political nonsense

United Nations peacekeepers sexually abused and exploited local women and girls in Liberia, a spokesman for the organization said.

Eighteen new cases of polio have been found in Yemen, and the country is “now facing a major epidemic,” Dr. David L. Heymann, the chief of polio eradication for the World Health Organization, said in Geneva.

Iran threatened Saturday to resume producing nuclear fuel, and North Korea dismissed President Bush as a “philistine whom we can never deal with.”

A philistine is a crass prosaic often priggish individual guided by material rather than intellectual or artistic values.

Plans to build the 1,776-foot Freedom Tower at ground zero have been delayed due to security concerns.

A red speck photographed near a dim and distant star last year is actually a huge planet, an international team of astronomers reported.

Zimbabwe lacks basic necessities
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Twelve days after Mr Calipari’s death, Mr Berlusconi said he would begin withdrawing his country’s troops from Iraq in September under pressure from public opinion. However, after a telephone conversation with President George Bush, he changed his mind.
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Only months after the US accused Khartoum of carrying out genocide in Darfur, Sudan has become a crucial intelligence asset to the CIA.

“I quite understand that the war on terrorism means dealing with bad actors, but to fly in one of Sudan’s chief committers of what Washington has formally described as genocide is deeply disturbing,” said an independent Sudan analyst, Eric Reeves.

Sudan remains on the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism. One senior Sudanese official told Ken Silverstein of the LA TImes that the country had achieved “complete normalization” of relations with the CIA.
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In California, a jury has found that police in Humboldt County used excessive force against non-violent anti-logging protesters in 1997. During a series of protests, police applied pepper spray directly to the eyes of the demonstrators by swabbing their eyes with Q-tips covered in pepper spray. The jury awarded the protesters one dollar each.
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Gas companies are making record profits. Exxon Mobil reported its first quarter earnings soared 44 percent over last year. ExxonMobil made more than seven-and-a-half billion dollars in the first three months of the year. RoyalDutch/Shell recorded a 28 percent rise in profits and ConocoPhillips has also recorded record profits.

You know, the only thing that is really fiscally solvent of any size in this country is the Social Security Trust Fund. It’s not going bankrupt. Our country is going bankrupt. Last night, as part of the budget resolution, they increased the debt ceiling to over $8 trillion. We have a $10 trillion economy, but we have got debt of 80% of that economy. He doesn’t seem to be concerned about that. Our health care crisis is in bankruptcy, but here he has taken on Social Security, which has a $1.7 trillion surplus. We’re gaining surplus every year. And in 2018, we’ll have $4.5 trillion. Then from that time, for another approximately 35 to 40 years, there will be enough to pay out full benefits, and after that, about 80% of benefits. That’s not bankruptcy. And it’s wrong to be telling people the system is going bankrupt so that you can pass an ideologically motivated plan basically to dismantle the whole system.

So, we’re creating a situation of fiscal insolvency in order to dismantle a program that is the last one we need to worry about right now. We need to be worrying about Medicare, we need to worrying about the federal budget and the hundreds of billions that our kids are going to have to pay in interest costs on that federal deficit. So, you know, I just think he has his priorities out of order. I think this is all about ideology rather than fiscal responsibility.

Clear Channel Communications Inc. on Friday unveiled plans to split up its media empire by spinning off its entertainment business. The nation’s top radio broadcaster also said profit fell by more than half in the first quarter. Revenue in the latest quarter totaled $1.88 billion, a decline of 4 percent from $1.97 billion a year earlier. Radio-broadcasting revenue dropped 7 percent to $773.6 million, which was somewhat offset by an increase in outdoor-ad revenue, which grew 11 percent to $579 million.

Following the breakup, Clear Channel Entertainment — which puts on concerts and sporting events — will have more flexibility as a separate and ”largely unregulated” public company, Clear Channel said. ”We’re seeking to unlock the considerable value in our company, and create a strong foundation for future growth, by improving the strategic, operational and financial flexibility in each of our leading business units,” President and Chief Executive Mark Mays said.

George J. Tenet, former director of central intelligence, said he regretted assuring President Bush in 2002 that he had “slam dunk” evidence that Iraq had unconventional weapons. “Those were the two dumbest words I ever said,” Mr. Tenet told 1,300 people at a Kutztown University forum Wednesday in Kutztown, Pa.

Citing new data from the oceans and space, leading climate scientists reported that Earth was absorbing much more heat than it was giving off.
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Seven men of Middle Eastern descent have sued a Denny’s restaurant and one of its managers for $28 million, saying they were forced to leave after being told, “We don’t serve bin Ladens here.”

Congress passed a $2.56 trillion federal budget for 2006 cutting Medicaid by $10 billion over five years, adding $106 billion in tax cuts and clearing the way for oil drilling in an Alaskan wildlife refuge. Senator Lisa Murkowski, the Alaska Republican who has led the fight in Congress to open the refuge, gave the thumbs-up sign and said, “Love it!”

The budget resolution instructs lawmakers to freeze spending in most domestic programs, but not for the military and for domestic security.

The House Democratic leader, Representative Nancy Pelosi of California, called it “a missed opportunity” and “an assault on our values.” Senator Kent Conrad of North Dakota, the senior Democrat on the Senate Budget committee, called it “a mistake for the country.”

Shortly before the House began its vote, Mr. DeLay said, “This is the budget the American people voted for when they returned a Republican House, a Republican Senate and a Republican president to the White House last November.”

People who are overweight, but not obese, have a lower risk of death than normal-size and skinny people.

The U.N. Security Council asked the International Criminal Court to investigate atrocities in Sudan. This is the world’s first permanent and independent criminal court for judging war crimes, which formed despite US opposition three years ago. Darfur will put the court to its first major test.

Some diplomats say the UN assigned this case to the court because it would allow the Security Council to postpone direct intervention and nonetheless appear to be taking action.

The outline for benefit cuts Mr. Bush provided Thursday night was based on a well-developed plan that he and other administration officials have been speaking of approvingly for several months. Specifically, rich people get less social security than poor people.

Iraq’s interim national assembly voted to approve a partial new cabinet today, including 27 ministers and five acting ministers, ushering in Iraq’s first democratically elected government in more than 50 years. The government’s formation coincided with the 68th birthday of former dictator Saddam Hussein.
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