Daily Headlines

Healthcare reform is top U.S. priority, says Sebelius

Reuters

By Matthew Bigg

ATLANTA (Reuters) – Healthcare reform is the top priority for the U.S. government this year, and the momentum is there to achieve it, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said on Tuesday.

Sebelius said there was "unprecedented" bipartisan cooperation to speed through reforms this year.

"In the Senate, Democrats have been working closely together and with their Republican counterparts. Key chairmen have committed to passing reform legislation out of their respective committees in June," Sebelius said.

"And, just last week, Congress passed a budget blueprint that includes an historic commitment to funding comprehensive health care reform," Sebelius told the Council on Foundations. in her first public address since being confirmed a week ago as President Barack Obama's health and human services secretary.

"At the same time, the old opponents of reform have joined our effort to change the status quo. Groups and organizations that were once fierce enemies have come to the table and embraced the call for real health care reform."

Most sides agreed that the U.S. healthcare system must be fixed, she said. "It is our single biggest challenge facing this country, facing this economy and it is our president's number one priority," Sebelius said.

"This is not political and it is not optional. Inaction threatens our health and our economic security," she said.

"Approximately 30 cents of every health care dollar are spent on billing, overhead and administration. Spending on the uninsured and the health care bureaucracy takes up nearly one half of every health care dollar and results in a system where we all pay more and get worse results. "

Sebelius said reform would have to include the following elements:

* Choice in providers and doctors. "No American should be forced to give up the doctor they trust or the health plan they like," Sebelius said.

* A cost-cutting element and quality drive

* Reform of the health delivery system

* A slowdown in the growth of costs of health care for businesses and government, which is driving the budget deficit

* Affordable, quality health coverage for all Americans so that people do not lose their health care if they lose their jobs

(Editing by Maggie Fox and David Storey)

Obama administration seeks $63B for world health

Associated Press

By PHILIP ELLIOTT, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON – The Obama administration wants the United States to spend $63 billion over the next six years to fight global diseases and provide more aid for prenatal and postnatal care, children's health and fighting tropical diseases.

"We cannot fix every problem," Obama said in a written statement Tuesday. "But we have a responsibility to protect the health of our people, while saving lives, reducing suffering, and supporting the health and dignity of people everywhere. America can make a significant difference in meeting these challenges and that is why my administration is committed to act."

The initiative, announced by Deputy Secretary of State Jack Lew, continues an effort begun under President George W. Bush to fight HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.

Lew called it "an extraordinary step to save the lives of men, women and children" and said it links U.S. national security policy with carrying out a moral obligation to help the world's poorest and most threatened populations.

"Our announcement today exemplifies a strategy we're bringing to bear across our foreign aid programs, even as we address crises in regions with conflict, we need to make the investments necessary to prevent such crises from occurring in the future," he said. "We are ramping up efforts to fight poverty, food insecurity and disease with solutions that will leave behind the tools to sustain long-term progress."

The Bush administration pushed for funding to improve health in the world's poorest places, arguing that some of those places could otherwise be breeding grounds for terrorism and anti-American sentiment. By helping those populations, Washington hoped to improve the United States' image and security.

Lew praised the Bush-era policies, known in part as the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief or PEPFAR.

"When we talk about development and diplomacy, we mean the United States needs to be affirmatively active dealing with some of the root causes of instability in so many poor countries," Lew said. "If people can't provide for the basic needs of their family ... it's a dangerous situation."

Obama plans to release his budget proposal in detail on Thursday. Ahead of the formal announcement, the White House has been detailing pieces of it, including $8.6 billion for the fiscal year that starts Oct. 1. The request is a $460 million increase over this year's budget.

If Obama wins approval of his budget request, the U.S. commitment would constitute more than 70 percent of global health funding.

Last year, Congress passed and Bush signed legislation to triple U.S. spending from $15 billion over the previous five years to $48 billion covering 2009 and the next four years.

Lew said the "challenge now is to take the things we've learned ... and build on it."

(This version CORRECTS that $63 billion is spread over six years, not in FY2010 budget.)

US's Holbrooke: Pakistan not a failed state

Associated Press

By MATTHEW LEE, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON – Pakistan is not a failed state but its government is facing tremendous challenges and needs U.S. help to counter Taliban advances, the Obama administration's point man for the region said Tuesday.

Richard Holbrooke, the U.S. special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, told a congressional committee that Pakistan's survival as a moderate, democratic state is critical to U.S. national security.

"Our most vital national security interests are at stake," Holbrooke told the House Foreign Affairs Committee. He said that although Pakistan "is a state under enormous social, political and economic pressures," it "is not a failed state."

Holbrooke was testifying ahead of meetings this week between President Barack Obama and the leaders of Afghanistan and Pakistan during which the administration will press the Pakistanis on combatting extremists.

Congress is considering a major boost in nonmilitary assistance to Pakistan — $1.5 billion per year over five years — and Holbrooke said success there is key to America's escalating military operation in Afghanistan.

"We need to put the most heavy possible pressure on our friends in Pakistan to join us in the fight against the Taliban and its allies," he said. "We cannot succeed in Afghanistan without Pakistan's support and involvement."

Speaking separately at a Washington think tank, Afghan President Hamid Karzai made a similar point. He said the key to the Taliban's resurgence in recent years is its havens across the border in Pakistan.

"The return of the Taliban is because we did not address the question of sanctuaries in time," Karzai said during a question-and-answer session with an audience of policy experts at the Brookings Institution.

Holbrooke played down suggestions that the administration is backing away from Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari in favor of opposition leader Nawaz Sharif. He praised Zardari for taking politically difficult stands by trying to work with Washington.

"We have not distanced ourselves from President Zardari," he said. "We have the highest strategic interests in supporting this government."

He compared U.S. relations with Sharif to contacts that American officials have with opposition leaders in other countries.

Several lawmakers questioned Holbrooke on Zardari's ability to control his country, with Rep. Gary Ackerman, D-N.Y., saying "Pakistan's pants are on fire." Holbrooke urged Ackerman and others to speak with Zardari about their concerns while he is in Washington.

Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton will hold two sets of meetings on Wednesday with Zardari and Karzai. Holbrooke said the talks, which will continue at a lower level on Thursday, will be historically important.

Clinton will meet with Zardari and Karzai and their delegations separately at the State Department before bringing them together there. Later, at the White House, Obama will follow the same pattern in talks with the two leaders, according to Holbrooke.

In the meetings, the administration will be seeking assurances that Pakistan's nuclear arsenal is safe and that its military intends to face down Taliban and al-Qaida extremists in coordination with Afghanistan and the United States.

Holbrooke declined to address the nuclear issue in open testimony, but other officials have said that while they believe Pakistan's nuclear weapons are secure for the moment, there is acute concern that militants might try to seize one or several of them.

Those anxieties have heightened amid the Taliban's recent advances and Americans worry about the commitment from Pakistan's government and military in battling the extremists, the officials said.

U.S. officials have also expressed concern that Pakistan's military and civilian leaders still regard traditional rival India as the greatest threat to their country and do not appreciate the dangers of rising Taliban and al-Qaida influence in their backyard.

"There is a real and present danger to Pakistan's survival but it comes from inside and not outside the country," Holbrooke said.

Barack Obama hints at tougher line on Israel

The Times of London

May 5, 2009

Tom Baldwin, Washington

The Obama Administration has signalled a tougher approach towards Israel ahead of fresh talks on the Middle East peace process by insisting it must endorse the creation of an independent Palestinian state.

“Israel has to work toward a two-state solution,” declared Vice-President Joe Biden today in a speech to the annual conference of a powerful pro-Israel lobby group in Washington.

“You’re not going to like my saying this,” he warned the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (Aipac) before adding that the Jewish state should not build any more settlements on Palestinian territory, and should “dismantle existing outposts and allow Palestinians freedom of movement”.

President Obama later held a White House meeting with Shimon Peres, his Israeli counterpart, who holds a largely ceremonial position. But the US Administration’s message appeared to be addressed to the new right-wing Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, who is due to visit the White House on May 18.
Mr Netanyahu has dismayed American, Arab and European officials by pointedly refusing to back Palestinian statehood since taking office on March 31. In his own speech to Aipac, sent via satellite link, he said: “We are prepared to resume peace negotiations without any delay and without any preconditions — the sooner the better.” Saeb Erekat, the senior Palestinian negotiator, however, criticised Mr Netanyahu’s speech for its “vagueness” on core issues such as the status of Jerusalem and refugees, as well as its failure to commit to a two-state solution.

Aipac has demonstrated that it — and Israel — still exercise considerable muscle in Washington by persuading the US Justice Department last week to abandon the prosecution of two former employees on charges that they spied on America for Israel.

Aipac’s 6,000 delegates are being urged to bombard Capitol Hill with demands that Congress support ever more draconian sanctions against Iran whose Government has threatened to wipe Israel off the face of the map.

Mr Biden used his speech to reiterate that the US would never abandon its commitment to Israel’s security and that “nothing is off the table” with Iran — a phrase often used to imply that military action against uranium enrichment facilities remains possible.

He added that Israel had the right “to make its own judgment about what it needs to do to defend itself”, which many members of the audience saw as a hint that the US might allow it to deliver an airstrike against Iran’s nuclear sites.

Rahm Emanuel, the White House Chief of Staff, was, however, reported to have linked efforts to thwart Iran’s nuclear programme — “the number one threat in the Middle East” — with progress in the peace process.

He told a private meeting of Aipac donors that the task of building an international coalition against Tehran will be made easier if Israel and the Palestinians hold a constructive dialogue.

Last month, Hillary Clinton, the US Secretary of State, warned Israel that it risks losing Arab support for combating threats from Iran if it rejects peace negotiations with the Palestinians.

General James Jones, Mr Obama’s National Security Adviser, is also said to have told a European foreign minister that — unlike the Bush Administration — the White House was now ready to be “forceful” with Israel.

“The new Administration will convince Israel to compromise on the Palestinian question,” General Jones was reported to have written in a confidential telegramme. “We will not push Israel under the wheels of a bus, but we will be more forceful toward Israel than we have been under Bush.” General Jones is due to travel to London next week for talks with British officials and Mr Netanyahu’s security adviser, Uzi Arad.

President Ahmadinejad of Iran was today meeting the heads of ten hard-line Palestinian groups — including Hamas — on a visit to Syria, sending what one of the leaders said would be a message to the new right-wing Israeli Government.

The Iranian leader arrived in the afternoon and went to the People’s Palace in Damascus, where he was given a red-carpet welcome by President Assad followed by a closed-door meeting.

Thousands Flee Pakistan's Swat Valley

Wall Street Journal

By ZAHID HUSSAIN

ISLAMABAD -- Thousands of panicked residents on foot and crammed in buses, vans and trucks fled Swat valley north of Pakistan's capital Tuesday following the breakdown of a fragile truce between government forces and the Taliban.

Authorities lifted a curfew for a few hours to allow residents to evacuate as the militants took control of Mingora, the main town of the valley, which lies about 100 miles from Islamabad. Mian Iftikhar Hussain, the information minister for North West Frontier Province, which includes Swat, said he expects as many as 500,000 to flee in the near future.

Khushal Khan, head of the local administration, urged residents to leave their homes before evening as fighting between the army and militants broke out once again. Pakistan's military has been fighting the Taliban in Swat after each side accused the other of failing to honor the terms of a peace accord struck in February to end the conflict in Swat in return for the imposition of Sharia law.

Tuesday's exodus worsened a humanitarian problem stemming from the displacement of more than half a million people from Pakistan's lawless tribal region near the Afghan border and in parts of North West Frontier Province where security forces have been check the militants' efforts to expand their influence.

Taliban fighters patrolled the streets and some others took positions on the roof tops of the hotels and other buildings in Mingora, which has a population of more than 300,000. Residents said the insurgents attacked a police station where some troops were also based. Mr. Khan said the Taliban also planted mines.

Military officials said 8,000 to 10,000 troops were ready to launch an offensive against the militants since they have refused to give up their arms -- a requisite of the peace accord.

As the tension mounted in Swat, a suicide bomber rammed his explosive-laden vehicle into a paramilitary Jeep Tuesday, in Bara outside Peshawar, the capital of North West Frontier Province. The blast killed five people and wounded several others, including schoolchildren waiting for a school van.

Many refugees from Swat and neighboring districts are living in crowded camps set up by the government in various parts of North West Frontier Province. The camps lack even basic facilities. There are thousands of women and children living without shelter. Others are living with relatives or have made their way to Karachi and Islamabad to search for work.

"We don't know when we can return home," said Bakht Rawan, a school teacher who fled his home with his wife and five children last week.

Mr. Hussain, the provincial information minister, said his government has no resources to deal with such a massive refugee problem. He called upon the federal government and the international community to help. "We have not received any funds from the federal government so far," he told reporters in Peshawar.

Fears of a deadly outbreak abate as swine flu virus gains foothold

Boston Globe

Officials temper stance on illness

By Stephen Smith
Globe Staff / May 5, 2009

When a novel flu virus emerged from a dusty Mexican village, disease investigators feared a global killer was on the loose: Two weekends ago, adults and children were falling ill by the hundreds in Mexico City, and reports of more than 100 deaths drew parallels to the lethal flu pandemic of 1918.

By yesterday, those worries had diminished somewhat. Swine flu, in a matter of days, had hopscotched the globe, racing in the era of jet travel from Mexico, through the United States, Europe, and all the way to China. But the virus has resulted in only a single death outside the outbreak's epicenter.

Instead, the strain known as H1N1 has spawned symptoms akin to the seasonal flu that strikes each winter. That was evident in new findings released last night by Governor Deval Patrick and his top health adminis trators at a State House press briefing.

They reported that the state now has 34 confirmed cases of the disease, up from six at the end of last week. People across the state have been stricken, but only three fell so ill that they needed to be hospitalized, and all have recovered.

"This is a cause for concern, but not for panic," Patrick said. "Flu always spreads." But, the governor quickly added, an ordinary flu season generates many more cases than the number of H1N1 illnesses reported so far.

And so, less than two weeks after disease detectives first identified the new virus, officials from Boston to Atlanta to Geneva began to ever so subtly modify their message about swine flu: Yes, it's something that needs to be watched closely. But the worst - at least right now - might not happen.

"While we're not out of the woods yet," said Dr. Richard Besser, acting director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, "we are seeing a lot of encouraging signs."

He counted among them the impending return of vibrancy to the streets of Mexico City, where the threat from the virus appears to have abated. Restaurants, bars, and churches will welcome revelers and worshipers once more later this week. And workers there are expected to return to their jobs in office towers and factories.

In the United States, federal health authorities are reconsidering their recommendation that schools stay shuttered for at least a week when a case of swine flu is confirmed. Mainly, it reflects what was apparent by yesterday: The virus has gained a foothold in most of the country and is being transmitted in the community, so closing schools does little to stem the spread.

But the reconsideration of the policy is also a tacit acknowledgement that the symptoms being caused by the germ - fever, coughing, headache, muscle pains - although miserable rarely result in life-threatening complications.

"Our approach, as I've said, has been very aggressive. You may only get one chance to get out in front of a new infectious disease, and so, that's what we've been doing all along," Besser said. "But as we've gathered more information, we're continually evaluating our guidance."

When disease trackers first spotted the virus, they knew this much: Most people's immune systems would not be able to put up much of a fight. That, and the deaths reported in Mexico, explained why they were so alarmed.

But even if the swine strain winds up being no more serious than an ordinary flu season - and there's still no guarantee of that - the consequences could still be substantial. The course of a flu outbreak is notoriously difficult to predict, and some specialists caution that swine flu could mutate and reemerge next winter in a more dangerous form.

"You have a virus that most people have no natural immunity to, it can spread to a lot of people quickly, and so the name of the game now is to slow transmission," said Dr. David Ozonoff, a Boston University School of Public Health disease specialist.

Much about the swine flu outbreak remains unexplained - and intriguing to the specialists tracking it. The tally of deaths attributed to swine flu in Mexico topped 150, for example, but has shrunk considerably as confirmatory testing has proceeded, to 25 now.

"The information simply came out very quickly and maybe they didn't have the opportunity to do the epidemiological studies that allow the best data to come out," said Dr. JudyAnn Bigby, the Massachusetts secretary of health and human services.

In the United States, the disease has disproportionately struck the young, with children and young adults accounting for 22 of the 36 cases reported in Massachusetts. That may shed light on why complications have been few: Flu generally proves most damaging to the old and to patients whose ability to fight diseases is impaired.

The large increase in Massachusetts cases reported yesterday in part reflects a backlog in testing that is being addressed now that the state lab in Jamaica Plain can perform the sophisticated analysis to identify the swine flu.

At least one of the new confirmed cases was a Harvard dental student. A cluster of as many as nine cases at the Longwood-area school led to the suspension of classes late last week at the adjacent dental and medical schools. Harvard announced medical school classes would resume today, but remain suspended at the dental school.

At last night's news conference, the state's chief epidemiologist, Dr. Alfred DeMaria, said there is reason to believe that the H1N1 virus may be spreading less aggressively than some seasonal flu strains. A reporter asked whether that made him less afraid.

"Influenza," he said, "always scares me."

Stephen Smith can be reached at stsmith@globe.com.
© Copyright 2009 Globe Newspaper Company.

Pakistan, US in talks on nuclear security

Boston Globe

By Bryan Bender
Globe Staff / May 5, 2009

WASHINGTON - US and Pakistani officials have begun behind-the-scenes talks aimed at achieving a greater US role in securing Pakistan's nuclear materials, including a proposal to ship some highly enriched uranium to the United States for disposal, according to two administration officials with direct knowledge of the discussions.

If successful, the talks between nonproliferation specialists at the State and Energy departments and their Pakistani counterparts would mark a breakthrough in efforts to persuade Pakistan to accept greater assistance in preventing terrorists from obtaining nuclear fuel or the technology to build a nuclear weapon.

"The Pakistanis take this very seriously," said a senior US official involved in the talks who asked not to be identified discussing the sensitive negotiations. "Pakistan faces some unique challenges."

The government of Pakistan, which is believed to have as many as 100 nuclear bombs, has been highly secretive about its nuclear activities for fear that the United States might try to destroy its arsenal or that its archenemy, nuclear-armed India, might launch a first strike. But the growing threat to the Pakistani government from the Taliban - and its allies in the Al Qaeda terrorist network - has given Pakistani leaders a new reason to cooperate with the United States, according to the officials.

"We believe the command and control of the nuclear arsenal is a primary concern of the Pakistanis," said the US official. The United States now provides some basic assistance to Pakistan in nuclear security. Measures include training Pakistani officials on export control and providing detection equipment for its seaports, airports, and border crossings to help thwart nuclear smuggling.

However, the new measures under consideration would for the first time give the United States access to some of Pakistan's nuclear ingredients, though not the actual weapons, which are reportedly stored unassembled under the control of a 10,000-member security force headed by a two-star general.

Two of the key proposals under discussion are a joint program to secure or destroy radioactive materials that could be used to make a crude nuclear device, and shipment to the United States of some of the highly enriched uranium fuel used in Pakistani civilian power plants. The enriched fuel is believed to be sought by terrorists as possible material for a weapon of mass destruction, the officials said.

Pakistan's embassy did not respond to several requests for comment.

Top officials in both countries continue to express public confidence that Pakistan's nuclear materials are safe from theft. President Obama, who is scheduled to meet with Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari in Washington tomorrow, told a news conference last week that "we can make sure that Pakistan's nuclear arsenal is secure because the Pakistani Army, I think, recognizes the hazards of those weapons falling into the wrong hands."

Navy Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told Pentagon reporters yesterday that he, too, is "comfortable" that the nuclear weapons cannot be stolen. "I don't think that's going to happen," said Mullen, who visited Pakistan last week. "I don't see that in any way imminent whatsoever at this particular point in time."

Yet many nuclear specialists both inside and outside the US government expressed worry that such expressions of confidence do not reflect the full extent of Pakistan's nuclear vulnerability - which, they say, goes far beyond the weapons themselves.

In addition to its arsenal, Pakistan has a vast network of nuclear facilities, equipment, and scientists - the extent of which the United States and its allies know very little. Any of those elements could be pilfered by terrorists or their sympathizers inside the Pakistani government or military, the international nuclear specialists said.

They point to the fact that A.Q. Khan, the builder of Pakistan's nuclear bomb, oversaw a black market that sold nuclear materials and know-how to a variety of international customers, including Iran and North Korea, for years before the scheme was revealed by the CIA in 2004.

"What other society has leaked nuclear secrets like Pakistan?" asked David Albright, a former United Nations weapons inspector who is now president of the Institute for Science and International Security in Washington, citing the documented evidence that classified bomb designs and centrifuges to enrich uranium into a bomb-making grade were sold to a variety of sources. "Why do people just sit there and say everything is fine?"

Others have raised similar alarms. The Congressional Research Service, an arm of Congress, issued a report last month that stated, "While nuclear weapons are currently under firm control, with warheads disassembled, technology could be sold off by insiders during a worsened crisis."

US officials hope to persuade the Pakistani government in the coming months that the importance given to the security of the weapons themselves must be extended to other parts of its nuclear industry, according to the officials. The US government official involved in the talks stressed, however, that there are legal restrictions on how far the United States can go in providing assistance. Because Pakistan is not a signatory of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, the US government is limited in how much assistance it can provide to Pakistan on nuclear matters.

Yet specialists said that if Pakistan's government were willing to accept more help, the United States could - and should - find ways to overcome those restrictions.

Bernard Finel, a senior fellow at the American Security Project, a Washington think tank, said enhancing nuclear-security cooperation "would be a really valuable place for us to spend a lot of diplomatic energy."

"The worst-case scenarios in Pakistan are worse than anywhere else," he added.

Bender can be reached at bender@globe.com.

© Copyright 2009 Globe Newspaper Company.

U.S. fears violence ahead of Kurdistan regional elections

McLatchy Newspapers

By Corinne Reilly and Laith Hammoudi | McClatchy Newspapers

BAGHDAD — Iraq's semi-autonomous northern region of Kurdistan will hold parliamentary elections on July 25, officials said Tuesday.

Tensions between the Kurdish regional government and Iraq's central government in Baghdad have been rising, and U.S. officials have said they fear the disputes could escalate into armed conflict.

None of Iraq's three mostly Kurdish provinces held elections in January, when the rest of Iraq chose new provincial councils, and the July elections could help further the Kurds' efforts to control their northern territory and the revenues from Iraq's northern oil fields.

Roughly 2.5 million people are eligible to vote in the elections, though registration is ongoing, said Musab al Mudaras, a spokesman for Iraq's Independent High Electoral Commission.

Voters won't vote for individual candidates, Mudaras said. Instead, they'll choose from the 42 political parties that have registered to run. Winning parties will decide whom to name to the regional parliament's 111 seats after the election results are announced.

For decades, two parties have dominated Kurdistan's politics: the Kurdistan Democratic Party, led by Kurdish President Massoud Barzani, and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, headed by Iraqi President Jalal Talabani.

Recently, some Kurds have begun demanding a shift from the two-party system, and many expect new challengers to take seats this year.

"We're afraid this election will witness violence and clashes between those competing for power," said Sardashat Aziz, a 24-year-old schoolteacher from the Kurdish city of Sulaymaniyah. "The electoral map is different this time . . . (The KDP and the PUK) aren't ready to give up their authority."

Local and international observers will be invited to ensure that the balloting is carried out fairly and without fraud, Mudaras said.

Regional parliament members serve four-year terms and are slated to choose a new Kurdish president soon after they take office.

The last time Kurdistan voters went to the polls was in 2005, and Kurdish parliamentary elections were initially scheduled for this month but were delayed after officials said they needed more time to prepare.

Kurdistan has remained fairly peaceful for the past six years, though separatist rebels in the region's northern mountains routinely fight with Turkey and Iran. In recent days, Iran has launched air strikes into northern Kurdish villages where rebels from the Kurdistan Workers' Party live and train.

(Reilly reports for the Merced Sun-Star. Hammoudi is a McClatchy special correspondent. McClatchy special correspondent Yaseen Taha contributed to this article from Kurdistan.)

Pakistani army flattening villages as it battles Taliban

McLatchy Newspapers

By Saeed Shah | McClatchy Newspapers

CHINGLAI, Pakistan — The Pakistani army's assault against Islamic militants in Buner, in northwest Pakistan, is flattening villages, killing civilians and sending thousands of farmers and villagers fleeing from their homes, residents escaping the fighting said Monday.

"We didn't see any Taliban; they are up in the mountains, yet the army flattens our villages," Zaroon Mohammad, 45, told McClatchy as he walked with about a dozen scrawny cattle and the male members of his family in the relative safety of Chinglai village in southern Buner. "Our house has been badly damaged. These cows are now our total possessions."

Mohammad's and other residents' accounts of the fighting contradict those from the Pakistani military and suggest that the government of President Asif Ali Zardari is rapidly losing the support of those it had set out to protect.

The heavy-handed tactics are ringing alarm bells in Washington, where the Obama administration is struggling to devise a strategy to halt the militants' advances. Officials Monday talked about the need to train the Pakistani military, which has long been fixated on fighting armored battles with India, in counterinsurgency warfare, but it may be too late for that.

Navy Adm. Michael Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters Monday that the Pakistani army in recent years has undertaken "bursts of fighting and engagement" fighting insurgents, but that its operations were "not sustained" by follow-up measures.

The army is now using force, but it also must hold and rebuild the area it conquers, he said. "There's a military piece" to the operation, he said, "but there also needs to be a hold and build aspect of it."

Another U.S. official, who closely tracks Pakistan developments, said the Pakistan army is "just destroying stuff. They have zero ability to deliver (aid) services."

"They hold villages completely accountable for the actions of a few, and that kind of operation produces a lot of (internally displaced persons) and a lot of angst," said a senior defense official. The officials spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.

In Buner, the Pakistani military appears to be losing public support in a stridently anti-Taliban district whose residents had raised their own militia to defend themselves against the militants, who last month seized control of the district about 60 miles from Islamabad, the capital.

Mohammad, who'd walked for two days with his cattle to escape the offensive against the Taliban, and other farmers accused the military of using poorly directed artillery and air power to pound civilian areas.

"They shouldn't use the army in this (indiscriminate) way. They should be targeted at the Taliban," said Saed Afsar Khan, who was leaving Buner with 18 members of his family and two cows. He estimated that the army had destroyed 80 of the 400 houses in his village of Kawga, near the key battlefield of Ambela.

"I don't think they've killed even one Taliban," he said. "Only ordinary people."

As the fighting raged in Buner, a bigger battle appears likely to erupt in neighboring Swat. Late Monday, fierce gun battles broke out between the army and Taliban in the streets of Mingora, the district's main town, and a controversial three-month-old peace deal between the government and the Taliban in Swat is disintegrating.

The Taliban were reported to have surrounded 46 police officers at the local electrical grid station. Earlier in the day, they ambushed a military convoy in Swat, killing one soldier and wounding two others.

The Pakistani army waited some 25 days after the Taliban stormed into Buner from Swat before launching their response, which television pictures show involves tanks and helicopter gunships.

"Why did they not nip the evil in the bud? This is criminal negligence," said Sahibzada, a college teacher, who goes by one name, in Palodand village, just south of Buner, where he helps organize relief to those fleeing from the fighting.

"They have caused huge financial losses for those who've been forced to flee and caused hatred among those people for their government."

Locals said that a key grievance was an order given by the government commissioner for the Malakand area, which includes Buner, to disband the anti-Taliban militia soon after the insurgents entered Buner.

The delay in moving the armed forces against the extremists in Buner may have allowed them to entrench themselves and mass sufficient weapons and men to put up stiff resistance. The Taliban have managed to take hostage some 2,000 villagers in the Pir Baba area in the north of Buner, the army confirmed Monday.

The Pakistan army wouldn't confirm civilian casualties or damage to civilian villages.

"There are no reports I have of any civilian casualties," said Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas, the army's chief spokesman. "Or any collateral damage. We have made maximum efforts to avoid it."

One reason why civilian casualties are likely is that government officials gave no instructions to ordinary people about how to leave the district, and many were confused about the timing of the curfew, those fleeing said. A cause of further frustration was that little or no preparation was made to accommodate those who'd inevitably be displaced by the fighting.

In southern Buner, in the Khudokhel area, on the road out to the nearest town of Swabi, there was no sign of any government-sponsored relief effort. Residents of villages along the road turned out instead, offering food and drink to weary travelers, and help with transportation onward. Those with spare rooms or buildings offered them to the displaced. Villagers in Chinglai, about an hour's drive into Buner from Swabi, are housing 20 families.

There are no reliable figures so far for how many people have fled Buner. Evacuees describe the district, which had a population of some 500,000, as having practically been emptied.

According to the al Khidmat Foundation, an Islamic charity, more than 150,000 people have taken the road south to Swabi alone. The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, the refugee arm of the United Nations, has registered around 18,000 people, but counting is tricky because almost none of the displaced have gone into the camps that are being set up for them outside Buner.

(Shah is a McClatchy special correspondent. Jonathan S. Landay and Nancy A. Youssef contributed to this article.)

Obama boosts product safety panel, names new chief

Los Angeles Times

The president nominates Inez Moore Tenenbaum, a former superintendent of education, to lead the Consumer Product Safety Commission. He also expands the panel and seeks $107 million more for its work.

By Mark Silva
7:45 AM PDT, May 5, 2009

Reporting from Washington -- In naming a new chairman for the Consumer Product Safety Commission today, expanding the size of the commission and boosting its budget, President Barack Obama said protecting consumers will be "a top priority" of his administration.

The president has nominated Inez Moore Tenenbaum, a former South Carolina superintendent of education, to serve as chairman of the commission. And he has named Robert Adler, a law professor at the University of North Carolina, to fill one of two new seats being added to the three-member commission.

The $107-million budget increase that the president is seeking for the commission represents a 71% boost in the agency's funding since 2007, according to the White House, calling this a major step toward meeting Obama's campaign commitment to double the funding for an agency criticized for lax regulation and coziness with industry.

"It is a top priority of my administration to ensure that the products the American people depend on are safe," Obama said today, in a statement issued by the White House.

"We must do more to protect the American public -- especially our nation's children -- from being harmed by unsafe products," Obama said, voicing confidence that "this new leadership . . . will revitalize the agency and achieve the high standard of product safety that the American people deserve."

