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)

More Republican Corruption

Aides to Republican lawmakers said Wednesday they are reviewing a 2003 trip to Ireland to determine if a lobbyist paid for it — as congressional records indicate.

If the records are accurate, the trip by Sen. Gordon Smith of Oregon, former Sen. Don Nickles of Oklahoma and Reps. Howard Coble of North Carolina, Harold Rogers of Kentucky and Clay Shaw of Florida violated ethics rules that bar lobbying firms from paying for trips taken by members of Congress.
(AP)

US Has Very Low Confidence In Bush's Social Security Scheme

A solid majority of Americans predict that their benefits will have to be cut or their taxes raised to ensure the long-term future of Social Security, a sign that most people are prepared to endure some pain to preserve the nation's retirement system.

A USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll taken Friday through Sunday finds both parties viewed skeptically on the issue, though. Sixty-two percent worry that Republicans will "go too far" in changing Social Security; 61% worry that Democrats "will not go far enough."

President Bush, who has put Social Security at the top of his second-term agenda, gets his worst rating so far on the issue: 35% approval, 58% disapproval. The idea he endorsed last week of "progressive indexing" - maintaining future benefits for low-income workers but reducing initial benefits for the middle-class and affluent - was opposed by 54%-38%.
(USA Today)

Republican Congress OKs Another $82B for Iraq

An $82 billion bill primarily to rush combat supplies to Iraq and Afghanistan came closer to passage in Congress on Tuesday after negotiators reached a deal on details of the emergency spending package.

The House of Representatives is likely to pass the legislation this week and the Senate next week, providing the Pentagon with the $75.9 billion it says it needs immediately to resupply U.S. forces fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan.
(Reuters)

Gen. Myers: US Military Vulnerable

The U.S. military may not be able to win any new wars as quickly as planned because the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistanhave strained its manpower and resources, the nation's top military officer told Congress in a classified report.

Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, described the U.S. military as in a period of increased risk, according to a senior defense official, who described the report Tuesday on the condition of anonymity.
(AP)

Downing St. Minutes Prove Bush and Blair Planned Iraq War Before Having Justification

BREAKING NEWS...

A SECRET document from the heart of government reveals today that Tony Blair privately committed Britain to war with Iraq and then set out to lure Saddam Hussein into providing the legal justification.

The Downing Street minutes, headed “Secret and strictly personal — UK eyes only”, detail one of the most important meetings ahead of the invasion.

It was chaired by the prime minister and attended by his inner circle. The document reveals Blair backed “regime change” by force from the outset, despite warnings from Lord Goldsmith, the attorney-general, that such action could be illegal.

The minutes, published by The Sunday Times today, begins with the warning: “This record is extremely sensitive. No further copies should be made. The paper should be shown only to those with a genuine need to know.” It records a meeting in July 2002, attended by military and intelligence chiefs, at which Blair discussed military options having already committed himself to supporting President George Bush’s plans for ousting Saddam.
(TimesOnline.com)

If at Frist You Don't Succeed …

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) is still at it. His number one priority is to invoke the nuclear option, but he hasn't been able to explain to the American people why it's a good idea to change 200 years of senate rules. The only reason seems to be that this is part of a partisan power grab.

Frist just wants to flex his own political power. He won't give up and insists on pushing this extreme, radical plan, even though members of his own Party disagree with him.

Frist claims "there are times in history where you have to change either the rules or the precedent…" yet he has not given any good reason to change the rules. [USA Today, 5-2-05]

Frist claims he is "running out of options," yet he has rejected a good faith compromise from Democrats.

"Changing the rules just to get what you want is not right, and it goes against our values as Americans," DNC Chairman Howard Dean said. "Democrats are going to fight against this abuse of power because we know our democracy works best when all the parties work together in the best interests of Americans."

DeLay in Serious Trouble, Experts in Ethics Cases Say

Now that it’s clear his controversial private-paid trips abroad will be put under a microscope in Congress, Tom DeLay is in serious danger of being declared in violation of House ethics rules, legal experts say.

Lawyers who specialize in ethics cases believe the Republican House majority leader from Texas might be in technical breach of at least a few congressional regulations.

According to published reports:
• A registered foreign agent paid for one of DeLay’s overseas trips.
• A registered lobbyist used his credit card to pay for another foreign airfare — actions the rules prohibit.

DeLay also might have:
• Accepted gifts that exceeded congressional limits
• Taken an expense-paid trip overseas for longer than the rules allow
• Not disclosed all the benefits he received.
(TheState.com)

Cuomo Warns of Tyranny of the Majority'

If Republicans rewrite Senate rules to more easily end filibusters, the country will experience "exactly the kind of `tyranny of the majority' that James Madison had in mind," former New York Gov. Mario Cuomo said Saturday.

Cuomo, in the Democratic Party's weekly radio address, said Senate Republicans "are threatening to claim ownership of the Supreme Court and other federal courts, hoping to achieve political results on subjects like abortion, stem cells, the environment and civil rights that they cannot get from the proper political bodies."

"How will they do this? By destroying the so-called filibuster, a vital part of the 200-year-old system of checks and balances in the Senate," Cuomo said.

"The Republicans say it would assure dominance by the majority in the Senate," he said. "That sounds democratic until you remember that the Bill of Rights was adopted, as James Madison pointed out, to protect all of Americans from what he called the `tyranny of the majority."'

"It sounds nearly absurd when you learn that the minority Democrats in the Senate actually represent more Americans than the majority Republicans do," Cuomo said.

More Limbaugh theology: "The religious left in this country hates and despises the God of Christianity and Catholicism"

Rush Limbaugh claimed that "the religious left ... hates and despises the God of Christianity." Limbaugh has previously asserted that "The left is scared to death of God,""Liberals consider themselves more powerful than God," and that liberals are "soulless" because "souls come from God."
(mediamatters.org)

Novak repeated conservative canard that Democrats "are opposing Judge Pryor of Alabama because of his religion"

CNN host and syndicated columnist Robert Novak repeated the baseless accusation that Democrats "are opposing Judge Pryor of Alabama because of his religion." In fact, senators who have opposed William H. Pryor's nomination to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals -- and even current Judiciary Committee Chair Arlen Specter (R-PA) -- have questioned Pryor over his willingness and ability to put aside his personal views and follow the law. Specter also echoed Democrats' concerns over inconsistent statements Pryor made to the committee regarding his involvement in the Republican Attorneys General Association (RAGA).
(mediamatters.org)

US First Quarter Growth Slowest in 2 yrs

The US economy grew at its softest pace in two years during the first quarter this year, slowing to a 3.1 per cent annual rate of expansion as consumers and businesses curbed spending in the face of rising prices, the Commerce Department said on Thursday.

The expansion in gross domestic product, which measures total output within US borders, was the weakest since a 1.9 per cent pace during the first quarter of 2003 and was a surprisingly sharp deceleration from the 3.8 per cent rate registered in the fourth quarter of 2004.
(Stuff-New Zealand)

BusinessWeek: Bush Is Blowing Smoke on Energy

Hitting all the points in a noted GOP pollster's playbook, the President's plan is driven by politics not policy. Worse, it won't cut oil dependency.
(BusinessWeekOnline)