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September 28, 2007

Where Have All the Recruits Gone?

It might not seem like the best idea for a Navy recruiter to use the phrase "narcissistic praise junkies" to refer to potential sailors. But it turned up in a presentation at the Annual Navy Workforce Research and Analysis Conference to describe the qualities of so-called "millennial" kids, the ones they're trying to get to join the Navy now. Here's a link to the whole presentation. (Warning: It's a PowerPoint document.)

But along with the amusing pieces in the presentation (favorite line: "This is not just a generation gap, but dealing with a somewhat alien life force." And a translation of l33t speak: Navy! FTW!), there is something that shows what we've been hearing all along: that the kids today just aren't all that interested in heading over to Iraq. Check out the slide below, showing the negative effect of the Iraq war on kids' patriotism and their likelihood to join the military.

Total sidenote: In the slide of the presentation that talks about the millennials' trademarks (never seen a film camera, always been online, etc.), there is one odd lapse for a military document. It says, "WW1 started nearly a century before he was born (For Boomers, Civil War started a century before birth)." Now, check me on this, but World War I started in 1914 (1917 if you're dating it to when America entered the war), which is 60-70 years before the millennials start being born (depending on when you count the beginning of the millennial generation). And the Civil War started in 1861, and assuming we're counting the boomers as being born after World War II but before the Vietnam War, that's about 80-some-odd years later. Maybe I'm being nitpicky, but don't they teach bloody dates at Annapolis anymore?

(Thanks to Danger Room.)

- JJ Sutherland

A slide from a presentation about recruiting members of the millennial generation at the Annual Navy Workforce Research and Analysis Conference.

Conference Web site

Myanmar Shuts Down Internet Access

The government of Myanmar has cut off the public's access to the Internet. That access has played a major role in allowing us to see images of what is happening during the anti-government protests in the country.

It looks like the government is continuing to violently clamp down on the protests that have drawn thousands of people into the streets, often led by Buddhist monks.

One blog that is still getting some stuff out of Myanmar is Ko Htike's. He's a native of the country, now living in London, who has been posting photos and reports on what is happening since the crisis began.

(Warning: Some of the images on his blog are graphic depictions of the results of the violence.)

- JJ Sutherland

Pretend to Be a Time Traveler Day

A few months back, someone proposed designating Dec. 8 as "Pretend to be a Time Traveler Day." And it's gaining steam online. The rules are simple: You can be from a utopian future or a dystopian one, or, "for beginners," the past.

Here's my favorite, the dystopian, from the proposal:

- If you go [for] the "prisoner who's escaped the future" try shaving your head and putting a barcode on the back of your neck. Then stagger around and stare at the sky, as if you've never seen it before.
- Walk up to random people and say "WHAT YEAR IS THIS?" and when they tell you, get quiet and then say "Then there's still time!" and run off.

- Stand in front of a statue (any statue, really), fall to your knees, and yell "NOOOOOOOOO"

People from places as far afield as Florida, Holland, Australia, Canada, Belgium and California have already signed up. There's a Facebook event with more than 2,000 confirmed guests. There are pages and pages of ideas and costume proposals.

One of my faves:

One of the ones I've done in real life was to get my friend to shave his head, draw a bar code on the back of his neck, stagger up to people and say "WHAT YEAR IS THIS" then run off. Then a second person walks up to that same person later with a photo and says "HAVE YOU SEEN THIS MAN"? It helps if you have a little eyepiece or small piece of obtuse technology on you.

Now, I have no idea if anyone will actually pull this off, but the enthusiasm seems to be running high, with blogs and sites talking about it. It's similar, perhaps, to the zombie day in San Francisco earlier this year. Or the incredibly insane anime dance number done in Tokyo, where a bunch of people met up online and decided to do the dance in the street, until the cops came. Kind of like a flash mob, like the 4,000 people who showed up during rush hour at London's Victoria station and danced. For two hours.

Of course, these kinds of things can be used in ways besides just odd public art pieces: protests, marketing, whatever. It might be the next step in linking virtual and "meat" space. And it's not moderated or organized by anyone really; it just comes from an idea that people build on. Open-source action.

- JJ Sutherland

2:20 PM ET | 09-28-2007 | permalink | e-mail post | trackbacks (0)

'I'm Not in the Business. I Am the Business.'

Director Ridley Scott attends the Blade Runner premiere at the Venice Film Festival earlier this month.

Chris Jackson/Getty Images

I just got off the phone with Tom Bullock, our head foreign producer. When both of us are in the country, we share a very small, very messy office. He's in Baghdad right now, but I called him with the news that Ridley Scott is releasing yet another version of Blade Runner in the coming months.

We have had a long-running conversation about various top fives (obviously inspired by High Fidelity), and Blade Runner makes both of our lists. As does The Empire Strikes Back, as well as Alien and Aliens. We disagree about the last entry, but that's simply because he's wrong in thinking 2001 is better than Terminator.

But yet another cut of Blade Runner? The movie was released 25 years ago, the director's cut 15 years ago, and now a five-disc set.

Blade Runner, in my opinion, still works. It feels real. It feels like a dirty, rainy, global megalopolis that could exist today. It still feels like an accurate portrayal of an ever-approaching future.

Why? Well, Wired has an interview with Scott this week. Here's what he says about how he approached the design of the film:

In this instance, my special effect was the world. That's why I put together people like [industrial designer] Syd Mead who were actually serious futurists. The big test is saying, Draw me a car in 30 years' time, without it looking like bad science fiction. Or, Draw me an electric iron that will be pressing shirts in 20 years without it looking silly. I wanted the world to be futuristic and yet feel — not familiar, because it won't be — but feel authentic. One of the hardest sets to design was the kitchen. It's easy to fantasize about Tyrell's giant neo-Egyptianesque boardroom, but imagining a bathroom and kitchen in those times, that's tricky. Nevertheless, fascinating. I love the problem.

It's on my Netflix list. You all rate the top five differently?

- JJ Sutherland

The Questions Being Asked Later

(Tom Regan is off today. NPR's JJ Sutherland is filling in.)

I never saw Baghdad before the war. I've heard it described as impeccably clean. A spread-out city more akin to Los Angeles than the densely packed old cities in the Middle East. Not much traffic, not a lot of cars.

It's still spread out, but the cleanliness and traffic have changed. Rubble and trash litter the streets. Sometimes someone has made a half-hearted effort to sweep the rubble into loose piles. The occasional burned-out car, usually from a car bomb, can be seen on the side of the road. Massive concrete walls seal off buildings and neighborhoods and markets in an attempt to secure them. Miles of razor wire spill in loose coils onto the street. It is not a pretty city.

But the scariest part to me is all the guys with guns. There seem to be dozens of different uniforms and vehicles, and many of them wear masks. But they all carry weapons, and they seem to be pointed at you all the time. It is not uncommon to be sitting in Baghdad's horrific traffic with some guy in a pickup truck or van or SUV pointing a rifle at you, and the only thing you can think is: "Who are those guys?"

And of those guys with guns, the Blackwater guys with their mirrored shades stood out. The rumors and stories about them among Iraqis are unending.

And so, this latest incident that is causing all the furor here and in Iraq didn't really surprise me. But reading The New York Times today did.

Continue reading "The Questions Being Asked Later" »

September 27, 2007

Study Finds Men Are Happier Than Women

This report caught me completely by surprise because I thought the results would be reversed. A new study by the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania found that men are happier than women. It's a major change from surveys 30 years ago.

And the main reason? While women do have more opportunities, the study found they are also being asked to handle many responsibilities, like a job and the housework. The guys? It seems they just get to "play a lot more than women do," as one of the survey subjects put it. (Which is shorthand for they're not doing housework.)

[Betsey Stevenson, an economist at the Wharton School] said that choosing between work and family is a major source of stress. "If you are at work, you feel torn you should be home," she said. "And if you are home you feel you should be at work. And if you cut back your hours as a stay at home mom, you feel you are a failure as a career woman."

But one big difference between today and past decades is that women do not intend to suffer in silence. "Perhaps one of the achievements of the women's movement is they feel more honest, and capable of being honest about their lack of happiness," Stevenson said.

GAO: Canadian Border Presents Security Concerns

A threat from the Great White North, eh?

A Government Accountability Office report, presented today to the Senate Finance Committee, says there are too many vulnerable spots along the 5,000-mile-long U.S.-Canadian border where someone could smuggle radioactive materials into the United States.

CongressDaily reports that on three separate occasions GAO officials "probed apparently unmonitored and unmanned sections of the northern border, finding that they could sneak from Canada into the United States undetected even while carrying a red duffel bag to simulate the smuggling of radioactive materials or other contraband." A GAO video shows agents going back and forth across the border.

A Customs and Border Protection spokesman downplayed the findings and hinted that officials might have been aware of what the GAO was doing but determined it wasn't a threat. CBS reports that border officials still believe the border with Mexico is a far greater threat.

U.K. Firm Tells U.S. Workers to Remove Helmet Decals

I remember seeing plenty of workers for KeySpan, a big natural gas firm in the Northeast, sporting hard hats that were so covered with stickers and decals, you couldn't see the white underneath.

Not anymore. The Boston Globe reports that a month after the British energy giant National Grid PLC took over KeySpan, managers told employees that the decals and stickers — often depicting the American flag or carrying slogans like "Proud to be an American" — had to go, or they would be suspended.

Some workers have resisted the new rule. A spokesman for the company says it's a safety issue as well as one of appearance because the decals could cover cracks and wear in the hard hats.

Now, I'm not quite sure if these British owners realize what they have done. I lived in Boston for a long time, and I can tell you that Bostonians still don't take well to British rule. It wouldn't surprise me at all if some of those safety helmets wind up in Boston Harbor.

How do you feel about the hard-hat stickers? Should workers be able to express themselves on the job?

Judge Rules Provisions of Patriot Act Unconstitutional

For the second time this month, a judge has ruled sections of the Patriot Act unconstitutional.

CNN reports that the two provisions struck down Wednesday deal with searches and intelligence gathering. U.S. District Judge Ann Aiken of Portland, Ore., ruled that the act violates the Constitution because it "permits the executive branch of government to conduct surveillance and searches of American citizens without satisfying the probable cause requirements of the Fourth Amendment."

The government "is asking this court to, in essence, amend the Bill of Rights, by giving it an interpretation that would deprive it of any real meaning. The court declines to do so," Aiken said.
The Justice Department was reviewing the decision, said spokesman Dean Boyd.

Aiken's ruling came in a case brought by attorney Brandon Mayfield, a Portland native who had been wrongly detained as a terrorism suspect in the Madrid bombings of 2004. As The Washington Post reports, the FBI used expanded powers under the Patriot Act "to secretly search Mayfield's house and law office, copy computer files and photos, tape his telephone conversations, and place surveillance bugs in his office using warrants issued by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court."

A New York judge also struck down part of the Patriot Act this month, ruling on Sept. 6 that provisions allowing the FBI to use national security letters to get data from private companies without a court warrant were unconstitutional.

September 26, 2007

Did Columnist's Gender Play Role in Coach's Tirade?

Watch Oklahoma State coach Mike Gundy's rant.

YouTube

By now, much of America has seen the tirade that Oklahoma State coach Mike Gundy unleashed on Oklahoman columnist Jenni Carlson after she wrote a scathing column about OSU quarterback Bobby Reid. (In case you missed it, it's a big hit on YouTube.)

Gundy said he felt that Carlson was too hard on an amateur player and that she wasn't able to understand how upset Reid was over losing his starting position because she didn't have any children.

More than a few sports columnists have taken Gundy to task for his rant. (He has refused to apologize. Carlson has written that she will stand by her original column.) Observers also have pointed out that Division I football players are often treated more like professionals than amateurs.

But Chicago Sun-Times sports columnist Carol Slezak wonders if Gundy would have openly berated a male columnist in the way that he went after a woman.

I can't imagine Gundy screaming during a press conference about a male writer's lack of offspring. I can't imagine him substituting ''daddy'' for ''mommy'' in his rant. I also wonder, as one of the few — or perhaps only — women in that room, if Carlson didn't make for an easy target in Gundy's mind. Watching the video, I sensed a subcurrent that gave me an uneasy feeling. As if what Gundy was really thinking was, ''How dare that bitch criticize one of my players. She shouldn't be writing about football. She should be home making babies."

Do you think Gundy's tirade was influenced by Carlson's gender or would he have treated a male writer the same way? Either way, was his anger at the column itself justified?

GAO Takes Administration to Task over Vet Benefits

The Government Accountability Office took the Bush administration to task today over veterans' benefits — or, to be more precise, the lack of them. The testimony before a House subcommittee was the first preliminary assessment of how things are going since The Washington Post documented problems with outpatient treatment at Walter Reed Army Medical Center.

The Army has touted the creation of more personalized medical care units to prevent wounded veterans from falling through the cracks, but GAO officials found that 46 percent of returning service members who were eligible didn't get the service because of staffing shortages.

GAO officials reported that the Pentagon and Veterans Affairs Department remain "far away" from having a comprehensive system for sharing medical records, even after 10 years of review, The Associated Press reports. The administration also lacks a solution for delays in disability payments, which average almost six months, despite reviews at multiple levels of government.

