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The Earlybird: Today's headlines
- Today Bush will introduce his education package, which will include "early literacy programs, annual assessment comparing progress among racial groups and an escape hatch that would make federal money portable for families in failing schools," the New York Times reports. The Washington Times reports that Bush met with a group of Democrats Monday to try to convince them to support the plan.
- During lunch with congressional Republicans Monday, Bush "indicated he may be planning to inundate the Congress with a steady series of bills for consideration," CNN.com reports.
- Bush will make his first foreign trip as president to Mexico on Feb. 16, Reuters reports. He will discuss "trade, immigration and illegal drugs" with Mexican President Vicente Fox.
- Secretary of State Colin Powell will meet with Canadian Foreign Minister John Manley in Washington this week, though State Department officials would not reveal what the topic of discussion will be, CNN.com reports.
- The Washington Times looks at three areas in which the new administration "is shaping up to be different from its Republican predecessors," including restructuring "the party's relationship to the White House, by using Republican governors as spokesmen between elections and by increasing outreach efforts to black voters."
- The Treasury Department announced Monday that the budget surplus was $32.7 billion in December, slightly less than the surplus for December 1999, Nando Times reports.
- The Senate Judiciary Committee will hold a vote Wednesday on the confirmation of Attorney General nominee John Ashcroft, the New York Times reports.
- On Monday, the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Development Committee voted unanimously to approve Mel Martinez's nomination as secretary of housing and urban development, Reuters reports.
- Michael Powell has been named the new chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, the Wall Street Journal reports. His father is Secretary of State Colin Powell. Reuters reports M. Powell's "record at the commission shows he is more reticent to regulate the constantly changing industries and instead let the marketplace work to compete."
- Interior Secretary nominee Gale Norton "made a series of recorded telephone calls in competitive legislative races in Colorado just before last November's election asserting that Democrats were engaged in a 'smear campaign,'" the New York Times reports. In the calls, Norton did not identify herself as a member of the GOP.
- Rep. Asa Hutchinson, R-Ark., confirmed yesterday that he is being considered for a post at the Department of Justice, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reports.
- Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., introduced his campaign finance legislation Monday, even though President Bush has said passing the legislation won't be one of his first priorities, CNN.com reports.
- Sen. Phil Gramm, R-Texas, said during a press conference Monday that he will pursue a new bankruptcy overhaul bill similar to the one vetoed by President Clinton last year, AP reports.
- Gramm and Sen. Zell Miller, D-Ga., introduced the Bush tax cut package Monday, AP reports. The Washington Post reports that Senate Minority Leader Thomas A. Daschle, D-S.D., "offered a separate package of more targeted tax reductions."
- Four of the seven inmates who escaped from a Texas prison in December were arrested in Colorado Monday after a "tipster" who called "America's Most Wanted" reported that they were living in an RV park, the Denver Post reports. A fifth inmate committed suicide and the remaining two are still at large and believed to be living in a van.
- Police are stepping up the effort to find the remaining inmates, who could be even more dangerous than the others, the Dallas Morning News reports. "Officers predict that the two would respond with violence if confronted by police or well-intentioned residents."
- During peace negotiations Monday with Israel, Palestinian negotiators "issued a caustic attack on the Clinton administration's 'mistakes and failures' in earlier negotiations" and "suggested that the exit of President Clinton and his team was one of the factors in prompting the Palestinians to call for a new push to remove the obstacles to a peace deal," the New York Times reports.
- U.S. Ambassador Barbara Bodine "was aboard a Yemeni airways plane that was hijacked on a domestic flight Tuesday," but she is now safe, AP reports.
- Great Britain on Monday approved legislation that will legalize human cloning, AP reports.
- Taiwan President Chen Shui-bian has asked the Bush administration to sell his nation "advanced" weapons, the Washington Times reports.
- Scientists at a United Nations conference on Monday said that global warming will cause "brutal droughts, floods and violent storms across the planet over the next century because air pollution," the Washington Post Foreign Service reports.
- Last week's oil spill in the Galapagos islands is spreading and is now threatening the environment there, AP reports. "Ecuador declared a state of emergency Monday night."
- "With a newfound hope that the current administration will be more sympathetic to their cause than the last," thousands of anti-abortion activists held a "March for Life" to the Supreme Court Monday, the Washington Times reports.
- The court said Monday that it will hear an Oklahoma case to decide "whether Indian tribes, like states, are exempt from some gambling taxes," AP reports.
- The court also agreed to hear a First Amendment case to decide whether "a federal law that prohibits computer-generated 'virtual' child pornography" is constitutional, USA Today reports.
- But the court will not "get involved in pop singer Michael Bolton's long battle to avoid a $5.4 million judgment for allegedly stealing a 1960s Isley Brothers tune," AP reports.
- Massachusetts Senate President Thomas Birmingham (D) has a war chest of more than $2.2 million for his 2002 gubernatorial bid against Gov. Paul Cellucci (R), who has raised $924,000, the Boston Globe reports.
- Sen. Phil Gramm, R-Texas, announced that he will seek re-election in 2002, the Dallas Morning News reports.
- In Wisconsin, Assembly Speaker Scott Jensen (R) announced that he is abandoning his "much-anticipated candidacy for governor in 2002," the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports.
- In Virginia, the state House "killed a proposed constitutional amendment that would have allowed gubernatorial succession," the Richmond Times-Disptach reports.
- Former Carolina Panther Rae Carruth "was sentenced Monday to spend 18 to 24 years in prison for masterminding a conspiracy that led to the murder of his pregnant girlfriend," the Raleigh News & Observer reports.
- The Rev. Jesse Jackson spoke "to black ministers and public officials at Rainbow/PUSH headquarters" on Chicago's South Side yesterday, the Chicago Sun-Times reports. "Jackson focused a double-barreled attack on the administration of President Bush and his confederate agenda.'"
- Lynne Cheney has returned to work as a lecturer and writer at the American Enterprise Institute, AP reports. Ms. Cheney is the first wife of a sitting vice president to hold a job in the private sector.
- Rep. Mary Bono, R-Calif., "will have a benign mass removed from her lower abdomen today and will miss several weeks in Congress while recuperating," the Los Angeles Times reports.
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