" 'When this is all over, this will be bigger than any (government scandal) in the last 50 years, both in the amount of people involved and the breadth to it,' said Stan Brand, a former U.S. House counsel who specializes in representing public officials accused of wrongdoing. 'It will include high-ranking members of Congress and executive branch officials.' " 01-06
"Super-lobbyist Jack Abramoff's guilty plea Tuesday to three felony counts sets the stage for the biggest congressional scandal perhaps in decades, certainly since the Republicans took over Congress 10 years ago, pledging clean government." 01-06
"Not since the 1987 nomination of Judge Robert Bork to replace retiring moderate Justice Lewis Powell has the high court faced such an abrupt move to the right in so many areas at once. And not since the Bork nomination has there been such a large and determined coalition assembled in opposition to a high court nominee, analysts say."
"Supporters portray Alito as a careful, conservative jurist within the mainstream of American legal thought. Opponents paint him as an agenda-driven ideologue." 01-06
"Christian broadcaster Pat Robertson suggested Thursday that Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s stroke was divine punishment for 'dividing God’s land.' "
According to Abraham H. Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League, Robertson's remarks "are un-Christian and a perversion of religion. Unlike Robertson, we don’t see God as cruel and vengeful." 01-06
"A former official at the supersecret National Security Agency is reportedly prepared to tell Congress what really went on in the domestic-spying program that was revealed last month."
"The Washington Times reported today that Russ Tice, who was fired from the NSA last year, has written and told House and Senate intelligence committees that he knows the government undertook electronic surveillance without obtaining permission from a special secret court." 01-06
"The real cost to the US of the Iraq war is likely to be between $1 trillion and $2 trillion (£1.1 trillion), up to 10 times more than previously thought, according to a report written by a Nobel prize-winning economist and a Harvard budget expert."
"The study, which expanded on traditional estimates by including such costs as lifetime disability and healthcare for troops injured in the conflict as well as the impact on the American economy, concluded that the US government is continuing to underestimate the cost of the war." 01-06
"Rep. Tom DeLay, the defiant face of a conservative revolution in Congress, stepped down as House majority leader on Saturday under pressure from Republicans staggered by an election-year corruption scandal." 01-06
"Advisers said Sunday that Ariel Sharon was waging a fierce comeback from a life-threatening stroke. Doctors planned to start easing the Israeli leader out of a medically induced coma Monday." 01-06
"The fall of Jack Abramoff threatens to provoke America's biggest corruption crisis for decades. It also reveals how money greases the political wheels."
"There are believed to be more than 30,000 lobbyists in Washington, outnumbering elected federal politicians by almost 60 to one. The money they deal in tops $2bn a year. Such numbers shock many on both sides of the party divide. The US constitution is often praised for its checks and balances between the president, Congress and the Supreme Court. But where money equals power, no one predicted the unofficial fourth branch of US government: K Street."
"Drug-makers are the biggest lobbyers, spending $681m in the six years up to 2004 to woo officials. They employ 3,000 lobbyists. The investment paid off in 2003 with the passing of a bill to provide taxpayer-funded drug prescriptions for the elderly. Many critics lambasted it as a giveaway to Big Pharma. One study predicted drug firms would reap $139bn in extra profits from the legislation." 01-06
"A retired, 34-year-old city police officer who spent hundreds of hours searching for Sept. 11 victims at ground zero has died of respiratory disease that union officials believe is related to the cleanup." 01-06
"Delegates at the U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) on Monday began debating a convention to protect 'cultural diversity' which is expected to be approved by the body's General Assembly on Thursday despite opposition from the United States."
"Supporters of the convention say that once ratified it would have legal weight in negotiations at the World Trade Organisation over such issues as cinema, publishing and the Internet." 01-06
"The 13 experts said it is 'beyond dispute that, in (our) democracy, the president cannot simply violate criminal laws behind closed doors because he deems them obsolete or impracticable.' " 01-06
"Party lines in the U.S. Senate hardened over the Supreme Court nomination of Samuel A. Alito Jr. as Democrats accused him of evasiveness and contradictory testimony on presidential power, abortion and his membership in a Princeton University alumni group." 01-06
"Most torso wounds that killed Marines in Iraq might have been prevented or minimized by improved body armor, a Pentagon study found."
"The unreleased study last summer by the Office of the Armed Forces Medical Examiner looked at 93 fatal wounds from the start of the war in March 2003 through June 2005. It concluded that 74 were bullet or shrapnel wounds to shoulders or areas of the torso not protected by ceramic armor plating." 01-06
"The Army plans to send thousands of ceramic body armor plates to Iraq this year to better protect soldiers while the Marine Corps already is delivering such gear, military officers said Wednesday."
"A Pentagon study done last summer but only disclosed recently found that improved armor may have prevented or minimized torso wounds that proved fatal to Marines in Iraq." 01-06
"The Pentagon is pushing back hard against allegations soldiers' lives have been lost in Iraq because they were not issued adequate body armor."
"The Pentagon has been under heavy political fire in the wake of recent reports concerning a secret study that found that up to 80 percent of Marines who died in Iraq from upper body wounds could have survived if they had body armor to protect their sides and shoulders. The study prompted outrage from Democrats on Capitol Hill, including from Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., who attributed the problem to the Bush administration's 'incompetence.' " 01-06
Compares current body armor with body armor available from Pinnacle Armor. The Pinnacle Armor product was claimed to cover a larger percent of the torso and to hold up better from multiple shots. The Pinnacle Armor is made from titanium plates and the military armor is made from ceramic plates. 01-06
"Christian broadcaster Pat Robertson has sent a letter apologizing for suggesting that Ariel Sharon's massive stroke was divine punishment for pulling Israel out of the Gaza Strip."
"Robertson's comments drew widespread condemnation from other Christian leaders, President Bush and Israeli officials, who canceled plans to include the American evangelist in the construction of a Christian tourist center in northern Israel."
" 'My concern for the future safety of your nation led me to make remarks which I can now view in retrospect as inappropriate and insensitive in light of a national grief experienced because of your father's illness,' the letter said." 01-06
"Soldiers exposed to Iraq's increasingly lethal roadside bombs, which can rip through armored Humvees, are drawing on wartime experience and stateside expertise to protect their vehicles with stronger armor and thermal detection cameras." 01-06
"The vast majority of American troops will be out of Iraq by the end of this year. Who says so? Congressman John Murtha says so, and he explains his plan to make that happen to correspondent Mike Wallace."
"Asked who these insurgents are, Murtha says they are Iraqis. 'Ninety-three percent of the insurgents are Iraqis. A very small percentage are foreign fighters. The Iraqis know who they are. Once we’re out of there, they’ll eliminate ‘em,' he says."
" 'Iraq is not where the center of terrorism is. So when he [President Bush] says we’re fighting terrorism over there, we’re inciting terrorism over there. We’re encouraging terror. We’re destabilizing the area by being over there ‘cause we’re the targets.' " 01-06
"Former Vice President Al Gore asserted Monday that President Bush 'repeatedly and persistently' broke the law by eavesdropping on Americans without a court warrant and called for a federal investigation of the practice."
"Gore, also a former member of the Senate from Tennessee, proposed that a special counsel be appointed by Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to investigate whether there have been violations of the law." The full text of Gore's speech is available here. 01-06
"Six former heads of the Environmental Protection Agency — five Republicans and one Democrat — accused the Bush administration Wednesday of neglecting global warming and other environmental problems." 01-06
"The internet search engine Google is resisting efforts by the US Department of Justice to force it to hand over data about what people are looking for."
"Google has also said that providing the data would make its users think it was willing to reveal personal information about them, as well as giving competitors access to trade secrets." 01-06
"Pakistani Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz on Sunday ridiculed as 'bizarre' a U.S. report that senior al Qaeda leaders were killed in a CIA attack on a home along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border." 01-06
"The U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, voting 10-8 along party lines, cleared the way for the full Senate to consider confirming Supreme Court nominee Samuel A. Alito Jr. to succeed retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor."
" 'This is a nomination that I fear threatens the fundamental rights and liberties of all Americans now and in generations to come,' said Patrick Leahy of Vermont, the Judiciary Committee's ranking Democrat. Leahy, who voted for Roberts, accused President George W. Bush, in selecting Alito, of reneging on his campaign promise to be 'a uniter and not a divider.' "
" Republicans say Alito has shown himself to be an even- handed jurist without a political agenda during his 15 years as a federal appeals court judge." 01-06
"Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton called President Bush’s explanations for eavesdropping on domestic conversations without warrants 'strange' and 'far-fetched' Wednesday in blistering criticism ahead of the president’s State of the Union address."
"The Bush administration has argued that the [war] resolution gave the president authority to order such electronic surveillance as part of efforts to protect the nation from terrorists." 01-06
"A South Korean court on Thursday ordered two U.S. manufacturers of the defoliant Agent Orange to pay $62 million in medical compensation to South Korean veterans of the Vietnam War and their families." 01-06
"The U.S. military in Iraq freed five women prisoners on Thursday, but American and Iraqi officials stressed their release was pre-planned and not linked to the case of kidnapped U.S. reporter Jill Carroll." 01-06
"Mr. Ramadan, a Swiss citizen, has been denied a United States visa since July 2004, when he was on the verge of moving with his family to Indiana to take up a tenured professor's position at the Joan B. Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies at the University of Notre Dame."
"The author of some 20 books on Islamic theology and the place of Muslims in the Western world, Mr. Ramadan, 43, is an outspoken critic of the Bush administration's policies in the Middle East. He has also rejected Muslim terrorism, calling it 'anti-Islam.' Last August, he was invited by Prime Minister Tony Blair to participate in a task force to counter extremism after the London bombings in July." 01-06
"Lieberman is the ranking Democrat on the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, which is conducting the investigation."
" 'A lot of federal government employees who we've interviewed, they've been told by the White House that they can't answer any questions about communications they had with people at the White House,' Lieberman told ABC News. 'Now, that's stonewalling. For the administration to simply tell people in the federal government they can't talk to our investigators about any of the conversations they had with people at the White House is unacceptable.' " 01-06
"Al Qaeda and its former protectors — the Taliban — are in the midst of a powerful resurgence, according to accounts by local officials and information contained in new al Qaeda videotapes obtained by ABC News."
"U.S. troops are not permitted inside Pakistan, and the Pakistani army is barely seen in this part of Waziristan Province." 01-06
"Diehard Democratic critics of Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito threatened on Thursday to block a vote on his confirmation, and Republicans countered with a move designed to force his approval by early next week." 01-06
"The Voting-on-Paper Assistive Device (Vote-PAD) is an inexpensive, non-electronic, voter-assist alternative that helps most people with visual or dexterity impairments to vote independently."
"The Vote-PAD can be used in any jurisdiction. It is customized to provide access to each precinct’s hand-counted or optically-scanned paper ballot. All jurisdictions must offer provisional ballots during federal elections, and many also provide paper ballot backups in case voting machines break down." 01-06
"A majority of Americans are more likely to vote for a candidate in November's congressional elections who opposes President Bush, and 58 percent consider his second term a failure so far, according to a poll released Thursday."
"Fewer people consider Bush to be honest and trustworthy now than did a year ago, and 53 percent said they believe his administration deliberately misled the public about Iraq's purported weapons program before the U.S. invasion in 2003, the CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll found."
"And 64 percent said things in the United States have gotten worse in the past five years, while 28 percent said things have improved." 01-06
"President Bush announced a lofty post-Katrina reconstruction plan in his Sept. 15, 2005, speech from New Orleans' Jackson Square. But the government's record of action has largely failed to match Bush's words." 01-06
"President Bush is moving to put healthcare at the top of America's political agenda."
"Key components of his plan include the expansion of health savings accounts, additional tax breaks for individuals who buy insurance on their own, and provisions that would improve public access to information on healthcare pricing."
"Supporters contend the proposals are crucial to making American more of an 'ownership' society, allowing individuals to have more control over their healthcare choices. Critics warn they'll shift more risk onto individuals and undermine the nation's already strained health-insurance system."
"These initiatives are outlined..., followed by arguments for and against:" 01-06
"At one point, Scarlett's letter said, FEMA asked U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services to help with search and rescue in New Orleans, St. Bernard Parish and St. Tammany Parish but that the rescuers 'never received task assignments.' The agency, a branch of the Interior Department, apparently went ahead anyway, according to the letter, which said that Fish and Wildlife helped rescue 4,500 people in the first week after Katrina."
"Other Interior Department resources that were offered, but unused, included flat-bottom boats for shallow-water rescues. 'Clearly these assets and skills were precisely relevant in the post-Katrina environment,' Scarlett wrote." 01-06
"Samuel A. Alito Jr. won U.S. Senate confirmation to replace Justice Sandra Day O'Connor in a mostly partisan vote that helps President George W. Bush move the Supreme Court to the right." 01-06
"The U.S. Army has been detaining Iraqi women to help track down husbands or fathers who are suspected terrorists, according to documents released Friday and an interview with a female detainee who was released Thursday after four months in prison."
" 'I was treated in a good way, no torture,' she said."
"The U.S. detention of female prisoners is a sensitive issue for the Iraqi populace, which considers the mistreatment of a woman a dishonor to her family. Iraqis find it particularly offensive that foreign male officers are holding female prisoners, as many Iraqis fear that U.S. soldiers will treat them disrespectfully." 01-06
"In the interview, Mr. Specter said that he wanted a fuller explanation as to how the Justice Department asserts that the eavesdropping operation does not conflict with the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which set strict and 'exclusive' guidelines for intelligence wiretaps."
"The operation was approved by President Bush, to allow the National Security Agency to conduct wiretaps on Americans' international communications without a court warrant. Mr. Specter said his view was that the operation 'violates FISA — there's no doubt about that.' "
"He also questioned why the administration did not go to Congress or the intelligence court to seek changes in the process before moving ahead on its own with the classified program after the Sept. 11 attacks." 02-06
" 'The political outcome of this battle will depend on who succeeds in defining the terms of the debate,' says Thomas Mann, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution."
" 'If it's a straight tradeoff between security and privacy or liberty, security wins. If it's framed as a way of monitoring suspicious characters, it wins overwhelmingly,' he says. 'But if there is any hint of abuse of power or of the president not telling the truth, of scrutinizing citizens with no evidence of suspicious behavior, then it turns into something else.' "
"If it were just a partisan fight, the White House charge that Democrats are locked in pre-9/11 mentality might carry the day. But four of the 46 senators who blocked a December vote to extend the Patriot Act are Republicans." 01-06
Cindy Sheehan was arrested for wearing a T-shirt with the message “2245 Dead. How many more?” at the State of the Union speech of President Bush. The wife of Congressman Bill Young was ejected for wearing a T-shirt with the message “Support the Troops — Defending Our Freedom.” 01-06
"A federal judge on Friday set former White House aide I. Lewis 'Scooter' Libby’s trial date for January 2007, two months after the midterm congressional elections." 02-06
"Congress sent President Bush a second five-week extension of the Patriot Act as Senate negotiators worked to close a deal with the White House on renewing the antiterrorism law with some new civil liberties protections." 02-06
"Richard Tarrant's campaign Web site flashes a running tally of the national debt as a protest, he says, of the ``borrow-and-spend Republicans'' in Washington."
"Tarrant is a Republican. He's also a candidate for Vermont's open U.S. Senate seat and among a group of party insurgents who want Republicans to reconcile their stated philosophy of fiscal restraint with the spending binge they've led over the past five years. The debt ticker is at $8.199 trillion and counting." 02-06
"The Bush administration has said it is planning to spend $120bn (£68bn) on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars this year, bringing their total cost so far to $440bn."
"The spending request, which will soon be presented to Congress, marks a 20% increase over last year, despite plans to draw down US troop levels in both war zones in the coming months." 02-06
"Cheered by hundreds of people, the body of Coretta Scott King was carried through the streets by horse-drawn carriage Saturday to Georgia's state Capitol, where she became the first woman and first black person to lie in honor." 02-06
"With Americans concerned about rising gasoline prices and dependence on imported oil, the president wants to cut 75 percent of US oil imports from the region by 2025 - and he provided a new energy plan to help do it."
