Zwichenzug Holding Zone

2005-07-25T09:22:00.000-05:00

British Police Arrest Suspect, After Shooting Man in Subway

fulltext

By ALAN COWELL

LONDON, July 22 - One day after four attempted bombings on London's transport system, police officers pursued a man onto a subway train today and fatally shot him at close range in full view of other passengers, the authorities and witnesses said.

Police also said today they had made one arrest related to Thursday's bombings in Stockwell, south London, the same area as the scene of the shooting. And, later, police in Birmingham said they had also made an arrest under anti-terrorism laws possibly related to the London attacks at a railroad station.

The killing threatened to overshadow police efforts to trace four men wanted for Thursday's failed attacks, which recalled the far bloodier assault on London's subway trains and a bus on July 7 when four bombers suspected of being Islamic exremists killed 52 people and themselves.

On a day when the police searched at least three homes in search of the bombers, the authorities also published photographs of the four wanted men. Three were shown at subway stations and one on the upper deck of a double-decker bus. One wore a dark top emblazoned with the words "New York" as he ran along a station corridor.

It was the second time that police had published images of accused bombers. An earlier image showed the four attackers from July 7 entering a station at Luton, north of London. The four images today showed the accused bombers at separate locations. The police urged anyone recognizing them to alert the authorities but not to approach them.

"This is the greatest operational challenge ever faced by the Metropolitan police service," Sir Ian Blair, the commander of the Metropolitan Police said at a news conference where police officials discussed the shooting and displayed the suspects' photos. "Officers are facing previously unknown thereats and great danger. We need the understanding of all communities and the cooperation of all communities. We need calm."

A police statement said, "The man shot at Stockwell station is still subject to formal identification and it is not yet clear whether he is one of the four people we are seeking to identify and whose pictures have been released today."

"The man who was shot was under police observation because he had emerged from a house that was itself under observation because it was linked to the investigation of yesterday's incidents," the statement said. "He was then followed by surveillance officers to the station. His clothing and his behaviour at the station added to their suspicions."

Sir Ian said the shooting was "directly linked to the ongoing and expanding anti-terrorist operation."

"I need to make clear that any death is deeply regrettable," Mr Blair said at the news conference. "But as I understand the situation, the man was challenged and refused to obey police instructions. I can't go any further at this stage."

A witness who had been sitting on a Northern Line subway train at Stockwell station said the man had been pursued by plainclothes police officers who fired five shots at close range.

"I was sitting on the train,' Mark Whitby said. "I heard a lot of noise, people saying, 'Get out, get down.' I saw an Asian guy. He ran on to the train, he was hotly pursued by three plain clothes officers, one of them was wielding a black handgun. He half tripped. They pushed him to the floor and basically unloaded five shots into him."

As the man stumbled onto the train, Mr. Whitby told the BBC, "I looked at his face, he looked sort of left and right, but he basically looked like a cornered rabbit, a cornered fox."

"He looked absolutely petrified and then he sort of tripped, but they were hotly pursuing him," he said. The police officers "couldn't have been any more than two or three feet behind him at this time and he half tripped and was half pushed to the floor and the policeman nearest to me had the black automatic pistol in his left hand."

"He held it down to the guy and unloaded five shots into him," Mr Whitby said. Some British reports said the man's heavy clothing may have persuaded police officers that he was carrying a suicide bomb.

At his news conference, Sir Ian said he knew that "there are rumors sweeping London and I do appeal to people to listen to the facts as they emerge."

According to the Metropolitan Police, fatalities in police shootings are relatively rare in London. Between 1997 and September 2004, police opened fire on 20 occasions, killing seven people and injuring 11.

Stockwell station is in the same area south of the Thames River as Oval station, one of the targets of Thursday's attacks. Two subway lines, the Victoria and Northern lines, were suspended after the shooting, plunging London's transport system once more into a chaos that some Londoners fear will be more prevalent. Lord Stevens, a former London police chief, said today that it could take "10 or 20 years" to end the terror threat.

The attacks also alarmed the drivers of London subway trains, which carry three million passengers a day, who are now pressing for increased numbers of staff on subway trains. Bob Crow, a leader of the drivers' union, said the union would back "any of our drivers who refused to work" during terror alarms.

While Londoners have gradually become used to armed police on the streets in recent years - particularly in the heightened security atmosphere since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States - the idea of armed police killing a suspect in full public view is still shocking. A debate on a Web site run by The Guardian newspaper today pursued heated arguments about the police action.

"I just hope they shot an actual terrorist," one contributor wrote.

The impact of the killing could be all the more incendiary if subsequent investigations identify the man as a Muslim. "This operation is targeted at criminals," Sir Ian said, apparently to head off accusations that Muslims are being unfairly singled out. "It is not targeted at any community or any section of the community."

But Nakib Islam, 19, a Muslim high school student, said "I am afraid of a stronger backlash" against Muslims. He was speaking after a bomb alert at the East London mosque turned out to have been a hoax.

"We all have to use the Tube and people who look like me all became suspicious. I even don't wear my rucksack anymore when I use the Tube because of that," he said.

Inayat Bunglawala, a spokesman for the Muslim Council of Britain, said Muslims he had spoken to this morning were "jumpy and nervous."

"We are getting phone calls from quite a lot of Muslims who are distressed about what may be a shoot to kill policy," he said.

The rapidly unfolding events also stunned Londoners sensing a new vulnerability after Thursday's attacks.

While there were no direct casualties from the four attempts on Thursday - when detonators apparently failed to set off home-made explosives on three subway trains and a bus - some Londoners asked why the authorities had failed to protect them from a repeat bombing just two weeks after the first on July 7.

"I wonder why London is different to New York and Madrid - why is it being sustained here?" said Patricia Mitchell, 35, a call center worker. "I'm wondering if it's an easier target. It feels like London has a lot more people and a lot more public transport. But I was completely surprised. I totally thought it was going to be an attack on London and then they move on to another city."At the news conference today, Andy Hayman, a senior police officer responsible for special operations, gave the first detailed account of Thursday's bombings as he released the images of the four suspects. He said one device had been left in a subway car at Oval station, apparently by a man who had boarded one stop earlier at Stockwell.

A second device was left at the rear of the top deck of a number 26 bus in east London. A second image showed a man on the top deck of the bus "wearing a gray T-shirt with what appears to have been a palm-tree design on the frfont and a dark jacket with a white baseball cap," Mr. Hayman said.

In the third attempted bombing,a man in dark clothing was shown leaving Warren Street subway station, while, in the fourth a man in dark shirt and trousers was seen running from a subway train at an above-ground section of the Hammersmith and City Line at Shepherd's Bush station.

Even as Mr. Hayman was speaking, armed police armed with tear-gas and dogs broke into a house in west London at Harrow Road quite close to Shepherd's Bush. "There are two further addresses being entered by Metropolitan Police officers in connection with this investigation," Mr. Hayman said.

Reporting for this article was contributed by Jonathan Allen, Souad Mekhennet, Karla Adam, Hélène Fouquet and Pamela Kent.

Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company

2005-06-17T09:32:00.000-05:00

George Lucas aiming to release the Star Wars movies in 3D - MovieWeb

According to The Hollywood Reporter, George Lucas is such a fan of the latest 3-D technology that he is planning to remaster all of the Star Wars films for rerelease in 3-D.

Appearing as part of a sextet of high-profile directors promoting 3-D and digital cinema at ShoWest on Thursday, Lucas said he hadn't yet committed to a precise schedule but hoped to have the first film ready for the 30th anniversary of the original Star Wars movie in 2007 and that he would then rerelease one Star Wars film per year in 3-D.

Lucas was joined by James Cameron, Robert Zemeckis, Robert Rodriguez and Randal Kleiser. Peter Jackson joined the group via a pretaped 3-D segment. They all implored the exhibition community to invest in digital projectors, which would allow theaters to show their upcoming movies in 3-D. Cameron is in preproduction on the 3-D film Battle Angel, planned for a 2007 release. Zemeckis has two 3-D features in production, and Rodriguez is readying The Adventures of Shark Boy & Lava Girl in 3-D for release in the summer. Jackson, who is currently filming King Kong, announced no specific 3-D plans, but according to sources he has installed a 3-D master suite in his production offices in New Zealand.

2005-06-11T12:37:00.000-05:00

Dangerrrr: cats could alter your personality

Times Online
eptember 21, 2003

The Sunday Times

Dangerrrr: cats could alter your personality
Jonathan Leake, Science Editor

THEY may look like lovable pets but Britain’s estimated 9m domestic cats are being blamed by scientists for infecting up to half the population with a parasite that can alter people’s personalities.
The startling figures emerge from studies into toxoplasma gondii, a parasite carried by almost all the country’s feline population. They show that half of Britain’s human population carry the parasite in their brains, and that infected people may undergo slow but crucial changes in their behaviour.

Infected men, suggests one new study, tend to become more aggressive, scruffy, antisocial and are less attractive. Women, on the other hand, appear to exhibit the “sex kitten” effect, becoming less trustworthy, more desirable, fun- loving and possibly more promiscuous.

Interestingly, for those who draw glib conclusions about national stereotypes, the number of people infected in France is much higher than in the UK.

The findings will not please cat lovers. The research — conducted at universities in Britain, the Czech Republic and America — was sponsored by the Stanley Research Medical Institute of Maryland, a leading centre for the study of mental illness. The institute has already published research showing that people infected with the toxoplasma parasite are at greater risk of developing schizophrenia and manic depression.

The study into more subtle changes in human personality is being carried out by Professor Jaroslav Flegr of Charles University in Prague. In one study he subjected more than 300 volunteers to personality profiling while also testing them for toxoplasma.

He found the women infected with toxoplasma spent more money on clothes and were consistently rated as more attractive. “We found they were more easy-going, more warm-hearted, had more friends and cared more about how they looked,” he said. “However, they were also less trustworthy and had more relationships with men.”

By contrast, the infected men appeared to suffer from the “alley cat” effect: becoming less well groomed undesirable loners who were more willing to fight. They were more likely to be suspicious and jealous. “They tended to dislike following rules,” Flegr said.

He also discovered that people infected with toxoplasma had delayed reaction times — and are at greater risk of being involved in car accidents. “Toxoplasma infection, could represent a serious and highly underestimated economic and public health problem,” he said.”

In Britain, concern over toxoplasma is growing among health experts — especially as the number of pet cats has grown to about 9m. Roland Salmon, an epidemiologist with the National Public Health Service for Wales, said: “The evidence is that cats are the main cause of infection.”

Toxoplasma moves in a natural cycle between rats and cats. Rats acquire it from contact with cat faeces and cats reacquire it from hunting infected rats. It has long been known that humans can become infected with the parasite through close contact with cats.

Pregnant women are advised to keep clear of the animals because the parasite can damage unborn babies. People with damaged immune systems, such as Aids victims, are also vulnerable.

Until now, however, the parasite has always been thought harmless to healthy people because their immune systems could suppress the infection. But this view seems certain to change, especially in the light of research at Oxford University.

Scientists there have found that when the parasite invades rats it somehow reprograms their brains, reversing their natural fear of cats. It is this same ability to destroy natural inhibitions that is thought to be at work in humans.

Doctors Manuel Berdoy and Joanne Webster at Oxford University are studying how toxoplasma alters rat behaviour and the chemical weapons it uses to subvert the brain.
Berdoy said: “The fact that a single-celled parasite can have such an effect on the mammalian or even human brain is amazing.”

One startling fact to emerge from research is the great differences in levels of infection. In France and Germany, for example, about 80%-90% of people are infected — nearly twice that in Britain or America.

“I am French and I have even wondered if there is an effect on national character,” Berdoy said.

Dr Dominique Soldati, a researcher at Imperial College in London, is studying ways of blocking toxoplasma from getting into cells. “Once you are infected you cannot get rid of this parasite and the numbers of them slowly grow over the years,” she said. “It’s not a nice thought.”

Copyright 2005 Times Newspapers Ltd.

2005-06-11T12:35:00.000-05:00

It's Insurance a la Cart: Costco Stores to Market Health Plans

Los Angeles Times

By Debora Vrana
Times Staff Writer

June 9, 2005

Costco Wholesale Corp., the low-cost bulk supplier of breakfast cereal, motor oil and diamond rings, is adding health insurance to its warehouse shelves.

In a pilot program to be launched next month in Southern California, Costco will offer family and individual coverage to its customers who pay $100 a year for "executive" membership, company officials said. The insurance is aimed at people such as contractors, waiters and students who are self-employed or cannot sign up for plans at work.

Although other discount stores such as Wal-Mart and Target have begun offering limited health services in their stores, Costco says it will be the first to offer insurance to members. About 18 million households nationally belong to Costco, including 3.4 million who pay for executive membership.

Company officials would not quote premiums but said the insurance would be 5% to 20% cheaper than policies individuals could buy on their own. Costco expects to offer coverage statewide by the end of the year and may eventually make it available to regular members, said Dellanie Fragnoli, assistant vice president of insurance services at Issaquah, Wash.-based Costco.

"It's one of the more requested services by our members," Fragnoli said.

Since 2003, Costco has offered group health insurance to its small-business members in the West through Cypress-based PacifiCare Health Systems Inc., said Cheryl Randolph, spokeswoman for PacifiCare.

The new program, also offered through PacifiCare, will be different in that it is tailored to individuals and families.

The preferred-provider plan, also known as a PPO, which encourages members to see participating doctors, will come in two forms offering similar benefits. One option will have a $1,500 annual deductible for individuals and a $3,000 deductible for families. The other, with lower premiums, will have deductibles twice as high, Costco said.

Coverage for both plans will include prescription drugs; co-payments for most office visits will be $35. Premiums will vary depending on age, location and health status.

Initially available only through Costco's 34 warehouses in Los Angeles, Orange and parts of Riverside and San Bernardino counties, the plan will be sold over the Internet and through a call center.

Costco can offer a discount in part because of lower administration, advertising and brokerage costs, Randolph said.

"They believe they can be cheaper than everyone else, not because of the bulk or the [lack of] frills, but because they are cutting out the middlemen, the broker," said J.D. Kleinke, a healthcare economist in Portland, Ore.

Costco is licensed to sell health insurance and receives a commission, but it "is significantly lower than what is generally paid," Fragnoli said.

Kleinke said consumers didn't really care who their health insurance provider was.

"They just want the cheapest way to see their doctor," Kleinke said.

Although discount retailers selling health insurance may seem like an odd mix, it points out the need consumers have for alternatives, given the rising costs of health insurance, Kleinke said.

Other major retailers including Target Corp. and Longs Drug Stores Corp. also have moved into the healthcare arena. At some Target stores in Minneapolis, shoppers can visit walk-up clinics staffed mostly by nurse practitioners for minor ailments, such as a bladder infection or seasonal allergies, with no appointment and little or no waiting. Target is contracting with Minneapolis-based MinuteClinic Inc. to run the clinics.

In Davis, Calif., this year, Longs unveiled its own in-store clinic. And also this year, the Wal-Mart Stores Inc.-operated Sam's Club began offering a discount program to members that cuts by as much as 50% the cost of some health services not covered by insurance, such as laser eye surgery and dental care.

This area is going to continue to grow, predict healthcare specialists like Kleinke, as rising costs push people to find new ways to insure themselves.

"We're not going to solve this problem," Fragnoli said. But "there is some value in Costco being in the arena. It keeps the providers on their toes."

Copyright 2005 Los Angeles Times

2005-06-11T12:31:00.000-05:00

Update: Hotels Vote to Lock Out Workers

Los Angeles Business Journal Online

By DAVID GREENBERG
Los Angeles Business Journal Staff
Six L.A. area hotels agreed to lock out 2,380 unionized workers after Unite HERE members walked off the job at the Hyatt West Hollywood, a member of a bargaining group with the other six hotels.

The Los Angeles Hotel Employer’s Council voted late Thursday in favor of the lockout after about 120 workers struck the Hyatt West Hollywood over health care reimbursements. The hotels said the lockout would not take effect until midnight Saturday, giving the union time to accept a "best and final" contract offer.

“This is what we call a defensive lockout – it comes in response to a strike,” said Fred Muir, consultant to the hotel council.

Tensions have been high since a contract between Unite HERE Local 11 and nine large hotels expired in April 2004. (Two have since dropped out.) The union has been seeking to align contract expiration dates throughout the country in 2006. The hotels have offered substantial pay increases but they want a longer contract.

The health care payments arose from earlier negotiations. To put pressure on the union, the hotels began deducting $40 in monthly health care premiums last July, but then stopped making the deductions in January. Since then, the union has been seeking reimbursement for premiums the workers paid in the interim.

