Free Internet Press Newsletter - Saturday July 21 2007 - (813)

Saturday July 21 2007 edition
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Federal Court Orders Government To Turn Over Files On Detainees 2007-07-21 02:19:09 A federal appeals court yesterday ordered the government to turn over virtually all its information on Guantanamo  detainees who are challenging their detention, rejecting an effort by the Justice Department to limit disclosures and setting the stage for new legal battles over its justification for holding the men indefinitely. The ruling, which came in one of the main court cases dealing with the fate of the detainees, effectively set the ground rules for scores of cases by detainees challenging the actions of Pentagon tribunals that decide whether terror suspects should be held as enemy combatants. A three-judge panel of the federal appeals court in Washington, D.C., unanimously rejected a government effort to limit the information it must turn over to the court and to lawyers for detainees. Read The Full Story Wildfire Burns Campground, Motel In Utah 2007-07-21 02:18:43 A wildfire that may have been started by sparks from a flat tire raced across thousands of acres toward a small town Friday, a day after burning through a campground and motel and forcing rescues. With a highly skilled team on its way from Florida, 150 area firefighters were battling the 24-square-mile fire against a backdrop of extraordinary heat and drought, with no immediate relief predicted. "It only takes a cigarette or a match and this stuff will explode," said Fred Burns, owner of Burns Brothers Ranch RV Resort in Fountain Green, which was nearby but not affected. The fire was burning toward the tiny community of Indianola, and residents in at least two dozen homes were advised to be ready to leave. Read The Full Story British Army Chief: We're Running Out Of Troops 2007-07-21 02:18:11 The head of the British Army has warned that Britain is almost running out of troops to defend the country or fight in military operations abroad. The warning by General Sir Richard Dannatt, chief of the general staff, to fellow defense chiefs comes at a time when the army is asking for a big increase in reservists to be deployed in Afghanistan, reflecting a crisis in Britain's armed forces. In a secret memorandum he says: "We now have almost no capability to react to the unexpected." Reinforcements for emergencies or for operations in Iraq or Afghanistan are "now almost non-existent". He adds: "The enduring nature and scale of current operations continues to stretch people". Gen. Dannatt warns the army had to "augment" 2,500 troops from other units for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan to bring up the total force to the 13,000 needed there. This remained "far higher than we ever assumed", he says. Read The Full Story Jordan's King Abdallah To Discuss Middle East With Bush On Tuesday 2007-07-21 02:17:21 Jordan’s King Abdallah is to meet with U.S. President George W. Bush in Washington on Tuesday for talks on latest moves aimed at relaunching the Arab-Israeli peace talks, the Jordanian royal court announced Friday. “The discussions will tackle the Middle East peace process and the US and international efforts aimed at creating an independent Palestinian state,” a court statement said. “The talks will also focus on means for building up on the U.S. president’s call on Monday for convening an international peace conference for spurring the peace talks between the Palestinians and Israelis,” it added. The king has welcomed Bush’s proposal, describing it “a positive step in the right direction.” Abdallah’s new visit to Washington will coincide with a trip to Israel by the Jordanian Foreign Minister Abdul Ilah Khatib and his Egyptian counterpart, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, as emissaries of the Arab League to relay to the Israeli government the text of the Arab peace initiative. According to the Jordanian ambassador to Israel, Ali Al-Ayed, Khatib and Aboul Gheit will meet with the Israeli President Shimon Peres, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and other Cabinet ministers and parliamentary leaders. Read The Full Story Bush To Have Colonoscopy, Briefly Hand Power To Cheney 2007-07-21 02:16:24 Vice President Cheney acting basis Saturday when President Bush undergoes general anesthesia for a routine colon examination, the White House said Friday. Bush will transfer powers under the 25th Amendment, which permits the president to voluntarily hand over authority when he is unable to perform his duties. The White House said Cheney will probably be in charge for about 2 1/2 hours while Bush recovers from the effects of the sedative. This will be the second time Cheney has become acting president, and under almost identical circumstances to the first. Bush underwent sedation for a colonoscopy on June 29, 2002, and Cheney was the commander in chief for two hours and 15 minutes. That test