While expanding the commission from three members to five, the president is seeking an additional $107 million from Congress as part of the $3.55-trillion federal budget that he proposes for the 2010 fiscal year starting in October. The president, who delivered only an outline of that budget in February, plans to deliver the details to Congress on Thursday.

The Consumer Product Safety Commission tests a wide range of products -- toys and cribs and strollers as well as toasters and all-terrain vehicles. The agency has been criticized for lax enforcement, allowing unsafe cribs, toys and other products to be sold, as investigations by the Chicago Tribune have revealed.

The CPSC, with about 430 employees, oversees about 15,000 products.

For more than 15 years, the White House says, the agency has operated with three commissioners. In expanding it to five, the White House calls this "tangible evidence of President Obama's commitment" to "revitalize" the agency.

Tenenbaum, once confirmed by the Senate, will replace Nancy Nord, who has become a target of criticism among Democrats in Congress and consumer advocates.

Nord, a former Eastman Kodak lobbyist appointed by former President George W. Bush, accepted at least three trips worth thousands of dollars from industry sources purportedly to share information about the CPSC and discuss toy safety. She has defended the trips as legal.

Tenenbaum, a lawyer who ran for the Senate in 2004, served two terms as the elected South Carolina education superintendent.

Tenenbaum was elected in 1998 and finished her second term in 2007. She had sought the Senate seat of retiring Democrat Fritz Hollings in 2004.

A lawyer, she had practiced health, environmental and public-interest law with the firm Sinkler & Boyd and had been director of research for the Medical, Military, Public and Municipal Affairs Committee of the South Carolina House of Representatives.

Adler is a professor of legal studies at the University of North Carolina law school and law and ethics at the Kenan-Flagler Business School.

He has served as the associate dean of the MBA program and as associate dean for the school's undergraduate business administration program. He served as counsel on the Energy and Commerce Committee, with work in consumer safety, under the chairmanship of Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.)

The nominations are subject to Senate confirmation.

mdsilva@tribune.com

Human Rights Activists Troubled by Administration's Approach

Washington Post

By Glenn Kessler and Michael D. Shear
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, May 5, 2009

The Obama administration has backed away from overt expressions of support for human rights and democracy in favor of a more subtle approach, worrying advocates who say that the issues are being given short shrift as President Obama seeks to rebuild relations with allies and reach out to adversaries.

Although Obama moved quickly to announce the closure of the detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, drawing praise from human rights activists, many say other actions by the administration have been troubling. Administration officials have suggested that sanctions against human rights pariahs Burma and Sudan could be eased, that concerns over China's treatment of Tibetans and dissidents should take a back seat to issues such as climate change, and that the United States might once again grant Egypt's autocratic government veto power over the disbursement of U.S. funds to nongovernmental groups.

"They need to be careful here that they don't set a pattern they will regret later on," said Jennifer Windsor, a former Clinton administration official who is executive director of Freedom House, a group that supports democracy activists. "There are some good people in the administration, but the instinct of abandoning everything President Bush has stood for has done a disservice."

Administration officials acknowledge they have approached the issue of human rights differently but deny that there has been a reduction in commitment. Instead, they say, they are first seeking to restore U.S. credibility on the issue by acknowledging U.S. failings and then pushing for progress on human rights and democracy.

In a speech last month in Istanbul, for instance, Obama noted his decision on Guantanamo and the fact that until recently the United States "made it hard for somebody who looks like me to vote." Then he urged Turkish authorities to bolster the rule of law and reopen a Greek Orthodox seminary, a step that U.S. officials say would ease religious animosity.

Former President George W. Bush made promoting "freedom" and "ending tyranny" around the globe one of the central themes of his administration. But, in the view of Obama advisers, Bush undermined that effort with an often-strident tone and an inconsistent application.

Human rights advocates now fear the pendulum may be swinging too far the other way, with the criticism of Obama from the right particularly intense.

"The most striking thing about the first steps in foreign policy of this administration is its sharp turning of its back on the issues of human rights and democracy and the victims of the abuse of human rights and the absence of democracy," said Joshua Muravchik, whose 1991 book, "Exporting Democracy," helped form the basis of the neoconservative policies of the past eight years.

Muravchik and others say Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton have gone out of their way to play down concerns about human rights and democratic movements in favor of an approach to other countries and their leaders that emphasizes cooperation on issues such as containing Iran's nuclear ambitions.

Just before visiting Beijing in February on her first trip overseas, Clinton said that pressing China on human rights "can't interfere with the global economic crisis, the global climate change crisis and the security crisis." Then, while traveling in the Middle East in March, Clinton appeared to play down human rights issues in Egypt and Turkey that had been raised in recent State Department reports. Clinton later tried to repair the damage by declaring that "a mutual and collective commitment to human rights is [as] important to bettering our world as our efforts on security, global economics, energy, climate change and other pressing issues."

Lorne W. Craner, a former assistant secretary of state for human rights under Bush, said he thinks Obama and Clinton had strong records on human rights before they came into office. But he said he has been surprised at the administration's initial steps.

"I am finding these guys very reactive and not creative. You can't just offer hope to Castro, Chávez and Mubarak," Craner said, referring to the leaders of Cuba, Venezuela and Egypt. "You have to offer hope to others" toiling in those countries for greater liberties.

Administration officials counter that they have a consistent vision of how to emphasize human rights in international discourse, which includes taking on tough issues but in a respectful and less rhetorical manner. "Any fair reading of this set of issues over the course of a broad sweep of time underscores that it's a fundamental issue for the president," said Denis McDonough, director of strategic communications at the National Security Council.

During a November 2007 Democratic primary debate, Obama eloquently insisted that American security is not more important than human rights, saying the two aims were "complementary." As Obama put it, "We've got to understand that, if we simply prop up antidemocratic practices, that that feeds the sense that America is only concerned about us and that our fates are not tied to these other folks."

But outside activists say they have a hard time perceiving such a balance, at least at this early juncture.

Many human rights activists have been shocked at the administration's apparent willingness to consider easing sanctions on Burma and Sudan. The Obama presidential campaign was scornful of Bush's handling of the killings in Sudan's Darfur region, which Bush labeled as genocide, but since taking office, the administration has been caught flat-footed by Sudan's recent ousting of international humanitarian organizations.

Obama appointed a special envoy for Sudan, retired Air Force Maj. Gen. Scott Gration, who has alarmed activists by telling them privately that he is looking at easing sanctions imposed by Bush and at whether Sudan should be removed from the list of state sponsors of terrorism. "He thinks that to keep banging on Khartoum is not the right way," said Omar Ismail, a Darfurian refugee and policy activist who has met with Gration three times. "He said he wants to build rapport with Khartoum."

Gration did not respond to a request for comment, and administration officials refused to say whether lifting sanctions was under consideration.

Eric Reeves, an activist who closely watches Sudan, said, "The real situation on the ground is extremely grim, and getting worse in many places. The Obama people must know this, which makes the decision to go the accommodationist route even more bewildering."

Pakistan Overshadows Afghanistan on U.S. Agenda

New York Times

By DAVID E. SANGER
Published: May 5, 2009

WASHINGTON — When President Obama announced his new strategy in March for dealing with the problems of Afghanistan and Pakistan, he declared that America’s once-grandiose goals in the region should be narrowed to taking aim at Al Qaeda. To get the job done, he was already sending upwards of 21,000 more troops to Afghanistan, and he promised to pour billions of dollars in aid into development programs in the region.

 There was only one hitch: Al Qaeda doesn’t really live in Afghanistan. It survives largely over the border in Pakistan, where American boots on the ground will never be tolerated. “This is the logical flaw in an otherwise pretty sophisticated plan,” one of the participants in the White House debate said at the time. “We have to stabilize Afghanistan. But if the goal is to take out Al Qaeda and its friends, we’re putting our troops in the wrong country.”

But only five weeks later, what seemed like a fissure in the plan — a fissure Mr. Obama himself discussed and fully understood, his aides say — has opened into a canyon. As Mr. Obama prepares to meet at the White House on Wednesday with President Asif Ali Zardari of Pakistan and President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan, the agenda has been overwhelmed by the drive that insurgents inside Pakistan are mounting for control of swaths of the country.

The original intention for the meeting was to find ways to accomplish something the Pakistanis and the Afghans have never been able to engineer, no matter how hard Washington has pushed them to: A coordinated military effort to squeeze the Taliban and other insurgents on both sides of their long, wild border. Suddenly, that seems like the lesser of two urgent problems.

“The possibility is now real that we will see a jihadist state emerge in Pakistan — not an inevitable outcome, not even the most likely, but a real possibility,” said Bruce Riedel, the Brookings Institution scholar who served as the co-author of Mr. Obama’s review.

“And that is the real strategic nightmare for the United States,” he added.

Important as Afghanistan is to the United States, he said, the events of the past few weeks focused American minds on Pakistan’s uniquely toxic cocktail.

“It’s where the far greater strategic risks lie,” said Mr. Riedel, a former intelligence officer who has long navigated the dangerous currents of South Asia. “It has more terrorists per square mile than anyplace else on earth, and it has a nuclear weapons program that is growing faster than anyplace else on earth.”

Or, as Admiral Michael Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, put it on Monday, “this isn’t about ‘can do’ any more; this is about ‘must do.’ ”

So in the land of no good options, what are some of the possibilities that Mr. Obama can explore? What can he accomplish sitting down with a weak Pakistani leader who spent years dodging charges of corruption, and whose early support in Washington has quickly soured? Or with an even weaker Afghan leader who was once a favorite of the United States — both for his elegance and for his eloquence — but who many the Obama administration would now like to see eased out of office in the coming election?

Here are a few possibilities to watch for:

Speed Up Plan A The core of Mr. Obama’s strategy was to bet on a long-term solution: Retraining the Pakistani military to become an effective counterinsurgency force and pour billions of dollars and plenty of manpower into real nation-building efforts on both sides of the border, but particularly in the tribal areas that have become Al Qaeda and Taliban strongholds — in short, to execute the Marshall Plan for the region that President George W. Bush first talked about in March 2002 but never executed.

According to administration officials, Mr. Obama is expected to promise to unlock nearly $1 billion in aid that the United States has promised but not yet delivered, and to announce a new training program for Pakistani soldiers, probably located in Kuwait so that American trainers need not set foot on Pakistani soil. But building schools and training soldiers takes time. And with the Taliban expansion threatening the country’s main East-West highway — the highway that leads to Islamabad — it is not clear that the long-term approach will address the immediate military emergency.

Step up Predator Attacks and Covert Ground Action Last summer Mr. Bush approved a covert plan allowing United States forces, for the first time, to use remotely piloted aircraft to attack not only Al Qaeda sites, but other insurgents that threaten either Afghanistan or Pakistan. President Obama continued that policy, but every proposed strike by the Predator drones has posed a awful choice: How do you blow up a house that has suspected terrorists in the basement if it also has seven-year-olds and their mothers in the living room? The popular anger in Pakistan about the drones has reached a fever pitch.

Mr. Obama’s aides have debated inviting the Pakistanis to participate the C.I.A.’s Predator program, actively managing the missions rather just permitting them to be mounted from a not-so-secret base on Pakistani territory. But many in the administration are hesitant, because past joint operations with Pakistan’s military and intelligence services have rarely worked.

“The question is whether the Taliban’s boldness has scared the Pakistanis enough to realize that they need our help,” one national security official involved in the debate said. “We don’t know the answer to that.”

There is similar concern about sending American special forces on missions deeper into Pakisitan, for fear of the political reaction if they are discovered operating inside Pakistan’s borders. (One of Mr. Bush’s aides put this problem pithily last summer when he asked, “How do you invade an ally?”)

Make Nuclear Arms the No. 1 Concern: In public, the administration says that no matter what inroads the Taliban make in Pakistan, the country’s nuclear arsenal is secure. “The Pakistani leadership and in particular the military is very focused on this,” Admiral Mullen said on Monday.

But when not speaking on the record, intelligence and administration officials say they cannot rely on vague assurances that the weapons and the nuclear materials are locked down. They worry about a stream of intelligence suggesting sophisticated efforts by Al Qaeda and others to place their sympathizers inside the nuclear infrastructure. (Pakistani officials say they extensively screen the thousands of nuclear workers and weed out anyone suspect. But even in the United States, such programs have failed in the past.)

So some officials argue for extending the American program to help secure Pakistan’s nuclear weapons, pressing Pakistan to develop joint plans to evacuate those weapons if they came under threat. It is doubtful that the Pakistanis, who fear the United States has secret plans to seize the arsenal, would ever agree.

The bluntest statement of concern to date came a week ago from Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, in an interview with James Rosen of Fox News. “If the worst, the unthinkable, were to happen, and this advancing Taliban, encouraged and supported by Al Qaeda and other extremists, were to essentially topple the government for failure to beat them back, then they would have the keys to the nuclear arsenal of Pakistan,” she said.

“We can’t even contemplate that,” she added. “We cannot let this go on any further, which is why we’re pushing so hard for the Pakistanis to come together around a strategy to take their country back.”

Porous Pakistani Border Could Hinder U.S.

New York Times

By JANE PERLEZ and PIR ZUBAIR SHAH
Published: May 4, 2009

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — President Obama is pouring more than 20,000 new troops into Afghanistan this year for a fighting season that the United States military has called a make-or-break test of the allied campaign in Afghanistan.

But if Taliban strategists have their way, those forces will face a stiff challenge, not least because of one distinct Taliban advantage: the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan barely exists for the Taliban, who are counting on the fact that American forces cannot reach them in their sanctuaries in Pakistan.

One Pakistani logistics tactician for the Taliban, a 28-year-old from the country’s tribal areas, in interviews with The New York Times, described a Taliban strategy that relied on free movement over the border and in and around Pakistan, ready recruitment of Pakistani men and sustained cooperation of sympathetic Afghan villagers.

His account provided a keyhole view of the opponent the Americans and their NATO allies are up against, as well as the workings and ambitions of the Taliban as they prepared to meet the influx of American troops.

It also illustrated how the Pakistani Taliban, an umbrella group of many brands of jihadist fighters backed by Al Qaeda, are spearheading wars on both sides of the border in what for them is a seamless conflict.

The tactician wears a thick but carefully shaped black beard and a well-trimmed shock of black hair, a look cultivated to allow him to move easily all over Pakistan. He spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution by his fellow Taliban members.

But on an array of issues, discussed over six months of interviews with The Times, he showed himself to be knowledgeable of Taliban activities, and the information he provided matched up consistently with that of other sources.

He was well informed — and unconcerned, he said — of the plans of the head of the United States Central Command, Gen. David H. Petraeus, to replicate in Afghanistan some of the techniques he had used in Iraq to stop the Sunni tribes from fighting the Americans.

“I know of the Petraeus experiment there,” he said. “But we know our Afghans. They will take the money from Petraeus, but they will not be on his side. There are so many people working with the Afghans and the Americans who are on their payroll, but they inform us, sell us weapons.”

He acknowledged that the Americans would have far superior forces and power this year, but was confident that the Taliban could turn this advantage on its head. “The Americans cannot take control of the villages,” he said. “In order to expel us they will have to resort to aerial bombing, and then they will have more civilian casualties.”

The one thing that impressed him were the missile strikes by drones — virtually the only American military presence felt inside Pakistan. “The drones are very effective,” he said, acknowledging that they had thinned the top leadership of Al Qaeda and the Taliban in the area. He said 29 of his friends had been killed in the strikes.

The drone attacks simply prompted Taliban fighters to spend more time in Afghanistan, or to move deeper into Pakistan, straddling both theaters of a widening conflict. The recruits were prepared to fight where they were needed, in either country, he said.

In the fighting now under way in Buner and Dir Districts, in the North-West Frontier Province of Pakistan, the Pakistani Taliban are taking on the Pakistani Army in a battle that is the most obvious front of a long-haul strategy to destabilize and take over a nuclear-armed Pakistan.

In Afghanistan, the Pakistani Taliban are directly singling out the United States and NATO forces by sending guerrillas to assist their Afghan Taliban allies in ousting the foreigners from Afghanistan.

While to the Taliban those conflicts are one fluid and sprawling war, the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan has long presented a firm barrier for the United States.

Although Pakistan is an official ally of the United States, the Pakistanis will not allow American troops to cross the border from Afghanistan. They will also not allow the troops to be present as a fighting force alongside the Pakistani military in the tribal areas that Al Qaeda and the Taliban use as a base.

The United States has helped Pakistan and Afghanistan recently open a series of joint posts to share intelligence and improve border monitoring. But those efforts are slight when compared with the demands of a 1,600-mile frontier of unforgiving terrain.

Despite years of demands by American and NATO commanders for Pakistan to control Taliban infiltration, the Taliban tactician said getting his fighters over the border was not a problem. The Pakistani paramilitary soldiers from the Frontier Corps who guard the border were too busy looking after their own survival, he said.

He has already begun moving 80 Taliban fighters in four groups stealthily into Afghanistan in the past month to meet the new American forces, he said.

The tactician says he embeds his men in what he described as friendly Afghan villages, where they will spend the next four to six months with the residents, who provide the weapons and succor for the missions against American and NATO soldiers.

In March, he made a reconnaissance trip by motorcycle to Paktika Province in Afghanistan from Wana, the main city in South Waziristan, in Pakistan’s tribal areas, to make sure the route was safe for his men. It was.

The main task for his first two groups of fighters will be to ambush convoys of NATO goods and soldiers on the Kandahar-Kabul highway, a major supply line for the allied war effort. “We want to inflict maximum trouble, to lower their morale, to destabilize,” he said.

His guerrillas, in their late teens to mid-20s, are handpicked for their endurance and commitment, he said. Some, like him, were trained by the Pakistani government as proxy fighters against India in Kashmir and have now joined the Qaeda and Taliban cause.

In a new twist, cameramen instructed to capture video of faltering American soldiers for propaganda DVDs are increasingly accompanying the guerrillas.

The tactician, a heavily built man who says he has put on weight in the past two years and is now too heavy and old to fight, said he was loyal to a commander named Mullah Mansoor.

In turn, Mr. Mansoor serves under the aegis of Siraj Haqqani, the son of a veteran Afghan mujahedeen leader, Jalaluddin Haqqani.

The tactician worked mostly from Wana, where he owns a small business and where, he acknowledged, the American drone strikes had disrupted life. The threat of the drones had ended the custom of gathering in groups of 10 to 20 men to discuss the issues of the day. “The gossip has finished,” he said.

The relationship between the Pakistani Taliban and Qaeda operatives, most of whom are Arabs, is respectful but distant, according to his descriptions.

The Arabs often go to the bazaar in Wana. But they bristle when asked questions, he said. “They never tell us their activities,” he said.

But the Taliban are willing providers for Al Qaeda. “When they need a suicide bomber, like blowing up a government building, we provide it,” he said.

There was respect for the scale of Al Qaeda’s ambitions. “They have a global agenda, they have a big design,” he said.

The Taliban goal was more narrow. “Capturing Afghanistan is not an Al Qaeda mission,” he said. “It’s a Taliban mission. We will be content in capturing Afghanistan and throwing the Americans out.”

The Pakistani Taliban will fight as long as it takes to defeat the Americans, he said. At the end of this fighting season, he said, “We will have a body count, and we will see who has broken whose back.”

A version of this article appeared in print on May 5, 2009, on page A1 of the New York edition.

Bernanke Sees Hopeful Signs but No Quick Recovery

New York Times

By EDMUND L. ANDREWS
Published: May 5, 2009

WASHINGTON — The chairman of the Federal Reserve, Ben S. Bernanke, said on Tuesday that the economy appeared to be stabilizing on many fronts but cautioned that a recovery was still months away and that “further sizable job losses” will continue even after an upturn begins.
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“We continue to expect economic activity to bottom out, then to turn up later this year,” Mr. Bernanke told the congressional Joint Economic Committee, according to his prepared remarks.

“Even after a recovery gets under way, the rate of growth of real economic activity is likely to remain below its longer-run potential for a while,” he predicted. “We expect that the recovery will only gradually gain momentum and that economic slack will diminish slowly.”

Notwithstanding his caveats, the Fed chairman gave his most upbeat assessment since the United States fell into its most severe financial crisis since the Depression and its steepest recession since at least the early 1980s.

He noted that consumer spending, which sank sharply the second half of 2008, actually grew in the first quarter of this year. Sales of existing homes have been “fairly stable” since late last year, in part because plunging home prices have made houses more affordable and interest rates on some fixed-rate mortgages have fallen below 5 percent.

Mr. Bernanke said conditions in credit markets have revived slightly in recent weeks. Homeowners are refinancing mortgages at a rapid clip, and financial institutions have stepped up their sale of securities backed by of credit card loans, automobile debt and student loans.

At the same time, the Fed chairman made it clear that the recession is not yet over and that many people will experience harder times in the months ahead. The nation has already lost five million jobs since the recession began more than one year ago, and unemployment usually continues to climb for many months after economic growth begins.

Mr. Bernanke noted that business investment was still “extremely weak,” which means that businesses are still contracting and will continue to shed workers. The unemployment rate hit 8.5 percent in March, and the Labor Department is expected to report on Friday that the jobless rate jumped sharply again in April.

Though Mr. Bernanke stopped short of saying the financial crisis is ending, he said the government’s much-criticized program to bail out banks and Wall Street firms had helped avoid a complete collapse. “I think we are in far better shape than we were in September and October,” he said.

The Fed chairman suggested that many of the nation’s 19 biggest banks will be instructed to raise additional capital when the Fed announces the results of “stress tests” on Thursday, and he tacitly acknowledged that the federal government will become a bigger shareholder in at least some of those institutions.

The tests are designed to determine whether the banks would have enough capital if the economic downturn is worse than expected. The banks have six months to raise that capital from private investors, but will have to take government money in exchange for shares of common stock if private money is unavailable.

“Following the announcement of the results, bank holding companies will be required to develop comprehensive capital plans,” Mr. Bernanke said, without specifying an exact number. Asked if he expected banks to raise the “majority” of the required capital from private sources, Mr. Bernanke predicted only that the amount could be “significant.”

Mr. Bernanke came under sharp criticism for his decision against immediately stopping credit card companies from abruptly doubling or tripling their interest rates to consumers, often for people who have remained current on all their payments.

The Fed is preparing new protections for credit card customers, but it will not impose them until much later this year. Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York, said he had asked Mr. Bernanke to use the Fed’s emergency powers to act immediately but that the Fed chairman refused to do so.

“The Federal Reserve’s failure to protect consumers from these outrageous rate increases is unconscionable,” Mr. Schumer said. Noting that the Fed had swiftly used its emergency powers to rescue “teetering financial institutions,” he attacked the Fed chairman for refusing to act more quickly to protect credit card customers.

“What about the the family that has a $10,000 balance and had its rate jump from 7 to 23 percent?” Mr. Bernanke said he was “very concerned” about such practices, but said that cutting short the normal process for approving new regulations might simply provoke banks to raise their rates even more quickly or to cut many customers off entirely.

“It’s a quandary,” he told Mr. Schumer.

“I’m very frustrated,” the senator responded. “You could have figured out a better way than the one you have chosen.”

Gates Asks Saudis for Help in Pakistan

New York Times

By THOM SHANKER
Published: May 5, 2009

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia — As the Obama administration prepares for talks this week with senior leaders from Afghanistan and Pakistan, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates flew to Saudi Arabia on Tuesday to seek help in pushing back Taliban advances in Pakistan that, he said, threaten the very existence of the government in Islamabad.

Mr. Gates said Saudi Arabia “clearly has a lot of influence throughout the region,” and he cited its “long-standing and close relationship with Pakistan.”

The defense secretary called on Pakistan’s allies across the region to assist in countering insurgent successes that represent a growing danger to Pakistan, and Mr. Gates said a goal of this week’s meetings with Afghan and Pakistani leaders in Washington would be to reach consensus on the nature of the threat.

In the past, the Pakistani government and its military have been far more focused on their traditional adversary, India, than on the domestic insurgency.

As Mr. Gates concluded talks in Egypt earlier Tuesday, the shadow of Iran’s regional ambitions prompted the defense secretary to declare that efforts by the Obama administration to seek better ties with Tehran would not jeopardize its relations with allies in the region.

He stressed that historic American partners in the Middle East would be kept fully informed of Washington’s diplomatic efforts toward Iran. The Obama administration was undertaking that effort to reach out to Iran “with its eyes wide open,” he said.

“If we encounter a closed fist when we extend our open hand, then we will react accordingly,” Mr. Gates said. “Concerns out here of some kind of a ‘grand bargain’ developed in secret are completely unrealistic and, I would say, are not going to happen.”

Pakistani Army Poised for New Push Into Area Held by Taliban

New York Times

By CARLOTTA GALL
Published: May 5, 2009

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Residents were flooding out of the Swat valley by the thousands on Tuesday as the government prepared to mount a new military operation against Taliban militants there after the collapse of a peace deal negotiated in February.

For weeks the Taliban have flaunted their disregard for the February peace accord, and two weeks ago they used the territory all but ceded to them under the deal to launch an offensive into another district, Buner, 60 miles from the capital.

This week the Taliban reversed the only achievement of the deal, a ceasefire in the Swat district capital, Mingora, which they seized control of Sunday, when their turbaned fighters laid siege to several police stations, a local lawyer and resident of the town said.

The Taliban’s armed return to Mingora on Sunday signaled the final breakdown in the government’s efforts to negotiate a peaceful solution to two years of fighting that has costs thousands of lives and damaged homes and livelihoods the length of the once-prosperous farming valley of Swat.

The Pakistani military, which is fighting to clear militants from two other districts of the North West Frontier Province, Dir and Buner, now appears ready to push its operations into Swat once again.

But the question remains whether the military has the will and capability to sustain its operations in three districts. The task in Swat remains hugely difficult, not least because the Taliban were digging in and mining the streets, according to residents, and the military had already failed to drive out the Taliban before it agreed to the February accord.

But public opinion in Pakistan toward the Taliban has undergone an important shift since the deal, and has now apparently given the military more confidence to move with full force against the Taliban.

A recent video showing the Taliban flogging a young woman as the militants clamped down their version of Islam law on Swat shocked the nation. The government has taken great pains to show its efforts to make the Swat peace deal work.

Finally, the Taliban incursion into Buner two weeks ago solidified a growing consensus that the Taliban had gone too far and that the military needed to stand up to the insurgents, and it has provided the catalyst for the military to act.

The media, politicians and even religious leaders are now speaking out against the extremist position of Maulana Sufi Muhammad, the main negotiator on the Swat deal, and Mullah Fazlullah, his son-in-law, who has links to the Qaeda-backed Taliban movement based in Pakistan’s tribal areas.

Leaders of the Awami National Party, which governs the North West Frontier Province where all of the districts are located, still stand by the deal, which it says has been critical in winning people away from the militants and over to the side of the government.

The peace deal was popular among the people of Swat, who were desperate for peace and angered by the heavy-handed military campaign in the valley. But over the last three months of efforts to make the deal work, the Taliban have revealed that they have no intention of ending their insurgency. It has also become apparent that Maulana Muhammad is not able to control the militants, the politicians say.

There is no doubt that the military is fighting this campaign seriously, said Maulana Yousuf Shah, general secretary of the Jamiat-u-Ulama-i-Islam-S, a political party that is close to the Taliban and has helped negotiations between the two sides.

A Supreme Court lawyer Anees Jillani, who visited Swat recently, said the military remains divided and some have a soft corner for the Islamists and are not willing to fight.

“When you ask them why are you not defeating them, they ask: ‘Why should we?’ and you ask about Sufi Muhammad, they say: ‘What’s wrong with him?’” he said.

On the ground, however, there has been a significant change in the military and paramilitary forces ranged against the Taliban.

Under the leadership of Maj. Gen. Tariq Khan, an energetic and determined commander, the Frontier Corps, the local Pashtun paramilitary force, has become better armed and equipped in recent months, with the help of the United States.

Supported by army units, it has proved itself better able to push back the Taliban, first in the tribal areas in Bajaur last year, and now in Buner, though at big cost to civilians caught up in the operations.

Anti-terrorist police units have also been deployed in the operations in some outlying districts, in police actions that are better suited to counterinsurgency operations.

Peshawar anti-terrorist police units have killed 88 suspected militants in the last four months, cracking down on the kidnapping and general lawlessness that were reaching right into the city, a senior police official said, asking not to be named because of the nature of his work.

“It is a manageable problem,” he said, when asked whether Pakistan can contain the militant threat. “It does not take much to dishevel them,” he said.

American support has been critical in the improvement of the Frontier Corps and the police are hoping for the same help, he said. “If Uncle Sam shows the same generosity to our force, I don’t see why we cannot be a good supporting force,” he said.

He said it was critical to have weapons and equipment that were better than those used by the militants.

“It’s a bad situation, but certainly not a lost situation,” he said. “It’s not false bravado, I have seen the small dent we have made in this area. That has made them more hesitant of operating in this area.”

Continuing the Conversation: Tax Reform for American Jobs

The White House Blog

Tuesday, May 5th, 2009 at 9:48 am

Yesterday, even before we posted here on the blog about the President's proposals to curb offshore tax havens and end tax incentives for companies shifting jobs overseas, we asked for your reactions on our various social networking outposts.  As we expected, there were a lot of interesting comments and questions, largely supporting the President but some raising concerns and objections.  We asked Jason Furman, Deputy Director of the National Economic Council, to address some of them:

kylekunkler: Ending deferral (when US already has 2nd highest corporate tax) will only hurt US MNCs and cost jobs! http://tinyurl.com/coofnd

Jason Furman: Kyle, you are correct that the United States has the second highest statutory tax rate in the world, the official rate published in the tax code. But the United States also has more loopholes and special tax preferences than many other countries. As a result, the United States has a much lower effective tax rate. If you look at corporate taxes as a share of GDP they are below those of most major economies. The result is a tax code that is complicated, inefficient and unfair. One of major causes of these problems is the way that we tax – or more often do not tax – the foreign earnings of American companies. The administration’s plan is intended as a major, first step in addressing this problem.

ScottGjerdingen: What sort of jobs would be impacted by Obama's "offshore jobs" corporate cutback on tax benefits?

Jason Furman: Scott, you ask an important question of what jobs would be affected by the President’s proposal. In answering it is important to look at both halves of the proposal. One half is to end special tax preferences for creating jobs overseas. The goal of this is not to stop American companies from competing and succeeding in the global economy. What the President wants is to stop giving them special subsidies for doing so – subsidies they would not get for investing in the United States. The result will be to shift more investment and job creation to the United States. The second half of the policy is to take these savings and use them to cut taxes in businesses that create jobs in the United States by making the tax credit for research & development permanent. The direct beneficiaries of this policy will be companies engaged in research and development, but the innovations that result will have important spillover effects, creating jobs and raising wages across the economy.

