I bet you expected a rooster. The endangered Southwestern willow flycatcher has built nests at Roosevelt and Horseshoe lakes on the Salt River Project water system.
Wednesday, August 24, 2005
Morning Papers - It's Origins
History
A.D. 79 long-dormant Mount Vesuvius erupted, burying the Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum in volcanic ash. About 20,000 people died.
1572 the slaughter of French Protestants at the hands of Catholics began in Paris.
1759 William Wilberforce, abolitionist
1814 British forces invaded Washington, D.C., setting fire to the Capitol and the White House.
1854 John VanSurley deGrasse, M.D., who received his medical degree
from Bowdoin College in 1849, becomes a member of the
Massachusetts Medical Society, a first for an African American.
1854 - National Emigration Convention meets in Cleveland with one
hundred delegates. William C. Munroe of Michigan is elected
president.
1890 Duke Kahanamoku, swimmer
1896 Leon Theremin, engineer and instrument maker
1922 René Lévesque, Québec premier
1932, Amelia Earhart became the first woman to fly nonstop across the United States, traveling from Los Angeles to Newark, N.J., in just over 19 hours.
1936 A. S. Byatt, novelist and scholar
1937 Moshood Kashimawo Olawale Abiola is born in Abeokuta, Nigeria.
He will a member of a very poor household of Yoruba-speaking
Muslims. He will attend the Islamic Nawar Ud-Deen School and
the Christian-run African Central School. After graduating
from the Baptist Boys' High School, he will work as a bank
clerk and a civil servant. He will go on to win a scholarship
to Glasgow University to study accounting. He will graduate
with several awards in 1965. He will return to Nigeria and
will work for major firms before launching his own company,
Radio Communications of Nigeria, in 1974. He will accumulate
great wealth in a short period of time. His business interests
will span 60 countries and include firms engaged in banking,
shipping, oil prospecting, agriculture, publishing, air
transportation, and entertainment. His Nigerian companies
alone will employ close to 20,000 workers. He will oppose
the Nigerian military dictatorship and on June 12, 1993, will
be elected president in a long awaited presidential election,
only to have the election results nullified by the country's
military leader. When Abiola announces a year later that he
is the country's legitimate leader, he will be imprisoned by
the current dictator, General Sani Abacha. After Abacha joins
the ancestors suddenly in 1998, attempts were made to free
Abiola, but he will also join the ancestors on July 7, 1998,
before his freedom becomes a reality. His death will cause
violence to occur and spur anti-government anger throughout
the country.
1940 Australian-born British pathologist Howard Florey and German-born British biochemist Ernst Chain announce in The Lancet that they have developed penicillin for general clinical use as an antibiotic.
1960 Cal Ripken, Jr., baseball player
1965 Reggie Miller is born. He will become a professional basketball
player and guard for the Indiana Pacers. He will play on the
'Dream Team' in the 1996 Olympics.
1967 Amanda Randolph joins the ancestors at the age of 65. She had
been an actress and was best known for her roles on the Danny
Thomas Show and television's Amos 'n' Andy (Mama).
1968, France became the world's fifth thermonuclear power as it exploded a hydrogen bomb in the South Pacific.
1981, Mark David Chapman was sentenced in New York to 20 years to life in prison for slaying rock star John Lennon.
1987 Bayard Rustin, longtime civil rights activist, early Freedom
Rider, and a key organizer of the 1963 March on Washington, joins
the ancestors in New York City. A Quaker, Rustin was best known
as a civil rights advocate, first as one of the founders of the
Congress for Racial Equality (CORE), then as a key advisor to a
young Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
1989, Baseball Commissioner A. Bartlett Giamatti banned Pete Rose from the game for gambling.
1992, Hurricane Andrew smashed into Florida, causing $20 billion of property damage and killing 41 people.
Missing in Action
1965 BRUNHAVER RICHARD M. YAKIMA WA 02/12/73 RELEASED BY DRV ALIVE IN 1998
1965 DOREMUS ROBERT H. MONTCLAIR NJ 02/12/73 RELEASED BY DRV ALIVE AND WELL 98
1965 FRANKE FRED A. BROOKLYN NY "02/12/73 RELEASED BY DRV (SAN DIEGO, CA)" " ""BILL"" ALIVE AND WELL 98"
1967 ALLARD RICHARD M. CHESANING MI
1967 GOFF KENNETH B. JR. WARWICK RI
1967 HESS JAY C. FARMINGTON UT 03/14/73 RELEASED BY DRV ALIVE AND WELL 98
1967 HOLTZMAN RONALD L. WHITEPOINT VA
1967 SCHELL RICHARD J. MINNEISKA MN
1968 HEEP WILLIAM ARTHUR SAN PEDRO CA
1968 LADEWIG MELVIN E. ENGLEWOOD CO
1968 READ CHARLES H. JR. MIAMI FL
1969 HATCH PAUL G. 08/25/69 ESCAPED
Boston Globe
Lawmakers set Sept. 14 for gay marriage Constitutional Convention
By Glen Johnson, AP Political Writer August 24, 2005
BOSTON --State legislators voted Wednesday to meet next month for a Constitutional Convention aimed at debating for the second time a proposed amendment replacing gay marriage in Massachusetts with Vermont-style civil unions.
Members of the House and Senate have already given initial approval to the amendment, but the state constitution requires them to approve identical language in two successive sessions before the amendment can be put before state voters. That would occur in 2006.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2005/08/24/lawmakers_set_sept_14_for_gay_marriage_constitutional_convention/
Tighter rules planned on light-truck fuel use
Heavier vehicles to remain exempt
By Rick Klein, Globe Staff August 24, 2005
WASHINGTON -- As gas prices hit record levels for the third consecutive week, the Bush administration announced plans yesterday to force automakers to increase the fuel efficiency of most sport-utility vehicles, minivans, and pickups starting in 2008 -- the first overhaul of industry standards in 30 years.
But heavier vehicles like Hummers, big pickups, and full-sized vans will continue to be exempt from the standards, and environmental groups said the new regulations will have little impact on the nation's gas usage because they will encourage companies to produce more gas-guzzlers.
http://www.boston.com/cars/articles/2005/08/24/tighter_rules_planned_on_light_truck_fuel_use/
Strong wind fans Portuguese forest fires
By Axel Bugge August 24, 2005
MIRANDA DO CORVO, Portugal (Reuters) - Portuguese forest fires flared anew on Wednesday, defying hopes that cooler weather would bring relief for one of the country's worst outbreaks of fires in decades.
Higher temperatures and rising winds reignited at least three blazes stretching over 20 km (12 miles) near Miranda do Corvo, a mountain town about 180 km (110 miles) north of the capital Lisbon, local firefighters said.
Nationwide, seven small fires were out of control, the national fire service said. Cooler foggy weather in the morning helped damp some fires, but rising winds later fanned the embers into leaping flames.
http://www.boston.com/news/world/europe/articles/2005/08/24/strong_wind_fans_portuguese_forest_fires/
NIH worker pleads not guilty in threat
By Curt Anderson, Associated Press Writer August 24, 2005
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. --A National Institutes of Health employee pleaded not guilty Wednesday to allegations she made an anthrax threat against a county agency during a tax dispute.
Michelle Ledgister, 43, faces up to five years in prison and a $250,000 fine if convicted under an anti-terrorism law making it a federal crime to falsely threaten someone with anthrax.
Ledgister works at the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases in Bethesda, Md., as a public health program analyst, according to NIH. She does not have access to any dangerous biological agents, spokesman Don Ralbovsky said.
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2005/08/24/nih_worker_pleads_not_guilty_in_threat/
Americans pay more for health insurance - study
August 24, 2005
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. workers who get health insurance coverage through their employers paid an average of 79 percent more in 2003 than they did in 1996, according to a report published on Wednesday.
And employers paid an average of 89 percent more, the U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality found.
The agency's survey of 48,000 U.S. employers also found a steady increase in premiums in more recent years.
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2005/08/24/americans_pay_more_for_health_insurance___study/
Muslim city in Russia readies for birthday
Municipal workers lay turf, with the Qol Sharif mosque in the background, in preparations for 1000th birthday of the city of Kazan of the mainly Muslim region of Tatarstan, located about 700 km (450 miles) east of Moscow, Wednesday, Aug. 24, 2005. (AP Photo)
By Mike Eckel, Associated Press Writer August 24, 2005
KAZAN, Russia --Streets are scrubbed. Buildings are painted. A massive stage in front of the Qol Sharif mosque and beside the mighty Volga awaits thousands of spectators -- including President Vladimir Putin -- and the attention of all the nation.
http://www.boston.com/news/world/europe/articles/2005/08/24/muslim_city_in_russia_readies_for_birthday/
Taiwan withdraws budget for U.S. arms
August 24, 2005
TAIPEI, Taiwan --Taiwan's Cabinet on Wednesday withdrew a special budget for a massive U.S. weapons package, part of a political maneuver aimed at getting the opposition-controlled legislature to pass the long-delayed package.
For more than a year, the opposition Nationalist Party and its allies have used their slim legislative majority to hold up a special $15.3 billion appropriation, saying it will spark an arms race with rival China that would bankrupt Taiwan.
Included in the package are eight diesel-powered submarines, 12 anti-submarine aircraft, and six Patriot missile batteries.
http://www.boston.com/news/world/asia/articles/2005/08/24/taiwan_withdraws_budget_for_us_arms/
London bomber made panicked calls to accomplices-report
August 24, 2005
LONDON (Reuters) - One of the July 7 London bombers made three "panicked" phone calls to his accomplices less than an hour before blowing himself up on a bus after his plans to bomb a train were disrupted, a newspaper reported on Wednesday.
Hasib Hussain, 18, had planned to detonate his rucksack bomb on an underground train, but was forced to change plans because the line he wanted to use was closed, the Evening Standard reported, citing security sources.
http://www.boston.com/news/world/europe/articles/2005/08/24/london_bomber_made_panicked_calls_to_accomplices_report/
Everyday people
August 24, 2005
LISTING SAME-SEX marriages and commitment ceremonies in the traditional ''Weddings" pages of newspapers was controversial when it began a few years ago. But anyone reading about the gay couples in the newspaper cannot help but see how utterly ordinary they are -- or should be.
Wedding announcements often include smiling pictures and mini-biographies: where the couple grew up, their professions and college degrees, sometimes a bit about their parents or where they plan to take their honeymoon. In the past few weeks, The Boston Globe and The New York Times wedding pages have included a handful of gay couples who have had their weddings performed in Massachusetts or Canada, two places where gay marriage is legal. Other than tending to be slightly older than the other couples featured, there is little to distinguish the same-sex announcements from the heterosexual ones. Here is a selection:
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/editorials/articles/2005/08/24/everyday_people/
Unwanted Pregnancy
Kersten's kind of activism
In her attempt to paint Minnesota judges as "engaged in ambitious social-engineering projects," Katherine Kersten made a revealing error in her Aug. 8 column.
She wrote, "In 1995, Minnesota's Supreme Court piled on. In Doe vs. Gomez, the state court forced the Minnesota Legislature to appropriate tax money to pay for abortions for poor women -- something federal courts have never required."
In truth, the Doe decision was based upon the Minnesota Constitution, a document for which federal courts defer to the judgment of Minnesota courts.
Kersten may disagree with the result of the Doe decision, but to criticize it without understanding the court's reasoning (or acknowledging the role of state courts in interpreting state constitutions) reveals an affinity for exactly the same sort of outcome-driven jurisprudence she pretends to criticize.
It seems that Kersten doesn't really object to judicial activism as much as she regrets that the Republican Party has not (yet) successfully funded the election of like-thinking judicial ideologues who will push for the "ambitious social-engineering projects" that she supports.
Michael Skoglund, Minneapolis.
http://www.startribune.com/stories/1519/5553985.html
Women's Excessive Work Load And Subordination
The Independent (Banjul)
August 22, 2005
Posted to the web August 23, 2005
By Fatou Badjie Ceesay
Banjul
In many societies, The Gambia included, women work more hours than men when their reproductive work and productive work are combined.
In The Gambia, women work for 16 to 18 hours a day. According to UNDP (1997): "...across a wide range of cultures and levels of economies development, women tend to specialize in unpaid reproductive or caring labour compared to men who tend to specialize in paid productive activities, and women combined paid and unpaid labour time is greater than men's." Women's reproductive roles involve domestic chores, child bearing and child rearing activities whilst their productive roles involve income-earning activities.
http://allafrica.com/stories/200508230682.html
Taking the plunge, not the pill
A survey by doctors reveals that college girls are sexually active, but unaware of emergency contraceptives
Express News Service
Chandigarh, August 23: Emergency contraceptives or the ‘‘morning after’’ pill for preventing unwanted pregnancy after an unprotected sexual intercourse, is yet to catch up in this highly literate population.
In a survey carried out by Dr Sonia Puri and Dr Anita of the Urban Health Training Centre, Sector 44, under the aegis of Director, GMCH Sector 32, Prof H M Swami, only 7.24 per cent of the college-going girl students in the sample size of 981 had a vague idea about emergency contraceptive pill (ECP) or e-pills.
