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Four Marines Killed; U.S. Toll Now 3,114
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - Four U.S. Marines were killed in fighting in Anbar province, the military said Thursday. The Marines, who were assigned to Multi-National Force - West, died Wednesday from wounds sustained due to enemy action in two separate incidents in the insurgent stronghold west of Baghdad, according to a statement. The deaths raised to at least 3,114 members of the U.S. military who have died since the Iraq war started in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.
The U.S. Embassy, meanwhile, said U.S. officials were investigating a previously undisclosed Jan. 31 incident involving a civilian helicopter. A military official in Washington said the helicopter either crashed or was forced to land by gunfire. The passengers and crew were rescued by another U.S. helicopter, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation was ongoing.
If confirmed, it would be the sixth helicopter to crash or be forced down in Iraq since Jan. 20, prompting the U.S. military to review flight operations. The most recent crash occurred Wednesday when a Marine CH-46 Sea Knight went down northwest of Baghdad, killing seven people.

http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9165


Contract worker killed in Iraq
Donald Tolfree of St. Charles killed Monday
By Terry Camp / WJRT
SAGINAW COUNTY - A Mid-Michigan community is stunned over the death of a contract worker in Iraq. Donald Tolfree, 52, who lived in St. Charles, was killed in Iraq on Monday.
His daughter says he was working for KBR, a subsidiary of Halliburton.
Tolfree's daughter spoke by phone Thursday and she is not sure exactly what happened to her dad, who was driving trucks across Iraq.
"I've known Don all my life," said friend Wayne Fuller. "We grew up together."
Tolfree was a 1973 graduate of Chesaning High School. He was a truck driver.
In early January, Tolfree left for Iraq to drive trucks for Houston-based Halliburton subsidiary KBR, the largest contractor in the war-torn country.
"He never had (any) bad words to say about anyone," Fuller said. "He was always smiling and laughing and joking around. I just couldn't believe it."

http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9170



AWOL Soldier To Spend 10 Months In Jail
Associated Press
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. -- A soldier who went AWOL before his second deployment to Iraq said he expects to be sentenced to less than a year in prison under a pretrial agreement with military prosecutors.
Spc. Mark Wilkerson of Colorado Springs said he agreed to plead guilty to desertion and missing a troop movement in exchange for a sentence of up to 10 months, The Gazette reported in Tuesday's editions.
He was to be sentenced at a Feb. 22 court-martial at Fort Hood, Texas, where he has been since surrendering in August.
Wilkerson, 23, was deployed to Iraq at the start of the March 2003 invasion. He said he applied for conscientious objector status after he returned because his views of the war changed.
His request was denied and he was told his appeal would not be considered until his unit returned from another deployment starting in January 2005. He said he fled in December 2004.

http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9166


British soldier killed in Iraq
Guardian
A roadside bomb has killed one British soldier and wounded three others in southern Iraq, the British military said.
The attack occurred around 1pm local time at an junction about three miles south-east of Basra, said a spokeswoman for British forces in Iraq.
The soldier was not immediately identified.
The latest casualty bring to 101 the number of British military deaths attributed to hostile action since the invasion in 2003, according to the Ministry of Defence.
Another 31 deaths were due to road accidents, illness, natural causes or unexplained causes, the ministry said - for a total of at least 132 since the beginning of the war.
Britain has about 7,500 troops in Iraq, based mostly in Iraq's second-largest city of Basra, 340 miles south-east of Baghdad.

http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9171


3 U.S. soldiers killed in Anbar province
Associated Press
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Three U.S. soldiers were killed in fighting in Iraq's western Anbar province, the military said Friday.
The soldiers, who were assigned to Multi-National Force — West, died Thursday from wounds sustained while conducting combat operations in the insurgent stronghold west of Baghdad, the military said in a statement.
Their names were withheld pending notification of relatives.
The deaths raised to at least 3,117 members of the U.S. military who have died since the Iraq war started in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.

http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9168



Democrats note Cheney incident on their calendar
Corpus Christi Caller-Times
U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi sent out the Democrats' 2007 calendar this week, which includes the House vote schedule, holidays, commemorative days, the dates when key economic data is published, the anniversaries of key acts of Congress and other special events.
The e-mail from Pelosi's office reads, "Attached is a calendar for 2007 that has been prepared by Speaker Pelosi's office. It was originally e-mailed out to Democratic offices in mid-December, but we wanted to e-mail it out again to ensure that all offices had seen it. We hope this calendar helps Democratic offices to plan press events and other activities for their member throughout the year."
Included in the calendar is a Feb. 11 entry reminding House members of the anniversary of the day Vice President Dick Cheney accidentally shot fellow hunter Harry Whittington at the Armstrong Ranch.
The item reads simply, "Cheney hunting accident (2006)."

http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9167


Farewell: Centerville soldier laid to rest
By Joe Burns / The Cape Codder
CENTERVILLE, MA -- “Ask not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country.”
John F. Kennedy uttered those immortal words in his inaugural address, and 46 years later, on a biting cold February morning at the Hyannis church were JFK came to pray, a community came together to say goodbye to a young Centerville soldier who gave his life for his country.
Sgt. Alexander Fuller, 21, was killed in Iraq on Jan. 26 while leading a convoy. On Feb. 6 he was laid to rest. St, Francis Xavier Church in Hyannis was filled to capacity as family, friends, public officials and strangers who felt for the fallen soldier and those left behind, came to bid a final goodbye.
“I’m here to pay my respects,” said Paul Hamel of Centerville, a Korean War veteran who stood in the cold, across the street from the church.

http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9169


Slideshow

http://util.wickedlocal.com/multimedia/capecodder/fullerfuneral/

An Iraqi policeman mans a machine gun as he oversees traffic at a vehicle checkpoint in Baghdad's Shite enclave of Sadr City, Iraq, Thursday, Feb. 8, 2007. U.S. officials confirmed the new security operation which will involve about 90,000 Iraqi and American troops and is seen by many as a last chance to curb Iraq's sectarian war was under way after a delayed start. (AP Photo/Adil al-Khazali)

http://news.yahoo.com/photos/ss/events/iraq/082701iraqplane/im:/070208/481/bag11602081218



US strike kills 8 Kurd soldiers in northern Iraq
By Ibon Villelabeitia Fri Feb 9, 11:25 AM ET
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - A U.S. air strike killed eight Kurdish Peshmerga soldiers and wounded six others in northern
Iraq on Friday in what appeared to be a "friendly fire" incident, Kurdish officials said.
The U.S. military said American forces hunting suspected al Qaeda militants killed five armed men during a raid in the northern city of Mosul after American ground forces received small-arms fire from a bunker near the targeted building.
The men, who had ignored warnings in Arabic and Kurdish to put down their weapons, turned out to be Kurdish policemen, the military said in a statement, adding that U.S. forces expressed their "deepest sympathies" to the families of the victims.
Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd who is also a close U.S. ally, has asked the Americans for more information on the incident, which comes as Kurdish soldiers prepare to deploy in Baghdad as part of a U.S.-backed plan to secure the capital.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/iraq_dc;_ylt=Al6Pl0HIuvaDspPOFtEq1SjlWMcF



7 GOP Senators Back War Debate
Lawmakers Had Blocked Action on Troop Resolution
By Shailagh Murray / Washington Post
Senate Republicans who earlier this week helped block deliberations on a resolution opposing President Bush's new troop deployments in Iraq changed course yesterday and vowed to use every tactic at their disposal to ensure a full and open debate.
In a letter distributed yesterday evening to Senate leaders, John W. Warner (Va.), Chuck Hagel (Neb.) and five other GOP supporters of the resolution threatened to attach their measure to any bill sent to the floor in the coming weeks. Noting that the war is the "most pressing issue of our time," the senators declared: "We will explore all of our options under the Senate procedures and practices to ensure a full and open debate."
The letter sent to Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) was not more specific about the Republican senators' strategy for reviving the war debate. But under the chamber's rules, senators have wide latitude in slowing the progress of legislation and in offering amendments, regardless of whether they have anything to do with the bill.

http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latestnews/index.php?id=9164



The Site of the Week

Listen to a tribute to Molly Ivins

Molly Ivins Dies at 62 After Bout with Breast Cancer
by Robert Siegel and Wade Goodwyn

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=7115608


Thre Los Angeles Times

U.N. nuclear agency plans to cancel some aid to Iran
The cuts, expected to be approved in March, end all technical assistance on certain projects.
By Kim Murphy, Times Staff Writer
February 10, 2007
TEHRAN — The U.N. nuclear agency signaled Friday that it was preparing to cancel technical aid on nearly half its nuclear cooperation projects with Iran, a significant step toward implementing sanctions aimed at halting the nation's controversial uranium enrichment program.
In a report to the International Atomic Energy Agency's board of governors in Vienna, the agency leadership recommended stopping all assistance on projects that could contribute to enrichment and reprocessing work prohibited under a sanctions resolution adopted by the U.N. Security Council in December.
The cuts, expected to be approved by the agency's board of directors in March, end all technical aid for "safe and reliable nuclear power generation," for strategic planning and for a nuclear technology center under development. But they leave intact assistance for medicine development, radioactive waste disposal, wastewater treatment and agriculture.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-irannuke10feb10,1,3112681.story?coll=la-headlines-world



Camouflaged defense spending
The government should stop deceptively pretending that war costs are separate from the Pentagon's budget.
AT THE SAME TIME that President Bush requested more than $700 billion for the Pentagon budget this week, he managed to create the impression that he was asking for the much smaller amount of $481 billion. The trick he used — socking about $235 billion into two "emergency supplemental" funding requests for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan — didn't fool the public for very long. But the longer the White House and Congress continue to treat "war-related" funding as a separate item from the budget for the Department of Defense, the harder it will be to control a ballooning federal budget.
Here's how the supplemental shell game works. The official defense budget for 2008 comes to $481 billion. That's a 10% increase over last year and a 62% increase over 2001. And it conveniently fails to include a supplemental request of $141.7 billion, which brings the 2008 defense total to $622.7 billion. On top of that, the president requested a 2007 supplemental in the amount of $93.4 billion, bringing this week's entire defense "budget authority request" to $716 billion (the figure of actual outlays is even higher because it includes billions already committed to the Pentagon).

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-derugy10feb10,0,5657155.story?coll=la-home-commentary


Taking deep breath of freedom
After 20 years in prison for a killing that a key witness now says he didn't commit, Timothy Atkins wants only some fresh air.
A lifelong heavy drug user, frequently homeless or in jail, Denise Powell was a hard person to track down.
Researchers for the California Innocence Project spent months searching for Powell — who was only in intermittent contact with her own family. Their goal was to finally document on the record what Powell had been openly admitting for years: Her testimony implicating Timothy Atkins for murder was false.
When researcher Wendy Koen finally found Powell in early 2005, in rehab after a recent arrest, she confessed without hesitation.
"She was ready to talk. She'd been wanting to talk for years," Koen said. "She said, 'I was young and stupid. I didn't know it would come to this. I lied.' "
Thus began the final step in Atkins' 20-year campaign to prove his innocence. On Friday morning, Atkins, now 39, walked out of Los Angeles County Jail and into the arms of his family, free for the first time since his teens.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-innocent10feb10,0,3314761.story?coll=la-home-headlines


Added troops yield few results yet in Baghdad
Gates hopes to speed the influx of forces, but a senior official says that may be impossible. Iraqis are growing impatient.
BAGHDAD — A month after the Bush administration announced a "surge" in troops for Baghdad, Iraqis are still waiting for anything to change.
Fewer than 20% of the additional Iraqi and American troops have arrived so far. And the roughly 5,000 that have arrived have yet to make a visible impact in this sprawling city of 6 million people, where thousands of paramilitary gunmen patrol the streets.
U.S. officials are trying to manage expectations both domestically and in Iraq, continually asserting that the new forces will slowly take up positions in the capital over the coming months.
But after one of the bloodiest weeks since the U.S.-led invasion of 2003, Iraqis are increasingly impatient. A series of high-profile attacks on both civilians and security forces killed more than 1,000 Iraqis and at least 33 U.S. troops in the first nine days of the month.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-surge10feb10,0,5491534.story?coll=la-home-headlines



Vietnamese voters at epicenter of O.C. political earthquake
With just 7 ballots separating them, Trung Nguyen and Janet Nguyen take nearly half of those cast for supervisor. They relied on ethnic loyalties and the absentee vote.
The two Republicans named Nguyen entered the race for a seat on the Orange County Board of Supervisors as blips on the establishment's screen: He an obscure school board member, she a neophyte councilwoman.
Against them stood candidates anointed by the Republican and Democratic machines — as well as the wisdom that in immigrant-rich central Orange County, party loyalties won elections.
When the votes for the 1st District race were tallied this week, the Nguyens, who are not related, had easily eclipsed the two favorites by shrewdly courting ethnic loyalties and the absentee vote.
Between them, the two bitter rivals won nearly half of the 46,000 votes cast in the Tuesday special election, with Trung Nguyen defeating Janet Nguyen by just seven ballots. She has asked for a recount. But whoever prevails will be Orange County's first Vietnamese American supervisor, demonstrating the emergence of Vietnamese political power.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-viet10feb10,0,1138179.story?coll=la-home-headlines



Reaping a profit from the air
As concern grows over global warming, farmers and corporations are responding by trading carbon credits through a Chicago exchange.
When Doug Gronau looks out the window of his Iowa farmhouse, he sees a profitable investment in the effort to stop global warming.
Most people see cornfields.
His cropland, which he is prohibited from tilling, is a greenhouse gas credit, packaged and sold on the Chicago Climate Exchange. An anonymous trader snapped up the field's ability to absorb carbon dioxide to offset — on paper — a tiny portion of the carbon dioxide emitted by some distant factory.
Gronau, 57, expects a check for $2,800.
"That may not sound like a lot," he said, "but farming is hard and it adds to your margin."
The Chicago Climate Exchange is the first and only legally binding carbon emissions market in North America. In the absence of federal controls on greenhouse gas emissions, it applies an axiom of economic theory to the problem of global warming: People in search of profit can be expected to do just about anything for a buck — even save the planet.

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-carbon10feb10,0,2739818.story?coll=la-home-headlines


Far apart under one roof
New York — CHANA Taub peered through a narrow gap in the recently built sheetrock wall that sliced her three-story house in two. Straining to look at what used to be her living room, she worried that her husband was lurking on the other side.
"I can't be near him," she whispered, just in case he was eavesdropping. "If I see him, I run the other way."
Chana and Simon Taub are in the middle of a spiteful divorce. Out of stubbornness — and a determination not to lose the house to the other — both refused to give up the place they shared for 18 years. In one of New York's strangest divorce battles, a judge ordered construction of the wall to keep the quarreling couple apart while under the same roof.
The wall went up in December as neighbors gathered outside to watch. The sand-colored barrier on the first floor separates the living room from a spiral staircase leading to the second and third floors. The second floor is divided in half by a locked glass and mahogany door that has been barricaded with plywood.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-divorce10feb10,0,1437470.story?coll=la-home-headlines


Sex offenders released before Prop. 83 can live near schools, parks, judge rules
A federal jurist says the ban can't be applied to those who had already served their sentences.
By Jenifer Warren, Times Staff Writer
February 10, 2007
SACRAMENTO — A federal judge Friday ruled that a voter-approved crackdown on sex offenders may not be applied retroactively, meaning thousands of offenders who have done their prison time probably will not be barred from living near California schools and parks.
U.S. District Judge Lawrence K. Karlton said there was no clear evidence that Proposition 83, dubbed Jessica's Law by promoters, was intended to govern those whose crimes occurred in the past.
"The court finds that the law does not apply to individuals who were convicted and who were paroled, given probation or released from incarceration prior to its effective date," Karlton wrote in his 11-page order.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-offenders10feb10,0,4024192.story?coll=la-home-headlines



Hospital's account of 'dumping' case disputed
LAPD and shelter officials contradict the facility's explanation for how a paraplegic homeless patient was left in a gutter on skid row.
Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center, accused by authorities in at least two incidents of dumping homeless patients, said Friday that its own preliminary investigation into why a hospital-hired van left a paraplegic man on a skid row street this week found that the actions were not in keeping with hospital policy.
The hospital offered its own account of how the patient ended up on skid row Thursday, but the Los Angeles Police Department and a homeless-shelter official disputed key portions of the explanation.
Meanwhile, the city attorney's office said it is expanding its ongoing investigation of the hospital, which has previously been accused of dumping homeless patients, to include the Thursday incident, which was met Friday with widespread disgust and outrage from civic leaders.
"This is obviously shameless," said City Atty. Rocky Delgadillo, whose office criminally charged Kaiser hospitals three months ago in a similar dumping case. "We were thinking the hospitals in this city had gotten the message," he added. "They continue to flout the law."

