Novak Fights Back

Columnist Bob Novak, already embroiled in the "Leakgate" scandal, nearly got into more hot water when he scuffled with a fellow airline passenger.

Novak was boarding a flight to Chicago and entering first class when he cut in front of another passenger, according to the Washington Post.

The passenger protested and laid a hand on Novak - who "responded by socking him and threatening to knock his teeth out," the Post reports.

Both parties were chided by airline staff before taking their seats.

When contacted by the Post in Hawaii, where he went to watch a University of Maryland basketball game, Novak said: "Some guy pushed me and I pushed him back. That's all there was to it."

Novak was the first journalist to identify Valerie Plame as a CIA operative.

Poll: Voters Cool on Arnold's Rivals

The bad news for California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is that his approval rating now stands at only 38 percent.

The good news: None of his would-be rivals in next year's election has a higher rating.

A new statewide Field Poll found that 54 percent of respondents hold a negative view of the Republican governor, compared to the 38 percent favorable. But the likely Democratic nominee, state treasurer Phil Angelides, fared even worse: Only 23 percent hold a positive view of him.

And only 18 percent have a favorable view of the other Democrat who has publicly announced his candidacy, Controller Steve Westly.

Two politically active actor-directors, Rob Reiner and Warren Beatty, have been mentioned as potential Democratic challengers to Schwarzenegger. But they can't match Arnold's figure - 25 percent of respondents said they have a positive view of Reiner, and just 16 percent feel that way toward Beatty, according to the poll reported by the Sacramento Bee.

The only incumbent or potential candidate listed by the pollsters who scored higher than Schwarzenegger was former Gov. Jerry Brown, at 39 percent.

Fortunately for Arnold, Brown - who's now the mayor of Oakland - is running for attorney general next year.

"What these numbers suggest is that while Schwarzenegger's popularity has dropped by 30 percentage points in the past year, that doesn't necessarily mean that his bid for a second term in 2006 is doomed," the Bee reports.

"While Schwarzenegger may be damaged, none of his announced or potential challengers is, at this point, more than a political blank slate, waiting to be defined."

U.S. Babies Couriered to China for $1,000

In a surprising trend that's just come to light, more than half of Chinese immigrant mothers surveyed in New York are sending their babies back to China, a new study reveals.

Facing substantial debt and six-day workweeks, the majority of mothers - many of them illegal aliens - said the lack of affordable child care in the city forced them to send their babies to relatives in China for the children's early years.

Business cards printed in Chinese can be found littered around the streets of Chinatown offering to courier babies to China for about $1,000, the New York Sun reports.

The study, "Prolonged Separation Among Chinese Immigrant Families in New York City," was based on interviews with 219 pregnant women using prenatal services at health clinics in Manhattan's Chinatown and in Flushing, Queens.

Lead researcher Henry Chung, a clinical associate professor of psychiatry at New York University, found that 57 percent of the women surveyed at the clinics - who tend to be poorer and more recent immigrants than the overall Chinese population in New York - are being forced by economic necessity to send babies to China soon after birth.

One Chinese woman, an illegal immigrant, told the Sun she plans to send her infant daughter Angela to live with her grandparents in a small town in Fujian Province four months after her birth.

"I would love to be able to look at her face every day, but financially I can't have her," the woman, who lives in a one-bedroom apartment she shares with another family, said through a translator.

"I have to go back to work."

Since arriving in the U.S., the woman and her husband have worked at least 12 hours a day to pay off the $50,000 debt they owe to smugglers.

"For Angela, to move to China is the best for her future," the new mom said. "This way my husband can save money for our own place when she comes back."

Illegal immigrants whose children are born in the U.S. can qualify for subsidized child care, but many are afraid to provide proof of employment and worry about revealing their immigration status.

Private day care is far too expensive for most of the immigrants.

Children often return to America in time for kindergarten. But some face problems learning English, adjusting to American culture and relating to their parents, whom they have often spoken to only on the phone.

"They need time to adjust because their grandparents spoiled them in China," said a family worker at a school in Chinatown - where about a third of the pre-kindergarten class lived in China before returning to America.

Car stolen? Who you gonna call?

Albanians are so sick of police doing nothing about the theft and hijacking of luxury cars that they've taken to setting up their own informal networks of hot-lines and roadblocks.

When a big new Mercedes was stolen at gunpoint earlier this month from a Tirana parking lot, the lot owner immediately called in his friends from the capital and around the country instead of dialing the local police precinct.

Using mobile phones, three cars homed in on the late-model limousine from different directions while an unofficial road block was set up near the northern town of Lezhe.

The car-jackers saw the private roadblock, got out and took off, the Gazeta Shqiptare newspaper said.

The Mercedes owner got his car back so fast he did not believe it had ever been stolen, until the parking lot owners showed him damage to the car radio, it added.

The paper said statistics showed "you could count on the fingers of one hand" the number of stolen car cases solved by police, while private recovery appeared to be highly effective.

Top model cars are being lifted at the rate of 15 a week in Tirana, the paper said, citing prosecutors' figures.

No one was allowed a car in Albania until the collapse of communism in 1991 and through the 1990s the country was known as the most likely destination of cars stolen in western Europe.

"Do business in Albania," ran a joke popular among German businessmen, "your car's already there."

Californian defends "suicide tourism" in Cambodia

A Californian man accused of defaming a sleepy Cambodian province by promoting it as the perfect place to commit suicide has defended himself on Thursday, saying he meant nobody any harm.

"I am an old man in a small town in Cambodia. I don't want to cause any trouble for anybody. But I do have my own beliefs which, if I can, I will tell people about," Roger Graham, 57, told Reuters after appearing in court in Kampot, a coastal town.

Graham, who runs the Blue Mountain Coffee and Internet Cafe, was answering a lawsuit lodged against him by Kampot's provincial governor Puth Chandarith over of his Web site www.euthanasiaincambodia.com.

"If they want to throw me out of the country, they can. All I want to do is to run a little cafe and live the rest of my life in peace. I intend to die here," he said.

Still emerging from decades of war, including the Khmer Rouge genocide of the 1970s in which 1.7 million people died, Cambodia has no laws governing euthanasia or assisted suicide, and the issue does not rank as a high priority in what is one of Asia's poorest nations.

Despite this, the government has come under pressure to close the Web site after the suicide of a 47-year-old British woman whose relatives believe its message -- "You're going to die anyway, so why not in Cambodia?" -- influenced her decision.

Since the controversy blew up a month ago, Graham said nearly half a million people had visited his Web site, which reopened two weeks ago after a temporary closure, compared to a paltry 1,600 per month before.

"Saying euthanasia harms Cambodia's tourism does not make sense. Around 450,000 visitors have looked at my Web Site and some of those will come here," he said with a smile.

He also stood by his convictions that individuals had the right to choose the time and place of their death, and, given the absence of any relevant laws, Cambodia made sense as a location.

"This is a good place for them to choose if they want to do," Graham told Reuters in his small cafe, overlooking a river.

"Kampot is one of the most beautiful places I have ever been. I get to see the sun rise and the sun set. I get people coming by and saying hello with smiling and happy faces."

Prosecutors who questioned Graham said they had not filed any charges against Graham and needed more time to make a decision.

Cookbook looks at 400 years of Thanksgiving food

By Jennifer Wolcott

Every year, American schoolchildren learn about the "First Thanksgiving," when Pilgrims and Indians came together to celebrate the fall harvest with a feast of turkey, mashed potatoes, and pumpkin pie. Rarely does anyone question the authenticity of that teaching.

But after years of research, culinary historian Kathleen Curtin knows better. In "Giving Thanks: Thanksgiving Recipes and History, from Pilgrims to Pumpkin Pie", which she co-wrote with 19th-century food expert Sandra Oliver, Ms. Curtin sets the record straight about what was really eaten on the shores of Plymouth, Mass., in 1621.

After nearly 20 years at Plimoth Plantation, a bicultural living history museum in Plymouth, Mass., Curtin is a leading authority on culinary traditions associated with this American holiday. She writes that it is probable, but not definite, that turkey was on the table. Venison was surely there, but mashed potatoes didn't show up until much later. And while stewed pumpkin was common in 17th-century England, pumpkin pies were still 200 years off.

