Timeline: The Frightening Future of Earth

livescience.com
Timeline: The Frightening Future of Earth
By Andrea Thompson
and Ker Than

Our planet's prospects for environmental stability are bleaker than ever with the approach of this year’s Earth Day, April 22. Global warming is widely accepted as a reality by scientists and even by previously doubtful government and industrial leaders. And according to a recent report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), there is a 90 percent likelihood that humans are contributing to the change.

The international panel of scientists predicts the global average temperature could increase by 2 to 11 degrees Fahrenheit by 2100 and that sea levels could rise by up to 2 feet.

Scientists have even speculated that a slight increase in Earth's rotation rate could result, along with other changes. Glaciers, already receding, will disappear. Epic floods will hit some areas while intense drought will strike others. Humans will face widespread water shortages. Famine and disease will increase. Earth’s landscape will transform radically, with a quarter of plants and animals at risk of extinction.

While putting specific dates on these traumatic potential events is challenging, this timeline paints the big picture and details Earth's future based on several recent studies and the longer scientific version of the IPCC report, which was made available to LiveScience.

2007

More of the world's population now lives in cities than in rural areas, changing patterns of land use. The world population surpasses 6.6 billion. (Peter Crane, Royal Botanic Gardens, UK, Science; UN World Urbanization Prospectus: The 2003 Revision; U.S. Census Bureau)

2008

Global oil production peaks sometime between 2008 and 2018, according to a model by one Swedish physicist. Others say this turning point, known as “Hubbert’s Peak,” won’t occur until after 2020. Once Hubbert’s Peak is reached, global oil production will begin an irreversible decline, possibly triggering a global recession, food shortages and conflict between nations over dwindling oil supplies. (doctoral dissertation of Frederik Robelius, University of Uppsala, Sweden; report by Robert Hirsch of the Science Applications International Corporation)

2020

Flash floods will very likely increase across all parts of Europe. (IPCC)

Less rainfall could reduce agriculture yields by up to 50 percent in some parts of the world. (IPCC)

World population will reach 7.6 billion people. (U.S. Census Bureau)

2030

Diarrhea-related diseases will likely increase by up to 5 percent in low-income parts of the world. (IPCC)

Up to 18 percent of the world’s coral reefs will likely be lost as a result of climate change and other environmental stresses. In Asian coastal waters, the coral loss could reach 30 percent. (IPCC)

World population will reach 8.3 billion people. (U.S. Census Bureau)

Warming temperatures will cause temperate glaciers on equatorial mountains in Africa to disappear. (Richard Taylor, University College London, Geophysical Research Letters:)

In developing countries, the urban population will more than double to about 4 billion people, packing more people onto a given city's land area. The urban populations of developed countries may also increase by as much as 20 percent. (World Bank: The Dynamics of Global Urban Expansion)

2040

The Arctic Sea could be ice-free in the summer, and winter ice depth may shrink drastically. Other scientists say the region will still have summer ice up to 2060 and 2105. (Marika Holland, NCAR, Geophysical Research Letters)

2050

Small alpine glaciers will very likely disappear completely, and large glaciers will shrink by 30 to 70 percent. Austrian scientist Roland Psenner of the University of Innsbruck says this is a conservative estimate, and the small alpine glaciers could be gone as soon as 2037. (IPCC)

In Australia, there will likely be an additional 3,200 to 5,200 heat-related deaths per year. The hardest hit will be people over the age of 65. An extra 500 to 1,000 people will die of heat-related deaths in New York City per year. In the United Kingdom, the opposite will occur, and cold-related deaths will outpace heat-related ones. (IPCC)

World population reaches 9.4 billion people. (U.S. Census Bureau)

Crop yields could increase by up to 20 percent in East and Southeast Asia, while decreasing by up to 30 percent in Central and South Asia. Similar shifts in crop yields could occur on other continents. (IPCC)

As biodiversity hotspots are more threatened, a quarter of the world’s plant and vertebrate animal species could face extinction. (Jay Malcolm, University of Toronto, Conservation Biology)

2070

As glaciers disappear and areas affected by drought increase, electricity production for the world’s existing hydropower stations will decrease. Hardest hit will be Europe, where hydropower potential is expected to decline on average by 6 percent; around the Mediterranean, the decrease could be up to 50 percent. (IPCC)

Warmer, drier conditions will lead to more frequent and longer droughts, as well as longer fire-seasons, increased fire risks, and more frequent heat waves, especially in Mediterranean regions. (IPCC)

2080

While some parts of the world dry out, others will be inundated. Scientists predict up to 20 percent of the world’s populations live in river basins likely to be affected by increased flood hazards. Up to 100 million people could experience coastal flooding each year. Most at risk are densely populated and low-lying areas that are less able to adapt to rising sea levels and areas which already face other challenges such as tropical storms. (IPCC)

Coastal population could balloon to 5 billion people, up from 1.2 billion in 1990. (IPCC)

Between 1.1 and 3.2 billion people will experience water shortages and up to 600 million will go hungry. (IPCC)

Sea levels could rise around New York City by more than three feet, potentially flooding the Rockaways, Coney Island, much of southern Brooklyn and Queens, portions of Long Island City, Astoria, Flushing Meadows-Corona Park, Queens, lower Manhattan and eastern Staten Island from Great Kills Harbor north to the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge. (NASA GISS)

2085

The risk of dengue fever from climate change is estimated to increase to 3.5 billion people. (IPCC)

2100

A combination of global warming and other factors will push many ecosystems to the limit, forcing them to exceed their natural ability to adapt to climate change. (IPCC)

Atmospheric carbon dioxide levels will be much higher than anytime during the past 650,000 years. (IPCC)

Ocean pH levels will very likely decrease by as much as 0.5 pH units, the lowest it’s been in the last 20 million years. The ability of marine organisms such as corals, crabs and oysters to form shells or exoskeletons could be impaired. (IPCC)

Thawing permafrost and other factors will make Earth’s land a net source of carbon emissions, meaning it will emit more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than it absorbs. (IPCC)

Roughly 20 to 30 percent of species assessed as of 2007 could be extinct by 2100 if global mean temperatures exceed 2 to 3 degrees of pre-industrial levels. (IPCC)

New climate zones appear on up to 39 percent of the world’s land surface, radically transforming the planet. (Jack Williams, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences)

A quarter of all species of plants and land animals—more than a million total—could be driven to extinction. The IPCC reports warn that current “conservation practices are generally ill-prepared for climate change and effective adaptation responses are likely to be costly to implement.” (IPCC)

Increased droughts could significantly reduce moisture levels in the American Southwest, northern Mexico and possibly parts of Europe, Africa and the Middle East, effectively recreating the “Dust Bowl” environments of the 1930s in the United States. (Richard Seager, Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory, Science)

2200

An Earth day will be 0.12 milliseconds shorter, as rising temperatures cause oceans to expand away from the equator and toward the poles, one model predicts. One reason water will be shifted toward the poles is most of the expansion will take place in the North Atlantic Ocean, near the North Pole. The poles are closer to the Earth’s axis of rotation, so having more mass there should speed up the planet’s rotation. (Felix Landerer, Max Planck Institute for Meteorology, Geophysical Research Letters)

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War Becomes Personal at Private Military Academy

AP
War Becomes Personal at Academy
WILSON RING

NORTHFIELD, Vt. — War is what cadets train for at the nation's oldest private military academy.

The grim reality of that career path is hitting home for the officers-to-be in the student body at Norwich University with the deaths of two former students in Iraq, within three days of each other.

"It's kind of like surreal now because before I heard names, you know, and I saw pictures and I didn't know them so it was kind of removed," said senior Cadet Jonathan Pride, 21, who graduates next month and will be commissioned an Army lieutenant. "Now, it's somebody I know. It's kind of like 'Wow, there really is a war out there.'"

Norwich, founded in 1819, has been training officers for battle on its picturesque hilltop campus since before the Civil War.

The school lost at least 52 graduates in the Civil War, 16 in World War I, 86 in World War II, three in Korea and 22 in Vietnam, although college officials say the numbers are imprecise.

And since the war began in Iraq, it has lost four graduates, including two this month:

_Army Capt. Anthony Palermo Jr., 27, of Brockton, Mass., was killed April 6 by an improvised explosive device that detonated near his Humvee in Baghdad. He attended Norwich for four years before graduating from Bridgewater State College in Massachusetts in 2003.

_Army Sgt. Adam Kennedy of Norfolk, Mass., was killed April 8 when he was hit while on patrol near Diwaniyah, Iraq. He graduated from Norwich in 2004.

"For the last three or four days, almost every senior I've talked to that's going to be commissioning in the Army had some kind of different temperance about them," said junior Kim Sorber, of Dallas, Pa., who is due to receive her commission in just over a year. "They've got some kind of, not even hesitance, but just a different, lower, more modest temperance about them."

Last year, Norwich produced more second lieutenants for the Army than any other college except the U.S. Military Academy at West Point.

Not every student is headed for a military career. Of the 1,950 who attend, 1,150 are members of the Corps of Cadets and only a portion of those are seeking officers' commissions.

It is an "awesome responsibility to prepare them, to guide them," said Commandant of Cadets Michael Kelley, a 1974 graduate and retired Army colonel. "The group that's here today came post 9/11. Every one of them knew the world order had changed."

During his student years at Norwich, five alumni died in Vietnam. But Kelley couldn't remember anything being done for any of them. Today, however, "our students take so proudly the service of others," he said.

Fallen Norwich graduates are remembered on the Harmon Wall, a granite monument on which are inscribed the names of graduates and others who have contributed to the community, not just those killed in action. It is named for former Norwich President Gen. Ernest Harmon.