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-dumping10feb10,0,7983871.story?coll=la-home-headlines



How Smith's death hit Page
THIS column is either part of the problem or a thought on its solution.
We comment; you decide.
The late Murray Kempton once described editorial writers as "the people who come down from the hill after the battle to shoot the wounded." Nowadays, media analysts are the guys who follow behind them, going through the pockets of the dead looking for loose change.
So, yes, this column is about Anna Nicole Smith.
Friday morning, less than 24 hours after she died in a Florida hotel room, the Drudge Report — our media culture's digital arbiter of all things tacky and prurient — had 12 items posted on the onetime topless dancer. That would account for some of the media frenzy surrounding her death. It's a little-known fact, but certain sectors of the broadcast media have long believed that if a dozen items on Anna Nicole Smith ever were posted on Drudge simultaneously, it would herald the onset of the apocalypse.

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/cl-et-rutten10feb10,0,4288851.story?coll=la-home-headlines



Paraplegic allegedly 'dumped' on skid row
L.A. police say man was dropped off in front of dozens of witnesses by van linked to Hollywood Presbyterian hospital.
A paraplegic man wearing a soiled hospital gown and a broken colostomy bag was found crawling in a gutter in skid row in Los Angeles on Thursday after allegedly being dumped in the street by a Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center van, police said.
The incident, witnessed by more than two dozen people, was described by police as a particularly outrageous case of "homeless dumping" that has plagued the downtown area.
"I can't think of anything colder than that," said LAPD Det. Russ Long, who called the case the most egregious of its kind that he has seen in his career. "There was no mission around, no services. It's the worst area of skid row."
Los Angeles Police Department detectives said they connected the van to Hollywood Presbyterian after witnesses wrote down a phone number on the van and took down its license-plate number.
They are questioning officials from the hospital, which the LAPD had accused in an earlier dumping case that is now under investigation.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-dumping9feb09,0,7452706.story?track=mostviewed-homepage


Pimp that electric vehicle
The Times John O'Dell reports that some Northern California firms are trying to create high-performance and ever Hummer-like electric cars:

Environmentally friendly cars don't have to be slow and stodgy. ZAP, a Santa Rosa, Calif.-based importer of electric scooters and a small, short-distance electric car, aims to launch a 155-mph all-wheel-drive electric sport utility vehicle next year. If it comes to market, the $60,000 ZAP-X would join a select group of high-performance electric vehicles led by a two-seat sports car from Tesla Motors Inc. of San Carlos, Calif. The $92,000 Tesla Roadster is capable of accelerating from a dead stop to 60 mph in four seconds and has a top speed of more than 130 mph.A third Northern California start-up, Wrightspeed Inc. of Burlingame, has announced plans for a $120,000 electric roadster that boasts a zero-to-60 time of 3.8 seconds.

An environmental group also ranked what it considers the most earth-friendly cars on the road.

Meanwhile, the Sacramento Bee editorial board is glad no more hybrids are being allow on the carpool lanes:

Carpool lanes were created not just to help clean the air but also to relieve congestion. The more that otherwise solo drivers left their own cars at home and took the bus, a van pool or joined two or three others in a carpool, the more congestion was eased for everyone else. These real carpoolers were justifiably rewarded by being allowed to zip along in relatively unclogged special lanes. By opening the lanes to solo drivers of hybrid vehicles, legislators degraded the carpool ethic itself. As one driver told the Los Angeles Times recently, "This is why I spent over 25 grand on a car -- just to get the (carpool lane) sticker."

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/bottleneck/



Would Obama be 'the black president'?
Some African American activists doubt that he'd stand firmly behind their causes. 'He would be the multicultural president,' one says.
By Peter Wallsten, Times Staff Writer
February 10, 2007
CHICAGO — Illinois state Sen. Rickey Hendon served eight years alongside Barack Obama in the state Capitol and plans to endorse him today when Obama launches a bid for the White House. But that does not mean Hendon has set aside the long-simmering doubts that he and other black leaders hold about a man who could become the first African American to occupy the Oval Office.
"I can endorse someone now and change my mind next week," Democrat Hendon said from Springfield, Ill., where U.S. Sen. Obama (D-Ill.) will kick off his campaign at the old state Capitol. "I'm going to look at how he runs his campaign. I'm going to look closely to see if he raises the issues that are important to my people."

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-obama10feb10,0,7292039.story?coll=la-home-nation



Putin Blasts U.S. for Its Use of Force
By DAVID RISING, Associated Press Writer
6:34 AM PST, February 10, 2007
MUNICH, Germany -- Russian President Vladimir Putin blasted the United States Saturday for the "almost uncontained" use of force in the world, and for encouraging other countries to acquire nuclear weapons.
In what his spokesman acknowledged were his harshest attacks on the U.S. since taking office in 2000, Putin also criticized U.S. plans for missile defense systems and NATO's expansion.
Putin told a security forum attracting top officials that "we are witnessing an almost uncontained hyper use of force in international relations" and that "one state, the United States, has overstepped its national borders in every way.
"This is very dangerous, nobody feels secure anymore because nobody can hide behind international law," Putin told the gathering.
Putin did not elaborate on specifics and did not mention the wars in Iraq or Afghanistan.
But he voiced concern about U.S. plans to build a missile defense system in eastern Europe -- likely in Poland and the Czech Republic -- and the expansion of NATO as possible challenges to Russia.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/wire/ats-ap_top11feb10,0,645316.story?coll=la-ap-topnews-headlines



No Deal Reached in N.Korea Nuke Talks
By HIROKO TABUCHI, Associated Press Writer
3:56 AM PST, February 10, 2007
BEIJING -- Negotiators on North Korea's nuclear programs engaged in intense diplomacy on Saturday but a deal that would see the communist state take its first real steps to disarm remained elusive. Japan's top envoy told reporters that a resolution had yet to be reached, though talks continue on Sunday.
"Unfortunately, as of today we have not reached a conclusion. We are boiling down our problems but there is not conclusion in sight for several issues," said Kenichiro Sasae.
U.S. envoy Christopher Hill said the negotiations boiled down to one or two unspecified sticking points after overcoming what he had considered "tough" issues.
"I am hopeful we can get through this," Hill said earlier Saturday. "But with the North Koreans you never know what is important, so we will have to see. ... If we live in a logical, rational world, we will get through this."
Representatives from China, Japan, the two Koreas, Russia and the U.S. spent Saturday in various meetings, discussing a Chinese draft agreement outlining moves for North Korea to disarm and what sort of aid and guarantees it would get in return.
Host China held bilateral meetings with all countries, and other talks were held among the delegations, a South Korean official said.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/wire/ats-ap_top12feb10,0,1038533.story?coll=la-ap-topnews-headlines


How to Get Wall Street to Hug a Tree
Environmentalists and investment bankers are working together to put a price tag on nature. The new 'greens' think that human beings are ready to start paying for Mother Nature's services—and that calculating their financial worth will save the planet.
By David Wolman, David Wolman is the author of "A Left-Hand Turn Around the World" and has written for Wired, Newsweek Discover and other magazines.
Gretchen Daily, an ecologist at Stanford University, wears butterfly-patterned socks. She's a careful recycler and bikes to work. She composts.
So what's she doing hanging out with guys from Goldman Sachs?
As a tried-and-true "green," she believes she doesn't have a choice.
"Time is running short," she says. "Appealing to moral sense isn't enough anymore. We have to make conservation fit mainstream business calculations."
In her fourth-floor office in the Herrin Labs just off Stanford's main quad, Daily, a professor of biological sciences and director of the tropical research program at Stanford's Center of Conservation Biology, shows me what she means. She clicks open a series of digital maps compiled for a meeting in New York with Goldman Sachs. The maps' rich purple-and-blue hues convey information about California's Central Coast eco-region, which stretches from Santa Barbara north to Napa County and includes San Francisco Bay. Daily explains how each image tells a story of the terrain's value—not property value as a real estate agent would figure it but value in terms of service to mankind. Where the terrain offers a high degree of flood protection, for example, the map is the brightest purple; where the flood-protecting function is comparatively low, the color is light blue. The ecosystems providing the most overall value to people are shaded to indicate highest priority.
If Daily and her colleagues can get Wall Street on board, the maps will also be shaded to indicate financial worth.

http://www.latimes.com/features/magazine/west/la-tm-greenies06feb11,0,7457674.story?coll=la-home-magazine


The DAWN

Probe into Nato 'incursion'
By Saleem Shahid
QUETTA, Feb 8: The authorities are investigating an incident in which a man was killed and two others injured allegedly by Nato and Afghan forces who had crossed into Pakistani territory in the Zhob district.
The incident reportedly occurred in Karez Qamaruddin village, a remote area along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border
Local people claimed that Nato and Afghan troops had crossed into Pakistani area and attacked Killi Haji Qamar early on Wednesday morning.
However, according to agency reports, Nato officials have denied the allegation and said that no Nato force was deployed in that area.
But a man claiming to have been injured in the attack said that Nato and Afghan soldiers had entered at least 600 meters inside Pakistani territory, adding that they were in three pick-up trucks and two armoured vehicles and they tried to search the village for Taliban and Al Qaeda suspects.
The man, Mohammad Khan, was talking to reporters in the Civil Hospital in Zhob. He said that the troops started firing on them when they refused to allow them to search their homes. He named the man killed in the firing as Mohammad Ismail.

http://www.dawn.com/2007/02/09/top4.htm



$5.4bn power plan approved
By Khaleeq Kiani
ISLAMABAD, Feb 8: The government on Thursday approved a plan to set up 11 power projects to cope with expected energy shortage of about 2000MW in coming years.
A mix of hydel-, coal- and gas-based projects, the $5.4 billion power projects would generate about 4,200 MW of electricity in three to seven years.
A meeting of the Private Power and Infrastructure Board (PPIB) presided over by Minister for Water and Power Liaquat Ali Jatoi decided to issue letters of interest to AES Corporation of the United States and Mitsui Corporation of Japan to conduct feasibility studies and then set up two power projects of 1000-1200MW each to be based on imported coal.
The coal-based projects would take about five years to start production with an estimated cost of $2.5 billion. The sponsors would be required to complete their feasibility studies in about one year and then complete construction of projects in about four years.
The board directed Wapda to instal a 100MW power plant in Khuzdar on a fast-track basis to improve the power supply situation in Balochistan, particularly in the Khuzdar area.
The meeting also approved a decision of the prime minister to set up another 450MW power plant based on low quality gas from the Uch field in Balochistan, instead of Sindh. These two projects are estimated to cost about $550 million.

http://www.dawn.com/2007/02/09/top2.htm



Baitullah denies role in suicide bombings
By Alamgir Bhitani
TANK, Feb 8: Militant commander Baitullah Mehsud has denied involvement in recent incidents of suicide attacks in the NWFP and Islamabad and challenged the government to produce any evidence of his involvement.
"I have no hand in the suicide attacks. But if the government has any evidence, proving my involvement, it should be brought before public," he told tribal mediators at an undisclosed location in the restive South Waziristan Agency on Wednesday night.
After the recent spate of terrorist acts in the country, the agency's administration formed a 21-member jirga, headed by tribal Senator Saleh Shah, to hold talks with Baitullah Mehsud who had vowed to avenge the Jan 16 Zamazola airstrike in which his 10 supporters were killed and eight others injured.
"Yes, I still stand by my words to avenge the Zamazola air strike, because it was quite painful and I was deeply hurt. As far as the suicide attacks are concerned, I have nothing to do with these incidents," Senator Shah quoted Baitullah as saying.
The senator told journalists that Baitullah, who had signed a peace deal with the government in February 2005, denied his involvement in the suicide bombings in Peshawar, Islamabad, Dera Ismail Khan and Tank and told the jirga that he had never accepted responsibility for the attacks.
"I was willing to abide by the peace deal but the government breached it by killing innocent people in Zamazola," the senator quoted the military commander as saying.
Baitullah Mehsud also criticised a statement of President Pervez Musharraf about "eliminating me". "It will not be the murder of an individual, but of the entire Waziristan Agency," claimed Baitullah.

http://www.dawn.com/2007/02/09/top5.htm



Disappearances new form of abuse: HRCP
By Jamal Shahid
ISLAMABAD, Feb 8: The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) has accused the government and its security apparatus of exercising a 'horrific pattern' of forced disappearances of its opponents, and described it as a 'new form of human rights abuse' in the country.
The commission's annual report for 2006 launched on Thursday described the forced disappearances 'a highly disturbing trend', which was increasing at an alarming rate. Citizens across the country were being picked up by intelligence agencies and taken to be detained in secret locations while some had been handed over to the US, the report said.
Spread over 340 pages, the report details the rights issues in 18 separate categories, ranging from law and administration of justice to law and order situation, rape and other atrocities against women, rights of children, restrictions of political participation, rights of labour, and issues of health and environment.
However, the report's real emphasis was on the deteriorating situation in Balochistan and Waziristan, the use of military to curb political and religious militancy, and abduction and disappearance of opponents, mainly from the violence-hit areas.
According to the report, the trend of organised disappearances started around 2001 and since then at least 400 persons had gone missing. However, the commission feared the figure was only 'the tip of the iceberg'.

http://www.dawn.com/2007/02/09/top3.htm



Musharraf's ME plan acknowledged by US
By Anwar Iqbal
WASHINGTON, Feb 8: President Gen Pervez Musharraf is trying to "band together" Arab and Muslim states to address the Israeli-Palestinian issue and to bridge the threatening Shia-Sunni divide in the Islamic community, says the US State Department.
This is the first US official description of the initiative that Gen Musharraf launched late last month, visiting nine Arab and Muslim states on a mission that even the Pakistani government has not yet defined.
"President Musharraf has made some recent trips around the globe to Arab Muslim states and some non-Arab Muslim states to talk about a couple of … issues," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack told a briefing in Washington.
"One, how they can band together to address the issue of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and two, also how to, in some way, address the divide within the Muslim community between the Sunni and Shia."
When asked to comment on the initiative, he said: "Any initiatives by responsible parties such as Pakistan or Indonesia or Egypt or Turkey in trying to tackle some of these tough issues in a responsible way are welcome."
The spokesman, however, said that he would defer any specific comment "until we have a better understanding of what it is that is being proposed. As I understand it now, it's still taking shape."
Gen Musharraf stirred world-wide speculations by visiting nine Muslim and Arab capitals one after another while senior government officials in Islamabad described the move as a Middle East peace initiative but gave no details.

http://www.dawn.com/2007/02/09/top7.htm



Iran proposes IPI summit
By Jawed Naqvi
NEW DELHI, Feb 8: Iran has proposed a tripartite summit with India and Pakistan to agree on a gas pipeline deal but the suddenness of the idea has prompted New Delhi to reserve comment, Indian news reports said on Thursday.
"The summit proposal — which took External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee and his delegation somewhat by surprise — was made by Iran's Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki at a joint press conference (in Tehran on Wednesday)," The Hindu said in a Front Page report.
Mr Mottaki apparently unexpectedly offered during the Indian foreign minister's ongoing visit to Tehran to host the summit between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, President Gen Pervez Musharraf and President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad to sign a final agreement on the 2,700-km long pipeline.
Because President Gen Musharraf had only recently visited Tehran for a closely watched meeting with President Ahmedinejad, it is thought that perhaps the idea for the pipeline summit was discussed first between the two.
Whether the move succeeds or gets shot down by India will become clear when Pakistan's Foreign Minister Khurshid Mahmud Kasuri arrives in Delhi for a four-day visit on Feb 20, official sources said.
The official reason for Mr Kasuri's visit being whispered on Thursday highlights bilateral agreements, including nuclear risk reduction and the release of each other's detained inmates. If an agreement is also reached on an early visit by the Indian prime minister to Islamabad, the Delhi Saarc summit in April could be a major beneficiary, possibly signalling Gen Musharraf's participation.
As far as The Hindu report goes, Indian officials told the newspaper that Dr Singh could visit Iran this year if ongoing negotiations on a Bilateral Investment Protection Agreement and a double tax avoidance agreement could be concluded quickly. Further movement on their energy and economic fronts was also a factor.
While Mr Mottaki chose to refer to the project as the "peace pipeline," Mr Mukherjee preferred the formal description of 'Iran-Pakistan-India pipeline,' The Hindu observed.


