Here are a few stories worth of a paragraph or two, but a lot of stuff we really don’t care about that much. - JS

N.C. coach’student marriage going to court

The parents of a 16-year-old girl who married her high school coach are suing the education board of North Carolina’s Brunswick County for mental stress.

Dennis and Betty Hager allege in a lawsuit they filed this week they suffered mental stress and anguish when their daughter decided to marry her 40-year-old South Brunswick High School coach in June, the Wilmington (N.C.) Star-News said Wednesday.

“Plaintiffs went through depression, anxiety, mental anguish, embarrassment and extreme stress as a result of the actions set forth herein,” the suit alleges.

Rainfall puts French wine harvest at risk

Wine-makers throughout France are concerned their wine harvest may be partially ruined this year due to a recent deluge of rain across the nation.

With much of France receiving nearly 60 consecutive days of rainfall recently, a form of mildew may have been created that could devastate the nation’s 2007 wine harvest, The Independent reported Wednesday.

1 in 85 Norwegians is a millionaire

One in 86 Norwegians has more than $1 million, giving Norway more millionaires per capita than any other country, an international study found Wednesday.

The study — by France’s Capgemini consulting and professional’services firm and Merrill Lynch & Co. — also found the number of Norwegian millionaires grew 9.7 percent last year.

This is a faster growth rate than the 8.3 percent world average and the 6.4 percent European average, Oslo’s Aftenposten daily reported.

Midnight box office magic for ‘Potter’

Midnight showings of “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix” at U.S. theaters yielded box office magic, scaring up an estimated $12 million in receipts.

The take from the first Wednesday screenings of the fifth Potter movie was $4 million more than current box office champ “Transformers” grossed all of Tuesday, E! News reported.

The midnight screenings were in roughly 2,300 theaters. Wednesday’s formal daytime opening was to play at 4,285 theaters, the second-biggest release ever, behind “Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End,” which opened in 4,362 movie houses in May.

from BBC Online

The Pakistani army says it has found 73 bodies inside a mosque compound in Islamabad, after fierce battles between soldiers and gunmen inside.

Officials said the Red Mosque, or Lal Masjid, complex had been cleared of militants but troops were combing the area for booby traps and explosives.

The mosque’s radical chief cleric, Abdul Rashid Ghazi, was among the dead, the army said.

The operation followed a week-long siege of the compound by troops.

The mosque had been the focus of spiraling tensions between the government and radical students, who had waged a campaign for the adoption of strict Islamic sharia law.

It had been feared that women and children might be among the casualties, but army spokesman Maj Gen Waheed Arshad said none had been found among the bodies.

Scores of civilians, and some militants, emerged from the complex after troops launched an all-out assault in the early hours of Tuesday morning.

read more at BBC ONLINE

From the NYT:

Gen. William E. Ward, the Army’s only black four’star general, was chosen to lead the Pentagon’s new Africa Command. General Ward, 58, now deputy commander of the European Command, will take over a command established to work with African countries to strengthen their governments and militaries and make them less vulnerable to terrorists. Initially, the command will be run through the European Command in Stuttgart, Germany, but is expected to become an independent unit by the end of September 2008.

WASHINGTON - The Defense Department put U.S. troops in Iraq at risk by awarding contracts for badly needed armored vehicles to companies that failed to deliver them on time, according to a review by the Pentagon’s inspector general.

The June 27 report, obtained Wednesday by The Associated Press, examined 15 contracts worth $2.2 billion awarded since 2000 to Force Protection Inc. and Armor Holdings Inc.

The contracts were issued without the normal competition for government work because the military determined these companies were the only ones capable of supplying the vehicles fast enough to meet the demands of deployed troops.

Yet the inspector general’s report concluded otherwise.

Overall, Force Protection of Ladson, S.C., received 11 contracts from the Army and Marine Corps worth $417 million for a variety of vehicles, including its Buffalo and Cougar mine-resistant trucks.

Force Protection failed to meet all delivery schedules, according to the report, and acquisition officials knew there were other manufacturers that might have supplied some of the vehicles in a more timely fashion. The report does not provide the names of those possible alternative sources.

More at Yahoo News

By John Poirier
Reuters

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. banks and credit unions should seek to stop charging hidden fees for overdraft protection when consumers exceed their account balance in an automated teller machine (ATM) or debit transaction, Democratic lawmakers and consumer groups said on Wednesday.

The overdraft fees are a lucrative source of income for financial institutions and House Democrats have introduced legislation that would require them to first inform consumers before assessing the fees.

Overdraft fees cost Americans $17.5 billion last year, up from $10.3 billion in 2005, the Center for Responsible Lending told a House Financial Services subcommittee hearing.

“Banks routinely permit the majority of account holders to overdraw accounts at ATMs and point of sale terminals using debit cards without warning or consent,” said Jean Ann Fox, director of consumer protection at the Consumer Federation of America.

Consumers are not given a choice of deciding whether to borrow from the bank or cancel the transaction when their accounts are overdrawn, the groups said.