Kennedy and Palermo, whose names will be on the wall's yet-to-be inscribed 2007 section, also will be remembered by the Corps of Cadets at a May 3 ceremony known as "echo taps."

The entire Corps of Cadets will gather in full dress uniform just before 11 p.m. and be called to attention with whispered orders. Following a salute of 21 shots by a firing party, two buglers at different locations on campus will play taps, a beat apart, just enough to make the sound appear to echo.

Pride and Sorber attended echo taps for 1st Lt. Mark Dooley, a 2001 graduate killed by a roadside bomb in Iraq in September 2005.

Pride was a member of the firing party.

"I was crying on the platform," Pride said. "It can be anybody. It can be him, it can be Kim, it can be anybody. We are all connected in this. We are at a small school. We are all connected in some way. It was almost as if part of me died."

___

On the Net:

Norwich: http://www.norwich.edu/

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Iraqi Soldiers Using Torture To Gain Information For US

The New York Times
After Iraqi Troops Do Dirty Work, 3 Detainees Talk
By ALISSA J. RUBIN

BAGHDAD, April 21 — Out here in what the soldiers call Baghdad’s wild west, sometimes the choices are all bad.

In one of the new joint American-Iraqi security stations in the capital this month, in the volatile Ghazaliya neighborhood, Capt. Darren Fowler was heaping praise on his Iraqi counterparts for helping capture three insurgent suspects who had provided information he believed would save American lives.

“The detainee gave us names from the highest to the lowest,” Captain Fowler told the Iraqi soldiers. “He showed us their safe houses, where they store weapons and I.E.D.’s and where they keep kidnap victims, how they get weapons, where weapons come from, how they place I.E.D.’s, attack us and go away. Because you detained this guy this is the first intelligence linking everything together. Good job. Very good job.”

The Iraqi officers beamed. What the Americans did not know and what the Iraqis had not told them was that before handing over the detainees to the Americans, the Iraqi soldiers had beaten one of them in front of the other two, the Iraqis said. The stripes on the detainee’s back, which appeared to be the product of a whipping with electrical cables, were later shown briefly to a photographer, who was not allowed to take a picture.

To the Iraqi soldiers, the treatment was normal and necessary. They were proud of their technique and proud to have helped the Americans.

“I prepared him for the Americans and let them take his confession,” Capt. Bassim Hassan said through an interpreter. “We know how to make them talk. We know their back streets. We beat them. I don’t beat them that much, but enough so he feels the pain and it makes him desperate.”

As American and Iraqi troops set up these outposts in dangerous neighborhoods to take on the insurgents block by block, they find themselves continually facing lethal attacks. In practice, the Americans and Iraqis seem to have different answers about what tactics are acceptable in response.

Beatings like this, which are usually hard to verify but appear to be widespread given the fears about the Iraqi security forces frequently expressed by ordinary Iraqis, present the Americans with a largely undiscussed dilemma.

The beaten detainee, according to Captain Fowler, not only led the Americans to safe houses believed to be used by Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia but also confessed to laying and detonating roadside bombs along a section of road heavily traveled by American patrols. Just a month ago, four soldiers from Captain Fowler’s regiment died on that road after the explosion of a large, deeply buried bomb, possibly made in the bomb factory that the Americans were able to dismantle because of the detainee’s information, Captain Fowler said.

But beating is strictly forbidden by the United States Army’s Field Manual, as well as American and Iraqi laws. When the Americans learned about the beating, they were quick to condemn it.

The use of torture by American soldiers and contractors at Abu Ghraib only compounded Iraqi hatred of Americans and further undermined American moral claims in Iraq. It also produced little valuable information. Most experts, including in the military, say they believe that coerced confessions are an unreliable way to learn about enemy operations because people being tortured will often say whatever they think it will take to stop the pain.

This joint security station in Ghazaliya opened on March 15, about a month after the latest increase in American troops began. The station, inhabited by about 70 soldiers of Company D of the Second Battalion, 12th Cavalry, and their Iraqi counterparts, is named for Specialist Robert Thrasher, a member of the unit killed by sniper fire on Feb. 11 when the company was scouting for a station site.

Thrasher, as the station is known, sits in the southern part of Ghazaliya, one of the roughest areas of western Baghdad. In the northern part, Shiite militias, led by the Mahdi Army, have been driving out Sunni Arabs through raids and assassinations. Sunnis have pushed Shiites out of the southern part.

Sewage pools in the streets. Water and electricity are almost nonexistent, and fewer than half the houses are occupied. The neighborhood graffiti broadcasts the presence of an active insurgency: “Long live Abu Hamza al-Muhajar,” reads one scrawl, referring to a local insurgent leader.

The outpost’s location, along one of the main arms smuggling routes from Falluja, was chosen because it was next to a litter-filled lot that was a dumping ground for bodies. When they first arrived, the American soldiers found 30 bodies there, among them women and children.

Now it is rare to find more than one or two, said Captain Fowler, who keeps photos of every one on his computer as a reminder of how much worse it was before his company took up residence. He can also point to other signs of progress: children have begun to play outside again, and women walk to the market.

But the area remains far from calm. The radio in the joint operations room crackles all day long with reports of bomb explosions or newly sighted explosive devices that must be scouted by the soldiers. The distance to the next security station is barely half a mile, but it is so dangerous that the soldiers cannot walk there and do not like to drive more often than necessary.

Although one tenet of the Baghdad security plan is that soldiers should patrol on foot to get to know local residents, it was on just such a patrol that Specialist Thrasher died. Now, said Sgt. Trevis Good, 34, “foot patrols don’t exist; they are not something we do.” The company’s partner is the Third Battalion, Fourth Brigade, of the Iraqi Army’s 10th Division. The soldiers come from Amara, the largest town in rural Maysan Province in the far south, a mostly peaceful area where in a year of active duty they never had an injury, much less a fatality.

In just three weeks in Ghazaliya, the battalion has lost two officers and a soldier; 16 troops have been wounded. A few hundred Iraqi soldiers live in three attached houses just over a brick wall from the Americans. The houses, beefed up only by sandbags, lie outside the station’s fortified area. Visiting their quarters means crouching down and running behind vehicles until entering one of the houses.

The Iraqi soldiers have their own network of informants, and they picked up the detainee who was later beaten, Mustafa Subhi Jassam, after seeing him loitering around a main patrol route twice in the same day. The other two insurgent suspects were picked up separately.

After interrogating Mr. Jassam, a thin young man wearing a blue and red warm-up outfit, for much of the night, the Americans took him to point out one of the houses where the Qaeda militants made bombs. When the Americans arrived, a half-eaten lunch was on the table next to a couple of detonators and some blasting wire. The insurgents appeared to have been gnawing on chicken and flat bread while making fuses for I.E.D.’s, improvised explosive devices, the military’s term for the roadside bombs found here.

On the table and in bags on the floor were mountains of soap, which can be used in homemade explosives. Blasting wire lay in coils. Buried in the garden were two large antiaircraft guns known as Duskas, three propane tanks, and an oxygen tank that was partly cut in preparation for being turned into a huge bomb, probably similar to the one that killed the four soldiers. On the roof a large pile of homemade explosives was drying in the sun.

The Iraqi soldiers were ecstatic. They had delivered. They snapped photos of each other in front of the cache with the blasting cords in their mouths, grinning. The Americans were nervous. “One spark will blow this place up,” said First Lt. Michael Obal as an Iraqi soldier flicked a lighted cigarette butt within inches of one cache of explosives. “It’s highly unstable TNT.”

Later, the Americans plotted into their computers the location of each of the Qaeda safe houses that Mr. Jassam had pointed out. “He was singing like a songbird,” said First Lt. Sean Henley, 24.

After the prisoner was returned to the Iraqis, Captain Fowler was asked whether the Americans realized that the information was given only after the Iraqis had beaten Mr. Jassam. “They are not supposed to do that,” he said. “What I don’t see, I don’t know, and I can’t stop. The detainees are deathly afraid of being sent to the Iraqi justice system, because this is the kind of thing they do. But this is their culture.”

Later, Captain Fowler said that he thought Mr. Jassam had talked because he hoped to be released. The captain wanted him let go so that he could act as an informant. The Iraqi soldiers vetoed the idea.

Mr. Jassam is now being held in an Iraqi government detention center, widely rumored to be places where suspected insurgents are abused.

Lieutenant Obal, the captain’s deputy, was distraught at the thought that the detainee had been beaten. “I don’t think that’s right,” he said. “We have intelligence teams, they have techniques for getting information, they don’t do things like that. It’s not civilization.”

About 30 yards away, on the other side of the wall, the Iraqi soldiers suggested that the Americans were being naïve. The insurgents are playing for keeps, they say, and force must be answered with force.

“If the Americans used this way, the way we use, nobody would shoot the Americans at all,” Captain Hassan said. “But they are easy with them, and they have made it easy for the terrorists.”

“I didn’t beat them all, I beat Mustafa in front of the others. We tell him we’re going to string him up.” He demonstrated, his arms spread wide. “And, I made the others see him,” he said.

Captain Hassan and his colleagues said they knew the Iraqi Army had rules against beatings, but “they tell us to do what we have to do,” he said.

“For me it’s a matter of conscience, not rules,” he said.

Captain Fowler’s proposal to release Mr. Jassam in the hope he would become an informant struck Captain Hassan as useless and quite possibly dangerous.

“It’s kind of not a good idea,” he said carefully, as if explaining something to a child. “He’ll never become an informant. Al Qaeda will know he’s been captured. He’ll go back to them and say, ‘The Americans wanted me to be an informer, but I will be loyal to you.’ He will be more afraid of Al Qaeda guys than of the Americans.”

But some detainees may have a simpler motivation: survival. The Iraqi soldiers say many of the insurgents are paid for their attacks, and they gain respect and protection from other militants.

