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(02/10/06 5:02am)
WASHINGTON -- A band of Senate Republican holdouts reached agreement with the White House Thursday on minor changes in the Patriot Act, hoping to clear the way for passage of anti-terror legislation that has been stalled in a dispute over protection of civil liberties.\nSen. John Sununu, R-N.H., and three other GOP lawmakers -- all of whom joined with Democrats last year to block a long-term extension of the law -- were to announce their accord with the administration in a late-afternoon news conference.\nWhite House press secretary Scott McClellan pre-empted them, saying the changes "continue to build upon the civil liberties protections that are in place but do so in a way that doesn't compromise our national security priorities."\nThere was no immediate reaction from House Republicans, although several GOP officials said key lawmakers had been informed of the proposed changes.\nOne GOP official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the legislation had been rewritten to make it clear that an individual receiving a so-called National Security Letter was not required to notify the FBI if he consulted a lawyer.\nThis official also said a second proposed change would clarify that only libraries that are "electronic service providers" could be required to provide information to government agents as part of a terrorist investigation.\nA GOP agreement would put Senate Democrats in a politically difficult position of deciding whether to renew their filibuster on an issue of national security -- an area where polling shows them trailing Bush and the Republicans.\nTwo Democrats swiftly denounced the GOP agreement, saying it fell short of what was needed.\nSen. Russell Feingold of Wisconsin said, "The few minor changes that the White House agreed to do not address the major problems with the Patriot Act that a bipartisan coalition has been trying to fix."\nSen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont, the senior Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, accused the White House of "naysaying and partisanship."\nStill, Leahy's statement stopped well short of joining in Feingold's threat to renew a filibuster that stopped passage of the legislation last year.\nThe Patriot Act was originally passed within days of the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and the administration says it has been an important weapon in the government's arsenal for tracking suspected terrorists.\nRenewal of the law was blocked last year when critics said its provisions shortchanged civil liberties, particularly in the cases of individuals who were not suspected of terrorist activities themselves, but might have had innocent dealings with suspects.\nAlso at issue was concern over the government's ability to demand information from libraries.\nAs a result of the deadlock, lawmakers decided to extend the old law temporarily, a short-term solution that left the administration and many in Congress unhappy.\nThe current extension expires March 10.\nRepublicans said that with the changes, the chance would be remote that any library would have to turn over information.\nBut Democrats said the same provision made explicit that some libraries could be forced to turn over information, adding that existing law is vague on the subject.\nOther than Sununu, the Republicans who had defied the president's wishes on the Patriot Act last December were Sens. Larry Craig of Idaho, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Chuck Hagel of Nebraska.\nThe changes were worked out over several weeks in discussions that involved the lawmakers and White House Counsel Harriet Miers, according to one Republican familiar with the compromise efforts.\nOfficials who discussed the issue did so on condition of anonymity, saying they did not want to pre-empt a formal announcement.\nOn Dec. 16, the Senate voted 52-47 to move to a final vote on the legislation, which deals specifically with 16 provisions in the act that Congress wanted reviewed and renewed by the end of last year. That was eight votes short of the 60 needed to end the filibuster.
(12/09/05 5:03am)
WASHINGTON -- Key Republicans from the House and Senate reached a White House-backed compromise Thursday to renew the broad powers granted to law enforcement agencies in the days after the 2001 terrorist attacks on American soil.\nGOP leaders pledged to pass the Patriot Act extension for President Bush's signature by the holidays, although bipartisan criticism flared. Sen. Russell Feingold, D-Wis., threatened to filibuster a bill he said lacked adequate safeguards to protect constitutional freedoms.\n"We hammered out what I think is a good bill. Not a perfect bill, but a good bill," said Sen. Arlen Specter, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, who announced the compromise at a news conference in the Capitol.\nRep. James Sensenbrenner, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, said the measure would assist "in the detection, disruption and dismantling of terrorist cells before they strike."\nImportant parts involve the ability of law enforcement officials to gain access to a wealth of personal data, including library records, as part of investigations into suspected terrorist activity.\nThe measure provides a four-year extension of the government's ability to conduct roving wiretaps -- which may involve multiple phones -- and to seek access to many of the personal records covered by the bill.\nAlso extended for four years is the power to wiretap "lone wolf" terrorists who may operate on their own, without control from a foreign agent or power.\nWhite House officials signaled their satisfaction, and Specter, R-Pa., has credited Vice President Dick Cheney with intervening this week to help bring the House and Senate together.\nCritics from the left and right said the legislation was a bad deal.\n"Taking away our rights does not make us safer," said Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., one of several lawmakers in both parties demanding changes in the measure.\nSix critics, three from each party, said in a statement, "We still can, and must, make sure that our laws give law enforcement agents the tools they need while providing safeguards to protect the constitutional rights of all Americans."\nFeingold, one of the six, went further.\n"I will do everything I can, including a filibuster," to block passage, said the Wisconsin Democrat, the lone senator to vote against the original legislation passed in 2001.\nUnder a filibuster, 60 votes are required to block a vote on final passage.\nRepublicans said they intended to proceed without further changes. Some aides, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that purely in political terms, they relished the prospect of Democrats trying to block an extension of anti-terrorism legislation.\n"We should unite in a bipartisan way to support the Patriot Act, to stand up for freedom, and against terror," said Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn.\nThe agreement capped weeks of fits and starts, and came after a day of confusion and mixed signals.\nSpecter held a late-morning news conference to hail the compromise and confidently predicted that the five other Senate Republican negotiators involved in talks with the House would back the deal.\nBut within a few hours, a House Judiciary Committee aide circulated an e-mail notice citing a "misrepresentation by Sen. Specter's office" and saying the legislation was unlikely to be completed this week.\nSeveral Republican officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said GOP Sens. Jeff Sessions of Alabama and Jon Kyl of Arizona had not yet given their approval.\nSensenbrenner, R-Wis., who had made last-minute concessions reluctantly, refused to answer questions on the subject.\nLeahy held a news conference where he and other Democrats urged Republicans to agree to a three-month extension of the existing law, to give time to consider a longer-term measure. \n"This is too important to the American people to rush through a flawed bill to meet some deadline that we have the ability to extend," he said.\nBy late afternoon, several officials said Kyl and Sessions were supporting the measure. One official said before giving their approval, the two senators wanted to know why the measure contained four-year extensions instead of the seven-year renewals in an earlier compromise, even though the change had failed to persuade Leahy to drop his opposition to the overall bill.\nThese officials spoke on condition of anonymity, saying they were not authorized to provide details of private conversations.
(12/09/05 3:05am)
WASHINGTON -- Key Republicans from the House and Senate reached a White House-backed compromise Thursday to renew the broad powers granted to law enforcement agencies in the days after the 2001 terrorist attacks on American soil.\nGOP leaders pledged to pass the Patriot Act extension for President Bush's signature by the holidays, although bipartisan criticism flared. Sen. Russell Feingold, D-Wis., threatened to filibuster a bill he said lacked adequate safeguards to protect constitutional freedoms.\n"We hammered out what I think is a good bill. Not a perfect bill, but a good bill," said Sen. Arlen Specter, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, who announced the compromise at a news conference in the Capitol.\nRep. James Sensenbrenner, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, said the measure would assist "in the detection, disruption and dismantling of terrorist cells before they strike."\nImportant parts involve the ability of law enforcement officials to gain access to a wealth of personal data, including library records, as part of investigations into suspected terrorist activity.\nThe measure provides a four-year extension of the government's ability to conduct roving wiretaps -- which may involve multiple phones -- and to seek access to many of the personal records covered by the bill.\nAlso extended for four years is the power to wiretap "lone wolf" terrorists who may operate on their own, without control from a foreign agent or power.\nWhite House officials signaled their satisfaction, and Specter, R-Pa., has credited Vice President Dick Cheney with intervening this week to help bring the House and Senate together.\nCritics from the left and right said the legislation was a bad deal.\n"Taking away our rights does not make us safer," said Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., one of several lawmakers in both parties demanding changes in the measure.\nSix critics, three from each party, said in a statement, "We still can, and must, make sure that our laws give law enforcement agents the tools they need while providing safeguards to protect the constitutional rights of all Americans."\nFeingold, one of the six, went further.\n"I will do everything I can, including a filibuster," to block passage, said the Wisconsin Democrat, the lone senator to vote against the original legislation passed in 2001.\nUnder a filibuster, 60 votes are required to block a vote on final passage.\nRepublicans said they intended to proceed without further changes. Some aides, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that purely in political terms, they relished the prospect of Democrats trying to block an extension of anti-terrorism legislation.\n"We should unite in a bipartisan way to support the Patriot Act, to stand up for freedom, and against terror," said Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn.\nThe agreement capped weeks of fits and starts, and came after a day of confusion and mixed signals.\nSpecter held a late-morning news conference to hail the compromise and confidently predicted that the five other Senate Republican negotiators involved in talks with the House would back the deal.\nBut within a few hours, a House Judiciary Committee aide circulated an e-mail notice citing a "misrepresentation by Sen. Specter's office" and saying the legislation was unlikely to be completed this week.\nSeveral Republican officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said GOP Sens. Jeff Sessions of Alabama and Jon Kyl of Arizona had not yet given their approval.\nSensenbrenner, R-Wis., who had made last-minute concessions reluctantly, refused to answer questions on the subject.\nLeahy held a news conference where he and other Democrats urged Republicans to agree to a three-month extension of the existing law, to give time to consider a longer-term measure. \n"This is too important to the American people to rush through a flawed bill to meet some deadline that we have the ability to extend," he said.\nBy late afternoon, several officials said Kyl and Sessions were supporting the measure. One official said before giving their approval, the two senators wanted to know why the measure contained four-year extensions instead of the seven-year renewals in an earlier compromise, even though the change had failed to persuade Leahy to drop his opposition to the overall bill.\nThese officials spoke on condition of anonymity, saying they were not authorized to provide details of private conversations.
