Wednesday, April 02, 2008

SPB News for Wednesday.


Bush forced into embarrassing crow-eating George W. Bush's first appearance with Kevin Rudd as Australian Prime Minister was almost embarrassing to watch as the US President [sic] ate political dirt and performed tortuous linguistic contortions in the name of the alliance. ...[F]or someone who genuinely worked on the Australian-US alliance, it was an act of public crow-eating that was inevitable since Labor's victory last year.


GAO Blasts Weapons Budget --Cost Overruns Hit $295 Billion Government auditors issued a scathing review yesterday of dozens of the Pentagon's biggest weapons systems, saying ships, aircraft and satellites are billions of dollars over budget and years behind schedule. The Government Accountability Office found that 95 major systems have exceeded their original budgets by a total of $295 billion, bringing their total cost to $1.6 trillion, and are delivered almost two years late on average.

Arms supplier in plot on Army base gets 20 months An ethnic Albanian immigrant [Agron Abdullahu] who supplied firearms to a group of Muslims accused of plotting to kill soldiers at a U.S. Army base was sentenced to 20 months in prison on Monday.


Border fence to go up despite federal law --Bush to sidestep environmental laws The Bush regime plans to use its authority to bypass more than 30 laws and regulations in an effort to finish building 670 miles of fence along the southwest U.S. border by the end of this year, federal officials said Tuesday.
Cash-strapped police using civilians to respond to 911 calls, other tasks --Departments under budget burdens hire outside help Facing tighter budgets, law enforcement agencies across the country are increasingly turning to civilians to respond to some calls that sworn officers and deputies are usually responsible for. That means people calling 911 to report a traffic accident, a burglarized home or a stolen car may be greeted by a civilian in a polo shirt instead of a gun-toting officer.
Texas Prosecutes Little Old Ladies for Voter Fraud --State's Attorney General has prosecuted Democrats who help seniors vote by mail while ignoring documented Republican ballot box stuffing. By Steven Rosenfeld Since 2005, Despite Abbott's [AG Greg Abbott, R] repeated declarations nobody is above Texas law, he has prosecuted no Republicans. "What is especially troubling is that while Greg Abbott's office has prosecuted minority seniors for simply mailing ballots, he has not prosecuted anyone on the other side of the aisle for what appear to be open and shut cases of real voter fraud," Hebert [Gerry Hebert, executive director of Campaign Legal Center] told Texas House Elections Committee, on January 25, 2008, as the panel held a hearing on a bill making the state's voter I.D. laws tougher.

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