Sunday, October 23, 2005
NYT, Miller Spar Over Role in Leak Probe
ABC News
NYT, Miller Spar Over Role in Leak Probe
N.Y. Times, Reporter Engage in Public Fight About Her Seeming Lack of Candor in CIA Leak Probe
By PETE YOST
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON - In the latest fallout from the CIA leak investigation, reporter Judith Miller and The New York Times are engaging in a very public fight about her seeming lack of candor in the case.
In a memo to the staff, Executive Editor Bill Keller says Miller "seems to have misled" the newspaper's Washington bureau chief, Phil Taubman, who said Miller told him in the fall of 2003 that she was not one of the recipients of a leak about the identity of covert CIA officer Valerie Plame.
Miller says Keller's criticism is "seriously inaccurate."
"I certainly never meant to mislead Phil, nor did I mislead him," Miller was quoted as saying in a Times story Saturday.
According to a Times story on Oct. 16, Miller told Taubman two years ago that the subject of Bush administration critic Joseph Wilson and Wilson's wife, Plame, had come up in casual conversation with government officials, but that Miller said "she had not been at the receiving end of a concerted effort, a deliberate organized effort to put out information."
In recent weeks, Miller testified to the grand jury in the leak probe that she had discussed Wilson and his wife in three conversations with Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby in June and July of 2003.
Keller wrote that if he had known of Miller's "entanglement" with Libby, he might have been more willing to explore compromises with the prosecutor who was trying to get her testimony for the criminal investigation into the leak of Plame's identity.
Miller spent 85 days in jail for refusing to cooperate with Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald. She was freed on Sept. 29 when she finally agreed to testify.
Responding to Keller's criticism, Miller told the newspaper, "I was unaware that there was a deliberate, concerted disinformation campaign to discredit Wilson and that if there had been, I did not think I was a target of it."
"As for your reference to my 'entanglement' with Mr. Libby, I had no personal, social or other relationship with him except as a source," Miller said.
Underlying the issue is Miller's own flawed prewar reporting on Iraq.
Her stories pointing to the presence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq helped clear a path for the administration's arguments in favor of going to war. No weapons of mass destruction have been found, and Keller said he regretted waiting a year before confronting problems with Miller's reporting.
In his memo, Keller wrote that the newspaper in the summer of 2003 had just been through the trauma of the Jayson Blair episode, in which a reporter was found to have fabricated articles, resulting in the departure of the Times' executive editor and managing editor.
"It felt somehow unsavory to begin a tenure by attacking our predecessors," Keller wrote. By waiting more than a year, he said, "We allowed the anger inside and outside the paper to fester. Worse, we fear, we fostered an impression that the Times put a higher premium on protecting its reporters than on coming clean with its readers."
Op-ed columnist Maureen Dowd weighed in with further criticism in Saturday's Times. "Sorely in need of a tight editorial leash, (Miller) was kept on no leash at all, and that has hurt this paper and its trust with readers," Dowd wrote.
If Miller returns to covering national security issues, Dowd wrote, "the institution most in danger would be the newspaper in your hands."
In a column written for Sunday's editions of The Times, public editor Byron Calame wrote, "It seems to me that whatever the limits put on her, the problems facing her inside and outside the newsroom will make it difficult for her to return to the paper as a reporter."
Senator Urges Gov't to Stop Price Gougers
ABC News
Senator Urges Gov't to Stop Price Gougers
Democratic Senator Calls on Federal Gov't to Pursue Price Gougers, Help Poor With Heating Bills
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON - Calling upon lessons learned from Hurricane Katrina, Democratic Sen. Mark Pryor of Arkansas said Saturday the federal government can do a better job of caring for its citizens.
Consumers need protection from price gouging in times of gasoline shortages and supply delays and low-income families need help paying home-heating fuel bills, projected to rise by as much as 50 percent this winter, Pryor said in the weekly Democratic radio address.
High energy costs also are hurting small and large businesses alike, he said.
Pryor said Congress and the Bush administration must return to an era of "responsible budgeting" and be less inclined to advocate tax cuts for special interests as a remedy for economic ills.
"We simply must do a better job of putting the needs of all Americans over the wants of a privileged few," the senator said.
He also stressed the importance of energy independence and said the country should waste no time in developing alternative fuels
Pryor reminded listeners that much work in health care, housing and economic opportunities remained to rebuild communities damaged by Gulf Coast hurricanes, and pledged Democratic resolve to fix problems that caused the failed government response to Hurricane Katrina.
Young Lawmaker Likens Congress to Jr. High
ABC News
Young Lawmaker Likens Congress to Jr. High
Rep. Patrick McHenry, Youngest Member of Congress, Says Capitol Hill Is Like Junior High
By ELISABETH GOODRIDGE
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON - Don't let his age fool you. The youngest member of Congress says he thinks he has Capitol Hill all figured out, though he's been on the job only 10 months.
"This place is a much more sophisticated junior high school," 30-year-old Rep. Patrick McHenry, R-N.C., said recently in an interview. "There are the nice guys that everybody likes, the jocks, the geeks, the bullies they're all here. It's a representative democracy."
It's easy to imagine where McHenry fits in this analogy. The freshman lawmaker, whose birthday was Saturday, would be the kid brother, the one eager to subject himself to an occasional barb if it helps him get into the club.
At a White House lunch for new members, President Bush teased McHenry about his boyish appearance despite his prematurely graying hair. House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., a former high school wrestling coach, put him in a playful headlock after a conference of House Republicans.
Brash, enthusiastic and a strong believer in an aggressive conservative agenda, McHenry is clearly looked upon by GOP leaders as just the type of eager-to-please foot soldier needed for carrying on their cause.
"He brings a fresh perspective to the issues at hand," said Ron Bonjean, a spokesman for Hastert. "We are lucky to have him."
And just like a kid brother, McHenry has remained loyal as scandals threaten the crowd he has joined. He continues to lead cheers for Rep. Tom DeLay, R-Texas, after his indictment on money-laundering charges, and for Karl Rove, Bush's political adviser caught up in an investigation into the leak of a CIA agent's identity.
McHenry echoes DeLay, calling Travis County district attorney Ronnie Earle "a partisan hack" and accusing the House Democrats' campaign operation of playing a role in the indictment.