Marc Solomon: Bringing jobs back to the US by switching tax incentives from creating jobs overseas to creating jobs in the US is a wonderful idea. My concern is, if the goal is to make our tax laws fairer and simpler, this accomplishes only the first and not the second (and of course that assumes fairer means fairer for US citizens and not for all people of the ... Read Moreworld). Wouldn't just removing the tax incentives for creating jobs overseas accomplish BOTH goals and not just the one? It would definitely simplify the tax laws and be fair for all people, not just U.S. citizens (although, personally, I am prejudiced to being fairer for U.S. citizens).

Jason Furman: Marc, you should understand that today’s announcement is a down-payment on the President’s overall tax agenda. As he said in his remarks today, "the steps I am announcing today will help us deal with some of the most egregious examples of what's wrong with our tax code and will help us strengthen some of these other efforts.  It's a down payment on the larger tax reform we need to make our tax system simpler and fairer and more efficient for individuals and corporations." That said, the proposals the President made today would start to simplify the tax code. This includes the President’s proposal to reward companies that create jobs in America – which would make the research and development tax credit permanent, adding more predictability and stability to the tax code because companies would no longer have to worry about whether or not the credit would expire or continue.

REMARKS BY THE VICE PRESIDENT AT THE ANNUAL POLICY CONFERENCE OF THE AMERICAN ISRAEL PUBLIC AFFAIRS COMMITTEE

THE WHITE HOUSE

Office of the Vice President
________________________________________________________
For Immediate Release                           May 5, 2009

Walter E. Washington Convention Center

Washington, DC

THE VICE PRESIDENT:  Thank you very much.  (Applause.)  Please.  (Applause.)   Larry, thank you for that introduction.

Ladies and gentlemen, there's an old -- there's an old Saxon expression.   And what it says is -- (applause) -- there's an old expression.  This is the man who introduced me to AIPAC.  And there's an old expression that says an institution is little more than the lengthened shadow of a man.  This is the man right here. This is the man.  (Applause.)

Ladies and gentlemen, I was backstage and the stage director, a lovely young woman, was telling me that she was the stage director, and I told her how well I take orders.  (Laughter.)  And Larry was speaking, and I said, you see that man?  I said, he's been my friend for 38 years.  And she looked at me like, that's not possible -- (laughter) -- not that I don't look that old, but that she wasn't born, I don’t think -- when she said it.  (Laughter.)

But the truth is Larry, and his magnificent wife, have been just wonderful, wonderful, wonderful supporters of Israel and AIPAC.  And he really did, along with one of my closest friends, period, not just in politics, Michael Adler -- Michael Adler's dad in Miami and Larry Weinberg on the West Coast are the two people who gave me my formal education.  And I thank them both.  Thank you both.  (Applause.)

I say to the board and all of you that are here, I'm delighted by your warm welcome.  And it's very good to be among friends.  I'd like to begin by congratulating your president, David Victor, for -- and the incoming president, Lee Rosenberg.  Rosy, we're all pulling for your dad, Big Rosy, and we know how proud he must be right now as you're about to take on your new responsibilities.  (Applause.) 

I'd like to also congratulate AIPAC's Executive Director, Howard Kohr, and the rest of the staff for another successful conference.  (Applause.)

And I want to congratulate an old friend, who I think is probably the most articulate and eloquent speechmaker in the world, Shimon Peres, President of the State of Israel -- (applause) -- on the 61st anniversary of Israel’s independence, which we're going to celebrate -- which we celebrated last week. And the President -- President Obama and I look forward to visiting later today with the President.  I'm anxious to see him in the White House.  (Applause.)

A little over a hundred days ago, our country started on a new path.  The citizens of this country made a very fundamental decision.  And it began with the historic inauguration of the 44th President, Barack Obama, but it grew -- it grew out of the determination of millions of Americans who desperately wanted to change not only the direction of our country, but quite frankly, the trajectory that the world was on.  That’s what the Obama-Biden administration has set out to do, a lofty goal but an absolutely minimum required task -- to change the direction of this country and all the trajectory of the world.  We not only want to do it here at home; we believe our fate is inextricably tied to the direction the world is moving in.

But in the midst of change, with all the change you will hear about, there is one enduring, essential principle that will not change; and that is our commitment to the peace and security of the state of Israel.  (Applause.)  That is not negotiable.  That is not a matter of change.  That is something to be reinforced and made clear.  (Applause.)  It seems almost unnecessary to state it, but I want the word to go forth in here that no one should mistake it. 

That commitment began when the United States of America emerged from World War II as the preeminent economic, political, and military power in the world, and one of our great Presidents, Harry Truman, reached out to a tiny, struggling state, emerging from the ashes of the Holocaust, and recognized the state of Israel.  It’s a commitment that spans generations, and administrations of both political parties.  And our job -- obviously you know it's yours -- just so you know, we know it's our job to ensure that that endures.

The bond between Israel and the United States was forged by a shared interest in peace and security; by shared values and to respect all faiths and for all faiths and for all people; by deep ties evidenced here today among our citizens, both Christian and Jew; and a common, unyielding commitment to democracy.

Indeed, we've both experienced recent elections and the peaceful transition of power.  I want to congratulate my friend, Prime Minister Netanyahu -- and as they say in the Senate, he is my friend -- for his victory.  Bibi and I have been friends for a long, long time -- too long to mention.  And you know the old cliché -- imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.  Well, I looked at Likud’s website, campaign website -- and on behalf of the Obama-Biden administration, I must say I am flattered.  (Laughter.)  Take a look at the website.  It looked like we were running co-joint campaigns here.  (Laughter.)  And we didn’t charge Bibi a thing for it.  (Laughter.)  All kidding aside, a lot of you in the audience, and a lot of board members here, have been my friends for a long, long time

My commitment, though, to Israel did not begin with the friendships that I share on this stage.  As the friends on this stage know, and some of you have heard me say, my commitment began at my father’s dinner table.  My father was what you'd refer to as a righteous Christian.  My father -- we had dinner at my father and mother's home as an occasion to sit down and have conversation and, incidentally, eat, rather than eat and, incidentally, have conversation.  And over the years, my commitment was nurtured by many of the people in this room, starting with Larry and many others that are here.

In 1973, as a 29-year-old or just 30 -- just turned 30 years old, elected United States senator from the state of Delaware -- I made my first overseas trip to Israel.  It was on the eve at the time unknown of the Yom Kippur War.  I had just come from Cairo, and visited the Suez Canal.  And I then went to visit the Prime Minister, Golda Meir, which was one of the great honors.  I was asked not long ago, what are the two most meaningful meetings I ever had as a senator.  And they were with the freed later president of South Africa, and Golda Meir.  (Applause.)  They both embodied everything I had been taught -- different races, different religions, different regions -- the same tenacity and the same open heart.

I sat across the desk from the Prime Minister.  And she, as many of you know, is a chain smoker.  She continually smoked.  And she had a set of maps behind her, the old maps that were on rollers.  There was a whole big slew of them, like eight maps in one set.  And she was describing to me the Six-Day War and reading letters from the front, from young Israelis, most of whom had died defending their country.  It was very moving.  She kept flipping the maps up and down and pointing to different battles.  I'm sure many of you had the experience.  I'm sure you had the experience, Larry. 

And there was a young man sitting next to me who didn't say a lot.  His name was Rabin.  And we had a conversation that lasted -- I won't put a time on it, but I'm quite confident it was over an hour.  It was a long time.  It was a great moment for a young man like me.  It was meaningful.  I learned a lot.  But it also gave me a sense of the degree of -- how do I say it -- the pain, the history, the hope, the pragmatism, the grit of an entire nation.  And almost it seemed in mid-sentence, she looked at me -- and my good friend, Michael Adler, heard me say this before, it was -- kind of startled me -- she said, Senator, would you like a photo?  It was, like, by the way, do you want to go to the ball game?

And I said, well, of course, Madam Prime Minister.  And the office in those days that she had, there were double doors that opened up onto a hallway.  And we walked out, and there were photographers arrayed.  And we stood next to one another, looking straight at the camera, at the photographers and the cameras.  But she was talking to me without looking at me.  She said the following.  She said, Senator -- looking straight ahead, but talking -- she said, Senator, you seem worried.  You look like you're worried.  And I turned to her, and I said, well, Madam Prime Minister, I am.  The picture you just painted -- in those days 60 million Arabs, 2 million Jews, et cetera. 

And she put her hand out -- still looking at the camera -- on my arm.  She said, Senator, don't worry.  We Jews have a secret weapon in our struggle here.  We have no place else to go. (Applause.)  

And, for me, I thought at the time -- some of you know, she was so engaging -- I thought at the time, I'm probably the only person in the world she ever said that to.  (Laughter.)  And it was for me, at that moment, her comments crystallized for me everything I'd learned at my father's table, and everything about the basic responsibility of the United States to be a partner in ensuring that there will always, always be a place for Jews of the world to go -- (applause) -- and that place always must be Israel.  (Applause.)  It's real.  It's serious.  It's compelling.  It's the only certainty, the only certainty.  (Applause.)

Ladies and gentlemen, I'm here today to tell you something you already know, and I assure you this -- President Barack Obama shares that same commitment.  (Applause.)  His support is rooted in his personal connection to the Zionist idea to which he spoke about last year at this conference.  He said last year that when he was a child, and I quote, "I was drawn to the belief that you could sustain a spiritual, emotional and cultural identity, and I deeply understood the Zionist idea that there is always a homeland at the center of our story."

Ladies and gentlemen, Barack Obama's commitment was reinforced -- not that it need to have been -- by his two relatively recent trips to Israel, when he met with Israeli leaders from across the spectrum -- and you all know it's a very wide spectrum in Israel; by the powerful, searing experience that he had visiting maybe in a sense the holiest of all places, commemorating the Holocaust; by seeing, first-hand, Israel's unique security dilemmas from a helicopter with top generals -- the sort of experience I had in '73 when I stood on the Golan Heights and realized if you had a really good arm you could literally throw a grenade down in the territory that could do damage to Israelis.

He also had it reinforced by traveling to the northern border, and met with families whose homes had been destroyed by rockets fired by Hezbollah and Hamas into their villages.  But the President and I both know that ultimately we'll be judged not by our commitment and our verbal assurances to you or to anyone else or to the state of Israel, but by the results of the commitment we have made.  (Applause.)

We believe that the results we seek, including a secure Israel at peace, can be best achieved by taking a new direction in our foreign policy; by, first and foremost, reestablish America's preeminent leadership in the world.  (Applause.)  The nation who asserts it leads, but has no one following, is not leading.  We must reassert the confidence that we once had, and the confidence the world once had in us to lead the world.

When America has confidence -- the confidence of our allies and our friends, and the broad support we need in the world -- not only is America stronger but Israel will be stronger, because America is able to be a more efficient partner and effective partner, and our adversaries and Israel's adversaries know that as well. 

In the Middle East, we stand for the premise that the status quo of the last decade has not served the interests of the United States or Israel very well.  It has not enhanced the peace and security of the region, no matter how good the intention.  I went to a Catholic grade school.  When you got in trouble, the nuns would make you -- I'd say, but, sister -- and they'd make you write on the board a hundred times after school:  The road to hell is paved with good intentions.  All the good intentions of the last decade have not resulted in a more secure, more stable Middle East; a more secure, more stable Israel; a more secure, more stable United States. 

So we are working to change that by responsibly ending the war in Iraq, by refocusing our efforts on Afghanistan and Pakistan to defeat al Qaeda, by engaging all countries in the region, including those with whom we have overwhelming disagreements, in order to advance our national security interests. 

We are intensely focused on avoiding the grave danger, as Larry spoke about and others have, as well, including my good friend, John, of a nuclear armed Iran.  (Applause.)  A nuclear-armed Iran risks an arms race in the region that would make every country less secure; presents an existential threat.  What we have tried with Iran in recent years has obviously not worked.  What will work remains to be seen. 

Since 2000, Iran has installed thousands of centrifuges and produced over a thousand kilograms of low-enriched uranium; not capable of use in a nuclear weapon -- low-enriched -- but nonetheless, they have produced that.  Instead of arresting the danger; in the last six years, the danger has grown.  It has not been arrested.  We're determined to change that.  That's why we will pursue direct, principled diplomacy with Iran with the overriding goal of preventing them from acquiring nuclear weapons. 

The United States will approach Iran initially in the spirit of mutual respect.  We want Iran to take its rightful place in the community of nations, politically and economically.  That's a path that the Islamic Republic can take if it so chooses.  Or that government can choose a different future:  one of international pressure, isolation; and one which nothing is taken off the table.

If our efforts to address this problem through engagement are not successful, we have greater international support to consider other options.  And ladies and gentlemen, don't kid yourselves -- international support matters, as we've learned over the last eight years.  (Applause.)  We must sometimes act alone, but it's always stronger when we act in unison.

Given the situation we inherited, we know we don't have unlimited time to make this assessment.  Iran also has played a dangerous role in the region supporting terrorist organizations like Hamas and Hezbollah and undermining many of our friends and those who claim to be our friends.  Indeed, these proxies are the tools in my view, our view, that Iran uses to exploit conflicts like the Israeli-Palestinian conflict -- use it to their advantage.

In this way the continuation of Israeli-Palestinian and Israeli-Arab -- Arab-Israeli conflicts, strengthen Iran's strategic position.  They give Iran a playing field upon which to extend its influence, sponsor extremist elements, inflame public opinion -- all which are counterintuitive.  It's counterintuitive if you think about it, that Iran's Shia influence in a Sunni Arab world would be able to be extended.

There are many reasons to pursue an end to these conflicts.  It gives Israelis peace and security they deserve; to help the Palestinians fulfill their aspirations of an independent and better life; to ease tension in the regions -- in this region.

Today, one of the most pressing reasons may be to deprive Iran of the ability to extend its destabilizing influence.  Again, it's counterintuitive if you think about its ability to extend its influence in the region.

That's why from day one of this administration we began to make a strong, sustained effort on behalf of peace.  The President decided that we must be engaged; we must take risk on behalf of peace for Israel.  The President appointed one of our most tenacious diplomats to lead that effort, George Mitchell, and the President is strongly and personally committed to achieving what all have basically said is needed -- a two-state solution, with a secure Jewish state of Israel living side by side in peace and security with a viable and independent Palestinian state.  (Applause.)

He and I both believe that it's absolutely necessary to ensure Israel's survival as a Jewish democratic state that this occur.  (Applause.)  That is also the solution that Israel and the Palestinians committed to in the road map and reaffirmed in Annapolis.  It can be achieved.  It must be achieved.

There's an old expression, which Larry will get a kick out of, and it relates to Christianity.  G.K. Chesterton once said, "It's not that Christianity has been tried and found wanting; it's been found difficult and left untried."  Well, the truth of the matter is, the fact that peace has not occurred does not mean peace cannot occur. 

Same time, we'll pursue a secure and lasting and comprehensive Arab-Israeli peace.  The Israelis and its Arab neighbors have sufficient common interest to bring this goal within reach.  Progress towards peace has only been possible when people -- when people were willing to think differently; to take risks; to make a principled compromise.  That's why we have to pursue every opportunity for progress while standing up for one core principle:  First, Israel's security is non-negotiable.  (Applause.)  Period.  Period.  Our commitment is unshakeable.  We will continue to provide Israel with the assistance that it needs.  We will continue to defend Israel's right to defend itself and make its own judgments about what it needs to do to defend itself.  (Applause.)

Secondly, all of us have obligations to meet, including commitments Israel and the Palestinians made in the road map.  The Palestinian Authority must combat terror and incitement against Israel.  The United States and its partners have provided funding and training for a reformed Palestinian security force, which has impressed everyone, including the Israeli security officers with its recent demonstrations of professionalism and effectiveness.  We are right now seeking funds from Congress to expand this program.  But Israel has to work towards a two-state solution.  You're not going to like my saying this, but not build more settlements, dismantle existing outposts, and allow the Palestinians freedom of movement based on their first actions -- (applause) -- its access to economic opportunity and increased security responsibility.  This is a "show me" deal -- not based on faith -- show me.  Prime Minister Netanyahu has important ideas about how to achieve some of these objectives and we look forward to working with him to help develop them when he comes to visit. 

The Quartet and the Arab states also have clear responsibilities.  One of the most important is to support the Palestinian Authority with the tools and funds it needs to govern on the West Bank, develop and reform its institutions, help the people of Gaza work toward returning to Gaza.  We are doing our part with major assistance packages currently before the Congress.  We expect others to do theirs. 

The Arab states should act now, not later, to build upon -- (applause) -- to build upon the Arab Peace Initiative -- a constructive combination that contains the promise of a cooperative and comprehensive peace, but now is the time.  Now is the time for Arab states to make meaningful gestures to show the Israeli leadership and the people that the promise of ending Israel's isolation in the region is real and genuine.  They must take action now -- show me.  (Applause.)

Ladies and gentlemen, finally, the world must continue to make clear to Hamas that the legitimacy it seeks will only come when it renounces violence, recognizes Israel, and abides by past agreements -- period.  (Applause.)  These are not -- some say, when I repeat that and the President says it, that these are unreasonable.  These are not unreasonable demands -- they're basic standards of international conduct. 

We're working hard to provide assistance to Palestinians in Gaza that does not benefit Hamas, and to coordinate with our allies to end the smuggling of weapons in the Gaza, which continue.  And we demand -- we demand the immediate and unconditional release -- unconditional release of Gilad Shalit -- (applause) -- after nearly three years -- three years of captivity.  It is not acceptable.  (Applause.)  And we remain committed -- we remain committed to seeing him returned safely to his family.

We will also explore opportunities, as the Israelis are, for progress between Israel and Syria.  Peace between Israel and Syria could reshape the region.  We will ensure that it does not come if it comes at the expense of Israel's security or Lebanon's sovereignty and independence. 

The search for a secure and just and lasting peace in the Middle East has frustrated many and all who have come before us.  We understand the immensity of the challenge.  We recognize the hard choices that must be made.  But we also know this:  The path we have been on in recent yeas will not result in security and prosperity for Israel or the Palestinians, nor will it produce the stability and progress that's needed in the region to ultimately guarantee Israel's security.

Look, we know there are different views in this room.  We know there are different views in this town about how to move forward.  Nowhere are these issues debated more openly and vividly than in the streets of Israel and in the Knesset, which is an overwhelming tribute to its democracy.  But I believe the critical question is not where we stand today, but how we see tomorrow, and what we're prepared to do to get there.  This administration sees and seeks a future of lasting peace and security in which Israeli children can leave behind the tyranny of rockets and terror; when Israeli mothers, as they send their children off to school, do not have to worry about whether or not they will come home; or Palestinian children have full opportunities to live out their dreams, and the entire Middle East does not have to live under the dread of a nuclear cloud.

Delaying the pursuit of these goals is not an option.  It's easier, but it is not an option.  And the longer we wait, the harder it will be.  Now is the time to work together for the promise of a better day, and for the success and strength and security of our most-treasured ally, Israel. 

Thank you very much.  God bless you all, and may God protect our troops.  (Applause.)

END

REMARKS BY THE VICE PRESIDENT AT AN EVENT HIGHLIGHTING OFFSHORE WIND POWER AND THE ADMINISTRATION'S COMMITMENT TO BUILDING A CLEAN, DOMESTIC ENERGY POLICY FOR THE 21ST CENTURY

THE WHITE HOUSE

Office of the Vice President
____________________________________________________
For Immediate Release                         May 4, 2009

The University of Delaware
Newark, Delaware

THE VICE PRESIDENT:  Thank you all.  (Applause.)  Thank you.  Mr. President, I can assure you had I graduated from Rutgers, we'd still be here.  (Laughter.)  If you believe that, then you don't understand politics.  (Laughter.) 

Look, folks, it's great to be home.  It's great to be here at my alma mater.  And it's great to be in a room -- I've spent more serious time in this room today than I did when it was a library -- (laughter) -- which it was here, this room, when I was here as a student.  But it is genuinely good to be home. 

And I've been telling, as Senator Carper has, I've been telling my good friend -- as my colleagues in the state legislature know, you refer to your colleagues as good friends.  But this guy really is a good and loyal friend for a considerable amount of time.  As a matter of fact, I blame him for my son running for attorney general.  I advised him no, and he went to see Ken Salazar, who was attorney general.  And so Ken is totally responsible.

But, look, all kidding aside, the fact of the matter is Ken has heard me and Tom, and probably Mike and others -- I remember -- I remind people, Governor, we had the first solar home here on the university.  I remember when we started off, as you point out, Mr. President, as early as the '70s, the university sort of began to stake its claim on alternative energy.  And so this is not -- this is not new for us.  We have not been recognized for it necessarily, nationally, until recently.  But the truth of the matter is this has been an incredibly environmentally conscious state, as well as university. 

And I would not -- I'd be remiss if I didn't again recognize Governor Peterson, who did what probably I think paved the way for us being able to sustain this state in a way that wouldn't have occurred before with the Coastal Zone Act.  It was a gigantic -- it was such a departure from business as usual back in 1971, that in the '70s, early '70s, that I think it set the stage for so much more.

And I look over here at a man who should have been the director of EPA.  He was the acting director, and through pure politics was held up by our friends in the other party from being able to be confirmed as the director of the EPA, but a guy who has been working in this, Mike McCabe, for longer than many of you and I have been.  He goes back all the way to the days with -- when he was working with Senator Harkin in the establishment of Earth Day and a lot of other things.  Michael, you deserve a great deal of credit.  (Applause.)     

Mr. President, I get energized every time I just come on campus.  The students here at the University of Delaware, they get it.  As some of the students, you pointed out the graduate students, they get that the impact of leading greener lives not only helps us all today, but allows -- it's going to allow their children, their children to live a much better tomorrow than we're living today.  And the good news is we recognize it as well, all of us in here, the state legislators and the university personnel, and the people standing to my left and my right.

Mr. President and Secretary Salazar, the entire administration, the entire administration sees the everlasting benefits of a clean-energy future.  This is a moment.  This is a moment that comes seldom in history.  It's probably occurred five or six times in the history of the United States, when we reach an inflection point that is so consequential for the next generations, not because of the merit or demerit of those in power, but because OF the nature of the change that has taken place in the world and the country.  It's an inflection point. 

And we are determined, Senator Obama -- President Obama.  We were senators when we started planning this, before we got sworn in, in Chicago in late November and December and January.  We are absolutely fundamentally committed to the notion that we're going to lay down a new foundation for the economic, as well as the environmental future of this country.  This is the moment.

We get criticized by many for proposing the Recovery Act.  We get criticized for saying we have to deal with energy education and health care all at once -- we should just worry about getting the economy back.  We cannot, we cannot lead the world in the 21st century -- let me say it again -- we cannot without a fundamental shift in our education, energy, and health care policy.  So it's not a question of doing too much.  There is no option.  It is now.  Now.  Now.   

And for those who say that we could not invest the money in the Recovery Act, let me tell you failure to invest now would put us in a position where we would be behind the curve for the next generation, in my humble opinion.  Because much of what the Secretary was able to do here, much of what we're able to do out of the Department of Energy, and out of the Department of Housing and Urban Affairs, all of which have energy impacts, is being funded on a one-time basis, with the boldest initiative any administration has every attempted in the midst of an economic recession -- a $787 billion down payment on the future.

Failure to act would result in 4 to 5 million additional lost jobs.  So it's a process folks.  And in this process, we really genuinely believe, and I know here you at the university you believe, we're in the beginning stages of beginning to change the world.  I know this sounds like hyperbole.  I'm back on campus and I feel as idealistic as I did when I was a 29 year-old kid summing up my campaign here for the United States Senate on campus. 

I am more certain, I am more committed, I am more idealistic about our opportunities than I have been the day I got elected to office as a 29 year-old kid.  I genuinely mean it.  Seldom do we get to a point where we have an option, an opportunity to literally alter the course of human history.  And it's like turning around a super tanker folks.  You change the heading of a super tanker by five degrees; 50 miles out, you're way off in a different direction than you were before you changed it.  And that's where we are right now.

In the most literal sense, that's why we're here today.  That's why we've chosen such a great university.  Now, I'm prejudiced, I know.  I'm not joking about this.  I say to the press and the national press that's here, I went here.  It's a great university, but it's even a greater university by a long shot.

We got a guy now at the helm of this university who has visions for this university that are totally, completely warranted.  And with the help of the legislature, and the help of the people of the state of Delaware, and the help of the philanthropies and the fundraising that go on, we in fact are going to be able to realize President Harker's dream for this university.  This is a premier institution, and no more than in the area of the kind of advancements we're talking about here.

This really is about making the world better.  And I'm not just -- I'm saying this because I'm on the university campus.  It's about the air we breathe.  It's about the water we drink.  It's about the mountains our children are going to be able climb, and it's about the lakes we swim in and the oceans that nourish us and, literally, renew our souls.  That's the world we intend to change, all of us.  And I'm sure you all share my view, Democrats and Republicans.

We've already begun.  It's been just slightly more than a hundred days.  The Recovery Act includes $11 billion to bolster state and local governments on one item alone, energy efficiency, energy-efficiency programs  -- to weatherize low-income homes that are already being put to work, for example.

Jack talked about the state buildings and the federal buildings.  I need not tell experts like you, sir, Professor, that the single biggest bang for the buck we could get is not with these wind turbines -- that's the future, the immediate future -- it's literally just weatherizing, just weatherizing, conservation.  The single biggest bang for the buck we can get.  We've been criticized for spending Recovery Act money to do that.  Today, here in Delaware, we're doing that and we're doing a lot more.

As the President announced on Earth Day, the Department of the Interior is releasing the regulations that will govern the development of renewable energy in the offshore waters.  These final rules are going to enable Delaware, and enable a nation, to tap into our ocean's vast, vast sustainable resources to generate clean energy in an environmentally sound and safe manner.

And with the release of these rules, we can much better, much better harness the wind here in Delaware, but also solar, wave, and ocean current energy along our nation's coast.  Gov, the prospects are unlimited.  The prospects are unlimited.  And it's time for us to dream really big, not small; not just in terms of whether or not we can actually provide the electricity for 50,000 or 100,000 or 200,000 homes in Delaware.  It is so much bigger than that.

And we're trying to do our part to spur investment -- a significant portion.  This is not the first.  This is multiple times that I've dealt with wind energy projects.  Just out of Missouri, John -- and I got to talk to you about what they're doing out there in creating in the steel mills and the turbines they're creating -- but not only that, the transformers that are being built.  Guess what happens.  This ultimately is about jobs.  It's jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs. 

I mean, we can't in Delaware -- we're losing jobs where people can, by a single job, live a decent way -- make a decent wage; have a sustainable income that can't be exported -- the job -- that allow people to live in a middle-class neighborhood like you and I grew up in.  Used to work at General Motors or Chrysler.  God willing, we'll be able to save some of it, we hope.  The truth of the matter is there's so many spin-offs here. 

And so the tax system that we wrote into the legislation provides financial incentives to projects like the one here in Delaware.  It's not just the regulations being issued; it's the significant incentives.  Let's not kid ourselves.  You can write the regulations, boss.  It ain't going, no matter what the state does, without these tax incentives. 

Across the country, the Recovery Act invests about $14 billion in renewables by allowing wind producers not only to access the investment tax credit, but also supports production tax credits.  It also -- thanks to the Recovery Act, the Department of Energy is spending $6 billion to underwrite up to $60 billion in loans -- $60 billion in loans for renewable-energy projects in the next 18 months.  And that's for projects just like the one we have here in Delaware.

Basically, between all our efforts, all of our efforts -- I mean everyone in this room, including the citizens of this state, we can finally truly get serious about our commitment to renewable energy of all types.  Not any of these things are enough.  You need to create the synergy to get this thing moving.  And we have the combination, the intellectual horsepower, the ingenuity, the policy changes needed that government had to supply to incentivize businesses to move in ways that they want to move in cooperation with the public sector.

But this is more than just a new source of energy, in my view.  And I go back to the purpose of the Recovery Act, which contains this money, these direct and indirect tax expenditures.  It is a new source of job creation, a new place for America to assert international leadership in climate change.  And most important, it's a way to build a platform -- build a platform for the economy of the future.  John, it's not just the platforms you're going to build for these windmills; it goes much more than that.  It's a fundamentally new approach to creating jobs that are not exportable, that pay a decent living union wage, and allow people to be able to turn to their kids and say, honey, it's going to be okay.  It's going to be okay.

I want to remind you of what -- President Obama and I have a simple proposition we both independently, and when we ran together, jointly talked about:  The measure of whether or not we succeed in economic growth is not whether the GDP increases; it's whether or not we increase the ranks of the middle class; it's whether or not we raise the living standard of middle-class workers.

I remind you, we had great economic growth in the end of the 19th century.  But guess what; they weren't decent-paying jobs.  So if we went out and created another 10 million jobs paying minimum wage, we would view that as a failure, a failure.  The middle class has been left behind.  It will not be left behind on our watch.  And a green economy is the automobile of the future.  It is the technology of the future. 

And so, folks, the economy and the environment, for the first time in my 37 years of holding high public office, they are the same shade of green.  We used to have those arguments, Bob, about whether or not by moving to a green economy we were going to cost ourselves jobs, cost ourselves economic opportunity.  Well, it's the opposite now.  We've reached that point, as I said earlier, that inflection point where jobs, economic growth, and the environment are the same shade of green, Gov.

And so I see firsthand everywhere I go -- a couple of weeks ago, as I said, I was at a transformer plant in Missouri, by the way, run by the UAW, putting people back to work as a consequence of building new wind farm projects out there in the central part of the state.  As a consequence of that order, because of the tax credits made available, they're building another new 100 windmills out there.  Guess what; they had to build these turbines.  I mean, they -- excuse me, had to build these transformers.  And it saved jobs, good-paying jobs.  So this, in a nutshell, is the story of the Recovery Act.

This is a story of how a new economy predicated on innovation, the environment, and efficiency is inspiring the kind of growth we need to build the 21st century to lead the world once again.  This is a story that stretches across Delaware, up and down our state, and throughout the entire country.  And it's a story we're writing together.  We've heard for years that a greener economy is going to benefit our grandkids -- and it will.  It clearly will.  But guess what.  It also will jumpstart our economy today.  That's the whole story. 

