WASHINGTON

HOUSE REJECTS GOP CUTS TO SCHOOL, HEALTH CARE PROGRAMS

Republicans suffered a startling setback in the House yesterday, losing a vote on cutting spending for education and health care programs. A broader budget-cutting blueprint targeting the poor, college students, and farmers also was in danger.

Both bills are part of a campaign by Republican leaders to burnish their party’s budget-cutting credentials as they try to reduce a deficit swelled by spending on the Iraq war and Hurricane Katrina. In both cases, GOP moderates balked. The 224-209 vote against a $602 billion spending bill for health, education, and labor programs disrupted plans by the Republican leaders to finish work on 11 spending bills that would pay for government operations and freeze many agency budgets through next September.

– Associated Press

ANTI-WAR ACTIVIST FOUND GUILTY

Iraq war protester Cindy Sheehan and 26 other peace activists were found guilty yesterday of protesting without a permit near the White House. They were each ordered to pay $75 in fines and court costs, but Ms. Sheehan’s lawyer said he plans to appeal the verdict.

– Associated Press

OCCUPATION OFFICIAL, BUSINESSMAN CHARGED IN KICKBACK SCHEME

A second man has been charged in a scheme that saw an American businessman pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to American occupation authorities in Iraq to get reconstruction contracts worth more than $13 million, federal authorities said yesterday.

Robert Stein Jr., who worked for the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq, and his wife paid for real estate, cars, jewelry and home improvements with money he received from Philip Bloom, a U.S. citizen who has lived in Romania for many years, according to federal affidavits made public Wednesday and yesterday. Mr. Stein, 50, of Fayetteville, N.C., appeared in U.S. District Court in Fayetteville, N.C., on Tuesday, and his case has been transferred to Washington, according to court records.

Mr. Bloom, 65, paid at least $630,000 in kickbacks to Mr. Stein, other occupation officials and their spouses, according to the affidavit supporting the criminal complaint against him. One person who received payments is a Defense Department employee, according to a government official who spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing.

– Associated Press

HEALTH

HIV DIAGNOSIS RATE DECREASING IN MINORITIES, CDC SAYS

The rate of newly reported HIV cases among blacks has been dropping by about 5% a year since 2001, the government said yesterday. But blacks are still eight times more likely than whites to be diagnosed with the AIDS virus.

The falling rate among blacks seems to be tied to overlapping drops in diagnoses among injection drug users and heterosexuals, CDC researchers said.

The study was based on 2001-2004 data from 33 states that have name-based reporting systems for HIV. Health officials do not know which diagnoses represent new infections and which ones were infections people had for years but had just discovered. The CDC found that overall diagnoses in the 33 states decreased slightly, from 41,207 cases in 2001 to 38,685 in 2004.The rate fell to 20.7 per 100,000 in 2004 from 22.8 cases per 100,000 people in 2001.

– Associated Press

SOUTH

JURY CONVICTS MECHANIC OF KILLING GIRL

SARASOTA, Fla. – A mechanic with a long criminal record was convicted yesterday of kidnapping, raping, and strangling an 11-year-old girl whose abduction was captured by a car-wash security camera. Joseph Smith, 39, could get the death penalty.

The jury took about five hours to find him guilty in the slaying of Carlie Brucia, whose half-naked body was found outside a church more than four days after the sixth-grader disappeared in February 2004 while walking home from a friend’s house. Smith was arrested after being identified as the burly, tattooed man seen taking the girl away by the arm in a fuzzy video that was broadcast nationwide during the search for the killer. Smith, who did not take the stand, showed no emotion when the verdict was read. The jury will return for the sentencing phase on November 28.

– Associated Press