Another officer in the Iraqi unit, Major Hussain, who would not give his full name, said the only way to lure such militants out of the insurgent life would be to offer them a comparable standard of living.

“Ziad, over there, wanted to come work with us,” Major Hussain said, indicating one of the insurgent suspects, Ziad Sabah Jasim, who became cooperative after witnessing the beating of Mr. Jassam. “He said, ‘Just let me join you,’ ”

“Most of them don’t believe in this insurgency,” he said. “They are young people. They are having to stay home without employment. They want food. They want money. They want to be able to marry. But there are no jobs. If you offered them jobs, most of them would not be working with Al Qaeda.”

The American soldiers would agree, but they also are clear that the only way to bring jobs is first to make the neighborhood secure. “You need a J.S.S. every kilometer or so,” Captain Fowler said. For now, there are nowhere near that many security stations on Baghdad’s west side.

Ashley Gilbertson contributed reporting.

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Gore campaign team assembles in secret

Gore campaign team assembles in secret
By Tim Shipman in Washington, Sunday Telegraph

Friends of Al Gore have secretly started assembling a campaign team in preparation for the former American vice-president to make a fresh bid for the White House.

Two members of Mr Gore's staff from his unsuccessful attempt in 2000 say they have been approached to see if they would be available to work with him again.

Mr Gore, President Bill Clinton's deputy, has said he wants to concentrate on publicising the need to combat climate change, a case made in his film, An Inconvenient Truth, which won him an Oscar this year.

But, aware that he may step into the wide open race for the White House, former strategists are sounding out a shadow team that could run his campaign at short notice. In approaching former campaign staff, including political strategists and communications officials, they are making clear they are not acting on formal instructions from Mr Gore, 59, but have not been asked to stop.

His denials of interest in the presidency have been couched in terms of "no plans" or "no intention" - politically ambiguous language that does not rule out a run.

One of his former campaign team said: "I was asked whether I would be available towards the end of the year if I am needed. They know he has not ruled out running and if he decides to jump in, he will have to move very fast.
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"He hasn't asked them to do this, but nor has he told them not to."

In an interview on Thursday, which touched on the prospects for next year's presidential election, Mr Clinton commented: "You've got the prospect that Vice-President Gore might run."

The most recent opinion polls show Mr Gore as third favourite to take the Democratic nomination, on about 17 per cent support, only a whisker behind Barack Obama, 45, who is aiming to become the first black US president, and ahead of John Edwards, 53, the senator whose wife was recently diagnosed with cancer.

Vice-President Gore's allies believe that Hillary Clinton, 59, the frontrunner, is unable to win the presidency. The most recent poll shows a growing number of voters think negatively of her, in contrast to Mr Gore, who enjoys far greater popularity than when he lost the 2000 presidential race despite polling more votes nationally than the eventual winner, George W Bush.

The second aide approached by Vice-President Gore's allies said: "There is no love lost between Gore and Hillary. They don't think she can win and they're probably right. If Gore runs, he's got a really good chance of getting the nomination. And he has a good chance of pulling off the election, too."

Gore-watchers believe that a new book he is publishing next month on the state of US politics will keep his name in the public eye. Many of his supporters helped to run the unsuccessful presidential campaign of John Kerry in 2004. But since Sen Kerry abandoned his presidential aspirations this year, many of his leading advisers have yet to align themselves with any of the other candidates.

They were expected to join the campaign of Sen Edwards, who was Sen Kerry's running mate last time.

The former aide, who has himself signed up with Sen Edwards, said: "The question is: where have all the Kerry people gone? The answer for most of them is nowhere. Now ask yourself why."

Among the senior officials not yet committed is Michael Whouley, who was national field director for the successful Clinton-Gore 1992 presidential campaign, national campaign manager for Mr Gore when he stood for re-election as vice-president in 1996, and then a senior adviser to Mr Gore in 2000.

Considered one of the most talented Democratic "ground war" experts, he masterminded John Kerry's political resurrection in the New Hampshire presidential primary three years ago, putting him on course for the nomination. Last year, he oversaw the Democratic victory in the mid-term elections.

Two months ago, a former Gore aide, Elaine Kamarck, convened a group of former aides in Boston to consider the possibilities of a Gore campaign.

James Carville, President Clinton's former strategy chief, suggested last week that Mr Gore, who has piled on the pounds, could shed weight over the summer to make himself more media-friendly for a White House run.

"I wouldn't be surprised if he lost 15lb or so," said Mr Carville. "And I think if people thought he could get us out of the mess we're in with Iraq, they wouldn't care how fat he is."

A poll of leading Democratic and Republican strategists found that one in four thought Mr Gore would emerge a strong contender. "He already has emerged - he just has to announce," a Democrat told the magazine Opinion Journal.

A Republican said: "Gore could be the toughest Democrat to beat."

At least eight websites are campaigning to "Draft Gore" into the election. More than 70,000 people have signed an online petition, and more than 120 groups of Gore supporters meet each month around the country to promote the case for a Gore presidency. One website offers the chance to download a song called Run Al, Run!

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IRS Not Adequately Protecting Sensitive Data

FindLaw
IRS Not Adequately Protecting Sensitive Data
By Eric Sinrod

First, the IRS takes your money, and now it seems that the IRS may not be adequately protecting your private information, according to a recent report by the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration. Curious? You should be.

The IRS processes in excess of 220 million tax returns per year. These returns contain personal financial data and personally identifiable information that includes social security numbers. The report concludes that hundreds of IRS laptops and other computer devices have been lost or stolen, employees have not properly encrypted data on the devices, and password controls for the laptops have not been adequate. As a consequence, it is "very likely" that sensitive data for a "significant number" of taxpayers has become available for potential identity theft and other fraudulent schemes. Not a pretty picture.

In terms of hard numbers, the report reveals that at least 490 IRS computers were lost or stolen between January 2, 2003 and June 13, 2006. While all such incidents cannot be prevented, the report suggests that the number would have been lower had IRS employees locked laptops in cabinets at work when away from the office, locked them in the trunks of their vehicles when unattended, and locked them up at home when not in use.

Problematic is the report's conclusion that lost or stolen devices open up the possibility for the revelation of sensitive data because IRS employees do not always follow encryption procedures because they were either unaware of security requirements, were inattentive, or did not know that personal data is considered sensitive. Yikes.

Not only have there been problems with laptops and other portable devices, but the report shows that the security of backup data at offsite facilities is not necessarily safe. At four such sites, for example, backup data has not been encrypted and adequately protected. Gulp.

Not surprisingly, the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration has some recommendations when it comes to the IRS and protection of sensitive taxpayer information. These recommendations include reminding employees of their responsibilities for protecting computer devices, purchasing locks for laptops, imposing penalties for negligence, and summarizing violation statistics and disciplinary actions.

The recommendations also embrace providing proper instructions on encrypting sensitive information, checking of encryption by employees, conducting annual inventory validation of backup media, and performing physical checks of offsite facilities used to store media.

The report indicates that the IRS has agreed with all of its findings and most of its recommendations. Let's just hope that going forward, the IRS does not take a "good enough for government work" attitude. The IRS as part of is mission has no trouble taxing you - now, let's hope that your money is put to work to ensure that your private information that is provided as part of the tax process is protected properly.

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Court upholds ban on abortion procedure

Yahoo! News
Court upholds ban on abortion procedure
By MARK SHERMAN, Associated Press Writer

The Supreme Court upheld the nationwide ban on a controversial abortion procedure Wednesday, handing abortion opponents the long-awaited victory they expected from a more conservative bench.

The 5-4 ruling said the Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act that Congress passed and President Bush signed into law in 2003 does not violate a woman's constitutional right to an abortion.

The opponents of the act "have not demonstrated that the Act would be unconstitutional in a large fraction of relevant cases," Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in the majority opinion.

The administration defended the law as drawing a bright line between abortion and infanticide.

The decision pitted the court's conservatives against its liberals, with President Bush's two appointees, Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito, siding with the majority.

Justices Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia also were in the majority.

It was the first time the court banned a specific procedure in a case over how — not whether — to perform an abortion.

Abortion rights groups as well as the leading association of obstetricians and gynecologists have said the procedure sometimes is the safest for a woman. They also said that such a ruling could threaten most abortions after 12 weeks of pregnancy, although government lawyers and others who favor the ban said there are alternate, more widely used procedures that remain legal.

The outcome is likely to spur efforts at the state level to place more restrictions on abortions.

"I applaud the Court for its ruling today, and my hope is that it sets the stage for further progress in the fight to ensure our nation's laws respect the sanctity of unborn human life," said Rep. John Boehner (news, bio, voting record) of Ohio, Republican leader in the House of Representatives.

Said Eve Gartner of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America: "This ruling flies in the face of 30 years of Supreme Court precedent and the best interest of women's health and safety. ... This ruling tells women that politicians, not doctors, will make their health care decisions for them." She had argued that point before the justices.

More than 1 million abortions are performed in the United States each year, according to recent statistics. Nearly 90 percent of those occur in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, and are not affected by Wednesday's ruling.

Six federal courts have said the law that was in focus Wednesday is an impermissible restriction on a woman's constitutional right to an abortion.

The law bans a method of ending a pregnancy, rather than limiting when an abortion can be performed.

"Today's decision is alarming," Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote in dissent. She said the ruling "refuses to take ... seriously" previous Supreme Court decisions on abortion.

Ginsburg said the latest decision "tolerates, indeed applauds, federal intervention to ban nationwide a procedure found necessary and proper in certain cases by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists."

She was joined by Justices Stephen Breyer, David Souter and John Paul Stevens.

The procedure at issue involves partially removing the fetus intact from a woman's uterus, then crushing or cutting its skull to complete the abortion.

