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(09/27/06 3:18am)
ATLANTA -- Travelers showed up at airports with toiletries stored in zip-top plastic bags Tuesday as they tried to comply with new security rules allowing them to carry on small amounts of liquids and gels.\n"I was thrilled to hear yesterday that actually you can carry mascara on the plane," said Val Chamberlain of Atlanta, who showed security screeners a plastic bag filled with mascara and small toiletries.\nBeginning Tuesday, liquid and gel toiletries in 3-ounce containers or smaller are allowed if they are in a clear plastic, quart-sized or smaller zip-top bag. Some items were permitted in any amount: saline solution, eye drops and prescription and non-prescription medicine, according to Transportation Security Administration spokesman Christopher White.\nDrinks, liquids and gels purchased in airport stores inside security checkpoints can be carried into passenger cabins, while baby formula is allowed but will be inspected.\n"I was glad to see (the changes)," said Vicki McGowan, a professional meeting planner at Oakland International Airport for a flight to Reno, Nev. "It's good. It will make life easier for traveling."\n"How can lipstick or mascara put people at risk?" she asked.\nJim Smith of the TSA said most passengers at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport came prepared and brought toiletries in plastic bags. But others first learned of the relaxed guidelines only after arriving and scrambled to throw away larger items or find plastic bags for toiletries.\nAt Chicago's O'Hare International Airport, Ginni and Edward Dewbray were stopped at the security line and told if they wanted to bring a small bottle of Oil of Olay lotion onto their flight to North Carolina, they would have to put it in a clear plastic bag. Edward Dewbray asked several other travelers for a bag and eventually found one.\n"It's an inconvenience," Ginni Dewbray said. "If they're going to stand there and ask you to have plastic bags, they should give them out. They're not that expensive."\nPat Henderson, of Palm Coast, Fla., was among those who did not want to bother with the new guidelines, throwing away the deodorant and toothpaste in his carry-on before entering the security check line at the Atlanta airport.\n"It's not worth the hassle," he said. "I just don't want to deal with it."\nKeith Fogarty, 45, of Norwood, Mass., was asked to check a small bag after trying to carry it through the US Airways security checkpoint at Boston's Logan International Airport.\nFogarty said he was aware some rule changes were taking effect but didn't know what they were.\n"There's too many rules," he said. "I don't bother paying attention. I just wait until I get here, and they'll tell me what to do. If I have to check the bag, I check the bag."\nIn Washington, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said the new rules "are likely to be with us for the foreseeable future." Testifying before the House Homeland Security Committee, Chertoff said the new rules would be in place for at least six weeks, but he declined to say whether they would remain as long as six months.\nTrash bins outside airport security checkpoints were filled with forbidden items. By 8 a.m., a trash bin at a checkpoint in Atlanta was three feet deep with water bottles and 16-ounce containers of toiletries, including shaving gel and hand lotion.\nThe new guidelines require items to be stored in bags quart-sized or smaller, but TSA officials in Atlanta allowed passengers to board planes with items stored in one-gallon bags since Tuesday was the first day the new rules were being enforced.\nIf a passenger brings a container larger than 3 ounces, it still must be put in checked baggage.\nAn outright ban on liquids, lotions and gels, ordered Aug. 10 after an alleged plot to bomb U.S.-bound jetliners was foiled, is no longer needed, Transportation Security Administration chief Kip Hawley said Monday.\nAfter testing a variety of explosives, the FBI and other laboratories found that tiny amounts of substances -- so small they fit into a quart-size plastic bag -- can't blow up an airliner.\nLeslie Walker, of Plano, Texas, was planning to carry her makeup and drinks for her 5-year-old daughter and 18-month-old son onto their flight from Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport to El Paso.\n"It was really a relief to know that I didn't have to get here this morning and repack everything. It saved me a little time," she said.\nChase Goodwin, 56, of Los Angeles, chugged liquid ginseng, which he drinks for health reasons, from a small bottle before going through security in Chicago.\n"The way the world is going you can only be so careful. It's a hindrance to some, but it doesn't bother me," he said of the security rules.\n--Associated Press writers Sophia Tareen in Chicago, Leslie Miller in Washington, Ken Maguire in Boston, Terence Chea in Oakland, Ca., and Paul Weber in Dallas contributed to this report.
