Major Security Breaches Uncovered On Our Rails

CBS 2 Investigates: Terror Just A Key Turn Away?
Major Security Breaches Uncovered On Our Rails
Scott Weinberger
Reporting

(CBS) NEW YORK A new state report has found a major security breach involving Metro-North Railroad and Grand Central Terminal. Sensitive documents and keys that access the entire rail system have been stolen.

The items were inside a backpack belonging to a Metro-North employee, who told police he mistakenly left it on the train. The backpack was found days later and the keys and documents were gone.

There is no doubt that the second largest commuter railroad in the nation remains an attractive target for terrorists.

On any given workday a quarter of a million riders board Metro-North trains.

We have seen the devastation of a terrorist attack on trains unfold all over the globe -- Madrid in 2004, London in 2005 and most recently in Mumbai, India, where a terrorist bomb killed 186 passengers.

So you can imagine the concern by State officials here when this theft was uncovered. But investigators would soon learn, this was just the tip of the iceberg.

"I really felt that was sensitive information," said Matthew Sansverie, The Inspector General for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.

Sansverie's agency is an independent watchdog overseeing the MTA. Once his investigators began to unravel the theft, they learned that missing keys and documents were nothing new. In fact, this same Metro-North employee has lost these items three times. Metro-North officials don't keep statistics on these types of losses. Why not? The railroad does not keep track of who is issued keys or these sensitive documents.

State officials admit this lapse in security leaves wide open the possibility that sensitive items could fall into the wrong hands. In fact, sources said the missing documents include a detailed description of highly sensitive areas at Grand Central Terminal, even evacuation plans showing the routes used to clear out passengers in an emergency.

When State investigators questioned Metro-North officials on how keys were issued, they were astonished to learn that in a six-month period last year the railroad handed out 16,000 universal door keys, while less than 1,000 employees were authorized to receive them.

"We don't think that management at the railroad put as high a value on these events that we would hope they would, especially in the current environment," Sansverie said.

Having complete access to a train leads to the possibility a terrorist could hijack it or even pack it with explosives and detonate it, while the train travels underneath the heart of Manhattan.

"Commuter trains are such an attractive target because of the large numbers of people on the trains at the same time. And most times they have to go through tunnels where there are contained spaces where the casualties and the fatalities are that much more exaggerated," said William Daly, a former FBI agent.

"This investigation suggested to us that the priorities should be looked at. While on-time performance is really important, it does not excuse taking care of the fundamentals like this," said Sansverie.

The MTA Inspector General said he has now opened a new investigation into the policies of the Long Island Railroad to see if they have a similar problem protecting keys and documents. He's also looking at NYC Transit. In a written response to the IG's report the MTA said they are taking steps to correct this security issue. They declined our requests for an on-camera interview.

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Feds, City Knew Of Ground Zero Toxins; Lower Manhattan Was Reopened Despite Knowledge The Air Was Unsafe

Documents: Feds, City Knew Of Ground Zero Toxins
Critics: Lower Manhattan Was Reopened Despite Knowledge The Air Was Unsafe
A CBS 2 Exclusive
Marcia Kramer
Reporting

(CBS) NEW YORK Stunning proof has been uncovered that the government knowingly put New Yorkers in harm's way after 9/11.

CBS 2 News has obtained documents revealing that Lower Manhattan was reopened a few weeks following the attack even though the air was not safe.

The two devastating memos, written by the U.S. and local governments, show they knew. They knew the toxic soup created at Ground Zero was a deadly health hazard. Yet they sent workers into the pit and people back into their homes.

One of the memos, from the New York City health department, dated Oct. 6, 2001, noted: "The mayor's office is under pressure from building owners ... in the Red Zone to open more of the city." The memo said the Department of Environmental Protection was "uncomfortable" with opening the areas but, "The mayor's office was directing the Office of Emergency Management to open the target areas next week."

"Not only did they know it was unsafe, they didn't heed the words of more experienced people that worked for the city and E.P.A.," said Joel Kupferman, with the group Environmental Justice Project.

Another part of the memo noted: "The E.P.A. has been very slow to make data results available and to date has not sufficiently informed the public of air quality issues arising from this disaster."

"Unfortunately, it doesn't surprise me," said health protestor Yuichi Tamamo. "For the last five years we've been saying air quality here has been horrible."

It also doesn't suprise Carmen Flores, who lives in an apartment in the Baruch Houses that was engulfed in the 9/11 toxic plume. Her health has deteriorated and she has multiple medicines.

"I feel forgotten," she said.

Bruce Sprague, an E.P.A. official in the New York and New Jersey region during 9/11 admited to CBS 2 News the agency was finding alarming air quality readings at Ground Zero and in the surrounding areas.

Sprague said the E.P.A. had written much more conservative health assessments, but the memos had to go to Washington. And when the White House got its hands on them, they -- according to Sprague -- softened them.

The city health department refused to comment on the memo, but inside sources told CBS 2 News the memo is real. And its veracity is not questioned by the Environmental Justice Project's Kupferman.

He calls it "a smoking gun."

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Poll: Many Americans Feel Less Safe

wcbstv.com
Poll: Many Americans Feel Less Safe

(CBS News) NEW YORK Do Americans feel safer now than before 9/11? For many, the answer is no, according to a CBS News/New York Times poll.

Fifty-four percent of Americans say they generally feel safe, but 46 percent say they feel somewhat uneasy or in danger.

Compared with five years ago, 39 percent of Americans say they feel less safe now, compared with only 14 percent who say they feel safer. Forty-six percent say they feel the same.

More also say the threat of terrorism has grown since 9/11 than said so a year ago. Forty-one percent say the threat has increased since the attacks, an 11 percent jump from last year. Just 14 percent say the threat has decreased, while 43 percent say the threat has not changed.

How safe do you feel compared to five years ago?

More Safe
14%
Less Safe
39%
Same
46%

Also, by a four-to-one margin (48 percent to 12 percent), Americans think the war in Iraq has made the threat of terrorism against the United States worse rather than better.

Five years after 9/11, most Americans say life has returned to the way it was before the attacks, at least in part. However, some behavior has changed: One in four Americans say they are less likely to fly now, and one in five are less likely to attend large events with thousands of people.

Has life in America returned to what it was before the 9/11 attacks?

Mostly Returned
28%
Somewhat Returned
48%
Has Not Returned
23%

Nearly one in four people say they still feel nervous and edgy. Women are more likely than men to say their behavior has been affected.

Both the war in Iraq and the war in Afghanistan are viewed as having created breeding grounds for terrorists. Fifty-four percent say the wars have created more terrorists, while just 15 percent say they've eliminated terrorists.

