What you won't read in our papers

Tehran Times: 'A Country That Has... Uranium Enrichment Is Only One Step Away from Producing Nuclear Weapons; This Step Is Not a Scientific or a Technical [One] – But a Matter of Political Decision'
By: Y. Mansharof

On April 10, 2007, after several postponements, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad delivered his long-promised message "that will gladden all Muslims" at Iran's Nuclear Day festivities. [1] During the day's main rally, held at the nuclear facility at Natanz, Ahmadinejad said that Iran was now manufacturing nuclear fuel on an industrial scale. [2]

At this stage, senior Iranian nuclear program officials are not saying exactly how many centrifuges are operating at Natanz, apparently out of fear of a possible military attack by the West. [3] At the same time, both senior officials and the Iranian media are stressing the importance of this accomplishment, and that it marks the point of no return in Iran's nuclearization process.

With this announcement, the Iranian regime is apparently trying to achieve two aims. The first is to announce its nuclear progress despite U.N. sanctions and international pressure, and thus to deter a possible attack on its nuclear facilities. The second is to reduce domestic criticism following the increase in Western pressures and sanctions. [4]

The following are excerpts from Ahmadinejad's April 10 speech and from statements by other senior Iranian officials, as well as from the Iranian press, on the issue.

Ahmadinejad: Iran Now Producing Nuclear Fuel on an Industrial Scale

"I declare today, in all pride, that from this day, Iran is among the countries producing nuclear fuel on an [industrial] scale... Today, Iran's enemies are embarrassed by Iran's progress in various areas... According to a pre-set program, the Iranian government is determined to produce at least 20,000 megawatts of nuclear electricity according to a specific timetable... We warmly shake the hands of all governments interested in holding talks with us and in cooperating with us in this area.

"I [address] the governments that have so far refused to come to terms with today's reality and with the Iranian people's right [to develop nuclear technology], and demand that they stop acting aggressively, illogically, hostilely, and in violation [of the law] towards Iran. [They had better] know that every member of the Iranian people stands fast behind its leaders, out of knowledge, faith, and absolute unity, and [that the Iranian people] will defend its right to the end... The [Western countries] should know that the path of the progress of the Iranian people is irreversible... They must pay attention, and do nothing to cause this brave and great people to reconsider the way it deals with them. [Western countries] have tried this [hostile] approach several times, and have seen that this [Iranian] people is capable of [reconsidering its approach towards them]..." [5]

Larijani: We Are Rapidly Advancing Towards 54,000 Centrifuges

In an interview with the Iranian daily Kayhan, which is identified with Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, Iranian Supreme National Security Council Secretary Ali Larijani, who is in charge of Iran's nuclear dossier, confirmed that UF6 gas had been injected into centrifuges installed in the uranium enrichment facility at Natanz. He said, "[The Western countries] must in any event accept a nuclear Iran... We are moving vigorously along the path of obtaining... 54,000 centrifuges... The sanctions against us [UNSC Resolution 1747] have had no effect, and will have no effect, on our movement towards this goal [in the future]..." [6]

Larijani also noted that the purpose of the nuclear program could change. He said, "We are not interested in such a thing taking place, but when we encounter the ill temper and exaggerations of [the West,] we are pressured by the Majlis, and could make different decisions." [7]

With regard to the number of centrifuges at Natanz, Larijani said, "The number of centrifuges doesn't matter. But we have a work output of 3,000 centrifuges. This level and above is considered industrial..." [8]

Aghazadeh: We Are Aiming to Operate 50,000 Centrifuges

Iranian Atomic Energy Organization director Gholam Reza Aghazadeh also refused to indicate the precise number of centrifuges operating in Natanz. He said, "Iran's program is not to install and operate only 3,000 centrifuges at the Natanz uranium enrichment facilities, but 50,000... We planned and invested for [the installation of] 50,000 centrifuges. The infrastructure that has been established - including equipment for air filtering, electricity, a new air supply, and everything required for this industry - was for 50,000 centrifuges... I intentionally did not indicate any number [in my speech at the Natanz celebrations]... because I wanted no misunderstandings in the foreign media, [and I did not want] them to think that Iran's [nuclear program] included [only] 3,000 centrifuges...

"[The situation is] quite the opposite. As we enter the industrial stage, the installation of the centrifuges will be carried out on an ongoing basis, until all 50,000 [centrifuges] are installed... Our declaration that we have entered the stage [of producing nuclear fuel] on an industrial [scale means] that there is no turning back." [9]

At the Natanz celebrations, Aghazadeh stressed that "despite the commitments we have received from [various] countries, no expert or [external] company has stood by us... but despite these challenges, obstacles, and problems, Iran was determined to realize, by means of its creative young people, its nuclear program - which includes peaceful purposes, with the first priority being to produce a nuclear fuel cycle as supreme science in nuclear technology... and in the past year our young scientists have managed to produce 270 tons of UF6.

"Not long ago, [producing] this important substance was far from the imagination of our country's nuclear researchers and scientists. But finally, we managed to attain [enrichment of] uranium, at [a level of] 3.5% to 5%... Now, as we enter mass production of centrifuges and begin to produce [nuclear fuel] on an industrial [scale], we are taking one more step towards the flowering of Iran..." [10]

Aghazadeh also pointed out, "Now that Iran has entered into production of nuclear fuel on an industrial [scale], there will be no limit on the production of nuclear fuel in Iran... This is the accomplishment of some 3,000 expert scientists and the best of the forces that worked in the past year night and day at the Natanz facility." [11]

Kayhan Editor: Only One More Step to Nuclear Fuel Production

In an April 10 lecture on the current state of Iran's nuclear dossier to students and lecturers at Babol University for the Medical Sciences in Mazandaran, Hossein Shariatmadari, editor of the Kayhan daily which is close to Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, said, "A country that has attained the knowledge and technology of uranium enrichment is only one step away from producing nuclear weapons. This [additional] step is not a scientific or a technical step, but a matter of political decision. But Iran announced several times that it would never produce nuclear weapons..." Shariatmadari added that Iran had decided to install at least 60,000 centrifuges. [12]

Kayhan: "The West Must Expect a Shock from Iran at Any Moment"

In an April 10, 2007 editorial headlined "Strategy of Ambiguity," Kayhan noted that since Iran had reached the point of no return in its nuclear program, it could shape its nuclear program in accordance with its political aspirations. The paper said that Iran was now acting far from the eyes of the International Atomic Energy Agency, and that this will enable it to surprise the West - which should at any moment expect an earthshaking announcement from Iran. The following are the main points of the editorial:

"Yesterday, Iran crossed the nuclear point of no return. Now it is for all practical purposes a nuclear state, and in light of this reality, its name should carry a different weight [than in the past] in any kind of regional or super-regional security balance... From now on, Iran is freed from technical limitations, and can choose the goals of its nuclear program.

"We will see in which [direction] Iran's political aspiration will incline. If Iran is subjected to threats, and others want to act [against it] illegally, the direction its desire will take is clear. If it is treated without rules and laws - which is what is actually happening - Iran will have a different aspiration [than it has today]... What is important is that Iran now has the backing it needs in order to choose any direction it wants.

"The event yesterday at Natanz sent a crystal-clear message to the West: the path you are following is mistaken... Iran is following two paths: one, the path of rapid progress in its technical work, and two, the gradual reduction of the IAEA's access to its nuclear facilities...

"Under the current threatening and unjust conditions, Iran has decided to employ a strategy of ambiguity. Since Iran's nuclear dossier was illegally returned to the U.N. Security Council, the eyes of the IAEA - the intelligence agency of the West - are finding it more difficult every day [to monitor Iran's activities]. When [the IAEA] reported on [Iran's nuclear dossier] to the Security Council last winter, Iran announced that it would no longer be implementing the Additional Protocol. A few months later, when sanctions resolution 1737 was issued, Iran began to install 3,000 centrifuges at Natanz... When sanctions resolution 1747 was passed, Iran further reduced IAEA access [to its nuclear facilities] by stopping the implementation of the agreements connected to the 'Safeguards Agreement.'