(09/27/06 3:15am)
WASHINGTON -- A declassified government intelligence report says the war in Iraq has become a "cause celebre" for Islamic extremists, breeding deep resentment of the U.S. that is likely to get worse before it gets better.\nIn the bleak report, released Tuesday on President Bush's orders, the nation's most veteran analysts conclude that despite serious damage to the leadership of al-Qaida, the threat from Islamic extremists has spread both in numbers and in geographic reach.\n"If this trend continues, threats to U.S. interests at home and abroad will become more diverse, leading to increasing attacks worldwide," the document says. "The confluence of shared purpose and dispersed actors will make it harder to find and undermine jihadist groups."\nBush ordered a declassified version of the classified report released after several days of criticism sparked by portions that were leaked. Asked about those Tuesday, Bush said critics who believe the Iraq war has worsened terrorism are naive and mistaken.\nThe intelligence assessment, completed in April, has stirred a heated election-season argument over the course of U.S. national security in the years following the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.\nBush and his top advisers had said the broad assessment on global terrorism supported their arguments that the world is safer. But more than three pages of stark judgments warning about the spread of terrorism contrasted with the administration's glass-half-full declarations.\nThe report said:\n• The increased role of Iraqis in opposing al-Qaida in Iraq might lead the terror group's veteran foreign fighters to focus their efforts outside the country.\n• While Iran and Syria are the most active state sponsors of terror, many other countries will be unable to prevent their resources from being exploited by terrorists.\n• The underlying factors fueling the spread of the extremist Muslim movement outweigh its vulnerabilities. These factors are entrenched grievances, a slow pace of reform in home countries, rising anti-U.S. sentiment and the Iraq war.\n• Groups "of all stripes" will increasingly use the Internet to communicate, train, recruit and obtain support.\nThe assessment also lays out weaknesses of the movement -- weaknesses analysts say must be exploited if its spread is to be slowed. For instance, they note that extremists want to see the establishment of strict Islamic governments in the Arab world -- a development they say would be unpopular with most Muslims.
(09/27/06 3:09am)
Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak will be coming to IU Oct. 30 as part of the IU Union Board lecture series. The speech, which will be held at the IU Auditorium, will be free to the public but will require a general admission ticket. \nBarak was elected Israel's leader in 1999 and served until he lost to Ariel Sharon in 2001. Much of Barak's tenure involved peace processes in the region, which included withdrawal of the Israeli Defense Forces from South Lebanon in 2000 and peace negotiations with Syria and the Palestinian Authority. \nTickets will be available at the IU Auditorium Box Office starting Oct. 16 to any student with a valid IU ID and Oct. 19 to faculty, staff and the general public, according to a press release. There will be a two-ticket limit per person. \n"This unique vision and background that Prime Minister Barak brings is invaluable for students as they get ready to become professionals in a global world," said Union Board Lectures Director Amanda Prager in a statement.
(09/27/06 3:05am)
BROWNSBURG, Ind. -- A woman shot herself with an officer's handgun while sitting in a Hendricks County Sheriff's Department squad car, authorities said Tuesday.\nNicole C. Butler, 26, was taken to Wishard Hospital in Indianapolis with a gunshot wound to her abdomen. Her condition was unknown, but police said she went into surgery.\nThe shooting occurred about 5:30 a.m. when two patrol cars responded to a disturbance call at the home of Butler's boyfriend in Brownsburg, said sheriff's Capt. Brett Clark.\nButler was placed alone in the front passenger seat of Deputy Evan Love's squad car while Love talked to Butler's boyfriend outside the house, Clark said.\nButler reached under the driver's side seat, grabbed a .38 revolver and shot herself, Clark said. The gun was issued by the department and was considered Love's backup firearm.\nClark said the shooting was being investigated. No immediate disciplinary action was taken against Love, who has been on the force for two years.
(09/27/06 3:04am)
INDIANAPOLIS -- Active duty soldiers and more veterans from Indiana would receive new tax relief and other benefits under a series of proposals presented Tuesday by Indiana House Republicans.\n"The sacrifices made by Hoosier troops currently serving, Hoosier veterans and all of their military families should never leave our thoughts," said House Speaker Brian Bosma, R-Indianapolis.\nHe was joined by about a dozen House members, candidates and members of veterans groups at the USS Indianapolis Memorial in announcing the legislative proposals. Other Republicans did the same at other locations around the state.\nRepublicans control the House 52-48, but as usual in recent years, the chamber is considered up for grabs in the November election.\nThe proposals include:\n--Exempting from the state income tax all military income of Indiana reservists and National Guard personnel who are actively deployed. They now get a $2,000 exemption for their military pay.\n--Increasing from $2,000 to $5,000 the amount of military pay that active-duty military personnel from Indiana are allowed to exempt from state income tax.\n--Extending eligibility in the newly created military relief fund to all active military personnel from Indiana, besides reservists and Guard soldiers. The fund is designed to provide financial relief to the families of serving soldiers.
