What makes her scream is having to pay more for season passes to Dorney Park and Wildwater Kingdom now that the owners are eliminating senior discounts at their parks nationwide, bucking an industry trend of increased marketing toward seniors.

Schmitt and her husband have had season passes to the park near Allentown for years. She loved the rides, especially the roller coasters, and they both enjoy cooling off at the water park in the summer. But the couple is on a fixed income and will likely not go when the price increases next season.

"That would be the same as taking away your bread at our age," said John Schmitt, 72, adding that the couple's two season passes would cost almost twice as much next year.

Sandusky, Ohio-based Cedar Fair LP said the change will affect all its parks — Cedar Point, in Sandusky; Knotts Berry Farm in Buena Park, Calif.; Valleyfair, near Minneapolis, Minn.; Worlds of Fun, in Kansas City, Mo.; and Michigan's Adventure near Muskegon, Mich.

Cedar Fair officials said they eliminated the discounts because seniors were becoming more active and no longer needed an incentive to visit their attractions.

"In the past the policy was because we felt there was less at the park for them to do," said Brian Witherow, director of investor relations for Cedar Fair. "We see more of them doing more than they were doing before."

The decision was made in the last month, Witherow said. He also said that Cedar Fair has done more than $90 million in improvements since it bought Dorney Park in 1992, including the addition of more slow-paced rides and areas for seniors. He said 50-and-over customers represent about 2 percent to 3 percent of park attendees.

The cut in senior discounts means people over 4 feet tall will have to pay $98 for season passes after the Dorney Park season opens next year, although that rate would be somewhat lower if tickets are bought in advance, spokesman Chris Ozimek said. Other major amusement park chains, however, said they expect to maintain their senior discounts and in some cases increase them.

Beth Robertson, a spokeswoman for the International Association of Amusement Parks and Attractions, which represents about 450 parks in the United States, said 4 percent to 5 percent of park attendees nationwide are seniors and that most parks have discounts for them. The number of seniors going to parks increases every year, especially in Florida and on the West Coast, Robertson said.

Gerard Hoeppner, a spokesman for Busch Gardens Tampa Bay in Florida, said his park is working to intensify marketing toward seniors. The park has discounts for AARP members, as well as certain discounts for anyone who is 50 or older.

"The active older adult of today is not the senior of 1950 and frankly not even 1960," Hoeppner said. "It's everyone from Mick Jagger to Bill Clinton. That's the new face of aging in America."

Oklahoma City-based Six Flags Inc., which owns and operates 39 amusement parks in North America and Europe, also has no plans to halt discounts for senior citizens, spokeswoman Debbie Nauser said.

Cedar Fair's policy is an aberration as opposed to the rule in an amusement park industry that is increasingly catering to seniors, especially as baby boomers grow older, according to Laura Rossman, vice president of lifestage products and integrated marketing for AARP Services.

And since seniors such as the Scmitts are becoming a more active and mobile crowd, Rossman said, parks that don't have discounts may feel a difference at the turnstiles.

"I would assume it's going to have some impact," she said.

One Graham adviser, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the senator was taking the next 24 to 48 hours to review new budget figures that are so low they leave him with few options. He must either exit the race or drastically scale back his operation and narrow the states where he will campaign.

The adviser said Graham is not inclined to leave the race, but it's unclear whether the senator has come to grips with the reality of how tough it would be to continue.

Graham spokesman Mo Elleithee said an exit strategy is not on the table.

"From everything I'm hearing, he's not considering getting out of the race," Elleithee said.

J.R. Middlemas, a close friend of Graham from Panama City, Fla., said he talked to the candidate Thursday night. "There's not going to be any withdrawal today," Middlemas said Friday.

Elleithee said Graham is deciding whether to pursue one of two options. He may focus on Iowa, which holds the first Democratic presidential caucus Jan. 19. Or he may spend his resources in southern states that come later in the primary calendar, beginning with South Carolina on Feb. 3.

Graham is expected to report raising around $2 million in the three-month period that ended Tuesday, which probably will place him behind six of his rivals. He had raised $3.1 million to date.

If Graham stays in the race, his senior team will be overhauled and money woes will force him to cut dozens of staffers from the payroll.

Officials said campaign manager Paul Johnson and communications director Steve Jarding will soon depart; they have been planning to leave for several weeks due to philosophical differences with senior campaign officials, sources said. Graham spokesman Jamal Simmons left the campaign Thursday and is talking with rival campaigns about a new job.

Thursday evening, the Graham campaign announced a news conference for 2 p.m. Friday, suggesting he would quit the race. But later Thursday night, the campaign and the Florida Democratic Party said there would be no news conference.

"Senator Graham has decided to soldier on," said Florida Democratic Party Chairman Scott Maddox.

Another Democratic source, speaking on a condition of anonymity, said the three-term senator had informed one of his Senate colleagues that he was getting out of the race. Elleithee disputed that account and said Graham had not talked to anyone in the Senate about getting out.

Graham, one of the most popular leaders in his home state, has struggled near the bottom of the 10-way Democratic presidential primary. He trails most of his rivals in fund raising and polls.

Graham called off a fund-raiser Thursday night in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., and decided not to attend another Friday evening in West Palm Beach. Elleithee said Graham decided to fly back to Washington and would speak Saturday to the Democratic National Committee along with other presidential candidates.

His daughter, Kendall, planned to attend the Friday fund-raiser as his replacement.

Graham has a strong resume — he is a former state legislator and two-term governor who served as chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee. He opposed military strikes against Iraq, arguing that the Bush administration abandoned the war on terrorism to pursue war with a country that is not an immediate threat to the United States.

But his low-key style has yet to attract a large following, while fellow war opponent Dean surges in the polls and fund raising, and other candidates attract more support from party insiders.

HONOLULU — Kobe Bryant was not on the private plane that brought Los Angeles Lakers veterans to training camp on Thursday and team officials refused to be more specific than saying the star guard was "under the weather."

"That's all we have to say," said general manager Mitch Kupchak, refusing to answer any other questions about Bryant, who faces felony sexual assault charges in Colorado.

"We're obviously disappointed that Kobe's not here with the basketball club, with his teammates," coach Phil Jackson said after practice for rookies and veterans with fewer than four years of experience.

"This is a team thing, it's about us as a basketball team and what the best is for our team," Jackson said. "So we'll commence tonight and go on as usual. No one is bigger than this team or the game. That's the way it is."

Lakers veterans, including Shaquille O'Neal and newcomers Gary Payton and Karl Malone, were due in Honolulu late Thursday afternoon, and a team meeting was scheduled for Thursday night.

The Lakers first got word on Wednesday from one of Bryant's representatives that he wasn't feeling well, then were told Thursday morning that he wouldn't be making the trip as scheduled.

Jackson tried to call Bryant on Wednesday but said the player wasn't taking calls.

"We have to trust that he's doing the most responsible thing he can do for himself and ultimately, at this point, I think Kobe has to think about himself before the team," Jackson said. "But we have to think about our team."

Asked what was wrong with Bryant, Jackson said: "I don't have any understanding in that department. I can't answer that question because I'm not privy to his condition. I know that the report is he's under the weather.

"I wasn't told he was sick, I was told that he was under the weather. Now is that the marine layer fog that's in L.A. that's been plaguing us for two weeks? Yes, I think that's probably under the weather," Jackson said.

Bryant faces a sexual assault charge involving a 19-year-old Colorado woman in a case that has drawn heavy media attention. The Lakers' guard contends he and the woman had consensual sex.

Jackson said the Lakers don't yet have a plan in place if Bryant's case takes him away from the team in the future, but added: "It caused us to think a little bit about it yesterday after we started hearing information."

Jackson didn't know if Bryant would show up in the next day or so.

"I'm not anticipating anything," the coach said. "That's one of the things that we've talked about earlier this year. We have to be real fluid, not get rigid or anticipate anything or get our hopes up one way or the other.

"We have plenty of players, we have a good team, we're confident in what we're going to do. We're hopeful Kobe will join us and that's as much I can say about it."

Jackson didn't think Bryant's being "under the weather" had anything to do with his shoulder or knee. During the offseason, Bryant underwent surgery on his right shoulder and had minor knee surgery the day after he is charged with committing the sexual assault.

Jackson did say the Lakers anticipate it will take Bryant some time to get into condition and that he might not even be on the court with the team for the first few days he's in camp.

"But we have to see him first to know that," Jackson said.

The Lakers' string of three straight NBA titles ended last spring with a loss in the Western Conference semifinals to eventual champion San Antonio

Alberto Gonzales, President Bush's legal counsel, sent a memo to employees Friday saying that to comply with deadlines set by the Justice Department all materials must be turned in to his office by 5 p.m. Tuesday.

He said materials convered by the order include all electronic records, correspondence, computer records, notes and calendar entries. Employees also must sign a certification form saying they have turned in materials or do not have any items related to the investigation.

Investigators are trying to determine who leaked the identity of Valerie Plame, a CIA operations officer who has served overseas. Plame is married to former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, who has accused the Bush administration of selective use of intelligence to exaggerate the threat from Iraq.

The Justice Department is conducting a criminal investigation into the leak of Plame's identity, which first appeared in a July 14 column by syndicated columnist Robert Novak and later was reported by Newsday in a story by Timothy M. Phelps, Washington bureau chief for the Long Island, N.Y., newspaper, and Knut Royce, a staff writer for the paper.

Gonzales told employees that any documents showing contact with Novak, Phelps or Royce are covered by his order.

On Thursday, the Justice Department expanded the scope of its investigation. It sent letters to the State and Defense departments requesting preservation of phone logs, e-mails and other documents that could become evidence in the inquiry, senior law enforcement officials said. Similar letters already have gone to the White House and the CIA.

The letters are routinely used in a national security investigation to prevent destruction of any information a government agency could have.

Officials at the State Department might have known of the CIA officer's identity because she probably was affiliated with one or more U.S. embassies overseas. The Defense Department is a key part of the U.S. intelligence apparatus that frequently works with the CIA.

Promising to cooperate, Secretary of State Colin Powell said Friday that State Department officials would search documents and other records "to see if we have anything relevant." He said he was not sure "what they are looking for." Two Defense Department officials said they had been told earlier to expect such a letter.

Justice Department policy is to consider seeking subpoenas of reporters only as a last resort, officials say.

"When it comes to the media, there are a lot of safeguards built into the system," FBI spokeswoman Susan Whitson said.

Attorney General John Ashcroft would have to personally approve any subpoenas for reporters' notes or telephone records.

The investigation, meanwhile, remained in its early stages. The FBI's team of about a half-dozen agents has put together an investigative strategy and set up a command structure that includes both FBI Director Robert Mueller and Deputy Director Bruce Gebhardt.

President Bush's spokesman, Scott McClellan, said Thursday that, as far as he knew, no White House staffers had been interviewed by the FBI and no subpoenas for records or documents had been received. McClellan promised to disclose any such subpoenas received by the White House, provided the Justice Department did not object.

On Capitol Hill, the Democratic drumbeat continued for Ashcroft to appoint a special counsel to run the investigation. Democrats say someone outside the Justice Department could conduct a more thorough investigation because that person would not have political ties to the Bush administration.

Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., took it a step further by urging Ashcroft to step aside from the probe, citing numerous political ties between Justice Department officials and the White House.

Schumer noted that Ashcroft stepped aside in the 2001 probe of former Sen. Robert Torricelli, D-N.J., because Torricelli had campaigned against Ashcroft in the attorney general's unsuccessful bid for re-election as a senator from Missouri in 2000.

"It is just as inappropriate for Mr. Ashcroft to do any work on this matter," Schumer said.

Justice Department officials say Ashcroft has not foreclosed any option in the investigation but continues to have confidence in career prosecutors and FBI agents to handle it.

Without identifying anyone, McClellan said foes of the White House "are looking through the lens of political opportunism" to fan the controversy.

"There are some that are seeking partisan political advantage," he said. "I don't need to go into names. We all know who they are."

A leading congressional critic, House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi, said the results of the search to date demonstrated no imminent threat existed "and there was time for more diplomatic effort before we went to war."

Bush made his comments at the White House, Pelosi in the Capitol, the two offering differing interpretations of an interim report submitted by chief U.S. weapons inspector David Kay.

While Kay's initial report said no weapons of mass destruction have been found, Bush said the investigation showed that Saddam was violating U.N. resolutions demanding that he disarm. "The report states that Saddam Hussein's regime had a clandestine network of biological laboratories, a live strain of deadly agent botulinum, sophisticated concealment efforts, and advanced design work on prohibited longer range missiles," the president said. (Audio: Bush discusses the findings)

He said the findings show that Saddam "actively deceived the international community, that Saddam Hussein, was in clear violation of United Nations Security Council resolution 1441 and that Saddam Hussein was a danger to the world." Bush did not reply directly when asked if he was still confident that banned weapons would be found.

The president brushed aside a poll that said public confidence in his ability to deal wisely with an international crisis had dropped sharply. "Sometimes the American people like the decisions I make, sometimes they don't," he said. "But they need to know I'll make tough decisions based upon what I think is right."

Noting that Kay found botulinum poison and work on longer-range missiles, Secretary of State Colin Powell said his report backed up the decision to go to war. "We are more convinced by the Kay report that we did the right thing," Powell told reporters Friday.

"Do you think vials of botulism should constitute a weapons of mass destruction?," Powell asked.

And at the same time, he said, the report verified that Iraq was trying to develop missiles beyond a range permitted by the United Nations.

But Pelosi, D-Calif., who met with Kay in a secure room in the Capitol, emerged to tell reporters that "it was clear to me that there was no imminence of a threat for weapons of mass destruction," as the White House had claimed.

She said the discoveries made so far are evidence of Iraq's aspiration for a weapons program, but added there was a difference between that and achieving the ability to deploy such weapons.

Pelosi, who voted against last year's authorization of the use of force in Iraq, said the classified intelligence she saw at the time did not support the claim of an imminent threat of the banned weapons.

"That was correct," she told reporters after meeting with Kay."

On Thursday, Kay insisted he needed another six to nine months of searching before he would feel confident enough to issue any conclusions about Iraq's weapons program. The Bush administration is asking for $600 million to continue the search, according to congressional officials.

"We have not found at this point actual weapons," Kay said after briefing lawmakers behind closed doors. "It does not mean we've concluded there are no actual weapons."

In a statement to several congressional committees Thursday, he only made one strong finding — that Saddam was actively developing missiles that exceeded range limits imposed by the United Nations.

"In addition to intent, we have found a large body of continuing activities and equipment that were not declared to the U.N. inspectors when they returned in November of last year," Kay said.

Taken together, Kay's findings do not validate most of Bush's prewar assertions that Saddam had widespread chemical and biological weapons and programs to make more, and was developing a nuclear weapon. Kay did not address U.S. assertions about Saddam's ties to terrorist groups, particularly al-Qaeda.

Critics have contended that the U.S. intelligence community made serious errors in its analysis of the threat posed by Iraq or the administration exaggerated what intelligence information it did have to persuade a skeptical world to support an invasion.

"Did we misread it, or did they mislead us, or did they simply get it wrong? Whatever the answer is, it's not a good answer," said Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee.

"I'm not pleased by what I heard today," said Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., the committee's chairman, "but we should be willing to adopt a wait-and-see attitude — and that's the only alternative we really have."

Kay did say, however, that there was evidence that Iraq "focused on maintaining small, covert capabilities that could be activated quickly to surge the production of (biological weapons) agents."

To that end, he described "a clandestine network of laboratories and safehouses within the Iraqi Intelligence Service that contained equipment ... suitable for continuing (chemical and biological weapon) research." Whether the equipment was actually utilized for that purpose, Kay's report does not say.

Kay said the information on trailers alleged to be mobile biological weapons labs was inconclusive.

ATLANTA — It didn't matter whether the Atlanta Braves hit the ball short or long, nor who swung the big bat. Just hitting the ball well again was all that mattered. Nobody knew that better than second baseman Mark DeRosa, who went on to carry out the plan to perfection Wednesday against the Chicago Cubs.

The 11th-hour substitute bailed the Braves out of a potential 0-2 hole with a two-out, two-run double to the left-center field wall in the bottom of the eighth inning, giving the Braves a 5-3 victory that evened the National League first-round series at 1-1, with Game 3 Friday in Chicago. (Related item: Game 2 report)

"I was just hoping for a splitter up in the zone and wanted to get some good wood on it," said DeRosa, penciled in after Marcus Giles couldn't go with a sore quadriceps. "He threw it, and (left fielder) Moises (Alou) was playing shallow, so I went up with it and hoped he couldn't get to it. Thankfully, he didn't."

More thankful was closer John Smoltz, who let a hard-fought 3-2 lead slip away in the top of the inning. He retired the Cubs in order in the ninth for the victory, symbolic of a night of rebounds for Atlanta.

"I didn't have my best stuff," Smoltz said, "but sometimes these games are won mentally rather than physically."

Perhaps, but there was no mistaking the timing of DeRosa's double. It was the only extra-base hit on a night the Braves put together 12 other little hits, a fine recovery after Cubs pitchers, led by Kerry Wood, held them to just three in Game 1. They usually strung them together in pairs or trios, turning it into something thanks to some good baserunning.

Javy Lopez had three hits batting in the No. 5 hole for a change, and DeRosa and leadoff man Rafael Furcal each had two.

Starting pitcher Mike Hampton joined the party with one himself, perhaps the surest sign that Atlanta's swing was back.

"DeRosa was the last guy we expected to be the hero, but it shows how we play as a team," Lopez said.

Of course, Hampton set the Braves' comeback tone with a stellar rebound himself. He started off in major trouble by walking the first two batters he faced on eight consecutive balls.

Sammy Sosa followed with an RBI double and Alou an RBI fielder's choice with none out, a situation that would unnerve some pitchers.

Hampton simply took a deep breath and went to his cutter, striking out the next six batters, tying an NL playoff record.

He didn't allow a hit after the third, leaving with a 3-2 lead thanks to a run-scoring grounder by Chipper Jones in the first, an RBI single by Andruw Jones in the fourth and a pinch-hit single by Giles in the sixth.

"It wasn't fun, I tell you that," said Hampton, who finished with nine strikeouts. "But when I went to my cutter, I was able to get it where I wanted and strike them out."

Notes: The Turner Field crowd was 52,743 — the most ever for a postseason game in Atlanta. ... Sosa reached base four straight time with two hits and two walks. ... Hampton's six straight strikeouts tied the postseason mark shared by Cincinnati's Hod Eller (1919 World Series), Baltimore Moe Drabowski ('66 Series) and St. Louis Todd Worrell ('85 Series).

***

Contributing: The Associated Press

OAKLAND — The Oakland A's squeezed past Boston 5-4 Wednesday when Ramon Hernandez — acting on his own — bunted with the bases loaded and two outs in the last of the 12th inning. The stunning hit gave the Athletics a 1-0 lead in the best-of-five opening-round AL series. (Related item: Game 1 report)

"It was the biggest hit in my career," said Hernandez, Oakland's All-Star catcher. "When you're playing a team like the Red Sox that's got good pitching and good hitting, you've got to try whatever you can to win."

Boston took a 4-3 lead into the last of the ninth but the bullpen — Byung-Hyun Kim and Alan Embree — failed to hold it. Erubiel Durazo hit a tying single with two outs in the ninth off Embree after Kim walked one man and hit another.

The outcome spoiled a clutch hitting night by Red Sox second baseman Todd Walker, who homered off Tim Hudson in the top of the first, then put Boston ahead with a two-run shot in the seventh off Ricardo Rincon.

At 4 hours, 37 minutes, the game was the longest in Oakland's postseason history, and it ended in the most improbable way: With the hard-hitting A's executing a small-ball play to eke out a run.

The tired teams return for Game 2 on Thursday at 4:06 p.m. ET.

Eric Chavez helped prevent Boston from taking the lead in the top of the 12th, making a tremendous play at third base. On the basepaths moments later, he alertly stole third, and Derek Lowe later intentionally walked Terrence Long to load the bases.

"Freaky, just freaky," Chavez said. "It was probably the best game I've ever been involved in."

Hernandez and Chavez both acted on their own, according to manager Ken Macha.

"What an ending. Who would have thought that? A's win with a bunt," Macha said. "Shame on anybody who missed it."

The A's usually eschew the bunt in favor of swinging away, but not on this night.

Walker had four hits, putting Boston ace Pedro Martinez in position to pull off a win in the AL's toughest road ballpark. Then came the latest postseason misadventure for Kim, whose struggles nearly cost Arizona its World Series title two years ago.

"Both teams were battling, and the game has got to end somehow," Boston manager Grady Little said. "We've had losses like that during the season. We've rebounded well before, and hopefully we can do that tomorrow."

Little said Lowe will be fine to start on Saturday in Game 3.

Lowe got into trouble in the 12th, walking three batters and allowing Chavez's steal with his deliberate motion.

After seeing Bill Mueller playing deep at third, Hernandez dropped an exceptional bunt down the third-base line, and Chavez scored without a throw. The A's mobbed Hernandez at first base.

"I looked over at third when I took the first pitch and watched what's over there," Hernandez said. "I thought he was very deep, and the first thing that comes through my mind is if I get it down the third-base line, I've got a good chance to be safe."

After Keith Foulke pitched three innings of scoreless relief for the A's, they went to rookie Rich Harden. He walked two batters and threw a wild pitch in the 12th, but Chavez saved the inning by fielding Gabe Kapler's sharp grounder and diving to tag third base before Manny Ramirez got there.

Harden, called up to the majors after the All-Star break, got the win.

Durazo, who had an early two-run double against Martinez, tied it with a clean single to center that delighted most of the 50,606 fans in the packed ballpark.

The Red Sox have lost seven of their last eight playoff openers.

Martinez and Walker were the stars of the first seven innings. Martinez remained unbeaten in his playoff career by narrowly outpitching Tim Hudson, but he didn't get the win.

Martinez yielded six hits and four walks in seven innings, throwing a season-high 130 pitches. But Boston's imposing ace was never far from trouble: He allowed three runs in the third, threw out a runner at home in the fifth and barely escaped a bases-loaded jam in the seventh.

Until Kim and Embree blew it, Boston's heavy-hitting lineup appeared headed to a win thanks to two big blows from one of its lightest bats.

Jason Varitek also homered and reached base four times for the Red Sox, who tagged Hudson for 10 hits and three runs. The damage could have been worse, but Ramirez stranded five runners while going 0-for-5.

Though he also escaped several jams, Hudson's postseason struggles continued: He has just one victory in six career playoff starts. The right-hander appeared to be pitching through pain in his final two innings, drawing the concern of Oakland's medical staff.

Durazo got the biggest hit in Oakland's third-inning rally, driving home Chris Singleton and Ellis with a hit into the right-center gap. Miguel Tejada, who batted .143 in the first-round series last season, followed with a single.

Notes: A's owner Steve Schott said there's nothing to the rumors of the Seattle Mariners coveting Oakland general manager Billy Beane to replace Pat Gillick. ... The game was played 100 years to the day after the Boston Americans faced the Pittsburgh Pirates in the first World Series game ever. ... A's fans and Red Sox fans found something to agree on: They all booed a commercial featuring Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter before the seventh inning.

Contributing: The Associated Press

Gen. Ralph E. Eberhart, head of U.S. Northern Command, said a strong set of safeguards are in place to prevent an accidental or unwarranted shootdown of a commercial airplane. Commanders, pilots and air defense crews are drilled on those procedures as many as four times each week, Eberhart said.

The rules allow for an order to shoot down a civilian plane only if there is no other option to prevent a Sept. 11-style attack on the ground, the general said. There are authentication procedures for such orders to make sure "someone can't just get on the radio and say, 'This is the president, I order you to shoot down that plane,'" Eberhart said.

Military jets were in the air during the 2001 attacks but were too far away to shoot down the planes before they struck the World Trade Center and Pentagon.

Airline passengers can be confident that their planes will not be accidentally shot down, Eberhart said.

"I would take issue with anyone who would say the men and women in our armed forces are trigger happy," Eberhart said at a breakfast meeting with reporters. "I'm more worried that they would be trigger hesitant than trigger happy. We have long discussions with people to see if they're ready to do this."

Eberhart said he has never heard of a case where a pilot or missile battery operator was hesitant to shoot down a hijacked airliner. Those involved have repeated psychological screening and testing on the procedures to make sure they will follow those rules, Eberhart said.

The Pentagon created Northern Command in the wake of the 2001 terrorist attacks to coordinate military defense of the United States and response to attacks or natural disasters.

Eberhart, a four-star general from the Air Force, said the al-Qaeda terrorist network responsible for the attacks two years ago has been seriously damaged.

"Most of the varsity players are gone. In most cases we're dealing with the junior varsity team or the freshman team," Eberhart said.

"But we can't rest on our laurels. We've got to keep the throttle up ... If anything, I think we've bought ourselves some time."

The arrests of three workers at the Guantanamo Bay prison camp for terrorist suspects have illustrated a concern about terrorists trying to penetrate the U.S. military, Eberhart said. The general said he had no indications of any coordinated terrorist effort to recruit American troops but said he had no doubt such efforts were happening.

"There's no doubt that there are people out there trying to turn our people," Eberhart said. "I'm sure there are people right now being worked on as we speak, and it's not working, and they're reporting it."

A senior Justice Department official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said those agencies, and possibly others, could get letters urging officials to preserve documents such as phone logs and not to delete e-mails. Similar letters have already gone to the White House and CIA.

Defense Department officials confirmed Thursday they were told to expect such a letter. At the State Department, spokeswoman Susan Pittman said she did not know if a letter had been received but that the agency "would cooperate fully" if asked.

Preventing loss of evidence is a key part of the early stage of the FBI's investigation, which is focused at the outset on narrowing the list of government officials who may have known the CIA officer's identity.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan told reporters Thursday that the White House had not received any subpoenas in the investigation and that, to his knowledge, no staffers had been interviewed by the FBI.

He promised to publicly disclose any such subpoenas should they be issued to the White House or its staff, if the Justice Department didn't object to releasing the information.

To his knowledge, no White House staff member has hired a lawyer because of the investigation, McClellan said.

The FBI has assembled a team of about a half-dozen experienced agents to handle the investigation into who leaked the name of a CIA officer married to former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson. Wilson had accused the Bush administration of manipulating intelligence to exaggerate the threat posed by Iraq.

