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(04/07/08 4:50am)
PHILADELPHIA - Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton are hustling for the youth vote in Pennsylvania as if they’ve never heard this is a state where the old hold sway.\nCampuses in the cities and mountainsides are alive with political activism, stirred most notably by Obama in student registration drives aimed at replicating his success with young voters dating to the Iowa caucus in January.\nHow motivated are his youthful supporters? So motivated that Alyssa Beasley, 20, endured an encounter with the DMV so she could switch her driver’s license from New Jersey and register to vote at the same time.\nAnd how high are their expectations? In Beasley’s case, very.\n“I feel like my entire hope and dream for America lies on this man’s shoulders,” she said on the tree-lined campus of the Jesuit-run University of Scranton.\nThat heady courtship is matched by a vigorous effort on Clinton’s side. Altogether, the April 22 primary is becoming more of a can’t-miss event for the young instead of just another why-bother one on the political calendar.\nDoug Jones, 19, got so caught up in the excitement that he registered as a Democrat to vote for Clinton, even though he’ll probably vote Republican in the fall.\n“I’m not doing it out of sneaky and scheming motives to down the Democratic nominee,” said the University of Scranton student. “I’d like to take part in the process.”\nPennsylvania ranks third in the nation in the percentage of people 65 and older, a group that has favored Clinton elsewhere and appears strong for her here.\nObama is counting on a big showing from the state’s nearly 700,000 college students on more than 150 campuses.\nThe Illinois senator has received the support of about 60 percent of voters aged 18-24 in competitive states, exit polls indicate, and his advantage with that group doesn’t appear to be waning in Pennsylvania.\nThe question is whether that will be enough to prevail in a state where polls have found Clinton consistently ahead, if by shrinking margins.\n“We have a long way to go in Pennsylvania and maximizing the votes of young voters is critical if we’re going to be able to close the gap,” said Sean Smith, an Obama spokesman.\nPennsylvania makes voting easy for students from other states because it only requires 30 days residency to register. However, no one who voted in an earlier primary elsewhere can vote again here.\nMia Prensky, 21, of Harrisburg, said Obama supporters have been on her campus at Bryn Mawr Colleg – a women’s school with stone buildings nestled in Philadelphia’s wealthy Main Line – handing out stickers, distributing information about the Iraq war and encouraging students to vote. They struck a chord with her.\n“I still don’t really like the fact that Hillary voted for the war,” she said.\nIn Philadelphia, where more than 100,000 college students live, Obama volunteers with voter registration forms in hand have been on campuses and at train stations around Philadelphia’s bustling University City district, encouraging their peers to register.\nAmong them was Seth Dean, 23, a University of Pennsylvania student who said he decided in January to register as a Democrat in Pennsylvania. At home in Florida, he was a registered independent.\n“I kind of thought from the beginning it was going to be kind of a long, drawn-out fight and it might come down to Pennsylvania, so I just made a tactical decision,” Dean said.\nAside from Obama’s strong base among black voters, young voters are probably his strongest group, said Scott Keeter, director of survey research for the Pew Research Center.\n“I cannot recall another candidate in the past couple of decades that had such consistent support from young people,” Keeter said.\nA recent Quinnipiac University poll found Obama leading Clinton 51 percent to 42 percent among likely Democratic voters ages 18-44 in Pennsylvania, but trailing nine points overall.
(08/02/07 12:27am)
WASHINGTON – President Bush’s choice to head the military Joint Chiefs of Staff said Tuesday an increase of troops in Iraq is giving commanders the forces needed to improve security there.\n“Security is better, not great, but better,” said Navy Adm. Michael Mullen, speaking before the Senate Committee on Armed Services at his nomination hearing.\nMullen acknowledged under questioning that, “there does not appear to be much political progress” in Iraq.\n“I believe security is critical to providing the government of Iraq the breathing space it needs to work toward political national reconciliation and economic growth, which are themselves critical to a stable Iraq,” Mullen said. “Barring that, no amount of troops and no amount of time will make much of a difference.”\nHe said morale is still high, but he doesn’t take for granted the service of U.S. troops. He said the war has spread forces thin.\n“I worry about the toll this pace of operations is taking on them, our equipment and on our ability to respond to other crises and contingencies,” he said.\nIn written answers to prepared questions, Mullen earlier said he and other Joint Chiefs met with the president and Defense Secretary Robert Gates to discuss the plan last January to pour as many as 30,000 more U.S. forces into Iraq.\n“We had rigorous and thorough discussions and debates” of the troop buildup plan, he said in the written response. “The president then made his decision, and I am in support of that decision and working to make it succeed.”\nAmbassador Ryan Crocker and Gen. David Petraeus, the U.S. commander in Iraq, are to report to Congress in September on conditions related to the war strategy. Already, however, lawmakers from both parties have expressed impatience with progress in Iraq. Earlier this week, the chief lawmaking body in Iraq went into recess until September.\nIf the United States fails in Iraq, Iran would be a winner, Mullen said. He said there’s a strong indication that Iran is supporting the Taliban in Afghanistan and indications Iran has fed technology into Iraq and Afghanistan that has led to the deaths of U.S. troops.\nHe said a combination of factors “makes me concerned about Iran and where they’re headed.”\nMullen acknowledged that slow progress in Iraq is hurting U.S. credibility and encouraging Iran’s regional ambitions.\nHe said it’s important to see results more than four years into the war. Some 160,000 U.S. troops are in Iraq, and more than 3,640 Americans have been killed.
