Free Internet Press Newsletter - Sunday May 13 2007 - (813)

Sunday May 13 2007 edition
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U.S. Attempts To Weaken G-8 Climate Change Statement 2007-05-13 02:23:40 Negotiators from the United States are trying to weaken the language of a climate change declaration set to be unveiled at next month's G-8 summit of the world's leading industrial powers, according to documents obtained Saturday by the Washington Post. A draft proposal dated April 2007 that is being debated in Bonn, Germany, this weekend by senior officials of the Group of Eight includes a pledge to limit the global temperature rise this century to 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit, as well as an agreement to reduce worldwide greenhouse gas emissions to 50 percent below 1990 levels by 2050. The United States is seeking to strike that section, the documents show. Many scientists have warned that an increase of more than 3.6 degrees this century could trigger disastrous consequences such as mass extinction of species and accelerated melting of polar ice sheets, which would raise sea levels. Read The Full Story For Giuliani, 9/11 Turned To Riches 2007-05-13 02:23:00 On Dec. 7, 2001, nearly three months after the terrorist attack that had made him a national hero and a little over three weeks before he would leave office, New York Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani took the first official step toward making himself rich. The letter he dispatched to the city Conflicts of Interest Board that day asked permission to begin forming a consulting firm with three members of his outgoing administration. The company, said Giuliani, would provide "management consulting service to governments and business" and would seek out partners for a "wide-range of possible business, management and financial services" projects. Over the next five years, Giuliani Partners earned more than $100 million, according to a knowledgeable source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the firm's financial information is private. And that success helped transform the Republican considered the front-runner for his party's 2008 presidential nomination from a moderately well-off public servant into a globe-trotting consultant whose net worth is estimated to be in the tens of millions of dollars. Read The Full Story Crews Still Battling Santa Catalina Blaze 2007-05-13 02:22:09 Cooler weather aided firefighters Saturday as they battled to surround a 4,200-acre wildfire in the rugged, unpopulated interior of Santa Catalina Island while a nearby resort town, no longer threatened, returned to life. The fire was about two-thirds contained and was expected to be encircled by Tuesday evening, said Los Angeles County Fire Capt. Andrew Olvera. One home and six businesses burned Thursday but no one had been seriously injured. Nearly 4,000 evacuated residents had started returning to the island, where damage was estimated at $2.1 million. Read The Full Story 'More Troops' Call As Iraq Murders Soar 2007-05-12 21:16:28 The U.S. military surge in Iraq, designed to turn around the course of the war, appears to be failing as senior U.S.  officers admit they need yet more troops and new figures show a sharp increase in the victims of death squads in Baghdad. In the first 11 days of this month, there have already been 234 bodies - men murdered by death squads - dumped around the capital, a dramatic rise from the 137 found in the same period of April. Improving security in Baghdad and reducing death-squad activity was described as one of the key aims of the U.S. surge of 25,000 additional troops, the final units of whom are due to arrive next month. In a further setback, the U.S. military announced Saturday the loss of an entire patrol south of Baghdad, with five soldiers dead and three others missing, after they were ambushed by insurgents in the town of Mahmoudiya. Read The Full Story Cannabis Cash 'Funds Islamist Terrorism' 2007-05-12 21:15:47 Cannabis smokers are unwittingly funding Islamist extremists linked to terror attacks in Spain, Morocco and Algeria, according to a joint investigation by the Spanish and French secret services. The finding will be seized on both by campaigners for a harsher clampdown on cannabis and by those who argue that legalization is the only way to end a petty dealing trend that is dragging growing numbers of teenagers into crime. The investigation by the Centro Nacional de Inteligencia and the Renseignements Generaux was launched after Spanish police found that the Islamists behind the March 2004 bombings in Madrid bought their explosives from former miners in return for blocks of hashish. The bombings claimed 191 lives. Spain's role as a transit point for drugs was highlighted last week when Madrid hosted