New voter registration laws leave thousands off the rolls

USA TODAY
New voter registration laws leave thousands off the rolls
By Richard Wolf, USA TODAY

WASHINGTON — Some of this year's elections could be decided by those who can't vote.

Across the country, new laws restricting who can register and vote have reduced the number of people who are eligible. Some of those laws have been blocked in court. Even so, critics say, the damage has been done:

•In Arizona, about 21,000 voter registration applications were rejected because of inadequate proof of citizenship, required under a 2004 law. Most who were affected lacked up-to-date driver's licenses, birth certificates or passports.

A federal appellate court blocked enforcement of the law — which also requires voters to show ID at the polls — last week, four days before the registration deadline. "We're looking at an enormous disparate impact on people of color," says Linda Brown, executive director of the Arizona Advocacy Network.

•In Florida, a law setting up new requirements for independent groups that register voters prompted the League of Women Voters to suspend registration drives for five months until a court intervened. In that period, the league could have registered thousands of people, The registration deadline is Tuesday. "You've just got to assume it's going to have an impact," says Dianne Wheatley-Giliotti, the league's state president.

•In Ohio, a law that made paid workers liable for the validity of the registrations they collect caused several groups to stop signing up voters for two months this summer. By the time courts intervened, the opportunity had been lost for thousands of registrations.

The group ACORN, which advocates for low-income families, wanted to sign up 138,000 Ohioans this year; now it will settle for 100,000. "Those were really the critical months," head organizer Katy Gall says. "In past years, we've met or exceeded our goals."

Advocates of registration and photo identification laws say they are needed to prevent fraud. They say the rules apply to all potential voters, regardless of race, ethnicity, income or ideology. "This is a matter of voter confidence, whether or not the fraud is real or perceived," says Indiana Secretary of State Todd Rokita, whose state has one of the nation's strictest ID requirements.

Laws tightening the rules on registrations also have been passed in Colorado, Georgia, Maryland, Missouri, New Mexico and Washington. Laws imposing photo ID requirements at the polls were passed in Georgia and Missouri, but courts have intervened.

Paul DeGregorio, chairman of the Election Assistance Commission, says the laws should not discourage citizens from voting. Far worse, he says, would be for states to ignore problems that cause Americans to distrust the process.

Wendy Weiser of the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law disagrees. "All of them will have an impact in suppressing votes," she says. "Even when courts have overturned them, they have ongoing impact."



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Bush's 'Axis of Evil' Comes Back to Haunt United States

washingtonpost.com
Bush's 'Axis of Evil' Comes Back to Haunt United States
By Glenn Kessler and Peter Baker
Washington Post Staff Writers

Nearly five years after President Bush introduced the concept of an "axis of evil" comprising Iraq, Iran and North Korea, the administration has reached a crisis point with each nation: North Korea has claimed it conducted its first nuclear test, Iran refuses to halt its uranium-enrichment program, and Iraq appears to be tipping into a civil war 3 1/2 years after the U.S.-led invasion.

Each problem appears to feed on the others, making the stakes higher and requiring Bush and his advisers to make difficult calculations, analysts and U.S. officials said. The deteriorating situation in Iraq has undermined U.S. diplomatic credibility and limited the administration's military options, making rogue countries increasingly confident that they can act without serious consequences. Iran, meanwhile, will be watching closely the diplomatic fallout from North Korea's apparent test as a clue to how far it might go with its own nuclear program.

"Iran will follow very carefully what happens in the U.N. Security Council after the North Korean test," said Robert J. Einhorn, senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). "If the United Nations is not able to act forcefully, then Iran will think the path is clear to act with impunity."

Michael E. O'Hanlon, a Brookings Institution scholar and co-author of the new book "Hard Power: The New Politics of National Security," said the U.S. response to North Korea will have ripple effects. "Iran will certainly watch what happens. North Korea watched what happened with Pakistan and decided that the world didn't punish Pakistan too hard or too long," he said. "Iran will certainly notice if North Korea gets treated with kid gloves."

Political strategists debated the domestic implications of the North Korean test with midterm elections four weeks away. Some Republicans predicted it would take the focus off the Mark Foley congressional page scandal and remind voters that it is a dangerous world best confronted by tough-minded leaders. Some Democrats argued it would be seen as another failure of Bush's foreign policy and moved quickly to try to pin blame on the Republicans. "Is this going to help Republicans?" asked Jim Manley, spokesman for Senate Minority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.). "The answer to that is absolutely not. This is another significant foreign policy failure for the administration."

In Bush's 2002 State of the Union address, a speech designed to shift the political debate from a battle against al-Qaeda to a possible confrontation with Iraq, the president mentioned North Korea, Iraq and Iran and declared: "States like these, and their terrorist allies, constitute an axis of evil, arming to threaten the peace of the world. By seeking weapons of mass destruction, these regimes pose a grave and growing danger. . . . In any of these cases, the price of indifference would be catastrophic."

All three issues came to a head in 2003: The United States invaded Iraq and discovered no weapons of mass destruction; North Korea began to obtain weapons-grade plutonium from fuel rods that had been under international observation; and Iran disclosed that it had made rapid progress with a previously secret uranium-enrichment program.

In contrast to its handling of Iraq, the administration has tried to resolve the North Korean and Iranian nuclear breakouts with diplomacy. But progress has been slow, in part because the United States has been reluctant to hold bilateral talks with either country except within the context of broader talks with other nations.

Former senator Sam Nunn (D-Ga.) faulted the administration for focusing on Iraq first, when greater threats loomed in North Korea and Iran. "We started with Iraq in the 'axis of evil' side, when we thought they did not yet have nuclear weapons, and that sent the signal to others that they better get them quick," he said. "I think we started on the wrong end of that."

The administration launched a full-court press yesterday at the Security Council, proposing elements of a tough resolution that would call for imposing an arms embargo and a series of legally binding U.N. financial and trade sanctions. The United States also called for international inspections of all trade in and out of North Korea to enforce the sanctions.

U.S. officials yesterday were focusing especially closely on the reaction of China, long North Korea's main benefactor. The Chinese government publicly denounced the test in unusually strong language, and a senior U.S. official said the private comments of Chinese officials were equally strong. While China has been reluctant to pressure North Korea, fearing a collapse of the government and mass refugees on its border, "the question is whether a chaotic North Korea is worse than a nuclear North Korea," the official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the diplomatic sensitivities.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice appears likely to make a trip to the region soon to further build support for a tough response by China, Japan and South Korea. Several experts predicted that although China's leadership is angry enough to support some sanctions, it always will stop short of putting enough pressure on Pyongyang to force its collapse. "Full-up sanctions I don't see happening," said former White House Asia expert Michael J. Green, now at CSIS.

James B. Steinberg, President Bill Clinton's deputy national security adviser and now dean of the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas at Austin, said the North Korea test will raise a larger question that echoes Ronald Reagan's most famous 1980 campaign line -- "With respect to the axis of evil," Steinberg said, "are you better off today than you were four years ago? . . . It's clear that the answer is we're worse off with respect to the nuclear proliferation problem in both North Korea and Iran than four to six years ago, and I would argue we're worse off in our overall security because of the situation in Iraq."

Staff writer Dafna Linzer contributed to this report.

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'Values' Decline As Issue In Ohio; Economic Woes Boost Democrats

washingtonpost.com
'Values' Decline As Issue In Ohio
Economic Woes Boost Democrats
By Michael A. Fletcher
Washington Post Staff Writer

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Two years ago, Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell was a driving force in the triumphant campaign for a state constitutional amendment to outlaw same-sex marriage. That helped cause a surge in turnout of "values voters," who helped deliver this pivotal state to President Bush's successful reelection effort.

As the Republican candidate for governor, Blackwell has been counting on values voters to do for him this year what they did for the party in 2004. But the culture wars are being eclipsed as a voting issue by economic worries and Republican scandals that have altered the political dynamic here in striking ways. Several polls find Blackwell trailing his Democratic opponent, five-term Rep. Ted Strickland, by double digits with less than four weeks to go until the Nov. 7 midterm elections.

The difficulty Blackwell is experiencing winning support for his socially conservative message reflects the anxiety evident this year among voters in Ohio and elsewhere, some pollsters say.

"It is harder to run on wedge issues when voters have huge concerns on their minds regarding war in Iraq, economic issues and a Congress they perceive as doing little," said Michael Bocian, a vice president at Greenberg Quinlan Rosner, a Democratic polling firm in Washington.

Strickland, 65, an ordained but non-practicing minister, has built his lead by speaking about the economic distress of this manufacturing state and by painting his opponent as a loyal soldier of a scandal-plagued Ohio Republican Party. At the same time, he is directly challenging Blackwell for values voters in ways that many analysts believe Democratic presidential nominee John F. Kerry did not two years ago.

"What I call the bread-and-butter issues probably are more prominently on the minds of people today than two years ago," Strickland said in an interview. "I think a lot of Ohioans are feeling economically insecure. Consequently, they are less willing to be distracted by issues that don't involve the economic security of their families."

His observation is borne out by a recent survey by the University of Cincinnati's Ohio Poll, which found that 63 percent of likely voters in the state are basing their choice of candidates on the "issues" rather than "character." The poll found that seven in 10 Strickland supporters were most concerned about "issues," including the economy and education; just over half of Blackwell supporters felt that way.

"Character can be everything from a voters' evaluation of a series of issues as a package, to notions as to whether they think a candidate agrees or disagrees with their values," said Eric W. Rademacher, co-director of the survey. Two years ago, exit polls found that "moral values" edged out the "economy and jobs" to top a list of concerns that Ohio voters said most influenced their Election Day choices. The exit polls found that at least a quarter of voters identified themselves as born-again Christians, and three-quarters of their votes went to Bush.

Leaders of the religious right here promised to build on that success to reshape Ohio's political landscape. They pledged to support candidates determined to "bring spiritual revival and moral reformation to the state," in the words of Reformation Ohio, an evangelical outreach effort.

