Miller Goes to Jail While Novak and Rove Remain Free

New York Times reporter Judith Miller was jailed Wednesday for refusing to divulge a confidential source to a grand jury investigating the Bush administration's leak of an undercover CIA operative's name. It added legal drama to what was already one of the most closely watched press freedom cases in recent history. Another reporter, Matthew Cooper of Time magazine, agreed to cooperate with prosecutors after disclosing that his source had given him permission to do so hours earlier.
(AP)

Nutty Santorum Criticizes Views of Sen. Clinton

"The African proverb says, 'It takes a village to raise a child,'" Santorum writes. "The American version is 'It takes a village to raise a child _ if the village wants that child.'"

Santorum, chairman of the Senate Republican Conference, is sometimes touted as a possible 2008 presidential candidate. Books outlining a politician's philosophical views often precede campaign announcements.

He could face a tough re-election battle in 2006. Early polling shows him behind state Treasurer Robert P. Casey Jr., the favorite to win the Democratic primary.

In the book, Santorum makes the case that abortion puts the liberty rights of the mother before those of her child just as the liberty rights of slave owners were put before those of the slave.

"This was tried once before in America ... But unlike abortion today, in most states even the slaveholder did not have the unlimited right to kill his slave," Santorum said.
(AP)

Katherine Harris Advocated Kabbalah Water to Treat Citrus Cankers

Four years ago, as the state labored to eradicate citrus canker by destroying trees, officials rejected other disease-fighting techniques, saying unproven methods would waste precious time and resources.

But for more than six months, the state, at the behest of then-Secretary of State Katherine Harris, did pursue one alternative method -- a very alternative method.

Researchers worked with a rabbi and a cardiologist to test "Celestial Drops," promoted as a canker inhibitor because of its "improved fractal design," "infinite levels of order" and "high energy and low entropy."

But the cure proved useless against canker. That's because it was water -- possibly, mystically blessed water.

The "product is a hoax and not based on any credible known science," the state's chief of entomology, nematology and plant pathology wrote to agriculture officials and fellow scientists after testing Celestial Drops in October 2001.
(Orlando Sentinel)

Joe Conason: World too dangerous to have Bolton in UN

Supporters of John Bolton, the president's frustrated nominee for U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, tell us that this is a dangerous world. They say that the U.N. must be reformed if it is ever to fulfill its original mission of preserving peace and promoting human rights. They insist that the American ambassador must be someone who will advance our national interests.

They're right, of course. It is a dangerous world. The U.N. needs reform. And our diplomacy must be devoted to our national interests. Those are precisely the reasons why Bolton failed to win confirmation in the Senate -- and why the president should withdraw his name rather than send him to the U.N. with a recess appointment.

When conservatives of the Bolton stripe tell us that the world is dangerous, they seem to be talking about military and terrorist threats to our security, from the likes of Kim Jong Il and Abu Musab al-Zarqawi (they don't talk so much about Osama bin Laden anymore). According to their worldview, the proper responses to such threats are to avoid the hindrance of arms treaties, build more nuclear weapons and missile defense systems, and beware of traditional alliances and international laws that might hamper our freedom to act.

Alan Dershowitz: Why is Novak Skating on the Rove/Plame Affair?

One of the dangers inherent in jailing journalists for not disclosing confidential sources, is that this draconian punishment can be invoked selectively against targeted journalists. Two excellent and independent reporters may go to jail while Robert Novak has not -- to my knowledge -- been presented with the tragic choice of disclosure or imprisonment. Why has he been exempted? Is it because he toes the administration's line? Is it because he knows whether Karl Rove was the source? An explanation for this apparent double standard is called for!
(huffingtonpost.com)

Protesters Demand Guantanamo Shutdown

The Bush administration "has claimed the power to kidnap men anywhere in the world and hold them, interrogate them, detain them without any process of law," said Meeropol, the granddaughter of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, who were executed in 1953 after being convicted of conspiring to commit espionage for the Soviet Union.
(AP)

John Nichols: Not Dominion, But Liberty

As the 229th anniversary of the founding of the American experiment approached, President Bush provided a painful reminder of how far the United States has drifted from the ideals of her youth.

Speaking to soldiers who would soon be dispatched to occupy Iraq, Bush sounded an awfully lot like the King George against whom George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and the other revolutionaries of 1776 led their revolt.

America was founded in opposition to empire. The Declaration of Independence was a manifesto against colonialism. And the founding generations abhorred imperialism.

Their opposition to empire was not merely rooted in their own bitter experience. It was, as well, rooted in a faith that American freedoms and democracy would suffer in the nation embarked upon a career of empire.

So, while Bush suggests that other lands must be occupied to preserve liberty at home, the patriots of our time recall will do well to recall words spoken on another July 4.

When America was younger and truer to her ideals, on Independence Day, 1821, Secretary of State John Quincy Adams appeared before the US House of Representatives and declared:

And now, friends and countrymen, if the wise and learned philosophers of the elder world, the first observers of nutation and aberration, the discoverers of maddening ether and invisible planets, the inventors of Congreve rockets and Shrapnel shells, should find their hearts disposed to enquire what has America done for the benefit of mankind?

Let our answer be this: America, with the same voice which spoke herself into existence as a nation, proclaimed to mankind the inextinguishable rights of human nature, and the only lawful foundations of government. America, in the assembly of nations, since her admission among them, has invariably, though often fruitlessly, held forth to them the hand of honest friendship, of equal freedom, of generous reciprocity.

She has uniformly spoken among them, though often to heedless and often to disdainful ears, the language of equal liberty, of equal justice, and of equal rights.

She has, in the lapse of nearly half a century, without a single exception, respected the independence of other nations while asserting and maintaining her own.

She has abstained from interference in the concerns of others, even when conflict has been for p

Breaking News...

ROVE LEAKED CIA AGENT'S IDENTITY

Lawrence O'Donnell: I revealed in yesterday's taping of the McLaughlin Group that Time magazine's emails will reveal that Karl Rove was Matt Cooper's source. I have known this for months but didn't want to say it at a time that would risk me getting dragged into the grand jury.

McLaughlin is seen in some markets on Friday night, so some websites have picked it up, including Drudge, but I don't expect it to have much impact because McLaughlin is not considered a news show and it will be pre-empted in the big markets on Sunday because of tennis.

Since I revealed the big scoop, I have had it reconfirmed by yet another highly authoritative source. Too many people know this. It should break wide open this week. I know Newsweek is working on an 'It's Rove!' story and will probably break it tomorrow.

(Huffingtonpost.com)

Time Magazine to Hand Over Reporter Notes

Breaking ranks with The New York Times, Time magazine said Thursday it would comply with a court order to hand over the notes of a reporter threatened with jail for refusing to cooperate with an investigation into the unmasking of a CIA operative.

Time relented after just days after the U.S. Supreme Court rejected appeals from its White House correspondent Matt Cooper and New York Times reporter Judith Miller, who have been locked in an eight-month battle with the government to protect their confidential sources.

The magazine said the high court's action will have "a chilling effect" on journalists' work but that Time had no choice but to comply.

"The same Constitution that protects the freedom of the press requires obedience to final decisions of the courts," Time said in a statement.

Representatives for both reporters said they believe that the turning over of the notes and other material would eliminate the need for Cooper or Miller to testify before a grand jury and remove any justification for jailing them.

A special counsel is investigating who in the Bush administration leaked the identity of CIA officer Valerie Plame, a possible federal crime. U.S. District Judge Thomas Hogan is threatening to jail Cooper and Miller for refusing to reveal their sources.
(AP)

June One of the Deadliest Months for US Troops in Iraq

June was one of the deadliest months of combat for U.S. troops since the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq 28 months ago. At least 68 U.S. soldiers, Marines and sailors were killed by hostile fire in Iraq, the fifth highest number since the war began, according to Iraq Coalition Casualty Count, a Web site that compiles official casualty reports. The June total could continue to rise as troops die from wounds sustained during the month.
(Knight Ridder)

State Department Doctors Bono Quote

A State Department release from Monday doctored remarks from U2’s Bono, twisting his quote to mean the very opposite of what he apparently believes. Here’s the State Department paragraph, two graphs below the lede [besides underlining, excerpt appears exactly as published]:

Bono, lead singer of the Irish band U2 and longtime activist for aid to Africa, echoed Geldof’s praise for President Bush as he told an American television interviewer June 26, “[Bush] has already doubled and tripled aid to Africa .… I think he has done an incredible job, his administration, on AIDS. 250,000 Africans are on anti-viral drugs; they literally owe their lives to America.”

In fact, Bono only said the latter half of that quote during his appearance on Meet the Press last Sunday. The first part — “[Bush] has already doubled and tripled aid to Africa” — is deceptively transplanted from an interview Bono did with Time magazine that Tim Russert quoted on the show, and the State Department has taken it entirely out of context. Here’s the full quote:

Question: Which of the G8 leaders do you think remains the toughest nut to crack?

Bono: The most important and toughest nut is still President Bush. He feels he’s already doubled and tripled aid to Africa, which he started from far too low a place. He can stand there and say he paid at the office already. He shouldn’t because he’ll be left out of the history books. But it’s hard for him because of the expense of the war and the debts.

In other words, Bono was relaying President Bush’s claim (which he repeated during his press conference with Tony Blair this month) that his administration has tripled aid to Africa. Yet we know Bono does not believe that Bush has tripled aid to Africa. On Meet the Press, Bono said that while Bush has made a commitment to triple aid, that will only be the case “if he follows through” on that pledge.

