White House accuses Kerry of 'coordinating' Guard attacks

The White House yesterday accused John Kerry of "coordinating" attacks on President Bush's National Guard service in response to the president's widening lead in the polls.
"You absolutely are seeing a coordinated attack by John Kerry and his surrogates on the president," White House press secretary Scott McClellan told reporters aboard Air Force One. "The polls show Senator Kerry falling behind, and it's the same old recycled attacks that we've seen every time the president has been up for election."
Mr. Kerry refused to denounce Texans for Truth, a group known by its tax code classification as a 527, for running TV ads that criticize the president's National Guard service. Last month, the Kerry campaign demanded that Mr. Bush denounce ads by another 527, Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, which questioned Mr. Kerry's Vietnam service.
Asked about the veracity of the anti-Bush ads yesterday, Mr. Kerry twice told an Associated Press reporter: "That's for the White House to answer."
White House spokesman Trent Duffy accused the Massachusetts Democrat of employing a double standard.
"When given the opportunity to put it to rest, Senator Kerry instead kept it alive," he said of the flap over Mr. Bush's service. "Nor did he condemn the ads, even though he had called on President Bush to condemn the Swift Boat ads."
For more than six months, Mr. Kerry has been questioning whether Mr. Bush fulfilled his military obligations after transferring from one National Guard unit in Texas to another in Alabama. The White House says the president's honorable discharge is proof that he fulfilled his duties.

posted by Frodgie at 6:33 AM

 

Rounding up all illegals 'not realistic'

The nation's border czar yesterday said it is "not realistic" to think that law-enforcement authorities can arrest or deport the millions of illegal aliens now in the United States and does not think the American public has the "will ... to uproot" those aliens.
Homeland Security Undersecretary Asa Hutchinson also said taxpayers "might be afraid" to learn how much it would take in manpower and resources to control the nation's borders and described as "probably accurate" a statement that no law-enforcement officials are looking for the vast majority of the 8 million to 12 million illegal aliens thought to be in the country.
"It's not realistic to say we're going to reduce that number," Mr. Hutchinson said during a luncheon meeting with editors and reporters at The Washington Times. "We don't set goals like that. Our goal is to enforce the law as we see violations of the law.

posted by Frodgie at 6:26 AM

 

Congress Reconsiders Bush Ideas

WASHINGTON — A Senate panel challenged President Bush on two fronts Thursday, voting to block his administration's efforts to restrict travel to Cuba (search) and parcel out thousands of federal jobs to private contractors.

In both cases, some Republicans on the GOP-run panel backed Democrats in a demonstration of how sensitive some issues can be in the weeks before the Nov. 2 elections.

The showdowns came as a subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee used a voice vote to approve a $90.6 billion bill for operating the Treasury and Transportation departments next year. The same bill has $1.2 billion to subsidize the financially struggling Amtrak national passenger railroad, $300 million more than Bush requested.

Also Thursday, the House focused on the spending bills that must be passed for the budget year starting Oct. 1 and approved one of the largest and most contentious bills -- a $142.5 billion measure that funds education, health and job training programs. The bill, approved 388-13, adds about 2 percent to the 2004 budget, with $63 billion going to the Health and Human Services Department and $58 billion for the Education Department.

Meanwhile, the full Senate stood by Bush and fended off repeated efforts by Democrats to add money for emergency responders and other domestic security efforts to a bill providing $32 billion for the Homeland Security Department next year. Final Senate passage is expected next week.


posted by Frodgie at 6:24 AM

 

Al-Zawahiri: U.S. faltering in Afghanistan

(CNN) -- Osama bin Laden's top lieutenant, Ayman al-Zawahiri, appeared in a videotaped message Thursday on the Arabic-language TV news network Al-Jazeera saying southern and eastern Afghanistan are controlled by the mujahedeen, or holy warriors.

He also said mujahedeen fighters in Iraq "turned America's plan upside down."

"The defeat of America in Iraq and Afghanistan has become just a matter of time, with God's help," he said.

"Americans in both countries are between two fires. If they carry on, they will bleed to death -- and if they pull out, they lose everything."