(02/11/05 4:24am)
EVANSVILLE -- When duty called him to Afghanistan, Dr. Anthony Carter closed his family medical practice in the tiny Kentucky town of Tompkinsville and laid off his 10 employees.\nThe Army reservist relished the opportunity to treat wounded soldiers. But Carter worried about mounting bills, his children in college and his laid-off workers.\nThe strain stemmed from the so-called "patriot penalty" -- the gap between what deployed Guard and Reserve troops are paid and their civilian salaries. For Carter, the difference was in the tens of thousands of dollars, and it meant having to borrow money to reopen his practice after nine months away in 2003.\n"I was glad to do it. I'm proud I did it, but financially it was a hardship," said Carter, 47.\nLegislation proposed by Sen. Evan Bayh, D-Ind., would eliminate that penalty by reimbursing troops who make less at war up to $50,000 of the lost income.\nIt also would offer tax breaks up to $15,000 annually to corporations that supplement the incomes of employees called to service.\nAbout half of all troops in Iraq are in the Guard and Reserves. Based on a Pentagon study, Bayh estimates that 40 percent of those troops make less money while deployed.\n"These families are trying to do the right thing for our country, and it's not right they should be struggling when we're in the right position to help them out," Bayh said.\nBayh said he would offer his plan as an amendment to President Bush's proposal to boost government payments to families of U.S. troops killed at war.\nBut some question whether Bayh's program, costing about $250 million a year, is the best use of resources when troops also need equipment and training.\n"This is a difficult environment right now and there are so many needs," said John Goheen, spokesman for the National Guard Association of the United States. "It becomes difficult to say yes, we support it, or whether we don't. It's a real tough issue."\nBayh said most payouts would be a few thousand dollars; a small amount "compared to the tens of billions we're spending annually in Iraq." He believes they could help with recruiting and re-enlistment efforts at a time when the Guard is stretched thin.\nNot all troops would qualify. Some make more money in the battlefield than in the civilian sector. Those who are single often come home with thousands in savings.\nBut those who don't reap the benefits need the help, said Dr. David Carlson, an Evansville surgeon and Army reservist who spent three months in Iraq in 2004.\n"A lot of them with families didn't have the savings or wherewithal to weather it very well," Carlson said of his fellow troops.\nRoger Stradley of USA Cares, a Radcliff, Ky.-based group that works to help military families in crisis, said many are embarrassed to seek financial help.\n"They're discouraged. They feel like they're all by themselves and they're not," said Stradley, whose group has provided military families $300,000 in food vouchers since the start of the Iraq war.\nCarter and his wife Teresa, a nurse who works as his office manager, are still feeling his loss of income.\nTeresa Carter, 46, said her husband's salary supports their three children, ages 13 to 23, and pays expenses like malpractice insurance and payroll. Many of those bills piled up while his practice was closed, she said.\n"If he got the $50,000 additional thing ... it would all be paying things back. I could see it going to zero really quickly," she said.\nCarter's practice has rebounded and he has rehired his employees. But his wife said it will take two to three years to fully recover.\n"I'm so proud of what he did that it's worth it," Teresa Carter said.\nShe worries, though, about young, less established Guard and Reserve families who might not have the background they did in handling money.\n"For somebody who did not know about finances or things, it would be such a shock for them," she said. "I think it would be really tough"
