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Intel
- 
Computer
- Marketing
- 
History
- Consumer
- 
Entertainment
- 
CA
- 
NV
- "Intel
Drops Logo After 37 Years; Seeks to Take Image Beyond PCs."
... "Intel Corp., whose marketing made its computer chips a household name,
is changing its logo for the first time in 37 years." ... "The dropped
``e'' in Intel will be shed in favor of a swoop around the company's name
with the tag line ``Leap Ahead.'' The ``Intel Inside'' phrase, a fixture
since 1991, will be dropped, Santa Clara, California-based Intel said yesterday."
... "Intel's image change, to coincide with next week's Consumer Electronics
Show in Las Vegas [Nevada], is part of an effort by new Chief Executive
Officer Paul Otellini to push Intel into home entertainment. The company,
whose processors run more than 80 percent of personal computers, is trying
to gain a foothold in the consumer market to counter slowing growth in
PC chips." -By Ian King
-Bloomberg
Auto
- 
Company
- 
Retiree
- History- 
Government
- "How
Bedrock Promises Of Security Have Fractured Across America:Companies
are discarding traditional pensions -- or making government foot the bill.
Delphi workers struggle with the changing landscape." ... "[Oct. 8,] That's
when Delphi Chief Executive Robert S. "Steve" Miller, citing global competition
and crippling "legacy costs," ushered the $28.6 billion-a-year company
into one of the largest industrial bankruptcies in U.S. history. In short
order, Miller called for slashing workers' compensation by almost two-thirds,
threatened to void the company's union contracts, and hinted broadly that
he would follow the playbook he had used elsewhere of pushing responsibility
for paying the firm's pensions to the federal government and dumping its
retiree health benefits altogether." ... "Delphi is at the cutting edge
of a crisis that's engulfing the U.S. auto industry, much as it did steel
and airlines. Its actions are adding to a gathering trend, a shift of economic
risks once largely borne by business and government to the backs of working
families." ... "Before the trouble is over, some believe, a corporate icon
such as Ford Motor Co. or GM could be swept from the American landscape.
So too could much of what remains of the already frayed relationship between
millions of working people and their employers." -By
Peter G. Gosselin
-LAtimes
Hawaii
- History
- 
Museum
- "Group
hides native Hawaiian artifacts: Judge jails leader,
holds three others in contempt of court." ... "Leaders of a Hawaiian group
vowed not to divulge the location of a cache of native artifacts obtained
from a museum and then buried, despite the jailing of their director."
... "One of the four, executive director Edward Halealoha Ayau, was taken
into custody after refusing [Chief U.S. District Judge David] Ezra's order
to reveal the exact location of the 83 artifacts from the Bishop Museum."
-AP via -CNN
Secret
- Government
- 
Terrorism
- 
Intelligence
- 
Law- 
Privacy
- History
- Samuel
Alito
- "In
1984 memo, Alito defends domestic wiretaps." ...
"As a Reagan administration lawyer, Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito
argued that federal officials can't be sued for damages for wiretapping
Americans without warrants in national security cases, a document released
Friday showed." ... "Alito's position may complicate his prospects for
confirmation because its disclosure comes amid an uproar over a four-year-old
Bush administration counterterrorism operation that's been eavesdropping
on Americans without court approval." ... "President Bush's argument that
he has the legal and constitutional authority to direct the National Security
Agency to conduct the secret domestic surveillance operation is almost
certain to end up before the Supreme Court." -By Jonathan
S. Landay -Knight
Ridder via -MercuryNews
Samuel
Alito
- 
Women's
- Abortion
- 
Health
- History
- Law
- "Alito
abortion memo drew cautionary response: Reagan administration
official said '85 correspondence should be kept quiet." ... "A June 1985
memo by Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito arguing that the Roe v. Wade
decision legalizing abortion should be overturned set off alarms in the
Reagan administration, prompting a senior official to caution that the
correspondence should be kept quiet, a new document released Friday shows."
... "In a recommendation to the solicitor general on filing a friend-of-court
brief, Alito said the government "should make clear that we disagree with
Roe v. Wade and would welcome the opportunity to brief the issue of whether,
and if so to what extent, that decision should be overruled."" ... "The
June 3, 1985 document was one of 45 released by the National Archives on
Friday. A total of 744 pages were made public."