The whole story is that building a green economy is for us, as well as our children.  It's going to increase the bottom lines through greater efficiency, lower gas prices, reducing dependence on foreign oil, return America to it's rightful place as the leading edge of progress in the world.  And those of you who travel the world are saddened when you find out we're not viewed that way in so many other countries.  We plan on recapturing that. 

As we do all that, we're leaving men and women with jobs that cannot be exported; jobs that will form the foundation for this new economy; and jobs that they can keep forever.  This right here, right here, is how we're  going to rebuild the economy.  And this right here is how we'll quite literally begin to change the world.

So I want to thank the brilliant professors here, and the students here at the university for your innovative notions, and your willingness to plow into this for so long, for so many years; finally beginning to be rewarded; finally beginning to be listened to.

I want to thank the Governor for his leadership, and it's real; it’s genuine.  I want to thank the private sector for deciding that this is a place where we should be investing.  And I want to thank Ken Salazar and my colleagues in the Senate for being so supportive -- so supportive of this kind of leap. 

But I want to make it clear to you.  If all we do -- if all we do is create one wind farm out there -- if we don't, as a consequence of that, restore our steel plants; if we don't, as a consequence of that, restore jobs -- go through the numbers, and I will not take the time now -- if we do what we have at our disposal to do right here in Delaware, we're going to save tens of millions of dollars; we're going to create hundreds of good, durable, sustaining jobs, and we're going to lead the country in renewing our commitment to innovation and transforming this economy.  And I've always believed that's what this university had the capacity to be on the ground floor doing.  And, once again, you are, Mr. President.

So to all of you I say thank you.  God bless you for what you're doing.  And may God protect our troops.  Thank you.  (Applause.)

END

Dean, Carville Warn Specter: Shape Up Or Face Primary

Huffington Post

Sam Stein

Less than a week into his tenure as a Democrat and Sen. Arlen Specter is already stepping sharply on the toes of party elders. Key Democratic figures warned on Monday that their newly minted colleague, despite having the backing of the White House, could face a tough primary challenge should he continue to oppose key tenets of the party's agenda.

"I'm pleased that he saw the light and decided he would be a better fit for the Democratic Party and I think you have to allow for his political views to evolve," said former DNC chairman Howard Dean in an interview with the Huffington Post. "But he won't win the Democratic primary by taking the position that you should not have [the Employee Free Choice Act] or a public option for health insurance... If he takes these kinds of views, of course there is going to be a Democratic primary."

In a separate interview with the Huffington Post, Democratic strategist James Carville was equally as sour on Specter's recent party switch, calling the defection a potential "major event in terms of how the Senate conducts its business," but "a relatively minor event in political history."

"[Specter] was the least reliable Republican. So he will just switch to become the least reliable Democrat," said the longtime Clinton confidant and author of the upcoming book, "40 More Years: How the Democrats Will Rule the Next Generation." "I wouldn't try to make much more out of it than the political survivor comes up with one more act in a long running play of political survival... The one thing I will give him is I will give him some points for candor for being so upfront about [his switch]."

"I'm not sure this is going to have a great ending," added Carville, who has worked extensively in Pennsylvania politics. "He could get primaried, you know... If [Rep. Joe] Sestak runs, [Specter] will have to fight."

The remarks come a day after Specter, appearing on Meet the Press, insisted that he had not pledged to be a "loyal Democrat" as a pre-requisite for switching party affiliations. He also restated his opposition to the Employee Free Choice Act, which he came out against while still a Republican, and said he would not support a public option for health care insurance as part of a reform package.

Specter's position on the former issue is shaping up to be the linchpin to whether the labor community would support him in a Democratic primary. And on Monday, a major official with the AFL-CIO warned that if the Senator didn't change his view on the legislation (perhaps, in the form of a compromise bill) he wouldn't get the union's support.

"Those decisions will be made by people in the state, and our members in the state know who will stand with them," Richard Trumka, the secretary-treasurer of the AFL-CIO, told ABC's Top Line. "And if Arlen Specter -- he stood with them in the past -- if he continues to stand with them, they'll support him. If he doesn't, they won't support him."

Meanwhile, another union official, in a conversation with the Huffington Post, noted that " both AFSCME and Teamsters endorsed Tom Ridge over the Democrat in [the gubernatorial race in] 1998," pointing to the recent discussion of Ridge putting his hat in the ring for the 2010 Republican senatorial nomination. "Union support for Ridge is not unprecedented in the state," the official added.

As it stands now, Specter's chance to be the Democratic nominee in that race seems relatively solid. The White House has committed itself to campaigning with and raising funds for the Senate veteran. And his poll numbers against Pat Toomey -- the only Republican candidate to official in the race -- are rock solid.

That said, in his interview with the Huffington Post, Howard Dean scoffed at the notion that other Democrats in Pennsylvania will cede the race to Specter if they believe he is vulnerable.

"You don't clear the field in a place like Pennsylvania," said the former Vermont Governor. "You only clear the field by merit. Pennsylvania is too big to have some of these people put your arm round you and say it is not the right time.... and labor is a powerful force in that state."

For GOP, it's Coleman or bust

Politico

By MANU RAJU & JOSH KRAUSHAAR

Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter’s shocking decision last week to become a Democrat has upped the ante in the never-ending Minnesota Senate race, providing a strong incentive for Republicans to hold out until every last appeal is exhausted.

With former Sen. Norm Coleman now standing between Democrats and their 60-seat supermajority, the GOP is prepared to back the Republican’s appeal to the federal level if even a shred of doubt emerges in the case currently before the Minnesota Supreme Court.

“This makes it pretty darn important,” said Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, of the race following Specter’s switch. “I expect they will pursue the appeals until they are exhausted, whenever that may be. … I would assume if they were unsuccessful in the Minnesota Supreme Court, there may very well be an appeal to the United States Supreme Court.”

Democrats, meanwhile, are planning a full-scale public pressure campaign to force Coleman to concede should the court affirm a three-judge panel’s ruling that Al Franken is the winner. Democrats have already begun using the race’s elevated importance to raise money, and they’re mounting a fresh campaign to pressure Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, a Republican, to sign an election certificate once the state Supreme Court rules.

“Pawlenty’s signature is very, very important,” said Sen. Chuck Schumer, the Democratic chairman of the Rules and Administration Committee, which oversees election disputes. “We expect it to happen after the Supreme Court of Minnesota rules. …. If he refuses to sign, we’ll have to cross that bridge when we come to it.”

A key issue for Democrats is whether to seat Franken in the Senate even if Pawlenty withholds his signature from the election certificate. In the wake of the recent flap over seating Sen. Roland Burris (D-Ill.), Democrats have set a precedent that to be seated in the Senate, a candidate needs a signed certificate from the sitting governor and secretary of state.

Democrats won’t say whether they’ll try to overcome a possible GOP filibuster by seating Franken if Pawlenty refuses to sign the certificate. But with Specter standing as the 59th Democrat, Democrats need just one GOP defection to break a filibuster in order to win Franken’s seating.

On Thursday, several Republicans said they expected any further appeals by Coleman to be fully supported by their conference, though some acknowledged that the party consensus could be fractured if Coleman continues to lose soundly before the courts.

“If they affirm a lower court’s ruling, then yeah I think it probably gets more difficult in each step of the process to continue to elevate it,” said Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.), a member of GOP leadership. He later added that there would be “broad support for whatever decision Norm and his camp make.”

Pawlenty’s role is central to the dispute, and the question of whether Pawlenty must sign the election certificate after the ruling by the state’s highest court is unclear. Coleman’s lawyers say there is a legal gray area as to whether Pawlenty should sign the certificate if there is a federal appeal pending, and the governor – who is eying a run for the White House in 2012 — says that he’ll follow the direction of the courts.

Pawlenty’s handling of the matter could endear him to the GOP base, but it might also infuriate some Minnesota voters if he seeks reelection as governor next year.

Pawlenty, however, may have no choice in the matter. As part of the fight before the state’s high court, where oral arguments are scheduled for June 1, Franken’s team is likely to ask for a ruling on whether Pawlenty is required to sign an election certificate even if the loser appeals the case to federal court, according to Sen. Robert Menendez, chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.

“If the court does that, there would be no opportunity for circumvention by Pawlenty,” Menendez said Thursday.

Last week, the White House-allied Americans United for Change launched a new advertisement, which is airing in Twin Cities and Rochester, Minn. cable markets, calling on Pawlenty to do his “legal duty” and sign an election certificate once the state’s highest court rules.

Republicans dismiss those tactics, and say that Coleman is fighting to ensure that some 4,900 absentee ballots are properly counted, as he argued Thursday in a new brief filed with the state Supreme Court.

National Republicans are eager to see Coleman continue fighting as long as he can – even to the federal level, a process that could take many months. But they are wary of being viewed as directing the fight out of Washington, saying that the decision remains up to Coleman, who can expect the full party’s financial and political backing should he appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court – or wage a new lawsuit in federal district court.

“Obviously it takes on added significance now with Specter’s switch,” Thune said, adding that Coleman’s “strongest argument” that Minnesota counties violated the Constitution’s equal protection clause by using different standards for counting absentee ballots is ripe for federal courts.

Cornyn, who views the race as his first of the cycle, added that he’s “not advising them, I’m just watching. That will have to be determined by Sen. Coleman and his legal team.”

Democrats believe that they are making headway in their argument that the GOP is intentionally dragging the fight out to keep the seat empty.

“I saw this cartoon that says, ‘Al Franken, a final decision has been made, you are now the senator. And President Sasha Obama would like to swear you in,’’” said Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), the majority whip. “I think Cornyn’s idea is to drag this on as long as possible – he said as much – and I think that’s unfair to the voters of Minnesota.”

Menendez also sent out a fundraising plea saying that Republicans will now become “more desperate” now that Specter is a Democrat.

“Norm Coleman will dig in his heels and fight even harder to deny us that filibuster-proof 60th seat.”

The GOP disputes that contention and says that Coleman is simply following the legal appeals set out by law and has a legitimate case to be made before the state’s highest court. And Senate Republicans are warning Democrats will overreach if Franken is seated in the Senate chamber since the GOP will lose their ability to force concessions on major bills by using the filibuster.

“If you lose a case and you feel like there’s a mistake, then you have a right to appeal,” said Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), the No. 3 Republican in the Senate. “That’s why we have a system of justice, particularly when we’re protecting the individual’s right to vote.”

University of Minnesota political science professor Larry Jacobs said that, with the stakes so high, Republicans have nothing left to lose in blocking Franken from being seated – and that the Minnesota Senate race has “just become the last stand at the Alamo” for the GOP.

“The Specter decision makes the Franken seating that much more urgent and politically explosive,” Jacobs said.

Iraq security at risk in crackdown on militias who fought al-Qaeda

The Times of London

James Hider in Baghdad

Iraq’s impressive security gains over the past 18 months are looking increasingly fragile as the government cracks down on US-backed Sunni militias who turned on al-Qaeda.

Government forces arrested another commander of the so-called Sunni Awakening Councils over the weekend, even as senior officials warned that al-Qaeda and the ousted Baath Party of Saddam Hussein were trying to launch new attacks to coincide with a planned US army withdrawal from inside Iraqi cities by the end of next month.

The Awakening Councils are largely made up of former Sunni insurgents who started fighting their erstwhile al-Qaeda allies in 2006, angered at the extremists’ bloody attempts to spark a civil war with the Shia community.

On Saturday, Iraqi police and US forces arrested Mullah Nadim al-Jabouri and his two brothers, the leaders of the Awakening Council in Balad, just north of Baghdad, on terrorism charges. It was the latest in a string of arrests of militia leaders whose forces, combined with the US Army’s troop escalation, halted a civil war that was tearing Iraq apart.

Now leaders of the militias, who still guard their communities against al-Qaeda attacks, are accusing the Government of trying to undermine them, playing into the hands of the terrorists.

“We signed a ceasefire agreement with American forces, just as we signed an agreement to grant us immunity from the courts, even if we killed half the American army or shot down a plane,” Mullah Jebouri said from his jail cell. “The case has been raised because I was in armed groups before ... The complaints have been raised against us because we were in armed groups falsely accused of killing and kidnapping.”

Many Awakening leaders accuse the families of al-Qaeda members they have killed in fighting of trying to have them arrested now for those very killings. In Iraq, an arrest warrant can be issued if two people level accusations at a suspect. Some leaders who were detained by Iraqi forces have since been released after the US Army raised objections.

The head of a powerful Awakening group in west Baghdad said the arrests were politically motivated by parties loyal to Iran, long accused of trying to exert its hegemony. “It’s Iran targeting us, I don’t think any decent Iraqi would target us,” Abu Ibrahim said. “It’s because the Awakening Councils stopped the Iranian expansion into Iraq.”

He said that Nouri al-Maliki, the Iraqi Prime Minister, was trying to prevent the Iranian-backed parties from sabotaging the reconciliation process, adding that the Shia premier had promised to have the mullah released.

Raad Ali, the Awakenings leader in the war-torn west Baghdad sector of Ghazaliyah, said the Americans had now abandoned the Sunni militias they once nurtured. “I think there’s a deal between them and the Government. We don’t have a real Government, we just have political parties, and some of them have good ties with Iran and Syria and they have a special agenda,” he said. “The truth is, they are trying to destroy us.”

While the militia leaders said none of their men were preparing to revert to their insurgent ways, a Kurdish member of the Iraqi parliament’s defence and security committee said defections were certain if the Government did not support the armed groups.

“I definitely expect some to go back [to fighting the American army and government forces]," Adel Barwali said. He added that part of the problem in the Iraqi Government, rather than the Americans, paying them, was finding the money in a budget hit hard by the economic crisis and the slump in oil prices. Militiamen frequently complain of delayed or cancelled salaries.

Mr Barwali also warned that Iraqi security forces are not yet ready to take over full control of Iraqi cities, and echoed the concerns of US commanders that the US withdrawal should be delayed in some areas. “Al-Qaeda can creep back in, especially in Baghdad,” he said.

However, the Government refused yesterday to make any change to the schedule for the departure of US troops, even as two more car bombs killed four people outside the Oil Ministry in Baghdad. 

Do Blue Dog Democrats have clout to hold down spending?

McLatchy Newspapers

By David Lightman | McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON — Moderate Democrats could hold the key to the fate of President Barack Obama's agenda this year.

They have the numbers to be decisive in the House of Representatives — the 51-member Blue Dog Coalition could doom an initiative if it sticks together, since Democrats control 256 seats, it takes 218 votes to win, and no Republicans have voted for major Democratic budget bills this year.

So far, though, it's debatable how much sway the Democratic centrists have had.

They declared victory last week when they got written promises from Obama and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., that they'd support paying for major new spending measures with offsetting spending cuts or higher taxes to avoid driving deficits even higher.

The Blue Dogs also claimed victory in helping derail an effort to change Senate rules to make it easier to cut off debate on global warming legislation. Moderates wanted a full airing of an issue that many fear could mean higher energy costs or burdens on hometown industries.

Critics, however, find those minor victories. The Obama-Pelosi pledge was a promise that, in the heat of battle this fall, could be easily skirted.

"It's hard to be effective on deficits with the economy in a deep slump," said House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman, D-Calif.

The emissions policy was also pushed by influential senators from both parties.

Even so, there's no doubt that the Blue Dog Coalition is full of potential.

"They're all afraid of us. Fear of us is its own motivator," said Rep. Jim Cooper, D-Tenn.

And they're not afraid to be ornery.

"I'm here to represent my constituency. I'm not here to represent anyone in the leadership," said Rep. Michael Michaud, D-Maine.

Still, Cooper conceded, so far it's hard to say where the coalition has made a difference.

"Often idealism clashes with reality," he said. "I'd like to think if we weren't there, things would be worse."

The Blue Dogs formed 14 years ago, as the dwindling number of conservative and moderate Democrats decided they could be more effective as a bloc. Their name came from one of two sources.

Some attribute it to the paintings of Louisiana artist George Rodrigue, whose paintings of blue dogs were fixtures in some lawmakers' offices. Another explanation is that former Rep. Pete Geren, D-Texas, coined the term after observing that "Yellow Dog Democrats," generally Southerners who'd rather vote for a yellow dog than a Republican, had been "choked blue" by party liberals.

Today, members come from all over the nation, though most tend to be from the South. They share a common interest in fiscal discipline, though they tend to diverge on other issues.

There are two views of how much clout they have at the moment.

One version is that they've done well. "The number one point of concern is we need enforceable budget discipline," said Rep. Earl Pomeroy, D-N.D., and they got that assurance from the top.

"Creating a new non-emergency tax cut or entitlement expansion would require offsetting revenue increases or spending reductions," Obama pledged in an April 24 letter.

Pelosi and House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., went further four days later, writing that the concept would be used for four bills affecting middle class tax cuts, alternative minimum tax relief, estate tax provisions and changes in the Medicare rate for doctors.

"If those criteria are not met," Hoyer said later, "we will not bring that legislation to the floor."

Critics, however, noted that such a pledge could set up a dangerous showdown. Suppose the Senate does not go along with the agreement — would it then be doomed in the House?

Blue Dogs think so.

"I hope this is a confidence-building step we can use to help address other issues,' said Rep. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin, D-S.D.

Gary Jacobson, a political science professor at the University of California, San Diego, warned, however, that "Pelosi doesn't control the Senate, and neither does Obama. They can say 'We're on your side,' but delivering results is another matter entirely."

Even in the House, it's unclear what the Blue Dogs can deliver.

On budget issues, for instance, holding the coalition together has been tough. Earlier this year, the group urged lawmakers to freeze nondefense discretionary spending, which includes most popular domestic programs, at the rate of inflation, which is virtually zero.

Instead, Congress last week approved a budget with an increase of about 2.9 percent over the next five years. Seventeen Democrats, including 13 Blue Dogs, opposed the measure.

"We were handed a historic debt by the previous administration, and with recent spending measures, this budget does not improve the situation and will only bring us back to where we started in January," explained Rep. Parker Griffith, D-Ala.

Democratic leaders face another problem: Many of the moderates come from the most politically vulnerable congressional districts. Many were first elected in 2006 and 2008, when a Democratic tide swept the country.

No one knows if that momentum will continue in 2010; moderate members may have to show some independence from the White House and Pelosi.

One way to do that is to stick with other moderates and show that a centrist view will be heard, especially on thorny issues such as health care, Michaud said. But can Blue Dogs put aside their demand that a costly overhaul not be fiscally irresponsible?

Hard to say, Cooper said. "Often," he said, "idealism meets reality."

In Baghdad, Iraqis fear return of sectarian bloodshed

McLatchy Newspapers

BAGHDAD — Jassim Hussein follows the news. He's well aware that violence in his country is creeping up again, and he's worried.

Not that you'd know it judging by the way he spent Saturday night: out with his wife celebrating their 25th wedding anniversary at a popular open-air creamery and cafe in Baghdad's Karrada neighborhood, their three children in tow.

"Yes, we're concerned. We feel it inside," said Hussein, a government administrator. "But that doesn't mean life stops."

Hussein and his family were far from the only ones out Saturday night. In fact, Hassan's Creamery was packed with couples holding hands, with girlfriends gossiping and laughing, with children chasing each other across the cafe's brightly lit courtyard.

"I think people just want to enjoy the security while they can," Hussein said. "A year ago we couldn't do this. Maybe soon it will be that way again."

Over the past two months, Iraq has witnessed a sharp increase in deadly bombings, and there is widespread worry that last year's security gains may be unraveling.

So far, fears of renewed violence don't appear to be changing habits here. Even at night, restaurants, cafes and parks are still busy, a far cry from 2007, when most ventured out only for essential reasons.

Still, Iraqis say they're nervous about the upswing in violence and what it may mean. They say they're worried things will get worse, concerned that Iraq's security forces aren't ready to stand on their own, and afraid that the country's ethnic, sectarian and political factions are still far from reconciliation.

Iraqis are acutely aware that large-scale bombings aimed at civilians, and especially at Shiite Muslims, are on the rise. Many said last month's explosions are reminiscent of the violence of early 2006 that sparked Iraq's sectarian war.

"I think the security is starting to go backwards," said Hussein Falih, a 37-year-old police officer. "The situation on the streets feels different, even if we are not behaving different. We are on alert."

Falih's fears are far from unfounded. By several measures, April was the bloodiest month Iraq has seen this year.

In Baghdad alone, more than 200 people died in attacks last month, compared with 99 in March and 46 in February, according to a McClatchy count.

The last time McClatchy recorded more than 200 civilian deaths in one month in the capital was more than a year ago, in March 2008.

At least 520 people were injured in attacks in Baghdad in April, the most since November.

Eighteen U.S. troops died across Iraq last month, the highest toll in seven months.

Most of April's bombings targeted large crowds of Shiites. On April 6 a series of seven explosions killed at least 32 people in Baghdad. Back-to-back bombings the following two days killed at least 15 in the mostly Shiite district of Kadhemiyah. More than 50 died in a suicide attack targeting Shiite pilgrims in Diyala province April 23. Roughly the same number were killed April 29 in three explosions in the east Baghdad Shiite slum of Sadr City.

Publicly, U.S. and Iraqi officials have said the renewed violence is not an indication that recent security gains are reversing.

Maj. Gen. David Perkins, the top U.S. military spokesman in Iraq, told reporters here this week that American commanders don't see cause for alarm primarily because recent attacks have not yet triggered revenge killings, the return of Shiite militias or sectarian-motivated violence.

Perkins said the U.S. military believes al Qaida in Iraq is to blame for most of April's bombings. He said extremists are attempting to incite sweeping Iraqi-on-Iraqi violence by carrying out high-profile attacks that target Shiite civilians. So far the military hasn't seen signs that al Qaida's plan is working, Perkins said.

"They may be accomplishing their task, which is to kill a lot of innocent civilians," he said. "But they are not accomplishing their purpose, which is to generate ethno-sectarian violence ... and chaos."

For the most part, Iraqis agree there is little evidence so far that suggests widespread sectarian killing will return. But many said they believe things could quickly change. And while most said they're confident violence will never get as bad as it was 18 months ago, many said they expect attacks to increase as the U.S. begins drawing down in Iraq.

"I'm worried," said Sadir Sami, who is 32 and looking for work. "A month ago, I felt safe leaving my house in the morning. But now I think twice about where I'm going. I still go, but I am more conscious of things around me."

Sami said his cousin was among those killed in an explosion in Baghdad's Karrada neighborhood on April 23.

"That's what changed it for me," he said. "I think this will bring the militias back."

Khadija Ahmed, a 25-year-old newlywed, said she's afraid Iraq's security forces won't be able to stand on their own when the U.S. is no longer supporting them.

"They need the help still," she said. "They won't be able to control things like the Americans."

Her husband, Ali, agreed. "I feel like things might explode again," he said. "In general, things are still OK. But we're preparing for that to change now."

Ahmed Muhsin, a 23-year-old waiter at Hassan's, said he's also concerned about what will happen as the U.S. role in Iraq diminishes.

"For a long time we didn't want (the Americans)," he said. "But now we're worried about how it will be when they go."

Hussein Ali Shukar, who sells frozen juice at a popular park along the Tigris River in Baghdad, said he's seen no drop-off in business since attacks have increased.

"I think it will have to get worse for people to really be afraid," he said. "Even if we are worried, we are used to explosions. I still go in the evenings to Adhamiyah to eat outside and smoke sheesha."

Ayas Abu Ahmed, a 41-year-old clothing merchant, attributed the recent violence to political factions that lost in provincial elections held here in January.

"They don't like the results, and they don't want to leave the power with the people who have it now," he said. "So they don't want the situation to be stable."

Though he's concerned about attacks, Ahmed said he isn't living his life any differently.

"This is still very good compared to what we had before," he said. "I'm not going to hide in my house. I'm going to live."

(Reilly reports for the Merced Sun-Star. McClatchy special correspondent Jenan Hussein contributed to this story.)

U.S. Options in Pakistan Limited

Washington Post

Nation Rife With Security Issues, Infighting, Anti-American Sentiment

By Karen DeYoung
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, May 4, 2009

As Taliban forces edged to within 60 miles of Islamabad late last month, the Obama administration urgently asked for new intelligence assessments of whether Pakistan's government would survive. In briefings last week, senior officials said, President Obama and his National Security Council were told that neither a Taliban takeover nor a military coup was imminent and that the Pakistani nuclear arsenal was safe.

Beyond the immediate future, however, the intelligence was far from reassuring. Security was deteriorating rapidly, particularly in the mountains along the Afghan border that harbor al-Qaeda and the Taliban, intelligence chiefs reported, and there were signs that those groups were working with indigenous extremists in Pakistan's populous Punjabi heartland.

The Pakistani government was mired in political bickering. The army, still fixated on its historical adversary India, remained ill-equipped and unwilling to throw its full weight into the counterinsurgency fight.

But despite the threat the intelligence conveyed, Obama has only limited options for dealing with it. Anti-American feeling in Pakistan is high, and a U.S. combat presence is prohibited. The United States is fighting Pakistan-based extremists by proxy, through an army over which it has little control, in alliance with a government in which it has little confidence.

The tools most readily at hand are money, weapons, and a mentoring relationship with Pakistan's government and military that alternates between earnest advice and anxious criticism. As criticism has dominated in recent weeks -- along with reports that the administration is wooing Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari's principal political opponent, former prime minister Nawaz Sharif -- the partnership has grown strained.

"What are the Americans trying to do, micromanage our politics?" a senior Pakistani official said testily. "This is not South Vietnam."

As Zardari arrives this week for his first official visit with Obama -- part of a tripartite summit with Afghan President Hamid Karzai -- the administration has asked Congress to quickly approve hundreds of millions of dollars in emergency military aid for Pakistan. That money, and billions more over the next several years, is to come with new authority for the Defense Department to decide what to spend it on.

Obama has also backed a five-year $7.5 billion economic assistance package and is resisting congressional efforts to impose strict conditions on any aid to Pakistan. Last month, the administration orchestrated an international donors' conference in Tokyo that netted $5.5 billion in pledges for Pakistan.

When he sits down with Zardari on Wednesday at the White House, Obama will urge him to put more effort into building domestic support by meeting critical public needs and to resolve his differences with Sharif and others so that he can concentrate on governing, according to officials who discussed sensitive and fluid Pakistan issues on the condition of anonymity.

Of particular concern are hundreds of thousands of Pakistanis who have been displaced by fighting in the North-West Frontier Province, U.S. officials said.

Security proposals up for discussion with Zardari and other members of his high-level delegation include counterinsurgency training for Pakistani army troops at U.S. bases in the Persian Gulf, Afghanistan, the United States or elsewhere. The administration wants to expand a small, in-country training force -- now limited to about 70 Americans -- that is working with the Frontier Corps, the local, poorly armed force in the border regions.

As 17,000 additional U.S. troops deploying to southern Afghanistan this spring and summer begin to push Taliban fighters toward the Pakistan border, there are hopes the extremists can be trapped in "hammer and anvil" operations with Pakistani forces in the southern province of Baluchistan. Right now, however, Pakistan fields only one army brigade and about 40,000 minimally trained and equipped Frontier Corps members in the vast region, according to U.S. officials.

In deference to Pakistani objections, the administration has not initiated covert ground attacks, approved by the Bush administration last year, in mountain villages farther to the north, in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, where it believes high-value al-Qaeda figures are located. But Obama authorized stepped-up attacks on the area by missiles launched from unmanned drone aircraft.

Although the missile attacks are privately approved by the Pakistani government, despite its public denunciations, they are highly unpopular among the public. As Zardari's domestic problems have grown, the Obama administration last month cut the frequency of the attacks. Some senior U.S. officials think they have reached the point of diminishing returns and the administration is debating the rate at which they should continue.

Always simmering, administration concern about Pakistani governance rose sharply last month when the Parliament approved an agreement between regional authorities and the Taliban to authorize sharia, or Islamic law, in the Swat Valley, located about 100 miles northwest of Islamabad. Rather than lay down their arms in exchange, Taliban forces began moving eastward. By the third week in April, they had established a presence in Buner district, 60 miles from the capital, with no apparent government resistance.

The day after the Buner reports surfaced, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton infuriated the Pakistani government by telling Congress it was "abdicating to the Taliban and to the extremists" and that the situation posed a "mortal threat" to the world.

"Absolutely, they're getting irritated," a senior U.S. official said of the Pakistanis. Clinton, he said, "knows she went too far" in her unscripted testimony. "But on the other hand," he said, "it was that kind of statement that helped wake up the Pakistanis."

A Pakistani military offensive in the Buner region was underway Tuesday, even as Obama's national security team met at the White House, and continued through the weekend. Administration officials said they were watching to see whether the military followed through or would simply stop without finishing the job, as it has in the past.

Meanwhile, Pakistan's government says it is in no mood for criticism or conditions on aid. After "billions of dollars were poured into Pakistan under the dictatorship" of Gen. Pervez Musharraf by the Bush administration, Pakistani ambassador to Washington Husain Haqqani said yesterday, the Obama administration has produced little but promises and disapproval of the democratically elected government.

"It is unfair to blame the civilian leadership that is bravely mobilizing the nation against terrorism when it is our American partners who have also slowed us down in the war effort by slowing down the flow of assistance," Haqqani said. "We trust that President Obama's emphasis on Pakistan will also translate promises into deliverables."

"You can't spend more in Iraq and Afghanistan," he said, "and then wonder why the effort in Pakistan is lagging behind."

Flu, Mostly Mild, Has Spread Across U.S.

New York Times

By DENISE GRADY
Published: May 3, 2009

Swine flu has become widespread in the United States, with 226 cases in 30 states and more expected to turn up in additional states in the next few days, federal health officials said Sunday.

“I think it’s circulating all over the U.S.,” Dr. Anne Schuchat, the interim deputy director for science and public health at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said in a news conference. “The virus has arrived, I would say, in most of the country now.”

The good news, Dr. Schuchat said, is that most cases in the United States have been mild, and health officials in Mexico said that cases there seemed to be leveling off.

But Dr. Schuchat said, “I don’t think we’re out of the woods yet.”

She said the virus, called H1N1 by scientists, had a number of unusual features that were cause for concern. It has flared up at a time of year when the flu season is normally ending. It is new, so people probably have little or no resistance to it.