(10/19/05 4:34am)
WASHINGTON -- Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers pledged unflagging opposition to abortion as a candidate for the Dallas City Council in 1989, according to documents released Tuesday. She backed a constitutional amendment to ban the procedure in most cases and promised to appear at "pro-life rallies and special events."\nAsked in a Texans United For Life questionnaire whether she would support legislation restricting abortions if the Supreme Court allowed it, Miers indicated she would. Her reply was the same when asked, "Will you oppose the use of city funds or facilities" to promote abortions?\nSupporters of Miers' nomination said they hoped the single sheet of paper -- delivered to the Senate Judiciary Committee as part of a shipment of 12 boxes of documents -- would help reassure rebellious conservatives that she would not disappoint them if she took a seat on the high court.\nPresident Bush knew of the views she had held before he picked her for the court, spokesman Scott McClellan, said at the White House. But he said the president "did not discuss with her or anyone else whether or not those were still her views."\nOne Democratic supporter of abortion rights responded warily. \n"This raises very serious concerns about her ability to fairly apply the law without bias in this regard. It will be my intention to question her very carefully about these issues," said Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California.\nMiers also returned a lengthy questionnaire to the Judiciary Committee during the day in which she wrote that the "role of the judiciary in our system of government is limited. ... And of course, parties should not be able to establish social policy through court action, having failed to persuade the legislative branch or the executive branch of the wisdom and correctness of their preferred course.\n"Courts are to be arbiters of disputes, not policymakers."\nBush nominated Miers three weeks ago to succeed retiring Sandra Day O'Connor, the justice who has cast the pivotal vote in a string of 5-4 rulings in recent years that sustained abortion rights, upheld affirmative action and limited the application of the death penalty. Many Republicans had hoped Bush would pick a prominent conservative with a long record on abortion and other issues rather than a 60-year-old White House counsel whose private law practice consisted almost entirely of representing corporate clients.\nAs a result, the appointment has created a political landscape unlike any other in the five years of the Bush administration -- tepid support at best from conservatives unhappy over a judicial nominee, with Democrats generally content to remain outside the fray rather than interfere in a remarkable round of GOP infighting.\nThere were some indications during the day that Miers might be gaining ground among Senate Republicans, none of whom has yet to announce plans to oppose confirmation.\nSen. Trent Lott, who spoke dismissively of Miers shortly after her appointment, told reporters it was "more than likely at some point I'll be satisfied. But I'm not there yet." The Mississippi Republican said his concern resulted from dealings he had with Miers over the summer that led him to question her competence. He declined to elaborate.\nSen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., told reporters he thought Miers was making headway among conservatives.\n"Grassroots Republicans that I talk to in Alabama feel positive about her," he told reporters. He added, "I might have liked a different type of nominee but that's the president's. He gets to pick that."\nWhile the Texans United For Life questionnaire was unsigned and undated, senior Justice Department officials who briefed reporters said Miers herself had included it in material to be turned over to the Judiciary Committee.\nThe document consisted of 10 questions and asked candidates to indicate agreement or disagreement based on their views.\nIn each case, Miers indicated she supported the positions taken by the group. That included support of Texas' ratification of any constitutional amendment that cleared Congress banning abortions except where necessary to prevent the death of the mother, and support for legislation "if the Supreme Court returns to the states the right to restrict abortion."\nMiers also said she would oppose the use of public money for abortion except where necessary to prevent the death of the mother.
(10/04/05 2:38am)
WASHINGTON -- President Bush named White House counsel Harriet Miers to a Supreme Court in transition Monday, turning to a longtime loyalist without experience as a judge or publicly known views on abortion to succeed Justice Sandra Day O'Connor.\nMiers "will strictly interpret our Constitution and laws. She will not legislate from the bench," the president said as the 60-year-old former private attorney and keeper of campaign secrets stood nearby in the Oval Office.\nMiers' was Bush's second selection in three months for vacancies on a high court long divided on key issues. The announcement came shortly before the president attended a ceremony marking John Roberts' new tenure as the nation's 17th chief justice.\n"The wisdom of those who drafted our Constitution and conceived our nation as functioning with three strong and independent branches has proven truly remarkable," Miers said at the White House before departing for the Capitol and a confirmation campaign already taking shape in the Senate.\nMajority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., said through his spokesman he wanted a confirmation vote by Thanksgiving, a compressed, seven-week timetable by recent historical standards. Sen. Arlen Specter, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, pledged thoroughness.\n"There needs to be, obviously, a very thorough inquiry into her background as a lawyer and her activities, people who will know her on the issues of character and integrity, which we will find out," he said.\nIn conference calls and interviews, the White House worked aggressively during the day to tamp down concern among conservatives determined -- as Bush has pledged -- to turn the court in a new direction.\nDespite criticism, initial reaction suggested Bush had managed to satisfy many of the conservatives who helped confirm Roberts -- without inflaming Democrats who repeatedly warned against the selection of an extreme conservative to succeed O'Connor, who has voted to uphold abortion rights and preserve affirmative action.\nSeveral officials familiar with Bush's consultations with Congress said Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada, the Democratic leader, had recommended Bush consider Miers for the vacancy. In a written statement, Reid praised the Dallas native as a "trailblazer for women as managing partner of a major Dallas law firm" and said he would be glad to have a former practicing attorney on the court.\nFrist greeted Miers by telling her, "We're so proud of you." Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., the second-ranking Republican in the Senate, issued a statement saying he looked "forward to Ms. Miers' confirmation."\nRepublicans hold a 55-44 majority in the Senate, with one independent. Barring a filibuster, they can confirm Miers on the strength of their votes alone.\nMiers has served as an adviser to Bush for more than a decade, in positions as varied as private attorney, chairwoman of the Texas Lottery Commission and in the White House.\nWhen Bush decided to run for governor of Texas in the early 1990s, he turned to Miers to research his own background for information that his opponents might try to use against him. When terrorists struck the United States in 2001, she was with him as staff secretary on what had been a routine trip to Florida.\nWhile her loyalty to Bush is unquestioned, Democrats publicly and Republicans privately wonder about her qualifications for the high court.
(09/23/05 4:41am)
WASHINGTON -- John Roberts' nomination as chief justice cleared a Senate committee on a bipartisan vote of 13-5 Thursday, with next week's confirmation so certain that Republicans and Democrats turned increasing attention to President Bush's choice to fill a second Supreme Court vacancy.\nBefore the committee vote on Roberts, Sen. Herb Kohl, D-Wis., said, "I will vote my hopes and not my fears, and I will vote to confirm him." Kohl was one of three Democrats on the Judiciary Committee who supported Roberts' nomination along with all 10 Republicans on the panel.\n"I don't see how anybody can justify a vote against Judge Roberts, unless they want to nitpick certain areas that you can nitpick on anybody," said Orrin Hatch, R-Utah.\nFive Democrats voted against Roberts, questioning his commitment to civil rights and expressing concern that he might overturn the 1973 court ruling that established the right to abortion.\n"The values and perspectives displayed over and over again in his record cast doubt on his view of voting rights, women's rights, civil rights and disability rights," Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass., said of the 50-year-old appeals court judge and former Reagan administration lawyer.\nThe Democratic support for Roberts marked a stinging defeat for the liberal groups that are lobbying energetically against confirmation. Without mentioning names, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., criticized them in remarks on the Senate floor, accusing them of "kneejerk, unbending and what I consider to be unfair attacks" on lawmakers who disagreed with them.\nEven so, one prominent conservative said he was unimpressed with the level of bipartisanship in committee.
