US Senate Approves Iraq Spending Bill With Troop Withdrawal Timeline

By Paula Wolfson White House 29 March 2007

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The U.S. Congress and the White House have moved a step closer to a major confrontation on Iraq. The Senate has passed a war funding bill that includes wording on a troop withdrawal. VOA's Paula Wolfson reports President Bush says he will veto the legislation.

The final Senate vote (51-47) was largely along party lines, with majority Democrats declaring victory.

Only two Senate Republicans - Chuck Hagel of Nebraska and Gordon Smith of Oregon - voted for the bill, which sets a goal of moving U.S. troops out of Iraq in about a year.

The legislation must now be reconciled with a version passed earlier by the House of Representatives, which mandates a pullout by the end of August of 2008.

President Bush has said any bill that contains a timetable for withdrawal is not only unacceptable, but a formula for disaster.

Shortly before the Senate vote, he met at the White House with all the Republican members of the House of Representatives - the first such meeting of the Bush presidency. They consulted behind closed doors, and then appeared as a group before cameras - the House members closing ranks around the president.

George W. Bush

"We stand united in saying loud and clear that when we have got a troop in harms way, we expect that troop to be fully funded," he said. "And we have got commanders making tough decisions on the ground, we expect there to be no strings on our commanders."

But Democrats remain unmoved, and are vowing to press forward despite the threat of a presidential veto. Patty Murray of Washington State led the drive to pass the bill in the Senate.

"We are taking a major step forward in saying that we are no longer going to idly stand by without any debates, without any discussion, without any consequences and move continuously to increase the war in Iraq," she said. "We have said it is time for us as a nation to tell the Iraqi people they need to stand up for themselves."

Senate Republicans fought the bill to the last, warning that valuable time is being wasted, as the Pentagon waits for the money needed to fund operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. They said Democrats do not have the two-thirds majority needed to override a presidential veto, and are pushing the bill to make political points.

Republican Richard Shelby of Alabama said by passing the bill, the Democrats have named a "date for defeat."

"We have taken a step backwards. We have put an arbitrary deadline on our military. It is the wrong message at the wrong time," he said. "Surely this will embolden the enemy. It will not help our troops in any way. It is a big mistake."

Moments after the Senate vote, a panel was named to begin negotiations with the House to reconcile their two different versions of the bill.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has said she expects the compromise that will go to the president will include language on a troop pullout, despite his promised veto.

Ex-Aide Disputes US Attorney General's Statements About Firings

By Deborah Tate Washington 29 March 2007

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A former U.S. Justice Department aide says Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was involved in the firing of federal prosecutors, contradicting statements made by the nation's top law enforcement official. His testimony to a Senate panel comes amid bipartisan calls for Gonzales' resignation for his handling of the matter. VOA's Deborah Tate reports from Capitol Hill.

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales' former Chief of Staff Kyle Sampson testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington, 29 Mar 2007

Testifying voluntarily and under oath before the Senate Judiciary Committee, the former chief of staff to Alberto Gonzales, Kyle Sampson, took issue with the attorney general's statement earlier this month that he was not involved in discussions about the replacement of eight federal prosecutors. "I do not think the attorney general's statement that he was not involved in any discussions about U.S. attorney removals is accurate," he said.

Sampson said Gonzales attended a meeting about the matter on November 27 of last year, just days before the attorneys were ousted.

The former aide, who resigned earlier this month, said he had shared information with Justice Department officials about the dismissals last year, despite arguments to the contrary by the attorney general. He said Gonzales signed off on the decision to remove the attorneys. "The attorney general approved the list," he said.

The Democratic-led Judiciary Committee is probing whether the Bush administration misled Congress about the reasons for the dismissals and whether they were politically motivated and aimed at intimidating other attorneys.

Senator Patrick Leahy, a Vermont Democrat, is chairman of the panel. "I want the American people to have confidence in federal law enforcement and I want our federal law enforcement officers to have the independence they need to be effective and to consistently merit the trust of the American people," he said.