(09/27/06 3:04am)
INDIANAPOLIS -- A woman convicted of swindling couples out of nearly $100,000 after promising to help them adopt Russian children was placed on electronically monitored home detention for two years Monday in federal court.\nVictoria Farahan, 42, a Russian native who lives in Carmel, Ind., also was sentenced to five years probation as part of a plea agreement on charges of mail and wire fraud, according to federal prosecutors.\nFarahan pleaded guilty in June as part of a deal with the U.S. attorney's office.\nAuthorities say Farahan told couples she worked with an international agency and could use her Russian contacts to help them adopt children from that country.\nAccording to a grand jury indictment, Farahan gave couples photos of children she said were Russian and available for adoption. Among the photos was one of her own child, taken when the child was an infant.\nDespite the exchange of money, no adoptions were ever completed, authorities said.\nU.S. District Judge Larry McKinney also fined Farahan $2,000 and ordered her to make restitution in the amount of $7,718. The victims already have been repaid $97,500.\nFarahan speaks fluent English. In 1990, she served as interpreter for Olga Korbut when the famed gymnast visited Indianapolis to pick up medicines donated to help survivors of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster.\nU.S. adoptions of children from the former Soviet Union are not uncommon. According to the U.S. State Department, more than 4,600 Russian orphans were issued visas to come to the U.S. during the 2005 budget year, second only to the number from China.
(09/27/06 3:02am)
NASHVILLE, Ind. -- A judge has approved an order blocking a California-based group from making automated calls attacking Democratic congressional candidate Baron Hill, who is challenging Republican U.S. Rep. Mike Sodrel in the 9th District.\nIndiana Attorney General Steve Carter sued the Economic Freedom Fund earlier this month in Brown County after receiving 12 consumer complaints about the calls, which are prohibited by state law unless previously agreed to by the recipient.\nThe state's lawsuit sought injunctions and fines of $5,000 for each violation.\nUnder an agreed entry signed Monday by Brown Circuit Court Judge Judith Stewart, the Economic Freedom Fund agreed to stop making the calls while litigation proceeds. A hearing set for Wednesday was canceled because of the order.\nCarter filed a similar lawsuit Monday in Harrison County against Washington, D.C.-based American Family Voices, accusing it of violating state law by making prerecorded phone calls attacking Sodrel.\n"I'm hopeful that American Family Voices will follow this early lead of the Economic Freedom Fund," Carter said in a news release.\nA hearing in the American Family Voices case is scheduled for next month.
(09/27/06 3:02am)
FORT WAYNE -- The state wants to get the message out that quality child care helps businesses to thrive and can serve as an economic development tool for Indiana.\nA statewide public awareness tour sponsored by the Indiana Family and Social Services Administration is necessary to put child care on the agenda of economic development agencies, economist Morton Marcus said during a stop Monday in Fort Wayne.\nHaving quality child care obviously benefits parents but also generally helps the work force, Marcus said.\nParents are more productive when they know their children are cared for and safe, he said, and child care could be a selling point to attract young, skilled workers.\nChildren also benefit because research shows they perform better in school when they have received quality care during the first six years, he said.\n"If nobody tells you your hair is important, you won't care about your hair. But when somebody says, 'Pay attention to your hair,' you'll start to look at it. That's what we are trying to do here," Marcus said.\nThe tour also features Carole Stein, the chief executive officer of the Stein Group, an Indianapolis-based think tank focusing on child and family issues.\n"Child care used to be seen as a social or welfare issue, but we're really seeing it as a link for the parents to be able to go to work -- an employment issue," Stein said.\nNortheast Indiana has organizations devoted to improving the quality of child care in the area, including Paths to Quality, a regional organization that licensed or accredited child-care providers can join.
(09/27/06 2:59am)
LAFAYETTE -- A series of voting centers will be established for next year's city elections as Tippecanoe County tests a system allowing voters to pick where they cast their ballots.\nUnder the plan announced Monday by Indiana Secretary of State Todd Rokita, voters will not be limited only to the voting site in the precinct where they live.\nCounty Clerk Linda Phillips said she expects 15 to 30 voting centers to be established for any election, down from the 69 polling places used for the county-wide primary in May.\nVoting centers could be set up at shopping malls, workplaces or schools, she said. The only requirements are that they be large, be accessible to the disabled and have a connection to the Internet.\nRokita said polling books at each center would be connected through the Internet, alerting poll workers if someone tries to vote more than once.\nRokita said he believed voters would find it more convenient to choose where to vote and not have to worry about finding the correct precinct site. He said he had seen similar centers used in Colorado.\n"The voters (in Colorado) weren't scrambling to go to the polls after work," he said. "Some were voting during their lunch hour. Others were voting even after dropping their kids off at school."\nWhile Phillips and Rokita both predicted that the centers would eventually be less expensive than traditional precinct voting sites, new equipment will need to be bought, and additional training will be necessary for poll workers during the first year.\nWayne County, which includes Richmond, also submitted a complete application seeking to test the voting centers, and Rokita said he would decide by next week whether to grant that request.