-AP via -MSNBC
Samuel
Alito
- Women's
- Abortion
- Health
- History
- Law
- "Alito
Argued to Overturn Roe in 1985 Memo: Supreme Court
Nominee Samuel Alito Advocated Reversing Roe V. Wade in 1985 Memo." ...
"In paperwork released earlier from Alito's time in the Justice Department's
solicitor general's office, he recommended a legal strategy of dismantling
abortion rights piece by piece. And as part of an application for a job
as deputy assistant attorney general, Alito said the Constitution does
not guarantee abortion rights." -By Donna Cassata
-AP via -ABCNEWS.com
Religion- 
Christmas
- History
- "Christmas
and Hanukkah have fallen on the same day only 4 times in the past 100 years."
... "When traditions overlap Interfaith families face the dilemma of how
to celebrate with respect, understanding." ... "For this first time since
1959, Christmas and the first night of Hanukkah fall on the same day."
... "The number of families trying to respect two religions is growing.
According to the National Jewish Population Survey 2000-01, 47 percent
of Jews who wed since 1996 have married people of other faiths." -By
Barbara Karkabi -HoustonChronicle.com
Government
- 
Political
- Intelligence
- Privacy
- Law
- History-
"Limits
to power: Restrictions on domestic spying were put
in place for a reason." ... "It's an old argument. Back during the Vietnam
War, government photographers went to the anti-war demonstrations and took
pictures of the demonstrators. Protest leaders thought, probably correctly,
that their phones were tapped. Even I, a reporter covering the protests,
heard some odd clicking noises when I picked up the phone to make some
calls. And, of course, FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover, who made his own laws,
eavesdropped on Martin Luther King Jr., among others, though we didn't
know it at the time." ... "Outside the law? John Mitchell, who was President
Richard Nixon's Attorney General, argued that the government didn't need
a warrant to tap the phone of any political dissenter it thought was a
threat to national security, which certainly does sound like the secret
police at work. But in 1972, the Supreme Court ruled 9-0 that Mitchell
was wrong. Justice Lewis Powell, a Nixon appointee, wrote for the unanimous
court that the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution protects Americans
from "unreasonable searches and seizures" and that that freedom "cannot
be properly guaranteed if domestic security surveillances are conducted
solely at the discretion of the executive branch."" ... "President Bush
obviously thinks the court was wrong, since he ordered the National Security
Agency (NSA) in 2002 to begin eavesdropping on American citizens without
a court-issued warrant." -By Bruce Morton
-CNN
Iran
- Entertainment
- 
TV
- 
Radio
- 
Music
- Religious
- Law
- History
- "Iran's
president bans all Western music." ... "Hard-line
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has banned all Western music from Iran's
state radio and TV stations — an eerie reminder of the 1979 Islamic revolution
when popular music was outlawed as "un-Islamic" under Ayatollah Ruhollah
Khomeini." ... "But as revolutionary fervor started to fade, some light
classical music was allowed on Iranian radio and television; some public
concerts reappeared in the late 1980s." ... "In the 1990s, particularly
during the presidency of reformist Mohammad Khatami starting in 1997, authorities
began relaxing restrictions further." ... "Ahmadinejad's order means the
state broadcasting authority must execute the decree and prepare a report
on its implementation within six months, according to the IRAN Persian
daily." -AP
via -USATODAY
Turkey
- 
Military
- Law
- 
Authors
- History
- 
Media
- TV
- Censorship
- "'Terrorised'
writers lament state's assault on free speech: Trial
of Turkey's greatest living author is focusing attention on attempts to
control public opinion." ... "Ertugrul Kurkcu has been hauled before the
judges for saying the wrong thing so many times that he has almost lost
count. "Six or seven trials, always acquitted, but I did get a 10-month
jail sentence from a military court for translating a Human Rights Watch
report," says the veteran leftwing Turkish dissident." ... "He took one
case to the European Court of Human Rights last year. The case was annulled
and the Turkish government paid him €5,000 compensation." ... "Mr
Kurkcu's problem is that he keeps colliding with the country's notion of
"Turkishness", and that spells danger for writers, historians and novelists,
who bring the wrath of the establishment down on their heads every time
they are deemed to have belittled it." ... "A raft of other regulations
make it possible for Turkey to muzzle, fine and pressure the publishing
industry, newspapers and television stations for stepping out of line.
Censorship flourishes, too, through requirements that manuscripts be submitted
to state authorities for approval and special licensing arrangements that
oblige the books industry to get official stamps before a book can be published."
