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SALT LAKE CITY (Reuters) - A federal judge Friday dismissed all charges against two former Utah Olympic executives on trial for bribery to bring the 2002 Winter Games to Utah.   "It offends my sense of justice. Enough is enough," U.S. District Court Judge David Sam said as he scolded the prosecution and asked how much taxpayer money was spent on the case. Tom Welch and Dave Johnson had been charged by the U.S. Justice Department (news - web sites) with masterminding a $1 million cash-for-votes scheme to entice international Olympic dignitaries to chose Salt Lake City over other...

ST. JOHN'S, Nfld. (CP) -- An American conservation group is calling for an international boycott of the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver-Whistler because of an annual seal hunt that takes place on Canada's East Coast. The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society based in Malibu, Calif., said the games, scheduled for February and March, will coincide with the time the seal hunt begins. "These dates fall at the exact time that the notoriously cruel, largest marine mammal slaughter in the world takes place on the East Coast of Canada," the society said in a statement found on their Web site. "The Olympics...

The race is not to the Swift: Controversial acting Jane Swift withdrew today from the Massachusetts governor's race and threw her support to Winter Olympics boss Mitt Romney. Later this afternoon he announced his candidacy. ``I believe that this is in the best interest of our state as it will allow the Republican Party's best chances of holding the governor's office in November,'' said Swifty, fighting back tears at the Statehouse in Boston. After a Republican activist recently tried to get her a job in the Bush administration to ease her out of the race, Swifty fumed, ``I guess...

Sources: Swift Dropping Out Of Governor's Race Cites Family Reasons For Leaving GOP Field To Romney BOSTON -- Sources tell NewsCenter 5 that Acting Gov. Jane Swift has decided to drop out of the race for the GOP gubernatorial nomination this fall. Swift, a mother of three, including twin girls who were born last June, cited family reasons for her decision not to run. Aides said she is expected to make a formal announcement later Tuesday. Swift's decision comes on the heels of a news that Olympic chief Mitt Romney plans to formally announce his candidacy for the corner office....

============================================================================ “Axles” of Evil at the Winter Olympics (By Shmuel R. Bulka) ============================================================================ I have watched the Olympics almost every year that they take place and invariably, after the Games are over, I promised myself that I would never watch them again. Why? The Olympics are run by a bunch of self-promoting, egotistical, self-important snobs. They wax poetic about the Olympic ideal, and then make a complete farce of it when the events are judged. After 1998, I promised myself I would not watch the Olympics again. Shortly before the 2000 Summer Games, I watched the HBO documentary on the ...

U.S.A! U.S.A! U.S.A! You couldn't get away from it. The crowds picked it up and waved flags with the rhythm. The cadence was like the heartbeat of the games. It wasn't overwhelming, but there was a spirit in the air that was transmitted from the venue competition right through the camera to the home television screen. We sure watched! The audience for the Olympics was beyond expectation. NBC salesmen must have thought they died and went to heaven and sponsors could finally justify the expense of those commercials! Who dreamed such success after the early scandals of payoffs and ...

The 2002 Winter Olympic Games may not have been the "Molympics," as many had feared, but the state's other religions received barely a mention by the 10,000 visiting journalists and only in passing. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, on the other hand, got a boatload of free publicity. In the days leading up to the Feb. 8 Opening Ceremony, LDS media officials received more than 2,000 phone calls as reporters from all over the world scrambled to produce at least one "Mormon" story. In the days that followed, the LDS Church was mentioned in about 100 stories ...

The Secret Service acknowledged Wednesday that two souvenir-seeking agents goofed Sunday when they misplaced a sheaf of papers detailing security plans for Vice President Dick Cheney's appearance at the Olympic Closing Ceremony. But the agency downplayed the importance of the document -- claiming the snafu did not constitute a major security breach -- and refused to say what action will be taken against the agents, who have not been identified. "Even if this thing were released, it would not compromise our overall security plan," said Brian Marr, Secret Service spokesman in Washington, D.C. "This was just a lapse, and we're ...

Bomb Is Suspected In Outage Federal agents are investigating the possibility that an electrical outage at a Utah Power relay station on the final day of the Winter Games was caused by an explosive device. State and federal authorities are looking at whether explosives wrapped in railroad spikes hurled shrapnel upward, shattering a circuit breaker. Railroad spikes were found at the substation near Salt Lake City International Airport, but officials have not settled the question of whether the explosion was a result of faulty equipment, vandalism or terrorism, The Salt Lake Tribune has learned. Material taken from the scene ...

Christian Astier, a 44-year-old Parisian, agrees that there is an "axis of evil." But he thinks the United States is part of it. "I have a very negative view of the Americans because they are intolerant, they focus on themselves and they think only about themselves," the civil servant says. "They are part of the 'axis of evil' as well." Astier is far from alone in his thinking. As post-Sept. 11 solidarity with the United States dies down in Europe and elsewhere around the world, unease and anger with American policy and Americans in general have returned to a ...