The officer's name, Valerie Plame, first appeared in a July 14 story by syndicated columnist Robert Novak, and she was identified later by Newsday as an undercover officer.

In Congress, Democrats and Republicans sparred over whether a special counsel should be appointed to investigate. Democrats contend an agency headed by Bush appointees cannot adequately investigate the administration. Republicans have labeled that claim politically motivated.

Overseeing the investigation is John Dion, a 30-year career prosecutor who has headed the counterespionage section at the Justice Department since 2002. FBI agents from the counterintelligence and inspections division and from the Washington field office will do the legwork.

The FBI, which can use grand jury subpoenas to compel disclosure of any evidence, has regularly used polygraph tests in investigations involving classified information. Asked Wednesday if White House staff members would submit to lie detector tests if requested, McClellan called the question "hypothetical."

"We will cooperate fully with the investigation and make sure that we preserve the integrity of the investigation," he said.

The White House and the Republican National Committee turned up the heat Wednesday on Wilson. The GOP's communication office highlighted remarks in which Wilson backtracked from his original assertion that Karl Rove, Bush's chief political strategist, was responsible for the leak.

McClellan told reporters that Wilson "has said a lot of things and then backed away from what he said. So I think part of your role is to do some further questioning there."

Novak, in a column published Wednesday, wrote that he discovered Plame's identity when talking with a senior administration official about why Wilson, who had been part of President Clinton's National Security Council, had been chosen to investigate allegations that Iraq tried to buy uranium from Niger.

A second official confirmed that Wilson's wife was a CIA officer, Novak wrote, adding that the CIA itself never suggested to him that publication of her name would endanger anyone. Novak also wrote that the officer's identity was widely known in Washington.

Former Attorney General Janet Reno, in June 2000 testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee, said the pool of potential leakers in any administration is so big it makes most leak investigations impractical.

"Almost all leak investigations are closed without having identified a suspect," she said.

Justice Department guidelines allow for journalists to be subpoenaed only on rare occasions, after all reasonable attempts are made to obtain the information from other sources.

Newsday Editor Howard Schneider said the newspaper had not been contacted by the Justice Department and that its reporters were continuing to pursue the leak story.

An ABC-Washington Post poll found 69% of Americans, including 52% of Republicans, believe a special counsel should be appointed. A substantial majority, 72%, said it's likely that someone in the White House leaked the classified information, but only 34% think it's likely Bush knew about the leak beforehand.

U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema rejected a more severe option to dismiss all charges. The government had acknowledged dismissal would be appropriate, so there could be a quick appeal of her earlier ruling grantings Moussaoui access to the prisoners.

She said the government's notice of intent to seek a sentence of death must be stricken and prosecutors cannot present any evidence or argument that the defendant was involved in, or had knowledge of, planning the Sept. 11 attacks.

Brinkema postponed the effect of her ruling so the government could appeal.

The government had been anticipating a dismissal, telling Brinkema that throwing out the charges would be the quickest route to intervention by an appellate court. Moussaoui and his court-appointed defense team had asked for dismissal.

Brinkema was responding to government defiance of her rulings in January and August, which granted Moussaoui access to the prisoners through a satellite connection.

Brinkema concluded that Moussaoui's constitutional right to potentially favorable witnesses took precedence over the government's need to protect classified information that could be revealed in testimony by the captives.

Prosecutors had argued that national security would be gravely harmed if any details were revealed about the sensitive interrogations of the prisoners, who are held in undisclosed locations outside the United States.

The Bush administration could decide to move Moussaoui's case to a military tribunal, where national security would likely trump a defendant's access to witnesses. However, that decision would likely be made only after the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, in Richmond, Va. ruled on the witness-access issue. The side that loses in the appellate court could ask the Supreme Court to intervene.

Two of the prisoners were among Osama bin Laden's top operatives, Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and a key planner of the attacks, Ramzi Binalshibh. The third is Mustafa Ahmed al-Hawsawi, a suspected paymaster for al-Qaeda.

Prosecutors argued that interrupting their interrogations would be a sensitive matter for the United States, because intelligence officials are learning valuable information about al-Qaeda's operations.

Mohammed, for instance, told U.S. officials the Sept. 11 plot was five years in the making and that a wave of suicide attacks was supposed to follow, The Associated Press reported after reviewing interrogation reports.

American forces are being attacked 15-20 times a day, counting roadside bombs, mostly in Baghdad and the surrounding Sunni stronghold to the west and north of the capital, Sanchez said.

Since May 1, when the U.S. declared the end of major combat, an estimated 90 soldiers have died in combat, according to an Associated Press tally. A total of 314 American service members have died since the war started March 20, according to the U.S. Defense Department.

Soldiers whose wounds are not severe are treated in field hospitals in Iraq. Those with more serious wounds are sent to the American military hospital in Landstuhl, Germany, after their conditions are stabilized. Some of the most seriously wounded are being sent to the United States. The military would not give a breakdown.

Landstuhl Regional Medical Center has been getting an average of 40 to 44 patients a day from Iraq, about 10 to 12% of whom are classified as "battle injuries," said spokeswoman Marie Shaw.

Since the start of the conflict, the hospital has seen 6,684 patients — 5,377 coming after May 1, Shaw said.

"What we don't see a lot of, though we see some, is gunshot wounds," Shaw said. "We see a lot of shrapnel wounds, some amputations, some burns — mostly from individual explosive devices."

Sanchez blamed the changing nature of the conflict on an influx of militants and other terrorist elements coming in from Syria and northern Iran to join the core resistance of Saddam loyalists.

"We believe there is, in fact, a foreign fighter element. There is a terrorist element focused on the coalition and international community in general and the Iraqi people to try to disrupt the progress being made," he said.

In the latest violence, U.S. soldiers came under fire Thursday near the Fallujah mayor's office and killed one of their attackers, an American officer said, while a witness said a U.S. convoy was attacked southeast of the volatile city.

Those incidents came a day after three American soldiers were killed in separate attacks as the U.S.-led coalition faced an increasingly sophisticated resistance movement.

None of the Americans was hurt in the attack by three gunmen in Fallujah, a major city 30 miles west of Baghdad in the so-called "Sunni Triangle," but two girls were injured in the crossfire, Lt. Col. Brian Drinkwine said.

A check by The Associated Press at the town's two hospitals showed one dead and four wounded — a policeman, a 17-year-old boy who underwent surgery for an abdominal wound, and a mother and her 4-year-old daughter. All were in stable condition.

Drinkwine said the attack was aimed at the city building.

"While we were conducting a meeting in the city council building (mayor's office), we were fired upon. We returned fire and killed one enemy," Drinkwine said.

Shortly before the attack, a fuel tanker in a U.S. convoy near Amiriyah, southeast of Fallujah, was hit by a mine or roadside bomb, according to Mohammed Hamid, who lives nearby. He said a soldier in the passenger seat of the cab pulling the tanker was killed and the driver was wounded. The military had no information on that attack.

Twenty miles to the east in Khaldiyah, a roadside bomb exploded as a U.S. convoy was passing, but did not damage the American vehicles.

Witness accounts of the Fallujah attack were at odds with those of the military, with some claiming the gunmen fired from a passing car on a U.S. foot patrol. Others said a single gunman attacked from the street.

Ali Jassim, commander of the Fallujah Protection Force, also said the dead man was not an attacker but an innocent bystander. He said policeman Mohammed Muafaq, 27, was shot in the hip.

Walid al-Jumaly, a tire shop owner, said more than 10 soldiers were walking across the main street in front of the mayor's office and an adjacent U.S. Army post when a man stepped from a side street, shouted "God is great!" and started firing with an assault rifle.

He said the Americans used tear gas and returned fire.

Afterward, residents of the Euphrates River city said they were happy the soldiers came under attack, calling the assailant a freedom fighter.

Assou Nadim Hamid, a policeman himself and brother of one of eight Fallujah police mistakenly killed by U.S. troops Sept. 12, voiced anger at the Americans.

"Whenever they come inside Fallujah, they will be attacked. Saddam Hussein is gone. But now we have the same kind of regime," he said.

A bomb was found at the mayor's office last week and defused. U.S. troops routinely are in the office to coordinate reconstruction projects in the region.

Fallujah, a wedge of land west and north of Baghdad, has been the scene of repeated attacks by resistance fighters opposed to the American occupation.

On Wednesday, a soldier from the 1st Armored Division was shot and killed while on patrol in the al-Mansour district of western Baghdad, the U.S. command said. A female soldier from the 4th Infantry Division also died Wednesday when a roadside bomb exploded about 300 yards from the main U.S. base in Tikrit, Saddam's hometown. Two other soldiers were wounded in the blast. U.S. troops in Tikrit fired mortars overnight into empty fields near the base in a show of force.

Another soldier from the 4th Infantry Division died following a rocket-propelled grenade attack on a convoy Wednesday near Samara, about 60 miles north of the Iraqi capital, according to the military.

In Tikrit, the military said the Baath Party official was arrested overnight near Baqouba. His name was not released, but the military said he was believed to have been helping Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, a longtime Saddam confidant and one of the most senior members of the former regime still at large.

Al-Douri, Saddam's Revolutionary Command Council vice chairman, is No. 6 on the most-wanted list of 55 Iraqis. His daughter was married to Saddam's son, Odai, who was killed with his brother, Qusai, in a U.S.-led attack in July.

Meanwhile, troops of the 4th Infantry Division killed one Iraqi and wounded another after assailants fired rocket-propelled grenades and small arms fire at a U.S. patrol near Balad, division spokeswoman Maj. Josslyn Aberle said.

In New York, U.S. diplomats circulated a new draft U.N. Security Council resolution calling for a strengthened U.N. role in rebuilding Iraq. The draft provided no timetable for a handover of authority to Iraqis, according to a copy of the document obtained by AP.

The drive to stop what opponents call partial birth abortion "will finally become law and the performance of this barbaric procedure will finally come to an end," said House Judiciary Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis.

Critics said the partial birth ban, twice vetoed by President Clinton, was part of a larger agenda to undermine the 1973 Supreme Court decision supporting a woman's right to end a pregnancy. It's "an attempt to whittle away at a woman's constitutional right to her privacy and control of her body," said Rep. Louise Slaughter, D-N.Y.

The bill, passed 281-142, could be taken up by the Senate as early as Friday. Bush's signature would make it the first federal law since Roe v. Wade in 1973 to restrict a specific abortion procedure.

"This will be an important step toward building a culture of life in America," said White House press secretary Scott McClellan, who praised the House and urged the Senate "to move quickly on this important piece of legislation as well."

Some 30 states have varying versions of partial birth bans, and opponents have successfully challenged most of those laws. Most significantly, in 2000 the Supreme Court, on a 5-4 vote, ruled that a Nebraska law was unconstitutional because it did not have an exception for the health of the mother and was so vague as to leave unclear what medical practices were being prohibited.

Clinton, in his two vetoes, also argued that there must be a health exception.

Supporters of the ban, led in the House by Rep. Steve Chabot, R-Ohio, said the House-Senate compromise bill being considered has tightened the definition of the banned procedure and contains findings to prove that the practice is never needed to protect a woman's health.

Partial birth is not a medically accepted term, but as defined by the bill it is a procedure in which the fetus is killed after the entire fetal head is outside the body of the mother or, in the case of breech presentation, "any part of the fetal trunk past the navel is outside the body of the mother." Doctors who perform the procedure would be subject to up to two years in prison.

There's disagreement about how often such abortions are performed. Defenders say it is sometimes the safest way to protect the health and future fertility of the mother when an abortion is found to be necessary during the second and third trimester of a pregnancy.

Both sides agree that the symbolic importance of the ban would be enormous. Anti-abortion groups say it would give momentum to other limitations on abortion, while abortion rights groups say the ultimate goal is to erode support for that 1973 decision on abortion rights, known as Roe v. Wade

Schwarzenegger's remarks, as he kicked off a statewide bus tour in the final days of the recall campaign, came after the Los Angeles Times published a story Thursday in which six women accused him of sexually harassing and groping them.

"Yes, it is true that I was on rowdy movie sets and I have done things that were not right, which I thought then was playful but now I recognize that I offended people," Schwarzenegger told a crowd of supporters in San Diego. (Related: Apology text Video)

"Those people that I have offended, I want to say to them I am deeply sorry about that and I apologize because that's not what I'm trying to do," he added.

From this point on, Schwarzenegger said, he would prove he is a "champion for the women." As he made the pledge, the crowd interrupted him with cheers.

Schwarzenegger also dismissed the Times story as "trash politics" and said much of it was not true.

Reaction to the apology was swift, with some of the actor's critics complaining that it was too little too late and some supporters saying they respected him for acknowledging past mistakes.

"All is not forgiven. He's got a pattern of this for 30 years, it just doesn't just go away," said Karen Pomer, a spokeswoman for the women's group CodePink.

"When you grab a woman's breast or rear when they don't want you to, that is sexual battery in the state of California," Pomer said.

Julie Vandermost, president of the California Women's Leadership Association, an Orange County-based Republican group that has endorsed Schwarzenegger, said she was not troubled by his remarks.

"I'm happy he's coming out, apologizing and being truthful, but it doesn't mean he shouldn't be governor," Vandermost said. "I'm madder at Gray Davis for tripling my car tax."

The president of the California National Organization for Women, Megan Seely, attending a news conference celebrating Gov. Gray Davis's signing of a package of women's health care bills Thursday, said "It's clear Schwarzenegger is not safe for women."

The Times said none of the actor's political opponents helped the newspaper locate Schwarzenegger's accusers and that none of the women had come forward on their own. None of the six have brought legal action against Schwarzenegger, according to the newspaper.

The Times, quoting two of the women by name and the rest anonymously, said the instances of unwanted fondling and groping allegedly occurred as far back as 1975 and as recently as 2000.

Schwarzenegger spokesman Sean Walsh had earlier denied the women's allegations in comments to the Times, saying the actor had not engaged in improper conduct toward women.

Walsh had said the claims were a political attack in the days leading up to the Oct. 7 recall election. "We believe that this is coming so close before the election, something that discourages good, hard-working, decent people from running for office," he was quoted in the paper as saying.

Schwarzenegger, in San Diego to kick off a four-day bus tour of the state, took the stage Thursday to chants of "Arnold, Arnold" and immediately addressed the Times story.

Without mentioning specifics, he admitted to wrongdoing and apologized.

"A lot of those that you see in the stories is not true, but at the same time, I have to tell you that I always say, that wherever there is smoke, there is fire," he said.

Schwarzenegger's alleged past indiscretions have been an issue in the campaign since he announced his bid for governor. Much of the controversy has surrounded a 1977 interview in Oui magazine in which Schwarzenegger talked about engaging in group sex. The actor has previously said he didn't remember it.

Before Schwarzenegger's remarks, several in the crowd of supporters at the San Diego Convention Center said they didn't believe the article and didn't think it would affect his campaign.

"I think it's baloney," said Kendall DePascal, 41, a marketing specialist from San Diego. "You know what, he worked on a movie set. You encounter people who make claims about you right and left. I don't believe it at all."

Three of the women quoted in the times said Schwarzenegger grabbed their breasts. Another said he reached under her skirt and grabbed her buttocks. Another woman said Schwarzenegger tried to remove her bathing suit in a hotel elevator, and the sixth said Schwarzenegger pulled her onto his lap and asked whether a certain sexual act had ever been performed on her.

Three of the women who spoke on condition of anonymity said being named could jeopardize their careers; another feared public ridicule or harm to her husband's business.

The latest poll from the Los Angeles Times, released Tuesday, showed Schwarzenegger leading among the 135 candidates in the race to replace Davis if the governor is recalled.

The poll showed 40% of likely voters supported Schwarzenegger, to 32% for Democrat Lt. Gov. Bustamante and 15% for Republican state Sen. Tom McClintock. A Sept. 12 poll had showed Bustamante leading with 30% to 25% for Schwarzenegger and 18% for McClintock.

The recent poll also showed the effort to oust Davis succeeding, 56% to 42%, a shift from the earlier poll, which had found 50% in favor of recalling Davis and 47% opposed.

The latest poll surveyed 815 likely voters Sept. 25-29 and had a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

One stretch would be built east of Ariel — the second-largest settlement in the West Bank, with 18,000 residents — although it won't immediately be connected to the main security fence running further west, closer to Israel, said Zalman Shoval, an adviser to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.

Israeli radio reports said similar barriers also would be erected east of several other settlements in the West Bank heartland, including Efrat, south of Bethlehem.

In other developments, Israeli commandos arrested Bassam Saadi, a senior leader of the Islamic Jihad, in the West Bank refugee camp of Jenin. A witness said Saadi was hiding under a parked car when he was seized.

Later Wednesday, an Islamic Jihad member, Mazen Badawi, was killed in an Israeli army raid in the West Bank refugee camp of Tulkarem. Palestinian security officials said Israeli undercover troops opened fire without provocation on Badawi outside the camp's sports club, and that a bystander was critically wounded.

The Israeli military said troops chased the wanted man, and that soldiers opened fire after being shot at, though it was unclear whether the fire came from the fugitive.

Also, the incoming Palestinian prime minister, Ahmed Qureia, said he has reached agreement on the formation of a Cabinet and would present it to parliament on Sunday and Monday. He would not discuss the size or composition of the new government, but Palestinian officials have said he was hoping to reduce the number of ministers from 24 to 12, in part because he was exasperated by wrangling over Cabinet seats.

The vote Wednesday by the Israeli Cabinet on the next segments of the security barrier was 18-4, with one abstention.

Israel says the barrier is necessary to keep out suicide attackers. Dozens of Israelis have been killed in more than 100 suicide attacks during three years of violence. Many bombers have simply walked across the unmarked line between Israel and the West Bank, blowing themselves up in Israeli cities.

Palestinian officials demand that the United States stop the barrier's construction, charging that Israel is grabbing land and unilaterally drawing a border that should be determined in peace talks.

"All these are procedures and actions that destroy all possibilities for peace and bringing about calm, be it settlements, the wall, or what is happening around Jerusalem," Qureia said.

The United States wants the barrier to run close to the Green Line, the frontier between Israel and the West Bank before the 1967 Mideast war. The Bush administration has said it might deduct some of the construction cost for the barrier from $9 billion in U.S. loan guarantees to Israel. On Tuesday, however, the State Department said it had no immediate plans to cut the guarantees.

About one-fourth of the barrier already has been built in the northern West Bank. In some parts, it runs close to Israel. Elsewhere, however, the barrier dips farther into the West Bank, isolating several Palestinian villages and cutting residents off from their land.

The most contested issue in planning the next segment was whether the barrier would incorporate Ariel, cutting deep into areas the Palestinians claim for a future state.

The Cabinet approved a compromise backed by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, who hopes to appease both the United States and his hardline constituents. Under the plan, the barrier would run east of Ariel but would not be connected for now to the main security fence running farther to the west, closer to Israel. The open sections would be patrolled by soldiers.

"Certainly it has to pass east of Ariel, but in a manner that will not antagonize the (Palestinian) population of the territories and will be in coordination with the agreements we have with the U.S. government," Vice Premier Ehud Olmert said before entering the Cabinet meeting.

Sharon initially opposed construction of the barrier because it would leave tens of thousands of Jewish settlers on the other side, but has relented under growing public pressure.

In the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, troops searching for weapon smuggling tunnels along the Egyptian border blew up one tunnel and destroyed several nearby buildings, the army and Palestinian witnesses said.

Palestinian security sources said that two of the 13 buildings destroyed were inhabited.

The army said that the buildings were used to hide weapons and that troops came under fire from Palestinian gunmen who also set off explosive devices.

Chairman Michael Powell of the Federal Communications Commission on Tuesday vowed to start enforcing the registry today despite a judge's order aimed at thwarting it. (More info: Clearing up confusion about do-not-call list)

His pledge before a Senate panel is the latest twist in a week of legal tussles featuring courts, agencies, Congress and the president.

"It is unclear whether American families gathering at the dinner table will be bombarded (on Wednesday) with the same unwanted calls that they receive today," said Sen. John McCain. R-Ariz., chairman of the Commerce Committee at Tuesday's hearing.

Consumers who registered numbers by Aug. 31 should see at least some drop in telemarketing calls starting today, officials say. Companies have an additional three months to stop calling those who signed up later. The list already has about 51 million numbers. Charities and politicians are exempted, as are companies that consumers did business with in the past 18 months.

Those who still want to register should act quickly. Chairman Timothy Muris of the Federal Trade Commission, which manages the list run jointly by the two agencies, told the panel that a judge's order Monday prompted it to begin cutting off registration. The shutdown, though, will take three days.

The FCC acted Monday to take over the registry after District Judge Edward Nottingham last week barred the FTC from enforcing it. He ruled in a lawsuit against the FTC by telemarketers who argued the list violates their free-speech rights.

Nottingham lashed back Monday night in a denial of the FTC's request to stay his ruling by barring the FTC from sharing the list it built with the FCC. The FTC has appealed his denial; a ruling is expected today.

Powell told the panel Nottingham's order would hamper its enforcement. But FCC officials say they can use other means to get the list and to bring cases against companies that call people on the list.

The industry's Direct Marketing Association, which represents 70% of telemarketers, has advised members to comply with the list. But the American Teleservices Association is leaving it up to its members.

A separate court ruling last week said the FTC lacked authority for the list, but Congress passed a bill to fix that, and President Bush signed it Monday.

John Paul missed his general audience last week because of what the Vatican called a mild intestinal ailment.

His appearance came after one of his closest advisers was quoted as saying in remarks published Tuesday that John Paul was "in a bad way" and urged Catholics to pray for him.

The comments by German Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger raised concerns the pope's health might have deteriorated beyond his obvious frailty. The pontiff suffers from Parkinson's disease, which makes it very difficult for him to speak and walk.

"He is in a bad way," Ratzinger told the German weekly Bunte. "We should pray for the pope."

The comments were made Sept. 22, a day before the pontiff came down with the intestinal ailment.

Ratzinger's aide at the Vatican, the Rev. Georg Gaenswein, told The Associated Press the cardinal in no way indicated John Paul's health had worsened recently.

Gaenswein said Ratzinger was responding to a request by a group of visiting German brewers who were to have an audience with the pontiff while they were in Rome.

"They were told, 'Unfortunately, this is not possible. The pope's health doesn't allow him to make a lot of physical effort,'" Gaenswein recalled.

The pope will also celebrate a Mass on Sunday on the steps of St. Peter's Basilica to raise three churchmen to sainthood. Canonization ceremonies generally last about two hours, an indication the pope's doctors think he has the stamina for the appearance.

Gaenswein noted that conserving strength was particularly important in the run-up to a heavy schedule John Paul has given himself for October, including celebrations of his 25th anniversary as pope.

On Saturday, John Paul holds talks at the Vatican with the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams. The talks are likely to cover the recent explosive decision of the U.S. Episcopal Church to name its first openly gay bishop.

After Wednesday's audience, the pope, seated in a throne-like chair on wheels, greeted selected pilgrims for nearly an hour atop the steps of St. Peters' Basilica.

The Vatican-based Chilean cardinal Jorge Medina was quoted Wednesday as saying that John Paul had neither lost his ability to govern the church nor had any intention of stepping down.

Medina told the Web site www.terra.cl he had no information to indicate that the pope was gravely ill but that he was suffering from the burdens of age and his ailments.

WASHINGTON — Congressional Democrats called anew Wednesday for an independent investigation of the White House to find out how an undercover CIA officer's identity was revealed.

Democratic leaders condemned the disclosure of the name of the CIA officer, who is the wife of former ambassador Joseph Wilson, a prominent critic of Bush's Iraq policy. They also want the Justice Department to appoint someone from outside its hierarchy to investigate the leaks.

Letting Attorney General John Ashcroft investigate the White House that appointed him is like having a fox guard a henhouse, said Rep. James McDermott, D-Wash. "How could Congress sit here with a straight face and allow that to be the way this issue is resolved?" he said.

The White House on Wednesday ordered its staff to preserve any document that could be relevant, but Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., said that should have been done earlier.

"Every good prosecutor knows that any delay could give a culprit time to destroy the evidence," Schumer said. "Issues like this one, which sow seeds of doubt about the fairness and honesty of Justice's investigation, will come up every day until a special counsel is appointed."

Ambassador Wilson originally planned to meet with House Democrats Wednesday morning but the meeting was canceled, officials said. Having Wilson at a partisan Democratic meeting would have given extra credence to Republican claims that the controversy is political, Democrats said.

Wilson has blamed the White House political operation and presidential adviser Karl Rove for his wife's name being made public. While he doesn't think Rove himself leaked the name, "I thought that it came from the White House, and Karl Rove was the personification of the White House political operation," Wilson said Monday.

Some Republicans said the Democrats were just playing politics.

"Surprise, surprise, they are calling for a special counsel. My goodness," said House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas. "It must be in their political handbook, their campaign handbook."

The Justice Department is trying to find out who leaked the name of the CIA operative, possibly in an attempt to punish Wilson, who had accused the administration of manipulating intelligence to exaggerate the threat from Iraq.

Democrats want Attorney General John Ashcroft to recuse himself and appoint a special prosecutor, saying Ashcroft is too close to the White House to be objective.

Republicans expressed confidence in the Justice Department's investigation.

"The FBI will be doing the legwork and as a result I think we will find out what happened here and, clearly, if the allegations are correct, the crime has occurred, then it should be prosecuted," said Sen. Judd Gregg, R-N.H.

Ashcroft has not ruled out appointing a special counsel, a senior law enforcement official said.

DeLay said a special counsel makes no sense.

"You have special counsels if you think the administration is trying to cover up or obstruct justice or is not interested in this issue," DeLay said. "It is quite obvious to me that the White House and the administration are very upset about this issue."

SAN FRANCISCO — Don't mess with the San Francisco Giants in a razor-close game. The Florida Marlins found that out Tuesday as the defending National League champions took a 2-0 victory in Game 1 of a Division Series at Pacific Bell Park. (Related item: Game report)

Right-hander Jason Schmidt gave San Francisco the dominating start it needed, holding the Marlins to three hits, striking out five and walking none for the complete-game shutout.

"Most of the time we use our bullpen to keep us in a close game," Giants manager Felipe Alou said. "But today, Schmidt was tremendous."

