Weekend News Roundup

Jim Swanson will be gracing our pages with a “Weekend News Roundup” Podcast. This is a test sample of his roundup for the past weekend. Jim is a 25 year radio veteran, and we are honored to have him as part of the Blue Herald Team!! Tune in for his informative and entertaining Weekend News Round Up! You can also “subscribe” with a podcast client application to the Blue Herald RSS/Atom feed and download new files automatically.

Enjoy!!!

Well alright…….

LONDON (AP) - A member of Tony Blair’s Cabinet on Monday brought out into the open a quiet shift away from the U.S. view on combatting extremist groups, acknowledging that British officials have stopped using the expression “war on terror” favored by President Bush.

International Development Secretary Hilary Benn, a rising star of the governing Labour Party, said the phrase strengthens terrorists by making them feel part of a bigger struggle.

“In the U.K., we do not use the phrase ‘war on terror‘ because we can’t win by military means alone, and because this isn’t us against one organized enemy with a clear identity and a coherent set of objectives,” Benn told a meeting in New York organized by the Center on International Cooperation think tank.

He said the real struggle pits the “vast majority” of the world’s people “against a small number of loose, shifting and disparate groups who have relatively little in common apart from their identification with others who share their distorted view of the world and their idea of being part of something bigger.”

Read more at MLive.com

From TPM

The White House and Democrats in Congress are both pushing for emails kept by the Republican National Committee, and the RNC is caught in the middle.

The House Judiciary Committee, chaired by Rep. John Conyers (D-MI), wants to get its hands on those RNC-issued email accounts used by Karl Rove and other White House personnel. Congressional investigators want to know about Rove’s and his deputy’s involvement in the U.S. attorney firings. But the White House insists that it review the emails first, before handing anything over to Democrats. Last week, Conyers warned the RNC not to do that, saying that it would be “an unjustified delay” and “potentially… an obstruction of our investigation.”

And today, in a letter to the RNC, the White House made their position clear: you have to give them to us first. There “exists a clear and indisputable Executive Branch interest” in the emails on the RNC-issued accounts, wrote Emmet Flood, Special Counsel to the President.

Conyers isn’t buying it:

“The White House’s position to clear all RNC emails before they can respond to our request is extreme and unnecessary. This is a clear attempt, on the Administration’s part, to delay this process and keep the wheels of Justice turning slowly.”
What happens next? I don’t know.

You know, this will go nowhere, but I love the guy for doing it.

Looks like he’s reached his boiling point.

Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio), the most liberal of the Democratic presidential candidates in the primary field, declared in a letter sent to his Democratic House colleagues this morning that he plans to file articles of impeachment against Vice President Dick Cheney.

Kucinich has made ending the war in Iraq the central theme of his campaign. He has even taken aim at the leading Democratic presidential candidates in the field for their votes on authorizing the war.

Article II, Section 4 of the Constitution gives Congress the authority to impeach the president, vice president and “all civil Officers of the United States” for “treason, bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.”

Sources tell the Sleuth that in light of the mass killings at Virginia Tech Monday, Kucinich’s impeachment plans have been put on hold. There will be no action this week, they say.

Kucinich’s office had no comment on the Congressman’s “Dear Colleague” letter — which apparently was drafted over the weekend, before the school massacre — or on what the focus of articles of impeachment against Cheney would be.

More at the Washington Post

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Two Secret Service officers were injured on Tuesday after a gun held by another Secret Service officer accidentally fired inside the White House gate, according to a spokesman, Darrin Blackford.

Their injuries are non-life threatening, the spokesman said.

One officer suffered a shrapnel wound to the face, and the other was wounded in the leg.

They were taken to George Washington Hospital.

At the time, President George W. Bush was on a trip to Blacksburg, Virginia, to attend a ceremony at Virginia Tech university following Monday’s shooting rampage.

“It appears that at approximately 2:10 p.m. (1810 GMT) there was an accidental discharge of a service issued weapon, which occurred inside the Southwest Gate at a security post near the White House,” Blackford said.

Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House, Lafayette Park across the street from the White House and other nearby walkways were all shut down to pedestrian traffic due to the incident. Many police vehicles were in the area.

Source: Reuters

US mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are developing new types of loans to help borrowers with high-risk mortgages avoid losing their homes.
The move comes amid turmoil in the sub-prime lending market, which offers higher priced loans to people with low wages or poor credit histories.

