**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US ATrays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
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Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/n/a/2007/01/16/politics/p111958S86.DTL&type=printable
McCain Hopes to Make Amends With Dobson
- By JIM DAVENPORT, Associated Press Writer
Tuesday, January 16, 2007
(01-16) 11:19 PST Columbia, S.C. (AP) --
Sen. John McCain said Tuesday he hopes to patch things up with conservativeChristian leader James Dobson, who recently said he wouldn't support theRepublican's presidential bid under any circumstances.
In a radio interview with KCBI, a Dallas Christian station, Dobson arguedthat McCain didn't support traditional marriage values and said he hasprayed "we won't get stuck with him." Dobson is founder of Focus on theFamily.
"I'm obviously disappointed and I'd like to continue and have a dialoguewith Dr. Dobson and other members of the community," McCain said Tuesdayduring a stop in Columbia.
McCain has said gay marriage should not be legal but has angered someconservatives with his opposition to a constitutional amendment banningsame-sex unions. The Arizona senator said the issue should be left to thestates.
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Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/16468314.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Tue, Jan. 16, 2007
IMMIGRATION
U.S. warning alarms some given asylum, green cards
A statement recently posted on a federal website has raised concern amongpermanent residents who obtained green cards through asylum.
BY ALFONSO CHARDY
achardy@MiamiHerald.com
Thousands of immigrants who obtained green cards after receiving asylum nowrisk losing them if they return to the countries where they claimed theywere persecuted, a recent U.S. government warning suggests.
The notice, titled ''fact sheet,'' marks the first time the agency haspublicly warned those with green cards that they could lose their asylumstatus, according to immigration attorneys. More than 110,000 immigrants whowon asylum since 1996 have received green cards, according to the Office ofImmigration Statistics.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/17/us/17bomber.html?pagewanted=print
January 17, 2007
Court Vacates Term of Algerian in Bomb Plot
By JENNIFER STEINHAUER
LOS ANGELES, Jan. 16 - A federal appeals court on Tuesday vacated the 2005sentence of an Algerian man convicted of plotting to bomb Los AngelesInternational Airport.
The man, Ahmed Ressam, known as the Millennium Bomber because of prosecutors' claims that he intended to bomb the airport on the eve of the millennium,was arrested in December 1999 in Washington State after driving off a ferryfrom British Columbia in a car with bomb-making materials in its trunk. Hewas convicted on nine counts, including document fraud and transportation ofdeadly explosives, and sentenced to 22 years in prison.
But on Tuesday, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, inSan Francisco, reversed his conviction on the ninth count, which chargedthat he was carrying explosives while committing the felony of making afalse statement to customs officials about both his identity and the factthat he had explosives.
Mr. Ressam became a suspect when a customs agent felt that his itineraryseemed unusual and that he was acting in a peculiar manner.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/17/opinion/17pearl.html?th=&emc=th&pagewanted=print
January 17, 2007
Op-Ed Contributor
Another Perspective, or Jihad TV?
By JUDEA PEARL
Los Angeles
IN late 2001, three months before my son, the Wall Street Journal reporterDaniel Pearl, was kidnapped, he interviewed the influential Qatari clericSheik Yusuf al-Qaradawi, and asked him about suicide bombings againstIsraeli civilians. The sheik replied with a novel twist of logic. "Israelisociety in general is armed," he said, implying that Israeli civilians -including women and children, doctors and journalists - are legitimatetargets.
At the time, it was still surprising to see an authoritative Muslim clericgive religious license to the ideology of terror - granting the faithfulpermission to elevate their own grievances above the norms of civilizedsociety.
Daniel would fall victim to that same ideology when he was abducted andmurdered in Pakistan. After his death, I discovered that Sheik Qaradawi isthe host of a weekly program on the Qatar-based TV news network Al Jazeeracalled "Sharia and Life." He uses this forum to preach his new morality tomillions of Arabic-speaking viewers, including Hamas operatives, Al Qaedarecruits, schoolteachers and impressionable Muslim youths. "We have the'children bomb,' and these human bombs must continue until liberation," hetold his audience in 2002. Consistent with this logic and morality, SheikQaradawi later extended his Koranic blessing to suicide bombing againstAmerican civilians in Iraq.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/17/opinion/17wed3.html?th=&emc=th&pagewanted=print
January 17, 2007
Editorial
Ending the Prison Windfall
The Census Bureau typically uses the decennial census to testdata-collection methods that become routine later on. The 2010 census shouldinclude a test run at counting the nation's 1.4 million prison inmates attheir permanent addresses instead of in prisons. That would help bring anend to a corrosive but little known practice that distorts the politicalprocess in virtually every corner of the country.
Inmates are denied the right to vote in all but two states. But statelawmakers treat them as residents of the prisons when drawing legislativemaps, to inflate the head count in lightly populated rural areas whereprisons are typically built. This creates legislative districts where nonewould ordinarily be, shifting political influence from the heavily populatedurban districts where inmates live.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/16/AR2007011601334_pf.html
Purse Strings and Pragmatism
By Melvin R. Laird
Wednesday, January 17, 2007; A19
The brewing fight in Congress over continued funding of the war in Iraq willnot be the country's first. It is an ominous reminder of 1975, when Congresscut off funding for the Vietnam War three years after our combat troops hadleft. With the assistance we promised South Vietnam in the 1972 ParisAccords -- U.S. equipment, replacement parts and ammunition -- it had wonevery major battle since we left. But Congress lost the will to keep ourpromise and killed the appropriation. The result was a bloodbath.
I spent 16 years in Congress, much of the time on the Appropriations defensesubcommittee grilling defense secretaries about the conduct of the VietnamWar. Then, as defense secretary I spent four years on the other side of thetable, holding fast to an exit strategy I believed in, "Vietnamization." Inever lost a vote during those four years. But it would have beendevastating if Congress had cut the purse strings before our troops werewithdrawn and before the South Vietnamese had learned to stand on their own.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/17/us/17race.html?th=&emc=th&pagewanted=print
January 17, 2007
Racial Hate Feeds a Gang War's Senseless Killing
By RANDAL C. ARCHIBOLD
LOS ANGELES, Jan. 16 - The Latino gang members were looking for a blackperson, any black person, to shoot, the police said, and they found one.Cheryl Green, perched near her scooter chatting with friends, was shot deadin a spray of bullets that left several other young people injured.
She was 14, an eighth grader who loved junk food and watching Court TV withher mother and had recently written a poem beginning: "I am black andbeautiful. I wonder how I will be living in the future."
"I never thought something like this could happen here in L.A.," said hermother, Charlene Lovett, fighting tears.
Cheryl's killing last month, which the police said followed a confrontationbetween the gang members and a black man, stands out in a wave ofbias-related attacks and incidents in a city that promotes its diversity asmuch as frets over it.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/12/AR2007011201846_pf.html
The Evidence Is Thin on Multivitamins
By Sally Squires
Tuesday, January 16, 2007; HE01
If you're among the 52 percent of Americans who take multivitamins orminerals, you may be surprised to learn how little experts know about theirbenefits -- or their potential harm.
In a series of papers in this month's American Journal of ClinicalNutrition, an expert panel convened by the National Institutes of Healthnotes that there's not enough evidence to recommend for or against thesecommon dietary supplements.
Yet U.S. consumers -- hoping to prevent heart disease, cancer, bone loss andmany other conditions -- spend $23 billion a year on multivitamins andminerals, according to the Nutrition Business Journal.
"If you're taking a multivitamin, there's no reason to stop," notes PaulCoates, director of the NIH Office of Dietary Supplements. "But if you'renot taking a multivitamin, there's also no reason to start taking one,either."
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/16/AR2007011601612_pf.html
Lawmakers' Lobbying Spouses Avoid Hill Reforms
By John Solomon
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, January 17, 2007; A01
When Sen. Byron L. Dorgan (D-N.D.) rose to the Senate floor last summer andpassionately argued for keeping the federal estate tax, he left one personwith an interest in retaining the tax unmentioned.
The multibillion-dollar life-insurance industry, which was fighting topreserve the tax because life insurers have a lucrative business sellingpolicies and annuities to Americans for estate planning, has employedDorgan's wife as a lobbyist since 1999.
A few months earlier, Sen. Elizabeth Dole (R-N.C.) had pleaded for restraintas she urged colleagues to avoid overreacting to the news that the Bushadministration had let a United Arab Emirates company take over operationsat six U.S. ports. At the same time, her husband, Robert J. Dole, a formersenator and presidential nominee, was registered to lobby for that companyand was advising it on how to save the deal from the political firestorm.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/16/AR2007011601335_pf.html
Seven Tough Choices We Will Not Make
By Robert J. Samuelson
Wednesday, January 17, 2007; A19
Fulfilling their promise, Democrats in the House have voted to raise theminimum wage from its current $5.15 an hour to $7.25 by 2009. But before youcount the big gains for low-income families, consider this fact: Among thepoorest fifth of U.S. households (their 2005 incomes: less than $19,178),only one in seven has a full-time, year-round worker. About 60 percent haveno worker at all, says the Census Bureau. The rest have part-time orpart-year workers. A higher minimum wage won't help most of thesehouseholds, which consist heavily of single parents and the elderly.
Among social scientists, it's no secret that the minimum wage is a weakweapon against poverty. Modest numbers of workers are affected; many areteenagers, often from middle-class homes; and many of the poor don't work.And a higher minimum wage may destroy some jobs. No matter. Democratsplunged ahead because raising the minimum wage is symbolically powerful. Itsays that you care about "economic justice."
This is, I think, a metaphor for what ails our politics: It's mostly aboutgestures and giveaways; it's not about hard choices.
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Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070115/COL04/701150333
Adultery could mean life, court finds
That's what the law says in sex-drug case Cox appealed
January 15, 2007
BY BRIAN DICKERSON
FREE PRESS COLUMNIST
In a ruling sure to make philandering spouses squirm, Michigan'ssecond-highest court says that anyone involved in an extramarital fling canbe prosecuted for first-degree criminal sexual conduct, a felony punishableby up to life in prison.
"We cannot help but question whether the Legislature actually intended theresult we reach here today," Judge William Murphy wrote in November for aunanimous Court of Appeals panel, "but we are curtailed by the language ofthe statute from reaching any other conclusion."
"Technically," he added, "any time a person engages in sexual penetration inan adulterous relationship, he or she is guilty of CSC I," the most serioussexual assault charge in Michigan's criminal code.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/16/AR2007011601577_pf.html
Senators To Target Executive Benefit
Deferred Pay May Be Capped
By Lori Montgomery and Jeffrey H. Birnbaum
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, January 17, 2007; D01
The Senate Finance Committee is considering a proposal to sharply limit theearnings corporate executives and other highly paid employees can placetax-free into deferred compensation plans, one of the most popular executivebenefits in corporate America.
Under the proposal, expected to be discussed today by committee members, anindividual taxpayer could defer no more than $1 million annually incompensation, beginning this year. The shift in tax policy would be likelyto affect top executives at hundreds of corporations and would raise taxeson some of the nation's wealthiest workers by an estimated $806 million over10 years.
The proposal tracks rhetoric that some Democrats employed during the midtermelections, when they portrayed the Republicans who controlled Congress asbeing too close to special interests and the wealthy. It also offers aresponse to controversies that have erupted over executive pay in recentmonths, including scandals over backdated stock options andmultimillion-dollar compensation packages paid to current and formercorporate chieftains.
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Sacbee.com
http://www.sacbee.com/110/v-print/story/108824.html
Editorial: Reclaiming our values
Endless detention hurts U.S. efforts abroad
-
Published 12:00 am PST Wednesday, January 17, 2007
During World War II, the United States had 511 camps that housed more than425,000 German, Italian and Japanese prisoners of war. The POWs weredetained from 1942 to 1945, and then returned to their home countries by1946.
Contrast that history with what's happening with prisoners captured in thewar in Afghanistan that began in October 2001.
The U.S. military picked up some prisoners in 2001 and 2002 in Afghanistan.But about 86 percent of the 759 prisoners who ended up at the U.S. base atGuantánamo Bay, Cuba, were picked up in random sweeps by Pakistanis andAfghans who had been enticed by U.S. bounties of $500 to $1,000. Someprisoners turned out to be Chinese dissidents training in Afghanistan tooppose Chinese domination, not to fight Americans.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/16/AR2007011601463_pf.html
Immigrants Mistreated, Report Says
By Spencer S. Hsu
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, January 17, 2007; A08
U.S. authorities mistreated suspected illegal immigrants at five prisons andjails nationwide, violating federal standards meant to ensure safe andhumane custody, according to a government report released yesterday.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials and contractorsdenied timely medical treatment to some of the immigrants, failed todisclose and justify disciplinary actions against them, and improperlylimited access to relatives, lawyers and immigration authorities, accordingto the Department of Homeland Security inspector general.
Detention officers failed to establish a system to report abuse and violatedhealth and safety rules by neglecting to monitor prisoners on hunger strikesor suicide watches and by serving undercooked food, the report said.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/17/washington/17libby.html?_r=1&th=&adxnnl=1&oref=slogin&emc=th&adxnnlx=1169038927-2SIwJu7SCs249eYzLhx1Cg&pagewanted=print
January 17, 2007
As Trial Begins, Cheney's Ex-Aide Is Still a Puzzle
By SCOTT SHANE
WASHINGTON, Jan. 16 - Paradox seems to define I. Lewis Libby Jr., whoremains a bit mysterious even to close colleagues. He is the White Housepolicy enforcer who also wrote a literary novel; a buttoned-down Washingtonlawyer who likes knocking back tequila shots in cowboy bars and hurtlingdown mountains on skis and bikes; and a 56-year-old intellectual known toall by his childhood nickname, Scooter.
But now comes the most baffling paradox of all, as Mr. Libby, former chiefof staff and alter ego to Vice President Dick Cheney, began his trial infederal court here on Tuesday on charges of perjury and obstruction ofjustice. By all accounts a first-rate legal mind and a hypercautious aidewhose discretion frustrated reporters, he is charged with repeatedly lyingto a grand jury and to the F.B.I. about his leaks to the news media in thebattle over Iraq war intelligence.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/17/business/17leonhardt.html?th=&emc=th&pagewanted=print
January 17, 2007
Economix
What $1.2 Trillion Can Buy
By DAVID LEONHARDT
The human mind isn't very well equipped to make sense of a figure like $1.2trillion. We don't deal with a trillion of anything in our daily lives, andso when we come across such a big number, it is hard to distinguish it fromany other big number. Millions, billions, a trillion - they all start tosound the same.
The way to come to grips with $1.2 trillion is to forget about the numberitself and think instead about what you could buy with the money. When youdo that, a trillion stops sounding anything like millions or billions.
For starters, $1.2 trillion would pay for an unprecedented public healthcampaign - a doubling of cancer research funding, treatment for everyAmerican whose diabetes or heart disease is now going unmanaged and a globalimmunization campaign to save millions of children's lives.
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Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/printer_011607L.shtml
Iraq Edges Closer to Iran, With or Without the US
By Louise Roug and Borzou Daragahi
The Los Angeles Times
Tuesday 16 January 2007
Baghdad - The Iraqi government is moving to solidify relations withIran, even as the United States turns up the rhetorical heat and bolstersits military forces to confront Tehran's influence in Iraq.
Iraq's foreign minister, responding to a U.S. raid on an Iranian officein Irbil in northern Iraq last week, said Monday that the governmentintended to transform similar Iranian agencies into consulates. Theminister, Hoshyar Zebari, also said the government planned to negotiate moreborder entry points with Iran.
The U.S. military is still holding five Iranians detained in Thursday'sraid. Army Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the commander of U.S. forces in Iraq,said records seized in the raid and statements made by the detainees showedthat at least some of them worked for Iran's intelligence service.
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Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/iraq/2007-01-16-violence_x.htm
Baghdad university bombing kills 65 as U.N. reports 34,000 Iraqi civilianskilled in '06
Updated 1/16/2007 3:36 PM ET
BAGHDAD (AP) - An explosion outside a Baghdad university as students wereheading home for the day killed at least 65 people on Tuesday in thedeadliest of several attacks on predominantly Shiite areas. The attacks -and the announcement of four U.S. military deaths - came on a day the UnitedNations said more than 34,000 Iraqi civilians died last year in sectarianviolence.
Attacks in Baghdad - including the university explosion, blasts at amarketplace for used motorcycles and a drive-by shooting - killed more than100 people in what appeared to be a final spasm of violence ahead of animminent drive by the Iraqi government and U.S. forces to secure thecapital.
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Forwarded from Susan Frishkorn
Tri-County - chances@attglobal.net
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=36166
Published on Tuesday, January 16, 2007 by Inter Press Service
Bush's New Iran Policy - No Evidence for IED Charge
by Gareth Porter
WASHINGTON - For 18 months now, the George W. Bush administration hasperiodically raised the charge that Iran is supplying anti-coalition forcesin Iraq with arms.
But in the past, high administration officials have always admittedthat they have no real evidence to support it. Now, they are going further.Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told reporters on her current MiddleEastern trip, "I think there is plenty of evidence that there is Iranianinvolvement with these networks that are making high-explosive IEDs[improvised explosive devices] and that are endangering our troops, andthat's going to be dealt with."
However, Rice failed to provide any evidence of official Iranian
involvement.
The previous pattern had been that U.S. and British officials suggestthat Iranian government involvement in the use by Sunni insurgents or Shiitemilitias of "shaped charges" that can penetrate U.S. armoured vehicles isthe only logical conclusion that could be drawn from the facts. But whenasked point blank, they admit that they have no evidence to support it.
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Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
Washingtonpost.com
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/15/AR2007011501204_pf.html
Interrogation Research Is Lacking, Report Says
Few Studies Have Examined U.S. Methods
By Josh White
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, January 16, 2007; A15
There is almost no scientific evidence to back up the U.S. intelligencecommunity's use of controversial interrogation techniques in the fightagainst terrorism, and experts believe some painful and coercive approachescould hinder the ability to get good information, according to a new reportfrom an intelligence advisory group.
The 374-page report from the Intelligence Science Board examines severalaspects of broad interrogation methods and approaches, and it finds that nosignificant scientific research has been conducted in more than four decadesabout the effectiveness of many techniques the U.S. military andintelligence groups use regularly. Intelligence experts wrote that a lack ofresearch could explain why abuse has been alleged at U.S. facilities inAfghanistan, Cuba and Iraq.
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Forwarded from Susan Frishkorn
Tri-County - chances@attglobal.net
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/17/business/17leonhardt.html
January 17, 2007
What $1.2 Trillion Can Buy
By DAVID LEONHARDT
The human mind isn't very well equipped to make sense of a figure like $1.2trillion. We don't deal with a trillion of anything in our daily lives, andso when we come across such a big number, it is hard to distinguish it fromany other big number. Millions, billions, a trillion - they all start tosound the same.
The way to come to grips with $1.2 trillion is to forget about the numberitself and think instead about what you could buy with the money. When youdo that, a trillion stops sounding anything like millions or billions.
For starters, $1.2 trillion would pay for an unprecedented public healthcampaign - a doubling of cancer research funding, treatment for everyAmerican whose diabetes or heart disease is now going unmanaged and a globalimmunization campaign to save millions of children's lives.