There's also increased pessimism about the overall war on terrorism, with 21 percent — the highest number ever — saying the terrorists are winning. Thirty-six percent say the United States is winning and 38 percent say neither side is winning.

Fewer than half of Americans are confident the United States will capture Osama bin Laden, the man believed responsible for the 9/11 attacks.

Still, a majority of Americans, 55 percent, say they approve of how President Bush is handling the war on terror — his highest rating in more than a year, but a sharp decrease from December 2001, when 90 percent approved.

About half of those polled say Bush administration policies have made America safer, but one in four say they've made the United States less safe. A similar number say they've had no effect.

One explanation for that skepticism may be that nearly half of Americans don’t think terrorism is a problem a president can do much about.

Americans are split on how prepared the United States is to deal with another terrorist attack: 49 percent think the country is prepared, 43 percent think it is not. Americans are especially worried about a potential biological or chemical attack — 73 percent say the United States is not prepared for that.

The number of Americans who say another attack on the United States is likely has dropped to 59 percent, down from a high of 78 percent in the weeks after 9/11. People in the Northeast, where the attacks on the World Trade Center occurred, are the most concerned that their area will be targeted, while those in the Midwest are the least concerned.

Nearly six in 10 say the government has not done all it could to make the country safe from future attacks.

The poll was conducted among a nationwide random sample of 1206 adults, interviewed by telephone August 17-21, 2006. The error due to sampling could be plus or minus three percentage points for results based on the complete sample.

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Bin Laden Gets a Pass from Pakistan

abcnews.com
Bin Laden Gets a Pass from Pakistan
Brian Ross and Gretchen Peters Report:



Osama bin Laden, America's most wanted man, will not face capture in Pakistan if he agrees to lead a "peaceful life," Pakistani officials tell ABC News.

The surprising announcement comes as Pakistani army officials announced they were pulling their troops out of the North Waziristan region as part of a "peace deal" with the Taliban.

If he is in Pakistan, bin Laden "would not be taken into custody," Major General Shaukat Sultan Khan told ABC News in a telephone interview, "as long as one is being like a peaceful citizen."

Bin Laden is believed to be hiding somewhere in the tribal areas of Pakistan, near the Afghanistan border, but U.S. officials say his precise location is unknown.

In addition to the pullout of Pakistani troops, the "peace agreement" between Pakistan and the Taliban also provides for the Pakistani army to return captured Taliban weapons and prisoners.

"What this means is that the Taliban and al Qaeda leadership have effectively carved out a sanctuary inside Pakistan," said ABC News consultant Richard Clarke, the former White House counter-terrorism director.

The agreement was signed on the same day President Bush said the United States was working with its allies "to deny terrorists the enclaves they seek to establish in ungoverned areas across the world."

The Pakistani Army had gone into Waziristan, under heavy pressure from the United States, but faced a series of humiliating defeats at the hands of the Taliban and al Qaeda fighters.

"They're throwing the towel," said Alexis Debat, who is a Senior Fellow at the Nixon Center and an ABC News consultant. "They're giving al Qaeda and the Taliban a blank check and saying essentially make yourselves at home in the tribal areas," Debat said.

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Harris wins Fla. GOP Senate nomination

Yahoo! News
Harris wins Fla. GOP Senate nomination
By STEVEN WINE, Associated Press Writer

U.S. Rep. Katherine Harris (news, bio, voting record) overcame a campaign ridiculed even by her own party to easily claim the GOP nomination for the Senate on Tuesday, and Rep. Jim Davis (news, bio, voting record) won the Democratic nomination to succeed popular Gov. Jeb Bush.

Harris next faces an uphill battle against incumbent Sen. Bill Nelson (news, bio, voting record), who had no primary challenger.

"Tonight is great victory for our party and for Florida," Harris said. "It's a great victory because it shows each of us we can overcome adversity to achieve extraordinary victories."

Davis won a concession from state Sen. Rod Smith, who trailed 47 percent to 41 percent with 84 percent of the precincts reporting. Davis' opponent in November will be Florida Attorney General Charlie Crist, who claimed the Republican nomination to replace Bush.

Crist had 64 percent of the vote to 34 percent for Tom Gallagher, the state's chief financial officer.

Harris had 49 percent of the vote against three relative unknowns. Attorney Will McBride ran second at 30 percent, and retired Navy admiral LeRoy Collins had 15 percent.

As Florida secretary of state six years ago, Harris oversaw the recount that gave George W. Bush the White House. She became a rising star in the Republican Party, parlaying name recognition into two terms in Congress.

But state GOP leaders tried to talk Harris out of running for the Senate, citing fears she would lose to Nelson while spurring a large November turnout by Democrats, which would hurt the entire Republican ticket.

Harris' campaign for the nomination was widely derided as spectacularly inept. Fundraising lagged, prompting her to pledge $10 million of her own money. Her makeup, clothes and personality were mocked on national TV. She was linked to a corrupt defense contractor. And staff members kept quitting in frustration.

Still, she won comfortably, thanks to weak opposition and a strong base of Republicans who loved her because of her role in the recount furor.

Some 2 1/2 hours after the polls closed, the 49-year-old congresswoman arrived at her Tampa campaign headquarters to chants of "We want Katherine."

"Tonight I say to Bill Nelson: Come home, Bill. Enough is enough," Harris said. She said the campaign "can't rest for even a moment."

Nelson didn't address Harris' win directly but said in a statement, "I look forward to ... spending the next six years continuing to fight for the people of Florida in the United States Senate."

Despite a handful of late openings at polling places, the primary appeared to be debacle-free, with no problems reported to rival the troubled elections in 2000 and 2002. Rainy weather in South Florida and other parts of the state was expected to reduce turnout figures.

"The primary election in Florida today ran very smoothly," state Division of Elections spokesman Sterling Ivey said.

State Sen. Skip Campbell easily won the Democratic nomination for attorney general over a little-known lawyer who did not campaign. Bill McCollum was unopposed for the Republican nomination.

Senate President Tom Lee won the Republican nomination for chief financial officer, setting up a November race with Democrat Alex Sink.

The Democratic race for governor tightened in recent days, but Smith fell short in his bid for a come-from-behind victory.

Largely unknown when he entered the race, Smith touted his pro-agriculture positions and law enforcement background as a former state attorney. Davis dogged Smith about his connections to big sugar, repeatedly pointing out how U.S. Sugar Corp. spent millions of dollars to fund attack ads.

Davis spoke to supporters in Tampa shortly after Smith phoned to concede.

"With all the talk of sugar in the news, let me say how sweet it is," Davis said. "It's time to change direction, and tonight is a new beginning."