(10/06/04 4:34am)
EVANSVILLE -- Two of the nation's most-watched congressional races are playing out in the rolling hills of southern Indiana, where conservative values hold sway and fickle voters make even a five-time incumbent fair game.\nThe 8th Congressional District, long known as the "Bloody 8th" for its close, contentious races, is living up to its nickname as Republican incumbent John Hostettler is being challenged by Jon Jennings, a former Boston Celtics scout and aide to President Clinton.\nThe 9th District race, meanwhile, is on track to be one of the district's most expensive as incumbent Democrat Baron Hill is challenged for a second time by millionaire trucking company owner Mike Sodrel.\nThough no Indiana congressional incumbent has lost in a decade, both Hostettler and Hill are seen as vulnerable because of their narrow margins of victory in 2002.\nAnd with Republicans holding a slim 229-206 edge in the U.S. House of Representatives, each district is being closely watched by the national parties.\n"In the nation at large, there are very few seats that are really worth the time and the attention of the national parties. It just so happens that two of them are down here by the Ohio River," said Robert Dion, who teaches American politics at the University of Evansville.\nThe national Republican Party has tried to give Sodrel the exposure he needs to unseat Hill, a three-time incumbent.\n"Mike Sodrel is one of our top challenger candidates anywhere in the country and has the full support of President Bush and the party," said Bo Harmon, spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee.\nThe 9th District consists of Louisville, Ky., suburbs, Ohio River counties in the south and rural counties to the north. It has historically been Democratic but has become more Republican in recent years.\nA victory for Sodrel would give Republicans another ally for President Bush.\nHill, who campaigns by walking the district, was a high school basketball star and a state legislator first elected in 1998 in a tight race for the seat held by Democrat Lee Hamilton for 34 years. \nAl Cox, a Libertarian, is also competing in the race.\nThomas Wolf, a political science professor emeritus at IU Southeast, predicts a close race. While Hill is well known in the party and district, Wolf said Sodrel is a more experienced candidate this time and could benefit from a strong turnout in Indiana for President Bush. No Democratic presidential candidate has won the state's electoral votes since Lyndon Johnson in 1964.\nThe 8th District, which encompasses Evansville and Terre Haute, could be just as close, due largely to voters' willingness to shift allegiance.\nStacy Kerr, press secretary for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, said the election is one of the party's best opportunities to oust a Republican incumbent.\n"Jon Jennings has been in the race for over a year. He has consistently out-raised Hostettler and is running a very organized field organization not seen in this district by a Democratic candidate," Kerr said.\nHostettler, a Christian fundamentalist who opposes gay marriage, has shown a willingness to buck the Republican Party. He was one of only six House Republicans to vote against authorizing force against Iraq. He also, in 2000, was one of three congressmen to vote against the Violence Against Women Act, which funds services to help victims of domestic and sexual violence.\nIn April, he was arrested at the Louisville, Ky., airport after being caught with a loaded gun at a security checkpoint. He pleaded guilty, receiving a 60-day jail sentence in August. He will avoid jail time if he has no criminal troubles for two years.\nIn 2002, Hostettler defeated Democrat Bryan Hartke, an engineer, by about 10,000 votes. Dion said that margin is low for a five-time incumbent and could leave Hostettler vulnerable on Nov. 2.\nMark Garvin, an Independent, is also in the 8th District race.