-By Ian Traynor -Guardian.co.uk
Turkey
- Law
- 
People
- History
- "Turk
writer's insult trial halted: The trial of Turkish
novelist Orhan Pamuk, accused of insulting his nation, has been halted
on its first day." ... "An Istanbul judge said the case needed approval
by the ministry of justice." ... "The ministry's permission is being sought
because of a dispute over whether Mr Pamuk is to be tried under Turkey's
old penal code or a recent, revised version." ... "The charges relate to
a magazine interview earlier this year in which Orhan Pamuk said: "One
million Armenians and 30,000 Kurds were killed in these lands and nobody
but me dares talk about it."" ... "Turkey maintains the deaths of Armenians
in conflicts accompanying the collapse of the Ottoman empire in the early
20th Century were not part of a genocidal campaign, arguing that many ethnic
Turks were also killed in that period." ... "Turkey also denies its efforts
to contain a separatist uprising in its Kurdish community in the 1980s
and 1990s can be classed as genocide."-BBC
/News
Secret
- Government
- Military
- Terrorism
- EMail
- Telecommunications
- Law
- Politics
- History
- "Bush
Authorized Domestic Spying: Post-9/11 Order Bypassed
Special Court." ... "President Bush signed a secret order in 2002 authorizing
the National Security Agency to eavesdrop on U.S. citizens and foreign
nationals in the United States, despite previous legal prohibitions against
such domestic spying, sources with knowledge of the program said last night."
... "For more than four years, the NSA tasked other military intelligence
agencies to assist its broad-based surveillance effort directed at people
inside the country suspected of having terrorist connections, even before
Bush signed the 2002 order that authorized the NSA program, according to
an informed U.S. official." ... "The effort, which began within days after
the attacks, has consisted partly of monitoring domestic telephone conversations,
e-mail and even fax communications of individuals identified by the NSA
as having some connection to al Qaeda events or figures, or to potential
terrorism-related activities in the United States, the official said."
... "It has also involved teams of Defense Intelligence Agency personnel
stationed in major U.S. cities conducting the type of surveillance typically
performed by the FBI: monitoring the movements and activities -- through
high-tech equipment -- of individuals and vehicles, the official said."
-By Dan Eggen with contributions by Dafna Linzer and
Peter Baker -WashingtonPost
EU
- Turkey
- Author
- Law
- History
- "Turkey,
not author, on trial, EU exec says: Many see test
of free speech in Istanbul today." ... "Orhan Pamuk, 53, was expected to
appear in court in the Istanbul district of Sisli, charged with "public
denigration of Turkish identity." The charge stems from an interview he
gave to a Swiss magazine in February in which he said that "30,000 Kurds
and 1 million Armenians were killed in these lands and nobody but me dares
talk about it."" ... "Pamuk, a prolific writer who has been compared to
James Joyce and Salman Rushdie, was referring to two of the most profound
issues in modern Turkey: The brutal repression of Kurdish separatists throughout
the past two decades and the genocide campaign perpetrated by Ottoman Turkish
forces from 1915 to 1918 that claimed the lives of about 1.2 million of
the collapsing empire's Armenian subjects." -By Amberin
Zaman -LAtimes
via -HoustonChronicle.com
Iran
- 
US
- 
Alaska
- 
Canada
- 
Germany
- History-
"Iranian
leader: Holocaust a 'myth'." ... "Iranian President
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has described the Holocaust as "a myth" and suggested
that Israel be moved to Europe, the United States, Canada or Alaska." ...
"Ahmadinejad sparked widespread international condemnation in October when
he called for Israel to be "wiped off the map."" ... "Last week, he also
expressed doubt about the killing by the Nazis of six million Jews during
World War II, but Wednesday was the first occasion when he said in public
that the Holocaust was a myth." ... "In Berlin, German Foreign Minister
Frank-Walter Steinmeier said his government had summoned the Iranian charge
d'affaires to make "unmistakably clear" its displeasure, The Associated
Press said." -CNN
California
- Los
Angeles - History
- Politics
- "Stanley
Tookie Williams executed: Crips gang co-founder put
to death for 4 murders." ... "Stanley Tookie Williams -- the cofounder
of the violent Crips street gang who became an anti-gang crusader while
on death-row -- died by lethal injection early Tuesday for the 1979 killings
of four people in two Los Angles [California] robberies." ... "Williams'
case set off intense debates over the death penalty and redemption, with
celebrities, activists and anti-death penalty advocates saying his initiatives
and anti-gang message from behind bars had proven his life was worth saving.
