Weekly Review

By Roger D. Hodge

President George W. Bush held a prime-time press conference and refused several times to apologize or accept responsibility for his government's failure to prevent the September 11 attacks; the¹ president defended his decision to conquer Iraq and said that the Iraqis were "deceptive at hiding things. We knew they were hiding things. A country that hides things is a country that is afraid of getting caught. And that was part of our calculation."² Bush also said that "freedom is the Almighty's gift to every man and woman in this world. And as the greatest power on the face of the Earth, we have an obligation to help the spread of freedom."³ A Pentecostal minister in Virginia was killed by a rattlesnake he was handling on Easter as a test of faith.⁴ Bob Woodward reported in a new book that Colin Powell warned President Bush that if he invaded Iraq he would have to face the "you break it, you own it" rule. "You're going to be the proud owner of 25 million people," Powell told the president in the summer of 2002. "You will own all their hopes, aspirations, and problems. You'll own it all." Powell also let it be known that Dick Cheney was the "powerful, steamrolling force" behind the decision to invade.⁵ Iraqi militants continued to kidnap foreigners, though some hostages were released.⁶ Al Jazeera broadcast a videotape showing an American soldier who was captured west of Baghdad. "I came to Iraq to liberate it," said Pfc. Keith M. Maupin. "But I didn't want to come here because I wanted to be with my son."⁷ Russia said that 605 people were kidnapped in Chechnya last year, and 253 were kidnapped in nearby regions.⁸ The Spanish government said that the bombers in Madrid sold hash and ecstasy and drank holy water from Mecca, and⁹ the new Socialist prime minister ordered the withdrawal of Spanish troops from Iraq.¹⁰ President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela expressed his support for the Iraqi insurgency.¹¹ A Democratic club in south Florida took out a newspaper ad saying that Donald Rumsfeld should be "put up against a wall" and shot.¹² Three crewmen died on a South Korean freighter after inhaling rotten squid gas.¹³

George Tenet, the director of central intelligence, told the 9/11 commission that he received a briefing in August 2001 entitled "Islamic Extremist Learns to Fly" but failed to act on the information.¹⁴ The North American Aerospace Defense Command admitted that in April 2001 it rejected a training scenario in which foreign terrorists were to hijack a commercial airplane and try to crash it into the Pentagon; the scenario was considered unrealistic.¹⁵ The 9/11 commission concluded that the harsh immigration policies put in place after September 11 were useless.¹⁶ In Kansas City a man went on a crime spree and shot two women for wearing blue.¹⁷ The U.S. porn industry was shut down after a performer tested positive for HIV.¹⁸ Officials in Northern Ireland apparently refused to let a woman with Down's syndrome register to vote because of a rule barring "idiots and lunatics" from voting.¹⁹ Scientists concluded that young female chimps are smarter than young males.²⁰ It was reported that President Bush does not even read his "President's Daily Briefs," which are apparently quite short, but has them orally summarized for him.²¹ Serbia's constitutional court suspended a law that gave financial benefits to Slobodan Milosevic and other Serb war criminals;²² Slobodan Milosevic submitted a list of 1,631 witnesses that he plans to call in his defense at The Hague.²³ President Bush saved $35,000 on his 2003 taxes as a result of his tax cuts.²⁴ In Italy, Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's corruption trial resumed; three months ago the Constitutional Court ruled that the law that was passed to protect Berlusconi from bribery charges was unconstitutional.²⁵ Twenty-one poor Indian women died in a stampede to collect free saris.²⁶

President Bush announced his support for Ariel Sharon's plan to withdraw unilaterally from the Gaza Strip and his approval, "in light of new realities on the ground," for the idea that Israel will never withdraw from its larger settlements in the West Bank.²⁷ Israel assassinated Dr. Abdel Aziz Rantisi, who succeeded Sheikh Ahmed Yassin as the leader of Hamas in Gaza after he was killed by an Israeli missile last month;²⁸ the Bush Administration "strongly urged" Israel to show "maximum restraint."²⁹ The Federal Election Commission was debating whether to regulate the political speech of many nonprofit organizations.³⁰ Bartholomew, the Eastern Orthodox patriarch of Constantinople, accepted the pope's apology for the sacking of his city by crusaders in the 13th century.³¹ Supreme Court justice Antonin Scalia apologized to two reporters whose recordings of a recent speech were erased by a federal marshal; Scalia had lamented in the speech that people just don't revere the Constitution the way they used to.³² A chicken farmer in Alaska injected eggs with dye to produce orange, red, green, purple, pink, and blue chicks. Colored ducklings were also available.³³ Children in Flint, Michigan, found two loaded pistols during an Easter egg hunt,³⁴ Irish farmers were outfitting their newborn lambs with blue overcoats, and a³⁵ piranha was found in a petting-zoo aquarium in Berlin.³⁶ Scientists using a new technique called microlensing found a planet in the constellation Sagittarius.³⁷ Researchers at Harvard University found that drinking alcohol can double a man's chances of getting gout.³⁸ The FDA admitted that it refused to permit its lead expert on the subject to testify publicly that antidepressant drugs cause children to become suicidal.³⁹ Mattel and Tek Nek Toys International recalled thousands of Batman cars and trucks after dozens of children were hurt playing with them; one child died.⁴⁰ The Department of Health and Human Services held a hearing on the recent decision by Abbott Laboratories to quintuple the price of its essential AIDS drug Norvir, which used to cost about $1,500 a year but now costs $7,800.⁴¹ A man in Ocala, Florida, was in trouble after his fiancée caught him raping her rottweiler dog.⁴² Zanzibar outlawed homosexuality.⁴³