USA Today's On Politics blog speculates that the GAO's report could reignite a debate about veterans' care among the presidential candidates. You might even see it discussed during the Democrats' debate tonight in New Hampshire.

Security Forces Start Crackdown in Myanmar

Fears that Myanmar's military rulers would retaliate against protesting monks and activists were realized today when security forces began a violent crackdown. The Associated Press reports that at least one person was shot and killed and dozens of Buddhist monks were dragged away. As many as 300 monks and activists were arrested.

There are differing reports of casualties. Agence-France Presse reports that three monks were killed — one when a gun went off as he struggled with a soldier, and two others who were beaten to death.

The military junta had banned all gatherings of more than five people and imposed a nighttime curfew following days of anti-government marches.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown called today for a U.N. Security Council meeting, vowing there would be "no impunity'' for human rights violators in the country.

12:03 PM ET | 09-26-2007 | permalink | e-mail post | trackbacks (0)

UAW, General Motors Reach Tentative Deal

The two-day strike is over. The United Auto Workers reached a tentative agreement with General Motors on a four-year contract early this morning.

The two sides released few details of the new contract, but the Chicago Tribune reports that it will shift "a $51 billion liability for retiree health care to a union-run trust fund." The union will take over managing the liability in a voluntary employee beneficiary association. It means the union will assume the risk of future increases in health care costs.

Union leaders said this morning that the contract includes assurances from GM that UAW workers' jobs will be protected and lump-sum bonuses instead of annual wage increases.

The next step is for local UAW presidents review the contract, and then it will be put to the union's 74,000 members at GM for a vote. The contract also needs court and regulatory approval, which means it may take a while to implement.

The agreement is expected to set a pattern for contract talks at Ford and Chrysler.

9:15 AM ET | 09-26-2007 | permalink | e-mail post | trackbacks (0)

September 25, 2007

Microsoft Hopes to Stay Ahead with 'Halo 3'

Microsoft is pinning a lot of hopes on today's release of the game Halo 3, including its ability to continue to claim the Xbox as the most popular video-gaming system.

Bloomberg reports that Xbox has been steadily losing ground to the more family-friendly Nintendo Wii system. But Microsoft hopes that Halo 3 — aimed at the gaming world's "sweet spot" of male teens and young adults — will become the year's biggest entertainment event. That title is currently held by the seventh Harry Potter novel, which brought in an opening-day total of $170 million.

Halo will sell for $59 to $129. Hardcore fans can even get a special edition Xbox for $400 in the green and gold colors of Master Chief, the soldier who defends humanity from alien invaders in the game.

Microsoft may have grand expectations, but Halo fan Rich Douek, a 32-year-old graphic designer from New York, tells The Associated Press that he's not expecting to be blown away.

"At end of the day it's just a really good first-person shooter. I don't see it as breaking any molds or being any new revolutionary concept in gaming," he said. "It may turn out to be best first-person shooter ever, but it's not going to, like, change the world in a meaningful way."

DEA Busts Steroid Rings with Links to China

One sports columnist is calling it "Armageddon for athletes."

The International Herald Tribune reports that federal officials from the Drug Enforcement Administration have made 124 arrests and seized millions of dollars' worth of illegal drugs as part of a bust that exposed "a sprawling underground distribution network for steroids, human growth hormone and other illicit bodybuilding drugs supplied by 37 companies in China." The DEA revealed the scope of the 18-month operation Monday, which also included raids and arrests in Mexico, Canada, Australia, Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Sweden and Thailand.

The authorities seized $6.5 million cash, 25 vehicles, 3 boats, 27 pill presses and 71 weapons while executing 143 search warrants at 56 makeshift steroid labs and other locations, the drug enforcement agency said.

The DEA estimates that 99 percent of the steroids were made with materials imported from China. A spokesman said if the agency comes across the names of athletes who received the illegal drugs during their investigation, they will leave it up to the Justice Department to decide if the players' leagues should be notified.

The Washington Post reports that the arrests "could have unusual and unnerving repercussions for the clientele of the labs" because the DEA is creating a database of people who received the drugs.

High Court to Hear Lethal Injection, Voter ID Cases

The U.S. Supreme Court agreed today to hear cases examining the constitutionality of two prominent issues: lethal injection and voter identification requirements.

The Associated Press reports that the court will hear an appeal from Ralph Baze and Thomas Clyde Bowling Jr., two Kentucky death-row inmates who sued the state in 2004, claiming lethal injection amounts to cruel and unusual punishment. Baze was scheduled to be executed today, but the Kentucky Supreme Court halted the proceedings earlier this month.

Lethal injections are used in 37 states. Anti-death penalty advocates say the three-drug "cocktail" used in injections can lead to excruciating pain. In Kentucky, an appeals court and the state's Supreme Court have ruled that lethal injection is constitutional. But a judge in Tennessee ruled against lethal injection last week and ordered the state to not to use it. A California judge made a similar ruling last year.

Ohio State University law professor Douglas Berman points out at his Sentencing Law and Policy blog that the court's decision to hear the case could mean a moratorium on all lethal injection executions nationwide until a ruling is issued, possibly as late as June 2008.

And in a case that will have implications for the 2008 elections, the Supreme Court also agreed to decide if voter identification laws unfairly dissuade minorities and the poor from voting. The challenge originates from an Indiana law that requires voters to present photo ID at the polls. The state says the law reduces voter fraud.

Along with these two cases, the court agreed to hear 15 others.

Housing Prices Decline Sharply in July

A decline in U.S. home prices sped up across the nation in July, leading to the sharpest drop in 16 years. The Associated Press reports that the S&P/Case-Shiller home price index of 10 cities out today shows a 4.5 percent drop from last year.

In the index of 20 cities, there was a 3.9 percent decrease. According to the report, prices are still rising in five of those cities: Atlanta; Charlotte, N.C.; Dallas; Portland; and Seattle — but Atlanta and Dallas are close to moving into negative territory.

The results of a Reuters/University of Michigan survey last week shows that today's news will come as no surprise to many homeowners. In the survey, 26 percent of homeowners said the value of their homes has fallen in the past year, while 21 percent said they expect their homes' value to fall in the year ahead.

But Diana Olick writes at CNBC that, as big as that 26 percent figure is, it only shows that the other 74 percent of homeowners are not facing the reality of the situation.

Sellers are stubborn; they just don't get it. Prices during the boom were unsustainable, affordability is now ridiculous, and continued price appreciation makes no economic sense in the current atmosphere. The boom-time price inflation in homes was thanks to a faulty mortgage system, which is now in the process of righting itself, and home prices rightfully have to fall in line. Do I like writing those words? Hell no! I own a home. I like money. I also like logic. Sue me.

Buddhist Monks Continue Protest Despite Threats

Buddhist monks and their supporters march in protest in Yangon today, despite stern warnings from Myanmar's junta.

AFP/Getty Images

Thousands of Buddhist monks continued their protests against the country's military rulers today in Myanmar, formerly Burma, despite threats of retaliation.

The monks and their civilian supporters again marched through the streets of Yangon, chanting, "We want dialogue" and "Democracy, democracy." The protests began Aug. 19 after the government sharply raised fuel prices.

Reuters reports that there were no overt signs of soldiers during the march, but police and military trucks drove into the city center after demonstrators left.

Monks have been passing out pictures of the late Aung San, an independence hero and the father of detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

The Bush administration has entered the fray, threatening further sanctions against the Myanmar government and those who fund it, The Associated Press reports. President Bush is expected to announce the sanctions during his speech today at the United Nations. U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told Reuters that the U.S. also will step up pressure for U.N. Security Council action on Myanmar.

September 24, 2007

California Church Wants Apology from IRS

It seems that the clergy and parishioners of All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena, Calif., are not interested in turning the other cheek when it comes to the Internal Revenue Service.

The Los Angeles Times reports that the Rev. J. Edwin Bacon Jr. said Sunday that the IRS had notified him that it had ended its lengthy investigation into what it considered an anti-war sermon given in the days before the 2004 election. The IRS said the church continues to qualify for tax-exempt status, but the agency still considers the sermon illegal.

Instead of accepting the decision, the church has decided to "seek clarification, a corrected record and an apology from the IRS." It also wants the Treasury Department, which overseas the IRS, to investigate reports of inappropriate conversations between the agency and the Justice Department.

Those conversations, documented in e-mails obtained by the church through Freedom of Information Act requests, appear to show that Justice Department officials were involved in the All Saints case before the IRS made any formal referral of it for possible prosecution, an attorney for the church said. The discussions raise concerns that the IRS' investigation was politically motivated, church officials said.

Chinese Happy About Mattel's Apology

Toy maker Mattel's very public apology to China over its recent recall of millions of Chinese-made toys is getting high marks in the country. The Sydney Morning Herald reports that Chinese newspapers editorialized today that the apology allows China to reclaim the "dignity" of the "made in China" brand.

A Mattel senior vice president apologized Friday. "Mattel takes full responsibility for these recalls and apologizes personally to you, the Chinese people, and all of our customers who received the toys," Thomas Debrowski, Mattel's executive vice president for worldwide operations, told Li Changjang, China's product safety chief.

But why would Mattel make such a public apology? Financial experts told The Associated Press that Mattel is concerned about its bottom line.

"Mattel is worried that the Chinese government is going to make it difficult for them to produce, put their costs up and hurt their stock price," said Peter Navarro, a business professor at the University of California, Irvine.

Chinese officials blame the world media for unfairly targeting China. And they may have an argument. A new report by two Canadian business professors says that of the 550 toy recalls since the 1980s, about 75 percent were caused by design flaws, not problems in the manufacturing process. In the Mattel case, the company said 17.4 million toys were recalled because of a design flaw involving loose magnets that could be swallowed and 2.2 million were recalled because of lead paint from Chinese suppliers.

UAW Members Start Picketing General Motors

United Auto Workers members wait at UAW Local 22 for news and their strike assignments Monday in Detroit.

Bill Pugliano/Getty Images

The Detroit Free Press reports that United Auto Workers members started picketing General Motors plants in suburban Detroit and Lansing, Mich., after an 11 a.m. deadline passed for the two sides to reach a new labor agreement. The walkout coincided with the lunch break at several plants.

A General Motors spokesman confirmed to The Associated Press that the UAW has called a strike against the company. Spokesman Dan Flores said GM was disappointed that a strike was called.

"The bargaining involves complex, difficult issues that affect the job security of our U.S. work force and the long-term viability of the company. We remain fully committed to working with the UAW to develop solutions together to address the competitive challenges facing GM," Flores said.

The strike, the first against General Motors since 1998, was unexpected. The Chicago Tribune reports it comes "as Asian automakers are grabbing bigger shares of the U.S. market and could be damaging to both sides." GM has cut more than 150,000 UAW jobs since 2005. A prolonged strike would likely lead to plant shutdowns and more layoffs.

It's Global Warming Week in America

If you're interested in global warming, this is the week to pay attention to the news.

Starting with a meeting today at the United Nations in New York, there will be a series of gatherings designed to confront the problems created by global warming — like the news that the Arctic polar ice cap retreated farther this summer than apparently any other time in more than a hundred years — and find political solutions. Today's gathering, designed to coincide with the opening of the U.N. General Assembly, will include representatives of more than 150 countries.

On Wednesday, the Clinton Global Initiative will bring together business and international political leaders for three days to discuss "grass-roots" solutions to global warming. Then on Thursday, President Bush will host the leaders of the world's top carbon-emitting countries, including India and China. (Some critics have charged that Bush is trying to upstage the U.N. meeting, but his supporters deny it.)

All these meetings come just a few days after 200 governments agreed at a U.N. conference in Montreal to speed up a treaty to phase out hydrochlorofluorocarbons, chemicals that harm the ozone layer.

12:12 PM ET | 09-24-2007 | permalink | e-mail post | trackbacks (0)

Ahmadinejad Comes to the Big Apple

This may be the most-watched visit to New York since, well, King Kong.

Controversial Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will drop by Columbia University today to address students and bring "alternative views" to a U.S. audience. It's my guess that his reception will be somewhat similar to a heckling Red Sox fan who shows up at Yankee Stadium. Then again, he probably won't get beaten up ... physically.

Police rejected Ahmadinejad's request to visit the site of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. In an interview on CBS' 60 Minutes Sunday night, Ahmadinejad said he wanted to visit to honor the victims of the attacks. Sort of.

"Usually, you go to these sites to pay your respects," Ahmadinejad said. "And also to perhaps air your views about the root causes of such incidents."

Ah, I'm not sure I've heard that one before. (And reading the transcript of the interview shows the Iranian leader is pretty dogged when it comes to spin, noting that "70, 80 percent of the American people are against their troops, their sons and daughters being in Iraq and war.")

Speaking of Iraq, The Associated Press reports that tensions between Iran and the U.S. continue to grow, most recently over the U.S. arrest of an Iranian official there, with the Iraqi government seeming to lean toward Iran.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki condemned the arrest, saying the official had been invited to Iraq. U.S. forces say he is a member of the elite Quds force of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, which is accused of smuggling weapons into Iraq.

