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(10/18/07 4:00am)
Has anyone ever more purely captured the human condition in song than Bob Dylan? I would challenge any critic to uncover an artist with more consistent range and poignancy. His staying power, bordering on divinity, lies in his application of simplicity, simple chords and a simple voice as a conduit for complex stories of simple human truths.\nDylan's 1975 album Blood on the Tracks is second only to Blonde on Blonde as the quintessential Dylan album. No appreciator of blues-americana could claim a complete record collection without this album. Dylan's dedication to his folk and blues roots remains true in this sad, homesick, regretful collection of traveling songs.\nWith iconic classics such as "Tangled Up in Blue," "Simple Twist of Fate" and "Shelter from the Storm," Blood on the Tracks has become firmly ingrained in our collective pop consciousness. In every song, Dylan plays on universal human experience to tell stories that stand the test of time like the works of Shakespeare, Ginsberg and Goethe. \n"Buckets of Rain" is the overlooked gem of this album. Buried as the last track, "Buckets" epitomizes the tangled mess of longing, respect and tired beauty, tinged with the misery that characterizes Dylan's romantically themed songs. The uncomplicated chord progression and child-like rhyme structure communicate the universality of unrequited romantic adoration. \nNo one in the history of music has displayed Dylan's influence and consistency. His unique storytelling style and cryptic wordplay have proved consistently iconic, and his coded imagery has provided critics and fans alike with debate fodder for decades. He has sung for the war-weary, the workingman, the heartbroken and the homesick. So long as these themes remain constants of the human condition, Dylan will remain a poignant staple of the American identity.
(10/18/07 4:00am)
f you ever buy an Elvis Costello album, buy this one.\nFor true enthusiasts, his 1977 debut album represents the premier of the Angry Young Man who introduced the pop combination of doo-wop and punk. For Costello students looking for the context of his sound, country-tinged tracks such as "Blame It On Cain" and "Waiting For The End Of The World" more clearly show the metamorphosis of Costello's 30-year career when comparing them to the variance of songs from his 21 studio albums.\nCostello's voice, basement-recording sound and bitingly clever lyrics make My Aim Is True worth the listen. If you don't fall for the swoon in the unfortunately affectionate chorus of "Alison," lyrics such as "Well I see you've got a husband now / Did he leave your pretty fingers lying / in the wedding cake?" catch your attention and maybe your resentment, a not uncommon reaction to his music.\nCostello first caught flack because of the lyrics in "Less Than Zero." His first British single, the song tells the metaphoric story of Mr. Oswald, his swastika tattoo and the porn films he made with his sister. The liner notes of Rhino's 2001 re-release of My Aim Is True identify Mr. Oswald as Oswald Mosley, a British politician from the 1930s who was widely associated with Hitler and Mussolini. It's a hip and sarcastic song that climaxes in the chorus with the kind of drum roll that becomes the calling card of his next album This Year's Model. \nThough it's grouped with the emerging punk scene of 1977, Costello's debut is much more melodic, with equal focus on the irreverent lyrics and an image reminiscent of Buddy Holly. My Aim is True is a classic and essential album for anyone interested in the transition music made from the disco-drenched '70s to the new-wave '80s.
(10/11/07 4:00am)
The greatest band in the world just released a full-length record, In Rainbows, for free. \nWrap your head around that for a second. A group of people who ostensibly make a product, and who make a damn good one, are giving away that product for nothing. OK, technically it's "pay what you want," but for our generation, that translates to "pay as little as you want." How little confidence do they have in the medium if they won't charge money for it?\nTo paraphrase David Byrne, how did we get here? The obvious answer is "the Internet," but the record industry has long been suffocating from its own excess. Even as the record industry scores a symbolic legal victory against downloaders, the bulk of online downloading continues to be clandestine file sharing. The industry's unfair pricing has driven its fans into the arms of file-sharers and copiers, who are becoming tougher to prosecute and tamp down. As a result, we consumers spit on their overpriced, outdated plastic discs. \nNow an album means nothing to us. Perversely, the music industry's high-priced discs eventually drove us to music sharing, making us the generation that feels it deserves free music. We'll drop $50 on a concert, even though we balk at buying the actual album. We won't shell out 10 bucks for a good band's new CD, which took months if not years to craft and move to production, but we'll sure spend $20 on the T-shirt with cheap screen print from a Malaysian sweatshop.\nWe've all known for a while that only a small fraction of a CD's sticker price goes to the artist (even on iTunes). What we hadn't figured out was how to construct a new model that bypasses the record industry entirely.\nRadiohead has found a way. Mustering its significant resources, the band is selling directly to the customer, with all the profits going to them. Rather than accept a royalty rate of pennies to the dollar, Radiohead's members can simply cut out the middleman, taking the bulk of the price. Even though Radiohead is giving away music for free, people are still willing to pay an average of about $10 (5 pounds) for the album. Fans know what they're getting with Radiohead and are willing to shell out big bucks. If anything, the In Rainbows experiment shows we're more than willing to help out our favorite artists; we just refuse to continue feeding the major-label machine.\nWhy do we need record companies these days, anyway? To "find" artists? The denizens of MySpace are five steps ahead of the record companies when it comes to finding new artists, such as singer-songwriter Colbie Caillat, whose MySpace phenomenon became a real hit. \nDeveloping bands and musicians? Please. Record companies stopped doing this 10 years ago. Now they're only searching for instant hits. It took Ray Charles more than six years to break onto the pop charts, with the artistic freedom Atlantic Records granted him allowing him to find his trademark sound. Can you imagine any artist getting a similar break today? The music industry today demands ready-made stars, not works in progress. \nRecently, in a rejection of the old recording model, artists as diverse as Prince and Nine Inch Nails have started giving away music for free. Music has gone from service (live performance) to goods (vinyl and plastic) back to service (concerts, streams and downloads). Basically, we've got musicians playing for tips again. And honestly, it's not that bad. The "pay-what-you-want" creates a more dynamic economic model, where the price is exactly what you're willing to pay, with a high ceiling on the number of potential downloads. Plus, more musicians get to hear more music, creating an exciting environment for new music and genre-hopping.\nThe common argument against such models centers on the struggling artist in need of the incentive to keep playing. But the digital age puts that possibility of incentive much closer at hand than it used to be. We've reached a do-it-yourself era in which anyone can plug in a Mac, soundproof their garage and start selling their tunes online. From small-scale garage bands to the best band on Earth, the twilight of the major labels has arrived.