(09/27/06 2:51am)
Last Wednesday, I attended a lecture by Nobel Prize-winning economist Amartya Sen titled "Identity: Enrichment, Violence and Terror." At the lecture, Sen advanced the key theory behind his latest book, "Identity and Violence: The Illusion of Destiny," which provides an interesting perspective on diversity issues here at IU.\nAt the risk of oversimplification (read the book for the whole shebang), Sen's theory goes something like this: When people belong to mutually exclusive groups, there is a lack of common feeling -- such a sympathy or empathy -- between individuals on opposite sides of the divide. The result is that when conflicts arise between these groups, say over cultural differences or group interests, it leads to violence between groups. What keeps us all from going at it like Rwanda's Hutus and Tutsis is that most of us, as individuals, have multiple overlapping identities that we emphasize differently from situation to situation -- and we share some of these identities with people who are members of other groups. \nSo, for example, I'm simultaneously a graduate student, IU student, political scientist, Scotch-Irish American, Ohioan, straight guy, white dude, agnostic, moderate Republican, lover of indie rock, mystery buff, amateur cook, Indiana Daily Student columnist and more. And what keeps me, a mystery-loving political scientist, from taking a machete to a sci-fi-loving political scientist over the last slice of pizza -- besides the laws of the land and the fact that I don't own a machete -- is that we share a common identity that promotes a degree of compassion between us. Problems arise, however, according to Sen, when one source of identity is held preeminent by a group or individual -- when, for example, your religious or ethnic or ideological identity strictly controls your behavior and relations with different groups. In other words, when we reinforce the idea that only one identity really matters, we split individuals from one another who may have commonalities and risk worsening group relations.\nThe next day, at a luncheon hosted by the India studies department, I asked Sen about how policymakers might apply this theory to reduce conflict. He answered by talking about his fears that the British approach to multiculturalism might promote group conflict and the British government's well-meaning attempts to work with self-appointed ethnic or religious community leaders and sponsor religious schools may actually exacerbate tensions between groups.\nBringing us back to IU, we wonder constantly about how to promote diversity. One of the big questions is how to make sure that it goes beyond the empty numbers regarding the demographic groups' respective sizes. So here's an idea: While we have many racial, ethnic, sexual and other identity-based groups here on campus (and I'm not complaining -- you should see me on St. Pat's Day), perhaps we should be looking at the ways to build better linkages among individuals within these groups. Certainly, the University has programs that serve this purpose, such as the Commission on Multicultural Understanding and the diversity office. But what about you? What are you doing?
(09/27/06 2:49am)
Calling all future Miss America hopefuls: If you're looking for the perfect interview coach, I'm your go-to gal. You know that question, "What could be done to make the world a better place?" I have the answer:\nNo pants.\nForget "world peace." Once you eliminate pants as a social fashion norm, the peace will follow.\nPantaloons, trousers, slacks -- they're all tools designed by a fashion designer known as "the man," who created them not for comfort, not for style but specifically to keep us down.\nLook around you. Everyone is wearing pants. Pants have become a wardrobe staple for virtually everyone, but getting rid of them has so many benefits.\nThink of all the money we could save by not purchasing pants. Your average pair of pants ranges in price anywhere from $10 to $10 million.\nHow many times have you heard, "Sorry kids, no food tonight. We had to buy another pair of pants?" \nNever again!\nPants also play a major role in the obstacle course of equality-- perhaps even more so than running through the tires of prejudice or climbing the wall of ignorance. If everyone stood together, unbuckled their belts and said, "To hell with pants!" they could knock down socioeconomic barriers and lead us one step closer to a classless utopia.\nThose pants are from Wal-Mart. Those pants are Gucci. Who cares? Labels and price wouldn't matter anymore if no one were wearing those pants. No longer would we be third-class citizens judged by our choice of pants aspiring to wear the fancy pants worn by the very elite. We would just be people, purely people.\nSocial inequality isn't the only injustice perpetuated by pants. The spark of gender inequality is fanned into a fire with the plague of pants-wearing. Pants are a symbol of masculinity. You've heard the phrase "wearing the pants" as a way to describe who holds control in a situation or relationship, implying that a man or whoever is most masculine should hold control. Without pants, clothing-based hierarchy could be debunked.\nThe absence of pants could also squelch the uprising of disruptive fashion controversy. Recently people have been taking to the streets to riot against the infiltration of leggings into mainstream fashion. Remove the pants factor and leggings would become a nonissue. Lives could be saved.\nSome people might argue that pants exist for a reason, for warmth and protection. Those people are sissies.\nSome might worry that cutting down on pants sales would ruin the lives of pants-makers everywhere. However, pants-dependent economies can easily transition their trade into crafting useful, pants-shaped nuclear weapons.\nAnd some people might just really love pants. Not to worry: Pants should not be outlawed, merely made optional. \nPants restrict movement and air flow. If the lower half of our bodies is restrained and controlled, how soon before the same happens to our minds? Or is it too late? No! The revolution begins when you take off your pants.
