Today’s Headlines

Today’s headlines brought to you by

Carolyn Kay
MakeThemAccountable.com

Sorry for the delay in posting today - there were technical problems with my website.

Top Story

Angry Bush will stonewall CIA probe
President George W. Bush tried to stop Attorney General Michael Mukasey from launching a criminal investigation into the Central Intelligence Agency’s destruction of tapes showing torture of a prisoner and has ordered top White House officials to stonewall the probe, Capitol Hill Blue has learned. Bush is reportedly “livid” that Makasey went ahead with the investigation and even discussed firing the attorney general but senior administration officials talked the President out of taking an action that would add fuel to suspicions of a cover-up.

The Heretik

The World

U.S.-allied Sunnis are target of suicide attack in Iraq
BAGHDAD — An attacker wearing explosives blew up Wednesday at a checkpoint in the city of Baqouba that was manned by Sunni Muslims allied with U.S. forces. The attack, the latest in a recent rash of suicide bombings, killed four people and injured 23, police and Ministry of Interior officials said.

Iraq Shiite politician criticizes gov't
BAGHDAD - A top Shiite politician on Thursday acknowledged the contribution of U.S.-backed Sunni Arab groups to the decline in violence across Iraq and called for their use in the continuing fight against al-Qaida.

Hezbollah wants veto in Lebanon
BEIRUT, Lebanon - No president will be elected in Lebanon unless the Hezbollah-led opposition gets veto power in the future government, the leader of the militant group declared Wednesday.

Israel lashes out at Egypt over Gaza crossing
JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel accused Egypt on Thursday of undercutting Israeli-Palestinian peace prospects by letting about 2,200 Palestinian pilgrims return to the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip without Israeli screening.

Iran's Ayatollah: No smear campaigning
TEHRAN, Iran - Iran's top leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called Wednesday for clean campaigning during March parliament elections, urging candidates and their supporters to abstain from smearing rivals' reputations.

Pakistan opposition wants better security ahead of vote
ISLAMABAD (AFP) - Pakistan's opposition parties demanded better security Thursday as the nation prepared for a lengthy campaign ahead of February 18 elections, a week after the assassination of Benazir Bhutto.

Special forces on standby over nuclear threat
US special forces snatch squads are on standby to seize or disable Pakistan's nuclear arsenal in the event of a collapse of government authority or the outbreak of civil war following the assassination of Benazir Bhutto. The troops, augmented by volunteer scientists from America's Nuclear Emergency Search Team organisation, are under orders to take control of an estimated 60 warheads dispersed around six to 10 high-security Pakistani military bases.

British police said ready to head to Pakistan
LONDON (AFP) - A team of British police is preparing to leave for Pakistan to help investigate the killing of Benazir Bhutto and hopes to be ready in 24 hours, a Scotland Yard spokesman said Thursday.

The Nation

Criminal Probe on CIA Tapes Opened
The Justice Department said yesterday that it has opened a formal criminal investigation into the CIA's destruction of interrogation tapes, appointing a career prosecutor to examine whether intelligence officials broke the law by destroying videos of exceptionally harsh questioning of terrorism suspects… To oversee the probe, Mukasey appointed John Durham, a career federal prosecutor from Connecticut, bypassing the department's Washington headquarters and the local U.S. attorney's office in Alexandria, which recused itself from the case.

The CIA Tapes Prosecutor is Neither "Outside" Nor "Special," Nor "Independent" (by Marty Lederman at Balkinization)
Initial reports are that the Attorney General appointed an "outside" counsel to oversee the criminal investigation of the CIA tape destruction. But there's nothing really "outside" about John Durham. He's a career DOJ prosecutor, the number two official in the U.S. Attorney's Office in Connecticut… (T)he AG appointed Durham to … serve as "Acting United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia" for purposes of this matter. Durham will still report to the Deputy Attorney General, who in turn reports to Judge Mukasey. This is not like the Scooter Libby case, in which the "special" prosecutor was guaranteed substantial independence from Main Justice.

Top senator hits US sale of F-16s to Pakistan
WASHINGTON (AFP) - A senior US senator lashed the administration of President George W. Bush Wednesday for its decision to sell F-16 fighter jets to Pakistan, calling it a sign of a "dangerously misguided" policy toward Islamabad.