(10/04/07 4:00am)
Jude longingly chased after Lucy, who told the world she wanted a revolution. Sexy Sadie sang the blues; Max fought in strawberry fields; and all the while, Prudence could barely tell the cheerleading captain she wanted to hold her hand. \nJulie Taymor's "Across The Universe" took the music that defined a generation and applied it to the culture, people, and circumstances that made the same impact. The result: a delightful cross between Beatles and 1960s pop culture references. \nMy only problem with this film: It isn't being released in Bloomington, or in Indiana for that matter. My Fandango search left me as sad as the kid who had just dropped their ice cream cone. I was lucky enough to attend in the great state of Illinois, just outside of Chicago, but unfortunately those who are continuously Bloomington-bound will have to wait for the video release. But that being said, the distributor's negligence of Indiana doesn't stifle the power of a good flick. \n"Across the Universe" mixed some of my favorite aspects of a good film: a great soundtrack, historical references, and witty non-obvious subtext. Subtle lines like, "Will you still need me when I'm 64?" as in the famous McCartney song and the illustration of a green apple a la The Beatles' record label Apple Records appear along side larger pop culture references to Janis Joplin, who is defined in the rocker character Sadie (Sexy Sadie), as well as Jimi Hendrix, whose is portrayed in the film as JoJo (Get Back), a guitarist whose first job is playing in Café Huh? (not unlike the real-life version Café Wha? where the real Hendrix played early in his career.) \nBut cementing the plot line are the love birds Jude ("Hey Jude") and Lucy ("Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds"), who fight to stay together through the brutal realities of the Vietnam War and the Civil Rights Movement, both of which propel prominent, moving scenes within the film. (Inside tip: Make sure you aren't refilling the popcorn bucket during the "Let It Be" scene.) \nThe Beatles' music, from "I Want to Hold Your Hand" to "Revolution" are incorporated perfectly into their scenes, and sang beautifully by the actors. Rachel Evan Wood, Jim Strugess and even Bono round out a wonderful cast and film, which left me craving for more. Though I loved their song choices, particularly mixed with the visuals they created, I would have loved to see "Help!", "Yesterday" and "Here Comes the Sun". But with 32 other songs, how could I complain?
(09/20/07 4:00am)
You have a decision to make, according to Meredith, the most beautiful woman on TV with scarred lips. That opening motif in the third season of Grey's Anatomy carries through more than intern-doctor adultery, ferry-boat catastrophes and mothers with Alzheimer's. \nThis season is emotional, so emotional it's exhausting because the script always mirrors two characters' lives. Christina (Sandra Oh) is getting married while Izzie's (Katherine Heigl) fiance just died. George's (T.R. Knight) father is living through cancer at the same time that Meredith's (Ellen Pompeo) mom is slowly dying from Alzheimer's. \nEach episode -- particularly the four extended episodes -- reveal a depth of character that had never been reached until this third season. At the same time, the intensity wears you out. It leaves you with a temporary feeling and a sense of skepticism that it can't keep moving forward. Meredith has always been vapid and narcissistic, but she's bordering on annoying.\nThis season dwarfs the past two in episodic length. Though it has two fewer episodes than the second season there are four extended episodes with commentary, lasting over an hour a piece. It's a cool bonus feature to see the entire show, unabridged by TV, but sometimes it's just too long.\nThe camera shots get uncomfortable too. "Where the Boys Are" is an hour of suspenseful close-ups. In the episode, all the men of the hospital go on a camping trip, including Joe, the bartender, and his boyfriend. The story line just serves to fill their sexual diversity quota and plays like "the token gay episode." They use sexuality as a plot line and theme when it's only an aspect of character. The "open-hand combat" fight between George and Alex Karev (Justin Chambers) is ridiculous. \nThe special features commentary for first episode "Time Has Come Today" explains the episode's flashback scenes that are otherwise confusing. Some of the flashbacks were from way back in Season One and even the diehard fans have forgotten plot subtleties from two seasons prior. The blooper reel is filled with inside jokes among the actors, making the viewers fee like the outsiders looking into an elite acting clique. Nonetheless, some of the bloopers are funny.\nOverall, for two seasons, Meredith's been struggling through misguided love affairs. In Season Three she makes a choice that makes her happy, but the audience bored and longing for her wild streak. Luckily, other doctors' sex-capades are enough to keep us tuning in.