The top Republican on the committee, Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, offered his own harsh assessment of the handling of the attorney firings. "It is generally acknowledged that the Department of Justice is in a state of disrepair, perhaps even dysfunctional, because of what has happened," he said.

Sampson defended the decision to replace the attorneys, saying it was based on legitimate reasons relating to their performance, although he acknowledged such reasons could also be perceived as political.

Senator John Cornyn, a Texas Republican, said he saw nothing wrong with the dismissals. "What I have heard, there is no evidence that any of this replacement of U.S. attorneys was designed to or actually did impede a criminal investigation or prosecution," he said.

Attorney General Gonzales is scheduled to appear before the committee next month.

White House spokeswoman Dana Perino reiterated that President Bush has confidence in his attorney general.

VOASE0329_Economics Report

29 March 2007

Credit Cards Are Easy to Get, But Harder to Pay Off
Interest rates are not the only measure of a card's cost; high fees become an issue in US.

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This is the VOA Special English Economics Report.

Buy now, pay later. Credit cards give people that choice. Those billions of small pieces of plastic in use all over the world make it easy to buy things. But people who use credit cards irresponsibly can soon find themselves heavily in debt.

Cardholders may not think about it, but they borrow money from a bank or other lender each time they charge something. They avoid interest charges if they pay their bill in full each month. But if they only make the minimum payment, the lowest required, it may take years to pay off a debt. Interest is continually charged on the unpaid balance.

A credit card may have a number of costs. First, there is the interest charge on purchases, known as the annual percentage rate, or A.P.R. In the United States right now, the average is between thirteen and fourteen to keep them.

Cardholders may have to pay cash advance fees if they withdraw money from a credit card. There are also fees if they go over their credit limit, or if a payment is late. Lenders may also raise interest rates as punishment.

In the United States, credit card fees have become a political issue. Congress has threatened to take action against what critics call abusive behavior by lenders.

Yet getting a credit card has become a lot easier for most people. Maybe too easy: People receive offers in the mail of pre-approved cards that they never asked for. Many cards offer low rates at first, especially if people agree to move their balance from another card.

About half of all Americans have at least two credit cards. And the credit rating agency Experian says fourteen percent of the population has more than ten.

Jeanne Hogarth at the Federal Reserve, the central bank, says the average family has four credit cards. But families that carry a balance, meaning they do not pay off their statements each month, have an average of five.

In nineteen eighty-eight Americans had three hundred thirty billion dollars in credit card debt. Last year it was eight hundred forty billion.

In the latest government study, the average credit card debt for all households was more than three thousand dollars. But for those that carried a balance, the average was five thousand three hundred.

And that's the VOA Special English Economics Report, written by Mario Ritter. Transcripts and audio archives of our reports are at voaspecialenglish.com. I'm Steve Ember.

VOASE0329_American Mosaic

29 March 2007

For College Basketball Fans in US, There Is Nothing Crazy About 'March Madness'
Also: A question from Nigeria about MP3 files. And music from Elvis Perkins, who performs folk-influenced songs about dreams, memories and sadness.

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HOST:

Welcome to AMERICAN MOSAIC, in VOA Special English.

(MUSIC)

I'm Doug Johnson. On our show this week:

We answer a question about MP3 players…

Present some music from Elvis Perkins…

And report about something called "March Madness."

March Madness

HOST:

"March Madness" describes the excitement about men's college basketball games every year at this time. Barbara Klein has more.

BARBARA KLEIN:

North Carolina's Tyler Hansbrough tries to block Georgetown's Roy Hibbert. But Georgetown defeated North Carolina in overtime to go on to the Final Four.

For the past two weeks, men's basketball teams from large colleges and universities have been playing in a championship competition. Millions of people have been watching the games on television and on Internet web sites. They are also betting on which teams will win and advance in the tournament.

The New York Times newspaper reports that the basketball tournament is one of the busiest times of the year in Las Vegas, Nevada. That is because college basketball fans from all over the country meet each other and bet on the games.

The series of games is known as "March Madness" because of the public's excitement about the games. And sometimes a team that is not expected to win defeats a team with a better record.

