Special Interest Glance
A broad coalition of interests from oil companies, defense manufacturers and well-connected lobbying firms to neoconservative scholars and Harvard Business School professors has worked in recent years to advance a rapprochement with Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi and take advantage of business opportunities in the country, even in the face of the longtime international pariah's brutal repression of his people and his legendary belligerence.
Yet Libya's opposition leaders say that such efforts have harmed the interests of the North African country by helping enrich Gaddafi's family and close allies at the expense of the majority of Libyans, serving only to prolong Gaddafi's brutal reign. They also blame U.S. policy for prioritizing national security interests over issues of reform and human rights, the lack of which helped fuel the country's ongoing violent upheaval.
Libyan Opposition Leaders Slam U.S. Business Lobby's Deals With Gaddafi
Web Wiretaps Raise Security, Privacy Concerns
In 1994, Congress passed a law requiring the new cell phone networks to provide "intercept solutions," as Caproni puts it. Now, the Obama administration wants a similar requirement for communications systems on the Internet.
The FBI, the Commerce Department and the various spy agencies have been meeting for months to discuss possible legislation, and last week there was a preliminary hearing on the subject in the House of Representatives.
Clarence Thomas hits five years without asking a question
Tuesday marked five years since Justice Clarence Thomas last asked a question during the Supreme Court's oral arguments.
Thomas speaks in the court only on the few occasions during the year when he is called upon to read a decision. Throughout his nearly 20 years on the bench, he has sat silently and watched as his colleagues quiz the lawyers on their cases.
Solar storms could create $2trillion 'global Katrina', warns chief scientist
The threat of solar storms that could wreak havoc on the world's electronic systems must be taken more seriously, the UK government's chief scientist has warned. A severe solar storm could damage satellites and power grids around the world, he said, leading to a "global Katrina" costing the world's economies as much as $2tn (£1.2tn).
"This issue of space weather has got to be taken seriously," said John Beddington, the UK government's chief scientific adviser, speaking at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in Washington DC.
Pentagon aide 'was killed by hitman' claims distraught widow
Prominent Washington aide John Wheeler was assassinated by a hitman in a targeted killing, his widow has claimed.
Katherine Klyce said the way her late husband’s body was dumped at a landfill site could only have been carried out by a professional.
The 66-year-old suggested his work with the Pentagon over his decades-long career could have made him enemies who wanted rid of him.
3 Philly priests named in sex report are suspended
The Philadelphia archdiocese has suspended three priests named as child molestation suspects in a scathing grand jury report issued last week and has pledged to reopen complaints made against 34 others still on the job.
Joseph Gallagher, Stephen Perzan and Joseph DiGregorio have been removed from ministry while their cases are reviewed.
Anthrax report casts doubt on scientific evidence in FBI case against Bruce Ivins
A panel of prominent scientists is casting new doubt on scientific evidence that was a key part of the FBI's case against Bruce E. Ivins, the deceased Army scientist accused of carrying out the deadly 2001 anthrax attacks.
The National Research Council, in a report issued Tuesday (read the 39-page summary), questioned the link between a flask of anthrax bacteria in Ivins's lab at Fort Detrick, Md., and the anthrax-infested letters that killed five people and sickened 17 others.
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