October 1, 2005. Holly Beach, Breaux Bridge, Louisiana. Complete devastation. Where does Bush get the idea he is anything but responsible for this? He had the study. He was warned. The people of the area was not warned until it was too late.
Monday, October 03, 2005
October 1, 2005. The family finally made it to the Beach House. The flag marks it's former place at Holly Beach, Louisiana at Breaux Bridge, La. This picture is sad enough but there is obviously no offshore wetlands to prevent this huge tidal surge. In addition, the 'sand' in this picture. Easily noted in the foreground. The sand has a 'rippling' through it. That pattern of 'rippling' is found in sand at the bottom of stagnant water. The water over this beach did not recede that quickly. It would have washed more of the beach away into the ocean if it immediately washed in and washed out. It tells me a lot about sea level rise. It tells me a lot about the length of the tidal surge of Rita. It tells me the 'side' of Rita that this beach received kept pushing water persistently to maintian a 'lagoo' until it passed. Rita was in no hurry to go inland as a result the persistent winds kept pushing the waters to the shore and created sustain presence long enough to begin to create an underwater ecosystem. When the storm finally passed the water receded into the ocean slower than one would think but with enough velocity to carry all the surface housing walls, boards and brick with it. It is this assessment that leads me to believe there was a curious dynamics with both Rita and Katrina that also would bring whirlpools with it as the water receded. It's a very strange picture. Very strange.
Morning Papers "Special Edition"
The Cheney Observer
Feds Supoenaed Records
Federal investigators have subpoenaed records from Springfield Consulting and Carlyle Group, whose advisors and board members have included President George H.W. Bush, former defense secretary Frank Carlucci, and Bush confidant and political powerbroker James Baker. The firm's current chairman is Louis Gerstner, former chief executive at IBM.
The list of influential persons and firms that have received millions of dollars of pension business and finder's fees is long and includes both Democrats and Republicans.
No one has been charged with a crime related to the payment of fees, but the political backlash has been furious. Investigations continue.
http://www.heartland.org/Article.cfm?artId=17827
Treat All Capital the Same
The National Tax Service (NTS) has completed a probe of overseas equity funds operating in Korea and decided to slap five of them, including Lone Star and the Carlyle Group, with a W214.8 billion (about U.S.$214.8 million) tax bill. The most remarkable aspect is that the NTS for the first time vetoed tax avoidance by companies nominally based in a tax haven.
Foreign funds evade tax in Korea by establishing paper companies in tax havens. Thus the U.S.-based fund Lone Star has a subsidiary in Belgium, and the W280 billion profits from real estate it made in Korea were made in the name of that firm, so Lone Star did not pay a penny in tax on account of a dual taxation avoidance treaty between Korea and Belgium.
http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/news/200509/200509300028.html
Robert Kjellander:
Bush Pioneer, Records Subpoenaed in Corruption Investigation. Robert Kjellander was named RNC treasurer in early August of 2005, soon after it was reported that a federal prosecutor investigating corruption at the Illinois Teacher's Retirement Systems, a state run teacher's pension fund. The subpoena specifically sought records relating to Kjellander's receipt of $4.5 million in fees from the Carlyle group, for helping to land the business with the pension fund. (AP, 8/10/05)
http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRelease.asp?id=54366
This Warden Takes No Prisoners
Former Abu Ghraib General's Book Names Names; Backs Up Abuse Allegations
By Steve Young
(NOTE: This article is based on a live interview with Janis Kapinski on L.A.'s KTLK Steve Young Show)
Sept. 27, 2005 — HOLLYWOOD (apj.us) — It's getting to be a long and ignominious list, these bombthrowers on the Left — Scott Ritter, Richard Clarke, Joe Wilson, Valerie Plame, Cindy Sheehan — all who might have been considered faithful friends of the Right until they opted for the greatest transgression again the Bush Administration: they told the truth.
Former Marine Ritter tread through the home fields of evil-doer Saddam looking for WMD, then screamed to 90% of America who didn't want to hear it, "There aint none!" Counter-terrorism expert Clarke, who worked for the last three Republican Presidents including George W, told the 9-11 commission that America owed the victims of 9-11 an apology for a massive screw up. Hailed as "truly inspiring" and "courageous" by W's dad, Wilson 'splained to the CIA that "Yellowcake's a fake." Plame was just a spy who they outed because...well, because they could. And Cindy Sheehan... no one tougher than a mother who's found that the cause her son had died for was not a cause at all. Not a soft target among them. Yet they each became delicious bull's eyes for the administration and their Lords of Loud.
These whistleblowers blew an ill wind for a presidency that doesn't cotton to standing in, or opting for, a draft. Exposing a misstep within the Bush administration assures having one's character and lives ripped to shreds and converted into anti-American, hate-the-troops, bulls-eye for the White House to hawk. Bush administration talking points are served up like raw meat to the damnation chuckers of the cabinet, congress, Robert Novaks and especially, the broadcast Lords of Loud.
But the Lords of Loud and the White House may be facing their most challenging task yet, as entering the fray comes the newest and perhaps most strong-headed of 'em all: the former commandant of the infamous Abu Ghraib prison — Janis Karpinski.
This lady is not a tramp. She's military; spent more time serving her country in a war torn country than her boss did serving a country he's ended up tearing apart.
http://www.americanpolitics.com/20050927Young.html
The War Against Tom DeLay
By ANNE E. KORNBLUT
WASHINGTON
TO hear Tom DeLay tell it, his indictment last week by a Texas grand jury resulted from a vast left-wing conspiracy - the culmination of years of relentless pursuit by Democrats who, in Mr. DeLay's words, "drug my name through the mud."
Democrats, of course, brushed the accusation aside, saying Mr. Delay, a Texas Republican, had only himself to blame for the conspiracy charge that forced him to step aside as the House majority leader.
But in fact an extensive network of forces has been aligned against Mr. DeLay - a kaleidoscope of activists and liberals, clean-government advocates and legal experts, even a smattering of resentful conservatives and Republican moderates, all bound by their desire to see him stopped.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/02/weekinreview/02kornblut.html?pagewanted=print
Someone needs to put a leash on DeLay !!
Tom Delay is a Man and Ronnie Earle is a Dog
October 01, 2005 10:27 AM EST
At a 4:00 p.m. press conference on September 30, 2005, in the fashionable Hess Club in Houston Texas, I, along with 200 other friends and supporters of Congressman Tom Delay came to hear what he had to say about his recent indictment and we weren't disappointed.
Here was a man, who stood firmly and told the crowd simply that he did nothing wrong and the crowd roared with approval. He pointed to his track record of public service and again the crowd roared. Then he talked about Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle and Earle's one man vendetta against all things Republican and the crowd of supporters booed at the mere mention of that "politician’s name".
http://www.theconservativevoice.com/articles/article.html?id=8683
TPMCafe: Politics, Ideas and Lots of Caffeine
Whose Skin is Judith Miller Really Trying to Save?
By Russ Hoyle
From: TPMCafe Special Guests
Ever since Judith Miller was cited for contempt of court and threatened with imprisonment back in March, her central role in the White House leak probe has had an air of unreality about it. After all, as reporters never tire of writing, Miller never even wrote about Valerie Plame, or anything else having to do with the case.
But with Miller’s release from jail last Thursday, her cloudy motives have grown even murkier. It may be time to admit that we’ve probably been asking the wrong questions about Judith Miller. The chattering classes so far have completely ignored the possibility that what Miller is so determined to protect may have nothing to do with the Plame case.
It may, however, have plenty to do with I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, the vice-president’s chief of staff, whom Miller met with on July 8, 2003 and spoke with at least once more that week, along with other unnamed officials, after her return from Iraq and the unsuccessful U.S. search for Saddam’s weapons. And it may have everything to do with protecting the White House officials who leaked classified intelligence – not about Valerie Plame toRobert Novak in the summer of 2003 – but to Miller herself about Iraq’s allegedly reconstituted nuclear weapons program in September 2002.
http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/10/2/23022/6302
The Daily Texan
Free at last
When we first heard that New York Times reporter Judith Miller was being released from prison Thursday night, excitement broke out in the newsroom. That excitement quickly turned to concern at the news she would testify before the grand jury Friday.
Miller waited in jail for 85 days to prove her commitment to her journalistic principles. She refused to reveal the name of her source - in this case I. Lewis Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff - until she was sure she had his un-coerced permission.
Her sacrifice is honorable and we are certainly in no place to tell her she should have remained in that prison. However, her choice to testify - even with persmission - could have serious consequences.
While it is clear in this case that Libby actually wanted Miller to testify, in the future a source with less clout might be compelled to let their reporter testify to let them out of prison - effectively bolstering the effectiveness of imprisoning journalists.
As Myron Farber, a Times reporter who was jailed in the late 70s for refusing to turn over notes, said, "Smaller people might tremble more when the reporter calls back and sayd, 'can you release me?'"
The ethical implications of this case will no doubt continue to be discussed. But for now, we'd like to congratulate Judith Miller on her hard-earned freedom.
NYT reporter’s stand draws journalists’ anger, scepticism
HOWARD KURTZ
WASHINGTON, OCOTOBER 1: In the end, what did Judith Miller accomplish by spending 85 days in jail? Not much, say her detractors, over the deal the New York Times reporter struck with I. Lewis Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, to testify about their 2003 conversations on CIA undercover Valerie Plame.
Some of Miller's colleagues at the Times, who declined to be identified, say much of the staff is frustrated and confused. “Was this a charade or a real principle?” one staffer said. “She wanted to resurrect herself from the WMD thing,” a reference to Miller’s stories while embedded with a US military unit searching for illegal weapons in Iraq in 2003.
http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=79249
FSRN Headlines
Judith Miller Testifies in front of Grand Jury
New York Times reporter Judith Miller was released from jail yesterday after getting the go ahead from the Vice President's Chief of Staff, Lewis Libby to disregard their confidentiality agreement. Gus Caravalho reports from Washington.
Scientists Say Global Warming Causes More Intense Hurricanes
Scientists today said climate change and the destruction of coastal wetlands could mean the same types of disasters New Orleans saw with Hurricane Katrina. Renee Feltz has more from Houston.
Former White House Official Under Fire
Conservative Commentator William Bennett was criticized by the White House today for saying that one way to reduce crime would be to abort black babies. On his talk show "Morning in America" Bennett made the comment in conversation with a caller about abortion.
BENNETT: "If you wanted to reduce crime, you could... if that were your sole purpose, you could abort every black baby in this country and your crime rate would go down. That would be an impossible, ridiculous and morally reprehensible thing to do, but your crime rate would go down."
White House Spokesperson Scott Maclellan said Bennett's comments were inappropriate, and Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid demanded an apology. Bennett was Education Secretary for the Reagan administration and Director of Drug Policy for Bush Senior.
VAWA Goes to Senate
The Violence Against Women Act was set to expire today, but lawmakers extended the bill to 2009. Leigh Ann Caldwell has more.
West Bank Palestinians Go to the Polls, Again
Palestininans in villages across the West Bank went to the polls yesterday in the third stage of municipal elections. Minar Jibreen reports.
Bolivian Protesters Call for the Extradition of Goni
In Bolivia, Police violently dispersed protestors at the US embassy calling for the extradition of former President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada from the United States. The first of three protests by family members of those killed during the demonstrations to oust the former President seeks to try Sanchez de Lozada for genocide. October marks two years since he fled office to the United States.
http://www.pacifica.org/programs/fsrn/fsrn_050930.html
Pacifica Reports From Iraq
Pacifica Correspondent Aaron Glantz is making his second trip to Iraq since the fall of Saddam Hussein. He will be filing a series of reports from Iraq, exclusively for Pacifica.org, called Pacifica Reports From Iraq.
Below is a list of these reports:
May 12 - US Army vs. the Posters of Muqtada al-Sadr
Iraq – US soldiers, backed by tanks and helicopters, launched a fresh attack today against fighters loyal to the firebrand cleric Moqtada al-Sadr in the Iraqi city of Kerbala. The Associated Press reports up to 25 Iraqis and seven US soldiers were wounded in the battle, which began only hours after Iraqi leaders had agreed on a proposal aimed at ending the US standoff with Mr Sadr's Mahdi army militia... more
May 5 - More Abuses from the Gates of Abu Ghraib
Abu Ghraib, Iraq – President George W. Bush continued his efforts to contain outrage over the torture scandal at Baghdad’s Abu Ghraib prison – formerly Saddam Hussein’s most notorious lock-up. Speaking to the Pentagon-run Arab satellite station al-Hurra (the freedom), Bush said reiterated he was “appalled” at broadcast images of Iraq’s naked and hooded. He pledged a full investigation and accountability for what he insisted were the actions of a few... more
May 4 - Killing the Followers of Sadr
Baghdad, Iraq -- Dozens of followers of Muqtada al-Sadr sing songs of martyrdom as they carry the coffins of two of their slain comrades into the shrine of the revered Imam Ali in the Iraqi Holy City, Najaf. Every night, Sadr's fighters engage in pitched battle with the US military which has placed its tanks and soldiers just outside the city limits. But that's not where these men died... more
May 3 - Fallujah Begins to Bury Its Dead
Baghdad, Iraq -- A team of local volunteers in surgical masks lift the rotting corpse of a middle aged woman from its shallow grave in the front yard of a single family home. The owner of the house explains the woman has been lying dead in his front yard for three weeks. He says an American war-plane bombed her car as she fled the city with her husband, who is buried in the garden of the house next door. The destroyed remains of
http://pacifica.org/programs/reportfromiraq/
Stephanopoulos: Source Says Bush & Cheney Involved in Plamegate
On today's This Week, host George Stephanopoulos cited an unnamed source who claims that President Bush and Vice-President Cheney were involved in the decision to out Valerie Plame. As the old spiritual goes, "And the walls came a-tumblin' down!"
http://www.newshounds.us/2005/10/02/stephanopoulos_source_says_bush_cheney_involved_in_plamegate.php
Source to Stephanopoulos: President Bush Directly Involved In Leak Scandal
Stephanopoulos: President Bush Directly Involved In Leak Scandal?
Judd posted this: "Near the end of a round table discussion on ABC’s This Week, George Stephanopoulos dropped this bomb:
Definitely a political problem but I wonder, George Will, do you think it’s a manageable one for the White House especially if we don’t know whether Fitzgerald is going to write a report or have indictments but if he is able to show as a source close to this told me this week, that President Bush and Vice President Cheney were actually involved in some of these discussions.
http://www.crooksandliars.com/2005/10/02.html
Pundit Pap
For Sunday, October 5, 2005
Tom DeLay's Smarm Offensive Overshadowed by George stephanopoulos' Leak
By JJ Balzer & Jeff Koopersmith
October 2, 2005—WASHINGTON (apj.us)—Tom DeLay was all over the Sunday shows, trying desperately to save his career as the top Republican "playa" in the legislative branch. He did little to help his own cause—not even Chris Wallace was giving him a pass. And a parade of military brass was on hand to tell America that we're making just splendid progress in Iraqnam.
But the big news so far this Sunday happened on ABC's This Week.
http://www.americanpolitics.com/20051002punditpap.html
Tom DeLay Says He Will Continue to Advance Agenda (Update1)
Oct. 2 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. Representative Tom DeLay, who stepped down as House majority leader after being indicted by a Texas grand jury on Sept. 28, said he still plans to participate in moving the Republican agenda forward.
``I can do my job, with or without the title,'' DeLay said today on ``Fox News Sunday.''
DeLay said he would continue to raise money and advise Speaker Dennis Hastert on initiatives to cut taxes, enforce immigration laws and reduce spending. DeLay, a Texas Republican, faces up to two years in prison on a charge of conspiracy in connection with corporate donations in his home state.
DeLay's legal problems have handed a potent political issue to Democrats, Representative Christopher Shays, a Connecticut Republican, said on CNN's ``Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer.''
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000087&sid=a4pPCKflCXFY&refer=top_world_news
DeLay Predicts Reinstatement as House Majority Leader
By VOA News
02 October 2005
Tom DeLay
U.S. Congressman Tom DeLay predicts he will be cleared of a criminal conspiracy charge, and that he will soon be reinstated as majority leader in the House of Representatives.
The Republican congressman was speaking on the television program "Fox News Sunday," where he called the indictment against him "manufactured" and "frivolous."
http://www.voanews.com/english/2005-10-02-voa38.cfm
Row flares between Jeb Bush and Jack T over games bill
You say potato and I say tomato
By Aaron McKenna: Sunday 02 October 2005, 09:52
LAST THURSDAY we ran a story based on a press release put out by Miami attorney and videogames watchdog Jack Thompson who claimed that he was requested by Florida Governor Jeb Bush to draft a violent video games bill. That's here. But according to the office of the Governor, he was bending the truth a little.
Thompson said he was asked to draft a bill similar to that currently awaiting signing or trashing in California, which would restrict the sale of violent and sexually explicit videogames to minors, and that if such legislation were passed Governor Bush had assured Thompson that he would sign the bill into law.