David Koff, research analyst for Unite HERE, said the local’s 2,500 workers were forced to pay more than $650,000 in health care premiums.

“This has been an issue that agitated the workers from the beginning,” said Koff. “We started at this hotel but it could expand.”

The union is looking for a two-year agreement that would be retroactive to April 15, 2004, when the previous contract expired. That would line Local 11’s agreement with those in several other cities, giving the union more bargaining power.

© 2005 Los Angeles Business Journal Associates

2005-06-11T12:29:00.000-05:00

Frosty reception for hotels' offer / Co-payment changes fail to impress union

San Francisco Chronicle
George Raine, Chronicle Staff Writer
Wednesday, June 8, 2005

The union representing workers at 14 San Francisco hotels won't formally reject the employers' most recent offer until they resume talks today, but the response has already been telegraphed.

"To say our people were unimpressed is an incredible understatement,'' Mike Casey, the president of Local 2 of the hotel workers union, said Tuesday.

On May 31 -- after more than 100 days with no negotiations -- the two sides met, and the hotels presented a contract proposal that would lower workers' co-payments for doctor's office visits and emergency room visits, compared with a previous offer.

The employers said the offer was made "in an effort to reach a settlement that provides hotel employees with a secure, long-term contract.''

The revised payment plan for office and ER visits is $10 and $20 respectively, compared with payments of $15 and $75 in the earlier proposal. Casey characterized the latest offer as an insignificant movement in negotiations.

One of the major issues dividing the two sides, which have been at odds over a new contract since August, is health care eligibility.

Currently, workers at union hotels need to work only two shifts a week in three out of four weeks to qualify for full health benefits. The employers want to increase the number of shifts to five, arguing that the change would be minimal.

Casey of Local 2 warned that the requirement would eliminate health benefits for as many as 1,000 people, who are banquet servers and people who are hired from a hiring hall, called extras.

Casey said he intends today to bring up language issues, a labor term referring to matters that do not affect the employers' bottom line. These include diversity in the workplace, uniforms and laundry expenses, which are still unresolved.

Steve Trent, a spokesman for the employers, said, "We are happy to be back at the table, and we look forward to the union's counterproposal. We hope the union's position will be a meaningful step toward reaching a fair and equitable contract for our employees.''

The 14 major hotels are represented by a bargaining organization that negotiates labor contracts that influence hotel workers' contracts throughout the city.

The member hotels include the Argent, Crowne Plaza, Fairmont, Four Seasons, Grand Hyatt, Hilton, Holiday Inn Civic Center, Holiday Inn Express & Suites at Fisherman's Wharf, Holiday Inn at Fisherman's Wharf, Palace, Hyatt Regency, Mark Hopkins, Omni and St. Francis.

E-mail George Raine at graine@sfchronicle.com.

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©2005 San Francisco Chronicle

2005-06-11T12:27:00.000-05:00

Union Strategy Taking Its Toll

Los Angeles Business Journal Online

By DAVID GREENBERG
Los Angeles Business Journal Staff
In the year-long game of poker between unionized hotel workers and owners of large hotels in Los Angeles, the owners appear to hold the weaker hand.

An aggressive boycott campaign has cost the hotels millions of dollars in lost business. Two of the nine hotels have dropped out of the Los Angeles Hotel Employer’s Council (both were sold; the new owner of the Hyatt Regency Los Angeles cut its own deal with the union and the St. Regis hotel will be converted to condominiums). And a third hotel manager is urging accession to Unite HERE Local 11’s demand for a contract that would expire in 2006, to line up with expiration dates in other large cities.

“Local 11 has outmaneuvered us,” said John Stoddard, general manager of the Wilshire Grand hotel. “What I’m saying is stop fighting them and give them the ’06 agreement.”

When the previous contract expired more than a year ago, there appeared little hope that Unite HERE Local 11 could prevail. The larger and deeper-pocketed grocery workers’ union had just lost a bruising battle with supermarket chains, and the contests had similar parallels.

Both unions represented lower-skill workers in industries where employers were aggressively seeking to cut costs. Both were at a disadvantage as a regional union fighting owners with nationwide, and in the case of the hotel owners, worldwide resources.

Knowing that it couldn’t afford to strike, the union launched a boycott of the hotels, even though a successful boycott was sure to cost workers in the form of lost hours. And it pressed on with a tactic of delaying negotiations, showing a willingness to work without a contract until 2006 if need be.

*The full story is available in the May 30 edition of the Los Angeles Business Journal.

© 2005 Los Angeles Business Journal Associates

2005-06-11T12:25:00.000-05:00

Biltmore Strikes Deal With Union

Los Angeles Business Journal Online
By ANDY FIXMER
Los Angeles Business Journal Staff

In another blow to the local hotel coalition whose members have been boycotted for months, downtown’s Millennium Biltmore Hotel will no longer oppose the efforts of a union to line up a contract with cities across the country.

In return, the union will stop urging Biltmore clients to boycott the hotel.

In response to the deal, the Los Angeles Hotel Employers Council – a group of seven hotels collectively bargaining with the union – filed charges of unfair labor practices with the National Labor Relations Board.

The hotel owners, in a 4-3 vote, filed the charges claiming that the union was improperly negotiating with individual properties – something not allowed under collective bargaining agreements. Fred Muir, a consultant to the hotel employers council, wouldn’t disclose which member hotels voted against filing the charges.

“It’s through their coercion of individual members of the council that we believe violate National Labor Relations regulations,” Muir said. “We also accuse them of not bargaining collectively in good faith.”

David Koff, a research analyst for Unite HERE Local 11, defended the outside agreements with hotel owners saying they did not constitute an outside contract. “They are still entitled to freedom of speech,” Koff said. “They have agreed to advocate for and recommend to the members of the employers council that they should accept the … proposal the union has had on the table for quite some time.”

Ivan Lee, the Biltmore’s general manager, would neither confirm nor deny the deal with the union, expected to be formally announced at the end of today. “We don’t have anything to disclose at this stage,” he said.

The Biltmore’s decision underscores an on-going dismantling of what appeared to be a formidable alliance of hotel owners who were seeking concessions from their employees when the contract expired nearly two years ago.

Last month, the owner of the Wilshire Grand agreed to similar terms as the Biltmore. As members of the Los Angeles Hotel Employers Council neither hotel can legally cut separate deals with the union. However, the two owners have agreed to vote in the union’s favor.

Besides the Biltmore and Wilshire Grand, six hotels that never joined the employers council and instead bargained independently with the union have all reached deals expiring in 2006 – the date when contracts in large cities nationwide are set to be renegotiated.

Muir wouldn’t address whether the NLRB filing indicated the employers council is concerned the union has driven a wedge between owners.

A union-led boycott has also cut into the bottom lines of employer council hotels, despite also reducing the hours of the workers it represents. The union estimates the boycott has cost the hotels between $10 million and $13 million in canceled room nights, conventions, corporate meetings and banquets by 114 confirmed clients.

The employers council has offered the union a five year contract that would give all full-time employees a $1,000 signing bonus, a 22 percent raise over the life of the contract and free family health care.

© 2005 Los Angeles Business Journal Associates.

2005-06-11T12:20:00.000-05:00

Judge Clears Way for Grocery Strike Suit

MSN Money - Associated Press News

LOS ANGELES (AP) - A federal judge ruled Wednesday that California authorities can proceed with an antitrust lawsuit against three grocery chains over a profit-sharing pact they forged during a prolonged labor strike-lockout.

Attorney General Bill Lockyer sued the three grocers -- Albertsons Inc., Kroger Co., which owns Ralphs, and Safeway Inc.'s Vons -- in February 2004, alleging the chains' deal to share costs during the strike violated antitrust laws and hurt consumers by discouraging competitive pricing.

The chains maintained federal labor laws governing collective bargaining shielded them from liability.

In his decision, U.S. District Court Judge George H. King concluded the potential anticompetitive effects of the grocers' mutual aid pact did not "follow naturally from the collective bargaining process," and was not protected from potential antitrust liability.

King made no determination on whether the grocers violated antitrust laws, but his ruling clears the way for the state to pursue its case.

"They can't hide behind immunity to shield their conduct," said Tom Dresslar, a spokesman for Lockyer. "We're confident that now that we've overcome this hurdle, we will be able to convince the court that this agreement violates federal law."

Messages left after hours to representatives for Ralphs, Albertsons and Safeway were not immediately returned Wednesday.

After union leaders ordered the strike against Safeway's Vons and Pavilions chains on Oct. 11, 2003, Albertsons and Ralphs responded by locking out their employees. In all, about 59,000 workers were idled at 859 stores.

About a month into the walkout, the United Food and Commercial Workers union withdrew picket lines at Ralphs stores. As a result of the profit-sharing agreement, Ralphs and sister chain Food 4 Less, which was not a target of the strike, paid Vons and Albertsons $146.2 million, according to court documents.

The strike lasted more than four months, cost store owners more than $2 billion by some estimates and resulted in the permanent loss of many customers.

© 2005 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

2005-06-11T12:19:00.000-05:00

NHL and Union Agree to a Revenue-Linked Cap

Chris Foster and Helene Elliott
From Times Staff and Wire Reports

June 9, 2005

The NHL and NHL Players' Assn. have agreed to a salary cap system based on team-by-team revenue, sources familiar with the negotiations said, a major step toward ending their labor dispute.

Negotiators, who met Wednesday in New York, have carved out a plan that calls for a salary cap linked to each team's revenue — the NHL is pushing for a link at 54%. The projections for the first year of the collective bargaining agreement would put the cap at $34 million to $36 million with a $22 million to $24 million minimum.

The amount would cover all player costs, including medical coverage and bonuses, as well as salary. The plan will also have a dollar-for-dollar luxury tax that goes into effect at the midpoint between the cap's ceiling and floor, $29 million.

While other issues remain, a source said that a deal could be in place in two weeks.

Salary arbitration, qualifying offers and free agency could stall negotiations, as could the 24% across-the-board salary rollback offered by the union in December.

Chris Foster and Helene Elliott

Copyright 2005 Los Angeles Times

2005-06-11T12:17:00.000-05:00

SACRAMENTO / Ballot OKd on use of public workers' union dues

San Francisco Chronicle
John Wildermuth, Chronicle Political Writer
Wednesday, June 8, 2005

Teachers, firefighters and other public workers would have to give written consent before their dues could be used for political purposes under an initiative that has qualified for a likely special election ballot.

"We need to protect public employees from the insult of having money taken from them and spent on causes they may violently disagree with,'' said Lewis Uhler, who sponsored the initiative.

Union officials argue that the measure is a Republican attempt to hamstring unions that have consistently supported Democratic candidates.

The union dues measure, along with another that would more than double the time a teacher would have to work before being granted a permanent job, got the OK late Monday from Secretary of State Bruce McPherson, who announced that they each had more than the 411,198 valid signatures needed to make the ballot.

Both measures will go on the next statewide ballot, now scheduled for next June. But Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is expected to call Monday for a special election, which would put the measures before voters on Nov. 8.

While the teacher tenure initiative is one of a package of measures being backed by Schwarzenegger, the fight over union dues is likely to be the nastiest -- and most expensive. In 1998, unions spent more than $17 million to defeat Proposition 226, which would have put similar restrictions on all unions, public and private, making it tougher to raise money for political purposes.

"This time we're focusing exclusively on public employee unions,'' Uhler said. "People are upset with their overreaching arrogance and even greed in collecting pay and benefits, with pensions no other taxpayer could enjoy.''

While Schwarzenegger has not endorsed the measure so far, his allies are pumping money into the anti-union effort. In the past week, the state Republican Party has put $200,000 into Uhler's campaign, while the Small Business Action Committee, run by former Schwarzenegger aide Joel Fox, has given $555,000.

Democrats and union leaders have pledged to fight all of Schwarzenegger's initiatives.

"For reasons I still don't understand, it seems the governor is going to call a special election on issues most people don't care about or don't know about,'' said Gale Kaufman, a veteran Democratic strategist who is heading the opposition to Schwarzenegger's initiative effort. "He is spending $80 million for an election on initiatives that will impact horribly on working men and women.''

An initiative that would require that parents be notified before their minor daughters receive abortions already is on the ballot.

E-mail John Wildermuth at jwildermuth@sfchronicle.com.

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©2005 San Francisco Chronicle

2005-06-10T15:02:00.000-05:00

Public Workers Under Fire
fulltext

Schwarzenegger Targets A Last Bastion of Security
By Harold Meyerson

Thursday, June 9, 2005; Page A21

America has a problem with its public employees. They are not downwardly mobile enough.

Policemen, firefighters, teachers, hospital nurses -- they still belong to the one part of the U.S. economy where the New Deal hasn't been repealed. Fully 90 percent of them have defined-benefit pensions as of old. In the private sector, just 60 percent of employees have retirement plans, and a scant 24 percent still cling to defined-benefit plans. Fully 86 percent of public employees are covered by on-the-job health insurance; in the private sector, the rate has fallen to 66 percent.

According to the Employee Benefit Research Institute, public employees make on average $49,275 a year. A sub-princely sum, that, but better than the $34,461 that is the average annual income of private-sector workers.

There are a number of reasons public employees have been able to preserve the kinds of benefits and, in some instances, living standards that were once more common to American workers generally, but chief among these is unions. While 37 percent of public-sector workers are unionized, just 8 percent of private-sector workers are. Through their power at the ballot box, public employees have maintained the ability to bargain with their employers, who are either elected officials or their appointees. For all intents and purposes, their private-sector counterparts have lost the power to bargain collectively.

But are decent living standards in one sector sustainable when they're dependent on the taxes of an increasingly beleaguered private sector? More and more, conservative political strategists see an opportunity to weaken the Democrats -- traditionally the beneficiaries of public-employee union support -- by pitting private-sector voters against public-sector ones. That certainly was Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's goal earlier this year when he backed an initiative that would have terminated the defined-benefit pensions for California's state and municipal employees and shifted them to 401(k)s instead.

Schwarzenegger's plan had a few glitches -- most notably, ending survivor benefits for widows and orphans of police officers and firefighters killed on the job. Facing an onslaught of criticism, Schwarzenegger backed off the initiative. But the war between Arnold and California's public employees has spread across many fronts. He's been embroiled with nurses on the question of nurse-patient ratios, and with teachers over his reneging on a funding commitment to public schools. He's been losing every one of these fights, with his support in the polls dropping from 60 percent to an anemic 40.

Now, a number of Schwarzenegger's business backers have funded yet another initiative, this one to curtail the ability of public-sector unions to fund political campaigns (including those for and against initiatives). The governor -- unless he trades off his support for this measure in return for concessions from the Democratic legislature -- is likely to back it.

Though the attacks from the gazillionaire governor on the state's public servants have only backfired, Arnold's handlers do not sound daunted. On Sunday the Los Angeles Times, reporting on a series of bi-weekly phone calls that Schwarzenegger and his strategists hold with his leading business backers, quoted veteran Republican operative Don Sipple, in one recent call, telling the assembled Arnoldistas how they'd go after the public employees.

"When you get to the point of . . . 'These people are on your payroll, and they are out to roll you every day,' that creates a kind of phenomenon of anger," Sipple said. "But it takes a long time to get there."

If Arnold truly believes he can convince his fellow Californians that the police, firefighters and teachers are out to roll them every day, then the tale of the Incredible Shrinking Governator will continue apace.

But the problems faced by public-sector workers as the private sector grows steadily meaner aren't going away, whatever the outcome of the immediate battles in California. When public-sector workers were first joining unions in the '60s, they were largely playing catch-up with private-sector employees. But as Wal-Mart has supplanted General Motors as America's largest private employer (and GM announced a cutback of 25,000 more workers Tuesday), it's the teachers and their public-sector cohorts who have emerged as the relatively more advantaged -- and politically exposed.

From the period of the three decades after World War II, when the long boom in the American economy was felt in every class and quadrant, we have devolved into a nation of separate economies -- increasingly insecure private-sector workers, a public sector where the guarantees of the New Deal order still pertain and a stratum of mega-rich whose investment income is taxed at lower rates than the incomes of those who work for a living. If we can't create more security in the private sector (and universal health insurance would be a good start), the modest security of a work life in the public sector will surely be eroded, too.

meyersonh@washpost.com

© 2005 The Washington Post Company

2005-06-09T08:48:00.000-05:00

Eighth-grader wins spelling bee

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WASHINGTON (AP) -- Eighth-grader Anurag Kashyap is good at math, science and geography. But rapid-fire spelling -- that's his forte.

