The Earlybird: Today's headlines

Pakistan demands bin Laden, Cheney talks U.S. wrath, Secret Service suppresses Bush's schedule, Fed cuts interest rates, markets to open, Congress wants to keep Rudy around:

• "A Pakistani delegation arrived in Afghanistan early today to demand that the ruling Taliban turn over suspected terrorist Osama bin Laden," the Houston Chronicle reports.
• Pakistani officials "cautioned that the chances of the Taliban bowing to the American demand were slim," the New York Times reports.
• "The Federal Reserve cut a key interest rate by one-half point Monday, to 3 percent," AP reports.
• "As signs mounted yesterday that Washington is on an imminent war footing, President Bush said he had notified the leaders of Pakistan, India and Saudi Arabia of his intentions and received 'positive' support for a sustained campaign against terrorism, the Washington Post reports. Today Bush will meet with Pentagon officials to "review military plans."
• Bush may travel to Somerset County, Pa., today to attend a memorial for the victims of the United Airlines Flight 93 crash, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reports. The White House would not confirm Bush's travel plans.
• Bush's schedule, which used to be made public in advance, "now will be secret until each morning" for security reasons, USA Today reports.

• Vice President Dick Cheney said on NBC's "Meet the Press" Sunday that Bush "had ordered U.S. fighter jets to shoot down civilian aircraft, if necessary, to protect the nation's capital Tuesday immediately after terrorists crashed hijacked planes into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon," the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports. MSNBC has a transcript of the interview.
• Cheney also said "the CIA must change its policy of not paying operatives with ties to terrorist groups when working to uncover schemes against America," AP reports.
• Cheney said that "bin Laden definitely played a role" in the attacks "and is a U.S. target whose death would be welcome," the Houston Chronicle reports.
• And Cheney "pledged to unleash 'the full wrath of the United States' against all who shelter bin Laden," the Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel reports.

• Attorney General John Ashcroft said during a news conference Sunday that "he would ask Congress to expand the FBI and CIA's intelligence-gathering arsenal by loosening restrictions on wiretapping and the hiring of new agents," the Dallas Morning News reports.
• Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said Sunday that the war on terrorism will take years, the Baltimore Sun reports.

• "A host of suspicions and resentments make it likely... that the fractiousness that has defined modern politics could soon reappear," the Washington Post reports.
• Reps. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., and Jane Harman, D-Calif., "are being thrust into high-profile roles as the leaders of a new House panel created to deal with the fallout" from last week's assaults, Roll Call reports. The two lawmakers "will be given subpoena power and charged with issuing a report outlining recommendations on how the United States can avoid future terrorist attacks."
• Some members of Congress "are investigating ways to suspend New York City's mayoral election to keep retiring Mayor Rudolph Giuliani in charge," U.S. News & World Report's "Washington Whispers" reports.
• "A Senate measure calling for another round of [military base] closings had been slated for debate this week but has been put on indefinite hold," Scripps Howard News Service reports.
• "Serious flaws" in Congress' evacuation plans were revealed last week, the Washington Times reports, and internal reviews are expected.
• "Congressional officials are racing to devise an improved emergency response plan for Members and staff in the event of another crisis," Roll Call reports.
• Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., "has made it clear" that he believes CIA Director George J. Tenet should be replaced, the Washington Times reports.
• A cousin of Rep. Joseph Crowley, D-N.Y., firefighter John Moran, is was one of the rescue workers missing in the World Trade Center rescue effort, the Washington Post reports.

• Bin Laden on Sunday issued a statement to the Arabic satellite channel Al Jazeera denying that he was responsible for last week's attacks, CNN.com reports. But Bush said bin Laden continues to be the "prime suspect."
• Two of the suspected hijackers were under investigation by the FBI at the time of the attacks "after the agency received information from the CIA that the men were associated with the terrorist organization of Osama bin Laden," Newsweek reports.
• Intelligence experts told the Boston Globe that the United States does not have good intelligence in Afghanistan and is "in the awkward position of relying entirely on foreign governments in the Muslim world for information on the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden."
• Intelligence officials said "they have no evidence about specific planned attacks," but they believe "that Tuesday's devastating strikes were part of a broader terrorist plot and that some of those involved were still at large," the Miami Herald reports. Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Bob Graham, D-Fla., said the attacks could include nuclear, chemical or biological weapons.
• Sources told AP on Sunday that former President Clinton "signed a secret directive in 1998 authorizing U.S. efforts to capture or disrupt Osama bin Laden and his terrorism network, and several unsuccessful attempts were made."

• The Taliban shut down airspace over Afghanistan today, AP reports.
• "Pakistan virtually shut down its border with Afghanistan on Monday, no longer allowing Afghan refugees into the country and confining those already there to the dozens of camps in the north," AP reports.
• As many as 10,000 Afghans may have fled to nearby Iran during the past few days out of fear of U.S. retaliation in their country, CNN.com reports.
• Intelligence officials said Sunday that "military forces in Iran and Iraq have begun dispersing throughout those countries in anticipation of retaliatory U.S. military attacks," the Washington Times reports.
• "The United States embassy in Pakistan, fearing fallout from military strikes on Afghanistan, said on Monday it had asked Washington to allow the departure of all non-essential staff and dependents," Reuters reports.