He had even been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize and the Nobel Prize
in Literature by an array of college professors, a Swiss lawmaker and others."
... "Before Williams went to the execution chamber, the stepmother of one
of the men Williams was convicted of killing said she felt "justice is
going to be done tonight."" ... "[...] Sister Helen Prejean, a Roman Catholic
nun and a prominent death penalty opponent, compared the death penalty
to "gang justice."" ... ""Gang justice is, if you kill a member of our
gang, we kill you -- and don't tell me anything about how you changed your
life or what you're going to do," she said. "You kill, and we kill you.
And that's what the United States of America is doing with this."" -With
contributions by Ted Rowlands, Kareen Wynter, and Bill Mears
-CNN
US
Immigration - History
- Legal
- "Study:
Immigration grows, reaching record numbers." ...
"Despite tougher border scrutiny after 9/11, a total of 7.9 million immigrants
have come to the USA since 2000, more than in any other five-year period
in the nation's history, figures released Monday show." ... "Almost half,
or 3.7 million, entered illegally, according to an analysis of Census data
by the Center for Immigration Studies, a Washington, D.C., group that advocates
controlling the flow of legal and illegal immigrants." ... "An estimated
11 million immigrants live illegally in the USA." -By
Haya El Nasser and Kathy Kiely -USATODAY
California
- Los
Angeles - Law
- History
- "Gov.
Schwarzenegger Denies Clemency for Crips Co-Founder."
... "Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger announced today that he would not grant
clemency to Stanley Tookie Williams, whose bid to avoid being put to death
shortly after midnight tonight has gained wide attention." ... "Governor
Schwarzenegger's decision not to halt Mr. Williams' execution by injection
at 12:01 a.m. Tuesday is his third rejection of a petition for a stay of
execution or clemency since he took office in 2003. Clemency has not been
granted to a death row inmate in California since 1967." ... "Mr. Williams,
51, is the co-founder of the Crips gang of Los Angeles and has been on
death row since 1981, following his conviction for murdering four people
in 1979." -By Sarah Kershaw and Shadi Rahimi .NYTimes
UK
- Auto
- Transportation
- "End
of the road for the traditional London bus." ...
"The "London bus" - the iconic, ever-popular double-decker with its half-cab,
old-fashioned bell, conductor and open rear platform, the star of postcards,
guide book covers and film - will run for the last time today on a mainstream
route." ... "When the number 159 rolls into Brixton garage in south London,
an era will have ended for the Routemaster, as it is known. It also marks
the end of the road for the bus conductor in London." -By
Simon Briscoe -FT.com
Iran
- 
Israel
- 
Saudi
Arabia - Britain
- Germany
- History
- "Iran's
Ahmadinejad casts doubt on Holocaust." ... "Iranian
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Thursday expressed doubt the Holocaust
took place and suggested the Jewish state of Israel be moved to Europe."
... "His comments, reported by Iran's official IRNA news agency from a
news conference he gave in the Saudi Arabian city of Mecca, follow his
call in October for Israel to be "wiped off the map", which sparked widespread
international outrage." ... "The latest comments also provoked quick condemnation.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel called them "totally unacceptable" and
British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said "I condemn them unreservedly.
They have no place in civilised political debate."" -By
Paul Hughes with contributions by Jeffrey Heller -Reuters.co.uk
Iran
- Israel
- Saudi
Arabia - Palestine
- Germany
- 
Austria
- Military
- History
- "Update
2: Iranian President: Move Israel to Europe." ...
"Iran's hard-liner president, who has called for Israel's destruction,
said Thursday that the Jewish state should be moved to Europe if the West
wants to make up for the Holocaust." ... "Speaking to reporters at an Islamic
summit in the Muslim holy city of Mecca [Saudi Arabia], Iranian President
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad implied that European countries backed the founding
of Israel in the Middle East in 1948 out of guilt over the Holocaust."
... ""Some European countries insist on saying that during World War II,
Hitler burned millions of Jews and put them in concentration camps," Ahmadinejad
said. "Any historian, commentator or scientist who doubts that is taken
to prison or gets condemned."" ... ""Let's give some land to the Zionists
in Europe or in Germany or Austria, so they can have their government there,"
he said. "They faced injustice in Europe, so why do the repercussions fall
on the Palestinians? Offer a piece of land from Europe, and we will back
this decision and will not attack this government.""
