Dioxin poisoning caused the mysterious illness of Ukrainian presidential candidate Viktor Yushchenko, doctors said Saturday.

Tests run over the past 24 hours provided conclusive evidence of the poisoning, Dr. Michael Zimpfer, director of Vienna's private Rudolfinerhaus clinic said.

"There is no doubt about the fact that Mr. Yushchenko's disease has been caused by a case of poisoning by dioxin," Zimpfer said.

Yushchenko has accused Ukrainian authorities of trying to poison him in the runup to a presidential vote. Citing fraud, Ukraine's Supreme Court voided the outcome of that vote, which Yushchenko lost to Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych. A rerun of the ballot is slated for Dec. 26.

In truth, Kerik was a corrupt GOP politician who happened to have a badge....It's sad to see that the ineptitude the Administration demonstrates in Iraq and foreign policy in general has spread to the most basic tasks like background checks and assembling a cabinet of bootlicking cronies. But let's also throw a brick at both New York Senators, Hillary Clinton and Chuck (See No Evil With Gonzales) Schumer, both of whom praised the selection of this Oliver North-loving, ethically challenged political hack who has misused his office and his staff for personal gain. So from now on, please shut up Chuck and Hillary. Neither one of you have any guts or real judgement.

An exhaustive investigation has turned up a link between current Florida Republican Representative Tom Feeney, a customized Windows-based program to suppress Democratic votes on touch screen voting machines, a Florida computer services company with whom Feeney worked as a general counsel and registered lobbyist while he was Speaker of the Florida House of Representatives, and top level officials of the Bush administration.

According to a notarized affidavit signed by Clint Curtis, while he was employed by the NASA Kennedy Space Center contractor, Yang Enterprises, Inc., during 2000, Feeney solicited him to write a program to "control the vote." At the time, Curtis was of the opinion that the program was to be used for preventing fraud in the in the 2002 election in Palm Beach County, Florida. His mind was changed, however, when the true intentions of Feeney became clear: the computer program was going to be used to suppress the Democratic vote in counties with large Democratic registrations.

Let me tell you what my plan for this Party is:

We're going to win in Mississippi
...and Alabama
...and Idaho
...and South Carolina.


Four years ago, the President won 49 percent of the vote. The Republican Party treated it like it was a mandate, and we let them get away with it.

Fifty one percent is not a mandate either. And this time we're not going to let them get away with it.

[snip]

To win the White House and a majority in Congress, yes. But also to do the real work that will make these victories possible -- to put Democratic ideas and Democratic candidates in every office -- whether it be Secretary of State, supervisor of elections, county commissioner or school board member.

Here in Washington, it seems that after every losing election, there's a consensus reached among decision-makers in the Democratic Party is that the way to win is to be more like Republicans.

I suppose you could call that philosophy: if you didn't beat 'em, join them.

I'm not one for making predictions -- but if we accept that philosophy this time around, another Democrat will be standing here in four years giving this same speech. we cannot win by being "Republican-lite." We've tried it; it doesn't work.
The question is not whether we move left or right. It's not about our direction. What we need to start focusing on... is the destination.

The destination of the Democratic Party means making it a party that can communicate with its supporters and with all Americans. Politics is at its best when we create and inspire a sense of community. The tools that were pioneered in my campaign -- like blogs, and meetups, and streaming video -- are just a start. We must use all of the power and potential of technology as part of an aggressive outreach to meet and include voters, to work with the state parties, and to influence media coverage.


The most practical destination is winning elective office. And we must do that at every level of government. The way we will rebuild the Democratic Party is not from consultants down, but from the ground up.

We cannot be a Party that seeks the presidency by running an 18-state campaign. We cannot be a party that cedes a single state, a single District, a single precinct, nor should we cede a single voter.

[note from me: Anne Wolfe will be happy to hear that.]

[snip]

Over fifty years ago, Harry Truman said, "We are not going to get anywhere by trimming or appeasing. And we don't need to try it."

Yet here we are still making the same mistakes.

Let me tell you something: there's only one thing Republican power brokers want more than for us to lurch to the left -- and that's for us to lurch to the right.

