I use sandboxie to prevent malware infection when I'm using windows.

The act of driving a nail into a piece of wood with a hammer creates loud noises.

House Motion Passes Supporting Kyoto

Members of Parliament voted Monday in favour of a motion from Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion that reaffirms Canada's support for the Kyoto Protocol.

Members of Prime Minister Stephen Harper's Conservative government followed party orders and voted unanimously against it, but 161 MPs voted in favour and 115 against the motion. Harper was not present for the vote.

Dion's non-binding motion, which was introduced Feb. 1, demands the government "honour the principles and targets of the Kyoto Protocol in their entirety," and calls on the Tories to create and publish a credible plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Monday's vote on the motion has no effect except that it puts MPs on the record. However, another vote on an opposition bill that would commit the government to Kyoto is expected in a couple of weeks.

Hours before the vote, Dion and Harper engaged in spirited debate over climate change during question period.

Dion urged Harper and the Conservatives to get on side, saying the Liberal motion was counting on the government to recognize that climate change is "the worst ecological threat" that humanity is facing, and that Canada needs to meet its Kyoto obligations with a comprehensive plan to fight global warming.

Dion asked Harper to acknowledge that he was wrong on climate change and that he vote in favour of the motion.

Harper responded by criticizing Dion for making the motion in the first place, particularly when Dion had admitted in recent months that the Kyoto targets could not be achieved.

"He needs to get his own position straight," Harper said to wide applause.

Last Thursday, Dion tabled the motion calling on the Tory government to reaffirm Canada's commitment to the accord, which was signed by the Liberals when they were in power.

The motion came as both parties hammer each other on their environmental record, and follows the recent surfacing of a letter Harper wrote in 2002 that derided the Kyoto accord.

The letter described Kyoto as a "socialist scheme" that is based on "tentative and contradictory scientific evidence" and designed to suck money out of rich countries.

Harper has since said he accepts the science of climate change, but that Canada has no chance of meeting its emissions targets under the accord and must set more realistic goals for reducing greenhouse gases.

Canada was one of the first countries to sign the Kyoto accord, on April 29, 1998. The Tories have said that the Liberals may have signed the agreement, but did nothing while in power to combat greenhouse gas emissions.

A Conservative MP says a new global agency isn't the answer in fighting global warming.

"We don't really have to set up a lot of new groups," Bob Mills, chair of the House of Commons environmental committee, told CTV's Question Period on Sunday.

He noted that British Prime Minister Tony Blair set up the G8-plus-five dialogue group. That group includes the G8 countries plus Mexico, China, Brazil, India and South Africa.

"The main thing is, is that we get action, that we start dealing with the solutions to climate change," he said.

What France's President Jacques Chirac proposed on the weekend is creating an agency that had the ability to define and possibly enforce environmental rules.

Canada is currently on target to miss its Kyoto Accord target of a six per cent cut in greenhouse gas emissions below 1990 levels by 2012.

The target is 563 megatonnes of carbon dioxide equivalents, while Canada produced 758 Mt of such emissions in 2004. If Canada misses its target, it will have a penalty tacked on in the next climate treaty.

Liberal environment critic David McGuinty told Question Period that the enforceability of the accord needs to be strengthened.

This government is, although it won't admit it, is actually withdrawing Canada from the Kyoto agreement by stealth, by a thousand cuts," he said -- a position that Mills challenged.

"This is not another dialogue group of the kind that Bob just referred to. It is important now to look, in the future, as to how we're going to enforce the greenhouse gas reductions," McGuinty said.

"There may be 168 countries signing Kyoto, but just the one atmosphere."

NDP environment critic Nathan Cullen told Question Period, "If there's any country in the world that needs help and policing, it's Canada."

Baird's views

Question Period host Craig Oliver asked Environment Minister John Baird, who hastily went to Paris for a conference held after the Friday release of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report, if he thought it was impossible to reach the Kyoto target. If not, what was possible?

"I think what Stephane Dion and the Liberal party planned to do all the time is to spend billions of dollars of Canadian taxpayers' money on hot air credits from countries like Russia where no greenhouse gases will actually be reduced," Baird said.

"What we want to do is show Canadians what can be done. Canadians have heard enough about why we can't do things or how it can't be done. What we want to focus on is the action we can take."

Baird said regulation of industry would be required, however, it wouldn't involve a carbon tax.

"No. Our plan involves industrial regulation. That's I think the best approach to take. And that's part of the plan, but it's probably the biggest part. That's important. So, too, is clean energy."

Baird noted the Conservative government has made three major announcements on clean energy in January.

Media analysis

The journalists' panel on Question Period felt that the Conservatives were essentially trying to neutralize as the environment as a political issue.

When Stephane Dion became Liberal leader, he ran on a green platform. The Conservatives are running ads attacking Dion on his record.

For his part, Dion has said of Prime Minister Stephen Harper: "He is still a climate change denier."

Harper savaged the Kyoto Accord in a 2002 fundraising letter for the then-Canadian Alliance party that he led.

While only four per cent of respondents rated the environment as the most important issue facing the country a year ago, it was the top issue in a recent Strategic Counsel poll done for CTV and The Globe and Mail newspaper.

"Everybody's read the polls," said CTV's Roger Smith. "And I think the Conservatives are desperate to neutralize this as a political issue before the next campaign."

John Ibbitson, a political columnist for the Globe, said if the Conservatives handle this properly, many Canadians who don't want to give up their SUVs or turn their thermostats down might say that Harper's done what he could.

"And here are three parties who would take us back to a pre-industrial age. If he comes up with something cogent and coherent ... he has a chance to marginalize those three parties."

People interviewed near Ottawa's Rideau Canal -- which has finally frozen after an abnormally warm start to the winter -- sounded like politicians on all sides were just making a bunch of self-serving noise.

OTTAWA — Canada's chief electoral officer, who was involved in a months-long spat with the Conservative party over whether it broke federal election laws, is resigning.

There was no immediate reason given for Jean-Pierre Kingsley's decision to step down as head of Elections Canada at the end of next month.

The Conservatives said Mr. Kingsley's departure and the dispute were completely unrelated.

"There is no connection whatsoever," said Tory House leader Rob Nicholson.

"I've had a great relationship with him. In fact I was in the House of Commons in 1990 when unanimous consent was given to his appointment.

"I've had a great relationship with him and that has never changed."

The announcement that Mr. Kingsley will end his 17-year tenure was made by the Prime Minister's Office on Thursday — almost one week after Mr. Kingsley declared those intentions in a letter.

Mr. Kingsley did not explain why he was leaving in his Dec. 22 letter to Parliament and said only that he would continue working on democratic initiatives abroad.

If the circumstances of Mr. Kingsley's departure were not immediately clear, the timing was notable. It came one day after the Conservatives relented in a lengthy skirmish with Elections Canada.

They were at odds for much of the year over whether the Tories broke the law with donations to their 2005 national convention.

The Liberals said they wanted to know whether Mr. Kingsley — who plays an apolitical role akin to that of electoral referee — was being pressured to quit.

"Whatever government might have been in power, if Mr. Kingsley felt they were off-base, he would say so," said Liberal House leader Ralph Goodale.

"We need to get to the bottom of this to see if undue pressure was placed on Mr. Kingsley because he had the courage to blow the whistle on the government's finances."

Mr. Kingsley publicly blasted Tory claims that they didn't need to declare their convention fees as political donations because the event didn't turn a profit.

Mr. Kingsley told a Senate committee last fall: "Profit's got nothing to do with it. . . A fee paid to attend a political event of a registered party amounts to a contribution."

The Tories maintain that convention fees should not be considered political donations. However, they quietly re-filed their 2005 financial report with Elections Canada last Thursday.

Mr. Kingsley's resignation letter went out the following day to the speakers of the House of Commons and the Senate.

The Tories' revised 2005 papers show an additional $539,915 in previously unreported donations and reveal that Prime Minister Stephen Harper and other party members exceeded the legal donation limit of $5,400 per year.

The prime minister and two other Conservatives were refunded $456 each. The Liberals say that 200 other Conservatives exceeded the donation limit.

"Not only did they break the law but now this accounting makes no sense," said Liberal MP Mark Holland.

"It's Enron accounting. Before they had said they made a profit, now they're saying their expenses exactly equal their revenue.

"If a church bazaar did that, it would be questionable. For a multimillion-dollar convention to exactly break even doesn't add up at all."

Mr. Holland said he wants Mr. Kingsley to appear before a parliamentary committee so MPs can find out more about the circumstances leading to his departure.

"I think there's a lot of mischief here," he said.

"The fact that (Conservatives are) trying to do it under the cover of Christmas — both to deal with their convention fees and also get rid of the chief person who's been digging into this emerging scandal — is very suspect."

During his tenure, Mr. Kingsley presided over five general elections, a 1992 national referendum and numerous by-elections.

The 63-year-old Mr. Kingsley has been involved in monitoring elections and developing democratic institutions abroad, including in Haiti, Iraq and Mexico.

"I'll be pursuing my professional interests in the international sphere," Kingsley wrote in a four-sentence resignation letter last week.

Elections Canada said Mr. Kingsley would be unavailable to elaborate on his reasons for departing until next week.

Mr. Harper said Canada is recognized worldwide for its commitment to democracy and its highly evolved electoral processes.

"Mr. Kingsley served as ambassador for Canadian democracy in a variety of international forums," Harper said in his statement Thursday.

"Mr. Kingsley has always served Canadians to the very best of his ability. The Government of Canada appreciates his contributions and wishes him all the best in his future endeavours."