(09/20/07 4:00am)
Many music fans know this story by heart: In the late '90s, Clear Channel, working in league with the Priory of Scion and Megatron, brainwashed the Federal Communications Commission into changing radio ownership rules, allowing a few corporations to buy thousands of radio stations and standardize formats across the country. Thanks to this noble deed, Americans can rest easy knowing that the new Fergie single is achieving market saturation from coast to coast.\nWhile the damage done by this (consolidation, not Fergie) is largely here to stay, Congress is currently attempting to return some semblance of diversity to the airwaves. The Local Community Radio Act of 2007, sponsored by Congressmen Mike Doyle and Lee Terry and Senators John McCain and Maria Cantwell, would expand lower-power radio across the country.\nCurrently, low-power radio stations, such as WIUX, only exist in less populated areas of the country. When low-power radio was introduced to air legally in 2000, large broadcasters convinced the FCC that low-power stations would interfere with America's favorite commercial conglomerate. As a result, only 800 LPFM stations were allowed to begin operation across the country.\nHowever, an independent engineering study concluded that no interference would result from introducing LPFM stations to markets such as New York and Chicago. Passage of the Local Community Radio Act would allow a whole variety of new stations that could better represent local communities and provide a chance to improve the dismal lack of women and minority ownership of radio stations across the country.\nGiven the size of the corporate radio lobby, passage of this new legislation is far from assured. It will take community advocates and concerned music fans educating their Congressmen in order to win. You can find your Congressman's information at www.congress.org, or visit Prometheusradio.org for more information.
(09/20/07 4:00am)
Quick Hits
(08/06/07 12:05am)
Nearly 100 countries speaking at the first U.N. General Assembly meeting on climate change signaled strong support for negotiations on a new international deal to tackle global warming. There was so much interest among worried nations, many facing drought, floods and searing heat, that the two-day meeting was extended for an extra day so more countries could describe their climate-related problems, how they are coping and the help they need.
(08/05/07 11:51pm)
LUCKNOW, India – Torrents of water washed away homes, crops and cows, leaving hungry and frightened villagers perched in treetops or on roofs as the death toll rose Friday from monsoon rains across northern India and Bangladesh.\nVital to farmers, the annual rains are a blessing and a curse for the subcontinent, a fact highlighted by official tallies: At least 186 people have been killed and 19 million driven from their homes in recent days.\nEven in areas where the rains are no worse than usual, the monsoon disrupted life. In Mumbai, India, the country’s bustling financial capital, people waded through knee-deep water that covered many streets Friday after severe overnight rains flooded sewers.\nThe South Asian monsoon season runs from June to September as the rains work their way across the subcontinent. It’s always dangerous – last year more than 1,000 people died, most from drowning, landslides or house collapses.\nThis year, estimates of total deaths vary wildly from a few hundred to well over a thousand.\nWith hundreds of villages submerged across the fertile plains that stretch along the southern edge of the Himalayas, people were taking refuge wherever they could – in Uttar Pradesh state, in northern India, women and children were spotted screaming for help from treetops.\nIn parts of the state, where an additional 8 inches of rain fell on Friday alone, river levels rose so quickly that villagers had no time to save any belongings.\n“The gush of water was so sudden we did not get the time to react,” Vinod Kumar, a resident of a flooded village in Basti district, told Eenadu TV.\nHe made it out but lost everything. \n“We do not have food, kerosene or even a match box,” he said. “The officials are saying relief is coming, but nothing has come so far.”\nHealth workers were fanning out across parts of Bangladesh and India to try to prevent the spread of waterborne diseases like diarrhea, typhoid and cholera.\nIn northwestern Bangladesh, farmer Rahmat Sheikh and his family were among 2,000 people who fled their flooded village for higher ground in the Sirajganj district.\n“The floods have taken away all I had,” said the 40-year-old Sheikh. “Rice paddies in the field, two cows and my house all are gone. I don’t know how we will now survive.”\nSirajganj, 65 miles northwest of the Bangladesh capital of Dhaka, is one of Bangladesh’s hardest-hit areas, and officials said they were sending in food, water and medicine.\nLike most of those displaced, Sheikh will return to his village as soon as the waters recede and start rebuilding.\nThe more immediate problem is finding food. With many farms and crops destroyed, costing an already poor region millions of dollars, food shortages were becoming a pressing problem.