Doubts Raised on Technology Sales to China
WASHINGTON — Six months ago, the Bush administration quietly eased some restrictions on the export of sensitive technologies to China… (T)oday the administration is facing questions from weapons experts about whether some equipment — newly authorized for export to Chinese companies deemed trustworthy by Washington — could instead end up helping China modernize its military. Equally worrisome, the weapons experts say, is the possibility that China could share the technology with Iran or Syria.

Legal voters thrown off rolls
Five years after passage of a federal law to create electronic registration databases to deter voter fraud, the new technology is posing hurdles that could disenfranchise thousands of legal voters, a USA TODAY examination finds.
Disenfranchisement of likely Democratic voters was always the objective.—Caro

Months of campaigning come down to final hours in Iowa
After countless visits, dozens of policy speeches, more than $40 million in television advertising, and months -- if not years -- of building statewide political operations, the battle for Iowa comes down to one simple reality: The Republican and Democrat who turns out the most supporters wins the day. And a win or a loss in the Iowa caucuses could very well determine the next president of the United States.

Basic facts on the Iowa caucuses
Some questions and answers about the Iowa caucuses this Thursday

Independents plan to caucus with Dems
Recent polls have shown the percentage of Iowa independents planning to participate in the Democrat caucuses is far higher than those who say they’ll caucus for Republicans. Turnout for the Democrats is projected to be higher than Republicans, perhaps double.

New Poll: Iowa, New Hampshire Have Too Much Influence
According to a new AP/Yahoo survey, just over half of all American voters believe New Hampshire and Iowa "have an extraordinary amount of influence" over who wins the Democratic and Republican presidential nominations. "Fewer than one in five voters said they favor the current system that allows Iowa and New Hampshire to hold the first contests, while nearly 80 percent would rather see other states get their chance at the front of the line."

Mitt Romney Is A National Embarassment (by tristero at Hullabaloo)
I suppose Romney's saying that the "enormous impact" of Monica's blowjob "on the culture our country" was responsible for Trent Lott's racist defense of Strom Thurmond, the substance abuse problems of Jeb Bush's daughter, the meth-fueled extramarital sex sessions of the former Reverend Ted Haggard, Larry Craig's widening stance, Bush/Iraq war supporter Brittney Spears' shaved head, and maybe even Cheney's inebriated behavior around loaded shotguns. Or maybe Romney has in mind serial adulterers in his own party like Scaife, Gingrich, Hyde, and Giuliani. Who knew a little fellatio was so insidious that it could cause David Addington and Alberto Gonzalez to countenance torture, or Tom Delay to use the Office of Homeland Security to help subvert the legislature of Texas? Or perhaps Romney had in mind the slimy christianist activists who Judge Jones accused of lying to a court of law during Kitzmiller v. Dover. Yes, this is all the Clintons' fault.

The Cost of a Free Lunch (Reason Online, thanks to Economist’s View)
(David Cay Johnston:) What I’m asking in (Free Lunch: How The Wealthiest Americans Enrich Themselves At Government Expense (and Stick you With the Bill)) is: Are you better off than you were a generation ago when Reagan was elected? Government is just as big, there are vastly more regulations, and as I show, we have many new rules and regulations that handcuff the invisible hand of the market and instead, in subtle, sometimes hidden, ways, extract money from the pockets of the many and funnel it to the politically connected few. It’s the very thing that Adam Smith said would ruin the benefits of markets.

Monster online jobs index falls in December
NEW YORK (Reuters) - A gauge of U.S. online labor demand plunged in December to its lowest level since January 2007, as a year-end seasonal slowdown met further moderation in online recruiting, a report showed on Thursday.