With US home repossessions hitting a record high last year, the situation has caused concern on Wall Street.

The two firms are looking at “more consumer-friendly sub-prime products”.

‘Challenging task’

Sub-prime mortgages are typically variable rate, starting with a low interest rate which can then rise sharply.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac said they were aiming to introduce new 30-year, and possibly 40-year, fixed rate deals, with the chance for existing sub-prime customers to switch.

Their announcement came after a high-level group of mortgage industry executives, federal officials and bankers met to discuss the difficulty in the sub-prime market.

They have agreed on a goal of keeping deserving borrowers with high-risk mortgages in their homes.

“It is going to be a very challenging task…we’ve not going to be able to save everybody,” said Sheila Bair, chairman of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation.

More at BBC.com

Reverend Lee
Diane Schuur

From the Miami Herald

TALLAHASSEE — For all you skeptics, here’s proof the Legislature has got your back:

Sen. Victor Crist, a Tampa Republican, is pushing legislation to require restaurants to supply toilet paper in every restroom stall. He has heard the no-paper complaint enough from female relatives.

The final straw, he says, was when he walked into the restroom of a Chinese restaurant in Tampa last year. It had no soap, no running water and the toilet wouldn’t flush. Then he saw the chef walk out of the bathroom.

‘The next day at the office, I said to the guys, `We’re doing a bill,’ ” Crist said.

His colleagues approved the bill unanimously Monday in a Senate committee. It would codify standards of sanitation into law — mandating antibacterial soap, toilet paper and cleanable fixtures.

Crist says it’s important in preventing food-borne illnesses. ”It’s not a pretty issue,” he said. “No one really wants to discuss it.”

Restaurants must follow standards based on state Department of Health rules, but Crist wants it in statute because he says the agency that inspects restaurants hasn’t been paying enough attention to the bathrooms. A 2005 audit showed the state didn’t inspect enough restaurants to satisfy the law.

Carol Dover, a lobbyist for the Florida Restaurant and Lodging Association, said Crist’s experience is the “exception to the rule.”

She added the problem is not standards, but the manpower given to the state to enforce restroom sanitation.

”The real issue is that there aren’t enough inspectors,” Dover said. “That’s where things are falling through the cracks.”

(emphasis mine)

4 U.S. troops were killed in Iraq yesterday…..11 in the last 3 days. (not counting today)

From Juan Cole:

I keep hearing from US politicians and the US mass media that the “situation is improving” in Iraq. The profound sorrow and alarm produced in the American public by the horrific shootings at Virginia Tech should give us a baseline for what the Iraqis are actually living through. They have two Virginia Tech’style attacks every single day. Virginia Tech will be gone from the headlines and the air waves by next week this time in the US, though the families of the victims will grieve for a lifetime. But next Tuesday I will come out here and report to you that 64 Iraqis have been killed in political violence. And those will mainly be the ones killed by bombs and mortars. They are only 13% of the total; most Iraqis killed violently, perhaps 500 a day throughout the country if you count criminal and tribal violence, are just shot down. Shot down, like the college students and professors at Blacksburg. We Americans can so easily, with a shudder, imagine the college student trying to barricade himself behind a door against the armed madman without. But can we put ourselves in the place of Iraqi students?

By the by, just a reminder the Gulf Coast is still a mess…..and here we are, going into another hurricane season that forecasters are saying is sure to be an active one. Why don’t we hear more about this in congress??? Why? Why? Why? Why not bring our troops home and concentrate on rebuilding our own Gulf Coast, and working on our own infastructure?

(AP) Allstate Insurance Co. must pay a Louisiana man who lost his home to Hurricane Katrina more than $2.8 million in damages and penalties, a federal jury decided Monday in a case that hinged largely on whether it was wind or storm surge that wiped out his house.

Allstate spokeswoman Kate Hollcraft said the company will appeal.

“Allstate is shocked with the jury verdict in favor of the plaintiff. Allstate believes it acted in good faith throughout the entire claims process with the Weiss family,” she said.

The jury found Allstate - which claimed most of the damage was due to storm surge, an event not covered in its policy - did not pay Robert Weiss enough money to cover wind damage to his home. The verdict included a $1.5 million penalty for the company’s failure to pay the claim quickly enough.

More at CBSNews