Josh Beckett, the young Marlins right-hander, was the loser, despite battling Schmidt for seven innings.

The Giants also finished with three hits, but the difference came in the fourth inning when they used two walks, Edgardo Alfonzo's bunt single and a throwing error by rookie third baseman Miguel Cabrera to break through for the game's first run.

"He's a guy that bats in the middle of the lineup, but I can do anything with him; bunt, hit and run, squeeze," Alou said of Alfonzo, whose double in the eighth inning scored Barry Bonds.

Not much separated the teams during the season. Although the Giants were 5-1 vs. the Marlins, they won the series by a combined score of 23-19.

Schmidt's phenomenal season is a product of his playoff experience last fall, when he emerged as the biggest star of a pitching staff that really didn't have one.

These days, Schmidt is the San Francisco Giants' unquestioned ace — and he gave the young Marlins a taste of tough postseason pitching.

"I felt like I learned a lot more in the last two games of the World Series than I did my whole career," said Schmidt, who has allowed just seven runs in his last four postseason outings. "I couldn't wait to get back to the postseason."

After retiring Derrek Lee on a grounder for the final out, Schmidt twirled on one leg before his teammates surrounded him in celebration.

The right-hander is feeling so good he'd appreciate the chance to face Bonds — and after the gem Schmidt just pitched, he might have a decent shot at shutting down baseball's most feared slugger.

"I would challenge him," Schmidt said playfully.

At 68, Alou wound up a winner while managing his first postseason game and 72-year-old Jack McKeon lost in his playoff debut, then couldn't get to the interview room because fans grabbed at his jacket and hat while he worked his way down a crowded hallway.

Game 2 in the best-of-five NL series is Wednesday.

Bonds barely had two feet in the batter's box when catcher Ivan Rodriguez's glove shot out to signal an intentional walk, showing just how serious the Marlins were about not getting beat by Bonds.

Instead, the Marlins beat themselves with one bad throw.

Bonds wound up 0-for-1 with three walks. Chad Fox intentionally walked Bonds with nobody on base in the eighth, and he came around to score on Alfonzo's double.

Bonds proved last postseason that he could carry his team — the five-time MVP hit .356 with eight homers, 16 RBI and 27 walks as the Giants reached the World Series for the first time since 1989 — but the Marlins don't plan to let that happen if they can help it.

When he was intentionally walked in the first, the crowd of 43,704 began booing lustily.

On a day the teams combined for only six hits, the Giants scored their first run on a misplay.

Cabrera, starting in place of injured All-Star Mike Lowell, charged in on Alfonzo's fourth-inning bunt and made a wild throw to first. By the time the ball had stopped it was in the bullpen dirt and Rich Aurilia was headed for home.

Alou had said the key for Schmidt was to keep his pitch count down — and that happened. The man with the league's lowest ERA worked ahead in the count and was at 79 pitches through six.

"We haven't seen any better stuff than that," Lee said. "He was throwing 94, 95, and hitting all the corners. It was impressive."

After Alex Gonzalez reached on an error in the fifth, Schmidt retired the final 14 batters. Schmidt walked none and struck out five.

Schmidt pitched the first postseason shutout for the Giants since Dave Dravecky beat St. Louis in Game 2 of the 1987 NL championship series.

Beckett was almost as impressive in his playoff debut. He gave up two hits in seven innings, striking out nine and walking five.

"When you're lucky enough to get a pitching performance like that, you've got to score some runs," Florida center fielder Juan Pierre said. "It's almost like we wasted it. We just ran into a bus over there. Everything would have been all right if we'd just scored some runs."

At 23, Beckett is seven years younger than Schmidt, but he didn't pitch like it.

"He's tough," Beckett said. "He threw probably 100 fastballs and I don't think he made a mistake on one of them. He outpitched me, what can I say?"

Beckett worked out of a first-inning jam after Ray Durham hit a leadoff double.

Durham went to third on J.T. Snow's flyout and after Bonds was walked with two outs, Alfonzo flied out.

Beckett retired seven consecutive batters, including five straight strikeouts before walking Aurilia in the fourth.

Before Bonds' fourth-inning at-bat, Beckett huddled on the mound with Rodriguez and pitching coach Wayne Rosenthal — certainly discussing how to approach him this time around.

Beckett challenged Bonds all right.

Here's how it went: A 97 mph fastball, strike one. Outside, ball one. Low and in, ball two. Foul, strike two. High, ball three. Low, ball four. And Bonds was aboard again while McKeon barked about plate umpire John Hirschbeck's strike zone.

Marlins center fielder Juan Pierre insisted San Francisco's 5-1 showing against Florida this season wasn't a true indication of the talent separation between these two clubs — the Giants reached the World Series last season and the Marlins are in the playoffs for the first time since winning the World Series in 1997, and they swept San Francisco in the first round to get there.

Notes: The crowd was a Pacific Bell Park record, breaking the mark of 43,070 from last Oct. 6 in Game 4 of the NLDS against Atlanta. ... Amputee football player Neil Parry of San Jose State threw out the first pitch. ... Beckett's nine strikeouts set a franchise division record. ... Alfonzo has 12 RBI in nine career division series games.

The Associated Press contributed to this report

NEW YORK — The Minnesota Twins picked a good time to end a two-year, 13-game losing streak to the New York Yankees. The underdog Twins beat the Yankees 3-1 in Game 1 of their best-of-five Division Series on Tuesday, doing it with pitching, defense and timely hitting, the staples the Yankees used to win four of the last seven World Series. (Related item: Game report)

"You are not going to get a lot of chances against the Yankees, so you have to make the most of them," the Twins' Doug Mientkiewicz said.

The Twins were everything the Yankees weren't. They had Shannon Stewart crashing into the left-field fence to make a ninth-inning catch and Cristian Guzman going from first to third on a single to left, sliding around a tag, then scoring on a sacrifice fly.

"That's the only way we can win games, run the bases hard," Twins manager Ron Gardenhire said.

New York had Bernie Williams stumbling in the dirt while rounding first, as well as misplaying a ball in center field that led to a run-scoring triple. They also had Alfonso Soriano making a throwing error that scored a run.

Tuesday's win was important because it guaranteed the Twins will get two games at the Metrodome, where they are 13-3 in the postseason.

But they aren't thinking beyond Thursday night, when Brad Radke pitches against the Yankees' Andy Pettitte.

"Every win is important, but this thing is far from over," right fielder Jacque Jones said. "The Yankees are going to come back even harder against us on Thursday. We've got to play hard."

Instead of getting tight when starting pitcher Johan Santana cramped up, the Twins stayed loose.

Playing a postseason game in Yankee Stadium for the first time, the Twins were guarding a one-run lead in the fifth inning when their pitcher suddenly couldn't go to the mound for the bottom half.

"One thing you don't do is show panic in the dugout," Gardenhire said. "So I just said, 'Well, let's have some fun. We are going to piece it together.' And that's what we did."

Those pesky Twins put the big, bad Yankees in another postseason funk.

Torii Hunter circled the bases when his line drive resulted in a pair of misplays that led to two sixth-inning runs.

"It's been a running joke the last couple of days- we might just as well scrimmage these guys and get them warmed up for the next round, because that's where everybody's putting them," Jones said.

New York was favored in last year's division series, too, before Anaheim won in four games to end a run of four consecutive AL pennants. The Yankees have dropped four straight postseason games for the first time since the 1981 World Series against the Dodgers, not exactly what owner George Steinbrenner was expecting when he set payroll records last winter in an effort to get his team its first Series title since 2000.

After Santana's injury, Rick Reed, J.C. Romero, LaTroy Hawkins and Eddie Guardado combined to allow five hits and one run.

Meanwhile, Williams failed to cut off Hunter's liner to center and Soriano made an error that gave Hunter what's often called a Little League home run. Williams also flopped flat on his belly rounding first base in the day's comic highlight, and New York's batters went 1-for-10 with runners in scoring position, getting an RBI infield single from Soriano in the ninth.

"When the game gets sloppy and the ball gets thrown around, that makes it tough," said Mike Mussina, who had been 20-2 against the Twins. "That's what the postseason is, minimizing mistakes. If you make a mistake in the postseason, they tend to be big ones."

Despite their troubles, the Yankees threatened to pull off yet another memorable ninth-inning comeback. But a spectacular leaping catch by Stewart against the left-field wall on a drive by Hideki Matsui helped Guardado limit New York to one run.

Stewart was fighting not only the sun — it was first early afternoon postseason game at Yankee Stadium since 1981 — but aggressive fans who leaned over to try for a grab similar to Jeffrey Maier's in the 1996 playoffs against Baltimore.

"The only thing I was worried about was that with the fans reaching out, he might get poked in the eye," said Jones, Minnesota's right fielder.

Baseball tried to knock off the Twins after the 2001 season as part of its failed contraction attempt. Minnesota has rebounded to win consecutive AL Central titles, losing to Anaheim in last year's AL championship series. The Twins succeed by executing the little things.

Minnesota went ahead in the third when speedy n Guzman reached on a slow roller past the mound, slid into third on Stewart's single to left and scored on Luis Rivas' sacrifice fly.

Santana, whose 12-3 record led the majors in winning percentage, allowed four hits but didn't let any runners get past second. He had thrown 59 pitches when his right leg tightened.

"I knew I was in pain," Santana said. "It was bad."

His relievers weren't ready.

"He totally caught the bullpen off guard," Hawkins said. "We were totally just like, 'Wow, what happened?' "

Talk about bullpen by committee!

It was somewhat similar to the night of June 11, when Roy Oswalt got hurt and Houston's bullpen beat the Yankees in the first six-pitcher no-hitter in major league history.

"We certainly didn't have a lot of opportunities," Yankees manager Joe Torre said. "And when we did, we didn't get the base hit, up until the ninth inning."

Hawkins struck out four over two innings for the win, and Guardado hung on for the save when Nick Johnson hit a game-ending grounder.

Minnesota gave itself margin for mistakes in the sixth. With Matthew LeCroy on first following a leadoff single, Hunter lined a pitch toward Williams. In the past, the outfielder usually would have scooped up the ball, but now 35 and slowed following knee surgery last spring, he let it roll by him to the wall.

"It went just too fast right by me and skipped very hard to my left," Williams said.

LeCroy scored and Hunter sped to third with a triple. When the relay throw from Soriano was way high, Hunter wound up coming home. He pumped his fists, telling teammates to score some more runs.

"It was trying to fire the guys up," Hunter said. "I think we had to get State Farm insurance. We know that they know that we know they're good."

Many fans in the sellout crowd of 56,292 booed.

The Yankees knew they had opened with a stinker.

"There's nobody in this clubhouse that took them for granted," Pettitte said. "They went further in the playoffs last year than we did."

Notes: Jason Giambi was 0-for-4 with a pair of strikeouts. ... During its run of nine straight postseason appearances, the Yankees have won all three first-round series in which they dropped the opener.

The Associated Press contributed to this report

ATLANTA — For the Atlanta Braves, it was a sobering Game 1. To look up and find their stands overrun by Chicago Cubs fans, and to see what happens when it is the other team with the best pitching. It was Kerry Wood's night Tuesday, delivering the message that Chicago's vaunted arms can stop Atlanta's powerful bats, throwing a two-hitter into the eighth inning and slamming a vital double to beat the Braves with his bat as well as his heat, 4-2. (Related item: Game report)

All of it in front of Atlanta's first postseason sellout in three years that included many Cubs fans, who had invaded to see Wood throw searing fastballs and unhittable sliders.

And a rapturous night it was for them. The Cubs had not won a postseason game since 1989 and had not won on the road since Claude Passeau pitched a one-hitter to beat Detroit in Game 3 of 1945 World Series.

Now they can take a decisive 2-0 lead in this National League Division Series with a win in Game 2 here Wednesday night at 7:06 p.m. ET.

"That's a big, big, big win," said Cubs manager Dusty Baker. "Especially in a five-game series."

In one game, the Cubs have taken home-field advantage. They have beaten Russ Ortiz, the league's only 20-game winner, as Wood delivered the killer with a two-run double in the sixth to break a 1-1 tie.

And they have shown they can shackle Atlanta's record-setting offense. Wood struck out 11 and allowed only one runner past first base until the eighth inning — Marcus Giles' home run in the third.

"Probably the biggest game of his life," Baker called it. And indeed, Wood later confessed to shaky knees warming up in the bullpen, and inner struggles the first two innings.

Then he took over the game, as he has for the last month, allowing six earned runs in his last seven starts.

"Everything feels good now," Wood said. "I like the way the ball's coming out of my hand. I'm just sticking with it and going after guys."

Baker said signs of greatness are there.

"It lets him know," Baker said, "and lets us know exactly what he's capable of doing.

"It's doing a lot for the maturity of a good pitcher turning into a great pitcher."

This is what dominance looks like: Wood had as many hits as he allowed, two, and his double was the only truly timely hit of the night.

"I was just trying to put it in play somewhere," said Wood of his two-bagger. "When (Ortiz) threw the breaking ball, I figured he'd throw a fastball, and I just needed someplace to hit it."

That one swing impressed Atlanta manager Bobby Cox.

"He won the ballgame with his bat," said Cox.

Wood finally tired in the eighth, loading the bases with one out with a couple of walks.

Then facing the Chicago bullpen, the Braves scored a run on Chipper Jones' ground ball forceout at second, though they probably shouldn't have. Replays suggest Jones was out at first in what would have been an inning-ending double play.

No matter.

When Javy Lopez grounded to short with the bases loaded and two out, the Braves' last real chance was gone. Chicago closer Joe Borowski struck out the side in the ninth, around one single.

A crowd of 52,043 watched the National League's most prolific offense (5.6 runs a game) finish Game 1 with three hits and 14 strikeouts.

"We hit the ball pretty good to have so few hits," Cox said, citing the Lopez grounder as Exhibit A. "He's not going to hit it any harder. It just didn't find a hole. The ball's got to bounce your way. Maybe the next night it will."

For awhile, the Cubs seemed intent on stranding enough runners to ruin whatever their pitchers might do.

They put eight runners on base with less than two outs in the first five innings. They loaded the bases with nobody out the fourth. They scored none of them.

Ortiz needed 74 pitches to zig-zag through the first four innings in constant crisis control. But he led 1-0.

In the sixth, the Cubs loaded the bases with nobody out again. And Ortiz still nearly slipped away.

He struck out pinch-hitter Randall Simon — by then, Baker's frustration in the dugout was palpable — and got Paul Bako to hit a ground ball to the right of first base; potentially another double play.

But the ball popped out of first baseman Robert Fick's glove. Giles retrieved it in time to get Bako, but a run scored to tie.

Not only that, it prolonged the inning for Wood, who promptly drilled a shot into the gap in left for two runs.

"I was pretty sure he was going to throw me a fastball," Wood said. "I got pretty good contact on it. Fortunately for us, it went into the gap."

Kenny Lofton blooped a single off Ray King to score Wood and make it 4-1. Not much of a gap for the Atlanta lineup to make up, usually. But this is the postseason, and the Cubs have come to pitch.

***

Contributing: Gary Graves, USA TODAY; The Associated Press

CHARLESTON, WV. Oct. 1, 2003 -- The Charleston City Council rules and ordinances committee met on Tuesday to try and update the city’s rules on loud noises like car radios, power tools, and animals. The group Decided to rewrite the rules so police will have more guidelines to use when they are called for noise related problems. According to Police Chief Jerry Pauley, currently the officers don’t have anything to go on except that it’s causing a disturbance for neighbors. Pauley says the officer has to use only his own discretion. City Council members said the new rules would probably include appropriate decibel levels. Citations would still be treated as misdemeanors.

But the two men who authorities say are responsible for the string of shootings that terrified the Washington, D.C., area were scheduled for a reunion of sorts as Malvo was to appear as a witness at Muhammad's pretrial hearing Wednesday.

Malvo's attorney, Craig Cooley, said prosecutors are aiming to determine whether Malvo will testify in Muhammad's trial by calling him to the stand. Cooley said his client will invoke his Fifth Amendment right to remain silent.

Lt. Tyler Corey, a spokesman for the Fairfax County jail, confirmed that Prince William County authorities picked up Malvo Tuesday at the Fairfax jail in advance of the hearing in Manassas.

Peter Greenspun, Muhammad's lawyer, said Malvo was called as a witness regarding a motion that is under court seal, and said he could not comment further. He said he did not subpoena Malvo.

Prince William County Commonwealth's Attorney Paul Ebert could not be reached for comment Tuesday evening.

According to Cooley, legal ethics do not allow prosecutors to put a witness in front of a jury if they have a strong expectation the witness will invoke his constitutional right to avoid self-incrimination, so they deal with the issue in a pretrial hearing.

Cooley said he expects Muhammad will similarly be called as a witness at a pretrial hearing for Malvo.

Two other matters are scheduled for argument at Wednesday's hearing. One motion seeks to suppress statements by Muhammad to investigators following his Oct. 24 arrest. Defense lawyers argue that police did not inform Muhammad of his right to remain silent in a timely manner.

A second motion seeks to bar the death penalty on one of two capital-murder counts levied against Muhammad. Defense lawyers argue that an antiterrorism statute under which Muhammad is charged is written in such a manner that the maximum penalty permitted should be life in prison.

Greenspun said Malvo has not been called as a witness for either motion.

Muhammad, 42, and Malvo, 18, have been charged with 13 shootings, including 10 deaths, over a three-week span in October in Virginia, Maryland, and Washington, D.C. They are also suspected or charged with shootings in Georgia, Alabama, Louisiana, Arizona and Washington state.

Muhammad's trial is scheduled Oct. 14; Malvo's is set for Nov. 10.

Businesses have cut about 3 million jobs since 2001. More than a million of the layoffs have occurred since November 2001, the month the National Bureau of Economics Research, the arbiter of such things, says the recession ended. Consumer confidence plunged in September, due to rising worries about the job market, the Conference Board said Tuesday.

Despite improvement in unemployment benefit claims, the number of major layoffs was higher this August than a year ago. The length and breadth of joblessness are the worst in decades.

With the economy expected to grow briskly this fall, many economists predict businesses will feel confident enough to hire. But even if the job market does turn around, improvement looks to be gradual.

"This is a different situation, and it has all the characteristics of a significant, structural change in the labor market," says Allen Sinai, chief global economist at Primark Decision Economics. "We will see fewer non-farm, payroll jobs created per dollar of GDP (gross domestic product) than at any time in our history."

The Congressional Budget Office projects the unemployment rate, which was 6.1% in August, will average 6.2% in 2004. The Federal Reserve expects a 5.5% to 6% jobless rate at the end of 2004.

Louise Geib, COO of Drummac, a mechanical maintenance and cleaning contractor for the transportation industry, says she thought the job market had gotten better. That was until she ran an ad for a $9-an-hour janitor position in Dallas in mid-September. Within days, she had hundreds of calls.

"What that signals to me is that we are still in a very sketchy economy," Geib says from her office in Jacksonville. "Three years ago, I couldn't get the phone to ring."

Similar stories are feeding concern, from the Federal Reserve to the White House, that lingering unemployment could slow or derail the accelerating recovery by hurting consumer confidence and spending, which makes up 70% of the economy.

Reasons not to hire

A number of intertwined factors seem to be behind the "jobless recovery."

New York Federal Reserve Bank economists Erica Groshen and Simon Potter say longer-term restructuring in the manufacturing and services sectors means many job cuts in this go-round were permanent, not temporary. Intense global competition has forced factories to shut down, cut workforces to the bare bones or move production overseas. Just-in-time delivery, the increase in outsourcing, changes in executive compensation and falling union membership are feeding the trend.

Soaring productivity is allowing businesses to produce more with fewer workers (or, conversely, is resulting partly from slow hiring). A strong dollar, which makes U.S. goods more expensive overseas, has hurt competitiveness, even as firms struggle to work through excess real estate and equipment acquired in the 1990s boom.

A recent study by the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City found managers are increasingly turning to overtime or temporary workers to meet unexpected needs in otherwise slow periods, rather than adding full-time hires. In fact, if factories had not relied on overtime by current workers, they could have retained nearly 18% of those laid off in the first year of the recovery, or about 71,000 people.

Atop everything else, business executives have become more cautious in the face of corporate scandals and rising costs of worker benefits, such as health insurance.

"I'm thinking things are starting to turn around a little bit," says Bill McKenna, owner of McKenna's Blues Booze and BBQ in Omaha. But, "You just need to see a little bit more before you pull the (hiring) trigger."

After cutting employees last year, Steve Drake, president of St. Louis-based Drake & Co., has hired five people since April. He has seen a pickup at his firm, which manages associations and does everything from fundraising to planning meetings to writing newsletters. But with health costs soaring, he is particularly careful, recently hiring some former retirees part time in part to avoid paying for insurance.

Not all news bad

The news is not all bleak — and there are skeptics who call the jobless-recovery label overblown.

Unemployment, measured on a historical basis, is relatively tame. Many of the factors restraining the job market, such as higher productivity, should help the economy grow faster in the future. Productivity gains have kept real wage growth strong compared with other postwar recessions, the New York Fed says.

Further, the Kansas City Fed study suggests that some of the policies that have made the job market sluggish — reliance on just-in-time employment — also softened the recession.

"It's absolutely hard on some of the workers," says Stacey Schreft, who wrote the study with Aarti Singh. "But this flexibility should make labor markets more efficient. ... This could also be contributing to recessions being shorter and milder."

There is also a growing debate about whether the government's employment numbers fully capture what's happening. That's partly due to a widening gap between the Labor Department's monthly survey of about 60,000 households, which shows 1.4 million jobs have been created since November 2001, and its survey of 400,000 businesses, which indicates 1.1 million have been lost.

"We know the payroll survey is missing some things for sure, like a trend in self-employment," says John Ryding, chief market economist at Bear Stearns, who expects some pickup by the end of the year. He adds, "Even if you gave full weight to the household survey and everything it said, it would still be a weak job recovery."

Labor Department officials Tuesday unveiled a report, based on data covering millions of private firms, that showed continued job loss through December 2002.

William Hummer, chief economist at Wayne Hummer Investments in Chicago, expects the economy to soon grow fast enough for businesses to create a million jobs by next September. That would not be enough to return to the historically low unemployment rates of less than 4% seen before the recession, but it would be a major improvement.

"It (job loss) has been overhyped a little. It's not permanent. Things are going to change for the better," Hummer says.

Is it really different?

This is not the nation's first jobless recovery. Rather, it's the second in a row, following lackluster employment growth after the 1990-91 recession. By this point in the 1990s, hiring had resumed.

To see whether a pattern is developing, Kansas City Fed economists looked at boom-and-bust cycles dating to 1960. They found that, on average, employment grew 2.7% in the first year of a recovery, except in the early 1990s and now. Put another way, the economy shed thousands of jobs during the initial year of the current recovery, compared with more than 2 million created on average in previous rebounds.

Manufacturing has taken the biggest hit, shedding 2.7 million jobs since mid-2000. The larger services sector has grown more slowly than in other recoveries.

Mark Zandi, chief economist at Economy.com, says the situation might be as bad as the early 1990s, though the jobless rate is lower. Unemployment peaked at 7.8% in June 1992, compared with the current high of 6.4% in June 2003.

Zandi says the share of the working-age population that has a job or is looking for one has fallen by a percentage point in the past three years, the largest decline in labor force participation on record. Frustrated job seekers have given up, and foreign workers who came to the USA during the 1990s tech expansion have left. If participation had remained flat, the unemployment rate would be 7.8%.

"Because so many people are out of work, we can get very, very qualified people right now," says Susan Hrib, CEO of Signum Group, a computer software firm near Atlanta. "If you are expanding, it's a great time to find good people."

What's good for employers is tough for workers.

Angie Malaier has been searching for work in Denver since May, when she got her MBA from the University of Notre Dame. She's had only four interviews, despite sending out 50 rιsumιs a week.

"If they have someone with 10 years of experience who has been laid off, they'll choose them over me," says Malaier, 27, who has borrowed from her parents.

What comes next

For the near term, the outlook is for slow improvement. Boston Fed President Cathy Minehan, in a Sept. 25 speech, predicted jobs would start coming back in 2004 if economic trends hold. Some forecasters say economic growth at 4% or a faster annual pace is needed, given higher productivity.

But Jared Bernstein, senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute, argues productivity isn't the big reason for current job losses. Pointing out that recent 4.4% productivity gains are not that much higher than the 4% average of previous recoveries, he says the real problems in this recovery are that real wages haven't been growing enough to generate demand and that the labor market is weak. Bernstein complains recent federal tax cuts, though they've boosted consumer spending, were not targeted at job creation.

Several economists suggest finding ways to increase exports, training and unemployment aid if the job market does not rebound. The White House and Congress are looking for ideas, nervous about the 2004 elections.

Recent polls show voters rank the economy as a bigger concern than terrorism, despite the fact business activity has expanded for nearly two years, the stock market is up significantly since January, and economic indicators have perked up.

Steven Wood of Insight Economics, an economic consulting firm, says he expects job creation to begin in earnest early next year. But if jobs don't come back strongly, "This is going to be another one of those short-lived economic bursts."

For the longer term, some of the current trends and pressures will persist even after the job market recovers. Just-in-time employment practices were more pronounced in this recovery but have been increasing for years.

Stephen Grubba is president of Superior Staffing Solutions, an employment search firm in Greer, S.C. His area is heavily dependent on manufacturing, where hiring freezes are commonplace. Contract work and temporary help have been improving.

"Absolutely, it (the job market) is dead, and it has been this way for months," Grubba says.

Firms are expected to keep moving white-collar and factory jobs overseas. A Goldman Sachs study estimates 300,000 to 500,000 jobs were lost in the past three years to foreign relocations. As many as 6 million jobs could move overseas in the next decade.

And business caution will persist.

After laying off seven people — a third of the staff — this year, the Waters Consulting Group, a human resources consulting firm in Dallas, is hiring a computer programmer. But the firm's managers, who have taken pay cuts and worked longer hours, feel comfortable with the move only because they have won a long-term contract.

"It's a very slippery slope," says Stacy Layton, operations director. "You have to have just enough people to handle the business."

If your child is always buried in homework, she doesn't have much company.

Most U.S. students in elementary through high school spend less than an hour studying most nights, a report released Wednesday says. That's contrary to the popular wisdom that says kids today get too much homework.