"The government of Iraq is an elected one and sovereign. When it gives a visa, it is responsible for the visa," al-Maliki told AP. "We consider the arrest ... of this individual who holds an Iraqi visa and a (valid) passport to be unacceptable."

September 21, 2007

Study Shows Quitters Are Winners

Winners never quit and quitters never win. Unless you count being healthier and happier. Seriously.

Two Canadian psychologists, Gregory Miller of the University of British Columbia and Carsten Wrosch of Concordia University in Montreal, wondered about the link between tenacity and health. So they developed a way to distinguish between "people who are relentless by nature and those who are much more accepting of life's curveballs." Or Bulldogs and Quitters.

For a study published in the September issue of the journal Psychological Science, the two men followed a group of teenagers for a year. Their results indicate that people who know their own limits are healthier in almost every measure than people who won't give up.

As Wray Herbert writes at Newsweek, "knowing when to throw in the towel is only half the story."

The psychologists also sorted both the Bulldogs and the Quitters by their willingness to re-engage and set new goals after they gave up on something important. While they did not find a direct link between re-engagement and physical health, they did find that people who readily jumped back into life had a greater sense of purpose and mastery and were less likely to ruminate about the past. Setting new goals appears to buffer the emotional consequences of failure, especially for those, like the Bulldogs, who have the hardest time admitting defeat.

Or, quoting Herbert quoting W.C. Fields, "If at first you don't succeed, try, try again. Then quit. There's no point in being a damn fool about it."

That's all for this week. If you see anything interesting, e-mail us at newsblog@npr.org.

Blogosphere Plays Role in 'Jena Six' Story, Others

If anyone doubts that the blogosphere is increasingly playing a role in shaping our political and news environment, this week's events may convince them otherwise. Three stories in the past few days illustrate the point.

First, there's Eric Weiner's piece for NPR.org about the role that African-American bloggers played in bringing the story of the "Jena Six" to the forefront of the traditional media. The story of the six black youths charged in the beating of a white classmate was largely untouched by mainstream media outlets for months, but a loose network of black bloggers (sometimes called the "Afro-Sphere") refused to let it die. Eventually their efforts helped lead to Thursday's massive — and massively covered — demonstration.

Shawn Williams, a blogger from Dallas, compared the bloggers' network to "the underground railroad. A lot of people are faceless and nameless. So just like the underground railroad, you know where to go but you don't know who might be there once you arrive."

Second, Dan Rather might still be an anchor at CBS, rather than suing it, if not for the blogosphere. After CBS aired a damning story about President Bush's days in the Air National Guard based on a series of memos, bloggers immediately raised concerns that they were phony. Eventually CBS retracted the story, which ultimately led to Rather's departure.

Finally, The Washington Post reported Sunday that President Bush had met with a group of military bloggers. The Post notes that the meeting offered Bush the chance to get around the traditional media, while also reaching out to the providers of a new source of information for soldiers, their families and others who follow the conflict in Iraq closely.

"More and more we are engaging in the new-media world, and these are influential people who have a big following," said Kevin F. Sullivan, the White House communications chief.

FBI Reportedly Taped Alaska Senator in Probe

The Associated Press reports that the FBI worked with an Alaska oil contractor to secretly tape telephone calls with Sen. Ted Stevens in a public corruption sting. Stevens, the longest-serving Republican senator, is under investigation in the FBI probe of several prominent lawmakers in Alaska.

[Bill] Allen, a wealthy businessman and Stevens' political patron, agreed to the taping last year after authorities confronted him with evidence he had bribed Alaska lawmakers. He pleaded guilty to bribery and is a key witness against Alaska legislators. He also has told prosecutors he paid his employees to renovate the senator's house ... Stevens has said he won't discuss the investigation for fear it will look like he's trying to influence it.

Allen testified in federal court last week that the FBI asked him to call several people. An example of Allen's handiwork surfaced in the trial of former Alaska House Speaker Peter Kott. In a call taped by the FBI, Allen asked Kott how his son resolved his financial troubles. Kott said, "It was your check."

The Anchorage Daily News reports that Kott said at his trial that, while he accepted money, he didn't take bribes.

12:34 PM ET | 09-21-2007 | permalink | e-mail post | trackbacks (0)

Report: U.S., Israel Shared Data about Syrian Site

Well, it looks like the recent speculation that Israel conducted a raid in Syria because of possible nuclear activity there might have been on the money. The Washington Post reports that Israel decided to bomb a suspected Syrian nuclear site after sharing information with the United States that indicated North Korean nuclear personnel were in Syria.

Ultimately, however, the United States is believed to have provided Israel with some corroboration of the original intelligence before Israel proceeded with the raid, which hit the Syrian facility in the dead of night to minimize possible casualties, the sources said.

But some proliferation experts have doubts about the intelligence that precipitated Israel's strike, the Post reports. They say Syria showed no interest in nuclear weapons in the past and it's possible North Korea was just unloading what it didn't need. North Korea denied this week that it was giving the country any nuclear aid.

Simon Tisdall of The Guardian writes that this "nuclear spectre has been conjured largely by American officials, some of whom famously misdirected similar WMD allegations at Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq." He says another explanation for the attack seems more plausible: that Israel was targeting Iranian arms on their way to Hezbollah. While Iran says it only provides financial support to the Lebanese organization, Tisdall writes, there are "persistent, credible reports" that Iranian weapons are making their way through Syria from northern Iraq.

10:17 AM ET | 09-21-2007 | permalink | e-mail post | trackbacks (0)

September 20, 2007

Canadian Dollar Matches U.S., While Euro Soars

Several years ago, when I lived in Canada and worked via the Internet for The Christian Science Monitor in Boston, the gap between my U.S. salary and what it was worth in Canadian dollars was so large, I had to pay an additional $30,000 in taxes in Canada. That's how much extra income the dollar difference generated.

Well, I wouldn't have to pay extra today. For the first time in 30 years, the Canadian and American dollars are at par. That's because this week's half-point interest cut had the effect of "weakening the dollar versus other currencies by reducing the cash yield on dollars," The Associated Press reports.

This will make Canadians heading to America on vacation very happy and Canadian auto-part makers, film people and American ball players in Toronto very unhappy.

But what's going on with the Canadian dollar is small potatoes compared to the euro. It hit $1.40 U.S. today, which is a big deal, as AP explains:

That level had long been seen as a key benchmark in terms of solidifying the euro's position on currency markets and giving it momentum toward becoming a reserve currency of choice — a position long held by the now-weakening dollar.

Is the U.S. Relationship with Israel Too Close?

John Mearsheimer is in the house, so get ready for the firestorm.

Mearsheimer and his colleague, Stephen Walt, generated a lot of debate last year with a controversial article about U.S.-Israeli relations in the London Review of Books. They argued that the United States should not have a special relationship with Israel and should instead treat it just like any other nation that does business with the United States.

Mearsheimer, of the University of Chicago, and Walt, of Harvard, also claim that the objectives pursued on behalf of the U.S. and Israel by the organizations that make up what they call "the Israel lobby" are actually harming both countries.

The two went on to publish a book on the subject, and Mearsheimer is a guest on Talk of the Nation today to talk about The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy.

The book has received several negative reviews (although some have been positive), and the authors have been labeled everything from "politically naive" to "anti-Semitic." However, Scott McLemee, who reviewed the book for New York's Newsday, writes, "The real problem with their argument is not that it is anti-Semitic, or even overly polemical. (You can find harsher criticisms of both Israel and its American supporters in Israeli newspapers.) It's that the term 'Israel lobby' is both too diffuse and too narrow."

Blackwater Affair a Propaganda Victory for U.S. Foes

While U.S. politicians and talk show hosts debate what really happened in Sunday's deadly shooting involving security firm Blackwater USA in Baghdad, the Iraqi public seems to have already decided the matter — they think Blackwater's employees are guilty of murder, CBS News reports.

For instance, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki told a press conference Wednesday that he cannot tolerate "the killing of our citizens in cold blood."

The shooting has become a "huge propaganda victory for America's enemies in Iraq" at a time when the U.S. felt it was making positive strides, CBS reports.

The already negative image of the security contractors was reinforced by televised interviews with survivors of the shooting (including Hassan Jaber Salma, 50, a lawyer who suffered eight gunshot wounds), who said they had been trying to help the diplomatic convoy that Blackwater employees were guarding get through the intersection but were shot anyway.

Anne Garrels reported for All Things Considered that reports of similar incidents involving Blackwater have poured out since Sunday's shootings, as if "the lid of compliance and silence was suddenly broken."

Karim Muhammed, who owns a furniture store, said he's seen people killed by foreign security companies. He said Iraqi officials should have done something about this a long time ago. "Why do they consider American blood first class, and ours a cheap commodity?" Muhammed said. "Are they better than us?"

Bill to Give Troops Extra Rest Fails

Senate Republicans have once again rejected an effort to give U.S. troops extra time at home between their combat stints. The proposal, co-sponsored by war veterans Jim Webb of Virginia and Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, was blocked with a 56-to-44 vote, short of the 60 votes needed to advance. The measure would have required the military to allow troops to remain on leave for at least as long as they were most recently deployed before going back to war.

The bill, viewed by many as the Democrats' best chance to affect war policy, was doomed by a joint effort from the Bush administration and the Pentagon, which convinced a number of wavering Republicans, including the other senator from Virginia, John Warner, to kill it. Although there are a number of other Iraq measures in the pipe, they are unlikely to go anywhere.

"I don't think there's going to be any meaningful change of votes or switching until we get into next year," Hagel told The Washington Post.

Republicans took a chance in defeating the measure. While the vote will make military leaders happy, it may not please the families of troops serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. There are already signs that more troops are shifting their support to the Democrats.

But Democrats don't have the anti-war vote in the bag. Politico reports that anti-war groups are furious over the lack of progress and may target Democrats they consider too weak in their support of anti-war measures in next year's primaries. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid reportedly met with leaders of the movement this week to try to pacify them.

The Reid mission reflected the paradox bedeviling the anti-war movement. It is powerful enough to command constant care and feeding by the Democratic Party's presidential candidates and congressional leaders. But so far it has proven largely impotent in forcing policy changes.

It's going to be an interesting election year.

September 19, 2007

Jeb Bush Takes Aim at His Successor over Insurance

Then-Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (left) and Charlie Crist talk during a Crist campaign event in 2006.

Jim Watson/AFP/Getty Images

President Bush's brother, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, is not too happy with how his Republican successor, Charlie Crist, is handling the state's insurance crisis — Bush's biggest challenge while in office.

Florida and other Southern states have found themselves with major insurance problems, largely brought on by the aftermath of Katrina and other hurricanes. The governors of Alabama and Mississippi have said that insurers' refusal to write new policies in certain areas, especially near the coast, have "forced the state to pick up the riskiest property and not charge sound rates," the St. Petersburg Times reports.

Bush, addressing the National Association of Mutual Insurance Companies convention outside Dallas this week, criticized Florida's latest efforts at reform, the Times reports. He specifically targeted "a January special session bill that doubled the state's catastrophe fund to $32-billion and allowed state-backed Citizens Property Insurance to directly compete with the private market."

The Times reports that Crist has all but "declared war on State Farm, Allstate, Nationwide and other large insurance companies operating in the state" because of their refusal to grant coverage to some homeowners. But Bush, without mentioning Crist by name, said the expansion of risk into the public domain would come back to hurt the state.

Crist said he did not take the remarks personally.

GOP Candidates Urged to Attend Minority Forums

Senior GOP officials are starting to get worried. They are concerned about the apparent reluctance of many of the GOP presidential contenders to appear at forums sponsored by prominent minority groups. For instance, take what Jack Kemp told The Washington Post.

"We sound like we don't want immigration; we sound like we don't want black people to vote for us," said former congressman Jack Kemp (N.Y.), who was the GOP vice presidential nominee in 1996. "What are we going to do — meet in a country club in the suburbs one day?"

Senior GOP officials have been trying to get the four leading candidates (Sen. John McCain, former Sen. Fred Thompson, ex-Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani) to reconsider after they said they could not attend a debate at Morgan State University organized by PBS host Tavis Smiley. Sen. Sam Brownback, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, Rep. Duncan Hunter, Rep. Ron Paul and Rep. Tom Tancredo will attend. Organizers plan to have empty podiums for the other candidates on stage in "a testament to their absentia," says a Smiley spokesman.

(GOP candidates aren't the only ones, by the way, taking heat when it comes to minorities. The Rev. Jesse Jackson reportedly said this week that Democratic Sen. Barack Obama is "acting like he's white" for not speaking out more about the case of six young black men in Jena, La. Jackson endorsed Obama's candidacy in March.)

One candid reason for the GOP candidates' absence from the Morgan State event comes from an adviser to one of them, who told the Post anonymously: "Why would [the candidates] go into a crowd where they're probably going to be booed?"