(09/27/06 2:49am)
BERLIN -- A leading opera house canceled a three-year-old production of Mozart's "Idomeneo" that included a scene showing the severed head of the Prophet Muhammad, unleashing a furious debate over free speech.\nIn a statement late Monday, the Deutsche Oper said it decided "with great regret" to cancel the production after Berlin security officials warned of an "incalculable risk" because of the scene.\nAfter its premiere in 2003, the production by Hans Neuenfels drew widespread criticism over the scene in which King Idomeneo presents the severed heads not only of the Greek god of the sea, Poseidon, but also of Muhammad, Jesus and Buddha. The disputed scene is not part of Mozart's original staging of the 225-year-old opera, but was an addition of Neuenfels' production, which was last performed by the company in March 2004.\n"We know the consequences of the conflict over the (Muhammad) caricatures," Deutsche Oper said in its statement announcing the decision. "We believe that needs to be taken very seriously and hope for your support."\nOn Tuesday, Deutsche Oper director Kirsten Harms said security officials had recommended, but not ordered, that she either cut the scene or pull the entire production from the 2006-2007 lineup.\n"The State Criminal Office assessed the situation and came to the conclusion that if the Deutsche Oper stages this version of 'Idomeneo' in its originally produced form, it will pose an incalculable security risk to the public and employees," Harms told reporters.\n"If I were to ignore this and say, 'We are going to stage this nevertheless, or because of this,' and something were to happen, then everyone would say, and would be right to say, 'She ignored the warning of security officials,'" Harms said.\nShe said she spoke at length with Neuenfels -- who insisted his staging not be altered -- as well as the orchestra director and others involved in the production before making her decision.\nWhile some expressed understanding for the decision, many were outraged.\n"That is crazy," Interior Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble told reporters in Washington, where he was holding meetings with U.S. officials. "This is unacceptable."\nThe leader of Germany's Islamic Council welcomed the decision, saying a depiction of Muhammad with a severed head "could certainly offend Muslims."\n"Nevertheless, of course I think it is horrible that one has to be afraid," Ali Kizilkaya told Berlin's Radio Multikulti. "That is not the right way to open dialogue"
(09/26/06 7:22am)
Sept. 21, the Indiana Daily Student reported that some campus bus routes are going to change starting Oct. 1. Campus Bus Services shortened the B bus route and scheduled the X buses to stop running an hour and a half earlier.\nThe change for the B bus is that it will no longer go to the stadium; the route will end at Fisher Circle by the Christian Student Fellowship and then turn around and go back down Jordan Avenue. In the IDS article, Operations Manager Perry Maull said that nobody rode the B bus to get to the stadium and suggested that students could just take the X or A bus.\nOne major problem with this is that the X and A buses are overcrowded enough as it is. After class, I've walked to where the X bus picks up students on 7th street by the Indiana Memorial Union. Anybody who has done the same after a 2:15 p.m. class will tell you that you have to wait at least a half-hour for the bus, if not more. The line of people stretches back hundreds of yards. If you're in the back half of the line, you will have to wait for a second bus because the first one will fill before you even get close enough to see it. The process is usually the same when waiting for the A bus. Swarms of students block the sidewalks near the stops and fight their way into the overcrowded buses.\nAnother problem with the route change is that, while Maull claims that no one rides the B bus to get to the stadium, this could be because bus drivers have growled at students for trying to do just such a thing. During the first week of classes, another student and I were both riding the B bus back to the stadium. After the last stop before the stadium, the bus driver discourteously told us that we needed to get off at that point. The other student pointed out that it said "Stadium pad" above the bus as part of its route. The driver still drove us back to the stadium, but it was apparent that he was deeply disturbed by the fact that he had to actually do his job. With a few exceptions, the campus bus drivers are one of the rudest groups of people I've ever met -- but that's a whole different story.\nInstead of having fewer buses, there should be more. Not everyone lives within walking distance of campus, and not everyone has an extra hour to spare to wait on the buses before or after class. I find it astoundingly ironic that while IU is enrolling more students than ever before, the University's actually reducing the routes to force more people onto fewer buses. While the over-arching significance of this change is minor, it is revealing of the University's tendency to sacrifice student needs to save a few extra bucks.