Abortion opponents say the law will not reduce the number of abortions performed because an alternate method — dismembering the fetus in the uterus — is available and, indeed, much more common.

In 2000, the court with key differences in its membership struck down a state ban on partial-birth abortions. Writing for a 5-4 majority at that time, Justice Breyer said the law imposed an undue burden on a woman's right to make an abortion decision.

The Republican-controlled Congress responded in 2003 by passing a federal law that asserted the procedure is gruesome, inhumane and never medically necessary to preserve a woman's health. That statement was designed to overcome the health exception to restrictions that the court has demanded in abortion cases.

But federal judges in California, Nebraska and New York said the law was unconstitutional, and three appellate courts agreed. The Supreme Court accepted appeals from California and Nebraska, setting up Wednesday's ruling.

Kennedy's dissent in 2000 was so strong that few court watchers expected him to take a different view of the current case.

Kennedy acknowledged continuing disagreement about the procedure within the medical community. In the past, courts have cited that uncertainty as a reason to allow the disputed procedure.

But Kennedy said, "The law need not give abortion doctors unfettered choice in the course of their medical practice."

He said the more common abortion method, involving dismemberment, is beyond the reach of the federal ban.

While the court upheld the law against a broad attack on its constitutionality, Kennedy said the court could entertain a challenge in which a doctor found it necessary to perform the banned procedure on a patient suffering certain medical complications.

Doctors most often refer to the procedure as a dilation and extraction or an intact dilation and evacuation abortion.

The law allows the procedure to be performed when a woman's life is in jeopardy.

The cases are Gonzales v. Carhart, 05-380, and Gonzales v. Planned Parenthood, 05-1382.

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The IRS warns of a late-breaking Internet tax scam, just before the April 17 deadline. Are you at risk?

Newsweek
IRS warns of online tax scam
The IRS warns of a late-breaking Internet tax scam, just before the April 17 deadline. Are you at risk?
WEB EXCLUSIVE
By Brian Braiker

April 14, 2007 - Haven’t done your taxes yet? If not, you’re in good company—with the deadline extended to April 17 this year, millions of honest taxpayers still have yet to file. In the rush to get them done on time, many may turn to the Web to file electronically.

And as a result, some may get fleeced.

The Internal Revenue Service announced Friday that they had discovered a new late-breaking scam: bogus Web sites are masquerading as affiliates of the IRS’s Free File Alliance of 19 tax-software companies. The people who set up these scam sites take tax information from well-meaning taxpayers, change their bank account numbers to their own and then file the return through a legitimate Free File partner.

Terry Lemons, a senior spokesperson for the IRS, stresses in an interview with NEWSWEEK’s Brian Braiker that such scams are nothing new—and the only way to safely participate in the Free File program is by going directly to the official IRS site. He also warns of other common scams that pre-date the Internet, and extolls the virtues of legitimate electronic filing. Excerpts:

NEWSWEEK: What caused you to alert taxpayers to this?
Terry Lemons: We have a program available through our Web site where people can prepare their tax returns for free through 19 different private-sector companies. What we discovered late Friday is that there was a site pretending to be one of the affiliates to get these people’s tax information, with official looking logos. If you stumbled onto this site you might think it’s legitimate. People were entering info, and the [people behind the scam site] were taking the bank account number, changing it to their own, and having the refund routed to their bank account.

How many of these scam sites are there?
We identified a couple of questionable sites [on Friday, April 13]. We’re still taking a look at them. It’s still very early in the process.

What are their URLs?
This is where it gets tricky. Because the investigation is still underway, I can’t point you to specific sites. But if you’re concerned, go to the official IRS site. That’s the only way to enter one of these Free File sites. There are legitimate places out there that offer online tax preparation for a fee. But if you want to actually do free filing through our Free File program, you have to go through the IRS—if you think you’ve entered it and you didn’t go through the IRS Web site, you’re not in the Free File program.

What recourse can the people who’ve been scammed take?
We are working to identify who the affected taxpayers are. We’re going to do everything possible to help these people out.

How many have been scammed so far?
It’s too early [to know] in this particular scam. It popped up so late in our tax season; we’re just days away. You have millions of people preparing, so you don’t want to have someone in a rush do an Internet search and end up at an unscrupulous site.

Is this similar to scams you’ve seen in the past?
At this time of year we typically see a lot of tax scams pop up. People have been thinking of countless ways through the years to scam taxpayers. We’ve seen a lot of phishing incidences, people using e-mail malevolently. Every March we see a spike in people sending out e-mails pretending to be from the IRS. With tax or any kind of financial information, any time you get an e-mail asking you to click on a link, rather than clicking, you really ought to be sure you’re going to the legitimate Web address.

What sort of scams predate the Internet?
One classic scam is people going door to door impersonating IRS agents; that’s been around for a long time. Another scam is people who pretend to be tax preparers and promise a big refund. Some of those guys will simply put their own bank account numbers on the return. Some unscrupulous preparers put some big refund on the return and ask for a percentage. That’s a real warning sign that you’ve got someone that’s not legitimate on your hands. And even if you go through a tax preparer, you’re the one ultimately responsible for what’s on the tax return. You need to treat the decision the same was as you would selecting a doctor or lawyer.

Any honest mistakes to watch out for?
The most common mistake we see is in people doing paper returns and making math errors. Simple mistakes like that and writing the Social Security number wrong. That’s the nice thing about filing electronically, that’s taken care of.

Have you filed your taxes yet?
[Laughs.] I’m still working on mine. I usually get mine done early but we’ve had a really busy tax season. This time of year everyone works for the IRS.

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18109853/site/newsweek/?from=rss

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A controversial series on the post-9/11 world isn't exactly fair and balanced—and that’s why it works.

Controversial PBS Series: 'America at a Crossroads'
A controversial series on the post-9/11 world isn't exactly fair and balanced—and that’s why it works.
By Devin Gordon
Newsweek

April 23, 2007 issue - In "The Case for War," the third installment of PBS's sprawling, 11-part, $20 million documentary series "America at a Crossroads," former Bush administration adviser Richard Perle spends the better part of an hour explaining why going to war in Iraq was the right thing to do. "The Case for War" has infuriated many public broadcasters and media watchdogs from the moment that plans for it, and for "America at a Crossroads," were announced in March 2004. Its critics accused the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the federal entity that helps fund PBS, of letting the Bush team hijack public television for its own ends. And they attacked Perle for pushing a neoconservative agenda with taxpayer money.

But when I watched "The Case for War," mostly I just felt bad for the guy. At one point, Perle wades into an antiwar rally in Washington, D.C., and is immediately swarmed. "It got pretty vicious," he tells NEWSWEEK. "When someone shouts, 'You're a weapon of mass destruction' or 'You're worse than Hitler,' how do you respond to that?" Throughout, however, Perle is unfailingly calm, even a bit downcast. To appease critics and give the film some objectivity, he also debates the Iraq question with several intelligent people who had the luxury of hindsight. (Other opponents of the war declined invitations to appear on camera, Perle says, including Noam Chomsky, actor Tim Robbins and "that fat guy who makes those documentaries." He means Michael Moore.) He comes across not as a frothing neocon caricature but as a thoughtful man with sincere beliefs who happens to be—at least from our current vantage point—on the wrong side of history. Despite the efforts to make it so, "The Case for War" isn't "balanced." It's the world according to Richard Perle, which is a pretty lonely perspective now. And that's why it's so fascinating.

"America at a Crossroads," which will air on PBS for six consecutive nights beginning April 15, had what its executive producer Dalton Delan calls "a tainted birth." The goal of the series was to prompt discussion about a handful of complex issues facing America in the post-9/11 world, including the struggles of moderate Muslims and Europe's antipathy toward the United States. (A disclosure: one of the films, "The Brotherhood," features NEWSWEEK reporters Mark Hosenball and Michael Isikoff; on screen, they're like our Woodward and Bernstein, only furrier.) But the debate began much sooner than anyone had in mind. "Crossroads" was the brainchild of CPB's executive vice president Michael Pack, a documentarian who had been installed in 2003 with a mandate to bring more conservative voices to PBS. Critics of the series argued that too many of the proposed installments, especially the Perle hour and a film about U.S. troops in Iraq called "Warriors," smacked of administration propaganda.

"Counterbalancing" projects were launched, then scrapped. The series's original advisory board was dismissed and replaced. In January 2006, Washington's public-television station, WETA, was brought in to oversee the project. "We knew that this could be a great series," Delan says. "But in this fishbowl world of scrutiny, trust was important. And any sideshow, perceived or otherwise, would've been a hurdle to that."

One such hurdle was removed just before WETA assumed control of "Crossroads." Brian Lapping, an award-winning British filmmaker and the initial producer of "The Case for War," agreed to recuse himself from the project after his friendship with Perle became public knowledge. When Karl Zinsmeister, one of the producers of "Warriors," accepted a position as President Bush's chief domestic-policy adviser, he also stepped aside at WETA's behest. Longtime PBS news anchor Robert MacNeil was brought in to host the series and tie together its disparate installments. But WETA stopped short of abandoning the Perle film (or any others) due to carping about imbalance. "The Case for War," says Jeff Bieber, an executive producer at WETA, "seemed to represent the kind of programs that PBS traditionally has not done, which is to showcase a conservative viewpoint."

