News politics 2008-08-08 Andanh.com

Incumbent Tenn. congressman loses primary Fri, 08 Aug 2008 01:20 EDT
A freshman U.S. representative on Thursday became the first Tennessee congressman to lose a primary since 1966 after a bruising campaign in which he was accused of selling out to "Big Oil."

Johnson City Mayor Phil Roe beat freshman U.S. Rep. David Davis by a 500-vote margin in the solidly Republican 1st District in the northeastern corner of the state.

Davis left his campaign party Thursday night without conceding the race, but Roe declared victory in a speech to supporters.

"I will try to serve you with dignity and honesty, just like we ran this campaign," Roe said. "Ain't it fun to win one?"

With all precincts reporting, Roe had 25,916 votes, or 50 percent of the vote, to Davis' 25,416 votes, or 49 percent.

Gates endorses big expansion of Afghan army Thu, 07 Aug 2008 23:40 EDT
Defense Secretary Robert Gates has endorsed an Afghanistan government proposal to increase the size of the Afghan army by more than 50,000 troops.

The new plan will cost well over $10 billion. Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell said Thursday officials are currently looking at ways to finance it. Options would include seeking money from NATO allies.

Morrell said the proposal would increase the size of the Afghan army from a planned 80,000 troops to roughly 122,000, plus 13,000 in support staff.

In addition, Gates is poised to approve a plan that would give Army Gen. David McKiernan broader control over U.S. forces in Afghanistan. Currently, McKiernan commands the NATO-led coalition in Afghanistan, which includes about 15,000 U.S. forces. Under the new proposal, McKiernan also would control the additional U.S. forces in Afghanistan who are training the Afghan army and police. There are about 33,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan, the highest since the war began.

All told, the five-year plan could cost about $20 billion, according to The New York Times, which first reported the proposal on it Web site late Thursday.

Despite demons, Ivins stayed at high-security lab Thu, 07 Aug 2008 23:00 EDT
What took so long? Army scientist Bruce Ivins had a history of paranoia, obsession and delusional thinking. And newly unsealed court documents show he didn't keep them to himself. Therapists knew. Doctors knew. Co-workers suspected.

One complained he was a "manic basket case." Another recalled him openly weeping at his desk inside one of the military's top biological warfare facilities.

The Justice Department, too, had long focused on Ivins. Investigators discovered years ago that he worked late nights just before the 2001 anthrax attacks. And by 2005, government scientists had genetically linked anthrax in his lab to the toxin that killed five people.

Yet Ivins stayed on the job at the military lab at Fort Detrick.

As the FBI closed in on its top suspect, Ivins grew more unstable. He killed himself last week, more than a year after the FBI had gathered the primary evidence held up Wednesday as proof of his guilt.

One-time anthrax subjects glad to move on Thu, 07 Aug 2008 23:00 EDT
For a few long hours in 2001, things looked impossibly grim for Dr. Irshad Shaikh and his brother, Masood. Not long after dawn on Nov. 13, armed FBI agents hunting for the anthrax killer crashed through the door of his Pennsylvania home and spent the next 13 hours searching the place in moon suits. Another team raided the apartment of a colleague, a few blocks away.

Even as TV cameras broadcast the spectacle live, Shaikh, a respected public health official, assured friends and reporters that everything was OK.

Vindication finally came this week, when authorities declared that Dr. Bruce Ivins, an Army biologist who killed himself last week, was responsible for the anthrax mailings.

The proclamation was welcome but slow in coming for Shaikh and other individuals mistakenly singled out in the anthrax investigation, the most prominent example being scientist Steven A. Hatfill. The government recently paid Hatfill $5.8 million to settle a lawsuit in which he claimed that the probe and related media coverage ruined his reputation.

Hatfill's story is well known, but he wasn't the only person whose life was upended. Others were discarded almost immediately as suspects and forgotten by the public, but spent years on terrorist watch lists or trying to repair damaged reputations.