The American Bankers Association, an industry group, said consumers should keep better track of their transactions to avoid withdrawing more money than they have.

Nessa Feddis, the banking group’s senior counsel for federal regulations, said customers already have many ways to monitor their account balances using the Internet, telephone or ATMs. “Simply put, consumers are in control of their finances and can avoid overdraft fees,” Feddis told the panel.

read more at REUTERS

by Jim Swanson

Since President Bush has ordered Harriet Miers NOT to testify tomorrow, (and since when do men order women to do anything?), The House of Representatives has a great way to put an end to this B.S. It’s called “Inherent Contempt“.

And just what is “Inherent Contempt?”

Under this process, the procedure for holding a person in contempt involves only the chamber concerned. Following a contempt citation, the person cited for contempt is arrested by the Sergeant-at-Arms for the House or Senate, brought to the floor of the chamber, held to answer charges by the presiding officer, and then subject to punishment that the House may dictate (usually imprisonment for punishment reasons, imprisonment for coercive effect, or release from the contempt citation.)

Concerned with the time-consuming nature of a contempt proceeding and the inability to extend punishment further than the session of the Congress concerned (under Supreme Court rulings), Congress created a statutory process in 1857. While Congress retains its “inherent contempt” authority and may exercise it at any time, this inherent contempt process was last used by the Senate in 1934, against the Postmaster-General. After a one-week trial in the Senate floor (presided by the Vice-President of the United States, acting as Senate President), the Postmaster-General was found guilty and sentenced to 10 days imprisonment.

The Postmaster General had filed a petition of Habeas Corpus in federal courts to overturn his arrest, but after litigation, the US Supreme Court ruled that Congress had acted constitutionally, and denied the petition in the case Jurney v. MacCracken, 294 U.S. 125 (1945).

In other words, The House finds Harriet in contempt, they tell the Sgt. at Arms, who gets the police, who gets Miers, who has a mini-trial in the House immediately, who then goes to jail.

Gee, who do you think is leaking this information? I don’t doubt that al Qaeda is ready to roll, but why is it coming out now? Did they not know prior to this that they are building up strength. Funny how this stuff comes out at certain times. Like when Bush and his Iraq war are tanking. Maybe to take the heat off Libby’s commutation. Maybe to take the heat off the U.S. attorney firings. His failed policies. Take your pick……

By KATHERINE SHRADER and MATTHEW LEE
Associated Press Writers

WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. intelligence analysts have concluded al-Qaida has rebuilt its operating capability to a level not seen since just before the 2001 terrorist attacks, The Associated Press has learned.

The conclusion suggests that the group that launched the most devastating terror attack on the United States has been able to rebuild despite nearly six years of bombings, war and other tactics aimed at crippling it.

Still, numerous government officials say they know of no specific, credible threat of a new attack.

A counterterrorism official familiar with a five-page summary of the new government threat assessment called it a stark appraisal that will be discussed at the White House on Thursday as part of a broader meeting on an upcoming National Intelligence Estimate.

The official and others spoke on condition of anonymity because the secret report remains classified.

By Thomas Ferraro
Reuters

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A former White House aide apologized on Wednesday for calling one of nine fired federal prosecutors “lazy” but refused to answer a host of questions at a congressional probe of the dismissals.

Sara Taylor, who had been White House political director until six weeks ago, testified under oath before the Senate Judiciary Committee in response to a subpoena.

But at the direction of President George W. Bush, Taylor refused to answer certain questions about the administration’s ouster last year of nine of the nation’s 93 U.S. attorneys.

“I will answer faithfully those questions that are appropriate for a private citizen to answer while doing my best to respect the president’s directive that his staff’s communications be privileged,” Taylor said.

Bush, under fire on a number of fronts from the Iraq war to U.S. immigration policy, claimed executive privilege on Monday to shield Taylor and former presidential counsel Harriet Miers from having to testify to Congress about the dismissals.

Critics charge that the firings of the prosecutors appear to have been politically motivated — perhaps even to influence investigations of Democratic or Republican lawmakers.

Read more at Yahoo

By MIKE BAKER
Associated Press Writer

GREENSBORO, N.C. (AP) — Detailed schematics of a military detainee holding facility in southern Iraq. Geographical surveys and aerial photographs of two military airfields outside Baghdad. Plans for a new fuel farm at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan.

The military calls it “need-to-know” information that would pose a direct threat to U.S. troops if it were to fall into the hands of terrorists. It’s material so sensitive that officials refused to release the documents when asked.

But it’s already out there, posted carelessly to file servers by government agencies and contractors, accessible to anyone with an Internet connection.

In a survey of servers run by agencies or companies involved with the military and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, The Associated Press found dozens of documents that officials refused to release when asked directly, citing troop security.

Such material goes online all the time, posted most often by mistake. It’s not in plain sight, unlike the plans for the new American embassy in Baghdad that appeared recently on the Web site of an architectural firm. But it is almost as easy to find.

More at the AP