(09/06/04 5:41am)
EDINBURGH, Ind. -- Lt. Col. Jim Cotter has never been in a combat zone, but he knows war is serious business.\nHe sees the evidence in the eyes of the wounded in their hospital beds, in the face of a soldier whose 3-year-old son doesn't recognize her after her time in Afghanistan. It's painfully clear in the words of a soldier who is asked if he saw anyone die in Iraq and replies, "Yeah, my marriage."\nCotter, 55, witnesses war's toll regularly as the chaplain at Camp Atterbury, a key mobilization station for deploying Guard and reserve troops about 30 miles south of Indianapolis.\nBy year's end, an estimated 20,000 troops will have been through the Army post since the start of the Iraq war. Cotter, activated with the Indiana National Guard in early 2003, will have met with most of them.\nSex and intimacy, alcoholism, war flashbacks -- no topics are taboo. Cotter listens and advises, his messages blunt but kind and filled with thanks for the soldiers' service.\nDuring a recent briefing with a Michigan Army National Guard unit just back from six months in the Sinai Peninsula, Cotter tried to prepare soldiers for the adjustment to civilian life. The road ahead, he said, would be bumpy, and they shouldn't expect things to be as they once were.\n"You guys changed. Your family changed," Cotter says. "You can't expect to go back in time to where you were ... you just aren't the same."\nCotter likely won't be the same either when he returns to his parish at Praise Lutheran Church in Fort Wayne in February.\nThough he previously served in the active Army and Army reserves in Colorado, this deployment with the Indiana Guard has been one of the most intense periods of his life.\nDuring his first year at Camp Atterbury, Cotter married more than 40 couples. He has baptized countless soldiers. But his hardest job is listening to the fears of those preparing for battle -- or dealing with its aftermath.\n"It would tear you up if you didn't have God's promises," Cotter said. "And it does. There are nights that I cry. There are days I'm grouchy to be around."\nAngie Garcia, a counselor who works with Cotter, said she has yet to see that side.\n"He's a wonderful man. He's really funny and he has such a huge concern for soldiers," Garcia said. "He always has a smile."\nBut his wife, Donna Cotter, said the war has taken on a toll on her husband of 35 years.\nWith her husband's long hours and the three-hour distance between them, she is lucky to see Cotter once a month. But when they're together, she has noticed the fun-loving chaplain is more serious.\n"He hurts for the troops. All the things they have to deal with, their problems here at home and then when they're gone, things that they're facing," Donna Cotter said.\nCapt. Leslie Haines, 45, has been Cotter's assistant since December. \nShe first met Cotter when she arrived at Camp Atterbury after being medically evacuated out of Iraq because of neurological problems in her arms.\nShe's seen the lighter side of him, such as the time he hid a soldier's vehicle after she ignored repeated warnings to stop leaving her keys in the ignition.\nAnd she has seen him welcome soldiers into the chapel late at night for talks, even though he was on his way out after a long day.\n"He's constantly taking care of soldiers," Haines said. "I've never seen anyone put in that level of dedication."\nCotter says he is in the right place.\n"I miss my wife. I miss my families. I miss my church. But I know, without a doubt, this is what God's called me to do, right here," Cotter said.\nHis one regret is that he has only five days to spend with returning troops at Camp Atterbury before they head back to their civilian lives.\n"There's not one soldier that comes back whole, not one," Cotter said. "I know that when we send them home, they're not whole still"
(07/22/04 2:17am)
FRENCH LICK, Ind. -- The Donald proved resilient again, beating two other casino groups -- including one backed by hometown hero Larry Bird -- Tuesday for the bid to build a casino in this struggling community where movie stars once vacationed.\nResidents immediately celebrated the decision with draft beer, pizza and hot dogs as a band played "Happy Days are Here Again." They gathered in a room next to where the commission had met at the French Lick Springs Resort & Hotel, about 60 miles northwest of Louisville, Ky.\n"Isn't this great?" said Geneva Street, a hairdresser who lobbied for 10 years at the Statehouse for the casino. "It's like Christmas in July."\nIn a 4-2 vote with one abstention, the Indiana Gaming Commission awarded the contract to billionaire developer Donald Trump after an hour-long discussion at the end of two days of public hearings.\nCommissioners who voted for Trump said the developer had the support of a local committee that earlier in the day unanimously endorsed his bid. He also was strongly backed by those who spoke during a public hearing Monday night. They also said he had the best marketing strategy.\nTrump promised to open the casino with a parking garage and to give $10 million to the French Lick Resort and the West Baden Springs Hotel for restoration.\nTrump's proposal includes a deli, a buffet and an entertainment lounge. Trump has the added draw of Indiana golfer Fuzzy Zoeller, who has said he would partner with the billionaire.\nIt is going to be built next to the French Lick resort, one of two in the area popular with celebrities before the 1929 stock-market crash.