What they fear most is that we may really begin fighting for what we believe -- the fiscally responsible, socially progressive values for which Democrats have always stood and fought.

Bush introduced Mike and Sharla Hintz, a couple from Clive, whom he said benefited from his tax plan.

Last year, because of the enhanced the child tax credit, they received an extra $1,600 in their tax refund, Bush said. With other tax cuts in the bill, they saved $2,800 on their income taxes.

They used the money to buy a wood-burning stove to more efficiently heat their home, made some home improvements and went on a vacation to Minnesota, the president said.
"Next year, maybe they'll want to come to Texas," Bush quipped.

Mike Hintz, a First Assembly of God youth pastor, said the tax cuts also gave him additional money to use for health care.

He said he supports Bush's values.

"The American people are starting to see what kind of leader President Bush is. People know where he stands," he said.

"Where we are in this world, with not just the war on terror, but with the war with our culture that's going on, I think we need a man that is going to be in the White House like President Bush, that's going to stand by what he believes.

A Des Moines youth pastor is charged with the sexual exploitation of a child.
KCCI learned that the married father of four recently turned himself in to Johnston police.

Rev. Mike Hintz was fired from the First Assembly of God Church, located at 2725 Merle Hay Road, on Oct. 30. Hintz was the youth pastor there for three years.
Police said he started an affair with a 17-year-old in the church youth group this spring.

Well, I think war room designation is something that comes from inside Washington. What I've created is a communications center where we're going to take some of the resources that are already there and make sure that when someone comes to the Senate floor to give a speech, that talk radio stations know what that person had to say. We're going to communicate with the American people to make sure that they understand the Democrats are in tune with millions of Americans across the country. In fact, we represent the people of this country, and this communications center that we have will certainly be an indication of how we feel.

MR. RUSSERT: When the president talked about Yucca Mountain and moving the nation's nuclear waste there, you were very, very, very strong in your words. You said, "President Bush is a liar. He betrayed Nevada and he betrayed the country."

Is that rhetoric appropriate?

SEN. REID: I don't know if that rhetoric is appropriate. That's how I feel, and that's how I felt. I think to take that issue, Tim, to take the most poisonous substance known to man, plutonium, and haul 70,000 tons of it across the highways and railways of this country, past schools and churches and people's businesses is wrong. It's something that is being forced upon this country by the utilities, and it's wrong. And we have to stop it. And people may not like what I said, but I said it, and I don't back off one bit.

MR. RUSSERT: The intelligence bill reforms which were recommended by the 9-11 Commission; now before the Senate and the House. Being held up by two Republican congressmen in the House. And now Senator John Warner, Republican from Virginia, said he has reservations. Will the intelligence reform bill pass this week in Congress?

SEN. REID: The Congress of the United States should not leave this town until we pass this. Governor Kean, Representative Hamilton were appointed by the president of the United States to give us some ideas as to what should be done following the terrorist attacks of 9/11. They told us what should be done. And we in the Senate and the House passed bills that were in keeping with what they wanted. Now, it's being held up because the speaker says he wants a majority--the majority to approve everything before they will pass it.

This legislation has enough votes in the House and the Senate to pass overwhelmingly. The president should intercede, as he I believe has an obligation to this country. We have people that want to be safe in America today. The secretary of Health and Human Service, Tommy Thompson, when he announced his resignation, said that the Americans' food and water supply is not safe. How can we leave town and not have this most important legislation passed? It may not be perfect, but no legislation's perfect. It's something that we need to do, and the people of America are depending on us to do it.

MR. RUSSERT: Stay through Christmas if necessary?

SEN. REID: Stay through the day before New Year's. We must pass this legislation. The people in Nevada want to be safe.

MR. RUSSERT: What must...

SEN. REID: The people in this country want to be safe.

MR. RUSSERT: What must the president do?

SEN. REID: The president, who controls both houses of Congress, should use his power. And he has said that he has power. He has a mandate. Let him pull a few bucks out of that pocket of mandate and give it to the House and Senate and say, "Here's part of my mandate. I want this legislation to pass."

MR. RUSSERT: Republicans are saying they're concerned about the intelligence on the ground with our troops and they're concerned about driver's licenses that there are not a--without uniform standards, hijackers could easily obtain them from localities that did not maintain rigid standards.