(09/09/05 4:37am)
WASHINGTON -- Acting with extraordinary speed, Congress approved an additional $51.8 billion for relief and recovery from Hurricane Katrina on Thursday. President Bush pledged to make it "easy and simple as possible" for uncounted, uprooted storm victims to collect food stamps and other government benefits.\n"We're not asking for a handout, but we do need help," said Sen. Trent Lott -- whose home state of Mississippi suffered grievously from the storm -- as lawmakers cleared the bill for Bush's signature less than 24 hours after he requested it. The measure includes $2,000 debit cards for families to use on immediate needs.\nBush signed the bill Thursday night. In a statement issued by the White House, he praised Congress for "moving swiftly and in strong bipartisan fashion to approve these additional emergency funds" but cautioned: "More resources will be needed as we work to help people get back on their feet."\nThe overwhelming support for the measure across party lines -- it passed 410-11 in the House and 97-0 in the Senate -- masked murmurs of concern about a rapidly rising price tag as well as a growing atmosphere of political jockeying in Congress less than two weeks after the hurricane battered the Gulf Coast.\nCongressional Democratic leaders said they would refuse to appoint members to a committee that Republican leaders intend to create to investigate the administration's readiness and response to the storm.\nHouse Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi called the GOP plan "a sham that is just the latest example of congressional Republicans being the foxes guarding the president's hen house." Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid said it was like a baseball pitcher calling "his own balls and strikes." Both urged appointment of an independent panel like the Sept. 11 commission.\nRepublicans said they intended to go ahead despite the threatened boycott. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee told reporters there had been a "systemwide failure" in the response to the storm. Citing problems at the local, state and federal levels, he said, "We will get to the bottom of that" in a congressional investigation.\nBeyond that, said New York Rep. Tom Reynolds, chairman of the House GOP campaign committee, "it is reprehensible that some elected officials are looking to score political points in the wake of Hurricane Katrina's devastation."\nEven before Bush spoke and Congress acted, the government provided fresh evidence of the impact of the storm.\nThe Labor Department reported that roughly 10,000 workers filed for unemployment benefits last week after losing their jobs as a result of the storm, and said the level would rise sharply. In a painful irony, analysts said Thursday's number would have been higher yet except that the storm forced claims offices to close and prevented more of the newly jobless from filling out their paperwork.\nBush, his poll numbers sagging and his administration buffeted by criticism of its response to the storm, dispatched Vice President Dick Cheney to the region and met with GOP congressional leaders at the White House. At mid-afternoon, flanked by members of his Cabinet, he stepped to the microphones to pledge additional help, ask for patience and announce a national day of prayer for Friday of next week.\nReferring to the debit cards in the legislation making its way quickly through Congress, he said, "The first step is providing every household with $2,000 in emergency disaster relief that can be used for immediate needs, such as food or clothing or personal essentials."\nAdditionally, with hundreds of thousands of storm victims now dispersed to numerous states, he said the government was working to "ensure that those of you who receive federal benefits administered by the states of Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana will continue to get those benefits in the states where you're now staying."\nHe said the government would formally grant those victims evacuee status, meaning they would be able to register for their benefits without producing all of the normal documentation -- much of which may have been lost in a desperate retreat from storm-threatened homes. He urged storm victims to contact the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and asked them to be patient if they encountered delays.\nBush said the evacuee status would apply to "the full range of federal benefits administered by the states," including Medicaid, welfare, food stamps, housing, school lunch and more.\n"In all the steps we take, our goal is not to simply provide benefits but to make them easy and simple as possible to collect," he said.\nLater, looking ahead to the massive reconstruction effort, Bush quietly waived sections of a federal law that requires payment of prevailing wages on government contracts. Prevailing wages are based on surveys that take into account union and non-union pay. One business organization welcomed the move, while the AFL-CIO criticized it. Conservatives, in particular, said they hoped the government's billions would be spent wisely.\n"We have all the hallmarks here of a rush to spend money," said Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., whose home state was damaged by the storm. "We have got to be careful that this does not become a feeding frenzy. ... This is our grandchildren's money."\nDemocrats, too, said they wanted the money to be well-spent. At the same time, Reid and other Senate Democrats unveiled a far more comprehensive proposal to provide health, housing, education and other benefits.\nThe White House said $50 billion of the $51.8 billion bill would be distributed through the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which has been the subject of widespread criticism in the past week.\nThe official breakdown said $23.2 billion was for housing aid and grants to individuals, of which about $640 million was for the unprecedented debit cards.\nState and local governments are in line for $7.7 billion in reimbursement costs.\nWhite House officials said the money was needed without delay to prevent an interruption in the massive operation designed to repair the damage along the Gulf Coast and bring hope to an almost unimaginable number of evacuees forced to flee.\nThe bill brought the total in disaster aid to $62.3 billion -- a total that is certain to rise as the full impact of the storm becomes clear. With much of New Orleans still covered by fouled floodwaters, for example, there is as yet no estimate for the cost of pumping out the city -- or rendering it safely habitable again.
(09/07/05 4:43am)
WASHINGTON -- President Bush intends to seek as much as $40 billion to cover the next phase of relief and recovery operations from Hurricane Katrina, congressional officials said Tuesday as leading lawmakers and the White House pledged to investigate an initial federal response widely condemned as woefully inadequate.\nOne week after the hurricane inflicted devastation of biblical proportions on the Gulf Coast, Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said the total tab for the federal government may top $150 billion.\nRelief and recovery needs will be the "No. 1 priority for the foreseeable future," pledged House Majority Leader Tom DeLay of Texas as Congress convened after a five-week vacation.\nRepublicans and Democrats alike heaped criticism on the Federal Emergency Management Administration, the government's front--line responder agency for national disasters. House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi told Bush to his face at the White House that he should fire the agency's director, Michael Brown. \n"The president thanked me for my suggestion," the California Democrat told reporters afterward.\nStung by earlier criticism, Bush invited congressional leaders to the White House for an afternoon meeting, their first since the hurricane hit the Gulf Coast and left much of New Orleans underwater.\n"Bureaucracy is not going to stand in the way of getting the job done for the people," the president earlier told reporters after meeting with his Cabinet.\nAt the Capitol, Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, said she intended to hold an initial hearing of the Governmental Affairs Committee next week into the aftermath of the storm. \n"It will focus on the way ahead," she said. An investigation into the faults of the recovery effort will be deferred until "after the situation is stabilized and people are no longer in danger."\nThe unprecedented scope of the destruction swiftly shot to the top of Congress' autumn to-do list.\nSenate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R--Tenn., put off planned votes on elimination of the inheritance tax, a GOP priority, and Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, said the need to address hurricane-related difficulties would further postpone Bush's long-delayed call for overhauling Social Security.\nAt the same time, Frist, like Bush, made clear Republicans want John Roberts confirmed as the nation's 17th chief justice in time to take his seat before the Oct. 3 opening of the Supreme Court's term. Hearings on Roberts' nomination open next Monday.\nIndividual lawmakers floated suggestions to ease the burden caused by the storm and ensuing New Orleans-area flood that left an unknown number of people dead, uncounted thousands of homes and businesses damaged or destroyed, and drove hundreds of thousands of Americans from their homes. Many are poor and normally receive welfare. Others are sick and are now cut off from their health care and prescription medication. Still others are school-age and will suddenly find themselves enrolled in classrooms not built to accommodate them.\nIndividual lawmakers outlined numerous suggestions to help, although it was not clear which of them might reach the floor of the House or Senate as legislation.\nAt his meeting with congressional leaders, Bush did not say how much additional money he would seek, and Scott Milburn, a spokesman for the Office of Management and Budget, said officials have not yet completed their estimate.\nThe congressional officials who relayed word of Bush's decision to seek another $40 billion from Congress did so on condition of anonymity because it was not clear when the formal announcement would be made. Reid said he expected a request in the range of $40 billion to $50 billion, and that the administration would make its request within 24 hours.\nCongress approved a $10.5 billion first installment in relief funding last week. Another congressional official, also speaking on condition of anonymity, said FEMA, spending about $750 million a day, would soon need additional funds.
(08/31/05 10:53pm)
With a vast federal relief effort grinding into operation, Bush also cautioned that the effects of the storm will be felt far beyond Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida.\nHe said he had ordered steps to cushion the impact on the storm on the nation's oil industry. At the same time, he conceded: "This will help take some pressure off of gas price, but our citizens must understand this storm has disrupted the capacity to make gasoline and distribute gasoline."\nFlanked by senior members of his administration, Bush recited some of the actions already taken to help victims of the storm _ more than 50 disaster medical assistance teams and more than 25 urban search and rescue teams, both from the Federal Emergency Management Administration.\nHe said the Transportation Department has provided trucks to convey 5.4 million ready-to-eat meals, 13.4 million liters of water, 10,400 tarps, 3.4 million pounds of ice, 144 generators, 20 containers of prepositioned disaster supplies, 135,000 blankets and 11,000 cots.\n"And we're just starting," he added.\nHe said buses were on the way to help take thousands of storm survivors from the overwhelmed Superdome in New Orleans to the Astrodome in Houston.\nBush said the Pentagon, as well, was contributing to the rescue and relief operations, and the administration would make road and bridge repair a priority.\nBush also said he had instructed Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman to work with refineries to "alleviate any shortage through loans."\nIn addition to the government's efforts, Bush encouraged private cash donations to recovery efforts.\nWhile Bush did not minimize the destruction left by the storm, he expressed optimism in words directed at the victims of the storm who have lost their homes, possessions and employment.\n"I'm confident that with time you'll get your life back in order, new communities will flourish, the great city of New Orleans will get back on its feet and America will be a stronger place for it," he said.\n"The country stands with you. We'll do all in our power to help you," he said.\nBush stepped to the microphones to put a personal imprint on efforts his administration is making to cope with the disaster in the Gulf Coast.\n"Truckloads of water, ice, meals, medical supplies, generators, tents and tarpaulins" are loaded aboard 1,700 trailer trucks in an initial emergency response, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said earlier at a news conference.\nHe pledged a "full range of federal resources" _ a list that ran from bridge inspection and repair to restoration of communications networks to mosquito abatement in a region with vast stretches underwater.\nAt the same time, officials warned of continuing hardships across an area laid waste by the powerful storm.\nMichael Leavitt, secretary of Health and Human Services, announced that he had declared a public health emergency in the area stretching from Louisiana to Florida. "We are gravely concerned about the potential for cholera, typhoid and dehydrating diseases that could come as a result of the stagnant water and the conditions," he said.\nChertoff and Leavitt spoke at a news conference attended by an unusual array of department and agency heads, each of whom came equipped with a list of actions already taken by the administration.\nIn addition to steps designed to alleviate the suffering of victims, the administration moved to cushion the impact the storm might have on the nation's oil supply.\nBush signed off on a plan to release oil from emergency stockpiles, a decision intended to offset the loss of production from Gulf Coast refiners.\nAt the same time, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Stephen Johnson announced a temporary nationwide waiver of certain pollution standards covering gasoline and diesel fuels.\nJohnson had issued the waiver for the four storm-damaged Gulf states on Tuesday but said the broader move was necessary "to ensure that fuel is available throughout the country, to address public health issues and emergency vehicle supply needs."\nAdditionally, Bodman said the Transportation Department had waived rules governing trucker hours, a step he said would increase the supply of gasoline.\nOverall, "the first stage is, of course, life saving," said Chertoff, who emerged as the administration's point man on the disaster response.\nEfforts are under way to clear roads and inspect bridges, establish communications and expand operations at airports, he added.\n"We are also looking at maritime assets that we can deploy to New Orleans to re-establish port operations there," he said.\nLonger term, Chertoff said, will be the rebuilding efforts.