"A bipartisan proposal in Congress - the 'Vehicle and Fuel Choices for American Security Act' - advocates a 7-million-barrel cut over 20 years, nearly double Bush's proposal and eliminating the need for any Middle Eastern oil." 02-06
"A study commissioned by the First Infantry Division estimated that eight out of 10 of its wounded soldiers from Iraq have gone through the same or a similar ordeal [of paycheck mixups]." 02-06
"A clear majority of Americans now disapprove of President Bush's handling of ethics in government, and three-quarters say the administration should disclose all contacts between White House officials and disgraced Washington lobbyist Jack Abramoff." 02-06
" 'The president does not have a blank check,' said Senate Judiciary Chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa., who wants the administration to ask the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to review the [Bush administration's domestic spying] program."
"Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., wasn't buying Gonzales' argument that the wiretaps were inherently part of the president's war powers, CBS News correspondent Jim Stewart reports."
" 'Taken to its logical conclusion, it concerns me that it could basically neuter the congress and weaken the courts,' Graham said. 'That's where we're at right now.' " 02-06
"Under President George W. Bush's new budget, the federal deficit would decline gradually until 2010 and then start rising again, as the full impact of his requested permanent tax cuts and other proposals is felt."
"While the health- care program for the elderly would be cut by $36 billion over the next five years, the budget sees his successor pushing through an $11 billion cut in the program in 2011 alone." 02-06
"Islamic tradition explicitly prohibits any depiction of Allah and the Prophet [Muhammad]."
"European papers have defended their decisions to publish [satirical cartoons of Muhammad] on free speech grounds." Also transliterated Mohammad, Mohammed, Muhammed, and sometimes Mahomet. Sometimes misspelled by visitors as Mohamad, Mohamed, Muhamad, or Muhamed.
"After the funeral, King’s body will be placed in a crypt near her husband’s tomb at the King Center, which she built to promote his memory."
"Between the tombs is the eternal flame that was placed there years ago in Martin Luther King Jr.’s honor. On the crypt, inscribed in black, is the Bible passage First Corinthians 13:13, which reads: 'And now abide Faith, Hope, Love, These Three; but the greatest of these is Love.' "
"Within the past year, according to current and former case officers and supervisors, virtually the entire top level of the [CIA's] D.O. has turned over. One intelligence official estimates that at least 20 of the most coveted senior spots have been vacated in the 17 months since [CIA Director] Goss arrived. The post of European division chief has turned over twice, as has the No.2 official of the directorate, the associate deputy director for operations."
"For the nation's premier intelligence agency, this amounts to the loss of hundreds of years of experience in some of the most difficult and dangerous parts of the world--precisely the places Washington needs experienced eyes and ears as it continues to prosecute the war on terrorism." 02-06
"With President Bush's signature Wednesday, Medicaid recipients can expect higher copayments and deductibles. College students may face higher interest rates on student loans, as lenders are squeezed. Work requirements for women on welfare are likely to be tightened. Federal aid to states for child-support enforcement will be curtailed."
" 'There's a fairness issue here,' says Isabel Sawhill, a senior fellow in economics at the Brookings Institution. 'We're basically cutting programs that serve low-income families and the middle class in order to pay for tax cuts that go overwhelmingly to the very wealthy. Even some Republicans have been uncomfortable with that.' "
"The Bush White House says programs slated for cuts or elimination are ineffective, and that there are other ways to help the poor, such as through programs supported by Bush's faith-based initiative." 02-06
"Former disaster agency chief Michael Brown is indicating he is ready to reveal his correspondence with President Bush and other officials during Hurricane Katrina unless the White House forbids it and offers legal support."
"Brown’s stance, in a letter obtained Wednesday by The Associated Press, follows senators’ complaints that the White House is refusing to answer questions or release documents about advice given to Bush concerning the Aug. 29 storm." 02-06
" 'There was a culture clash that didn’t recognize the absolute inherent science of preparing for a disaster,' he [former FEMA head Michael Brown] told the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee. 'Any time you break that cycle ... you’re doomed to failure.' ”
“ 'The policies and decisions implemented by the DHS put FEMA on a path to failure,' he added."
"Collins asked Brown why he did not implement pre-Katrina reforms that a consultant urged FEMA to take, among them fewer political appointees and more experts." 02-06
"Claims by the Homeland Security Department that it didn't quickly realize the scope of the Aug. 29 storm's devastation are 'just baloney,' [former FEMA head Michael] Brown testified at a Senate hearing on Friday.”
“And in a punch to the president whom he says he still respects, Brown testified that he told top White House officials the day Katrina hit about massive flooding in New Orleans and warned that 'we were realizing our worst nightmare.' " 02-06
"The report is the result of a Republican 11-member House select committee that investigated the response to Katrina at all levels -- local, state and federal."
" 'If this is what happens when we have advance warning, we shudder to imagine the consequences when we do not. Four and a half years after 9/11, America is still not ready for prime time. This is particularly distressing because we know we remain at risk for terrorist attacks, and because the 2006 hurricane season is right around the corner.' "
" 'What's needed is a National Action Plan. Not a plan that says Washington will do everything, but one that says, when all else fails, the federal government must do something, whether it's formally requested or not. Not even the perfect bureaucratic storm of flaws and failures can wash away the fundamental governmental responsibility to protect public health and safety,' the panel said."
"A U.N. investigation has concluded that the United States committed acts amounting to torture at Guantanamo Bay, including force-feeding detainees and subjecting them to prolonged solitary confinement, according to a draft report obtained Monday."
The UN investigators were "appointed to their three-year terms by the 53-nation U.N. Human Rights Commission, the global body's top rights watchdog." 02-06
"There are few issues as hotly contested — and as poorly understood — as the question of what makes a person gay or straight. It's not only a political, social, and religious question but also a scientific question, one that might someday have an actual, provable answer." 03-06
" 'I was astonished to see that we don't have the capabilities most 21st century corporations have,' he said."
Susan Collins, chair of the Senate panel investigating Katrina responses, "has said the panel's report will recommend the creation of emergency operation teams made up of personnel from the Defense, Homeland Security Health and Human Services and other departments who would focus on specific regions of the country."
"The terror-fighting USA Patriot Act moved a step toward renewal Thursday when the Senate overwhelmingly rejected an attempt by Sen. Russell Feingold to stop it until more civil liberties safeguards are added." 02-06
"Vice President Dick Cheney says he has the power to declassify government secrets, raising the possibility that he authorized his former chief of staff to pass along sensitive prewar data on Iraq to reporters." 02-06
"In a single year, it is difficult to measure overall progress in the war on terror. But ABC News has learned today that President Bush will ask Congress for an additional $65.3 billion for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. It brings the total funds requested this year to more than $110 billion for those operations." 02-06
"President George W. Bush, seeking to boost support for plans to break America's 'addiction' to fossil fuels, said the U.S. must prevent terrorist states from developing atomic weapons and expand its own nuclear power capacity." 02-06
"Older voters, a critical component of Republican Congressional victories for more than a decade, could end up being a major vulnerability for the party in this year's midterm elections, according to strategists in both parties. Paradoxically, one reason is the new Medicare drug benefit, which was intended to cement their loyalty." 02-06
"Sen. Robert Menendez, who is working on legislation to prohibit companies owned or controlled by foreign governments from running port operation in the U.S., said Chertoff's comments showed him that the administration 'just does not get it.' "
"In a statement, the New Jersey Democrat said, 'No matter what steps the administration claims it has secretly taken, it is an unacceptable risk to turn control of our ports over to a foreign government, particularly one with a troubling history. We cannot depend on promises a foreign government has given the administration in secret to secure our ports.' "
"Chertoff said Dubai Ports World should not be excluded automatically from such a deal because it is based in the UAE."
"Critics have cited the UAE's history as an operational and financial base for the hijackers who carried out the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001."
"In addition, they contend the UAE was an important transfer point for shipments of smuggled nuclear components sent to Iran, North Korea and Libya by a Pakistani scientist." 02-06
"Two Republican governors on Monday questioned a Bush administration decision allowing an Arab-owned company to operate six major U. S. ports, saying they may try to cancel lease arrangements at ports in their states." 02-06
"A very powerful and very Republican voice has joined those questioning the White House's acceptance of a plan by the Arab company Dubai Ports World to take over the operations at major East Coast shipping ports, including those in New York and Philadelphia."
"Meanwhile, President Bush said today that he would veto any congressional efforts to stop the deal from going forward."
"[Sen. Evan] Bayh points out that a congressional investigation requested in 2003 and completed in 2005 found that the government entity that cleared such sales 'uses such a narrow definition of national security that it approves too many questionable takeovers without sufficient review.' " 02-06
"Democrats and Republicans are challenging the Bush administration's plan to give a company based in the United Arab Emirates significant control over the nation's biggest ports — including New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, New Orleans, Miami and Philadelphia."
" 'I strongly disagree with [Homeland Security Chief] Mike Chertoff on this,' Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, said today on ABC's 'Good Morning America.' 'The fact is, this was a very compressed investigation — at most 20 to 25 days, and only a few days was spent looking at the security aspects.' "
"In his opinion, securing the nation's ports is difficult enough. So why add to the complications by letting a 'company which could have an al Qaeda infiltration,' know U.S. ports' security measures." 02-06
"President Bush was unaware of the pending sale of shipping operations at six major U.S. seaports to a state-owned business in the United Arab Emirates until the deal already had been approved by his administration, the White House said Wednesday." 02-06
"Sectarian battles between Shiite and Sunni Muslims raged across Iraq on Thursday, as furious reprisals to the bombing of the Askariya shrine in Samarra threatened to plunge Iraq into civil war and derail U.S. efforts to form a new government." 02-06
"Health care — which now consumes about one in every six dollars spent in the United States — will eat up one of every five dollars by 2015, according to a new government analysis." 02-06
"Security is a top priority at the ports, but there's concern the Bush administration has not provided enough funds to properly pay for it. Earlier this month, the president of the American Association of Port Authorities complained that the $708 million allotted for maritime security over the past four years amounted to only one-fifth of what the port authorities had identified as needed to properly secure the ports." 02-06
" 'Bagram was never meant to be a long-term facility, and now it's a long-term facility without the money or resources,' said one Defense Department official who has toured the detention center. Comparing the prison with Guantánamo, the official added, 'Anyone who has been to Bagram would tell you it's worse.' "
"After an Army investigation, the practices found to have caused those two deaths [of prisoners] — the chaining of detainees by the arms to the ceilings of their cells and the use of knee strikes to the legs of disobedient prisoners by guards — were halted by early 2003. Other abusive methods, like the use of barking attack dogs to frighten new prisoners and the handcuffing of detainees to cell doors to punish them for talking, were phased out more gradually, military officials and former detainees said." 02-06
"A direct attack on Roe v. Wade is coming from the South Dakota legislature. The new bill, which outlaws abortion, makes no exceptions, not for a pregnancy caused by incest or rape. It would only be legal—the only exception if it would save the pregnant woman's life."
"Doctors who perform abortions could face up to five years in prison." 02-06
"A direct attack on Roe v. Wade is coming from the South Dakota legislature. The new bill, which outlaws abortion, makes no exceptions, not for a pregnancy caused by incest or rape. It would only be legal—the only exception if it would save the pregnant woman's life."
"Doctors who perform abortions could face up to five years in prison." 02-06
"A high-ranking Army Corps of Engineers official who publicly criticized the Pentagon's decision to award Halliburton Co. a no-bid contract for work in Iraq has been demoted, officials said Monday."
" 'The failure to abide by prior commitments and the circumstances surrounding Ms. Greenhouse's removal are the hallmark of illegal retaliation,' her attorney, Michael D. Kohn, wrote in the letter to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld."
" 'Her removal will send a message to all concerned that if they dare stand up to corrupting influences within the Army contracting world their careers will be destroyed,' he added." 02-06
"The U.S. Coast Guard said questions about foreign influence, employees and operations made it impossible to assess the threat posed by a state-owned Dubai company's purchase of a firm that manages some terminal operations at six U.S. seaports." 02-06
"Citing broad gaps in U.S. intelligence, the Coast Guard cautioned the Bush administration weeks ago that it could not determine whether a United Arab Emirates-based company seeking a stake in some U.S. port operations might support terrorist operations." 02-06
"The latest CBS News poll finds President Bush's approval rating has fallen to an all-time low of 34 percent, while pessimism about the Iraq war has risen to a new high."
"Americans are also overwhelmingly opposed to the Bush-backed deal giving a Dubai-owned company operational control over six major U.S. ports. Seven in 10 Americans, including 58 percent of Republicans, say they're opposed to the agreement." 02-06
"Prosecutors call it a corruption case with no parallel in the long history of the U.S. Congress. And it keeps getting worse. Convicted Rep. Randall 'Duke' Cunningham actually priced the illegal services he provided." 03-06
"George Barisich, president of the United Commercial Fisherman's Association, has been selling anti-FEMA T-shirts since last fall, a reflection of his frustration with the federal government's response to the storm that left him homeless and unemployed."
"But on Feb. 1, when he handed a shirt to a fellow Katrina victim as he was picking up canned goods at a charity's relief tent, Barisich found himself in trouble with the government."
"He was cited by a group of Homeland Security officials for selling a T-shirt on federal property — in this case, near a FEMA center in the parking lot of a Wal-Mart in Chalmette, La."
"The government is sticking to its guns. 'If we ignored this violation, you could have potentially 20 to 30 people standing out in front of the (FEMA) center, obstructing things,' says Dean Boyd, a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) spokesman." 03-06
"President George W. Bush's public support continues to fall as his signature political strength, fighting terrorism, is undercut by overwhelming opposition to plans to let a Dubai company operate U.S. port facilities." 03-06
"In an exclusive interview with ABC News' Elizabeth Vargas, President Bush offered his views on a range of topics, including the response to Hurricane Katrina, the war in Iraq, U.S. port security and the future of his presidency. What follows is a transcript of the interview."
President Bush defended FEMA's response to Katrina as an opportunity to learn. He stated his approval for the transfer of management of some U.S. ports to Dubai. President Bush said "I want the American people to understand, if I thought in any way that a foreign company managing terminals would cause us to be less secure, I would, I would object strongly." 03-06
"One of the most prominent House Republicans on military issues said Thursday he would try to scuttle a Dubai-based company's effort to manage U.S. ports as lawmakers' complaints about the Bush administration's handling of the issue continued to spread."
" 'Dubai cannot be trusted,' said Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., chairman of the House Armed Services Committee and normally one of the administration's most trusted allies. He called the United Arab Emirates 'a bazaar for terrorist nations' and asserted that the United States should not permit DP World to take over significant operations at six U.S. ports."
"Hunter listed instances between 1994 and 2003 in which he said the country helped move materials for weapons of mass destruction, such as heavy water and high-speed electrical switches, to Pakistan, Iran and other countries. He plans to introduce legislation that would require U.S. companies to be the sole owners of infrastructure critical to national security." 03-06
"A stunning investigation of bribery and corruption in Congress has spread to the CIA, ABC News has learned."
"The CIA Inspector General has opened an investigation into the spy agency's executive director, Kyle 'Dusty' Foggo, and his connections to two defense contractors accused of bribing a member of Congress and Pentagon officials." 03-06
"House Republican leaders on Tuesday embraced legislation that would block a Dubai-owned company from taking over operations at several U.S. ports, brushing aside a veto threat from President Bush."
