Myanmar hints at Suu Kyi release

The Myanmar ruling military has hinted that it might release pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi in six months time. But critics argue the words are just empty rhetoric.

Al Jazeera's Hannah Belcher reports.

MAD WORLD

Gary Jules Lyrics
Mad World Lyrics

NOW THAT THE STRIKE IS OVER

Now that from today the public transport is back in service let`s analyze what had caused all that happened.

First of all no Government should make promises that he knows he cant keep and the one with the transport authorities was not the only one.

Before the Election Letters like the one sent by the ex minister Jesmond Mugliette where sent from basically every department to all kinds of people with all kinds of promises.

It was only days after the election that young couples found out that the "Equity Sharing scheme" in which new couples could have saved thousands of Euros when buying a new apartment was stopped, the next thing was He did not want to negotiate with the University staff about there agreement ( And they ended up with industrial action as well) .

On another note he said that he will fix things up at MEPA ( Malta Environment Planning Authority) just a few days ago they issued a press release about the permits for Fort Cambridge before that the same MEPA held a public meeting to hear what the area residents had to say.

Now just last week we had Mr John Dalli saying that "Mater Dei" the Hospital that took 17 years to be built and is supposed to be a "state of the Art" kind of hospital is only a part time hospital and that the waiting lists are unacceptable, in the mean time these waiting lists keeps growing.

Now that the Opposition party have a new Leader and by next week will have all the people that are taking other places in the party hopefully it will move in some direction because till know it had not done much, One thing I would like to know from the Labour Party is the real reason why it had agreed with the Lisbon treaty, A treaty that everybody knows is not much more than the EU constitution under a different name the same constitution that was rejected where it was put to a referendum.

Malteseken ,Friday July 18 ,2008

Back to work

Malta Bus Drivers

Hi everyone,

What we Maltese people had to witness today is something that should not happen in this day and age, Everybody should have a right to Strike but nobody have the right to stop other people from doing their Job, nobody have the right to block the roads and nobody should consider himself above the law.

On these video`s you can see some of the inconvenience that has been caused to day all over Malta .



Bus Drivers, Taxi drivers, Mini bus drivers trying to go in the Prime Minister`s office.



Buses , white Taxis and Mini Buses Blocking the Roads going in and out of Valletta



Bus drivers stopping a private Coach full of tourists from entering Valletta.

Some private coaches has had their windscreens broken and other mini buses had been attacked as well. These actions should be condemned and whoever took part should be prosecuted. Every body knows that bus drivers in Malta along with Taxi drivers hardly have any manners and that all efforts done by authorities to upgrade the service giver have4 resulted in nothing.I think it`s about time that these people have to be stopped. You cant have a public service run by a bunch of people with manners that you only can compare them with old time Pirates.

Inakadate Rice Fields

Yesterday a friend of mine EMDexreme on the Virgin Radio Community where apart from listening to good music you can create your own blog as well shared with us some really nice pictures of the rice fields in Inakadate so I decided to do some more research about this.



To tell you the truth this was something that I never heard about, that`s why I decided to do a little bit of searching and to share it over here, While doing my search I found a blog called Life in Inakadate which have more information on many other aspects about the culture and the people of Inakadate.

Another good article that I found is called Homegrown art on The Japan Times by Yoko Hani a journalist that writes a lot about agriculture among other articles which you can find here on this link.

EARTHLINGS

EARTHLINGS is a feature length documentary about humanity's absolute dependence on animals (for pets, food, clothing, entertainment, and scientific research) but also illustrates our complete disrespect for these so-called "non-human providers." The film is narrated by Academy Award nominee Joaquin Phoenix (GLADIATOR) and features music by the critically acclaimed platinum artist Moby. With an in-depth study into pet stores, puppy mills and animals shelters, as well as factory farms, the leather and fur trades, sports and entertainment industries, and finally the medical and scientific profession, EARTHLINGS uses hidden cameras and never before seen footage to chronicle the day-to-day practices of some of the largest industries in the world, all of which rely entirely on animals for profit. Powerful, informative and thought-provoking, EARTHLINGS is by far the most comprehensive documentary ever produced on the correlation between nature, animals, and human economic interests. There are many worthy animal rights films available, but this one transcends the setting. EARTHLINGS cries to be seen. Highly recommended! Other languages and download at: http://veg-tv.info/Earthlings



Earthlings official website

Exclusive: secret film reveals how Mugabe stole an election

A film that graphically shows how Robert Mugabe's supporters rigged Zimbabwe's election has been smuggled out of the country by a prison officer. It is believed to be the first footage of actual ballot-rigging and comes as Zimbabwe's president faces growing international pressure.