Within Canada, Elections Canada also ushered in important changes under Mr. Kingsley's watch — including a new permanent voters' list and the computerization of Canada's electoral infrastructure, Mr. Harper said.

Born in Ottawa, Mr. Kingsley served as a hospital administrator in his native city and in Edmonton before climbing the ranks of the federal civil service.

The Mulroney Conservatives were in power when Kingsley became chief electoral officer through a unanimous vote in Parliament in 1990.

Iran's Oil Industry in Peril, Report Says

Despite Western opposition, need for nuclear power `could be genuine,' analysis suggests


As Iran faces international sanctions to curtail its nuclear program, the energy-rich country's oil industry is heading for a crisis and could be crippled within a decade, says a report released today by the Washington-based National Academy of Sciences.

"They're riding high right now because oil prices have soared," says author Roger Stern of Baltimore's Johns Hopkins University, an economic geographer specializing in global security. "But in the intermediate term Iran is in a perilous situation. If oil revenues decline the country could become unstable."

On Saturday, the United Nations Security Council voted to slap sanctions on Iran's import and export of materials and technology for uranium enrichment, reprocessing and ballistic missiles.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad responded angrily that the council would "regret this superficial action," threatening to "drive with full speed" toward enrichment that critics say could produce weapons-grade fuel for nuclear bombs.

But the West's insistence that Iran is solely interested in nuclear technology to develop weapons of mass destruction may be inaccurate, Stern says.

"If there is a large decline in its oil industry, the need for nuclear power could be genuine," he said in an interview, adding that attacking Iran with military force if it refuses to halt its nuclear program would be a mistake, as the dictatorial regime could collapse of its own accord.

Ahmadinejad's administration lost ground in recent elections for local officials and Iran's key religious scholars, the Assembly of Experts.

Washington's former UN ambassador, John Bolton, has led the charge against Iran's nuclear program, claiming Iran's contention that it needs to develop nuclear energy for domestic purposes "strains credulity."

But Stern said, "although he was right that Iran has enormous oil and gas reserves, when you look at the figures the picture is very different."

The idea that Iran – the world's fourth-largest oil and gas producer – will run out of oil profits that have given the country new political and economic clout seems at first unbelievable, he admitted. But his analysis of the country's oil industry details a dramatic scenario of decline and mismanagement.

"The short story is they're already consuming 40 per cent of their own petroleum production. Because they haven't reinvested for 20 years or more, the decline rate is higher than any other producer's."

With a decline of 10 to 12 per cent annually, exports could be halved in less than five years, he said. In a worst-case scenario, "exports could decline to zero by 2015."

The crisis is caused by an upsurge in domestic consumption and failure to explore new reserves and repair a crumbling infrastructure that is hemorrhaging millions of barrels of oil. And, Stern said, it may force Iran to seek other sources of energy to save its export market.

"It's true that they have lots of reserves of oil and gas that they could lift if they reinvested. But their economy is so tied to the Soviet-style welfare state that the state oil firm can't get its hands on its own revenues," Stern said.

Iran subsidizes the price of oil at home, and siphons foreign oil profits into loss-making programs and projects that leave little money for rebuilding the oil and gas industry's infrastructure, or replacing exported oil with new reserves, he said.

Hostility to foreign investment and Byzantine rules and regulations for investors have prevented an influx of money from developing Iran's petroleum industry, he added. The U.S. has also discouraged investors from funnelling money into Iran.

Oil minister Kazem Vaziri-Hamaneh told a government news agency last week that overseas banks and financiers had decreased their co-operation as the nuclear dispute escalated. While banks are unwilling to lend money for Iranian projects, the International Energy Agency estimates $165 billion will be needed to meet targets Iran has set for raising oil and gas production by 2030.

Stern said that proof of the industry's decline is that Iran has failed to meet its Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries quotas for more than 18 months – something that has only happened during the catastrophic Iran-Iraq war. Tehran currently earns about $50 billion a year from oil exports.

Michael Klare, author of Blood and Oil: the Dangers and Consequences of America's Growing Dependency on Imported Petroleum, says predictions of an Iranian oil crash are exaggerated.

Klare said Iran will likely find a way to reinvest in the industry before a crisis hits. "They have ample reserves to develop. But pressure from the U.S. has scared away foreign companies from helping Iranians from developing the new fields."

Ahmadinejad: UN Sanctions Cannot Scare Iran;
Tehran Vows To Drive Nuclear Program At 'Full Speed'
By Haaretz Service and Agencies


A defiant Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Sunday dismissed the United Nations Security Council resolution imposing sanctions on Iran over its nuclear program as "a piece of torn paper" that would not deter Iran from its nuclear activities.

"It is a piece of torn paper... by which they aim to scare Iranians... It is in the Westerners' interests to live with a nuclear Iran," the semi-official Fars news agency quoted him as saying.

In his first response since the 15-member Council voted unanimously Saturday to impose economic sanctions, the hard-line Iranian president said that the supporters of the resolution would soon regret their "superficial act," the Irna news agency reported.

"This resolution will not harm Iran and those who backed it will soon regret their superficial act," Ahmadinejad said.

"Iranians are neither worried nor uncomfortable with the resolution... we will celebrate our atomic achievements in February."

Meanwhile, Tehran's chief nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani said that in an immediate response to the resolution, Iran will start installing 3,000 centrifuges at its Natanz uranium enrichment plant.

"From Sunday morning, we will begin activities at Natanz -site of 3,000 centrifuge machines - and we will drive it with full speed. It will be our immediate response to the resolution," Iran's Kayhan newspaper quoted Larijani as saying.

On Saturday, the Security Council voted unanimously to impose sanctions on Iran for refusing to suspend uranium enrichment, increasing international pressure on the government to prove that it is not trying to make nuclear weapons. The resolution, which was sponsored by Britain, Germany, and France, was approved in a 15-0 vote that included a yes vote by Qatar.

International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director Mohamed ElBaradei said Saturday. that his agency is ready to implement the UN Security Council resolution on Iran.

"The agency will implement the relevant parts of the UNSC resolution that relates to its work," the IAEA said. According to diplomats close to the IAEA the resolution "does not ask much" of the UN nuclear watchdog, only to limit its technical cooperation with Iran, excepting fields like food or agriculture.

Iran formally rejected the council's decision, calling the sanctions illegal and vowing to continue its nuclear program. Iran's parliament speaker said prior to the vote that parliament would alter the Islamic Republic's relationship with the UN's International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) nuclear watchdog if the sanctions were approved.

"Today we are placing Iran in the small category of states under Security Council sanctions," acting U.S. Ambassador Alejandro Wolff told the council before the vote.

"We will not hesitate to return to this body to seek further action should Iran fail to comply," Wolff added.

Russia's UN Ambassador Vitaly Churkin, who was successful in watering down parts of the resolution, emphasized however that the resolution did not permit any use of force.

Moscow's earlier hesitation over supporting the resolution prompted a phone call Saturday between U.S. President George W. Bush to Russian President Vladimir Putin, who had reviewed the resolution until the last minute following two months of tough negotiations. Russia is building an $800 million light-water reactor for Tehran that is exempted in the resolution.

The resolution demands Tehran end all research on uranium enrichment, which can produce fuel for nuclear power plants as well as for bombs, and halt research and development that can make or deliver atomic weapons.

The resolution is under Article 41 of Chapter 7 of the UN Charter, which makes enforcement mandatory but restricts action to nonmilitary measures. It would suspend sanctions if Tehran in turn suspended "all enrichment related and reprocessing activities, including research and development."

The thrust of the sanctions is a ban on imports and exports of dangerous materials and technology relating to uranium enrichment, reprocessing and heavy-water reactors, as well as ballistic missile delivery systems.

Iran has vowed to continue its nuclear program, which first came to light in 2002 and Iran says is for peaceful purposes. (Click here for a timeline of Iran's nuclear program)

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini told state-run television the resolution "cannot affect or limit Iran's peaceful nuclear activities but will discredit the decisions of the Security Council, whose power is deteriorating."

The IAEA expressed its hope that a diplomatic solution was still possible and a comprehensive agreement could be reached: "The Director General believes that a long term solution to the Iranian nuclear issue has to be based on negotiation and mutual
accommodation."

ElBaradei hopes for an agreement allowing for the development of cooperation with Iran based on "mutual respect and the establishment of international confidence in the exclusively peaceful nature of Iran's nuclear program."

Israel welcomes resolution

Israeli leaders meanwhile welcomed the Security Council's decision, while the United States administration said the sanctions aren't enough, and it hopes that the international community will enact further measures.

The resolution imposed sanctions on Iran's trade in sensitive nuclear materials and ballistic missiles in an attempt to get Tehran to halt uranium enrichment work.

Iran also accused the Security Council of pursuing a double standard in imposing sanctions on what it said was Tehran's peaceful nuclear program while ignoring Israel's purported nuclear a.rsenal.

"It is indisputable that nuclear weapons in the hands of the Israeli regime with an unparalleled record of noncompliance with Security Council resolutions ... poses a uniquely grave threat to regional and international peace and security," Iranian UN Ambassador Jawad Zarif told the 15-nation council.

"The same governments which have pushed this council to take groundless punitive measures against Iran's peaceful nuclear program have systematically prevented it from taking any action to nudge the Israeli regime towards submitting itself to the rules governing the nuclear nonproliferation regime," Zarif told the 15-nation council.

"A nation is being punished for exercising its inalienable rights" to develop nuclear energy, primarily at the behest of the U.S. and Israel, "which is apparently being rewarded today for having clandestinely developed and unlawfully possessed nuclear weapons," Zarif said.