The Division One National Collegiate Athletic Association Championship Tournament has been played every year since nineteen thirty-nine. Sixty-three basketball games take place each March. The competition begins with sixty-five teams. The winner of each game continues on to play the winner of another game. The number of teams in the competition is slowly reduced to the "Sweet Sixteen" then the "Elite Eight" and finally the two teams who will play for the championship.

Four teams have won all their games so far. They will compete in the semi-final games on Saturday in Atlanta, Georgia. These teams are called the "Final Four." The University of Florida basketball team will play the University of California at Los Angeles. And the Ohio State University team will play Georgetown University. The winners will face each other in the Division One NCAA championship game on Monday, April second.

Last year, the teams from Florida and UCLA played each other in the final game of the basketball tournament. Florida won, so it is now the defending champion. Will it win again? We will let you know next week.

MP3s

HOST:

Our VOA listener question this week comes from Nigeria. Aminu Tijjani Ali wants to learn more about MP3s.

Several kinds of small MP3 players

An MP3 is a kind of file used for sending music or other material over the Internet. These files are compressed, or reduced in size, compared to songs on a compact disc, or CD. MP3 files are played on a computer using media programs like iTunes or Windows Media Player.

MP3s can also be played on iPods and other small players as well as some wireless telephones that can store music. Many players can hold thousands of songs yet are small enough to carry in your pocket. Changing, or converting, a song from a music CD to an MP3 file is called "ripping." Software for ripping is available by itself and in programs like iTunes and Windows Media Player.

The MP3 was developed by researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute in Germany and other laboratories in the nineteen eighties. By the late nineteen nineties, music fans were beginning to change their music collections from CDs to MP3s. They were also able to download MP3 music files from the Internet much faster because of the MP3’s smaller file size.

File-sharing services quickly began appearing on the Internet. They made it possible for people to exchange copyrighted music at no cost. However, the record industry started to get concerned because people were trading free music on the Internet instead of buying it in music stores.

A few years ago, the original Napster Web site was one of the most popular music-sharing services. But then the music industry won court cases that decided that this kind of file-sharing was illegal and violated copyright laws.

MP3 files are still shared on the Internet today. People also buy them from online music stores. The new Napster Web site is one of these services that charges money for MP3s on the Internet.

On the Special English Web site, voaspecialenglish.com, we provide MP3 files of our programs at no cost.

Elvis Perkins

HOST:

Elvis Perkins

Elvis Perkins has just released his first album, "Ash Wednesday." Perkins performs folk music-influenced songs about dreams, memories, and sadness. Critics are praising his imaginative songs and soft but expressive voice. Faith Lapidus has more.

(MUSIC)

FAITH LAPIDUS:

That was "While You Were Sleeping." Its rich imagery gives a good example of the poetic quality of Elvis Perkins' music. The song describes the many thoughts of a person who cannot sleep at night. Like many songs on this record, it also expresses sadness. You could say it is an album that deals with mourning.

Perkins' mother, the photographer Berry Berenson, died in one of the planes that terrorists used to attack the United States on September eleventh, two thousand one. Nine years earlier, Elvis' father, the famous actor Anthony Perkins, had died. In songs like "Ash Wednesday" Elvis Perkins mourns for his parents.

(MUSIC)

Elvis Perkins has been playing music since he was a child. In high school he had his own music band. During his twenties, he wrote and recorded songs, some of which are on this album. Perkins did not want his album to have a digital high-tech sound. He made many of the recordings on analog tape, both at a sound studio and also at an old house in Los Angeles, California. This method helps give a warm and personal sound to the album.

Elvis Perkins will be performing around the United States and Canada this spring to promote "Ash Wednesday." He gives an energetic performance, singing and playing the guitar and harmonica. We leave you with the dreamy sound of "Sleep Sandwich."

(MUSIC)

HOST:

I'm Doug Johnson. I hope you enjoyed our program today.

It was written by Brianna Blake, Dana Demange and Nancy Steinbach. Caty Weaver was our producer.

Join us again next week for AMERICAN MOSAIC, VOA’s radio magazine in Special English.