Good Morning! - Morning Headlines

[Caro]

Morning headlines brought to you by

Carolyn Kay
MakeThemAccountable.com

Top Story

Democrats not backing down on Iraq Bill
House Democratic leaders are indicating they are not ready to back down in their confrontation with President Bush on Iraq, even as pressure mounts to approve new funding for U.S. troops. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (news, bio, voting record), D-Calif., and other party leaders are considering a bill that would fund the war as Bush wants, but only guarantee the money through July. After that, Congress could block additional money from being sent if the Iraqi government does not meet certain political and security goals.

The Radical Fringe

The World

Call for Sunni inclusion at Iraq summit
SHARM EL-SHEIK, Egypt - Iraq's neighbors negotiated a declaration Friday that would pledge support for Iraq's embattled Shiite-led government in return for more inclusion of Sunni Arabs in the political process.

Fears of an Islamic agenda in Turkey
ISTANBUL, Turkey - Turkey's secular circles rocked the government by portraying its leaders as Islamists intent on imposing religion on society. But the ruling party, an advocate of European Union membership, has done more than most of its predecessors to introduce Western reforms to the country.

Islamic militants blow up Pakistan music shops
PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AFP) - Suspected Islamic militants targeted music shops with explosive devices overnight in northwest Pakistan, damaging a dozen outlets, police said Friday.

Migration to U.S. tops death in Mexico
MEXICO CITY - Mexico has lost more people to migration to the United States than death since 2000, according to a government report released Thursday.

Blair suffers in elections, risks losing Scotland
ABERDEEN (Reuters) - British Prime Minister Tony Blair's party risked losing control of the Scottish parliament to a pro-independence rival on Friday and his government also suffered losses in local elections.

Royal compares Sarkozy to Bush
PARIS - Socialist Segolene Royal, seizing on President Bush's unpopularity in France, accused her rival in Sunday's presidential runoff of "mimicking" the American leader by feigning concern for people who are suffering.

The Nation

Republican candidates invoke Reagan, evade Bush
Republican White House hopefuls Thursday night frequently invoked the name of former President Ronald Reagan during the first GOP presidential debate but avoided mentioning the current president by name.

Leading GOP Presidential Candidates Continue to Fail 'The Reagan Test,' Says Richard Viguerie
"The three leading Republican presidential candidates continue to fail 'the Reagan test,'" says Richard A. Viguerie, author of Conservatives Betrayed: How George W. Bush and Other Big Government Republicans Hijacked the Conservative Cause, referring to the debate aired over MSNBC. "The only thing genuinely Reaganesque about the performances of Rudy Giuliani, John McCain, and Mitt Romney was their physical location at the Presidential Library."

Saying "I'm sorry" fails to soothe public anger
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Even saying he's sorry isn't working for U.S. President George W. Bush these days. Bush has used the words "mistakes," "apologize" and "responsibility" in trying to calm public anger over the Iraq war, substandard care of wounded veterans and the botched response to Hurricane Katrina. Still his approval rating hovers around 35 percent in opinion polls, just above the lows of his two-term presidency.

NJ: DAG McNulty Ordered Calls to USAs
It's already been a rough week for Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty. Now this: “The chief of staff to Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty has told congressional investigators that phone calls he placed to four fired U.S. attorneys -- calls that three of the prosecutors say involved threats about testifying before Congress -- were made at McNulty's direction.”
Lawyer: DoJ Release "Smacks of Retribution"
Many were suspicious of the timing yesterday of the Justice Department's announcement that Monica Goodling was under investigation for possible criminal wrongdoing. So, apparently, is Goodling's lawyer, John Dowd.

