THE BURNED OVER DISTRICT

"Whatever you think of its policies, the current administration has been more secretive, more mistrustful of an inquisitive press, than any since the Nixon administration. It has treated freedom of information requests with contempt, asserted sweeping claims of executive privilege, even reclassified material that had been declassified. The administration has subsidised propaganda at home and abroad, refined the art of spin, discouraged dissent, and sought to limit traditional congressional oversight and court review. The war in Iraq alone is a case study of the administration's determination to dominate the flow of information - from the original cherry-picking of intelligence, to the deliberate refusal to hear senior military officers when they warned of the potential for chaos, to the continually inflated claims about the progress in building up an indigenous Iraqi army. . . .

// posted by montag @ 6:05 PM 0 Comments

I recently castigated Mr. Obama for adopting right-wing talking points about a Social Security “crisis.” Now he’s echoing right-wing talking points on health care.

What seems to have happened is that Mr. Obama’s caution, his reluctance to stake out a clearly partisan position, led him to propose a relatively weak, incomplete health care plan. Although he declared, in his speech announcing the plan, that “my plan begins by covering every American,” it didn’t — and he shied away from doing what was necessary to make his claim true.

Now, in the effort to defend his plan’s weakness, he’s attacking his Democratic opponents from the right — and in so doing giving aid and comfort to the enemies of reform.

Discussing his crime-fighting success as mayor, Mr. Giuliani told a television interviewer that New York was “the only city in America that has reduced crime every single year since 1994.” In New Hampshire this week, he told a public forum that when he became mayor in 1994, New York “had been averaging like 1,800, 1,900 murders for almost 30 years.” When a recent Republican debate turned to the question of fiscal responsibility, he boasted that “under me, spending went down by 7 percent.”

All of these statements are incomplete, exaggerated or just plain wrong. And while, to be sure, all candidates use misleading statistics from time to time, Mr. Giuliani has made statistics a central part of his candidacy as he campaigns on his record.

// posted by montag @ 6:51 AM 0 Comments

Missing porn star apparently found dead

// posted by montag @ 7:19 PM 0 Comments

The executive privilege claim ''is surprising in light of the significant and uncontroverted evidence that the president had no involvement in these firings,'' Leahy wrote in his ruling. ''The president's lack of involvement in these firings -- by his own account and that of many others -- calls into question any claim of executive privilege.''

''It's a bad idea to have subpoenas issued and then not to act on them,'' said Specter, the panel's ranking Republican and a former chairman. ''If you cry wolf, you ought to follow up.''

// posted by montag @ 6:48 PM 0 Comments

As New York mayor, Rudy Giuliani billed obscure city agencies for tens of thousands of dollars in security expenses amassed during the time when he was beginning an extramarital relationship with future wife Judith Nathan in the Hamptons, according to previously undisclosed government records.

The documents, obtained by Politico under New York’s Freedom of Information Law, show that the mayoral costs had nothing to do with the functions of the little-known city offices that defrayed his tabs, including agencies responsible for regulating loft apartments, aiding the disabled and providing lawyers for indigent defendants.

At the time, the mayor’s office refused to explain the accounting to city auditors, citing “security.”

// posted by montag @ 6:05 PM 0 Comments

Gunmen in Baghdad's Shaab neighborhood stormed into a house not far from an Iraqi police checkpoint and killed 11 members of an Iraqi journalist's family, witnesses and journalism organizations reported Monday.

Iraqi police and U.S. military officials said they had no record of the killings. But family members confirmed that the killings took place on Sunday in a neighborhood controlled by the Mahdi Army militia. The militia is loyal to radical Shiite Muslim cleric Muqtada al Sadr.

It was the third mass killing reported in Baghdad since Friday, underscoring the fragility of recent declines in violence. Car bombings on Friday and Sunday killed at least 22 people and injured 96 in the worst such attacks since September.

Meanwhile, the U.S. military said that American troops killed three people, including a child, Monday when they fired on a vehicle that failed to stop at a roadblock north of Baghdad. The incident occurred after U.S. forces had attacked suspected al Qaida in Iraq members near the town of Bayji, killing four, a military statement said.

// posted by montag @ 7:26 AM 0 Comments

The stern warnings, coming from Sens. Lindsey Graham and Saxby Chambliss Monday, are an indication that while GOP patience on the war has greatly increased this fall because of security gains made by the military, it isn't bottomless.

"I do expect them to deliver," Graham, R-S.C., said in a phone interview upon returning from a Thanksgiving trip to Iraq. "What would happen for me if there's no progress on reconciliation after the first of the year, I would be looking at ways to invest our money into groups that can deliver."

Chambliss, R-Ga., who traveled with Graham as part of a larger congressional delegation, said lawmakers might even call for al-Maliki's ouster if Baghdad didn't reach agreement on at least some of the major issues seen as key to tamping down sectarian violence.

"If we don't see positive results by the end of the year I think you'll probably see a strong message coming out of Congress calling for a change in administration," he said in a conference call with reporters.

// posted by montag @ 6:53 AM 0 Comments

Doctors administered an electrical shock to Vice President Dick Cheney's heart and restored it to a normal rhythm during a 2 1/2 hour hospital visit Monday. The procedure was described as a low-risk, standard practice. Cheney, 66, went home from George Washington University Hospital and was expected back at work on Tuesday.

Cheney, who has a history of heart problems, was discovered to have an irregular heartbeat around 7 a.m. when he was seen by doctors at the White House for a lingering cough from a cold. He remained at work throughout the day, joining President Bush in meetings with Mideast leaders.

// posted by montag @ 9:39 PM 1 Comments

Vice President Dick Cheney, who has a history of heart problems, experienced an irregular heartbeat today and will be evaluated at George Washington University Hospital.

Sen. Trent Lott of Mississippi, the No. 2 Republican leader in the Senate, announced Monday that he will resign before the end of the year.