"It's a major part of their agenda," McHenry said. "It's so clear that this is a major desire for (Democratic Reps.) Nancy Pelosi and Rahm Emanuel and the leftist organizations to make political hay out of this."
Democrats say McHenry's inside-the-Beltway posturing comes at the expense of his constituents.
"I think the 10th District (of North Carolina) sent him to Washington to work for them, not Tom DeLay or Karl Rove," said Sarah Feinberg, a spokeswoman for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
McHenry has demonstrated some independence. Textile and furniture manufacturing are a big part of the economy in his district, and he bucked party leaders by upholding a campaign promise to vote against the Central American Free Trade Agreement.
In March, he was among a small number of conservatives who threatened to vote against the 2006 budget resolution unless it included new rules to restrain spending.
"I got a lot of pressure over a period of about two weeks, and I held my ground," McHenry said. "I was committed to a cause."
He has eagerly sought the role of an attack dog against Democrats, although he has sometimes come off as more like a puppy nipping at their heels. But GOP leaders chose him over more senior members to debate Democrats twice his age on national television.
According to fellow freshman Rep. Cathy McMorris, R-Wash., McHenry is right where he wants to be.
"He enjoys a good debate and being at the center of the action," she said.
Rep. Sue Myrick, a friend and fellow North Carolina Republican, said McHenry has "got innate political sense, simply because he's been in politics since he was knee-high."
McHenry first ran for public office as a 22-year-old candidate for the North Carolina legislature. He lost to the father of a high school classmate.
He worked as a national youth coordinator for Bush's 2000 presidential campaign, and after cultivating top Republicans and conservative leaders in Washington for two years, returned to western North Carolina to win a seat in the state legislature. He was serving his first term when veteran Republican Rep. Cass Ballenger decided not to seek re-election.
"I got into the race and people literally laughed," McHenry said. "They thought I had no chance of winning."
Largely outspent by his opponents in the primaries, McHenry credits his win to an army of college-age Republicans knocking on 70,000 doors and making more than 100,000 campaign calls.
When he won the primary by 85 votes, he promptly received $10,000 each from the political action committees operated by Hastert, DeLay and another Republican leader, Rep. Roy Blunt, R-Mo. He won in November with 63 percent of the vote against Democratic social worker Anne Fischer.
McHenry sits on the Budget, Government Reform and Financial Services committees. The House Republican campaign operation placed him on its executive committee, and he is a member of the House Republican Study Committee, a group of 100 of the most conservative House members.
"I thought it would take years for a new member to become a player," McHenry said. "It's better than I expected."
On the Net:
Rep. Patrick McHenry: http://www.house.gov/mchenry
Poll: Clinton Would Lead Rice in '08 Race
ABC News
Poll: Clinton Would Lead Rice in '08 Race
Poll Shows Hillary Clinton Leading Condoleezza Rice in Hypothetical 2008 Presidential Matchup
By MARC HUMBERT
The Associated Press
ALBANY, N.Y. - Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton leads Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in a hypothetical presidential matchup, according to an independent poll released Friday.
The poll, conducted by Marist College's Institute for Public Opinion in conjunction with New York City television station WNBC, gave the former first lady 50 percent to 41 percent for Rice.
But Republicans John McCain and Rudolph Giuliani both topped Clinton.
Clinton, McCain and Giuliani are all considered potential 2008 presidential candidates. Rice has said she will not run.
The poll, mirroring other recent national surveys, had Clinton as the clear front-runner for the 2008 Democratic nomination, favored by 41 percent of her party's voters to 17 percent for Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts and 14 percent for former Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina, Kerry's running mate in 2004.
Asked about Clinton's political leanings, 39 percent of voters said she was too liberal, while 46 percent said she was about right.
"She remains a controversial figure when she moves out from the Democratic primary sweepstakes," Marist pollster Lee Miringoff said.
On the Republican side, Rice, Giuliani and McCain were about tied for the GOP nomination, each attracting about 20 percent of the vote.
But with Rice out of the mix, Giuliani, the former New York City mayor, was favored over the senator from Arizona, 31 percent to 24 percent.
No other Republican topped single digits.
The poll had McCain leading Clinton, 50 percent to 41 percent. Giuliani was ahead of the former first lady, 50 percent to 43 percent.
Voters were divided over electing a woman as president. Twenty-six percent told pollsters they were likely or very likely to vote for a woman, while 28 percent said they were not likely to vote for a woman.
They were also divided on whether Clinton should run for president, 48 percent in favor and 49 percent opposed.
Marist's telephone poll of 827 registered voters was conducted Oct. 12-13 and Oct. 17 and had a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.
Like Father, Like Son for Bushes
ABC News
Newsview: Like Father, Like Son for Bushes
Newsview: Bush Has Struggled to Avoid Father's Mistakes but Is Bedeviled by Similar Problems
By TOM RAUM
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON - Throughout his first term, President Bush struggled to avoid repeating his father's mistakes. Yet less than a year after he claimed the re-election mandate denied his dad, he is confronting some of the same problems that bedeviled the first Bush presidency.
Like father, like son:
Conservatives are rebelling.
His poll numbers are in the basement.
Economic unrest is growing.
Top White House staffers are under fire.
"George W. Bush always wanted to be like Ronald Reagan, rather than like his father," said presidential historian Thomas Cronin of Colorado College.
But it was an aspiration that may have set him up for failure.
"Both Bushes were held to a real and imagined Reagan bar. And when his father broke his promise on 'no new taxes,' he got hit really hard by the right," Cronin said.
Likewise, when the younger Bush nominated Harriet Miers, his former personal lawyer, to the Supreme Court, bypassing experienced jurists with proven conservative credentials, many prominent conservatives balked. He promised them another conservative like Justice Antonin Scalia, but he gave them a mystery. Politicians of all stripes hate uncertainty.
Congressional misgivings over Miers and the CIA leak investigation involving White House advisers have cast a cloud over the administration. Soaring gas prices, hurricane reconstruction costs, the war in Iraq and declining consumer confidence have darkened the economic outlook.
Avoiding his father's path was a first-term mantra for the younger Bush.
