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Former U.S. President Carter to Help Mediate Talks in Venezuela Between Gov't and Opposition CARACAS, Venezuela June 30 — Venezuela's president said Sunday he hoped that former President Carter's visit next week will help revive talks between the government and its opposition, which have been locked in a power struggle since a failed coup. "We receive him with faith and joy," Hugo Chavez said Sunday during his weekly radio show, adding that Carter's visit should "open the way and strengthen peace."After meeting with Chavez and opposition politicians last week, the Atlanta-based Carter Center announced Saturday that Carter would arrive July...

Time for a Little Rebellion "I hold it, that a little rebellion, now and then, is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical." So Jefferson wrote to fellow Virginian James Madison in the year Madison authored his country's Constitution. It's past time for "a little rebellion" against federal jurists who are perverting that Constitution to make themselves petty dictators. On June 26, a panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco declared, 2 to 1, that the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag of the United States is...

Interview: Professor JK Galbraith - Economist This surely is the hour of John Kenneth Galbraith, grand old man of American economics. But those who travel to the leafy suburbs of Boston in the expectation of a giant and gloating "I told you so" will come away disappointed.Amid the debris of Enron and WorldCom, the lifelong critic of unbridled corporate power exhibits none of the satisfaction of a prophet whose warnings have come to pass."Those of us who've concerned themselves with this matter cannot take satisfaction for discovering that we were at least partly right. That's too much like seeing a...

Grizzly Gulch Fire surges to 4,500 acresBy Journal staff and AP staffThe 4,500-acre Grizzly Gulch Fire that burned Saturday on the edges of Deadwood was 30 percent contained Sunday, as the relatively small crew of about 200 firefighters managed to save the northern Black Hills gambling town. "When I first drove in here, I thought we were going to lose a lot of Deadwood, and it's because of you, we didn't," South Dakota Wildland Fire Coordinator Joe Lowe told firefighters Sunday morning. Officials ordered residents, casino guests and others to evacuate Saturday afternoon. However, not every one complied in what...

<p>A fingertip-sized moon rock, brought to Earth aboard Apollo 17, could be worth millions of dollars. A fingertip-sized moon rock, brought to Earth aboard Apollo 17, could be worth millions of dollars.</p> <p>MIAMI, Florida (AP) -- In a cross between science fiction and a children's tale, a moon rock gets dug up from its peaceful valley, flies aboard Apollo 17 to Earth, visits Honduras and winds up in a U.S. court.</p>

APNewsAlert Jun 30, 2002 (AP WorldStream via COMTEX) -- UNITED NATIONS - United States vetoes resolution to extend U.N. peacekeeping mission in Bosnia. Copyright 2002 Associated Press, All rights reserved

WINNIPEG - People in Winnipeg are being encouraged to give panhandlers a different sort of donation these days – not spare change, but a token that can be traded at the Union Gospel Mission. About 5,000 special "help keys" are in circulation in the city. People buy them from local businesses for $1 each. Panhandlers can then redeem the blue and white keys for a meal, shower or change of clothes. Supporters say the program prevents donated cash from being used to buy illegal drugs and alcohol. "We're saying, it's not up to the panhandler what they get," says mission...

Ronaldo says winning the World Cup is better than sex because it only comes around once every four years. "It's not that sex isn't good but the World Cup is every four years and sex is not," he said, adding cheekily: "I'm going to have sex in a few moments." Ronaldo is shown celebrating his second goal for Brazil during the World Cup final match against Germany on June 30, 2002. Photo by Paulo Whitaker/Reuters

Defense could pin hopes on insect life By Kristen Green UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITERJune 30, 2002 In the first four weeks of David Westerfield's murder trial, jurors were schooled in scientific evidence such as blood and DNA, fingerprints and fibers. Now they'll get a crash course in the life cycle of flies. Westerfield's team of lawyers is expected to launch his defense this week, and lead attorney Steven Feldman has hinted that he will use insect biology to prove 7-year-old Danielle van Dam died after police and reporters began tracking his client's every move. That would mean Westerfield couldn't have killed...

Harare - Long lines of people waiting for corn meal snake through the streets of a nation that was once the breadbasket of southern Africa. Some wait for days, sleeping in lines so they won't lose their place. Girls 13 and under are being married off for the bride price to buy expensive black-market food. Many people are getting one meal a day. And Zimbabwe's hunger crisis is sure to get worse. Drought, a crashing economy and a land reform program that has destroyed commercial farming have pushed millions of Zimbabweans to the brink of starvation. Five other southern African...