// posted by montag @ 6:34 PM 0 Comments

"'What exactly would it take for the president to conclude Musharraf has crossed the line? Suspend the constitution? Impose emergency law? Beat and jail his political opponents and human rights activists? He's already done all that. If the president sees Musharraf as a democrat, he must be wearing the same glasses he had on when he looked in Vladimir Putin's soul.'"

// posted by montag @ 4:33 PM 0 Comments

“National Republicans are in disarray, forcing them to recruit inexperienced and unprepared self-funders,”

// posted by montag @ 11:15 PM 0 Comments

Condoleezza Rice and President Bush are often described as opposites, but their closest advisers say they are remarkably alike.

Condoleezza Rice became secretary of state almost three years ago with strong support from President Bush, glamorous reviews in the news media and high hopes from America's diplomats.

Since then, Pakistani strongman Pervez Musharraf has ignored her pleas and imposed emergency rule, throwing a key counterterrorism ally into turmoil. In Russia, the country Rice prides herself on knowing best, she and Bush appear to have badly misread President Vladimir Putin, who's restored autocratic rule and his country's rivalry with America. Her drive for Middle East democracy has stalled in Lebanon and elsewhere, and other big issues, including the environment and relations with East Asia, have been relegated to the back burner.

In her own State Department, Rice's concept of "transformational diplomacy" is largely forgotten, a fanfare about better public diplomacy has faded and morale is sinking. Rice is under fire for her handling of staffing in Iraq, and the $740 million U.S. Embassy in Baghdad is riddled with problems and has yet to open.

// posted by montag @ 10:59 PM 0 Comments

With American military successes outpacing political gains in Iraq, the Bush administration has lowered its expectation of quickly achieving major steps toward unifying the country, including passage of a long-stymied plan to share oil revenues and holding regional elections.

Instead, administration officials say they are focusing their immediate efforts on several more limited but achievable goals in the hope of convincing Iraqis, foreign governments and Americans that progress is being made toward the political breakthroughs that the military campaign of the past 10 months was supposed to promote.

The short-term American targets include passage of a $48 billion Iraqi budget, something the Iraqis say they are on their way to doing anyway; renewing the United Nations mandate that authorizes an American presence in the country, which the Iraqis have done repeatedly before; and passing legislation to allow thousands of Baath Party members from Saddam Hussein’s era to rejoin the government. A senior Bush administration official described that goal as largely symbolic since rehirings have been quietly taking place already.

// posted by montag @ 4:18 PM 0 Comments

The city of Phoenix in Arizona sits in the middle of a desert that for the past 11 years has been suffering a punishing drought. Temperatures in the city rose above 43C (110F) for a record 30 days this year and water levels in the rivers that supply its 1.5 million people with drinking water are at near-record lows.

A perfect spot then to build what is described as a "year-round watersports paradise", in which visitors will be able to revel in whatever watery pastime takes their fancy.

Scuba diving? No problem. White water rafting? Step this way to the largest man-made white water channel in the world. Surfing your thing? Then come barrel under perfect 12ft waves.

The businessmen behind Waveyard say they plan to recreate the seascape of Indonesia or Hawaii in an area that has just eight inches of rainfall a year.

// posted by montag @ 10:28 PM 0 Comments

Fox was seriously injured when a roadside bomb blew up his vehicle. He was knocked unconscious. His back was injured and lost all vision in his right eye.

A few months later Fox was sent home. His injuries prohibited him from fulfilling three months of his commitment. A few days ago, he received a letter from the military demanding nearly $3,000 of his signing bonus back.

"I tried to do my best and serve my country. I was unfortunately hurt in the process. Now they're telling me they want their money back," he explained....

"I'd do it all over again... because I'm proud of the discipline that I learned. I'm proud to have done something for my country," he said.

But Fox feels like he's already given enough. He'll never be able to pursue his dream of being a police officer because of his wounds and he can't believe he's being asked to return part of his $10,000 signing bonus.

// posted by montag @ 6:07 PM 0 Comments

Brian Elwood, a spokesman for Xcel Energy, said a squirrel came in contact with an overhead transformer and knocked out service to 177 customers Monday. Power was fully restored in just under an hour, and repair crews found the remains of the ''unfortunate squirrel,'' he said.

By coincidence, another squirrel got into a substation 40 miles away in Ironwood, Mich., Monday morning and caused a temporary outage that affected about 1,400 customers in Ironwood and two nearby communities, Elwood said.

// posted by montag @ 6:52 AM 0 Comments

Michael Mardino, no age given, was hurt after a shotgun that was in the back seat of a vehicle he was riding in accidentally went off. The incident occurred Sunday morning on the Thruway near Exit 59.

State Police said Mardino was reaching back to move a tote bag that apparently had became caught in the trigger. The gun accidentally discharged, hitting Mardino in the arm, just below the elbow.

// posted by montag @ 10:07 PM 0 Comments

The 80-year-old leader of a suburban Atlanta megachurch is at the center of a sex scandal of biblical dimensions: He slept with his brother's wife and fathered a child by her.

Members of Archbishop Earl Paulk's family stood at the pulpit of the Cathedral of the Holy Spirit at Chapel Hill Harvester Church a few Sundays ago and revealed the secret exposed by a recent court-ordered paternity test.

In truth, this is not the first - or even the second - sex scandal to engulf Paulk and the independent, charismatic church. But this time, he could be in trouble with the law for lying under oath about the affair.

The living proof of that lie is 34-year-old D.E. Paulk, who for years was known publicly as Earl Paulk's nephew.

// posted by montag @ 9:50 PM 0 Comments

A suicide bomber detonated his explosives as American soldiers were handing out toys to children northeast of Baghdad on Sunday, killing at least three children and three of the troops, U.S. and Iraqi authorities said.

