Following 9/11, President Bush and seven top officials of his administration waged a carefully orchestrated campaign of misinformation about the threat posed by Saddam Hussein's Iraq.
By Charles Lewis and Mark Reading-Smith
President George W. Bush and seven of his administration's top officials, including Vice President Dick Cheney, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, made at least 935 false statements in the two years following September 11, 2001, about the national security threat posed by Saddam Hussein's Iraq. Nearly five years after the U.S. invasion of Iraq, an exhaustive examination of the record shows that the statements were part of an orchestrated campaign that effectively galvanized public opinion and, in the process, led the nation to war under decidedly false pretenses.
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Wednesday, January 23, 2008
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Senate Takes Up Indian Health Care Measure Under Veto Threat
The Senate began its 2008 session Tuesday with legislation to reauthorize health care services for American Indians as the White House threatened a veto of the measure.
The White House, in a policy statement, demanded modifications to the bill, which would reauthorize funding for the Indian Health Service, and said President Bush would veto the bill if they were not made.
The veto threat could easily derail what was expected to be a noncontroversial bill. The administration’s main concern was a provision that would expand federal prevailing wage requirements to projects funded under the bill. The White House also objected to what it says are lax documentation requirements in the bill for enrolling patients in Medicaid and other government programs.
The bill would authorize spending for the Indian Health Service, which provides health care for 1.8 million American Indians and Alaska natives, through 2017. According to a Congressional Budget Office estimate, it would authorize discretionary spending of $16 billion over five years and $35 billion over 10 years.
Since a 1992 reauthorization expired in 2001, the health service has continued operating under old guidelines through annual appropriations. Spending in fiscal 2008 totaled $3 billion.
CQ TODAY MIDDAY UPDATE
Jan. 22, 2008
The White House, in a policy statement, demanded modifications to the bill, which would reauthorize funding for the Indian Health Service, and said President Bush would veto the bill if they were not made.
The veto threat could easily derail what was expected to be a noncontroversial bill. The administration’s main concern was a provision that would expand federal prevailing wage requirements to projects funded under the bill. The White House also objected to what it says are lax documentation requirements in the bill for enrolling patients in Medicaid and other government programs.
The bill would authorize spending for the Indian Health Service, which provides health care for 1.8 million American Indians and Alaska natives, through 2017. According to a Congressional Budget Office estimate, it would authorize discretionary spending of $16 billion over five years and $35 billion over 10 years.
Since a 1992 reauthorization expired in 2001, the health service has continued operating under old guidelines through annual appropriations. Spending in fiscal 2008 totaled $3 billion.
CQ TODAY MIDDAY UPDATE
Jan. 22, 2008
The lowdown on topsoil: It's disappearing
Disappearing dirt rivals global warming as an environmental threat
By TOM PAULSON
P-I REPORTER
The planet is getting skinned.
While many worry about the potential consequences of atmospheric warming, a few experts are trying to call attention to another global crisis quietly taking place under our feet.Call it the thin brown line. Dirt. On average, the planet is covered with little more than 3 feet of topsoil -- the shallow skin of nutrient-rich matter that sustains most of our food and appears to play a critical role in supporting life on Earth.
"We're losing more and more of it every day," said David Montgomery, a geologist at the University of Washington. "The estimate is that we are now losing about 1 percent of our topsoil every year to erosion, most of this caused by agriculture."
"It's just crazy," fumed John Aeschliman, a fifth-generation farmer who grows wheat and other grains on the Palouse near the tiny town of Almota, just west of Pullman.
"We're tearing up the soil and watching tons of it wash away every year," Aeschliman said. He's one of a growing number of farmers trying to persuade others to adopt "no-till" methods, which involve not tilling the land between plantings, leaving crop stubble to reduce erosion and planting new seeds between the stubble rows.
Read Full Article >>
By TOM PAULSON
P-I REPORTER
The planet is getting skinned.
While many worry about the potential consequences of atmospheric warming, a few experts are trying to call attention to another global crisis quietly taking place under our feet.Call it the thin brown line. Dirt. On average, the planet is covered with little more than 3 feet of topsoil -- the shallow skin of nutrient-rich matter that sustains most of our food and appears to play a critical role in supporting life on Earth.
"We're losing more and more of it every day," said David Montgomery, a geologist at the University of Washington. "The estimate is that we are now losing about 1 percent of our topsoil every year to erosion, most of this caused by agriculture."