Davis, considered the more liberal, pro-environment candidate, relied heavily on big-name endorsements. He spent the final weekend campaigning with well-respected former Sen. Bob Graham (news, bio, voting record).

Crist campaigned as a champion of consumer causes and Bush's policies — at least when it came to crime, taxes and education. But Crist criticized the governor's decision to intervene in the Terri Schiavo right-to-die case, and said he wouldn't try to change the class-size limits that the governor has opposed.

A roar went up in Crist's hotel suite in St. Petersburg when he told family and supporters The Associated Press had declared him the winner.

"It's wonderful, wonderful news," Crist said. "All I want to be is the people's governor, and they should rest assured that if they elect me in November, no one will fight harder for the people."

Bush, brother of the president, must step down because of term limits.

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Democrats Challenge Republicans To Do The Peoples Business

Huffington Post
Carl Pope
Does Anyone Remember Speaker Foley?

The Democrats have just been handed a golden opportunity for this November, and they seem to be grasping it. Faced with dismal poll numbers, the Republican leadership of a failed Congress has decided to abandon the public's business, run for the hustings (or the hills), and campaign against their own Congress and White House.
"Don't blame me -- it's those guys in DC."

In the process, the Republican Congressional leadership has decided to abandon any pretense of legislating. Next week, Congress will vote on a bill to prevent horse slaughter for human consumption -- and then they will go home without having passed a single one of the vital Appropriations bills, much less dealing with energy policy, immigration, pension security, or any of the other big issues facing them.

This same instinct to cut and run afflicted the Democratic 103rd Congress back in 1994. The Democrats had a substantial legislative agenda -- campaign finance reform, Superfund reauthorization, and education funding. The House had passed these bills. But, determined to deny the Democrats any victories, the Republicans in the Senate filibustered everything. Exactly twelve years ago, I remember meeting with then Vice-President Gore to urge him and President Clinton to announce that until the Senate voted crucial bills up or down -- just voted (either way) -- he would keep Congress in session. I argued then, and I would argue today, that for a party in power there is no substitute for doing the public's business and demanding that your opposition join you in that labor.

Gore said he was intrigued, but he told me that the Democrats in Congress were so eager to get out of town and on the campaign trail that the President couldn't hold them. Speaker Foley, among others, went down in flames five weeks later.

Now the Republicans are borrowing from Foley's script, but their situation is vastly worse. In '94 the Democrats could pass bills; they just couldn't get past the filibuster. In 2006, the Republicans can't even agree among themselves. So they are not fleeing an empowered opposition -- they are fleeing their own internal contradictions and failures -- and the daily news from Iraq.

And the same tired scent of abuse of power that Newt Gingrich rode into power 12 years ago is once again oozing from Capitol Hill. Senate Appropriation Chair Ted Stevens, of "Bridges and Roads to Nowhere" infamy, was exposed as the Senator who had single-handedly prevented the Senate from considering legislation that would have created a searchable database of federal contractors to enhance the chances that inside deals would get detected and headed off in time. The legislation was by fellow Republican Senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma, and Stevens, who cheerfully showered hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayer money on pork barrel projects in his state, objected secretly, because, he claimed, he just "wanted to make sure that this wasn't going to be a huge cost to the taxpayer..." When the "hold" blocking consideration of the bill was first announced, everyone in Washington assumed it was Stevens who was behind it. Coburn bluntly told the press that if Stevens had concerns, he should have attended the hearings, and that the only reason to hold it up was if Stevens had something to hide. Well, there is another explanation -- the fact that Coburn had tried to cut off appropriations for the Bridges to Nowhere earlier in the year. Ted Stevens, it appears, is not one who believes that revenge is a dish best eaten cold -- he likes it piping hot.

The Democrats have grabbed on to this opportunity. Last week the Democratic leadership sent their Republican colleagues a letter stating that "we propose Congress act on five key issues that have an immediate impact on the lives of the American people before adjourning for the November election." The five issues were homeland security, health care, college tuition, oil addiction, and economic security. After making the case for doing the public business, the Democratic leadership threw down the gauntlet: "For Members of Congress to hit the campaign trail while urgent national needs remain unmet would be a serious abdication of our responsibilities as elected officials. We reject assertions that the people's business can wait until after the November election. Therefore, until Congress passes legislation that meets the real needs of the American people, House Democrats will actively resist adjournment."

This should become the theme of this fall's election. Tom Foley's colleagues found out the hard way that they couldn't run from being the party in power; Dennis Hastert may be about to learn the same lesson.

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The Republican War on Workers

sfgate.com
The war on workers
- David Sirota

U.S. Education Secretary Rod Paige labeled one "a terrorist organization." Former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, called them "a clear and present danger to the security of the United States." And U.S. Rep. Charles Norwood, R-Ga., claimed they employ "tyranny that Americans are fighting and dying to defeat in Iraq and Afghanistan" and are thus "enemies of freedom and democracy," who show "why we still need the Second Amendment" to defend ourselves with firearms.

Who are these supposed threats to America? No, not Osama bin Laden followers, but labor unions made up of millions of workers -- janitors, teachers, firefighters, police officers, you name it.

Bashing organized labor is a Republican pathology, to the point where unions are referenced with terms reserved for military targets. In his 1996 article, headlined "GOP Readies for War With Big Labor," conservative columnist Robert Novak cheered the creation of a "GOP committee task force on the labor movement" that would pursue a "major assault" on unions. As one Republican lawmaker told Novak, GOP leaders champion an "anti-union attitude that appeals to the mentality of hillbillies at revival meetings."

The hostility, while disgusting, is unsurprising. Unions wield power for workers, meaning they present an obstacle to Republican corporate donors, who want to put profit-making over other societal priorities.

Think the minimum wage just happened? Think employer-paid health care and pensions have been around for as long as they have by some force of magic? Think again -- unions used collective bargaining to preserve these benefits. As the saying goes, union members are the folks that brought you the weekend.

The government's numbers explain how unions have helped their members. According to an analysis of federal data by the Labor Research Association, average union members receive a quarter more in compensation than nonunion workers. Eighty-nine percent of union members have access to employer-sponsored health care, compared to just 67 percent of nonunion workers. Unionized workers receive 26 percent more vacation than nonunion workers.

Unions also benefit nonunion workers. That's thanks to the "union threat effect" whereby anti-union companies meet higher standards in order to prevent workers from becoming angry and organizing. For instance, Princeton researchers found in industries that are 25 percent unionized, average nonunion workers get 7.5 percent more compensation specifically because of unionization's presence.

The flip side is obvious: The more corporations and politicians crush unions, the more all workers suffer. It is no coincidence that as union membership and power has declined under withering anti-union attacks, workers have seen their wages stagnate, pensions slashed, and share of national income hit a 60-year low. As Council on Foreign Relations scholars put it, the decline in unions "is correlated with the early and sharp widening of the U.S. wage gap."