(08/05/07 11:50pm)
MINNEAPOLIS – Divers looking in the Mississippi River for victims of a bridge collapse were forced to suspend their search Saturday, hampered by debris shifting in the swirling, murky current.\nFamilies of the missing waited a third agonizing day to find out whether any bodies were found. It was not clear whether divers would return to the water later in the day.\n“The dive itself has been suspended due to moving debris,” said Mary Jerde, a spokeswoman for the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office.\nThe number of dead stood at five as new details emerged about the eight or more victims believed trapped in the wreckage.\nThe missing include Christine Sacorafas, 45, a recent transplant to Minnesota who was on her way to teach a Greek folk dancing class; Greg Jolstad, 45, a construction worker who was operating a skid loader on the bridge; Peter Hausmann, 47, a former missionary heading to pick up a friend; and Somali immigrant Sadiya Sahal, 23, a pregnant nursing student traveling with her 2-year-old daughter, Hanah.\nFamilies of the missing gathered in a Red Cross center that was moved Saturday to a classroom at Augsburg College. With the search so far yielding no victims, the families have grown more distressed but have also turned to one another for comfort, sharing photographs and stories about their relatives.\n“They’ve just been waiting for word, any kind of word,” Red Cross spokesman Ted Canova said.\nOf the roughly 100 injured, 24 remained hospitalized Saturday, five in critical condition.\nPresident Bush took an aerial tour of the damage Saturday morning, then went to the scene to speak with a construction worker who helped rescue children. After walking around the site, Bush went to a makeshift command post where he spoke with the families of two victims, as well as first responders and rescue workers.\nBush praised the divers and all those who rushed to help victims of Wednesday’s collapse of the Interstate 35W bridge, a major Twin Cities artery.\n“There’s a lot of people here in the Twin Cities whose first instinct was to save the lives of people who were hurting,” Bush said.\nThe president pledged to help cut the red tape to reconstruct the bridge, but could not promise how quickly the project would proceed. The eight-lane bridge, which came tumbling down in just seconds during evening rush hour, once carried 141,000 vehicles a day.\nA memorial service with songs and prayers for the victims was set for 7 p.m., Sunday. Republican Gov. Tim Pawlenty and Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak encouraged Minnesotans to attend and honor the families and first responders.\nThe Minnesota Orchestra and other musicians were scheduled to perform, and any money raised will be distributed to victims’ families.\nMinnesota’s legislative leaders began putting lawmakers on standby for a post-Labor Day special session. Pawlenty, in a huge political concession, announced he is willing to reverse his longstanding opposition to a state gas tax increase.\nPawlenty said he hopes lawmakers will agree to his ideas for funding road and bridge repairs but that details had not yet been worked out. The state’s gas tax has stood at 20 cents per gallon since 1988.\nState transportation officials said Saturday that they have hired the New York-based Parsons Brinckerhoff engineering firm as the consultant to review MnDOT’s bridge inspection protocols. Parsons will also assist in speedier inspections of Minnesota bridges.
(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.
(08/02/07 12:26am)
WASHINGTON – Chief Justice John Roberts walked out of a hospital in Maine on Tuesday, released a day after he suffered a seizure. The White House said he told President Bush he was doing fine.\nRoberts strode briskly out of the Penobscot Bay Medical Center in Rockport, Maine, wearing a blue sport coat, open collar shirt and slacks. He waved to onlookers before getting into a waiting sports utility vehicle for a short trip to a dock, where he then took a pontoon boat to his summer home on Hupper Island, near Port Clyde, Maine.\nRoberts had no response when a reporter hollered, “How are you feeling?”\nThe chief justice, 52, plans to continue his summer vacation, Supreme Court spokeswoman Kathy Arberg said. She said that doctors found no cause for concern after evaluating Roberts.\nRoberts was hospitalized after he fell on a dock near his home on Monday. He had a prior unexplained seizure in 1993. Bush had called Roberts earlier Tuesday, and press secretary Tony Snow said the president was assured the chief justice was doing well.\nSnow said that Roberts “sounded like he was in \ngreat spirits.”\nDoctors who examined Roberts after his seizure said they found no tumor, stroke or any other explanation for the episode.\nRoberts told the White House of his previous seizure when Bush nominated him to the nation’s highest court and “it was taken into consideration,” Snow said. Roberts also had physical exams that were forwarded to relevant members of Congress. “He was very open about it,” Snow said.\nThe spokesman did not know whether outside experts were consulted or whether Bush himself was informed at the time but said it was determined that Roberts had a clean bill of health and was competent to serve.\nTwo Senate Judiciary Committee aides who were involved in Roberts’ confirmation hearing in 2005 said the committee was aware of a previous seizure whose cause was never diagnosed. The sources would not say whether Roberts disclosed that he took any medication as a result. Such health information is often provided to the panel in private briefings, according to the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.\nBy definition, someone who has had more than one seizure without any other cause is determined to have epilepsy, said Dr. Marc Schlosberg, a Washington Hospital Center neurologist who is not involved in the Roberts case.\nWhether Roberts will need anti-seizure medications to prevent another is something he and his doctor will have to decide. After two seizures, the likelihood of another at some point is greater than 60 percent.\nEpilepsy is merely a term for a seizure disorder, but it is a loaded term because it makes people think of someone who has frequent seizures, cautioned Dr. Edward Mkrdichian, a neurosurgeon at the Chicago Institute of Neurosurgery and Neuroresearch.