No one better embodied that promise than Blackwell. An experienced and articulate politician, he is given to quoting Scripture on the campaign trail and is unambiguous about his opposition to abortion and same-sex marriage. "I don't know how many of you have a farming background, but I can tell you right now that notion even defies barnyard logic," Blackwell has said of same-sex marriage.

As in 2004, conservative religious leaders have been registering thousands of voters across the state, talking from the pulpit about the need to vote and leading rallies to drum up enthusiasm among values voters.

"Politicians in Ohio certainly are focusing more on economic issues, but our focus is on encouraging members of our church and the Center for Moral Clarity to support the candidates that best reflect their values on issues of righteousness and justice," said Rod Parsley, a Columbus televangelist. Parsley is pastor of World Harvest Church, which has 12,000 members, and leads Reformation Ohio and the Center for Moral Clarity, another outreach group.

Parsley, who faces an Internal Revenue Service investigation prompted by a complaint by a group of ideologically moderate ministers who allege he has crossed a line barring political advocacy from the pulpit, has not endorsed Blackwell. But he is quick to add: "I'm sure Ohioans will recall which candidates have stood with them in the past."

So far, it seems that the efforts of Parsley and other evangelical leaders are being overshadowed by this state's recent record of job losses and the resultant economic concern. The unemployment rate in Ohio is 5.7 percent -- a full point above the national figure. Meanwhile, the Ohio Poll found that 82 percent of Ohioans believe that the economy is in poor or fair shape, and two-thirds say things are getting worse.

For his part, Blackwell, 58, has offered a string of proposals that he says would revive Ohio's economy. He wants to do away with the graduated state income tax and implement a flat tax. He has proposed looking at ways to de-couple school financing from local property taxes and cap educational administrative costs, while allowing students greater freedom to attend schools of their choice. "I think the big issues in the campaign are jobs, education and health care and getting our economy growing again so we can break out of the growth deficit we've been in," Blackwell said.

John C. Green, a senior fellow at the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life and a professor at the University of Akron, said that in this campaign Blackwell's biggest problem has not been his policy ideas but his arch-conservative profile. "Ohio leans to the right. But he is way to the right, and some Republicans are quite unhappy with his relationship with religious conservatives," Green said.

Strickland has advocated greater investment in public schools and has targeted state support for growing sectors of the Ohio economy. Meanwhile, he has brandished his own socially conservative credentials, including his support of gun ownership. Although he told the Dayton Daily News that he is now an occasional churchgoer, Strickland touts his background as a minister.

"When you have a candidate who is pretty conservative in Strickland, that makes drawing distinctions between the candidates difficult," Bocian said. Republicans control every statewide office in Ohio and both chambers of the legislature, but, given the voter pessimism this year, that is proving to be a political disadvantage. Then there are the scandals that have ensnared two of the leading Republicans in the state: Gov. Bob Taft was convicted of illegally accepting gifts, and Rep. Robert W. Ney admitted taking bribes in the Abramoff scandal and is not seeking reelection.

Through the years, Blackwell has worked to cultivate an image of independence, opposing state tax increases and supporting the ban on same-sex marriage, which both Taft and Sen. Mike DeWine (R) opposed. Blackwell, an African American, served as state treasurer, mayor of Cincinnati and a deputy secretary of the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development before being elected Ohio's secretary of state in 1998. He was in charge of the problem-plagued 2004 election in Ohio, an issue of particular importance to some black voters who felt disenfranchised. But through multiple recounts and lawsuits, Blackwell has been cleared of playing a role in any irregularities.

He says that his support of values issues involves not just opposing same-sex marriage and abortion but also ensuring that the poor receive health care and educational opportunities -- positions he said are warmly received by black audiences. Also, as the campaign winds toward Election Day, Blackwell said he plans to close ground by sharpening his attacks on Strickland's record as a congressman, which earned him a ranking as one of the least influential members of the House from the nonpartisan Web site Congress.org.

Meanwhile, Strickland plans to challenge Blackwell among his base of values voters. During a recent debate, Strickland talked about how his community and church helped him become the first member of his family to go to college. Then he reminded the audience of another stop in his career path: "I've been able to be a minister in the United Methodist Church."

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Court Rejects Companion Case to Roe V. Wade Seeking to Reverse Abortion Ruling

ABC News
Court Rejects Roe V. Wade Companion Case
Court Rejects Companion Case to Roe V. Wade Seeking to Reverse Abortion Ruling
The Associated Press

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court on Tuesday turned aside the case of Sandra Cano, one of the women behind the legalization of abortion, who had sought to reverse the victory she won 33 years ago.

Cano says she never wanted an abortion and that her difficult early life resulted in her becoming the anonymous plaintiff in Doe v. Bolton, the lesser-known case which the justices ruled on the same day in 1973 as the landmark Roe v. Wade.

"We're very disappointed that the Supreme Court has not decided to protect women and children from the harm of abortion," said Allan Parker, one of Cano's attorneys. "The court has aborted the normal regulation of medicine in this area."

Cano says she was a 22-year-old victim of an abusive husband and that her children were in foster care when she sought legal assistance in getting a divorce and in getting her children back.

She said an aggressive attorney pushed her into the abortion case.

"What I received was something I never requested the legal right to abort my child," Cano said in an affidavit six years ago.

Her current lawyers' legal brief says that despite advances in medicine, science and technology, the justices have "frozen abortion law based on obsolete 1973 assumptions and prevented the normal regulation of the practice of medicine."

The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in January that neither it nor a U.S. District Court had the authority to reverse the Supreme Court's decisions in Doe v. Bolton or Roe v. Wade.

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As Election Nears, Groups Plan Negative Ads

The New York Times
As Election Nears, Groups Plan Negative Ads
By JOHN BRODER

WASHINGTON, Oct. 10 — A previously unknown group led by a Republican political consultant in Houston is financing television advertisements against nine Democratic House candidates from North Carolina to Arizona.

The group, Americans for Honesty on Issues, is spending more than $1 million on the advertisements, which accuse Democratic candidates of carpetbagging, coddling illegal immigrants, being soft on crime and advocating cutting off money for troops in Iraq.

The television spots appear to be the first wave of a boatload of negative political advertising that will appear in the weeks before the Nov. 7 election. Many of the advertisements will be produced by independent organizations known as 527 groups, after the provision in the tax code that allows such groups to spend virtually unlimited sums on political activity as long as it is not formally coordinated with parties or candidates.

The 527 groups had raised nearly $200 million as of June 30, much of which appears to be available to be spent on pre-election activities. And if past trends hold, the total raised and spent by the groups on this election will surpass $300 million, eclipsing the $258 million spent by such groups in the last midterm election, in 2002.

The increase is striking because the campaign finance law enacted in 2002 now forbids federal elected officials and candidates from operating their own 527 groups. In 2002, committees maintained by such officials raised about a third of the total dollars for the groups.

The leader of Americans for Honesty on Issues is Sue Walden, a close ally of Tom DeLay, the former House majority leader who left Congress amid questions on ethics and fund-raising. Ms. Walden has also raised money for President Bush and served as an adviser to Kenneth L. Lay, the former chief executive of Enron who died in July.

She referred a call seeking comment to Glenn M. Willard, a lawyer with Patton Boggs in Washington, who drew up the papers establishing the organization. Mr. Willard confirmed that Ms. Walden was the nominal head of the committee, but he declined to identify the group’s donors or say how much it planned to spend.

The group’s Web site does not give an address or phone number, nor does it list any of the officers or sponsors. It says only, “Americans for Honesty on Issues is organized to engage in political issue communications in compliance with federal and state laws.”

Democrats, generously financed by labor unions and rich individuals like George Soros, dominated the 527 field in the presidential election of 2004, when such groups raised and spent more than $650 million. But Democratic groups have been relatively quiet this year, in part because big donors like Mr. Soros are giving much less money.

One Democratic 527 group, Majority Action, announced this week that it would run advertisements in four Congressional districts criticizing incumbent Republican House members for voting against federal financing for stem cell research.

The advertisements will focus on Representatives Chris Chocola of Indiana, Thelma Drake of Virginia, Don Sherwood of Pennsylvania and James T. Walsh of New York.

Total spending on the 60-second advertisements will be about $500,000, said Bill Buck, spokesman for Majority Action. The group’s founders include Joe Andrew and Don Fowler, former chairmen of the Democratic National Committee.

Another Democratic 527 organization, the September Group, founded by the longtime party operative Harold M. Ickes, is planning a late burst of anti-Republican spending, said Howard Wolfson, a political consultant working with the group. But Mr. Wolfson would not say how much money the group had raised nor how it intended to spend it.

Emily’s List, which supports Democratic candidates at the state and federal level, reported raising $3 million and spending nearly $2 million from July through September. Among its major donors are Linda Pritzker, a member of the family that owns the Hyatt hotel chain; Alida Messinger, a Rockefeller; Lee Fikes, a Texas oilman; and Mr. Soros.

Among the most active Republican 527 groups is the Economic Freedom Fund, which was formed this year and received a $5 million contribution from Bob J. Perry, a major Bush donor and an underwriter of the Swift boat veterans group in 2004. The fund is running advertisements on behalf of Republican candidates in Georgia, Indiana, Iowa, Oregon and West Virginia.

Aron Pilhofer and Kitty Bennett contributed research.

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Lamont Uses Lieberman In Ad

courant.com
Lamont Uses Lieberman In Ad
By MARK PAZNIOKAS
Courant Staff Writer

Ned Lamont is trying to coax the ghost of campaigns past to haunt the present campaign of Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman.

In a new Lamont ad scheduled to air today, challenger Joe Lieberman of 1988 seems to be making a case to reject the 18-year incumbent Lieberman of 2006.

"After 18 years, it's time for somebody new," Lieberman says in the Lamont ad. "It's time for a change."

The video is from 1988, when Lieberman's hair was longer and darker - and he was challenging Sen. Lowell P. Weicker Jr., then an 18-year incumbent under fire for missed Senate votes.