This blatant dishonesty is even more relevant in light of the study by Susan Rice that Brookings released this week. Rice’s analysis showed that…

…U.S. aid to Africa from FY 2000 (the last full budget year of the Clinton Administration) to FY2004 (the last completed fiscal year of the Bush Administration) has not “tripled” or even doubled. Rather, in real dollars, it has increased 56% (or 67% in nominal dollar terms). The majority of that increase consists of emergency food aid, rather than assistance for sustainable development of the sort Africa needs to achieve lasting poverty reduction.
(Think Progress)

Bush's Approval Rating in Rhode Island Sinks to 24%

Days after the death of a local female soldier in Iraq, the people of Rhode Island express their views on Bush and on local Democrats in a Brown University poll

U.S. Sen. Jack Reed, already at the top of Rhode Islanders' approval scale in February, climbed even higher, from 63 percent to 71 percent. Approval ratings for the other three congressmen also went up: Rep. James Langevin from 59 to 63 percent, Rep. Patrick J. Kennedy from 49 to 56 percent, and Sen. Lincoln Chafee from 48 to 53 percent (Chafee is famous in the Senate for breaking from the Republican party on may key issues and for refusing to vote to re-elect Bush in 2004).

Just 24 percent of respondents described the job President Bush is doing as "good" or "excellent."
(Providence Journal)

Approval of president's Social Security efforts dips

Americans disapprove of the way President Bush is handling Social Security by a ratio of more than 2-to-1, a new low for the White House on its top domestic policy issue, according to the latest USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll.

The poll, taken over the weekend, showed a steady erosion in the president's handling of Social Security since early February, when 43% approved. Now, 31% approve and 64% disapprove, the first time disapproval has risen above 60%.

Opposition to Bush is greatest among seniors, women, and people with lesser incomes and levels of education. Democrats disapprove by a ratio of more than 20-to-1, but Republicans back Bush's performance on the issue by a 2-to-1 ratio.
(USA Today)

Bush's Iraq-terrorism link faces skeptical US public

President George W. Bush sought support this week for the war in Iraq by invoking the September 11 attacks several times on national television, but a skeptical US public seems less afraid of another terrorist attack on US soil.

A Gallup poll last week showed that only 35 percent of Americans believe that an attack could occur soon, compared to 39 percent in January and 85 percent in October 2001, a month after the attacks.

And another Gallup poll this week found that, for the first time, one in two Americans do not believe the war in Iraq is part of Washington's global war on terror.

Bush mentioned "September 11" five times late Tuesday in a speech that sought to rally Americans behind the Iraq war amid polls showing that a majority of the US public disapproves of his handling of the conflict.

"The only way our enemies can succeed is if we forget the lessons of September 11," Bush said.

"Clearly a political decision has been taken in the White House that the only way that they can regain momentum is by going back to the sort of primal source of their support, September 11," said David Rothkopf, a terrorism expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

"I think it is just unvarnished demagoguery," he said.

Democrats assailed the president for linking September 11 with the war in Iraq.

"Facing an historic opportunity for leadership, George Bush turned to the darkness of divisiveness, attempting to garner support for his failed policies by pandering to fear, rather than inspiring us with a plan for hope," said Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean.

In an editorial, The New York Times said "we had hoped he would resist the temptation to raise the bloody flag of 9/11 over and over again to justify a war in a country that had nothing whatsoever to do with the terrorist attacks."
(AFP)

Democrats fault Bush over Iraq link to Sept. 11

Democrats on Wednesday challenged President Bush's claim that America must stay the course in Iraq because of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, but his backers said the link was justified.

"I feel compelled ... to set the record straight about why we got into this war," said Sen. John Rockefeller of West Virginia, top Democrat on the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee.

"It had nothing to do with Osama bin Laden. It had nothing to do with al Qaeda. It had nothing to do with September 11th," Rockefeller told a news conference.

Rockefeller and other Democrats pointedly noted that the stated reason for U.S.-led invasion of Iraq was the claim that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, which have never been found.
(Reuters)

Molly Ivins: The Republican Shopping Spree

Seriously, this administration is starting to look like that old television show in which contestants lined up their shopping carts in a grocery store and, on the signal, began running around throwing every valuable item they could find in their carts. Whoever grabbed the most high-priced items won. The contestants here and now are corporations and lobbyists.

The amusing case of the congressman whose house was bought by the founder of a defense firm for $700,000 more than it was worth is being exceptionally well-reported by the congressman's hometown paper, the San Diego Union-Tribune. You will not be amazed to learn the congressman in question (Randy Cunningham) oversees the committee that grants contracts to that very defense firm.

The story gets better by the day -- the congressman lives on a yacht in D.C. owned by the defense contractor, and employees of the defense firm say they were threatened with firing if they did not give to the company PAC. Well shut my mouth!

Meanwhile, the Senate has endorsed the Bush administration's do-nothing policy on global warming by approving a measure that avoids mandatory reductions of heat-trapping pollution. These are the same bozos who refuse to require better mileage per gallon from the auto industry, even though the technology is readily available.

Sidney Blumenthal: Blinded by the light at the end of the tunnel

The American public is increasingly disillusioned by the Iraq war, and Bush's triumphalism only makes things worse.

On June 21, network news reported that the Pentagon had claimed that 47 enemy operatives had been killed in Operation Spear in western Iraq. Last month, the Pentagon declared 125 had been killed in Operation Matador, near the Syrian border. "We don't do body counts on other people," Donald Rumsfeld, the secretary of defence, stated in November 2003.

On January 29 this year, the day before the Iraqi election, President Bush announced that it was the "turning point". On May 2 2003, he stood on the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln behind a banner saying "Mission Accomplished" and the next day proclaimed that the "mission is completed". On June 2 this year, he declared: "Our mission is clear there, as well, and that is to train the Iraqis so they can do the fighting."
(The Guardian)

US suspected of keeping secret prisoners on warships: UN official

The UN has learned of "very, very serious" allegations that the United States is secretly detaining terrorism suspects in various locations around the world, notably aboard prison ships, the UN's special rapporteur on terrorism said.

While the accusations were rumours, rapporteur Manfred Nowak said the situation was sufficiently serious to merit an official inquiry.

"There are very, very serious accusations that the United States is maintaining secret camps, notably on ships," the Austrian UN official told AFP, adding that the vessels were believed to be in the Indian Ocean region.
(AFP)

War injured toll soars, hits veterans health costs

As the numbers of U.S. war injured in Iraq and Afghanistan soared, the Bush administration admitted to lawmakers on Tuesday it had underestimated funds to cover health care costs for veterans and Congress would have to plug a $2.6 billion hole.

"The bottom line is there is a surge in demand in VA (health) services across the board," said Veterans Affairs Secretary James Nicholson.

The Veterans Administration assumed it would have to take care of 23,553 patients who are veterans from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan but that number had been revised upward to 103,000, Nicholson told a House of Representatives panel.
(Reuters)

Santorum Blames Crisis in Catholic Church on Boston Liberals

"It is startling that those in the media and academia appear most disturbed by this aberrant behavior, since they have zealously promoted moral relativism by sanctioning "private" moral matters such as alternative lifestyles. Priests, like all of us, are affected by culture. When the culture is sick, every element in it becomes infected. While it is no excuse for this scandal, it is no surprise that Boston, a seat of academic, political and cultural liberalism in America, lies at the center of the storm."
(catholic.org)

The Real News in the Downing Street Memos
By Michael Smith

It is now nine months since I obtained the first of the "Downing Street memos," thrust into my hand by someone who asked me to meet him in a quiet watering hole in London for what I imagined would just be a friendly drink.

At the time, I was defense correspondent of the London Daily Telegraph, and a staunch supporter of the decision to oust Saddam Hussein. The source was a friend. He'd given me a few stories before but nothing nearly as interesting as this.

The six leaked documents I took away with me that night were to change completely my opinion of the decision to go to war and the honesty of Prime Minister Tony Blair and President Bush.

They focused on the period leading up to the Crawford, Texas, summit between Blair and Bush in early April 2002, and were most striking for the way in which British officials warned the prime minister, with remarkable prescience, what a mess post-war Iraq would become. Even by the cynical standards of realpolitik, the decision to overrule this expert advice seemed to be criminal.

The second batch of leaks arrived in the middle of this year's British general election, by which time I was writing for a different newspaper, the Sunday Times. These documents, which came from a different source, related to a crucial meeting of Blair's war Cabinet on July 23, 2002. The timing of the leak was significant, with Blair clearly in electoral difficulties because of an unpopular war.

I did not then regard the now-infamous memo — the one that includes the minutes of the July 23 meeting — as the most important. My main article focused on the separate briefing paper for those taking part, prepared beforehand by Cabinet Office experts.

It said that Blair agreed at Crawford that "the UK would support military action to bring about regime change." Because this was illegal, the officials noted, it was "necessary to create the conditions in which we could legally support military action."

But Downing Street had a "clever" plan that it hoped would trap Hussein into giving the allies the excuse they needed to go to war. It would persuade the U.N. Security Council to give the Iraqi leader an ultimatum to let in the weapons inspectors.

Although Blair and Bush still insist the decision to go to the U.N. was about averting war, one memo states that it was, in fact, about "wrong-footing" Hussein into giving them a legal justification for war.

