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TOP STORIES
4
Years After Hussein's Fall, Regret in Iraq
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/08/AR2007040801058.html
"We got rid of a
tyrant and tyranny. But we were surprised that after one thief had left,
another 40 replaced him," said Jubouri, who is a Shiite Muslim. "Now,
we regret that Saddam Hussein is gone, no matter how much we hated him."
His faith in the United States has also vanished, he said. But he still has a
passion for one thing uniquely American: the Harley-Davidson. On the wall of
his cluttered office, next to medals he won as a champion weightlifter, hangs a
tapestry emblazoned with an American flag, a bald eagle, a Harley and the
words: "Born in the USA." On most days, however, he cannot afford to
buy gas for his own Harley, a 1982 Fat Boy. His country today is politically
fractured and struggling to find direction. He has seen four Iraqi governments
since the fall of Hussein. Tens of thousands of Iraqis have died. At least
3,260 U.S. soldiers have been killed. But the numbers that most directly affect
Jubouri are these: Seven of his relatives and friends have been killed,
kidnapped or driven from their homes. He gets four hours of electricity a day,
if he's lucky. The cost of cooking gas and fuel have soared, but his income is
a quarter of what he used to earn.
RELATED: Rally Marks Anniversary of Baghdad's Fall
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/09/AR2007040900062.html
RELATED: Iraqis
Protest U.S. Occupation of Iraq
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/09/world/middleeast/09cnd-iraq.html?hp
With
rise in desertions, Army cracks down
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2007/04/09/with_rise_in_desertions_army_cracks_down/
Army prosecutions of
desertion and other unauthorized absences have risen sharply in the last four
years, resulting in thousands more negative discharges and prison time for both
junior soldiers and combat-tested veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan,
Army records show. The increase in prosecutions is meant to serve as a
deterrent to a growing number of soldiers who are ambivalent about heading --
or heading back -- to Iraq and might be looking for a way out, several Army
lawyers said. Using courts-martial for these violations, which before 2002 were
treated mostly as unpunished nuisances, is a sign that active-duty forces are
being stretched to their limits, said military lawyers and mental health
specialists.
RELATEDL: Recruiting can lead to payouts
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2007-04-07-cash-for-recruits_N.htm
Counselor
To Gonzales Announces Resignation
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/06/AR2007040600512.html
The senior counselor
to Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales submitted her resignation yesterday,
becoming the third high-ranking Justice Department aide to quit in the
aftermath of the firings of eight U.S. attorneys. The departure of Monica M.
Goodling, 33, comes two weeks after she first refused to answer questions from
Congress about the firings, invoking her Fifth Amendment right against
self-incrimination. Goodling's resignation also comes amid signs of sinking
morale in some U.S. attorney's offices. In Minneapolis, three top managers
staged a revolt Thursday, choosing to demote themselves rather than work for
the newly confirmed U.S. attorney there, who is a former Gonzales aide,
officials said. The department was so alarmed that it sent a Washington-based
Justice official to Minneapolis this week to try to talk the three out of their
plans, officials said.
RELATED: Attorney Inquiry Touches a Pillar of New Mexico
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/08/washington/08domenici.html
GOP-issued laptops now a White House
headache
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-na-laptops9apr09,0,4563806.story?coll=la-home-headlines
When Karl Rove and his
top deputies arrived at the White House in 2001, the Republican National
Committee provided them with laptop computers and other communication devices
to be used alongside their government-issued equipment. The back-channel e-mail
and paging system, paid for and maintained by the RNC, was designed to avoid
charges that had vexed the Clinton White House — that federal resources were
being used inappropriately for political campaign purposes. Now, that dual
computer system is creating new embarrassment and legal headaches for the White
House, the Republican Party and Rove's once-vaunted White House operation.
Democrats say evidence suggests the RNC e-mail system was used for political
and government policy matters in violation of federal record preservation and
disclosure rules.