"Now, when less than 15 days of the two-month extension given to Iran under 1747 remain, Iran celebrates its entrance into the club of the [countries] producing nuclear fuel on an industrial [scale]. The path is completely clear... From now on, Westerners must expect a shock from Iran at any moment. It is true that our hands are tied in the Security Council, and that we have no great ability to restrain their [i.e. the West's] aggression. But the Westerners must not forget that Iran's hands are completely free in its nuclear facilities, and that any sanctions resolution in New York... accelerates our technological progress at Natanz. The new surprise has begun...

"According to [Iran's] obligations under the agreement [with the IAEA], it is required to inform the IAEA only 180 days before bringing nuclear material into its facilities. That is, Iran... can patiently plan and build the facilities it wants, and inform the IAEA [only] when the work is finished. True, under the 'Safeguards Agreement,' (known as Section 3.1), any country that recognizes [the agreement] must inform the IAEA about its nuclear facilities as soon as it begins construction (not [180 days] before the facility begins operation). But Iran - which implemented this agreement since May 2003 - announced following sanctions resolution 1747 that it would stop [abiding by Section 3.1]... This is precisely the strategy of ambiguity." [13]

In another editorial, published April 11, 2007 and headlined "Duel with an Unloaded Gun," Kayhan said, "Now America has expended all the bullets in its clip. Now, it is Iran that will decide, in the face of the shocked world, on the 'news' and the 'event' with which it will strike the superpowers at their weak points and their Achilles heel. Iran still has great wisdom in its clip - and each bullet of wisdom prepares the ground for new opportunities, and makes Iran's hands more skilled... America is now dealing with the deadly hail of Iran's wisdom..." [14]

Resalat: Iran Has Become an Influential Force on a Global Scale

An article published April 11, 2007 by the conservative daily Resalat stressed that Iran's entrance into the club of countries producing nuclear fuel on an industrial scale had been attained by relying solely on domestic capabilities. It also stated that the West was helpless in the face of this achievement, and that whether it continued to object to Iran's nuclearization or recognized its right to do so, Iran had won. The following are the main points of the article:

"On the day of the nuclear celebrations, Iran took another [significant] step on the path to the country's progress and flowering. With the beginning of the production of nuclear fuel on an industrial [scale], Iran has joined the limited group of countries that [possess this capability]. When it declared that it was producing nuclear fuel on an industrial [scale], Iran reached the point of no return of nuclear technology, and today we are recognized as an influential power in the regional and world balance.

"The phenomenal progress of Iran's scientists in producing nuclear fuel and in injecting [UF6] gas into 3,000 centrifuges is significant... because no foreign country or organization helped Iran in the slightest, and because Iran's nuclear technology is completely domestic...

"Now, in light of their progress, which brings pride to the sons of the Iranian people, the powers of arrogance [i.e. the West, headed by the U.S.] stand before two paths: Either they continue on the path of their hostility towards Iran - and if they do, they will make the Iranian people determined to conquer the highest peaks of science - or they officially recognize the legal right of the Iranian people, and stop being stubborn. In either case, victory will be with the great Iranian people... Our experience with the difficulties raised by Russia in operating the Bushehr nuclear reactor, and its failure to send nuclear fuel to this reactor, have proven that others cannot be trusted..." [15]

Tehran Times Editor: Recognize Iran's Nuclear Rights - Or "The World Will Again Witness the Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons"

In an article in the Iranian daily Tehran Times, which is identified with Iran's Foreign Ministry, Pervez Ismaili, who is also the editor-in-chief of the conservative Iranian news agency Mehr, stated that the West must recognize Iran's nuclear rights, because Iran had reached the point of no return in its nuclear program. The following are the main points of the article, in the original English:

"...What happened in Iran on Monday provides a great opportunity for the international community. In the current situation, particularly since the 1990s, all nuclear tensions are focused on the idea that there is only a short distance between attaining the expertise required for gaining access to the complete nuclear fuel cycle to produce nuclear fuel for peaceful purposes and using that ability to produce nuclear weapons…

"However, the West's severe reaction to Iran's transparent nuclear measures will certainly encourage developing countries to limit transparency or even to establish secret underground installations and eventually withdraw from the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) in order to maintain their national interests… If the international community fails to resolve the current crisis as soon as possible by accepting Iran's model, the world will again witness the proliferation of nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction in the near future, regardless of the outcome of the confrontation with Iran…" [16]

* Y. Mansharof is a research fellow at MEMRI.

Iran

Crazy Liberal Mom Still Stalking Dems to end the War

Marine's Mom Arrested at Pelosi's Office

Apr 16 04:56 PM US/Eastern
By FREDERIC J. FROMMER
Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) - The mother of a Marine who tried to kill himself after two tours of duty in Iraq was arrested Monday while protesting the war outside the office of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
Tina Richards of Salem, Ore., was charged with disorderly conduct, said Sgt. Kimberly Schneider, a U.S. Capitol Police spokeswoman. Schneider said Richards would be issued a citation and released.

Drew Hammill, a spokesman for Pelosi, D-Calif., said Richards was with a group of 15 to 20 protesters when she was arrested in the hallway outside the speaker's office.

Gael Murphy, a spokesman for Codepink, an anti-war group that helped organize the protest at Pelosi's office, said Richards was arrested after chanting anti-war statements.

"I have been trying to meet with Speaker Pelosi since November because she needs to listen to the moms and other women affected by the war," Richards said in a statement.

Hammill said Richards' request for a meeting with Pelosi is pending. "She's met repeatedly with staff, and we've passed her concerns to the speaker," he said.

Last month, Richards confronted Rep. David Obey, D-Wis., chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, in her effort to persuade lawmakers to cut off funding for the war. That exchange was videotaped and played widely on YouTube.

"You can't end the war if you vote against the supplemental. It's time these idiot liberals understand that," Obey told her during the exchange. He later apologized.

Krauthammer on Iraq (CM)

Charles Krauthammer writes that “14 of the 18 tribal leaders in Anbar have turned against al-Qaeda…[Gen. David] Patraeus is "trying now to complete the defeat of the Sunni insurgents in Baghdad” while "simultaneously pursuing and suppressing Shiite militias.”
Does this sound like the time to give up and let these forces take over the country?
Krauthammer also agrees with the points I make in my latest column that it simply not true that last election was a call by voters for America to accept defeat in Iraq. Read the whole piece here.

Another Hostage taken by Iran

Report: Radio reporter held in Iran
Sun. 15 Apr 2007
Associated Press

PRAGUE, Czech Republic (AP) - The U.S.-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty said Saturday that Iranian authorities have prevented one of its journalists from leaving the country.

Parnaz Azima, who is based in Prague where she works for Radio Farda - Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty's Persian service operated jointly with the Voice of America radio broadcaster - arrived in the capital, Tehran, on Jan. 25 to visit a sick relative, the broadcaster said in an e-mailed statement.

On arrival, authorities seized her Iranian passport and have failed to return it to her, it said. It was not clear what the reason was. The statement said Azima was once asked to cooperate with Iran's intelligence services, which she refused.

Azima has dual Iranian and U.S. citizenship, the radio said.

"I call on the Iranian authorities to return Ms. Azima's passport and to allow her to leave Iran without further delay," said Jeffrey Gedmin, the broadcaster's president. "There is no reason to prevent this talented journalist from returning to her professional duties immediately.''

The broadcaster is a private, nonprofit corporation that receives funding from the U.S. government. It was established in 1949 to spread pro-Western news and promote democratic values and institutions in countries behind the Iron Curtain.

The station moved its headquarters to Prague from Munich, Germany, in 1995, after the collapse of communism.

It has broadcast in 28 languages to 20 countries, including Iran and Iraq since 1998, and Afghanistan from 2002.

