Brits don't like being cast with Genocidal US Americans!
Most Britons say Iraq invasion a mistake

Tue Mar 20, 12:30 PM ET

LONDON - Nearly six in 10 people in Britain believe it was a mistake to invade
Iraq, according to a BBC poll published Tuesday.


Fifty-five percent of respondents said they felt the war in Iraq has made Britain less safe, and only 5 percent said it left them feeling safer, according to the British Broadcasting Corp. poll commissioned to mark the invasion's fourth anniversary.

"Four years on from the war, most people in the country have now come to the view that the United States and Britain were wrong to take military action against Iraq in 2003," said Nick Sparrow from ICM Research, which conducted the poll.

More than half of respondents, 51 percent, said they would not trust the British government if it said military action was needed elsewhere because a country posed a threat to national security. Thirty-two percent said they would trust the government.

However, 57 percent said they would support sending British troops in overseas for disaster relief missions or to stop genocide — 24 percent opposed such missions.

ICM interviewed 1,019 adults across the country by telephone between March 2 and March 4. The poll had a margin of error of 3 percentage points.

In the U.S., public sentiment toward the war has changed dramatically. Almost three-fourths of people in the U.S. supported the war when it began in March 2003, while one-fourth opposed it, according to Gallup polling at the time.

Last month, AP-Ipsos polling found that not quite four in 10 people surveyed agreed with the decision to go to war and six in 10 opposed.

Name what US corporations are involved here as beneficiaries of this mutual admiration society?
Vietnam, U.S. sign nuclear conversion agreement

Mon Mar 19, 11:19 PM ET

HANOI (Reuters) - Vietnam has agreed to work with the United States to begin converting a nuclear research reactor to using low-enriched uranium fuel from highly-enriched uranium, state media said on Tuesday.

Vietnam's Atomic Energy Commission also signed an agreement with the
United Nations nuclear watchdog, the
International Atomic Energy Agency, to send any highly-enriched uranium back to Russia, where it was originally imported from, the reports and a statement by the U.S. Embassy in Hanoi said.

The statement said U.S. and Vietnam government agencies "recently signed contracts to further enhance security at the Dalat Research Reactor and at three radiological facilities in Vietnam to protect materials that could be used for harmful purposes."

It said the two contracts stem from last November's state visit to Vietnam by
President Bush, the second visit by a U.S. President to Hanoi since the former war enemies established diplomatic relations in 1995.

The U.S.
Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration will administer the project at Dalat, capital of south-central Lam Dong province and the other sites.

Vietnam, which signed the nuclear non-proliferation treaty in 1982, plans to start building a nuclear power plant in 2015 to help drive the energy-hungry economy.

The Vietnam Atomic Energy Commission says the country will need 2,000 megawatts to 4,000 megawatts of nuclear power from 2017, but does not want to enrich uranium on its soil.

International Atomic Energy Agency director Mohamed ElBaradei said on a visit to Hanoi in December that the communist-run government had involved the agency from the beginning of its nuclear power development.

"It's those damned Carpetbaggers again, George."
Homeowners drop insurance after Katrina

By MICHAEL KUNZELMAN, Associated Press Writer Mon Mar 19, 3:49 PM ET

NEW ORLEANS - Disgusted with his insurance company after Hurricane Katrina, the Rev. Simmie Harvey let his homeowner policy lapse and left his house in the hands of a higher power.

Somebody up there must like the 88-year-old Baptist minister: His newly uninsured house escaped serious damage last month when a tornado ripped through the city's Uptown neighborhood and toppled a tree that narrowly missed his home.

"I wasn't lucky. I'm blessed," he said. "I'm going to be all right. The Lord takes care of me."

Facing soaring premiums or feeling shortchanged by their insurers, a growing number of homeowners and businesses in Louisiana and Mississippi are "going bare," or dropping their coverage altogether, insurance agents and consumer advocates say. Many more are drastically reducing their coverage.

"I have every belief that it's going to be more and more common," said Amy Bach, executive director of the United Policyholders advocacy group. "If it's a choice between eating or paying their insurance bills, of course they're going to eat."

With the new hurricane season beginning June 1, it is a risky strategy. These people could lose everything in a storm or some kind of tragic accident around the house.

"You're basically playing Russian roulette with your most valuable asset," said Robert Hartwig, president and chief economist of the Insurance Information Institute, an industry-funded group.

Elderly homeowners — particularly those on fixed incomes and those who have paid off their mortgages — may be the most likely to go uninsured. Most homeowners don't have that choice, because mortgage companies require borrowers to have insurance. Those whose homes are paid off can drop their policies, unless they are getting government grants or loans that require one.

"Definitely, you'll be seeing more of this," said Bennett Powell, a Metairie insurance agent whose firm sold Harvey his policy.

Exactly how many policyholders are going bare is unclear. The insurance commissioners in Mississippi and Louisiana are not keeping track, and insurers say they do not how many of their former customers are simply buying new policies from a different company.

Shopping around can also be a risky strategy, because homeowners in Louisiana who switch are no longer protected by a state law that bars insurers from canceling policies that have been in effect for three years or longer.

"Do not shop," said Louisiana Insurance Commissioner Jim Donelon. "That protection outweighs the advantage of shopping, in my opinion."

Homeowner insurance typically covers wind damage from hurricanes, as well as damage to the home from fires, auto accidents and other misfortunes. It also protects a homeowner if someone gets injured on the property. Along the Gulf Coast, flood insurance is sold separately from homeowner insurance, and made available thorugh a federal program.

Robert Page, a Houma, La.-based insurance agent and president-elect of the National Association of Professional Insurance Agents, said the owners of three large apartment complexes in Houma recently dropped their wind and hail coverage after their premiums doubled. Page said only a few of his thousands of customers have gone completely bare after Katrina.