Where the father distanced himself from religious conservatives, the son aggressively courted them.
The first Bush built an international coalition and ended the first Gulf War after driving Iraq from Kuwait. The younger Bush ignored international opposition and toppled Saddam Hussein's government.
The father was criticized for lacking an economic program other than "message: I care." The son promised big tax cuts and muscled them through Congress. No one called him a wimp.
But the younger Bush made several miscalculations, some of his Republican critics suggest.
"I think he concluded that as long as he remained loyal to the conservative side on one issue tax cuts he could pretty much do anything he wanted in other areas and the conservatives would stand behind him," said Bruce Bartlett, who was deputy assistant treasury secretary in the first Bush administration.
"And that worked for quite a while. But it was a shortsighted point of view," said Bartlett, who has just written a book, "The Impostor: How George W. Bush Bankrupted America and Betrayed the Reagan Legacy."
The selection of Miers, the White House counsel, to replace retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor followed growing conservative unease about other Bush moves: the escalating cost of the Iraq war, Medicare and other government programs; his proposal to liberalize immigration laws; and his pledge to "spend what it takes" and lift New Orleans out of poverty.
"There's a lot of frustration that was bubbling and building up," said Republican consultant Greg Mueller. "And Harriet Miers kind of became the vehicle to channel that frustration, kind of the tipping point in many ways."
Some of the fiercest criticism of the Miers nomination is coming from veterans of the first Bush White House.
Peggy Noonan, a speechwriter for both Reagan and the elder Bush, contended that Miers' nomination is a mistake on par with the father's selection of Dan Quayle for vice president.
Quayle should have said, "Thanks, I'm not ready," Noonan wrote in a Wall Street Journal column, and so should Miers now.
Conservative editor and commentator William Kristol, who was Quayle's chief of staff, said recent White House efforts to convince conservatives that Miers really is one of them "hasn't changed anyone's mind."
Bush "has alienated his base without intending to," said political scientist Bruce Buchanan of the University of Texas. "He was feeling his oats a little bit on the (Chief Justice John) Roberts success and didn't anticipate the fury of the reaction on Harriet Miers."
Both Bushes saw their approval ratings soar above 80 percent the elder Bush in 1991 after the first Gulf War, the younger Bush after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 only to see them plummet.
The elder Bush's ratings dipped under 30 percent in late summer 1992. The current president stood at 39 percent in an AP-Ipsos poll taken two weeks ago, the lowest of his presidency.
The current Bush was criticized that he was slow to recognize the severity of Hurricane Katrina. The first Bush was criticized for being slow to respond to Hurricane Andrew, which slammed into southern Florida on Aug. 24, 1992, and did extensive damage.
The current Bush's White House is distracted by a special prosecutor's inquiry into whether administration officials illegally leaked the name of a CIA operative for political reasons. The investigation appears focused on Bush's top White House adviser, Karl Rove, and Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby.
In the year before the 1992 presidential election, with his poll numbers tumbling, the elder Bush had a staff that also was in turmoil. John Sununu resigned as chief of staff under a cloud and was replaced by former Transportation Secretary Sam Skinner, who in turn was replaced by former Secretary of State James A. Baker III.
Of course, the younger Bush's timing is better. At least his political woes are happening after the election not right before, as was the case with his father.
EDITOR'S NOTE Tom Raum has covered Washington for The Associated Press since 1973, including five presidencies.
Legal Problems Dog Bush's Inner Circle
ABC News
Legal Problems Dog Bush's Inner Circle
All the President's Men and Women Are Getting Worn Out by Legal Problems
By DONNA CASSATA
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON - It's a nightmare prospect that Republicans have trouble fathoming: legal problems that could drive some of the president's most powerful aides from office.
A special prosecutor and grand jury are closing in on a deadline to decide whether to lodge criminal complaints against presidential adviser Karl Rove and White House aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby in the outing of covert CIA officer Valerie Plame, the wife of Iraq war critic Joseph Wilson.
If it comes to pass, administration officials and GOP consultants expect President Bush to turn to a few individuals to fill any void in his inner circle.
Among the candidates are go-to Republicans whom Bush trusts, including Ed Gillespie, Ken Mehlman and Karen Hughes; former lawmakers Rob Portman and Vin Weber; and those who could be promoted from within, such as Dan Bartlett, Joshua Bolten and Joe Hagin.
It's also possible the president could reach out to others in his Cabinet, among them Labor Secretary Elaine Chao and Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez.
Republicans steadfastly cling to the belief that there will be no indictments, the issue will blow over and the speculation will amount to nothing more than idle chatter.
"I don't think anybody's leaving," said Charles Black, a veteran GOP strategist and close Bush ally.
But one White House official, noting that Bush's senior staff is tired of the long hours and increasing pressure, has told colleagues it might be best if everyone closest to the president resign and clear the way for new blood and fresh perspectives.
White House chief of staff Andrew Card has been on the job since January 2001, a mark of longevity for Bush compared with Presidents Reagan and Clinton, who each had four chiefs of staff through two terms. Even Bush's father, George H.W. Bush, had three chiefs of staff in four years as president.
If the unthinkable happens, Republicans know where Bush will look.
Rove has been labeled "Bush's brain" by administration foes and the "architect" of Bush's rise to power by the president's backers. He is considered a White House adviser without peer. Conservative activist Grover Norquist finds it hard to imagine one person handling Rove's job.
"Karl is sufficiently sui generis (unique), it would take two or three different people to replace him," Norquist said.
Among the possible replacements are Gillespie, a former chairman of the Republican National Committee; current RNC chief Mehlman, or Hughes, a former White House political adviser to Bush now working in the State Department.
Hughes, whose title is Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, is trying to reverse anti-American sentiment around the world.
Black said he would be surprised if Hughes left that post because Bush "believes he's put Karen in the most important job in the government." Rather, the president would likely promote from within, and White House counselor Bartlett could get the call.
Kevin Spillane, a Republican consultant in California, said Gillespie and Hughes would be the most obvious candidates.
"Hughes is unique in selling policy and has the president's trust," Spillane said. "Gillespie can juggle policy and media."
Although Rove is considered indispensable to Bush, the political landscape has changed with no presidential election for Bush on the horizon. Mehlman can handle the politics of the 2006 midterm elections and beyond, Norquist said.