Shepherd Yuda, 36, fled the country this week with his wife and children. He said that he hoped the film, which was made for the Guardian, would help draw further attention to the violence and corruption in Zimbabwe.

Much of the footage was shot inside the country's notorious jail system. Yuda, who has worked in the prison service for 13 years, was motivated by the intensifying violence directed towards the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) and the murder, two months ago, of his uncle, a MDC activist.

Initially he intended to chronicle secretly what life was like inside Zimbabwe's jails but he found himself present when a war veteran and Mugabe supporter organised the vote-rigging by getting prison officers to fill in their postal ballots in his presence.

Using a hidden camera, Yuda filmed for six days prior to last Friday's run-off election in which Mugabe claimed victory with 90% of the vote. Morgan Tsvangirai, the MDC leader, had earlier said his party would not be participating in the run-off because of intimidation.

"I had never seen that kind of violence before," said Yuda, of the run-up to the election. "How can a government that claimed to be democratically elected kill its people, murder its people, torture its people?"

The film, made for Guardian Films, shows how Yuda and his colleagues at Harare central jail had to fill in their ballots in front of Zanu-PF activists.

Yuda also obtained footage of Zanu-PF rallies where voters were told they should pretend to be illiterate so that an official could fill in their ballot for them on behalf of Mugabe.

He was able to film the MDC's general secretary, Tendai Biti, in leg irons in jail. Biti, now on bail, faces treason charges which carry the death penalty.

Having completed filming, Yuda left Zimbabwe with his family for a new life and is now at a secret destination.

"I don't regret doing this, although it is a painful decision I have taken," he said. "We can live without the memories of seeing dead bodies in the prison, dead bodies in the street, dead bodies in my family.

"I've lost my uncle. My father was also beaten by Zanu-PF. I am praying to God: please God deal with Zanu-PF ruthlessly."

Mugabe has now been sworn in for a sixth term as Zimbabwe's president, a process which Tsvangirai described as "a complete joke". More than 130,000 voters spoiled their ballot papers in the election.

International pressure is mounting against Mugabe. It emerged yesterday that a US draft resolution to the UN will call for sanctions against Mugabe and demand that his government immediately begin talks with the MDC.

If adopted by the Security Council, the resolution would freeze the financial assets of Mugabe and 11 other Zimbabwean officials and ban them from travelling.

Duncan Campbell and Paul Lewis

The Guardian, Saturday July 5 2008

Woman left to die on hospital floor

After the good news of yesterday about Ingrid Betancourt release today I decided to check Sitemeter and I found out that my blog has been visited by the (IOWA HEALTH SYSTEM) because of a blog that I did about how the people that wanted to return home after the flooding where treated by the so called strike teams.

What irritated me today is that the Health system in the states can find people to can spend the whole day looking at blogs but cant find decent people to employ in their own hospitals.


A women was left to die in the Hospital waiting room with nobody doing nothing for more than an hour after that she fell from the chair she was sitting on.



A shocking video shows a woman dying on the floor in the psych ward at Kings County Hospital, while people around her, including a security guard, did nothing to help.

After an hour, another mental patient finally got the attention of the indifferent hospital workers, according to the tape, obtained by the Daily News.

Worse still, the surveillance tape suggests hospital staff may have falsified medical charts to cover the utter lack of treatment provided Esmin Green before she died.

"Thank God for the videotape because no one would have believed this could have happened," said Donna Lieberman, executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union.

"There's a clear possibility of criminal wrongdoing with regard to recordkeeping, and that has to be investigated."

The city Department of Investigation is part of a sweeping probe that has brought some changes to the ward known as G Building.

A federal suit filed last year in Brooklyn alleged neglect and abuse of mental patients at the hospital. The suit sparked an investigation by the Brooklyn U.S. attorney's civil rights unit before the June 19 death.

Two different security guards spotted Green, a native of the island of Jamaica, prone on the floor and did nothing, the tape shows. They have been fired, along with four other staffers.

