, about four o'clock, a cold front came through, wind and rain began and as I write this, the temperature has dropped to 71 and is falling fast.
The neighbors with whom I spent the weekend invited me up for coffee this afternoon. And it being a pleasant day at the time, I accepted, and walked up to their house on the hill above mine, and enjoyed a pleasant chat about the issues of the day, and the arrangements for selling my house. I got an invite to go swimming with them in the lake on Sunday, which will be a delight if the weather is warm - the lake temperature of Arenal is cool, but not unpleasantly so. They have two sons, and a daughter, and the older son speaks English quite fluently, so that helps to ease the occasional awkward moment. And they're a delight to be around, the five of them. Their hospitality is exceptional and they are fun company. Makes me glad to have them for neighbors. I'm looking forward to Sunday.
We watched some television as the wife was preparing a snack and coffee. The snack proved to be stewed plantains with natilla (a very light sour cream unique to Costa Rica). It was delicious, and with coffee, just right for an afternoon snack.
As I was snacking on the plantains and coffee, a howling wind came up, it clouded over and began to rain, and the temperature dropped noticably. Walking back to the house, I was sure glad that I had taken my umbrella. The dry season isn't here. Not yet.
More Reasons Why I Am Glad I Am Out Of The States: Construction on the vast network of Homeland Security internment camps, announced previously in this space as being planned, has now actually begun. Ominously called "Project Endgame" by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which planned the project, it is ostensibly being built to house as many as five million "illegal immigrants" and a contract to build it has just been announced, and of course, you'll never guess who got the work - Kellogg Brown and Root, a subsidiary of Halliburton, announced Tuesday that the Department of Homeland Security's (DHS) U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) component has awarded KBR an Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) contingency contract to support ICE facilities "in the event of an emergency." KBR is the engineering and construction subsidiary of Halliburton. With a maximum total value of $385 million over a five-year term, consisting of a one-year based period and four one-year options, the competitively awarded contract will be executed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Fort Worth District.
A bare majority of Americans now favor the impeachment of the president, according to a new Zogby poll. The word "impeachment" is popping up increasingly these days and not just off the lips of liberal activists spouting predictable bumper-sticker slogans. After the unfounded claims about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction and recent news of domestic spying without warrants, mainstream politicians and ordinary voters are talking openly about the possibility that President Bush could be impeached. So is at least one powerful Republican senator, Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. So far, it's just talk. And with Republicans controlling Congress - and memories still fresh of the bitter fight and national distraction inflamed by former President Clinton's 1998 impeachment - even the launching of an official inquiry is a very long shot. But a poll released last week by Zogby International showed 52 percent of American adults thought Congress should consider impeaching Bush if he wiretapped U.S. citizens without court approval (which Smirkey has admitted and is defending), including 59 percent of independents and 23 percent of Republicans. (The survey had a margin of error of 2.9 percentage points.)
The Bush administration has embarked on a concerted public defense of its warrantless domestic spying practices. It is focusing particularly on the electronic surveillance of Americans suspected of links to international terrorism. On Tuesday Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said eavesdropping on citizens' international calls without court approval was legal and necessary. President Bush is also expected to address this issue on Wednesday. The news that US intelligence agencies have been listening to the international communications of Americans without getting the usual permission from the courts to do so is creating some political turbulence for the Bush administration. Democrats in Congress, and some Republicans, have expressed anger at what they see as an infringement of civil liberties, and Congressional researchers have even debated the program's legality.
But the PR campaign is not going down well. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales defended the Bush administration's domestic spying program Tuesday at Georgetown Law School and suggested that some critics and news reports have misled Americans about the breadth of the National Security Agency's surveillance. As he spoke, more than a dozen students stood silently with their backs turned to the attorney general. Outside the classroom where Gonzales was to speak, a pair of protesters held up a sheet that said, "Don't torture the Constitution."
Struggling to lay the groundwork for a disinformation campaign denying any connections between indicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff and Smirkey, the White House has been desperately trying to round up all known photographs of the two together, as was reported previously in this space. Well, proving that there is no honor among thieves, Abramoff has been shopping around photos of himself and Smirkey. Over the weekend, Time magazine and the Washingtonian both reported on five photos of President Bush with Jack Abramoff, but neither publication revealed its source. Yesterday, ThinkProgress laid out the case for why the source for the photos was likely Abramoff himself. Last night, the hunch was confirmed. Appearing on MSNBC, Newsweek correspondent Michael Isikoff reported that it was indeed Abramoff who floated the photographs to Washingtonian.
A US Senate panel has voted to approve Smirkey's Supreme Court nominee, Samuel Alito. All 10 Republicans on the judiciary committee backed the conservative judge, while all eight Democrats opposed Mr. Alito. The nomination now goes to the Republican-led Senate, which is expected to confirm Mr. Alito.