found no signs of cancer and doctors said then that Bush would need another test in five years. A spokesman said Bush has experienced no symptoms. Read The Full Story Commentary: Go To Iraq And Fight, Mr. President 2007-07-20 16:00:56 Intellpuke: The following commentary is by Keith Olbermann, anchor for the "Countdown" program on MSNBC. In his commentary, Mr. Olbermann takes issue with the Bush administration's attacks on Sen. Hillary Clinton, attempting to make her the scapegoat for all that has gone wrong in Bush's war in Iraq. Instead, Mr. Olbermann challenges Bush to go to Iraq and do a little fighting on the ground himself. Mr. Olbermann's commentary follows: It is one of the great, dark, evil lessons, of history. A country - a government - a military machine - can screw up a war seven ways to Sunday. It can get thousands of its people killed. It can risk the safety of its citizens. It can destroy the fabric of its nation. But as long as it can identify a scapegoat, it can regain or even gain power. The Bush administration has opened this Pandora's Box about Iraq. It has found its scapegoats: Hillary Clinton and us. The lies and terror tactics with which it deluded this country into war - they had nothing to do with the abomination that Iraq has become. It isn't Mr. Bush's fault. The selection of the wrong war, in the wrong time, in the wrong place - the most disastrous geopolitical tactic since Austria-Hungary attacked Serbia in 1914 and destroyed itself in the process - that had nothing to do with the overwhelming crisis Iraq has become. It isn't Mr. Bush's fault. The criminal lack of planning for the war - the total "jump-off-a-bridge-and-hope-you-can-fly" tone to the failure to anticipate what would follow the deposing of Saddam Hussein - that had nothing to do with the chaos in which Iraq has been enveloped. It isn't Mr. Bush's fault. The utter, blinkered idiocy of "staying the course," of sending Americans to Iraq and sending them a second time, and a third and a fourth, until they get killed or maimed - the utter de-prioritization of human life, simply so a politician can avoid having to admit a mistake - that had nothing to do with the tens of thousand individual tragedies darkening the lives of American families, forever. It isn't Mr. Bush's fault. Read The Full Story Pakistan Supreme Court Reinstates Judge, Ruling Deals Political Blow To Musharraf 2007-07-20 13:07:25 Pakistan's Supreme Court on Friday reinstated its ousted chief justice, Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry, dealing a political blow to the president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, even as he confronts a developing military challenge from Islamist radicals. The court ruled that Musharraf's March 9 suspension of Chaudhry was "set aside as being illegal" and ordered the judge resume his post - a major victory for opponents of the U.S.-allied Musharraf who are trying to bring democratic, civilian rule back to Pakistan. Before his removal, Chaudhry had been expected to consider cases that challenged Musharraf's plans to orchestrate a new five-year term for himself before upcoming parliamentary elections. Although the Musharraf government accused Chaudhry of misconduct, critics charged the removal was part of the president's plan to retain power. It is unclear how Chaudhry will proceed with the election cases now that he is reinstated to the Supreme Court - or how Musharraf, leader of the country since a 1999 military coup, will respond. Read The Full Story U.S. Radiation Detector Program Delayed 2007-07-20 02:55:40 A $1.2 billion program to deploy new radiation monitors to screen trucks, cars and cargo containers for signs of nuclear devices has been delayed by questions over whether Department of Homeland Security officials misled Congress about the effectiveness of the detectors. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff announced the contracts for monitors with cutting-edge technology a year ago. He said they would improve radiation scans at borders and ports, while sharply reducing the number of false alarms. Congress had allowed the five-year project to move ahead after Homeland Security assured appropriators that the $377,000 machines would detect highly enriched uranium 95 percent of the time. "What this next generation of detection equipment is going to let us do is make those determinations much more precisely, much more easily and much more quickly," said Chertoff. But the department's Domestic Nuclear Detection Office did not know whether the detectors would work effectively, according to documents and interviews. Read The Full Story Pull Australian Troops Out Of Iraq, Says Former Aussie Prime Minister 2007-07-20 02:55:02 Malcolm Fraser has issued a call for Australia to withdraw its forces from Iraq by Christmas, unless the U.S. makes a serious diplomatic effort to calm the region. The Liberal prime minister from 1975 to 1983 has long been a critic of the invasion, but, until