Today in history - Dec. 31

The Associated Press

Today is Sunday, Dec. 31, the 365th and final day of 2006.

Today's Highlight in History:

On Dec. 31, 1879, Thomas Edison first publicly demonstrated his electric incandescent light in Menlo Park, N.J.

On this date:

In 1775, the British repulsed an attack by Continental Army Gens. Richard Montgomery and Benedict Arnold at Quebec; Montgomery was killed.

In 1857, Britain's Queen Victoria decided to make Ottawa the capital of Canada.

In 1862, President Lincoln signed an act paving the way for West Virginia statehood.

In 1877, President and Mrs. Hayes celebrated their silver anniversary (actually, a day late) by re-enacting their wedding ceremony in the White House.

In 1946, President Truman officially proclaimed the end of hostilities in World War II.

In 1974, private U.S. citizens were allowed to buy and own gold for the first time in more than 40 years.

In 1980, Canadian communications theorist Marshall McLuhan died at age 69.

In 1985, singer Rick Nelson, 45, and six other people were killed when fire broke out aboard a DC-3 that was taking the group to a New Year's Eve performance in Dallas.

In 1986, 97 people were killed when fire broke out in the Dupont Plaza Hotel in San Juan, Puerto Rico. (Three hotel workers later pleaded guilty to charges in connection with the blaze.)

In 1991, representatives of the government of El Salvador and rebels reached agreement at the United Nations on a peace accord to end 12 years of civil war.

Ten years ago: Leftist rebels in Peru released two diplomats, leaving 81 hostages in the besieged Japanese embassy residence in Lima.

Five years ago: New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani spent his final day in office praising police, firefighters and other city employees, and said he had no regrets about returning to private life. Notre Dame tapped Tyrone Willingham to be its football coach, replacing George O'Leary, who'd resigned because of misstatements about his academic and athletic achievements on his resume; Willingham became the first black head coach in any sport for the Irish. Actress Eileen Heckart died in Norwalk, Conn., at age 82.

One year ago: In central Indonesia, suspected Islamic militants set off a powerful bomb at a busy market frequented by Christians, killing seven people. Dick Clark, in his first television appearance since his stroke in 2004, helped to ring in the new year in Times Square.

Today's Birthdays: Folk and blues singer Odetta is 76. Actor Sir Anthony Hopkins is 69. Actor Tim Considine ("My Three Sons") is 66. Actress Sarah Miles is 65. Rock musician Andy Summers is 64. Actor Ben Kingsley is 63. Rock musician Peter Quaife (The Kinks) is 63. Producer-director Taylor Hackford is 62. Actor Tim Matheson is 59. Pop singer Burton Cummings (The Guess Who) is 59. Singer Donna Summer is 58. Actor Joe Dallesandro is 58. Rock musician Tom Hamilton (Aerosmith) is 55. Actor James Remar is 53. Actress Bebe Neuwirth is 48. Actor Val Kilmer is 47. Singer Paul Westerberg is 47. Rock musician Ric Ivanisevich (Oleander) is 44. Rock musician Scott Ian (Anthrax) is 43. Actress Gong Li is 41. Pop singer Joe McIntyre is 34.

Thought for Today: "Though the past haunt me as a spirit, I do not ask to forget." — Felicia Dorothea Browne Hemans, English poet (1793-1835).

Sphere: Related Content

50 Dumbest Things Bush Ever Said


50. "I promise you I will listen to what has been said here, even though I wasn't here." —at the President's Economic Forum in Waco, Texas, Aug. 13, 2002

49. "We spent a lot of time talking about Africa, as we should. Africa is a nation that suffers from incredible disease." —Gothenburg, Sweden, June 14, 2001

48. "You teach a child to read, and he or her will be able to pass a literacy test.'' —Townsend, Tenn., Feb. 21, 2001

47. "We both use Colgate toothpaste." —after a reporter asked what he had in common with British Prime Minister Tony Blair, Camp David, Md., Feb. 23, 2001

46. "Tribal sovereignty means that; it's sovereign. I mean, you're a — you've been given sovereignty, and you're viewed as a sovereign entity. And therefore the relationship between the federal government and tribes is one between sovereign entities." —Washington, D.C., Aug. 6, 2004

45. "I glance at the headlines just to kind of get a flavor for what's moving. I rarely read the stories, and get briefed by people who are probably read the news themselves." —Washington, D.C., Sept. 21, 2003

44. "I'm the commander — see, I don't need to explain — I do not need to explain why I say things. That's the interesting thing about being president." —as quoted in Bob Woodward's Bush at War

43. "I am here to make an announcement that this Thursday, ticket counters and airplanes will fly out of Ronald Reagan Airport." —Washington, D.C., Oct. 3, 2001

42. "The war on terror involves Saddam Hussein because of the nature of Saddam Hussein, the history of Saddam Hussein, and his willingness to terrorize himself." —Grand Rapids, Mich., Jan. 29, 2003

41. "I saw a poll that said the right track/wrong track in Iraq was better than here in America. It's pretty darn strong. I mean, the people see a better future." —Washington, D.C., Sept. 23, 2004

40. "Oh, no, we're not going to have any casualties." —discussing the Iraq war with Christian Coalition founder Pat Robertson, as quoted by Robertson

39. "I hear there's rumors on the Internets that we're going to have a draft." —presidential debate, St. Louis, Mo., Oct. 8, 2004

38. "Haven't we already given money to rich people? Why are we going to do it again?" —to economic advisers discussing a second round of tax cuts, as quoted by former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neil, Washington, D.C., Nov. 26, 2002

37. "We need an energy bill that encourages consumption." —Trenton, N.J., Sept. 23, 2002

36. "After standing on the stage, after the debates, I made it very plain, we will not have an all-volunteer army. And yet, this week — we will have an all-volunteer army!" —Daytona Beach, Fla., Oct. 16, 2004

35. "Do you have blacks, too?" —to Brazilian President Fernando Cardoso, Washington, D.C., Nov. 8, 2001

34. "This foreign policy stuff is a little frustrating." —as quoted by the New York Daily News, April 23, 2002

33. "I got to know Ken Lay when he was head of the — what they call the Governor's Business Council in Texas. He was a supporter of Ann Richards in my run in 1994. And she had named him the head of the Governor's Business Council. And I decided to leave him in place, just for the sake of continuity. And that's when I first got to know Ken and worked with Ken." —attempting to distance himself from his biggest political patron, Enron Chairman Ken Lay, whom he nicknamed "Kenny Boy," Washington, D.C., Jan. 10, 2002

32. "It is white." —after being asked by a child in Britain what the White House was like, July 19, 2001

31. "I couldn't imagine somebody like Osama bin Laden understanding the joy of Hanukkah." —at a White House menorah lighting ceremony, Washington, D.C., Dec. 10, 2001

30. "For every fatal shooting, there were roughly three non-fatal shootings. And, folks, this is unacceptable in America. It's just unacceptable. And we're going to do something about it." —Philadelphia, Penn., May 14, 2001

29. "I don't know why you're talking about Sweden. They're the neutral one. They don't have an army." —during a Dec. 2002 Oval Office meeting with Rep. Tom Lantos, as reported by the New York Times

28. "You forgot Poland." —to Sen. John Kerry during the first presidential debate, after Kerry failed to mention Poland's contributions to the Iraq war coalition, Miami, Fla., Sept. 30, 2004

27. "I'm the master of low expectations." —aboard Air Force One, June 4, 2003

26. "I'm also not very analytical. You know I don't spend a lot of time thinking about myself, about why I do things." —aboard Air Force One, June 4, 2003

25. "I know what I believe. I will continue to articulate what I believe and what I believe — I believe what I believe is right." —Rome, Italy, July 22, 2001

24. "We need to counter the shockwave of the evildoer by having individual rate cuts accelerated and by thinking about tax rebates." —Washington, D.C. Oct. 4, 2001

23. "People say, how can I help on this war against terror? How can I fight evil? You can do so by mentoring a child; by going into a shut-in's house and say I love you." —Washington, D.C., Sept. 19, 2002