Wearing a white turban and glasses, al-Zawahiri said American forces are hunkered down and afraid to respond to advances of the mujahedeen.

There currently are about 16,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan conducting daily patrols in remote mountain villages, mostly in the eastern part of the country. There are nearly 140,000 American troops in Iraq.

"East and south Afghanistan is an open battlefield for the mujahedeen, while the liars are hiding in the big capitals," he said, a Kalashnikov assault rifle resting on the wall behind him.

"The Americans are hiding now in trenches and they refuse to come out and meet the mujahedeen, despite the mujahedeen antagonizing them with bombing and shooting and roadblocks around them. Their defense focuses on airstrikes, which wastes America's money in just stirring up sand."


posted by Frodgie at 6:22 AM

 

CBSNEWS LAUNCHES INTERNAL INVESTIGATION AFTER SUSPICIOUS BUSH DOCS AIRED

CBS NEWS executives have launched an internal investigation into whether its premiere news program 60 MINUTES aired fabricated documents relating to Bush's National Guard service, the DRUDGE REPORT has learned.

"The reputation and integrity of the entire news division is at stake, if we are in error, it will be corrected," a top CBS source explained late Thursday.

The source, who asked not to be named, described CBSNEWS anchor and 60 MINUTES correspondent Dan Rather as being privately "shell-shocked" by the increasingly likelihood that the documents in question were fraudulent.

Rather, who anchored the segment presenting new information on the president's military service, will personally correct the record on-air, if need be, the source explained from New York.-from Drudge

posted by Frodgie at 6:20 AM

 

U.S. Hits Insurgent Strongholds in Fallujah

FALLUJAH, Iraq — American warplanes fired missiles on a building used by an Al Qaeda-linked militant group in the rebel stronghold of Fallujah (search) early Thursday, the U.S. military said.

The military said intelligence showed that three associates of Jordanian-born militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi (search) were in the area when jets unleashed a precision strike.

Dr. Ahmad Thair of the Fallujah General Hospital said five people were killed, including two women and a child, and nine others injured in the strike. The U.S. military had no information about casualties.

"The cooperation of the Iraqi people that lead to this and other precision strikes continues to break apart the Abu Musab al-Zarqawi network and deny foreign fighter support and safe havens," the military said in a statement. It gave no details of what kind of help Iraqis were providing.

It was the third straight day that U.S. jets have been in action over Fallujah, a hotbed of Sunni Muslim insurgents bent on driving coalition forces from the country.

U.S. forces pulled out of Fallujah in April after ending a three-week siege of the city that left hundreds dead and a trail of devastation. Insurgents have only strengthened their hold on it since then.


posted by Frodgie at 6:35 AM

 

Russia vows pre-emptive terror hits

A top Russian general yesterday claimed the right to strike pre-emptively "terrorist bases" anywhere in the world — a grave warning only days after a school siege in southern Russia claimed the lives of hundreds of children.
The remarks of Col. Gen. Yuri Baluyevsky, chief of the Russian General Staff, reminded of President Bush's doctrine of pre-emption adopted after the September 11 terrorist attacks in the United States.
"As for carrying out preventive strikes against terrorist bases, we will take all measures to liquidate terrorist bases in any region of the world," Gen. Baluyevsky told reporters in Moscow during a press conference with NATO's supreme allied commander in Europe, Gen. James Jones.
Although Gen. Baluyevsky did not specify what kind of terrorists and what parts of the world he had in mind, Moscow blamed the school siege in the Northern Ossetian town of Beslan on rebels in the breakaway republic of Chechnya.
Yesterday, authorities offered a $10 million reward for information leading to the top rebel leaders, Shamil Basayev and Aslan Maskhadov.
At least 326 hostages and 30 terrorists died in the three-day siege.
Chechen separatists are also being held responsible for two plane crashes and a Moscow subway station bombing, both of which occurred days before last week's attack.

posted by Frodgie at 6:33 AM

 

Libyan sincerity on arms in doubt

The United States stood by for years as supposed allies helped its enemies obtain the world's most dangerous weapons, reveals Bill Gertz, defense and national security reporter for The Washington Times, in the new book "Treachery" (Crown Forum).