A senior Iranian official threatened that Tehran may forcibly prevent oil export via the Straits of Hormuz if the UN imposed economic sanctions due to Iran's nuclear program, an Iranian news Web site said on Monday. This is the first time an Iranian official has made military threats in a public statement on Tehran's recent disagreements with the West. The news site, affiliated with the radical student movement in which President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was once a member, quoted Mohammed-Nabi Rudaki, deputy chairman of the Iranian parliament's National Security and Foreign Policy Commission. 25% of the world's oil production passes through the Straits of Hormuz, which connect the Persian Gulf with the Indian Ocean. The meaning of Rudaki's threat is that not only will Tehran stop its oil production from reaching the West, it may also use force to prevent the other oil producers in the region (the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait) from exporting to the West.
If you're in the military and want to see "Brokeback Mountain" in the theater on-base, don't expect to see it anytime soon. "Brokeback Mountain," the movie about a gay cowboy love affair that recently won four Golden Globe awards and is expected to be in the Oscar hunt, will not play in any U.S. military theaters in Europe. And not because it’s a gay cowboy love story. The movie, which has received almost universally glowing reviews and was the nation’s top grossing film per theater last week, suffers from the same problem that kept many of last year’s Academy Award winners "The Aviator" and "Sideways" among them, out of AAFES theaters: It was released late in the year by a small, independent movie studio. Arrangements for first-run movies, shown on military bases within two weeks of their stateside openings, require that distributors send AAFES 11 prints of the film. But movies such as "Brokeback Mountain" which open on a relatively few screens, unlike blockbusters like "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe," and hope to build momentum do not have an adequate number of copies.
IRS Commissioner Mark Everson ordered a review Tuesday of a tax fraud detection program criticized for freezing thousands of refunds without notifying taxpayers. Everson said the tax agency will soon announce new procedures to advise taxpayers when a refund has been frozen. The agency will also revise its fraud screening procedures so that it withholds fewer refunds owed to innocent taxpayers. "Honest taxpayers expecting a refund deserve to be treated fairly," Everson said. National Taxpayer Advocate Nina Olson criticized the program in her annual list of the worst problems facing taxpayers. Her office, which helps taxpayers resolve disputes with the IRS, handles more frozen refunds than any other issue. A study of those cases found no evidence of fraud in two out of three instances.
On Monday, the Bush administration's top mine safety official, David Dye, walked out of an appearance before a Senate subcommittee to explain the administration's response to the Sago coal mine disaster. Specifically, senators wanted to know why mine safety has been consistently underfunded under President Bush, and why regulations have been rolled back or weakly enforced. Unfortunately, David Dye has a busy schedule. After an hour of questioning, Dye announced he had "some really pressing matters" to attend to, and asked to leave the hearing. Committee chairman Arlen Specter (R-PA) urged him not to: "Your presence will be required here for at least one more hour." But Dye insisted: "We have been diverted, dealing with these matters. We were happy to prepare for the hearing, but we really need to get back and attend to all this. There's 15,000 mines in the United States, and we've got some really pressing matters." The New York Times describes what occurred next: "After Mr. Specter added, 'That's the committee's request, but you're not under subpoena,' Mr. Dye got up and walked out. 'I can't recollect it ever happening before,' Mr. Specter said of the departure. 'We'll find a way to take appropriate note of it.'"
Why I Am Embarrassed To Present My Passport: South Korea's president lashed out today at hardliners in Washington, who he said appeared to be trying to force the collapse of North Korea's totalitarian regime. President Roh Moo-hyun spoke out following calls from US treasury officials for South Korea - a long-time US ally - to help prevent Pyongyang's alleged criminal activity. The US says the communist dictatorship is engaged in counterfeiting, money laundering and drug trafficking. The north today repeated its demands that the US lift the sanctions recently imposed over the claims of illegal activity. Pyongyang refuses to return to international talks about its nuclear ambitions until the sanctions are lifted.
Washington has warned India a landmark deal giving it US nuclear technology may fall through if Delhi does not back a UN motion against Iran. The deal could "die in Congress" if India does not vote against Iran at a meeting of the UN nuclear watchdog, US Ambassador David Mulford said. The US is pursuing action against Iran over its apparent nuclear ambitions. India says it rejects any attempt to tie its stance on Iran to its deal with the US on acquiring nuclear know-how.
Mexico's national human rights commission announced yesterday that it would give would-be migrants detailed maps of the Arizona desert, the most popular - but riskiest - clandestine immigration corridor into the United States. The plan comes at a time of increasing anti-immigrant sentiment in the US and the maps are unlikely to go down well among advocates of an American bill designed to toughen up control of the 2,000-mile border, due to be debated in the Senate next month. "We recognise the right of every country to define its migration policy, but at the same time nothing can be above basic human rights," said Mauricio Farah of the human rights commission, which is technically independent but government-funded. "Our intention is not to encourage migration but to save lives."