"The legislation is expected to reach the House floor next week as part of a $91 billion measure for wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and aid for Gulf Coast states recovering from Hurricane Katrina." 03-06
"The collapse of a plan to let a Dubai company manage U.S. ports marks another setback for President George W. Bush, exposing deteriorating relations with fellow Republicans and underscoring a perception of incompetence stemming from the government's response to Hurricane Katrina." 03-06
"Faith Hill and Tim McGraw — two stars who usually stay out of politics — blasted the Hurricane Katrina cleanup effort, with Hill calling the slow progress in Louisiana and Mississippi 'embarrassing' and 'humiliating.' "
"McGraw specifically criticized President Bush." 03-06
"The leaders [of Congress] told the president they would pass measures to block the [port] deal by veto-proof majorities, sources said. Bush had threatened to veto any legislation that stopped the deal. Bush has said any effort to stall or kill the deal would strain ties with a vital Arab ally in the war on terrorism." 03-06
"A former adviser to President Bush was arrested this week in Maryland and charged with swindling two department stores out of more than $5,000 in a refund scam."
"Allen resigned without explanation in early February as Bush's top domestic political adviser. Allen had long been a darling among the conservative right -- and Bush had even nominated him to be a federal appeals court judge in 2003, but Democrats blocked the move." 03-06
"Knight Ridder, the second-largest newspaper company in the United States, agreed last night to sell itself for about $4.5 billion in cash and stock to the McClatchy Company, a publisher half its size, according to people involved in the negotiations." 03-06
"Mexican President Vicente Fox has announced the discovery of a new deep-water oil field, which is believed to contain 10bn barrels of crude."
"With at least 3.4m barrels per day, Mexico is Latin America's largest crude producer ahead of Venezuela and Brazil, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA)."
"The oil industry provides one third of the Mexican state income. More than half the crude extracted is exported, mainly to the United States." 03-06
"U.N. member states ignored U.S. opposition and overwhelmingly approved a new Human Rights Council on Wednesday, attempting to strengthen the world body's machinery to deal with major human rights offenders."
"The 191-member General Assembly burst into sustained applause when its president, Jan Eliasson, announced the results of the vote: 170 in favor, 4 against, and 3 abstentions." 03-06
"When I first arrived in Baghdad before the war, Iraq seemed lifeless. Baghdad felt like a city without oxygen, where those with big dreams couldn’t breathe or imagine a better life. Now, the country is very changed — in some ways for the better (as you'll see in the chart below) — but it has become equally menacing, terrifying and sinister." 3-06
"Thousands of anti-war protesters took to the streets around the world Saturday, marking the third anniversary of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq with demands that coalition troops leave immediately." 3-06
"Three years to the day after the beginning of the war in Iraq, terrorists have reached a point of 'desperation,' U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney said on CBS’s Face The Nation, but on the same day the former Iraqi prime minister argued that civil was is already underway in his homeland." 3-06
"The empty seats are a sight that is becoming more common in the Capitol with Congress on track to set a modern-day record for the least amount of time in session. The House plans to be in Washington 97 days this year." 03-06
"North Korea suggested Tuesday it had the ability to launch a pre-emptive attack on the United States, according to the North's official news agency." 03-06
"U.S. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist urged Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to 'use every diplomatic means necessary' to win the immediate release of an Afghan man facing the death penalty for converting from Islam to Christianity."
"The dispute over the prosecution of Rahman has exposed religious tensions in a country the Bush administration has promoted as a tolerant, emerging democracy. The U.S. is spending almost $1 billion a month on military operations and rebuilding in Afghanistan."
"Top Muslim clerics said today that Rahman, 41, should be executed, the Associated Press reported from Kabul. 'Rejecting Islam is insulting God. We will not allow God to be humiliated. This man must die,' AP cited cleric Abdul Raoulf as saying. Raoulf was jailed three times by the Taliban, according to the news agency." 03-06
"Following are the ABC News Investigative Unit's summaries of five documents from Saddam Hussein's government, which the U.S. government has released." 03-06
"Paul D. Eaton, a retired Army major general, was in charge of training the Iraqi military from 2003 to 2004."
According to Major General Eaton, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld "has shown himself incompetent strategically, operationally and tactically, and is far more than anyone else responsible for what has happened to our important mission in Iraq. Mr. Rumsfeld must step down." 03-06
"FEMA has broken its promise to reopen four multimillion-dollar no-bid contracts for Hurricane Katrina work, including three that federal auditors say wasted significant amounts of money." 03-06
"Daniel McGrory,a Times expert on al-Qaeda, examines the inconsistencies behind Zacarias Moussaoui's confession that he was part of the 9/11 plot." 03-06
Joshua Bolten became President Bush's Chief of Staff on March 28, 2006. "Joshua Bolten joined President George W. Bush's Cabinet on June 30, 2003, when he was sworn in as the Director of the Office of Management and Budget." 03-06
"As Sen. Russ Feingold urges the Senate to censure President Bush, the alleged misdeed that moved the Wisconsin Democrat to propose censure continues: the Bush administration keeps conducting surveillance of calls by suspected al Qaida operatives to and from people in the U.S."
"Even as he moves ahead on a censure showdown, [Sen. Arlen] Specter is also pressing forward on the bill he has drafted to put the NSA surveillance under the scrutiny of a special court established by the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA)."
"Specter’s view is that Bush has violated the 1978 FISA law by ordering the [warrantless] surveillance program but he adds, 'It may well be that the program is within the president’s inherent (constitutional) authority. But it seems to me that determination has to be made in accordance with tradition by a court, by judicial review.' " 03-06
"The Afghan apostate threatened with execution finally found sanctuary yesterday when the Italian Government granted him fast-track asylum on the ground of 'religious persecution'." 03-06
"Soldiers will no longer be allowed to wear body armor other than the protective gear issued by the military, Army officials said Thursday, the latest twist in a running battle over the equipment the Pentagon gives its troops in Iraq and Afghanistan." 03-06
"JILL CARROLL, the American journalist held hostage in Iraq, was freed yesterday in Baghdad after nearly three months in captivity."
"She appeared almost immediately on Iraqi television to say that she had been treated very well by her captors. Her release sparked a huge outpouring of relief across America." 03-06
"The estimated cost of rebuilding New Orleans's levees damaged by Hurricane Katrina may triple to $9 billion, delaying the city's effort to rebuild after the worst natural disaster in U.S. history and leaving it vulnerable in the next hurricane season." 03-06
"Former hostage Jill Carroll strongly disavowed statements she had made during captivity in Iraq and shortly after her release, saying Saturday she had been repeatedly threatened." 04-06
"Senator Lindsey Graham said his fellow Republicans will be committing 'political suicide' if they push through Congress immigration legislation that focuses only on building walls along the U.S.-Mexico border and deporting illegal immigrants." 04-06
"Melting ice is opening up the Northwest Passage and reviving a dispute between the United States and Canada over who controls the potentially lucrative shipping route."
"The United States calls the passage an international strait, open to all. Canada claims control because it considers the passage an internal waterway, like the Mississippi River." 04-06
"The 'World News Tonight' co-anchor suffered severe head injuries in a roadside bombing in Iraq in January."
Bob Woodruff "is still on heavy pain medication as his body recovers from the serious head injuries and other wounds. But he recognizes people, he can tell his daughter he loves her, and the multilingual journalist has even said a few words in Chinese and German." 04-06
"An Iraqi cameraman working for CBS News was acquitted Wednesday of insurgent activity, a year after being wounded and detained by the U.S. military after a car bombing." 04-06
"Katie Couric announced on air Wednesday that she is stepping down as co-host of NBC's 'Today' show after 15 years in the job."
"She will join CBS News as Anchor and Managing Editor of The CBS Evening News With Katie Couric. She will also contribute to 60 Minutes and will anchor CBS News primetime specials as well." 04-06
"President Bush authorised the leak of secret intelligence to the New York Times to help defend the war in Iraq, a former top White House aide has said." 04-06
"Vice President Dick Cheney's former top aide told prosecutors that President Bush authorized a leak of sensitive intelligence information about Iraq, according to court papers filed by prosecutors in the CIA leak case."
"Libby's testimony indicates both the president and the vice president authorized leaks, and CBS News correspondent Gloria Borger reports that for a president that has prided himself on keeping secrets, Thursday's news could hardly be more embarrassing. Mr. Bush and Cheney both have long said they abhor that practice, so much so that the administration has put in motion criminal investigations to hunt down leakers." 04-06
"Senate Republicans and Democrats reached an agreement on procedures for allowing undocumented aliens to apply for citizenship, clearing an obstacle that stalled legislation overhauling U.S. immigration laws."
"The compromise splits the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants into three groups, based on how long they have been in the U.S., for the purpose of setting rules on their eligibility to apply for legal status." 04-06
"Members of the Senate and the Assembly have already handed a bill over to Governor Mitt Romney that would require citizens to purchase some kind of health care coverage. Penalties for those who refuse would include stiff penalties, and eventually outright fines."
"Employers will also be held accountable. Any business with eleven employees or more would have to provide health insurance or pay close to $300 a year to uncovered workers." 04-06
"Marion County Clerk Doris Anne Sadler blasted a voting machine company this morning saying it supplied error-filled ballots for next month's primary election."
"Meanwhile, clerks in Johnson and Hancock counties, also are upset with the company because it did not deliver absentee ballots in time and failed to program touch screen voting machines." 04-06
"At a time when the U.S. economy is on the upswing and more people are finding work, young African American men are falling further behind."
"That’s the grim portrait painted by three new and forthcoming books by scholars at Columbia, Georgetown and Princeton universities. The picture isn't new, but the depths of its despair and pathology are." 04-06
"The U.S. administration is stepping up plans for a possible air strike on Iran, despite publicly pushing for a diplomatic solution to a dispute over its nuclear ambitions, according to a report by influential investigative journalist Seymour Hersh." 04-06
"Whether diplomats and politicians find a solution that will spare the life of Abdel Rahman, an Afghan man who could possibly face the death penalty for his Christian faith, the perception of Islam in the West may have already taken a hard hit."
"Conservative Muslims in Afghanistan see Rahman's conversion as an act of treason against Islam and its communal identity. For Americans and others in countries that have spent money and precious lives to rid Afghanistan of the Taliban, Rahman's trial is itself a betrayal not of religious values but of the values of human rights." 04-06
Newsweek interviewed Alex Avila, "the senior producer of LatinoUSA, a nationally syndicated English language radio program produced in Austin, Texas, and distributed by National Public Radio."
"The legislation brought a sense of urgency in the immigrant community and the students have been waiting for something like this to energize them. And since the Senate didn’t do anything last week, I think there's a sense of urgency still. I don't expect these marches to disappear in the next week. It's Holy week [for Catholics] this week, so they expect to have it off, and I think they'll tie the spiritual and the political." 04-06
"President Bush's job approval rating is at a career low in this latest ABC News/Washington Post poll amid continued broad public skepticism about the Iraq war."
"Today, just 20 percent of Americans "strongly" approve of his work in office, while more than twice as many, 47 percent, strongly disapprove." 04-06
"Tens of thousands of immigrants spilled into the streets of Atlanta and other cities Monday in a national day of action billed as a 'campaign for immigrants' dignity.' "
"In Dallas, where a march Sunday drew between 350,000 and 500,000 people, activists also were urging immigrants to showcase their spending power by not buying anything during an economic boycott. Rallies also were planned Monday in Houston, El Paso and Austin." 04-06
"As many as 2 million people may rally across the U.S. today against an immigration reform bill passed by the House of Representatives that would tighten the borders and impose stiffer penalties on illegal immigrants." 04-06
"When two small trailers were seized in Iraq in late May 2003, President Bush proclaimed a fresh victory. The administration called the trailers mobile 'biological laboratories,' and Mr. Bush declared: 'We have found the weapons of mass destruction.' "
"But a secret mission to Iraq, according to the Post, had already concluded the trailers had nothing to do with biological weapons."
"The trailers...were primary pieces of evidence offered by the Bush administration before the war to support its contention that Iraq was making weapons of mass destruction." 04-06
"A growing number of retired generals are publicly opposing US conduct of the war in Iraq, breaking a decades-old tradition of not criticizing ongoing military operations.
"The focus of their ire: Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. Four generals have called for his resignation, saying he ignored military advice and made key strategic mistakes." 04-06
"Democrats, buoyed by President George W. Bush's problems, have taken commanding leads over Republicans on most issues and in voter preferences for the November congressional elections, a Bloomberg/Los Angeles Times poll shows."
"Congress's overall approval rating fell to 28 percent in the poll, a record low in Los Angeles Times polling, which suggests Americans are frustrated with both parties. For instance, Americans see no difference between the parties on which has more honesty and integrity, with 30 percent saying Democrats and 29 percent choosing Republicans." 04-06
"Retired Army Maj. Gen. John Batiste says he is calling for Donald Rumsfeld's resignation because he believes the defense secretary violated the principles of war planning when deciding to invade Iraq, and as a leader he needs to be accountable for that action."
"Batiste led the First Infantry Division in Iraq in 2004 and 2005. He retired from the military in November 2005, passing up a third star and a chance to be second in command in Iraq." 04-06
"The 104-acre complex — the size of about 80 football fields — will include two office buildings, one of them designed for future use as a school, six apartment buildings, a gym, a pool, a food court and its own power generation and water-treatment plants. The average Baghdad home has electricity only four hours a day, according to Bowen's office." 04-06
"Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari, under intense pressure to give up plans for a second term, agreed Thursday to let Shiite lawmakers reconsider his nomination, a step that could mark a breakthrough in the months-long effort to form a new government."
"Key to al-Jaafari's change of heart was pressure from U.N. envoy Ashraf Qazi and his meetings Wednesday with the most powerful Shiite cleric in the country, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, and Muqtada al-Sadr, a radical cleric who has backed al-Jaafari, said Kurdish lawmaker Mahmoud Othman." 04-06
"While patients, doctors and hospitals have been feeling the pain of rising health-care costs, the chairman and CEO of UnitedHealth has been accumulating one of the richest batches of stock options ever." 04-06
Provides a list of "many of the detainees who have been held at the Guantanamo Bay detention center in eastern Cuba. The list includes the names and citizenship of all detainees who passed through the Combatant Status Review Tribunal process in 2004 and 2005." 04-06
"Don McPherson, a former star quarterback at Syracuse University and NFL player, knows a thing or two about the behavior of athletes. And despite public perception, he said the athletes of today are better behaved than ever before."
"And to help make sure athletes and other students understand acceptable behavior, McPherson works with young people across the country as executive director of the Sports Leadership Institute at Adelphi University in Garden City, N.Y." 04-06
"The overhaul of the White House staff intensified on Wednesday as Karl Rove, one of the president's most powerful and feared advisers, gave up day-to-day control over the administration's domestic policy to concentrate on the midterm elections." 04-06
"President Bush today greeted Chinese President Hu Jintao at the White House with direct appeals for more help on easing nuclear standoffs with Iran and North Korea and for reducing trade imbalances." 04-06
"The fortresslike compound rising beside the Tigris River here will be the world's largest of its kind, the size of Vatican City, with the population of a small town, its own defense force, self-contained power and water, and a precarious perch at the heart of Iraq's turbulent future."
" 'The presence of a massive U.S. Embassy -- by far the largest in the world -- co-located in the Green Zone with the Iraqi government is seen by Iraqis as an indication of who actually exercises power in their country,' the International Crisis Group, a European-based research organization, said in one of its periodic reports on Iraq." 04-06
"More than 1,000 Iraqis who live south of Baghdad within the bombed and looted complex that was once the centre of Saddam Hussein's nuclear programme are at acute risk of radioactive poisoning, the UN's nuclear authority said yesterday." 04-06
"Conservative pundit Tony Snow will be named White House press secretary, Republican officials said Tuesday night, in the latest move in President Bush’s effort to remake his troubled White House." 04-06
"Five people whose homes were flooded during Hurricane Katrina sued the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on Tuesday, accusing the agency of ignoring repeated warnings that a navigation channel it built would turn into a 'hurricane highway.' " 04-06
"Just back from Baghdad and eager to discuss promising developments, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice found herself knocked off message Sunday, forced to defend prewar planning and troop levels against an unlikely critic — Colin Powell, her predecessor at the State Department." 05-06
"The senior Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee proposed Monday that Iraq be divided into three separate regions — Kurdish, Shiite and Sunni — with a central government in Baghdad." 05-06
" 'Those who come here to start new lives in our country have a responsibility to understand what America is about and the responsibility to learn the English language so they can better understand our national character and participate fully in American life,' the president said in a ceremony at the White House East Room." 05-06
"As sectarian violence continues in Iraq, Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., argues that Iraq should be divided into three separate regions: Kurdish, Shiite and Sunni, with a central government in Baghdad."
