July-August, 2004

Historical Timeline

Chronology:
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1 A.D. - 1389 A.D. 1390 A.D. - 1889 A.D.
1890 A.D. - 1969 A.D. 1970 A.D. - 1988 A.D.
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Jan.-April / May-June / July-August / Sept.-Dec. 2004

"Most newspaper article events happen anywhere from days, to months, to years before they reach publication. Consequently, most newspaper articles on this timeline are preceeded by the date of the newspaper in which they appear." [E.M.] *Color Code

JULY 2004
2004 - Maritime Treaty - "The Coast Guard will board every foreign-flagged vessel that sails into a U.S. port beginning Thursday [07/01/04] to check whether it is complying with rules aimed at foiling terrorists." [A.P.]
2004 - Flooding / Texas - July 1st, 2004: "Rain swept across northern Texas for a record 18th consecutive day on Wednesday [06/30/04], causing flooding that chased people out of their homes and a major amusement park. Up to seven inches of rain fell in three hours early Wednesday in southern Texas and the San Antonio area, the National Wheather Service said. No deaths or injuries were reported, but flooding closed the Six Flags Over Texas amusement park in Arlington on Tuesday [06/29/04]."
2004 - Revelation / Utah Villiages - July 1st, 2004: "EAST CARBON CITY, Utah - Archaeologists led reporters into a remote canyon Wednesday [06/30/04] to reveal an almost perfectly preserved picture of ancient life: stone pit houses, granaries and a bounty of artifacts kept secret for more than a half century. [....] Archaeologists said the villiages were occupied more than 1,000 years ago and may be as old as 4,500 years. [....] Hundreds of granaries, ranging from cupboard-sized to several yards across, are in some cases hundreds of feet up nearly inaccessible cliffs. [....] Waldo Wilcox, the rancher who sold the land and returned Wednesday [06/30/04], kept the archaeological sites a closely guarded secret for more than 50 years." [Based on: A.P. article by Paul Foy]
2004 - Fatality / al-Qaida-Linked Cleric - July 1st, 2004: "A firebrand cleric who issued religious decrees for an al-Qaida-linked terrorist group was killed Wednesday [06/30/04] during a car chase and shootout with police that also killed a policeman." [News Services]
2004 - Rerouted / Israeli Separation Barrier - July 1st, 2004: "BIDOU, West Bank - Israel's Supreme Court sided with the Palestinians in a ground-breaking decision Wednesday [06/30/04], ordering the government to reroute part of its West Bank separation barrier near Jerusalem because it causes too much suffering." [A.P.]
2004 - Mad Cow Update / United States - July 1st, 2004: "No sign of mad cow disease was found in an animal singled out in a preliminary screening last week and then subjected to a follow-up chemical test, the Agriculture Department said Wednesday [06/30/04]. Officials declined to provide additional information about the animal. Test results on a second animal that was possibly being infected will not be available for several days [the results were eventually ruled negative by 07/02/04]." [News Services, 07/01/04]
2004 - Public Appearance / Saddam Hussein - July 1st, 2004: "Saddam Hussein made his first public appearance [before a judge] since a U.S.-led invasion toppled his government in April last year." [Etznab Mathers]
2004 - Above The Law? / Rep. Bill Janklow - July 1st, 2004: "SIOUX FALLS, S.D. - Former Rep. Bill Janklow, who resigned from Congress after being convicted in a highway death, was stopped 16 times by state troopers during his last term as governor but was never ticketed, according to a South Dakota Highway Patrol report." [A.P.]
2004 - Raised / U.S. Short-Term Interest Rate - July 1st, 2004: "The Fed. at the end of a two-day meeting in Washington, raised its short-term interest rate [06/30/04] to 1.25 percent from 1 percent, the lowest level in 46 years." [St. Louis Post-Dispatch]
*Trivia: "The most hated sort, and with the greatest reason, is usury, which makes a gain out of money itself, and not from the natural object of it. For money was intended to be used in exchange, but not to increase at interest. [....] Wherefore of all modes of getting wealth this is the most unnatural." [Aristotle, Politics, Book One, part X]
*Trivia: "All usurers are thieves and belong in the gallows." [Martin Luther]
*Trivia: "Benjamin Franklin wrote of the British colonies in North America in the 1750s: 'Nowhere on Earth does one find a happier and more well-being people.' He explained that this was due to that 'we in the colonies make our own currency,' called 'colonial scrip.' He further explained: 'By issuing our own currency we can control its buying power, and we are not obliged to pay interest to anyone.'
"In these British colonies in New England, there was a wealth contrasting sharply to the poverty and misery in England. There was enough money, and it was definitely interest free.
"When the Masonic bankers in England heard Franklin's speech to the British Parliament, they made sure that Parliament forbade the colonies to use their own financial system and instead demanded they use interest money in gold and silver. Only an insufficient amount of this money was to be available. The money supply was reduced in half, and the colonies were forced to borrow money from the Bank of England. The result was steep interest and price increases. Within a year the streets were full of unemployed people." [Juri Lina, The Barnes Review, September/October 2004, pp. 9-10]
2004 - Orbit Entry / Cassini Spacecraft - Saturn - July 1st, 2004: "PASADENA, Calif. - The international Cassini spacecraft threaded a gap between two of Saturn's dazzling rings late Wednesday [06/30/04] and entered orbit around the giant planet, completing one of the mission's most critical maneuvers more than 900 million miles from Earth." [A.P.]
2004 - Died / Marlon Brando - July 3rd, 2004: "Brando [Marlon Brando] died of lung failure Thursady evening (July 1, 2004) at UCLA medical Center, said Roxanne Moster, a spokeswoman for the medical center." [A.P.]
2004 - Hostages Released / Baghdad - July 3rd, 2004: "Iraqi insurgents have released [07/02/04] two Turks and a Pakistani they had threatened to behead." [Los Angeles Times]
2004 - U.S. Crash-Victim Remains / China - July 3rd, 2004: "An American search team has located what it believes are human remains at a site in China where a CIA plane crash-landed on a secret mission nearly 52 years ago, a Pentagon official said Friday [07/02/04]."
2004 - Fuzzy Details / Titan - July 4th, 2004: "The Jet Propulsion Laboratory team's efforts to peer through the dense, smoggy haze that surrounds Saturn's largest moon revealed only fuzzy details of the surface, but those details left team members puzzled and confused. [....] Turtle [Elizabeth Turtle, of the University of Arizona] noted that the images were taken from 200,000 miles away from Titan and that Cassini will get much closer to the moon on many of the 45 fly-bys yet to come." [Los Angeles Times]
2004 - Israeli Interrogator? / Iraq - July 4th, 2004: "Brig. Gen. Janis Karpinski, who was suspended in May over allegations of prisoner abuse, told British Broadcasting Corp. radio she met a man during a visit to a Baghdad intelligence center who told her he was Israeli and in Iraq to do 'some of the interrogation.' " [A.P.]
2004 - Public Relations Coups / Saudi Arabia & Britian - July 4th, 2004: "LONDON - U.S. officials agreed to return five terrorism suspects to Saudia Arabia from Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, last year as part of a secret three-way deal intended to satisfy important allies in the invasion of Iraq, according to senior U.S. and British officials. Under the arrangements, Saudi officials later released five Britons and two others who had been convicted of terrorist attacks in Saudi Arabia, the officials said. British diplomats said they believed that the men had been tortured by Saudi security police officers into confessing falsely. Officials involved in the deliberations said the transfer of the Saudis from Guantanamo initially met with objections from officials at the Pentagon, the CIA and the Justice Department. The Saudi prisoners were transferred to Riyadh, the capital, in May 2003. The five Britons and two others were freed three months later, in August. The releases were public relations coups for the Saudi and British governments." [New York Times]
2004 - Cornerstone Laid / Freedom Tower, New York - July 5th, 2004: "NEW YORK - In a ceremony filled with pride and painful memories, New York officials laid a 20-ton slab of granite Sunday [07/04/04] as the cornerstone of a new tower at the site of the World Trade Center." [Los Angeles Times]
2004 - Comments / Ralph Nader - July 6, 2004: "Independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader ... in a statement made available in Washington July 6, called U.S.-based multinational corporations 'unpatriotic.' 'These companies were formed in the United States, rose to their large size with the sweat of American workers, went to Washington for bailouts, subsidies or other forms of corporate welfare and, when in further trouble, asked for the U.S. armed forces or regime overthrows to come to their rescue overseas,' Nader said. 'U.S. corporations, with your taxpayer subsidies, are selling weapons of rapid destruction to regimes all over the world—many of which are dictatorships or oligarchies, oppressing their people and reshipping their weapons wherever they please,' Nader said. [....] U.S. multinationals 'export industries and jobs to oppressive regimes utilizing an assortment of governmental incentives and promotions,' Nader said. 'Attempts in Congress to end these subsidies for fleeing America—and establishing tax havens in Bermuda—have been defeated by corporate lobbyists and President Bush. They lose no sleep over this callous behavior hollowing our communities and leaving American families in desperate straits—while some worry about their loved ones in the Iraq quagmire.' [....] 'For many decades corporate polluters have been relentlessly using our air, water and soil as their private, toxic sewers,' Nader said. 'Their despoiling, poisoning and ruining of the natural beauty of our country has made large swathes of America uninhabitable,' Nader said. 'Year after year, lobbyists with campaign cash oppose and undermine the laws, regulations and enforcement mitigating these sources of cancer, respiratory ailments, genetic damage and other diseases.' " [By James P. Tucker Jr.]
2004 - U.S. Employed Shin Bet Forces? / Iraq - July 6th, 2004: "Israeli 'security service' experts, employed by the U.S. military, have played a major role in the interrogation of high-level Iraqi prisoners, according to a leading British journal of global military and intelligence affairs. Interrogators from Shin Bet, one of Israel’s notorious secret services responsible for torturing thousands of Palestinians, have reportedly been working with the U.S. military to 'break' Iraqi prisoners in places likeAbu Ghraib, according to the well-respected Foreign Report, published by Jane’s Information Group (in the United Kingdom). 'At least one aspect of the occupation of Iraq was well planned by Washington. The U.S.A. needed help conducting mass interrogations of Arabic-speaking detainees,' Foreign Report wrote on July 6. 'To make up for this shortfall, the U.S.A. employed Israeli security service (Shin Bet) experts to help their U.S. counterparts ‘break’ their captives. 'Top Shin Bet interrogation experts were sent to Iraq to help with the most difficult interrogations, such as the captured heads of the Iraqi intelligence—and perhaps with former president Saddam Hussein,' Jane’s reported. Jane’s is an independent organization that focuses on intelligence and defense matters and has a worldwide reputation for accuracy and impartiality. An on-line subscription to Foreign Report, where the article was posted on July 6, costs $1,040 per year, according to Melissa Golding at the Jane’s Washington bureau. Many major media outlets subscribe to the on-line service, Golding said. The journal, which is published in London, has no bylines, and the editor does not give interviews. Golding kindly sent American Free Press the full text of the article. While the U.S. mass media is aware of the article published by Jane’s and the extensive U.S.-Israeli cooperation in Iraq, it chooses to withhold this information from the public. The only media report of the Shin Bet interrogators in Iraq came from the Council for the National Interest (CNI), a Washington-based think tank of former diplomats and experts on the Middle East. Asked why the mainstream media would ignore this story, CNI spokesman Terry Walz said: 'The extent to which Israel cooperates with the United States in Iraq is kept deliberately hidden by both parties, because it is an explosive issue. American media has been reluctant to discuss the detail of this alliance. It’s part of the general inability of the press to tell the truth about Israel,' Walz said. U.S. reliance on the Israeli military alliance in the Middle East is so extensive, 'it will be impossible to suppress,' Walz added." [By Christopher Bollyn, A.F.P.]