Green, 49, taken to the unit for "agitation," keels over out of her chair at 5:32a.m., according to the time stamp on the video. She had been sitting about 3feet from an observation window. Two other patients were in the room.

Green is lying facedown on the floor, her legs splayed, when a security guard strolls by at 5:53 a.m., looks at her for about 20 seconds and then walks away.

She is writhing on the floor, thrashing her legs, about 6 a.m., when her medical chart contends she was "awake, up and about, went to the bathroom."

Green rolls on her back at 6:04a.m. She stops moving at 6:08 a.m., but two minutes later a security guard pushed his chair into camera view.

He never gets out of the chair, but looks at Green and scoots away. A female patient who was in and out of the room finally brings a clinic staffer to check the woman and a crash cart is summoned.

The medical chart claims she was "sitting quietly in [the] waiting room" at 6:20 a.m., although she was already dead. The cause of death is still under investigation.

"We are shocked and distressed by this situation," the Health and Hospitals Corp. said in a statement.

BY JOHN MARZULLI
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

read more on Metro news uk

FREE AT LAST

Today like everybody else I was very happy to hear about the release of Ingrid Betancourt. Since I found the Flash news on BBC rss feed I first started checking other news sites just to check if it`s true. Then started checking all the TV news channel and on one of them there was a conference from her sister Astrid and her two children Lorenzo and Melanie.

Just now on Al Jazeera English they are showing, Ingrid Betancourt and the other 14 hostages that where released, She looks a lot better than the last video that was released and she thanked one of the other hostages wich she said was her doctor in the jungle where they where being held captive for the last six years.

While checking for any videos on youtube for the latest events I didn`t find any, but there was this video wich is (Hommage à Ingrid bétancourt et à toutes les femmes otages dans le monde) dedicated to Betancourt and all the other women held captive in the world.

THE GIRL WHO SILENCED THE WORLD FOR 5 MINUTES

Raised in Vancouver and Toronto, Severn Cullis-Suzuki has been camping and hiking all her life. When she was 9 she started the Environmental Children's Organization (ECO), a small group of children committed to learning and teaching other kids about environmental issues. They were successful in many projects before 1992, when they raised enough money to go to the UN's Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro. Their aim was to remind the decision-makers of who their actions or inactions would ultimately affect. The goal was reached when 12 yr old Severn closed a Plenary Session with a powerful speech that received a standing ovation.

Mercosur anger at EU migrant laws

Leaders attending an Argentine summit of South American trade bloc Mercosur are expected to strongly criticise new European Union immigration laws.

A directive passed by the EU last month could see illegal immigrants detained for up to 18 months and if expelled they face a five-year ban on re-entry.

There are hundreds of thousands of South Americans working in EU countries, many of them illegally.

Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa has called the EU measures "shameful".

The Bolivian leader, Evo Morales, said they did nothing to combat discrimination and racism, while Argentine Foreign Minister Jorge Taiana said the region did not accept the concept of migration as a crime.

South American leaders often find it difficult to reach agreement on many things but they appear to be united in their anger at the new EU immigration rules, reports the BBC's Daniel Schweimler from Argentina.

Most of South America's leaders are in the Argentine city of Tucuman where their summit plans to issue a declaration condemning the EU measures.

The European Union last month adopted the rules, which could come into force in 2010.

The law will oblige EU members to choose between issuing residency permits to the estimated 500,000 illegal immigrants who enter each year, or returning them to their country of origin.

Under the new rules, an illegal immigrant can be detained for a maximum of six months. This period is extendable by a further 12 months under certain conditions if, for example, the immigrant fails to co-operate with the authorities.

The rules allow for a 30-day voluntary departure period for illegal immigrants before their expulsion.

Once expelled, they may be barred from re-entering the EU for a five-year period.

Food shortages

On other issues, Mercosur says it is taking a big step towards regional integration by lifting visa restrictions, which will allow South Americans to travel freely between member and associate countries showing only their ID cards.

Other topics being addressed at the meeting which began on Monday and runs until Tuesday are regional and international food crises and on this there is no unity, our correspondent says.

The summit host, Argentine President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, who has been facing farmers' strikes over her proposals to raise tariffs on food exports, blamed poor wealth distribution for food shortages.