Whizzing through words most people never heard of, the 13-year-old from Poway, California, won the 2005 national spelling bee championship on his second try as a contestant.

"I was really nervous because I worked really hard on that and I wanted to do good," Anurag said Friday on ABC's "Good Morning America." He had to guess at a few words he hadn't studied, including "priscilla" (a ruffled curtain) in the third round, Anurag said.

But he exuded confidence as he spelled the final, winning word Thursday. He rushed through "appoggiatura" (melodic tone), and ran into his father's arms and burst into tears. He said he felt "just pure happiness" and later coined his own word, "ecstatic-ness."

A straight-A student, Anurag has represented his school at the California Geographic Bee and recently took part in state-level math and science competitions.

He beat out 272 other competitors in the 19th round of the 78th annual National Scripps Spelling Bee to win $30,000 in cash, scholarships and books.

Anurag sailed through "prosciutto," an Italian dry-cured ham, and "sphygmomanometer," an instrument for measuring blood pressure.

He sometimes spelled so quickly that only the judges appeared to be able to follow him.

Anurag tied for 47th in last year's spelling bee. That experience "helped me to know what I should study to ... like, win this thing," he said at a news conference, repeatedly hiding his face behind a cardboard number that hung around his neck during the contest.

Tied for second place were 11-year-old Samir Patel, who is home-schooled in Colleyville, Texas, and Aliya Deri, 13, of Pleasanton, California.

"I'm disappointed," Samir said, adding that he will try again next year.

Aliya, who will begin high school next year and be ineligible for the 2006 contest, said she was happy with how well she did.

She said after the contest that French is one of her favorite subjects.

"Though you wouldn't know it by the way I spelled the last word," she said. She was eliminated when she missed "trouvaille," a lucky find.

Samir delighted the audience with several of his questions and comments. Twice on hearing a word he had to spell that was familiar to him he said, "Yes!"

Upon correctly spelling "filiciform," in the sixth round, the home-schooled Samir yelled, "Thanks, Mom!"

Samir ultimately stumbled on the word "Roscian," meaning skilled in acting. Two years ago, when Samir tied for third place, bee winner Sai Gunturi predicted he would be a force to be reckoned with.

Each speller won at least $50. Anurag gets $28,000 in cash, scholarships and savings bonds, plus books from Encyclopedia Britannica.

The contest is administered by E.W. Scripps Co. The youngsters all won local contests sponsored by newspapers.

Copyright 2005 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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http://www.cnn.com/2005/EDUCATION/06/02/spelling.bee.ap/?section=cnn_us

2005-06-07T13:27:00.000-05:00

Antidote To Secrecy

By David S. Broder
The Washington Post
Sunday, June 5, 2005; B07

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The great benefit of W. Mark Felt's decision to identify himself as "Deep Throat," the famous Watergate secret source, is that a whole new generation of Americans now has a chance to learn just how perverse were the values that infected the Nixon White House.

Some -- but not all -- of the surviving Nixon loyalists reacted in "shoot-the-messenger" fashion to Vanity Fair's revelation that the former No. 2 man in the FBI was the shadowy figure who helped Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein unlock the Watergate story in the pages of The Post.

Chuck Colson, Nixon's special counsel, who was jailed for his part in the criminal conspiracy hatched in the Oval Office, told NBC's "Today" show that he was "in a state of shock" at learning it was Felt, because "I never thought anybody in such a position of sensitivity in the Justice Department would breach confidences."

Pat Buchanan, who sharpened his rhetorical claws as a Nixon speechwriter, told "Today's" Matt Lauer, "There's nothing heroic about breaking faith with your people, breaking the law, sneaking around in garages, putting stuff from an investigation out to a Nixon-hating Washington Post."

Colson added that Felt "broke the confidence of the president of the United States. If you're a president of the United States, you've got to have somebody in the FBI you can talk to with the confidence you talk to a priest."

And Buchanan threw in the extraordinary assertion that "what he did was help destroy an enormously popular president and, partly as a consequence of that, what 58,000 Americans died for in Vietnam was poured down the sewer."

In these comments, Americans born in the 1970s, '80s and '90s can learn everything they need to know about the dangerous delusions of the Nixon era. The mind-set that created enemies lists, the blind loyalty to a deeply flawed individual, the twisting of historical fact to turn villains into heroes and heroes into villains -- they are all there.

Such tendencies are not unique to one White House; they go with the territory. They must be consciously resisted by men and women of conscience working within an administration and checked by those on the outside -- notably journalists -- whose job it is to monitor the presidency.

That is why excessive official secrecy is always suspect and why the isolation of a president behind a closed circle of advisers can lead to abuse of power.

To get a balanced view of what Felt did in becoming a source for the Watergate reporters, it is wise to bypass Colson and Buchanan and listen to William Ruckelshaus.

As deputy attorney general, he followed the example of his boss, the late Elliot Richardson, and resigned rather than carry out Nixon's order to fire Watergate special prosecutor Archibald Cox.

When I interviewed Ruckelshaus last week, he said there were obvious dangers when "somebody who is involved in an investigation," as Felt was involved in the FBI's investigation of the Watergate break-in, "puts out information to the press. You can hurt innocent individuals and damage the investigative process.

"But if you see the White House and the head of the FBI [L. Patrick Gray] interfering with the investigation, what are you going to do? If you go public with the charges, who is going to believe you?"

Mark Felt did what whistle-blowers need to do. He took his information to reporters who diligently dug up the evidence to support his well-founded suspicions.

The republic was saved and the public well served. That Colson and Buchanan still don't get it speaks volumes about them.

davidbroder@washpost.com

© 2005 The Washington Post Company

2005-06-07T09:35:00.000-05:00

Justices Say U.S. May Prohibit the Use of Medical Marijuana

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By LINDA GREENHOUSE
The New York Times

WASHINGTON, June 6 - The Supreme Court on Monday upheld the power of Congress to prohibit and prosecute the possession and use of marijuana for medical purposes, even in the 11 states that permit it.

The 6-to-3 decision, a firm reassertion of federal authority, revealed a deep fissure within the coalition that over the past decade has provided the majority for a series of decisions curbing Congressional power and elevating the role of the states within the federal system. Two members of that coalition, Justices Anthony M. Kennedy and Antonin Scalia, voted this time to uphold federal authority.

The decision overturned a 2003 ruling by a federal appeals court that shielded California's Compassionate Use Act, the medical-marijuana initiative adopted by the state's voters nine years ago, from the reach of federal drug enforcement.

The appeals court had held that Congress lacked constitutional authority to regulate the noncommercial cultivation and use of marijuana that did not cross state lines.

But "the regulation is squarely within Congress's commerce power," Justice John Paul Stevens said for the majority on Monday. He added that the court's precedents interpreting Congress's authority under the Commerce Clause of the Constitution had clearly established "Congress's power to regulate purely local activities that are part of an economic 'class of activities' that have a substantial effect on interstate commerce."

The decision, Gonzales v. Raich, No. 03-1454, was not necessarily the last word on medical marijuana, either from the courts or from other branches of government. Under the terms of the opinion, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, in San Francisco, will now consider other challenges to the application of federal drug law.

These include an argument made by the two women who brought the case that it is a violation of their constitutional right to due process to deprive them of what they say is the only drug that eases their suffering from a variety of painful conditions.

Because the two patients, Angel McClary Raich and Diane Monson, prevailed in the Ninth Circuit on their Commerce Clause argument, the appeals court did not address the other issues they raised.

Advocates for medical marijuana, meanwhile, emphasized on Monday that the state laws remained in effect, meaning that state officials would not prosecute patients who used medical marijuana, and that the prospect of federal enforcement was fairly remote. Allen Hopper, a lawyer with the Drug Law Reform Project of the American Civil Liberties Union, noted that the federal government handles only about 1 percent of marijuana prosecutions.

Justice Stevens, noting that "perhaps even more important than these legal avenues is the democratic process," suggested that the executive branch might reclassify marijuana for medical purposes or that Congress might take up the matter.

The first option appeared quite unlikely, given the response by John P. Walters, the Bush administration's "drug czar," the director of national drug control policy. "To date, science and research have not determined that smoking a crude plant is safe or effective," his official statement said, adding, "We have a responsibility as a civilized society to ensure that the medicine Americans receive from their doctors is effective, safe and free from the pro-drug politics that are being promoted in America under the guise of medicine."

The House of Representatives is due to vote next week on an appropriations amendment that would prohibit the Justice Department from spending money to enforce federal drug laws against patients using marijuana for medical purposes. While the amendment failed last year, 19 Republicans voted for it. It was not brought to a vote in the Senate.

Mrs. Raich, one of the plaintiffs, speaking along with her husband and lawyers in a telephone news conference, said she would continue to use the marijuana that was prescribed by her doctor and is grown for her by friends. "I don't have a choice but to continue because if I stopped I would die," she said. She suffers from a wasting syndrome, among other ailments, and said that only marijuana gave her the appetite to eat enough to maintain her weight.

The women brought the case after federal agents arrived at Ms. Monson's home in 2002 and, after a three-hour standoff, seized and destroyed her six plants. The two women sued for a declaration that the federal Controlled Substances Act did not apply to their situation.

The opinion by Justice Stevens was joined by his allies in many recent battles over federalism, Justices David H. Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen G. Breyer, and by Justice Kennedy, who did not provide an explanation for his vote.

Justice Scalia, by contrast, explained himself at length. He did not sign the majority opinion, instead offering a separate concurring opinion that was no less definite in its support for federal authority.

"Where necessary to make a regulation of interstate commerce effective, Congress may regulate even those intrastate activities that do not themselves substantially affect interstate commerce," Justice Scalia said. He cited opinions from the early 1940's, after the Supreme Court rallied to support the New Deal and gave Congress a degree of power over national affairs that was not seriously challenged until the Rehnquist Court began invalidating federal laws in the mid-1990's.

Chief Justice Rehnquist was one of the dissenters on Monday. He and Justice Clarence Thomas joined a dissenting opinion by Justice Sandra Day O'Connor; Justice Thomas also wrote a separate dissenting opinion.

As a prime mover of the court's federalism revolution, Justice O'Connor did not hide her dismay. The court's opinion provided a roadmap to "removing meaningful limits on the Commerce Clause" and "threatens to sweep all of productive human activity into federal regulatory reach," she said.

Justice O'Connor said that while she did not support the medical marijuana initiative as public policy, it represented the kind of innovation and "experiment" that came within the latitude the Constitution allows the states.

"The states' core police powers have always included authority to define criminal law and to protect the health, safety and welfare of their citizens," she said, adding that "whatever the wisdom of California's experiment with medical marijuana, the federalism principles that have driven our Commerce Clause cases require that room for experiment be protected in this case."

Justice Thomas said that "if Congress can regulate this under the Commerce Clause, then it can regulate virtually anything, and the federal government is no longer one of limited and enumerated powers."

The sharpest dispute was over the meaning of two of the core decisions of the Rehnquist Court's approach to federalism. Both struck down federal laws, the Gun-Free School Zones Act and the Violence Against Women Act, on the ground that they exceeded Congressional authority, and both were decided by five-member majorities that included Justices Kennedy and Scalia.

While Justice O'Connor declared that the marijuana decision was "irreconcilable" with the earlier ones, Justice Scalia disagreed. Neither of the earlier decisions "involved the power of Congress to exert control over intrastate activities in connection with a more comprehensive scheme of regulation" comparable to federal drug laws, he said.

Besides California, states allowing use of marijuana for medical purposes are Alaska, Arizona, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, Washington and Vermont.

Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company

2005-06-06T12:22:00.000-05:00

Supreme Court Rejects Women's Sports Case - Yahoo! News

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By GINA HOLLAND, Associated Press Writer

The Supreme Court refused Monday to consider reinstating a lawsuit that accuses federal officials of discriminating against male athletes in enforcing equal opportunities for women.

Justices without comment rejected an appeal from the National Wrestling Coaches Association and other groups that have been fighting federal policies under the anti-discrimination law known as Title IX.

At issue for the court was whether the challengers showed that the law directly caused a reduction in men's sports, and whether they should be allowed to sue federal officials.

The Supreme Court has indicated a special interest recently in Title IX, the 1972 law that bars sex discrimination in any educational program receiving federal funds.

In March, justices ruled 5-4 that a teacher or coach who claims sexual discrimination on behalf of others is protected from firing under the landmark law. That decision expands the scope of the law to protect whistleblowers as well as direct victims.

Then last month, the justices told a lower court to reconsider whether Michigan high schools discriminated against female athletes by scheduling their basketball and volleyball seasons during nontraditional times of the year.

The latest case involved claims that the government is forcing colleges to discriminate against male athletes, because of a requirement that the ratio of male and female athletes be similar to the overall student population.

"If unchecked, the gender quota ... will continue to cause sweeping injustices and discrimination in colleges nationwide, and is already being applied to public high schools," justices were told in a brief filed by the Eagle Forum Education & Legal Defense Fund.

Over the past two decades, the number of wrestling teams at NCAA schools has dropped from 363 to 222, while football teams increased from 497 to 619, according to NCAA leaders. Title IX has been blamed for part of the decline.

In addition to men's wrestling team cuts, other schools have dropped outdoor track, swimming programs and ice hockey, the court was told.

A divided panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit said that the lawsuit should have been filed against individual colleges that eliminated men's sports, not the federal government.

Title IX covers admissions, recruitment, course offerings, counseling, financial aid, student health and student housing, as well as athletics.

The case is National Wrestling Coaches Association v. Department of Education, 04-922.

Copyright � 2005 The Associated Press.

2005-05-27T11:55:00.000-05:00

It's a Video Game, and an Army Recruiter

By Josh White
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, May 27, 2005; A25

The Army's flagging recruitment numbers are serious business. So Army officials increasingly are turning to a game for help.

It is an online, multiplayer video game that they believe will lure teenagers into Army culture, hoping both to educate them about the military and to spark interest in volunteering to serve.

The game, dubbed America's Army, employs a realistic and team-oriented approach to give players a sense of what it is like to join the Army, to train how to use weapons and then how to work together on missions. Players progress through the game and its many updates in a variety of ways, learning how to jointly accomplish military tasks while using different skills, such as fighting as an infantryman or saving lives as a medic.

First-time visitors go through weapons training on the game Web site and learn how to jump from airplanes. They are punished for their "criminal" mistakes -- such as shooting the drill instructor -- by doing time at Fort Leavenworth's prison. Then players join others from around the country on virtual missions, helping one another move through lifelike scenarios.

"We want kids to come into the Army and feel like they've already been there," said Col. Casey Wardynski, who as director of the Army's office of economic and manpower analysis came up with the idea. "A game is like a team effort, and the Army is very much a team effort. By playing an online, multiplayer game, you can get the feel of being in the Army."

Wardynski began developing the game after a similar recruiting crisis in 1999, when top Army officials were looking for a way to reach out to potential recruits with minimal cost. Wardynski wanted an economical way to counter pop-culture images of the military with a no-nonsense approach to being a soldier. The game, he decided, would provide a gateway to information and entertainment, targeting boys 14 and older.

With many potential recruits put off by images of basic training and drill sergeants, Wardynski said, the game tries to break down those barriers.

"It's designed to give them an inside view on the very fundamentals of being a soldier, and it's also designed to give them a sense of self-efficacy, that they can do it," Wardynski said. Players start out completing obstacle courses and learning how to fire realistic Army weapons, such as automatic rifles and grenade launchers. "We want them to see that they can succeed in doing this. You don't have to think what it would look like -- you can see what it looks like."

Since the game's launch in 2002, nearly 5.4 million users have registered on the game's Web site, and more than 2 million users have passed through basic training in the latest version of the game, which focuses on the Special Forces. Wardynski said the game and its nearly 20 updates have been downloaded 20 million times, and recruiters have issued almost 2 million copies of the game on CD-ROM. The Army also has licensed the game for release on Microsoft's Xbox and Sony's PlayStation platforms later this year.

Although the game runs through its own Web site ( http://www.americasarmy.com/ ), its developers purposefully built privacy into the game -- no personal information is gathered from players. Army officials know how many people have registered and how they are doing within the game, but have no way to contact the players individually. There are links within the game for those who want to contact a recruiter or to learn more about the Army.

Recruiters have used the game, however, to get people to come to them. America's Army is the subject of gaming tournaments around the country, giving recruiters an opportunity to interact with people already familiar with Army basics and might be more apt to join.

Sgt. 1st Class Bo Scott, recruiting station commander in Newport News, said he was able to meet 70 people at a recent tournament he sponsored with a local college. Out of the group, one video gamer has already enlisted through his office, and another has contacted him about signing up.