The new ad is one of a series planned by the Lamont campaign using Lieberman's own words and image. The first spot contrasts clips of Lieberman criticizing Weicker in 1988 with facts about Lieberman's present-day record.

"In this campaign I promise you I will not miss more than 300 votes," Lieberman says. On screen flashes a slide that says, "The Fact: Joe Lieberman has skipped more than 418 votes."

See the ad here.

By echoing the Lieberman of 1988, the Lamont campaign is trying to blunt Lieberman's charge that Lamont's campaign is unusually negative.

It was a charge Lieberman's spokesman, Dan Gerstein, repeated Monday.

"In this case, all Ned is showing is his own desperation and hypocrisy," Gerstein said. "The fact is Joe Lieberman has a 93 percent career voting record over his 18 years in the Senate, which is the same exact percentage as Ned Lamont compiled during his six years on a Greenwich town board."

In 1988, Lieberman attacked Weicker for missing hundreds of votes, sometimes because Weicker was absent giving speeches for fees.

This year, Lamont has criticized Lieberman for missing hundreds of votes, many taken while he was running for president and vice president.

"I think this shows that Joe is a typical politician, and he will say or do anything to stay in Washington," said Tom Swan, manager of the Lamont campaign.

Lieberman is running as a petitioning candidate after losing the Democratic nomination to Lamont in a primary that focused on the war in Iraq.

Lamont, 52, is a successful cable television entrepreneur seeking statewide office for the first time. Lieberman, 64, has held state or federal office for all but two of the past 36 years.

The two main rivals have ignored three other candidates in the race: Alan Schlesinger of the Republican Party, Ralph Ferrucci of the Green Party and Timothy Knibbs of the Concerned Citizens.

Lieberman is currently airing a commercial that begins as a testimonial to his experience: A man in Groton talks about the role Lieberman played saving the submarine base in 2005.

"When Joe Lieberman helped save this sub base, he saved this whole town," the man says.

But the piece quickly transforms into an attack on Lamont, quoting another resident to reinforce a Lieberman talking point: "Lamont doesn't have the experience or the clout."

"He is trying to have his negatives be more subtle, but they're still negative and just like everything else, he tries to distort and hide his real record," Swan said.

His commercial portrays Lieberman as a savior of the sub base. The base had been slated for closure by the Pentagon, but the decision was overturned by the Base Realignment and Closure Commission. Republican Gov. M. Jodi Rell and U.S. Rep. Rob Simmons, R-2nd District, also are touting in campaign ads their role in saving the base.

But Swan said the good feelings about saving the base obscure the steady erosion of jobs in the 18 years Lieberman has represented Connecticut in Washington.

"Half of our defense and 40 percent of our manufacturing jobs have been lost since he was elected U.S. senator," Swan said.

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At Least 37 U.S. Troops killed in Iraq since the start of October

Reuters
Three U.S. Marines killed in western Iraq

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Three U.S. Marines were killed in action in Anbar province in western Iraq on Monday, the U.S. military said in a statement on Wednesday.

Anbar is the heartland of the Sunni insurgency against Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's Shi'ite-led government and U.S. forces. It is the deadliest area in Iraq for U.S. soldiers.

The deaths of the three soldiers brought to at least 37 the number of U.S. troops killed in Iraq since the start of October.

The U.S. military said on Tuesday it killed seven insurgents in an air strike on a building in Ramadi, capital of Anbar, after U.S. troops came under "extremely heavy fire".

Three U.S. soldiers were killed in Anbar on Sunday.

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Hastert says those who hid scandal must go

Reuters
Hastert says those who hid scandal must go

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Republican head of the U.S. House of Representatives said on Tuesday anyone who covered up a growing Internet sex scandal on Capitol Hill should step down.

House Speaker Dennis Hastert made the comment as Rep. Jim Kolbe of Arizona, Congress' only openly gay Republican, confirmed he was told six years ago of inappropriate Internet messages from former Republican Rep. Mark Foley to a young male former House aide.

Kolbe said he passed the information on to the House office that supervises the page program, in which high school students spend time in Washington as junior congressional assistants.

"This was done promptly," Kolbe said in a statement. "I did not have a personal conversation with Mr. Foley about the matter. I assume e-mail contacts ceased since the former page never raised the issue again with my office."

Republican House leaders have said they only recently became aware of the illicit side of the case when Foley resigned from his Florida district seat last late month.

The scandal involving Foley's lewd computer messages is undermining Republican efforts to retain control of Congress in the November 7 elections.

Hastert's handling of the case has come under fire and there have been calls for his resignation. His own staff has been closely scrutinized amid the finger-pointing within the party's ranks about who knew what, when they learned about it, and what -- if anything -- they did.

"If anybody's found to have hidden information or covered up information, they really should be gone," Hastert told reporters in his Illinois district.

A former chief of staff for Foley said last week that he first advised Hastert's office of the Florida congressman's troublesome behavior three years ago. Hastert's chief of staff has denied it.

The House Ethics Committee last week began what it promised would be a wide-ranging investigation. The FBI and authorities in Foley's home state are also looking into it.

As the issue heated up Florida politics, the state's Democratic Party asked the state attorney general for copies of all of his office's records, e-mails and phone logs pertaining to Foley and Internet communications, dating back to 2003.

The public records request sought copies of such communications with the White House, Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, the National Republican Campaign Committee and various Republicans in Congress.

The Democrats asked state Attorney General Charlie Crist, a Republican gubernatorial candidate with a 10-point lead over his Democratic challenger, to produce all the records within one week or provide a written explanation why he did not.

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Lower Aptitude Standards Help U.S. Army Reach Recruiting Goal of 80,000

ABC News
Lower Standards Help Army Recruit More
Lower Aptitude Standards Help U.S. Army Reach Recruiting Goal of 80,000
By LOLITA C. BALDOR Associated Press Writer
The Associated Press

WASHINGTON - The U.S. Army recruited more than 2,600 soldiers under new lower aptitude standards this year, helping the service beat its goal of 80,000 recruits in the throes of an unpopular war and mounting casualties.

The recruiting mark comes a year after the Army missed its recruitment target by the widest margin since 1979, which had triggered a boost in the number of recruiters, increased bonuses, and changes in standards.

The Army recruited 80,635 soldiers, roughly 7,000 more than last year. Of those, about 70,000 were first-time recruits who had never served before.

According to statistics obtained by The Associated Press, 3.8 percent of the first-time recruits scored below certain aptitude levels. In previous years, the Army had allowed only 2 percent of its recruits to have low aptitude scores. That limit was increased last year to 4 percent, the maximum allowed by the Defense Department.

The Army said all the recruits with low scores had received high school diplomas. In a written statement, the Army said good test scores do not necessarily equate to quality soldiers. Test-taking ability, the Army said, does not measure loyalty, duty, honor, integrity or courage.

Daniel Goure, vice president of the Lexington Institute, a private research group, said there is a "fine balance between the need for a certain number of recruits and the standards you set."

"Tests don't tell you the answer to the most critical question for the Army, how will you do in combat?" Goure said. But, he added, accepting too many recruits with low test scores could increase training costs and leave technical jobs unfilled.

"The absolute key for the Army is a high-school diploma," Goure said.

About 17 percent of the first-time recruits, or about 13,600, were accepted under waivers for various medical, moral or criminal problems, including misdemeanor arrests or drunk driving. That is a slight increase from last year, the Army said.

Of those accepted under waivers, more than half were for "moral" reasons, mostly misdemeanor arrests. Thirty-eight percent were for medical reasons and 7 percent were drug and alcohol problems, including those who may have failed a drug test or acknowledged they had used drugs.

The Army said the waiver process recognizes that people can overcome past mistakes and become law abiding citizens.

Army Brig. Gen. Anthony A. Cucolo said that adding more recruiters enabled the Army to identify more recruits. "We got the right people in the field in the right places in the right numbers," said Cucolo, the chief spokesman for the Army.

About two-thirds of the recruits qualified for a bonus an average of $11,000 each. Some in highly valued specialties, such as special operations forces, can get up to $40,000 in extra cash.

The Army National Guard and the Army Reserve both fell slightly short of their recruiting goals. The Reserves recruited 25,378 of the targeted 25,500; and the Guard recruited 69,042 of the targeted 70,000.

Associated Press Writer Stephen Ohlemacher contributed to this report.

On the Net:

Defense Department: http://www.defenselink.mil

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Iraqi Vice President’s Brother Is Killed by Gunmen

The New York Times
Iraqi Vice President’s Brother Is Killed by Gunmen
By SABRINA TAVERNISE

BAGHDAD, Oct. 9 — Men wearing military police uniforms broke into the house of the brother of Iraq’s Sunni vice president on Monday, chased him onto a neighbor’s roof and shot him in the head, killing him, Iraqi authorities and witnesses said.

Amir al-Hashemi was the third sibling of Iraq’s vice president, Tariq al-Hashemi, to be killed since spring. His death underscored just how deeply Baghdad has sunk into lawlessness, particularly in its religiously mixed neighborhoods, and was reminiscent of the politically motivated assassinations that have plagued Iraq since the American invasion.

A bomb in a parked car exploded in a crowded market area in the predominantly Shiite neighborhood of Shaab at nightfall on Monday, killing at least 13 and wounding 46, a police official said. The attack was the first large bombing in the capital in almost a month, and brought the number of Iraqis killed in violence on Monday to 18.

In addition, Iraqi authorities said they found 57 bodies in eastern and western Baghdad.

The military on Monday announced the deaths of four American troops. One was killed by small arms fire in eastern Baghdad, and three marines died from wounds on Sunday in Anbar in western Iraq. The deaths brought the toll to more than 30 so far this month.

Killings of politicians have become grimly familiar, but Monday’s still stood out: The killers wore what looked like official uniforms, enabling them to surprise and overwhelm Mr. Hashemi’s guards. They then seized at least seven neighbors who witnessed the attack, including the neighbors’ children and an elderly bakery worker. As of Monday night, their whereabouts were still unknown.

Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki condemned the attack, saying it was the work of “blood stained terrorist hands,” and pledged that Iraqi security forces would track down the killers. But Sunni Arab politicians put the blame squarely on Mr. Maliki’s government, saying that slowness in weeding out militias from its security forces allowed it to happen.

“The government is not working serious to find a solution to the militias,” said Ayad al-Samarrai, a Sunni member of Parliament. “He was killed because he was a Sunni.”

In a food poisoning incident unusual even by the standards of current Iraqi mayhem, about 400 Iraqi policemen, most of them Shiite, became ill after a Ramadan dinner on Sunday night in the southern city of Numaniya, Iraqi authorities said. Reuters, citing an unidentified person at the police base, reported that seven officers had died, but a spokesman for the commander of Iraq’s armed forces disputed that account, saying only a few men were hospitalized and then released.

Iraqi authorities also disputed accounts of foul play, but the contractor who had provided the food was detained, along with several other suspects, whom Reuters identified as cooks.

Political leaders tend to be vocal over abuses by other sects, so the silence among Iraqi Shiites on Monday seemed to indicate that they did not consider the poisoning to be a sectarian attack.

The killing of Mr. Hashemi occurred early Monday morning in the troubled Sunni Arab neighborhood of Slekh, where a Kurdish legislator was assassinated just last week. The area is densely settled, with houses close together and a bakery nearby.

In interviews on Monday, five of Mr. Hashemy’s neighbors, four of whom said they saw part of the attack, provided an account. From 20 to 25 men uniformed men arrived in about eight sport utility vehicles. They surprised his guards and chased him onto the roof, and then to the roof of a neighbor, Abu Amar, residents said. It was there that the attackers shot him in the head, the witnesses said.

The men then seized two neighbors, their children, one of their wives and an elderly man, a baker, all of whom witnessed the attack. The men sounded like they were speaking Arabic with a foreign accent, residents said. After they took Mr. Hashemi’s guards, one was heard shouting to another, “go, go,” in English.

The use of police uniforms by militias has been the most crippling aspect to solving the militia violence, as it has destroyed Iraqis’ confidence in government forces.

Mr. Hashemi, most recently a lieutenant general, was the commander of Iraqi ground forces in a previous government under Hazem Shaalan, a former defense minister who had been accused of embezzling. Recently, he worked as an adviser to the Minister of Defense.

His brother, Tariq, is one of the country’s most influential Sunni Arab politicians and a central Sunni figure in the patchwork of ethnicities and sects that is Iraq’s government. Another one of his brother’s, Mahmoud, and a 61-year-old sister, Maysoon, were both killed in April.

The American military said a unit of Iraqi special forces had arrested a suspected bomb maker in Sadr City, a large Shiite district in eastern Baghdad. One man was killed, and five more were detained in the raid, the military said.

Saddam Hussein’s trial for genocide against the Kurds resumed on Monday in Baghdad after a two-week recess, with a Kurdish woman telling the court that her family had been buried alive, Reuters reported.

Reporting was contributed by Sahar Nageeb, Qais Mizher and Omar al-Neami.

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Sen. Allen's Shameless Stock Fraud

Huffington Post
Trey Ellis
Sen. Allen's Shameless Stock Fraud

So far the AP has only reported that Senator Allen has failed to tell Congress about his stock options in Xybernaut, a now bankrupt company that tried to make wearable computers. What the AP hasn't yet reported is that Xybernaut, where Senator Allen was on the board of directors, was an obvious stock fraud run by a notorious rogues gallery.

According to the Washington Post last year, "Criminal charges have been filed in New York against three men accused of defrauding investors out of $16.8 million in the sale of Xybernaut stock. The chief target of the 64-count federal indictment is John Marciano, a former Long Island stockbroker who was the chief executive of the brokerage firm that managed Xybernaut's initial public offering in 1996."

And he is hardly the only crook involved. Dr. Joseph D. Ben-Dak, Xybernaut's chief scientist was involved with another famous fraud, Turbodyne, and was even caught affixing fake U.N. seals on reports.

Someone needs to ask the Senator some tough questions about the company he keeps. How much did he know about these cheats, and when did he know it.

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Remember When "W" Stood for Women? Calling Mavis Leno...

Huffington Post
Deanne Stillman
Remember When "W" Stood for Women? Calling Mavis Leno...

The women of Iraq are under siege, raked with bullets for going to work, beaten for not wearing socks, kidnapped and not rescued if those who take them don't ask for ransom because it's assumed they've been raped and therefore deserve to be killed. Generally I steer clear of the overused word "shocking," but that's what the situation is, as this Observer article details.

Please read and circulate, and after that, call Mavis Leno. Sounds like a joke, but before the invasion of Afghanistan, she was the only person in the US lobbying on behalf of women under the Taliban, and she was having some success. Now, the Taliban-like crews in Iraq are sending women back to the Stone Age. What must Laura Bush think? And Karen Hughes, who campaigned for Bush in 04, using the "W stands for women" line to appeal to soccer moms? What about Condoleeza Rice? Can she sleep at night, knowing that she is not her sisters' keeper? And for that matter, in his heart of hearts, how about Dubya? I keep thinking of Karla Faye Tucker, the killer on Death Row in Texas, who pleaded for her life on the Larry King show when Bush was governor. "Please don't kill me," he mocked, pursing his lips in pretend desperation when a reporter asked what he thought about the interview.

The fact is, the President can't stand the sight of pain, unlike Bill Clinton, who felt everybody's except his wife's. If women in Iraq are now begging for their lives, the plea will not register on Pennsylvania Avenue. And even if it did, with the exception of Kurdish territory, the situation is now out of control.

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Congressional ethics probe casts wide net

Reuters
Congressional ethics probe casts wide net
By Thomas Ferraro and Richard Cowan

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A congressional probe into Republican ex-Rep. Mark Foley's unwanted advances on young male interns is also trying to determine if any other member of the U.S. House of Representatives demonstrated such behavior toward current or former teenage assistants.

The House Ethics committee investigating the cybersex scandal is asking House members to contact all young aides who worked for them to see if they had improper communication from the Florida lawmaker who resigned after sending inappropriate messages to underage boys, or from any other lawmaker.

The letter indicating a wide-ranging investigation was signed by leaders of the ethics committee and distributed to House members' offices over the weekend. A copy of the letter was obtained by Reuters on Monday.

Revelations of Foley's lurid Internet contacts with teenage boys have raised Democrats' hopes of winning control of the House and Senate from President George W. Bush's Republicans in the November 7 elections.

A Newsweek magazine poll found that 53 percent of those asked want Democrats to win control of Congress and 52 percent believe House Speaker Dennis Hastert, an Illinois Republican, covered up the Foley matter.

In another development, The Washington Post reported that Rep. Jim Kolbe of Arizona, the only openly gay Republican in Congress, knew six years ago about Foley's improper computer messages to teenage interns formally known as congressional pages. The newspaper reported that Kolbe confronted Foley at the time.

Neither Kolbe, who is retiring from his seat, nor his aides were available for comment.

Ron Bonjean, Hastert's spokesman, said: "All accusations are being referred to the Committee on Standards (ethics committee)."

Top House Republicans have said they learned of Foley's troublesome behavior late last year or early this year. But they also say they were unaware of his overtly sexual Internet messages until they were publicly disclosed last month, prompting Foley to resign.

WHAT AND WHEN?

The ethics committee's investigation is examining who knew what and when, and what they did about it.

The letter distributed to the 432 House members now in office was signed by House Ethics panel chairman Doc Hastings, a Washington Republican, and Howard Berman of California, the panel's senior Democrat.

It asked that "you contact current and former House Pages sponsored by your office for the purpose of learning whether any of those individuals had any inappropriate communications or interactions with former Representative Foley or any other member of the House."

The committee began an investigation last week, promising to finish within weeks.

Democrats have accused Republican leaders of a cover-up and putting partisan politics above the safety of the young aides who run errands for lawmakers.

Republicans deny the charges, yet have also engaged in internal finger-pointing and second-guessing.

Foley's former chief of staff, Kirk Fordham, said he first alerted Hastert's office about Foley's troublesome behavior three years ago. Hastert's office denies it.

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Republican knew of Foley messages in 2000: Post

Reuters
Republican knew of Foley messages in 2000: Post

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A Republican colleague of disgraced former Rep. Mark Foley knew of his sexually charged computer messages to teenage assistants as far back as 2000 and confronted him about them, the Washington Post reported on Monday.

A congressional page showed Arizona Republican Rep. Jim Kolbe inappropriate messages he had received from Foley six years ago, the Post reported.

The news indicates that Foley's sexually charged communications with pages were known to other lawmakers five years earlier than was previously acknowledged.

House Speaker Dennis Hastert, a Republican from Illinois who is facing calls to step down for his handling of the scandal, has suggested that congressional Republicans did not know of Foley's behavior until late 2005.

Foley, a Florida Republican, resigned on September 29 when inappropriate messages were made public.

An anonymous source told the Post that the messages shared with Kolbe were sexually explicit, but Kolbe's spokeswoman said that was not the case.

Spokeswoman Korenna Cline said "corrective action" had been taken but said she did not know whether Kolbe discussed the messages with anyone except Foley.

Kolbe, a former page himself, is retiring at the end of the year.

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Documents: CIA warned of plane bomb plot

Yahoo! News
Documents: CIA warned of plane bomb plot
By ANDREW O. SELSKY, Associated Press Writer

An anti-Castro militant now in a Texas jail warned the CIA months before the 1976 bombing of a Cuban airliner that fellow exiles were planning such an attack, according to a newly released U.S. government document.

The document shows that Luis Posada Carriles — who had worked for the CIA but was cut off by the agency earlier that year — was secretly telling the CIA that his fellow far-right Cuban exiles opposed to Fidel Castro's communist government were plotting to bring down a commercial jet.

The document does not say what the CIA did with Posada's tip. A CIA spokesman said he had no comment on Monday, a federal holiday.

