Sunday, November 20, 2005
Security adviser named as source in CIA scandal
The Sunday Times
Security adviser named as source in CIA scandal
Michael Smith and Sarah Baxter
THE mysterious source who gave America’s foremost journalist, Bob Woodward, a tip-off about the CIA agent at the centre of one of Washington’s biggest political storms was Stephen Hadley, the White House national security adviser, according to lawyers close to the investigation.
Woodward, the Washington Post reporter who broke the Watergate scandal that forced President Richard Nixon out of office, has refused publicly to divulge the name of his informant without permission, which has thus far been withheld.
The naming of CIA agent Valerie Plame as the wife of Joseph Wilson, the former US ambassador sent to Niger to investigate disputed claims that Saddam Hussein was trying to purchase uranium yellowcake for the manufacture of nuclear weapons, led to the indictment last month of Vice-President Dick Cheney’s top aide, Lewis “Scooter” Libby, for lying to a grand jury.
It is an offence in America to reveal the identity of a covert agent, although doubts remain about Plame’s precise status.
A spokeswoman for the National Security Council (NSC) denied that Hadley was the journalist’s source. However, in South Korea on Friday during an official visit with President George W Bush, Hadley dodged the question.
“I’ve also seen press reports from White House officials saying that I am not one of his sources,” Hadley said with a smile. Asked if this was a yes or no he replied: “It is what it is.”
A White House official said the national security adviser’s ambiguity was unintentional and repeated that Hadley was not Woodward’s source. But others close to the investigation insisted that he was.
If so, according to Woodward’s timeline, he will have disclosed the information in mid-June 2003, roughly a week before Libby talked to other reporters on June 23. Supporters of Cheney’s disgraced aide are jubilant that this casts doubt on special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald’s contention that Libby was the first to spread the word about Plame.
When Woodward realised this, he went back to his informant. “My source said he or she had no alternative but to go to the prosecutor. I said, ‘If you do, am I released?’ The source said yes, but only for the purpose of discussing it with Fitzgerald.” Woodward testified under oath to the special prosecutor last Monday.
Woodward said the unnamed official told him about Plame in “an offhand, casual manner . . . almost gossip” and “I didn’t attach any importance to it”. He never wrote up the story.
With more journalists in the loop than previously identified, it will be harder for Fitzgerald to prove Libby was deliberately lying when he said he first learnt of Plame from a journalist rather than the CIA.
Two years ago, when Plame’s identity was first revealed, Hadley was Condoleezza Rice’s deputy at the NSC. He is also thought to have been a key source for two books by Woodward on the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks.
Other potential suspects have been denying they are Woodward’s source. Cheney has come under suspicion, although sources close to the investigation claim he is not in the frame.
Fitzgerald may want to interview Woodward’s informant and declared in court filings on Friday that proceedings would continue under a new grand jury. Supporters of Karl Rove, the top White House adviser known as “Bush’s brain”, also fear Fitzgerald may still be investigating him.
Woodward declined to confirm or deny that Hadley had leaked him the information.
It is familiar territory for the Washington Post journalist, who kept the name of Deep Throat, his Watergate informant, secret for more than three decades until Mark Felt, the former deputy director of the FBI, outed himself this year.
Yet colleagues at the Washington Post have been criticising him on their internal message board. One accused Woodward of being the “800-pound elephant in the room”, adding: “I admire the hell out of Bob, but this looks awful.”
Cheney Picks a Fight With a Marine
The Nation
Cheney Picks a Fight With a Marine
John Nichols
When Dick Cheney, a Wyoming congressman who had never served in the military and who had failed during his political career to gain much respect from those who wore the uniform he had worked so hard to avoid putting on during the Vietnam War, was selected in 1989 by former President George Herbert Walker Bush to serve as Secretary of Defense, he had a credibility problem. Lacking in the experience and the connections required to effectively take charge of the Pentagon in turbulent times, he turned to a House colleague, Pennsylvania Democrat John Murtha, a decorated combat veteran whose hawkish stances on military matters had made him a favorite of the armed services. "I'm going to need a lot of help," Cheney told Murtha. "I don't know a blankety-blank thing about defense."
Murtha, a retired Marine colonel who earned a chest full of medals during the Vietnam fight and who has often broken with fellow Democrats to back U.S. military interventions abroad -- most notably in Latin America, where Murtha often supported former President Ronald Reagan's controversial policies regarding El Salvador and Nicaragua in the 1980s -- gave that assistance.
During both the first and second Bush administrations he emerged as a key ally -- often, the most important Democratic ally -- of the Republican presidents. Cheney frequently acknowledged their long working relationship, describing Murtha in public statements as a Democrat he could "work with."
In the 2004 vice presidential debate, Cheney noted that, "One of my strongest allies in Congress when I was Secretary of Defense was Jack Murtha, a Democrat who is chairman of the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee." The vice president was particularly complimentary over the years of the Pennsylvania representatives decision to provide high-profile backing of the administration's 2002 request for authorization to use force against Iraq.
But the cross-party relationship has soured as Murtha, whose concern has always been first and foremost for the men and women who serve in the military, has reached the conclusion that the Iraq intervention has steered U.S. troops into a quagmire from which they must be extracted. Typically blunt, Murtha said this week: "The U.S. cannot accomplish anything further in Iraq militarily. It is time to bring (the troops) home."
Cheney's response to the man he begged to help him understand military affairs during the first Bush administration was to rip into Murtha and other Democrats who had tried to work with the administration. "Some of the most irresponsible comments have, of course, come from politicians who actually voted in favor of authorising force against Saddam Hussein," the vice president growled in a speech to the conservative Frontiers of Freedom Institute. In another clear reference to Murtha, Cheney said, "The president and I cannot prevent certain politicians from losing their memory, or their backbone -- but we're not going to sit by and let them rewrite history."
Of course, it is not Murtha but Cheney who is rewriting history -- or, at least, attempting to obscure it.
As Murtha noted, he's the one who put on a Marine uniform, took his shots in Vietnam and went on to a long career of working with and defending the military, while Cheney is the one who did everything in his power to avoid serving in southeast Asia and has never been seen as a friend of the men and women who actually fight the wars the vice president so shamelessly -- and disingenuously -- promotes. "I like guys who got five deferments and (have) never been there and send people to war, and then don't like to hear suggestions about what needs to be done," said Murtha, referencing the vice president's long record of draft avoidance in the 1960s.
The clearest evidence that Cheney still does "get it" when it comes to defense policy is his decision to take on Jack Murtha. The draft dodger who not all that many years ago admitted that he "(didn't) know a blankety-blank thing about defense" will come to regret picking a fight with the Marine he called in to help him understand military matters.