Big Business claims union membership has declined because workers do not want to join unions -- a claim debunked by public-opinion data. In 2002, Harvard University and University of Wisconsin researchers found at least 42 million workers want to be organized into a bargaining unit -- more than double the 16 million unionized workers in America. A 2005 nationwide survey by respected pollster Peter Hart found 53 percent of nonunion workers -- that's more than 50 million people -- want to join a union, if given the choice.

Increasingly, however, workers have no real choice. According to Cornell University experts, 1 in 4 employers illegally fires at least one worker during a union drive, 3 in 4 hire anti-union consultants, and 8 in 10 force workers to attend anti-union meetings. When workers petition the government to enforce laws protecting organizing rights, they are forced to go before the National Labor Relations Board, which is both run by anti-union presidential appointees, and chronically understaffed so as to slow down proceedings. When Democrats have tried to expand workers' union rights by introducing the Employee Free Choice Act, the GOP has prevented a vote on the legislation.

So when GOP lawmakers pledge their commitment to workers at Labor Day celebrations today, remember -- Republicans are waging a war on the very workers they purport to care about.

David Sirota is the author of "Hostile Takeover" (Crown, 2006). He is the co-chair of the Progressive States Network (www.progressivestates.org).

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Hesitancy of some CBS affiliates to air a powerful Sept. 11 documentary next week proves there's been a chilling effect on the First Amendment

Yahoo! News
Some stations want cursing out of '9/11'
By LARRY NEUMEISTER, Associated Press Writer

Broadcasters say the hesitancy of some CBS affiliates to air a powerful Sept. 11 documentary next week proves there's been a chilling effect on the First Amendment since federal regulators boosted penalties for television obscenities after Janet Jackson's breast was exposed at a Super Bowl halftime show.

"This is example No. 1," said Martin Franks, executive vice president of CBS Corp., of the decision by two dozen CBS affiliates to replace or delay "9/11" — which has already aired twice without controversy — over concerns about some of the language used by the firefighters in it.

"We don't think it's appropriate to sanitize the reality of the hell of Sept. 11th," Franks said. "It shows the incredible stress that these heroes were under. To sanitize it in some way robs it of the horror they faced."

Actor Robert De Niro hosts the award-winning documentary, which began as a quest to follow a rookie firefighter on an ordinary day but resulted in the only known video of the first plane striking the World Trade Center and horrific and inspiring scenes of rescue, escape and death. CBS will show it on Sept. 10 from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. EDT, profanity intact.

Carter G. Phillips, a lawyer for Fox Television Stations Inc., cited the decision by several CBS affiliates to replace the documentary or show it after 10 p.m., the time at which the Federal Communications Commission loosens restrictions, when he spoke last week to the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan.

Phillips addressed the court as part of a hearing on whether the FCC rushed to judgment in concluding that "NYPD Blue" and three other programs violated decency rules.

Saying the FCC was chilling free speech rights, Phillips mentioned the documentary to show the court how timid broadcast companies had become since the FCC toughened its position toward profanities after the 2004 Super Bowl halftime show on CBS, in which Jackson's breast was briefly bared.

Congress recently boosted the maximum fines the FCC can impose for indecency from $32,500 to $325,000.

So far, about a dozen CBS affiliates have indicated they won't show the documentary, another dozen say they will delay it until later at night and two dozen others are considering what to do.

On Friday, Sinclair Broadcasting became the latest company to say it was delaying the broadcast until after 10 p.m. on its stations in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, and Portland, Maine, saying it was concerned it could face fines.

The announcement came as the Tupelo, Miss.-based American Family Association readied its 3 million members to flood the FCC and CBS with complaints after the documentary airs.

"This isn't an issue of censorship. It's an issue of responsibility to the public," said Randy Sharp, director of special projects for the group, which describes itself as a 29-year-old organization that promotes the biblical ethic of decency.

The documentary first aired on the six-month and one-year anniversaries of the Sept. 11 attacks on the trade center and the Pentagon. This latest showing, on the eve of the five-year anniversary, includes new interviews with many of the firefighters featured in the original, describing how their lives have changed.

Franks said it was an easy decision not to edit the language in the documentary, especially since it has won a George Foster Peabody Award, among others. "It was a much more difficult decision five years ago when the emotions were much more raw and fresh," he said.

Franks said it seemed "dishonest somehow" for the network to cover up the real language five years later because of the current regulatory environment.

However, he said he understood the difficulties of small stations that fear the huge FCC fines. "We're not twisting arms," he said.

FCC spokeswoman Tamara Lipper said the commission routinely takes context into account in any decency analysis.

"We don't police the airwaves. We respond to viewer complaints," Lipper said. "We haven't seen the broadcast in question. It's up to individual stations to decide what they should air or not air."

She noted that "the historical context of 9/11 is important to the context of the broadcast" but said she could not predict how the commission might view the show if it receives complaints.

Sharp promised on Friday that his organization would flood the FCC with complaints, saying nearly 198,000 people already had told the FCC they want the agency to "enforce the law should CBS decide to break it."

CBS is feeling the heat. "Even if all 206 stations decide between now and the 10th to air the program live, what we have gone through for the past two or three weeks is overwhelming evidence of the chill facing broadcasters," Franks said.

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The Closets of Karl and Ken

Huffington Post
James Moore
The Closets of Karl and Ken

In July of 2004, Karl Rove was concluding a trip to Palm Springs, California and heading off to manage the reelection campaign of George W. Bush. The president's senior political advisor had settled on a strategy that he was convinced would increase turnout of the conservative Republican base as well as appeal to fundamentalist Christians in the African-American community.

Rove and his lieutenant Ken Mehlman, who ran the Republican National Committee, had targeted eleven swing states as locales to play out the wedge issue of gay marriage. Although they would work closely with the GOP state operations, Rove and Mehlman denied any coordination or involvement. They were, as they often are, lying.

Rove had left a secret behind in the Southern California desert that made bizarrely cynical his decision to use gay issues to motivate GOP voters. His father, who had just died, was gay. Louis Rove had been a prolific smoker and died of lung diseases but he had loved his son and was very proud of his achievements. Although he was not Karl's biological father, Louis was the only father he had ever known because Karl's mother Reba had divorced very early in her son's life. In an interview with Wayne Slater and myself after he had guided the first Bush victory, Rove emphasized that he did not consider Louis his stepfather. "I don't call him Louis," he explained. "He's my father, my adopted father."