The CIA had extensive contacts with anti-Castro militants and trained some of them, but has denied involvement in the bombing.

The documents were posted online Thursday by the National Security Archive, an independent research institute at George Washington University that seeks to declassify government files through the Freedom of Information Act.

The Cubana Airlines plane, on a flight from Venezuela to Cuba, blew up shortly after taking off from a stopover in Barbados on Oct. 6, 1976, killing all 73 aboard, including Cuba's Olympic fencing team.

The bombing remains an open wound in Cuba. Weeping relatives of the victims met in a Havana cemetery on Friday, the 30th anniversary of the bombing. They demanded that Posada — who is now 78 and in a Texas detention center on an immigration violation — be put on trial.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez is seeking the extradition of Posada, a naturalized Venezuelan who served as the country's counterintelligence chief. He accuses the U.S. government of protecting a terrorist.

The National Security Archive's Peter Kornbluh urged the U.S. government to tell everything it knows about Posada.

"Now is the time for the government to come clean on Posada's covert past and his involvement in international terrorism," Kornbluh said. "His victims, the public, and the courts have a right to know."

Separating deception from truth in the intelligence world is notoriously difficult, and the newly released documents contain mixed messages about Posada. Much remains murky.

In a report dated a month after the bombing, then FBI Director Clarence Kelly told Secretary of State Henry Kissinger that a confidential FBI source ascertained the bombing had been planned in Caracas by Posada, Venezuelan intelligence agency official Ricardo Morales Navarrete and Cuban exile Frank Castro, who is not related to the Cuban leader.

Two Venezuelan employees of Posada's private security agency were arrested in Trinidad the day after the bombing, and one of them — who said he had worked for the CIA — admitted the two had planted the bomb, documents posted by the National Security Archive show.

Posada trained with the CIA for the 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion and served in the U.S. Army in the early 1960s. In 1965, he allegedly plotted to overthrow the Guatemalan government and blow up a Soviet or Cuban freighter in Mexico, according to the FBI. In 1967, he moved to Venezuela, eventually leading its counterintelligence agency, and was running his own security firm in the mid-1970s.

In 1973, Posada was investigated by the CIA for allegedly smuggling cocaine, but was cleared after he convinced interrogators he was "guilty of only having the wrong kind of friends," a declassified document says. The same document says the CIA "formally terminated" its relationship with him on Feb. 13, 1976.

Yet Posada still contacted the agency.

"After 2/76 contacts with (deleted by censors) were at Posada's own initiative to volunteer information in exchange for assistance U.S. visa for self and family," said the document, an annotated list of still-secret records on Posada's CIA career that was marked "sanitized."

It tells how Posada contacted the CIA in February 1976 to describe an assassination plot by Orlando Bosch and Frank Castro, two fellow right-wing Cuban exiles, against leftist Andres Pascal Allende, the nephew of slain Chilean President Salvador Allende. Posada worried that his allies would discover he was giving up their secrets.

"Posada concerned that Bosch will blame Posada for leak of plans," the report says. Andres Allende was not assassinated, and it is unclear whether the Cuban exiles ever made an attempt on his life.

Then, four months later, Posada came back to tell of a sinister plot to blow up an airliner.

On June 22, 1976, "Posada again contacts (deleted by censor) reptd info concerning possible exile plans to blow up Cubana Airliner leaving Panama and requested visa assistacne," read the document, filled with typographical errors.

Shortly after, a bomb aboard a Cubana Airlines plane leaving Panama failed to detonate, and the following month, a bomb in a suitcase exploded before being loaded onto a Cubana plane leaving Jamaica, according to a confidential State Department memo previously posted by the National Security Archive.

The day after the Cubana Airlines flight was bombed near Barbados, the CIA tried unsuccessfully to contact Posada, according to the annotated list. Five days later, Posada was arrested in Venezuela. He denied involvement in the bombing and escaped from prison in 1985 before a civilian trial was completed.

Allegations that he masterminded mass murder did not keep U.S. covert operatives from hiring Posada again. Within months, he was delivering weapons to Nicaraguan Contra rebels in an illegal Reagan administration operation. Posada also acknowledged, and then denied, a role in Havana hotel bombings in 1997 that killed a tourist.

And in 2000, Posada was arrested for allegedly plotting to assassinate Castro during a summit in Panama. He was pardoned in 2004 by then Panamanian President Mireya Moscoso.

Posada was detained in Florida in May 2005 for entering the United States illegally. A U.S. immigration judge has ruled that he cannot be sent to Cuba or Venezuela, citing fears that he would be tortured.

__

On the Net:

National Security Archive: http://www.gwu.edu/nsarchiv/

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To Military Families of America: Jack Murtha Speaks for the Military and Deserves a Presidential Medal Of Freedom

Huffington Post
Brent Budowsky
To Military Families of America: Jack Murtha Speaks for the Military and Deserves a Presidential Medal Of Freedom

I consider these words the most important I have ever written on this site because of the enormous implications they suggest.

I know far more than I can say publicly, about what our commanders and our intel people really believe, because I was told things in confidence and unlike most in Washington I honor confidences.

I have posted what I know from public sources,
far more is emerging in the news today, and still more will be public soon.

I will add, that Jack Murtha was around when I worked for the Congressional Leadership, he would probably laugh if he reads this, but we always considered him a solid guy but a pain in the ass because of the number of times he supported President Reagan and Republicans in the House. At the whip meetings there was always a moment when someone would say: "OK, who wants to talk to Murtha?" Not many hands would be raised.

In Washington today there is a hard time in distinguishing between the truth and the lie. Lying is epidemic. But the good answer to the Big Lie is the Big Truth, and the Big Truth is this: Congressman Jack Murtha is a man of staggering honor and integrity, a man of enormous physical and moral courage, a United States Marine of the first order of magnitude and he speaks for the overwhelming majority of active duty American commanders who cannot speak publicly for themselves.

In a city of moral midgets, Jack Murtha is a giant. I repeat this for emphasis because it is the heart of the matter with Iraq today: if the active duty commanders in the Unites States Marine Corps, the United States Army, and our Guard and Reserves were permitted to say publicly what they believe privately, in my estimation at least 80% to 90% of them would say they fundamentally agree with Jack Murtha, and have time and time again been beaten down and disresepcted by civilians when they tried to turn in the policy in a Murtha-like direction.

Additionally, Jack Murtha has spent a lifetime speaking for and fighting for our troops. This is not new for Congressman Murtha, nor is it politics. This is in Jack Murtha's blood, in his personal history, in his life, in his heart, in his soul, in his spirit and in the depth of his being with a passion and honor that others in the Congress would do well to emulate.

Whether it was defying the Democratic Leaders often when I worked for the Leadership, or now defying the President and Secretary of Defense Jack Murtha always did what he believed was right and true, and always did what he believed was in the interests of our commanders and troops, and was always seen as their truest authentic voice in either the legislative or the executive branches.

When Jack Murtha opposes torture, he is speaking for them.

Jack Murtha leads the fight for body armor and the whole list of protections for our troops in combat, he is speaking for them, and he is fighting for them.

When Jacik Murtha leads the fight for new policies towards Iraq that would redeploy forces to places where they would be more effective and more safe at the same time, he is speaking for them, and fighting for them.

And the honest truth is, because the stakes are so high this truth must be told: when George W. Bush accuses Jack Murtha and others using various phrases, George W Bush is lying through his teeth, because he knows damn well what the commanders really think, and what the overwhelming majority of them think, is what Jack Murtha says, not what George W. Bush falsely claims they think.

Finally, for now, this is the truth:

George W. Bush knows that the policy is failing. He knows that the overwhelming majority of commanders believe the policy is failing.

He knows that the commanders want major changes in the policy.

He knows that Senator Warner speaks for the commanders as Jack Murtha speaks for the commanders, when they both state major changes are needed.

He knows that major changes in the policy are mandatory and inevitable yet the man who brags about being a wartime President is committing two historic sins that are unworthy of the Presidency, which are these:

He is lying about his political opponents such as Jack Murtha when he knows they speak and fight for commanders and troops, and;

George W. Bush is delaying the changes in the policy so he can use the issue for personal and partisan politics, while troops risk and give their lives today for the political benefit of a morally decayed Republican Party and a President who knows the policy must change, maneuvers the decision for political reasons, in a way that no commander in chief has ever done except Nixon and Kissinger in Vietnam.

If there is one man in America who deserves the Presidential Medal of Freedom it is not George Tenet, and not Paul Bremer, but Congressman Jack Murtha who stands like a tower of honor, in a Republican Congress of Shame.

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The Truth and Anna P.

Huffington Post
Jayne Lyn Stahl
The Truth and Anna P.

On Thursday, Bob Schieffer, renowned CBS newsman who has covered events in D.C. for more than three decades, said that he can't recall "a time when it's been more challenging for journalists." Schieffer was referring, of course, to the Bush administration's program of domestic surveillance, as well as a rash of frivolous grand jury subpoenas, over the past five years, coercing journalists to give up their confidential sources.

Schieffer is right. There is no way news of extraordinary rendition, secret prisons, and Abu Ghraib would reach our shores were it not for reporters. The press, in this country, has acted as the watchdog for governmental transgressions; indeed, were it not for two Washington Post reporters, Richard Nixon might not have been forced to resign.

Less than 36 hours after Bob Schieffer made the above remarks, alas, in Russia, a 48 year old celebrated investigative journalist, Anna Politkovskaya, who has been working copiously to expose the travesties of her government, under Alexander Putin, was shot dead in the elevator of her apartment building in Moscow. Ms. Politkovskaya had received nearly a dozen awards from human rights, and international journalist groups such as Reporters without Borders, over the years, for her ongoing exemplary work exposing, and documenting, the slaughter, torture, and harassment of innocent civilians by Russian soldiers in Chechnya. "People sometimes pay with their lives for saying out loud what they think," Ms. Politkovskyaya has been quoted as saying. (AP) Clearly, too, they pay the ultimate price for writing what they think as a book that she recently wrote which takes issue with Putin's campaign against "terror" in Chechnya, and reveals "widespread abuse of civilians by government troops" (AP) surely didn't win her any fans among Moscow's military elite.

