QUOTE OF THE DAY "It's a sad situation out there in Southern California." President Bush, before leaving for California to examine wildfire destruction Article, 1A
Mukasey's waterboarding view key, 2 say
WASHINGTON - Judge Michael Mukasey's nomination for attorney general ran into trouble Thursday when two top Senate Democrats said their votes hinge on whether he will say on the record that waterboarding is torture.
Waterboarding is an interrogation technique that simulates drowning.
"It's fair to say my vote would depend on him answering that question," Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., told reporters late Thursday.
"This to me is the seminal issue," said Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin of Illinois, another member of Leahy's panel.
Asked if his vote depends on whether Mukasey equates waterboarding with torture, Durbin answered: "It does."
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said his support could be in doubt over the same issue.
Mukasey's confirmation shifted away from being a virtual certainty last week when he said he did not know if waterboarding is torture because he is not familiar with how it is done.
$280 billion farm bill clears Senate panel
WASHINGTON - Legislation that would continue billions of dollars in payments to farmers won approval Thursday by a Senate committee.
The five-year farm bill, approved unanimously by the Senate Agriculture Committee, would provide more than $280 billion for agriculture and nutrition programs and leave in place most subsidies to producers of major crops.
The legislation attempts to limit subsidies by eventually banning payments to "nonfarmers" whose income averages more than $750,000 a year. The bill defines farmers as those who earn more than two-thirds of their income from agriculture.
There would be no income-based limits on what a farmer could collect.
Pelosi urged to delay Ottoman Turks vote
WASHINGTON - House sponsors of a resolution that would label as genocide the 1915 killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks, in a letter Wednesday, have asked Speaker Nancy Pelosi to delay a vote on the measure.
Support for the resolution, approved earlier this month by the House Foreign Affairs Committee, deteriorated after Turkey recalled its U.S. ambassador in protest and several lawmakers said they feared it would cripple U.S.-Turkey relations. A member of NATO, Turkey is considered a rare Muslim ally to the United States in its war on terrorism.
The letter was signed by four primary sponsors of the resolution: California Democrats Adam Schiff, Anna Eshoo and Brad Sherman, and Frank Pallone, D-N.J.
Judge asked to drop '92 Hsu conviction
SAN FRANCISCO - Political donor Norman Hsu last week asked a judge to toss his 15-year-old felony fraud conviction, arguing that his right to a speedy trial was violated because authorities weren't actively pursuing him.
They could easily have arrested Hsu, his lawyers argue, at one of the swank fundraisers he hosted in California for prominent Democrats, including Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y.
State prosecutors filed documents Tuesday arguing that Hsu shouldn't benefit from his flight from justice, even if he was hiding in plain sight. That would "stand the criminal justice system on its head," Deputy Attorney General Ronald Smetana wrote.
News reports this summer revealed that Hsu was a fugitive who fled the state before he was sentenced for a 1992 fraud conviction. He turned himself in on Aug. 31, then fled again.
He was recaptured last month after he tried to kill himself by overdosing on drugs aboard an Amtrak train in Colorado. Hsu is being held without bail in a Redwood City jail.
Front Section, Pages 4 on 10/26/2007