As for Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff and his assistant on national security affairs, his departure would leave Cheney with the option of bringing in a trusted adviser. That could be former aide Mary Matalin or a specialist in national security, such as Eric Edelman, the U.S. ambassador to Turkey.
Edelman was national security assistant to Cheney from February 2001 to June 2003.
Republicans close to senior administration officials say it is unlikely Card would leave, especially if the White House is in a lurch with a Rove indictment. But if Card does exit, Bush could tap Gillespie; turn to Portman, the former Ohio congressman now serving as U.S. trade representative; choose one of his Cabinet secretaries or promote Card's deputy, Joe Hagin, or Bolten, the White House budget chief.
And what if the unthinkable happens and Cheney is indicted?
Cheney has said he is not interested in pursuing the Republican nomination for president in 2008. So Bush's choice to replace his running mate would tip the president's hand on his preference for 2008. Florida governor and first brother, Jeb Bush?
AP Political Writer Ron Fournier contributed to this report.
On the Net:
White House: http://www.whitehouse.gov
Sunni area 'rejects Iraq charter'
BBC NEWS
Sunni area 'rejects Iraq charter'
Partial results of the vote on a new Iraqi constitution suggest at least one Sunni province has rejected it.
The 20% sample said 81.5% had rejected the draft in Salahuddin, but in Diyala - which has a slight Sunni majority - it was approved by just over 50%.
No figures were given for the other two Sunni provinces of Anbar and Ninevah. A two-thirds rejection of the charter in both would torpedo the project.
As expected, the results suggested a very high approval by Shias and Kurds.
The new Iraqi constitution was meant to help unite the country, but it has proved bitterly divisive, says the BBC's Caroline Hawley in Baghdad.
The Secretary General of the Arab League, Amr Moussa, is on his first visit to Iraq since the US led invasion in a sign of Arab concern over the fragmentation of the country, says our correspondent.
After meeting Shia spiritual leader Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani in the holy city of Najaf, Mr Moussa said he had secured his support for a conference aimed at promoting national reconciliation.
No violations
Adil al-Lami of the Independent Electoral Commission of Iraq (IECI) told a news conference he could not give a date for the announcement of final results but said it would take some days.
And he cautioned that the results unveiled on Saturday could not be interpreted either way.
CONSTITUTION'S KEY POINTS
Iraq to be federal, parliamentary democracy
Official languages to be Arabic and Kurdish
Official religion to be Islam but religious freedoms guaranteed
Equal rights for all
Independent judiciary
Elections every four years
"Let's pretend there are 100 ballot boxes in all Iraq. Well, 20 of those boxes have been brought to Baghdad and these results today represent half of those," Mr Lami said.
"These figures do not show anything much yet."
The official said the count was taking longer than expected because - under international standards - it was necessary to recount the ballots in areas where the "Yes" or "No" vote was very high.
The provisional results showed several provinces approving the constitutional draft with more than 90% - including Najaf with 96%, and Karbala with 90%. In Baghad, the approval rate was 78%.
Mr Lami said no "dangerous" violations of the electoral law had been reported by the complaints.
"We have received more than 100 complaints from different parties... but these complaints are very simple, for very simple violations made by those guarding the elections," Mr Lami said.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/middle_east/4367356.stm
Saturday, October 22, 2005
Friday, October 21, 2005
Former Powell Aide Says Bush Policy Is Run by 'Cabal'
The New York Times
Former Powell Aide Says Bush Policy Is Run by 'Cabal'
By BRIAN KNOWLTON
WASHINGTON, Oct. 20 - Secretary of State Colin Powell's former chief of staff has offered a remarkably blunt criticism of the administration he served, saying that foreign policy had been usurped by a "Cheney-Rumsfeld cabal," and that President Bush has made the country more vulnerable, not less, to future crises.
The comments came in a speech Wednesday by Lawrence Wilkerson, who worked for Mr. Powell at the State Department from 2001 to early 2005. Speaking to the New America Foundation, an independent public-policy institute in Washington, Mr. Wilkerson suggested that secrecy, arrogance and internal feuding had taken a heavy toll in the Bush administration, skewing its policies and undercutting its ability to handle crises.
"I would say that we have courted disaster, in Iraq, in North Korea, in Iran, generally with regard to domestic crises like Katrina, Rita - and I could go on back," he said. "We haven't done very well on anything like that in a long time."
Mr. Wilkerson suggested that the dysfunction within the administration was so grave that "if something comes along that is truly serious, truly serious, something like a nuclear weapon going off in a major American city, or something like a major pandemic, you are going to see the ineptitude of this government in a way that will take you back to the Declaration of Independence."
Mr. Wilkerson, a retired Army colonel and former director of the Marine Corps War College, said that in his years in or close to government, he had seen its national security apparatus twisted in many ways. But what he saw in Mr. Bush's first term "was a case that I have never seen in my studies of aberration, bastardizations" and "perturbations."
"What I saw was a cabal between the vice president of the United States, Richard Cheney, and the secretary of defense, Donald Rumsfeld, on critical issues," he said.
The former aide referred to Mr. Bush as someone who "is not versed in international relations, and not too much interested in them, either." He was far more admiring of the president's father, whom he called "one of the finest presidents we've ever had."
Mr. Wilkerson has long been considered a close confidant of Mr. Powell, but their relationship has apparently grown strained at times - including over the question of unconventional weapons in Iraq - and the former colonel said Mr. Powell did not approve of his latest public criticisms.
Worker Tells of Response by FEMA
The New York Times
The Emergency Agency
Worker Tells of Response by FEMA
By ERIC LIPTON
WASHINGTON, Oct. 20 - It was on the day before Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast, after thousands of people had packed the Superdome, that the lone FEMA worker in New Orleans sent his first plea for help.
"Issues developing at the Superdome," the official, Marty J. Bahamonde, wrote in an agency e-mail message released Thursday by Congressional investigators. "The medical staff at the dome says they will run out of oxygen in about two hours."