Iraqi Report: Blackwater Convoy Was Not Ambushed

The Iraqi Interior Ministry's preliminary report on a shooting involving security firm Blackwater USA, in which several Iraqis were killed, seems to contradict the company's account that their employees only fired after they were fired upon. According to The New York Times, the report, though unverified, says that Blackwater personnel "were not ambushed ... but instead fired at a car when it did not heed a policeman's call to stop, killing a couple and their infant."

The ministry also says 20 civilians were killed in the shooting, a higher number than was reported earlier.

The United States has suspended all land travel by diplomats and other civilian officials in Iraq outside Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone — a sign of just how much the shooting has increased tensions between the U.S. and the Iraqi government. Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has called on the U.S. to replace Blackwater with another firm.

"This is what happens when government fails to act," writes Peter Singer, a security industry expert, on the Brookings Institution's Web site. According to Singer, The Associated Press reports, nearly a year after a law was passed that holds contracted employees to the same code of justice as military personnel, the Bush administration has not published guidance on how military lawyers should do that.

Laura Dickinson, a University of Connecticut law professor who has studied the use of private contractors on the battlefield, says to enforce the many laws that apply to contracted security firms, a single government office should monitor contracts and keep Congress informed.

Experts: Fed Rate Cut May Not Help Borrowers Much

You know, I hate to be a pessimist, but the more I read about the Federal Reserve's decision to cut the Fed Funds rate by half a point, the less sure I am that it's going to make much of a difference.

Although Tuesday's rate reduction will help "banks, lenders and Wall Street," says Christopher Cagan, research director for First American Real Estate Solutions, it probably won't have much effect on homeowners struggling to pay their mortgages or trying to refinance to make their loans more affordable.

"But I don't think we'll see credit card rates dropping, or that all of a sudden the spigot will open and everyone will be making all those mortgages loans again," Cagan told the San Jose Mercury News.

Although the Fed cut the rate by more than expected, Richard Hastings, an analyst at Bernard Sands LLC, told MarketWatch that the Fed can't help the subprime-mortgage borrowers. "It will help those who need it the least," he said. "But for those who need the most help, this does nothing for them."

Some experts say the cut sends a signal to reassure lenders, Jim Zarroli reported on Morning Edition, although a change in the housing market may take time.

Edward Leamer of the UCLA Anderson Forecast says even if mortgage rates decrease, that alone won't be enough to stop the housing recession. "There's not going to be a lot of joy out there in those neighborhoods where the foreclosures and delinquencies are already high," he said.

One group who may benefit? Folks who have home-equity lines of credit, whose rates are tied directly to the prime rate. Lenders generally match the Fed rate changes on these loans.

To be honest, I lose and win on this one. It won't help my house in Massachusetts sell faster, but it means the monthly payment on my home equity loan goes down. How about you?

September 18, 2007

Protest over 'Pornographic' Book Raises Interest

You know, it's fascinating how raising a stink about a risque book increases its popularity.

Take, for instance, JoAn Karkos and her battle with two libraries in Maine over the acclaimed sex education book for preteens, It's Perfectly Normal: Changing Bodies, Growing Up, Sex & Sexual Health. Karkos was apparently so offended by the book (which she had learned about from an anti-abortion group) that she took the copies out of both libraries and refused to return them (although she did send in checks to cover the cost).

Karkos wrote a letter to the editor of the local paper, saying that the book "promotes promiscuous sex by illustrations and written content specifically intended to distort, undermine, and destroy wholesome traditional family values."

The librarians were not amused. "This has never happened before," Rick Speer, director of the Lewiston Public Library, told the Sun Journal. "It is clearly theft." The book's publisher notes that it has been sold in 25 countries and translated into 21 languages.

And Karkos may have been hoist by her own petard. Not only have both libraries ordered copies to replace the books she took, but one ordered an additional two because of an increase in requests to borrow it. Karkos did say she knew that might happen.

Iraqi Refugees Face Long, Often Dangerous Waits

We all know that living in Iraq can be dangerous. Trying to leave it can be a problem, too.

The number of displaced Iraqis has topped 4 million: 2 million within the country, along with 2.2 million refugees. The U.S. has said that it will help resettle more than 2 million refugees, but as Deborah Amos reported for Morning Edition today, that is often complicated by U.S. relations with Syria and other countries where the refugees are living.

But waiting for a visa in Syria is probably preferable to waiting for one in Iraq. Newsweek tells the story of Hazim Hanna and his wife, Emel Meskoni, two of the first Iraqis to work for the U.S.-led coalition after the fall of Baghdad. They passionately believed in a new Iraq, but as the situation in the country grew worse, life became too dangerous for them. They were waiting for final approval to immigrate to the United States in late May when kidnappers grabbed Hanna. Meskoni disappeared a few days later when she went to deliver the ransom for her husband. Their bodies were found about a month later.

Their deaths prompted Ambassador Ryan Crocker to send a memo pressing Washington to process visas for Iraqis more quickly. (Newsweek reports that the United States will have approved about 1,700 asylum requests by the end of September, according to a Homeland Security estimate.) Judging from the Morning Edition report, however, it doesn't seem to have sped things up.

Music Industry Plays Tough in File-Sharing Suit

It's not often that a radio piece makes me really angry. But that's exactly how I felt when I heard a Marketplace report about the way the Recording Industry Association of America targeted Tanya Andersen of Oregon in its quest to sue people who are illegally downloading music. The problem? Andersen said she didn't do it and could prove it. But that didn't seem to make a difference to the RIAA.

Andersen's case illustrates what many see as the RIAA's "scorched earth" policy to curtail file-sharing. Her lawyer told Marketplace that after Andersen decided to fight back against the erroneous accusations, someone from the RIAA's law firm called her apartment manager and threatened to get him in a lot of trouble if he didn't give out Andersen's personal information.

For its part, the RIAA says people accused of illegally downloading files frequently say they have been wrongly targeted. Mitch Bainwol, the head of the RIAA, says people can be "creative" with the way they portray the facts.

However, Andersen's fight with the RIAA, which dragged on for a couple of years, ended when a federal court told the group that it had to prove Andersen had made the downloads. The association then dropped the suit, leaving her with thousands of dollars in legal fees. But as Marketplace notes, the courts may be losing patience with this tactic. A judge recently ordered the organization to pay a Texas woman's $68,000 legal bill.

Now Andersen has turned the tables and is suing the RIAA, accusing the group of "fraud, malicious prosecution, libel and slander, invasion of privacy, deceptive business practices, misuse of copyright laws and colluding to engage in widespread extortion and racketeering."

'TimesSelect' Goes the Way of the Dinosaurs

At midnight, the content of TimesSelect, The New York Times' fee-based section that includes its top columnists and its archives, will be accessible free of charge. (Well, at least most of it. You'll still have to pay for archived stories from 1923-86.)

In a statement on the Times' Web site today, Vivian Schiller, senior vice president and general manager, acknowledged that the times (and the Times) have changed.

Since we launched TimesSelect in 2005, the online landscape has altered significantly. Readers increasingly find news through search, as well as through social networks, blogs and other online sources. In light of this shift, we believe offering unfettered access to New York Times reporting and analysis best serves the interest of our readers, our brand and the long-term vitality of our journalism. We encourage everyone to read our news and opinion — as well as share it, link to it and comment on it.

Marketplace reports that the change comes because of pressure to "increase revenue from advertising." The first sponsor for the now-free TimesSelect content will be American Express.

One person who I'm betting will be happy about the development is award-winning Times columnist Thomas Friedman. He had been critical of the move because he felt it would cut him off from members of his global audience who couldn't afford to pay. Now they can read him all they want, all the time.

Lawyer: Musharraf to Leave Army Post if Re-elected

Gen. Pervez Musharraf's lawyer says that if the Pakistani president is re-elected, he'll resign his post as army chief. The BBC reports that Musharraf's chief lawyer, Sharifuddin Pirzada, told the country's Supreme Court, which is debating whether Musharraf has the right to remain head of the army while seeking another term, that the general would be sworn in as a civilian.

There has been growing opposition to amendments to the Pakistani constitution that allow Musharraf to head the government and the army at the same time. Several petitions before the Supreme Court are seeking to have him disqualified as a candidate. They also dispute the general's plan to seek re-election from the outgoing parliament and provincial lawmakers, arguing that general elections should come first.

In a move that complicated the issue, the country's Election Commission has ruled that Musharraf can run while still leading the army. But a decision by the Supreme Court (which has issued several rulings recently challenging Musharraf's administration) about the petitions would override the commission's ruling.

Thus the promise to step down from the army if re-elected. It may sound good, but Musharraf has made the same promise before. In 2002, he told the country's Islamic parties that, in return for a constitutional amendment legitimizing his 1999 coup, he would step down as army chief. He got the amendment but didn't resign.

So he may not be taken at his word alone. As they say, fool me once...

9:55 AM ET | 09-18-2007 | permalink | e-mail post | trackbacks (0)

September 17, 2007

Liberal Professor Gets UC Irvine Job Back

Last week, we examined the controversy over the University of California, Irvine's, decision to withdraw its offer to prominent liberal legal scholar Erwin Chemerinsky to head its new law school. Chemerinsky said he was told he wasn't being hired because he was too controversial, sparking protest from both the left and the right.

Well, there's nothing like a mountain of negative publicity to make a university chancellor change his mind. The Los Angeles Times reports that Chancellor Michael V. Drake and Chemerinsky announced today that they have reached an agreement that will allow the scholar to take the dean's post.

5:01 PM ET | 09-17-2007 | permalink | e-mail post | trackbacks (0)

AOL to Move from Virginia to New York

AOL is moving its bigwigs from the leafy suburbs of the nation's capital to the Big Apple. The Associated Press reports that the Internet giant will move most of its senior executives from Dulles, Va., to New York as part of a plan to complete a move from the company's long-time identity as an Internet provider to an ad-driven business.

(Let us all bow our heads in a moment of silence for the AOL CDs that came to us in the mail, stalked us at computer stores, called to us from post office displays.)

The new AOL headquarters will be at a 15-story building in Greenwich Village just south of Union Square... The announcement comes a little more than a year after AOL accelerated efforts to drive traffic to its ad-supported Web sites by giving away AOL.com e-mail accounts, software and other features once reserved for paying customers.

AOL also announced a deal with computer maker Hewlett-Packard to have an AOL-HP branded portal as the default home page on the Web browsers installed on HP machines.

Data shows that subscriptions to the service had been plummeting. AOL had 10.9 million paying U.S. subscribers as of the end of June. That's a 60 percent drop from its peak of 26.7 million in September 2002.

4:50 PM ET | 09-17-2007 | permalink | e-mail post | trackbacks (0)

French Foreign Minister: Get Ready for War with Iran

Ah, the French. It seems their new government's desire to make amends with the Bush administration is no passing fancy. Officials seem to be taking a tougher approach to foreign affairs. For instance, take the statement Sunday by France's foreign minister, Bernard Kouchner, who said that the world should prepare for war over Iran's nuclear program.

Kouchner also called for "more effective sanctions" against Iran if it continues to resist the demands of the international community to curtail its nuclear program. He said the European Union should prepare its own set of sanctions outside of any imposed by the United Nations Security Council, and he has asked several large private companies not to do business with Iran.

Not everyone is happy with the new tough garcon image Kouchner projected. Austrian Foreign Minister Ursula Plassnik said she can't comprehend why Kouchner "is resorting to such martial rhetoric at this time." Ha'aretz reports that Mohamed ElBaradei, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, called the comments "hype."

"There are rules on how to use force, and I would hope that everybody would have gotten the lesson after the Iraq situation, where 70,000 innocent civilians have lost their lives on the suspicion that a country has nuclear weapons," ElBaradei told reporters.

But if the French keep up all this tough talk, which the BBC reports is seen as a way to court favor with the U.S., there might not be any more talk of "freedom fries" in the congressional cafeteria.

2:03 PM ET | 09-17-2007 | permalink | e-mail post | trackbacks (0)

Iraq Cancels Blackwater's Operating License

The Iraqi government says it's canceling the operating license of U.S. security firm Blackwater USA after accusations that it was involved in a deadly shootout in Baghdad. The firm provides personal security for many U.S. officials working in the country.

Agence-France Presse reports that the shootout Sunday in a Baghdad neighborhood, which involved a U.S. diplomatic convoy, left at least eight people dead and 13 others wounded. Officials say that most of the dead and wounded were bystanders.

"The interior minister (Jawad al-Bolani) has issued an order to cancel Blackwater's licence and the company is prohibited from operating anywhere in Iraq," interior ministry director of operations Major General Abdel Karim Khalaf said. "We have opened a criminal investigation against the group who committed the crime."

All Blackwater employees have been told to leave Iraq immediately, except for those involved in the shooting, the BBC reports. Blackwater hasn't commented so far.

As Jackie Northam reported recently for Morning Edition, there are thousands of private contractors in Iraq — with little oversight. Critics say the contractors often are not trained properly, the BBC reports.

European Court Rules Against Microsoft

Boy, it seems like high season for accusations that dominant teams are bending the rules to gain a competitive advantage. Last week, of course, we had the NFL's New England Patriots and "Videogate." Today, we have Microsoft and anti-competitive behavior.

