Jailed Journalists
CUBA:
PRINT PAGE
IFEX MEMBERS DEMAND FREEDOM FOR JAILED JOURNALISTS
Two years after the Cuban government launched a crackdown on freedom of expression by arresting dozens of dissidents and journalists, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), Reporters Without Borders (Reporters sans frontières, RSF), Human Rights Watch and the Inter American Press Association (IAPA) are focusing attention on the plight of more than 20 journalists who remain behind bars.
http://www.ifex.org/en/content/view/full/65535/
President pardons jailed editor
Country/Topic: YemenDate: 23 March 2005Source: Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) Person(s): Abdelkarim al-KhaiwaniTarget(s): editor(s) , newspaper(s) Type(s) of violation(s): charged , imprisoned , suspended Urgency: Bulletin
(CPJ/IFEX) - The following is a CPJ press release:
Yemen: President Pardons Jailed Editor
New York, March 23, 2005 - The Committee to Protect Journalists welcomes today's presidential pardon of a Yemeni editor who was jailed for nearly seven months for publishing opinion articles that strongly criticized the government.
http://www.ifex.org/en/content/view/full/65532/
Yemen: President pardons jailed editor
New York, March 23, 2005—The Committee to Protect Journalists welcomes today's presidential pardon of a Yemeni editor who was jailed for nearly seven months for publishing opinion articles that strongly criticized the government.
http://www.cpj.org/news/2005/Yemen23mar05na.html
The Belfast Telegraph
Murder victim's sisters say no to election
By Chris Thornton
24 March 2005
A sister of Robert McCartney said today that the murdered man's family has ruled out running in the upcoming local and Westminster elections.
Paula McCartney, who had considered running for Belfast City Council to highlight the cover-up of her brother's murder, said the family has decided that the election could distract from their campaign.
http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/story.jsp?story=623313
Cheney defends UN choice of Bolton
By Rupert Cornwell
24 March 2005
Dick Cheney, America's Vice-President has made clear what has been almost universally suspected - that President George Bush's recent diplomatic appointments are intended to push his agenda of promoting freedom and democracy around the world.
In an interview yesterday with the Washington Post, Mr Cheney said the choice of John Bolton as US ambassador to the United Nations was intended to shake up the world body. The fact that Mr Bolton, a neoconservative arch hawk, had strongly criticised the UN in the past would give him "a great deal more credibility" there, said Mr Cheney.
(WHAT'S THE MATTER DICK losing a grip on Halliburton, Iraq?)
The US was host country of, and the biggest contributor to, the UN, whose long-term success "depends, I think, on the continued support of the US and the American people". A lot needed to be done at the UN, Mr Cheney added. "A great many Americans" were unhappy with its performance.
http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/story.jsp?story=623181
Natural gas in pipeline for more ulster towns after move on licences
By Robin Morton, Business Correspondent
rmorton@belfasttelegraph.co.uk
24 March 2005
The prospect of natural gas being supplied to towns beyond the greater Belfast area moved a step closer today.
Ofreg announced that it was granting towns gas licences to Bord Gais Eireann (Northern Ireland).
http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/business/story.jsp?story=623258
Oracle in major Belfast move
By Paul Dykes
newsdesk@belfasttelegraph.co.uk
23 March 2005
Oracle, one of the biggest enterprise software companies in the world, is setting up a customer services operation in Belfast.
The £1.1m investment by Oracle Corporation will provide services to its customers in the UK and Republic of Ireland.
Invest Northern Ireland is providing £250,000 in support of the investment.
http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/business/story.jsp?story=622903
Ulster farmers' fury over OFT report
By Michael Drake
mdrake@belfasttelegraph.co.uk
23 March 2005
Northern Ireland farmers expressed anger today over an Office of Fair Trading report which has found supermarkets treat their suppliers fairly.
Ulster Farmers Union deputy president Kenneth Sharkey said the OFT had missed an opportunity to create a fairer trading environment between supermarkets and their suppliers.
http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/business/story.jsp?story=622902
Warning of £12bn tax hike after election
By Paul Dykes
bustel@belfasttelegraph.co.uk
23 March 2005
A leading firm of international business advisers has identified a potential £12bn post-election tax hike that will hit Northern Ireland.
PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) has studied the small print in last week's Budget, and is warning that tax increases of £8bn to £12bn could be required to balance the books.
PwC calculates that the March 16 Budget raised about £265m for the Government, in contrast to the pre-election Budget of 2001 in which Gordon Brown managed to find about £3.6bn in pre-election sweeteners
http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/business/story.jsp?story=622901
Michael Moore Today
Gun Violence in Iraq,
Gun Violence Here at Home
http://www.michaelmoore.com/
Details Emerge About School Shooting in Minnesota
Monica Davey and Christine Hauser / New York Times
RED LAKE, Minn., March 22 -Sixteen-year old Jeff Weise wore a bulletproof vest and a police holster when he opened fire on students taking cover in a classroom and gunned down others who were fleeing in corridors during a 10-minute shooting spree at an Indian reservation school on Monday, the authorities said today.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=1915
After Signing Schiavo Law, Bush Says 'It Is Wisest to Always Err on the Side of Life'
By Anne E. Kornblut / New York Times
TUCSON, March 21 - After a private bill-signing ceremony in the middle of the night, President Bush made a public case for helping Terri Schiavo on Monday, praising Congress for sending him the legislation that allowed federal courts to intervene.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=1916
March 22nd, 2005 9:29 pm
UA Young Democrat banned from forum
Arizona Daily Wildcat
A UA student was banned from attending President Bush's Social Security forum at the Tucson Convention Center yesterday.
UA Young Democrat Steven Gerner, a political science and pre-pharmacy sophomore, said he and three other Young Democrats had been waiting in line with their tickets for about 40 minutes when a staff member approached him and asked to read his T-shirt.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=1918
Huddled masses reach 10 million.
Study: Undocumented population tops 10 million
http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/03/21/undocumented.immigrants.ap/index.html
Republicans See Issue As Way To Do Right, Stoke Electoral Base
By KEITH EPSTEIN and WILLIAM MARCH wmarch@tampatrib.com
Published: Mar 22, 2005
WASHINGTON - The urgency in Washington last weekend wasn't just about Terri Schiavo. It also was about politics.
As hundreds of congressmen and President Bush cut short vacations to intervene, they also hoped to broaden the party's hold on power.
Republicans acknowledged the goal of using the Schiavo case as ammunition against Democrats, particularly Florida Sen. Bill Nelson.
http://news.tbo.com/news/MGBV50RML6E.html
In Texas, Critics Question Bush's 'Life' Culture
By REUTERS
Published: March 22, 2005
Filed at 6:32 p.m. ET
HOUSTON (Reuters) - President Bush's intervention for Terry Schiavo has opened old wounds in Texas where death penalty opponents say his words of support for a ``culture of life'' ring hollow after so many executions during his time as governor of the state.
Bush said he stepped into the Schiavo case because the United States should have ``a presumption in favor of life,'' but there were 152 executions in Texas during his administration, including some in which the convict's guilt was in doubt, critics said.
``It's hypocrisy at a thousand levels,'' said University of Houston law professor and death penalty defense attorney David Dow.
``I saw many, many cases where there was substantial doubt about whether someone was guilty or whether the death penalty was the appropriate sentence, but he never said anything,'' said David Atwood, head of the Texas Coalition Against the Death Penalty. ``I really can't say he cares about life.''
``We all recognize there is a difference between an innocent person and someone who has committed a heinous crime, but to say one life is important and one isn't, that's politics,'' Atwood said.
Bush has defended the high number of executions by saying he was confident everyone put to death in Texas was guilty because they had had a fair hearing in the courts he believed capital punishment was a deterrent to crime.
He interrupted a Texas vacation and flew to Washington to sign an emergency law passed by Congress on Monday that forced a review of the Schiavo case in federal court.