"Extraordinary Rendition" Watch: Europe's human rights watchdog accused Washington yesterday of using "gangster tactics" by flying in terrorist suspects to countries where they would face torture, and criticised European countries who appear to have done nothing to intervene. "If a country resorts to the tactics of gangsters I say no," Dick Marty, a Swiss senator, said at the Council of Europe's winter session in Strasbourg. "There are different elements that allow me to say that governments were aware of what was happening."
Republicans Believe In Honest, Transparent Government: A senior fraud investigator for the Pentagon who has crusaded against military contractor overcharges for seven years has been suspended for "insubordination," according to an article written by Eric Rosenberg for the Hearst News Service. Rosenberg's article, which went out to Hearst member papers, has not appeared in any of them, nor has any story been published by the mainstream press about his suspension, according to Google News. Kenneth Pedeleose, an industrial engineer for the Defense Contract Management Agency (DCMA), told Hearst that his 30-day suspension was "absolutely related" to his whistleblowing. In 2002, Pedeleose's 90-page report "Criminal Vulnerability and Fraud" which accused Lockheed Martin of "willfully" overcharging the Pentagon and defense officials of ignoring his warnings led Senate Finance Committee Chairman Charles Grassley (Rep-IA) to persuade DoD's Inspector's General offices to launch investigations.
Republican Policies Are Good For America: Spending and savings habits of US consumers would "have to change." Speaking at the traditional "update" on the global economy at the start of the World Economic Forum (WEF), AIG vice-chairman Jacob Frenkel said the dire predictions of a dollar slump had not materialised because the US economy was much more robust, flexible and competitive than many had assumed. A year ago, they agreed that the US dollar would come tumbling down, weakened by the massive current account deficit of the US economy. Big investors like Microsoft boss Bill Gates and legendary money manager Warren Buffett even bet huge sums on it. However, the dollar managed to climb back from its record low against the euro. Searching for explanations, Morgan Stanley chief economist Stephen Roach said the fact that the dollar had not declined for a third year did not mean the economic fundamentals had changed. But the panel could not agree on how far the US dollar had to fall. Laura Tyson, dean of the London Business School, said there was "a substantial dollar decline out there, maybe 30%", although it could come gradually. "2006 will see the end of the great American spending binge," Roach said
News From Smirkey's Wars: Since 2003, the United States has been pushing for rapid free-market reforms in Iraq. Such policies, U.S. officials say, are necessary to spur development and revive Iraq's moribund economy, which is still suffering from sanctions and decades of Baath Party mismanagement. But rapid economic liberalization here is taking a toll on ordinary Iraqis. They've seen prices skyrocket for everything from shampoo to vegetables to heating oil. Food rations meant to help the estimated 8 million Iraqis who live on less than $1 a day have been cut by 25 percent. Many changes implemented by the U.S. occupation in 2003, after Saddam Hussein's government fell, are still in effect as Iraqi politicians await election results that will lead to the formation of a permanent government. Tariffs on imports have been cut across the board, allowing cheap goods to pour in from China and driving Iraqi manufacturers out of business. A 2003 foreign investment law continues to anger Iraqi businessmen who say it is squeezing them out of the reconstruction boom.
The first official history of the $25 billion American reconstruction effort in Iraq depicts a program hobbled from the outset by gross understaffing, a lack of technical expertise, bureaucratic infighting, secrecy and constantly increasing security costs, according to a preliminary draft. The document, which begins with the secret prewar planning for reconstruction and touches on nearly every phase of the program through 2005, was assembled by the office of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction and debated last month in a closed forum by roughly two dozen experts from outside the office. A person at the forum provided a copy of the document, dated December 2005, to The New York Times. The inspector general's office, whose agents and auditors have been examining and reporting on various aspects of the rebuilding since early 2004, declined to comment on the report other than to say it was highly preliminary.
Stretched by frequent troop rotations to Iraq and Afghanistan, the Army has become a "thin green line" that could snap unless relief comes soon, according to a study for the Pentagon. Andrew Krepinevich, a retired Army officer who wrote the report under a Pentagon contract, concluded that the Army cannot sustain the pace of troop deployments to Iraq long enough to break the back of the insurgency. He also suggested that the Pentagon's decision, announced in December, to begin reducing the force in Iraq this year was driven in part by a realization that the Army was overextended. As evidence, Krepinevich points to the Army's 2005 recruiting slump - missing its recruiting goal for the first time since 1999 - and its decision to offer much bigger enlistment bonuses and other incentives. "You really begin to wonder just how much stress and strain there is on the Army, how much longer it can continue," he said in an interview. He added that the Army is still a highly effective fighting force and is implementing a plan that will expand the number of combat brigades available for rotations to Iraq and Afghanistan. The 136-page report represents a more sobering picture of the Army's condition than military officials offer in public. While not released publicly, a copy of the report was provided in response to an Associated Press inquiry.
Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld on Wednesday disputed reports suggesting that the U.S. military is stretched thin and close to a snapping point from operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, asserting "the force is not broken. This armed force is enormously capable," Rumsfeld told reporters at a Pentagon briefing. "In addition, it's battle hardened. It's not a peacetime force that has been in barracks or garrisons."