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Huffington Post
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jane-smiley/not-only-the-worst-presid_b_38703.html?p=2#comments
Not Only the Worst President, but the Worst Possible President
Back in the year 2000, when George W. Bush lost the popular vote and wasshoe-horned into office by the Supreme Court in spite of clear conflicts ofinterest on the part of Scalia and Thomas, the psychology of Little Georgewas known to only a few. To most of us he seemed like a doofus--a more orless well-meaning guy who enjoyed running things like baseball teams and theState of Texas if not too much work was involved. Had been an alcoholic anda drug user, but had apparently come clean in some hazy, quasi-religiousway--that was his personal history to many Americans (if not to all thosewho met with Karl Rove behind closed doors and heard the truth). At anyrate, I remember thinking that Bill Clinton had done such a good job overthe years getting the budget into a surplus and winning good feelings aroundthe world that it really didn't matter who of the four who were running(Gore, Bradley, McCain, Bush) might win. They all seemed about the same inlots of ways. What we really needed was some respite from Clinton's ownpenchant for mischief. I liked Clinton. I remember that The New Yorkermagazine asked me for my take on the Lewinsky scandal, and I said that onbalance, in spite of the brouhaha, I still preferred a president who wouldmake love, not war. Clinton was a flawed human being, that was evident, buthe knew it. He never didn't know it. And he was always trying to makeamends. But he was exhausting--or the media made him exhausting. I thoughtwe were due for a rest.
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http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/january2007/160107Jones.htm
Prisonplanet.com
Mr. Bush: Meet Walter Jones
Patrick J. Buchanan
Lew Rockwell.com
Tuesday, January 16, 2007
America is four years into a bloody debacle in Iraq not merely because Bushand Cheney marched us in, or simply because neocon propagandists lied aboutSaddam's nuclear program and WMDs, and Iraqi ties to al-Qaida, anthraxattacks and 9-11.
We are there because a Democratic Senate voted to give Bush a blank checkfor war. Democrats in October 2002 wanted the war vote behind them so theycould go home and campaign as pro-war patriots.
And because they did, 3,000 Americans are dead, 25,000 are wounded, perhaps100,000 Iraqis have lost their lives, 1.6 million have fled, $400 billionhas been lost and America stands on the precipice of the worst strategicdefeat in her history.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
USA Today
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2007-01-16-army-gear_x.htm
AP: Iran gets army gear in Pentagon sale
Posted 1/16/2007 7:53 AM ET
WASHINGTON (AP) - The U.S. military has sold forbidden equipment at least ahalf-dozen times to middlemen for countries - including Iran and China - whoexploited security flaws in the Defense Department's surplus auctions. Thesales include fighter jet parts and missile components.In one case, federal investigators said, the contraband made it to Iran, acountry President Bush branded part of an "axis of evil."
In that instance, a Pakistani arms broker convicted of exporting U.S.missile parts to Iran resumed business after his release from prison. Hepurchased Chinook helicopter engine parts for Iran from a U.S. company thathad bought them in a Pentagon surplus sale. Immigration and CustomsEnforcement agents, speaking on condition of anonymity, say those parts madeit to Iran.
[Send your comments about articles to Rays.List@Comcast.net]
#####
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
NATIONAL & WORLD DIGEST January 17, 2007
**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US ATrays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
The Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/palmbeach/sfl-paaronson17jan17,0,4446557,print.story?coll=sfla-news-palm
Developers pour cash into stem-call campaign by county commissioner
By Andy Reid
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
January 17, 2007
Developers are picking up most of the tab for Palm Beach County CommissionerBurt Aaronson's campaign to support embryonic stem cell research.
Home builders and other real estate interests provided more than half of the$351,112 Aaronson's political committee has raised to try to force astatewide vote in support of the controversial but potentially lifesavingresearch.
While most individual contributions to Aaronson's group trickle in at the$10 to $50 range from retirees, the big money comes from developers -- someof whom benefited from Aaronson's help in the past or could need his vote inthe future.
In the aftermath of conflict-of-interest concerns that forced formerCommissioner Tony Masilotti from office, some question whether developers'donations to Aaronson's cause could be seen as a way to influence his votes.
"I think it's pay to play," said Lesley Blackner, a Palm Beach attorneypushing to change state law to give voters more control over developmentapprovals. "They want influence. They want a good relationship with a countycommissioner."
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The Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/opinion/editorial/sfl-edittdcarltonmoorejan17,0,2828927,print.story?coll=sfla-news-editorial
Carlton Moore
South Florida Sun-Sentinel Editorial Board
January 17, 2007
ISSUE: Official protests traffic stop, says police tarnish his reputation.
If Fort Lauderdale City Commissioner Carlton Moore is so concerned about hisreputation's being tarnished, why doesn't he stop calling undue attention tohis recent indefensible actions?
Moore, who has been very busy lately implying that the Fort LauderdalePolice Department is racist, was pulled over and given a ticket on themorning of Dec. 3. The violation? Driving with a suspended license. Not justfor a few days or even weeks, mind you, but for 11 months!
Moore is well within his rights to challenge the police department forepisodes involving the city's minority community, and his calls forinvestigations are appropriate. But doesn't he realize that his whiningabout a traffic violation -- an infraction he acknowledges -- undermines hisown credibility?
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PalmBeachPost.com
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/content/state/epaper/2007/01/17/s1a_insure_0117.html
House and Senate far apart on Citizens' role, state risk
By Dara Kam And Randy Diamond
Palm Beach Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
TALLAHASSEE - The opening day of a weeklong special legislative session withthe goal of lowering property insurance rates found lawmakers in the Houseand Senate deeply divided about the role government should play in bailingout insurers and homeowners.
The two key issues splitting the two Republican-controlled chambers: anexpansion of the state-run Citizens Property Insurance Corp. and thecreation of a super-catastrophe fund. The concepts are included in theSenate plan, and House leaders are balking at both.
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The Washington Post
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-finsure17jan17,0,2382783,print.story?coll=sfla-home-headlines
Legislators clash, irate homeowners protest on opening day of session oninsurance
By Linda Kleindienst,
Mark Hollis and Kathy Bushouse Tallahassee Bureau
January 17, 2007
TALLAHASSEE · With homeowners across Florida demanding swift action, statelegislators opened their emergency session on soaring property insurancerates Tuesday, but clashed immediately on how large a tab taxpayers shouldhave to pay to help rebuild after a major hurricane.
Causing the early discord was a Senate plan that would place a $20 billionceiling on what private insurance companies would have to pay policy holdersto reimburse storm losses. Remaining claims would fall to Florida taxpayers,and would be paid for through a tax hike, cuts in the state budget, or aspecial fund.
The brainchild of Senate Democratic Leader Steve Geller of Hallandale Beach,the idea has been embraced by the Senate's Republican leaders andtentatively endorsed by Republican Gov. Charlie Crist, who has called theinsurance crisis the most urgent problem facing his two-week-oldadministration. The theory is premiums will drop and competition increase ifinsurers no longer have to carry expensive reinsurance -- insurance coverageinsurers buy to help pay claims -- to cover losses in the event of acatastrophe.
[ Send your comments about any of the articles in Ray's List Digest toRays.List@Comcast.net ]
#####
=
The Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/palmbeach/sfl-paaronson17jan17,0,4446557,print.story?coll=sfla-news-palm
Developers pour cash into stem-call campaign by county commissioner
By Andy Reid
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
January 17, 2007
Developers are picking up most of the tab for Palm Beach County CommissionerBurt Aaronson's campaign to support embryonic stem cell research.
Home builders and other real estate interests provided more than half of the$351,112 Aaronson's political committee has raised to try to force astatewide vote in support of the controversial but potentially lifesavingresearch.
While most individual contributions to Aaronson's group trickle in at the$10 to $50 range from retirees, the big money comes from developers -- someof whom benefited from Aaronson's help in the past or could need his vote inthe future.
In the aftermath of conflict-of-interest concerns that forced formerCommissioner Tony Masilotti from office, some question whether developers'donations to Aaronson's cause could be seen as a way to influence his votes.
"I think it's pay to play," said Lesley Blackner, a Palm Beach attorneypushing to change state law to give voters more control over developmentapprovals. "They want influence. They want a good relationship with a countycommissioner."
=
The Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/opinion/editorial/sfl-edittdcarltonmoorejan17,0,2828927,print.story?coll=sfla-news-editorial
Carlton Moore
South Florida Sun-Sentinel Editorial Board
January 17, 2007
ISSUE: Official protests traffic stop, says police tarnish his reputation.
If Fort Lauderdale City Commissioner Carlton Moore is so concerned about hisreputation's being tarnished, why doesn't he stop calling undue attention tohis recent indefensible actions?
Moore, who has been very busy lately implying that the Fort LauderdalePolice Department is racist, was pulled over and given a ticket on themorning of Dec. 3. The violation? Driving with a suspended license. Not justfor a few days or even weeks, mind you, but for 11 months!
Moore is well within his rights to challenge the police department forepisodes involving the city's minority community, and his calls forinvestigations are appropriate. But doesn't he realize that his whiningabout a traffic violation -- an infraction he acknowledges -- undermines hisown credibility?
=
PalmBeachPost.com
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/content/state/epaper/2007/01/17/s1a_insure_0117.html
House and Senate far apart on Citizens' role, state risk
By Dara Kam And Randy Diamond
Palm Beach Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
TALLAHASSEE - The opening day of a weeklong special legislative session withthe goal of lowering property insurance rates found lawmakers in the Houseand Senate deeply divided about the role government should play in bailingout insurers and homeowners.
The two key issues splitting the two Republican-controlled chambers: anexpansion of the state-run Citizens Property Insurance Corp. and thecreation of a super-catastrophe fund. The concepts are included in theSenate plan, and House leaders are balking at both.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-finsure17jan17,0,2382783,print.story?coll=sfla-home-headlines
Legislators clash, irate homeowners protest on opening day of session oninsurance
By Linda Kleindienst,
Mark Hollis and Kathy Bushouse Tallahassee Bureau
January 17, 2007
TALLAHASSEE · With homeowners across Florida demanding swift action, statelegislators opened their emergency session on soaring property insurancerates Tuesday, but clashed immediately on how large a tab taxpayers shouldhave to pay to help rebuild after a major hurricane.
Causing the early discord was a Senate plan that would place a $20 billionceiling on what private insurance companies would have to pay policy holdersto reimburse storm losses. Remaining claims would fall to Florida taxpayers,and would be paid for through a tax hike, cuts in the state budget, or aspecial fund.
The brainchild of Senate Democratic Leader Steve Geller of Hallandale Beach,the idea has been embraced by the Senate's Republican leaders andtentatively endorsed by Republican Gov. Charlie Crist, who has called theinsurance crisis the most urgent problem facing his two-week-oldadministration. The theory is premiums will drop and competition increase ifinsurers no longer have to carry expensive reinsurance -- insurance coverageinsurers buy to help pay claims -- to cover losses in the event of acatastrophe.
[ Send your comments about any of the articles in Ray's List Digest toRays.List@Comcast.net ]
#####
NATIONAL & WORLD DIGEST January 17, 2007
**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US ATrays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
The Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/palmbeach/sfl-paaronson17jan17,0,4446557,print.story?coll=sfla-news-palm
Developers pour cash into stem-call campaign by county commissioner
By Andy Reid
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
January 17, 2007
Developers are picking up most of the tab for Palm Beach County CommissionerBurt Aaronson'scampaign to support embryonic stem cell research.
Home builders and other real estate interests provided more than half of the$351,112Aaronson's political committee has raised to try to force astatewide vote in support of thecontroversial but potentially lifesavingresearch.
While most individual contributions to Aaronson's group trickle in at the$10 to $50 range fromretirees, the big money comes from developers -- someof whom benefited from Aaronson's helpin the past or could need his vote inthe future.
In the aftermath of conflict-of-interest concerns that forced formerCommissioner TonyMasilotti from office, some question whether developers'donations to Aaronson's cause could beseen as a way to influence his votes.
"I think it's pay to play," said Lesley Blackner, a Palm Beach attorneypushing to change statelaw to give voters more control over developmentapprovals. "They want influence. They want agood relationship with a countycommissioner."
=
The Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/opinion/editorial/sfl-edittdcarltonmoorejan17,0,2828927,print.story?coll=sfla-news-editorial
Carlton Moore
South Florida Sun-Sentinel Editorial Board
January 17, 2007
ISSUE: Official protests traffic stop, says police tarnish his reputation.
If Fort Lauderdale City Commissioner Carlton Moore is so concerned about hisreputation's being tarnished, why doesn't he stop calling undue attention tohis recent indefensible actions?
Moore, who has been very busy lately implying that the Fort LauderdalePolice Department is racist, was pulled over and given a ticket on themorning of Dec. 3. The violation? Driving with a suspended license. Not justfor a few days or even weeks, mind you, but for 11 months!
Moore is well within his rights to challenge the police department forepisodes involving the city's minority community, and his calls forinvestigations are appropriate. But doesn't he realize that his whiningabout a traffic violation -- an infraction he acknowledges -- undermines hisown credibility?
=
PalmBeachPost.com
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/content/state/epaper/2007/01/17/s1a_insure_0117.html
House and Senate far apart on Citizens' role, state risk
By Dara Kam And Randy Diamond
Palm Beach Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
TALLAHASSEE - The opening day of a weeklong special legislative session withthe goal of lowering property insurance rates found lawmakers in the Houseand Senate deeply divided about the role government should play in bailingout insurers and homeowners.
The two key issues splitting the two Republican-controlled chambers: anexpansion of the state-run Citizens Property Insurance Corp. and thecreation of a super-catastrophe fund. The concepts are included in theSenate plan, and House leaders are balking at both.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-finsure17jan17,0,2382783,print.story?coll=sfla-home-headlines
Legislators clash, irate homeowners protest on opening day of session oninsurance
By Linda Kleindienst,
Mark Hollis and Kathy Bushouse Tallahassee Bureau
January 17, 2007
TALLAHASSEE · With homeowners across Florida demanding swift action, statelegislators opened their emergency session on soaring property insurancerates Tuesday, but clashed immediately on how large a tab taxpayers shouldhave to pay to help rebuild after a major hurricane.
Causing the early discord was a Senate plan that would place a $20 billionceiling on what private insurance companies would have to pay policy holdersto reimburse storm losses. Remaining claims would fall to Florida taxpayers,and would be paid for through a tax hike, cuts in the state budget, or aspecial fund.
The brainchild of Senate Democratic Leader Steve Geller of Hallandale Beach,the idea has been embraced by the Senate's Republican leaders andtentatively endorsed by Republican Gov. Charlie Crist, who has called theinsurance crisis the most urgent problem facing his two-week-oldadministration. The theory is premiums will drop and competition increase ifinsurers no longer have to carry expensive reinsurance -- insurance coverageinsurers buy to help pay claims -- to cover losses in the event of acatastrophe.
[ Send your comments about any of the articles in Ray's List Digest toRays.List@Comcast.net ]
#####
=
The Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/palmbeach/sfl-paaronson17jan17,0,4446557,print.story?coll=sfla-news-palm
Developers pour cash into stem-call campaign by county commissioner
By Andy Reid
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
January 17, 2007
Developers are picking up most of the tab for Palm Beach County CommissionerBurt Aaronson'scampaign to support embryonic stem cell research.
Home builders and other real estate interests provided more than half of the$351,112Aaronson's political committee has raised to try to force astatewide vote in support of thecontroversial but potentially lifesavingresearch.
While most individual contributions to Aaronson's group trickle in at the$10 to $50 range fromretirees, the big money comes from developers -- someof whom benefited from Aaronson's helpin the past or could need his vote inthe future.
In the aftermath of conflict-of-interest concerns that forced formerCommissioner TonyMasilotti from office, some question whether developers'donations to Aaronson's cause could beseen as a way to influence his votes.
"I think it's pay to play," said Lesley Blackner, a Palm Beach attorneypushing to change statelaw to give voters more control over developmentapprovals. "They want influence. They want agood relationship with a countycommissioner."
=
The Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/opinion/editorial/sfl-edittdcarltonmoorejan17,0,2828927,print.story?coll=sfla-news-editorial
Carlton Moore
South Florida Sun-Sentinel Editorial Board
January 17, 2007
ISSUE: Official protests traffic stop, says police tarnish his reputation.
If Fort Lauderdale City Commissioner Carlton Moore is so concerned about hisreputation's being tarnished, why doesn't he stop calling undue attention tohis recent indefensible actions?
Moore, who has been very busy lately implying that the Fort LauderdalePolice Department is racist, was pulled over and given a ticket on themorning of Dec. 3. The violation? Driving with a suspended license. Not justfor a few days or even weeks, mind you, but for 11 months!
Moore is well within his rights to challenge the police department forepisodes involving the city's minority community, and his calls forinvestigations are appropriate. But doesn't he realize that his whiningabout a traffic violation -- an infraction he acknowledges -- undermines hisown credibility?
=
PalmBeachPost.com
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/content/state/epaper/2007/01/17/s1a_insure_0117.html
House and Senate far apart on Citizens' role, state risk
By Dara Kam And Randy Diamond
Palm Beach Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
TALLAHASSEE - The opening day of a weeklong special legislative session withthe goal of lowering property insurance rates found lawmakers in the Houseand Senate deeply divided about the role government should play in bailingout insurers and homeowners.
The two key issues splitting the two Republican-controlled chambers: anexpansion of the state-run Citizens Property Insurance Corp. and thecreation of a super-catastrophe fund. The concepts are included in theSenate plan, and House leaders are balking at both.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-finsure17jan17,0,2382783,print.story?coll=sfla-home-headlines
Legislators clash, irate homeowners protest on opening day of session oninsurance
By Linda Kleindienst,
Mark Hollis and Kathy Bushouse Tallahassee Bureau
January 17, 2007
TALLAHASSEE · With homeowners across Florida demanding swift action, statelegislators opened their emergency session on soaring property insurancerates Tuesday, but clashed immediately on how large a tab taxpayers shouldhave to pay to help rebuild after a major hurricane.
Causing the early discord was a Senate plan that would place a $20 billionceiling on what private insurance companies would have to pay policy holdersto reimburse storm losses. Remaining claims would fall to Florida taxpayers,and would be paid for through a tax hike, cuts in the state budget, or aspecial fund.
The brainchild of Senate Democratic Leader Steve Geller of Hallandale Beach,the idea has been embraced by the Senate's Republican leaders andtentatively endorsed by Republican Gov. Charlie Crist, who has called theinsurance crisis the most urgent problem facing his two-week-oldadministration. The theory is premiums will drop and competition increase ifinsurers no longer have to carry expensive reinsurance -- insurance coverageinsurers buy to help pay claims -- to cover losses in the event of acatastrophe.
[ Send your comments about any of the articles in Ray's List Digest toRays.List@Comcast.net ]
#####
Tuesday, January 16, 2007
GLBT DIGEST January 16, 2007
**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US ATrays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/01/011507saf.htm
Gay AIDS Worker Charged With Genocide
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: January 16, 2007 - 12:01 am ET
(Cape Town, South Africa) Zackie Achmat, South Africa's most outspoken AIDScare advocate and the head of the Treatment Action Campaign, has beencharged with genocide at the International Criminal Court in The Hague forpromoting the use of antiretroviral drugs to treat HIV.
Achmat has been a vocal critic of the South African government's refusal toprovide antiretrovirals to the majority of its citizens with HIV/AIDS.