Europe's second-highest court rejected the giant software company's appeal of an earlier ruling by the European Commission that found it had abused its dominant position in the marketplace. The Court of First Instance in Luxembourg ordered Microsoft to pay 80 percent of the commission's legal costs, on top of about $600 million in fines that it had already been ordered to pay.

PC World reports that lawyers are analyzing the ruling but that "already some things are clear." The court backed the commission's order that Microsoft develop a version of Windows without its Media Player. (The original complaint said that by bundling its Media Player with its operating system, Microsoft gained an unfair advantage over rivals like Real Player.) The court also agreed that Microsoft's refusal to share information about its operating system "limits technical development to the prejudice of consumers."

Microsoft did win one small part of the case (and will probably appeal the entire ruling). The court overturned the part of the original decision that had established an independent trustee to monitor Microsoft's behavior.

Hmm. No monitor, eh? That would be like trusting the Patriots' word that they won't videotape again without keeping a close eye on them. We'll have to see how that one works out.

10:41 AM ET | 09-17-2007 | permalink | e-mail post | trackbacks (0)

September 14, 2007

O.J. Simpson Is Suspect in Las Vegas Hotel Break-In

Yes, the man that the cable news and entertainment networks see as Lindsay, Britney and Paris all rolled into one big ratings winner is back in the news.

O.J. Simpson has been named a suspect in an alleged break-in of a hotel room at Palace Station hotel and casino in Las Vegas. Simpson told The Associated Press that he was doing a "sting operation" to get back collectibles that belonged to him. He was questioned by police and released.

My wife had an interesting comment that I suspect shows how many people may think of Simpson these days: "He's just a sad figure now."

That's all for this week. If you see something interesting, send an e-mail to newsblog@npr.org.

College Withdraws Job Offer to Liberal Professor

If the chancellor of the University of California, Irvine, was too worried about taking heat from conservatives to hire liberal constitutional scholar Erwin Chemerinsky as the head of the college's new law school (as Chemerinsky says) ... well, it backfired. Chancellor Michael V. Drake, who decided to rescind his offer to Chemerinsky, is taking lots of heat from conservatives — and liberals, too — for the decision.

The Washington Post reports that Drake told Chemerinsky, who has criticized the Bush administration, that he was too politically risky.

According to Chemerinsky, the UC-Irvine chancellor told him on Tuesday that he "knew I was liberal but didn't know how controversial I would be." The chancellor also said "some conservative opposition was developing," and the University of California regents would have "a bloody fight" over approving him, Chemerinsky said.

Hugh Hewitt, the prominent conservative columnist and law professor, called the decision "clearly a boneheaded move." "Even though I agree with him on only about one out of 100 issues, I believe he is one of the top legal minds in the United States," he said.

Douglas W. Kmiec, a conservative constitutional scholar and law professor at Pepperdine University, wrote in an opinion piece in the Los Angeles Times that it was "a betrayal of everything a great institution like the University of California represents."

In his own op-ed piece in the Times, Drake denied he withdrew his offer because Chemerinsky was too liberal. He wrote that it was "a management decision — not an ideological or political one."

One of the best lines came from John Jeffries, dean of the University of Virginia Law School. "It seems late in the day to notice [that] Erwin Chemerinsky is a prominent liberal. ... It's rather like discovering that Wilt Chamberlain was tall. How could you not know?"

Is North Korea Helping Syria Build a Nuclear Facility?

North Korea and Syria might seem like odd bedfellows, but the two nations have already worked together on missile technology. Now, The Washington Post reports that their cooperation might be extending to the nuclear level.

North Korea may be cooperating with Syria on some sort of nuclear facility in Syria, according to new intelligence the United States has gathered over the past six months, sources said. The evidence, said to come primarily from Israel, includes dramatic satellite imagery that led some U.S. officials to believe that the facility could be used to produce material for nuclear weapons.

Hmm. This might explain why Israel has spent some time in Syria's airspace recently. The idea of Iran having a nuclear weapon is scary enough for Israeli officials. The thought that Syria might want to develop one likely has Prime Minister Ehud Olmert sweating bullets.

The Post reports that the new information has been restricted to a special few, and many people in the intelligence community don't know anything about it. The Israelis, the Syrians and the White House aren't saying a thing about the reports. Some analysts say they doubt the two are working together.

But former United Nations Ambassador John Bolton, no fan of North Korea, told the Post that, given the country's trade in missiles with Syria, it is "legitimate to ask questions about whether that cooperation extends on the nuclear side as well."

Pentagon Releases Audio of Terror Suspects' Hearings

The Pentagon has released audio recordings from the military hearings of several terror suspects detained at the Guantanamo Bay base in Cuba. Morning Edition reports that the detainees were among those sent to Cuba about a year ago after being held in secret CIA prisons for years.

The audio, available on the Pentagon's Web site, includes the 40-minute-long hearing of suspected Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. However, officials deleted a section that they felt could be used to recruit future terrorists, NPR's Jackie Northam reports.

The censored section includes a 10-minute passage about the capture and beheading of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl and Mohammed explaining why Islamic radicals are waging war on the U.S., The Associated Press reports.

A transcript of Mohammed's hearing, which was posted on the Pentagon's Web site in March, includes some of the sections removed from the tape. Officials told AP that they felt the audio version could be used by al-Qaida in recruitment.

In another statement cut from the audio, Mohammed said he felt some sorrow over Sept. 11.

"The language of the war is victims," Mohammed said in a part of the transcript that was cut from the audio. He compared al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden to George Washington, saying Americans view Washington as a hero for his role in the Revolutionary War and many Muslims view bin Laden in the same light.

9:37 AM ET | 09-14-2007 | permalink | e-mail post | trackbacks (0)

September 13, 2007

Author Scolded by Oprah Gets New Book Deal

Proving once again that there is no such thing as bad publicity, James Frey, the author who acknowledged making up sections of his best-selling memoir A Million Little Pieces, has landed safely a year later. The New York Times reports that Frey has signed a new deal with HarperCollins for his novel Bright Shiny Morning.

Frey will forever be remembered as the author Oprah Winfrey chewed out on national television for lying to her. Seldom has there been such a public tongue-lashing — outside of reality TV.

But Frey should not have any problems with this new book. People already know it's fiction.

The Story of the Lackawanna Six

I treated myself Wednesday evening. Instead of heading straight home to do the dishes, I went to hear my NPR colleague Dina Temple-Raston talk about her new book, The Jihad Next Door. It's the story of the Lackawanna Six, a group of young Muslim men from the Buffalo, N.Y., area who were arrested and described by then-Attorney General John Ashcroft as an al-Qaida sleeper cell. But it's not quite that simple, as Dina's book so ably illustrates.

As someone who wrote about terrorism and security for several years in my old job and frequently blogged about the original arrests and subsequent trial, I came to believe that there was a great deal of nuance in this and similar stories. Despite the often black-and-white portrayals from law enforcement officials (particularly in the first few years of this administration) and the media, there were many gray areas. Dina's book captures this complexity.

I was struck by two things Dina said during her talk. First, that the FBI has gotten much better at working with the Muslim community. For instance, when the bureau was about to announce the indictment of the Fort Dix Six, agents first phoned all the top imams in the country and explained the situation to them. Basically, they wanted to give the details to the community before they were manipulated in the media. Dina, who called the imams to check this out, said they really appreciated it and that it made a difference in their communities' reactions.

The second — and rather chilling — thing is that public officials are absolutely certain that there will be another attack in the U.S. And it probably will be either a car bomb or someone wearing a suicide vest. It may be homegrown or it may be imported, but it will happen, they say.

Bomb Kills Sheik Helping U.S. in Anbar Province

Sheik Abdul-Sattar Abu Risha

Sabah Arar/AFP/Getty Images

Sheik Abdul-Sattar Abu Risha was killed by a roadside bomb in Iraq today — a blow that has the potential to set back some of the gains the U.S. has made in Anbar province.

Abu Risha was the leader of the Anbar Salvation Council, the group of Sunni clans backing U.S. troops in the province. He was among a group of tribal leaders that met with President Bush at al-Asad Air Base earlier this month.

The Associated Press reports that no group has claimed responsibility, but suspicion has fallen on al-Qaida in Iraq. U.S. officials say the terrorist group has suffered serious setbacks because of Abu Risha and the movement referred to as the "Anbar Awakening." It also appears that an act of generosity may have led to his death. A Ramadi police officer said Abu Risha had received a group of poor people at his home earlier in the day to mark the beginning of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. The policeman said authorities believe one of the visitors planted the bomb.

Gen. David Petraeus told The Washington Post that Abu Risha's death is a tragic loss. "It's a terrible loss for Anbar province and all of Iraq. It shows how significant his importance was and it shows al-Qaeda in Iraq remains a very dangerous and barbaric enemy."

Poll Results Question Assumptions about Muslim World

Here's an eye-opener for you.

The Gallup World Poll analyzed a series of polls taken between 2005 and 2007 that covered about 90 percent of the Muslim world. It found that just 7 percent of those surveyed said the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, were morally justified.

That's despite strong anti-Americanism in many Muslim nations. In one of them, Indonesia, no one who supported the attacks did so for religious reasons — instead, they cited mostly secular issues like U.S. foreign policy. In fact, many of those who didn't support the attacks gave humanitarian or religious reasons.

Dalia Mogahed, executive director of the Center for Muslim Studies at the Gallup Organization, writes that the results of the polls question the assumptions of the war on terror. "Defining the current conflict as a battle between Western values and 'radical Islam' misses the root cause of terrorism while energizing the very perception that fuel sympathy for it — that Islam itself is under attack," she writes.

The study of the polls did show that the minority who approved of the attacks often said the greatest danger their countries faced was "occupation and U.S. domination." If the West wants better relations with the Muslim world, they said, it "should respect Islam and stop imposing its beliefs and policies."

Among moderates, economics was the main danger for their countries, "and along with respecting Islam, they see economic support and investments as a way for the West to better relations." (This supports the findings of a separate poll done by the Pew Global Attitudes Project.)

Car Companies Lose Big in Little State

A federal judge's decision in Vermont on Wednesday means it's OK for the state to use the same emissions standards for vehicles that California created recently. The California rules would require car makers to cut greenhouse gas emissions by about 30 percent by 2016.

One of the most interesting things about the decision is that Judge William Sessions didn't buy a single argument put forward by the car makers against the tougher state standards. Not one.

As the Burlington Free Press reports, the companies testified during the hearing in April that if the standards were adopted, they would stop selling cars in the states that had them. Nonsense, Sessions said.

"It is not credible that the regulation will actually drive auto manufacturers to take such drastic steps," he wrote in a 240-page decision that rejected every one of the automakers' challenges to the California rules.
"It is improbable that an industry that prides itself on its modernity, flexibility and innovation will be unable to meet the requirement of the regulation, especially with the range of technological possibilities and alternatives before it," he wrote.

His ruling comes after a Supreme Court decision in April that the Environmental Protection Agency violated the Clean Air Act by not regulating vehicles' greenhouse gas emissions. In addition, Congress plans to look at fuel-efficiency legislation that could prompt a big change in the car-making business.

The fight is not over, of course. The Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers says it might appeal the Vermont decision. And before any state can go ahead with the standards, the EPA must approve California's rules, Elizabeth Shogren reported for All Things Considered. The agency says it will rule by the end of the year.

Vermont's attorney general says he thinks the issue will end up in the Supreme Court.

September 12, 2007

Hope for Fossett Fades, Even as Web Expands Search

Hope is fading that aviator Steve Fossett is still alive. The Associated Press reports that the search for Fossett continues in the area of Nevada where he was believed to have flown his single-engine plane 10 days ago. But experts are now publicly expressing doubt that he is still alive.

"There's no news of him signaling for help and that's a problem," said David McMullen of Berkeley, Calif., a leader of the hiking group Desert Survivors, whose members frequently venture into some of the country's harshest terrain. "He's either so injured he can't signal or he's perished."

Dan Charles reported on Morning Edition today that thousands of Internet users have joined in the search. They're hunting for his missing airplane by looking at satellite photos of the area where Fossett disappeared. The Internet company Google contacted the two companies it relies on for photos for its Google Earth service, GeoEye and DigitalGlobe, and asked them to focus on the section of Nevada where the search has been centered.

Google passed those images along to Amazon.com, because Amazon has a way to let thousands of people share the job of searching for Steve Fossett.
Amazon's tool divides the whole search area — 6,000 square miles — into small squares about 300 feet across. It assigns each of those small squares to anyone who signs up to help.

If you're interested in helping to search for Fossett, Amazon is still looking for volunteers.

Say It Ain't So, Bill! Are the Pats Cheaters?

The New England Patriots are, by many accounts, the NFL's best team this year. (I'm a huge Pats fan, just to be up-front about it.)

But it appears they may also be cheats.

ESPN is reporting that NFL commissioner Roger Goodell has determined that the Patriots violated the rules by videotaping defensive signals used by the New York Jets during Sunday's 38-14 Patriots win. League sources say Goodell "is considering severe sanctions, including the possibility of docking the Patriots draft picks." A similar videotaping accusation was leveled against the team in a game against Green Bay last year.