There are no statistics about how many people have joined the Army because of the game, or after playing the game, but Army officials have plenty of positive anecdotes and say it can only help in a very difficult recruiting environment.

"The game is never going to overcome someone's trepidation and fears regarding the ongoing war on terror," Scott said. "But it does get some people talking to recruiters who might not have otherwise. It opens a window, and if they look in and they decide to join, great."

© 2005 The Washington Post Company

2005-05-17T13:58:00.000-05:00

A Critic Takes On the Logic of Female Orgasm - New York Times

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May 17, 2005
A Critic Takes On the Logic of Female Orgasm

By DINITIA SMITH
Evolutionary scientists have never had difficulty explaining the male orgasm, closely tied as it is to reproduction.

But the Darwinian logic behind the female orgasm has remained elusive. Women can have sexual intercourse and even become pregnant - doing their part for the perpetuation of the species - without experiencing orgasm. So what is its evolutionary purpose?

Over the last four decades, scientists have come up with a variety of theories, arguing, for example, that orgasm encourages women to have sex and, therefore, reproduce or that it leads women to favor stronger and healthier men, maximizing their offspring's chances of survival.

But in a new book, Dr. Elisabeth A. Lloyd, a philosopher of science and professor of biology at Indiana University, takes on 20 leading theories and finds them wanting. The female orgasm, she argues in the book, "The Case of the Female Orgasm: Bias in the Science of Evolution," has no evolutionary function at all.

Rather, Dr. Lloyd says the most convincing theory is one put forward in 1979 by Dr. Donald Symons, an anthropologist.

That theory holds that female orgasms are simply artifacts - a byproduct of the parallel development of male and female embryos in the first eight or nine weeks of life.

In that early period, the nerve and tissue pathways are laid down for various reflexes, including the orgasm, Dr. Lloyd said. As development progresses, male hormones saturate the embryo, and sexuality is defined.

In boys, the penis develops, along with the potential to have orgasms and ejaculate, while "females get the nerve pathways for orgasm by initially having the same body plan."

Nipples in men are similarly vestigial, Dr. Lloyd pointed out.

While nipples in woman serve a purpose, male nipples appear to be simply left over from the initial stage of embryonic development.

The female orgasm, she said, "is for fun."

Dr. Lloyd said scientists had insisted on finding an evolutionary function for female orgasm in humans either because they were invested in believing that women's sexuality must exactly parallel that of men or because they were convinced that all traits had to be "adaptations," that is, serve an evolutionary function.

Theories of female orgasm are significant, she added, because "men's expectations about women's normal sexuality, about how women should perform, are built around these notions."

"And men are the ones who reflect back immediately to the woman whether or not she is adequate sexually," Dr. Lloyd continued.

Central to her thesis is the fact that women do not routinely have orgasms during sexual intercourse.

She analyzed 32 studies, conducted over 74 years, of the frequency of female orgasm during intercourse.

When intercourse was "unassisted," that is not accompanied by stimulation of the clitoris, just a quarter of the women studied experienced orgasms often or very often during intercourse, she found.

Five to 10 percent never had orgasms. Yet many of the women became pregnant.

Dr. Lloyd's figures are lower than those of Dr. Alfred A. Kinsey, who in his 1953 book "Sexual Behavior in the Human Female" found that 39 to 47 percent of women reported that they always, or almost always, had orgasm during intercourse.

But Kinsey, Dr. Lloyd said, included orgasms assisted by clitoral stimulation.

Dr. Lloyd said there was no doubt in her mind that the clitoris was an evolutionary adaptation, selected to create excitement, leading to sexual intercourse and then reproduction.

But, "without a link to fertility or reproduction," Dr. Lloyd said, "orgasm cannot be an adaptation."

Not everyone agrees. For example, Dr. John Alcock, a professor of biology at Arizona State University, criticized an earlier version of Dr. Lloyd's thesis, discussed in in a 1987 article by Stephen Jay Gould in the magazine Natural History.

In a phone interview, Dr. Alcock said that he had not read her new book, but that he still maintained the hypothesis that the fact that "orgasm doesn't occur every time a woman has intercourse is not evidence that it's not adaptive."

"I'm flabbergasted by the notion that orgasm has to happen every time to be adaptive," he added.

Dr. Alcock theorized that a woman might use orgasm "as an unconscious way to evaluate the quality of the male," his genetic fitness and, thus, how suitable he would be as a father for her offspring.

"Under those circumstances, you wouldn't expect her to have it every time," Dr. Alcock said.

Among the theories that Dr. Lloyd addresses in her book is one proposed in 1993, by Dr. R. Robin Baker and Dr. Mark A. Bellis, at Manchester University in England. In two papers published in the journal Animal Behaviour, they argued that female orgasm was a way of manipulating the retention of sperm by creating suction in the uterus. When a woman has an orgasm from one minute before the man ejaculates to 45 minutes after, she retains more sperm, they said.

Furthermore, they asserted, when a woman has intercourse with a man other than her regular sexual partner, she is more likely to have an orgasm in that prime time span and thus retain more sperm, presumably making conception more likely. They postulated that women seek other partners in an effort to obtain better genes for their offspring.

Dr. Lloyd said the Baker-Bellis argument was "fatally flawed because their sample size is too small."

"In one table," she said, "73 percent of the data is based on the experience of one person."

In an e-mail message recently, Dr. Baker wrote that his and Dr. Bellis's manuscript had "received intense peer review appraisal" before publication. Statisticians were among the reviewers, he said, and they noted that some sample sizes were small, "but considered that none of these were fatal to our paper."

Dr. Lloyd said that studies called into question the logic of such theories. Research by Dr. Ludwig Wildt and his colleagues at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg in Germany in 1998, for example, found that in a healthy woman the uterus undergoes peristaltic contractions throughout the day in the absence of sexual intercourse or orgasm. This casts doubt, Dr. Lloyd argues, on the idea that the contractions of orgasm somehow affect sperm retention.

Another hypothesis, proposed in 1995 by Dr. Randy Thornhill, a professor of biology at the University of New Mexico and two colleagues, held that women were more likely to have orgasms during intercourse with men with symmetrical physical features. On the basis of earlier studies of physical attraction, Dr. Thornhill argued that symmetry might be an indicator of genetic fitness.

Dr. Lloyd, however, said those conclusions were not viable because "they only cover a minority of women, 45 percent, who say they sometimes do, and sometimes don't, have orgasm during intercourse."

"It excludes women on either end of the spectrum," she said. "The 25 percent who say they almost always have orgasm in intercourse and the 30 percent who say they rarely or never do. And that last 30 percent includes the 10 percent who say they never have orgasm under any circumstances."

In a phone interview, Dr. Thornhill said that he had not read Dr. Lloyd's book but the fact that not all women have orgasms during intercourse supports his theory.

"There will be patterns in orgasm with preferred and not preferred men," he said.

Dr. Lloyd also criticized work by Sarah Blaffer Hrdy, an emeritus professor of anthropology at the University of California, Davis, who studies primate behavior and female reproductive strategies.

Scientists have documented that orgasm occurs in some female primates; for other mammals, whether orgasm occurs remains an open question.

In the 1981 book "The Woman That Never Evolved" and in her other work, Dr. Hrdy argues that orgasm evolved in nonhuman primates as a way for the female to protect her offspring from the depredation of males.

She points out that langur monkeys have a high infant mortality rate, with 30 percent of deaths a result of babies' being killed by males who are not the fathers. Male langurs, she says, will not kill the babies of females they have mated with.

In macaques and chimpanzees, she said, females are conditioned by the pleasurable sensations of clitoral stimulation to keep copulating with multiple partners until they have an orgasm. Thus, males do not know which infants are theirs and which are not and do not attack them.

Dr. Hrdy also argues against the idea that female orgasm is an artifact of the early parallel development of male and female embryos.

"I'm convinced," she said, "that the selection of the clitoris is quite separate from that of the penis in males."

In critiquing Dr. Hrdy's view, Dr. Lloyd disputes the idea that longer periods of sexual intercourse lead to a higher incidence of orgasm, something that if it is true, may provide an evolutionary rationale for female orgasm.

But Dr. Hrdy said her work did not speak one way or another to the issue of female orgasm in humans. "My hypothesis is silent," she said.

One possibility, Dr. Hrdy said, is that orgasm in women may have been an adaptive trait in our prehuman ancestors.

"But we separated from our common primate ancestors about seven million years ago," she said.

"Perhaps the reason orgasm is so erratic is that it's phasing out," Dr. Hrdy said. "Our descendants on the starships may well wonder what all the fuss was about."

Western culture is suffused with images of women's sexuality, of women in the throes of orgasm during intercourse and seeming to reach heights of pleasure that are rare, if not impossible, for most women in everyday life.

"Accounts of our evolutionary past tell us how the various parts of our body should function," Dr. Lloyd said.

If women, she said, are told that it is "natural" to have orgasms every time they have intercourse and that orgasms will help make them pregnant, then they feel inadequate or inferior or abnormal when they do not achieve it.

"Getting the evolutionary story straight has potentially very large social and personal consequences for all women," Dr. Lloyd said. "And indirectly for men, as well."

2005-04-10T17:13:00.000-05:00

The Independent: Dandruff is as bad for the Earth as it is for your Image

2005-04-06T19:22:00.000-05:00

BBC NEWS | Health | Cannabis chemical 'helps heart'

2004-07-21T19:36:00.000-05:00

The Great Blogroll Spring Cleaning, pt. 2

nosey online
Description: liberal poliblog, mostly a linker
Category: poliblog

Not Geniuses
Description: liberal to moderate poliblog, has been moving left for awhile
Category: poliblog

Notes on the Atrocities
Description: liberalish poliblog, lots of content
Category: poliblog

Nurse Ratched's Notebook
Description: Lefty poliblog with a dark sense of humor; lean postings lately
Category: poliblog

Obsidian Wings
Description: Despite the name, it's a good blog-serious comment on current events. moderate liberal/libertarian republican mix multiblog.
Category: poliblog

One Hand Clapping
Description: Conservative poliblog, sometimes manages to say something sensible.
Category: poliblog, A-lis

Open Source Politics
Description: Geek-centric group liberal poliblog
Category: poliblog

Orcinis
Description: Freelance journalist's somewhat snarky liberal poliblog
Category: poliblog, A-list

Pandagon
Description: Liberal poliblog,
Category: A-list

PEA Soup
Description: group academic philosoblog focused on ethics
Category: philosoblog

Peter Levine
Description: Sort of philosophy, sort of public policy, occasionally current events
Category: philosoblog

Philosophy from the (617)
Description: Apparently defunct philosoblog
Category: philosoblog

Philosoraptor
Description: Not really a philosoblog. Looks at current events using the methodology of analytic philosophy. Yea!
Category: poliblog

Political Animal
Description: Kevin Drum sells out and moves up. (If you don't change at all, is that really selling out?)
Category: A-list, poliblog

Political Wire
Description: Political news for political junkies
Category: poliblog

The Poor Man
Description: Liberal poliblog
Category: poliblog, almost A-list

Power Line
Description: Conservative group blog, pithy, reasonably sane, not too snarky
Category: poliblog

Pro-War dot com
Description: snarkish liberal blog
Category: poliblog

Pseudopodium
Description: Like L'Alpe de Huez, psuedopodium is beyond category
Category: Literablog

randomWalks
Description: group radical poliblog
Category: poliblog

rawblogXport
Description: labor linker extraordinaire
Category: labor

Real Live Preacher
Description: Essays from a real live preacher
Category: Literablog

The Red Pages
Description: Joshua Norton II, Emporer of the United States and Protector of Mexico, blogfights with A Small Victory.
Category: poliblog

Strip Mining for Whimsy
Description: Emporer Joshua Norton gets autobiographical on your ass.
Category: literablog

Rick's Café Americain
Description: sometime comedian has a bloggy blog with some politics
Category: bloggy blog

The Road to Surfdom
Description: Ex-pat Australian living in the U.S. has a liberal poliblog
Category: poliblog, A-list

Roger Ailes
Description: snarky liberal commentary
Category: poliblog

Rook's Rant
Description: Snarky liberal links/rants/chess moves
Category: poliblog

Rubber Hose
Description: liberalish poliblog
Category: poliblog

Running from the Thought Police
Description: C/U based liberal blog (from a catholic)
Category: poliblog

Safety Neal's Fireside Chat
Description: Neal
Category: peeps

Samizdata
Description: Armed libertarian group blog with a clever but inappropriate name
Category: poliblog

Sapphos Breathing
Description: bloggy blog philosofemiblog
Category: philosoblog

Sarah's Chess Journal
Description: A chess history blog, with an eye towards women in chess. Recently underwent an unfortunate facelift, but current interface problems may be temporary.
Category: Chessblog

Scott Rosenberg
Description: Salon writer dips his ink in the blogwell. Does technology and politics
Category: poliblog, techblog

Rallblog
Description: Editorial cartoonist Ted Rall's blog
Category: poliblog

Seeing the Forest
Description: Earnest and contenful group blog by some liberals on a mission
Category: poliblog

SistersTalk
Description: liberal poliblog with an eye for issues relevant to women of color
Category: poliblog

2004-07-17T16:30:00.000-05:00

Blogroll Spring Cleaning, Episode I

I'm going through my blogroll as part of a barely conceived effort to make this page more usefull to me. What follows is, well, it's probably pretty obvious.

On the off chance that any of the bloggers I've linked to stop by and think my description is wrong, feel free to comment in the Submit a Link field above.

Here goes.

A Book Inside Me
Description: "Publish the book that I have not writen yet"
Category: Literablogging

A Daily Dose of Architecture
Description: daily postings on happenings in the world of architecture
Category: Peeps, art&culture

Abject Funk
Description: lefty political blog, moderate posting tending towards original thought
Category: poliblog

Africa Pundit
Description: Started out as an instapundit style news blog from Africa, but posting is extremely light.
Category: poliblog

The Agitator
Description: Libertarian leaning balko blog with occasional guest postings. A bit of a know it all hothead
Category: poliblog

Alas! A blog
Description: Another cartoonist with a blog. Lefty politics with special attention to women's issues.
Category: poliblog

Always Low Prices
Description: group blog about everything wal-mart. Tends to be pro-wallly, but they're open to posters who have alternate opinions.
Category: poliblog

Ambivalent Imbroglio
Description: Todd Chatman's law school blog
Category: peeps, social commentary, bloggy blog

American Samizdat
Description: Lefty poliblog
Category: poliblog

Andrew Sullivan
Description: Gay Republican comes to grips with his inner social liberal
Category: poliblog, A-list

Angry Bear
Description: liberalish economist has a blog
Category: poliblog, economoblog

Art Machine
Description: Everything from star trek to netflix to culture to leftyish social commentary
Category: bloggy blog, random

Blaugistine
Description: art-centric lefty poliblog
Category: poliblog, art&culture

Billmon's Whiskey Bar
Description: In depth analysis of current events from a smart liberal
Category: poliblog, A-list

Boing! Boing!
Description: a directory of wonderful things
Category: Coolio, A-list

Busy Busy Busy
Description: left leaning shorter than short summaries of current events.
Category: satire, A-list

Certain doubts
Description: blog devoted to epistemology; lots of high dollar academic contributors
Category: philosoblog

China Herald
Description: English language blog from Shanghai; focuses on issues at the interface of technology and politics
Category: poliblog?