And unlike the common types of seasonal flu, it appears to infect an unusually high percentage of young people. The median age of patients is 17.

“Very few confirmed are over 50,” Dr. Schuchat said. “They tend to be younger. Whether it will pan out in the weeks ahead we don’t know, but it is a pattern that looks different from seasonal influenza.”

Of 30 people hospitalized in this country, she continued, a high proportion are older children and younger adults, a big change from the age groups that generally have the highest risk of needing hospital care for flu: the elderly and the very young.

She said scientists at the C.D.C. were preparing a “seed stock” from virus samples that could be used for a vaccine.

Similar work began several weeks ago to make a vaccine to protect pigs from the H1N1 virus, said Dr. John R. Clifford, the chief veterinary officer for animal health for the Department of Agriculture. He said the new virus had never been found in pigs in this country. But pigs in Canada have contracted it from a human, indicating that the animals are susceptible.

Worldwide, laboratories have now confirmed 898 human cases of the new swine flu in 18 countries, according to the World Health Organization.

Outside the Americas, the country with the most cases is Spain, with 44. All but four involved people who had recently traveled to Mexico, and all are recovering, the Spanish Health Ministry said.

The ministry said it would tighten controls at airports on Monday, but did not say how. Passengers arriving from affected areas have been filling out health questionnaires, and cabin crews have been supplied with gloves and masks.

The possibility that H1N1 might be passed back and forth between humans and pigs was discussed at a World Health Organization news teleconference from Geneva on Sunday. Canadian officials reported on Saturday that an infected farm worker had spread the virus to pigs in Alberta.

Peter K. Ben Embarek, a food safety scientist with the health organization, said there was also a risk that the disease could go the other way: that people who worked closely with sick animals on farms or in slaughterhouses could catch it from the pigs. In the past, he said, people have caught other types of swine flu from contact with infected pigs.

“Of course that could happen again here,” Dr. Ben Embarek said, adding that it was important to avoid exposing people to sick animals — and also to avoid exposing pigs to sick people.

Dr. Ben Embarek and other health officials reiterated that it was safe to eat properly cooked pork and also cured pork products like ham.

“You can continue to eat safely your prosciutto,” he said.

The cases in the pigs in Canada were detected because of a policy introduced months ago in Alberta, which requires farmers and veterinarians to report all cases of flu in pigs to the government. But Jurgen Preugschas, the chairman of the Canadian Pork Council, said the country’s decision on April 24 to increase oversight of the pork industry, in response to the H1N1 outbreak, probably led health officials to react quickly to the report from the Alberta farm.

In the United States, farmers are not required to report flu in pigs to the government. Dr. Clifford said that influenza was endemic in pigs in this country. Every year, he added, some pigs sick with the flu are tested and the virus is analyzed, and the new strain of H1N1 has never been found in pigs in this country.

“Just like people have flu seasons, so do pigs, normally in fall and winter,” Dr. Clifford said, adding that vaccine is widely used, and that some 58 million doses were produced last year for pigs in the United States. If a new vaccine is produced to prevent H1N1, it will be up to individual hog producers to decide whether to use it.

In New York, researchers are still trying to figure out why so many students at St. Francis Preparatory School in Queens became infected; 59 cases, all of them mild, have been linked to the school.

Nancy Clark, assistant commissioner for environmental disease prevention at the New York City Health Department, said one suspect, a new ventilation system at the school, did not appear to be a cause.

“We inspected many components of it, and generally found it to be in good condition and clean,” Ms. Clark said.

Victoria Burnett contributed reporting from Madrid, Ian Austen from Ottawa and Anemona Hartocollis from New York.

A version of this article appeared in print on May 4, 2009, on page A10 of the New York edition.

Karzai Enlists Former Warlord as Running Mate

New York Times

By ABDUL WAHEED WAFA
Published: May 4, 2009

KABUL, Afghanistan — President Hamid Karzai named a powerful former warlord as one of his two vice-presidential running mates on Monday, a day of scattered insurgent attacks that left as many as 23 people dead.

The vice-presidential candidate, Muhammad Qasim Fahim, was Mr. Karzai’s vice president in his early administration, but was pushed aside in 2004 as Mr. Karzai tried to move away from traditional power blocs and bring more technocrats into the government. The government in Kabul, however, remains weak and troubled, and Mr. Fahim’s return appears to be a sign that Mr. Karzai is reaching for strong partners with broad support among former mujahedeen parties.

Over the weekend, a strong rival pulled out of the race, removing one of the main obstacles to Mr. Karzai’s re-election. Gul Agha Shirzai, the governor of Nangarhar Province, announced his withdrawal on Saturday, saying he had met for four hours with Mr. Karzai on Friday night, according to Afghan news reports.

Mr. Karzai’s second running mate is a current vice president, Muhammad Karim Khalili, officials at the presidential palace said. He is a powerful Shiite leader and also a former mujahedeen commander.

He named his running mates as he officially registered for re-election at the Independent Electoral Commission. The vote is set for Aug. 20.

Roads around the presidential palace and the main road to Jalalabad were blocked by security forces for almost two hours while Mr. Karzai visited the electoral commission to file and submit the necessary documents.

Underscoring the continuing tension as the election campaign season begins, a suicide bomber killed the mayor of Mehterlam, the capital of Laghman Province, on Monday.

The mayor, Mohammad Rahim, was killed along with three bodyguards and his driver by a suicide attack on their vehicle at the entrance of the mayor’s office, a spokesman for the provincial governor said.

Laghman is about 80 miles east of Kabul and has been considered relatively peaceful. Other reports said a child had also died in the attack.

In another attack, a bus struck a land mine — believed to have been newly laid — in the southern province of Zabul, killing 12 civilians, a district official said.

Also in Zabul, Taliban guerrillas ambushed a security firm convoy, killing six Afghan security guards in the convoy and two civilians nearby, Reuters reported.

Sangar Rahimi contributed reporting from Kabul, and Taimoor Shah from Kandahar.

U.S. Offers Mixed Assessment of Pakistan’s Security

New York Times

By ELISABETH BUMILLER
Published: May 4, 2009

WASHINGTON — Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Monday that he was comfortable that Pakistan’s nuclear weapons were secure, but that he was “gravely concerned” about the progress the Taliban had made inside both Pakistan and Afghanistan.

In a news briefing at the Pentagon, Admiral Mullen offered a mixed assessment about security in the region in advance of three-way meetings this week between President Obama and President Asif Ali Zardari of Pakistan and President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan.

Admiral Mullen, who was in the region last week, said that he did not think for now that the United States had to worry that militants would get hold of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal. “We all recognize, obviously, the worst downside with respect to Pakistan is that those nuclear weapons come under the control of terrorists,” Admiral Mullen said. “I don’t think that’s going to happen. I don’t see that in any way imminent whatsoever at this particular point in time.”

But at the same time, Admiral Mullen said that the main military focus of the United States must now shift from Iraq to Afghanistan and that the gains of the Taliban in the region threatened American interests in the region as well as the safety of Americans at home.

“I say that with the full knowledge that we still have about 136,000 American troops in Iraq, and that the fighting there isn’t over,” Admiral Mullen said. “We remain committed to the mission we’ve been given in Iraq, make no mistake, and we will stay there long enough, in keeping with their agreement, to ensure the Iraqis can provide for their own security.”

Nonetheless, he said, “Afghanistan has been an economy-of-force operation for far too long.” Admiral Mullen said it was no longer about “can-do anymore, this is about must-do, and we must do more over at least the next two years, starting now.”

Admiral Mullen declined to offer a public assessment of the leadership of Mr. Zardari, who Pentagon officials consider increasingly weak, but he did say that Mr. Zardari needed to face a number of economic and political challenges at home.

Obama Calls for New Curbs on Offshore Tax Havens

New York Times

By JEFF ZELENY and BRIAN KNOWLTON
Published: May 4, 2009

WASHINGTON — President Obama presented a far-reaching set of proposals on Monday that are aimed at the tax benefits enjoyed by companies and wealthy individuals harboring cash in offshore accounts.

 These steps, he said, would be the first in a much broader effort to fix a “broken tax system.”

Mr. Obama made the announcement in the Grand Foyer of the White House, standing alongside Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner and the Internal Revenue Service commissioner, Douglas Shulman. His remarks echoed the sentiment he voiced again and again during the presidential campaign when he pledged to crack down on overseas tax evaders.

The proposed tax overhaul, which will be detailed later this week when the White House presents its formal budget, could help raise $210 billion in revenue over 10 years, the administration estimates.

While most Americans pay their fair share of taxes, Mr. Obama said, “there are others who are shirking theirs, and many are aided and abetted by a broken tax system.” Multinational corporations, he said, paid an average tax rate of just 2 percent on their foreign revenue. And some wealthy individuals hide their fortunes in foreign tax havens.

The president thus set up a frontal clash with big business over the tax advantages enjoyed by companies with extensive overseas operations.

Large multinational companies like Microsoft, General Electric and Cisco Systems have been bracing for such an initiative from the Obama administration. Critics of the approach say that it could lead not to the administration’s hoped-for repatriation of taxes but rather to job losses or higher prices as companies try to compensate for a greater tax burden.

Martin Regalia, chief economist of the United States Chamber of Commerce, challenged the administration’s reasoning.

“The United States is the only major industrialized country which double-taxes the overseas earnings of our companies,” he said in a statement. By limiting companies’ ability to defer tax payments, he said, “you limit the ability of U.S. companies to compete, you impede growth in the U.S. economy, and you cause the loss of jobs — both at the companies directly impacted and companies in their supply chains.”

Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader, said he supported tax reform and efforts to crack down on tax evaders. But, he added, “I cannot endorse a plan that gives preferential treatment to foreign companies at the expense of U.S. companies.”

He called the plan “a significant tax increase on companies representing 44 percent of total U.S. private employment” and said that in the depths of recession, it seemed “particularly harmful to our shared goal of creating more American jobs rather than driving them overseas."

President Obama addressed some of the concerns Monday, saying that “I want to see our companies remain the most competitive in the world” but that the way to do that was “not to reward companies for moving jobs off our shores or transferring profits” abroad.

One proposed change would restrict companies from deferring the payment of taxes on profit earned overseas. Administration officials said the plan would keep businesses from taking deductions against their taxes by inflating the amount of foreign taxes they paid.

Mr. Obama raised the idea frequently during his presidential campaign. In his remarks to Congress in February, as he outlined his priorities for the year, he pledged to make the tax code more equitable by “finally ending the tax breaks for corporations that ship our jobs overseas.”

The White House said that Mr. Obama is seeking to shut down overseas tax havens in an attempt to “close the international tax gap.”

Mr. Geithner noted that the Group of 20 industrial countries had agreed this year to act against tax havens like Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg and Monaco. Amid such rising pressure, 10 countries have agreed to adopt new international standards, he said.

“For years, we’ve talked about shutting down overseas tax havens,” Mr. Obama said. “That’s what our budget will finally do.”

The president said he hopes to remove the competitive advantage for companies that invest and create jobs overseas, working to replace their tax advantages with incentives to produce jobs in the United States.

American multinational corporations paid only $16 billion in taxes to the United States on $700 billion in foreign earnings — an effective tax rate of 2.3 percent — in 2004, the most recent year for which data are available, according to the White House. It distributed a statement that said that nearly one-third of all foreign profit reported by such corporations in 2003 came from three small low-tax countries: Bermuda, the Netherlands and Ireland.

About 200 companies and trade associations have signed a letter stating that the proposed tax changes would put them at a disadvantage with their rivals.

Cisco Systems, which sells Internet products and services, said in a statement that a change in the tax deferral measure “would adversely impact our ability to invest and grow our business in the U.S.” and place the company at a disadvantage against foreign competitors not subject to American taxes.

Among other companies, Google, the giant Internet search company, said it was monitoring the situation. "At this point it is too early to evaluate the potential effect on Google’s operations as there will likely be multiple proposals considered," Google said in a statement.

In his presidential campaign last year, Mr. Obama often criticized provisions in the tax code that allowed American companies with overseas operations to defer paying taxes on corporate profits, providing that they placed the money back into their foreign subsidiaries.

In his remarks on Monday, the president called for an end to that practice, as well as the closure of loopholes that allow companies and individuals to legally avoid paying billions in taxes through hidden accounts.

The White House said the administration would raise $103.1 billion over 10 years by removing a rule that allows companies to take immediate deductions for overseas expenses while deferring tax payments on profit there, and eliminating loopholes that permit businesses to claim inflated credit against American taxes for foreign taxes paid.

Of this, $74.5 billion would go to “make permanent a tax credit for investment in research and innovation within the United States,” the White House statement said.

The administration also said it would raise $95.2 billion over 10 years by tightening requirements on income shifted from one foreign subsidiary to another in a lower-tax country, making it more difficult for financial institutions and individuals to hide money in offshore accounts, and hiring 800 new I.R.S. staff to tighten international enforcement.

Many of the tax proposals will require Congressional approval and, if passed, none would take force before 2011.

S.&P. 500 Erases 2009 Losses as Stocks Jump

New York Times

By JACK HEALY
Published: May 4, 2009

As stocks climbed on Monday, a leading stock index crossed a milestone that seemed unthinkable during the worst declines of the bear market: It turned positive for the year.

The Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index, a key gauge of the broader market and the benchmark for many investors’ index funds, erased all its 2009 losses just before the close.

Stocks catapulted higher following reports that government stress tests of major banks would offer more cause for cheer than fear about the health of the financial system. Investors also gleaned some hope from signs of improvement in the housing market and the construction industry. And jitters about a swine-flu pandemic seemed to be easing.

The S.&P. 500 jumped 29.72 points, or 3.4 percent, to close at 907.24 points on Monday. This jump finally gave the index a 2009 gain of 0.44 percent after a grinding start to the year.

In contrast, the Nasdaq composite index is up 11.8 percent since the beginning of January, buoyed by gains in technology companies. On Monday, the Nasdaq rose 44.36 points, or 2.6 percent, to 1,763.56.

The Dow Jones industrial average gained 214.33 points, or 2.6 percent, to 8,426.74. Still, the Dow remains down nearly 4 percent for the year to date.

As Wall Street turns in day after day of better performance amid some encouraging signs from the economy, analysts are placing more faith in the stability of a nearly two-month rally in stock markets. Since the stock market plunged to its bear-market lows on March 9, the S.&P. 500 has bounced back nearly 33 percent.

“The fact that we’re not going down and not correcting is important,” said Richard Sparks, vice president of research at Schaeffer’s Investment Research. “It shows the persistence of the rally.”

Still, Mr. Sparks noted that polls of investor sentiment continued to show bearishness and skepticism, and that a considerable amount of money was still lingering on the sidelines. Many analysts worry that stocks could give back much of their gains if rising unemployment prompts a new leg down in the recession, spurring a wave of new credit losses or foreclosures.

But those concerns seemed to be distant shadows on the horizon on Monday. Financial stocks led Wall Street as investors hoped that the government’s stress tests would show that the financial system was in better shape than they had suspected. Bank of America rose 5 percent, and Wells Fargo was more than 9 percent higher.

Energy companies and materials producers climbed higher as the prices of oil and copper rose, pushed up by hints of an economic thaw.

Spending on construction rose 0.3 percent in March from February, the Commerce Department reported, mostly because of a 1.1 percent increase in public construction projects. Residential construction was down 4.1 percent from February, and a third lower than a year earlier.

Also, the National Association of Realtors reported that the number of homes with signed contracts that had not yet closed increased 3.2 percent in March from a month earlier and was slightly higher than a year earlier. Plunging home prices and lower mortgage rates have lured some potential buyers back to the housing markets, reviving some depressed markets.

European markets also rallied, on the heels of a surge that lifted Asian stock markets to their highest levels in months. Indexes in Frankfurt and Paris rose more than 2 percent, with markets in London closed for the day.

Major Gains in Blacks’ Ratings of Their Standard of Living

Gallup

Increases first observed in January; ratings have recovered to early 2008 levels

by Jeffrey M. Jones

PRINCETON, NJ -- Gallup Poll Daily tracking of Americans' assessments of their standard of living finds continued improvement among blacks after a dramatic 31-point spike in January. Blacks' score on Gallup's Standard of Living Index dropped to as low as -1 during the height of the financial crisis last October, remaining low in November and December, but it now stands at +62.

The Standard of Living Index is based on respondents' reported satisfaction with their current standard of living and their assessments of whether it is getting better or getting worse. Positive scores indicate that more Americans have a positive view of their standard of living, and negative scores mean more Americans have a negative view. In general, Americans tend to be more positive than negative when asked about their living standard.

Gallup monitors Americans' reported standard of living as part of its daily polling, which began in January 2008. The results reported here are based on monthly aggregates of roughly 30,000 interviews per month.

On the first of the two Index questions -- measuring overall satisfaction or dissatisfaction with one's current standard of living -- blacks (as well as the broader population of all U.S. adults) have been consistently more likely to say they are satisfied than dissatisfied. However, the gap between the percentage satisfied and the percentage dissatisfied shrank to single digits last fall, with 52% of blacks satisfied and 47% dissatisfied in the November data. Those assessments were essentially unchanged in December, but in January they improved significantly, with nearly 6 in 10 blacks satisfied, and have continued to increase since then to the current 64%.

There has been a similar -- though perhaps more dramatic -- shift in blacks' reports of whether their standard of living is "getting better" or "getting worse," the second of the two Index questions. In October, significantly more blacks said their standard of living was getting worse (49%) rather than better (37%). But by January, those numbers had switched places, with 52% of blacks saying their standard of living was getting better and only 32% saying worse. Now, 59% of blacks report their standard of living as improving.

The continued improvement on both Index components has pushed blacks' Standard of Living Index score to +62 in April.

Notably, blacks' score on this index has exceeded that for whites in each of the last three months. Prior to that, whites' score had always been higher than blacks' score.

It is important to note that the data reported here are based on self-reports of standard of living. It is not clear that blacks' objective standard of living has improved greatly in the last few months. Therefore, much of the decline and subsequent improvement during the last year may have been largely perceptual in nature, as opposed to reflecting concrete change.

Given the timing of the recent increase in January, it is hard not to believe it reflects enthusiasm among the black community about Barack Obama's presidency. Blacks may perceive their standard of living to be improving under a Democratic administration -- headed by an African-American president -- which promises to be more in tune with their needs than the prior Republican administration.

Gallup has documented overwhelming support for Obama among the black community, with more than 9 in 10 saying they approve of the job he is doing as president.

There has not been a similar pattern of change in whites' perceptions of their standard of living. After a slight improvement from a +34 Index score in December to +42 in January, the Index score for whites fell back into the 30s. To the extent that whites were hopeful about the prospects of a new administration, it apparently was on a much smaller level and was shorter lived than was the case among blacks.

However, even if the recent improvement is driven to a degree by enthusiasm for changes in the political guard, it is important to point out that blacks' current ratings of their standard of living are similar to what they were in the first quarter of 2008, before the economy started to deteriorate rapidly. Thus, the recent improvement may simply represent a restoration of earlier levels, rather than an improvement above and beyond what had existed before.

Bottom Line

It is unlikely that the election of a new president would have much of an immediate effect on most individuals' actual standard of living. Most Americans would continue to work in the same jobs that they had before the election, with the same income and the same expenses. But having a president that one believes in may just lead people to have a much sunnier outlook, not only on the government but on other aspects of life, and may cause them to rate conditions in a variety of areas more positively. In prior research, Gallup has in fact demonstrated that Americans who identify with the president's party usually give higher ratings to conditions on a national level (such as the economy, national defense, and education, to name a few) -- and even on a personal level (their own finances) -- than do Americans who support the opposition party.

Obama's domestic policies may have the effect of raising blacks' actual standard of living in the future, but given that he has been in office only a short while and the most tangible benefit blacks may have seen thus far is a small income-tax cut, it is probably more likely that the recent improvement in blacks' reported standard of living reflects their confidence in the political leadership and is more perceptual in nature than a real improvement in their living standard.

Survey Methods

Results are based on telephone interviews with 29,379 national adults, aged 18 and older, conducted April 1-30, 2009, as part of Gallup Poll Daily tracking. For results based on the total sample of national adults, one can say with 95% confidence that the maximum margin of sampling error is ±1 percentage point.

For results based on the sample of 1,765 blacks, the maximum margin of sampling error is ±3 percentage points.

For results based on the sample of 23,988 non-Hispanic whites, the maximum margin of sampling error is ±1 percentage points.

Interviews are conducted with respondents on land-line telephones (for respondents with a land-line telephone) and cellular phones (for respondents who are cell-phone only).

In addition to sampling error, question wording and practical difficulties in conducting surveys can introduce error or bias into the findings of public opinion polls.

Gallup's Standard of Living Index is computed as follows: (% Satisfied with standard of living minus % Dissatisfied) + (% Saying standard of living getting better minus % Saying standard of living getting worse).

REMARKS BY THE FIRST LADY AT A LAMB SCHOOL HISPANIC HERITAGE EVENT, 5/4/09

THE WHITE HOUSE

Office of the First Lady
_______________________________________________________________
For Immediate Release                                    May 4, 2009 

 Latin American Montessori Bilingual Public Charter School
Washington, D.C.

12:21 P.M. EDT

MRS. OBAMA:  Que fantastico!  (Applause.)  Thank you, Laurie, for that wonderful introduction.  You guys are terrific -- all the singing and the dancing.  It was just amazing.  You all look so pretty and bright, and your school is just beautiful.  You should be so proud to go here because it is a really beautiful school and you're so very lucky.

I also want to say Feliz Cuatro de Mayo -- (laughter) -- right?  Why, why?  Because what's tomorrow, really?  What's tomorrow?  Tomorrow is really actually Cinco de Mayo.  But I'm -- but I'm going to --

Q    (Inaudible.)

MRS. OBAMA:  What, what?  Yes, I'm right about that.  So today is actually what?

Q    Cuatro.

MRS. OBAMA:  Cuatro de Mayo.  So Happy Cuatro de Mayo.  (Laughter.)

I am really honored to be here.  This is one of the favorite -- one of my favorite things that I get to do is go around and visit schools and to talk to all of you.  So I am so happy to be here.  Even though it's rainy and soggy outside, I was looking so forward to today, and meeting all of you, and seeing your school, and hearing you sing and dance.  It's just a wonderful treat.

And at a time that we're celebrating Mexican culture and heritage, it's so important for us to think about some of the challenges that the folks in Mexico are facing right now.  And we want to make sure that we're sending our thoughts and our prayers out to people as they're getting well, and the rest of the people around the country as they're getting well, from folks who have gotten the flu and all that kind of stuff, right?  So we want to send good thoughts to everyone, okay?

But since I've moved to Washington -- because I didn't live here before, before my husband came -- became the President, me and our girls, our family, we lived where?

Q    Chicago!

MRS. OBAMA:  In Chicago.  She has the book, so she's -- (laughter) -- you've got the answers there.  It's this book -- I didn't even know what was going on.  (Laughter.)

So now that we've moved to Washington, our new community, we've really been trying to get to know the community and get to know our neighbors.  That's one of the reasons why at least once a week I get out of the White House and come and see you guys so I get to learn about your schools, learn about your neighborhoods, your communities, because I think it's important for all of us to get to know our communities, and not just to get to know it but to participate, because Washington, D.C., the place where you live, is just an amazing place.  Don't you think? 

I mean, you guys are living where there's the Capitol, and the White House, and the Washington Monument, and the Supreme Court -- because we're in the process of selecting a new Supreme Court member.  So there's so much excitement here.  And what happens here is that the whole world looks to Washington, D.C., to really understand what America means.  And you guys live here. 

So I want to make sure that the children of D.C. feel as much a part of the business part of D.C.; that you guys get to know the capital and you feel comfortable knowing where the White House is, and that you come to visit us, because it's important for you to understand what Washington is all about, not just what's going on in your schools and your communities, but what goes on in the capital, and that you feel like that space is your space, and that that's -- it's your democracy, as much as it is anyone else's.

And I want you all to keep in mind, as you think about this stuff, especially our Next Step folks, our AmeriCorps young people, is that I always want all of you to start thinking about public service.

And public service can mean a whole lot of things.  It just means that you take the time to help your community, because we're at a point in time when we're going to need a lot of help from you all, especially our Next Steppers, right?  Moving on, we are going to need you all to take on the next challenges of leadership.  And we want you, as you move forward, to think about developing careers in public service, whether it's working in government, or working in communities, or working with youth groups, or whether it's, you know, raising money.  Whatever it is, think about a way that you can develop a career or have some time spent in your life to give back, because all of you guys are future leaders.  Every single one of you, the three-year-olds on up to the 20-year-olds, we're all counting on you to make good choices.

So as First Lady I really want to make sure that people feel connected.  And one way that we're doing that with kids in D.C. -- and this is more for the older kids -- is that we're developing this summer at the White House a program called D.C. Scholars, where we're inviting teens from Washington, D.C. -- and it's exclusive to the teens who live in the area -- to come and be interns at the White House.

For the first time -- and this hasn't been done -- students from the D.C. public school system will have the opportunity to be interns at the White House.  We've already selected our first class.  But for those of you who are interested in coming to work in my office maybe, or working in the President's office, or -- you know, there's a whole range of opportunities.  It's important for you to look out on the web site at the White House for how to get involved in next year's summer program.

But in order to be a part of this program, you have to have your stuff together, right?  You all know that, right?  You're passing that down to these young people.  And by having your stuff together, it means that you have to do what?  What are some of the things that you need to be doing now in order to get really good internships?  What do you guys think you need to be doing?

Q    Working!

MRS. OBAMA:  Working hard, yes.  What else?  Just shout out.

Q    Studying!

Q    Reading!

MRS. OBAMA:  Studying, reading.

Q    Listening!

MRS. OBAMA:  What?

Q    Listening. 

MRS. OBAMA:  Listening.  To who?

Q    Teachers!

MRS. OBAMA:  Your teachers.  Who else should you be --

Q    Parents!

MRS. OBAMA:  Your parents.  You guys know this, right?  Let's see if some of the big kids know this.  (Laughter.)   What do you all have to be doing to have your stuff together? 

Q    Studying hard!

MRS. OBAMA:  Studying, right?  And learning.  All right, we got it, we got it.  I think -- have you -- do you all hear?  Do you all have it from the little people?

So one of the things that I try to encourage all students to do now, because -- listen, listen -- it is so important, the choices you make now as students.  And we're not looking for young people to always be at the top of their class.  A lot of times we look for the kids who are trying really hard, right, who are showing through the little things -- whether they come to class on time, whether they're pushing and challenging themselves, not whether they are always getting everything right.

I tell my kids, I want you to be comfortable with failing, because if you learn how to fail, then you're not afraid to do what?  To try, right?  So we're asking young people at this point in time in our country's history, we want you to try.  And if you're trying now, and you're staying out of trouble, and you're working with your teachers, and you're doing community service, and you're giving back, and you're getting decent grades, and you're listening to your parents, then opportunities like interning at the White House, working in the First Lady's Office, maybe standing here one day, are open to you.

And the White House internship program for D.C. public school kids is one way that we just want to create a little bit of an incentive for all of you all to just keep it up and keep pushing, right, whether you're three or 23.  You can do this.

So I really want to thank you all from -- on behalf of myself and the President and Malia and Sasha and Bo.   (Laughter.)  We are so happy to be here with you all today.  We are so proud of you.  We want you to know that you can do anything you want as long as you try, right?

So I'm going to stop now because I am -- I get to let you guys -- you guys get to ask me a couple of questions.  But I have to say, make them very easy questions, because it's very nerve-wracking being up here, and there are cameras back there and everything.  Please ask me something I can answer.

All right, do we -- we have a mic.  All right, Diane, why don't you -- feel free, you go around and find -- do a good mix of kids.  And we have time for three or four. 

All right, so your teachers are going to come around.  And speak up and tell me your name and how old you are, too, before you ask your question. 

All stand, stand up for me.  Stand up.  Stand up tall.  Stand up tall.

Q    What is your grandma's name?

MRS. OBAMA:  First, tell me your name. 

Q    Sierra (ph). 

MRS. OBAMA:  What?

Q    Sierra (ph). 

MRS. OBAMA:  How old are you?

Q    What is your grandma's name?  (Laughter.) 

MRS. OBAMA:  What's my grandma's name, or what's Malia and -- what's my mom's name, or what's Malia and Sasha's name?  Her name is Marian Robinson, but we call her Grandma.  (Laughter.)  Thank you for that question.  See?  I knew that.  I knew that one.

All right, stand up.  Tell me your name.

Q    Olivia (ph).

MRS. OBAMA:  How old are you, Olivia (ph)? 

Q    Eight.

MRS. OBAMA:  Ooh, big time. 

Q    What was it like your first time stepping into the White House?

MRS. OBAMA:  Oh, wow.  Well, the first time I stepped into the White House, it was to visit the Bush family, because they hadn't moved out yet, and after my husband won and he was the President-elect, we went to go visit.  And it was actually a very exciting experience for me, because I had never set foot in the residence of the White House, so it was very exciting.

But the thing is that the Bush family, they were so kind to us, they were so nice.  The Bush daughters were so nice to Malia and Sasha, and they showed them where their rooms might be, and they told them all the secrets of how life at the White House can be fun.  So it was really exciting for me, probably like you might feel if you walked into the house where you were going to live, right, for the first time.  That's how I felt.  I was pretty excited.

All right, let's get another question going.

Q    Yes, how are you doing, Ms. Michelle Obama? 

MRS. OBAMA:  It's good to --

Q    My name is George (ph), I'm an AmeriCorps member.

MRS. OBAMA:  It's good to see you.  (Applause.)

Q    And with the D.C. Scholars, is that only for people in D.C.?  Because we actually -- I live in Maryland.

MRS. OBAMA:  You know, that's a good question.  Where's my team?  Is it just for -- I think it's just for D.C. public school kids.  It's for D.C. public school kids.

Q    It's only for D.C.?

MRS. OBAMA:  But we -- you know, there goes Jocelyn, who's my policy director.  If you think you want to make a case for expanding it, go see her.  (Laughter.)

All right, we're getting another big person question.

Q    My name is Plazy (ph).  I'm 20 years old.  I want to ask a -- did you never had tried Mexican food?  What type of --

MRS. OBAMA:  Have I ever tried Mexican food?