Seven children were wounded in the attack in Baqubah, where U.S. soldiers wrested control from al-Qaida in Iraq last summer.

The attack, along with a series of other blasts in the capital and to the north, underlined the uncertainty of security in Iraq even as the American military said overall violence is down 55 percent since a troop buildup began this year.

Police said the attack occurred as U.S. soldiers were handing out toys, sports equipment and other treats in a playground near Baqubah, 35 miles northeast of Baghdad.

Few details were available, but the U.S. military said it was a “suicide vest attack” and that three American soldiers were killed.

In all, at least 29 people were killed Sunday, including the three soldiers.

The deadliest attack was a parked car bomb targeting a convoy carrying Salman al-Mukhtar, an adviser to the Iraqi finance minister. Al-Mukhtar escaped injury, but the blast in the predominantly Shiite district of Karradah in central Baghdad killed at least 10 people and wounded 21, including two of the official’s bodyguards, according to police and hospital officials.

// posted by montag @ 7:21 PM 0 Comments

Iraqi soldiers detained two American security guards along with several other foreigners traveling Monday in a private security convoy after they opened fire in Baghdad, wounding one woman, an Iraqi military spokesman said.

"We have given orders to our security forces to immediately intervene in case they see any violations by security companies. The members of this security company wounded an innocent woman and they tried to escape the scene, but Iraq forces arrested them," al-Moussawi told The Associated Press.

// posted by montag @ 6:05 PM 0 Comments

The water tankers arrive twice a week in this parched village surrounded by fallow fields stretching into the horizon. The town's wells still pump out a flow, but few villagers dare drink from it unless in desperation.

At the gate of Kayria Fayhan's home, 250 gallons of the trucked-in cargo fill a metal tank for cooking and drinking, sometimes for washing up if itching from the groundwater becomes unbearable.

Even the "clean" water from the tanker is a gamble on some weeks. "They say the water is clean, but sometimes the water is green," Fayhan said. "Sometimes, there's rust floating in it."

Despite the fact that Iraq and U.S. officials have made water projects among their top priorities, the percentage of Iraqis without access to decent water supplies has risen from 50 percent to 70 percent since the start of the U.S.-led war, according to an analysis by Oxfam International last summer. The portion of Iraqis lacking decent sanitation was even worse -- 80 percent.

// posted by montag @ 6:40 PM 0 Comments

Experts say these unorthodox and sometimes desperate responses have become routine in school districts across the country as health care grows more unaffordable for working parents.

The number of uninsured children age 18 and younger grew by 710,000 to a total of 9.4 million in 2006, according to new research by the Urban Institute. Seventy percent of these newly uninsured children came from families earning more than twice the federal poverty level — that's $41,300 for a family of four.

More than 3 million of these uninsured youngsters would get full health insurance under legislation Congress passed to renew and expand the State Children's Health Insurance Program by $35 billion over five years. About 6.6 million children are now covered under the program.

But after watching President Bush twice veto the legislation, citing cost and programmatic concerns, many school officials say the president has misplaced priorities.

// posted by montag @ 6:29 PM 0 Comments

Soldiers who haven’t been downrange yet had better hone their warrior skills because the Army wants to see more combat patches in the ranks.

The Army has targeted 37,000 active-duty soldiers who have yet to serve a combat tour after more than six years of war in Afghanistan and Iraq.

“Everybody wants to go downrange and be part of this because they know the importance of this war,” Cody said, adding, “At the same time, there’s a demand to make sure we have the right noncommissioned officer leaders and officer leaders at our training bases that are training up these young men and women to go to these units.”

The need to get combat vets into training bases forced HRC to look deeper into the ranks for soldiers who could deploy and have not.

// posted by montag @ 6:13 PM 0 Comments

The group, most often referred to as RAM, has sent health expeditions to countries like Guyana, India, Tanzania and Haiti, but increasingly its work is in the United States, where 47 million people — more than 15 percent of the population — live without health insurance. Residents of remote rural areas are less likely than their urban and suburban counterparts to have health insurance and more likely to be in fair or poor health. According to the Department of Health and Human Services, nearly half of all adults in rural America are living with at least one chronic condition. Other research has found that in these areas, where hospitals and primary-care providers are in short supply, rates of arthritis, hypertension, heart ailments, diabetes and major depression are higher than in urban areas.

And so each summer, shortly after the Virginia-Kentucky District Fair and Horse Show wraps up at the fairgrounds, members of Virginia Lions Clubs start bleaching the premises, readying them for RAM’s volunteers, who, working in animal stalls and beneath makeshift tents, provide everything from teeth cleaning and free eyeglasses to radiology and minor surgery.

// posted by montag @ 4:17 PM 0 Comments

“Musharraf thinks that Bush has certain weaknesses that can be manipulated. I would say that President Musharraf doesn’t think highly of President Bush, but his interests force him to do business with the U.S. president.”

// posted by montag @ 12:48 PM 0 Comments

What is known right now is that three of the current candidates have been treated for cancer — Mr. Giuliani, Senator John McCain and former Senator Fred Thompson. Voters have a right to know about all of the candidates’ health before they decide who should take on the grueling burdens of the White House.

// posted by montag @ 11:01 PM 0 Comments

The Giuliani story, by contrast, is relatively virgin territory. And with the filing of a lawsuit by a vengeful eyewitness who was fired from her job, it may just have gained its own reincarnation of Linda Tripp.

// posted by montag @ 10:16 PM 0 Comments

Garrett Anderson with the Illinois National Guard, for example, has been fighting the VA since October 15, 2005. Shrapnel tore through his head and body after a roadside bomb blew up the truck he was driving. He lost his right arm.

The VA initially rejected his claim, saying his severe shrapnel wounds were "not service connected."

He lost part of his skull in the blast and part of his brain was damaged. Half of his left arm was amputated and some of the fingers were blown off his right hand.