"Once the nation effectively divides, so does its major resource and in ways that make the territorial losers in nonoil areas effectively dysfunctional. The central government cannot preside over a divided nation and hope to control oil and the nation's infrastructure and export facilities at the same time. This leaves the losers with little choice other than further conflict." 05-06
"Instead of selling back their textbooks to the bookstore or letting them gather dust in their basement, students at a handful of universities are donating their used books to Iraq's war-torn capital."
"The program, 'Books for Baghdad,' collects and distributes textbooks in science, mathematics and technology (some of the few subjects taught in English in the Middle East) and transports them to the University of Baghdad and its library in Iraq." 05-06
"Kidnapping has flourished here [in Iraq] since the fall of Saddam Hussein, as insurgents, militias and criminal gangs have taken advantage of the breakdown in social order. Iraq has caught up with the traditional world leaders in kidnapping — like Colombia, Mexico and Brazil — and may have surpassed them. The vast majority of victims are Iraqis. Between 5 and 30 are abducted every day according to figures maintained by the American Embassy in Baghdad, though Iraqi and American officials acknowledge that any estimate is merely guesswork since most kidnappings go unreported." 05-06
"The incoming chairman of Augusta National, the home of the Masters, has dismissed the possibility of women becoming members in the near future." 05-06
"The American Bar Association rated one of President Bush's judicial nominees "not qualified" Wednesday, prompting a call from a liberal group for the president to withdraw the Mississippi lawyer's nomination." 05-06
"Disaffection over spending and immigration have caused conservatives to take flight from President Bush and the Republican Congress at a rapid pace in recent weeks, sending Bush's approval ratings to record lows and presenting a new threat to the GOP's 12-year reign on Capitol Hill, according to White House officials, lawmakers and new polling data." 05-06
"Congressional Republicans and Democrats demanded answers from the Bush administration Thursday about a government spy agency secretly collecting records of ordinary Americans' phone calls to build a database of every call made within the country." 05-06
"President Vladimir Putin warned yesterday that the U.S.-Russian arms race is not over and called for a strengthening of his nation's nuclear and conventional forces so Moscow can better resist foreign pressure."
"The remarks, in his seventh state of the nation address since taking power in 2000, follow increasingly sharp criticism of Russia's democratic and foreign policy directions from the United States, including a harsh rebuke by Vice President Dick Cheney last week in Lithuania." 05-06
"USA Today reported Thursday that the National Security Agency has been building up the database using records provided by three major phone companies — AT&T Inc., Verizon Communications Inc. and BellSouth Corp. — but that the program 'does not involve the NSA listening to or recording conversations.' "
" 'It’s the largest database ever assembled in the world,' the paper quoted one source as saying. The agency’s goal is 'to create a database of every call ever made' within U.S. borders, it said the source added." 05-06
"The government urged a federal judge on Friday to block a lawsuit filed by a German national who says he was illegally held in a CIA-run prison in Afghanistan for four months and tortured."
"Al-Masri said he was taken into custody after being mistaken for an associate of the Sept. 11, 2001, hijackers. He said Macedonian authorities arrested him when he crossed the border on New Year’s Eve 2003 and turned him over to the CIA after three weeks."
"He said he was then flown to Afghanistan where he was 'dragged off the plane and thrown into the trunk of a car' and beaten by his captors." 05-06
"The role of Vice President Dick Cheney in the criminal case stemming from the outing of White House critic Joseph Wilson's CIA wife is likely to get fresh attention as a result of newly disclosed notes showing that Cheney personally asked whether Wilson had been sent by his wife on a 'junket' to Africa." 05-06
"According to the Newsweek poll, 73 percent of Democrats and 26 percent of Republicans think the NSA’s program is overly intrusive. Details of the surveillance efforts were first reported on Wednesday by USA Today. The newspaper said the NSA has collected tens of millions of customer phone records from AT&T Inc., Verizon Communications Inc. and Bell-South Corp., in an effort to assemble a database of every call made within the United States. While the records include detailed information about when and where phone calls were made, the government isn’t listening in to the actual conversations, a U.S. intelligence official familiar with the program told the newspaper." 05-06
"President Bush signed a $70 billion tax-cut package Wednesday that Republicans hope will ingratiate them with voters as they head into midterm elections with worries about holding control of Congress." 05-06
"Mr Bush is now just hovering above lows reached only by presidents Richard Nixon, Jimmy Carter, Harry Truman and his father. He has been unable to reverse the slump, despite a series of initiatives that included reshuffling his White House team last month, making a televised address to the nation on Monday night on Mexican immigration, and talking up progress on a new government for Iraq." 05-06
"Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has not decided whether to comply with President Bush's plan to put National Guard troops on the Mexican border and, according to a spokesman, will only make his decision after he gets more information about what the White House has in mind."
"Also Thursday, the Senate is set to debate an amendment that would make English the national language. It's part of the overall discussion on immigration reform. Lawmakers Wednesday engaged in some give-and-take, backing the construction of a fence on the Mexican border while leaving intact a plan to give millions of illegal immigrants a potential path to citizenship." 05-06
"In a report to be published today, a United Nations panel urges the U.S. to close the Guantanamo prison, stop all use of torture and use the courts to try terrorism suspects. There are about 400 detainees at Guantanamo, some of whom were captured when the U.S. ousted Afghanistan's Taliban regime following the 2001 terrorist attacks in the U.S." 05-06
"A decorated Marine colonel turned anti-war congressman has said Marines killed at least 30 innocent Iraqi civilians 'in cold blood' in Haditha in November, suggesting the death toll may be twice as high as originally reported."
"An Iraqi human rights group, Hammurabi Human Rights Association, caught the scene on video, which was obtained by Time magazine. A criminal investigation ensued." 05-06
"A government analysis of more than 100 soft drinks and other beverages turned up five with levels of cancer-causing benzene that exceed federal drinking-water standards, the Food and Drug Administration said Friday." 05-06
"U.S. Rep. John Murtha, an outspoken opponent of the war in Iraq, and Alberto Mora, a former Navy general counsel who clashed with superiors over abuse of terrorism detainees, were honored Monday as recipients of the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award."
" 'We need to be clear. Cruelty disfigures our national character,' Mora said. 'It is incompatible with our constitutional order, with our laws, and with our most prized values. Cruelty can be as effective as torture in destroying human dignity, and there is no moral distinction between one and the other.' " 05-06
"Personal data, including the Social Security numbers of 26.5 million U.S. veterans, was stolen from a Veterans Affairs employee this month after he took the information home without authorization, the department said Monday." 05-06
"A major contractor would take a large cut and pay smaller amounts to the subcontractors, down to the company with the truck hauling debris to the dump."
"The lion's share of the money has gone to firms like politically-connected AshBritt of Florida. The company received $500 million, reports CBS News correspondent Sharyl Attkisson."
" 'It seems you get more than half,' [Rep. D-Calif.] Waxman told Randall Perkins, president of AshBritt Inc. in Pompano Beach, Fla., after Perkins said his company received $23 a cubic yard in a debris removal contract but paid a subcontractor $10 to haul the material." 05-06
"New Orleans' levee system was routinely underfunded and therefore inadequate to protect against hurricanes, according to an independent report released Monday. "
"The report also called for an overhaul of the agencies that oversee flood protection. It took aim at Congress for its piecemeal funding over the past 50 years, and at state and local levee authorities for failing to properly oversee maintenance of the levees."
"The [Los Angeles Times] newspaper reports that these findings — laid out in a 600-page report — undermine assurances by both the Bush administration and the Corps of Engineers that the federal levee repair program will provide a higher level of protection to New Orleans." 05-06
"2005 should have taught the United States many lessons about being unprepared for hurricanes. But a new report finds most coastal states still aren't ready." 05-06
"Why the divergence and vehemence of opinion? The answer, analysts say, is the issue has become a test for a conservative movement unsure of its identity at a time when its leaders have presided over an era of exploding deficits and expanding government."
"Jeff Bell, an anti-abortion activist and former adviser to Presidents Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon, said the divide in the conservative movement reflects 'two different impulses at work: one that sees America as fundamentally a nation of immigrants, and one that fears outside forces are eroding our values.' " 05-06
"A human rights group said Friday that about 34 civilians were killed in a U.S. air attack Monday on the village of Azizi in southern Afghanistan, more than double the number previously cited by President Hamid Karzai." 05-06
"On Monday, he dropped out of the MoveOn.org web primary, in which members of the group are being asked to express their preference in the race — as they did early in the race for the 2004 Democratic presidential nod. No one doubted that he was seeking to avoid another setback."
"Nor does anyone doubt that the man the Democrats nominated for vice president in 2000, and who looked at the start of the year like a sure bet for reelection, is going to have to fight to be the party's nominee for his own seat in 2006." 05-06
"The Bush administration has asked federal judges in New York and Michigan to dismiss a pair of lawsuits filed over the National Security Agency’s domestic eavesdropping program, saying litigating them would jeopardize state secrets." 05-06
"The office of Vice President Dick Cheney routinely reviews pieces of legislation before they reach the president's desk, searching for provisions that Cheney believes would infringe on presidential power, according to former White House and Justice Department officials.""The officials said Cheney's legal adviser and chief of staff, David Addington, is the Bush administration's leading architect of the 'signing statements' the president has appended to more than 750 laws. The statements assert the president's right to ignore the laws because they conflict with his interpretation of the Constitution.""The Bush-Cheney administration has used such statements to claim for itself the option of bypassing a ban on torture, oversight provisions in the USA Patriot Act, and numerous requirements that they provide certain information to Congress, among other laws." 05-06
"Authorities in Afghanistan imposed a curfew in the city of Kabul Monday after a traffic accident involving a U.S. Humvee triggered a day of rioting that left at least eight people dead and more than 100 injured." 05-06
"The shooting death of a pregnant Iraqi, apparently by U.S. troops, as she was rushing to a hospital threw an intense spotlight Wednesday on the troubling issue of Iraqi civilian deaths." 05-06
"For Iraq's new ambassador to the United States, Samir Sumaydi, representing his nation is painfully personal. Sumaydi's family hails from the western town of Haditha, the site of an alleged massacre of civilians by U.S. marines last November." 06-06
"The BBC has uncovered new video evidence that US forces may have been responsible for the deliberate killing of 11 innocent Iraqi civilians."
"The new evidence comes in the wake of the alleged massacre in Haditha, where US marines are suspected of massacring up to 24 Iraqi civilians in November 2005."
"According to the Americans, the building collapsed under heavy fire killing four people - a suspect, two women and a child."
"But a report filed by Iraqi police accused US troops of rounding up and deliberately shooting 11 people in the house, including five children and four women, before blowing up the building." 06-06
"Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki declared a state of emergency Wednesday in the southern city of Basra, where 140 people have been killed in rival gang clashes in May alone, police said." 06-06
"President Hamid Karzai Thursday denounced the use of gunfire by U.S. troops to suppress Afghans angered by a traffic accident involving a military truck that sparked the worst riots in the capital since the fall of the Taliban." 06-06
"Most of the California soldiers won't be armed and would perform support jobs such as surveillance, vehicle repair, road maintenance and repair and communications. Only volunteers would be used on the border, Schwarzenegger said."
" 'The mission I will assign will be significantly different than the plan laid out by President Bush,' Schwarzenegger said." 05-06
"Six world powers agreed Thursday on a package of incentives in a bid to persuade Iran to halt its nuclear program and said U.N. Security Council action against Tehran would be suspended if it agrees to stop enriching uranium."
" 'Hans Blix pointed his finger today at Iran, Israel, North Korea and the U.S., with a plan to back the world off nuclear brinksmanship,' said Falk from the U.N. 'His comprehensive plan to reduce weapons and bring about a nuclear free Middle East carries particular weight because he appears in hindsight to have been right in his assessments of pre-war Iraq.' " 06-06
"But as CBS News correspondent Anthony Mason reports, the Dow has now lost almost 600 points since early May. What is happening is part of two larger concerns — only one of which is inflation." 06-06
"The Supreme Court said Monday it will decide the extent to which public schools can use race in deciding school assignments, setting the stage for a landmark affirmative action ruling." 06-06
"Israel and Egypt, both U.S. allies, were demoted in a State Department ranking of countries judged on efforts to combat forced labor and other forms of exploitation."
"Countries on the watch list are in jeopardy of being dropped the following year into the lowest ranking, where they face the possibility of U.S. sanctions relating to foreign aid. Support from the U.S. government for loans from the International Monetary Fund or the World Bank may also be withheld." 06-06
"The humanitarian organization Keep A Child Alive has enlisted Keys as an ambassador to raise awareness about AIDS in Africa, where it hopes to attack the pandemic through a simple philosophy: $1 per child, per day for life-saving drugs, with nearly 100 percent of donations going toward treatment." 06-06
"Mr. Maliki's tough stance suggests a new assertion of sovereignty by the Iraqi government, something that actually works to the US's favor. But the allegations [of a massacre], coming as the new government tries to demonstrate control, are likely to complicate both US-Iraq relations and Maliki's task of leading the Iraqi people." 06-06
"So many viewers have written wanting to open their homes and offer Iraqi children new lives. Unfortunately, Iraqi lawyers, international child care agencies, officials at the U.S. embassy in Baghdad and the U.S. State Department in Washington all tell us adoption is not possible." 06-06
"Chinese authorities have blocked most domestic users from the main Google.com search engine, a media watchdog said."
" 'It was only to be expected that Google.com would be gradually sidelined after the censored version was launched in January,' Reporters Without Borders said in a statement." 06-06
"Hundreds of newly freed Iraqi prisoners kissed the ground after being dropped at bus stations Wednesday as Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki launched the largest such release since the U.S.-led invasion."
"Sunni Arab political leaders welcomed the initiative, which was intended to promote reconciliation in this fractured nation." 06-06
"Wall Street finished its worst week of the year with a moderate decline Friday as persistent unease over inflation and interest rates kept investors nervous about buying. The major indexes ended the week sharply lower." 06-06
"In short, the federal government seems to have much larger unfinanced liabilities than official data imply. If you compare the present value of all projected future government expenditures, including debt-service payments, with the present value of all projected future government receipts, the gap is about $66 trillion, according to calculations by the economists Jagadeesh Gokhale and Kent Smetters. That's almost eight times the size of the official gross federal debt." 06-06
"Politicians deploy righteous indignation like college students use credit cards—to excess and with abandon. For such seasoned performers, the emotion is easy to muster, and there are few upfront costs. Rail against powerful interests or the mendacity of your opponent on the stump, and the crowd goes nuts."
"But there are sometimes hidden costs in the fine print, interest payments not due for months, especially when the outrage is calculated for maximum political effect. And that outrage came back to haunt Barack Obama Wednesday when Jim Johnson, the man running his vice presidential search team, stepped down after the Wall Street Journal reported that he had received preferential deals on mortgages because he was friendly with an executive at Countrywide Financial, which has been tied to the subprime foreclosure crisis." 06-08
"A sergeant who led a squad of Marines during the incident in Haditha, Iraq, that left as many as 24 civilians dead said his unit did not intentionally target any civilians, followed military rules of engagement and never tried to cover up the shootings, his attorney said." 06-06
"Once-secret documents obtained by The Associated Press detail how the company, Kieger Enterprises of Lino Lakes, Minn., went unpunished for the Sept. 11 thefts after the government discovered FBI agents and other government officials had stolen artifacts from New York's ground zero."
"As a result, most Americans were kept in the dark about a major fraud involving their donated goods even as new requests for charity emerged with disasters like Hurricane Katrina. And Christopherson and L'Allier were left disillusioned." 06-06
"In confronting a frustratingly resilient insurgency, the U.S. is relying heavily on precision bombing, which destroys buildings and can kill civilians, generating ill will. Tactics used in house clearings have led to incidents such as an alleged massacre by Marines in the town of Haditha."