In the past, Iran put diplomatic and trade pressure on the Czech government to end Radio Farda's programming, the U.S. Ambassador to Prague, Richard Graber,said recently.
Iran

The Bear Growls the TRUTH

Irresponsible Democrats & The War
Dick Cheney

(Note: Remarks delivered yesterday by Vice President Dick Cheney to the Heritage Foundation in Chicago, IL.)

The American people spoke in the mid-term elections, the 110th Congress has arrived in Washington, D.C., and for the first time since 1995 the Democratic Party now controls both the House and the Senate. It was, in retrospect, a narrow victory. A shift of only 3,600 votes would have kept the Senate in Republican hands, and a shift of fewer than 100,000 votes would have maintained Republican control of the House of Representatives.

This weekend marks the 100th day of this Congress, and it's not too soon to assess the direction in which the new majority is attempting to move the country. The Democrats, as all of us remember, came in with high expectations, many pledges to bring change, and a promise of something new. What we've seen, however, is not really that new -- in fact, it's kind of familiar to those of us who've been around a while and can remember the early 1970s.

Thirty-five years ago, the standard-bearer for the Democrats, of course, was Senator George McGovern, who campaigned on a far-left platform of heavy taxation, a greatly expanded role for government in the daily lives of Americans, and a major retreat from America's commitments in the Cold War. Senator McGovern was, and is, an honest and a straightforward man. He said what he believed and he told people where he stood. And on Election Day, Senator McGovern lost every state but one, and collected just over 3 percent of the electoral vote.

That was the last time the national Democratic Party took a hard left turn. But in 2007, it looks like history is repeating itself. Today, on some of the most critical issues facing the country, the new Democratic majority resembles nothing so much as that old Party of the early 1970s.

On taxes, the Democratic leadership has made clear its opposition to the Bush tax cuts that have fueled this economy and helped to create nearly 8 million new jobs. The budget passed by the House assumes that all of the Bush tax reductions will be swept from the books within just a few years. The result would be a staggering tax increase on the middle class, on families and small businesses, and a return of the federal death tax from zero back up to a confiscatory 55 percent. This would constitute the largest tax increase in American history.

On the spending side of the ledger, it's enough, I think, to offer this example: Last month, in response to President Bush's request for an emergency war supplemental, the House and Senate tacked on billions of dollars to cover items on their wish list -- from fighting crickets to spinach subsidies. Even though it's still early in the session, when it comes to the appetite for tax dollars, the new Congress has already earned a place in the big-spending hall of fame.

But the Democrats' return to old patterns is most dramatic, and most consequential, in the field of national security. This will be the focus of my remarks today. In the early 1970s, the far left wing turned the Democratic Party away from the confident Cold War stance of President Truman, President Kennedy, and Senator Scoop Jackson. The result, as we know, was not merely defeat at the polls, but the beginning of a long period in which the American people largely declined to trust the Democratic Party in matters of national security. In fact, that period ended only when the Cold War itself came to an end, during the administration of former President Gerald Bush -- George Bush.

Today, as the United States faces a new kind of enemy and a new kind of war, the far left is again taking hold of the Democratic Party's agenda. The prevailing mindset, combined with a series of ill-considered actions in the House and Senate over the last several months, causes me to wonder whether today's Democratic leaders fully appreciate the nature of the danger this country faces in the war on terror -- a war that was declared against us by jihadists, a war in which the United States went on offense after 9/11, a war whose central front, in the opinion and actions of the enemy, is Iraq.

An early sign of unseriousness was the comment by Howard Dean, now the party chairman, that the capture of Saddam Hussein did nothing to make America safer. He made that statement several years ago while running for president, and a number of his fellow Democrats sharply criticized him. Yet now we hear almost daily the claim that the fight in Iraq has nothing to do with the war on terror. Opponents of our military action there have called Iraq a diversion from the real conflict, a distraction from the business of fighting and defeating Osama bin Laden and the al Qaeda network. We hear this over and over again, not as an argument, but as an assertion meant to close off argument.

Yet the evidence is flatly to the contrary. And the critics conveniently disregard the words of bin Laden himself. "The most ¼ serious issue today for the whole world," he said, "is this third world war¼ [that is] raging in [Iraq]." He calls it "a war of destiny between infidelity and Islam." He said, "The whole world is watching this war," and that it will end in "victory and glory or misery and humiliation." And in words directed at the American people, bin Laden declares, "The war is for you or for us to win. If we win it, it means your defeat and disgrace forever."

This leader of al-Qaeda has referred to Baghdad as the capital of the caliphate. He has also said, "Success in Baghdad will be success for the United States. Failure in Iraq is the failure of the United States. Their defeat in Iraq will mean defeat in all their wars."

Obviously, the terrorists have no illusion about the importance of the struggle in Iraq. They have not called it a distraction or a diversion from their war against the United States. They know it is a vital front in that war, and it's where they have chosen to make a stand. Our Marines are fighting al Qaeda terrorists in Anbar province. U.S. and Iraqi forces recently killed al Qaeda terrorists in Baghdad, who were responsible for numerous bomb attacks. Iraq's relevance to the war on terror simply could not be more plain. Here at home, that makes one thing, above all, very clear: If you support the war on terror, then it only makes sense to support it where the terrorists are fighting us. (Applause.)

The Democratic leadership has assured us that, in any event, they support the troops in the field. They did vote to confirm General Dave Petraeus unanimously in the United States Senate -- and for good reason. General Petraeus is one of the finest military officers of his generation, an expert in counterinsurgency, a leader committed to victory, and with a strategy to achieve it.

The senators knew something else about General Petraeus. They knew he had told the Armed Services Committee that he could not do his job without reinforcements. Yet within days of his confirmation a large group of senators tried to pass a resolution opposing those very reinforcements, thereby undermining the General's mission. Over in the House of Representatives, such a resolution actually passed on the floor. As President Bush said, this may be the first time in history that a Congress "voted to send a new commander into battle and then voted to oppose the plan he said was necessary to win that battle."

In the weeks since that vote, the actions of the Democratic leadership have moved from the merely inconsistent to the irresponsible. It's now been 67 days since the President submitted the emergency supplemental request. As most Americans know by now, the House of Representatives has voted to provide the funding, but also to require that we cut the number of troops below the level that our commanders in Iraq say is necessary for victory, and further require that American forces begin withdrawing from Iraq according to a set timetable, and be gone next year regardless of circumstances on the ground.

Not before that vote had the Democrats ever managed to find enough members of the House to support a planned retreat from Iraq. So how did they manage to pass it this time? They did it by horse-trading -- by adding in all that pork-barrel spending we've heard about. And when they had the votes they needed, they stopped adding the pork, and they held the vote.

Such an outcome raises more than a little concern about the future of fiscal discipline on Capitol Hill. The implications for national security are equally obvious, and far more critical to the future of the country. An editorial by The Washington Post aptly termed the House bill an "unconditional retreat ". The legislation that passed in the Senate is no better, and that bill, also, calls for the withdrawal of American troops according to a pre-set timetable determined by members of Congress.

So this is where things stand today. The Democratic Congress has approved appropriations for a war, and attached detailed provisions for the timing and the movement of American troops. It is unacceptable, of course, from an institutional standpoint. Under the Constitution, Congress has the purse strings and the power to confirm officers. But military operations are to be directed by the President of the United States, period. (Applause.) By the wisdom of the framers, that power rests in the hands of one Commander-in-Chief, not 535 commanders-in-chief on Capitol Hill.

I might add that we don't need 535 secretaries of state, either. (Laughter and applause.) It didn't help matters when the Speaker of the House showed up in Damascus for a sit-down with Syrian president Bashar Assad. Here again, we have an instance of the new congressional leadership making a bad move and sending mixed signals about the policies and the intentions of the United States.