Still, this was not the first attempt on the life of this 48 year old mother of two.

Back in 2004, she experienced symptoms of food poisoning after drinking tea during a Moscow flight to south Russia where she was covering a hostage crisis in a school. A few years before this incident, she reportedly received e-mail death threats seeking to avenge the reputation of a member of Russian law enforcement who she accused of torturing civilians. (AP) Still, nothing deterred her from her lifelong commitment to investigating, and exposing the travesties visited upon the Russian people by their government.

Anna P. was one of the few allowed into a theatre in Moscow held hostage by Chechen rebels, back in 2002, and she tried to negotiate with the militants. The fact that many of those who were in the theatre, at the time, later succumbed to gas poisoning served as the focus of much of her most recent investigative work, as well as her ongoing inquiry into the Putin regime's campaign of torture against Chechen "terrorists."

Nearly two dozen journalists have been killed in Russia over the past 8 years, many in Chechnya, making Russia among the most dangerous countries for journalists, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. (AP) Still, the syllabus for Journalism 101 doesn't include serving in a war, an undeclared war, no less, against the free flow of information, and a free press.

Notably, Human Rights Watch, in a report more than two years ago, reports that of the seven Russian detainees, at Guantanamo Bay, who were released by the U.S. government, six urged the U.S. not to release them saying they were afraid they'd be "tortured, or mistreated" when they got back home. "They were right," asserts HRW, "All seven have been variously harassed, detained, mistreated, and beaten since they set foot on Russian soil. Two have been convicted of terrorism after highly irregular trials. One was tortured in pre-trial detention. Three are in hiding after campaigns of intimidation and harassment by Russian law enforcement authorities." So, given how the Russian government harasses its citizens, it should come as no surprise then how it treats one who exposes its campaign of beating, and intimidation of its civillians.

Over the past 50 years, much of the world has the words "made in the USA" stamped all over it, which may explain why the Cold War ended not with a bang, but a whimper. Since the Berlin Wall came down, and the U.S.S.R was dissolved, a dreadful mimesis has maimed, and forever defaced, the autonomy of many autonomous states. Only dogs bark at their own reflection in the mirror. Monsters often embrace what they see that most resembles themselves, and do the best they can to destroy anything that differs.

So, while Russian prosecutors open an investigation into who, or what, killed this prominent reporter, and while they concede that "the killing could be linked to her work," (AP) it is up to those of us who care about getting the truth out to continue Anna Politkovskaya's mission to uncover those crimes that come within the parameters of normal governmental practice. We, in this country, can best do justice to her memory, as well as the memory of all those who keep us informed in these dark times, by acknowledging universally that torture must not be allowed to breed under the badge of terror, and demand that crimes against journalists be seen, and punished, as crimes against humanity.

Anna Politkovskaya was a foot soldier in the campaign for truth, a free press, and a multidimensional view of global politics, as was Daniel Pearl, and others who have received no accolades, and who will not be remembered except as a footnote in a history book yet to be written. It is up to each and every one of us to celebrate members of the press, one and all.

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"Stay-the-course" not U.S.'s only Iraq option: Baker

Reuters
"Stay-the-course" not U.S.'s only Iraq option: Baker

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - James Baker, a former U.S. secretary of state and close political associate of the Bush family, said on Sunday there are alternatives in Iraq for the United States other than the "stay-the-course" policy of President George W. Bush's administration.

Baker -- the co-chair of a high-level panel of prominent former officials charged by members of Congress with taking a fresh look at America's policy on Iraq, which has support from the White House -- said it would be a mistake for the United States to withdraw from Iraq over the next year.

But, in an interview on ABC's "This Week," he added, "I happen to think, and I think it's fair to say our commission believes, that there are alternatives between the stated alternatives ... of stay-the-course and cut-and-run."

Bush and his top officials say the United States must press on with war in Iraq. They accuse critics, including some Democrats, who call for a U.S. troop pullout or a timetable for withdrawal, of advocating a policy of "cut-and-run."

"I think that if we picked up and left right now that you would see the biggest civil war you've ever seen and every neighboring country would be involved in there doing its own thing," Baker said.

He said the panel, co-chaired by former Democratic Rep. Lee Hamilton, probably would issue its report some time after the November 7 congressional election and hoped to come up with a bipartisan consensus.

In response to questions, Baker said the task force was weighing the pros and cons of a number of ideas, including one that would create a new power-sharing arrangement in Iraq that would give more autonomy to regional factions.

Baker, a Texan lawyer, served as secretary of state and White House chief of staff for President George H. W. Bush. In 2000, he served as chief legal adviser for George W. Bush's presidential campaign and played a key role in the legal battles over the Florida vote recount that resulted in Bush's victory.

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South Dakota Nears Historic Nov. 7 Referendum on Ban of Virtually All Abortions

ABC News
South Dakota Nears Vote on Abortion Ban
South Dakota Nears Historic Nov. 7 Referendum on Ban of Virtually All Abortions
By DAVID CRARY
The Associated Press

WESSINGTON SPRINGS, S.D. - Circled around a living room, sipping coffee, five long-acquainted couples grappled with their stark differences on a topic they would have skirted in the past but now cannot avoid abortion.

Like other South Dakotans, people in this tiny farming town are confronting a historic opportunity on Nov. 7. They'll sway a tortuous national debate by making a choice no statewide electorate has faced before: whether to approve a sweeping ban on virtually all abortions.

"None of us think abortion is a desirable thing," said Tom Dean, a family physician who hosted the discussion along with his wife, Kathy. "But it's not a problem for government to solve by passing a rigid law."

Yet Lynn Ogren, who helps her husband run a sheep and cattle ranch, choked up with emotion as she explained her support for the ban.

"I value every child's life, whether it's from a rape or not," she told her friends. "Who's fighting for these kids?"

The measure would allow abortions only to save a pregnant woman's life. It makes no exception for other health concerns, or for cases of rape or incest; a doctor performing illegal abortions could face five years in prison.

The Legislature passed the law overwhelmingly in February, expecting it to be challenged in court and perhaps lead to a U.S. Supreme Court reversal of the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion. Instead of suing, opponents swiftly collected signatures to force a referendum; the law will be scrapped if voters reject it.

Each side depicts the other as dominated by out-of-state groups and indeed such forces are active, viewing the vote as an unprecedented gauge of public sentiment on abortion. The Rev. Jerry Falwell has urged his conservative followers to donate in support of the ban; Planned Parenthood and NARAL Pro-Choice America have raised funds to oppose it.

"We're David, they're Goliath," contended Leslee Unruh, head of the campaign group supporting the ban. Parked outside her VoteYesForLife.com office in Sioux Falls were cars with a blunt bumper sticker: "The Killing Stops Here."

The most recent independent poll, in July, found 47 percent of voters opposed the ban, 39 percent favored it, 14 percent were undecided. When asked if they would approve a ban with exceptions for rape and incest, support rose to 59 percent.

Unruh, who had an abortion years ago that she now regrets, says momentum is turning as more voters hear her side's core message: Abortion hurts women. In the event of defeat, she vows to keep fighting.

"Sometimes it's not about votes it's about the truth," she said.

Jan Nicolay, a former school principal and Republican state legislator, is co-chair of the campaign to keep abortion legal. She knows the stakes are high.

"People from other states are telling me, 'You're in the limelight. Good luck. Please do everything you can to defeat it,'" she said.

Among her colleagues is Russ Tarver, a retired Methodist minister who signed a statement against the abortion ban along with 16 other ministers. "Some legislators were stunned to learn there were pastors on the other side of the issue," he said.

If the ban is defeated, anti-abortion activists might try again later with a milder version making exceptions for rape and incest, but the outcome would be heralded nationally as a major victory for abortion rights. If the ban is approved, several other state legislatures might follow South Dakota's example building momentum for a possible Supreme Court review of Roe v. Wade.

Each side has recruited South Dakota rape victims to aid their campaigns. Connie Pich, impregnated by a rapist as a teenager in 1973, said victims must be able to choose freely whether to bear the child. On the pro-ban side, Megan Barnett has spoken at the Legislature and in campaign videos about how glad she is to have borne a daughter resulting from a rape.

Barnett, in a telephone interview, expressed empathy with women in comparable plights, but said abortion shouldn't be an option.

"Two wrongs don't make a right," she said. "It's a baby, whether you're raped or not. You need a choice both you and your baby can live with."

The ban's supporters note that the measure allows rape and incest victims to get emergency contraception, which is effective if taken within 72 hours. Opponents say emergency contraception isn't widely available in South Dakota, and argue that many victims are too overwrought to seek prompt help.

"It's a sham," Nicolay said of the contraception provision. She noted that anti-abortion lawmakers quashed a measure this year that would have required hospitals to inform raped women that emergency contraception is available.

One of the legislators responsible for the toughly worded measure is House Majority Leader Larry Rhoden, a Republican cattle rancher. He was swayed by women's testimony that their abortions left emotional scars, but now aware of polls showing his side behind he has second thoughts.

"I've spent a great deal of time and thought wondering if it would have been wiser to write in the exceptions," he said. "We have a long row to hoe based on the numbers I've seen."

In some ways, South Dakota is an odd venue for the showdown. It has had no resident abortion provider for 10 years, and most of its 800 or so annual abortions are performed at an often-picketed Planned Parenthood clinic in Sioux Falls by doctors flying in once a week from Minnesota.

Sarah Stoesz, president of Planned Parenthood's Minnesota/Dakotas chapter, said even people on the sidelines of the abortion debate rallied to help the petition drive after lawmakers approved the ban.

"It was a political moment like I've never seen, a spontaneous uprising of grass-roots fury," she said. "Abortion isn't a subject people normally discuss, but this has forced ordinary mainstream people to talk about it."