Island life in multiracial Hawaii shaped Obama Thu, 07 Aug 2008 22:15 EDT
The diverse culture of the nation's 50th state - and the island nature of Hawaii itself - shaped Barack Obama's view of the world and the politics he would practice.

Those who knew him as a child say that view and those politics click with the themes of his Democratic presidential campaign. For Obama, though, Hawaii is even more personal, the place where he picked up basketball and formed his racial identity.

"If you grow up here, where we have no majority and there's a complete ethnic mix, people have learned how to get along with others who look different and are from different places," said longtime family friend Georgia McCauley.

"In Hawaii, because we have a confined space in terms of being an island state, we perhaps have to learn how to cooperate and compromise more," McCauley said. "We learn how to listen to each other and work on things in a positive manner."

Obama was born in Hawaii in 1961 to a white mother and a black father who had met in Russian class at the University of Hawaii. He was an island boy most of his first 18 years, a pudgy kid called Barry who lived in a modest apartment with his grandparents.

Man held in Fla. on charge of threatening Obama Fri, 08 Aug 2008 01:30 EDT
A man who authorities said was keeping weapons and military-style gear in his hotel room and car appeared in court Thursday on charges he threatened to assassinate Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama.

Raymond Hunter Geisel, 22, was arrested by the Secret Service on Saturday in Miami and was ordered held at Miami's downtown detention center without bail Thursday by a federal magistrate.

A Secret Service affidavit charges that Geisel made the threat during a training class for bail bondsmen in Miami in late July. According to someone else in the 48-member class, Geisel allegedly referred to Obama with a racial epithet and continued, "If he gets elected, I'll assassinate him myself."

Obama was most recently in Florida on Aug. 1-2 but did not visit the South Florida area.

Another person in the class quoted Geisel as saying that "he hated George W. Bush and that he wanted to put a bullet in the president's head," according to the Secret Service.

McCain calls for probe of company he once aided Fri, 08 Aug 2008 01:30 EDT
Republican John McCain called Thursday for a federal investigation into plans by the DHL shipping company that could cost 10,000 jobs here, as he and his campaign manager took criticism for helping DHL complete a key corporate merger in 2003.

With Democrats and labor groups blaming McCain and his campaign manager Rick Davis for their role in the threat to local jobs, McCain moved to demonstrate his concern about possible job losses in this critical swing state that gave President Bush the electoral votes needed for re-election in 2004.

The Republican presidential candidate called on the Justice Department to begin an antitrust investigation into DHL's plans to puts its packages aboard the planes of a rival, United Parcel Service, before delivering them in DHL trucks. Because UPS flies out of Louisville, Ky., the plans call for shutting the DHL shipping hub here that uses the Wilmington airport and eliminating up to 10,000 jobs.

McCain met with elected officials and residents of the southwest Ohio city to discuss the DHL plans. "I can't assure you that this train wreck isn't going to happen, but I will do everything in my power to see that we avert it," McCain told the group.

"Should this happen, DHL will cede significant elements of cost and quality to one of its chief competitors. Consumers all over America would suffer," McCain told reporters later.

Today on the presidential campaign trail Thu, 07 Aug 2008 10:25 EDT
IN THE HEADLINES

McCain to discuss potential job losses in Ohio from corporate merger aided by campaign manager ... Hawaii and its multiracial society influenced Obama's view of the world and politics

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In Ohio, McCain to discuss potential job losses

MARION, Ohio (AP) - Republican presidential candidate John McCain is taking up the issue of possible job losses due to the closure of a DHL shipping site in Ohio, the result of a corporate merger aided by his campaign manager during his work as a lobbyist.

McCain campaign to return 50K in donations Thu, 07 Aug 2008 19:55 EDT
John McCain's campaign said Thursday it is returning $50,000 in contributions solicited by a foreign citizen. The move follows the disclosure that the money was being raised by a Jordanian man who is a business partner of prominent Florida Republican Harry Sargeant III, who has collected hundreds of thousands of dollars for McCain.