It is strange enough that the Speaker should do anything to anything to undermine America's careful, and successful, multilateral effort to isolate the Syrian regime. But at least one member of the Speaker's delegation saw the trip in even grander terms. He said the delegation was offering, quote, "an alternative Democratic foreign policy." Once again, we must return to a basic constitutional principle. No member of Congress, Democrat or Republican, has any business jetting around the world with a diplomatic agenda contrary to that of the President and the Secretary of State. It is for the executive branch, not the Congress, to conduct the foreign policy of the United States of America. (Applause.)

In America, above all, the Democrats -- excuse me, in Iraq, above all, the Democrats' attempt to micromanage our commanders is an unwise and perilous endeavor. It is impossible to argue that an unconditional timetable for retreat could serve the security interests of the United States or our friends in the region. Instead, it sends a message to our enemies that the calendar is their friend, that all they have to do is wait us out -- wait for the date certain, and then claim victory the day after.

This notion of a timetable for withdrawal has been specifically rejected by virtually every mainstream analysis. The report of the Baker-Hamilton commission recommended against it. The National Intelligence Estimate produced by the intelligence community said a rapid withdrawal would be ill-advised. Our military commanders believe a rigid timetable is not a good strategy. It does, perhaps, appeal to the folks at MoveOn.org.

Recently the National Commander of the American Legion said, "You cannot support the troops if you want them to cut and run. ¼ It's time for the President to veto this surrender bill and for Congress to pass a serious war-funding bill, which would provide the money without the micromanagement." (Applause.) Standing here today, I can assure the American Legion, and the VFW, and all the veterans organizations, and all the men and women serving at this very hour, that the President of the United States will, indeed, veto this irresponsible legislation. (Applause.)

Rarely in history has an elected branch of government engaged in so pointless an exercise as Congress is now doing. And yet the exercise continues. Three days ago the President invited the Democratic leaders to meet with him next week to discuss the supplemental. The majority leader, Senator Harry Reid, at first declined to do so. When Nancy Pelosi flies nearly 6,000 miles to meet with the president of Syria, but Harry Reid hesitates to drive a mile and half to meet with the President of the United States, there's a serious problem in the leadership of the Democratic Party.

Senator Reid has threatened that if the President vetoes the timetable legislation, he will send up Senator Russ Feingold's bill to de-fund Iraqi operations altogether. Yet only last November, Senator Reid said there would be no cutoff of funds for the military in Iraq. So in less than six months' time, Senator Reid has gone from pledging full funding for the military, and then full funding, but with a timetable, and then a cutoff of funding. Three positions in five months, on the most important foreign policy question facing our country and our troops.

Senator Reid, of course, was one of the many Democrats who voted for the use of force in Iraq. They are entitled, if they want now, to oppose this war. Yet Americans are entitled to question whether the endlessly shifting positions that he and others are taking are reflections of principle, or of partisanship and blind opposition to the President.

In their move to the left, many leading Democrats have turned not just against the military operation in Iraq, but against its supporters, as well. I think of the case of Senator Joe Lieberman. I've known Joe since I was secretary of defense, and we debated each other when he was Al Gore's running mate in 2000. I've run for office eight times in my career, and I have to say that Joe is the toughest opponent I've ever faced, and also the one I've most admired.

Joe and I see many issues differently. He's a center-left Democrat, and he has been throughout his career. Yet last year Joe was targeted for political extinction by his fellow Democrats. Al Gore himself, who famously endorsed Howard Dean in 2004, refused to help his former running mate, Joe Lieberman, on grounds that he doesn't get involved in primaries. Senator Lieberman's Connecticut colleague and best friend in the Senate, Chris Dodd, campaigned against him. In a tough political fight, Joe Lieberman was abandoned simply because of his firm stand on the war -- a stand he has consistently held regardless of whether the news was good or bad, or whether snapshot polls agreed or disagreed with him.

Not surprisingly, Joe Lieberman was re-elected, winning more votes than the Democratic and Republican candidates combined. The campaign against him was the political equivalent of street theater, and the voters of Connecticut showed little interest. It is tempting, I suppose, to view the current situation on Capitol Hill in the same way -- as mere posturing by a liberal element that has no chance of prevailing. But it's far more serious than that. We're talking about a congressional majority with real power and a liberal agenda that, if followed, would have serious consequences for the country.

In light of recent events, it's worth asking how things would be different if the current Democratic leadership had controlled Congress during the last five years. Would we have the terrorist surveillance program? Or the Patriot Act? Or military commissions to try unlawful combatants? All these measures have been essential to protecting the American people against enemies who are absolutely determined to cause another 9/11, or something far worse. And it's an open question, I think, whether the current Democratic leadership would have put these protections in place.

They've even created controversy over the words we use to describe the challenges now facing America. According to news accounts, one committee in the House has decided to stop using the phrase, "Global War on Terrorism." I'm left to wonder -- which part of that phrase is the problem? Do they deny the struggle is global, after the enemy has declared the ambition of building a totalitarian empire that stretches from Europe around to Indonesia? Do they deny this is a war, in which one side will win and the other will lose? Do they deny that it's terror that we're fighting, with unlawful combatants who wear no uniform, who reject the rules of warfare, and who target the innocent for indiscriminate slaughter?

That's the nature of the fight we're in. We can't wish it away, or define it away. In Iraq, while extremists are trying to stir an endless cycle of violence, where al Qaeda is operating and trying to open new fronts, where an elected government is going about the hard work of political reconciliation, the United States has interests at stake, and promises to keep.

The ultimate solution in that country will be a political solution, but reconciliation cannot be reached in an atmosphere of violence and instability. So we are there, alongside Iraqi forces, to bring security to Baghdad. Together our forces have carried out thousands of patrols. We have set up joint security stations and combat posts in the capital city, we've seized hundreds of weapons caches, found and cleared hundreds of improvised explosive devices, detained suspected killers and bomb makers, and found and destroyed car bomb factories.

Our new strategy in Iraq is still in its early stages of implementation. Roughly half of the reinforcements have arrived, and as General Petraeus has said , it'll be a while before we can fully assess how well it's working. But there's one thing the American people already know: The men and women we've sent to carry out this mission are brave and decent. They and their families represent the best in the American character, and we are proud of each and every one of them. (Applause.)

The good men and women serving in the war on terror, on every front, are staring evil in the face. Some of them will not make it home. They can never be sure what the next day will bring. But they're giving it all they have, and we owe them the same. Both political parties, both elected branches, both houses of Congress need to unite and back up our military 100 percent, leaving no uncertainty about whether this country supports them and what they're doing. (Applause.) They deserve this support so they can finish the job and get it done right, and return home to an America made safer by their courage.

The United States is keeping its commitments, and persevering despite difficulty, because we understand the consequences of getting out before the job is done. History provides its own lessons, and none perhaps is better than the example of Afghanistan in the 1980s. During those years, Afghanistan was a major front in the Cold War. The strategic significance was clear to all, and the United States was heavily engaged in the area, supporting the Mujahedin against the Soviets. But when the Soviet Union collapsed, everybody walked away from Afghanistan. From that point on, extremist factions began to vie for power. Civil war broke out. By the end of the 1990s, the Taliban had an iron grip on the country, and was hosting Osama bin Laden and the training camps for terrorists that led directly to the attacks of September 11th, 2001.

The consequences of walking away from Afghanistan were severe, but perhaps hard to foresee prior to 9/11. But no one could plead ignorance of the potential consequences of walking away from Iraq now, withdrawing coalition forces before Iraqis could defend themselves. Moderates would be crushed. Shiite extremists backed by Iran could be in an all-out war with Sunni extremists led by al Qaeda and remnants of the old Saddam Hussein regime.

As this battle unfolded, Sunni governments might feel compelled to back Sunni extremists in order to counter growing Iranian influence, widening the conflict into a regional war. If Sunni extremists prevailed, al Qaeda and its allies could recreate the safe haven they lost in Afghanistan, except now with the oil wealth to pursue weapons of mass destruction and they could underwrite their own designs, including against our friends in the region. If Iran's allies prevailed, the regime in Teheran's own designs for the Middle East would be advanced, and the threat to our friends in the region would only be magnified.