SEN. REID: Tim, we dealt with immigration in this bill. This is not an immigration bill. Immigration is covered as recommended by the commission, and we've done that. This is a holdup. These are people who have committees, Sensenbrenner and Hunter, and they want to maintain power. Power--this is not about power. It's about keeping the American people safe. And the president, I repeat, should intercede any way that he can, and there are lots of ways he can. He hasn't even sent a letter yet. You know, you keep three or days--he hasn't even sent a letter to the congressional leaders saying he wants it passed. This should be passed as quickly as possible. Every day that goes by, the American people are not as safe.

Tim, I can remember as a little boy my widowed grandmother with eight children. She lived alone, but she felt independent because she got every month her old age pension check. That's what this is all about. The most successful social program in the history of the world is being hijacked by Wall Street. Yes, Social Security is a good program. And if the president has some ideas about trying to improve it, I'll talk to him, and we as Democrats will, but we are not going to let Wall Street hijack Social Security. It won't happen. They are trying to destroy Social Security.

MR. RUSSERT: No private accounts?

SEN. REID: They are trying to destroy Social Security by giving this money to the fat cats on Wall Street, and I think it's wrong.

Tim, all experts say that Social Security beneficiaries will receive every penny of their benefits that they're entitled to--100 percent of them--until the year 2055. After that, if we still do nothing, they'll draw 80 percent of their benefits. I want those beneficiaries after year 2055 to draw 100 percent of their benefits. But this does not require dismantling the program. For heaven's sakes, they're crying wolf a little too regularly here. There is not an emergency on Social Security. We can do this. The president should not try to jam this private accounts in an effort to destroy Social Security.

In the early--when Social Security came before the Congress, who opposed it? The Republicans. And they have a long memory. They've been trying to destroy Social Security for a long time and now they think they have an opening to do it.

MR. RUSSERT: You also said this back in 1994. "I believe in a consumption tax. ...The income tax is not working as well as it should. I think we should do away with it." Is that still your view?

[snip]

What I am concerned about that's happening with the talk that's coming from 17th and Pennsylvania Avenue is that they're talking about having a consumption tax and an income tax. That's the worst of all worlds. That's what they have in Europe where you have an income tax and you add on that the value-added tax. It's a terrible system. So what I say is if we can figure out a way to make our tax less burdensome and if we could go to a consumer based tax, I think it would be wonderful. But the transition rules of that are very difficult and I have looked into that. It's extremely difficult.

MR. RUSSERT: But the national sales tax or consumption tax is very regressive. Poor people get hit very hard with that as...

SEN. REID: No question.

MR. RUSSERT: ...to a progressive income tax.

SEN. REID: No question about it and I've learned a lot since the statement. I think if it's an ideal world, maybe we could work something out, but as I've learned in so many different areas, we...

MR. RUSSERT: You're less enthusiastic about a consumption tax now.

SEN. REID: Yeah.

MR. RUSSERT: Could you support Antonin Scalia to be chief justice of the Supreme Court?

SEN. REID: If he can overcome the ethics problems that have arisen since he was selected as a justice of the Supreme Court. And those ethics problems--you've talked about them; every people talk--every reporter's talked about them in town--where he took trips that were probably not in keeping with the code of judicial ethics. So we have to get over this. I cannot dispute the fact, as I have said, that this is one smart guy. And I disagree with many of the results that he arrives at, but his reason for arriving at those results are very hard to dispute.

I think that he has been an embarrassment to the Supreme Court. I think that his opinions are poorly written. I don't--I just don't think that he's done a good job as a Supreme Court justice.

MONTGOMERY - An Alabama lawmaker who sought to ban gay marriages now wants to ban novels with gay characters from public libraries, including university libraries.

A bill by Rep. Gerald Allen, R-Cottondale, would prohibit the use of public funds for "the purchase of textbooks or library materials that recognize or promote homosexuality as an acceptable lifestyle." Allen said he filed the bill to protect children from the "homosexual agenda."

"Our culture, how we know it today, is under attack from every angle," Allen said in a press conference Tuesday.