now, has refrained from suggesting any deadline for a troop pullout. He had always argued against a "precipitate withdrawal". His new position highlights the increasingly isolated position of the Prime Minister, John Howard, and his U.S.  counterpart, George Bush, whose Iraq policy this week lost the support of key Republican allies in the U.S. Senate. The Republican Party in Congress is now developing an Iraq withdrawal policy in spite of the pleadings of the President to wait for a progress report from the military in September. Read The Full Story Israel Frees More Than 250 Prisoners 2007-07-20 02:54:22 A top PLO body gave its approval Thursday for President Mahmoud Abbas to hold new presidential and legislative elections, a high-stakes gamble meant to sideline Hamas militants but also bound to set off more confrontations between Palestinian rivals Fatah and Hamas. Hamas, which won parliament elections last year, immediately threatened to derail a new vote. On Friday, Israel started releasing more than 250 Palestinian prisoners in an attempt to bolster Abbas in his power struggle with Hamas. Most of those released were from Abbas' Fatah movement. A first batch of about 120 prisoners were put aboard buses at the Ketziot prison camp in southern Israel's Negev desert early Friday morning, headed for the West Bank. Read The Full Story	Commentary: An Inability To Tolerate Islam Contradicts Western Values 2007-07-21 02:18:55 Intellpuke: The following commentary by Karen Armstrong appears in the Guardian edition for Saturday, July 21, 2007. Ms. Armstrong is the author of several books on the history and teachings of the world's religions, including "The Great Transformation: The World in the Time of Buddha, Socrates, Confucius and Jeremiah", "A History of God", "The Battle For God: A History of Fundamentalism" and "Holy War: The Crusades and Their Impact On Today's World" among other books. Ms. Armstrong's commentary follows. In the 17th century, when some Iranian mullahs were trying to limit freedom of expression, Mulla Sadra, the great mystical philosopher of Isfahan, insisted that all Muslims were perfectly capable of thinking for themselves and that any religiosity based on intellectual repression and inquisitorial coercion was "polluted". Mulla Sadra exerted a profound influence on generations of Iranians, but it is ironic that his most famous disciple was probably Ayatollah Khomeini, author of the fatwa against Salman Rushdie. This type of contradiction is becoming increasingly frequent in our polarized world, as I discovered last month, when I arrived in Kuala Lumpur to find that the Malaysian government had banned three of my books as "incompatible with peace and social harmony". This was surprising because the government had invited me to Malaysia, and sponsored two of my public lectures. Their position was absurd, because it is impossible to exert this type of censorship in the electronic age. In fact, my books seemed so popular in Malaysia that I found myself wondering if the veto was part of a Machiavellian plot to entice the public to read them. Old habits die hard. In a pre-modern economy, insufficient resources meant freedom of speech was a luxury few governments could afford, since any project that required too much capital outlay was usually shelved. To encourage a critical habit of mind that habitually called existing institutions into question in the hope of reform could lead to a frustration that jeopardized social order. It is only 50 years since Malaysia achieved independence and, although the public and press campaign vigorously against censorship, in other circles the old caution is alive and well. Read The Full Story Europe Experiencing Freak Weather 2007-07-21 02:18:27 A heat wave sweeping central and southeastern Europe killed at least 13 people this week, with soaring temperatures sparking forest fires, damaging crops and prompting calls to ban horse-drawn tourist carriages. In Romania, where temperatures reached 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit) Friday, the Health Ministry said at least nine people had died since Monday due to heat. In Austria, where highs had hovered around 35 Celsius for days, the Health Ministry said three deaths Thursday were likely heat-related. Austrian media said at least five people had died from the heat, including an elderly woman who collapsed on a Vienna street Friday. A 56-year-old woman collapsed and died in Zagreb, Croatia, of what doctors believed was a heat-related heart attack. Temperatures in the Balkan country reached about 40 C Friday. Read The Full Story Taliban Threatens To Kill Kidnapped South Koreans 2007-07-21 02:17:38 Taliban militants threatened Friday to kill at least 18 kidnapped South Korean Christians, including 15 women, within 24 hours unless the Asian nation withdraws its 200 troops from Afghanistan. In the largest abduction of foreigners since the fall of the Taliban regime in 2001, several dozen fighters kidnapped the South