An expanded paperback edition of John Nichols' biography of Vice President Dick Cheney, The Rise and Rise of Richard B. Cheney: Unlocking the Mysteries of the Most Powerful Vice President in American History (The New Press: 2005), is available at this link:
http://tinyurl.com/8lt56
The book features an exclusive interview with Joe Wilson and a chapter on the vice president's use and misuse of intelligence. Publisher's Weekly describes the book as "a Fahrenheit 9/11 for Cheney" and Esquire magazine says it "reveals the inner Cheney."
(John Nichols' book:
Dick: The Man Who is President (Dick Cheney) can be found at this link:
http://tinyurl.com/bjhmw )
House Republicans Stoop To New Lows
Reuters
House rejects Iraq pullout
By Vicki Allen
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - In a maneuver to strike at Iraq war critics, the Republican-led House of Representatives engineered a vote on Friday on a resolution to pull U.S. troops immediately from Iraq, which was defeated nearly unanimously.
Republicans, who introduced the surprise resolution hours before lawmakers were to start a Thanksgiving holiday recess, said the vote was intended to show support for U.S. forces.
Democrats denounced it as a political stunt and an attack on Rep. John Murtha of Pennsylvania, a leading Democratic military hawk who stunned his colleagues on Thursday by calling for troops to be withdrawn from Iraq as quickly as possible.
The action by House Republicans was the latest volley in an offensive launched by President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney last week to attack war critics as unpatriotic and hypocritical.
"The best strategy to keep America safe is to continue taking the fight to the terrorists, not to retreat in the face of the despicable attacks of a determined enemy," the White House said in a statement.
Unlike Murtha's proposal calling for troops to be withdrawn "as soon as practicable," which he expected would be about six months, the Republican resolution said deployment of the U.S. forces should be "terminated immediately."
Democrats said no one advocated an immediate pull-out without ensuring the safety of troops, and that it was a meaningless resolution that ducked serious debate on the situation in Iraq. It was defeated 403-3.
"To take this proposal and trash it, trivialize it, is outrageous," said Rep. John Spratt, a South Carolina Democrat.
Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi of California said Republicans had "stooped to a new low even for them."
Many Democrats have called on Bush to present a plan to end the war and an estimate of when U.S. forces can start to be withdrawn based on conditions on the ground. Only a few have called for a set timetable for withdrawal.
During the emotional, raucous debate, Ohio Republican Rep. Jean Schmidt read a letter from an Ohio state representative who she said asked her to send Congress and Murtha "a message that cowards cut and run, Marines never do."
Democrats erupted, halting floor debate, and Schmidt withdrew the remark.
Lawmakers from both parties then applauded Murtha, a decorated Vietnam war veteran and retired Marine colonel, with several ovations.
Murtha said he had received "an outpouring from this country" since his call to withdraw troops from "people thirsting for an answer to this problem" in Iraq."
Iraqis "must be put on notice the United States will immediately redeploy," he said. "All of Iraq must know that Iraq is free, free from the United States occupation."
Republicans countered with another war hero, Rep. Sam Johnson of Texas who was a war prisoner in Vietnam for seven years.
"When I was a p.o.w. I was scared to death when our Congress talked about pulling the plug that I would be left there forever," Johnson said. Soldiers "need to have full faith that a few naysayers in Washington won't cut and run and leave them high and dry."
Americans have become increasingly disenchanted with the Iraq war, which claimed its 2,000th U.S. military death last month. Tens of thousands of Iraqis have also died.
Bush, in South Korea for a summit of Asian leaders, rejected calls for a timetable to withdraw, and vowed "we will stay in the fight" until victory.
Despite several such speeches, the Republican-led Senate voted on Tuesday to require progress reports on the war from Bush and said Iraqis should start taking the lead in their own security next year to allow a withdrawal of U.S. troops.
White House spokesman Scott McClellan charged Murtha with endorsing a "surrender" policy advocated by "extreme" liberals such as filmmaker Michael Moore.
That provoked a swift response from Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry, last year's defeated Democratic presidential candidate.
"It disgusts me that a bunch of guys who have never put on the uniform of their country venomously turn their guns on a Marine who came home from Vietnam with a Bronze Star and two Purple Hearts," he said.
Bush served in the Texas Air National Guard during the Vietnam period and never saw combat. Cheney received draft deferments that kept him out of the military during Vietnam.
(Additional reporting by Alan Elsner)
Ex-Republican aide charged in corruption case
Reuters
Ex-Republican aide charged in corruption case
By James Vicini
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A one-time aide to former House Republican Leader Tom DeLay of Texas has been charged with conspiring with his lobbyist partner Jack Abramoff to defraud Indian tribes of millions of dollars and to corruptly give gifts to a member of Congress, prosecutors said.
The filing of the one-count charge in federal court against Michael Scanlon, was contained in what is called a criminal information, usually used in cases involving a plea agreement, rather than in an indictment.
The New York Times reported on its Web site that Scanlon had agreed to plead guilty on Monday. "Mr. Scanlon and the Department of Justice will present a proposed plea agreement to the court to resolve the charge," his lawyer, Stephen Braga, was quoted as saying.
The charge was filed in federal court on Thursday and made public on Friday.
According to the charge, Scanlon and Abramoff, once a powerful Washington lobbyist, provided a stream of things of value to a member of Congress, identified only as "Representative No. 1," from January 2000 through April of last year.
The lawmaker and members of his staff received a lavish golf trip to Scotland, tickets to sporting events and other entertainment, regular meals and campaign contributions in return for supporting legislation, according to the court documents.
Rep. Bob Ney, a Republican from Ohio, said recently he had received a subpoena as part of the U.S. Justice Department's investigation of Abramoff.
A spokesman for Ney said the lawmaker will fully cooperate in the investigation. "He has not been told that he is the target of any investigation and there would be no grounds to do so. Mr. Scanlon's being charged with lying to and cheating his clients does not change that," the spokesman said.
According to the seven-page court document, the conspiracy's purpose was for Scanlon and Abramoff "to enrich themselves by obtaining substantial funds from their clients through fraud and concealment and through obtaining benefits for their clients through corrupt means."
A Justice Department spokesman said a hearing had been scheduled for Monday in federal court in Washington in Scanlon's case, but refused to give any details.
The documents described Scanlon's dealings with "Lobbyist A," with whom he worked. Although the lobbyist was not identified by name, a source close to the investigation said that it was Abramoff.