(04/26/05 4:36am)
WASHINGTON -- Majority Leader Bill Frist said Sunday it was not "radical" to ask senators to vote on judicial nominees as he hardened his effort to strip Democrats of their power to stall President Bush's picks for the federal court.\nFrist, speaking at an event organized by Christian groups trying to rally churchgoers to support an end to judicial filibusters, also said judges deserve "respect, not retaliation," no matter how they rule.\nA potential candidate for the White House in 2008, the Tennessee Republican made no overt mention of religion in the brief address, according to his videotaped remarks played on giant television screens to an audience estimated at 1,700 in Louisville, Ky.\nInstead, Frist seemed intent on steering clear of the views expressed by House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, and other conservatives in and out of Congress who have urged investigations and even possible impeachment of judges they describe as activists.\n"Our judiciary must be independent, impartial and fair," said Frist, who was not present at the event.\n"When we think judicial decisions are outside mainstream American values, we will say so. But we must also be clear that the balance of power among all three branches requires respect -- not retaliation. I won't go along with that," Frist said.\nFor months, Frist has threatened to take action that would shut down the Democrats' practice of subjecting a small number of judicial appointees to filibusters. Barring a last-minute compromise, a showdown is expected this spring or summer.\n"I don't think it's radical to ask senators to vote. I don't think it's radical to expect senators to fulfill their constitutional responsibilities," said Frist, whom Democrats have accused of engaging in "radical Republican" politics.\n"Either confirm the nominees or reject them," Frist said. "Don't leave them hanging."\nWhile a majority of the Senate is sufficient to confirm a judge, it takes 60 votes under Senate rules to overcome a filibuster and force a final vote.\nRather than change the rules directly, Frist and other Republicans have threatened to seek an internal Senate ruling that would declare that filibusters are not permitted against judicial nominees.\nBecause such a ruling can be enforced by majority vote, and Republicans have 55 seats in the 100-member Senate, GOP leaders have said they expect to prevail if they put the issue to the test.\nDemocrats blocked 10 appointments in Bush's first term. The president has renominated seven of the 10 since he won re-election, and Democrats have threatened to filibuster them again.\nAmong the speakers Sunday was Charles Pickering of Mississippi, one of the judges blocked from a permanent promotion to an appeals court. He called the filibuster tactic unconstitutional and said it should be ended permanently if used again.\nPickering's bruising battle for a seat on a federal appeals court abruptly ended when Bush, in a temporary recess appointment that did not require Senate approval, elevated him last year to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans.\nDemocrats threatened a filibuster of Pickering's nomination, accusing him of supporting segregation as a young man, and promoting anti-abortion and anti-voting rights as a state lawmaker -- allegations Pickering denied.\nPickering announced his retirement in December, saying he would not seek nomination for a permanent seat that would have required Senate approval.
(02/04/05 4:45am)
WASHINGTON -- President Bush challenged a wary Congress on Thursday to "put partisanship aside and focus on saving Social Security," promoting his idea that would combine reduced government benefits for younger workers with the prospect of higher retirement checks from personal investment accounts.\nBush, in a speech in Fargo, N.D., noted that Democrats grumbled and groaned at his assertion that Social Security will require higher taxes, big benefit cuts or massive borrowing unless something is done to fix its finances.\n"Some of them didn't see the problem," the president said at the first stop on a two-day, five-state trip to sell his program. Each state he visits is represented in the Senate by at least one Democrat the administration hopes to sway on Social Security.\n"I expect people in Congress, when they see a problem, to then come up with solutions," Bush said.\n"In other words, we're not going to play politics with the issue," he promised. "We're going to say, 'If you've got a good idea, come forth with your idea.' Because now is the time to put partisanship aside and focus on saving Social Security for young workers."\nBush was accompanied on Air Force One by several members of Congress, including Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D. The president spent much of the flight talking with the lawmakers.\n"He's saying we've got to take more money out of Social Security to start private accounts and borrow the money," said Conrad, a target of Bush's travels. "I just think it's very unwise."\nOther Democrats said Bush's program could reduce guaranteed government benefits for younger Americans by 40 percent, while swelling the national debt by close to $2 trillion over a decade.\n"All of us are willing to work with your administration for Social Security reform that will keep the system solvent for the long term," Senate Democrats wrote the president. "But we are concerned about the fiscal crisis facing the nation, and none of us would find it easy to support a Social Security plan that would increase each American's indebtedness to such a degree."\nBush outlined his plans only in broad strokes in Wednesday night's State of the Union address. Aides said that by leaving many key details vague, he intended to give GOP congressional leaders room to piece together legislation that can command a majority.\nHe laid down a few markers, though, saying he will not agree to increase payroll taxes and wants provisions to keep lower-income Americans above the poverty line during retirement.\n"We must guarantee that there is no change" in current or promised benefits for anyone age 55 and older, he said in a move to neutralize opposition from older Americans.\nIn a 53-minute speech, Bush also blended the conservative with the compassionate, and gave no ground on his policy on the war in Iraq in which more than 1,400 American forces have died.\nHe renewed his call for a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, and announced an increase in the use of DNA evidence to prevent wrongful convictions.\nSocial Security was the centerpiece of the speech, and Bush called for far-reaching changes in a program that was established in 1935 and remains one of the enduring legacies of Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal.\nRepublicans and Democrats in Congress must "strengthen and save" the program, Bush said, warning that without action, it was headed for bankruptcy. Official estimates predict that benefits will exceed tax receipts beginning in 2018. In 2042, these estimates predict the trust funds will be exhausted, and benefits will have to be cut to 73 percent of current levels.\nThe president noted that a variety of solutions have been proposed over the years and said all are "on the table."\n"He made it clear to the American people why we must strengthen the Social Security system, and gave the American people a realistic plan for how to do it," Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., said.\nBUSH "Before the president's opponents get too worked up solely to scare seniors and play politics, I would hope both parties take the details of tonight's speech to heart," added Rep. Dennis Hastert, R-Ill.\nDemocrats, who argue that Bush is depicting the problems as grimmer than they are, attacked as soon as he finished speaking.\n"There's a lot we can do to improve Americans' retirement security, but it's wrong to replace the guaranteed benefit that Americans have earned with a guaranteed benefit cut of 40 percent or more," said Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid, who delivered his party's formal response along with House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi.\nIn addition to North Dakota, Bush had Montana, Nebraska, Arkansas and Florida on his itinerary.\nThe AARP, a powerful advocacy group for Americans age 50 and over, renewed its opposition to a key feature of Bush's plan.\nAccording to officials who were briefed in private by the administration, the guaranteed Social Security benefit would be cut for all workers under 55, more so for those who decide to establish a personal account than for others.
(11/17/04 4:36am)
WASHINGTON -- Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada won election as leader of the shrunken Democratic minority on Tuesday, and said he stands ready to cooperate with Republicans or confront them as he deems necessary.\n"I always would rather dance than fight. But I know how to fight," he said at a news conference after the Democratic rank and file chose him leader for the Congress that convenes in January.\nReid said he and Democrats would stress expanded access to health care and increased support for education. "I believe in the minimum wage and we have to raise it," he said.\nReid also cautioned majority Republicans not to "mess with the rules" in the Senate by trying to make it easier to override Democratic objections to some of President Bush's judicial nominations.\nHe said the Senate had confirmed 203 of President Bush's court nominations over the past four years and blocked 10. \n"I think they are crying wolf all too often," he said of Republicans who used the 10 thwarted nominations to label Democrats as obstructionists.\nReid takes command of a party that will have only 44 seats when the new Congress convenes in January, fewer than at any time since Herbert Hoover sat in the White House, according to records on the Senate's Web site. Republicans have 55 seats, and there is one independent. He succeeds Sen. Tom Daschle, who was defeated for re-election on Nov. 2 in South Dakota.\nThe 64-year-old Nevadan, who has long served as Daschle's second-in-command, was elevated to leader in a closed-door meeting of Democrats who will serve in the next Senate.\nSen. Dick Durbin of Illinois was unopposed to replace Reid as the party's whip, the Democrat's second-ranking Senate leader.\nDaschle has served as party leader since 1995, leading Democrats in periods in which they were in the minority, the majority and then back again.\nThere were other reminders of the Nov. 2 election as Democrats met in a historic room in the Capitol. Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts participated in the session as he picked up his Senate duties two weeks after losing his bid for the White House.\nReid was nominated for the party leadership job by Sen. Robert C. Byrd of West Virginia, who served in the post in the 1970s and 1980s. Seconding the nomination was Sen. Ben Nelson of Nebraska, who occasionally vexed Daschle by crossing party lines.\n"I said he will lead this caucus into a new era and oppose where necessary, compromise where possible and avoid the obstructionist label," Nelson said of his closed-door remarks.\nWith the exception of abortion rights and gun control, both of which he opposes, Reid's recent voting record on major issues puts him in the mainstream of Senate Democrats.\n"My senators who support me know who I am. No one has to guess where I stand on issues," Reid said in a recent interview. "I'm going to do what I think is right."\nReid, a veteran of 22 years in Congress, voted against President Bush's tax cuts in 2001 and opposed the final version of the administration's landmark Medicare overhaul legislation in 2003.\nLike a majority of Democrats, he voted to give Bush authority to use military force to oust Iraq's Saddam Hussein, and he voted, many months later, to spend $87 billion to help pay the costs of military actions in Iraq and Afghanistan.\nEarlier this year, he helped bottle up a proposed constitutional amendment to ban gay marriages, and he sided with organized labor when it sought to make sure no worker lost overtime rights under new administration regulations.\nHe's also worked with environmentalists to block oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.\nHe's been a loyal supporter of Democratic filibusters against 10 of Bush's judicial nominees deemed extremists by a coalition of civil rights, women's and other groups.\nAn early test of Reid's strategy is likely to come on judicial appointments, and, already, there is some pressure on him to stay the course set by Daschle.\nWhile Democrats lost seats this fall, they have more than the 41 votes needed to block Bush's legislation or his judicial appointments if they remain united. At the same time, some Democrats have said their party will have to pick its fights more carefully.\nReid is a fierce opponent of the effort to build a repository for nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain in his home state and has used his seat on the Appropriations Committee to battle the administration.\nReid was first elected to the House in 1982, then won his Senate seat in 1986. Six years ago, he nearly lost a campaign for re-election, prevailing by only 428 votes. He won his fourth term far more easily two weeks ago.\nDurbin, who celebrates his 60th birthday next week, served 14 years in the House before winning his Senate seat in 1996. He was re-elected in 2002 with 60 percent of the vote.\nDemocrats also were electing Michigan Sen. Debbie Stabenow as caucus secretary.