But "it's only the beginning," he said. "In my opinion, it's going to get worse before it gets better."

Harvey, whose modest ranch-style house has a neat lawn and a long driveway for his black Cadillac, rode out Katrina in his home during the summer of 2005 and only briefly evacuated the city in the storm's chaotic aftermath.

His roughly $1,800 annual premium did not increase significantly after Katrina, but he said he elected to drop his Farmers Insurance Co. policy because the company paid him about $4,000 even though he blames the wind for about $10,000 in damage to his roof.

"If that's all I can get, I don't have any need to get insurance," he said, figuring he is better off saving his money than paying premiums.

In Louisiana, insurance companies raised their homeowner rates an average of 13.2 percent in 2006, according to Amy Whittington, spokeswoman for the Louisiana Insurance Department. Some insurers went far higher.

Many small business owners are feeling the sharpest pinch. The insurer of last resort for many Mississippi homeowners and businesses is the state's "wind pool," and its commercial rates have jumped 268 percent since Katrina.

Tom Simmons, who owns three office buildings in Gulfport, Miss., said he paid $3,070 in premiums for the rental properties before Katrina. Maintaining that level of coverage this year would cost more than $25,000, he said.

Simmons is considering dropping his wind and hail policies but holding onto his fire and liability coverage. Even though none of his properties flooded during Katrina, the thought of heading into the next storm season without wind coverage is "scary as hell."

"The whole darn area is facing this sort of thing," he said. "The insurance companies obviously want out. Maybe they're just pricing us out of the market rather than just saying they're leaving the state."

Jeffrey O'Keefe, president of the Bradford-O'Keefe Funeral Homes on Mississippi's Gulf Coast, already has scaled back his coverage.

Before Katrina, he paid $61,224 in annual premiums to insure five funeral homes, two cemeteries and a crematorium. Renewing that $7 million in coverage would have cost about $781,000, so he reduced his coverage to $2 million. But he is still paying $122,113 in premiums, twice as much as before the storm.

"As a small business owner, it's really putting a hurt on us," he said. "It's a bad problem."

well,we wouldn't want any laws to stand created out of "thin air" by "Liberal" Judges!
Court hears "Bong hits 4 Jesus" case

By James Vicini Mon Mar 19, 2:31 PM ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - In its first major student free-speech rights case in almost 20 years,
U.S. Supreme Court justices struggled on Monday with how far schools can go in censoring students.

In a case involving a Juneau, Alaska, high school student suspended for unfurling a banner that read "Bong Hits 4 Jesus," several justices seemed wary about giving a principal too much authority at the expense of the student's right to express his views.

"It's political speech, it seems to me. I don't see what it disrupts," a skeptical Justice
David Souter said.

"And no one was smoking pot in that crowd," Justice
Ruth Bader Ginsburg said, referring to the group of students standing near the banner as the Winter Olympic torch relay passed by in January 2002.

The incident occurred during school hours but on a public sidewalk across from the school.

Student Joseph Frederick says the banner's language was meant to be meaningless and funny in an effort to get on television.

Principal Deborah Morse said the phrase "bong hits" referred to smoking marijuana. She suspended Frederick for 10 days because the banner advocated or promoted illegal drug use in violation of school policy.

Justice
Stephen Breyer said he was struggling with the case.

A ruling for Frederick could result in students "testing limits all over the place in the high schools" while a ruling against Frederick "may really limit people's rights on free speech," Breyer said.

Kenneth Starr, the former special prosecutor who investigated former President
Bill Clinton in the Monica Lewinsky sex scandal, said Morse acted reasonably and in accord with the school's anti-drug mission.

A Bush administration lawyer, Edwin Kneedler, argued for a broad rule that public schools do not have to tolerate a message inconsistent with its basic educational mission.

"I find that a very, very disturbing argument," Justice
Samuel Alito said, adding that schools could define their educational mission so broadly to suppress political speech and speech expressing fundamental student values.

Justice
Anthony Kennedy asked Kneedler if the principal could have required the banner be taken down if it had said "vote Republican, vote Democrat."

Kneedler replied the principal has that authority.

Frederick's lawyer, Douglas Mertz of Juneau, said: "This is a case about free speech. It is not a case about drugs."

Mertz argued the court should not abandon its famous 1969 ruling that students do not "shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate," a decision that allowed students to wear black armbands in class to protest the Vietnam War.

But the Supreme Court's last major rulings on the issue went against the students.

The court ruled in 1986 that a student does not have a free-speech right to give a sexually suggestive speech at an assembly and in 1988 that school newspapers can be censored.

A decision in the case is expected by the end of June.

Why does anyone continue to trust the forked tongue promises of The Great White "Parent?"
Canada Scolded over Exploitation of Indigenous Peoples' Lands

Haider Rizvi, OneWorld US Fri Mar 16, 6:48 PM ET

UNITED NATIONS, Mar 16 (OneWorld) - Canada, like the United States, is facing international scrutiny for its treatment of indigenous people.

This week, a
United Nations treaty body took the rare step of telling Canada to change its behavior on the human rights of native populations.

In a report, the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) said it was concerned about complaints of exploitation of indigenous resources by corporations registered in Canada.

CERD, which is based in Geneva, told the Canadian government to take "appropriate legislative or administrative measures to prevent the acts of transnational corporations on indigenous territories."

The CERD report comes in response to a petition filed by indigenous organizations that charged private businesses from Canada were unlawfully involved in the exploitation of their lands located in the United States.

Their petition particularly focused on the situation facing the Western Shoshone, a native American tribe, whom some non-natives also refer to as "Snake Indians," although in their own language they are called Newe people.