-AP via -Forbes
Israel
- 
World
- Law
- History
- "Crystal
joins Cross and Crescent: A diamond-shaped red crystal
on a white background is to join the Red Cross and the Red Crescent as
an emblem for ambulances and relief workers." ... "Geneva Convention member
states voted by a two-thirds majority for the symbol which ends a decades-old
row and opens the way for Israel to join." ... "Israel had been denied
entry because its Red Shield was not approved." ... "Relief workers and
ambulances bearing the Red Cross or Red Crescent symbols are protected
under international law." ... "The Red Shield of David - or Magen David
Adom - was not recognised by the 1949 Geneva Conventions, and Arab states
had blocked attempts to find an alternative symbol."-BBC
/News
Iraq
- Political
- History
- "Hussein
faces victims amid shouts, chaos: As trial's first
witnesses take the stand, ex-Iraqi leader 'not afraid to be executed'."
... "The first witnesses took the stand Monday in Saddam Hussein's trial
and gave gripping accounts of torture and mass executions as the defiant
ex-president and other defendants tried to intimidate those testifying."
... "The outbursts punctuated an extraordinary eight-hour session in which
Hussein faced victims of his government's massacres in court for the first
time. The first witness, Ahmad Hassan Muhammad, 38, riveted the courtroom
with the scenes of torture he had witnessed after his arrest in 1982, including
seeing a machine that "looked like a grinder" with hair and blood beneath
it." ... "Standing 10 feet from Hussein, he described Baath Party officials
hurling a young boy out a window to his death. At one point, Muhammad briefly
broke down in tears as he recalled how his brother was tortured with electrical
shocks in front of their 77-year-old father." ... ""There were mass arrests
of men and women and children," Muhammad said. "Even if a child was 1 day
old, they used to tell his parents, 'Bring him with you.' "" -By
Robert F. Worth -NYTimesvia
SFGate.com
Iraq
- Political
- History
- "Accounts
of Brutality Roil Hussein Trial: The deposed leader
is confronted by witnesses who tell of torture and attacks on their village.
He threatens and spars with them and the judge." ... "The first witnesses
to take the stand against Saddam Hussein confronted him Monday with chilling
testimony about an aerial assault on their village, mass arrests, torture
by electric shock, and executions after the Iraqi leader survived an assassination
attempt there." ... "Two witnesses, men now in their 30s, stood glaring
at the deposed leader a few feet away as each outlined his memory of the
horrors suffered in their youth. Hussein and some of his seven co-defendants
being tried in the slayings of 146 villagers repeatedly disrupted the proceedings
and furiously disparaged the charges." ... "Hussein and his co-defendants
are accused of ordering or carrying out the roundup, interrogation and
torture of about 1,500 villagers in Dujayl after a small group of gunmen
opened fire on the presidential motorcade July 8, 1982. They are also charged
with criminal destruction of tens of thousands of acres of village land."
(1, 2)
-By Richard Boudreaux with contributions by Borzou
Daragahi -LAtimes
Christmas
- 
Family
- Religious
- TV
- Entertainment
- Business
- History
- "The
Christmas classic that almost wasn't." ... "When
CBS bigwigs saw a rough cut of A Charlie Brown Christmas in November
1965, they hated it." ... ""They said it was slow," executive producer
Lee Mendelson remembers with a laugh. There were concerns that the show
was almost defiantly different: There was no laugh track, real children
provided the voices, and there was a swinging score by jazz pianist Vince
Guaraldi." ... "Mendelson and animator Bill Melendez fretted about the
insistence by Peanuts creator Charles Schulz that his first-ever
TV spinoff end with a reading of the Christmas story from the Gospel of
Luke by a lisping little boy named Linus." ... "The first broadcast was
watched by almost 50% of the nation's viewers." ... "And when the program
airs today at 8 p.m. ET on ABC, it will mark its 40th anniversary — a run
that has made it a staple of family holiday traditions and an icon of American
pop culture. The show won an Emmy and a Peabody award and began a string
of more than two dozen Peanuts specials." -By Bill
Nichols -USATODAY
UK
- Christmas
- Business
- "One
of first Christmas cards is sold at auction." ...
"A 162-year-old Christmas card — one of the first ever printed — sold at
auction Saturday for $16,000." ... "The hand-colored card, which shows
a family celebrating around a table, is one of about 10 surviving from
an original batch of 1,000 printed in 1843, auctioneer Henry Aldridge said."