We must consider, as well, just what a precipitous withdrawal would mean to our efforts in the war on terror, and to our interests in the broader Middle East. Having tasted victory in Iraq, jihadists would look about for new missions. Many would head for Afghanistan to fight alongside the Taliban. Others would set out for capitals across the Middle East, spreading more discord as they eliminate dissenters and work to undermine moderate governments, in what the terrorist Zawahiri has called a "jihad wave." Still others would find their targets and victims in other countries on other continents.

What would it say to the world if we left high and dry those millions of people who have counted on the United States to keep its commitments? And what would it say to leaders like President Karzai in Afghanistan and President Musharraf in Pakistan, who risk their lives every day as fearless allies in the war on terror? Critics enjoy pointing out mistakes through the perceptive power of hindsight. But the biggest mistake of all can be seen in advance: A sudden withdrawal of our Coalition would dissipate much of the effort that's gone into fighting the global war on terror, and result in chaos and mounting danger. And for the sake of our own security, we will not stand by and let it happen. (Applause.)

This nation has chosen a better course. Instead of allowing problems to simmer, instead of allowing threats to gather thousands of miles away and assume they won't find us at home, we've decided to face our challenges squarely. We offer a vision of freedom, justice, and self government as a superior alternative to ideologies of violence, anger, and resentment. We believe, and we know, that free institutions and human liberty provide the best long-term hope of progress for nations, and peace for the world.

The course we have chosen is not an easy one for America. But it will be far easier on the conscience of America when we see it through, sparing millions from suffering, and leaving behind a free and democratic Iraq. Although the current political environment in our country carries echoes of the hard left in the early '70s, America will not again play out those old scenes of abandonment, and retreat, and regret. Thirty-five years is time enough to have learned the lessons of that sad era. When the United States turns away from our friends, only tragedy can follow, and the lives and hopes of millions are lost forever.

Ladies and gentlemen: not this time. Not on our watch. (Applause.) This cause is bigger than the quarrels of party and the agendas of politicians. At this hour in our history, it is the cause of America -- and the best among us are fighting and sacrificing for its success. And if we in Washington, all of us, can only see our way clear to work together, then the outcome is not in doubt. We will press on in this mission, and we will turn events towards victory.

Thank you very much.
Cheyney
Democrats

Another Democrat that thinks the Law does not Apply to HIM

N.J. Gov. Corzine on ventilator but stable after crash

CAMDEN, New Jersey (Reuters) - New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine was heavily sedated and breathing with the help of a ventilator on Friday after an accident while en route to a meeting with fired radio host Don Imus and the Rutgers women's basketball team.

Corzine, who was a passenger in the front of a police sport utility vehicle when it swerved to avoid another car, was not wearing a seat belt as mandated by state law.

Hamas Issues Islamic Call For Genocide on PA Television

Hamas Issues Islamic Call For Genocide on PA Television
by Ezra HaLevi

(IsraelNN.com) While Hamas has sought to strike a moderate tone in order to renew international funding since the Mecca Agreement with Fatah, it continues the calls for genocide of Jews.

In a recent sermon on PA TV, Hamas spokesman Dr. Ismail Radwan reiterated Hamas’s classic ideology that:

* The Hour – the Islamic resurrection and end of days – is dependent on the killing of Jews by Muslims.
* The remaining Jews will unsuccessfully attempt to hide, but the rocks and trees will expose them, calling out "there is a Jew behind me, kill him!"
* "Palestine… will be liberated through the rifle," meaning that Israel will be destroyed through violence.

The Hamas spokesman ended his sermon with a prayer to Allah to "take" Israel and the USA.

Click here to view the video

The following is the full text of the Hamas spokesman's call for genocide of Jews, translated by Palestinian Media Watch:

Hamas spokesman, Dr. Ismail Radwan (PA TV, March 30, 2007): “The Hour [Resurrection] will not take place until the Muslims fight the Jews and the Muslims kill them, and the rock and the tree will say: ‘Oh, Muslim, servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me, kill him!’

“We must remind our Arab and Muslim nation, its leaders and people, its scholars and students, remind them that Palestine and the Al Aqsa mosque will not be liberated through summits nor by international resolutions, but it will be liberated through the rifle. It will not be liberated through negotiations, but through the rifle, since this occupation knows no language but the language of force…

“O Allah, strengthen Islam and Muslims, and bring victory to your Jihad-fighting worshipers, in Palestine and everywhere… Allah take the oppressor Jews and Americans and their supporters!”

Back to Issues that matter Democrat Ethics or Lack there of

Senator Feinstein's Iraq Conflict
As a member of the Military Construction Appropriations subcommittee, Sen. Feinstein voted for appropriations worth billions to her husband's firms

By Peter Byrne

IN THE November 2006 election, the voters demanded congressional ethics reform. And so, the newly appointed chairman of the Senate Rules Committee, Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., is now duly in charge of regulating the ethical behavior of her colleagues. But for many years, Feinstein has been beset by her own ethical conflict of interest, say congressional ethics experts.

As chairperson and ranking member of the Military Construction Appropriations subcommittee (MILCON) from 2001 through the end of 2005, Feinstein supervised the appropriation of billions of dollars a year for specific military construction projects. Two defense contractors whose interests were largely controlled by her husband, financier Richard C. Blum, benefited from decisions made by Feinstein as leader of this powerful subcommittee.

Each year, MILCON's members decide which military construction projects will be funded from a roster proposed by the Department of Defense. Contracts to build these specific projects are subsequently awarded to such major defense contractors as Halliburton, Fluor, Parsons, Louis Berger, URS Corporation and Perini Corporation. From 1997 through the end of 2005, with Feinstein's knowledge, Blum was a majority owner of both URS Corp. and Perini Corp.

While setting MILCON agendas for many years, Feinstein, 73, supervised her own staff of military construction experts as they carefully examined the details of each proposal. She lobbied Pentagon officials in public hearings to support defense projects that she favored, some of which already were or subsequently became URS or Perini contracts. From 2001 to 2005, URS earned $792 million from military construction and environmental cleanup projects approved by MILCON; Perini earned $759 million from such MILCON projects.

In her annual Public Financial Disclosure Reports, Feinstein records a sizeable family income from large investments in Perini, which is based in Framingham, Mass., and in URS, headquartered in San Francisco. But she has not publicly acknowledged the conflict of interest between her job as a congressional appropriator and her husband's longtime control of Perini and URS—and that omission has called her ethical standards into question, say the experts.

Insider Information
The tale thickens with the appearance of Michael R. Klein, a top legal adviser to Feinstein and a long-time business partner of Blum's. The vice-chairman of Perini's board of directors, Klein was a partner in Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering, a powerful law firm with close ties to the Democratic Party, for nearly 30 years. Klein and Blum co-own ASTAR Air Cargo, which has military contracts in Iraq and at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Klein also sits on the board of SRA International, a large defense contractor.

In an interview with this reporter in September, Klein stated that, beginning in 1997, he routinely informed Feinstein about specific federal projects coming before her in which Perini had a stake. The insider information, Klein said, was intended to help the senator avoid conflicts of interest. Although Klein's startling admission was intended to defuse the issue of Feinstein's conflict of interest, it had the effect of exacerbating it.

Klein said that he regularly gave Feinstein's chief of staff, Mark Kadesh, lists of Perini's current and upcoming contractual interests in federal legislation, so that the senator would not discuss, debate, vote on or participate in matters that could affect projects in which Perini was concerned.

"Earmarks, you know, set asides, you name it, there was a system in place which on a regular basis I got notified, I notified her office and her office notified her," Klein said.

"We basically identified any bid that Perini was going for and checked to see whether it was the subject of already appropriated funds or funds yet to be appropriated, and if it was anything that the senator could not act on, her office was alerted and she did not act on it."