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Jun 30, 2002 (AP WorldStream via COMTEX) -- President Saddam Hussein has praised Iraqi military scientists for making a "new and important scientific achievement" to upgrade Iraqi defense systems. "We are not surprised when you (the scientists) say you can accomplish any task," Saddam told a group of military commanders and researchers, according to a report in Sunday's official al-Iraq newspaper. "The policies of big countries are those of (self) interest. So, we have to depend on ourselves to reach our goals," Saddam reportedly said. The report did not provide specific details about the "new and important...

<p>Corporate crime calls for tough prosecution.</p> <p>Saturday, June 29, 2002 12:01 a.m.</p> <p>Walking through the New Orleans French Quarter the morning after Mardi Gras is never pretty: men sleeping off the night before, lots of bottles and discarded masks, and here and there the police investigating a fresh felony. This is the equivalent of what we're watching now as the U.S. economy and culture recover from the late 1990s boom.</p>

The Zimbabwe government has ruled out devaluation of the country's volatile currency despite a foreign exchange crisis that has rocked the country for years, the state-run Sunday Mail said. The paper said a special cabinet committee on finance and economic affairs chaired by President Robert Mugabe last week threw out a proposal by the country's central bank and finance ministry to devalue the Zimbabwe dollar. "The Reserve Bank and the Ministry of Finance officials were told that what they were proposing was untenable," an unnamed source told the paper. "The officials had inexplicably failed to come up with a complete...

Analysis: Canada looking for independence By E.W. KieckheferUnited Press International From the National Desk Published 6/30/2002 1:46 PM Some Canadians are wondering whether their country should have joined the rebel colonies in the American Revolution as the United States approaches another Independence Day. They were urged to join in the uprising against the British crown but declined. And over the years, Canadians have felt a sort of smug satisfaction in that decision, believing they had created a better nation. The differences between the two countries never have been great. Still, Canadians always have accepted a dependence upon their governments...

<p>FULLERTON, Calif. (AP) - Secret Service agents pursued and arrested a driver who crashed into several other cars during the brief chase, police said.</p> <p>As agents raided a home on Ash Street shortly before 5 p.m. Friday, the driver got into a car and fled, said Lt. Joe Klein. A message left at the Santa Ana Secret Service office was not immediately returned early Saturday.</p>

SHOW LOW, Ariz., Jun 30, 2002 (AP Online via COMTEX) -- A massive wildfire that has destroyed more than 400 homes in the mountains of eastern Arizona was sparked in part by a contract firefighter who hoped to make money fighting the flames, prosecutors said Sunday. Leonard Gregg, 29, worked part-time as a firefighter for the Bureau of Indian Affairs and was one of the first people called to fight the blaze. According to a statement filed in federal court by a BIA investigator, Gregg said he set the fire so he could get work on a fire crew....

WASHINGTON, Jun 30, 2002 (AP Online via COMTEX) -- Congressional investigators reviewing documents concerning Martha Stewart 's sale of ImClone stock have found no credible record of an arrangement with her broker to dump her shares when the stock fell below a certain price, according to a magazine report. House Energy and Commerce Committee investigators are examining whether Stewart had inside information when she sold nearly 4,000 shares of ImClone on Dec. 27 and have obtained her account through her lawyers. Investigators may want to talk to Stewart directly following an interview with her broker, Peter Bacanovic, a committee spokesman...

June 30, 2002Thirteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time Psalm: Sunday Week 30 Reading I Responsorial Psalm Reading II Gospel Reading I2 Kgs 4:8-11, 14-16a One day Elisha came to Shunem,where there was a woman of influence, who urged him to dine with her. Afterward, whenever he passed by, he used to stop there to dine.So she said to her husband, "I know that Elisha is a holy man of God.Since he visits us often, let us arrange a little room on the roofand furnish it for him with a bed, table, chair, and lamp,so that when he comes to us he...

From: Defense & Foreign Affairs Strategic Policy, 4-5, 1998 Terrorism and the Balkans: Italy Becomes Iran’s New Base For Terrorist Operations Iranian Islamists have established an effective terrorist infrastructure in the Balkans region. Its axis runs from Albania, through Bosnia and Herzegovina, to Italy. There, a forward operations center in Milan is preparing to export terror into Western Europe. Senior Editor Yossef Bodansky uncovers this clandestine web which has already attempted the assassination of Pope John Paul II. At the international conference on Bosnia in Bonn on December 10, 1997, the US made a strenuous effort to expand the definition...

Decline of the Violence Policy Center Dr. Michael S. Brown June 19, 2002 One of the most interesting and entertaining combatants in the forty-year war over gun rights is the Violence Policy Center of Washington, DC. A recent VPC "study" on the topic of concealed handguns in the state of Texas reveals much about this unique organization. But first a little background on concealed carry laws. Thirty-four states now have laws that guarantee a concealed handgun permit to citizens who have passed a criminal background check and completed appropriate training. None of these laws has ever been repealed, because they...