Good Morning! - Morning Headlines

Morning headlines brought to you by

Carolyn Kay
MakeThemAccountable.com

Top Story

It’s the Oil (by Jim Holt, thanks to Maha at the Mahablog, “Would You Pay $1 to Get $30?”)
Iraq is ‘unwinnable’, a ‘quagmire’, a ‘fiasco’: so goes the received opinion. But there is good reason to think that, from the Bush-Cheney perspective, it is none of these things. Indeed, the US may be ‘stuck’ precisely where Bush et al want it to be, which is why there is no ‘exit strategy’… The value of Iraqi oil, largely light crude with low production costs, would be of the order of $30 trillion at today’s prices. For purposes of comparison, the projected total cost of the US invasion/occupation is around $1 trillion… The occupation may seem horribly botched on the face of it, but the Bush administration’s cavalier attitude towards ‘nation-building’ has all but ensured that Iraq will end up as an American protectorate for the next few decades – a necessary condition for the extraction of its oil wealth.

Seeds of Doubt

The World

Bin Laden urges Iraq insurgents to unite
BAGHDAD - Osama bin Laden scolded his al-Qaida followers in Iraq and other insurgents, saying they have "been lax" for failing to overcome fanatical tribal loyalties and unite in the fight against U.S. troops.

Turkish FM rejects cease-fire
BAGHDAD - Turkey's foreign minister rejected any cease-fire by Kurdish rebels Tuesday as he met with Iraqi leaders in Baghdad to press them to crack down on the guerrillas. Turkish forces massed on the border and tensions rose over a threatened military incursion.

Walking a nuclear tightrope (Ha’aretz)
Russia is opposed to solving the crisis of the Iranian nuclear program by military means. It believes the Iranian leaders can still be convinced to postpone, at least for a while, the realization of their right to enrich uranium by themselves on a low level for civilian needs. That means (Russian president Vladimir) Putin will not agree, at least not publicly, neither by silence nor by a wink, to an American military attack against Iran, not to mention an Israeli one.

Afghan battle kills militants, civilians
KABUL, Afghanistan - NATO and Afghan troops called in airstrikes during a battle against insurgents that left 20 suspected militants but also several civilians dead, officials said Tuesday.

Pakistani politics gets dirty after Bhutto attack
KARACHI (Reuters) - Bad blood between Benazir Bhutto and President Pervez Musharraf's allies in Pakistan bubbled to the surface on Tuesday, after an attack on the opposition leader that killed 139 people four days earlier.

India's Gandhi to visit China as ties show strain
NEW DELHI (Reuters) - India's most powerful politician, Sonia Gandhi, heads to China this week to set the stage for a summit between the Asian heavyweights, as relations between the rivals show renewed signs of strain.

Polls see wide victory for Argentine first lady
BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) - Argentine first lady and senator Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner is set for a resounding victory in the presidential election one week away, according to 10 different polls published on Sunday.

Chile vows to expand Antarctic claims
SANTIAGO, Chile - Chile said Monday it will claim an extended portion of the Antarctic seabed to uphold its rights in the face of a similar step by Britain.

The Nation

Bush works to avert Turkish military incursion in Iraq
WASHINGTON — President Bush scrambled Monday to avert a full-scale military assault by Turkey against Kurdish rebels inside northern Iraq, urging Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki to stop cross border attacks by the separatist group known as the PKK. Bush also telephoned Turkish President Abdullah Gul to expressed "deep concern" over the killing of Turkish civilians and troops by the PKK and assured him that the United States would press Iraq to move on the group, the White House said.

Joint Chiefs Chairman Looks Beyond Current Wars
The new chairman (of the Joint Chiefs of Staff), Adm. Mike Mullen, … rejected the counsel of those who might urge immediate attacks inside Iran to destroy nuclear installations or to stop the flow of explosives that end up as powerful roadside bombs in Iraq or Afghanistan, killing American troops. With America at war in two Muslim countries, he said, attacking a third Islamic nation in the region “has extraordinary challenges and risks associated with it.” The military option, he said, should be a last resort.

Bush wants $46 billion more for wars
President Bush will ask Congress for another $46 billion to fund the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and finance other national security needs, The Associated Press has learned… To date, Congress has already provided more than $455 billion for the Iraq war, with stepped-up military operations running about $12 billion a month. The war has claimed the lives of more than 3,830 members of the U.S. military and more than 73,000 Iraqi civilians.