22. "I wish you'd have given me this written question ahead of time so I could plan for it…I'm sure something will pop into my head here in the midst of this press conference, with all the pressure of trying to come up with answer, but it hadn't yet….I don't want to sound like I have made no mistakes. I'm confident I have. I just haven't — you just put me under the spot here, and maybe I'm not as quick on my feet as I should be in coming up with one." —President George W. Bush, after being asked to name the biggest mistake he had made, Washington, D.C., April 3, 2004

21. "The really rich people figure out how to dodge taxes anyway." —explaining why high taxes on the rich are a failed strategy, Annandale, Va., Aug. 9, 2004

20. "My plan reduces the national debt, and fast. So fast, in fact, that economists worry that we're going to run out of debt to retire." —radio address, Feb. 24, 2001

19. "You know, when I was one time campaigning in Chicago, a reporter said, 'Would you ever have a deficit?' I said, 'I can't imagine it, but there would be one if we had a war, or a national emergency, or a recession.' Never did I dream we'd get the trifecta." —Houston, Texas, June 14, 2002 (There is no evidence Bush ever made any such statement, despite recounting the trifecta line repeatedly in 2002. A search by the Washington Post revealed that the three caveats were brought up before the 2000 campaign — by Al Gore.)

18. "See, free nations are peaceful nations. Free nations don't attack each other. Free nations don't develop weapons of mass destruction." —Milwaukee, Wis., Oct. 3, 2003

17. "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa." —State of the Union Address, Jan. 28, 2003, making a claim that administration officials knew at the time to be false

16. "In Iraq, no doubt about it, it's tough. It's hard work. It's incredibly hard." —repeating the phrases "hard work," "working hard," "hard choices," and other "hard"-based verbiage 22 times in his first debate with Sen. John Kerry

15. "The most important thing is for us to find Osama bin Laden. It is our number one priority and we will not rest until we find him." —Washington, D.C., Sept. 13, 2001

14. "I don't know where bin Laden is. I have no idea and really don't care. It's not that important. It's not our priority." —Washington, D.C., March 13, 2002

13. "But all in all, it's been a fabulous year for Laura and me." —summing up his first year in office, three months after the 9/11 attacks, Washington, D.C., Dec. 20, 2001

12. "I try to go for longer runs, but it's tough around here at the White House on the outdoor track. It's sad that I can't run longer. It's one of the saddest things about the presidency." —interview with "Runners World," Aug. 2002

11. "Can we win? I don't think you can win it." —after being asked whether the war on terror was winnable, "Today" show interview, Aug. 30, 2004

10. "I just want you to know that, when we talk about war, we're really talking about peace." —Washington, D.C. June 18, 2002

9. "I trust God speaks through me. Without that, I couldn't do my job." —to a group of Amish he met with privately, July 9, 2004

8. "Major combat operations in Iraq have ended. In the battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed." —speaking underneath a "Mission Accomplished" banner aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln, May 1, 2003

7. “We found the weapons of mass destruction. We found biological laboratories … And we'll find more weapons as time goes on. But for those who say we haven't found the banned manufacturing devices or banned weapons, they're wrong, we found them." —Washington, D.C., May 30, 2003

6. "Those weapons of mass destruction have got to be somewhere!" —President George W. Bush, as he narrated a comic slideshow during the Radio & TV Correspondents' Association dinner, Washington, D.C., March 24, 2004

5. "If this were a dictatorship, it'd be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I'm the dictator." —Washington, D.C., Dec. 19, 2000

4. "There's an old saying in Tennessee — I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can't get fooled again." —Nashville, Tenn., Sept. 17, 2002

3. "Too many good docs are getting out of the business. Too many OB-GYNs aren't able to practice their love with women all across this country." —Poplar Bluff, Mo., Sept. 6, 2004

2. "Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we." —Washington, D.C., Aug. 5, 2004

1. "My answer is bring them on." —on Iraqi insurgents attacking U.S. forces, Washington, D.C., July 3, 2003

Sphere: Related Content

Top Ten Ways the US Enabled Saddam Hussein


Juan Cole


The old monster swung from the gallows this morning at 6 am Baghdad time. His Shiite executioners danced around his body.

Saddam Hussain was one of the 20th century's most notorious tyrants, though the death toll he racked up is probably exaggerated by his critics. The reality was bad enough.

The tendency to treat Saddam and Iraq in a historical vacuum, and in isolation from the superpowers, however, has hidden from Americans their own culpability in the horror show that has been Iraq for the past few decades. Initially, the US used the Baath Party as a nationalist foil to the Communists. Then Washington used it against Iran. The welfare of Iraqis themselves appears to have been on no one's mind, either in Washington or in Baghdad.

The British-installed monarchy was overthrown by an officer's coup in 1958, led by Abdul Karim Qasim. The US was extremely upset, and worried that the new regime would not be a reliable oil exporter and that it might leave the Baghdad Pact of 1955, which the US had put together against the Soviet Union (grouping Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Pakistan, Britain and the US). (Qasim did leave the pact in 1959, which according to a US official of that time, deeply alarmed Washington.)

Iraq in the 1940s and 1950s had become an extremely unequal society, with a few thousand (mostly Sunni Arab) families owning half of the good land. On their vast haciendas, poor rural Shiites worked for a pittance. In the 1950s, two new mass parties grew like wildfire, the Communist Party of Iraq and the Arab Baath Socialist Party. They attracted first-generation intellectuals, graduates of the rapidly expanding school system, as well as workers and peasants. The crushing inequalities of Iraq under the monarchy produced widespread anger.

Qasim undertook land reform and founded a new section of Baghdad, in the northeast, which he called Revolution Township, where rural Shiites congregated as they came to the capital seeking work as day laborers (it is now Sadr City, where a majority of Baghdadis live). The US power elite of the time wrongly perceived Qasim as a dangerous radical who coddled the Communists.

1) The first time the US enabled Saddam Hussein came in 1959. In that year, a young Saddam, from the boondock town of Tikrit but living with an uncle in Baghdad, tried to assassinate Qasim. He failed and was wounded in the leg. Saddam had, like many in his generation, joined the Baath Party, which combined socialism, Arab nationalism, and the aspiration for a one-party state.

In 1959, Richard Sale of UPI reports,


' According to another former senior State Department official, Saddam, while only in his early 20s, became a part of a U.S. plot to get rid of Qasim. According to this source, Saddam was installed in an apartment in Baghdad on al-Rashid Street directly opposite Qasim's office in Iraq's Ministry of Defense, to observe Qasim's movements.

Adel Darwish, Middle East expert and author of "Unholy Babylon," said the move was done "with full knowledge of the CIA," and that Saddam's CIA handler was an Iraqi dentist working for CIA and Egyptian intelligence. U.S. officials separately confirmed Darwish's account.'



CIA involvement in the 1959 assassination attempt is plausible. Historian David Wise says there is evidence in the US archives that the CIA's "Health Alteration Committee" tried again to have Qasim assassinated in 1960 by "sending the Iraqi leader a poisoned monogrammed handkerchief."

2) After the failed coup attempt, Saddam fled to Cairo, where he attended law school in between bar brawls, and where it is alleged that he retained his CIA connections there, being put on a stipend by the agency via the Egyptian government. He frequently visited US operatives at the Indiana Cafe. Getting him back on his feet in Cairo was the second episode of US aid to Saddam.

3) In February of 1963 the military wing of the Baath Party, which had infiltrated the officer corps and military academy, made a coup against Qasim, whom they killed. There is evidence from Middle Eastern sources, including interviews conducted at the time by historian Hanna Batatu, that the CIA cooperated in this coup and gave the Baathists lists of Iraqi Communists (who were covert, having infiltrated the government or firms). Roger Morris, a former National Security Council staffer of the 1960s, alleged that the US played a significant role in this Baath coup and that it was mostly funded "with American money.". Morris's allegation was confirmed to me by an eyewitness with intimate knowledge of the situation, who said that that the CIA station chief in Baghdad gave support to the Baathists in their coup. One other interviewee, who served as a CIA operative in Baghdad in 1964, denied to me the agency's involvement. But he was at the time junior and he was not an eyewitness to the events of 1963, and may not have been told the straight scoop by his colleagues. Note that some high Baathists appear to have been unaware of the CIA involvement, as well. In the murky world of tradecraft, a lot of people, even on the same team, keep each other in the dark. UPI quotes another, or perhaps the same, official, saying that the coup came as a surprise to Langley. In my view, unlikely.