the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency's annual conference. Experts heard not only that North African hashish was funding terrorism in Europe, but also that West Africa had become a new hub for South American cocaine shipments bound for Europe. Read The Full Story 3 U.S. Soldiers Missing, At Least 5 Dead As Patrol Attacked Near Baghdad 2007-05-12 15:38:50 As many as five U.S. soldiers were killed in action and three are missing after a pre-dawn attack south of Baghdad Saturday, the U.S. military said. "Coalition Forces are currently using every means at our disposal to find the missing Soldiers, and we will continue these efforts until all are accounted for," Maj. Gen William B. Caldwell IV, the military's top spokesman in Iraq, said in an e-mailed statement. "Our thoughts and prayers go out to the families of those killed in this attack and for the missing soldiers and their loved ones back home." The team, comprised of seven U.S. soldiers and their Iraqi Army interpreter, was attacked at 4:44 a.m, 12 miles west of the southern town of Mahmudiyah, said Caldwell. It was unclear whether the interpreter was a soldier or a civilian, said Lt. Col. Christopher Garver, a military spokesman. Nor was it clear whether he was among those killed or missing, Garver added. Read The Full Story Chinese Hospital Staff Face Attacks Amid High Prices, Dubious Care 2007-05-12 15:38:15 China unveiled plans Friday to deploy police in hospital wards and outpatient clinics to protect medical staff from the public, amid growing instances of physical violence meted out by patients furious at charges and dubious treatment. The government is concerned about increased attacks on doctors, nurses and administrative staff as the healthcare system becomes the focus of resentment about the gap between rich and poor. According to the China Daily, 5,500 medical workers were injured last year in assaults and protests, causing more than 200 million yuan (£13 million or $26 million) damage. Read The Full Story 27 Killed In Pakistan Political Violence 2007-05-12 15:37:45 Government supporters and opponents turned neighborhoods of Pakistan's largest city into battlegrounds Saturday, leaving at least 27 people dead in the worst political violence since President Gen. Pervez Musharraf suspended the chief justice. The justice, Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry, flew to Karachi to attend a rally organized by his supporters but never made it out of the airport. He abandoned his plans in the face of street battles across the sprawling city. Gunmen with assault rifles traded fire in a residential area of bungalows and concrete apartment blocks just a half-mile from the international airport, where nearby streets were blocked by shipping containers and immobilized trucks and gunfire left several activists lying in pools of their own blood. A private TV network came under attack as well, but stayed on the air as rioters torched vehicles outside. Chaudhry took an evening flight back to the capital and it was unclear whether the rally at Karachi's high court would proceed. Read The Full Story Changes at Free Internet Press 2007-05-12 14:15:53   We've recently made some improvements to Free Internet Press.     The biggest changes have come in the "User Options" area.  You can now: Retrieve lost passwords Change your newsletter options Change your name/alias on file Change your address (for newsletters and lost password retrevial) Make donations    We've implemented a new subscription system.  Free Internet Press is far from being a "pay" site, but your donations help us keep running.  If you've donated from your account, all advertisements  go away.  We've also put up what I hope will be a not-so-intrusive reminder to make a donation.  It is only shown  on every 10th story viewed.   By donating, you'll help us expand Free Internet Press!  We're hoping these changes will allow us to hire more staff writers, and make more technical changes to the site.  In the end, you! r $3/month donation will get you more and better news quicker.  As many people have commented to us over the years, we've been doing a great job of getting the important news out, frequently faster than most "mainstream" media organizations, if they're even willing to cover it.   "Archived" stories will only show the beginning of the story.  An archived story is any story which was posted more than 60 day ago.    We've moved the comments up to the right side of the story, so they'll be more visible.  Feel free to write how you feel about the story.  Not only does it let us know how you feel about what's happening, but governments and other groups from around the world read the news here frequently, so you're getting your opinion out to a huge and influential group.  