WASHINGTON

NEGROPONTE FACES QUESTIONS ON THREATS, EAVESDROPPING

Al Qaeda is the leading terrorism threat to America followed by the nuclear ambitions of Iran and North Korea, the nation’s intelligence chief said yesterday in a forum that turned into a debate on government eavesdropping.

National Intelligence Director John Negroponte tried to focus on terrorist threats, but lawmakers repeatedly returned to the uproar surrounding the National Security Agency’s surveillance program.

Senator Rockefeller of West Virginia, the Intelligence Committee’s senior Democrat, called the operations the largest NSA program within America in history. He accused the Bush administration of using the program politically while keeping the vast majority of Congress “in the dark.”

Mr. Negroponte and his top deputy, General Michael Hayden, fiercely defended President Bush’s authorization allowing the NSA to eavesdrop – without first obtaining warrants – on international communications of people on American soil who may be linked to Al Qaeda.

– Associated Press

BUSH TO REQUEST $120 BILLION FOR IRAQ, $18 MILLION FOR KATRINA RELIEF

The Bush administration said yesterday it will ask Congress for $120 billion more for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and $18 billion more this year for hurricane relief.

If approved by Congress, the war money would push spending related to the wars toward a staggering half-trillion dollars.

Details of the requests are not final, but the 2007 budget proposal that President Bush will submit next week will reflect the totals for planning purposes. The president also will ask Congress to devote an additional $2.3 billion this year for prepare for a bird flu epidemic.

About $70 billion of the new war money will be requested for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan this year, bringing total spending on the two campaigns to $120 billion for the current budget year. The other $50 billion in new war money will be set aside in the 2007 budget for the first few months of the fiscal year that begins October 1. More money will likely be needed in 2007.

– Associated Press

WHITE HOUSE CLAIMS IMPROVEMENTS IN WASTEFUL OVERPAYMENTS

The White House budget office is giving the government higher marks for reducing improper benefit payments for programs such as Medicare, food stamps, and unemployment insurance, cutting such overpayments by $7.8 billion from 2004 levels.

The agency boasting the greatest improvement was the Department of Health and Human Services, which used stricter documentation rules to decrease improper Medicare payments by more than $9 billion. That savings far exceeds those produced by all other agencies combined.

But more progress needs to be made in curbing waste in Social Security and the Earned Income Tax Credit, a refundable tax cut paid to the working poor, according to an Office of Management and Budget report.

– Associated Press

SENATORS PROPOSE WAYS TO RESTRAIN EARMARKS

Senator Lott proposed new restraints on home district spending projects known as earmarks yesterday, but vowed to “fight like a tiger” against eliminating a practice that has spurred calls for higher ethics in Congress.

Mr. Lott, chairman of the Senate Rules Committee, and Senator Feinstein, a Democrat of California, jointly proposed a change that would give senators the opportunity to kill special projects inserted, often without the knowledge or vote of other senators, in larger pieces of legislation.

The Lott-Feinstein measure is the latest of a number of clean government proposals to come out of Congress as lawmakers react to scandals involving bribery and unethical or illegal lobbying practices.

There were an estimated 14,000 earmarks or pork barrel projects inserted into legislation in 2004, more than triple the number of a decade earlier, according to one congressional study. The value of these projects, ranging from highways to defense contracts, was put at $52 billion, nearly double a decade earlier.

– Associated Press

RUMSFELD SAYS TERROR THREAT MAY BE GREATER TODAY THAN EVER

Despite progress in fighting terrorism, the threat today may be greater than ever before because the available weapons are far more dangerous, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld said yesterday.

“The enemy – while weakened and under great pressure – is still capable of global reach, still possesses the determination to kill more Americans – and still trying to do so with increasingly powerful weapons,” Mr. Rumsfeld said at the National Press Club.

The American strategy, he said, includes doing everything possible to prevent the enemy from gaining weapons of mass destruction, improving homeland defense and intelligence gathering and helping friendly nations become better able to fight the terrorists in their own countries.

“Because they lurk in shadows, without visible armies, and are willing to wait long periods between attacks, there is a tendency to underestimate the threat they pose,” said Mr. Rumsfeld. He said there are no fewer than 18 organizations, loosely connected with Al Qaeda, conducting terrorist attacks.

– Associated Press

AUDIT FINDS SHODDY ACCOUNTING IN VETERANS’ HEALTH CARE

Eager to reduce spending, the Bush administration falsely claimed savings of more than $1.3 billion in the Department of Veterans Affairs to justify cuts to health care services, congressional investigators say.

The report by the Government Accountability Office is the latest to document funding woes at the VA, which currently offers health care to 7 million out of 24 million eligible veterans. It found that the agency used misleading accounting methods and lacked documentation to prove its claimed savings.

The audit, released yesterday, comes amid growing political debate about streamlining veterans’ health care. In the last fiscal year, more than 260,000 veterans considered to have higher incomes could not sign up for services because of cost cutting, a move decried by Democrats.

“It’s unconscionable,” said Rep. Lane Evans, a Democrat of Illinois, the ranking Democrat on the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee, who requested the audit. “Veterans needing health care are being penalized because of an accounting deception promulgated by this administration.”

– Associated Press

NORTHEAST

TEEN OPENS FIRE IN GAY BAR, INJURING THREE IN POSSIBLE HATE CRIME

NEW BEDFORD, Mass. – A teenager armed with a hatchet and handgun opened fire inside a gay bar early yesterday, wounding at least three people in what police are investigating as a hate crime.

A bartender at Puzzles Lounge told the Associated Press that the young man, dressed all in black, ordered a drink and asked if Puzzles was a gay bar. He finished his drink shortly after midnight, ordered another, then started attacking people, the bartender said. Three were hospitalized yesterday.

Police were searching for 18-year-old Jacob Robida, Police Captain Richard Spirlet said. An arrest warrant sought to charge Mr. Robida with assault, attempted murder, and civil rights violations.

According to a court filing attached to the warrant, his mother told police he came home around 1 a.m., bleeding from the head, then left again. Officers who searched his bedroom found what they described as “Nazi regalia” and anti-Semitic writings on the wall, the police affidavit said. It said Mr. Robida was recognized by a woman in the bar.

Captain Spirlet said the teenager was armed with a handgun and “some sort of cutting instrument” when he walked into Puzzles Lounge.

– Associated Press