SPB News for Sunday.

Edwards Wants to Remain On R.I. Ballot John Edwards dropped out of the Democratic race this week and initially, his campaign asked the secretary of state to remove his name. But NBC 10 reported that Edwards's campaign later asked for Edwards's name to remain on the ballot.

Another GOPedophile bites the dust! DCF spokesman arrested on child porn charges The spokesman for the Department of Children and Families was arrested on child pornography charges Friday night, accused of soliciting two teen-agers to perform sex acts which he used to make child pornography. Al Zimmerman, 40, who has worked for DCF since spring 2005, was arrested in Lakeland and taken to the Hillsborough County Jail, where he was booked on eight counts of using a child in a sexual performance.

USDA Bird Flu Plan Needs Test The Agriculture Department cannot ensure it will respond effectively to a bird flu outbreak because it has not tested many of the policies put in place as part of a national preparedness plan, an inspector general's report said Friday... The federal government's plan to prepare the country for avian influenza includes more than 300 tasks [!] for various federal departments. See: Flu 'Oddities' and:

U.S. pandemic plans call for military quarantines, forced vaccinations: ACLU 14 Jan 2008

U.S. European, Northern, and Pacific Commands sponsored pandemic response exercises: DoD 03 May 2006

DoD to 'augment civilian law' during pandemic or bioterror attack 11 May 2007

KBR awarded $385M Homeland Security contract for U.S. detention centers 24 Jan 2006

Killer flu recreated in the lab 07 Oct 2004

Bush to seek $140.7 billion for Army in budget President [sic] George W. Bush will seek $140.7 billion on Monday for the U.S. Army in fiscal 2009, including increased funds to buy helicopters and other equipment, according to budget documents obtained by Reuters. That request would be 8 percent higher than the Army budget requested for fiscal 2008.

Rice heads for London as Afghan crisis looms --Row escalates over Nato troop reinforcements --Canada may withdraw unless others do more. Condoleezza Rice, the US secretary of state [war criminal], is to fly to London next week to tackle an escalating row over Nato troop reinforcements for Afghanistan, amid worries that the entire international stabilisation strategy is in danger of failing.
letter to urge larger German deployment to south Afghanistan.

Pakistan unable to confirm killing of Al-Qaeda leader The Pakistan government said it could not confirm that a top Al-Qaeda [al-CIAduh] operative was among those killed in a missile strike in the North Waziristan tribal area of the country on Monday. Caretaker Interior Minister Lt. General Hamid Nawaz Khan (Retd.) said on Friday: "We cannot confirm al-Libi’s death because the militants had removed bodies from the site where the explosion happened and the security personnel did not find any corpse."

Guantánamo Decision Rebuffs Government A federal appeals court ruled against the Bush regime on Friday in a central case on Guantánamo detainees, declining to reconsider an order that the government has to turn over virtually all its information on many prisoners. Unless the Justice Department obtains a stay, the decision, from the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, will clear the way for prisoners’ lawyers to press 180 appeals cases of Guantánamo inmates challenging their detentions.