The series is at its best during installments like Perle's, when the perspective it presents is sharp, specific and unfamiliar. "Crossroads" might have had an easier journey to the screen if its producers had forsaken polarizing narrators (such as Muslim author and reformer Irshad Manji in "Faith Without Fear") in favor of dispassionate drones, but what a bore that would've been. And besides, aren't we smart enough to listen to what Perle has to say and decide for ourselves if we agree? To suggest otherwise betrays a dim, even condescending, opinion of PBS's audience. Balance, after all, is an illusory concept. There are portions of "Crossroads" that are biased toward one viewpoint, but the series, on the whole, is not. A film such as "Warriors," which is about the day-to-day valor of a battalion in Iraq, might strike some viewers as naive about the complexities of the war. But its scenes of raw combat and perplexed soldiers calling every Iraqi man "Uday"—a reference to Saddam Hussein's dead son—give it the ring of truth. The next night, "Crossroads" will air a film called "Gangs of Iraq," which is a sobering look at the forces dragging Iraq into chaos. Set amid the same war, the two films couldn't be more different. But that doesn't invalidate either of them.

The biggest flaw in "America at a Crossroads" isn't imbalance. It's ill timing. The series was supposed to air around the fifth anniversary of 9/11, but all the political bickering at the outset thwarted that plan. The result is a series that feels unmoored to any major moment and, in some spots, oddly outdated. "It's not a bad time," says Bieber. "But yes, had this series aired when, say, Congress was debating the surge, that would've been great. Holding it for closer to the 2008 election would've been even better, but that just wasn't possible." Even MacNeil points out the folly of a series called "America at a Crossroads" that makes no mention of Iran or North Korea. "We did our best with the cards we were dealt," he says. Instead, the series kicks off with a two-hour primer on Osama bin Laden and the roots of Al Qaeda. It'd be a worthy curtain raiser if "Crossroads" had aired in 2003. But here in 2007, with bin Laden largely marginalized and Iraq in ruins, "America at a Crossroads" left me wondering if America has already blown through its crossroads, and now there's no turning back.

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18080996/site/newsweek/?from=rss

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Bombs hit Baghdad Shiite areas; 45 dead

Yahoo! News
Bombs hit Baghdad Shiite areas; 45 dead
By LAUREN FRAYER, Associated Press Writer

Cars, minibuses and roadside bombs exploded in Shiite Muslim enclaves across the city Sunday, killing at least 45 people in sectarian violence that defied the Baghdad security crackdown, while a radical anti-U.S. cleric raised a new threat to Iraq's government.

Two officials close to Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr said his followers would quit their six Cabinet posts Monday — a move that could leave Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's already weak administration without enough support to stay in power.

And in a rare gesture of dissent from America's partners in Baghdad, dozens of Iraqi policemen demonstrated in front of their station, accusing U.S. troops of treating them like "animals" and "slaves."

The U.S. military command announced the combat deaths of three more Americans. Two British service members died when their helicopters crashed in midair north of Baghdad, and hours later a U.S. helicopter was hit by ground fire near Mosul but landed safely with no injuries.

Six powerful bombs, gunfire and artillery blasts enveloped Baghdad in a near-constant din that seemed a setback for the 9-week-old U.S.-Iraqi military campaign to pacify the capital.

U.S. commanders previously cited a slight decrease in violence since the crackdown began Feb. 14, but urged patience for what they warned would be a long, tough fight.

"Although we're making steady progress ... we have a long way to go," Rear Adm. Mark Fox, a U.S. military spokesman in Baghdad, told reporters Sunday. "We will continue to face attacks from those who attempt to tear down what the Iraqi people have worked so hard to build."

The crackdown is believed to have driven many insurgents from Baghdad, and violence has soared in areas outside the capital, such as the bombing in the Shiite holy city of Karbala that killed 47 people and wounded 224 Saturday.

But violence has spiked upward again in Baghdad, with Sunday's six bombings coming just three days after a suicide bomber blew himself up inside parliament and killed a lawmaker.

"This week has been difficult for the Iraqi people," Fox acknowledged.

The carnage caused some to voice doubts about the Baghdad crackdown.

"The security plan has made more troubles for Iraqis than helping them," said Juma'a Khamis, 42, a technician who lives in the capital. "There have been no positive results. It's a failure, and so is the government."

Others retained hope that the campaign could carve out breathing room for Iraqi forces to regain control of the city.

"We need to build our security forces, and step by step we can achieve stability," said Nassir Amir, a 31-year-old civil engineer. "The Iraqi government is trying its best but it faces a lot of difficulties ... It needs more time — maybe one year at least."

Violence isn't the only threat to the government. A pullout by the al-Sadr faction, which provided the crucial votes that put al-Maliki in office, could collapse his already shaky regime.

Al-Sadr's six followers on the 37-seat Cabinet would officially withdraw from the government Monday, said Saleh al-Aujaili and Hassan al-Rubaie, members of the Sadrist bloc in parliament. They said al-Sadr's 30 legislators would stay in parliament.

The officials said al-Sadr ordered the Cabinet ministers to quit in protest over the arrests of leaders in his Shiite militia during the Baghdad crackdown and for the prime minister's failure to back setting a timetable for U.S. withdrawal.

Earlier in the day, dozens of Iraqi police officers chanted "No, no to America! Get out occupiers!" during a protest at the Rashad station in Baghdad's eastern neighborhood of Mashtal. U.S. troops in two Humvees and a Bradley fighting vehicle watched from a distance.

Officers complained that American troops do not treat them with respect, but it wasn't clear if any specific incident set off the demonstration.

The day's first bombings came at midday, when two cars packed with explosives blew up five minutes apart in a busy market area of Shurta Rabia, a mostly Shiite area of western Baghdad.

The first detonated in front of a kebab restaurant, and the second went off as rescuers were evacuating victims, police said. Many women and children were reported among the 18 dead and 50 wounded.

Less than two hours later, a suicide bomber blew himself up on a minibus near a courthouse in the mainly Shiite neighborhood of al-Utafiyah of northwest Baghdad — killing at least eight people and wounding 11, officials said. Many victims were severely burned, an official at Khazimiyah Hospital said.

Another minibus rigged with explosives detonated near a cluster of electronics shops in the predominantly Shiite district of Karradah, killing 11 people and wounding 15, authorities said.

The owner of a glass shop said he saw someone park the bus and leave.

"It was an ordinary thing because usually bus drivers stop there waiting for passengers, so we didn't suspect anything," said the witness, who gave only his nickname, Abu Jassim. "Five minutes later, the bus blew up — damaging the surrounded area and burning more than eight civilian cars that were passing by."

After nightfall, insurgents struck in Karradah again — with two roadside bombs exploding within five minutes and 20 yards of one another. Eight more people died and 23 were wounded, police said. Six shops and several parked cars were damaged.

The two British helicopters crashed after colliding over a rural area near Taji, 12 miles north of Baghdad. Two British crew members were killed and four were injured, one very seriously.

"We believe it's almost certainly an accident," Prime Minister Tony Blair told British Broadcasting Corp. television.

British forces, headquartered in the southern city of Basra, rarely fly missions near Taji.

"I can't talk about the particular mission they were involved in, but we do have units operating as part of the coalition across Iraq," a British defense official said on condition of anonymity, in line with government policy.

In the northern city of Mosul, a U.S. Kiowa helicopter was hit by insurgent ground fire, causing it to make a "precautionary landing due to mechanical problems," a military statement said. The aircraft was assisting Iraqi soldiers whose outpost was attacked by insurgents, it said.

Uninjured, both pilots "returned to their base, launched another helicopter and went back to the engagement area to continue the fight," the statement said. Four Iraqi soldiers were killed in the battle, it said.

One U.S. Army soldier was killed by small arms fire Sunday while trying to reach an Iraqi police unit under attack near a mosque in southern Baghdad, the military said in a statement. One civilian was wounded in the incident.

Another soldier died Saturday when a roadside bomb exploded alongside a foot patrol south of Baghdad, the military said. A Marine died the same day in combat in Anbar province, west of the capital.

A third soldier died from non-combat related causes Saturday while on leave in Qatar, the military said.

___

Associated Press writers Qassim Abdul-Zahra in Baghdad and Jennifer Quinn in London contributed to this report.

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Global Warming Called Security Threat

The New York Times
Global Warming Called Security Threat
By ANDREW C. REVKIN and TIMOTHY WILLIAMS

For the second time in a month, private consultants to the government are warning that human-driven warming of the climate poses risks to the national security of the United States.

A report, scheduled to be published on Monday but distributed to some reporters yesterday, said issues usually associated with the environment — like rising ocean levels, droughts and violent weather caused by global warming — were also national security concerns.

“Unlike the problems that we are used to dealing with, these will come upon us extremely slowly, but come they will, and they will be grinding and inexorable,” Richard J. Truly, a retired United States Navy vice admiral and former NASA administrator, said in the report.

The effects of global warming, the study said, could lead to large-scale migrations, increased border tensions, the spread of disease and conflicts over food and water. All could lead to direct involvement by the United States military.

The report recommends that climate change be integrated into the nation’s security strategies and says the United States “should commit to a stronger national and international role to help stabilize climate changes at levels that will avoid significant disruption to global security and stability.”

The report, called “National Security and the Threat of Climate Change,” was commissioned by the Center for Naval Analyses, a government-financed research group, and written by a group of retired generals and admirals called the Military Advisory Board.

In March, a report from the Global Business Network, which advises intelligence agencies and the Pentagon on occasion, concluded, among other things, that rising seas and more powerful storms could eventually generate unrest as crowded regions like Bangladesh’s sinking delta become less habitable.

One of the authors of the report, Peter Schwartz, a consultant who studies climate risks and other trends for the Defense Department and other clients, said the climate system, jogged by a century-long buildup of heat-trapping gases, was likely to rock between extremes that could wreak havoc in poor countries with fragile societies.

“Just look at Somalia in the early 1990s,” Mr. Schwartz said. “You had disruption driven by drought, leading to the collapse of a society, humanitarian relief efforts, and then disastrous U.S. military intervention. That event is prototypical of the future.”