BrideGroom
18-2526-3031-3536-4546-5099-50
Only 2.24 per cent knew correctly that the pills can be effectively used till 72 hours of the intercourse.
http://cities.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=145289
Study Finds 29-Week Fetuses Probably Feel No Pain and Need No Abortion Anesthesia
By DENISE GRADY
Published: August 24, 2005
Taking on one of the most highly charged questions in the abortion debate, a team of doctors has concluded that fetuses probably cannot feel pain in the first six months of gestation and therefore do not need anesthesia during abortions.
Their report, being published today in The Journal of the American Medical Association, is based on a review of several hundred scientific papers, and it says that nerve connections in the brain are unlikely to have developed enough for the fetus to feel pain before 29 weeks.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/24/health/24fetus.html
Unwanted pregnancy spurs malpractice suit
By Bruce Gerstman
Knight Ridder
A Bay Point woman says Planned Parenthood and the Contra Costa Regional Medical Center are responsible for the costs of raising her child because they failed to keep her from getting pregnant.
In 2004, Planned Parenthood staff examined Kelly Horde, now 33, three times, and medical center staff members examined her once before she learned she was in her fifth month of pregnancy, she said in a complaint filed in Contra Costa Superior Court.
She is suing for an unspecified amount claiming negligence and medical malpractice. Horde is also alleging ``wrongful life'' -- a legal term that usually means a child should not have been born.
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/living/health/12452097.htm
Co-sponsor: Bill shouldn't keep birth control from women
Associated Press
RACINE, Wis. - A co-sponsor of a bill that would protect the jobs of pharmacists who refuse to fill certain prescriptions says he may not support the measure if it would allow women to be denied birth control as critics claim.
State Rep. Robin Vos, a Republican from Caledonia, is the target of a paid advertisement that the family planning agency Planned Parenthood is running on the Web site of The Journal Times of Racine, saying Vos "wants to make it legal for pharmacists to DENY women their birth control pills ...."
http://www.duluthsuperior.com/mld/duluthsuperior/news/politics/12458962.htm
LaToyia & birth control
THE TRAGIC ending to LaToyia Figueroa's life was of her own making.
She already had one daughter by a seemingly decent boyfriend. What caused her to leave this boyfriend and hook up with this Poaches character?
Poaches already had another girl pregnant, and I guess finding out that he would have two mouths to feed, he may have decided to get rid of LaToyia.
If LaToyia wanted to sleep around, why didn't she at least take birth control? She was 24 years old, and, I hope, a little bit smart enough to know that she could get pregnant again if she didn't take the responsibility for herself and use birth control.
LaToyia told Poaches that she didn't believe in abortion. It looks like she didn't believe in birth control either. Maybe if she had prevented this pregnancy, she would have lived to see her daughter grow up.
http://www.philly.com/mld/dailynews/news/opinion/12450972.htm
Daily Reproductive Health Report
In The Courts Convicted Abortion Clinic Bomber Eric Rudolph Sentenced in Atlanta Court to Four Consecutive Life Sentences Plus 120 Years
[Aug 23, 2005]
Convicted abortion clinic bomber Eric Rudolph on Monday in Atlanta was sentenced to four consecutive life sentences plus 120 years and ordered to pay $2.3 million in restitution for three separate Atlanta-area bombings, including one at an abortion clinic, one at a gay bar and one at the 1996 Olympics, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports (Seymour et al., Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 8/23). Rudolph in July in Birmingham, Ala., was sentenced to two consecutive life terms without parole for the 1998 bombing of a Birmingham abortion clinic, which killed a police officer and critically injured a nurse. He also was ordered to pay $1.2 million in restitution to the victims, although the judge acknowledged that Rudolph has no financial resources. As part of a plea deal with Department of Justice officials, Rudolph in April pleaded guilty to the four bombings that killed two people and wounded more than 120 others, saying that he committed the crimes to call attention to the U.S. government's "abominable sanctioning of abortion on demand" and other issues, such as homosexuality. Rudolph, who was captured in North Carolina in May 2003 after a five-year manhunt, had faced a possible death sentence if convicted of the Birmingham bombing (Kaiser Daily Reproductive Health Report, 7/20). Rudolph in court on Monday read a statement apologizing to the victims of the Centennial Olympic Park bombing in Atlanta but did not say anything to the victims of the other bombings. Sixteen bombing victims or family members of victims spoke at the sentencing (Dewan, New York Times, 8/23). Rudolph likely will serve his sentences at a maximum security prison in Florence, Colo., according to U.S. Attorney David Nahmias (Copeland, USA Today, 8/23). Nahmias also said Rudolph focused on antiabortion sentiments in order to draw support and previously had concentrated on other issues (Barry, Los Angeles Times, 8/23).
http://www.kaisernetwork.org/daily_reports/rep_index.cfm?DR_ID=32176
Doctors challenge abortion laws
August 24, 2005
Bloemfontein: The public's right to participate in the law-making process came under scrutiny in the Constitutional Court yesterday in a case that could also be the first challenge to the government's law-making process and which touches on issues relating to the separation of powers.
Lobby group Doctors for Life is arguing that amendments to four health laws were passed without proper participation by the public called for by the constitution.
The Bills in question are: the Choice on Termination of Pregnancy Amendment Bill; the Sterilisation Amendment Bill; the Dental Technicians Amendment Bill; and the Traditional Health Practitioners Bill. Some have already been passed into law.
http://www.themercury.co.za/index.php?fSectionId=283&fArticleId=2848800
Ohio Abortion Business Files Lawsuit Over Health Dept. Investigation
LifeNews.com Editor
August 23, 2005
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- An abortion business in Ohio has filed a lawsuit to stop the state's health department from conducting an investigation to determine whether it is meeting state regulations for surgical centers. The abortion facility calls the health department's desire to review medical records a "fishing expedition."
The Ohio Department of Health is seeking access to records of 224 customers at the Central Ohio Women's Center abortion business. The center is affiliated with Planned Parenthood of Central Ohio, which operates seven abortion facilities, and told the Associated Press it's not aware of any pending lawsuits against it.
http://www.lifenews.com/state1163.html
Pill access could usher a new era of choices, moral rifts
FDA will weigh over-the-counter availability of morning-after contraception
By TODD ACKERMAN
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle
To many women, the morning-after pill is an almost-ideal solution to the possibility of an unwanted pregnancy after unprotected sex — safe, affordable treatment that can be taken at home.
ADVERTISEMENT
Except for one thing: It's not that easy to get it the morning after.
The Food and Drug Administration is about to decide whether to make the morning-after pill available over the counter, a decision that could usher in a new era in the culture wars, revolutionizing the debate about abortion and impacting intimate decisions.
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/nation/3319606
Get his view on abortion
By Thomas Allen
When I heard that in 1990 Judge John G. Roberts signed on to a memo advocating that Roe v. Wade be overruled, I thought of a phone call I received decades ago from a frightened mother. She didn't know where to turn. Her 17-year-old daughter was pregnant, and she knew her son had impregnated her. It was several years before Roe v. Wade. Abortion was illegal in Pennsylvania and around the country. At my hospital, we hadn't even established an abortion committee yet to provide services to women in life-threatening situations.
I arranged to see the young woman at my office, where I examined her and confirmed the pregnancy. Later, at the family's home, I induced an abortion, the first I ever provided.
From the early 1940s until 1973, when Roe v. Wade was decided, I saw the effects of illegal abortion firsthand. Hospital wards were crowded with women with infections and blood loss caused by illegal or self-induced abortions. Many, if they didn't die from gas gangrene or something else, were permanently injured and would never be able to have children.
http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/news/editorial/12434247.htm
Abortion likely to be early test for new justice
Sunday, August 21, 2005
By Bill Cahir
Bill.Cahir@Newhouse.com
WASHINGTON -- People who oppose abortion claim the Supreme Court is divided 6 to 3 in favor of the procedure's legality. They suggest the high court would maintain a woman's right to terminate an unwanted pregnancy no matter who is confirmed to replace retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor.
However, the claim that abortion rights are safe soon will be tested. The high court in its next term will hear at least one -- and possibly two -- cases of pressing concern to Planned Parenthood Federation of America and its allies.
The replacement of O'Connor, who has voted to keep abortion legal, with appeals court Judge John G. Roberts Jr., whose views are not wholly clear, may alter the face of American law.
http://www.nj.com/news/gloucester/local/index.ssf?/base/news-1/1124612173108230.xml&coll=8
The Morning After Pill - Legality vs. Morality
August 21, 2005 08:57 AM EST
The city council of Austin, TX has ruled that as of September, 1, 2005 all Walgreens pharmacies within that city must fill prescriptions for "morning after" emergency contraception pills for women who receive aid from Austin's Medical Assistance Program.
This measure is the result of the refusal by many pharmacists on moral grounds to fill prescriptions for birth control and for the "morning after" pill, which is designed to prevent (or abort) pregnancy caused by recent sexual activity. Walgreens is that city's pharmaceutical contractor.
http://www.theconservativevoice.com/articles/article.html?id=7625
New York Times
9 States in Plan to Cut Emissions by Power Plants
Marilynn K. Yee/The New York Times
Plants like the Ravenswood Power Station in Long Island City would be subject to an accord to cut pollution.
By ANTHONY DePALMA
Published: August 24, 2005
Officials in New York and eight other Northeastern states have come to a preliminary agreement to freeze power plant emissions at their current levels and then reduce them by 10 percent by 2020, according to a confidential draft proposal.
The cooperative action, the first of its kind in the nation, came after the Bush administration decided not to regulate the greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming. Once a final agreement is reached, the legislatures of the nine states will have to enact it, which is considered likely.
Enforcement of emission controls could potentially result in higher energy prices in the nine states, which officials hope can be offset by subsidies and support for the development of new technology that would be paid for with the proceeds from the sale of emission allowances to the utility companies.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/24/nyregion/24air.html
Panel Rejects Pentagon Plan to Close Connecticut Base
By CHRISTINE HAUSER
Published: August 24, 2005
The commission charged with assessing the Pentagon's base-closing plan voted today to keep open key naval facilities in New England, including the Navy submarine base in Groton, Conn., rejecting some elements of the Pentagon proposal to shut, consolidate and realign more than 800 military facilities in all 50 states.
The Navy submarine base in Groton, Conn., is one of the largest military installations in the New England region.
The panel, the Defense Base Closure and Realignment Commission, also voted to close several major army bases, including Fort Monmouth, N.J., and some naval facilities but kept open or realigned others in its first day of deliberations today.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/24/national/23cnd-bases.html?hp
As Israel Leaves Gaza, It Strengthens West Bank Presence
By GREG MYRE
Published: August 24, 2005
JERUSALEM, Aug. 24 - Israeli soldiers worked today to wrap up the military portion of the Gaza Strip withdrawal, and the defense minister said all but a small number of soldiers could be removed from the territory by mid-S
Security forces struggled with a settler who was resisting evacuation from the settlement of Homesh in the last phase of the Israeli pullout.
At the same time, Israeli officials confirmed that the government had issued orders to seize West Bank land to build the separation barrier around the largest Jewish settlement, Maale Adumim, and link it up to nearby Jerusalem.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/24/international/middleeast/24cnd-mideast.html?hp&ex=1124942400&en=9beeec04fe17b4d3&ei=5094&partner=homepage
Insurgents Attack Baghdad Police in Gun Battles on Streets
By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr.
and TERENCE NEILAN
Published: August 24, 2005
BAGHDAD, Iraq, Aug. 24 - Insurgents armed with rocket-propelled grenades, assault rifles and hand grenades roamed the streets of western Baghdad in cars today, attacking police patrols in residential areas, an Interior Ministry official said.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/24/international/middleeast/24cnd-iraq.html?hp&ex=1124942400&en=2afd541f34223acb&ei=5094&partner=homepage
Myanmar Junta Leader Rumored Ousted in Coup
By REUTERS
Published: August 24, 2005
Filed at 4:05 a.m. ET
BANGKOK (Reuters) - Rumors swirled in army-ruled Myanmar and neighboring Thailand on Wednesday that junta strongman Senior General Than Shwe has been removed by the powerful army commander.
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-myanmar.html
The Arab News
Jordan Says Syrian Militants Behind Attack
Abdul Jalil Mustafa & Agencies
AMMAN, 24 August 2005 — Syrian militants linked to Al-Qaeda’s leader in Iraq, Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi, were behind last week’s rocket attack on US warships in the Red Sea port of Aqaba, Jordanian security officials said yesterday. Zarqawi’s Sunni Muslim group claimed responsibility for Friday’s attack, in which the rockets missed their targets, but hit a warehouse and a hospital, killing a Jordanian soldier, and struck the Israeli port of Eilat.
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=4§ion=0&article=68943&d=24&m=8&y=2005
Iraq Bickering Could Lead to Partition: Saud
Samir Al-Saadi, Arab News
JEDDAH, 24 August 2005 — Saudi Arabia said yesterday it hoped Iraq’s draft constitution would guarantee unity and warned that confrontational disputes may lead to the partition of the state along sectarian lines.