(10/05/04 4:50am)
HAVERTOWN, Pa. -- Put Barbara White down as undecided in the race for the White House.\n"The economy makes me afraid of Bush, but I'm scared of Kerry because of security," she said, standing in the doorway of her home outside Philadelphia.\nThe mother of three sons and employed in her husband's business, the 44-year-old White says she sided with Democrat Al Gore four years ago. The vote she casts this year -- in suburbs that the former vice president carried on his way to a statewide victory -- will help determine whether Sen. John Kerry holds Pennsylvania or President George W. Bush prevails this time.\nNumerous polls point to a close finish, and in surveys taken before last week's debate, Bush is running better in the suburbs than four years ago. "That's because of the effective job Republicans did on national security and terrorism," Democratic Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell said recently.\nThe votes of women like White aren't all that matter in the nation's sixth most populous state -- a land of 21 electoral votes, tight polls, frequent visits by both candidates, nonstop television ads and an army of organizers, paid and volunteer.\nRepublicans hunt new voters statewide in Bush's conservative, churchgoing base, and one poll underscores the reason. Nearly one-quarter of his supporters listed family and moral issues as uppermost in their minds.\nDemocrats hope to strengthen their margins in Philadelphia. John Street, the city's black mayor, won a new term last year after the independent group America Coming Together, or ACT, helped register more than 80,000 new voters in a rehearsal for the presidential campaign. Republicans look to whittle their customary deficits around Pittsburgh, where suburban shopping malls sit on land once occupied by steel mills. Democrats aim to build on Gore's heavy vote totals around Wilkes-Barre and Scranton -- hoping that job losses rather than anti-abortion sentiment will determine voting patterns. Republicans talk of stressing a need to limit malpractice awards in southeastern Pennsylvania, citing reports of physicians are leaving the area because of a plague of baseless lawsuits.\nRendell and others say Kerry's support for abortion rights, a ban on certain semiautomatic weapons and expanded federal support for stem cell research can appeal to moderate women in the Philadelphia suburbs.\nThroughout the state, an organizational war has raged for months, and limited evidence suggests an advantage for Bush's campaign.\nIn one recent ABC poll of Pennsylvania voters, 21 percent reported having been contacted in person or by phone by the president's campaign. Only 14 percent said they had heard from Kerry's.\n"I was told to build the largest grass-roots campaign in the history of Pennsylvania politics," said Guy Ciarrocchi, executive director of the state Bush-Cheney campaign. Asked how he has made out, he straightened a few of the neatly arranged small stacks of papers on his desk.\n"Every precinct in Pennsylvania has someone who is responsible for it," Ciarrocchi said. All 9,530 of them.\n"Everyone has a theory" to overcome Bush's 200,000 vote deficit of four years ago, concentrating on one group or another, he said.\nDemocrats say that in fact, Bush's strategy is simple.\n"Republicans are trying to register every living Christian," said Tony Podesta, who ran President Clinton's Pennsylvania campaign in 1996 and is back for Kerry this year.\nUnlike Bush, Kerry is relying to a large extent on ACT and other anti-Bush allies to do the labor-intensive organizational work.\n"The Kerry campaign has probably been less focused on that end of it and more focused on the day-to-day operations of running a campaign operation in a battleground state," said state Democratic chairman T.J. Rooney.\nACT says it has helped add 130,000 voters to the rolls, not counting tens of thousands from last year's Philadelphia mayoral election, and plan to have 12,000 paid workers on the street election day.\nACT claims about 80 paid employees in the state and several office, including one in the basement of a Friends Meeting House in the Philadelphia suburbs.\nThree young paid staff members set out recently to knock on doors in one suburban neighborhood, and it quickly became apparent that not all houses were created equal. Instead, they knock only on the doors where they think they'll find a new Kerry supporter or volunteer.\n"I'm not affiliated with any political party," Jake Fisher of ACT tells Barbara White when she comes to the door.\nShe agrees to answer a few questions and volunteers information about the issues she's interested in. Fisher tallies her responses on a handheld personal digital assistant, information that will be transferred to a database later.\n"We're getting slaughtered" on prescription drug costs, White says in an interview after Fisher heads for the next house, adding that her husband has bills of several hundred dollars a month. Moments later, she volunteers that she appreciated the refund check she received on the family's taxes.\nShe seems of two minds about Iraq and the overall war on terrorism.\n"I'm not sure where I stand on his aggressiveness," White says of Bush. "People are getting killed and that upsets me. At the same time, we have a problem with terrorists and we have to be bold.\n"And I'm not sure about Kerry ... I don't get that from him."\nA few doors away, Joan Myers says she, too is undecided, and the war is the issue uppermost in her mind.\nIn all, Fisher and the other ACT canvassers spent about 90 minutes at their task. Their total in one small skirmish of a large war to organize a state of 12.2 million: 44 doors knocked on, only 14 responses.
(02/25/04 6:11am)
Democratic front-runner John Kerry fired back at President Bush on Tuesday, depicting him as a "walking contradiction" who has presided over job losses, a deficit increase and frayed international alliances despite promises to the contrary.\nOne day after Bush criticized Kerry in his most partisan remarks of the campaign, Sen. John Edwards issued a rebuttal of a different sort.\n"Not so fast, George Bush," said Kerry's sole remaining major rival for the Democratic nomination. "You don't get to decide who our nominee is."\nTaken together, the exchanges underscored the state of the race for the White House -- Bush able to concentrate his energy on the general election, with Kerry eager to do the same and Edwards struggling to sustain his own candidacy.\nKerry, a fourth-term senator from Massachusetts, held a large and growing lead in the Democratic delegate chase, with 632 in The Associated Press count to 190 for Edwards. The front-runner told reporters he was "optimistic and hopeful" about padding his advantage in the day's contests -- a primary in Utah and caucuses in Idaho and Hawaii. A total of 61 delegates were at stake.\n"Bush is turning me on to politics," said Kathy Locke, a first-time voter in line at the polls in Salt Lake City. "He's got to be stopped."\nA day after targeting Democrats, Bush used the White House as the backdrop for an appeal for passage of a constitutional amendment banning gay marriages, a move certain to please his conservative Republican base.\n"A few judges and local authorities are presuming to change the most fundamental institution of civilization," said the president, referring to a recent court opinion in Kerry's home state of Massachusetts and a decision by city officials in San Francisco to issue same-sex marriage licenses.\nBoth Kerry and Edwards promptly accused the president of playing politics with the Constitution -- a charge the White House denied. The two Democrats said they oppose gay marriage, but would vote against the amendment if it is brought before the Senate.\nNeither Democratic contender campaigned in any of the three states, preferring to spend time and resources in the 10 delegate-rich states on next week's ballot. Increasingly, Edwards looked to Georgia and Ohio as well as upstate portions of New York to slow Kerry's rush toward the nomination.\nBoth men have committed to large advertising campaigns in the three states. Officials said during the day that Edwards had increased his commitment in Ohio, even though Kerry was continuing to outspend him there.\nThe Massachusetts senator was unveiling a new commercial for use in Ohio and parts of New York, and it focused on the Republican in the White House. The commercial calls Bush's economic policy "an astonishing failure" and promises to protect American jobs.\n"We need to be on the side of America's workers," Kerry says in the ad. "George Bush won't do it. I will."\nThe ad was unveiled one day after Kerry said he would run a clean TV ad campaign if Bush's re-election team promised to do the same. The president's campaign is expected to begin running television commercials next week.\nIn his comments to reporters, Kerry was dismissive of Bush's criticisms.\n"Last night was almost a fantasy speech about a world that doesn't exist for most Americans," he said. "The president talked about a prosperity that millions of Americans are not seeing, feeling or living."\nOn Monday night, Bush, without naming Kerry, ridiculed him as a politician who has held opposing positions on tax cuts, NAFTA, the war with Iraq and more.\nBush also sought to cast the election as a choice between "keeping the tax relief that's moving the economy forward, or putting the burden of higher taxes back on the American people."\n"It's a choice between an America that leads the world with strength and confidence, or an America that is uncertain in the face of danger," the president said.\nJobs was a recurring refrain as Edwards and Kerry campaigned during the day, the front-runner in economically distressed northeast Ohio, and his pursuer in Georgia and Texas.\n"Let the president come to Ohio and give a speech to the workers of Ohio about their real lives," said Kerry, who said 270,000 jobs have been lost in the state since Bush's inauguration. "Let the workers of Ohio hear from the president about how he's going to help them keep their jobs or find new jobs in an economy that's not creating jobs as fast as they are disappearing." On Wednesday, in Toledo, Kerry was picking up his latest in a series of endorsements, this one from former astronaut and retired Sen. John Glenn.\nIn addition, he said Bush had presided over a huge expansion in the deficit as well as a loss in jobs. Accusing the president of trying to change the subject, he said, "he can't talk about making the world really safer because he's left our allies and our relationships disappointed all around the world."\nWhite House spokesman Scott McClellan told reporters that politics played no role in the president's announcement on gay marriage, made in the venerable Roosevelt Room of the White House.\nAt the same time, public opinion polling shows that a strong majority of the country opposes gay marriage, and members of Bush's political team have long signaled they intended to make use of the issue in the fall campaign.