A case in point is Wessington Springs, a town of 1,000 where pride in its seven churches and Shakespearean Gardens mingles with worries over business failures and an exodus of young people.

Tom Dean, whose family's local roots date to 1882, and his wife, Kathy, a nurse-midwife, decided to serve on the anti-ban campaign's statewide board, then placed a small ad in the local paper explaining their stance.

"We were a little concerned not for our safety, but of offending our friends," said Kathy Dean, a longtime abortion-rights supporter.

For several years, the Deans have hosted a monthly discussion group, broaching an array of topics. Its members recently convened to wrestle with the abortion ban.

Near the end, after listening in silence, Evelyn Bradley spoke out.

"Life isn't always black and white," said Bradley, the wife of an Air Force retiree. "There are situations where it would be really difficult to have another child, and I'd resent the law saying you have to have it. Shouldn't I be allowed to make that choice?"

The issue has been raised at the town's Roman Catholic church by the priest, Jim Friedrich, who fervently supports the ban.

"So far no one (in the parish) has spoken against it," he said quietly in his rectory. "The way I spoke, I doubt they'd have the guts to tell me otherwise."

John Paulson, minister at nearby Our Savior's Lutheran Church, takes a different tack.

"We can't read God's mind on this," he said. "As pastor, I'd support people voting their conscience with a prayerful heart."

On the Net:

Anti-ban campaign: http://www.sdhealthyfamilies.org

Pro-ban campaign: http://www.voteyesforlife.com

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Lotsa Bush Books Out

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Where Have You Been Woodward?

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Never Mind. Wrong Number.

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Disgraced Congressmen Don't Need Lawyers . . .

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With me as an advisor . . .

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Election Commission Alters Rule on Money Used for Recounts

The New York Times
Election Commission Alters Rule on Money Used for Recounts
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

WASHINGTON, Oct. 4 (AP) — Changing nearly 30 years of election policy, federal regulators said Wednesday that money used to pay for vote recounts and legal challenges was subject to campaign finance restrictions on contributions and expenditures.

The 4-to-2 decision by the Federal Election Commission affects House and Senate candidates as well as state parties. It could be especially significant this year when both political parties are bracing for potential postelection challenges to results in tight Congressional races.

“This is going to make them work a little harder to raise the money,” said Ellen L. Weintraub, a commissioner and a Democrat, who offered a compromise to break a 3-to-3 deadlock. “But it’s doable.”

At issue was whether a 2002 campaign finance law that did away with unrestricted and unlimited giving to the political parties altered regulations adopted in 1977. The decision redefined those regulations.

The commission’s chairman, Michael E. Toner, the commission chairman, and Hans von Spakovsky, a commissioner, both Republicans, voted against the compromise, saying that the campaign finance law applied only to the election, not recounts. Mr. Toner also objected to the timing of the change, noting that it came only five weeks before the Nov. 7 elections.

In making its decision, the commission recognized that recounts were expensive. As a result, the contributions that candidates raise from individuals for their recount accounts will not count against their fund-raising for the election. Under current law, a candidate can receive donations up to $2,100 from an individual for each election.

Now a contributor who had already reached the donation limit with a candidate could contribute also to the recount account.

Similarly, while the state parties would have to abide by the $10,000 contribution limits that apply to them, they would not have to live within limitations on spending for so-called coordinated expenditures with federal candidates.

As before, neither candidates nor state parties will be able to raise money from labor unions, corporations or foreign citizens.

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Security Gaps in Medicare and Medicaid

The New York Times
Security Gaps in Medicare and Medicaid
By ROBERT PEAR

WASHINGTON, Oct. 7 — Federal investigators say they have found serious computer security flaws that could lead to the improper disclosure of sensitive medical information on people enrolled in Medicare and Medicaid.

In a new report, the investigators, from the Government Accountability Office, said “key information security controls were missing” from a huge communication network used by the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

As a result, they said, sensitive, personally identifiable information “could be improperly modified, disclosed or deleted.” Moreover, the report said, “these weaknesses could lead to disruptions in services” to millions of Medicare and Medicaid beneficiaries.

The network is used to pay claims and to communicate with state Medicaid agencies, health care providers and many private contractors.

Dr. Mark B. McClellan, administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, said none of the flaws had led to “actual security breaches.” Dr. McClellan said he was taking steps to fix the problems.

But the G.A.O. said Medicare officials would not necessarily know if a security breach had occurred because they had no “audit trail” to document use of the computer network, or a reliable way to detect intrusions into their computers.

In their report, the investigators described several problems:

¶The potential for unauthorized users to gain access to the agency’s computers because of a lack of strict password controls. Passwords are often so simple that outsiders can guess them.

¶Medicare and Medicaid data not being encrypted. “This could allow an attacker to view medical information” on beneficiaries.

¶A failure to keep complete records of who uses the network, so it cannot be determined who views or modifies files.

Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, who requested the investigation, said Medicare officials needed “to get on top of these shortcomings immediately.”

“Beneficiaries not only rely on Medicare for their health care coverage,” said Mr. Grassley, chairman of the Finance Committee, which oversees Medicare and Medicaid, “they expect that the private information they entrust to the government is kept private, safe and secure.”

Concern about computer security has increased since May, when the Department of Veterans Affairs reported a laptop computer with personal information on millions of veterans had been stolen from the home of an agency employee.

Dr. McClellan said, “We are very concerned about the specific control weaknesses” identified in the latest report. The computer network carries immense amounts of data with personal information on beneficiaries, including name, sex, date of birth, Social Security number and home address. The network also transmits medical and financial information, showing the diagnosis of a patient’s illness, prescriptions, names of doctors and hospitals, services provided and the amounts paid.

Daniel R. Levinson, the inspector general at the Department of Health and Human Services, and his predecessors have expressed concern about weaknesses in Medicare computer security. The weaknesses “could ultimately result in unauthorized disclosure of sensitive information, improper Medicare payments or disruption of critical operations,” Mr. Levinson warned last year.

The computer network connects the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services with banks, insurance companies, hospitals, nursing homes, health plans, other federal agencies and private contractors that pay claims for the government.

Medicare paid more than 1.1 billion claims last year. The size of its computer network and the number of transactions increased this year with the addition of a prescription drug benefit. The new program fills more than three million prescriptions a day. Insurers must file detailed data on each transaction.

In June, Medicare officials warned Humana after a company employee left personal information on 17,000 Medicare beneficiaries unsecured on a hotel computer in Baltimore.

The Bush administration is encouraging adoption of electronic health records and is urging doctors to send prescriptions electronically to drugstores. It is also asking beneficiaries to keep track of their health information, including Medicare claims and prescriptions, by using a new online service at www.MyMedicare.gov. In fine print, the government says it “does not warrant the accuracy” of information on the Web site.

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Republican Coward of the Day: Tom Kean Jr.

Huffington Post
Bob Geiger
Republican Coward of the Day: Tom Kean Jr.

After a debate this morning at CBS studios in Manhattan with New Jersey Senatorial candidates Robert Menendez and Tom Kean Jr., JoAnn Sohl, a member of the anti-war group Military Families Speak Out (MFSO), tried to talk to Republican Kean about his "stay the course" strategy for Iraq.

Sohl, whose son is serving in Iraq, got the usual, cowardly brush-off given to military families by Republicans when spouses or parents of troops demand answers on the lies that put our people in Iraq and the Republican goal of keeping them smack-dab in the middle of a civil war.

A few months ago, MFSO requested meetings with both Menendez and Kean Jr. to talk to them about the war. Both accepted the meetings, but Kean Jr. decided to get up and walk out in the middle of his meeting, saying that he'd get back to the military families in writing. He never did.

When Sohl again attempted to talk to Kean Jr. after the debate, Kean scampered off and left his Rove-like campaign manager, Evan Koslow, to blow her off.

Watch the video and you'll see that Kean Jr. goes to the back of the room, stands alone and cowers while his campaign hack continues to tell a military Mom whose questions have clearly not been answered, that they have.

It's disgusting, but it's precisely what we've come to expect from the GOP at this point.

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Cheney Back Delivering the Grim Campaign Speech

washingtonpost.com
Cheney Back Delivering the Grim Campaign Speech
Democrats Cast As Foils to the Nation's Security
By Peter Baker
Washington Post Staff Writer

MILWAUKEE -- Vice President Cheney sometimes starts speeches with a Ronald Reagan quotation about a "happy" nation needing "hope and faith." But not much happy talk follows. Not a lot of hope, either. He does, though, talk about the prospect of "mass death in the United States."

The not-so-happy warrior of the past two campaign cycles is back on the road delivering a grim message about danger, defeatism and the stakes of the coming election. If it is not a joyful exercise, it is at least a relentless one. Even with poll ratings lower than President Bush's, Cheney has become a more ubiquitous presence on the campaign trail than in the last midterm election.

He takes on not only the traditional vice presidential assignment of slicing up the opposition but also the Cassandra role of warning about dire threats to the nation's security. While others get distracted by Capitol Hill scandal, Cheney remains focused on the terrorists, who are, as he says in his stump speech, "still lethal, still desperately trying to hit us again." Bush, he says, is "protecting America" while the Democrats advocate "reckless" policies that add up to a "strategy of resignation and defeatism in the face of determined enemies."

But the message is carefully targeted. More than half of Cheney's fundraisers in this two-year cycle have been behind closed doors. Even at a lunchtime speech to Wisconsin Republican donors that was open to reporters, gubernatorial candidate Rep. Mark Green did not stand on stage, ensuring no pictures of the two together on the news, and some other Republican candidates did not attend at all.

That is okay with the White House, which at a perilous moment is counting on Cheney's under-the-radar campaign to rally the base, not the broader public. "The fact that he's willing to go after Democrats as harshly as the Democrats are going after the White House gets the party faithful going," said GOP strategist Glen Bolger.

It happens to inflame the Democratic faithful as well, and party strategists consider him a prime target for their own pitch to voters. "When he threatens Democrats and calls them names, it's something that really fires up our base," said John Lapp, executive director of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee's independent expenditure program.