Iran warns of retaliatory strikes on US interests
TEHRAN, Feb 8: Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Thursday warned that Iran would hit back at American interests worldwide if the United States attacked the Islamic republic to thwart its nuclear programme.
"They should not intimidate the Iranian people with these things, since the United States has previously attacked Iran," Khamenei said, referring to repeated speculation that Washington plans to strike Iran's nuclear facilities.
"The enemies understand well that the Iranian nation will give a comprehensive response to the aggressors and their interests worldwide," Ayatollah Khamenei added, according to state-run television.
His comments came on the second and final day of war games by Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards, who on Thursday successfully test-fired a land-to-sea missile with a range of 350 kilometres.

http://www.dawn.com/2007/02/09/top11.htm



Peace process can help resolve Kashmir dispute
By Our Correspondent
WASHINGTON, Feb 8: The India-Pakistan peace process could ultimately lead to an understanding between the two neighbours on the Kashmir dispute, according to ambassador Dennis Kux.
An expert on South Asia and a former US ambassador, Mr Kux was the main speaker at a Kashmir Day seminar on Capitol Hill on Wednesday where several speakers described Kashmir as an issue that could lead to a nuclear disaster in South Asia.
Mr Kux termed the Siachen dispute "the most resolvable" conflict in the region but said he did not understand why the two nations had not yet been able to solve it.

http://www.dawn.com/2007/02/09/top13.htm



Lebanese army told to be on alert
BEIRUT, Feb 8: Prime Minister Fuad Siniora on Thursday ordered the Lebanese army to respond to any new Israeli violation of Lebanese sovereignty after an overnight cross-border clash.
"Siniora was in contact with the army command... and gave clear orders for the confrontation of any Israeli violation of Lebanese sovereignty," the state National News Agency reported.
It said Siniora met early on Thursday with Gier Pedersen, the United Nations representative in Lebanon, over the overnight exchange of shots between Lebanese and Israeli troops at the border.
"Siniora informed Pedersen that the Lebanese government rejects these new Israeli aggressions on Lebanese sovereignty," said the agency.
"It is a violation of the Blue Line," the line drawn by the United Nations delineating the Lebanese-Israeli border.
"It is a new violation in addition to the Israeli air violations of Lebanese sovereignty which never stopped after the ceasefire declared last August" ended Israel's war against the Lebanese Shiite Hezbollah movement.
Late on Wednesday, the Lebanese army fired at Israeli troops at the border and Israeli forces returned fire. No casualties were reported on either side.
The incident was sparked by Israeli sappers moving in to clear unexploded ordnance, both sides said.—AFP



Olmert rejects appeal to stop excavation
JERUSALEM, Feb 8: Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has rejected an appeal by his defence minister to halt excavation work near Jerusalem's most important holy site, the Haaretz daily newspaper reported on Thursday.
The work has angered Palestinians.
"A thorough examination of the matter would reveal that nothing about the work under way will harm anyone, and there is no truth in the contentions against the work," the newspaper quoted Olmert's office as saying.
Defence Minister Amir Peretz had made a written appeal to Olmert.-—Reuters


The Jerusalem Post

Aquifer that provides 20% of water could become unusable
By Zafrir Rinat , Haaretz Correspondent
One of Israel's three sources for fresh water, the coastal aquifer, is in danger of becoming unusable because of contamination, according to data collected by the Water Authority and the Health Ministry.
The data shows that over the past decade, 160 wells were shut down (because of various kinds of contamination) from an overall figure of 1,000 wells, which provide about 20 percent of the country's annual water consumption.
The main sources of contamination are: untreated sewage, salination stemming from the penetration of sea water, agricultural fertilizers and industrial pollutants, including heavy metals and carcinogenic organic products.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/823797.html


'Quartet will not accept new PA gov't'
By REBECCA ANNA STOIL
Iranian influence over Hamas will preclude the Quartet from approving a Palestinian national unity government, Internal Security Minister Avi Dichter predicted on Thursday.
He spoke just before Fatah and Hamas leaders announced in Mecca that they had struck a deal on a government that would not require Hamas to abide by previous agreements signed between the PLO and Israel. This agreement violates the Quartet's three principles for recognizing a government which include recognizing Israel, abiding by past agreements between Israel and the Palestinian Authority and renouncing violence.
Speaking to The Jerusalem Post on the last day of a four-day North American trip, Dichter said that the Saudi-brokered Palestinian cease-fire talks in Mecca "are one of the main issues" that he discussed with his American counterparts during the less than 48 hours in Washington.

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1170359818436&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull


Lebanese army to keep Hizbullah arms
By ASSOCIATED PRESS
BEIRUT, Lebanon
Lebanon's defense minister said on Friday that a truckload of ammunition belonging to the Hizbullah seized the previous day in an east Beirut suburb, would be used by the Lebanese army in case of future Israeli attacks.
Defense Minister Elias Murr said the ammunitions would not be returned to the Hizbullah as the militants demanded after the seizure Thursday.
"The truck and the weapons are now in the south ... and we will use them tomorrow morning if there is an Israeli violation," Murr said after talks with the new commander of the UN peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon, Major-General Claudio Graziano of Italy.

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?c=JPArticle&cid=1170359822382&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull


Lebanon won't submit complaint to UN
Lebanon reneged Friday on its plan to file a complaint against Israel to the United Nations Security Council over Wednesday's flare-up on the northern border, after UNIFIL accepted Israel's version of events.
IDF tanks shelled a Lebanese army position after the Israeli troops came under fire during an operation to clear mines on the Israeli side of the border two days after five explosive devices were discovered in the area.
Lebanon's Interior Minister Ahmad Fatfat told Al Jazeera that "for the moment there is no need to file a complaint. The main message we conveyed to Israel was that we will not sit down and shake hands over violations of our sovereignty."
UNIFIL accepted Israel's version of the episode after inspecting the area and came to the conclusion that an Israeli bulldozer did not cross the Blue Line, the border drawn by the United Nations after Israel's withdrawal from south Lebanon in 2000.

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?c=JPArticle&cid=1170359820070&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull


'Border clash was an isolated incident'
By YAAKOV KATZ AND HERB KEINON
A day after clashes erupted between IDF troops and the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF), a top officer in the Northern Command told The Jerusalem Post Thursday that Hizbullah - as a result of the border flare-up - had readied itself in preparation for additional violence.
The officer stressed, however, that Hizbullah did not appear like it was ready to attack Israel and that the border incident seemed to pass as an isolated incident.
Late Wednesday night, IDF troops searching for Hizbullah bombs inside Israel, although past the northern border security fence, came under fire from nearby Lebanese army troops. In response, an IDF tank fired two shells at an LAF position.
"There is a tense quiet," Deputy Northern Command chief Brig.-Gen. Alon Friedman said Thursday. "All the sides are on the ready, including the LAF and Hizbullah."

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1170359816411&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull


US: Too soon to judge Palestinian deal
The United States said Friday it is too soon to tell whether plans for a unified Palestinian government will meet international conditions for legitimacy and financial aid.
"We still haven't seen enough of the details on this to give you an answer," State Department spokesman Tom Casey said.
Casey said there is no change in the US position that Hamas is a terrorist organization with whom it will not deal and no change in US support for Abbas now that he has agreed to govern alongside the militants.
Casey also said he knows of no plans to scrub or change Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's planned trip to meet with Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert later this month.
European Union officials said Friday they were cautiously optimistic about a Palestinian power-sharing deal reached by Hamas and Fatah, but said it was too early to lift an international aid embargo against the Hamas-led government.

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1170359820165&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull


NATO seeks more ME training partners
NATO pushed ahead Friday with plans to develop military training with Israel and six Arab nations as part of efforts to boost security cooperation.
"Terrorism, failed states and weapons of mass destruction proliferation are issues we all have to deal with," said NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer at a meeting of alliance defense ministers and counterparts from the seven North African and Middle Eastern nations.
Ministers agreed that a special training faculty at NATO's college in Rome should be opened for officers from the seven nations by the end of the year.
De Hoop Scheffer welcomed plans for some of the nations to join NATO's counter-terrorism patrols in the Mediterranean Sea and hold more joint exercises and intensified political contacts.
However, he insisted that the Western alliance has no plans to open bases in the region.

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1170359822515&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull


The 'education' of Ethiopian wives
When the TV news would tell of an Ethiopian immigrant who had murdered his wife, "Shoshana" recalls that her ex-husband would say, "Good for him. I'll bet he suffered just like I do. One day I'll do the same thing."
Beaten, cursed and publicly humiliated by her husband, who suspected her of sleeping with every man she said hello to, Shoshana once made a noose for herself and wrote a suicide note, but gave up the plan when her husband discovered it and howled with laughter. When his death threats escalated, she left the house with her two children, called the police and went to a battered woman's shelter in the center of the country. Her husband never went to prison, largely because she refused to testify against him. "He said he'd kill me if I put him in jail," she explains.

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1170359811318&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull


Haaretz

State Department: New PA gov't must meet international demands
By Avi Issacharoff, Haaretz Correspondent, Haaretz Service and Agencies
If the Palestinian Authority wants to have a "broader relationship" with the internationalcommunity, it must recognize Israel, renounce terrorism and accept previous Israeli-Palestinian agreements, U.S. State Department spokesman Tom Casey said in response to a deal on a Palestinian unity government reached Thursday night.
The deal between rival Palestinian factions Fatah and Hamas, which was reached after two days of intensive negotiations in the Saudi city of Mecca, sets out the principles of the unity government, including an ambiguous promise that it will "respect" previous peace deals with Israel, delegates said. The Mecca accord does not address the other two international requirements.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/823843.html


Text of Mecca Accord for Palestinian coalition government
By The Associated Press
MECCA - Under the Palestinians' Mecca Accord, the mainstream Fatah movement and the militant group Hamas agreed on forming a new coalition government that will respect previous peace deals with Israel.
The accord came in the form of a letter from Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas of Fatah, designating Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas to form the government.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/823792.html


Four Qassams strike western Negev, no damage reported
By Mijal Grinberg, Haaretz Correspondent
Four Qassam rockets were fired at the western Negev on Friday, two landing next to the
Karmi crossing, and the other two next to the Gaza security fence. There are no reports of damage or injuries at this time.
On Thursday, three rockets were at the Negev, with one striking the industrial zone in South Ashkelon . No damage was caused, but one bystander was rushed to the city's Barzilai Hospital to be treated for shock.
The remaining rockets landed in open fields and in a water-retention facility at Kibbutz Niram, with no damage reported.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/824069.html


Russia jails five teenagers for killing Jewish man
By Reuters
A Russian court sentenced five teenagers to between five and 10 years in jail on Friday for beating a Jewish man to death in a cemetery with a metal cross, media reported.
The court said that in 2005 when they were aged from 12 to 17, the five escorted the 21-year-old victim to the cemetery before attacking him. The agency quoted a court official in the Ural mountains region of Sverdlovsk as saying the murder was racially motivated.
Racism has flourished in Russia since the Soviet collapse, with skinheads killing dozens of dark-skinned foreigners over the past several years.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/824074.html


Hundreds attend reinterment of murdered French Jewish man
By Amiram Barkat, Haaretz Correspondent
Hundreds of people participated Friday in a reinterment ceremony in Jerusalem for Ilan Halimi, a 23-year-old French Jew kidnapped and fatally tortured by a gang exactly a year ago.
Halimi was laid to rest at the Givat Shaul cemetery in Jerusalem.
When Halimi's kidnappers were arrested, they told French police they had selected a Jewish victim because they believed Jews are wealthy. The case shocked the 500,000-strong Jewish community in France and the general public.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/823844.html


ANALYSIS: New PA government creates a real problem for Israel
By Avi Issacharoff, Haaretz Correspondent
The new Palestinian unity government creates a real problem for Israel. It will be headed by a senior Hamas figure, Ismail Haniyeh. Moreover, it will not recognize Israel and does not pretend to meet the Quartet's conditions, as one Hamas leader said.
Yet the same time, it is not a Hamas government, and Hamas will not have a majority in the cabinet. The finance minister-designate, Salem Fayad, is the White House's darling. The foreign minister-designate, academic Ziad Abu Amar, has lectured at many American universities and does not have extremist positions on Israel. And the interior minister, who commands the security forces, will be an independent rather than a Hamas member, though he will be appointed on Hamas' recommendation.
Under these circumstances, Israel and the U.S. will have trouble demanding that the international economic boycott of the Palestinian government remain in place.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/824039.html


Minimum to lift economic siege
By Zvi Bar'el
For a while, it seemed as though Khaled Meshal was the Palestinian president, rather than Mahmoud Abbas.
In his speech, Meshal stressed the commitment to stop the bloodshed among the Palestinian factions and continued cooperation with Abbas. He did not utter a word about the political issues the two had agreed upon.
In the government appointment letter, Abbas called on Ismail Haniyeh to honor (not to commit to) the signed agreements (without saying with whom) and to honor the international decisions and the Arab League's resolutions.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/823814.html



The Cheney Observer

The Libby Trial: Time Magazine Reporter Testifies Karl Rove First Revealed Identity of CIA Operative Valerie Plame
We end today's program with the latest on the trial of Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff, Lewis "Scooter" Libby. Former Time Magazine reporter Matt Cooper testified Wednesday that it was President Bush's political advisor, Karl Rove, who first revealed the CIA status of Valerie Plame. Cooper is the second reporter to testify at Libby's perjury and obstruction trial. On Tuesday, former New York Times reporter Judith Miller was called to the witness stand. In her second day of testimony, Miller acknowledged that she had conversations with other government officials and could not be "absolutely certain" that she first heard about Plame from Libby. One of Libby's lawyers told the judge that the defense plans to call the managing editor of the New York Times, Jill Abramson, to discredit Miller.
The government's other witnesses who have testified in the trial so far include Ari Fleischer, the former White House Press Secretary and Catherine Martin, Dick Cheney's former spokesperson. Special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald said Wednesday that the government expected to finish presenting its case early next week.