Koreans at gunpoint from a bus in Ghazni province on Thursday, said Ali Shah Ahmadzai, the provincial police chief. “They have got until tomorrow (Saturday) at noon to withdraw their troops from Afghanistan, or otherwise we will kill the 18 Koreans,” Qari Yousuf Ahmadi, who claims to speak for the Taliban, told the Associated Press on a satellite telephone from an undisclosed location. “Right now they are safe and sound.” Outmatched by foreign troops, the Taliban often resort to kidnapping civilians caught traveling on treacherous roads, particularly in the country's south, where the insurgency is raging. The tactic hurts President Hamid Karzai's government by discouraging foreigners involved in reconstruction projects from venturing into remote areas where their help is most needed. Read The Full Story Bush Executive Order Governs CIA Interrogation Techniques 2007-07-21 02:17:04 President Bush Friday signed an executive order governing the interrogation of terrorism suspects by the CIA and barring torture, degrading treatment and serious acts of violence, the White House announced. The order "interprets the meaning and application" of Common Article 3 of the 1949 Geneva Conventions for purposes of the CIA's detention and interrogation program, which is designed to extract information from "captured al-Qaeda terrorists" about attack plans and the whereabouts of senior leaders, White House spokesman Tony Snow said in a statement. CIA Director Michael V. Hayden said in a separate statement that the executive order gives CIA interrogators new legal protections against claims of wrongdoing. Read The Full Story Commentary: King George W. - James Madison's Nightmare 2007-07-20 16:01:08 Intellpuke: The following commentary by journalist and author Robert Scheer first appeared on the Truthdig website on Tuesday, July 17, 2007. I thought it merited a broader audience and hope that Truthdig and Mr. Scheer agree. Mr. Scheer's commentary follows: George W. Bush is the imperial president that James Madison and other founders of this great republic warned us about.  He lied the nation into precisely the “foreign entanglements” that George Washington feared would destroy the experiment in representative government, and he has championed a spurious notion of security over individual liberty, thus eschewing the alarms of Thomas Jefferson as to the deprivation of the inalienable rights of free citizens.  But most important, he has used the sledgehammer of war to obliterate the separation of powers that James Madison enshrined in the U.S. Constitution. With the “war on terror,” Bush has asserted the right of the president to wage war anywhere and for any length of time, at his whim, because the “terrorists” will always provide a convenient shadowy target.  Just the “continual warfare” that Madison warned of in justifying the primary role of Congress in initiating and continuing to finance a war - the very issue now at stake in Bush’s battle with Congress. In his “Political Observations,” written years before he served as fourth president of the United States, Madison went on to underscore the dangers of an imperial presidency bloated by war fever.  “In war,” Madison wrote in 1795, at a time when the young republic still faced its share of dangerous enemies, “the discretionary power of the Executive is extended ... and all the means of seducing the minds are added to those of subduing the force, of the people.” How remarkably prescient of Madison to anticipate the specter of our current King George imperiously undermining Congress’ attempts to end the Iraq war.  When the prime author of the U.S. Constitution explained why that document grants Congress - not the president - the exclusive power to declare and fund wars, Madison wrote, “A delegation of such powers [to the president] would have struck, not only at the fabric of our Constitution, but at the foundation of all well organized and well checked governments.” Read The Full Story Commentary: Bush's Wooden-Headedness Kills 2007-07-20 16:00:26 Intellpuke: The following commentary by Ray McGovern originally appeared on the Consortiumnews.com website Wednesday, July 18, 2007. Mr. McGovern works with Tell the Word, the publishing arm of the ecumenical Churche of the Savior in Washington, D.C. During his 27-year career as a CIA analyst, he chaired National Intelligence Estimates and prepared/briefed the President's Daily Brief. He is on the Steering Group of Veteran Intelligence Professonals for Sanity (VIPS). He commentary follows: President George W. Bush is convinced, despite all evidence to the contrary, that he is on the right course in the war in Iraq and the struggle against terrorism. He says he will not change his mind. Thus, we are at an historic moment; and we would be well advised to see what light historians might shed on our current predicament in Iraq and the basic (but unanswered) question as to why so many people resort to terrorism against us. Historian Barbara Tuchman