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=26629
War, Racism and Global Warming
October 02, 2005
The three days of anti-war actions in Washington, D.C. last weekend organized primarily by United for Peace and Justice were a huge victory for the progressive movement. From the Saturday rally and march co-organized with ANSWER, to the Peace and Justice Fair all day on the Washington Monument grounds, to the highly successful Operation Ceasefire concert/rally Saturday going late into the night attended by tens of thousands, to the tent revival inter-denominational religious service Sunday evening, to the mass lobbying of many hundreds on Capitol Hill Monday morning followed by almost 400 people getting arrested in front of the White House Monday afternoon-all of it was a powerful manifestation of our movement's growing political strength.
http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=1&ItemID=8857
How local officials voted on Roberts nomination to the Supreme Court
By Alison Vekshin and Elizabeth Piet
Stephens Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON - The Senate last week confirmed appeals court judge John Roberts to become the 17th chief justice of the Supreme Court.
All 55 of the Senate's Republicans and half of the Democrats voted 78-22 in favor of Roberts, who will succeed the late William Rehnquist. Independent James Jeffords of Vermont also voted for Roberts.
Roberts' supporters lauded his legal background and his ability to fairly interpret the law and the Constitution.
http://www.heralddemocrat.com/articles/2005/10/02/texas_news/state01.txt
Bill Bennett's Call for Genocide
By Leo Walsh
Related stories: right wing watch
10-01-05, 9:07 am
The archconservative opinion rag National Review welcomed hypocritical gambling addict and anti-public education ideologue William Bennett back into the public spotlight this past week. Not because Bennett is leading some sort of new campaign on a far right issue that the wing nut journal has endorsed, but because of his racist suggestion that to reduce crime policymakers ought to abort African American babies.
To Bennett's credit he posed genocide only as a hypothetical, but insisted that its underlying premise is true.
While the White House officially treated Bennett's call for genocide in the same fashion as they treated right-wing televangelist Pat Robertson's call to illegally assassinate President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, most right-wing loudmouth's courageously remained silent about Bennett's hot potato. (In a muted press release, the White House described Bennett's comment as "inappropriate.")
http://www.politicalaffairs.net/article/articleview/1941/1/122/
Wilson and the Iraq War.
When did the war between Joe Wilson and The White House start in spring 2003?
The actions, and war, against Joe Wilson from The White House Staff, started already in March 03, several days before the start of the Iraq war, the 19. of March 03.
See my article about the 3 month activity, before July 03, here: http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/8/5/525/20717
When the international renowned Dr. Mohammad El Baradei told the U.N. Security Council March 7, 2003, that the British reports, on a possible uranium selling from Niger to Iraq, was unsubstantial and based on forged documents, was it a basic attack on US plans to attack Iraq.
And when Joe Wilson went to TV (CNN) a few days later, and told the audience, that US government was untruthful on the Niger case, and he could prove it. It was then, long before his July article, the war between Wilson and The White House started. Not in July.
We was clearly aware in Europe, at that time, long before the Iraq war, that the US government, and its president George Bush, was not credible, when they told the World, they could prove (without doubt) that Iraq had NBC-weapons.
http://houseoflabor.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/10/1/112739/959
ROVE AIDE CALLED TO TESTIFY TOOK HIS MESSAGES
John Byrne
A former senior aide to Bush adviser Karl Rove who reportedly gave testimony to a grand jury investigating the leaking of a
CIA agent's identity answered phones and took Rove's messages, RAW STORY has discovered.
According to a 2004 Salon piece, she also had a role with one of conservative Washington's leading men, Grover Norquist, in which she took messages for Rove and called Norquist to screen callers.
"For two years, the assistant who answered Rove's phone was a woman who had previously worked for lobbyist Jack Abramoff, a close friend of Norquist's and a top DeLay fundraiser," Salon reported. "One Republican lobbyist, who asked not to be named because DeLay and Rove have the power to ruin his livelihood, said the way Rove's office worked was this: 'Susan took a message for Rove, and then called Grover to ask if she should put the caller through to Rove. If Grover didn't approve, your call didn't go through.'"
http://rawstory.com/news/2005/ROVE_AIDE_CALLED_TO_TESTIFY_TOOK_HIS_MESS_0802.html
Karl Rove Has Complete Confidence in President Rover?
U.S.
Does Karl Rove really have complete confidence in President Rover? After the President´s roundtable discussion that occured Monday, he should.
During yesterday’s roundtable discussion in Texas, the man most Americans describe as President Bush stated "Karl´s got my complete confidence. He´s a valuable member of my team,"
The Washington Post has called this comment as Bush’s strongest defense yet of Rove, the architect of his presidential campaigns.
Which support of Karl Rove at this time raises some very interesting, if not ludicrous questions.
The truth is—many people have wondered out loud if Karl Rove really is George Bush’s brain. The President’s comments that he has “complete confidence” almost makes one wonder if that brain is completely void of thought.
http://www.bayoubuzz.com/articles.aspx?aid=4652
I did not vote for Bush
http://www.ididnotvote4bush.com/pages/1/index.htm
Judith Miller walks
But the principle of confidentiality seems to stumble
Saturday, October 01, 2005
On general principles, we're against journalists being jailed for doing their job, so we applaud New York Times reporter Judith Miller's release on Thursday. Miller had served 85 days for refusing to testify about a confidential source, for refusing to answer a question she never should have been asked.
And we'd love to join her ringing cry on release, "I went to jail to preserve the time-honored principle that a journalist must respect a promise not to reveal the identity of a confidential source."
But when we actually trace the details on this story, it gets harder to see just what the principle behind Miller's appalling incarceration was. Worse, it seems that the principle of guaranteeing confidentiality to a source -- a vital tool for journalists discovering and reporting things that powerful people don't want revealed -- has taken a battering from virtually everyone involved.
http://www.oregonlive.com/editorials/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/editorial/1128164541276760.xml&coll=7
Libby Is to Cheney What Cheney Is to Bush
By NEDRA PICKLER
The Associated Press
Friday, September 30, 2005; 4:57 PM
WASHINGTON -- President Bush has Dick Cheney as his behind-the-scenes adviser and problem solver. The vice president has his own man who fits that description: I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby.
His job as Cheney's chief of staff gives Libby extraordinary influence and access in all corners of White House policy-making, particularly national security. But, just as Cheney doesn't talk about his conversations with Bush, Libby does not promote what he does for the vice president.
Lewis Libby, Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington in this March 1, 2001 file photo. New York Times reporter Judith Miller was released Thursday Sept. 29, 2005 after agreeing to testify in the investigation into the disclosure of the identity of a covert CIA officer after securing an unconditional release from Libby, two people familiar with the case said. (AP Photo/Joe Marquette, File) (Joe Marquette - AP)
Unlike many senior White House officials, Libby avoids the Sunday talk shows and rarely is quoted by name.
However, his quiet contacts with reporters have pushed Libby into the spotlight as a grand jury investigates whether White House officials leaked the name of a covert CIA operative, Valerie Plame.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/30/AR2005093001218.html
Leak probe's focus shifts to top Cheney aide
Reporter who spent 85 days in jail testifies about her interview with 'Scooter' Libby
By CAROL D. LEONNIG and JIM VANDEHEI
Washington Post
PRISON TIME
Judith Miller's sentence was the third-longest among those incarcerated for refusing to identify anonymous sources, according to a list from the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press:
• The longest: Freelance writer Vanessa Leggett served 168 days in 2001 after she balked at participating in a 1997 murder investigation involving a Houston socialite.
Source: Newsday
WASHINGTON - New York Times reporter Judith Miller told a grand jury Friday about her conversations with Vice President Dick Cheney's top aide in 2003, moving the two-year investigation into whether senior Bush administration officials illegally leaked covert CIA agent Valerie Plame's identity a step closer to its end.
Sources familiar with Miller's testimony say her account of two discussions with Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, that July are similar to the account Libby reportedly gave the grand jury last year.
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/nation/3377421
Conspiracy Theories and the Fight for Truth
By Danny Schecter
MediaChannel.org
Aug 02, 2005
Washington, D.C. - Remember the "Jersey Girls?" That's a phrase we haven't heard in a while, a reference to several New Jersey-based widows who lost their husbands in the attack on the World Trade Center on 9-11. They were ordinary apolitical suburbanites, mostly with Republican leanings, who did an extraordinary thing in questioning the Administration's version of the attack and demanding that their government do so as well.
That led, after nearly a year of well-informed, frustrating and persistent lobbying, to the launch of the 9-11 investigation formally known as The National Commission On Terrorist Attacks Upon The United States.
http://www.theepochtimes.com/news/5-8-2/30806.html
Daily Briefing: Scrap the News Cycle
Bush nominates White House counsel Harriet Miers to replace Sandra Day O'Connor.
Fitzgerald may seek criminal conspiracy charge from leak investigation. "Scooter" Libby discussed Valerie Plame with at least two reporters but maintains he did not say her name or unveil her covert status; testimony of Libby and Karl Rove appears to contradict early White House statements.
Tom DeLay: "I think it will be over and be over very, very soon, and I think I will go back and be majority leader."
Christopher Shays (R-Conn.): "We got elected basically by saying we would live by a higher moral standard, and I don't think recently we have."
Majority of governors want states, not the Pentagon, to oversee responses to national disasters.
http://www.wonkette.com/politics/lewis-libby/index.php
Cheney aide revealed as source of CIA leak
Julian Borger
Scandal involving Lewis Libby threatens White House directly
WASHINGTON: An investigation into a White House intelligence leak was nearing its conclusion after a New York Times reporter, jailed in July for refusing to testify, identified U.S. Vice-President Dick Cheney's leading aide as her principal source.
Judith Miller was released from a prison in Virginia, where she had spent 12 weeks, and appeared in a federal court in Washington on Friday to give her account of a scandal that has been hanging over the administration for two years.
According to lawyers involved in the case, Ms. Miller identified Lewis ``Scooter'' Libby, the Vice-President's chief of staff, as the government official she had spoken to in July 2003 about a CIA undercover agent, Valerie Plame.
http://www.hindu.com/2005/10/02/stories/2005100201161400.htm
Taking Out the Trash: Cheney Directly Involved In Leak Scandal
In today’s New York Times an anonymous source reveals that Cheney was directly involved in the strategy to discredit former ambassador Joe Wilson:
A lawyer who knows Mr. Libby’s account said the administration efforts to limit the damage from Mr. Wilson’s criticism extended as high as Mr. Cheney. This lawyer and others who spoke about the case asked that they not be identified because of grand jury secrecy rules.
On July 12, 2003, four days after his initial conversation with Ms. Miller, Mr. Libby consulted with Mr. Cheney about how to handle inquiries from journalists about the vice president’s role in sending Mr. Wilson to Africa in early 2002 to investigate reports that Iraq was trying acquire nuclear material there for its weapons program, the person said.
This is an effort by the White House to reveal more details about Cheney’s role on their own terms. The information was leaked to the New York Times on Saturday, the day when the fewest number of people read the paper. Also, it is presented in a way that makes Cheney’s involvement sound innocuous as possible.
http://thinkprogress.org/2005/10/01/taking-out-the-trash/
The Bush-Cheney Gazillions Tour
Get Out Your Checkbooks. It's a Bundle of Fun
by Ward Harkavy
October 22 - 28, 2003
President Bush's re-election campaign has coupled the time-honored tradition of the chicken-dinner whistle-stop tour with the 21st-century technology of electronic check-tracking and a bit of Texas terminology to produce a monster of political fundraising.
"Soft money" has been outlawed. And individual contributions are limited to $2,000 each. Now the key word is "bundling."
Bush has three levels of bundlers who woo friends and allies to high-ticket (usually $1,000-a-plate) campaign lunches and dinners. Rangers are those committed to raising at least $200,000 each for the campaign; Pioneers have a goal of $100,000; and Mavericks are the under-40 crowd aiming at $50,000 each. (During the 2000 campaign, Bush had only the Pioneer category, of which Enron's Ken Lay was a member.)
http://www.villagevoice.com/news/0343,harkavy,48033,1.html
Congressman calls VP too old and sick for the job
October 1, 2005, 6:01 AM EDT
NEW YORK (AP) _ For the second time in recent months, the dean of New York's congressional delegation has questioned whether Vice President Dick Cheney is fit for the duties of his office.
In an interview in August on NY1, the New York City-based all-news channel, Rep. Charles Rangel suggested that Cheney might be too sick to perform his job.
On Friday evening, Rangel was asked in a follow-up talk on the station
http://www.newsday.com/news/local/wire/newyork/ny-bc-ny--rangel-cheney1001oct01,0,4252015.story?coll=ny-region-apnewyork
Prosecutor Tightlipped About Plame Case
It has been two years since a grand jury began looking into the Valerie Plame CIA identity case, a criminal investigation that could close up shop shortly or cause more pain for the Bush White House. Following Friday's grand jury testimony by New York Times reporter Judith Miller, special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald gave no indication of his plans and his spokesman refused to comment. New York Times reporter Judith Miller, center, smiles as she is accompanied by New York Times Publisher Arthur O. Sulzberger, Jr., left, and New York Times Executive Editor Bill Keller, right, as she leaves the courthouse in Washington Friday, Sept. 30, 2005. Miller testified before a grand jury Friday, ending her silence in the investigation into whether White House officials leaked the name of a covert CIA operative, Valerie Plame. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak) (Charles Dharapak - AP)
http://www.scoopt.org/article2591-prosecutor-tightlipped.html
Sure they want him to stay. He manipulates issues like no one else can. That is how he got in trouble in the first place.
Newsweek: 39% see DeLay in serious wrongdoing; 73 % see GOP 'too close' to big business
New York- Thirty-nine percent of Americans believe that House Majority Leader Tom DeLay probably engaged in "serious wrongdoing," according to the new Newsweek Poll. When asked if Tom DeLay engaged in wrongdoing, or if this week's indictment was more likely a case of DeLay's political opponents wanted to embarrass him, 39 percent of those polled say DeLay was probably engaged in serious wrongdoing, 28 percent believe it is a case of his political opponents wanting to embarrass him; while 10 percent are not aware of any charges being brought against him. Among Republicans, 21 percent believe DeLay was probably engaged in serious wrongdoing while 47 percent believed it was more likely his opponents were trying to embarrass him.
http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Newsweek_Monday_39_percent_see_DeLay_1001.html
Chron editorial board:
Tom DeLay?
Who's that?
Thursday, the editorial page of every major newspaper in the state (along with "national" newspapers) weighed in on the DeLay indictment.
The Chronicle was silent, instead running another "In the aftermath of Katrina" editorial.
The Chronicle editorial page offered nothing on the topic yesterday, instead choosing to run a laughable "In the aftermath of Katrina" editorial that contended the wild tales from New Orleans circulated by major media were not the fault of major media (when in fact, the vaunted "fact checking" and editors and extensive resources devoted to New Orleans quite clearly failed at basic journalism -- vetting and reporting FACTS).
The Chronicle editorial page offered nothing on the topic today, instead choosing to run another "aftermath of Katrina" editorial. The editorial idealists must be tired of bloggers laughing at them, though, because they busted out a thesaurus and came up with "In the wake of..." as a substitute. That's even funnier, actually.
Maybe the editorial idealists will be all rested up by tomorrow (it's HARD to put out a newspaper in the midst of a big news event, as the reader representative reminded us, and apparently takes quite a bit of time to recover), and can offer some opinion about the DeLay indictment.
http://www.bloghouston.net/item/1914/catid/3
Some 5,400 trailers delivered to Miss.
JACKSON, Miss., Oct. 1 (UPI) -- Some 5,400 trailers had been delivered for occupancy in Mississippi for those made homeless from Hurricane Katrina.
More than 7,700 people have moved into the trailers, according to Bechtel, one of four companies chosen by the Federal Emergency Management Agency to set up temporary housing for displaced families.
Bechtel has also hired 1,600 people -- mostly via local suppliers and contractors -- to help set up the trailers.
Bechtel has set up temporary emergency housing operation centers in three southern Mississippi counties -- Hancock, Harrison and Jackson -- where more than 14,500 people have registered with FEMA for housing.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/upi/?feed=TopNews&article=UPI-1-20051001-19071400-bc-us-katrina-trailers.xml
Well, why should there be a shadow over Jeb?
Jeb Bush defends $192 million charter of ships for storm relief
BY TOM STIEGHORST
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. - (KRT) - Florida Gov. Jeb Bush on Friday defended Carnival Cruise Lines' $192 million charter of three ships for hurricane relief, saying critics who have labeled it a "sweetheart deal" are wrong, and that the unfair charge could inhibit companies in Florida from stepping forward in the future if a similar hurricane situation develops here.
Bush spoke to about 1,300 travel agents at a cruise industry show at the Broward County Convention Center.
"There's some senators and politicians up there in Washington criticizing this and I think its wrong," Bush said at Cruise3sixty, an expo sponsored by the Cruise Line Industry Association. Bush said the deal was done during a crisis.
http://www.macon.com/mld/macon/news/nation/12787449.htm
Worker injured on Big Dig gets $8 million settlement
October 1, 2005
BOSTON --A Big Dig construction worker injured when he was impaled by a steel beam will receive at least $8 million in a settlement reached with the companies managing the massive highway project and a subcontractor.
Natalio Elias, of New Bedford, suffered brain damage after he was injured in July 2000, when an 8-foot-long piece of steel fell from a crane and impaled his skull.
Under the settlement, which is believed to be the largest liability settlement involving a Big Dig worker since the project began 15 years ago, Elias and his family will receive $8 million in damages and up to $7.3 million more for medical expenses throughout his life.