“Saudi Arabia... hopes that the constitution will meet the aspirations of the Iraqi people in consecrating national unity and maintaining its Arab and Muslim identity,” said Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al-Faisal during a news conference in Jeddah.
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=1§ion=0&article=68935&d=24&m=8&y=2005
Transparent Sham in Gaza
Fawaz Turki, disinherited@yahoo.com
So the wretched settlers — all 8,500 of them who had occupied 20 percent of Gaza’s choice land to build their colonies on — have pulled out, leaving a desolate landscape of rubble and garbage behind. But whatever you do, hold the celebrations, and think not of what has changed, but what has not. The settlers may have folded their tents, as it were, and headed north — for many, to settle on expropriated Palestinian land in the West Bank — but the military occupation remains very much in place, determining the economic and social future of the strip.
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=7§ion=0&article=68933&d=24&m=8&y=2005
Recruitment Official Denies Wage Discrimination for Maids
Mohammed Rasooldeen, Arab News
RIYADH, 24 August 2005 — The Kingdom determines wages for housemaids by their experience and not by their nationality, a senior official of the Riyadh Chamber of Commerce and Industry said, refuting allegations of discrimination in fixing their salaries.
Waleed Al-Swaidan, chairman of the Saudi Arabian National Recruitment Committee, told Arab News that the wages of female domestic helps are fixed by their proven capabilities and not by any other criteria.
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=1§ion=0&article=68941&d=24&m=8&y=2005
We’ve Nothing to Do With Rising Oil Prices: Sultan
P.K. Abdul Ghafour, Arab News
JEDDAH, 24 August 2005 — Crown Prince Sultan, deputy premier and minister of defense and aviation, yesterday reaffirmed that Saudi Arabia had nothing to do with increasing oil prices in the world market and had done everything possible to lower them.
Prince Sultan also disclosed plans for creating more job opportunities for Saudi women by allowing them to work two shifts.
In a wide-ranging interview with the Kuwaiti newspaper Assyasah, Prince Sultan highlighted Saudi Arabia’s efforts to strengthen the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) by making a number of concessions to the member states. He also noted the efforts of Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah to boost the country’s progress and prosperity by carrying out new welfare projects.
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=1§ion=0&article=68940&d=24&m=8&y=2005
continued …
A.D. 79 long-dormant Mount Vesuvius erupted, burying the Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum in volcanic ash. About 20,000 people died.
1572 the slaughter of French Protestants at the hands of Catholics began in Paris.
1759 William Wilberforce, abolitionist
1814 British forces invaded Washington, D.C., setting fire to the Capitol and the White House.
1854 John VanSurley deGrasse, M.D., who received his medical degree
from Bowdoin College in 1849, becomes a member of the
Massachusetts Medical Society, a first for an African American.
1854 - National Emigration Convention meets in Cleveland with one
hundred delegates. William C. Munroe of Michigan is elected
president.
1890 Duke Kahanamoku, swimmer
1896 Leon Theremin, engineer and instrument maker
1922 René Lévesque, Québec premier
1932, Amelia Earhart became the first woman to fly nonstop across the United States, traveling from Los Angeles to Newark, N.J., in just over 19 hours.
1936 A. S. Byatt, novelist and scholar
1937 Moshood Kashimawo Olawale Abiola is born in Abeokuta, Nigeria.
He will a member of a very poor household of Yoruba-speaking
Muslims. He will attend the Islamic Nawar Ud-Deen School and
the Christian-run African Central School. After graduating
from the Baptist Boys' High School, he will work as a bank
clerk and a civil servant. He will go on to win a scholarship
to Glasgow University to study accounting. He will graduate
with several awards in 1965. He will return to Nigeria and
will work for major firms before launching his own company,
Radio Communications of Nigeria, in 1974. He will accumulate
great wealth in a short period of time. His business interests
will span 60 countries and include firms engaged in banking,
shipping, oil prospecting, agriculture, publishing, air
transportation, and entertainment. His Nigerian companies
alone will employ close to 20,000 workers. He will oppose
the Nigerian military dictatorship and on June 12, 1993, will
be elected president in a long awaited presidential election,
only to have the election results nullified by the country's
military leader. When Abiola announces a year later that he
is the country's legitimate leader, he will be imprisoned by
the current dictator, General Sani Abacha. After Abacha joins
the ancestors suddenly in 1998, attempts were made to free
Abiola, but he will also join the ancestors on July 7, 1998,
before his freedom becomes a reality. His death will cause
violence to occur and spur anti-government anger throughout
the country.
1940 Australian-born British pathologist Howard Florey and German-born British biochemist Ernst Chain announce in The Lancet that they have developed penicillin for general clinical use as an antibiotic.
1960 Cal Ripken, Jr., baseball player
1965 Reggie Miller is born. He will become a professional basketball
player and guard for the Indiana Pacers. He will play on the
'Dream Team' in the 1996 Olympics.
1967 Amanda Randolph joins the ancestors at the age of 65. She had
been an actress and was best known for her roles on the Danny
Thomas Show and television's Amos 'n' Andy (Mama).
1968, France became the world's fifth thermonuclear power as it exploded a hydrogen bomb in the South Pacific.
1981, Mark David Chapman was sentenced in New York to 20 years to life in prison for slaying rock star John Lennon.
1987 Bayard Rustin, longtime civil rights activist, early Freedom
Rider, and a key organizer of the 1963 March on Washington, joins
the ancestors in New York City. A Quaker, Rustin was best known
as a civil rights advocate, first as one of the founders of the
Congress for Racial Equality (CORE), then as a key advisor to a
young Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
1989, Baseball Commissioner A. Bartlett Giamatti banned Pete Rose from the game for gambling.
1992, Hurricane Andrew smashed into Florida, causing $20 billion of property damage and killing 41 people.
Missing in Action
1965 BRUNHAVER RICHARD M. YAKIMA WA 02/12/73 RELEASED BY DRV ALIVE IN 1998
1965 DOREMUS ROBERT H. MONTCLAIR NJ 02/12/73 RELEASED BY DRV ALIVE AND WELL 98
1965 FRANKE FRED A. BROOKLYN NY "02/12/73 RELEASED BY DRV (SAN DIEGO, CA)" " ""BILL"" ALIVE AND WELL 98"
1967 ALLARD RICHARD M. CHESANING MI
1967 GOFF KENNETH B. JR. WARWICK RI
1967 HESS JAY C. FARMINGTON UT 03/14/73 RELEASED BY DRV ALIVE AND WELL 98
1967 HOLTZMAN RONALD L. WHITEPOINT VA
1967 SCHELL RICHARD J. MINNEISKA MN
1968 HEEP WILLIAM ARTHUR SAN PEDRO CA
1968 LADEWIG MELVIN E. ENGLEWOOD CO
1968 READ CHARLES H. JR. MIAMI FL
1969 HATCH PAUL G. 08/25/69 ESCAPED
Boston Globe
Lawmakers set Sept. 14 for gay marriage Constitutional Convention
By Glen Johnson, AP Political Writer August 24, 2005
BOSTON --State legislators voted Wednesday to meet next month for a Constitutional Convention aimed at debating for the second time a proposed amendment replacing gay marriage in Massachusetts with Vermont-style civil unions.
Members of the House and Senate have already given initial approval to the amendment, but the state constitution requires them to approve identical language in two successive sessions before the amendment can be put before state voters. That would occur in 2006.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2005/08/24/lawmakers_set_sept_14_for_gay_marriage_constitutional_convention/
Tighter rules planned on light-truck fuel use
Heavier vehicles to remain exempt
By Rick Klein, Globe Staff August 24, 2005
WASHINGTON -- As gas prices hit record levels for the third consecutive week, the Bush administration announced plans yesterday to force automakers to increase the fuel efficiency of most sport-utility vehicles, minivans, and pickups starting in 2008 -- the first overhaul of industry standards in 30 years.
But heavier vehicles like Hummers, big pickups, and full-sized vans will continue to be exempt from the standards, and environmental groups said the new regulations will have little impact on the nation's gas usage because they will encourage companies to produce more gas-guzzlers.
http://www.boston.com/cars/articles/2005/08/24/tighter_rules_planned_on_light_truck_fuel_use/
Strong wind fans Portuguese forest fires
By Axel Bugge August 24, 2005
MIRANDA DO CORVO, Portugal (Reuters) - Portuguese forest fires flared anew on Wednesday, defying hopes that cooler weather would bring relief for one of the country's worst outbreaks of fires in decades.
Higher temperatures and rising winds reignited at least three blazes stretching over 20 km (12 miles) near Miranda do Corvo, a mountain town about 180 km (110 miles) north of the capital Lisbon, local firefighters said.
Nationwide, seven small fires were out of control, the national fire service said. Cooler foggy weather in the morning helped damp some fires, but rising winds later fanned the embers into leaping flames.
http://www.boston.com/news/world/europe/articles/2005/08/24/strong_wind_fans_portuguese_forest_fires/
NIH worker pleads not guilty in threat
By Curt Anderson, Associated Press Writer August 24, 2005
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. --A National Institutes of Health employee pleaded not guilty Wednesday to allegations she made an anthrax threat against a county agency during a tax dispute.
Michelle Ledgister, 43, faces up to five years in prison and a $250,000 fine if convicted under an anti-terrorism law making it a federal crime to falsely threaten someone with anthrax.
Ledgister works at the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases in Bethesda, Md., as a public health program analyst, according to NIH. She does not have access to any dangerous biological agents, spokesman Don Ralbovsky said.
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2005/08/24/nih_worker_pleads_not_guilty_in_threat/
Americans pay more for health insurance - study
August 24, 2005
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. workers who get health insurance coverage through their employers paid an average of 79 percent more in 2003 than they did in 1996, according to a report published on Wednesday.
And employers paid an average of 89 percent more, the U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality found.
The agency's survey of 48,000 U.S. employers also found a steady increase in premiums in more recent years.
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2005/08/24/americans_pay_more_for_health_insurance___study/
Muslim city in Russia readies for birthday
Municipal workers lay turf, with the Qol Sharif mosque in the background, in preparations for 1000th birthday of the city of Kazan of the mainly Muslim region of Tatarstan, located about 700 km (450 miles) east of Moscow, Wednesday, Aug. 24, 2005. (AP Photo)
By Mike Eckel, Associated Press Writer August 24, 2005
KAZAN, Russia --Streets are scrubbed. Buildings are painted. A massive stage in front of the Qol Sharif mosque and beside the mighty Volga awaits thousands of spectators -- including President Vladimir Putin -- and the attention of all the nation.
http://www.boston.com/news/world/europe/articles/2005/08/24/muslim_city_in_russia_readies_for_birthday/
Taiwan withdraws budget for U.S. arms
August 24, 2005
TAIPEI, Taiwan --Taiwan's Cabinet on Wednesday withdrew a special budget for a massive U.S. weapons package, part of a political maneuver aimed at getting the opposition-controlled legislature to pass the long-delayed package.
For more than a year, the opposition Nationalist Party and its allies have used their slim legislative majority to hold up a special $15.3 billion appropriation, saying it will spark an arms race with rival China that would bankrupt Taiwan.
Included in the package are eight diesel-powered submarines, 12 anti-submarine aircraft, and six Patriot missile batteries.
http://www.boston.com/news/world/asia/articles/2005/08/24/taiwan_withdraws_budget_for_us_arms/
London bomber made panicked calls to accomplices-report
August 24, 2005
LONDON (Reuters) - One of the July 7 London bombers made three "panicked" phone calls to his accomplices less than an hour before blowing himself up on a bus after his plans to bomb a train were disrupted, a newspaper reported on Wednesday.
Hasib Hussain, 18, had planned to detonate his rucksack bomb on an underground train, but was forced to change plans because the line he wanted to use was closed, the Evening Standard reported, citing security sources.
http://www.boston.com/news/world/europe/articles/2005/08/24/london_bomber_made_panicked_calls_to_accomplices_report/
Everyday people
August 24, 2005
LISTING SAME-SEX marriages and commitment ceremonies in the traditional ''Weddings" pages of newspapers was controversial when it began a few years ago. But anyone reading about the gay couples in the newspaper cannot help but see how utterly ordinary they are -- or should be.
Wedding announcements often include smiling pictures and mini-biographies: where the couple grew up, their professions and college degrees, sometimes a bit about their parents or where they plan to take their honeymoon. In the past few weeks, The Boston Globe and The New York Times wedding pages have included a handful of gay couples who have had their weddings performed in Massachusetts or Canada, two places where gay marriage is legal. Other than tending to be slightly older than the other couples featured, there is little to distinguish the same-sex announcements from the heterosexual ones. Here is a selection:
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/editorials/articles/2005/08/24/everyday_people/
Unwanted Pregnancy
Kersten's kind of activism
In her attempt to paint Minnesota judges as "engaged in ambitious social-engineering projects," Katherine Kersten made a revealing error in her Aug. 8 column.
She wrote, "In 1995, Minnesota's Supreme Court piled on. In Doe vs. Gomez, the state court forced the Minnesota Legislature to appropriate tax money to pay for abortions for poor women -- something federal courts have never required."
In truth, the Doe decision was based upon the Minnesota Constitution, a document for which federal courts defer to the judgment of Minnesota courts.