2004 - Marketing Milk - July 7th, 2004: "Drinking at least a glass of milk a day may lower the risk of colorectal cancer, say researchers who pooled some of the world's largest studies on the long-believed link. [....] People who consumed 6 to 8 ounces of milk a day had a 12 percent lower risk of later developing colorectal cancer and those who drank less than two glasses a week, the researchers reported Tuesday [07/06/04] in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute." [News Services]
*Trivia: "Humans are among the very few [if any] mammals who continue to drink milk after infancy." [Etznab Mathers]
*Trivia: "The common product sold as milk in stores today is derived from cows. Milk from cows is naturally designed to grow the brain and bodies of cows!" [Etznab Mathers]
2004 - Status / AIDS Epidemic - July 7th, 2004: "LONDON - The world is losing the race against the AIDS virus, which last year [2003] infected a record 4.8 million people and killed an unprecedented 2.9 million, the United Nations reported Tuesday. [....] Eastern Europe and Asia, which is home to 60 percent of the world's population, are emerging as the new front lines in the fight against AIDS. In Asia, the disease is confined mostly to drug addicts, homosexual or bisexual men, prostitutes and their clients, and the sexual partners of people who frequent prostitutes. [....] The epidemics in Central Asia and Eastern Europe are being driven by intravenous drug users. About 1.3 million people there have HIV, compared with 160,000 in 1995. More than 80 percent of the infected are under age 30. [....] In Latin America, the epidemic is concentrated among drug addicts and homosexuals. Countries have low infection rates overall, but pockets are bad. For instance, in Brazil, the most populous country in the region, national HIV prevalence is below 1 percent, but in some cities, 60 percent of intravenous drug users have the virus. In the Caribbean, the disease is spread mainly through heterosexual sex and in many places is focused around prostitution. The worse-affected country is Haiti, which has the highest infection rate outside Africa with 5.6 percent of the population afflicted." [By Emma Ross, A.P.]
2004 - Soy / Lacking Estrogen? - July 7th, 2004: "A new study casts doubt on the value of soy powder as a substitute for estrogen pills. Dutch researchers found that soy did not increase bone density in postmenopausal women, and did not improve their memory or cholesterol levels either. 'The results are, of course, very disappointing,' said study co-author Dr. Sanne Kreijkamp-Kaspers of University Medical Center in Utrecht. [....] The study which appears this week in the Journal of the American Medical Association, involved 202 women ages 60 to 75." [News Services]
*Commentary: "An indirect literary attempt to discredit the value of soy products?" [Etznab Mathers]
2004 - John Kerry & John Edwards - July 7th, 2004: "PITTSBURG - Sen. John Kerry turned to vanquished rival John Edwards of North Carolinia to become his running mate in November. [....]" [Post-Dispatch Wahsington Bureau]
2004 - Bird Flu Outbreak / China - July 7th, 2004: "China reported a new outbreak of bird flu Tuesday [07/06/04], and Thailand said it had a suspected case - signs of the return of the highly contagious disease that health experts fear could sicken humans." [News Services]
2004 - Bankruptcy / Portland Archdiocese - July 7th, 2004: "PORTLAND, Ore. - The Portland Archdiocese filed for bankruptcy Tuesday [07/06/04] because of the steep costs from clergy sex abuse lawsuits. [....]" [A.P.]
2004 - Syphilis Update - July 8th, 2004: "A fast-spreading mutant strain of syphilis is proving resistant to the antibiotic pills [ex. azithromycin] that are offered to some patients as an alternative to painful penicillin shots. [....] The percentage of samples from San Francisco with the mutant strain jumped to 37 percent last year [2003] from 4 percent in 1999-2002. Most of the increase was among gay or bisexual men with multiple partners. The study was reported in today's issue of the New England Journal of Medicine." [News Services]
2004 - Nuclear Concerns / Israel? - July 8th, 2004: "The head of the U.N. atomic watchdog agency got an airborne glimpse Wednesday [07/07/04] of the reactor believed linked to Israel's alleged nuclear weapons program. But the official made no progress in getting Israel to talk about its nuclear capabilities. Mohamed ElBaradei, chief of the International Atomic Energy Agency, saw Dimona reactor as part of the flight over the country in which he was briefed on Israel's security needs. ElBaradei wants at least tacit acknowledgement that Israel has nuclear weapons as part of his efforts to restart talks on a Middle East free of arms of mass destruction. But Israel has stuck to its policy of neither confirming nor denying that it has nuclear weapons. On Wednesday [07/07/04], ElBaradei said that Israel was alarmed by Iran's nuclear ambitions, adding that such fear worked against any change in Israeli policy." [A.P.]
*Trivia: "American Free Press reported one year ago that—buried in brief news notes in some Jewish newspapers in early 2003—former Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres had formally broken Israel’s longstanding policy of denying its nuclear weapons capabilities, although it was not reported in the mass media in America. Peres admitted in a Feb. 20, 2003 speech in Jerusalem that Israel did indeed have nuclear weapons. The Israeli leader made the admission to a delegation from the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations. (Despite all of this, most mainstream reports about Israel’s nuclear programs continue to state that Israel officially denies having nuclear weapons, Peres’ statement notwithstanding.) This admission by Peres was particularly interesting because in 1999, many American Jewish organizations reacted with alarm when then-President Bill Clinton dared to mention Israel’s nuclear program. On May 14, 1999, the influential Jewish weekly, Forward, published an article expressing outrage that 'President Clinton is raising for the first time public concerns about Israel’s nuclear program.' The article pointed out that some 35 members of the U.S. Congress had written a letter to Clinton expressing concerns about imprisoned Israeli nuclear engineer Mordechai Vanunu, who was the first to publicly expose Israel’s nuclear bomb production program. Responding in a letter dated April 22, 1999 to then-Rep. Lynn Rivers (D-Mich.), President Clinton did more than just express his own concerns about Vanunu’s plight. Clinton also said: 'I . . . share your concerns about the Israeli nuclear program. We have repeatedly urged Israel and other non-parties to the Non-Proliferation Treaty to adhere to the treaty and accept comprehensive International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards. Forward reported that 'Jewish leaders reacted with shock at news that Mr. Clinton had weighed in on Mr. Vanunu and Israel’s nuclear program,' and cited the reaction of Anti-Defamation League director Abe Foxman, who attacked Clinton, saying: 'I can’t believe the president would send such a letter. These are very sensitive issues. It is so judgmental.' Foxman’s disgust with Clinton was not unique. Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice president of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, declared: 'The president’s reference to Israel’s nuclear program is surprising and disturbing. As far as we know it’s unprecedented.' " [Michael Collins Piper, A.F.P., March 2004]
*Commentary: "Iran, Iraq, and North Korea each have made admissions about, and/or allowed inspectors to monitor their respective nuclear weapons capabilities. In spite of such admissions and/or cooperation [be it limited at times], these countries have been labled by President George W. Bush as belonging to what he called an 'Axis of Evil.' However, if Israel has nuclear weapons capabilities, and in fact, nuclear weapons, but at the same time continues a policy of 'neither confirming nor denying' [whatever that is supposed to mean] ... is that evil? Moreover, if such inadmission is actually the case with Israel, then why isn't the United States invading Israel? Is it per chance because the United States itself maintains one of the largest [if not the largest] W.M.D. arsenal [] on the planet? [Etznab Mathers]
2004 - Limited Martial Law? / Iraq - July 8th, 2004: "BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraq unveiled emergency laws Wednesday [07/07/04] to fight the enduring insurgency, even as masked gunmen battled Iraqi and American forces in Baghdad. The measures give the government broad powers - including the right to impose limited martial law - but some Iraqis questioned whether they would restore order. The laws - decreed in an order by Prime Minister Iyad Allawi - allow him to set curfews, send security forces on searches and freeze suspects' assets and monitor their communications. He can also assign military leaders to run restive areas." [By Hamza Hendawi, A.P.]
2004 - Sealed Indictment / Kenneth Lay - July 8th, 2004: "WASHINGTON - A federal grand jury in Houston issued a sealed indictment Wednesday [07/07/04] against former Enron Corp. chief executive Kenneth Lay, and prosecutors are set to make the criminal charges public today [07/08/04]." [Washington Post]
2004 - Mediation / Gaza Strip Withdraw - July 8th., 2004: "JERUSALEM - Israel snubbed a delegation of mediators [from the U.S., E.U., U.N., & Russia] who had come to discuss its plan to withdraw from the Gaza Strip, officials said Wednesday [07/07/04]. [....] 'We do not work with the Europeans on security issues,' said Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's spokesman, Asaf Shariv. 'We work with the Americans on these issues.' " [A.P.]
2004 - Stretched Thin / U.S. Military Forces - July 8th, 2004: "WASHINGTON - Lawmakers from both parties said Wednesday [07/07/04] the Pentagon is stretching troops to their limit and perhaps undermining the nation's future force." [A.P.]
*Commentary: "A similar situation signaled the Fall of the Roman Empire?" [Etznab Mathers]
2004 - Quote / George Tenet - July 9th, 2004: "In a challenge to would-be CIA reformers in Congress, Tenet told agency officials, 'If people or leaders want to take you back in a different direction, then it is your voices that must be heard to say, 'We know better and we're not going to put up with it.' " [Washington Post]
2004 - Status / USA Patriot Act - July 9th, 2004: "WASHINGTON - The Republican-led House bowed to a White House veto threat Thursday [07/08/04] and stood by the USA Patriot Act, defeating an effort to block the part of the anti-terrorism law that helps the government investigate people's reading habits. The effort to defy President George W. Bush and bridle the laws powers lost by 210-210, with a majority needed to prevail." [A.P.]
2004 - Filipino Hostage / Iraq - July 9th, 2004: "The Philippines prohibited its citizens from traveling to Iraq to work after militants released a videotape threatening to kill a Filipino hostage if the country did not withdraw its troops." [A.P.]
2004 - Bulgarian Hostages / Iraq - July 9th, 2004: "Early today, the al-Jazeera television network broadcast a video showing Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's terrorist group threatening to execute two Bulgarian hostages if the U.S. military did not release all Iraqi detainees within 24 hours." [A.P.]
2004 - President Heinz Fischer / Austria - July 9th, 2004: "Heinz Fischer of the opposition Social Democrats promised to 'observe all laws and the constitution of the republic' as he was sworn in as president in Austria's parliament."
2004 - Anti-U.S. Mortar Barrage / Samarra, Iraq - July 9th, 2004: "BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraqi insurgents detonated a car bomb and then hammered a military headquarters in the city of Samarra with a mortar barrage [38 mortars] Thursday [07/08/04], leveling the building and killing five U.S. soldiers and one Iraqi guardsman, the U.S. military said. [....] As many as 44 people were wounded, including 20 American soldiers and four Iraqi guardsmen, the military and hospital officials said." [A.P.]
2004 - Not Missing? / Cpl. Wassef Ali Hassoun - July 9th, 2004: "BEIRUT, Lebanon - A Marine whose apparent kidnapping in Iraq was followed by conflicting claims - first that he was beheaded, then that he was alive - contacted U.S. authorities Thursday [07/08/04] and was safe in his native Lebanon. The Navy was investigating whether his abduction could have been a hoax." [A.P.]
*Trivia: "Cpl. Wassef Ali Hassoun, the Marine who disappeared under mysterious circumstances while on duty in Iraq, insisted on Monday [07/19/04] that he was captured by insurgents and that he is still a loyal Marine." [A.P., 07/19/04]
*Trivia: "A Marine who was reported abducted in Iraq this summer and later turned up in his native Lebanon was charged Thursday [12/09/04] with desertion. Cpl. Wassef Ali Hassoun was charged following a five-month investigation into his disappearance in June [2004] from a U.S. military camp near Fallujah, Iraq, according to a statement from the 4th Marine Expeditionary Brigade at Camp Lejeune, N.C. Hassoun, of West Jordan, Utah, is accused of taking unauthorized leave from the unit in which he served as an Arabic interpreter. Hassoun also is charged with loss of government property and theft of a military firearm - the charges state he left the Marine camp while still in possession of his 9 mm service pistol - as well as theft and wrongful appropriation of a government vehicle." [A.P., 12/10/04]
2004 - Destroyed Military Records? / President George W. Bush - July 9th, 2004: "HOUSTON - "Military records that could help establish President George W. Bush's whereabouts during his disputed service in the Texas Air National Guard more than 30 years ago have been inadvertently destroyed, according to the Pentagon. [....] The destroyed records cover three months in 1972 and 1973 when Bush's claims of service in Alabama are in question." [New York Times]
2004 - Banned Cow Products - July 10th, 2004: "Closing loopholes in protections against mad cow disease, the Food and Drug Administration on Friday [07/10/04] banned brains and other cattle parts that could carry the disease's infectious agent from use in cosmetics and dietary supplements. [....] However, the use of tallow, a processed fat made from cattle, still will be allowed provided it carries less than 0.15 percent impurities. Tallow is used in cosmetics." [News Services]
2004 - Fatality / Paul Klebnikov - July 10th, 2004: "The American editor of Forbes Magazine's Russian edition and author of a book about tycoon Boris Berezovsky was shot to death late Friday [07/10/04], the magazine said. [....] His 2000 book 'Godfather of the Kremlin: Boris Berezovsky and the Looting of Russia' described how Berezovsky, now living in exile in Britain, allegedly siphoned hundreds of millions of dollars out of Russia." [News Services]
2004 - Train Derailment / Illinois - July 10th, 2004: "BENTON, Ill. - Eight train cars and 800 tons of coal fell from a railroad bridge onto interstate 57 in Southern Illinois on Friday morning [07/09/04], narrowly missing three vehicles passing under the railroad tracks. [....] The coal train belongs to the same company that owns a train that derailed near Tamaroa, Ill., in February last year. More than 1,000 people were evacuated in a 3-mile radius of that crash after hazardous chemicals spilled from 16 tank cars. Federal investigators blamed a defective joint in the railroad tracks." [St. Louis Post-Dispatch]
2004 - Nuclear Waste / United States - July 10th, 2004: "Scientists agree that some radionuclides to be kept at Yucca Mountain would reach their peak of danger well beyond 10,000 years. But the EPA maintained that computer models for any time beyond that are unreliable and essentially useless." [By H. Josef Hebert, A.P.]