But "Giving Thanks" is not just about dispelling myths. This engrossing new cookbook traces the history and evolution of Thanksgiving across four centuries and includes more than 80 recipes, each of which tells a story - including a seasonal stew from the native Wampanoag people.

For Curtin, the best part of writing "Giving Thanks" was interviewing a diverse group of Americans about their Thanksgiving recipes and traditions.

"I became fascinated by what people served," she says. "It was often different than what I expected." For example, in Baltimore sauerkraut is typically present at the meal. "That was a revelation!" she says.

And Thanksgiving just wouldn't be Thanksgiving in some households without lasagna. It is popular among Italian-Americans, as one might expect, but it's especially popular among recent immigrants from Eritrea, Bosnia, Trinidad, and India, says Curtin, many of whom consider it the most American of dishes.

In the Midwest, Curtin took an informal poll, asking everyone she met if they served Jell-O salad. "We northerners think of it as kitschy," she says, "but for many people, it's a holiday staple."

Also intriguing to Curtin is the strong Southern influence on 20th-century Thanksgiving dishes. "The American menu has become deeply Southernized," she says, "with foods like sweet potatoes, corn-bread stuffing, baked ham, pecan pie, and the presence of multiple dessert courses."

Turkey appears on most of today's Thanksgiving tables (97 percent of them, in fact), regardless of ethnic or cultural background. Most cooks roast it, but others, such as those from the Deep South, might deep-fry or grill their bird.

Whether your turkey shares a table with Chinese-American rice dressing, French-Canadian pork pie, or Puerto Rican roast pork shoulder (all recipes included in her book), it's important that dishes reflect the culture, tastes, and traditions of the individuals and families sharing the meal, Curtin says.

"Your Thanksgiving menu should tell a story about you," she says. "Let the table speak to who your family is."

At this time of year, when she looks at popular food magazines, Curtin often bristles. "The Thanksgiving recipes are all so trendy," she says. "This holiday is not about trends; it's about tradition. Radicchio salad doesn't say anything about who we are."

For Curtin, the simple dish of mashed carrots and turnips will always hold a special place at her Thanksgiving table. "It was my grandfather's favorite side dish," she recalls.

This year, Curtin plans to share her Thanksgiving feast with relatives a week early because, on Nov. 24, she'll be helping to serve 3,000 guests at Plimoth Plantation.

It's a sacrifice Curtin doesn't mind making. In her book, she speaks of Thanksgiving as a holiday about "going home ... about comfort, ritual, and nostalgia for a simpler time."

She couldn't be more delighted to help conjure up these feelings for thousands of guests - many of whom might not have anyone to celebrate with, and in doing so, to enlighten them a bit about how the Thanksgiving meal has evolved over 400 years.

Curried Pumpkin Bisque

The humble pumpkin went upscale in the late 20th century. Vegetable bisques like this were all the rage in the 1970s. For more kick, dust the soup with a little cayenne before serving.

2 tablespoons butter
1 cup diced onion
1 cup chopped celery
1 cup peeled and chopped carrot
2 garlic cloves, minced
3/4 cup canned crushed tomatoes, with juice
4 cups homemade or canned chicken or vegetable broth
1 15-ounce can pumpkin puree or 2 cups homemade pumpkin puree
1 teaspoon curry powder, or to taste
2 bay leaves
1 cup light cream
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
1/4 cup chopped cilantro, for garnish

Melt the butter in a large pot over medium-high heat. Add the onion, celery, carrot, and garlic and sauté until vegetables are very soft, about 10 minutes. Stir in the tomatoes, broth, pumpkin, curry powder, and bay leaves. Bring to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer the soup for about 15 minutes. Remove and discard the bay leaves. Let the soup cool slightly. Transfer by batches to a food processor or blender and puree until smooth. Return soup to a cooking pot, stir in the cream, and heat briefly over low heat; do not allow the soup to boil. Season to taste with salt, pepper, and additional curry powder, if desired. Serve garnished with chopped cilantro. Serves 6 to 8.

Spanish Catholics mount opposition to Socialist education reform

Hundreds of thousands protested a controversial education bill last weekend.

By Geoff Pingree and Lisa Abend

Spain's parliament opened debate this week on a controversial education bill that modifies state support for religious instruction. While the bill largely upholds protections already in place, many of the country's Catholics have loudly denounced it, saying it would diminish parents' rights to educate children according to their values.

Some observers contend that many Spanish Catholics, who have witnessed the Zapatero government legalize gay marriage and stem-cell research, may oppose the legislation primarily because they are anxious about the government creating a fully secular state.

At a rally organized by the Catholic Church and the opposition Popular Party (PP), hundreds of thousands turned out last weekend to protest the bill, but some demonstrators seemed confused about exactly what the changes would be.

Amid chants of "Zapatero resign," Ana Fernández, a young teacher, claimed, "They want to get rid of the religion course."

In fact, the proposed Organic Education Law (or LOE) retains the requirement that all public schools offer Catholic religion classes. It also would continue to subsidize private Catholic schools (for more than 2 billion euros annually), safeguard the Catholic bishops' right to select the courses' instructors, and makes the state pay those teachers' salaries.

While the proposed law covers a broad range of topics, recommending a mandatory civic ethics course and requiring foreign language instruction for all students beginning in elementary school, religious education has dominated public discussion of the proposed reform.

This emphasis stems in part from the prominent role of the Spanish Bishops' Conference, which instructed priests to urge protest participation in their sermons and which has waged an aggressive anti-legislation media campaign.

And groups like the National Catholic Confederation of Parents (CONCAPA) have said that the proposed law discriminates against students who opt for the class by making them, in effect, work more.

The proposed law would neither allow religious instruction courses to be graded nor require students opting out of such classes to enroll in alternatives and maintain an equivalent course load. CONCAPA Vice President Guillermo Pérez Bonmati, a protest organizer, says if the religion courses remain elective, "there is no guarantee that students will take them."

This objection fuels critics' suspicions that the march was largely a church- and PP-engineered assault on the government. With 3 billion euros of government funding going to the Catholic church or religious schools, Spain's financing of the church is some of the most generous in the EU.

For Julian Casanova, a history professor at the University of Zaragoza, the education bill is an excuse for a political attack. "The church has connected its educational mobilization to political mobilization. It's a battle they've joined with the PP, based on their shared interests. They tried to whip up outrage over gay marriage and it didn't work. Now they're using education."

Although Prime Minister José Luis Rodriguez Zapatero met with demonstration organizers on Thursday to discuss their differences, grounds for compromise seem to be eroding.

At a press conference last week, Deputy Prime Minister Maria Teresa Fernandez de la Vega said, "Those who say that the LOE denies the rights of parents to choose their children's education are simply not telling the truth."

High-tech child's play

Soon, experts say, the real thing may be cheaper than the plaything that is designed to mimic it.

By Matt Bradley

When it comes to technology, young children are a marketer's least discerning demographic - they are largely uninterested in bandwidth, megapixels, or thread counts. But this Christmas, tech-peddlers are turning their gaze toward kids, with new lines of grown-up gadgets built for tiny hands.

The new and aggressive marketing strategy may have Barbie shaking in her high-heeled, separately sold boots. As prices rise and traditional toys go the way of Stretch Armstrong, parents may also find cause for concern.

"There's a shift in need in terms of what a child finds fun and entertaining," says Jim Silver, editor of the toy trade publication Toy Wishes. "A lot of that has to do with the computer age. If a 3-year-old is entertained by software, the toys that might normally entertain him might not have the same value."

The fact that factory shipments for old favorites like the Barbie franchise were down 30 percent in the run-up to Christmas signals a paradigm shift for toymakers and their diminutive customers. With more money going to complex products, experts predict a third straight year of decline for traditional toy sales. The NPD Group, a marketing and sales analysis firm, says toy revenues this year through August are down 5 percent from the same period last year.

"As the world becomes more tech-savvy, children are becoming more tech-savvy," Mr. Silver says. "Technology-based toys will continue to grow and take a larger share of the market."

The declining sales are also part of broader economic trends as rising oil prices increase shipping and manufacturing costs, driving up prices on toy shelves. The toy market, however, is typically considered recession-proof based on the simple assumption that parents will always scrape up enough cash to buy at least a few toys for their children.