Report: Most of $1.2 billion to train Iraqi police unaccounted for
(CNN) -- The U.S. State Department is unable to account for most of $1.2 billion in funding that it gave to DynCorp International to train Iraqi police, a government report said Tuesday.

Bush seeks $500M for Mexican drug war
WASHINGTON - President Bush asked Congress on Monday to approve $500 million to help Mexico fight drug trafficking that spills over into the United States, the first installment of a $1.4 billion aid package for the U.S.'s southern neighbor.
And who will train the drug forces? The same people who “lost” that $1.2 billion: “Contractors may train Mexican drug forces”.—Caro

US official urges passage of trade deal
NEW YORK - The Bush administration warned Monday that failure by Congress to adopt a free trade agreement with Colombia would bolster the anti-American campaign of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.
Oh, no, don’t link me to a SOCIALIST! That’s worse than being linked to a TERRORIST!—Caro

Chertoff waives laws for border fence
WASHINGTON - Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff on Monday invoked his power to bypass certain laws to restart construction of a fence on the Arizona-Mexico border.

Power Outage Shuts Down Government Agency
Workers at the National Science Foundation (NSF) in Arlington, Va., have been sent home after a power outage forced the entire government agency to close. The Web site of the NSF, an agency that played a major role in the development of the Internet, is also out of service, with only a brief note explaining the reason for the shutdown.

Sanders to vote against Mukasey
WASHINGTON - Sen. Bernie Sanders said Monday he will vote against confirming Michael B. Mukasey, President Bush's nominee for attorney general. The former federal judge, Sanders said, would not adequately protect people's civil liberties.
Thank you, Senator Sanders!—Caro

Regulators Avoiding Intel Investigation?
WASHINGTON (AP) - Federal regulators appear to be resisting a formal probe of alleged anticompetitive practices of semiconductor giant Intel Corp., despite requests from members of Congress and corporate rivals.

Congress worried air safety data destroyed
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S. congressional committee ordered NASA on Monday to more quickly turn over records on a study the agency conducted on airline safety, fearful some data may have been suppressed or destroyed to protect the industry.

Rove Aide Heads for The Exits
Another day, another resignation. This time, it's Scott Jennings, who … gave the most infamous of (the government agency political) briefings, at the General Services Administration. After Jennings had finished his rundown of which GOP candidates were in trouble of losing reelection, GSA chief Lurita Doan asked aloud how GSA projects could be used to help "our candidates." Jennings reportedly replied that the top would be better discussed "off-line."

Persecution of The Body Snatcher
(Former attorney general Dick) Thornburgh's run-in with Alberto Gonzales' DoJ came via the case of Dr. Cyril Wecht, a celebrity forensic pathologist, prominent Pennsylvania Democrat, and up until his indictment on a raft of fraud charges, coroner of Allegheny County. Thornburgh is one of Wecht's defense lawyers, and his complaints stem from what he's called the "sheer intensity" of the investigation, which involves relatively minor accusations that Thornburgh says should have been handled by the state ethics commission… The most colorful of the charges, of course, involve the elaborate body snatching scheme: prosecutors allege that Wecht gave a local Catholic university unclaimed bodies in exchange for laboratory space.

Media

Permanent link to MTA daily media news

Okay, Ready? My Coordinates for a Successful News Site (by Jay Rosen)
√ High quality aggregation within a strong editorial focus. (Like the Huffington Post nationally, or Twin Cities Daily Planet locally.) √ Blogging platform with the best posts filtered to the front page. (Like Daily Kos, still the best at this.) √ Original reporting with hybrid strength, including amateurs with pro support (training, production values, copy editing, editorial oversight), pros with amateur support (like Regina Lynn; see also my Idea Lab post on beat reporting with a social network), and pros doing what pros have always done.
Click through for lots more ideas.—Caro

Plame Wilson On CIA Career
In an exclusive "60 Minutes" interview, ex-CIA operative Valerie Plame Wilson speaks with Katie Couric about being at the center of a White House scandal.
Click through to watch the video.—Caro

Preemptive Mythbuster: Is It Just Bush? (by Mark Thoma at Economist’s View)
Conservatives will do their best to convince us it's just Bush, it's not the movement itself that is at fault, but the Iraq war and other failures such as the push to privatize Social Security and eliminate the estate tax came with the full support and approval of conservatives. The bills the Republican congress sent to Bush that increased spending while cutting taxes were certainly not Bush acting alone… For the most part, he has been faithful to the conservative movement.