Second of three excerpts

Musa Kusa, the head of Libya's spy agency, got the attention of Britain's Foreign Office and MI6 intelligence service when he contacted them in March 2003.
Kusa was a man with blood on his hands. He had been deputy chief of Libyan intelligence when two of its agents were dispatched to blow up Pan Am Flight 103 in December 1988, killing all 259 on board and 11 on the ground.
When Kusa informed the British officials that he had an offer from Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi, they heard him out.
Kusa said Libya would agree to rid itself of all nuclear and chemical weapons and materials, along with longer-range missile delivery systems. Gadhafi's condition: Britain and the United States must help remove the sanctions on his regime and normalize relations with Libya, an officially designated state sponsor of terrorism.
The CIA was skeptical.
"You're talking to the most suspicious organization in the world," said one intelligence official who was closely involved in the negotiations.
Still, a decision was made at the highest levels of both governments — by President Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair — to pursue the talks.
To Douglas Feith, U.S. undersecretary of defense for policy, Gadhafi's apparent decision to "open up" reflected a victory in Bush's global war on terrorism, which focused on the connections among terrorist organizations, weapons of mass destruction and state sponsors of terrorism.
For many years, Gadhafi tried to remain at that intersection while attempting to buy his way off the list of rogue states, Feith said.
posted by Frodgie at 6:31 AM

 

U.S. Agents Face Violence at the Border

LOS ANGELES — Human smugglers growing frustrated with increased border enforcement are taking it out on border patrol officers (search).

As Washington throws more resources at sealing the southern border between the U.S. and Mexico, determined smugglers and illegal immigrants (search) are creating an increasingly dangerous situation for those who patrol the border.

In fact, agents call the area they watch a war zone. The daily exodus from Mexico tops more than 1,300 illegal immigrants a day in the Tucson, Ariz., area alone -- and those who are charged with stopping the illegals are being assaulted more and more.

"I had an M-80 tossed at me, right by my truck, wrapped in paper," said Border Patrol agent Mark Jarman. "I did not know what it was until I picked it up. I went deaf for about 30 seconds."

Agent Cory Runyon had similar encounters.

"I personally had things thrown at me on the highway. Going down the road, blankets thrown, boxes thrown, tires kicked out the back of cars rolling down [the] highway coming at me. Everything you can think of," he said.


Some see the violence as a measure of success. Smugglers are facing more prosecutions, longer sentences, seizure of cars and assets, which may explain why illegal aliens and those that bring them across the border are more desperate than ever.

Click on the video box near the top of this story to watch a report by FOX News' William LaJeunesse.




posted by Frodgie at 6:29 AM

 

Abortion ban found unconstitutional

LINCOLN, Nebraska (AP) -- A third federal judge ruled Wednesday that the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act is unconstitutional, saying it fails to include an exception when a woman's health is in danger.

U.S. District Judge Richard Kopf of Lincoln said that Congress ignored the most experienced doctors in determining that the banned procedure would never be necessary -- a finding he found "unreasonable."

"According to responsible medical opinion, there are times when the banned procedure is medically necessary to preserve the health of a woman and a respectful reading of the congressional record proves that point," Kopf wrote. "No reasonable and unbiased person could come to a different conclusion."

The abortion ban was signed last year by President Bush but was not enforced because three federal judges, in Lincoln, New York and San Francisco, agreed to hear constitutional challenges in simultaneous non-jury trials.

Last month, U.S. District Judge Richard C. Casey in New York said the Supreme Court has made it clear that a banned procedure must allow an exception to preserve a woman's health -- even as he called the abortion procedure "gruesome, brutal, barbaric and uncivilized."


posted by Frodgie at 6:24 AM

 

Deadly car bomb rocks Jakarta

JAKARTA, Indonesia (CNN) -- A powerful car bomb has hit central Jakarta near the Australian Embassy, killing as many as six people and wounding about 100 others.

The Thursday morning explosion went off four meters (12 feet) away from the embassy's gate, leaving a crater three meters deep.

CNN Correspondent Maria Ressa said that according to police, the blast was "far larger" than one that killed 12 people in the JW Marriott Hotel in the same district last year.

Indonesia's police chief, Gen. Dai Bachtiar, reported four deaths, although the number could be higher.

