Free Internet Press Newsletter - Wednesday September 5 2007 - (813)

Wednesday September 5 2007 edition
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Washington, D.C. Gun Appeal Could Reshape U.S. Gun Laws 2007-09-05 03:10:19 If the U.S. Supreme Court hears handgun ban appeal, the decision could determine if Second Amendment is an individual right or a collective, civic right. The District of Columbia Tuesday asked the Supreme Court to uphold the city's ban on private ownership of handguns, saying the appeals court decision that overturned the law "drastically departs from the mainstream of American jurisprudence". Most legal experts believe the court will accept the case, which could lead to a historic decision next year on whether the ambiguously worded Second Amendment to the Constitution protects private gun ownership or only imparts a civic right related to maintaining state militias. The District argues in its petition for review that its law - one of the toughest handgun bans in the nation - should be upheld regardless of whether the court sides with the so-called "individualist" or "collective" legal theories. Read The Full Story U.S. Efforts May Work Against Iraqi Self-Sufficiency 2007-09-05 03:09:46 After the feast, the tribal leaders of Jiff Jaffa laid out their problem. They had five water pumps issued by the Iraqi government, but none were working. Municipal officials either said they were afraid to visit this dangerous region or demanded that the leaders pay large sums to use certain contractors. Now, the sheiks were asking for help from the United States. It was a familiar request for the group of U.S. soldiers and aid officials seated in a large trailer on a farm in this rural stretch of southern Iraq. "So the real reason they are not helping you is they want a bribe?" asked Lewis Tatem, the tall, deep-voiced deputy leader of the Embedded Provincial Reconstruction Team in charge of this area. "Yes, a bribe," replied Hamid Mazza al-Masodi. Read The Full Story Sen. Craig Now Reconsidering His Resignation From U.S. Senate 2007-09-05 03:08:42 Sen. Larry E. Craig (R-Idaho) is reconsidering his announced intention to resign, if he can clear his name of criminal and ethics charges before the end of the month, a spokesman said Tuesday night. Other Craig aides, however, sent mixed signals Tuesday about the strength of the senator's desire to remain in the chamber as he pursues a legal challenge to his guilty plea stemming from an undercover sex sting in an airport restroom, as well as an investigation by the Senate Ethics Committee. Republican leaders, who leaned hard on Craig last week to resign, had put the matter behind them, with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell(Kentucky) declaring Tuesday, "The episode is over." Informed Tuesday night of the apparent change of heart, McConnell's spokesman declined to comment. Read The Full Story Hurricane Felix Slams Ashore In Nicaragua As Category 5 Storm 2007-09-04 15:12:48 Hurricane Felix slammed into Nicaragua's Miskito Coast as a record-setting Category 5 storm Tuesday, whipping metal rooftops through the air like razors and forcing thousands to flee. Hurricane Henriette made for a direct hit on the Cabos resorts of Mexico's Baja California peninsula. Twin Atlantic and Pacific hurricanes making landfall on the same day is unprecedented, according to National Hurricane Center records dating back to 1949. The closest comparison happened at 5 a.m. on Aug. 24, 1992, when Hurricane Andrew devastated southern Florida 23 hours after Hurricane Lester hit Baja California, Mexico. "The winds are horrible," Red Cross official Claudio Vanegas said by phone from the Nicaraguan town of Puerto Cabezas shortly after Felix struck land nearby with 160 mph winds. "They send roofs flying through the air, so we aren't going outside because it is too dangerous." Read The Full Story Oil Jumps $1 to $74 A Barrel Over Hurricane Jitters 2007-09-04 15:12:18 Oil jumped $1 Tuesday as a top U.S. hurricane forecaster called for a busy end to the Atlantic storm season, raising concerns over potential oil and gas disruptions. U.S. crude rose $1.00 to $75.04 by 2:01 p.m. EDT after trading as high as $75.13. London Brent crude was up 50 cents at $73.91 a barrel. Hurricane Felix slammed into Central America on Tuesday, sparing oil and gas installations in the Gulf of Mexico, but forecasters at Colorado State University said the rest of the 2007 Hurricane season would be busy, with a total of 15 named storms. U.S. and Mexican oil installations have escaped major storm damage so far this year, but markets remain on edge after hurricanes knocked out refining and offshore production facilities in 2005. Read The Full Story Bremer's Letter Counters Bush On Iraqi Army 2007-09-04 15:11:30 A previously undisclosed exchange of letters shows that President Bush was told in