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Nuclear missile crew fell asleep on duty

The Air Force said Thursday that it plans to punish three officers who fell asleep on July 12 while guarding a classified nuclear launch codes device. The device contained codes that had been deactivated, but nevertheless their lapse of unconsciousness constituted a 'procedural violation' -- and one which the Air Force wishes to avoid in the wake of Minot Air Force Base's 5th Bomb Wing accidentally flying six warheads over the United States last August. The sleeping officers on July 12 were also from Minot. "While waiting for permission to bring the device back to base, the three officers with the code component in their possession fell asleep," reported the Air Force Times. "The fourth officer was not present. "When they woke up, the officers reported the incident to their command, said Col. Dewey Ford, a Space Command spokesman. Representatives from U.S. Strategic Command, Space Command, the 91st Missile Wing at Minot, the 20th Air Force � headquartered at F.E. Warren Air Force Base, Wyo., and the National Security Agency investigated the incident. They found that the missile launch codes were not compromised." "This does bring a new meaning to the phrase, 'Asleep at the switch,'" said Barbara Starr, a CNN Pentagon correspondent. This video is from CNN's Situation Room, broadcast July 24, 2008.
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Bin Laden thought Flight 93 shot down

Welcome Digg readers! Want to get stories before they break? Get Raw headlines in your browser, or in RSS. GUANTANAMO BAY U.S. NAVAL BASE, Cuba, July 22 (Reuters) - Osama bin Laden's driver knew the target of the fourth hijacked jetliner in the Sept. 11 attacks, a prosecutor said on Tuesday in an attempt to draw a link between Salim Hamdan and the al Qaeda leadership in the first Guantanamo war crimes trial. Hamdan's lawyer said in opening statements that the Yemeni, held for nearly seven years before his trial, was just a paid employee of the fugitive al Qaeda leader, a driver in the motor pool who never joined the militant group or plotted attacks on America. But prosecutor Timothy Stone told the six-member jury of U.S. military officers who will decide Hamdan's guilt or innocence that Hamdan had inside knowledge of the 2001 attacks on the United States because he overheard a conversation between bin Laden and his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri. "If they hadn't shot down the fourth plane it would've hit the dome," Stone, a Navy officer, said in his opening remarks, repeating Bin Laden's deputy's claim. The tribunal's chief prosecutor, Col. Lawrence Morris, later explained that Stone was quoting Hamdan in evidence that will be presented at trial. Morris declined to say if the "dome" was a reference to the U.S. Capitol. "Virtually no one knew the intended target, but the accused knew," Stone said. Latest News: CBS scrubs McCain 9/11 gaffe from broadcast. United Airlines Flight 93 crashed in a field in rural Pennsylvania. U.S. officials have never stated it was shot down although rumors saying that abound to this day. Hamdan, a father of two with a fourth-grade education, is charged with conspiracy and providing material support for terrorism in the first U.S. war crimes trial since World War Two. He could face life in prison if convicted. Prosecutors say Hamdan had access to al Qaeda's inner circle. Stone told the jury that Hamdan earned the trust of bin Laden and helped him flee after attacks on U.S. embassies in East Africa in 1998 and the Sept. 11 attacks. "He served as bodyguard, driver, transported and delivered weapons, ammunition and supplies to al Qaeda," Stone said. Hamdan was being tried in a hilltop courthouse at the U.S. Navy base in Guantanamo Bay, which has been a lightning rod for criticism of the United States since early 2002, when it began housing a prison camp to hold alleged Taliban and al Qaeda fighters from the battlefields of Afghanistan. The war crimes tribunal system has been criticized by human rights groups and defense lawyers, some of them U.S. military officers. Detainees have been held for years without charges. Washington has declared them unlawful enemy combatants not entitled to the rights afforded formal prisoners of war. Responding to the widespread criticism, Morris, the chief prosecutor, said on Tuesday: "In my opinion they are seeing the most just war crimes trial that anyone has ever seen." WORKED FOR WAGES Defense lawyer Harry Schneider described Hamdan as a poor Yemeni who lost his parents at a young age and lived on the streets, where he developed a knack for fixing cars. "The evidence is that he worked for wages. He didn't wage attacks on America," he said. "He had a job because he had to earn a living, not because he had a jihad against America." "There will be no evidence that Mr. Hamdan espoused or believed or embraced any form of what you will hear about, radical Islam beliefs, extremist Muslim beliefs," he said. The first two prosecution witnesses were U.S. military officers who were in Afghanistan during the early days of the U.S. invasion in 2001. Both addressed a key issue at trial -- whether Hamdan had surface-to-air missiles when he was captured at a checkpoint near Takhteh Pol in November 2001. Defense lawyers dispute the prosecution's contention that Hamdan had the weapons. But a U.S. officer identified only as "Sergeant Major A" said the missiles were found in the "trunk of a car driven by Mr. Hamdan." He said troops also found a mortar manual with "al Qaeda" on the front, a book by bin Laden and a card issued to al Qaeda fighters and signed by Mullah Omar, the Taliban commander. Ali Soufan, an al Qaeda expert with the FBI, took the jury through a long description of al Qaeda's hierarchy and called bin Laden "the emir, the prince." He said Hamdan was part of bin Laden's security detail. "The people who are around bin Laden have to be trusted ... true believers in the cause," he said. (Editing by Eric Beech)