... "The cards were commissioned by Sir Henry Cole, a Londoner who is generally
recognized as the inventor of the commercial Christmas card. "
-AP via -USATODAY
US
- 
North
Carolina - Legal
- History
- World
- "N.
Carolina carries out 1,000th execution." ... "Double
murderer Kenneth Lee Boyd became the 1,000th prisoner executed in the United
States since the reinstatement of capital punishment when he was put to
death by lethal injection on Friday." ... "Boyd, who was 57, died at 2:15
a.m. (0715 GMT) at Central Prison in North Carolina's state capital, Raleigh,
spokeswoman Pamela Walker of the Department of Corrections said." ... "Boyd,
a Vietnam war veteran with a history of alcohol abuse, was sentenced to
death for the murder in 1988 of his wife and father-in-law committed in
front of two of his children." ... "His execution drew world attention
because of its symbolism since the U.S. Supreme Court allowed the death
penalty to be brought back in 1976 after a nine-year unofficial moratorium."
(1, 2,
3)
-By Andy Sullivan -Reuters
Samuel
Alito
- Abortion
- Politics
- 
Pennsylvania
- History
- "Alito's
role in trying to overturn Roe v. Wade detailed in papers."
... "As a Justice Department lawyer in the Reagan administration, Supreme
Court nominee Samuel Alito helped devise a legal strategy to persuade the
high court to restrict and eventually overturn Roe v. Wade, the historic
decision legalizing abortion." ... "In a memo disclosed Wednesday that
he wrote in 1985 as an assistant to the solicitor general, Alito recommended
that the administration submit a brief to the Supreme Court, asking it
to uphold a Pennsylvania law that imposed a variety of abortion restrictions
and "make clear that we disagree with Roe v. Wade."" ... "Alito argued
that stepping into the case, Thornburgh v. American College of Obstetricians
and Gynecologists, would be a more effective strategy for President Reagan
than a "frontal assault" on the landmark case and would not "even tacitly
concede Roe's legitimacy." Disagreeing with the administration's position,
the court struck down the law the following year." -By
Amy Goldstein and Jo Becker-WashingtonPost
via -SeattleTimes.NWsource
Australia
- US
- Business
- 
Home
- Health
- History
- "James
Hardie to Sign Asbestos Compensation Deal Today (Update3)."
... "James Hardie Industries NV, whose top executives quit last year amid
an asbestos probe, will today sign a A$1.6 billion ($1.2 billion) agreement
to compensate Australians sickened by its products." ... "James Hardie
is the biggest seller of home siding in the U.S., where it gets 80 percent
of its profit. In February, the company said it doesn't expect a significant
number of compensation claims in the U.S., where its subsidiaries never
used the asbestos." ... "James Hardie started using asbestos in Australia
in the 1920s. It began to phase out blue asbestos in 1968, and all products
were asbestos-free by 1986. The fibrous mineral has been linked to lung
cancer and mesothelioma, a form of cancer affecting the chest or abdomen."
-By Miriam Steffens -Bloomberg
World
- People
- Parents
-History
- "World
AIDS Day Observances." ... "World AIDS Day is being
marked by events around the globe taking note of the millions who've died
from the disease and highlighting campaigns to control it." ... "As of
this 18th World AIDS Day the global AIDS epidemic has killed 25 million
people. Last year saw 3.1 million AIDS deaths." ... "New HIV infections
have surged to a record high: an estimated 40,300,000 people." ... "An
estimated 2.2 million of those infected are children, according to the
United Nations, which is marking World AIDS Day with a new campaign to
fight the disease in children." (1, 2)
-AP -CBSNews
Science
- History
- "Busiest
Hurricane Season on Record Ends." ... "The busiest
hurricane season on record ends today with 26 named storms, including a
tropical system that formed on Tuesday over the central Atlantic." ...
"At 4 p.m. Eastern time, the center of Tropical Storm Epsilon was about
650 miles southeast of Bermuda and turning slightly south at a rate of
7 miles per hour." ... ""This hurricane season shattered records that have
stood for decades-most named storms, most hurricanes and most Category
5 storms," the undersecretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere, retired
Vice Adm. Conrad C. Lautenbacher Jr., said in a statement issued by the
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. "Arguably, it was the
most devastating hurricane season the country has experienced in modern
times."" -By Jennifer Bayot
-NYTimes
Samuel
Alito
- Law
- History
- Pennsylvania
- "Alito
to face questioning on affirmative action, voting rights."
