Peninsula Daily News for Wednesday, May 4, 2011
Second Front Page
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Briefly: Nation Those 45 and older are voting majority in U.S.
stripping out numerous tax write-offs while lowering income tax rates — but would leave Social Security untouched. The tax reform idea would generate an overall revenue increase in the range of perhaps WASHINGTON — For the $1 trillion over the coming first time, Americans 45 and decade. older make up a majority of the Conrad briefed his Demovoting-age population, giving cratic colleagues on the draft older Americans wider influence plan, which under Capitol Hill’s in elections as the U.S. stands arcane budget process is a bluedivided over curtailing Medicare print setting a nonbinding and other benefits for seniors. framework for future legislaAlong with the information tion. about the growing influence of The measure could come up older adults, preliminary census for a committee vote next week, estimates also show a decline in Conrad said. the number of married couples with children, slight growth in GOP sticking with plan household size and a rapid rise in the number of Mexicans. WASHINGTON — RepubliThe findings, based on the cans hoping to unseat President latest publicly available govern- Barack Obama said they see ment data, offer a preview of al-Qaida leader Osama bin Ladtrends that will be detailed in en’s death as a welcome develthe next round of 2010 census opment but no reason to change results being released this political strategy. month that focus on age, houseWhile Obama almost surely hold relationships and racial will get a boost in his poll numsubgroups. bers, advisers for the still-formAs a whole, the numbers ing field of GOP candidates point to a rapidly graying expect that it will be temporary nation driven largely by the and that voters will select a nation’s 78 million baby boompresident based on how the ers, who are now between the economy recovers — or doesn’t ages of 46 and 65 and looking — over the next 18 months. ahead to retirement. A trio of polls released Tuesday reflected an uptick for Dem’s deficit plan Obama’s overall approval rating in the wake of the bin Laden’s WASHINGTON — The top Democrat in the Senate on bud- death in Pakistan at the hands of Navy SEALs. get matters said Tuesday that But that could change he’s preparing a fiscal blueprint to slash the deficit by $4 trillion quickly. The killing of a terrorist over the upcoming decade — a half a world away doesn’t plan built on the bipartisan change the fact that the unemfindings of President Barack ployment rate remains stubObama’s deficit commission. bornly high, gasoline prices are Budget Committee Chairrising, and the economic recovman Kent Conrad, D-N.D., said ery is sluggish. Those are top the plan calls for a complete issues for voters. overhaul of the tax code — The Associated Press
Briefly: World Arctic ice is melting faster than expected STOCKHOLM — The ice of Greenland and the rest of the Arctic is melting faster than expected and could help raise global sea levels by as much as 5 feet this century, dramatically higher than earlier projections, an authoritative international assessment said. The findings “emphasize the need for greater urgency” in combating global warming, said the report of the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program (AMAP), the scientific arm of the eight-nation Arctic Council. The warning of much higher seas comes as the world’s nations remain bogged down in their two-decade-long talks on reducing emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases blamed for global warming. Rising sea levels are expected to cause some of global warming’s worst damage — from inundated small islands to possible flooding of New York City’s subways. Oceans will not rise uniformly worldwide because of currents, winds and other factors, but such low-lying areas as Bangladesh and Florida will likely be hard-hit.
14 miners trapped SAN JUAN DE SABINAS, Mexico — A gas explosion Tuesday in a coal mine trapped 14 miners and injured another in northern Coahuila state near
the U.S. border. A mine employee wearing a mask and air tank was lowered into the shaft to evaluate conditions for a possible rescue at the small mine, and emergency personnel and federal and state officials gathered outside the pit head. There were no confirmed deaths, and as of Tuesday afternoon, rescue crews had yet to reach the trapped miners, said Luis Martinez, mayor of the town of San Juan de Sabinas, Mexico, where the mine is located, about 85 miles southwest of Eagle Pass, Texas. The 14 miners had gone down the 197-foot-deep shaft when the explosion happened early Tuesday. The mine had opened just over a month ago and employed a total of about 25 miners.
Gadhafi shells rebels TRIPOLI, Libya — Forces loyal to Moammar Gadhafi shelled a rebel supply route and a besieged opposition stronghold in western Libya on Tuesday, even as the embattled Libyan leader’s international isolation deepened with a demand by Turkey that he resign now. Turkey is a key regional mediator and in the past tried to nudge Gadhafi to meet demands for change from the opposition. However, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan adopted a much tougher stance Tuesday, saying that Gadhafi must “immediately step down.” In Tripoli, Libya’s deputy foreign minister, Khaled Kaim, said such a decision is not up to Turkey but the Libyan people. The Associated Press
The Associated Press
Afghan men point at a television screen as the killing of al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden is announced at a TV shop in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Monday.