2004 - Elections / Japan - July 12th, 2004: "TOKYO - Japan's ruling coalition clinched a majority in the upper house of Parliament in elections Sunday [07/11/04]. But gains by the opposition signaled discontent with the prime minister's [Junichiro Koizumi] cuts in pension benefits and dispatch of troops to Iraq." [A.P.]
2004 - Scandal / Anti-Semitism, France - July 12th, 2004: "Newspapers [several] reported that a woman in France was accosted by thugs who drew swastikas on her chest." [Etznab Mathers]
*Trivia: "Just days after claiming to be the victim of an attack that stunned France, a young mother confessed to making up the story, authorities said Tuesday [07/13/04]." [A.P.]
*Trivia: "The attack came only one day after Chirac complained of a series of racist and anti-Semitic attacks in France, including the desecration of Jewish and Muslim graves. The first six months of 2004 has already seen almost as many hate crimes against Jews and Muslims as all of 2003." [CBC]
*Trivia: "A French woman who admitted to lying about being the victim of an anti-Semitic attack was convicted Monday [07/26/04] of fabricating a story that stunned France. She got a four-month suspended sentence. Marie Leblanc, 22, was also ordered to receive counseling and put on probation for two years at the trial in Pontoise, north of Paris. [....] Leblanc claimed she was robbed on a suburban Paris train earlier this month by a knife-wielding gang that mistook her for a Jew and scrawled swastikas on her body." [News Services, 07/27/04]
2004 - Anthrax Cleanup / National Enquirer - July 12th, 2004: "Workers began pumping a potent chemical into the former headquarters of the National Enquirer on Sunday [07/11/04] to clean up the first target of the deadly anthrax attacks in 2001. [....] The arrival of anthrax in the mail at the building was the first in a series of still-unsolved attacks that killed five people, among them photo editor Bob Stevens of American Media Inc.'s tabloid the Sun. AMI also published the Enquirer." [News Services]
2004 - Philippine Withdraw / Iraq - July 14th, 2004: "BAGHDAD, Iraq - The Plilippines announced plans to withdraw its peacekeepers from Iraq, an apparent effort to meet the demand of kidnappers threatening to kill a captive Filipino truck driver." [A.P.]
2004 - Fatality / Bulgarian Hostage, Iraq - July 14th, 2004: "A Bulgarian government spokesman confirmed the killing of Georgi Lazov, one of two Bulgarian hostages held in Iraq." [Based on: A.P., 07/14/04]
2004 - Earthquake / Fiji - July 15th, 2004: "An earthquake measuring 7.1 occured near Fiji on thids date."
2004 - Suicide Bomber / Iraq - July 15th, 2004: "BAGHDAD, Iraq - A suicide bomber killed at least 10 people and injured 40 at a busy checkpoint in Baghdad on Wednesday [07/14/04]. The attack was the worst in the capital since the United States transferred power to the Iraqis on June 28. In a separate incident, guerrillas assassinated the governor [Osama Youssef Kashmoula] of the northern province of Nineveh in a targeted ambush on the road to the capital." [Knight Ridder Newspapers]
2004 - "Flawed Data" / Iraq W.M.D. - July 15th, 2004: "LONDON - A report on the merits of intelligence used to justify the Iraq war dealt a blow to Prime Minister Tony Blair on Wednesday [07/14/04] by asserting that intelligence had partly been based on 'seriously flawed' or unsubstantiated information. The report found no evidence of cooperation between Iraq's rulers and al-Qaida and no evidence that Iraq possessed usable stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction. [....] The 200-page report echoed a U.S. Senate committe report released last week [July 2004] that was critical of unsubstantiated U.S. intelligence on weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. [....] In a statement to the House of Commons, Blair acknowledged that it was 'increasingly clear' Saddam had no stockpiles of unlawful weapons on the eve of the war." [Cox News Service, 07/15/04]
2004 - Blocked / Anti-Gay Marriage Amendment - July 15th, 2004: "WASHINGTON - A divided Senate blocked on Wednesday [07/14/04] a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage, rejecting pleas from the White House for its approval and shifting the debate to the campaign trail this fall. [....] The 50-48 tally fell short of the 60 votes needed to move to a vote on the amendment and the 67 votes required for its final approval." [St Louis Post-Dispatch]
2004 - Pentagon Denies Concealing Imprisoned Suspects - July 15th, 2004: "WASHINGTON - The Pentagon on Wednesday [07/14/04] denied it is hiding any imprisoned terrorism suspects from the International Committe of the Red Cross." [A.P.]
2004 - Launch / Aura Satellite - July 16th, 2004: "NASA's satellite Aura was launched into orbit early Thursday [07/15/04] on a $785 million mission to study Earth's atmosphere." [News Services]
2004 - Wildfires / Western United States - July 16th, 2004: "CARSON CITY, Nev. - An army of firefighters struggled Thursday [07/15/04] to contain an explosive wildfire that destroyed several luxury homes and threatened 550 other houses and businesses on the edge of Nevada's capital. [....] Meanwhile, a fast-moving fire in California threatened two rural communities in the Angeles National Forest, as firefighters elsewhere made big gains against blazes that have charred about 36 square miles of brushland and forest this week. [....] In Alaska, fire crews continued to fight 75 separate blazes. Among the largest was a fire that had spread to within 15 miles of Fairbanks and expanded to half the size of Rhode Island, blackening more than 590 square miles." [A.P.]
2004 - "Most Dangerous Building" / Rocky Flats, Colo. - July 16th, 2004: "Demolition began Thursday [07/15/04] on what has been called 'the most dangerous building in America,' where workers at the Rocky Flats nuclear plant once handled highly radioactive plutonium used in triggers for nuclear weapons. Leaks, spills and a 1957 fire plagued the building, and part of it was closed 30 years ago because radiation levels were off the charts. The building was called the workhorse of the weapons factory, 16 miles northwest of Denver. The Department of Energy called the building its 'greatest vulnerability' in 1994 because of the buildup of contamination over five decades." [News Services]
*Trivia: "State and federal agencies want to see the sealed files of a grand jury that investigated alleged environmental crimes at the former Rocky Flats nuclear weapons plant after an advocacy group said cleanup plans for the site were dangerously incomplete." [A.P.]
2004 - Status / Bird Flu - July 18th, 2004: "Bird flu, the poultry disease that health experts fear could morph into a globe-spanning epidemic of severe human illness, has reappeared in four countries in the past two weeks. More than 15,000 chickens, ducks and other birds have died in China, Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam, and 78,000 others have been slaughtered in an attempt to halt the spread of the disease. Last winter's six-country outbreak sickened 34 people, killing 23." [News Services]
2004 - NEOCONS / U.S.A. - July 18th, 2004: "I like a guy who won't quit. [....] And I like William Kristol, the editor of The Weekly Standard, the Rupert Murdoch-owned neoconservative newsweekly. Undaunted by the polls, undaunted by the events of the past year, Kristol forges on in defense of the war in Iraq that he and his neocon pals so desperately wanted. [....] The whole neoconservative deal started with Leo Strauss at the University of Chicago teaching young saps that they were philosopher-kings who had to take action that the hoi polloi wouldn't understand. As author James mann discusses in his new book 'The Rise of the Vulcans,' the neocons went to ground during the Clinton administration, waiting for an empty vessel they could fill. Along comes George W. Bush, who had barely ever been out of the country and whose views on foreign policy were - shall we say - unformed. By the time you looked around, the neocons had set up shop: Scooter Libby was running Vice President Dick Cheney's office, which was running the White House; and Cheney's old pal and boss, Donald Rumsfeld, was running the Pentagon with the help of Paul Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith; and every eager-beaver Young Republican in the country was walking around with The Weekly Standard in his jacket pocket; and they had Bush so locked, cocked and ready to rock that the dust at Ground Zero was still settling and he was already looking for an excuse to invade Iraq. So now all the flesh has been ripped off the fish by predators (Democrats, media people, Quisling Republicans); CIA director George Tenet has been tossed over the side (wait 'til he writes his book) , as has Ahmed Chalabi, war provocateur and one-time neocon poster child. The president has made nice with France, of all places, and checked in with the United Nations before installing Chalabi's old rival as Iraq's prime minister. It's a bad time to be a neocon. All of their assumptions were wrong. Postwar Iraq turned out to be a dog's breakfast. The high-tech, hi-speed Army is so desperate for soldiers it's planning to offer bonuses of up to $10,000 to sailors and airmen who would otherwise muster out of the Navy and Air Force. The weapons of mass destruction haven't been found and democracy isn't flowering. But still, Bill Kristol is standing tall." [Based on: article by Kevin Horrigan, St-Louis Post-Dispatch, 07/18/04]
2004 - Resignation / Ahmed Qureia - July 18th, 2004: "RAMALLAH, West Bank - The Palestinian prime minister resigned Saturday [07/17/04], leaving the government without a top official. 'There is a crisis. There is a state of chaos in the security situation,' Ahmed Qureia said after announcing his resignation as premier at a Cabinet meeting in the West Bank town of Ramallah. [....] Qureia, also known as Abu Ala, was appointed in September 2003, when the first prime minister of the Palestinian government , Mahmoud Abbas, quit after just four months. The two men were among the two negotiators of the 1993 Oslo peace agreement with Israel that established the Palestinian Authority. Qureia's resignation was the third in two days among well-known figures in the Palestinian hierarchy. The head of the Palestinian Intelligence Service, Maj. Gen. Amin al Hindi, and the head of Preventive Security in the Gaza Strip, Rashid Abu Shbak, also quit Friday [07/16/04]." [A.P.]
*Trivia: "Arafat returned his ousted security chief - Abdel Razak Majaide - to power on Monday [07/19/04] in an apparent attempt to quell violent protests in the Gaza Strip." [A.P.]