Once he got out of the hospital, he was unable to hold a job. He anticipated receiving a monthly VA disability check sufficient to cover his small-town lifestyle in Washington, Illinois.

Instead, he got a check for far less than expected. After pressing for answers, Ziegel finally received a letter from the VA that rated his injuries: 80 percent for facial disfigurement, 60 percent for left arm amputation, a mere 10 percent for head trauma and nothing for his left lobe brain injury, right eye blindness and jaw fracture.

// posted by montag @ 4:39 PM 0 Comments

Today, Pakistan is in crisis once more. Musharraf has managed to alienate secular democrats and radical Islamists alike. Thousands of opposition activists are now in prison, two-thirds of Pakistan's senior judges are under house arrest, and Musharraf has suspended the constitution.

As Musharraf clings to power, we continue to lose traction in the battle against extremism in Pakistan. A recent opinion poll found that most Pakistanis are so alienated that they give Osama bin Laden higher approval ratings than they give to Musharraf -- or to you, George.

Osama thanks you.

And what are you doing about all this?

Nothing! You're not calling on Musharraf to step down and hold elections, you're not threatening to pull the plug on any U.S. military aid, you're not opening up links to the grass-roots democratic opposition. Which means there's little chance that we'll get what we say we want -- and what most Pakistanis want: a moderate, democratic Pakistani government.

Instead, our policies will continue to inspire and strengthen Islamic extremism.

Look, George, I'm not saying you consciously meant for things to turn out this way. But as Freud said, there's no such thing as an accident.

// posted by montag @ 1:34 PM 0 Comments

"For months, Congress has delayed action on supplemental war funding because some in Congress want to make a political statement about the war," he said, criticizing Democrats for leaving for their Thanksgiving break without approving the war funds.

A bill passed this week by the House of Representatives would have given Bush about a quarter of the $196 billion he wants for the wars while setting a goal that all U.S. combat soldiers withdraw from Iraq by December 15, 2008.

Republicans stopped the measure in the Senate.

Republicans stopped the measure in the Senate.

// posted by montag @ 1:23 PM 0 Comments

"It's a strawman to say that a country like Canada could not be responsible for safe drugs to be brought into our country. Many of them are manufactured in Canada, as you know."

// posted by montag @ 1:11 PM 1 Comments

The agency that distributes billions of dollars in American foreign aid cannot "reasonably ensure" that its money does not wind up in terrorist hands, an internal audit has concluded.

The United States Agency for International Development funded groups with ties to terrorism on at least two occasions, the agency's inspector general found in an audit. That included approving $180,000 for a Bosnian group whose president was on a "watch list" that barred him from entering the United States, and $1 million for an aid "partner" who later pleaded guilty to lying to federal agents about his involvement with a disciple of Osama bin Laden.

// posted by montag @ 12:22 PM 0 Comments

Eric Barton, a former manager in Iraq for EOD Technology, was accused by the Army Suspension and Debarment Office of helping his company win convoy security work last year while having an affair with Air Force Capt. Sherrie Remington, a contracting officer, according to records released to USA TODAY under the Freedom of Information Act.

Remington gave Barton information about previous security contracts and awarded his company seven contracts between January and March of 2006, according to the records from the Army Suspension and Debarment Office.

Remington gave two contracts to EODT without asking for other bids, and approved three other contracts for the Tennessee-based company even though other firms had lower bids, the records show. In contracting files, Remington said the lower-priced competitors were either too busy with other work or had problems delivering on past contracts.

// posted by montag @ 7:14 PM 0 Comments

Senate GOP Blocks $50B War Funding Package

// posted by montag @ 6:09 PM 0 Comments

Consider only this number: Interest costs on Iraq-related debt will be more than $23 billion for fiscal 2008. That sum is almost exactly the amount separating Bush and Congress on spending levels for the entire budget now being debated.

// posted by montag @ 7:18 AM 0 Comments

Reflecting the deep divisions within Congress over granting legal immunity to telephone companies for cooperating with the Bush administration’s program of wiretapping without warrants, the Senate Judiciary Committee approved a new domestic surveillance law on Thursday that sidestepped the issue.

By a 10 to 9 vote, the committee approved an overhaul of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act that dropped a key provision for immunity for telecommunications companies that another committee had already approved. The Senate leadership will have to decide how to deal with the immunity question on the Senate floor.

On Thursday night, the House voted 227 to 189, generally along party lines, to approve its own version of the FISA bill, which also does not include immunity.

// posted by montag @ 6:51 AM 0 Comments

On a spring day in 2004, he again set off for Baghdad. He never returned. His body was found on the side of a road. He was shot to death, his truck torched and destroyed. At 23, Abdulrasool was a widow.

"I lost my husband, father of my two boys and my only support in this world," she said.

Alone to raise her family, she fell into despair. Her way out was to remarry, again and again and again. She betrothed herself to men who provided dowries and a sense of security and comfort, if only fleetingly.

"It has become a way of life to me," she said.

These temporary marriages — called mutaa or "pleasure" marriages — are said to be on the rise in Iraq, where the ravages of war have made widows of thousands of women.

// posted by montag @ 7:16 PM 0 Comments

Officials seized 2,400 bottles late last month during warehouse raids in Nashville and Lynchburg, the southern Tennessee town where the whiskey is distilled.

Authorities are still determining how much of the liquor will be disposed of, and how much can be sold at auction.

Tennessee law requires officials to destroy whiskey that cannot be sold legally in the state, such as bottles designed for sale overseas and those with broken seals.

"Jack never did anything wrong, and the whiskey itself is innocent."

// posted by montag @ 6:07 PM 1 Comments

“They don’t want to encourage another military coup, but they are also beginning to understand that Musharraf has become part of the problem,” said one former official with knowledge of the debates inside the Bush administration.