Stretching across the states of Nevada, California, Idaho, and Utah, the Shoshone lands are currently the third largest gold producing area in the world, where numerous multinational corporations are operating and many are planning to move in.

Many of these companies, which include Bravo Venture Group, Nevada Pacific Bold, Barrick Gold, Glamis Gold, Great Basin Gold, and U.S. GoldCorp, according to the complaint, are registered in Canada.

Many areas where mining is going on have been used by natives for spiritual ceremonies and cultural purposes for thousands of years. Certain areas are home to Shoshone creation stories and vital to indigenous traditions of acquiring knowledge.

"The sites where the Canadian [corporations] are operating or preparing to operate are akin to a church or mosque to us," said Carrie Dann, a Shoshone elder. "We believe we're placed here on this land as caretakers. We are responsible for the health and preservation of our lands."

Shoshone elders have repeatedly charged that the enormous amount of toxic material produced as a result of mining is causing enormous damage to the health and well being of their people and the environment.

Last year, in response to the Western Shoshone petition, CERD assailed the U.S. government for violating the tribes' rights and said Washington had run afoul of the international antiracism treaty.

The 18-member UN panel of experts, set up to monitor global compliance with the 1969 Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, said it had "credible information" that the Shoshone were being denied their traditional rights to land.

In its petition, the tribe had challenged the U.S. government assertion that it owned 90 percent of Shoshone lands covering about 60 million acres. CERD members said the U.S. government must cease all commercial activities on tribal lands, including mining operations.

The United States recognized Shoshone rights to their land under the 1863 Treaty of Ruby Valley. However, the
U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1979 that the pact gave Washington trusteeship over tribal lands.

The federal government justified its position by saying that tribe members had abandoned traditional land tenure and practices and cited "gradual encroachment" by non-natives as evidence to claim much of the land as federal territory.

The Western Shoshone, in their petition to the UN panel, countered that "gradual encroachment" in fact took place as part of a U.S. policy to steal their lands, and that this constituted racism.

The Geneva-based panel agreed with the Shoshone by noting that Washington's claim to the land "did not comply with contemporary international human rights norms, principles, and standards that govern determination of indigenous property interests."

Shoshone leaders said they went before the UN panel because they had exhausted all other legal options to prevent the U.S. government from taking over their ancestral lands, and for similar reason they had to challenge the role of the Canadian government.

In addition to recommending legal steps to change corporate behavior, the UN panel has also asked Canada to submit a report on the effects of the activities of transnational corporations in Canada on indigenous peoples abroad.

For their part, Dann and other indigenous leaders said they were pleased with the UN response to their petition.

"This is ground breaking news," Dann said about the CERD report on Canada. "This is the first time a UN treaty body has addressed government accountability to its corporate profiteering of ongoing human rights violations against indigenous peoples."

Sinbad: "I'm Not Dead"

Sinbad: "I'm Not Dead"
AP

MIAMI - March 17, 2007 - Actor-comedian Sinbad had the last laugh after his Wikipedia entry announced he was dead, the performer said Thursday.


Rumors began circulating Saturday regarding the posting, said Sinbad, who first got a telephone call from his daughter. The gossip quieted, but a few days later the 50-year-old entertainer said the phone calls, text messages and e-mails started pouring in by the hundreds.

"Saturday I rose from the dead and then died again," the Los Angeles-based entertainer told The Associated Press in a phone interview.

The St. Petersburg-based nonprofit organization, which describes itself as "the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit," leaves it to a vast user community to catch factual errors and other problems. Apparently, someone edited it to say Sinbad died of a heart attack. By the time the error was caught, e-mail links of the erroneous page had been forwarded to hundreds of people.

A note on Sinbad's Wikipedia page Thursday night said the site has been temporarily protected from editing to deal with vandalism.

Wikipedia was created in 2001 as a Web research tool. It has more than 1.6 million articles, contributed by members of the public.

A telephone call and an e-mail left for Wikipedia were not immediately returned Thursday night.

When asked if he was upset about the mix-up, Sinbad, whose real name is David Adkins, just laughed.

"It's gonna be more commonplace as the Internet opens up more and more. It's not that strange," the Los Angeles-based entertainer told the Associated Press in a phone interview.

Sinbad, who is currently on the road doing stand up, said he hasn't received an apology from the Internet site. He has appeared in the films, "Houseguest," and "Jingle All the Way."

(Copyright 2007 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)

Most recent R. Crumb non-interview!
Crumb Interview; San Francisco Chronicle; March ‘07

San Francisco Chronicle
Drawing out artist R. Crumb

Delfin Vigil

Sunday, March 11, 2007

Robert Crumb isn't a cartoonist. He's an escape artist.

"Wait a minute," says Crumb in his New York hotel room before the first question of this telephone interview is even asked. "I think I hear people having sex in the room next door."

A shuffling of the phone is followed by an awkward pause.

"Yeah. It's two guys," he says. "Those are definitely male voices."

With that, Crumb has not only solved the mystery of the sounds coming from next door, but he's also three minutes closer to getting out of another interview.

Crumb is no Picasso. He's more like MacGyver.

On Saturday, when the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts opens its exhibition "R. Crumb's Underground," it promises to be the most extensive collection culled from Crumb's entire comic-book art career. Spanning from 1959 (his homemade comics days with his brother Charles), his late '60s Zap Comix years in San Francisco and a New York Times series from 2005, the retrospective tribute also includes sketchbooks, sculptures, posters and every random ephemera you can think of.

Fritz the Cat will be there. Mr. Natural will be there. The Snoid will be there.

But R. Crumb will not.