2004 - "Genomic Instability" / Radiation Exposure - "Plutonium may be many times more dangerous than previously thought. The cancer risk from exposure inside the body could be 10 times higher than is allowed for in calculating international safety limits. The danger is highlighted in a report written by radiation experts for the UK government, which has been leaked to New Scientist. The experts are unanimous in saying that low-level radiation emitted by plutonium may cause more damage to human cells than previously believed. Their opinion could provoke a rethink of the guidelines on exposure to radiation. Several tonnes of plutonium have been released into the environment over the last 60 years by nuclear weapons tests and nuclear plants. Concern over the harmfulness of plutonium is growing because of discoveries about the subtle effects of low-level radiation. Researchers in Europe and North America have shown that the descendants of cells that seem to survive radiation unharmed can suffer delayed damage, a phenomenon called 'genomic instability' (New Scientist print edition, 20 January 2001)." [Newscientist.com, 07/18/04]
2004 - Declassified / Secret Pre-911 U.S. Hijack Data - July 18th, 2004: "WASHINGTON - A secret intelligence report prepared for President Bill Clinton in December 1998 reported on a suspected plot by Osama bin Laden to hijack a U.S. airliner in an effort to force the United States to release imprisoned conspirators in the 1993 World Trade Center attacks. The one-page declassified version of the President's Daily Brief dated Dec. 4, 1998, contains chilling information the CIA had gleaned from several sources indicating that al-Qaida was working with U.S.-based operatives of the Egyptian group Gama at al-Islamiyya in the purported hijack plot. The briefing shows that the intelligence community and the White House were aware of al-Qaida's interest in hijacking U.S. airliners long before the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. The day the briefing was prepared, then-CIA director George Tenet said in a memo that 'we are at war,' and that no resources should be spared to defeat the terrorists. A report by the presidential commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks will include the newly declassified document and a previously declassified presidential briefing from Aug. 6, 2001, when it is released this week. It will also contain details of what the commission's executive director, Philip Zelikow, described Saturday [07/17/04] as an 'energetic response' to the hijack threat information by the Clinton administration, including its efforts to determine if the reports were true. The Aug. 6, 2001, brief prepared for President George W. Bush mentioned 1998 intelligence concerning a plot by bin-Laden 'to hijack a U.S. aircraft to gain the release of 'Blind Sheik' Omar Abdel Rahman and other U.S.-held extremists.' The 2001 brief said intelligence officials 'have not been able to corroborate' the plot reports from 1998. The 1998 brief is titled: 'Bin Laden preparing to hijack U.S. aircraft and other attacks.' It was declassified, with some parts covered up, by the White House last Monday [July 2004] at the request of the Sept. 11 commission. The text of the 1998 brief was read to a reporter by an administration official. [....] A White House official said Saturday [07/17/04] that the Bush national security team was not apprised by the Clinton administration about the intelligence report on a suspected hijack plot to free Rahman." [By Susan Schmidt, The Washington Post]
2004 - Research / Mars Water - July 19th, 2004: "Surface water on Mars existed across a significant span of time, not just for years but eons, suggest new findings made by NASA's Mars rover Opportunity." [Newscientist.com]
2004 - French Criticism / Israel - July 19th, 2004: "France sharply criticized Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon on Sunday [07/18/04] after he urged French Jews to emigrate immediately to Israel to escape what he called 'the wildest anti-Semitism.' Branding Sharon's language 'unacceptable,' a French Foreign Ministry spokesman said Paris had demanded an explanation. France, home to western Europe's biggest Jewish and Muslim communities, has been troubled by attacks on Jewish people and property in recent years, some of it blamed on youths of North African origin angered by the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Sharon, who regularly calls on all the world's Jews to migrate to Israel, acknowledged in a speech to Jewish leaders in Jerusalem that the French government was making efforts to stem anti-Semitism. But he added that the threat was so grave that French Jews should head for Israel without delay." [News Services]
2004 - Status / Natural Gas, Bolivia - July 19th, 2004: "Bolivians voting in a referendum on Sunday [07/18/04] overwhelmingly supported President Carlos Mesa's plan for the government to exert greater control over U.S. and other foreign gas companies. With 66.4 percent of the vote counted, 87 percent of the voters approved a measure that would repeal a 1996 law that permitted foreign energy companies to exploit Bolivia's vast and virtually untapped natural gas reserves. In addition, 92 percent supported a proposal for Bolivia to take back ownership of natural gas at the wellhead, meaning companies would be paid for pumping the oil but would not own it. Mesa has said he will honor prior contracts reached with U.S. and other foreign gas companies. But with the weight of a referendum behind him, he will have some leverage in asking oil companies to reconsider their contracts." [News Services]
2004 - Comments / Acting CIA Director - July 19th, 2004: "John McLaughlin said 'a good argument can be made' for a Cabinet-level position to oversee the nation's 15 intelligence agencies and control their budgets. But, he added, 'It doesn't relate particularly to the world I live in. I see the director of central intelligence as someone who is able to do that and is empowered to do so under the National Security Act of 1947.' "
2004 - "Girlie Men" Democrats / California - July 19th, 2004: "LOS ANGELES - A spokesman for Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said Sunday [07/18/04] that the governor would not apologize for calling lawmakers 'girlie men,' despite criticisms from Democrats that the remark was sexist and homophobic. Schwarzenegger dished out the insult at a rally Saturday [07/17/04] as he claimed Democrats were delaying the budget by catering to special interests. 'If they don't have the guts to come up here in front of you and say, 'I don't want to represent you, I want to represent those special interests, the unions, the trial lawyers ... if they don't have the guts, I call them girlie men,' Schwarzenegger said at a mall in Ontario, Calif. [....] State Sen. Sheila Kuehl, a Democrat, said the governor had resorted to 'blatant homophobia.' " [A.P.]
2004 - Dementia Studies - July 20th, 2004: "Obesity, lack of greens and inactivity can add up to dementia in old age, according to several new studies." [By Jamie Talan, Newsday]
2004 - Truck Bomb / Baghdad, Iraq - July 20th, 2004: "BAGHDAD, Iraq - Just as nearly 300 police officers were gathering in their station's parking lot for a shift change Monday morning [07/19/04], a white tanker truck came barreling down a nearby street, crashed into a brick wall and exploded [resulting in 9 dead & 62 injured]. [....] It was the fifth vehicle bombing in the last week, including one suicide attack that narrowly missed the justice minister - but killed five bodyguards - and another that killed 11 people outside the protected area that houses the interim Iraqi government." [Knight Ridder Newspapers]
2004 - Research / Gulf War Syndrome - July 20th, 2004: "Researchers have found that veterans of the 1991 Gulf War are more likely to suffer from chronic symptoms, including memory and thinking problems, debilitating fatigue, severe muscle and joint pain, depression and rashes. But the cause has proved elusive. Theories include stress, bacterial infection, chemical or biological weapons, pollutants from burning oil fields, depleted-uranium munitions, and vaccinations for anthrax and other potential biological weapons." [News Services]
2004 - Ratified / Convential Forces Treaty, Europe - July 20th, 2004: "President Vladimir Putin on Monday [07/19/04] signed into law a measure that ratifies a 1990 arms treaty that sets limits on deployment of heavy, non-nuclear weapons throughout Europe." [News Services]
2004 - Focus of Criminal Investigation / Sandy Berger - July 20th, 2004: "WASHINGTON - President Bill Clinton's national security advisor, Sandy Berger, is the focus of a criminal investigation after removing highly classified terrorism documents and handwritten notes from a secure reading room during preparations for the Sept. 11 commission hearings, The Associated Press has learned. [....] 'In the course of reviewing over several days thousands of pages of documents on behalf of the Clinton administration in connection with requests by the Sept. 11 commission, I inadvertently took a few documents from the Archives,' Berger said. 'When I was informed by the Archives that there were documents missing, I immediately returned everything I had except for a few documents that I apparently had accidently discarded,' he said." [A.P.]
*Trivia: "The documents involved have been a key point of contention between the Clinton and Bush administrations on the question of who responded more forcefully to the threat of al-Qaida terrorism. Written by former National Security Advisor aide Richard Clarke, they discuss the 1999 plot to attack U.S. millennium celebrations and offer more than two dozen recommendations for improving the response to Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network." [A.P.]
2004 - E.U. President / Josep Borrell - July 21st, 2004: "European Parliament members on Tuesday [07/20/04] elected a Spaniard as its next president as the expanded body met for the first time. The 732-member assembly chose Josep Borrell, a relatively unknown Spanish Socialist, to its top job. The parliament vote was the first for hundreds of lawmakers from the 10 new member states - many from the former Soviet bloc - that joined the European Union in May [2004]. Borell comes from the Catalonia region of Spain. He succeeds outgoing president Pat Cox. The European Parliament is responsible for EU legislation. It also decides how the EU's $138 billion budget will be spent." [News Services]
2004 - Freed Flilipino Hostage, Iraq - July 21st, 2004: "In Baghdad, Fhilipino hostage Angelo dela Cruz was dropped off in front of the United Arab Emirates Embassy on Tuesday [07/20/04], a day after his government withdrew the last of the 51 troops they had stationed in Iraq." [A.P.]
*Trivia: "More than 60 foreigners have been taken hostage in recent months, and there were fears that the Philippines' action would lead to more kidnappings and prompt members of the U.S.-led coalition to think twice about sending their soldiers to Iraq or keeping them there." [A.P., 07/21/04]
2004 - Status / U.S. Health Care Reform - July 21st, 2004: "The National Coalition on Health Care called Tuesday [07/20/04] for a rapid, sweeping reorganization of American health care. [....] Health costs have been growing at three to four times the overall economy in recent years." [By Judith VandeWater, St Louis Post-Dispatch]
2004 - Porn Scandal / Austrian Seminary - July 21st, 2004: "VIENNA, Austria - Moving to contain a scandal that has deeply embarrassed the Roman Catholic Church, Pope John Paul II appointed a special inspector Tuesday [07/20/04] to investigate a seminary where authorities uncovered 40,000 pornographic photos, including child porn. [....] The Vatican inquiry will examine the child porn issue as well as the discovery of candidates for the priesthood kissing and fondling eachother and their older religious instructors. The police investigation has avoided the priest sex issues." [A.P.]
*Trivia: "A Roman Catholic bishop [Bishop Kurt Krenn] blamed for a seminary porn scandal that has rocked Austria's church has resigned, media reports said Wednesday [04/29/04]." [News Services, 04/30/04]
2004 - U.N. Condemnation / Israeli Barrier - July 21st, 2004: "UNITED NATIONS - The U.N. General Assembly overwhelmingly adopted a resolution Tuesday [07/20/04] demanding that Israel comply with a world court decision and tear down the barrier it is building to seal off the West Bank. The vote was 150 in favor, 6 opposed - including the United States - and 10 abstentions. The assembly's vote - like the opinion of the International Court of Justice - is not legally binding, but both have symbolic value as international statements of condemnation for the barrier. [....] The court, as well as the resolution, demands that the barrier be dismantled and reparations be paid to Palestinians harmed by its construction. Israel has refused to recognize the world court ruling." [A.P.]
2004 - Global Warming Suit - July 22nd, 2004: "NEW YORK - Accusing the federal government of neglecting the threat of global warming, eight states [California, Connecticut, Iowa, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont & Wisconsin] and New York City sued some of the nation's largest power companies Wednesday [07/21/04] to force them to reduce their carbon dioxide emissions. [....] The plantiffs want a federal judge to force five power producers - American Electric Power Co., Southern Co., Xcel Energy Inc., Cinergy Corp. and the federal Tennessee Valley Authority - to reduce emissions 3 percent annually for 10 years. They say those power producers own 174 fossil fuel-burning power plants that generate 646 million tons of carbon dioxide annually - about 10 percent of the nation's total." [A.P.]
*Trivia: "It is amazing to consider that Nikola Tesla, sometime in the 1920's first wrote in his personal journals his thoughts concerning the buildup of greenhouse gases in the Earth's atmosphere. These gases, caused by manmade and natural pollutants were to eventually cause the planet's overall temperature to increase to such a point that the polar icecaps would melt, flooding the coastlines. As well, weather patterns would change dramatically bringing about fierce storms, droughts in some areas and floods in others. Agriculture would be destroyed and life as we know it would cease to exist." [Tim Swartz, The Lost Journals of Nikola Tesla, p. 120]
2004 - Hostages Taken / Iraq - July 22nd, 2004: "BAGHDAD, Iraq - Militants took six foreign truck drivers hostage and threatened Wednesday [07/21/04] to behead them unless their company ended its business in Iraq, and their countries - India, Egypt and Kenya - pull all their citizens out." [A.P.]
2004 - U.S. Dead & Injured / Iraq - July 22nd, 2004: "The U.S. military death toll [in Iraq] now has reached 900, and the number of American soldiers wounded in action or injured is approaching 6000." [By Robert Burns, A.P.]
2004 - Status / Paul M. Johnson Jr. - July 22nd, 2004: "RIYADH, Saudia Arabia - Saudi security forces found the head of the murdered American hostage Paul M. Johnson Jr. in a freezer during a raid on an al-Qaida hideout, officials said Wednesday [07/21/04]." [A.P.]
2004 - Free Trade / U.S. & Morocco - July 22nd, 2004: "WASHINGTON - The Senate agreed Wednesday [07/21/04] to effectively eliminate trade barriers with Morocco, one of America's oldest trading partners and closest allies in the Arab world."
2004 - Survivor Accounts / Sierra Leone - July 22nd, 2004: "Survivors this week and last have started telling their accounts of one of Africa's most heartless wars: a 1991-2002 campaign by rebels who killed, raped, kidnapped and hacked to pieces hundreds of thousands of civilians in hopes of terrorizing Sierra Leone into ceding control of its government and diamond fields."
2004 - Needs Money? / U.S. Pentagon - July 22nd, 2004: "WASHINGTON - The Pentagon faces a $12.3 billion shortfall through September for the cost of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and its worldwide effort against terrorism, congressional auditors estimated Wednesday [07/21/04]. The amount is triple what Air Force Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, projected in April he would need to make it through September." [A.P.]
2004 - "Project BioShield" / United States - July 22nd, 2004: "WASHINGTON - Warning that terrorists are seeking deadly technology, President George W. Bush signed legislation on Wednesday [07/21/04] to develop and stockpile vaccines and antidotes for chemical and germ weapons. [....] Federal health officials also hope that the $5.6 billion program will provide antidotes for botulism and anthrax, a safer smallpox vaccine and a long-awaited children's version of an anti-radiation pill. The program received bipartisan support in Congress. It passed the House on a 414-2 vote July 15. The discovery of sarin gas in a roadside bomb in Iraq and ricin and anthrax attacks against the Capitol spurred the Senate to pass it 99-0 in May." [By Deb Riechmann, A.P.]