"The chief cause of the world food shortage is poorly distributed wealth by oligopolies and financial institutions and lack of market access," she said on Sunday.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who is against tariffs, argues that producing more food would solve the crisis.

"The more (food) we produce, the more food security we'll have. With fair prices you can increase exports," he said.

BBC NEWS

OHIO TEACHER BURNS CROSS ON CHILD`S ARM

A public school teacher preached his Christian beliefs despite complaints by other teachers and administrators and used a device to burn the image of a cross on students' arms, according to a report by independent investigators.

Mount Vernon Middle School teacher John Freshwater also taught creationism in his science class and was insubordinate in failing to remove a Bible and other religious materials from his classroom, the report said.

School board members were scheduled to meet Friday afternoon to discuss the findings by consulting firm H.R. On Call Inc., hired by the district to investigate. The report was released Thursday.

School Superintendent Stephen Short wouldn't comment on the report before Friday's meeting, his office said. A message seeking comment was left for Freshwater's attorney, Roger Weaver.

The report comes one week after a family filed a federal lawsuit in Columbus against Freshwater and the school district, saying Freshwater burned a cross on their child's arm that remained for three or four weeks.

Freshwater's friend Dave Daubenmire defended him.

"With the exception of the cross-burning episode ... I believe John Freshwater is teaching the values of the parents in the Mount Vernon school district," he told The Columbus Dispatch in a story published Friday.

comcast.netNEWS

THE REAL FACE OF THE EUROPEAN UNION

The EU has been sold to Britain as our best hope for the future . . . But behind the scenes, has another, more unsettling agenda been unfolding? The European Economic Community (EEC) began for Britain as a free-trade agreement in 1972. Today's European Union is well on its way to becoming a federal superstate, complete with one currency, one legal system, one military, one police force – even its own national anthem. In this shocking new documentary featuring EU insiders and commentators, independent author Phillip Day covers the history and goals of the European Union, as well as the disturbing, irrevocable implications this new government has for every British citizen. Whether the viewer is for or against Britain's participation, this film asks the troubling questions the mainstream media has refused to confront.

Google videos

THE REAL FACE OF THE EUROPEAN UNION

Ohio board votes to ax teacher accused of branding

Dahr Jamail: Iraq and U.S Military expansion

Posted on June 27, 2008 by dandelionsalad

talkingsticktv

Talk by independent journalist Dahr Jamail author of “Beyond the Green Zone: Dispatches from an Unembedded Journalist in Occupied Iraq” given June 7, 2008 in Seattle.



see

Iraq

Israel Lobby

Jamail-Dahr

GI Resistance

It’s March 19 and Blogswarm Day! Posts on Iraq War by Lo (list of Winter Soldier posts)

Respect the Irish Vote: Aftershock in European Parliament

European Parliament (Strasbourg) 16-18 June 2008.
Reactions to the Irish No to the Lisbon Treaty.

In order of appearance:

- Hans-Gert Pöttering MEP, EPP-ED, President of the European Parliament (16.06.2008)
- José Manuel Barroso, EU Commission President (13.06.2008; 18.06.2008; 10.07.2007)
- Nigel Farage MEP, Co-President, Independence/Democracy Group (IND/DEM) (17-18.06.2008)
- Martin Schulz MEP, President, PES Group (18.06.2008)
- Margot Wallström, Commission Vice-President (18.06.2008)
- Daniel Hannan MEP, non-attached (formerly EPP-ED) (18.06.2008)
- Hanne Dahl MEP, IND/DEM Group (18.06.2008)
- Kathy Sinnott MEP, Co-President, IND/DEM Group (18.06.2008)
- Philip Bushill-Matthews MEP, EPP-ED (18.06.2008)
- Poul Nyrup Rasmussen MEP, President of the Party of European - Socialists (PES)(18.06.2008)
- Tobias Pflüger MEP, European Left - GUE/NGL (18.06.2008)

NOTE - The MEPs wearing the "Respect the Irish Vote" shirts are from various countries and from different groups.

Note on the rejected EU Constitution and Lisbon Treaty:

The people of France and the Netherlands rejected the proposed EU constitution in the 2005 referendums. After this, other countries cancelled a promised referendum and the EU Constitution was re-written as an "amending treaty" or a "reform treaty" and named "Treaty of Lisbon".