"Despite his recent high-profile Camp David, Md., summit with his war Cabinet and select outside experts, there is little evidence that President Bush has made any changes to his strategy for Iraq." 06-06
"United States Special Operations troops employed a set of harsh, unauthorized interrogation techniques against detainees in Iraq during a four-month period in early 2004, long after approval for their use was rescinded, according to a Pentagon inquiry released Friday." 06-06
"The 24 Iraqis killed included 5 men in a taxi and 19 other civilians in several houses, where, marines have contended, their use of grenades and blind fire was permitted under their combat guidelines when they believed their lives were threatened."
"However, investigators have found evidence that the men in the taxi were not fleeing the bombing scene, as the marines have told military officials. Investigators have also concluded that most of the victims in three houses died from well-aimed rifle shots, not shrapnel or random fire, according to military officials familiar with the initial findings."
"The civilian survivors said the victims were shot at close range, some while trying to protect their children or praying for their lives. The death certificates Colonel Watt examined were chillingly succinct: well-aimed shots to the head and chest." 06-06
"Gottesman, 26, has been the president's personal aide for more than four years and gets more face time with Bush than the vice president or White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove." 06-06
"Acting at the mayor's request, Gov. Kathleen Blanco said Monday she would send National Guard troops and state police to patrol the streets of New Orleans after a bloody weekend in which six people were killed." 06-06
"Three US troops have been charged with murder for shooting three Iraqi prisoners and threatening to kill a fellow soldier who wanted to report the incident, the Pentagon said yesterday." 06-06
"Iraqi police Wednesday discovered the bullet-riddled body of Khamees al-Ubaidi, a lead defense attorney for former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein." 06-06
"Under a secret Bush administration program initiated weeks after the Sept. 11 attacks, counterterrorism officials have gained access to financial records from a vast international database and examined banking transactions involving thousands of Americans and others in the United States, according to government and industry officials."
"Nearly 20 current and former government officials and industry executives discussed aspects of the Swift operation with The New York Times on condition of anonymity because the program remains classified. Some of those officials expressed reservations about the program, saying that what they viewed as an urgent, temporary measure had become permanent nearly five years later without specific Congressional approval or formal authorization." 06-06
"Billionaire investor Warren Buffett announced plans Sunday to give the bulk of his roughly $42 billion fortune to five foundations in annual gifts of stock starting next month." 06-06
"The modern-day gold rush is driven by a number of factors: generous government subsidies, surging demand for ethanol as a gasoline supplement, a potent blend of farm-state politics and the prospect of generating more than a 100 percent profit in less than two years."
"The rush is taking place despite concerns that large-scale diversion of agricultural resources to fuel could result in price increases for food for people and livestock, as well as the transformation of vast preserved areas into farmland." 06-06
"Now Wal-Mart is bringing premium fruits, vegetables and other produce to parts of America where they simply did not exist earlier. However, that does not necessarily mean Americans are going to make the right choices." 06-06
"Iraq’s prime minister unveiled a 24-point national reconciliation initiative Sunday, offering amnesty to insurgents who renounce violence and have not committed terrorist attacks on American soldiers or Iraqis."
" 'To those who want to rebuild our country, we present an olive branch,” al-Maliki told applauding lawmakers. 'And to those who insist on killing and terrorism, we present a fist with the power of law to protect our country and people.' " 06-06
The defendant's "military-appointed attorney, Navy Lt. Cmdr Charles Swift, said the lawsuit is aimed at moving the case to the civilian court system or to a traditional military court-martial. Lawyers for several defendants contend the tribunals lack guidelines and favor the prosecution."
" 'This is about a fair trial, not a free pass,' Swift said." 06-06
"Most of the electronic voting machines widely adopted since the disputed 2000 presidential election 'pose a real danger to the integrity of national, state and local elections,' a report out Tuesday concludes."
"There are more than 120 security threats to the three most commonly purchased electronic voting systems, the study by the Brennan Center for Justice says. For what it calls the most comprehensive review of its kind, the New York City-based non-partisan think tank convened a task force of election officials, computer scientists and security experts to study e-voting vulnerabilities." 06-06
"Russian President Vladimir Putin told his security services to find and kill those responsible for the deaths of four Russian diplomats in Iraq, after Russian lawmakers blamed the U.S. for rising violence in that country."
" 'It is our deep conviction' that the U.S. could have prevented the tragedy, lawmakers said in the resolution, which was supported by 425 of the lower house's 450 members. The killings 'were made possible first of all because of the growing crisis in the country as the occupying forces increasingly lose control of the situation.' '' 06-06
"More than six in 10 Americans say the country is on the wrong track, according to a new Bloomberg/Los Angeles Times poll. More than half disapprove of Bush's handling of the economy, and 36 percent strongly disapprove. Almost half, 48 percent, say his policies have made the economy worse than it was when he became president; 19 percent say it's better.'' 06-06
"The US government said it could not find the men that Guantánamo detainee Abdullah Mujahid believes could help set him free. The Guardian found them in three days."
"The case illustrates the egregious flaws that have discredited Guantánamo-style justice and which led the US supreme court to declare such trials illegal on Thursday in a major rebuke to the Bush administration." 06-06
"The editors wrote that judging whether to report sensitive information is a deliberate and intensive process, but they have an obligation to inform. 'Our job, especially in times like these, is to bring our readers information that will enable them to judge how well their elected leaders are fighting on their behalf, and at what price.' "
"The editors cited examples in which both of their newspapers had made decisions to not publish certain stories or details out of security concerns, noting that The New York Times story about the financial records tracking focused on its sweep and legal basis rather than how the program operated." 07-06
"North Korea’s test-firing of a stream of missiles harmlessly into the sea appeared to be a military failure, but it achieved one important objective for Pyongyang: It got worldwide attention." 07-06
"America’s two top officials in Iraq on Thursday sought to calm Iraqi anger over allegations that U.S. soldiers were involved in the rape-murder of a girl, promising an open investigation and calling such acts 'absolutely inexcusable and unacceptable.' " 07-06
"One day, Bowker recalls, a colleague explained the goal: to 'find the legal equivalent of outer space'—a 'lawless' universe. As Bowker understood it, the idea was to create a system where detainees would have no legal rights and U.S courts would have no power to intervene."
"In a ruling late last month, the Supreme Court came down squarely on the side of the dissenters [against the Bush administration policies for detainees]."
" 'This is an extremely damaging decision for presidential power,' says a former senior administration lawyer, who asked for anonymity owing to his intimate involvement in the legal wrangling over prisoner treatment. 'And it was largely a self-inflicted wound.' The bitter irony: an administration determined to expand executive power may have caused a serious contraction." 07-06
" 'We can’t be briefed on every little thing that they are doing,' Hoekstra said. 'But in this case, there was at least one major — what I consider significant activity that we have not been briefed on. I want to set the standard there that it is not optional for this president or any president or people in the executive community not to keep the intelligence committees fully informed of what they are doing,' he said on 'Fox News Sunday.' " 07-06
"At least 40 people, apparently all Sunnis, were killed yesterday by Shia militants in a rampage in a Baghdad suburb - one of the capital's most deadly sectarian pogroms - that revived fears of civil war." 07-06
"This report surveys four major studies that reviewed DRE voting machine security and reliability. Two of the reports involved extensive review of more than 80 academic, technical, and industry reports on DREs. Each report concluded DRE machines to be vulnerable to malfunction and also to tampering in which a computer-savvy hacker with minimal access to the machine could introduce malicious code to the DRE software and change the results of an election. Such manipulation could be undetectable. In machines equipped with a modem, it could even be done from a remote location.” 07-06
"When horrible things happen someplace far away, it is easy to pause for a moment, shake your head and say "that's awful" before returning to your safe, comfortable life — even if you work in the news industry like I do, as a producer for ABCNEWS.com."
"I do not enjoy that luxury with the situation in Lebanon and Israel. One of my closest friends is caught in the middle of the violence." 07-06
"US President George W Bush has blocked legislation to expand embryonic stem-cell research."
"Several polls have shown a clear majority of Americans support the research, which would use embryos that already exist in fertility clinics and would otherwise be thrown out."
"The cells would be used to try and cure conditions like diabetes, spinal cord injuries, Parkinson's and Alzheimer's diseases." 07-06
"The video has been one of the most popular clips on the Web and spawned countless remarks on the particulars of etiquette for world leaders."
Larry Sabato, professor of politics at the University of Virginia, says " 'A president ought to know enough not use an expletive in a fairly open meeting, and almost any male alive today knows that you don’t offer uninvited massages to any female, much less the chancellor of Germany.' " 07-06
"The U.S. military said Thursday it was paying $112,000 in compensation to victims of a traffic accident involving an American cargo truck that sparked the deadliest riot in Kabul in years."
"The Afghan parliament later [after the riot] passed a non-binding resolution calling for the U.S. troops involved in the crash to be prosecuted in Afghanistan, but U.S. officials say the United States and Afghanistan have an agreement that excludes U.S. soldiers from being prosecuted locally." 07-06
"The Senate voted overwhelmingly on Thursday to extend the landmark Voting Rights Act for another 25 years, as lawmakers of both parties said federal supervision was still required to protect the ability of minorities and the disadvantaged to cast ballots in some regions of the country." 07-06
"...a task force of the American Bar Association has concluded that the president's stream of signing statements poses a dangerous challenge to the constitutional checks and balances central to governmental power in the United States. One of the signing statements reserves the right to torture detainees held in the war on terrorism." 07-06
"Nearly a quarter-million homes and businesses still had no electricity Monday as the city struggled to recover from last week’s devastating thunderstorms." 07-06
"Americans are clearly pessimistic about the direction of the country. Now 67 percent of all Americans think the country is on the wrong track, while just 29 percent think the country is going in the right direction."
"The survey shows that while the president received a modest boost for his handling of terrorism (55 percent approve) in the wake of the [London] plot, concerns about Iraq, the economy and the Mideast neutralized that advantage. As a result, Mr. Bush's approval rating remained at 36 percent." 08-06
"Tied to the restoration of the Gulf Coast is, perhaps, the president's credibility. Critics and Gulf residents alike wait to see if the president — who sells himself as man of his word — will deliver on the promises he's made." 08-06
"Warren Mitofsky, a pioneer in exit polling, a giant in the field of survey research and the former Executive Director of the CBS News Election and Survey Unit, died Friday in New York City of an aortic aneurysm. He was 71." 09-06
"The U.S. command in Baghdad is seeking bidders for a two-year, $20 million public relations contract for monitoring the tone of news stories about the Iraq war filed by U.S. and foreign media." 09-06
"By 59 percent to 31 percent, Americans said the United Nations and other countries, rather than the United States, should take the lead in solving international crises. " 09-06
"Most Americans are angry about 'something' when it comes to how the country is run, and they are more likely than in previous years to vote for a challenger this November, a new poll suggests." 09-06
"Indeed, Clinton -- who leads in the polls anywhere from 25 to 40 points over her GOP rivals -- appears poised to replicate what George W. Bush did in 1998: He won re-election as Texas governor by a wide margin against a weak opponent, enabling him to rack up impressive showings among key demographic groups, and that helped catapult his presidential bid two years later." 09-06
"There’s no evidence Saddam Hussein had ties with al-Qaida, according to a Senate report issued Friday on prewar intelligence that Democrats say undercuts President Bush’s justification for invading Iraq."
"Bush administration officials have insisted on a link between the Iraqi regime and terror leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Intelligence agencies, however, concluded there was none." 09-06
"One of Richards' lifelong goals, and ultimately one of the greatest legacies of the former governor who died Wednesday, was to open public service to groups that were historically underrepresented." 09-06
"A senior administration official, authorized to speak with reporters about the legal issues behind the administration's strategy yesterday on condition that he not be named, said the CIA interrogations at issue are in 'the gray area on the margins -- that ill-defined boundary -- of Common Article 3.' He was referring to a Geneva Convention provision that bars cruel, humiliating and degrading treatment, as well as 'outrages upon personal dignity.' " 09-06
"[CIA Director Michael V.] Hayden said in the memo that the clarifying language of the administration's bill would give him confidence that what he 'asked an Agency officer to do under the program is lawful.' "
"The rival Senate bill on interrogations -- approved by the Armed Services Committee on Thursday and sharply criticized by Bush yesterday -- is silent on how the CIA should comply with the Geneva Conventions. Its intent, according to several government officials, is not only to avoid sending a signal to other nations that Washington is reinterpreting its treaty obligations, but to leave in place a historic understanding of international law, which would render unlawful many of the extreme interrogation techniques the CIA has been using." 09-06
"Power from tidal flows, waves, and irrigation canals are expanding the definition of hydropower - none of which are likely to get DOE research funding if the hydropower budget gets whacked, some observers say." 09-06
"President George W. Bush comes to the United Nations tomorrow with limited diplomatic leverage to block the nuclear ambitions of Iran and North Korea, largely because of fallout from the Iraq war, according to envoys." 09-06
"Pacific swells off the Oregon coast can range from at least five feet high in the summer to 11-1/2 feet high in the winter. Over the length of the coastline, these swells could, in principle, provide 13,800 megawatts each year to a state that consumes 5,000 to 6,000 megawatts. Oregon already hosts several old coastal lumber mills that are powered by individual power substations, each of which has an outflow pipe to the sea. The existing mills would allow wave-power companies to ship 2,000 megawatts to Oregon communities without any additional infrastructure."
"Nicol Stephen, a Scottish enterprise minister who visited the project in Portugal, is proposing Scotland utilize the same Pelamis technology and begin harnessing ocean power in the waters off Orkney by 2007. The payoff could be substantial. According to a report by Carbon Trust, a British organization that works with both business and public sectors to reduce carbon emissions, wave and tidal power could in the long run supply as much as 20 percent of the United Kingdom's current electricity needs." 09-06
"Pope Benedict XVI's comments that link Islam and the Prophet Muhammad to violence has sparked protest and criticism from the Muslim community. Experts analyze the broader implications of these remarks and the state of relations between Catholics and Muslims." 09-06
" 'I want to see them as radically laying down their lives for the gospel as they are in Palestine, Pakistan and all those different places,' Fisher said. Because, excuse me, we have the truth."
" 'A lot of people die for God,' one camper said, 'and they're not afraid.' "
"This camp is, by many accounts, a small — and perhaps extreme — slice of what some say is a growing, intensifying evangelical youth movement." 09-06
"Mercury contamination is making its way into nearly every habitat in the United States, not just oceans, according to a report that the National Wildlife Federation will release Tuesday."
"[Felicia] Stadler[of the National Wildlife Federation] said she believes the key is for this country — and the whole world for that matter — to realize just how big a threat mercury pollution is to our ecosystems."
" 'We need to be as drastic at cutting mercury as we have been in cutting lead,' she said." 09-06
"At a news conference in New York, the foreign minister [of Venezuela] said his ticket and passport were confiscated illegally by US officials at the security check. He said he was then verbally abused and strip-searched during a 90-minute interrogation." 09-06
"The intelligence estimate, completed in April, is the first formal appraisal of global terrorism by United States intelligence agencies since the Iraq war began, and represents a consensus view of the 16 disparate spy services inside government. Titled 'Trends in Global Terrorism: Implications for the United States,' it asserts that Islamic radicalism, rather than being in retreat, has metastasized and spread across the globe."
"An opening section of the report, 'Indicators of the Spread of the Global Jihadist Movement,' cites the Iraq war as a reason for the diffusion of jihad ideology."