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/02/01/1532228#transcript



The Christian Right and the Rise of American Fascism
by Chris Hedges
11/15/04
Third World Traveler
(This is an article by Chris Hedges that no major publication will print.)
Dr. James Luther Adams, my ethics professor at Harvard Divinity School , told us that when we were his age, he was then close to 80, we would all be fighting the "Christian fascists."
The warning, given to me 25 years ago, came at the moment Pat Robertson and other radio and televangelists began speaking about a new political religion that would direct its efforts at taking control of all institutions, including mainstream denominations and the government. Its stated goal was to use the United States to create a global, Christian empire. It was hard, at the time, to take such fantastic rhetoric seriously, especially given the buffoonish quality of those who expounded it. But Adams warned us against the blindness caused by intellectual snobbery. The Nazis, he said, were not going to return with swastikas and brown shirts. Their ideological inheritors had found a mask for fascism in the pages of the Bible.

http://t155.bgtoyou.com/The-Christian-Right-and-the-Rise-of-American-Fascism/



Delay Pays More than $450,000 In Legal Expenses
(February 1, 2007)--Republican Tom DeLay's congressional committee reports paying more than $454,000 for legal expenses in the last quarter of 2006.
Details come from PoliticalMoneyLine, a Web site that tracks campaign fund-raising and spending.
The embattled former US House majority leader quit Congress in June.
The Houston-area lawmaker faces charges in Austin as part of an investigation into the allegedly illegal use of funds for state legislative races.
DeLay has denied the allegations.
Members of Congress filed 2006 year-end reports this week.
Election Commission: www.fec.gov



Investigation closed into NASA chief's comments about DeLay
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. The feds have closed a review of whether NASA's chief administrator broke the law by urging an audience to support former U-S House Majority Leader Tom DeLay.
But the Office of Special Counsel sent a warning letter to NASA Administrator Michael Griffin -- saying he should have used better judgment in his remarks.
The review found Griffin did not break a law against using official authority to influence an election.
The Office of Special Counsel investigated Griffin's remarks last March to an audience at a Rotary Club banquet in Houston, near DeLay's district.
Griffin had been introduced by the Republican congressman, who at the time was seeking re-election and remains under indictment for alleged violations of campaign-finance rules.
DeLay quit Congress in June.
A spokesman says Griffin had no intention of making a political endorsement.

http://www.team4news.com/Global/story.asp?S=6007085&nav=0w0v


Brownback has been parading around conservative corners and reactionary rallies stumping that he is the only Reaganesque full-fledged Conservative in the running.
This ideological nonsense has won him at least one supporter.
As you can see in the quote, DeLay hasn't come to terms with his poison-pill status. We knew he was corrupt, but this stupid? Wow.

http://bluetiderising.blogspot.com/2007/02/tom-delay-endorses-brownback.html



DeLay warns former colleagues against endorsing presidential hopefuls early
By Susan Crabtree
As GOP presidential contenders scramble to cast themselves as conservatives to appeal to primary voters, former Rep. Tom DeLay (R-Texas) yesterday cautioned right-leaning Republican lawmakers against endorsing a candidate with nearly two years to go before the election.
DeLay issued his words of warning hours after former Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) publicly endorsed Mitt Romney for the Republican presidential nomination.
"I'm a little surprised that Hastert endorsed this early," DeLay said in an interview. "It's not usually what Denny does — he's usually very methodical and thinks things through, although he may have already in the last few months."
Although DeLay gave up his seat over the summer following his indictment in a campaign-finance case and continues to fight conspiracy and money-laundering charges, he remains influential in conservative circles. He recently formed the Grassroots Action and Information Network, an online organization dedicated to fostering conservative beliefs and countering the liberal voices in the blogosphere and elsewhere on the Web.

http://www.thehill.com/thehill/TheHill/News/Frontpage/012407/delay.html



Law & Order: Coulter 'Causes' Murder,
Has Drinks With Limbaugh
The plot of tonight's (Friday) Law & Order on NBC will revolve around a "right-wing" character who is clearly inspired by Ann Coulter and who brags about having a drink with "Rush." In a 20 second promo aired this week for the February 2 episode that will air at 10pm EST/PST, the announcer touts how "a controversial speaker causes a campus shooting." A detective calls the Coulter character "a real pain in the a[ss]-" before the promo cuts to a scene of her excusing herself from the DA's office: "I've got drinks with Rush."

http://www.proudtobecanadian.ca/index/weblog/comments/video_ann_coulter_causes_murder_in_tonights_law_order/#When:18:17:01Z



Life is Harsher in New Guantanamo Unit
All expressed a desperate desire for sunlight, fresh air and someone to speak to, located on the U.S. military base in southeastern Cuba, where the U.S. holds nearly 400 men suspected of links to al-Qaida or the Taliban.
Wells Dixon, who represents clients held at Guantanamo, predicted the lack of human interaction in Camp 6 will cause detainees to lose their grip on reality.
"It will very soon become an insane asylum," he told The Associated Press in a phone interview after he returned from the base.
It's very hard to believe most here are not on charges and no one at the prison has been convicted.
Camp 6 was built for $37 million by KBR, a subsidiary of Houston-based Halliburton Co. Dick Cheney's Halliburton stock options have risen 3281 percent in the last year, ...and they are still soaring!

http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/105886/Life_is_Harsher_in_New_Guantanamo_Unit



Life harsher for detainees in Guantanamo 's newest prison unit
GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba : Detainee Abdul Helil Mamut's good behavior earned him a spot in a medium-security compound at the Guantanamo Bay prison, where he slept in a barracks, shared leisurely meals with other prisoners and could spend more than half the day in an outdoor recreation area.
But in December, Mamut was transferred along with dozens of other prisoners from Camp 4 to the maximum-security Camp 6, the newest section of Guantanamo Bay's military prison.
Billed by the government as a modern addition that improves the lives of detainees, the new unit houses 160 men — more than a third of the total at Guantanamo — and is similar to the highest-security U.S. prisons, even though no one at the prison has been convicted of a crime.

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/02/03/news/CB-GEN-Guantanamo-Harder-Time.php



Changing the Subject: From Bush's Mess in Mesopotamia to the Peril in Persia
President Bush faces a rebellion among the American people and Congress against his call for a surge of troops that will escalate the killing in his Iraq war of choice.

So Bush is now attempting to change the subject from the monumental mess of his making in Mesopotamia to an even more monstrous peril in Persia.

Iraq and Iran are contemporary names for the ancient civilizations known as Mesopotamia and Persia.

Bush lacks public and Congressional support to widen the war in Iraq. His oft-stated cause for war---that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction for imminent use against the U.S. and was complicit in the 9/11 attacks---has proven to be fabrication. Bush appears puppet-like under the influence of Vice-President Cheney and his cabal of neo-con warmongers, the principle architects of the imperialistic mis-adventure in Iraq. We are facing another fear driven, made-up run-up to an even more costly war against Iran to divert our attention from the debilitating debacle in Iraq that has taken such a terrible toll in lives, suffering and money, and to make more money for oil and war profiteers.

By February 1, 2007, Bush/Cheney's Iraq War had killed 3088 U.S. military personnel, 130 Brits and 123 more coalition troops.

770 U.S. civilian contractors were also killed by January 28th. Bush/Cheney's war of folly has killed about 655,000 Iraqis, according to a study led by Gilbert Burnham of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore. By January 28, 2007, 23,114 U.S. military personnel had been wounded in action.

http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=15&ItemID=12027


Bush Budget Hikes War Funding
(02-02) 19:14 PST WASHINGTON, (AP) --
Keeping troops in Iraq for another year and a half will cost nearly a quarter-trillion dollars — about $800 for every man, woman and child in the U.S. — under the budget President Bush will submit to Congress Monday.
Bush will ask for $100 billion more for military and diplomatic operations in Iraq and Afghanistan this year and seek $145 billion for 2008, a senior Pentagon official said Friday. Those requests come on top of about $344 billion spent for Iraq since the 2003 invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein.
At the same time, Bush's budget request will propose cost curbs on Medicare providers, a cap on subsidy payments to wealthier farmers and an increase to $4,600 in the maximum Pell Grant for low-income college students.
Bush's proposal, totaling almost $3 trillion for the budget year starting Oct. 1, will kick off a major debate with the new Democratic-controlled Congress. Democrats are sure to press for more money for domestic programs, and they've signaled they won't consider renewing Bush's tax cuts until closer to 2010, when they are to expire.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2007/02/02/national/w132010S83.DTL


Libby's Approximate Date
As astute readers have noted, there is a key detail from the note Libby wrote in June 2003 recording the information Cheney had just passed along, that Plame worked in the Counter-Proliferation Department of the CIA.
The day recorded in the date was changed. And it has a squiggly line indicating an approximation.
This suggests the possibility that Libby changed the date to make it less incriminating. And that he added the squiggly line to further obscure the date. Which of course leads me to suspect that the date might have real significance.
Now, before I lay out four scenarios explaining the sensitivity of the date, let me just say--it gets worse.
You see, Libby admitted to the FBI that this was dated after the fact (and somewhere, though I can't find it, someone admits that the day was changed).

http://mparent7777.blogspot.com/2007/02/libbys-approximate-date.html


May 29: At one of two Deputies meetings both attended, Libby asks Grossman about the Wilson trip. Grossman asks Armitage (who knows nothing), then asks Kansteiner and Ford, who know it was Joe. Grossman asked for a report. …

http://thenexthurrah.typepad.com/the_next_hurrah/files/us_v_libby_gx104_plame_cp.pdf


CIA-Gate Scandal Resurfaces
Washington , Feb 2 (Prensa Latina) Former top aid of US President George W. Bush, Lewis Libby, arranged with VP Richard Cheney to punish US diplomats critical of the US war on Iraq.
Federal sources said Libby, top defendant in the CIA-gate scandal, planned with Cheney to leak to the press the name of covert CIA agent Valerie Plame, wife of ex Ambassador Joseph Wilson.
The action generated a political crisis four years back that led to a judicial probe.
The Washington Times said the collusion surfaced in the testimony by FBI officer Deborah Bond who claims to have evidence that they discredited Wilson for criticizing President Bush.
The revelation confirms allegations by defense attorney Theodore Wells that Libby was sacrificed to protect Bush's political strategist Karl Rove.
Wells described Libby as a disciplined executive that followed orders. He was charged with perjury and obstruction of justice, for which he could get 30 years in jail.

http://www.plenglish.com/article.asp?ID=%7BC4FECF50-0BCE-42A7-8005-C109D6AD1698%7D)&language=EN


Clint Eastwood on Bush’s approach of converting people to Democracy: “Naive”

By: John Amato on Friday, February 9th, 2007 at 7:03 AM - PST
Clint was at Pebble Beach with Neil Cavuto and spent some time talking about his films, Iraq and George Bush. Cavuto kept prodding Clint in that swarmy style he has about the big, bad "Hollywood liberal" theme, but Clint gently steered him away from it.
Eastwood on Bush:…(H)e genuinely believes–I just don't happen to believe with him–on making…converting people to a democracy overnight or even in a ten year period. I just think that's a little bit naive to approach it that way…
Remember when Million Dollar Baby came out and the Michael Medveds of the world attacked it because of the euthanasia aspect of the film? Eastwood replied that there was no agenda, other than to tell a good story and make you think. Cavuto only wanted to keep pushing Eastwood to defend scenes which didn't relect the FoxNews conservative/jingoistic viewpoint of the world and Eastwood easily brushed them aside.

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/02/09/clint-eastwood-on-bushs-approach-of-converting-people-to-democracy-naive/


Towards a Sociological Understanding of American Islamophobia
The widespread harassment, imprisonment, and deportation targeting Arabs and Muslims has been called the “new McCarthyism”.[1] Yet U.S. government officials maintain that this new “war on terrorism” is not against any specific group but those who seek to attack innocent civilians and hate “our freedoms” and “way of life”.[2] In this article, I seek to determine if there is a systematic persecution of Muslims buttressed by widespread intolerance. Since there is essentially no serious scholarly treatment of this topic, I will also examine the usefulness of current sociological models used to understand racism.
Historical Background: Early Manifestations
There is a strong link between treatment of Arabs and Muslims in America and U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Official government suspicion of the entire “Arabic speaking population” as potential terrorists in America began with the Nixon administration following the Munich affair at the 1972 Olympics. “Operation Boulder”, a systematic violation of constitutionally-guaranteed rights of U.S. citizens with Middle-Eastern descent, was justified by the supposed objective of thwarting Palestinian terrorist attacks, even though the only successful and attempted verified acts of domestic terrorism in connection with the Arab-Israeli conflict were committed against Arabs and Muslims by the Jewish Defense League (JDL).[3]

http://www.studentsforahumansociety.org/?p=60


NBC newsman wraps up testimony
February 08, 2007 15:50 EST
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The prosecution is resting its case against a former White House aide, following some courtroom drama involving a Sunday morning T-V host.
Tim Russert of "Meet the Press" was the last prosecution witness in the Lewis Libby trial. Libby is accused of lying to investigators tracing the source of a leak about a C-I-A operative.
Along with being a newsman, Russert is also a law school graduate. And during a tense cross-examination, he was able to avoid several traps put out by Libby's lawyer, who tried criticizing Russert's ethics.
Still, Russert looked uncomfortable at times. That includes when he was asked why he willingly talked to the F-B-I about a chat with Libby -- then gave a sworn statement saying it was a confidential talk that he wouldn't testify about. At one point, Libby's lawyer demanded a "yes or no" answer.

http://www.wlos.com/template/inews_wire/wires.national/36c5d8af-www.wlos.com.shtml


“Did You Tell Mr. Libby That Wilson’s Wife Worked at the CIA?” “No.” (Byron York)
National Review ^ 2-8-07 Byron York
Posted on 02/08/2007 4:25:17 PM PST by STARWISE
Tim Russert testifies at the Libby trial.
Tim Russert’s testimony at the perjury and obstruction of justice trial of Lewis Libby presented a dilemma for the left-wing netroots critics of the Bush administration who have come to the federal courthouse in Washington to watch the proceedings.
On the one hand, they can’t stand Libby and, even more, Libby’s old boss, Vice President Dick Cheney. But on the other hand, they can’t stand Tim Russert, either. Whose side to take?
Neither, of course. But what became clear by the close of court yesterday was this: Yes, the netroots types hate Cheney and Libby. But they really hate Tim Russert.
“Tim Russert hobbled into the courtroom this afternoon on crutches,” noted Arianna Huffington of the Huffington Post. (He broke his ankle several weeks ago.)

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1781637/posts


Prosecutors Rest In Libby Perjury Trial
POSTED: 4:18 pm EST February 8, 2007
UPDATED: 4:50 pm EST February 8, 2007
WASHINGTON -- The prosecution has rested its case against a former White House aide, following some courtroom drama involving a Sunday morning TV host.
Tim Russert, of "Meet the Press," was the last prosecution witness in the Lewis Libby trial. Libby is accused of lying to investigators tracing the source of a leak about a CIA operative.
Along with being a newsman, Russert is also a law school graduate. And during a tense cross-examination, he was able to avoid several traps put out by Libby's lawyer, who tried criticizing Russert's ethics.

http://www.wmtw.com/politics/10965341/detail.html


Washington riveted by Libby trial
The prosecution was winding up on Thursday in a perjury trial that has gripped Washington for the past three weeks and seen a parade of witnesses from the Bush administration and the United States media. On Monday it will be the turn of defence lawyers representing Lewis Libby, the former chief of staff to the Vice-President, Dick Cheney, who is also due to give evidence.
At the US district court on Constitution Avenue, within sight of Congress and close to the White House, members of the capital's elite have been shuffling in and out, offering insights into the workings of the notoriously secretive Bush administration. The case has revealed the closeness of the politicians, officials and media and the trade-offs between them.
If Libby is found guilty of perjury, it will be a major embarrassment to the already weakened President George Bush. Libby denies five criminal charges for which he could be fined and jailed.

http://www.mg.co.za/articlepage.aspx?area=/breaking_news/breaking_news__international_news/&articleid=298559


