Washington, DC, Jun. 13 (UPI) — Insider notes from United Press International for June 8

A former Bush team member during his first administration is now voicing serious doubts about the collapse of the World Trade Center on 9-11. Former chief economist for the Department of Labor during President George W. Bush’s first term Morgan Reynolds comments that the official story about the collapse of the WTC is “bogus” and that it is more likely that a controlled demolition destroyed the Twin Towers and adjacent Building No. 7. Reynolds, who also served as director of the Criminal Justice Center at the National Center for Policy Analysis in Dallas and is now professor emeritus at Texas A&M University said, “If demolition destroyed three steel skyscrapers at the World Trade Center on 9/11, then the case for an ‘inside job’ and a government attack on America would be compelling.” Reynolds commented from his Texas A&M office, “It is hard to exaggerate the importance of a scientific debate over the cause of the collapse of the twin towers and building 7. If the official wisdom on the collapses is wrong, as I believe it is, then policy based on such erroneous engineering analysis is not likely to be correct either. The government’s collapse theory is highly vulnerable on its own terms. Only professional demolition appears to account for the full range of facts associated with the collapse of the three buildings.”

Two years after President George W. Bush proclaimed “mission accomplished” in Iraq, some thoughtful officers are beginning to question who the insurgents actually are. In a recent interview the head of the US 42nd Infantry Division which covers key trouble spots, including Baquba and Samarra Major General Joseph Taluto said he could understand why some ordinary Iraqis would take up arms against U.S. forces because “they’re offended by our presence.” Taluto added, “If a good, honest person feels having all these Humvees driving on the road, having us moving people out of the way, having us patrol the streets, having car bombs going off, you can understand how they could (want to fight us). There is a sense of a good resistance, or an accepted resistance. They say ‘okay, if you shoot a coalition soldier, that’s okay, it’s not a bad thing but you shouldn’t kill other Iraqis.'” Taluto insisted however that the other foreign forces would not be driven out of Iraq by violence, observing, “If the goal is to have the coalition leave, attacking them isn’t the way,” he said. “The way to make it happen is to enter the political process cooperate and the coalition will be less aggressive and less visible and eventually it’ll go away.” Taluto’s comments are sure to raise hackles at the Pentagon, which insist that all insurgents are either Baathists or al-Qaida. Taluto observed that “99.9 per cent” of those captured fighting the U.S. were Iraqis.

Full: washingtontimes.com

All of this sudden candor from the extreme right-wing is FREAKING ME OUT.

RUSSIAN President Vladimir Putin sparked uproar yesterday by saying Africans had a history of CANNIBALISM.

He lashed out at the continent’s past after being challenged about his human rights’ record.

In an astonishing outburst, Mr Putin said: “We all know that African countries used to have a tradition of eating their own adversaries.

“We don’t have such a tradition or process or culture and I believe the comparison between Africa and Russia is not quite just.”

Tony Blair, who had just finished talks with Mr Putin, was left squirming with embarrassment as the former KGB boss let rip.

Minutes before the outburst, Mr Blair had hailed reaching a deal with the Russian leader on aid and debt relief for Africa.

But Mr Putin’s remarks about cannibalism will be greeted with astonishment in Africa and the wider world, as he will succeed the PM as G8 president next year.

Commission for Racial Equality chief Trevor Phillips said last night: “What a preposterous thing to say. He is at best insensitive and at worst a downright racist.”

Mr Putin had invited Mr Blair to his country residence for talks about the Prime Minister’s drive to wipe out third world poverty before next month’s G8 summit at Gleneagles.

The pair struck a deal after Mr Blair agreed to Mr Putin’s demands that aid was linked to Africa’s move towards democracy.

Earlier Mr Blair made a grovelling public apology for being the only senior world leader to miss a gathering to mark the 60th anniversary of the end of World War Two in Moscow last month.

He sent Deputy PM John Prescott instead.

Without prompting, Mr Blair said sorry yesterday and paid tribute to the “courage, dedication and heroism” of the Russian people.
Full: thesun.co.uk

It takes a racist to know one. Look at the Brits acting all superior while they have ‘raised’ racist discourse into a subtle art form. It was the indelicacy of Putin’s ‘astonishing [read crazy Russian] outburst’ that offended them.

The president of Gold Star Families for Peace, a mother who lost a son in Iraq, criticized the United States’ “illegal and unjust war” yesterday during an interfaith rally in Lexington.

Cindy Sheehan of Vacaville, Calif., accused President Bush of lying to the nation about a war which has consumed tens of billions of dollars and claimed more than 1,700 American lives — including the life of Army Specialist Casey Austin Sheehan.

Sheehan was one of more than a dozen activists who were scheduled to speak at yesterday’s anti-war rally at the Red Mile, which was organized by the Clergy and Laity Network and co-sponsored by dozens of liberal religious organizations.