Defense firm sued over racial incident

Marvin Jackson, a former employee of US defense contractor Northrop Grumman, has filed a lawsuit claiming he was fired after complaining of a co-worker's use of the 'n-word.' His plight became the focus of a report on CNN's American Morning on Thursday. "In this particular case, Marvin Jackson says he was at work, he was at Northrop Grumman, and a coworker came up to him and said, 'Hey, what's up my ... N-word," said CNN reporter Sunny Hostin. "Actually, the co-worker's defense in this was, 'I was trying to bond. I grew up in the inner-city, I am white, but this is a term of endearment, and this is something that I use.'" Marvin Jackson did not see it that way. And, he claims, his complaint over the exchange cost him his job. "I don't use that word with my friends, and my friends don't use it with me," Jackson told CNN. "And I'm not a friend of this person, and he has no right to address me in that manner." "As one of our nation's leading defense suppliers, Northrop Grumman is proud to be an equal employment opportunity employer -- one which does not tolerate racial discrimination or harassment in any form in the workplace," said Katherine Lamb-Heinz, a spokesperson for Northrop. "Because legal proceedings associated with Mr. Jackson's case are still pending, it would be improper for us to discuss the details of his allegations." "We're seeing a lot of this," said CNN's Hostin. "These 'n-word' lawsuits. And in January 2008, Lockheed-Martin paid $2.5 million to settle a similar racial harassment lawsuit. $2.5 million to an African-American electrician who was subjected to the 'n-word'. I think the takeaway here is it's never appropriate to use that type of word, in my view ever, but certainly not in the workplace." This video is from CNN's American Morning, broadcast July 24, 2008. Download video

100,000 support 'Send Rove to Jail'