Nonetheless, Rove was decidedly circumspect when we asked him questions about his family. Louis and Reba Rove's marriage fell apart in 1969 during Karl's senior year of high school in Utah. Rove told us it was somewhat of a mystery but his father came home Christmas Eve and then returned to Los Angeles where he had taken a job as a geologist with Getty Oil. The family was supposed to move to LA with Louis at the end of the year. "But for whatever reason, that didn't happen," Rove told us. "My mother, who was very good at explaining things without explaining them, said it was not going to happen."

Karl seems to have inherited this particular talent from his mother. What he told us was fundamentally true; what he didn't tell us was the most important part of the story. Louis Rove had informed his wife that he was gay and that he was coming out of the closet and wanted a divorce. After he retired from his job in LA, Louis Rove moved to Palm Springs and befriended other retired gay men. He drank and socialized at the Rainbow Cactus and the Martini Burger and became part of a group of gay men who referred to themselves as "The Old Farts Club." According to his close friend of many years, retired insurance executive Joseph Koons, Louis Rove was one of the best people he knew and that both Louis and his son Karl were comfortable with the father's sexual orientation. Although Karl lovingly accepted his father as a gay man and treated Louis' gay associates with respect, Louis Rove's death was a private matter. His friends knew nothing of a memorial service and no death notice was published in the Palm Springs newspaper.

Rove may have felt his father had a right to a private life but he clearly thinks differently about other homosexuals. This fall Rove and the GOP will once more push the idea of a federal amendment to the constitution to outlaw gay marriage, repeating their silly message that it is a threat to the institution of heterosexual marriage. As nonsensical as these assertions are, there appears to be a legion of Republican voters who believe physically mature adults wake up one morning and decide to stop being heterosexual. Their goal is to marry other individuals of the same sex and destroy the fabric of American culture. The idea that sexual orientation is a biological determination is a notion fundamentalist conservatives cannot countenance. Their God would not make such a mistake.

The zealousness with which Rove and Mehlman pursue an anti-gay agenda for political utility suggests more than just an ambition to win elections. Students of Freud might be able to artfully deconstruct their behavior but even lay analysts can see a bit of repression and self-loathing at work. Maybe Rove has a desire to get back at his father for leaving his mother when he "chose" to be gay. Or perhaps he is fighting his own homo-erotic impulses. His description of George Bush the first time they met goes a bit beyond a geek's admiration of the cool guy quarterback:

"I can literally remember what he was wearing: an Air National Guard flight jacket, cowboy boots, complete with the - in Texas you see it a lot - one of the back pockets will have a circle worn in the pocket from where you carry your tin of snuff, your tin of tobacco. He was exuding more charisma than any one individual should be allowed to have."

Karl has always had an eye for detail and that could explain how Bush's early image has moved through Rove's memory for decades.

But what about RNC chairman Ken Mehlman? His sexual orientation has been the subject of speculation by gay rights advocates for several years and has been discussed on progressive radio talk shows. Mainstream reporters have never asked Mehlman if he is gay but Eric Resnick, a journalist for a gay publication in Cleveland, chased Mehlman down at a GOP fund-raising dinner in Akron. Resnick told Mehlman that he had been outed on blogs and talk radio and he wondered how he justified being gay and pushing an anti-gay agenda. Mehlman was non-responsive. Resnick persisted and finally asked Mehlman if he was gay.

"You have asked a question no one should have to answer," Mehlman responded.

The delicately chosen words annoyed Resnick and John Aravosis of Americablog. According to Aravosis, Mehlman, who is in his early 40s and unmarried, gave a "non-answer, answer."

"He's at the top of his profession in a conservative political party," Aravosis told me last year. "If he's not gay, why wouldn't he react the same way every straight guy does when someone asks them if they are gay? They sort of energetically tell you hell no they're not gay. Mehlman says nothing. Seems like he would want everyone in his party to know he's not gay. Maybe he's a closeted heterosexual."

Mehlman subjected himself to such speculation after deploying a voter profiling mechanism for the 2004 election. The RNC used background data on voters such as what type of car they drive, how much they earn, marital status, the color of their skin, the neighborhood where they live, and other factors to arrive at various political conclusions about individuals and determine if they were likely GOP voters. His political critics have decided it is now fair to talk about what type of profile best fits Mehlman.

Whatever he is, Mehlman and his political consort Rove are driving an issues agenda that is making life even more difficult for millions of Americans dealing with their sexuality. They are being discriminated against for the way they were born in the same manner as were African-Americans when their rights were also disputed by conservatives. And that's what turns the personal lives of Karl Rove and Ken Mehlman into public affairs. They promulgate policies that invade the privacy of gay and lesbian Americans while covering up their own backgrounds.

And it is time for their hypocrisy to come out of the closet.

(This information is taken from our new book, "The Architect: Karl Rove and the Master Plan for Absolute Power.")

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Democrats see support for anti-Rumsfeld vote

Reuters
Democrats see support for anti-Rumsfeld vote
By Susan Cornwell

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A resolution demanding the resignation of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld after he compared Iraq war critics to Nazi appeasers has strong support among U.S. Senate Democrats, a senior Democrat said on Sunday.

A resolution against Rumsfeld, long a lightning rod for criticism of the Iraq war, would struggle to be passed by the Republican-controlled Senate and would anyway not be binding on the administration of President George W. Bush.

But Democrats, who have a strong chance to win back control of at least one chamber of Congress in November mid-term elections, will use it to send a message that the administration's policies in Iraq are failing, New York Sen. Charles Schumer said.

"It says that our policies are not going well," Schumer, chairman of the Senate Democrats' campaign committee for the November elections, told Fox News Sunday.

"And the reason is not that we shouldn't fight a strong war on terror, but Rumsfeld's not doing a very good job of it."

Schumer said there was a "a lot of sentiment" among Senate Democrats to push for a resolution, and noted that it was not just Democrats that have called for Rumsfeld to step down -- a Republican candidate for the Senate from New Jersey, Thomas H. Kean Jr., did so on Saturday.

California Democrat Sen. Barbara Boxer has vowed to offer a resolution calling on Bush to name a new defense secretary, saying she was outraged by Rumsfeld's comments that appeared to compare Iraq war critics to appeasers of Nazi Germany.

A similar resolution against the defense secretary is being considered by House Democrats.

Rumsfeld says his remarks in a speech last week were misrepresented. Bush has rejected previous calls for Rumsfeld to quit.

Another senior Democrat, Delaware Sen. Joe Biden, told ABC's "This Week" he would probably support a no-confidence resolution against Rumsfeld.

The administration has begun a new push to bolster sagging public support for the war ahead of the elections, with Bush framing the debate as a choice between staying the course or giving in to terrorists. Republicans argue that Democrats are weak on security issues and would "cut and run" in Iraq.