Turning the Tide
Description: Billed as a blog by Noam Chomsky, but it's mostly just an editor recycling things that he wrote elsewhere. Comments are back.
Category: poliblog

Cold Fury
Description: Yet another political cartoonist's blog. Think Mallard Filmore meets Tank McNamara.
Category: Toonblog

The Command Post
Description: wingnut news and comment
Category: poliblog, A-list

Shameless Agitator
Description: Lefty links plus the weekly "Shameless Agitator Award"
Category: poliblog

Confined Space
Description: Blog dedicated to workplace safety issues
Category: Labor

Corrente
Description: snarky liberal group blog focused on current events
Category: poliblog

Counterbias
Description: Lefty news and views, formatted to look like an online magazine
Category: poliblog

Cowgirl Funk (Superhero)
Description: leftish poliblog
Category: poliblog

Creative Class Warfare
Description: liberal poliblog from a person with a degree in Canadian Studies
Category: poliblog

Critical Viewer
Description: Champaign/Urbana based liberal poliblog - slim postings lately
Category: poliblog

Crooked Timber
Description: Academic group blog with some politics, social commentary, and philosophy
Category: poliblog, philosoblog, A-list

The Daily Dilley
Description: lefty links
Category: poliblog, peeps

Daily Kos
Description: THE liberal poliblog
Category: poliblog, A-list

dailysoy
Description: Eric Bohn's J-E translator blog
Category: peeps, bloggy blog

Daniel Drezner
Description: socially moderate conservative (libertarianish) poli-sci professor's current events blog
Category: poliblog, A-list

Deliberative Democracy
Description: seldom updated academic blog dedicated to issues in the study of deliberative democracy
Category: philosoblog

DeLong
Description: moderate liberal economist's poliblog
Category: econoblog, poliblog, A-list

Demosthenes
Description: liberal poliblog, postings are all over the map, somewhat infrequent
Category: poliblog

Discourse
Description: Law Prof Michael Froomkin's liberal current events blog
Category: poliblog, A-list

Dohiyi Mir
Description: " A non-violent, counter-dominant, left-liberal, possibly charismatic, quasi anarcho-libertarian Quaker's take on politics, bicycling, and other esoterica." But what ever happened to the first ever bloggers chess match?
Category: poliblog

Donkey Rising
Description: Ruy Teixeira's "Emerging Democratic Majority" blog. Very much a mainstream Democratic blog -- like KOS but more so.
Category: poliblog

Dreyfuss Report
Description: progressive investigative reporter Bob Dreyfuss' national security blog, hosted by tompaine.com
Category: poliblog

Dru Blood
Description: A radical poliblog from the randomwalks family. I think the blogger is a punk rocker from Austin.
Category: poliblog

Electrolite
Description: Sci-fi editor's left leaning poliblog. Light posting lately.
Category: poliblog

Empire Notes
Description: Rahul Mahajan kicks some foreign policy ass.
Category: poliblog

Eschaton
Description: Atrios' mainstream Democratic poliblog. Yes, the name is from Infinite Jest
Category: poliblog, A-list

ex-lion tamer
Description: quick hitting lefty poliblog
Category: poliblog

Examined Live
Description: Original blog of some of the Crooked Timber crew, ex-pat philosophers living in Singapore. Equal parts cultural criticism, philosophy, politcs, and cooking
Category: poliblog, philosoblog, A-list

Fake Barn Country
Description: Get it? It's a gettier joke. Ok, it's a post-gettier joke. Anyway, this is a group blog by the grad philosophy students at Brown.
Category: philosoblog

Feminisms, Technologies and Rhetorics
Description: bloggy blog with a significant dollop of cultural criticism
Category: peeps, art&culture

First Draft
Description: Liberal writer's writing blog
Category: Literablog

For the Record
Description: U. Michigan philosopher's left leaning poliblog
Category: poliblog

funferal
Description: Lefty poliblog focusing on cultural and media criticism and Irish politics
Category: poliblog, peeps

Goldberg and Guthrie
Description: Illinois based two man liberal poliblog
Category: poliblog

Goodbye Maggie
Description: "A multi-author commentary on economic vision beyond capitalism, especially participatory economics."
Category: poliblog, econoblog

GRIMamusements
Description: Liberalish political commentary
Category: poliblog

Intel Dump
Description: Ex-army officer, future lawyer blogs about military affairs. Seems liberalish, but maybe that's just because Bush sucks so hard.
Category: poliblog, milblog, A-list

Iraq'd
Description: TNR's Spencer Ackerman on all things Iraq
Category: poliblog, A-list

Island of Balta
Description: liberal current events poliblog
Category: poliblog

It's No Accident
Description: poliblog from a lefty activist
Category: poliblog

John Quiggen
Description: Bearded Australian economist from the Crooked Timber crew has a liberal poliblog
Category: poliblog, econoblog, A-list

Journal in the Flesh
Description: startup liberal blog focused on education issues
Category: poliblog, bloggy blog

Informed Comment
Description: UM History Prof Juan Cole knows a thing or two about the Middle East
Category: poliblog, A-list

K Marx The Spot
Description: Puts the "left" in Lefty poliblog
Category: poliblog

Kathryn Cramer
Description: Sci-fi editor turned lefty blogger/investigative reporter
Category: poliblog

Kilroy was here
Description: poliblog focused on democratic politics and vote markets
Category: poliblog

The Joe Hill Dispatch
Description: Labor news blog
Category: Labor

Artichoke Heart
Description: Feminist poet's blog
Category: Art&Culture, Literablog, bloggy blog

Lean Left
Description: Left leaning group blog
Category: poliblog

Left Wing Liberal Commie Agitator
Description: The name says it all.
Category: poliblog

Liberal Media Conspiracy
Description: Liberal current events criticism
Category: poliblog

Long Story, Short Pier
Description: Thoughtful, leftish blog with a mix of political and cultural comment -- and a sense of humor
Category: poliblog

Matthew Yglesias
Description: One time philosophy student, current liberal journalist
Category: poliblog, A-list

Legal Fiction
Description: Legal commentarity from a law clerk in the South
Category: poliblog, lawblog

Max Speak!
Description: liberalish economist blogs about current events
Category: econoblog, poliblog, A-list

Mediaocracy
Description: media watch blog with a health dollop of concern for economic issues.
Category: poliblog

Milblog
Description: conservative leaning blog focused on current events
Category: poliblog, bloggy blog

Moooooo
Description: snarky liberalish poliblog, infrequent posting lately
Category: poliblog

Mun Mun
Description: mostly poetry
Category: Literablog

Nathan Newman
Description: Left leaning poliblog from a union/community activist lawyer with academic interests in ecomics and technology
Category: poliblog

ncfocus
Description: liberal poliblog, intermittent posting
Category: poliblog

News Dissector
Description: Left leaning media watch blog
Category: Mediablog

No More Mister Nice Blog
Description: Liberal poliblog
Category: poliblog

2004-07-09T13:50:00.000-05:00

The Seattle Times | Contract accepted at Boeing's Wichita plant:

'We made some gains — that is the important thing,' SPEEA Midwest director Bob Brewer said after announcing the vote count, but added, 'We still have a lot of work to do. We are not done yet.'

Boeing spokesman Dick Ziegler said, 'We were sure we had a good contract on the table that met both the employees' needs and the company's requirements. We are exceptionally satisfied that they agreed.'

Among those voting yes was Cheri Urban, who has worked at Boeing for 25 years. Two years ago, her husband was laid off from his Boeing job. He now works as a painter, making half of his aerospace salary.

'I feel the fear of striking. I am not happy with the offer — it stinks,' Urban said. 'But we have been in a situation the last two years where we are trying to survive.'

The union had told its membership it did not believe further negotiation gains were possible without a strike.

2004-07-07T10:15:00.000-05:00

Pentagon Deputy's Probes in Iraq Weren't Authorized, Officials Say

A senior Defense Department official conducted unauthorized investigations of Iraq reconstruction efforts and used their results to push for lucrative contracts for friends and their business clients, according to current and former Pentagon officials and documents.

2004-07-06T11:33:00.000-05:00

memeorandum: Archive Edition for Tuesday, July 6, 2004

The New York Post: "John Kerry has chosen Rep. Richard Gephardt, the veteran congressman from Missouri, to be his running mate, The Post has learned. Gephardt, 63, a 28-year veteran of the House of Representatives, could be named by the presumptive Democratic nominee as the party's vice-presidential candidate as soon as today."

2004-07-06T00:03:00.000-05:00

The New York Times | Intelligence: C.I.A. Held Back Iraqi Arms Data, U.S. Officials Say

The existence of a secret prewar C.I.A. operation to debrief relatives of Iraqi scientists — and the agency's failure to give their statements to the president and other policymakers — has been uncovered by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. The panel has been investigating the government's handling of prewar intelligence on Iraq's unconventional weapons and plans to release a wide-ranging report this week on the first phase of its inquiry. The report is expected to contain a scathing indictment of the C.I.A. and its leaders for failing to recognize that the evidence they had collected did not justify their assessment that Mr. Hussein had illicit weapons.
...
While the Senate panel has concluded that C.I.A. analysts and other intelligence officials overstated the case that Iraq had illicit weapons, the committee has not found any evidence that the analysts changed their reports as a result of political pressure from the White House, according to officials familiar with the report.

2004-07-05T17:15:00.000-05:00

Reuters | U.S. Special Forces to Train Philippine Troops

U.S. and Philippine officials have said the exercises aim to train Filipino troops to use small, well-equipped teams against militants belonging to the Jemaah Islamiah network believed to use Mindanao as a training base.

2004-07-05T16:20:00.000-05:00

The New York Times | House of Lords Limits
Parents' Right to Hit Children

Some of the discussions today revolved around what exactly is meant by 'smacking,' the term used in the measure, with opponents of a total ban saying the law should draw a distinction between beating and a 'mild smacking' behind closed doors.

2004-07-05T16:15:00.000-05:00

The State | 07/04/2004 | Karpinski says Israeli was interrogator in Iraq

Brig. Gen. Janis Karpinski, suspended in May over allegations of prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib, said she met a man who told her he was Israeli during a visit to a Baghdad intelligence center with a senior coalition general.

"I saw an individual there that I hadn’t had the opportunity to meet before, and I asked him what did he do there, was he an interpreter — he was clearly from the Middle East," Karpinski told British Broadcasting Corp. radio in an interview broadcast Saturday. "He said, ‘Well I do some of the interrogation here. I speak Arabic, but I’m not an Arab; I’m from Israel.’

"I was really kind of surprised by that ... He didn’t elaborate any more than to say he was working with them and there were people from lots of different places that were involved in the operation."

2004-07-04T01:49:00.000-05:00

The New York Times | A Union Label, Inside Out

Tom LaSorda is the No. 2 executive at Chrysler, now a division of the German automaker DaimlerChrysler. He is the first child of a union leader - and on both sides of the family at that - to become a top executive at any of the Big Three.

In many ways, his ascension is a powerful sign of a new era of cooperation, born of necessity, between the car companies and the labor unions. 'It's very symbolic,' said Gary N. Chaison, a professor of industrial relations at Clark University in Worcester, Mass. 'Having someone grow up in a union household makes them aware of the pressures the union faces on their side of the bargaining table.'

2004-07-04T00:49:00.000-05:00

San Jose Mercury News | 07/03/2004 | Sources: Track coach Graham turned in syringe of THG that ignited Balco scandal

Graham is the mystery coach who turned in a syringe filled with the designer steroid THG, five sources have told the Mercury News. Graham has received limited immunity to cooperate with an investigation into Balco, the Burlingame nutrition company at the center of the scandal.

How the anti-doping agency came to receive the syringe offers a peek into track and field's underbelly, where backbiting over who takes what designer drugs is part of the rivalries and jealousies. The rift between Graham and Conte started with nasty exchanges on a popular track Internet message board a year ago. Now it threatens to derail some of the top U.S. track athletes -- including two of Graham's prize former pupils, sprinters Marion Jones and Tim Montgomery -- as this summer's Olympics approach.

2004-07-03T12:14:00.000-05:00

Army Stage-Managed Fall of Hussein Statue | L.A. Times

As the Iraqi regime was collapsing on April 9, 2003, Marines converged on Firdos Square in central Baghdad, site of an enormous statue of Saddam Hussein. It was a Marine colonel — not joyous Iraqi civilians, as was widely assumed from the TV images — who decided to topple the statue, the Army report said. And it was a quick-thinking Army psychological operations team that made it appear to be a spontaneous Iraqi undertaking.

2004-07-03T12:12:00.000-05:00

Chemicals Not Found in Iraq Warheads | Washington Post

Sixteen rocket warheads found last week in south-central Iraq by Polish troops did not contain deadly chemicals, a coalition spokesman said yesterday, but U.S. and Polish officials agreed that insurgents loyal to former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein and foreign terrorist fighters are trying to buy such old weapons or purchase the services of Iraqi scientists who know how to make them.

2004-07-02T11:59:00.000-05:00

Yahoo! News - Day-Of-Rest Law Worries Va. Employers

Because of a legislative oversight, a new Virginia law requires businesses to give workers Saturdays or Sundays off if they want it, alarming some businesses with weekend and round-the-clock shifts to cover.

Some retailers are even trying to get a game plan in place for their holiday shopping season, still several months away.

It was a mistake made last legislative session that came out of good intention.

All state Sen. Frederick M. Quayle wanted to do was repeal the archaic laws banning Sunday work. His measure did that, but it also got rid of a long list of business exemptions attached to the old statute. That list was the same one attached to another obsolete statute, the 'day-of-rest' law, which is still on the books.

2004-07-02T10:27:00.000-05:00

Reuters | U.S. Job Growth Stunted

The Labor Department said only 112,000 jobs were created last month, far fewer than the 250,000 that Wall Street analysts had anticipated. April and May new-job totals were revised down, to 324,000 and 235,000 respectively, from 346,000 and 248.000.

2004-07-01T17:55:00.000-05:00

Salon.com News | Polish troops find sarin warheads in Iraq

Polish troops have found two warheads in Iraq believed to contain a deadly nerve agent, but it is not clear what period the weapons came from, the Defense Ministry said Thursday.

The two warheads were found in early June in a bunker in the area controlled by Polish forces, and they tested positive for cyclosarin, a substance many times stronger than sarin, the ministry said in a statement.

2004-07-01T13:17:00.000-05:00

Kerry cited in Catholic heresy case | The Washington Times | July 01, 2004

A Catholic lawyer has filed heresy charges against Sen. John Kerry with the Archdiocese of Boston, accusing the Democratic presidential candidate of bringing 'most serious scandal to the American public' by receiving Holy Communion as a pro-choice Catholic. The 18-page document was sent to the archdiocese June 14, but released to the public only yesterday by Marc Balestrieri, a Los Angeles-based canon lawyer and an assistant judge with the Archdiocese of Los Angeles' tribunal, an ecclesiastical court.

(via Andrew Sullivan)

2004-06-30T11:50:00.000-05:00

The Nation | Tyson's Moral Anchor

A generation ago, meatpacking workers earned some of the highest wages of any industrial workers in the United States. Working in a slaughterhouse was a hard, dirty job, but it provided a stable middle-class income. Today meatpacking is one of the lowest-paid industrial jobs, with one of the highest turnover rates. It is also the nation's most dangerous job, measured by the rate of serious injury. During the 1970s IBP was largely responsible for changing the industry's labor policies, breaking unions, slashing wages and recruiting an immigrant work force. In a very tough business, IBP gained the reputation of being by far the toughest. In 1974 IBP was convicted for collaborating with organized-crime figures in New York City to bribe meat wholesalers and union leaders. Any meatpacking company that hoped to compete with IBP had to cut wages and benefits, too. Over the past twenty-five years some wages in the meatpacking industry, adjusted for inflation, have declined by more than 50 percent.

2004-06-30T11:46:00.000-05:00

Boston Globe | Police say they won't picket convention

Boston's main police union abandoned yesterday their threat to picket at the site of next month's Democratic National Convention, handing Senator John F. Kerry a major victory on the day he honored the union's picket line by not making a speech before a US Conference of Mayors meeting in Boston.

2004-06-30T03:47:00.000-05:00

The New York Times | Wakefulness Finds a Powerful Ally

Since 1998, modafinil, made by Cephalon and sold under the brand name Provigil, has quietly altered the lives of millions of people. No one knows exactly how it works, but sales of the drug are skyrocketing.

People who take it say it keeps them awake for hours or even days. It has been described as a nap in the form of a pill, making most users feel refreshed and alert but still able to go to bed when they are ready. And because its side effects are rarely worse than a mild headache or slight nausea, experts fear that it has rapidly become a tempting pick-me-up to a nation that battles sleep with more than 100 million cups of coffee a day.

2004-06-29T04:22:00.000-05:00

The New York Times | Krugman | Who Lost Iraq?

Plans for privatization were eventually put on hold. But as he prepared to leave Iraq, Mr. Bremer listed reduced tax rates, reduced tariffs and the liberalization of foreign-investment laws as among his major accomplishments. Insurgents are blowing up pipelines and police stations, geysers of sewage are erupting from the streets, and the electricity is off most of the time — but we've given Iraq the gift of supply-side economics.

2004-06-29T04:10:00.000-05:00

FDA: OK to market bloodsuckers | CNN

The government has lent its seal of approval to a marketing an age-old medical device -- leeches. The Food and Drug Administration said Monday that Ricarimpex SAS, a French firm, is the first company to request and receive FDA clearance to market the bloodsucking aquatic animals as medical devices.

2004-06-02T22:11:00.000-05:00

Chess Masters Are Quick On The Trigger

Bruce D. Burns of Michigan State University, in an article to be published in the July issue of Psychological Science, a journal of the American Psychological Society, compared chess players' rankings at normal tournament chess to their rankings at fast-paced blitz chess. In blitz chess, players have 5 minutes to complete all of their moves, which gives them an average of 7.5 seconds for each move. Because of that limitation, they don't have the time to mull over their moves and are forced to rely on their immediate intuition.

