WASHINGTON

FILIBUSTER COMPROMISE EFFORTS END, SHOWDOWN IMMINENT

Top Senate leaders declared an unsuccessful end yesterday to their compromise talks over President Bush’s stalled judicial nominees, despite fresh talk of a deal to clear five appeals court appointees while scuttling three others.

“I’ve tried to compromise and they want all or nothing, and I can’t do that,” Democratic leader, Harry Reid, of Nevada, told reporters after a private meeting with majority leader, Bill Frist, a Republican of Tennessee.

“We both agreed that after several months of discussions, we have been unable to come to a negotiated position where the president’s nominees get an up-or-down vote,” Dr. Frist said. By their comments, the two party leaders pushed the Senate closer to a historic confrontation that could decide the fate of the appeals court candidates, Supreme Court nominees during Mr. Bush’s term, as well as the Senate’s venerable filibuster rules. Democrats prevented final votes on 10 of Mr. Bush’s first-term appeals court nominees, and have threatened to do the same this year to seven whom the president renominated. Dr. Frist has threatened to change Senate procedures to strip them of their ability to do so. At issue is the filibuster, a parliamentary device that can be overcome only by a majority of 60 votes or greater.

– Associated Press

SOUTH

SOME 11 JURORS DISMISSED FOR TRIAL OF MAN ACCUSED OF AIDING TERRORISTS

TAMPA, Fla. – Most potential jurors in the federal trial of a former state university professor charged with aiding a Palestinian Arab terrorist group said they could fairly decide his fate yesterday, the first day of jury selection. Sami Al-Arian, a former University of South Florida computer scientist, and three co-defendants are charged with raising money for the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, which is on a State Department list of terrorist organizations. Attorneys for Mr. Al-Arian and the federal public defender’s office, which represents co-defendant Hatim Naji Fariz, had asked the judge to move the trial out of Tampa, claiming the jury pool is tainted by politics and pervasive press coverage. But out of 46 people questioned by attorneys yesterday, just 11 were dismissed by the judge.

– Associated Press

SOUTHWEST

MILITARY JURY CONVICTS RESERVIST ACCUSED IN ABU GHRAIB PRISON SCANDAL

FORT HOOD, Texas – A military jury yesterday convicted the second soldier to be tried in the Abu Ghraib prison scandal, returning guilty verdicts on all but one of the seven charges she faced for her role in the abuse of Iraqi inmates. A panel of four Army officers and four senior enlisted soldiers convicted Specialist Sabrina Harman on one count of conspiracy to maltreat detainees, four counts of maltreating detainees, and one count of dereliction of duty. The 27-year-old reservist from Lorton, Va., was acquitted on one maltreatment count that accused her of photographing a group of Iraqi detainees who were forced to masturbate in public by Abu Ghraib guards. One of Harman’s co-defendants testified last week that she was not present when that incident occurred.

– Associated Press

HEALTH

STUDY SUGGESTS LOW-FAT DIETS PREVENT RETURN OF BREAST CANCER

A new study seems to suggest that low-fat diets can help prevent a return of breast cancer in certain women, but many specialists disagreed with the conclusions, saying other factors might have played a role. The report created a buzz at the world’s largest cancer meeting, the American Society of Clinical Oncology, where it was presented yesterday and immediately made headlines on television and the Internet.

Many previous studies have failed to find that cutting fat in the diet can prevent breast cancer, so some doctors urged caution in interpreting the new information. The study was funded by the National Cancer Institute and involved 2,437 women at 37 sites around the country. All had surgery followed by standard chemotherapy drugs for early-stage breast cancer and five years of tamoxifen if their tumors were estrogen-receptor positive – that is, helped to grow by estrogen. As a group, 29% of their calories came from fat, already far lower than the typical American, who gets up to half of calories from fat, according to what the women told doctors at the outset of the study.

– Associated Press