Scanlon's former boss, DeLay, faces conspiracy and money laundering charges in Texas as part of a campaign finance investigation. He resigned as majority leader in September when he was indicted.
Abramoff has pleaded not guilty to federal charges in Florida that he defrauded lenders in a casino cruise line deal.
The charges involving Scanlon said Abramoff solicited an Indian tribe in Mississippi in 1995 as a client for lobbying services on various issues.
Abramoff recommended that the tribe hire Scanlon's company, Capital Campaign Strategies, while concealing the fact that Abramoff would get half of the profits from the tribe's payments to Scanlon, according to the court papers.
The tribe paid Scanlon's firm $14.8 million from June 2001 through April 2004, while Scanlon concealed from the tribe that 50 percent of the profit, about $6.3 million, was kicked back to Abramoff under their secret arrangement, according to the papers.
The court documents detailed similar arrangements for tribes in Louisiana, Michigan and Texas.
House votes to cut $700 mln in food stamps
Reuters
House votes to cut $700 mln in food stamps
By Charles Abbott
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. House of Representatives voted on Friday to cut $700 million from the food stamp program, despite objections from antihunger groups complaining that estimates show some 235,000 people would lose benefits.
The House bill, which also trimmed other social programs for the poor in an effort to reduce federal spending by $50 billion, was narrowly approved 217-215.
House and Senate negotiators now must write a final, compromise version of legislation to pare federal spending over five years. The Senate did not touch food stamps in its version of a $35 billion budget-cutting bill.
Food stamps, the major U.S. antihunger program, help poor people buy food. Some 25.8 million Americans received food stamps in a program run by the U.S. Agriculture Department.
Senate Agriculture Committee chairman Saxby Chambliss said through a spokesman that he was aiming for "zero" cuts in food stamps during talks with the House. As a committee chairman, the Georgia Republican would be a senior negotiator.
The final bill should abandon proposals to cut food stamps, urged Ellen Vollinger of the Food Research and Action Center. "In nutrition, the Senate did the right thing," she said.
Bread for the World, another antihunger group, said the prospect of food stamp cuts "will make Thanksgiving bleaker for hundreds of thousands of hard-working families." It pointed to government estimates that 38.2 million Americans live in "food insecure" households that have trouble buying enough food.
House Republican leaders say the cuts are only a sliver of food stamp spending that runs more than $35 billion a year. Earlier this week, House Majority Leader Roy Blunt said the cuts would focus the program on "the people you intended to help instead of just adding on at the edges."
In a statement, the White House said it supported the House "efforts to narrow overly broad exemptions from the food stamp program's eligibility limits." President (George W.) Bush proposed restrictions in February that are similar to the House-approved steps.
Under the House plan, roughly 165,000 people now automatically enrolled in food stamps when they get assistance from welfare programs would lose food stamps. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities said these were mostly working families with children.
States would have the option to continue offering free school lunches to families cut off of food stamps. The Center on Budget said it was unlikely all states would do so.
The House proposal also would require 70,000 legal immigrants in most cases to wait seven years to become eligible for food stamps, rather than the current five years. That brings the total number of people affected by the plan to 235,000.
Ford to cut 4,000 jobs in North America
Reuters
Ford to cut 4,000 jobs in North America
By Poornima Gupta
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Ford Motor Co., facing a deepening financial crisis, said on Friday it plans to eliminate 4,000 salaried jobs, or 10 percent of its North American white-collar work force, as part of a larger restructuring plan.
A majority of the job cuts -- announced to employees in an e-mail distributed by Mark Fields, president of Ford's Americas business -- will be made in the first quarter of 2006, spokesman Oscar Suris said.
The cuts will come through attrition, layoffs and the elimination of some agency and contract positions, Suris said.
They will be in addition to the 2,750 job losses already announced by the automaker this year.
Ford lost $284 million in the third quarter and its automotive division is in the red. Its North American vehicle operations have lost more than $1.4 billion before taxes so far this year.
The company's shares have dropped more than 40 percent since the end of 2004. They hit $7.57 per share on Thursday, the lowest in more than two years, before rebounding to $8.41 per share on Friday.
Ford Chairman and Chief Executive Bill Ford Jr. said last month that the automaker will announce its long-awaited restructuring plan -- dubbed "Way Forward" -- in January.
He also warned that the plan would include "significant plant closings" to help slash costs in North America.
Fields and his team are expected to present Bill Ford with the restructuring plan in December.
Ford, like cross-town rival General Motors Corp., has seen its margins squeezed by intense competition in the U.S. market and by a dramatic slowdown in sales of cash cows such as mid-size and large SUVs due to high gasoline prices.
The two companies are also facing higher costs and a cut in their credit ratings to high-yield, or "junk," status.
Ford has taken a number of steps this year to strengthen its balance sheet, including the sale its Hertz Corp. rental car unit.
It also agreed to bailout former parts subsidiary Visteon Corp. and announced that it intends to increase the production of hybrid vehicles tenfold to 250,000 annually.
Senate approves $60 billion tax-cut bill
Reuters
Senate approves $60 billion tax-cut bill
By Donna Smith
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Senate on Friday voted to extend $60 billion in tax cuts for individuals and businesses but added a $5 billion tax on big oil companies, drawing a veto threat from the White House.
The tax package passed on a 64-33 vote only after the Senate dropped provisions that would have kept in place tax-rate reductions for capital gains and dividends beyond their expiration in 2008. Democrats and some moderate Republicans put up solid opposition to those investor provisions backed by the White House.
The tax legislation is part of a broader effort by congressional Republicans to maintain Bush's tax cuts while trimming domestic spending to reduce deficits.
The House of Representatives early on Friday passed a $50 billion package of spending cuts on social programs, student loans and farm subsidies that Democrats and some moderate Republicans said put too much of the deficit-reduction burden on the poor.
The overall cost of the Senate's tax-cut legislation was trimmed by a number of measures to raise revenues, including an accounting provision that would raise about $5 billion from big oil companies by temporarily changing the way they value oil inventories.
A White House statement said President George W. Bush's advisers would recommend a veto if the oil provision remains in place through negotiations with the House. Conservative Republicans will likely insist the accounting change be dropped. But Democrats criticized the White House's position.
"It is amazing that even this White House, which is of, by, and for the big oil companies, would threaten to use its first veto ever to help its big oil buddies even at a time when they're rolling in record profits," said Sen. Charles Schumer, a New York Democrat who sits on the Senate Finance Committee.
The House will likely take up its version of the tax cut legislation when lawmakers return in early December after a Thanksgiving holiday break.