The real economic trend behind changing tastes for toys, market analysts say, is the precipitous decline in the price of electronics. Low-cost technology has turned items that once cost hundreds of dollars a few years ago into kids' stuff. For example, Hasbro's VCam Now gives kids a digital video camera experience for $79. So whereas toys have always imitated grown-up items, low prices have led to the creation of fully-functioning, lower-quality replicas of adult electronics. Sean McGowan, a toy market analyst for Harris Nesbitt, calls the phenomenon "the juvenilization of electronics."

"Traditional play may be in decline," Mr. McGowan says. "Toys mimic what children see in real life. As we look around the house, everything is getting consistently tech-driven."

While traditional adult gadgets are fertile ground for "juvenilization," you're still unlikely to see "Baby's First Spreadsheet Application" on store shelves. Toys will be toys, and most items this season will maintain the requisite whimsy. But despite the introduction of some interesting and inspiring new electronic playthings, some parents and child psychologists question the wisdom behind high-tech play.

"A growing concern of the preschool teachers that I'm talking to is that children are coming to preschool not even knowing how to play," says Susan Linn, a psychiatry instructor at Harvard Medical School and author of "Consuming Kids: Protecting Our Children From the Onslaught of Marketing and Advertising." "To really benefit children, a toy should be 90 percent child and 10 percent toy."

Is educational software backfiring?

Concern that children who are not exposed to technology at an early age will be left behind are unfounded, Linn says. In fact, she cites "mounting evidence" that a significant amount of time spent in front of a screen - whether watching TV, playing video games, or even participating in educational software - is contributing to attention deficit disorder, obesity, bullying, and even poor standardized test scores.

"What's going on is what the industry calls 'aspirational marketing.' They exploit the fact that children want to be like older kids," Linn says. "If you're 12, you're being marketed products for 18-year-olds. And if you're 6, you're being marketed products for 12-year-olds. Younger and younger kids are being marketed products more intensively."

Some psychologists say today's children are essentially the same as they were a century ago. John Cerio, professor of psychology at Alfred University in New York and a practicing child psychologist, says several studies show that technology has done nothing to improve children's learning capabilities.

"The controversy is that with traditional toys, like the traditional doll, kids have to be creative and generate the conversation with the doll," says Dr. Cerio. "When you have a doll that's programmed to respond in certain ways to the child, it takes away the spontaneity and creativity of the child's own thought process. That's the piece you lose with high-tech toys versus traditional toys."

Cost of tech drops as toy prices rise

On Wall Street, where mountains of money move to the rhythm of tiny feet, toys are a very serious business. The prevailing trend of high-tech toys emulating grown-up products is elevating how much is spent on toys, despite the decline in the cost of electronics. The average price for a big-ticket item this Christmas is $53, McGowan says. Last year, the hottest toys sold for about $40. Such a dramatic price shift may backfire on toy companies.

"It doesn't feel like the kind of year where consumers are going to embrace that kind of percentage increase," McGowan says. "I don't know which one of those products is going to be a bestseller, but I can guarantee you someone on that list is going to be disappointed."

Another pitfall for toy companies that "juvenilize" products: Adult products will soon be cheap enough to give to a child instead of a toy. Hasbro's "ZoomBox" is essentially a cheap video projector that is made and marketed for children. This $299 "toy" lets kids project and play video games on blank walls. Another example is Hasbro's $99 imitation cellular phone called "Chat Now." Despite its flip-phone fanciness and built-in black-and-white camera, Chat Now cannot actually place a telephone call.

"Kids know the difference between a cellphone and a walkie-talkie as soon as they go to make a phone call," McGowan says. "You give this to an 8-year-old and he'll say 'Nice try, but I want the real thing.' This one might sell this year, but next year the real one's price might be so low, why not just buy the real thing?"

Hot toys: talking kitchens and music-altering aliens

Toy Wishes Magazine makes annual predictions of the most popular toys for the holiday gift-giving season. Its "Holiday Hot Dozen" this year includes (in alphabetical order):

Black Belts Karate Home Studio (Spin Master, 3 years & up, $24.99) A complete karate studio that helps younger kids learn the basics of karate.

Dora's Talking Kitchen (Fisher-Price, 2 years & up, $79.99) Kitchen play set designed after Nickelodeon's "Dora the Explorer."

Fly Wheels Assortment (Jakks Pacific, 8 years & up, $4.99-$39.99) This new assortment lets kids add stunt ramps, rapid fire launchers and change the wheel size on the original Fly Wheels remote-controlled car.

Furby (Hasbro, 8 years & up, $39.99) New and improved, this furry friend comes with facial expressions and voice-recognition technology.

I-Dog (Hasbro, 8 years & up, $29.99) This robotic dog features iPod stylings and responds with lights, sounds, and movement to whatever music you play.

iZ (Zizzle, 5 years & up, $39.99) By plugging a music player into this alien creature, children can manipulate the sound by turning its ears and flicking its antennae.

Leapster L-Max Learning Game System (LeapFrog, pre-K through 4th grade, $99.99) This hand-held educational video-game lets kids develop and reinforce skills in language, math, logic, writing, and spelling.

The Magnetix World (Rose Art, 6 years & up, prices vary) This city building set has more than 100 pieces, including magnetic rods that snap together.

Pixel Chix (Mattel, 7 years & up, $29.99) As 2-D animated characters appear on screen inside their own 3-D houses, the Pixel Chix can play different games, change fashions, and more.

Shell Shocker (Tyco, 8 years & up, $79.99) This high-powered vehicle can morph into a "cyberball" or a "cyberbeast" on the fly.

Vcam Now (Hasbro, 8 years & up, $79.99) Make movies and take pictures with this versatile and very real video camera. Record up to seven minutes of video or take as many as 480 still pictures - or more, since its memory is expandable.

V.Smile Pocket (VTech, 5 years & up, system $89.99, games $19.99) This is a hand-held version of the V.Smile video-game learning toy that kids can take with them or connect to a TV for on-screen play.

Latino ‘Slaves’ Clean Up After Katrina

Things are still a mess in New Orleans, with some illegal immigrant workers hired to clean up a damaged military base claiming they were underfed, badly housed and treated as unpaid "slave labor.”

An investigative story in Germany's Der Spiegel news magazine reported the convoluted arrangement that led to some 74 undocumented aliens allegedly being maltreated - then fired without pay for three weeks worth of work - and put out on the streets.

According to the magazine:

Illegal immigrants were lured to the U.S. by a subsidiary of the giant Halliburton firm to help clean up the Belle Chasse Naval Base near New Orleans. They were promised to be paid $8 per hour in federally approved Katrina-recovery dollars, and provided room-and-board.

After three weeks of work at the base, the underfed workers – who were living in hovels - were fired and ejected from the base. According to reports, they were never paid for their work.

Some workers were housed in what Der Spiegel described as "squalid trailer parks - like the one at Arlington Heights in Gulfport - where up to 19 unpaid, unfed and undocumented KBR site workers inhabited a single trailer for $70 per person, per week. Workers there and on the bases complained of suffering from diarrhea, sprained ankles, cuts and bruises, and other injuries sustained on the KBR sites - where they received no medical assistance, despite being close to medical facilities on the same bases they were cleaning and helping rebuild."

The fired workers were left homeless and without jobs after being ejected from the naval base.

The Mississippi Immigrant Rights Alliance - an immigrant rights group - recently filed complaints with the Department of Labor on behalf of 74 workers allegedly owed more than $56,000.

Arnulfo Martinez , 16, recalled leaving the cornfields of Oaxaca, Mexico, for the promise that he would make $8 an hour - plus room and board - while working for a subcontractor of KBR, a wholly owned subsidiary of Halliburton that was awarded a major contract by the Bush administration for disaster relief work. The job entailed cleaning up a Gulf Coast naval base in the region devastated by Hurricane Katrina.

"I was cleaning up the base, picking up branches and doing other work," Martinez told Der Spiegel. "They gave us two meals a day and sometimes only one."

He says that Karen Tovar, a job broker from North Carolina who hired workers for a KBR subcontractor called United Disaster Relief, booted him from the base and left him homeless, hungry and without money.

Martinez told Der Spiegel that Tovar "kicked us off the base," forcing him and other cleanup workers - many of them Mexican and undocumented - to sleep on the streets of New Orleans.

