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The coalition of the willing that went to war in Iraq is becoming the coalition of the disappearing.

President Bush and Iraqi President Jalal Talabani formally thanked the diminishing band of allies at a meeting Tuesday night on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly. The low-key, low-profile gathering stood in stark contrast to the early days of Bush’s administration, when hot debates over the war formed the centerpiece of the annual global forum.

“It’s a pleasure to be with nations that have helped your democracy grow,” Bush told Talabani in a room packed with representatives of more than two dozen countries that have contributed in Iraq. “A lot of people around the world have made sacrifices along with the Iraqi people to enable a country to emerge from the shadows of tyranny — become a hopeful example for nations around the world.”

At its height, the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq included 50,000 troops from more than three dozen countries other than the United States. But by the next 90 days or so, that global coalition will shrink to just a handful of nations, according to White House advisers.

The White House says that isn’t because international support is dwindling, but because security gains and the increased capability of Iraqi forces allow outside forces to do more with less.

“Many of the troops of the countries represented here have returned home, but they have done so on success,” Bush said at the reception.

Iraq is drafting bilateral agreements with the U.S. and other countries to replace a U.N. mandate that authorizes their presence now but which expires at year’s end. The White House has not disclosed the names of countries likely to remain in Iraq after the expiration of the U.N. mandate, saying it’s up to the Iraqi government to seal each agreement on its own.

The president was careful not to imply that all is well in Iraq.

Bush’s military buildup last year — along with several key local factors as well — did help to quell violence. But security gains were meant to provide breathing room for political reconciliation, and progress there has been spotty.

On Wednesday, Iraq’s parliament overwhelmingly approved a provincial elections law, setting the stage for local elections believed to be an essential step to building a long-term peace among the country’s rival religious and ethnic communities. Bush issued a statement of congratulations to Iraqi leaders for working together, saying “nothing is more central to a functioning democracy than free and fair elections.”

Lasting power-sharing agreements have been elusive in Iraq so far. The law still needs approval by the country’s three-member presidential panel.

“Mr. President, we’ve still got work to do,” Bush told Talabani. “But there is no doubt that the situation in Iraq has changed substantially.”

According to a list provided by the White House, representatives of the following nations were recognized at the meeting for past or ongoing contributions: Albania, Australia, Azerbaijan, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, El Salvador, Estonia, Georgia, Hungary, Italy, Japan, Kazakhstan, South Korea, Latvia, Lithuania, Macedonia, Moldova, Mongolia, Montenegro, Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Slovenia, Tonga, Turkey and the United Kingdom.

“I’m here on behalf of the Iraqi people to express my deepest appreciation for all countries who participated in the breaking Iraq from worst kind of dictatorship,” Talabani said. “I want to express my deepest condolences for your brave soldiers and civilians who have lost their lives while standing up for our shared values of freedom and democracy.”

In the fall of 2002, Bush went to the United Nations and got a strong U.N. Security Council resolution demanding that former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein give up all unconventional weapons and open his country to new arms inspections. Former Secretary of State Colin Powell’s congressional testimony in early 2003 documenting Saddam’s weapons programs was based, as it turned out later, on faulty U.S. intelligence.

But when Bush went to war in Iraq in spring 2003, he did so without U.N. backing — amassing the coalition on his own instead, with often tiny contributions from other countries. The United States has always contributed the vast majority of troops — 250,000 out of 300,000 at its height.

The number of people without health insurance fell by more than 1 million in 2007, the first annual decline since the Bush administration took office, the Census Bureau reported Tuesday. Incomes edged up for the middle class while poverty held steady.

The numbers represent a scorecard on President Bush’s stewardship of the economy at the kitchen-table level. But they only went as far as the end of last year, before the current economic downturn started gathering force. Although there were some bright spots, it was a mixed picture.

While the overall poverty rate held steady at 12.5 percent, poverty did rise among some groups. Latinos, children and the foreign-born — demographic categories that overlap considerably — experienced significant increases.

And while the number of uninsured dropped to 45.7 million, down from 47 million in 2006, it was largely because more people were covered through government programs.

For the middle class, the median — or midpoint — household income rose to $50,233, a modest increase of $665 from the previous year, although it was the third consecutive annual rise.

“The gains that occurred last year were welcome, but unfortunately, they are too little, too late,” said Jared Bernstein, a senior economist with the liberal Economic Policy Institute in Washington. “The median household is no better off now than they were back in 2000, despite their deep contribution to the nation’s economic growth during this period.”

For example, after adjusting for inflation, last year’s median household income of $50,233 was not significantly different from the figure for 2000, which was $50,557. “The American work force is baking a bigger economic pie, but the slices haven’t grown at all,” Bernstein said.

But White House spokesman Tony Fratto said the household income and health insurance numbers are definitely good news.

“It’s clear that the long period of strong economic growth we were in had a positive impact for most Americans,” Fratto said. “Obviously today we’re dealing with higher energy prices and the downturn in housing, but the economy is showing enough resilience to keep growing in spite of those challenges.”