2004 - Wrong About Black Holes? / Stephen Hawking - July 22nd, 2004: "DUBLIN, Ireland - After 29 years of thinking about it, Stephen Hawking says he was wrong about black holes. The renowned Cambridge University physicist presented a paper Wednesday [07/21/04] arguing that black holes - the celestial vortexes formed from collapsed stars - preserve traces of objects swallowed up and eventually could spit bits out 'in a mangled form.' " [A.P.]
*Commentary: "Preserve traces of objects swallowed up? Spit bits out in mangled form? Is that not what allegedly happened in the Philadelphia Experiment?" [Etznab Mathers]
2004 - Resolved Arms Trading Dispute / U.S. & South Africa - Jully 22nd, 2004: "A long-standing dispute over arms trading between South Africa and the United States has ended, and defense trade relations have been normalized, U.S. officials said Wednesday [07/21/04]. The State Department decided to normalize arms trade after reviewing a 1996 settlement between the countries over alleged violations of U.S. export laws by three South African defense firms, U.S. Ambassador Cameron Hume said." [News Services]
2004 - Final Report / 911 Commission - July 23rd, 2004: "WASHINGTON - The 567-page report issued Thursday [07/22/04] about what went wrong during the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, boils down to a simple conclusion: The federal government at all levels, did not do its most important job, that of defending the country." [Based on: Article, St. Louis Post-Dispatch Washington Bureau]
2004 - Withdrawl From Iraq / Kenya Citizens - July 23rd, 2004: "The deepening hostage crisis across Iraq led Kenya, facing an ultimatum by militants to behead three of its citizens in captivity, to tell its people Thursday [07/22/04] to leave Iraq." [A.P.]
2004 - Color Image of Saturn / Cassini Spacecraft - July 23rd, 2004: "The international Cassini spacecraft sent back a natural-color image of Saturn showing the planet's rings are shades of pink, gray and a bit of brown, scientists announced Thursday [07/22/04]. The image was taken June 21, a few days before the spacecraft entered orbit, from 4 million miles below the rings. The rings are mostly ice, which is white if it is pure ice. Researchers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Labatory believe the different colors reflect the presence of other materials." [From Staff and News Services]
2004 - Torture Investigation / U.S. Soldiers, Afghanistan - July 23rd, 2004: "KABUL, Afghanistan - The U.S. military said Thursday [07/22/04] it held an Afghan prisoner for two months after receiving him from three Americans who have been charged with torturing detainees at a private jail. [....] Idema [Jonathan Idema] told reporters in the courtroom that he had daily contact with U.S. officials 'at the highest level,' including Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld's office." [By Stephen Graham, A.P.]
2004 - Human Cloning / Japan - July 24th, 2004: "Japan's top science council voted Friday [07/23/04] to adopt policy recommendations that would permit the limited cloning of human embryos for scientific research, an official said. [....] Britain and South Korea allow therapeutic cloning, but the United States prohibits any kind of embryo cloning." [News Services]
2004 - Hostage Taken / Egyptian Diplomat - July 24th, 2004: "BAGHDAD, Iraq - Militants kidnapped a senior Egyptian diplomat as he left a mosque Friday [07/23/04] and demanded that his country abandon any plans to send security experts to support Iraq's new government, according to a video broadcast on the Al-Jazeera television state." [A.P.]
2004 - "Day Out of Time" - "July 25th, 2004, the Day Out of Time on the 13 Moon/28 day calendar, was prophesied as the beginning of the shift toward 2012. This date, and the events occuring on it worldwide, are more important than the Harmonic Convergence [08/16/1987] because it initiates the final approach to 2012. This day is called the 'Day out of Time,' because on the 13 Moon/28 day calendar, it is the 365th day of the year - a day for forgiveness, freedom and a celebration of natural time." [Jose Arguelles]
2004 - Protestors / Gaza to Jerusalem - July 25th, 2004: "About 100,000 protestors created a human chain across some 55 miles from Gaza to Jerusalem." [A.P., 07/27/04]
2004 - Misleading Statements / Risperdal - July 25th, 2004: "TRENRON, N.J. - The maker of popular medicine for schizophrenia has notified doctors that it minimized potentially fatal safety risks and made misleading claims about the drug in promotional materials. [....] The Miami Herald reported Saturday [07/24/04] that a handful of boys in Florida developed lactating breasts after taking Risperdal. The drug which is prescribed to more than 10 million people worldwide, was cited in a federal lawsuit filed earlier this month by a doctor who claims children have been harmed and even killed by the misuse of drugs he blames on aggressive marketing by drug manufacturers. [....] Risperdal is the leading drug used to combat schizophrenia and other types of psychotic disorders, earning Janssen about $2.1 billion in annual sales. The drug was first marketed about eight years ago." [A.P.]
2004 - Rejected / Genocide Charges, Mexico - July 25th, 2004: "A Mexican judge threw out charges Saturday [07/24/04] accusing former President Luis Echeverria of ordering a 1971 massacre of student protestors, a setback in the nation's bid to punish state atrocities. [....] A criminal court judge ruled that the statute of limitations had run out on crimes committed during the June 10, 1971, attack by a paramilitary band on student protestors in Mexico city that killed as many as 40 people. Special prosecutor Ignacio carrillo said he will appeal the ruling within three days and hopes to take it to the nation's highest court. Carrillo is pressing genocide charges against Echeverria and several members of his administration." [News Services]
2004 - E-Mail Trivia / Graham Forsyth - July 26th, 2004:
"[....] I am hoping that this website allows me to give my own side of the events that led to my involvement with Ford Johnson and the exposing of Eckankar. I am trying to use this facility because my participation on Ford Johnson's bulletin boards has now been made conditional for me. I have not become a member of his organisation, yet I have used his boards in order to share my own views and help support the principal that the individual is the centre for their own truth, not any teacher or organisation. Because of my use of his boards and my refusal to become more active in his organisation, and a furthering of differences in regards to an open letter I was initiay intending to send to Harold Klemp that I thought had been redrafted out of context to myself by Darrell Johnson and reviewed by Ford, I was eventually told by Ford: "there are some concessions to organization and unity that must be made in order to succeed in the physical dimension." I was not prepared to make any concessions to any organisation, therefore I withdrew completely from the use of his boards. This now leaves me in the position of seeing my name mentioned by others yet I have no recourse at the moment to help me give my view of things. I will, hopefully, try and explain my own posting in regards to your comments. [....]"
[Based on: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/eckankartruth/message/4590]
2004 - Nonviolent Protest / West Bank - July 26th, 2004: "This summer, several Israeli and Palestinian groups have been working together in the West Bank to apply nonviolence against the Israeli occupation at checkpoints, the wall, house demonstrations, refugee camps and roadblocks. You would think the United States and Israel would hail this effort. Yet our government and media are silent, and the Israeli authorities are responding with armed force. Unless one believes that all Palestinians, or all who oppose the occupation, belong to Hamas, which is clearly not the case, how can one explain this violent response to unarmed, nonviolent resistance? If an alternative to terrorism is an Israeli goal, Palestinian nonviolence should be a dream come true. Or are Palestinians not allowed any right of defense against the occupation?" [By Angie O'Gorman, St. Louis]
2004 - Tour de France Winner / Lance Armstrong - July 26th, 2004: "With his record-breaking sixth Tour de France victory [07/25/04], Lance Armstrong joins the league of legendary athletes." [A.P.]
2004 - Fat Research - July 27th, 2004: "As an epidemic of obesity sweeps the nation, scientists are making new discoveries about fat that could lead to better treatments for the overweight, diabetics and people with heart disease. [....] A growing body of evidence suggests that fat is a diet consultant, metabolism thermostat, immune regulator, birth control device and a possible aging-control center." [By Tina Hesman, St Louis Post-Dispatch]
2004 - Kidnappings / Iraq - July 27th, 2004: "BAGHDAD, Iraq - A new wave of kidnappings has sent shock waves through the diplomatic and business communities in Baghdad, virtually shutting down most embassies and thwarting Prime Minister Iyad Allawi's efforts to drum up international support for his fledgling government. Insurgents on Monday [07/26/04] kidnapped two Jordanian drivers, the latest in a string of kidnappings." [Knight Ridder Newspapers]
2004 - Ground Zero Study - July 27th, 2004: "WASHINGTON - A group of hazardous chemicals released into the air following the collapse of the World Trade Center doesn't appear to be much of a cancer risk to local residents. [....] A team led by Stephen M. Rappaport of the University of North Carolinia studied 243 samples collected near ground zero. They analyzed the amounts of nine chemicals known as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, which are known to cause cancer. 'The public was exposed to some toxic PAHs at levels that were quite high soon after the collapse. However, due to the rapid decline in PAH levels, with the dissipation of the fires, the long-term risks of cancer were minuscule,' Rappaport said. 'Nonetheless,' he added, 'sensitive populations, such as the offspring of women who were pregnant at the time, were at particular risk and may well have suffered as a result of their exposure to PAH during the critical time period.' Rappaport said the risk of cancer related to PAHs would be 0.157 cases per million people over 70 years near ground zero, and this would increase only to 0.167 cases per million as a result of the chemicals released in the building collapse and resulting cleanup. The report appeared this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The study concluded that more than 90 percent of the airborne particles released in the building collapse were larger than 10 microns across, a size that tends to settle quickly out of the air. Ten microns is about one-seventh the width of the average human hair. A fraction of the particles were 2.5 microns or less, a size that can easily remain in the air and penetrate into the lung, the report noted. These particles were released in the fires accompanying the collapse and from diesel engines used int the cleanup, the report said." [A.P]
2004 - Status / Israeli Separation Barrier - July 27th, 2004: "JERUSALEM - Israel's Defense Ministry has mapped out a new route for the separation barrier in the West Bank that heeds a Supreme Court order to reduce hardships for Palestinians and runs closer to the Israel's 1967 border, officials said Monday [07/26/04]. Word of the new route came as Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon insisted he would go ahead with his plan to pull soldiers and settlers out of the Gaza Strip despite a huge demonstration against it Sunday [07/25/04], when about 100,000 protestors created a human chain across some 55 miles from Gaza to Jerusalem. [....] Details of the new route were not available, but the officials said it would run much closer to the internationally recognized cease-fire line of 1967 than originally planned. [....] About one-fourth of the barrier, which will eventually run 425 miles, has been built." [By Laurie Copans, A.P.]
2004 - Jewish Demonstration / Jerusalem - July 28th, 2004: "In Jerusalem Tuesday [07/27/04], police turned back about 30 Jewish zealots who were trying to enter a disputed Jerusalem holy site under Muslim control, saying the act could incite Palestinian violence. The demonstration was by the Temple Mount Faithful, a group dedicated to rebuilding a biblical temple destroyed by the Babylonians in 586 B.C. and again by the Romans in A.D. 70. The group wants to remove two mosques - the Dome of the Rock and Al Aqsa - built on the ancient site. Muslim tradition says the site is where the prophet Muhammad ascended to heaven. Tuesday [07/27/04] was the Jewish holiday of Tisha B'Av, or the ninth of the month of Av, on which Jews believe both temples were destroyed." [A.P.]
2004 - Suspended Traffic / Philadelphia Airport - July 28th, 2004: "According to an airline passenger report, a four-hour lull in traffic this afternoon [no arriving or departing flights] occured at the Philadelphia airport."
*Trivia: "A security test at Philadelphia International Airport led to delays and fears for hundreds of passengers Wednesday [07/28/04]. US Airways travelers in terminals A through D were forced to evacuate and be re-screened Wednesday [07/28/04] afternoon. The Transportation Security Administration blamed the evacuation on a computer glitch, but police sources said TSA officials sent a fake weapon through security as part of a test. Police officials denied that's what took place."
*Trivia: "A computer problem grounded American Airlines and US Airways flights nationwide Sunday [08/01/04] morning, triggering delays that lasted through the day. A computer company official said human error was the likely cause." [News Services, 08/02/04]
2004 - Reconciliation / Yasser Arafat & Ahmed Qureia - July 28th, 2004: "Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat ... and Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia show unity after a Cabinet meeting in the West bank city of Ramallah on Tuesday [07/27/04]. Qureia withdrew his resignation Tuesday [07/27/04], and Arafat promised to let Cabinet ministers do their jobs." [A.P.]