\n"I think the locals are going to have to live with this a long time. To go against what they recommended, I'd have to have a very good reason," said gaming commission member Robert Barlow.\nThe commissioners said they were not as impressed by the offer made by Orange County Development, a group that includes the NBA's Indiana Pacers President Bird.\nThe project included a museum featuring Bird's basketball memorabilia. Any money Bird made in the partnership would have gone to a foundation he said would have generated $10.46 million for Orange County in 10 years.\nBut unlike the two other groups, which promised to spend more than $100 million on the project, Orange County Development was not willing to invest more than $60 million.\n"I found the details woefully lacking," said Maurice Ndukwu, a commission member.\nDon Vowels, gaming commission chairman, did say he was impressed that the Bird group did not appear to exaggerate its offer and was "very refreshing in their lack of hyperbole."\nThe two commissioners who voted against Trump's proposal favored the Lost River Group, which partnered an Indianapolis real estate company and a Chicago gaming operator. Lost River preferred building the casino next to the West Baden hotel, and proposed retail shops and bowling alley. It also said it had agreed to buy and restore the West Baden for $65 million.\nTrump already operates a Lake Michigan riverboat in Gary. Trump's casino company lost $87 million last year, but an executive told the state commission Monday that the company was going through a reorganization that would give it a strong balance sheet this year.\nCommissioners Ndukwu and Marya Rose, who voted against Trump, both said they were worried about the company's financial health.\n"I'm concerned about trying to overreach here, and that's why the Trump proposal gives me pause. I've got a financial concern about their stability, and is it really just too much?" Rose said.\nCommission member Ann Bochnowski countered with, "I have to take them on their word that their financial house will soon be in order."\nNdukwu said Trump's group had done a good job appealing to locals during meetings over the last several months. The group also has promoted his star power to attract celebrities and said he would attend the riverboat opening.\nThat was appealing news to many in Orange County, which consistently has one of the worst unemployment rankings in the state.\n"If anything, that's where Lost River group may have fallen short -- they didn't have same local support," Ndukwu said. "It's a shame because they actually had a very tight presentation and viable option for this community."\nRepresentatives from Lost River and Bird's group left the meeting Tuesday without commenting.\nTrump's group has said it expects to open the casino 16 months after receiving the bid.
(04/22/04 4:27am)
LYNNVILLE, Ind. -- A paramedic hurt when a medical helicopter crashed on a remote southwestern Indiana hillside used his cell phone to call for help and then waved a flashlight to signal their whereabouts.\nThe crash some 20 miles northeast of Evansville killed the heart patient on board the flight from Huntingburg to an Evansville hospital.\nAll three crew members were injured but were listed in stable condition Wednesday, said Toni Chritton, a spokeswoman for Air Evac Lifeteam, which owned the helicopter.\nIt was unclear whether Jerry Leonard, 63, of Birdseye Ind. died as a result of his heart condition or injuries received in the crash, said Indiana State Police Sgt. Todd Ringle. Investigators were awaiting the results of an autopsy.\nRingle said the crash happened about 11:30 p.m. Tuesday after the pilot of the Bell Jet Ranger "started to make a turn, and as he was doing so, he started to tumble."\nShortly after midnight, Robert Williams, 29, of Paragon, used a cell phone to call dispatchers for Air Evac Lifeteam in West Plains, Mo., to report the crash, Chritton said.\n"He was obviously upset," Chritton said. "He was injured, and he was telling us his right arm was broken, so he was having trouble trying to hold the cell phone and hold the flashlight at the same time."\nThree medical helicopters -- one from Kentucky and two from Illinois -- and a fourth from the Indiana State Police searched for the crash site for more than an hour before it was located by air.\n"It was in the middle of the night. We had no idea where they were," Chritton said. "The paramedic was the only one able to tell us where to locate the aircraft to get the help they needed to the scene."\nChritton, however, said it was too early to know what happened. Authorities from the National Transportation Safety Board were on the scene of Wednesday's investigation.\nChritton said the 13-year-old helicopter had been refurbished and the company had started flying it a month ago.\n"We truly don't know if he was making an emergency landing or he crashed," Chritton said.\nThe pilot, Richard Larock, 42, of Shepherdsville, Ky., was partially ejected and was listed in stable condition at University of Louisville Hospital in Louisville, Ky., Chritton said.\nA nurse, Steve Ritchey, 30, of Terre Haute, was in stable condition at Deaconess Hospital in Evansville, Chritton said. She said he was unconscious at the crash site.\nWilliams was also in stable condition at Deaconess, Chritton said.\nThe four were the only people on the helicopter, which was based in Washington, Ind.\nAir Evac Lifeteam has 37 medical helicopters in 10 states.