addressed the kind of situation we face at this juncture in our country’s history in her best-selling book, “The March of Folly: From Troy to Vietnam.” (Had she lived, she surely would have updated the book to take Iraq into account.) Tuchman wrote: “Wooden-headedness...plays a remarkably large role in government. It consists in assessing a situation in terms of preconceived fixed notions while ignoring or rejecting any contrary signs. It is acting according to wish while not allowing oneself to be deflected by the facts.” Read The Full Story Bush Administration Claims Justice Dept. Can't Pursue Congress Contempt Charges 2007-07-20 02:55:57 Bush administration officials unveiled a bold new assertion of executive authority yesterday in the dispute over the firing of nine U.S. attorneys, saying that the Justice Department will never be allowed to pursue contempt charges initiated by Congress against White House officials once the president has invoked executive privilege. The position presents serious legal and political obstacles for congressional Democrats, who have begun laying the groundwork for contempt proceedings against current and former White House officials in order to pry loose information about the dismissals. Under federal law, a statutory contempt citation by the House or Senate must be submitted to the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, "whose duty it shall be to bring the matter before the grand jury for its action." Yet administration officials argued Thursday that Congress has no power to force a U.S. attorney to pursue contempt charges in cases, such as the prosecutor firings, in which the president has declared that testimony or documents are protected from release by executive privilege. Officials pointed to a Justice Department legal opinion during the Reagan administration, which made the same argument in a case that was never resolved by the courts. Read The Full Story Deadly Violence Spreads In Pakistan 2007-07-20 02:55:20 The wave of violence that has gripped Pakistan in recent days spread to new parts of the country and featured more ferocious tactics Thursday, with suicide bombers targeting a mosque, a police academy and a convoy of Chinese engineers in attacks that killed more than 50 people. The strikes yielded the highest single-day death toll since the government stormed the Red Mosque in Islamabad  last week. More than 120 people died during the standoff at the mosque, and more than 160 have been killed in the attacks that have followed. The severity of the violence has stunned Pakistanis. It also has left the country groping for direction as the military, pro-democracy moderates and Islamic extremists vie for control in a struggle that appears likely to intensify. The military has vowed a fresh offensive and is moving troops into position, while extremists have declared jihad against the president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, and his government. Read The Full Story Nuclear Partnership Between U.S., Australia In The Offing 2007-07-20 02:54:48 Australia is negotiating a big nuclear energy plan with the U.S. and is considering whether to join an exclusive American-led club of nations to control the distribution, reprocessing and storage of nuclear fuel worldwide. According to draft plans seen by the Sydney Morning Herald, the ministers for foreign affairs and resources have urged Australian Prime Minister John Howard to announce the joint plan during George Bush's Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation visit in September. "The proposed action plan would help to open the way for valuable nuclear energy co-operation with the United States," the briefing note says. "It would also be consistent with the Government's strategy for the nuclear industry in Australia. An action plan on nuclear energy would also have bilateral advantages further broadening our relationship with the United States. "While the U.S. has not raised the possibility, the action plan may be a possible 'announceable' for President Bush's visit in September." Read The Full Story U.S. Will Allow Most Types Of Lighters On Planes 2007-07-20 02:54:04 Federal aviation authorities have decided to stop enforcing a two-year-old rule against taking cigarette lighters on airplanes, concluding that it was a waste of time to search for them before passengers boarded. The ban was imposed at the insistence of Congress after a passenger, Richard Reed, tried to ignite a bomb in his shoe in 2001 on a flight from Paris to Miami. Lawmakers said that if Mr. Reid had used a lighter, instead of matches, he might have been able to ignite the bomb, but Kip Hawley, assistant secretary for the Transportation Security Administration, said in an interview on Thursday that the ban had done little to improve aviation security because small batteries could be used to set off a bomb. Matches have never been prohibited on flights. Read The Full Story
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