The Earlybird: Today's Headlines

Education debate, China roadblocks, interest rate cut, Bush's talk with Israel, Cheney's call to Pawlenty, continued flooding, RNC's new focus:

• Speaking at Central Connecticut State University in Connecticut on Wednesday, President Bush "said that his administration and congressional Democrats had reached general agreement on his education proposals, which include annual testing of students in grades 3 through 8, tighter accountability, more local control over federal dollars and a focus on early reading," the Hartford Courant reports.
• The Bush administration plans to tighten the standard for arsenic in drinking water within nine months, AP reports.
• The administration also said Wednesday that it plans to go forward with a Clinton administration proposal to "require ground meat to carry nutrition labels similar to those on boxes and cans of processed foods," AP reports.
• An energy task force report drafted this month "has broached the possibility of lifting some economic sanctions against Iran, Libya and Iraq as part of a plan to increase America's oil supply," the Washington Post reports.
• "Bush will nominate Donald E. Powell, a Texas bank executive, as chairman of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.," AP reports.
• The National Capital Region Transportation Planning Boards voted unanimously yesterday for a "resolution calling on" President Bush "to reopen 'America´s Main Street'" -- Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House, the Washington Times reports.

• The United States and China finished two days of talks about the spy plane incident "with no sign of agreement Thursday on the return of an American spy plane or Beijing's demand to end surveillance flights near its coast," AP reports.
• A Pentagon official said Wednesday night that "the Pentagon has prepared detailed plans that call for fighter jets to escort military reconnaissance aircraft through international airspace, plans likely to be implemented if talks between the United States and China continue to go badly," the Washington Post reports.
• The Bush administration on Wednesday "signaled that it would not sell Taiwan four destroyers equipped with high-tech radar" -- a sale that China opposes, USA Today reports.
• In other military news, a Pentagon panel on Wednesday "recommended an overhaul of the Marine Corps' troubled V-22 Osprey program," the New York Times reports.

• Bush and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon talked on the phone Wednesday and "agreed on the need for restraint in the region to avoid greater violence," Reuters reports.
• Palestinian militants on Wednesday "fired a fresh volley of homemade mortar shells... at nearby Israeli settlements and military posts," the New York Times reports.
• Bush "toured the Holocaust Museum on Wednesday to mark the Days of Remembrance in memory of the 6 million Jews and others killed by Nazi Germany during World War II," Reuters reports.

• The Federal Reserve Board on Wednesday made a "surprise" half-percentage point cut in interest rates, the New York Times reports. "In announcing its decision... the Fed signaled that it was likely to reduce rates further in coming months."
• Stock prices "soared" after the cut, AP reports.
• With the move, "the Federal Reserve Board implicitly acknowledged that the collapse in corporate investment and rising unemployment could leave the U.S. economy stuck in neutral for the next year, or even tip it into recession," the Washington Post reports.

• On Wednesday a court in Yugoslavia issued arrest warrants for 14 world leaders -- including former President Bill Clinton and British Foreign Minister Robin Cook -- who were "sentenced to 20 years in absentia for war crimes" under "former president Slobodan Milosevic's regime in its last days before being ousted," CNN.com reports.
• British Health Secretary Alan Milburn "announced on Thursday that the government is bringing forward legislation to outlaw human cloning within months," BBCNews.com reports. If the legislation is approved, Britain will be the first country to outlaw cloning.
• "The United Nations Commission on Human Rights on Wednesday condemned Cuba for human-rights abuses," the Chicago Tribune reports.
• Today NASA will launch "the shuttle Endeavour on an 11-day mission to deliver Canada's $1 billion robot arm to the international space station," the Houston Chronicle reports.

• The Supreme Court on Wednesday upheld North Carolina's 12th Congressional District, saying that "challengers failed to prove racial gerrymandering by state legislators who drew the district in 1997," the Winston-Salem Journal reports.
• The court also ruled Wednesday that "prison inmates have no constitutional right to give legal advice to fellow inmates," AP reports.
• On Wednesday a federal judge in Oklahoma turned down the request of two Internet companies "to permit Timothy McVeigh's execution to be shown on the Internet," the Oklahoman reports.

• Former Tennessee Board of Regents chancellor and state education commissioner Charles Smith (D) said yesterday that he will run for governor in 2002, AP reports. Meanwhile, businessman Bill Baxter (R) said he would not run.
• Minnesota House Majority Leader Tim Pawlenty (R) said yesterday he will not run for Senate after "a last minute call from Vice President Dick Cheney," who, "on behalf of President Bush, asked him to defer to St. Paul Mayor Norm Coleman in the 2002 race against Democratic U.S. Sen. Paul Wellstone," the St. Paul Pioneer Press reports. Pawlenty is also considering a 2002 gubernatorial bid.
• Arkansas Attorney General Mark Pryor (D) said he will announce "in a few weeks" whether he will challenge Sen. Tim Hutchinson, R-Ark., in 2002, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reports. Pryor's father, David Pryor, held the seat until his retirement in 1996.
• Republicans in parts of Virginia's 4th District will meet tonight "to select delegates to the district's April 28 convention in Prince George County, where a nominee will be chosen for the June 19 special election" to replace the late Rep. Norman Sisisky, D-Va., the Norfolk Virginian-Pilot reports.

• The Mississippi River flood in the upper Midwest "neared its peak Wednesday" AP reports. "The river, which has a flood stage of 12 feet" at La Crosse, Wis., "hovered at around 16.3 feet through the night and was expected to crest later today at 16.5 feet before dropping to 16.2 feet by Friday."
• "About 70 Iowa Army National Guard troops have been put on alert" as flood waters keep rising in that state, the Des Moines Register reports.

• "Energy experts told" California "state legislators Wednesday that a Texas company hoarded space on a key natural gas pipeline into California, causing electricity prices to skyrocket," the Los Angeles Times reports.
• California Gov. Gray Davis (D) approved a "controversial power plant in San Jose, saying California needs every megawatt it can harness," the San Francisco Chronicle reports.

• Roger Clinton, half-brother of former President Bill Clinton, "is considering invoking the Fifth Amendment against self-incrimination when called before a federal grand jury in New York next week on his role in the White House pardons scandal," Reuters reports.
• Sen. Robert Torricelli, D-N.J., "angrily" said yesterday "that the federal investigation into his 1996 campaign has spun out of control and denounced allegations he has engaged in illegal conduct as 'unequivocally false,'" the Newark Star-Ledger reports.
• Virginia Gov. Jim Gilmore (R) said the Republican National Committee, which he heads, is "creating a new division" with an "emphasis... on Hispanics and Roman Catholics," AP reports.
• The Dallas Morning News reports that Judicial Watch "is expected to announce at a news conference Thursday that it is hiring" Russell Verney, Ross Perot's former "political right arm," to "open a Southwest office in Dallas."
• Jane Fonda officially filed papers of divorce from husband of eight years, media mogul Ted Turner, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports.
• A "star witness" in the case against Michael Skakel, nephew of Ethel Kennedy, "said yesterday that he used heroin one hour before telling a grand jury in 1999 that Skakel had confessed to the murder of teenager Martha Moxley," the Boston Globe reports.