"The report 'says that the Iraq war has made the overall terrorism problem worse,' said one American intelligence official." 09-06
"The Army is stretched so thin by the war in Iraq that it is again extending the combat tours of thousands of soldiers beyond the promised 12 months — the second such move since August." 09-06
"Even Bill Clinton, who never met a camera he failed to charm, couldn't keep his rage out of public view any longer. Ever since ABC television aired its riveting but risibly fictive docudrama 'The Path to 9/11' earlier this month, former Clintonites have been seething. The miniseries had laid much of the blame for the failure to get Osama bin Laden on Clinton and his supposedly wimpy national-security team. The Bush administration, meanwhile, is portrayed mostly positively, seen gearing up to take on bin Laden when 9/11 hits."
"The former president said his anti-bin Laden efforts had far exceeded those of the Bush administration before 9/11."
"While the bill would grant defendants more legal rights than they had under the administration's old system, it nevertheless would eliminate rights usually granted in civilian and military courts."
"The measure also provides extensive definitions of war crimes such as torture, rape and biological experiments - but gives Bush broad authority to decide which other techniques U.S. interrogators can legally use. The provisions are intended to protect CIA interrogators from being prosecuted for war crimes." 09-06
"A $75 million project to build the largest police academy in Iraq has been so grossly mismanaged that the campus now poses health risks to recruits and might need to be partially demolished, U.S. investigators have found."
" 'This is the most essential civil security project in the country -- and it's a failure,' said Stuart W. Bowen Jr., the special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction, an independent office created by Congress. 'The Baghdad police academy is a disaster.' " 09-06
"Three Senate Democrats proposed emergency legislation on Tuesday to reimburse states for printing paper ballots in case of problems with electronic voting machines on Nov. 7."
"Last week, Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. of Maryland, a Republican, joined the skeptics, saying he lacked confidence in his state’s new $106 million electronic system and suggesting that state officials offer all voters paper ballots as an alternative." 09-06
"The provisions [defining war crimes] are intended to protect CIA interrogators from being prosecuted for war crimes."
The Senate voted against an amendment by Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., that would have allowed terror suspects to file 'habeas corpus' petitions in court. Specter contends the ability to such pleas is considered a fundamental legal right and is necessary to uncover abuse." 09-06
"The U.S. Supreme Court began its next term Monday with cases on late-term abortions, the use of race in school admissions, patent law and pollution control. Legal experts discuss the cases and the issues that will define the new term." 10-06
"Pollution experts have 'serious scientific concerns' that newly unveiled U.S. air quality standards may pose risks to human health and welfare, according to a letter made public on Tuesday."
"The experts, all charter members of a key advisory panel to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, questioned the agency's decision to keep annual standards for fine soot particles at the same level they have been since 1997." 10-06
"President Bush, again defying Congress, says he has the power to edit the Homeland Security Department’s reports about whether it obeys privacy rules while handling background checks, ID cards and watchlists." 10-06
"Things were already looking grim for the Republicans. Hurricane Katrina, high petrol prices, internal divisions over 'war on terror' torture and phone-tapping, and endless bad news from Iraq all pointed to a drubbing in next month's mid-term congressional elections. Now the party leadership's alleged cover-up of an email sex scandal involving a gay Republican congressman, Mark Foley, could deliver the coup de grace.
"In stark terms, that may mean the loss of the House of Representatives to the Democrats, who must gain 15 seats to win, and possibly the Senate, too." 10-06
"The US goes to the polls on 7 November. At stake is control of Congress, as all 435 seats in the House of Representatives are up for grabs as are a third of the seats in the Senate." 10-06
"Legislators and regulators are not the only people in government who have drafted special rules for religious organizations. Judges, too, have carved out or preserved safe havens that shield religious employers of all faiths from most employee lawsuits, from laws protecting pensions and providing unemployment benefits, and from laws that give employees the right to form unions to negotiate with their employers." 10-06
"But five years after U.S. troops swept away the Taliban and brought promises of a better life, Afghanistan's future is, at best, touch and go: Suicide bombers are striking in the capital, while once routed Taliban fighters have regrouped to take on NATO troops-mostly British and Canadian soldiers-in the Pashtun 'tribal belt' villages. Throughout the country, corruption is rampant, courts are nonexistent, and infrastructure remains abysmal in a nation where the average life expectancy is just 43 years." 10-06
"At a time when many states are instituting new requirements for voter registration and identification, a preliminary report to the U.S. Election Assistance Commission has found little evidence of the type of polling-place fraud those measures seek to stop." 10-06
"A team of American and Iraqi public health researchers has estimated that 600,000 civilians have died in violence across Iraq since the 2003 American invasion, the highest estimate ever for the toll of the war here." 10-06
"Many experts on gambling, e-commerce and the law say the odds are extremely long that the feds will be able to come up with a set of regulations that will accomplish what the lawmakers want to impose on what has grown to become a $12 billion-a-year industry." 10-06
"The chairmen of the Iraq Study Group, Republican James Baker and Democrat Lee Hamilton, discuss their assessment of the situation on the ground, its impact on the surrounding region and consequences for U.S. interests." 10-06
"The overwhelming majority of House incumbents have little if any serious opposition in November's midterm elections, whose outcome likely will be decided by 30 to 40 tossup races out of a total of 435 contests." 10-06
"A paralegal and a military lawyer who brought forward allegations about prisoner abuse at the Guantanamo Bay detention center have been ordered not to speak with the press, lawyers and a military spokeswoman said Saturday." 10-06
"The wife of a gunman who killed five girls and injured five others at an Amish school released a statement thanking the Amish and others in the Lancaster County community for their 'forgiveness, grace and mercy.' "
" 'Your love for our family has helped to provide the healing we so desperately need,' she wrote. 'Gifts you've given have touched our hearts in a way no words can describe. ... Your compassion has reached beyond our family, beyond our community, and is changing our world, and for this we sincerely thank you.' " 10-06
David Kuo, former deputy director of the White House Office of Faith-Based Initiatives, says "the office was misused to rally evangelical Christians, the Republican base voters, to get GOP politicians elected. Not only that, Kuo claims Bush officials mocked evangelical leaders behind their backs, alleging that in the office of political guru Karl Rove they were called 'the nuts.' " 10-06
"Just 20 days until Election Day, the latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll finds approval of the GOP-held Congress is at its lowest mark in 14 years, the Republican Party's favorability rating is at an all-time low and President George W. Bush's approval rating remains mired in the 30s -- all ominous signs for a party trying to maintain control of Congress." 10-06
"First thing this morning, the president signed into law the Military Commissions Act of 2006, which does away with habeas corpus, the right of suspected terrorists or anybody else to know why they have been imprisoned, provided the president does not think it should apply to you and declares you an enemy combatant."
"Does that not basically mean that if Mr. Bush or Mr. Rumsfeld say so, anybody in this country, citizen or not, innocent or not, can end up being an unlawful enemy combatant?"
"Jonathan Turley, George Washington University Constitutional Law Professor: It certainly does. What the Congress did and what the president signed today essentially revokes over 200 years of American principles and values." 10-06
"In 2000 and 2004, problems plagued the polls in different parts of the country: long lines, eligible voters turned away, voter intimidation, misallocation and malfunctioning of voting equipment. They were underreported on Election Day. Days and weeks later, a more complete picture of voter disenfranchisement emerged—but it was too late. The elections were over and the media had moved on. Starting this election, citizen journalists—people like you and I—will document problems as they occur. We'll play them online, spread word through blogs and partner websites, doing our part to make sure the full story of our elections is told." 10-06
" 'We started this NetPAC in order to be able to support office-holders and candidates who share our vision of promoting and preserving the internet as a free and open platform for information, communication and innovation,' he says. 'Google has thrived thanks to the opportunities of the free market so we believe it is important to look at policymakers as they make decisions that impact our users and businesses.' " 10-06
"Two weeks out from the midterm elections, a second round of MSNBC/McClatchy polls, conducted by Mason-Dixon in eight states, show Democrats are slightly closer to taking control of the Senate than they were last month. The Democrats are ahead or within striking distance in all these states but there is no evidence of a national Democratic 'tidal wave.' " 10-06
"A federal judge Thursday evening blocked enforcement of new identification requirements for absentee voters, agreeing that the state's voter ID law is vague, confusing and unevenly applied by Ohio election boards since early voting began this month." 10-06
"Dick Cheney, US vice-president, has endorsed the use of 'water boarding' for terror suspects and confirmed that the controversial interrogation technique was used on Khaled Sheikh Mohammed, the senior al-Qaeda operative now being held at Guantánamo Bay."
" '[It's] a direct affront to the primary authors of the Military Commission Act in the Senate — John McCain, Lindsey Graham and John Warner — all of whom have publicly stated that the legislation signed by the president last week makes water boarding a war crime,' said Jennifer Daskal, advocacy director at Human Rights Watch." 10-06
"The federal government is investigating the takeover last year of a leading American manufacturer of electronic voting systems by a small software company that has been linked to the leftist Venezuelan government of President Hugo Chávez." 10-06
"The board of trustees of the nation’s premier school for the deaf voted Sunday to revoke the appointment of the incoming president, who had been the subject of weeks of protests that at times shut down the campus." 10-06
"When all Americans were asked which they would rather see happen: the GOP retain control of Congress or the Democrats win enough seats to take over one or both houses, 50 percent of adults said they want a Democratic takeover while 35 percent said they wanted the Republicans to hold tight the reigns of power; in last week’s poll, 55 percent wanted the Democrats to take over and 32 wanted the Republicans to retain power." 10-06
"The Pentagon has begun a new "rapid response" operation to quickly respond to news media stories critical of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and the war in Iraq, as well as other stories the Defense Department leadership doesn't like." 10-06
"Jon Moore, the deputy team chief, said: 'We don't know who...we're teaching: Are they police or are they militia?' "
"Sitting in the battalion's war room with four other members of his team, Moore estimated it would take 30 to 40 years before the Iraqi police could function properly, perhaps longer if the militia infiltration and corruption continue to increase. His colleagues nodded."
" 'It's very, very slow-moving,' Estes said."
" 'No,' said Sgt. 1st Class William T. King Jr., another member of the team. 'It's moving in reverse.' " 10-06
"Political groups are doing something advertisers and corporate America have been doing for years: finding out your consumer preferences and using that data to get you to buy their product — in this case, their politicians." 10-06
"Unlike some other GOP incumbents who are decidedly distancing themselves from the president, his low approval ratings and his Iraq policy, Burns asked for Mr. Bush's help in getting out the vote in this state that twice helped put him in the White House."
"Despite Bush’s low approval, CBS News senior White House correspondent Bill Plante reports the president is giving no ground on Iraq. He told The Associated Press Wednesday that he wants Vice President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to stay on the job for the rest of his term." 10-06
"Anyone who can get at the yellow button can ruin the election. It takes no password, no computer knowledge, no equipment."
"The formula is printed in materials that have been distributed to thousands of people. The machines will count millions of votes."
"Citizens -- not scientists or certifiers or testing lab authorities -- identified the problem and have now notified the California secretary of state, and emergency measures are reportedly being taken in California, but not yet in Florida, Illinois, New Jersey, or any other state using Sequoia Voting Systems, the third-largest voting system vendor in the U.S." 10-06
"The battle for control of Congress headed on Friday to a tense finish, with Democrats threatening to sweep Republicans out of power and President George W. Bush trying to stoke turnout among the party faithful." 10-06
"Just days after President Bush publicly affirmed Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's job security through the end of his term, a family of publications catering to the military will publish an editorial calling for the defense secretary's removal."
"Kenneth Adelman, who served on the Defense Policy Board with Perle, said Bush, Defense Rumsfeld and others in the administration 'turned out to be among the most incompetent teams in the postwar era. Not only did each of them, individually, have enormous flaws, but together they were deadly, dysfunctional.' " 10-06
"Mining the most reliable polls and expert analysis, we have summarized the nation’s closest and most controversial races into two categories: the 10 Spotlight Races on which control of the House could turn, and 15 other important showdowns you’ll definitely want to keep an eye on as precinct results pour in." 10-06
"As President George W. Bush jets across Red State America this weekend, Republican candidates are falling further behind Democratic rivals, according to the new NEWSWEEK poll." 10-06
President Bush’s director of national intelligence, John Negroponte, "suspended public access to the site Thursday night, after The New York Times asked officials whether the site provided too much information on making atomic bombs for an article it published Friday. Negroponte, who had ordered the documents released, also began a review of the consequences, including who accessed the documents." 11-06
"The list of alleged contractor misdeeds in Iraq has grown long in the past 3 1/2 years. Yet when it comes to holding companies accountable, the charges seldom stick." 11-06
"Iraq is still an open- ended tragedy, and there is mounting evidence that without vigilant, independent monitoring, reconstruction contracts will waste American tax dollars without delivering the results that Iraqis have been promised. Still, America's Republican-controlled Congress has voted to close down, as of next October 1, the one effective oversight agency that has shown it could produce results." 11-06
"Former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein was found guilty of crimes against humanity and sentenced to death by hanging by Iraq's High Tribunal on Sunday." 11-06
"When Americans go to vote tomorrow, a new breed of activist will be on guard, monitoring polling stations for everything from voting-machine glitches to long lines to registration snafus." 11-06
"From the country's heartland, voters sent messages that altered America's culture wars and dismayed the religious right - defending abortion rights in South Dakota, endorsing stem cell research in Missouri, and, in a national first, rejecting a same-sex marriage ban in Arizona." 11-06
"By choosing Robert Gates as his new Defense secretary, President George W. Bush is once again turning to a trusted warhorse from his father’s administration. But the Gates nomination also could remind the new Democratic Congress about controversies from the George H.W. Bush era as well." 11-06
"Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld stepped down as defense secretary on Wednesday, one day after midterm elections in which opposition to the war in Iraq contributed to heavy Republican losses." 11-06
"Thumped in Tuesday's elections, the Republican Party faces a dilemma as it prepares for 2008: trying to claw back support in the center while keeping loyal conservative Christians happy." 11-06
" '60 Minutes' correspondent Ed Bradley died Wednesday night in a Manhattan hospital of complications resulting from chronic lymphocytic leukemia. A pioneering black journalist, Bradley won 19 Emmys for his work." 11-06
"Iraqis on Thursday cheered the resignation of U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, blaming him for policy failures and scandals they say helped spawn the daily sectarian carnage wracking their nation." 11-06
"The seismic shift that midterm elections brought to Washington’s political landscape was welcomed by many Wednesday in a world sharply opposed to the war in Iraq and outraged over the harsh methods the Bush administration has employed in fighting terrorism." 11-06
"After the mess of the May primary in Cuyahoga County, where results were delayed for a week because of technological glitches, county commissioners opened their checkbook to make sure the general election would go well." 11-06
"Intense scrutiny of the process has helped poll workers stay on their toes, say experts."
"This year, a new initiative called 'Video the Vote' enlisted amateurs to film poll irregularities. The idea: to bring attention to voting problems even in elections where the winning margin was large enough that they would normally receive little attention.
'There's so much focus on calling the winners and losers ... that we lose sight of whether the voter was a winner or loser,' says Ian Inaba, one of the leaders of the project that has posted hundreds of interviews at videothevote.org. 'You look at those lines in Denver and Missouri or listen to some of those voters in Maryland or even New Jersey - things were not OK [Tuesday]. There were a lot of frustrated people.' " 11-06
"Most of the post-election attention Thursday remained focused on Sarasota County, where more than 18,000 blank ballots -- representing 13 percent of the 142,284 ballots cast -- could have affected the outcome of one of the most hotly contested congressional races in the country."
"In that race, Republican Vern Buchanan defeated Democrat Christine Jennings by only 373 votes -- triggering a likely recount."
"But an Orlando Sentinel review of results among the 24 other counties that use the same electronic-voting machines as Sarasota found three other instances -- in Sumter, Lee and Charlotte counties -- where an even higher percentage of ballots failed to show any vote cast in the race for state attorney general."
"By comparison, undervotes in those same counties in the U.S. Senate race were no higher than 1.5 percent." 11-06
"The Democratic congressman who will investigate the Bush administration's running of the government says there are so many areas of possible wrongdoing, his biggest problem will be deciding which ones to pursue."