There really is not any controversy about the US having supplied the names of Communists to the Baath, which rooted them out and killed them. Saddam Hussein was brought back from Cairo as an interrogator and quickly rose to become head of Baath Intelligence. So that was his first partnership with the US.

The 1963 Baath government only lasted 8 months, and was overthrown by officers who had been around Qasim. The military wing of the Baath, which was heavily Shiite, was relentlessly pursued by the new government, and was virtually wiped out. The largely Sunni civilian party, however, survived underground.

4) In 1968, the civilian wing of the Baath Party came to power in a second coup. David Morgan of Reuters wrote,

' "In 1968, Morris says, the CIA encouraged a palace revolt among Baath party elements led by long-time Saddam mentor Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr, who would turn over the reins of power to his ambitious protégé in 1979. "It's a regime that was unquestionably midwived by the United States, and the (CIA's) involvement there was really primary," Morris says. '

As I noted in The Nation, in their book Unholy Babylon, "Darwish and Alexander report assertions of US backing for the 1968 coup, confirmed to me by other journalists who have talked to retired CIA and State Department officials." It was alleged to me by one journalist who had talked to former US government officials with knowledge of this issue that not only did the US support the 1968 Baath coup, but it specifically promoted the Tikritis among the coup-makers, helping them become dominant. These included President Ahmad Hasan al-Bakr and his cousin Saddam Hussein, who quickly became a power behind the throne.

5) The second Baath regime in Iraq disappointed the Nixon and Ford administrations by reaching out to the tiny remnants of the Communist Party and by developing good relations with the Soviet Union. In response, Nixon supported the Shah's Iran in its attempts to use the Iraqi Kurds to stir up trouble for the Baath Party, of which Saddam Hussein was a behind the scenes leader. As supporting the Kurdish struggle became increasingly expensive, Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlevi of Iran decided to abandon the Kurds. He made a deal with the Iraqis at Algiers in 1975, and Saddam immediately ordered an invasion of Iraqi Kurdistan. The US acquiesced in this betrayal of the Kurds, and made no effort to help them monetarily. Kissinger maintained that the whole operation had been the shah's, and the shah suddenly terminated it, leaving the US with no alternative but to acquiesce. But that is not entirely plausible. The operation was supported by the CIA, and the US didn't have to act only through an Iranian surrogate. Kissinger no doubt feared he couldn't get Congress to fund help to the Kurds during the beginnings of the Vietnam syndrome. In any case, the 1975 US about-face helped Saddam consolidate control over northern Iraq.

6) When Saddam Hussein invaded Iran in 1980, he again caught the notice of US officials. The US was engaged in an attempt to contain Khomeinism and the new Islamic Republic. Especially after the US faced attacks from radicalized Shiites in Lebanon linked to Iran, and from the Iraqi Da`wa Party, which engaged in terrorism against the US and French embassies in Kuwait, the Reagan administration determined to deal with Saddam from late 1983, giving him important diplomatic encouragement. Historians are deeply indebted to Joyce Battle's Briefing Book at the National Security Archives, GWU, which presents key documents she sprung through FOIA requests, and which she analyzed for the first time.

I wrote on another occasion,

' Reagan sent Rumsfeld to Baghdad in December 1983. The National Security Archive has posted a brief video of his meeting with Hussein and the latter’s vice president and foreign minister, Tariq Aziz. Rumsfeld was to stress his close relationship with the U.S. president. The State Department summary of Rumsfeld’s meeting with Tariq Aziz stated that “the two agreed the U.S. and Iraq shared many common interests: peace in the Gulf, keeping Syria and Iran off balance and less influential, and promoting Egypt’s reintegration into the Arab world.” Aziz asked Rumsfeld to intervene with Washington’s friends to get them to stop selling arms to Iran. Increasing Iraq’s oil exports and a possible pipeline through Saudi Arabia occupied a portion of their conversation.

. . . The State Department, however, issued a press statement on March 5, 1984, condemning Iraqi use of chemical weapons. This statement appears to have been Washington’s way of doing penance for its new alliance.

Unaware of the depths of Reagan administration hypocrisy on the issue, Hussein took the March 5 State Department condemnation extremely seriously, and appears to have suspected that the United States was planning to stab him in the back. Secretary of State George Shultz notes in a briefing for Rumsfeld in spring of 1984 that the Iraqis were extremely confused by concrete U.S. policies . . . "As with our CW statement, their temptation is to give up rational analysis and retreat to the line that US policies are basically anti-Arab and hostage to the desires of Israel.”

Rumsfeld had to be sent back to Baghdad for a second meeting, to smooth ruffled Baath feathers. The above-mentioned State Department briefing notes for this discussion remarked that the atmosphere in Baghdad (for Rumsfeld) had worsened . . . the March 5 scolding of Iraq for its use of poison gas had “sharply set back” relations between the two countries.

The relationship was repaired, but on Hussein’s terms. He continued to use chemical weapons and, indeed, vastly expanded their use as Washington winked at Western pharmaceutical firms providing him materiel. The only conclusion one can draw from available evidence is that Rumsfeld was more or less dispatched to mollify Hussein and assure him that his use of chemical weapons was no bar to developing the relationship with the U.S., whatever the State Department spokesman was sent out to say. '



7) The US gave
practical help to Saddam during the Iran-Iraq War:


' As former National Security Council staffer Howard Teicher affirmed, “Pursuant to the secret NSDD [National Security Directive], the United States actively supported the Iraqi war effort by supplying the Iraqis with billions of dollars of credits, by providing US military intelligence and advice to the Iraqis, and by closely monitoring third country arms sales to Iraq to make sure that Iraq had the military weaponry required.” The requisite weaponry included cluster bombs. . . '



Richard Sale of UPI also reported that military cooperation intensified:


' During the war, the CIA regularly sent a team to Saddam to deliver battlefield intelligence obtained from Saudi AWACS surveillance aircraft to aid the effectiveness of Iraq's armed forces, according to a former DIA official, part of a U.S. interagency intelligence group. . .

According to Darwish, the CIA and DIA provided military assistance to Saddam's ferocious February 1988 assault on Iranian positions in the al-Fao peninsula by blinding Iranian radars for three days. '



8) The Reagan administration worked behind the scenes to foil Iran's motion of censure against Iraq for using chemical weapons. I wrote at Truthdig:


' The new American alliance might have been a public relations debacle if Iran succeeded in its 1984 attempt to have Iraq directly condemned at the United Nations for use of chemical weapons. As far as possible, Shultz wanted to weasel out of joining such a U.N. condemnation of Iraq. He wrote in a cable that the U.S. delegation to the U.N. “should work to develop general Western position in support of a motion to take ‘no decision’ on Iranian draft resolution on use of chemical weapons by Iraq. If such a motion gets reasonable and broad support and sponsorship, USDEL should vote in favor. Failing Western support for ‘no decision,’ USDEL should abstain.” Shultz in the first instance wanted to protect Hussein from condemnation by a motion of “no decision,” and hoped to get U.S. allies aboard. If that ploy failed and Iraq were to be castigated, he ordered that the U.S. just abstain from the vote. Despite its treaty obligations in this regard, the U.S. was not even to so much as vote for a U.N. resolution on the subject!