Reading recent stories and comments will remain free. You must sign up for an account to post comments.  These accounts are free, and only requi! re an email address.  We've noticed many people use "disposable" addresses, which is fine with us.   The important part of running this site is that we're getting the news out!   We will never lease, loan, sell, or give away any private information provided in the user registrations.  We've added a privacy policy to the bottom of every page, which outlines this.    We sincerely appreciate our readers, and everyone who's donated time, money, and materials to our cause.  We hope that we've met your goals.    Any comments, complaints and/or suggestions may be sent to Intellpuke and myself at editor@freeinternetpress.com   JW Smythe   Editor/Publisher   Free Internet Press Read The Full Story U.S. Study: Billions In Iraqi Oil Missing 2007-05-12 03:05:34 Between 100,000 and 300,000 barrels a day of Iraq's declared oil production over the past four years is unaccounted for and could have been siphoned off through corruption or smuggling, according to a draft American government report. Using an average of $50 a barrel, the report said the discrepancy was valued at $5 million to $15 million daily. The report does not give a final conclusion on what happened to the missing fraction of the roughly two million barrels pumped by Iraq each day, but the findings are sure to reinforce longstanding suspicions that smugglers, insurgents and corrupt officials control significant parts of the country’s oil industry. The report also covered alternative explanations for the billions of dollars worth of discrepancies, including the possibility that Iraq has been consistently overstating its oil production. Read The Full Story Colleagues Cite Partisan Focus By Goodling 2007-05-12 03:03:54 Two years ago, Robin C. Ashton, a seasoned criminal prosecutor at the Department of Justice, learned from her boss that a promised promotion was no longer hers. “You have a Monica problem,” Ms. Ashton was told, according to several Justice Department officials. Referring to Monica M. Goodling, a 31-year-old, relatively inexperienced lawyer who had only recently arrived in the office, the boss added, “She believes you’re a Democrat and doesn’t feel you can be trusted.” Ashton’s ouster - she left the Executive Office for United States Attorneys for another Justice Department post two weeks later - was a critical early step in a plan that would later culminate in the ouster of nine United States attorneys last year. Goodling would soon be quizzing applicants for civil service jobs at Justice Department headquarters with questions that several United States attorneys said were inappropriate, like who was their favorite president and Supreme Court justice. One department official said an applicant was even asked, “Have you ever cheated on your wife?” Read The Full Story U.S. Won't Limit Detainees Visits With Attorneys 2007-05-12 03:02:06 The Justice Department Friday withdrew one of its proposals to tighten restrictions on lawyers representing detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba,but said it would continue to press a federal appeals court for other limitations on the lawyers. In a court filing Friday morning, department lawyers said they were no longer asking the appeals court in Washington to limit the lawyers to three visits with detainees at the Guantanamo naval base, where about 380 men are now held. A series of department proposals to curtail detainees’ lawyers drew wide attention and was criticized by legal groups and in Congress, with opponents saying the Bush administration was denying detainees the most rudimentary tools to challenge their confinement. Read The Full Story The Cold War's Cancerous Legacy 2007-05-12 02:59:38 Walter McKenzie's assignment toward the end of the Cold War was to mop up after mishaps at a nuclear weapons factory. With a crew of other laborers from rural Georgia, he swabbed away leaks and spills inside the secret buildings, until one day his body became so contaminated with radiation that alarms at the factory went off as he passed. "They couldn't scrub the radiation off my skin - even after four showers," McKenzie, 52, recalled of his most terrifying day at the Savannah River nuclear weapons plant near Aiken, South Carolina. "They took my clothes, my watch and even my ring, and sent me home in rubber slippers and a jumpsuit." Later, when doctors discovered the first of 19 malignant tumors on his bladder, McKenzie followed the same torturous path as thousands of nuclear weapons workers with cancer: He filed a claim for federal compensation. It was denied. Unable to access secret government files, or even some of his own personnel records, McKenzie could not sufficiently prove that he was exposed to something that may have made