"Robert wears his nerves on the outside of his body," explains Crumb's wife, Aline, as they swap the Sheraton room telephone back and forth. "He appreciates the fact that all these people love him. He wants that love. But he doesn't know what to do with it. And when he shows up to these things, it takes him a while to recover and get back to work. The only reason he's in New York City now is because it's a Valentine's Day present for me. I eat it up. That's why I can't wait to get to San Francisco."

To call Robert and Aline Kominsky Crumb eccentrics would be too simple a way to describe a very complicated but content couple, who met and started drawing comics together in the 1970s in San Francisco.

Robert, 63, became famous almost from the start for his narrative and satirical approach that could cover everything from masturbation to racial tension. His influence shines brightly through the works of fans, such as in Art Spiegelman's Maus as well as in that of contemporaries such as Harvey Pekar's American Splendor.

Aline, 59, says she became so used to having her comic book art rejected, it got to the point where she'd rather spend her time painting or teaching yoga classes in the South of France village where the couple live. They moved there about 16 years ago because "if we lived here in New York we'd be impoverished," she says.

Actually, with the "2 cents" for every R. Crumb book that sells, the Crumbs are living in a nice big house and are financially comfortable and quite happy, she says.

"The thing that bugs me sometimes is when people think that my self-image is affected by the way Robert draws these big Amazon-type women," says Aline, who first sought out Crumb after seeing a character of his that looked a little like her. "Some people think he's a big chauvinistic pig monster guy and I'm just a browbeaten woman living in his shadow. I don't feel that way at all."

The connection between the Crumb couple is a big focus of the show, according to Rene de Guzman, Yerba Buena's director of visual arts.

"Robert has been recast into this isolated-genius mold where he goes off on his own until the muse visits him to help him do his work," says de Guzman, who had been in contact with Crumb for a show for several years. "In reality, his work comes out of direct contact and sets of relationships between him and Aline and his daughter, Sophie, and in some parts of the show, his relationship with San Francisco and the comic book community."

Back in the New York Sheraton hotel room, Crumb gets back on the phone. What does he think about the forthcoming tribute?

"On the one hand, it's flattering," he says. "On the other hand, I'm old enough to perceive that so much in this world is bull -- . It seems to me that the same fuss could easily be made for an artist that I have utter contempt for and think is total nonsense. So I can't get too excited. On the other hand, if it enhances the value of our art ... well, hey. ... We've lived in difficult times before, so that would be OK with me."

To avoid allowing Crumb to escape the interview to investigate more hotel room sounds, I came prepared with a pop quiz.

Q: When was the last time a work of art made you cry?

A: I don't cry too easily. It must have been a long, long time ago because I really don't remember. Aline, on the other hand -- she cries at almost every movie. They manipulate her very easily.

Q: What's the worst advice you've ever been given?

A: The world is full of bad advice. A few years ago this guy wanted me to do artwork for his company and he offered to pay me in stock options. I refused, even though all these people, including our accountant, urged me to take the offer. They'd say, "What? Are you crazy? You don't want stock options?" I said, "No, I want money!" That company went bust, but I got paid well. I don't want anything to do with that stock market crap.

Q: Where do you feel most at home?

A: In my room. With my stuff. My record collection. My artwork. My desk. My letter files. My photo files. My photocopy machine. When we moved to France, I basically just moved my room to France. Wherever I am, I just want to be in my room. If we had to live in Peking, China, I'd still be in my room.

Q: If you had 48 hours to spend in San Francisco and never see it again, how would you spend the time?

A: I'm not thrilled or feel anything special about San Francisco particularly. I guess I'd visit my brother Max, my friend Terry Zwigoff and my friend Spain. That would probably take up a good 48 hours.

Q: Any particular food or restaurant you'd want to eat at here?

A: Food, schmood. That's not important to me.

Q: When are you most happy?

A: When I'm fulfilling my sex fantasies. When I listen to music that makes me ecstatic. I won't go into details, but my old '78 records give me musical ecstasy. There are also moments I've had with loved ones, with Aline and my daughter, that make me very happy.

Q: When were you most miserable?

A: I was quite miserable for a good chunk of my youth. I was chronically depressed between the ages of 17 and 25. Suicidal depressed. Over decades it gradually ... gradually ... diminished. I'm less depressed right now. That's not to say I'm happy. I used to feel a profound alienation from the world. You can't even imagine. I felt like an invisible ghost moving but not able to affect anything around me. But I did get a lot of artwork done. I lived those years on paper.

Q: If you could travel in time and change one thing in history -- personal or for the world -- where would you go and what would you do?

A: S -- , I don't know. (About 30 seconds passes, wherein Aline, in the background, recommends stopping the Holocaust.) Wait a minute. I would go back to 1932 and take all the records left over in the warehouse of Paramount Records in Port Washington, Wis. I'd take all the records that were there when the company ran out of business. I'd hide them in another warehouse and write that address down. Then I'd go find my father and give the address to him. I'd tell him to keep that address and not to lose it. I'd tell him, "You will have a son named Robert. When he is 25 years old, you will give him this address. Your son will need this and will be very happy." Countless records were thrown away and lost forever in the Depression.

Q: If you could design your tombstone, what would it look like?

A: (Confers first with his wife.) Aline says she wants her ashes burned and placed in an Art Deco vase. My ashes will have to go with hers. On it should read: "We lived for the pretty things." I guess now we'll have to tell Sophie to do that.
R. Crumb's Underground

A collection of more than 150 original drawings, sketchbooks, sculptures, posters and other printed material spanning Robert Crumb's career from 1959 to 2005, will be on display at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts from Saturday through July 1. Opening night party will be 8-11 p.m. Friday at the gallery. 701 Mission St., San Francisco. (415) 978-2787. www.ybca.org.