Q    Yes, what type --

MRS. OBAMA:  Oh, let me tell you, Mexican food is my favorite food in the whole wide world.  I think I'm on record.  (Laughter.)  Ooh, what do I love?  I love -- oh, I love tortillas, I love tamales -- (laughter) -- I love beans and rice, I love mole, I love all the mole sauces, I love beef and lamb and quesadillas.  I mean, you name it.  The question is, what don't I like?  (Laughter.)  I like it all. 

All right, we want to do two more questions.  We can do two more.  We'll do two more. 

Okay, here we go.  We have a young lady with the mic. 

MS. COTTEN:  What's your name?

Q    Maya (ph).

MRS. OBAMA:  Maya (ph). 

Q    I'm seven years old.  What were there differences between living in the White House and your house in Chicago?

MRS. OBAMA:  Oh, yes, what are the differences?  Big differences.  First of all, you know, there's a lot of protection at the White House.  There are a lot of people who are around making sure that the President is safe -- the Secret Service, yes.  Some of them are here right now, yes.  (Laughter.)

But, you know, part of it is that the White House is not really just our house, and we don't view it that way.  Like, our house in Chicago, it was really just our house, right?  And we feel like the White House belongs to everybody.  So there are always people in and out of our house.  We have tours going on, we host receptions for people, we want to make sure that kids are coming in and out.  So we don't really feel like it's just our house for us; that it's a house for everybody.  But our house in Chicago is really just for us. 

So I think that's one big difference.  It's a house that we share.  We live in it for now, but we're borrowing it, and we have to take really good care of it.  But it really belongs to everyone in this country, which is why I want to make sure, if you guys haven't come and taken a visit -- and had a visit, you should come by and see what it looks like, right?  Make sure your teachers take you on a trip, or your parents take you over the summer, so that you see what it's like living there, okay?  

All right, we'll take one more question.  One more question.  You want to pick them?  Oh, we've got -- okay, there you go.

Q    My name is Stephanie (ph), I'm 24 years old.  And my question is more of a request.  I wanted to know if I can get your autograph on these two magazines that I've purchased.  (Laughter.)

MRS. OBAMA:  You know, what I'm going to ask you guys to do is just have -- who do we have here who can collect the things that we need to sign?  Well, I'll sign them, I'll make sure we collect them in the back.  So make sure you have something with your name on it so that we can get it back to you.  I'd be happy to.

Q    Thank you.

MRS. OBAMA:  All right, that wasn't a question.  We'll do one more question, and then we'll stop.

Okay, here we go.  Tell me your name.

Q    Amelia (ph).  I'm eight years old.

MRS. OBAMA:  Amelia (ph).  Thank you for the flower, by the way.

Q    You're welcome.  I'm eight years old, and I wanted to know what has surprised you mostly about the White House.

MRS. OBAMA:  Oh, see, this is a question; serious.  What has surprised me most?  I think -- you know, I didn't -- I didn't know that I would have this much fun doing what I'm doing.  I didn't know what to expect.  I didn't know how hard it would be, I didn't know how much work it would be.  I didn't know completely what to expect. 

But what I found is that this is a really good job.  I've always felt like public service is a really good thing to do.  I used to be a lawyer.  I went to law school -- you knew that because it's in the book, isn't it?  (Laughter.)  That's good.  But I practiced law, and I enjoyed practicing, but I decided early in my career that I wanted to make my career be something that helped others. 

And being the First Lady is like the icing on the cake of helping other people.  In this role, I have a big platform.  I can come by your school, and people will follow, and they get to see what's going on here, and they get to see your faces, and we get to remind them why education is important, and why investing in you guys is so good, and the whole world will see you dancing and singing just because I came by to say hi.

Or I can plant a garden, something as small as planting a garden, and the whole world will pay attention, and then we can talk about the importance of not just gardening but of eating good food, right, of making sure you guys eat fruits and vegetables and that they taste good.

I can get my kids a dog and we can talk about the importance of young people taking responsibility for their pets, because if you ask for a pet, you got to take care of it, right? 

So there's a lot I can do to help the public, and it's been fun and surprisingly fun for me.  So I think that'd be the most important thing.

So, you guys, thank you so much.  You've been great and patient.  (Applause.) 

END                                                                                                 
12:38 P.M. EDT

Sens. Shelby, Leahy on CNN’s ‘State of the Union’

Congressional Quarterly

CQ Transcriptswire

SPEAKERS: JOHN KING, HOST

SEN. RICHARD C. SHELBY, R-ALA.

SEN. PATRICK J. LEAHY, D-VT.

[*] KING: I’m John King, and this is our “State of the Union” report for this Sunday, May 3th.

After just three months in office, President Obama gets a rare gift -- a vacancy on the nation’s highest court. But with opportunity comes pressure, from within his own party and from worried conservatives. The Democratic chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee and Republican Senator Richard Shelby right here to talk about the legal and political stakes.

Senator Arlen Specter ’s party switch is the latest blow to the Republican Party, but leaders of a new outreach effort say better days for the GOP are closer than you think. We’ll ask House Republican Whip Eric Cantor and former Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney about rebuilding the Republican brand and about the lessons they’re learning from the Democrat in the White House.

There are now more than 780 confirmed cases of the H1N1 flu strain in 17 countries, including 160 cases right here in the United States. We’ll take you inside the government’s Washington war room so you can judge the administration’s response to this alarming outbreak. That’s all ahead in this hour of “State of the Union.”

Justice David Souter’s decision to retire gives President Obama his first chance and an early chance to put his stamp on the Supreme Court. The president says his selection team will quickly get to work. So, too, though, are all the competing political voices. There are competing pressures from White House allies to pick a woman, a Latino, an African-American, and conservatives are gearing up, too, watching the White House and warning their allies not to shy away from a spirited confirmation battle.

We discuss both the legal issues and the political pressures with the Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy and Republican Senator Richard Shelby.

Chairman Leahy, I’d like to begin the conversation with you. As the Democrat, the chairman of the committee that will consider the president’s nominee, after eight years of George W. Bush , what are you looking for, sir? There are some who say name a middle-of-the-road, a pragmatist, a coalition builder, but there are others on the left who say, no, we need intellectual fire power to go up against Justice Scalia, to go up against Justice Alito. What would you like, sir?

LEAHY: Well, I’ve talked to President Obama about this. I will be meeting with him this week. I’ve also encouraged him to meet with both the Republican and Democratic leadership on this issue.

But you know what I think about? As you walk into the Supreme Court, over the -- over the doorway, there’s a big piece of Vermont marble, and on it’s carved, “equal justice under law.” I want, first and foremost, somebody who believes in equal justice under law. That is equal justice for all, whether they are liberals or conservatives, Democrats, Republicans or whatever. And I think that is who he is going to look for.

Remember, the president was a constitutional law professor. He understands the court probably better than certainly any president in my lifetime. And I know some of the names he’s thinking of. They are all going to be extremely good, good people.

I don’t want to see an ideologue. I’ve said before I don’t like to see an ideologue of either the right or the left. I don’t think we’re going to have one.

KING: Well, Senator Shelby, I want you to explain how this standard applies to you. Because I’m holding up a pocket version of the Constitution here. There are some who say any president, when given this rare opportunity, should read this, and what a judge should do is read this, and a constructionist would say do no more, do no less than the founders intended. But Senator Shelby, President Obama has laid out some of his thoughts on this choice. Here is something he said back in 2007 to Planned Parenthood. “We need somebody who’s got the heart, the empathy, to recognize what it’s like to be a young teenage mom. The empathy to understand what it’s like to be poor or African-American or gay or disabled or old, and that’s the criteria by which I’ll be selecting my judges.”

Is that the right criteria, Senator Shelby?

SHELBY: Well, I think that’s part of it, but that’s not all the criteria. I think the criteria should be to follow the law, not to make the law. To follow the Constitution, to try to stay within a lot of norms. I have no illusions about President Obama appointing a conservative like Alito or Roberts and so forth. But if he will appoint a pragmatist, someone who is not an ideologue, that someone is not just going to light all the lightbulbs in America on the left, I think that would be good for the country. He is very smart. He is very careful. I hope he is going to be careful in this appointment.

KING: Could there be, Senator Shelby, a sense of payback brewing among Republicans in that Senator Obama, before he was President Obama, voted against both Bush nominees, voted against Judge Alito, voted against Chief Justice Roberts. And Senator Lindsey Graham , who’s on the committee, the Judiciary Committee, says this in the New York Times. He says, “President Obama should hope that Republican senators are fairer than he was when he was a senator.”

SHELBY: Well, I’m not a payback type of guy. I think you have to keep moving.

On the other hand, a lot of us were aware of then Senator Obama’s votes against Alito and I believe against Roberts, and a lot of other Democrats. But I think Obama has -- President Obama has got some strong cards to deal. I hope he makes a great choice for the court.

KING: Chairman Leahy, take me behind the curtain. You know, I’m getting e-mails and phone calls from African-American groups, saying first black president, he should pick an African-American. I’m getting phone calls and emails from Latino groups saying he got our votes, he owes us. The women’s groups say he owes us. What is it like? What kind of pressure are you facing and is he facing right now?

LEAHY: John, I’m getting some of the same. You and I talked before we went on the air about the fact that Marcelle and I drove to Vermont on Friday, which is something we do about once a year, instead of flying, and thought it would be a nice quiet time. It was like a phone booth in our car all the way up with all these different groups, everybody else calling about who should be there.

I want the president to pick somebody for all of the American people. In the past few years, the court, many members of the court have seemed to be more and more isolated from real Americans, real people. I’d like to see somebody -- I’d like to see an appointment of somebody who has real life experiences, not just within a judicial monastery, but somebody who can reflect the feelings of real Americans.

KING: I’ll end this. A short time we have left, I want to switch to some other subjects quickly. Senator Shelby, you’re the ranking Republican on the Banking Committee. The administration in the week ahead will release the results on these so-called stress tests on America’s banks. Are we going to learn that more of our banks are in trouble of failing? And Senator Shelby, do you believe more taxpayer money will be requested by the administration to help keep them afloat?

SHELBY: John, I don’t know what we’re totally going to learn come -- I believe it’s Thursday, from the stress test. But I think sooner or later, we’re going to learn a lot. Some banks are going to come out of the stress test looking strong. Others are going to need more capital. And if they can access that capital, privately, that’s the best way. We’ll -- the banks that are lacking in capital and don’t meet this test, I think there will be a push to put more capital in them.

That’s not my way of doing business. I think we should let the ordinary course of events happen. When banks are insolvent, they should close them, whether they’re large or small.

KING: Senator Leahy, in the Boston Globe today, in an op-ed piece, you continue your effort to get what you call a commission of inquiry to look back into the practices, the detainee interrogation practices, what you call the torture committed during the Bush administration.

You write this about the Justice Department memos that President Obama has released so far. “These memoranda seem calculated to provide legal cover, a legal free pass for these unlawful policies. The Justice Department was apparently being used to immunize government officials to conduct torture by defining it down and building in legal loopholes.”

Essentially, your case that the department that was built to uphold the law was helping people break the law is the case you make. Senator Feinstein has said the Intelligence Committee will investigate this. The White House has said that is fine with them. Leave it in the Intelligence Committee. Why isn’t that good enough?

LEAHY: What I’m saying is instead of having four or five committees in the Senate and four or five committees in the House do it, why not have one nonpartisan or bipartisan commission do it all at once, get all the answers? Sort of like what we did after 9/11. We did the same thing after some of the savings and loan problems, things of that nature. And have all of the answers. Just so that nobody is tempted to repeat this, nobody is attempting to set up an idea that certain people in our government are above the law, that the law doesn’t apply to everyone. That’s what I want.

But if we don’t have such a commission, then we will have the Intelligence Committee and we will have the Judiciary Committee and we will have the Armed Service Committee and others each do pieces of it, but that in some ways is like, you know, the committee of blindfolded people who are trying to describe an elephant, each having just part of the elephant.

KING: Interesting way to put it.

Senator Shelby, it was 15 years ago -- it’s hard for me to believe because I remember it like yesterday -- you were a Democrat who switched over to the Republican Party. Arlen Specter left the Republican Party to go to the Democrat Party this last week. I just want -- do you have any advice for Senator Specter? Just your thoughts on what it’s like to be caucusing with one group on Monday and the other guys on Tuesday? SHELBY: Well, it’s a good experience from the standpoint of serving in both caucuses. You have friends in both.

Arlen Specter is a friend of mine. I differ with him on a lot of issues, but I wish him the best. I wish he hadn’t left the caucus, but he did. Perhaps there’s somebody over there, I don’t know who he is, I hope (ph) it will be Leahy, that can rejoin us and have an equilibrium.

KING: Senator Shelby in New York, Chairman Leahy in Burlington, Vermont this morning. Gentlemen, thank you both.

SHELBY: Thank you, John.

LEAHY: Thank you. Good to be with you.

DHS Secretary Napolitano, HHS Secretary Sebelius on NBC’s ‘Meet the Press’

Congressional Quarterly

CQ Transcriptswire

SPEAKERS: DAVID GREGORY, HOST

SECRETARY OF HOMELAND SECURITY JANET NAPOLITANO

SECRETARY OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES KATHLEEN SEBELIUS

DR. RICHARD BESSER, ACTING DIRECTOR, CDC

SEN. ARLEN SPECTER, D-PA.

[*] GREGORY: First, the latest on the H1N1 or swine flu outbreak around the globe. Here with us, the top U.S. officials coordinating the response: Dr. Richard Besser, acting director of the CDC; Homeland Security secretary, Janet Napolitano ; and the new secretary of Health & Human Services, Kathleen Sebelius .

Welcome to all of you.

BESSER: Thank you.

GREGORY: Dr. Besser, let me start with you. This is the cover of Newsweek magazine hitting newsstands now, and it talks about “Fear & the Flu: The New Age of Pandemics.”

This is what people are concerned about. What’s the very latest on how bad this is?

BESSER: Well, this is a rapidly evolving situation with a lot of uncertainty. The good news is that each day we’re learning a lot about this virus and what it’s doing both here, in Mexico and around the globe. And we’re starting to see some encouraging signs, and that’s good, but our approach has to be aggressive. With a new infectious disease you may only get one chance to get out in front of it, and that’s what we’re doing.

GREGORY: So what are the raw facts here, number of cases, number of deaths?

BESSER: Here’s where we are. In the United States we’ve got 160 confirmed cases, 21 states. The World Health Organization this morning reported confirmed cases in 15 countries. Thankfully, in this country we are not seeing the number of deaths in Mexico. We reported last week the tragic death of the child in -- in Texas.

But as we’re looking we’re not seeing those deaths, but I’m not totally assured. We need some more information to see what this is going to do. And it’s very encouraging to see that people are taking this seriously.

GREGORY: Right.

BESSER: And our doing the things to protect their health that they can do.

GREGORY: But let, let, let me try to understand this, because this was the big issue: What’s going on in Mexico?

BESSER: Right.

GREGORY: Why are people getting this flu and dying, whereas people in the United States are getting the flu and they’re OK, they’re going through it but they’re recovering?

BESSER: We’re getting clues to that. We’re, we’re in Mexico as part of a tri-national team with Canada, the U.S. and Mexico, and we’re looking very hard at that question. And what we’re starting to see, we’re starting to see that there was widespread flu in Mexico.

Initial reports really were looking at flu that was all presenting as hospitalization, high rates of mortality. As we learn more about how widespread this is, it may be that the rates of severe disease in Mexico will end up being not different than what we see here. We’re earlier than the Mexicans are, and it appears that they have had widespread flu across their country.

GREGORY: But I just want to be clear. So in other words, we’re, we’re talking about 19 confirmed deaths in Mexico, 473 confirmed cases in Mexico. But many, many, many more cases of this particular virus than, than we knew to be the case.

BESSER: One of the first things that we worked to do with the Canadians and the Mexicans was help them set up laboratory capacity so that they could do those confirmations. The initial tests that were all being done were on hospitalized patients, the sickest of the sick. As we’re looking more, we’re seeing that that may have actually been the tip of the iceberg, with a large number of cases that were less severe.

GREGORY: OK, and that’s an important point, that you could have this flu, this virus coursing through a country, a community, and that, for most people, it’s less severe.

Secretary Sebelius, some, some context here. The seasonal flu, what we all know about, kills 36,000 people every year, more than 200,000 people are hospitalized. In this country 13 have been hospitalized with H1N1 or, or swine flu.

Are we overreacting?

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SEBELIUS: Well, I think, David, we -- we don’t know. And what’s important is that we’re aggressively reacting to what the science is telling us. And as Dr. Besser just said, it’s evolving day at a time. And so the guidance is being updated, the information is being updated.

We know a couple of things. As you just said, seasonal flu kills people every year, hospitalizes people. What we don’t know is what this new virus will do, what this new flu strain will do. And what’s why I think taking precautions, being prudent at the outset and then reinforming as we move forward is the most important thing. We are in vaccine mode, so we’re producing -- accelerating the production...

GREGORY: There’s no vaccine right now.

SEBELIUS: No. You can’t begin a vaccine until you identify the virus and the strain.

GREGORY: Right. SEBELIUS: So we’re -- but the flu strain has been identified, it’s being grown, it’s going to be tested. We can be ready to produce. Meanwhile, the production of seasonal flu vaccine is accelerating.

GREGORY: Right.

SEBELIUS: So we’re going to do both. We’re going to be ready for both come fall.

GREGORY: Secretary Napolitano, isn’t the quandary here for the government, for this administration getting out all of the necessary public health information, raising that level of concern, but then being careful not to make people too alarmed or getting them to panic?

And this week it seems like the administration went over that line. Vice President Biden on the “Today” show Thursday said this:

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

VICE PRESIDENT JOSEPH R. BIDEN JR.: I would tell members of my family, and I have, I wouldn’t go anywhere in confined places now. It’s not that it’s going to Mexico, it’s you’re in a confined aircraft. When one person sneezes it goes all the way through the aircraft. That’s me. I -- I would not be, at this point, if I -- if they had another way of transportation, suggesting they ride the subway.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GREGORY: The vice president’s office issued a statement later saying, “What he meant to say was if you’re sick, don’t get on an airplane.”

And look what happened just this week, Friday, a flight from Munich to Washington diverted to Boston because a woman showed signs of the flu, was complaining about flu-like symptoms. They diverted the flight. How much damage do comments like Vice President Biden’s do in the middle of all this?

NAPOLITANO: Well, I think the vice president immediately clarified what he meant to say, which is, if you’re sick, don’t -- don’t get on a flight, don’t get on -- in the subway. If your child is sick, don’t send the child to school. If you’re sick, don’t go to work. Stay home. Our whole strategy is built around containing the spread of the virus.

But on -- on the other hand, people should otherwise just carry on with their normal, everyday lives. And by and large, that’s what Americans have been doing.

GREGORY: Well, you -- you say that. But The New York Times reports some of the reactions, some of the precautions being taken.

And, Dr. Besser, I want you to react to this. “In Delaware, a rap concert was canceled. At Slippery Rock University of Pennsylvania, 22 students who had been student teaching in Mexico were told not to take part in graduation ceremonies. In Chicago, some Roman Catholic priests stopped giving communion wine and were asking parishioners to avoid shaking hands. `The handshake of peace will be the nod of peace for now,’ the Reverend Joseph M. Jackson of St. Ignatius Church said.’”

Appropriate or overreaction?

BESSER: You know, what we’re seeing across the country is people who are concerned and trying to do what they can to protect their health.

And what we’re trying to do is, is share what things do we know really work, and encouraging people to do those things: the importance of hand-washing or using alcohol hand gels; the importance of covering your cough with your sleeve and not your hand; the important of staying home if you’re sick.

We’re seeing other things taking place as well, and when we see that we try and channel towards the things we know that -- that work. We’re not telling people to not get together for concerts. But we are telling people who are sick, don’t go to that concert.

GREGORY: OK. But -- fair enough. But -- but that’s your message. But the reaction seems to be different.

BESSER: Well, you know, everybody is going to deal with their concerns in different ways, and that’s the nature of -- of people.

GREGORY: Right.

BESSER: What we can do is -- is try and tell them what the risks are, what do we know.

GREGORY: Right.

BESSER: Share information as we have it and continue to hit the messages of -- of those things that can really be effective.

GREGORY: But, Secretary Sebelius, you’ve got reports, one out of Southern California, where people are flooding emergency rooms when they cough, afraid that they’re going to die.

SEBELIUS: Well...

GREGORY: That isn’t -- that is not correct.

SEBELIUS: You’re right. That’s, that is likely an overreaction. But it’s also an indication of another of the key priorities of the president and this administration.

GREGORY: Mm-hmm.

SEBELIUS: One of the reasons people visit emergency rooms is that we have far too Americans who don’t have health coverage, who don’t have a doctor to call, who don’t have a health home. And it -- this situation that we’re in links directly into health reform.

GREGORY: Right.

SEBELIUS: It -- it presents itself as why we desperately need a reformation of the health system, while we need attention at that issue so we get people health homes; we get preventative care; and we get a conversation going so people have more information on a regular basis and have that kind of preventive care and don’t go through emergency room doors.

GREGORY: I -- I want to be clear about something, Secretary Napolitano.

But first, Dr. Besser, the strategy, right now, is containment. Let me walk you through this. So a virus like this is unpredictable. So it may seem like it’s tame; it could evolve in such a way to become deadly. It could become a more devastating virus in the United States. So...

BESSER: Could I correct something you’ve said already?

GREGORY: Yes, OK.

BESSER: The strategy is not containment. Containment is a strategy that...

GREGORY: Secretary Napolitano said we’re trying to contain the virus.

BESSER: Well...

NAPOLITANO: Contain what you spread of the virus.

BESSER: Yes.

NAPOLITANO: If you’re sick.

BESSER: Yes. In...

NAPOLITANO: Let’s be careful what we’re saying here.

(LAUGHTER)

BESSER: Yes. In -- in terms of containment, had this been an outbreak that had started in a distant place in a small community, the approach would have been, send a large team of international support in there, try and limit it or contain it to that area. What we’re trying to do is reduce the impact on people’s health.

And you do that by trying to limit spread from person to person. But it is in our communities, and we are not going to be able to prevent it from going community to community. But what you can do is try and reduce the burden on the health care system, which is so overloaded as it is, so that those people who are sickest are really able to be -- be cared for. GREGORY: But let me -- so I think you -- you’re speaking to this point. If we talk about containment, stopping the spread from person to person, there is still this mystery about why there’s a greater degree of virulence in Mexico, thus far, than the United States. So for a period of time, why not seal the border?

Why not stop flights in and out of Mexico simply until we know more?

NAPOLITANO: Well, we take our advice from the scientists, from the doctors who really understand epidemiology.

If they had told us that we would have an impact on the spread of this virus in the United States by taking some of those actions, we would have moved to do so. They told us no, it would have had no impact, and that really our efforts needed to be focused on communicating with people. If you’re sick, stay home. If your child is sick, keep them home. Cover -- cover your mouth when you cough and wash your hands -- very simple, common-sense things.

So the reason that that was not done is because the scientists said it wouldn’t have an impact.

BESSER: If this had started in a distant place, beefing up activities on the borders would have slowed entry into this country for, at best, two to three weeks. That would have been important, because it would have allowed us to do the things that we’ve been doing now: distributing anti-virals around the country, getting surveillance in place, putting out the education messages.

Once it’s already in your, in your -- in your borders, those efforts have really no impact on, on spread in your country and divert yourselves from the things that can really work.

GREGORY: So what is your big question now?

BESSER: You know, the big question -- and we’re getting information on that -- is the one that you raised: What’s different about Mexico and the United States?

And the second question is, what do we know about this virus and its ability to cause severe disease?

We’re learning a lot about both of those things.

GREGORY: All right, so I have three young kids at home. If any of them present -- if they -- if they’re coughing; if they have runny noses; if they appear to have a cold, what should I do?

BESSER: What you should do is call your doctor and say, “Here are the symptoms that my child has. What do you think? Do I need to be concerned?”

And your doctor will be able to work with you, find out whether your children have any underlying medical problems or anything that would put them at special risk, and tell you what to do. GREGORY: Mm-hmm. Right. Because normally I wouldn’t call, necessarily -- especially, you know, the second and third kid, because I’m not as worried as much.

BESSER: Right.

GREGORY: But you’re saying now with a cold, be more vigilant about it.

Secretary Sebelius, final point. Big question about what happens in our flu season, which is in the fall.

SEBELIUS: Right, right. Well, as you already pointed out, we know seasonal flu will hit. We know it will kill Americans, unfortunately, hospitalize folks, millions of people will get it. So we are ramping up production of the seasonal flu vaccine right now. We want to be ready to deal with that situation.

At the same time, we’re growing the virus and testing the virus to attack H1N1, and we’ll be production ready when it’s time to go.

And then it’ll be a question of who and when to distribute that vaccine. So we’ll be ready for both. We know it will come back. We don’t know in what phase we’ll see H1N1 continue or maybe ramp up in flu season.

And we want to be out ahead of this; again, not looking back in February and said we could’ve, should’ve, would’ve done something.

GREGORY: Right. Final message from you this morning?

NAPOLITANO: That we’re doing everything we can to be ahead of this virus, to keep Americans informed and to be safe.

GREGORY: All right, thank you all very much for coming on this morning.

SEBELIUS: Thank you.

GREGORY: And good luck monitoring all of this.

Coming next, a surprise on Capitol Hill as veteran Republican Senator Arlen Specter becomes a Democrat. He’s here live for his first television interview since that announcement.

Then, what does Specter’s move mean for the GOP? Two key Republicans weigh in, Joe Scarborough and Ed Gillespie, only here on “Meet the Press.”

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GREGORY: The Republican Party and a retirement on the Supreme Court, after this brief commercial break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GREGORY: We are back, and joining us live now from Philadelphia, the Senate’s newest Democrat, Arlen Specter .

Senator, welcome back to “Meet the Press.”

SPECTER: Thank you, David. Nice to be with you.

GREGORY: Thank you. Your decision -- or, since your decision, there’s been some pretty big news. We’ll get to the reasons for your decision in just a moment.

But I want to talk about the retirement of Justice Souter and the vacancy to the Supreme Court that President Obama will now fill. You have a fair amount of experience with this, as the former Judiciary chairman, and you might return to that post, even as a Democrat.

So what kind of justice should President Obama be looking for?

SPECTER: He should be looking for someone with a strong academic and professional background. It would be my hope that he would choose someone with diversity. Women are underrepresented on the court. We don’t have an Hispanic. African-Americans are underrepresented. I would hope that he would look beyond the circuit courts of appeals which now populate the Supreme Court and pick someone with greater world experience and diversity.

GREGORY: That’s important. Are you suggesting that he should not pick a judge, but perhaps a politician or a leader from another discipline in life?

SPECTER: Well, maybe not a politician, perhaps a statesman or a stateswoman. But all of the justices now have been on the circuit courts of appeals and they have lives and experiences which are all very similar.

And we live in a very diverse country with a lot of different interests, and I think it’s important to have an Hispanic on the court at some point, important to have more than just one woman on the court and more than one African-American. And it would be good to get people who know something besides wearing a black robe.

GREGORY: Do you have a candidate in mind and have you shared that with the White House?

SPECTER: I do not. I’m going to respect the Constitution. It’s up to the president to make the selection, and it’s up to me as one of the senators to consider the confirmation question.

GREGORY: You mentioned the import of a woman on the court. Here are a few of the standouts that have been speculated about so far: Elena Kagan -- she’s the solicitor general now; Sonia Sotomayor, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit; Kathleen Sullivan, director of Stanford’s Constitutional Law Center; and Diane Wood, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit.

Out of that list, do you think there’s a front-runner?

(LAUGHTER) SPECTER: I don’t know. You’d have to ask President Obama.

GREGORY: All right. The president said the other day, and he said this repeatedly, that he wants an empathetic justice on the Supreme Court. Empathetic: is that code, to you, for an activist judge?

SPECTER: Well, we look to the court to interpret the Constitution and the statutes passed by Congress and not to make laws. There is no doubt that the standards and values in our country have shifted, as Cardozo said in the Palko case years ago. There was a time when equal protection meant that the Senate galleries were segregated, and we know how foolish that would be in modern-day life.

So there’s no doubt that there are changes with the times. But if you talk about empathy, you may be talking about something which is -- which is broader. But we’ll have to test the nominee on that.

Listen, the job of the United States Senate is to ask firm, really tough questions to find out whether the nominee has an open mind, whether the nominee respects the supremacy of the Constitution, whether the nominee will look to Congress to establish public policy. And there are going to be some empathetic factors, but basically we’re a nation with a rule of law.

GREGORY: You’re a Democrat now, and so I ask you whether, in light of that switch, do you regret your support in the past for some of the more conservative members of this court: Alito, Roberts, Clarence Thomas ?

SPECTER: I do -- I do not. Remember, I was a leading voice opposite -- opposing Judge Bork, a Republican. Got a lot of brickbats for that. Not a month passes by today without my hearing about Judge Bork, who was a leading Republican candidate.

So I’ve not hesitated to oppose Republicans, a Republican, when I thought he was out of the mainstream of American jurisprudence.

GREGORY: All right, let me ask you about this switch from the Republican to the Democratic Party.

Back in April of this year on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” you said this: “So I’m trying to bring back those voters to the Republican Party. We need balance, and I’m trying to get people to register Republican. We need a second party. Look here, our country is built on checks and balances. The only check and balance in America today are the 41 Republican Senators who can talk and filibuster, otherwise, the White House, the House of Representatives will be a steamroller.”

Well, Senator, you’ve now decided to join that steamroller. What changed?

SPECTER: Well -- well, since that time I undertook a very thorough survey of Republicans in Pennsylvania with polling and a lot of personal contacts, and it became apparent to me that my chances to be elected on the Republican ticket were, were bleak. And I’m simply not going to subject my 29-year record in the United States Senate to that Republican primary electorate. I’m not going to do that.

Now, with respect to the steamroller, I have shown repeatedly my independence, willing to cross party lines when I thought the interests of the American people in Pennsylvania were required it.

Take one example: There’s a bill on employees’ choice known as Card Check, which would take away the secret ballot and impose mandatory arbitration. I said, when I made the switch, I’m still against that bill. Democrats are all for it; Republicans are all against it and I’m the critical vote. And if I see that there are other issues where I feel, as a matter of conscience, I will continue a filibuster against legislation.

GREGORY: Are there other issues, right now, that you can name where you don’t see eye to eye with this president?

SPECTER: Well, I’m not going to start to explore a long range of issues. I -- I’m not going to do that...