Tovar, however, told the magazine that she let the workers go because her own bosses at United Disaster Relief did not pay her. In turn, UDR manager Zachary Johnson told the Washington Post on Nov. 4 that his company had not been paid by KBR for two months.

Tracing the responsibility for the clean up job is a similar to solving an alphabetic puzzle. UDR, it seems, was retained by KBR (formerly Kellogg, Brown & Root), which in turn is a subsidiary of Halliburton. KBR hired UDR to handle the Belle Chasse cleanup.

Relaxation of federal regulations involving employment policies allowed Halliburton/KBR and its subcontractors to hire undocumented workers and pay them meager wages (regardless of what wages the workers may have otherwise been promised). The two policies have recently been reversed.

Halliburton/KBR spokesperson Melissa Norcross told Der Spiegel. "In performing work for the U.S. government, KBR uses its government-approved procurement system to source and retain qualified subcontractors," she said in an e-mail.

"KBR's subcontractors are required to comply with all applicable labor laws and provisions when performing this work."

Jeanine Pirro Blasts Hillary's Party for Ex-Klansman

New York Senate hopeful Jeanine Pirro is blasting 2008 presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton for throwing a birthday party tonight for Ku Klux Klansman-turned-Senator Robert Byrd at the home of a civil rights pioneer.

"It's outrageous and shocking that Senator Clinton and her Democrat colleagues would choose Frederick Douglass' house to honor Senator Robert Byrd, who has a history of involvement with hate groups and has used racial slurs publicly," Pirro spokeswoman Andrea Tantaros told the Associated Press.

"Any person who has made racially insensitive comments and participated in groups that promote ethnic prejudice - Republican or Democrat - does not deserve support from a United States senator, especially the senator from New York, at a landmark that is so cherished by those who respect and honor racial equality," Pirro's spokeswoman added.

Byrd joined the Klan in 1943 and rose the level of Kleagle before being unanimously elected to the office of Grand Cyclops. He claims to have resigned a few months later. But in 1946 Byrd wrote the Klan's Grand Imperial Wizard to express his support.

"Klan is needed today as never before and I am anxious to see its rebirth," the top Democrat urged.

Byrd led the filibuster of the 1964 Civil Rights Act and called notorious white supremacist Sen. Richard B. Russell, who was chiefly remembered for blocking anti-lynching legislation, "my mentor." In 1972 Byrd sponsored legislation to name the Senate's main office building after Russell.

As recently as 2001, the West Virginia Democrat was still using the N-word in television interviews.

Mrs. Clinton's spokesman, Howard Wolfson, defended her tribute to the longtime racist, saying Pirro's criticism was off base.

"Sadly, Ms. Pirro continues to wage a campaign of insults and attacks instead of offering New Yorkers a positive agenda," he said, without explaining why Mrs. Clinton was honoring the one-time nightrider.

The former first lady's tribute to Byrd is sure to spark comparisons with Sen. Trent Lott, who had to resign his Senate leadership post after he praised the late Senator Strom Thurmond at his 100th birthday party.

Though Thurmond was once a pro-segregationist Dixiecrat - he never joined the Klan.

Unlike the Lott episode, however, it's not clear whether any toasts to the ex-Klansman by prominent Democrats will be videotaped.

Clintons Announce Opposition to Iraq War

Breaking News from NewsMax.com

In twin moves that amount to a 180 degree reversal of their previous positions, former President Bill Clinton called the Iraq war yesterday "a big mistake," while his wife, Sen. Hillary Clinton, voted for a Democratic bill that would announce a timetable for U.S. withdrawal.

"Saddam is gone. It's a good thing, but I don't agree with what was done," Mr. Clinton told students at the American University of Dubai.

"It was a big mistake," he added, in quotes picked up by the Associated Press. "The American government made several errors, one of which is how easy it would be to get rid of Saddam and how hard it would be to unite the country."

Mr. Clinton had previously said that he supported the decision to remove Saddam Hussein, although he wished U.N. weapons inspectors had been given more time.

Meanwhile, Mrs. Clinton reversed herself on whether the U.S. should announce a timetable for a U.S. pullout, voting for an amendment proposed by Iraq war opponent, Sen. Russ Feingold.

The Feingold Amendment stipulates "estimated dates for the phased redeployment" of U.S. troops in Iraq. Sen. Feingold has set a target date for a complete U.S. withdrawal by Dec. 31, 2006.

Asked in February, however, whether she supported a timetable for withdrawal, Mrs. Clinton told NBC's "Meet the Press":

"At this point in time, I think that would be a mistake. I don't believe we should tie our hands or the hands of the new Iraqi government. Now obviously, as this government is stood up and takes responsibility, there may come a time when it decides for its own internal reasons that we should set such a deadline and withdrawal agenda. But right now I think it would be a mistake."

After Banning Guns and Military Recruiters, San Francisco Goes After First Amendment

Jim Kouri, CPP

The bad boy of cable news, Bill O'Reilly, touched a raw nerve when he angrily told his substantial audience that as a result of their latest anti-American legislation, San Francisco deserved to be struck by rabid terrorists.

O'Reilly's anger was on display on national television for all to see after residents of San Francisco passed two ballot initiatives: one prohibited military recruiters from visiting schools, while the other banned citizen ownership of handguns. What really got the goat of the popular host of Fox News Channel's "The O'Reilly Factor," is the fact that in the midst of a war on terrorism, the denizens of the People's Republic of San Francisco view the US military and the Second Amendment as the enemy.

Since O'Reilly's televised comments, the founding mothers of the People's Republic of San Francisco or PRSF, are demanding Fox and Westwood One, a radio syndicate that carries O'Reilly's "Radio Factor," fire him. In essence, the PRSF have set their sights on the First Amendment by attempting to silence anyone who disparages their decidedly Stalinist worldview. And it's not just PRSF residents who want him canned, political leaders are on the forefront of an anti-O'Reilly campaign.

If San Francisco voters are intent on opposing military recruitment in their public schools and to ban citizens from being able to protect themselves from thugs with their handguns, then perhaps the federal government should cut off their funding, O'Reilly said. Then he gave his San Francisco viewers a piece of his mind:

"Fine. You want to be your own country? Go right ahead. And if Al-Qaeda comes in here and blows you up, we're not going to do anything about it. We're going to say, look, every other place in America is off limits to you except San Francisco. You want to blow up the Coit Tower? Go ahead."

And in textbook Stalinist style, the founding mothers of the PRSF, such as Chris Daly, a San Francisco city supervisor, turned the issue into O'Reilly's comments rather than about his attack on the US military, the Second Amendment, and now the First Amendment.

And the news media are doing their part to help their comrades. The propaganda ministers are parading teenagers in front of TV cameras to prove the hatred of the military comes from them. These kids, resembling Hitler's Youth, spout the words that have been drilled into them since they were knee-high to grasshoppers. The leaders of PRSF should be proud of their handiwork. Suddenly, the mainstream news people find wisdom proceeding from the mouths of teenagers, who don't even bathe regularly let alone possess an independent thought process. While listening to these kids, I wanted them to turn around to see if they were carrying Mao's Red Book in their backpockets.

As far as San Francisco's gun ban, a look at the city's crime statistics shows that compared with national figures, PRSF has a violent crime rate 24% higher than the national average. They fair a bit better with property crimes with a rate 12% higher than the national average. While most of the United States is enjoying reductions in violent crime, the PRSF actually boasts an increase. In 2003, the city had 69 murders, while the most recent FBI report shows 88 murders. The city also had more aggravated assaults, as well.

In the Bizarro world of the PRSF, if you're witnessing higher murder rates, the best thing to do is disarm law-abiding citizens. This makes sense to these numbnuts. Don't be surprised if in the future San Franciscanistas decide to pass a ballot initiative outlawing common sense. For instance, one of their heroes, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., globetrots in his private jet and rides around in his chauffeured limo while badgering people to cut down on fuel consumption. This make sense to the useful idiots in PRSF.

To be fair, there are other cities that wish to follow San Francisco's lead such as Boston, where cute little Maoists talk about our sons and daughters in the military as if they were Nazi stormtroopers. And why not? The Democrat Party's establishment, in unguarded moments, spout the same anti-military, anti-American rhetoric backed by their cadre of propaganda spinmeisters in the news media. Did we forget Senator "Little" Dick Durbin's comments on the floor of the US Senate?