Shultz also wanted to throw up smokescreens to take the edge off the Iranian motion, arguing that the U.N. Human Rights Commission was “an inappropriate forum” for consideration of chemical weapons, and stressing that loss of life owing to Iraq’s use of chemicals was “only a part” of the carnage that ensued from a deplorable war. A more lukewarm approach to chemical weapons use by a rogue regime (which referred to the weapons as an “insecticide” for enemy “insects") could not be imagined. In the end, the U.N. resolution condemned the use of chemical weapons but did not name Iraq directly as a perpetrator. '

9) The Reagan administration not only gave significant aid to Saddam, it attempted to recruit other friends for him.


' Teicher adds that the CIA had knowledge of, and U.S. officials encouraged, the provisioning of Iraq with high-powered weaponry by U.S. allies. He adds: “For example, in 1984, the Israelis concluded that Iran was more dangerous than Iraq to Israel’s existence due to the growing Iranian influence and presence in Lebanon. The Israelis approached the United States in a meeting in Jerusalem that I attended with Donald Rumsfeld. Israeli Foreign Minister Ytizhak Shamir asked Rumsfeld if the United States would deliver a secret offer of Israeli assistance to Iraq. The United States agreed. I traveled with Rumsfeld to Baghdad and was present at the meeting in which Rumsfeld told Iraqi Foreign Minister Tariq Aziz about Israel’s offer of assistance. Aziz refused even to accept the Israelis’ letter to Hussein.” It might have been hoped that a country that arose in part in response to Nazi uses of poison gas would have been more sensitive about attempting to ally with a regime then actively deploying such a weapon, even against its own people (some gassing of Kurds had already begun). '


10) After the Gulf War of 1991, when Shiites and Kurds rose up against Saddam Hussein, the Bush senior administration sat back and allowed the Baathists to fly helicopter gunships and to massively repress the uprising. President GHW Bush had called on Iraqis to rise up against their dictator, but when they did so he left them in the lurch. This inaction, deriving from a fear that a Shiite-dominated Iraq would ally with Tehran, allowed Saddam to remain in power until 2003.

Sphere: Related Content

The Man Who'll Replace Rummy

Bob Gates is a Bush family hand from way back. But he'll need all his skills, and lucky stones too, as he takes on the second-hardest job in Washington.

The last time presumptive Pentagon boss Robert M. Gates faced Senate confirmation â/&/#128;/&/#148; for CIA director in 1991â/&/#128;/&/#148; he put a small good luck charm in his pocket. It was a smooth, white, oblong stone he'd picked up while hiking in Washington state's Olympic range. Gates put it in his pocket to remind him during the tough confirmation hearings that there was life after Washington if his nomination went down to defeat.

source

Tags: second-hardest | presumptive | oblong | Tough | takes | skills | remind | pocket | picked | Nomination | LUCKY | luck | Hiking | hearings | faced | Director | confirmed | charm | BOSS | Washington | senate | Rummy | Robert | replace | Pentagon | Olympic | man | Gates | Bush

Sphere: Related Content

Minors most likely victims of sexual abuse in Saudi Arabia


According to recent studies, 60 percent of all sexual assault victims are minors. Family members commit nearly one third of these incidents.

Addressing the issue of family violence at the Jeddah Chamber of Industry and Commerce last week, Inaam Robai, chairperson of the Committee for Protecting Children?s Rights at the Armed Forces Hospital, said that child abuse in Saudi Arabia has become a very serious issue.

"The term 'family violence' includes many different forms of abuse, mistreatment or neglect that adults or children may experience in their homes," said Robai. "As our understanding of the nature and extent of violence within intimate relationships and families improves, and our insight deepens, the definition of family violence continues to evolve."

She pointed out that Interior Ministry studies have shown that 45 percent of children are mistreated during their daily lives.

"Unfortunately we don't like to talk about the problem and we always ignore it here in Saudi Arabia," she said.

Robai cited a study of Makkah households estimating that 77 percent of child abusers are parents.

"Abuse may take place anywhere and may occur, for example, within the child's home or that of someone known to the child," she said.

"Many cases of child abuse remain undisclosed, either because a child does not, or cannot, tell anyone what has happened to them, or because no one reports the abuse to the authorities."

Participants in recent conference in Jeddah called for forming a committee of experts under the supervision of the Ministry of Social Affairs to solve problems concerning domestic issues.

Sphere: Related Content

Despite law, sex with minors goes unpunished in Israel


Ruth Sinai


Last August, police arrested Vadim Bartel, 41, on suspicion of engaging a 15-year old girl as a prostitute. The police caught him red-handed, as he sent the girl to a client's home. The client had requested "fresh meat." Bartel was accused of pimping. The client, like others who employed the 14-year-old's services, suffered no legal consequences. This, despite the fact that Clause 203 of the Penal Law stipulates that those who pay for the sexual services of a minor must serve three years in prison.

Enacted in 2000, Clause 203 - the only clause which permits the trial of clients of prostitutes - was added to protect minors from exploitation. But since becoming law, the clause has been applied only once, apparently in the context of a plea bargain. Police maintain that the law has not been implemented because prostitution among minors is rare. But the Elem non-profit organization, which assists youth at risk, maintains there are more than a thousand minors engaged in prostitution in Israel.

In coming days, Elem will mount a media campaign to fight this phenomenon. Ads will attempt to raise awareness of the fact that those who engage in sex with minors are engaging in sex with children.

"The more we decrease demand, the smaller the numbers of minors who offer themselves up will be," says Elem Director Tzion Gabai. "There are thousands of adults who obtain sexual services from minors. We are a masculine, macho society and, in certain cultures, engaging in relations with what is called 'fresh meat' is considered a conquest. All these minors are victims of their life stories and anyone who buys sexual services from them is exploiting their distress."

Elem volunteers work undercover to find these minors on the Internet and in "spa" clubs, often associated with organized crime. According to Gabai's estimates, about a quarter of the acts of prostitution take place in these settings. A volunteer who discovers a minor offering his services invites that minor to contact Elem's hotline or stay in the organization's day facility.

The law raises the question of whether other nations have addressed prostitution by acting against clients. Sweden is the only nation that enacted a law which condemns clientele. But MK Zehava Gal-On (Meretz), who established the parliamentary committee to fight trade in women, says that the Swedish law did not actually cause a decline in the industry.

Nevertheless, the nation must attempt to use such law to protect minors, according to Gal-On. "When there is demand, there is supply. Those who procure sexual services from minors must know that they will be punished," she says. In her opinion, procurement of sexual services from minors represents one aspect of a slippery slope: "Those who believe that it is fine to exploit foreign women, because they are not our own, should not be surprised when others begin to use Israeli minors."

Gal-On believes police preferences are misguided. She says they prefer to take on pimps rather than clientele. "In my opinion, clients collaborate with pimps and they are guilty, too."

Police say the number of minors who engage in prostitution is much smaller than Elem estimates. "We do not excuse anyone who is caught red-handed with minors," said Chief Superintendent Suzie Ben Baruch, head of the Youth Division. "But I do not remember a case in the last three years in which a customer was caught red-handed with a minor."

Attorney Naomi Levenkron, of the Hotline for Migrant Workers and the College of Management, recently contacted State Prosecutor Eran Shendar, requesting that police and prosecutors enforce the law. Levenkron received no response to her request, but in response to Haaretz, the Justice Ministry said the State Prosecutor attaches great significance to enforcing laws that protect minors.

That being said, all the examples provided by the ministry involve assault, abuse, and neglect of minors, not prostitution. "Instructions explicitly declare that there is a great deal of public interest in intensive enforcement when there is suspicion of involvement of minors in prostitution," they reported. The ministry did not explain why it does not try clients for engaging in prostitution with minors.

According to Levenkron, the law needs to be changed. The fact that statutory rape of a minor - even if consenual - is punishable by a 20-year prison sentence, but paying for sex with a minor is punishable by only three years is completely distorted.

"Money is the only element that transforms statutory rape into prostitution," she says. "But the crime is the same crime. A man only has to throw NIS 50 at a girl to reduce his sentence by 17 years - if he is sentenced at all."

Sphere: Related Content

Today in history - Dec. 29

Today is Friday, Dec. 29, the 363rd day of 2006. There are two days left in the year.


