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Wednesday, May 16, 2007

News Brief's For Wednesday Morning

WASHINGTON - A small group of Republican senators, led by Virginia's John Warner, is coalescing around legislation that would threaten billions of dollars in U.S. aid to Iraq and make clear American troops will stay only as long as Baghdad lives up to its promises.

  "The United States strategy in Iraq, hereafter, shall be conditioned on the Iraqi government meeting benchmarks," a draft of the proposal says. 

GOP Sen's. Susan Collins  and Olympia Snowe of Maine and Norm Coleman  of Minnesota also were working with Warner, former chairman of the Armed Services Committee, to draft the legislation and were expected to support it.

Under the proposal, the president would have to certify that Baghdad was making "satisfactory progress" on political and security reforms or cut off U.S. aid. However, the president would be allowed to waive the restriction. Bush requested about $2 billion in economic assistance for Iraq through September.     Yahoo News

   Nothing but the GOP attempting to avoid their own massacre in 2008.

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   MLK's daughter,Yolanda King, dies at 51

ATLANTA, Georgia (AP) -- Yolanda Denise King, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s eldest child who pursued her father's dream of racial harmony through acting and motivational speaking, has died. She was 51.

King died late Tuesday in Santa Monica, California, said Steve Klein, a spokesman for the King Center. The family did not know the cause of death but that relatives think it might have been a heart problem, he said.    CNN

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White House Support for Wolfowitz Wavers

The Bush administration softened its support for World Bank President Paul D. Wolfowitz yesterday, signaling a willingness to replace him if the bank's executive board resolves an ethics controversy without firing him.

"All options are on the table," said White House spokesman Tony Snow, addressing reporters at a morning briefing. "Members of the board, Mr. Wolfowitz, need to sit down and figure out what is in fact going to be best for this bank. . . ."           Washington Post

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Ashcroft almost quit over eavesdropping

WASHINGTON, May 16 (UPI) -- Former U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft nearly resigned after the White House recertified an anti-terrorism program, another former official told Congress.

Former Deputy Attorney General James Comey testified before the Senate

Judiciary Committee that he, Ashcroft and other officials were poised to resign when the White House went ahead with a counter-terrorism program that Ashcroft had refused to approve, The Washington Post reported Wednesday.

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Tuesday, May 15, 2007

Senator John Warner After DoD For Blocking Social Website's YouTube, MySpace and Others From U.S. Troops Access

   You all know by now that those rocket scientist at the Department of Defense have decided that it will start blocking their computers  and networks from access to such sites as MySpace, Youtube, and about 11 other website's. This will be a worldwide ban and will go into effect this Monday.  Source

  But not so fast DoD!

Sen. John Warner (R-Va., Armed Services Committee) stated today that he will investigate this decision by the Pentagon.

Warner: “Believe me, I am going to jump on that like a June bug right now. I’ve got a call into the Pentagon saying, ‘Hey guys, what is the rationale?"

  The Pentagon is using the old security issue concern as their reason for cutting our troops off of these sites. Guess that Bush and his hired hands are getting a little tired of the troops posting videos of themselves and the carnage that they have to live with everyday while the Iraqi country goes to shit and our president lies about it.

  Of course, this would be in line with the Iraqi government deciding that news reporters and camera men are no longer allowed at car-bombing sites and such because they may be destroying evidence that the local police may need.

  One thing that I would like explained to me. Four year old war going on and Bush and Iraq just now coming up with these things? Come on now! If it took you people this long to think that evidence might be getting messed up, then Bush and his puppets are really as dumb and stupid as we have believed them to be.

   These two new rules are nothing but Bush/military ways of attempting to hide the truth about what is actually going on in Iraq.

  For all of you with son's and daughters/ husbands and wives in Iraq, I have a " work around " for the YouTube, MySpace problem that the Pentagon is so suddenly concerned about.

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