(04/18/03 5:01am)
American commandos captured a half brother of Saddam Hussein on Thursday, the latest success in a campaign to round up insiders from the former regime. U.S. troops thwarted a Baghdad bank robbery over the protests of Iraqis eager to share in the loot.\nAs U.S. forces struggled to restore order, water and power throughout the country, international experts said the looting at Iraq's antiquities museum appeared to have been an organized effort to steal priceless artifacts.\nWith the fighting all but over, the USS Constellation steamed from the Persian Gulf for its home port, carrying dozens of warplanes no longer needed to bomb Iraqi forces into submission. It was the second aircraft carrier ordered home in recent days.\nBrig. Gen. Vincent Brooks announced the capture of Barzan Ibrahim Hasan, telling reporters he was an adviser to Saddam "with extensive knowledge of the regime's inner workings."\nA U.S. intelligence official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Barzan Hasan had been a presidential adviser to Saddam's regime since 1998, but had a shaky relationship with his half brother and was not part of the regime's inner circle.\nHe was a representative to the United Nations in Geneva from 1989 to 1998. Earlier, from 1979 to 1983, he headed Iraq's Mukhabarat, or intelligence service, a period when the organization arranged executions of regime opponents in Iraq and overseas, the official said.\nBrooks provided scant details of the operation that netted Barzan Hasan, saying that he was taken inside Baghdad and that U.S. special forces were aided by Marines. He said there were no casualties.\nAnother of Saddam's three half brothers, Watban Ibrahim Hasan, was captured earlier by U.S. forces. The third has not been found.\nAmerican forces have been criticized for failing to stop looting in several Baghdad cities, and there have been complaints that humanitarian relief has been slow in arriving.\nBut Marines foiled a brazen act of lawlessness during the day when they interrupted a robbery-in-progress at a branch of the al-Rashid Bank and took away $4 million for safekeeping.\nThieves had blown a hole in the vault and dropped children in to bring out fistfuls of cash. As word spread that the robbery was under way, Iraqis gathered, saying they had accounts at the branch, and a riot broke out.\nMarines broke it up -- over the protests of Iraqis not involved in the robbery -- and removed $4 million in American dollars. The thieves were arrested.\n"These people want the money and they believe it is rightfully their money, but they don't understand that the proper distribution is not first-come, first-served," said Col. Philip DeCamp, a battalion commander.
(04/17/03 5:43am)
The top commander of U.S. forces in Iraq briefed President Bush on the war from inside one of Saddam Hussein's ornate palaces Wednesday, underscoring the death of the old regime. At home, the administration reduced the terrorist threat a notch, from orange to yellow.\nBush urged the United Nations to lift economic sanctions against Iraq, saying the country had been liberated by U.S.-led forces. "Terrorists and tyrants have now been put on notice," he added.\nFour weeks after the war began, American troops raided the Baghdad home of the mastermind of Iraq's biological weapons laboratory and also discovered a recently abandoned Palestinian terrorist training camp on the outskirts of the capital.\nArmy forces exchanged fire with a small number of die-hard paramilitary fighters north of Baghdad, then took out two surface-to-air missile systems and three anti-aircraft guns left over from Saddam's military.\nIraqis in Mosul said three people were killed and at least 11 wounded when shooting erupted for the second straight day. Iraqis blamed the Americans, but the circumstances were cloudy.\nGen. Tommy Franks, in command of more than 200,000 troops in the war zone, lit up a cigar as he toured the palace just outside Baghdad that had been part of Saddam's realm. Franks and other senior officers sat in plush green chairs with gold and wood trim for the briefing with Bush in Washington, held over a secure videoconference linkup.\nEarlier, the four-star general viewed, with evident disgust, gold sink fixtures, a gold toilet paper dispenser and a toilet bowl brush inside one of the bathrooms.\n"It's the oil-for-palace program," he said, a biting reference to the U.N. program that allowed Iraqi oil exports on condition that the proceeds went to food for civilians.\nFranks' visit to Baghdad, from his command headquarters in Qatar, came less than two weeks after Army tanks first rumbled through the capital and one week after Iraqis, aided by Marines, toppled a statue of Saddam in a downtown city square, signaling the end of his regime.\nSaddam twice was the target of U.S. bombs dropped on places where he was believed to be, but his whereabouts are unknown. U.S. officials say they don't know if he is dead or alive.\n"The fact of the matter is, though, he is gone. Whether he is dead or alive, he is gone," Secretary of State Colin Powell told Associated Press Television News. "He is no longer in the lives of the people of Iraq."\nSlowly, cities across Iraq were struggling to shed the effects of the war. After days of looting and mayhem in Baghdad, Americans armed newly recruited Iraqi police officers with handguns to help keep order. And citizens sought to pick up their normal lives.\n"The market is open and products are available," said Tadamoun Abdel-Aziz as she shopped with her son for eggs, bread and vegetables in the downtown Irkheita Market. But with power only partially restored and temperatures in the 90s, some residents bought 3-foot blocks of ice.\nAmerican commandos backed by about 40 Marines staged the raid on the residence of Rihab Taha, dubbed "Dr. Germ" by U.N. weapons inspectors. Taha, a microbiologist, was in charge of Iraq's secret biological laboratory, suspected of weaponizing anthrax.\nThree men emerged from the raid on her home with their hands up, and American troops removed several boxes of documents. Her whereabouts were unknown.\nAdministration officials cited the desire to eliminate weapons of mass destruction as one key reason for the war, although none has yet been found. "We're really just in the early stages of that" search, Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks told reporters at a briefing in Qatar.\nU.N. weapons inspectors also failed to find any banned weapons during prewar searches. Hans Blix, the chief inspector, is expected to appear before the U.N. Security Council next week to discuss a possible resumption of the effort -- even though the United States has not invited the international team back into Iraq.\nA Marine spokesman, Cpl. John Hoellwarth, said the terrorist training camp consisted of about 20 permanent buildings on 25 acres south of Baghdad, and was operated by the Palestine Liberation Front and the Iraqi government.\nHe said recruits were apparently instructed in the art of bomb-making, adding that Marines found chemicals, beakers and pipes at the site, along with questionnaires that asked recruits to state their preference in missions. Hoellwarth said many volunteered for suicide missions.
(04/16/03 5:26am)
Iraqis met under American auspices to shape a new government Tuesday and said "the rule of law must be paramount" following Saddam Hussein's fall. In a war dividend, U.S. officials said they had taken Palestinian terrorist Abul Abbas into custody in Baghdad.\nFour weeks after U.S.-led forces unleashed their assault, President Bush promised to "liberate every corner" of Iraq and American troops hastened to redeem his pledge. Marines solidified their grip on Tikrit, Saddam's hometown, and American officials said fighting had ended in Qaim, a town near the Syrian border.\nActing on a tip, commandos searching a home in Baghdad found a weapons cache with a sizable chemical laboratory and documents they said were instructions on making chemical and biological weapons. They also reported finding a bomb concealed inside a bottle, another in an umbrella and a third in a telephone.\nThe U.S.-organized meeting on a new government drew scores of Iraqis to a gold-colored tent erected in Ur -- biblical birthplace of the Jewish patriarch Abraham -- and an anti-American protest in a nearby city.\n"No to America and no to Saddam," chanted thousands of Shiite protesters in Nasiriyah, exercising their new freedom of speech to object to the imminent creation of an American interim governing authority.\nInside the meeting, White House envoy Zalmay Khalilzad said the United States has "no interest, absolutely no interest, in ruling Iraq."\nHe added, "We want you to establish your own democratic system based on Iraqi traditions and values."\nA 13-point statement released after the session envisioned a democratic country where "the rule of law is paramount." It said Saddam's "Baath party must be dissolved and its effects on society must be eliminated."\nIt wasn't immediately clear whether the paper was drafted by U.S. officials in advance of the meeting.\nAbbas, the leader of a Palestinian group that killed an American on the hijacked cruise liner Achille Lauro in 1985, was captured by U.S. commandos on Monday, U.S. officials disclosed.\nA number of his associates also were detained during raids at several sites around Baghdad, these officials said on condition of anonymity.\nAbbas, whose name actually is Mohammed Abbas, led a faction of the Palestine Liberation Front, a Palestinian splinter group. His faction was in Tunisia until the attack on the Achille Lauro, after which it relocated to Iraq. Leon Klinghoffer, an elderly American, was shot and tossed overboard in his wheelchair during the hijacking.\nThere was no major combat during the day, but at least 10 Iraqis were reported killed and 16 injured in a clash between U.S. Marines and a stone-throwing crowd in Mosul in northern Iraq, The New York Times reported on its Web site. The U.S. Central Command in the Persian Gulf said it could not confirm the report.\nCentral Command reported an unidentified Marine was shot to death in Baghdad by a member of his unit who mistook him for an Iraqi soldier. Another Marine, Cpl. Ariel Gonzalez, 25, of Hileah, Fla., was killed Monday when a commercial refueling vehicle collapsed on him in southern Iraq, the Pentagon said.\nWhile anti-American sentiment flared in Iraq, U.S. forces also won cooperation from civilians eager to restore order and vital services.\nSome Marines in Tikrit wore flowers on their uniforms, gifts from residents of the city.\nJoint Iraqi-U.S. patrols made their first forays into Baghdad. American commanders reported ample assistance from Iraqis eager to help troops uncover regime secrets.\n"We're getting millions of these tips, some credible, some not so credible," said Lt. Col. Philip DeCamp. The United States was offering incentives, too. Defense officials said the Pentagon would pay up to $200,000 for information on the whereabouts of regime leaders.\nSoldiers patrolling northern Baghdad found a mobile AM radio station in a warehouse at the Iraqi railroad yard, and worked to clear a city park from hundreds of munitions left from an Iraqi artillery and mortar position.\nIn Washington, the Bush administration dampened talk of possible military action against Syria. Secretary of State Colin Powell, who suggested diplomatic or economic measures might be taken, said Iraq was "a unique case" that required U.S. military action.\nAdministration officials have accused Syria of maintaining a program to develop weapons of mass destruction and of harboring members of the Iraqi regime seeking to flee. Syrian officials deny the allegations.\nStill, at the Pentagon, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said he believed troops had shut down an illegal oil pipeline said to export up to 200,000 barrels daily to Syria.\nFor his part, Bush said, "Our victory in Iraq is certain, but it is not complete."\nHe added, "Today the world is safer, the terrorists have lost an ally, the Iraqi people are regaining control of their own destiny. These are good days for the history of freedom."\nAfter nearly a quarter-century of living under a regime that punished dissent with death, Iraqis experimented with newfound freedoms.\n"Americans are against freedom and democracy," shouted one man in Tikrit, Saddam's birthplace and the last major population center to fall to U.S.-led forces.\nAnd in Kut, military officials said hundreds of protesters blocked Marines from entering city hall to meet a radical anti-American Shiite cleric who has declared himself in control.\nThe meeting near Ur took place close to a 4,000-year-old ziggurat, a terraced-pyramid temple of the ancient Assyrians and Babylonians. Participants in the meeting included Kurds, Sunnis and Shiites from inside the country as well as others who have been in exile.\nAmericans picked the groups to be represented, but each faction selected its own representatives.\nThere were some boycotts, one of several indications of the difficulty confronting those attempting to build a government where religious and ethnic rivalries flourish. In addition, some Iraqi opposition leaders fear the United States is trying to impose Ahmed Chalabi, head of the Iraqi National Congress opposition group, as leader of a new Iraqi administration.