Meanwhile, among the nearly 10,000 service members expelled under the Pentagon's anti-gay "don't ask, don't tell" policy over a 10-year period, hundreds have been medical specialists and officers. According to data released on Wednesday by the Center for the Study of Sexual Minorities in the Military, 244 medical specialists were kicked out in the period spanning 1994 to 2003, the first 10 years the policy was in effect. The data were obtained from the Pentagon with the help of Rep. Marty Meehan, a Massachusetts Democrat who sits on the House Armed Services Committee. Aaron Belkin, director of the center and an associate professor of political science at the University of California, Santa Barbara, said the discharges provide evidence that the ban is hampering military readiness. "The consequences of shortfalls in medical specialists during wartime are serious," he said. "When the military lacks the medical personnel it needs on the front lines, it compromises the well-being not only of its injured troops but of the overextended specialists who have to work longer tours to replace those who have been discharged." According to the new data, the 244 medical personnel discharged under "don't ask, don't tell" included physicians, nurses, biomedical laboratory technicians, and other highly trained medical specialists. The revelation comes at a time when the military has acknowledged it is struggling with significant shortfalls in recruitment and retention of medical personnel for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Scandals Du Jour: At the historic swearing-in of John Roberts as the 17th chief justice of the United States last September, every member of the Supreme Court, except Antonin Scalia, was in attendance. ABC News has learned that Scalia instead was on the tennis court at one of the country's top resorts, the Ritz-Carlton hotel in Bachelor Gulch, Colo., during a trip to a legal seminar sponsored by the Federalist Society. Not only did Scalia's absence appear to be a snub of the new chief justice, but according to some legal ethics experts, it also raised questions about the propriety of what critics call judicial junkets. "It's unfortunate of course that what kept him from the swearing-in was an activity that is itself of dubious ethical propriety," said Stephen Gillers, a New York University law professor, who is a recognized scholar on legal ethics. Scalia spent two nights at the luxury resort lecturing at the legal seminar where ABC News also found him on the tennis court, heading out for a fly-fishing expedition, and socializing with members of the Federalist Society, the conservative activist group that paid for the expenses of his trip. At a press conference, almost two weeks later, Scalia was not inclined to tell reporters his whereabouts during Roberts' swearing-in. "I was out of town with a commitment that I could not break, and that's what the public information office told you," he said. (The link above includes a link to video of him actually playing tennis at the resort while his new boss was being sworn in).
The number of Houston television stations planning to air a slightly sanitized version of an anti-Tom Delay ad has now reached three. NBC affiliate KPRC and CBS affiliate KHOU have decided to join Fox affiliate KRIV in airing the 30-second spot. ABC affiliate KTRK is still choosing not to air the spot. All four had declined to air a previous version of the commercial attacking the Republican congressman from the Houston suburb of Sugar Land. The new ad says DeLay "received" campaign money from disgraced super-lobbyist Jack Abramoff. The original said he "pocketed" the money. The original ad, paid for by two liberal groups, was supposed to start running on Houston stations last week. The DeLay campaign sent letters asking them not to run the ad, saying it was misleading. The new version says "Here's the ad Tom DeLay does not want you to see." Delay spokeswoman Shannon Flaherty says it's still "fraudulent."
For nearly 2 months after Mike Brown was forced to resign from FEMA for his incompetent response to Hurricane Katrina, he continued to collect his full $148,000 salary as a "consultant." Why was Brown retained? According to a FEMA spokeswoman, it was so he could fully cooperate with the investigations into what went wrong: FEMA spokeswoman Nicol Andrews confirmed that Brown is still on FEMA’s payroll as a consultant. She said he works from home, where he is "pulling all the documentation together" to aid in the investigations into the government’s response to Katrina. Now that Brown has cashed his checks, he is refusing to cooperate with the Senate investigation. While FEMA has been helpful, Mike Brown, the former FEMA director who resigned amid intense criticism of his agency’s response, has refused to answer even the simplest questions, according to Sen. Joe Lieberman. Brown continues to talk about the issue, but only for a fee. He recently keynoted a storm response conference and provided insight and perspective on Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Senators investigating the issue could have attended for the low price of only $375.
In what has been denounced as an effort to undermine the prosecution in the Jack Abramoff scandal, Smirkey on Wednesday nominated one of the Justice Department's lead prosecutors in the Jack Abramoff corruption probe to a U.S. District Court seat. Noel Hillman, chief of the department's public integrity section, was nominated for the federal judgeship in New Jersey, where he served in the U.S. Attorney's office under Michael Chertoff, now secretary of Homeland Security. The White House was poised to nominate Hillman last summer, after New Jersey's two Democratic senators took the opportunity to weigh in on Hillman and other nominees in exchange for lifting their objections to another candidate Bush had nominated in 2003.