him sick. Nor can most of the 104,000 other workers, retirees and family members who have sought help from a federal program intended to atone for decades of hazardous working conditions at scores of nuclear weapons facilities around the country. Read The Full Story U.S. Army Tries Incentives To Keep Officers 2007-05-12 02:57:46 The Army will offer incentives to keep midlevel officers as it faces another decade or so in combat around the world, its chief of staff said Friday. Gen. George Casey, who took over as the Army's chief just a month ago, said the United States will "be in a period of conflict for, I believe, another five or ten years." And the Army, which has been stretched and stressed by five difficult years at war, must be organized and equipped to deal with that challenge, he said. The general said he is not suggesting that the Iraq or Afghanistan wars will last five more years. But Casey, who was the top commander in Iraq until February, acknowledged that building a stable, self-governing Iraq is a "long-term proposition." "We have been attacked and are at war with an insidious group of transnational terrorists who are attacking our way of life, and are going to continue to attack our way of life until we beat them, because I don't see them giving up," he said. Read The Full Story	Army Career Behind Him, Gen. Batiste Speaks Out On Iraq 2007-05-13 02:23:23 John Batiste has traveled a long way in the last four years, from commanding the First Infantry Division in Iraq to quitting the Army after three decades in uniform and, now, from his new life overseeing a steel factory here, to openly challenging President Bush on his management of the war. “Mr. President, you did not listen,” General Batiste says in new television advertisements being broadcast in Republican Congressional districts as part of a $500,000 campaign financed by VoteVets.org. “You continue to pursue a failed strategy that is breaking our great Army and Marine Corps. I left the Army in protest in order to speak out. Mr. President, you have placed our nation in peril. Our only hope is that Congress will act now to protect our fighting men and women.” Those are powerful, inflammatory words from General Batiste, a retired major general who spent 31 years in the Army, a profession sworn to unflinching loyalty to civilian control of the military. Many senior officers say privately that talk like this makes them uncomfortable; when you pin that first star on your shoulder, they say, your first name becomes “General” for the rest of your life. Read The Full Story Report: Taliban's Top Operational Commander Killed 2007-05-13 02:22:36 The Taliban's top operational commander, Mullah Dadullah, has been killed in a clash in southern Afghanistan,  security officials said on Sunday. "Mullah Dadullah has been killed and his body is in Kandahar," said Saeed Ansari, spokesman for the intelligence department. "Yes, he was killed last night and right now I have his body before me," Kandahar's governor Assadullah Khalid told Reuters by phone. He said Dadullah was killed in neighboring Helmand province. Read The Full Story Katrina Victims Files Rash Of Lawsuits 2007-05-13 02:21:43 Ever since the floodwaters receded, the idea that the U.S. government was to blame for the Katrina catastrophe has possessed and angered its victims. A legion of lawn signs, posted in front of many wrecked homes, wagged a finger at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the federal agency responsible for the flood works: "Hold the Corps accountable!" Turns out it was more than mere talk. After a massive deadline filing rush recently that is still being sorted through, the United States is facing legal claims from more than 250,000 people here demanding compensation because, they allege, the Corps negligently designed the waterworks that permeate the city. Read The Full Story The Madam, Her Girls And A City In Fear 2007-05-12 21:16:12 Deborah Jeane Palfrey first knew something was wrong on a trip to Germany. She suddenly found her bank card was not working any more. Then, back in her hotel room, a journalist from a gossip website called her. He had been leaked a court document detailing Palfrey's alleged sex empire in Washington, D.C., serving the rich and powerful with a ring of beautiful, university-educated call girls. Her assets had been seized by the government. As Palfrey struggled to understand what was happening, the journalist wanted to know if she was ashamed of herself. The "D.C. Madam" scandal had just been born. It is a story that has gripped Washington's usually staid political classes. Palfrey stands accused of running a prostitution ring for more than 13 years. It is a charge she denies, maintaining her girls dealt out only massages and erotic role-play. She made them all sign agreements