GREGORY: All right. Well...

SPECTER: You don’t -- you don’t have enough time, David.

(LAUGHTER)

GREGORY: Well, hey, we can make time.

(LAUGHTER)

We’re going to get to a few issues in a couple of minutes, but I want to stick to this point, what you’re saying. This was politics. This was a cold, hard political reality check. This is what David Broder wrote in his column in the Washington Post, and it was pretty pointed.

Look at the headline: “Specter the Defector.”

“The one consistency in the history of Arlen Specter has been his willingness to do whatever will best protect and advance the career of Arlen Specter . So, once again, Specter is likely to reap political rewards from his maneuvering. But the Democrats should be open-eyed about what they are gaining from his return to his original political home. Specter’s history shouts the lesson that he will stick with you only as long as it serves his own interests -- and not a day longer.”

You’re about to stand for re-election as a Democrat. Do you think that reputation hurts you?

SPECTER: I think it’s a -- a misreading. I do not think it is true. I can pick up any of the issues and tell you what my reasons were, and I think I have very strong reasons for all of them.

There’s more than being re-elected, here. There’s the factor of principle. The Republican Party has gone far to the right since I joined it under Reagan’s big tent. When I came to the Senate, you had a roomful of moderate Republicans, Heinz and Weicker and Stafford and Chafee and Danforth and on and on. And in recent times, I have diverged materially from the Republican line. And the critical factor, David, as most -- many people know, was the stimulus package.

I bucked the Republican line, Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe and I, and that created a schism. My approval rating dropped 30 points with Republicans as a result of that vote, so that, as the picture has evolved, I felt a lot more comfortable, as a matter of principle, with Democrats than with Republicans.

GREGORY: All right.

SPECTER: Let me mention...

GREGORY: Yes.

SPECTER: ... one other important point, and that is my work in the Senate on medical research. I’ve been a major -- maybe the major spear carrier for the National Institutes of Health. And I’m trying to get more federal funding.

I’ve opened up a Web site, specterforthecure.com. If we had pursued the war on cancer which President Nixon declared in 1970, Jack Kemp might be alive today. This medical research has prolonged or saved many lives, including mine. And The New York Times today has a column, when you compare my work on medical research, it makes party allegiance look pretty small.

GREGORY: I want to move on, though, to the question of what it took for the Democrats to get you. What were you offered? What inducements have you been given to switch parties?

SPECTER: None.

GREGORY: None?

SPECTER: None.

GREGORY: You won’t retain your seniority, as you move over, on -- on key committees?

SPECTER: Well, that is -- that is -- that is true, but...

GREGORY: That’s not an inducement, Senator?

SPECTER: Well, no, that’s an entitlement. I’ve earned -- I’ve earned the seniority.

(LAUGHTER)

I was elected in 1980. And I think that’s -- that’s not a bribe or a gift or something extraordinary. I will be treated by the Democrats as if I’d been elected as a Democrat.

GREGORY: What about how you stand for election?

Has the Democratic Party -- Leader Reid, Governor Rendell in Pennsylvania and the president himself -- seen to it, have they seen to it that you will not face a primary challenger?

SPECTER: They have not -- flatly not.

GREGORY: But the president said he’s going to campaign for you.

SPECTER: Well...

GREGORY: Who’s going to step up against you when the president’s declared his intention in the primary?

SPECTER: Well -- well, that’s a different question. You asked me if they’ve cleared the field, and they have not. There -- there are two candidates in the field and there are others on the sidelines; one other, specifically, who’s talking about running.

I didn’t ask them to clear the field. The reality is, you can’t tell other people what to do. I’m prepared to run in a contested primary. But I don’t want to run against a stacked deck, like I would have had to against the Republican primary electorate.

GREGORY: You know that Tom Ridge, former secretary of Homeland Security and governor of Pennsylvania, is thinking about getting into the Republican primary race. Do you think he could win what you couldn’t?

SPECTER: Well, I think former Governor Ridge is a very able fellow, and I have a lot of respect for him.

GREGORY: One potential challenger is Congressman Joe Sestak , and he was interviewed in the Los Angeles Times talking about exactly what kind of Democrat you would be.

And this is what he said: “Sestak said that Specter would have to answer a series of questions in the coming weeks, such as why Democratic voters should view him as a leader in their party when he failed to prevent the GOP from moving to the hard right.”

`What are you running for, Arlen?’ Sestak asked. `How are you going to use your leadership to shape the Democratic Party? Is it to the way we believe Pennsylvania should be helped? And the platform we should follow? Are you a Democrat, an independent or a Republican?’”

You always talked about core conservative values when you ran for president. What are your core political beliefs now?”

SPECTER: My core views are freedom, a woman’s right to choose, consistently voted for increasing the minimum wage, for expanding unemployment compensation, for the nuclear test ban treaty, where I broke with Republicans.

I got into politics, David, as the result of the inspiration of my father, who was a Russian immigrant, who was a veteran in World War I. The government broke the promise to pay World War I veterans a bonus. And Harry Specter was a little guy.

And you take a look at my record in the Senate, or my record in public life generally, I’ve always been for the little guy. I say, in a sense, that I -- I’m on my way -- I was on my way to Washington to get my father’s bonus. I haven’t gotten it yet, so I’m running for re-election.

But I’ve helped the veterans. I’ve broken with the party on -- on funding for veterans. I’ve broken with the party on voting for Social Security increases. My record has been issue-oriented, one at a time.

And I think, as a matter of principle -- listen, the stimulus vote was a mighty big test. It cost me dearly with the Republicans. And I stood with the Democrats because I thought it was right. I thought, otherwise, this country might have been on the verge of a 1929 Depression.

And I knew it was politically problemsome, perhaps disastrous. I represent the people of Pennsylvania, not any political party.

GREGORY: It was reported this week that when you met with the president you said, “I will be a loyal Democrat. I support your agenda.”

Let me test that on probably one of the most important areas of his agenda, and that’s health care. Would you support health care reform that puts up a government-run public plan to complete with a private plan issued by a private insurance company?

SPECTER: No. And you misquote me, David. I did not say I would be a loyal Democrat. I did not say that. And last week, after I said I was changing parties, I voted against the budget because the budget has a way to pass health care with 51 votes, which undermines a basic Senate institution to require 60 votes to impose cloture on -- on key issues. But I...

GREGORY: All right, just to be clear, Wednesday in The Wall Street Journal, Jonathan Weisman and Greg Hitt reported that, when you met with the president, you said, “I’m a loyal Democrat,” and, according to people familiar with the White House, quote, “I support your agenda.”

So that’s wrong? You didn’t say those things?

SPECTER: I did not say “I’m a loyal Democrat.”

(LAUGHTER)

You know, I read once another mistake in the newspaper, some newspaper.

GREGORY: Let me -- I just want to turn, then, to the issue of health care. You would not support a public plan?

SPECTER: That’s what I said... GREGORY: OK.

SPECTER: ... and that’s what I meant.

GREGORY: Do you support taxing the value of, the value of employer-provided health care for workers?

SPECTER: No, I’d be very reluctant to do that. Health care provided by employers, which is deductible for them and not added on as income to the recipient, has been the mainstay of health coverage for millions of Americans, and I’d be very reluctant to abandon that.

GREGORY: So the health care reform you would like to see is what?

SPECTER: I would, I would like to see all Americans covered. I’ve joined with the Wyden-Bennett plan, has 14 co-sponsors. I would like to see health care which emphasizes exercise and diet and makes premiums lower on that basis. I would like to see health care which had very tough prosecution against Medicare and Medicaid fraud, put people in jail as opposed to fines, which are licenses to steal.

I would emphasize National Institute of Health research. What better way to reduce the cost of health care than to, than to have -- prevent illness?

I would support advanced directives, where we find so much of medical care is paid for the in the last few hours or few days or a person’s life. Not to tell people what to do on their care at that time, but have them, have them think about it. I support programs which improves technology, as the stimulus package has $19 billion.

I’ve been in this field for a long time and have a lot of ideas, participated in the president’s task force, and I’m ready to put my shoulder to the wheel to get legislation adopted. But I’m going to take a look at it piece by piece. I’m not committed.

GREGORY: Finally, Senator Specter, what is the future of the Republican Party, the party you have now left behind?

SPECTER: Well, it would be hope, David, that there would be a, a wake-up call. It would be my hope that there would be a strong two- party system. That’s what I’ve worked for for a long time, trying to bring back the Republican Party in the city of Philadelphia, trying to bring back the Republican Party nationally. And I have campaigned for Republican candidates and moderates. It would be my hope that the party would turn away from the Club for Growth.

Let me be very specific here. The Club for Growth has undertaken campaigns to defeat moderate Republicans in the primaries, knowing that they would lose in the general election. I give you a long list. But take one case which was slightly different on procedure, and that was Linc Chafee. Club for Growth beat Linc Chafee, made him spend all his money in the primary.

Had Linc Chafee been elected in 2006, the Republican Party would’ve controlled the Senate in 2007 and ‘8 and would’ve confirmed 34 Republican judges which were left on the table unconfirmed. And I think that my colleague Senator Olympia Snowe had it right in her New York Times op-ed piece that you have to have a big tent.

GREGORY: Right.

SPECTER: You can’t -- listen, I voted 10,000 times. I don’t expect people to agree with all my votes. I don’t agree with all of them at this time. But can you imagine picking one vote out of 10,000 and having the party say to me, in effect, “We don’t want you as our candidate”?

So there has to be room for people who are, who are moderates.

GREGORY: Right.

SPECTER: It has to be Reagan’s big tent again.

GREGORY: All right, Senator Arlen Specter , thank you very much for appearing this morning.

SPECTER: Great being with you, David. Thank you.

Who's watching news scorecards on Obama?

Associated Press

By DAVID BAUDER, AP Television Writer

NEW YORK – As President Barack Obama passed his 100th day in office last week, two studies judged that the news media has given him more coverage, and more positive coverage, than his two predecessors at the same point in their terms.

What is that information really worth?

"It's always good to know what you're doing," said Bob Lichter, director of the Center for Media and Public Affairs at George Mason University. "Journalists get critiques from all sides at all times. Instead of throwing up your hands and ignoring critiques of your work, you can focus on reliable critiques."

Lichter's group did one of the studies, looking at evening news coverage and stories in The New York Times over 50 days. It found the ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts devoted nearly 28 hours to the new Obama administration, more than they did during the same stretch in the Bush and Clinton presidencies combined.

The tone of comments by reporters and sources on the three networks reflected positively on Obama in roughly the same proportions, 57 percent on ABC, 58 percent on CBS and 61 percent on NBC. Bush faced a two-thirds negative reaction, and Clinton 44 percent in the same period.

Obama's policies have come in for more criticism than the president himself, the center said.

Another independent think tank, the Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism, did a more extensive look at media outlets and judged 42 percent of news stories, editorials and columns were pro-Obama. Clinton was 27 percent positive and Bush 22 percent positive in a similar evaluation.

News organizations are focusing more on Obama's leadership style and personal qualities than they did for his immediate predecessors, the Pew Center said.

"My eyes are always open to everything, including studies like these," said Jon Banner, executive producer of ABC's "World News." "I do not program the news by studies or by anything else, for that matter. I program it by the news of the day and what our journalistic guts tell us."

He doesn't pay much attention to the studies parsing his newscast, particularly when done by organizations with a clear point of view.

Given a new president trying to change the direction of two wars and restart the economy, "if we are covering the news, we are covering this administration," Banner said. "There's really no way around that."

Banner said his broadcast isn't influenced by polls indicating Obama's popularity. But Pew's Mark Jurkowitz said it's hard to get around that as a factor for the positive tone in coverage, especially since the election can be seen as a mandate.

"In many ways, he had a better 100 days than Bush or Clinton," Jurkowitz said. "He faced huge challenges. He's had a certain amount of success and it's clear that the public likes him."

The newscasts reflect reality, said Rick Kaplan, executive producer of the "CBS Evening News." He said he believed that the president has done extraordinarily well. "Everybody, including Republicans, would have to say that his first 100 days have been great," he said.

"You cover what's out there," Kaplan said. "Everybody gets upset. If you cover somebody too hard, his supporters think you're being unfair. If you cover somebody too soft, his opponents think you're too soft. Across his four years, or eight years, whatever it is, there will be plenty for people on all sides to not like or love. It will balance itself out inevitably."

NBC anchor Brian Williams said it now appears the nation had a realigning election.

`It was historic," he said. "It has changed, fundamentally and forever, the poster of the presidents in front of the classroom. That accounts for the quantity of coverage, and we're judged on the quality of the coverage every day, as it should be."

The conservative Media Research Center is doing its own study. While not quite done, its conclusion is already clear: The media "are completely in the tank, working overtime to help (Obama) succeed," said Brent Bozell, the organization's president.

Ethanol test for Obama on climate change, science

Associated Press

By H. JOSEF HEBERT, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama's commitment to take on climate change and put science over politics is about to be tested as his administration faces a politically sensitive question about the widespread use of ethanol: Does it help or hurt the fight against global warming?

The Environmental Protection Agency is close to proposing ethanol standards. But two years ago, when Congress ordered a huge increase in ethanol use, lawmakers also told the agency to show that ethanol would produce less pollution linked to global warming than would gasoline.

So how will the EPA define greenhouse gas emissions from ethanol production and use? Given the political clout of farm interests, will the science conflict with the politics?

Environmentalists, citing various studies and scientific papers, say the agency must factor in more than just the direct, heat-trapping pollution from ethanol and its production. They also point to "indirect" impacts on global warming from worldwide changes in land use, including climate-threatening deforestation, as land is cleared to plant corn or other ethanol crops.

Ethanol manufacturers and agriculture interests contend the fallout from potential land use changes in the future, especially those outside the United States, have not been adequately proven or even quantified, and should not count when the EPA calculates ethanol's climate impact.

"It defies common sense that EPA would publish a proposed rule-making with harmful conclusions for biofuels based on incomplete science and inaccurate assumptions," complained Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa.

He was one of 12 farm-state senators, both Democrats and Republicans, who wrote EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson in March, urging the agency to stick to assessing only the direct emissions.

Ethanol, which in the future may come from cellulosic sources such as switchgrass and wood chips, is promoted by its advocates as a "green" substitute for gasoline that will help the U.S. reduce its reliance on fossil fuels, especially foreign oil. That transition is a priority of the Obama White House.

In 2007, Congress ordered huge increases in ethanol use, requiring refiners to blend 20 billion gallons with gasoline by 2015 and a further expansion to 36 billion gallons a year by 2022.

Congress said any fuel produced in plants built after 2007 must emit 20 percent less in greenhouse gases than gasoline if it comes from corn, and 60 percent less if from cellulosic crops.

Meeting the direct emissions would not be a problem. But if indirect emissions from expected land use changes are included, ethanol probably would fail the test.

Nathaniel Greene, director of renewable energy policy at the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental advocacy group, said that wouldn't mean the end of ethanol.

Ethanol from existing production facilities is grandfathered and "there are ways to produce advanced ethanol's that would comply with the greenhouse thresholds," even using land use climate impacts if the industry chose to adopt them, Greene said.

But farm interests and their allies in Congress are pushing to get the EPA to at least postpone any consideration of the land-use impacts issue, arguing the science surrounding the issue is uncertain.

The senators' letter said that an overreaching regulation by EPA on ethanol's link to climate change "could seriously harm our U.S. biofuels growth strategy by introducing uncertainty and discouraging future investments."

Environmentalists say there have been enough studies on the indirect impact of ethanol on greenhouse pollution to justify the science.

Ignoring the indirect impacts "will undermine the environmental benefits" of the renewable fuels program "and set a poor precedent for any future policies attempting to reduce global warming pollution," 17 environmental group wrote Jackson in response to the senator's plea.

Greene said the EPA's handling of the ethanol rule will be a "a test of our ability to follow sound science" even when it conflicts with the interests of powerful interests.

The environmental organizations noted that Obama has "vowed to make the U.S. a leader on climate change" and put science over politics, and "now is the time to uphold those pledges."

EPA spokeswoman Andora Andy declined to say when an agency proposal — a holdover issue from the Bush administration — would be issued. Interest groups on both sides of the debate said it could come in days. The White House Office of Management and Budget concluded its review of the EPA proposal last week.

U.S. says Islamist militancy a concern in Bangladesh

Reuters

DHAKA (Reuters) – The United States believes that Islamist militancy remains a concern for Bangladesh, U.S. Ambassador James F. Moriarty said Sunday, after a former prime minister said there was no such threat.

"The recent seizure of weapons in Bhola and continued arrests of JMB (Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh) members throughout the country demonstrates terrorism remains a concern," Moriarty told reporters.

Outlawed JMB, which wants to turn the country into a sharia-based Islamic state, killed about 30 people and wounded 150 in a series of bomb attacks in late 2005, police said.

Security forces seized a cache of arms and explosives and arrested four militants from a madrasa (Islamic religious school) at a village near Bhola district town, 350 km (219 miles) south of the capital Dhaka, in late March.

The raid was conducted as the government suspected that Islamist militants were involved in a mutiny at the Dhaka headquarters of a paramilitary unit in late February.

The February 25-26 mutiny killed nearly 80 people, mostly army officers commanding the paramilitary Bangladesh Rifles (BDR) troops, and raised fears of more violence.

Security forces have since raided several hideouts, seized explosives and detained nearly 200 Islamist militants.

Bangladesh's former prime minister Begum Khaleda Zia told a rally Saturday there were no active Islamist militants in the country, saying her government had routed Islamist groups in a countrywide crackdown when she was in power between 2001-06.

Addressing a May Day rally Friday, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina blamed Khaleda's government for inaction against Islamist groups.

Radical Islamists have been largely quiet since six top JMB commanders were executed in 2007. But intelligence officials have said they are regrouping and might strike again.

Despite a decrease in violence in Iraq, recent attacks in India, Pakistan and other countries demonstrated the world had a long way to go before it got rid of terrorism, Moriarty said.

(Reporting by Nizam Ahmed; Editing by Anis Ahmed)

U.S. asks Germany to take Guantanamo inmates: German government

Reuters

BERLIN (Reuters) – The United States has made a formal request to Germany to take in some prisoners held at its military prison in Guantanamo Bay, a spokesman for Interior Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said on Sunday.

Confirming a report to appear in Monday's Der Spiegel news magazine, the spokesman said the ministry is currently reviewing the request. He declined to provide further details.

Der Spiegel said the United States has asked Germany to take about 10 prisoners who cannot be sent to their home countries and who are classified as not posing a security threat.

Schaeuble, a leader in Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats, has expressed reservations about Germany accepting detainees.

But Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, a Social Democrat leader and chancellor candidate, has said Germany should take in some prisoners as a token of solidarity after Germany had long urged the United States to close the prison.

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said in Berlin last week that Washington has identified about 30 inmates in Guantanamo Bay who are ready to be released.

U.S. President Barack Obama, in one of his first acts after taking office, ordered that the prison be closed within a year.

Some European countries, including France and Portugal, have signaled a readiness to accept former Guantanamo inmates.

(Reporting by Erik Kirschbaum; editing by Dominic Evans)

Gates optimistic on 2010 U.S. defense budget success

Reuters

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said in an interview aired on Sunday that he is optimistic his recommendations for overhauling defense spending can survive an upcoming budget fight in Congress.

Gates told CNN that he has been surprised by the limited scope of criticism aimed so far at his recommendations for the Pentagon budget for fiscal year 2010, which begins October 1, and had heard some "important voices raised in support."

"I'm relatively optimistic, actually," he said in the interview, which was taped last week. "I think we've presented, as one news magazine referred to it, a radically sane set of proposals. They don't represent a cut, and where we have eliminated one program, you have added to others."

Gates is recommending a $534 billion defense budget for fiscal year 2010 as part of the $3.4 trillion federal budget plan approved by Congress on Wednesday.

The defense budget recommendations do not include the cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the broader U.S. war on terrorism.

A more detailed 2010 budget proposal is expected to arrive as early as this week on Capitol Hill, where lawmakers decide what will, and will not be, included in the final version.

Gates, backed by the White House and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, scored an initial victory last week in his drive to rein in congressional moves to add funding for specific weapons to the war spending budget, a move that may signal big changes in the defense procurement process, analysts said.

Representative John Murtha, who heads the House of Representatives Appropriations defense subcommittee, agreed not to add a provision to a 2009 war spending bill that required the Pentagon to divide a $35 billion contract for aerial refueling tankers between Boeing Co and a team including Northrop Grumman Corp and Europe's EADS.

Gates has argued forcefully against dividing the tanker work between those companies, saying it would add $7 billion in extra development, logistics and operations costs.

House appropriators also agreed to fund just eight more Boeing C-17 transport planes with the supplemental budget, instead of the 15 sought by Boeing and backed by Murtha.

"Murtha had to apologize on Thursday to members of his subcommittee for failing to deliver on commitments as he had in the past," said defense analyst Loren Thompson of the Virginia-based Lexington Institute think tank.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid was also pressuring Daniel Inouye, who heads the Senate defense appropriations committee, to avoid adding funding for extra weapons to the Senate version of the war spending bill, Thompson said.

Thompson said Murtha's retreat on tankers may signal a turning point for the influence of senior congressional appropriators, who historically have been very supportive of weapons programs.

Murtha plans to revisit the tanker issue during the 2010 budget process, his spokesman said. But industry executives say it may be even tougher to add funding for a split tanker buy to the 2010 budget, since it requires approval by two additional committees, the House and Senate armed services committees.

Consultant Jim McAleese said Gates was already warning the military services to skip the "unfunded priorities" lists that lawmakers have used in the past to justify added funding for programs like the C-17 that were not in the Pentagon's base budget. "You're not going to get two bites at the apple anymore," McAleese said.

The Gates proposals scale back or eliminate spending programs for costly weapons systems, while placing greater emphasis on irregular warfare and care for wounded troops and their families.

The U.S. defense chief dismissed criticism that the proposed shift in priorities could risk leaving the United States vulnerable to future weapons threats from countries such as China and Russia.

"At the end of the day, 50 percent of our procurement budget is still for these high-tech modernization programs, about 40 percent for dual-purpose capabilities ... and about 10 percent for irregular conflicts," Gates said.

(Reporting by David Morgan and Andrea Shalal-Esa; Editing by Will Dunham)

U.S. senators weigh in on Supreme Court selection

Reuters

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama's choice to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice David Souter should be pragmatic, follow the law and not be an ideologue, Democratic and Republican senators said on Sunday.

Obama has said he wants someone with a sharp, independent mind for his first appointment to the nation's highest court. He also said last week he would look for someone who had empathy for ordinary Americans, remarks that raised concerns among conservatives that he would appoint an "activist judge," who would make decisions based on politics and not law.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy said on Sunday that he did not see Obama selecting an ideologue to replace Souter, who has served on the nine-member court since 1990. Souter said last week that he intended to retire when the justices go on their summer recess at the end of next month.

"I don't like to see an ideologue of either the right or the left. I don't think we're going to have one," Leahy, a Democrat, said on CNN's "State of the Union."

Republican Senator Richard Shelby on the same show acknowledged that Obama would not lean conservative in his appointment, but said he should avoid someone who would bring their personal politics to the court.

"If he will appoint a pragmatist, someone who is not an ideologue, that someone is not just going to light all the light bulbs in America on the left, I think that would be good for the country," Shelby said.

Senator Orrin Hatch, an influential Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, told ABC's "This Week" that Obama would likely select a liberal who backed abortion rights.

"The question is, are they qualified? Are they going to be people who will be fair to the rich, the poor, the weak, the strong, the sick, the disabled, and yet give justice to those who may not be," Hatch said.

Senator Arlen Specter, who last week switched from the Republican to the Democratic Party, said on CBS' "Face the Nation" that he would like to see someone with broad experience appointed to the bench. He added that it may be time to appoint the first Hispanic to the court, or another woman or African-American.

"We have a very diverse country," Specter said. "We need more people to express a woman's point of view or a minority point of view, Hispanic or African-American, so that somebody who has done something more than wear a black robe for most of their lives."

Leahy, who as head of the Judiciary Committee will help usher Obama's appointment through the Senate, said he would like to see someone with broad life experience appointed.

"I'd like to see an appointment of somebody who has real life experiences, not just within a judicial monastery, but somebody who can reflect the feelings of real Americans," Leahy said on CNN's "State of the Union."

(Editing by Eric Beech)

Obama Says Wall Street will play less dominant role

Associated Press

WASHINGTON – Wall Street is not going to play as dominant a role in the economy as regulations reduce "some of the massive leveraging and the massive risk-taking that had become so common," President Barack Obama says.

The changes in the role of Wall Street and the huge profits that came from that risk-taking could mean other adjustments as well, Obama said in an interview in this week's New York Times Magazine.

"That means that more talent, more resources will be going to other sectors of the economy," he said. "I actually think that's healthy. We don't want every single college grad with mathematical aptitude to become a derivatives trader. We want some of them to go into engineering, and we want some of them to be going into computer design."

The Obama administration is trying to restore more regulations on the financial sector to avoid some of the risk-taking that helped cause the current economic problems.

"Wall Street will remain a big, important part of our economy, just as it was in the '70s and the '80s," he said. "It just won't be half of our economy."

Obama said he expects that government efforts to fix the economy will cause long-term changes.

"What I think will change, what I think was an aberration, was a situation where corporate profits in the financial sector were such a heavy part of our overall profitability over the last decade," he said.

Obama said he's confident that people will regain trust and confidence in the financial system, but he believes it will take time.

"I think it's important to understand that some of that wealth was illusory in the first place," he said.

GOP group launches listening tour to rebrand image

Associated Press

By JACKIE QUINN, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON – With its party struggling to define itself, a group of prominent Republicans launched a listening tour Saturday in a bid to boost the GOP's sagging image and regroup for future elections.

Former presidential candidate Mitt Romney, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and House Minority Whip Eric Cantor, R-Va., held a town-hall style meeting at a pizza restaurant in the Democratic suburb of Arlington, Va., to hear about people's concerns on issues from the economy and health care to the rising costs of college tuition.

"You can't beat something with nothing, and the other side has something," Bush told a group of about 100 people at the Pie-Tanza pizza parlor. "I don't like it, but they have it and we have to be respectful and mindful of that.

"I hope across the country people will be excited about the prospect of sharing their ideas to bring about a better America," he said.

It was the first meeting of the GOP group National Council for a New America, which was created to rebrand the party's image. The meeting comes after a bad week in which Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter announced he was switching to the Democratic party and Democrat Scott Murphy won a close U.S. House race in a GOP district in upstate New York.

An Associated Press-GfK poll released in April shows that Democrats outnumber Republicans by 46 percent to 28 percent, including those leaning toward either party.

The national council, which plans listening sessions in other cities, also includes Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour and Sen. John McCain. Republican aides on Capitol Hill disclosed the group this past Wednesday just before Obama started a news conference to mark his first 100 days in office. The group is partly highlighting their differences with the Republican National Committee's political strategy.

That group and a similar one — Resurgent Republic, a collection of the party's senior strategists — are meant to be Republican roadshows outside Washington's circus tent.

Still, notably absent from either group's rosters are the 2008 GOP vice presidential nominee, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, and former Speaker Newt Gingrich, who has his own policy group. Others mentioned as potential 2012 candidates and missing are South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford and Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, although the latter is a close McCain ally.

Cantor said he wanted to focus the meeting on "bread and butter" issues such as the rising costs of education and health care, which resonate the most with Americans right now.

"These are discussions that need to occur with the American people of any political stripe," he said. "We need to make sure, the discussions, I believe, should be focused on the principles that have made America great — the principles of freedom and opportunity."

Problem of Guantanamo detainees returns to haunt Barack Obama

The Times of London

Tim Reid in Washington

President Obama is on the verge of breaking two key campaign promises in his troubled attempt to shut Guantánamo Bay — with plans to revive the military tribunal system set up by George Bush and to continue the indefinite detention of up to 100 inmates.

The moves, which have not yet been signed off by Mr Obama but look increasingly likely, are a result of his promise on his second day in office to shut the Guantánamo Bay prison within a year.

Since then, officials charged with working out how to shut down the prison concede that up to 100 of the 241 detainees remaining are either too dangerous to release or cannot be tried in a military or civilian court. The evidence against many of them is tainted because they were tortured, or involves sensitive issues of national security that cannot be revealed.

The latest Administration thinking has been decried by human rights groups who point out that as a presidential candidate, Mr Obama called the military tribunal system an enormous failure and condemned the indefinite detention of detainees as a gross breach of the US Constitution

In addition to his pledge to shut Guantánamo, Mr Obama ordered a 120-day suspension of the military tribunal system, pending a review. Officials say that they now want a three-month extension, and have indicated that the hearings are likely to be restarted, with some modifications.

On the campaign trail, Mr Obama criticised the military tribunals because they drastically reduced the rights of defendants, with hearsay evidence permitted and even testimony produced under the harsh interrogation techniques the new Administration says amounted to torture.

Now Mr Obama’s lawyers are worried that they will struggle to try many detainees in federal court because a civilian judge could throw out much of the evidence, allowing allegedly dangerous men to walk free. Plans being worked on are to modify the tribunal system to increase the rights of defendants, but without giving them the full protections provided by the American legal system.

At a recent House hearing, Eric Holder, Mr Obama’s Attorney General, said that military tribunals could still be used but “would be different from those previously in place”.

Robert Gates, the Defence Secretary, who was asked last week if the Administration would abandon the Guantánamo tribunal system, said: “Not at all.” He added: “The commissions are still very much on the table.”

Jameel Jaffer, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), said: “To revive a fatally flawed system that was designed to evade due process and the rule of law would be a grave error and a huge step backward.” Just as dismaying for such groups is the admission by Mr Gates to Congress last week that up to 100 detainees will probably have to be detained without trial, possibly in facilities on the US mainland.

Mr Gates said that 50 to 100 inmates “who we cannot release and cannot try” could end up being held without trial, probably on US soil. When asked about Mr Obama’s pledge to shut Guantánamo by January, Mr Gates said: “I think that question is still open.” Mr Gates did not specify whether such detentions would be temporary or indefinite, but acknowledged that congressmen and senators in all 50 states would oppose taking such detainees into their regions.

Anthony Romero, the executive director of the ACLU, said: “President Obama’s decision to close Guantánamo will be betrayed if we simply replace it with another detention centre on US soil that disregards the law.”