We Conservatives Are More Moral Than You: Acting Majority Leader Roy Blunt's political action committee received its biggest contributions from the coffers of a "world class phone sex operator," according to today's edition of Roll Call. Seeing as he's an outspoken social conservative, some folks were surprised to find out that one of the largest contributors to Rep. Roy Blunt's (R-Mo.) political action committee last year was a businessman who made his fortune in the 1990s off the phone-sex business. Jeffrey Prosser, dubbed by the Columbia Journalism Review in a 1998 story "a world-class phone-sex operator," gave $5,000 to Blunt's Rely On Your Beliefs fund in 2005 and his wife, Dawn Prosser, gave another $5,000, making them the largest donor couple to Blunt??'s PAC. Blunt's ROYB Fund executive director, Keri Ann Hayes, said the Congressman had no clue that Prosser was a 1-900 kind of a guy. "Mr. Blunt was not aware of the colorful history of this individual contributor when his PAC accepted the donation," she said. Hayes said Blunt will not return the money because "the funds were given in a 100 percent legal and ethical fashion."
The weather has heated up substantially - maybe the Arenal dry season is finally here. I can certainly hope so. Last night I ran the ceiling fan in the bedroom for the first time in several months, because the overnight low only made it down to 72. And it made it to 79 today, in spite of being cloudy most of the day, and there has been only very sporadic rains lasting for only couple of minutes at a time. Sure looks like the dry season may have finally begun.
I haven't spent much time in the yard since getting back to town Sunday afternoon. It seems that the chigger season has started here in Arenal, and walking around in the yard in bare feet or even sandals, means that you're inviting some incredibly itchy insect bites. The little buggers are unbelievably annoying, as they create a bite that will itch intensely for two weeks before it heals. I really need to ask around and find out if my Tico neighbors know of a cure for the itching.
Looking out into the yard, I notice that while I was gone, the wind blew over a rather sizable banana plant, which crashed onto the lawn narrowly missing a small guanabana (soursop) tree that I planted last year on one side, and an avocado tree I had planted as well, on the other. It was a fortunate accident that it came down where it did. It didn't have a banano (banana bunch) on it yet, but it was clearly getting close to mature and probably would have fruited in a month or two, so that was a loss, but its proximity to the fruit trees has convinced me to not replant another banana there. Bad idea. I'll keep those banana plants over across the pond in the North Forty banana patch, where, when the wind blows them over, it is not going to cause other damage. I'll have the gardener move the hijos (rhizome starts) to the banana patch when he gets here on Friday.
The wind also broke my shortwave antenna, which I had to spend some time repairing. Made from ordinary iron wire, it had rusted to the extent that it had lost some of its strength. So I had to at least get it up off the ground for now, and back up high enough to listen to shortwave. I have decided not to put up anything sophisticated to replace it while I am still living here, as it would not look attractive to potential buyers of the property, and I would just have to haul it back down again when I move. And running around putting up antennas isn't going to be much fun as long as chigger season is on anyway. Sure, I could listen to great shortwave, but what would be point when I am constantly distracted by a whole lot of itching on my ankles?
More Reasons Why I Am Glad I Am Out Of The United States: The Bush administration is bracing for impeachment hearings in Congress. "A coalition in Congress is being formed to support impeachment," an administration source said. Sources said a prelude to the impeachment process could begin with hearings by the Senate Judiciary Committee in February. They said the hearings would focus on the secret electronic surveillance program and whether Mr. Bush violated the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Administration sources said the charges are expected to include false reports to Congress as well as Mr. Bush's authorization of the National Security Agency to engage in electronic surveillance inside the United States without a court warrant. This included the monitoring of overseas telephone calls and e-mail traffic to and from people living in the United States without requisite permission from a secret court. Sources said the probe to determine whether the president violated the law will include Republicans, but that they may not be aware they could be helping to lay the groundwork for a Democratic impeachment campaign against Mr. Bush. "Our arithmetic shows that a majority of the committee could vote against the president," the source said. "If we work hard, there could be a tie."
The International Atomic Energy Agency chief ruled out advancing a wide-ranging report on Iran's disputed nuclear work in time for a February 2 IAEA crisis meeting, dealing a setback to U.S.-EU efforts to crack down on Tehran. Iranian officials said they did not fear Western threats over their atomic energy drive and vowed to pursue uranium enrichment even if the IAEA, the U.N. nuclear watchdog, referred Tehran to the U.N. Security Council for possible sanctions. But Tehran, which denies Western suspicions that it seeks to build atomic bombs, also urged more dialogue with the European Union to resolve a standoff that is jacking up world oil prices. Western powers want IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei to make a broad accounting of Tehran's nuclear project to the special IAEA meeting they called for February, rather than wait for a regularly scheduled March 6 session.
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Monday there was strong international consensus against Iran's nuclear plans and time had run out for talking to Tehran. With Italy's foreign minister at her side, Rice said the next step must be to refer Iran to the U.N. Security Council. The United States believes Iran is building a nuclear bomb but Iran says its nuclear program is for peaceful, energy purposes. "The referral absolutely has to be made," Rice told reporters.