... "[Pennsylvania] Sen. Arlen Specter, serving notice that he intends
to take up contentious issues raised in years-old writings by Judge Samuel
A. Alito Jr., asked the Supreme Court nominee Wednesday to be prepared
to clarify his views on affirmative action and voting rights." ... "In
a 1985 memo Alito wrote while seeking a promotion in the Reagan administration's
Justice Department, he said he disagreed with Supreme Court reapportionment
decisions in the 1960s that enforced the doctrine of "one person, one vote.""
... "Specter also noted that the case that established "one person, one
vote" had been "instrumental to ensuring that all people's votes are weighted
equally in our representative democracy."" -By Steve
Goldstein -KnightRidder
via -MercuryNews
Canada
- History
- "Defeated
Canadian PM sets election date." ... "Prime Minister
Paul Martin launched an election campaign on Tuesday with a slim lead in
the polls after his minority government was toppled in Parliament on Monday
night over a corruption scandal." ... "Martin informed Governor-General
Michaelle Jean, representative of head of state Queen Elizabeth, that his
Liberal government had lost the confidence of Parliament and emerged from
her official residence to announce the election would be on January 23."
... "The Liberals, who have governed a majority of the time since Canada
was founded in 1867, will be seeking their fifth straight term since the
Conservatives went down to defeat in 1993." (1, 2)
-By Randall Palmer and David Ljunggren -Reuters
Virginia
- Execution
- Law
- Politics
- North
Carolina - 
South
Carolina - "UPDATE
1-Virginia governor stops milestone U.S. execution."
... "Virginia Gov. Mark Warner halted the execution of a convicted murderer
who would have been the 1,000th person put to death in the United States
since the Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976, a spokesman
said on Tuesday." ... "Since the Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty
in 1976 and executions resumed in 1977, 999 people have been executed in
the United States. North Carolina and South Carolina have scheduled executions
later in the week." -By Andy Sullivan
-Reuters
Virginia
- History
- "McDonnell
Wins Va. Vote, Pending Recount." ... "The closest
statewide election in modern Virginia history headed for a recount Monday
after Republican Bob McDonnell was certified as the winner of the attorney
general's race by 323 votes out of more than 1.9 million cast."
-AP via-WashingtonPost
Architecture
- Law
- "Piece
of Supreme Court building falls: Chunk of marble
falls onto where tourists normally enter; no one hurt." ... "A basketball-sized
piece of marble molding fell from the facade over the entrance to the Supreme
Court Monday, landing on the steps near visitors waiting to enter the building.
No one was hurt." ... "The chunk of Vermont marble was part of the dentil
molding that serves as a frame for nine sculptural figures completed in
1935. The piece that fell was over the figure of Authority, near the peak
of the building's pediment, and to the right of the figure of Liberty,
who has the scales of justice on her lap."
-AP via -MSNBC
World
- 
Climate
- 
Air
- 
Ice- Science- History
- "Greenhouse-gas
levels highest for 650,000 years: Climate record
highlights extent of man-made change." ... "Current levels of greenhouse
gases in the atmosphere are higher than at any time in the past 650,000
years, say researchers who have finished cataloguing air bubbles trapped
for millennia inside Antarctic ice. The record, which extends back over
the past eight ice ages, shows that today's concentrations of carbon dioxide
and methane far outstrip those in the past." ... "The researchers studied
air bubbles preserved in ice drilled from the Antarctic ice sheet as part
of the European Project for Ice Coring in Antarctica (EPICA). The ice core
represents a logbook of the state of the world's climate [...] and goes
back 210,000 years further than previous records." -By
Michael Hopkin -Nature
Iraq
- 
Oil
- Business
- 
UN
- Legal
- History-
"Scope
of oil-for-food fraud 'overwhelming'." ... "It began
with the best of intentions and achieved its major goals: feeding the Iraqi
people while keeping dangerous weapons out of Saddam Hussein's hands."
... "Along the way, the United Nations' oil-for-food program metastasized
into the worst corruption scandal in U.N. history." ... "Three weeks after
a scathing report detailed the scope of the fraud — implicating governments,
former diplomats, businessmen and corporations — a relatively small number
of criminal investigations and other probes have begun." -By
Barbara Slavin -USATODAY
Samuel
Alito
- Women's
- Abortion
- Health
- History
- Politics
- Pennsylvania
- 
Illinois
- "A
coauthor says Alito was instrumental in Roe v. Wade brief."