The House bill would extend for two years a 15-percent tax rate for capital gains and dividends. A similar provision was dropped from the Senate bill to overcome opposition from moderate Republicans and Democrats.
The investment tax breaks were the cornerstone of Bush's 2003 tax cut and will expire at the end of 2008 if Congress fails to act. The capital gains rate would then go to 20 percent and dividends would be taxed at regular income rates.
The Senate bill includes about $7 billion in tax breaks to help rebuild regions destroyed by Hurricane Katrina and other provisions to encourage charitable giving.
The Senate bill also extends a number of tax breaks for business, education and savings that otherwise would expire at the end of the year. Among them is a $30 billion measure that would keep millions of taxpayers from paying the alternative minimum tax next year -- a tax originally intended for the very wealthy.
(Additional reporting by Tom Doggett)
Jewish Leader Blasts 'Religious Right'
Yahoo! News
Jewish Leader Blasts 'Religious Right'
By KRISTEN HAYS, Associated Press Writer
The leader of the largest branch of American Judaism blasted conservative religious activists in a speech Saturday, calling them "zealots" who claim a "monopoly on God" while promoting anti-gay policies akin to Adolf Hitler's.
Rabbi Eric Yoffie, president of the liberal Union for Reform Judaism, said "religious right" leaders believe "unless you attend my church, accept my God and study my sacred text you cannot be a moral person."
"What could be more bigoted than to claim that you have a monopoly on God?" he said during the movement's national assembly in Houston, which runs through Sunday.
The audience of 5,000 responded to the speech with enthusiastic applause.
Yoffie did not mention evangelical Christians directly, using the term "religious right" instead. In a separate interview, he said the phrase encompassed conservative activists of all faiths, including within the Jewish community.
He used particularly strong language to condemn conservative attitudes toward homosexuals. He said he understood that traditionalists have concluded gay marriage violates Scripture, but he said that did not justify denying legal protections to same-sex partners and their children.
"We cannot forget that when Hitler came to power in 1933, one of the first things that he did was ban gay organizations," Yoffie said. "Yes, we can disagree about gay marriage. But there is no excuse for hateful rhetoric that fuels the hellfires of anti-gay bigotry."
The Union for Reform Judaism represents about 900 synagogues in North America with an estimated membership of 1.5 million people. Of the three major streams of U.S. Judaism — Orthodox and Conservative are the others — it is the only one that sanctions gay ordination and supports civil marriage for same-gender couples.
Yoffie said liberals and conservatives share some concerns, such as the potential damage to children from violent or highly sexual TV shows and other popular media. But he said, overall, conservatives too narrowly define family values, making a "frozen embryo in a fertility clinic" more important than a child, and ignoring poverty and other social ills.
One attendee, Judy Weinman of Troy, N.Y., said she thought Yoffie was "right on target."
"He reminded us of where we have things in common and where we're different," she said.
Yoffie also urged lawmakers to model themselves on presidential candidate John F. Kennedy, who famously told a Houston clergy group in 1960 that a president should not make policy based on his religion.
On other topics, Yoffie asked Reform synagogues to do more to hold onto members, who often leave after their children go to college. He also said the Reform movement, which is among the most accepting of non-Jewish spouses, should make a greater effort to invite spouses to convert.
___
AP Religion Writer Rachel Zoll contributed to this report.
___
On the Net:
Union for Reform Judaism: http://urj.org
GOPs Dis Springsteen
HuffingtonPost.com
GOPs Dis Springsteen
Steve Cobble
So the Republican leadership, led by Bill Frist, won't honor Bruce Springsteen's contributions to American culture with a simple resolution, the type that is usually passed easily by voice vote...
Well, I've got a solution, jiu-jitsu move that goes way beyond getting even.
I posted on the idea last week.
Newly-elected Governor and about to be ex-Senator Jon Corzine should ask Bruce to join Frist in the Senate.
A cosmic joke, Jon--and everyone will get it but Frist...
Seriously, Governor Corzine, why not?
The Senate could use another (a?) fighter for the working class.
New Jersey voters would like it, and you'd be an instant national (indeed, international) hero.
And as I pointed out last week, Bruce could change the rules. He wouldn't have to act like the usual Senator--he could take his show out on the road, a peace-and-justice organizing tour aimed at revitalizing the opposition to a Bill Frist, Tom DeLay, George W. Bush, and the mean-spirited band of conservative thugs who have just finished knocking poor kids off food stamps in order to pay for more tax cuts and their illegal, immoral war.
Make your first move as Governor one to remember. One for the history books. One for the whole world to applaud. Ask Bruce. He was born to run--and he could help us turn this country around.
Bush Rewrites History To Criticize His Antiwar Critics
The Nation
Bush Rewrites History To Criticize His Antiwar Critics
David Corn
[From 11.14.05]
In a Veterans Day speech on Friday, delivered to troops and others at the Tobyhanna Army Depot in Pennsylvania, George W. Bush veered from the usual commemoration of sacrifice to strike at critics who have questioned whether he steered the country into war by using false information. This has become a tough and troubling issue for his presidency. A poll taken before his speech found that 57 percent of the respondents now believe that Bush "deliberately misled" the nation into war. That is astounding and, I assume, without precedent in history. Has there been another wartime period during which a majority of Americans believed the president had purposefully bamboozled them about the reasons for that war? Addressing this charge is tough for Bush because it calls more attention to it, and the on-ground-realities in Iraq only cause more popular unease with the war. But Bush and his aides calculated that it was better to punch back than ignore the criticism, and that's a sign that they're worried that Bush is coming to be defined as a president who conned the nation into an ugly war. So Bush tried. Let's break down his effort:
Our debate at home must also be fair-minded. One of the hallmarks of a free society and what makes our country strong is that our political leaders can discuss their differences openly, even in times of war.
Conservative who claim raising questions about the war does a disservice to the troops and is anti-American might want to keep these words in mind.
When I made the decision to remove Saddam Hussein from power, Congress approved it with strong bipartisan support.
Actually, Congress did not approve Bush's decision to remove Saddam. In October 2002, the House and Senate approved a resolution that gave Bush the authority to go to war in Iraq if he deemed that appropriate. At the time, Bush and his aides were claiming it was their goal to force Saddam Hussein to give up his weapons of mass destruction and his WMD programs (which, we know now, did not exist). When the resolution passed---and in the weeks after---the White House insisted that Bush was not bent on "regime change" and that he was willing to work within the UN to force Saddam to accept UN inspectors (which Saddam did) in pursuit of the goal of disarming Iraq. Is Bush now saying that he had already resolved to invade Iraq at this point and all his talk about achieving disarmament through the UN process was bunk? Is he rewriting history--or telling us the real truth? In any event, when Bush did order the invasion of Iraq months later in March 2003, he did not ask Congress to vote on his decision to remove Saddam.