Cheney's fundraising visits often end up as fodder for opponents of those he tries to help. "Dick Cheney, Big Oil and Big Drug Companies Threw Curt Weldon a secret Washington thank you party," reads a Democratic brochure targeting the Republican Pennsylvania congressman. "And we got stuck with the bill."

The campaign comes at a pivotal moment for Cheney. His influence within the administration is widely perceived to be waning as Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's star rises. The president in his second term has adopted a more diplomatic approach to problems such as Iran and North Korea than insiders believe would be to Cheney's liking. And as the 2008 presidential sweepstakes heat up, he will be the first vice president in a generation not to be seeking a promotion, leaving him on the sidelines of the most important national discussion.

But White House aides said it would be a mistake to underestimate Cheney even now. Although he is viewed favorably by just 34 percent of the public in the most recent Wall Street Journal-NBC poll, he remains a champion of conservatives at a time when the right has been angry at Bush over issues such as deficit spending and immigration. So Cheney's mission is to bring home core Republican voters when they are needed most.

"He's a good carrier of the Republican message," said Michigan GOP Chairman Saul Anuzis, noting that a Cheney visit to Grand Rapids last month raised between $750,000 and $1 million, a record for western Michigan. "He exudes a confidence. He makes you feel good and comfortable that he's vice president of the country."

Cheney's job is "a lot of volume, a lot of what we call McFundraisers," GOP lobbyist Ed Rogers said. Cheney has headlined 111 fundraisers so far in this two-year cycle, bringing in more than $39 million and already surpassing his total of 106 events for the entire 2002 cycle. Cheney is also regularly dispatched to conservative radio shows hosted by Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham. He takes the shots the White House does not want Bush to take or wants to test out first. When Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (D-Conn.) was defeated by antiwar challenger Ned Lamont in a primary, Cheney called reporters to say the result would encourage "al-Qaeda types" who want "to break the will of the American people."

Out here on the hustings, Cheney does not come across as the most natural campaigner. A Cheney speech does not draw its audience to its feet. It plods through an argument that is more sobering than inspiring. He delivers even red-meat lines in a flat monotone, sounding more like a chief executive reporting to shareholders than a politician issuing a call to action.

The vice president, though, goes after Democrats by name in a way Bush rarely does, including Senate Minority Leader Harry M. Reid (Nev.), Rep. John P. Murtha (Pa.) and party Chairman Howard Dean. At a fundraiser in Sarasota, Fla., last week, he also singled out Sens. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (Del.), Edward M. Kennedy (Mass.), John D. Rockefeller IV (W.Va.) and Reps. John Conyers (Mich.), Henry A. Waxman (Calif.) and Barney Frank (Mass.).

He talks mainly about terrorism and Iraq, arguing that U.S. withdrawals from Lebanon after the Marine barracks bombing in 1983 and from Somalia after the "Black Hawk Down" ambush in 1993 emboldened terrorists. "If we follow Congressman Murtha's advice and withdraw from Iraq the same way we withdrew from Beirut in 1983 and Somalia in 1993, all we will do is validate the al-Qaeda strategy and invite even more terrorist attacks," Cheney said in Milwaukee. In Houston last week, he accused Democrats of "apparently having lost their perspective concerning the nature of the enemy."

The crux of his pitch is what he calls the continuing "danger to civilization." Cheney, who warned in 2004 that the United States would be hit by terrorists if Democrat John F. Kerry was elected president, has not gone that far this time but does say that it "is not an accident" that the country has not suffered another attack since Sept. 11, 2001, giving Bush credit.

Democrats regularly punch back, suggesting Cheney is out of touch and desperate. "At a time when the Bush Administration finds itself increasingly isolated on Iraq, Vice President Cheney today went on the attack," Senate Democrats said in a statement last week. "Instead of ranting and raving on the campaign trail, Bush and Cheney should spend their time on the trail of Osama bin Laden."

Five years after Sept. 11, Cheney's message may be wearing. Some find it too limited. "To tell you the truth, I was a little disappointed," David Huibregtse, head of Wisconsin's Log Cabin Republicans, a group of gay party members, said after a speech. "Too much on how great President Bush is doing and very little on why we should vote for the Republicans."

Yet it still resonates in certain quarters. Between fundraisers, Cheney addressed a Michigan National Guard rally, an ostensibly nonpartisan event that nonetheless provided helpful photos of him surrounded by soldiers in uniform.

Dick Szymanski, a manufacturing executive whose son serves in the Marines, applauded the vice president's message. "We respect him," Szymanski said. "It's a very, very hard job that he and the president have, that they've had handed to them. You can belittle people for the things they should or should not have done. But they're there trying to take care of the public."

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U.S. Casualties in Iraq Rise Sharply

washingtonpost.com
U.S. Casualties in Iraq Rise Sharply
Growing American Role in Staving Off Civil War Leads to Most Wounded Since 2004
By Ann Scott Tyson
Washington Post Staff Writer

The number of U.S troops wounded in Iraq has surged to its highest monthly level in nearly two years as American GIs fight block-by-block in Baghdad to try to check a spiral of sectarian violence that U.S. commanders warn could lead to civil war.

Last month, 776 U.S. troops were wounded in action in Iraq, the highest number since the military assault to retake the insurgent-held city of Fallujah in November 2004, according to Defense Department data. It was the fourth-highest monthly total since the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003.

The sharp increase in American wounded -- with nearly 300 more in the first week of October -- is a grim measure of the degree to which the U.S. military has been thrust into the lead of the effort to stave off full-scale civil war in Iraq, military officials and experts say. Beyond Baghdad, Marines battling Sunni insurgents in Iraq's western province of Anbar last month also suffered their highest number of wounded in action since late 2004.

More than 20,000 U.S. troops have been wounded in combat in the Iraq war, and about half have returned to duty. While much media reporting has focused on the more than 2,700 killed, military experts say the number of wounded is a more accurate gauge of the fierceness of fighting because advances in armor and medical care today allow many service members to survive who would have perished in past wars. The ratio of wounded to killed among U.S. forces in Iraq is about 8 to 1, compared with 3 to 1 in Vietnam.

"These days, wounded are a much better measure of the intensity of the operations than killed," said Anthony H. Cordesman, a military expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

The surge in wounded comes as U.S. commanders issue increasingly dire warnings about the threat of civil war in Iraq, all but ruling out cuts in the current contingent of more than 140,000 U.S. troops before the spring of 2007. Last month Gen. John P. Abizaid, the top commander in the Middle East, said "sectarian tensions, if left unchecked, could be fatal to Iraq," making it imperative that the U.S. military now focus its "main effort" squarely on Baghdad.

Thousands of additional U.S. troops have been ordered to Baghdad since July to reinforce Iraqi soldiers and police who failed to halt -- or were in some cases complicit in -- a wave of hundreds of killings of Iraqi civilians by rival Sunni and Shiite groups.

U.S. commanders have appealed for weeks for 3,000 more Iraqi army troops to help secure Baghdad but as of Thursday had received only a few hundred, according to military officials in the Iraqi capital. Mistrust of Iraqi police in Baghdad remains high, Abizaid said. Last week, an Iraqi police brigade with hundreds of officers was removed from duty over its involvement in sectarian killings.

"The Baghdad security plan and the general spiral of operations is driving us to be more active than we have been in recent months," said Michael E. O'Hanlon, a military analyst at the Brookings Institution, a Washington-based think tank. "We have more people on patrols and out of base, so we get more people hurt and killed in firefights," he said, explaining that U.S. military offensives -- more than other factors such as shifting enemy tactics -- tend to drive the number of American casualties.

In March, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said that Iraqi forces -- not U.S. troops -- would deal with a civil war in Iraq "to the extent one were to occur." Today's operations in Baghdad demonstrate that that goal was not realistic, experts say.

"In a sense, the Baghdad security plan is a complete repudiation of the earlier Rumsfeld doctrine where he said the Iraqis would prevent the civil war," said O'Hanlon.

Despite the mounting cost in U.S. wounded and dead -- including 13 American soldiers killed in combat in Baghdad in three days last week -- Pentagon officials say aggressive military operations in the Iraqi capital are at best a short-term and partial solution, buying time for political compromise, which they call the only way to arrest Iraq's disintegration.

"The Baghdad security plan will only be a temporary fix," said a Pentagon official who has served in Iraq. "You need to address the root causes," said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly.

The rising toll of wounded reflects ongoing heavy combat in Anbar as well as in Baghdad, where U.S. troops face an escalation of small-arms and other attacks as they push into the city's most violent neighborhoods to rein in sectarian death squads, militias and insurgents, officers say.

"Attacks against the coalition have definitely increased as . . . the enemy is trying to come in and reestablish themselves" in a dozen religiously divided districts in east and west Baghdad, said Lt. Col. Jonathan Withington, a spokesman for the U.S. military command in the city. "There's a lot of weapons in Baghdad," contributing to an increase in enemy attacks using small arms, he said.

Withington said he was not authorized to release the number of U.S. military personnel wounded in Baghdad or the number of attacks in the city, although the military has released such data in the past.

A survey of reports on combat deaths from August through early October, however, shows an increase in those killed in Baghdad from small-arms fire as well as bombs along roads. Dense urban terrain in the city of 6 million people, where enemy fighters have many places to hide and can attack from close quarters, reduces the advantage of the better-trained and better-equipped U.S. forces.

"September was horrific" in terms of the toll of wounded, and if the early October trend continues, this month could be "the worst month of the war," said John E. Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org, a Virginia-based Web site that tracks defense issues.

The worsening violence in Baghdad has led some Pentagon officials to criticize decisions by the U.S. military since early 2005 to transfer responsibility for security in large swaths of Baghdad to Iraqi forces while cutting back on American patrols.

"We made decisions to take an indirect approach, which is great if you want low U.S. casualty rates," said the Pentagon official. However, he said: "Passing responsibility to Iraqis does not equal defeating terrorists and neutralizing the insurgency. Period."

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