thursday reads

Several Burmese pro-democracy activists arrested in the recent demonstrations, including two young Rangoon University students, have been tortured to death while being pressed to disclose the whereabouts of comrades on the run, human rights organisations reported today.



The Marine Corps is pressing to remove its forces from Iraq and to send marines instead to Afghanistan, to take over the leading role in combat there, according to senior military and Pentagon officials.



Turkey warned on Thursday that relations with its NATO ally the United States would be harmed by a U.S. House committee's approval of a resolution calling the 1915 massacres of Armenians by Ottoman Turks genocide.



Judge Suspends Key Bush Effort in Immigration

A federal judge in San Francisco ordered an indefinite delay yesterday of a central measure of the Bush administration’s new strategy to curb illegal immigration.

The judge, Charles R. Breyer of the Northern District of California, said the government had failed to follow proper procedures for issuing a new rule that would have forced employers to fire workers if their Social Security numbers could not be verified within three months.

Judge Breyer chastised the Department of Homeland Security for making a policy change with “massive ramifications” for employers, without giving any legal explanation or conducting a required survey of the costs and impact for small businesses.

Former President Jimmy Carter said Wednesday he is convinced the United States engages in torture that clearly breaches international law and told CNN President Bush creates his own definition of human rights to escape violating them.



Wired - NSA's Lucky Break: How the U.S. Became Switchboard to the World



No sooner did Alberto Gonzales resign as attorney general last month than he retained a high-powered Washington criminal-defense lawyer to represent him in continuing inquiries by Congress and the Justice Department.



New testimony released yesterday by the House Judiciary Committee reveals details about the alleged involvement of former Bush administration advisor Karl Rove in the prosecution of Democratic Alabama Governor Don Siegelman.


Nancy Gets testy with the Peasants