Elias, 42, had sued Bechtel/Parsons Brinckerhoff, which oversees the mammoth project, and Mark Equipment Corp., the subcontractor that provided the crane involved in the accident.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2005/10/01/worker_injured_on_big_dig_gets_8_million_settlement/
A Flood of Money
In the Gulf, a gold rush for government funds
By Angie C. Marek
There's a price for luxury. Just ask the Federal Emergency Management Agency. On September 1, when FEMA officials thought they would have thousands of evacuees from Hurricane Katrina to house and feed, along with hundreds of emergency workers, the disaster management agency signed a no-bid contract with the Carnival Corp., owners of a fleet of luxe cruise ships. The deal: The feds would get three ships, Holiday, Ecstasy, and Sensation, with food included, all for a cool $236 million for six months.
http://www.usnews.com/usnews/news/articles/051010/10hurricane.htm
The New Orleans Aftermath and an Ugly Glimpse of the Future
October 01, 2005
The most important and lasting story of New Orleans is not the catastrophe wrought by nature, important as that is. It's the planned and now being implemented one brought to that city and its benighted majority poor and mainly black population by the combined and complicit federal, state and local governments beholden to corporate interests. The overwhelming destruction and human misery and death caused by a natural phenomenon has quickly metamorphosed into an extraordinary golden opportunity for business profit and predation. The brazen and out of control Bush administration has taken full advantage by rewarding its corporate cronies well with lucrative contracts for what they and the major media call "rebuilding." What's really happening is something much different and well concealed that should be exposed as a national scandal. It's exploitive predatory disaster capitalism that's an unexpected "windfall" [excuse the pun] for the usual corporate "favorites" - Halliburton [of course, always first chosen], Bechtel, and the oil, chemical and all other corporations that will benefit from redevelopment contracts plus those to receive large federal subsidy handouts [above the large ones already gotten] . And, of course, all this will be funded, as it always is, mostly by middle and low income taxpayers who receive only the bill and none of the benefits.
http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=13&ItemID=8851
Pakistan struggling for establishment of independent Palestinian state: Musharraf
Saturday October 01, 2005 (2033 PST)
KAKUL, October 02(Online): President General Pervez Musharaff has said that Pakistan is committed to its principle stand and struggling very hard for the creation of independent Palestinian State based on West Bank and Gaza.
He stated this while addressing a passing out parade ceremony of 112 PMA long course and integrated course-31 in Pakistan Military Academy here on Saturday.
President said that he had been engaged in creation of independent Palestian including West Bank and Gaza and would make all possible initiatives in future in this regard.
He further said that Palestian cadets who had got training in the PMA long course would be helpful in achieving the freedom and creation of homeland.
http://www.paktribune.com/news/index.php?id=120994
NY MOSQUE LEADERS INDICTED
Grand Jury Indicts Two N.Y. Mosque Leaders.
ALBANY, N.Y. Sep 29, 2005 — A federal grand jury has handed up new indictments charging two leaders of an area mosque with conspiring to support terrorists, the U.S. Attorney said Thursday.
The superseding indictment returned Thursday also charges Yassin Aref and Mohammed Hossain with attempting to provide support to Jaish-e-Mohammed, an Islamic extremist group based in Pakistan that is on the State Department’s list of designated foreign terrorist organizations.
Aref also was charged with making a false statement when he answered “none” to an immigration question asking him to list any organizations to which he had belonged. He also was charged with making false statements to the FBI when he was arrested in August 2004 and denied he was a member of the Islamic Movement in Kurdistan. At the time, he also denied knowing Mullah Krekar, believed to be the founder of Ansar-al-Islam, a radical Islamic fundamentalist group. Thursday, September 29, 2005
http://frontpagemagazine.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=19683
Hey Florida scum . . . it’s time for you to run!
Oct 1, 2005
by Doug Giles ( bio archive contact )
“. . . if you do that which is evil, be afraid.”
1 Rom.13.4
As of this Saturday, October 1, 2005, the law abiding citizens of Florida have been “given back” the already God-given, Constitution-given and no-duh-right to defend themselves, and if need be, use deadly force in so doing. That’s right . . . if you decide to rape, rob, car jack or accost a Floridian, you might want to think twice about that brain fart, as that may be the last thing you do before your soul wings its way to Hades.
If you’re the little weed contemplating these things, you should reflect a bit longer on the wisdom of this course of violent action, because we the people can now wale on you and be protected from criminal prosecution and/or an inane civil suit.
Here’s what Floridians are now afforded via The Castle Doctrine. This beautiful new law basically gives the average Joe who gets criminally assaulted while minding his own beeswax three essentials things:
http://www.townhall.com/opinion/columns/douggiles/2005/10/01/158897.html
Feds Supoenaed Records
Federal investigators have subpoenaed records from Springfield Consulting and Carlyle Group, whose advisors and board members have included President George H.W. Bush, former defense secretary Frank Carlucci, and Bush confidant and political powerbroker James Baker. The firm's current chairman is Louis Gerstner, former chief executive at IBM.
The list of influential persons and firms that have received millions of dollars of pension business and finder's fees is long and includes both Democrats and Republicans.
No one has been charged with a crime related to the payment of fees, but the political backlash has been furious. Investigations continue.
http://www.heartland.org/Article.cfm?artId=17827
Treat All Capital the Same
The National Tax Service (NTS) has completed a probe of overseas equity funds operating in Korea and decided to slap five of them, including Lone Star and the Carlyle Group, with a W214.8 billion (about U.S.$214.8 million) tax bill. The most remarkable aspect is that the NTS for the first time vetoed tax avoidance by companies nominally based in a tax haven.
Foreign funds evade tax in Korea by establishing paper companies in tax havens. Thus the U.S.-based fund Lone Star has a subsidiary in Belgium, and the W280 billion profits from real estate it made in Korea were made in the name of that firm, so Lone Star did not pay a penny in tax on account of a dual taxation avoidance treaty between Korea and Belgium.
http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/news/200509/200509300028.html
Robert Kjellander:
Bush Pioneer, Records Subpoenaed in Corruption Investigation. Robert Kjellander was named RNC treasurer in early August of 2005, soon after it was reported that a federal prosecutor investigating corruption at the Illinois Teacher's Retirement Systems, a state run teacher's pension fund. The subpoena specifically sought records relating to Kjellander's receipt of $4.5 million in fees from the Carlyle group, for helping to land the business with the pension fund. (AP, 8/10/05)
http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRelease.asp?id=54366
This Warden Takes No Prisoners
Former Abu Ghraib General's Book Names Names; Backs Up Abuse Allegations
By Steve Young
(NOTE: This article is based on a live interview with Janis Kapinski on L.A.'s KTLK Steve Young Show)
Sept. 27, 2005 — HOLLYWOOD (apj.us) — It's getting to be a long and ignominious list, these bombthrowers on the Left — Scott Ritter, Richard Clarke, Joe Wilson, Valerie Plame, Cindy Sheehan — all who might have been considered faithful friends of the Right until they opted for the greatest transgression again the Bush Administration: they told the truth.
Former Marine Ritter tread through the home fields of evil-doer Saddam looking for WMD, then screamed to 90% of America who didn't want to hear it, "There aint none!" Counter-terrorism expert Clarke, who worked for the last three Republican Presidents including George W, told the 9-11 commission that America owed the victims of 9-11 an apology for a massive screw up. Hailed as "truly inspiring" and "courageous" by W's dad, Wilson 'splained to the CIA that "Yellowcake's a fake." Plame was just a spy who they outed because...well, because they could. And Cindy Sheehan... no one tougher than a mother who's found that the cause her son had died for was not a cause at all. Not a soft target among them. Yet they each became delicious bull's eyes for the administration and their Lords of Loud.
These whistleblowers blew an ill wind for a presidency that doesn't cotton to standing in, or opting for, a draft. Exposing a misstep within the Bush administration assures having one's character and lives ripped to shreds and converted into anti-American, hate-the-troops, bulls-eye for the White House to hawk. Bush administration talking points are served up like raw meat to the damnation chuckers of the cabinet, congress, Robert Novaks and especially, the broadcast Lords of Loud.
But the Lords of Loud and the White House may be facing their most challenging task yet, as entering the fray comes the newest and perhaps most strong-headed of 'em all: the former commandant of the infamous Abu Ghraib prison — Janis Karpinski.
This lady is not a tramp. She's military; spent more time serving her country in a war torn country than her boss did serving a country he's ended up tearing apart.
http://www.americanpolitics.com/20050927Young.html
The War Against Tom DeLay
By ANNE E. KORNBLUT
WASHINGTON
TO hear Tom DeLay tell it, his indictment last week by a Texas grand jury resulted from a vast left-wing conspiracy - the culmination of years of relentless pursuit by Democrats who, in Mr. DeLay's words, "drug my name through the mud."
Democrats, of course, brushed the accusation aside, saying Mr. Delay, a Texas Republican, had only himself to blame for the conspiracy charge that forced him to step aside as the House majority leader.
But in fact an extensive network of forces has been aligned against Mr. DeLay - a kaleidoscope of activists and liberals, clean-government advocates and legal experts, even a smattering of resentful conservatives and Republican moderates, all bound by their desire to see him stopped.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/02/weekinreview/02kornblut.html?pagewanted=print
Someone needs to put a leash on DeLay !!
Tom Delay is a Man and Ronnie Earle is a Dog
October 01, 2005 10:27 AM EST
At a 4:00 p.m. press conference on September 30, 2005, in the fashionable Hess Club in Houston Texas, I, along with 200 other friends and supporters of Congressman Tom Delay came to hear what he had to say about his recent indictment and we weren't disappointed.
Here was a man, who stood firmly and told the crowd simply that he did nothing wrong and the crowd roared with approval. He pointed to his track record of public service and again the crowd roared. Then he talked about Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle and Earle's one man vendetta against all things Republican and the crowd of supporters booed at the mere mention of that "politician’s name".
http://www.theconservativevoice.com/articles/article.html?id=8683
TPMCafe: Politics, Ideas and Lots of Caffeine
Whose Skin is Judith Miller Really Trying to Save?
By Russ Hoyle
From: TPMCafe Special Guests
Ever since Judith Miller was cited for contempt of court and threatened with imprisonment back in March, her central role in the White House leak probe has had an air of unreality about it. After all, as reporters never tire of writing, Miller never even wrote about Valerie Plame, or anything else having to do with the case.
But with Miller’s release from jail last Thursday, her cloudy motives have grown even murkier. It may be time to admit that we’ve probably been asking the wrong questions about Judith Miller. The chattering classes so far have completely ignored the possibility that what Miller is so determined to protect may have nothing to do with the Plame case.
It may, however, have plenty to do with I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, the vice-president’s chief of staff, whom Miller met with on July 8, 2003 and spoke with at least once more that week, along with other unnamed officials, after her return from Iraq and the unsuccessful U.S. search for Saddam’s weapons. And it may have everything to do with protecting the White House officials who leaked classified intelligence – not about Valerie Plame toRobert Novak in the summer of 2003 – but to Miller herself about Iraq’s allegedly reconstituted nuclear weapons program in September 2002.
http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/10/2/23022/6302
The Daily Texan
Free at last
When we first heard that New York Times reporter Judith Miller was being released from prison Thursday night, excitement broke out in the newsroom. That excitement quickly turned to concern at the news she would testify before the grand jury Friday.
Miller waited in jail for 85 days to prove her commitment to her journalistic principles. She refused to reveal the name of her source - in this case I. Lewis Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff - until she was sure she had his un-coerced permission.
Her sacrifice is honorable and we are certainly in no place to tell her she should have remained in that prison. However, her choice to testify - even with persmission - could have serious consequences.
While it is clear in this case that Libby actually wanted Miller to testify, in the future a source with less clout might be compelled to let their reporter testify to let them out of prison - effectively bolstering the effectiveness of imprisoning journalists.
As Myron Farber, a Times reporter who was jailed in the late 70s for refusing to turn over notes, said, "Smaller people might tremble more when the reporter calls back and sayd, 'can you release me?'"
The ethical implications of this case will no doubt continue to be discussed. But for now, we'd like to congratulate Judith Miller on her hard-earned freedom.
NYT reporter’s stand draws journalists’ anger, scepticism
HOWARD KURTZ
WASHINGTON, OCOTOBER 1: In the end, what did Judith Miller accomplish by spending 85 days in jail? Not much, say her detractors, over the deal the New York Times reporter struck with I. Lewis Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, to testify about their 2003 conversations on CIA undercover Valerie Plame.
Some of Miller's colleagues at the Times, who declined to be identified, say much of the staff is frustrated and confused. “Was this a charade or a real principle?” one staffer said. “She wanted to resurrect herself from the WMD thing,” a reference to Miller’s stories while embedded with a US military unit searching for illegal weapons in Iraq in 2003.
http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=79249
FSRN Headlines
Judith Miller Testifies in front of Grand Jury
New York Times reporter Judith Miller was released from jail yesterday after getting the go ahead from the Vice President's Chief of Staff, Lewis Libby to disregard their confidentiality agreement. Gus Caravalho reports from Washington.
Scientists Say Global Warming Causes More Intense Hurricanes
Scientists today said climate change and the destruction of coastal wetlands could mean the same types of disasters New Orleans saw with Hurricane Katrina. Renee Feltz has more from Houston.
Former White House Official Under Fire
Conservative Commentator William Bennett was criticized by the White House today for saying that one way to reduce crime would be to abort black babies. On his talk show "Morning in America" Bennett made the comment in conversation with a caller about abortion.
BENNETT: "If you wanted to reduce crime, you could... if that were your sole purpose, you could abort every black baby in this country and your crime rate would go down. That would be an impossible, ridiculous and morally reprehensible thing to do, but your crime rate would go down."
White House Spokesperson Scott Maclellan said Bennett's comments were inappropriate, and Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid demanded an apology. Bennett was Education Secretary for the Reagan administration and Director of Drug Policy for Bush Senior.
VAWA Goes to Senate
The Violence Against Women Act was set to expire today, but lawmakers extended the bill to 2009. Leigh Ann Caldwell has more.
West Bank Palestinians Go to the Polls, Again
Palestininans in villages across the West Bank went to the polls yesterday in the third stage of municipal elections. Minar Jibreen reports.
Bolivian Protesters Call for the Extradition of Goni
In Bolivia, Police violently dispersed protestors at the US embassy calling for the extradition of former President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada from the United States. The first of three protests by family members of those killed during the demonstrations to oust the former President seeks to try Sanchez de Lozada for genocide. October marks two years since he fled office to the United States.
http://www.pacifica.org/programs/fsrn/fsrn_050930.html
Pacifica Reports From Iraq
Pacifica Correspondent Aaron Glantz is making his second trip to Iraq since the fall of Saddam Hussein. He will be filing a series of reports from Iraq, exclusively for Pacifica.org, called Pacifica Reports From Iraq.
Below is a list of these reports:
May 12 - US Army vs. the Posters of Muqtada al-Sadr
Iraq – US soldiers, backed by tanks and helicopters, launched a fresh attack today against fighters loyal to the firebrand cleric Moqtada al-Sadr in the Iraqi city of Kerbala. The Associated Press reports up to 25 Iraqis and seven US soldiers were wounded in the battle, which began only hours after Iraqi leaders had agreed on a proposal aimed at ending the US standoff with Mr Sadr's Mahdi army militia... more
May 5 - More Abuses from the Gates of Abu Ghraib
Abu Ghraib, Iraq – President George W. Bush continued his efforts to contain outrage over the torture scandal at Baghdad’s Abu Ghraib prison – formerly Saddam Hussein’s most notorious lock-up. Speaking to the Pentagon-run Arab satellite station al-Hurra (the freedom), Bush said reiterated he was “appalled” at broadcast images of Iraq’s naked and hooded. He pledged a full investigation and accountability for what he insisted were the actions of a few... more
May 4 - Killing the Followers of Sadr
Baghdad, Iraq -- Dozens of followers of Muqtada al-Sadr sing songs of martyrdom as they carry the coffins of two of their slain comrades into the shrine of the revered Imam Ali in the Iraqi Holy City, Najaf. Every night, Sadr's fighters engage in pitched battle with the US military which has placed its tanks and soldiers just outside the city limits. But that's not where these men died... more
May 3 - Fallujah Begins to Bury Its Dead
Baghdad, Iraq -- A team of local volunteers in surgical masks lift the rotting corpse of a middle aged woman from its shallow grave in the front yard of a single family home. The owner of the house explains the woman has been lying dead in his front yard for three weeks. He says an American war-plane bombed her car as she fled the city with her husband, who is buried in the garden of the house next door. The destroyed remains of
http://pacifica.org/programs/reportfromiraq/
Stephanopoulos: Source Says Bush & Cheney Involved in Plamegate
On today's This Week, host George Stephanopoulos cited an unnamed source who claims that President Bush and Vice-President Cheney were involved in the decision to out Valerie Plame. As the old spiritual goes, "And the walls came a-tumblin' down!"
http://www.newshounds.us/2005/10/02/stephanopoulos_source_says_bush_cheney_involved_in_plamegate.php
Source to Stephanopoulos: President Bush Directly Involved In Leak Scandal
Stephanopoulos: President Bush Directly Involved In Leak Scandal?