"All of this hoopla about kids being burdened just is not backed up by evidence," says study author Tom Loveless of Brookings Institution's Brown Center on Education Policy.

Another study by the RAND Corp., to be released next month, backs up Loveless' assertion. It says that since 1948, only one in four high school students has studied for more than two hours a night.

Students always have complained about homework. But parents have gotten into the game, saying higher academic standards have increased the workload. In 2000, the book The End of Homework, by Etta Kralovec and John Buell, argued that schools should abolish homework and let families spend more time together.

Loveless says the debate has been heavy on anecdotes but light on statistics. "At some point, we do have to examine the evidence."

He analyzed four previous nationwide studies. One in 2000 by the University of Michigan analyzed diaries of 2,818 kids; those 12 and younger spent 13½ hours a week watching TV but only 2 1/4 hours studying. In 1999, a government study found only 35% of high school seniors studied an hour or more a night, down from 40% in 1984. In 2002, UCLA found that 76% of 282,549 freshmen at 437 colleges said that as high school seniors, they had spent five hours or more a week socializing, but only 33% spent as much time studying.

Author Buell says the fight over homework is part of a larger debate about the quality of schools. "The focus on getting students to work harder at home is a distraction," he says.

Research on the effects of homework is inconclusive at best. But Loveless says, "I don't know if any proposed reforms will work if, in the end, we don't ask kids to work harder."

New York-based JetBlue will start operating flights in January between Boston and Denver and between Boston and three cities in Florida. By midmonth, the airline plans three daily flights between Boston and Orlando, two daily flights to Tampa and one flight a day to Fort Lauderdale and Denver.

To help launch the service, JetBlue said it will charge customers who book on its Web site an introductory fare of $79 one way between Boston and Florida and $99 one way between Boston and Denver.

JetBlue has said it plans to use some of the new Airbus airplanes scheduled for delivery this year to start service to a new city.

Politicians and airport officials in a range of cities had courted JetBlue, one of the highest-flying stars in the low-fare airline industry, to lure service to their part of the country.

Mitt Romney, Massachusetts' governor, said in a written statement that "JetBlue's entry into Boston means more local jobs, more economic activity for our state and more low-fare flying choices."

JetBlue, a startup that went public in April 2002, has already built a strong presence on the Atlantic Coast between New York and Florida and in the transcontinental market between New York and Long Beach, California.

The airline's fleet of A320s currently stands at 47, and it is scheduled to put another six into service by the end of the year.

When the shooting stopped about 30 minutes later, fist fights broke out between some demonstrators and police. The protesters said they had been promised police jobs in July, but the positions had not been given out. They charged that police were demanding bribes in return for hiring them.

Salah Hasan, a policeman, said officers fired into the air when the Facilities Protection Force station was attacked by the demonstrators. Several officers were injured he said, and the demonstrators set two cars on fire.

Police Cpl. Hashim Habib Mohsen said some of the demonstrators fired on police. Firefighters were battling the car fires.

Police Lt. Mothana Ali said about 100 demonstrators had gone to the station demanding jobs. The police, he said, told the group the were not hiring any news officers, when provocateurs incited the group to storm the building.

One protester, Ali Hamid, 21, said the protesters had applied for jobs as police but were refused even though they'd paid to get their names on the rolls of candidates.

"All these policemen are corrupt. We gave them money to register our names as candidates and when we returned they said we have no business being here. They are all corrupt from officers to regular policemen," Hamid said.

Ali Aboud, a 52-year-old out-of-work builder, said police had asked him to pay $100 for a job. He said such a sum was out of the question.

"They promised us they would give us jobs in July. We have come every week, but still we get no answer," Aboud said.

U.S. troops arrived at the scene of the violence about 45 minutes after the shooting broke out.

The shooting took place about three blocks north of the Palestine Hotel, home to much of the foreign journalist corps covering the U.S. occupation of the country.

Despite court challenges, conflicting signals from telemarketers and widespread confusion, America's phones may be a little quieter Wednesday as the National Do Not Call Registry gets off to a troubled start.

Chairman Michael Powell of the Federal Communications Commission on Tuesday vowed to start enforcing the registry today despite a judge's order aimed at thwarting it. (More info: Clearing up confusion about do-not-call list)

His pledge before a Senate panel is the latest twist in a week of legal tussles featuring courts, agencies, Congress and the president.

"It is unclear whether American families gathering at the dinner table will be bombarded (on Wednesday) with the same unwanted calls that they receive today," said Sen. John McCain. R-Ariz., chairman of the Commerce Committee at Tuesday's hearing.

Consumers who registered numbers by Aug. 31 should see at least some drop in telemarketing calls starting today, officials say. Companies have an additional three months to stop calling those who signed up later. The list already has about 51 million numbers. Charities and politicians are exempted, as are companies that consumers did business with in the past 18 months.

Those who still want to register should act quickly. Chairman Timothy Muris of the Federal Trade Commission, which manages the list run jointly by the two agencies, told the panel that a judge's order Monday prompted it to begin cutting off registration. The shutdown, though, will take three days.

The FCC acted Monday to take over the registry after District Judge Edward Nottingham last week barred the FTC from enforcing it. He ruled in a lawsuit against the FTC by telemarketers who argued the list violates their free-speech rights.

Nottingham lashed back Monday night in a denial of the FTC's request to stay his ruling by barring the FTC from sharing the list it built with the FCC. The FTC has appealed his denial; a ruling is expected today.

Powell told the panel Nottingham's order would hamper its enforcement. But FCC officials say they can use other means to get the list and to bring cases against companies that call people on the list.

The industry's Direct Marketing Association, which represents 70% of telemarketers, has advised members to comply with the list. But the American Teleservices Association is leaving it up to its members.

A separate court ruling last week said the FTC lacked authority for the list, but Congress passed a bill to fix that, and President Bush signed it Monday.

WASHINGTON — President Bush said Tuesday that he welcomed a full-scale criminal investigation by the Justice Department into allegations that an administration official illegally leaked the name of a CIA operative and blew her cover. (Audio: USA TODAY's Susan Page talks about the scandal)

Bush called on his White House staff to cooperate fully.

"If there was a leak out of my administration, I want to know who it is," Bush told reporters in Chicago. "If the person has violated law, the person will be taken care of. I welcome the investigation ... I want to know the truth."

Bush, already on the defensive over a lagging economy and the lingering instability in Iraq, could be facing a major political crisis on this issue.

Before the investigation by the Justice Department was announced, Democrats were calling for the appointment of a special counsel to ensure impartiality. The Justice Department's top officials, including Attorney General John Ashcroft, are Bush appointees.

House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said, "If there ever was a case for the appointment of a special counsel, this is it."

Syndicated columnist Robert Novak published the intelligence officer's identity in July, shortly after her husband, former ambassador Joseph Wilson, disputed Bush's claim that Iraq tried to buy uranium in Niger to build nuclear weapons. Novak refuses to reveal his source. Critics cast the alleged leak as a White House attempt to get revenge for the embarrassment to the president caused by Wilson's report.

The Justice Department informed the White House on Monday evening that the FBI was launching the inquiry and said all relevant material should be preserved. That would normally include all related telephone logs, e-mails, meeting notes and other documents.

Ashcroft, at a news conference Tuesday, said the CIA also had been instructed to tell employees to preserve relevant information.

"Such requests are standard procedures in investigations of this type," Ashcroft said. He declined to say why he hadn't sought an outside investigation. "Because of an ongoing investigation of criminal violations, I will not be making any further comment at this time," Ashcroft said.

Though the administration appeared cool toward naming a special counsel, Ashcroft has not ruled out that possibility, a senior law enforcement official said.

Federal law prohibits the unauthorized disclosure of a covert agent's name, which is punishable by up to 10 years in prison.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan said White House officials told the Justice Department that they would notify White House staffers about the investigation Monday night. He said officials at the Justice Department "said tomorrow morning would be fine."

White House counsel Alberto Gonzales told Bush about the Justice Department investigation at 7 a.m Tuesday.

McClellan said Bush "wants to get to the bottom of this, and he expects anyone — anyone — throughout his administration to adhere to the highest standards of conduct."

Bush didn't mention the controversy earlier at a fundraiser for his re-election campaign in Chicago. But he lamented the "needless partisan bickering that dominates the Washington, D.C., landscape and the zero-sum politics of Washington."

Although his administration has occasionally leaked information, Bush has railed against the practice. He campaigned as a leader who would bring integrity and leadership to the White House after years of Republican criticism of the Clinton administration.

In June 2002, Bush instructed Vice President Cheney to call two congressional leaders to chew them out for leaks of sensitive counterterrorism material.

"There are too many leaks of classified information in Washington. There are leaks out of the executive branch, out of the legislative branch," he said Tuesday.

A Bush aide said the president is certain that no one in the White House was responsible for the leak about the CIA operative. "You betcha he's confident," the adviser said. Democrats say Bush's reluctance to order an independent probe raises questions about his commitment to finding the truth. "I think there is always going to be a cloud hanging over whether or not this Justice Department, run by John Ashcroft, will ever have the objectivity and the independence to do the kind of investigation required," Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D., said.

Republicans accused Democrats of playing politics.

"Surprise, surprise, they are calling for a special counsel. My goodness," House Majority Leader Tom DeLay of Texas said.

At Bush's side Tuesday was Karl Rove, the president's senior adviser. Wilson, whose wife, Valerie Plame, is the CIA officer who was identified by Novak, had blamed Rove for the leak. Wilson now said he has no firsthand knowledge about Rove's role.

Wilson, appearing Tuesday on ABC's Nightline, said he was prepared to tell investigators the names of journalists who called him about the leak.

Bush's comment that he knew of no one in his administration who leaked Plame's identity was in response to a question about accusations against Rove.

Democrats aren't likely to take Bush's assurance as the final word. "This Justice Department has proven itself too political and in fact this attorney general, John Ashcroft, was the client of Karl Rove, so there's a link to the White House," said Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry, a Democratic presidential candidate.

Benedetto and Locy reported from Washington; Keen was in Chicago.

Contributing: Jill Lawrence, wire services

President Bush is to sign legislation Monday setting up a national Do Not Call Registry, but the legal fight over the measure is likely to continue.
However, the nation's largest telemarketing association Monday urged its members to comply with the list beginning Wednesday, when it was to have become effective. Direct Marketing Association president H. Robert Wientzen made the appeal on the trade group's Web site.

Court actions in Oklahoma and Colorado mean telemarketers can keep dialing even after Bush signs legislation to ratify the Federal Trade Commission's authority to establish the no-call list, which has swelled to more than 50 million home and cellular numbers.

A previous court ruling said the FCC, not the FTC, has the authority to enforce and administer such a list. But neither agency may be able to use the list because of First Amendment issues.

The FTC lost a crucial battle Thursday, when U.S. District Judge Edward Nottingham found that the registry violates telemarketers' free-speech rights — by allowing charities and politicians to make calls while discriminating against for-profit businesses.

That means the FTC cannot enforce $11,000 fines against telemarketers.

On Friday, the FTC asked Nottingham to suspend his ruling while it appeals the decision. The FTC is also appealing an earlier ruling by U.S. District Judge Lee West in a lawsuit filed by the Direct Marketing Association and four telemarketers. That ruling found the agency did not have the authority to administer the list. Congress moved swiftly to pass a bipartisan bill giving authority to the FTC.

Eventually, the issue is likely to end up at the Supreme Court.

"We believe that the judge is wrong," FTC commissioner Timothy Muris said. "It'll eventually be reversed. We're hopeful that we'll get a stay of the lower court judge's ruling, but if we don't we'll ultimately prevail."

The First Amendment ruling also threatens 28 do-not-call lists in states such as New York, Texas, Florida and Pennsylvania. The ruling could "effectively cripple virtually every do-not-call registry in the U.S., " warned Muris on Friday.

State officials from do-not-call programs in New York, Texas and Pennsylvania told USA TODAY they will continue to operate their lists. California, which planned to launch its list of 6 million numbers Wednesday as part of the federal registry, will move forward on its own if necessary, says state spokeswoman Hallye Jordan.

So what can consumers do? If you get an unwanted call, tell the caller: "Put this number on your do-not-call list." Telemarketers are required by law to put your number on their list or face penalties, the FTC says.

Jason Catlett, founder and president of Junkbusters, doesn't believe the setbacks will kill the list. "If you look at the history of ... court decisions about similar questions ... they've always come in favor of reasonable results of consumer privacy."

Farther south in the Atlantic, meanwhile, Tropical Storm Kate neared hurricane strength Monday as it swirled far from land — about 835 miles southwest of Lajes in the Azores Islands. Kate had maximum sustained winds near 70 mph — 4 mph short of hurricane strength — and was moving toward the northeast at around 20 mph.

Hundreds of Nova Scotia residents were evacuated from low-lying areas and residents were warned to stay indoors Monday because falling trees had knocked down a "terrific" number of still-live power lines.

Halifax, the largest city on Canada's east coast, received the brunt of Juan's punch with wind speeds reaching 89 mph early Monday.

"It was quite a fantastic event," said Carolyn Marshall, spokeswoman at Canada's Hurricane Center in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia.

Two deaths were blamed on the storm — both of them drivers killed when trees fell on their vehicles. One was an ambulance driver responding to a call near the Camp Hill Hospital in Halifax, officials said.

In nearby Dartmouth, fierce winds tore off an apartment building's roof and knocked down a wall in a hallway, firefighters said. Police dug through the rubble but reported no injuries.

"We're not sure how stable it is and we're not taking any chances," said district fire chief Tim Bookholt. "It's been a busy night. I hope the worst of it is over."

At least 200 residents were evacuated from the four-story building — many of them seniors — and bused to a hockey arena serving as a temporary shelter.

In Halifax, the swirling storm system knocked out power to significant areas as downed tree limbs cartwheeled through city streets and damaged cars.

The exact number of people left without electricity wasn't known early Monday, but it was "in the thousands," said Margaret Murphy, a spokeswoman for Nova Scotia Power.

Audrey Russell, from the coastal town of Eastern Passage, grabbed a tooth brush, toothpaste, her cat and some clothes and then headed for refuge in a nearby firehall.

"I was kind of worried, so I didn't want to stay around too long," Russell said.

Juan was downgraded to a Category 1 hurricane Sunday and had lost some of its ferocity by the time it reached cooler waters off Nova Scotia. A Category 1 hurricane has winds ranging from 74 to 95 mph.

Boaters in nearby Lunenburg hauled about 40 yachts off the town's marina while wearily keeping an eye on the skies.

"We're Nova Scotians. We're used to dealing with these sorts of things," said Jim Mosher of the Lunenburg Yacht Club.

In 1996, when Hurricane Hortense brushed past Halifax, the storm surge topped three feet, and winds uprooted trees and left tens of thousands without power. Tropical storms routinely soak Atlantic Canada each summer and autumn, but a full-fledged hurricane making landfall is rare.

Juan arrived a week after Hurricane Isabel hit the U.S. coast, killing 40 people from North Carolina to New Jersey and knocking out electrical service to 6 million customers as far north as New York.

The Atlantic hurricane season began June 1 and runs through Nov. 30.

Some companies are reducing or eliminating e-mail in a bid to staunch the spread of disruptive computer viruses and spam.

The Weymouth Club, a Boston-area health club chain, is cutting off some PCs to the Internet. Merrill Lynch last month banned employee use of AOL, Yahoo and other outside e-mail services to better protect its network. The Sports Section, a photography company in Atlanta, forced its 100 employees to change e-mail addresses six months ago and also banned the use of Web-based e-mail addresses.

Phones4U, a mobile-phone retailer in England, has gone so far as to ban its 2,500 employees from e-mailing one another. Customers can still e-mail the company.

Executives admit the changes may be extreme. E-mail is considered the most efficient form of non-face-to-face communication at work, according to 80% of 500 businesses surveyed this year by Meta Group.

But e-mail spam and viruses — which often spread via e-mail — cost companies billions of dollars a year in lost productivity. This year, half of all external corporate e-mail — or more than 2 trillion messages — will be spam, researcher IDC says. Meanwhile, about 450 viruses are discovered a month. Employers also want to curb excessive e-mail and Web surfing by workers. To bypass e-mail, companies are using:

•Alternatives. Software maker Mobile Automation whacked e-mail use by 20% this year when it relied more on cell phones and instant messaging which, so far, isn't a big spam target.

Security-services firm Guardent recently armed 25 of its 150 employees with cell phones. "People were spending five hours a day doing nothing but trading messages and deleting spam," says company President Paul Brady. "E-mail was not that productive or the best direct communication."

•Access. The Weymouth Club is terminating Internet connections, and thus e-mail, to seven of 28 PCs after a spate of virus-related problems the past year. It determined those employees didn't need the access. Some PCs are used by several workers. Those keyboards are locked up during non-work hours. "Users are more likely to download dodgy material when it is a shared PC," says executive Rich Synnott.

•Security. Corporations are adopting stricter e-mail policies, which often ban the downloading of suspicious e-mail attachments and secondary e-mail addresses for personal use.

Up to 80% of U.S. businesses will have policies in place next year, twice that of today, says market researcher CipherTrust Research.

Companies could sacrifice productivity if they overly restrict e-mail, tech analysts say. Spiking e-mail to avoid spam and viruses "is like someone deciding not to drive because they might get in an accident," says Meta's Matt Cain.

When The Sports Section forced employees to change e-mail addresses this year, employees complained it hampered communications with customers. "It's unfortunate but a better alternative than spreading a virus to one of our 185 outlets, which has happened," says Joe Lindenmayer, company vice president.

The advance in spending came on top of an even bigger 0.9% increase in July as larger paychecks and other incentives from a federal income tax cut began to take hold.

The August spending figure was in line with economists' expectations.

Meanwhile, disposable incomes, or what's left after taxes, advanced 0.9% in August, following a 1.5% jump in July.

The government attributed much of the increase in disposable incomes in both July and August to President Bush's tax cuts, which lowered federal tax withholdings, boosting take-home pay, and provided other incentives.

Excluding the tax impact, disposable incomes increased a more modest 0.3% in July and 0.2% in August.

The spending and income figures are not adjusted for price changes.

Consumer spending accounts for roughly two-thirds of economic activity in the United States. Because of that, consumer spending is a major factor in shaping the economy's recovery.

Thus far, consumers are keeping their pocketbooks and wallets sufficiently open to keep cash registers humming and the economy's rebound chugging forward.

Many analysts believe the economy is growing at an annual rate in excess of 5% in the current quarter and should be able to maintain growth above 4% in the final three months of the year.

That forecast, if it proves correct, would represent the strongest back-to-back growth since the last two quarters of 1999, a period in which the economy was headed toward a record 10-year economic expansion.

Still, analysts cautioned that they have predicted second-half economic rebounds for three years that have failed to happen as companies and consumers remained uncertain about the future.

Near rock-bottom short-term interest rates, along with the latest round of tax cuts, are helping support consumer spending and offset the negative impact of a sluggish job market, economists say.

In August, businesses slashed jobs for a seventh month. And, more recently, claims for unemployment benefits have remained stubbornly high.

In August, consumer spending on durable goods — products such as cars and appliances, went up 2.8%, following a 3.3% increase in July.

Spending on nondurables such as food and clothing, rose 0.9% for the second month. For services, spending increased 0.3% in August, after a 0.5% gain.

Because disposable income growth outpaced spending, the nation's personal savings rate, or savings as a percentage of after-tax incomes, rose to 3.8% in August from 3.6% in July. The savings rate in August was the best showing since February.

Amid signs the economy is picking up, the Federal Reserve earlier this month decided to hold a key short-term interest rate at a 45-year low 1% and hinted that the rate could stay there some time. That might motivate consumers and businesses to step up spending and investment, boosting economic growth.

SAN FRANCISCO — California voters are ready to fire Gov. Gray Davis and replace him with actor and political novice Arnold Schwarzenegger, a USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll finds.

A week before the vote on recalling the two-term Democrat, 63% of probable voters say they will vote to remove him from office. Three-quarters are unhappy with his job performance. (Related story: Arnold looking good)

Schwarzenegger, a Republican who is making his first run for elective office, captures 40% of the vote in the poll. His closest pursuer, Democratic Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante, receives 25%.

A poll Sept. 9-17 by the Public Policy Institute of California had Bustamante with 28% and Schwarzenegger 26%, indicating that Schwarzenegger gained support after last week's TV debate.

More than two-thirds of independents favor ousting Davis in the USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll. Schwarzenegger picks up more independents and crossover voters than Bustamante. More ominous for Davis: Nearly a third of Democrats plan to vote for the recall.

"It's looking like a stunning defeat for the Democratic Party at a time when nationally, Bush and the Republicans are suffering," says Bruce Cain, a political science professor at the University of California-Berkeley. "This just shows we've got a very cranky electorate in California that is very unhappy with the status quo."

Earlier California polls had shown the percentage of voters favoring recall as low as 53%.

State Sen. Tom McClintock, a conservative Republican who has been under pressure to quit the race and allow the GOP to unite behind Schwarzenegger in this overwhelmingly Democratic state, drew 18% in the poll. That's up slightly from previous surveys.

McClintock has rebuffed all calls to drop out, but the poll suggests that Schwarzenegger may not need his votes to become the first entertainer to lead California since Ronald Reagan in 1966.

Schwarzenegger receives a favorable approval rating from 63% of voters, down from 82% in a USA TODAY poll in August. By contrast, 54% have an unfavorable opinion of Bustamante.

Only 24% of voters approve of Davis' job performance. He could be the first California governor to be run from office by the voters and only the second in U.S. history. Schwarzenegger's popularity with the voters seems not to be driven by his Hollywood star power: 46% say they aren't a fan of his movies; 39% say they are.

The two bombings hit U.S. military convoys in the adjacent towns of Habaniyah and Khaldiyah at about the same time. The bombing in Khaldiyah prompted the big firefight in which two soldiers and one civilian were injured, according to Lt. Col. Jeff Swisher of the 1st Infantry Division.

The Khaldiyah fighting began at 9 a.m. when an American patrol was hit by roadside bombs, then insurgents opened fire with rocket-propelled grenades and small arms, Swisher said. The patrol returned fire and support was called in," he said.

Americans began withdrawing at about 5:30 p.m. from the al-Qurtan neighborhood on the north side of Khaldiyah, scene of several previous firefights between the U.S. military and guerrilla fighters. Angry residents cursed at reporters who entered the fire zone after the battle. Swisher said 14 people were detained.

The bombing in Habaniyah took place at about 9:10 a.m as a U.S. convoy passed, killing one soldier and wounding another, said U.S. military spokesman Lt. Col. George Krivo in Baghdad.

Habaniyah and Khaldiyah are about 50 miles west of Baghdad.

Six soldiers from the 82nd Airborne Division were wounded Sunday in nearby Fallujah in another roadside bombing, U.S. officials said.

In another incident, 4th Infantry Division troops late Sunday killed one Iraqi and captured three others in a shootout 9 miles south of Balad, U.S. officials said. In the car, troops found two M-16 rifles that belonged to two American soldiers who were abducted and killed in June, officials said.

In the Khaldiyah firefight, American M1A2 tanks fired 120-mm cannons as helicopters strafed farm houses with 50-mm machine gun fire. Two A-10 Thunderbolt attack aircraft bombed guerrilla positions while F-15 jets streaked across the sky.

At midafternoon, six U.S. armored personnel carriers — two of them ambulances — arrived as reinforcements. As the fight continued, eight Humvees carrying U.S. troops also could be seen heading toward the battle.

A U.S. armored personnel carrier left the area carrying six blindfolded Iraqi prisoners. In the distance, civilians, including women and children, could be seen fleeing on foot. An American recovery vehicle towed away two Humvees, one of which had a bullet hole in the windshield.

An Iraqi man, fleeing on foot with his wife, three other women, a nephew and five children, said at least 10 houses had been destroyed. He refused to give his name.

"Is this the freedom that we were promised?" he asked. "I had to get my family out. ... The helicopters were firing almost nonstop. My 7-year-old is too young to hate but how can he not hate them (the Americans) after this?"

Meanwhile, soldiers of the U.S. 4th Infantry Division launched two dozen raids in Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit and other areas of northern Iraq, arresting 92 people and seizing weapons and ammunition. One of the raids included the largest joint operation between U.S. military police and about 200 American-trained Iraqi police.

Lt. Col. David Poirier, who commands the 720th Military Police Battalion, based in Fort Hood, Texas, said the operations in Tikrit and other areas that ended Monday morning were designed to "break the back of the Fedayeen."

"The people we went after are the trigger-pullers attacking the coalition," Poirier said.

Of the 92 arrested, four were taken into custody in the joint U.S.-Iraqi raid. But the joint raid failed to locate any major suspects. Some of the Iraqi police vehicles switched on their headlights during the nighttime operation despite U.S. instructions to drive with them off.

Raids in the 4th Division sector have intensified after Iraqi resistance fighters shot and killed three Americans in an ambush two weeks ago just outside Tikrit. In a coordinated series of attacks and ambushes against U.S. forces last week, nine Iraqi fighters were also killed.

"We think all these people and weapons found in the past are linked," Poirier said. "We think they are linked to the organized attacks and are also responsible for the assassination attempts against the Iraqi police as well."

In a village near Kirkuk, 145 miles northeast of Baghdad, U.S. troops were dispatched when 200 people marched on a government building, according to Maj. Gordon Tate of the 4th Infantry Division.

Arab satellite broadcaster Al-Jazeera reported U.S. troops fired on the crowd, killing a 10-year-old boy. Tate said U.S. forces did not shoot although someone in the crowd did fire shoots. The Americans said they did not know how the boy was killed.

The ongoing violence has complicated efforts to rebuild this country following the collapse of Saddam's regime in April. Since President Bush declared an end to major combat on May 1, more than 80 American soldiers have been killed by hostile fire. That has led to questions about the U.S.-led coalition's stewardship of this country since American and allied forces launched military operations March 20.

In Baghdad, suspected Saddam supporters Monday blew up early a video shop that sold videotapes depicting atrocities committed by the ousted regime. No one was injured in the pre-dawn blast which also damaged four other shops on al-Rasheed street. Shopkeeper Abbas Fadhil, 27, said he had received leaflets warning him to stop selling such tapes "but I paid no attention to them."

