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FORMER Pakistani leader Benazir Bhutto has been killed in a gun and bomb attack.
At least 20 people were killed when the bomber struck after opposition leader Mrs Bhutto addressed a political rally, witnesses said.
It has been reported that Mrs Bhutto was shot in the neck and the chest before the bomber blew himself up.
Wasif Ali Khan, a member of Bhutto’s party who was at Rawalpindi General hospital, said Mrs Bhutto died at 6.16pm Pakistani time (1.16pm GMT)
Babar Awan, Bhutto’s lawyer, said: “The surgeons confirmed that she has been martyred.”
A witness at the scene of the attack said he heard two shots moments before the blast.
“As party leaders, including Bhutto, started coming out a man tried to go close to them and then he fired some shots and blew himself up,” said a police officer, at the scene.
The charges are too serious to ignore. There is credible evidence that the Vice President abused the power of his office, and not only brought us into an unneccesary war but violated the civil liberties and privacy of American citizens. It is the constitutional duty of Congress to hold impeachment hearings.
As the House Judiciary Committee continues to refuse any action on proposals to impeach Vice President Dick Cheney, three of that panel's members tried to take their case to influential op-ed pages of the nation's largest newspapers.
They were turned down by every one -- including the New York Times, Washington Post and Miami Herald -- so now one of the lawmakers has taken his campaign to the Internet.
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"The truth is the mainstream media have no interest in this issue," Wexler said Friday.
"They have bought into the notion that impeachment hearings are outside the bounds of what the congress ought to be doing," the six-term Congressman elaborated during a conference call Friday.
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"People are just afraid that we would just be putting the shoe on the other foot and just doing ... what the Republicans did to Bill Clinton," Wexler told the conference call, which was organized by Democrats.com.
The "kangaroo court" Republicans used to impeach Clinton, on grounds that he lied about his liaison with an intern, cannot become the precedent by which the constitutional tool is judged, Wexler said.
Although Bush and Cheney will be leaving the White House for good in 13 months, Wexler said impeachment hearings were necessary because of the need to ferret out possible criminality in the administration.
"We have to follow the evidence where it leads," he said. "We have an obligation to do it, and to do it as thoroughly as possible."
As you know, California Counts -- a cabal of right-wing political operatives linked to Rudy Giuliani -- are working hard to steal the White House (again) in 2008. They want to fool California voters into changing the rules so Giuliani -- or some other regressive Republican presidential nominee -- can rob at least 20 Electoral College votes from California.If you come across this tactic being used here in California please report it to the Courage Campaign at http://www.couragecampaign.org/sneaky where it will be passed on to Secretary of State Debra Bowen. Debra has promised to take action on the matter if she receives enough complaints.
When Steven Attewell, an eagle-eyed member of the blog Daily Kos, alerted Courage Campaign staffer Erik Love that California Counts petition-gatherers at UC Santa Barbara were gathering signatures to help "children with cancer," he headed out to investigate. And, sure enough, Erik noticed that "children with cancer" was just a sneaky tactic to get people to sign the so-called "Electoral College Reform Initiative" -- what we call the dirty trick initiative. Erik and a Courage Campaign film crew caught these sneaky tactics. [Video Above ]
The pilot of the freighter that struck the Bay Bridge last week, fouling the bay with 58,000 gallons of fuel, told federal investigators that the accident occurred after the ship's radar failed and the captain of the vessel made a monumental error, a lawyer for the pilot said Tuesday.
Meanwhile, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger postponed the start of the bay's normally vibrant fishing season, while cleanup crews made significant headway on the worst-hit beaches, and politicians and environmentalists braced for a flurry of state and federal hearings into the spill.
The most startling of the day's revelations came from attorney John Meadows, who represents John Cota, the pilot of the Cosco Busan last Wednesday. Cota said the Chinese captain of the ship guided the freighter toward a bridge tower in the fog, the attorney said.
Meadows said his client told him and investigators for the National Transportation Safety Board, which is looking into the crash, that the Cosco Busan's radar "conked out" twice - first before departure and again as the ship was near the lighthouse on Yerba Buena Island.
More Here - includes a time line of the incident plus numerous links to orginaztions involved in the cleanup.
My question is why this 900 foot long ship was allowed to navigate in the fog with 300 feet visibility and a faulty radar?The Coast Guard and the owners of the Cosco Busan freighter apparently botched the drug and alcohol testing of the crew of the ship after it hit the Bay Bridge last week and dumped 58,000 gallons of oil into the bay, Coast Guard officials told The Chronicle this morning.The agency informed lawmakers on Capitol Hill Wednesday that ship's operators had failed to test all the crew members for drugs within the 32 hours required by federal law. In fact, some of the crew was not tested until 53 hours after the incident last week.
The immediate testing of the crew after an incident is the responsibility of the owner and operator of the vessel, but the Coast Guard is responsible for making sure the testing rules are strictly followed.
The Coast guard, for whom I have always held the highest regards, is beginning to look like FEMA:
There also seems to be a huge discrepancy in the amount of oil recovered so far:"It certainly shows the operator missed a crucial detail," Lt. Commander Tony Guild, who oversees inspections, investigations and analysts for the Coast Guard's western region.
Guild said a Coast Guard casualty investigator only learned on Friday that the drug testing of the crew had not taken place from an agent for the ship's owner, Regal Stone Ltd.
"(The agent) said, 'We only tested the master for drugs, so the Coast Guard investigating officer said, 'You need to test everybody,' " Guild said.
Guild said the Coast Guard investigator moved quickly to order the drug tests, but acknowledged the agency bore some responsibility for failing to get the tests done on time.