(04/15/03 5:27am)
Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit fell Monday with unexpectedly light resistance, the last Iraqi city to succumb to overpowering U.S.-led ground and air forces. A senior Pentagon general said "major combat engagements" probably are over in the 26-day-old war.\nAs fighting wound down, Pentagon officials disclosed plans to pull two aircraft carriers from the Persian Gulf. At the same time, Iraqi power brokers looked ahead to discussions on a postwar government at a U.S.-arranged meeting set for Tuesday.\n"I would anticipate that the major combat engagements are over," Maj. Gen. Stanley McChrystal told reporters at the Pentagon. Tikrit fell with no sign of the ferocious last stand by Saddam loyalists that some military planners had feared.\nSecretary of State Colin Powell hinted at economic or diplomatic sanctions against Syria, saying the government is developing a weapons of mass destruction program and helping Iraqis flee the dying regime. Syrian officials denied the charges.\nLooting eased in Baghdad after days of plundering at government buildings, hospitals and an antiquities museum, and a group of religious and civil opposition leaders met in the capital to plan efforts at renewing power, water, security and other vital services.\nAmerican forces found prodigious amounts of Iraqi weaponry, French-made missiles and Russian anti-tank rocket launchers among them. And Army troops discovered thousands of microfilm cartridges and hundreds of paper files inside a Baath Party enclave as the dead regime began yielding its secrets.\nIn Tikrit, about 90 miles north of Baghdad, "There was less resistance than we anticipated," Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks told reporters, as American ground troops moved into the city after days of punishing airstrikes.\nAmerican forces captured a key Tigris River bridge in the heart of town and seized the presidential palace without a fight as they rolled past abandoned Iraqi military equipment.\nThey set up checkpoints to keep prominent regime figures from leaving, and a line of armored vehicles was parked in front of a bazaar inside the city.\n"We have had engagements, and we have defeated the enemy in every one of those engagements," said Capt. Frank Thorp, a spokesman at U.S. Central Command.\nThe operation inside Tikrit, Brooks added, "is really the only significant combat action that occurred within the last 24 hours." McChrystal told reporters, "I think we will move into a phase where it (combat) is smaller, albeit sharp fights."\nWith Saddam and his two sons dead or in hiding, his regime gone and his armed forces routed, U.S. commanders took steps to reduce American firepower in the war zone.\nA U.S. defense official said two of five aircraft carrier battle groups in the region would soon be leaving, the USS Kitty Hawk returning to its base in Japan and the USS Constellation to San Diego. Each carrier has about 80 warplanes, including F/A-18 and F-14 strike aircraft as well as surveillance and other support craft.\nThe Air Force already has sent four B-2 stealth bombers home.\nIn a reminder of lingering hazards, two soldiers with the Army's V Corps were killed and two wounded when a grenade exploded accidentally at a checkpoint south of Baghdad and a third soldier was killed and another wounded in an accidental shooting near Baghdad International Airport, Central Command said.\nWith fighting on the wane, troops continued their search for remaining POWs as well as evidence of weapons of mass destruction.\nMaj. Trey Cate, a spokesman for the 101st Airborne Division, said tests were planned on 11 shipping containers found buried near Karbala with lab equipment inside.\nA team of experts from the CIA and Defense Intelligence Agency also has arrived in the Persian Gulf region to search for clues to the whereabouts of Capt. Scott Speicher, a Navy pilot shot down during the 1991 Gulf War, officials said.\nU.S. official said an Iraqi nuclear scientist, Jaffar al-Jaffer, had surrendered to authorities in an unidentified Middle Eastern country in recent days and was being interviewed by Americans.\nSaturday, Saddam's top science adviser, Lt. Gen. Amer al-Saadi surrendered to U.S. forces.\nIn Washington, Powell became the latest senior administration official to accuse Syria of harboring former members of Iraq's regime and of maintaining a chemical weapons program.\n"Of course, we will examine possible measures of a diplomatic, economic or other nature as we move forward," Powell told reporters.\nFayssal Mekdad, Syria's deputy ambassador to the United Nations, denied it. "There is no cooperation. We have no chemical weapons," he said.\nIn London, British Prime Minister Tony Blair said Syrian President Basher Assad had personally assured him that his government "would interdict anybody" crossing the border from Iraq. "And I believe they are doing that," Blair told the House of Commons.\nMore and more, efforts were turning to building a postwar Iraq. Officials made preparations for a meeting Tuesday in the southern city of Ur, said to be the birthplace of the biblical patriarch Abraham.\nThere, Iraqis from inside and outside the country will begin discussions on the shape of a future government.\nAt the Pentagon, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said, "it's not possible to know how long" a process of stabilization will take inside Iraq.\nGovernment offices and most stores remained closed in the capital, but many buses were running, packed with passengers. The first joint patrols moved through Baghdad during the day, with Marines and Iraqis working together.\nPolice Lt. Col. Haitham al-Ani said American troops and Iraqis would patrol in separate cars and that the Iraqis would be unarmed, at least for now.\nAt the same time, local leaders met in Baghdad to discuss security and plans to restore water and electricity to a city that has been without power for more than a week. One Shiite Muslim cleric, Ayad al-Musawi, told the meeting there should be "no Sunni, no Shiite, just one Iraqi nation."\nHe added, "God willing, we will be one hand, one voice and not betray each other"
(04/11/03 5:38am)
Kurdish fighters swept into Kirkuk and other areas around Iraq's northern oil fields on Thursday, fresh evidence that Saddam Hussein's regime was history. "Your nation will soon be free," President Bush promised Iraqis in a televised address.\nThere were fresh American casualties as well as widespread looting in Baghdad, 24 hours after the Iraqi capital fell to U.S. forces. One Marine was killed and as many as 20 were injured in a daylong fight triggered by Iraqi gunfire on the city's northern edge.\nAnother four Marines were injured in a suicide bombing at a military checkpoint after dark.\nNearly 100 miles to the north, U.S. commanders were turning their focus on Tikrit, Saddam's birthplace and the likely site of a last stand by his armed forces -- if there is to be one. "Some of it has been unconventional," said Maj. Gen. Gene Renuart, signaling the presence of U.S. commandos in the area.\nWarplanes also bombed Iraqi positions near the border with Syria, where special forces were trying to prevent regime loyalists from slipping out of Iraq and to keep foreign fighters from entering.\nKurdish forces, which have battled Saddam for years, triggered celebrations when they reached Kirkuk, an ancestral home and gateway to Iraq's northern oilfields.\nIn a scene reminiscent of downtown Baghdad a day earlier, joyous residents toppled a statue of the Iraqi leader, then stomped it and hit it with their shoes -- a serious insult in the Arab world. The letters USA were spraypainted on the base of the statue.\nCars and trucks laden with Kurdish fighters drove through the city, flying the flags of the two major Kurdish political parties that rule the region -- yellow for Kurdistan Democratic Party and green for the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan.\nLocal residents cheered the passing Kurdish forces and pelted them with roses.\nTo the southeast, Kurdish peshmerga forces also moved into the city of Khaneqin near the border with Iran.\nThe city had been under a curfew for several days. But shortly after Iranian television broadcast images of Wednesday's developments in Baghdad, residents emerged from their homes and found Iraqi soldiers and Baath party members were gone.\nThe advances sparked alarm in Turkey, Iraq's neighbor to the north, which fears permanent Kurdish control over Kirkuk and nearby oil reserves. The Turkish government announced it was sending military observers to the city with U.S. approval, and Bush administration officials rushed to prevent difficulties.\nSecretary of State Colin Powell told The Associated Press that Kurdish forces would pull back from Kirkuk, reducing the likelihood that Turkish forces would enter the region. "We assured them," he said of the Turks.\nBush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair both taped addresses to be televised in Iraq, part of a new information program that will include publication of a newspaper to be circulated in southern Iraq.\n"The regime of Saddam Hussein is being removed from power and a long era of fear and cruelty is ending," Bush said, while Arabic subtitles scrolled across the screen. Promising to protect the country's "great religious traditions," he also said, "We will help you build a peaceful and representative government that protects the rights of all citizens."\nBlair articulated similar themes. "Our enemy is Saddam and his regime, not the Iraqi people," he said. Our forces are friends and liberators of the Iraqi people, not your conquerors."