Wilson has publicly blamed Karl Rove, Bush's top political adviser, for the leak, although Wilson did say Monday he did not know whether Rove personally was the source of Novak's information, only that he thought Rove had "condoned it."

"He wasn't involved," White House press secretary Scott McClellan said of Rove. "The president knows he wasn't involved. ... It's simply not true."

The letter was sent from the CIA's Office of General Counsel to the Department of Justice in late July. It noted a violation of the law had apparently occurred when someone provided Novak with the name of the CIA officer. The letter was not signed by CIA Director George Tenet and did not call for a specific investigation of the White House.

A senior administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said FBI officials are trying to determine whether there was a violation of the law and, if so, then whether a full-blown criminal investigation is warranted, the official said.

"It's a serious matter and it should be looked into," McClellan said.

Asked whether Bush should fire any official found to have leaked the information, McClellan said: "They should be pursued to the fullest extent by the Department of Justice. The president expects everyone in his administration to adhere to the highest standards of conduct and that would not be."

Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., said matter should be investigated from someone outside the Bush administration.

"If there was ever a case that demanded a special counsel, this is it," he said.

The Justice Department had no immediate comment on Schumer's request.

The rules for appointment of a special counsel give Attorney General John Ashcroft wide latitude to either appoint one outright, conduct a preliminary investigation to determine if such a counsel is needed or to conclude that it would be better for the Justice Department to handle the probe itself.

From the presidential campaign trail, other Democrats called for independent probes.

Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean said Ashcroft should recuse himself from an investigation, which Dean believes should be handled by an "independent Justice Department inspector general."

Rep. Dick Gephardt, D-Mo., called for a congressional investigation into whether the administration leaked the identity of an undercover CIA officer. "There's nothing that says Congress cannot carry out this investigation," he said. "I don't think we can leave this to the administration's own Justice Department."

On Sunday, Bush national security adviser Condoleezza Rice and Secretary of State Colin Powell both said they were unaware of any White House involvement in the matter. McClellan reiterated the White House position, and pledged cooperation.

"There has been nothing that has been brought to our attention beyond what we've seen in the media reports that suggests that there was White House involvement," McClellan said. "No one was authorized to do this. That is simply not the way this White House operates, and if someone leaked classified information it is a very serious matter and it should be pursued."

The flap began in January when Bush said in his State of the Union address that British intelligence officials had learned that Iraq had tried to purchase yellowcake uranium in Africa.

In an opinion piece published in July by The New York Times, Wilson said he told the CIA long before Bush's address that the British reports were suspect and the administration has since said the assertion should not have been in Bush's speech.

A week after Wilson went public with his criticism Novak, quoting anonymous government sources, said Wilson's wife was a CIA operative working on the issue of weapons of mass destruction.

The Washington Post on Sunday quoted an unidentified senior administration official as saying two top White House officials called at least a half-dozen journalists and revealed the identity and occupation of Wilson's wife. Disclosing the name of an undercover CIA agent could violate federal law.

Wilson told The Associated Press on Sunday that he believes the White House leaked his wife's name "to intimidate others and keep others from stepping forward." Wilson had said in a late August speech in Seattle that he suspected Rove. But on ABC's Good Morning America Monday, he backtracked somewhat from that assertion.

"In one speech I gave out in Seattle not too long ago, I mentioned the name Karl Rove," he said. "I think I was probably carried away by the spirit of the moment. I don't have any knowledge that Karl Rove himself was either the leaker or the authorizer of the leak. But I have great confidence that, at a minimum, he condoned it and certainly did nothing to shut it down."

NEW YORK — Retired four-star general Wesley Clark made his debut as part of the Democratic pack running for president Thursday in a nationally televised debate that kicked off with a challenge to his Republican past and quickly became an intramural scrap.

The nine other veteran candidates largely left Clark untouched as they went after each other, a shift from the past couple of debates when they presented a mostly unified front against President Bush. (Audio: USA TODAY's Jill Lawrence: Clark scores in first debate)

Clark, an investment banker who as a general in the U.S. Army ran the war in Kosovo and plunged into politics nine days ago, was the first candidate to get a question. MSNBC anchor Brian Williams, moderator of the two-hour session at Pace University in Lower Manhattan, asked him about a speech in May 2001 to Arkansas Republicans in which he suggested Bush, his staff and his Cabinet were needed.

"Did you believe it then? Do you believe it now?" Williams asked?

"It's been an incredible journey for me and for this country since early 2001," replied Clark, a veteran TV military commentator. He called Bush's tax and Iraq policies "reckless" and said "there was only one party to come to" when he decided to speak out.

"I am pro-choice, I am pro-affirmative action, I'm pro-environment, pro-health. I believe the United States should engage with allies. ... That's why I'm proud to be a Democrat," Clark said.

"Welcome to the party," said activist Al Sharpton. He then added, in what sounded like a cut at some of his rivals onstage who voted for the Iraq war, "It's better to be a new Democrat that's a real Democrat, than a lot of old Democrats up here that have been acting like Republicans all along."

It was left to Howard Dean to draw the contrast that other candidates have been making elsewhere. "I'm not a new entrant to the Democratic Party," said Dean, the former Vermont governor. "I've been here a long time."

Dean is breaking Democratic fundraising records and leading other candidates in the early Iowa and New Hampshire contests. On Thursday, they unleashed the attacks that were expected but for the most part did not materialize in past debates.

Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry suggested Dean was "pandering" on trade policy. Missouri Rep. Richard Gephardt compared him to Newt Gingrich for supporting a Republican-sponsored $270 billion cut in the growth of the Medicare budget.

Dean, a physician who instituted near-universal health coverage in Vermont, retorted that "I've done more for health insurance, Dick Gephardt, frankly, than you ever have."

And then Dean, who spent the first part of the year attacking his rivals in order to win attention, offered his colleagues a mini-lecture: "We need to remember that the enemy here is George Bush, not each other."

One clash involved how much of the Bush tax cuts to repeal.

Dean and Gephardt support repealing all of them while Kerry, Lieberman, Clark and North Carolina Sen. John Edwards want to keep cuts that benefit the middle class. Gephardt wants to spend all the money on a broad expansion of health care that he says would stimulate jobs; Dean wants to expand coverage more modestly and move toward a balanced budget. "The middle class never got a tax cut for us to defend" because states and localities have had to raise tuition and property taxes, Dean said.

But Kerry said that "we Democrats fought hard to put those tax cuts in place" and that tens of millions of families received $1,000 or more.

Clark largely sat out the crossfire, but was able to summarize his three-point economic plan that he issued Wednesday — Day Eight of his candidacy.

"We need to go back to the top 2% and repeal those tax cuts. We need to put all the government spending programs on the table, including the military programs. We need to then have no new programs unless you can pay as you go. And then we need a simpler, fairer, more progressive tax code," he said.

Clark, who in his first two days on the campaign trail last week gave opposite answers on how he would have voted last fall on the resolution authorizing force in Iraq, also showed he is growing as a politician.

Asked how he would vote on the president's request for $87 billion for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, Clark replied: "If I've learned one thing in my nine days in politics, you better be careful with hypothetical questions, and you've just asked one."

A second federal judge Thursday blocked the federal Do Not Call Registry for consumers to place their phone numbers off-limits to telemarketers, saying the list violates telemarketers' commercial free speech rights.

The ruling threw the list back into limbo less than an hour after Congress overrode a technical legal hurdle to the Federal Trade Commission-run list raised earlier by a judge in Oklahoma.

The latest ruling on First Amendment grounds by U.S. District Judge Edward Nottingham in Denver may be harder to overcome because it will be settled in the courts, not Congress. The list was to take effect Oct. 1, a schedule that now appears unlikely.

"The next step is to ... have an appeal heard as quickly as possible," says attorney Bill Heberer of Hall Dickler Kent Goldstein & Wood. "But whatever kind of fast track they could get, I don't think it will be resolved by Wednesday."

HOW TO SIGN UP

Consumers can register online for the federal telemarketing do-not-call list at donotcall.gov. You must give an e-mail address to which a confirmation will be sent and can enter up to three phone numbers. The e-mail will contain a link that must be clicked on within 72 hours to complete sign-up.

People can register by phone at 888-382-1222. Consumers signing up by phone must call from the number they want to register.






Nottingham said in his ruling: "The Federal Trade Commission has chosen to entangle itself too much in the consumers' decision by manipulating consumer choice and favoring speech by charitable (organizations) over commercial speech."

The registry, on which consumers have listed more than 50 million of their phone numbers since registration opened in June, bans calls to listed numbers from telemarketers, but exempts political or charitable groups.

The Denver judge said the distinction based on call content unconstitutionally trampled on telemarketers.

The industry's American Teleservices Association filed the lawsuit and has a similar action pending against the FCC, which is cooperating on the list.

ATA Executive Director Tim Searcy expressed hope late Thursday that the FTC would abandon the list. "We hope the FTC will recognize the validity of the judge's opinion and work with the industry to craft voluntary policies that will be more appropriate."

But Deborah Thoren-Peden, a partner in law firm Pillsbury Winthrop, which specializes in telemarketing clients, said that the latest ruling is likely to delay the list, not kill it. "It will cloud the do-not-call list for a little bit," she said. "But given the interest in the public in having a list put into effect, it will prevail one way or another."

The Denver decision came as Congress answered Oklahoma U.S. District Judge Lee West's ruling this week that the FTC did not have a specific authority from Congress to run the list. He ruled in a lawsuit by the Direct Marketing Association and four telemarketers.

The House, by 412-8, and the Senate, by 95-0, on Thursday voted to clarify the FTC's authority and sent the bill to the White House, which had indicated its support. West, however, refused an FTC request to immediately lift his ruling.

Contributing: Wire reports

The quake forced the evacuation of 41,000 people and left some 16,000 homes blacked out. Warnings of tsunami, or ocean waves, were briefly issued as far away as Hawaii and Alaska.

The quake, which struck at 4:50 a.m., cracked roads, capsized fishing boats and caved in part of the roof of the airport in Obihiro, a city of 200,000.

The temblor, centered in the Pacific about 60 miles off Hokkaido's eastern shore, was followed by several strong aftershocks and small tsunami, ocean waves.

The government warned residents to avoid coastal areas, but the highest waves recorded were only about four feet.

Hokkaido government official Hideki Domon said 323 people were confirmed injured as of 4 p.m., about 11 hours after the quake. Police said 22 were seriously hurt, mostly with broken bones.

Japan's public broadcaster, NHK, put the injury toll at nearly 400.

Kushiro, 560 miles northeast of Tokyo, was believed to be the hardest hit by the powerful quake.

"The shaking went on and on," said Fumiko Okuse, who owns a liquor store with her husband in Kushiro. "Everything was thrown out of the refrigerators and all over the floor. Juice, beer, everything."

Television footage showed an office where books were knocked off shelves, and desks and computers swayed back and forth as the quake hit. Merchandise fell off store shelves and people sought shelter in schools.

"It shook hard and long and I was very frightened," said Eri Takizawa, a city official in Kushiro. "We have small quakes here from time to time, but this was completely different."

Black plumes of smoke and flames leapt from an oil tank in the city of Tomakomai. The fire was contained within three hours and no injuries were reported.

Police said one person was injured when a local train carrying about 39 passengers derailed.

Though not listed as a quake-caused fatality, a 61-year-old man cleaning up broken beer bottles on a street immediately after the quake was struck by an oncoming car and died, Hokkaido police said.

A 58-year-old man also died aboard his fishing boat while trying to sail it to calm waters, but local officials said his death did not appear to have been caused by the quake.

Most of the injured escaped with minor bruises and cuts caused by glass from shattered windows and objects falling off of shelves.

A 70-year-old woman in this Hokkaido city, just west of Kushiro, broke her leg trying to crawl out a window.

The quake had a magnitude of 8, according to Japan's Central Meteorological Agency. It was followed by an aftershock of magnitude 7.

Japan is one of the world's most earthquake-prone countries. It sits atop four tectonic plates, slabs that move across the earth's surface.

This month, Japan marked the 80th anniversary of a magnitude 8.3 quake that devastated Tokyo and neighboring Yokohama, killing at least 140,000 people.

In January 1995, a magnitude 7.2 temblor in Kobe killed more than 6,000 people.

Hokkaido is the northernmost and most sparsely populated of Japan's major islands. Sapporo, which hosted the 1972 Olympics, is the prefecture's capital.

A quake and tsunami on the western side of Hokkaido killed 230 people in July 1993, most on the nearby isle of Okushiri.

But many said the two-week home leave will also bring heartbreak when it's time for their loved ones to return to duty.

Some of the first to get the vacation from Iraq are expected to arrive in Baltimore Friday morning. They flew Thursday out of the region en route to Germany and the United States, taking leave from deployments that are turning out to be longer and tougher than expected.

"If he got the opportunity I'd tell him definitely to come," said Michelle Jansen, 24, wife of Spec. Scott Jansen of the Army's 101st Airborne Division. "I think definitely the having to say goodbye again would definitely be worth the 15 days. Better than nothing."

Donabelle King of Beatrice, Neb., said Thursday that she had no word when leave might be given to her son — 45-year-old Lt. Col. Gene King, also with the 101st.

"I think they'd probably hate to have to go back," she said. "As long as they're there they might as well stay a little bit and get it over with."

The program was ordered to provide relief and boost morale for forces serving 12-month tours of duty in the hot, dangerous and sometimes primitive conditions in Iraq, as well as those in support roles in neighboring countries. That means it's available to the vast majority of the more than 130,000 troops deployed there, officials said.

Announced Thursday, the program offers 15-day vacations, with some transportation paid, for every soldier, sailor, airman or Marine staying in region for a year, said Marine Maj. Pete Mitchell, a Central Command spokesman.

The first planeload left Kuwait Thursday for Germany, where some forces are normally stationed. An unknown number of the 270 on that flight were to get off there and the rest were to continue to Baltimore.

The government pays for the flights to Germany and Baltimore. Troops continuing on from there to their homes or other places will cover that expense. Eventually the military hopes to also have flights to Atlanta, Dallas-Fort Worth and Los Angeles.

Yearlong rotations were ordered during the summer for most troops as violent resistance to the occupation spiraled and the Bush administration found little success in getting more nations to contribute forces.

The subject of deployment lengths has been sensitive, with some soldiers and their families complaining bitterly about delays in their homecoming, repeated deployments and the extension of tours.

"First of all, rest and recuperation ... is essential just because what they're being asked to do is pretty darn difficult," Mitchell said of the troops. "But it's more than that; we also believe rest and recuperation will improve readiness."

He said the mental and physical break from Iraq will make forces "that much more alert, that much ... more on top of the game."

Bob Muller, president of the Vietnam Veterans of American Foundation, took an opposite view, saying he recalls that there was a disproportionate number of casualties among those back from leave in Vietnam compared to the rest of the troops. He said troops go through a rigorous and intense period preparing for deployment, then take time to adapt to a combat zone.

"To get yanked out of that is such a trip in your own head ... it makes it really hard to come back in," he said. "It was sort of like you broke stride ... you're distracted."

Still, he said, he would never say he was against giving leaves.

"My memory of my R&R experience is very vivid," said Muller, who served in the war in the late 1960s with the Marines. "The night before departure was just raucous, exuberant, everybody was pumped. A week later coming back nobody said a word — and I mean it was absolute stone silence."

WASHINGTON — U.S. search teams have dramatically scaled back their expectations for finding weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. They are now looking for a relatively small volume of chemical munitions that might be buried there, according to three U.S. intelligence officials.

Saddam Hussein's regime had no nuclear weapons and only minimal elements of a program to make them, the search teams have concluded, according to the intelligence officials. All three spoke on the condition they not be named, but all have knowledge of the contents of a draft of chief arms searcher David Kay's report, which could be presented to Congress as soon as next week.

Saddam's suspected biological weapons, if they existed, would have a relatively short shelf life, and most or all could now be useless, these officials said. And Kay's team has found no evidence that Iraq shipped illegal weapons out of the country — to Syria, for example — to avoid detection by U.N. inspectors, as some administration officials suggested earlier this year.

Weapons hunters believe the one remaining possibility is that the regime buried some chemical weapons, which can remain lethal for years, at sites as yet undiscovered. The volume of Iraqi chemical agents unaccounted for at the time of the U.S.-led invasion was small enough to fit in a backyard swimming pool, according to an analysis by Kay's team.

"There is still a huge set of missing chemical weapons that will be found," one of the intelligence officials said. "They do not deteriorate as quickly as the biological weapons." It will take significant effort, the official said. "The guys have a lot of digging to do in hot, remote places to find them."

As time goes by with no discoveries, the Bush administration is under pressure to back up its prewar claims that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and that they represented a threat to the United States.

The administration has not explicitly backed off that charge.

"We believe that there were weapons of mass destruction and a weapons of mass destruction program" in Iraq, White House spokesman Scott McClellan said Thursday. He declined to address Kay's specific findings.

But officials have also begun to emphasize the idea that the invasion of Iraq eliminated a future threat, and that the risk that Saddam had weapons that he could have given to terrorist groups had to be treated seriously in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks.

"Nine-eleven changed my calculation," President Bush said Thursday. "It made it really clear that we have to deal with threats before they come to our shore."

Officials in Kay's 1,400-member Iraq Survey Group have also concluded, based on documents found in Iraq and information provided by captured members of Saddam's regime, that Iraq did destroy some of its chemical and biological weapons stockpile as the regime claimed before the U.S.-led war.

Saddam apparently decided not to disclose the destruction of his chemical and biological weapons because he wanted potential enemies to think he still had them. U.S. intelligence analysts speculate that Saddam concluded that the weapons would do him little good against a modern force such as the U.S. Army, but that doubt about whether he still had them might deter enemies.

One of the intelligence officials, who has seen early drafts of Kay's report, said it makes no mention of discoveries of actual weapons or banned materials but focuses primarily on circumstantial evidence of Iraq's attempts to acquire or develop weapons of mass destruction.

The figures were previewed three weeks ago by a Census survey testing a new methodology. Today's figures are considered more authoritative and comprehensive. They're the ones used by the government in calculating unemployment and setting policies.

Although the economy is showing signs of improvement, poverty rates lag behind economic shifts. Today's report will give Democrats ammunition to attack President Bush's stewardship of the economy.

The official definition of poverty varies by family size and age and can change annually with the cost of living. In 2001, a family of two parents under 65 and two children younger than 18 were considered poor with a household income below $12,207. That year, 32.9 million people were defined as poor.

David Wyss, chief economist at Standard & Poor's, said, "Clearly, with a hiring slump going on, you'd expect poverty to get worse."

The economy was stagnant in 2002 amid layoffs and spending cuts by employers and state governments. More people were unemployed for longer periods, and more saw their jobless benefits run out.

But Robert Rector, who studies poverty at the Heritage Foundation, says the 2002 poverty rate reported today is still likely to be close to a 40-year low. The recession, job losses and slumping income of the past few years have not completely erased the gains of the 1990s boom, he said.

And fresher indicators suggest the economy is staging a comeback: Retail sales are rising, corporate profits are rebounding, investing is picking up, and the stock market has rallied.

But a hiring rebound remains little more than a forecast — and a shaky prospect that has proven elusive for nearly three years. Even if economic growth continues to accelerate, it might be too uncertain and subpar to encourage a quick hiring revival, or to stop the rise in unemployment and poverty.

For the first time in 15 years, the poverty report is being released on a Friday. That has prompted charges by Democrats that the White House hopes to see the bad news buried in little-seen Friday night and Saturday news coverage.

Census officials strongly deny the accusation.

"The news conference was moved from Sept. 23 to Sept. 26 because the professional staff asked for extra time to process this round of data," Census spokesman Lawrence Neal said. "The Sunday public affairs shows will make a meal of the data and spit them back into the news cycle on Monday. ... The notion that we should, could or would suppress these numbers doesn't pass the laugh test."

OPEC decided to remove 900,000 barrels a day or 3.5% from output limits for 10 members, bringing the ceiling to 24.5 million barrels daily effective Nov. 1, ministers said.

"We don't want the market to collapse on our heads," said Rilwanu Lukman, Nigerian Presidential Adviser on Energy. "(Crude oil) stocks are rising and prices were falling and Iraq (oil production) is on its way back so wouldn't you be cautious?" (Related: Iraq rejoins OPEC talks).

The deal could inflate energy bills for oil importing nations like the United States, Japan and Germany this winter.

The price of U.S. light crude futures jumped $1.19 to $28.30 a barrel on the news.

"If oil prices continue to move higher, then interest rates in the G7 (major industrialized nations) may need to be higher than they would otherwise be, which is not good for recovery prospects," said Paul Robson, international economist at Bank One Corp in London.

"I think it is very bullish for oil prices," said Gary Ross of New York consultancy PIRA Energy. "It shows that OPEC cares more about revenue and price than anything else."

Conjecture that OPEC might insist on big non-OPEC rivals like Russia contributing to any supply curbs came to nothing.

Delegates said OPEC kingpin Saudi Arabia preferred for now to stick to its strategy of sacrificing a modest amount of market share to defend the group's central $25 price target.

OPEC ministers had watched world oil prices ease this month to four-month lows, despite a sluggish recovery in post-war Iraqi output.

Walking into Wednesday's meeting, several had said they expected no change in output.

The recent price fall and projections that increasing non-OPEC production would swamp demand growth apparently spurred a late change of minds.

Ministers also were worried about a buildup of oil supplies during the fourth quarter and Iraq's continued recovery.

"We believe that we have about 2.5 million barrels a day of oversupply in the first quarter of 2004, and it's better to start before to prevent a bad situation," said Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Zanganeh.

He said more cuts could come when ministers meet again Dec. 4 in Vienna to set policy for the first quarter 2004.

Forecasts for 2004 from the International Energy Agency, adviser on energy to 26 industrialized nations, are for 1.4 million barrels per day (bpd) of extra non-OPEC supply and only 1.1 million bpd of demand growth on the 79 million bpd world market.

Iraq, attending its first OPEC meeting since U.S. occupation, reassured fellow members that Washington's influence would not prevent it staying in the cartel.

"Iraq will remain in OPEC as a full member," Iraq's new Oil Minister Ibrahim Bahr al-Uloum told a news conference.

He said Baghdad's reintegration into OPEC's quota system would have to wait until Iraqi production, still to reach pre-war volumes, had been restored.

OPEC postponed a discussion on the election of a new secretary-general until its December meeting.

Contributing: The Associated Press

LOS ANGELES — Now that a federal appeals court has nailed down Oct. 7 as voting day, California's recall election enters a frenetic 13-day home stretch that pivots on actor Arnold Schwarzenegger's performance in a televised debate Wednesday night.

On Tuesday, an 11-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals reinstated the Oct. 7 date that a three-judge panel of the same circuit had postponed. The American Civil Liberties Union said it will not appeal the unanimous reversal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Tonight's matchup in Sacramento at 6 p.m. PT pits the Republican political rookie against four rivals to replace Democratic Gov. Gray Davis if he is recalled. Schwarzenegger skipped three debates and says he'll do only this one. If he looks scripted and unprepared to govern, Davis benefits. Many Republicans may vote to keep a weakened Davis if it appears that his successor otherwise would be Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante, the only major Democrat running.

The debate's TV viewership could be large because Californians know for sure that the on-again, off-again election is on.

A three-judge panel had ruled Sept. 15 that an October election would be "constitutionally infirm" because six large counties would use inaccurate punch-card voting machines like those that figured in the Supreme Court's Bush vs. Gore decision in 2000 to stop the Florida presidential recount. The old machines will be phased out for California's March 2 primaries.

The 11 judges overturned that ruling after hearing arguments Monday. They said the public interest in maintaining the California Constitution's fast voting schedule outweighs the "speculative" violation of racial minorities' rights if the punch-card machines fail to count their ballots.

Debate viewers tonight could see Schwarzenegger go head-to-head with state Sen. Tom McClintock, a conservative Republican. McClintock trails in polls but has refused to drop out for party unity. His departure would virtually assure that Schwarzenegger would beat Bustamante.

Leading Republicans, including Rep. Darrell Issa, who helped finance the recall drive, turned up pressure on McClintock to quit. But a bravura debate showing by Schwarzenegger could encourage conservatives to abandon McClintock.

"We need to be making decisions about alerting reservists over the next four to six weeks," he said. "I would think that by around the end of October or the beginning of November we should be alerting those forces that may need to be called up to relieve or be prepared to relieve (troops there now) if we don't have specificity by then on a third" multinational division.

He said the Guard and Reserve troops should be notified about four months before they would need to ship out because they require some training time.

Separately, a defense official said the Pentagon's personnel chief, David Chu, has approved a new policy that will allow U.S. troops — both active duty and reserve — who are in Iraq on 12-month assignments to take 15 days of vacation at some point during their tour. Details are to be worked out by Central Command, the organization that runs military operations in Iraq, the official said. The official disclosed the Chu decision on condition of anonymity.

When it announced a troop rotation plan in July, the Pentagon assumed that it would have available a third multinational division of 10,000 to 15,000 troops to replace the Army's 101st Airborne Division early next year.

Britain is leading one multinational division and Poland is leading another. Among nations mentioned as possibilities for a third division are Turkey, Pakistan, India and South Korea, but none has agreed to do so.

Pace said U.S. Central Command, which is running the military operation in Iraq, may determine that it can find enough active-duty troops to fill any gap next year. But he indicated that mobilizing more National Guard and Reserve troops was an option under active consideration.

"The entire population of the active force of the Marine Corps and the reserve force of the Marine Corps, and the Army and the National Guard and Reserves will be looked at" for possible duty, Pace said in an interview with a group of reporters at a Washington hotel.

Some in the military are concerned that reservists are being asked to shoulder too much of the burden.

Loren Thompson, a defense analyst at the Lexington Institute in Arlington, Va., said Wednesday that few reservists were likely to have realized when they signed up that they would be used so heavily.

"It has to have an impact — a negative one — on retention," he said. "People's lives are being obliterated" by lengthy and sometimes frequent mobilizations for duty overseas.

In testimony Wednesday before the Senate Appropriations Committee, however, Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs, said the Army has retained more than the usual number of National Guard and Reserve troops recently, although it faces "challenges" in recruiting more to join.