I also recognize that some of our fellow citizens and elected officials didn't support the liberation of Iraq. And that is their right, and I respect it. As President and Commander-in-Chief, I accept the responsibilities, and the criticisms, and the consequences that come with such a solemn decision.
Bush might accept "the responsibilities and criticisms," but has yet to acknowledge the mistakes he and his aides made before and after the invasion about planning for a post-invasion Iraq. He also has not insisted on any accountability for these mistakes. For instance, he gave a spiffy medal to former CIA chief George Tenet, who was responsible for the prewar intelligence failure.
While it's perfectly legitimate to criticize my decision or the conduct of the war, it is deeply irresponsible to rewrite the history of how that war began.
When was the last time Bush talked about how the war began--that is, when did he mention that his primary reason for war (protecting the American public from the supposed WMD threat posed by Saddam Hussein) was discredited by reality? Is ignoring history the same as rewriting it?
Some Democrats and anti-war critics are now claiming we manipulated the intelligence and misled the American people about why we went to war. These critics are fully aware that a bipartisan Senate investigation found no evidence of political pressure to change the intelligence community's judgments related to Iraq's weapons programs.
This is not the full and accurate explanation of the controversy at hand. The issue of whether the Bush administration misled the nation in the run-up to the war has two components. The first is the production of the intelligence related to WMDs and the supposed al Qaeda-Sadam connection. The second is how the Bush crowd represented the intelligence to the public when trying to make the case for war. As for the first, the Senate intelligence committee report did say the committee had found no evidence of political pressure. But Democratic members of the committee and others challenged this finding. Several committee Democrats pointed to a CIA independent review on the prewar intelligence, conducted by a panel led by Richard Kerr, former deputy director of the CIA, which said,
Requests for reporting and analysis of [Iraq's links to al Qaeda] were steady and heavy in the period leading up to the war, creating significant pressure on the Intelligence Community to find evidence that supported a connection.
More to the point, Kerr told Vanity Fair that intelligence analysts did feel pressured by the go-to-war gang. The magazine in May 2004 reported,
"There was a lot of pressure, no question," says Kerr. "The White House, State, Defense were raising questions, heavily on W.M.D. and the issue of terrorism. Why did you select this information rather than that? Why have you downplayed this particular thing?...Sure, I heard that some of the analysts felt pressure. We heard about it from friends. There are always some people in the agency who will say, 'We've been pushed to hard.' Analysts will say, 'You're trying to politicize it.' There were people who felt there was too much pressure. Not that they were being asked to change their judgments, but there were being asked again and again to restate their judgments--do another paper on this, repetitive pressures. Do it again."
Was it a case, then, of officials repeatedly asking for another paper until they got the answer they wanted? "There may have been some of that," Kerr concedes. The requests came from "primarily people outside asking for the same paper again and again. There was a lot of repetitive tasking. Some of the analysts felt this was unnecessary pressure. The repetitive requests, Kerr made clear, came from the C.I.A.'s "senior customers," including "the White House, the vice president, State, Defense, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff."
Despite Bush's assertion, the question remains whether undue pressure was applied by the White House. And in his Veterans Day speech, Bush ducked the second issue: how he and his aides depicted the intelligence. This is the source of the dispute over the so-called Phase II investigation of the Senate intelligence committee. The allegation is that Bush and administration officials overstated and hyped the flawed intelligence and claimed it was definitive when they had reason to know it was not.
For example, in his final speech to the nation before launching the war, Bush claimed that US intelligence left "no doubt" about Iraq's supposed WMDs. But there was plenty of doubt on critical issues. Intelligence analysts at the Energy Department and State Department disagreed with those at the CIA about the evidence that purportedly showed Iraq had revived its nuclear weapons program: its importation of aluminum tubes and the allegation that Iraq had been uranium-shopping in Niger. (In 2002, Dick Cheney said the tubes were "irrefutable evidence," and Condoleezza Rice said they were "only really suited for nuclear weapons programs." But a year earlier, as The New York Times reported in 2004, "Rice's staff had been told that the government's foremost nuclear expert seriously doubted that the tubes were for nuclear weapons.") The CIA believed Iraq had chemical weapons. But the Defense Intelligence Agency reported that there was no evidence such stockpiles existed. Some intelligence analysts concluded that Iraq was developing unmanned aerial vehicles that could deliver chemical or biological weapons. The experts on UAVs at the Air Force thought this was not so. Was Bush speaking accurately when he told the public--and the world--there was "no doubt"?
Also, did Bush make specific claims unsupported by the intelligence? The National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq, produced in October 2002, maintained that Iraq had an active biological research and development program. Bush publicly said Iraq had "stockpiles" of biological weapons. There is a difference between an R&D program (which Iraq did not have) and warehouses loaded with ready-to-go weapons (which Bush implied existed). How did an R&D program become stockpiles? This is as intriguing a question as how those sixteen words about Iraq's alleged pursuit of uranium in Africa became embedded in the State of the Union speech Bush delivered in early 2003.
On the key issue of Saddam Hussein's alleged connection to al Qaeda, Bush also made statements that went beyond the intelligence. This link was crucial to the case for war, for Bush and other hawks were arguing that Saddam Hussein could slip his WMDs to his pal Osama bin Laden. Bush claimed that Saddam Hussein was "dealing with" al Qaeda. But his intelligence agencies had not reached that conclusion. (And the 9/11 Commission later said there was no evidence of collusion between al Qaeda and Saddam.) So how did Bush come to make such a statement? Recently, Senator Carl Levin, a Democrat, released formerly classified material showing that before the war when Bush, Cheney, Colin Powell and other administration officials cited evidence that Iraq had been training al Qaeda operatives in the use of bombs and other weapons, Bush and these officials were relying on the statements of a captured al Qaeda member whose claims had been discounted by the Defense Intelligence Agency. Once more, how had Bush and his senior aides come to disseminate specific and provocative information deemed unreliable by the intelligence community?
Bush's Veterans Days comments addressed none of this.
They also know that intelligence agencies from around the world agreed with our assessment of Saddam Hussein.
The people with the most hands-on information regarding WMDs in Iraq did not. The International Atomic Energy Agency, led by recent Nobel Peace Prize winner Mohamed ElBaradei, concluded weeks before the war (after their inspectors had returned to Iraq) that Saddam Hussein had not revived the nuclear weapons program that the IAEA had dismantled in the mid-1990s. And Hans Blix, head of the UN inspectors in Iraq, repeatedly said that his team was not finding evidence of chemical or biological weapons stockpiles.