British officials hoped the ultimatum could be framed in words that would be so unacceptable to Hussein that he would reject it outright. But they were far from certain this would work, so there was also a Plan B.

American media coverage of the Downing Street memo has largely focused on the assertion by Sir Richard Dearlove, head of British foreign intelligence, that war was seen as inevitable in Washington, where "the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy."

But another part of the memo is arguably more important. It quotes British Defense Secretary Geoff Hoon as saying that "the U.S. had already begun 'spikes of activity' to put pressure on the regime." This we now realize was Plan B.

Put simply, U.S. aircraft patrolling the southern no-fly zone were dropping a lot more bombs in the hope of provoking a reaction that would give the allies an excuse to carry out a full-scale bombing campaign, an air war, the first stage of the conflict.

British government figures for the number of bombs dropped on southern Iraq in 2002 show that although virtually none were used in March and April, an average of 10 tons a month were dropped between May and August.

But these initial "spikes of activity" didn't have the desired effect. The Iraqis didn't retaliate. They didn't provide the excuse Bush and Blair needed. So at the end of August, the allies dramatically intensified the bombing into what was effectively the initial air war.

The number of bombs dropped on southern Iraq by allied aircraft shot up to 54.6 tons in September alone, with the increased rates continuing into 2003.

In other words, Bush and Blair began their war not in March 2003, as everyone believed, but at the end of August 2002, six weeks before Congress approved military action against Iraq.

The way in which the intelligence was "fixed" to justify war is old news.

The real news is the shady April 2002 deal to go to war, the cynical use of the U.N. to provide an excuse, and the secret, illegal air war without the backing of Congress.
(The Sunday Times of London)

US acknowledges torture at Guantanamo and Iraq, Afghanistan: UN source

Washington has for the first time acknowledged to the United Nations that prisoners have been tortured at US detention centres in Guantanamo Bay, as well as Afghanistan and Iraq, a UN source said.

The acknowledgement was made in a report submitted to the UN Committee against Torture, said a member of the ten-person panel, speaking on on condition of anonymity.

"They are no longer trying to duck this, and have respected their obligation to inform the UN," the Committee member told AFP.

"They they will have to explain themselves (to the Committee). Nothing should be kept in the dark."

UN sources said it was the first time the world body has received such a frank statement on torture from US authorities.

The Committee, which monitors respect for the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, is gathering information from the US ahead of hearings in May 2006.
(AFP)

God's Chosen Envoy for America, by Norman Mailer

The following is just for the sake of it -- I want to feed the maw of the blog:

In the wake of all the fluvial funereal obsequies that the media attached to Ronald Reagan's earthly departure, I felt obliged to remark that he had been the most overrated president in American history and the second most ignorant. Then I added -- how could I not? -- guess who is the most ignorant? Half the audience applauded; the other half were outraged and groaned in true patriotic pain. Since George W. is not only a horse's ass, but vain and platitudinous to boot, it can hardly escape us that he is also serving (with all due inner incandescence) as God's chosen envoy for America.
(Huffingtonpost.com)

Rumsfeld: Insurgency Could Last for Years

WASHINGTON -- Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Sunday he is bracing for even more violence in Iraq and acknowledged that the insurgency "could go on for any number of years."

Defeating the insurgency may take as long as 12 years, he said, with Iraqi security forces, not U.S. and foreign troops, taking the lead and finishing the job.

The assessment comes on the heels of the latest Associated Press-Ipsos poll showing public doubts about the war reaching a high point with more than half saying that invading Iraq was a mistake.
(AP)

Florida Senate: Nelson holds commanding lead over Harris

Democratic U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson holds a commanding lead in his 2006 re-election bid over Republican U.S. Rep. Katherine Harris, whose candidacy already is sharply dividing Florida voters, according to a statewide poll released Monday.

In a snapshot taken 17 months before the election, Nelson is favored 53 percent to 36 percent over Harris, with 11 percent of voters undecided. The poll also found that Harris remains a polarizing figure to many of the state's voters.

"This is one of those rare cases where, going in, the challenger has higher negative ratings than the incumbent," said Brad Coker, managing director of Mason-Dixon Polling & Research Inc., which conducted the poll for the Orlando Sentinel and WESH 2 News. "At this point, when you look at these numbers, I don't know how she's going to win this race."
(Mason-Dixon)

Six Months After

By WILLIAM JEFFERSON CLINTON

IT has been nearly six months since the tsunami struck 11 nations surrounding the Indian Ocean, killing more than 200,000 people. The tragedy touched the chord of our common humanity. Forty countries committed military forces to provide food, water and shelter to the survivors. Millions of Americans contributed more than $1 billion to the relief effort. Millions of others across the world also sent contributions, and the United Nations and hundreds of charitable organizations rushed to the region.

This rapid response yielded substantial dividends. Widespread starvation was avoided. There were no epidemics.

Of course, the recovery effort has a long way to go. Hundreds of thousands of people remain homeless, and unable to work. Thousands of schools have to be built, and many of the region's children remain frightened and distressed. Fortunately, the United Nations, international financial institutions, governments, businesses and nongovernmental organizations have pledged billions of dollars to help the tsunami generation "build back better."

As the special envoy for tsunami relief for the United Nations, I am working to make good on that commitment. To achieve our goals, I have asked all those involved in tsunami relief to agree to the following agenda:

First, we are developing a joint action plan detailing precisely who will do what, where and when, to avoid duplication of effort, ensure efficient use of resources and leave no person or community behind. For example, we all agree on the need for an early warning system. The plan will identify who is responsible for financing and building the system, where it will be located, how the system will actually alert the public, and who will oversee its maintenance and reliability.

We are also devising a reporting system to ensure that donations are being used appropriately and a unified scorecard to show what we have achieved and what remains to be done.

Second, we will work to restore the livelihoods of the survivors; to finance new economic activities to raise family incomes above their pre-tsunami levels; and to increase the capacity of local governments, nongovernmental organizations and businesses to undertake the gargantuan reconstruction effort.

To diversify the affected economies, we need to make small loans - micro-credit - available for new ventures or for the expansion of existing ones. And we must help restore tourism in the entire region, especially in the Maldives, where destruction of tourism facilities, fishing operations and other enterprises and homes ran up losses in excess of 60 percent of the country's annual gross domestic product. Most tourist operations are open for business, but most potential visitors don't seem to know that.

Jobs for local people in the reconstruction will require large vocational training programs. Thousands of masons, woodworkers, supervisors and laborers are needed.

Third, we must move survivors from tents and barracks to decent transitional shelters as soon as possible. Although there are still some frustrating delays in getting government approval for contracts and for imports of machinery and materials, there are fewer bureaucratic obstacles every day. All of the affected countries have good plans, with able people in charge of executing them.

Still, the housing shortage presents a serious challenge. Last year, before the tsunami, 5,000 new homes were built in Sri Lanka. Now survivors in Sri Lanka alone need almost 100,000 homes. In Aceh Province in Indonesia, 2,000 schools and 200,000 homes must be constructed. Even the United States would have a difficult time getting a million people back into their houses in a year or two.

The construction effort also carries significant environmental risks. Wholesale, unrestricted logging can cause deforestation in some regions, particularly in Indonesia, doing great damage to rainforests and setting the stage for more natural disasters. Timber needs to be obtained legally, and conservation measures, like replanting mangrove trees rather than developing the land from which they were uprooted, should be part of the reconstruction.

The housing problem is further complicated because many ownership records were swept away by the waves. And in many small villages, such documents never existed. In some of the affected countries, up to 90 percent of displaced people have lost their identity documents. The World Bank is financing a "titling" project in Aceh to help Indonesians develop an effective property-rights system - it is an initiative that should be replicated across the region. (Sri Lanka must also resolve conflicts arising out of the government's policy largely prohibiting reconstruction within a "buffer zone" near the water. Many survivors who want to return to their old land oppose the restrictions and their concerns should be taken into account as they are in Indonesia.)

Finally, we must do all we can to assure that the voices of the most vulnerable are heard. Will women survivors be involved in the design and execution of the recovery process? Will their property rights be protected? Will the Dalits (also known as the "untouchables") of India be discriminated against? Will poor families get documentation for their assets and have access to lines of credit? Will national governments give localities greater flexibility to meet their particular needs? Will children who survived be able to get back to school? Will the disaster usher in a new chapter in the peace processes in Sri Lanka and Aceh, thereby making it easier for aid to be distributed and reconstruction to take place wherever it's needed?

Thanks to the generosity of millions of people, we will have the resources to meet these daunting challenges. The World Food Program of the United Nations is feeding more than 700,000 people daily. Unicef is making substantial commitments to meeting the area's large needs for water and sanitation. Other United Nations agencies are doing their part.

But most of the financing for reconstruction and recovery is in the hands of donor governments and charitable groups like the Red Cross, Catholic Relief Services, and hundreds of other nongovernmental organizations. In order for the recovery effort to succeed, these groups have to be treated as equal partners in the planning process.

Of course, the reconstruction process will proceed more smoothly in Aceh and Sri Lanka if all parties to the longstanding conflicts there are involved. Cooperation might even lead to greater prospects for peace in both places.

On my most recent trip to the region, I visited the Jantho camp for displaced people in Aceh, where I met a woman who had lost nine of her 10 children. As one of the camp leaders, she introduced me to the youngest camp member: a 2-day-old boy. She said the child's mother wanted me to give him a name. I asked if there was an appropriate Indonesian word for "new beginning" and was told that there was: "dawn," which in their language is a boy's name. I think a lot about that little boy, and our obligation to give him a new dawn. We can do it together.