SendRoveToJail.com. That's the name of the website now claiming to have over 101,000 signatures in their campaign to urge the House Judiciary Committee to cite former White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove for contempt. Rove failed to testify after being subpoenaed by the Judiciary Committee to provide information regarding the selective prosecution of former Alabama Democratic Governor Don Siegelman. RAW STORY's reporting on Siegelman's case, along with that of CBS' 60 Minutes, sparked a national outcry that resulted in Siegelman being let out of jail pending appeal. "We call on the the House Judiciary Committee to cite Rove with contempt for failing to comply with a Congressional subpoena," the petition at the website reads. "Since Rove regards the law with such contempt, it's high time the law and Congress hold him in contempt as well. We demand the [Committee] let Rove know he can't decide which subpoenas he obeys and which he ignores." Both the Committee and House Democrats have subpoenaed numerous Bush Administration officials. Some have failed to show up, while others, like former Attorney General John Ashcroft, repeatedly declined to answer, citing their own forgetfulness. "I must admit, it's been difficult for me sometimes to distinguish between what I in fact recall as a matter of my own experience, and what I remember from the accounts of others," the former Attorney General said on July 17. Next Tuesday, a coalition of organizations -- including Brave New Films, The Nation magazine, Campaign for America's Future, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, Progress Now Action and CREDO Mobile -- will deliver the petition to the House Judiciary Committee. The online petition, created by Brave New Films and housed at SendRoveToJail.com, claims to have amassed over 100,000 names in less than six days. As of Thursday morning, the total was 101,722. "Karl Rove is not above the law," Robert Greenwald, founder and president of Brave New Films, said in a release. "Rove's refusal to comply with a Congressional subpoena makes a mockery of the justice system. Even former high government officials like Rove are accountable to the law. Rove needs to learn that we live in a democracy, not a dictatorship." "Karl Rove has built a career out of bending the law, but now he seems to feel entitled simply to break it," added Michael Kieschnick, President of CREDO Mobile. "We expect the House Judiciary Committee to agree that Karl Rove is in contempt and should be sent to jail if he persists in his flagrant disregard for the laws of this country." The "Send Rove to Jail" campaign follows the liberal film company's "Lieberman Must Go" campaign. It was also a Brave New Films video that exposed Senator John McCain's (R-AZ) relationship with the controversial Reverend Rod Parsley, forcing McCain to denounce the pastor's endorsement.

Nas berates O'Reilly 'racism'

Nas, who like many hip hop stars has been regularly sneered at by Fox News personality Bill O'Reilly, says the conservative talker and others on the network spew racism that makes Rupert Murdoch's 24-hour cable news outlet unfit to participate in the public discourse. His comments come in the wake of a public outcry over comments made by radio host Don Imus, who was fired from CBS radio in April. Imus subsequently sued CBS for terminating his contract unfairly and settled with the network in August. Nas showed up at the Fox News studios Wednesday to present a petition signed by 620,000 people denouncing racist campaign coverage. The network gleefully spread the rumor that Democratic candidate Barack Obama, the first African American to top a major party ticket, was educated in a Madrassa, referred to his fist bump as a "terrorist fist jab," called Michelle Obama his Baby Mama and hosted a guest who joked about killing Obama. Oh, and the network's anchors seem especially fond of Obama's middle name, Hussein. And any list of Fox's transgressions would be incomplete without mention of O'Reilly's musings on a "lynching party" for Michelle Obama. Fox wouldn't accept the petition, and O'Reilly refused an invitation to debate Nas, so the rapper took his message to satirical O'Reilly stand-in Stephen Colbert. "Why do you think Fox News is racist?" Colbert asked, feigning shock. "That's a terrible thing to say. It's Fox and Friends not Fox and racists." Nas, sitting atop some of the 20 crates he earlier in the day had tried to deliver to Fox News' Manhattan studio, laid into the host Colbert jokingly refers to as Papa Bear. "Everybody that has eyes and ears can see that this guy is out of control," Nas said of O'Reilly. "He knows what he's doing. ... It's out of line, and the things he's saying is worse than the worst rap lyrics I've ever heard." O'Reilly has been attacking Nas since the performer was booked for a memorial concert at Virginia Tech University last year. The Fox host said Nas' lyrics are inappropriate, charges he has leveled against other stars in the past, such as Ludacris. Nas told Colbert his lyrics were simply reflecting reality growing up in the inner city. He said television should focus on how guns and violence crept into neighborhoods like his instead of demonizing performers who are simply speaking the truth. The protest outside Fox's studio Wednesday afternoon was organized with the help of MoveOn.org and ColorOfChange.org. About 150 protesters joined Nas, some wielding signs that crossed out the network's "Fair and Balanced" slogan and replaced it with the words "Fairly Racist!" Nas raps about the network's bias in the song "Sly Fox," from his new album. He performed an excerpt from it on Colbert's show. "Fox poisons this country every time they air racist propaganda and try and call it news," he said at the demonstration. This video is from Comedy Central's The Colbert Report, broadcast July 23, 2008.
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This video of Nas outside the Fox News studios was posted to YouTube:

With wire reports