TV News LIES

Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced today the new Majority Leadership team for the 111th Congress, elected today by members of the Democratic Caucus:

• Speaker of the House: Nancy Pelosi of California
• Majority Leader: Steny Hoyer of Maryland
• Majoriy Whip: James E. Clyburn of South Carolina
• Democratic Caucus Chairman: John B. Larson of Connecticut
• Democratic Caucus Vice Chairman: Xavier Becerra of California
• Assistant to the Speaker and Chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee: Chris Van Hollen of Maryland

Half the world's population could face a shortage of clean water by 2080 because of climate change, experts warned Tuesday.

Wong Poh Poh, a professor at the National University of Singapore, told a regional conference that global warming was disrupting water flow patterns and increasing the severity of floods, droughts and storms — all of which reduce the availability of drinking water

More...

The Justice Department has agreed to pay for a private lawyer to defend former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales against allegations that he encouraged officials to inject partisan politics into the department's hiring and firing practices.

Dan Metcalfe, a former high-ranking veteran Justice Department official who filed the suit on behalf of eight law students, called the department's decision to pay for a private attorney rather than rely on its civil division "exceptional."

More...

A new military judge has been named to the trial of accused September 11 mastermined Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other defendants at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, a Pentagon official said Monday.

Colonel Stephen Henley was tapped to replace Colonel Ralph Kohlmann, who will retire in April, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Kohlmann, who is the chief judge of the military commissions at Guantanamo, stepped down because he realized that the September 11 trial would not be completed by the time he retired, the official said.

An American Muslim subjected to several years of intense FBI scrutiny and questioning about links to terrorism has been held without charges, access to a lawyer or contact with his family for nearly three months by the security services of the United Arab Emirates.

That allegation is central to a lawsuit that the American Civil Liberties Union was planning to file Tuesday in federal court in Washington against President Bush, Attorney General Michael Mukasey and FBI Director Robert Mueller. 

More...

New government figures show that almost 700,000 children went hungry in the United States at some point in 2007, up more than 50 percent from the year before to mark the highest point since 1998. And that's even before this year's sharp economic downtown, the Agriculture Department reported Monday.

The department's annual report on food security showed that during 2007 the number of children who suffered a substantial disruption in the amount of food they typically eat was more than double the 430,000 in 2006 and the largest figure since 716,000 in 1998.

Overall, the 36.2 million adults and children who struggled with hunger during the year was up slightly from 35.5 million in 2006. That was 12.2 percent of Americans who didn't have the money or assistance to get enough food to maintain active, healthy lives.

TVNL Comment: Another Bush legacy. America, "the greatest nation in the world". What a joke. Where is the bailout for the hungry?

More...

The Kansas Republican Party has suspended party voting privileges for 17 precinct leaders in Johnson County who gave donations to Democrats running for public office this year.

State party officials, led by Republican Chairman Kris Kobach, approved a loyalty plank in the party’s constitution last year: Anyone holding a party position who donated money to a Democrat would forfeit his or her voting rights. This is the first election in which the provision has been enforced.

More...