(08/02/07 12:25am)
SHARM EL-SHEIK, Egypt –\n President Bush’s top national security aides said Tuesday their double-barreled show of diplomatic and military support for friendly Arab allies this week is not a shot across Iran’s bow.\n“We are out here to talk about the long term,” Defense Secretary Robert Gates said, as he and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice began two days of meetings among Persian Gulf allies and Egypt. Gates noted that U.S. relationships in the Gulf and beyond predate the current unease over Iran’s ambitions and influence.\nIf Iran perceives the joint visit and U.S. overtures differently, “that’s in the eye of the beholder,” Gates said.\nThe Cabinet secretaries also said during a joint press conference in this Red Sea resort that they heard worries from Arab allies about the future of the U.S. military presence in Iraq.\n“There clearly is concern on the part of the Egyptians, and I think it probably represents concern elsewhere in the region, that the United States will somehow withdraw precipitously from Iraq, or in some way that is destabilizing to the entire region,” Gates told reporters after he and Rice wrapped up meetings with Egypt’s top leaders.\nHe pledged “understanding that this needs to be done carefully and not leave Iraq in chaos.”\nGates and Rice later traveled to Saudi Arabia to meet with King Abdullah and other leaders.\nThe United States won no specific new promises of Arab help for struggling Iraq on Tuesday, but Rice said she heard the right expressions of support after a gathering of several nations listed as recipients of an expanded aid and weapons package for friendly states in the region.\nIraq’s Arab neighbors repeated a general pledge to promote stability in Iraq, torn by more than four years of war and bitter sectarian divisions that have killed thousands and driven far more from their homes.\n“I think we know what the obligations of the neighbors are,” Rice said, adding that Egypt and other U.S. allies are working to meet past promises of relief of Iraq’s heavy international debt, additional foreign aid and help tamping down violence inside Iraq.\nRice and Gates were making a rare joint show of diplomatic force during two days of meetings with Arab allies. The tour also opens talks on a proposed U.S. arms package for Arab states worth more than $20 billion.\nAt a press conference with her Egyptian host, Rice pointed to no fresh commitments from the Arabs. A statement issued following a nine-nation meeting promised only “to continue to support Iraq and expand their financial and political support,” and restated a general commitment to blocking would-be terrorists and financing that supports them from entering Iraq.\n“The ... commitment was always to help a united Iraq to reach that point of full stability, and that we have been trying to do over the last four years,” Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit said following the joint meeting.\nBush’s top diplomatic and military managers have a tough assignment to convince skeptical, mostly Sunni-led Arab nations that they have more to lose if Iraq fails than they stand to gain by waiting until the U.S. leaves or Bush’s term ends.\nThe Cabinet secretaries are also trying to solidify what the U.S. sees as a bulwark of generally moderate Arab states against an increasingly ambitious and unpredictable Iran.\n“We have also been calling for the noninterference of any foreign powers into Iraq,” Aboul Gheit said. “That is something we would renew.”
(07/30/07 12:58am)
PARIS – Political leader Dominique de Villepin, the impassioned voice of French opposition to the U.S. war in Iraq, was formally accused Friday of complicity in a tawdry campaign to smear his rival Nicolas Sarkozy’s reputation and presidential aspirations.\nA silver-haired intellectual who has served as foreign minister, interior minister and prime minister, de Villepin was hit with preliminary charges that include “complicity in slanderous denunciations” and “complicity in using forgeries,” according to one of his lawyers. De Villepin, who vehemently denied the charges, could face up to five years in prison if convicted.\nThe charges filed by investigating judges stem from an alleged attempt in 2003-2004 to discredit Sarkozy, who was, like Villepin, a government minister, member of the conservative UMP party and potential candidate for the country’s highest office.\nThe scandal began when a judge received a mysterious computer disc accusing Sarkozy and other top ministers of using a Luxembourg bank to hide kickbacks from the sale of $2.8 billion worth of French frigates to Taiwan in 1991.\nBut the charges proved baseless and investigators turned their attention to finding out who had sent the disc.\nVillepin, then foreign minister, came under suspicion of attempting to smear his rival by asking intelligence official Gen. Philippe Rondot to secretly investigate Sarkozy for bribe-taking.\nVillepin admits asking Rondot to investigate the case, but denies naming Sarkozy as a target or otherwise attempting to smear him.\nThat argument was weakened by traces of Rondot’s erased computer files recovered by investigators probing the smear. Rondot appeared to have written in the files that two key figures said that Villepin, acting on orders from then-President Jacques Chirac, told them to go public with the secret bank account list that named Sarkozy.\nThe investigators searched Villepin’s home and office this month after finding the computer files.\nUnder French law, preliminary charges mean the investigating judge has determined there is strong evidence to suggest involvement in a crime. The filing gives the magistrate time to further pursue an investigation that can result in a trial or the dropping of charges if no crime is found.\nThe case has cast a shadow over the reputation of Villepin, 53, who left his strongest mark as foreign minister in 2002-2004.\nAt the U.N. Security Council in February 2003, he argued that war with Iraq should be a last resort.\n“In this temple of the United Nations, we are the guardians of an ideal, the guardians of conscience,” he said. “This onerous responsibility and immense honor we have must lead us to give priority to disarmament through peace.”\nDelegates broke protocol to applaud. But the attempts also earned him enemies. The New York Post doctored a photo to show Villepin and his anti-war ally, German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer, as weasels.\nInside France, his popularity plunged during strikes and protests over a labor law he pushed last year. He left the premiership in May when Sarkozy won France’s highest office.\nOn Friday he vowed to fight his case “so the truth can at last appear.”\n“At no moment did I take part in any political maneuvering,” he said.\nJudges also barred Villepin from meeting with Chirac, his political mentor, as well as four major players in the alleged smear campaign. Villepin is appealing the measures, judicial officials said.