Kersten may disagree with the result of the Doe decision, but to criticize it without understanding the court's reasoning (or acknowledging the role of state courts in interpreting state constitutions) reveals an affinity for exactly the same sort of outcome-driven jurisprudence she pretends to criticize.
It seems that Kersten doesn't really object to judicial activism as much as she regrets that the Republican Party has not (yet) successfully funded the election of like-thinking judicial ideologues who will push for the "ambitious social-engineering projects" that she supports.
Michael Skoglund, Minneapolis.
http://www.startribune.com/stories/1519/5553985.html
Women's Excessive Work Load And Subordination
The Independent (Banjul)
August 22, 2005
Posted to the web August 23, 2005
By Fatou Badjie Ceesay
Banjul
In many societies, The Gambia included, women work more hours than men when their reproductive work and productive work are combined.
In The Gambia, women work for 16 to 18 hours a day. According to UNDP (1997): "...across a wide range of cultures and levels of economies development, women tend to specialize in unpaid reproductive or caring labour compared to men who tend to specialize in paid productive activities, and women combined paid and unpaid labour time is greater than men's." Women's reproductive roles involve domestic chores, child bearing and child rearing activities whilst their productive roles involve income-earning activities.
http://allafrica.com/stories/200508230682.html
Taking the plunge, not the pill
A survey by doctors reveals that college girls are sexually active, but unaware of emergency contraceptives
Express News Service
Chandigarh, August 23: Emergency contraceptives or the ‘‘morning after’’ pill for preventing unwanted pregnancy after an unprotected sexual intercourse, is yet to catch up in this highly literate population.
In a survey carried out by Dr Sonia Puri and Dr Anita of the Urban Health Training Centre, Sector 44, under the aegis of Director, GMCH Sector 32, Prof H M Swami, only 7.24 per cent of the college-going girl students in the sample size of 981 had a vague idea about emergency contraceptive pill (ECP) or e-pills.
BrideGroom
18-2526-3031-3536-4546-5099-50
Only 2.24 per cent knew correctly that the pills can be effectively used till 72 hours of the intercourse.
http://cities.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=145289
Study Finds 29-Week Fetuses Probably Feel No Pain and Need No Abortion Anesthesia
By DENISE GRADY
Published: August 24, 2005
Taking on one of the most highly charged questions in the abortion debate, a team of doctors has concluded that fetuses probably cannot feel pain in the first six months of gestation and therefore do not need anesthesia during abortions.
Their report, being published today in The Journal of the American Medical Association, is based on a review of several hundred scientific papers, and it says that nerve connections in the brain are unlikely to have developed enough for the fetus to feel pain before 29 weeks.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/24/health/24fetus.html
Unwanted pregnancy spurs malpractice suit
By Bruce Gerstman
Knight Ridder
A Bay Point woman says Planned Parenthood and the Contra Costa Regional Medical Center are responsible for the costs of raising her child because they failed to keep her from getting pregnant.
In 2004, Planned Parenthood staff examined Kelly Horde, now 33, three times, and medical center staff members examined her once before she learned she was in her fifth month of pregnancy, she said in a complaint filed in Contra Costa Superior Court.
She is suing for an unspecified amount claiming negligence and medical malpractice. Horde is also alleging ``wrongful life'' -- a legal term that usually means a child should not have been born.
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/living/health/12452097.htm
Co-sponsor: Bill shouldn't keep birth control from women
Associated Press
RACINE, Wis. - A co-sponsor of a bill that would protect the jobs of pharmacists who refuse to fill certain prescriptions says he may not support the measure if it would allow women to be denied birth control as critics claim.
State Rep. Robin Vos, a Republican from Caledonia, is the target of a paid advertisement that the family planning agency Planned Parenthood is running on the Web site of The Journal Times of Racine, saying Vos "wants to make it legal for pharmacists to DENY women their birth control pills ...."
http://www.duluthsuperior.com/mld/duluthsuperior/news/politics/12458962.htm
LaToyia & birth control
THE TRAGIC ending to LaToyia Figueroa's life was of her own making.
She already had one daughter by a seemingly decent boyfriend. What caused her to leave this boyfriend and hook up with this Poaches character?
Poaches already had another girl pregnant, and I guess finding out that he would have two mouths to feed, he may have decided to get rid of LaToyia.
If LaToyia wanted to sleep around, why didn't she at least take birth control? She was 24 years old, and, I hope, a little bit smart enough to know that she could get pregnant again if she didn't take the responsibility for herself and use birth control.
LaToyia told Poaches that she didn't believe in abortion. It looks like she didn't believe in birth control either. Maybe if she had prevented this pregnancy, she would have lived to see her daughter grow up.
http://www.philly.com/mld/dailynews/news/opinion/12450972.htm
Daily Reproductive Health Report
In The Courts Convicted Abortion Clinic Bomber Eric Rudolph Sentenced in Atlanta Court to Four Consecutive Life Sentences Plus 120 Years
[Aug 23, 2005]
Convicted abortion clinic bomber Eric Rudolph on Monday in Atlanta was sentenced to four consecutive life sentences plus 120 years and ordered to pay $2.3 million in restitution for three separate Atlanta-area bombings, including one at an abortion clinic, one at a gay bar and one at the 1996 Olympics, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports (Seymour et al., Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 8/23). Rudolph in July in Birmingham, Ala., was sentenced to two consecutive life terms without parole for the 1998 bombing of a Birmingham abortion clinic, which killed a police officer and critically injured a nurse. He also was ordered to pay $1.2 million in restitution to the victims, although the judge acknowledged that Rudolph has no financial resources. As part of a plea deal with Department of Justice officials, Rudolph in April pleaded guilty to the four bombings that killed two people and wounded more than 120 others, saying that he committed the crimes to call attention to the U.S. government's "abominable sanctioning of abortion on demand" and other issues, such as homosexuality. Rudolph, who was captured in North Carolina in May 2003 after a five-year manhunt, had faced a possible death sentence if convicted of the Birmingham bombing (Kaiser Daily Reproductive Health Report, 7/20). Rudolph in court on Monday read a statement apologizing to the victims of the Centennial Olympic Park bombing in Atlanta but did not say anything to the victims of the other bombings. Sixteen bombing victims or family members of victims spoke at the sentencing (Dewan, New York Times, 8/23). Rudolph likely will serve his sentences at a maximum security prison in Florence, Colo., according to U.S. Attorney David Nahmias (Copeland, USA Today, 8/23). Nahmias also said Rudolph focused on antiabortion sentiments in order to draw support and previously had concentrated on other issues (Barry, Los Angeles Times, 8/23).
http://www.kaisernetwork.org/daily_reports/rep_index.cfm?DR_ID=32176
Doctors challenge abortion laws
August 24, 2005
Bloemfontein: The public's right to participate in the law-making process came under scrutiny in the Constitutional Court yesterday in a case that could also be the first challenge to the government's law-making process and which touches on issues relating to the separation of powers.
Lobby group Doctors for Life is arguing that amendments to four health laws were passed without proper participation by the public called for by the constitution.
The Bills in question are: the Choice on Termination of Pregnancy Amendment Bill; the Sterilisation Amendment Bill; the Dental Technicians Amendment Bill; and the Traditional Health Practitioners Bill. Some have already been passed into law.
http://www.themercury.co.za/index.php?fSectionId=283&fArticleId=2848800
Ohio Abortion Business Files Lawsuit Over Health Dept. Investigation
LifeNews.com Editor
August 23, 2005
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- An abortion business in Ohio has filed a lawsuit to stop the state's health department from conducting an investigation to determine whether it is meeting state regulations for surgical centers. The abortion facility calls the health department's desire to review medical records a "fishing expedition."
The Ohio Department of Health is seeking access to records of 224 customers at the Central Ohio Women's Center abortion business. The center is affiliated with Planned Parenthood of Central Ohio, which operates seven abortion facilities, and told the Associated Press it's not aware of any pending lawsuits against it.
http://www.lifenews.com/state1163.html
Pill access could usher a new era of choices, moral rifts
FDA will weigh over-the-counter availability of morning-after contraception
By TODD ACKERMAN
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle
To many women, the morning-after pill is an almost-ideal solution to the possibility of an unwanted pregnancy after unprotected sex — safe, affordable treatment that can be taken at home.
ADVERTISEMENT
Except for one thing: It's not that easy to get it the morning after.
The Food and Drug Administration is about to decide whether to make the morning-after pill available over the counter, a decision that could usher in a new era in the culture wars, revolutionizing the debate about abortion and impacting intimate decisions.
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/nation/3319606
Get his view on abortion
By Thomas Allen
When I heard that in 1990 Judge John G. Roberts signed on to a memo advocating that Roe v. Wade be overruled, I thought of a phone call I received decades ago from a frightened mother. She didn't know where to turn. Her 17-year-old daughter was pregnant, and she knew her son had impregnated her. It was several years before Roe v. Wade. Abortion was illegal in Pennsylvania and around the country. At my hospital, we hadn't even established an abortion committee yet to provide services to women in life-threatening situations.
I arranged to see the young woman at my office, where I examined her and confirmed the pregnancy. Later, at the family's home, I induced an abortion, the first I ever provided.
From the early 1940s until 1973, when Roe v. Wade was decided, I saw the effects of illegal abortion firsthand. Hospital wards were crowded with women with infections and blood loss caused by illegal or self-induced abortions. Many, if they didn't die from gas gangrene or something else, were permanently injured and would never be able to have children.
http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/news/editorial/12434247.htm
Abortion likely to be early test for new justice
Sunday, August 21, 2005
By Bill Cahir
Bill.Cahir@Newhouse.com
WASHINGTON -- People who oppose abortion claim the Supreme Court is divided 6 to 3 in favor of the procedure's legality. They suggest the high court would maintain a woman's right to terminate an unwanted pregnancy no matter who is confirmed to replace retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor.
However, the claim that abortion rights are safe soon will be tested. The high court in its next term will hear at least one -- and possibly two -- cases of pressing concern to Planned Parenthood Federation of America and its allies.
The replacement of O'Connor, who has voted to keep abortion legal, with appeals court Judge John G. Roberts Jr., whose views are not wholly clear, may alter the face of American law.
http://www.nj.com/news/gloucester/local/index.ssf?/base/news-1/1124612173108230.xml&coll=8
The Morning After Pill - Legality vs. Morality
August 21, 2005 08:57 AM EST
The city council of Austin, TX has ruled that as of September, 1, 2005 all Walgreens pharmacies within that city must fill prescriptions for "morning after" emergency contraception pills for women who receive aid from Austin's Medical Assistance Program.
This measure is the result of the refusal by many pharmacists on moral grounds to fill prescriptions for birth control and for the "morning after" pill, which is designed to prevent (or abort) pregnancy caused by recent sexual activity. Walgreens is that city's pharmaceutical contractor.
http://www.theconservativevoice.com/articles/article.html?id=7625
New York Times
9 States in Plan to Cut Emissions by Power Plants
Marilynn K. Yee/The New York Times
Plants like the Ravenswood Power Station in Long Island City would be subject to an accord to cut pollution.
By ANTHONY DePALMA
Published: August 24, 2005
Officials in New York and eight other Northeastern states have come to a preliminary agreement to freeze power plant emissions at their current levels and then reduce them by 10 percent by 2020, according to a confidential draft proposal.
The cooperative action, the first of its kind in the nation, came after the Bush administration decided not to regulate the greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming. Once a final agreement is reached, the legislatures of the nine states will have to enact it, which is considered likely.
Enforcement of emission controls could potentially result in higher energy prices in the nine states, which officials hope can be offset by subsidies and support for the development of new technology that would be paid for with the proceeds from the sale of emission allowances to the utility companies.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/24/nyregion/24air.html
Panel Rejects Pentagon Plan to Close Connecticut Base
By CHRISTINE HAUSER
Published: August 24, 2005
The commission charged with assessing the Pentagon's base-closing plan voted today to keep open key naval facilities in New England, including the Navy submarine base in Groton, Conn., rejecting some elements of the Pentagon proposal to shut, consolidate and realign more than 800 military facilities in all 50 states.
The Navy submarine base in Groton, Conn., is one of the largest military installations in the New England region.
The panel, the Defense Base Closure and Realignment Commission, also voted to close several major army bases, including Fort Monmouth, N.J., and some naval facilities but kept open or realigned others in its first day of deliberations today.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/24/national/23cnd-bases.html?hp
As Israel Leaves Gaza, It Strengthens West Bank Presence
By GREG MYRE
Published: August 24, 2005
JERUSALEM, Aug. 24 - Israeli soldiers worked today to wrap up the military portion of the Gaza Strip withdrawal, and the defense minister said all but a small number of soldiers could be removed from the territory by mid-S
Security forces struggled with a settler who was resisting evacuation from the settlement of Homesh in the last phase of the Israeli pullout.