South Africa is home to about 5.3 million people living with HIV/AIDS. InNovember 2003 the government committed to providing 53,000 patients withfree antiretroviral treatment for HIV/AIDS by March 2004. Even by March2005, only about half that number were receiving treatment, according to theTAC.
Former South African health minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang insisted in2005 that good nutrition was just as important as anti-retroviral medicinesand said her government would not be pressured into meeting U.N. treatmenttargets. (story)
=
365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/01/011507arnold.htm
Log Cabin Pressuring Schwarzenegger On Gay Marriage
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: January 15, 2007 - 8:00 pm ET
(San Francisco, California) California gay Republicans have begun a majoreffort to convince Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to sign a bill legalizingsame-sex marriage if it passes the legislature.
The Religious Freedom and Civil Marriage Protection Act was introduced inthe Assembly last month by Assemblyman Mark Leno (D-San Francisco). The billis identical to a one passed last year in both the Assembly and Senate butvetoed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
The legislation has the backing of the full LGBT caucus at the legislature -all Democrats and is again expected to narrowly pass both houses. But thisis the first time the governor is being pressed by gays in his own party.
Log Cabin Republicans have mounted a full scale lobbying effort San Jose'sKNTV reported Monday.
=
365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/01/011507georgia.htm
8 Charged In Anti-Gay School Protest
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: January 15, 2007 - 8:00 pm ET
(Cleveland, Georgia) Eight protesters have been were charged with holding ademonstration without a permit following a noisy demonstration against thesettlement of lawsuit over a gay-straight student group at White County HighSchool.
The demonstrators, from a local evangelical church, marched along the sideof a busy highway yelling their objections to homosexuality and thesettlement. At least one of the protestors was using a bullhorn.
When the protestors reached the intersection of U.S. 129 and Georgia 75 theywere stopped by Cleveland police and White County sheriff's officers.
The group was told they had to stop the demonstration until they obtained apermit from the city.
When they refused the eight were given citations for unlawful assembly andusing a public address system in violation of a city sound ordinance. Theyare expected to appear in court on Tuesday.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/15/AR2007011501298_pf.html
Wide Berth Allowed on Teaching About Homosexuality
By Daniel de Vise
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, January 16, 2007; B01
Montgomery County's overhaul of its sex education curriculum, which hasinspired a lawsuit, petition drives, national news coverage and theformation of fiercely polarized community groups, was itself inspired by twowords buried deep within the regulatory code of Maryland, which advisesschool systems to teach "sexual variations."
The county school system invoked those regulations in defense of disputednew lessons that introduce students to sexual orientation and transgenderismin grades eight and 10.
Neither Maryland nor Virginia requires school systems to teach about sexualorientation, state officials said. Maryland's stipulation that schools teachsexual variations as one of several "areas of emphasis" in health classes isopen to broad interpretation.
Montgomery's new curriculum, approved last week for field tests this spring,goes deeper into sexual and gender identity than most other Washington areaschool systems have dared, judging by an informal survey. Some NorthernVirginia systems don't teach about sexual orientation, and Maryland systemsgenerally broach the topic in less detail or at the request of a curiousstudent. Information from D.C. schools was not available.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.contracostatimes.com/mld/cctimes/news/16453088.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Sat, Jan. 13, 2007
Attack on vocal group sparks a big squawk
By Mary Anne Ostrom
MEDIANEWSS STAFF
It began as a New Year's Eve assault on a Yale University choral group,allegedly at the hands of rich young San Franciscans with ties to aprominent city prep school.
Now, as police sort out the details, the incident has exploded into a causecelebre, complete with allegations of anti-patriotism, gay-bashing andpolice screw-ups.
Outraged that the assault occurred after the group sang "The Star-SpangledBanner," conservative pundits are skewering the city as unpatriotic, and apopular Fox News host is offering a $10,000 reward for information leadingto arrests.
And some gay-rights activists, responding to reports that anti-gay slurswere uttered at the singers, are blogging about the city's perceivedintolerance.
=
Press Release from Transgender Europe – Network and Council
15th January 2006
European Transgender Groups Unite
A new coalition of European Transgender and Transsexual Groups, TransGender Europe, has received organizational recognition by the Austrian authorities this week. The initiative brings together 66 transgender organizations from 21 countries, after they agreed to join together when meeting in Vienna last year, for the first-ever European TransGender Council.
High on the list of priorities for the new organization are the promotion of the human rights of transgender people - especially with regards to the legal recognition of the gender of trans people in the gender they live in, as well as non-discrimination in all aspects of life, equal access to Healthcare, and social acceptance.
'This is a major milestone towards the recognition of the rights of transgender people', says Justus Eisfeld, chairperson of the new organization. 'Now TransGender Europe can apply for funding and make our voices heard on an international level', says Eisfeld.
In most European countries there are strict limitations to changing one's legal gender. In most European countries it includes obligatory sterilization, while other countries such as Ireland don't allow a legal gender change at all. The UK is the only country in Europe where the law does not require extensive physical treatments before recognising the gender role a person is living in. Transgender people in Europe frequently face prejudice and discrimination at home, in the streets and at work.
[Send your comments about articles to Rays.List@Comcast.net]
#####
=
365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/01/011507saf.htm
Gay AIDS Worker Charged With Genocide
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: January 16, 2007 - 12:01 am ET
(Cape Town, South Africa) Zackie Achmat, South Africa's most outspoken AIDScare advocate and the head of the Treatment Action Campaign, has beencharged with genocide at the International Criminal Court in The Hague forpromoting the use of antiretroviral drugs to treat HIV.
Achmat has been a vocal critic of the South African government's refusal toprovide antiretrovirals to the majority of its citizens with HIV/AIDS.
South Africa is home to about 5.3 million people living with HIV/AIDS. InNovember 2003 the government committed to providing 53,000 patients withfree antiretroviral treatment for HIV/AIDS by March 2004. Even by March2005, only about half that number were receiving treatment, according to theTAC.
Former South African health minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang insisted in2005 that good nutrition was just as important as anti-retroviral medicinesand said her government would not be pressured into meeting U.N. treatmenttargets. (story)
=
365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/01/011507arnold.htm
Log Cabin Pressuring Schwarzenegger On Gay Marriage
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: January 15, 2007 - 8:00 pm ET
(San Francisco, California) California gay Republicans have begun a majoreffort to convince Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to sign a bill legalizingsame-sex marriage if it passes the legislature.
The Religious Freedom and Civil Marriage Protection Act was introduced inthe Assembly last month by Assemblyman Mark Leno (D-San Francisco). The billis identical to a one passed last year in both the Assembly and Senate butvetoed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
The legislation has the backing of the full LGBT caucus at the legislature -all Democrats and is again expected to narrowly pass both houses. But thisis the first time the governor is being pressed by gays in his own party.
Log Cabin Republicans have mounted a full scale lobbying effort San Jose'sKNTV reported Monday.
=
365gay.com
http://www.365gay.com/Newscon07/01/011507georgia.htm
8 Charged In Anti-Gay School Protest
by 365Gay.com Newscenter Staff
Posted: January 15, 2007 - 8:00 pm ET
(Cleveland, Georgia) Eight protesters have been were charged with holding ademonstration without a permit following a noisy demonstration against thesettlement of lawsuit over a gay-straight student group at White County HighSchool.
The demonstrators, from a local evangelical church, marched along the sideof a busy highway yelling their objections to homosexuality and thesettlement. At least one of the protestors was using a bullhorn.
When the protestors reached the intersection of U.S. 129 and Georgia 75 theywere stopped by Cleveland police and White County sheriff's officers.
The group was told they had to stop the demonstration until they obtained apermit from the city.
When they refused the eight were given citations for unlawful assembly andusing a public address system in violation of a city sound ordinance. Theyare expected to appear in court on Tuesday.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/15/AR2007011501298_pf.html
Wide Berth Allowed on Teaching About Homosexuality
By Daniel de Vise
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, January 16, 2007; B01
Montgomery County's overhaul of its sex education curriculum, which hasinspired a lawsuit, petition drives, national news coverage and theformation of fiercely polarized community groups, was itself inspired by twowords buried deep within the regulatory code of Maryland, which advisesschool systems to teach "sexual variations."
The county school system invoked those regulations in defense of disputednew lessons that introduce students to sexual orientation and transgenderismin grades eight and 10.
Neither Maryland nor Virginia requires school systems to teach about sexualorientation, state officials said. Maryland's stipulation that schools teachsexual variations as one of several "areas of emphasis" in health classes isopen to broad interpretation.
Montgomery's new curriculum, approved last week for field tests this spring,goes deeper into sexual and gender identity than most other Washington areaschool systems have dared, judging by an informal survey. Some NorthernVirginia systems don't teach about sexual orientation, and Maryland systemsgenerally broach the topic in less detail or at the request of a curiousstudent. Information from D.C. schools was not available.
=
Forwarded from Victoria Lavin
Daily Queer News
dailyqueernews@yahoo.com
http://www.contracostatimes.com/mld/cctimes/news/16453088.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Sat, Jan. 13, 2007
Attack on vocal group sparks a big squawk
By Mary Anne Ostrom
MEDIANEWSS STAFF
It began as a New Year's Eve assault on a Yale University choral group,allegedly at the hands of rich young San Franciscans with ties to aprominent city prep school.
Now, as police sort out the details, the incident has exploded into a causecelebre, complete with allegations of anti-patriotism, gay-bashing andpolice screw-ups.
Outraged that the assault occurred after the group sang "The Star-SpangledBanner," conservative pundits are skewering the city as unpatriotic, and apopular Fox News host is offering a $10,000 reward for information leadingto arrests.
And some gay-rights activists, responding to reports that anti-gay slurswere uttered at the singers, are blogging about the city's perceivedintolerance.
=
Press Release from Transgender Europe – Network and Council
15th January 2006
European Transgender Groups Unite
A new coalition of European Transgender and Transsexual Groups, TransGender Europe, has received organizational recognition by the Austrian authorities this week. The initiative brings together 66 transgender organizations from 21 countries, after they agreed to join together when meeting in Vienna last year, for the first-ever European TransGender Council.
High on the list of priorities for the new organization are the promotion of the human rights of transgender people - especially with regards to the legal recognition of the gender of trans people in the gender they live in, as well as non-discrimination in all aspects of life, equal access to Healthcare, and social acceptance.
'This is a major milestone towards the recognition of the rights of transgender people', says Justus Eisfeld, chairperson of the new organization. 'Now TransGender Europe can apply for funding and make our voices heard on an international level', says Eisfeld.
In most European countries there are strict limitations to changing one's legal gender. In most European countries it includes obligatory sterilization, while other countries such as Ireland don't allow a legal gender change at all. The UK is the only country in Europe where the law does not require extensive physical treatments before recognising the gender role a person is living in. Transgender people in Europe frequently face prejudice and discrimination at home, in the streets and at work.
[Send your comments about articles to Rays.List@Comcast.net]
#####
NATIONAL & WORLD DIGEST January 16, 2007
**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US ATrays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
http://www.heralddemocrat.com/articles/2007/01/14/texas_news/state10.txt
Texas will consider death penalty for repeat sexual predators
By JIM VERTUNO
Associated Press
AUSTIN - Texas lawmakers are talking tough about cracking down on sexualpredators who prey on children. Some propose the death penalty for repeatoffenders, potentially creating hundreds more death row inmates in a statethat already executes more than any other.
Other ideas include mandatory long sentences for first-time offenders oreliminating probation.
But opposition is flaring from unexpected sources: prosecutors and victimadvocates.
They fear some of the proposals would make it harder to get convictions and,perhaps, put children in even more danger by giving molesters incentive tokill the only potential witness to their crimes.
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/16/opinion/16reynolds.html?pagewanted=print
January 16, 2007
Op-Ed Contributor
A Rifle in Every Pot
By GLENN REYNOLDS
Knoxville, Tenn.
IT'S a phenomenon that gives the term "gun control" a whole new meaning:community ordinances that encourage citizens to own guns.
Last month, Greenleaf, Idaho, adopted Ordinance 208, calling for itscitizens to own guns and keep them ready in their homes in case ofemergency. It's not a response to high crime rates. As The Associated Pressreported, "Greenleaf doesn't really have crime ... the most violent offensereported in the past two years was a fist fight." Rather, it's a statementabout preparedness in the event of an emergency, and an effort to promote aculture of self-reliance.
And it may not be a bad idea. While pro-gun laws like the one in Greenleafare mostly symbolic, to the extent that they actually make a difference, itis likely to be a positive one.
=
The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/16/us/16census.html?ei=5094&en=47985bda8ea9f048&hp=&ex=1169010000&partner=homepage&pagewanted=print
January 16, 2007
51% of Women Are Now Living Without Spouse
By SAM ROBERTS
For what experts say is probably the first time, more American women areliving without a husband than with one, according to a New York Timesanalysis of census results.
In 2005, 51 percent of women said they were living without a spouse, up from35 percent in 1950 and 49 percent in 2000.
Coupled with the fact that in 2005 married couples became a minority of allAmerican households for the first time, the trend could ultimately shapesocial and workplace policies, including the ways government and employersdistribute benefits.
Several factors are driving the statistical shift. At one end of the agespectrum, women are marrying later or living with unmarried partners moreoften and for longer periods. At the other end, women are living longer aswidows and, after a divorce, are more likely than men to delay remarriage,sometimes delighting in their newfound freedom.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/15/AR2007011501462_pf.html
Castro Reportedly in Grave Condition
The Associated Press
Tuesday, January 16, 2007; 2:00 AM
MADRID, Spain -- Ailing Cuban leader Fidel Castro is in "very grave"condition after three failed operations and complications from an intestinalinfection, a Spanish newspaper said Tuesday.
The newspaper El Pais cited two unnamed sources from the Gregorio Maranonhospital in the Spanish capital of Madrid. The facility employs surgeon JoseLuis Garcia Sabrido, who flew to Cuba in December to treat the 80-year-oldCastro.
In a report published on its Web site, El Pais said: "A grave infection inthe large intestine, at least three failed operations and variouscomplications have left the Cuban dictator, Fidel Castro, laid up with avery grave prognosis."
=
The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/15/AR2007011501085_pf.html
Burden Set to Shift On Balanced Budget
Bush Likely to Force Democrats' Hand
By Lori Montgomery and Nell Henderson
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, January 16, 2007; A01
When he takes the House rostrum next week for the State of the Unionaddress, President Bush will list among his goals a balanced federal budget,a shift for a president who has presided over record deficits whileaggressively cutting taxes.
Politically, analysts say, the president is calling the bluff of Democrats,who won control of Congress in part by accusing Bush of reckless fiscalpolicies. While Bush now shares the Democrats' goal to erase the deficit by2012, the politically perilous work of making that happen -- cuttingspending or raising taxes -- falls to the Democratic-run Congress.
"The Democrats have assailed deficits under President Bush. The White Houseis telling Democrats to walk the walk," said Brian M. Riedl, a budgetanalyst at the conservative Heritage Foundation.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/15/AR2007011501227_pf.html
Some at Guantanamo Mark 5 Years in Limbo
Big Questions About Low-Profile Inmates
By Carol D. Leonnig and Julie Tate
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, January 16, 2007; A01
Shackled at the wrists and blinded by special goggles, the first captivesfrom the U.S. war in Afghanistan were ushered to makeshift prison cellsthousands of miles from the battle, at the U.S. naval station at GuantanamoBay, Cuba, five years ago last week.
Gholam Ruhani was among them, the prison's third official inmate, flown inby cargo plane with the first group of 20 men. The 23-year-old Afghanshopkeeper, who spoke a little English, was seized near his hometown ofGhazni when he agreed to translate for a Taliban government official seekinga meeting with a U.S. soldier.
Ruhani is still at Guantanamo, marking the fifth anniversary of the prisonand his own captivity. He remains as stunned about his fate, according totranscripts of his conversations with military officers, as he was when U.S.military police led him inside the razor wire on Jan. 11, 2002, and accusedhim of being America's enemy.
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Boston.com
http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2007/01/16/law_school_deans_sign_letter_condemning_boycott?mode=PF
Law school deans sign letter condemning boycott
Pentagon official provoked outcry
By Lisa Wangsness, Globe Staff | January 16, 2007
The deans of Massachusetts' major law schools joined about 100 law deans insigning a letter condemning a senior Pentagon official's suggestion that UScompanies should boycott law firms representing detainees at Guantanamo Bay,Cuba.
The comments last week by Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for DetaineeAffairs Charles D. "Cully" Stimson provoked outrage from the legalcommunity, and the Pentagon has distanced itself from the remarks.
The deans' letter, which was co authored by Emily A. Spieler , dean ofNortheastern University School of Law , denounces Stimson's comments as"contrary to the basic tenets of American law" and calls on the Bushadministration to "promptly and unequivocally repudiate" them.
"Our American legal tradition has honored lawyers who, despite theirpersonal beliefs, have zealously represented mass murderers, suspectedterrorists, and Nazi marchers," said the letter, which was sent to TheBoston Globe and The New York Times yesterday. "At this moment in time, whenour courts have endorsed the right of the Guantanamo detainees to be heardin courts of law, it is critical that qualified lawyers provide effectiverepresentation to these individuals."
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Boston.com
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/editorials/articles/2007/01/16/congressional_casualties?mode=PF
GLOBE EDITORIAL
Congressional casualties
January 16, 2007
ELECTION JITTERS last fall kept Congress from passing appropriations billsthat members feared could provide fodder for their opponents. Even duringthe lame-duck session after November, Congress failed to vote on the bills,resorting to a continuing resolution that keeps funding for programs at lastyear's level until mid-February. While this is adequate for some governmentservices, it is a prescription for disaster in areas like veterans'healthcare or efforts to combat AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis.
Congress based its appropriation for fiscal 2006 veterans' medical care on2005 casualty data. Since then, the number of wounded has increased sharply.According to Linda Bilmes , who teaches public finance at Harvard's KennedySchool of Government, the VA will have to go to Congress for emergencyfunding, as it has in the previous two years. The VA, she wrote in a recentop-ed in the Los Angeles Times, "is buckling under a growing volume ofdisability claims and rising demand for medical attention."
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Boston.com
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2007/01/16/another_chance_for_gore?mode=PF
SCOT LEHIGH
Another chance for Gore?
By Scot Lehigh, Globe Columnist | January 16, 2007
THE PRESIDENTIAL primary campaign is now underway, and though neither hasyet declared, the Democratic main event is already being framed as a contestbetween Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.
Each, however, comes with sizable drawbacks.
Although Clinton has proved herself a highly capable senator, worries aboundabout her electability. And then there's the recurring query that worriedDemocrats whisper to each another: Is Bill behaving?
Obama certainly qualifies as the next new thing, and as his December visitto New Hampshire demonstrated, he has generated real excitement at the grassroots. And yet, in the age of terrorism, it will be a tall test for afirst-term senator with no real Washington accomplishments to convince thecountry that he's ready to be commander in chief.
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Boston.com
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2007/01/16/whats_next____war_with_iran?mode=PF
H.D.S. GREENWAY
What's next -- war with Iran?
By H.D.S. Greenway | January 16, 2007
ONE OF the more far-reaching aspects of President Bush's new strategy washis stunning rebuke of the Iraq Study Group recommendation that the UnitedStates should try to "engage" Iran and Syria "constructively." Instead, thepresident has made more threats and promises more confrontation. He promisedto "seek out and destroy the networks providing advance weaponry andtraining to our enemies in Iraq," opening up the possibility of cross borderoperations.