2004 - Preventable Medical Mistakes / Third Leading Cause of Death in the United States? - July 28th, 2004: "BOSTON - The number of hospital patients who die from preventable errors may be twice as high as previously estimated, according to a review of Medicare records by a Denver-based health care ranking group. The findings would make medical mistakes the third-leading cause of death in the country, behind heart disease and cancer." [Based on: Boston Globe article]

2004 - Hybrid SUVs - July 29th, 2004: "Next week, the Ford Motor Co. will begin producing the world's first gasoline-electric hybrid sport utility vehicle at its plant in Kansas City. Other hybrid SUVs due out within the next few months are the Lexus RX 400h and the Toyota Highlander." [By Sara Shipley, St. Louis Post Dispatch]
2004 - W. Stephen Thayer III - July 29th, 2004: "WASHINGTON - A key overseer [W. Stephen Thayer III] of the Bush administration's unsuccessful efforts to create a more comprehensive screening process for airline passengers resigned in disgrace four years ago [2000] from the New Hampshire Supreme Court to avoid prosecution over his conduct on the bench." [By Michael J. Sniffen & Leslie Miller, A.P.]
2004 - Trivia / V-Chip, U.S.A. - July 29th, 2004: "A 2001 study by the Kaiser Family Foundation found that 40 percent of American families own a television set with a V-chip; 17 percent of those families use the device." [A.P.]
2004 - Suicide Car Bombing / Iraq - July 29th, 2004: "BAQOUBA, Iraq - A suicide car bomb tore through a downtown street Wednesday [07/28/04], killing at least 68 Iraqis and leaving a bustling area of shops and fruit stalls strewn with charred corpses, twisted metal and burning cars. The attack was the deadliest in the month since U.S. authorities handed sovereignty to an interim government." [By Hadi Awad, A.P.]
*Trivia: "70 killed, 56 wounded in a July 28 explosion next to a line of police applicants." [A.P., 01/13/05]
2004 - Fatalities / Pakistani Hostages, Iraq - July 29th, 2004: "A militant group holding two Pakistani contractors said Wednesday [07/28/04] that it had killed the men but freed their Iraqi driver, the television station Al-Jazeera reported. The group, calling itself the Islamic Army in Iraq, had announced Monday [07/26/04] that it kidnapped two Pakistanis working for U.S. forces and sentenced them to death because their country was discussing sending troops to Iraq. [....] The militants also warned the company to stop doing business in Iraq or they would kill more of its employees." [By Hadi Awad, A.P.]
2004 - Prisoner Status / Ahmed Abu Ali, Saudi Arabia - July 29th, 2004: "WASHINGTON - Federal agencies that have declined for months to discuss their role in the detention of a U.S. citizen [Ahmed Abu Ali] in Saudi Arabia have a new reason for keeping mum - the lawsuit his family filed Wednesday [07/28/04] demanding that the U.S. government order his release." [By Jon Sawyer, Post-Dispatch Washington Bureau Chief]
2004 - Afghanistan Departure / Doctors Without Borders - July 29th, 2004: "KABUL, Afghanistan - Doctors Without Borders became the first major aid agency to leave Afghanistan since the Taliban's fall, saying Wednesday [07/28/04] that the government failed to act on evidence that local warlords were behind the murder of five members of its staff." [By Stephen Graham, A.P.]
2004 - Status / Israeli Barrier - July 30th, 2004: "JERUSALEM - Israel is rerouting its West Bank barrier to move it closer to the 1967 pre-war boundary, but it will still jut into the occupied territory to encircle major Jewish settlements, a Defense Ministry official says. [....] Mashiah [Nezah Mashaih] stressed that the barrier would not run exactly along the Green Line, a cease-fire line from the 1948-49 war that followed Israel's creation. Israel does not recognize it as a border. [....] Palestinian Arabs charge that the barrier route is meant to reduce the territory available to them in a future state. They claim all of the West Bank and Gaza, lands Israel captured in the 1967 Mideast war. Israel says the barrier is necessary to prevent attacks on its towns and cities." [By Steven Gutkin, A.P.]
2004 - Heavy Storms / Texas - July 30th, 2004: "At least two people died as thunderstorms spewed more than a foot of rain in parts of north Texas [07/29/04], flooding homes, knocking out power and washing out a bridge south of Dallas." [News Services]
2004 - Death Toll / Monsoon Rains, South Asia - July 30th, 2004: "Monsoon rains across South Asia caused floods that have killed more than 1,300 people since mid-June." [A.P.]
*Trivia: " 'This is the worst flooding in recent memory with 22 of the 24 districts in Assam under floodwater,' Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi said in the Indian state of Assam. 'The high water current has washed away rows and rows of villages. The condition of the people is really devastating,' he told the AFP news agency." [BBC, 07/13/04]
2004 - Assassination Attempt / Pakistan Prime Minister - July 30th, 2004: "At least five people were killed and 25 injured in an apparent suicide attack on Pakistan's Prime Minister-designate Shaukat Aziz, police say. [....] His motorcade was attacked as he left an election rally in Attock, northern Punjab, ahead of a crucial by-election scheduled for 18 August." [BBC News]
2004 - Protestors / Democratic National Convention, Boston - July 30th, 2004: "After four days of relative calm, protests became tense Thursday [07/29/04] outside the site of the Democratic National Convention as demonstrators burned a U.S. flag and a two-faced effigy depicting George W. Bush on one side and Sen. John Kerry on the other. About 400 protestors marched through Boston before arriving outside the fenced-in demonstration area near the FleetCenter, where a shoving match errupted as the throng pressed up against police officers who used clubs to keep the crowd at bay. Several protestors were dragged from the crowd and handcuffed by police. Others screamed at the officers to let them go. Police reported three arrests, according to the Associated Press." [A.P.]
2004 - Turkish Hostages / Iraq - "BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraqi militants said Saturday [07/31/04] that they had kidnapped two Turks and threatened to behead them within 48 hours even as efforts intensified to win the release of seven truck drivers taken captive by other insurgents." [A.P.]
2004 - Talk of Resignation / Tom Ridge - July 31st, 2004: "Several senior Homeland Security officials said Ridge had indicated in recent weeks [July 2004] he probably would resign after the election, even if Bush wins. They spoke on condition of anonymity, citing the delicate nature of describing private conversations with their boss." [News Services]
2004 - Convicted / Joseph Massino - July 31st, 2004: "Bonanno crime boss Joseph Massino was convicted Friday [07/30/04] of orchestrating a quarter century's worth of crimes including murder, racketeering, arson and extortion. [....] Massino had been dubbed 'The Last Don' for his ability to rebuild the family and avoid jail while the heads of New York's other four Mafia families were all behind bars." [News Services]
2004 - Suicide Bombers / Uzbekistan - July 31st, 2004: "TASHKENT, Uzbekistan - Suicide bombers struck the U.S. and Israeli embassies along with the top prosecutor's office Friday [07/30/04], killing at least two Uzbeks and wounding nine others in nearly simultaneous attacks in the capital of Uzbekistan, a close U.S. ally in the war on terrorism." [A.P.]
2004 - Status / Guantanamo Detainees - July 31st, 2004: "... The Justice department filed 07/30/04] its first detailed response to lawsuits from Guantanamo detainees. The detainees have no constitutional rights, including the right to see a lawyer, the government said in federal court filings." [A.P.]
2004 - Status / U.S. Reconstruction Aid, Iraq - July 31st, 2004: "BAGHDAD, Iraq - Secretary of State Colin Powell said Friday [07/30/04] that the United States will speed delivery to Iraq of billions of dollars in reconstruction aid that Congress approved last year. [....] U.S. lawmakers and others have said the administration has moved too slowly in converting $18 billion in reconstruction aid into projects on the ground in Iraq. To date [July 2004], only $458 million has been spent, officials said, blaming red tape." [By George Gedda, A.P.]
2004 - Christened / Nuclear Submarine "Texas" - "Laura Bush, wife of President George W. Bush, christened a $2.2 billion nuclear-powered attack submarine named after her home state of Texas on Saturday [07/31/04], cracking a bottle of American sparkling wine against the hull on her first try. 'May all who board her be forever blessed and may all who encounter her on the seas remember, 'Don't mess with texas,' she said at the ceremony at the Northrop Grumman Newport News shipyard. The submarine is the second ship in the Virginia class submarine, which eventually could have 30 ships. The Texas is expected to be delivered to the Navy next Year." [Based on, News Services]
2004 - Copies Mailed / "911 In Plane Site" - July 2004: "In July of 2004, The Power Hour mailed DVD copies of '911 In Plane Site' to 20 government agencies including The DoD, The U.S. House of Representatives, The Senate, The CIA, The FBI, The Department of Homeland Security, & The President of The United States. To date, we have received only one response to our inquiry. Below [see link] is a copy of the letter we sent to Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld. [....]"
[Based on: http://www.911inplanesite.com/dod.htm]
August 2004
2004 - Possible Bankruptcies / U.S. Airline Industry - August 1st, 2004: "NEW YORK - In an echo of the savings and loan industry collapse of the 1980s, the federal agency that insures company pensions is facing a possible cascade of bankruptcies and pension defaults in the airline industry. Some experts fear that could lead to another multibillion-dollar taxpayer bailout." [New York Times]
2004 - Tropical Storm Alex - August 2nd, 2004: "Alex, the first named tropical storm of the Atlantic hurricane season, developed off the South Carolinia coast Sunday [01/08/04] as forecasters predicted it would make landfall in North Carolinia." [News Services]
2004 - Bomb Blast / Prague - August 2nd, 2004: "A bomb targeting an Israeli casino owner exploded under a car on a busy restaurant street in the Czech capital Sunday [08/01/04], injuring at least 18 people, including foreign tourists." [News Services]
2004 - Status / West Nile Virus - August 2nd, 2004: "West Nile has sickened more than 260 people across the nation this year and caused six deaths, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Many people who get the virus are unaffected, but others show flu-like symptoms. Less than 1 percent get seriously ill with conditions such as meningitis or encephalitis." [News Services]
2004 - Computer Problems / U.S. Airlines - August 2nd, 2004: "A computer problem grounded American Airlines and US Airways flights nationwide Sunday [08/01/04] morning, triggering delays that lasted through the day. A computer company official said human error was the likely cause." [News Services]
2004 - Discovery / Ancient Tomb, Egypt - August 2nd, 2004: "Builders laying the foundations for a mosque in northeast Cairo found a tomb dating from the Pharaonic period intact but full of ground water, official sources said Sunday [08/01/04]. The tomb contains an unopened basalt sarcophagus, slivers of gold dedicated to the ancient Egyptian gods Isis and Horus, and inscriptions showing the tomb belonged to a man called Ankh Khansu Derat Hor, the news agency MENA said. The head of the Supreme Council for Antiquities, Zahi Hawass, said the tomb dated from the New Kingdom, which lasted from the 16th to 11th century BC." [News Services]
2004 - Deadly Supermarket Fire / Paraguay - August 2nd, 2004: "ASUNCION, Paraguay - At least 256 people were killed after a propane gas tank exploded inside a crowded supermarket in Asuncion, igniting a fast-moving fire that left a crowd of Sunday [08/01/04] shoppers trapped behind doors that may have been locked to prevent looting." [By Hector Tobar & Luis Maria Paredes, Los Angeles Times]
2004 - Bomb Targets / Christian Churches, Iraq - August 2nd, 2004: "BAGHDAD, Iraq - Assailants triggered a coordinated series of explosions outside five churches in Baghdad and Mosul during Sunday [08/01/04] evening services. The attacks killed 11 people and wounded more than 50 in the first major assault on Iraq's Christian minority. [....] The attacks against Iraq's 750,000-member Christian minority seemed to confirm community member's fears they might be targeted as suspected collaborators with American forces amid a rising tide of Islamic fundamentalism." [By Omar Sinan, A.P.]