(07/30/07 12:58am)
BEIJING – China’s premier ordered increased vigilance over food and drug safety Friday as the Cabinet announced a new regulation that mandates stronger supervision and outlines hefty punishments for makers of dangerous goods.\nThe twin actions highlighted the leadership’s focus on winning back international confidence in its exports, which have been found to contain potentially dangerous levels of chemicals and toxins.\n“Food safety and product quality should be our top priority,” Premier Wen Jiabao was quoted as saying on the government’s Web site. “It is not only an urgent task, but an arduous and long-term task.”\nWen is the highest-ranking leader to address the issue since global alarm was triggered earlier this year, when a pet food ingredient from China was linked to the deaths of cats and dogs in North America.\nSince then, a slew of exports, from toothpaste to tires to seafood, have been recalled or rejected around the world.\nChinese officials, initially reluctant to acknowledge the problem, have vowed more stringent surveillance and a crackdown on the country’s countless small, unregulated producers, the heart of China’s ongoing product safety woes.\nMeanwhile, the State Council, China’s Cabinet, introduced a new regulation that addresses the responsibilities of local governments and lays out fines for producers of dangerous goods.\nA draft of the regulation was passed Wednesday and approved by the council a day later, an unusually swift passage that again underscores Beijing’s concern. On Friday, it was posted on the government Web site.\n“Quality concerns the people,” Wen said at a national conference on product safety. “It also concerns the image of the country.”\nThe regulation, effective immediately, applies to food, agricultural products and pharmaceutical drugs.\nIt said that manufacturers should be responsible and recall potentially dangerous products. It also detailed fines of up to 20 times the value of income made from the goods.\nCooperation between various government agencies should be improved, the regulation said. Currently, the responsibility for product safety is split among at least six agencies, including those that handle health, agriculture and commerce. The lines of authority are ill-defined, and different bodies oversee different laws.\nPolice arrested 15 members of a gang that sold fake rabies vaccine and blood protein in the northeastern province of Heilongjiang, the official Xinhua News Agency said in the latest in a string of such announcements.\nThe drugs were counterfeits of 67 types of pharmaceuticals, it said, citing the provincial public security department. Bogus products seized by agents included 10,000 doses of rabies vaccine, 20,250 bottles of a medication used to treat heart disease and 211 bottles of blood protein, Xinhua said.\nThe former head of China’s Food and Drug Administration was executed two weeks ago after he was convicted of taking bribes and gifts in exchange for approving substandard medications for the domestic market, including an antibiotic blamed in the deaths of at least 10 people.\nWen also emphasized the need for stricter export controls by manufacturers and officials to “uphold the good image of Chinese products.”\nAmong the measures he brought up were the need for exporters to meet the standards of importing countries and pass quarantine inspections. He also said there needs to be better record-keeping of good and bad companies, which should be blacklisted for violations.
(07/30/07 12:57am)
LONDON – When Prime Minister Gordon Brown stepped into Tony Blair’s shoes a month ago, his government signaled that the relationship with the Bush administration would be different, notably by appointing an outspoken critic of the Iraq war to his Cabinet.\nOn Sunday, Brown heads to Washington for a first face-to-face test of his relationship with President Bush, keen to smooth tensions over a perceived turn against the White House.\nThe trip is Brown’s first major overseas visit since he ended his 10-year wait to succeed Blair last month.\nHe will hold talks with Bush at Camp David, his Maryland retreat, and deliver a speech to the United Nations in New York following talks with U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.\nBrown must contend with inevitable comparisons to Blair. The former prime minister’s close bonds with Bush and predecessor Bill Clinton won him admiration in the United States but cost him popularity at home, especially with regard to his decision to back the Iraq invasion.\nWhite House press secretary Tony Snow said Thursday that Bush and Brown have a “very special important relationship.”\nBut some of Brown’s first moves as premier raised eyebrows in Washington.\nHe named Mark Malloch-Brown as junior foreign affairs minister. As deputy to ex-U.N. General Secretary Kofi Annan, Malloch-Brown had fierce spats with former U.S. ambassador John Bolton. Malloch-Brown has said Bush and Brown would not be “joined at the hip,” anther signal that Britain could be seeking some distance from Washington.\nBritish commentators also interpreted a speech in Washington by new International Development Secretary Douglas Alexander as a subtle critique of Bush’s policies. Alexander called for an end to a world in which “a country’s might was too often measured in what they could destroy.”\n“In the 21st century, strength should be measured by what we can build together,” he said.\nBrown also offered a post to John Denham, an ex-minister who quit the government in 2003 in protest over Iraq.\nBrown’s office denied a report in the Independent newspaper that Brown’s visit had been rushed forward from a planned date in September to reassure Washington.\nIn many ways, Brown knows the United States better than Blair. While Blair took family holidays in Italy and France, Brown prefers Cape Cod. Alan Greenspan, the former Federal Reserve chairman, is a respected economic adviser to Brown.\nBut Reginald Dale, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, said it was unlikely Brown could recreate Blair’s close relationship with Bush.\n“Most people here acknowledge things won’t be the same,” said Dale. “It will be amicable, but not as intense as Bush’s relationship with Blair, which was something quite unique.”\nWhile Bush and Blair were “in tune, they were soulmates on the most important strategic and political issues of the day,” Brown is likely to prove more cautious and pragmatic, Dale said.\nBrown arrives with some thorny issues in his policy folder, not least the fate of Britain’s remaining soldiers in Iraq.\nBritain has 5,500 troops in the country, based almost entirely on the fringes of the southern city of Basra. Military chiefs in London have said Britain is likely to hand over control of Basra to local forces by the end of the year, a move certain to spark a domestic clamor for more British troop withdrawals.\nBrown will discuss with Bush Britain’s likely role in aiding the U.S. plan to deploy a missile defense system in Europe, his Downing Street office said.