...And many of these critics supported my opponent during the last election, who explained his position to support the resolution in the Congress this way: "When I vote to give the President of the United States the authority to use force, if necessary, to disarm Saddam Hussein, it is because I believe that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a threat, and a grave threat, to our security." That's why more than a hundred Democrats in the House and the Senate--who had access to the same intelligence--voted to support removing Saddam Hussein from power.
As noted above, the Democrats voted to give Bush the authority to use force when he thought he should--but only after Bush had promised to go to the United Nations in an effort to disarm Saddam Hussein, who, it turned out, was telling the truth when he denied his government possessed WMDs. Even the John Kerry quote that Bush cites contains the to-disarm condition. And several Democratic members of Congress have claimed that they did not see all the intelligence that was available to the White House.
The stakes in the global war on terror are too high, and the national interest is too important, for politicians to throw out false charges.
It's hard to argue with that.
These baseless attacks send the wrong signal to our troops and to an enemy that is questioning America's will. As our troops fight a ruthless enemy determined to destroy our way of life, they deserve to know that their elected leaders who voted to send them to war continue to stand behind them. Our troops deserve to know that this support will remain firm when the going gets tough.
Who said that "it's perfectly legitimate to criticize" the "decision [to go to war in Iraq] or the conduct of the war"? That was Bush, moments earlier, in the same speech. So which is it? Is it okay to criticize the conduct of the war or not?
By the way, while accusing his critics of falsifying history, Bush never conceded that he launched the war on a false premise--that Saddam Hussein was up to his neck in WMDs--and, thus, as he paid tribute to veterans of this war and others, he did not accept responsibility for sending American troops into battle for a cause that did not exist.
Congress Helps Self to $3,100 Pay Raise
ABC News
Congress Helps Self to $3,100 Pay Raise
Congress Helps Self to $3,100 Pay Raise but Postpones Action on Spending and Tax Bills
By DAVID ESPO
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON - The Republican-controlled Congress helped itself to a $3,100 pay raise on Friday, then postponed work on bills to curb spending on social programs and cut taxes in favor of a two-week vacation.
In the final hours of a tumultuous week in the Capitol, Democrats erupted in fury when House GOP leaders maneuvered toward a politically-charged vote and swift rejection of one war critic's call for the withdrawal of troops from Iraq. "You guys are pathetic, pathetic," Massachusetts Rep. Martin Meehan yelled across a noisy hall at Republicans.
On another major issue, a renewal of the Patriot Act remained in limbo as an unlikely coalition of liberal Democrats and conservative Republicans sought curbs on the powers given law enforcement in the troubled first days after the 2001 terrorist attacks.
Both the House and Senate were in session after midnight Thursday, working on the tax and deficit-cutting bills at the heart of the GOP agenda, before returning to work a few hours later.
"What it does is start to turn down the escalating costs ... for our children and our grandchildren. One of the things that we cannot leave to that next generation is a huge deficit that they can't afford," House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., said after enactment of a $50 billion deficit-reduction bill.
Democrats dissented, with one eye on the 2006 elections.
"The Republicans are taking food out of the mouths of children to give tax cuts to America's wealthiest. This is not a statement of America's values," said the Democratic leader, Rep. Nancy Pelosi of California. "Democrats believe that together, America can do better," she said, invoking the party's new campaign slogan.
The cost-of-living increase for members of Congress which will put pay for the rank and file at an estimated $165,200 a year marked a brief truce in the pitched political battles that have flared in recent weeks on the war and domestic issues.
So much so that the issue was not mentioned on the floor of either the House or Senate as lawmakers worked on legislation whose passage will assure bigger paychecks.
Lawmakers automatically receive a cost of living increase each year, unless Congress votes to block it. By tradition, critics have tried to block increases by attaching a provision to the legislation that provides funding for the Treasury Department. One such attempt succeeded in the Senate earlier in the year, but the provision was omitted from the compromise measure moved toward final approval.
The overall bill provided $140 billion for transportation, housing and other programs. It cleared the House on a vote of 392-31. Senate passage was by voice vote.
Pay raise harmony aside, Republicans spent the day celebrating a party-line, post-midnight vote in which the House cleared legislation to reduce deficits by $50 billion over five years. The vote was 217-215, with all the Democrats who voted in opposition, along with 14 GOP rebels.
Acting Majority Leader Roy Blunt of Missouri said Republicans would make their tax cut bill the top item on the agenda when lawmakers return to the Capitol in December.
The House-passed measure attacks deficits by limiting spending for the first time in a decade on Medicaid, food stamps, student loans and other benefit programs that normally rise with inflation and eligibility.
The House GOP leadership had hoped to clear the measure a week ago. It was forced to retreat when Republican moderates rebelled, even after Hastert agreed to strip out a controversial proposal to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling.
The Senate-passed companion measure calls for less deficit reduction, $35 billion over five years, but includes the ANWR provision.
The differences are expected to make it difficult for the House and Senate to reach a compromise by year's end, particularly since Republicans can't count on any Democratic support.
The tax bill presents difficulties of its own for a GOP majority struggling to translate last fall's election gains into this year's legislative achievements.
The Senate cleared a measure after 1:30 a.m. that calls for $60 billion in cuts over five years.
The measure drew bipartisan support, passing on a vote of 64-33. Its provisions would continue a series of existing tax breaks that otherwise will expire, and shelters 14 million upper middle-income families from higher taxes.
The White House has threatened a veto, citing a provision that raises taxes on oil companies.
The House has yet to pass a companion measure. When it does, the tax on oil companies is unlikely to be included, and it is likely to be jettisoned before a compromise measure reaches the White House.
Hastert said Republicans want to "make sure that we support our troops that are fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan ... a lot of people say: Look, this is a tough time, we just ought to pull out and leave. We pull out and leave, we strand an effort to make sure that we can tamp down terrorism, to tamp down a dictatorship, that we can stabilize an area in the Middle East," he added.
GOP aides conceded the last-minute maneuver was designed to put Democrats in a political squeeze voting for withdrawal and exposing themselves to attacks from the White House, or voting against it and risk angering the voters that polls show want an end to the conflict.
Democrats angrily attacked the GOP move, then lined up with Republicans to vote against a troop withdrawal in hopes of draining the issue of its political significance. The vote was 403-3 against the measure.
Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass., called the measure "a piece of garbage" and an attack on Rep. John Murtha. The Pennsylvania Democrat, a decorated veteran and respected congressional voice on military matters, said Thursday it was time for the troops to come home.