The New York Times reported Thursday that Sargeant allowed a longtime business partner, Mustafa Abu Naba'a, to bring in some $50,000 in donations in March from members of a single extended family in California, the Abdullahs, along with several of their friends.

The Abdullahs and other Arab-Americans in California also contributed tens of thousands of dollars to Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton and Republicans Rudolph Giuliani and Florida Gov. Charlie Crist, a longtime friend of Sargeant.

According to the Times, Abu Naba'a is a dual citizen of Jordan and the Dominican Republic.

It is illegal for foreigners to contribute their own money to U.S. political campaigns, and McCain's campaign said Abu Naba'a did not do so.

Democrats see gains in voter registration Thu, 07 Aug 2008 02:55 EDT

Democrats are poised to increase their share of registered voters in Kentucky for the first time in two decades, thanks to a surge in sign-ups and the first slowdown in Republican registrants in years.

Democrats had seen a gradual decline among their ranks for 15 consecutive general elections since a peak in 1989, when 67.6 percent of Kentucky voters were card-carrying Democrats. That proportion shrank to an all-time low of 56.9 percent last fall.

Since then, Democrats have jumped nearly a half a percentage point to 57.3 percent, as they signed up 30,554 new voters between November 2007 and July 15. Republicans, in that same span, had a net gain of 5,470 registrants and lost voters in some counties, including Fayette.

Election officials and observers attribute the Democratic Party's gain to a combination of buzz over that party's presidential primary and the Democrats taking back the governor's office last fall.

Officials say Bill Clinton to address Democrats Fri, 08 Aug 2008 01:25 EDT
Former President Clinton will have a role at the Democratic convention in Denver later this month.

Democratic officials said Thursday that Clinton will give a speech on the third night of the convention, before an address by the as-yet-to-be-named running mate for Barack Obama, the party's likely presidential nominee. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity before the details were formally announced.

Exactly what role the former president would play at the gathering Aug. 25-28 has been the subject of speculation since his wife, New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, ended her bid for the Democratic presidential nomination in early June and endorsed Obama.

Obama clinched the nomination after a sometimes bitter primary contest with Clinton.

Sen. Clinton is expected to speak on the convention's second night.

Democrats nominate Flood to replace Stein Wed, 06 Aug 2008 21:25 EDT

Democratic Executive Committee members in Fayette County nominated Kelly Flood to fill the 75th District House vacancy left by Democrat Kathy Stein, who is running for the 13th District Senate seat.

Flood was nominated during a public meeting.

She is vice president for advancement at the Starr King School for the Ministry, which is affiliated with the Unitarian Universalist church. The school is in Berkley, Calif. Flood received a bachelor's degree in American studies from Florida State University and a master's of divinity from Starr King.

She lives in Lexington with her husband and son.

Lunsford, McConnell contest: Issues, anyone? Mon, 04 Aug 2008 01:54 EDT

PRINCETON . Throughout the weekend's political events in Western Kentucky, Democrats routinely gave the loudest cheers for Republican U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell . for beating him, to be precise.

Sure, they clapped politely for McConnell's Democratic challenger, Bruce Lunsford, when he was introduced at Democratic Rep. Mike Cherry's back-yard rally in Princeton, for instance. But it was strong calls for the ousting of McConnell made by other Democratic officials that brought cheers and whoops.

Later, at the Fancy Farm picnic, it was the same story, with anti-McConnell props, signs and cheers such as, .Send him home..

.I think the overriding unifying force for Kentucky Democrats across the state is a desire to replace Mitch McConnell with someone who can relate better to the majority of Kentuckians,. said Democratic state Auditor Crit Luallen. .I think that is the driving force, but it opens a great opportunity for Bruce Lunsford..

Edwards admits having affair, says he's ashamed Fri, 08 Aug 2008 17:40 EDT
John Edwards says he made a serious error in judgment when he had an affair and is ashamed of his conduct. In a statement, the former Democratic presidential candidate also said he informed his wife about his affair with 42-year-old Rielle Hunter in 2006 and has asked her forgiveness.