// posted by montag @ 6:51 AM 0 Comments

On this night in his dream, like every night, Stephens will keep a promise -- to his soldiers and, in particular, to the mother of a blue-eyed gunner named Danny.

Nearly four years ago, in January 2004, the N.C. National Guard platoon sergeant stood in an Army classroom facing that mother and the families of the 40 men he was about to lead into war.

He stood 6-foot-4 and infantry-lean, and in the confident voice familiar to his men, he made a promise: I'll bring your sons home.

He had wanted it to be true.

Even then, Stephens knew he was lying....

....Stephens, 40, would be anointed a hero, praised by the Pentagon and the media, earning one of the nation's highest honors for a day of valor that left him weeping under a desert night, his uniform soaked in another man's blood, his lessons about sacrifice and heroism only beginning.

In the years after his deployment to Iraq, Stephens would see how a single firefight would change his soldiers, change himself and fundamentally alter the life of one Jacksonville mother. He would come home from war to find he had become a different man, one seeking help from an Army that didn't know how to give it. He would try to fulfill a promise he had no right to make and shoulder the wounds of a grieving woman and a platoon of haunted men.

// posted by montag @ 7:14 PM 0 Comments

A separate military review of the Sept. 16 shootings concluded that all of the killings were unjustified and potentially criminal. One of the military investigators said the F.B.I. was being generous to Blackwater in characterizing any of the killings as justifiable.

// posted by montag @ 6:52 AM 0 Comments

The town is run by deals among its anointed leaders, nearly all of them former Sunni Muslim insurgents. None was elected. No one pays any mind to what might be happening in Iraq’s Shiite-dominated parliament in Baghdad. In fact, residents assume that the elected central government will never help them.

Instead, the insurgents-turned-leaders depend on an influx of money from the U.S. or from the provincial government to keep Islamic extremists from dominating the town again. So far, the U.S. military has spent $1 million, the cost of one of the military’s newest armored vehicles, on reconstruction projects and salaries for residents to secure the town and its surrounding area — 30,000 people in all. If the U.S. plan works, the next million will come from the Shiite-led provincial government.

U.S. officials acknowledge that their approach is tenuous, but one that so far has produced a big drop in violence. No U.S. soldier has been attacked since June, and they can now walk in town with some assurance of safety.

// posted by montag @ 7:50 PM 0 Comments

“The U.S. Army strictly prohibits the use of waterboarding during intelligence investigations by any of its members. It is specifically prohibited by Field Manual 2-22.3 and is not a sanctioned interrogation technique in any training manual or any instructions to soldiers in the field,” the statement says.

// posted by montag @ 7:34 PM 1 Comments

Judith Regan, the book publisher who was fired by the News Corporation last year, asserts in a lawsuit filed today that a senior executive at the media conglomerate encouraged her to mislead federal investigators about her relationship with Bernard B. Kerik during his bid to become homeland security secretary in late 2004.

The lawsuit asserts that the News Corporation executive wanted to protect the presidential aspirations of former Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, Mr. Kerik’s mentor, who had appointed him New York City police commissioner and had recommended him for the federal post.

"Defendants were well aware that Regan had a personal relationship with Kerik," the complaint says. "In fact, a senior executive in the News Corporation organization told Regan that he believed she had information about Kerik that, if disclosed, would harm Giuliani’s presidential campaign. This executive advised Regan to lie to, and to withhold information from, investigators concerning Kerik."

// posted by montag @ 7:15 PM 0 Comments

Bush called it a matter of setting priorities in a time of war.

"The majority was elected on a pledge of fiscal responsibility, but so far it's acting like a teenager with a new credit card,"

// posted by montag @ 7:01 PM 0 Comments

The Walter Reed Army Medical Center commander who was fired this year following revelations of substandard conditions for patients has been named the new commanding general at Fort Detrick.

According to an Army news release, Maj. Gen. George Weightman will also take command of the U.S. Army Medical Research and Materiel Command, which is headquartered at Fort Detrick.

// posted by montag @ 6:55 AM 0 Comments

When N.C. Baptists meet this week for their annual session, they will likely kick out a Charlotte church that has said it welcomes homosexuals as they are -- a violation of controversial rules passed at last year's state convention.

If all goes as expected, the 4,000-plus attendees at the Baptist State Convention will vote Tuesday morning to cast out Myers Park Baptist -- but only after short speeches from two of the church's leaders. One -- Nancy Walker, secretary to the church's board of deacons -- is a lesbian.

"It's important for our particular witness to be made," said the Rev. Stephen Shoemaker, Myers Park's senior minister and the other scheduled speaker Tuesday. "We think the local (Baptist) church ought to be free to interpret Scripture itself ... And we believe in the spirit of Christ, who allowed all to come to the table."

// posted by montag @ 7:44 PM 0 Comments

A Marine captain, in what he described as the “C-Y-A part” of his briefing, ordered dozens of men in his company to get their story straight in case investigators asked questions about a 2006 firefight that might have left Iraqi women and children dead in the crossfire.

“Earlier up on the roof, there was like five women and little girls, OK? We f---ed that area up,” Capt. Shane Cote, 35, told his Marines, after a day that included at least nine firefights in 14 hours. “If we did any collateral damage, there will be people here asking. Your answer, for the sake of yourselves — and me — better be you were f---ing shooting at muzzle flashes.”

His Marines grunted out their affirmatives, “ooh-rahs” all around. They got it.

One of them even got it on tape.

A secret recording of the briefing (Warning: Explicit language), obtained by Marine Corps Times, was made by a sergeant who believes the captain was ordering his men to lie about the shooting.

// posted by montag @ 7:13 PM 0 Comments

In a Veterans Day ceremony north of Baghdad on Sunday, 178 service members became U.S. citizens.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff administered the Oath of Allegiance at Sustainer Theater on Logistical Support Area Anaconda, the Army announced in a press release Monday.

