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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Orcastraiter who wrote (431633)	7/23/2003 1:19:52 AM
From: Skywatcher	Respond to of 769670

Don't forget....there is no global warming.... keep pumping that oil! Bush Ready to Wreck Ozone Layer Treaty US slips in demand to drop ban on harmful pesticide By Geoffrey Lean The Independent Sunday 20 July 2003 President George Bush is targeting the international treaty to save the ozone layer which protects all life on earth from deadly radiation, The Independent on Sunday can reveal. New US demands - tabled at a little-noticed meeting in Montreal earlier this month - threaten to unravel one of the greatest environmental success stories of the past few decades, causing millions of deaths from cancer. The news comes at a particularly embarrassing time for the Prime Minister, Tony Blair, who pressed the President in their talks in Washington last week to stop his attempts to sabotage the Kyoto Protocol which sets out to control global warming: one of the few international issues on which they differ. Now, instead of heeding Mr Blair, Mr Bush is undermining the ozone treaty as well, by seeking to perpetuate the use of the most ozone-destructive chemical still employed in developed countries, otherwise soon to be phased out. Ironically, it was sustained pressure from the Reagan administration, in which Mr Bush's father served as vice-president, that ensured the treaty was adopted in the first place. It has proved such a success that environmentalists have long regarded it as inviolable. The ozone layer - made of a type of oxygen so thinly scattered through the upper atmosphere that, if gathered all together, it would form a ring around the earth no thicker than the sole of a shoe - screens out the sun's harmful ultraviolet rays which would, otherwise, wipe out terrestrial life. As it weakens, more of the rays get through, causing skin cancer and blindness from cataracts. The world was shocked to discover in the 1980s that pollution from man-made chemicals had opened a hole the size of the United States in the layer above Antarctica, and had thinned it worldwide. Led by the US, nations moved with unprecedented speed to agree the treaty, called the Montreal Protocol, in 1987 - which started the process of phasing out use of the chemicals. The measures have been progressively tightened ever since. Scientists reckon that they will eventually prevent 2 million cases of cancer a year in the US and Europe alone. But President Bush's new demands threaten to throw the process into reverse. They centre on a pesticide, methyl bromide, now the greatest attacker of ozone left in industrialised countries. The US is responsible for a quarter of the world's consumption of the chemical, which has also been linked with increased prostate cancers in farmers. Under an extension to the Montreal Protocol, agreed in 1997, the pesticide is being gradually phased out and replaced with substitutes; its use in the West is due to end completely in 2005. Nations are legally allowed to extend the use of small amounts in "critical" applications, but the US is demanding exemptions far beyond those permitted, for uses ranging from growing strawberries to tending golf courses. It is also pressing to exploit a loophole in the treaty - allowing the use of the chemical to treat wood packaging - so that, instead of being phased out, its use would increase threefold. The demands now go to an international conference in Nairobi this autumn. Experts fear that, if agreed, the treaty will begin to fall apart, not least because developing countries - which are following rich nations in phasing out ozone-depleting chemicals - could cease their efforts. "The US is reneging on the agreement, and working very, very hard to get other countries to agree," said David Doniger, a former senior US government official dealing with ozone issues, who now works for the Natural Resources Defense Council. "If it succeeds, it threatens to unravel the whole fabric of the treaty." Dr Joe Farman, the Cambridge scientist who discovered the Antarctic ozone hole, added: "This is madness. We do not need this chemical. We do need the ozone layer. How stupid can people be?" CC

To: Orcastraiter who wrote (431633)	7/23/2003 1:22:10 AM
From: Skywatcher	Respond to of 769670

Bush turns on his own CIA for his personal VENDETTA...... Destroys agent to punish REAL HERO Who's Unpatriotic Now? By Paul Krugman The New York Times Tuesday 22 July 2003 Some nonrevisionist history: On Oct. 8, 2002, Knight Ridder newspapers reported on intelligence officials who "charge that the administration squelches dissenting views, and that intelligence analysts are under intense pressure to produce reports supporting the White House's argument that Saddam poses such an immediate threat to the United States that pre-emptive military action is necessary." One official accused the administration of pressuring analysts to "cook the intelligence books"; none of the dozen other officials the reporters spoke to disagreed. The skepticism of these officials has been vindicated. So have the concerns expressed before the war by military professionals like Gen. Eric Shinseki, the Army chief of staff, about the resources required for postwar occupation. But as the bad news comes in, those who promoted this war have responded with a concerted effort to smear the messengers. Issues of principle aside, the invasion of a country that hadn't attacked us and didn't pose an imminent threat has seriously weakened our military position. Of the Army's 33 combat brigades, 16 are in Iraq; this leaves us ill prepared to cope with genuine threats. Moreover, military experts say that with almost two-thirds of its brigades deployed overseas, mainly in Iraq, the Army's readiness is eroding: normal doctrine calls for only one brigade in three to be deployed abroad, while the other two retrain and refit. And the war will have devastating effects on future recruiting by the reserves. A widely circulated photo from Iraq shows a sign in the windshield of a military truck that reads, "One weekend a month, my ass." To top it all off, our insistence on launching a war without U.N. approval has deprived us of useful allies. George Bush claims to have a "huge coalition," but only 7 percent of the coalition soldiers in Iraq are non-American - and administration pleas for more help are sounding increasingly plaintive. How serious is the strain on our military? The Brookings Institution military analyst Michael O'Hanlon, who describes our volunteer military as "one of the best military institutions in human history," warns that "the Bush administration will risk destroying that accomplishment if they keep on the current path." But instead of explaining what happened to the Al Qaeda link and the nuclear program, in the last few days a series of hawkish pundits have accused those who ask such questions of aiding the enemy. Here's Frank Gaffney Jr. in The National Post: "Somewhere, probably in Iraq, Saddam Hussein is gloating. He can only be gratified by the feeding frenzy of recriminations, second-guessing and political power plays. . . . Signs of declining popular appreciation of the legitimacy and necessity of the efforts of America's armed forces will erode their morale. Similarly, the enemy will be encouraged." Well, if we're going to talk about aiding the enemy: By cooking intelligence to promote a war that wasn't urgent, the administration has squandered our military strength. This provides a lot of aid and comfort to Osama bin Laden - who really did attack America - and Kim Jong Il - who really is building nukes. And while we're on the subject of patriotism, let's talk about the affair of Joseph Wilson's wife. Mr. Wilson is the former ambassador who was sent to Niger by the C.I.A. to investigate reports of attempted Iraqi uranium purchases and who recently went public with his findings. Since then administration allies have sought to discredit him - it's unpleasant stuff. But here's the kicker: both the columnist Robert Novak and Time magazine say that administration officials told them that they believed that Mr. Wilson had been chosen through the influence of his wife, whom they identified as a C.I.A. operative. Think about that: if their characterization of Mr. Wilson's wife is true (he refuses to confirm or deny it), Bush administration officials have exposed the identity of a covert operative. That happens to be a criminal act; it's also definitely unpatriotic. So why would they do such a thing? Partly, perhaps, to punish Mr. Wilson, but also to send a message. And that should alarm us. We've just seen how politicized, cooked intelligence can damage our national interest. Yet the Wilson affair suggests that the administration intends to continue pressuring analysts to tell it what it wants to hear. Dear President Bush... YOU CAN'T HANDLE THE TRUTH......