With Osama gone, will U.S. stick to war plan? Commanders fear squandering hard-fought gains on battlefield By Donna Cassata and Robert Burns The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — The demise of Osama bin Laden complicates what was already a tough call for President Barack Obama: how to wind down the nearly decade-old war in Afghanistan. Now the symbolic reason for staying in the fight — to get al-Qaida’s leader and avenge 9/11 — has been undercut. Momentum had been building in Congress and elsewhere for a shift to a narrower, less costly military mission in Afghanistan even before the U.S. raid that killed bin Laden. This could suit Obama’s desire to put Afghanistan behind him by beginning a phased troop pullout this summer along with NATO partners. But it also could put him at sharper odds with his military commanders, who argue for a slower drawdown and a longer-
term military commitment that they believe would lessen the chances of Afghanistan again falling apart. U.S. commanders fear squandering hard-fought battlefield gains, particularly those achieved with the addition last year of an extra 30,000 American troops. They now face a spring offensive by the Taliban, whose goal remains undermining the Afghan government, discrediting its security forces and driving out U.S. troops. Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., reflected a wider skepticism about remaining heavily involved in Afghanistan when he said Tuesday that he had not imagined at the outset of the war in October 2001 that U.S. troops would still be there — “with no end in sight, even after the death of Osama bin Laden.” Top administration officials have vowed not to abandon Afghanistan, even as the U.S. mil-
itary role shrinks, and their central rationale is not changed by the elimination of bin Laden. They point to 1989 and the U.S. decision to walk away from Afghanistan after the Soviet occupation collapsed; chaos ensued, the Taliban rose to power, and alQaida had a launch pad for global terror. The worry is that the pattern would be repeated if the U.S. left anytime soon, giving terrorists a haven and compelling a future president to intervene yet again. “Nobody wants them [U.S. troops] to leave and come home more than I do, but I don’t want them to go back,” Sen. Lindsey Graham, an outspoken supporter of Obama’s plan to keep troops there until at least 2014, told reporters. His advice to the president: “Stay with the plan you got.” House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, who traveled to Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan last month, said it was clear the administration’s plan is working. “I don’t want to see us take any steps that jeopardize the progress we’ve made,” Boehner told reporters.
White House has contrasting stories about bin Laden raid By Erica Werner
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Killing Osama bin Laden was a big victory for the U.S., but how exactly the raid went down is another story — and another, and another. Over two days, the White House has offered contradictory versions of events as it tries to sort through what the president’s press secretary called the “fog of combat” and produce an accurate account. Press Secretary Jay Carney said Tuesday that officials were trying to get information out as quickly as possible about the complex event witnessed by just a handful of people, and the story line was being corrected. Some of the White House contradictions and corrections that have emerged so far: n White House counterterrorism adviser John Brennan told reporters Monday that bin Laden’s son, Khalid, was killed in the raid. When the White House
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released a transcript of Brennan’s briefing, it substituted the name of a different son, Hamza. The White House said that was a transcription error. n Brennan said bin Laden’s wife died while shielding the terrorist leader from U.S. gunfire. Carney said Tuesday that the wife hadn’t died and was merely shot in the leg, although another woman did die. But it wasn’t clear that either of them was trying to shield bin Laden. n Brennan and other officials suggested that bin Laden was holding a gun and even firing at U.S. forces. Carney said Tuesday that bin Laden was unarmed. n Officials have offered varying accounts of how President Barack Obama and his team in the White House Situation Room were able to monitor the raid. Without providing details on the technology involved, Brennan said that “we were able to monitor in a real-time basis the progress of the operation from its commencement to its time on target
to the extraction of the remains and to then the egress off of the target.” CIA Director Leon Panetta told PBS on Tuesday that “once those teams went into the compound, I can tell you that there was a time period of almost 20 or 25 minutes that we really didn’t know just exactly what was going on.” n The night of the raid, administration officials held a telephone briefing for reporters. “During the raid, we lost one helicopter due to mechanical failure,” one of the administration officials said. Later in the same call, another official contradicted that: “We didn’t say it was mechanical.” Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, clarified Tuesday that the explanation was more technical: The air temperature in the compound was hotter than expected and the helicopter was too heavy to stay aloft under that condition.
. . . more news to start your day
West: Officials try to ID badly decomposed body
Nation: Blast eases flood threat; water level to rise
Nation: Men steal antlers from Pittsburgh NRA event
Nation: Alligator takes bite out of police cruiser
DNA TESTS MIGHT be needed to identify a badly decomposed body found in the home of a former Playboy playmate and B-movie actress who appeared in “Attack of the 50 Foot Woman,” a coroner’s official said Tuesday. The body was discovered last week in pack-rat conditions in the neglected Benedict Canyon home of Yvette Vickers. It was unrecognizable as a man or woman and listed in records only as a “Doe.” Coroner’s Lt. Cheryl MacWillie said it could take a week to determine the identity.
THE DRAMATIC, LATE-NIGHT demolition of a huge earthen levee sent chocolate-colored floodwaters pouring onto thousands of acres of Missouri farmland Tuesday, easing the threat to a tiny Illinois town being menaced by the Mississippi River. But the blast near Cairo, Ill., did nothing to ease the risk of more trouble downstream, where the mighty river is expected to rise to its highest levels since the 1920s in some parts of Tennessee, Mississippi and Louisiana. “We’re making a lot of unfortunate history here in Mississippi in April and May,” said Jeff Rent, a spokesman for the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency.
POLICE ARE POINTING at two exhibition workers in the theft of two massive sets of elk antlers following the National Rifle Association’s annual meeting in Pittsburgh. Investigators said 46-year-old Gary Felts and 44-year-old Stephen Lee stole the antlers Sunday night while a vendor at the convention center waited to load a truck. Police said the vendor reported the theft and the men were detained on a sidewalk outside with the antlers, valued at more than $500,000. Felts, of Joppa, Md., and Lee, of Cumberland, Md., were charged with theft and conspiracy and released on $5,000 bail.
A 10-FOOT-LONG ALLIGATOR has taken a bite out of a Florida deputy sheriff’s cruiser. Authorities said Alachua County Deputy Victor Borrero spotted the gator Saturday evening near the Gainesville Golf and Country Club. It attacked the patrol car while the deputy was waiting for an alligator trapper to show up. Sheriff’s spokesman Todd Kelly said the car’s front bumper was heavily damaged. A Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission spokeswoman said the alligator was put down under the state’s nuisance gator policy. Under that policy, the trapper is allowed to keep hide and meat from the gator.