<p>SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- The FBI is investigating the possibility that a power outage on the last day of the Winter Olympics was caused by a bomb, The Associated Press has learned.</p> <p>Electricity was cut to 33,000 customers -- including the airport and the main media center downtown -- for up to two hours Sunday morning when a circuit breaker exploded at a substation. Investigators later found that a security fence had been cut.</p>

Poll: Mass. wants Mitt HERALD POLL/by David R. Guarino Tuesday, February 26, 2002 Republican Mitt Romney would steamroll into the governor's race a certified front-runner, far more popular than the wounded acting governor and besting every Democrat in the field, a new Herald poll shows. In a staggering sign the GOP could abandon acting Gov. Jane M. Swift for Romney, 48 percent of Republicans surveyed now disapprove of the job Swift is doing as governor. Meanwhile, 69 percent of Republican voters view Romney favorably while only 36 percent give Swift favorable marks. And while Swift's plummeting fortune now has ...

We're going to try to make amends for the NBC's decision to cut from the live fireworks. Click on the video links below for the show from cameras placed all along the Wasatch Front. Salt Lake and the world said good-by to the 2002 Winter Games Sunday... And it was a spectacular send-off. But an unexpected decision by NBC angered hundreds... maybe thousands of KSL viewers. NBC dumped out of its coverage of Closing Ceremonies before the incredible fireworks show. That meant Salt Lake didn't get to see live coverage of the largest pyrotechnical display to ever be attempted in ...

SALT LAKE CITY - The mood was cranky here in the waning moments of the 2002 Winter Games: &#149;&nbsp;RUSSIA threatened to walk out of the Olympics if it was not immediately awarded gold medals in women's figure skating, the Nordic combined alpine snowshoe and two events to be named later. &#149;&nbsp;KOREA threatened to walk out of the Olympics if it did not get whatever Russia got. &#149;&nbsp;LITHUANIA threatened to walk out of the Olympics if whoever stole its lucky towel did not return it. &#149;&nbsp;PORTUGAL actually did walk out of the Olympics, but nobody noticed, so Portugal sulked back into ...

Want Olympic spirit? Introduce more subjective sports SALT LAKE CITY - The 2002 Winter Olympic games are finally over, except for curling, which hopes to wrap up by May. Thousands of visitors are leaving Utah, taking with them a lifetime supply of fond memories and soiled underwear. But the nonstop craziness of the last three weeks has forever changed the moral tone of this once-stodgy state, as evidenced by the Utah legislature's unanimous vote Saturday to legalize the sale of heroin in elementary schools. Yes, it has been quite a party, right through the upbeat Closing Ceremony, which featured Vice ...

PARK CITY, Utah - I came to watch the skeleton event, which involves sliding through icy turns at death-defying speeds approaching 80 miles per hour. And that was driving here in my rental car. The actual skeleton event was even scarier. Skeleton is a sport wherein competitors hurtle face-first down a twisting ice track, lying on what appears to be either a small sled or a large belt buckle. The sled has no brakes and no steering (although it does have a CD player). The competitors steer by screaming. The skeleton event has appeared in two previous Winter Olympics, in ...

Delta's terminal 2 at the Salt Lake City International Airport is filled to capacity following the last day of the Olympic Winter Games as people try to make their flights on Monday.Lines of tired, cranky travelers snaked outside Salt Lake City International Airport on Monday as Olympic spectators, athletes and coaches tried to leave town on the busiest day in the airport's history. Many passengers missed their flights on Olympic sponsor Delta Air Lines, which appeared to have the most trouble accommodating the throngs that swamped Terminal 2 the day after the Closing Ceremony of the 2002 Winter Games. One ...

The predominant lot of surprise, upset, upstage U.S. gold medals at Salt Lake this month were won by women. No, Wilbur, we have not forgotten Mr. Apolo Anton Ohno who brazenly attempted to skate past his presumed South Korean superior in the men's 1,500-meter speedskating competition, then came in second but won the Gold because his adversary illegally blocked him. He, Derek Parra and other male American athletes certainly succeeded in unexpected ways. But the athletes we Americans will all remember five years from now (if indeed we remember any of them five years from now) will be Sarah ...

An outspoken critic of the political chicanery inherent in the Olympic movement, Ken Bullock remembers being lectured about how the community would come together once people saw the Olympic torch. But Bullock, who represents the interests of local government as a director on the Salt Lake Organizing Committee board, was doubtful until he stood on a street corner in Lehi earlier this month as thousands greeted the arrival of the torch. "(That) was right," said Bullock. "I saw people wanting to believe in ideals that superseded the struggles people have on a daily basis, a need to believe in ...