The move was being finalized Friday after consultations with U.S. ally Japan, which opposes the action, and what appears to have been a fierce internal debate within the Bush administration, said the officials, who requested anonymity because the announcement hasn't been made yet.
Bush to remove N. Korea from terror list to save nuke deal
President Bush is set to remove North Korea from the U.S. list of terrorist-sponsoring nations as early as Saturday in an end-of-term bid to save a deal to eliminate the secretive communist nation's nuclear weapons program, State Department officials said Friday.
Conn. high court rules gay couples can marry
Connecticut's Supreme Court ruled Friday that gay couples have the right to marry, making the state the third behind Massachusetts and California to legalize such unions through the courts.More...
WHO: 12% of world population affected by mental disorders
Mental disorders are affecting nearly 12 percent of the world's population, but mental health generally ranks low on the public health agenda, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Friday.
Some 450 million people all over the world experience a mental illness that could benefit from diagnosis and treatment, WHO said in a statement. Problems associated with mental illness and disorders will continue to rise unless more is done to tackle the issue and to reduce the burden of mental disorders.
Afghanistan Facing "Downward Spiral"
The situation in Afghanistan now is the worst since the U.S.-led invasion of 2001 and the country is in danger of a "downward spiral" into violence and chaos, according to an intelligence report draft.
The nearly completed National Intelligence Estimate, the work of 16 intelligence agencies, says Afghanistan's deterioration has accelerated alarmingly in past two months. Bush administration officials say privately that Afghanistan is now the single most pressing security threat in the fight against terrorism.
TVNL Comment: Keep talking about Willian Ayers and nobody will notice this.
Former Bush Official Is Indicted Again
A former White House official was indicted again on charges of obstruction and making false statements in an investigation into his dealings with the disgraced former lobbyist Jack Abramoff. In June, an appeals court overturned the June 2006 conviction of the former official, David H. Safavian, on charges of lying and obstructing justice and ordered a new trial.
ABC Won't Air Gore's Global Warming Ad
The media in the hip pocket of big oil and coal? Sounds like an outrageous claim given how much those industries get blasted on the networks. But that’s just what the CEO of the Al Gore’s Alliance for Climate Protection’s “We Campaign” has alleged.
CEO Cathy Zoi, in an Oct. 8 e-mail, complained that ABC, CBS and CNN aired TV spots for the oil and coal industry during the Oct. 7 presidential debate, but ABC was refusing to air theirs.
“Did you notice the ads after last night’s presidential debate?” Zoi wrote. “ABC had Chevron. CBS had Exxon. CNN had the coal lobby. But you know what happened last week? ABC refused to run our Repower America ad – the ad that takes on this same oil and coal lobby.”
Nature loss 'dwarfs bank crisis'
The global economy is losing more money from the disappearance of forests than through the current banking crisis, according to an EU-commissioned study.
It puts the annual cost of forest loss at between $2 trillion and $5 trillion.
In Reversal, Democrats Shelve Iran Resolution
Falling from shoo-in status to widely rejected legislation within the space of four months, a resolution that would have opened the door for a naval blockade on Iran was officially shelved at the end of September, after several of its cosponsors withdrew their support.
AIPAC framed the bill as a necessary escalation of tactics toward Iran. In a statement on the legislation, AIPAC announced, "Iran poses a growing threat to the United States and our allies as it continues rapidly advancing toward a nuclear weapons capability.
TVNL Comment: AIPAC is the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. This pro Israel lobby framed a resolution to enable an act of war against Iran by the US. This resolution has been tabled, not defeated.
Report: U.S. spied on Americans' intimate conversations abroad
The chairman of the Senate intelligence committee is looking into allegations that a U.S. spy agency improperly eavesdropped on the phone calls of hundreds of Americans overseas, including aid workers and U.S. military personnel talking to their spouses at home.
The allegations, by two former military intercept officers assigned to the National Security Agency, include claims that U.S. spies routinely listened in on intimate conversations and sometimes shared the recordings with each other. At least some of the snooping was done under relaxed eavesdropping rules approved by the Bush administration to facilitate spying on terrorists.
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