Mr. Bahamonde sent a series of messages as the hours and days passed, desperation growing. Most startling, he told the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee on Thursday, was that his supervisors in Washington did not seem to understand. In a series of e-mail messages in which he warned of worsening problems, he was told that the director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency needed time to eat dinner at a restaurant in Baton Rouge, La., and to have a television interview.
"It was sad, it was inhumane, it was heartbreaking, and it was so wrong," Mr. Bahamonde said of the conditions and the response. "There was a systematic failure at all levels of government to understand the magnitude of the situation."
A spokesman for the Homeland Security Department, William R. Knocke, said Mr. Bahamonde was a respected official and did not contest his testimony. He said Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff was also frustrated at the response that Mr. Bahamonde was reporting.
Mr. Bahamonde's being the sole FEMA representative in New Orleans for the storm was unintentional, he said. He drove there on Aug. 27, two days before the storm hit, to introduce himself to City Hall officials. Though instructed by officials in Washington to leave, he stayed behind because of traffic jams.
Mr. Bahamonde stayed near the Superdome, where he had been told that a FEMA medical team, as well as 360,000 ready-to-eat meals and 15 water trucks, were being sent ahead of the storm.
None of that turned out to be true. Five water trucks and 40,000 meals were in place. The medical team did not arrive until Aug. 30, the day after the hurricane hit.
The situation worsened by late morning on Aug. 29, when Mr. Bahamonde learned that the 17th Street Canal levee had failed and that the city was flooding. An e-mail message at 1:38 p.m. to FEMA headquarters described the levee break, as well as reports that an estimated 12,000 people were at the Superdome and that 30,000 tourists were stuck in the city.
"North side of city under est. 11' water in heavy residential area," the message said, attributing the information to Mr. Bahamonde.
Mr. Chertoff has often said he did not know about the levee break and flooding until Aug. 30, explaining in part why he went to a meeting that day in Atlanta on avian flu.
"That is incredible," Senator Carl Levin, Democrat of Michigan, said about the communications delay.
Mr. Levin questioned Mr. Bahamonde about testimony last month by the former director of the emergency agency, Michael D. Brown, that a dozen agency employees were in New Orleans before the storm, including an emergency response team.
"How many FEMA people were pre-positioned at the Superdome or in New Orleans?" Mr. Levin asked.
"One," Mr. Bahamonde said.
"And that was?"
"Me."
On Aug. 31, Mr. Bahamonde decided to send an e-mail message directly to Mr. Brown.
"I know you know, the situation is past critical," Mr. Bahamonde wrote. "Hotels are kicking people out, thousands gathering in the streets with no food or water."'
An aide to Mr. Brown responded hours later that the director would need a restaurant in Baton Rouge that night. "It is very important that time is allowed for Mr. Brown to eat dinner," the message said.
Ruling From the Head, Not the Heart
The New York Times
Ruling From the Head, Not the Heart
By MORRIS B. HOFFMAN
Denver
ONE thing can be said of President Bush's nomination of Harriet Miers. It has focused the spotlight of the Constitution's "advice and consent" clause on its proper target: the nominee's qualifications and not her politics. But one of the most important "qualifications" is a nominee's overarching view of the role of the judiciary in American life. With straight faces, Senate Democrats demand Supreme Court appointees who will "protect individual rights," except, of course, the wrong kinds of individual rights (like the right to be born, the right to bear arms, or the right to be considered for state jobs, contracts or college admission without regard to race or gender). Republicans demand, with equally straight faces, justices who will "apply the law, not legislate from the bench," despite a tradition of judge-made law that goes back centuries, and despite a written Constitution that even the most ardent textualists must concede contains at least a couple of ambiguous words.
This battle over the meaning, and continued vitality, of judicial restraint has been going on since Marbury v. Madison, when Chief Justice John Marshall, in the epitome of naked judicial activism, seized for the judicial branch the power to interpret a Constitution that itself was utterly silent on the matter.
Today's version of this fundamental philosophical question, on which our two major political parties seem so sharply to disagree, is this: Does a judge's obligation begin and end with the law, or is the law merely an instrument through which judges should strive to achieve greater social good? It would be unfortunate indeed if we lost sight of this important and legitimate question in our ache for moderation and our distaste of political excess.
Several years ago I had lunch with some trial court colleagues from another jurisdiction. I asked one of the newest judges how she liked the job so far, and she said that she enjoyed it immensely and that she "was even able to do some good in a case last week." Never has there been a more succinct confession of the roots of judicial activism. The good news is that even this activist judge admitted she wasn't free to "do good" all the time; she was often constrained by the unavoidable limitations of that nettlesome interloper, the law.
It is this difference over the perceived role of judges, more than any differences in interpretative theories or even political philosophy, that I believe distinguishes restrained judges from unrestrained ones. Those of us who see the judiciary as an essentially conservative institution, who are wary of our own power, and who know that all manner of personal preferences can be hidden in the sheep's clothing of "discretion" or "interpretation," don't try to find ambiguities in the law that we can then replace with our own views of proper public policy.
Truly restrained judges follow the law no matter how politically or socially unpleasant the destination. A week doesn't go by when I am not forced by the law to do something that I would rather not do if I were, say, a philosopher-king unencumbered by the legislation of mere mortals.
In the early 1900's, Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. was mistaken by many Progressives as one of them, when in a series of dissents he argued that Congress's progressive legislation was not unconstitutional. But in fact Holmes loathed the Progressive agenda and years later described the essentials of judicial restraint with these now famous words in a letter to a friend: "If my fellow citizens want to go to hell I will help them. It's my job."
We need more judges, at all levels, who are not frustrated policymakers, who won't strain to find ambiguity in unambiguous words because they want to "do good," and who won't hesitate to go where their own principled application of the law takes them, even if (and especially if) it is a result they would not freely choose.
As the Senate takes up the nomination of Harriet Miers next month, let us hope the process sheds as much light on her views on the role of judges in the constitutional firmament as it does on her political and personal preferences, or on the value of her other qualifications.
Morris B. Hoffman is a state trial judge in Denver.
Deferential Calculus
The New York Times
Deferential Calculus
By DAHLIA LITHWICK
Charlottesville, Va.
OF all the mysteries surrounding President Bush's nomination of Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court, possibly the biggest is this: How could a man who got it so right with John Roberts get it so wrong with Ms. Miers?