Judd posted this: "Near the end of a round table discussion on ABC’s This Week, George Stephanopoulos dropped this bomb:
Definitely a political problem but I wonder, George Will, do you think it’s a manageable one for the White House especially if we don’t know whether Fitzgerald is going to write a report or have indictments but if he is able to show as a source close to this told me this week, that President Bush and Vice President Cheney were actually involved in some of these discussions.
http://www.crooksandliars.com/2005/10/02.html
Pundit Pap
For Sunday, October 5, 2005
Tom DeLay's Smarm Offensive Overshadowed by George stephanopoulos' Leak
By JJ Balzer & Jeff Koopersmith
October 2, 2005—WASHINGTON (apj.us)—Tom DeLay was all over the Sunday shows, trying desperately to save his career as the top Republican "playa" in the legislative branch. He did little to help his own cause—not even Chris Wallace was giving him a pass. And a parade of military brass was on hand to tell America that we're making just splendid progress in Iraqnam.
But the big news so far this Sunday happened on ABC's This Week.
http://www.americanpolitics.com/20051002punditpap.html
Tom DeLay Says He Will Continue to Advance Agenda (Update1)
Oct. 2 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. Representative Tom DeLay, who stepped down as House majority leader after being indicted by a Texas grand jury on Sept. 28, said he still plans to participate in moving the Republican agenda forward.
``I can do my job, with or without the title,'' DeLay said today on ``Fox News Sunday.''
DeLay said he would continue to raise money and advise Speaker Dennis Hastert on initiatives to cut taxes, enforce immigration laws and reduce spending. DeLay, a Texas Republican, faces up to two years in prison on a charge of conspiracy in connection with corporate donations in his home state.
DeLay's legal problems have handed a potent political issue to Democrats, Representative Christopher Shays, a Connecticut Republican, said on CNN's ``Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer.''
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000087&sid=a4pPCKflCXFY&refer=top_world_news
DeLay Predicts Reinstatement as House Majority Leader
By VOA News
02 October 2005
Tom DeLay
U.S. Congressman Tom DeLay predicts he will be cleared of a criminal conspiracy charge, and that he will soon be reinstated as majority leader in the House of Representatives.
The Republican congressman was speaking on the television program "Fox News Sunday," where he called the indictment against him "manufactured" and "frivolous."
http://www.voanews.com/english/2005-10-02-voa38.cfm
Row flares between Jeb Bush and Jack T over games bill
You say potato and I say tomato
By Aaron McKenna: Sunday 02 October 2005, 09:52
LAST THURSDAY we ran a story based on a press release put out by Miami attorney and videogames watchdog Jack Thompson who claimed that he was requested by Florida Governor Jeb Bush to draft a violent video games bill. That's here. But according to the office of the Governor, he was bending the truth a little.
Thompson said he was asked to draft a bill similar to that currently awaiting signing or trashing in California, which would restrict the sale of violent and sexually explicit videogames to minors, and that if such legislation were passed Governor Bush had assured Thompson that he would sign the bill into law.
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=26629
War, Racism and Global Warming
October 02, 2005
The three days of anti-war actions in Washington, D.C. last weekend organized primarily by United for Peace and Justice were a huge victory for the progressive movement. From the Saturday rally and march co-organized with ANSWER, to the Peace and Justice Fair all day on the Washington Monument grounds, to the highly successful Operation Ceasefire concert/rally Saturday going late into the night attended by tens of thousands, to the tent revival inter-denominational religious service Sunday evening, to the mass lobbying of many hundreds on Capitol Hill Monday morning followed by almost 400 people getting arrested in front of the White House Monday afternoon-all of it was a powerful manifestation of our movement's growing political strength.
http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=1&ItemID=8857
How local officials voted on Roberts nomination to the Supreme Court
By Alison Vekshin and Elizabeth Piet
Stephens Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON - The Senate last week confirmed appeals court judge John Roberts to become the 17th chief justice of the Supreme Court.
All 55 of the Senate's Republicans and half of the Democrats voted 78-22 in favor of Roberts, who will succeed the late William Rehnquist. Independent James Jeffords of Vermont also voted for Roberts.
Roberts' supporters lauded his legal background and his ability to fairly interpret the law and the Constitution.
http://www.heralddemocrat.com/articles/2005/10/02/texas_news/state01.txt
Bill Bennett's Call for Genocide
By Leo Walsh
Related stories: right wing watch
10-01-05, 9:07 am
The archconservative opinion rag National Review welcomed hypocritical gambling addict and anti-public education ideologue William Bennett back into the public spotlight this past week. Not because Bennett is leading some sort of new campaign on a far right issue that the wing nut journal has endorsed, but because of his racist suggestion that to reduce crime policymakers ought to abort African American babies.
To Bennett's credit he posed genocide only as a hypothetical, but insisted that its underlying premise is true.
While the White House officially treated Bennett's call for genocide in the same fashion as they treated right-wing televangelist Pat Robertson's call to illegally assassinate President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, most right-wing loudmouth's courageously remained silent about Bennett's hot potato. (In a muted press release, the White House described Bennett's comment as "inappropriate.")
http://www.politicalaffairs.net/article/articleview/1941/1/122/
Wilson and the Iraq War.
When did the war between Joe Wilson and The White House start in spring 2003?
The actions, and war, against Joe Wilson from The White House Staff, started already in March 03, several days before the start of the Iraq war, the 19. of March 03.
See my article about the 3 month activity, before July 03, here: http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/8/5/525/20717
When the international renowned Dr. Mohammad El Baradei told the U.N. Security Council March 7, 2003, that the British reports, on a possible uranium selling from Niger to Iraq, was unsubstantial and based on forged documents, was it a basic attack on US plans to attack Iraq.
And when Joe Wilson went to TV (CNN) a few days later, and told the audience, that US government was untruthful on the Niger case, and he could prove it. It was then, long before his July article, the war between Wilson and The White House started. Not in July.
We was clearly aware in Europe, at that time, long before the Iraq war, that the US government, and its president George Bush, was not credible, when they told the World, they could prove (without doubt) that Iraq had NBC-weapons.
http://houseoflabor.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/10/1/112739/959
ROVE AIDE CALLED TO TESTIFY TOOK HIS MESSAGES
John Byrne
A former senior aide to Bush adviser Karl Rove who reportedly gave testimony to a grand jury investigating the leaking of a
CIA agent's identity answered phones and took Rove's messages, RAW STORY has discovered.
According to a 2004 Salon piece, she also had a role with one of conservative Washington's leading men, Grover Norquist, in which she took messages for Rove and called Norquist to screen callers.
"For two years, the assistant who answered Rove's phone was a woman who had previously worked for lobbyist Jack Abramoff, a close friend of Norquist's and a top DeLay fundraiser," Salon reported. "One Republican lobbyist, who asked not to be named because DeLay and Rove have the power to ruin his livelihood, said the way Rove's office worked was this: 'Susan took a message for Rove, and then called Grover to ask if she should put the caller through to Rove. If Grover didn't approve, your call didn't go through.'"
http://rawstory.com/news/2005/ROVE_AIDE_CALLED_TO_TESTIFY_TOOK_HIS_MESS_0802.html
Karl Rove Has Complete Confidence in President Rover?
U.S.
Does Karl Rove really have complete confidence in President Rover? After the President´s roundtable discussion that occured Monday, he should.
During yesterday’s roundtable discussion in Texas, the man most Americans describe as President Bush stated "Karl´s got my complete confidence. He´s a valuable member of my team,"
The Washington Post has called this comment as Bush’s strongest defense yet of Rove, the architect of his presidential campaigns.
Which support of Karl Rove at this time raises some very interesting, if not ludicrous questions.
The truth is—many people have wondered out loud if Karl Rove really is George Bush’s brain. The President’s comments that he has “complete confidence” almost makes one wonder if that brain is completely void of thought.
http://www.bayoubuzz.com/articles.aspx?aid=4652
I did not vote for Bush
http://www.ididnotvote4bush.com/pages/1/index.htm
Judith Miller walks
But the principle of confidentiality seems to stumble
Saturday, October 01, 2005
On general principles, we're against journalists being jailed for doing their job, so we applaud New York Times reporter Judith Miller's release on Thursday. Miller had served 85 days for refusing to testify about a confidential source, for refusing to answer a question she never should have been asked.
And we'd love to join her ringing cry on release, "I went to jail to preserve the time-honored principle that a journalist must respect a promise not to reveal the identity of a confidential source."
But when we actually trace the details on this story, it gets harder to see just what the principle behind Miller's appalling incarceration was. Worse, it seems that the principle of guaranteeing confidentiality to a source -- a vital tool for journalists discovering and reporting things that powerful people don't want revealed -- has taken a battering from virtually everyone involved.
http://www.oregonlive.com/editorials/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/editorial/1128164541276760.xml&coll=7
Libby Is to Cheney What Cheney Is to Bush
By NEDRA PICKLER
The Associated Press
Friday, September 30, 2005; 4:57 PM
WASHINGTON -- President Bush has Dick Cheney as his behind-the-scenes adviser and problem solver. The vice president has his own man who fits that description: I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby.
His job as Cheney's chief of staff gives Libby extraordinary influence and access in all corners of White House policy-making, particularly national security. But, just as Cheney doesn't talk about his conversations with Bush, Libby does not promote what he does for the vice president.
Lewis Libby, Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington in this March 1, 2001 file photo. New York Times reporter Judith Miller was released Thursday Sept. 29, 2005 after agreeing to testify in the investigation into the disclosure of the identity of a covert CIA officer after securing an unconditional release from Libby, two people familiar with the case said. (AP Photo/Joe Marquette, File) (Joe Marquette - AP)
Unlike many senior White House officials, Libby avoids the Sunday talk shows and rarely is quoted by name.
However, his quiet contacts with reporters have pushed Libby into the spotlight as a grand jury investigates whether White House officials leaked the name of a covert CIA operative, Valerie Plame.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/30/AR2005093001218.html
Leak probe's focus shifts to top Cheney aide
Reporter who spent 85 days in jail testifies about her interview with 'Scooter' Libby
By CAROL D. LEONNIG and JIM VANDEHEI
Washington Post
PRISON TIME
Judith Miller's sentence was the third-longest among those incarcerated for refusing to identify anonymous sources, according to a list from the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press:
• The longest: Freelance writer Vanessa Leggett served 168 days in 2001 after she balked at participating in a 1997 murder investigation involving a Houston socialite.
Source: Newsday
WASHINGTON - New York Times reporter Judith Miller told a grand jury Friday about her conversations with Vice President Dick Cheney's top aide in 2003, moving the two-year investigation into whether senior Bush administration officials illegally leaked covert CIA agent Valerie Plame's identity a step closer to its end.
Sources familiar with Miller's testimony say her account of two discussions with Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, that July are similar to the account Libby reportedly gave the grand jury last year.
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/nation/3377421
Conspiracy Theories and the Fight for Truth
By Danny Schecter
MediaChannel.org
Aug 02, 2005
Washington, D.C. - Remember the "Jersey Girls?" That's a phrase we haven't heard in a while, a reference to several New Jersey-based widows who lost their husbands in the attack on the World Trade Center on 9-11. They were ordinary apolitical suburbanites, mostly with Republican leanings, who did an extraordinary thing in questioning the Administration's version of the attack and demanding that their government do so as well.
That led, after nearly a year of well-informed, frustrating and persistent lobbying, to the launch of the 9-11 investigation formally known as The National Commission On Terrorist Attacks Upon The United States.
http://www.theepochtimes.com/news/5-8-2/30806.html
Daily Briefing: Scrap the News Cycle
Bush nominates White House counsel Harriet Miers to replace Sandra Day O'Connor.
Fitzgerald may seek criminal conspiracy charge from leak investigation. "Scooter" Libby discussed Valerie Plame with at least two reporters but maintains he did not say her name or unveil her covert status; testimony of Libby and Karl Rove appears to contradict early White House statements.
Tom DeLay: "I think it will be over and be over very, very soon, and I think I will go back and be majority leader."
Christopher Shays (R-Conn.): "We got elected basically by saying we would live by a higher moral standard, and I don't think recently we have."
Majority of governors want states, not the Pentagon, to oversee responses to national disasters.
http://www.wonkette.com/politics/lewis-libby/index.php
Cheney aide revealed as source of CIA leak
Julian Borger
Scandal involving Lewis Libby threatens White House directly
WASHINGTON: An investigation into a White House intelligence leak was nearing its conclusion after a New York Times reporter, jailed in July for refusing to testify, identified U.S. Vice-President Dick Cheney's leading aide as her principal source.
Judith Miller was released from a prison in Virginia, where she had spent 12 weeks, and appeared in a federal court in Washington on Friday to give her account of a scandal that has been hanging over the administration for two years.
According to lawyers involved in the case, Ms. Miller identified Lewis ``Scooter'' Libby, the Vice-President's chief of staff, as the government official she had spoken to in July 2003 about a CIA undercover agent, Valerie Plame.
http://www.hindu.com/2005/10/02/stories/2005100201161400.htm
Taking Out the Trash: Cheney Directly Involved In Leak Scandal
In today’s New York Times an anonymous source reveals that Cheney was directly involved in the strategy to discredit former ambassador Joe Wilson:
A lawyer who knows Mr. Libby’s account said the administration efforts to limit the damage from Mr. Wilson’s criticism extended as high as Mr. Cheney. This lawyer and others who spoke about the case asked that they not be identified because of grand jury secrecy rules.
On July 12, 2003, four days after his initial conversation with Ms. Miller, Mr. Libby consulted with Mr. Cheney about how to handle inquiries from journalists about the vice president’s role in sending Mr. Wilson to Africa in early 2002 to investigate reports that Iraq was trying acquire nuclear material there for its weapons program, the person said.
This is an effort by the White House to reveal more details about Cheney’s role on their own terms. The information was leaked to the New York Times on Saturday, the day when the fewest number of people read the paper. Also, it is presented in a way that makes Cheney’s involvement sound innocuous as possible.
http://thinkprogress.org/2005/10/01/taking-out-the-trash/
The Bush-Cheney Gazillions Tour
Get Out Your Checkbooks. It's a Bundle of Fun
by Ward Harkavy
October 22 - 28, 2003
President Bush's re-election campaign has coupled the time-honored tradition of the chicken-dinner whistle-stop tour with the 21st-century technology of electronic check-tracking and a bit of Texas terminology to produce a monster of political fundraising.
"Soft money" has been outlawed. And individual contributions are limited to $2,000 each. Now the key word is "bundling."
Bush has three levels of bundlers who woo friends and allies to high-ticket (usually $1,000-a-plate) campaign lunches and dinners. Rangers are those committed to raising at least $200,000 each for the campaign; Pioneers have a goal of $100,000; and Mavericks are the under-40 crowd aiming at $50,000 each. (During the 2000 campaign, Bush had only the Pioneer category, of which Enron's Ken Lay was a member.)
http://www.villagevoice.com/news/0343,harkavy,48033,1.html
Congressman calls VP too old and sick for the job
October 1, 2005, 6:01 AM EDT
NEW YORK (AP) _ For the second time in recent months, the dean of New York's congressional delegation has questioned whether Vice President Dick Cheney is fit for the duties of his office.
In an interview in August on NY1, the New York City-based all-news channel, Rep. Charles Rangel suggested that Cheney might be too sick to perform his job.
On Friday evening, Rangel was asked in a follow-up talk on the station
http://www.newsday.com/news/local/wire/newyork/ny-bc-ny--rangel-cheney1001oct01,0,4252015.story?coll=ny-region-apnewyork
Prosecutor Tightlipped About Plame Case
It has been two years since a grand jury began looking into the Valerie Plame CIA identity case, a criminal investigation that could close up shop shortly or cause more pain for the Bush White House. Following Friday's grand jury testimony by New York Times reporter Judith Miller, special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald gave no indication of his plans and his spokesman refused to comment. New York Times reporter Judith Miller, center, smiles as she is accompanied by New York Times Publisher Arthur O. Sulzberger, Jr., left, and New York Times Executive Editor Bill Keller, right, as she leaves the courthouse in Washington Friday, Sept. 30, 2005. Miller testified before a grand jury Friday, ending her silence in the investigation into whether White House officials leaked the name of a covert CIA operative, Valerie Plame. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak) (Charles Dharapak - AP)
http://www.scoopt.org/article2591-prosecutor-tightlipped.html
Sure they want him to stay. He manipulates issues like no one else can. That is how he got in trouble in the first place.
Newsweek: 39% see DeLay in serious wrongdoing; 73 % see GOP 'too close' to big business
New York- Thirty-nine percent of Americans believe that House Majority Leader Tom DeLay probably engaged in "serious wrongdoing," according to the new Newsweek Poll. When asked if Tom DeLay engaged in wrongdoing, or if this week's indictment was more likely a case of DeLay's political opponents wanted to embarrass him, 39 percent of those polled say DeLay was probably engaged in serious wrongdoing, 28 percent believe it is a case of his political opponents wanting to embarrass him; while 10 percent are not aware of any charges being brought against him. Among Republicans, 21 percent believe DeLay was probably engaged in serious wrongdoing while 47 percent believed it was more likely his opponents were trying to embarrass him.
http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Newsweek_Monday_39_percent_see_DeLay_1001.html
Chron editorial board:
Tom DeLay?