not to engage in illegal behavior. Palfrey has vowed to identify the men who used her services to prove her story, and she has years of phone records to help her. All across the Washington area there are now thousands of nervous, powerful - often married - men. Read The Full Story Merkel's Modest Rise To Summit 2007-05-12 21:15:22 Until recently Angela Merkel was viewed as the naive and colourless newcomer on the international stage. She was the inexperienced leader of whom nobody expected much. Now she is preparing to make her mark on history. As she gears up to host the G8 summit of industrial leaders in Heiligendamm next month, she does so fully aware that it is her chance to establish herself as the world's most respected and powerful stateswoman. As current president of the European Union, Merkel, 53, a former physicist from east Germany, has already won praise for her no-nonsense way of doing business - she even takes it on herself to rearrange the seating at meetings if leaders are not seeing eye to eye; and, if she is brought fizzy water when she had asked for still, stirs the bubbles out with her pen rather than make a fuss. Read The Full Story Russia, Central Asia Agree On Caspian Pipeline 2007-05-12 15:38:37 Russia announced a deal Saturday to dramatically increase the amount of natural gas it moves from Central Asia to Europe, a key victory in a growing rivalry with the West for the region's vast energy resources. Russian President Vladimir Putin and the leaders of the region's main energy producers, Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan, agreed to build a pipeline running from Turkmenistan through Kazakhstan and into Russia's network of pipelines to Europe. The three presidents also said that, with Uzbekistan, they would revamp the entire Soviet-built pipeline network that carries Central Asian gas to Russia. Along with two oil deals, the new gas agreements are a blow to U.S. and European efforts to construct oil and gas pipelines from Central Asia that would cross under the Caspian Sea, avoiding Russia, and connect to Europe through Azerbaijan and Turkey. Read The Full Story Cheney Pointedly Warns Iran On Sea Lanes 2007-05-12 15:37:58 Aboard an aircraft carrier in the Persian Gulf 150 miles off Iran's coast, Vice President Dick Cheney warned  Teharan Friday that the United States and its allies will not allow Iran to acquire nuclear weapons, close off vital sea lanes for oil supplies, or control the Middle East. Cheney issued the blunt warning during his Middle East tour, and just two days before Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad makes his own trip to the Gulf. The two visits reflect the growing rivalry between Washington and Tehran for influence in the region. "Throughout the region our country has interests to protect and commitments to honor," Cheney told Navy staff aboard the USS John C. Stennis. "With two carrier strike groups in the Gulf, we're sending clear messages to friends and adversaries alike. We'll keep the sea lanes open. We'll stand with our friends in opposing extremism and strategic threats. We'll disrupt attacks on our own forces. We'll continue bringing relief to those who suffer and delivering justice to the enemies of freedom." Read The Full Story Untouchables Win Surprise Landslide In Indian Election 2007-05-12 15:37:24 India's most prominent untouchable leader, a former Delhi school teacher, Friday pulled off a surprise landslide election victory in the country's most populous state - stalling the political ambitions of the Gandhi family's heir apparent. Mayawati, who only uses a single name, leads the Bahujan Samaj party which looks set to sweep the polls in Uttar Pradesh, a northern Indian state of 170 million people and the country's most important bellweather of public opinion. Uttar Pradesh is a dirt-poor rural backwater that would be the world's sixth most populous state if it were a nation. Less than half the women in the state can read or write. It has also produced most of India's prime ministers. Mayawati looks able to form a majority without the help of any other party in the state's 403-seat house. She has been chief minister of the state three times, but each was a short stint where her party was a junior partner in a coalition. Read The Full Story Coast Guard Hunts For Rhode Island Crew 2007-05-12 14:15:40 Coast Guard rescue crews searched thousands of square miles off the coast of North Carolina yesterday for four missing sailors from Rhode Island, whose 54-foot sailboat disappeared early Monday during a storm that swept through the area. The crew of the Flying Colours -- Patrick Topping, 39; Jason Franks, 34; Christine Grinavic, 26; and Rhiannon Borisoff, 22 -- were hired by its owner to sail the boat from its winter port in St. Thomas, the US Virgin Islands, to