E-mail Delfin Vigil at dvigil@sfchronicle.com.

This article appeared on page PK - 18 of the San Francisco Chronicle

Animal owners frantic on pet food recall!
Animal owners frantic on pet food recall

By MATTHEW VERRINDER, Associated Press Writer 35 minutes ago

UNION, N.J. - Pet owners were worried Saturday that the pet food in their cupboards could be deadly after millions of containers of dog and cat food sold at major retailers across North America were recalled.

Menu Foods, the Ontario-based company that produced the pet food, said Saturday it was recalling dog food sold under 48 brands and cat food sold under 40 brands including Iams, Nutro and Eukanuba. The food was distributed throughout the United States, Canada and Mexico by major retailers such as Wal-Mart, Kroger and Safeway.

An unknown number of cats and dogs had suffered kidney failure and about 10 died after eating the affected pet food, the company said.

Many stores that sold the affected brands frantically pulled packages off shelves.

At a Petsmart store in Union, Silviene Grzybowski became worried when the four types of Iams products she buys for her cat, Smokey, had vanished from shelves. The cat was very sick and had not been eating for days, she said.

"The vet told us to buy her her favorite food, but I'm going to call the vet right now," Grzybowski said, looking at an announcement Petsmart had taped to shelves announcing the recall.

A complete list of the recalled products along with product codes, descriptions and production dates was available from the Menu Foods Web site, http://www.menufoods.com/recall. The company also designated two phone numbers that pet owners could call for information — (866) 463-6738 and (866) 895-2708 — but callers kept the lines busy for much of Saturday.

Menu Foods' chief executive and president Paul Henderson told the Associated Press on Friday that the company was still trying to figure out what happened.

He said that the company had received an undisclosed number of owner complaints that dogs and cats were vomiting and suffering kidney failure after eating its products. He estimated that the recall would cost the company, which is mostly owned by the Menu Foods Income Fund, an estimated $26 million to $34 million.

Sarah Tuite, a company spokeswoman, has said the recalled products were made using wheat gluten purchased from a new supplier, which has since been dropped for another source. Wheat gluten is a source of protein.

Food and Drug Administration spokeswoman Julie Zawisza said it is still too early to determine what could have affected the food. Zawisa added that even if wheat gluten is the source "it doesn't necessarily mean the wheat gluten per se. It could be another substance associated with the wheat gluten."

The recall covers the company's "cuts and gravy" style food, which consists of chunks of meat in gravy, sold in cans and small foil pouches from Dec. 3 to March 6.

In Omaha, Neb., Susan Balvanz said she sometimes feeds her five cats packets of sliced meat and gravy sold by Nutro Products, one of the brands affected.

"I've done so much research on pet food. It didn't surprise me but it scared me all the same," said Balvanz.

She said her 9-year-old cat, Boots, was especially fond of the food but seemed to have lost its appetite in the last few days.

At the Missouri Valley Veterinary Clinic in Bismarck, N.D., veterinarian Jacob Carlson has been referring worried pet owners to the Menu Foods web site.

"We've had a lot of calls," Carlson said, although none of his patients were sick.

The company said it makes pet food for 17 of the top 20 North American retailers. It is also a contract manufacturer for the top branded pet food companies, including Procter & Gamble Co.

___

Associated Press writers Phyllis Mensing in Bismarck, N.D., and Rebecca Santana in Trenton also contributed to this report.

"An Inconvenient Truth," may impact in Finnish election.
Finland's Greens hope for Gore windfall

By KARL RITTER, Associated Press Writer 2 hours, 45 minutes ago

HELSINKI, Finland - A small environmental party has been showing
Al Gore's global warming documentary all over Finland — where recent mild winters have people worried — in the hope of a record result in Sunday elections.

Prime Minister Matti Vanhanen's Center Party is widely expected to win the election but some polls show the Greens on target to win a record 10 percent. That could give the environmentalists, who have been in earlier governments, a good chance of joining a new coalition.

"This has really helped us a lot," Heidi Hautala, a candidate for the Greens, said of the party's screenings of "An Inconvenient Truth."

The party is hoping to benefit from a growing concern about climate change in the Nordic country of 5.3 million, which has seen warmer winters in recent decades. A survey released Friday showed global warming has overtaken terrorism as the Finns' greatest worry.

The opposition Conservative Party has made strong gains in recent polls, and could replace the left-leaning Social Democrats as Vanhanen's main coalition partner.

A survey released Friday showed Center with 24.7 percent support, while the Social Democrats had fallen to 21.3 percent. The Conservative Party, which managed to win 18.6 percent in the last election, was up to 20.4 percent.

The Greens overtook the ex-communist Left Alliance to become the fourth-biggest party, with 9.7 percent support, according to Taloustutkimus market research, which interviewed 1,995 people on March 13-15 for the survey, which had a margin of error of two percentage points.

"There may be some kind of center-right surprise brewing, and this could have an impact on the formation of the next government, which is of course the most important and critical question," Tuomo Martikainen, political science professor at the University of Helsinki, said of the Greens' apparent popularity.

Finland, home to the world's largest mobile-phone maker,
Nokia Corp., has a booming economy and an extensive welfare state. Its main political parties differ little on substance, with broad agreement on foreign and domestic policies.

In the previous election in 2003, the Center Party narrowly defeated the Social Democrats to take the top spot, and it has maintained its lead in polls. A book by Vanhanen's former girlfriend, exposing details about their love life, has only boosted Vanhanen's popularity, analysts say.

Social Democratic leader Eero Heinaluoma said his party was not despondent over its bad showing in the polls, and would give out 100,000 red roses during weekend campaigning in a bid to win over voters.