Congress was quick to react. Senator Joe Biden, Democrat of Delaware, madeit clear that any move to expand the war into neighboring countries wouldneed congressional approval, and Chuck Hagel, a Nebraska Republican,compared the prospect with the invasion of Cambodia during the Vietnam War.
It is ironic that while Bush ramps up confrontation, the Iraqi government --presumably our ally -- is trying to make diplomatic efforts toward both Iranand Syria to explore areas of mutual interest.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/16/us/politics/16dems.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&pagewanted=print
January 16, 2007
Democrats Seek the Middle on Social Issues
By ROBIN TONER
WASHINGTON, Jan. 15 - The promise may not outlast their political honeymoon,but Democratic Congressional leaders say they are committed to governingfrom the center, and not just on bread-and-butter issues like raising theminimum wage or increasing aid for education. They also hope to bring thatphilosophy to bear on some of the most divisive social issues in politics,like abortion.
In their first days in session, Senate Democratic leaders reintroduced abill that they said was indicative of their new approach: the PreventionFirst Act, which seeks to reduce the number of abortions by expanding accessto birth control, family planning and sex education.
In the House last week, Democrats showcased a vote on expanding federalfinancing for embryonic stem cell research, which, despite fierce oppositionfrom many conservatives, has won bipartisan support among lawmakers - andvoters - who are otherwise divided on abortion.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/16/opinion/16tue1.html?pagewanted=print
January 16, 2007
Editorial
Energy Time
Al Hubbard, the economic adviser who's coordinating the administration'senergy strategy, recently promised that President Bush would produce"headlines above the fold that will knock your socks off in terms of ourcommitment to energy independence." Every president since Richard Nixon hastalked this way, while every year the country slides further intodependency. Mr. Bush's overpromising has included a forecast that we wouldall be buying hydrogen-fueled cars in 20 years and his pledge a year ago torid the country of its addiction to oil.
Still, we must hope that Mr. Bush is serious this time, because we simplycannot continue to hold our national security and the health of the planethostage to our appetite for fossil fuels.
America's closest allies, and increasingly its governors, know this. Lastweek, the European Union - shaken by Russia's threatened shutdown of oilpassing through Belarus - announced a menu of initiatives aimed at reducingEurope's dependence on unreliable suppliers while cutting greenhouse gasemissions with cleaner fuels and new technologies.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/16/opinion/16tue2.html?pagewanted=print
Jauary 16, 2007
Editorial
Tracking Outsourced Bonanzas
The new Congress is promising far tighter oversight of Bush administrationspending programs, and few targets are more in need of scrutiny and daylightthan the outsourcing of government programs to private contractors. Thishighly lucrative world quietly ballooned by 86 percent - to $377 billionannually - during the first five years of the Bush administration, accordingto Congressional estimates. Outsourced spending, on Iraq, Katrina and otherbonanzas, has grown twice as fast as other discretionary spending, accordingto Representative Henry Waxman, the California Democrat who is chairman ofthe oversight and reform committee.
Mr. Waxman is fairly itching to finally map the waste, fraud and abuse inprivate contracting that went largely ignored by the previous RepublicanCongress. Taxpayers should wish him well.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/16/opinion/16tue4.html?pagewanted=print
January 16, 2007
Editorial Observer
A Bishop's Fall Provides a View on Soviet-era Collaboration
By SERGE SCHMEMANN
Stanislaw Wielgus had to step down as archbishop of Warsaw. The CatholicChurch played too central and heroic a role in the Polish resistance toCommunist dictatorship (think of Lech Walesa taking communion at the Gdanskshipyard, or Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski, or Pope John Paul II) for anyone whois known to have collaborated with the secret police to have so prominent arole. Yet I find myself pausing to reflect for a moment about Bishop Wielgusand about how surviving in that world, especially for anyone in a positionof authority, presented excruciating choices, again and again.
There are huge numbers of names in those cursed secret-police archives leftbehind in Poland and all other police states past and present, and many arepeople whose only crime was that they were not heroes. In that sameCommunist Poland, a Polish friend once came to me, distraught. The secretpolice had come to him and had ordered him to serve as an informer; if hedid not, his only child would be expelled from the university. Just tellingme was an act of courage. In the end, my friend was saved by the demise ofCommunist rule. But his terrible dilemma was shared by millions of people inthe Soviet empire.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/16/realestate/16rentals.html?ei=5094&en=2afc72067a1f2634&hp=&ex=1169010000&partner=homepage&pagewanted=print
January 16, 2007
Buyers Scarce, Many Condos Are for Rent
By VIKAS BAJAJ
WASHINGTON - David Franco's illuminated model of a proposed 10-storycondominium tower dominates a sales center that, in spite of the "NowSelling" banner still fluttering outside, is conspicuously closed forbusiness.
"We could have waited it out and kept pushing and pushing," Mr. Franco saidabout the decision to abandon plans to sell 180 luxury condominiums withfloor-to-ceiling windows offering views of the Washington Monument andCapitol Hill. "But it would have taken significantly longer."
After six weeks of failing to lure more than a couple of dozen buyers, Mr.Franco and his partner, Jeff Blum, joined the builders of nearly 6,000condominium units in the Washington metropolitan area who have decided inthe last three months to recast their projects as rental apartmentbuildings.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Pakistan-Al-Qaida.html?ei=5094&en=df55acdc0512d335&hp=&ex=1169010000&partner=homepage&pagewanted=print
January 16, 2007
Pakistan Destroys Suspected Militant Hideouts
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 6:46 a.m. ET
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) -- Pakistan's army destroyed suspected al-Qaidahideouts in an airstrike near the Afghan border on Tuesday, killing 10people, officials said.
The army and a senior local official said the dead were militants, andincluded some foreigners, but a resident said the slain men were Afghanlaborers.
The raid in South Waziristan came days after the U.S. intelligence chiefsaid leaders of both al-Qaida and Afghanistan's former ruling Talibanmilitia were finding shelter in Pakistan's lawless frontier areas.
An army statement said intelligence sources confirmed the presence of 25 to30 foreign terrorists and their local facilitators occupying five compoundsin the area of Zamzola -- a village about two miles from the frontier.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/16/nyregion/16organs.html?pagewanted=print
January 16, 2007
Turning the Grief-Stricken Toward Organ Donation
By RICHARD PÉREZ-PEÑA
There was barely a mark on her 9-year-old daughter's head, and when doctorstold Surangni Gunaratne that the girl she adored was brain dead, sheresponded with fury. "I yelled at them, I said they had no feelings," shesaid, "and I told them to get out."
But over the next few days, the people at St. Vincent's Hospital StatenIsland helped Mrs. Gunaratne accept that Tiffany was gone. Kathleen Atkinsonwas an especially persistent presence, doing a little of everything, fromfetching coffee and fending off paperwork to shooing away friends whosometimes crowded around Tiffany's bed.
Ms. Atkinson works for the New York Organ Donor Network, not the hospital,and her mission during that week last July was to persuade Mrs. Gunaratneand her husband, Ajantha, to donate their daughter's organs. Five days afterTiffany was hit by a car outside her family's house, her liver and kidneyswere transplanted, prolonging the lives of three strangers, one of them just7 years old.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/14/AR2007011401091_pf.html
First U.S. Uterus Transplant Planned
Some Experts Say Risk Isn't Justified
By Rob Stein
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, January 15, 2007; A01
First came kidney, liver and heart transplants. Then a few doctors startedtransplanting hands. French surgeons even did a face.
Now, doctors are planning the first womb transplant in the United States.
A team based in Manhattan has begun screening women left barren by cancer,injuries or other problems who want a chance to bear their own children.
"The desire to have a child is a tremendous driving force for many women,"said Giuseppe Del Priore of the New York Downtown Hospital, who is leadingthe team. "We think we could help many women fulfill this very basic
desire."
But the planned operation, which Del Priore and his colleagues could attemptlater this year, is stirring objections among some transplant experts,fertility specialists and medical ethicists. They question whether theprocedure has been tested sufficiently on animals and whether the benefit ofbeing able to carry a pregnancy outweighs the risks for the woman and fetus.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/15/AR2007011500967_pf.html
Ending an Opium War
Poppies and Afghan Recovery Can Both Bloom
By Anne Applebaum
Tuesday, January 16, 2007; A19
Once, the British Empire fought a war for the right to sell opium in China.In retrospect, history has judged that war destructive and wasteful, ashameless battle of colonizers against the colonized that in the end helpedneither one.
Now, NATO is fighting a war to eradicate opium from Afghanistan. Allegedly,the goals this time around are different. According to the Britishgovernment, Afghanistan's illicit drug trade poses the "gravest threat tothe long term security, development, and effective governance ofAfghanistan," particularly since the Taliban is believed to be the biggestbeneficiary of drug sales. Convinced that this time they are doing themorally right thing, Western governments are spending hundreds of millionsof dollars bulldozing poppy fields, building up counternarcotics squads andfinancing alternative crops in Afghanistan. Chemical spraying may begin asearly as this spring. But in retrospect, might history not judge this war tobe every bit as destructive and wasteful as the original Opium Wars?
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/15/AR2007011500965_pf.html
A Dark Horse's War Edge
By E. J. Dionne Jr.
Tuesday, January 16, 2007; A19
Mike Huckabee, who just stepped down as Arkansas governor, is the brighteststar among Republican presidential dark horses.
It's not just because he, like a certain other Arkansan, has ties to a towncalled Hope, or because he lost 105 pounds and has written a popular dietbook. And it's not only because he is mastering a conservative form oftriangulation blending religious conservatism with policy pragmatism.
Huckabee, if he chooses to run for president in 2008, has another asset:While front-runners John McCain and Rudy Giuliani have placed large bets onthe success of President Bush's Iraq policy, Huckabee has maintained whatyou might call loyal distance.
This is what Huckabee said in an interview last week when I asked him aboutthe surge: "The honest answer for me is that I'm not subjected to the samepiles of military and diplomatic information and intelligence that he has,and I'm going to have to trust that the advice that he's based his decisionon as commander in chief is good. I don't honestly know. I hope it's right.I have to hope that, because there are going to be people from my state thatare going to be asked to go and make it right."
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/15/AR2007011500966_pf.html
Our Tunnel Vision
By Richard Cohen
Tuesday, January 16, 2007; A19
Some years ago, I accompanied John McCain to Vietnam. For him, it was yetanother trip to the place where he had been a prisoner of war, but for me itwas a first. After we visited Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City (the formerSaigon), McCain and the rest of his party went home. A colleague and Istayed behind to visit the famous Cu Chi tunnels. To the Vietnamese, theyare a monument to a lesson they taught us. To us, they are a monument to alesson we never seem to learn.
Experience -- reporting, we call it in my business -- can be vastlyoverrated. I went to Bosnia and Croatia during the war there and came awayconvinced that NATO, which was to say the United States, should stay out ofthat conflict. I was intimidated by the terrain and horrified by the ethnicenmity. I came away with precisely the wrong lesson. NATO went in and endedthe killing.
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The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/16468032.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Tue, Jan. 16, 2007
Terror suspect was terrorized in a Navy brig
BY FRED GRIMM
fgrimm@MiamiHerald.com
The accused was held in extreme isolation for 1,307 days. Held in anine-by-seven-foot cell. The only window blacked out. He was the loneprisoner on the two-tier cellblock. He was given food through a slot in thedoor. He slept on a steel mattress. No reading material. No calendar. Noclock. Nothing to connect him to the outside world.
But it was the short trip down the hallway for a dental examination thatcaptured the utter isolation and sensory deprivation inflicted on JosePadilla during his 3 ½ years in the Navy brig at Charleston, S.C.
Helmeted guards, their faces obscured behind dark plastic visors, manacledhis hands and feet through slots in his cell door. They covered his earswith sound-canceling headphones, covered his eyes with blacked-out goggles.
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The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/opinion/16468354.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Tue, Jan. 16, 2007
SOCIAL ECONOMY
Reduce poverty in America
BY LARRY SNYDER
www.catholiccharitiesusa.org
The promise of America has been that if you work hard, you can provide abetter life for you and your family. Unfortunately, too many people in thiscountry are working hard, but falling further behind -- with their dream ofa better tomorrow detoured down a path to poverty.
Today, more than 37 million people are living in poverty in one of thewealthiest nations in the world. The numbers are rising, with increasingnumbers of people who are hungry, more children without health insurance andmore families without a decent place to live.
Poverty is a moral and social crisis for our country, one that threatens thehealth and economic well being of both families and our nation as a whole.
Throughout the great history of this country, our nation's leaders and itspeople have demonstrated a capacity to come together in times of greatcrisis to secure the common good of our nation.
The escalating number of people living in poverty is such a crisis, one thatdemands the attention and collective will of the country. Reducing povertywill help not only those in need but also our country as a whole.
That's why Catholic Charities USA is launching the Campaign to ReducePoverty in America to confront this challenge. Our goal is to cut thenation's poverty rate in half by 2020.
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The St. Petersburg Times
http://www.sptimes.com/2007/01/16/State/Hard_lessons_for_our_.shtml
Hard lessons for our teachers
School systems flock to learn from and adopt the ideas of educational"gurus" intent on retooling outdated curricula.
THOMAS C. TOBIN
Published January 16, 2007
On a stage adorned with video screens as big as billboards, Willard R.Daggett moves back and forth with a preacher's zeal, a dose of humor and asling full of zingers.
"I guarantee you I will make everybody at some time in the next hour and 10minutes angry with me," he warns about 3,000 educators packed into aKissimmee ballroom.
English teachers, he says, are "academic elitists" who have helped dumb downcurricula. Math teachers, he says, have a "horrendously poor track record"of introducing concepts in ways that make sense to kids.
Tough assessments like those have helped make Daggett a rock star amongeducation "gurus," a small club that has grown in stature since governmentaccountability programs began pressing school systems to run harder.
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http://select.nytimes.com/2007/01/16/opinion/16kristof.html
The New York Times
January 16, 2007
Op-Ed Columnist
Car Washes and Genocide
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
Genocide may be the worst of crimes, but historically it has also brought
out the best in some people.
The Raoul Wallenbergs of 2007 speckle America and the globe. And I don't
just mean the aid workers - 13 of whom have been murdered for their efforts
in Darfur since last May - but also those ordinary Americans who have united
in a grass-roots campaign to try to stop genocide half a world away in
Sudan.
President Bush and other world leaders have dropped the ball on Darfur. But
that vacuum of moral leadership has been filled by university students,
churches and temples, celebrities like George Clooney and Mia Farrow, and
armies of schoolchildren.
Their arsenal - green armbands, phone calls to the White House, bake sales
to raise money - all seem pallid. How can a "Save Darfur" lawn sign in
Peoria intimidate government-backed raiders in Sudan or Chad who throw
babies into bonfires?
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Harpers.org
http://harpers.org/ThroughAGlassDarkly-12838838.html
Through a Glass, Darkly
How the Christian right is reimagining U.S. history
Posted on Wednesday, January 10, 2007. Originally from December 2006. By
Jeff Sharlet.
Sources
We keep trying to explain away American fundamentalism. Those of us not
engaged personally or emotionally in the biggest political and cultural
movement of our times-those on the sidelines of history-keep trying to come
up with theories with which to discredit the evident allure of this
punishing yet oddly comforting idea of a deity, this strange god. His
invisible hand is everywhere, say His citizen-theologians, caressing and
fixing every outcome: Little League games, job searches, test scores, the
spread of sexually transmitted diseases, the success or failure of terrorist
attacks (also known as "signs"), victory or defeat in battle, at the ballot
box, in bed. Those unable to feel His soothing touch at moments such as
these snort at the notion of a god with the patience or the prurience to
monitor every tick and twitch of desire, a supreme being able to make a lion
and a lamb cuddle but unable to abide two men kissing. A divine love that
speaks through hurricanes. Who would worship such a god? His followers must
be dupes, or saps, or fools, their faith illiterate, insane, or misinformed,
their strength fleeting, hollow, an aberration. A burp in American history.
An unpleasant odor that will pass.
[Send your comments about articles to Rays.List@Comcast.net]
#####
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Forwarded from Kenneth Sherrill - Ken's List
Kenneth.Sherrill@hunter.cuny.edu
kenslist@groups.queernet.org
http://www.heralddemocrat.com/articles/2007/01/14/texas_news/state10.txt
Texas will consider death penalty for repeat sexual predators
By JIM VERTUNO
Associated Press
AUSTIN - Texas lawmakers are talking tough about cracking down on sexualpredators who prey on children. Some propose the death penalty for repeatoffenders, potentially creating hundreds more death row inmates in a statethat already executes more than any other.
Other ideas include mandatory long sentences for first-time offenders oreliminating probation.
But opposition is flaring from unexpected sources: prosecutors and victimadvocates.
They fear some of the proposals would make it harder to get convictions and,perhaps, put children in even more danger by giving molesters incentive tokill the only potential witness to their crimes.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/16/opinion/16reynolds.html?pagewanted=print
January 16, 2007
Op-Ed Contributor
A Rifle in Every Pot
By GLENN REYNOLDS
Knoxville, Tenn.
IT'S a phenomenon that gives the term "gun control" a whole new meaning:community ordinances that encourage citizens to own guns.
Last month, Greenleaf, Idaho, adopted Ordinance 208, calling for itscitizens to own guns and keep them ready in their homes in case ofemergency. It's not a response to high crime rates. As The Associated Pressreported, "Greenleaf doesn't really have crime ... the most violent offensereported in the past two years was a fist fight." Rather, it's a statementabout preparedness in the event of an emergency, and an effort to promote aculture of self-reliance.
And it may not be a bad idea. While pro-gun laws like the one in Greenleafare mostly symbolic, to the extent that they actually make a difference, itis likely to be a positive one.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/16/us/16census.html?ei=5094&en=47985bda8ea9f048&hp=&ex=1169010000&partner=homepage&pagewanted=print
January 16, 2007
51% of Women Are Now Living Without Spouse
By SAM ROBERTS
For what experts say is probably the first time, more American women areliving without a husband than with one, according to a New York Timesanalysis of census results.
In 2005, 51 percent of women said they were living without a spouse, up from35 percent in 1950 and 49 percent in 2000.
Coupled with the fact that in 2005 married couples became a minority of allAmerican households for the first time, the trend could ultimately shapesocial and workplace policies, including the ways government and employersdistribute benefits.
Several factors are driving the statistical shift. At one end of the agespectrum, women are marrying later or living with unmarried partners moreoften and for longer periods. At the other end, women are living longer aswidows and, after a divorce, are more likely than men to delay remarriage,sometimes delighting in their newfound freedom.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/15/AR2007011501462_pf.html
Castro Reportedly in Grave Condition
The Associated Press
Tuesday, January 16, 2007; 2:00 AM
MADRID, Spain -- Ailing Cuban leader Fidel Castro is in "very grave"condition after three failed operations and complications from an intestinalinfection, a Spanish newspaper said Tuesday.
The newspaper El Pais cited two unnamed sources from the Gregorio Maranonhospital in the Spanish capital of Madrid. The facility employs surgeon JoseLuis Garcia Sabrido, who flew to Cuba in December to treat the 80-year-oldCastro.
