Wednesday, June 07, 2006
Wednesday: News from Here and There
Same-sex Marriage * Tom DeLay's Wife * Secret Prisons *Iraq
President's game plan suffered a setback, or did it really? President Bush was well aware that his proposed constitutional amendment to ban same sex weddings didn't have enough support in the Senate. It was a move to appease and energize his core support groups. "WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A constitutional ban on same-sex marriage failed to pass the Senate on Wednesday but Republican leaders planned to take it up in the House, keeping a national spotlight on the divisive issue." Republicans thrive on divisive issues.
- The 49 to 48 vote basically ensures the measure won't get anywhere in the full Congress, thwarting President Bush and the mostly Republican senators who argued that the Constitution must be amended to prevent judges from striking down existing state bans on gay marriage.
The former House Majority Leader continues to be in the spotlight. Details have emerged about a questionable retirement fund set up for Mrs Christine DeLay when Tom DeLay was the House Whip. The Washington Post: "A registered lobbyist opened a retirement account in the late 1990s for the wife of then-House Whip Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) and contributed thousands of dollars to it while also paying her a salary to work for him from her home in Texas, according to sources, documents and DeLay's attorney, Richard Cullen. "
- Buckham's financial ties to DeLay's family -- and the retirement account in particular -- have recently attracted the interest of FBI agents and others in the federal task force probing public corruption by lawmakers and lobbyists, according to a source who was questioned in the course of the government's investigation.
Secret Prisons, What Secret Prisons?
The story refuses to die. The pesky Europeans continue to follow the trail about secret prisons used by the United States for holding and interrogating prisoners. The facts include complicity by a number of European nations. It is not difficult to understand countries like Poland,Romania, Turkey, and Bosnia doing dirty work for the United States in exchange for money or other forms of payment. One can also find no surprise in Tony Blair's Britain being involved. But Sweden, Germany, Italy ! They should be ashamed. "BERLIN, June 7 -- A European investigator concluded Wednesday that there are "serious indications" that the CIA operated secret prisons for suspected al-Qaeda leaders in Poland and Romania as part of a clandestine "spider's web" to catch, transfer and hold terrorism suspects around the world."
- In addition, Dick Marty, a Swiss investigator working on behalf of the Council of Europe, the continent's official human-rights organization, said at least seven European nations colluded with the CIA to abduct and secretly detain terrorism suspects, including several who were ultimately cleared of wrongdoing. He said those countries should be held accountable under European human-rights laws.
- Sweden, Italy, Britain, Turkey, Germany, Bosnia and Macedonia "could be held responsible for violations of the rights of specific individuals" who were handed over to the CIA or captured by U.S. operatives in those countries, Marty said in a report released Wednesday in Paris.
The Free, Democratized Iraq of G.W. Bush
The BBC reports "Violent Baghdad deaths top 6,000" The number is for this year (2006) and just for Baghdad...not all of Iraq.
MORTUARY'S MONTHLY TOLL
January: 1068
February: 1110
March: 1294
April: 1155
May: 1398
Is this the Iraq President Bush talks about? There is a disconnect somewhere. Comments of an Iraqi woman blogger in Baghdad Burning.