At the same time, Israeli officials confirmed that the government had issued orders to seize West Bank land to build the separation barrier around the largest Jewish settlement, Maale Adumim, and link it up to nearby Jerusalem.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/24/international/middleeast/24cnd-mideast.html?hp&ex=1124942400&en=9beeec04fe17b4d3&ei=5094&partner=homepage
Insurgents Attack Baghdad Police in Gun Battles on Streets
By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr.
and TERENCE NEILAN
Published: August 24, 2005
BAGHDAD, Iraq, Aug. 24 - Insurgents armed with rocket-propelled grenades, assault rifles and hand grenades roamed the streets of western Baghdad in cars today, attacking police patrols in residential areas, an Interior Ministry official said.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/24/international/middleeast/24cnd-iraq.html?hp&ex=1124942400&en=2afd541f34223acb&ei=5094&partner=homepage
Myanmar Junta Leader Rumored Ousted in Coup
By REUTERS
Published: August 24, 2005
Filed at 4:05 a.m. ET
BANGKOK (Reuters) - Rumors swirled in army-ruled Myanmar and neighboring Thailand on Wednesday that junta strongman Senior General Than Shwe has been removed by the powerful army commander.
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-myanmar.html
The Arab News
Jordan Says Syrian Militants Behind Attack
Abdul Jalil Mustafa & Agencies
AMMAN, 24 August 2005 — Syrian militants linked to Al-Qaeda’s leader in Iraq, Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi, were behind last week’s rocket attack on US warships in the Red Sea port of Aqaba, Jordanian security officials said yesterday. Zarqawi’s Sunni Muslim group claimed responsibility for Friday’s attack, in which the rockets missed their targets, but hit a warehouse and a hospital, killing a Jordanian soldier, and struck the Israeli port of Eilat.
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=4§ion=0&article=68943&d=24&m=8&y=2005
Iraq Bickering Could Lead to Partition: Saud
Samir Al-Saadi, Arab News
JEDDAH, 24 August 2005 — Saudi Arabia said yesterday it hoped Iraq’s draft constitution would guarantee unity and warned that confrontational disputes may lead to the partition of the state along sectarian lines.
“Saudi Arabia... hopes that the constitution will meet the aspirations of the Iraqi people in consecrating national unity and maintaining its Arab and Muslim identity,” said Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al-Faisal during a news conference in Jeddah.
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=1§ion=0&article=68935&d=24&m=8&y=2005
Transparent Sham in Gaza
Fawaz Turki, disinherited@yahoo.com
So the wretched settlers — all 8,500 of them who had occupied 20 percent of Gaza’s choice land to build their colonies on — have pulled out, leaving a desolate landscape of rubble and garbage behind. But whatever you do, hold the celebrations, and think not of what has changed, but what has not. The settlers may have folded their tents, as it were, and headed north — for many, to settle on expropriated Palestinian land in the West Bank — but the military occupation remains very much in place, determining the economic and social future of the strip.
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=7§ion=0&article=68933&d=24&m=8&y=2005
Recruitment Official Denies Wage Discrimination for Maids
Mohammed Rasooldeen, Arab News
RIYADH, 24 August 2005 — The Kingdom determines wages for housemaids by their experience and not by their nationality, a senior official of the Riyadh Chamber of Commerce and Industry said, refuting allegations of discrimination in fixing their salaries.
Waleed Al-Swaidan, chairman of the Saudi Arabian National Recruitment Committee, told Arab News that the wages of female domestic helps are fixed by their proven capabilities and not by any other criteria.
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=1§ion=0&article=68941&d=24&m=8&y=2005
We’ve Nothing to Do With Rising Oil Prices: Sultan
P.K. Abdul Ghafour, Arab News
JEDDAH, 24 August 2005 — Crown Prince Sultan, deputy premier and minister of defense and aviation, yesterday reaffirmed that Saudi Arabia had nothing to do with increasing oil prices in the world market and had done everything possible to lower them.
Prince Sultan also disclosed plans for creating more job opportunities for Saudi women by allowing them to work two shifts.
In a wide-ranging interview with the Kuwaiti newspaper Assyasah, Prince Sultan highlighted Saudi Arabia’s efforts to strengthen the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) by making a number of concessions to the member states. He also noted the efforts of Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah to boost the country’s progress and prosperity by carrying out new welfare projects.
http://www.arabnews.com/?page=1§ion=0&article=68940&d=24&m=8&y=2005
continued …
Morning Papers - continued ...
Haaretz
Viewpoint / Spare the IDF the pain
By Tzipi Livni
In the midst of tremendous fears of a violent evacuation and physical confrontations between settlers and security forces, more of the anti-pullout effort has been redirected toward messages that will be received with relief and a feeling of, "Thank God, the important thing is that there will be no violence."
The message is deliberate, and is accompanied by signs posted in public places. "Brother, a settler calls to a soldier, look me in the eye and be ashamed." Or, "Your deeds are immoral, you cruel person harming my family and children."
In heart-rending conversations between settlers and soldiers, the message is repeated in different ways. I asked some settlers and they told me their objective: "We want to sear the soldiers' consciousness, so they remember us all their lives, so they feel the pain."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/613478.html
PM vows to keep evacuated communities together
By Roni Singer, Haaretz Correspondent and Haaretz Staff
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said Wednesday that the government would continue with its primary endeavor to relocate evacuated settlers in new homes, and pledged to keep communities together.
Speaking at a meeting of the ministerial committee on the disengagement, Sharon said that the government would also make every possible effort to minimize the poeriod in which evacuees "are living with uncertainty."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/616750.html
The exports better be secure. I'm sorry but to think the Palestinians will be a legitimate trading partner is still rather skeptical to me.
Palestinians sign export deal for Gaza greenhouse produce
By Arnon Regular
PalTrade, the Palestinian company in charge of running the greenhouses that the Palestinians will inherit from Gaza evacuees, recently signed its first export agreement for the produce slated to be grown there.
The produce will be marketed via the Israeli firm Agrexco, which handles most of Israel's agricultural exports. Palestinian farmers in the Gaza Strip already export under a special brand name that Agrexco launched for this purpose, and this brand will apparently be used for the new venture as well.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/616294.html
IMI to supply ammunition to U.S. army in $300 million deal
By Ora Koren, Haaretz Correspondent
Israel Military Industries won a tender Tuesday for around $300 million to supply the U.S. army with ammunition. IMI said this is their biggest ammunition deal with the U.S. army to date.
IMI will supply light ammunition for rifles and machine guns, which will be produced in its 'Yitzhak' factory in Upper Nazareth. The deal will double the factory's scope of activity. It currently employs 350 workers, and has a revenue today of over $60 million a year.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/616757.html
Gaza terror group said to have rocket that could hit Ashkelon
By Haaretz Service
The Popular Resistance Committees organization, which has carried out a number of high-profile terror attacks in recent years, has said that it has developed a rocket capable of striking targets 15 kilometers away, which after a planned IDF pullout from the Gaza Strip, would put southern Ashkelon within range of the projectile, Army Radio reported Wednesday.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/616716.html
Poll: Deep rift has opened between Sharon and Likud
By Yossi Verter
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's detractors and rivals will look at today's newspaper headlines that festively herald the end of the Jewish settlement enterprise in the Gaza Strip and northern West Bank with some degree of solace in their hearts and minds - the belief that Sharon, the man who brought about this calamity and shattered their dreams is rapidly approaching his final days in the Prime Minister's Office.
It is not fact; it is only a belief and a hope - and also the concern of many in the political establishment who believe that if Sharon is not reelected Likud chairman, he will not be reelected prime minister.
Facing them, there are those who are convinced that every end is merely a beginning, and that Sharon will again show his skill at turning failure into success, a disadvantage into an advantage, and will return for a third term in office, with or without the Likud.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/616297.html
Michael Moore Today
Viewpoint / Spare the IDF the pain
By Tzipi Livni
In the midst of tremendous fears of a violent evacuation and physical confrontations between settlers and security forces, more of the anti-pullout effort has been redirected toward messages that will be received with relief and a feeling of, "Thank God, the important thing is that there will be no violence."
The message is deliberate, and is accompanied by signs posted in public places. "Brother, a settler calls to a soldier, look me in the eye and be ashamed." Or, "Your deeds are immoral, you cruel person harming my family and children."
In heart-rending conversations between settlers and soldiers, the message is repeated in different ways. I asked some settlers and they told me their objective: "We want to sear the soldiers' consciousness, so they remember us all their lives, so they feel the pain."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/613478.html
PM vows to keep evacuated communities together
By Roni Singer, Haaretz Correspondent and Haaretz Staff
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said Wednesday that the government would continue with its primary endeavor to relocate evacuated settlers in new homes, and pledged to keep communities together.
Speaking at a meeting of the ministerial committee on the disengagement, Sharon said that the government would also make every possible effort to minimize the poeriod in which evacuees "are living with uncertainty."
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/616750.html
The exports better be secure. I'm sorry but to think the Palestinians will be a legitimate trading partner is still rather skeptical to me.
Palestinians sign export deal for Gaza greenhouse produce
By Arnon Regular
PalTrade, the Palestinian company in charge of running the greenhouses that the Palestinians will inherit from Gaza evacuees, recently signed its first export agreement for the produce slated to be grown there.
The produce will be marketed via the Israeli firm Agrexco, which handles most of Israel's agricultural exports. Palestinian farmers in the Gaza Strip already export under a special brand name that Agrexco launched for this purpose, and this brand will apparently be used for the new venture as well.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/616294.html
IMI to supply ammunition to U.S. army in $300 million deal
By Ora Koren, Haaretz Correspondent
Israel Military Industries won a tender Tuesday for around $300 million to supply the U.S. army with ammunition. IMI said this is their biggest ammunition deal with the U.S. army to date.
IMI will supply light ammunition for rifles and machine guns, which will be produced in its 'Yitzhak' factory in Upper Nazareth. The deal will double the factory's scope of activity. It currently employs 350 workers, and has a revenue today of over $60 million a year.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/616757.html
Gaza terror group said to have rocket that could hit Ashkelon
By Haaretz Service
The Popular Resistance Committees organization, which has carried out a number of high-profile terror attacks in recent years, has said that it has developed a rocket capable of striking targets 15 kilometers away, which after a planned IDF pullout from the Gaza Strip, would put southern Ashkelon within range of the projectile, Army Radio reported Wednesday.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/616716.html
Poll: Deep rift has opened between Sharon and Likud
By Yossi Verter
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's detractors and rivals will look at today's newspaper headlines that festively herald the end of the Jewish settlement enterprise in the Gaza Strip and northern West Bank with some degree of solace in their hearts and minds - the belief that Sharon, the man who brought about this calamity and shattered their dreams is rapidly approaching his final days in the Prime Minister's Office.
It is not fact; it is only a belief and a hope - and also the concern of many in the political establishment who believe that if Sharon is not reelected Likud chairman, he will not be reelected prime minister.
Facing them, there are those who are convinced that every end is merely a beginning, and that Sharon will again show his skill at turning failure into success, a disadvantage into an advantage, and will return for a third term in office, with or without the Likud.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/616297.html
Michael Moore Today
Come one, come all!
Crawford Update
This upcoming weekend (27th and 28th) is going to be HUGE at Camp Casey! It's the last weekend we will spend in Crawford before heading to D.C., and we want to lots of people here to experience the wonder of Camp Casey.
Saturday we will be having a fabulous Texas-style BBQ at Casey II, to which we have invited the President and First Lady (though I suspect the food will be more authentically Texan than they are). Sunday is a National Day of Prayer for the troops; regardless of your political persuasion or position on the war, this is a day for you and your community to pray for/meditate on the troops' well-being in Iraq and Afghanistan.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=3830
Bush Bikes, Boats During Idaho Vacation
By Christopher Smith / Associated Press
DONNELLY, Idaho -- President Bush spent Tuesday at a resort in the Idaho Rockies, mountain biking around a rugged trail circuit before going fishing in a small pontoon boat on a wind-whipped lake.
"I'm kind of hanging loose, as they say," Bush said earlier outside of his lodge at the 9-month-old Tamarack Resort, where he was spending two nights away from his Texas ranch.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=3832
Bush Believes Those Who Protest Iraq War Don't Want U.S. to Win 'War on Terror,' Spokesman Says
By E&P Staff / Editor & Publisher
NEW YORK Meeting briefly with reporters Monday aboard Air Force One, Trent Duffy, a White House spokesman subbing for Scott McClellan, said that President Bush believes that those who want the U.S. to begin to change course in Iraq do not want America to win the overall "war on terror."
Duffy spoke on a day when a surprisingly large antiwar protest met the president during his stay in Salt Lake City, Utah, where he addressed a Veterans of Foreign Wars convention.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=3816
Congresswoman Calls for Return of Troops
By Jamie Stengle / Associated Press
CRAWFORD, Texas - U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee visited the anti-war inspired "Camp Casey" near President Bush's ranch on Monday, lending support and words of encouragement to several families whose loved ones died in Iraq.
"It is time to bring our troops home," Lee said at the demonstration started by Cindy Sheehan, of Vacaville, Calif., on Aug. 6.
Sheehan, whose 24-year-old son Army Spc. Casey Sheehan died last year in Iraq, is currently in Los Angeles to be with her mother, who had a stroke. But about 60 other people were spread between two anti-war campsites near the ranch on Monday.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=3815
No Proof Found of Iran Arms Program
Uranium Traced to Pakistani Equipment
By Dafna Linzer / Washington Post
Traces of bomb-grade uranium found two years ago in Iran came from contaminated Pakistani equipment and are not evidence of a clandestine nuclear weapons program, a group of U.S. government experts and other international scientists has determined.