"Some of the members of the Security Council, especially the United States ... do not commit themselves to the NPT [Non-Proliferation Treaty] and freely provide this technology and equipment to other countries and do not commit themselves to any of the articles of nuclear disarmament," Hosseini said. "On the contrary they develop their nuclear a.rsenals."

"This decision cannot stand against the will of the Iranian nation," the spokesman added.

He said in a separate statement that Iran would press ahead with its plan to install 3,000 centrifuges in its Natanz facility.

"The new resolution won't be an obstacle in the way of Iran's nuclear progress," the statement said. "The Iranian nation, relying on its national capabilities and within the framework of its rights stipulated in the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, will continue its peaceful nuclear activities."

The centrifuges are machines which can purify uranium to a low level for use in reactors, or a far higher level for use in nuclear weapons.

Israel: Resolution sends clear message to Iran

Defense Minister Amir Peretz welcomed Saturday's UN Security Council decision to impose sanctions on Iran, calling it an important step. Nonetheless, Peretz said, Israel must continue to push for stricter sanctions.

Vice Premier Shimon Peres said the "decision is a small first step, but in the right direction."

"Before going to war it is possible to achieve what we want without war, if the world will take the right steps," continued Peres.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Mark Regev said it sends "a clear message to the Iranian leadership that Iran's nuclear program is total unacceptable and the community of nations will act to prevent the Iranian regime from obtaining nuclear weapons."

The Defense Ministry said the international community "will need to continue to show determination to reach the goal of blocking Iran's nuclear plan."

The U.S. administration said Saturday it hopes the resolution penalizing Iran for its nuclear enrichment program will clear the way for tougher measures against Tehran by individual countries, particularly Russia.

"We don't think this resolution is enough in itself," Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns said. "We want the international community to take further action. We're certainly not going to put all our eggs in the UN basket."

Approval of the resolution under a part of the UN Charter that makes it binding is "going to be humiliating for Iran," Burns told reporters after the unanimous vote.

Burns said the resolution takes away a main argument against bilateral penalties by individual countries, which have told U.S. officials that they could not do so until the UN acted. The administration wants other nations to join the U.S. and stop selling arms to Iran and to limit export credits to Tehran, he said.

"We want to let the Iranians know that there is a big cost to them," Burns said, so they will return to talks.

"We hope the Russian government is going to work with us in a very active way to send this message of unity to Iran and we hope Russia is going to take a very vigorous approach itself," Burns said.

Neither President George W. Bush, spending the holidays at Camp David in
Maryland and meeting with advisers on a new Iraq plan, nor the White House offered immediate comment on the vote.

"And yet we feel very strongly that having achieved this, this is a powerful message to Iran," Burns said.

Reacting to the resolution, France's Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy said in a statement Saturday: "Today, more than ever, our objective remains convincing Iran to conform with its international commitments."

He lauded the unanimous passage of the resolution and said it places Iran squarely before a choice: "cooperate with the international community or continue its (uranium) enrichment and reprocessing activities at the risk of growing isolation."

The minister said that France, which worked to make the resolution acceptable to all Security Council members, would continue to press for dialogue with Tehran.

Iran warning

Iran's parliament speaker said Saturday that parliament would alter the Islamic Republic's relationship with the UN's International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) nuclear watchdog if the sanctions were approved.

"If they intend to deprive the Iranian nation of its certain right to nuclear technology by a resolution... parliament will reconsider the nature of its relationship with the IAEA," Parliament Speaker Gholamali Haddadadel told state television.

Haddadadel said if the pressure mounts on Iran, parliament will have to discuss a plan, approved by the parliament's national security committee, that wants a serious reconsideration in Iran's relation with the IAEA.

He did not elaborate on the contents of the bill and how it was meant to alter Iran's relationship with the IAEA. Parliament has already banned IAEA snap inspections in February in response to its nuclear case referral to the UN Security Council.

However, the head of parliament's national security committee Alaeddin Boroujerdi said on Saturday that Iran was not interested in quitting the Nuclear non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) despite possible sanctions.

"Since Iran seriously opposes building nuclear weapons it is not interested in signing out from such an important matter in international aspect," Boroujerdi was quoted by Iran's student news agency ISNA as saying.

The Iranian government has finally developed a new weapon that can destroy the financial system underpinning the American Empire. The U.S. dollar dominance is coming to an end.

A hundred years ago the U.S. currency’s dominance was referred to as “dollar diplomacy”. After the end of the Second World War, and the fall of the Soviet Union in 1989, that policy evolved into “dollar hegemony.”

But after all these many years of great success, this “diplomacy” or “hegemony” seems to be coming to an end soon.

Iran announced yesterday ordering the central bank to direct foreign transactions and transform the state's dollar-denominated assets held abroad to the single European currency instead of the U.S. currency.

"The government has ordered the central bank to replace the dollar with the Euro to limit the problems of the executive organs in commercial transactions," government spokesman Gholam Hossein Elham told reporters.

The switch will include not only in the budget but also foreign as well as oil trade, and assets abroad, ending Iran's dollar dependence.

“Some banks abroad are also willing to go Euro in dealing with us and there is no problem if some others want to do business in other exchanges based on their preference,” said governor of the Central Bank of Iran (CBI), adding that the country’s FRF stands at $10 billion, indicating a 35 percent growth over last year.

It has been said that he who holds the gold makes the rules.

Will other oil producing countries in the Middle East, members of The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), follow the suit?

A switch by OPEC members from the U.S. currency to the Euro could enhance the value of the Euro, the new official currency of the European Union (EU) which first came into existence on Jan. 1, 1999, further, ending the U.D. Dollar supremacy.

And despite a claim by Monica Fan, currency strategist at RBC Capital Markets’ that the news from Iran had little impact on the market "as it had already been announced by the Finance Minister on Dec. 4 and an estimated 70% of Iran's $45.5 billion reserves are already held in non-dollar assets," the impact of Iran’s move on the dollar has immediately been felt.

Yesterday the dollar was slightly lower against its major counterparts, reversing early gains.

Fan however, warned that the "more bearish effect" from Iran is that "the market will suspect this is the precursor to similar moves by other Middle Eastern governments".

Combined, the foreign-exchange reserves of Libya, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Lebanon, Kuwait, Yemen, Jordan, Qatar, Oman and Bahrain carry a total of about $170 billion, Fan said, according to MarketWatch.

A day before Iran announced converting its dollar-denominated assets held overseas into Euros, Sultan Nasser al-Suweidi, the United Arab Emirates' central bank governor, said that "we're waiting for a clear trend to emerge before converting our reserves into Euros or any other currency."

The bank holds 98% of its reserves in greenbacks but plans reducing its dollar holdings to between 50% and 90%.

Analysts aroused fears over Iran’s move, warning it would prompt another U.S. war in the region. When other countries, like Iran, sought payment of oil in other currencies, most notably Euro, the punitive action was in order.

The American President George W. Bush's Shock-and-Awe in Iraq was not about Saddam's nuclear ambitions, or the alleged link to Al Qaeda network which the U.S. blames for September 11 attacks, it’s about defending the dollar, and setting an example that anyone who seeks payment for oil in currencies other than U.S. Dollars, which is what Saddam did in 2000, would be likewise punished.

But if the U.S. decided to commit the same mistake it made in Iraq again; i.e. invading Iran, it will definitely bring an end to its political hegemony not just the hegemony of its currency, in the region and the world.

History teaches that an empire should go to war for either defending itself or benefiting from war; otherwise, as Paul Kennedy stated in his The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers, "a military overstretch will drain its economic resources and precipitate its collapse".

British police arrested a second man Tuesday in their ongoing investigation into the murders of five prostitutes in eastern England.

A 48-year-old man was arrested around 5 a.m. in Ipswich, located about 110 kilometres northeast of London, Detective Chief Superintendent Stewart Gull said Tuesday.

Police searched the home of the second suspect, located in Ipswich's red-light district, and carried away a dark blue Ford Mondeo.

Neither suspect has been officially identified by police.

However, the 37-year-old man arrested Monday has been identified by the media as Tom Stephens.

Stephens was arrested at his home in Trimley, about 13 kilometres southeast of Ipswich, where the victims were known to work.

"We have two suspects, maybe one of them is innocent, maybe they're both innocent or maybe they're working together," said CTV's London Bureau Chief Tom Kennedy.

Over a 10-day span beginning Dec. 2, the naked bodies of the five victims were found in rural areas in and around Ipswich.

Stephens spoke to a tabloid paper prior to his arrest and said that he could understand why he was a suspect.

"From the police profiling it does look like me -- white male between 25 and 40, knows the area, works strange hours. The bodies have got close to my house,'' he told the Sunday Mirror newspaper.

"If new information, coincidental information, crops up, I could get arrested,'' he said, adding that he was confident he would not be charged.

Stephens told the newspaper that he turned to prostitutes after his eight-year marriage ended 18 months ago.

"He admitted (to the paper) that he knew all five women that had been murdered, he was friends with them," Kennedy said Monday.

Earlier Monday, police postponed the coroner's inquests into the deaths of Tania Nicol, Anneli Alderton, Paula Clennell and Annette Nicholls.

Clennell, 24, died of compression to her neck and Alderton, 24, was strangled, according to a senior pathologist. Post-mortem examinations of Nicol and Nicholls could not determine the cause of death.

An inquest into the fifth victim, Gemma Adams, 25, also reached no conclusion about the cause of her death.

To help solve the case, around 340 specialist investigators were brought in from across Britain to assist the 160 Suffolk officers.