(04/09/03 4:47am)
OUTSKIRTS OF BAGHDAD, Iraq -- The road led to what looked like a carport -- a really long one, but a carport nonetheless. At the rear, though, was something far more interesting to U.S. forces.\nA door. And behind it, lined with moss, a cave entrance -- another mysterious, potentially dangerous gateway into the murky world of Baghdad Underground.\nWas this a path to one of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's notorious hideouts? Were booby traps -- or, worse, Iraqi soldiers lurking inside?\n"We wanted to know if there was enemy in there. We thought there was enemy in there," said Lt. Col. Lee Fetterman, commander of the 101st Airborne's 3rd Battalion, 3rd Brigade.\nYears of rumors about tunnels Saddam had built raised the possibility that just about anything could be underground -- troops, weapons of mass destruction, the Iraqi leader himself.\nA former Iraqi scientist who fled during the 1991 Gulf War, Hussein al-Shahristani, told CBS' "60 Minutes" in February that there were "more than 100 kilometers (over 60 miles) of very complex network, multilayer tunnels."\nBut he never saw them himself. Few have, said Patrick Garrett, a military analyst at Globalsecurity.org. \n"There is tons of conjecture on this subject right now," he said, but "there's been no official confirmation or official imagery."\nSo far, a series of tunnels under Baghdad's international airport have been discovered. On Monday, U.S. forces captured an Iraqi colonel in one tunnel who was calling in artillery fire from his hideout, said Lt. Mark Kitchens, a spokesman for the U.S. Central Command.\n"Obviously for the type of regime we're dealing with, the tunnels represent an ideal spot to conceal weapons and serve as a hideout and in some cases an escape route," he said.\nThe area near the airport had already seen days of skirmishes when forces from the 101st Airborne Division secured it fully on Tuesday.\nThe troops at the airport belong to a unit known as the "Iron Rakkasans" because of strips of burlap connected to their helmets -- "iron hairs" -- that distinguish them from other fighters in the division.\nThe Rakkasan nickname dates to World War II, when the 187th Regiment, 3rd Brigade, parachuted from planes. Loosely translated in Japanese, "Rakkasan" means falling down umbrellas.\nThey were brought to Baghdad because they are light infantry fighters, highly trained in urban combat. Their particular skill is room-clearing, which they used searching for al Qaeda fighters in caves in Afghanistan.\nTo reach the carport, they crossed a landscape of bombed compounds, piles of unexploded ordnance and a field of dead Iraqi fighters, their bodies blackened from coalition attacks.\nWhen the American forces got to the carport, they initially believed it to be one of the intricate tunnel systems that dots the Iraqi capital. That was nerve-racking in itself: Over the weekend, during the night, two Iraqi fighters had popped up from a tunnel on the airport grounds and were chased by U.S. forces into the darkness.\nCarefully, about 150 U.S. soldiers headed out to explore it, first donning the night-vision goggles.\nThey went past the nearby lake, past the lakehouse. They went into the cave mouth, through shin-deep mud and down a set of dark stairs. Then they went in the door.\nInside, they found 12 rooms, each with white marble tile floors, 10-foot ceilings and fluorescent lighting.
(04/07/03 4:39am)
OUTSKIRTS OF BAGHDAD, Iraq -- A giant C-130 transport plane landed at the Baghdad airport Sunday, the first known U.S. aircraft to arrive in the Iraqi capital since the airfield fell into U.S. hands.\nMeanwhile, troops of the 101st Airborne Division exchanged gun and artillery fire with Iraqi forces probing the airport's 13-square-mile perimeter. No U.S. forces were hurt, but a dozen Iraqis were believed killed, said Maj. David Beachman, a battalion operations officer.\nThe airport, captured in an all-night battle last week, is expected to be a major resupply base for American forces and a key to channeling aid to Iraqi civilians. It offers critical landing strips that will let the military hopscotch over the 350-mile supply line that now stretches from the capital to U.S. bases in Kuwait.\nIt is also just 10 miles west of central Baghdad, adjacent to the Radwaniyah presidential residence.\nNavy Lt. Mark Kitchens, a Central Command spokesman, confirmed the C-130 had landed but gave no details.\nIraqi Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf has insisted Iraqi forces recaptured the airport. U.S. forces say they have effective control over the airfield, despite sporadic attacks like the one Sunday.\nTroops of the 101st fortified their position at the sprawling airport Sunday, digging trenches and bulldozing sand berms. Two weapons caches -- including one with 12 crates of shoulder-fired missiles -- were found just outside the airport grounds. Troops also found 35 French-made Roland surface-to-air missiles in the airport complex.\nDuring the fighting, a mortar exploded within 40 feet of a battalion commander scouting the airport perimeter. Beachman said air strikes and artillery barrages were called in to fight off Iraqi forces.