"The biggest smoking gun that everyone was waving is now eliminated with these conclusions," said a senior official who discussed the still-confidential findings on the condition of anonymity.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=3819
Rumsfeld: Constitution Won't End Violence
WASHINGTON (AP) -- A new constitution will not end all the violence in Iraq, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Tuesday, acknowledging that the continuing turbulence ''has to be a heart-wrenching thing'' for the families of U.S. forces still fighting insurgents there.
''The process has been delayed a bit, but democracy has never been described as speedy, efficient or perfect,'' Rumsfeld said during a Pentagon briefing. Earlier, Iraqi lawmakers delayed a vote on the draft constitution to give negotiators more time to persuade Sunni Arabs to accept it.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=3828
Troops' Gravestones Have Pentagon Slogans
By David Pace / Associated Press
ARLINGTON, Va. - Unlike earlier wars, nearly all Arlington National Cemetery gravestones for troops killed in Iraq or Afghanistan are inscribed with the slogan-like operation names the Pentagon selected to promote public support for the conflicts.
Families of fallen soldiers and Marines are being told they have the option to have the government-furnished headstones engraved with "Operation Enduring Freedom" or "Operation Iraqi Freedom" at no extra charge, whether they are buried in Arlington or elsewhere. A mock-up shown to many families includes the operation names.
The vast majority of military gravestones from other eras are inscribed with just the basic, required information: name, rank, military branch, date of death and, if applicable, the war and foreign country in which the person served.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=3822
War stress blamed for shootings by vets
Some question whether Army doing enough to help soldiers
(AP) -- One was a skinny 20-year-old discharged from the Army who couldn't shake the piercing rat-a-tat-tat reminders of combat. The other, a decorated Marine family man whose job preparing bodies of U.S. soldiers for burial had caused clammy, restless nights.
Both home from duty in Iraq, they were on opposite ends of the country, but their stories have much in common.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=3829
Robertson Calls for Chavez Assassination
By Sue Lindsey / Associated Press
VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. - Religious broadcaster Pat Robertson has suggested that American agents assassinate Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to stop his country from becoming "a launching pad for communist infiltration and Muslim extremism."
An official of a theological watchdog group on Tuesday criticized Robertson's statement as "chilling."
"We have the ability to take him out, and I think the time has come that we exercise that ability," Robertson said Monday on the Christian Broadcast Network's "The 700 Club."
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=3820
Talk Show Host Graham Fired By WMAL Over Islam Remarks
By Paul Farhi / Washington Post
Washington radio station WMAL-AM fired talk show host Michael Graham yesterday after he refused to soften his description of Islam as "a terrorist organization" on the air last month.
Graham had been suspended without pay from his daily three-hour show since making his comments July 25. The station had conditioned his return to the midmorning shift on reading a station-approved statement in which Graham would have said that his anti-Muslim statements were "too broad" and that he sometimes uses "hyperbole" in the course of his program. WMAL also asked Graham to speak to the station's advertisers and its employees about the controversy.
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/index.php?id=3824
The Sun Sentinel
Tropical Storm Katrina takes aim at South Florida's shores
Workers begin lowering levels in the area's 2,000-mile network of drainage canals
Associated Press
MIAMI -- Tropical Storm Katrina formed Wednesday morning in the Bahamas and could reach hurricane strength before hitting the coast of Florida later this week, the National Hurricane Center said.
A 200-mile stretch of Florida's east coast from the Seven Mile Bridge in the Keys north to Vero Beach was under a tropical storm watch, meaning tropical storm conditions were likely by late Thursday. The storm is expected to slowly cross the state and could cause flooding as it dumps a foot of rain or more in spots before heading into the Gulf of Mexico.
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/weather/hurricane/sfl-katrina,0,4750075.story?coll=sfla-home-headlines
Report: Tour de France director says it's a 'fact' Lance Armstrong took steroids
Associated Press
Posted August 24 2005, 10:54 AM EDT
PARIS -- The director of the Tour de France claims Lance Armstrong has "fooled" the sports world and that the seven-time champion owes fans an explanation over new allegations he used a performance-boosting drug.
Tour director Jean-Marie Leblanc's comments appeared in the French sports daily L'Equipe on Wednesday, a day after the newspaper reported that six urine samples provided by Armstrong during the '99 Tour tested positive for the red blood cell-booster EPO.
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-824tourdefrance,0,4366082.story?coll=sfla-home-headlines
It would be a sad day if Armstrong was lying
Published August 24, 2005
For the umpteenth time, cyclist Lance Armstrong reiterated yesterday that he isn't a drug cheat. He damn sure better not be. If Armstrong, the world's most famous cancer survivor, has been lying to us for years and he really did use the endurance-boosting drug EPO during his first Tour de France victory in 1999 - which was the explosive allegation yesterday in a four-page story published in the French newspaper L'Equipe - then Armstrong is guilty of a deceit of incomprehensible callousness and staggering proportion.
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/ny-sphow244396012aug24,0,7296481.column?coll=sfla-home-headlines
Home sales in Broward drop 28% due to few for-sale listings
By Alexandra Navarro Clifton and Robin Benedick
Staff Writers
Posted August 24 2005
The median price of an existing single-family home in Broward County continued to rise in July when it cost $83,700 more to buy a home than a year ago.
But the blistering pace of escalating prices is leveling off, growing only 28 percent compared with this year's high of 34 percent in May.
While the median price rose to $385,600 in July, sales in Broward County dropped 28 percent from a year ago, according to data released Tuesday by the Florida Association of Realtors. The figures do not include condominiums or townhouses.
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-zhomesbrow24aug24,0,7819923.story?coll=sfla-home-headlines
Witness in Rilya Wilson disappearance refuses to testify against accused killer
By Ihosvani Rodriguez
Miami Bureau
Posted August 24 2005
Robin Lunceford's words were enough to land a murder indictment last year against Geralyn Graham, the former caregiver of missing 4-year-old Rilya Wilson. But on Tuesday, she refused to snitch.
Lunceford, 42, repeatedly invoked her Fifth Amendment right not to testify during a bond hearing for Graham in a Miami-Dade courtroom on Tuesday. Graham's attorney, Brian Tannebaum, tried to ask Lunceford about the confession she claims she obtained from Graham while the two women were in a courthouse holding cell last year. A Miami-Dade County grand jury used Lunceford's statement to indict Graham, 59, in March on first-degree murder.
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-drilya24aug24,0,5838798.story?coll=sfla-home-headlines
Bush critics, fans in S. Florida blast Pat Robertson's assassination remark
By Sandra Hernandez & James D. Davis
Staff Writers
Posted August 24 2005
Televangelist Pat Robertson's call to assassinate Venezuela's president has formed an unlikely alliance: Local South Florida critics of the president have joined with his supporters who have denounced the remarks as "crazy" and "stupid."
Robertson's comments regarding President Hugo Chávez were made Monday on the Christian Broadcast Network's The 700 Club.
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-cchavezaug24,0,2232172.story?coll=sfla-home-headlines
Winn-Dixie closing 8 S. Florida stores by Sunday
By Karen-Janine Cohen
Business Writer
Eight Winn-Dixie stores slated to close in South Florida as part of the company's Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization plan will shut their doors by Sunday. Some have already closed, according to the company, and others are set to close today.
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/business/local/sfl-zwinndixie23aug24,0,5046622.story?coll=sfla-business-front
Insurance agents to study government program for providing wind insurance
By Kathy Bushouse
Business Writer
The trade group representing Florida's insurance agents announced Tuesday it will study another avenue for covering hurricane wind damage in the state.
With insurers cutting their Florida exposure and state-backed Citizens Property Insurance Corp. levying a 6.8 percent assessment on home insurance policies, "it's time that we look for solutions that consider the needs of both insurers and consumers," said Jeff Grady, president of the Florida Association of Insurance Agents, in a written statement.
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/business/local/sfl-zinsure24aug24,0,2486031.story?coll=sfla-business-front
Fusion might end need for embryo cells
1st step reported; decade of development forecast
By Jonathan Bor and Dennis O'Brien
Sun Staff
A Harvard scientist who led experiments that transformed skin cells into stem cells said yesterday that the technique could lead to ways to dispense altogether with the use of human embryos - but it could take a decade to accomplish.
When embryonic stem cells were fused with adult skin cells, the stem cells, in effect, taught the more mature cells to act just like them.
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/features/health/bal-te.stemcell23aug23,0,501614.story?coll=sfla-news-health
Aspirin cuts risk of colon cancer
Study shows illness was reduced, but high dose over long time is necessary and could carry side effects
BY DELTHIA RICKS
STAFF WRITER
Posted August 24 2005
Taking aspirin and possibly other medications in its class can prevent colorectal cancer, but it takes more than a decade and a relatively high dosage, a team of scientists report today.
"Overall our study did show protection against colorectal cancer. But it required 10 years or more before we saw optimal decrease in risk," said Dr. Andrew Chan, lead investigator of an analysis in today's Journal of the American Medical Association.
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/features/health/ny-hscanc244395816aug24,0,2520355.story?coll=sfla-news-science
The Cheney Observer
Cause is not clear, but message is
Lucy Morales Harty
Fort Lauderdale
Subscribe today to the Sun-Sentinel
and find out how to get one week extra!
Click here or call 1-877-READ-SUN.
What message is our president sending? While his war rages, he bikes around his ranch, ignoring the mother of a fallen soldier camped nearby.
While he declares that Casey Sheehan's death was for a "noble cause," he has not made clear what that cause is.
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/opinion/letters/sfl-brmail950xaug23,0,3102424.story?coll=sfla-news-letters
Late report disputes Pentagon's estimate
Hundreds of military jobs are on the line
11:57 PM PDT on Tuesday, August 23, 2005
By DARRELL R. SANTSCHI and JOE VARGO / The Press-Enterprise
A new study conducted on behalf of Norco's embattled naval weapons assessment center indicates moving the base could top $140 million, nearly twice what Pentagon budget crunchers originally estimated.
The figure, released in a study made public prior to this week's decisive hearings by the Base Realignment and Closure commission, gives Norco supporters new hope they can keep the 64-year-old base open.
http://www.pe.com/localnews/inland/stories/PE_News_Local_D_close24.1352639f.html
Army planning for four more years in Iraq
By ROBERT BURNS
AP Military Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Army is planning for the possibility of keeping the current number of soldiers in Iraq - well over 100,000 - for four more years, the Army's top general said Saturday.
In an Associated Press interview, Gen. Peter Schoomaker said the Army is prepared for the "worst case" in terms of the required level of troops in Iraq. He said the number could be adjusted lower if called for by slowing the force rotation or by shortening tours for soldiers.
http://customwire.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/ARMY_CHIEF_INTERVIEW?SITE=CARIE&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2005-08-21-02-23-38
Do you support the idea of the USA should leave 100,000 troops in Iraq for four more years?
Yes, removing troops too early will undermine the country's stability
34.38% 99 votes
No, we should start removing our troops and let the Iraqis take over security
63.89% 184 votes
I'm not sure
1.74% 5 votes
288 Total Votes
http://www.pe.com/perl/common/surveys/vote_now.pl
Early birds flying White House trail
BY MARK SILVA
Chicago Tribune
WASHINGTON - (KRT) - To spread a little good will before a tour of Iowa last week, Newt Gingrich, the former speaker of the House, endowed tiny Luther College with a $25,000 scholarship.
Iowans have grown accustomed to would-be presidents bearing gifts, common in a state with the traditional duty of vetting presidential candidates. But this one is music to their ears, with the money earmarked for the study of piano, organ or wind instruments at the college in Decorah.
http://www.philly.com/mld/philly/news/special_packages/election2004/12453115.htm
THIS IS A BENEFIT FOR DELAY ?????
Cheney to campaign for embattled DeLay
BY TODD J. GILLMAN
The Dallas Morning News
WASHINGTON - (KRT) - Battered by months of ethics allegations, Majority Leader Tom DeLay has turned for help to the White House, which is sending Vice President Cheney next month to headline a fund-raiser for him in Houston.
Cheney stumped for about 70 House candidates last year, and another dozen so far this year - mostly newcomers or veterans locked in uphill fights. But with 14 month before DeLay, R-Texas, faces voters in a district whose contours he personally approved, analysts see anxiety over the fate of a lawmaker widely seen as the most powerful majority leader in history.
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/politics/12456675.htm
AVOIDING THE OBVIOUS NEED FOR ALTERNATIVES. IF THIS PROVES TO BE AS SUCCESSFUL AS BUSH'S VENTURES IN THE PAST I WON'T HOLD MY BREATH.
On familiar ground: Dick Cheney to visit Alberta for Big Oil
August 23, 2005
Derrick O'Keefe
U.S. Vice-President Dick Cheney will make a visit to Canada in early September. His itinerary, though, isn’t likely to take him near the nation’s capital in Ottawa, as he plans to stick to the more familiar territory of oil-rich Alberta. Cheney’s trip highlights once again the priorities of the U.S. administration. Dick will be here to size up the vaunted tar sands of Alberta which, despite still difficult and costly extraction, some tout as the world’s largest reserve of hydrocarbons.