WHO Chief Prepares for Pandemic

Wall Street Journal

By BETSY MCKAY

The World Health Organization's chief laid the groundwork Sunday for her agency potentially to declare a new strain of A/H1N1 swine flu a pandemic, saying such a move doesn't necessarily mean the disease is highly lethal or that it will sweep the entire globe.

 "There is a lot of misunderstanding in terms of fear and death," Margaret Chan, the United Nations public health agency's director-general, said in an interview. "It doesn't mean death in big numbers is going to happen."

A week and a half after learning that a new strain of swine flu was causing outbreaks in Mexico and infections in the U.S., the WHO chief is now faced with the distinct possibility that she will have to formally declare the disease a pandemic, once it begins spreading in a sustained way in other parts of the world beyond the Americas. WHO protocols will compel that to happen, she said, even though thus far the strain isn't producing the deadly sort of scourge most people associate with the word "pandemic" and in fact looks to have exacted a lighter death toll in Mexico than authorities there originally believed.

As the disease has spread quickly over the past 11 days, the agency has raised its global pandemic alert level twice, to phase 5 -- signaling outbreaks in more than one country in one of the agency's geographical regions -- from phase 3. Its highest level is a phase 6, meaning community outbreaks are occurring in at least three countries in at least two of the WHO's regions. The disease is spreading within communities in the U.S. and Mexico, and case counts are mounting in Canada. Public health officials have said sustained transmission hasn't been seen elsewhere yet, but is likely to emerge in countries that already have multiple case counts.

Dr. Chan said she couldn't say when the agency would raise the alert level to phase 6. "That is very unpredictable," she said. "We will continue to monitor and watch very carefully."

"Phase 6 is a signal to all public health authorities in the world that they need to activate their pandemic preparedness plans," Dr. Chan said. But "it doesn't mean every country in the world will be affected by this wave of infection," she said. Additionally, "we know fully from the data that most people make a full recovery and some people don't even need to take medicine."

But signs that the virus thus far seems to produce predominantly mild disease don't mean countries can afford to let down their vigilance, she stressed. The WHO acted appropriately in raising the global alarm over the new strain because no one can predict whether it will morph into a more dangerous form at a later point after its initial emergence at the tail end of this flu season, she said. An initial outbreak of the 1918 flu in the spring was followed by a second, far deadlier wave which killed millions of people as it swept the globe, she noted.

"We cannot overreact and we cannot be complacent either," she said. "We haven't seen the full spectrum of the disease.

"It may come back. The world should prepare for it."

Moreover, even seasonal flu takes a hefty toll, she said. "We should not forget that even with seasonal flu about half a million people die each year from complications."

As of Sunday, the new flu had spread to 17 countries and sickened 787 people, according to the WHO, which counts only cases that have been confirmed by a laboratory test. Those cases include 506 infections in Mexico, with 19 deaths -- far lower than Mexican authorities originally believed. The U.S. has reported 160 infections and one death.

While the world overall is much better prepared for a pandemic than just a few years ago, many poor, developing countries remain particularly exposed, she said. The WHO said this weekend it's dispatching antiviral medications to many poor countries that lack supplies.

Write to Betsy McKay at betsy.mckay@wsj.com

Accidental deaths plaguing US in Iraq

Boston Globe

Military aiming to reduce toll

By Bryan Bender
Globe Staff / May 3, 2009

WASHINGTON - The 130,000 American troops serving in Iraq are more likely to die in accidents, from natural causes, or in other "nonhostile" incidents than at the hands of insurgents, according to Defense Department statistics for the past eight months ending in April.

The statistics highlight the dramatic reduction of violence in Iraq over the past year, but also underscore a challenge that has bedeviled US troops in Iraq and Afghanistan since hostilities began: A steady stream of soldiers and Marines are losing their lives in circumstances that are often preventable.

Between September 2008 and April 2009, 72 troops died in Iraq from accidents, illness, or suicide, compared with 67 who died in action, according to the Pentagon - the first extended period in the six-year conflict where insurgents did not pose the greatest threat.

In response to the growing number of deaths and injuries occurring outside combat - most of which are attributed to accidents - the Defense Department recently approved plans to hire hundreds of additional safety specialists to deploy with Army and Marine Corps units, according to top safety officials. The military has also initiated a series of new training drills such as a simulation exercise that teaches troops how to escape if their Humvee rolls over.

"We are taking them very seriously," Lieutenant Colonel Michael Miller, the top ground safety officer at Marine Corps headquarters, said of the nonhostile casualties. "Whether a Marine or soldier is injured or, God forbid, killed in some kind of accident, at the end of the day we have lost that person."

Miller and others said the deaths and injuries go "beyond the human aspect" and degrade the overall readiness of the force.

"As stressed as the Army force is, rotating soldiers in and out of a combat zone, the last thing we need" are casualties that can be prevented, said Sergeant Major Tod Glidewell, the senior noncommissioned officer at the Army Combat Readiness Center at Fort Rucker, Ala.

Some specialists, meanwhile, also expressed concern that an increase in accidental gunshot wounds and suicides may be new evidence of pressure on troops who have served multiple tours.

"That is a sign of wear on the force," said Paul Reickhoff, an Iraq veteran who is now president of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, a leading advocacy group. "It has become cumulative."

Officials say they have made strides in controlling some types of accidents, such as vehicle rollovers. But those declines have been offset by the increase in weapons accidents and suicides, meaning that the rate of deaths by nonhostile causes has remained fairly steady throughout the Iraq war - between 100 and 175 per year.

Compared with past conflicts, the percentage of nonhostile deaths is at a historic high. A full 20 percent - or 1 out of every 5 - of all US troop deaths in Iraq have been the result of nonhostile wounds. In Afghanistan - where far fewer US troops have been engaged in combat - the share of nonhostile deaths is nearly half of the total, although, with violence increasing, hostile deaths are on the increase.

While officials stressed that the casualty information is far more accurate and detailed today than it was in the past, in both cases those percentages are higher than in the Vietnam and Korean wars, according to historical Defense Department data.

Military officials began taking notice last summer that, even as overall violence in Iraq declined, nonhostile incidents continued unabated - and in some categories increased.

"Unfortunately, according to casualty and medical reports, noncombat injuries and illnesses are now the number one hazard in Iraq," an internal report by the Marine Corps Center for Lessons Learned concluded.

The biggest cause of nonhostile deaths remains accidents. Since the start of the war in March 2003 more than 500 troops have died from vehicle or aircraft crashes and other accidents such as falls, according to the data. Dozens more have drowned, while at least 26 troops were slain by fellow soldiers.

Another major cause of accidents are so-called negligent discharges - or accidental gunshots - which the Marine Corps report said increased every year between 2004 and 2008, including those involving "more senior, highly trained personnel." More than 180 troops have died from accidental gunshot wounds since the invasion, most recently two Marines in Anbar Province who died within the past two weeks, according to the Pentagon.

Miller said many of the accidental-discharge deaths involved units that had recently arrived in the combat zone, suggesting that lack of training played a role.

"Now you are armed to the teeth 24-7 and you are walking around essentially with a loaded weapon all the time," he said. "Even when you go to the shower you bring your personal weapon with you. There is a learning curve."

Other gunshot accidents have been traced to complacency or fatigue, he said. "If it's 3 o'clock in the morning and you've been on a combat patrol for the last eight hours you can sometimes miss some things," Miller said.

Now, the Marines are preparing an aggressive effort to get safety specialists into every major fighting unit overseas, recently approving plans to more than triple the number of so-called tactical safety specialists over the next 18 months from 78 to 245.

"Every infantry battalion, every combat logistics battalion, is going to have a full-time safety specialist to work with the commander to identify and abate the hazards and risks associated in theater," Miller said.

The Army is taking similar steps, according to retired Colonel James Yonts, a spokesman for the Army Safety Center at Fort Rucker.

"We are lacking in qualified safety officers who are out there with the commanders," he said.

Bryan Bender can be reached at bender@globe.com.
© Copyright 2009 Globe Newspaper Company.

U.S. allies losing asylum bids over definition of 'terrorist'

McLatchy Newspapers

By Marisa Taylor | McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON — Forced to flee his homeland because he supported America's ideals, Tsegu Bahta thought he'd be embraced by the country he emulated and respected.

Instead, the U.S. has branded him a terrorist.

The former rebel commander and top official in Eritrea once provided the U.S. with intelligence about Osama bin Laden and advocated the adoption of an American-style constitution for his fledgling African nation. He now works as a Washington parking lot attendant, biding his time until the U.S. government decides whether to deport him.

Bahta is among at least 6,000 immigrants who've tried to find refuge in the U.S. only to be told that they don't qualify because the Patriot Act and other post-9/11 laws label members of armed groups terrorists, even if they supported pro-democracy efforts and opposed despots and dictators. Others who gave money to terrorists under threat of death are considered terrorist sympathizers.

As a result, a wide range of immigrants, from Iraqis who worked for the U.S. government despite death threats to child soldiers who fled their African countries so they'd no longer be forced to kill, are trapped in legal limbo.

Their cases help fuel a growing perception internationally that the U.S., which still accepts the most refugees in the world, has become much less welcoming — even to those who champion democratic ideals.

"It's like Alice in Wonderland: Everything is upside down," said Bereket Selassie, Bahta's U.S. citizen uncle who's a constitutional law professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. "These are people who have fought for freedom and democracy and who were recognized by the American government for their efforts. Now, they're terrorists? It doesn't make any sense."

Some immigrants have been told that they can't receive asylum status and could be deported.

Others received asylum before the government began relying on the broader interpretation of post-9/11 anti-terrorism laws. Now, they can't get permanent residency or "green cards."

Without green cards, their dreams of becoming U.S. citizens go unfulfilled. Some can't get jobs because of the stigma. Although their lawyers try to reassure them otherwise, they live in fear that the U.S. will take their asylum status away and send them home.

Many of them feel betrayed, especially since the trauma and persecution they experienced in the native lands are now being held against them.

An Iraqi Kurd, who was granted asylum and applied for a green card in 2004, continues to wait in vain despite his work as an interpreter for the U.S. military for almost three years. The reason: His relatives supported the U.S.-backed Kurdish Democratic Party that had tried to topple Saddam Hussein.

The interpreter, who asked that his identity be withheld out of fear for his relatives, is especially bitter because he says he helped U.S. military forces break up terrorist organizations in Iraq and detect plots to bomb U.S. facilities. His attorney, Thomas Ragland, showed immigration officers proof of his client's work for the U.S. military, but to no avail.

Without a green card, he's unable to bring his elderly mother and father to the U.S.

"Do you know what they do to the relatives of interpreters in Iraq?" the interpreter asked. "They behead them."

Department of Homeland Security officials acknowledge that many of the immigrants deserve asylum or green cards, but say they're restrained by the law.

In Bahta's case, officials point to his work as a government official freeing opponents of the brutal regime of Ethiopian President Mengistu Haile Mariam, who was later convicted of genocide. Many of those prisoners later joined armed groups that helped topple the dictatorship — an effort the U.S. backed at the time, but now says could count as terrorist activity.

After the civil war ended in 1991, Eritrea broke away from Ethiopia. As a top Eritrean official, Bahta pressured the new leadership to endorse a new constitution and hold democratic elections.

The U.S. took note of his efforts and paid for him to attend a rule of law class in Washington. His own government, however, grew suspicious of his activities and blacklisted him. By 2001, the new Eritrean regime had itself become a dictatorship, shutting down universities and newspapers and jailing top officials who were seen as critical of the government. Eventually, Bahta was warned that he, too, would be imprisoned if he remained.

If he's sent back now, the 55-year-old predicted: "I could be executed."

For others, the threat of deportation is even more imminent.

Louis, a welder from the central African country of Burundi, has been detained in a Virginia jail for 17 months although an immigration judge has said he's eligible for asylum. The same judge, however, said he was prevented from granting asylum because Louis had been forced at gunpoint to give a Burundi rebel group the equivalent of $4. At another point, Louis and other passengers on a bus were forced to hand over their lunches to the rebels.

The 2007 robberies are seen as "material support" of a terrorist group, although Louis was forced to flee the country because of the rebels.

Through his lawyer, Louis asked that his last name not be disclosed because he fears being harmed by the rebels if he's deported. The rebel group, known as the FNL, recently tracked down his wife and broke her legs.

Steven Schulman, Louis' attorney, said government lawyers continue to raise the same arguments that the Bush administration did against granting asylum in these types of cases. He's also representing a Sri Lankan fisherman who paid ransom to the terrorist group, the Tamil Tigers, after he was taken hostage. The ransom means he provided material support, DHS asserts.

"They literally make the argument that these people are a danger to the security of the United States," he said. "To make this argument with a straight face is outrageous."

Refugee advocates are holding out hope that the Obama administration will take notice and overhaul the handling of the cases.

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano has ordered a broad review of all department policies, including the asylum rules, said agency spokesman Matt Chandler, who added that the DHS would institute changes "where possible and appropriate."

"The Department of Homeland Security is committed to the dual goals of protecting the security of the United States while providing deserving applicants who pose no security threat the opportunity to seek and obtain immigration status," he said.

Thomas Ragland, a former Justice Department lawyer who once represented the government in immigration cases, said he thinks that bureaucratic inertia has been behind the holdups, not concern for national security.

"After 9/11, everything switched to 'We assume you're a terrorist,'" said Ragland, a Washington attorney who now represents several of the immigrants.

The Bush administration vowed to fix the problem more than a year ago after Congress got word that an Iraqi interpreter who worked for the U.S. military had been told he couldn't get a green card.

At the time, then-Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff agreed that the Iraqi deserved permanent residency and pledged to review the thousands of pending cases.

"We're out of 'Alice in Wonderland'," he said.

To ensure that the situation was remedied, Congress passed a new law giving the DHS and the State Department broader discretion to grant individuals waivers from the terrorist definition. The law included exemptions for 10 groups, including an organization that opposed Cuban dictator Fidel Castro. Immigrants who were forced to support terrorist organizations, such as child soldiers, also were expected to receive help.

The procedures for granting thousands of waivers were never put into place, however. Hundreds, if not thousands, of pro-democracy groups whose members should be eligible for asylum were left off the list.

From 2005 through March, the U.S. has issued just over 9,600 waivers, mostly for Burmese refugees, who are fleeing a repressive military regime.

"There was a lack of political will at the highest levels," said Elizabeth Campbell, the director of Refugee Council USA. "No one appeared to have any intention of really solving the problem."

Meanwhile, the immigrants wait.

Tadele Worku, a 44-year-old Ethiopian immigrant who already received asylum, applied for a green card eight years ago. He fled to the U.S. from Ethiopia after he was repeatedly imprisoned in his homeland for his membership in a pro-democracy group, beginning when he was 13.

The Irvine, Calif., computer engineer has written several members of Congress and he calls DHS every six months in an effort to find out about his case. His application hasn't budged. If he ever gets his green card, he could be required to wait another five years before becoming a U.S. citizen.

"I'm stuck," he said. "Half of my life has been here. This country is my country. This country is where I have a future. But I can't move on until this is resolved."

(Tish Wells contributed to this article.)

Pakistan moves closer to conflict with Taliban in Swat

McLatchy Newspapers

By Saeed Shah | McClatchy Newspapers

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Pakistan on Sunday edged closer to a major conflict with Taliban militants as a controversial peace deal with Islamic extremists in the Swat valley near the Afghan border began to unravel, according to military officials and politicians.

The confrontation comes as President Asif Zardari is scheduled to arrive Tuesday in Washington, where he'll meet President Barack Obama and hold trilateral talks with U.S. and Afghan political leaders. Last month, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton accused Pakistan of "abdicating to the Taliban," but in recent days the country's security forces have battled militants in parts of the troubled Northwest Frontier Province, though not in the militants' new stronghold of Swat.

The Obama administration as grown increasingly alarmed by the militants' advance, which if it continues could threaten a crucial U.S. supply route to Afghanistan, and by the Zardari government's efforts to fight the militants in some places while negotiating with them in others.

The administration, however, is also divided about both the causes of Pakistan's tentative responses to what Defense Secretary Robert Gates on Sunday called "an existential threat," and about possible solutions to it.

Administration officials held a high-level meeting Saturday at the National Defense University in Washington to review their Afghan strategy.

Some officials blame Zardari and advocate reaching out to his main political opponent, Nawaz Sharif, but others distrust Sharif, who has ties to a number of Islamist groups and to Saudi Arabia.

Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, blames Pakistan's civilian leaders rather than the military for the indecisiveness. But others think that the military has been unable or unwilling to accept the fact that Islamic militancy, not Hindu-dominated India, is now the country's main enemy.

Violence erupted in Swat over the weekend, following weeks of relative calm after Pakistani officials negotiated a peace accord with the insurgents in mid-February. Pakistani forces have been battling militants first in Dir and then in Buner districts, which are on either side of Swat, since April 26, but a delicate truce had held in Swat.

The bodies of two armed forces personnel were found Sunday, their heads severed and their bodies mutilated, in the Khwazakhela area of Swat. Kidnapped several days earlier while they were on leave, the army soldier and paramilitary trooper bore marks of severe torture, according to a security official, who couldn't be named because he's not authorized to speak to the media.

Separately, militants blew up a school in the Kabal area of Swat and attacked the electric grid station in the district's main town of Mingora. Officials said that Taliban were openly patrolling the streets of Mingora with their weapons, in violation of the peace deal. Authorities imposed a curfew in Mingora Sunday night.

"The militants have completely gone back on their pledges. They don't want peace, they just want an autonomous state," said the security official. "They are a menace. They have to be taken on, no matter how big the challenge."

Since the Pakistani Taliban made a grab to take over Swat in summer 2007, there have been two unsuccessful military offensives against them, leading to significant civilian casualties and leaving almost total control of the area in the hands of the extremists.

This time, with global attention on Swat and domestic criticism of the army's failure there, any new operation looks likely to be much larger, possibly involving regular army troops rather than members of the Frontier Corps, which unlike the Punjabi-dominated army is made of largely of ethnic Pashtuns, the same group as the Taliban.

With soldiers now positioned on both sides of Swat, in Dir and Buner, the Pakistani army would be able to use a pincer movement to retake the huge Swat valley.

On Feb. 16, the provincial government and the Taliban, represented by radical cleric Sufi Mohammad, agreed to a cessation of violence in return for the imposition of Islamic law in Swat. Among the terms of the accord was a pledge by the Taliban to recognize the writ of the state and to stop "displaying" arms.

The deal, pushed by the administration of the North West Frontier Province and signed by Zardari on April 13, hasn't led to a disbanding of the Taliban, and now even the NWFP government has signaled its exasperation with the attempt to solve the Swat issue through dialogue.

"Between February 16 and now, there have been 190 violations (of the peace deal) on record. We are ready to fulfill our pledges. ... We say to them (the Taliban) even now, lay down your arms," NWFP Information Minister Mian Iftikhar told reporters.

At the beginning of April, Taliban from Swat invaded Buner, which is just 60 miles from Islamabad, the Pakistani capital, testing the resolve of the Pakistan army, which finally responded more than three weeks later under intense U.S. pressure with an operation to drive them out of Buner,

In a CNN interview on Sunday, Defense Secretary Gates described the Buner incursion as "a real wake-up call for the Pakistan government ... (of a) truly existential threat."

Pakistani public opinion had been largely hostile to fighting the Taliban at home, believing that negotiation was the best approach, but in recent weeks there's been a swing in sentiment behind the army and a military solution. The emergence of a video showing the Taliban in Swat flogging a young woman for alleged adultery, and their Buner expansion, appear to have jolted the public.

(Shah is a McClatchy special correspondent.)

It's all on Obama now

Los Angeles Times

Political observers say that with the events of the last week, accountability for the nation and its current problems has clearly shifted from Bush.

By Peter Nicholas
May 3, 2009
Reporting from Washington -- In the span of a single week -- from the day Arlen Specter turned Democratic to the moment Congress passed the White House's budget blueprint and on through the opening of a spot on the Supreme Court -- President Obama crossed a fateful line: From now on, it's his country.

Every president inherits a tangle of problems from his predecessor. War and recession, natural disaster and foreign crises. And for some undefined interval, new presidents argue that they should not be accountable for the troubles that arose on another's watch.

But inevitably, responsibility shifts. And for Obama, that time came last week, bringing both greater opportunities and greater risks.

On the economy, Obama won approval Wednesday of a $3.5-trillion budget plan that aims to help pull the country out of the worst recession in decades. It also smooths the way for one of the president's signature domestic priorities -- overhauling the nation's healthcare system.

At the same time, the budget projects a whopping $1.2-trillion deficit in 2010, undercutting Obama's ability to bemoan Bush-era red ink.

"It is now absolutely his economy," said Paul Light, a New York University professor who specializes in presidential transitions. "I don't think that the public will continue to believe that this was all George W. Bush's doing. And every day that goes by, it becomes more Obama's than Bush's."

Ever since his inauguration, Obama has nurtured the idea that responsibility for grim economic conditions rested with former President Bush. As recently as Wednesday, Obama sought that political cover when it was announced that the economy had shrunk by 6.1% in the first quarter of the year.

Speaking at a town hall meeting near St. Louis, he said: "Now, we've got a lot of work to do, because on our first day in office we found challenges of unprecedented size and scope."

But the events of the last week made Bush seem less relevant, presidential experts and political strategists said. As Obama's imprint on the economy grows, so does his ownership of the issue.

That ownership became almost literal as Obama moved more deeply into the banking and auto industry crises.

As the Treasury Department finished "stress tests" on 19 of the country's biggest banks, the administration became further enmeshed in the workings of the financial system.

And on Thursday, Obama announced he was pushing Chrysler into bankruptcy. He may take another corporate icon, General Motors, down the same path.

As a kind of shareholder in chief, the president now is responsible for guiding companies with thousands of union workers and investors -- firms that remain vital to the economies of states that stretch across the nation's industrial heartland, from Pennsylvania to Illinois and south into Kentucky and Tennessee.

Though the auto industry was in crisis before Obama reached the White House, his team has been in charge of the rescue effort for the last four months.

"The perception will be that Barack Obama owns this bankruptcy," said Neil Newhouse, a Republican pollster. "He owns this economy."

On the political front, the decision by Pennsylvania's senior senator to join the Democrats moved Obama to the brink of a 60-vote majority in the Senate, which could prevent Republicans from blocking his initiatives by filibuster. One of the people instrumental in persuading Specter to abandon the GOP was Vice President Joe Biden, reinforcing the appearance of White House influence on Capitol Hill.

All that raised expectations that Obama should be able to win congressional approval of his core agenda.

Yet Specter insisted he would not be a rubber stamp for the president. He promptly voted against the Obama budget. And although Democrats have a strong majority in the House, their control of the Senate is still far from absolute.

Democrat Al Franken, the apparent victor in the still-contested Minnesota Senate race, has yet to be seated.

In addition, Obama must work to get support from such relatively conservative Democratic senators as Ben Nelson of Nebraska.

"It's nice to say you have 60 votes. Having said that, there are going to be tensions within the Democratic caucus," said Harold M. Ickes, deputy chief of staff under President Clinton.

As for the Supreme Court, David H. Souter's announcement Friday that he was stepping down gives Obama a chance to start putting his mark on the court, one of the most lasting elements in a president's legacy.

Souter has been a reliably liberal vote on the court. But Obama, if he chose, could come up with a replacement even more progressive and more inclined to uphold his policies, should they face legal challenges.

Or, seeking to reinforce his moderate image and avoid a potentially bruising confirmation battle with Senate Republicans, the president could choose someone with a more centrist record.

No matter whom he chooses, Obama will be judged by the selection. And there is no guarantee that his pick will turn out as planned. Souter was chosen by Republican President George H.W. Bush, and in the end he disappointed the GOP base.

Throughout last week, Obama also had to cope with fears of a global swine flu pandemic. The president worked to calm Americans, urging people to take common-sense precautions such as washing their hands and covering their mouths when coughing. (The outbreak hit close to home when a member of the White House team that traveled to Mexico last month developed flu-like symptoms. There is no sign that Obama was infected.)

The public's reaction to Obama's assertive steps points up the potential gains and risks of being seen as clearly in charge.

Americans say they like the president. They also expect economic conditions to worsen, suggesting they're prepared to wait for the promised recovery.

But the activist government Obama has unleashed is increasingly worrisome to voters, polls show.

An NBC-Wall Street Journal poll showed that 47% of those surveyed believe "government should do more," compared with 46% who believe "government is doing too many things." In July, the gap between those who wanted government to do more and those who believed it was doing too much was 11 percentage points.

Seeming to recognize the danger of moving ever deeper into the affairs of the country, especially the private sector, Obama said at a news conference Wednesday that he wanted out of the auto business.

"I don't want to run auto companies," the president said. "I don't want to run banks. I've got two wars I've got to run already. I've got more than enough to do. So the sooner we can get out of that business, the better off we're going to be."

Inside the White House, aides seemed to sense that in the last week, a threshold was crossed.

"There are some occasions where a movie script would not do justice to the number of major events happening at one time," said Jen Psaki, a White House spokeswoman. "This week was one of those occasions."

peter.nicholas@latimes.com

The Religious Dimensions of the Torture Debate

Pew Forum

April 29, 2009

Amid intense public debate over the use of torture against suspected terrorists, an analysis by the Pew Research Center's Forum on Religion & Public Life of a new survey by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press illustrates differences in the views of four major religious traditions in the U.S. about whether torture of suspected terrorists can be justified. Differences in opinion on this issue also are apparent based on frequency of attendance at religious services.

Data from a Pew Research Center survey conducted April 14-21, 2009, among 742 American adults. Other religious groups are not reported due to small sample sizes.

Question wording: Do you think the use of torture against suspected terrorists in order to gain important information can often be justified, sometimes be justified, rarely be justified, or never be justified?

Empathy and Judicial Picks Rarely Mix on Capitol Hill

Washington Post

By Dan Balz
Sunday, May 3, 2009

With the retirement of Supreme Court Justice David H. Souter, President Obama has another opportunity to define his young presidency.

The replacement of Souter, who has been a reliable part of what constitutes a liberal bloc on the high court, is not likely to shift the bench's ideological balance. Obama will almost certainly reinforce the liberal bloc and, with the nomination of a youthful justice, conceivably reinvigorate that wing of the court for many years to come. He probably won't pick a Souter, which is to say he will avoid choosing someone whose judicial philosophy isn't already absolutely clear.

Given the makeup of Obama's Cabinet and White House staff, it is plain that diversity is a principal goal in his personnel selections. On a court that is devoid of Latinos and has just one woman and one African American, Obama could instantly alter the gender or racial balance in a significant way. That is why so much of the early speculation on a successor has focused on women in particular.

The court as currently composed represents a narrow slice of America in another way. They are for the most part graduates of two law schools -- Harvard and Yale -- and their routes to the Supreme Court included tenure on appellate circuit courts. Obama's nominee will reveal how much that lack of diversity of background concerns him.

Obama's choice will be important in another way. After a series of inflamed confirmation fights over judicial nominees, will the president be effective in lowering the temperatures on the left and the right as the confirmation process plays out? On this, Obama's record is contradictory.

There are few rituals more established in Washington than the battle over the confirmation of a new Supreme Court justice. It was only a matter of hours after the first reports of Souter's pending retirement that the machinery of the interest groups on the right and the left had cranked into action. With a Democrat in the White House, those on the right were especially vociferous in declaring some potential nominees out of bounds -- as those on the left were during George W. Bush's presidency.

One person who doesn't appreciate all that comes with that ritual -- the to-the-barricades rhetoric, the unforgiving ideological stamping of the nominees, the often overheated attention to hot-button issues -- is a former Democratic senator who spoke of his dislikes almost four years ago in the midst of the confirmation debate over now- Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr.

This former senator chastised liberal advocacy groups for attacking the ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee,  Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont, who had decided to support Roberts's confirmation. He also accused groups on both the left and the right of taking an "unyielding, unbending, dogmatic approach" that created "a poisonous atmosphere" when it came to judicial nominations.

"These groups on the right and left should not resort to the sort of broad-brush dogmatic attacks that have hampered the process in the past and constrained each and every senator in this chamber from making sure that they are voting on the basis of their conscience," he said.

That former senator was Barack Obama, who then turned around and sided with those liberal advocacy groups in opposing the Roberts nomination. He was just one of 22 senators (all Democrats) to vote no. For a politician with national aspirations, the vote made perfect political sense. But it also seemed to contradict much of what Obama the politician had projected in his then-brief time on the national stage, which was a call to bring the country together, to diminish polarization, to dampen rampant partisanship.

Not that Obama agreed with Roberts philosophically. It was obvious that they looked at the world from different perspectives. But as Obama said at the time, Roberts had the intellect, experience and temperament to qualify him for the court. Obama said he opposed Roberts "with considerable reticence." He explained his vote by saying he feared that Roberts too often would side with the strong over the weak, and that he was too dismissive of those pressing to eradicate racial discrimination or gender bias.

If elections matter -- and Obama has made clear as president to Republicans that he believes they do -- then was Obama simply succumbing to the power of the liberal interest groups? And if he was, was he not contributing to the kind of polarized court battles that he explicitly condemned?

Now as president he has the opportunity both to affect the court and the confirmation process. When he spoke Friday, Obama offered some clues to his thinking about a nominee but little about the process. He said he wanted someone with "a sharp and independent mind and a record of excellence and integrity." He also said he will look for someone with empathy, who understands the struggles of all kinds of people and how the court's decisions affect their daily lives.

John Podesta, who helped organize the transition for Obama, said he believes that "argues for someone who's going to be mainstream, moderate in their orientation." His hope, he said, is that Republicans will, after a rigorous confirmation hearing, strongly support Obama's choice, though he said he doubted that would be the case, particularly among the outside groups.

Republicans are wary of the criteria that Obama may apply. The "empathy" test, said  Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.), is "a dangerous road to go down." What about empathy "for the unborn?" he wondered. Graham thinks Obama would take back his vote on Roberts, had he another chance to consider it, saying, "I hope the Senate will treat his nominees better than he treated Bush's when he was in the Senate."

Kenneth Duberstein, the former Reagan White House chief of staff who helped guide Souter's nomination through the Senate for President George H.W. Bush, wondered how well Obama will, in the end, be able to resist the "pulls and tugs" of the liberal constituency groups. "With Supreme Court nominations, it's very difficult to have a do-over. You've got to get it right the first time."

That is why so much is at stake for Obama as he weighs this decision.