Thursday, February 09, 2006

Another Angle 9 - February - 2006

ANOTHER ANGLE
News others won't tell you



NATIONAL:



Lessons On Being Black
Use secondary link to see the video.



As liberal Democrat calls for special prosecutor on Iraq, Democrats duck
What's striking isn't that Conyers is calling on Gonzales to appoint a special prosecutor. He's done it before, and he'd likely do it again. But his decision to take public action to seek a Justice Department investigation of pre-war policy and manipulation of the press has met resounding silence among his Democratic Party.


Ex-FEMA boss may tell-all on Katrina
"Unless there is specific direction otherwise from the president, including an assurance the president will provide a legal defense to Mr. Brown if he refuses to testify as to these matters, Mr. Brown will testify if asked about particular communications."



Judge: Rights of poor violated
For more than 20 years, Hamilton County(Cincinnati) violated the constitutional rights of poor people by sending them to jail for failing to pay minor fines, a federal judge ruled Tuesday.



Soldiers Face Debilitating Diseases
An investigation has found that for some soldiers, their service has meant a long and debilitating death sentence with mysterious diseases.


INTERNATIONAL:



Israel plans to build 'museum of tolerance' on Muslim graves
Skeletons are being removed from the site of an ancient Muslim cemetery in Jerusalem to make way for a $150m (£86m) "museum of tolerance" being built for the Los Angeles-based Simon Wiesenthal Centre.



World's first Sept 11 convict released in Germany
A retrial was ordered when a federal court in 2004 quashed the verdict on the grounds that US authorities had refused to allow the court to question top suspects from Osama bin Laden's Al-Qaeda network in American custody.



WTO 'FRANKENFOODS' RULING REVEALS SPECIAL INTERESTS
A World Trade Organisation decision that called European safety bans on genetically modified food illegal under its global trade rules could usher in a new phase of potentially hazardous "Frankenfoods" worldwide and further erosion of local protections, say environmental and advocacy groups.



Russia confirms missile defence contract with Iran .:. NewKerala - India's Top Online Newspaper
Worth an estimated $700 million, the deal for up to 30 Tor M-1 surface-to-air missiles is the largest since Russia in 2000 withdrew from an agreement with the US restricting the supply of military hardware to Iran.



IRAQ:



Women soldiers died from dehydration
Col. Janis Karpinski told a panel of judges at the Commission of Inquiry for Crimes against Humanity Committed by the Bush Administration in New York that several women had died of dehydration because they refused to drink liquids late in the day. They were afraid of being assaulted or even raped by male soldiers if they had to use the women's latrine after dark.


Gas prices on the rise in Iraq
Iraq will gradually increase state-controlled domestic fuel prices tenfold this year to meet International Monetary Fund demands, Iraqi officials said yesterday. Iraq won a crucial loan accord with the IMF in late December and a $14 billion debt swap with private lenders. The $685 million IMF standby credit arrangement was the fund's first ever with Iraq and is designed to support the economic program over the next 15 months.



BUSH CRIME FAMILY:



Cheney Spearheaded Effort to Discredit Wilson
In interviews over the course of two days this week, these officials were urged to speak on the record for this story. But they resisted, saying they had already testified before a grand jury investigating the leak of Wilson's wife, covert CIA operative Valerie Plame Wilson, and added that speaking out against the administration and specifically Vice President Cheney would cause them to lose their jobs and subject their families to vitriolic attacks by the White House.



Bush NASA Appointee Resigns After He's Busted Lying On His Resume...
NASA public affairs official George C. Deutsch, who has been accused of exerting political pressure on agency scientists, resigned his position late Tuesday, the space agency said. NASA Press Secretary Dean Acosta declined to say Wednesday why Deutsch left his job. But he said Deutsch, 24, claimed to be a journalism graduate from Texas A&M University, something the university denied.



Bush's Social Security Sleight of Hand
Last year, even though Bush talked endlessly about the supposed joys of private accounts, he never proposed a specific plan to Congress and never put privatization costs in the budget. But this year, with no fanfare whatsoever, Bush stuck a big Social Security privatization plan in the federal budget proposal, which he sent to Congress on Monday.



ECONOMY:



Admin. seeks rate hike for disaster loans
Facing budget pressures, the Bush administration is seeking to markedly increase the interest rates that small businesses and homeowners pay for government-backed loans designed to get them back on their feet after disasters. The agency(SBA) wants a new formula that, if implemented today, would raise the disaster loan interest rate for homeowners from its current 2.68 percent to more than 4.5 percent by pegging it to Treasury bill rates.



OP-ED:



Trapped Like a Rat
On Tuesday, by his own design. George W. Bush was trapped like a rat on that stage. He was forced to listen to eloquent denunciations of his politics and his policies, perhaps for the first time since he took office. Politics belonged in that church on Tuesday. Period. Coretta Scott King would have approved.



Carter Was Right On Energy All Along
There was Jimmy Carter, the day after the Bush address, appearing on "Larry King Live." In a segue to commercials, a portion of Carter's famous 1977 address flashed on the screen. A youngish and serious-looking Carter looked Americans in the eye and said, "With the exception of preventing war, this is the greatest challenge our country will face during our lifetimes."



FOOD&DRINK:



SHRIMP, SCALLOP, AND COD LASAGNE
Used 2 lbs. of cod, 1 lb. of shrimp, and NO cream. Looked soupy when cooking but after sitting 10 minutes all the liquid was obsorbed and it was perfect.



REVIEWS/INTERVIEWS:



L.A. Hosts the Pan African Film and Arts Festival
It's the 14th anniversary of the festival, and this year it's being billed as the largest Black History Month event in the United States. It features more than 150 movies by filmmakers from the Caribbean, Latin America, the South Pacific, Europe, Canada, Africa and the United States.



HUMOR?:



Day by Day.



Yeah, yeah, lecture us on being black, please
Let's analyze this strip, shall we?