"We're going to knock the polls. There's a surprise in store tomorrow," Heinaluoma said in Helsinki.

Some 4.3 million people were eligible to cast ballots in Sunday's vote, which falls on the 100th anniversary of Finland's first elections in 1907.

___

Associated Press Writer Matti Huuhtanen in Helsinki contributed to this report.

The dream of clean, safe, non-fossil burning Power remains alive where no choice is accepted!
Russians plan more nuclear power reactors

Fri Mar 16, 2:55 PM ET

MOSCOW - Government officials said Friday that Russia will build two nuclear reactors annually through 2015, and increase to four a year by 2020 in an effort to sharply increase atomic power generation, according to Russian news agencies.

First Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov, one of two likely contenders to succeed President
Vladimir Putin in next year's election, said Russia should not rely exclusively on dwindling oil, gas and other hydrocarbons.

"The need to diversify our energy balance is obvious," Ivanov was quoted as saying by ITAR-Tass, Interfax and RIA Novosti.

Russia has 31 reactors at 10 nuclear power plants, accounting for 16 percent to 17 percent of its electricity generation. Putin has called for raising the share of nuclear-generated power to at least 25 percent by 2030.

Ivanov said that Russia will launch two 1,000-megawatt nuclear reactors a year under a program for which the government has allocated $26 billion through 2015.

"Nuclear industry must become a backbone of Russia's modern energy sector," Ivanov was quoted as saying.

Sergei Kiriyenko, head of the Federal Nuclear Power Agency, said that starting in 2016, Russia will be building three reactors a year and four annually beginning in 2020, the agencies said.

In recent years, Russia has overcome a public backlash against nuclear power that followed the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, and the government has supported efforts to revive the industry.

An idea easy to ridicule, except for Marlin Brando's image, "piles of little arms," in Apocalypse Now!
FBI: Extremists driving school buses

By LARA JAKES JORDAN, Associated Press Writer 1 hour, 50 minutes ago

WASHINGTON - Suspected members of extremist groups have signed up as school bus drivers in the United States, counterterror officials said Friday, in a cautionary bulletin to police. An
FBI spokesman said, "Parents and children have nothing to fear."

Asked about the alert notice, the FBI's Rich Kolko said, "There are no threats, no plots and no history leading us to believe there is any reason for concern," although law enforcement agencies around the country were asked to watch out for kids' safety.

The bulletin, parts of which were read to The Associated Press, did not say how often foreign extremists have sought to acquire licenses to drive school buses, or where. It was sent Friday as part of what officials said was a routine FBI and
Homeland Security Department advisory to local law enforcement.

It noted "recent suspicious activity" by foreigners who either drive school buses or are licensed to drive them, according to a counterterror official.

Foreigners under recent investigation include "some with ties to extremist groups" who have been able to "purchase buses and acquire licenses," the bulletin says.

But Homeland Security and the FBI "have no information indicating these individuals are involved in a terrorist plot against the homeland," it says. The memo also notes: "Most attempts by foreign nationals in the United States to acquire school bus licenses to drive them are legitimate."

Kolko said the bulletin was sent merely as an educational tool to help local police identify and respond to any suspicious activity.

One counterterror official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue, said the government felt it was likely that the foreigners investigated were merely employed as bus drivers, and did not intend to use them as part of any terror plot.

A second official said the government felt it prudent that the backgrounds of all those who come in contact with school children be checked.

Homeland Security spokesman Russ Knocke said the government has no credible information to suggest terrorists are "involved in buying school buses or seeking licenses to drive them." He said there was no indication of any immediate threat to the country.

___

Associated Press reporters Katherine Shrader and Beverley Lumpkin contributed to this report.

Support nothing less than a Free, completely intact Kurdistan!
PKK open to peace deal with Turkey

By YAHYA BARZANJI, Associated Press Writer Fri Mar 16, 7:37 AM ET

IN THE QANDIL MOUNTAINS, Iraq - Kurdish rebels say they have enough weapons to defend themselves against Turkish raids on their bases in northern
Iraq but remain open to a political settlement with Turkey that recognizes Kurdish national identity.

Turkey is pressing Iraq and its American ally to crack down on rebels of the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, who launch attacks on Turkey from bases in northern Iraq. The group has been waging a bloody war in southeast Turkey since 1984 in a conflict that has claimed 37,000 lives.

The Turks have not ruled out military incursions into Iraq to hunt PKK fighters, despite U.S. fears that such a move could lead to tensions with Iraqi Kurdish groups, important allies of the U.S. in Iraq.

During an interview last week with the a PKK mountain stronghold, a spokesman for the PKK insisted that the rebels have the weapons to resist any Turkish incursion.

"Our fighters are training very hard since we heard the Turkish threats," Rustam Jawdat said. "We have enough fighters to defend ourselves."

He added that the PKK was open to a deal — but on its terms.

"We want to solve the problem with Turkey peacefully. We have simple weapons. If we have guarantees to recognize Kurdish national identity, we would not need to carry weapons," he said.

The interview occurred in a PKK base in the rugged mountains of northern Iraq. Access to the camp was on foot, and the fighters would not allow photographs of the area for security.

Jawdat indicated the rebels are more confident now because they believed Kurdish politicians would put pressure on the United States, and by extension Turkey, to avoid any armed incursion.

"Now the Iraqi Kurdish leaders are against any Turkish interference to the Iraqi territories," Jawdat said. He noted that both Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, and the leader of the Kurdish self-ruled administration in Iraq, Massoud Barzani, had spoken out strongly against any Turkish move into Iraq.