If the lesson of the Roberts confirmation was to pick someone superbly qualified and watch him whiz through his confirmation, why did President Bush almost deliberately flout that wisdom by nominating an inexperienced crony?
But Chief Justice Roberts and Ms. Miers may have more in common than you think. Both their nominations reflect a deep concern about a too-powerful court and the president's troubling new hostility toward the institution.
Consider this: Chief Justice Roberts's judicial philosophy - to the extent he admits to one - is of "modesty." Throughout his public life, an overwhelming jurisprudential concern has been the constraint of judicial power. He made it clear at his hearings and in rulings from the federal bench that the court exists not to act - not even to react - but chiefly to interpret passively. He has defended court-stripping legislation and argued for limiting judicial remedies.
In Chief Justice Roberts's world view, there are few situations in which the courts ought to be proactive - not when a student is raped by a teacher, and Title IX, the federal law barring sex discrimination in public schools, does not provide her with a meaningful remedy; and not when Virginia Medicaid patients seek reimbursement at reasonable rates, and the Medicaid Act creates no expressly enforceable rights.
John Roberts was unequivocal, at his hearing last month, that if Congress wants to protect the weak, it must write crystal-clear legislation. He would argue that at the end of the day, it's the court's job not to ensure equity or social justice but rather to narrowly construe the law as written regardless of whether the results are fair.
That's a significant departure from the approach taken by the Rehnquist court. Chief Justice Roberts's argument that "if it is not necessary to decide more, it is necessary not to decide more," sounds clever. But it substantially constrains the formerly broad reach of the Rehnquist court.
But nowhere is John Roberts more deferential as a judge than when it comes to the executive branch. In his rulings when he sat on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, he offered expansive readings of presidential authority. He ruled on that court that the Geneva Conventions do not confer on so-called enemy combatants any individual rights. And he was unwilling to answer at his hearings whether Congress has the power to end a war started by the president.
If you think of John Roberts as the justice who will urge a far more sweeping judicial deference - particularly to the executive branch - the subsequent Miers nomination makes sense. If Mr. Bush wants to refashion the courts into a weaker, passive entity that exists primarily to check its own institutional prerogatives, then a former White House counsel like Ms. Miers is the perfect choice.
For one thing, having been present in the White House boiler room during the discussions of presidential power in wartime, Ms. Miers is primed to rule in President Bush's favor in the executive power cases. But more profoundly, and perhaps more symbolically, the elevation of Ms. Miers - someone with no judicial experience, no body of constitutional thinking or writing, nothing it seems, but her noble heart to recommend her - sends precisely the message that Mr. Bush wants to send to the courts: You don't need the most qualified candidate. You don't even need someone among the top 500 most qualified candidates. Why? Because the Supreme Court doesn't matter.
Justice Roberts and Ms. Miers represent a one-two punch for presidential supremacy: Justice Roberts would turn the Supreme Court into a body of nine constitutional plumbers - tinkerers around the margins with no affirmative place on the national stage. And Ms. Miers is a plumber - a perfectly competent lawyer with no national distinction. Her nomination would be an insult to the court if the court's work still mattered. But President Bush doesn't want it to matter.
The president has long claimed that Congress and the courts were usurping his powers. The hallmark of his presidency has been efforts to reclaim those powers, be it through Patriot Act provisions that curtail judicial oversight, his invention of new courts to deliver justice-lite to Guantánamo detainees or threats to veto legislation that would prohibit torture.
Now he has had two openings to render the court toothless. He has filled those vacancies with a brilliant jurist who apparently believes the court should sit on its hands in perpetuity, and a place-filler - his new judicial ideal.
Dahlia Lithwick is a senior editor at Slate.
The New York Times
Hiding Behind Katrina
It takes gall to use Hurricane Katrina as cover to undermine the democratic process, but that's what conservative ideologues are attempting in the House. Among their budget-cutting proposals - being sold as "tough choices" for America to pay for the Gulf Coast recovery - is a startling plan to kill public financing in the presidential election system.
That program, financed by $3 checkoffs volunteered by taxpayers on their returns, has been a bulwark of presidential elections. It was enacted about 30 years ago, after the Watergate scandal exposed the big-money bagmen corrupting the heart of the political process. It makes politics more competitive for underdogs, more involving for the public and less reliant on floods of special-interest campaign money.
Congress should indeed turn its attention to the program - not to end it, but to repair its outdated limits. The primary calendar has become so front-loaded that the candidates with the strongest sources of private donations are now choosing to skip the limitations of public financing so they can spend early and furiously, leaving other challengers at a disadvantage.
The primary subsidy formula needs to be made more realistic to level the field, and the checkoff amount should be increased. Candidates should not be allowed to have it both ways by feeding on private money in the primaries, then switching to public money in the general election, as President Bush and Senator John Kerry did last year.
Under the current system, participating candidates in the primaries receive matching funds for the first $250 of each private contribution. This one-to-one formula should be increased to two-to-one matching or more as a way to invite more of the small donations that began showing up impressively last year from Internet users.
Sponsors of the House proposal must know they are wrong because they are trying to tuck the change into a budget bill without a public hearing and debate. If they want budget cuts, they should focus on government waste, not open elections.
The National Parks Under Siege
The New York Times
The National Parks Under Siege
Year after year, Americans express greater satisfaction with the National Park Service than with almost any other aspect of the federal government. From the point of view of most visitors, there is no incentive to revise the basic management policy that guides park superintendents, a policy that was last revised in 2001 and is usually re-examined only every 10 or 15 years. Longtime park service employees feel much the same way. Yet in the past two months we have seen two proposed revisions. The first, written by Paul Hoffman, a deputy assistant secretary in the Interior Department, was a genuinely scandalous rewriting that would have destroyed the national park system.
On Tuesday, the Interior Department released a new draft. The question isn't whether this revision is better than Mr. Hoffman's drastic rewrite. Almost anything would be better than his version, a glaring example of the zeal to dilute conservation with commercialism among political appointees in the Interior Department. But the new draft would still undermine the national parks.
