"The other day I was walking to Sociology class and heard the ROTC instructor telling the kids, 'Okay, this is how you hold your M-16.' The whole culture of the school is military these days, so nobody notices anything unusual about this. And I think the few teachers who aren't prowar or proBush are afraid to get in trouble if they say anything that doesn't sound pro-military."

In a rare public appearance Wednesday, CIA Director Porter Goss said he is overwhelmed by the many duties of his job, including devoting five hours out of every day to prepare for and deliver intelligence briefings to President Bush.Goss, who has made few public comments beyond congressional testimony, also said the legislation creating the position of director of national intelligence left him unclear on his future role.

The National Vaccine Information Center, founded in 1982, the nation's largest and oldest consumer led vaccine safety organization, is attempting to get the word out about a bill introduced by Senators Judd Gregg and Bill Frist.This bill is titled the "Protecting America in the War on Terror Act of 2005"(S3).According to NVIC, this piece of legislation is an "assault on the Constitution" and represents a serious threat in protecting the health and the right of Americans to be fully informed if they are forced to use federally regulated vaccines and drugs -NewsWithViews

China's top leader, Hu Jintao, has apparently fired the unpopular Tung Chee-hwa, the first chief executive of Hong Kong, dashing hopes that the former British colony will achieve its long-promised autonomy.When China took Hong Kong back seven years ago, it promised "a high degree of autonomy", claiming that at last "Hong Kong people would rule Hong Kong" -Independent UK

With 210 million people, Indonesia is the world's fourth-most populous state and possesses Southeast Asia's strongest military. Consisting of more than 17,000 islands, spanning from the east of Malaysia to the western portion of the island of New Guinea, Indonesia controls critical sea lanes and airways, making it a strategic regional state in Southeast Asia.As Jakarta continues to struggle with political stability, it faces a number of threats to its interests -Erich Marquardt/Asia Times

In one of her first acts as secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice decided to restore Indonesia's full International Military Education and Training (IMET) program after determining that authorities in that country now are cooperating with a Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) probe into the August 31, 2002 murders of an Indonesian and two American employees of the mining giant Freeport McMoRan during a military-style ambush in Timika, West Papua province.Rice's action hardly comes as a surprise -David Isenberg/Asia Times

Indonesian Muslim cleric Abu Bakar Ba'asyir, accused of leading an al-Qaeda-linked group blamed for bombings across Asia, was jailed for two-and-a-half-years Thursday at the end of his terrorism trial.The United States was quick to express unhappiness over the sentence -Jakarta Post ID

U.S. spy planes flying near North Korea have detected traces of a radioactive gas emitted during the reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel rods, which could be a possible sign of a secret nuclear facility, sources here said.U.S. intelligence analysts are still trying to determine the significance of finding krypton 85, a radioactive isotope that is a byproduct of reprocessing nuclear fuel rods to extract plutonium, in the atmosphere near North Korea last December -Asahi Shimbun JP

In recent public speeches, President George W Bush and others in the US administration, including Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, have begun to make a significant shift in the rhetoric of war.A new "war on tyranny" is being groomed to replace the outmoded "war on terror".Far from being a semantic nuance, the shift is highly revealing of the next phase ofWashington's global agenda -F William Engdahl/Asia Times

Uruguay has traditionally been better off than many other countries in South America, and is known for its progress in education, its advanced welfare system and its liberal laws governing social issues such as divorce -BBC

The re-establishment of full diplomatic relations between Montevideo and Havana has generated almost as many international headlines as the swearing in of Uruguay's new leftist "and proud of it" president, Tabaré Vázquez.And the reopening of the Cuban Embassy in Montevideo on Wednesday highlighted what Larry Birns, director of the Washington-based Council on Hemispheric Affairs, described as a shift in alliances."In more than 40 years of monitoring, I have never seen the U.S. so isolated in Latin America and Cuba so not isolated," Birns said -CBS News

The United States is under pressure to suspend security aid to Nepal to end a political crackdown but fears the move could undermine Katmandu's fight against insurgents, a senior U.S. diplomat said on Wednesday.India and Britain froze military aid to the Himalayan kingdom, and human rights groups and some U.S. lawmakers have urged Washington to follow suit

One of the leading homeland security law firm practices will now be headed by one of the founding members of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.Asa Hutchinson, the nation's first Under Secretary of Border and Transportation Security, is joining Washington-based Venable LLP.He will serve as chair of the firm's established Homeland Security practice

A woman fired by the FBI after alleging security lapses in its translator program has gained support from two members of Congress who said Wednesday they will question the Justice Department about her accusations.Edmonds commented on the issue while testifying at a House Government Reform subcommittee hearing on the government's designation of information as classified.She told lawmakers the people she accused were still working at the FBI

At least 50 Congolese militiamen were killed in a gun battle with United Nations peacekeepers Tuesday when the U.N. troops, backed by an attack helicopter and armored vehicles, stormed a militia camp in a volatile enclave of northeastern Congo in the largest show of force since the U.N. mission began six years ago.