(09/26/06 4:13am)
BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Iraq's feuding ethnic and sectarian groups moved ahead Monday with forming a committee to consider amending the constitution after their leaders agreed to delay any division of the country into autonomous states until 2008.\nAs legislators formed a 27-member committee to begin talking about amending Iraq's constitution, official observances of Ramadan were punctuated with violence around the country.\nBritish forces reported they had killed Omar al-Farouq, a top militant leader, identified by Iraqi officials as an al-Qaida leader who had escaped from a U.S. prison in Afghanistan and returned to Iraq.\nShiite, Sunni Arab and Kurdish political leaders in parliament formed the constitutional committee, which will take about a year to review any changes and get them approved.\nA separate Shiite-sponsored federalism bill will be read to the legislature Tuesday and then debated for two days before parliament breaks for the Iraqi weekend. The legislation would be read again, with any changes made by legislators, Oct. 1.\nA vote would come four days after the second reading, with the bill needing a simple majority for passage. If approved, it would be implemented 18 months later -- in 2008 -- according to the deal made by the parties.\nThe deal was a victory for Sunni Arabs, who had been fighting the federalism bill proposed by Shiite cleric Abdel Aziz al-Hakim, the leader of the United Iraqi Alliance. They fear that if not amended, it will splinter the country and deny them a share of Iraq's oil, which is found in the predominantly Kurdish north and the heavily Shiite south.\nThey agreed to break a two-week deadlock after all parties accepted a Sunni demand that the parliamentary committee be set up discuss amending the constitution.\nSunni Arabs hope to win an amendment that would make it more difficult to establish autonomous regions.\nAlthough the deal was struck and endorsed by Adnan al-Dulaimi's Sunni Arab Accordance Front, which has 44 seats in the 275-member parliament, it was rejected by the hard-liners.\n"We reject any attempt to promote the regions legislation or federalism because it will pave the way for the partitioning of Iraq," Hamid al-Mutlaq, a senior official in the Sunni Arab National Dialogue Front, told The Associated Press.\nHe added that his bloc, which has 11 seats in parliament and is run by Saleh al-Mutlaq, was distressed that other groups such as the Accordance Front either helped strike the deal or supported it.\n"The groups, especially the Iraqi Accordance Front, that helped pass this legislation and ignored the will of the Iraqi people bear a historical responsibility regarding this issue," he said.\nAlthough federalism is enshrined in the constitution approved by Iraqis in a referendum a year ago, the right to seek amendments to the charter was a key demand made by Sunni Arabs when they agreed to join Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's national unity government in the spring.\nThe deal opened the way for Iraq's communities to move ahead politically and solve an impasse that threatened to worsen relations among them. If left unresolved, the deadlock could have further shaken Iraq's fragile democracy and led to more sectarian violence.\nThe depth of enmity between Shiites and Sunni Arabs was evident in their disagreement over the day the Muslim holy month of Ramadan was to begin.\nSunni Arabs began observing the month of daytime fasting Saturday, while Iraq's most influential Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, declared the start to be Monday. The Shiite-led government followed al-Sistani's lead.\nThe observances started with violent attacks around Iraq, including an assault on a police station and the discovery of more apparent victims of sectarian death squads in the capital.\nIraq has seen increased violence during Ramadan in the past, and Maj. Gen. William B. Caldwell, spokesman for the U.S.-led military coalition, warned last week it was anticipated that Iraq's already severe sectarian violence would escalate during the holy month once again.\nAl-Farouq was killed in the raid against his home in Basra, 340 miles south of Baghdad, when he opened fire on British soldiers entering the building, British forces spokesman Maj. Charlie Burbridge said.\n"We had information that a terrorist of considerable significance was hiding in Basra, as a result of that information we conducted an operation in an attempt to arrest him," Burbridge told The Associated Press from southern Iraq. "During the attempted arrest Omar Farouq was killed, which is regrettable, because we wanted to arrest him."\nWhen asked if it was Omar al-Farouq, a top leader of al-Qaida in Southeast Asia who escaped last year from a U.S. prison in Afghanistan, he said he could not elaborate, citing British policy.\nA Basra police officer, speaking on condition of anonymity for security reasons, said it was the same man, adding al-Farouq was known to be an expert in bomb-making. The officer said al-Farouq was going by the name Mahmoud Ahmed while living in Basra, adding that he entered Iraq three months ago.