\n"It's fine right now. We know who's shooting at who," said Staff Sgt. Jeremy Reed, 29, of Dothan, Ala., as blasts of artillery fire whizzed overhead.\nThe airport troops belong to a 101st unit known as the "Iron Rakkasans" because of strips of burlap connected to their helmets that they call "iron hairs." It distinguishes them from other fighters in the division.\nThe troops were brought to Baghdad because they are light infantry fighters who are highly trained in urban combat. Now that they've arrived, there's little to do but wait.\nSome, like Sgt. Jason Slusser, 24, of Wisconsin Rapids, Wis., are engaged in the universal search for sleep and soap. He said he was washing and doing his laundry in a small plastic tub.\n"An all-out shower, no, but you can get a scrub," Slusser said.\nSgt. 1st Class Richard Clinton, 32, of Madison, Wis., said he "looking forward to the hot towels they give you on the plane on the way back."\nStanding next to a dusty palm tree with a pit of trash burning nearby, he joked: "I'm reading the brochure before I sign up for the next trip"
(11/20/02 3:56am)
EVANSVILLE -- State officials could push back a year-end deadline to announce a route for Interstate 69 through southwestern Indiana to allow more time to consider an alternative proposed by the Environmental Protection Agency.\nBut the goal is still to announce an interstate route from Indianapolis to Evansville by the end of the year, State Transportation Commissioner J. Bryan Nicol said Monday.\n"It will be a couple weeks before we know if it's going to take a little bit longer," Nicol said.\nThe state is reviewing thousands of comments on a draft environmental impact statement that examined 12 routes for the interstate from Indianapolis to Evansville -- five of which the state named as preferred.\nIt is also analyzing a "hybrid" route suggested by EPA officials during an October meeting with Nicol that would follow Indiana 37 south from Indianapolis to Bloomington before turning west to link with U.S. 41 near Vincennes.\nThat route is a combination of two of the studied routes with some additional roadway, Nicol said.\n"We are taking all routes seriously, including the EPA alternative," Nicol said.\nNo decision has been made, but Nicol said the EPA-backed alternative "has the potential to meet our project goals and have less environmental impact."\nTransportation officials have not determined whether the state would need to conduct an environmental impact study of the hybrid route or hold public hearings, Nicol said.\nIf a decision is made to do another study and conduct hearings, choosing a route by the end of the year will be nearly impossible, said James McDowell, a political science professor at Indiana State University.\nBut the state will likely face intense public pressure if it chooses not to publish a study and hold public hearings if it moves forward with the hybrid route.\n"If they didn't do this now, people are going to scream and holler," McDowell said.\nIn a report earlier this month, the EPA said the state's five top choices would damage the state's wetlands and forests, and the state should reconsider a route using existing U.S. 41 and I-70.\nThe U.S. 41/I-70 route is backed by environmentalists but has the longest travel time between Indianapolis and Evansville of the 12 routes. It was not one of the state's top five routes.\nAfter the report was made public last week, Nicol said the "hybrid" route was being reviewed.
(08/01/02 2:07am)
EVANSVILLE -- The route that environmentalists have backed for the Interstate 69 extension between Indianapolis and Evansville is not among the five that state officials said Wednesday they preferred.\nThat route would follow I-70 from Indianapolis to Terre Haute and then use portions of the existing four-lane U.S. 41 south to Evansville, requiring the least amount of new road construction.\nEnvironmentalists contend it would be less expensive and do less damage to farmland and forests than the others.\nAlthough at an estimated average $930 million it is the cheapest, and it would require the most businesses to move and rated poorly when factors such as reducing travel time and spurring economic growth in southwestern Indiana were considered, state highway Commissioner J. Bryan Nicol said.\n"We could not in good conscious take that one forward," Nicol said. "We have to look at the entire picture. We're presenting the entire picture to the public."\nState officials on Wednesday released a detailed study of the five corridors proposed last year for the highway. The study looks at factors such as environmental impact, cost, economic growth, and traffic-related issues such as travel time and freight movement.\nIt then identified 12 possible routes and designated five of them as preferred routes.\nThe announcement drew immediate criticism from the Hoosier Environmental Council.\n"What they said in their presentation today was that (U.S.) 41 is still the cheapest and the least environmentally destructive route, so it's absurd that they are still trying to eliminate that route," said Andy Knott, the group's director of air and energy policy.