On Thursday, Retired U.S. Air Force Gen. Joseph Ralston, a special envoy tasked with countering the PKK, said in Washington that the U.S. is addressing Turkish complaints about PKK activity and that reducing the PKK threat to Turkey would go a long way toward improving U.S.-Turkish relations.

"As the snows melt in the mountain passes along the Turkish-Iraqi border in several weeks, we will see if the PKK renews its attacks and how the Turkish government chooses to respond," Ralston said.

Jawdat said the PKK was willing to work with the Americans and Europeans to resolve the conflict with Turkey.

"America and the
European Union should know that we will not give up our weapons as long as (the Turks) do not accept our rights and do not recognize our national identity," Jawdat said. "It is impossible to get the right of self-determination in the Middle East without using armed struggle."

Got news for you, ALL US PILOTS ARE HOT DOGS! Exhibit "A," John McCain!
Iraq friendly fire death "criminal": UK coroner

By Peter Graff Fri Mar 16, 2:45 PM ET

LONDON (Reuters) - A British coroner ruled on Friday a U.S. friendly fire air strike that killed a British soldier was "criminal," a scathing verdict in a case that has exposed rifts between the
Iraq allies.

A U.S. A-10 tankbuster attack plane killed Lance Corporal Matty Hull by firing on his vehicle near Basra in the first week of the 2003 invasion, after the American pilots mistook Hull's British convoy for Iraqis.

"The attack on the convoy amounted to an assault. It was unlawful because there was no lawful reason for it and in that respect it was criminal," coroner Andrew Walker said, recording a verdict of "unlawful killing."

He said the planes were not in danger and the incident could not therefore be justified as self-defense.

State Department spokesman Sean McCormack disputed the coroner's findings.

"We certainly would not agree with any conclusion that categorizes this as a criminal act," he told reporters in Washington. "There was a terrible tragedy. There was an unfortunate chain of events that led to the actions that resulted in the death of this individual during a time of war."

Washington has said its own investigation into the incident exonerated the pilots. An earlier British military probe concluded "procedures were not followed" because the planes opened fire without seeking clearance from ground controllers.

The case has been covered extensively in British media, where the issue of friendly fire deaths has been vivid since the first
Gulf War in 1991, when another U.S. A-10 killed nine British soldiers in a mistaken attack.

British commentators have said Hull's death -- and the Pentagon's insistence no one was to blame -- demonstrate that rules for U.S. pilots allow them to be more gung-ho than their British comrades.

Washington does not publish the "rules of engagement" that explain when its forces can fire, but strongly denies they behave irresponsibly.

REMORSE

In a cockpit video, the U.S. pilots are repeatedly told there are no friendly forces in the area. They can be heard convincing themselves that orange panels -- meant to mark the British vehicles as friendly -- were in fact orange Iraqi rocket launchers, before they open fire without seeking permission.

The coroner and Hull's family have repeatedly accused Washington of trying to hide details from the inquest. At one point Walker suspended the inquest when Washington refused to allow him to see the cockpit video.

The inquest resumed after a British newspaper leaked the video, and Washington later said the coroner could see it. But parts of the transcript of the U.S. probe remained blacked out.

Hull's widow said she did not want criminal or disciplinary action to be taken against the American pilots.

"I hope that they are at peace with themselves and they can move on in their lives," Susan Hull told reporters. "I'm sure that they are feeling remorse for what they did."

Britain's Ministry of Defense said in a statement it was carefully considering the coroner's comments and apologized for the "confusion and upset" caused over the handling of the video.

Susan Hull said the lack of cooperation from the United States throughout the trial had been "very disappointing."

No American witnesses gave evidence.

But the video footage -- which was played out on television -- gave a graphic account of the incident. One of the pilots could be heard weeping after they realized what they had done.

"We're in jail, dude," one of them said.

(Additional reporting by Michael Holden, Paul Hughes and Katherine Baldwin)

Why US Commanders cover up such incidents, and how such elitist arrogance can cost us...
Brits rule friendly fire deaths criminal

By THOMAS WAGNER, Associated Press Writer 2 hours, 46 minutes ago

LONDON - A British coroner ruled Friday that an attack by two American pilots that killed a British soldier in
Iraq was a criminal assault, contradicting a U.S. finding that the incident captured in a dramatic cockpit video was a tragic accident.

The finding has no direct legal consequences but the case has stirred tensions between Britain and the United States, which declined to send the pilots to give evidence and repeatedly refused to release the cockpit recording. The recording was eventually leaked to a British newspaper and broadcast across the world.

In the tape, one U.S. pilot says, "We're in jail dude," after realizing his team has killed a member of the coalition forces.

Oxfordshire Assistant Deputy Coroner Andrew Walker did not say whether he would recommend a criminal investigation, and the widow of Lance Cpl. Matty Hull, 25, said she would not pursue criminal charges against the pilots.

Walker said there was no evidence the attack that killed Hull resulted from either self-defense or an honest mistake. He did not offer a detailed explanation of his finding, but said the Idaho Air National Guard pilot who fired the fatal shots acted outside the law by failing to "properly identify the vehicles and seek clearance before opening fire."

"The attack on the convoy amounted to an assault," Walker said. "It was unlawful because there was no lawful reason for it, and in that respect it was criminal."

He criticized the U.S. military for failing to cooperate with his inquiry.

The
Pentagon extended its condolences to Hull's family but the U.S. State Department disputed the finding.

"We would not agree with the characterization of it as a criminal act," said State Department spokesman Sean McCormack.

The cockpit video captured the attack on March 28, 2003, when two U.S. jets made a deadly mistake in assuming that a British convoy was a caravan of rocket-toting insurgents. Hull was killed and four other British soldiers were wounded.