Meanwhile, Smirkey yesterday committed the US to the defense of Israel against threats from Iran, saying he would not allow the world to be "blackmailed" by an Iranian nuclear weapon. The US president's warning, issued in an exchange with students in Kansas, came at a tense time in relations with Iran, after Tehran vowed to restart nuclear research. The US is leading a diplomatic attempt to persuade other countries to refer Iran to the UN security council for failure to cooperate with United Nations inspectors. Tehran insists it is interested only in a civilian nuclear energy program, and has threatened to return to full-scale production of nuclear fuel if it is referred to the UN. He said "Israel's our ally. We're committed to the safety of Israel, and it's a commitment we will keep." This is fueling speculation in the financial community that Israel will be used as a proxy to launch an attack on Iran to forestall it opening a euro-based oil trading market in March, thereby undermining the dollar's reserve-currency status.
The Committee to Protect Journalists on Monday called for the U.S. military to free two journalists, one held without charge in Iraq and the other, the media rights group said, detained at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The New York-based group also demanded an explanation from the U.S. military for holding a Reuters TV cameraman for eight months without charges until his release on Sunday. Samir Mohammed Noor, a 30-year-old Iraqi freelancer, was freed from military custody after being held in Baghdad's Abu Ghraib prison and then at Camp Bucca in southern Iraq. "Samir Mohammed Noor should not have been jailed for eight months without charge, explanation, or due process," CPJ Executive Director Ann Cooper said in a statement. "The military owes an explanation for this open-ended and unsubstantiated detention," she said. "U.S. officials should also credibly explain the basis for the other detentions or release those journalists immediately," Cooper said. The CPJ said the military continued to hold without charge at least one journalist in Iraq and another at the U.S. Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay, where the United States keeps foreign detainees captured in its war against terrorism. The military does not confirm the names of most of those detained at Guantanamo.
The Justice Department's voting section, a small and usually obscure unit that enforces the Voting Rights Act and other federal election laws, has been thrust into the center of a growing debate over recent departures and controversial decisions in the Civil Rights Division as a whole. Many current and former lawyers in the section charge that senior officials have exerted undue political influence in many of the sensitive voting-rights cases the unit handles. Most of the department's major voting-related actions over the past five years have been beneficial to the GOP, they say, including two in Georgia, one in Mississippi and a Texas redistricting plan orchestrated by Rep. Tom DeLay (R) in 2003. The section also has lost about a third of its three dozen lawyers over the past nine months. Those who remain have been barred from offering recommendations in major voting-rights cases and have little input in the section's decisions on hiring and policy.
The Supreme Court, ruling today in an important campaign finance case, opened the door to a new round of legal challenges to the limits Congress placed four years ago on election advertisements paid for by corporations and broadcast during the weeks before federal elections. The court's opinion was surprising, coming only six days after the argument. It was unsigned, barely two pages long, and unanimous. It may, however, have considerable impact, given that the court itself, two years ago, had appeared to foreclose further challenges to the "electioneering communications" portion of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002. The Supreme Court at that time upheld the law, usually known as McCain-Feingold after the names of its Senate sponsors, in a 5-to-4 decision that considered multiple free-speech challenges to the statute "on its face" rather than in particular applications. The court ruled today that both the government and a special three-judge federal district court here had misinterpreted its earlier decision to foreclose future challenges to the advertising restrictions as they applied to particular advertisements or to particular corporate sponsors.
The Homeland Security Department was warned a day before Hurricane Katrina hit that the storm's surge could breach levees and leave New Orleans flooded for weeks or months, documents released Monday show. An Aug. 28 report by the department's National Infrastructure Simulation and Analysis Center concluded that a Category 4 or 5 hurricane would cause severe damage in the city, including power outages and a direct economic hit of up to $10 billion for the first week. "Overall, the impacts described herein are conservative," stated the report, which was sent to Homeland Security's office for infrastructure protection. "Any storm rated Category 4 or greater ... will likely lead to severe flooding and/or levee breaching, leaving the New Orleans metro area submerged for weeks or months," said the report, which was released by a Senate panel examining the government's breakdown in responding to Katrina.
Smirkey was stumped during the Q and A session of his speech today by a sophomore at Kansas State: Q: "My name is Tiffany Cooper. I’m a sophomore here at Kansas State and I was just wanting to get your comments about education. Recently 12.7 billion dollars was cut from education. I was just wondering how is that supposed to help our futures? [snip]" Smirkey: "Actually, I think what we did was reform the student loan program. We are not cutting money out of it." Smirkey was wrong and the student was right - $12.7 billion was, in fact, cut from the student loan program as reported here, with Vice President Cheney cutting short an overseas trip to return to cast the tie-breaking vote in the Senate in favor of the cuts.