In a report published on its Web site, El Pais said: "A grave infection inthe large intestine, at least three failed operations and variouscomplications have left the Cuban dictator, Fidel Castro, laid up with avery grave prognosis."
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/15/AR2007011501085_pf.html
Burden Set to Shift On Balanced Budget
Bush Likely to Force Democrats' Hand
By Lori Montgomery and Nell Henderson
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, January 16, 2007; A01
When he takes the House rostrum next week for the State of the Unionaddress, President Bush will list among his goals a balanced federal budget,a shift for a president who has presided over record deficits whileaggressively cutting taxes.
Politically, analysts say, the president is calling the bluff of Democrats,who won control of Congress in part by accusing Bush of reckless fiscalpolicies. While Bush now shares the Democrats' goal to erase the deficit by2012, the politically perilous work of making that happen -- cuttingspending or raising taxes -- falls to the Democratic-run Congress.
"The Democrats have assailed deficits under President Bush. The White Houseis telling Democrats to walk the walk," said Brian M. Riedl, a budgetanalyst at the conservative Heritage Foundation.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/15/AR2007011501227_pf.html
Some at Guantanamo Mark 5 Years in Limbo
Big Questions About Low-Profile Inmates
By Carol D. Leonnig and Julie Tate
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, January 16, 2007; A01
Shackled at the wrists and blinded by special goggles, the first captivesfrom the U.S. war in Afghanistan were ushered to makeshift prison cellsthousands of miles from the battle, at the U.S. naval station at GuantanamoBay, Cuba, five years ago last week.
Gholam Ruhani was among them, the prison's third official inmate, flown inby cargo plane with the first group of 20 men. The 23-year-old Afghanshopkeeper, who spoke a little English, was seized near his hometown ofGhazni when he agreed to translate for a Taliban government official seekinga meeting with a U.S. soldier.
Ruhani is still at Guantanamo, marking the fifth anniversary of the prisonand his own captivity. He remains as stunned about his fate, according totranscripts of his conversations with military officers, as he was when U.S.military police led him inside the razor wire on Jan. 11, 2002, and accusedhim of being America's enemy.
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Boston.com
http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2007/01/16/law_school_deans_sign_letter_condemning_boycott?mode=PF
Law school deans sign letter condemning boycott
Pentagon official provoked outcry
By Lisa Wangsness, Globe Staff | January 16, 2007
The deans of Massachusetts' major law schools joined about 100 law deans insigning a letter condemning a senior Pentagon official's suggestion that UScompanies should boycott law firms representing detainees at Guantanamo Bay,Cuba.
The comments last week by Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for DetaineeAffairs Charles D. "Cully" Stimson provoked outrage from the legalcommunity, and the Pentagon has distanced itself from the remarks.
The deans' letter, which was co authored by Emily A. Spieler , dean ofNortheastern University School of Law , denounces Stimson's comments as"contrary to the basic tenets of American law" and calls on the Bushadministration to "promptly and unequivocally repudiate" them.
"Our American legal tradition has honored lawyers who, despite theirpersonal beliefs, have zealously represented mass murderers, suspectedterrorists, and Nazi marchers," said the letter, which was sent to TheBoston Globe and The New York Times yesterday. "At this moment in time, whenour courts have endorsed the right of the Guantanamo detainees to be heardin courts of law, it is critical that qualified lawyers provide effectiverepresentation to these individuals."
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Boston.com
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/editorials/articles/2007/01/16/congressional_casualties?mode=PF
GLOBE EDITORIAL
Congressional casualties
January 16, 2007
ELECTION JITTERS last fall kept Congress from passing appropriations billsthat members feared could provide fodder for their opponents. Even duringthe lame-duck session after November, Congress failed to vote on the bills,resorting to a continuing resolution that keeps funding for programs at lastyear's level until mid-February. While this is adequate for some governmentservices, it is a prescription for disaster in areas like veterans'healthcare or efforts to combat AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis.
Congress based its appropriation for fiscal 2006 veterans' medical care on2005 casualty data. Since then, the number of wounded has increased sharply.According to Linda Bilmes , who teaches public finance at Harvard's KennedySchool of Government, the VA will have to go to Congress for emergencyfunding, as it has in the previous two years. The VA, she wrote in a recentop-ed in the Los Angeles Times, "is buckling under a growing volume ofdisability claims and rising demand for medical attention."
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Boston.com
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2007/01/16/another_chance_for_gore?mode=PF
SCOT LEHIGH
Another chance for Gore?
By Scot Lehigh, Globe Columnist | January 16, 2007
THE PRESIDENTIAL primary campaign is now underway, and though neither hasyet declared, the Democratic main event is already being framed as a contestbetween Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.
Each, however, comes with sizable drawbacks.
Although Clinton has proved herself a highly capable senator, worries aboundabout her electability. And then there's the recurring query that worriedDemocrats whisper to each another: Is Bill behaving?
Obama certainly qualifies as the next new thing, and as his December visitto New Hampshire demonstrated, he has generated real excitement at the grassroots. And yet, in the age of terrorism, it will be a tall test for afirst-term senator with no real Washington accomplishments to convince thecountry that he's ready to be commander in chief.
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Boston.com
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2007/01/16/whats_next____war_with_iran?mode=PF
H.D.S. GREENWAY
What's next -- war with Iran?
By H.D.S. Greenway | January 16, 2007
ONE OF the more far-reaching aspects of President Bush's new strategy washis stunning rebuke of the Iraq Study Group recommendation that the UnitedStates should try to "engage" Iran and Syria "constructively." Instead, thepresident has made more threats and promises more confrontation. He promisedto "seek out and destroy the networks providing advance weaponry andtraining to our enemies in Iraq," opening up the possibility of cross borderoperations.
Congress was quick to react. Senator Joe Biden, Democrat of Delaware, madeit clear that any move to expand the war into neighboring countries wouldneed congressional approval, and Chuck Hagel, a Nebraska Republican,compared the prospect with the invasion of Cambodia during the Vietnam War.
It is ironic that while Bush ramps up confrontation, the Iraqi government --presumably our ally -- is trying to make diplomatic efforts toward both Iranand Syria to explore areas of mutual interest.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/16/us/politics/16dems.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&pagewanted=print
January 16, 2007
Democrats Seek the Middle on Social Issues
By ROBIN TONER
WASHINGTON, Jan. 15 - The promise may not outlast their political honeymoon,but Democratic Congressional leaders say they are committed to governingfrom the center, and not just on bread-and-butter issues like raising theminimum wage or increasing aid for education. They also hope to bring thatphilosophy to bear on some of the most divisive social issues in politics,like abortion.
In their first days in session, Senate Democratic leaders reintroduced abill that they said was indicative of their new approach: the PreventionFirst Act, which seeks to reduce the number of abortions by expanding accessto birth control, family planning and sex education.
In the House last week, Democrats showcased a vote on expanding federalfinancing for embryonic stem cell research, which, despite fierce oppositionfrom many conservatives, has won bipartisan support among lawmakers - andvoters - who are otherwise divided on abortion.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/16/opinion/16tue1.html?pagewanted=print
January 16, 2007
Editorial
Energy Time
Al Hubbard, the economic adviser who's coordinating the administration'senergy strategy, recently promised that President Bush would produce"headlines above the fold that will knock your socks off in terms of ourcommitment to energy independence." Every president since Richard Nixon hastalked this way, while every year the country slides further intodependency. Mr. Bush's overpromising has included a forecast that we wouldall be buying hydrogen-fueled cars in 20 years and his pledge a year ago torid the country of its addiction to oil.
Still, we must hope that Mr. Bush is serious this time, because we simplycannot continue to hold our national security and the health of the planethostage to our appetite for fossil fuels.
America's closest allies, and increasingly its governors, know this. Lastweek, the European Union - shaken by Russia's threatened shutdown of oilpassing through Belarus - announced a menu of initiatives aimed at reducingEurope's dependence on unreliable suppliers while cutting greenhouse gasemissions with cleaner fuels and new technologies.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/16/opinion/16tue2.html?pagewanted=print
Jauary 16, 2007
Editorial
Tracking Outsourced Bonanzas
The new Congress is promising far tighter oversight of Bush administrationspending programs, and few targets are more in need of scrutiny and daylightthan the outsourcing of government programs to private contractors. Thishighly lucrative world quietly ballooned by 86 percent - to $377 billionannually - during the first five years of the Bush administration, accordingto Congressional estimates. Outsourced spending, on Iraq, Katrina and otherbonanzas, has grown twice as fast as other discretionary spending, accordingto Representative Henry Waxman, the California Democrat who is chairman ofthe oversight and reform committee.
Mr. Waxman is fairly itching to finally map the waste, fraud and abuse inprivate contracting that went largely ignored by the previous RepublicanCongress. Taxpayers should wish him well.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/16/opinion/16tue4.html?pagewanted=print
January 16, 2007
Editorial Observer
A Bishop's Fall Provides a View on Soviet-era Collaboration
By SERGE SCHMEMANN
Stanislaw Wielgus had to step down as archbishop of Warsaw. The CatholicChurch played too central and heroic a role in the Polish resistance toCommunist dictatorship (think of Lech Walesa taking communion at the Gdanskshipyard, or Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski, or Pope John Paul II) for anyone whois known to have collaborated with the secret police to have so prominent arole. Yet I find myself pausing to reflect for a moment about Bishop Wielgusand about how surviving in that world, especially for anyone in a positionof authority, presented excruciating choices, again and again.
There are huge numbers of names in those cursed secret-police archives leftbehind in Poland and all other police states past and present, and many arepeople whose only crime was that they were not heroes. In that sameCommunist Poland, a Polish friend once came to me, distraught. The secretpolice had come to him and had ordered him to serve as an informer; if hedid not, his only child would be expelled from the university. Just tellingme was an act of courage. In the end, my friend was saved by the demise ofCommunist rule. But his terrible dilemma was shared by millions of people inthe Soviet empire.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/16/realestate/16rentals.html?ei=5094&en=2afc72067a1f2634&hp=&ex=1169010000&partner=homepage&pagewanted=print
January 16, 2007
Buyers Scarce, Many Condos Are for Rent
By VIKAS BAJAJ
WASHINGTON - David Franco's illuminated model of a proposed 10-storycondominium tower dominates a sales center that, in spite of the "NowSelling" banner still fluttering outside, is conspicuously closed forbusiness.
"We could have waited it out and kept pushing and pushing," Mr. Franco saidabout the decision to abandon plans to sell 180 luxury condominiums withfloor-to-ceiling windows offering views of the Washington Monument andCapitol Hill. "But it would have taken significantly longer."
After six weeks of failing to lure more than a couple of dozen buyers, Mr.Franco and his partner, Jeff Blum, joined the builders of nearly 6,000condominium units in the Washington metropolitan area who have decided inthe last three months to recast their projects as rental apartmentbuildings.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Pakistan-Al-Qaida.html?ei=5094&en=df55acdc0512d335&hp=&ex=1169010000&partner=homepage&pagewanted=print
January 16, 2007
Pakistan Destroys Suspected Militant Hideouts
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 6:46 a.m. ET
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) -- Pakistan's army destroyed suspected al-Qaidahideouts in an airstrike near the Afghan border on Tuesday, killing 10people, officials said.
The army and a senior local official said the dead were militants, andincluded some foreigners, but a resident said the slain men were Afghanlaborers.
The raid in South Waziristan came days after the U.S. intelligence chiefsaid leaders of both al-Qaida and Afghanistan's former ruling Talibanmilitia were finding shelter in Pakistan's lawless frontier areas.
An army statement said intelligence sources confirmed the presence of 25 to30 foreign terrorists and their local facilitators occupying five compoundsin the area of Zamzola -- a village about two miles from the frontier.
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The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/16/nyregion/16organs.html?pagewanted=print
January 16, 2007
Turning the Grief-Stricken Toward Organ Donation
By RICHARD PÉREZ-PEÑA
There was barely a mark on her 9-year-old daughter's head, and when doctorstold Surangni Gunaratne that the girl she adored was brain dead, sheresponded with fury. "I yelled at them, I said they had no feelings," shesaid, "and I told them to get out."
But over the next few days, the people at St. Vincent's Hospital StatenIsland helped Mrs. Gunaratne accept that Tiffany was gone. Kathleen Atkinsonwas an especially persistent presence, doing a little of everything, fromfetching coffee and fending off paperwork to shooing away friends whosometimes crowded around Tiffany's bed.
Ms. Atkinson works for the New York Organ Donor Network, not the hospital,and her mission during that week last July was to persuade Mrs. Gunaratneand her husband, Ajantha, to donate their daughter's organs. Five days afterTiffany was hit by a car outside her family's house, her liver and kidneyswere transplanted, prolonging the lives of three strangers, one of them just7 years old.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/14/AR2007011401091_pf.html
First U.S. Uterus Transplant Planned
Some Experts Say Risk Isn't Justified
By Rob Stein
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, January 15, 2007; A01
First came kidney, liver and heart transplants. Then a few doctors startedtransplanting hands. French surgeons even did a face.
Now, doctors are planning the first womb transplant in the United States.
A team based in Manhattan has begun screening women left barren by cancer,injuries or other problems who want a chance to bear their own children.
"The desire to have a child is a tremendous driving force for many women,"said Giuseppe Del Priore of the New York Downtown Hospital, who is leadingthe team. "We think we could help many women fulfill this very basic
desire."
But the planned operation, which Del Priore and his colleagues could attemptlater this year, is stirring objections among some transplant experts,fertility specialists and medical ethicists. They question whether theprocedure has been tested sufficiently on animals and whether the benefit ofbeing able to carry a pregnancy outweighs the risks for the woman and fetus.
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/15/AR2007011500967_pf.html
Ending an Opium War
Poppies and Afghan Recovery Can Both Bloom
By Anne Applebaum
Tuesday, January 16, 2007; A19
Once, the British Empire fought a war for the right to sell opium in China.In retrospect, history has judged that war destructive and wasteful, ashameless battle of colonizers against the colonized that in the end helpedneither one.
Now, NATO is fighting a war to eradicate opium from Afghanistan. Allegedly,the goals this time around are different. According to the Britishgovernment, Afghanistan's illicit drug trade poses the "gravest threat tothe long term security, development, and effective governance ofAfghanistan," particularly since the Taliban is believed to be the biggestbeneficiary of drug sales. Convinced that this time they are doing themorally right thing, Western governments are spending hundreds of millionsof dollars bulldozing poppy fields, building up counternarcotics squads andfinancing alternative crops in Afghanistan. Chemical spraying may begin asearly as this spring. But in retrospect, might history not judge this war tobe every bit as destructive and wasteful as the original Opium Wars?
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/15/AR2007011500965_pf.html
A Dark Horse's War Edge
By E. J. Dionne Jr.
Tuesday, January 16, 2007; A19
Mike Huckabee, who just stepped down as Arkansas governor, is the brighteststar among Republican presidential dark horses.
It's not just because he, like a certain other Arkansan, has ties to a towncalled Hope, or because he lost 105 pounds and has written a popular dietbook. And it's not only because he is mastering a conservative form oftriangulation blending religious conservatism with policy pragmatism.
Huckabee, if he chooses to run for president in 2008, has another asset:While front-runners John McCain and Rudy Giuliani have placed large bets onthe success of President Bush's Iraq policy, Huckabee has maintained whatyou might call loyal distance.
This is what Huckabee said in an interview last week when I asked him aboutthe surge: "The honest answer for me is that I'm not subjected to the samepiles of military and diplomatic information and intelligence that he has,and I'm going to have to trust that the advice that he's based his decisionon as commander in chief is good. I don't honestly know. I hope it's right.I have to hope that, because there are going to be people from my state thatare going to be asked to go and make it right."
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The Washington Post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/15/AR2007011500966_pf.html
Our Tunnel Vision
By Richard Cohen
Tuesday, January 16, 2007; A19
Some years ago, I accompanied John McCain to Vietnam. For him, it was yetanother trip to the place where he had been a prisoner of war, but for me itwas a first. After we visited Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City (the formerSaigon), McCain and the rest of his party went home. A colleague and Istayed behind to visit the famous Cu Chi tunnels. To the Vietnamese, theyare a monument to a lesson they taught us. To us, they are a monument to alesson we never seem to learn.
Experience -- reporting, we call it in my business -- can be vastlyoverrated. I went to Bosnia and Croatia during the war there and came awayconvinced that NATO, which was to say the United States, should stay out ofthat conflict. I was intimidated by the terrain and horrified by the ethnicenmity. I came away with precisely the wrong lesson. NATO went in and endedthe killing.
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The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/16468032.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Tue, Jan. 16, 2007
Terror suspect was terrorized in a Navy brig
BY FRED GRIMM
fgrimm@MiamiHerald.com
The accused was held in extreme isolation for 1,307 days. Held in anine-by-seven-foot cell. The only window blacked out. He was the loneprisoner on the two-tier cellblock. He was given food through a slot in thedoor. He slept on a steel mattress. No reading material. No calendar. Noclock. Nothing to connect him to the outside world.
But it was the short trip down the hallway for a dental examination thatcaptured the utter isolation and sensory deprivation inflicted on JosePadilla during his 3 ½ years in the Navy brig at Charleston, S.C.
Helmeted guards, their faces obscured behind dark plastic visors, manacledhis hands and feet through slots in his cell door. They covered his earswith sound-canceling headphones, covered his eyes with blacked-out goggles.
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The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/opinion/16468354.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Tue, Jan. 16, 2007
SOCIAL ECONOMY
Reduce poverty in America
BY LARRY SNYDER
www.catholiccharitiesusa.org
The promise of America has been that if you work hard, you can provide abetter life for you and your family. Unfortunately, too many people in thiscountry are working hard, but falling further behind -- with their dream ofa better tomorrow detoured down a path to poverty.
Today, more than 37 million people are living in poverty in one of thewealthiest nations in the world. The numbers are rising, with increasingnumbers of people who are hungry, more children without health insurance andmore families without a decent place to live.
Poverty is a moral and social crisis for our country, one that threatens thehealth and economic well being of both families and our nation as a whole.
Throughout the great history of this country, our nation's leaders and itspeople have demonstrated a capacity to come together in times of greatcrisis to secure the common good of our nation.
The escalating number of people living in poverty is such a crisis, one thatdemands the attention and collective will of the country. Reducing povertywill help not only those in need but also our country as a whole.
That's why Catholic Charities USA is launching the Campaign to ReducePoverty in America to confront this challenge. Our goal is to cut thenation's poverty rate in half by 2020.
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The St. Petersburg Times
http://www.sptimes.com/2007/01/16/State/Hard_lessons_for_our_.shtml
Hard lessons for our teachers
School systems flock to learn from and adopt the ideas of educational"gurus" intent on retooling outdated curricula.
THOMAS C. TOBIN
Published January 16, 2007
On a stage adorned with video screens as big as billboards, Willard R.Daggett moves back and forth with a preacher's zeal, a dose of humor and asling full of zingers.
"I guarantee you I will make everybody at some time in the next hour and 10minutes angry with me," he warns about 3,000 educators packed into aKissimmee ballroom.
English teachers, he says, are "academic elitists" who have helped dumb downcurricula. Math teachers, he says, have a "horrendously poor track record"of introducing concepts in ways that make sense to kids.
Tough assessments like those have helped make Daggett a rock star amongeducation "gurus," a small club that has grown in stature since governmentaccountability programs began pressing school systems to run harder.