• British Prime Minister Tony Blair said Sunday that "the international community gives its full backing to the fight 'between the civilised world and fanaticism,'" CNN.com reports.
• German President Johannes Rau said "that he does not expect the German army will take part in a military reponse to the terror attacks in the U.S." and that the terrorists should be tried in court, CNN.com reports.
• Iran's Islamic Republic News Agency, however, reports that German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder "refused to rule out German military participation."
• "Italian Defense Minister Antonio Martino on Sunday said Italian troops would not take part in any US retaliation after the terror attacks and that use of the term 'war' was inappropriate," Agence France-Presse reports.
• Amr Moussa, secretary general of the 22-nation Arab League, said during an interview this weekend that "the United States must consult countries around the world before retaliating for last week's devastating attacks," the Boston Globe reports.
• Pope John Paul II said he was "heartbroken" over the attacks, but he urged restraint and a commitment to peace in responding, CNN.com reports.

• Four people have been flown to New York for questioning, including "Zacarias Moussauoi, who raised suspicions at a flight training facility near Minneapolis and was arrested on Aug. 17 on a passport violation," two men "who were pulled off a train in Fort Worth Wednesday with box cutters in their possession," and an unidentified person who was "also brought in from Texas," the New York Times reports.
• "One of the men suspected of crashing American Airlines Flight 77 into the Pentagon had flown over the Washington area in small planes at least three times over the past six weeks," the Washington Post reports.
• Federal officials "are trying to determine whether a man who gained access to the control tower at Boston's Logan International Airport, and identified himself to controllers as an airline pilot with family in Afghanistan, is one of the hijackers responsible for the destruction of the World Trade Center," the Boston Globe reports.
• Thirteen New Jersey men "have been detained by the FBI for questioning about the World Trade Center and Pentagon terror attacks," the Newark Star Ledger reports.
• Two men believed to be connected to the attacks regularly went to a South Florida library and motel to use the Internet, the Miami Herald reports.
• FBI agents "searched apartments and questioned residents in several South Florida cities on Sunday," the Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel reports. Nationwide, the FBI is checking out "more than 69,000 leads and tips."

• Rescue workers "dug down on Sunday to the lowest level below the remains of the World Trade Center -- a commuter rail station 80 feet underground -- but still found no survivors," AP reports.
• As rescuers searched through the rubble at the World Trade Center site yesterday, "no intact bodies were recovered, only dozens of shattered body parts," the New York Post reports.
• The New York Post reports crime in New York City "has dropped about 30 percent for the week to date, Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik said."
• A story that was first reported Sunday in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette details the final 15 minutes of United Airlines Flight 93, which crashed in Pennsylvania soon after passenger Todd Beamer was heard saying to fellow passengers: "Are you guys ready? Let's roll!"
• Unidentified Defense officials told CNN yesterday that in the minutes following Tuesday's attacks on the World Trade Center, the Federal Aviation Administration "warned the military's air defense command that a hijacked airliner appeared to be headed toward Washington," but "the federal government failed to make any move to evacuate" federal buildings.

• Trading resumes on the stock market today, and "Wall Street is bracing for wild swings in stock prices," USA Today reports. "Many analysts expect stocks to plunge sharply when trading opens but then stabilize and trend higher once the initial panic subsides."
• Treasury Secretary Paul H. O'Neill will be "on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange when it reopens at 9:30 Monday morning," the New York Times reports.
• "European central bankers may also act soon" to cut interest rates, Bloomberg reports.

• Virginia gubernatorial candidates Mark Earley (R) and Mark Warner (D) "began their gradual reentry into a campaign" on Sunday with parade appearances, the Washington Post reports. A debate tonight at George Mason University was canceled, but both plan to resume their campaigns "in earnest" this week.
• Warner and Earley "and their advisors are trying to calculate the impact of the past week, conceding that the tools of modern politics, such as polls, focus groups and telephone banks, may prove to be ineffective," the Richmond Times-Dispatch reports.
• New Jersey gubernatorial hopefuls Jim McGreevey (D) and Bret Schundler (R) are "fine-tuning their campaigns behind the scenes," though "publicly they are observing an unofficial moratorium on political activities that could last for days or even weeks," the Philadelphia Inquirer reports.
• Rep. Richard Burr, R-N.C., announced he will remain in the House and not seek the GOP nomination for Senate, Roll Call reports.
• Gubernatorial hopefuls in Illinois halted their campaigns, but "some scrambled to find a way to raise their profiles," the Chicago Tribune reports. Lt. Gov. Corinne Wood (R) "was tapped by the governor to coordinate Illinois' relief efforts with the American Red Cross," while state Attorney General Jim Ryan (R) "announced an assault on gasoline price-gouging."

• A man was charged with murder in Arizona on Sunday "after he allegedly fired at two gas stations and a home, killing an Indian immigrant inside one gas station," AP reports.
• Dallas police and the FBI are "investigating whether the shooting death of a Pakistani grocer in Pleasant Grove was out of anger at Muslims for Tuesday's terrorist attacks," the Dallas Morning News reports.

• Cheney, Rumsfeld and Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta all said Sunday that "they had serious security questions about reopening" National Airport, which is "uniquely convenient to downtown but also uniquely poised as a launching point for terrorist attacks."
• The International Monetary Fund and the World Bank are postponing their annual meetings set for later this month in Washington, AP reports.
• Stories carried by many major news organizations about the arrests of 10 armed men at New York airports were false, the Washington Post reports. None "had weapons, and most were quickly released."