Australian and Indonesian officials told Howard there may be six dead. The number could include locally based security personnel at the embassy and passers-by.

Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri returned to Jakarta from Brunei, where she was attending a royal wedding, and toured the bomb site.

Most of Thursday's deaths occurred just outside the 6-meter (20-foot) high steel gate, which was mangled in the blast.

The explosion shattered nearly all the windows in seven surrounding high-rise buildings while offices several blocks away also suffered damage.


posted by Frodgie at 6:20 AM

 

Rumsfeld: Iran aids rebels

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld charged yesterday that Iran is fueling the deadly insurgency in Iraq with money and fighters.
But, in an interview with editors and reporters of The Washington Times, Mr. Rumsfeld acknowledged that the United States has limited options because other nations are "not willing" to join in pressuring Iran, which has shown behavior that Mr. Rumsfeld said is "not part of the civilized world."
The defense secretary, a main architect of President Bush's strategy of attacking Islamic terrorists worldwide, declared of the insurgency in Iraq, "They're losing."
His assessment came on a day when the military death toll in Iraq reached 1,000 Americans since the invasion in May 2003.
"I feel generally quite good about how things are going there," he said. "Needless to say, you can't feel good about it when you've lost over a thousand people."
He gave the administration and the coalition a "B-plus" for managing Iraq after the fall of Saddam Hussein in terms of interaction between the new government and U.S. forces.
"If I had to grade it so far, I'd probably give it a B-plus, pretty good, and maybe an A in interaction and maybe a B in outcome," Mr. Rumsfeld said. "But it's a tough business."

posted by Frodgie at 6:50 AM

 

French connection armed Saddam

The United States stood by for years as supposed allies helped its enemies obtain the world's most dangerous weapons, reveals Bill Gertz, defense and national security reporter for The Washington Times, in the new book "Treachery" (Crown Forum). In this excerpt, he details France's persistence in arming Saddam Hussein.

New intelligence revealing how long France continued to supply and arm Saddam Hussein's regime infuriated U.S. officials as the nation prepared for military action against Iraq.
The intelligence reports showing French assistance to Saddam ongoing in the late winter of 2002 helped explain why France refused to deal harshly with Iraq and blocked U.S. moves at the United Nations.
"No wonder the French are opposing us," one U.S. intelligence official remarked after illegal sales to Iraq of military and dual-use parts, originating in France, were discovered early last year before the war began.
That official was careful to stipulate that intelligence reports did not indicate whether the French government had sanctioned or knew about the parts transfers. The French company at the beginning of the pipeline remained unidentified in the reports.
France's government tightly controls its aerospace and defense firms, however, so it would be difficult to believe that the illegal transfers of equipment parts took place without the knowledge of at least some government officials.
Iraq's Mirage F-1 fighter jets were made by France's Dassault Aviation. Its Gazelle attack helicopters were made by Aerospatiale, which became part of a consortium of European defense companies.
"It is well-known that the Iraqis use front companies to try to obtain a number of prohibited items," a senior Bush administration official said before the war, refusing to discuss Iraq's purchase of French warplane and helicopter parts.
The State Department confirmed intelligence indicating the French had given support to Iraq's military.

posted by Frodgie at 6:48 AM

 

2 Italian women kidnapped by militants in Iraq

BAGHDAD — Two Italian women working for an aid agency in Iraq were kidnapped yesterday, the agency said.
Gunmen in olive green uniforms broke into the group's Baghdad offices and took the women along with two Iraqis, one of them a woman, neighbors said.
The attack was only the second known kidnapping of foreign women since the wave of abductions began earlier this year. The first involved a Japanese aid worker captured in Fallujah in April along with two other Japanese, who were all released a week later.
The Washington Times reported two months ago that U.S. forces believed Iraqi militants were seeking to kidnap an American woman in order to shock the American public.
The kidnappings came as renewed fighting with the Mahdi's Army militia of radical Shi'ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr helped push the number of Americans killed in Iraq to 1,001, according to an Associated Press tally. The official Pentagon count remained at 994.
Two of the seven Americans killed yesterday died in Sadr City, where battles involving warplanes and tanks killed an estimated 35 Iraqis and wounded more than 200. The outbreak threatened to shred a cease-fire negotiated with Sheik al-Sadr 12 days ago in the city of Najaf.

posted by Frodgie at 6:47 AM

 

Pollardites in the Pentagon?