Sheehan ridiculed Bush for saying that it’s “hard work” comforting the widow of a soldier who’s been killed in Iraq.

“Hard work is seeing your son’s murder on CNN one Sunday evening while you’re enjoying the last supper you’ll ever truly enjoy again. Hard work is having three military officers come to your house a few hours later to confirm the aforementioned murder of your son, your first-born, your kind and gentle sweet baby. Hard work is burying your child 46 days before his 25th birthday. Hard work is holding your other three children as they lower the body of their big (brother) into the ground. Hard work is not jumping in the grave with him and having the earth cover you both,” she said.
Full: www.kentucky.com

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israel is trying to defuse a festering dispute over longstanding U.S. opposition to its arms sales to China and faces new U.S. demands for closer oversight of weapons deals with India, Israeli officials said on Tuesday.

The affair has strained security ties between Israel and the United States, its main ally and provider of about $2 billion in annual defense aid, at a time when it seeks U.S. assistance to help implement its planned withdrawal from Gaza this August.

“There is a crisis that has been going on for almost a year,” Yuval Steinitz, head of the parliamentary Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, told Israel Radio.

Israel’s Haaretz daily reported the United States recently suspended several weapons and technology projects with Israel, moves which the newspaper said deepened the dispute that erupted last year over Israeli-supplied Harpy attack drones to China.

Israeli defense officials denied the report but said that Washington, seeking better supervision of Israeli arms sales to countries the United States deems problematic, now wants Israel to obtain advance approval for any weapons deals with India.
Full: washingtonpost.com

I always figure that when it comes to arms sales, Israel is doing proxy work for the US

No one needs to tell Sofia Campos what hard work is all about. Since coming to New York City from Mexico in 1993, she has been employed at a succession of the low wage jobs that newly arrived immigrants often fill. But nothing prepared Sofia for her experience working at a small chain store in the Bushwick section of Brooklyn.

“I worked from 9 a.m. until 7:30 at night, six days a week,” Sofia said.

“I earned $240 per week, but I would have been earning $358 if I had been paid the minimum wage,” she added, noting that several of her co-workers were also underpaid.

Sofia’s story is not unfamiliar to the workers at the 175 stores that line this busy section of Knickerbocker Avenue. Like her, many come to Bushwick from the Caribbean or Latin America and find work at retailers who deny them wages they are legally entitled to.

Luckily, Sofia reached out to Make the Road by Walking, a Bushwick-based community organization. Together, they launched a consumer boycott that eventually forced the employer to pay Sofia and her coworkers the $65,000 they were entitled to.

Working with New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, the activists forced another merchant to pay more than $27,000 to four employees who had each been paid only $320 after putting in 72 hour work weeks.

Has it always been this way in Bushwick? Hardly. From the 1950s through the early 1970s, most of the stores on Knickerbocker Avenue were “mom and pop” operations whose owners often lived in the community they served. Most importantly, employees at more than half of the stores on Knickerbocker Avenue were protected by union contracts. They not only earned more than the minimum wage, they also received health insurance and other needed benefits. To retain good workers, many non-union businesses felt obliged to follow suit.

However, the mom and pop retailers have since been replaced by small, non-union chain stores. Instead of treating employees as a valuable asset, these businesses often regard them as expenses to be cut.

What is happening on Knickerbocker Avenue is not unique to Bushwick, either. A 2003 study for the Economic Policy Institute by Dr. Moshe Adler of Columbia University found that the wages and benefits of New York’s retail workers are so meager that taxpayers spend $1.1 billion annually to provide the health insurance, rent subsidies and other assistance they and their families need to survive. In other words, retailers are nickel and diming workers and New York taxpayers are getting stuck with the tab.

americanprogress.org

President Bush, meeting in Washington with the leaders of five African nations, said today that democratic reforms and free trade were the best ways to help poor nations.

Mr. Bush’s remarks follow an announcement on Saturday that the world’s wealthiest nations would cancel at least $40 billion of debt owed to international agencies by the world’s poorest countries, most of them in Africa.

The Group of 8 – the United States, Britain, Germany, France, Italy, Canada, Japan and Russia – agreed that the best solution to poor countries’ indebtedness was to cancel their debt burden completely rather than easing it by taking over interest repayments. But in his remarks today, made as he stood alongside the presidents of Botswana, Ghana, Mozambique, Namibia and Niger, Mr. Bush also seemed to be saying that economic stability and growth had to go hand in hand with political reforms.

“All the presidents gathered here represent countries that have held democratic elections in the last year,” Mr. Bush said. “What a strong statement that these leaders have made about democracy and the importance of democracy on the continent of Africa.