Who's that?
Thursday, the editorial page of every major newspaper in the state (along with "national" newspapers) weighed in on the DeLay indictment.
The Chronicle was silent, instead running another "In the aftermath of Katrina" editorial.
The Chronicle editorial page offered nothing on the topic yesterday, instead choosing to run a laughable "In the aftermath of Katrina" editorial that contended the wild tales from New Orleans circulated by major media were not the fault of major media (when in fact, the vaunted "fact checking" and editors and extensive resources devoted to New Orleans quite clearly failed at basic journalism -- vetting and reporting FACTS).
The Chronicle editorial page offered nothing on the topic today, instead choosing to run another "aftermath of Katrina" editorial. The editorial idealists must be tired of bloggers laughing at them, though, because they busted out a thesaurus and came up with "In the wake of..." as a substitute. That's even funnier, actually.
Maybe the editorial idealists will be all rested up by tomorrow (it's HARD to put out a newspaper in the midst of a big news event, as the reader representative reminded us, and apparently takes quite a bit of time to recover), and can offer some opinion about the DeLay indictment.
http://www.bloghouston.net/item/1914/catid/3
Some 5,400 trailers delivered to Miss.
JACKSON, Miss., Oct. 1 (UPI) -- Some 5,400 trailers had been delivered for occupancy in Mississippi for those made homeless from Hurricane Katrina.
More than 7,700 people have moved into the trailers, according to Bechtel, one of four companies chosen by the Federal Emergency Management Agency to set up temporary housing for displaced families.
Bechtel has also hired 1,600 people -- mostly via local suppliers and contractors -- to help set up the trailers.
Bechtel has set up temporary emergency housing operation centers in three southern Mississippi counties -- Hancock, Harrison and Jackson -- where more than 14,500 people have registered with FEMA for housing.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/upi/?feed=TopNews&article=UPI-1-20051001-19071400-bc-us-katrina-trailers.xml
Well, why should there be a shadow over Jeb?
Jeb Bush defends $192 million charter of ships for storm relief
BY TOM STIEGHORST
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. - (KRT) - Florida Gov. Jeb Bush on Friday defended Carnival Cruise Lines' $192 million charter of three ships for hurricane relief, saying critics who have labeled it a "sweetheart deal" are wrong, and that the unfair charge could inhibit companies in Florida from stepping forward in the future if a similar hurricane situation develops here.
Bush spoke to about 1,300 travel agents at a cruise industry show at the Broward County Convention Center.
"There's some senators and politicians up there in Washington criticizing this and I think its wrong," Bush said at Cruise3sixty, an expo sponsored by the Cruise Line Industry Association. Bush said the deal was done during a crisis.
http://www.macon.com/mld/macon/news/nation/12787449.htm
Worker injured on Big Dig gets $8 million settlement
October 1, 2005
BOSTON --A Big Dig construction worker injured when he was impaled by a steel beam will receive at least $8 million in a settlement reached with the companies managing the massive highway project and a subcontractor.
Natalio Elias, of New Bedford, suffered brain damage after he was injured in July 2000, when an 8-foot-long piece of steel fell from a crane and impaled his skull.
Under the settlement, which is believed to be the largest liability settlement involving a Big Dig worker since the project began 15 years ago, Elias and his family will receive $8 million in damages and up to $7.3 million more for medical expenses throughout his life.
Elias, 42, had sued Bechtel/Parsons Brinckerhoff, which oversees the mammoth project, and Mark Equipment Corp., the subcontractor that provided the crane involved in the accident.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2005/10/01/worker_injured_on_big_dig_gets_8_million_settlement/
A Flood of Money
In the Gulf, a gold rush for government funds
By Angie C. Marek
There's a price for luxury. Just ask the Federal Emergency Management Agency. On September 1, when FEMA officials thought they would have thousands of evacuees from Hurricane Katrina to house and feed, along with hundreds of emergency workers, the disaster management agency signed a no-bid contract with the Carnival Corp., owners of a fleet of luxe cruise ships. The deal: The feds would get three ships, Holiday, Ecstasy, and Sensation, with food included, all for a cool $236 million for six months.
http://www.usnews.com/usnews/news/articles/051010/10hurricane.htm
The New Orleans Aftermath and an Ugly Glimpse of the Future
October 01, 2005
The most important and lasting story of New Orleans is not the catastrophe wrought by nature, important as that is. It's the planned and now being implemented one brought to that city and its benighted majority poor and mainly black population by the combined and complicit federal, state and local governments beholden to corporate interests. The overwhelming destruction and human misery and death caused by a natural phenomenon has quickly metamorphosed into an extraordinary golden opportunity for business profit and predation. The brazen and out of control Bush administration has taken full advantage by rewarding its corporate cronies well with lucrative contracts for what they and the major media call "rebuilding." What's really happening is something much different and well concealed that should be exposed as a national scandal. It's exploitive predatory disaster capitalism that's an unexpected "windfall" [excuse the pun] for the usual corporate "favorites" - Halliburton [of course, always first chosen], Bechtel, and the oil, chemical and all other corporations that will benefit from redevelopment contracts plus those to receive large federal subsidy handouts [above the large ones already gotten] . And, of course, all this will be funded, as it always is, mostly by middle and low income taxpayers who receive only the bill and none of the benefits.
http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=13&ItemID=8851
Pakistan struggling for establishment of independent Palestinian state: Musharraf
Saturday October 01, 2005 (2033 PST)
KAKUL, October 02(Online): President General Pervez Musharaff has said that Pakistan is committed to its principle stand and struggling very hard for the creation of independent Palestinian State based on West Bank and Gaza.
He stated this while addressing a passing out parade ceremony of 112 PMA long course and integrated course-31 in Pakistan Military Academy here on Saturday.
President said that he had been engaged in creation of independent Palestian including West Bank and Gaza and would make all possible initiatives in future in this regard.
He further said that Palestian cadets who had got training in the PMA long course would be helpful in achieving the freedom and creation of homeland.
http://www.paktribune.com/news/index.php?id=120994
NY MOSQUE LEADERS INDICTED
Grand Jury Indicts Two N.Y. Mosque Leaders.
ALBANY, N.Y. Sep 29, 2005 — A federal grand jury has handed up new indictments charging two leaders of an area mosque with conspiring to support terrorists, the U.S. Attorney said Thursday.
The superseding indictment returned Thursday also charges Yassin Aref and Mohammed Hossain with attempting to provide support to Jaish-e-Mohammed, an Islamic extremist group based in Pakistan that is on the State Department’s list of designated foreign terrorist organizations.
Aref also was charged with making a false statement when he answered “none” to an immigration question asking him to list any organizations to which he had belonged. He also was charged with making false statements to the FBI when he was arrested in August 2004 and denied he was a member of the Islamic Movement in Kurdistan. At the time, he also denied knowing Mullah Krekar, believed to be the founder of Ansar-al-Islam, a radical Islamic fundamentalist group. Thursday, September 29, 2005
http://frontpagemagazine.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=19683
Hey Florida scum . . . it’s time for you to run!
Oct 1, 2005
by Doug Giles ( bio archive contact )
“. . . if you do that which is evil, be afraid.”
1 Rom.13.4
As of this Saturday, October 1, 2005, the law abiding citizens of Florida have been “given back” the already God-given, Constitution-given and no-duh-right to defend themselves, and if need be, use deadly force in so doing. That’s right . . . if you decide to rape, rob, car jack or accost a Floridian, you might want to think twice about that brain fart, as that may be the last thing you do before your soul wings its way to Hades.
If you’re the little weed contemplating these things, you should reflect a bit longer on the wisdom of this course of violent action, because we the people can now wale on you and be protected from criminal prosecution and/or an inane civil suit.
Here’s what Floridians are now afforded via The Castle Doctrine. This beautiful new law basically gives the average Joe who gets criminally assaulted while minding his own beeswax three essentials things:
http://www.townhall.com/opinion/columns/douggiles/2005/10/01/158897.html
October 3, 2005. 1530z. Infrared satellite. "Hurricane Otis" in the has dissipated into a peripheral flow of the vortices. There is again dynamics at play at both coasts of Central America that could easily manifest into a single large storm considering there is still an exacerbating dynamics along the east coast of the USA. There is an 'eddy' off the vortex east of Greenland now located east of the Virginia and North Carolina border. This east coast system could generate a similar storm to "Ophelia."
October 3, 2005. The Jet Stream is waining but did last for more than 48 hours. It is again oscillating toward a vortex dynamics with the return of equatorial storms and turbulence. This system is taking more a character of a gigantic 'vortex street' and a return to an earlier dynamics for this episode of Earth. The more vortices there are the faster the degradation of the ice pole, however. The oscillations are getting ,more extreme in that this dynamics needed to build 'heat' energy in the normalcy of The Jet Stream for nearly 48 hours. Earth is trying really hard to go back with every increasing dynamics. I have seen this before in that the number of vortices has reached a maximum of seven before the hemispheric vortex over the North Pole became reality. This could be a rolling back of the Climate Change dynamics and hopefully a return to ONLY Global Warming and 'calm' melting. We need to trim back CO2 in large measure. We need to help. NOTED: This is happening as autumn is approaching and the direct solar rays are moving south HOWEVER it could be happening in winter and not autumn when it would be more reasonable to expect. This remains a hopeful picture to me.
October 1, 2005. The burgeoning storms. This is somewhat predictable. I have seen this 'resolve' of the troposphere several times now both in last year and this year storm season. As soon as the 'major' storm of focus resolves and in this case it was "Rita" there is the beginning of the manifestation of the NEXT. The 'area' of this season's storms that are spawning the storms is the 'hotter' water between Haiti and Honduras. The notable vortices are narly in a straight line but not exactly the same latitudes as the storm known as "Hurricane Kenneth" dissipated and turned into a vortex as the heat resulting in the low pressure system had not completely resolved so much as transferred into a tropospheric event rather than a ocean event. "Hurricane Otis" is noted here. The two burgeoning storms in the Gulf are only beginning as Tropical Depressions 19 and 20. The most interesting aspect of this satellite picture is the return of the Jet Stream to latitudes about 45 north. The solar radiaiton is moving to the southern hemisphere and while there is an increase in 'darkness' in falling hours of daylight and less direct 'sun' the votices are diminished enough in this picture to allow the Jet Stream ot take prominence. This was an event much earlier in the year and was very brief, approximately 12 hours out of a day but it was hopes that it was a clear indication the CO2 level might be falling enough to resolve the votices dynamics and return normal dynamics back to Earth. It looks like that may be the trend regardless how 'brief' these manifestations are. The frequency they occur and the interval at which they occur will clearly indicate a trend of a return to a normal troposphere or not. It is my estimate as it has been the entire time that as soon as the CO2 levesl fell below 2002 levels the vortex dynamics woud resolve. I still feel that is the case and a very achievable goal.
Sunday, October 02, 2005
Cleaning Up New Orleans. Also affectionately called by the Caucasian Religious Right as "Cleaning Up Nagin Land"
The latest escapades of the right's media to exonerate Bush from negligence and death regarding Katrina is Bill Bennett's theory on "Intelligent Design."
That was preceded by the only poll that ever out lies any other poll and that is the CNN/Gallup/USA Today poll that has Bush taking enormous strides back to being near and dear every American post Rita. That is a crock if I ever heard one, as they only 'intelligently designed' the poll to elevate the prez's ratings hoping every other poll would follow.
It will be a real eye opener to find the American people conveniently forgetting about the disaster and exorbitant death of Katrina only to give Bush a better job rating while the Texas coast lay in devastation. It would reveal the true labiality of this country with feeble and fickle thinking regarding the ludicrous idea of 'forgiveness' because a Boy Scout President "did better this time."
He did?
He listened to a weather service that emptied an area from Northern Mexico to the Florida Keys sparing no expense in an unpredictable storm from hell by the name of "Rita" that was 'designed' for him to redeem himself. You'll excuse me but if the USA had credible scientists at it's top posts at The National Hurricane Center the oil industry would not be the first and only concern of this Oil Barron President.
With Katrina nearly a month in the nation's timeline, the right's media is taking on the issue of Image Reform, damned the expense, to bring 'The Party' back to 'Favorite Son' status. In order to do that rarely are there Democrats by large numbers making appearances on news segments out numbering the pandering Republicans who have yet to learn the vocabulary associated with Global Warming.
Of interest is the recent 'witch hunt' image building of Mayor Nagin which is being designed to 'take the fault' from Bush's incompetence minimally manifested in the resignation of "The Horsy Set's" Michael Brown. It would have been refreshing to hear "Brownie" come forward with an apology for his negligence and mismanagement rather than expounding a love fest with Louisiana and Mississippi. The biggest challenge to the pandering Governor Haley Barbour is to win over the pastorate so the casinos can be built on dry land returning lost income to his state while driving the devil back to New Orleans rather than his self-righteous parishes while covertly burying the dead.
Seeking scandal and undercutting of authority through Evangelical Christian ridicule, the latest campaign against Ray Nagin surrounds the allegations of the New Orleans Police Department. It's always had problems but none more than the stark reality the rest of the city experiences today which lay devastated and rotting with deadly mold, mildew and yeast that are quickly becoming more of a health problem than decaying carcasses.
How anyone can stand in ridicule of a city authority that keeps dodging storm after flooding storm while FEMA and the USA Coast Guard search and rescue a month later still finds it impossible to bring all those alive out of attics and off rooftops to safety while dead human beings become bloated in the hot sun. If, a month later some of the news teams are still finding bloated bodies on islands of dry debris or land; they were not dead a month ago. Okay? More testament to the fact on this Sunday in October 2005 while Bush is basking in unintelligently designed higher approval ratings people are still dying unattended in the parishes of The Gulf Coast while $100 million of FEMA ice is stored in refrigerator trailers of semi's across the country still waiting for directions to the 'drop off' destination.
The New Orleans police department is no different than any other big city police in that corruption finds it's way into the chaotic back streets of authority which seems to supplement their income over what officers are compensated in a world designed by Bush to send every 'paid' employee of every company and government job below the poverty level.
The latest in New York City would the escapades of Eppolito and Caracappa. The corruption in NYC spans decades and while there is a lot of good that can come out of an internal audit of the New Orleans Police Department in relation to Kartina perhaps what is more in the hopes of former Police Chief Richard Pennington is a revival of a pseudo 1971 Knapp Commission whereby Frank Serpico broke the blue wall of silence to clean up the streets of the city they loved. If there lies within the Police Authority of New Orleans, as with other major cities, the opportunity to purge itself of corruption then let this be the time with adequate funding to bring the city to prominence in crime fighting to enhance it's attraction again as a world class city.
What is troubling is the covert vigilante film making of right wing news journalists that would seek to exploit episodes of looting while finding Fido shot dead post storm now that people are returning to their neighborhoods. As with most rooted out scandals that lead to artificial bolstering of intelligent design by Rove for more favorable Bush ratings these are based minimally in truth so much as sensationalism which The Right thrives on serving no one's best interest. Film footage does not lie and neither should 'the truth telling' surrounding it.
It would seem to me Mayor Ray Nagin has been completely transparent and apolitical in his post storm appearances in New Orleans which vastly out number that of Bush. He could conveniently hide away from the public if deep seated corruption exists but instead is braving the New Orleans' spirit of adventure returning parts of the city to people returning to the hard work of reclaiming their lives, a return of a tax base as well as hope to a beleaguered city still suffering from water drenched streets in the fear of still an active storm season.
What is lacking from the attempt of the right to divert blame to "Nigan Land" from Bush are citizens and their organized groups of independent authority or "Political Action Committees" if you will that attend to such vital details of city dwelling to bring not only spotty incidents during Katrina but also a history of validated problems that might extract real fact finding fixing complaints that might actually serve New Orleans and not the Repuglican Party. That is vastly different than the current commission Ray Nagin has created to direct questions of Police Misconduct due to Katrina. The Right is seeking scandal that leads to Ray Nagin's supposedly deeply hid responsibility in the disproportionate deaths of Katrina in New Orleans. This somehow will not only purge Bush of "Bad Boy" status but also the Repuglican Party of Racism.
What this witch hunt does not reveal is the disproportionate deaths reflected in the other affected Gulf States as well. Normally these storms, as demonstrated with the underestimated "Andrew," take lives that number maximally around 50 per storm but "Katrina" has minimally twenty times that many.
If we are to avoid the tragedy of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast again we need to deal with the fact the USA has profound issues of segregation and stereotyping that leads to devastating poverty and generations of hopelessness.
Where issues also need attention is the return to nurturing of the biotic world of this country which by the way were the first statements regarding the 'cause' of the tragedy that beset this mayor August 30th, when he was given a candid moment. I remind everyone of the post Katrina Mayor Ray Nagin and our compassion for him as a nation. Why is it we can't seem to leave it there and support this city back to not only rebuilding but world acclaim.
BROWN: Mayor, this is what we call in my business a hanging curve question. Is there anything else you want to say, you want people to understand about the situation? Anything I should have asked I didn't ask?
NAGIN: The only thing I would point out is everyone knows New Orleans is one of the great unique cultural cities in the world and we are basically left unprotected right now because of coastal erosion.