Libby defense plans to call top journalists to the stand
Lawyers for I. Lewis Libby Jr. will try to use some of the country's top journalists to rebut the potentially damaging testimony of their colleagues when Mr. Libby begins his defense next week against charges of perjury and obstruction of justice.
Among the journalists the Libby defense plans to call is the managing editor of the New York Times, Jill Abramson, who could cast doubt on the testimony last week of a former Times reporter, Judith Miller.
The most well-known journalist the defense plans to call is the assistant managing editor of the Washington Post, Bob Woodward, who first rose to stardom during the Watergate scandal. He has said he learned of Ms. Plame in June 2003 — a month before her identity became public — from the deputy secretary of state at the time, Richard Armitage.
Lawyers for Mr. Libby also want to question an NBC News correspondent, Andrea Mitchell, about a televised interview she gave in October 2003 in which she said she and other journalists were aware that Ms. Plame worked for the CIA before that information was first reported in a July 14, 2003, column by Robert Novak. She later backed off that statement, saying she either misspoke or was confused.
Source: Russell Berman.
The New York Sun

http://www.spj.org/pressnotes.asp?REF=18390



Cheney Testifies, Found in Contempt
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
The prosecution in the I. Lewis Libby case called Vice President Dick Cheney to the stand today to testify about comments attributed to him during the federal investigation of leaks involving CIA agent Valerie Plame. OP News Service obtained this exclusive transcript from an unnamed "live blogger" covering the trial in real time.
Judge: Clerk, please swear the Vice President in.
Clerk: Will you swear to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help you God?
Cheney: Go [explicative] yourself.
Judge: Mr. Vice President, please answer the question.
Cheney: It is NOT a legitimate question. You and Wolf Blitzer are impertinate [explicative].
Judge: Sir, be that as it may, I must insist you answer the question or I will find you in contempt.
Cheney: Contempt? That's rich! I'm the [explicative] President, um Vice President, of the United [explicative] States of America. I shoot people in the [explicative] face before breaking for cocktails at the club. And those are just the people I'm found of. You should see what I do to the enemies of America!
Judge: Sir, please!
Cheney: Yeah! OK, I'll tell my version of the truth.

http://omnipotentpoobah.blogspot.com/2007/02/cheney-testifies-found-in-contempt.html


Timothy P. Carney: Sweeping Boeing’s bank under the rug
Timothy P. Carney, The Examiner
Read more by Timothy P. Carney
Feb 9, 2007 12:00 AM (19 hrs ago)
Current rank: # 580 of 14,689 articles
WASHINGTON - President Bush’s budget proposes cutting nearly all funding for the favorite government agency of many American big businesses — and they’re just thrilled.
The Export-Import Bank of the United States is a federal agency that loans money and guarantees loans to foreign governments and companies to help the foreign buyers buy American goods.
In recent years, Congress has appropriated more than $900 million for Ex-Im, but this year, the president’s budget calls for only $1 million, a 99 percent reduction. This is hardly a step by the president to abolish corporate welfare, but rather a move to reduce the scrutiny of corporate welfare by making Ex-Im self-financing.
Ex-Im is a posterboy for corporate welfare. Its mission is to transfer money from U.S. taxpayers, through foreign buyers, and ultimately into the pockets of American companies. While the agency touts its support for small business, a vast majority of its money goes to subsidize sales by the largest corporations in America.

http://www.examiner.com/a-556142~Timothy_P__Carney__Sweeping_Boeing_s_bank_under_the_rug.html


Bolivia: Evo’s report card
[Cochabamba, Bolivia] Seven years ago the central Bolivian city of Cochabamba exploded onto the world’s business pages because of its rejection of a World Bank-backed plan to privatise its water services. When the San Francisco-based utility Bechtel put tariffs up by 50% without any improvement in service quality, the citizens decided enough was enough. Their resistance not only saw the end of Bechtel’s Bolivian adventures [the company eventually settled for 30 cents], but led to the rejection of other privatisation deals across the country.
Evo Morales, who earned his stripes as a union leader in the province of Cochabamba, was instrumental in leading the popular affront against lop-sided foreign private contracts. A year into power, Bolivia’s first ever indigenous president has made steps to reorder Bolivia’s economy towards a more equitable investment pattern. But not only is changing entrenched economic structures harder than his leftist supporters had expected, Mr. Morales’ attempts at reform are also leaving him with growing domestic opposition. Last month, a nationwide debate over greater regional autonomy spilled over on the streets of Cochabamba. Two people died and 160 were injured in the ensuing violence.

http://ethicalcorporation.blogspot.com/2007/02/bolivia-evos-report-card.html


War Profiteering Exposed To The Light Of Day
by Thomas L. Walsh
For at least three years, the "liberal media" slept soundly for the most part as the Bush administration created its unfathomable mess in Iraq.
Now, within the last year, the din of the media objecting to its ham-fisted incompetence in all things to do with Iraq has become a deafening crescendo, obliterating almost any other news.
While the administration's hard-shelled support base has by now dropped below thirty per cent, there remains one group of silent, unwavering, and immensely powerful supporters who remain firmly at the president's side.
I am speaking of the many corporations who have unquestioningly funded his election campaigns, as a means of bolstering and continuing their avaricious war profiteering.
Yes folks, this war and its uniquely Republican method of steering billions, not millions of taxpayers' dollars toward the dreamy GOP philosophy of privatization, has been an unprecedented boon for these corporations.

http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_thomas_l_070208_war_profiteering_exp.htm


THE OPPORTUNIST 'PRIVATE CONTRACTORS' IN IRAQ SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN THERE. It was an illegal war that true patriots should have never participated in, but, where money is more important that the honor and dignity of a country,mercenaries take over and expect 'the country' to follow in some kind of misconceived definition of patriotic purpose. I don't think so.


Army Says It Will Withhold $19.6 Million From Halliburton, Citing Potential Contract Breach
WASHINGTON, Feb. 7 — The Army announced during a House oversight committee hearing on Wednesday that it would withhold $19.6 million from the Halliburton Company after recently discovering that the contractor had hired the company Blackwater USA to provide armed security guards in Iraq, a potential breach of its government contract.
The Army has said that its contracts with Halliburton, which has a five-year, $16 billion deal to support American military operations in Iraq, generally barred the company and its subcontractors from using private armed guards. But in a statement, Halliburton disagreed with the Army’s interpretation and suggested that there was nothing to prohibit Halliburton’s subcontractors from hiring such guards.
The announcement came during a hearing of the House Government Oversight Committee that included emotional testimony about the killing of four Blackwater employees in Falluja, Iraq, in 2004.
In an e-mail message made public in the hearing and written only hours before the four were killed, another Blackwater worker told the company to end the “smoke and mirror show” and provide its employees in the war zone with adequate weapons and armored vehicles.
“I need ammo,” the worker, Tom Powell, said in an e-mail message dated March 30, 2004, to supervisors at Blackwater, which is based in North Carolina. “I need Glocks and M4s — all the client body armor you got,” he wrote. “Guys are in the field with borrowed stuff and in harm’s way.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/08/washington/08waxman.html?_r=1&adxnnl=1&oref=slogin&adxnnlx=1171080406-D4Ng5AiAdi0+JLGBKhCtIQ

continued ...

 

February 8, 2007

Maldon, United Kingdom

Photographer states :: The snow arrived this morning and we are expecting more tonight.

So much for an English Garden. Hope everyone across the pond is okay.


 

Has Lake Michigan ever frozen over completely from shore to shore?

 

February 8, 2007

Manistique, Michigan

Photographer states :: Frozen over.

Manistique is the very northern reach of Lake Michigan. Lake Michigan is frozen. I sure don't see any white caps out there. Lake Michigan never freezes.

Trends in Lake Michigan Ice Cover (click on)

It is rare that Lake Michigan freezes over completely. Despite the area¹s reputation for harsh winters, the only year we are certain Lake Michigan approached being completely frozen over was 1979, when extended periods of low temperatures resulted in an extensive ice buildup in the southern half of the lake (see Figure 3). In an average year, ice covers a bit less than half of Lake Michigan¹s surface. Because the lake stretches about 300 miles from North to South, there is usually much open water over the deeper waters of the southern basin due to milder temperatures. Since airborne and satellite observations of lake ice began four decades ago, only two other years, 1977 and 1994, have seen periods when nearly 90% of the lake was ice-covered. Recently, warmer temperatures have kept the ice cover far below average levels. The icepack covered only 15% of Lake Michigan in 1998, even in late February when the icepack is usually at its greatest.


 

 


February 8, 2007

Havre-de-Grace, Maryland

Photographer states :: Taken from 8,500' altitude, this photo shows extensive ice on the Chesapeake Bay to the left. Havre-de-Grace, MD, is near the center of the photo on the far shore of the Susquehanna River, and the Rt. 95 bridge over the Susq. Riv. is to the right. A breath-taking view!
 

 

February 8, 2007

Toronto, Canada  

 

February 7, 2007

Wanswell, Gloucestershire, England

Photographer states :: This was my trip to the supermarket this morning - we dipped to minus 5C and it didn't go much above freezing all day.

 

Morning Papers - continued

Sydney Morning Herald

The USA has nothing. It’s all lies, you can tell through the ‘uncertainty’ they are putting forward.

US has evidence of Iranian involvement in Iraq
Serial numbers and markings on explosives used in Iraq provide "pretty good" evidence that Iran is providing either weapons or technology for militants there, US Defence Secretary Robert Gates asserted today.
Offering some of the first public details of evidence the military has collected, Gates said: "I think there's some serial numbers, there may be some markings on some of the projectile fragments that we found" that point to Iran.
But at the same time, he said he was somewhat surprised recent raids by coalition and Iraqi forces in Iraq swept up some Iranians.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/us-has-evidence-of-iranian-involvement-in-iraq/2007/02/10/1170524310797.html

Robert Gates is a pandering moron that believes he can sell still another reason for a Neocon war. Why would any raids by USA troops be a surprise in finding Iranians in Iraq. There are lots of Iranians in Iraq. They are there on pilgramages. They are there about family circumstances. They are there for worship with other Shi'ites and they might even be there to find a way to end the war that Bush has no intention of ending.


States sign on to carbon trading scheme
A NATIONAL carbon trading scheme by 2010 now seems a reality, after Queensland and Western Australia dropped their reservations about the state-driven scheme and agreed to sign on.
But the states say they would still prefer the Federal Government to implement the scheme rather than pursue it through co-operative arrangements. "Today we are issuing a national call-to-arms on climate change, signing a declaration on climate change," the Premier, Morris Iemma, said yesterday. "We are speaking with one voice, and it is time to act."
Victoria's Premier, Steve Bracks, said: "Mark this day down. Today is the turning point in the debate on climate change."

http://www.smh.com.au/news/environment/states-sign-on-to-carbon-trading-scheme/2007/02/09/1170524303964.html


Tobacco cheque tops MP's undeclared fund
THE federal Liberal MP Sophie Mirabella has been linked to a secret Sydney supporters' fund which raised tens of thousands of dollars that was not declared to the Australian Electoral Commission.
None of the cash - which includes $15,000 from British American Tobacco - was disclosed on party returns to the commission, the group admits.
Nor did the group disclose its funds separately as an "associated entity" of the Liberal Party.
A spokesman for the group Friends of Indi, named after Mrs Mirabella's Wangaratta-based electorate, admitted it was a "terrible oversight".

http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/tobacco-cheque-tops-mps-undeclared-fund/2007/02/09/1170524303985.html


Whaling acid attack terrorist act: Japan
Japan has expressed outrage after anti-whaling activists lobbed acid onto the decks of a whaling ship in the Southern Ocean and slightly injured two crew members, terming their activities "piratical, terrorist acts".
After the clash, two protesters from the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, an environmental group chasing the Japanese whalers, tied their boat to an iceberg for protection from icy winds as they drifted in fog after the inflatable was damaged.
The Japanese whaling boat, the Nisshin Maru, joined the search for the men, who were rescued safely eight hours later.
The group then resumed its pursuit of Japan's whaling fleet, a senior official at Japan's Fisheries Agency said.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/World/Whaling-acid-attack-terrorist-act-Japan/2007/02/09/1170524300133.html


Branson-Gore crusade
Airline tycoon Richard Branson announced on Friday a $25 million prize for the first person to come up with a way of scrubbing greenhouse gases out of the atmosphere in the battle to beat global warming.
Flanked by climate campaigners former US Vice President Al Gore and British ex-diplomat Crispin Tickell, Branson said he hoped the prize would spur innovative and creative thought to save mankind from self-destruction.
"Man created the problem and therefore man should solve the problem," he told a news conference to reveal the Virgin Earth Challenge.
"Unless we can devise a way of removing CO2 (carbon dioxide) from the earth's atmosphere we will lose half of all species on earth, all the coral reefs, 100 million people will be displaced, farmlands will become deserts and rain forests wastelands."

http://www.smh.com.au/news/environment/bransongore-crusade/2007/02/10/1170524306987.html


Jakarta's future under cloud as water retreats
RECEDING floods across Jakarta exposed a rank, muddy mess of sodden belongings littering countless streets and homes.
The deluge that inundated most of the city also revealed gaping flaws in Indonesian planning and administration, and raised questions of abandoning the capital altogether.
As residents began salvaging and beginning anew, anger grew at the lack of help from officials at all levels. No one took responsibility and relief agencies were unco-ordinated.
The President, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, did not intervene but called on governors around the city to co-ordinate future flood mitigation efforts.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/jakartas-future-under-cloud-as-water-retreats/2007/02/09/1170524304080.html


China's blue bloods ignore call of politics
READERS who made it to the last paragraph of the recent Herald obituary of the legendary Chinese Red Army marshal Bo Yibo will have learnt an odd, but illustrative, factoid about today's China.
The veteran revolutionary's grandson is attending Harrow, the famous English public school.
The boy's father is China's Minister of Commerce, Bo Xilai, who rose to his position via a stint as governor of the Manchurian province of Liaoning, where he was known for his toughness against dissidents.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/chinas-blue-bloods-ignore-call-of-politics/2007/02/09/1170524304074.html



Police mission to Solomons at risk of collapse
THE Australian-led Regional Assistance Mission to the Solomon Islands is close to breakdown, with the Foreign Minister, Alexander Downer, taking the unprecedented step of appealing directly to the people of the Solomons to stop their Government from expelling the regional police force.
With communication lines broken between Australia and the Solomons Prime Minister, Manessah Sogavare, Mr Downer published his appeal in an open letter in the country's media.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/police-mission-to-solomons-at-risk-of-collapse/2007/02/09/1170524304062.html


Islamists label UK a police state
FIVE men were to appear in court yesterday charged with terrorism offences after raids in Birmingham over an alleged plot to behead a Muslim British soldier and show a video of his execution on the internet.
"Five men from Birmingham have been charged overnight with offences under the Terrorism Acts 2000 and Terrorism Act 2006," a police spokeswoman said. Another man is being held for questioning.
The charges against the men, aged 29 to 43, came amid increasing controversy over the arrest last week of nine British men of Pakistani origin and accusations that Britain had become a police state for Muslims.
On Thursday anti-terrorism police arrested the controversial London Muslim Abu Izzadeen, who last September was watched by millions on television as he heckled the Home Secretary, John Reid, at a public meeting.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/islamists-label-uk-a-police-state/2007/02/09/1170524304068.html


Carr: don't ease rules on new marinas
THE former premier Bob Carr has been so upset by a plan to strip the Maritime Authority of its front-line planning powers over Sydney Harbour that he has lobbied to extract a promise from the Government that the plan will be dumped.
Mr Carr, whose government placed a moratorium on commercial harbour marina development six years ago, was so disturbed at revelations in Monday's Herald about cabinet approving a new draft policy that he has devoted much of his week to lobbying senior Government MPs.
He confirmed to the Herald yesterday that he had "contacted people in the Government seeking clarification of to what extent a new draft policy would depart from the previous one".

http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/carr-dont-ease-rules-on-new-marinas/2007/02/09/1170524303922.html


Coalmine 'too noisy for locals'
A DEPARTMENT of Environment recommendation that a giant coalmine in the Hunter Valley not proceed unless nearby residents were bought out has been watered down by a panel of experts established by the Planning Minister, Frank Sartor.
The noise and vibration from the Anvil Hill mine proposed by Centennial Coal represented "an unacceptable impact on an entire community", according to the Department of Environment and Conservation.
Nothing could be done to cut the noise likely to be suffered by people living in 82 nearby homes, so Centennial should buy the houses, said the department.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/coalmine-too-noisy-for-locals/2007/02/09/1170524303955.html