\n"They have all these other criteria by which they measure things that are biased toward building a new-terrain highway," he said.\nIn comparison to the route supported by Knott, the most expensive route listed as preferred -- estimated to cost $1.74 billion -- goes from Evansville to Washington, then to outside Bloomington, where it follows State Road 37 into Indianapolis.\nOther proposed routes were eliminated because of potential environmental damage to natural resources such as the Beanblossom Bottoms Nature Preserve northwest of Bloomington and Tincher Special Area of the Hoosier National Forest west of Bedford.\nFederal law requires a 30-day comment period on the study. However, Nicol said 90 days would be provided for the public response.\nThe Hoosier Environmental Council has pushed for a 120-day public comment period. It also said the state was moving too quickly by scheduling public hearings on Aug. 19, 20 and 21.\n"They just got through saying this was the most comprehensive and complete study ever done. How can they expect the public to digest a 1,000-page document in less than 20 days?" Knott said.\nThe public comments will be reviewed and a final route will then likely be selected by the end of the year, Nicol said.\nJohn Moore, an attorney with the Environmental Law and Policy Center of the Midwest, said he hoped the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency would take a close look at the draft environmental impact statement.\nThe agency criticized such a report on the I-69 project done in 1996. Among other things, it said the state did not address the project's potential for causing sprawl-type development or its potential for drawing existing development away from the U.S. 41 corridor.\nMoore said it was too early to tell how the EPA would react to this report, but said, "INDOT has invented a lot of fictional purposes and imaginary needs for an all-new highway, and I think that is its biggest weakness."\nHowever, James G. Newland, executive director of the I-69 Mid-Continent Highway Coalition in Indianapolis, said he trusts the work done by the consultants and hopes construction starts soon.\nInterstate 69 is "the answer really to the economic future of southern Indiana," Newland said. "I'm anxious they get working on this, so we can get it started and get this thing finished."\nThe proposed connection is part of the national I-69 proposed NAFTA Superhighway that would link Canada and Mexico. The highway already runs from the Canadian border at Port Huron, Mich., to Indianapolis.\nFrom Evansville, it is planned to go south through Kentucky, Tennessee, Mississippi, Arkansas, Louisiana and Texas.\nIndiana is also funding a separate study with Kentucky to develop an I-69 route that would link Evansville and Kentucky over the Ohio River.\nAssociated Press writer Mike Smith contributed to this story from Indianapolis.\nOn the Net: I-69 Official Web site \n
(06/18/02 11:28pm)
EVANSVILLE, Ind. (AP) - A moderate earthquake rattled church bells and nerves Tuesday in portions of the Midwest and South, but authorities had no immediate reports of serious damage.\nThe quake, which struck at 12:37 p.m. CDT, registered a magnitude of 5.0, said John Bellini with the U.S. Geological Survey in Golden, Colo.\nThe epicenter was 10 miles northwest of Evansville, Ind., near the small town of Darmstadt.\n\"Initially, it was this thunderous noise, and then the actual vibration,\" said Vicki Stuffle, an employee of Old ational Bank in Darmstadt. \"We actually saw the building moving.\"\nThe quake was hard enough to sound the bells inside a church steeple, she said.\nThe quake shook buildings in downtown Evansville and was felt in Indiana as far north as South Bend, about 250 miles away. It also was felt in Illinois, Ohio, Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee and West Virginia.\nThe only damage immediately reported was cracked chimneys and broken glass in the Evansville area, said Alden Taylor, spokesman for the Indiana state emergency management agency.\nOfficials were inundated with calls from people asking about the tremor.\nIn Louisville, Ky., Jerrod Pratt, who works the night shift at a Ford Co. assembly plant, said the quake shook him from his sleep but didn\'t appear to damage his house.\n\"I was laying in my bed and my bed was shaking, my house was shaking,\"\nPratt said. \"I looked out my window and my neighbors were all standing outside looking around.\"\n\"It was weird,\" he said. \"I\'d never experienced anything like that.\"\nBill Smith, a U.S. Geological Survey geophysicist, said the Wabash Valley region periodically is struck by small earthquakes, typically ones that are not strong enough to be felt.\n\"This is much larger than average for the region, but not unprecedented,\" Smith said\nThe strongest earthquake in the region in the last 100 years happened on Nov. 9, 1968. Centered in south-central Illinois, it had a magnitude of 5.4 and was felt in 23 states.\nMaj. Tom Wallis of the Vanderburgh County Sheriff\'s Department felt the quake in his office and said authorities were checking bridges and other structures for damage.\n\"We were shaking, rattling and rolling,\" Wallis said. \"I thought it was Jerry Lee Lewis doing the big one."