House and Senate negotiators announced a tentative agreement earlier in the week to pass a seven-year extension of the Patriot Act. Key senators lawmakers involved in the talks balked at the terms, and officials said they would resume compromise efforts when Congress returns to work in December.
Democrat Calls Bush Fiscal Policy Reckless
ABC News
Democrat Calls Bush Fiscal Policy Reckless
California Democrat Urges Fiscal Responsibility, Calls Bush Fiscal Policies Reckless
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON - Calling the Bush administration's fiscal policies reckless and broken, Rep. Dennis Cardoza, D-Calif., urged the federal government on Saturday to rein in spending.
Speaking in the Democratic Party's weekly radio address, Cardoza said, "Under President Bush, we have run up the biggest deficits in the history of the world."
The national debt was increased by Bush and the Republican-controlled Congress to $8 trillion, or $27,000 for each American, he said. And a nearly $50 billion GOP deficit-reduction bill passed in the House early Friday will actually increase the deficit, he said.
"The Republican Party has abandoned fiscal conservatism and embraced a budget system with no accountability," he said.
Cardoza also criticized the amount of debt the U.S. owes to other countries, saying the amount is "unprecedented."
"This president has borrowed more money from abroad than all 42 of his predecessors combined, including billions of dollars from the Central Bank of China," he said.
Cardoza is a member of the Blue Dog Coalition, a group of 37 House Democrats who list a balanced federal budget as a major goal. The group has offered several measures to reduce the deficit.
"Now is the time for real reform," Cardoza said. "Every American understands that they need to balance their check book each and every month. Government shouldn't be any different."
Saturday, November 19, 2005
French solution: Paristinian state
WorldNetDaily.com
French solution: Paristinian state
Joseph Farah
OK, enough is enough.
It's clear France is no longer in control of its population.
It's clear millions within its borders are struggling for freedom and independence.
It's clear that these people are not rioting for the sake of rioting, they are responding to oppression from French authorities.
It's clear that their uprising cannot be met with state violence, because that would only lead to a cycle of violence.
It's clear that these freedom-fighters – whom I have dubbed "Paristinians" – want a state of their own.
It's clear that the international community must force France to the negotiating table with these freedom fighters to begin the peace process that will inevitably lead to the creation of an autonomous, independent state of "Paristine."
If it's good enough for Israel, it's good enough for the French surrender monkeys who have been leaders of the global movement to force the Jewish state into appeasement of terrorists.
We've got to stop referring to this "intifada" in France as "riots." This is a movement for self-determination. This is a movement for independence. This is a movement for freedom from imperialism.
The analogy is apt.
That's not "Frère Jacques" they're singing in France. It's "Fire Jacques."
The president of France can see the cinder in the eye of others, but is missing the beam in his own.
What's good for the goose liver is good for the gander liver.
The chicken cordon bleu has come home to roost.
It's time for France to stop the hypocrisy.
It's time for the French to take a dose of the medicine they have been handing out to the Jews of Israel.
It's time to end the apartheid within its population. It's time for France to stop treating those poor, Muslim immigrants as second-class citizens. It's time to accept the only permanent solution that can address the root problem in French society – the recognition of the Paristinians as a legitimate negotiating partner.
Enough rubber bullets!
Enough police repression!
Enough calls for restraint!
Enough with the threats!
Before this cycle of violence spreads throughout all of Europe, France needs to do the right thing.
The French have been speaking out of both sides of their mouths for too long. They've been speaking out of both of their nostrils for too long, too. If appeasement was the solution in Iraq, it's the solution for the "Paristinian" revolt. If appeasement was the solution for Hitler, it's the solution for the "Paristinian" revolt. If appeasement was the solution for Israel in dealing with its "Palestinian" problem, it's the solution for France's "Paristinian" uprising.
As I mentioned yesterday in my column, if France has these kinds of systemic problems with its Muslim population, then it is time to partition France. It's time for an independent Muslim state to be created. After all, isn't that what France and other European nations have determined is the proper solution for Israel?
These are not just riots. This is an intifada – just like the one begun in 2000 within and around Israel.
France and other countries, including the United States, have demanded that Israel meet those attacks with land concessions to the rioters and suicide bombers. That is the only viable, long-term solution, they say. They claim this violence will never cease until those oppressed by Israel are granted an independent, autonomous state of their own.
Why should the solution be any different in France?
Stop the violence! Now – not at a snail's pace. The time has come to begin talks with the "Paristinians" about their own future homeland of "Paristine."
Friday, November 18, 2005
Accord on anti-terror law faces opposition
Reuters
Accord on anti-terror law faces opposition
By Thomas Ferraro
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A bipartisan group of six senators vowed on Thursday to oppose renewal of the anti-terror Patriot Act unless a tentative accord drafted by Republican-led negotiators was changed to provide greater protections of civil liberties.
It was unclear what, if any, changes would be made. Critics expressed hope they could obtain some revisions to ease concerns in the 100-member Senate.
But top Republican aides in the House of Representatives and the Senate said they expected to muster adequate support to proceed with perhaps relatively minor modifications.
The Patriot Act, a controversial centerpiece of President George W. Bush's war on terror, was enacted after the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States to expand federal powers to track suspected terrorists.
Republican-led negotiators agreed on Wednesday to extend or make permanent key provisions set to expire next month, including ones covering wiretaps, Internet surveillance and access to personal records.
But six senators -- three Democrats and three Republicans -- on Thursday called the tentative accord "unacceptable."
Among the revisions they demanded were ones that would require the government to convince a judge that records sought have a connection to a suspected terrorist or spy. They also want people more quickly advised after they are subjected to "a sneak-and-peek search" of their home or place of business.
"If further changes are not made, we will work to stop this bill from becoming law," they wrote leaders of the Judiciary and Intelligence committees.
The six are assistant Senate minority leader Dick Durbin of Illinois, fellow Democrats Russell Feingold of Wisconsin and Ken Salazar of Colorado, and Republicans Larry Craig of Idaho, John Sununu of New Hampshire and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.
Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter, a Pennsylvania Republican, declined comment, other than to tell reporters, "We're working on it."
Feingold said, "They (proponents) may be able to get it through ... but I am ready to resist."
Feingold and other critics have at least slowed down final congressional consideration. Proponents had initially hoped to bring the tentative accord up for a vote in the House on Thursday.
The House and Senate would both have to approve such legislation before it could be sent to Bush to sign into law.