Of the 302 U.S. troops who have died in Iraq since the war began, at least 47 were National Guard or Reserve, according to an unofficial count. Twenty-one of the 47 were hostile deaths; 26 were non-hostile.

There are now about 130,000 U.S. troops in Iraq, including several thousand Guard and Reserve forces. Current plans call for mobilizing two National Guard brigades for duty in Iraq this fall. The Pentagon had hoped that it would need to activate no National Guard units beyond that, but Pace said more could be alerted within weeks for possible deployment.

"What is not clear now ... is whether or not what we thought two months ago about the security environment (in Iraq) is still a valid projection, and then whether the coalition countries will or will not come up with a third division," he said.

"There are many countries out there talking about it, and we have every hope that that will happen," he said, "but hope is not a plan."

But a top Democrat questioned whether the American people have ever blessed the U.S.-led Iraqi reconstruction effort now under way.

"Is $87 billion a great deal of money?" Rumsfeld said before the Senate Appropriations Committee. "Yes. But can our country afford it? The answer is also yes. Because it is necessary for the security of our nation and the stability of the world."

Rumsfeld cited progress in reopening Iraqi schools and hospitals and training a new Iraqi army.

Rumsfeld and Gen. Richard Myers, the Joint Chiefs chairman, and Gen. John Abizaid, the head of U.S. Central Command, were appearing before the committee as the Bush administration continued its intensive push for approval of the $87 billion request.

At the same time, the U.S. civil administrator in Iraq, L. Paul Bremer, was making his third Capitol Hill appearance in three days, appearing before the Foreign Relations Committee. He was also going before the House Appropriations Committee on Wednesday afternoon and meeting with two other panels on Thursday.

Vice President Dick Cheney also met in a closed-door session with House Republican members. Lawmakers, said Republican Whip Roy Blunt of Missouri, gave Cheney a warm reception but also gave "notice to the vice president that we intend in the appropriations process to ask some tough questions."

Rep. Chris Cox, R-Calif., head of the Republican Policy Committee, said Cheney made clear that no U.S. money will be used to repay Saddam Hussein's debts to other countries.

Bremer and Rumsfeld's appearances at hearings come at a time when partisan fighting has increased over Iraq.

In a bristling exchange, Sen. Robert Byrd, D-W.Va., challenged Rumsfeld on the $20.3 billion part of Bush's plan that would go toward rebuilding Iraq and establishing a democratic government.

"Secretary Rumsfeld, where is the mandate from the American people to carry out the reconstruction of Iraq?" Byrd said. "When did the American people give their assent?"

Rumsfeld cited the resolution Congress approved allowing force against Iraq and defended rebuilding as being in U.S. interests.

"Once having gone in, the last thing we need to do is turn over that country to another dictator like Saddam Hussein," he said.

Bremer was appearing before a panel whose leaders had been urging the administration since before the war to lay out its strategy for rebuilding Iraq. Both Chairman Richard Lugar, R-Ind., and Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., have criticized the administration for failing to acknowledge the long-term costs and commitments involved.

Biden said Bush's foreign policy "so poisoned the well" before the war by failing to build a broad international coalition, that next month's international donors conference is unlikely to generate more than $2 billion or $3 billion in support.

"It's a terrible indictment, in my view, of our foreign policy and a harsh example of the price of unilateralism," he said.

Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., said her constituents are telling her it was "a brilliant military campaign, but this administration was wrong about weapons of mass destruction, wrong about what would happen after the war, wrong on what it would cost to rebuild Iraq, wrong on how many troops would be needed, wrong on oil revenues, wrong on how much other countries would contribute."

Republicans also voiced some discomfort. Sen. George Voinovich of Ohio questioned prospects for international contributions, so "that this isn't just going to be Uncle Sugar's full responsibility."

Several Republicans expressed concern about whether the Iraqi constitution would protect religious freedoms and other civil liberties. Sen. Sam Brownback of Kansas urged Bremer to insist that those rights be included. "They are foundational. And I don't hear that coming from you," he said.

Bremer said he would make the point "but the Iraqis are writing this constitution, not me."

The contentious mood in Congress is a striking change from last year. Bush was soaring in opinion polls then, and, with midterm elections approaching, Democrats were wary about being seen as undermining him on national security issues so soon after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.

But many Democrats acknowledge that the $87 billion request likely will be approved. They say they can't deny the money that the Pentagon says is needed for U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Receiving a renewed German offer to help train Iraqi police and security forces, Bush said, "I appreciate his efforts to help Iraq grow to be a peaceful and stable and democratic country."

Still, there was no indication Germany would contribute peacekeeping troops, as it has to Afghanistan, or that Schroeder would retract his support for France's call for a quick end to the U.S. occupation of Iraq.

And Schroeder said he did not feel "under time pressure" from a proposed U.S. resolution in the U.N. Security Council designed to draw in troops and financial support for reconstruction.

He described his conversation with Bush as "very open-minded" and "trustful."

Bush faced an uphill task in his drive for an unhurried transition to rule by Iraqis as the difficult reconstruction of postwar Iraq reopened the divide between the United States and the United Nations despite the president's softer rhetorical tone here.

Except for a handshake at an economic conference last spring, it was the first formal meeting between Bush and Schroeder in more than a year.

Bush said he had told Schroeder that "we have had differences and they are over, and we're going to work together."

Schroeder, sounding the same theme, told reporters Germany "would like to come in and help with the resources that we do have."

A German diplomat, meanwhile, said Bush had expressed understanding that Germany could not provide troops. The diplomat, who was at the meeting, said the issue of financial contributions was not discussed.

France, Germany and many other nations remained opposed to continued U.S. occupation after Bush's mild defense Tuesday of an unhurried transition to democracy in Iraq.

President Jacques Chirac of France insisted on a "realistic timetable" for returning sovereignty to the Iraqi people. While Chirac promised not to veto a stalled U.S. resolution designed to attract more peacekeeping troops, he also insisted steps begin immediately to end the U.S. military occupation.

"In an open world," Chirac said, "no one can live in isolation, no one can act alone in the name of all, and no one can accept the anarchy of a society without rules."

As Chirac stood against unilateral U.S. action in his speech to the U.N. General Assembly, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan criticized Bush's "pre-emptive" attack on Iraq.

Such strikes "could set precedents that result in a proliferation of the unilateral and lawless use of force, with or without credible justification," Annan said.

Bush suggested softly "Let us move forward."

A year ago, Bush, in a stern speech, tried to build a case against Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein. Ultimately, he drew only some support from the Security Council and went to war without direct authority.

Britain, Australia and several other nations stood with the United States. But Bush said Tuesday "some of the sovereign nations of this assembly disagree with our actions."

To try to accommodate them, Bush offered the United Nations a larger role in Iraq's reconstruction. But he did not budge from his plan for step-by-step transformation of Iraq to democracy.

"This process must unfold according to the needs of Iraqis — neither hurried nor delayed by the wishes of other parties," he said.

Bush's remarks did not overcome the gap between the United States and skeptical leaders, and a senior administration official made clear afterward that the United States intends to remain in charge of reconstruction as it insists on being in charge of the peacekeeping operation.

"There is an important role for the U.N. to play," the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. But, the official said, the Coalition Provisional Authority headed by American L. Paul Bremer "has to get the job done" and whatever resolution the Security Council may adopt must reflect "what really are the facts on the ground."

The official said Bush has touched off a debate about whether the United Nations is capable of dealing with the threats of the 21st century. "If you cannot reform the U.N., if the Security Council cannot act, then you leave no choice but for people to protect themselves," the official said.

Work on the U.S. resolution has stopped, at least until Bush concludes his meetings with foreign leaders on Wednesday. Among them are Schroeder and Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf. On Tuesday he talked with Chirac and a supporter of the Iraq war, Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar of Spain.

Bush will raise with Musharraf concerns expressed to the president on Tuesday by Afghan President Hamid Karzai that Taliban forces were being trained in Pakistan and then crossing the border into Afghanistan, a U.S. official said.

Resurgent Taliban forces, chased from Afghanistan two years ago in a U.S.-led war, are getting protection from Islamic hardline politicians and rogue elements of Pakistani security, Afghan and Western officials charge.

The debate over the role of the United Nations in Iraq reverberated from the U.N. and private meetings in New York to Capitol Hill and the presidential campaign.

In Washington, Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle said he thought Bush "lost an opportunity."

"He came before the international community and he could have made the case for more troops, more resources," the South Dakota Democrat said. "He didn't do that."

Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., a member of the Foreign Relations and Intelligence committees, said he was encouraged by Bush's private meetings with world leaders. "If our alliances were damaged by the Iraq war, let the liberation of Iraq be the reason for repairing and strengthening those alliances," Hagel said.

WASHINGTON — A federal judge in Oklahoma has ruled that the Federal Trade Commission overstepped its authority in creating a national do-not-call list against telemarketers.

The ruling came in a lawsuit brought by telemarketers who challenged the list, comprised of names of people who do not want to receive business solicitation calls. The immediate impact of Tuesday's ruling was not clear.

U.S. District Judge Lee West sided in favor of the plaintiffs, U.S. Security, Chartered Benefit Services Inc., Global Contact Services Inc., InfoCision Management Corp. and Direct Marketing Association Inc.

The telemarketing industry estimates that the do-not-call list could cut its business in half, costing it up to $50 billion in sales each year.

The FTC had signed up about 50 million phone numbers for the list, which was due to take effect on Oct. 1.

The Direct Marketing Association sued to block the list shortly after Congress approved it in January, saying it would violate free-speech laws and discriminate against an industry that provides millions of jobs.

"The Direct Marketing Association and its fellow plaintiffs are grateful that the federal District Court in Oklahoma City understood and upheld the industry's belief that the Federal Trade Commission does not have authority to implement and enforce a national do-not-call list," the trade group said in a press release.

An FTC official declined to comment until the agency had a chance to examine the ruling.

"We're received it, and we're reviewing it," FTC spokeswoman Cathy MacFarlane said.

Lawmakers were quick to criticize the court's decision, arguing that they had given the FTC the authority to implement the list.

"We are confident this ruling will be overturned and the nearly 50 million Americans who have signed up for the do-not-call list will remain free from unwanted telemarketing calls in the privacy of their own homes," Reps. Billy Tauzin and John Dingell said in a statement.

The three-judge panel said the election, previously scheduled for Oct. 7, should wait until six counties still using punch card ballots can upgrade to more reliable voting machines.

The judges chosen for the new panel are more conservative than the three who made the original ruling, and some legal scholars said it was likely the earlier ruling would be overturned. Depending on the outcome, the case could be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court. For an Oct. 7 election, Monday was the voter registration deadline.

Davis, buoyed by new poll results that show a slight drop in recall proponents, planned more campaign stops this week with high-profile Democrats, just days after he stumped with former President Bill Clinton and the Rev. Jesse Jackson.

Actor and Republican candidate Arnold Schwarzenegger outlined several proposals to cut air pollution in California by 50% by 2011. He promised to create a network of hydrogen fueling stations throughout the state to promote increased use of hydrogen-powered vehicles and said he would prevent coastal oil drilling and seek to reduce energy consumption by 20% within two years.

Schwarzenegger responded to environmentalists' digs at the gas-guzzling Hummers he drives, saying he would have one overhauled to run on less-polluting hydrogen.

He also criticized Davis' environmental record.

"Gray Davis has just started talking about the environment the last few days," Schwarzenegger said. But he backtracked when reminded of recent legislation signed by the governor, saying, "I'm not aware of all those bills that he has signed the last year."

Gabriel Sanchez, a spokesman for Davis' campaign, scoffed at Schwarzenegger's claim. "Gov. Davis has been active in protecting the environment throughout his entire 30-year career and to say otherwise is misleading and flat-out false," Sanchez said.

Appearing in Los Angeles on Monday with Washington Gov. Gary Locke, Davis said their states and Oregon would work together to obtain fuel-efficient vehicles, reduce diesel fuel emissions and improve monitoring of greenhouse gas emissions.

"Obviously, an initiative from Washington, D.C., along the lines of what we are doing today would be welcome, but in its absence the states have to act," he said.

Davis entered the week with new poll numbers showing he is gaining momentum.

A statewide poll by the Public Policy Institute of California released Sunday showed 53% of likely voters want to oust Davis, down from 58% last month. Forty-two percent said they would vote to keep him in office.

It mirrored two other statewide polls earlier this month which showed that, while a majority of voters wanted to recall Davis, the margin has tightened.

The same poll found 28% support for Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante, the only major Democrat among 135 candidates vying to replace Davis if he is recalled, and 26% for Schwarzenegger. It showed 14% backing Republican state Sen. Tom McClintock.

The poll of 1,033 likely voters conducted between Sept. 9-17 had a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

The findings fueled new speculation about whether McClintock will get out of the race in order not to split the Republican vote and hand the election to Bustamante. McClintock has said he does not plan to quit.

Jack Pitney, professor of government at Claremont-McKenna College, said a scheduled debate Wednesday night will give Schwarzenegger his best chance to win over conservative voters, who are the core of McClintock's support.

"The debate is an opportunity for Schwarzenegger to close the sale with a lot of Republicans and conservatives, or an opportunity for other candidates to stop him cold," Pitney said.

Davis, who will not participate in the debate, planned to campaign this week with Sen. Joe Lieberman, a Democratic presidential candidate. Lieberman will also campaign with Bustamante, who is his California campaign chairman.

"We are going to stay focused on the strategy that gotten us through this entire surreal process," said Davis campaign spokesman Peter Ragone.

Most of the lesser-known candidates, about 90 of them, planned to make their own grab at the national spotlight Monday by all sitting in the audience of The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.

Over time, bin Laden scrapped various parts of the Sept. 11 plan, including attacks on both coasts and hijacking or bombing some planes in East Asia, Mohammed is quoted as saying in reports that shed new light on the origins and evolution of the plot of Sept. 11, 2001.

Addressing one of the questions raised by congressional investigators in their Sept. 11 review, Mohammed said he never heard of a Saudi man named Omar al-Bayoumi who provided some rent money and assistance to two hijackers when they arrived in California.

Congressional investigators have suggested Bayoumi could have aided the hijackers or been a Saudi intelligence agent, charges the Saudi government vehemently deny. The FBI has also cast doubt on the congressional theory after extensive investigation and several interviews with al-Bayoumi.

In fact, Mohammed claims he did not arrange for anyone on U.S. soil to assist hijackers Khalid al-Mihdhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi when they arrived in California. Mohammed said there "were no al-Qaeda operatives or facilitators in the United States to help al-Mihdhar or al-Hazmi settle in the United States," one of the reports state.

Al-Mihdhar and al-Hazmi were on the plane that was flown into the Pentagon.

Mohammed portrays those two hijackers as central to the plot, and even more important than Mohammed Atta, initially identified by Americans as the likely hijacking ringleader. Mohammed said he communicated with al-Hazmi and al-Mihdhar while they were in the United States by using Internet chat software, the reports states.

Mohammed said al-Hazmi and al-Mihdhar were among the four original operatives bin Laden assigned to him for the plot, a significant revelation because those were the only two hijackers whom U.S. authorities were frantically seeking for terrorist ties in the final days before Sept. 11.

U.S. authorities continue to investigate the many statements that Mohammed has made in interrogations, seeking to eliminate deliberate misinformation. But they have been able to corroborate with other captives and evidence much of his account of the Sept. 11 planning.

Mohammed told his interrogators the hijacking teams were originally made up of members from different countries where al-Qaeda had recruited, but that in the final stages bin Laden chose instead to use a large group of young Saudi men to populate the hijacking teams.

As the plot came closer to fruition, Mohammed learned "there was a large group of Saudi operatives that would be available to participate as the muscle in the plot to hijack planes in the United States," one report says Mohammed told his captors.

Saudi Arabia was bin Laden's home, though it revoked his citizenship in the 1990s, and he reviled its alliance with the United States during the Gulf War and beyond. Saudis have suggested for months that bin Laden has been trying to drive a wedge between the United States and their kingdom, hoping to fracture the alliance.

U.S. intelligence has suggested that Saudis were chosen, instead, because there were large numbers willing to follow bin Laden and they could more easily get into the United States because of the countries' friendly relations.

Mohammed's interrogation report states he told Americans some of the original operatives assigned to the plot did not make it because they had trouble getting into the United States.

Mohammed was captured in a March 1 raid by Pakistani forces and CIA operatives in Rawalpindi. He is being interrogated by the CIA at an undisclosed location.

He told interrogators about other terror plots that were in various stages of planning or had been temporarily disrupted when he was captured, including one planned for Singapore.

The sources who allowed AP to review the reports insisted that specific details not be divulged about those operations because U.S. intelligence continues to investigate some of the methods and search for some of the operatives.

The interrogation reports make dramatically clear that Mohammed and al-Qaeda were still actively looking to strike U.S., Western and Israeli targets across the world as of this year.

Mohammed told his interrogators he had worked in 1994 and 1995 in the Philippines with Ramzi Yousef, Abdul Hakim Murad and Wali Khan Amin Shah on the foiled Bojinka plot to blow up 12 Western airliners simultaneously in Asia.

After Yousef and Murad were captured, foiling the plot in its final stages, Mohammed began to devise a new plot that focused on hijackings on U.S. soil.

In 1996, he went to meet bin Laden to persuade the al-Qaeda leader "to give him money and operatives so he could hijack 10 planes in the United States and fly them into targets," one of the interrogation reports state.

Mohammed told interrogators his initial thought was to pick five targets on each coast, but bin Laden was not convinced such a plan was practical, the reports stated.

Mohammed said bin Laden offered him four operatives to begin with — al-Mihdhar and al-Hazmi as well as two Yemenis, Walid Muhammed bin Attash and Abu Bara al-Yemeni.

"All four operatives only knew that they had volunteered for a martyrdom operation involving planes," one report stated.

Mohammed said the first major change to the plans occurred in 1999 when the two Yemeni operatives could not get U.S. visas. Bin Laden then offered him additional operatives, including a member of his personal security detail. The original two Yemenis were instructed to focus on hijacking planes in East Asia.

Mohammed said through the various iterations of the plot, he considered using a scaled-down version of the Bojinka plan that would have bombed commercial airliners, and that he even "contemplated attempting to down the planes using shoes bombs," one report said.

The plot, he said, eventually evolved into hijacking a small number of planes in the United States and East Asia and either having them explode or crash into targets simultaneously, the reports stated.

By 1999, the four original operatives picked for the plot traveled to Afghanistan to train at one of bin Laden's camps. The focus, Mohammed said, was on specialized commando training, not piloting jets.

Mohammed's interrogations have revealed the planning and training of operatives was extraordinarily meticulous, including how to blend into American society, read telephone yellow pages, and research airline schedules.

A key event in the plot, Mohammed told his interrogators, was a meeting in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in January 2000, that included al-Mihdhar, al-Hazmi and other al-Qaeda operatives. The CIA learned of the meeting beforehand and had it monitored by Malaysian security, but it did not realize the significance of the two eventual hijackers until just before the attacks.

The interrogation reports state bin Laden further trimmed Mohammed's plans in spring 2000 when he canceled the idea for hijackings in East Asia, thus narrowing it to the United States. Bin Laden thought "it would be too difficult to synchronize" attacks in the United States and Asia, one interrogation report quotes Mohammed as saying.

Mohammed said around that time he reached out to an al-Qaeda linked group in southeast Asia known as Jemaah Islamiyah. He began "recruiting JI operatives for inclusion in the hijacking plot as part of his second wave of hijacking attacks to occur after Sept. 11," one summary said.

Jemaah Islamiyah's operations chief, Riduan Isamuddin Hambali, had attended part of the January 2000 meeting in Kuala Lumpur but Mohammed said he was there at that time only because "as a rule had had to be informed" of events in his region. Later, Hambali's operative began training possible recruits for the second wave, according to the interrogation report.

One of those who received training in Malaysia before coming to the United States was Zacarias Moussaoui, the Frenchman accused of conspiring with the Sept. 11 attacks. Moussaoui has denied being part of the Sept. 11 plot, and U.S. and foreign intelligence officials have said he could have been set for hijacking a plane in a later wave of attacks.

As the U.N. General Assembly on Monday reviewed progress since its 2001 special session, the report outlined shortfalls on numerous fronts including expanding access to drugs, caring for AIDS orphans, preventing discrimination and transmission of the disease from mothers to their children.

"We are not on track to begin reducing the scale and impact of the epidemic by 2005," Secretary-General Kofi Annan said in a speech to open the U.N. session.

Without more money and more political will, it is unlikely the goals of having 3 million HIV-positive people in the developing world taking AIDS drugs by 2005 and halting and reversing the epidemic by 2015 will be met, experts said.

There are only 300,000 people in the developing world with access to medication, although between 5 million and 6 million individuals need the drugs, the report said. Brazil, which has a widely heralded AIDS program, accounts for more than one-third of the patients in the developing countries who are receiving treatment. In sub-Saharan Africa, only an estimated 50,000 people receive medication when 4.1 million require them.

Experts say there has been no slowdown in the progression of the disease, which affects 40 million people, about 29 million of them in Africa. If the response to the pandemic doesn't improve, UNAIDS estimates there will be 45 million new infections by 2010. China, India and Russia are among the countries were AIDS is rising rapidly.

There are few indications that the financial commitment is increasing enough to fight the epidemic. UNAIDS estimated there is a $1.6 billion gap this year between projected spending and what AIDS programs need.

"We are getting further and further behind because the demands for prevention and especially treatment for the disease is increasing faster than our resources," said Paul De Lay, director of monitoring and evaluation at UNAIDS, which wrote the Progress Report on the Global Response to the HIV/Epidemic.

The report was written using information submitted by 103 of the 189 countries that signed the Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS that was adopted at the 2001 session.

The report renewed activists' accusations that the United States is failing to do its part to fight the pandemic. Although the Bush administration has promised $15 billion over five years to combat AIDS abroad, Congress has only earmarked $2 billion of the $3 billion available for 2004.

Moreover, Bush has only requested $200 million for the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. The fund, established after the 2001 AIDS meeting, is a major source of money for treatment and prevention programs. It has $4.6 billion in pledges through 2008, but only 23% of its needs through 2004 are met by those funds.

"For the U.S. to be sitting with a fiscal 2004 appropriation for the fund of $200 million absolutely makes no sense," said Jeffrey Sachs, an adviser to U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan.

White House spokeswoman Suzy De Francis said new federal laws prevent the United States from giving more than one-third of the fund's money, and currently U.S. contributions account for 40% of its assets. She said the U.S. can't give the $200 million unless the rest of the world increases its share.

De Francis added the U.S. will only spend $2 billion instead of $3 billion on AIDS next year because the Bush administration wants to make sure there are policies and infrastructure available in the developing world to use the money wisely.

Overall funding for HIV/AIDS has increased. This year, spending on HIV/AIDS programs in the developing world will reach US$4.7 billion — a 20% increase over 2002. Increases have come from both international donors and the affected countries themselves.

"Yet we are still only half way to the $10 billion a year that is needed by 2005," Annan said.

De Lay said there were some glimmers of hope in the report. The declaration required all countries to develop a national AIDS strategy by 2003. Ninety-three% say they have accomplished that goal. Countries were also supposed to have a strategy to provide care for HIV-affected individuals by 2003, and 76% of countries had such policies in place.

The 2001 declaration resolved that by 2005 at least 80% of pregnant women should have access to information, counseling and treatment to prevent HIV transmission to their children. The report said, that except for Botswana, less than 1% of pregnant women in heavily affected countries have access to such services.

HIV and AIDS has left more than 14 million children under the age of 15 without at least one parent. The declaration said that by 2003 countries should have developed and by 2005 implemented policies to support the orphans. Yet, 39% of countries with epidemics have no national policy to support for these children.

Patterson's death is likely to reignite the debate surrounding RU-486, the pill approved by the Food and Drug Administration two years ago as a way for women to end pregnancies themselves.

Her father is hoping the tragedy will encourage other women considering abortion to seek support, especially from their families.

"Every time I think about it, I think, 'She suffered in silence,'" said Monty Patterson, who said he did not know his daughter was pregnant or taking abortion drugs. "She felt she would disappoint everyone around her, and then she had to carry that whole load. I wish she could have told me so I could have helped her."

Holly Patterson, who lived in the San Francisco suburb of Livermore, visited a Planned Parenthood clinic Sept. 10 to take the pill. She followed the prescribed procedure for using RU-486, taking two more pills at home three days later.

After experiencing bleeding and cramps so severe that she was unable to walk, her boyfriend rushed her to the hospital the following evening, where she was given painkillers and sent home. Three nights later, she was back in the hospital. She died the following day.

An autopsy has been scheduled to determine the cause of Holly's death. But Monty Patterson said he learned from an attending physician at the hospital that she had died after a massive infection caused by fragments of the fetus left inside her uterus caused her to go into septic shock. Planned Parenthood also said it is investigating Patterson's death.

A spokeswoman for Danco Laboratories, which makes RU-486, estimated that 200,000 women in the United States and more than 1 million worldwide have used the pill since it was invented in France in the 1980s.

Two women who took it in the United States have died, although the FDA says it is unclear if their deaths were directly related to the pill's use.

Patients who take RU-486 take the first pill under the care of a physician. A second medication called misoprostol, taken three days later, induces labor so the embryo can be expelled. In 5 to 8% of cases, surgery is required to stop the patient's bleeding.

Planned Parenthood's Web site compares the process to having a miscarriage. Five to eight% of cases require surgery, either to stop a patient's bleeding or to complete the abortion.

Eric Schaff, chair of the National Abortion Federation, which promotes non-surgical abortion, said aspirin causes more deaths than RU-486.

But anti-abortion groups such as the National Right to Life Committee insist that the pills "offer a whole new set of significant risks," and makes abortion seem too simple. A report on the group's Web site says the pill gives "supporters of abortion a chance to change the image of abortion, making it seem as simple as taking a pill."

Although he said he did not blame the pill for his daughter's death, Monty Patterson regretted that she and her boyfriend hadn't received more information and support from family members, counselors and physicians.

"What's disturbing is these young couples, they are relying upon what they think is good, solid info, and relying on what they think is a supportive network telling them everything is OK," he said. "I would have said, 'You know what, they don't know everything. Let's get more information.'"

"A woman can fix the mess they have created, because we are practical, we are not afraid of partnerships and we are committed to making the world better for our children."