“Picture that in Central America or the Caribbean, which are just as likely,” he said. “This is not distant, this is now. And we need to be preparing.”

Other recent studies have shown that drought and scant water have already fueled civil conflicts in global hot spots like Afghanistan, Nepal, and Sudan, according to several recent studies.

This bodes ill, given projections that human-driven warming is likely to make some of the world’s driest, poorest places drier still, experts said.

“The evidence is fairly clear that sharp downward deviations from normal rainfall in fragile societies elevate the risk of major conflict,” said Marc Levy of the Earth Institute at Columbia University, which recently published a study on the relationship between climate and civil war.

Given that climate models project drops in rainfall in such places in a warming world, Mr. Levy said, “It seems irresponsible not to take into account the possibility that a world with climate change will be a more violent world when making judgments about how tolerable such a world might be.”

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Domenici Sought Iglesias Ouster

abqjournal.com
Domenici Sought Iglesias Ouster
By Mike Gallagher

Former U.S. Attorney David Iglesias was fired after Sen. Pete Domenici, who had been unhappy with Iglesias for some time, made a personal appeal to the White House, the Journal has learned.
Domenici had complained about Iglesias before, at one point going to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales before taking his request to the president as a last resort.
The senior senator from New Mexico had listened to criticism of Iglesias going back to 2003 from sources ranging from law enforcement officials to Republican Party activists.
Domenici, who submitted Iglesias' name for the job and guided him through the confirmation process in 2001, had tried at various times to get more white-collar crime help for the U.S. Attorney's Office— even if Iglesias didn't want it.
At one point, the six-term Republican senator tried to get Iglesias moved to a Justice Department post in Washington, D.C., but Iglesias told Justice officials he wasn't interested.
In the spring of 2006, Domenici told Gonzales he wanted Iglesias out.

Gonzales refused. He told Domenici he would fire Iglesias only on orders from the president.
At some point after the election last Nov. 6, Domenici called Bush's senior political adviser, Karl Rove, and told him he wanted Iglesias out and asked Rove to take his request directly to the president.
Domenici and Bush subsequently had a telephone conversation about the issue.
The conversation between Bush and Domenici occurred sometime after the election but before the firings of Iglesias and six other U.S. attorneys were announced on Dec. 7.
Iglesias' name first showed up on a Nov. 15 list of federal prosecutors who would be asked to resign. It was not on a similar list prepared in October.
The Journal confirmed the sequence of events through a variety of sources familiar with the firing of Iglesias, including sources close to Domenici. The senator's office declined comment.
The House and Senate Judiciary committees are investigating Iglesias' firing as well as the dismissals of six other U.S. attorneys.
Gonzales, the embattled attorney general whose job is likely in the balance, is scheduled to testify Tuesday before the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Senate and House Democrats have focused on a telephone call Domenici made to Iglesias in October.
Iglesias testified before the congressional committees that Domenici called him at home and asked if indictments were imminent in a public corruption investigation of Albuquerque's Metropolitan Courthouse construction. Iglesias told him indictments were not expected anytime soon.
Iglesias testified that Domenici said, "I'm very sorry to hear that." And then hung up.
Iglesias said he felt "pressured" and "violated" by the telephone call but did not report it to Justice Department headquarters as required.
Domenici has admitted and apologized for making the call, but he denied pressuring Iglesias. He has also said he didn't mention the election.
Democrats have accused Domenici of attempting to influence the outcome of a tight congressional race between incumbent Republican Heather Wilson and former state Attorney General Patricia Madrid. Wilson won the election by fewer than 900 votes.
Iglesias could not be reached for comment. He was reportedly out of the country on Navy duty.
A spokesman for Domenici's office said they were not prepared to comment at this time.

Looking for a paper trail
Exactly how Iglesias' name came to be included on a Nov. 15 list of U.S. attorneys to be fired has been a mystery House and Senate Democrats have been trying to unravel.
There are gaps in documents provided to Congress by the Justice Department about the firings and other records are severely redacted.
Gonzales' former chief of staff, Kyle Sampson, said he couldn't give a reason for Iglesias' firing during his testimony before Congress last month. He did say that if a U.S. attorney wasn't succeeding politically, he wasn't succeeding.
Documentation that has been turned over to Congress doesn't indicate problems with Iglesias' performance from the Department Justice point of view.
The documents reveal Domenici called Gonzales and his deputies on several occasions in 2005 and 2006.
In one undated memo, a Gonzales aide wrote, "Domenici says he doesn't move cases," in reference to Iglesias.
New Mexicans who complained directly to the Justice Department about Iglesias said they learned he was held in high regard by Gonzales and his staff.
At least one memo shows Iglesias was offered a job heading the Executive Office of U.S. Attorneys in Washington, D.C.
Iglesias turned the job down.
That job offer, according to several sources, was made at the prodding of Domenici.
According to sources, Iglesias was also considered for U.S. attorney for Washington, D.C., and other administrative posts at department headquarters.
Iglesias was apparently unaware that Domenici was unhappy with his job performance when he turned those jobs down.

White-collar crime
In September 2005, Iglesias announced the arrests of state Treasurer Robert Vigil and his predecessor, Michael Montoya, on extortion charges. Both are Democrats in a state where Democrats control the Legislature and most statewide offices.
Republicans who had complained about political corruption in the state for years saw an opportunity to do more than complain. And this was an issue with political traction.
The point man would be Iglesias.
During one of his few news conferences while U.S. attorney, Iglesias called political corruption "endemic" in New Mexico.
The FBI also put a high priority on public corruption, naming it its top priority behind terrorism.
According to Justice Department memos turned over to congressional investigators, Domenici approached Iglesias in late 2005 and asked if he needed additional prosecutors for corruption cases.
Iglesias, according to the memo, told Domenici he didn't need white-collar crime prosecutors. He needed prosecutors for immigration cases.
Domenici was disappointed in the response. After that conversation, Domenici decided he would try to get Iglesias help, whether Iglesias wanted it or not.
In 2006, Domenici asked Gonzales if he could find additional experienced white-collar crime prosecutors to send to New Mexico. Gonzales had a number of prosecutors who were finishing the ENRON prosecutions and were quite experienced at complex white-collar crime cases.
None was sent here.
Within Iglesias' own office, prosecutors suggested moving more attorneys into the White Collar Crime-Public Corruption section in 2005 because the FBI was developing more cases and leads than the section could handle in a timely fashion.
Iglesias was initially enthusiastic about the idea but didn't follow through after consulting senior staff.

Treasurer's Office scandal
Montoya and others pleaded guilty in the Treasurer's Office scandal. Vigil went to trial in April 2006. After more than five weeks, a mistrial was declared. Several jurors said one holdout prevented conviction on at least some charges.
The second trial in September ended in one conviction on attempted extortion and acquittal on 23 counts. Vigil has been sentenced to 37 months in prison.
After the first trial, then-Attorney General Madrid indicted key prosecution witnesses in the federal case based on their testimony. She said Iglesias hadn't been tough enough in cutting plea deals and hadn't worked out an agreement with her office.
As a result, one key witness refused to testify in the second trial.
During this time, the much-publicized courthouse investigation was essentially put on the shelf. The lead prosecutor in the U.S. Attorney's Office was handling both the Vigil trials and the courthouse investigation.
Delays in the courthouse case led to frustration among Republicans who had tried to make Madrid's track record on ethics and corruption cases an issue in the Madrid-Wilson race.
Indictments in the courthouse case were announced last month.

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Gwen Ifill Calls Out Russert, Brooks For Their Silence On Imus

thinkprogress.org
Gwen Ifill Calls Out Russert, Brooks For Their Silence On Imus

This morning on NBC’s Meet the Press, PBS anchor Gwen Ifill directly called out host Tim Russert and fellow guest David Brooks for failing to speak out against Don Imus’ offensive remarks.

“There has been radio silence from a lot of people who have done this program who could have spoken up and said, I find this offensive or I didn’t know,” Ifill said. “These people didn’t speak up.” She then turned Russert and Brooks, frequest guests on Imus’s show. “Tim, we didn’t hear from you. David, we didn’t hear from you.”

Ifill added, “A lot of people did know and a lot of people were listening and they just decided it was okay. They decided this culture of meanness was fine — until they got caught. My concern about Mr. Imus and a lot of people and a lot of the debate in this society is not that people are sorry that they say these things, they are sorry that someone catches them.”

Despite being called out by Ifill, Russert said little during the show about his frequent appearances on Imus’ show. Intead, he suggested that Imus will launch a new show dedicated to “racial reconciliation and healing,” which Russert said he would “absolutely” listen to.

Transcript:

And yet, you write this: “Why do my journalistic colleagues appear on Mr. Imus’ show? That’s for them to defend and others to argue about. I certainly don’t know any black journalists who will.”

Yow know, it’s interesting to me. This has been an interesting week. The people who have spoken, the people who issued statements and the people who haven’t. There has been radio silence from a lot of people who have done this program who could have spoken up and said, I find this offensive or I didn’t know. These people didn’t speak up. Tim, we didn’t hear from you. David, we didn’t hear from you. What was missing in this debate was someone saying, you know, I understand that this is offensive. You know, I have a 7-year-old god daughter. Yesterday she went out shopping with her mom for high-Thetop basketball shoes so she can play basketball. The offense, the slur that Imus directed at me happened more than 10 years ago. I would like to think that 10 years from now, that Asia isn’t going to be deciding that she wants to get recruited for the college basketball team or be a tennis pro or go to medical school and that she is still vulnerable to those kinds of casual slurs and insults that I got 10 years ago, and that people will say, I didn’t know, or people will say, I wasn’t listening. A lot of people did know and a lot of people were listening and they just decided it was okay. They decided this culture of meanness was fine — until they got caught. My concern about Mr. Imus and a lot of people and a lot of the debate in this society is not that people are sorry that they say these things, they are sorry that someone catches them. When Don Imus said this about me when I worked here at NBC, when I found out about it, his producer called because Don said he wants to apologize. Well, now he says he never said it. What was he apologizing for? He was apologizing for getting caught, not apologizing for having said it in the first place. And that to me is the debate we need to have, David is right, about the culture of meanness, about the culture of racial complaint, about the internal culture within our community about how we talk to one another. But just this week it was finally saying, enough.