Actually, I have more respect for the citizens and government of San Francisco. What you see is what you get, with those folks; unlike people such as Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, John Edwards and Howard Dean who attempt to hide their true feelings and ideas from the American people in order to be elected.

Next French revolution: a less colorblind society

from the November 14, 2005 edition - http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/1114/p01s02-woeu.html

Proudly held French ideals of citizenship have been shaken by the riots.
By Peter Ford Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

PARIS - Now comes the hard part. As the nationwide violence that has racked France for two weeks begins to abate, the country's leaders and citizens find themselves facing tough questions about the fundamental values that define the French dream: liberty, equality, and fraternity.
In the face of dramatic evidence that so many of France's ethnic minority citizens and recent immigrants feel that their society has betrayed its promises, one of the pillars supporting France's vision of itself is shaking.

"The events mark a failure and perhaps the decline of the French model of integration [of its immigrants]," says Michel Wieviorka, director of studies at the School for Higher Social Science Studies in Paris. "It is not working any more, and needs at least reform, if not replacement."
This will take a revolution in French thinking about integration, but there are signs that the recent violence has begun to persuade some policymakers that they'll have to overhaul their color-blind ideals of citizenship and face up to the existence of ethnic minorities.

That is likely to be a long and difficult job. France is proud of its ideals and the way it thought it was offering them to newcomers. French politicians may not find it easy to acknowledge how far the country has fallen short of its goals, some immigration experts predict, though Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin acknowledged last week to parliament that, "the effectiveness of our integration model is in question."

Paris remained relatively quiet over the weekend, with authorities implementing a state-of-emergency ban on meetings. Lyon and other cities were ensconced in the ongoing rioting widely seen to be protesting inequalities suffered by France's immigrant population. Nationwide, fewer than 400 vehicles burned, down from highs of more than 1,000 last week.

"When the flames are out, we will have to rebuild not just schools but trust and fraternity," says Marc Cheb Sun, an Egyptian-Italian journalist who edits "Respect," a magazine aimed mainly at young ethnic minorities.

Even before the recent trouble erupted in the country's poorest and most heavily immigrant suburbs, business leaders, government advisory boards, and the intellectuals who dominate the policy debate in France had been inching toward new ways of thinking about immigrant integration. Their moves could provide the foundations for future reform, optimists say.

For example, 40 of France's top companies - including Total, Peugot-Citroën, and Airbus - last year signed a Diversity Charter that commits them, among other things, to "seek to reflect the diversity of French society" in their hiring policies. And one of France's most prominent business leaders, Claude Bébéar, is leading a campaign in favor of anonymous résumés, so that job applicants are not rejected because their names are not French.

France's policy is to treat all its people as citizens, with no consideration of their color, creed, or race that could undermine national unity. The republic does not recognize ethnic differences; there is no room in the official view for "Arab-Frenchmen," in the way a "Mexican-American" is seen as such in the United States. No official statistics are compiled to count the number of people descended from immigrants, or to pinpoint the number of Muslims in France.

Acknowledging ethnic differences and measuring them, runs the official view, would lead to ethnic separatism and weaken the unitary state.

"The French approach is that if you don't attach too much importance [to ethnic and racial divisions in society] and don't talk about them, they will shrink and disappear," explains Patrick Simon, a social demographer, who says that the riots have created a general awareness - similar to that experienced by Americans in the 1960s - that the inequalities faced by ethnic minorities go beyond individual cases of discrimination.

"The system is theoretically defensible but ineffective in practice," continues Professor Simon. "Instead of having the positive effects that were hoped for, it has the opposite effect."

That supposedly color-blind treatment has not led to equal outcomes is clear from the suburbs where violence exploded two weeks ago: The poorest districts of French cities are overwhelmingly inhabited by North African and black African immigrants and their descendants who complain bitterly about discrimination.

"Your name says everything in France," says a young black man in the Paris suburb of Grigny, who gave his name as Billy Fabrice. "If you are called Diallo or Amir, that's all they want to know. If you are called Jean-Pierre, you show up for a job and they take you."

"It's as if we were here just as extras," agrees Mr. Fabrice's friend Amadi Boda, whose parents came to France from Senegal.

Forbidden by their mind-set from targeting social programs at ethnic groups, the French authorities have instead directed their money and their efforts geographically, targeting the most deprived districts. Since that is where a lot of North African and black African families live, they say, those are the people who will benefit.

Though this approach has not worked as well as it was intended to, French politicians have stuck to their conceptual guns.

At a ceremony last June that launched the "High Authority Against Discrimination and For Equality" (HALDE), President Jacques Chirac was blunt. "There is a limit that we should not cross because that would touch what, in my eyes, is our very identity," he warned. "It would consist of choosing a conception in which some Frenchmen should define themselves according to their origins in order to pursue their rights. That would lead to juridically enshrining inequality and open the way to ethnic separatism."

Some critics say the problem is not cultural integration but straightforward discrimination in a society that has not allowed the arrival of millions of immigrants from different countries to change its view of itself.

"In spirit and behavior I am French, but my skin color is black," says Abdelouaye Juye, a retired woodworker who left Senegal 31 years ago. "How can I be asked to integrate into my own country?

"What do they mean by integration?" he asks, hitching up his gray jellabah, a dress-like garment. "Putting on a jacket and tie? Conforming with everything my neighbor expects? Do all citizens have to be 100 percent conformist?"

"A lot of young people see 'integration' as an insult," adds Alec Hargreaves, an expert in French immigration policy at Florida State University. "They say, 'we've integrated culturally into your norms, but you don't let us participate in your society,' " he explains.

Policy planners are unable, though, to measure the extent to which immigrants' descendants are excluded from jobs, housing, or educational opportunities, and thus are unable to do much about it, because they cannot measure ethnic disparities.

"The last great taboo the French need to face ... the one absolutely critical part of the jigsaw that is still missing," is ethnic monitoring, says Professor Hargreaves. That would allow businesses and government agencies to measure their workforce, or their provision of services, by ethnic category, and thus identify discrimination.

There are signs that this will happen. Equal Opportunities Minister Azouz Begag told FranceInter radio last week that after 25 years of "blah-blahing about integration, without giving ourselves any goals to meet" the government intends to "give ourselves the means, commit money, and evaluate the results."

An advisory board led by former Education Minister Luc Ferry, in a September report to the government, recommended ethnic monitoring, as carried out in Britain and the United States, on a voluntary basis.

In addition to the Diversity Charter of Frances' top companies, other moves are afoot, including the nomination of Mr. Begag, a sociologist born in a Lyon slum to illiterate Algerian parents, to a cabinet job that had never existed before. Still, no members of parliament are of immigrant descent.

One of France's most prestigious elite institutions, the "Sciences Politiques" college, two years ago instituted a special admissions program for young people from the most disadvantaged neighborhoods. The state-owned television channels have committed themselves to "positive action" that has put two black women in anchors' chairs for the first time, and the government last June created the independent HALDE, to which citizens can report cases of discrimination. The organization can demand inquiries on the practices of a particular agency and bring court cases on behalf of citizens.

Another sign of a new approach came last week in the influential daily "Le Monde," where the country's best known sociologist, Alain Touraine, urged a rethink. "Rejection of ethnic separatism must be matched by a recognition of differences," he argued. "France as a society could become a threat to itself unless it manages to combine integration with differences and universalism with individual cultural rights."

Left Coast Report

Oliver Stone 9/11 Movie Title: 'World Trade Center'

Harry Knowles' Ain't It Cool News Web site is reporting some new tidbits about Oliver Stone's 9/11 movie - including that the title of the film will be "World Trade Center." Here are some other details from the article:

Stone promises that this will be Nic Cage "like you've never seen him before." Cage plays 9/11 hero Sgt. John McLoughlin, who according to Stone is very 'John Wayne' in contrast with the other Port Authority officers he's trapped with.

The film takes place over the course of 24 hours.

Policemen, firemen, and Ground Zero neighbors stop by the set frequently to make sure that 'they're doing it right.'

The destruction of the towers is going to be shot on Hollywood soundstages, not in New York.
There wasn't much rewriting to be done on Andrea Berloff's script. Stone says the script came out of the blue and hit him "directly between the eyes."