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http://select.nytimes.com/2007/01/16/opinion/16kristof.html
The New York Times
January 16, 2007
Op-Ed Columnist
Car Washes and Genocide
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
Genocide may be the worst of crimes, but historically it has also brought
out the best in some people.
The Raoul Wallenbergs of 2007 speckle America and the globe. And I don't
just mean the aid workers - 13 of whom have been murdered for their efforts
in Darfur since last May - but also those ordinary Americans who have united
in a grass-roots campaign to try to stop genocide half a world away in
Sudan.
President Bush and other world leaders have dropped the ball on Darfur. But
that vacuum of moral leadership has been filled by university students,
churches and temples, celebrities like George Clooney and Mia Farrow, and
armies of schoolchildren.
Their arsenal - green armbands, phone calls to the White House, bake sales
to raise money - all seem pallid. How can a "Save Darfur" lawn sign in
Peoria intimidate government-backed raiders in Sudan or Chad who throw
babies into bonfires?
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Harpers.org
http://harpers.org/ThroughAGlassDarkly-12838838.html
Through a Glass, Darkly
How the Christian right is reimagining U.S. history
Posted on Wednesday, January 10, 2007. Originally from December 2006. By
Jeff Sharlet.
Sources
We keep trying to explain away American fundamentalism. Those of us not
engaged personally or emotionally in the biggest political and cultural
movement of our times-those on the sidelines of history-keep trying to come
up with theories with which to discredit the evident allure of this
punishing yet oddly comforting idea of a deity, this strange god. His
invisible hand is everywhere, say His citizen-theologians, caressing and
fixing every outcome: Little League games, job searches, test scores, the
spread of sexually transmitted diseases, the success or failure of terrorist
attacks (also known as "signs"), victory or defeat in battle, at the ballot
box, in bed. Those unable to feel His soothing touch at moments such as
these snort at the notion of a god with the patience or the prurience to
monitor every tick and twitch of desire, a supreme being able to make a lion
and a lamb cuddle but unable to abide two men kissing. A divine love that
speaks through hurricanes. Who would worship such a god? His followers must
be dupes, or saps, or fools, their faith illiterate, insane, or misinformed,
their strength fleeting, hollow, an aberration. A burp in American history.
An unpleasant odor that will pass.
[Send your comments about articles to Rays.List@Comcast.net]
#####
FLORIDA DIGEST January 16, 2007
**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US ATrays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
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http://www.floridatoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070116/OPINION/701160317/1004
Florida Today
January 16, 2007
Our view: Still getting hotter
Florida should join other states in battling dangers of global warming
It's official:
Scientists say 2006 continued the trend of the warmest years on record, withgreatly above normal temperatures reported worldwide and polar ice capsmelting at an accelerated rate.
Scientists have already said the monster hurricanes of 2004-05 that struckFlorida and the Gulf Coast were fueled in part by higher sea-surfacetemperatures triggered by global warming.
But there are other signs of global warming in the Space Coast's backyard,too.
For centuries, tropical mangroves grew no further north than Brevard andVolusia counties, because it was too cold in the winter. Now, the plants aresprouting 200 miles further north, in St. Johns County near Jacksonville.
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The Washington Post
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/broward/sfl-cflopelect16jan16,0,7850969,print.story?coll=sfla-news-broward
Oakland Park opts against referendum on having an elected mayor
By Elizabeth Baier
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
January 16, 2007
Oakland Park · One month after agreeing to hold a special referendum in theupcoming municipal election, commissioners voted to rescind the ordinancethat would have let residents decide on having an elected mayor.
Commissioners in December voted 3-2 to adopt the ordinance, which would havesubmitted a referendum for the March 13 election. Residents would have beenasked if they wanted to change the city's charter to create an elected,rather than rotating, mayoral position.
But at a special meeting on Jan. 4, Commissioner Layne Dallet Walls, whoproposed the original ordinance, asked her fellow commissioners to considerwithdrawing the referendum.
"I honestly still think we should do it," she said. "But I think thecommission is a snapshot of the community, and I don't see any reason to doit now if the commissioners are not all in favor of it."
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The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/local/states/florida/counties/broward_county/16468037.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Tue, Jan. 16, 2007
The new judges and their jobs
Last year, the Legislature created six new Broward judgeships. Aseventh judge, Charlie Kaplan, was elected to replace an outgoing circuitjudge.
The new judges, and their assignments:
CIRCUIT JUDGES
. Charlie Kaplan has been assigned to juvenile delinquency court atthe main courthouse in Fort Lauderdale.
. Michele Towbin Singer takes on felony mental health court at themain courthouse in Fort Lauderdale.
. Marina Garcia Wood will hear cases in juvenile dependency court atthe main courthouse in Fort Lauderdale.
County Judges
. Jill Levy will hear civil cases at the North Satellite Courthouse inDeerfield Beach.
. Alan Marks will hear civil cases at the West Satellite Courthouse inPlantation.
. Terri Ann Miller will hear civil cases at the South SatelliteCourthouse in Hollywood.
. Arlene Joy Simon (formerly Arlene Simon Campione) will hear civilcases at the South Satellite Courthouse in Hollywood.
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The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/local/states/florida/counties/broward_county/16468030.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Poted on Tue, Jan. 16, 2007
BROWARD COURTS
Rookie judge takes on a crucial job
Six new Broward judges officially take the bench today. Among them: a rookiejudge who's taking over the county's felony mental health court.
BY NIKKI WALLER
nwaller@MiamiHerald.com
Six new judges officially start work in the Broward courts today. Of those,none have a tougher or more high-profile assignment than Michele TowbinSinger, a longtime Miami-Dade assistant public defender who won election tothe circuit bench in November.
Towbin Singer, 46, takes over the county's felony mental health court, apioneering division that serves the growing number of people with mentalillnesses who are accused of serious crimes.
Established in November 2003, Broward's felony mental health court wasFlorida's first. Defendants are referred to the court when their judge orattorney suspects they may be incompetent to stand trial on felony charges.Defendants must undergo treatment and evaluation until they are competent tostand trial. The court dismisses charges against defendants if they are notdeclared competent within five years.
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PalmBeachPost.com
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/opinion/content/opinion/epaper/2007/01/16/a14a_leadedit_winn_0116.html
Winn-win for Florida: Education chief departs
Palm Beach Post Editorial
Tuesday, January 16, 2007
Florida's new governor is unfailingly polite and mild-mannered, but as itturns out, he also has a pretty stiff backbone.
Last week, Gov. Crist revoked the appointments of 283 people whom Jeb Bushhad chosen to serve on state boards. Most notably, Gov. Crist pulled backthe appointments of Phil Handy and T. Willard Fair. Both had reached the endof their legal terms on the Board of Education, where their primary functionhas been to heap hosannas on each of Gov. Bush's education proposals.
To keep them on the board, Gov. Bush invented a loophole and, just beforeleaving office, shoved the two men through it. The dodge was particularlyhypocritical, since Mr. Handy became a force in state politics bychampioning the 1992 term-limit amendment. Other board members - all Bushappointees - with typical subservience elected Mr. Fair chairman and Mr.Handy vice chairman. At Mr. Bush's farewell appearance before the board, Mr.Fair told him: "In my judgment, there is no greater person on this Earththan you. I love you."
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Tampabay.com
http://www.sptimes.com/2007/01/16/news_pf/State/Seven_days_to_fix_ins.shtml
Seven days to fix insurance
A special session starting today may not be enough to settle on substantivereforms.
TOM ZUCCO, JENNIFER LIBERTO and JONI JAMES
Published January 16, 2007
In his inaugural address Jan. 2, Gov. Charlie Crist promised no "Band-Aid orfinger in the dike" solutions to Florida's property insurance crisis.
This wasn't a voice in the wilderness. In recent weeks, nearly every senatorand representative in the state has weighed in with some version of the"people need rate relief" message, all part of an extraordinary shift in themind-set of Florida lawmakers.
Now it's time to see whether Crist and the Legislature can deliver.
As lawmakers begin a weeklong special session on insurance today, thecentral issue is pain and who will feel it: policyholders, the insuranceindustry, or most likely, a combination of both.
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The Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-cmanatees16jan16,0,5756157,print.story?coll=sfla-home-headlines
State rejects Broward County's plan to save manatees
By David Fleshler
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
January 16, 2007
A Broward County manatee-protection plan has been rejected by the statewildlife agency because it would allow the construction of thousands of newdocks along waterways heavily used by the endangered marine mammals.
The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission told the county theplan was unacceptable and urged county officials to find ways to reduce thenumber of collisions between manatees and boats. Watercraft killed sevenmanatees in Broward last year, the highest number in at least 30 years.
The rejection is a blow to the area's boating industry because it means athree-year moratorium on the construction of docks, dry-stack marinas, boatramps and other boating facilities will continue. About 40 proposals for newmarine construction have been held up throughout the county because of themoratorium, said Frank Herhold, executive director of the Marine IndustryAssociation of South Florida.
"We're disappointed," he said.
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
For further information contact
Terry DeCarlo - Public Relations and Marketing Manager
Care Resource - 305-576-1234 x 210
CARE RESOURCE RECEIVES $100,000 CHECK FROM M.A.C. COSMETICS
Grant will fund Youth Health Intervention Project
Miami, FL; January 12, 2007 - Care Resource announced today that they havereceived a check for $100,000 from the M.A.C. Cosmetics AIDS fund to helptheir YHIP program.
Y-HIP is an HIV prevention and behavior modification program that aims toincrease HIV/AIDS awareness through education and testing, facilitate accessto care, and promote risk reduction behaviors by providing health educationand skills building in the Miami and Fort Lauderdale areas. The programutilizes a peer-based outreach intervention model to target young men ofcolor who have sex with men (YMSM). To achieve this, the outreach siteswhere the programs offer their services are those in which youth congregate,as well as public schools, colleges, and university. The Y-HIP team engagesyouth by involvement in community activities that are youth oriented, as theprogram staff represent the age of the youth targeted. Staff distributeseducational materials, and information about and HIV and STDs, and invitesthe young men and their sex partners to be tested.
YHIP participants who test positive will be referred for comprehensiveservices. In addition, the project offers a series of fun and educationalworkshops and behavior modification groups where high-risk youth will:Increase their knowledge about HIV and other related topics and/or issues;reduce their risk behaviors, such as unprotected sex and drug use; improvenecessary preventive skills, such as assertive communication anddecision-making skills; develop a social network of resources andinformation and engage in the process of educating other youth, andtherefore becoming more aware of the importance of the topics and/or issuesdiscussed. The curriculum for the workshops is based on a program designcalled B.A.R.T (Becoming A Responsible Team). YHIP is a CDC supportedprogram.
Established in 1994 by M·A·C Cosmetics, the M·A·C AIDS Fund supports men,women and children affected by HIV/AIDS globally. Introducing its first VIVAGLAM lipstick that same year, M·A·C decided that every cent of the sellingprice of he VIVA GLAM lipsticks would go to the M·A·C AIDS Fund. With atotal of four VIVA GLAM lipsticks now sold worldwide, and through the annualKids Helping Kids Card Program, M·A·C Cosmetics has provided over $85million to date for the M·A·C AIDS Fund. The M·A·C AIDS Fund is the heartand soul of the company – with its employees giving their time, energy andtalent to help those affected by HIV/AIDS worldwide. Dita Von Teese, wife ofrock star Marilyn Manson, is the spokesperson for the M.A.C. AIDS Fund andvisited Care Resources Miami offices on December 8th.
=
Boys Night Out at The Melting Pot
Join one of ArtsUnited's ardent supporters, The Melting Pot, for BoysNight Out at every third Wednesday of the month at The Melting Pot FortLauderdale. This Wednesday, January 17 enjoy a four course fondue with wine,featuring fashions from Dillards, the latest men's products from Cliniqueand Paul Mitchell and door prizes. Tickets are $50 per person, available byadvance purchase only, and includes taxes, gratuity, and gift bags for all.The Melting Pot Fort Lauderdale is located at 1135 N. Federal Highway.Tickets may be purchased by calling 954-568-1581.
[ Send your comments about any of the articles in Ray's List Digest toRays.List@Comcast.net ]
#####
=
http://www.floridatoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070116/OPINION/701160317/1004
Florida Today
January 16, 2007
Our view: Still getting hotter
Florida should join other states in battling dangers of global warming
It's official:
Scientists say 2006 continued the trend of the warmest years on record, withgreatly above normal temperatures reported worldwide and polar ice capsmelting at an accelerated rate.
Scientists have already said the monster hurricanes of 2004-05 that struckFlorida and the Gulf Coast were fueled in part by higher sea-surfacetemperatures triggered by global warming.
But there are other signs of global warming in the Space Coast's backyard,too.
For centuries, tropical mangroves grew no further north than Brevard andVolusia counties, because it was too cold in the winter. Now, the plants aresprouting 200 miles further north, in St. Johns County near Jacksonville.
=
The Washington Post
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/broward/sfl-cflopelect16jan16,0,7850969,print.story?coll=sfla-news-broward
Oakland Park opts against referendum on having an elected mayor
By Elizabeth Baier
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
January 16, 2007
Oakland Park · One month after agreeing to hold a special referendum in theupcoming municipal election, commissioners voted to rescind the ordinancethat would have let residents decide on having an elected mayor.
Commissioners in December voted 3-2 to adopt the ordinance, which would havesubmitted a referendum for the March 13 election. Residents would have beenasked if they wanted to change the city's charter to create an elected,rather than rotating, mayoral position.
But at a special meeting on Jan. 4, Commissioner Layne Dallet Walls, whoproposed the original ordinance, asked her fellow commissioners to considerwithdrawing the referendum.
"I honestly still think we should do it," she said. "But I think thecommission is a snapshot of the community, and I don't see any reason to doit now if the commissioners are not all in favor of it."
=
The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/local/states/florida/counties/broward_county/16468037.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Tue, Jan. 16, 2007
The new judges and their jobs
Last year, the Legislature created six new Broward judgeships. Aseventh judge, Charlie Kaplan, was elected to replace an outgoing circuitjudge.
The new judges, and their assignments:
CIRCUIT JUDGES
. Charlie Kaplan has been assigned to juvenile delinquency court atthe main courthouse in Fort Lauderdale.
. Michele Towbin Singer takes on felony mental health court at themain courthouse in Fort Lauderdale.
. Marina Garcia Wood will hear cases in juvenile dependency court atthe main courthouse in Fort Lauderdale.
County Judges
. Jill Levy will hear civil cases at the North Satellite Courthouse inDeerfield Beach.
. Alan Marks will hear civil cases at the West Satellite Courthouse inPlantation.
. Terri Ann Miller will hear civil cases at the South SatelliteCourthouse in Hollywood.
. Arlene Joy Simon (formerly Arlene Simon Campione) will hear civilcases at the South Satellite Courthouse in Hollywood.
=
The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/local/states/florida/counties/broward_county/16468030.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Poted on Tue, Jan. 16, 2007
BROWARD COURTS
Rookie judge takes on a crucial job
Six new Broward judges officially take the bench today. Among them: a rookiejudge who's taking over the county's felony mental health court.
BY NIKKI WALLER
nwaller@MiamiHerald.com
Six new judges officially start work in the Broward courts today. Of those,none have a tougher or more high-profile assignment than Michele TowbinSinger, a longtime Miami-Dade assistant public defender who won election tothe circuit bench in November.
Towbin Singer, 46, takes over the county's felony mental health court, apioneering division that serves the growing number of people with mentalillnesses who are accused of serious crimes.
Established in November 2003, Broward's felony mental health court wasFlorida's first. Defendants are referred to the court when their judge orattorney suspects they may be incompetent to stand trial on felony charges.Defendants must undergo treatment and evaluation until they are competent tostand trial. The court dismisses charges against defendants if they are notdeclared competent within five years.
=
PalmBeachPost.com
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/opinion/content/opinion/epaper/2007/01/16/a14a_leadedit_winn_0116.html
Winn-win for Florida: Education chief departs
Palm Beach Post Editorial
Tuesday, January 16, 2007
Florida's new governor is unfailingly polite and mild-mannered, but as itturns out, he also has a pretty stiff backbone.
Last week, Gov. Crist revoked the appointments of 283 people whom Jeb Bushhad chosen to serve on state boards. Most notably, Gov. Crist pulled backthe appointments of Phil Handy and T. Willard Fair. Both had reached the endof their legal terms on the Board of Education, where their primary functionhas been to heap hosannas on each of Gov. Bush's education proposals.
To keep them on the board, Gov. Bush invented a loophole and, just beforeleaving office, shoved the two men through it. The dodge was particularlyhypocritical, since Mr. Handy became a force in state politics bychampioning the 1992 term-limit amendment. Other board members - all Bushappointees - with typical subservience elected Mr. Fair chairman and Mr.Handy vice chairman. At Mr. Bush's farewell appearance before the board, Mr.Fair told him: "In my judgment, there is no greater person on this Earththan you. I love you."
=
Tampabay.com
http://www.sptimes.com/2007/01/16/news_pf/State/Seven_days_to_fix_ins.shtml
Seven days to fix insurance
A special session starting today may not be enough to settle on substantivereforms.
TOM ZUCCO, JENNIFER LIBERTO and JONI JAMES
Published January 16, 2007
In his inaugural address Jan. 2, Gov. Charlie Crist promised no "Band-Aid orfinger in the dike" solutions to Florida's property insurance crisis.
This wasn't a voice in the wilderness. In recent weeks, nearly every senatorand representative in the state has weighed in with some version of the"people need rate relief" message, all part of an extraordinary shift in themind-set of Florida lawmakers.
Now it's time to see whether Crist and the Legislature can deliver.
As lawmakers begin a weeklong special session on insurance today, thecentral issue is pain and who will feel it: policyholders, the insuranceindustry, or most likely, a combination of both.
=
The Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/southflorida/sfl-cmanatees16jan16,0,5756157,print.story?coll=sfla-home-headlines
State rejects Broward County's plan to save manatees
By David Fleshler
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
January 16, 2007
A Broward County manatee-protection plan has been rejected by the statewildlife agency because it would allow the construction of thousands of newdocks along waterways heavily used by the endangered marine mammals.
The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission told the county theplan was unacceptable and urged county officials to find ways to reduce thenumber of collisions between manatees and boats. Watercraft killed sevenmanatees in Broward last year, the highest number in at least 30 years.
The rejection is a blow to the area's boating industry because it means athree-year moratorium on the construction of docks, dry-stack marinas, boatramps and other boating facilities will continue. About 40 proposals for newmarine construction have been held up throughout the county because of themoratorium, said Frank Herhold, executive director of the Marine IndustryAssociation of South Florida.
"We're disappointed," he said.
=
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
For further information contact
Terry DeCarlo - Public Relations and Marketing Manager
Care Resource - 305-576-1234 x 210
CARE RESOURCE RECEIVES $100,000 CHECK FROM M.A.C. COSMETICS
Grant will fund Youth Health Intervention Project
Miami, FL; January 12, 2007 - Care Resource announced today that they havereceived a check for $100,000 from the M.A.C. Cosmetics AIDS fund to helptheir YHIP program.