On September 8, Cheney will have a high-level “invitation-only” dinner in Calgary with western premiers Ralph Klein and Gordon Campbell, with the evening’s host being none other than the ‘non-partisan’ Fraser Institute, an influential right-wing ‘think-tank.’
http://www.sevenoaksmag.com/commentary/75_comm1.html
TAKE 'EM TO COURT !!
Commissioners to discuss power plant plans, protest prohibitions
By J.B. Smith Tribune-Herald staff writer
Tuesday, August 23, 2005
McLennan County commissioners will handle two hot topics at today's meeting: potential pollution in Riesel and potential protest restrictions around the Bush ranch near Crawford.
At their 9 a.m. meeting, commissioners will hear two environmental evaluations of the billion-dollar, coal-fired power plant that LS Power wants to build in Riesel. They also will consider whether to call a public hearing on proposed regulations to “prohibit stopping, standing and/or parking of vehicles” on 7.5 miles of road near the Bush ranch.
http://www.wacotrib.com/news/content/news/stories/2005/08/23/20050823waccommishadvance.html
Halliburton worker admits bribes
KBR is no stranger to controversy
A former employee of Halliburton subsidiary KBR has admitted taking $110,300 (£61,225) in bribes from an Iraqi firm it awarded a US contract.
The $609,000 contract was to renovate warehouse and office space in Iraq.
Glenn Allen Powell - whom KBR has fired - faces up to 20 years in jail and a fine of up to $1.25m (£694,376).
Iraq-related US government contracts have won the firm and its parent, which was once run by US vice president Dick Cheney, more than $9bn.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/4177832.stm
HALLIBURTON: LOSES IRAN CONTRACT DUE TO CORRUPTION CHARGES
(AGI) - Tehran, Iran, Aug 23 - US multinational Halliburton lost a 310 million dollar contract for natural gas extraction in the Iranian site of South Pars. According to Tehran authorities, Oriental Oil Kish, a subsidiary of Halliburton operating in the Middle East, won the contract last January thanks to bribes. The activities of the company in South Pars have been suspended and the contract annulled. Halliburton, once led by US Vice President Dick Chaney, is under investigation for the same contract in the US as well, on the basis of a 1996 law that punishes companies, both American and foreign, which invest more than 40 million dollars in Iran. The contract should now be passed on to the National Iranian Drilling Company, the Iranian state-owned energy company. (AGI) -
231946 AGO 05
http://www.agi.it/english/news.pl?doc=200508231946-1176-RT1-CRO-0-NF51&page=0&id=agionline-eng.arab
Hey, George. You forgot to undercut this investigation !!
Subpoena for Chicago Bridge
SEC investigation concerns a Halliburton project in Nigeria.
Stephen Taub, CFO.com
August 23, 2005
Engineering and construction company Chicago Bridge & Iron Co. announced that it has received a subpoena from the Securities and Exchange Commission in connection with the SEC's investigation into a Halliburton project in Nigeria.
In a regulatory filing, Chicago Bridge added that it was served as one of several subcontractors to a Halliburton affiliate and that it is cooperating fully.
http://www.cfo.com/article.cfm/4314909/c_4313935?f=home_todayinfinance
continued …
We don't belong in Iraq. We never did.
Well, at least they keep the street picked up. This is progress? I don't call this progress. I call it at the very least undignified. I also call it a failure of policy.
Caption :: A policeman walks past a vehicle carrying the bodies of Iraq's Justice Undersecretary bodyguards killed in a shooting in western Baghdad, Wednesday, Aug. 24, 2005. Undersecretary Awshoo Ibrahim who was driving to work when his car and convoy came under heavy fire, escaped unharmed although police said four of his bodyguards were killed and another five injured. (AP Photo/Khalid Mohammed)
I DO BELIEVE I SEE A STAR OF DAVID AMONG ALL THOSE CROSSES. The gravestones of fallen Americans buried at Arlington National Cemetery during the Iraq war era show a change in style from earlier conflicts, in Arlington, Va., Friday, June 17, 2005. Unlike earlier wars, nearly all Arlington National Cemetery gravestones for troops killed in Iraq or Afghanistan are inscribed with the operation names, such as 'Operation Iraqi Freedom' and 'Operation Enduring Freedom', which the Pentagon selected to promote public support for the conflicts. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
Morning Papers - concluding
The Washington Post
Wave of Marine Species Extinctions Feared
By Juliet Eilperin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, August 24, 2005; Page A01
BIMINI, Bahamas -- The bulldozers moved slowly at first. Picking up speed, they pressed forward into a patch of dense mangrove trees that buckled and splintered like twigs. As the machines moved on, the pieces drifted out to sea.
Sitting in a small motorboat a few hundred yards offshore on a mid-July afternoon, Samuel H. Gruber -- a University of Miami professor who has devoted more than two decades to studying the lemon sharks that breed here -- plunged into despondency. The mangroves being ripped up to build a new resort provide food and protection that the sharks can't get in the open ocean, and Gruber fears the worst.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/22/AR2005082200036.html
Japanese House-Sitter Robot Hits Stores
By HIROKO TABUCHI
The Associated Press
Tuesday, August 23, 2005; 9:13 PM
TOKYO -- Worried about leaving your house empty while you go on vacation? Japan has the answer: a house-sitter robot armed with a digital camera, infrared sensors and a videophone.
Stores across Japan started taking orders on Thursday for the Roborior _ a watermelon-sized eyeball on wheels that glows purple, blue and orange _ continuing the country's love affair with gadgets.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/23/AR2005082300216.html
Google to Launch IM Service
Move Steps Up Competition Among Internet Chat Programs
By Yuki Noguchi
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, August 24, 2005; Page D01
Instant messaging, a type of communication long dominated by chatty teens, has become the latest front in an escalating war among big Internet companies competing to make themselves indispensable to mainstream audiences.
Google Inc. plans to enter the fray today by launching Google Talk, its own version of a service that allows registered users to send instant messages or talk over the Web to other users.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/23/AR2005082301588.html
Confidence In Military News Wanes
By Josh White
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, August 24, 2005; Page A04
The U.S. public's confidence that the military and the media keep them informed about national security issues has eroded significantly over the past six years, according to a new poll that shows 60 percent of Americans believe they do not get enough information about military matters to make educated decisions.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/23/AR2005082301290.html
Constitution on the Brink
Wednesday, August 24, 2005; Page A14
WHILE TALKS over the Iraqi constitution continue in Baghdad, the results so far can only be worrisome for those who hoped the process would help consolidate a new democratic political order and alleviate the Sunni insurgency. The completion of a constitution in the coming days would keep Iraq on track toward holding elections and forming a permanent government by early next year, a timetable the Bush administration has made an overriding priority. Yet both the means adopted to complete the draft and some of the language reported to be in the document risk exacerbating the divide between Iraq's majority Shiite and Kurd communities and the minority Sunnis, thereby adding fuel to the insurgency. Iraqis and U.S. officials need to make good use of the brief time between now and the scheduled meeting of the National Assembly tomorrow if that outcome is to be avoided.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/23/AR2005082301374.html
Chinese Detainees Are Men Without a Country
15 Muslims, Cleared of Terrorism Charges, Remain at Guantanamo With Nowhere to Go
By Robin Wright
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, August 24, 2005; Page A01
In late 2003, the Pentagon quietly decided that 15 Chinese Muslims detained at the military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, could be released. Five were people who were in the wrong place at the wrong time, some of them picked up by Pakistani bounty hunters for U.S. payoffs. The other 10 were deemed low-risk detainees whose enemy was China's communist government -- not the United States, according to senior U.S. officials.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/23/AR2005082301362.html
In Iraq Jail, Resistance Goes Underground
Escape Tunnel, Improvised Weapons Showcase Determination of Inmates
By Steve Fainaru and Anthony Shadid
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, August 24, 2005; Page A01
CAMP BUCCA, Iraq -- In the darkest hours before dawn, groups of 10 detainees toiled 15 feet beneath Compound 5 of America's largest prison in Iraq. The men worked in five-minute shifts, digging with shovels fashioned from tent poles and hauling the dirt to the surface with five-gallon water jugs tethered to 200 feet of rope. They bagged it in sacks that had been used to deliver their bread rations and spread it surreptitiously across a soccer field where fellow inmates churned it during daily matches, guards and detainees recalled.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/23/AR2005082301525.html
3 Dead, 10 Hurt in Iraq Police Attacks
The Associated Press
Wednesday, August 24, 2005; 8:19 AM
BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Insurgents attacked Iraqi police patrols Wednesday in western Baghdad with three car bombs and small arms fire, killing at least three people and wounding 10, police said.
Two of the car bombs were piloted by suicide drivers near the western neighborhood of Khadra, police Capt. Taleb Thamer said. He said three civilians were killed and 10 people, including three policemen, were wounded.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/24/AR2005082400416.html
Warner: Defense Closures 'Rigged'
D.C. Area Jobs Long Targeted, Senator Asserts
By Spencer S. Hsu
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, August 24, 2005; Page A01
Virginia Sen. John W. Warner (R) said that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and a senior aide improperly manipulated the national base realignment plan announced earlier this year to compel the movement of more than 20,000 defense jobs away from the Washington area.
Two years before the Pentagon revealed its base closing plan May 13, in a stream of memos and internal records, top department officials were saying that "thinning of headquarters in the National Capital Region remains a[n] objective," according to Warner.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/23/AR2005082301537.html
Who Will Say 'No More'?
By Gary Hart
Wednesday, August 24, 2005; Page A15
"Waist deep in the Big Muddy and the big fool said to push on," warned an anti-Vietnam war song those many years ago. The McGovern presidential campaign, in those days, which I know something about, is widely viewed as a cause for the decline of the Democratic Party, a gateway through which a new conservative era entered.
Like the cat that jumped on a hot stove and thereafter wouldn't jump on any stove, hot or cold, today's Democratic leaders didn't want to make that mistake again. Many supported the Iraq war resolution and -- as the Big Muddy is rising yet again -- now find themselves tongue-tied or trying to trump a war president by calling for deployment of more troops. Thus does good money follow bad and bad politics get even worse.
Gravestones of fallen Americans at Arlington National Cemetery. (J. Scott Applewhite -- AP)
History will deal with George W. Bush and the neoconservatives who misled a mighty nation into a flawed war that is draining the finest military in the world, diverting Guard and reserve forces that should be on the front line of homeland defense, shredding international alliances that prevailed in two world wars and the Cold War, accumulating staggering deficits, misdirecting revenue from education to rebuilding Iraqi buildings we've blown up, and weakening America's national security.
But what will history say about an opposition party that stands silent while all this goes on?
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/23/AR2005082301178.html
Regime Change By Assassin? Easier Said Than Done.
By Lynne Duke
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, August 24, 2005; Page C01
So Pat Robertson, founder of the Christian Coalition, thinks the United States should assassinate Hugo Chavez, the Venezuelan president.
Let's see. What are our options? The 30-year-old Senate reports of the Church committee give us some options.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/23/AR2005082301406.html
Chicago Tribune
TV host puts U.S. in hot water
Pat Robertson's call to kill Venezuela's Hugo Chavez gives ammunition to critics in Latin America
By Gary Marx
Tribune foreign correspondent
Published August 24, 2005
HAVANA -- The already-icy relationship between the U.S. and Venezuela chilled further Tuesday in the wake of religious broadcaster Pat Robertson's suggestion that the United States assassinate President Hugo Chavez.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-0508240209aug24,1,6246337.story?coll=chi-news-hed
The New Zealand Herald
Green MP wants tighter export rules
Keith Locke
24.08.05 4.00pm
Green MP Keith Locke is calling for tighter control of exports to prevent New Zealand-made goods being used in weapons after revelations the Government is funding an Auckland company whose products go into smart bombs.
Rakon manufactures quartz crystals for United States company Rockwell to use at the heart of Global Positioning System (GPS) units in smart bombs.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=1&ObjectID=10342250
London bombers triggered blasts by hand says paper
24.08.05 4.00pm
LONDON - Four suicide bombers who killed 52 people in attacks on London's transport network on July 7 triggered the blasts by hand rather than by mobile phones as previously suggested, a British newspaper reported.
The Guardian, citing unidentified senior police and anti-terrorism sources for its information, said the four British Muslims who blew themselves up on three trains and a bus used "button-like" devices to set off the bombs.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10342269
Cricket: Vincent's 172 leads NZ to victory in Zimbabwe
25.08.05 12.30am
Lou Vincent cracked the highest one-day cricket innings by a New Zealand batsman as his team plundered 397 for five against Zimbabwe in the tri-series opener in Bulawayo today.
Vincent's stunning 172 led New Zealand to their highest total -- scored off just 44 overs after the match was reduced due to a damp pitch.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=4&ObjectID=10342383
Scientists near to growing human lungs in laboratory
24.08.05 1.00pm
By Steve Connor
The prospect of growing a set of human lungs in the laboratory for transplant surgery has come a step closer with the successful growth of mature lung cells from embryonic tissue.