What Burns found was that players' rankings at normal chess were remarkably accurate predictors of their rankings at blitz chess, especially among higher-ranked players. Among lower-ranked players, performance at normal chess didn't seem to relate quite as strongly to their performance at blitz chess. This suggests that the skills chess masters use in normal chess are the same as those they use in blitz chess: lightning-fast intuition.

2004-05-26T11:22:00.000-05:00

Associated Press | Nations Value Immigrant Workers

People in some of the world's leading industrial nations say immigrants mostly take jobs that citizens of their own countries do not want, yet they still say immigrants are a bad overall influence, Associated Press polls found.

In the United States and in the European countries polled - Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Spain - people were more likely to say they had negative views of the influence of immigrants, according to the AP-Ipsos polls. That comes at a time of high concern over unemployment and jobs and worries about terrorism.

Canadians have a positive view of the influence of immigrants, while the Japanese were divided on the influence of immigration on their country, according to the polls conducted for the AP by Ipsos, an international polling firm.

2004-05-25T19:12:00.000-05:00

FOX News Watch: May 22 Edition

BURNS: As what we're saying now indicates, there's a tremendous amount of controversy in this country today about the media's role in covering the war in Iraq. And it's reflected in a new Fox News/Opinion Dynamics Poll. Look at this: where are the problems being created? More people think that the problems related to Iraq are being created in the news media than in Iraq, in Washington D.C., or in any of those combined.

Cal, is this a typical blame the messenger syndrome or is there something more at work here?

THOMAS: I think there's part of that. But I'd like to see a debate on whether we should go back to a form of censorship during the process of war itself. To be able to show all of those pictures while it's going on -- the embedding during the war coverage was fine, I thought. But in the aftermath now, with all of these questions being raised, it's a political and election year, I'm not sure that some form of censorship might not be called for.

(via Sisyphus Shrugged)

2004-05-25T18:16:00.000-05:00

Associated Press | Van Could Take Photographs While Driving

An odd-looking van sprouts 13 digital cameras that its builder wants to use to photograph 50 million buildings in the country while driving, taking pictures every 15 feet. The van's drive-by snaps would be matched against GPS satellite positioning data and aerial photographs in a database. Police, insurance agents and others then could call up overhead and street-level views simply by entering an address.

2004-05-25T17:42:00.000-05:00

Knight-Ridder Washington Bureau | 05/21/2004 | Trucks made to drive without cargo in dangerous areas of Iraq

Twelve current and former truckers who regularly made the 300-mile re-supply run from Camp Cedar in southern Iraq to Camp Anaconda near Baghdad told Knight Ridder that they risked their lives driving empty trucks while their employer, a subsidiary of Halliburton Inc., billed the government for hauling what they derisively called 'sailboat fuel.'

(via Sahelli)

2004-05-25T13:01:00.000-05:00

CNN.com - 'Babylon 5' actor dies - May 25, 2004

Richard Biggs, who played Dr. Stephen Franklin on 'Babylon 5' and also had a long run on the soap opera 'Days of Our Lives,' died Saturday. He was 44, according to the actor's Web site.

2004-05-25T11:04:00.000-05:00

TerraFly

TerraFly ® changes the way you view your world. Simply enter an address, and our system will put you at the controls of a bird's view aerial imagery to explore your digital earth.

(via Daily Soy)

2004-05-25T10:38:00.000-05:00

Asahi Shimbun | U.S. Forces in Japan get top strategy rank

Washington views U.S. troops in Japan as having the most important role in East Asia, even above those stationed in South Korea, government sources here said Thursday. The U.S. government plans to classify its military personnel stationed overseas into four levels depending on strategic importance. The rankings will be used in the process of realigning U.S. troops abroad.

U.S. officials explained the plan in February to South Korean government officials in Seoul, sources said. The U.S. troops in the most important category will be considered "power projection hubs." Troops in Japan will likely fall in this category, according to South Korean government sources. U.S. troops in Guam and Britain will also likely be put into the top category, the sources said.

The U.S. military personnel in South Korea are expected to fall just below that first rank or be placed in the second category, called "main operating bases," the sources said.

2004-05-24T22:41:00.000-05:00

indieWIRE BLOGS > "Tarnation" Blog

Tomorrow we take off with Tarnation into the wild French blue yonder for our euro premiere (Director's Fortnight) at the Cannes Film Festival! Wewatched our subtitled 35mmprint today and its BEAUTIFUL! Its gonna blow those French folks to PIECES! Absolute pieces! Jonathan and I are going to carry the print on the plane with us and its heavy as hell but the weight really makes one remember... we ARE film!

(via ambivalent imbroglio)

2004-05-24T18:47:00.000-05:00

eXile - Issue #189 - War Nerd - Most Valuable Weapon: the RPG - By Gary Brecher

Which brings us to Iraq, now. The first key to the RPG's effectiveness is availability, and it turns out that the one thing Iraq had more than enough of, in spite of all those sanctions, was RPG launchers and rounds. Saddam's army had an official license from the Russians to produce RPGs in Iraqi factories, and they made so many that, when Saddam went down, there were piles of launchers with plenty of anti-armor and anti-personnel rounds in most Iraqi towns. And after the Iran-Iraq War and Gulf War I, so many Iraqi men had trained on the RPG that there were plenty of gunners and instructors to teach the new generation how to use it.

(via Boing Boing)

2004-05-22T13:40:00.000-05:00

Reporters Subpoenaed in CIA Leak (washingtonpost.com)

Tim Russert, host of NBC's 'Meet the Press,' and Time reporter Matthew Cooper were subpoenaed by special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald. NBC said in a statement that it would fight the subpoena, as did a lawyer for Time.

2004-05-22T13:38:00.000-05:00

Reuters | Export of U.S. Jobs Seen Up - Report

The movement overseas of U.S. white-collar jobs over the next few years is accelerating faster than previously expected, Forrester Research said on Monday, fueling a highly charged election-year issue.
...
Forrester said it saw little change in its long-term outlook, forecasting that 3.4 million jobs will move overseas not just to India but to China, Russia, the Philippines and Mexico by 2015, up from the 3.3 million it had predicted.

2004-05-22T13:35:00.000-05:00

Baltimore Sun - China to keep foreign films out of theaters in July

2004-05-22T00:52:00.000-05:00

Punishment and Amusement (washingtonpost.com)

He said that he asked Graner, a Pennsylvania prison guard in civilian life, about the photographs. Graner replied: "The Christian in me says it's wrong, but the corrections officer in me says, 'I love to make a grown man piss himself.' "

2004-05-21T12:56:00.000-05:00

Asahi Shimbun | Mitsubishi Fuso admits cover-up

The company knew about deadly clutch defects, and again hid the problem. Wilfried Porth, the president of embattled Mitsubishi Fuso Truck & Bus Corp., admitted Thursday that a new cover-up of problems with clutches in large vehicles-which led to one fatal accident-was a criminal act.

2004-05-21T12:53:00.000-05:00

Baltimore Sun | DNA analysis of dogs produces surprises

The study's lead author, Leonid Kruglyak at the Hutchinson Center, said he was startled by the genetic variation among breeds - a difference even greater than 'among human populations that evolved on different continents.'

The reason, scientists said, is that dogs are probably the most genetically manipulated mammals on Earth. Recent DNA studies show Canis familiaris diverged from East Asian wolves roughly 15,000 years ago and then trailed humans overland to Europe and across the Bering Strait to North America. As early dog populations became isolated from one another, distinct breeds began to emerge, scientists say.

2004-05-21T12:44:00.000-05:00

Race film withheld but can still cause damage | Hindustan Times/UK Edition

2004-05-20T17:29:00.000-05:00

Bizjournals | Congress may help small biz fight OSHA

A seldom-used federal law allows businesses to recover their legal costs when they prevail against the government, but agencies don't have to pay if they can show their actions were 'substantially justified.'

This provides a broad loophole for agencies that is difficult -- and costly -- for small businesses to overcome, business groups say. They have asked Congress to pass legislation that would force OSHA to pay a small business's legal fees whenever the agency loses a case.

The House Education and Workforce Committee passed the legislation by a 24-20 party-line vote May 5.

(via John Lacny)

2004-05-20T11:06:00.000-05:00

Electric Martian Dust Devils Could Prove Hazardous For Space Travelers

2004-05-19T10:54:00.000-05:00

Starbucks Workers Move to Unionize

Starbucks workers here have organized a union with the Industrial Workers of the World IU/660 and have submitted union cards today to the NLRB for a certification election.

The workers are poised to become the first Starbucks Baristas union certified in the country. Starbucks Baristas at the 36th and Madison location in Midtown Manhattan have come together in an effort to raise themselves out of poverty as well as to achieve respect and dignity on the job. The workers are calling on Starbucks to obey the law as the election approaches.

2004-05-19T10:50:00.000-05:00

Guardian Unlimited | Wildcat fire strikes spread

Those taking part in the unofficial action included 20 officers in three full-time stations in Somerset. A fire service spokesman said: 'Because the action is unofficial it is difficult to know when it will end - it could be today, tomorrow or in a couple of days.'

2004-05-17T11:38:00.000-05:00

Indian voters deal setback to Hindu nationalism | Christian Science Monitor

To many observers, however, the lesson of the election was that economic disparities could no longer be trumped by appeals to Hindu unity. In fact, in a sign that Hindu nationalism may be on the wane, voters seemed fatigued with identity politics. The BJP fared poorly in regions most affected by the violent controversies surrounding Hindu nationalists' struggle to unite their brethren around a sense that India is first and foremost a Hindu nation.

2004-05-17T11:29:00.000-05:00

Reuters | Michael Moore backs striking French workers

2004-05-16T11:20:00.000-05:00

LA Times | Riding Shotgun on a Pipeline

U.S.-trained Colombian troops, backed by U.S. intelligence and private contractors, unleashed the offensive to stop rebel attacks on a pipeline that Los Angeles-based Occidental Petroleum Corp. depends on to transport oil. They also had another goal, company officials said: secure an area deep in the heart of rebel territory so Occidental could explore a new field believed to hold 20 million barrels of oil.

2004-05-13T12:04:00.000-05:00

By 2020, moon cukes and other crops? | Christian Science Monitor

Mars presents tough challenges for both greenhouses and their plant inhabitants. The Red Planet's temperature extremes - which can range from 50 degrees F. in the day to more than negative 200 degrees F. at night - could crack the shell of a greenhouse, and could make the internal environment too cold to sustain the plants.

2004-05-13T12:00:00.000-05:00

The Australian: Unionist faces jail over 'scab' raids [May 12, 2004]

Seven days after the AMWU set up a picket, a boltcutter was used to gain entry to Johnson Tiles, where Johnston was seen holding a camera to 'take photos of the scabs'. His voice was heard by witnesses and others saw his 'red whiskers from his beard poking through' a balaclava.

2004-05-13T11:57:00.000-05:00

"Jack of Smarts" by Justin Peters

Every generation gambles, but how they gamble says something about the spirit of the age. Why are yuppies-in-the-making suddenly interested in poker, a game most of us grew up associating with either paneled basements and cheap cigars or Rococo Old West saloons filled with bolo-tied card sharps? The answer may be that the popular image of the game has undergone a subtle recasting--one with a great attraction to ironic youngsters like me who find in the game the same slightly glamorous, slightly seedy, go-getter spirit that characterized the Internet boom. It makes sense that today's college-educated young adults, especially young men, choose poker. Strategy-oriented, individualistic, and embedded in a nice masculine mythology, poker is the perfect game for the revenge-of-the-nerds generation looking to square their intelligence with their inner maleness.

2004-05-12T10:48:00.000-05:00

Worcester Telegram & Gazette Online - Union moves to bar gay couples from receiving benefits

A Massachusetts labor union with about 6,000 members has amended its benefits plan to exclude gay married couples from receiving health and pension benefits, a move denounced by some other union leaders. Trustees and administrators of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 103 benefits plan issued a clarification of the phrase "dependent spouse" to mean "a person of the opposite sex."
...
The move to deny same-sex couples the benefits that opposite-sex couples receive is legal, according to a lawyer who specializes in employee benefits. Employers and unions whose benefit plans are covered under the federal Employee Retirement Income Security act can choose whether to extend benefits to same-sex spouses, said Matt Giuliani.

2004-05-11T13:51:00.000-05:00

Channel3000.com - News - Tyson Wins, Union Losing Power in Jefferson

A ruling handed down by a regional office of the Labor Relations Board may spell the end to union representation at the Jefferson Tyson plant. In a 27-page document, the LRB ruling states that all 'replacement workers' hired by Tyson during the strike are 'permanent.' When striking union workers returned to work at Tyson in February they sent a letter to the company demanding that replacement workers be assessed initiation fees and dues. That prompted one replacement worker to lobby the labor relations board to deauthorize the union at Tyson.

2004-05-09T09:59:00.000-05:00

Hindustan Times (Reuters) | Nancy Reagan calls for stem cell research

Speaking to the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, Mrs. Reagan noted that Alzheimer's had taken her husband Ronald Reagan 'to a distant place where I can no longer reach him and share our 52 years.'

She added after accepting the group's 'Care Giver's Award,' 'Science has presented us with a hope called stem cell research, which may provide our scientists with many answers that for so long have been beyond our grasp. I just don't see how we can turn our backs on this.

'We have lost so much time already. I just really can't bear to lose any more.'

2004-05-07T15:37:00.000-05:00

Red Cross Sees Torture-Like Abuse in Iraq

'What we have observed are situations from a human point of view that are degrading in treatment and in some incidents tantamount to torture,' Pierre Kraehenbuehl, director of ICRC operations, told journalists.

'Our findings do not allow us to conclude that what we were dealing with...were isolated acts of individual members of coalition forces. What we have described is a pattern and a broad system,' he said.

2004-05-07T14:30:00.000-05:00

Rocky Mountain Bullhorn | Indy Beat | Wal-Martyrs

Despite the lousy prognosis, Mansell and a small band of organizers wagered their job security, work relationships and emotional wellbeing in service to the cause. Their reasons vary.

"Healthcare is probably the [main] thing," Mansell explains. "I’m tired of feeling like every week I go without getting in an accident, or getting really ill, like I won the lottery."

2004-05-07T14:21:00.000-05:00

Steve Martin to Be the New Inspector Clouseau | Reuters

2004-05-06T13:49:00.000-05:00

The Daily Telegraph | Good ol' girl who enjoyed cruelty

In Fort Ashby, in the isolated Appalachian mountains 260km west of Washington, the poor, barely-educated and almost all-white population talk openly about an active Ku Klux Klan presence. There is little understanding of the issues in Iraq and less of why photographs showing soldiers from the 372nd Military Police Company, mostly from around Fort Ashby, abusing prisoners has caused a furore.

(via Boing Boing

2004-05-06T13:42:00.000-05:00

Alas, a Blog

My conclusion: Maybe the 'real' number is that 2% of men commit rape sometime in their life, and 8% of women are raped. Maybe it's more like 8% and 20%. We'll never know for sure. But from the data that's currently available, we can say this: Rape is a scary, serious, widespread national problem. It is not something committed by a freakishly small minority of men (unlike, say, serial killing); it is not something that happens to a small number of women.

2004-05-06T13:39:00.000-05:00

Toronto Globe and Mail | Outside police forces patrol divided Kanesatake

Kanesatake has been tense since February, when Chief Gabriel tried to bring in police officers from other communities to buttress his authority. Some members of the community reacted violently, burning the chief's home and driving him out of the area.

2004-05-06T13:35:00.000-05:00

Bismarck Tribune | Tribe says donated houses have lead, asbestos

Tribal officials trying to cure a housing crunch worry about health risks and the cost of cleaning up donated Air Force houses laced with asbestos and lead. Since the late 1990s, the Turtle Mountain reservation in Rolette County has received more than 100 homes through a program that redistributes housing from Air Force bases. Most of those houses have lead paint on the walls and asbestos-based glue under the floors -- expensive problems that were not disclosed to tribal officials, said Richard Schroeder, the Turtle Mountain Housing Authority's business manager.

2004-05-05T12:37:00.000-05:00

Porn Actors' Struggles Began Long Before HIV

He's a middle-aged black porn actor who had wanted to be a policeman. Known for his conscientiousness, he'd ask costars to refrain from smoking even as they were having unprotected group sex.