Allen said that if his bill passes, novels with gay protagonists and college textbooks that suggest homosexuality is natural would have to be removed from library shelves and destroyed.

"I guess we dig a big hole and dump them in and bury them," he said.

A spokesman for the Montgomery-based Southern Poverty Law Center called the bill censorship.

"It sounds like Nazi book burning to me," said SPLC spokesman Mark Potok.

Allen pre-filed his bill in advance of the 2005 legislative session, which begins Feb. 1.

If the bill became law, public school textbooks could not present homosexuality as a genetic trait and public libraries couldn't offer books with gay or bisexual characters.

When asked about Tennessee Williams' southern classic "Cat On A Hot Tin Roof," Allen said the play probably couldn't be performed by university theater groups.

Allen said no state funds should be used to pay for materials that foster homosexuality. He said that would include nonfiction books that suggest homosexuality is acceptable and fiction novels with gay characters. While that would ban books like "Heather has Two Mommies," it could also include classic and popular novels with gay characters such as "The Color Purple," "The Picture of Dorian Gray" and "Brideshead Revisted."

The bill also would ban materials that recognize or promote a lifestyle or actions prohibited by the sodomy and sexual misconduct laws of Alabama. Allen said that meant books with heterosexual couples committing those acts likely would be banned, too.

His bill also would prohibit a teacher from handing out materials or bringing in a classroom speaker who suggested homosexuality was OK, he said.

Allen has sponsored legislation to make a gay marriage ban part of the Alabama Constitution, but it was not approved by the Legislature.

On the day a New Jersey native was offcially nominated to become the nation's homeland security chief, the federal government sharply cut New Jersey's anti-terrorism funding.

[snip]

The loss of $31 million to protect the state is "a slap in the face to New Jersey and all our residents," [Codey] said.

He said he was especially angry at what he considers to be the inequitable distribution of the money, saying that New Jersey will receive $4.35 per capita in federal homeland security funds while Wyoming and North Dakota will get $29.45 per capita and $20.80, per capita respectively.

[snip]

Newark, which is home to Prudential Financial Inc.'s headquarters, was among the East Coast cities where the terror alert level was raised last summer in response to intelligence indicating that major financial institutions could be al-Qaeda terror targts. The alert level was reduced in November.

As President Bush lays the groundwork for a possible overhaul of the U.S. tax code, one option under consideration would deal its biggest financial blow to citizens of blue states such as California and New York.

Some conservative activists are urging the Bush administration to scrap the federal deduction for state and local taxes as part of a broader plan to revamp the nation's tax system.

Although the proposal would hurt some taxpayers in nearly every state, it would hit hardest in states with higher-than-average income levels and bigger-than-average state and local tax burdens. High on the list are a number of blue states — those that were carried by Democrat Sen. John F. Kerry in last month's presidential election.

Taxpayers in California and New York, for example, which have top state income tax rates of 9.3% and 6.5% respectively, would be highly affected; residents of Florida and Texas, which have no state income taxes, much less so.

"There's no question this effort would punish blue states," said Rep. Robert T. Matsui (D-Sacramento), a member of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee. Over time, he said, it could force state and local governments to cut expenditures.

That could happen if taxpayers, stung by the higher tax burden that would come from losing the deduction for state and local tax payments, demand a cut in local and state tax rates and become unwilling to approve any increases.

Supporters of the change insist the disproportionate effect on blue states is a coincidence, but they acknowledge that the proposal could hurt most in states that voted against Bush.

"Let me put it like this: It certainly isn't something that's a discouragement," said one prominent conservative. "Yes, we talked about this. The fact that it hits blue states is not something that's been missed among Republicans."

"We've got to repudiate, you know, the most strident and insulting anti-American voices out there sometimes on our party's left ... We can't have our party identified by Michael Moore and Hollywood as our cultural values." – Al From, CEO, Democratic Leadership Council

"You know, let's let Hollywood and the Cannes Film Festival fawn all over Michael Moore. We ought to make it pretty clear that he sure doesn't speak for us when it comes to standing up for our country." – Will Marshall, president of the Progressive Policy Institute, the think tank of the DLC