Our coast has eroded to the point where it really threatens this wonderful city that everybody loves and we need some help and we need some help from the federal government.
We have lost our marshland and for every acre of marshland, it would allow a tidal surge from a hurricane to be dissipated one foot.
And the big problem we have with this hurricane was there was nothing to subside the tidal surge. So coastal erosion is a big challenge going forward.
BROWN: Mayor, our thoughts and prayers are with you tonight. Thank you for your time.
NAGIN: Really appreciate that and I hope the nation continues to pray for us. We will rebuild. It's going to take a while for us to do it.
BROWN: Sir, thank you very much.
NAGIN: Thank you.
BROWN: Ray Nagin, the mayor of New Orleans. One of the things we like about the mayor is he doesn't mess around. He gave a very clear, I thought stark in some cases, description of where they are. Thirty-seven hundred National Guard troops heading to the city but they're not their yet and for those of you who came in at the top of the hour if you missed it, we asked him if you wished they were there tonight and he said, yes he does.
That was preceded by the only poll that ever out lies any other poll and that is the CNN/Gallup/USA Today poll that has Bush taking enormous strides back to being near and dear every American post Rita. That is a crock if I ever heard one, as they only 'intelligently designed' the poll to elevate the prez's ratings hoping every other poll would follow.
It will be a real eye opener to find the American people conveniently forgetting about the disaster and exorbitant death of Katrina only to give Bush a better job rating while the Texas coast lay in devastation. It would reveal the true labiality of this country with feeble and fickle thinking regarding the ludicrous idea of 'forgiveness' because a Boy Scout President "did better this time."
He did?
He listened to a weather service that emptied an area from Northern Mexico to the Florida Keys sparing no expense in an unpredictable storm from hell by the name of "Rita" that was 'designed' for him to redeem himself. You'll excuse me but if the USA had credible scientists at it's top posts at The National Hurricane Center the oil industry would not be the first and only concern of this Oil Barron President.
With Katrina nearly a month in the nation's timeline, the right's media is taking on the issue of Image Reform, damned the expense, to bring 'The Party' back to 'Favorite Son' status. In order to do that rarely are there Democrats by large numbers making appearances on news segments out numbering the pandering Republicans who have yet to learn the vocabulary associated with Global Warming.
Of interest is the recent 'witch hunt' image building of Mayor Nagin which is being designed to 'take the fault' from Bush's incompetence minimally manifested in the resignation of "The Horsy Set's" Michael Brown. It would have been refreshing to hear "Brownie" come forward with an apology for his negligence and mismanagement rather than expounding a love fest with Louisiana and Mississippi. The biggest challenge to the pandering Governor Haley Barbour is to win over the pastorate so the casinos can be built on dry land returning lost income to his state while driving the devil back to New Orleans rather than his self-righteous parishes while covertly burying the dead.
Seeking scandal and undercutting of authority through Evangelical Christian ridicule, the latest campaign against Ray Nagin surrounds the allegations of the New Orleans Police Department. It's always had problems but none more than the stark reality the rest of the city experiences today which lay devastated and rotting with deadly mold, mildew and yeast that are quickly becoming more of a health problem than decaying carcasses.
How anyone can stand in ridicule of a city authority that keeps dodging storm after flooding storm while FEMA and the USA Coast Guard search and rescue a month later still finds it impossible to bring all those alive out of attics and off rooftops to safety while dead human beings become bloated in the hot sun. If, a month later some of the news teams are still finding bloated bodies on islands of dry debris or land; they were not dead a month ago. Okay? More testament to the fact on this Sunday in October 2005 while Bush is basking in unintelligently designed higher approval ratings people are still dying unattended in the parishes of The Gulf Coast while $100 million of FEMA ice is stored in refrigerator trailers of semi's across the country still waiting for directions to the 'drop off' destination.
The New Orleans police department is no different than any other big city police in that corruption finds it's way into the chaotic back streets of authority which seems to supplement their income over what officers are compensated in a world designed by Bush to send every 'paid' employee of every company and government job below the poverty level.
The latest in New York City would the escapades of Eppolito and Caracappa. The corruption in NYC spans decades and while there is a lot of good that can come out of an internal audit of the New Orleans Police Department in relation to Kartina perhaps what is more in the hopes of former Police Chief Richard Pennington is a revival of a pseudo 1971 Knapp Commission whereby Frank Serpico broke the blue wall of silence to clean up the streets of the city they loved. If there lies within the Police Authority of New Orleans, as with other major cities, the opportunity to purge itself of corruption then let this be the time with adequate funding to bring the city to prominence in crime fighting to enhance it's attraction again as a world class city.
What is troubling is the covert vigilante film making of right wing news journalists that would seek to exploit episodes of looting while finding Fido shot dead post storm now that people are returning to their neighborhoods. As with most rooted out scandals that lead to artificial bolstering of intelligent design by Rove for more favorable Bush ratings these are based minimally in truth so much as sensationalism which The Right thrives on serving no one's best interest. Film footage does not lie and neither should 'the truth telling' surrounding it.
It would seem to me Mayor Ray Nagin has been completely transparent and apolitical in his post storm appearances in New Orleans which vastly out number that of Bush. He could conveniently hide away from the public if deep seated corruption exists but instead is braving the New Orleans' spirit of adventure returning parts of the city to people returning to the hard work of reclaiming their lives, a return of a tax base as well as hope to a beleaguered city still suffering from water drenched streets in the fear of still an active storm season.
What is lacking from the attempt of the right to divert blame to "Nigan Land" from Bush are citizens and their organized groups of independent authority or "Political Action Committees" if you will that attend to such vital details of city dwelling to bring not only spotty incidents during Katrina but also a history of validated problems that might extract real fact finding fixing complaints that might actually serve New Orleans and not the Repuglican Party. That is vastly different than the current commission Ray Nagin has created to direct questions of Police Misconduct due to Katrina. The Right is seeking scandal that leads to Ray Nagin's supposedly deeply hid responsibility in the disproportionate deaths of Katrina in New Orleans. This somehow will not only purge Bush of "Bad Boy" status but also the Repuglican Party of Racism.
What this witch hunt does not reveal is the disproportionate deaths reflected in the other affected Gulf States as well. Normally these storms, as demonstrated with the underestimated "Andrew," take lives that number maximally around 50 per storm but "Katrina" has minimally twenty times that many.
If we are to avoid the tragedy of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast again we need to deal with the fact the USA has profound issues of segregation and stereotyping that leads to devastating poverty and generations of hopelessness.
Where issues also need attention is the return to nurturing of the biotic world of this country which by the way were the first statements regarding the 'cause' of the tragedy that beset this mayor August 30th, when he was given a candid moment. I remind everyone of the post Katrina Mayor Ray Nagin and our compassion for him as a nation. Why is it we can't seem to leave it there and support this city back to not only rebuilding but world acclaim.
BROWN: Mayor, this is what we call in my business a hanging curve question. Is there anything else you want to say, you want people to understand about the situation? Anything I should have asked I didn't ask?
NAGIN: The only thing I would point out is everyone knows New Orleans is one of the great unique cultural cities in the world and we are basically left unprotected right now because of coastal erosion.
Our coast has eroded to the point where it really threatens this wonderful city that everybody loves and we need some help and we need some help from the federal government.
We have lost our marshland and for every acre of marshland, it would allow a tidal surge from a hurricane to be dissipated one foot.
And the big problem we have with this hurricane was there was nothing to subside the tidal surge. So coastal erosion is a big challenge going forward.
BROWN: Mayor, our thoughts and prayers are with you tonight. Thank you for your time.
NAGIN: Really appreciate that and I hope the nation continues to pray for us. We will rebuild. It's going to take a while for us to do it.
BROWN: Sir, thank you very much.
NAGIN: Thank you.
BROWN: Ray Nagin, the mayor of New Orleans. One of the things we like about the mayor is he doesn't mess around. He gave a very clear, I thought stark in some cases, description of where they are. Thirty-seven hundred National Guard troops heading to the city but they're not their yet and for those of you who came in at the top of the hour if you missed it, we asked him if you wished they were there tonight and he said, yes he does.
Saturday, October 01, 2005
"The House of the Rising Sun" by The Animals
This ballad has two versons . One is masculine and one is feminine. The thoughts that come to mind are completely different. The masculine variety lends itself to hard luck and a hard life, but, the female variety dictates sexuality and sin. The divison of 'life experience' is completely a double standard.
There is a house in New Orleans
They call the Rising Sun
And it's been the ruin of many a poor boy
And God I know I'm one
My mother was a tailor
She sewed my new bluejeans
My father was a gamblin' man
Down in New Orleans
Now the only thing a gambler needs
Is a suitcase and trunk
And the only time he's satisfied
Is when he's on a drunk
------ organ solo ------
Oh mother tell your children
Not to do what I have done
Spend your lives in sin and misery
In the House of the Rising Sun
Well, I got one foot on the platform
The other foot on the train
I'm goin' back to New Orleans
To wear that ball and chain
Well, there is a house in New Orleans
They call the Rising Sun
And it's been the ruin of many a poor boy
And God I know I'm one
There is a house in New Orleans
They call the Rising Sun
And it's been the ruin of many a poor boy
And God I know I'm one
My mother was a tailor
She sewed my new bluejeans
My father was a gamblin' man
Down in New Orleans
Now the only thing a gambler needs
Is a suitcase and trunk
And the only time he's satisfied
Is when he's on a drunk
------ organ solo ------
Oh mother tell your children
Not to do what I have done
Spend your lives in sin and misery
In the House of the Rising Sun
Well, I got one foot on the platform
The other foot on the train
I'm goin' back to New Orleans
To wear that ball and chain
Well, there is a house in New Orleans
They call the Rising Sun
And it's been the ruin of many a poor boy
And God I know I'm one
The House of the Rising Sun by Bob Dylan
There is a house down in new orleans
They call the risin’ sun
And it’s been the ruin of many a poor girl
And me, oh god, I’m a-one
My mother was a tailor
She sewed these new blue jeans
My sweetheart was a gambler, lord
Down in new orleans
Is a suitcase and a trunk
And the only time he’s satisfied
Is when he’s on a drunk
He fills his glasses up to the brim
And he’ll pass the cards around
And the only pleasure he gets out of life
Is ramblin’ from town to town
Oh tell my baby sister
Not to do what I have done
But shun that house in new orleans
They call the risin’ sun
Well,it’s one foot on the platform
And the other foot on the train
I’m goin’ back to new orleans
To wear that ball and chain
I’m a-goin’ back to new orleans
My race is almost run
I’m goin’ back to end my life
Down in the risin’ sun
There is a house in new orleans
They call the risin’ sun
It’s been the ruin of many poor girl
And me, oh god, I’m a-one
They call the risin’ sun
And it’s been the ruin of many a poor girl
And me, oh god, I’m a-one
My mother was a tailor
She sewed these new blue jeans
My sweetheart was a gambler, lord
Down in new orleans
Is a suitcase and a trunk
And the only time he’s satisfied
Is when he’s on a drunk
He fills his glasses up to the brim
And he’ll pass the cards around
And the only pleasure he gets out of life
Is ramblin’ from town to town
Oh tell my baby sister
Not to do what I have done
But shun that house in new orleans
They call the risin’ sun
Well,it’s one foot on the platform
And the other foot on the train
I’m goin’ back to new orleans
To wear that ball and chain
I’m a-goin’ back to new orleans
My race is almost run
I’m goin’ back to end my life
Down in the risin’ sun
There is a house in new orleans
They call the risin’ sun
It’s been the ruin of many poor girl
And me, oh god, I’m a-one
Hawaii avoided a hurricane because it dissipated but it is under a vortex now.
UNISYS WATER VAPOR SATELLITE - Hawaii is located at the lower left corner. The small red dots.
0000
ZHW70 PHFO 012003
MWSHFO
MARINE WEATHER STATEMENT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE HONOLULU HI
1000 AM HST SAT OCT 1 2005
PHZ110>124-020400-KAUAI NORTHWEST WATERS-KAUAI WINDWARD WATERS-KAUAI LEEWARD WATERS-KAUAI CHANNEL-OAHU WINDWARD WATERS-OAHU LEEWARD WATERS-KAIWI CHANNEL-MAUI COUNTY WINDWARD WATERS-MAUI COUNTY LEEWARD WATERS-MAALAEA BAY-PAILOLO CHANNEL-ALENUIHAHA CHANNEL-BIG ISLAND WINDWARD WATERS-BIG ISLAND LEEWARD WATERS-BIG ISLAND SOUTHEAST WATERS-1000 AM HST SAT OCT 1 2005
...THUNDERSTORMS AND WATERSPOUTS POSSIBLE TODAY
...TROPICAL MOISTURE AND AN UNSTABLE AIRMASS WILL MAINTAIN A THREAT OF THUNDERSTORMS OVER ALL HAWAIIAN COASTAL WATERS TODAY. THUNDERSTORMS CAN FORM WITH LITTLE OR NO ADVANCE WARNING. MARINERS CAN EXPECT GUSTY WINDS UP TO 30 KNOTS...LOCALLY HIGHER SEAS...WATERSPOUTS...AND LIGHTNING STRIKES. BOATERS SHOULD SEEK SAFE HARBOR IMMEDIATELY IF THUNDERSTORMS ARE ENCOUNTERED.
TANABE
0000
ZHW70 PHFO 012003
MWSHFO
MARINE WEATHER STATEMENT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE HONOLULU HI
1000 AM HST SAT OCT 1 2005
PHZ110>124-020400-KAUAI NORTHWEST WATERS-KAUAI WINDWARD WATERS-KAUAI LEEWARD WATERS-KAUAI CHANNEL-OAHU WINDWARD WATERS-OAHU LEEWARD WATERS-KAIWI CHANNEL-MAUI COUNTY WINDWARD WATERS-MAUI COUNTY LEEWARD WATERS-MAALAEA BAY-PAILOLO CHANNEL-ALENUIHAHA CHANNEL-BIG ISLAND WINDWARD WATERS-BIG ISLAND LEEWARD WATERS-BIG ISLAND SOUTHEAST WATERS-1000 AM HST SAT OCT 1 2005
...THUNDERSTORMS AND WATERSPOUTS POSSIBLE TODAY
...TROPICAL MOISTURE AND AN UNSTABLE AIRMASS WILL MAINTAIN A THREAT OF THUNDERSTORMS OVER ALL HAWAIIAN COASTAL WATERS TODAY. THUNDERSTORMS CAN FORM WITH LITTLE OR NO ADVANCE WARNING. MARINERS CAN EXPECT GUSTY WINDS UP TO 30 KNOTS...LOCALLY HIGHER SEAS...WATERSPOUTS...AND LIGHTNING STRIKES. BOATERS SHOULD SEEK SAFE HARBOR IMMEDIATELY IF THUNDERSTORMS ARE ENCOUNTERED.
TANABE
Friday, September 30, 2005
Morning Papers - It's Origins
Rooster “Crowing”
“Okeydoke”
History
1791 Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart conducts the premiere of his singspeil The Magic Flute, just over two months before his death.
1921 Outfielder Babe Ruth of the New York Yankees hits his 60th home run of the season, breaking his own record and setting a mark that would last until 1961.
1946 Following World War II, the International Military Tribunal in Nürnberg, Germany, sentences 11 leaders of Nazi Germany, including Field Marshal Hermann Göring, to death for crimes during the war.
1949 The Berlin airlift, caused by the Soviet blockade of overland traffic to West Berlin, ends after more than 277,000 flights from Western nations, which supplied the city with food and fuel for nearly 11 months.
1955 Actor James Dean dies at the age of 24 in an automobile accident in California, having starred in only three motion pictures.
1972 Pittsburgh Pirates outfielder Roberto Clemente collects the 3,000th and final hit of his career, three months before dying in a plane crash while on an earthquake relief mission.
Missing in Action
1965 CHESNUTT CHAMBLESS M. LITTLE ROCK AR PROB DEAD REMAINS RECOVERED 03/20/85
1965 CHWAN MICHAEL DANIEL BAYONE NJ PROB DEAD REMAINS RECOVERED 03/20/85
1965 KILLIAN MELVIN JOSEPH COUNCIL BLUFFS IA PROB DEAD REMAINS RECOVERED 03/20/85
1968 FIESZEL CLIFFORD W. LUBBOCK TX
1968 SMITH HOWARD H. OKLAHOMA CITY OK
1968 SPINELLI DOMENICK A. OAK HARBOR WA LISTED ON THE WALL AS OHIO
1968 VAN RENSELAAR LARRY J. LAS VEGAS NV COMPLETE REMAINS RETURNED 1989 FAMILY ACCEPTS 7/90
1971 BOND RONALD L. HADDONFIELD NJ
1971 DONOVAN MICHAEL L. NORTON KS
The Sydney Morning Herald
Climate change warning - this time it's personal
By Wendy Frew Environment Reporter
October 1, 2005
Eastern suburbs residents will be the first to be warned of how climate change threatens every aspect of their lives in what could be the largest environment campaign in decades.
In a project they hope to take nationwide at a cost of up to $2 million a year, Australia's main environment groups will next week start door-knocking in Sydney's east to talk about what predicted climate changes could mean for beaches and parks, health and hip pockets.
