WASHINGTON

INVESTMENT CHIEF QUESTIONS BUSH PLAN FOR PRIVATE ACCOUNTS

The investment executive President Bush lauds while selling his Social Security overhaul suggested yesterday the White House drop its insistence on private investment accounts funded with payroll taxes if that prevents Democrats from supporting the effort.

Bob Pozen, whose concept of “progressive indexing” for future benefits has become an administration favorite, said lawmakers should instead focus on so-called add-on accounts, which are funded with other revenues. The Boston investment chief has suggested increasing investment in Roth IRAs by lifting the existing caps on them. “Given the lack of bipartisan support for carve-out personal accounts, the president should not insist on carve-out accounts,” Mr. Pozen, himself a Democrat, said in a statement issued after he made similar comments at a think tank in the capital. A White House spokesman said Mr. Bush remains committed to the carve-out accounts because they are the best way to allow low-income workers to invest without affecting their take-home pay.

“They are really the only way for lower-income workers, who live paycheck-to-paycheck, to take advantage of long-term investment,” said spokesman Trent Duffy. Mr. Bush has proposed allowing workers under 55 to invest nearly two-thirds of their Social Security taxes in private accounts. He has also highlighted Mr. Pozen’s plan for changing benefit calculations by keeping those for low-income workers linked to wages while shifting those for middle- and upper-income workers to an increasing reliance on a slower-growing price index.

– Associated Press

SPECULATION OF CLINTON PRESIDENTIAL RUN STIRRED BY DINNER FOR IOWANS

Senator Clinton is planning to host a group of Iowans at her home in the capital, stirring speculation that she is laying the groundwork for a presidential bid in 2008. The dinner is billed as a fundraiser for her 2006 Senate re-election campaign, according to Roll Call, a Capitol Hill newspaper.

Mrs. Clinton has refused to speculate about a presidential campaign, but a national campaign is likely to be discussed at a gathering with supporters from the pivotal first-in-the-nation caucus state, several political strategists told Roll Call. Mrs. Clinton has also hosted contributors from other states, including Massachusetts and California. “There are people in some states who want to not just contribute, but also spend time with her,” the head of the Friends of Hillary political action committee, Ann Lewis, told Roll Call.

Asked whether the dinner was intended to build relationships in Iowa, Ms. Lewis was quoted as saying, “The purpose is to raise funds for 2006.” Mrs. Clinton raised $4 million in campaign funds in the first three months of the year, and another $8.7 million at the end of March. In the last cycle, Iowans contributed only $40,000 to her campaign. She has raised $1,000 from the state this year, Roll Call reported.

– Staff Reporter of the Sun

EAST

CARDINAL SKIPPING COMMENCEMENT OVER GIULIANI’S ABORTION STANCE

BALTIMORE – William Cardinal Keeler will not attend Friday’s commencement at Loyola College of Maryland because the keynote speaker, Rudolph Giuliani, is an advocate of abortion rights. A Catholic group and a spokesman for the Archdiocese of Baltimore confirmed that William Cardinal Keeler was refusing to attend because the former New York City mayor supports abortion rights.

William Cardinal Keeler could not be reached for comment Wednesday night, but his letter informing Loyola’s interim President David Haddad that he will not attend indicates that William Cardinal Keeler’s boycott would extend to his staff.

“May I state that there will be no representative of the archdiocese participating in any event honoring former Mayor Giuliani,” William Cardinal Keeler wrote.

Mr. Giuliani, a Catholic and a Republican who has been mentioned as a possible candidate for president in 2008, was invited to deliver Loyola’s commencement address and receive an honorary degree at the ceremony set for Friday at First Mariner Arena.

– Associated Press

SOUTH

LAWYERS: BUSH SLAY PLOT SUSPECT TORTURED

ALEXANDRIA, Va. – Two doctors who examined a Virginia man accused of joining Al Qaeda and plotting to assassinate President Bush have concluded that he was tortured while in Saudi custody, according to defense lawyers.

The torture resulted in Ahmed Omar Abu Ali giving a false confession to Saudi authorities, according to the lawyers, who are seeking to have the statement thrown out. “The physical and psychological abuse that Abu Ali suffered over a two-year period critically impaired his capacity for self-determination and overcame his will,” wrote defense lawyer Ashraf Nubani. “It resulted in him making involuntary, false statements to alleviate his suffering and appease his interrogators.” Federal prosecutors have consistently denied that Abu Ali was tortured.

– Associated Press

WEST

MAN QUESTIONED IN CONNECTION WITH IDAHO SLAYING RULED OUT AS SUSPECT

COEUR D’ALENE, Idaho – Detectives who questioned a man in the killings of three people ruled him out as a suspect yesterday and said they still had no idea where two children missing from the family’s home were. The man, Robert Roy Lutner, 33, of Hayden, voluntarily took and passed a polygraph test during a seven-hour interview with investigators, Kootenai County sheriff’s Captain Ben Wolfinger said. Mr. Lutner said he saw the three alive when he attended a “barbecue-type get-together” at their rural home Sunday night, less than 24 hours before the bodies were found. “He had nothing to do with the death scene or the abduction of the children,” Captain Wolfinger said.

– Associated Press