Rove Sinks to New Low; Dems Demand Apology or Resignation

Democrats said Thursday that White House adviser Karl Rove should either apologize or resign for accusing liberals of wanting "therapy and understanding" for the September 11 attackers, escalating partisan rancor that threatens to consume Washington.

Rove's comments -- and the response from the political opposition -- mirrored earlier flaps over Democratic chairman Howard Dean's criticism of Republicans, a House Republican's statement that Democrats demonize Christians and Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin's comparison of the Guantanamo prison to Nazi camps and Soviet gulags.

White House press secretary Scott McClellan came to Rove's defense, saying the president's chief political adviser was "simply pointing out the different philosophies and different approaches when it comes to winning the war on terrorism."
(AP)

An open letter to the Penguin Group, publishers of "The Truth About Hillary," from David Brock

June 20, 2005

Susan Peterson Kennedy
President
Penguin Group
375 Hudson Street
New York, N.Y. 10014


Dear Ms. Peterson Kennedy,

I'm writing today to seek a public explanation of what, if any, editorial standards and fact-checking processes the Penguin Group applies to its imprints. Specifically, I believe the public, and the Clinton family, deserve an explanation for why Penguin has chosen to publish through its Sentinel imprint Edward Klein's attack book on Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, The Truth About Hillary: What She Knew, When She Knew It and How Far She'll Go to Become President, which pre-publication reports have already exposed as an obviously false and defamatory tract.
(mediamatters.org)

Read the entire text of Brock's letter by clicking here.

U.S. Senate rejects mandatory emissions cuts

The U.S. Senate on Wednesday soundly rejected a plan to force American industry to cut greenhouse gas emissions, in a vote that came a day after lawmakers approved voluntary reductions.
(Reuters)

House Approves Move to Outlaw Flag Burning

A constitutional amendment to outlaw flag burning cleared the House Wednesday but faced an uphill battle in the Senate. An informal survey by The Associated Press suggested the measure doesn't have enough Senate votes to pass.

The 286-130 outcome was never in doubt in the House, which had passed the measure or one like it five times in recent years. The amendment's supporters expressed optimism that a Republican gain of four seats in last November's election could produce the two-thirds approval needed in the Senate as well after four failed attempts since 1989.

But an AP survey Wednesday found 35 senators on record as opposing the amendment — one more than the number needed to defeat it if all 100 senators vote, barring a change in position.
(AP)

Senate Republicans press Bush to turn over Bolton documents

A growing number of Senate Republicans say John Bolton won't be confirmed as United Nations ambassador unless the White House turns over documents that Democrats say they need to assess Bolton's fitness for the post.

Though the White House continued Wednesday to demand an up-or-down vote on Bolton, these Republican senators say the Senate is in a standoff that only President Bush can resolve.

"I hope the president will take a very hard look at the documents," Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said in an interview with Knight Ridder. "Unless we resolve this dilemma quickly, Mr. Bolton is not going to be the U.N. ambassador. ... The president should understand that we're at an impasse. It may be more important to preserve the doctrine of separation of powers than to have John Bolton in the U.N."

Alexander's comments came after Sen. Trent Lott, R-Miss., the former Senate majority leader, urged the White House to turn over documents to Bolton's two leading Democratic foes, Sens. Joseph Biden of Delaware and Christopher Dodd of Connecticut. Another Republican, Sen. Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island, also called for the White House to relent.
(Knight-Ridder)

Molly Ivins: The Hyper-Rich

In addition to paying the same percentage of their income as those in the $50,000 to $75,000 range, the hyper-rich are very good at finding ways -- both legal and illegal, observes Johnston -- of sheltering a lot of income even from the taxes they are supposed to pay. The Texas billionaires and Bush buddies Charles and Sam Wyly are now under investigation by the IRS, SEC and Manhattan district attorney concerning a tax-shelter plan run out of the Isle of Man, according to the Independent of Britain.

Look, Medicare is being cut, Pell grants are way down, food stamps are being cut -- every day we get news from Washington that some new measure hurting the poor or the middle class has been put in place. At the same time, the country is running up a monstrous debt that will be passed to our children.

Sydney Blumenthal: Nixon's empire strikes back

George Bush is building a leviathan beyond Nixon's imagining. The Bush presidency is the highest stage of Nixonism. The commander-in-chief has declared himself by executive order above international law, the CIA is being purged, the justice department deploying its resources to break down thewall of separation between church and state, the Environmental Protection Agency being ordered to suppress scientific studies and the Pentagon subsuming intelligence and diplomacy, leaving the US with blunt military force as its chief foreign policy.

The three main architects of Bush's imperial presidency gained their formative experience amid Nixon's downfall. Donald Rumsfeld, Nixon's counsellor, and his deputy, Dick Cheney, one after the other, served as chief of staff to Nixon's successor, Gerald Ford, both opposing congressional efforts for more transparency in the executive.
(The Guardian)

Gore Vidal: Something Rotten in Ohio

So we have seen what democracy across the water can do. All in all a jarring experience for anyone foolish enough to believe that America is democratic in anything except furiously imprisoning the innocent and joyously electing the guilty. What to do? As a first step, I invite the radicals at C-SPAN who take seriously our Constitution and Bill of Rights to address their attention to the corruption of the presidential election of 2004, particularly in the state of Ohio.
(The Nation)

Senate GOP Turns Up Heat Over Bolton

Senate Republicans sought Tuesday to turn up the political heat on Democrats stalling the nomination of President Bush's choice to be the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

"It's been 200 days that this vacancy sign above our U.N. ambassador's door in New York has been blinking. It is now time to end that," Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist told reporters.

The Tennessee Republican said he would schedule a vote at the end of the week to cut off debate on Bolton so that the Senate can hold a final up-or-down vote on Bolton's nomination.

However, it's not clear Frist has enough votes to end debate. Several Democrats would have to side with all Republicans to reach the 60 votes needed to go forward.

Sen. John McCain (news, bio, voting record), R-Ariz., said that holding such a vote — even if it doesn't succeed — keeps the pressure on Democrats. "I don't want people to have the impression that we just dropped the Bolton vote," he said.

Democrats complain that the administration has refused to give them access to information they need to make informed decisions on whether Bolton is the right man for the job.

G8 ministers back Africa debt deal

LONDON, England -- Finance ministers from the world's wealthiest nations have agreed to an historic accord to cancel $40 billion worth of debt owed by the world's poorest nations.

The Group of Eight (G8) ministers -- meeting for a second day Saturday in London -- backed a deal that includes an immediate scrapping of 100 percent of the debt belonging to 18 countries to the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the African Development Bank.

As many as 20 other countries could be eligible if they meet strict targets for good governance and tackling corruption, leading to a total debt relief package of more than $55 billion.

British Finance Minister Gordon Brown called the accord a "new deal" for relations between the rich and the poor countries.

Finance ministers from the United States, Britain, Japan, Canada, Russia, Germany, Italy and France agreed to the package ahead of a G8 summit July 6-8 in Gleneagles, Scotland.

Hopes of an accord on debt relief were raised Friday with reports of an agreement between the United States and Britain on writing off debt owed by the 18 countries.

The countries are Benin, Bolivia, Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Ghana, Guyana, Honduras, Madagascar, Mali, Mauritania, Mozambique, Nicaragua, Niger, Rwanda, Senegal, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair -- current G8 president -- had demanded that poor countries' debts be cancelled and their aid doubled.

The debts would be written off by the lenders in an effort to allow the debtor countries to start fresh, get their books in order and eventually be able to borrow again for economic development, health, education and social programs, rather than simply to repay existing loans.

The G8 ministers discussed other issues Saturday, including concerns about the effect of high oil prices on the global economy, U.S. deficits, reform of Japan's financial sector and poor economic growth in European.

Chinese officials have been included in order for U.S. and European ministers to urge them to the float the yuan, which many see as being overvalued, leading to floods of cheap imports.

U.S. Treasury Secretary John Snow is urging his Chinese counterpart Jin Renqing to scrap the yuan's exchange rate peg to the U.S. dollar.
(CNN.com)

Childish Sensenbrenner Stamps His Feet and Ends Hearing

The Republican chairman walked off with the gavel, leaving Democrats shouting into turned-off microphones at a raucous hearing Friday on the Patriot Act.

The House Judiciary Committee hearing, with the two sides accusing each other of being irresponsible and undemocratic, came as President Bush was urging Congress to renew those sections of the post-Sept. 11 counterterrorism law set to expire in September.

Rep. James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., chairman of the panel, abruptly gaveled the meeting to an end and walked out, followed by other Republicans. Sensenbrenner declared that much of the testimony, which veered into debate over the detainees at Guantanamo Bay, was irrelevant.

Rep. Jerrold Nadler (news, bio, voting record), D-N.Y., protested, raising his voice as his microphone went off, came back on, and went off again.

"We are not besmirching the honor of the United States, we are trying to uphold it," he said.
(AP)

Froma Harrop: Lend your ears to Bill Clinton

KNOW WHAT THE Europeans need? They need Bill Clinton. The French and Dutch votes against the European Union constitution reflect a deep suspicion of political elites and their big plans. The workers fear being thrown on a cruise to the global economy, then sold up the river.

