Free Internet Press Newsletter - Monday September 10 2007 - (813)

Monday September 10 2007 edition
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Poll: Most Americans Doubt Petraeus Assessment Will Be Accurate 2007-09-10 01:22:21 Most Americans think this week's report from Army Gen. David H. Petraeus will exaggerate progress in Iraq, and few expect it to result in a major shift in President Bush's policy. Despite skepticism about the Petraeus testimony and majority support for a U.S. troop reduction in Iraq, there has also been a slight increase in the number who see the situation there as improving. The findings, from a new Washington Post-ABC News poll, underscore the depth of public antipathy toward the Iraq war, the doubts about the administration's policies and the limited confidence in the Iraqi government to meet its commitments to restore civil order. Fifty-eight percent, a new high, said they want to decrease the number of U.S. troops in Iraq. And most of those who advocated a troop reduction said they want the drawdown to begin either right away or by the end of the year. A majority, 55 percent, supported legislation that would set a deadline of next spring for the withdrawal of American combat forces. That figure is unchanged from July. Read The Full Story Arecibo Radio Telescope And Its Budget Hang In The Balance 2007-09-10 01:21:39 In the tangled forests of Puerto Rico's steamy interior, suspended by steel cables strung from 300-foot towers, an array of antennas hangs above an aluminum bowl 1,000 feet in diameter that gazes into space. Arecibo Observatory, the largest and most sensitive radio telescope on Earth, looks like a secret outpost built by aliens. In fact, one of its missions is to search the galactic frontier for signs of intelligent life - a sci-fi goal that landed it a leading role in the Jodie Foster movie "Contact" and cameos in a James Bond movie. Among astronomers, Arecibo is an icon of hard science. Its instruments have netted a decades-long string of discoveries about the structure and evolution of the universe. Its high-powered radar has mapped in exquisite detail the surfaces and interiors of neighboring planets. It is the only facility on the planet able to track asteroids with enough precision to tell which ones might plow into Earth - a disaster that could cause as many as a billion deaths and that experts say is preventable with enough warning. Yet, for want of a few million dollars, the future for Arecibo appears grim. Read The Full Story Canada's Oil Sands Facing Pipeline Capacity Squeeze 2007-09-10 01:20:45 There's a lack of pipeline capacity to take Canadian crude to refineries in the U.S. between now and 2009. A lack of pipeline capacity to take Canadian crude to refineries in the United States between now and 2009 will increase competition for producers to get their output to market, according to a new report from energy industry consultancy Purvin & Gertz. The constraints could result in apportionment, an unpromising scenario where there's not enough infrastructure in place to take all production to market, creating both lower prices and higher price volatility. Consequently, producers could delay some oil sands projects to try to ensure they don't have to discount their future output to guarantee it gets to market, said Tom Wise, executive vice-president at Purvin & Gertz. “We do see growth in Canadian production, but the pipelines are full and we could see apportionment,” he said in an interview. Read The Full Story Canadian Wages Swell As Jobless Rate Matches 33-Year Low 2007-09-10 01:13:43 Canadian employers boosted wages and created a greater-than-expected 23,300 jobs in August as the construction and education sectors added to payrolls. The jobless rate held steady at 6 per cent, matching a 33-year low as more people looked for work, Statistics Canada said Friday. A tight labor market caused wages to heat up. Average hourly wages rose the fastest in six years. August was the fourth month in a row with year-over-year hourly wage increases above 3 per cent, well above Canada's inflation rate of 2.2 per cent and making a future interest-rate increase more likely. “Canada's shrink-wrap-tight labor market just got a little tighter, and wages are beginning to respond,” said Douglas Porter, deputy chief economist at BMO Capital Markets, in a note. Read The Full Story The New Al-Qaeda Central 2007-09-09 03:09:36 Far from declining, the network has rebuilt, with fresh faces and a vigorous media arm. When Osama bin Laden resurfaced Friday in a 26-minute videotaped speech, his most important message was one left unsaid: We have survived. The last time bin Laden showed his face to the world was three years ago, in October 2004. Since then, al-Qaeda's  core leadership - dubbed al-Qaeda Central by intelligence analysts - has grown stronger, rebuilding the organizational framework that was badly damaged after the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan, according to counterterrorism officials in Pakistan, the United States and Europe.  It has accomplished this revival, the officials said in interviews, by drawing on lessons learned during 15 years of failed campaigns to destroy it. In that period, bin Laden and his followers have outfoxed powerful enemies from the Soviet army to the Saudi royal family to the CIA. Read The Full Story Commentary: Reporting From Baghdad 2007-09-09 03:08:37 Intellpuke: The following commentary was written by Scott Ritter and appeared on the Truthdig.com website Thursday, September 6, 2007. Mr. Ritter is a former U.S. Marine and weapons inspector in Iraq. His commentary follows: It should come as no surprise that the Bush administration's newest military-man-of-substance-turned- political lapdog, General Petraeus, maintains that the situation in Iraq is not only salvageable, but actually improving, due to the "surge" of U.S. combat troops into Iraq over the past year. All the president and his collection of G.I. Joe hand-puppets ask for is more time, more money and more troops. There is no reason to believe that the compliant war facilitators who comprise the "anti-war" Democratic