Police received more than 10,000 calls and from the public prior to Monday's arrest.

With any luck it will be a step forward for gays and lesbians in the US so that maybe some day they can enjoy fair and equal treatment under the law.

Mixed Reaction to Cheney's Daughter's Pregnancy


WASHINGTON (AP) -- Conservative leaders voiced dismay Wednesday at news that Mary Cheney, the lesbian daughter of D.ick Cheney, is pregnant, while a gay-rights group said the vice president faces "a lifetime of sleepless nights" for serving in an administration that has opposed recognition of same-sex couples.

Mary Cheney, 37, and her partner of 15 years, Heather Poe, 45, are expecting a baby in late spring, said Lea Anne McBride, a spokeswoman for the vice president.

"The vice president and Mrs. Cheney are looking forward with eager anticipation" to the arrival of their sixth grandchild, McBride said.

Mary Cheney was an aide to her father during the 2004 campaign, and now is vice president for consumer advocacy at AOL. She and Poe moved from Colorado to Virginia a year ago to be closer to the Cheney family.

Family Pride, which advocates on behalf of gay and lesbian families, noted that Virginia last month became one of 27 states with a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage.

"Unless they move to a handful of less restrictive states, Heather will never be able to have a legal relationship with her child," said Family Pride executive director Jennifer Chrisler.

The couple "will quickly face the reality that no matter how loved their child will be. ... he or she will never have the same protections that other children born to heterosexual couples enjoy," Chrisler said. "Grandfather Cheney will no doubt face a lifetime of sleepless nights as he reflects on the irreparable harm he and his administration have done to the millions of American gay and lesbian parents and their children."

For years, Mary Cheney's openness about her sexual orientation had posed a dilemma for conservative activists who admire D.ick Cheney's stance on many issues but consider homosexuality a sin.

Janice Crouse of Concerned Women for America described the pregnancy as "unconscionable."

"It's very disappointing that a celebrity couple like this would deliberately bring into the world a child that will never have a father," said Crouse, a senior fellow at the group's think tank. "They are encouraging people who don't have the advantages they have."

Crouse said there was no doubt that the news would, in conservatives' eyes, be damaging to the Bush administration, which already has been chided by some leaders on the right for what they felt was halfhearted commitment to anti-abortion and anti-gay-rights causes in this year's general election.

Carrie Gordon Earll, a policy analyst for the conservative Christian ministry Focus on the Family, expressed empathy for the Cheney family but depicted the pregnancy as unwise.

"Just because you can conceive a child outside a one-woman, one-man marriage doesn't mean it's a good idea," Earll said. "Love can't replace a mother and a father."

The vice president's office declined to elaborate on the circumstances of Mary Cheney's pregnancy.

The news was welcomed by the president of the largest national gay-rights group, Joe Solmonese of the Human Rights Campaign.

"Mary and Heather's decision to have a child is an example that families in America come in all different shapes and sizes," he said. "The bottom line is that a family is made up of love and commitment."

Was former KGB agent murdered over false-flag terrorism within Russia?

Were a Russian journalist and an ex-KGB officer murdered over an investigation of the Beslan terrorist attack?

Former KGB officer Alexander Litvinenko, who passed away late last week from what many intelligence officials have indicated they believe to be a state-sponsored assassination, was likely the victim of the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service, Sluzhba Vneshney Razvedki (SVR), well-placed sources tell RAW STORY.

Specifically, two former Cold War CIA officers, who still on occasion provide consulting work for the CIA, point to the S Directorate of SVR, which is in charge of black operations and other allegedly highly illegal transnational activities. They believe that the murders are closely tied to terrorist activities within Russia, and likely do involve Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Litvinenko died of radiation poisoning from a rare and highly concentrated isotope, polonium-210. It is alleged that prior to the poisoning he had been in receipt of documents that were also in the possession of Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya when she was found dead of multiple gunshot wounds in her Moscow apartment building in October of this year.

"They put a contract out on her," said one former high-ranking CIA officer with expertise in the region, "and there was already a failed poisoning attempt."

"They had her shot," that source explains, "in order to send a message to other Russian journalists to back off reporting on the Russian bombings."

The Alleged Russian False Flag Bombings

Although none of the sources interviewed for this article were able to say too much regarding what is an ongoing investigation into the two murders, several former intelligence sources pointed to alleged false-flag bombings that were carried out in Russia starting in 1999.

A false-flag operation is one in which an attack is carried out by one government or entity and made to seem the work of another. In modern times, the term has become synonymous with Operation Gladio, a series of false-flag bombings inflicted on Italy by certain far right members of elements in the government and military, the aim of which was to frame opposition parties in order to discredit them, as well as to force that nation as a whole to move politically right of center. This method was known as the Strategy of Tension.

The Russian bombings bear all the hallmarks of such operations, including the most well-known of these bombings, in which a car bomb was detonated in front of an apartment building in the city of Buynaksk that served as military housing for Russian soldiers, killing more than sixty residents. The attack was blamed on Chechen separatists and was used to justify attacks on suspected Chechen sympathizers and alleged co-conspirators, as well as on Chechnya itself. Other bombings soon followed, leading to then-Prime Minister Vladimir Putin declaring war on the separatist region, which had gained de facto independence following the breakup of the Soviet Union.

But it was not until the failed Rayzan bombing attempt that the suspected role of the Russian government in the bombings began to be alleged publicly. In mid-1999, a group of agents of the Russian Federal Security Service, or Federalnaya Sluzhba Bezopasnosti (FSB), were found placing explosives at an apartment complex in the city of Rayzan. The FSB is the Russian equivalent of the FBI, and it and the SVR are the two arms of what used to be known as the KGB. The materials used in this incident were similar to those found at the other bombings committed throughout 1999, but th FSB denied any involvement in the previous terrorist attacks and described the Rayzan bombing plot as a domestic counter-terrorism exercise.

The Russian Duma -- the lower house of the Federal Assembly -- attempted to investigate the bombings, but the Kremlin would not cooperate or provide requested documentation.

What was Anna Politkovskaya working on?

At the time of the alleged attempt to poison Anna Politkovskaya, the reporter was en route to the city of Beslan, the site of an infamous elementary school hostage crisis of September 2004, a three day stand-off between alleged Chechen terrorists and Russian domestic security forces that left 344 people dead, more than half of them children.

A source in one of the Western European intelligence organizations suggests that "Annas heart never left Beslan," and that up until the moment of her death the journalist was pursuing evidence that might prove "embarrassing to the Kremlin."

RAW STORY has not been able to obtain additional confirmation of this particular allegation, or greater clarity on what the Kremlin might view as embarrassing with regard to Beslan. There have, however, been allegations of censorship of information and stalling by the Kremlin to avoid investigating the massacre, including outright claims of criminal incompetence.

Whatever it was that Politkovskaya was working on eventually landed in the lap of Alex Litvinenko -- or at least was supposed to on the day he was poisoned.

Who Killed Alex Litvinenko?

One of the CIA officers RAW STORY spoke with for this article suggested that whoever carried out the Litvinenko murder would have required the backing of a state sponsor, because only a government would have access to something as rare and difficult to obtain as polonium-210. The highly powerful and radioactive isotope has a half-life of fewer than 140 days.

Another former CIA officer (who sometimes currently serves as a CIA consultant) alleged that whoever carried out the attack must actually have been doing it on behalf of Russian President Vladimir Putin and was either an agent of or working directly for the S Directorate of SVR.

"They never thought anyone would identify the poison," said this source. "but the Brits were very good."

Reports have Litvinenko meeting with several individuals on November 1 -- the day on which he became ill -- including a meeting that afternoon at a sushi bar with Mario Scaramella, his contact regarding the Politkovskaya murder. Some have indicated that they believe that a meeting at a London hotel with two Russian friends that same morning may have been where he was poisoned.

There is also an allegation that the murder may have taken place when Litvinenko had tea at the apartment of a friend prior to proceeding to the sushi restaurant. According to the BBC, Oleg Gordievsky -- who is a former KGB colleague of Litvinenko, like him a defector to the UK, and the author of a book blaming FSB agents for the 1999 bombings -- pointed to a Russian friend with whom Litvinenko had a meeting earlier in the day. "He told the BBC he believed Mr. Litvinenko was poisoned when he drank a cup of tea at the flat of an old Russian friend -- before the lunchtime meeting at the sushi restaurant."

However, one British intelligence officer, who wished to remain anonymous given that the investigation is still ongoing, suggested a different possibility. "You should start," says this source, "with the Italian." The Italian in question is Mario Scaramella, the contact whom Litvinenko met at the sushi bar to discuss the case of Anna Politkovskaya.

Scaramella, an expert on the former Soviet Union, does indeed appear to have both a relationship with the Russian FSB and some knowledge of radioactive materials. According to an account by BBC International Monitoring, originally from an Italian source, in 2004 Scaramella brought to the attention of Italian police an attempt to smuggle highly enriched uranium into Italy:

"During the month of September 2004 I was approached by a Ukrainian national, whom I know by the name of Sasha, who wanted to sell me a briefcase containing radioactive material, and, more precisely, uranium for military use." There is enough testimony by Giovanni Guidi, a Rimini businessman, and by other defendants - Giorgio Gregoretti, Elmo Olivieri and Giuseppe Genghini - to fuel a spy story [preceding two words published in English] worthy of a novel by Le Carre. Involved is a briefcase containing five kilos of highly enriched uranium, half of which would be enough to build an atomic device, which remained for months in a Rimini garage. A briefcase, however, which eluded investigators, and which managed to get back into the hands of the Ukrainian national, who perhaps is still in Italy. Together with another briefcase having a similar content, and a third believed to conceal a tracking system. The entire kit geared to the assembly of a small tactical atomic bomb.