In 1987, Jonathan Pollard, U.S. Navy intelligence analyst, was imprisoned for life for selling a roomful of U.S. secret documents to Israel. Tel Aviv refused to return them. At the Clinton-Netanyahu summit at Wye River, Pollard became a subject of contention.

"Bibi" Netanyahu wanted to fly the American traitor back to Israel where he is a hero. Clinton balked. CIA's George Tenet would resign, Clinton told Netanyahu, if he pardoned Pollard.

This history is recalled for a reason. Washington today is rife with reports the FBI has been investigating whether or not a nest of Pollardites inside the Pentagon has been funneling secrets, through the Israeli lobby AIPAC, to the Reno Road embassy and on to Sharon.

Suspected mole Larry Franklin, a Pentagon Iranian analyst, was reportedly sighted trying to hand over to an AIPAC official a draft copy of a National Security Presidential Directive on Iran. With the mullahs apparently pursuing atomic bombs, Israel wants the United States to attack, denuclearize and bring down its No. 1 enemy, the regime in Tehran.

Franklin popped up on FBI radar when he joined a breakfast meeting between an AIPAC man and an Israeli diplomat. AIPAC had been under FBI surveillance for over two years as a probable conduit to Israel of the fruits of espionage against the United States.

Franklin, a devout Catholic and hawk on Iran, is now said to be cooperating with the FBI. His boss, William Luti, is the deputy to the Pentagon's No. 3, Douglas Feith, who has close ties to Likud.

According to the Washington Post, the FBI is now interviewing present and ex-officials from Cheney's office and the Pentagon as to whether Feith, Richard Perle, David Wurmser and Paul Wolfowitz might have leaked U.S. security secrets to Israel, AIPAC or Ahmed Chalabi.

posted by Frodgie at 6:45 AM

 

U.S. Warplanes Strike Fallujah

FALLUJAH, Iraq — U.S. warplanes launched strikes in the insurgent-held city of Fallujah (search) on Wednesday, hitting at suspected militant hideouts used to plan attacks on American forces, the U.S. military said. At least two people were killed, hospital officials said.

Witnesses said a series of explosions rocked the city before dawn and again later in the day and that jets swooped low over eastern and southern neighborhoods.

Wednesday's attack targeted a militant "command and control headquarters that has recently been coordinating attacks" against coalition forces, the military said in a statement.

The hospital officials said at least two people were killed in Wednesday's strikes. There were no reports of any wounded.

On Tuesday, U.S. jets fired several missiles into Fallujah in retaliation for militant attacks on Marine positions outside the city, the military said. Four people were killed and 11 wounded in those strikes, Fallujah hospital officials said.

In a statement late Tuesday, Marine spokesman Lt. Col. T.V. Johnson said "significant numbers of enemy fighters (up to 100) are estimated to have been killed" by Tuesday's missiles. The claim could not be verified, and Johnson acknowledged that U.S. forces have "not entered the city of Fallujah."


posted by Frodgie at 6:42 AM

 

$10m reward for Chechen rebels

MOSCOW, Russia (CNN) -- Russia's Federal Security Bureau has promised a reward of $10 million for information that helps "neutralize" Chechen rebel leaders Shamil Basayev and Aslan Maskhadov, according to Russian news agencies.

The reward came after chilling video from inside the Russian school seized by terrorists last week was broadcast on television.

The video provides a first-hand glimpse of the horror inside, with hundreds of people huddled in the gymnasium as masked gunmen string up explosives.

The Associated Press reported Wednesday news of the reward broke as state television broadcast footage of Prosecutor-General Vladimir Ustinov briefing President Vladimir Putin on the investigation into the school siege, which claimed more than 335 lives -- many of them children.

That broadcast spoke of more than 1,500 hostages in the school siege.

It was the first official admission that the number of hostages had been so high. Initially the government said about 350 had been seized.