This entire exercise is unnecessary, driven by politics and ideology. The only reason for revisiting and revising the 2001 management policy was Mr. Hoffman's belief, expressed during a press conference earlier this week, that the 2001 policy is "anti-enjoyment." This will surely come as news to the 96 percent of park visitors who year after year express approval of their experiences. The kind of enjoyment Mr. Hoffman has in mind - as clearly evidenced by his draft and by remarks from Interior Secretary Gale Norton - is opening up the parks to off-road vehicles, including snowmobiles. The ongoing effort to revise the 2001 policy betrays a powerful sense, shared by many top interior officials, that the national parks are resources not to be protected but to be exploited.
This new policy document doesn't go as far as the earlier version. But it would eliminate the requirement that only motorized equipment with the least impact should be used in national parks. It would lower air-quality standards and strip away language about preserving the parks' natural soundscape - language that currently makes it hard, for instance, to justify allowing snowmobiles into Yellowstone. It would also refer park superintendents to other management documents that have been revised to weaken fundamental standards and protections for the parks.
Mr. Hoffman and National Park Service officials have tried to argue that this new policy revision offers greater clarity. What it really offers is greater flexibility to interpret the rules the way they want to. The thrust of these changes is to diminish the historical, and legally upheld, premise that preservation is the central mission of the park system.
Here, for instance, is what this proposed policy revision would remove from the very heart of the park system's mission statement: "Congress, recognizing that the enjoyment by future generations of the national parks can be ensured only if the superb quality of park resources and values is left unimpaired, has provided that when there is a conflict between conserving resources and values and providing for enjoyment of them, conservation is to be predominant."
These unambiguous words contain the legal and legislative history that has protected the parks over the years from exactly the kind of change Mr. Hoffman has in mind, allowing all the rest of us to enjoy the national parks in ways that are more respectful of the future and of the parks themselves.
One of the most troubling aspects of this revised policy is how it was produced. Instead of being shaped by park service professionals thinking in a timely way about how to do their jobs better, this is a defensive document that was rushed forward to head off the more sweeping damage that Mr. Hoffman's first draft threatened to do. It is a tribute to the National Park Service veterans who worked on it that they were able to mitigate so much of the harm, even though they, too, were working directly under Mr. Hoffman's eye. They risked their jobs to protect the parks from political appointees in the Interior Department. This is a measure of how distorted the department's policies have become.
There is more potential damage on the way. At least two deeply worrying new directives have been handed down. One allows the National Park Service to solicit contributions from individuals and corporations instead of merely accepting them when they're offered. This is another way to further the privatization of the national parks and edge toward their commercialization. Privatizing the government's core responsibilities - like the national parks - is unacceptable, and so is the prospect of any greater commercial presence in the parks.
More alarming still is a directive released last week that would require park personnel who hope to advance above the middle-manager level to go through what is essentially a political screening. What we are witnessing, in essence, is an effort to politicize the National Park Service - to steer it away from its long-term mission of preserving much-loved national treasures and make it echo the same political mind-set that turned Mr. Hoffman, a former Congressional aide to Dick Cheney and a former head of the Cody, Wyo., chamber of commerce, into an architect of national park policy.
Congress Passes New Legal Shield for Gun Industry
The New York Times
Congress Passes New Legal Shield for Gun Industry
By SHERYL GAY STOLBERG
WASHINGTON, Oct. 20 - The Republican-controlled Congress delivered a long-sought victory to the gun industry on Thursday when the House voted to shield firearms manufacturers and dealers from liability lawsuits. The bill now goes to President Bush, who has promised to sign it.
The gun liability bill has for years been the No. 1 legislative priority of the National Rifle Association, which has lobbied lawmakers intensely for it. Its final passage, by a vote of 283 to 144, with considerable Democratic support, reflected the changing politics of gun control, an issue many Democrats began shying away from after Al Gore, who promoted it, was defeated in the 2000 presidential race.
"It's a historic piece of legislation," said Wayne LaPierre, the association's chief executive, who said the bill was the most significant victory for the gun lobby since Congress rewrote the federal gun control law in 1986. "As of Oct. 20, the Second Amendment is probably in the best shape in this country that it's been in decades."
The bill, which is identical to one approved in July by the Senate, is aimed at ending a spate of lawsuits by individuals and municipalities, including New York City, seeking to hold gun manufacturers and dealers liable for negligence when their weapons are used in crimes.
While it bars such suits, the measure contains an exception allowing certain cases involving defective weapons or criminal behavior by a gun maker or dealer, such as knowingly selling a weapon to someone who has failed a criminal background check.
President Bush said in a statement that he looked forward to signing the bill, which he said would "further our efforts to stem frivolous lawsuits, which cause a logjam in America's courts, harm America's small businesses, and benefit a handful of lawyers at the expense of victims and consumers."
Backers of the measure say it is necessary to keep the American arms industry in business, while opponents say the law would deprive gun violence victims of a legitimate right to sue. Dispirited gun-safety advocates said they now expected attempts to dismiss nearly a dozen lawsuits around the country, and they vowed to challenge the constitutionality of the bill in court.
"It's always been a tough fight, let's face that," said Representative Carolyn McCarthy, Democrat of New York, who ran for Congress in 1996 after her husband was killed and her son injured by a gunman on the Long Island Rail Road. She added, "This is personal for me."
Fifty-nine Democrats joined 223 Republicans and the House's lone independent to pass the bill. The chief House sponsor of the bill, Representative Cliff Stearns, Republican of Florida, said the measure received a boost in July, when Pentagon officials wrote a letter saying they supported it as a way to "safeguard our national security" by limiting lawsuits against companies that supply weapons to the military.
"There's a subtle undertow here about buy America," Mr. Stearns said, adding, "This bill has picked up a little bit of steam because of that."
Mr. Stearns said he had been working to pass the legislation for six years. But the turning point came not in the House, which had previously passed a similar bill, but in the Senate, which has 55 Republicans after the 2004 elections. The stronger majority enabled Republicans to beat back Democratic amendments that had doomed the measure in the past.
The bill's passage was a bit of good news for President Bush and Congressional Republicans, who have been consumed by an intraparty budget battle in the House, the criticism over the Supreme Court nomination of Harriet E. Miers, a leak investigation involving the president's senior political adviser and the scheduled arraignment of Representative Tom DeLay, who was recently forced to step aside as majority leader, on charges of money laundering and conspiracy in Texas.