“I can’t think of people who are more deserving of citizenship than those who are fighting to defend the country even before they are citizens. They understand that freedoms don’t come free and they are willing to make sacrifices even before they reap the benefits of citizenship,” Chertoff said in the release

// posted by montag @ 6:47 PM 0 Comments

Two Oklahoma men whose sons were killed in Iraq criticized U.S. involvement in the war during a small protest Monday at the state Capitol.

Warren Henthorn of Choctaw and John Scripsick of Wayne praised veterans of all wars for their service.

But they said the Iraq war should never have happened and it is past time to end the United States’ participation....

....Also speaking out against the war was Dr. Katherine Scheirman of Oklahoma City, who retired as an Air Force colonel in 2006. She was chief of medical operations at Ramstein Air Force Base in Germany, which has treated most of the soldiers injured in Iraq.

She said veterans who served in Iraq have shown courage, as have those who are speaking out against the war.

“It doesn’t take courage to be like Rush Limbaugh or Bill O’Reilly or Richard Cheney and talk tough and warmonger when you haven’t put yourself or a member of your family on the line,” Scheirman said, referring to radio and television personalities and the vice president.

// posted by montag @ 6:32 PM 1 Comments

"The fact of the matter is, we all want to bribe a politician. We all thought it'd take a Mercedes or a Porsche. Nobody knew you could buy a politician for the cost of a used riding lawn mower."

// posted by montag @ 1:23 PM 0 Comments

Iraqi officials are concerned about the past behavior of many of the men now working with the Americans, citing problems arising from the infiltration of the police by Shiite militias. "We ended up with a police force that is not loyal to the government and to the country," said Sami al-Askiri, a Shiite legislator and Maliki adviser. "If we copy this and do it with Sunnis, we will just create another problem."

"We have to take the Sunnis inside the police and the army. They are part of the Iraqi society, but we have to check them, we have to check all their backgrounds," Askiri said. "If we do this the wrong way, we will end up with another militia inside the police force, but a Sunni one, not a Shiite one."

// posted by montag @ 12:40 PM 0 Comments

US military officials are putting huge pressure on interrogators who question Iraqi insurgents to find incriminating evidence pointing to Iran, it was claimed last night.

Micah Brose, a privately contracted interrogator working for American forces in Iraq, near the Iranian border, told The Observer that information on Iran is 'gold'. The claim comes after Washington imposed sanctions on Iran last month, citing both its nuclear ambitions and its Revolutionary Guards' alleged support of Shia insurgents in Iraq. Last week the US military freed nine Iranians held in Iraq, including two it had accused of links to the Revolutionary Guards' Qods Force.

Brose, 30, who extracts information from detainees in Iraq, said: 'They push a lot for us to establish a link with Iran. They have pre-categories for us to go through, and by the sheer volume of categories there's clearly a lot more for Iran than there is for other stuff. Of all the recent requests I've had, I'd say 60 to 70 per cent are about Iran.

'It feels a lot like, if you get something and Iran's not involved, it's a let down.' He added: 'I've had people say to me, "They're really pushing the Iran thing. It's like, shit, you know." '

He denied ever being asked to fabricate evidence, adding: 'We're not asked to manufacture information, we're asked to find it. But if a detainee wants to tell me what I want to hear so he can get out of jail... you know what I'm saying.'

// posted by montag @ 12:32 AM 0 Comments

An Iraqi taxi driver was shot and killed on Saturday by a guard with DynCorp International, a private security company hired to protect American diplomats here, when a DynCorp convoy rolled past a knot of traffic on an exit ramp in Baghdad, the Iraqi Interior Ministry said Sunday.

Three witnesses said the taxi had posed no threat to the convoy, and one of them, an Iraqi Army sergeant who inspected the car afterward, said it contained no weapons or explosive devices.

“They just killed a man and drove away,” Maj. Gen. Abdul-Karim Khalaf, an Interior Ministry spokesman, said in his office on Sunday afternoon. He added later, “We have opened an investigation, and we have contacted the company and told them about our accusations, and we are still waiting for their response.”

// posted by montag @ 10:54 PM 1 Comments

As chairman of the House transportation committee, Alaska Congressman Don Young flew at least three times to upstate New York aboard a sleek jet owned by Robert Congel, an ambitious shopping mall developer seeking federal highway dollars.

With Young’s help, Congel got millions of dollars to boost his dream of building the largest mall in North America. The veteran Republican congressman got something, too: more than $33,000 in political donations from Congel, his family and his associates.

For Young, the Congel story was hardly unusual. Time after time, Young approved millions of dollars for highway projects for people who in turn fattened his campaign coffers.

With money pouring in from transportation interests, Young amassed $6.5 million in political contributions from 2001 to 2005. Facing weak political opposition at home, he didn’t need much for his campaign. Instead, Young tapped his campaign fund to travel the country, often lavishly and in corporate jets, to meet with more developers and view their proposed highway projects.

// posted by montag @ 7:33 PM 0 Comments

Efraim Halevy, the former head of the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad, titled his memoirs "Man in the Shadows." But now that he's out in the sunlight, the 72-year-old retired spy chief has some surprisingly contrarian things to say about Iran and Syria. The gist of his message is that rather than constantly ratcheting up the rhetoric of confrontation, the United States and Israel should be looking for ways to establish a creative dialogue with these adversaries.

Halevy is a legendary figure in Israel because of his nearly 40 years of service as an intelligence officer, culminating in his years as Mossad's director from 1998 to 2003. He managed Israel's secret relationship with Jordan for more than a decade, and he became so close to King Hussein that the two personally negotiated the 1994 agreement paving the way for a peace treaty. So when Halevy talks about the utility of secret diplomacy, he knows whereof he speaks.

// posted by montag @ 6:32 PM 0 Comments

Privacy no longer can mean anonymity, says Donald Kerr, the principal deputy director of national intelligence. Instead, it should mean that government and businesses properly safeguard people's private communications and financial information.