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G.O.P. Candidates Lay Into Democrats, Not One Another

The New York Times
G.O.P. Candidates Lay Into Democrats, Not One Another
By ADAM NAGOURNEY

DES MOINES, April 14 — A parade of Republican White House candidates appealed for support from over 1,000 Iowa Republicans on Saturday, with two of their leading candidates — Senator John McCain and Rudolph W. Giuliani — assailing Democrats in Washington for pressing legislation that would set a timetable for bringing American troops back from Iraq.

It was the first time that the major Republican candidates had appeared at the same event — the annual Lincoln Day dinner, held in the sprawling ballroom of a downtown convention center here. For more than three hours, an audience of the state’s most active Republicans listened attentively as candidates proclaimed their strong opposition to abortion rights, called for a crackdown against illegal immigrants and warned that a Democratic return to the White House would result in higher taxes.

Although the event was called a “Unity Dinner,” the speeches reflected divisions among the Republicans on various issues, in particular abortion. Several candidates, including Mr. McCain of Arizona and Mike Huckabee of Arkansas, presented themselves as lifelong opponents of abortion rights, drawing clear if unspoken contrasts with Mr. Giuliani, who supports abortion rights, and Mr. Romney, who once supported abortion rights but now opposes them.

But the strongest divisions emerged between the parties, as Mr. Giuliani and Mr. McCain offered attacks on Democrats for their efforts to bring an end to the war in Iraq. Apart from his remark about abortions — and a warm-up joke that involved Zsa Zsa Gabor — Mr. McCain devoted almost his entire nine-minute speech to arguing in support of the war, and attacking Democrats for opposing it.

“The Democrats want to set a date for withdrawal, which should be named a date certain for surrender,” Mr. McCain said. “There is no way we can prevail if we announce a date for withdrawal.”

“There is only one commander-in-chief of the United States and that is George W. Bush,” he continued, drawing some of the loudest applause of the night in response to one of the few times Mr. Bush was even mentioned. “I support him, and I believe in him.”

Mr. Giuliani, the former mayor of New York, said the debate on the war had “intensified to me the difference between us and the Democrats.” He criticized Democrats whom he said opposed expanding domestic surveillance programs and wanted to weaken some provisions of the so-called Patriot Act, saying such moves were a retreat from the offensive on terrorism.

“If we back off that, then we are going back on the defense,” Mr. Giuliani said, “and we are no longer on the offense.”

Mr. Giuliani said he did not fault people who failed to grasp the threat of terrorism after the first attack on the World Trade Center or after the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole. “But after Sept. 11, it’s clear what we need to do to protect ourselves,” he said.

Mr. Romney, the former Massachusetts governor, who is also a leading candidate for his party’s nomination, called for expanded spending on the military in order to toughen the United States against threats and warned about the threat of what he called Jihadists.

“They want to create the collapse of the United States of America and our retreat militarily,” he said.

“The Republican Party — and conservatism generally — are a philosophy of strength,” he said. “Military strength, economic strength, personal strength and family strength.”

The attendance at the event, both by the candidates and the state’s Republicans, reflected the importance Iowa has assumed in the presidential nominating process, and the intense interest voters here have in the race.

Several candidates said Republicans should avoid attacking one another and be prepared to band together around a nominee next year. “I would like you to select me,” Mr. Giuliani said. “But if you don’t, every single person who comes up after me — every single one of them — is better than Hillary, Senator Obama and Senator Edwards,” referring to Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama, as well as former Senator John Edwards. It was his only remark that drew loud applause from the crowd.

And one candidate, Jim Gilmore, the former governor of Virginia, drew soft boos when he mentioned candidates’ names in a not-so-subtle way of suggesting that three of the leading candidates had records of shifting positions on some issues that are crucial to conservatives.

“Don’t be fooled by people who come to you now and say they are conservative,” Mr. Gilmore said. “I can assure you that Rudy McRomney is not conservative, and he knows he is not a conservative.”

But the undercurrent was unmistakable, even when names were not used. Mr. Huckabee, a former governor of Arkansas, pointedly noted that he had always been an opponent of abortion rights and gun-control measures, and that he had supported President Bush’s tax cuts from the beginning.

“I’m not late in declaring that life begins at conception and we ought to protect human life,” he said. “I am not late in believing that the Bush tax cuts were good when they were first proposed, and they are still good today.”

Mr. Romney recently joined the National Rifle Association, as he sought to argue that he was a lifelong opponent of gun control measures. And Mr. McCain voted against many of Mr. Bush’s tax cuts, a position that has contributed to conservative unease with his candidacy.

Mr. Romney appeared on stage with his wife, Ann, and one of his sons, Josh, paying a long and warm tribute to his family. The tableau came immediately after Mr. Giuliani finished and served — by design or not — to remind Republicans of what has troubled some here about Mr. Giuliani: his three marriages and his estranged relationship with his son, Andrew.

The candidates were each given six minutes to talk, though that was one rule that none of the candidates, after spending hours flying here, seemed prepared to follow. Mr. Giuliani spoke for 17 minutes, though he left immediately after he was done, passing up the glad-handing of dinner attendees to leave Iowa for a fund-raiser in Missouri.

In a reflection of the potency of the immigration issue here, Representative Tom Tancredo of Colorado drew some of the loudest applause of the night when he questioned his opponent’s commitment to cracking down on illegal immigrants and said he would never support a measure allowing them to stay in this country.

“I will never grant amnesty to illegal immigrants,” Mr. Tancredo said.

Marc Santora contributed reporting.

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Gonzales: U.S.A. Review Should Have Been "More Rigorous"

tpmmuckraker.com
Gonzales: U.S.A. Review Should Have Been "More Rigorous"
By Paul Kiel

The Justice Department has released Alberto Gonzales' written statement for Tuesday's hearing, which was provided today to the Senate Judiciary Committee. We've posted the entire section concerning the U.S. attorneys below.

The statement is long on promises and short on specifics, and Gonzales' narrative for how the firings occurred is a very simple one: he tasked Kyle Sampson with it, had a handful of conversations about it over the course of two years, and then eventually signed off on the firings.

Nevertheless, there are a couple of noteworthy passages.

First, Gonzales says again that (as far as he knows, at least) none of the U.S. attorneys were fired for "improper" reasons -- which would be "in order to impede or speed along particular criminal investigations for illegitimate reasons." But he says that "it is clear to me that I should have done more personally to ensure that the review process was more rigorous." That's an admission that's sure to open him up to some battering from senators on the panel.

Second, he again says that he "misspoke" at a press conference on March 13th when he said "I was not involved in any discussions about what was going on.” That statement, he says, "was too broad." He regrets the confusion, he says.

The entire thing is below....

From Gonzales' written statement for Tuesday's hearing:

First, I will address the issue of the resignations of eight of 93 U.S. Attorneys. I know this is an issue of concern to the Committee, and I want you to know that I share your commitment to bringing all of the facts to light on this matter. I hope we can make great progress on that goal today.

I also want the Committee and those U.S. Attorneys to know how much I appreciate their public service. Each is a fine lawyer and dedicated professional who gave many years of service to the Department. I apologize to them and to their families for allowing this matter to become an unfortunate and undignified public spectacle, and I am sorry for my missteps that have helped to fuel the controversy.

The Justice Department has tried to be forthcoming with the Congress and the American people about the process that led to the resignations. The Department has provided thousands of pages of internal and deliberative documents to the Congress. I consistently and voluntarily have made Justice Department officials available for interviews and hearings on this subject.

I have taken these important steps to provide information for two critical reasons: (1) I have nothing to hide, and (2) I am committed to assuring the Congress and the American public that nothing improper occurred here. The sooner that all the facts are known, the sooner we can all devote our exclusive attention to our important work – work that includes protecting the American people from the dangers of terrorism, violent crime, illegal drugs, and sexual predators. I know that the Committee must be eager to focus on those issues of great importance to the American people as well.

At this point, we can all agree that U.S. Attorneys serve at the pleasure of the President. We further should agree on a definition of what an “improper” reason for the removal of a U.S. Attorney would be. As former Acting Solicitor General and Assistant Attorney General Walter Dellinger has stated, an improper reason would be: “The replacement of one or more U.S. attorneys in order to impede or speed along particular criminal investigations for illegitimate reasons.”

I agree with that. Stated differently, the Department of Justice makes decisions based on the evidence, not whether the target is a Republican or a Democrat.

For the benefit of the Committee as well as for the American people, I would like to be abundantly clear about the decision to request the resignations of eight (of the 93) United States Attorneys – each of whom had served his or her full four-year term of office:

I know that I did not, and would not, ask for a resignation of any individual in order to interfere with or influence a particular prosecution for partisan political gain.

I also have no basis to believe that anyone involved in this process sought the removal of a U.S. Attorney for an improper reason.

These facts have been made clear through the testimony of Justice Department officials who have appeared before the Congress, as well as by the thousands of pages of internal documents that the Department of Justice has released. Based upon the record as I know it, it is unfair and unfounded for anyone to conclude that any U.S. Attorney was removed for an improper reason. Our record in bringing aggressive prosecutions without fear or favor and irrespective of political affiliations – a record I am very proud of – is beyond reproach.