Media

Permanent link to MTA daily media news

"You Don't Understand Our Audience": What I learned about network television at Dateline NBC (by John Hockenberry, writing at the MIT Technology Review, thanks to Economist’s View)
Networks are built on the assumption that audience size is what matters most. Content is secondary; it exists to attract passive viewers who will sit still for advertisements. For a while, that assumption served the industry well. But the TV news business has been blind to the revolution that made the viewer blink: the digital organization of communities that are anything but passive. Traditional market-driven media always attempt to treat devices, audiences, and content as bulk commodities, while users instead view all three as ways of creating and maintaining smaller-scale communities. As users acquire the means of producing and distributing content, the authority and profit potential of large traditional networks are directly challenged.
Sadly, the prevalence of funding new media solely by advertising will simply ensure the continuation of seeking audience size at the expense of content. I have called for user subscriptions to offset the dependence on advertising, but to no avail.. This is a long but important story for understanding the mindset of those in control of old media, and I hope you will take the time to read the whole piece.—Caro

Free WSJ.com Would Need 12x Traffic To Offset Loss; DJ Buy To Shave A Penny From NWS: Analyst (by Joseph Weisenthal at Paid Content)
Turning WSJ.com into a free site would require a 12x increase in traffic growth to offset the lost revenue, according to a new report from Bear Stearns analyst Spencer Wang. WSJ.com revenue is currently pegged at $78 million annually, based on an estimated 989,000 subscribers paying $79/year. Including non-subscriber traffic, the company claims 122.4 million monthly page views. Based on an estimated CPM of $6 and a few other assumptions about sell-through rate and ad impressions per page, Wang arrives at the 12x conclusion. So that’s the math, but is it achievable? That’s where things get dicier.
Part of the difference between the WSJ and the NYT could be that WSJ subscriptions are more likely to be paid for by one’s company than by oneself.—Caro

Memories of oil futures past (by Paul Krugman)
Rupert Murdoch, on the eve of the invasion of Iraq: “The greatest thing to come out of this for the world economy, if you could put it that way, would be $20 a barrel for oil. That’s bigger than any tax cut in any country.” Not so much.
Why do rich media moguls get to determine our future? See “Oil Hits $100 a Barrel for the First Time”.—Caro

Should Big Media Choose Our Candidates?
Why should ABC and Fox get to decide who is a viable candidate for president?

Toobin on Mukasey’s Criminal probe of the CIA’s destroyed tapes… (by John Amato at Crooks and Liars)
CNN’s Ed Henry talks about the Keane/Hamilton op-ed and Jeffrey Toobin discusses the new criminal probe of the destroyed CIA tapes led by John Durham.
Click through to watch the video.—Caro

Fox News guest: sex ed boosters want kids to get STDs.
During the Dec. 31 broadcast of Fox News’ Special Report, Concerned Women for America President Wendy Wright claimed that proponents of comprehensive sex education are trying to “encourage” sex because “they benefit when kids end up having sexually transmitted diseases, unintended pregnancies and then they lead them into having abortions.” She then added, “You have to look at the financial motives behind those who are promoting comprehensive sex ed.”
Click through to watch the video.—Caro

Bhutto coverage emblematic of foreign policy coverage issues (by A.J. Rossmiller at Crooks and Liars)
From the American perspective, generally speaking, analysis of foreign leaders too often goes something like this: Speaks English? Sophisticated. Speaks language of country of origin? Backwater. Went to an Ivy League school? Moderate. Educated anywhere in the Eastern Hemisphere? Extremist. Appreciates single malt? A partner for peace. Eschews the party circuit? Untrustworthy. And through these heuristics, you get things like people predicting electoral victories of, for example, Iraq's Allawi and Chalabi the day before Sadr and Hakim sweep the polls. It's very frustrating.

Carlisle: Conservatives should do more investigative reporting
John Carlisle notes that many newspapers are cutting their investigative reporting teams and relying on nonprofit organizations to fill the gap. "If conservative nonprofit organizations significantly increase their use of investigative reporting, then the movement will be able to partly offset the liberal bias of the mainstream media," he writes. "Despite their political agenda, newspapers and TV networks like scandals simply because they make great headlines. Experience shows that they will cover scandals exposed by conservatives."
Actually, experience shows that newspapers and TV networks cover almost exclusively scandals exposed by conservatives. Scandals exposed by liberals are barely covered at all.—Caro

Drug Safety, Tainted Food Among Year's Top Health Stories
A big stem cell advance and a jump in the number of uninsured also made the list.
But important aspects of health care have been very poorly covered. See below.—Caro

Medicare Mystery (by Trudy Lieberman at Columbia Journalism Review)
A recent retirement column posted on businessweek.com/investing questioned the silence about Medicare and other retirement issues. The writer, Ellen Hoffman, scanned position papers, statements, and tried, sometimes without success, to get more information from campaign staffs. It’s a hopeful sign that she tried… Here’s a case where the press needs to lead rather than wait for the spinmeisters to decide what gets covered.