2004 - Terror Alert? / Financial Services Sectors, U.S.A. - August 2nd, 2004: "WASHINGTON - The federal government on Sunday [08/01/04] warned financial services sectors in New York, Washington and Newark, N.J., of possible terrorist attacks, citing the discovery of remarkably detailed intelligence showing that al-Qaida operatives have been plotting for years to blow up specific buildings with car or truck bombs. The government raised the terrorism alert level to orange, or high, in Washington and Newark. In New York, which has been on high alert since Sept. 11, 2001, officials stepped up security measures. Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge said the newly acquired information pointed to five potential targets: the International Monetary Fund and World Bank headquarters in Washington; the New York Stock Exchange and Citicorp Center in New York; and the Prudential Financial building in Newark, N.J." [By Dan Eggen & John Mintz, Washington Post]
*Trivia: "The unannounced capture of a figure from al-Qaida [Muhammad Naeem Noor Khan, also known as Abu Talha] in Pakistan several weeks ago [07/13/04] led the CIA to the rich lode of information that prompted the terrorism alert on Sunday [08/01/04], according to senior U.S. officials." [By Douglas Jehl & David Rohde, New York Times]
2004 - Crimes Against Nature - "In 2004, HarperCollins Publishers Inc. published Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s book: Crimes Against Nature." [Etznab Mathers]
2004 - Trivia / Biggest Polluters, U.S.A. - "The present cabinet boasts more CEOs than any in history. Most come from the energy, extractive, and manufacturing sectors that rely on giant subsidies and create the worst pollution. Almost all the top positions at the agencies that protect our environment and oversee our resources have been filled by former lobbyists for the biggest polluters in the very businesses that these ministries oversee. These men and women seem to have entered government service with the express purpose of subverting the agencies they now command. The administration is systematically muzzling, purging, and punishing scientists and other professionals whose work impedes corporate profit taking. The immediate beneficiaries of this corrupt largesse have been the nation's most irresponsible mining, chemical, energy, agribusiness, and automobile companies. The American people have been the losers." [Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Crimes Against Nature, p. 5]
2004 - Turkish Hostage Fatality / Iraq - August 3rd, 2004: "BAGHDAD, Iraq - Masked gunmen shot a blindfolded Turkish hostage three times in the head on a gruesome Internet video meant to warn Muslim workers to stay out of Iraq. Soon after the video was discovered Monday [08/02/04], Turkish truckers announced they would stop hauling goods for U.S. forces in hopes of saving two other Turkish captives." [By Ravi Nessman, A.P.]
2004 - Trivia / Industrial Pollution, U.S.A. - "Industrial farms illegally dump millions of tons of untreated fecal and toxic waste onto the land and into the air and water. Factory farms have contaminated hundreds of miles of waterways, put tens of thousands of family farmers and fishermen out of work, killed billions of fish, sickened consumers, and subjected millions of farm animals to unspeakable cruelty." [Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Crimes Against Nature, p. 7]
2004 - Trivia / Mercury Contamination, U.S.A. - "Most bodies of water in New York - and all freshwater bodies in 17 other states - are so tainted with mercury that one cannot eat the fish with any regularity. Forty-five states advise the public against regular consumption of at least some local fish due to mercury contamination." [Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Crimes Against Nature, p. 6]
2004 - Today Show Appearance / Robert F. Kennedy Jr. - August 3rd, 2004: "Robert F. Kennedy Jr. appeared [08/03/04] to endorse his new book, Crimes Against Nature, on America's popular morning program: The Today Show." [Etznab Mathers]
2004 - Amendment to Ban Gay Marriage / Missouri - August 3rd, 2004: "Missouri voters approved [08/03/04] an ammendment to the state constitution banning gay marriage." [Etznab Mathers]
2004 - SEC Fine / Halliburton Co. - August 4th, 2004: "HOUSTON - Halliburton Co. will pay $7.5 million to settle a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation that found the oil services conglomerate failed to disclose a change in it's accounting proceedures in 1998, when it was run by Vice President Dick Cheney. [....] The commission said Halliburton failed to disclose the new practice for six reporting periods." [A.P.]
2004 - Resignation / Gerald E. Daniels - August 4th, 2004: "Gerald E. Daniels, a long-time Boeing senior executive, abruptly resigned Aug. 4 after 16 months as head of Engineered Support Systems Inc. He was replaced by company veteran Gerald Potthoff."
2004 - Launched / Mercury Probe - August 4th, 2004: "The spacecraft Messenger rocketed away Tuesday [08/03/04] on a long quest to reveal the secrets of Mercury, the sun's nearest planet. The journey will take 6 1/2 years, covering nearly 5 billion miles on a roundabout ramble through the inner solar system. The probe should reach Mercury by March 2011, then spend a year gathering data." [News Services]
2004 - Car Bomb Attack / Columbia - August 4th, 2004: "A car bomb planted by suspected Columbian rebels ripped apart three passing police vehicles Tuesday [08/03/04], killing nine officers and casting doubt on President Alvaro Uribe's ability to crush a 40-year-old leftist insurgency. [....] Authorities blamed the bloodiest attack suffered by police forces this year on the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia, or FARC, the country's main rebel group." [News Services]
2004 - Massive Flooding / Bangladesh - August 4th, 2004: "Bangladesh will need food aid for 20 million people - or one-seventh of its population - over the next five months because of massive flooding that has destroyed crops, the country's disaster minister said Tuesday [08/04/04]. The worst monsoon rains and flooding in six years have covered 60 percent of this nation of 140 million since June, destroying crops and jobs, said Chowdhury Kamal Ibne Yusouf, food and disaster management minister. [....] The overall flood damage could total $6.7 billion, officials have estimated." [News Services]
2004 - Status / "Black Boxes" in U.S. Vehicles - August 4th, 2004: "WASHINGTON - The National Transportation Safety Board on Tuesday [08/03/04] recommended that the federal government require passenger vehicles to be equipped with devices that record speed, seat belt use, braking and other factors. [....] 'We believe very strongly that vehicles should have a black box,' said safety board chairman Ellen Engleman Conners. In June [2004], the national Highway Safety Administration said automakers are adding black boxes fast enough on their own. About 15 percent of vehicles now on the road have the data recorders, and the traffic safety agency says from 65 to 90 percent of 2004 vehicles have some sort of recording ability. [....] If the agency has its way, by September 2008, recorders will collect up to 42 data elements, including the time it takes for air bags to deploy. [....] 'The basic question I have is, 'Why not?' Engleman Conners said."
2004 - Hostages Rescued / Iraq - August 5th, 2004: "BAGHDAD, Iraq - In an extraordinary assault , gunmen in the city of Fallujah stormed a kidnappers' lair and forced the overmatched militants inside to flee, freeing four Jordanian truck drivers held captive, local officials said Wednesday [08/04/04]."
2004 - Civil Lawsuit / Express Scripts Inc. - August 5th, 2004: "Express Scripts Inc. engaged in elaborate schemes that inflated perscription drug costs by millions of dollars for New York employees, the state alleged in a civil lawsuit filed Wednesday [08/04/04]. The company, based in Maryland Heights [Mo.], denied any wrongdoing." [By Mary Jo Feldstein, St. Louis Post Dispatch]
2004 - Settlement / Bristol-Meyers Squibb Co. - August 5th, 2004: "WASHINGTON - Bristol-Meyers Squibb Co. said Wednesday [08/04/04] that it will pay $150 million to settle Securities and Exchange Commission charges that the New York-based drugmaker fraudulently boosted earnings by more than $1 billion in 2000 and 2001. This settlement is the second-largest penalty that federal securities regulators have ordered in case of financial fraud." [By Carrie Johnson, The Washington Post]
2004 - Above the Law? / White House Counsel - August 5th, 2004: "WASHINGTON - Attorneys for President George W. Bush's administration ignored the law and their own professional obligations in preparing memos justifying the use of torture against suspected foreign terrorists, legal experts said Wednesday [08/04/04]. [....] The memos 'amount to advice by government lawyers as to how members of the executive branch can violate the statutes and treaties of the United States and nevertheless avoid prosecution,' said John Gibbons, a former federal appeals court judge. 'That's clearly a step over the line in appropriate lawyer conduct.' [....] The memos on torture were prepared by counsel for the White House and the Departments of Defense and Justice. The documents ignore and misinterpret the U.S. Constitution and laws, international treaties and rules of international law,' the critics said in their statement to Bush and Congress. The lawyers who approved and signed these memoranda have not met their high obligation to defend the Constitution,' said the statement, which also went to Vice President Dick Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Attorney General John Ashcroft." [Cox News Service]
2004 - CEO Severence / Dynegy Co. - Dynegy Co. - August 5th, 2004: "Dynegy Inc., owner of power plants in 12 states, will pay $22 million in severence to Charles L. Watson, fired as chief executive in May 2002 as regulators investigated the company's accounting. Dynegy had argued that Watson's performance made him inelligible for the $28.7 million he sought. Watson, 54, founded NGC Corp., the predecessor to Dynegy, in 1985 and ran the company for 17 years." [Compiled from Associated Press, Bloomberg News and St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports.]
2004 - Died / Rick James - August 6th, 2004: "Funk singer Rick James, at age 56, died on this date [08/06/04] in history." [Etznab Mathers]
2004 - Israeli Inroads / West Bank - August 6th, 2004: "Israeli bulldozers churned across a West Bank hill Thursday [08/05/04], gouging a rough road needed for a government to build housing in an area it hopes to make a permanent part of Israel. Israel took the action despite strong objections from both the Palestinian leadership and President George W. Bush's administration. [....] Israeli officials confirmed Thursday [08/05/04] that they forsee thousands of new homes along the route - despite a provision of the internationally supported 'road map' peace plan that calls for a halt to growth of Israeli settlements." [News Services]
2004 - Medical Research / Hepatitis C - August 6th, 2004: "WASHINGTON - Scientists may have figured out why some people infected with liver-destroying hepatitis C essentially cure themselves: Their genes seem to unleash a faster immune attack. The research was reported Thursday in journal Science. [....] About 20 percent of people infected with hepatitis C somehow clear the virus from their bodies without treatment." [A.P.]
2004 - U.S. Candidates Stumble over Words - August 6th, 2004: "While GOP operatives were holding a couple of John Kerry quotes up for public ridicule Thursday [08/05/04], their own guy was continuing his war on the English language. At the White House signing ceremony for a defense appropriation bill, President George W. Bush said the money was crucial to make sure the nation spends what's needed on the military. 'Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we,' Bush said. Bush's comment came as his political operatives picked on two recent Kerry comments. Sunday in Michigan, apparently forgetting he was no longer in Ohio, Kerry voiced support for 'Buckeye football.' The Ohio State Buckeyes are the University of Michigan's top rival. In its Thursday edition of 'He said it,' the Republican National Committee noted that Kerry, in a Thursday speech in Washington, said he could fight a 'more sensitive war on terror.' " [From Staff & News Services]
2004 - Update / U.S. Anthrax Investigation - August 6th, 2004: "Federal agents investigating the deadly 2001 anthrax attacks on Thursday [08/05/04] searched homes belonging to the founder of the organization that trains medical professionals to respond to chemical and biological attacks. More than three dozen agents, some in protective suits, combed through two homes in Wellsville in Upstate New York while a similar search took place in New Jersey. Property records list the New York homes as addresses of Dr. Kenneth Berry, 48, a bioterrorism expert who once advocated the distribution of anthrax vaccine in major cities. It was not immediately known why the homes were searched." [News Services]
2004 - Abrupt CEO Resignation / Gerald E. Daniels - August 6th, 2004: "Shares of high-flying defense contractor Engineered Support Systems Inc. tumbled 13 percent Thursday [08/05/04] after the abrupt resignation of its chief executive sparked concern among investors that there may be hidden problems. A frenzied sell-off of the stock erased about $186 million in shareholder value." [By Tim McLaughlin, St. Louis Post-Dispatch]
2004 - Denounced / Removal of "Under God" - August 7th, 2004: "WASHINGTON - The director of religious outreach for the Democratic Party [Rev. Brenda Bartella Peterson] says she resigned this week because of criticism over her support for removing the words 'under God' from the Pledge of Allegiance. [....] The Catholic League, a conservative anti-defamation group based in New York, critisized the political views of Peterson, an ordained minister in the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), in three statements issued over the first three days of the week. On Wednesday [08/04/04], Peterson resigned and cited 'recent negative publicity' from the amicus brief in the pledge case that she and 31 other clergy members signed. [....] The 350,000-member Catholic League called Peterson a 'left-wing activist.' It also critisized her for her role in the Clergy Leadership Network, a coalition of anti-Bush religious liberals for which she served as executive director." [A.P.]
2004 - U.S. Anti-Insurgent Battles / Najaf, Iraq - August 7th, 2004: "NAJAF, Iraq - U.S. helicopter gunships and fighter jets attacked Shiite Muslim insurgents hiding in a sprawling cemetary Friday [08/06/04]. The U.S. military said 300 militants were killed in the past two days." [By Abdul Hussein Al-Obeidi, A.P.]
2004 - Court Jester / England - August 8th, 2004: "Nigel Roder beat six rivals by public acclaim on Saturday [08/07/04] to become England's first official jester for more than 350 years, succeeding Muckle John, who lost his job when King Charles I was beheaded in 1649." [News Services]
2004 - Flooding / NE Nigeria - "Flood date(s): August 8th-12th, 2004. Number of recorded deaths: 65." [Based on: The World Almanac and Book of Facts, 2005, p. 207]
2004 - Closed / Al-Jazeera, Iraq - August 8th, 2004: "BAGHDAD, Iraq - The Iraqi government on Saturday [08/07/04] closed the Iraqi offices of the Arab television station Al-Jazeera for 30 days, accusing it of inciting viloence. A spokesman for Al-Jazeera called the closure 'unwise' and said it restrained freedom of the press." [A.P.]