Clinton was a master at navigating between the demands of a modern economy and people's need for security. He is someone Europe's average Joes might trust.

Of course, Europeans must become more competitive. Their plush social benefits need revising. Employers must have more flexibility in hiring and firing people. And places like France should open the windows and let in some free-market breezes. But that doesn't mean that the French have to flood their market with low-wage workers from Eastern Europe and, as some would like, Turkey.

Clinton knew how to strike the right balance. As president, he supported freer trade and pushed for the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). He understood that government programs can provide the wrong incentives and endorsed welfare reform. But when the budget needed balancing, his tax increases were limited to the highest incomes.
(Providence Journal)

Nicholas D. Kristof: Sudan's policy of systematic rape

All countries have rapes, of course. But here in the refugee shantytowns of Darfur, the horrific stories that young women whisper are not of random criminality but of a systematic campaign of rape to terrorize civilians and drive them from "Arab lands" - a policy of rape.

One measure of the international community's hypocrisy is that the world is barely bothering to protest. More than two years after the genocide in Darfur began, the women of Kalma Camp - a teeming squatters' camp of 110,000 people driven from their burned villages - still face the risk of gang rape every single day as they go out looking for firewood.
(International Herald-Tribune)

Secretary General Clinton?

In 2001, in the opening months of his ex-presidency, Bill Clinton confided to an aide that he had decided on his dream job for the next chapter of his life: secretary general of the United Nations.

The goal may not be realistic, he acknowledged, but he then went on to analyze all the factors in minute detail, as though he were preparing for a political campaign: whether a U.S. president would ever see fit to back him, for one, and what it would take to persuade other nations to bend the long-standing tradition that the top job does not go to someone from a country with permanent status on the U.N. Security Council.

His ambition, as the aide described it, was both breathtaking and entirely logical for a natural-born politician who had reached the top of the American political ladder: "president of the world."

Four years later, say several associates who have spoken with him in recent months, Clinton regards his dream of leading the United Nations as something more than a flight of fancy and something less than a serious prospect. Already, however, he has succeeded to a surprising degree in fashioning his ex-presidency to make himself a dominant player on the world stage.
(Washington Post)

Bush Economic Plan Continues to Disappoint

Employers throttled back hiring in May, boosting jobs by just 78,000, the government reported Friday. The most sluggish pace of payroll expansion in nearly two years dramatized the erratic behavior of the nation's job market.
(AP)

Analysts Behind Iraq Intelligence Were Rewarded

Two Army analysts whose work has been cited as part of a key intelligence failure on Iraq -- the claim that aluminum tubes sought by the Baghdad government were most likely meant for a nuclear weapons program rather than for rockets -- have received job performance awards in each of the past three years, officials said.

The civilian analysts, former military men considered experts on foreign and U.S. weaponry, work at the Army's National Ground Intelligence Center (NGIC), one of three U.S. agencies singled out for particular criticism by President Bush's commission that investigated U.S. intelligence.

The Army analysts concluded that it was highly unlikely that the tubes were for use in Iraq's rocket arsenal, a finding that bolstered a CIA contention that they were destined for nuclear centrifuges, which was in turn cited by the Bush administration as proof that Saddam Hussein was reconstituting Iraq's nuclear weapons program.

The problem, according to the commission, which cited the two analysts' work, is that they did not seek or obtain information available from the Energy Department and elsewhere showing that the tubes were indeed the type used for years as rocket-motor cases by Iraq's military. The panel said the finding represented a "serious lapse in analytic tradecraft" because the center's personnel "could and should have conducted a more exhaustive examination of the question."
(Washington Post)

Poll majority say they'd be likely to vote for Clinton

For the first time, a majority of Americans say they are likely to vote for Hillary Rodham Clinton if she runs for president in 2008, according to a USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll taken Friday through Sunday.

The survey shows that the New York senator and former first lady has broadened her support nationwide over the past two years, though she still provokes powerful feelings from those who oppose her.

Clinton commands as much strong support - but more strong opposition - as George W. Bush did in a Newsweek poll in November 1998, two years before the 2000 election. She is in slightly stronger position than then-vice president Al Gore, the eventual 2000 Democratic nominee, was in 1998.

"Over time, Clinton fatigue has dissipated ... and people are looking back on the Clinton years more favorably," says Andrew Kohut, director of the non-partisan Pew Research Center. In a Pew poll released this month, Kohut called former president Bill Clinton and the senator "comeback kids" because of their rising ratings.
(USA Today)

BREAKING NEWS

Former Hillary Clinton Aide Acquitted

LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- The former national finance director for Hillary Rodham Clinton's Senate campaign was acquitted Friday of lying to the government about a lavish 2000 Hollywood fund-raising gala.

David Rosen was charged with two counts of making false statements to the Federal Election Commission about the cost of the star-studded gala, which attracted such celebrities as Cher, Melissa Ethridge, Toni Braxton, Diana Ross, Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston.

The jury deliberated about six hours before reaching its verdict.

"It was hard for me to hold back tears. My whole family is crying, and my attorney is crying. It was the happiest moment, next to my marriage, in my life," Rosen said.

Clinton was not charged, but Republicans closely monitored the trial, hoping fallout from it might damage the New York Democrat's 2006 re-election bid and scuttle any hopes for a possible presidential campaign in 2008.

Judge Rules Against DeLay Group Official

The treasurer of a political action committee formed by U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay broke the law by not reporting hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign contributions, a judge ruled Thursday in a lawsuit brought by Democratic candidates.

State District Judge Joe Hart said the money, much of it corporate contributions, should have been reported to the Texas Ethics Commission.

The judge ordered Bill Ceverha, treasurer of Texans for a Republican Majority, to pay nearly $200,000 in damages. It will be divided among those who brought the lawsuit against Ceverha — five Democrats who lost state legislative races in 2002.
(AP)

Democrats Force Delay of Bolton Final Vote

Democrats forced the Senate to put off a final vote Thursday on John R. Bolton's nomination to be U.N. ambassador, the latest setback for the tough-talking nominee President Bush has called strong medicine for corruption and inefficiency at the United Nations. Democrats contended the White House had stiff-armed the Senate over classified information on Bolton's tenure in his current job as the State Department's arms control chief, and demanded more information before the Senate can give Bolton an up-or-down vote.
(AP)

GOP Confident Bolton Will Get U.N. Post

Democrats held out the possibility that they could try to hold up a final vote on Bolton on Thursday if they do not receive internal State Department documents and classified intelligence information they have sought for several weeks.

At the same time, Democrats said they do not plan to mount a filibuster to indefinitely block a vote, and some of their leading voices on the Bolton fight seemed to acknowledge that time is running out.

"I would seriously hope that the president — and I really don't have much hope — but I wish the president had taken another look at this and found us someone," else, argued Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr., D-Del.

"This guy should not be going to the U.N.," Biden said with an air of resignation.
(AP)

FBI Records Cite Quran Abuse Allegations

Terror suspects at the Guantanamo Bay prison told U.S. interrogators as early as April 2002, just three months after the first detainees arrived, that military guards abused them and desecrated the Quran, declassified FBI records say.

"Their behavior is bad," one detainee is quoted as saying of his guards during an interrogation by an FBI special agent on July 22, 2002. "About five months ago the guards beat the detainees. They flushed a Quran in the toilet."
(AP)

Amnesty International: Guantanamo is the 'Gulag of Our Time'

Amnesty International castigated the U.S. prison camp in Guantanamo Bay as a failure Wednesday, calling it "the gulag of our time" in the human rights group's harshest rebuke yet of American detention policies.

Amnesty urged Washington to shut down the prison at the U.S. Navy's base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where some 540 men are held on suspicion of links to Afghanistan's ousted Taliban regime or the al-Qaida terror network. Some have been jailed for more than three years without charge.
(AP)

Latest Poll: Bush Approval Ratings Plummet; Disapproval Rating His Highest in Over a Year

Gallup Poll and CNN/USA Today/Gallup Poll (5/20-22)

"Do you approve or disapprove of the way George W. Bush is handling his job as president?"

Approve: 46%
Disapprove: 50%
Unsure: 4%

House Dems to hold forum on media bias Tuesday with Franken, Brock, others

In the wake of a firestorm on the House floor over a Newsweek article about desecrating the Quran, a dozen members of Congress have planned a forum next Tuesday on media bias, RAW STORY has learned.

Among those scheduled to testify are Air America Radio host Al Franken, Media Matters chief David Brock, AmericaBLOG's John Aravosis, a Washington bureau BBC reporter, Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting's Steve Rendell and Mark Lloyd, from the progressive thinktank Center for American Progress. Wonkette's Ana Marie Cox has also been invited.

The panel will be hosted by ranking House Judiciary Committee Democrat Rep. John Conyers, Jr (D-MI).

“I think a number of Democratic members have been disturbed about what is and what isn’t being covered in the corporate news media," a House aide said, speaking of the event. "Specifically, there’s been a great deal of disappointment of the media’s coverage of the Iraq war and the Downing Street memo and great concern about the White House’s efforts to intimidate media outlets such as they’ve done in the Newsweek matter.”

House Republicans have aggressively attacked Newsweek for an article later retracted that said an internal U.S. military report would find that the Quran had been flushed down a toilet at the Guantanamo Bay prison.
(Raw Story)

Deal Reached to Avert U.S. Showdown on Judges

Fourteen U.S. Senate moderates struck a deal across party lines on Monday to avert a historic showdown vote over President Bush's stalled judicial nominees.