Mr. DeLay issued a statement calling the gun bill an important step toward revamping the nation's tort law system. On Wednesday, the House passed another measure, the so-called cheeseburger bill, which protects the restaurant industry from obesity-related lawsuits. Taken together, Mr. DeLay said, the bills "protect America's legal system for genuine plaintiffs."
There have been dozens of lawsuits against the gun industry in recent years, most of them dismissed by the courts. In response to those suits, Mr. LaPierre said, 33 states have adopted laws similar to the federal bill.
While opponents of the measure said it singles out the gun industry for special protection, Mr. LaPierre said the protection is necessary because, unlike auto manufacturers or pharmaceutical companies, American firearms makers "don't have deep pockets," and the industry would be at risk simply from the cost of fighting the lawsuits.
But opponents called the bill shameful - "bought and paid for by the N.R.A.," in the words of Senator Edward M. Kennedy, Democrat of Massachusetts. Representative Chris Van Hollen, Democrat of Maryland, whose constituents include victims of the 2002 sniper shootings in Washington and its suburbs, called the measure "a cruel hoax" on victims of gun violence.
"I went to a lot of memorial services during that period of time," Mr. Van Hollen said. "I've met with family members. To tell them that their cases were frivolous is, I think, to add insult to injury."
Eight of the sniper victims or their relatives won a $2.5 million legal settlement from the manufacturer of the gun used in the shootings and the dealer in Washington State who sold it. Mr. LaPierre said that suit would have been permitted under the law passed Thursday. But the lawyer who brought it, Dennis Henigan of the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, disagreed.
Mr. Henigan said that while the dealer had violated federal law, the bill would have prevented the suit nonetheless because the violations did not pertain directly to the weapon used in the sniper shootings. He said he intended to challenge the bill on constitutional grounds, arguing that it deprives states of their right to legislate and deprives victims of their right to sue.
"We're going to argue that this statute is literally unprecedented in American history," Mr. Henigan said, "because it is the first time that the federal government will be stepping in and retroactively depriving injured people of their vested legal rights under state law, without providing them any alternative."
Wednesday, October 19, 2005
UK: Flu jab for whole population plan
BBC NEWS
Flu jab for whole population plan
Plans to purchase enough vaccine to cover every person in the UK in the event of a flu pandemic have been announced by the Department of Health.
Chief Medical Officer Sir Liam Donaldson said 120 million doses would be needed.
But he said it could not be developed until the exact strain of the flu virus causing the pandemic was known.
The ability of EU nations to coordinate their efforts to tackle a pandemic is to be tested in a simulation exercise.
On Wednesday an outbreak of the bird flu virus was reported in poultry in the Russian province of Tula, to the south of Moscow.
China revealed that 2,600 birds have died from the disease in Inner Mongolia.
And Romania has confirmed birds infected a second outbreak in the country did have the deadly H5N1 strain of the virus.
Contracts
Sir Liam Donaldson on Wednesday published updated guidance on how to prepare for a possible pandemic.
The government is inviting manufacturers to tender for a contract to supply the pandemic flu vaccine.
And thousands of information packs are to be sent to GPs.
PANDEMIC PREDICTIONS
25% of the population - 15 million people - may suffer from flu during a pandemic
Out of a population of 100,000 people, local health care organisations should expect to see at least 1,000 new flu patients a week
This figure could rise to 5,000 a week at the virus's peak
Around 25% of the working population may need to take sick leave of between five and eight working days
Source: Department of Health
Sir Liam said: "We cannot prevent a flu pandemic, but we can reduce its impact.
"One of the most effective counter-measures we can take against a flu pandemic is to make sure we develop and manufacture a vaccine as quickly as possible.
"We will use this vaccine to immunise the UK population and reduce the impact of a pandemic on society."
Two doses
Sir Liam said each person in the country would need two doses of vaccine if a mutated form of bird flu affecting humans hit the UK.
However, he admitted that manufacturing the vaccine could take some time - experts have predicted it could take months.
It is thought that there is no direct threat to the public from current outbreaks in other countries.
Sir Liam has predicted that the epicentre of any new strain is likely to be in East Asia, and that a major outbreak is unlikely in the UK this year.
But he has also warned that 50,000 lives could be lost in the event of bird flu taking hold in the UK.
The UK Influenza Pandemic Contingency Plan includes quarantine measures, stockpiling of anti-viral drugs and research into a vaccine as well as arrangements for the emergency services.
Concerts and football matches could both be banned and travel restricted in the event of an outbreak to stop the virus spreading.
The UK has so far stockpiled 2.5 million doses of anti-viral drugs - and may restrict travel if there is an outbreak.
On Monday, Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt told MPs she was confident enough was being done.
European exercise
The European simulation exercise will involve officials in command centres across Europe reacting to imaginary scenarios.
The exercise, called Common Ground, requested by the European Commission, will not involve any "real world" mobilisation of emergency services and healthcare staff. It will be command centre and desk-based.
Other European countries are stepping up measures to prevent the spread of bird flu, following the discovery in Turkey and Romania of the H5N1 strain which is dangerous to humans.
The European Commission has banned bird and poultry imports from the countries.
H5N1 has killed more than 60 people in South-East Asia since 2003.
On Monday, Greece became the first EU member to confirm a case of bird flu.
It is not yet known if the Greek case is H5N1.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/health/4355532.stm
Terror threat snarls Baltimore
nydailynews.com
Terror threat snarls Baltimore
BALTIMORE - A sketchy threat to blow up vehicles full of explosives prompted authorities yesterday to close one of the busy tunnels underneath Baltimore's harbor and partially shut down the other.
One person who may have been connected to the threat was arrested on immigration charges, a law enforcement official said.
Traffic was allowed to resume by early afternoon after being diverted for nearly two hours, but the FBI continued to investigate.
The four-lane Baltimore Harbor Tunnel was closed around midday, and the eight-lane Fort McHenry Tunnel was reduced to one lane in each direction. The tunnels, both about 1.4 miles long, carry traffic between Washington and the Philadelphia and New York City areas.
A federal law enforcement official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said a man in custody in the Netherlands was the source of information about the threat.
The Associated Press
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