Several NFL coaches interviewed after the story broke said that teams have been trying to steal each other's signals forever. But why would a team with as much talent and leadership as the Patriots go so far as to allegedly break league rules? Was Bill Belichick determined not to lose again to his former assistant, Jets coach Eric Mangini? (Then again, at least one report claims Mangini blew the whistle on his old team.) Who knows?

The New York tabloids are having a field day with the controversy. The funniest headline I saw comes from the New York Post — "Belicheat." Belichick did apologize today but didn't say specifically for what.

Russia Debuts 'Dad of All Bombs'

OK, this takes blowing things up to a whole new level.

Russia announced Tuesday that it tested what it called the most powerful non-nuclear bomb ever. It's been nicknamed the "dad of all bombs." The nickname the "Mother Of All Bombs" is already taken — it refers to the United States' Massive Ordnance Air Blast, a large-yield, satellite-guided, air-delivered bomb. As The Associated Press reports:

[Russia's] Channel One said that while the Russian bomb contains 7.8 tons of high explosives compared to more than 8 tons of explosives in the U.S. bomb, it's four times more powerful because it uses a new, highly efficient type of explosives that the report didn't identify. While the U.S. bomb is equivalent to 11 tons of TNT, the Russian one is equivalent to 44 tons of regular explosives. The Russian weapon's blast radius is 990 feet, twice as big as that of the U.S. design, the report said.

So with bombs, size might not matter.

Anyway, now that the "mother" and "dad" nicknames are taken, what's left for other countries that want to make big bombs? Are they going to have to resort to the "great aunt of bombs"? Or maybe the "second-cousin-twice-removed of bombs"?

When It Comes to Iraq, Six Months Can Last for Years

Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker couldn't be pinned down when asked how long it would be before the U.S. could possibly leave Iraq during their Senate testimony on Tuesday. They did, however, say that support for the surge until next spring — in about six months — is crucial.

When it comes to Iraq, it seems the next six months are always the most important. Almost from the moment the invasion was launched in March 2003, lawmakers, military commanders and pundits have said the fate of Iraq will be determined in "the next six months." Democrats, Republicans, independents ... all have used the six-month time frame as a kind of magic number.

For instance, The Guardian reported in February that an "elite team of officers" had told Petraeus that the U.S. had six months to turn around the situation in Iraq or it could face a Vietnam-style collapse that could force the military into a "hasty retreat."

Back in June 2006, Zalmay Khalilzad, the former U.S. ambassador to Iraq, told the German magazine Der Spiegel that the next six months would be crucial to stabilizing Iraq.

A month later, Defense and the National Interest, a conservative Web site dedicated to fostering debate about role of the armed forces after the Cold War, started a list of these "next six months" statements. By my count, it has found at least 27 examples.

Those on the list include Sen. John McCain, Sen. Hillary Clinton, former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, Sen. Chuck Hagel and New York Times columnist Tom Friedman, who has used the six-months figure as a marker several times. Friedman's use of the phrase even prompted liberal blogger Atrios to start measuring a six-month unit as a "Friedman" in May 2006.

12:07 PM ET | 09-12-2007 | permalink | e-mail post | trackbacks (0)

Japanese Prime Minister Abe Resigns

In a move that caught many international observers by surprise, Shinzo Abe, Japan's prime minister, announced his resignation today. Abe, who has suffered through a series of scandals and an election defeat that sapped his government's popularity, resigned partly because he no longer has the political muscle to ensure that the Japanese naval mission in Afghanistan would continue.

As The Associated Press reports:

In such a weakened state, Abe may have feared he wouldn't have the clout to win passage of the Afghan mission, said Eiken Itagaki, a political analyst and writer.

"He has run out of political capital," Itagaki said. "So he bolted, in the hope that a more experienced successor can save the mission, and sort out the mess."

The Japan Times reports that three days ago Abe told a news conference after the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit that he would likely resign "if he failed to extend the Maritime Self-Defense Force's refueling mission in the Indian Ocean to continue Japan's support for NATO-led counterterrorism operations in Afghanistan."

Since then, Abe, a member of Japan's long-dominant Liberal Democratic Party, had been unable to gain the support of Ichiro Ozawa, leader of the Democratic Party of Japan. Ozawa says the mission in Afghanistan goes against the Japanese constitution. Because his party now controls the upper house in Japan's parliament, it would have been able to block any attempt by Abe to extend the mission.

Kyodo News reports the party plans an election next week for party president, who will take over as prime minister because of the LDP's control of the legislature's powerful lower house.

10:08 AM ET | 09-12-2007 | permalink | e-mail post | trackbacks (0)

September 11, 2007

Kanye West and 50 Cent Fake a Faceoff

Kanye West (left) and 50 Cent face off literally while presenting an award at the MTV Video Music Awards on Sunday in Las Vegas.

Kevin Winter/Getty Images

Well, all the hype about Kanye West and 50 Cent "facing off" is just that — hype.

Both artists released albums today, and 50 Cent has vowed to stop recording solo albums if West's Graduation sells more than his Curtis. (I'll believe it when I see it.) Christopher Johnson reports for Day to Day that their rivalry is not real and has more to do with marketing — because these are desperate times for rap. Hip-hop is just not selling like it used to.

Time reported last month that while all music sales are down, no genre has fallen harder than rap. But it's the reason cited by one manager that will raise eyebrows.

"It's collapsing because they can no longer fool the white kids," says Richard Nickels, who manages the hip-hop band the Roots. "There's only so much redundancy anyone can take."

So while the whole Kanye-50 Cent showdown is fun to watch (the two are actually friends), it all seems designed to sell a few more albums.

At last look, Graduation was No. 1 on Amazon's top sellers list. Curtis was No. 6 — behind the soundtrack to High School Musical 2. Ouch.

Muslims: The Other Victims of Sept. 11

There is no doubt that Americans' lives were deeply affected by the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in lasting ways. (For example, I overheard two men on the Washington, D.C., subway this morning talking about where they keep their gas masks in case of an attack.) Yet one of the groups most affected — on a global level — has been the Muslim "ummah," or community.

Although Osama bin Laden likes to say that he is making war on the West, since the Sept. 11 attacks, Muslims have overwhelmingly been the main targets of his brand of jihadist terrorism. The State Department's annual Country Reports on Terrorism around the world show that Muslims are the most frequent victims of terrorist attacks. This may help explain why recent surveys like the Pew Global Attitudes Project have shown that support for bin Laden is falling sharply in some Muslim countries.

Meanwhile, the Iraq Body Count Web site (which many consider a conservative estimate) says that between 71,000 and 78,000 Iraqis have died from a combination of insurgent attacks, sectarian violence and U.S.-led coalition operations since the invasion of 2003.

There is also the price North American Muslims pay every day in many ways since Sept. 11, 2001, also thanks to bin Laden. Some of those experiences have been draconian, like those of Capt. James Yee, one-time Muslim chaplain at Guantanamo, or Portland, Ore., lawyer Brandon Mayfield, at one point accused of being involved in the Madrid bombings. The Canadian case of Maher Arar also stands out.

But most of the time, the price is just dealing with everyday suspicion because you happen to be Muslim — or look Arab. Take, for instance, the San Diego flight that was delayed when a passenger reported that a group of Iraqi men (who turned out to be instructing Marines in the area) were speaking Arabic.

Poll Shows Most Iraqis Believe Surge Has Failed

Talk about your mixed messages. While Gen. David Petraeus is back on Capitol Hill today with his message that the surge is working, and while Iraqi politicians are welcoming the positive report, a poll finds a solid majority of Iraqis believe the surge has failed.

In the poll of 2,000 Iraqis from across the country, conducted jointly for the BBC, ABC News and Japan's NHK, about 70 percent say that "security has deteriorated in the area covered by the US military 'surge' of the past six months." Even worse, about 60 percent say attacks on U.S. troops are justified.

The poll indicates the mood in Iraq is just as negative as it has been since the 2003 invasion, the BBC reports, despite the upbeat assessments from Iraqi and American politicians and military commanders. Only 29 percent of Iraqis polled think things will improve in the next year, compared with 64 percent two years ago.

There were similar negative responses about many other issues in Iraq — 65 percent to 70 percent of those surveyed said things have gotten worse in the areas of: security outside the area covered by the surge; conditions for political dialogue; the ability of the Iraqi government to do its work; the pace of reconstruction; and the pace of economic development.

So Is the U.S. Going to Bomb Iran?

It was interesting that both Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker took the opportunity during their congressional testimony Monday to bash Iran. For example, Petraeus said the flow of weapons from Iran has increased but that Iranian Quds Force trainers have pulled out. He accused Iran of trying to create a Hezbollah-like force using Iraqi Shiite militants.

So is the United States going to attack Iran? Mike Shuster examined that question for All Things Considered. The answer? Maybe yes, maybe no. What's perhaps most worrying is that hardliners from both countries see an attack as a way to support their respective agendas.

The war camp in Tehran has its reflection in the war camp in Washington, [Abbas Milani, director of Iranian studies at Stanford University] says. "The danger is that these two camps will do for one another what needs to be done to make their desire come true," Milani says.

The Washington Post reports that, regardless of the possibility of an attack, there is no doubt that Washington and Tehran are "vying for influence in Iraq and the wider region."

"What is striking about what [Petraeus and Crocker] said today, comparing U.S.-Iran talks with five years ago on Afghanistan, is that we're dealing with an Iranian government that feels the wind is behind it and America's moment in the Middle East is receding — and Iran wants to give us a firm push from behind as we depart so we will never, ever think about intervening on the ground in the Gulf again, and certainly not into Iran," [Bruce Riedel, a former senior CIA, National Security Council and Pentagon official who opposed the war and the troop buildup] said.

September 10, 2007

'American Gladiators' Coming Back

Watch part of an episode of American Gladiators.

YouTube

American Gladiators, that really great over-the-top show from the '90s, is back!

Yes, the one with the joust, the monkey bars, the obstacle courses. I don't know if the really tight men's shorts will be back, but I know the big hair is gone on the women. I wonder if the names will be the same: Thunder, Gemini, Blaze, Nitro ... and my all-time favorite, Zap. (Why couldn't my parents have named me Zap?)

NPR's Robert Smith, who gets many cool assignments, was in Los Angeles this weekend for the auditions of the new American Gladiators show. He asked contestants why they wanted to audition and even what names they would choose for themselves: Iron Hands (because he'll smash things up), Mercury (because she's on fire), Ferret (not going to work, as Robert noted) and Christy Crash (her roller derby name — sign her up!).

The new show is due out sometime "midseason," according to a report last month in Variety. It will be modeled more closely after the British version of Gladiators, which focused on the "back story" of the amateur competitors who took on the gladiators each week.

All I can say is: Go, Zap!

Craig Tries to Take Back Guilty Plea in Airport Arrest

Is he in, or is he out? Of the Senate, that is.

Idaho Republican Sen. Larry Craig filed papers in Minnesota today to withdraw his guilty plea to disorderly conduct in a men's bathroom at the Minneapolis airport. His lawyer says that, basically, Craig just went there to, well, "relieve himself."

The court filing argues that the plea was not "knowingly and understandingly made." It claims Craig was under too much stress at the time, and it was the media's fault (isn't it always?) for investigating past allegations of homosexual conduct. So, his lawyer said this morning, he just pleaded guilty to make it "go away."

Hmm. Doesn't entering a guilty plea to make it "go away" mean that you understand what you are doing? Seems to me that it would be hard to prove that a U.S. senator who was arrested and interrogated, then signed a paper pleading guilty, didn't get what was going on. (Even Sen. Arlen Specter, who supports Craig, basically called his guilty plea not too intelligent over the weekend.) We'll have to see what the court says.

Meanwhile, over the past 10 days, Craig has said he planned to resign from the Senate, signaled he might reconsider, then appeared to indicate he had virtually given up the possible attempt to finish his third term. He still hasn't said whether he will absolutely, positively, no-doubt-about-it leave the Senate. The Associated Press reports that Craig's spokesman said that he would likely only stay if the court rules quickly in his favor.

GOP leaders must have ground their way through several sets of teeth by now.

This Just In: Liberals, Conservatives Think Differently

This is one of those studies that make you go, "Well, duh." But it's always nice when science confirms what we've suspected all along.

A new study by scientists at New York University and the University of California, Los Angeles, shows that the brains of conservatives and liberals work differently. The researchers used a simple experiment to reach their conclusion, the Los Angeles Times reports. "Scientists instructed [volunteers] to tap a keyboard when an M appeared on a computer monitor and to refrain from tapping when they saw a W. M appeared four times more frequently than W, conditioning participants to press a key in knee-jerk fashion whenever they saw a letter."

Participants were wired to show "the part of the brain that detects conflicts between a habitual tendency (pressing a key) and a more appropriate response (not pressing the key)."

Liberals made fewer mistakes, tapping less often when they saw a W. (Although I guess you could argue that liberals had an advantage — their aversion to anything "Dubya"-related.) Apparently, this supports the idea that liberals are more "open" to new experiences, while conservatives tend to be more structured and "persistent" in their views.

I always suspected poor typing skills lay at the root of differences between liberals and conservatives.