This is an extraordinary thing for Klein and the senator to do, since the detailed project proposals that the Pentagon sent to Feinstein's subcommittee for review do not usually name the firms already contracted to perform specific projects. Nor do defense officials typically identify, in MILCON hearings, which military construction contractors were eligible to bid on upcoming work.

In theory, Feinstein would not know the identity of any of the companies that stood to contractually benefit from her approval of specific items in the military construction budget—until Klein told her.

Klein explained, "They would get from me a notice that Perini was bidding on a contract that would be affected as we understood it by potential legislation that would come before either the full Congress or any committee that she was a member of. And she would as a result of that not act, abstain from dealing with those pieces of legislation."

However, the public record shows that contrary to Klein's belief, Feinstein did act on legislation that affected Perini and URS.

According to Klein, the Senate Select Committee on Ethics ruled, in secret, that Feinstein did not have a conflict of interest with Perini because, due to the existence of the bid and project lists provided by Klein, she knew when to recuse herself. Klein says that after URS declined to participate in his conflict of interest prevention plan, the ethics committee ruled that Feinstein could act on matters that affected URS, because she did not have a list of URS' needs. That these confidential rulings are contradictory is obvious and calls for explanation.

Klein declined to produce copies of the Perini project lists that he transmitted to Feinstein. And neither he nor Feinstein would furnish copies of the ethics committee rulings, nor examples of the senator recusing herself from acting on legislation that affected Perini or URS. But the Congressional Record shows that as chairwoman and a ranking member of MILCON, Feinstein was often involved in supervising the legislative details of military construction projects that directly affected Blum's defense contracting firms.

After reviewing the results of this investigation, Wendell Rawls, executive director of the Center for Public Integrity in Washington, D.C., observes that by giving Feinstein notice of Perini's business objectives, Klein achieved the opposite of preventing a conflict of interest.

Rawls comments, "Sen. Feinstein has had a serious conflict of interest, a serious insensitivity to ethical considerations. The very least she should have done is to recuse herself from having conversations, debates, voting or any other kind of legislative activity that involved either Perini Corporation or URS Corporation or any other business activity where her husband's financial interests were involved.

"I cannot understand how someone who complains so vigorously as she has about conflicts of interest in the government and Congress can have turned such a deaf ear and a blind eye to her own. Because of her level of influence, the conflict of interest is just as serious as the Halliburton-Cheney connection."

Called Into Question
Here are a few examples from the Congressional Record of questionable intersections between Feinstein's legislative duties and her financial interests:


At a MILCON hearing in 2001, Feinstein interrogated defense officials about the details of constructing specific missile defense systems, which included upgrading the early warning radar system at Cobra Dane radar on Shemya Island, Alaska. In 2003, Perini reported that it had completed a contract to upgrade the Cobra Dane radar system. It has done similar work at Beale Air Force Base in California and in the United Kingdom. URS also bids on missile defense work.


In the 2002 MILCON hearings, Feinstein questioned an official about details of the U.S. Army's chemical demilitarization program. URS is extensively involved in performing chemical demilitarization work at key disposal sites in the United States.


At that same hearing, Feinstein asked about the possibility of increasing funding for anti-terrorism-force protection at Army bases. The following year, on March 4, 2003, Feinstein asked why the anti-terrorism-force protection funds she had advocated for the year before had not yet been spent. On April 21, 2003, URS announced the award of a $600 million contract to provide, among other services, anti-terrorism-force protection for U.S. Army installations.


Beginning in 2003, both Perini and URS were awarded a series of open-ended contracts for military construction work around the world, including in Iraq and Afghanistan. Under Feinstein's leadership, MILCON regularly approved specific project "task orders" that were issued to Perini and URS under these contracts.


At a March 30, 2004, MILCON hearing, Feinstein grilled Maj. Gen. Dean Fox about whether or not the Pentagon intended to prioritize funding the construction of "beddown" maintenance facilities for its new airlifter, the C-17 Globemaster. After being reassured by Fox that these funds would soon be flowing, Feinstein said, "Good, that's what I really wanted to hear. Thank you very much. Appreciate it very much, General." Two years later, URS announced a $42 million award to build a beddown maintenance facility for the C-17 at Hickam Air Base in Hawaii as part of a multibillion dollar contract with the Air Force. Under Feinstein's leadership, MILCON approved the Hickam project.


In mid-2005, MILCON approved a Pentagon proposal to fund "overhead coverage force protection" in Iraq that would reinforce the roofs of U.S. Army barracks to better withstand mortar rounds. On Oct. 13, 2005, Perini announced the award of a $185 million contract to provide overhead coverage force protection to the Army in Iraq.


In the 2005 MILCON hearings, Feinstein earmarked MILCON legislation with $25 million to increase environmental remediation at closed military bases. Year after year, Feinstein has closely overseen the environmental cleanup and redevelopment of McClellan Air Force Base near Sacramento, frequently requesting that officials add tens of millions of dollars to that project. URS and its joint ventures have earned tens of millions of dollars cleaning up McClellan. And CB Richard Ellis, a real estate company headed by Feinstein's husband Richard Blum, is involved in redeveloping McClellan for the private sector.

This investigation examined thousands of pages of documents, including transcripts of congressional hearings, U.S. Security and Exchange Commission filings, government audits and reports, federal procurement data and corporate press releases. The findings were shared with contracting and ethics experts at several nonpartisan, Washington, D.C.-based government oversight groups. Danielle Brian, executive director of the Project on Government Oversight, a nonprofit organization that analyzes defense contracts and who examined our evidence says, "The paper trail showing Sen. Feinstein's conflict of interest is irrefutable."

On the face of it, there is nothing objectionable about a senator closely examining proposed appropriations or advocating for missile defense or advancing the cleanup of a toxic military base. Blum profitably divested himself of ownership of both URS and Perini in 2005, ameliorating the conflict of interest. But Feinstein's ethical dilemma arose from the fact that, for five years, the interests of Perini and URS and CB Richard Ellis were inextricably entwined with her leadership of MILCON, which last year approved $16.2 billion for military construction projects.

Melanie Sloan, executive director of Citizens for Responsible Ethics in Washington, remarks, "There are a number of members of Congress with conflicts of interest. [California Republican Congressman John T.] Doolittle, for example, hired his wife as a fundraiser, and she skimmed 15 percent off of all campaign contributions. Others, like [former] Speaker [Dennis] Hastert and Cong. [Ken] Calvert, were earmarking federal money for roads to enhance the value of property held by their families.

"But because of the amount of money involved," Sloan continues, "Feinstein's conflict of interest is an order of magnitude greater than those conflicts."

Family Matters
Californians elected San Francisco's former Mayor Dianne Feinstein to the Senate in 1992. She was overwhelmingly re-elected in November 2006. She is well liked by both liberals and conservatives. She supports abortion rights and gun control laws. She politicked this year for renewal of the Patriot Act and sponsored a constitutional amendment to ban American flag burning. She is currently calling for President Bush to set a timetable for withdrawing troops from Iraq, but she strongly supported the invasions, occupations and "reconstructions" of both Iraq and Afghanistan. She sits on the Defense Appropriations subcommittee and the Senate Intelligence Committee, and she is a consistent hawk on matters military.

And she is wealthy. In 2005, Roll Call calculated Feinstein's wealth, including Blum's assets, at $40 million, up 25 percent from the year before. That made her the ninth wealthiest member of Congress. Feinstein's latest Public Financial Disclosure Report shows that in 2005 her family earned income of between $500,000 and $5 million from capital gains on URS and Perini stock combined. From CB Richard Ellis, Blum earned between $1.3 million to $4 million. (The report allows for disclosure of dollar amounts within ranges, which accounts for the wide variance.)

A talented financier and deal-broker, Blum, 70, presides over a global investment empire through a labyrinth of private equity partnerships. His flagship entity is a merchant banking firm, Blum Capital Partners, L.P., of which he is the chairman and general partner. Through this bank, Blum bought a controlling share of Perini in 1997, when it was nearly broke. He named his close associate, the attorney Michael R. Klein, to represent his interest on the board of directors. Blum declined to comment for this story. Perini CEO Robert Band deferred to Klein for comment.