Today's Highlight in History:


On Dec. 29, 1916 (according to the New Style calendar; Dec. 16th by the Old Style), Grigory Rasputin, the so-called "Mad Monk" who had wielded great influence with Czar Nicholas II, was murdered by a group of Russian noblemen in St. Petersburg.


On this date:


In 1170, Archbishop Thomas Becket was murdered in Canterbury Cathedral in England.


In 1808, the 17th president of the United States, Andrew Johnson, was born in Raleigh, N.C.,

source

Tags: wielded | noblemen | Rasputin | Grigory | Czar | so-called | president | Murdered | influence | Calendar | Style | South Dakota | Russian | RALEIGH | Politics | Petersburg | nicholas | monk | London | Germany | Dec | canterbury

Sphere: Related Content

Today in history - Dec. 29



The Associated Press

Today is Friday, Dec. 29, the 363rd day of 2006. There are two days left in the year.

Today's Highlight in History:

On Dec. 29, 1916 (according to the New Style calendar; Dec. 16th by the Old Style), Grigory Rasputin, the so-called "Mad Monk" who had wielded great influence with Czar Nicholas II, was murdered by a group of Russian noblemen in St. Petersburg.

On this date:

In 1170, Archbishop Thomas Becket was murdered in Canterbury Cathedral in England.

In 1808, the 17th president of the United States, Andrew Johnson, was born in Raleigh, N.C.,

In 1845, Texas was admitted as the 28th state.

In 1851, the first American Young Men's Christian Association was organized, in Boston.

In 1890, the Wounded Knee massacre took place in South Dakota as some 300 Sioux Indians were killed by U.S. troops sent to disarm them.

In 1934, Japan renounced the Washington Naval Treaty of 1922 and the London Naval Treaty of 1930.

In 1940, during World War II, Germany dropped incendiary bombs on London, setting off what came to be known as "The Second Great Fire of London."

In 1975, a bomb exploded in the main terminal of New York's LaGuardia Airport, killing 11 people.

In 1986, former British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan died at his home in Sussex, England, at age 92.

In 1989, playwright Vaclav Havel was elected president of Czechoslovakia by the country's Federal Assembly, becoming the first noncommunist to attain the post in more than four decades.

Ten years ago: War-weary guerrilla and government leaders in Guatemala signed an accord ending 36 years of civil conflict. North Korea apologized for sending a spy submarine into South Korean waters.

Five years ago: A fire sparked by a fireworks explosion in downtown Lima, Peru, killed 274 people.

One year ago: International monitors said they would review Iraq's parliamentary elections in response to fraud complaints by Sunni Arab and secular Shiite groups.

Today's Birthdays: Actress Inga Swenson is 74. ABC newscaster Tom Jarriel is 72. Actress Mary Tyler Moore is 69. Actor Jon Voight is 68. Country singer Ed Bruce is 67. Rock musician Ray Thomas is 65. Singer Marianne Faithfull is 60. Jockey Laffit Pincay Jr., is 60. Actor Ted Danson is 59. Actor Jon Polito is 56. Singer-actress Yvonne Elliman is 55. Actress Patricia Clarkson is 47. Comedian Paula Poundstone is 47. Rock singer-musician Jim Reid (The Jesus and Mary Chain) is 45. Actor-comedian Mystro Clark is 40. Actor Jason Gould is 40. Movie director Andy Wachowski is 39. Actress Jennifer Ehle is 37. Rock singer-musician Glen Phillips is 36. Actor Kevin Weisman is 36. Actor Jude Law is 34. Rapper Pimp C is 33. Actor Mekhi Phifer is 32. Actor Shawn Hatosy is 31. Actor Diego Luna is 27. Country singer Jessica Andrews is 23.

Thought for Today: "If a child is to keep alive his inborn sense of wonder, he needs the companionship of at least one adult who can share it, rediscovering with him the joy, excitement and mystery of the world we live in." — Rachel Carson, American biologist (1907-1964).

Sphere: Related Content

Israeli weapons transfer to be used against Jews


Aaron Klein
WorldNetDaily.com

Weapons transferred yesterday with the help of Israel to militants from Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah party will be used in attacks against the Jewish state, a senior Fatah militant told WND.

Also, a leader of the Popular Resistance Committees, a major Palestinian terror group suspected of attacks against U.S. Middle East targets, told WND his organization has infiltrated Fatah and likely will obtain some of the new arms.

According to reports here, Egypt yesterday transferred 2,000 AK-47 assault rifles, 20,000 magazines and two million rounds of ammunition to Fatah security organizations in the Gaza Strip to bolster the groups in clashes against rival Hamas factions.

Hamas and Fatah have engaged in heavy firefights since Abbas earlier this month called for new Palestinian elections in a move widely seen as an attempt to dismantle the Hamas-led PA.


The Egyptian weapons were delivered yesterday with the help of the Israeli Defense Forces and with authorization from Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, according to Israel's Haaretz daily newspaper.

Israeli and Palestinian security officials confirmed the Egyptian weapons shipments to WND.

According to the officials, four trucks filled with Egyptian weapons were transferred into Israel through a major border crossing in coordination with the IDF. The Israeli army then escorted the arms to a Gaza Strip checkpoint, where they were received by PA security personnel affiliated with Mahmoud Dahlan, a Fatah strongman in Gaza.

Israel's Defense Ministry said Olmert approved the Egyptian weapons shipment to bolster peace in the region.

"The assistance is aimed at reinforcing the forces of peace in the face of the forces of darkness that are threatening the future of the Middle East," said Amos Gilad, head of the Defense Ministry's political military policy department.

But according to Abu Yousuf, a senior member of Fatah's Force 17, which received the Egyptian weapons, the Egyptian arms shipment will be used to attack Jews and "fight Israeli occupation."

Force 17 serves as Abbas' personal security detail and as de facto police units in the West Bank and Gaza. Many of its members, including Abu Yousuf, also openly serve as militants in the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades terror group, the declared "military wing" of Fatah.

"These weapons (from Egypt) will be used to fight Israeli occupation forces, especially to defend against Zionist aggression in the Gaza Strip," said Abu Yousuf.

The Fatah militant accused Egypt of attempting to generate Palestinian civil war by arming one faction against another.

"These weapons are an attempt by Egypt, backed by Israel and the U.S., to fuel a civil war in the Palestinian territories, but this conspiracy won't work. We will not use any weapons against Hamas unless they attack Abu Mazen (Abbas). The weapons will be used against Israel," Abu Yousuf told WND.

Abu Yousuf went on to hint new weapons provided to his group with the help of Israel could be shared with the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades terror organization.

"During our official service and during our job hours we are soldiers (in Force 17). What we do in our free time it is our business. Of course, as members of Fatah, some of us are members in the Brigades and we take part in the defense and protection of our people and in the fight against the Israeli occupation," Abu Yousuf said.

Anti-U.S. terror group: We'll obtain Israeli weapons shipment

Meanwhile, in a joint interview today with WND and with the Ynetnews Israeli website, Muhammad Abdel-Al, a spokesman for the Popular Resistance Committees, said his terror group would likely obtain some of the Egyptian weapons.

"We vow to show the Israelis very soon the weapons they lately channeled to the Presidential Guards (Force 17) and to the Fatah security services will be directed against the (Israeli) occupation," said Abdel-Al

"In all the security services, including in Force 17, there are activists affiliated with all the Palestinian groups, including ours, and Hamas," he said. "We vow that there will be no use (of these arms) in a civil war, as we promise that should these arms reach us we will use them against the occupation and the Zionist enemy."

The Popular Resistance Committees is a coalition of several Palestinian terror groups and is responsible for scores of anti-Israel shootings and rocket attacks. The Committees is also accused of carrying out a bombing in 2003 on a U.S. convoy in Gaza in which three American contractors were killed.

Yesterday's Egyptian arms transfer was the latest foreign weapons shipment provided to Fatah with the help of Israel.

WND reported exclusively the U.S. sent assault rifles and ammunition earlier this month to Fatah groups in Gaza. The weapons were delivered by an Israeli army convoy, according to Israeli and Palestinian officials involved in the transfer.