Edwards said he is not the father of the woman's daughter and is willing to take a test to determine the 5-month-old baby's paternity.

He said the affair lasted for a short time in 2006.

Until Friday, Edwards had denied reports in the National Enquirer that he had an affair while his wife, Elizabeth, was battling cancer. He admitted to the affair in an interview with ABC News, then released a statement.

Clinton says she wants Obama to win White House Fri, 08 Aug 2008 17:15 EDT
Hillary Rodham Clinton told an exuberant crowd Friday she wants Barack Obama to win the White House, even though he dashed her own presidential dreams - and she wants her supporters to vote that way, too.

"Anyone who voted for me or caucused for me has so much more in common with Sen. Obama than Sen. McCain," Clinton told her cheering audience in the Las Vegas suburb of Henderson. "Remember who we were fighting for in my campaign."

Though she has endorsed her former rival, the speech was Clinton's first appearance at a rally for Obama since the two appeared together in Unity, N.H., in June.

In another sign of growing detente between the House of Clinton and the House of Obama, Democrats said Bill Clinton would speak on the third night of this month's national convention in Denver.

The Clintons' efforts on Obama's behalf may ease worries within the party that bad feelings from the long primary battle might erupt at the convention.

US weighs stepped-up military forays into Pakistan Fri, 08 Aug 2008 16:30 EDT
Top Bush administration officials are pressing the president to direct U.S. troops in Afghanistan to be more aggressive in pursuing militants into Pakistan on foot as part of a proposed radical shift in regional counterterrorism strategy, The Associated Press has learned.

Senior intelligence and military aides want President Bush to give American soldiers greater flexibility to operate against al-Qaida and Taliban fighters who cross the border from Pakistan's lawless tribal border area to conduct attacks inside Afghanistan, officials say.

The plan could include sending U.S. special forces teams, temporarily assigned to the CIA, into the tribal areas to hit high-value targets, according to an intelligence official with direct knowledge of the plan.

Such a move would be controversial, in part because of Pakistani opposition to U.S. incursions into its territory, and the proposal is not universally supported in Washington. It comes amid growing political instability in Pakistan and concerns that elements of Pakistan's security forces are collaborating with extremists.

Senior members of Bush's national security team met last week at the White House to discuss the recommendations and are now weighing how to proceed, the officials said.

US tells Russia to halt attacks in South Ossetia Fri, 08 Aug 2008 16:20 EDT
The United States urged Russia on Friday to halt aircraft and missile attacks in Georgia's breakaway region of South Ossetia and withdraw its combat forces from Georgian territory as the situation in the former Soviet state verged on full-scale war.

The White House said President Bush discussed the situation with Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin while both leaders were in Beijing for the start of the Olympics. And Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice called the parties involved in hopes of ending the fighting, and made plans to send a U.S. envoy to the region.

"The United States calls for an immediate ceasefire to the armed conflict in Georgia's region of South Ossetia," Rice said in a statement. "We call on Russia to cease attacks on Georgia by aircraft and missiles, respect Georgia's territorial integrity and withdraw its ground combat forces from Georgian soil."

Rice also said Russia should respect Georgian sovereignty and agree to international mediation to end the crisis that threatens to engulf the volatile region. "We urgently seek Russia's support of these efforts," she said.

Rice said she and other senior U.S. officials had been in touch with "the parties" to the conflict but did not identify to whom they had spoken. In Moscow, Russia's foreign ministry said Rice had talked to Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. Lavrov told her that Georgia must be convinced to withdraw its forces from South Ossetia, it said.

McCain, Obama urge halt to fighting in Georgia Fri, 08 Aug 2008 16:00 EDT
The major candidates for president on Friday called on Russia and Georgia to end their military action and appealed for more diplomatic efforts aimed at avoiding a full-scale war.

Republican John McCain said Russia should withdraw its forces. Democrat Barack Obama condemned the violence and urged the two sides to show restraint.

Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili has long pledged to take back control of South Ossetia, which battled Georgia for de facto independence in fighting that ended in 1992. On Friday, Moscow sent tanks into the region when Georgia launched a major military offensive to retake the breakaway province.

Campaigning in Iowa, McCain told reporters that the U.S. should convene an emergency session of the U.N. Security Council to resolve the crisis.

"What's most critical now is to avoid further confrontation between Russian and Georgian military forces," McCain said.

In corn country, McCain says no to ethanol support Fri, 08 Aug 2008 17:00 EDT
Republican presidential candidate John McCain didn't mince words Friday at the Iowa State Fair, telling corn producers he didn't want to subsidize their ethanol but was eager to help market farm products around the world.

"My friends, we will disagree on a specific issue and that's healthy," McCain said as he stood near bales of straw at one of the nation's premier farming showcases. "I believe in renewable fuels. I don't believe in ethanol subsidies, but I believe in renewable fuels."

McCain has never been shy about speaking against subsidizing ethanol when he is in farm country, though that stand helped to make him unpopular enough in Iowa that he skipped participating in its leadoff presidential caucuses in 2000 and again in 2008.

In a brief speech at the fairgrounds - where he viewed a 1,253-pound boar named Freight Train and looked for pork chop on a stick, a fair delicacy - McCain pledged to negotiate trade deals favorable to farm commodities.

"My mission and my job as president of the United States will be to make sure every market in the world is open to your products," he said.

Cheney to speak at GOP convention on opening night Fri, 08 Aug 2008 17:10 EDT
Vice President Dick Cheney, a conservative favorite but a divisive national figure, will join President Bush in addressing delegates on the opening night of the Republican National Convention, the White House said Friday.

There had been doubts about a speech by Cheney, who remains unpopular with most Americans. When asked earlier this week about the vice president's plans to attend the convention, spokeswoman Megan Mitchell left the question open by saying his schedule for September had not been set.

Cheney plans to speak the same Monday night that Bush will address delegates in St. Paul, Minn., Mitchell said Friday. The convention is scheduled for Sept. 1-4, ending with John McCain's nomination.

In a statement, the White House said, "The vice president looks forward to participating in the Republican National Convention and continuing to work for the election of Sen. McCain and other Republican candidates in the coming months."

Democratic candidate Barack Obama has tried to link McCain to Cheney as well as Bush in an effort to portray a McCain administration as a continuation of Bush's. Only 31 percent of Americans approve of the job Bush is doing, according to an Associated Press-Ipsos poll released this week. In June, an NBC News-Wall Street Journal poll showed Cheney viewed positively by just 23 percent.

McCain seeks to define himself and Obama Fri, 08 Aug 2008 17:00 EDT
John McCain's efforts to define Barack Obama have been well cataloged in recent days, from the substantive (calling Obama a tax raiser slow to offer an energy plan) to the silly (comparing the Illinois senator to Britney Spears and Paris Hilton.)

What's less apparent are McCain's efforts to define himself.

The GOP presidential hopeful has adopted a new campaign slogan, "Country First," a paean to his years in the military and decades in Congress. He's begun speaking more openly about his years as a prisoner of war in Vietnam. And despite his wealth and elite legacy as the scion of admirals, McCain has tried to cast himself the embodiment of middle-class, middle-American values.

The new effort was in full swing Thursday, when he spoke at a town hall meeting in northwestern Ohio.

"This is the heartland of America!" McCain proclaimed repeatedly, saying there is no more patriotic part of the country.

Chandler says "it's time' to withdraw from Iraq Fri, 08 Aug 2008 01:48 EDT

After making his first whirlwind trip through Iraq over the weekend, Democratic U.S. Rep. Ben Chandler said the United States should begin to withdraw troops now and force the Iraqi government to stand on its own.

.As long as we continue to fund this thing and as long as we continue to provide security, there is less incentive for the Iraqi government to do the things they need to do to control the country,. Chandler told the Herald-Leader. .I think we need to leave them with as stable a situation as we can but we need to lift off from the country as soon as possible.