Technology & Science

Rivalry over wireless high-def TVs
NEW YORK - Flat-panel TVs look lovely on a wall — the cords hanging from them, less so. After a few years of false starts, the industry finally seems close to tackling that problem. At least three dueling wireless technologies for high-definition TVs will be on display at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, which starts Monday.
I look forward to the day when we don’t need any wires at all. Even power will be provided to our devices and appliances by radio frequency signals.—Caro

Cell phone users tie up traffic: study
CHICAGO (Reuters) - If you're late for work, a driver using a cell phone may be to blame. U.S. researchers said on Wednesday that people who use cell phones while behind the wheel impede the flow of traffic, clog highways and extend commute times.

Happiness may be good for your health
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - A happy heart just might be a healthier one as well, new research suggests.

What to Expect in 2008: Work, Work, Work
If you've resolved to work less or cut stress in 2008, expect to break your resolution. A surprisingly large segment of the global workforce spends long hours on the job, despite all the time-saving promises of technology. In fact, technology simply brings more work for many, as modern communication devices erase boundaries between work and home.

The Modern Vacation: Fully Wired, Totally Ruined
"If I were a manager, I would insist that my employees leave their cell phones at work during vacation and not check their e-mail while away," (said Dov Eden, an organizational psychologist at Tel Aviv University). "In the long run, the employee will be better rested and better able to perform his or her job because true respite affords an opportunity to restore depleted psychological resources."

Snorting a Brain Chemical Could Replace Sleep
A nasal spray containing a naturally occurring brain hormone called orexin A reversed the effects of sleep deprivation in monkeys, allowing them to perform like well-rested monkeys on cognitive tests. The discovery's first application will probably be in treatment of the severe sleep disorder narcolepsy.
Considering all the recent research finding how important sleep is to our bodily functions, color me skeptical on the long-term effects of chemical sleep deprivation.

Most Free Drug Samples Go to Wealthy and Insured
Study undercuts notion that they're given to help the poor, some experts say

Scientists look to sperm to power nanobots
A tiny assembly line that powers the whip-like tail of sperm could be harnessed to send future nanobots or other tiny medical devices zooming around the human body, according to a preliminary research report.

Survey: 61 Percent Agree with Evolution
Americans would rather hear about evolution from scientists than from judges or celebrities, according to a new survey that finds a majority agree that evolution is at work among living things.
This is actually very good news. The polls I heard about a couple of years ago said that only 30 percent of Americans believe in evolution.—Caro

Must-See Meteor Shower Friday Morning
The Quadrantid meteor shower is due to reach maximum in the predawn hours of Friday, Jan. 4. The Quadrantids are notoriously unpredictable, but if any year promises a fine display, this could be it.

Environment

Global Warming May Reduce Carbon Sink Capacity In Northern Forests
ScienceDaily (Jan. 3, 2008) — An international study investigating the carbon sink capacity of northern terrestrial ecosystems discovered that the duration of the net carbon uptake period (CUP) has on average decreased due to warmer autumn temperatures.

Fifteen states sue EPA over auto emissions
HARTFORD, Connecticut (Reuters) - Fifteen states said on Wednesday they filed a lawsuit against the federal Environmental Protection Agency in a bid to tighten regulations of greenhouse gas emissions from cars.

Small Businesses to Get Energy Efficiency Help
WASHINGTON, Jan. 3, 2007 -- The energy bill signed into law last month includes provisions that will offer low-cost loans to small businesses working on energy efficiency projects for their operations.

ShipGreen Offers Retailers a Web-Based Program to Offset Carbon Emissions from Shipping
Through the pioneering work of Dr. Cristiano Facanha of ICF International and Dr. Arpad Horvath of the University of California at Berkeley, ShipGreen.net now offers a web-based program that integrates with retailers’ online shopping carts, enabling consumers to easily — and accurately — offset the carbon produced from product life-cycle shipping emissions.

For more headlines, visit MakeThemAccountable.com.

;-)

Happy New Year, Caro!

:kick:

I'd heard of your site but I didn't visit it until just now. Very good job. Keep posting here! :hi:

:kick:

Caro