A mystery story fuelled by information supplied the Rimini police department by a consultant of the Mitrokhin committee, Mario Scaramella, who, acting on behalf of the agency presided over by Paolo Guzzanti, was trying to track illegal funds from the former USSR that had transited through [the Republic of] San Marino.

Scaramella is also said to have connections to the deputy chief of the FSB, Viktor Komogorov, who is alleged by Chechen sources to have been conducting an internal FSB investigation of Litvinenko..

One CIA officer also suggested an outsourcing to non-Russian agents, indicating that, "this would give Putin plausible denial," in the event the plot was uncovered,. "Perhaps," the source joked, "Gladio has not been dismantled, but simply privatized."

Rumsfeld Okayed Abuses Says Former U.S. General

MADRID (Reuters) - Outgoing Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld authorized the mistreatment of detainees at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, the prison's former U.S. commander said in an interview on Saturday.

Former U.S. Army Brigadier General Janis Karpinski told Spain's El Pais newspaper she had seen a letter apparently signed by Rumsfeld which allowed civilian contractors to use techniques such as sleep deprivation during interrogation.

Karpinski, who ran the prison until early 2004, said she saw a memorandum signed by Rumsfeld detailing the use of harsh interrogation methods.

"The handwritten signature was above his printed name and in the same handwriting in the margin was written: "Make sure this is accomplished"," she told Saturday's El Pais.

"The methods consisted of making prisoners stand for long periods, sleep deprivation ... playing music at full volume, having to sit in uncomfortably ... Rumsfeld authorized these specific techniques."

The Geneva Convention says prisoners of war should suffer "no physical or mental torture, nor any other form of coercion" to secure information.

"Prisoners of war who refuse to answer may not be threatened, insulted, or exposed to any unpleasant or disadvantageous treatment of any kind," the document states.

A spokesman for the Pentagon declined to comment on Karpinski's accusations, while U.S. army in Iraq could not immediately be reached for comment.

Karpinski was withdrawn from Iraq in early 2004, shortly after photographs showing American troops abusing detainees at the prison were flashed around the world. She was subsequently removed from active duty and then demoted to the rank of colonel on unrelated charges.

Karpinski insists she knew nothing about the abuse of prisoners until she saw the photos, as interrogation was carried out in a prison wing run by U.S. military intelligence.

Rumsfeld also authorized the army to break the Geneva Conventions by not registering all prisoners, Karpinski said, explaining how she raised the case of one unregistered inmate with an aide to former U.S. commander Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez.

"We received a message from the Pentagon, from the Defense Secretary, ordering us to hold the prisoner without registering him. I now know this happened on various occasions."

Karpinski said last week she was ready to testify against Rumsfeld, if a suit filed by civil rights groups in Germany over Abu Ghraib led to a full investigation.

President Bush announced Rumsfeld's resignation after Democrats wrested power from the Republicans in midterm elections earlier this month, partly due to public criticism over the Iraq war.

O.J. Simpson Book, TV Special Canceled

By DAVID BAUDER, AP Television Writer

NEW YORK - After a firestorm of criticism, News. Corp. said Monday that it has canceled the O.J. Simpson book and TV special "If I Did It."

"I and senior management agree with the American public that this was an ill-considered project," said Rupert Murdoch, News Corp. chairman. "We are sorry for any pain that this has caused the families of Ron Goldman and Nicole Brown Simpson."

A dozen Fox affiliates had already said they would not air the two-part sweeps month special, planned for next week before the Nov. 30 publication of the book by ReganBooks. The publishing house is a HarperCollins imprint owned — like the Fox network — by News Corp.

In both the book and show, Simpson speaks in hypothetical terms about how he would have committed the 1994 slayings of his ex-wife Nicole and her friend Goldman.

Relatives of the victims have lashed out at the now scuttled publication and broadcast plans.

"He destroyed my son and took from my family Ron's future and life. And for that I'll hate him always and find him despicable," Fred Goldman told ABC last week.

The industry trade publication Broadcasting & Cable editorialized against the show Monday, saying "Fox should cancel this evil sweeps stunt."

One of the nation's largest superstore chains, Borders Group Inc., said last week it would donate any profits on the book to charity.

Simpson was acquitted in 1995 of murder in a case that became its own TV drama. The former football star and announcer was later found liable for the deaths in a wrongful death lawsuit filed by the Goldman family.

Judith Regan, publisher of "If I Did It," said she considered the book to be Simpson's confession.

The television special was to air on two of the final three nights of the November sweeps, when ratings are watched closely to set local advertising rates. It has been a particularly tough fall for Fox, which has seen none of its new shows catch on and is waiting for the January bows of "American Idol" and "24."

The closest precedent for such an about-face came when CBS yanked a miniseries about
Ronald Reagan from its schedule in 2003 when complaints were raised about its accuracy. The Reagan series was seen on its sister premium-cable channel, Showtime, instead.

One station manager who had said he wasn't airing the special said he was concerned that whether or not Simpson was guilty, he'd still be profiting from murders.

"I have my own moral compass and this was easy," said Bill Lamb, general manager of WDRB in Louisville.

For the publishing industry, the cancellation of "If I Did It" was an astonishing end to a story like no other. Numerous books have been withdrawn over the years because of possible plagiarism, most recently Kaavya Viswanathan's "How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life," but a book's removal simply for objectionable content is virtually unheard of.

Sales had been strong, but not sensational. "If I Did It" cracked the top 20 of Amazon.com last weekend, but by Monday afternoon, at the time its cancellation had been announced, the book had fallen to No. 51.

Several Affiliates Nixing Simpson Show

By DAVID BAUDER, AP Television Writer


NEW YORK - Several Fox affiliates have chosen not to broadcast "If I Did It," the two-part special where O.J. Simpson talks in hypothetical terms about his role in the 1994 killing of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend Ronald Goldman.

Lin Broadcasting and Pappas Broadcasting, which own a combined nine Fox affiliates, have said they won't air it. Fox has scheduled the Simpson interview for Nov. 27 and 29.

The television special precedes the Nov. 30 publication of a book where Simpson talks about how he would have committed the murders "if he were the one responsible."

"After careful consideration regarding the nature of the show, as well as the feedback we received from the viewers of northeast Wisconsin, we determined that this programming was not serving the local public interest," wrote Jay Zollar, general manager of WLUK-TV in Green Bay.

WLUK is a Lin-owned station, along with other Fox affiliates in Mobile, Ala.; Toledo, Ohio; Albuquerque, N.M.; and Providence, R.I.

The Pappas stations said they were uninterested in helping Simpson profit from the project. Pappas owns Fox stations in Omaha and Lincoln, Neb.; Fresno, Calif.; and Dakota Dunes, S.D.

There are about 200 Fox affiliates across the country.

Scott Grogin, Fox spokesman, said Sunday the network had no comment about the decision by its affiliates.

Simpson was acquitted in 1995 of murder in a case that became its own television drama. The former football star and announcer was later found liable for the deaths in a wrongful death lawsuit filed by the Goldman family.

Judith Regan, publisher of "If I Did It," said she considered the book to be Simpson's confession.

The television special will air on two of the final three nights of the November sweeps, when ratings are watched closely to set local advertising rates. It has been a particularly tough fall for Fox, which has seen none of its new shows catch on and is waiting for the January bows of "American Idol" and "24."

The show is expected to draw high ratings among the curious, but there's some question about how much Fox can take advantage of it given an expected reluctance of advertisers to be associated with it.

The Fox stations in most of the nation's biggest cities, including New York, Los Angeles and Chicago, are owned by Fox, so they would abide by the network's decision on what to air.

Report: Israeli Spies in Iran Told of Test of Nuclear Bomb Triggers


Author Seymour Hersh has reported in The New Yorker magazine that Israeli spies have been operating in Iran as recently as the summer, and that they gathered intelligence showing that Tehran has developed and tested a trigger device for a nuclear bomb.

A report of the Israeli intelligence data is being used by White House hawks within the Bush administration to "prove the White House's theory that the Iranians are on track" to produce a nuclear weapon," Hersh wrote, citing an unnamed former senior intelligence official.

Hersh cites unnamed current and former military officers and consultants as confirming the report of Israeli spies operating in Iran.

The article was published Monday on the magazine's Web site.

"The problem is that no one can verify it," the ex-intelligence official was quoted as having told Hersh, in a reference to the reported Israeli intelligence data on nuclear triggers.

"We don't know who the Israeli source is," the official said. "The briefing says the Iranians are testing trigger mechanisms" [simulating a zero-yield nuclear explosion without any weapons-grade materials] "but there are no diagrams, no significant facts. Where is the test site? How often have they done it? How big is the warhead? A breadbox or a refrigerator? They don't have that."

Despite the Israeli report, the CIA is standing by its position that it as yet has found no conclusive evidence of a secret Iranian nuclear-weapons program running parallel to the civilian operations that Iran has declared to the International Atomic Energy Agency, Hersh wrote

The White House has asked to see the "raw" - the original, unanalyzed and unvetted - Israeli intelligence, Hersh quoted a Pentagon official as saying.

"Such 'stovepiping' of intelligence had led to faulty conclusions about nonexistent weapons of mass destruction during the buildup to the 2003 Iraq war," Hersh wrote.

The Pentagon consultant was further quoted as telling Hersh that, while there may be pressure from the Israelis to allow an Israeli strike against Iran, "they won't do anything on their own without our green light."