The bipartisan compromise -- which includes a commitment to clear the way for confirmation votes on three of five disputed nominees -- was reached less than 24 hours before the Republican-led Senate was to decide whether to strip Democrats of their power to block Bush's candidates for federal courts.

If Republicans had prevailed -- and it was uncertain whether they had the votes -- Democrats vowed to retaliate by raising other obstacles that could tie the chamber into knots.

The issue has assumed major political significance because of its importance to future Supreme Court nominations, with at least one retirement expected soon.

Special-interest groups from the political right and left have joined the battle, since the federal courts decide many cultural and social issues, such as abortion rights.

With the stakes high and outcome uncertain, the 14 moderate lawmakers crafted their deal a week after talks between the Senate's top two leaders broke down.

"This is a good day for the country, a good day for the Untied States Senate," Ohio Republican Sen. Mike DeWine, flanked by fellow negotiators, told a news conference in announcing the accord.

"I say thank God," said Sen. Robert Byrd, a West Virginia Democrat. "We have lifted ourselves above politics."

The accord provided enough senators on both sides of the political aisle to enforce a carefully worded compromise.
(Reuters)

Laura Bush Heckled in Jerusalem

US first lady Laura Bush faced Palestinian and Israeli protests yesterday as she toured Jewish and Muslim holy sites in Jerusalem’s Old City.

Wearing a black headscarf and accompanied by the wife of Israeli President Moshe Katsav, Mrs. Bush spent a few moments of silence in the women’s section of the Western Wall, a Jewish holy site.

Among the bystanders, dozens of young women waved photographs of Jonathan Pollard, a Jewish American who was jailed for life in 1987 in the United States on charges of spying for Israel. A slightly larger group of men, some of them symbolically handcuffed, also shouted slogans calling for Pollard’s release.

At the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound, the response to her visit was equally hostile, with a handful of protesters shouting as she entered the golden-topped Dome of the Rock. (Arab TV stations showed only one person shouting).

But the visit passed off peacefully, arousing little interest among local Palestinian stallholders, who dismissed the trip by the wife of US President George W. Bush as little more than a photo opportunity for the media.

“It’s mainly a publicity stunt,” said Mazen, a 50-year-old carpet seller. “What we want to see is results on the ground. President Bush promised to resolve the conflict two years ago, but nothing has changed.”

Hassanin, 43, said, “We don’t care about any American presidents or their wives. They don’t help us.”
(Al-Jezeera)

Dozens Have Alleged Koran's Mishandling

Senior Bush administration officials reacted with outrage to a Newsweek report that U.S. interrogators had desecrated the Koran at the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, detention facility, and the magazine retracted the story last week. But allegations of disrespectful treatment of Islam's holy book are far from rare.

An examination of hearing transcripts, court records and government documents, as well as interviews with former detainees, their lawyers, civil liberties groups and U.S. military personnel, reveals dozens of accusations involving the Koran, not only at Guantanamo, but also at American-run detention facilities in Afghanistan and Iraq.

The Pentagon is conducting an internal investigation of reported abuses at the naval base in Cuba, led by Air Force Lt. Gen. Randall Schmidt. The administration has refused to say what the inquiry, still weeks from completion, has found so far.

But two years ago, amid allegations of desecration and hunger strikes by inmates, the Army instituted elaborate procedures for sensitive treatment of the Koran at the prison camp. Once the new procedures were in place, complaints there stopped, said the International Committee of the Red Cross, which monitors conditions in prisons and detention facilities.

The allegations, both at Guantanamo Bay and elsewhere, contain detailed descriptions of what Muslim prisoners said was mishandling of the Koran — sometimes in a deliberately provocative manner.

In one instance, an Iraqi detainee alleged that a soldier had a guard dog carry a copy of the Koran in its mouth. In another, guards at Guantanamo were said to have scrawled obscenities inside Korans.

Other prisoners said Korans were kicked across floors, stomped on and thrown against walls. One said a soldier urinated on his copy, and others said guards ridiculed the religious text, declaring that Allah's words would not save detainees.
(Los Angeles Times)

Media Matters: The Top 10 filibuster falsehoods

With Senate debate on two of President Bush's most controversial judicial nominees beginning May 18, the heated rhetoric over the so-called "nuclear option" to ban Senate filibusters on judicial nominations has reached its boiling point. The rules of the Senate thus far remain intact, but filibuster opponents have pulled all rhetorical stops, advancing numerous falsehoods and distortions, and, as Media Matters for America documents below, the media have too often perpetuated that misinformation by unskeptically, and sometimes even deliberately, repeating it.
(MediaMatters.org)

LA Elects Latino Labor Leader as Mayor

Los Angeles has elected its first Latino mayor in more than a century: Antonio Villaraigosa defeated incumbent Jim Hahn in a landslide, 59 to 41 percent. As mayor of the country's second-biggest city, Villaraigosa immediately becomes a national political figure in the Democratic Party. But he's not just a Latino; he's also a longtime labor activist who started out as a union organizer and then headed the ACLU of Southern California.

This was Villaraigosa's second try--he was defeated four years ago when Hahn ran a vicious campaign that successfully exploited black fears about electing a Latino mayor. Hahn lost his African-American support when he fired the black police chief, Bernard Parks, who then ran against him in this year's primary. Villaraigosa knows his key political task is cementing a progressive alliance between Latinos and blacks. If he can do that, he will point the way to a new liberal-left coalition and make political history not just for LA but for the country.
(The Nation)

Iraq outlook bleak, U.S. generals say

U.S. military commanders in Baghdad and Washington gave a sobering new assessment of the war in Iraq, adding to the mood of anxiety that prompted Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to make a trip to Baghdad last weekend to consult with Iraq's new government.

In interviews and briefings, the generals pulled back from recent suggestions -- including by some of the same officers -- that positive trends in Iraq could allow a reduction in the 138,000 U.S. troops in Iraq late this year or early in 2006.

One senior officer suggested that U.S. military involvement could last "many years."
Gen. John Abizaid, the top U.S. officer in the Middle East, said in a briefing in Washington that one problem was the disappointing progress in developing Iraqi paramilitary police units cohesive enough to mount an effective challenge to the insurgents and allow U.S. forces to reduce their role in fighting.
(Duluth News Tribune)

Democrats see risk in Social Security plan

After Thomas lauded that advice in his opening statement, the panel’s top Democrat, Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., slapped him down, saying the committee’s rightful focus should be on ensuring the solvency of Social Security.

“I wish the chairman had a written statement so I could follow more clearly where you want to take the committee,” Rangel said as Thomas leaned back in his chair next to him.
(MSNBC)

Joe Conason: On Nuclear Issues Bolton’s a Failure

Of all the questions that cloud the nomination of John Bolton as ambassador to the United Nations, the most troubling has so far received the least attention: Has he performed his current diplomatic duties competently and in accordance with U.S. policy?

The answer is a matter of profound concern, because Mr. Bolton’s job, as Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security, is to promote multilateral action against the proliferation of the world’s most destructive weapons. There are few officials in government with as much responsibility for the future security of this country and the world.

Specifically, Mr. Bolton is in charge of securing Russian cooperation to safeguard old Soviet stockpiles of uranium and plutonium, the core elements of nuclear weapons, from terrorists who want to inflict catastrophic harm on democratic civilization. Today, at least 300 metric tons of the stuff still remains inadequately protected.
(New York Observer)

Christian School's Students, Faculty Protesting Bush as Commencement Speaker

Calvin College may be predominantly Republican, but a visit from President George W. Bush on Saturday is stirring up some discontent among students, faculty and alumni.

One-third of the faculty members have signed a letter of protest that will appear in a half-page ad in the Grand Rapids Press on Saturday, the day Bush is to deliver the commencement address to 900 graduating seniors at Calvin. The ad cost $2,600.

"As Christians, we are called to be peacemakers and to initiate war only as a last resort," the letter says. "We believe your administration has launched an unjust and unjustified war in Iraq."
More than 800 students, faculty and alumni also have signed a letter protesting Bush's visit that will appear Friday as a full-page ad in the Grand Rapids paper. The ad cost more than $9,500.

"We are alumni, students, faculty and friends of Calvin College who are deeply troubled that you will be the commencement speaker at Calvin," the letter states. "In our view, the policies and actions of your administration, both domestically and internationally over the past four years, violate many deeply held principles of Calvin College."

And about 100 students are expected to adorn their graduation gowns with armbands and buttons bearing the slogan: "God is not a Republican or Democrat."

"I'm definitely worried about a Christian school being affiliated with the Christian right," said Elise Elzinga, a 22-year-old Lambertville resident who will graduate Saturday with a degree in political science and international relations.
(Detroit Free Press)

Santorum Makes a Fool of Himself...Again!

Countered Republican Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, "It's the equivalent of Adolf Hitler in 1942." He said Democratic protests over Republican efforts to ensure confirmation votes would be like the Nazi dictator seizing Paris and then saying, "I'm in Paris. How dare you invade me. How dare you bomb my city. It's mine."
(AP)

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

For 15 years King Coal and Big Oil, led by the Exxon Corporation, have funded dozens of Washington think tanks stocked with aberrant scientists (known as bio-stitutes) to persuade the public and the press that the science is still out on global warming and give political cover to the industries’ indentured servants on Capitol Hill -- corporate toadies like James Inhofe and Tom DeLay.