.I think it's time to start withdrawing,. he added, although he acknowledged that any such shift in policy isn't likely to occur until the next president takes office in January.

He also said he's increasingly concerned with the mounting cost of U.S. occupation and reconstruction of Iraq, which works out to roughly $330 million per day.

Lunsford airs second campaign ad Fri, 08 Aug 2008 01:48 EDT

Democrat Bruce Lunsford's campaign for the U.S. Senate rolled out his second television ad Thursday, saying Republican incumbent Mitch McConnell is .the master. of turning campaign contributions from special interests such as oil companies into legislative favors.

McConnell's campaign responded by bringing up problems Lunsford had with his nursing-home business.

In his new 30-second ad titled How It Works , Lunsford is shown standing near a split-rail fence in a rural setting.

.Here's how it works in Washington,. says Lunsford. .The politicians get millions in campaign cash. The special interests get what they want. And we get the short end of the stick.

Beshear moves CPE out of Education Cabinet Fri, 08 Aug 2008 01:48 EDT

FRANKFORT . Reversing an action by his predecessor, Gov. Steve Beshear signed an executive order Thursday to move administration of the Council on Postsecondary Education from the Education Cabinet to his office.

Beshear said the move .more clearly demonstrates the importance of higher education to my administration while removing an unnecessary layer of government bureaucracy..

Interim CPE President Richard Crofts and other higher education leaders, including University of Kentucky President Lee T. Todd Jr. and Eastern Kentucky University President Doug Whitlock, applauded the move.

Beshear said his order also shows potential candidates for the CPE presidency that the governor wants that person to be one of his top advisers.

Statement from Edwards on his affair Fri, 08 Aug 2008 17:40 EDT
Here is the text of John Edwards' statement:

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In 2006, I made a serious error in judgment and conducted myself in a way that was disloyal to my family and to my core beliefs. I recognized my mistake and I told my wife that I had a liaison with another woman, and I asked for her forgiveness. Although I was honest in every painful detail with my family, I did not tell the public. When a supermarket tabloid told a version of the story, I used the fact that the story contained many falsities to deny it. But being 99 percent honest is no longer enough.

I was and am ashamed of my conduct and choices, and I had hoped that it would never become public. With my family, I took responsibility for my actions in 2006 and today I take full responsibility publicly. But that misconduct took place for a short period in 2006. It ended then. I am and have been willing to take any test necessary to establish the fact that I am not the father of any baby, and I am truly hopeful that a test will be done so this fact can be definitively established. I only know that the apparent father has said publicly that he is the father of the baby. I also have not been engaged in any activity of any description that requested, agreed to or supported payments of any kind to the woman or to the apparent father of the baby.

It is inadequate to say to the people who believed in me that I am sorry, as it is inadequate to say to the people who love me that I am sorry. In the course of several campaigns, I started to believe that I was special and became increasingly egocentric and narcissistic. If you want to beat me up - feel free. You cannot beat me up more than I have already beaten up myself. I have been stripped bare and will now work with everything I have to help my family and others who need my help.

Chandler returns from Iraq saying soldiers do .outstanding job' Fri, 08 Aug 2008 02:58 EDT

When he found out that one of his Democratic congressional colleagues was planning a visit to Baghdad, U.S. Rep. Ben Chandler, D-Versailles, jumped at the chance to go.

.I had been looking for a trip to get over there,. said Chandler, a member of the House appropriations committee's panel on the State Department and foreign operations. .I feel it was something I had to do..

And in the course of the visit, which lasted little over 24 hours, the delegation stayed in Saddam Hussein's former hunting lodge, rode on a helicopter that threw out decoy flares and met with two top U.S. generals.

Democratic Rep. Mike Ross of Arkansas organized the trip. He brought Chandler, Rep. Tim Bishop, D-New York, and three other Arkansans: Republican Rep. Mike Boozman, Democratic Sen. Mark Pryor and Democratic Rep. Marion Berry.

Chinese Dir