Schiavo, 41, has been in a vegetative state since a heart attack in 1990. Last week, a Florida court, at her husband's request, ordered the removal of the feeding tube keeping her alive, but her parents argued it should stay in place.
``In cases like this one, where there are serious questions and substantial doubts, our society, our laws and our courts should have a presumption in favor of life,'' said Bush, who has spoken often of creating a ``culture of life'' by limiting such things as abortion and stem cell research.
Death penalty opponents said Bush did not give the same presumption to death row inmates in Texas, where he used his power to grant an execution stay only once while governor from 1995 to 2000.
In 2000, the state set a U.S. record with 40 executions, including that of Gary Graham, whose guilt was hotly contested and became an international controversy.
``In the face of pretty substantial evidence that Gary Graham was not a murderer, George Bush didn't say anything about a 'culture of life,''' Dow said.
Legal experts say Bush has not been totally consistent on the ``right-to-die'' issue because in 1999 he signed a Texas law similar to the Florida law under which a judge ordered the removal of Schiavo's feeding tube.
The Texas law allows for life support to be stopped under certain circumstances at the request of a family member or other appropriate surrogate.
``If this case had been in Texas the same thing would have happened as happened in Florida,'' said John Robertson, professor at the University of Texas law school and author of a book on bioethics called ``The Rights of the Critically Ill.''
But, he said, Bush's support of the emergency bill for Schiavo was not ``a direct contradiction'' of the Texas law.
``He's saying he thought it was good enough from the state's perspective at the time, and now he's saying there may be cases that might need a second look,'' he said.
Diane Clemens, head of the Houston-based Justice for All victims' rights group, said death penalty opponents were not making legitimate comparisons.
``This woman is an innocent, brain-damaged individual who has harmed no one. Killers are convicted murderers who have harmed many people. They have had a fair process,'' she said.
``They have had the very process these people would try and deny Schiavo -- and that is a request for life at the federal level, in the federal courts.''
On Monday, White House spokesman Scott McClellan said the president's decision was based on principle, not politics.
``It (Schiavo case) is a complex case, where serious questions and significant doubts have been raised,'' he said. ``And the president is always going to stand on the side of defending life.''
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/politics/politics-rights-schiavo-texas.html
Some consider measure censorship of professors
By Lisa Petrillo / Union-Tribune
SAN MARCOS – Do California's 2 million public college students need Sen. Bill Morrow to protect them from their professors' politics?
That was the debate yesterday at California State University San Marcos, where 300 students gathered to hear Morrow, a Republican state senator from Oceanside, defend his proposed academic "bill of rights" – his second effort to legislate what professors could discuss in their classrooms.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=1940
Rumsfeld Questions Venezuela on Rifles
By John J. Lumpkin / Associated Press
MANAUS, Brazil - Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld on Wednesday criticized Venezuela's reported efforts to purchase 100,000 AK-47 assault rifles from Russia, suggesting that Venezuela's possession of so many weapons would threaten the hemisphere.
Harsh accusations and increasing animosity have marked the relationship between the United States and Venezuela. Venezuela's president, Hugo Chavez, has warned that he will cut off shipments of his country's oil to the United States if the Bush administration supports an attempt to force him from office.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=1936
Monday, March 21st, 2005
Cost of Iraq War
Cost of the War in Iraq:
$158,219,118,491
Compared to the cost of:
PRE-SCHOOL KIDS' HEALTH PUBLIC EDUCATION COLLEGE SCHOLARSHIPS PUBLIC HOUSING WORLD HUNGER AIDS EPIDEMIC WORLD IMMUNIZATION
http://costofwar.com/
http://www.michaelmoore.com/
Critics: Republicans have deserted core principles
By Dick Polman / Knight Ridder
In the beginning, the architects of conservatism proclaimed their antigovernment creed.
Barry Goldwater said in 1964, "I fear Washington and centralized government more than I do Moscow." Ronald Reagan said in 1975, "The basis of conservatism is a desire for less governmental interference, or less centralized authority." And Newt Gingrich vowed in 1994 that a Republican Congress would hasten "the end of government that is too big, too intrusive."
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=1939
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