Sharif Kicked Out of Pakistan Within Hours

Former Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif waves as he lands at Islamabad's airport Monday.

Richard Beeston/AFP/Getty Images

Well, that was a short trip. I hope former Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had a chance to pick up a few gifts for his family at the airport — because he sure didn't stay long in Pakistan today.

Sharif was deported this morning, just hours after returning to his home country from seven years in exile, intending to campaign against President Gen. Pervez Musharraf. Morning Edition reports that a few hours after he arrived, Sharif was separated from his entourage and whisked off on a plane to Jiddah, Saudi Arabia.

Sharif probably had an idea it would happen. Dawn, an English-language Pakistani daily, was reporting on Sunday that the government had such a plan in place.

And while political leaders all over the world probably dream about being able to stick the opposition on a plane to another country, it's a real gamble by Musharraf. Last month, the country's Supreme Court ruled that Sharif could return to Pakistan and that authorities could not stop him. Musharraf already sparred with the top court earlier this year, when he tried to oust the chief justice, setting off a round of violent clashes.

Dawn also reports that constitutional expert Abid Hasan Minto said Sunday that deporting Sharif would amount to contempt of court.

Just what everyone needs: more unrest in Pakistan.

11:30 AM ET | 09-10-2007 | permalink | e-mail post | trackbacks (0)

Democrats Debate in (Translated) Spanish

You just can't get away from Iraq. On Sunday night, the Democratic candidates held the first-ever Spanish-language debate, and the first topic discussed was Iraq — not immigration, as some may have expected. That might be because, as a debate moderator noted, two-thirds of Hispanics support a withdrawal from Iraq.

But what really stood out at the debate, broadcast on Univision, was that none of the candidates were actually allowed to speak Spanish. The moderators asked questions in Spanish, the candidates' answers were translated into Spanish, but the candidates who can speak the language fluently, like New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, weren't allowed to do so because it might give them an advantage over the others. As Richardson put it, "Univision is promoting English-only in this debate."

Overall, the debate served as a reminder that the millions of Spanish-speaking Americans are important targets for the 2008 election, and the Democrats are doing everything they can to bring more Hispanic votes their way.

As ABC News notes, President Bush (who has shown that he also understands the importance of this vote) and Karl Rove really went after the Hispanic community in 2004, and about 40 percent voted GOP. But that dropped to 30 percent in 2006 — a decrease attributed to the GOP rhetoric on illegal immigration. And it's not likely to increase when you have a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination (can you say "Tom Tancredo"?) suggesting that even legal immigration be stopped.

The Republicans were invited to debate on Univision as well, but only John McCain accepted.

September 7, 2007

G.I. Joe Becomes 'Global Integrated' Joe

The original hand-carved, hand-painted G.I. Joe prototype (third from left) sits with fellow original G.I. Joe prototyes.

Victoria Arocho/AP

Ah, G.I. Joes. I had lots of them when I was a kid. Back in the '60s, Joe was still fighting Nazis and the Japanese. And he was a lot bigger than the G.I. Joe action figures are today. My father would drive me crazy when he would say they looked just like dolls. Dads ... What do they know?

But G.I. Joe has changed over the years, and now he may be in for the biggest change of all. Instead of the "Real American Hero," G.I. Joe is being made over as "a Global Integrated Joint Operating Entity" for Paramount Pictures' new movie, Variety reports. No more "Government Issue." Joe is being changed to appeal to a wider, more international audience.

Traditionalists are upset. Retired Army Col. David W. Hunt, a Fox News military and terrorism analyst, called it "a shame."

Well, as weird as it may be, it's life. Joe is a "brand" after all, and brands change all the time in an effort to reach new audiences and make more money. (Hasbro has not said if it will change the toys it sells to match the movie's new look. But it's my guess that we'll have new Joes and the old Joes. Joe has probably been made in China for years now, anyway.)

However, I've seen some stretches to come up with names from acronyms before, but "Global Integrated Joint Operating Entity"? Geesh.

That's all for this week. If you see anything interesting, e-mail us at newsblog@npr.org.

President Bush Has Tough Day at OPEC ... er, APEC

As Mark Knopfler once sang, some days you're the windshield, and some days you're the bug.

President Bush, in Australia for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit, had one of those "bug" days today. First, South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun sandbagged Bush at their joint press conference. Normally, these press events are about as exciting as watching paint dry. But Roh really pushed the president about when he would actually end the war with Korea. (A treaty officially ending the war has never been signed.) An obviously irritated Bush said only that North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il had to get rid of "his (nuclear) weapons in a verifiable fashion" first.

And Bush's speech at the Sydney Opera House was held up for 10 minutes while workers moved people from the balcony to fill in the seats near the front. Then, Bush thanked Australian Prime Minister John Howard for being his host at the "OPEC," not APEC, conference. He also mentioned the service of the "Austrian troops" in Iraq. Which is nice, but it was supposed to be Australian. Easy to mix up ... except one likes edelweiss, the other, shrimp on the barbie.

When Bush finished, he was headed for a steep ledge at the edge of the stage before Howard and others caught him and guided him to the steps.

Just one of those days that won't make it into the autobiography.

But it ended on a positive note for U.S. officials. North Korea announced that it has "invited nuclear experts from the United States, China and Russia into the country to survey and recommend ways of disabling all of its atomic facilities by the end of the year," according to The Associated Press.

Bin Laden's Video — and Beard Job?

You're holed up in a cave somewhere in Afghanistan or Pakistan with a bunch of guys who all probably smell really bad. Your second-in-command has been getting all the press lately. You're worried about losing your edge. So maybe you decide you want to spruce up a bit for your next jihadist video.

Still, Osama bin Laden is the last guy in the world I would have suspected of using Just for Men beard coloring.

ABC reports that intelligence sources say they believe that a new video from bin Laden is authentic and recently produced. The video itself apparently doesn't say much new, but, boy, that beard. It looks like the victim of one of the worst dye jobs since Ronald Reagan's hair. I mean, just look at it. All the gray from 2004 is gone.

"It does look oddly like he is wearing a false beard," Richard Clarke, a former White House counterterrorism official and now ABC News consultant, said. "If we go back to the tape three years [ago], he had a very white beard. This looks like a phony beard that has been passed on."

You know, now that Clarke mentions it, the beard could be a fake, not a dye job. It does remind me of those fake beards the women bought in that scene in Monty Python's Life of Brian so they could get in on stoning someone.

Report: Homeland Security Not So Secure

After reading that a group of Australian comics got past $250 million worth of security with a fake motorcade at the APEC summit Thursday in Sydney, you might think that kind of thing would never happen in the United States. But not so fast.

A government report released Thursday is casting doubt on how well the Department of Homeland Security is doing its job. Auditors from the Government Accountability Office (which seems to be kicking butt and taking names lately) said that the department cannot take credit for the fact that there have been no attacks on American soil since Sept. 11, 2001. (Ouch.)

"Auditors said the nation is safer than it was that day in 2001, but the department has poorly managed its mission," The Associated Press reports. The GAO identified 171 performance expectations and found the department "achieved fewer than half since it formed four years ago."

The GAO gave the department high marks for maritime security, an area in which it made "substantial progress." But its efforts in emergency preparedness and response, science and technology, human capital management and information technology management all got the lowest marks.

Homeland Security is disputing the report. Maybe the department wants to talk to the GAO about some of its grading, just like the Pentagon did after a GAO report challenged its rosier picture of what's happening in Iraq.

Federal Judge Strikes Down Key Section of Patriot Act

You know, the idea that the FBI could send a company or an individual a letter, ask them for records and then tell them that they couldn't tell anyone about it, never seemed quite kosher. Apparently, U.S. District Judge Victor Marrero feels the same way.

On Thursday, Marrero ruled that the section of the Patriot Act that requires people contacted by the FBI for information not to tell anyone about that contact, or what information was given, is unconstitutional. Marrero agreed with the American Civil Liberties Union that so-called national security letters, which the FBI uses without getting permission from a judge, are effectively gag orders that violate First Amendment rights of free speech.

The letters were actually created in 1986 but were rarely used. The Patriot Act made it much easier for the FBI to use them without court order. Charlie Savage of The Boston Globe reports that in 2005, 19,000 of the letters were sent, seeking 47,000 pieces of information. When the U.S. inspector general analyzed a batch of 293 national security letters issued between 2003 and 2005, he found 22 possible breaches of regulations. This was after Attorney General Alberto Gonzales "had testified that there had not been a reported instance of Patriot Act powers being abused. Later, it turned out Gonzales had been aware of the problems with the National Security Letters."

Marrero, who had struck down parts of the Patriot Act once before, gave the government 90 days to appeal his order, which it is likely to do. If the ruling is upheld, it will mean the letters cannot be used without significant oversight.

September 6, 2007

Remembering the World's Best-Known Opera Singer

Luciano Pavarotti in 2005.

Henning Kaiser/AFP/Getty Images

Thirty-two years ago this fall, I was a theater student at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Every now and then, I would try to pick up a few extra credit hours by working on productions at the local arts auditorium, which was on campus. And that's how I met Luciano Pavarotti.

He was just starting to become famous then (or else, to be quite honest, he probably wouldn't have been in Halifax). I can still see him walking down the hall. Huge grin, oozing confidence, dressed with a flair, his fisherman's cap on his head, with a small entourage following behind him. Later, I ended up standing beside him and started up a brief conversation. I told him that my best friend was an opera singer, and when we had roomed together the previous summer while working at a resort hotel, I would wake up many mornings to the sounds of Pavarotti blasting on the stereo. I could tell he was pleased with that news, and he laughed.

It was just one of those brief moments you have with someone famous that don't mean anything to the celebrity but add a little sparkle to life. Sometimes they are fun, sometimes a little weird (one day I'll tell you about being introduced to singer Paul Anka when I was about 8 years old).

I always was a Pavarotti fan after that day. (I'm probably one of the few people who actually went to see Yes, Giorgio.) It's sad to think that he's gone now.

Australian Comedy Show Gets Through APEC Security

You know, this is like the story about the nuclear weapons that mistakenly hitched a ride on an Air Force bomber — it's something that's not supposed to happen ... until it actually does.

Today, a satirical Australian TV show, The Chaser's War on Everything, staged a fake motorcade through the streets of Sydney. Many world leaders, including President Bush, are in Sydney for this week's Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting. So there is a lot of security, about $250 million worth. But the fake motorcade of three cars and two motorcycles made it through two official checkpoints. The convoy was eventually pulled over about a block from Bush's hotel, apparently when the comics tried to turn around.

Here's the best part: One of the people in the motorcade was dressed to look like Osama bin Laden.

New South Wales Police Minister David Campbell said he didn't think the stunt was funny (the authorities had, in fact, warned the show not to try something like this, and 11 people have been charged with breaching APEC security), but a quick online poll by The Sydney Morning Herald found 86 percent of respondents saw the humor. Campbell denied he was embarrassed by the comedians getting through the checkpoints — and in an effort to make a souffle out of broken eggs, he said he was pleased the "multi-layered'' security had worked.

Actually, I completely understand how this happened. The Chaser team's vehicles were flying little Canadian flags. Who in their right mind would suspect Canadians of anything nefarious, eh?

Fred Thompson Goes to Hollywood to Enter Race

Former Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson speaks to Jay Leno during Wednesday's taping of The Tonight Show. Thompson announced on the show that he is running for president.

Paul Drinkwater/NBC Universal via Getty Images

I don't know, there's something about launching your run for the most important job on the planet on a late-night talk show that seems, well, a little low rent, even if you are a former movie star like Fred Thompson. It's like you couldn't get permission from your hometown to announce your candidacy on the front steps of city hall. I understand there's wisdom in appearing on such a show if you're running (say, to play your saxophone) and that other candidates have done it, but there's a tradition to saying "I want to be president" formally that I kind of like.

At any rate, it was pretty anticlimactic at this point. When Arnold Schwarzenegger announced on Leno that he was going to run for governor of California, it actually surprised people. (It would have been hard for him to announce his run from the steps of a city hall somewhere in Austria, anyway.)

Thompson's decision to make his announcement on The Tonight Show on the same night that the rest of the GOP field was debating in New Hampshire also gave the other candidates a chance to take a few rather funny shots at him.

The former Tennessee senator seems to want to set himself apart. He waits to actually announce his bid until long after the other candidates have hit the ground running. And he says that he's not really interested in taking part in multi-candidate debates. "I'll do my share, but I don't think it's a very enlightening forum, to tell you the truth," he said.

Oh well, I've seen him on TV and in the movies. That's all I need to know about his qualifications to be president, right?

I'll Show You My Iraq Stats If You Show Me Yours

Lies, damn lies and statistics, as the saying goes. I remember my father, who once worked on Parliament Hill in Canada, used to tell me that quoting a statistic, even one you knew was completely wrong, made up or twisted around, could work wonders for your argument. "People are more likely to believe you 86.7 percent of the time," he would say with a wink.

That's why I found Guy Raz's Morning Edition piece today on the use of statistics in the Iraq debate so fascinating. Accusations that numbers are being cherry-picked have been a persistent feature of the war. Now, statistics are playing a large role in the argument over whether the surge in Iraq is improving security.