(09/26/06 3:54am)
Basketball player Alan Henderson, golfer Erika Wicoff and sportscaster Dick Enberg headline this year's class of Indiana University Hall of Fame inductees.\nThe rest of this year's class, announced Monday, includes basketball player Jon McGlocklin, tennis player Dave Power and baseball star Mike Smith.\nWicoff, McGlocklin, Power and Smith will all be inducted Nov. 10 and will be recognized at halftime of Indiana's football game Nov. 11 against Michigan. Enberg and Henderson, who still plays in the NBA, will be inducted when their schedules permit.\nHenderson, a former All-American, ranks sixth on the Hoosiers' career scoring list with 1,979 points, holds the career record for rebounds (1,091) and helped Indiana reach the Final Four in 1992 and the regional semifinals in 1993.\nWicoff is the most decorated women's golfer in Indiana history after earning three individual Big Ten titles and leading the Hoosiers to Big Ten team crowns in 1995 and 1996. Indiana finished fifth nationally in 1996, and Wicoff set the single-season school record for lowest scoring average (73.92) in 1994. She was a two-time All-American and has five top 10 finishes in seven years on the LPGA Tour.\nEnberg received a master's degree and a doctorate in health sciences at Indiana, and he received an honorary doctorate from IU in 2002. He is celebrating his 50th anniversary in broadcasting this year. He has worked for CBS and NBC and has called nine Rose Bowls, six Orange Bowls, four Olympic Games and 22 Wimbledon championships, among other events.\nMcGlocklin scored 827 points in three years from 1963-65 and is fourth on the school's single-season list for free throw percentage (90.0). He played 11 seasons in the NBA, including eight with the Milwaukee Bucks, who retired his jersey -- No. 14-- in 1976.\nPower, a two-time All-American, went 57-7 in singles and 47-8 in doubles, helping Indiana capture the 1964 Big Ten title. He is currently vice president of Windward Lake Club in Alpharetta, Ga.\nSmith was the 1992 Big Ten player of the year and won college's triple crown with a .490 batting average, 27 home runs and 95 RBI. He once hit nine home runs in nine days and is the school's career leader in home runs (47) and slugging percentage (1.490).
(09/26/06 3:53am)
Philadelphia -- Crotchety old science professors are becoming a rarer breed, at least for students at the University of Pennsylvania School of Engineering and Applied Science. \nIn the last five years alone, Penn's Engineering School has made a total of 35 new hires, and more than half of the engineering faculty were hired within the last eight years, according to Engineering School Dean Eduardo Glandt.\nAnd some of these professors are just a few years older than the students they teach. \n"When I first started teaching at Penn, before people knew who I was, I was sometimes mistaken for a graduate student," said computer engineering professor Milo Martin, who started teaching in January 2004 when he was 29.\nRecords show that the average age of the engineering faculty hired in the last five years is just 33, said Sandy Rathman, director of faculty affairs for the engineering school. This is because of the fact that new faculty members are usually hired immediately after completing their post-doctoral fellowships. \nThe recent increase in young faculty hires comes as no surprise to the engineering administrators.\nBioengineering professor Jason Burdick attributes the recent massive faculty recruitment effort to the fact that "the engineering school had undergone a rapid expansion 40 years ago, and as a result there is a large set of faculty who've reached retirement age."\nGlandt said the 1960s expansion was a response to the Sputnik launches in the 1950s, which "caused a tremendous reaction, leading to an investment into the sciences."\nFaculty of the "Sputnik generation" are now in their 70s or older, Glandt said.\nWhile Penn says goodbye to some longtime members of its faculty who have retired, a surge of young faculty are coming in to take their place, and many engineering administrators see this as a positive thing.\n"People are coming to Penn fresh out of other labs, bringing new twists and new ideas," Burdick said.\nFernando Pereira, chairman of the Department of Computer and Information Sciences, had a similar reaction.\n"I love having groups of young, energetic colleagues, who are bringing ideas from the outside and new approaches to teaching," he said.\nPereira said many engineering courses have had "great success" because of curriculum revisions made by new faculty.
(09/26/06 3:06am)
SEATTLE -- Got three bucks? That and a nickel will buy you a coffee drink at Starbucks.\nStarbucks Corp. said Thursday that it planned to raise the prices of its lattes, cappuccinos, drip coffee and other drinks by 5 cents, an average of 1.9 percent.\nThe increase, which goes into effect Oct. 3 at all company-operated stores in the United States and Canada, will mark the first time in two years the company has boosted drink prices.\nStarbucks also is increasing the price of its coffee beans by about 50 cents per pound, an average of 3.9 percent. That's the first price increase for whole beans in nine years, spokeswoman Valerie O'Neil said.\nStarbucks isn't raising prices on the prepared drinks it sells in refrigerated cases.\nO'Neil said the company decided to charge more because costs, including fuel and energy, are going up.\n"It's not one specific thing. It's part of our ongoing evaluation of business costs," O'Neil said.\nStarbucks' pricing varies based on the market, but the 5-cent price increase will be across the board, regardless of drink or part of the country, O'Neil said.\nCurrently, a tall, or 12-ounce, cup of Starbucks coffee costs between $1.40 and $1.65. Twelve-ounce lattes cost between $2.40 and $3.10, depending on the market, and a tall mocha costs between $2.70 and $3.40.\nSeattle-based Starbucks had 8,624 stores in the United States as of Aug. 30, about 5,500 of which are company-operated. O'Neil said Starbucks has 495 company-operated stores in Canada, but she did not have a figure for the total number of stores there.\nThe coffee retailer has said it expects to open as many as 30,000 stores worldwide.\nThe price increase does not affect Starbucks stores overseas, where Starbucks mainly operates its stores in partnership with other companies in those markets.\nO'Neil said Starbucks and its overseas partners could choose to raise prices in a certain country or local market at any time but wouldn't have an across-the-board increase like this one because of the different operating structure.