Republican candidate John McCain distanced himself from the White House response, saying in a statement, “Too many of our neighbors are living in poverty, too many can’t find a job, and too many are living without health insurance.” The Arizona senator pledged tax cuts and policy changes to make health care more affordable.

Some analysts said that global trends, not just administration policies, are shaping the economic fortunes of individual Americans.

“Presidents like to take credit when things go well, and therefore they should get the blame when things don’t go well, but there are lots of things driving this, not all of which are home grown,” said Douglas Besharov, an expert on poverty at the business-oriented American Enterprise Institute. “The oil shocks are not. And globalization, which on balance is good for the country, leaves winners and losers.”

The Census report was immediately swept up into presidential politics. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama’s campaign fired off a statement blasting what it called the “failed record” of Bush’s economic policies and promising “bottom up economic growth” if the Illinois senator is elected.

Overall, the Census found 37.3 million people living in poverty in 2007, of which 13.3 million were children. The poverty level for a four-person family in 2007 was $21,203. Among age groups, seniors had the lowest poverty rate at 9.7 percent, while children had the highest at 18 percent. The poverty rate for 2006 was 12.3 percent, but the change in 2007 was not statistically significant.

The welcome news on health insurance coverage was tempered by the continued erosion of private coverage paid for by employers and individuals. Government programs — such as Medicaid for the poor — picked up the slack, resulting in the overall reduction in people without health insurance.

The uninsured rate also fell to 15.3 percent, down from 15.8 percent in 2006.

“Private insurance has been falling (and) public insurance definitely went up,” said David Johnson, who oversees the Census division that produced the statistics. The number of uninsured children also fell in 2007, after an increase in 2006 that had interrupted years of progress in getting more kids covered.

But seen over a longer period of time, the health insurance numbers are not reassuring. The number of uninsured — and the rate — are higher today than they were at the outset of the Bush administration in 2001. That year, 39.8 million people, or 14.1 percent, were uninsured.

“The number of uninsured is considerably higher than when the president took office, and in each year since then, employer-sponsored insurance has continued to diminish,” said Ron Pollack, executive director of Families USA, a liberal group advocating coverage for all.

Stuart Butler, a top health policy expert at the conservative Heritage Foundation, said employers are scaling back on providing health care coverage because costs keep rising.

“I think it’s more like we are seeing a tide that I don’t think anybody can easily fix, particularly in the small-business sector,” said Butler.

The Census report also underscored the growing role of women in the workplace, finding the gap between the earnings of women and men has shrunk to an all-time low.

In 2007, women working full-time, year-round averaged 78 percent of what men earned. But the gender gap varied considerably depending on the industries and types of jobs involved. And the good news for women may not necessarily be a positive for family incomes. The Census found that a major reason the gap is shrinking is that men’s earnings have been fairly flat.

Cell phone calls on airplanes in flight are not only unsafe, they’re obnoxious and they should be permanently banned, according to some members of Congress.

House members, most of whom board airplanes almost every week, traded horror stories Thursday about their worst experiences with annoying fellow passengers who talk loudly on cell phones before takeoff and after landing. One lawmaker said his wife sat next to a woman who loudly discussed her sex life on the phone.

Another House member topped that with the passenger sitting him behind on one flight who got a “dear John” phone call from either his wife or sweetheart just before takeoff. The begging and pleading was just terrible to listen to, he said. Finally, with the plane ready to take off, a flight attendant had to threaten to have U.S. Marshals drag the man off the plane before he finally put his phone away.

A third House member raised the specter of national security, saying she’d witnessed one man use his cell phone camera to take pictures of sensitive parts of the airplane.

With that, the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee approved by voice vote a bill that would make the current Federal Aviation Administration and Federal Communication Commission ban on cell phone use during flight permanent.

The committee’s action comes as the European Union is moving to allow airline passengers to talk on their cell phones during flight. Some U.S. airlines are experimenting with in-flight Internet access. And some lawmakers worry that domestic airlines might try to get the cell phone ban lifted so they can charge passengers extra to sit in no-phone sections.

“I do believe this is important that we don’t make what is already a crowded and difficult environment for the traveling public and flight attendants” worse by allowing cell phone use in-flight, said Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore., sponsor of the Halting Airplane Noise to Give Us Peace (HANG UP) Act.

But Rep. John Mica, R-Fla., said there are a lot of annoying things on airplanes, including children with dirty diapers and noisy MP3 players, but that doesn’t mean they should be banned.

“You are trying to legislate courtesy, folks, and that just doesn’t work,” Mica said.

While many have bewailed the complexity of tax laws, making them almost incomprehensible to the ordinary taxpayer, e-file services have greatly simplified the process. By making use of available online services, income tax preparation has become easier than ever.

One of the advantages of making use of online programs is that it minimizes errors, mistakes and inaccuracies.

Assessments online

Online services provide easy tools for assessing tax liabilities. The individual taxpayer does not have to be alone in determining the tax credits, exemptions, deductions or refunds he might be entitled to, nor in computing with the applicable federal or state tax rates applicable. While the process is made is made simplified as possible, assistance is also made readily available to those who desire further help. Already this can help minimize disagreements in tax assessments.