Y-HIP is an HIV prevention and behavior modification program that aims toincrease HIV/AIDS awareness through education and testing, facilitate accessto care, and promote risk reduction behaviors by providing health educationand skills building in the Miami and Fort Lauderdale areas. The programutilizes a peer-based outreach intervention model to target young men ofcolor who have sex with men (YMSM). To achieve this, the outreach siteswhere the programs offer their services are those in which youth congregate,as well as public schools, colleges, and university. The Y-HIP team engagesyouth by involvement in community activities that are youth oriented, as theprogram staff represent the age of the youth targeted. Staff distributeseducational materials, and information about and HIV and STDs, and invitesthe young men and their sex partners to be tested.
YHIP participants who test positive will be referred for comprehensiveservices. In addition, the project offers a series of fun and educationalworkshops and behavior modification groups where high-risk youth will:Increase their knowledge about HIV and other related topics and/or issues;reduce their risk behaviors, such as unprotected sex and drug use; improvenecessary preventive skills, such as assertive communication anddecision-making skills; develop a social network of resources andinformation and engage in the process of educating other youth, andtherefore becoming more aware of the importance of the topics and/or issuesdiscussed. The curriculum for the workshops is based on a program designcalled B.A.R.T (Becoming A Responsible Team). YHIP is a CDC supportedprogram.
Established in 1994 by M·A·C Cosmetics, the M·A·C AIDS Fund supports men,women and children affected by HIV/AIDS globally. Introducing its first VIVAGLAM lipstick that same year, M·A·C decided that every cent of the sellingprice of he VIVA GLAM lipsticks would go to the M·A·C AIDS Fund. With atotal of four VIVA GLAM lipsticks now sold worldwide, and through the annualKids Helping Kids Card Program, M·A·C Cosmetics has provided over $85million to date for the M·A·C AIDS Fund. The M·A·C AIDS Fund is the heartand soul of the company – with its employees giving their time, energy andtalent to help those affected by HIV/AIDS worldwide. Dita Von Teese, wife ofrock star Marilyn Manson, is the spokesperson for the M.A.C. AIDS Fund andvisited Care Resources Miami offices on December 8th.
=
Boys Night Out at The Melting Pot
Join one of ArtsUnited's ardent supporters, The Melting Pot, for BoysNight Out at every third Wednesday of the month at The Melting Pot FortLauderdale. This Wednesday, January 17 enjoy a four course fondue with wine,featuring fashions from Dillards, the latest men's products from Cliniqueand Paul Mitchell and door prizes. Tickets are $50 per person, available byadvance purchase only, and includes taxes, gratuity, and gift bags for all.The Melting Pot Fort Lauderdale is located at 1135 N. Federal Highway.Tickets may be purchased by calling 954-568-1581.
[ Send your comments about any of the articles in Ray's List Digest toRays.List@Comcast.net ]
#####
Monday, January 15, 2007
FLORIDA DIGEST January 15, 2007
**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US ATrays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
http://www.floridatoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070114/VERGE/70112035/1035/verge&template=printart
It's tough to vote for the lesser of two evils
BY AARON BRYCE û
AARON BRYCE WALLACE
Jim Davis, a former candidate for Florida governor, pledged to raises taxesto almost a billion dollars, which some economists believe would force theaverage Floridia taxpayer to pay almost 55¤percent of their income in taxes.
The second major candidate was Charlie Crist, a man that accepted millionsof dollars in campaign donations from insurance companies, which couldpossibly lead to a slight bias.
I found myself searching in all political races of the midterm for thelesser of two evil candidates.
It seems our political system has boiled down to choosing the lesser of twoevils.
We have the freedom to vote in this country, but we have no way to expressdisdain for the candidates.
=
PalmBeachPost.com
Broward Big draws bead on Wexler
Broward Big draws bead on Wexler
By George Bennett
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Monday, January 15, 2007
You have to figure something's percolating when a longtime Broward Countypolitician ventures into Palm Beach County's Democratic condo belt to holdforth on foreign policy.
The politician in question is former Broward County Commissioner Ben Graberand, indeed, he's considering a challenge of reputedly unbeatable U.S. Rep.Robert Wexler in a Democratic congressional primary next year.
Graber lost a Democratic state Senate primary last year to Wexler-backedJeremy Ring. Now Graber is remaining in circulation in Wexler's PalmBeach-Broward congressional district and making it known he's available tospeak to clubs and other organizations. On Tuesday, Graber has a gig at aKings Point Democratic club confab west of Delray Beach. After a career instate and local politics, Graber will speak to Kings Pointers on a topic ofcongressional heft: Iran, Iraq, Israel and U.S. policy.
=
The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/16456505.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Sun, Jan. 14, 2007
THE INSURANCE CRISIS
Pay now or pay later?
The legislature meets Tuesday to tackle the insurance crisis. Homeownerswill see some rate relief, but it comes at a big price.
BY BEATRICE E. GARCIA
bgarcia@MiamiHerald.com
Relief from rocketing insurance rates is on the way.
But curb your excitement. You will pay later.
Many of the proposals to be deliberated on during this week's specialsession of the Legislature would pass more risk from insurers to consumersand the state of Florida.
That means the tab would be deferred until a major storm hits. Then allFlorida residents would pay, through hefty surcharges on insurance policiesor higher taxes.
''What we're doing is providing a short-term fix, which is great forconsumers,'' said Michael Keeby, senior vice president of HBA InsuranceGroup. ``Long-term, what's going to happen is that [this crisis] is going tokill our economy.''
=
PalmBeachPost.com
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/content/state/epaper/2007/01/15/m1a_FLAPREZ_0115.html
Bush allies back Romney, Oct. straw poll
By Brian E. Crowley
Palm Beach Post Political Editor
Monday, January 15, 2007
Jeb Bush may be gone from Tallahassee, but his political machine is activeand plotting a course that would make Florida a major player in picking theRepublican Party's candidate for president.
Key Bush operatives are backing former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. Theyare led by Sally Bradshaw, Bush's former campaign manager and chief ofstaff; Ann Herberger, Bush's finance director; and Mandy Fletcher, who juststepped down as executive director of Bush's Foundation for Florida's
Future.
Romney's Florida team is pushing for an October straw ballot in which 3,500Republican delegates would cast nonbinding votes for president. The Octobervote would bring attention from the nation's news media and give the winnera boost going into the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary.
=
The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/16462114.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Mon, Jan. 15, 2007
TALLAHASSEE
Florida's finance chief tested early
Alex Sink, one of just two Democrats holding statewide office, has a lotriding on how she will handle the state's insurance crisis.
BY GARY FINEOUT
gfineout@MiamiHerald.com
TALLAHASSEE - Just days before Adelaide ''Alex'' Sink was sworn in to hernew job as Florida's chief financial officer, the company responsible forreplacing one of the state's most important computer systems walked out thedoor.
The project is already behind schedule, likely to cost at least double the$57 million the state has already spent, and the now-departed company,Bearing Point, may wind up in court to get money it says the state owes it.
And this is no ordinary computer system the state is trying to fix: It's theaccounting system that actually keeps track of the billions spent by thestate each year.
=
Tampabay.com
http://www.sptimes.com/2007/01/14/news_pf/Opinion/What_the_senator_lear.shtml
What the senator learned in Syria
SUSAN TAYLOR MARTIN
Published January 14, 2007
U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson, a Florida Democrat, recently met with Bashar Assad,the 41-year-old president of Syria, whose country is accused by the Bushadministration of letting foreign fighters cross its border into Iraq.Syria, along with Iran, also supports the anti-Israel groups Hamas andHezbollah, and was implicated in the 2005 assassination of former LebanesePrime Minister Rafik Hariri, a critic of Syria's longtime control ofLebanon.
Nelson, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, discussed histrip with Senior Correspondent Susan Taylor Martin.
Q. Why did you want to go to Syria?
A. The Iraq Study Group had just reported to our committee, and one of themajor recommendations was that there needed to be a huge diplomaticoffensive throughout the Middle East to try to solve the Iraq situation, andone of their recommendations was to start a dialogue with Syria.
[ Send your comments about any of the articles in Ray's List Digest toRays.List@Comcast.net ]
#####
=
http://www.floridatoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070114/VERGE/70112035/1035/verge&template=printart
It's tough to vote for the lesser of two evils
BY AARON BRYCE û
AARON BRYCE WALLACE
Jim Davis, a former candidate for Florida governor, pledged to raises taxesto almost a billion dollars, which some economists believe would force theaverage Floridia taxpayer to pay almost 55¤percent of their income in taxes.
The second major candidate was Charlie Crist, a man that accepted millionsof dollars in campaign donations from insurance companies, which couldpossibly lead to a slight bias.
I found myself searching in all political races of the midterm for thelesser of two evil candidates.
It seems our political system has boiled down to choosing the lesser of twoevils.
We have the freedom to vote in this country, but we have no way to expressdisdain for the candidates.
=
PalmBeachPost.com
Broward Big draws bead on Wexler
Broward Big draws bead on Wexler
By George Bennett
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Monday, January 15, 2007
You have to figure something's percolating when a longtime Broward Countypolitician ventures into Palm Beach County's Democratic condo belt to holdforth on foreign policy.
The politician in question is former Broward County Commissioner Ben Graberand, indeed, he's considering a challenge of reputedly unbeatable U.S. Rep.Robert Wexler in a Democratic congressional primary next year.
Graber lost a Democratic state Senate primary last year to Wexler-backedJeremy Ring. Now Graber is remaining in circulation in Wexler's PalmBeach-Broward congressional district and making it known he's available tospeak to clubs and other organizations. On Tuesday, Graber has a gig at aKings Point Democratic club confab west of Delray Beach. After a career instate and local politics, Graber will speak to Kings Pointers on a topic ofcongressional heft: Iran, Iraq, Israel and U.S. policy.
=
The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/16456505.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Sun, Jan. 14, 2007
THE INSURANCE CRISIS
Pay now or pay later?
The legislature meets Tuesday to tackle the insurance crisis. Homeownerswill see some rate relief, but it comes at a big price.
BY BEATRICE E. GARCIA
bgarcia@MiamiHerald.com
Relief from rocketing insurance rates is on the way.
But curb your excitement. You will pay later.
Many of the proposals to be deliberated on during this week's specialsession of the Legislature would pass more risk from insurers to consumersand the state of Florida.
That means the tab would be deferred until a major storm hits. Then allFlorida residents would pay, through hefty surcharges on insurance policiesor higher taxes.
''What we're doing is providing a short-term fix, which is great forconsumers,'' said Michael Keeby, senior vice president of HBA InsuranceGroup. ``Long-term, what's going to happen is that [this crisis] is going tokill our economy.''
=
PalmBeachPost.com
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/content/state/epaper/2007/01/15/m1a_FLAPREZ_0115.html
Bush allies back Romney, Oct. straw poll
By Brian E. Crowley
Palm Beach Post Political Editor
Monday, January 15, 2007
Jeb Bush may be gone from Tallahassee, but his political machine is activeand plotting a course that would make Florida a major player in picking theRepublican Party's candidate for president.
Key Bush operatives are backing former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. Theyare led by Sally Bradshaw, Bush's former campaign manager and chief ofstaff; Ann Herberger, Bush's finance director; and Mandy Fletcher, who juststepped down as executive director of Bush's Foundation for Florida's
Future.
Romney's Florida team is pushing for an October straw ballot in which 3,500Republican delegates would cast nonbinding votes for president. The Octobervote would bring attention from the nation's news media and give the winnera boost going into the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary.
=
The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/16462114.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Mon, Jan. 15, 2007
TALLAHASSEE
Florida's finance chief tested early
Alex Sink, one of just two Democrats holding statewide office, has a lotriding on how she will handle the state's insurance crisis.
BY GARY FINEOUT
gfineout@MiamiHerald.com
TALLAHASSEE - Just days before Adelaide ''Alex'' Sink was sworn in to hernew job as Florida's chief financial officer, the company responsible forreplacing one of the state's most important computer systems walked out thedoor.
The project is already behind schedule, likely to cost at least double the$57 million the state has already spent, and the now-departed company,Bearing Point, may wind up in court to get money it says the state owes it.
And this is no ordinary computer system the state is trying to fix: It's theaccounting system that actually keeps track of the billions spent by thestate each year.
=
Tampabay.com
http://www.sptimes.com/2007/01/14/news_pf/Opinion/What_the_senator_lear.shtml
What the senator learned in Syria
SUSAN TAYLOR MARTIN
Published January 14, 2007
U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson, a Florida Democrat, recently met with Bashar Assad,the 41-year-old president of Syria, whose country is accused by the Bushadministration of letting foreign fighters cross its border into Iraq.Syria, along with Iran, also supports the anti-Israel groups Hamas andHezbollah, and was implicated in the 2005 assassination of former LebanesePrime Minister Rafik Hariri, a critic of Syria's longtime control ofLebanon.
Nelson, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, discussed histrip with Senior Correspondent Susan Taylor Martin.
Q. Why did you want to go to Syria?
A. The Iraq Study Group had just reported to our committee, and one of themajor recommendations was that there needed to be a huge diplomaticoffensive throughout the Middle East to try to solve the Iraq situation, andone of their recommendations was to start a dialogue with Syria.
[ Send your comments about any of the articles in Ray's List Digest toRays.List@Comcast.net ]
#####
FLORIDA DIGEST January 15, 2007
**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US ATrays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
http://www.floridatoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070114/VERGE/70112035/1035/verge&template=printart
It's tough to vote for the lesser of two evils
BY AARON BRYCE û
AARON BRYCE WALLACE
Jim Davis, a former candidate for Florida governor, pledged to raises taxesto almost a billion dollars, which some economists believe would force theaverage Floridia taxpayer to pay almost 55¤percent of their income in taxes.
The second major candidate was Charlie Crist, a man that accepted millionsof dollars in campaign donations from insurance companies, which couldpossibly lead to a slight bias.
I found myself searching in all political races of the midterm for thelesser of two evil candidates.
It seems our political system has boiled down to choosing the lesser of twoevils.
We have the freedom to vote in this country, but we have no way to expressdisdain for the candidates.
=
PalmBeachPost.com
Broward Big draws bead on Wexler
Broward Big draws bead on Wexler
By George Bennett
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Monday, January 15, 2007
You have to figure something's percolating when a longtime Broward Countypolitician ventures into Palm Beach County's Democratic condo belt to holdforth on foreign policy.
The politician in question is former Broward County Commissioner Ben Graberand, indeed, he's considering a challenge of reputedly unbeatable U.S. Rep.Robert Wexler in a Democratic congressional primary next year.
Graber lost a Democratic state Senate primary last year to Wexler-backedJeremy Ring. Now Graber is remaining in circulation in Wexler's PalmBeach-Broward congressional district and making it known he's available tospeak to clubs and other organizations. On Tuesday, Graber has a gig at aKings Point Democratic club confab west of Delray Beach. After a career instate and local politics, Graber will speak to Kings Pointers on a topic ofcongressional heft: Iran, Iraq, Israel and U.S. policy.
=
The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/16456505.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Sun, Jan. 14, 2007
THE INSURANCE CRISIS
Pay now or pay later?
The legislature meets Tuesday to tackle the insurance crisis. Homeownerswill see some rate relief, but it comes at a big price.
BY BEATRICE E. GARCIA
bgarcia@MiamiHerald.com
Relief from rocketing insurance rates is on the way.
But curb your excitement. You will pay later.
Many of the proposals to be deliberated on during this week's specialsession of the Legislature would pass more risk from insurers to consumersand the state of Florida.
That means the tab would be deferred until a major storm hits. Then allFlorida residents would pay, through hefty surcharges on insurance policiesor higher taxes.
''What we're doing is providing a short-term fix, which is great forconsumers,'' said Michael Keeby, senior vice president of HBA InsuranceGroup. ``Long-term, what's going to happen is that [this crisis] is going tokill our economy.''
=
PalmBeachPost.com
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/content/state/epaper/2007/01/15/m1a_FLAPREZ_0115.html
Bush allies back Romney, Oct. straw poll
By Brian E. Crowley
Palm Beach Post Political Editor
Monday, January 15, 2007
Jeb Bush may be gone from Tallahassee, but his political machine is activeand plotting a course that would make Florida a major player in picking theRepublican Party's candidate for president.
Key Bush operatives are backing former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. Theyare led by Sally Bradshaw, Bush's former campaign manager and chief ofstaff; Ann Herberger, Bush's finance director; and Mandy Fletcher, who juststepped down as executive director of Bush's Foundation for Florida's
Future.
Romney's Florida team is pushing for an October straw ballot in which 3,500Republican delegates would cast nonbinding votes for president. The Octobervote would bring attention from the nation's news media and give the winnera boost going into the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary.
=
The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/16462114.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Mon, Jan. 15, 2007
TALLAHASSEE
Florida's finance chief tested early
Alex Sink, one of just two Democrats holding statewide office, has a lotriding on how she will handle the state's insurance crisis.
BY GARY FINEOUT
gfineout@MiamiHerald.com
TALLAHASSEE - Just days before Adelaide ''Alex'' Sink was sworn in to hernew job as Florida's chief financial officer, the company responsible forreplacing one of the state's most important computer systems walked out thedoor.
The project is already behind schedule, likely to cost at least double the$57 million the state has already spent, and the now-departed company,Bearing Point, may wind up in court to get money it says the state owes it.
And this is no ordinary computer system the state is trying to fix: It's theaccounting system that actually keeps track of the billions spent by thestate each year.
=
Tampabay.com
http://www.sptimes.com/2007/01/14/news_pf/Opinion/What_the_senator_lear.shtml
What the senator learned in Syria
SUSAN TAYLOR MARTIN
Published January 14, 2007
U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson, a Florida Democrat, recently met with Bashar Assad,the 41-year-old president of Syria, whose country is accused by the Bushadministration of letting foreign fighters cross its border into Iraq.Syria, along with Iran, also supports the anti-Israel groups Hamas andHezbollah, and was implicated in the 2005 assassination of former LebanesePrime Minister Rafik Hariri, a critic of Syria's longtime control ofLebanon.
Nelson, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, discussed histrip with Senior Correspondent Susan Taylor Martin.
Q. Why did you want to go to Syria?
A. The Iraq Study Group had just reported to our committee, and one of themajor recommendations was that there needed to be a huge diplomaticoffensive throughout the Middle East to try to solve the Iraq situation, andone of their recommendations was to start a dialogue with Syria.
[ Send your comments about any of the articles in Ray's List Digest toRays.List@Comcast.net ]
#####
=
http://www.floridatoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070114/VERGE/70112035/1035/verge&template=printart
It's tough to vote for the lesser of two evils
BY AARON BRYCE û
AARON BRYCE WALLACE
Jim Davis, a former candidate for Florida governor, pledged to raises taxesto almost a billion dollars, which some economists believe would force theaverage Floridia taxpayer to pay almost 55¤percent of their income in taxes.
The second major candidate was Charlie Crist, a man that accepted millionsof dollars in campaign donations from insurance companies, which couldpossibly lead to a slight bias.
I found myself searching in all political races of the midterm for thelesser of two evil candidates.
It seems our political system has boiled down to choosing the lesser of twoevils.
We have the freedom to vote in this country, but we have no way to expressdisdain for the candidates.
=
PalmBeachPost.com
Broward Big draws bead on Wexler
Broward Big draws bead on Wexler
By George Bennett
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
Monday, January 15, 2007
You have to figure something's percolating when a longtime Broward Countypolitician ventures into Palm Beach County's Democratic condo belt to holdforth on foreign policy.