Braun stunned the political establishment in 1992 — the "Year of the Woman" — unseating an incumbent Democratic senator in the primary, two-term lawmaker Alan Dixon, on her way to what was once considered an improbable victory in November.

Her election was heralded as an advance for women and minorities, but her popularity fell amid accusations that she exercised poor judgment in visiting Nigeria's brutal former dictator Sani Abacha and misused campaign funds.

A campaign finance investigation cleared Braun, but she lost her seat to well-funded Republican challenger Peter Fitzgerald in 1998. After the defeat, President Clinton appointed her ambassador to New Zealand.

Braun used her announcement speech to present her vision for the future — "an American renaissance" — and criticize President Bush's record on national security and the economy. Unlike the official campaign announcements by some of her nine rivals, Braun took questions from a handful of Howard University students and reporters following her speech. She fielded broad questions about poverty and children, and more specific queries about the command and control of U.S. troops in Iraq.

A fierce opponent of the U.S.-led war against Iraq, Braun said the United States will work to ensure a peaceful Iraq. "Americans don't cut and run, we have to see this misadventure through," she said.

Monday's kickoff schedule started with speeches at two historically black colleges — Howard and Benedict College in Columbia, S.C. Braun's final appearance was scheduled in her home town of Chicago, where she got her start in politics 25 years ago with election to the Illinois Legislature.

During months of campaigning, Braun has struggled to build a fund-raising network. She has pleaded for financial support, especially when speaking to women's groups, but raised less than $250,000 in the first half of the year.

Last month, she picked up her first two major endorsements from the National Organization for Women and the National Women's Political Caucus. Leaders of both groups said they would help raise money for her among their members, and their support gave Braun encouragement to continue her bid beyond the exploratory phase.

Braun ranks near the bottom in most surveys, but some polls show her with more support than some of her better-financed rivals. She ranks higher in some polls of black voters.

She has avoided much of the intra-party fighting of her rivals who confront each other in an effort to rise to the top of the field. Her criticism has been focused on President Bush's policies at home and abroad.

"America is at a tipping point — if we stay the course we are on now, we won't recognize this country five years from now," she said in Monday's speech. "But if we shift gears, try another way, tap some of the talent that has been relegated to the sidelines of leadership, we can heal and renew and save our country."

The blast occurred at the entrance to a parking lot next to the U.N. compound at the Canal Hotel, scene of a devastating car bombing last month that killed about 20 people, including the U.N.'s top envoy.

The powerful blast was heard throughout the city and hurled the hood of the car some 200 yards. The arm of one victim lay more than 100 yards away.

"It was as if I was being pushed and thrown three meters from where I was standing," said a passer-by, Wissam Majid, who was slightly injured. "I saw fire and smoke. I started running away and then I lost consciousness."

A U.N. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the bomber wore an explosives belt and also had a 50-pound bomb in the car.

Secretary-General Kofi Annan warned that if the situation continued to deteriorate, U.N. operations in Iraq "will be handicapped considerably."

"I am shocked and distressed by this latest attack on our premises in Baghdad, Annan said at the United Nations.

"We are assessing the situation to determine what happened, who did it, and taking further measures to protect our installations," he said.

The bombing occurred when a gray 1995 Opel with Baghdad license plates approached the parking lot, said Master Sgt. Hassan al-Saadi, among the first on the scene.

"A guard went to search the car, opened the trunk and the car exploded, killing him and the driver. When I arrived, there was fire and smoke, even the guard's body was ablaze," he said.

Capt. Sean Kirley of the U.S. 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment said the Iraqi police had a warning of the attack shortly before it happened. He would not elaborate.

Kirley said the attack showed security around the compound was working, since the bomber did not enter the complex. He said he didn't know whether any U.S. troops were nearby at the time, but none was wounded.

Authorities identified the slain policeman as 23-year-old Salam Mohammed. Nineteen people were injured and six people were unaccounted for, said another U.N. official who spoke on condition of anonymity.

United Nations staff have continued to work in undamaged offices at the hotel complex since the Aug. 19 bombing.

Monday's blast took place one day before President Bush is to address the U.N. General Assembly. He is expected to offer an expanded role in rebuilding Iraq, a condition set by many nations for contributing peacekeepers and money to the reconstruction effort.

Annan has made clear he wants assurances of security for U.N. personnel in Baghdad along with any expanded role.

The United Nations curtailed its efforts in Iraq after the Aug. 19 bombing. At that time, U.N. spokesman Fred Eckhard said there were about 300 international staff in Baghdad and more than 300 elsewhere in Iraq. These numbers are thought to have now been dramatically reduced.

Antonia Paradela, U.N. World Food Program spokeswoman, said Monday's bombing "worries us that the security situation is getting worse and that there are more incidents ... in the country and that our work might be hindered because of that."

The bomb exploded two days after an assassination attempt against Aquila al-Hashimi, one of three women on the Iraqi Governing Council and a leading candidate to become Iraq's U.N. ambassador if the interim government wins approval to take the country's U.N. seat.

She was reported to be improving Monday. The Governing Council president, Ahmad Chalabi, blamed remnants of the regime of Saddam Hussein, whose government was toppled by U.S.-led forces in April.

Since Bush declared an end to major combat operations on May 1, more than 160 American soldiers have been killed. More than 300 U.S. soldiers have died in Iraq since the U.S.-led coalition launched military operations March 20.

The ongoing violence has raised questions about American stewardship of the country and has led to calls for an expanded role in Iraq for the United Nations.

On Sunday, Bush said he's not sure the United States will have to yield a significantly larger role to the United Nations to make way for a new resolution on Iraq. He continued to insist on an orderly transfer of authority to the Iraqis rather than the quick action demanded by France.

In an interview with Fox News, Bush said he will declare in his U.N. speech Tuesday that he "made the right decision and the others that joined us made the right decision" to invade Iraq.

But the president said he will ask other nations to do more to help stabilize Iraq.

"We would like a larger role for member states of the United Nations to participate in Iraq," Bush said in the interview to be aired Monday night. "I mean, after all, we've got member states now, Great Britain and Poland, leading multinational divisions to help make the country more secure."

Asked if he was willing for the United Nations to play a larger role in the political developments in Iraq to get a new resolution, Bush responded, "I'm not so sure we have to, for starters."

But he said he did think it would be helpful to get U.N. help in writing a constitution for Iraq.

"I mean, they're good at that," he said. "Or, perhaps when an election starts, they'll oversee the election. That would be deemed a larger role."

The president of Pakistan, meanwhile, told The New York Times that his country needed more military and intelligence help from Washington to fight terrorism and more political support from the Islamic world before it can send troops to Iraq.

Gen. Pervez Musharraf said in an interview published Monday that the idea of contributing forces to a multinational contingent is extremely unpopular among Pakistanis.

The briefing at the Virginia State Police Academy was conducted by Mike Brown, director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and Tom Ridge, director of the Department of Homeland Security.

Isabel ravaged nine states and the District of Columbia on Thursday, leaving more than a million people without power and at least 35 dead.

Ridge said his agency, which has been charged with protecting the nation against terrorism, has worked with state officials to coordinate the relief effort to "restore the hope and vitality to communities affected."

Ridge told Bush: "Mother Nature threw some terror at you."

Bush said he would honor Gov. Mark Warner's request to expand the state's emergency declarations to 43 additional jurisdictions in Virginia. Bush said he would also consider such requests from other states.

FEMA officials in Washington showed the president in a conferencing video and presented a brief slide presentation of pictures showing Isabel five days before rainfall and how it tracked across the Southeast.

Bush thanked the FEMA employees for working around the clock to guide emergency relief efforts.

Afterward, the president spoke with several governors who gave him updates on power outages and other problems that remain in the aftermath of the hurricane.

South Carolina Gov. Michael Easley said 42 of 100 counties are in a state of emergency in his state and 90,000 residents remain without power, down from 700,000 after the storm hit.

"The main thing we need — the MREs (military Meals Ready to Eat) are very important," Easley said to the president on the phone. "The MREs, the ice, if you could keep those coming."

CHARLESTON, WV., Sept. 22, 2003 -- The Department of Health and Human Resources reporting today that West Virginians are more likely to die from chronic lower respiratory diseases than residents of any other states. West Virginia’s death rate of 63.2 deaths per 100,000 residents was highest in the nation in 2000. Reports show that smoking is the most important health risk factor in about 80 percent of all the cases.

CHARLESTON, WV., Sept. 22, 2003 -- Each year for the past five, West Virginians are less likely to pay back their college loans than their peers nationwide. Federal statistics released last week show only Alaska, Arkansas, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Puerto Rico have worse student loan default rates than West Virginia. Those who attend private, non-profit colleges are the most likely to pay back loans, while those who attend two year profit colleges are the least likely to repay loans.

UNITED NATIONS, Sept. 22, 2003 — When President Bush speaks to the U.N. General Assembly on Tuesday, he will find a much more divided and resentful audience than when he came to New York just over a year ago and surprised the world body with a rousing call to action against Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.

U.N. officials and diplomats, as well as high-ranking administration officials, say the bitter prewar battle on the Security Council over the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq has left wounds that threaten to undermine the U.N.'s ability to deal with world crises.

The U.N.'s image has suffered as well. A USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll last month found 60% of Americans believe it is doing a "poor job," the highest number since Gallup began asking the question in 1953.

The concern about U.N. divisions is so acute here that many diplomats see Bush's speech, as well as his attempt to win passage of a new Iraq resolution, as a pivotal moment in U.S. foreign policy. The resolution would bring much-needed foreign reinforcements for U.S. troops in Iraq but, in exchange, would give the U.N. a larger role in the rebuilding effort.

Addressing the U.N. General Assembly is usually just a fall ritual for U.S. presidents. But Bush faces a delicate piece of diplomacy: U.N. delegates want to hear some version of a U.S. mea culpa for invading Iraq without U.N. backing. But Iraq hawks within the administration — and key segments of Bush's GOP base — would have difficulty stomaching an explicit apology to the U.N., an organization many conservatives love to ridicule.

The stakes are high, and the fate of the resolution could hang in the balance. Bush aides say that he's well aware of how important it is for him to please this particular audience and that he plans to take a conciliatory tone that acknowledges past divisions — though he'll also insist that the U.N. meet its responsibilities in Iraq.

"He ought to reach out and say, 'This is an international problem,' " former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said Sunday on NBC's Meet The Press. "And not, ... 'We don't really need you, but if you want to come along with us, OK.' "

Diplomats say Bush will find an audience looking for a reason to applaud; some nations that broke with the United States before the war — chiefly Germany and Russia — want to repair relations with Washington, U.N. officials say.

HOW U.N. HAS HANDLED IRAQ

2002

Sept. 12: President Bush speaks at the United Nations and calls for action to disarm Saddam Hussein.

Nov. 8: By a 15-0 vote, the Security Council passes a resolution returning U.N. weapons inspectors to Iraq.

Nov. 27: U.N. inspectors return to Iraq.

2003

Feb. 23: United States and Britain introduce a second resolution claiming Iraq "failed to take the final opportunity" to disarm that was offered by the November resolution.

Feb. 24: Germany, France and Russia put out a counterproposal calling for a step-by-step program of Iraqi disarmament with no definite end point.

March 5: Foreign ministers from Germany, France and Russia release a statement saying they will not allow passage of a resolution authorizing war.

March 14: French President Jacques Chirac says France will not support any resolution that gives Iraq an ultimatum.

March 17: Britain and the United States pull the second resolution without a vote.

March 19: The war on Iraq begins with U.S. airstrikes on Baghdad targets.

April 9: Baghdad falls.

May 22: Security Council passes a resolution recognizing US and Britain as the occupying powers in Iraq and giving them access to Iraqi oil revenue previously overseen by the UN The vote: 14-0, with Syria boycotting.

Aug. 14: Security Council passes a resolution setting up a permanent UN mission in Iraq and welcoming the creation of a 25-member Iraqi Governing Council. The vote: 14-0, with Syria abstaining.

Aug. 19: A car bomb explodes at U.N. headquarters in Baghdad, killing 23, including the chief U.N. envoy, Sergio Vieira de Mello.

Sept. 3: United States puts forward a new draft resolution calling for the creation of a multinational force in Iraq and giving the UN a larger role in Iraq's political development.

Sept. 23: Bush to address U.N.

Sources: United Nations, USA TODAY research






But many of those countries also believe that events have proved them right, particularly about whether Iraq really possessed the weapons of mass destruction that Bush said were an imminent threat to world security. Before they make peace, they want U.S. officials to acknowledge that the decision to attack Iraq without explicit U.N. backing was a mistake.

Bush won't admit error

Aides say that Bush won't flatly say he was wrong and that his speech will closely mirror last year's address, in which he warned that the world body must take action on key problems or risk becoming a "debating society."

Other countries, caught between a desire to humiliate Washington for its perceived arrogance before the war and the realization that a broken Iraq must be fixed, will look instead for diplomatic nuance or compromises in the new Iraq resolution as evidence Bush will show the U.N. new respect.

"I don't think anybody's in the mood to have the U.S. taught an international civics lesson by withholding support. ... It's in nobody's interest to have a further deterioration in Iraq," says Mark Malloch Brown, the British administrator of the U.N. Development Program. "But on the other hand, I think many members feel that their warnings before the war were quite prophetic. They expect to be asked properly."

What U.S. officials want is a resolution that would bring much-needed foreign reinforcements in Iraq at the expense of giving the council a new level of responsibility for crafting a timetable for returning Iraq to Iraqi control — a policy the White House adamantly opposed for months.

U.S. diplomats believe that a solid majority of the council supports the current draft, but they are likely to continue modifying the proposal in search of unanimity.

A number of countries, led by France, Germany and Russia, want a quicker turnover of sovereignty to an Iraqi government. France and Germany have called for a return to Iraqi rule within months, while the U.S. officials see the timeline stretching into next year.

French President Jacques Chirac and German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder reiterated their views at a summit in Berlin Saturday with British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

The most serious problem Washington faces is France. Although Paris is believed to have made a decision not to veto the resolution, U.S.-French tensions remain at a slow boil.

Many U.S. officials can barely hide their disdain for French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin, whose showy rhetoric and aristocratic demeanor exemplify Gallic haughtiness to some American diplomats.

Bad feelings toward de Villepin in Washington spiked on Jan. 21, when he took over a long-planned U.N. meeting on terrorism and turned it into a bash-the-U.S. session on Iraq.

Though the council has reached postwar agreement on issues such as sending U.N.-approved forces to Liberia and Congo, the slightest conflict seems to reveal continuing bad blood between Washington and Paris. This month, when France suddenly held up passage of a British resolution lifting sanctions on Libya for its role in the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988, U.S. and British diplomats exploded.

U.S. and British negotiators had gotten Libya to agree to pay as much as $10 million to the families of each of the victims of the bombing. Embarrassed that they had extracted only about $200,000 per family for the victims of the Libyan bombing of a French airliner, French diplomats were using U.N. leverage to reopen talks with the Libyans. Privately, furious British and U.S. diplomats accused France of blackmail. The issue was resolved, but the bad taste lingered.

The Texas cowboy

U.S. critics at the U.N. say the current bad feelings, though sharpened by the Iraq debate, began when many governments were angered by Bush's go-it-alone policies during his first months in office that earned him a reputation as a foreign policy cowboy:

• He pulled out of the Kyoto Protocol, an international anti-global-warming treaty.

• He pulled out of the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty with Russia.

• He removed the U.S. signature from the treaty creating the International Criminal Court.

The international resentment over those policies all but evaporated on Sept. 11, 2001, however. Bush's response to the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington created a new era of good feeling for the United States abroad.

It was against that backdrop that Bush came to the U.N. on Sept. 12, 2002, and urged the council to force Saddam to give up his alleged weapons of mass destruction. Bush won broad support at the U.N. and went on to win a 15-0 vote at the council in November for a resolution that returned U.N. weapons inspectors to Iraq.

But U.S. officials and U.N. diplomats say that when disagreement began to grow in January about the next step Bush favored — using force to remove Saddam from power — charges of U.S. imperiousness once again began to surge.

"The U.S. approach was to ask for our support, but while asking, point out that they didn't really need it, planned to attack Iraq anyway and basically thought that the United Nations was a worthless institution," says a diplomat from a country that opposed the war, who asked not to be named. "Not surprisingly, that didn't produce an outpouring of affection."

U.S. officials paint a different picture, one in which France, in an effort to establish itself as a counterweight to the United States, refused to consider any compromise. "The council would have acted if it hadn't been for France and one or two others," said a U.S. official who requested anonymity.

The resulting ruckus has damaged both the institution of the U.N. and its image in the United States. Edward Luck, director of the Center on International Organization at Columbia University, says the blowup was "the first really public split in the Western alliance on the council since the Cold War. ... There's a lasting wound."

Keeping the peace

Almost as soon as the drive for a resolution backing the war ended in a diplomatic train wreck on March 17, a cleanup effort began.

War opponents began a charm offensive to avoid being frozen out by Washington. U.S. officials praise Russia's behind-the-scenes efforts to find a compromise on the new resolution. Germany also has launched a repair operation that appears to have worked.

Malloch Brown, however, says concern remains about the U.S.-French relationship. "If you spend a quarter-century in this business, you come to conclude that personal pique, vanity and bad temper can trigger things careening off in particular directions," says Malloch Brown, an advisor to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan. "My suspicion is that there's still an awful lot of ill will between Paris and Washington."

Annan, aides say, shares that suspicion. He has spoken about possible structural changes to the Security Council — possibly making it larger — to avoid future impasses and has begun a review of the Iraq debate.

Perhaps most important, Annan, who was accused by some in the Bush administration of trying to thwart a U.S. strike on Iraq, has put himself at the center of the drive for a new resolution. He summoned foreign ministers from the council's five permanent member nations to Geneva on Sept. 13 to try to find a common position. And he has badgered all 15 council members to stop criticizing one another in the press and go to work to find a new arrangement.

As Bush prepares for Tuesday's speech, the fate of the new resolution is unclear. Much depends, diplomats and U.N. experts say, on the tone and tactics Bush adopts.

In terms of U.S.-U.N. relations, "whether we stagger along or whether we repair the damage of last year is going to depend on the administration's attitude and whether it wants to see if in fact there's a way forward," says former Clinton State Department official Lee Feinstein.

GUANTANAMO BAY, Cuba, Sept. 22, 2003 — Staff Sgt. William Angelo recalled no clue that day, no warning that the detainee — a prisoner in the war on terrorism — planned to hang himself with a bed sheet.

Such incidents have become common in the last 14 months here at the U.S. military's Camp Delta, a high-security prison housing alleged al-Qaeda and Taliban operatives captured in Afghanistan in late 2001 and elsewhere during the war on terrorism. (Related audio/photos: Camp Delta guards describe their mission)

"Right or wrong, innocent or guilty," says Angelo, 26, a military police officer from Fort Wayne, Ind., "I think two years in a cell would make you frustrated."

During the past 14 months, there have been 32 suicide attempts by 21 detainees. Only one detainee has been seriously injured. In January, that detainee — who also tried to hang himself — lapsed into a coma for 21/2 months. But he is recovering; he is walking, talking and receiving physical therapy.

Interviews this month with Angelo and other military police officers (MPs) revealed that the suicide attempts are emblematic of the stressful conditions that U.S. soldiers and the 660 detainees deal with daily inside Camp Delta, the centerpiece of one of the Bush administration's most controversial policies in the war on terrorism.

A key part of the military's strategy here is fostering uncertainty about the fate of the camp's detainees at home, abroad and especially "inside the wire," as the MPs call it.

Camp Delta

At Camp Delta, which opened in April 2002 and now houses about 660 detainees from the war on terrorism, each cell has:

• A floor-style toilet, consistent with Middle Eastern culture.
• A sink that is low to the ground to allow feet washing before Muslim prayers.
• An arrow stenciled into cot frames, pointing way to Mecca.

Key facts about Camp Delta:

• The military plays the Muslim call to prayer five times a day over loudspeakers. The detainees receive mats to use for prayers. In Camp 4, the medium-security facility within Camp Delta that houses cooperative detainees, the captives receive authentic prayer mats.

• Most detainees wear orange uniforms. In Camp 4, they wear white uniforms, the color signifying purity in Muslim culture.

• Cells at Camp Delta are cooled by large fans. Camp Iguana, which houses three juvenile detainees, is air-conditioned.

• The detainees are from 42 countries and speak a total of 17 languages.

• A mental-health unit opened in March to provide care for an estimated 5% of the detainees who suffer from acute mental problems, including post-traumatic stress and schizophrenia.

• There is only one patient at the detention hospital: a detainee who, after trying to kill himself in January, lapsed into a coma. He is making a surprising recovery and now is walking, talking and receiving physical therapy. There also are 12 amputees in the camp, men who lost limbs in the war in Afghanistan.

Source: Defense Department






The U.S. government refuses to say when the detainees might be released, and it will not elaborate on its justification for continuing to hold men who have been locked up so long that whatever information they have about terrorist plots likely has grown stale.

The detainees frequently ask when they can go home. The MPs say they cannot reply because they do not know. Interrogators want it that way. They haven't told the soldiers because they want to keep the detainees off-balance.

But the answer is all around them here at the U.S. Naval Base: No one is going anywhere any time soon. The military's 2,200-member Joint Task Force, which is in charge of detaining and questioning the captives, is digging in, building and renovating housing for hundreds of soldiers.

For the MPs, the nearly yearlong tour of duty is intense. They spend hours pacing cellblocks of 48 detainees, passing each one every 30 seconds or so to try to ensure that no one hurts himself or a soldier.

The young MPs find themselves under a microscope, watched by the world as they carry out a mission that they say is "to treat the detainees humanely and fairly."

For the detainees, the ambiguity of their situations has led to excessive yelling, complaints of abdominal pain and occasional refusals to shower. They spend their days inside metal mesh cells that are 8 feet deep, 7 feet wide and 8 feet tall.

Throughout the day — and night — they are interrogated by U.S. officials who are piecing together information about potential threats to Americans at home or overseas.

Bush administration officials say the detainees are "enemy combatants," not "prisoners of war."

By labeling them enemy combatants, U.S. officials say the detainees are not entitled to legal rights and can be held as long as the war on terrorism lasts — or, indefinitely. And by keeping the detainees outside the continental USA, the officials are trying to block legal challenges in U.S. civilian courts to their detentions. So far, the courts agree.

Critics say the administration's position is antithetical to American principles of fairness and the Third Geneva Convention's mandate that impartial tribunals review the status of prisoners of war.

In a filing at the U.S. Supreme Court, lawyers for two British and two Australian citizens say Camp Delta is "a law-free zone," where men are held "without charges, without recourse to any legal process and with no opportunity to establish their innocence."

Military officials at Camp Delta say they realize that some detainees were forced to fight in Afghanistan by the Taliban. They say they have separated "conscripted" detainees from hard-core Muslim jihadists.

Human-rights activists argue those men should be released. But only 68 detainees have been released, 64 of whom were transferred for continued custody in their home countries. The other four were freed.

In November 2001, President Bush authorized the use of military tribunals, or commissions as the Defense Department calls them, for trials of suspected terrorists. The tribunals are controversial because defendants will receive fewer rights than in civilian courts.

It is unclear how many of the 660 detainees will face trial by a tribunal. In July, Bush declared six detainees as eligible for such trials. But no one has been charged.

The Pentagon also has resisted saying where trials will be held, even though the base is preparing to host tribunals.

This month, workers applied a primer coat of paint to a World War II-era structure that everyone here calls "the Commissions Building." It is on a hill above the bay and has a new courtroom with cherry wood and red carpet.

The rise of Camp Delta

When the first detainees arrived here in January 2002, the images on television of Camp X-Ray, a temporary facility that held 300 captives, were jarring.

Human-rights activists protested the sight of U.S. soldiers placing shackled, blindfolded captives in the cage-like camp. The military quickly built Camp Delta, a permanent structure with cellblocks that can hold up to 1,000 detainees.

The Army-led task force is now focusing on improving housing for the soldiers needed to run Camp Delta. There is so much construction that the sounds of heavy equipment drown out conversations. And tractor-trailers with wide loads of supplies jockey for position on the base's roads.

Military officials say their purpose here is to develop intelligence and detain terrorist operatives who could threaten the USA.

Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, commander of the detention operation, concedes that detainees who have been in custody for 18 months or more are unlikely to provide leads on imminent threats. But, he says, the detainees' information remains valuable. He says they provide "operational and strategic intelligence," dealing with "how they were recruited, how they were organized, where the money is and other elements."

Miller says interrogators — who operate out of trailers at Camp Delta — also run names of terrorists by detainees to help U.S. law enforcement agencies try to figure out alliances among terrorism groups.

"We developed five times as much intelligence last month as we did in January," says Miller, who estimates that 80% of the detainees are cooperating.

Brig. Gen. James Payne, deputy commander of the detention operation, says cooperation increased dramatically this year when a detainee reward system was put in place. The opening in April of a medium-security unit also helped ease tensions in the camp, he says. The 100 most cooperative detainees live in "Camp 4" in a communal setting, where they read, eat and pray together.

The reward system involves the giving and taking away of personal items, such as board games, canvas sneakers and less-restricted reading materials. No matter how badly detainees behave, they never lose access to food, water, clothes or the Koran.

Payne says a mental health unit's opening in March also helped. But, as recently as Aug. 22, a detainee attempted suicide.

Three juveniles are held here, kept apart from adults in cinder-block building called Camp Iguana, which overlooks the sea. When they arrived, they could not read or write in their own languages. Now, they can. The boys spend about eight hours a day on schoolwork. In a large yard, they can play soccer or look at the ocean.

Miller has recommended that the juveniles be sent home but kept in custody.

Inside the wire

Spc. Jim Henderson, 29, of Fort Wayne, Ind., says the motto is "expect the unexpected" inside Camp Delta's fence, which is topped with concertina wire.

Henderson and other MPs say the detainees can be calm one minute, but can turn on the soldiers the next by calling them "donkeys," throwing water on them or cursing at them in English.

"You have to learn to put a lot of emotions, especially with 9/11, behind you," Angelo says.

No detainee has tried to escape. Nor has any MP been removed for health or behavior reasons.