Fatah's Abu Yousuf told WND earlier this month the American arms will be used against Israel.

U.S. weapons prompting Palestinian arms race?

Also, Abu Abdullah, considered one of the most important operational members of Hamas' so-called military wing, told WND in an exclusive interview last week the U.S. weapons shipments prompted a Palestinian arms race.

The Hamas leader said weapons procured as a result of the U.S. shipment will be used against Israel.

"The more the Americans give Abu Mazen (Abbas) weapons, the more we will have in the future weapons to use against the Israelis, because it incites the different organizations to intensify their own supply of weapons," said Abu Abdullah of Hamas' Izzedine al-Qassam Martyrs Brigades, Hamas' declared "resistance" department.

Abu Abdullah said the U.S. weapons would eventually fall into the hands of Hamas:

"These American weapons will be one day the property of all the Palestinian people and its resistance, including Hamas," Abu Abdullah said. "The U.S. gives weapons to Fatah during internal Palestinian clashes, but one day when we go back to carrying out operations together these [weapons] will be shared."

Sphere: Related Content

U.S. finally admits Arafat murdered American officials


Joseph Farah

WorldNetDaily.com

After 33 years of secrecy, the U.S. State Department has finally declassified a document admitting it knew the late Yasser Arafat, chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization, plotted and supervised the murders of two U.S. diplomats in Sudan in 1973, a cover-up first exposed by WND in January 2001.

The document, released earlier this year, with no fanfare, makes it clear the Khartoum operation "was planned and carried out with the full knowledge and personal approval" of Arafat, a frequent visitor to the White House throughout the 1990s who died in 2004.

In the attack March 1, 1973, eight members of the Black September terrorist organization, part of Arafat's Fatah faction of the PLO, stormed the Saudi embassy in Khartoum on Arafat's orders, taking U.S. Ambassador Cleo Noel, diplomat Charge d'Affaires George Curtis Moore and others hostage, and one day later, killing Noel, Moore and Belgian diplomat Guy Eid.

(Story continues below)

The admission comes 33 years after James J. Welsh, then the National Security Agency's Palestinian analyst, saw a communication intercepted from Arafat to his terrorist commandos in Sudan.

Within minutes, Welsh told WND, the director of the NSA was notified and the decision was made to send a rare "FLASH" message – the highest priority – to the U.S. Embassy in Khartoum via the State Department.

But the message didn't reach the embassy in time. Somewhere between the NSA and the State Department, someone decided the warning was too vague. The alert was downgraded in urgency.

The next day, eight members of Black September, part of Arafat's Fatah organization, stormed the Saudi embassy in Khartoum, took Noel, Moore and others hostage. A day later, on March 2, 1973, Noel, Moore and Eid were machine-gunned to death – all, Welsh had insisted for years, on the direct orders of Arafat.

Welsh, who left the Navy and NSA in 1974, spoke to WND about the incident in 2001 after years of attempting to get answers from his own agency and the State Department. He became particularly troubled about the cover-up of Arafat's role in the murders of American officials when President Clinton invited the PLO leader to the White House for direct negotiations on the Middle East.

Ever since, he had been on a personal one-man mission to uncover the tape recordings and transcripts of those intercepts between Arafat and Fatah leader Salah Khalaf, also known as Abu-Iyad, in Beirut and Khalil al-Wazir in Khartoum.

"I have decided that my oaths of secrecy must give way to my sense of right and wrong," he told WND. "I was particularly outraged as I had spent four years following these individuals and, at the moment of our greatest intelligence coup against them, an uninformed GS level had pooh-poohed our work and cost the lives of two U.S. diplomats," he recalls.

Welsh has continued to research the Arafat murders continually and stumbled upon the 2006 State Department document during a routine Internet search.

The document goes on to say that Fatah leaders never expected their hostage-taking to result in the freeing of the captives. A primary goal of the attack, it says, "was to strike at the United States because of its efforts to achieve a Middle East peace settlement which many Arabs believe would be inimical to Palestinian interests."

The report also said the Khartoum operation demonstrated the ability of the Black September organization to strike where least expected and warned the U.S. was at risk of future attacks from the group and its Fatah allies.

Welsh believes the initial cover-up of the communications breakdown and the role of Arafat was launched to prevent embarrassment to the State Department and White House. President Nixon, he points out, was in the death throes of the Watergate scandal at the time. The last thing he needed, Welsh speculates, was an international scandal to deal with on the front page of the Washington Post.

Later, after Nixon was gone, Welsh believes the whole matter of the Arafat tapes was kept quiet to protect the future viability of signals intelligence intercepts of this kind. And, finally, he said, the cover-up persisted to foster Arafat's role as a "peacemaker" and leader of the Palestinian cause.

Back in 1973, Welsh had received spontaneous transcripts of the dialogue between Arafat and his subordinates. But, under NSA protocol, he was not permitted to keep copies. Under normal procedure, he expected copies of the final transcripts and tapes to arrive on his desk for further analysis. They never came.

"Things were recorded but never arrived at my desk," he recalls. "I know they were recorded because I was receiving simultaneous reports from a collection site. The warning I drafted for the State Department was based on those reports."

After the deadly attack in Khartoum, Arafat ordered the eight gunmen to surrender peacefully to the Sudanese authorities. Two were released for "lack of evidence." Later, in June 1973, the other six were found guilty of murdering the three diplomats. They were sentenced to life imprisonment and released 24 hours later to the PLO.

Before surrendering, the Khartoum terrorists demanded the release of Sirhan Bishara Sirhan, the convicted assassin of Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, as well as others being held in Israeli and European prisons. Nixon refused to negotiate.

Sphere: Related Content

Woman Discovers Her Bracelet Is 10,000 Years Old Via National geographic

Fredericton, Canada (AHN) - A Canadian archeologist plans to carry out his excavations in New Brunswick after he came to know that a woman found a spearhead, as old as 10,000 years old, from a nearby area.


According to the Canadian Broadcasting Corp., Joan Rennick found a spearhead seven years ago at Cape Spear, about 31 miles east of Moncton and thought it would be a good piece of jewelry.


"I put it in a little bracket and wore it around my neck for the last seven years," said Rennick.


The spearhead is about 5 inches long and is made of a dark rock.


However, she recently came to learn of its value after she saw a spearhead in National Geographic that looked very similar to hers.


She contacted Brent Suttie, an archeologist for the province of New Brunswick, who examined it and told her it was almost 10,000 years old.


"We may be able to find an intact site there," he said.


"We'd be able to garner so much more information, like what they were eating [10,000 years ago], how their tents were laid out ... all these kinds of things we didn't know before," he added.

source

Tags: garner | excavations | Suttie | Rennick | YEARS | tents | Spearhead | PROVINCE | plans | nearby | MILES | looked | laid | information | examined | EATING | contacted | archeologist | spear | MONCTON | JOAN | geographic | Culture | CORP | cape | CANADIAN | Canada | Brunswick | broadcasting | brent

Sphere: Related Content

'Papa Pilgrim' pleads no contest to sex charges

A self-styled religious patriarch known as "Papa Pilgrim" pleaded no contest Tuesday to felony charges including incest.


Robert Hale, 65, was accused of molesting one of his 15 children over a seven-year span, including a period when his family lived in seclusion at Wrangell-St. Elias National Park.


The Pilgrims, as they once called themselves, gained notoriety for their feud with the National Park Service over access to the family's remote homestead within the 13.2 million-acre park.


In Tuesday's hearing, Hale pleaded no contest to consolidated counts of first-degree sexual assault, incest and coercion.


He told Superior Court Judge Donald Hopwood that he never sexually assaulted anyone but decided to plead "for the good of his family," said Palmer assistant district attorney Richard Payne.


Hale had been scheduled for a January 16 trial on 30 felony counts involving one of his daughters. The incest and two other counts were consolidated and charges of kidnapping and assault were dropped in a deal Hale made in exchange for a state-approved sentence of 14 years.