Climate of fear drives Prime Minister's conversion
Call me a narky old cynic, but I can't help thinking that the Prime Minister's new-found interest in global warming has a lot to do with his plummeting opinion poll ratings and very little to do with a sudden, sinking conviction at Kirribilli House that the end of the world might be more nigh than we would like.
For years, Howard and his ministers - cheered on by their claque of right-wing media ratbags - have scorned warnings of climate change as no more than a wicked plot to destroy capitalism. The mounting pile of scientific evidence advancing theory and fact of a warming planet mattered not.
What had their knickers knotted was the sort of people who were sounding the alarm bells. As ever with the Tories, it was not what they didn't like so much as who they didn't like. Aloft in the ivory tower, they could see the class enemy advancing, a Tolkien horde of bearded tree-huggers, drug-addled university students, amazonian women activists in very bad hand-knits, Greenpeace warriors, Herald letter writers, doctors' wives and Senator Bob Brown, all of them to be bucketed out of reflex habit. The pejorative "enviro-Nazis" was flung about with gay abandon.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/climate-of-fear-drives-prime-ministers-conversion/2007/02/09/1170524294887.html


Tiger Airways not spoiling tactic
SINGAPORE AIRLINES has denied it is using its part-owned budget carrier Tiger Airways in a plot to undermine the $11.1 billion private equity bid for Qantas.
Four years after Singapore Air abandoned plans to establish a domestic airline in Australia, the carrier rejected any notion on Friday that it was behind Tiger's plans to enter the Australian domestic market.
"We addressed the issue of our future involvement in the domestic market back in 2003," said a Singapore Air spokesman, Stephen Forshaw, who stressed that Tiger Airways was run entirely independently from his airline.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/business/tiger-airways-not-spoiling-tactic/2007/02/09/1170524296603.html


Inside the $50b battle for America's office empire
"ROSES are red, violets are blue; I hear a rumour, is it true?"
That strained line of poetry set off the fiercest buyout battle since the epic contest for RJR Nabisco in the late 1980s, a struggle that was captured in the book Barbarians at the Gate.
The line, written by the real estate mogul Samuel Zell in an email message last month, invited a rival bid topping a $US48.50-a-share offer for his Equity Office Properties, the biggest office landlord in the nation, with buildings in Manhattan, Chicago, Atlanta and other major cities.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/business/inside-the-50b-battle-for-americas-office-empire/2007/02/09/1170524296618.html


Mainstream nakedness
As we celebrate the annual festival of overpriced roses in the coming week, it's likely that the 32nd birthday of Australia's first legal nudie beach will go by without a peep.
Granted recent nude news has been dominated by reports of Christina Aguilera spending Sundays at home with her husband stark naked. Then again, there's not much to peep about. But for a relaxed and comfortable country we've made very little public nudity progress since 1975, when Don Dunstan declared Maslin Beach near Adelaide officially bare. Free-range nakedness is relegated to Leunig cartoons, super-leftie protesters and card-carrying naturists.
High culture, strippers and university college "bonding" sessions also get a look-in. But Queensland doesn't even have a legal clothes-optional beach; streakers get arrested at the cricket; and while we don't like banning films for violence, we'll yank 'em out of cinemas quick smart if they show too much naked body.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/mainstream-nakedness/2007/02/09/1170524294875.html


Unholy alliance
Roulla Yiacoumi looks at how the porn industry is driving technology - and vice versa.
EVERY January, thousands of gadget geeks from around the world gather in Las Vegas to witness the unveiling of new toys at the annual Consumer Electronics Show. In an adjacent hall in the Sands Expo and Convention Centre is a show of toys of a very different kind - the Adult Entertainment Expo.
The venue is not the only thing the two shows have in common. Each attracts a predominantly male crowd, both are part of an industry that generates billions in revenue and each are trying hard to get more women involved as consumers.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/technology/an-unholy-alliance/2007/02/07/1170524129445.html


Covers come off Apple's new Sydney store
Detailed plans for Apple's first Australian retail store, soon to pop up on the corner of George and King streets in the Sydney CBD, have been revealed.
The shopfront will spread over three levels of a building being built at 367 George Street, architectural drawings first revealed by website ifoAppleStore.com show.
Each of the levels will have a floor space of around 445-square-metres, and hanging over the store's entrance will be a large white Apple logo, suspended inside a transparent glass facade.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/biztech/covers-come-off-apples-new-sydney-store/2007/02/09/1170524276066.html


Murdoch/FOX keen to hang onto MySpace

http://www.smh.com.au/news/technology/murdoch-keen-to-hang-onto-myspace/2007/02/08/1170524232308.html


British Airways introduces baggage charge
British Airways (BA) introduces new baggage charges next week which have been criticised by Help the Aged charity which says they will hit older customers.
From Tuesday, passengers face paying up to 240 pounds ($A608) if they want to check in more than one bag on a long haul return flight.
BA said the new baggage policy, announced last June, would be simpler and only affect 2 percent of its customers.
"We are changing some of our excess baggage policies from next week, but our overall baggage allowances remain highly competitive when compared with other airlines," a BA spokesman said.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/travel/british-airways-introduces-baggage-charge/2007/02/09/1170524269057.html


'Australia' up for sale
A Kuwaiti firm has said it was negotiating with regional and international investors to sell all or part of the "Australia" segment it had purchased in Dubai's The World property project.
Investment Dar, a publicly-quoted company on the Kuwait Stock Exchange, two years ago bought the Australian continent on The World, some 300 islands shaped like a world map off Dubai's coast.
The company said in a statement posted on the KSE website that its subsidiary, Oqyana Real Estate, which is managing the project is "holding talks to sell all or significant parts of Australian continent."

http://www.smh.com.au/news/travel/australia-up-for-sale/2007/02/08/1170524205827.html


Upsurge of violence in resort town
More than a dozen armed assailants staged and videotaped simultaneous attacks against two offices of the state attorney general in Acapulco on Tuesday, killing at least seven people in this Pacific resort plagued by drug violence.
The attacks took place in two neighborhoods about nine miles north of the tourist zone before 11 a.m., said Enrique Gil Mercado, special prosecutor for the attorney general's office in the state of Guerrero, which includes Acapulco.
The gunmen were dressed in military uniforms and pretended to be conducting a weapons check, said Erit Montufar, director-general of the attorney general's investigative police offices in Guerrero.
Montufar said an assailant in one office asked: "Are you the only ones here?" At the other office, a gunmen asked: "Are these all the weapons you have?"

http://www.smh.com.au/news/travel/upsurge-of-violence-in-resort-town/2007/02/08/1170524200529.html


Tourist goes on anti-Semitic rampage
An Austrian court sentenced a 24-year-old Croatian man to 15 months in jail on Wednesday for smashing up a Jewish school with a crowbar in an anti-Semitic rampage last year. The man, whose name was not released pending a possible appeal, told the court "there are two many Jews in this country" and justice officials said his failure to show any remorse for the attack contributed to the jail sentence.
He was convicted of causing severe property damage, which insurers put at 150,000 euros ($190,000). The Lauder Chabad School was unoccupied at the time and no one was injured.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/travel/tourist-goes-on-antisemitic-rampage/2007/02/08/1170524205687.html



New Zealand Herald

Climate challenge tipped to heat up the global economy

Climate change will boost the global economy and dominate financial markets over the next 25 years, a leading investment bank has predicted.
In a new report, Barclays Capital challenges the conventional wisdom that global warming will have a devastating impact on economic growth.
It believes the need to increase energy capacity by 50 per cent by 2035, while simultaneously reducing dependence on hydrocarbons, will spark an "energy revolution" reminiscent of the technology revolution which led to the dot.com boom.
"If ever the time were ripe for such an energy revolution, it is now," said Tim Bond, global head of asset allocation at Barclays Capital, and author of the report.
"And like all historical adoptions of general purpose technologies, the process should prove immensely stimulative to economic growth."Mr Bond says that those who couch the climate change debate in terms of the cost to growth are underestimating the impact of an energy revolution.
Last year's Stern Review concluded that if temperatures rise by five degrees celsius, up to 10 per cent of global output could be lost.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/3/story.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10422999


Branson puts up cash for clean air
Virgin Airlines boss Sir Richard Branson has announced a multi-million pound prize for the best way of removing thousands of tonnes of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
The prize - around £10 million ($28.5 million) - will go to the most convincing invention for actively absorbing and storing the globally warming gas in the atmosphere.
Sir Richard has drawn up a distinguished panel of judges to oversee the prize, including James Lovelock, the inventor of the Gaia theory; James Hansen, the Nasa researcher who first warned the US Government of climate change; and Tim Flannery, the acclaimed Australian zoologist and explorer.
Last September, Sir Richard announced at the Clinton Global Initiative in New York that he would invest all his profits from his five airlines and train companies - which he estimated to be US$3 billion over 10 years - into ways of developing energy sources that do not contribute to global warming.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10423232



Whalers and protesters join to search for missing activists
Japanese whalers joined anti-whaling activists in the cold oceans around Antarctica in the hunt for two missing activists in an inflatable.The pair, an American and an Australian, disappeared in heavy fog while operating from the anti-whaling group Sea Shepherd's vessel Farley Mowat.The ship and her Zodiacs were confronting the Japanese whaling fleet.The Sea Shepherd Society sought help from both the whaling fleet and New Zealand authorities to find the missing dinghy. The pair have since been found.A spokesman for the Sea Shepherd said the pair were well but happy to be found."They had radio problems and were making there way back to the ship when the fog set in. They huddled down and waited to be found," he said.The inflatable was carrying a GPS locator and VHS radio.The fog prevented Sea Shepherd from using helicopters to undertake an aerial search.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10423192


Survivors rope in iceberg's aid
Two anti-whaling protesters lost in frigid Antarctic waters lassoed an iceberg to protect them from the wind as they drifted in heavy fog.
Karl Nielsen of Perth and American John Gravois were found yesterday afternoon seven hours after becoming lost in the inflatable boat they had been using to frustrate Japan's annual whale hunt.
Mr Gravois said they had been trying to foul the propeller of a Japanese whaling ship with a net, but got too close and their small craft collided with the ship's massive hull.
The inflatable - part of an ongoing protest by the Sea Shepherd conservation group - soon began taking on water and could not keep up with other, similar craft involved in the campaign.
The pair were quickly left behind but the real blow came when they found their radio would not work, Mr Gravois said after being hauled safely on board Sea Shepherd's flagship, the Farley Mowat.
The Los Angeles man said yesterday that the hours spent in icy temperatures, enveloped in fog and cut off from any form of help, had been "pretty hairy".

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10423308


Snow in winter takes UK transport by surprise
LONDON - Millions of commuters were braced for delays on their journey home after heavy snow caused delays on planes, trains and roads on Thursday.
While the cold snap gave many children a surprise day off in the snow, passengers at several airports endured long waits as workers struggled to clear runways.
Gatwick, Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Luton and Stansted were closed for part of the day because the wintry showers made it too dangerous for planes to take off or land.
The Met Office said many areas received 5 to 10 cm of snow, although the snowfall eased during the day.
Stansted Airport was among the worst affected.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10423138


Snow start to day in the UK
Friday February 09, 2007
Britain was hit by travel chaos yesterday as much of the country was covered by a thick blanket of snow at morning rush-hour.
Luton Airport had to be closed for up to four hours and one lane of the M25 motorway was blocked in Hertfordshire.
Birmingham and Gatwick flights were also affected. Schools were closed in Birmingham.



Flood hit Far North towns reconnected
A temporary crossing over a stream in the Far North has been created, reconnecting communities cut off from the rest of New Zealand by flooding this week.The Mitimiti Bridge, north of Te Kao, was closed on Wednesday after severe flooding washed away an embankment.The collapse effectively cut off several communities -- about 500 people -- as the bridge is part of State Highway 1, the only major road in the isolated area.Transit NZ's northern operations manager Joseph Flanagan said a temporary stone crossing had been laid across the stream next to the bridge."This crossing has allowed us to reopen SH1 and communities who were previously cut-off to the north of the Mitimiti stream have access once more," he said."We have also successfully repaired the cracks in the Mitimiti bridge and work is progressing well on restoring the southern embankment. Work will be completed by Sunday as planned when the bridge will be reopened."Mr Flanagan, who visited the worksite with Associate Minister of Transport Judith Tizard today, said Transit was also repairing a number of slips to the north of the bridge.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10423219



Flood-hit bridge to be ready by Sunday
Transit New Zealand said today repairs to a bridge linking Cape Reinga and other far northern areas with the rest of New Zealand should be finished by Sunday.
The Mitimiti Bridge, north of Te Kao, was closed yesterday after severe flooding washed away the embankment.
The collapse effectively cut off several communities -- about 500 people -- as the bridge carries State Highway 1, the only major road in the isolated area.
Transit's Northern operations manager Joseph Flanagan said today repairs were expected to be complete by Sunday so the road and bridge could be reopened.
"We are fortunate that it is the embankment and not the bridge that has been damaged by the flooding as we are able to get the job completed much faster this way.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=68&objectid=10423029


20 die in floods, more rain on the way
JAKARTA - Indonesia's capital faced more misery yesterday from floods that officials estimate have killed at least 20 people and displaced 340,000, as swollen rivers and canals spilled muddy water on to the city streets.
The flooding in parts of the tropical city of nine million people has been up to 4m deep, causing blackouts, cutting telephone lines and blocking key roads.
Floods are common in Indonesia during the rainy season but the devastation of recent days has been the worst in five years and meteorologists have warned the city could suffer heavy rains until the end of the month.
"In Jakarta, Bekasi and Tangerang, 340,000 people have been displaced," Rustam Pakaya, a Health Ministry official, said by telephone, referring to two areas around the capital.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=68&objectid=10422596



Science great mourned by two nations
New Zealand and American flags flew at half-mast outside the Hunter Building at Victoria University's Kelburn campus yesterday to mark the passing of one of New Zealand's greatest scientists.
Nobel Laureate Professor Alan MacDiarmid, a Victoria alumnus, died on Wednesday after a fall at home in Philadelphia while preparing to travel to New Zealand. He was 79.
In 2000 Professor MacDiarmid became the country's third Nobel Prize winner (after Sir Ernest Rutherford and Maurice Wilkins), winning the chemistry prize for his work with Alan Heeger and Hideki Shirakawa on making plastics conduct electricity.
The breakthrough paved the way for cheap plastic batteries and light-emitting diodes used in television screens and cellphones, among other things.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10423058



Winner of fishing contest bolts as organisers investigate
Organisers of a fishing contest are offering a reward after they suspect foul play in a competition.
They are offering a $500 reward to anyone who can prove the winning fish in the Mokihinui angling competition was actually caught in a set net and was not fair game on the end of a hook.
The Fishing Paper editor Daryl Crimp, of Nelson, said the judges were highly suspicious of the person who had claimed the $600 prize for the biggest overall snapper just one hour before the 10-day competition officially ended.
However, they felt obliged to pay out."
What happened was that someone rang up about 2.30pm on the last day of the competition and asked whether it was still open. He then registered at 3pm and 'caught' the winning snapper a little later," Mr Crimp said.The "winner" was within the designated boundaries -- but some distance from other anglers -- when the fish was landed and he was not known as a "rod and reel man".