They have also relied heavily on shills like Rush Limbaugh to delude the broader public with their junk science. Limbaugh’s 1993 book, "The Way Things Ought to Be," argues that global warming is a hoax -- a point of view he regularly espouses on his popular radio show.

Now, the very industries for which Limbaugh has ransomed his integrity are turning on him and his junk science cronies. Last month, Cinergy, one of America’s largest coal-burning utilities, devoted 35 pages of its annual report to global warming. And last week, Exxon and General Electric launched massive new campaigns to develop technology to deal with climate change. Even these companies recognize that the facts about global warming are no longer deniable and they have left loyal mouthpieces like Limbaugh high and dry.
(Huffingtonpost.com)

Froma Harrop: Liberals and Illegal Immigration

Hillary gets it. Hillary Clinton says she's against illegal immigration. And she would fine employers who hire illegal aliens. Pundits say the New York Democrat is using this hot-button issue to position herself for the 2008 presidential election. It's a way to hit Republicans from the right. Polls show huge majorities of both Republicans and Democrats oppose illegal immigration -- and are frustrated that President Bush won't do a thing to stop it. But this issue does not belong to the right. Or it shouldn't. Illegal immigration hurts most liberal causes. It depresses wages, crushes unions and kills all hope for universal health coverage. Progressives have to understand that there can be little social justice in an unregulated labor market. "Liberals are so confused on this issue," says Vernon Briggs, a labor economist at Cornell University and self-described liberal. "Immigration policy has got to be held accountable for its economic consequences."

Sydney Blumenthal: The Veneer of Fraternity

Tony Blair's near-fatal political strategy inadvertently but inevitably exposed him to the dilemma of his special relationship with George Bush. Blair had attempted to wage a campaign that skirted Iraq - which voters cited as the overriding issue for their disillusionment, with about only one-third willing to admit that they trusted the prime minister. But his invitation to the voters to vent their frustration at the beginning of the campaign - the so-called masochism strategy - naturally brought their anger over Iraq to the surface. Once he had raised the level of political toxicity, Blair simply froze.
(The Guardian)

Senate Defies Bush, Approves Highway Bill

The Republican-controlled Senate brushed aside a presidential veto threat Tuesday and passed a $295 billion highway bill, arguing that massive spending on bigger and better roads was necessary to fight congestion and unsafe roadways.

The administration, while pressing Congress to pass a new highway bill, said the Senate version was too expensive in a time of war and debt and could result in the first veto of the Bush presidency.

The vote was 89-11 with a majority of Republicans joining Democrats in approving the six-year package that the administration said was $11 billion above what it would accept.

Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla, chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee, described himself as one of the most conservative members of Congress but said he was at odds with the administration because "there are two areas where we need to spend money. One is national defense and the other is infrastructure."
(AP)

Joe Conason: And You Thought World War II Was Over?

Historical falsification, when spoken by the President of the United States to slander one of his greatest predecessors, should not go unanswered. In a display of the extremist ideology that drives politics and policy in his administration, George W. Bush chose a platform in Latvia to repeat an old right-wing slur against Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

Mr. Bush said that the 1945 Yalta conference where Roosevelt met with Winston Churchill and Josef Stalin to plan the end of the Second World War "followed in the unjust tradition of Munich and the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact."

For the President to utter such cheap remarks about Roosevelt (and Churchill, whom he ridiculously imagines to be his model) was unfortunate. For him to utter those remarks on foreign soil, during ceremonies commemorating the end of the war fought so bravely by Roosevelt and Churchill, was unforgivable.

Mr. Bush sounded as if he (or his chief thinker, Karl Rove) had received special tutoring from noted fabulist Ann Coulter. Her regurgitation of these same themes in a book-length screed earned the repudiation of many decent conservatives and every competent historian who bothered to take notice.

Sky-High Global Consumption Stoking Environmental, Security Concerns

People are gobbling up more food, material goods, and natural resources than ever before and the worldwide pursuit of prosperity is stoking environmental and security problems, according to a new report on trends shaping the planet's future.

Increased production and consumption of everything from grain and meat to oil and cars reflects strong economic growth in 2004, says ''Vital Signs 2005'' from the Washington, D.C.-based think tank Worldwatch Institute.

But the social and environmental costs of economic growth go largely unnoticed, the report says. These include pollution, ecosystem degradation, and a growing divide between those who gain from economic growth and those who do not.

''We have by no means freed ourselves from the material world and its persistent threats,'' said Christopher Flavin, Worldwatch's president.

The study highlights the example of China, which it describes as ''a global force that is driving consumption and production of almost everything through the roof.''

Oil consumption in the world's most populous nation surged by 11 percent last year to 6.6 million barrels a day, fueling the fastest rate of increase in world oil consumption in 16 years.
(OneWorld.net)

Reid Says Showdown Imminent in Senate

Top Senate leaders declared an unsuccessful end Monday to their compromise talks over President Bush's stalled judicial nominees, despite fresh talk of a deal to clear five appeals court appointees while scuttling three others.

"I've tried to compromise and they want all or nothing, and I can't do that," Democratic leader Harry Reid of Nevada told reporters after a private meeting with Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn.
(AP)

Another Italian Aid Worker Abducted in Afghanistan

Four armed men dragged an Italian woman working for CARE International from her car in the center of Afghanistan's capital on Monday in a bold kidnapping that reinforced fears that militants or criminals are copying tactics used in Iraq.

The kidnapping followed warnings from security agencies that foreigners might be targeted in response to the arrest of a suspect in the kidnappings of three U.N. election workers last year.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the abduction of aid worker Clementina Cantoni, 32, or demands for her release, said police and the agency's director, Paul Barker.

"Four men carrying Kalashnikovs bashed in the window of her car and took her away. They told the driver not to move or he would be shot," Barker said.
(AP)

Ex-Wife: Bush's FDA Advisor a Serial Rapist

Hager cast himself as a victim of religious persecution in his sermon. "You see...there is a war going on in this country," he said gravely. "And I'm not speaking about the war in Iraq. It's a war being waged against Christians, particularly evangelical Christians. It wasn't my scientific record that came under scrutiny [at the FDA]. It was my faith.... By making myself available, God has used me to stand in the breach.... Just as he has used me, he can use you."

Up on the dais, several men seated behind Hager nodded solemnly in agreement. But out in the audience, Linda Carruth Davis--co-author with Hager of Stress and the Woman's Body, and, more saliently, his former wife of thirty-two years--was enraged. "It was the most disgusting thing I've ever heard," she recalled months later, through clenched teeth.

According to Davis, Hager's public moralizing on sexual matters clashed with his deplorable treatment of her during their marriage. Davis alleges that between 1995 and their divorce in 2002, Hager repeatedly sodomized her without her consent. Several sources on and off the record confirmed that she had told them it was the sexual and emotional abuse within their marriage that eventually forced her out. "I probably wouldn't have objected so much, or felt it was so abusive if he had just wanted normal [vaginal] sex all the time," she explained to me. "But it was the painful, invasive, totally nonconsensual nature of the [anal] sex that was so horrible."
(The Nation)

Democrats Consider Revamping Primaries

Democrats, looking to reverse their fortunes after two straight White House defeats, met Saturday to hear competing proposals to revamp the election calendar used to choose a presidential nominee every four years.

The three major proposals would focus on regional primaries. Two of those proposals would allow Iowa and New Hampshire to retain their leadoff roles in the candidate selection process.

A third plan, offered by Michigan Democrats, would create a rotating series of six regional primaries. A different region would launch each presidential nominating season.

That plan would allow single-state contests to begin the process, but those states would be rotated. "Share the wealth," said Michigan Sen. Carl Levin "I would not lock in specific states."
(AP)

7 GOP Senators Key in Filibuster Fight

Seven Republican senators will determine the outcome of a showdown this week between the president and Congress — and a minority within it — over who is going to shape the federal courts.

Barring any unforeseen developments, these are the lawmakers in the make-or-break position when it comes to deciding whether to allow a Senate minority to block a president's nominees for the federal bench.

The senators are Susan Collins of Maine, Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, John Warner of Virginia, Mike DeWine of Ohio, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and John Sununu of New Hampshire.


(AP )

Molly Ivins on the Downing Street Memo

I cannot let this astounding Downing Street memo go unmentioned.

On May 1, the Sunday Times of London printed a secret memo that went to the defense secretary, foreign secretary, attorney general and other high officials. It is the minutes of their meeting on Iraq with Tony Blair. The memo was written by Matthew Rycroft, a Downing Street foreign policy aide. It has been confirmed as legitimate and is dated July 23, 2002. I suppose the correct cliche is "smoking gun."

"C reported on his recent talks in Washington. There was a perceptible shift in attitude. Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy. (There it is.) The NSC (National Security Council) had no patience with the U.N. route, and no enthusiasm for publishing material on the Iraqi regime's record. There was little discussion in Washington of the aftermath after military action." After some paragraphs on tactical considerations, Rycroft reports, "No decisions had been taken, but he (British defense secretary) thought the most likely timing in U.S. minds for military action to begin was January, with the timeline beginning 30 days before the U.S. congressional elections.

Sydney Blumenthal: The Good Soldier's Revenge

In Colin Powell's battle to block Bush's nominee to the UN, far more is at stake than John Bolton's unsuitability.
(The Guardian)

U.S. Lawmakers Seek Wal-Mart Pay Data

In a letter sent on Thursday afternoon to Wal-Mart Chief Executive Officer Lee Scott, lawmakers said the company pays female hourly workers 40 cents less an hour than men and pays female managers nearly $5,000 less a year than their male counterparts.