"I think Secretary Rumsfeld has done an excellent job. He'll be remembered as one of the great secretaries of defense," Senate Majority Whip Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, told CBS's "Face the Nation".

McConnell said Democrats wanted to "wave the white flag" on the Iraq war. He said the Republican-run Senate would dwell on national security issues all through September.

Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean said on "Face the Nation" that "of course" Rumsfeld should resign, adding that it was not smart to attack the majority of Americans who thought the war in Iraq was a mistake.

"Secretary Rumsfeld and Vice President (Dick) Cheney have gone on television saying people who disagree with the president are essentially like Nazi appeasers. When you start attacking voters out of your frustration, that is not a good thing for winning elections," Dean said

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A Legend In His Own Mind

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Islamofacism!

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Donald The Rumsfeld

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How Iraq became the central front in the war on terror

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Last Year, This Year

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Demagoguery Won't Keep Us Safe

Huffington Post
Demagoguery Won't Keep Us Safe
Coleen Rowley

In the past week, Vice President Cheney and Defense Secretary Rumsfeld have both made impassioned appeals to continue the U.S. occupation of Iraq, insisting that any other option means defeat or, worse yet, is an effort to "appease" the terrorists. Cheney insisted that opponents of the occupation are not "serious" about fighting terror, while Rumsfeld accused critics of wanting to "Blame America First".

It didn't take long for Peter Baker and Jim VandeHei of the Washington Post to expose the fact that the only thing Rumsfeld and Cheney are serious about is using the terrorist threat --- again --- to vilify their opponents for political gain:

Bush suggested last week that Democrats are promising voters to block additional money for continuing the war. Vice President Cheney this week said critics "claim retreat from Iraq would satisfy the appetite of the terrorists and get them to leave us alone." And Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, citing passivity toward Nazi Germany before World War II, said that "many have still not learned history's lessons" and "believe that somehow vicious extremists can be appeased."

Pressed to support these allegations, the White House yesterday could cite no major Democrat who has proposed cutting off funds or suggested that withdrawing from Iraq would persuade terrorists to leave Americans alone.

The fact that senior members of the administration are relying so heavily on straw men in their efforts to bolster support for the occupation of Iraq demonstrates just how weak their case is. But Donald Rumsfeld made a particular appeal to "history's lessons" in his speech, and it is worth pointing out a number of historical lessons which the current administration would do well to learn.

1. Bravado is no substitute for policy. As Keith Olbermann so eloquently explained, the real parallel between today's situation and Neville Chamberlain's attempts to appease Hitler is that, like the Bush administration, Chamberlain willfully ignored important facts which contradicted his chosen course. In the absence of a detailed plan for success in Iraq --- and it's abundantly clear more than three years in that there is none --- the Bush position essentially boils down to Chamberlain's: trust that the government knows what it's doing.

For some administrations, this might be a tenable position. However the Bush administration has been consistently proven wrong about every aspect of the 'war on terror', from supposed links between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda to the magnitude of Iraq's weapons stockpiles to the number of troops required for a successful mission to the overall cost of the war. Given their track record alone, their 'stay the course' policy is almost certainly the wrong one. As I've often said on the campaign trail these last 14 months, quoting from the great Albert Einstein, "We cannot solve a problem with the same level of mentality that created it."

2. Military force is ineffective against insurgencies. The U.S., U.S.S.R. and Great Britain were able to defeat the Nazis on the battlefield because the Nazis were on the battlefield. Yet despite the administration's acknowledgement that the terrorist threat is "a different kind of enemy," they still believe terrorism can be defeated militarily.

From the American withdrawal from Vietnam to the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan to the 18-year Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon, history teaches us that military force is an inefficient tool for combating insurgencies. It is even less effective when focused on a single country in an effort to defeat a global enemy like al Qaeda.

3. Our choices are not limited to all-out war or 'appeasement'. The Cold War was 'cold' because we never directly engaged the Soviets in combat. There were proxy wars, to be sure, but there was also a great deal of negotiation, economic pressure, and carrot-and-stick applied to bring about the demise of the Soviet Union. It took nearly fifty years, but in the end we won, and democracy flowered in Eastern Europe in spectacular fashion. This came about not as the result of armed conflict or 'appeasement', but by tough-minded negotiation based on rock-solid intelligence, all backed by a credible threat of force.

4. Violating civil liberties in the name of security is a mistake. Japanese-Americans were forced into internment camps during WWII. Joe McCarthy conducted a witch hunt investigating 'un-American activities'. And Cold War surveillance abuses under Presidents Johnson and Nixon led to near-unanimous approval of the FISA act. All of these efforts purporting to increase security by violating the constitutionally-guaranteed rights of Americans have been rightly regarded by posterity as 'un-American'. There is no question history will render the same verdict on President Bush's illegal and unconstitutional surveillance of innocent Americans.

There is one final lesson of history, not for Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld, but for the American people. The two U.S. presidents who have come closest to 'appeasement' in Iraq are Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush, each of whom turned a blind eye to massacres Saddam Hussein committed against his own people. Bush Senior even failed to lift a finger as Hussein massacred hundreds of thousands of Shi'ites who attempted to depose him at Bush's behest. Rumsfeld was the Reagan administration envoy who negotiated with Hussein, and Dick Cheney was Secretary of Defense under George H.W. Bush.

If Cheney and Rumsfeld had admitted error in their previous dealings with Hussein, they might have more credibility now. But for them, as for George Bush, the top priority is never to admit fault, and never to appear weak. Ironically, the desire to appear strong has dangerously weakened our military and significantly increased the terrorist threat.

Bravado is not a defense against terrorism, and neither is demagoguery. It's time America had leaders who understand that.

Co-written by Coleen Rowley, Candidate for Congress in Minnesota's 2nd District and David Bailey, researcher and writer for the campaign.

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Hizbullah's Worrisome Weapon: Imagine if terrorists got hold of car bombs with wings. Now they can.

Hizbullah's Worrisome Weapon
Imagine if terrorists got hold of car bombs with wings. Now they can.
By Dan Ephron
Newsweek

Sept. 11, 2006 issue - Hizbullah's chief, Hassan Nasrallah, spent the past two years bragging about a remote-control aircraft that could carry an explosive device to strike a target anywhere inside Israel. He finally put that threat into action a few weeks ago, during the Lebanon war, launching three of the pilotless planes toward Israeli targets—including two on the war's last day. They were Iranian-built Ababil unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), capable of carrying an 88-pound warhead for up to 150 miles. The Israelis say Hizbullah received at least 12 UAVs from Iran before the war—meaning that Nasrallah may still have a small arsenal of them hidden away for future use.