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10423200


Downer warns Solomon Islanders of threats to peacekeeping
HONIARA - Australia's Foreign Minister Alexander Downer has warned Solomon Islanders that attempts are being made to undermine Australian efforts to help their country.
In a letter to Solomon Islanders published in the country's newspapers today, Downer said obstacles were being placed in the path of the Australian-led Regional Assistance Mission to Solomon Islands (Ramsi).
He also warned against Solomons government plans to re-arm the nation's police against the wishes of most Solomon Islanders.
Solomons prime minister Manasseh Sogavare has been embroiled in a series of diplomatic spats with Canberra since his election in May and has threatened to oust the Australian component of Ramsi.
The mission arrived in mid-2003 to restore law and order and good governance following years of ethnic unrest.
Downer said the Solomons was once again at a crossroads but most Solomon Islanders supported Ramsi and wanted the mission to stay.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10423183


NZ Super Fund invested in nuclear bombs making – Greens
The Green Party dropped a bombshell today, saying the New Zealand Super Fund is investing taxpayers' money in nuclear weaponry manufacturing.
Green Party co-leader Russel Norman said the fund had invested millions of dollars in businesses that the Norway Pension Fund refused to support, for ethical reasons.
Dr Norman has produced a report comparing investments between the New Zealand and Norway fund.
"There are 12 companies that the NZ Super Fund invests in that Norway has blacklisted for ethical reasons," he said.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10423170


Guarded hope greets North Korea nuclear proposal
BEIJING - With guarded optimism in the air, six-way talks on North Korea's nuclear arms program will consider a draft agreement on Friday that promises rare but limited steps towards curbing Pyongyang's atomic ambitions.
Envoys to the talks in China's capital saw hope that North Korea would accept initial measures to rein in its nuclear activities in return for aid and security assurances broadly spelled out in a September 2005 deal.
China was due to circulate the draft late on Thursday or early on Friday, the chief US negotiator, Assistant Secretary of State Christopher Hill, told reporters. Russia's RIA news agency said it was already in negotiators' hands.
"We hope we can achieve some kind of joint statement here," Hill said. "The delegations are coalescing around some of the themes that we believe should be the basis for a first step in implementing the September agreement."
Even if agreement is reached, it will be just one part of a complicated puzzle involving financial disagreements, North Korea's energy and economic needs, and distrust between Pyongyang and Washington over their ultimate intentions.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10423189


Iran says it will target US interests if attacked
TEHRAN - Iran's top authority, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said on Thursday the Islamic Republic would target US interests around the world if it came under attack over its disputed nuclear programme.
His comments came as an Iranian naval commander said Revolutionary Guards had test fired missiles that could sink "big warships" in the Gulf, the waterway where a second US aircraft carrier is now heading. The White House said it did not see that as a direct assault on US ships.
Iran and the United States are locked in a war of words over Tehran's nuclear energy programme, which Washington says is being channelled into bomb-building, a charge Tehran denies.
"(Iran's) enemies know well that any aggression will lead to a reaction from all sides in the Iranian nation on the aggressors and their interests around the world," state television quoted Khamenei as saying.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10423135



Five men arrest in UK on terror charges
Five men have been charged under anti-terrorism laws after a series of police raids in the central English city of Birmingham last week, British police said on Friday.
A sixth man was released without charge, while another man was still being held for questioning. Two other men were released without charge earlier this week.
"Five men from Birminghamn have been charged overnight with offences under the Terrorism Acts 2000 and 2006," police said in a joint statement with the Crown Prosecution Service. No immediate details of the charges were available.
The men, aged 29, 30, 31, 36 and 43, were due to appear in court.
Detectives investigating a suspected plot to kidnap a British Muslim soldier arrested nine men in raids on Wednesday last week in Birmingham, Britain's second largest city and one of its most ethnically diverse with a large Muslim population.
Britain has been on its second highest alert level since four British Muslims killed 52 people on London's transport system in July 2005 in Western Europe's first Islamist suicide bombings.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10423207


White House says 'we're not invading Iran'
WASHINGTON - President George W. Bush and his administration are not contemplating invading Iran, the White House said overnight.
"I've said it, the secretary of defence has said it, the president has said it: We're not invading Iran," White House spokesman Tony Snow said.
Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Thursday his country would target US interests if it came under attack.
"He's spinning a hypothetical about something that is not contemplated," White House spokesman Tony Snow said.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10423124


Muslim cleric's arrest prompts 'witch hunt' claims
A radical cleric who said Muslim members of the British armed forces should be executed has been arrested by police, sparking claims of a 'witch-hunt' against his community.
Abu Izzadeen, 31, also gained notoriety when he denounced John Reid as "an enemy of Islam and Muslims" when the Home Secretary visited east London last year.
Scotland Yard said he was being questioned on suspicion of allegedly encouraging terrorism.
But the radical Muslim leader, Anjem Choudhury, said the arrest was further proof of a "witch-hunt" against the community.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10423129


Three Iraqi diplomats seek asylum in Australia
CANBERRA - Three Iraqi diplomats and their families have asked for humanitarian asylum in Australia, refusing orders to return to their conflict-racked country.
Chief defence attache Brigadier-General Sabah al-Kareen Zebon Fureje and two staff, Colonel Kamal J Askander and Ala' al-Amiri, refused to go home after the defence office within the Canberra Embassy was shut down in mid-December.
The claim may embarrass the Australian Government, which insists that Iraq is making progress towards democracy, despite the country's bloody post-war insurgency.
The bad news yesterday continued unabated in Iraq: seven people died and 12 were wounded in two bombings last night at Suwaira, south of Baghdad; all seven crew members and passengers aboard a United States Marine helicopter were killed, the fifth such aircraft to crash in Iraq in less than three weeks. And with the promised military surge under way in Baghdad, US-Iraqi forces last night raided the Health Ministry and arrested deputy health minister Hakim Zamili. He is a senior member of the political group loyal to anti-American Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.
…But al-Sadr, the nationalist Shiite cleric whom the Mehdi army follows, is determined to avoid a military confrontation with US forces implementing the new security plan to regain control of Baghdad. Sadrist officials say they would allow the US Army into their bastion of Sadr City, home to two million people, but this probably (PROBABLY. That is a word all too conveniently used to maintain the hate of the Shi’ites.) means the militiamen would just go underground. (There is no proof anyone is going underground.)

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10423071


Former Aceh rebel gains new cause
Friday February 09, 2007
BANDA ACEH - A former separatist leader was sworn in as governor of Indonesia's once-rebellious Aceh province yesterday, further cementing a peace deal that ended almost three decades of war.
Irwandi Yusuf, 46, who escaped jail when the 2004 tsunami struck his prison, was sworn in with a copy of Islam's holy Koran above his head, pledging to be loyal to Indonesia's state ideology and constitution. Hundreds of Acehnese who came to the Parliament building in the provincial capital of Banda Aceh to witness the ceremony applauded after the swearing-in.
Yusuf won with 38 per cent of the vote, defeating seven other candidates including two former generals.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10423062


US helicopter crash near Baghdad kills seven
BAGHDAD - All seven US troops aboard a military helicopter were killed when it crashed near Baghdad on Wednesday, the fifth such aircraft to be lost in Iraq in less than three weeks, a US defence official said.
"I can tell you that the initial report was seven," the official in Washington said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The official did not say what caused the crash, but Iraqi witnesses reported seeing the helicopter in trouble during gunfire from the ground.
Five such aircraft have been lost in Iraq in nearly three weeks, killing 28 US servicemen and private security contractors. The US military said on Sunday it was adjusting its tactics after four helicopters had been shot down.
The high number lost in such a short time has raised questions about whether militants have changed tactics or are using more sophisticated weapons.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10422989


Palestinians reach deal on unity government
MECCA, Saudi Arabia - Rival Palestinian factions agreed on the formation of a unity government at crisis talks in Saudi Arabia on Thursday, an official said.
"We have agreed to form a national unity government. The agreement will be signed very soon," Palestinian ambassador to Saudi Arabia Jamal al-Shobaki said.
The Islamist group Hamas, which won the last Palestinian elections, and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah faction earlier agreed on the distribution of key cabinet posts.
Abbas, Hamas chief Khaled Meshaal and Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh met for the crisis talks after internecine fighting that has killed more than 90 Palestinians since December.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10423126



Nelson cannabis grower gets to keep property
A Nelson man has been jailed after being caught running a sophisticated cannabis growing operation but was spared having to forfeit his property.
In the High Court at Wellington today, Kelvin Russell Proctor, 49, was sentenced on two charges of cultivating cannabis and one of illegally possessing a pistol.
The court was told police raided his Nelson property in August last year and found two separate growing areas, one of which had six cannabis plants about 30cm tall.
The growing areas included a concrete tank with fans and lights installed, and an outside room with hydroponic growing equipment inside but no plants.
While searching Proctor's house and property they also found a loaded .22 calibre rifle that had been fashioned into a pistol next to his bed, and the remains of harvested cannabis plants in a compost heap. There was also a security camera on the property.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10423193



Arthritis drug 'has fewer side-effects'
A new arthritis drug made by Merck & Co. causes fewer stomach disorders and complications than an older painkiller, researchers said today.
They analysed the results of three clinical trials to assess the safety of Merck's drug etoricoxib -- sold under the name Arcoxia -- as compared with diclofenac.
Arcoxia is a COX-2 inhibitor while diclofenac belongs to an older class of therapies known as non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs or NSAIDs, which includes aspirin and ibuprofen.
"Our results indicate that the rate of clinically important upper gastrointestinal events was lower with the COX-2 selective inhibitor etoricoxib than it was with the traditional NSAID diclofenac," said Dr. Loren Laine of the University of Southern California Keck School of Medicine in Los Angeles.
There were fewer ulcers in patients taking the new drug and more patients continued to take the treatment, she added.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/3/story.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10423176


Cullen takes aim at mortgage holders
Finance Minister Michael Cullen has floated the idea of a levy on mortgages to drive down inflation.
Fixed rate mortgages mean that Reserve Bank interest rate rises take a few years to have an impact while a levy would be an additional interest rate charge on all borrowers.
The idea was raised in a Treasury-Reserve Bank report and Dr Cullen said it had merit.
"I think that's one area which is worth further investigation at this point," he told Radio New Zealand today.
"Even then my strong reservation is it impacts primarily upon homeowners with substantial mortgages and there's a degree of inequity in that but then that's always been true of monetary policy."

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/3/story.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10423144


Almost no chance of levy on mortgages – economist
A leading bank economist sees almost no chance of a levy being introduced on fixed rate mortgages.
Today Finance Minister Michael Cullen said such a levy was worth further investigation.
But BNZ chief economist Tony Alexander was sceptical about the chances of it being introduced.
"I put the chances of a fixed rate levy coming in close to zero because it would affect something like 1.2 million people out there, or at least that's the number of loans we have," he told Radio New Zealand.
"There wouldn't be many votes in it."
Dr Cullen's comments on Radio New Zealand today caused a dip in the value of the NZ dollar, from around US68.65c shortly before 8am to about US68.40c, 30 minutes later.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/3/story.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10423154


YouTube founders split US$650m from Google payday
SAN FRANCISCO - YouTube's two founders stand to divide shares of stock now valued at around US$650 million, Google said in a regulatory filing today detailing the payout from its US$1.65 billion acquisition.
Chad Hurley, chief executive of the online video sharing phenomenon, received 694,087 of Google common stock worth around US$326 million, according to the US Securities and Exchange Commission filing.
Co-founder Steve Chen received Google common stock valued at a similar amount, including 625,366 shares directly owned and another 68,721 shares held in a trust.
Sequoia Capital, the sole venture capital backer of YouTube, stands to receive around US$442 million in Google shares based on the US$470.01 closing price of the Web search leader on Wednesday.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10423137


Veterinarian monitored for possible bird flu
LONDON - A worker involved in the cull of 160,000 turkeys in Britain's first outbreak of deadly bird flu is being monitored in hospital with a mild respiratory complaint, the Health Protection Agency has said.
British media said the person was a government veterinarian, but the agency would not confirm this.
It said a number of tests were being carried out, one of which was for possible contamination with the H5N1 avian flu virus.
"It is a person who was involved after the outbreak so would have been issued with full protective gear and already be on a course of antivirals, an HPA spokesman said.
"The person is not seriously ill - it could be normal winter flu - and it is highly unlikely was exposed to H5N1. Among the tests is one for H5N1. We should get the results tomorrow," he added.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=204&objectid=10422825


Cats can spread bird flu, UN agency warns
ROME - Cats should be kept away from areas affected by the deadly H5N1 bird flu virus as they can pick up and spread the disease, the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) said on Thursday.
Cats at infected farms should be kept indoors, the agency said, as evidence from Indonesia and other countries showed they could catch bird flu from eating infected poultry or wild birds.
The worst fear is that cats could become a host for the virus where it could mutate into a form that may cause a human pandemic, the FAO said.
"Cats could act as intermediary hosts in the spread of the H5N1 virus between species," said FAO's Assistant Director-General Alexander Mueller.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10423125



Fire destroys Argentina's 'Cardboard City'
BUENOS AIRES - A fire devastated a shantytown on the edge of the Argentine capital on Thursday, forcing about 300 families from their makeshift homes and injuring several residents, officials said.
Television pictures showed weeping residents rushing to save furniture, refrigerators and other goods from their homes, as black smoke billowed over the shantytown, built under a highway on the fringes of Buenos Aires.
"There's a team looking for a place to take the people so they can have a bit of peace and get treated by psychologists and social workers to help them get through this terrible moment," a city government spokesman said.
The city government's health service said 31 people were taken to a hospital to be treated for smoke inhalation and emotional distress.
The shantytown is known as "Cardboard City" because most of its residents make a living by gathering discarded cardboard boxes and selling them to recycling centres. It is common to see entire families sifting through trash throughout Buenos Aires.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10423174


S.Africa launches biggest Aids vaccine trial
JOHANNESBURG - South Africa, burdened with one of the world's major HIV/Aids epidemics, unveiled plans on Thursday for its biggest Aids vaccine trial.
The government-backed South African Aids Vaccine Initiative (SAAVI) said the Phambili trial would be conducted on 3000 HIV negative people aged between 18 and 35.
It will test whether the MRKAd5 HIV-1 vaccine developed by drug firm Merck & Co either prevents HIV infection or lowers HIV levels in those who become infected, SAAVI said in a statement.
It will also measure the effectiveness of the drug on the C strain of HIV prevalent in South Africa, whose population of 45 million has an HIV infection rate of around one in nine.
The vaccine was developed for the B strain and has undergone testing elsewhere in Africa, the Americas and Australia.
"This test vaccine is one of the most promising currently available internationally," said Professor Anthony MBewu, president of the state-funded Medical Research Council.
"South Africa's conduct of this trial is a significant and exciting step forward in our search for a successful vaccine against HIV/Aids."


Catholic Brazil to put condom machines in schools
BRASILIA - Brazil's health ministry vowed on Tuesday to proceed with plans to put condom vending machines in schools and sought to defuse criticism with a new study showing that parents in the world's largest Roman Catholic nation approve of the idea.
The study, conducted by the United Nations body UNESCO, concluded that two-thirds of the parents surveyed like having the government offer teenagers free condoms and sex education.
The findings could come as a surprise to some Brazilian parents. Most of the population of 185 million is Catholic and the church, which remains influential despite losing ground to fast-growing evangelical churches, is opposed to birth control and preaches sexual abstinence until marriage.
Brazil's health ministry has been offering free condoms and sex education for more than a decade in some schools as part of an Aids-prevention programme that has been recognised worldwide for its success in avoiding an epidemic of the sexually transmitted disease.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=301&objectid=10422770


Priest gunned down
5:15AM Friday February 09, 2007
Suspected Tamil Tiger rebels have shot dead a Hindu priest who welcomed President Mahinda Rajapakse to a former guerrilla bastion in the island's east.
Selliah Parameswar was dragged out of his house in Batticaloa district and shot dead by a group of unidentified gunmen.


US soldier to be tried over agent's killing
ROME - A Rome judge has ordered a United States soldier to stand trial for killing an Italian intelligence agent in Iraq in 2005 while he was escorting a freed hostage to safety.
Mario Lozano, of the US Army's 69th Infantry Regiment, was charged with voluntary homicide for shooting Nicola Calipari at a checkpoint near Baghdad Airport.
Lozano will almost certainly be tried in absentia. Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said it was "a fair assumption" the US military would not hand over Lozano for trial.
"As far as the Defence Department is concerned, we and the Ministry of Defence in Italy consider this a closed matter." Both countries have called the death an accident.
Italy's independent prosecutors disagreed and Judge Sante Spinaci granted their request to charge Lozano also on two counts of attempted murder - one for the other Italian agent driving the vehicle and the second for the freed hostage inside.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10423063


Giuliani likely to face attack for 9/11 effort
Email this storyPrint this story Friday February 09, 2007
By Daniel Trotta
Former New York Mayor and presidential hopeful Rudolph Giuliani gained fame for his performance after the September 11 attacks, but charges he also made serious blunders could give ammunition to rival candidates.
Republican Giuliani has all but formally declared his candidacy and polls show he is a strong contender, largely due to his steely and comforting leadership that day in 2001.
But Giuliani made mistakes handling emergency services that may have cost lives, say the co-authors of a book last year Grand Illusion: The Untold Story of Rudy Giuliani and 9/11. Of the 2992 people killed in the hijacked plane attacks, 2759 died at New York's World Trade Centre.
Such criticism raises the possibility the former Mayor may be attacked on his perceived strength, as 2004 Democratic nominee John Kerry was when his Vietnam War record was called into question.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10423059


Clark, Howard not banned from Fiji
Neither Prime Minister Helen Clark nor Australian Prime Minister John Howard is banned from Fiji, says the acting head of the Fiji Prime Minister's Office, Parmesh Chand.
Nor is Foreign Minister Winston Peters, he said.
Mr Chand is himself banned from New Zealand along with other senior officials.
It was also reported last week after TV3 interviewed the military commander and interim Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama that Mr Peters was banned.
But in a statement to the Herald yesterday, Mr Chand said: "I can confirm that NZ's Foreign Affairs Minister, Winston Peters as well as Prime Ministers Helen Clark and John Howard are not on any list as such of people either restricted from entering or departing Fiji. This is the official position of Fiji Government."