The politician in question is former Broward County Commissioner Ben Graberand, indeed, he's considering a challenge of reputedly unbeatable U.S. Rep.Robert Wexler in a Democratic congressional primary next year.
Graber lost a Democratic state Senate primary last year to Wexler-backedJeremy Ring. Now Graber is remaining in circulation in Wexler's PalmBeach-Broward congressional district and making it known he's available tospeak to clubs and other organizations. On Tuesday, Graber has a gig at aKings Point Democratic club confab west of Delray Beach. After a career instate and local politics, Graber will speak to Kings Pointers on a topic ofcongressional heft: Iran, Iraq, Israel and U.S. policy.
=
The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/16456505.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Sun, Jan. 14, 2007
THE INSURANCE CRISIS
Pay now or pay later?
The legislature meets Tuesday to tackle the insurance crisis. Homeownerswill see some rate relief, but it comes at a big price.
BY BEATRICE E. GARCIA
bgarcia@MiamiHerald.com
Relief from rocketing insurance rates is on the way.
But curb your excitement. You will pay later.
Many of the proposals to be deliberated on during this week's specialsession of the Legislature would pass more risk from insurers to consumersand the state of Florida.
That means the tab would be deferred until a major storm hits. Then allFlorida residents would pay, through hefty surcharges on insurance policiesor higher taxes.
''What we're doing is providing a short-term fix, which is great forconsumers,'' said Michael Keeby, senior vice president of HBA InsuranceGroup. ``Long-term, what's going to happen is that [this crisis] is going tokill our economy.''
=
PalmBeachPost.com
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/content/state/epaper/2007/01/15/m1a_FLAPREZ_0115.html
Bush allies back Romney, Oct. straw poll
By Brian E. Crowley
Palm Beach Post Political Editor
Monday, January 15, 2007
Jeb Bush may be gone from Tallahassee, but his political machine is activeand plotting a course that would make Florida a major player in picking theRepublican Party's candidate for president.
Key Bush operatives are backing former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. Theyare led by Sally Bradshaw, Bush's former campaign manager and chief ofstaff; Ann Herberger, Bush's finance director; and Mandy Fletcher, who juststepped down as executive director of Bush's Foundation for Florida's
Future.
Romney's Florida team is pushing for an October straw ballot in which 3,500Republican delegates would cast nonbinding votes for president. The Octobervote would bring attention from the nation's news media and give the winnera boost going into the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary.
=
The Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/16462114.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
Posted on Mon, Jan. 15, 2007
TALLAHASSEE
Florida's finance chief tested early
Alex Sink, one of just two Democrats holding statewide office, has a lotriding on how she will handle the state's insurance crisis.
BY GARY FINEOUT
gfineout@MiamiHerald.com
TALLAHASSEE - Just days before Adelaide ''Alex'' Sink was sworn in to hernew job as Florida's chief financial officer, the company responsible forreplacing one of the state's most important computer systems walked out thedoor.
The project is already behind schedule, likely to cost at least double the$57 million the state has already spent, and the now-departed company,Bearing Point, may wind up in court to get money it says the state owes it.
And this is no ordinary computer system the state is trying to fix: It's theaccounting system that actually keeps track of the billions spent by thestate each year.
=
Tampabay.com
http://www.sptimes.com/2007/01/14/news_pf/Opinion/What_the_senator_lear.shtml
What the senator learned in Syria
SUSAN TAYLOR MARTIN
Published January 14, 2007
U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson, a Florida Democrat, recently met with Bashar Assad,the 41-year-old president of Syria, whose country is accused by the Bushadministration of letting foreign fighters cross its border into Iraq.Syria, along with Iran, also supports the anti-Israel groups Hamas andHezbollah, and was implicated in the 2005 assassination of former LebanesePrime Minister Rafik Hariri, a critic of Syria's longtime control ofLebanon.
Nelson, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, discussed histrip with Senior Correspondent Susan Taylor Martin.
Q. Why did you want to go to Syria?
A. The Iraq Study Group had just reported to our committee, and one of themajor recommendations was that there needed to be a huge diplomaticoffensive throughout the Middle East to try to solve the Iraq situation, andone of their recommendations was to start a dialogue with Syria.
[ Send your comments about any of the articles in Ray's List Digest toRays.List@Comcast.net ]
#####
GLBT DIGEST - January 15, 2007
**IF YOU CAN'T ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE, CONTACT US ATrays.list@comcast.net and we'll be happy to send the full article.
=
HUMAN RIGHTS CAMPAIGN
http://www.hrc.org/placestowork/
BEST PLACES TO WORK FOR GLBT EQUALITY
Check out our list of the top companies that support equality for gay,lesbian, bisexual and transgender employees. Based on our annual report, theCorporate Equality Index that rates corporate America's treatment of GLBTemployees, more than 140 companies received a perfect score demonstratingtheir commitment to equality. (More on methodology)
Individuals can be fired in 33 states if they are gay, lesbian, or bisexual,and 42 states if they are transgender. HRC recognizes these Best Places toWork for GLBT Equality as companies that have made a commitment to enddiscrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity in theworkplace.
Click on the industry heading to see a list of companies as well as theirscores on our report, information on their policies and a link to theirsite. Good luck on your job search.
Advertising and Marketing back to top
Starcom MediaVest Group Chicago IL
Aerospace and Defense back to top
Boeing Co. Chicago IL
Honeywell International Inc. Morristown NJ
Northrop Grumman Corp. Los Angeles CA
Raytheon Co. Waltham MA
Airlines back to top
AMR Corp Fort Worth TX
US Airways Group, Inc. Tempe AZ
Apparel, Fashion, Textiles and Department Stores back to top
Abercrombie & Fitch Co. New Albany OH
Gap Inc. San Francisco CA
Levi Strauss & Co. San Francisco CA
Liz Claiborne Inc. New York NY
Nike Inc. Beaverton OR
Nordstrom Inc. Seattle WA
Automotive back to top
DaimlerChrysler Corp. Auburn Hills MI
Ford Motor Co. Dearborn MI
General Motors Corp. Detroit MI
Volkswagen of America Inc. Auburn Hills MI
Banking and Financial Services back to top
American Express Co. New York NY
Ameriprise Financial Inc. Minneapolis MN
Bank of America Corp. Charlotte NC
Capital One Financial Corp. McLean VA
Charles Schwab Corp., The San Francisco CA
Citigroup Inc. New York NY
Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC New York NY
Deutsche Bank New York NY
Fannie Mae Washington DC
Goldman Sachs Group Inc., The New York NY
J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. New York NY
Lehman Brothers Holdings New York NY
Mellon Financial Corp. Pittsburgh PA
Merrill Lynch & Co. New York NY
Morgan Stanley New York NY
State Street Corp. Boston MA
SunTrust Banks Inc. Atlanta GA
Visa International Foster City CA
Wachovia Corp. Charlotte NC
Wells Fargo & Co. San Francisco CA
Chemicals and Biotechnology back to top
Dow Chemical Co. Midland MI
DuPont (E. I. du Pont de Nemours) Wilmington DE
Computer Software back to top
Adobe San Jose CA
Intuit Mountain View CA
Microsoft Redmond WA
Computers and Data Services back to top
ChoicePoint Inc. Alpharetta GA
International Business Machines Corp. Armonk NY
Computers and Office Equipment back to top
Apple Computer Inc. Cupertino CA
Cisco Systems Inc. San Jose CA
Dell Inc. Round Rock TX
Hewlett-Packard Co. Palo Alto CA
Lexmark International Inc. Lexington KY
NCR Corp. Dayton OH
Sun Microsystems Inc. Santa Clara CA
Tech Data Corp. Clearwater FL
Xerox Corp. Stamford CT
Consulting back to top
Bain & Company Inc. Boston MA
Deloitte & Touche USA LLP New York NY
Ernst & Young LLP New York NY
Hewitt Associates Lincolnshire IL
KPMG LLP New York NY
McKinsey & Co. Inc. New York NY
PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP New York NY
Entertainment and Media back to top
Clear Channel Communications, Inc. San Antonio TX
Google Inc. Mountain View CA
Viacom Inc. New York NY
Walt Disney Co. Burbank CA
Food and Beverage back to top
Anheuser-Busch Companies, Inc. St. Louis MO
Brinker International Inc. Dallas TX
Cargill Inc. Wayzata MN
Coca-Cola Company Atlanta GA
Coors Brewing Company Denver CO
General Mills Inc. Minneapolis MN
Kraft Foods Inc. Northfield IL
PepsiCo Inc. Purchase NY
Health Care back to top
Aetna Inc. Hartford CT
Bausch & Lomb Inc. Rochester NY
CIGNA Corp. Philadelphia PA
Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Inc. Wellesley MA
Kaiser Permanente Oakland CA
High-Tech Photography and Science back to top
Agere Systems Inc. Allentown PA
Agilent Technologies Inc. Palo Alto CA
Corning Inc. Corning NY
Eastman Kodak Co. Rochester NY
Freescale Semiconductor Inc. Austin TX
Intel Corp. Santa Clara CA
Motorola Inc. Schaumburg IL
Home Furnishing back to top
Mitchell Gold + Bob Williams Taylorsville NC
Replacements Ltd. McLeansville NC
Hotels, Resorts and Casinos back to top
Carlson Companies Inc. Minnetonka MN
Global Hyatt Corp. Chicago IL
Kimpton Hotel & Restaurant Group, Inc. San Francisco CA
Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide White Plains NY
The Olivia Companies LLC San Francisco CA
Insurance back to top
Allianz Life Insurance Co. of North America Minneapolis MN
California State Automobile Association San Francisco CA
Chubb Corp. Warren NJ
CNA Insurance Chicago IL
ING North America Insurance Corp. Atlanta GA
MetLife, Inc. New York NY
Nationwide Columbus OH
Prudential Financial Inc. Newark NJ
Law Firms back to top
Alston & Bird LLP Atlanta GA
Arnold & Porter Washington DC
Dorsey & Whitney Minneapolis MN
Faegre & Benson Minneapolis MN
Heller Ehrman LLP San Francisco CA
Jenner & Block LLP Chicago IL
McDermott Will & Emery LLP Chicago IL
Morrison & Foerster LLP San Francisco CA
Nixon Peabody LLP Rochester NY
Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe San Francisco CA
Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP San Francisco CA
Powell Goldstein LLP Atlanta GA
Manufacturing back to top
Cummins Inc. Columbus IN
Owens Corning Toledo OH
Miscellaneous back to top
Bright Horizons Family Solutions Inc. Watertown MA
Oil and Gas back to top
BP America Warrenville IL
Chevron San Ramon CA
Pharmaceuticals back to top
Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. New York NY
Eli Lilly & Co. Indianapolis IN
GlaxoSmithKline plc Philadelphia PA
Hospira Inc. Lake Forest IL
Johnson & Johnson New Brunswick NJ
Merck & Co. Inc. Whitehouse Station NJ
Pfizer Inc. New York NY
Schering-Plough Corp. Kenilworth NJ
Publishing and Printing back to top
CMP Media Manhasset NY
New York Times New York NY
Retail back to top
Best Buy Co. Inc. Richfield MN
Clorox Company Oakland CA
Estee Lauder Companies New York NY
S.C. Johnson & Son, Inc. Racine WI
Sears Holdings Corporation Hoffman Estates IL
Walgreens Co. Deerfield IL
Whirlpool Corp. Benton Harbor MI
Telecommunications back to top
AT&T Inc. San Antonio TX
Avaya Inc. Basking Ridge NJ
BellSouth Corp. Atlanta GA
Lucent Technologies Inc. Murray Hill NJ
Motorola Inc. Schaumburg IL
Sprint Nextel Corp Reston VA
Utilities back to top
Consolidated Edison Co. New York NY
Keyspan Corp Brooklyn NY
PG&E Corp. San Francisco CA
Sempra Energy San Diego CA
[Send your comments about articles to Rays.List@Comcast.net]
#####
=
HUMAN RIGHTS CAMPAIGN
http://www.hrc.org/placestowork/
BEST PLACES TO WORK FOR GLBT EQUALITY
Check out our list of the top companies that support equality for gay,lesbian, bisexual and transgender employees. Based on our annual report, theCorporate Equality Index that rates corporate America's treatment of GLBTemployees, more than 140 companies received a perfect score demonstratingtheir commitment to equality. (More on methodology)
Individuals can be fired in 33 states if they are gay, lesbian, or bisexual,and 42 states if they are transgender. HRC recognizes these Best Places toWork for GLBT Equality as companies that have made a commitment to enddiscrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity in theworkplace.
Click on the industry heading to see a list of companies as well as theirscores on our report, information on their policies and a link to theirsite. Good luck on your job search.
Advertising and Marketing back to top
Starcom MediaVest Group Chicago IL
Aerospace and Defense back to top
Boeing Co. Chicago IL
Honeywell International Inc. Morristown NJ
Northrop Grumman Corp. Los Angeles CA
Raytheon Co. Waltham MA
Airlines back to top
AMR Corp Fort Worth TX
US Airways Group, Inc. Tempe AZ
Apparel, Fashion, Textiles and Department Stores back to top
Abercrombie & Fitch Co. New Albany OH
Gap Inc. San Francisco CA
Levi Strauss & Co. San Francisco CA
Liz Claiborne Inc. New York NY
Nike Inc. Beaverton OR
Nordstrom Inc. Seattle WA
Automotive back to top
DaimlerChrysler Corp. Auburn Hills MI
Ford Motor Co. Dearborn MI
General Motors Corp. Detroit MI
Volkswagen of America Inc. Auburn Hills MI
Banking and Financial Services back to top
American Express Co. New York NY
Ameriprise Financial Inc. Minneapolis MN
Bank of America Corp. Charlotte NC
Capital One Financial Corp. McLean VA
Charles Schwab Corp., The San Francisco CA
Citigroup Inc. New York NY
Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC New York NY
Deutsche Bank New York NY
Fannie Mae Washington DC
Goldman Sachs Group Inc., The New York NY
J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. New York NY
Lehman Brothers Holdings New York NY
Mellon Financial Corp. Pittsburgh PA
Merrill Lynch & Co. New York NY
Morgan Stanley New York NY
State Street Corp. Boston MA
SunTrust Banks Inc. Atlanta GA
Visa International Foster City CA
Wachovia Corp. Charlotte NC
Wells Fargo & Co. San Francisco CA
Chemicals and Biotechnology back to top
Dow Chemical Co. Midland MI
DuPont (E. I. du Pont de Nemours) Wilmington DE
Computer Software back to top
Adobe San Jose CA
Intuit Mountain View CA
Microsoft Redmond WA
Computers and Data Services back to top
ChoicePoint Inc. Alpharetta GA
International Business Machines Corp. Armonk NY
Computers and Office Equipment back to top
Apple Computer Inc. Cupertino CA
Cisco Systems Inc. San Jose CA
Dell Inc. Round Rock TX
Hewlett-Packard Co. Palo Alto CA
Lexmark International Inc. Lexington KY
NCR Corp. Dayton OH
Sun Microsystems Inc. Santa Clara CA
Tech Data Corp. Clearwater FL
Xerox Corp. Stamford CT
Consulting back to top
Bain & Company Inc. Boston MA
Deloitte & Touche USA LLP New York NY
Ernst & Young LLP New York NY
Hewitt Associates Lincolnshire IL
KPMG LLP New York NY
McKinsey & Co. Inc. New York NY
PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP New York NY
Entertainment and Media back to top
Clear Channel Communications, Inc. San Antonio TX
Google Inc. Mountain View CA
Viacom Inc. New York NY
Walt Disney Co. Burbank CA
Food and Beverage back to top
Anheuser-Busch Companies, Inc. St. Louis MO
Brinker International Inc. Dallas TX
Cargill Inc. Wayzata MN
Coca-Cola Company Atlanta GA
Coors Brewing Company Denver CO
General Mills Inc. Minneapolis MN
Kraft Foods Inc. Northfield IL
PepsiCo Inc. Purchase NY
Health Care back to top
Aetna Inc. Hartford CT
Bausch & Lomb Inc. Rochester NY
CIGNA Corp. Philadelphia PA
Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Inc. Wellesley MA
Kaiser Permanente Oakland CA
High-Tech Photography and Science back to top
Agere Systems Inc. Allentown PA
Agilent Technologies Inc. Palo Alto CA
Corning Inc. Corning NY
Eastman Kodak Co. Rochester NY
Freescale Semiconductor Inc. Austin TX
Intel Corp. Santa Clara CA
Motorola Inc. Schaumburg IL
Home Furnishing back to top
Mitchell Gold + Bob Williams Taylorsville NC
Replacements Ltd. McLeansville NC
Hotels, Resorts and Casinos back to top
Carlson Companies Inc. Minnetonka MN
Global Hyatt Corp. Chicago IL
Kimpton Hotel & Restaurant Group, Inc. San Francisco CA
Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide White Plains NY
The Olivia Companies LLC San Francisco CA
Insurance back to top
Allianz Life Insurance Co. of North America Minneapolis MN
California State Automobile Association San Francisco CA
Chubb Corp. Warren NJ
CNA Insurance Chicago IL
ING North America Insurance Corp. Atlanta GA
MetLife, Inc. New York NY
Nationwide Columbus OH
Prudential Financial Inc. Newark NJ
Law Firms back to top
Alston & Bird LLP Atlanta GA
Arnold & Porter Washington DC
Dorsey & Whitney Minneapolis MN
Faegre & Benson Minneapolis MN
Heller Ehrman LLP San Francisco CA
Jenner & Block LLP Chicago IL
McDermott Will & Emery LLP Chicago IL
Morrison & Foerster LLP San Francisco CA
Nixon Peabody LLP Rochester NY
Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe San Francisco CA
Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP San Francisco CA
Powell Goldstein LLP Atlanta GA
Manufacturing back to top
Cummins Inc. Columbus IN
Owens Corning Toledo OH
Miscellaneous back to top
Bright Horizons Family Solutions Inc. Watertown MA
Oil and Gas back to top
BP America Warrenville IL
Chevron San Ramon CA
Pharmaceuticals back to top
Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. New York NY
Eli Lilly & Co. Indianapolis IN
GlaxoSmithKline plc Philadelphia PA
Hospira Inc. Lake Forest IL
Johnson & Johnson New Brunswick NJ
Merck & Co. Inc. Whitehouse Station NJ
Pfizer Inc. New York NY
Schering-Plough Corp. Kenilworth NJ
Publishing and Printing back to top
CMP Media Manhasset NY
New York Times New York NY
Retail back to top
Best Buy Co. Inc. Richfield MN
Clorox Company Oakland CA
Estee Lauder Companies New York NY
S.C. Johnson & Son, Inc. Racine WI
Sears Holdings Corporation Hoffman Estates IL
Walgreens Co. Deerfield IL
Whirlpool Corp. Benton Harbor MI
Telecommunications back to top
AT&T Inc. San Antonio TX
Avaya Inc. Basking Ridge NJ
BellSouth Corp. Atlanta GA
Lucent Technologies Inc. Murray Hill NJ
Motorola Inc. Schaumburg IL
Sprint Nextel Corp Reston VA
Utilities back to top
Consolidated Edison Co. New York NY
Keyspan Corp Brooklyn NY
PG&E Corp. San Francisco CA
Sempra Energy San Diego CA
[Send your comments about articles to Rays.List@Comcast.net]
#####
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