To cope with the stress, the MPs take one another out for beers or a meal after work, says Staff Sgt. Molly Jaffe, 25, of Indianapolis.

Military brass also recognize the stress and are making improvements at the base, adding cybercafes, TV rooms and gyms.

The MPs are told not to learn personal information about the detainees. But they say the detainees talk, and they cannot help but learn about the men they guard.

Henderson says many detainees would be a danger to U.S. troops and citizens if they were released.

"These are guys who have killed U.S. soldiers," he says. "These are guys who have killed innocent Muslims in different Arab nations."

The MPs say they believe many detainees trained in al-Qaeda's camps in Afghanistan. They say detainees discuss the pros and cons of the AK-47s that they like versus the M-16s that U.S. soldiers carry.

At first, Jaffe says, the detainees would not look at her. Radical Islamists believe women should be subservient to men. But, she says, the detainees realize that "this is the way it is."

Some detainees claim they are teachers or farmers who were taken into custody by accident, the MPs say. One detainee says his ex-wife sold information on his whereabouts to U.S. soldiers so they could capture him.

But the MPs believe the U.S. government is doing the right thing here. "You may not know for sure what part you played for 15 years or 20 years from now," Angelo says. "But we have to believe that being here is making a difference."

Mohammed also divulged that, in its final stages, the hijacking plan called for as many as 22 terrorists and four planes in a first wave, followed by a second wave of suicide hijackings that were to be aided possibly by al-Qaeda allies in southeast Asia, according to the reports.

Over time, bin Laden scrapped various parts of the Sept. 11 plan, including attacks on both coasts and hijacking or bombing some planes in East Asia, Mohammed is quoted as saying in reports that shed new light on the origins and evolution of the plot of Sept. 11, 2001.

Addressing one of the questions raised by congressional investigators in their Sept. 11 review, Mohammed said he never heard of a Saudi man named Omar al-Bayoumi who provided some rent money and assistance to two hijackers when they arrived in California.

Congressional investigators have suggested Bayoumi could have aided the hijackers or been a Saudi intelligence agent, charges the Saudi government vehemently deny. The FBI has also cast doubt on the congressional theory after extensive investigation and several interviews with al-Bayoumi.

In fact, Mohammed claims he did not arrange for anyone on U.S. soil to assist hijackers Khalid al-Mihdhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi when they arrived in California. Mohammed said there "were no al-Qaeda operatives or facilitators in the United States to help al-Mihdhar or al-Hazmi settle in the United States," one of the reports state.

Al-Mihdhar and al-Hazmi were on the plane that was flown into the Pentagon.

Mohammed portrays those two hijackers as central to the plot, and even more important than Mohammed Atta, initially identified by Americans as the likely hijacking ringleader. Mohammed said he communicated with al-Hazmi and al-Mihdhar while they were in the United States by using Internet chat software, the reports states.

Mohammed said al-Hazmi and al-Mihdhar were among the four original operatives bin Laden assigned to him for the plot, a significant revelation because those were the only two hijackers whom U.S. authorities were frantically seeking for terrorist ties in the final days before Sept. 11.

U.S. authorities continue to investigate the many statements that Mohammed has made in interrogations, seeking to eliminate deliberate misinformation. But they have been able to corroborate with other captives and evidence much of his account of the Sept. 11 planning.

Mohammed told his interrogators the hijacking teams were originally made up of members from different countries where al-Qaeda had recruited, but that in the final stages bin Laden chose instead to use a large group of young Saudi men to populate the hijacking teams.

As the plot came closer to fruition, Mohammed learned "there was a large group of Saudi operatives that would be available to participate as the muscle in the plot to hijack planes in the United States," one report says Mohammed told his captors.

Saudi Arabia was bin Laden's home, though it revoked his citizenship in the 1990s, and he reviled its alliance with the United States during the Gulf War and beyond. Saudis have suggested for months that bin Laden has been trying to drive a wedge between the United States and their kingdom, hoping to fracture the alliance.

U.S. intelligence has suggested that Saudis were chosen, instead, because there were large numbers willing to follow bin Laden and they could more easily get into the United States because of the countries' friendly relations.

Mohammed's interrogation report states he told Americans some of the original operatives assigned to the plot did not make it because they had trouble getting into the United States.

Mohammed was captured in a March 1 raid by Pakistani forces and CIA operatives in Rawalpindi. He is being interrogated by the CIA at an undisclosed location.

He told interrogators about other terror plots that were in various stages of planning or had been temporarily disrupted when he was captured, including one planned for Singapore.

The sources who allowed AP to review the reports insisted that specific details not be divulged about those operations because U.S. intelligence continues to investigate some of the methods and search for some of the operatives.

The interrogation reports make dramatically clear that Mohammed and al-Qaeda were still actively looking to strike U.S., Western and Israeli targets across the world as of this year.

Mohammed told his interrogators he had worked in 1994 and 1995 in the Philippines with Ramzi Yousef, Abdul Hakim Murad and Wali Khan Amin Shah on the foiled Bojinka plot to blow up 12 Western airliners simultaneously in Asia.

After Yousef and Murad were captured, foiling the plot in its final stages, Mohammed began to devise a new plot that focused on hijackings on U.S. soil.

In 1996, he went to meet bin Laden to persuade the al-Qaeda leader "to give him money and operatives so he could hijack 10 planes in the United States and fly them into targets," one of the interrogation reports state.

Mohammed told interrogators his initial thought was to pick five targets on each coast, but bin Laden was not convinced such a plan was practical, the reports stated.

Mohammed said bin Laden offered him four operatives to begin with — al-Mihdhar and al-Hazmi as well as two Yemenis, Walid Muhammed bin Attash and Abu Bara al-Yemeni.

"All four operatives only knew that they had volunteered for a martyrdom operation involving planes," one report stated.

Mohammed said the first major change to the plans occurred in 1999 when the two Yemeni operatives could not get U.S. visas. Bin Laden then offered him additional operatives, including a member of his personal security detail. The original two Yemenis were instructed to focus on hijacking planes in East Asia.

Mohammed said through the various iterations of the plot, he considered using a scaled-down version of the Bojinka plan that would have bombed commercial airliners, and that he even "contemplated attempting to down the planes using shoes bombs," one report said.

The plot, he said, eventually evolved into hijacking a small number of planes in the United States and East Asia and either having them explode or crash into targets simultaneously, the reports stated.

By 1999, the four original operatives picked for the plot traveled to Afghanistan to train at one of bin Laden's camps. The focus, Mohammed said, was on specialized commando training, not piloting jets.

Mohammed's interrogations have revealed the planning and training of operatives was extraordinarily meticulous, including how to blend into American society, read telephone yellow pages, and research airline schedules.

A key event in the plot, Mohammed told his interrogators, was a meeting in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in January 2000, that included al-Mihdhar, al-Hazmi and other al-Qaeda operatives. The CIA learned of the meeting beforehand and had it monitored by Malaysian security, but it did not realize the significance of the two eventual hijackers until just before the attacks.

The interrogation reports state bin Laden further trimmed Mohammed's plans in spring 2000 when he canceled the idea for hijackings in East Asia, thus narrowing it to the United States. Bin Laden thought "it would be too difficult to synchronize" attacks in the United States and Asia, one interrogation report quotes Mohammed as saying.

Mohammed said around that time he reached out to an al-Qaeda linked group in southeast Asia known as Jemaah Islamiyah. He began "recruiting JI operatives for inclusion in the hijacking plot as part of his second wave of hijacking attacks to occur after Sept. 11," one summary said.

Jemaah Islamiyah's operations chief, Riduan Isamuddin Hambali, had attended part of the January 2000 meeting in Kuala Lumpur but Mohammed said he was there at that time only because "as a rule had had to be informed" of events in his region. Later, Hambali's operative began training possible recruits for the second wave, according to the interrogation report.

One of those who received training in Malaysia before coming to the United States was Zacarias Moussaoui, the Frenchman accused of conspiring with the Sept. 11 attacks. Moussaoui has denied being part of the Sept. 11 plot, and U.S. and foreign intelligence officials have said he could have been set for hijacking a plane in a later wave of attacks.

Over time, bin Laden scrapped various parts of the Sept. 11 plan, including attacks on both coasts and hijacking or bombing some planes in East Asia, Mohammed is quoted as saying in reports that shed new light on the origins and evolution of the plot of Sept. 11, 2001.

Addressing one of the questions raised by congressional investigators in their Sept. 11 review, Mohammed said he never heard of a Saudi man named Omar al-Bayoumi who provided some rent money and assistance to two hijackers when they arrived in California.

Congressional investigators have suggested Bayoumi could have aided the hijackers or been a Saudi intelligence agent, charges the Saudi government vehemently deny. The FBI has also cast doubt on the congressional theory after extensive investigation and several interviews with al-Bayoumi.

In fact, Mohammed claims he did not arrange for anyone on U.S. soil to assist hijackers Khalid al-Mihdhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi when they arrived in California. Mohammed said there "were no al-Qaeda operatives or facilitators in the United States to help al-Mihdhar or al-Hazmi settle in the United States," one of the reports state.

Al-Mihdhar and al-Hazmi were on the plane that was flown into the Pentagon.

Mohammed portrays those two hijackers as central to the plot, and even more important than Mohammed Atta, initially identified by Americans as the likely hijacking ringleader. Mohammed said he communicated with al-Hazmi and al-Mihdhar while they were in the United States by using Internet chat software, the reports states.

Mohammed said al-Hazmi and al-Mihdhar were among the four original operatives bin Laden assigned to him for the plot, a significant revelation because those were the only two hijackers whom U.S. authorities were frantically seeking for terrorist ties in the final days before Sept. 11.

U.S. authorities continue to investigate the many statements that Mohammed has made in interrogations, seeking to eliminate deliberate misinformation. But they have been able to corroborate with other captives and evidence much of his account of the Sept. 11 planning.

Mohammed told his interrogators the hijacking teams were originally made up of members from different countries where al-Qaeda had recruited, but that in the final stages bin Laden chose instead to use a large group of young Saudi men to populate the hijacking teams.

As the plot came closer to fruition, Mohammed learned "there was a large group of Saudi operatives that would be available to participate as the muscle in the plot to hijack planes in the United States," one report says Mohammed told his captors.

Saudi Arabia was bin Laden's home, though it revoked his citizenship in the 1990s, and he reviled its alliance with the United States during the Gulf War and beyond. Saudis have suggested for months that bin Laden has been trying to drive a wedge between the United States and their kingdom, hoping to fracture the alliance.

U.S. intelligence has suggested that Saudis were chosen, instead, because there were large numbers willing to follow bin Laden and they could more easily get into the United States because of the countries' friendly relations.

Mohammed's interrogation report states he told Americans some of the original operatives assigned to the plot did not make it because they had trouble getting into the United States.

Mohammed was captured in a March 1 raid by Pakistani forces and CIA operatives in Rawalpindi. He is being interrogated by the CIA at an undisclosed location.

He told interrogators about other terror plots that were in various stages of planning or had been temporarily disrupted when he was captured, including one planned for Singapore.

The sources who allowed AP to review the reports insisted that specific details not be divulged about those operations because U.S. intelligence continues to investigate some of the methods and search for some of the operatives.

The interrogation reports make dramatically clear that Mohammed and al-Qaeda were still actively looking to strike U.S., Western and Israeli targets across the world as of this year.

Mohammed told his interrogators he had worked in 1994 and 1995 in the Philippines with Ramzi Yousef, Abdul Hakim Murad and Wali Khan Amin Shah on the foiled Bojinka plot to blow up 12 Western airliners simultaneously in Asia.

After Yousef and Murad were captured, foiling the plot in its final stages, Mohammed began to devise a new plot that focused on hijackings on U.S. soil.

In 1996, he went to meet bin Laden to persuade the al-Qaeda leader "to give him money and operatives so he could hijack 10 planes in the United States and fly them into targets," one of the interrogation reports state.

Mohammed told interrogators his initial thought was to pick five targets on each coast, but bin Laden was not convinced such a plan was practical, the reports stated.

Mohammed said bin Laden offered him four operatives to begin with — al-Mihdhar and al-Hazmi as well as two Yemenis, Walid Muhammed bin Attash and Abu Bara al-Yemeni.

"All four operatives only knew that they had volunteered for a martyrdom operation involving planes," one report stated.

Mohammed said the first major change to the plans occurred in 1999 when the two Yemeni operatives could not get U.S. visas. Bin Laden then offered him additional operatives, including a member of his personal security detail. The original two Yemenis were instructed to focus on hijacking planes in East Asia.

Mohammed said through the various iterations of the plot, he considered using a scaled-down version of the Bojinka plan that would have bombed commercial airliners, and that he even "contemplated attempting to down the planes using shoes bombs," one report said.

The plot, he said, eventually evolved into hijacking a small number of planes in the United States and East Asia and either having them explode or crash into targets simultaneously, the reports stated.

By 1999, the four original operatives picked for the plot traveled to Afghanistan to train at one of bin Laden's camps. The focus, Mohammed said, was on specialized commando training, not piloting jets.

Mohammed's interrogations have revealed the planning and training of operatives was extraordinarily meticulous, including how to blend into American society, read telephone yellow pages, and research airline schedules.

A key event in the plot, Mohammed told his interrogators, was a meeting in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in January 2000, that included al-Mihdhar, al-Hazmi and other al-Qaeda operatives. The CIA learned of the meeting beforehand and had it monitored by Malaysian security, but it did not realize the significance of the two eventual hijackers until just before the attacks.

The interrogation reports state bin Laden further trimmed Mohammed's plans in spring 2000 when he canceled the idea for hijackings in East Asia, thus narrowing it to the United States. Bin Laden thought "it would be too difficult to synchronize" attacks in the United States and Asia, one interrogation report quotes Mohammed as saying.

Mohammed said around that time he reached out to an al-Qaeda linked group in southeast Asia known as Jemaah Islamiyah. He began "recruiting JI operatives for inclusion in the hijacking plot as part of his second wave of hijacking attacks to occur after Sept. 11," one summary said.

Jemaah Islamiyah's operations chief, Riduan Isamuddin Hambali, had attended part of the January 2000 meeting in Kuala Lumpur but Mohammed said he was there at that time only because "as a rule had had to be informed" of events in his region. Later, Hambali's operative began training possible recruits for the second wave, according to the interrogation report.

One of those who received training in Malaysia before coming to the United States was Zacarias Moussaoui, the Frenchman accused of conspiring with the Sept. 11 attacks. Moussaoui has denied being part of the Sept. 11 plot, and U.S. and foreign intelligence officials have said he could have been set for hijacking a plane in a later wave of attacks.

BRUSSELS. Sept. 22, 2003 — The North Atlantic Treaty Organization is expected to announce early this week that Dutch Foreign Minister Jaap de Hoop Scheffer will be the new leader of the military alliance, according to a European diplomat familiar with the discussions.

As of Friday, 18 of NATO's member countries, including the United States, had given Scheffer the thumbs-up.

Only Canada was holding out, continuing to support its own candidate for secretary-general, Canadian Finance Minister John Manley. NATO decisions must be unanimous.

Barring any last-minute horse-trading, Scheffer would replace George Robertson, the former British defense secretary, who plans to step down in December. A NATO spokesman declined to comment.

The change in command comes at a critical time for the U.S.-European military organization, which is playing a growing role in the Middle East and South Asia. Scheffer, a relatively unknown career diplomat, would oversee the expansion both of NATO's mission and its size. The defense alliance plans to add seven Eastern European countries in May.

Last week, NATO said it was exploring ways to expand its mission in Afghanistan. The alliance sent 5,500 troops to Kabul in August to ensure protection for the interim government headed by President Hamid Karzai. It is NATO's first operation outside Europe in its 54-year history and could be a test case for a future role in Iraq.

The United States has almost 10,000 soldiers around Kabul, the capital. But security has been deteriorating significantly in recent months as supporters of the former Taliban regime regroup along Afghanistan's border with Pakistan. Last week, U.S. and Afghan government soldiers killed about 11 Taliban fighters in the southern provinces of Kandahar and Zabul, both Taliban strongholds.

Robertson, the outgoing NATO commander, said recently that it was important to choose a successor soon to ensure a smooth transition as NATO evolves and redefines its mission.

Robertson could be a hard act to follow. He was instrumental in healing the breach among some of the 19 NATO countries over the Iraq war.

Some members — notably France and Germany — opposed the U.S.-led war and initially resisted sending forces to protect member-country Turkey. The United States had insisted that Turkey needed assistance because it could be a target for retaliation from Iraq.

Potential candidates to replace Robertson from Portugal and Italy bowed out early because it was clear they would not get enough support. Two weeks ago, Norwegian Defense Minister Kristin Devold also took her name out of contention. That left Canada's Manley and the Netherlands' Scheffer.

The United States would not approve Manley, a late entrant to the race, because of Canada's opposition to the war in Iraq. Also, Canada is not a member of the European Union. The secretary-general of NATO traditionally has been from a European country, since most member nations are in Europe.

The Netherlands is a solid EU member and supported the United States in the war in Iraq.

If chosen, Scheffer's biggest challenge will be ensuring that member countries, excluding the United States, increase their spending on military technology to meet new threats, especially terrorism.

WASHINGTON, Sept. 22, 2003 — Congress and the travel industry are strongly criticizing the first phase of a plan to track visitors to the USA and raising doubts about whether the program can begin as scheduled Jan. 1.
Border agents are supposed to photograph and fingerprint all foreign visitors traveling with visas through U.S. airports and seaports. The information would be compared with lists of known and suspected terrorists and other lawbreakers.

Officials would also keep track of whether the visitors left the USA when they said they would.

The ambitious plan was ordered by Congress after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks when officials learned that two hijackers had violated the terms of their visas.

Initially, the plan would cover 14% of the foreign travelers to the USA — the 7 million a year from countries where they are required to apply for visas from U.S. consulates.

It would exempt those from 27 countries deemed low-risk, but eventually those countries would put the information in chips in passports. That requirement has been delayed for a year. Border crossings would be added to the program starting with the 50 largest by 2005.

It has run into widespread complaints:

• Congress is cutting its funding by a third. Republicans and Democrats complain that the Homeland Security Department has not properly accounted for its initial $380 million allocation. As a result, lawmakers last week agreed to cut to $330 million the Bush administration's 2004 request for $480 million.

• Key players haven't been included in the planning or kept informed. Thirty airport executives have signed a letter expressing concern to be sent to Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge today.

Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport CEO Jeff Fegan says he didn't hear about the program until last week and will be hard-pressed to implement it by January.

• Tourism could suffer. Rick Webster of the Travel Industry Association says officials haven't publicized the program for international travelers, who will have to place two fingers on a machine and have their pictures taken. That could lead to confusion at airport gates, long delays and a decline in tourism, he says.

The conflicts highlight the tension between battling terrorism and maintaining open borders.

Officials estimate that more than 3 million people are in the USA on expired visas.

The program is called US VISIT, for U.S. Visitor and Status Indication Technology. It could cost $10 billion or more and take a decade to put in place.

Asa Hutchinson, the Homeland Security Department's chief of border and transportation security, says getting the program set up has been a struggle.

"We're working aggressively to meet the deadlines that Congress has given to us," Hutchinson says.

Some experts question whether the effort is a smart expenditure.

"If the primary purpose of this is as an anti-terrorist measure, I don't know that we're going to get our money's worth," says James Ziglar, former head of the Immigration and Naturalization Service.

Ziglar says would-be terrorists will simply send operatives with clean backgrounds who can get in and out of the country before their visas expire. If they don't get out on time, he says, the government still may lack enough investigators to track them down.

NEW YORK — Former Citigroup co-chairman John Reed was named interim chairman of the New York Stock Exchange on Sunday, temporarily succeeding deposed chairman Richard Grasso, who resigned five days ago.

Reed, 64, was at the top of a list of 12 candidates for the interim chairmanship, said NYSE director Laurence Fink, who chaired the NYSE board's search committee.

How long he'll remain in the job is unclear. Peter Fisher, the outgoing undersecretary for domestic finance at the Treasury Department, has emerged as a leading candidate to be Grasso's permanent successor.

Reed, a respected executive, faces difficult challenges in the wake of Grasso's forced resignation amid criticism over a $140 million compensation package. The Grasso controversy has focused attention on the ability of the board to govern the world's largest stock market when many directors represent major Wall Street firms.

John S. Reed bio

AGE: 64
HOMETOWN: Chicago
EDUCATION: Undergraduate degrees from Washington and Jefferson College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; master's degree from MIT; U.S. Army.
CAREER: Former chairman and co-chief executive of Citigroup, 1998-2000; chairman and chief executive of Citicorp and Citibank, 1984-1998. Joined Citibank in 1965.
QUOTE: "I have seen crises quite comparable to what the NYSE has gone through ... and clearly it did not help anyone."

By The Associated Press

At least four NYSE directors turned down the interim chairmanship, according to people knowledgeable about the board's search efforts. In the NYSE's statement Sunday, Fink was quoted as saying Reed was the only person offered the job.

Reed resigned as chairman and co-chief executive of Citigroup in April 2000, after losing a power struggle with current Citigroup Chairman Sandy Weill. Reed was chairman and CEO of Citicorp before its merger with Travelers Group in 1998.

People close to the board say Reed's selection underlines the NYSE's commitment to internal reform measures.

Reed, who participated in a news conference Sunday by telephone from a vacation site in France, said he would be paid $1 for the job. He will join the exchange on Sept. 30. Scheduled to leave his Treasury job Oct. 10, he says he is unwilling to comment publicly on his interest in the NYSE job while he is still employed at the Treasury.

People close to the NYSE board — where Fisher has several backers — say he'd be willing to take the top job as long as the Big Board's regulatory and trading arms are not split into two. That idea is one of several proposals under consideration for strengthening the NYSE's governance.

Fisher is a respected figure on Wall Street. While overseeing financial markets at the New York Federal Reserve, he helped orchestrate the 1998 bailout of Long-Term Capital Management, the powerful hedge fund whose collapse threatened world markets.

People familiar with the situation say Fisher's mastery of financial markets and public policy make him a first-rate candidate to replace Grasso.

"It was as if I was being pushed and thrown three meters from where I was standing," said a passerby, Wissam Majid, who was lightly injured. "I saw fire and smoke. I started running away and then I lost consciousness."

The blast, which could be heard over much of the Iraqi capital, took place one day before President Bush is expected to address the U.N. General Assembly and offer an expanded role in rebuilding Iraq, a condition set by many nations for contributing peacekeepers and money to the reconstruction effort.

The driver was stopped by an Iraqi police officer just before the checkpoint, said Capt. Sean Kirley, a U.S. 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment spokesman. That policeman was killed, although it was not clear whether he was shot or died in the explosion, he said.

Iraqi police Lt. Col. Thaer Ahmed said 11 other people, mostly policemen, were wounded. Kirley said he didn't know whether any U.S. troops were near the scene at the time, but none was wounded. He said there was no damage to U.N. buildings and that police had a few minutes warning of a possible attack. He refused to elaborate.

United Nations staff have continued to work in undamaged offices at the hotel complex since the Aug. 19 bombing.

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan has made clear he wants assurances of security for U.N. personnel in Baghdad along with any expanded role.

The United Nations curtailed its efforts in Iraq after the Aug. 19 bombing. At the time of the attack, U.N. spokesman Fred Eckhard said there were about 300 international staff in Baghdad and more than 300 elsewhere in Iraq. These numbers are thought to have now been dramatically reduced.

After the bombing, about 20 U.S. military vehicles could be seen swarming around the compound, and the area in northeastern Baghdad was sealed off by Iraqi police.

The bomb exploded two days after an assassination attempt against Aquila al-Hashimi, one of three women on the Iraqi Governing Council and a leading candidate to become Iraq's U.N. ambassador if the interim government wins approval to take the country's U.N. seat.

She was reported in serious but stable condition following the Saturday attack, which occurred as she was riding in a car near her home in western Baghdad. The Governing Council president, Ahmad Chalabi, blamed remnants of the regime of Saddam Hussein, whose government was toppled by U.S.-led forces in April.

Since Bush declared an end to major combat operations on May 1, more than 160 American soldiers have been killed. More than 300 U.S. soldiers have died in Iraq since the U.S.-led coalition launched military operations March 20.

The ongoing violence has raised questions about American stewardship of the country and has led to calls for an expanded role for the United Nations in post-Saddam Iraq.

On Sunday, Bush said he's not sure the United States will have to yield a significantly larger role to the United Nations to make way for a new resolution on Iraq. He continued to insist on an orderly transfer of authority to the Iraqis rather than the quick action demanded by France.

In an exclusive interview with Fox News' Brit Hume, Bush said he will declare in his speech Tuesday at the U.N. General Assembly that he "made the right decision and the others that joined us made the right decision" to invade Iraq.

But the president said he will ask other nations to do more to help stabilize Iraq.

"We would like a larger role for member states of the United Nations to participate in Iraq," Bush said in the interview to be aired Monday night. "I mean, after all, we've got member states now, Great Britain and Poland, leading multinational divisions to help make the country more secure."

Asked if he was willing for the United Nations to play a larger role in the political developments in Iraq to get a new resolution, Bush responded, "I'm not so sure we have to, for starters."

But he said he did think it would be helpful to get U.N. help in writing a constitution for Iraq.

"I mean, they're good at that," he said. "Or, perhaps when an election starts, they'll oversee the election. That would be deemed a larger role."

Germany, France and Britain have also called for more authority for the world body in Iraq, as Washington debates with its allies over a new U.N. resolution. British Prime Minister Tony Blair, however, has not joined France's call for a quick handover of power to Iraqis, backing the U.S. stance instead.

Bush said he would tell the United Nations that while some countries did not agree with the U.S.-led military action in Iraq, it's now in the international community's best interest to not only rebuild Iraq, but rebuild Afghanistan, fight AIDS and hunger, deal with slavery and proliferation of heinous weapons.

He said the United Nations has a chance to do more as a result of U.N. resolution 1441.

The United States argues that U.N. resolution 1441, passed unanimously in November, provided sufficient authority for the U.S.-led war. That resolution threatened Baghdad with "serious consequences" if it failed to show it had handed over or destroyed its weapons of mass destruction.

"That's the resolution that said if you don't disarm there will be serious consequences," he said. "At least somebody (the United States) stood up and said this is a definition of serious consequences."