\nTheir words were broadcast from a new station, dubbed "Towards Freedom," from U.S. C-130 Hercules aircraft patrolling the skies over Iraq. Officials said the station would provide five hours of programming five days a week over the frequency used by the former Iraqi state television channel.\nWhile Bush, Blair and their commanders talked of a new life for Iraqis, Saddam's whereabouts remained unknown and there were fresh reminders that the war was not over.\n"Baghdad's still an ugly place," Renuart told reporters at the U.S. Central Command headquarters in Qatar.\nU.S. forces battled holdout fighters for hours near the al-Azimyah Palace and a nearby mosque and Baath Party official's house.\n"Our troops were fired on, took heavy fire from the vicinity of this mosque and were engaged in a fairly heavy firefight for a number of hours," Renuart said. U.S. officials said they had been tipped off that senior Baath Party leaders were meeting in the area.\nSeveral hours later, a suicide blast injured four Marines shortly after dark in downtown Baghdad.\nMarine Capt. Joe Plenzler said that, according to initial reports, "a man strapped with explosives approached a Marine checkpoint and detonated himself." No further details were available.\nHalf a world away, the victim of an earlier suicide bombing was laid to rest in Arlington National Cemetery outside Washington. Capt. Russell B. Rippetoe, an Army ranger from Denver, became the first soldier from the Iraqi conflict to be buried on the historic grounds.\nIn Najaf, in southern Iraq, two Islamic clerics were hacked to death inside a mosque in the Shiite holy city of Najaf, witnesses told reporters.\nThe killings of Haider al-Kadar and Abdul Majid al-Khoei took place at the shrine of Imam Ali, at a meeting called to decide how to control the mosque, one of the holiest sites of Shiite Islam.\nMany troops in Baghdad got a warm welcome. Pedestrians offered flowers to Marine guards. A few women teasingly asked one Marine, Kurt Gellert, to marry them, and others offered the use of their phones to call home. "That was tempting," he said.\nLooting in Baghdad was rampant, as civilians cleaned out government buildings, carting away television sets, refrigerators, carpets and more,\nSome Iraqis did what they could.\nAt al-Kindi hospital, medical students were sent into neighborhoods to retrieve medicine that had been taken on Wednesday. They returned with double-decker buses loaded with boxes of badly needed supplies.
(04/11/03 5:35am)
Opposition forces crumbled in northern Iraq on Thursday as U.S. and Kurdish troops seized oil-rich Kirkuk without a fight and held a second city within their grasp. U.S. commanders said signs pointed to a last stand by Iraqis in Saddam Hussein's birthplace of Tikrit.\nDespite the gains, one Marine was killed and 22 injured in a seven-hour battle in the Iraqi capital. Four more were wounded in a suicide bombing. "Baghdad's still an ugly place," said Maj. Gen. Gene Renuart.\nWidespread looting persisted 24 hours after the city celebrated the regime's fall.\nStriking anew at the regime leadership, coalition warplanes dropped six satellite-guided bombs on a building where Saddam's half brother, Barzan Ibrahim Hasan al-Tikriti, a close adviser, was believed to be.\nAl-Tikriti once headed the Iraqi intelligence service, and the building in Ar Ramadi, 60 miles west of Baghdad, had served as an intelligence service operations site, said Marine Maj. Brad Bartelt, a spokesman for the U.S. Central Command in the Persian Gulf. It was not known immediately whether al-Tikriti was hit.\nIncreasingly, the U.S. military focus was away from the capital. Kurdish troops set off celebrations in Kirkuk when they moved in, and there were hopes that Iraqis would surrender in Mosul, another northern city, on Friday.\nNearly 100 miles to the north of Baghdad, U.S. commanders said Tikrit was the likely site of a last stand by Iraqi forces -- if there is to be one. Iraqi defenders were believed to have moved there from other parts of the country. U.S. commandos were in the region, and warplanes were attacking.\nU.S.-led fighters and bombers also hit Iraqi positions near the border with Syria, where special forces were trying to prevent regime loyalists from slipping out of Iraq and to keep foreign fighters from entering.\nThere were signs of difficulties ahead in efforts at building a new society.\nTwo Islamic clerics were hacked to death by a mob in Najaf at one of Shiite Islam's holiest shrines, witnesses said.\nOne of the clerics killed, Haider al-Kadar, was a widely hated loyalist of Saddam, part of the Iraqi leader's Ministry of Religion. The other was Abdul Majid al-Khoei, a high-ranking Shiite cleric and son of one of the religion's most prominent spiritual leaders, who was persecuted by Saddam. They were killed at a meeting meant to serve as a model for reconciliation in post-Saddam Iraq. The U.S. military had flown in journalists aboard two helicopters to witness it, although they arrived after the violence.\nAn American plane beamed taped addresses by President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair to the Iraqi people. "Your nation will soon be free," Bush said.\nThere was looting in Baghdad and elsewhere, in the wake of the disappearance of civilian authority. One senior Pentagon official said military commanders have asked religious leaders in the capital to help calm the populace and reduce the looting. One Marine commander said he would institute a dusk-to-dawn curfew.\nSome Iraqis did what they could to prevent looting.\nAt al-Kindi hospital, medical students were sent into neighborhoods to retrieve medicine that had been taken on Wednesday. They returned with double-decker buses loaded with boxes of badly needed supplies.\nIn Washington, one administration official told Congress the Pentagon envisions parallel ministries run by Americans and Iraqis after the war until an interim government can be established. Paul Wolfowitz, deputy secretary of defense, offered no timetable for creation of the interim government or how long U.S. troops would remain in Iraq.\nAfter three weeks of Operation Iraqi Freedom, Air Force Secretary James Roche told CNN: "We effectively have won the conflict. The regime is gone."\nIn northern Iraq, Lt. Col. Robert Waltemeyer, commander of a special forces unit, said troops would enter the city of Mosul "in a matter of hours or days."\nGen. Babakir Zebari, a Kurdish commander, said remnants of Saddam's Baath party and Iraqi military commanders in Mosul had offered to surrender on condition that the U.S.-led bombing stopped and they received amnesty.\nDefense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said at least some of the Iraqi forces inside the city had stacked their weapons in accordance with U.S. surrender demands. Waltemeyer said the U.S. military would meet with representatives from Mosul on Friday morning in an attempt to negotiate a surrender, although he said, "I'm not here to make deals."\nKurdish forces, which have battled Saddam for years, triggered celebrations in Kirkuk when they reached the city, an ancestral home and gateway to Iraq's northern oilfields.\nIn a scene reminiscent of downtown Baghdad a day earlier, joyous residents toppled a statue of the Iraqi leader, then stomped it and hit it with their shoes -- a serious insult in the Arab world. The letters "USA" were spraypainted on the base of the statue.\nLocal residents cheered the passing Kurdish forces and pelted them with roses.\nTo the southeast, Kurdish peshmerga forces also moved into the city of Khaneqin near the border with Iran.\nThe city had been under a curfew for several days. But shortly after Iranian television broadcast images of Wednesday's developments in Baghdad, residents emerged from their homes and found Iraqi soldiers and Baath party members were gone.\nThe advances sparked alarm in Turkey, Iraq's neighbor to the north, which fears permanent\nKurdish control over Kirkuk and nearby oil reserves. The Turkish government announced it was sending military observers to the city with U.S. approval.\nAmerican troops soon moved into the city, and Secretary of State Colin Powell told The Associated Press that Kurdish forces would pull back, reducing the likelihood that Turkish forces would enter the region.\nThe Bush and Blair addresses were part of a new information program that will include publication of a newspaper to be circulated in southern Iraq.\n"The regime of Saddam Hussein is being removed from power and a long era of fear and cruelty is ending," Bush said, while Arabic subtitles scrolled across the screen.\nBlair articulated similar themes. "Our enemy is Saddam and his regime, not the Iraqi people," he said.\nWhile Bush, Blair and their commanders talked of a new life for Iraqis, Saddam's whereabouts remained unknown and there were fresh reminders that the war was not over.\nU.S. forces in Baghdad battled holdout fighters for hours near the al-Azimyah Palace and a nearby mosque and Baath party official's house.\nU.S. officials said they had been tipped off that senior Baath party leaders were meeting in the area, and the Iraqis opened fire first.\nHours later, a suicide blast injured four Marines shortly after dark in downtown Baghdad. No further details were available.\nHalf a world away, the victim of an earlier suicide bombing was laid to rest in Arlington National Cemetery outside Washington. Capt. Russell B. Rippetoe, an Army ranger from Arvada, Colo., became the first soldier from the Iraqi conflict to be buried on the historic grounds.