The Great Lie of Supply-Side Economics (by Mark Thoma of Economist’s View)
I've been frustrated with the press on the 'Laffer curve, tax cuts have paid for themselves' issue because the press has enabled a big lie. It's a lie Republican candidates, even the president, can still repeat with very little attention from the mainstream media. No matter how often reputable economists on the right and the left have said this is a lie, the press has ignored it and allowed it to continue unquestioned… The big lie matters, and the sooner the press starts to call politicians on it, the better for us all.
This example shows why we have two Americas. There’s the America that believes the folks who are highly paid to lie to them, and the one that doesn’t. No wonder we can’t work together on anything.—Caro

Fact Checker: Mostest (by Josh Marshall)
I've sort of gotten tired of explaining that, no, the Founding Fathers actually weren't all born-agains and bible thumpers. Not hardly… But presidential candidate and former Arkansas Governoer Mike Huckabee, himself a Baptist minister, actually told a crowd yesterday that "most" of the signers of the Declaration of Independence were "clergymen." As these folks at Politifact.com point out, one out of 56 were clergymen. It's a creative definition of 'most'.

Bush Says No To Children And Yes To War - Bin Laden Tape Shows Up Just In Time (by BillW at Crooks and Liars)
On Wed the House will have another hearing on the long-term cost of the war. The last time the figure was $1 trillion and it’s a no-brainer the new figure is going to be much higher… Also, surprise! (not) There’s a new bin Laden tape out, this time urging al Qaeda in Iraq and other insurgent groups to merge forces. His timing couldn’t possibly have been any better coordinated to conveniently help boogieman Congress into getting Bush all the money he wants, could it?

Sleazy hypocrites: What keeps me going on dark days (by Amanda Marcotte at Pandagon)
(Richard Mellon) Scaife’s no doubt sincere and deep horror at the mere idea of adultery—a horror that appears to have driven him to spend millions of dollars to punish the former President for it—seems to have hit a stumbling block... “(Private investigator Keith) Scannell followed Richard Scaife to nearby North Huntingdon, home of Doug’s Motel, a place where the TVs are bolted to the furniture and rooms can be rented in three-hour increments, for $28… There, according to Scannell, Scaife spent a few hours with Tammy Sue Vasco… The two usually met each other twice a week, for months.”

Clinton Finds Way to Play Along With Drudge
WASHINGTON, Oct. 21 — As Senator Barack Obama prepared to give a major speech on Iraq one morning a few weeks ago, a flashing red-siren alert went up on the Drudge Report Web site. It read, “Queen of the Quarter: Hillary Crushes Obama in Surprise Fund-Raising Surge,” and, “$27 Million, Sources Tell Drudge Report.” Mrs. Clinton’s aides declined to discuss how the Drudge Report got access to her latest fund-raising figures nearly 20 minutes before the official announcement went to supporters.

PLUTOCRATIC PATTERN! A professor newly arrived from Mars can’t explain all that strange Clinton hatred: (by Bob Somerby)
It would be hard to waste more ink than Alec MacGillis did in (a) front-page report. It appeared in Sunday’s Washington Post; spanning 1695 words, it helped us grasp the following points about the Clinton candidacy: 1. Some voters in upstate New York do not want Clinton to be president. 2. Other such voters are “ambivalent” about the prospect. (More specifically, you can still hear some voters say, “I don’t know if I want her to be president.”) 3. Some parts of Florida are more conservative than upstate New York.

Media Matters for America headlines

Beck: "(A) handful of people who hate America ... are losing their homes in a forest fire today"

Hannity dismissed Fox text-message polls as "just a lot of fun" when results favored Paul, but not when results favored Bush

AP reports on Limbaugh's "phony soldiers" comment have failed to correctly explain timeline of controversy

HuffPo Will Lose a Lot More Than Money If It Doesn't Pay Talent (By Simon Dumenco)
I understand that it's costly to build an editorial franchise of any sort; I've launched several websites and other editorial products myself, and I understand the need to be frugal -- cheap, even -- during launch mode. My point is simply that, long-term, the "We don't pay for content" mentality is not only insufferably arrogant, it's self-destructive… The media industry must find a way to engineer financial models that don't redefine journalism downward as, well, a hobby or pro bono work.