"It's just crazy," fumed John Aeschliman, a fifth-generation farmer who grows wheat and other grains on the Palouse near the tiny town of Almota, just west of Pullman.
"We're tearing up the soil and watching tons of it wash away every year," Aeschliman said. He's one of a growing number of farmers trying to persuade others to adopt "no-till" methods, which involve not tilling the land between plantings, leaving crop stubble to reduce erosion and planting new seeds between the stubble rows.
Read Full Article >>
Sunday, January 20, 2008
Petraeus Is Undecided About Deeper Troop Cuts
Army Chief Of Staff: "The Surge Has Sucked All Of The Flexibility Out Of The System"
By Gina Chon and Yochi J. Dreazen
Wall Street Journal | January 17, 2008 02:41 PM
WASIT PROVINCE, Iraq -- The top American commander in Iraq said that 30,000 American troops would leave the country by July but that he had yet to make up his mind about whether to recommend any additional reductions.
In an interview, Gen. David Petraeus said he was working to finalize an assessment of security conditions in Iraq and the wisdom of further military withdrawals in advance of a high-profile appearance before Congress in March.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates has said he hopes to see the U.S. military presence fall below 130,000 by the end of 2008, a position shared by many senior Pentagon commanders who worry the high troop levels in Iraq are causing growing manpower strains on the army.
"The surge has sucked all of the flexibility out of the system," Army Chief of Staff George Casey said in an interview this week. "And we need to find a way of getting back into balance."
But President Bush made clear this week that additional troop withdrawals were far from a sure thing. After a meeting in Kuwait with Gen. Petraeus and Ryan Crocker, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Mr. Bush said he was open to slowing or stopping the withdrawal of troops to avoid jeopardizing recent security gains in Iraq. "My attitude is, if he didn't want to continue the drawdown, that's fine with me in order to make sure we succeed," Mr. Bush said, referring to Gen. Petraeus.
Read the rest on the Wall Street Journal.
By Gina Chon and Yochi J. Dreazen
Wall Street Journal | January 17, 2008 02:41 PM
WASIT PROVINCE, Iraq -- The top American commander in Iraq said that 30,000 American troops would leave the country by July but that he had yet to make up his mind about whether to recommend any additional reductions.
In an interview, Gen. David Petraeus said he was working to finalize an assessment of security conditions in Iraq and the wisdom of further military withdrawals in advance of a high-profile appearance before Congress in March.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates has said he hopes to see the U.S. military presence fall below 130,000 by the end of 2008, a position shared by many senior Pentagon commanders who worry the high troop levels in Iraq are causing growing manpower strains on the army.
"The surge has sucked all of the flexibility out of the system," Army Chief of Staff George Casey said in an interview this week. "And we need to find a way of getting back into balance."
But President Bush made clear this week that additional troop withdrawals were far from a sure thing. After a meeting in Kuwait with Gen. Petraeus and Ryan Crocker, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Mr. Bush said he was open to slowing or stopping the withdrawal of troops to avoid jeopardizing recent security gains in Iraq. "My attitude is, if he didn't want to continue the drawdown, that's fine with me in order to make sure we succeed," Mr. Bush said, referring to Gen. Petraeus.
Read the rest on the Wall Street Journal.
'Darkest ever' material created
by Helen Briggs
BBC News science reporter
The "darkest ever" substance known to science has been made in a US laboratory.
The material was created from carbon nanotubes - sheets of carbon just one atom thick rolled up into cylinders.
Researchers say it is the closest thing yet to the ideal black material, which absorbs light perfectly at all angles and over all wavelengths.
The discovery is expected to have applications in the fields of electronics and solar energy.
Theoretical clues
An ideal black object absorbs all the colours of light and reflects none of them. In theory, it should be possible to make something that approaches the "perfect absorber".
MORE >>
BBC News science reporter
The "darkest ever" substance known to science has been made in a US laboratory.
The material was created from carbon nanotubes - sheets of carbon just one atom thick rolled up into cylinders.
Researchers say it is the closest thing yet to the ideal black material, which absorbs light perfectly at all angles and over all wavelengths.
The discovery is expected to have applications in the fields of electronics and solar energy.
Theoretical clues
An ideal black object absorbs all the colours of light and reflects none of them. In theory, it should be possible to make something that approaches the "perfect absorber".
MORE >>
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