On the basis of this deceit, they claimed that no referendums are necessary on the Lisbon Treaty. Ireland was constitutionally required to hold a referendum and on the 12 June 2008 the people of Ireland gave a resounding No to Lisbon. Yet this vote is not being respected and the rule of law is being ignored. The EU leaders agreed at the June 19-20 EU Summit that ratifications must go on. Moreover, no other government is asking the people.

The Lisbon Treaty establishes a new "European Union" with joint citizenship - an EU "federal" State that is technically and politically empowered to centralize more power in Brussels. The treaty also stipulates the militarisation of the Union in order to 'police the world' just like the US does today.

Credits:

- Hemicycle scenes: Audio Visual, European Parliament
- Barroso excerpt (10.07.2007) from EUX.TV (http://www.eux.tv ): "Barroso: European Union is 'empire' (short version)". Watch video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2Ralo...

- Music: Cornerstone Cues: Requiem For A Tower Mvt. II; Reprogram. From "El Morro": Drum Train, Burning Touch, Undefeated. From "Air Lyndhurt": Dark Rise, Velvet Choker.
..................................

Obama Camp Closely Linked With Ethanol

Senator Barack Obama last July in Adel, Iowa. His strong support of ethanol helped propel him to his first caucus victory there.

By LARRY ROHTER

When VeraSun Energy inaugurated a new ethanol processing plant last summer in Charles City, Iowa, some of that industry’s most prominent boosters showed up. Leaders of the National Corn Growers Association and the Renewable Fuels Association, for instance, came to help cut the ribbon — and so did Senator Barack Obama.

Then running far behind Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton in name recognition and in the polls, Mr. Obama was in the midst of a campaign swing through the state where he would eventually register his first caucus victory. And as befits a senator from Illinois, the country’s second largest corn-producing state, he delivered a ringing endorsement of ethanol as an alternative fuel.

Mr. Obama is running as a reformer who is seeking to reduce the influence of special interests. But like any other politician, he has powerful constituencies that help shape his views. And when it comes to domestic ethanol, almost all of which is made from corn, he also has advisers and prominent supporters with close ties to the industry at a time when energy policy is a point of sharp contrast between the parties and their presidential candidates.

In the heart of the Corn Belt that August day, Mr. Obama argued that embracing ethanol “ultimately helps our national security, because right now we’re sending billions of dollars to some of the most hostile nations on earth.” America’s oil dependence, he added, “makes it more difficult for us to shape a foreign policy that is intelligent and is creating security for the long term.”

Nowadays, when Mr. Obama travels in farm country, he is sometimes accompanied by his friend Tom Daschle, the former Senate majority leader from South Dakota. Mr. Daschle now serves on the boards of three ethanol companies and works at a Washington law firm where, according to his online job description, “he spends a substantial amount of time providing strategic and policy advice to clients in renewable energy.”

Mr. Obama’s lead advisor on energy and environmental issues, Jason Grumet, came to the campaign from the National Commission on Energy Policy, a bipartisan initiative associated with Mr. Daschle and Bob Dole, the Kansas Republican who is also a former Senate majority leader and a big ethanol backer who had close ties to the agribusiness giant Archer Daniels Midland.

Not long after arriving in the Senate, Mr. Obama himself briefly provoked a controversy by flying at subsidized rates on corporate airplanes, including twice on jets owned by Archer Daniels Midland, which is the nation’s largest ethanol producer and is based in his home state.

Jason Furman, the Obama campaign’s economic policy director, said Mr. Obama’s stance on ethanol was based on its merits. “That is what has always motivated him on this issue, and will continue to determine his policy going forward,” Mr. Furman said.

Asked if Mr. Obama brought any predisposition or bias to the ethanol debate because he represents a corn-growing state that stands to benefit from a boom, Mr. Furman said, “He wants to represent the United States of America, and his policies are based on what’s best for the country.”

Mr. Daschle, a national co-chairman of the Obama campaign, said in a telephone interview on Friday that his role advising the Obama campaign on energy matters was limited. He said he was not a lobbyist for ethanol companies, but did speak publicly about renewable energy options and worked “with a number of associations and groups to orchestrate and coordinate their activities,” including the Governors’ Ethanol Coalition.

Of Mr. Obama, Mr. Daschle said, “He has a terrific policy staff and relies primarily on those key people to advise him on key issues, whether energy or climate change or other things.”