// posted by montag @ 6:16 PM 0 Comments

Washington Mutual Inc. got what it wanted in 2005: a revised bankruptcy code that no longer lets people walk away from credit card bills.

The largest US savings and loan didn't count on a housing recession. The new bankruptcy laws are helping drive foreclosures to a record as homeowners default on mortgages and struggle to pay credit card debts that might have been wiped out under the old code, said Jay Westbrook, a professor of business law at the University of Texas Law School in Austin and a former adviser to the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.

"Be careful what you wish for," Westbrook said. "They wanted to make sure that people kept paying their credit cards, and what they're getting is more foreclosures."

Washington Mutual, Bank of America Corp., JPMorgan Chase & Co., and Citigroup Inc. spent $25 million in 2004 and 2005 lobbying for a legislative agenda that included changes in bankruptcy laws to protect credit card profits, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan Washington group that tracks political donations.

The banks are still paying for that decision. The surge in foreclosures has cut the value of securities backed by mortgages and led to more than $40 billion of writedowns for US financial institutions. It also reached to the top echelons of the financial services industry.

// posted by montag @ 1:35 PM 1 Comments

But what about accountability for Wall Street CEOs who line their pockets while making stupid decisions that rob shareholders and pensioners of billions of dollars? Recently, corporate boards have been fundamentally misinterpreting the phrase "the buck stops here" -- and handing the bucks over to their miserably performing bosses....

....The real frustration is that there's so little that can be done. Shareholders supposedly have access to the courts for a remedy, but they won't get far. A stockholder suit filed more than two years ago challenging the Morgan Stanley payoffs languishes in court. The CEO-and-director club knows that pro-business judges in the corporate haven of Delaware and elsewhere in the legal system will protect them. Shareholder suits against Time Warner's Levin got nothing back from him.

The government -- forget it. The SEC, and even Congress, appear to be getting ready to cut back shareholder rights and court access even more. And the Justice Department is busy defending waterboarding and targeting Democratic activists. Why do you think corporate bigwigs behave so badly so often?

// posted by montag @ 12:43 PM 0 Comments

As the insurgency in Iraq escalated in the spring of 2004, American officials entrusted an Iraqi businessman with issuing weapons to Iraqi police cadets training to help quell the violence.

By all accounts, the businessman, Kassim al-Saffar, a veteran of the Iran-Iraq war, did well at distributing the Pentagon-supplied weapons from the Baghdad Police Academy armory he managed for a military contractor. But, co-workers say, he also turned the armory into his own private arms bazaar with the seeming approval of some American officials and executives, selling AK-47 assault rifles, Glock pistols and heavy machine guns to anyone with cash in hand — Iraqi militias, South African security guards and even American contractors.

“This was the craziest thing in the world,” said John Tisdale, a retired Air Force master sergeant who managed an adjacent warehouse. “They were taking weapons away by the truckload.”

Activities at that armory and other warehouses help explain how the American military lost track of some 190,000 pistols and automatic rifles supplied by the United States to Iraq’s security forces in 2004 and 2005, as auditors discovered in the past year.

// posted by montag @ 11:18 PM 0 Comments

In the six years of compromising our principles since 9/11, our democracy has so steadily been defined down that it now can resemble the supposedly aspiring democracies we’ve propped up in places like Islamabad. Time has taken its toll. We’ve become inured to democracy-lite. That’s why a Mukasey can be elevated to power with bipartisan support and we barely shrug.

This is a signal difference from the Vietnam era, and not necessarily for the better. During that unpopular war, disaffected Americans took to the streets and sometimes broke laws in an angry assault on American governmental institutions. The Bush years have brought an even more effective assault on those institutions from within. While the public has not erupted in riots, the executive branch has subverted the rule of law in often secretive increments. The results amount to a quiet coup, ultimately more insidious than a blatant putsch like General Musharraf’s.

More Machiavellian still, Mr. Bush has constantly told the world he’s championing democracy even as he strangles it. Mr. Bush repeated the word “freedom” 27 times in roughly 20 minutes at his 2005 inauguration, and even presided over a “Celebration of Freedom” concert on the Ellipse hosted by Ryan Seacrest. It was an Orwellian exercise in branding, nothing more. The sole point was to give cover to our habitual practice of cozying up to despots (especially those who control the oil spigots) and to our own government’s embrace of warrantless wiretapping and torture, among other policies that invert our values.

// posted by montag @ 9:39 PM 0 Comments

A former intelligence officer and a pious Sunni, Hajji Abu Abed has the aura of a mafia don. And for Abu Abed, like a don, connections are everything. His office is decorated with pictures of him hugging US officers, including the senior commander in Iraq, General David Petraeus, and a Captain Cosper.

On Abu Abed's desk stands a glass box containing a black suede cavalry hat and a letter proclaiming him an honorary US cavalryman. In a silver frame is a picture of him with a female interpreter in military uniform.

As the Hajji settled into his office, a long line of men formed at the door. From a small purse tucked into his belt he dispensed handfuls of Iraqi dinars to his followers as they filed through. He is the only figure of authority many of them have seen for several years.

One old man asked him for an electricity generator; another, carrying a large file, asked him about a US construction contract that he was promised. Two young boys were seated next to him. One had brought him a leather ammunition belt, and the other handed him the keys to a new pick-up truck Abu Abed had ordered.

The Americans pay him $400 (£200) a month for each fighter he provides, he said, and he had 600 registered. His men are awed by his courage, his piety and his neurotic rages.

Abu Abed walked into the scuffle. The detained man was not the target. Someone had overheard him saying Abu Abed's men were "worse than al-Qaida" after Bakr's men raided the house.

Furious at the insult, Abu Abed aimed his gun at the brother. "Al-Qaida is better than us, huh? Did you forget when the bodies were piled in the streets?"