How dangerous could terrorist UAVs be? Some analysts doubt that the pilotless planes are a real threat. Ephraim Sneh, a retired Israeli general and a Labor Party member of Parliament, says a UAV's relatively small payload gives only "limited" capacity to inflict damage—although it still packs significantly more explosive power than any of the unguided Katyusha rockets that pounded northern Israel until the fighting stopped. All three UAVs launched by Hizbullah during the 33-day war were shot down by Israeli jets before they could do any harm. It's easy if you know how, says Israel's outgoing chief of military intelligence, Brig. Gen. Yossi Kuperwasser.

Still, many U.S. and Israeli defense experts are worried. What if terrorists crashed a UAV into a petrochemical facility? Or detonated it inside a packed sports stadium? "I suspect they would have loved to hit one of our national symbols," says another Israeli source, asking not to be named discussing sensitive military matters. The vehicles, especially models with sophisticated guidance systems like the Ababil's, can fly close to the ground, making them tough to detect by radar.

The Pentagon saw the risk even before Lebanon erupted. This past January, NEWSWEEK has learned, the U.S. Air Force ordered a classified study of the UAV threat. The Air Force's Scientific Advisory Board is still working on its report, which is expected to suggest ways to disable the planes—possibly by jamming their remote signals—without affecting America's own communications. In laying out the study's "terms of reference," Air Force officials warned that the "total number of UAVs, including those that have the potential to be used against U.S. interests, is proliferating exponentially."

U.S. analysts have particular qualms about the Tehran regime. "If the Iranians supplied UAVs to Hizbullah, there's no reason they couldn't supply similar capability to elements of the insurgency in Iraq," says Roger Cressey, a former counterterrorism official on the National Security Council. A senior Pentagon official, asking not to be named discussing strategic issues, says U.S. troops are equipped to track most tactical objects that become airborne, including at least some of the smaller pilot-less planes. But the terrorists and their weapons keep growing more sophisticated. Tim Owings, the deputy project manager for the U.S. Army's own Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Systems, says his team is giving close attention to the threat. "We're certainly spending more time exploring counter-type activities," he tells NEWSWEEK. Now Nasrallah has made the task more urgent than ever.

With Kevin Peraino in Jerusalem

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14640261/site/newsweek/

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The 'Islamofascists'

The 'Islamofascists'
Bush's new national-security offensive has been plagued by debate over what to call the bad guys.
By Richard Wolffe and Holly Bailey
Newsweek

Sept. 11, 2006 issue - Last fall White House aides were grappling with a seemingly simple question that had eluded them for years: what should the president, in his many speeches on the war on terror, call the enemy? They were searching for a single clean phrase that could both define the foe and reassure Americans who were confused by a conflict that had grown much bigger than Osama bin Laden. But the answer was anything but simple. Some academics preferred the term "Islamism," but the aides thought that sounded too much as if America were fighting the entire religion. Another option: jihadism. But to many Muslims, it's a positive word that doesn't necessarily evoke bloodshed. Some preferred the conservative buzzword "Islamofascism," which was catchy and tied neatly into Bush's historical view of the struggle.

But when national-security adviser Steve Hadley called the CIA, the Pentagon and the State Department, the experts nixed the idea of a single phrase for a war that was so complex. "There was a conscious desire not to use just one definitive word, because there wasn't a perfect word," recalls Michael Gerson, Bush's chief speechwriter at the time (and now a NEWSWEEK contributor). The result was a rhetorical mishmash. "Some call this evil Islamic radicalism," Bush explained, "others, militant jihadism; still others, Islamofascism. Whatever it's called, this ideology is very different from the religion of Islam."

Five years after 9/11, and more than three years after invading Iraq, President Bush is still searching for the perfect phrase to define the enemy in the war on terror—and reassure Americans who will soon head to the polls. Other Republicans—including Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, who is in a tough re-election race—have adopted "Islamofascism" as shorthand for terrorists. The term gained currency in the early '90s in reference to radical Muslim clerics, and was popularized after 9/11 by neocons.

Bush has used the term "Islamic fascists" sporadically, most recently to describe the alleged London bomb plotters last month. But the phrase was noticeably absent from his latest major speech on the war last week—which was part of a procession of campaign-style addresses by the administration's biggest names. This time he called the bad guys "a worldwide network of radicals that use terror to kill those who stand in the way of their totalitarian ideology." It was hardly the kind of pithy slogan GOP activists could slap on a bumper sticker.

With the elections just two months away, the White House is turning once again to a strategy that has worked so well in the past: evoke 9/11, raise the specter of Al Qaeda and accuse the Democrats of fatal weakness in the face of the enemy. But 2006 is not 2004, when the administration found it easier to tie bin Laden's loyalists in with the insurgents in Iraq. One of Bush's strengths has been his ability to make the complex seem simple. But the war on terror's many fronts—British airline plots, Lebanese militias, Iranian nukes, brewing civil war in Iraq—defy any simple political packaging. (Some foreign-policy analysts question whether Bush may be unwittingly helping the jihadists by lumping together disparate groups, instead of exploiting the differences between Sunnis and Shiites, Arabs and non-Arabs.)

Voters—including many Republicans—are openly doubting the president's ability to make the country more secure.

Voters—including many Republicans—are openly doubting the president's ability to make the country more secure. Polls show that voters narrowly side with Republicans on terrorism, but they now prefer Democrats on Iraq. The White House believes the numbers are driven by the continuing bloodshed (the latest Pentagon report shows a 50 percent increase in Iraqi casualties this summer, citing a rise in sectarian violence and a still-powerful Sunni insurgency). For an administration that has built its entire political strategy around simplifying the complexities of national security, the widening war—and the softening ground at home—are sources of great frustration. "It can be hard to really explain who we are fighting and what we are up against in a way that isn't confusing," said one senior Bush aide, who declined to be named while speaking about strategy.

The uncertainty over how best to sell the war may help explain last week's speeches by the administration's biggest guns—Dick Cheney, Don Rumsfeld, Condi Rice. The media played them as a concerted effort to put Democrats on the defensive and win back the trust of disillusioned Republicans. But the speeches also underscored something else: how disjointed the once disciplined administration has become when talking about the war. Cheney, usually the most aggressive member of Team Bush, was notably less strident about the war's critics; his assertion that they suffer from "self-defeating pessimism" was a step back from earlier complaints that they had lost "their memory, or their backbone." Bush described the doubters as "sincere" and "patriotic"—but wrong. But Rumsfeld apparently didn't get the memo. In one of his more extreme rhetorical forays, the Defense secretary likened critics of the war to the appeasers of Nazi Germany in prewar Europe. Rice, meanwhile, chose an altogether different historical analogy. The fight against terrorists, she suggested, was akin to the long struggle of the cold war.