"There's the response to Hurricane Katrina, government contracting in Iraq and on homeland security, political interference in regulatory decisions by the Environmental Protection Agency and the Food and Drug Administration, and allegations of war profiteering, Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., told the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce." 11-06
"Democrats gained control of the Senate on Thursday, giving them a majority in both houses of Congress for the first time since 1994 and increased influence over President Bush’s policies at home and abroad, starting with the war in Iraq."
"But even as he was extending courtesies to his new partners, Mr. Bush was demanding action on several contentious measures before the Republican-led Congress disbands next month. The president renominated John R. Bolton to the post as United Nations ambassador and asked Congress to complete work on a bill authorizing domestic surveillance by the National Security Agency, both lightning-rod matters for Democrats." 11-06
"Military veterans display their medals and service ribbons all day once a year in Australia. It’s a tradition that Veterans Affairs Secretary Jim Nicholson would like to import to the U.S." 11-06
"After 12 years of Republican rule, the Democrats likely to take over key House committees are promising big changes, from tax policy to homeland security." 11-06
"Democrats preparing to take control of Congress for the first time in over a decade are looking to the Republican takeover in 1995 as an object lesson of what to emulate and what to avoid. They hope to match the legislative energy of the Newt Gingrich era while avoiding at all costs the partisan pitfalls that eventually soured voters on the GOP." 11-06
"Sen. Mel Martinez, the first-term Florida lawmaker who previously served in President Bush's Cabinet, will assume the chairmanship of the Republican National Committee, GOP officials said Monday." 11-06
"Sweden, Britain and Denmark are doing the most to protect against climate change, but their efforts are not nearly enough, according to a report released Monday by environmental groups."
"The United States — the world's biggest emitter of greenhouse gases — ranked at 53, with only China, Malaysia and Saudi Arabia doing worse." 11-06
"As Commander of the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force during the lead-up to the war, Hagee was in charge of planning for the Marines' original push to Baghdad. So I asked him about one of the enduring mysteries of the invasion — why there was no real plan for running the country once Saddam Hussein fell from power."
"Hagee says he asked his boss again and again who would take charge of those cities. He wanted to know what the plan was for Phase IV — military terminology for the phase that follows the end of major combat operations. Phase IV is, in other words, what comes after 'mission accomplished.' Hagee says that he sent his questions up the chain of command, as they say in the military — and never heard back." 11-06
"Mississippi Sen. Trent Lott, ousted from the top Senate Republican leadership job four years ago because of remarks considered racially insensitive, won election to the chamber's No. 2 GOP post Wednesday." 11-06
"The Israelis have called off a planned air attack on a house in Jabaliya refugee camp in Gaza after hundreds of Palestinians formed a human shield." 11-06
"On the streets of Iraq the sight of a uniformed policeman, who might actually be an insurgent, has spread fear."
" 'We have no respect for uniforms,' says an Iraqi. 'No trust, how can we believe in them, perhaps the uniform is a fake.' ”
"Allawi insists that means starting all over again — dismantling the police, arresting senior officers, and re-screening recruits. And soon, because the rot has already begun to spread."
"If the army goes the way of the police, Iraq will surely descend into the violent, ungovernable chaos, that everyone has been dreading." 11-06
"Blair, speaking after a meeting with Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf, said more aid, moderate Islamic role models and a lasting resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict were key to defeating Islamic extremism." 11-06
"The government has never conducted a comprehensive study of the health effects of uranium mining on the reservation. But individual scientists working on their own have documented sharply elevated cancer rates near old mines and mills. High concentrations of uranium, arsenic and other heavy metals have been found in one out of five drinking-water sources sampled." 11-06
"An Israeli advocacy group, using maps and figures leaked from inside the government, says that 39 percent of the land held by Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank is privately owned by Palestinians."
"Israel has long asserted that it fully respects Palestinian private property in the West Bank and only takes land there legally or, for security reasons, temporarily." 11-06
"As of April 2006, the GAO recommended that $56 billion would be insufficient to complete Iraqi reconstruction. As of June 2006, no reliable figure for the eventual costs of Iraqi reconstruction existed. That said, as of April 2006, the United States has made available about $30 billion for Iraqi reconstruction, of which $23 billion has been obligated and $16 billion disbursed. International donors have pledged $13.6 billion, of which $2.7 billion has been provided, $900 million has been obligated, and $400 million has been disbursed, as of December 2005." 11-06
"The cost of combat in Iraq has now surpassed $300 billion, according to government estimates. Add in activities in Afghanistan, and the total price of the global war on terror is about $500 billion, making it one of the most monetarily costly conflicts in which the nation has ever engaged."
Also provides the total cost (in today's dollars) and cost per person of past U.S. conflicts and wars. The cost of the Iraq/Afghanistan conflict is estimated to be $1,829 per person in the United States. 11-06
"The U.S. military's effort to train Iraqi forces has been rife with problems, from officers being sent in with poor preparation to a lack of basic necessities such as interpreters and office materials, according to internal Army documents."
"The shortcomings have plagued a program that is central to the U.S. strategy in Iraq and is growing in importance. A Pentagon effort to rethink policies in Iraq is likely to suggest placing less emphasis on combat and more on training and advising, sources say." 11-06
"Insurgent attacks in Iraq killed 3,709 civilians last month, making October the deadliest month since the war began in 2003, according to U.N. figures."
"Sunni-Shiite hostilities, with revenge killings, mosque attacks, and militias and death squads prominent, were central to Iraq's problems, the report found." 11-06
"Thanks to increased security along the Mexican border, thousands of migrant workers who harvest the nation's fruits and vegetables never showed up for work. Ivicevich's pears ripened and then just fell off the tree."
" 'Do we want to become dependent on foreign food like we are on foreign oil?' asked Toni Scully, a California pear shipper. 'Or do we want to recognize that our food is put on our table by Mexican workers who need a legal way, and deserve a legal way, to come into this country?' " 11-06
"Mayor Michael Bloomberg weighed in on the uproar over a deadly police shooting Monday, saying bluntly that officers appeared to use excessive force when they fired 50 shots at an unarmed man in a confrontation outside a strip club hours before his wedding." 11-06
"Most police officers don't fire their guns a single time over the course of their careers. But those rare moments when they do pull the trigger are fast, furious and frenetic." 11-06
"Ohio received $130 million from the federal government under the Help America Vote Act, with nearly $18 million going to Cuyahoga County to purchase 5,407 touch screen machines and the 20 scanners."
"Commissioners spent another $5.4 million to buy 900 more touch-screen machines and other equipment because election officials were concerned that they didn't have enough to handle a large voter turnout." 11-06
"A federal judge struck down President Bush's authority to designate groups as terrorists, saying his post-Sept. 11 executive order was unconstitutional and vague, according to a ruling released Tuesday."
" 'This law gave the president unfettered authority to create blacklists,' said David Cole, a lawyer for the Washington, D.C.-based Center for Constitutional Rights that represented the group. 'It was reminiscent of the McCarthy era.' " 11-06
"The Supreme Court hears arguments this week in a case that could determine whether the Bush administration must change course in how it deals with the threat of global warming." 11-06
"Three pillars of the economy — consumer confidence, orders for manufactured goods and home prices — showed surprising cracks on Tuesday, flashing signals that growth may slow more heading into the important holiday shopping season." 11-06
"The Iraqi president said Sunday the bipartisan U.S. report calling for a new approach to the war offered dangerous recommendations that would undermine his country’s sovereignty and were 'an insult to the people of Iraq.' " 12-06
"Demoralized Republicans adjourned the 109th Congress at 5 a.m. yesterday with a near-empty Capitol, closing the door on a dozen years of nearly unbroken GOP control by spending more time in the final days lamenting their failures -- to rein in government, tame the deficit and temper their own lust for power -- than reliving their successes." 12-06
"The challenge for Bush's team was to make the president appear as though he were taking the release of the [Baker-Hamilton] report seriously, without necessarily embracing its conclusions. In the days following the report's release, Bush the Decider transformed himself into Bush the Listener. Usually prickly with war critics—on the rare occasions he spoke to them at all—the president now invited them in from the cold and kept quiet."
"The Baker-Hamilton report may not change Bush's military or diplomatic strategy in Iraq. But the report has had one noticeable effect: it marks a point of no return in the way Bush talks about the war and deals with his critics. He may not always be as accommodating as he seemed to be last week. But from here on in, the president can no longer plausibly dismiss Democrats as wanting to 'cut and run' or blame the media for overplaying the violence and ignoring the 'good news' from Baghdad." 12-06
"What if we faced a constitutional crisis and hardly anyone noticed? As he quietly mastered the tiresome cat-and-mouse game inside the Senate Judiciary Committee last week, Judge Samuel Alito gave few hints of where he stood on a matter that goes to the heart of what it means to live in a republic. With a few exceptions, the media coverage didn't help."
"I wasn't expecting Alito to say whether he thought that President Bush broke the law when he admitted authorizing warrantless wiretaps on American citizens, which is a clear violation of the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA)."
"The 'momentous' issue (Alito's words) is whether this president, or any other, has the right to tell Congress to shove it. And even if one concedes that wartime offers the president extra powers to limit liberty, what happens if the terrorist threat looks permanent? We may be scrapping our checks and balances not just for a few years (as during the Civil War), but for good." 01-06
"Last week, we learned through Dick Cheney's former aide, 'Scooter' Libby, that it was President Bush who authorized the leaking of a classified document that detailed certain conclusions about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction."
"If he didn't mislead us when he acted outraged about the leak, what was he doing?" 04-06
"I believe there is now a professional, well-trained elite, supported by large institutions, that is adept and willing to use corrupt practices to accumulate wealth."
"The predator class will not be exterminated by cease and desist orders, Senate hearings, independent boards of directors and the invisible hand. It's a culture. And essentially, it's our culture." 01-06
"The overall cost of health care doubled between 1993 and 2004, and in 2004, health care spending topped $1.9 trillion or 16 percent of the nation's economic output -- the largest share on record, according to a report released Monday by the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services." 01-06
"Quest [Qwest phone company] wanted to know who authorized this [collection of domestic phone calls] program. America has very strict laws on collecting this data and sharing it." (Qwest refused to give the National Security Agency the information because it did not present the legal justification. Other phone companies gave them the information.)
"You know there’s another piece of this. It’s not only telephone calls, but email traffic. And when you couple this with other data collection – when you go to a grocery store or drug store and you give them a little card for discount, they also record your purchase – put those lists together and you have a complete profile of 'Joe Smith on First Street.' These are the drugs he takes, these are the foods he buys, these are the calls he makes, these are the credit lines he has. Pretty soon both the government and private sector companies know everything about you." 05-06
"The United States is riding roughshod over human rights by outsourcing key anti-terror work in Iraq to private contractors, who operate beyond Iraqi law and outside the military chain of command, Amnesty International said Tuesday." 05-06
"The FBI's weekend search of the House office of a Louisiana Democrat under investigation for bribery may have overstepped Constitutional boundaries, House leaders said as the congressman under investigation pledged to stay in office."
"House Speaker Dennis Hastert said the Justice Department had never before crossed a line that separates Congress from the executive branch by searching a congressional office while investigating a member of Congress." 05-06
"President Bush highlighted U.S. preparedness for the upcoming hurricane season on Thursday as he marked a change of command at the U.S. Coast Guard, which rescued 33,000 people after Hurricane Katrina."
" 'While President Bush has pushed hard to ensure that our military has the resources necessary to protect our nation abroad, he has let our country's fire fighters and paramedics down by failing to provide the resources necessary for them to protect our citizens here at home,' said Harold Schaitberger, president of the International Association of Fire Fighters. 'Our nation shouldn't have to suffer another Katrina or 9/11 before our nation's first responders get the support they need.' " 05-06
"The top Marine general flew to Iraq on Thursday to caution troops on the danger of becoming 'indifferent to the loss of a human life,' following allegations that Marines in Iraq murdered civilians." 05-06
"A police officer whose photograph appeared in a USA TODAY and USATODAY.com report May 18 about the surging violence against police in the Mexican border city of Nuevo Laredo was in critical condition Tuesday after he was shot five times outside his home.""The attack highlights the unrelenting threat against Mexican police in a city where two major drug cartels are battling for control of routes into the USA for shipments of drugs and illegal immigrants." 05-06
"Canadian intelligence officials passed false warnings and bad information to American agents about a Muslim Canadian citizen, after which U.S. authorities secretly whisked him to Syria, where he was tortured, a judicial report found Monday." 09-06
"Global temperatures are dangerously close to the highest ever estimated to have occurred in the past million years, scientists reported Monday." 09-06
"The military trials bill approved by Congress lends legislative support for the first time to broad rules for the detention, interrogation, prosecution and trials of terrorism suspects far different from those in the familiar American criminal justice system."
"The bill rejects the right to a speedy trial and limits the traditional right to self-representation by requiring that defendants accept military defense attorneys."
"By writing into law for the first time the definition of an 'unlawful enemy combatant,' the bill empowers the executive branch to detain indefinitely anyone it determines to have 'purposefully and materially' supported anti-U.S. hostilities." 09-06
"Five years after the Taliban were ousted from Kabul, the number of Afghan women setting fire to themselves because they cannot bear their lives has risen dramatically."
"More than half of all girls are married off before the age of 16, some as young as six. Many of these marriages are to settle debts or feuds between tribes. The women are regarded as commodities rather than wives and are often treated like slave workers by their new families."
"Those who try to escape often end up in prison like 13-year-old Shabano, jailed in Kandahar for running away from the 50-year-old man to whom her father had sold her."
"The only area in which the country could really be said to have made remarkable progress is in growing the poppy. Under British supervision, Afghanistan has become the world’s biggest opium producer. Last year it produced 6,100 tons — 92% of world supply." 11-06
"Because much of the militancy in Iraq comes from outside its borders, [British Prime Minister Tony] Blair said what he called a 'whole Middle East strategy' was needed to counter it."
"Resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict must be the core of such an approach, he argued, followed by efforts to stabilize Lebanon and unite moderate Arabs and Muslims behind a push for peace in those countries and in Iraq." 11-06
"Last week in Florida's 13th Congressional district, the victory margin was only 386 votes out of 153,000. There'll be a mandatory lawyered-up recount, but it won't include the almost 18,000 votes that seem to have disappeared. The electronic voting machines didn't include them in their final tallies, and there's no backup to use for the recount. The district will pick a winner to send to Washington, but it won't be because they are sure the majority voted for him. Maybe the majority did, and maybe it didn't." 11-06
"Representative Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic leader, and many Democratic candidates have railed for months against wasteful 'special interest earmarks' inserted into bills 'in the dark of night.' Now their party’s electoral victories mean that Mr. Stevens will hand Mr. Inouye the gavel of the Senate defense appropriations subcommittee, which presides over the largest pool of discretionary spending and earmarks. But if the Democratic leaders are talking about 'earmark reform,' that may be news to Mr. Inouye."
" 'I don’t see any monumental changes,' Mr. Inouye said in a recent interview. He plans to continue his subcommittee’s approach to earmarks, he said." 11-06
"After six years of technological research, more than $4 billion spent by Washington on new machinery and a widespread overhaul of the nation’s voting system, this month’s midterm election revealed that the country is still far from able to ensure that every vote counts." 11-06
"The United States must change its military and diplomatic strategies to tackle the 'grave and deteriorating' situation in Iraq, according to a report from the Iraq Study Group."
"The approach must be a 'diplomatic offensive,' urged the report presented to President Bush Wednesday, and U.S. combat brigades should be pulled out by early 2008. U.S. troops would evolve into advisers to the Iraqi Army."12-06
"George Bush yesterday rejected key recommendations made by the Iraq Study Group, revealing important differences with Tony Blair, who embraced the proposals put forward by the US bipartisan commission." 12-06
"While intending to propose a rescue plan for the faltering U.S. military mission in Iraq, the Iraq Study Group on Wednesday delivered a broader rebuke of the Bush administration's policies there and throughout the Middle East." 12-06
"President Bush was warned yesterday that his policy in Iraq was 'not working' and that to have a chance of avoiding a regional disaster he would have to repudiate much of the foreign policy he has pursued over the past six years."