In 2000, according to public records, Perini—which partly specializes in erecting casinos—earned a mere $7 million from federal contracts. Post-9/11, Perini transformed into a major defense contractor. In 2004, the company earned $444 million for military construction work in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as for improving airfields for the U.S. Air Force in Europe and building base infrastructures for the U.S. Navy around the globe. In a remarkable financial recovery, Perini shot from near penury in 1997 to logging gross revenues of $1.7 billion in 2005.

In December 2005, Perini publicly identified one of its main business competitors as Halliburton. The company attributed its growing profitability, in large part, to its Halliburton-like military construction contracts in Iraq and Afghanistan. But the company warned investors that if Congress slammed the brakes on war and occupation in the Middle East, Perini's stock could plummet.

According to Klein and to public records, Blum's firm originally paid $4 a share for a controlling interest in Perini's common stock. After a series of complicated stock transactions, Blum ended up owning 13 percent of the company, a majority interest. In mid- and late 2005, Blum and his firm took their profits by selling about 3 million Perini shares for $23.75 per share, according to Klein and reports filed with the SEC. Klein says Blum personally owned 100,000 of the vastly appreciated shares when they were sold. Shortly thereafter, Feinstein began calling for winding down the Iraq war while urging that the "global war on terror" continue indefinitely.

Perini's Payday
It is estimated that Perini now holds at least $2.5 billion worth of contracts tied to the worldwide expansion of American militarism. Its largest Department of Defense contracts are "indefinite delivery-indefinite quantity" or "bundled" contracts carrying guaranteed profit margins. As is all too common, competitive bidding was minimal or nonexistent for many of these contracts.

In June, U.S. Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Los Angeles, released a report by the House Committee on Government Reform criticizing the Pentagon's growing use of bundled contracts. Waxman complained that these contracts give companies an incentive to increase costs. One of the "problem contracts" identified by Waxman was a no-bid, $500 million contract held by Perini to reconstruct southern Iraq's electrical grid.

In fact, bundled military construction contracts fueled Perini's transformation from casino builder to major war contractor. As of May 2006, Perini held a series of bundled contracts awarded by the Army Corps of Engineers for work in the Middle East worth $1.725 billion. Perini has also been awarded an open-ended contract by the U.S. Air Force for military construction and cleaning the environment at closed military bases. Perini shares that $15 billion award with several other firms, including URS.

Perini regularly performs military construction jobs from Afghanistan to Alaska. It built a biological warfare laboratory for the Navy in Virginia. It built fuel tanks and pipelines for the Navy in North Africa. Details of these projects are typically examined and approved or disapproved by MILCON.

At a 2001 MILCON hearing, Feinstein, attending to a small item, told Maj. Gen. Earnest O. Robbins that she would appreciate receiving an engineering assessment on plans to build a missile transport bridge at Vandenberg Air Force Base. He said he would give it to her. She also asked for and received a list of unfunded construction projects, which prioritize military construction wish lists down to the level of thousand-dollar light fixtures. While there is no evidence to point to nefarious intent behind Feinstein's request for these details, it is worth noting that Perini and URS have open-ended contracts to perform military construction for the Air Force. The senator could have chosen to serve on a subcommittee where she had no potential conflict of interests at all.

In 2003 hearings, MILCON approved various construction projects at sites where Perini and/or URS are contracted to perform engineering and military construction work. The sites included: Camp Lejeune; the Underwater Systems Lab in Newport, R.I.; Hill Air Force Base, Utah; the Naval facilities at Dahlgren, Va.; projects at the Naval Surface Warfare Center in Crane, Ind., and Roosevelt Roads, Puerto Rico; and military bases in Guam, Diego Garcia and Crete.

There are some serious problems with Perini's work in Iraq. In June 2004, the Government Accountability Office reported that Perini's electrical reconstruction contract in southern Iraq suffered from mismanagement and lack of competition. In 2006, the Office of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction found that Perini was paid to construct multimillion-dollar electrical substations in the desert that could not be connected to the electrical grid. And the company was billing the government for purchasing and subcontracting costs that were not justified, according to the Defense Contract Audit Agency. An October 2005 audit by the Defense Department's Inspector General criticized the execution of Perini's cost-plus military construction work in Afghanistan, saying, "The contractor had an incentive to increase costs, because higher costs resulted in higher profit."

URS and McClellan
URS dwarfs Perini. With more than 100 subsidiaries, it employs nearly 30,000 engineers and workers worldwide. The firm's largest customer is the U.S. Army, from which it booked $791 million in work in 2005 out of a total revenue of $3.9 billion.

URS is not just a construction company; it also develops and maintains advanced weapons systems. In 2002, URS purchased weaponry firm EG&G Technical Services from the Carlyle Group, in which former President George H.W. Bush was a principal. But as profitable as its arms dealing division is, URS reports that its growth sectors are military construction, homeland security and environmental services for military sites under existing Defense Department contracts.

According to a database of federal procurement records made available for this investigation by Eagle Eye Publishers of Fairfax, Va., URS's military construction work in 2000 earned it a mere $24 million. The next year, when Feinstein took over as MILCON chair, military construction earned URS $185 million. On top of that, the company's architectural and engineering revenue from military construction projects grew from $108,726 in 2000 to $142 million in 2001, more than a thousandfold increase in a single year.

As Congress gave the Bush administration the green light on military spending after 9/11, the value of Blum's investment in URS skyrocketed. Between 2003 and 2005, URS' share price doubled. In late 2005, Blum resigned from the URS board of directors, after 30 years as a member. Simultaneously, he sold 5.5 million URS shares, worth about $220 million at market price.

The Congressional Record shows that in year after year of MILCON hearings, Feinstein successfully lobbied defense officials to increase the budget for military base cleanup and redevelopment, especially at the decommissioned McClellan Air Force Base. The detoxification of McClellan is a plum job: it is estimated to cost $1.3 billion and take many years to complete. There is, of course, nothing unusual about a senator advocating for projects that improve environmental health, particularly when the project is in her home state; and the Pentagon is notoriously lax about cleaning up its Superfund sites.

It turns out, though, that URS specializes in environmental consulting and engineering work at military installations. It holds a $69 million contract to manage the cleanup of Hill Air Force Base in Utah, which was awarded in 2004. It has a $320 million contract to remediate pollution at U.S. Army bases in the United States and the Caribbean, which was awarded in 2005. And from 2000 to 2005, URS and its partners were paid $204 million for work at McClellan Air Force Base, according to Eagle Eye.

At a MILCON hearing in 2001, Feinstein cited the environmental work at McClellan as needing more money. "That is a base that I am very familiar with, and I am glad that we were able to provide that funding so that work at McClellan can proceed," she said. Feinstein then asked for and received detailed information concerning the Pentagon's projected schedule to finish the McClellan cleanup and the effect of delaying cleanup upon its potential for commercial reuse.

At a MILCON hearing in March 2002, Chairwoman Feinstein interrogated Assistant Secretary of Defense Nelson F. Gibbs:

Sen. Feinstein: Is the Air Force capable of executing greater [cleanup] funding in 2003 at McClellan?
Mr. Gibbs: Yes, ma'am.
Feinstein: And how much would that be? How about $22 million?
Gibbs: That would be very close. That would be almost exact as a matter of fact. ... If you would like, I can provide for you a list of those individual projects.
Feinstein: I would. If you would not mind. Thank you very much.

The next week, Gibbs sent Feinstein a memo showing the addition of $23 million to the McClellan environmental budget, mostly for groundwater remediation, URS' specialty.

In the 2003 MILCON hearings, Feinstein told Dov S. Zakheim, then the Defense Department comptroller, that she "was really struck by the hit that environmental remediation [at McClellan Air Force Base] took. ... However, I have just [received] a list from the Air Force of what they could use to clean up ... McClellan, and one other base, and it is 64 million additional dollars this year."

