Blue's News

Yeah, there was Bush's speech, but there was also some real news yesterday...

NY Times: "Democrats Step Up Criticism of Halliburton Billing in Iraq"

WASHINGTON, June 27 - Democratic legislators stepped up criticism of the Halliburton Company on Monday for what they said was "war profiteering," citing Pentagon audits that question more than $1 billion of the company's bills for work in Iraq.

The estimates of excessive spending and improper billing by Halliburton, a Texas-based company that provides logistical support and oil-field repairs in Iraq, are more than twice as high as those in previous official reports. The findings, including previously unpublicized internal Pentagon studies, were released at a Democrat-sponsored forum that was held, Democratic leaders maintained, because the Bush administration and Congressional Republicans have refused to hold the contractor accountable...

The hearing featured videotaped testimony from a former food manager in Iraq for Kellogg Brown & Root who said the dining hall where he worked in early 2004 charged the Army for 20,000 meals a day when it was only serving 10,000, routinely used expired foods and punished him for speaking to auditors by transferring him to the more dangerous outpost of Falluja...

Under the contract, the company is reimbursed for its actual costs and then paid a premium of 1 percent to 3 percent, depending on performance. Critics say this arrangement gave the company an incentive to inflate costs and ignore wasteful practices.

San Jose Mercury News: "State Guard forms anti-terrorism intelligence unit"

SACRAMENTO - Three decades after aggressive military spying on Americans created a national furor, California's National Guard has quietly set up a special intelligence unit that has been given ''broad authority'' to monitor, analyze and distribute information on potential terrorist threats, the Mercury News has learned.

Known as the Information Synchronization, Knowledge Management and Intelligence Fusion program, the project is part of an expanding nationwide effort to better integrate military intelligence into global anti-terrorism initiatives.

Although Guard officials said the new unit would not collect information on American citizens, top National Guard officials have already been involved in tracking at least one recent Mother's Day anti-war rally organized by families of slain American soldiers, according to e-mails obtained by the Mercury News.

Associated Press: "Town says Patriot Act lets stations bar homeless"

NEWARK, N.J. (AP) The USA Patriot Act allows the government to find out which books and Internet sites a person has seen. It also lets investigators secretly search someone's home and monitor people's phone calls and e-mail, all in the name of fighting terrorism.

Now, a New Jersey town being sued for kicking homeless people out of a train station claims the Patriot Act allows it to do that as well.

In an answer to a federal lawsuit brought by a homeless man, Richard Kreimer, who objected to being told to leave the Summit train station, the city says its conduct is protected by the Patriot Act and the lawsuit should be barred. The city cited a section of the law regarding "attacks and other violence against mass transportation systems."

Reuters: "Iraqi students say arrested for wearing jeans"

NAJAF, Iraq (Reuters) - Students in the Shi'ite Muslim religious Iraqi city of Najaf said that police recently arrested and beat several of them for wearing jeans and having long hair.

"They arrested us because of our hair and because we were wearing jeans," said student Mohammed Jasim, adding that the arrests took place two weeks ago in the city, the spiritual heart of Iraq's newly dominant Shi'ite majority.

"They beat us in front of the people. Then they took us to their headquarters, beat us again, shaved our heads and tore our clothes.

"When we asked what we had done, they said that we had no honor," he told Reuters this week.

Police in Najaf, a conservative city that some residents say has grown more so since
Saddam Hussein was overthrown two years ago and religious Shi'ites gained greater power in Iraq, disputed the students' version of events.

"We didn't oppress any freedoms. We detained them for a while and after we knew that they were students, we released them after they pledged they wouldn't do it again," Colonel Najah Yasir told Reuters.

Washington Post: "Soro's Nats Bid Irks Republicans"

Major League Baseball hasn't narrowed the list of the eight bidders seeking to buy the Washington Nationals and some Republicans on Capitol Hill already are hinting at revoking the league's antitrust exemption if billionaire financier George Soros , an ardent critic of President Bush and supporter of liberal causes, buys the team.

"It's not necessarily smart business sense to have anybody who is so polarizing in the political world," Rep. John E. Sweeney (R-N.Y.) said. "That goes for anybody, but especially as it relates to Major League Baseball because it's one of the few businesses that get incredibly special treatment from Congress and the federal government.

Rep. Tom M. Davis III (R-Va.), who was a strong supporter of bringing a baseball team to Virginia, told Roll Call yesterday that "Major League Baseball understands the stakes" if Soros buys the team. "I don't think they want to get involved in a political fight."

That's a nice anti-trust exemption you've got there. Be a shame if something were to happen to it. Jeez.

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