That assurance, the Pentagon official said, "comes from the Cheney shop. It's [Vice President**** Cheney himself who is saying, "We're not going to leave you high and dry, but don't go without us.'"

Hersh quoted a senior European diplomat as agreeing. "For Israel, it is a question of life or death. The United States does not want to go into Iran, but, if Israel feels more and more cornered, there may be no other choice," the official said.

IDF cancels air strike to avoid harming Palestinian human shields

The IDF canceled a planned air strike on the home of a militant in the northern Gaza Strip on Sunday after several hundred Palestinians barricaded themselves inside the building, an IDF spokesman and witnesses said.

Palestinian sources said the protest against the planned IAF strike was first of its kind to have in effect prevented an air strike. An IDF spokesman said the strike had been called off so to avoid inflicting civilian casualties.

Hundreds of Palestinians formed a human shield around the home of the militant in Beit Lahia late Saturday to prevent an Israel Air Force air strike on the building, residents said.

"The attack plan was canceled because of the people there," the spokesman said. "We differentiate between innocent people and terrorists," he added.

The spokesman vowed Israel would continue its strikes against militants, and accused gunmen of using the civilians in the camp as human shields.

People flocked to the home of Mohammed al-Baroud after he received a warning from the army late Saturday giving him 30 minutes to leave the house. Barhoud is a commander in the Popular Resistance Committees in the town who is in charge of firing homemade rockets at Israel. Crowds of people stood on the rooftop and in the yard of the home.

Israel routinely orders occupants out of homes ahead of air strikes on suspected weapons-storage facilities, saying it wants to avoid casualties. The incident in Beit Lahia was the first time Palestinians have tried to prevent such an airstrike.

The crowd chanted anti-Israel and anti-American slogans, and people said they were prepared to give their lives to protect the home. "Yes to martyrdom. No to surrender," the crowd chanted.

"We came here to protect this fighter, to protect his house and to prove that we are capable of defeating this Zionist policy," said Nizar Rayan, a local Hamas leader who joined the protest.

Bush: I'd Understand if Israel Chose to Attack Iran

By Yossi Verter, Haaretz Correspondent


The United States lacks sufficient intelligence on Iran's nuclear facilities at this time, which prevents it from initiating a military strike against them, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has told European politicians and diplomats with whom she has recently met.

Rice mentioned three reasons why the United States is currently unable to carry out a military operation against Iran: the wish to solve the crisis through peaceful means; concern that a military strike will be ineffective - that it would fail to completely destroy Iran's nuclear capabilities; and the lack of precise intelligence on the targets' locations.

U.S. President George W. Bush and President Jacques Chirac of France met several weeks ago. Bush told his French counterpart that the possibility that Israel would carry out a strike against Iran's nuclear installations should not be ruled out.

Bush also said that if such an attack were to take place, he would understand it. According to European diplomats who later met with Rice, the secretary of state did not express the same willingness to show understanding for a possible Israeli strike against Iran.

Nonetheless, Rice did not discount the possibility that such an operation may take place.

In recent talks with their Israeli counterparts, French government officials estimated that Iran would reach the "point of no return" in its nuclear program by spring 2007, in approximately five months.

At that point, according to Israeli sources, Iran will be in a position to simultaneously operate approximately 3,000 centrifuges for enriching uranium.

Various estimates by international experts hold that Monday Iran is operating 340-600 such centrifuges.

In talks with Israeli sources several days ago, a French government official asserted that an Israeli military attack against Iran would be "a total disaster" in terms of its implications for the entire world.

According to the French official, such a strike would at best delay the completion of Iran's nuclear program by two years.

The attack would also result in Iran cancelling its membership in the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, cause a great deal of agitation in the Arab world, lead to a rise in oil prices, and could result in a major Iranian military response that would not target Israel alone.

Layton Wants Tories to Commit to Kyoto Target


As Canada's Environment Minister Rona Ambrose returned Sunday from a UN climate change conference in Kenya where Canada's commitment to the Kyoto Protocol came under question, NDP leader Jack Layton had a prescription for change.

Layton unveiled his party's demands Sunday on CTV's Question Period.

"We think it needed to be completely rewritten and if I can borrow a football analogy today, the Conservatives really fumbled the ball here on the whole issue of air pollution and climate change, and we're going to pick it up and run with it," Layton told The Globe and Mail's Jane Taber, co-host of Question Period.

Layton said the NDP-proposed amendments include the following:

* To rename the act the Healthy Air and Climate Act, indicating that Kyoto Protocol targets, which were absent from the original bill, would become a key priority of the revised act;
* To set targets that Canada must meet, such as the Kyoto Protocol 2008 to 2012 targets, an 80 per cent reduction in emissions below 1990 levels, by 2050;
* To set interim targets at five year intervals between 2015 and 2050;
* To give new authority to the environment minister that would allow him or her to designate significant areas under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act;
* And a "just-transition fund" to help the automobile move from voluntary to mandatory targets.

The changes would effectively gut the Conservative legislation as it currently stands.

The aim is to establish "real targets" based on science, that address the growing climate change crisis facing Canada and the world, and to set firm timelines to begin controlling major polluters, such as the automobile sector, Layton said.

The NDP is also calling for a fund to ease the financial stress on the auto industry as it -- under the new changes -- would transition from voluntary commitments to reduce pollution to mandatory ones.

Layton said the NDP wants incentives for industries that make efforts to green their processes. Those incentives could come in the form of a $1 billion fund.

"Industries need to know that if they pollute a lot they're going to pay, but if they clean up their act and bring in more energy efficiency and renewable energy, and then there will be financial help. And that's what the carbon trading system is all about and we want to legislate that so that we get going and follow the path that's been set out by Europe where they're meeting their targets and in some cases exceeding them," he said.

The Politics

All three opposition parties have said they won't support the Clean Air Act in its current form. Ambrose needs the NDP and some additional opposition support to save the legislation.

The Conservatives, while not withdrawing from Kyoto, have said Canada's target of reducing greenhouse gas emissions to six per cent below 1990 levels by 2012 is not achievable.

Canada's target is a six per cent cut (the average cut is 5.2 per cent), but emissions have risen by at least 27 per cent since the treaty was signed in 1997.

Ambrose used her UN climate conference speech to conduct what many saw as a partisan attack over the rise in emissions.

"We found that measures to address climate change by previous governments were insufficient and unaccountable," Ambrose told the conference.

Green Party Leader Elizabeth May told CTV News on Sunday that it's time to stop playing the blame game.

"Well, it's a minority government -- and, for a minority government, it's been wreaking havoc globally, not only embarrassing Canada, but acting as a saboteur to global progress," she said.

Layton said he hopes the Conservatives will closely consider the amendments the NDP has put forward, and said Canadians want action, and "they're going to call on all members of Parliament from all parties to get moving."

"The problem is so vital and critical and more and more Canadians understand that, that we can't afford the luxury of delay or bickering."

However, it seems unlikely the Conservatives will give into all, if any, of the changes. Doing so could amount to admitting that the Clean Air Act has failed, after months of promising the legislation would be the best solution to Canada's environmental concerns. However, none of the opposition parties will support the bill in its current form.

Layton said changes are necessary, and denied rumours that he had struck a deal with the Tories to abstain from criticizing the government in exchange for a compromise on the legislation.

"We feel the so-called Clean Air Act was frankly not honest with Canadians because it allows air to get dirtier rapidly," Layton said. "We felt a whole new approach was needed. There's no deal with Mr. Harper. We've said we want all the parties to bring forward their best ideas and let's see if we can't actually do something for the average Canadian."

Layton Wants Tories to Commit to Kyoto Target


As Canada's Environment Minister Rona Ambrose returned Sunday from a UN climate change conference in Kenya where Canada's commitment to the Kyoto Protocol came under question, NDP leader Jack Layton had a prescription for change.

Layton unveiled his party's demands Sunday on CTV's Question Period.

"We think it needed to be completely rewritten and if I can borrow a football analogy today, the Conservatives really fumbled the ball here on the whole issue of air pollution and climate change, and we're going to pick it up and run with it," Layton told The Globe and Mail's Jane Taber, co-host of Question Period.

Layton said the NDP-proposed amendments include the following:

* To rename the act the Healthy Air and Climate Act, indicating that Kyoto Protocol targets, which were absent from the original bill, would become a key priority of the revised act;
* To set targets that Canada must meet, such as the Kyoto Protocol 2008 to 2012 targets, an 80 per cent reduction in emissions below 1990 levels, by 2050;
* To set interim targets at five year intervals between 2015 and 2050;
* To give new authority to the environment minister that would allow him or her to designate significant areas under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act;
* And a "just-transition fund" to help the automobile move from voluntary to mandatory targets.

The changes would effectively gut the Conservative legislation as it currently stands.

The aim is to establish "real targets" based on science, that address the growing climate change crisis facing Canada and the world, and to set firm timelines to begin controlling major polluters, such as the automobile sector, Layton said.

The NDP is also calling for a fund to ease the financial stress on the auto industry as it -- under the new changes -- would transition from voluntary commitments to reduce pollution to mandatory ones.

Layton said the NDP wants incentives for industries that make efforts to green their processes. Those incentives could come in the form of a $1 billion fund.

"Industries need to know that if they pollute a lot they're going to pay, but if they clean up their act and bring in more energy efficiency and renewable energy, and then there will be financial help. And that's what the carbon trading system is all about and we want to legislate that so that we get going and follow the path that's been set out by Europe where they're meeting their targets and in some cases exceeding them," he said.