A Muslim man detained for months without charge after September 11 and then deported to Egypt gave a deposition in New York on Monday in a suit against the U.S. government for unlawful imprisonment and abuse. Yasser Ebrahim was one of four Muslim men who are being allowed to return to participate in the case under strict conditions including confinement to their hotel rooms for the duration of their stay. The men, who were cleared of any connection to terrorism, say they suffered inhumane and degrading treatment in a Brooklyn detention center, including solitary confinement, severe beatings, incessant verbal abuse and a total blackout on communications with their families and attorneys. Ebrahim's attorneys said the men will be deposed over the next two weeks in a class action suit against the government over the treatment of more than 1,200 Muslim and South Asian men rounded up after the September 11 attacks blamed on al Qaeda. The Center for Constitutional Rights -- a civil rights group handling the case -- said the conditions for their return to the United States include a ban on their speaking to anybody outside the case and confinement to their hotel room.
The city of Calabasas, Calif., has passed one of the nation's toughest antismoking laws, including restrictions on smoking in outdoor public spaces, the Los Angeles Times reported Jan. 21. The city has banned smoking in outdoor public spaces when other people are present. Nonsmokers who ask smokers to put out their cigarettes but are refused can file a complaint with the city attorney's office. "Everything is forbidden here," said Tal Genin, a smoker. "No skateboarding, no rollerblading; you can't swim in the lake. It's like 'The Truman Show': Everything looks really nice, but you can't live life." Mayor Barry Groveman defended the law, saying he hoped it would prompt restaurants, malls, and other businesses with outdoor public spaces to create separate outdoor smoking "outposts."
In a little-noticed move, the U.S. Army has issued new regulations governing the death penalty, raising speculation that the military might be preparing for its first execution since 1961. "This publication is a major revision," said the document issued January 17 and signed by Sandra Riley, administrative assistant to the secretary of the Army. "This regulation establishes responsibilities and updates policy and procedures for carrying out a sentence of death as imposed by general courts-martial or military tribunals," the document said. There are currently six men on military death row in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. One, Dwight Loving, is believed to be the leading candidate for execution. "We're worried these new regulations might be a sign they are getting ready for an execution," said David Elliot of the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty.
"Extraordinary Rendition" Watch: Governments across the European Union have "collaborated, tolerated or looked away" from the United States Central Intelligence Agency’s clandestine operations on their countries’ soil for the last two to three years. This is expected to be one of the main findings that will be revealed on Tuesday when a Council of Europe (COE) inquiry presents its interim report on the use of European territory for the practice of 'extraordinary rendition.' The preview was given by Swiss COE senator Dick Marty, tasked with heading a wide-sweeping investigation into allegations that member States have hosted CIA flight stopovers and detention centres linked to the highly controversial practice of 'extraordinary rendition.'
Habeas Corpus Death Watch: A federal judge made a final ruling on Monday requiring the Pentagon to release the names of detainees at the U.S. naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. U.S. District Judge Jed Rakoff ordered in favor of the Associated Press, which sued the Defense Department in April, 2005, seeking the names of detainees and transcripts of military hearings held to determine whether they were properly classified as enemy combatants. In his written ruling, the judge said the Pentagon must provide the Associated Press with unredacted copies of the transcripts by January 30, 2006. The government had asked Rakoff to reconsider his January 4 ruling, which stopped short of ordering the release of the transcripts but rejected the government's arguments. The government immediately asked the judge to reconsider saying the court had overlooked the privacy interests of detainees families and friends. But the judge said the government's motion to reconsider was based on "speculative assertions" and the "government had not remotely met its burden showing that either the detainees or their families, friends, or associates have a protectable privacy interest."
Trickle-Down Economics Trickling On You: At a time when energy prices and industry profits are soaring, the federal government collected little more money last year than it did five years ago from the companies that extracted more than $60 billion in oil and gas from publicly owned lands and coastal waters. If royalty payments in fiscal 2005 for natural gas had risen in step with market prices, the government would have received about $700 million more than it actually did, a three-month investigation by The New York Times has found. But an often byzantine set of federal regulations, largely shaped and fiercely defended by the energy industry itself, allowed companies producing natural gas to provide the Interior Department with much lower sale prices - the crucial determinant for calculating government royalties - than they reported to their shareholders. As a result, the nation's taxpayers, collectively, the biggest owner of American oil and gas reserves, have missed much of the recent energy bonanza. The disparities in gas prices parallel those uncovered just five years ago in a wave of scandals involving royalty payments for oil. From 1998 to 2001, a dozen major companies, while admitting no wrongdoing, paid a total of $438 million to settle charges that they had fraudulently understated their sale prices for oil.