... "Samuel A. Alito Jr. played a major role in constructing the Reagan
administration's 1985 brief that argued for overturning the Supreme Court
decision legalizing abortion, according to one of the coauthors." ... "Albert
Lauber, who served with Alito in the solicitor general's office, said Alito
had been instrumental in drafting arguments for why the court should uphold
laws in Pennsylvania and Illinois, which imposed numerous restrictions
on abortions." ... "''Sam did make a major contribution to a brief which
did argue, among other things, that Roe should be overruled," Lauber said.
''He just didn't write that specific part of the argument."" ... "The Supreme
Court struck down some of the abortion restrictions, saying in the 5-4
decision, ''the States are not free, under the guise of protecting maternal
health or potential life, to intimidate women into continuing pregnancies.""
-By Michael Kranish
-Boston/Globe
Political
- Government
- Radio
- TV
- Media
- Editorial
- Money
- History
- "Report:
Former CPB chair violated law: Is accused of trying
to turn public radio, TV into GOP mouthpiece." .. "The former chairman
of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting broke federal law by interfering
with PBS programming and appearing to use political tests in hiring the
corporation's new president, internal investigators said Tuesday."
.. "The corporation - which funnels hundreds of millions of federal dollars
to National Public Radio, the Public Broadcasting Service and noncommercial
radio and television stations - was created by Congress in the late 1960s
to shield public broadcasting from political influence." .. "Specifically,
the report said [Republican Kenneth Y.] Tomlinson violated the Public Broadcasting
Act of 1967 and ethical standards by dealing directly with one of the creators
of the conservative-leaning "Journal Editorial Report," hosted by the editor
of The Wall Street Journal editorial page."
-AP via -MSNBC
US
- Iraq
- 
Vietnam
- Military
- Political
- History
- "Poll:
American attitudes on Iraq similar to Vietnam era."
... "There are enormous differences between the war in Iraq and the one
in Vietnam that defined a generation. The current conflict hasn't lasted
as long, taken nearly as many American lives or sparked the sort of massive
protests that became common in the '60s and '70s." ... "But when it comes
to public opinion, Americans' attitudes toward Iraq and the proper course
ahead are remarkably similar to public attitudes toward Vietnam in the
summer of 1970, a pivotal year in that conflict and a time of enormous
domestic unrest." ... "Some political scientists and Vietnam War historians
predict the Iraq war, like the one in Southeast Asia a quarter-century
ago, will shape American attitudes long after it's over." -By
Susan Page with contributions by Andrea Stone
-USATODAY
Samuel
Alito
- Abortion
- Politics
- History
-"Alito
earlier opposed abortion." ... "U.S. Supreme Court
nominee Samuel Alito wrote 20 years ago as a lawyer in the Reagan administration
"that the Constitution does not protect the right to an abortion," The
Washington Times reported on Monday." ... "According to The Washington
Times, Alito wrote in the 1985 memo, a job application, to then Attorney
General Edwin Meese: "It has been an honor and source of personal satisfaction
for me to serve in the office of the Solicitor General during President
Reagan's administration and to help advance legal positions which I personally
believe in very strongly."" ... ""I am particularly proud of my contributions
in recent cases in which the government has argued in the Supreme Court
that racial and ethnic quotas should not be allowed and that the Constitution
does not protect a right to an abortion," added Alito, who got the new
job as a deputy to Meese." -By Thomas Ferraro
-Reuters via
-BostonGlobe
Liberia- 
Uganda
- Political
- History
- "Blazing
a trail for Africa's women: African women are celebrating,
as Liberia's Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf looks set to become the continent's
first elected woman president." ... "The 67-year-old grandmother said she
hoped her win would "raise the participation of women not just in Liberia
but also in Africa"." ... "So is Mrs Johnson-Sirleaf's apparent victory
the start of a trend?" ... "Ugandan academic Sylvia Tamale says African
patriarchal societies like to see women firmly in their place. She quotes
a Ugandan man at a woman candidate's parliamentary campaign rally in 1996
asking: "Have you ever heard a hen crow?"" ... "Yet, despite these traditional
values, African women can crow success on a number of fronts." -By
Lucy Fleming-BBC
/