Supported by Greenpeace, WWF Australia, Climate Action Network Australia, the Nature Conservation Council of NSW and Environment Victoria, the Power to Change campaign will also include mail drops, street stalls and public meetings.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/climate-change-warning--this-time-its-personal/2005/09/30/1127804662703.html
Michael Moore Today
DeLay Faces Tough Road Back to Top
Indictment, Ethics Questions, Abramoff Case Are Obstacles
By Dan Balz / Washington Post
For the first time in more than a decade, Rep. Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) arrived at work yesterday without a leadership title attached to his name. Sidelined from his post as majority leader by a criminal indictment in Texas, the man who accumulated extraordinary power on his way up the ladder faces a difficult and uncertain road back to those heights.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=4332
SEC Opens Full Probe Into Frist Stock Sale
By Jonathan M. Katz / Associated Press
WASHINGTON - While insiders at HCA Inc. (HCA) were selling millions of dollars of their own stock this year, they were also painting a sunny picture of the company's outlook for investors. Federal prosecutors and the Securities and Exchange Commission are investigating the sale of HCA stock by Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., whose family founded the company that grew into the nation's largest for-profit health care chain.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=4322
Condoleezza Rice: Civil Rights Struggle Didn't Affect Me
Associated Press
WASHINGTON - Most people who were alive at the time would tell you they had a lot of feelings during the civil rights era. But not Condoleezza Rice.
The secretary of state said she was too young and too busy to feel much of an effect from the massive social changes during the 1960s. Rice said she was only 12 or 13 and that all she did "was play the piano and ice skate."
Rice said because of that, she didn't focus much on what she now calls "the counterculture."
Rice didn't give up a whole lot during the interview with Fox News Channel. Asked if she ever did drugs -- Rice didn't answer, urging her interviewer to go back to questions about foreign policy.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=4341
Pentagon still not reimbursing troops who buy own body armor
By Lolita C. Baldor / Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Nearly a year after Congress demanded action, the Pentagon still hasn't figured out a way to reimburse U.S. troops for body armor and equipment they purchased to better protect themselves while serving in Iraq.
For Marine Sgt. Todd Bowers that extra equipment — a high-tech rifle scope bought by his father for $600 and a $100 pair of goggles — turned out to be a life-or-death purchase. And he has never been reimbursed.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=4340
A Look at U.S. Military Deaths in Iraq
By The Associated Press Thu Sep 29, 8:23 PM ET
As of Thursday, Sept. 29, 2005, at least 1,933 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the
Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count. At least 1,499 died as a result of hostile action, according to the military's numbers. The figures include five military civilians.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/iraq_us_deaths
HUD chief foresees a 'whiter' Big Easy
By Brian DeBose / Washington Times
A Bush Cabinet officer predicted this week that New Orleans likely will never again be a majority black city, and several black officials are outraged.
Alphonso R. Jackson, secretary of housing and urban development, during a visit with hurricane victims in Houston, said New Orleans would not reach its pre-Katrina population of "500,000 people for a long time," and "it's not going to be as black as it was for a long time, if ever again."
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=4349
Ex-secretary asked to apologize for linking crime, blacks
WASHINGTON (AP) - The White House on Friday criticized former Education Secretary William Bennett for remarks linking the crime rate and the abortion of black babies.
"The president believes the comments were not appropriate," White House press secretary Scott McClellan said.
Bennett, on his radio show, Morning in America, was answering a caller's question when he took issue with the hypothesis put forth in a recent book that one reason crime is down is that abortion is up.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=4348
Others deny DeLay didn't get chance to tell his side
By Janet Elliott / Associated Press
AUSTIN - The day after U.S. Rep. Tom DeLay's grand jury indictment, his lawyer and the jury foreman on Thursday appeared to contradict the Texas politician's assertions that he was not given a chance to speak before the jury.
The foreman, William M. Gibson Jr., a retired state insurance investigator, said the Travis County grand jury waited until Wednesday, the final day of its term, to indict him because it was hoping he would accept jurors' invitation to testify.
DeLay said in interviews that the grand jury never asked him to testify.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=4347
Uzbeks Stop Working With U.S. Against Terrorism
By Robin Wright / Washington Post
After cutting off U.S. access to a key military base, Uzbekistan has also quietly terminated cooperation with Washington on counterterrorism, a move that could affect both countries' ability to deal with al Qaeda and its allies in Central Asia and neighboring Afghanistan, U.S. officials said.
The government of President Islam Karimov, one of the most authoritarian to emerge from the collapse of the Soviet Union, has made a broader strategic decision to move away from the 2002 agreement made with President Bush after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and is cooling relations with Europe as well, the officials said.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=4342
Housing for Storm's Evacuees Lagging Far Behind U.S. Goals
By Eric Lipton and Leslie Eaton / New York Times
WASHINGTON, Sept. 29 - After Hurricane Katrina left hundreds of thousands of people homeless, the Federal Emergency Management Agency signed contracts for more than $2 billion in temporary housing, including more than 120,000 trailers and mobile homes. But the agency has placed just 109 Louisiana families in those homes.
A month after the disaster, the federal government's temporary housing effort is stumbling.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=4336
The Seattle Post Intelligencer
Hurricane Otis strengthens, nears Baja
By IGNACIO MARTINEZ
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
CABO SAN LUCAS, Mexico -- Newly formed Hurricane Otis swept toward a sparsely populated stretch of Baja California on Friday, forcing dozens of people to evacuate low-lying neighborhoods in this western resort city.
Mayor Luis Armando Diaz led a contingent of police officers going door to door and asking residents to leave the outskirts of Cabo San Lucas, where many poor families live in flimsy shacks.
Only a few dozen people had left their homes, but authorities hoped to move out as many as 1,000 by late evening. Five shelters were opened.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/aplatin_story.asp?category=1102&slug=Mexico%20Hurricane%20Otis
Three die in medical helicopter crash
By ELIZABETH M. GILLESPIE
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
SEATTLE -- The pilot and two nurses aboard a medical transport helicopter were killed when the aircraft crashed into Puget Sound north of Seattle on a flight back to its base, authorities said Friday.
Remains of the three people were found Friday in the large debris field left by the Agusta A109/Mark II twin-engine helicopter when it plunged Thursday night into the sound off Edmonds, about eight miles north of here, said Airlift Northwest, the operator of the aircraft. No patient was aboard the helicopter.
The cause of the crash was not immediately known, authorities said.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/aplocal_story.asp?category=6420&slug=WA%20Helicopter%20Crash
Judge gives feds deadline for salmon plan
By BRAD CAIN
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
PORTLAND, Ore. -- A federal judge Friday gave federal agencies one year to come up with a new plan to keep threatened and endangered salmon from getting killed by the government's hydroelectric dams on the Snake and Columbia rivers.
Federal officials had asked for two years. But U.S. District Judge James Redden went along with the one-year timetable sought by environmentalists, Indian tribes and fishermen.
"We're running out of time," the judge said. "This time we're going to do it."
Salmon are dwindling in the Columbia Basin because of the combined effects
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apus_story.asp?category=1110&slug=Salmon%20Dams
Statues of ancient goddesses discovered
By NICHOLAS PAPHITIS
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
ATHENS, Greece -- The life-sized marble statues of two ancient Greek goddesses have emerged during excavations of a 5,000-year-old town on the island of Crete, archaeologists said Friday.
The works, representing the goddesses Athena and Hera, date to between the second and fourth centuries - during the period of Roman rule in Greece - and originally decorated the Roman theater in the town of Gortyn, archaeologist Anna Micheli from the Italian School of Archaeology told The Associated Press.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apscience_story.asp?category=1501&slug=Greece%20Ancient%20Statues
U.S. millionaire prepares for blastoff
By MIKE ECKEL
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
U.S. astronaut William McArthur, center, Russian cosmonaut Valery Tokarev, right, and U.S. space tourist Gregory Olsen, left, wave after a news conference at Baikonur Cosmodrome, Friday, Sept. 30, 2005. The next U.S.-Russian space crew, including U.S. space tourist Gregory Olsen, will blast off to the International Space Station on Saturday, Oct. 1. (AP Photo/Ivan Sekretarev)
BAIKONUR, Kazakhstan -- U.S millionaire scientist Gregory Olsen, the world's third space tourist, bid farewell to his family Friday during final preparations for his flight to the international space station with a Russian-American crew.
The 60-year-old founder of an infrared-camera maker based in Princeton, N.J., reportedly paid $20 million for a seat on the Expedition 12 flight.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apscience_story.asp?category=1501&slug=Russia%20Space
Ranchers still waiting for disaster cash
By MARY CLARE JALONICK
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
WASHINGTON -- Livestock producers around the country are still waiting for agricultural disaster payments Congress approved a year ago to help them deal with an ongoing drought.
Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., and other senators are pressuring the Department of Agriculture to distribute money that Congress appropriated in an October 2004 spending bill. Baucus, who met with Deputy Agriculture Secretary Chuck Conner Friday to discuss the issue, said that only 13 percent of the checks have been distributed to qualified producers.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apus_story.asp?category=1110&slug=Livestock%20Drought
Ky. governor'ss ex-chief of staff charged
By MARK R. CHELLGREN
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
FRANKFORT, Ky. -- A special grand jury examining alleged political hiring by Gov. Ernie Fletcher's administration on Friday indicted his former chief of staff and a representative of his local outreach office.
Daniel Groves, who resigned as chief of staff in the past month, and Vince Fields were each charged with three counts of violating state personnel laws to fill state jobs with Republicans.
The grand jury previously charged nine current and former members of Fletcher's administration, including high-ranking officials and the chairman of the state Republican Party.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apus_story.asp?category=1110&slug=Kentucky%20Politics
American accused in Afghan worker's death
By MATTHEW PENNINGTON
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
KABUL, Afghanistan -- Guards for a U.S. security firm obstructed an investigation into whether one of its supervisors fatally shot his Afghan interpreter, an Afghan police chief said Friday.
Noor Ahmad, 37, was shot in the head Tuesday at the compound of his employer, U.S. Protection and Investigations, at Tut village in Farah province's Gulistan district, police and provincial officials said.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apasia_story.asp?category=1104&slug=Afghan%20Shooting
U.S. views on North Korea prevail at U.N.
By GEORGE JAHN
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
VIENNA, Austria -- The U.N. atomic watchdog agency took North Korea to task Friday for breaching the nuclear arms control treaty but welcomed its pledge to give up atomic weapons in a resolution that highlights U.S. priorities for future talks with Pyongyang.
China refrained from co-sponsoring the text in a reflection of its displeasure with a text focusing on Washington's priorities. Still, diplomats noted that the resolution was submitted to the 139-nation International Atomic Energy Agency's General Assembly only after Beijing indirectly signed off on it.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apasia_story.asp?category=1104&slug=Nuclear%20Agency%20NKorea
North Korean workers speak about nukes
By BURT HERMAN
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
DIAMOND MOUNTAIN, North Korea -- Parroting the official stance of their government, North Korean workers at this tourist resort insist their country should not give up its nuclear weapons until after it gets something from the United States.
The comments this week by North Korean workers at the Diamond Mountain tourist enclave, which South Koreans and foreigners can freely visit, embody the wide gap in perspective that remains between the North and the United States despite a breakthrough Sept. 19 agreement at six-nation arms talks in Beijing.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apasia_story.asp?category=1104&slug=NKorea%20Nuclear
Bush is imposing other religions on Saudi Arabia? What? Where does he get the nerve? That is not the USA. It's a sovereign nation. This is an outrage. Bush imposes religious standards but not child labor laws or environmental standards. Oh, my God.
Bush delays action against Saudi Arabia
By BARRY SCHWEID
AP DIPLOMATIC WRITER
WASHINGTON -- The Bush administration has postponed punishing Saudi Arabia for restricting religious freedom, giving the U.S. ally six more months to show it has made progress in its treatment of religious minorities.
One year ago, the State Department declared that religious freedom was absent in the Arab kingdom. Under U.S. law, the Bush administration could have imposed sanctions such as trade restrictions - as it has done with some other countries.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Religious%20Freedom
Poll: Most New Yorkers would back Hillary
By MARC HUMBERT
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
ALBANY, N.Y. -- Over half of New York voters say they definitely will vote to re-elect Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton next year, and she holds big leads over all her potential Republican rivals, according to statewide poll released Friday.
The Marist College Institute for Public Opinion poll also found that a narrow majority of the state's voters do not want the former first lady to run for president in 2008.
The poll found 52 percent of registered voters said they would definitely vote to re-elect Clinton, while 32 percent said they would definitely vote against her.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apelection_story.asp?category=1132&slug=New%20York%20Senate
Mayor: NYC has flawed security structure
By SARA KUGLER
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
NEW YORK -- Mayor Michael Bloomberg wants the New York Police Department to take control of the city's bridges, tunnels and airports during disasters, saying Thursday the current multi-agency command structure is "backward."
Bloomberg said the NYPD is "the agency generally recognized as the most sophisticated counterterrorism force in the world," and should be calling the shots if a catastrophe strikes any of those targets.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apelection_story.asp?category=1135&slug=Mayor%27s%20Race%20Security
Russian ammo dump fire prompts evacuation
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
MOSCOW -- A fire at a navy ammunition depot caused artillery shells to explode, forcing the evacuation of thousands in a remote eastern region Saturday, officials said.
Some 4,000 residents from five towns in the region of Kamchatka had to leave their homes, news agencies reported, quoting the local Emergency Situations Ministry.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apeurope_story.asp?category=1103&slug=Russia%20Ammo%20Fire
Rwandan pleads innocent to genocide charge
By SUKHDEV CHHATBAR
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
Rwanda genocide accused, Joseph Serugendo, right, talks to his lawyer Charles .Maruma, centre, and Consta Hometow, a court official, left, on Friday Sept. 30, 2005, before he pleaded innocent at the UN Court in Arusha,Tanzania. Joseph Serugendo, who was arrested in Libreville, Gabon on Sept. 16, who according to Prosecutor William Egbe was a key leader of the Interahamwe militia, an extremist Hutu force that led the genocide. No date has been set for Serugendo's trial.(AP Photo/ Sukhdev Chattbar)
ARUSHA, Tanzania -- A former technical director at a radio station that promoted Rwanda's 1994 genocide pleaded innocent Friday to five counts of genocide and crimes against humanity at the U.N. tribunal trying accused masterminds of the 100-day slaughter.
Joseph Serugendo, who was arrested in Libreville, Gabon, on Sept. 16, was also a leader of the Interahamwe militia, an extremist Hutu force that led the genocide, prosecutor William Egbe said.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apafrica_story.asp?category=1105&slug=Rwanda%20UN%20Tribunal
U.S. insists no plans to invade Venezuela
By CHRISTOPHER TOOTHAKER
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
CARACAS, Venezuela -- The United States is not planning to invade Venezuela, the U.S. ambassador to Venezuela said Thursday, disputing claims by President Hugo Chavez.
Chavez has said his government has documents showing Washington has a "Plan Balboa" to invade his oil-producing countrywide with aircraft carriers and planes. He said Venezuela is preparing to repel any attack.
"No 'Plan Balboa' exists," Ambassador William Brownfield said.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/aplatin_story.asp?category=1102&slug=Venezuela%20US
Eight dead, 12 missing in Amazon shipwreck
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
A passenger boat arrives with survivors of a shipwreck on the Amazon River to Itacoatiara, in the Brazilian Amazon, on Friday, Sept. 30, 2005. An Amazon River passenger ship crashed into two barges and sank, leaving at least eight people dead and a dozen missing, Brazilian authorities said Friday. (AP Photo/Chico Batata, Diario do Amazonas)
SAO PAULO, Brazil -- An Amazon River passenger ship crashed into two barges and sank, leaving at least eight people dead and a dozen missing, Brazilian authorities said Friday.
The wooden ship was traveling on a remote stretch of the Amazon late Thursday night when it collided with the barges carrying commercial trucks, said Capt. Edlander Santos of the Brazilian navy. The ship was en route to the jungle city of Manaus, 1,700 miles northwest of Sao Paulo.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/aplatin_story.asp?category=1102&slug=Brazil%20Amazon%20Shipwreck
continued …
“Okeydoke”
History
1791 Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart conducts the premiere of his singspeil The Magic Flute, just over two months before his death.
1921 Outfielder Babe Ruth of the New York Yankees hits his 60th home run of the season, breaking his own record and setting a mark that would last until 1961.
1946 Following World War II, the International Military Tribunal in Nürnberg, Germany, sentences 11 leaders of Nazi Germany, including Field Marshal Hermann Göring, to death for crimes during the war.
1949 The Berlin airlift, caused by the Soviet blockade of overland traffic to West Berlin, ends after more than 277,000 flights from Western nations, which supplied the city with food and fuel for nearly 11 months.
1955 Actor James Dean dies at the age of 24 in an automobile accident in California, having starred in only three motion pictures.
1972 Pittsburgh Pirates outfielder Roberto Clemente collects the 3,000th and final hit of his career, three months before dying in a plane crash while on an earthquake relief mission.