Spielberg's 'Munich' Trailer

The trailer for Steven Spielberg¹s terror drama "Munich" is now available online. Due out on December 23, "Munich" will be Spielberg's recounting of Mossad retaliation operations against PLO terrorists who killed 11 Israeli athletes during the 1972 Olympic Games.

The film has been the subject of considerable media debate over the past several months, due to concerns that Spielberg might temporize or muddle the question of moral equivalency with respect to PLO terrorists and the Mossad.

And that does appear to be what he's doing, at least in the trailer.
The trailer spends a lot of time with Mossad Agent Eric Bana looking soulfully off-camera, wondering whether he's losing his humanity.

Notably absent through most of the trailer are the terrorists themselves - who seem merely to be faceless, anonymous victims blown-up in apartments by Mossad agents.

There's something vaguely self-absorbed here about Spielberg's focusing on the moral qualms of the Mossad agents. The Mossad wasn't the problem here - the terrorists were the problem.

The "Munich" trailer delivers the vague impression that the Mossad agents themselves were acting like terrrorists in their hunting down of the Munich perpetrators. This kind of moral confusion is not exactly a helpful contribution to ongoing public debate about the War on Terror.


Another Suicide Bomber Movie

The Hollywood Reporter informed us this week that a new movie, soon to be produced, will be based on an article published in the June issue of O: The Oprah Magazine, depicting "a teenage Palestinian girl's arrest and conviction on charges of plotting a suicide bombing following her disastrous affair with a charismatic rebel leader who was locked in war with the Israeli military."
Wonderful! This new film will join "Paradise Now," "The War Within" and the forthcoming "American Dreamz" in the now fast-growing and entertaining genre of 'suicide bomber movie.'


Gay Cowboy Movie Sets Hearts Aflutter

Matt Drudge reported this week that industry insiders are already touting the Oscar potential of the new gay cowboy movie, "Brokeback Mountain."

Apparently there 'wasn't a dry eye in the house' at a recent screening at the Telluride Film Festival.

"Brokeback Mountain" joins films like "Alexander" and the forthcoming "Breakfast on Pluto" and "Transamerica" as films highlighting the homosexual experience.

"Brokeback Mountain" supposedly features nudity and explicit gay sex scenes between the two cowboys, played by Jake Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger. New York Daily News critic Jack Mathews is quoted as saying that the film may be "too much for red-state audiences, but it gives the liberal-leaning Academy a great chance to stick its thumb in conservatives' eyes."

Great! That's just what an industry in economic free fall should be doing, isn't it? The question here is whether Mathews identified the real reason why these new films are being made, and all right now in the midst of ongoing debates about gay marriage. Are these films honest depictions of the homosexual experience, or merely political agitprop dressed-up as art?

Audiences, as ever, will have to decide.


The New James Bond Doesn't Like Guns

A recent article in the British press reveals that the new James Bond, actor Daniel Craig, apparently doesn't like guns. Here's Craig:

"I hate handguns. Handguns are used to shoot people and as long as they are around, people will shoot each other.

"That's a simple fact. I've seen a bullet wound and it was a mess. It was on a shoot and it scared me. Bullets have a nasty habit of finding their target and that's what¹s scary about them."
Nor does the 37-year-old share Bond¹s love of Martinis shaken and stirred.

"I love a Martini straight up. I don't think anybody makes a Martini stirred any more," he said.
All of this would seem to beg the question of why Craig is taking the role. Could it be that he's a typical money-grubbing, liberal entertainment industry hypocrite?


Aniston Pops Off About Pres. Bush

So Jennifer Aniston is now popping off about President Bush, perhaps as a means of distracting herself from some recent domestic problems of hers.
Ms. Aniston is quoted by MSNBC as saying:

"How about that indictment?! And why did it take so long to respond to the crisis in New Orleans? Everything is imploding. It all seems to lead back to our dear president."
It's conceivable that this is some sort of effort to win back her famous ex-husband, perhaps by way of left-leaning, public rhetorical flourishes. We doubt that'll be enough, though, given Angelina Jolie's aptitude for left-leaning, public rhetorical flourishes.

Judging 'Jarhead'

"Jarhead" is a war film, but not in the conventional sense.

The movie focuses more on how one particular group of Marines prepares for battle but never really gets the chance to engage.

The theme is encapsulated in a single sentence, when lead actor Jake Gyllenhaal's character expresses his disappointment at the end of the Gulf War by saying, "I never got to shoot my gun."

The film version of "Jarhead" is not nearly as negative with respect to the military as Anthony Swofford's best-selling memoir is. Sam Mendes (who also directed "American Beauty") appears to have made a concerted effort to be objective in his screen presentation.

The movie's storyline revolves around the travails of the main character as he makes his way from boot camp to Saudi Arabia, where he interacts with other jarheads including Troy (Peter Sarsgaard) and Sgt. Siek (Jamie Foxx).

When a screenplay is adapted from a slanted source, it will inevitably contain some distortion. And although Swofford's experiences during the first Gulf War may be authentic, one must keep in mind that they are merely one Marine's point of view.

The characters that populate the film are quirky caricatures, the cinematic suggestion being that they are typical of all of our military.

This having been said, "Jarhead" is worth the watch.

The stunning images, expert directing and in-your-face script has the audience sweltering in the heat of the desert while appreciating the immense sacrifices of those who defend our freedom.

The scenes that depict the final moments of the Gulf War are notable. Vistas of blazing oil wells, charred corpses and an oil-soaked horse limping through the desert are sure to stick in the mind long after the last frame goes black.

Mendes apparently was too kind to the military for many in the film critic community. The movie is getting mixed reviews, with many mainstream publications slamming it.

Variety critic Todd McCarthy thinks the movie isn't bold enough. He claims that "Jarhead" is unable to achieve "a confident, consistent or sufficiently audacious tone."

The Los Angeles Times' Kenneth Turan calls it "a cold film that only sporadically makes the kind of emotional connection it's after."

And A.O. Scott of the New York Times writes that "Jarhead" strains for "an authenticity it lacks either the will or the means to achieve."

The criticisms don't ring true. The film is, in this reviewer's opinion, audacious, emotionally stirring and authentic.

It is, however, full of profanity, so folks would be wise not to let the kids sneak into the multiplex.

The Left Coast Report sees the film as a partial yet powerful representation of the United States Marine Corps and notes that those who hold our military and its finest in high esteem will not be dissuaded.

Is America Still Red Vs. Blue, or Purpler?

ERIN McCLAM

Dial back to a year or so ago, to the wrenching, vicious, partisan escapade that was Campaign 2004, to a time when we were told by a thousand pundits that America was deeply, hopelessly divided.

And it felt that way: Family dinners became shouting matches. Bush and Kerry signs were snatched from yards. Blue and red were at war.
But 12 months have passed since then, ample time for the nation to relearn the principles of civil discourse. We have had time to heal, to start listening to each other again. To become, in a word, purpler.

So have we?

If you want signs of hope, you can read about the hundreds of millions of dollars that poured in for relief after a nation watched, united in its horror, as a humanitarian nightmare took hold in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. You can remember the nomination of John Roberts for chief justice, which sailed through the Senate.

And if you want reasons to despair, you can flick on your computer and read the blogs, where conservatives accuse liberals of being unhinged "moonbats," and liberals fire back that the right is a collection of "wingnuts." Or you can reflect on the immediate partisan warfare that broke out over President Bush's nomination of Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court.

Ask political experts around the country about the state of American discourse. You could ask 20 of them, actually, and come back with 20 different answers.

Put another way: The nation is divided over whether it's still divided.

"I think there has been a calming down," says Morris Fiorina, a Stanford University political scientist. "Maybe it's wishful thinking, but I see signs here and there that people are just getting tired of it."

He points to the Gang of 14, the bipartisan group of senators who headed off an historic battle over the threat of Democratic filibusters to stop President Bush's appeals court nominees.
And he cites the confirmation of Roberts — a nomination that had left- and right-wingers spoiling for a fight, only to end in overwhelming approval.

"There is some turning away from this hyperpartisanship," Fiorina says. "It focuses people's minds on the idea that there real issues, real problems, that need to be solved."

But ask Guy Burgess, who leads the Conflict Research Consortium at the University of Colorado, and he will paint a bleaker picture.