(07/30/07 12:55am)
TOKYO – Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s ruling party suffered humiliating losses in parliamentary elections Sunday after a string of political scandals, exit polls showed, but Abe said he did not plan to resign.\nThe Liberal Democratic Party, which has ruled Japan almost without interruption since 1955, was set to lose its majority in the upper house while the leading opposition party made huge gains, according to exit polls broadcast by Japanese television networks.\nAbe told reporters at his party’s headquarters that he intends to stay on despite the disappointing results, and accepts responsibility for the defeat.\n“We tried our best and felt we made some progress, so the results are extremely disappointing ... I must push ahead with reforms and continue to fulfill my responsibilities as prime minister,” he said. “The responsibility for this utter defeat rests with me.”\nThe Kyodo news agency reported that the party’s No. 2 official may resign.\n“If projections are correct, we are looking at utter defeat,” Liberal Democratic Party Secretary-General Hidenao Nakagawa told reporters at the party’s Tokyo headquarters after polls closed.\nAccording to television network NTV, the polls showed the Liberal Democratic Party and its coalition partner, the New Komei Party, emerging with 104 seats, a 28-seat loss that left it far short of the 122 needed to control of the 242-member upper house.\nThe main opposition Democratic Party of Japan appeared set to emerge with 111 seats, up from 83.\nThe network based its forecast on exit polls taken shortly after the voting ended Sunday night. Other networks had similar projections.\nA loss wouldn’t immediately threaten the political grip of the Liberal Democratic Party. The upper house is largely ceremonial, and the Liberal Democratic Party would keep control over the lower house, which chooses the prime minister and can override most votes in the upper house.\nAbe said he does not intend to call snap elections for the lower house despite the projected defeat.\nBut the major defeat shown by exit polls could usher in a period of political gridlock. Deep voter dissatisfaction with Abe, fueled by a series of financial and other scandals, appears to have spawned a stunning reversal of fortune for a ruling party that his predecessor, Junichiro Koizumi, led to a landslide in the last elections in 2005.\n“We must humbly accept the results of this election,” Liberal Democratic Party lawmaker Yoichi Masuzoe said after polls closed. But when asked whether Abe should step down, he said “I think we must not act hastily. We must carefully decide what is the best course of action.”\nOpposition leaders immediately jumped on the results as proof the tide had turned against Abe.\n“I think there was a lot of hope put on our party,” Takaaki Matsumoto, policy chief for the Democratic Party of Japan, said of the exit polls.\nAbe took office less than a year ago as Japan’s youngest-ever prime minister and won points after taking office for mending strained diplomatic ties with South Korea and China.\nBut in the first in a series of scandals, Administrative Reform Minister Genichiro Sata stepped down in December over charges of misusing of political funds. In May, Abe’s agriculture minister killed himself amid allegations he too misused public money.\nThe government was severely criticized again last month, when Defense Minister Fumio Kyuma suggested the 1945 U.S. nuclear bombings of Japan were justified. Public outcry led to Kyuma’s speedy departure.
(07/26/07 12:08am)
CHARLESTON, S.C. – The rival camps of Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama clashed Tuesday over the meaning of Obama’s claim in a Democratic presidential debate that he’d be willing to meet with leaders of rogue nations such as Cuba, North Korea and Iran.\nClinton supporters characterized it as a gaffe that underscored the freshman senator’s lack of foreign-policy savvy while Obama’s team claimed his response displayed judgment and a repudiation of President Bush’s diplomacy.\n“I would think that without having done the diplomatic spadework, it would not really prove anything,” former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said in a conference call with reporters set up by the Clinton campaign.\nIn a memo from Obama spokesman Bill Burton, the campaign contended that Obama’s comments played well with focus groups that watched the debate and “showed his willingness to lead and ask tough questions on matters \nof war.”\nObama “offered a dramatic change from the Bush administration’s eight-year refusal to protect our security interests by using every tool of American power available, including diplomacy,” said \nthe memo.\nIn Tuesday’s two-hour debate from Charleston, S.C., Obama was asked if he would be willing to meet, without precondition, in the first year of his presidency with the leaders of Iran, Syria, Venezuela, Cuba and North Korea.\n“I would,” he responded.\nClinton said she would not.\n“I don’t want to be used for propaganda purposes,” she said. Her campaign quickly posted video of her answer online, trying to show she has a different understanding of foreign policy than her chief rival.\nObama adviser David Axelrod said on Tuesday that Obama would not just meet blindly with such leaders but only after diplomatic spadework had \nbeen accomplished.\nAmericans “are sick of the Bush diplomacy and aren’t interested in continuing it,” said Axelrod.\nThe Obama campaign was quick to point to an April 23 quote from Clinton in which she said, “I think it’s a terrible mistake for our president to say he won’t talk to \nbad people.” \nThat, Obama representatives said, showed Clinton had changed \nher position.\nBut Albright said, “I never would have gotten out of the debate last night that there was any change in position.”\nShe emphasized that Obama had said he would meet with such leaders in his first year without preconditions.\n“If you look back at real breakthroughs and diplomatic history, what you basically find is that in order to understand where the situation is, to clear the underbrush away, it is necessary to have lower level people make the initial contact,” Albright said.\nObama representatives also sought to emphasize anew Clinton’s initial support for the war, echoing comments by the candidate himself who asserted in the debate: “The time to ask how we’re going to get out of Iraq was before we got in.”\nRival John Edwards, who campaigned in South Carolina on Tuesday, echoed Clinton’s comments in the debate.\n“I would not commit myself on the front end openly to meet with (Iranian President Mahmoud) Ahmadinejad, (North Korean leader) Kim Jong Il, (Venezuelan President) Hugo Chavez,” Edwards told reporters in McClellanville, S.C.