(09/26/06 3:02am)
MARTINSVILLE, Ind. -- The widow of an 83-year-old man killed by dogs said Monday she's dissatisfied that the dogs' owners were sentenced to home-detention.\nBelva Fiscus, 79, called the attack "murder by dog," as she testified at Monday's sentencing hearing for neighbors Andy and Anita Warren.\n"They got away with murder," Fiscus said after the hearing.\nShe said the Warrens should go to jail as a warning to others who might let dangerous dogs run loose.\nThe Warrens pleaded guilty to failure to restrain a dog resulting in death for the July 1, 2005, fatal mauling of retired furniture store owner Boyd Fiscus.\nMorgan Superior Court Judge G. Thomas Gray said he was bound by the terms of the couple's plea agreement.\nGray sentenced Andy Warren, 50, to 180 days of home detention. Anita Warren, 48, received 90 days. Both were given three-year suspended sentences.\nThe Warrens were neighbors and friends of Boyd Fiscus, who lived with his wife in a rural Mooresville area.\nInvestigators determined that the Warrens' four dogs -- two bulldogs, a mastiff and a border collie that were destroyed after the mauling -- attacked and killed Fiscus.\nAnita Warren found Fiscus' body after Belva Fiscus called her, worried because she had found his torn straw hat but got no response when she called his name.
(09/26/06 3:00am)
INDIANAPOLIS -- A voting machine company is working to fix a software glitch in 5,000 machines in Indiana that forced a voting systems developer to prevent voters from casting a straight-party ballot.\nOfficials with the Indiana Election Commission were upset that MicroVote General Corp. did not tell them sooner about the software problem. The general election is Nov. 7.\n"I am disturbed by their lack of candor, and the commission is disturbed by their lack of candor," said commission Chairman Tom Wheeler, who sent a three-page letter to every county election official who uses MicroVote's Infinity system.\nThe Infinity voting machines are used in 47 Indiana counties. The company disabled the straight-party voting function so the machines could be certified for use in the primary election but did not tell election officials.\n"I don't know if they just thought they would just get it fixed or no one would notice or what," Wheeler said.\nThe software glitch would have allowed voters in split precincts casting a straight-ticket ballot to illegally vote for a candidate outside of the area where they live. Split precincts can straddle municipality boundaries.\nTime constraints before the primary led an independent lab, Colorado-based CIBER, to recommend that the straight-ticket function be disabled, said MicroVote attorney John R. Price.\n"They said you can either spend the time to fix it now or disable it and we'll fix it later," Price said. "That was an easy call. MicroVote said, 'We'll disable it now, and we'll fix it later.'"\nLaura Herzog, Hendricks County's election supervisor, said she stands behind MicroVote. "I don't know why it's been so difficult for them to get certified," she said.\nLast week, the commission approved the new upgrade after receiving a letter from the independent lab confirming that the system meets federal requirements.\n"If the vendor had been more forthright and candid earlier, it probably wouldn't result in the counties having this work done in the last half of September," said Brad King, Republican co-chairman of the Indiana Election Division.
(09/26/06 2:59am)
MUNSTER, Ind. — A new state law that requires convicted sex offenders to attend group therapy and other treatment or risk losing their right to early prison releases is winning early adoption by its target audience.\nThe new law, which took effect July 1, affects some 3,500 adult males in the Indiana Department of Correction, 125 juvenile males, 45 adult females and two juvenile females, said William Elliott, director of mental health for the agency.\nOf the more than 600 adult men instructed to join treatment so far, only seven have refused, Elliott told The Times of Munster for a story Monday. Those seven will not be eligible to earn an early release and walk out of prison after serving just half of their sentence.\nThe sex offender treatment involves a combination of group therapy and classroom instruction, on topics including sexual deviance, relapse prevention, anger management and healthy sexuality, Elliott said. Inmates will be required to complete between 60 and 160 hours of treatment based on their level of risk.\nElliott said denial and/or fear of stigma could be at play among noncompliant inmates. There also are some inmates who just refuse to take part in anything while behind bars, he said.\nThe new law states convicted sex offenders can be deprived of credit time if they refuse to participate in the treatment. The DOC typically awards one day credit for each day served unless the inmate creates disciplinary problems.\nThe DOC is grouping all of its incarcerated sex offenders at a few prisons to make it easier for the agency to implement the new law, Elliott said.