Family member Moses Hale, 22, said no one in the family wanted to comment.

source

Tags: seven-year | self-styled | million-acre | Wrangell-St | Hopwood | span | SEXUAL | sex | seclusion | remote | RELIGIOUS | plead | patriarch | notoriety | molesting | lived | known | including | incest | homestead | hearing | gained | FIRST-DEGREE | feud | FELONY | District | decided | counts | contest | consolidated | charges | called | attorney | assistant | assault | accused | access | tuesday | superior | SERVICE | Richard | pilgrim | Park | papa | palmer | judge | Hale | Elias | donald | Crime | court | anchorage | Alaska

Sphere: Related Content

Today in History - Dec. 28


The Associated Press

Today is Thursday, Dec. 28, the 362nd day of 2006. There are three days left in the year.

Today's Highlight in History:

One hundred and fifty years ago, on Dec. 28, 1856, the 28th president of the United States, Thomas Woodrow Wilson, was born in Staunton, Va.

On this date:

In 1694, Queen Mary II of England died after five years of joint rule with her husband, King William III.

In 1832, John C. Calhoun became the first vice president of the United States to resign, stepping down over differences with President Jackson.

In 1846, Iowa became the 29th state to be admitted to the Union.

In 1897, the play "Cyrano de Bergerac," by Edmond Rostand, premiered in Paris.

In 1917, the New York Evening Mail published a facetious essay by H.L. Mencken on the history of bathtubs in America.

In 1937, composer Maurice Ravel died in Paris.

In 1944, the musical "On the Town," with music by Leonard Bernstein and book and lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green, opened on Broadway.

In 1945, Congress officially recognized the Pledge of Allegiance.

In 1973, Alexander Solzhenitsyn published "Gulag Archipelago," an expose of the Soviet prison system.

In 1981, Elizabeth Jordan Carr, the first American "test-tube" baby, was born in Norfolk, Va.

Ten years ago: Leftist rebels in Peru released 20 more hostages, including two ambassadors, from Japan's embassy residence, following the first face-to-face talks between guerrillas and the government's negotiator.

Five years ago: The National Guard was called out to help Buffalo, New York, dig out from a paralyzing, five-day storm that had unloaded nearly seven feet of snow. Lawrence Singleton, a rapist and killer whose most notorious crime was chopping off a teen-age hitchhiker's forearms in California in 1978, died at a prison in Starke, Fla., at age 74.

One year ago: Former top Enron Corp. accountant Richard Causey pleaded guilty to securities fraud and agreed to help pursue convictions against Enron founder Kenneth Lay and former CEO Jeffrey Skilling. A U.S. immigration judge ordered retired auto worker John Demjanjuk, accused of being a Nazi concentration camp guard, deported to his native Ukraine. (Demjanjuk is appealing the deportation order.)

Today's Birthdays: Actor Lou Jacobi is 93. Bandleader Johnny Otis is 85. Comic book creator Stan Lee is 84. Former United Auto Workers union president Owen Bieber is 77. Actor Martin Milner is 75. Actress Dame Maggie Smith is 72. Rock singer-musician Charles Neville is 68. Rock singer-musician Edgar Winter is 60. Rock singer-musician Alex Chilton (The Box Tops; Big Star) is 56. Actor Denzel Washington is 52. Country singer Joe Diffie is 48. Country musician Mike McGuire (Shenandoah) is 48. Actor Chad McQueen is 46. Country singer-musician Marty Roe (Diamond Rio) is 46. Actor Malcolm Gets is 42. Actor Mauricio Mendoza is 37. Comedian Seth Meyers is 33. Rhythm-and-blues singer John Legend is 28. Actress Sienna Miller is 25. Actress Mackenzie Rosman is 17.

Thought for Today: "More persons, on the whole, are humbugged by believing nothing, than by believing too much." — Phineas T. Barnum, American showman (1810-1891).

Sphere: Related Content

Chess player caught cheating with wireless device

An Indian chess player has been banned for 10 years for cheating after he was caught using his mobile phone's wireless device to win games, chess officials said on Wednesday.


The player, Umakant Sharma, had logged rating points at a rapid pace in the last 18 months and also qualified for the national championship, arousing the suspicion of officials and bemusing rivals.


Sharma was finally caught at a recent tournament when officials discovered that he had stitched a Bluetooth device in a cloth cap which he always pulled over his ears.


He communicated to his accomplices outside the hall, who then used a computer to relay moves to him, Indian chess federation secretary D.V. Sundar said on Wednesday.


"We have banned him for 10 years," he told Reuters. "We wanted to send a clear message to such people."


Chess officials were also probing whether another player had similar advantages through such illegal means, he added.


Copyright 2006 Reuters. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

source

Tags: communicated | bemusing | arousing | Umakant | YEARS | wireless | tournament | suspicion | stitched | Secretary | relay | RATING | rapid | qualified | pulled | points | player | Phone | Pace | officials | moves | months | mobile | LOGGED | Hall | Games | finally | Federation | discovered | device | Computer | cloth | Chess | CHEATING | championship | banned | accomplices | Sharma | Reuters | INDIAN | India | Crime | bluetooth

Sphere: Related Content

50 Things We Know Now (That We Didn't Know This Time Last Year) 2006 Edition

You know how it is.


You go through life thinking you've got your head wrapped around the world and all of its knowable information.


Then one day you read that since 2005, scientists have discovered more than 50 new species of animals and plants on the Southeast Asian island of Borneo. These new members of the List of Animals We Previously Didn't Have a Clue About include a catfish with protruding teeth and suction cups on its belly that help it stick to rocks.


Go back for a second.


A bucktooth, rock-climbing catfish. With suckers.


We'll understand if at this point you wish that your brain were an Etch A Sketch so you could shake it clean and start over.


Even more mind-numbing: Tons of cool new discoveries wash ashore in the media tide each year but fall through the cracks, what with all the coverage of Britney Spears' undies and Tom Cruise's wedding.


Consider this list - culled from dozens of news stories from 2006 - your chance to catch up.


1. U.S. life expectancy in 2005 inched up to a record high of 77.9 years.


2. The part of the brain that regulates reasoning, impulse control and judgment is still under construction during puberty and doesn't shift into autopilot until about age 25.


3. Blue light fends off drowsiness in the middle of the night, which could be useful to people who work at night.


4. The 8-foot-long tooth emerging from the head of the narwhal whale is actually a type of sensor that detects changes in water temperature, pressure and particle gradients.


5. U.S. Protestant "megachurches" - defined as having a weekly attendance of at least 2,000 - doubled in five years to more than 1,200 and are among the nation's fastest-growing faith groups.


6. Cheese consumption in the United States is expected to grow by 50 percent between now and 2013.


7. At 68.1 percent, the United States ranks eighth among countries that have access to and use the Internet. The largest percentage of online use was in Malta, where 78.1 percent access the Web.


8. The U.S. government has paid about $1.5 billion in benefits to thousands of sick nuclear-weapons workers since 2001.


9. Scientists have discovered that certain brain chemicals in our tears are natural pain relievers.


10. FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover wrote a drooling fan letter to Lucille Ball in 1955 to tell her how much he enjoyed an episode of "I Love Lucy." "In all the years I have traveled on trains," he noted, "I have often wondered why someone did not pull the emergency brake, but I have never been aboard a train where it was done. The humor in your program last Monday, I think, exceeded any of your previous programs and they have been really good in themselves."


11. Wasps spray an insect version of pepper spray from their heads to temporarily incapacitate their rivals.


12. A sex gene responsible for making embryos male and forming the testes is also produced by the brain region targeted by Parkinson's disease, a discovery that may explain why more men than women develop the degenerative disorder.


13. Ancient humans from Asia may have entered the Americas following an ocean highway made of dense kelp.


14. An impact crater 18 miles in diameter was found 12,500 feet under the Indian Ocean.


15. Americans spent almost $32 billion on toys during 2005. About a third of that was spent on video games.


16. A new planet described as a "super-Earth," which weighs 13 times as much as our planet, exists in a solar system 9,000 light-years away.