(07/26/07 12:07am)
BAGHDAD – A revised U.S. military plan envisions establishing security at the local level in Baghdad and elsewhere in Iraq by summer 2008, leading one year later to security conditions nationwide that Iraqi forces are capable of sustaining, U.S. officials \nsaid Tuesday.\nKnown as the Joint Campaign Plan, developed in tandem by Gen. David Petraeus and his political counterpart in Baghdad, Ambassador Ryan Crocker, it reflects a timetable starkly at odds with the push by many in Congress to wind down U.S. involvement in a matter of months.\nPetraeus and Crocker are due to testify before Congress in September on how the current strategy is working and whether it needs to be revised. The strategy was announced in broad terms by President Bush in January, when he ordered five extra Army brigades to Baghdad to help implement it. But the more detailed campaign plan was developed in the months following – not to alter the strategy, but to give it depth, with detailed avenues of approach.\nCol. Steve Boylan, chief spokesman for Petraeus, said the plan is still in the final editing stages and has not yet been put fully into effect. He said that while it sets an initial goal of achieving localized security by summer 2008, it does not make assumptions about specific levels of U.S. troops between now and then, including how long the five extra brigades will stay.\nThe campaign plan’s timeline was first reported in Tuesday’s editions of the New York Times.\nBoylan stressed in a telephone interview that like any military campaign plan, this one is subject to revision as conditions on the ground evolve. Thus the summer 2008 goal, he said, should be seen as “a place holder, a mark on the wall,” not an immovable commitment.\nThe plan envisions using locally based security initiatives, such as those that in western Anbar province have proven successful in reducing insurgent violence this year, as a starting point. Such efforts are now under way elsewhere in Iraq, including some \nparts of Baghdad.\nThat approach, it is hoped, will encourage movement at the national level to achieve political reconciliation, which is the ultimate objective.\nThere are early signs, however, that the Shiite-dominated government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki is unwilling to move in that direction. His office has expressed anger at recent U.S. efforts to empower local Sunni groups in an alliance against the al-Qaida in Iraq insurgent group, apparently out of suspicion that these Sunni groups will become extralegal militias allied against \nhis government.\nThe Petraeus-Crocker plan is based on more than military strategy. It factors in a combination of political, economic, security and diplomatic efforts, along the lines Bush has described in recent months, plus actions to be taken by the Iraqi government. That includes movement on long-stalled legislation on oil-sharing, plus measures to bring more Sunnis who were members of Saddam Hussein’s Baath Party into the government, and other measures designed to promote reconciliation and build a government of national unity.
(07/19/07 1:04am)
WASHINGTON – The terrorist network al-Qaida will likely leverage its contacts and capabilities in Iraq to mount an attack on U.S. soil, according to a new National Intelligence Estimate on threats to the United States.\nThe declassified key findings, to be released publicly on Tuesday, were obtained in advance by The Associated Press.\nThe report lays out a range of dangers, from al-Qaida to Lebanese Hezbollah to non-Muslim radical groups, that pose a “persistent and evolving threat” to the country over the next three years. As expected, however, the findings focus most of their attention on the gravest terror problem: Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaida network.\nThe report makes clear that al-Qaida in Iraq, which has not yet posed a direct threat to U.S. soil, could become a problem here.\n“Of note,” the analysts said, “we assess that al-Qaida will probably seek to leverage the contacts and capabilities of al-Qaida in Iraq (AQI), its most visible and capable affiliate and the only one known to have expressed a desire to attack the homeland.”\nThe analysts also found that al-Qaida’s association with its Iraqi affiliate helps the group to energize the broader Sunni Muslim extremist community, raise resources and recruit and indoctrinate operatives, “including for homeland attacks.”\nNational Intelligence Estimates are the most authoritative written judgments of the 16 spy agencies across the breadth of the U.S. government. These agencies reflect the consensus long-term thinking of top intelligence analysts. Portions of the documents are occasionally declassified for public release.\nThe White House brushed off critics who allege the administration released the intelligence estimate at the same time the Senate is debating Iraq. White House press secretary Tony Snow pushed back at the critics Tuesday, saying they are “engaged in a little selective hearing themselves to shape the story in their own political ways.”\n“We don’t keep it on the shelf and say, ‘Let’s look for a convenient time,’” Snow said.\nDemocrats said the report was proof U.S. anti-terrorism efforts were being drained by the Iraq war.\n“We must responsibly redeploy our troops out of Iraq, handing responsibility for security over to the Iraqis and leaving only those forces required for limited missions,” said Rep. Ike Skelton, D-Mo., chairman of the House Armed Services Committee. “This will allow us to concentrate our efforts on Afghanistan and the al-Qaida terrorists who attacked us on 9/11.”\nHouse Republican leader Rep. John Boehner of Ohio said the report confirms gains made by Bush and blamed Democrats for being too soft on terrorism.\n“Retreat is not a new way forward when the safety and security of future generations of Americans are at stake,” he said in a statement.\nThe new report echoed statements made by senior intelligence officials over the last year, including the assessment of spy agencies that the country is in a “heightened threat environment.” It also provided new details on their thinking and concerns.\nFor instance, the report says that worldwide counterterrorism efforts since 2001 have constrained al-Qaida’s ability to attack the U.S. again and convinced terror groups that U.S. soil is a tougher target.\nBut, the report quickly adds, analysts are concerned "that this level of international cooperation may wane as 9/11 becomes a more distant memory and perceptions of the threat diverge"