“All of us share a fundamental commitment to advancing democracy and opportunity on the continent of Africa, and all of us believe that one of the most effective ways to advance democracy and deliver hope to the people of Africa is through mutually beneficial trade,” he said.

Mr. Bush devoted most of his remarks during his appearance at the Executive Office Building, next to the White House, to hailing the successes of the African Growth and Opportunity Act that was approved by Congress in 2000.

The act reduced or eliminated tariffs and quotas on more than 1,800 items from some African countries, and Mr. Bush said today that exports from those nations to the United States were up 88 percent over the year before. The agreement requires participating countries to show that they are making progress toward a market-based economy, the protection of workers’ rights and policies that will reduce poverty.

“We have opened our markets, and people are now making goods that the United States consumers want to buy,” Mr. Bush said. “And that’s helpful. That’s how you spread wealth. That’s how you encourage hope and opportunity.”

He said that over the same period, United States exports to sub-Saharan Africa were up by 25 percent.

“In other words, this is a two-way street,” he said. “Not only have folks in Africa benefited by selling products in the United States, American businesses, small and large, have benefited through the opening of the African market as well.”

Mr. Bush said that the agreement announced on Saturday would benefit nations “that have put themselves on the path to reform.”

“We believe that by removing a crippling debt burden, we’ll help millions of Africans improve their lives and grow their economies,” he said.

Mr. Bush also emphasized that the United States was committed to helping fight the spread of HIV and AIDS, and said that the United States was well on its way to reaching a five-year goal of providing treatment to nearly two million Africans.

“These are just some of the initiatives that we’re pursuing to help Africa’s leaders bring democracy and prosperity and hope to their people,” Mr. Bush said.
Full: nytimes.com

The only thing they ‘bring’ is the worst sort of hypocrisy.

UNITED NATIONS, June 12 – A Congressionally mandated panel will report this week that the United Nations suffers from poor management, “dismal” staff morale and lack of accountability and professional ethics but will acknowledge the broad changes proposed for the organization by Secretary General Kofi Annan and urge the United States to support them.
Full: nytimes.com

Talk about the pot calling the kettle black.
(more…)

MAHMUDIYA, Iraq – A small but telling test of Iraq’s fledgling army came recently in this troubled farm town south of Baghdad, when a group of Iraqi soldiers, ending a house raid and rushing to board pickups they use as troop carriers, abandoned the blindfolded, handcuffed man they had come to arrest.

A mission by new Iraqi troops at Mahmudiya was rated a limited success. More Photos >
“They left the detainee,” an astonished American soldier said, spotting the man squatting in the dust along a residential street. “They just left him there. Sweet.”

The Iraqi troops were on their seventh house raid of the morning, part of a cordon-and-search operation in an area of towns and farmland so dangerous that American soldiers call it the Triangle of Death. Prompted by the soldier, the Iraqis ran back for the detainee, and managed much of the rest of their mission effectively, rounding up 13 insurgent suspects in three hours without having to call for direct involvement of the watching American troops.

Such limited successes stand against a backdrop of American disappointment with many of the Iraqi units, whose effectiveness is crucial to a future American troop withdrawal.

Despite the Bush administration’s insistent optimism, Americans working with the Iraqis in the field believe that it could be several years, at least, before the new Iraqi forces will be ready to stand alone against the insurgents.
Full: nytimes.com

PALO ALTO, Calif. — Apple Computer Inc.’s CEO Steve Jobs told Stanford University graduates Sunday that dropping out of college was one of the best decisions he ever made because it forced him to be innovative _ even when it came to finding enough money for dinner.

In an unusually candid commencement speech, Jobs also told the almost 5,000 graduates that his bout with a rare form of pancreatic cancer reemphasized the need to live each day to the fullest.

“Your time is limited so don’t let it be wasted living someone else’s life,” Jobs said to a packed stadium of graduates, alumni and family.
Full:washingtonpost.com

In 1997, a new heart failure treatment called BiDil appeared dead on arrival. The Food and Drug Administration rejected the drug, saying that studies supporting it were inconclusive.

Then, proponents of BiDil refocused their strategy. This Thursday, eight years after the drug was rejected for use in the general public, an F.D.A. panel will consider whether BiDil should become the first drug intended for one racial group, in this case, African-Americans.

A study of 1,050 African-American heart failure patients showed that BiDil significantly reduced death and hospitalization, prompting the American Heart Association to call BiDil one of the top developments of 2004. BiDil increases levels of nitric oxide, which widens blood vessels.

The drug’s maker, NitroMed Inc., says its decision to test and market BiDil as a drug for African-Americans is based on solid science. But BiDil’s application has engendered controversy, with many scientists convinced that race is too broad and ill-defined a category to be relevant in determining a drug’s approval, especially since geneticists have failed to identify a biological divide separating one race from another.
Full: nytimes.com