He believes, to his disappointment, that we are still a nation of scorekeepers: Two points for the Bush administration if the day goes well in Iraq, two points for the war opposition if the body count pushes higher.

To Burgess, this is still a nation of dueling political slogans rather than of real, substantive discussion.

"I'm not sure that it's gotten any better," he says. "It may be a little more polite and a little less focused than before the election. But that's just because the election was an immediate power contest that tends to bring out this kind of thing."

Any discussion of how the American landscape has changed since last November must include
Hurricane Katrina. In an already divided nation, the apocalyptic storm and flood pointed up more divisions in the nation's social fabric — painful, searing, difficult-to-address problems of race and class.

In some ways, Katrina's aftermath appeared to line up along the standard red-and-blue divide — right-leaners blaming the Democratic-led state and local governments in Louisiana, left-wingers blaming the Republican-led federal response.

Edwin Fuelner, president of the conservative Heritage Foundation in Washington, said the polarization after the storm was "instantaneous."

Pressed to cite examples, he was quick to name two.

One came from a Republican: Rep. Don Young of Alaska, who dismissed as "moronic" the notion that money should be diverted from perceived home-state pork projects to rebuild the Gulf Coast.

And one came from a Democrat: Sen. Mary Landrieu of Louisiana, who was so fed up with federal criticism of the local response that she said on ABC, of Bush: "One more word about it after this show airs and I might likely have to punch him. Literally."

"Here we are, the whole country, kind of in a state of shock over what happened," Fuelner says. "In mourning over loss of life. Everybody should be pulling together, and instead we're all calling each other names."

Zizi Papacharissi of Temple University, who has studied civility — or the lack of it — in online political groups, believes some of the polarization arises from the extraordinarily large number of traumatic events the nation has lived through in just the past several years.

She lists them: Impeachment, the Sept. 11 attacks, wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, a seemingly
countless string of deadly hurricanes. Not to mention two very different presidential administrations.

"I would be even more likely to use the word cynicism," she says. "It has to do with the fact that it's a public that's very seasoned. So there's skepticism, cynicism, disillusionment."

It all reminds Stathis Kalyvas, a professor at Yale University who studies international politics, of Europe in the 1970s, when all politics was about division and it seemed no one could agree on anything.

Today, he notes with irony, governing in Europe is about moderate platforms, appealing to the center.

"In the U.S. today one gets the sense a lot of people have difficulty just discussing things with one another," he says. "There seems to be a lot of bad feeling. The bloggers, the public — you get a sense that people are much more fanatical."

But Fiorina argued in a book, "Culture War?", that the notion of a polarized America was a myth to begin with. The true polarization, he said, was always in the politicians — offering starkly different choices to voters — and in the media, eager to portray a conflict and more exposed to political junkies in New York and Washington.

"The quick finding is, if you look at people's positions, there's not that much difference," he says.
Still, David Bennett, a professor of history at Syracuse University, called last year's climate the most divided America since World War II. He believes polarization may be abating, citing eroding support for Bush over the Iraq war and the slow federal response to Katrina.

Bennett blames divisive Bush policies for fostering the steady environment of polarization in the United States. Of course, it's just as easy to find those who blame obstinate Democrats.

Where do we go from here? "I think we're in a moment when political pundits and students of politics are not quite sure what the environment will be in 2006, whether we'll have this deep polarizing divide," Bennett says.

Burgess, of the Conflict Research Consortium, says he'll continue working on the political help-wanted ad he constructs in his daydreams. He wants a candidate who will stand up to "political manipulation," and explain to Americans how opportunistic politicians are distorting real debate for selfish purposes.

"Somebody's got to get up and explain to people how they're being manipulated," he says. "I think there's an opportunity for someone to run against it."

Then he considers what he has just said.

"I might be being naive."

Endangered Species Act in cross hairs

Steve Ivey

Congress is taking steps to rewrite the Endangered Species Act for the first time in the law's 32-year history to make it more friendly to landowners and builders, a move decried by conservationists and welcomed by developers.

Environmentalists view the act as a signature accomplishment that has been vital in protecting the nation's natural heritage, from bald eagles to whooping cranes. But critics of the 1973 legislation have long charged that it shows more concern for the northern spotted owl and snail darter than for workers and property owners.

The House passed a bill to significantly rewrite the law in September, and the Senate is expected to adopt at least some of those changes. The House bill would require, for example, that the government pay developers if the act prevents them from building, and it would eliminate the government's ability to designate a creature's "critical habitat" where building is forbidden.

Opponents are still hoping to find enough allies in the Senate to thwart a move they see as part of a broad assault on the environment by the Bush administration and the Republican-led Congress.

"This is a reckless bill that would have profound consequences on protecting the nation's endangered species," said Robert Dewey, vice president of government affairs for Defenders of Wildlife. "As a general matter, it hardly matters what you do if you don't protect their habitats."
Another item in the House bill would let the Interior Department use commercial as well as scientific data in deciding whether to allow development. And the department would be limited to 180 days to make a decision; after that, developers would receive permission to build by default.

The bill awaits action in the Senate in a subcommittee led by Sen. Lincoln Chafee (R-R.I.), who has sided with environmental groups in the past. His spokesman, Stephen Hourahan, said Chafee wants any Senate bill to reinstate the "critical habitat" designation, but he added that Chafee intends to make changes in the act.

"What the senator wants is a bill that will actually pass, be effective and address some of the issues hindering the Endangered Species Act," Hourahan said. Chafee wants to look at alternative ways to reimburse land owners, he said, such as tax credits.

Supporters of an overhaul say it is long overdue. While developers say they have been hurt by the act, they argue, less than 1 percent of the roughly 1,300 species of plants and animals covered by it have been deemed fully "recovered," or no longer threatened or endangered.
"The act has failed miserably at recovering species," said Jason Lynn, federal legislative director for the National Association of Home Builders. "In the meantime, developers and builders are forced to comply with regulations and restrictions at great cost."

State farm bureaus, environmental groups, homebuilder associations and timber industry representatives will meet this month in Keystone, Colo., to look for a compromise on changing the act. Their report won't be ready until early next year, and Hourahan said no Senate vote is likely before then.

Even some Senate Democrats agree changes are needed, but they say they hope Congress won't render the act ineffective.

"In looking at the [act] and the issues surrounding it, I am convinced that it can be improved," said Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.), who has been working on a compromise. "All parties
involved recognize the value of biological diversity."

Even if the Senate waters down the House bill, property rights advocates may ultimately have the upper hand. Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.), the chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee who supports the House bill, and Rep. Richard Pombo (R-Calif.), who sponsored it, would be partially responsible for appointing the members of a conference committee that would hammer out a final measure.

"Any deal that might be reached could come undone in conference," said Michael Bean, wildlife chairman for Environmental Defense.

Pombo said he is determined to overhaul the act.

"The protection of those property owners has to be in the final bill," Pombo said on the House floor, "because the only way this is going to work is if we bring in property owners to be part of the solution and be part of recovering those species."

Pombo, a longtime property rights advocate and former rancher, is drawing the ire of the
environmental lobby.

In recent weeks, he has proposed selling 15 national parks to developers and urged a vote on drilling for oil in the Arctic Wildlife National Refuge in Alaska. The Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund began a media campaign last week, dubbed "Pombo's in their pocket," to highlight his connections with the development industry.

But Senate committee staffers said any conclusions on what the Senate bill may look like are premature.

The act "has been implemented now for 30 years," said Bill Holbrook, spokesman for the Senate environment committee. "A lot has changed over that time. We have advances in science, better ways of managing things. There is definitely a need for modernizing it . . . in a way that would include land owner participation in any process."

Bush tries to sell Americans on Alito

By Steve Holland and John Poirier

U.S. President George W. Bush sought to persuade Americans on Saturday to support Judge Samuel Alito's nomination to the Supreme Court after his first choice, Harriet Miers, withdrew under fierce attack from conservatives.

Bush, beset by a series of political woes and with approval ratings at an all-time low, used his weekly radio address to outline Alito's lengthy resume and deep background in constitutional law. Conservative Republicans had fought Miers, the White House counsel, accusing her of lacking the intellectual heft and experience needed for the highest U.S. court and doubting whether she was truly a conservative.