Some neighbours intervened, and the man was released. His brother grabbed him by the arm and pushed him inside.

Abu Abed, shaking his head and waving his gun, walked back to his car, murmuring "Al-Qaida, better than us..."

He stopped in mid-stride and turned to charge with his men back into the house. They pushed the gate open and ran inside firing their weapons in the air. In the dark kitchen, they grabbed the man again, pushed him to the floor and kicked him. The women were screaming and crying. One of them pulled away her headscarf and wailed, holding on to the man's ripped shirt as Abu Abed and the gunmen dragged him out, kicking and slapping him. Other fighters fired their Kalashnikovs in the air. The man was shoved into a car, as was his brother.

Abu Abed, screaming and pointing his gun, charged at the crowd. "Qaida is better than me? I will show you!"

He held his gun high and quoted al-Hajjaj, a 7th-century ruler of Iraq, in a hoarse voice: "Oh, people of Iraq, I had come to you with two swords, one is for mercy which I have left back in the desert, and this one" - he pointed his gun at the crowd -"is the sword of oppression, which I kept in my hand."

// posted by montag @ 5:28 PM 0 Comments

The Bishops of the United Methodist Church approved a resolution calling on Bush, Congress and leaders of the other coalition partners to begin the “immediate safe and full withdrawal” of all troops, declare that there will be no permanent military bases in Iraq, increase support for veterans of all wars and initiate a reconstruction plan to address the humanitarian, social and educational needs of the Iraqi people.

The 125 current and retired bishops now meeting in the Great Smoky Mountains in North Carolina represent more than 11 million Methodists worldwide – including the current occupant of the White House, a member of Highland Park United Methodist Church in Dallas.

In issuing the call, the bishops said their position is based on the denomination’s belief that “war is incompatible with the teachings and examples of Christ,” and on the call of Jesus Christ for “his followers to be peacemakers.”

“Every day that the war continues, more soldiers and innocent civilians are killed with no end in sight to the violence, bloodshed and carnage,” the bishops said in their resolution.

// posted by montag @ 1:08 PM 0 Comments

Whenever you read that a candidate “values loyalty above all else” — run for the hills. Loyalty is a terribly important consideration if you’re choosing a pet, but not a cabinet member.

How about if this time we try for a president who would recruit gifted people who can accomplish great things, as opposed to a room full of dopes who will never write tell-all memoirs?

// posted by montag @ 12:39 PM 0 Comments

These days, you can forget that old-style GOP rhetoric about "values," "human dignity" and the "culture of life." Because the GOP has a new litmus test for its nominees: Will you or will you not protect U.S. officials who order the torture of prisoners?

// posted by montag @ 11:26 PM 0 Comments

“You people are really nuts... There’s kids dying in the war, the price of oil right now — there’s better things in this world to be thinking about than who served Hillary Clinton at Maid-Rite and who got a tip and who didn’t get a tip.”

// posted by montag @ 6:06 PM 0 Comments

According to Gallup, if you lump together the Americans who "strongly" approve of Bush as president with those who only "moderately" feel one way or the other about him, you end up with about half the population. That leaves a full 50 percent who "strongly disapprove" of Bush -- as high a level of intense repudiation as Gallup has ever recorded in its decades of polling.

Gallup has been asking the "strongly disapprove" question since the Lyndon Johnson administration. The only time the polling firm has measured such strong give-this-guy-the-hook sentiment was in February 1974, at the height of the Watergate scandal, when Nixon's "strongly disapprove" number was measured at 48 percent. Bush beats him by a nose, but the margin of error makes the contest for "Most Reviled President, Modern Era" a statistical tie.

The Gallup Poll found that among Bush's shrinking Republican base, he has unusually strong support. Independents, though, have joined Democrats in the Bush Derangement Syndrome clinic: They, too, "strongly disapprove" of the job the president is doing.

Bush didn't come by this distinction with help from family connections or the Supreme Court. No, he earned it.

// posted by montag @ 7:15 AM 0 Comments

"There's a feeling among the Chinese public that their nation is a great power, and great powers have aircraft carriers," said Andrew S. Erickson, a civilian scholar at the China Maritime Studies Institute of the Naval War College in Rhode Island. "We've seen grass-roots campaigns that say, 'Everyone contribute some money so we can have an aircraft carrier.' "

Top People's Liberation Army officers voiced interest in building aircraft carriers to visiting senior U.S. military commanders this year, peppering them with questions.

"We said to them, essentially, 'Knock yourselves out. It ain't as easy as it looks,' " Adm. Timothy J. Keating, the head of the U.S. Pacific Command, said in July. "They acknowledged that and said, 'We reserve the right to develop aircraft carriers if we so choose.' They said to us there is no more prominent and visible signal of a nation's resolve and might than an aircraft carrier coming into a port."

// posted by montag @ 7:53 PM 0 Comments

Anti-war vets have been banned from marching in the 11th Veterans Day Parade in Long Beach.

A participation application filed by Iraq Veterans Against the War, Veterans for Peace and Military Families Speak Out was turned down because organizers want Saturday’s parade free from politics.

“They do not fit the spirit of the parade,

// posted by montag @ 7:43 PM 0 Comments

Veterans make up one in four homeless people in the U.S., though they are only 11 percent of the general adult population, according to a report to be released Thursday.

And homelessness is not just a problem among middle-age and elderly veterans. Younger veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan are trickling into shelters and soup kitchens seeking services, treatment or help with finding a job.

// posted by montag @ 7:39 PM 0 Comments

The Status of any given family is raised not by who has the most resources, but by who distributes the most resources.

An audit by the National Archives inspector general concluded that the library in Simi Valley was unable to properly account for more than 80,000 objects out of its collection of some 100,000 artifacts, the Los Angeles Times reported on its Web site Wednesday night.

// posted by montag @ 6:36 PM 0 Comments