For instance, take Anbar province, which President Bush visited over the weekend. He called it one of the safest places in Iraq. While it may be true, it's relative — being safe in Iraq is not like being safe in, say, Des Moines. And while military casualties in Anbar are definitely down, it is still the second-deadliest place for U.S. troops in Iraq, Raz reports. Baghdad remains Numero Uno.

Or how about another stat from this morning's piece: Every month this year, more American troops have been killed as compared with the same month last year. Or that the Pentagon won't include in sectarian violence figures the deaths of 500 ethnic Yezidis in August because officials don't consider large bombings examples of sectarian violence.

Former Army National Guard Lt. Paul Rieckhoff writes about statistics in his firsthand account of the war in Iraq, Chasing Ghosts:

"American politicians, military commanders and media personalities are preoccupied with numbers. They can understand numbers. They can plug numbers into an article or use them as talking points. They can slice and manipulate numbers. Self-proclaimed experts gauge whether America is winning or losing the war in Iraq based on numbers of U.S. troops in Iraq, or daily attacks on Americans or Iraq security forces trained. All these numbers are useless without security."

So has security improved in Iraq? What information do you use to form your opinion?

September 5, 2007

Apple Sticks Wi-Fi in New iPod, Drops iPhone Price

I've been in the audience when Steve Jobs makes an appearance at the Moscone Center in San Francisco. The few moments before he walks on stage are like waiting for a rock star to appear. Or maybe a really casually dressed Santa Claus — because Jobs always brings presents.

At today's "Apple Event," he brought a bundle, so to speak, including: a new version of iTunes that will allow users to make custom ring tones for their iPhones; a redesigned iPod Nano that includes video, more games support and more storage; a new partnership with Starbucks that will make it possible for users to buy whatever music is playing at their local Starbucks when they walk in; and the touch-screen iPod Touch, the first iPod to feature wireless networking capabilities.

And Jobs must have been reading all those reports saying that the iPhone isn't selling quite as well as hoped, because Apple is dropping the price of an 8-gigabyte iPhone by $200 to $399. (I think it's still about $100 too high for many consumers, but it's more affordable.)

Macworld offers lots of coverage of all the new features.

Jobs even joked about the company's recent problems with NBC Universal, which said last week that it won't renew its contract to sell its popular TV shows on iTunes. When showing people how to turn their tunes into custom phone rings, Jobs played "Give Peace a Chance," and added, "That's [for] when NBC calls."

Air Force Bomber Mistakenly Carries Nukes

Maybe the conversation went something like this:

"Hey, have you seen my nukes?" ... "No, I haven't touched anything." ... "I just put them down here a minute ago." ... "Don't worry. They're probably under a pile of papers. They'll show up."

OK, well, maybe it didn't sound quite like that. There must have been some panic last week when Air Force officials realized that several cruise missiles with nuclear warheads had been, well, missing. The Military Times reports that they were mistakenly strapped onto a B-52 bomber and flown from Minot Air Force Base, N.D., to Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana on Aug. 30, meaning for a few hours, they were unaccounted for.

Of course, the Air Force says the missiles were always under its control and that, because the bomber was flying over the United States, there was no chance of the missiles being seized by a hostile force. So the big question becomes, "But what if they crashed and took out half of some state with them?"

At no time was there a risk for a nuclear detonation, even if the B-52 crashed on its way to Barksdale, said Steve Fetter, a former Defense Department official who worked on nuclear weapons policy in 1993-94. A crash could ignite the high explosives associated with the warhead, and possibly cause a leak of the plutonium, but the warheads' elaborate safeguards would prevent a nuclear detonation from occurring, he said.

Right. Just like the safeguards that keep nuclear warheads from being in the wrong place at the wrong time. I think Don Shepperd, a retired Air Force major general and military analyst for CNN, was on the money when he said, "This is a major gaffe, and it's going to cause some heads to roll down the line."

One commander has already been fired.

Massachusetts Democrats Launch Anti-Romney Site

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney

Eric Thayer/Getty Images

I lived in Massachusetts when Mitt Romney was governor. And it's pretty fair to say that the Gov and the state's Democratic Party didn't get along all that well, especially after Romney decided to campaign for the GOP presidential nomination and started to reverse some of his earlier, more liberal positions. Apparently, the Democrats have decided it's time for a little payback.

As The Boston Globe reports, the state party launched today "a first-of-its-kind website that it says contains an unparalleled repository of information about Mitt Romney's record that could be used against the former governor in his White House run."

Kevin Madden, a spokesman for the Romney campaign, said, "Democrat party operatives are going to continue to peddle distortions and try and attack the governor in every which way possible."

But this is a rather unique method of attack. In addition to assembling the party's own problems with Romney as a candidate, the site offers documents for people who want to try to uncover potentially unfavorable information on their own. (Take a look at the Citizen Journalist Tool Kit.) The Globe reports:

RomneyFacts.com lays out a wealth of documents: personal financial disclosure statements he filed as governor; policy proposals he put forward in his 2002 campaign; several old campaign ads; and a unique searchable database of campaign contributions from his entire political career.

Somewhere in America, Rudy Giuliani, John McCain and Fred Thompson must be smiling.

'All Things Considered' Wants You to Pick Lyrics

With a song in my heart... Never mind, I won't sing.

First, Hillary Clinton had a contest to pick a theme song for her presidential campaign. Now, All Things Considered has the bug. The show last month asked listeners to write lyrics for its theme (I'm humming it now, in case you can't remember it). Nearly a thousand people took the plunge and tried their hand at being this generation's Ira Gershwin ... well, maybe not. Apparently, some submissions were more like a bad version of "Weird Al" Yankovic. But hey, it's the thought that counts, right?

The show's producers have chosen four finalists. You can hear them here, sung by the charming songstress (and Supreme Court connoisseur) Nina Totenberg. Then, click on the link above the final four to register your vote.

My favorite line comes from Steve Ledford's version: "Could be worse, it could be pledge week."

Craig: Then again, maybe I won't

Republican Sen. Larry Craig is having second thoughts.

Late Tuesday, his spokesman said that the Idaho senator may rethink his decision to step down from his seat on Sept. 30. Craig said last weekend that he planned to resign after the uproar from his arrest in a restroom at the Minneapolis airport during a sex sting and his guilty plea on a misdemeanor charge.

"We're still preparing as if Sen. Craig will resign Sept. 30, but the outcome of the legal case in Minnesota and the ethics investigation will have an impact on whether we're able to stay in the fight — and stay in the Senate," spokesman Sidney Smith said.

The New York Daily News reports that Craig received a vote of support from his children, who angrily denounced the GOP leaders who couldn't seem to denounce Craig fast enough after the Minneapolis arrest became public.

"I was angry," said Michael Craig, 38, who appeared on ABC's Good Morning America with his sister Shea Howell.
"These people are friends of our family, friends of my dad," he said, adding that he was disappointed at "the lack of public support, when I know so many of his colleagues back on Capitol Hill have worked with my dad for 30 years."

The New York Times reports that one of Craig's lawyers, Stanley M. Brand, has advised him not to resign his seat.

As the Top of the Ticket blog points out, the idea that he won't go is not going to be a popular one in GOP circles.

September 4, 2007

Report: Some U.S. Troops Showing Disregard for Rules

The American Civil Liberties Union today released about 10,000 pages of courts-martial summaries, transcripts and military investigative reports about 22 incidents involving U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. They show several examples, some unreported before today, of U.S. troops killing local citizens while falsely believing they were within the law.

The Associated Press reports that the documents were obtained through a federal Freedom of Information Act request that the ACLU filed more than a year ago. The organization asked for all documents relevant to U.S. military involvement in the deaths of civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan. Only the Army responded to the request. The ACLU is suing to get the remaining documents.

The released documents include examples of U.S. troops shooting wounded Iraqis and killing suspected insurgents in custody.

In one case, AP reports, lawyers for a soldier argued that "the rules of engagement are clear and in favor of soldiers, contending that the perception of hostility merits deadly action." But a retired Army intelligence colonel who reviewed the documents for the ACLU disagreed. Michael Pheneger said the "fog of war" is a reality, but that "it's perfectly obvious that there is no rule of engagement that would authorize someone to kill someone in custody."

The Power of Positive Thinking, Circa 2007

Good old Norman Vincent Peale. Fifty years ago, he was telling people in The Power of Positive Thinking that if you had more positive thoughts, your life would get better. I read all his books when I was a teen, and I have to say, they did help. Then I grew up and discovered that positive thinking won't solve all of life's problems, even if it does make them a little more palatable.

Positive psychology looks to be a stepchild of Peale's ideas — with a bit more scientific sheen. Basically, it's psychology that looks at the positive aspects of being human to understand "What's it all about?" And just like Peale's work, it includes a healthy dose of religion.

This has some psychologists upset. In almost an echo of the argument over evolution and intelligent design, traditional psychologists worry that this new field will be twisted into a vehicle to advance religious beliefs. But religion has been of interest to many prominent psychologists and thinkers over the last century, including William James and Carl Jung.

John Shook of the Center for Inquiry says that as long as positive psychology remains rooted in the real world, it could teach us a lot about what makes people happy. In fact, when Chantal Allan interviewed Shook, an atheist, for Day to Day, he said that research into positive psychology could show that what makes a person happy is basically the same for believers and atheists.

Craig Venter's DNA for All to See

Craig Venter is, by some accounts, pretty full of himself. The "celebrity scientist," who led the team that finished second in the race to publish the first complete human genome in 2003, has never seemed afraid to let it all hang out in public. But this might be taking it to extremes.

Venter and his team unveiled the first individual genome ever sequenced today. And who did the DNA belong to? Venter himself — all 2.8 billion contiguous bits of genetic code of him.

Self-promotion aside, scientists say it's an important breakthrough, especially for research in preventative medicine. And Venter's DNA shows that we're not all that alike. The old thought had been that humans were about 99.9 percent similar. But now we know that it's more like 99.5 percent (and maybe even just 99 percent). That may still sound pretty close, but the 0.4 percent allows for a multitude of differences.

Yet, there is something unsettling here as well. Venter's code shows that he has a propensity for heart disease and Alzheimer's. The argument is, of course, that knowing about these potential diseases means that he can try to avoid them.

But how much do we want to find out about our futures? How would you feel about knowing what diseases you might get or how long you may live?

Myths Have a Way of Sticking in the Mind

For years, I've been puzzled by the persistence of the myth that Saddam Hussein was involved in the Sept. 11 terrorist attack. The myth continues to thrive among a significant portion of the population, despite numerous studies, reports and investigations that have shown it to be false.

Well, a recent study seems to show why: Myths have a way of sticking in the mind.

The research centered on a flier from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that labeled statements about the flu vaccine "true" or "false." (For instance, the statement "Only older people need flu vaccine" was false.) The idea behind the flier was to combat myths about the vaccine. Only it didn't quite work.

The Washington Post reports that Norbert Schwarz, a social psychologist at the University of Michigan, had volunteers read the CDC flyer. Within 30 minutes, older volunteers had "misremembered" 28 percent of the myths as true. Within three days, it was 40 percent. Younger volunteers did better at first, but within three days they had misremembered as much as the older volunteers had after the first 30 minutes.

So what does this mean (besides that our memories are not the greatest)? Well, as the Post notes, "The conventional response to myths and urban legends is to counter bad information with accurate information. But the new psychological studies show that denials and clarifications, for all their intuitive appeal, can paradoxically contribute to the resiliency of popular myths."

Wow. So the more we try to correct a myth, the more we can actually help perpetuate it. Which helps explain Saddam and Sept. 11. And the Loch Ness Monster. And Bigfoot. Etc., etc....

The Dora Market: Petraeus' 'Potemkin Village'?

As Congress returns to Washington this week, Morning Edition reports it will be Iraq 'round the clock — at least until Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker deliver their report next week on how things are going. They are expected to say that security is improving.

One of the main examples Petraeus uses to support his optimism is the Dora market in Baghdad. The Washington Post quotes a soldier who calls it "General Petraeus's baby." The market, once a target for roadside bombings and other attacks, now boasts 349 vendors. (Before the American-led invasion in 2003, there were more than 850.) It's often shown to politicians and other generals who travel to the country.

But while used as a symbol of improved security, the market is also a bit of a mirage ... or "a Potemkin village of sorts," the Post reports. The area is heavily patrolled by U.S. troops. Merchants are given $2,500 by the U.S. to open a stall. The military has rebuilt shops that burned down. The market attracts few people from outside Dora because of the danger. And the shops are only open for a few hours a day.

1st Lt. Jose Molina, who is in charge of monitoring and disbursing the grant money, said the U.S. military includes barely operating stores in its tally. "Although they sell dust, they are open for business," said Molina, 35, from Dallas. "They intend to sell goods or they may just have a handful of goods. But they are still counted."

The Dora market is a great example of the dilemma faced by the U.S. On the one hand, security has improved enough to allow the Dora market to be open for business. But on the other hand, the improvement is heavily propped up by the U.S. military, leaving one to wonder what happens once the U.S. leaves.

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