Dr. Zakheim replied, "Well, let me first say that I remember your concern last year, and I am glad that we took care of [McClellan]. That is important."

Feinstein remarked that the Pentagon had already spent $7 billion on environmental cleanup of closed bases, and that another $3.5 billion should be immediately allocated so that the clean bases can be transferred to the private sector. Demonstrating her grasp of technical details, she remarked, "I am particularly concerned with the dilapidated condition of the sewer line at McClellan that continues to impede significant economic redevelopment of the base."

That is where CB Richard Ellis comes in.

The real estate firm is politically well-connected. Sen. Feinstein's husband chairs the board of directors. Bill Clinton's secretary of commerce, Michael Kantor, joined in 2004. Former Senate Majority Leader Thomas A. Daschle signed on in 2005. The firm specializes in consulting with local governments and developers from California to Puerto Rico on how best to redevelop cleaned-up military bases. It also brokers the sale and lease of redeveloped base lands to the private sector. Since Blum took over CB Richard Ellis, for example, the company has closed deals leasing tens of thousands of square feet of commercial space on cleaned-up portions of McClellan to private developers.

In a 2003 MILCON hearing, Sacramento County redevelopment official Robert B. Leonard told Feinstein, "We wanted to express our appreciation for your efforts over the last year in supporting our needs at McClellan." During the five years that Feinstein led the subcommittee, support for the McClellan cleanup and the redevelopment deals were particular focuses of her attention.

URS declined to comment for this story. The sole comment that Feinstein's office made in response to a series of written questions about facts in this story is that "Sen. Feinstein has never had any knowledge nor has she exercised any influence on the award of environmental cleanup contracts under the jurisdiction of the Military Construction Appropriations Subcommittee."

Let the Sunlight In
Last week, the Senate voted to close some significant loopholes in its ethics rules. But it stopped short of creating an office of public integrity, which would independently monitor lobbyists and members of Congress for ethical compliance. Setting her own limits on the extent of reform she will countenance, Feinstein says she is opposed to the creation of an independent congressional ethics watchdog. "If the law is clear and precise, members will follow it," she assured The New York Times on Nov. 18, 2006.

The problem with the existing rules governing congressional ethics is that they are neither clear nor precise, and neither are they effective. Senate rules governing conflicts of interest are so vaguely worded, say government watchdogs, that short of stashing cash bribes in the refrigerator, the line between serving constituents and serving oneself is often blurred. The public record shows that Feinstein has a history of crossing that blurry line.

Charles Tiefer is a professor of law specializing in legislation and government contracting at the University of Baltimore in Maryland. He served as solicitor and deputy counsel to the House of Representatives for 11 years. He has taught at Yale Law School and written books on congressional procedures and separation of powers. Tiefer observes that, unlike the executive and judiciary branches of government, Congress does not have enforceable conflict of interest rules. It is up to Sen. Feinstein's constituents, Tiefer says, to decide if she has a conflict of interest and to take whatever action they want. To make that possible, Feinstein should have publicly disclosed the details of her family investments in Perini, URS and CB Richard Ellis as they related to her actions on MILCON. Tiefer avers that when Klein gave Feinstein lists of Perini's interests, he worsened her conflict of interest.

"The senator should, at a minimum, have posted Klein's lists on her Senate website, so that the press and the public would be warned of her potential conflicts," Tiefer says, noting that she should also make public her correspondence with the Senate Ethics Committee.

As the arbiter of Senate rules on ethics, it is incumbent on Feinstein to provide the public with an explanation of why she did not recuse herself from acting on MILCON details that served her financial interests, and why she failed to resign from the subcommittee after she recognized the potential for conflicts of interest, which, unfortunately, materialized in an obvious way and over a long period of time.

Research assistance for this story was provided by the Investigative Fund of the Nation Institute.

Feinstein
Democrats
Ethics

Two Racists Presure CBS to Fire Imus

Two of the biggest Racists Al Sharpton and Jessie Jackson gang up on a Stupid White Man

CBS Fires Don Imus
CBS) NEW YORK CBS 2 has learned that CBS-owned radio station WFAN has fired Don Imus. The news comes a day after MSNBC discontinued their relationship his radio show.

CBS Chairman and CEO Les Moonves met with Reverends Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson on Thursday morning to discuss Imus' future with the company. The shock jock has been in hot water since calling members of the Rutgers women's basketball team "nappy-headed hos."

CBS 2's Magee Hickey, Deborah Garcia, and Brendan Keefe contributed to this report.

SHARPTON VOWS MORE: 'It is our feeling that this is only the beginning. We must have a broad discussion on what is permitted and not permitted in terms of the airwaves'...

Imus
Democrats

Playing With Fire: Pelosi Advertises American Disunity

By: Thomas Sowell, The Bulletin
04/11/2007
Congressman Tom Lantos, who is a member of the delegation that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is leading to Syria, put the mission clearly when he said: "We have an alternative Democratic foreign policy."Democrats can have any foreign policy they want - if and when they are elected to the White House. Until Nancy Pelosi came along, it was understood by all that we had only one president at a time and - like him or not - he alone had the Constitutional authority to speak for this country to foreign nations, especially in wartime. All that Pelosi's trip can accomplish is to advertise American disunity to a terrorist-sponsoring nation in the Middle East while we are in a war there. That in turn can only embolden the Syrians to exploit the lack of unified resolve in Washington by stepping up their efforts to destabilize Iraq and the Middle East in general.Members of the opposition party, whichever party that might be at a given time, knew that their role was not to intervene abroad themselves to undermine this country's foreign policy, however much they might criticize it at home.During the Second World War, the defeated Republican presidential candidate, Wendell Wilkie, even acted as President Roosevelt's personal envoy to British Prime Minister Churchill.He understood that we were all in this together, however we might disagree among ourselves about the best course to follow.Today, Nancy Pelosi and the Congressional Democrats are stepping in to carry out their own foreign policy and even their own military policy on troop deployment - all the while denying that they are intruding on the president's authority.They are doing the same thing domestically by making a big media circus over the fact that the Bush administration fired eight U.S. attorneys. These attorneys are among the many officials who serve at the pleasure of the president - which means that they can be fired at any time for any reason or for no reason.That is why there was no big hullabaloo in the media when Bill Clinton fired all the U.S. attorneys across the country - even though that got rid of the U.S. attorneys who were conducting an on-going investigation into corruption in Clinton's own administration as governor of Arkansas.So much hate has been hyped against George W. Bush that anything that is done against him is unlikely to be questioned in most of the media.But whatever passing damage is being done to George W. Bush is a relatively minor concern compared to the lasting damage that is being done to the presidency as an institution that will still be here when George W. Bush is gone.Once it becomes accepted that it is all right to violate both the laws and the traditions of this nation, and to undermine the ability of the United States to speak to other nations of the world with one voice, we will have taken another fateful step downward into the degeneration of this society.Such a drastic and irresponsible step should remove any lingering doubt that the Democrats' political strategy is to ensure that there is an American defeat in Iraq, in order to ensure their own political victory in 2008.That these political games are being played while Iran keeps advancing relentlessly toward acquiring nuclear weapons is a fateful sign of the utter unreality of politicians preoccupied with scoring points and a media obsessed with celebrity bimbos, living and dead.Once Iran has nuclear weapons, that will be an irreversible change that will mark a defining moment in the history of the United States and of Western civilization, which will forever after live at the mercy of hate-filled suicidal fanatics and sadists. Yet among too many politicians in Washington, it is business as usual. Indeed, it is monkey business as usual, as Congressional Democrats revel in the power of their new and narrow election victory last year to drag people before committee hearings and posture for the television cameras.It has been said that the world ends not with a bang but with a whimper. But who would have thought that it could end with political clowning in the shadow of a mushroom cloud?

Thomas Sowell is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305. His Web site is www.tsowell.com.