Missing in Action
1965 CHESNUTT CHAMBLESS M. LITTLE ROCK AR PROB DEAD REMAINS RECOVERED 03/20/85
1965 CHWAN MICHAEL DANIEL BAYONE NJ PROB DEAD REMAINS RECOVERED 03/20/85
1965 KILLIAN MELVIN JOSEPH COUNCIL BLUFFS IA PROB DEAD REMAINS RECOVERED 03/20/85
1968 FIESZEL CLIFFORD W. LUBBOCK TX
1968 SMITH HOWARD H. OKLAHOMA CITY OK
1968 SPINELLI DOMENICK A. OAK HARBOR WA LISTED ON THE WALL AS OHIO
1968 VAN RENSELAAR LARRY J. LAS VEGAS NV COMPLETE REMAINS RETURNED 1989 FAMILY ACCEPTS 7/90
1971 BOND RONALD L. HADDONFIELD NJ
1971 DONOVAN MICHAEL L. NORTON KS
The Sydney Morning Herald
Climate change warning - this time it's personal
By Wendy Frew Environment Reporter
October 1, 2005
Eastern suburbs residents will be the first to be warned of how climate change threatens every aspect of their lives in what could be the largest environment campaign in decades.
In a project they hope to take nationwide at a cost of up to $2 million a year, Australia's main environment groups will next week start door-knocking in Sydney's east to talk about what predicted climate changes could mean for beaches and parks, health and hip pockets.
Supported by Greenpeace, WWF Australia, Climate Action Network Australia, the Nature Conservation Council of NSW and Environment Victoria, the Power to Change campaign will also include mail drops, street stalls and public meetings.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/climate-change-warning--this-time-its-personal/2005/09/30/1127804662703.html
Michael Moore Today
DeLay Faces Tough Road Back to Top
Indictment, Ethics Questions, Abramoff Case Are Obstacles
By Dan Balz / Washington Post
For the first time in more than a decade, Rep. Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) arrived at work yesterday without a leadership title attached to his name. Sidelined from his post as majority leader by a criminal indictment in Texas, the man who accumulated extraordinary power on his way up the ladder faces a difficult and uncertain road back to those heights.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=4332
SEC Opens Full Probe Into Frist Stock Sale
By Jonathan M. Katz / Associated Press
WASHINGTON - While insiders at HCA Inc. (HCA) were selling millions of dollars of their own stock this year, they were also painting a sunny picture of the company's outlook for investors. Federal prosecutors and the Securities and Exchange Commission are investigating the sale of HCA stock by Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., whose family founded the company that grew into the nation's largest for-profit health care chain.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=4322
Condoleezza Rice: Civil Rights Struggle Didn't Affect Me
Associated Press
WASHINGTON - Most people who were alive at the time would tell you they had a lot of feelings during the civil rights era. But not Condoleezza Rice.
The secretary of state said she was too young and too busy to feel much of an effect from the massive social changes during the 1960s. Rice said she was only 12 or 13 and that all she did "was play the piano and ice skate."
Rice said because of that, she didn't focus much on what she now calls "the counterculture."
Rice didn't give up a whole lot during the interview with Fox News Channel. Asked if she ever did drugs -- Rice didn't answer, urging her interviewer to go back to questions about foreign policy.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=4341
Pentagon still not reimbursing troops who buy own body armor
By Lolita C. Baldor / Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Nearly a year after Congress demanded action, the Pentagon still hasn't figured out a way to reimburse U.S. troops for body armor and equipment they purchased to better protect themselves while serving in Iraq.
For Marine Sgt. Todd Bowers that extra equipment — a high-tech rifle scope bought by his father for $600 and a $100 pair of goggles — turned out to be a life-or-death purchase. And he has never been reimbursed.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=4340
A Look at U.S. Military Deaths in Iraq
By The Associated Press Thu Sep 29, 8:23 PM ET
As of Thursday, Sept. 29, 2005, at least 1,933 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the
Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count. At least 1,499 died as a result of hostile action, according to the military's numbers. The figures include five military civilians.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/iraq_us_deaths
HUD chief foresees a 'whiter' Big Easy
By Brian DeBose / Washington Times
A Bush Cabinet officer predicted this week that New Orleans likely will never again be a majority black city, and several black officials are outraged.
Alphonso R. Jackson, secretary of housing and urban development, during a visit with hurricane victims in Houston, said New Orleans would not reach its pre-Katrina population of "500,000 people for a long time," and "it's not going to be as black as it was for a long time, if ever again."
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=4349
Ex-secretary asked to apologize for linking crime, blacks
WASHINGTON (AP) - The White House on Friday criticized former Education Secretary William Bennett for remarks linking the crime rate and the abortion of black babies.
"The president believes the comments were not appropriate," White House press secretary Scott McClellan said.
Bennett, on his radio show, Morning in America, was answering a caller's question when he took issue with the hypothesis put forth in a recent book that one reason crime is down is that abortion is up.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=4348
Others deny DeLay didn't get chance to tell his side
By Janet Elliott / Associated Press
AUSTIN - The day after U.S. Rep. Tom DeLay's grand jury indictment, his lawyer and the jury foreman on Thursday appeared to contradict the Texas politician's assertions that he was not given a chance to speak before the jury.
The foreman, William M. Gibson Jr., a retired state insurance investigator, said the Travis County grand jury waited until Wednesday, the final day of its term, to indict him because it was hoping he would accept jurors' invitation to testify.
DeLay said in interviews that the grand jury never asked him to testify.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=4347
Uzbeks Stop Working With U.S. Against Terrorism
By Robin Wright / Washington Post
After cutting off U.S. access to a key military base, Uzbekistan has also quietly terminated cooperation with Washington on counterterrorism, a move that could affect both countries' ability to deal with al Qaeda and its allies in Central Asia and neighboring Afghanistan, U.S. officials said.
The government of President Islam Karimov, one of the most authoritarian to emerge from the collapse of the Soviet Union, has made a broader strategic decision to move away from the 2002 agreement made with President Bush after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and is cooling relations with Europe as well, the officials said.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=4342
Housing for Storm's Evacuees Lagging Far Behind U.S. Goals
By Eric Lipton and Leslie Eaton / New York Times
WASHINGTON, Sept. 29 - After Hurricane Katrina left hundreds of thousands of people homeless, the Federal Emergency Management Agency signed contracts for more than $2 billion in temporary housing, including more than 120,000 trailers and mobile homes. But the agency has placed just 109 Louisiana families in those homes.
A month after the disaster, the federal government's temporary housing effort is stumbling.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=4336
The Seattle Post Intelligencer
Hurricane Otis strengthens, nears Baja
By IGNACIO MARTINEZ
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
CABO SAN LUCAS, Mexico -- Newly formed Hurricane Otis swept toward a sparsely populated stretch of Baja California on Friday, forcing dozens of people to evacuate low-lying neighborhoods in this western resort city.
Mayor Luis Armando Diaz led a contingent of police officers going door to door and asking residents to leave the outskirts of Cabo San Lucas, where many poor families live in flimsy shacks.
Only a few dozen people had left their homes, but authorities hoped to move out as many as 1,000 by late evening. Five shelters were opened.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/aplatin_story.asp?category=1102&slug=Mexico%20Hurricane%20Otis
Three die in medical helicopter crash
By ELIZABETH M. GILLESPIE
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
SEATTLE -- The pilot and two nurses aboard a medical transport helicopter were killed when the aircraft crashed into Puget Sound north of Seattle on a flight back to its base, authorities said Friday.
Remains of the three people were found Friday in the large debris field left by the Agusta A109/Mark II twin-engine helicopter when it plunged Thursday night into the sound off Edmonds, about eight miles north of here, said Airlift Northwest, the operator of the aircraft. No patient was aboard the helicopter.
The cause of the crash was not immediately known, authorities said.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/aplocal_story.asp?category=6420&slug=WA%20Helicopter%20Crash
Judge gives feds deadline for salmon plan
By BRAD CAIN
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
PORTLAND, Ore. -- A federal judge Friday gave federal agencies one year to come up with a new plan to keep threatened and endangered salmon from getting killed by the government's hydroelectric dams on the Snake and Columbia rivers.
Federal officials had asked for two years. But U.S. District Judge James Redden went along with the one-year timetable sought by environmentalists, Indian tribes and fishermen.
"We're running out of time," the judge said. "This time we're going to do it."
Salmon are dwindling in the Columbia Basin because of the combined effects
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apus_story.asp?category=1110&slug=Salmon%20Dams
Statues of ancient goddesses discovered
By NICHOLAS PAPHITIS
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
ATHENS, Greece -- The life-sized marble statues of two ancient Greek goddesses have emerged during excavations of a 5,000-year-old town on the island of Crete, archaeologists said Friday.
The works, representing the goddesses Athena and Hera, date to between the second and fourth centuries - during the period of Roman rule in Greece - and originally decorated the Roman theater in the town of Gortyn, archaeologist Anna Micheli from the Italian School of Archaeology told The Associated Press.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apscience_story.asp?category=1501&slug=Greece%20Ancient%20Statues
U.S. millionaire prepares for blastoff
By MIKE ECKEL
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
U.S. astronaut William McArthur, center, Russian cosmonaut Valery Tokarev, right, and U.S. space tourist Gregory Olsen, left, wave after a news conference at Baikonur Cosmodrome, Friday, Sept. 30, 2005. The next U.S.-Russian space crew, including U.S. space tourist Gregory Olsen, will blast off to the International Space Station on Saturday, Oct. 1. (AP Photo/Ivan Sekretarev)
BAIKONUR, Kazakhstan -- U.S millionaire scientist Gregory Olsen, the world's third space tourist, bid farewell to his family Friday during final preparations for his flight to the international space station with a Russian-American crew.
The 60-year-old founder of an infrared-camera maker based in Princeton, N.J., reportedly paid $20 million for a seat on the Expedition 12 flight.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apscience_story.asp?category=1501&slug=Russia%20Space
Ranchers still waiting for disaster cash
By MARY CLARE JALONICK
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
WASHINGTON -- Livestock producers around the country are still waiting for agricultural disaster payments Congress approved a year ago to help them deal with an ongoing drought.
Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., and other senators are pressuring the Department of Agriculture to distribute money that Congress appropriated in an October 2004 spending bill. Baucus, who met with Deputy Agriculture Secretary Chuck Conner Friday to discuss the issue, said that only 13 percent of the checks have been distributed to qualified producers.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apus_story.asp?category=1110&slug=Livestock%20Drought
Ky. governor'ss ex-chief of staff charged
By MARK R. CHELLGREN
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
FRANKFORT, Ky. -- A special grand jury examining alleged political hiring by Gov. Ernie Fletcher's administration on Friday indicted his former chief of staff and a representative of his local outreach office.
Daniel Groves, who resigned as chief of staff in the past month, and Vince Fields were each charged with three counts of violating state personnel laws to fill state jobs with Republicans.
The grand jury previously charged nine current and former members of Fletcher's administration, including high-ranking officials and the chairman of the state Republican Party.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apus_story.asp?category=1110&slug=Kentucky%20Politics
American accused in Afghan worker's death
By MATTHEW PENNINGTON
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
KABUL, Afghanistan -- Guards for a U.S. security firm obstructed an investigation into whether one of its supervisors fatally shot his Afghan interpreter, an Afghan police chief said Friday.
Noor Ahmad, 37, was shot in the head Tuesday at the compound of his employer, U.S. Protection and Investigations, at Tut village in Farah province's Gulistan district, police and provincial officials said.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apasia_story.asp?category=1104&slug=Afghan%20Shooting
U.S. views on North Korea prevail at U.N.
By GEORGE JAHN
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
VIENNA, Austria -- The U.N. atomic watchdog agency took North Korea to task Friday for breaching the nuclear arms control treaty but welcomed its pledge to give up atomic weapons in a resolution that highlights U.S. priorities for future talks with Pyongyang.
China refrained from co-sponsoring the text in a reflection of its displeasure with a text focusing on Washington's priorities. Still, diplomats noted that the resolution was submitted to the 139-nation International Atomic Energy Agency's General Assembly only after Beijing indirectly signed off on it.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apasia_story.asp?category=1104&slug=Nuclear%20Agency%20NKorea
North Korean workers speak about nukes
By BURT HERMAN
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
DIAMOND MOUNTAIN, North Korea -- Parroting the official stance of their government, North Korean workers at this tourist resort insist their country should not give up its nuclear weapons until after it gets something from the United States.
The comments this week by North Korean workers at the Diamond Mountain tourist enclave, which South Koreans and foreigners can freely visit, embody the wide gap in perspective that remains between the North and the United States despite a breakthrough Sept. 19 agreement at six-nation arms talks in Beijing.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apasia_story.asp?category=1104&slug=NKorea%20Nuclear
Bush is imposing other religions on Saudi Arabia? What? Where does he get the nerve? That is not the USA. It's a sovereign nation. This is an outrage. Bush imposes religious standards but not child labor laws or environmental standards. Oh, my God.
Bush delays action against Saudi Arabia
By BARRY SCHWEID
AP DIPLOMATIC WRITER
WASHINGTON -- The Bush administration has postponed punishing Saudi Arabia for restricting religious freedom, giving the U.S. ally six more months to show it has made progress in its treatment of religious minorities.
One year ago, the State Department declared that religious freedom was absent in the Arab kingdom. Under U.S. law, the Bush administration could have imposed sanctions such as trade restrictions - as it has done with some other countries.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apmideast_story.asp?category=1107&slug=Religious%20Freedom
Poll: Most New Yorkers would back Hillary
By MARC HUMBERT
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
ALBANY, N.Y. -- Over half of New York voters say they definitely will vote to re-elect Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton next year, and she holds big leads over all her potential Republican rivals, according to statewide poll released Friday.
The Marist College Institute for Public Opinion poll also found that a narrow majority of the state's voters do not want the former first lady to run for president in 2008.
The poll found 52 percent of registered voters said they would definitely vote to re-elect Clinton, while 32 percent said they would definitely vote against her.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apelection_story.asp?category=1132&slug=New%20York%20Senate
Mayor: NYC has flawed security structure
By SARA KUGLER
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
NEW YORK -- Mayor Michael Bloomberg wants the New York Police Department to take control of the city's bridges, tunnels and airports during disasters, saying Thursday the current multi-agency command structure is "backward."
Bloomberg said the NYPD is "the agency generally recognized as the most sophisticated counterterrorism force in the world," and should be calling the shots if a catastrophe strikes any of those targets.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apelection_story.asp?category=1135&slug=Mayor%27s%20Race%20Security
Russian ammo dump fire prompts evacuation
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
MOSCOW -- A fire at a navy ammunition depot caused artillery shells to explode, forcing the evacuation of thousands in a remote eastern region Saturday, officials said.
Some 4,000 residents from five towns in the region of Kamchatka had to leave their homes, news agencies reported, quoting the local Emergency Situations Ministry.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apeurope_story.asp?category=1103&slug=Russia%20Ammo%20Fire
Rwandan pleads innocent to genocide charge
By SUKHDEV CHHATBAR
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
Rwanda genocide accused, Joseph Serugendo, right, talks to his lawyer Charles .Maruma, centre, and Consta Hometow, a court official, left, on Friday Sept. 30, 2005, before he pleaded innocent at the UN Court in Arusha,Tanzania. Joseph Serugendo, who was arrested in Libreville, Gabon on Sept. 16, who according to Prosecutor William Egbe was a key leader of the Interahamwe militia, an extremist Hutu force that led the genocide. No date has been set for Serugendo's trial.(AP Photo/ Sukhdev Chattbar)
ARUSHA, Tanzania -- A former technical director at a radio station that promoted Rwanda's 1994 genocide pleaded innocent Friday to five counts of genocide and crimes against humanity at the U.N. tribunal trying accused masterminds of the 100-day slaughter.
Joseph Serugendo, who was arrested in Libreville, Gabon, on Sept. 16, was also a leader of the Interahamwe militia, an extremist Hutu force that led the genocide, prosecutor William Egbe said.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apafrica_story.asp?category=1105&slug=Rwanda%20UN%20Tribunal
U.S. insists no plans to invade Venezuela
By CHRISTOPHER TOOTHAKER
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
CARACAS, Venezuela -- The United States is not planning to invade Venezuela, the U.S. ambassador to Venezuela said Thursday, disputing claims by President Hugo Chavez.
Chavez has said his government has documents showing Washington has a "Plan Balboa" to invade his oil-producing countrywide with aircraft carriers and planes. He said Venezuela is preparing to repel any attack.
"No 'Plan Balboa' exists," Ambassador William Brownfield said.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/aplatin_story.asp?category=1102&slug=Venezuela%20US
Eight dead, 12 missing in Amazon shipwreck
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
A passenger boat arrives with survivors of a shipwreck on the Amazon River to Itacoatiara, in the Brazilian Amazon, on Friday, Sept. 30, 2005. An Amazon River passenger ship crashed into two barges and sank, leaving at least eight people dead and a dozen missing, Brazilian authorities said Friday. (AP Photo/Chico Batata, Diario do Amazonas)
SAO PAULO, Brazil -- An Amazon River passenger ship crashed into two barges and sank, leaving at least eight people dead and a dozen missing, Brazilian authorities said Friday.
The wooden ship was traveling on a remote stretch of the Amazon late Thursday night when it collided with the barges carrying commercial trucks, said Capt. Edlander Santos of the Brazilian navy. The ship was en route to the jungle city of Manaus, 1,700 miles northwest of Sao Paulo.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/aplatin_story.asp?category=1102&slug=Brazil%20Amazon%20Shipwreck
continued …
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