"The White House is likely to be particularly resistant to opening a dialogue with Tehran without an Iranian pledge to halt uranium enrichment, but Mr Baker was insistent it was essential to the panel's blueprint. 'For 40 years, we talked to the Soviet Union, during a time when they were committed to wiping us off the face of the earth,' Mr Baker said. 'So you talk to your enemies, not just your friends.' "12-06
"Clinton and Obama are a study in contrasts. She is familiar, while he is new. She has experience, while he has excitement. She is battle-scarred, poked and prodded, whereas he is untested, with so much unknown — though he insists he's not worried about any skeletons in his closet." 12-06
"Most Americans think the United States is losing the war in Iraq and support a bipartisan commission's key proposals to change course, according to a poll released yesterday. But the Iraq Study Group's report has become a political orphan in Washington with little backing from either party." 12-06
"A new study indicates that five years after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, public health emergency preparedness is still not at an acceptable level in most states." 12-06
"The Pentagon called them 'among the most dangerous, best-trained, vicious killers on the face of the earth,' sweeping them up after Sept. 11 and hauling them in chains to a U.S. military prison in southeastern Cuba."
"Since then, hundreds of the men have been transferred from Guantanamo Bay to other countries, many of them for 'continued detention.' "
"Congressional visitors continued to come to the hospital and comfort family members as the South Dakota senator's progress was closely watched across Washington. His sudden illness raised questions about the Democrats' one-vote majority in the upcoming Senate session." 12-06
"Data released by the US census bureau today forecasts that Americans will spend a total of 65 days watching TV next year and 41 days listening to the radio. A week each will be given to reading newspapers and surfing the internet." 12-06
"Rep. Ike Skelton, D-Mo., who will become the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee next month, discusses his new role and gives his assessment of the war in Iraq."
"REP. IKE SKELTON: What is winning? They've moved the goalposts on us." "At first, as you know, it was ridding Iraq of weapons of mass destruction. Then it was establishing a democracy. And now it's quelling the sectarian violence. Really, what is winning in today's terms?" 12-06
"If Baghdad could get a Christmas present, this might be it: more neighborhoods like An Nil. CBS News correspondent Randall Pinkston reports."
"There, children play on the street, young men hang out and businesses open their shops not worrying about kidnappings, bombings or guns."
"In the An Nil neighborhood, Shiite, Sunni and Christian residents have lived side by side for decades — like family. And in some cases, they are family." 12-06
"Four marines were charged yesterday with murder in the killings of two dozen Iraqi civilians, including at least 10 women and children, in the village of Haditha last year, military officials said at Camp Pendleton, Calif." 12-06
"The danger, voiced by Sunni Arabs, is that an emboldened militant fringe will conduct broader killings without being stopped by the government, or, some fear, with its help. That could, in turn, draw Sunni countries into the fight and lead to a protracted regional war, precisely the outcome that Americans most fear." 12-06
"Over the next year, the Bush administration is expected to face stern questions in Congress over the increasingly unpopular war. And with military commanders saying the war could stretch into the next decade, the issue is likely to preoccupy the administration throughout the lame-duck president's final two years in office, fuel critics who seek to replace him in 2008, and overshadow the rest of his agenda." 12-06
"President Bush signed into law a $38 million grant program to preserve notorious internment camps where Japanese-Americans were kept behind barbed wire during World War II." 12-06
"Hundreds of British and Iraqi soldiers assaulted a police station in the southern city of Basra on Monday, killing seven gunmen, rescuing 127 prisoners from what the British said was almost certain execution and ultimately reducing the facility to rubble." 12-06
"Gerald R. Ford, who picked up the pieces of Richard Nixon’s scandal-shattered White House as the 38th president and the only one never elected to nationwide office, has died. He was 93." 12-06
"Two years after his hopes for a Democratic takeover of the White House were narrowly dashed, former vice presidential nominee John Edwards said Thursday that he is making another run at the presidency." 12-06
"Until now, the relationship between the two presidents has been portrayed largely as a matter of political necessity, with Nixon tapping Ford for the vice presidency in late 1973 because he was a confirmable choice on Capitol Hill."
"But the tapes, documents and two lengthy recent interviews with Ford before his death this week, conducted for a future book and embargoed until after his death, show that the close political alliance between the two men seriously influenced Ford's eventual decision to pardon Nixon, the most momentous decision of his short presidency and almost certainly the one that cost him any chance of winning the White House in his own right two years later." 12-06
"Three years after he was hauled from a hole in the ground by pursuing U.S. forces, Saddam Hussein was hanged Saturday under a sentence imposed by an Iraqi court, state-run Iraqiya television reported." 12-06
"Iran and Kuwait, both attacked by Saddam Hussein, welcomed his execution today, while Libya mourned his death, and the Arab leaders of Egypt, Syria and Saudi Arabia remained mum on the hanging of a former colleague." 12-06
"Gerald R. Ford's state funeral will begin Friday in his beloved California, with the late president then to lie in state in the U.S. Capitol over the weekend, a family representative said Wednesday."
Regarding seating arrangements in Washington DC, "The presidential party is followed by chiefs of state, arranged alphabetically by the English spelling of their countries."
"Royalty representing chiefs of state come next, and then heads of governments followed by other officials." 12-06
"Podcasting is the latest in on-the-go, on-demand technology. With podcasting, you can listen to radio programs or events whenever and wherever you choose. Podcasts are MP3 audio files that are automatically downloaded to your personal computer, and then transferred to an iPod or other MP3 player using a podcasting application." 03-06
"An estimated 3.6 million U.S. households — or about three out of every 100 — reported being victims of identity theft, according to a government study that counted misuse of someone else's cell phone, credit card or personal information." 04-06
"The Bush administration and Senate Republicans announced agreement Thursday on terms for the interrogation and trial of terror suspects. "
"The central sticking point had involved a demand from McCain, Warner and Sen. Lindsey Graham for a provision making it clear that torture of suspects would be barred." 09-06
"Samuel Anthony Alito Jr. (born on April 1, 1950) is an Associate Justice on the United States Supreme Court. He was sworn in on January 31, 2006, as the Supreme Court's 110th Justice." 01-06
"Two weeks ago, Rolling Stone came out with 'Did Bush Steal the 2004 Election?' -- a masterful investigative piece by Robert Kennedy, Jr., arguing that Bush & Co. stole their 're-election' in Ohio, and pointing out exactly how they did it."
"One week after Kennedy's article appeared, Salon posted an attack upon it by Farhad Manjoo, the magazine's technology reporter."
This open letter is Mark Crispin Miller's response to Salon's response. The basic question under discussion is about how much election reform is necessary now. Is our election system broken or does it just need a little refinement? 06-06
"Let's bring some rationality to our budgeting for security. The first step is to have the Congressional Budget Office prepare a Unified Security Budget. Here, we would bring together three broad functions under the same budgetary umbrella: offense (primarily the military); defense (primarily homeland security); and prevention (primarily international affairs)."
"This seemingly simple step would give us a mechanism for examining, and fully debating, our big-picture security priorities." 01-06
"Human rights groups count dozens of detainee deaths for which no one has been punished or that were never explained. The secret prisons — unknown in number and location — remain available for future detainees. The new manual banning torture doesn’t cover CIA interrogators. And thousands of people still languish in a limbo, deprived of one of common law’s oldest rights, habeas corpus, the right to know why you are imprisoned." 09-06
" 'A number of important new reforms are contained in the various proposals that have been presented,' according to Democracy 21 President Fred Wertheimer. 'In order to determine just how effective the reforms will be, however, it is essential to analyze the legislative language of the proposals. This is a case where reality lies in the details.' "
" 'The absence of any oversight and enforcement of the congressional ethics rules is its own Washington scandal and a central factor in the lobbying and ethics scandals in Congress,' Wertheimer stated. 'The absence of a "sheriff" for Congress has resulted in a "wild-west," "anything goes" approach to complying with or ignoring the rules.' "
"In an unprecedented failure, for example, the House Ethics Committee was non-operational and did not function for the entire year in 2005." 01-06
"Do you agree with veterans groups who say that rehabilitation facilities like the Intrepid Center should be funded by the government, not through private donations?"
"I think the Iraq war has created a need for these centers that was not there before. Because of the nature of the combat injuries coming out of Iraq, wounded soldiers are needing long-term care of more than just a month or two. And there was nothing set up for them."
"The VA’s budget is not a mandatory one, and I personally think it needs to be. The budget can be cut, which means that there are veterans who, after having served this country, have to go without some of the basic care they were promised they would get … There are veterans from the first gulf war that have to wait eight, nine months to get into the VA system. In the meantime, a lot of them go without health insurance." 06-06
"For most of the past five and a half years, interest rates have been low, allowing the government to borrow more and more - to cut taxes while fighting two expensive wars - without having to shoulder higher interest payments."
"That's over now. For the first time during President George W. Bush's tenure, the U.S. government's interest bill is expected to rise in 2006, from $184 billion in 2005 to $220 billion this year, up nearly 20 percent."
"And that's not the worst of it. While foreign investors were putting up most of the $1.5 trillion the U.S. government has borrowed since 2001, they were also snapping up hundreds of billions of dollars in private sector securities, transactions that have been a big source of the easy money that allowed Americans to borrow heavily against their homes."
"The result, as The Wall Street Journal reported last week, is that for the first time in at least 90 years, America is now paying noticeably more to foreign creditors than it receives from its investments abroad. That is a momentous shift. It means that a growing share of America's future collective income will flow abroad, leading to a lower standard of living in the United States than would otherwise have been achieved. Americans deserve better than this financial mess." 10-06
"By definition, federal borrowing eventually results in a transfer of income from U.S. taxpayers, whose taxes go to pay the interest on the debt, to the investors who hold the Treasury bonds. As long as the bonds are owned by Americans, the transfer is simply from one group of citizens to another.""Today, however, 43 percent of the United States' publicly held debt of $4.8 trillion is held abroad, mainly by central banks in Japan, China and Britain and by offshore hedge funds. That's up from a 30 percent share in 2001, an extraordinary increase. Indeed, during the Bush years, 73 percent of new government borrowing has been from abroad."
"America is living beyond its means, and foreigners are increasingly supporting the excess - in exchange for a government guarantee that a chunk of America's future collective income will benefit them, not the Americans who earn it." 05-06
"We have a duty as Americans to defend our citizens' right not only to life but also to liberty and the pursuit of happiness. It is therefore vital in our current circumstances that immediate steps be taken to safeguard our Constitution against the present danger posed by the intrusive overreaching on the part of the Executive Branch and the President's apparent belief that he need not live under the rule of law."
"I endorse the words of Bob Barr, when he said, 'The President has dared the American people to do something about it. For the sake of the Constitution, I hope they will.' " 01-06
"A US plan to stop nuclear programs - without toppling leaders - is under debate."
"Ever since President Bush's 'axis of evil' speech in 2002, US policy for dealing with the nuclear programs of what it considers to be 'rogue states' has rested on one cornerstone: regime change."
" 'If the US is signaling it is no longer mixing regime change and its nuclear nonproliferation objectives, that would be very useful,' says Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association in Washington. The US approach to North Korea is 'not working,' Mr. Kimball says, as evidenced by Pyongyang's continued buildup of its nuclear arsenal since talks in September. He says that fact and the lack of options on Iran may be pushing the administration to consider new options." 05-06
"The danger is that democracy will reveal the people's true and continuing preference for a society with no place for all the other Western liberal values that our founding document calls 'self-evident' (equality, freedom to pursue happiness, and so on). Even worse, these societies may decide to export their distaste for Western values just as we try to export the values themselves—and they may not agonize, Western-style, over the distinction between violent and nonviolent means of persuasion."
"Recent news has left us awash in examples: the triumph of Hamas (religious fanatics dedicated in both theory and practice to the destruction of Israel) in the Palestinian elections; the emergence of a similarly attractive group, the Muslim Brotherhood, as an electoral force in Egypt; and above all the result of the American-sponsored election in Iraq, which seems to be just about the opposite of the lion-and-lamb tranquility that democracy enthusiasts had hoped." 03-06
"Never before in our country's history have both the president and Congress been so out of touch with most Americans. Never before have so few of our elected officials and corporate leaders been less willing to commit to the national interest. And never before has our nation's largest constituent group -- some 200 million middle-class Americans -- been without representation in our nation's capital." 05-06
"Two months ago the secretary of the VA went to a House committee, hat in hand, because the agency had so grossly underestimated the number of veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan needing medical services that he found himself $1 billion short of necessary funding. Never mind the yellow-ribbon magnets; patriotism is an empty, dumb show if it doesn't include adequate health care, a living wage and decent shelter for people who laid down their lives." 05-06
"One of the most popular new features on MSNBC.com is Wonderful World. In this section you will find uplifting, happy stories and videos from the U.S. and abroad — tales of rescues and heroism; cute stories about kids and animals; and heartwarming acts of generosity that demonstrate the best of the human spirit." 12-06
Provides a running total of the cost of war in Iraq and compares it to other uses of the same amount of money, such as for health care for children or education assistance.
"War affects everyone, not just those directly involved in the fighting. This webpage is a simple attempt to demonstrate one of the more quantifiable effects of war: the financial burden it places on our tax dollars." Quotes a former president, Dwight D. Eisenhower:
" 'Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies in the final sense a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.' " 9-03
"Many scientists say that sharply reducing emissions of these gases [from coal processing] could make more difference in slowing climate change than any other move worldwide. And they point out that American companies are best positioned to set an example for other nations in adopting a new technique that could limit the environmental impact of the more than 1,000 coal-fired power projects on drawing boards around the world."
"But most in the industry are not making that bet. Among them is Gregory H. Boyce, chief executive of Peabody Energy, the largest private-sector coal producer in the world thanks in part to its growing operations here in Wyoming and with aspirations to operate coal-fired plants of its own. Mr. Boyce's company alone controls reserves with more energy potential than the oil and gas reserves of Exxon Mobil." 05-06
"Many U.S. companies are outsourcing customer service, tech and other jobs to India, where they've discovered an educated, cheap — and with 1.1 billion people, huge — work force." 03-06
"A groundbreaking study on the mental health of returning troops released this week indicates that fully one-third of those who served in Iraq during the first year of the war sought mental health services upon leaving the fighting. The war's succeeding years have been, if anything, more intense."
"Published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, the study opens a window on the enormous psychological and emotional toll the conflict has taken on the men and women who are doing the fighting." 03-06
"Among the names mentioned as GOP nominee possibilities are Sens. Bill Frist, John McCain, Chuck Hagel, and George Allen; New York Gov. George Pataki; former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, and Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney." 11-04
"When Rumsfeld arrived to take over the Pentagon for the second time in January 2001 he acted like a man on a mission. Rumsfeld came equipped with a glittering résumé: Princeton wrestling captain. Naval aviator. Congressman at 30. White House chief of staff at 42. Defense secretary at 43 (the youngest ever, way back in 1975). Fortune 500 CEO and turnaround specialist." 11-06
Provides a "full transcript of the joint US-India statement, as released by the office of the Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Thursday after hosting talks with President George Bush." 03-06
"From deteriorating security in Afghanistan and Somalia to mayhem in the Middle East, confrontation with Iran and eroding relations with Russia, the White House suddenly sees crisis in every direction."
" 'North Korea is firing missiles. Iran is going nuclear. Somalia is controlled by radical Islamists. Iraq isn't getting better, and Afghanistan is getting worse,' said William Kristol, editor of the Weekly Standard and a leading conservative commentator. 'I give the president a lot of credit for hanging tough on Iraq. But I am worried that it has made them too passive in confronting the other threats.' " 07-06
"Washington is immersed in a furious debate over the legality of the National Security Agency's warrantless surveillance program - and the argument's outcome may affect the balance of power in the US government for decades to come."
" 'This is a defining issue in the constitutional history of the United States,' constitutional lawyer Bruce Fein testified Tuesday before the Senate Judiciary Committee." 03-06