majority in Congress will do anything other than give the president what he is asking for. No one seems to want to debate, in any meaningful fashion, what is really going on in Iraq. Why would they? The Democrats, like their Republican counterparts, have invested too much political capital into fictionalizing the problem with slogans like "support the troops," "we're fighting the enemy there so we don't have to fight them here," and my all-time favorite, "leaving Iraq would hand victory to al-Qaeda." There simply is no incentive to put fact on the table and formulate policy that actually seeks a solution to a properly defined problem. Like the Republicans before them, the Democrats today seek not to govern with the best interests of the people in mind, but rather to game the system in order to consolidate political power. Political sloganeering has so trumped reality that any political backlash that is generated from the so-called "Petraeus Report" will be limited to how the Democrats could better sustain a conflict that kills American troops, since no main-stream Democratic leader has expressed a true "get out of Iraq now" policy. Read The Full Story Commentary: CBS Early Show Removes Anti-War Protesters From View In Kansas City 2007-09-09 03:07:49 Intellpuke: The following commentary was written by Matthew Rothschild and appeared on The Progressive magazine's website on Tuesday, September 4, 2007. Mr. Rothschild is the editor of The Progessive. His commentary follows: On August 10, the CBS Early Show came to Kansas City, Missouri. Using Liberty Memorial Park, the Early Show was featuring the country western band Big & Rich, which is famous for "Save a Horse (Ride a Cowboy)" and for leading audiences in the Pledge of Allegiance. When the local peace community heard that the Early Show was coming to the park, activists hoped to get their message to a national audience. "I received an e-mail about the event and a flier from the Early Show inviting people to attend," says Ira Harritt, Kansas City area program coordinator for the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC). "I rsvp'd, saying some people from the AFSC would be there." Read The Full Story Mrs. Ashcroft And The Hospital 'Tongue' Lashing 2007-09-09 03:07:03 The wife of former Attorney General John Ashcroft stuck her tongue out at two Bush administration officials as they left the hospital room of her seriously ill husband, according to a new account by the man who triggered that now infamous nighttime visit, former Assistant Attorney General Jack Goldsmith. At age 41, the former University of Chicago law professor Goldsmith joined the Justice Department in the fall of 2003 as the head of the Office of Legal Counsel, a little-known but extremely powerful position as the chief adviser to the president and attorney general on the legality of their policies. During his first weeks on the job, Goldsmith says he found the legal basis for the country's most important counterterrorism policies, including those for the CIA's interrogation techniques, to be deeply flawed and sloppily reasoned. Goldsmith says he inherited a legal mess from his predecessor. "My first reaction was I should quit because if I go down this path, it's going to cause enormous disruption to the administration's most important counterterrorism policies," Goldsmith said in an interview with ABC News' Brian Ross. Read The Full Story	Al-Qaeda Says It Carried Out Algeria Bombings That Killed At Least 52 People 2007-09-10 01:22:03 Fears that North Africans now part of terror network. Al-Qaeda's purported North African wing has claimed responsibility for two deadly suicide bomb attacks in Algeria, reinforcing fears that jihadi militants have opened a new frontline in the Maghreb. At least 30 people died on Saturday and 50 were injured when a hijacked delivery van packed with explosives smashed through a barrier at a coastguard barracks at Dellys, east of Algiers. The bombing appeared timed to kill as many officers as possible, when they were grouped together to raise the national flag. Last Thursday, 22 people were killed and more than 100 wounded when a man detonated a bomb in a crowd waiting to meet President Abdelaziz Bouteflika in Batna, also east of the capital. That was an apparent assassination attempt, but the attacker was spotted by the crowd, and set off the device before Bouteflika arrived. Algerian security named the man as Bellazrak Houari, 20, and said he had been on their wanted list since 2006. In an internet statement, the al-Qaeda Organization in the Islamic Maghreb (North Africa) said it was trying to target police and security forces "in defense of Islam and the Islamic nation", not innocent people. "We swear to God to continue sacrificing our lives until you stop supporting the crusaders in their war, apply Islamic tenets, and stop your war against God's religion," it stated. Read The Full Story Hunt Oil Company Signs Deal With Iraq's Kurds 2007-09-10 01:21:09 Texas' Hunt Oil Co. and Kurdistan's regional government said Saturday they've signed a production-sharing contract for petroleum exploration in northern Iraq, the first such deal since the Kurds passed their own oil and gas law in August. A Hunt subsidiary, Hunt Oil Co. of the Kurdistan Region, will begin geological survey and seismic work by the end of 2007 and hopes to drill an exploration well in 2008, the parties said in a news release. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. Hunt is a privately held independent oil company based in Dallas, Texas. A third partner, Impulse Energy Corp., also has a stake in the project. "We're very pleased to have the opportunity to be a part of these landmark events by actively participating in the establishment of the petroleum industry," Ray L. Hunt, Hunt's CEO, said in a statement. Read The Full Story Strong 6.8 Earthquake Hits Columbia's Pacific Coast 2007-09-10 01:20:03 A strong 6.8 magnitude earthquake hit near the Pacific coast of Colombia Monday, but local authorities said there were no immediate reports of serious damage. Officials in coastal Narino province said they had no news of damaged buildings or injuries, but they were continuing to contact remote rural areas. Residents told local radio the shock knocked out electricity in some areas. "For now, the checks conducted by operational units show no reports of any impact, but we will have to wait for the results of monitoring," said Luz Amanda Pulido, national director of Colombia's disaster prevention office. Read The Full Story Among Top U.S. Officials, 'Surge' Has Sparked Dissent, Infighting 2007-09-09 03:09:57 For two hours, President Bush listened to contrasting visions of the U.S. future in Iraq. Gen. David H. Petraeus  dominated the conversation by video link from Baghdad, making the case to keep as many troops as long as possible to cement any security progress. Adm. William J. Fallon, his superior, argued instead for accepting more risks in Iraq, officials said, in order to have enough forces available to confront other potential threats in the region. The polite discussion in the White House Situation Room a week ago masked a sharper clash over the U.S. venture in Iraq, one that has been building since Fallon, chief of the U.S. Central Command, which oversees Middle East  operations, sent a rear admiral to Baghdad this summer to gather information. Soon afterward, said officials, Fallon began developing plans to redefine the U.S. mission and radically draw down troops. One of those plans, according to a Centcom officer, involved slashing U.S. combat forces in Iraq by three-quarters by 2010. In an interview, Fallon disputed that description but declined to offer details. Nonetheless, his efforts offended Petraeus' team, which saw them as unwelcome intrusion on their own long-term planning. The profoundly different views of the U.S. role in Iraq only exacerbated the schism between the two men. "Bad relations?" said a senior civilian official with a laugh. "That's the understatement of the century. ... If you think Armageddon was a riot, that's one way of looking at it." Read The Full Story One In Four Mammal Species Threatened With Extinction 2007-09-09 03:09:08 Habitat loss means thousands of endangered species will survive only in zoos, report says. Thousands of species in danger of extinction in the wild may survive only in captivity. The annual "Red List" of extinct and endangered species to be published on Wednesday by the World Conservation Union is expected to show another increase in the numbers under threat of being wiped out by habitat loss, hunting, alien predators and climate change. Last year the union warned that the world faced "the sixth great extinction of life on earth" as mammals, amphibians, birds, insects, fish and plants were being lost at "unprecedented rates". One in four mammals and one in eight bird species have been labelled "threatened". News that the list will show another deterioration will prompt fresh warnings about the danger of ecosystems collapsing, leading to problems with food supply and other "biological services" such as the provision of clean water. Although some species are expected to be put into "safer" categories after successful projects to protect them, more are believed to face a vulnerable future. Read The Full Story Commentary: Time To Take A Stand 2007-09-09 03:08:17 Intellpuke: The following commentary was written by Paul Krugman, an op-ed colunist for the New York Times. His commentary appeared in that newspaper's edition for Friday, Sept. 7, 2007. Here's what will definitely happen when Gen. David Petraeus testifies before Congress next week: he'll assert that the surge has reduced violence in Iraq - as long as you don't count Sunnis killed by Sunnis, Shiites killed by Shiites, Iraqis killed by car bombs and people shot in the front of the head. Here's what I'm afraid will happen: Democrats will look at Gen. Petraeus's uniform and medals and fall into their usual cringe. They won't ask hard questions out of fear that someone might accuse them of attacking the military. After the testimony, they'll desperately try to get Republicans to agree to a resolution that politely asks President Bush to maybe, possibly, withdraw some troops, if he feels like it. There are five things I hope Democrats in Congress will remember. First, no independent assessment has concluded that violence in Iraq is down. On the contrary, estimates based on morgue, hospital and police records suggest that the daily number of civilian deaths is almost twice its average pace from last year. And a recent assessment by the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office found no decline in the average number of daily attacks. Read The Full Story Warning On 'Mortgage Rescue' Firms 2007-09-09 03:07:21 Debt-ridden homeowners sell to companies and then rent their property back - but they can then face eviction. British homeowners struggling with spiralling mortgage costs have been warned to beware of companies which promise a quick way out of debt but could cost them their houses. A new wave of "mortgage rescue" firms is targeting financially stretched owners, promising to solve their debt problems by buying their homes quickly and free of fees. Although the companies typically pay as little as two-thirds of the property's market value, people are attracted to the deals because they believe they will be able to carry on living in their homes indefinitely. But according to the Citizen's Advice Bureaux and the housing charity Shelter, some homeowners have unknowingly signed up to unprotected, short-term tenancies, leaving them in danger of being made homeless with little notice. The Wolverhampton Citizen's Advice Bureau alone has advised on 17 cases of people losing their homes through such contracts in the last couple of months. The warning comes as increasing numbers of homeowners struggle with their mortgages. The courts have seen a 98 per cent increase in the first quarter of the year of mortgage possession orders compared to the same period in 2004; and last week the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors reported that mortgage payments are swallowing the biggest share of take-home pay for 17 years. Read The Full Story
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