"I think we could have done a better job of that," he said.
More than 2,745 gallons of oil has been collected from the water so far, the command center for the spill reported this morning. Another 580 gallons have been dispersed naturally, and an estimated 4,060 gallons of oil has evaporated.The total has been revised in recent days from a total of 20,546 reported recovered from the water last week, as emergency officials were able to more accurately gauge the precision of what was water, what was oil, and what was actually pulled up from the bay.
The Intelligence Committee bill faces substantial roadblocks because of its immunity provision. Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT) has placed a customary "hold" on the bill, and he says he would filibuster if a bill that grants immunity comes up for a vote. Dodd, a dark-horse presidential candidates, has been joined by the Senate's more prominent White House contenders like Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.
Activists credit pressure aimed a lawmakers from whistleblowers and others alleging abuse from telecom companies.
"That makes me feel like maybe we've had a teeny bit of impact," said Mark Klein, a former AT&T employee who has alleged the company has allowed the National Security Agency to monitor all Web traffic on the company's network. Klein's allegations and internal documents he obtained form the basis of a key lawsuit against AT&T brought by the Electronic Frontier Foundation on behalf of AT&T customers.
Former U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld fled France today fearing arrest over charges of "ordering and authorizing" torture of detainees at both the American-run Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and the U.S. military's detainment facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, unconfirmed reports coming from Paris suggest.
U.S. embassy officials whisked Rumsfeld away yesterday from a breakfast meeting in Paris organized by the Foreign Policy magazine after human rights groups filed a criminal complaint against the man who spearheaded President George W. Bush's "war on terror" for six years.
American Freedom Agenda Act of 2007 (Introduced in House)
HR 3835 IH
110th CONGRESS
1st Session
H. R. 3835
To restore the Constitution's checks and balances and protections against government abuses as envisioned by the Founding Fathers.
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
October 15, 2007
Mr. PAUL introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on the
Judiciary, and in addition to the Committees on Armed Services, Foreign Affairs, and
Select Intelligence (Permanent Select), for a period to be subsequently determined by
the Speaker, in each case for consideration of such provisions as fall within the
jurisdiction of the committee concerned
A BILL
To restore the Constitution's checks and balances and protections against government
abuses as envisioned by the Founding Fathers.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
(1) Unchecked power by any branch leads to oppressive transgressions on
individual freedoms and ill-considered government policies.
(2) The Founding Fathers enshrined checks and balances in the Constitution
to protect against government abuses to derail ill-conceived domestic or
foreign endeavors.
(3) Checks and balances make the Nation safer by preventing abuses that
would be exploited by Al Qaeda to boost terrorist recruitment, would deter
foreign governments from cooperating in defeating international terrorism,
and would make the American people reluctant to support aggressive
counter-terrorism measures.
(4) Checks and balances have withered since 9/11 and an alarming
concentration of power has been accumulated in the presidency based on
hyper-inflated fears of international terrorism and a desire permanently to
alter the equilibrium of power between the three branches of government.
(5) The unprecedented constitutional powers claimed by the President since
9/11 subtracted national security and have been asserted for non-national
security purposes.
(6) Experience demonstrates that global terrorism can be thwarted,
deterred, and punished through muscular application of law enforcement
measures and prosecutions in Federal civilian courts in lieu of military
commissions or military law.
(7) Congressional oversight of the executive branch is necessary to prevent
secret government, which undermines self-government and invites
lawlessness and maladministration.
(8) The post-9/11 challenges to checks and balances are unique in the
Nation's history because the war on global terrorism has no discernable
end.
(b) Purpose-The American Freedom Agenda Act of 2007 is intended to restore the
Constitution's checks and balances and protections against government abuses as
envisioned by the Founding Fathers.
SEC. 3. MILITARY COMMISSIONS; ENEMY COMBATANTS; HABEAS CORPUS.
(a) The Military Commissions Act of 2006 is hereby repealed.
(b) The President is authorized to establish military commissions for the trial of
War crimes only in places of active hostilities against the
immediate trial is necessary to preserve fresh evidence or to prevent local
anarchy.
(c) The President is prohibited from detaining any individual indefinitely as an
unlawful enemy combatant absent proof by substantial evidence that the
individual has directly engaged in active hostilities against the
provided that no
citizen shall be detained as an unlawful enemy combatant.
(d) Any individual detained as an enemy combatant by the
entitled to petition for a writ of habeas corpus under section 2241 of title 28,
No civilian or military tribunal of the
defendant by torture or coercion.
Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (50 U.S.C. 1801 et seq.). The President's constitutional power to
gather foreign intelligence is subordinated to this provision.
SEC. 6. PRESIDENTIAL SIGNING STATEMENTS.
declaratory judgment action in an appropriate Federal district court to challenge
the constitutionality of a presidential signing statement that declares the
President's intent to disregard provisions of a bill he has signed into law because he believes
they are unconstitutional.
person abroad based solely on the President's belief that the subject of the
kidnapping, imprisonment, or torture is a criminal or enemy combatant; provided
that kidnapping shall be permitted if undertaken with the intent of bringing the
kidnapped person for prosecution or interrogation to gather intelligence before a
tribunal that meets international standards of fairness and due process. A knowing
violation of this section shall be punished as a felony punishable by a fine or
imprisonment of up to 2 years.
information received from the executive branch or Congress unless the publication
would cause direct, immediate, and irreparable harm to the national security of the
DESIGNATIONS.
or any other member of the executive branch to designate an individual or
organization with a
terrorist organization for purposes of the criminal law or otherwise imposing
criminal or civil sanctions.