Ethanol is one area in which Mr. Obama strongly disagrees with his Republican opponent, Senator John McCain of Arizona. While both presidential candidates emphasize the need for the United States to achieve “energy security” while also slowing down the carbon emissions that are believed to contribute to global warming, they offer sharply different visions of the role that ethanol, which can be made from a variety of organic materials, should play in those efforts.

Mr. McCain advocates eliminating the multibillion-dollar annual government subsidies that domestic ethanol has long enjoyed. As a free trade advocate, he also opposes the 54-cent-a-gallon tariff that the United States slaps on imports of ethanol made from sugar cane, which packs more of an energy punch than corn-based ethanol and is cheaper to produce.

“We made a series of mistakes by not adopting a sustainable energy policy, one of which is the subsidies for corn ethanol, which I warned in Iowa were going to destroy the market” and contribute to inflation, Mr. McCain said this month in an interview with a Brazilian newspaper, O Estado de São Paulo. “Besides, it is wrong,” he added, to tax Brazilian-made sugar cane ethanol, “which is much more efficient than corn ethanol.”

Mr. Obama, in contrast, favors the subsidies, some of which end up in the hands of the same oil companies he says should be subjected to a windfall profits tax. In the name of helping the United States build “energy independence,” he also supports the tariff, which some economists say may well be illegal under the World Trade Organization’s rules but which his advisers say is not.

Many economists, consumer advocates, environmental experts and tax groups have been critical of corn ethanol programs as a boondoggle that benefits agribusiness conglomerates more than small farmers. Those complaints have intensified recently as corn prices have risen sharply in tandem with oil prices and corn normally used for food stock has been diverted to ethanol production.

“If you want to take some of the pressure off this market, the obvious thing to do is lower that tariff and let some Brazilian ethanol come in,” said C. Ford Runge, an economist specializing in commodities and trade policy at the Center for International Food and Agricultural Policy at the University of Minnesota. “But one of the fundamental reasons biofuels policy is so out of whack with markets and reality is that interest group politics have been so dominant in the construction of the subsidies that support it.”

Corn ethanol generates less than two units of energy for every unit of energy used to produce it, while the energy ratio for sugar cane is more than 8 to 1. With lower production costs and cheaper land prices in the tropical countries where it is grown, sugar cane is a more efficient source.

Mr. Furman said the campaign continued to examine the issue. “We want to evaluate all our energy subsidies to make sure that taxpayers are getting their money’s worth,” he said.

He added that Mr. Obama favored “a range of initiatives” that were aimed at “diversification across countries and sources of energy,” including cellulosic ethanol, and which, unlike Mr. McCain’s proposals, were specifically meant to “reduce overall demand through conservation, new technology and improved efficiency.”

On the campaign trail, Mr. Obama has not explained his opposition to imported sugar cane ethanol. But in remarks last year, made as President Bush was about to sign an ethanol cooperation agreement with his Brazilian counterpart, Mr. Obama argued that “our country’s drive toward energy independence” could suffer if Mr. Bush relaxed restrictions, as Mr. McCain now proposes.

“It does not serve our national and economic security to replace imported oil with Brazilian ethanol,” he argued.

Mr. Obama does talk regularly about developing switchgrass, which flourishes in the Midwest and Great Plains, as a source for ethanol. While the energy ratio for switchgrass and other types of cellulosic ethanol is much greater than corn, economists say that time-consuming investments in infrastructure would be required to make it viable, and with corn nearing $8 a bushel, farmers have little incentive to shift.

Ethanol industry executives and advocates have not made large donations to either candidate for president, an examination of campaign contribution records shows. But they have noted the difference between Mr. Obama and Mr. McCain.

Brian Jennings, a vice president of the American Coalition for Ethanol, said he hoped that Mr. McCain, as a presidential candidate, “would take a broader view of energy security and recognize the important role that ethanol plays.”

The candidates’ views were tested recently in the Farm Bill approved by Congress that extended the subsidies for corn ethanol, though reducing them slightly, and the tariffs on imported sugar cane ethanol. Because Mr. McCain and Mr. Obama were campaigning, neither voted. But Mr. McCain said that as president he would veto the bill, while Mr. Obama praised it.

Published: June 23, 2008