British Staff Cpl. Stuart Matthews, a ground traffic controller, testified ground control never gave permission for the U.S. pilots to fire. The U.S. military has refused to provide the rules of engagement under which the pilots were operating, although it said procedures were followed.

Britain's Ministry of Defense refused to say Friday whether the U.S. pilots violated the separate U.S., British or coalition rules of engagement in place at the time. It also declined to describe those rules.

"The (U.S.) investigation determined that the incident took place in a complex combat environment; the pilots followed applicable procedures and processes for engaging targets, believing they were engaging enemy targets," and "that this was a tragic accident," the U.S. Central Command said in a statement.

The "unlawful killing" ruling is the most serious Walker could have returned.

One of the pilots from the 190th Fighter Squadron of the Idaho Air National Guard spotted orange markers on top of the armored vehicles. The markers are routinely used to visually identify coalition forces, but the pilot said they looked like orange rockets.

A British military inquiry into the attack said the "lack of passage of positional data and target coordinates between the U.S. pilots and their U.S. ground control elements is worrying."

Three days after the attack, one of the wounded soldiers, Lance Corp. Steven Gerrard, said the U.S. pilot who fired at the British convoy circled after his initial attack and fired a second time. Gerrard called the pilot "a cowboy" who had "no regard for human life" and who had "gone out on a jolly."

Hull's widow, Susan, said 11 lines of the report into the incident had been blacked out in a copy supplied to the inquest, and has appealed to
President Bush to release the details of the military investigation.

"I feel we have been badly let down by the Americans," she said, adding that "lessons must be learned from my husband's death."

Walker asked for evidence beside the U.S. rules of engagement, including details of the pilots' training, Hull family lawyer Geraldine McCool said.

None of it had been supplied, she said.

McCool said the widow and her relatives would not seek criminal charges against the American pilots.

Last year, Walker ruled that U.S. forces in Iraq unlawfully killed a British TV journalist, Terry Lloyd, by shooting him in the head as he lay in the back of a makeshift ambulance in the opening days of the war. Walker has asked the attorney general to bring to justice those responsible for the death. The Crown Prosecution Service is considering the case.

It's harder to leave than to get in...
U.S. swamped with passport requests

By ASHLEY M. HEHER, Associated Press Writer 1 hour, 4 minutes ago

CHICAGO - Thirteen-year-old Eli Rogatz applied months ago for a passport so that he could fly to
Israel with his family for his bar mitzvah. It finally came through on Friday, with just days to spare.

"Everybody has a passport except my son, the bar mitzvah boy," Mitch Rogatz, a book publisher from the Chicago suburb of Glencoe, grumbled as he camped out in a federal office building for at least four hours. "Given what else is being spent, we want to make sure he's there."

Similar waiting games are being played out at passport processing sites across the country as the State Department wades through an unprecedented crush of passport applications. They are pouring in at more than 1 million per month.

Passport requests usually shoot up this time of year ahead of the busy spring and summer travel season. But the department has been really swamped since the government in late January started requiring U.S. airline passengers — including children — to show a passport upon their return from Mexico, Canada or the Caribbean.

Passport applications filed between October and March are up 44 percent from the same period a year ago, the department told lawmakers this week. In February alone, applications were up 25 percent.

Because of the glut, it could take 10 weeks instead of the usual six to process routine applications, according to the department. And expedited requests, which cost an extra $60 on top of the normal $97 fee, could take four weeks instead of two.

The State Department said it is working overtime to handle the load and hopes to have an additional 400 passport adjudicators by the end of next year.

That is little solace to travelers like Lisa Purdum, a newlywed from Yardley, Pa., who was told her husband's passport would not arrive until weeks after their planned April 2 honeymoon to Mexico. Worse, her birth certificate, which accompanied her own passport application, was reported missing, she said.

She was one of dozens of people waiting in a line that spilled into the lobby in Philadelphia's regional passport office Friday.

"My husband's is a month behind and mine is missing altogether and our honeymoon is in two weeks, and I'm either losing half my money or all of my money," she said.

People who had not received their passports two weeks before their trips were generally told to go to one of 14 big-city passport offices across the country. There, they were mostly confronted with long lines and no guarantee they would leave with a passport.

Jackie Moore drove overnight from Columbus, Ohio, to Chicago, hoping to pick up a passport for her 8-year-old grandson. The family had a 6 a.m. flight Saturday for a vacation in the Dominican Republic, and the boy was the only one whose passport had not arrived.

"My little grandson is going to be heartbroken if we don't get him on this plane," she said.

The line curled around the block outside the passport office in downtown Miami, where 29-year-old Qandeel Sakrani stood with her husband and their two young daughters, hoping to get a passport so she could travel to Pakistan next month.

"I haven't seen my parents in 18 months, and I haven't seen the rest of my family for five years," she said.

Lawndale, Calif., accountant Emilia Moreno sent in an application to renew her passport four weeks ago, only to discover there were no records it ever got there. The 48-year-old woman spent most of the week fighting for an appointment with the passport agency in Los Angeles so she would be able to travel to Italy and France for vacation on Wednesday.

"My employer already told me she's going to buy me a pizza, for me to think that I'm in Italy," she said.

For others, it may already be too late.

Judith Jones was supposed to fly to Jamaica on Friday for a vacation with friends. Instead, she spent a second day in line in Chicago, trying to track down her passport.

"It's supposed to be a girls' trip. The girls are there, but I'm not yet," said the 41-year-old from Griffith, Ind.

About 12 million passport applications were processed in 2006, and as many as 17 million are expected this year, according to the State Department said. Some 74 million Americans have valid passports.

___

Associated Press Writers Ron Todt in Philadelphia, Laura Wides-Munoz in Miami and Solvej Schou in Los Angeles contributed to this story.