The Politics

All three opposition parties have said they won't support the Clean Air Act in its current form. Ambrose needs the NDP and some additional opposition support to save the legislation.

The Conservatives, while not withdrawing from Kyoto, have said Canada's target of reducing greenhouse gas emissions to six per cent below 1990 levels by 2012 is not achievable.

Canada's target is a six per cent cut (the average cut is 5.2 per cent), but emissions have risen by at least 27 per cent since the treaty was signed in 1997.

Ambrose used her UN climate conference speech to conduct what many saw as a partisan attack over the rise in emissions.

"We found that measures to address climate change by previous governments were insufficient and unaccountable," Ambrose told the conference.

Green Party Leader Elizabeth May told CTV News on Sunday that it's time to stop playing the blame game.

"Well, it's a minority government -- and, for a minority government, it's been wreaking havoc globally, not only embarrassing Canada, but acting as a saboteur to global progress," she said.

Layton said he hopes the Conservatives will closely consider the amendments the NDP has put forward, and said Canadians want action, and "they're going to call on all members of Parliament from all parties to get moving."

"The problem is so vital and critical and more and more Canadians understand that, that we can't afford the luxury of delay or bickering."

However, it seems unlikely the Conservatives will give into all, if any, of the changes. Doing so could amount to admitting that the Clean Air Act has failed, after months of promising the legislation would be the best solution to Canada's environmental concerns. However, none of the opposition parties will support the bill in its current form.

Layton said changes are necessary, and denied rumours that he had struck a deal with the Tories to abstain from criticizing the government in exchange for a compromise on the legislation.

"We feel the so-called Clean Air Act was frankly not honest with Canadians because it allows air to get dirtier rapidly," Layton said. "We felt a whole new approach was needed. There's no deal with Mr. Harper. We've said we want all the parties to bring forward their best ideas and let's see if we can't actually do something for the average Canadian."

Governments and corporations are, IMHO, one in the same.

My point is is that I can't see the state and capital working together to find cleaner energy solutions when it is in capital's interest not to do so, i.e. it negatively impacts their profits.

Yes, government has a role to play, but this a democracy. If the people aren't behind it, with something more than their mouth, the government can't do much about it. And if your average citizen knows that they have made their sacrifice and contribution, than a wise government will follow.

I believe the reason OJ wrote the book was to get the last laugh on us... for whatever reason.

Well it looks like our dirty little secret is finally officially out for all the world to see


A dirty secret that's also existed during the past 13 years of LIBERAL federal government

It's amazing how often liberals complain about things stephen harper's government hasn't done [as a MINORITY government, not even a year old], when the previous LIBERAL MAJORITY government of 13 YEARS!!!!! didn't do them either

French Minister Shocked by Canada's Kyoto Position


Canadian Press

NAIROBI, Kenya -- French Environment Minister Nelly Olin says she is shocked by Canada's decision to renounce its emissions-cutting targets under the Kyoto Protocol.

But Environment Minister Rona Ambrose says Olin is meddling in Canadian domestic politics, reiterating that the Conservative government was left with an impossible challenge on the climate file because of the previous government's failure to take action.

Under the Kyoto Protocol, Canada is committed to cutting its greenhouse emissions six per cent from 1990 levels, but its emissions have actually risen 27 per cent since 1990.

Canada is the only country that has publicly repudiated its targets under the climate treaty, and French President Jacques Chirac has already made some scathing comments about countries that go back on their commitments.

LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- In a deal that some media executives called revolting, O.J. Simpson plans a book and TV interview to discuss how, hypothetically, he could have killed his ex-wife and her friend -- a story his publisher considers "his confession."

Two weeks before the book, "If I Did It," goes on sale, scorn was already being heaped Wednesday on Simpson, the publisher and Fox, which plans to air the Simpson interview in two parts November 27 and 29.

Denise Brown, sister of Simpson's slain ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, lashed out at the publisher for "promoting the wrongdoing of criminals" and commercializing abuse.

Judith Regan, whose ReganBooks imprint is publishing the book, declined to reveal further details of the book's contents.

"This is an historic case, and I consider this his confession," Regan told The Associated Press. She also refused to say what Simpson is being paid for the book but said he came to her with the idea.

The former football star was acquitted in 1995 of murdering his ex-wife and her friend Ron Goldman after a trial that became an instant cultural flashpoint.

He was later found liable for the deaths by in a civil wrongful-death suit filed by the Goldman family. In the years since, he has been mocked relentlessly by late-night comedians, particularly for his vow to hunt down the true killers.

Simpson has failed to pay the $33.5 million judgment against him in the civil suit. His NFL pension and his Florida home cannot legally be seized. He and the families of the victims have wrangled over the money in court for years.

Simpson and his attorney Yale Galanter did not immediately return calls for comment.

Meanwhile, other publishers and publishing industry observers practically fell over each other to criticize ReganBooks, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, and Simpson himself.

"This is not about being heard. This is about trying to cash in, in a pathetic way, on some notoriety," said Sara Nelson, editor in chief of Publishers Weekly. "That a person keeps wanting to bring this up seems almost nutty to me."

Patricia Schroeder, president and chief executive of the American Association of Publishers, described the developments as sickening.

"But I think it's going to stir an awful lot of debate and make the culture take a real look at itself, and that may not be unhealthy," she said.

Indeed, one thing that seemed certain was that the book and interview -- which Fox will air at the end of the crucial sweeps month -- were bound to generate a torrent of publicity.

Shari Anne Brill, a television analyst for the Madison Avenue firm Carat USA, predicted public interest would rival that of the 2003 interview with Michael Jackson, seen by 27 million people in 2003.

At least one other network, NBC, said it had been approached to air the special but declined the offer.

"This is not a project appropriate for our network," said Rebecca Marks, a spokeswoman for the entertainment division of NBC, a network that once employed Simpson as a football analyst.

Representatives for CBS and ABC did not immediately return calls for comment.

One expert noted that the justice system's protection against being tried twice for the same crime means Simpson's book, explosive as it may be, should not expose him to any new legal danger.

"He can write pretty much whatever he wants," said Laurie Levenson, a Loyola University law school professor and former federal prosecutor who has followed the case closely. "Unless he's confessing to killing somebody else, he can probably do this with impunity."

Copyright 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Canada Pressured at UN Climate Change Talks


Updated Mon. Nov. 13 2006 11:57 PM ET

CTV.ca News Staff

Environmentalists have made it clear that Canada's Environment Minister Rona Ambrose will be feeling the heat during her stay at the UN climate conference.

"She's going to try and put some lame excuses out but clearly Canada is in real trouble in terms of its international reputation as a result of this government's stance on Kyoto and climate change," the Sierra Club's John Bennett told CTV Newsnet on Monday.

In Nairobi, Kenya, the Climate Action Network handed out its "fossil of the day" award to Canada and Australia, deeming them the countries that have contributed the least to the fight against climate change.

The award came on the same day as Prime Minister Stephen Harper spoke over the phone about climate change with both U.S. President George Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

Australia and the U.S. never ratified Kyoto, the 1997 climate change-fighting treaty. The Nairobi conference, which runs from Nov. 6-17, is discussing the timetables and quotas that should follow the expiry of the Kyoto pact in 2012.

"The axis of environmental evil: Canada, the US and Australia because we were actively blocking progress," David Chernushenko, deputy leader of the Green Party, told CTV News.

The bad news for Canada didn't stop with the "award." This country also ranked near the bottom of the list created by a Bonn-based development group that ranks countries on their efforts to fight global warming.

Germanwatch placed Canada 51st out of a list of 56 countries that were either part of a 1992 climate treaty or contribute at least one per cent of the greenhouse gas emissions in the world.

The countries, which were graded on emissions levels, emissions trends and climate policy, produce 90 per cent of global carbon dioxide emissions.

Topping the list were Sweden, the United Kingdom and Denmark while the only countries below Canada were Kazakhstan, the United States, China, Malaysia and Saudi Arabia.

Opposition speaks

CTV's Murray Oliver, reporting from Nairobi, said Ambrose wouldn't stop and talk with reporters when she arrived.

She insisted Sunday that Canada will manage to present a united front at the conference.

"The opposition makes a lot of noise back here at home, and that's their role," she told CTV's Question Period. "But we have the support of the international community. We are not isolated. We stand with every developed country, having many of the same challenges, many of the same criticisms and many of the same issues that we think need to be focused on."

Opposition MPs and environmentalists made it clear at a news conference in Nairobi, however, that they reject the government's position on Kyoto.

"The majority of Canadians are firmly and strongly behind living up to our Kyoto obligations," said Liberal environment critic John Godfrey.

Quebec Environment Minister Claude Bechard called on Ambrose to reaffirm Canada's commitment to the Kyoto Protocol.

"Until that's done, there's no point in talking about any targets whatever," Bechard said.

Ambrose is expected to tout the Conservative government's approach on climate change when she addresses the conference on Wednesday.

A news release says Ambrose will highlight Canada's "first-ever legislative plan to address air pollutants and greenhouse gas emissions" -- apparently meaning the recently-tabled Clean Air Act.

However, the government's many critics say the bill is fatally weak on reducing greenhouse gas emissions and is essentially a move away from Kyoto, the treaty that Canada ratified in 2002.

In ignoring Kyoto, the Conservatives' legislation promised to impose binding cuts only by 2020-2025.

Critics say this is a virtual abandonment of the treaty, although the Tories haven't said they are formally withdrawing from it.