"During his career on the bench, Judge Alito has participated in thousands of appeals and authored hundreds of opinions," said Bush, who was in Argentina attending the 34-nation Summit of the Americas. "He has demonstrated that he understands the proper role of a judge: to interpret the Constitution and laws, not to impose the judge's own preferences or priorities on the people."

Conservatives back Alito wholeheartedly but the question for the White House is to what degree Senate Democrats will go along with the appeals court judge from New Jersey.

Democrats are worried the conservative Alito would shift the balance of power in the divided Supreme Court toward the right on social issues such as abortion rights.

In the Democratic radio response, U.S. Sen. Barbara Mikulski of Maryland expressed disappointment that Bush did not nominate a woman to take the seat being vacated by the retiring Sandra Day O'Connor.

"I cannot believe the president searched the country and was unable to find a qualified female nominee," Mikulski said. "More likely, he was unable to find a qualified female nominee who satisfied that far right wing of the Republican Party."

NOMINATION BATTLE

The White House strategy was to repeat the Senate confirmation process of U.S. Chief Justice John Roberts, a conservative whose depth of experience impressed even his detractors as he was approved in by a 78-22 vote.

Although nomination battles are unpredictable, Bush said Alito was off to a good start since he was nominated on Monday.

Bush is hopeful that getting Alito confirmed by the Senate will be one step toward a rebound in his presidency after struggling with Hurricane Katrina, soaring gasoline prices, a rising U.S. death toll in Iraq, the failed Miers nomination and White House staffers being linked to the leaking of a CIA operative's identity.

The problems have left Bush in a slump, with his job approval ratings at their lowest levels. An ABC News/Washington Post poll on Friday showed that only 40 percent of Americans said Bush was honest and trustworthy and fewer than half called him a strong leader.

Alito had private meetings with numerous senators all week in Washington and a bipartisan group of moderates that could hold the key to his confirmation has adopted a calm "wait-and-see" attitude after its first meeting about Alito on Thursday.

Bush said on Friday, said he was disappointed by the decision by Senate Judiciary Chairman Arlen Specter, a Pennsylvania Republican, to put off Alito's confirmation hearing until January. Bush had hoped to get Alito confirmed by the end of the year.

He said Specter told him the reason why the committee could not meet Bush's timetable was "Alito had written so many opinions" that Specter and others wanted time to read them.

Monkey Math Mirrors Our Own

Conversely, if the two animals are large, such as a cow and an elephant, the typical person will be quicker at saying the elephant is larger than saying the cow is smaller.

This rule, known to scientists from actual tests on people, is known as "semantic congruity," and it also holds true for comparing numbers and distances.

Until now, scientists thought the rule was rooted in our language abilities. But in a recent study by researchers at Duke University, a group of monkeys have shown a similar ability to tell the difference between large and small groups of dots.

Researchers showed macaque monkeys two arrays of randomized numbers of dots on a computer touch screen. Instead of asking the monkeys to choose the larger or smaller array of dots, the researchers gave cues by changing the color of the background behind the dots.

If the background was blue, the monkeys were supposed to touch the larger array. If it was red, they were to choose the smaller one. If they did a good job, they were rewarded with a sip of a sweet drink.

"Clearly, even though their capability has nothing to do with language, it is nevertheless semantic in that the red and blue color cues carry meaning for the monkeys," said study co-author Jessica Cantlon. "Our results showed a very large semantic congruity effect. For example, when the number pair was small, such as two versus three, the monkeys were much faster at choosing the smaller compared to the larger of the pair."

This finding is the most recent in a series of discoveries that indicate our primate cousins display human-like characteristics. Monkeys like to gamble and enjoy looking at other monkeys' bottoms. Chimpanzees have been found to crack under social pressures.

"This is another piece of the puzzle showing us that the comparison mechanism that the monkeys use is, as far as we can tell, the same mechanism that humans are using," said study co-author Elizabeth Brannon.

This work was detailed online this week in the Proceedings of the National Academies of Science.

• Monkeys Brains Alter to Work Robotic Arm
• Math Made Easy: Study Reveals 5-year-olds' Innate Ability
• Darwin's Natural Selection Still at Work in Humans
• No Birdbrain, Parrot Grasps Concept of Zero

Newsmax: Micheal Moore caught redhanded

Filmmaker Michael Moore has made a career out of trashing corporations and said he doesn't own any stocks due to moral principle.

How then did author Peter Schweizer uncover IRS documents showing that Moore's very own foundation has bought stocks in some of America's largest corporations - including Halliburton, other defense contractors and some of the same companies he has attacked?

In his blockbuster new book "Do As I Say (Not As I Do): Profiles in Liberal Hypocrisy," Hoover Fellow Schweizer reveals the glaring contradictions between the public stances and real-life behavior of prominent liberals including Al Franken, Ralph Nader, Ted Kennedy, Hillary Clinton and Nancy Pelosi.

But he reserves some of his sharpest barbs for Moore.

In his first documentary "Roger & Me," Moore skewered General Motors, Schweizer points out.

In "The Big One," he went after Nike and PayDay candy bars.

"Bowling for Columbine" was an attack on the American gun industry.

Oil companies played a major role in "Fahrenheit 911."

His upcoming film "Sicko" pillories drug companies and HMOs.

On his television shows "TV Nation" and "The Awful Truth," he criticized HMOs and defense contractors.

He once said that major defense contractor Halliburton was run by a bunch of "thugs," and suggested that for every American killed in the Iraq war, "I would like Halliburton to slay one mid-level executive."

Publicly, Moore has claimed he wants no part of these companies and won't own stock.

In his book "Stupid White Men," he wrote: "I don't own a single share of stock."

He repeated the claim in a 1997 letter to the online magazine Salon, saying: "I don't own any stock."

Privately, however, he tells the IRS a different story, Schweizer discloses in his book.

The year that Moore claimed in "Stupid White Men" that he didn't own any stock, he told the IRS that a foundation totally controlled by Moore and his wife had more than $280,000 in corporate stock and nearly $100,000 in corporate bonds.

Over the past five years, Moore's holdings have "included such evil pharmaceutical and medical companies as Pfizer, Merck, Genzyme, Elan PLC, Eli Lilly, Becton Dickinson and Boston Scientific," writes Schweizer, whose earlier works include "The Bushes" and "Reagan's War."

"Moore's supposedly nonexistent portfolio also includes big bad energy giants like Sunoco, Noble Energy, Schlumberger, Williams Companies, Transocean Sedco Forex and Anadarko, all firms that 'deplete irreplaceable fossil fuels in the name of profit' as he put it in ?Dude, Where's My Country?'

"And in perhaps the ultimate irony, he also has owned shares in Halliburton. According to IRS filings, Moore sold Halliburton for a 15 percent profit and bought shares in Noble, Ford, General Electric (another defense contractor), AOL Time Warner (evil corporate media) and McDonald's.

"Also on Moore's investment menu: defense contractors Honeywell, Boeing and Loral."

Does Moore share the stock proceeds of his "foundation" with charitable causes, you might ask?

Schweizer found that "for a man who by 2002 had a net worth in eight figures, he gave away a modest $36,000 through the foundation, much of it to his friends in the film business or tony cultural organizations that later provided him with venues to promote his books and film."

Moore's hypocrisy doesn't end with his financial holdings.

He has criticized the journalism industry and Hollywood for their lack of African-Americans in prominent positions, and in 1998 he said he personally wanted to hire minorities "who come from the working class."

In "Stupid White Men," he proclaimed his plans to "hire only black people."

But when Schweizer checked the senior credits for Moore's latest film "Fahrenheit 911," he found that of the movie's 14 producers, three editors, production manager and production coordinator, all 19 were white. So were all three cameramen and the two people who did the original music.

On "Bowling for Columbine," 13 of the 14 producers were white, as were the two executives in charge of production, the cameramen, the film editor and the music composer.

His show "TV Nation" had 13 producers, four film editors and 10 writers - but not a single African-American among them.

And as for Moore's insistence on portraying himself as "working class" and an "average Joe," Schweizer recounts this anecdote:

"When Moore flew to London to visit people at the BBC or promote a film, he took the Concorde and stayed at the Ritz. But he also allegedly booked a room at a cheap hotel down the street where he could meet with journalists and pose as a ?man of humble circumstances.'"

That's hypocrisy with a capital H!