2004 - Status / Flooding, South Asia - August 8th, 2004: "NEW DELHI - A flood swollen river was overflowing a major Indian dam [Narmada River dam] as 41 more deaths were reported across South Asia. Those deaths raised the total to 1,972 in a season of destruction." [A.P.]
2004 - Largest Skyscraper / Taipei 101 - August 8th, 2004: "TAIPEI, Taiwan - Some liken it to a giant bamboo shoot of glass and steel. The less charitable see an outsize stack of Chinese food containers. At 101 floors, Taipei's newest skyscraper is the world's tallest, and an ego boost for a people who feel snubbed by the world. [....] Still, the building, which was completed this year [2004], has an image problem: It stands on an island in a typhoon and earthquake belt. A quake in central Taiwan in 1999 killed more than 2,300 people." [A.P.]
2004 - Halted / Asbestos Removal, St. Louis, MO - August 8th, 2004: "The Environmental Protection Agency reversed course Friday and permanently banned the use of a controversial demolition method near Lambert Field [MO] that critics say increased the risks of exposure to potentially deadly asbestos fibers. [....] In many cases, a home was demolished while people still lived in adjacent houses." [By Andrew Schneider, St. Louis Post Dispatch]
*Trivia: "Where is the outrage? Thanks to Andrew Schneider and his articles last fall [2004], the St. Louis community learned of the environmental nightmare created in Bridgeton. I waited for residents of St. Louis County to call for an investigation, but no call came. Asbestos never degrades. Once a soil is contaminated, fibers will be released into the air every time it is disturbed. Has anyone driven past the huge dirt pile being turned into an additional runway Lambert no longer needs? Earth-moving equipment is in the area constantly. The city admits not removing the asbestos before demolishing houses in an effort to save money and time. What it failed to explain is why the homs were torn down and the trash piled into the basements and covered with dirt.. These homes, built during the 1960-70s, contained asbestos in the flooring, heating systems and joint compound used on the wall boards. Residents in Fort Worth rallied together to keep one structure from demolition, but 1,300 in St. Louis have been torn down without controversy. I ask again: Where's the outrage? [Cathy McGinty, Bridgeton Missouri - Editorial Section, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, p. 33, 01/29/05]
2004 - Trivia / Medical Expenses, U.S.A. - August 9th, 2004: "The cost of providing health care to workers has surpassed the cost of paid leave as the most expensive benefit for employers. In the year's first quarter, medical benefits accounted for 23.0 percent of compensation outside of wages, compared with 22.6 percent for paid leaves, which include vacation and sick time. The data come from a study by the Employment Policy Foundation." [By Kristen Gerencher, CBS MarketWatch]
2004 - Arrest Warrants / Ahmad & Salem Chalabi - August 9th, 2004: "BAGHDAD, Iraq - An Iraqi judge has issued an arrest warrant for Ahmad Chalabi, the one-time Iraqi exile long favored by the Pentagon and Vice President Dick Cheney, accusing him of counterfeiting Iraqi currency, it was learned Sunday [08/08/04]. The judge in Baghdad simultaneously issued a warrant for Chalabi's nephew, Salem Chalabi, on murder charges." [By Tom Lasseter & Warren P. Strobel, Knight Ridder Newspapers]
2004 - Nuclear Accident / Japan - August 10th, 2004: "MIHAMA, Japan - Japan suffered its deadliest accident at a nuclear powerplant Monday [08/09/04] when a bursting pipe killed at least four workers and injured seven. No radiation was released when the boiling water and steam exploded from a cooling pipe at the plant in Mihama, a small city about 200 miles west of Tokyo. [....] Japan is dependent on nuclear fuel for nearly 35 percent of its energy supply, and a government blueprint calls for building 11 new plants and raising electricity output from nuclear facilities to nearly 40 percent of the national supply by 2010." [A.P.]
2004 - Forest Fires / California - August 10th, 2004: "A 600-acre fire in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada prompted the evacuation of 250 people, one of several fires around California that have scorched thousands of acres and driven people from their homes." [News Services]
2004 - Sentenced / Terry Nichols - August 10th, 2004: "McALESTER, Okla. - Oklahoma City bombing conspirator Terry Nichols, addressing a court for the first time, pledged his allegiance to Christianity and asked victims of the blast for forgiveness Monday [08/09/04]. A judge then sentenced him to 161 consecutive life sentences." [By Tim Talley, A.P.]
2004 - Status / U.S. Oil Refineries - August 10th, 2004: "A new refinery [oli refinery] hasn't been built in the United States in 28 years, and more than 200 smaller facilities have closed. [....] A refinery in California is expected to shut its gates this fall. Two refineries in Texas have been on the market for three years with no takers. [....] A refinery project in Arizona has yet to break ground after five years of trying. [....] In 1981 the country had 324 operating refineries; today there are 149. They have been running at an average of 96 percent capacity but are unable to keep up with demand. Only gasoline imports have prevented shortages and gas lines. [....] In the last six years, refiners added 1.2 million barrels of production capacity, equivalent to building one additional medium-size refinery each year, according to the EIA, which keeps energy statistics for the government. At the same time, demand grew by 1.4 million barrels a day. [....] Demand for refined products, especially gasoline, is expected to grow at an annual rate of 1.6 percent for the rest of this decade, requiring an additional 260,000 barrels a day of gasoline and other fuels each year, according to Goldman Sachs." [By Martin Crutsinger, A.P.]
2004 - Above the Law? / United States - August 10th, 2004: "ATLANTA - The nation's largest lawyers group condemned the government's handling of foreign detainees Monday [08/09/04]. The American Bar Association criticized what it called 'a wide-spread pattern of abusive detention methods.' Those abuses, it said, 'feed terrorism by painting the United States as an arrogant nation above the law.' [....] Some members complained that the nonpartisan group, with more than 400,000 members, was getting too political, especially as the presidential election nears." [By Gina Holland, A.P.]
2004 - Life Sciences Initiative / St. Louis Mo. - "August 10th, 2004: "Cortex, an initiative to develop a life-sciences business district in midtown St. Louis, today [08/10/04] will receive a federal grant of $2.9 million." [By Rachel Melcer]
2004 - Future Combat Systems / Boeing Co. - August 10th, 2004: "The Army has agreed to provide up to an additional $6.4 billion to fund the development phase of Boeing Co.'s Future Combat Systems, a St. Louis-based program designed to create a network that links soldiers to unmanned ground vehicles, sensors and advanced communications systems. The Army now says it will spend up to $21.2 billion on FCS, a 43 percent increase over the $14.78 billion approved by the Defense Acquisition Board in May 2003. [....] Boeing said the first fully equipped FCS unit will be ready by 2014. [....] The changes to the program will allow the Army to field accelerated FCS capabilities beginning in 2008, Boeing said. [....] Boeing also recently showed a full-scale model of its X-45C unmanned combat drone, whose first flight is set for 2007. [....] Classified projects at Boeing are becomming a bigger slice of the company's St. Louis-based defense business, which accounted for the majority of company-wide earnings in the second quarter [2004]." [By Tim McLaughlin, St Louis Post-Dispatch]
*Trivia: "The Army's new system of digitally connected manned vehicles, robots and drones [FCS] is now projected to cost as much as $133 billion - up 45 percent from its earlier estimate of $92 billion. [....] Boeing Co., the world's largest aircraft maker, manages the system for the Army. [....] The FCS is the Pentagon's second-most-expensive weapons system. Lockheed Martin Corp's Joint Strike Fighter, at $244 billion, is the costliest." [Based on: News Services, 03/15/05]
*Trivia: - "A St. Louis physicist [Stephen Thaler] created a computer program called the Creativity Machine that simulates what goes on in the human brain. It has invented new products, composed music, coined new words and frightened some who fear such self-aware machines could take over the world. [....] Thaler, too, is engineering independent robots. A glossy, black, plastic cockroach named H3 could be the prototype for swarms of bunker-busting robots that could seek out, explore and use collective intelligence to defeat an enemy target. The U.S. Air Force has contracted Thaler to create such robots. [....] Thaler's first contact with the Air Force used a Creativity Machine to help design warheads that reconfigure the pattern of schrapnel scattering. That's important to limit collateral damage and to save money by tailoring bombs to destroy a target in one hit. [....] Spy agencies want to use Thaler's technology to map the Internet and detect unusual behavior. [....] Sci-fi fans see similarity between Thaler's thinking machines and Skynet. There's even an eerie coincidence between the fictional satellite's Judgement Day - August 29th, 1997 - and the date the patent for Creativity Machine became final - August 19th, 1997." [By Tina Hesman, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 01/25/2004]
2004 - Below Normal Temperatures / St. Louis MO - August 10th, 2004: "It's not a typical August in St. Louis. So far this month, high temperatures have averaged 3.1 degrees below normal - 84.8 compared with 87.9, according to the national Weather Service. July was cool too, at 3.9 degrees below normal for high temperatures - 85.9 compared with 89.8. [....] It's all caused by a persistent trough of low pressure in the upper levels of the atmosphere over the eastern half of the United States, explained John Carney, a meterologist with the National Weather Service. That pushed a jet stream further south than usual, bringing cooler air to our area. What's causing the low pressure? 'You'd have to ask the man upstairs about that,' Carney said." [By Michele Munz, St. Louis Post Dispatch]
2004 - CIA Director Nominee / Porter Goss - August 11th, 2004: "WASHINGTON - President George W. Bush on Tuesday [08/10/04] nominated as CIA director Rep. Porter Goss, R-Fla., a man widely seen as well-qualified but whose selection touched off a firestorm of criticism on political grounds." [By Philip Dine, Post-Dispatch Washington Bureau]
*Trivia: "The Republican congressman selected by President George W. Bush to run the CIA worked as an agency officer overseeing spies in Central America and Western Europe during the 1960's until a mysterious infection forced his retirement from the world of cloak and dagger. [....] Goss, 65, a multimillionaire who rose in local and then national politics after his recovery from illness, has never disclosed details of his CIA employment from roughly 1960 to 1971 except to reveal that he worked in Haiti, the Dominican Republic and Mexico - all tumultuous countries during that decade of the Cold War. Goss was transferred to Europe toward the end of his career. [....] Goss, who speaks Spanish and French, started with the CIA in Miami about the time of the Cuban missle crisis. [....] Goss suffered a mysterious blood infection in 1970; he was so weak during his recovery that the CIA refused to send him back into the field, so he retired. Goss, who is married with four grown children moved to southwest Florida in 1971 to recuperate among a small enclave of former espionage officers. There he founded the newspaper the Island Reporter with two other ex-spy partners and participated in other lucrative business ventures. He served in local politics - becoming Sanibel Island's first mayor in 1974 - and won his seat in Congress in 1988." [By Ted Bridis, A.P.]
2004 - Canceled Hearing / Michael M. Sears - August 11th, 2004: "U.S. prosecutors canceled a hearing at which former Boeing Co. Chief Financial Officer Michael M. Sears was to plead guilty to deceiving the Defense Department about negotiations for a $23 billion air-tanker contract. Sears, 57, had agreed to admit guilt today as part of an agreement with prosecutors investigating negotiations he had with a former Pentagon official, Darleen A. Druyun, to whom he offered a job. Druyun pleaded guilty to felony conspiracy in April [2004]. The plea agreement 'was taken off the docket,' said a spokeswoman for U.S. Attorney Paul J. McNulty in Alexandria, Va. 'We're not going into any more details.' The hearing has not been rescheduled." [Compiled from Associated Press, Bloomberg News and Post-Dispatch reports.]
2004 - Raised / U.S. Federal Funds Interest Rate - August 11th, 2004: "For the second time in six weeks, the Federal Reserve raised a key interest rate Tuesday [08/10/04], saying a summer economic slowdown will not be enough to derail what had been a mounting recovery." [By Eric Heisler, St. Louis Post-Dispatch]
*Trivia: "The most hated sort, and with the greatest reason, is usury, which makes a gain out of money itself, and not from the natural object of it. For money was intended to be used in exchange, but not to increase at interest. [....] Wherefore of all modes of getting wealth this is the most unnatural." [Aristotle, Politics, Book One, part X]
*Trivia: "All usurers are thieves and belong in the gallows." [Martin Luther]
*Trivia: "Benjamin Franklin wrote of the British colonies in North America in the 1750s: 'Nowhere on Earth does one find a happier and more well-being people.' He explained that this was due to that 'we in the colonies make our own currency,' called 'colonial scrip.' He further explained: 'By issuing our own currency we can control its buying power, and we are not obliged to pay interest to anyone.'
"In these British colonies in New England, there was a wealth contrasting sharply to the poverty and misery in England. There was enough money, and it was definitely interest free.
"When