In the video shown Tuesday on Russia's NTV television, at least one woman, dressed from head to toe in black and armed with a pistol, stands guard at a doorway.

The video appears to have been shot by the terrorists.

It shows wires strung up throughout the gym and explosives hanging from the basketball goals at both ends of the court. Another explosive hangs above the heads of the hostages in the middle of the room.


posted by Frodgie at 6:41 AM

 

Kerry blasts Bush on record deficit predictions

"Only George W. Bush could celebrate over a record budget deficit of $422 billion, a loss of 1.6 million jobs and Medicare premiums that are up by a record 17 percent," Kerry said. "W stands for wrong -- the wrong direction for America."

The Congressional Budget Office projected this election-year's federal deficit will reach $422 billion, the highest ever but less than the amount analysts predicted earlier this year.

Tim Adams, policy director for Bush's re-election campaign, said the president's tax cuts helped lower the deficit below earlier predictions.

"John Kerry's plan for $2 trillion in new spending means higher taxes on all Americans or a budget deficit that is completely out of control," Adams said.

The estimate came as Kerry talked to North Carolina voters about his plan to change tax rules that let companies defer paying taxes on money earned overseas.

"We give them a complete freebie, and when I'm president of the United States, it will take me about a nanosecond to ask the Congress to close that stupid loophole that rewards companies," Kerry said.


posted by Frodgie at 6:39 AM

 

Bush mocks a new Kerry 'U-turn'

POPLAR BLUFF, Mo. — President Bush yesterday said the war in Iraq was "right for America," rebutting Democratic presidential nominee Sen. John Kerry's contention it was "the wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time."
At a stop in the battleground state of Missouri on the traditional opening day of the campaign, Mr. Bush scolded his opponent for what he characterized as waffling on the Iraq war, and took a jab at a Democratic campaign that appears troubled amid a reshuffling of top staffers.
"After voting for the war but against funding it, after saying he would have voted for the war even knowing everything we know today, my opponent woke up this morning with new campaign advisers and yet another new position," Mr. Bush told a Labor Day rally at a fairgrounds in the southeastern corner of the state.
"Suddenly, he's against it again," he said to the crowd, estimated by the campaign at 23,000. "No matter how many times Senator Kerry changes his mind, it was right for America then and it's right for America now that Saddam Hussein is no longer in power."
Mr. Bush, who is riding a surge in the polls after his convention in New York last week, has opened up a polling lead over Mr. Kerry after concentrating on highlighting his leadership in the war on terror.
The latest Gallup poll for CNN/USA Today of likely voters, taken Friday through Sunday, put Mr. Bush at 52 percent and Mr. Kerry at 45 percent, with 1 percent for independent Ralph Nader. The same poll taken before the convention had Mr. Bush ahead by just two percentage points. Earlier post-convention polls showed 11-point margins.

posted by Frodgie at 6:10 AM

 

33 Killed in Clashes with Sadr Militia

BAGHDAD, Iraq — U.S. forces battled insurgents loyal to radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr (search) in the Baghdad slum of Sadr City (search) on Tuesday, the U.S. military said. At least 33 people were killed and 193 injured in the fighting, Iraqi authorities said.

U.S. Army Capt. Brian O'Malley said several American soldiers have been injured, but that he did provide the exact figure.

The fighting erupted when militants attacked U.S. forces carrying out routine patrols, O'Malley said.

"We just kept coming under fire," he said.

Residents said loud explosions and gunfire could be heard across Sadr City on Monday night and that clashes spilled over into Tuesday morning.

A senior Health Ministry official, said a total of 33 people have been killed and 193 injured in the Sadr City clashes in the past 24 hours.


posted by Frodgie at 6:08 AM

 

Both candidates stress jobs

CANONSBURG, Pennsylvania (AP) -- Democrat John Kerry opened his packed Labor Day schedule in battleground states Monday with talk of jobs, criticizing the Bush administration for doing little to help workers in a tough economy.

"If you want four more years of your wages falling ... if you want four more years of losing jobs overseas and replacing them with jobs that pay $9,000 less than the jobs you had before, then you should go vote for George Bush," Kerry said at an early rally.