Comey Details U.S. Attorney Firings
If there was one major revelation during the hearing today, it was that James Comey had been involved in the firing of two U.S. attorneys when he was deputy attorney general. But these firings were worlds away from the firing of the eight U.S. attorneys last December. First, they were individual cases -- and in each case, Comey said, there was "serious misconduct... these were not close calls, as soon as you read about it, you said, 'this guy's got to go.'" Second, Comey said that there was extensive discussion with the U.S. attorneys about what the problem was. And third, Comey had discussions with senior staff and the attorney general about the problem before asking the U.S. attorneys to resign.
Comey is the one who appointed Patrick Fitzgerald to investigate Plamegate. Both Comey and Fitzgerald are examples of what appointees in the Department of Justice should be. —Caro

Media

Permanent link to MTA daily media news

Imus plans to sue CBS: paper
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Ousted radio host Don Imus is expected to file a $40 million lawsuit against CBS next week, accusing it of breach of contract, the New York Times reported on its Web site on Friday.

WH reporters go easy on Snow, wear bracelets in his honor
Dana Milbank says White House reporters "weren't eager to torture the convalescing press secretary" with questions about al-Qaeda on Wednesday, and "at least two of the reporters in the audience wore yellow cancer bracelets with Tony Snow's name inscribed on them."
Why do we allow such people to call themselves journalists? —Caro

Blitzer did not challenge Snow's false claim that Bush "never argued" that Saddam was involved in 9-11
On the May 1 edition of CNN's The Situation Room, host Wolf Blitzer did not challenge White House press secretary Tony Snow's claim that President Bush "never argued" that "somehow Saddam (Hussein) was involved in September 11th,"… President Bush and other administration officials have frequently claimed a connection between Saddam and the September 11, 2001, attacks, including the specific assertion of such a link in a letter to Congress at the start of the war.

CNN Report On Rice's Meeting With Syrian Official Omits Mention Of Criticism Of Pelosi
I'm really not sure what to make of this. But it seems absolutely abysmal. Is it really possible that CNN -- the network which went mad for days flacking the bogus Pelosi-to-Syria story -- is airing a segment on Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's meeting with her Syrian counterpart that doesn't mention the administration's attacks on Pelosi for meeting with Syria's President?

USA Today and AP uncritically reported GOP claims that terrorists will "follow us home" after Iraq withdrawal
In recent articles on the standoff between President Bush and Congress over funding for the Iraq war, USA Today and the Associated Press uncritically reported Republican claims that terrorists in Iraq will "follow us home" if the United States withdraws its troops from the country. However, both news outlets did not report, as others recently have, that security and terrorism experts have challenged that view.

Bloggers Who Crave the Mainstream Media's Attention
The strange thing about the netroots, and something that was made very clear to me at YearlyKos, is that the prominent members of the blogosphere have a real deep complex about their relationship to the “mainstream.” Their feelings (again, generalizing) towards the mainstream pundits, TNR, Joe Klein, Tim Russert et al, is similar to the way a pimply, awkward 14-year-old-boy might feel about the hot, mean girl in his class. He judges her harshly, thinks she’s vapid and cruel, and desperately wants her attention.

Technology & Science

The Top 25 Web Hoaxes and Pranks
These online spoofs and shams have made the rounds on Web sites and through e-mail. Perhaps you even believed one or two of them yourself.

Court denies Vonage bid for patent case retrial
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S. appeals court has denied a request by Internet phone company Vonage Holdings Corp. that it order a retrial in the patent infringement case brought against it by Verizon Communications Inc..

IBM uses self-assembling material in chip advance
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - IBM has developed a way to make microchips run up to one-third faster or use 15 percent less power by using an exotic material that "self-assembles" in a similar way to a seashell or snowflake.

Honeybee die-off threatens food supply
BELTSVILLE, Md. - Unless someone or something stops it soon, the mysterious killer that is wiping out many of the nation's honeybees could have a devastating effect on America's dinner plate, perhaps even reducing us to a glorified bread-and-water diet.

Environment

Delegates reach deal on climate change
BANGKOK, Thailand - Delegates at an international conference on climate change brokered a blueprint Friday for combatting global warming, resisting pressure from China to tone down language on cutting emissions of heat-trapping gases.

Intel analysts to study climate change
WASHINGTON - Top intelligence analysts are diving into the politically sensitive issue of climate change, but some Democrats in Congress are demanding even more.

For more headlines, visit MakeThemAccountable.com.