Lawmakers reject emergency bird flu funds
Reuters
Lawmakers reject emergency bird flu funds
By Richard Cowan
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Emergency money that President George W. Bush requested to combat a looming influenza pandemic has been deleted from U.S. health-funding legislation after conservative Republicans insisted it would have to be paid for by cutting other government programs.
The U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday unexpectedly defeated the fiscal 2006 health-care spending bill, even with the avian flu funds barred from the measure. The fate of the massive funding bill, as well as money to fight an avian flu outbreak, was now in doubt as Congress had little time left before adjourning for the year.
After days of intensive talks between the House and Senate, negotiators dropped a plan for $8 billion in funds that Democrats pushed through the Senate last month.
Following that Senate vote, Bush on November 1 asked Congress for $7.1 billion in emergency money.
The funding fight erupted after conservative Republicans in the House insisted that an emergency U.S. effort to stockpile vaccines and anti-viral drugs that could be effective against the deadly flu would have to be paid for by cutting other government programs.
Republican leaders in the House said that instead of attaching the bird flu money to a massive $602 billion health and labor spending bill that is rapidly moving through Congress, they would try separate legislation later this year or early next year.
Avian flu has been killing poultry flocks in Asia and the animal disease has spread globally. More than 100 people have been infected with avian flu and about half have died.
Scientists fear a pandemic-style human outbreak if the virus mutates in a way that people could easily pass the disease to each other.
POTENTIAL FOR PANDEMIC
House Appropriations Committee Chairman Jerry Lewis, a California Republican, helped block the emergency funds. But earlier this week he acknowledged, "The more I study it, the more I see the potential for a pandemic."
Arizona Rep. Jeff Flake, one of several conservative Republicans pushing for less government spending, told Reuters he would try to kill any avian flu legislation that does not offset the spending with cuts to other programs.
But Rep. Ralph Regula, the Ohio Republican who oversees health-care funding in the House, said it's such a big-ticket item that "There's no way to offset $7 billion or $8 billion."
Democrats in Congress have been urging quick approval of the money, which also would be used to step up worldwide surveillance of the disease and help localities cope with an outbreak.
But with Congress already reeling over $62 billion in emergency spending for the fall's hurricane cleanup and with huge budget deficits becoming chronic, conservatives have warned their leaders that they will not tolerate an open checkbook.
As a result, the House on Thursday also was set to debate $50 billion in spending cuts that hit social programs for the poor and have generated a broad debate over government priorities. At the same time, House Republicans are advancing tax cuts that help the wealthy.
Broadcast ex-chief sent 'bragging' e-mail to Rove
Reuters
Broadcast ex-chief sent 'bragging' e-mail to Rove
By Deborah Zabarenko
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Corporation for Public Broadcasting's former chief e-mailed White House strategist Karl Rove, "bragging" about a push for conservative programming on U.S. public television, the CPB's inspector general said on Thursday.
Kenneth Tomlinson, who resigned as CPB's chairman this month, told Rove of his work to balance the liberal PBS program "Now with Bill Moyers," with a conservative show, "The Journal Editorial Report," Inspector General Kenneth Konz said in a telephone interview.
"There's a few of them to and from Karl Rove," Konz said of the e-mail traffic. "They primarily relate to (ex-)Chairman Tomlinson advising Mr. Rove and his staff regarding his success in getting a program to be put on the air to balance the Bill Moyers program. ... He was bragging on how successful he was being.
"In addition, I saw some general comments relating to how (Tomlinson) was shaking things up here at CPB," Konz said, adding Rove responded with "sort of general congratulations ... very short, very cryptic."
The e-mails show no evidence Tomlinson acted with White House guidance to push for right-leaning programming, Konz said, but they do show Tomlinson failed to keep the CPB board and management informed about what he was doing.
"It went against what the law said he had the authority to do," Konz said.
The Bush administration came under fire earlier this year for trying to influence news coverage, including paying a conservative commentator to praise its new education law and the production by government agencies of video news releases that some television stations aired without identifying their origin.
Konz's office released a highly critical report on Tuesday that said Tomlinson violated CPB policy and federal law by involving himself in specific programming decisions, and by using "political tests" to choose a new CPB president.
The new president, Patricia Harrison, formerly co-chaired the Republican National Committee.
Also on Thursday, The Wall Street Journal released e-mail exchanges between Tomlinson and Paul Gigot, the newspaper's editorial page editor, regarding the PBS program "The Journal Editorial Report."
In one of the e-mails, Tomlinson told Gigot, "I'm trying to pressure Pat Mitchell (PBS president) to produce a real conservative counterpart to Moyers." In another, Tomlinson wrote, "I do not trust Pat Mitchell but I have a deal with others stipulating that you will have access to the same deal Moyers has."
Both Tomlinson and The Wall Street Journal's editorial page accused Konz of being motivated by politics, an accusation Konz denied.
CPB is a federally funded nonprofit corporation and the largest single source of money for U.S. public television and radio programming, including PBS and National Public Radio. It is governed by a presidentially appointed board.
Most airline cargo isn't checked for explosives
Yahoo! News
Report: Most airline cargo isn't checked for explosives
By Thomas Frank, USA TODAY
Nearly all of the cargo in the nation's aviation system goes unchecked for explosives, and policies aimed at thwarting cargo bombs on passenger planes are flawed, according to a government report due out Wednesday.
Terrorists could foil the government's strategy for keeping bombs out of cargo holds by meeting a few basic requirements that would allow them to put an explosives-laden package on a jet, the Government Accountability Office said.
Passenger planes carried 6 billion pounds of cargo last year, and only "a very small percentage" is inspected, the report said. By contrast, all domestic luggage is scanned for bombs.
The GAO, a watchdog arm of Congress, urged the Transportation Security Administration to come up with ways to close cargo security loopholes. A study should be done to track the steps in which cargo goes from shippers to the belly of an airplane, the GAO said.
"TSA has not taken needed steps to identify shippers who may pose a security threat," the report said.
The TSA said in a statement Tuesday that it has improved cargo security but "recognizes the need to do more."
Rep. Edward Markey (news, bio, voting record), D-Mass., said air cargo "is an opening which al-Qaeda can exploit." He requested the GAO report last year with four House members from both parties. All cargo should be inspected before going on passenger planes, Markey said.
The TSA objects to the idea, saying it would cost the government $3.6 billion over 10 years and could delay cargo shipments.
The agency allows cargo on passenger planes only from shippers that meet certain security requirements. Air carriers must randomly inspect some cargo. But the GAO said the criteria "may not ... deter or prevent terrorists." The report said a significant portion of cargo is exempt from random inspection.
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