Today’s complete national news
Colorado
Ranchers
and Army Are at Odds in Old West
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/09/us/09hearing.html?ref=washington
Mack Louden worries
that his 30,000-acre ranch sits in the cross hairs of the Army’s plans to
expand its Piñon Canyon Maneuver Site at Fort Carson, and he, along with other
Colorado ranchers, are increasingly upset about the idea. “Where we live, how
we live, it’s all going to die a slow death if the Army gets our land,” said
Mr. Louden, a fourth-generation rancher from Las Animas County, along the
southern edge of the state. He and other ranchers are to testify on Monday
before a committee of state lawmakers in support of a bill that seeks to keep
the Army from acquiring nearly a half-million acres it says it needs to train
soldiers in the nuances of modern warfare. Colorado law grants the federal
government permission to condemn land for some purposes, like building
courthouses and post offices. And the Defense Department lifted a moratorium
this year on land acquisitions to allow the Piñon Canyon expansion.
RELATED: Ranchers protest proposed Army training site expansion
http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/local/article/0,1299,DRMN_15_5472642,00.html
RELATED: Ranchers seek
state shield
http://www.denverpost.com/newsheadlines/ci_5624166
U.S.,
China Got Climate Warnings Toned Down
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/06/AR2007040600291.html
Some sections of a
grim scientific assessment of the impact of global warming on human, animal and
plant life issued in Brussels yesterday were softened at the insistence of
officials from China and the United States, participants in the negotiations
said. In particular, U.S. negotiators managed to eliminate language in one
section that called for cuts in greenhouse gas emissions, said Patricia Romero
Lankao, a scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in Boulder, Colo., who was one of the report's lead authors. In the course of negotiations
over the report by the second working group of the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel
on Climate Change, U.S. officials challenged the wording of a section
suggesting that policymakers need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions because
countries will not be able to respond to climate change simply by using
adaptive measures such as levees and dikes.
RELATED: Climate report cites risks for Colorado
http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/local/article/0,1299,DRMN_15_5469993,00.html
RELATED: West gets
dire global warming warning
http://www.denverpost.com/newsheadlines/ci_5617476
Bills
would provide business oversight
http://www.gazette.com/articles/bill_21036___article.html/bills_naturopathic.html
Five professions that
could be licensed for the first time in Colorado if bills continue to advance:
athletic trainers, landscape architects, mortgage brokers, naturopathic doctors
and plumbing contractors. It isn’t just professions that are being targeted by
new regulations this year. Previously unregulated activities have at least been
part of the debate. One unsuccessful bill would have required teens who use
tanning beds to get permission slips from parents or doctors, and a measure
still making its way through the Senate would require motorcycle riders under
age 18 to wear a helmet designed to certain specifications. Some occupations,
like luxury limousine operators and moving company workers, find themselves
coming under more scrutiny, such as stricter background criminal checks or
qualifications for their licenses. Others, like audiologists and wholesale food
manufacturers, are likely to see their regulations continue beyond the date
they were set to expire. Rep. Jeanne Labuda, D-Denver, said she sponsored the
naturopathic doctors bill after reading about the case of Brian O’Connell, a
Wheat Ridge naturopath practitioner who received an online degree and was
charged with 14 counts after one of his patients died. She doubts all
professions need regulation but said she likes to look at the bills on a
case-to-case basis. But Republican leaders have resisted many of the measures,
saying that they block people from operating a business and put government
limits on jobs that, even if performed poorly, would hurt no one.
Labor
girds for '08 convention
http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/other_business/article/0,2777,DRMN_23916_5470108,00.html
Nationally, private
sector union membership has fallen to about 7.4 percent, down from 7.8 percent
at the end of 2005. While the public and private sectors combined have a higher
percentage of workers in unions, Colorado lags the national average. There were
165,000 union members in Colorado last year. Shaiken, who specializes in labor
issues, said growing income disparity has created the economic conditions that
led to unions in the first place. Still, unions have become "somewhere
between less visible and invisible in terms of the attention they
receive." All that has changed recently in Colorado where labor issues
have moved to center stage. Turmoil within the state's AFL-CIO organization,
Gov. Bill Ritter's surprise veto of a pro-union bill and the convention
controversy are among the issues making headlines. Several key union leaders in
Washington, including Teamsters leader James Hoffa Jr., declined to elaborate
this week on what they hope to get by leaning on Democrats ahead of the
convention here. A spokesman for Hoffa, for instance, said the union head had
"said his piece" when he hassled Ritter about Colorado labor issues
at a Washington social event last weekend.
Today’s complete Colorado news
Today’s complete daily news: http://media.progressnowaction.org/digest/040907.htm
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