17. A gene for a light-sensitive protein in the eye is what resets the body's "internal clock."


18. Australian scientists discovered a polyrhachis sokolova, which is believed to be the only ant species that can live under water. It nests in submerged mangroves and hides from predators in air pockets.


19. Red wine contains anti-inflammatory chemicals that stave off diseases affecting the gums and bone around the teeth.


20. A substance called resveratrol, also found in red wine, protects mice from obesity and the effects of aging, and perhaps could do the same for humans.


21. Two previously unknown forms of ice - dubbed by researchers as ice XIII and XIV - were discovered frozen at temperatures of around minus 160 degrees Celsius, or minus 256 Fahrenheit.


22. The hole in the earth's ozone layer is closing - and could be entirely closed by 2050. Meanwhile, the amount of greenhouse gases is increasing.


23. Scientists discovered what they believe to be football-field-sized minimoons scattered in Saturn's rings that may be debris left over from a collision between a comet and one of Saturn's icy moons.


24. At least once a week, 28 percent of high school students fall asleep in school, 22 percent fall sleep while doing homework and 14 percent get to school late or miss school because they overslept.


25. Women gain weight when they move in with a boyfriend because their diet deteriorates, but men begin to eat more healthy food when they set up a home with a female partner.


26. Some 45 percent of Internet users, or about 60 million Americans, said they sought online help to make big decisions or negotiate their way through major episodes in their lives during the previous two years.


27. Of the 10 percent of U.S. teens who uses credit cards, 15.7 percent are making the minimum payment each month.


28. Around the world, middle-aged and elderly men tend to be more satisfied with their sex lives than women in the same age group, a new survey shows.


29. The 90-million-year-old remains of seven pack-traveling carnivorous dinosaurs known as Mapusaurus were discovered in an area of southern Argentina nicknamed "Jurassic Park."


30. A group of genes makes some mosquitoes resistant to malaria and prevents them from transmitting the malaria parasite.


31. A 145-million-year-old beach ball-sized meteorite found a half-mile below a giant crater in South Africa has a chemical composition unlike any known meteorite.


32. Just 30 minutes of continuous kissing can diminish the body's allergic reaction to pollen, relaxing the body and reducing production of histamine, a chemical cell given out in response to allergens.


33. Saturn's moon Titan features vast swaths of "sand seas" covered with row after row of dunes from 300 to 500 feet high. Radar images of these seas, which stretch for hundreds of miles, bear a stunning likeness to ranks of dunes in Namibia and Saudi Arabia.


34. Scientists have discovered the fastest bite in the world, one so explosive it can be used to send the Latin American trap-jaw ant that performs it flying through the air to escape predators.


35. Janjucetus Hunderi, a ferocious whale species related to the modern blue whale, roamed the oceans 25 million years ago preying on sharks with its huge, razor-sharp teeth.


36. DNA analysis determined the British descended from a tribe of Spanish fishermen who crossed the Bay of Biscay almost 6,000 years ago.


37. Marine biologists discovered a new species of shark that walks along the ocean floor on its fins.


38. Most of us have microscopic, wormlike mites named Demodex that live in our eyelashes and have claws and a mouth.


39. The common pigeon can memorize 1,200 pictures.


40. The queens of bee, ant and wasp colonies that have the most sex with the largest number of males produce the strongest and healthiest colonies.


41. By firing atoms of metal at another metal, Russian and American scientists found a new element - No. 118 on the Periodic Table - that is the heaviest substance known and probably hasn't existed since the universe was in its infancy.


42. A "treasure-trove" of 150-million-year-old fossils belonging to giant sea reptiles that roamed the seas at the time of the dinosaurs was uncovered on the Arctic island chain of Svalbard, about halfway between the Norwegian mainland and the North Pole.


43. Sleeping in on Saturday and Sunday can disturb your body clock, leaving you fatigued at the start of the week.


44. Migrating dragonflies and songbirds exhibit many of the same behaviors, suggesting the rules that govern such long-distance travel may be simpler and more ancient than was once thought.


45. During the past five years, the existence of a peanut allergy in children has doubled.


46. Photos taken of Mars in 1999 and 2005 show muddy sand, indicating there may have been a flood sometime between those years.


47. A python was the first god worshipped by mankind, according to 70,000-year-old evidence found in a cave in Botswana's Tosodilo hills.


48. Red wines from southwest France and Sardinia boast the highest concentrations of chemical compounds that promote heart health.


49. One of the most effective ways for athletes to recover after exercise is to drink a glass of chocolate milk.


50. Researchers from the University of Manchester managed to induce teeth growth in normal chickens - activating genes that have lain dormant for 80 million years.


Sources: The Associated Press, Wall Street Journal, U.S. Journal of Dental Research, Comte News, Harvard School of Dental Medicine, National Space Biomedical Research Institute, Bereavement Magazine, James Cook University, U.S. National Institutes of Health, The New York Times, University of Oregon, Current Biology, Hartford Seminary, University of Nottingham, LucyLibrary.com, Pew Internet /&/amp; American Life Project, Junior Achievement, Physorg.com, University of Chicago, Newcastle University, Forbes, National Geographic, University of Minnesota, USA Today, The Christian Science Monitor, MSNBC.com, Daily Record, Oxford University, New Scientist, Glasgow Daily Record, The San Jose Mercury News, Flinders University, Biology Letters, The Washington Post, University of Oslo, The Times of London, Indiana University, University of Manchester, Discovery.com

source

Tags: roamed | minus | Etch | wrapped | wine | Whale | wasp | uses | UNIVERSE | undies | understand | tide | suction | spray | Spent | species | shark | shake | SEAS | Response | RANKS | protruding | program | Plants | Percent | online | news | mind-numbing | MILES | members | Media | malaria | largest | known | knowable | GIANT | gene | forms | expected | exists | episode | emerging | effects | dunes | disease | Discovery | discovered | dinosaurs | cups | crater | cracks | Coverage | Closed | catfish | brain | billion | belly | ashore | animals | access | Washington | United | TONS | things | states | spears | SOUTHEAST | sketch | SCIENTIST | Saudi Arabia | Saturn | San Jose | research | previously | People | Oxford | Oslo | Oregon | Nottingham | Newcastle | New York | namibia | Minnesota | Manchester | malta | London | journal | internet | institute | Indiana | hoover | Hartford | glasgow | France | edition | DENTAL | daily | CRUISE | clue | Chicago | Britney | botswana | borneo | biology | asian | Asia | Argentina | ancient | American | Africa

Sphere: Related Content

Britney Skewered as 2006's "Most Controversial" Celebrity

Pop princess Britney Spears has been named the most controversial celebrity of the year. The singer, whose wild antics have raised eyebrows in recent weeks since her split with husband Kevin Federline, beat out competition from other potential candidates - including Mel Gibson for his drunken, anti-Jewish rant, comedian Michael Richards for spewing racial epithets, and model Naomi Campbell for abusing her personal staff - to land the title on the Showbiz Tonight programme on CNN Headline News.


In addition to club-hopping while wearing short skirts and no panties, inadvertently flashing paparazzi in the process, Spears hit the headlines earlier in the year for incidents including driving with her infant son on her lap, having social services investigate reports that the boy fell out of this high chair, and posing nude on the cover of Harper's Bazaar while pregnant with her second child.

source

Tags: spewing | inadvertently | club-hopping | Skewered | weeks | Wearing | title | Staff | split | skirts | Singer | services | Reports | Rant | raised | racial | programme | PRINCESS | pregnant | potential | posing | paparazzi | panties | Nude | named | Model | investigate | infant | including | incidents | HUSBAND | flashing | eyebrows | Epithets | Earlier | DRUNKEN | driving | controversial | competition | comedian | celebrity | CANDIDATES | antics | anti-Jewish | addition | ABUSING | tonight | spears | Showbiz | richards | People | NAOMI | Michael | Kevin | headline | harper | Gibson | Federline | Campbell | Britney | bazaar

Sphere: Related Content