British scientists announced yesterday that they have been able to stimulate stem cells from a human embryo to develop in a test tube into some of the highly specialised cells of the lungs.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=5&ObjectID=10342247
Planes fly into restricted zone at Bush resort
24.08.05 3.20pm
DONNELLY, Idaho - In separate incidents, two small planes wandered into restricted air space over the Idaho resort where United States president George W Bush is staying, but he was never in danger, the White House said.
The planes committed a "minor violation of temporary flight restrictions" put in place to protect the president, White House spokesman Trent Duffy told reporters.
"The president was never in any danger and the systems designed to protect him worked effectively," Duffy said.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10342267
Bush to meet with China's Hu at White House
24.08.05 1.00pm
WASHINGTON - United States president George W Bush will host Chinese president Hu Jintao on September 7, a visit that caps months of rising trade friction as well as growing co-operation on stopping North Korea's nuclear arms ambitions.
Bush and Hu will discuss "the full range of issues on the US-China agenda and continuing to build a candid, constructive and co-operative bilateral relationship," the White House said on Tuesday in Idaho, where Bush is holidaying.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10342252
Sunnis call new Iraqi constitution a 'betrayal'
24.08.05
By Kim Sengupta
Iraq's new constitution, supposedly the blueprint for a democratic future, is threatening to plunge the country into a brutal civil war.
As Shiites and Kurds presented the draft to the National Assembly, Sunnis bitterly opposed to its federal structure talked of "betrayal" and warned of a violent backlash.
The constitution is the principal plank of President George W. Bush's exit strategy from the Iraq conflict, which has made his popularity among American voters plummet.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10342176
Europe battles extreme weather on two fronts
A forest fire burns near Vila Flor in Miranda Do Corvo, near Coimbra in central Portugal. Picture / Reuters
24.08.05 4.00pm
By Elizabeth Nash and Tony Paterson
Europe is battling extreme weather on two fronts, with at least five people reported killed by storms in Austria and Switzerland, while 16 have been killed this year in scores of fires raging in Portugal.
Hundreds of towns and villages were cut off from the outside world yesterday as fierce flooding and torrential rain continued to sweep through Austria, Switzerland and southern Germany.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10342270
continued ...
Wave of Marine Species Extinctions Feared
By Juliet Eilperin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, August 24, 2005; Page A01
BIMINI, Bahamas -- The bulldozers moved slowly at first. Picking up speed, they pressed forward into a patch of dense mangrove trees that buckled and splintered like twigs. As the machines moved on, the pieces drifted out to sea.
Sitting in a small motorboat a few hundred yards offshore on a mid-July afternoon, Samuel H. Gruber -- a University of Miami professor who has devoted more than two decades to studying the lemon sharks that breed here -- plunged into despondency. The mangroves being ripped up to build a new resort provide food and protection that the sharks can't get in the open ocean, and Gruber fears the worst.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/22/AR2005082200036.html
Japanese House-Sitter Robot Hits Stores
By HIROKO TABUCHI
The Associated Press
Tuesday, August 23, 2005; 9:13 PM
TOKYO -- Worried about leaving your house empty while you go on vacation? Japan has the answer: a house-sitter robot armed with a digital camera, infrared sensors and a videophone.
Stores across Japan started taking orders on Thursday for the Roborior _ a watermelon-sized eyeball on wheels that glows purple, blue and orange _ continuing the country's love affair with gadgets.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/23/AR2005082300216.html
Google to Launch IM Service
Move Steps Up Competition Among Internet Chat Programs
By Yuki Noguchi
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, August 24, 2005; Page D01
Instant messaging, a type of communication long dominated by chatty teens, has become the latest front in an escalating war among big Internet companies competing to make themselves indispensable to mainstream audiences.
Google Inc. plans to enter the fray today by launching Google Talk, its own version of a service that allows registered users to send instant messages or talk over the Web to other users.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/23/AR2005082301588.html
Confidence In Military News Wanes
By Josh White
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, August 24, 2005; Page A04
The U.S. public's confidence that the military and the media keep them informed about national security issues has eroded significantly over the past six years, according to a new poll that shows 60 percent of Americans believe they do not get enough information about military matters to make educated decisions.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/23/AR2005082301290.html
Constitution on the Brink
Wednesday, August 24, 2005; Page A14
WHILE TALKS over the Iraqi constitution continue in Baghdad, the results so far can only be worrisome for those who hoped the process would help consolidate a new democratic political order and alleviate the Sunni insurgency. The completion of a constitution in the coming days would keep Iraq on track toward holding elections and forming a permanent government by early next year, a timetable the Bush administration has made an overriding priority. Yet both the means adopted to complete the draft and some of the language reported to be in the document risk exacerbating the divide between Iraq's majority Shiite and Kurd communities and the minority Sunnis, thereby adding fuel to the insurgency. Iraqis and U.S. officials need to make good use of the brief time between now and the scheduled meeting of the National Assembly tomorrow if that outcome is to be avoided.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/23/AR2005082301374.html
Chinese Detainees Are Men Without a Country
15 Muslims, Cleared of Terrorism Charges, Remain at Guantanamo With Nowhere to Go
By Robin Wright
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, August 24, 2005; Page A01
In late 2003, the Pentagon quietly decided that 15 Chinese Muslims detained at the military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, could be released. Five were people who were in the wrong place at the wrong time, some of them picked up by Pakistani bounty hunters for U.S. payoffs. The other 10 were deemed low-risk detainees whose enemy was China's communist government -- not the United States, according to senior U.S. officials.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/23/AR2005082301362.html
In Iraq Jail, Resistance Goes Underground
Escape Tunnel, Improvised Weapons Showcase Determination of Inmates
By Steve Fainaru and Anthony Shadid
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, August 24, 2005; Page A01
CAMP BUCCA, Iraq -- In the darkest hours before dawn, groups of 10 detainees toiled 15 feet beneath Compound 5 of America's largest prison in Iraq. The men worked in five-minute shifts, digging with shovels fashioned from tent poles and hauling the dirt to the surface with five-gallon water jugs tethered to 200 feet of rope. They bagged it in sacks that had been used to deliver their bread rations and spread it surreptitiously across a soccer field where fellow inmates churned it during daily matches, guards and detainees recalled.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/23/AR2005082301525.html
3 Dead, 10 Hurt in Iraq Police Attacks
The Associated Press
Wednesday, August 24, 2005; 8:19 AM
BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Insurgents attacked Iraqi police patrols Wednesday in western Baghdad with three car bombs and small arms fire, killing at least three people and wounding 10, police said.
Two of the car bombs were piloted by suicide drivers near the western neighborhood of Khadra, police Capt. Taleb Thamer said. He said three civilians were killed and 10 people, including three policemen, were wounded.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/24/AR2005082400416.html
Warner: Defense Closures 'Rigged'
D.C. Area Jobs Long Targeted, Senator Asserts
By Spencer S. Hsu
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, August 24, 2005; Page A01
Virginia Sen. John W. Warner (R) said that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and a senior aide improperly manipulated the national base realignment plan announced earlier this year to compel the movement of more than 20,000 defense jobs away from the Washington area.
Two years before the Pentagon revealed its base closing plan May 13, in a stream of memos and internal records, top department officials were saying that "thinning of headquarters in the National Capital Region remains a[n] objective," according to Warner.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/23/AR2005082301537.html
Who Will Say 'No More'?
By Gary Hart
Wednesday, August 24, 2005; Page A15
"Waist deep in the Big Muddy and the big fool said to push on," warned an anti-Vietnam war song those many years ago. The McGovern presidential campaign, in those days, which I know something about, is widely viewed as a cause for the decline of the Democratic Party, a gateway through which a new conservative era entered.
Like the cat that jumped on a hot stove and thereafter wouldn't jump on any stove, hot or cold, today's Democratic leaders didn't want to make that mistake again. Many supported the Iraq war resolution and -- as the Big Muddy is rising yet again -- now find themselves tongue-tied or trying to trump a war president by calling for deployment of more troops. Thus does good money follow bad and bad politics get even worse.
Gravestones of fallen Americans at Arlington National Cemetery. (J. Scott Applewhite -- AP)
History will deal with George W. Bush and the neoconservatives who misled a mighty nation into a flawed war that is draining the finest military in the world, diverting Guard and reserve forces that should be on the front line of homeland defense, shredding international alliances that prevailed in two world wars and the Cold War, accumulating staggering deficits, misdirecting revenue from education to rebuilding Iraqi buildings we've blown up, and weakening America's national security.
But what will history say about an opposition party that stands silent while all this goes on?
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/23/AR2005082301178.html
Regime Change By Assassin? Easier Said Than Done.
By Lynne Duke
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, August 24, 2005; Page C01
So Pat Robertson, founder of the Christian Coalition, thinks the United States should assassinate Hugo Chavez, the Venezuelan president.
Let's see. What are our options? The 30-year-old Senate reports of the Church committee give us some options.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/23/AR2005082301406.html
Chicago Tribune
TV host puts U.S. in hot water
Pat Robertson's call to kill Venezuela's Hugo Chavez gives ammunition to critics in Latin America
By Gary Marx
Tribune foreign correspondent
Published August 24, 2005
HAVANA -- The already-icy relationship between the U.S. and Venezuela chilled further Tuesday in the wake of religious broadcaster Pat Robertson's suggestion that the United States assassinate President Hugo Chavez.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-0508240209aug24,1,6246337.story?coll=chi-news-hed
The New Zealand Herald
Green MP wants tighter export rules
Keith Locke
24.08.05 4.00pm
Green MP Keith Locke is calling for tighter control of exports to prevent New Zealand-made goods being used in weapons after revelations the Government is funding an Auckland company whose products go into smart bombs.
Rakon manufactures quartz crystals for United States company Rockwell to use at the heart of Global Positioning System (GPS) units in smart bombs.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=1&ObjectID=10342250
London bombers triggered blasts by hand says paper
24.08.05 4.00pm
LONDON - Four suicide bombers who killed 52 people in attacks on London's transport network on July 7 triggered the blasts by hand rather than by mobile phones as previously suggested, a British newspaper reported.
The Guardian, citing unidentified senior police and anti-terrorism sources for its information, said the four British Muslims who blew themselves up on three trains and a bus used "button-like" devices to set off the bombs.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10342269
Cricket: Vincent's 172 leads NZ to victory in Zimbabwe
25.08.05 12.30am
Lou Vincent cracked the highest one-day cricket innings by a New Zealand batsman as his team plundered 397 for five against Zimbabwe in the tri-series opener in Bulawayo today.
Vincent's stunning 172 led New Zealand to their highest total -- scored off just 44 overs after the match was reduced due to a damp pitch.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=4&ObjectID=10342383
Scientists near to growing human lungs in laboratory
24.08.05 1.00pm
By Steve Connor
The prospect of growing a set of human lungs in the laboratory for transplant surgery has come a step closer with the successful growth of mature lung cells from embryonic tissue.
British scientists announced yesterday that they have been able to stimulate stem cells from a human embryo to develop in a test tube into some of the highly specialised cells of the lungs.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=5&ObjectID=10342247
Planes fly into restricted zone at Bush resort
24.08.05 3.20pm
DONNELLY, Idaho - In separate incidents, two small planes wandered into restricted air space over the Idaho resort where United States president George W Bush is staying, but he was never in danger, the White House said.
The planes committed a "minor violation of temporary flight restrictions" put in place to protect the president, White House spokesman Trent Duffy told reporters.
"The president was never in any danger and the systems designed to protect him worked effectively," Duffy said.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10342267
Bush to meet with China's Hu at White House
24.08.05 1.00pm
WASHINGTON - United States president George W Bush will host Chinese president Hu Jintao on September 7, a visit that caps months of rising trade friction as well as growing co-operation on stopping North Korea's nuclear arms ambitions.
Bush and Hu will discuss "the full range of issues on the US-China agenda and continuing to build a candid, constructive and co-operative bilateral relationship," the White House said on Tuesday in Idaho, where Bush is holidaying.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10342252
Sunnis call new Iraqi constitution a 'betrayal'
24.08.05
By Kim Sengupta
Iraq's new constitution, supposedly the blueprint for a democratic future, is threatening to plunge the country into a brutal civil war.
As Shiites and Kurds presented the draft to the National Assembly, Sunnis bitterly opposed to its federal structure talked of "betrayal" and warned of a violent backlash.
The constitution is the principal plank of President George W. Bush's exit strategy from the Iraq conflict, which has made his popularity among American voters plummet.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10342176
Europe battles extreme weather on two fronts
A forest fire burns near Vila Flor in Miranda Do Corvo, near Coimbra in central Portugal. Picture / Reuters
24.08.05 4.00pm
By Elizabeth Nash and Tony Paterson
Europe is battling extreme weather on two fronts, with at least five people reported killed by storms in Austria and Switzerland, while 16 have been killed this year in scores of fires raging in Portugal.
Hundreds of towns and villages were cut off from the outside world yesterday as fierce flooding and torrential rain continued to sweep through Austria, Switzerland and southern Germany.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/index.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10342270
continued ...
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