Jobs, not surprisingly, was the order of the day for both campaigns, which were fanning out across the Midwest, appealing for votes in the territory pivotal to winning November's election.

President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney were heading to three states between them Monday; Kerry and running mate John Edwards were venturing to six. Cheney and Edwards set campaign courses that cross paths in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Polls in half the eight states on the candidates' Labor Day agenda -- Minnesota, Iowa, Pennsylvania and Ohio -- show them running neck-and-neck. Those four states offer 58 electoral votes, more than 20 percent of the total needed to win.

Kerry chose to spend his Labor Day in Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia, hoping to sway traditionally Democratic West Virginia away from its tilt toward Bush. He joins mine workers in a Labor Day celebration.


posted by Frodgie at 6:05 AM

 

Clinton Has Successful Quadruple Bypass

NEW YORK (AP) - Bill Clinton underwent a successful quadruple heart bypass operation Monday to relieve severely clogged arteries that doctors said put the former president at grave risk of suffering a heart attack.

Clinton is expected to make a full recovery, but doctors said he was fortunate to have checked himself into the hospital when he did. The heart disease they repaired was extensive, and blockage in several of Clinton's arteries was "well over 90 percent," said Dr. Craig R. Smith, the surgeon who led the operation.

"There was a substantial likelihood that he would have had a substantial heart attack" in the near future, said Dr. Allan Schwartz, chief of cardiology at New York Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia.

Smith said Clinton could leave the hospital in four or five days. Clinton was awake but sedated about four hours after the operation ended, Schwartz said. He still was using a breathing tube and had not spoken yet, he said.


The four-hour surgery came three days after Clinton arrived at the hospital complaining of chest pain and shortness of breath. But doctors said Clinton's problems were not as sudden as had been portrayed. He had suffered shortness of breath and tightness in his chest for several months, but blamed them on off-and-on exercising and acid reflux, his doctors said.


posted by Frodgie at 6:01 AM

 

U.S. Near Seizing bin Laden, Official Says

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) - The United States and its allies have moved closer to capturing Osama bin Laden in the last two months, a top U.S. counterterrorism official said in a television interview broadcast Saturday.

"If he has a watch, he should be looking at it because the clock is ticking. He will be caught," Joseph Cofer Black, the U.S. State Department coordinator for counterterrorism, told private Geo television network.

Asked if concrete progress had been made during the last two months - when Pakistan has arrested dozens of terror suspects including some key al-Qaida operatives - Black said, "Yes, I would say this."

Black, who briefed a group of Pakistani journalists after talks with officials here Friday, said he could not predict exactly when bin Laden and other top al-Qaida fugitives would be nabbed.

"What I tell people, I would be surprised but not necessarily shocked if we wake up tomorrow and he's been caught along with all his lieutenants. That can happen because of the programs and infrastructure in place," he told Geo.


posted by Frodgie at 1:48 PM

 

Russian carnage stirs grief, anger

What the news media does not want you to see about militant Islam, I'll show you...click on the pictures for full-size photos

BESLAN, Russia — This city of 35,000 in the southern Russian region of North Ossetia faced overwhelming grief as the evening light faded yesterday.
"They killed people here, not just people, children, children. They killed children here," said Vitaly, 29, throwing out his hands and spitting out a string of profanities at the charred shell of the gymnasium at School No. 1.
For the many trying to understand what befell the town, there was grief and then anger yesterday as authorities allowed residents into the husk of the school.
"The people who did this weren't human beings," said Alon Tseloyev, 30. His neighbor's son was among at least 1,000 other hostages.
In the gymnasium, many of the hostages spent more than two days — hungry, thirsty, crowded in and barely able to sit, mocked and threatened with death by the Islamist militants who hung explosives in the basketball nets.
The stench of burnt plastic hangs in the gymnasium along with that of sulfur and mildew. A blackened basketball hoop rests in the corner, and the floor is littered with glass, shrapnel and wood splinters. The windows are smashed, the walls riddled with bullet holes.
The open sky above is framed by the rafters that supported a roof until Friday afternoon, when an explosion brought it down on terrified hostages. More than 340 hostages died in the explosions and fighting that followed, officials say.
posted by Frodgie at 8:21 AM