She's a white French Canadian stripper with waif-like eyes and a history of depression. Her dream was to open her own escort service. Or become a fashion designer. Or cut a rap CD with Missy Elliott.

2004-05-05T10:53:00.000-05:00

Safeway still affected by fallout from strike

The California-based grocer said yesterday that its net income for the three months ended March 27 totaled $43.1 million. That compared with a profit of $162.6 million at the same time last year. A strike against the company's Vons and Pavilion stores wiped out $122 million of Safeway's first-quarter profit, according to management estimates.

2004-05-05T01:24:00.000-05:00

The New York Times | Disney Forbidding Distribution of Film That Criticizes Bush

The Walt Disney Company is blocking its Miramax division from distributing a new documentary by Michael Moore that harshly criticizes President Bush, executives at both Disney and Miramax said Tuesday.

2004-05-05T01:05:00.000-05:00

Salon.com News | Iraqi human rights minister resigns

Iraq's U.S.-appointed human rights minister said Tuesday he had resigned to protest abuses of Iraqi detainees by American guards, and the interior minister demanded that Iraqi officials be allowed to participate in the running of prisons. Abdul-Basat al-Turki said he resigned 'not only because I believe that the use of violence is a violation of human rights but also because these methods in the prisons means that the violations are a common act.'

2004-05-05T01:02:00.000-05:00

A state's troubled foray into electronic voting | Christian Science Monitor

The decision by California late last week to withdraw from one of the nation's biggest moves into electronic voting is likely to reverberate across the country as other states consider alternative balloting systems.

2004-04-30T10:13:00.000-05:00

Northwestern Memorial Tests 'Pacemaker' For Stomach

Manufactured by Transneuronix, this system consists of an electrical pulse generator, about the size of a pocket watch, which is placed under the skin in the abdomen and connected to the wall of the stomach with two wires. The pulse generator delivers electrical stimulation to the stomach, causing the feeling of fullness. Implanting it takes less than an hour and is done as an outpatient laparoscopic procedure.

2004-04-30T09:49:00.000-05:00

Teamster investigators resign

The former federal prosecutor who heads the Teamsters' internal anti-corruption program as well as 20 other investigators and lawyers involved in that effort resigned yesterday, saying the union's president was not fully committed to fighting corruption.

In a sharply worded resignation letter, Edwin Stier, the former prosecutor, accused James P. Hoffa, the Teamsters president, of blocking a broad investigation into possible union corruption in Chicago and of dragging his feet in a case of alleged embezzlement by a Teamsters leader in Houston.

In addition to the investigators and lawyers, a 10-member anti-corruption advisory panel also resigned.

2004-04-30T09:43:00.000-05:00

Daily Illini | Senate president: UI funding or Chief

Illinois Senate president Emil Jones Jr. (D-Chicago) suggested Tuesday that unless Chief Illiniwek is retired, he would consider blocking all state funding to the University.

At a news conference, Jones said the Board of Trustees should get rid of the mascot before the state legislature adjourns in late May and hinted at cutting state funding if the board doesn't comply.

'If our tax dollars are going to that university, and that university is using those tax dollars to permit stereotyping, then I think we should deal with it accordingly,' Jones said.

2004-04-30T09:40:00.000-05:00

Salon.com News | Pentagon's No. 2 flubs Iraq casualties

Asked how many American troops have died in Iraq, the Pentagon's No. 2 civilian estimated Thursday the total was about 500 -- more than 200 soldiers short.

2004-04-29T23:36:00.000-05:00

The Badger Herald Online - TAA rally ends in echoing chants at the Capitol

The striking members of the TAA picketed several buildings around the University of Wisconsin's central campus, holding signs pleading with students to support the strike and to not go to class, chanting and singing union songs. When picketing ended for the day after 4 p.m., the graduate employees gathered atop Bascom Hill, marched through State Street and rallied at the Capitol steps, which featured local TAA speakers and orators from various unions across the Midwest.

2004-04-27T00:32:00.000-05:00

Excerpt from The Fourth Geneva Convention

Occupied Territories

Art. 47. Protected persons who are in occupied territory shall not be deprived, in any case or in any manner whatsoever, of the benefits of the present Convention by any change introduced, as the result of the occupation of a territory, into the institutions or government of the said territory, nor by any agreement concluded between the authorities of the occupied territories and the Occupying Power, nor by any annexation by the latter of the whole or part of the occupied territory.

Art. 48. Protected persons who are not nationals of the Power whose territory is occupied, may avail themselves of the right to leave the territory subject to the provisions of Article 35, and decisions thereon shall be taken in accordance with the procedure which the Occupying Power shall establish in accordance with the said Article.

Art. 49. Individual or mass forcible transfers, as well as deportations of protected persons from occupied territory to the territory of the Occupying Power or to that of any other country, occupied or not, are prohibited, regardless of their motive.

Nevertheless, the Occupying Power may undertake total or partial evacuation of a given area if the security of the population or imperative military reasons so demand. Such evacuations may not involve the displacement of protected persons outside the bounds of the occupied territory except when for material reasons it is impossible to avoid such displacement. Persons thus evacuated shall be transferred back to their homes as soon as hostilities in the area in question have ceased.

The Occupying Power undertaking such transfers or evacuations shall ensure, to the greatest practicable extent, that proper accommodation is provided to receive the protected persons, that the removals are effected in satisfactory conditions of hygiene, health, safety and nutrition, and that members of the same family are not separated.

The Protecting Power shall be informed of any transfers and evacuations as soon as they have taken place.

The Occupying Power shall not detain protected persons in an area particularly exposed to the dangers of war unless the security of the population or imperative military reasons so demand.

The Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.

Art. 50. The Occupying Power shall, with the cooperation of the national and local authorities, facilitate the proper working of all institutions devoted to the care and education of children.

The Occupying Power shall take all necessary steps to facilitate the identification of children and the registration of their parentage. It may not, in any case, change their personal status, nor enlist them in formations or organizations subordinate to it.

Should the local institutions be inadequate for the purpose, the Occupying Power shall make arrangements for the maintenance and education, if possible by persons of their own nationality, language and religion, of children who are orphaned or separated from their parents as a result of the war and who cannot be adequately cared for by a near relative or< friend. "

A special section of the Bureau set up in accordance with Article 136 shall be responsible for taking all necessary steps to identify children whose identity is in doubt. Particulars of their parents or other near relatives should always be recorded if available.

The Occupying Power shall not hinder the application of any preferential measures in regard to food, medical care and protection against the effects of war which may have been adopted prior to the occupation in favour of children under fifteen years, expectant mothers, and mothers of children under seven years.

Art. 51. The Occupying Power may not compel protected persons to serve in its armed or auxiliary forces. No pressure or propaganda which aims at securing voluntary enlistment is permitted.

The Occupying Power may not compel protected persons to work unless they are over eighteen years of age, and then only on work which is necessary either for the needs of the army of occupation, or for the public utility services, or for the feeding, sheltering, clothing, transportation or health of the population of the occupied country. Protected persons may not be compelled to undertake any work which would involve them in the obligation of taking part in military operations. The Occupying Power may not compel protected persons to employ forcible means to ensure the security of the installations where they are performing compulsory labour.

The work shall be carried out only in the occupied territory where the persons whose services have been requisitioned are. Every such person shall, so far as possible, be kept in his usual place of employment. Workers shall be paid a fair wage and the work shall be proportionate to their physical and intellectual capacities. The legislation in force in the occupied country concerning working conditions, and safeguards as regards, in particular, such matters as wages, hours of work, equipment, preliminary training and compensation for occupational accidents and diseases, shall be applicable to the protected persons assigned to the work referred to in this Article.

In no case shall requisition of labour lead to a mobilization of workers in an organization of a military or semi-military character.

Art. 52. No contract, agreement or regulation shall impair the right of any worker, whether voluntary or not and wherever he may be, to apply to the representatives of the Protecting Power in order to request the said Power's intervention.

All measures aiming at creating unemployment or at restricting the opportunities offered to workers in an occupied territory, in order to induce them to work for the Occupying Power, are prohibited.

Art. 53. Any destruction by the Occupying Power of real or personal property belonging individually or collectively to private persons, or to the State, or to other public authorities, or to social or cooperative organizations, is prohibited, except where such destruction is rendered absolutely necessary by military operations.

Art. 54. The Occupying Power may not alter the status of public officials or judges in the occupied territories, or in any way apply sanctions to or take any measures of coercion or discrimination against them, should they abstain from fulfilling their functions for reasons of conscience.

This prohibition does not prejudice the application of the second paragraph of Article 51. It does not affect the right of the Occupying Power to remove public officials from their posts.

Art. 55. To the fullest extent of the means available to it, the Occupying Power has the duty of ensuring the food and medical supplies of the population; it should, in particular, bring in the necessary foodstuffs, medical stores and other articles if the resources of the occupied territory are inadequate.

The Occupying Power may not requisition foodstuffs, articles or medical

occupation forces and administration personnel, and then only if the requirements of the civilian population have been taken into account.

Subject to the provisions of other international Conventions, the Occupying Power shall make arrangements to ensure that fair value is paid for any requisitioned goods.

The Protecting Power shall, at any time, be at liberty to verify the state of the food and medical supplies in occupied territories, except where temporary restrictions are made necessary by imperative military requirements.

Art. 56. To the fullest extent of the means available to it, the public Occupying Power has the duty of ensuring and maintaining, with the cooperation of national and local authorities, the medical and hospital establishments and services, public health and hygiene in the occupied territory, with particular reference to the adoption and application of the prophylactic and preventive measures necessary to combat the spread of contagious diseases and epidemics. Medical personnel of all categories shall be allowed to carry out their duties.

If new hospitals are set up in occupied territory and if the competent organs of the occupied State are not operating there, the occupying authorities shall, if necessary, grant them the recognition provided for in Article 18. In similar circumstances, the occupying authorities shall also grant recognition to hospital personnel and transport vehicles under the provisions of Articles 20 and 21.

In adopting measures of health and hygiene and in their implementation, the Occupying Power shall take into consideration the moral and ethical susceptibilities of the population of the occupied territory.

Art. 57. The Occupying Power may requisition civilian hospitals of hospitals only temporarily and only in cases of urgent necessity for the care of military wounded and sick, and then on condition that suitable arrangements are made in due time for the care and treatment of the patients and for the needs of the civilian population for hospital accommodation.

The material and stores of civilian hospitals cannot be requisitioned so long as they are necessary for the needs of the civilian population.

Art. 58. The Occupying Power shall permit ministers of religion to give spiritual assistance to the members of their religious communities.

The Occupying Power shall also accept consignments of books and articles required for religious needs and shall facilitate their distribution in occupied territory.

Art. 59. If the whole or part of the population of an occupied territory is inadequately supplied, the Occupying Power shall agree to relief schemes on behalf of the said population, and shall facilitate them by all the means at its disposal.

Such schemes, which may be undertaken either by States or by impartial humanitarian organizations such as the International Committee of the Red Cross, shall consist, in particular, of the provision of consignments of foodstuffs, medical supplies and clothing.

All Contracting Parties shall permit the free passage of these consignments and shall guarantee their protection.

A Power granting free passage to consignments on their way to territory occupied by an adverse Party to the conflict shall, however, have the right to search the consignments, to regulate their passage according to prescribed times and routes, and to be reasonably satisfied through the Protecting Power that these consignments are to be used for the relief of the needy population and are not to be used for the benefit of the Occupying Power.

Art. 60. Relief consignments shall in no way relieve the Occupying Power of any of its responsibilities under Articles 55, 56 and 59. The Occupying Power shall in no way whatsoever divert relief consignments from the purpose for which they are intended, except in cases of urgent necessity, in the interests of the population of the occupied territory and with the consent of the Protecting Power.

Art. 61. The distribution of the relief consignments referred to in the foregoing Articles shall be carried out with the cooperation and under the supervision of the Protecting Power. This duty may also be delegated, by agreement between the Occupying Power and the Protecting Power, to a neutral Power, to the International Committee of the Red Cross or to any other impartial humanitarian body.

Such consignments shall be exempt in occupied territory from all charges, taxes or customs duties unless these are necessary in the interests of the economy of the territory. The Occupying Power shall facilitate the rapid distribution of these consignments.

All Contracting Parties shall endeavour to permit the transit and transport, free of charge, of such relief consignments on their way to occupied territories.

Art. 62. Subject to imperative reasons of security, protected persons in occupied territories shall be permitted to receive the individual relief consignments sent to them.

Art. 63. Subject to temporary and exceptional measures imposed for urgent reasons of security by the Occupying Power:

(a) recognized National Red Cross (Red Crescent, Red Lion and Sun) Societies shall be able to pursue their activities in accordance with Red Cross principles, as defined by the International Red Cross Conferences. Other relief societies shall be permitted to continue their humanitarian activities under similar conditions;

(b) the Occupying Power may not require any changes in the personnel or structure of these societies, which would prejudice the aforesaid activities.

The same principles shall apply to the activities and personnel of special organizations of a non-military character, which already exist or which may be established, for the purpose of ensuring the living conditions of the civilian population by the maintenance of the essential public utility services, by the distribution of relief and by the organization of rescues.

Art. 64. The penal laws of the occupied territory shall remain in force, with the exception that they may be repealed or suspended by the Occupying Power in cases where they constitute a threat to its security or an obstacle to the application of the present Convention.

Subject to the latter consideration and to the necessity for ensuring the effective administration of justice, the tribunals of the occupied territory shall continue to function in respect of all offences covered by the said laws.

The Occupying Power may, however, subject the population of the occupied territory to provisions which are essential to enable the Occupying Power to fulfil its obligations under the present Convention, to maintain the orderly government of the territory, and to ensure the security of the Occupying Power, of the members and property of the occupying forces or administration, and likewise of the establishments and lines of communication used by them.

Art. 65. The penal provisions enacted by the Occupying Power shall not come into force before they have been published and brought to the knowledge of the inhabitants in their own language. The effect of these penal provisions shall not be retroactive.

Art. 66. In case of a breach of the penal provisions promulgated by it by virtue of the second paragraph of Article 64 the Occupying Power may hand over the accused to its properly constituted, non-political military courts, on condition that the said courts sit in the occupied country. Courts of appeal shall preferably sit in the occupied country.

Art. 67. The courts shall apply only those provisions of law which were applicable prior to the offence, and which are in accordance with general principles of law, in particular the principle that the penalty shall be proportionate to the offence. They shall take into consideration the fact the accused is not a national of the Occupying Power.

Art. 68. Protected persons who commit an offence which is solely intended to harm the Occupying Power, but which does not constitute an attempt on the life or limb of members of the occupying forces or administration, nor a grave collective danger, nor seriously damage the property of the occupying forces or administration or the installations used by them, shall be liable to internment or simple imprisonment, provided the duration of such internment or imprisonment is proportionate to the offence committed.

Furthermore, internment or imprisonment shall, for such offences, be the only measure adopted for depriving protected persons of liberty. The courts provided for under Article 66 of the present Convention may at their discretion convert a sentence of imprisonment to one of internment for the same period.

The penal provisions promulgated by the Occupying Power in accordance with Articles 64 and 65 may impose the death penalty on a protected person only in cases where the person is guilty of espionage, of serious acts of sabotage against the military installations of the Occupying Power or of intentional offences which have caused the death of one or more persons, provided that such offences were punishable by death under the law of the occupied territory in force before the occupation began.

The death penalty may not be pronounced on a protected person unless the attention of the court has been particularly called to the fact that since the accused is not a national of the Occupying Power, he is not bound to it by any duty of allegiance.

In any case, the death penalty may not be pronounced on a protected person who was under eighteen years of age at the time of the offence.

Art. 69. In all cases the duration of the period during which a protected person accused of an offence is under arrest awaiting trial or punishment shall be deducted from any period of imprisonment of awarded.

Art. 70. Protected persons shall not be arrested, prosecuted or convicted by the Occupying Power for acts committed or for opinions expressed before the occupation, or during a temporary interruption thereof, with the exception of breaches of the laws and customs of war.

Nationals of the occupying Power who, before the outbreak of hostilities, have sought refuge in the territory of the occupied State, shall not be arrested, prosecuted, convicted or deported from the occupied territory, except for offences committed after the outbreak of hostilities, or for offences under common law committed before the outbreak of hostilities which, according to the law of the occupied State, would have justified extradition in time of peace.

Art. 71. No sentence shall be pronounced by the competent courts of the Occupying Power except after a regular trial.