The environment minister dismissed the criticism over the weekend, making no apologies for her repeated statements that Canada can't meet its targets for pollution reduction under Kyoto.

"Canada is in the protocol, we are being constructive, but we are also being realistic," Ambrose insisted on Question Period.

"This meeting is all about talking about what has worked, what hasn't, where do we go from here?"

Canada promised in the treaty to reduce emissions to six per cent below 1990 levels by 2008-2012. Instead, emissions under the Liberals rose 27 per cent to 758 million tonnes by 2004.

Ambrose has set a new goal of cutting emissions between 45 and 65 per cent from 2003 levels.

But her green plan promises to cut the emissions by 2050, a deadline that has attracted criticism both on domestic and international fronts.

China and the Group of 77 developing countries have lodged a formal complaint against Canada and a handful of other nations for failing to file progress reports that were required under the rules of the Kyoto treaty.

Chernushenko compared the current situation to Canada's stature following the 1992 Rio conference on sustainable development, when the Progressive Conservative government of Brian Mulroney was out front on the issues.

"Were we ever full of hope and was Canada ever seen as a leader on these issues. Wow, have we ever fallen," he said.

With a report from CTV's Lisa LaFlamme and files from The Canadian Press

U.N. says 2005 set Greenhouse Gas Record


By ELIANE ENGELER, Associated Press Writer 1 hour, 34 minutes ago

GENEVA - Heat-trapping greenhouse gases in the atmosphere reached a record high in 2005 and are still increasing, the U.N. weather agency said Friday.

The measurements coordinated by the World Meteorological Organization show that the global average concentrations of carbon dioxide, or CO2, and nitrous oxide, or N2O, reached record levels last year and are expected to increase even further this year, said Geir Braathen, a climate specialist at the Geneva-based agency.

"There is no sign that N2O and CO2 are starting to level off," Braathen said at the global body's European headquarters. "It looks like it will just continue like this for the foreseeable future."

The concentration of carbon dioxide rose by about 0.5 percent last year to reach 379.1 parts per million, according to the agency. Nitrous oxide has totaled 319.2 parts per billion, which is 0.19 percent higher than in 2004. Levels of methane, another so-called greenhouse gas, remained stable since last year, Braathen said.

Water vapor is the most common greenhouse gas, followed by CO2, N2O — produced by natural sources as well as fertilizers, tree burning and industry — and methane — produced by wetlands and other natural and human processes. There is 35.4 percent more carbon dioxide since the late 18th century primarily because of human burning for fossil fuels, the WMO statement said.

Scientists say that carbon dioxide and other gases primarily from fossil fuel-burning trap heat in the atmosphere and have warmed the Earth's surface an average 1 degree in the past century.

A report this week by British government warned that global warming would devastate the world economy on the scale of the world wars and the Great Depression if left unchecked.

It said such warming could have effects such as melting glaciers, rising sea levels, declining crop yields, drinking water shortages, higher death tolls from malnutrition and heat stress, and widespread outbreaks of malaria and dengue fever. Developing countries often would be the hardest hit.

The U.N. agency said it also has concluded that "greenhouse gases are some of the major drivers behind global warming and climate change."

Braathen said power plants, automobiles, ships and airplanes using coal, oil or gas were contributing to the rise in carbon dioxide emissions

"The increase in CO2 is linked to the burning of fossil fuels," he said.

WMO said it based its findings on readings from 44 countries that were collected in Japan.

The agency's findings come just ahead of the second meeting of the countries that adhered to the Kyoto Protocol — aimed at capping greenhouse gas emissions and staving off global warming — to be held in Nairobi, Kenya, Nov. 6-17. Under the 1997 Kyoto accord, 35 industrialized nations have committed to reducing emissions by an average 5 percent below 1990 levels by 2012. The United States, the biggest emitter, rejects the agreement.

Braathen said it would take time until the protocol, which has been in effect since last year only, leads to a reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and that countries need to do more.

"To really make CO2 level off, we need more drastic measures than are in the Kyoto Protocol today," he said.

On Monday, the U.N. climate treaty secretariat also reported that global greenhouse gas emissions are on the rise, with increased values from 34 industrialized nations between 2000 and 2004. In the United States, source of two-fifths of the industrialized world's greenhouse gases, emissions grew by 1.3 percent in that period, and by almost 16 percent between 1990 and 2004, the U.N. said.

A Kerry spokeswoman, Amy Brundage, said Kerry's prepared text had called for him to say: "Do you know where you end up if you don't study, if you aren't smart, if you're intellectually lazy? You end up getting us stuck in a war in Iraq. Just ask President Bush."

Kerry's remarks came during a campaign rally for California Democratic gubernatorial candidate Phil Angelides. Kerry opened his speech at Pasadena City College with several one-liners, saying at one point that Bush had lived in Texas but now "lives in a state of denial."

He then said: "You know, education, if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. If you don't, you get stuck in Iraq."

By JENNIFER LOVEN, Associated Press Writer 10 minutes ago

WASHINGTON - The White House and Sen. John Kerry traded their harshest accusations since the 2004 presidential race on Tuesday, with President Bush accusing the Democrat of troop-bashing and Kerry calling the president's men hacks who are "willing to lie."

The war of words, tough even for this hard-fought campaign season, came after Kerry told a group of California students on Monday that those unable to navigate the country's education system "get stuck in Iraq."

The two parties are searching for any edge amid indications Democrats could take back the House and possibly win control of the Senate in next week's midterm elections. Though neither Bush nor Kerry is on any ballot, the bitterness with which they fought each other as 2004 rivals spilled over as both campaign hard for their parties in a race shaped in large measure by public doubts about the Iraq war.

As Republicans demanded that Kerry apologize, a Democratic congressional candidate in a close race in Iowa canceled a campaign event with Kerry, saying the senator's comments were inappropriate. And Kerry canceled an appearance for a Democratic candidate in Minnesota.

White House press secretary Tony Snow was asked about Kerry's comment at his regular briefing with reporters, and had clearly come prepared with a lengthy attack. He said the quote "fits a pattern" of negative remarks about U.S. soldiers from the decorated Vietnam veteran and suggested that whether Democratic candidates — particularly those running on their military service backgrounds — agree with their 2004 standard-bearer should be a campaign litmus test.

Bush, campaigning later in Georgia, said Kerry's statement was "insulting and it is shameful."

"The members of the United States military are plenty smart and they are plenty brave and the senator from Massachusetts owes them an apology," Bush said during an appearance for a former GOP congressman, Mac Collins, who is trying to oust Democratic Rep. Jim Marshall (news, bio, voting record). There were boos at the mention of Kerry's name and cheers at Bush's call for an apology.

Kerry, who is considering another run for the White House in 2008, angrily fired back.

At a hastily arranged news conference in Seattle, Kerry said: "I apologize to no one for my criticism of the president and of his broken policy."

Kerry said the comment in question was "a botched joke about the president and the president's people, not about the troops ... and they know that's what I was talking about."

A Kerry spokeswoman, Amy Brundage, said Kerry's prepared text had called for him to say: "Do you know where you end up if you don't study, if you aren't smart, if you're intellectually lazy? You end up getting us stuck in a war in Iraq. Just ask President Bush."

Kerry's remarks came during a campaign rally for California Democratic gubernatorial candidate Phil Angelides. Kerry opened his speech at Pasadena City College with several one-liners, saying at one point that Bush had lived in Texas but now "lives in a state of denial."

He then said: "You know, education, if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. If you don't, you get stuck in Iraq."

That, Kerry said, was meant as a reference to Bush, not troops. Kerry said it is the president who owes U.S. soldiers an apology — for "a Katrina foreign policy" that misled the country into war in Iraq, failed to adequately study and plan for the aftermath, has not properly equipped troops and has expanded the terrorist threat.

"I'm sick and tired of a bunch of despicable Republicans who will not debate real policy, who won't take responsibility for their own mistakes, standing up and trying to make other people the butt of those mistakes," he said. "It disgusts me that a bunch of these Republican hacks who've never worn the uniform of our country are willing to lie about those who did."

Unsubstantiated allegations about Kerry's Vietnam War heroism from a group called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth figured prominently in the 2004 Kerry-Bush race.

In Iowa, a spokesman for Democratic congressional candidate Bruce Braley said Braley had decided independently to cancel an event with Kerry scheduled for Thursday. Braley, who is running against Republican Mike Whalen in the state's 1st District, said in a statement that the White House and Kerry should stop bickering and focus on how to change course in Iraq.

In Minnesota, Meredith Salsbery, a spokeswoman for Tim Walz, the Democratic candidate in the 1st congressional district, said Kerry canceled an appearance with Walz slated for Wednesday in Mankato. "He wants to make sure the campaign is about the issues we've been talking about the last two years," she said of Kerry's decision. "It's important to him that we are able to do that."

Other Republicans issued demands for an apology from Kerry.

GOP Sen. John McCain (news, bio, voting record), like Kerry a decorated Vietnam veteran and a potential 2008 rival, said while campaigning for Republican candidates in Indiana that "the suggestion that only the least educated Americans would agree to serve in the military and fight in Iraq is an insult to every soldier serving in combat today."

Added House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., struggling to keep his party in control of Congress: "Our soldiers risk their lives in the face of grave dangers on the battlefield, and no one who chooses to courageously and selflessly defend our country can be considered 'uneducated.'"

The national commander of the veterans group the American Legion, Paul A. Morin, called on Kerry to apologize for a "false and outrageous attack."

___

Associated Press writers Michael Blood in Los Angeles, Mike Smith in Indianapolis and Henry C. Jackson in Des Moines contributed to this report.