Online Filing

One of the obvious advantages of online filing or e-filing is the minimal use of papers and documents. It is also a speedy and efficient way of settling transactions and tax liabilities, since it can be done easily over the internet. This of course helps the taxpayer file his income tax returns well within the legal time limits, reducing the chances of additional charges or penalties.

You may have heard of some Greek organizations in the news for hazing new members. And, while hazing once was very popular it is no longer the case. That is because sororities and fraternities like Alpha Kappa Alpha are adhering to strict guidelines set forth by their universities in regards to hazing.
Hazing is considered as any act or action that may potentially harm a person emotionally, physically, psychologically, or anything of this nature. This does not matter whether the individual is becoming part of the Greek organization or not. Hazing is a serious infraction of many university regulations and any Greek organization not abiding by these rules will be reprimanded.
This is good news for all the new recruits who are interested in joining Zeta Tau Alpha. Or, those who want to pledge Alpha Xi Delta. Nobody wants to be hazed but many students accept it simply because they want to be part of the Greek organization.
The reason hazing has practically been outlawed is because many student deaths and illnesses occurred that were highlighted in the news. Action has been taken against those organizations and now hazing is severely limited if it occurs at all.

1. im so happy about it and cant wait for the peso to take the lead……sarcasm
2. im so happy about it and cant wait for the peso to take the lead……sarcasm
3. Yes it is correct. The dollar is in steep decline since Bush came into office. If you peruse the Internet and dig up the Dollar Index chart you’ll notice that the dollar has fallen from 120 on the chart when Bush took office to about 76 on the chart today.

   Tax cuts for the rich combined with massive war spending are never a good thing for the value of a currency. None-the-less, that policy can serve to further enrich a cabal of wealthy elites at the expense of the general public — which is exactly what capitalism is designed to do.

4. yes, it is correct.
   today CAD is worth more than USD.

   1 USD = 0.98321 CAD

5. I personally believe that we wouldnt be in the pickel that we are if the “responsable” people we have elected to office for the past 25 yrs would stop spending money like a 16 year old with there dads credit card…

   How strong does our economy really look to outsiders when we havent stopped borrowing money since the was it reagan or nixon?

6. It’s more correct to say that the American dollar is worth less than the Canadian dollar, since the Canadian dollar is worth less than it used to be. Look at the price of gold: $800 per ounce!

   The Federal Reserve is printing paper federal reserve notes rather than the U.S. mint coining gold and silver. That’s why we have inflation.

   Ron Paul wants to return to honest money and abolish the Federal Reserve. He has my vote.

7. http://finance.yahoo.com/currency/conver…
8. Yes it is, 1 US dollar to .98 Canadian cents. I really don’t think too much about it; I’m still looking forward to my Quebec trip in January

1. Absolutely!!

2. No. The President needs to be intelligent and powerful enough not to be a puppet.

3. Nope.

4. Oh my god no. She is the freakiest person I ever heard of. She makes absolutely no sense when she talks. She speaks in that government speak and does not make any sense. Have I mentioned she makes no sense?

5. Possibly, a black woman being president would be GREAT, but I don’t think there’s a chance she would ever run. She does seem to agree with EVERYTHING Bush does, other than that I think she could handle the job.

6. From what I have seen of her, I would seriously consider her as a viable candidate.

7. I would sooner vote for Condie than for Hillary

8. Helllllllllllllllllllllll Nooooooooooooooooooo!

9. It depends on who she ran against but she is definitely very highly regarded by me.

10. nope…no way …not a frig’n shot, she’s as bad as bush and darth cheney

11. Possibly, yes. IMHO, she’s the most qualified woman in America. However, she has never held an elected position in government. I say that she’d be a good VP running mate for the republican party … that would get Hillary’s and the democrat party’s panties in a bunch!

12. I would vote for her before I would Hillary Clinton. And with the way she handling foreign relations and the mid-eastern peace talks I think she would make a good president.

13. Maybe, depend on the other choice

14. She was so weak as the national security adviser and the Secretary of state that Donald Rumsfeld and the defense department bullied their way in to dictating what state department policy should be.

She would be a weak president.

15. depends on her stances and ideals, but i wouldn’t out right rule it out.

16. You bet. It’s nice to have a leader with class. And she’s tough and is a good speaker.

Joey, what a great idea!

17. No, since I never voted for her in anything in the first place. I want to know who the People get to nominate? All we get is a premade selection of choices that I would never make in the first place.

Environmental conditions in China are poor and getting worse. Its energy demands are

expanding exponentially, and the only way for it to keep up is fossil fuel energy

production. As a result, they are building thousands of coal fire power plants and

negotiating oil deals around the world.

There are some conservation efforts, but these efforts are limited by severe population

pressures–you can’t conserve a lot of land when you’ve got more than a billion mouths to

feed.

Lots of groups, including the PRC, monitor environmental conditions, but there isn’t a lot

anyone can do. This isn’t even really the Chinese govt’s fault. Chinese people have the

right to enjoy the same quality of life as anyone else. The problem is that there are so

many of them in a concentrated area that it produces massive amounts of pollution.