Annapolis, Md. Coast officials could not say where in Rhode Island they are from nor identify the owner of the boat. Coast Guard air and sea crews began searching for the Flying Colours after 3:30 a.m., when officials at the Rescue Coordination Center in Portsmouth, Va., received an alert from the boat's emergency radio beacon. They lost contact with the beacon at 7 a.m. Monday, about 160 miles southeast of Cape Lookout, N.C. The ship was supposed to arrive in Annapolis yesterday or Tuesday, but by last night, officials had not made contact with the crew or found any debris. The Coast Guard described the boat as having a blue hull, with either a green or light blue keel, a white topside with teak decks, and lots of stainless steel. Read The Full Story U.S. General Asks For More Troops For Northern Iraq 2007-05-12 03:04:54 The commander of U.S. forces in northern Iraq said Friday that he did not have enough troops to bring stability, sharpening the debate in America about the effectiveness of George Bush's war plan. Major General Benjamin Mixon told a video press conference that his region was a haven for militants fleeing a crackdown by U.S. forces in Baghdad, and that the local Iraqi authorities were virtually non-functioning. "I am going to need additional forces in Diyala province to get the situation there to an acceptable level," he said. There are 3,500 troops in the region. The appeal comes amid multiplying signs of disillusion in America over President Bush's plan to take control of the situation with an infusion of 30,000 extra troops. On Thursday Congress voted to fund the war only until mid-July, at which point it would look at a progress report. Bush said he would veto the measure. Read The Full Story Car Bombings Kill 23 At Baghadad Bridges 2007-05-12 03:03:08 Twin suicide car bombers struck police checkpoints at bridges in a predominantly Shiite area of Baghdad on Friday, killing at least 23 people just hours after a series of U.S. raids on car bomb networks around the capital killed four suspected insurgents. The blasts underscored the difficulty U.S.-led forces were having in destroying the presumably Sunni insurgent cells that have stepped up car bombings in the capital since the U.S. began its security crackdown 12 weeks ago. "They have actually pushed back," U.S. spokesman Lt. Col. Christopher Garver said, referring to the insurgents. "We've been saying this all along, the enemy is determined." In a sign of that determination, the top U.S. commander in northern Iraq said he doesn't have enough troops to crush al-Qaida-led insurgents in Diyala, a province northeast of Baghdad and scene of recent sharp fighting. Read The Full Story Venezuelan Oil Losing Share Of Key U.S. Market 2007-05-12 03:00:44 When the state oil company recently took over the last privately run oil fields in Venezuela, President Hugo Chavez declared it a victory against Washington and a giant leap toward a new energy policy that would diversify the market for Venezuelan crude to include rising powers like China. "Down with the American Empire!" shouted Chavez, who often warns that he'll shut off the oil spigot to the United States if the Bush administration invades Venezuela or hatches an assassination plot against him. But new study of trade and oil consumption data shows that Venezuela appears ever more dependent on selling its oil to the country Chavez calls "the cruelest, most terrible, most cynical, most murderous empire that has existed." And U.S. government energy trade data show the United States is slightly less dependent on Venezuela, which at one time challenged Canada, Mexico and Saudi Arabia as the No. 1 provider of foreign oil but now tussles with up-and-coming Nigeria for the fourth spot. Read The Full Story Gloomy Greenspan Warns Of U.S. Economic Recession 2007-05-12 02:58:58 Further gloom gathered over the U.S. economy Friday as retail sales lurched lower while former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan issued a fresh warning that the world's largest economy could be heading for recession. New figures showed retail sales in the U.S. unexpectedly tumbled last month, hit by a double whammy of higher petrol (gasoline) prices and a crumbling housing market. Retail sales are being closely watched since U.S. consumers have helped keep the world economy afloat in recent years, borrowing against the rising value of their houses to finance spending. Retail sales fell 0.2% in April from March, according to the U.S. Commerce Department, against expectations of a 0.4% rise. They follow weak gross domestic product growth figures for the first quarter and poor employment, or non-farm payroll, numbers for April which showed the slowest growth for more than two years. Read The Full Story
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