While reasonable people may dispute whether or not the actual reasons for these decisions were sufficient to justify a particular resignation, again, there is no factual basis to support the allegation, as many have made, that these resignations were motivated by improper reasons. As this Committee knows, however, to provide more certainty, I have asked the Justice Department’s Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) to investigate this matter. Working with the Department’s Office of Inspector General (OIG), these non-partisan professionals will complete their own independent investigation so that the Congress and the American people can be 100 percent assured of the facts.

The Committee should also know that, to ensure the independence and integrity of these investigations, and the investigations of congressional committees, I have not spoken with nor reviewed the confidential transcripts of any of the Department of Justice employees interviewed by congressional staff. I state this because, as a result, I may be somewhat limited when it comes to providing you with all of the facts that you may desire. I hope you understand that, to me, it was absolutely essential that the investigative work proceeds in a manner free of any complications by my efforts to prepare for this testimony.

While I firmly believe that these dismissals were appropriate, I have equal conviction that the process by which these U.S. Attorneys were asked to resign could have – and should have – been handled differently.
I made mistakes in not ensuring that these U.S. Attorneys received more dignified treatment. Others within the Department of Justice also made mistakes. As far as I know, these were honest mistakes of perception and judgment and not intentional acts of misconduct. The American public needs to know of the good faith and dedication of those who serve them at the Department of Justice.

As I have stated before, I want to be as crisp and clear as I can be with the Committee about the facts of my involvement in this matter as I recall them.

The Coordination Process

Shortly after the 2004 election and soon after I became Attorney General, my then-deputy-chief-of-staff Kyle Sampson told me that then-Counsel to the President Harriet Miers had inquired about replacing all 93 U.S. Attorneys. Mr. Sampson and I both agreed that replacing all 93 U.S. Attorneys would be disruptive and unwise. However, I believed it would be appropriate and a good management decision to evaluate the U.S. Attorneys and determine the districts where a change may be beneficial to the Department.

I delegated the task of coordinating a review to Mr. Sampson in early 2005. Mr. Sampson is a good man and was a dedicated public servant. I believed that he was the right person (1) to collect insight and opinions, including his own, from Department officials with the most knowledge of U.S. Attorneys and (2) to provide, based on that collective judgment, a consensus recommendation of the Department’s senior leadership on districts that could benefit from a change.

I recall telling Mr. Sampson that I wanted him to consult with appropriate Justice Department senior officials who would have the most relevant knowledge and information about the performance of the U.S. Attorneys. It was to be a group of officials, including the Deputy Attorney General, who were much more knowledgeable than I about the performance of each U.S. Attorney. I also told him to make sure that the White House was kept informed since the U.S. Attorneys are presidential appointees.

Mr. Sampson periodically updated me on the review. As I recall, his updates were brief, relatively few in number, and focused primarily on the review process itself. During those updates, to my knowledge, I did not make decisions about who should or should not be asked to resign.

For instance, I recall two specific instances when Mr. Sampson mentioned to me that Harriet Miers had asked about the status of the Department’s evaluation of U.S. Attorneys.

I also recall Mr. Sampson mentioning Assistant Attorney General Rachel Brand as a possible candidate to be U.S. Attorney if a vacancy were to occur. I am not sure he mentioned a specific district, but it may have been Michigan. I do not recall my response, nor when it happened. But I do recall thinking I did not want to lose Ms. Brand as head of Legal Policy. I also recall Mr. Sampson mentioning career prosecutor Deborah Rhodes for San Diego in the event of a vacancy. I do not recall my response or any other discussion. Nor do I recall the timing of when this was raised with me. Although these names were mentioned to me, I do not recall making any decision, either on or before December 7, 2006, about who should replace the U.S. Attorneys who were asked to resign that day.

Near the end of the process, as I have said many times, Kyle Sampson presented me with the final recommendations, which I approved. I did so because I understood that the recommendations represented the consensus of senior Justice Department officials most knowledgeable about the performance of all 93 U.S. Attorneys. I also remember that, at some point in time, Mr. Sampson explained to me the plan to inform the U.S. Attorneys of my decision.

*******

I believed the process that Mr. Sampson was coordinating would produce the best result by including those senior Justice Department officials with the most knowledge about this matter. As in other areas of the Department’s work – whether creating a plan to combat terrorism or targeting dangerous drugs like methamphetamine – my goal was to improve the performance of the Justice Department. And as in other areas of the Department’s work, I expected a process to be established that would lead to recommendations based on the collective judgment and opinions of those with the most knowledge within the Department.

In hindsight, I would have handled this differently. As a manager, I am aware that decisions involving personnel are some of the most difficult and challenging decisions one can make. United States Attorneys serve at the pleasure of the President, but looking back, it is clear to me that I should have done more personally to ensure that the review process was more rigorous, and that each U.S. Attorney was informed of this decision in a more personal and respectful way.

I also want to address suggestions that I intentionally made false statements about my involvement in this process. These suggestions have been personally very painful to me. I have always sought the truth. I never sought to mislead or deceive the Congress or the American people about my role in this matter. I do acknowledge however that at times I have been less than precise with my words when discussing the resignations.

For example, I misspoke at a press conference on March 13th when I said that I “was not involved in any discussions about what was going on.” That statement was too broad. At that same press conference, I made clear that I was aware of the process; I said that “I knew my chief of staff was involved in the process of determining who were the weak performers. Where were the districts around the country where we could do better for the people in that district, and that’s what I knew.” Of course, I knew about the process because of, at a minimum, these discussions with Mr. Sampson. Thus, my statement about “discussions” was imprecise and overbroad, but it certainly was not in anyway an attempt to mislead the American people.

I certainly understand why these statements generated confusion, and I regret that. I have tried to clarify my words in later interviews with the media, and will be happy to answer any further questions the Committee may have today about those statements.

It is said that actions speak louder than words. And my actions in this matter do indeed show that I have
endeavored to be forthcoming with the Congress and the American people.

I am dedicated to correcting both the management missteps and the ensuing public confusion that now surrounds what should have been a benign situation. For example:

In recent weeks I have met personally with more than 70 U.S. Attorneys around the country to hear their concerns and discuss ways to improve communication and coordination between their offices and Main Justice.
These discussions have been frank, and good ideas are coming out, including ways to improve communication between the Department and their offices so that every United States Attorney can know whether their performance is at the level expected by the Attorney General and the Deputy Attorney General. Additionally, I have asked the members of the Attorney General’s Advisory Committee of United States Attorneys to present to me recommendations on formal and informal steps that we can take to improve communication.

During these meetings I am also sharing with the U.S. Attorney community several key messages that I wish to also share with the Committee:

First, the process of selecting U.S. Attorneys to be asked to resign, while not improper, should have been more rigorous and should have been completed in a much shorter period of time.

Second, every U.S. Attorney who was asked to resign – Dan Bogden, Margaret Chiara, Paul Charlton, David Iglesias, Carol Lam, John McKay, Kevin Ryan, and Bud Cummins – served honorably, and they and their families made sacrifices in the name of public service. The Justice Department owes them more respect than they were shown. In some cases, Department leaders should have worked with them to make improvements where they were needed. In all cases, I should have communicated the concerns more effectively, and I should have informed them of my decisions in a more dignified manner. This process could have been handled much better and for that I want to apologize publicly.

And third, I am also telling our 93 U.S. Attorneys that I look forward to working with them to pursue the great goals of our Department in the weeks and months to come. I have told them that I expected all of them to continue to do their jobs in the way they deem best and without any improper interference from anyone. Likewise, in those offices where U.S. Attorneys have recently departed, I emphasized the need to continue to aggressively investigate and prosecute all matters – sensitive or otherwise – currently being handled by those offices.

I wish to extend that sentiment to the Committee as well. During the past two years, we have made great strides in securing our country from terrorism, protecting our neighborhoods from gangs and drugs, shielding our children from predators and pedophiles, and protecting the public trust by prosecuting public corruption. Recent events must not deter us from our mission. I ask the Committee to join me in that commitment and that re-dedication.

We must ensure that all the facts surrounding the situation are brought to full light. It is my sincere hope that today’s hearing brings us closer to a clearing of the air on the eight resignations.

That is why I intend to stay here as long as it takes to answer all of the questions the Committee may have about my involvement in this matter. I want this Committee to be satisfied, to be fully reassured, that nothing improper was done. I want the American people to be reassured of the same.

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Cheney Hasn't Called Libby Since Trial

Cheney Hasn't Called Libby Since Trial
AP

WASHINGTON — In the nearly six weeks since his close friend and former chief of staff was convicted of lying and obstructing an investigation, Vice President Dick Cheney has not once spoken to I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby.

Why?

"Well, there hasn't been occasion to do so," Cheney said in an interview broadcast Sunday on CBS' "Face the Nation."

Libby is the highest-ranking White House official convicted in a government scandal since the Iran-Contra affair two decades ago. He was found guilty last month of perjury and obstruction in the investigation into the 2003 leak of CIA operative Valerie Plame's identity.

The episode undercut the Bush administration's credibility, one of a string of a bad-news stories that have hurt the president's standing.

President Bush and Cheney have expressed sadness for Libby and his family, but largely refrained from comment because the matter is an active legal case. Libby plans to appeal.

In the interview, Cheney said he believes deeply in Libby.

"He's one of the most dedicated public servants I've ever worked with, and I think this is a great tragedy," Cheney said.

Yet Cheney has not spoken with Libby to tell him so directly.

Cheney's interviewer, Bob Schieffer, was so surprised to hear that news that he asked the vice president about it again.

Why not calls to express your regrets?

"I just _ I haven't had occasion to do that," was all that Cheney would say.

Libby faces a likely sentencing range of one to three years in prison when he is sentenced June 5.

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