advance by his top Iraq envoy in May 2003 of a plan to “dissolve Saddam’s military and intelligence structures,” a plan that the envoy, L. Paul Bremer, said referred to dismantling the Iraqi Army. Bremer provided the letters to the New York Times on Monday after reading that Bush was quoted in a new book as saying that American policy had been “to keep the army intact” but that it “didn’t happen.” The dismantling of the Iraqi Army in the aftermath of the American invasion is now widely regarded as a mistake that stoked rebellion among hundreds of thousands of former Iraqi soldiers and made it more difficult to reduce sectarian bloodshed and attacks by insurgents. In releasing the letters, Bremer said he wanted to refute the suggestion in  Bush’s comment that Bremer had acted to disband the army without the knowledge and concurrence of the White House. “We must make it clear to everyone that we mean business: that Saddam and the Baathists are finished,” Bremer wrote in a letter that was drafted on May 20, 2003, and sent to the president on May 22 through Donald H. Rumsfeld, then secretary of defense. Read The Full Story MI5 Reveals File On George Orwell, Dispels Myth 2007-09-04 15:09:27 George Orwell's left-wing views and bohemian clothes led British police to label him a communist, but newly declassified files show that British intelligence took a much softer line. The file kept by Britain's MI5 spy agency on the author from 1929 until his death in 1950 has just been released by the National Archives. It reveals that in contrast to the fictional "Big Brother," the cruel and all-seeing secret police of Orwell's classic "1984," MI5 took a surprisingly benign view of the writer. Orwell savaged the totalitarianism of Stalin's Russia in "Animal Farm" and "1984." But he was also a socialist who railed against inequality in earlier works such as "Down and Out in Paris and London" and "The Road to Wigan Pier." Read The Full Story	In Baghdad, No Relief From Fear 2007-09-05 03:10:02 Despite U.S. buildup, families still fleeing Baghadad homes in fear of sectarian violence. Driven by fear and desperation, Um Abdullah's parents, who are Sunnis, swapped homes with a Shiite family they have known for years. Her parents moved to a section of Baghdad's Saidiya neighborhood controlled by Sunni insurgents. And their friends moved into her family home in the Risala area, controlled by Shiite militias. Each family left behind their furniture, so they could move swiftly and in secret. It seemed a perfect solution in a capital whose polarization along sectarian lines has deepened this year, despite the influx of 30,000 U.S. military reinforcements. But within days of the arrival of Um Abdullah's parents two months ago, Shiite militias pushed deeper into Saidiya, driving out hundreds of Sunni families. The parents' fear returned. "If they leave their house in Saidiya, that means they will lose their house in Risala because they made the exchange," said Um Abdullah, who would allow only her nickname to be used because of safety concerns. "My parents feel trapped." A seven-month-old security offensive was intended to bring enough calm to Baghdad and other areas to resuscitate Iraq societally, politically and physically. Achieving those goals has proved elusive. Read The Full Story Packing Dangerous Winds, Hurricane Felix Hits Nicaragua As Henriette Slams Baja Peninsula 2007-09-05 03:09:19 Hurricanes swept ashore in Nicaragua and Mexico within hours of each other Tuesday, the first time Atlantic and Pacific hurricanes have made landfall on the same day since 1998, according to the U.S. National Hurricane Center, in Miami, Florida.  Felix arrived first, punishing sparsely populated northern Nicaragua with 160 mph winds before dawn, then plowing inland across Honduras and threatening floods and mudslides in a region still recovering from Hurricane Mitch, which killed nearly 11,000 people in 1998. More than 1,900 miles away, Henriette swelled to hurricane strength Tuesday afternoon and roared onto the southern tip of Mexico's Baja peninsula, an area thick with some of Latin America's  swankiest hotels and vacation homes. Felix, which is expected to dump up to 25 inches of rain in the Honduran capital, Tegucigalpa, and the Guatemalan capital, Guatemala City,slashed through small villages in Nicaragua, turning thin walls into kindling, toppling trees and kicking up a heavy storm surge. The storm confounded meteorologists. Originally forecast to slam into Belize on Wednesday, it veered sharply south late Monday and early Tuesday, making landfall in a coastal region of Nicaragua populated primarily by small groups of Miskito Indians, many of whom refused to evacuate as the storm approached. Read The Full Story Musharraf Considers Declaring State Of Emergency In Pakistan 2007-09-05 03:08:02 A top adviser to Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf acknowledged Tuesday that the general's options for staying in power are increasingly bleak and said that a declaration of emergency is being considered as a way of keeping him in office. Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain, president of the ruling Pakistan Muslim League, said that while a complete military takeover under martial law had been ruled out, a state of emergency that would allow for the postponement of elections for up to a year and the curtailment of individual liberties was still on the table. "Martial law is a very harsh word," Hussain said in an interview. "Emergency rule is not so harsh." The comments came on the same day that nearly simultaneous bombs tore through a market and a bus in the garrison city of Rawalpindi,killing 25 people and injuring more than 60 others in attacks that seemed to target the Pakistan military. The bus, operated by the Defense Ministry, was taking employees of Pakistan's influential Inter-Services Intelligence branch to work, according to witnesses and officials. Read The Full Story Coal Rush Reverses, Power Firms Follow 2007-09-04 15:12:35 Plans for new plants stalled by growing opposition. The mayor of Missoula, Montana, is the latest person to discover just how unpopular coal plants have become. In early August, Mayor John Engen (D) won city council support to buy electricity from a new coal-fired plant scheduled to begin operation in 2011. He said the city government would save money on its electric bills. Three weeks later, Engen pulled out of the deal after receiving hundreds of e-mails and phone calls from constituents upset that Missoula would contribute to the creation of a coal plant and concerned about what the town would do if the plant never got built. "Coal is a double-edged sword," said Engen. "I sort of felt both edges." Read The Full Story Selling The 'Surge' Among The Shops In Iraq 2007-09-04 15:12:02 The U.S. war in Iraq hinges on the counterinsurgency strategy of Gen. Petraeus. The results have been tenuous. Nearly every week, American generals and politicians visit Combat Outpost Gator, nestled behind a towering blast wall in the Dora market. They arrive in convoys of armored Humvees, sometimes accompanied by helicopter gunships, to see what U.S. commanders display as proof of the effectiveness of a seven-month-long security offensive, fueled by 30,000 U.S. reinforcements. Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top U.S. military leader in Iraq,  frequently cites the market as a sign of progress. "This is General Petraeus's baby," said Staff Sgt. Josh Campbell, 24, of Winfield, Kansas, as he set out on a patrol near the market on a hot evening in mid-August. Next week, Petraeus and U.S. Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker will deliver to Congress their much-anticipated response to the central question that has dominated U.S. policy in Iraq this year: Is the "surge" working? Read The Full Story GAO Report Finds Progress Lacking In Iraq 2007-09-04 15:10:00 A report by Congressional auditors issued today, as the Iraq war debate enters a pivotal phase in Washington, concludes that “violence remains high” in Iraq amid mixed progress on security and that political reconciliation efforts remain far from sufficient, eight months after President Bush began his troop-increase plan. The report from the independent Government Accountability Office came a day after Bush, in a surprise visit to Iraq, suggested that pulling out forces might be possible if trends he described as security successes should continue. The report places greater emphasis on shortcomings than successes, saying that Iraq has failed to meet 11 of the 18 military and political objectives, or benchmarks, set by Congress and agreed on by Bush, while partially meeting four, according to wire-service reports. That assessment was noticeably rosier than a draft version of the G.A.O. report, which held that Iraq had fallen short on 13 of the 18 standards for progress, partly meeting two. That finding was disputed by the Pentagon. Read The Full Story At Least 25 Killed In Coordinated Bombings In Pakistan 2007-09-04 15:08:58 Powerful coordinated explosions set off by two suicide bombers jolted this garrison city near the capital early Tuesday, killing at least 25 people, including some from the country’s powerful intelligence agency, and wounding at least 68, said government and military officials. The brazen attacks took place within a mile of each other in the heart of Rawalpindi, a tightly guarded city that holds the headquarters of Pakistan’s military. The president, General Pervez Musharraf, survived two assassination attempts here in 2003. There were no immediate claims of responsibility, but the pair of blasts came at a time of great political tension. Read The Full Story
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