Accused persons who are prosecuted by the Occupying Power shall be promptly informed, in writing, in a language which they understand, of the particulars of the charges preferred against them, and shall be brought to trial as rapidly as possible. The Protecting Power shall be informed of all proceedings instituted by the Occupying Power against protected persons in respect of charges involving the death penalty or imprisonment for two years or more; it shall be enabled, at any time, to obtain information regarding the state of such proceedings. Furthermore, the Protecting Power shall be entitled, on request, to be furnished with all particulars of these and of any other proceedings instituted by the Occupying Power< against protected persons. "

The notification to the Protecting Power, as provided for in the second paragraph above, shall be sent immediately, and shall in any case reach the Protecting Power three weeks before the date of the first hearing. Unless, at the opening of the trial, evidence is submitted that the provisions of this Article are fully complied with, the trial shall not proceed. The notification shall include the following particulars:

(a) description of the accused;

(b) place of residence or detention;

(c) specification of the charge or charges (with mention of the penal provisions under which it is brought);

(d) designation of the court which will hear the case;

(e) place and date of the first hearing.

Art. 72. Accused persons shall have the right to present evidence necessary to their defence and may, in particular, call witnesses. They shall have the right to be assisted by a qualified advocate or counsel of their own choice, who shall be able to visit them freely and shall enjoy the necessary facilities for preparing the defence.

Failing a choice by the accused, the Protecting Power may provide him with an advocate or counsel. When an accused person has to meet a serious charge and the Protecting Power is not functioning, the Occupying Power, subject to the consent of the accused, shall provide an advocate or counsel.

Accused persons shall, unless they freely waive such assistance, be aided by an interpreter, both during preliminary investigation and during the hearing in court. They shall have at any time the right to object to the interpreter and to ask for his replacement.

Art.73. A convicted person shall have the right of appeal provided for by the laws applied by the court. He shall be fully informed of his right to appeal or petition and of the time limit within which he may do so.

The penal procedure provided in the present Section shall apply, as far as it is applicable, to appeals. Where the laws applied by the Court make no provision for appeals, the convicted person shall have the right to petition against the finding and sentence to the competent authority of the Occupying Power.

Art. 74. Representatives of the Protecting Power shall have the right to attend the trial of any protected person, unless the hearing has, as an exceptional measure, to be held in camera in the interests of the security of the Occupying Power, which shall then notify the Protecting Power. A notification in respect of the date and place of trial shall be sent to the Protecting Power.

Any judgement involving a sentence of death, or imprisonment for two years or more, shall be communicated, with the relevant grounds, as rapidly as possible to the Protecting Power. The notification shall contain a reference to the notification made under Article 71 and, in the case of sentences of imprisonment, the name of the place where the sentence is to be served. A record of judgements other than those referred to above shall be kept by the court and shall be open to inspection by representatives of the Protecting Power. Any period allowed for appeal in the case of sentences involving the death penalty, or imprisonment of two years or more, shall not run until notification of judgement has been received by the Protecting Power.

Art. 75. In no case shall persons condemned to death be deprived of the right of petition for pardon or reprieve.

No death sentence shall be carried out before the expiration of a period of a least six months from the date of receipt by the Protecting Power of the notification of the final judgment confirming such death sentence, or of an order denying pardon or reprieve.

The six months period of suspension of the death sentence herein prescribed may be reduced in individual cases in circumstances of grave emergency involving an organized threat to the security of the Occupying Power or its forces, provided always that the Protecting Power is notified of such reduction and is given reasonable time and opportunity to make representations to the competent occupying authorities in respect of such death sentences.

Art. 76. Protected persons accused of offences shall be detained in the occupied country, and if convicted they shall serve their sentences therein. They shall, if possible, be separated from other detainees and shall enjoy conditions of food and hygiene which will be sufficient to keep them in good health, and which will be at least equal to those obtaining in prisons in the occupied country.

They shall receive the medical attention required by their state of health.

They shall also have the right to receive any spiritual assistance which< they may require. "

Women shall be confined in separate quarters and shall be under the direct supervision of women.

Proper regard shall be paid to the special treatment due to minors.

Protected persons who are detained shall have the right to be visited by delegates of the Protecting Power and of the International Committee of the Red Cross, in accordance with the provisions of Article 143.

Such persons shall have the right to receive at least one relief parcel monthly.

Art. 77. Protected persons who have been accused of offences or convicted by the courts in occupied territory, shall be handed over at the close of occupation, with the relevant records, to the authorities of the liberated territory.

Art. 78. If the Occupying Power considers it necessary, for imperative reasons of security, to take safety measures concerning protected persons, it may, at the most, subject them to assigned residence or to internment.

Decisions regarding such assigned residence or internment shall be made according to a regular procedure to be prescribed by the Occupying Power in accordance with the provisions of the present Convention. This procedure shall include the right of appeal for the parties concerned. Appeals shall be decided with the least possible delay. In the event of the decision being upheld, it shall be subject to periodical review, if possible every six months, by a competent body set up by the said Power.

Protected persons made subject to assigned residence and thus required to leave their homes shall enjoy the full benefit of Article 39 of the present Convention.

2004-04-27T00:25:00.000-05:00

Excerpts from Laws and Customs of War on Land (Hague IV); October 18, 1907

SECTION III

MILITARY AUTHORITY OVER THE TERRITORY OF THE HOSTILE STATE

Art. 42. Territory is considered occupied when it is actually placed under the authority of the hostile army.

The occupation extends only to the territory where such authority has been established and can be exercised.

Art. 43. The authority of the legitimate power having in fact passed into the hands of the occupant, the latter shall take all the measures in his power to restore, and ensure, as far as possible, public order and safety, while respecting, unless absolutely prevented, the laws in force in the country.

Art. 44. A belligerent is forbidden to force the inhabitants of territory occupied by it to furnish information about the army of the other belligerent, or about its means of defense.

Art. 45. It is forbidden to compel the inhabitants of occupied territory to swear allegiance to the hostile Power.

Art. 46. Family honour and rights, the lives of persons, and private property, as well as religious convictions and practice, must be respected.

Private property cannot be confiscated.

Art. 47. Pillage is formally forbidden.

Art. 48. If, in the territory occupied, the occupant collects the taxes, dues, and tolls imposed for the benefit of the State, he shall do so, as far as is possible, in accordance with the rules of assessment and incidence in force, and shall in consequence be bound to defray the expenses of the administration of the occupied territory to the same extent as the legitimate Government was so bound.

Art. 49. If, in addition to the taxes mentioned in the above article, the occupant levies other money contributions in the occupied territory, this shall only be for the needs of the army or of the administration of the territory in question.

Art. 50. No general penalty, pecuniary or otherwise, shall be inflicted upon the population on account of the acts of individuals for which they cannot be regarded as jointly and severally responsible.

Art. 51. No contribution shall be collected except under a written order, and on the responsibility of a commander-in-chief.

The collection of the said contribution shall only be effected as far as possible in accordance with the rules of assessment and incidence of the taxes in force.

For every contribution a receipt shall be given to the contributors.

Art. 52. Requisitions in kind and services shall not be demanded from municipalities or inhabitants except for the needs of the army of occupation. They shall be in proportion to the resources of the country, and of such a nature as not to involve the inhabitants in the obligation of taking part in military operations against their own country.

Such requisitions and services shall only be demanded on the authority of the commander in the locality occupied.

Contributions in kind shall as far as possible be paid for in cash; if not, a receipt shall be given and the payment of the amount due shall be made as soon as possible.

Art. 53. An army of occupation can only take possession of cash, funds, and realizable securities which are strictly the property of the State, depots of arms, means of transport, stores and supplies, and, generally, all movable property belonging to the State which may be used for military operations.

All appliances, whether on land, at sea, or in the air, adapted for the transmission of news, or for the transport of persons or things, exclusive of cases governed by naval law, depots of arms, and, generally, all kinds of munitions of war, may be seized, even if they belong to private individuals, but must be restored and compensation fixed when peace is made.

Art. 54. Submarine cables connecting an occupied territory with a neutral territory shall not be seized or destroyed except in the case of absolute necessity. They must likewise be restored and compensation fixed when peace is made.

Art. 55. The occupying State shall be regarded only as administrator and usufructuary of public buildings, real estate, forests, and agricultural estates belonging to the hostile State, and situated in the occupied country. It must safeguard the capital of these properties, and administer them in accordance with the rules of usufruct.

Art. 56. The property of municipalities, that of institutions dedicated to religion, charity and education, the arts and sciences, even when State property, shall be treated as private property.

All seizure of, destruction or wilful damage done to institutions of this character, historic monuments, works of art and science, is forbidden, and should be made the subject of legal proceedings.

2004-04-27T00:18:00.000-05:00

Exerpts from PROTOCOL ADDITIONAL TO THE GENEVA CONVENTIONS OF 12 AUGUST 1949, AND RELATING TO THE PROTECTION OF VICTIMS OF INTERNATIONAL ARMED CONFLICTS (PROTOCOL I)

Article 45

Protection of persons who have taken part in hostilities

1. A person who takes part in hostilities and falls into the power of an adverse Party shall be presumed to be a prisoner of war, and therefore shall be protected by the Third Convention, if he claims the status of prisoner of war, or if he appears to be entitled to such status, or if the Party on which he depends claims such status on his behalf by notification to the detaining Power or to the Protecting Power. Should any doubt arise as to whether any such person is entitled to the status of prisoner of war, he shall continue to have such status and, therefore, to be protected by the Third Convention and this Protocol until such time as his status has been determined by a competent tribunal.

2. If a person who has fallen into the power of an adverse Party is not held as a prisoner of war and is to be tried by that Party for an offence arising out of the hostilities, he shall have the right to assert his entitlement to prisoner-of-war status before a judicial tribunal and to have that question adjudicated. Whenever possible under the applicable procedure, this adjudication shall occur before the trial for the offence. The representatives of the Protecting Power shall be entitled to attend the proceedings in which that question is adjudicated, unless, exceptionally, the proceedings are held in camera in the interest of State security. In such a case the detaining Power shall advise the Protecting Power accordingly.

3. Any person who has taken part in hostilities, who is not entitled to prisoner-of-war status and who does not benefit from more favourable treatment in accordance with the Fourth Convention shall have the right at all times to the protection of Article 75 of this Protocol. In occupied territory, any such person, unless he is held as a spy, shall also be entitled, notwithstanding Article 5 of the Fourth Convention, to his rights of communication under that Convention.

Article 75

Fundamental guarantees

1. In so far as they are affected by a situation referred to in Article 1 of this Protocol, persons who are in the power of a Party to the conflict and who do not benefit from more favourable treatment under the Conventions or under this Protocol shall be treated humanely in all circumstances and shall enjoy, as a minimum, the protection provided by this Article without any adverse distinction based upon race, colour, sex, language, religion or belief, political or other opinion, national or social origin, wealth, birth or other status, or on any other similar criteria. Each Party shall respect the person, honour, convictions and religious practices of all such persons.

2. The following acts are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever, whether committed by civilian or by military agents:

(a) violence to the life, health, or physical or mental well-being of persons, in particular:

(i) murder;

(ii) torture of all kinds, whether physical or mental;

(iii) corporal punishment; and

(iv) mutilation;

(b) outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment, enforced prostitution and any form of indecent assault;

(c) the taking of hostages;

(d) collective punishments; and

(e) threats to commit any of the foregoing acts.

3. Any person arrested, detained or interned for actions related to the armed conflict shall be informed promptly, in a language he understands, of the reasons why these measures have been taken. Except in cases of arrest or detention for penal offences, such persons shall be released with the minimum delay possible and in any event as soon as the circumstances justifying the arrest, detention or internment have ceased to exist.

4. No sentence may be passed and no penalty may be executed on a person found guilty of a penal offence related to the armed conflict except pursuant to a conviction pronounced by an impartial and regularly constituted court respecting the generally recognized principles of regular judicial procedure, which include the following:

(a) the procedure shall provide for an accused to be informed without delay of the particulars of the offence alleged against him and shall afford the accused before and during his trial all necessary rights and means of defence;

(b) no one shall be convicted of an offence except on the basis of individual penal responsibility;

(c) no one shall be accused or convicted of a criminal offence on account of any act or omission which did not constitute a criminal offence under the national or international law to which he was subject at the time when it was committed; nor shall a heavier penalty be imposed than that which was applicable at the time when the criminal offence was committed; if, after the commission of the offence, provision is made by law for the imposition of a lighter penalty, the offender shall benefit thereby;

(d) anyone charged with an offence is presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law;

(e) anyone charged with an offence shall have the right to be tried in his presence;

(f) no one shall be compelled to testify against himself or to confess guilt;

(g) anyone charged with an offence shall have the right to examine, or have examined, the witnesses against him and to obtain the attendance and examination of witnesses on his behalf under the same conditions as witnesses against him;

(h) no one shall be prosecuted or punished by the same Party for an offence in respect of which a final judgement acquitting or convicting that person has been previously pronounced under the same law and judicial procedure;

(i) anyone prosecuted for an offence shall have the right to have the judgement pronounced publicly; and

(j) a convicted person shall be advised on conviction of his judicial and other remedies and of the time-limits within which they may be exercised.

5. Women whose liberty has been restricted for reasons related to the armed conflict shall be held in quarters separated from men's quarters. They shall be under the immediate supervision of women. Nevertheless, in cases where families are detained or interned, they shall, whenever possible, be held in the same place and accommodated as family units.

6. Persons who are arrested, detained or interned for reasons related to the armed conflict shall enjoy the protection provided by this Article until their final release, repatriation or re-establishment, even after the end of the armed conflict.

7. In order to avoid any doubt concerning the prosecution and trial of persons accused of war crimes or crimes against humanity, the following principles shall apply:

(a) persons who are accused of such crimes should be submitted for the purpose of prosecution and trial in accordance with the applicable rules of international law; and

(b) any such persons who do not benefit from more favourable treatment under the Conventions or this Protocol shall be accorded the treatment provided by this Article, whether or not the crimes of which they are accused constitute grave breaches of the Conventions or of this Protocol.

8. No provision of this Article may be construed as limiting or infringing any other more favourable provision granting greater protection, under any applicable rules of international law, to persons covered by paragraph 1.

2004-04-26T20:52:00.000-05:00

The State | College Leader 'Disappointed' by Cheney

Westminster College's president said Monday he was so 'surprised and disappointed' by Vice President Dick Cheney's attacks on John Kerry during a speech that he is inviting the Democrat to visit for a reply.

2004-04-26T11:39:00.000-05:00

Power lines set to carry high-speed Internet | Christian Science Monitor

BPL will also encourage innovative technology, proponents say. 'If every power plug in your house becomes a broadband connection, that means that almost anything you plug into the wall can connect to the Internet,' says Thomas of the FCC. 'That means that your refrigerator can have a meaningful conversation with the supermarket and say, 'Hi, I need milk.' Or you could call your house and say, 'I'm coming home in two hours, turn the air conditioner on.' It's only restricted by imagination.'

2004-04-26T11:37:00.000-05:00

Southwest Flies Into Labor Turbulence

The flight attendants have held rallies to publicize their frustration, arguing that Southwest's latest offer would leave their wages 20% to 30% below the industry average. There has even been talk of a possible strike against Dallas-based Southwest if the talks deteriorate further.

2004-04-26T11:30:00.000-05:00

Muncie Star Press | Americans put bodies on line for lawns

Though it's not well publicized, he said, thousands of Americans are maimed every year in mowing accidents.

2004-04-25T14:56:00.000-05:00

Brattleboro Reformer | VY search continues

Neal Sheehan, NRC spokesman for region I, said the fuel was most likely in one of three places: lying at the bottom of the 40-feet-deep spent fuel pool; sitting in some testing lab, where it may have been shipped off to without being properly recorded; or buried deep in the low-level waste dump in Snelling, S.C., where it may have been inadvertently sent.

2004-04-23T18:13:00.000-05:00

St. Louis Post-Dispatch | Business | Like the jingle, union label fades away

2004-04-23T17:32:00.000-05:00

StrategyPage.com EPA Approved ICBMs

In order to comply with EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) regulations, and at a cost of about $5.2 million per ICBM, the rocket motors on 500 Minuteman III missiles will be replaced with new ones. These rockets will emit less toxic chemicals when used.

(via Tom Tomorrow)

2004-04-23T17:25:00.000-05:00

State Is Urged to Ban Vote Machine

Four California counties should be prohibited from using an electronic voting machine sold by Diebold Election Systems for the November election, a state advisory panel said Thursday. If Secretary of State Kevin Shelley follows the panel's recommendation, election officials in San Diego, Kern, Solano and San Joaquin counties will be forced to find a potentially costly replacement system for the 15,000 affected machines before the election. The panel also urged the state attorney general to launch an investigation of the manufacturer.