GOP strategists are working to get their own message under control, and to unify a disparate party. According to one internal party memo, Bush's position on national security is the best way to motivate Republicans to go to the polls in November. Longtime pollster Fred Steeper, a former adviser to Bush 41, wrote that "large majorities" supported Bush's commitment to defeating terrorists in Iraq and around the world.

Any sign of disarray was out of sight as Bush landed in Utah, one of the reddest states in the Union, last week. A hastily arranged crowd of more than 3,000 supporters gathered late on Wednesday to greet him at Salt Lake City airport. Bush bounded off his plane to the soundtrack of the movie "Air Force One" as rock-concert lights spun and twirled in the night sky. "You're the man, George!" screamed one fan. The president might not know what to call the enemy, but he knows where to find his friends.

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14640535/site/newsweek/

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Iraq, US at odds over military handover

Reuters
Iraq, US at odds over military handover
By Ross Colvin

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - The United States and Iraq were at odds on Saturday over the transfer of operational control of Iraq's military to Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's government, forcing a delay of a handover ceremony.

Saturday's ceremony to transfer control of Iraq's army from U.S. commander General George Casey to the Iraqi Defense Ministry had been hailed by U.S. officials as a big step toward Iraq taking responsibility for security.

"There is a disagreement on the wording of the document that outlines the new relationship between Coalition Forces and Iraqis," U.S. military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Barry Johnson told Reuters late on Saturday evening.

"It is embarrassing, but it was decided it was better not to sign the document," he said, adding that objections to the wording had been raised by Maliki's government.

The U.S. military, suffering almost daily casualties, has been training Iraq's fledgling military so that it can gradually extract itself from Iraq's increasingly sectarian violence more than three years after the 2003 invasion.

"They are not going to go ahead with the document until the language is agreed upon. It's not a matter of major substance, but they're not happy with the wording of the document," Johnson said, adding that it would be signed "in a matter of days".

Maliki, keen to be seen as ending his government's dependency on U.S. military power, said this week his forces would take control of most of Iraq from foreign troops by the end of the year. But some analysts have questioned this timetable given the surge in sectarian bloodletting.

Fourteen Pakistani and Indian Shi'ite pilgrims were abducted and killed in Iraq's western desert, police said on Saturday, victims of sectarian strife between Sunnis and Shi'ites that threatens civil war.

In his weekly radio address, U.S. President George. W Bush told Americans that Iraq was not in civil war, despite a bloody week in which hundreds more died and a grim Pentagon report said spreading violence may turn into just such an all-out conflict.

"Our commanders and diplomats on the ground believe that Iraq has not descended into a civil war," Bush said. "They report that only a small number of Iraqis are engaged in sectarian violence, while the overwhelming majority want peace and a normal life in a unified country."

PM MEETS SISTANI

The top Shi'ite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, issued a new call for restraint after meeting Shi'ite Islamist Maliki in the holy city of Najaf and warned the government to act quickly to avoid disaster.

The slain pilgrims, 11 Pakistanis and three Indians, had been traveling to holy Shi'ite sites in Iraq on Thursday when they were attacked in Anbar province, the desert heartland of the Sunni insurgency, Iraqi and Indian officials said.

An official at the al-Hussein hospital in the Shi'ite holy city of Kerbala, where the bodies were taken on Friday, said the 14 men had their hands bound and had been shot in the head. Some had been tortured and one was partially decapitated.

An attack on a revered Shi'ite shrine in February has unleashed bloodletting between majority Shi'ites and minority Sunni Muslims who were politically dominant under Saddam Hussein and now form the backbone of the three-year-old insurgency.

"If the state is unable to ensure security for the people then this will open the way for some groups to do this and this would be very risky," Sistani said in a statement, referring to militias blamed for violence and which Maliki vows to disband.

But the reclusive Sistani's restraining hand on Shi'ites has been weakened since the February attack as Shi'ite death squads have become prime movers in what the Pentagon called the "core conflict" -- no longer the insurgency but sectarian bloodshed.

Indian junior Foreign Minister E. Ahamed told Reuters the 14 pilgrims killed on Thursday were among 40 people who had entered Iraq after touring holy sites in Jordan and Syria.

Ahamed said gunmen had stopped the convoy and separated the men from the women in the party, which comprised 14 Indians and 26 Pakistanis. Police found the bodies of the men in neighboring Kerbala province the following day, he said.

Assessing the situation in Iraq over the past three months, a 63-page Pentagon report said on Friday attacks rose by 24 percent, Iraqi casualties soared by 51 percent and the violence was extending north beyond Baghdad. Partial Iraqi data indicated a dip of about a quarter in civilian deaths in August, however.

(Additional reporting by Robert Birsel in Islamabad, Patricia Wilson in Washington, N. Ananthanarayanan in New Delhi and Alastair Macdonald, Ibon Villelabeitia, and Mussab Al-Khairalla in Baghdad)

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Agency wants FAA execs disciplined over 9/11

Reuters
Agency wants FAA execs disciplined over 9/11: NYT

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The U.S. Transportation Department's inspector general has urged the FAA to consider disciplining two executives who failed to correct false information provided to the commission that investigated the September 11 attacks, the New York Times reported on Saturday.

Citing the report by the acting inspector general, Todd Zinser, whose office acts as the department's internal watchdog, the Times said the Federal Aviation Administration executives, as well as a third, now-retired official, learned after the fact that false information was given to the commission in May 2003 about the FAA's contacts with the Air Force on the morning of the attacks.

That information suggested that the FAA had made contact with its Air Force liaison immediately after the first of the four hijacked planes struck the World Trade Center in New York, the Times said.

But the commission's investigators found that the liaison did not join a conference call with the FAA until after the third plane crashed nearly an hour later.

The time gap is considered significant because it helps undermine an initial claim by the North American Aerospace Defense Command, which is responsible for domestic air defense, that it moved quickly and had a chance to shoot down the last of the hijacked planes still in the air, United Airlines Flight 93, the Times said.

Now the inspector general's report, compiled to address complaints from the independent September 11 commission, has found that the three FAA executives failed to act on an "obligation" to correct the false information given to the commission.

The FAA declined to identify the executives and their names and titles were not disclosed in the inspector general's report, the Times said. The agency also did not say whether it was considering disciplinary action. There was no evidence that the executives provided false information knowingly, the inspector general's office found.

The FAA said the "inspector general's investigation has clarified the record and found no evidence that FAA officials knowingly made false statements," the Times said.

The Pentagon's inspector general said in a similar finding last month concerning military officers who provided inaccurate testimony to the commission that their inaccuracies could be mainly attributed to poor record-keeping.

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