A Kiwi in the White House
When Peter S. Watson talks, it's a discourse that follows a looping arc - so long it sometimes circles the globe before it gets to the point. Such convoluted conversation normally loses the listener, but this is strangely absorbing.
Then again, it's not every day you meet a New Zealander who's served in the White House, reporting directly to the President of the United States.
Watson was in New Zealand last month to receive an award, with broadcaster Paul Holmes, from the Woodrow Wilson Centre - "a living memorial to American president Woodrow Wilson", the icon of one-worldism.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10423252


Renaissance of the dark arts
When Raphael Kogun's uncle fell ill two years ago, his brothers knew exactly what to do. They called in a witchdoctor to find out who was responsible for their relative becoming "bagarup" - pidgin for sick, from the English "buggered up".
The finger of blame was pointed at a middle-aged couple from Kogun's village in the highlands of Papua New Guinea, who were accused of being possessed by evil spirits and placing a curse on the man.
"We ran after them and we chopped their heads off with an axe and a bush knife," said Kogun, a 27-year-old farmer from Goroka, in Eastern Highlands province.
"I felt sorry for them but they were witches, they deserved to die. If they were still alive they could hurt people with their magic."

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10423203


Tracey Barnett: Click of a mouse takes you into the war zone
All I have to do is click on to my home computer and suddenly I'm there, inside war. This is no game. It is real, like television gone helter-skelter.
There are no filters, no news editors, no context. I don't know anything about what I'm seeing, I just know I can't take my eyes off the screen.
I watch as a young, slightly overweight man with glasses smiles and jokes with the cameraman. There is an Arabic logo and titles against a backdrop of emotive, traditional singing.
He gets into a fairly nondescript car and the camera zooms in to a close-up of his face, relaxed and laughing. It pans to the seat beside him and we see explosives filling both the passenger side and the back foot well. He waves to the camera.
We cut to a military roadblock in the distance. His car enters the frame as we hear chanting by the cameraman get louder and louder.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10423230


Minister to marry in gay union
Conservation Minister Chris Carter is marrying his long-term partner Peter Kaiser today in a civil union attended by Prime Minister Helen Clark.
The ceremony is understood to be taking place at the Waitakere City Council building, with 180 guests.
The Speaker of Parliament, Margaret Wilson, and Cabinet ministers are also attending, as are many of Mr Kaiser's family, who have made the trip from Holland. Mr Kaiser, the principal of Tirimoana Primary School in Te Atatu South, has Dutch ancestry.
Last night, Mr Carter said: "It is a chance to celebrate our relationship with our friends and family."

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10423319


Child's Horror Life
Social workers came under fire after an investigation into the abuse of a disabled 4-year-old girl described by a detective as "one of the worst cases" he had seen.
The girl, who has cerebral palsy, suffered at the hands of her mother, Kimberly Harte, 23, and her boyfriend, Samuel Duncan, 27, from west London, who were sentenced to a total of 22 years in jail.
The "systematic violence" included pouring boiling water over her hands, kicking her in the groin and locking her naked in the lavatory every night, sometimes forcing her to eat her own faeces.
Although the girl was initially removed by Westminster City Council's social services after domestic violence between Harte and Duncan, she was returned home despite the concerns of her foster carers. Within four weeks, Duncan broke her arm.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10423236


Peaks, sounds, parks and islands tops in Kiwi eyes
Visiting Mitre Peak and Milford Sound is the country's No 1 "must-do" experience - but most Kiwis reckon there's no great reason to visit Parliament.
Or so says a 101 must-do list of the best sights, attractions and adventures on offer in New Zealand.
The Automobile Association five-month survey garnered 20,000 votes from the public which resulted in few surprises among the top choices such as Doubtful Sound, Bay of Islands, Fiordland and Abel Tasman National Park.
At the other end of the scale, Stonehenge Aotearoa in the Wairarapa and the Rugby Museum in Palmerston North rate just above the Beehive. And all of them rate lower than the Hundertwasser toilet in the Far North town of Kawakawa.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10423289


Aroha is missing her Key friend
Aroha Ireland returned to Auckland's Wesley Intermediate this week to be mobbed by schoolmates wanting her autograph.
"Some were teasing me and kept coming up for autographs," said the 12-year-old plucked from obscurity a week ago by National Party leader John Key to attend Waitangi Day.
"They were just joking. I didn't sign anything."
The quiet Year 8 student from McGehan Close - labelled by Mr Key as a street of hopelessness - had to cope with the death of her 13-year-old cousin, living in nearby Mt Albert, in the Starship hospital on Thursday.
But last night she was still in good spirits, saying her trip to Waitangi was "all right".

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10423291


Finding land for new cash cow
A New Zealand firm is growing gold kiwifruit south of Rome, PGG Wrightson is setting up farms in Uruguay and Fonterra has a big dairy project planned for China.
Kiwi farming is embarking on a big OE and senior agriculture figures say the overseas investment wave is ready to swell as available land here dwindles.
Opotiki Packing and Coolstorage set up its 8ha, Zespri-supplying kiwifruit operation in Italy six years ago.
The multi-million-dollar business is described by Tauranga sharebroker and company director Neil Craig as "certainly the largest in Italy" of its kind. Opotiki Packaging also has a 60ha Californian operation.
Last year, Craig's firm ABN Amro Craigs also played a role in PGG Wrightson's New Zealand Farming Systems Uruguay offer, which raised $105 million for beef and dairy farming in the South American country.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/3/story.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10423277


Rugby: NZ female ref at Twickenham
New Zealand referee Nicky Inwood will make history tomorrow when she becomes the first woman to officiate in the Six Nations women's rugby match and the first woman to referee at Twickenham.
Inwood, 37, of North Canterbury, will control the match between England and Italy, the curtain-raiser to the men's Six Nations match between the same countries.
New Zealand Rugby Union high performance refereeing manager Keith Lawrence said Inwood was a standout referee.
"This is an outstanding achievement and is further recognition of her successful refereeing at last year's women's Rugby World Cup," he said.
"Nicky has performed consistently well over the last seven years at international and regional level."
Inwood, a former Canterbury and Wanganui player, represented the Black Ferns from 1989 to 1991.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/4/story.cfm?c_id=4&objectid=10423323


Gorbachev's plea to Gates
MOSCOW - Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev has asked Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates to intercede on behalf of a Russian teacher accused of using pirated software in his classroom.
In an open letter, Nobel Peace Prize winner Gorbachev said the teacher, Alexander Ponosov, from a remote village in the Urals, should be shown mercy because he did not know he was committing a crime.
"A teacher, who has dedicated his life to the education of children and who receives a modest salary that does not bear comparison with the salaries of even regular staff in your company, is threatened with detention in Siberian prison camps," read the letter, posted on the internet site of Gorbachev's charitable foundation www.gorby.ru. "We ask you to show mercy and withdraw your complaint."
Prosecutors accuse Ponosov, headmaster of an intermediate school, of violating Microsoft's intellectual property rules by using computers in his school that contained unlicensed copies of the firm's software.
Russia has been mounting a high-profile crackdown on piracy as part of its efforts to join the World Trade Organisation.



Survey says 40% of kids see porn online
CHICAGO - About four in every 10 US youngsters age 10 to 17 report they've seen pornography while on the internet, two-thirds of them saying it was uninvited, according to a study published on Monday.
Many of the encounters with online pornography, both sought-out and accidental, were related to use of file-sharing programs to download images, the report from the University of New Hampshire in Durham said.
"Although there is evidence that most youth are not particularly upset when they encounter unwanted pornography on the internet (it) could have a greater impact on some youth than voluntary encounters with pornography," the study said.
"Some youth may be psychologically and developmentally unprepared for unwanted exposure, and online images may be more graphic and extreme than pornography available from other sources," it added.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=5&objectid=10422829

 

February 9, 2007

Oswega, New York

Photographer states :: Helpful Paws

She is very smart in protecting her home. She is shoveling off the snow from her roof. Water is heavy and an accumulation this dense could easily collapse a roof. Not only that but when there is melting and then refreezing the house is faced with an icing problem. Additionally, when all that starts to melt and there is runoff, the flooding inside the house could be significant either into basements and/or the house itself depending on whether it is a higher elevation than the surrounding yard or at the base of a hill. This is not funny business. This is dangerous stuff.  

 


February 9, 2007

Oswego, New York.

Photographer states :: 780 feet from the road.  

Glacier aren't measured by retreat or expansion but by mass balance

  

What is occurring and why it is so difficult to relate this to the public is not so much complicated, at least I don't see it that way, but easily 'skepticized' into quackery. Scientists are tired of being abused and beat up by the UNQUALIFIED (...and by 'unqualified' I do mean the so called Christian Scientists that completely depart from sound math and science to carry out political agendas of assault on the ACTUAL truth and not the GODLY truth. Which is not the same by the way. "The Truth" Christian espouse is NOT 'The Truth' that is science and 'real' life. Christians espouse "The Godly Truth" which is based in religious dogma and not sound science OR political benevolence.) and political directives that are not only dangerous but deadly.

I am assuming my personal right of moral authority on this subject from experience in 'the field' literally and figuratively. Amateur status at this point. That is right, I do it for the love of it. The love of saving actual lives. I love the word amateur and the capacity of dedication that it brings, however, in this field of science I have not meet one scientist that is any less in love with the science than I am.

The glaciers are very interesting bodies of frozen H2O. They manifest with little provocation from humans and demise the same way. We have learned a great deal about glaciers but there is still far more we need to learn.

In this case, in Greenland, as in other cases 'reportings' of mass balance in other icefields their 'appears' to be a respite if you will to 'retreat,' however, that does not indicate there are actual 'build ups' of icefields. Actually, quite the contrary.

The icefields are experiencing 'recharge' (a replacement of melted waters) from different areas in this current Human Induced Global Warming episode of Earth.

Recharge of a glacier is vital to it's existance. Why is this at all important? Because the glaciers, icefields, the Arctic Ocean and Antarctica are thermostats to the biotic 'availability' of life. Earth will exist with or without icefields, however, life on Earth will not exist without a temperate climate. That climate that ALLOWS life is completely dependant upon Earth to 'oscillate' enough in it's 'benevolent' temperature to accomdate fluctuations in it's gaseous troposphere.

In other words, when carbon dioxide levels rise and cause heating, which is a good thing as that is where life exists on Earth, IN RESPONSE to that heating the icefields 'take a hit' and melt back to accomodate that increase in temperature. The icefields and their available fluctuations are what keeps the oceans cool. The Greenland Ice is interesting because one of the 'bad effects' of high carbon dioxide levels is the complete melting of Earth's ice and the slowing of it's ocean circulation. THAT CIRCULATION, throughout Earth, BEGINS in the North Atlantic with North Atlantic Deep Water, but, that is another discussion except for the fact that The Greenland Ice is extremely important to ocean circulation.

Departing from the specifics of The Greenland Ice mass balance, what is happening in glacier retreat vs recharge is that the recharge areas are moving to higher elevations. Why? Because the 'snow storms' that provide the recharge are moving to higher elevations. Why? Because the tropospheric heat at the surface is pushing percipitation to higher elevations.

Earlier this year we heard about mountain climbers that succumbed to the climate at the top of a mountain unexpectedly due to a high wind and percipitation event. That event occurred at the 'peak' of the mountain. That does not necessarily occur every year in the capacity it is occuring now. Frequently, the denser ice areas of Earth do not receive 'recharge' so much as 'protection' from lower recharging icefields.

Take Antarctica for instance. The Blue Ice doesn't keep building in capacity. It is mostly fixed with some very slow movement over long periods of time. Perhaps, meters per year. Yet the icefields of Antarctica are very dynamic. So dynamic that they are the feeding grounds in the 'summer' months to baleen whales and other migratory marine life.

The icefields of Antarctica are broken down scientifically into catagories, such as 'terrances' and icefields (Such as the Larson Fields) and 'sea ice.' All those 'forms' of ice have different capacity and importance to the dynamics of Antarctica and ultimately to The Dynamic Earth. All the different categories of 'ice' in Antarctica provide a 'protection' of sort to The Blue Ice. One of the most alarming events in recent history was the collapse of Larsen B. However, that was not alone alarming to the point that 'the terraces' were also now exposed and melting. The terraces lead to the denser Blue Ice. The terraces protect the three mile high Blue Ice from 'heated air.' It is when those protections are gone or better stated 'lacking enough mass' that the demise of The Blue Ice, not already sublimed by heat, will become a point of whether or not there will be tsunamis around the globe as it loses it's gavity center and crashes into the oceans.

Scary, huh? That is why the entire mess is 'left alone' by most scientists. They don't like scaring people. They like to perform science and leave the protections of people to the political rhelm. Well, when you have people at the top of leadership ignoring and abusing science for the sake of wealth then it is time for scientists to 'speak truth to power' and put the political animals in their place.

But to return to the odd 'stability' of the icefields. As the percipitation for recharge goes to higher elevations the amounts of persciptation push the capacity of the top ice to supply the lower icefields with mass. Not recharge now, mass.

The issue is this, what difference does it make that the icefields are recharged at higher elevations or lower elevations or that protections are in place or not so long as they are there and providing a 'Dynamic Earth' with the cooling capacity to ULTIMATELY protect Earth's ability to sustain life. What's the big deal? Right? No icefield is more important than the political directives of governments so what's this fuss all about? Just the love of icefields?

No.

Here is why.

As the 'recharge' areas go to higher elevations, that is a clear indication that the capcity of 'rain water / snow water' is going to higher elevations. As Earth heats it will lose it's capacity to receive 'rain/snow' at ground level at all. Where are your crops? At 10,000 feet? How much productive farmland is at 10,000 feet? How many people will have food and who will they be? Where do your economies come from? In the case of the wine industry, it comes from growing crops in 'temperate' climates. Earth supplies that temperate climate to the point of wonderful benevolence with the gross assistance of ICE. Lots and lots of stored capacity water.

Now. I'll stop there. To go on any further to the issues as what can happen to human life on Earth with a CHRONICALLY increasing carbon dioxide level is hideous. It becomes bizarre and uncivilized. We need to protect our icefields to insure civility on Earth, love life and enjoy the capacity Earth gives us to have economies of benevolence and fulfillment of higher values.

Glaciology is one of those 'distant' practices in science that seem 'silly' to most people and that is okay to think that way. For lots of reasons it should seem silly in a society well prepared to understand it's PLACE on this Dynamic Earth. But, in principle, glaciology, is one of the most important fields of science in realizing the biotic Earth depends on it's ice. The science is not simply people loving ice and it's fascination with melting and freezing or the life ecosystems surrounding this 'ice phenomena' of Earth. It isn't a bunch of ski bumps that found a way of making a living. It, like all areas of science and math are vital to the understanding of the world we live in and how to interact with it.

The heating of Earth through the high emissions of carbon dioxide has to stop. Societies need to address their energy and transportation needs responsiblity with a 'can do' philosophy. Stop being whiners. Become doers ! CHANGE !!!