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...The drumbeat on global warming was intended to reach a crescendo during the run-up to the summit at Gleneagles. Prime Minister Blair has been a leader in the global warming crusade. (Whether his stance reflects simple conviction or the need to propitiate his party's Left after Iraq is unknown.) In the event, for believers, Gleneagles turned out to be a major disappointment. On the eve of the summit, the Economic Committee of the House of Lords released a report sharply at variance with the prevailing European orthodoxy. Some key points were reported in the Guardian, a London newspaper not hostile...

PRESIDENTIAL NEWS OF THE DAY: While the First Lady and daughter Jenna are on an African trip, there was no public word about where President Bush and the dogs are spending the weekend. However, it's safe to say he's spending at least part of the time reviewing material on potential Supreme Court nominees. It has been a momentous week just past, and next week promises to be hectic. Here's a few notes from today's top stories... President George W. Bush, who kept something of a low profile at the G8 summit that closed Friday at Gleneagles, Scotland, appears nonetheless to...

1. We face serious and linked challenges in tackling climate change, promoting clean energy and achieving sustainable development globally. (a) Climate change is a serious and long-term challenge that has the potential to affect every part of the globe. We know that increased need and use of energy from fossil fuels, and other human activities, contribute in large part to increases in greenhouse gases associated with the warming of our Earth's surface. While uncertainties remain in our understanding of climate science, we know enough to act now to put ourselves on a path to slow and, as the science justifies,...

EDINBURGH -- Bob Geldof Tuesday dismissed protesters who fought running battles with the police in Edinburgh as "a bunch of losers." The Live 8 organizer said that they had nothing to do with the Make Poverty History campaign and he ridiculed the so-called anarchist clowns with "white painted faces" who thought they could "cause world revolution by standing on top of park benches and hitting the police." He also praised the police's handling of the protests. Geldof arrived in Edinburgh Tuesday night on the eve of the G-8 summit at Gleneagles Hotel, as dozens of those arrested appeared in court....

ALARM - Leger accident of bicycle for Bush, who returns in a police officer GLENEAGLES (the United Kingdom) - George W. Bush was Wednesday victim of a light accident of bicycle when it entered in collision with a police officer at the time of a walk around Gleneagles where it is to take part in G8, announced her spokesman, specifying that the American president had simply scratched the hands.

ON THE SIDELINE of this week's G8 Summit at Gleneagles, US President George W. Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin will meet one on one. Atop their agenda will be commitments they made four months ago in Bratislava to address an issue even more important to the well-being of Russian and American citizens than African aid and climate change, the issues that will headline the G8. Recall the first televised presidential debate last fall when the moderator asked both President Bush and Senator John Kerry: ''What is the single most serious threat to American national security?" Both answered: nuclear terrorism....

LONDON (Reuters) - A new draft communique on climate change for next month's Group of Eight summit has removed plans to fund research and put into question top scientists' warnings that global warming is already under way. The text seen by Reuters, titled Gleneagles Plan of Action and dated June 14, has been watered down from a previous draft which itself had no specific targets or timetables for action. The latest draft also explicitly endorses the use of "zero-carbon" nuclear power -- another development that will dismay many environmentalists three weeks before the summit of the world's eight richest nations...