Republican Policies Are Making America A Better Nation: A pilot nation-by-nation study of environmental performance, jointly produced by Yale and Columbia Universities, ranked the United States 28th over all, behind most of Western Europe, Japan, Taiwan, Malaysia, Costa Rica and Chile, but ahead of Russia and South Korea. The bottom half of the rankings is largely filled with the countries of Africa and Central and South Asia. Pakistan and India both rank among the 20 lowest-scoring countries, with overall success rates of 41.1 percent and 47.7 percent, respectively. The pilot study, called the 2006 Environmental Performance Index, has been reviewed by specialists both in the United States and internationally. Using a new variant of the methodology the two universities have applied in their Environmental Sustainability Index, produced in four previous years, the study was intended to focus more attention on how various governments have played the environmental hands they have been dealt, said Daniel C. Esty, the director of the Yale Center for Environmental Law and Policy and an author of the report. Just six nations - led by New Zealand, followed by five from Northern Europe - have achieved 85 percent or better success in meeting a set of critical environmental goals ranging from clean drinking water and low ozone levels to sustainable fisheries and low greenhouse gas emissions.
News From The Talibaptist Jihad: Smirkey told abortion opponents Monday that they are pursuing "a noble cause" and making a real difference in the campaign to recruit more Americans to stand on their side. "We're working to persuade more of our fellow Americans of the rightness of our cause," the president told abortion foes gathered at the foot of Capitol Hill on a chilly, rainy day. He spoke by telephone from Manhattan, Kansas, where he was to give a speech. "This is a cause that appeals to the conscience of our citizens and is rooted in America's deepest principle," the president said. "And history tells us that with such a cause we will prevail."
"Most commonly, they ingest a whole bottle of quinine pills, with castor oil. We try to get them to the ER before their cardiac rhythm is interrupted. Sometimes they douche with very caustic products like bleach. We had a patient, a teen, who burned herself so badly with bleach that we couldn't even examine her, her vaginal tissue was so painful... Our local hospital tells me they see 12-20 patients per year, who have already self-induced or had illegal abortions. Some make it, some don't. They are underage or poor women mostly, and a few daughters of pro-life families." If you assume the quotes above come from a veteran of the abortion rights movement, talking about the "bad old days" before Roe v. Wade, when desperate women suffered death and injuries because abortion was illegal, you'd be partly right. The speaker is a longtime worker in reproductive health, whose involvement with abortion started before Roe. But the situations she describes are occurring now. Indeed, in another eerie echo from the pre-Roe era, the increase in illegal abortion in the worker's area is so significant that a doctor from the hospital mentioned above contacted her. He asked for her help in setting up a special ward for the treatment of illegal abortions when Roe is overturned, because he knows the caseload will mushroom then. "He didn't say 'if' - he said 'when,'" she said. "Chills ran down my spine." The very policies that could reduce unwanted pregnancies - and thus abortions, legal and otherwise - are resisted at every turn by right-wing extremists and their allies in the Bush White House. Funds for family planning services are cut back while millions of dollars of federal funding are spent on totally ineffective "abstinence only" sex education.
News From Smirkey's Wars: Toppled Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein's lawyers said Sunday they are seeking to file a case against President George Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair. President of the Jordan Bar Association, Saleh Armouti, who recently joined Saddam's defense team, told journalists the attorneys will seek Saddam's approval this week to file a law suit against the American and British leaders in a European international court. The lawyers want to try them on charges of illegally invading and occupying a sovereign country. Armouti made his comments shortly before he and other members of Saddam's defense team left the Jordanian capital, Amman, to Baghdad before the former Iraqi leader's trial resumes Tuesday. He also said the lawyers will ask the Iraqi authorities to move Saddam's trial from Baghdad to Jordan or Qatar.
Iraq's top professionals - doctors, lawyers, professors - and businessmen - have been targeted by shadowy political groups for kidnapping and ransom, as well as murder, some of them say. So many have fled the country that Iraq is in danger of losing the core of skilled people it needs most just as it is trying to build a newly independent society. "It's creating a brain drain," said Amer Hassan Fayed, assistant dean of political science at Baghdad University. "We could end up with a society without knowledge. How can such a society make progress?" Professionals and businessmen with the means to escape are going to Jordan, Syria, Egypt or, if they have visas, to Western countries. Those left behind say they feel abandoned. Ahmed Meer Ali, a 27-year-old resident doctor, is left alone to man the private hospital where Kubasi's office is locked and shuttered. Most of the specialists who worked there, providing care to patients and guidance to Ali, have left. "They are the ones with specialties from England or the U.S.A. They were the ones teaching me," he said. "Now, some patients even go to Iran to get care. In the past, no one in Iraq would go to Iran." And many educated young Iraqis are hoping to follow.
A US officer who faced up to three years in jail for killing an Iraqi general being held in U.S. custody has been punished with a reprimand and a $6,000 fine. Chief Warrant Officer Lewis Welshofer Jr was convicted last week of the negligent homicide of Maj Gen Abed Hamed Mowhoush in 2003. Prosecutors said Gen Mowhoush was tied, placed headfirst in a sleeping bag and died with an officer sitting on him. Welshofer has thanked his military "family" for supporting his defense.
Scandals Du Jour: Lawyers for Scooter Libby on Monday made their first request to use classified evidence at his trial, lau