Written by Connecticut Democratic Rep. Rosa DeLauro (news, bio, voting record), the letter was signed by 50 of her colleagues.

The letter said women comprise 72 percent of the work force at the world's biggest retailer, but only fill one-third of its management positions.
(Reuters)

White House Sleepovers Included Large Number of Donors

The Center for Responsive Politics, a non-partisan watchdog group, said that while the practice of inviting donors to spend the night at the White House and the presidential retreat isn't new, it doesn't look any better than when it sparked a scandal during the Clinton administration.

"It sounds like to a certain degree the White House and Camp David are being used as they have been for quite a while - as a way to reward fundraisers and big givers."
(USA Today)

Panel Sends Bolton Nomination to Senate

The Foreign Relations Committee voted 10-8 along party lines to advance Bolton's nomination without the customary recommendation that the Senate approve it. The procedural move spared Bush outright defeat in the Republican-led committee but still represented an embarrassing setback early in his second term.

The pivotal vote came from Ohio Republican Sen. George Voinovich (news, bio, voting record), who said Bolton was a sometime bully whose short fuse would have gotten him fired in the private sector.

"This is not behavior that should be endorsed as the face of the United States to the world community at the United Nations," Voinovich said. "It is my opinion that John Bolton is the poster child of what someone in the diplomatic corps should not be."
(AP)

Pat Buchanan Outrages With WWII Comments...Again

"That is more or less saying they fought for the wrong reasons and the sacrifice was futile," said Veterans of Foreign Wars spokesman Jerry Newberry. "Buchanan apparently hasn't given much thought to what the world would have looked like if Hitler and his henchmen would have succeeded."

Buchanan did not return calls yesterday.

Former Mayor Ed Koch offered this blunt rebuttal: "I believe that no decent human being should ever sit down at the same table with Pat Buchanan and I am shocked that otherwise responsible, respectable citizens share platforms with him on Sunday shows."
(Newsday)

Garrison Keillor: Confessions of a Listener

The deregulation of radio was tough on good-neighbor radio because Clear Channel and other conglomerates were anxious to vacuum up every station in sight for fabulous sums of cash and turn them into robot repeaters. I dropped in to a broadcasting school last fall and saw kids being trained for radio careers as if radio were a branch of computer processing. They had no conception of the possibility of talking into a microphone to an audience that wants to hear what you have to say. I tried to suggest what a cheat this was, but the instructor was standing next to me. Clear Channel's brand of robotics is not the future of broadcasting. With a whole generation turning to iPod and another generation discovering satellite radio and Internet radio, the robotic formatted-music station looks like a very marginal operation indeed. Training kids to do that is like teaching typewriter repair.
(The Nation)

Kabul Blast Signals Return of Forgotten Taliban Insurgency

A United Nations employee has been killed in a suicide bomb attack in Kabul, after the worst week of fighting further south in Afghanistan for nine months.

About 70 Taliban fighters and 10 government security personnel have also been killed and seven US soldiers wounded in two battles, confounding hopes that the Taliban insurgency may be petering out.

In Kabul, a bomber apparently ran into an internet café, popular with foreigners, and detonated a grenade which killed himself and two others, and wounded six. One of the dead was a Burmese engineer who had worked for the UN for about a year, the first UN employee to be killed in Afghanistan since 2001. He was checking e-mails when the attack happened at the Park internet café in the city centre on Saturday.
(The Independent)

Ari Berman: Inflate and Intimidate

A major showdown looms large this week, with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee scheduled to vote Thursday on John Bolton's nomination as America's new UN ambassador. The Bush Administration, with Chairman Richard Lugar's assistance, is withholding crucial information describing how Bolton tried to spy on colleagues through National Security Agency intercepts and how he skewed intelligence on Syria. The lack of cooperation may prompt Democrats to postpone the vote.

One thing is certain: a flurry of new allegations has surfaced since the Foreign Relations Committee postponed a vote on Bolton three weeks ago. Each has reinforced his reputation as a unilateral uber-hawk who intimidates subordinates, ignores orders, exaggerates intelligence and consistently favors ideology over expertise. Here's a rundown of the most recent allegations. For the backstory, read here, here and here.

** Bolton repeatedly exaggerated the extent of Syria's weapons capabilities and threat to the United States and the greater Middle East, clashing with the CIA and other intelligence agencies.

N.H. May Charge Poorest for Medicaid

As states struggle to cut Medicaid costs, New Hampshire has proposed going further by making the poorest of the poor — even families with no income at all — contribute to their coverage.
(AP)

UN challenges U.S. Congress on Oil, Food Probe

The United Nations won the firstround of a skirmish against the U.S. Congress on Monday when a federal judge temporarily blocked a former investigator from distributing documents on the oil-for-food program for Iraq.

U.S. District Judge Ricardo Urbina in Washington issued a 10-day restraining order against the investigator, Robert Parton, a former FBI agent, so both sides could have time to resolve the issue.

The restraining order was sought by Paul Volcker, head of a U.N.-appointed Independent Inquiry Committee (ICC) investigating fraud in the $67 billion humanitarian program.
(Reuters)

Five Years Later, Clinton's Favorability Ratings

Still Higher Than Bush's

William Jefferson Clinton: 53% Favorability Rating
George W. Bush: 52% Favorability Rating
(Fox News/Opinion Dynamics Poll; April 25-26, 2005)

Reid: Bush is a "Loser"

Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid called President Bush "a loser" during a civics discussion with a group of teenagers at a high school on Friday.


"The man's father is a wonderful human being," Reid, D-Nev., told students at Del Sol High School when asked about the president's policies. "I think this guy is a loser."

Sen. Biden Asks Rice for Bolton Documents

The top Democrat on the Senate committee considering the nomination of John R. Bolton as United Nations ambassador scolded Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Saturday for ignoring Democratic requests for additional information about the embattled nominee.

In a curt letter to Rice, Sen. Joseph Biden D-Del., reiterated his requests for State Department documents related to charges that Bolton tried to bend or ignore government intelligence findings that did not suit his hard right ideology.

Lobbyist Had Close Contact With Bush Team

In President Bush's first 10 months, GOP fundraiser Jack Abramoff and his lobbying team logged nearly 200 contacts with the new administration as they pressed for friendly hires at federal agencies and sought to keep the Northern Mariana Islands exempt from the minimum wage and other laws, records show.

The meetings between Abramoff's lobbying team and the administration ranged from Attorney General John Ashcroft to policy advisers in Vice President Dick Cheney's office, according to his lobbying firm billing records.

Abramoff, a $100,000-plus fundraiser for Bush, is now under criminal investigation for some of his lobbying work. His firm boasted its lobbying team helped revise a section of the Republican Party's 2000 platform to make it favorable to its island client.
(AP)

Terror Suspect Gets Bush Fundraiser Invite

A year after federal agents raided his home in a terrorism investigation, Muslim businessman Syed Maswood is lucky to get on an airplane without being detained and searched. But that didn't stop him from getting an invitation to dine with President Bush.

Maswood, a nuclear engineer who has not been charged with any crime and has been trying for months to get his name off no-fly lists, received an invitation to serve as an honorary chairman at a Republican fundraiser with Bush in Washington next month.

A Republican who has donated money to GOP campaigns, Maswood said he briefly considered attending but his wife refused to fly. The last time they were in Washington, he said, they were held for hours at the airport.
(Reuters)

Bush Budget Seeks Deep Cutbacks

President Bush has presented his 2006 budget, cutting domestic spending in a bid to lower a record deficit projected to peak at $427bn (£230bn) this year.

The $2.58 trillion (£1.38 trillion) budget submitted to Congress affects 150 domestic programmes from farming to the environment, education and health.
(BBC News)

Brazil Takes a Stand, Says 'No Thanks' to US Aid

Brazil yesterday became the first country to take a public stand against the Bush administration's massive AIDS programme which is seen by many as seeking increasingly to press its anti-abortion, pro-abstinence sexual agenda on poorer countries.

Campaigners applauded Brazil's rejection of $40m for its AIDS programmes because it refuses to agree to a declaration condemning prostitution.

The government and many AIDS organisations believe such a declaration would be a serious barrier to helping sex workers protect themselves and their clients from infection.

The demand from the US administration, heavily influenced by the religious right, follows what is known as the "global gag" - a ban on US government funds to any foreign-based organisation which has links to abortion. This has resulted in the removal of millions of dollars of funding from family planning clinics worldwide.
(The Guardian)

Federal auditors can't trace $96.6 million earmarked for Iraq

Nearly $100 million in Iraqi reconstruction cash - which was supposed to be handed out by U.S. workers in shrink-wrapped bricks of new hundred-dollar bills - can't be accounted for, federal auditors reported Wednesday.

A criminal investigation into possible fraud in a handful of cases is under way to determine what happened to some of the $96.6 million that was earmarked to rebuild south-central Iraq, according to a new report by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction.

The money came from Iraqi oil sales and other local revenues, not from U.S. taxpayers, and it was supposed to be distributed by the main financial office of the U.S. rebuilding effort in Iraq. That financial office - first part of the now-defunct Coalition Provisional Authority and now run by Joint Area Support Group-Central - hired a cadre of U.S. workers who pay cash to locals and contractors to repair Iraq and provide relief to Iraqis.
(KnightRidder)