Technology & Science

Study: Most ID Thieves Don't Use Internet
According to a new study, identity thieves are typically young, work solo and, perhaps surprisingly, rely on the Internet for fewer than a fifth of their crimes.

Spammers turn to MP3s to deliver pitches
SAN JOSE, Calif. - Spam is now being served in audio form.

Laptop-Users Rejoice: FAA to Allow Fuel Cells on Flights
The digital logjam aloft has been broken. The Federal Aviation Administration has decided to draw up rules that will encourage the development of devices that air travelers can use in flight to power mobile devices for longer trips.

Phone Uses Jaw Bone to Transmit Sound
The Pantech phone uses bone conduction; when the phone is placed against your jaw, the mechanical vibration from the phone is conducted to your inner ear, which responds normally. The result: you hear the other person on the phone perfectly. A bone conduction cell phone has an additional advantage; it makes it easier to hear phone conversations in a noisy room.

Obsession with Pets at All-Time High
Whether they bark, meow, squeak, chirp or hiss, pets are treasured household members for most Americans at some point, and recent surveys show more and more people are welcoming animals into their homes and treating them as family.
They ARE family. It’s much less expensive, less time consuming, less constraining, and less risky to keep a pet than raise a child. Not only that, people with pets live longer than those who don’t have them.—Caro

Emotions Run Amok in Sleep-Deprived Brains
Without sleep, the emotional centers of our brains dramatically overreact to bad experiences, research now reveals.

Hearing loss warning on impotence drugs
WASHINGTON - Viagra and other impotence drugs are about to bear new warnings that users may experience sudden hearing loss.
Huh?—Caro

Shuttle Astronauts Arrive at Launch Pad
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – The seven STS-120 astronauts have arrived at Pad 39A where their shuttle Discovery awaits an 11:38 a.m. EDT (1528 GMT) liftoff. The astronauts will enter Discovery one by one, beginning with shuttle commander Pamela Melroy, to prepare for today’s launch.
Click through to watch the live video feed.—Caro

The Enduring Mysteries of the Sun
The sun lies at the heart of our solar system, but it still holds back many secrets from science. Unlocking these mysteries could shed light on puzzling activity seen in other stars and even safeguard lives.

Old Galaxy Finds Fountain of Youth
In a galaxy far, far away, a theft of cosmic proportions is taking place in an effort to claim the fountain of youth. A massive galaxy is stealing a billion suns worth of gas from a smaller galactic neighbor. In space, gas is a hot commodity. Really hot. In this case, about 1,340 degrees Fahrenheit (730 degrees Celsius). And it's great for making new stars.

Environment

California wildfires force hundreds of thousands to flee
LOS ANGELES (AFP) - Firefighters battled out-of-control wildfires in southern California on Tuesday that forced tens of thousands of people to flee their homes and prompted the deployment of National Guard soldiers.

World's carbon dioxide emissions rising at alarming rate
Just days after the Nobel prize was awarded for global warming work, an alarming new study finds that carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is increasing faster than expected.

Caribbean Urged to Face Warming Risks
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) - The Caribbean tourism industry, the lifeblood for many island economies, needs to brace itself for stronger hurricanes, more frequent droughts and rising sea levels resulting from global warming, scientists said Monday.

Drought Can Destroy Biodiversity
The skimmer and swimmer critters in ponds dried out by drought end up looking the same as each other when waters return, causing a decline in biodiversity, a new study finds. In worst-case outcomes, drops in biodiversity—the variety and number of species, in a given locale can lead to more serious consequences, such as resulting in ecosystem collapses that affect the web of life and food that supports all animals and humans.

Birth of Antarctic Iceberg Imaged from Space
Satellite images taken over the last year show the birth of an iceberg as it broke away from its parent glacier in Antarctica and drifted out to sea… The calving of large icebergs such as this one is a natural part of the life cycle of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS); a 34-year-long study showed that one of the icebergs breaks off every 5 to 10 years. The last such major iceberg calved away in 2001.

Plant-based plastics carving larger niche
Target offers shoppers an unusual message about its gift cards at some stores, advising that they are biodegradable. "Just make sure you spend them first," the displays conclude.

For more headlines, visit MakeThemAccountable.com.

One World

Caro