The Earlybird: Today's headlines

Cinco de Mayo at the White House, no U.S. seat at human rights commission, budget delay, logging modifications, no party-switching for Miller, Gore's grades as a teacher:

• On Thursday President Bush met with Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres at the White House, AP reports. After the meeting, Peres told reporters that "the U.S. was giving the highest priority to countering terrorism in the Middle East."
• Bush also "met with Mexican President Vicente Fox to discuss temporary visas for Mexican workers and plans for long-range energy development between Mexico, the United States and Canada," AP reports.
• In honor of Cinco de Mayo, Bush will "deliver a version" of his weekly radio address this weekend in Spanish, AP reports. "Minority Leader Dick Gephardt, D-Mo., and Rep. Silvestre Reyes, D-Texas, will provide the Spanish response."
• Today Bush will "toast" the World Series champs, the New York Yankees, at the White House, the New York Post reports.

• On Thursday the United States was voted off of the United Nations Human Rights Commission, "the first time it has not held a seat since the United Nations was formed in 1947," Knight Ridder Tribune News reports. Sudan -- which Bush called "a disaster area for human rights" -- was given a seat.
• The U.N. vote "reflected mounting resentment among foreign nations over US policy on human rights and other global issues" and "suggested that the United States has lost support among its allies," the Boston Globe reports.
• "In Congress, leaders from both parties expressed outrage that nations whose records have long been criticized by the United States apparently banded together with European nations to quell Washington's voice," the New York Times reports.
• Meanwhile, the The European Court of Human Rights ruled yesterday that "IRA men shot dead" during the 1980s and 1990s "by British soldiers and the Royal Ulster Constabulary in Northern Ireland had their human rights violated," BBCNews.com reports.

• On Thursday Bush announced a "federal power conservation effort" and "instructed federal agencies in California to turn off escalators during power emergencies and keep building temperatures at 78 degrees," CBSNews.com reports.
• California Gov. Gray Davis (D) met with Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham yesterday "to discuss federal energy conservation plans," the Los Angeles Times reports. "Also Thursday, Davis met with alternative energy producers in an attempt to persuade them to continue operations, despite being owed more than $1 billion by California's private utilities."

• Today the Bush administration must decide whether it will enforce or reverse "a decision by President Clinton to ban logging and road-building in national forests," the Boston Globe reports. The administration plans to keep the rule but "modify" it to "allow state and local officials, in conjunction with local forest managers, to appeal the rule 'on a case-by-case basis,' with the possible outcome of waiving the rule."
• Clinton "has some surprisingly complimentary things to say" to friends about Bush, but he has also said "that he believes Mr. Bush built much of his agenda on undoing Clinton administration actions," the New York Times reports.

• Early this morning "the House vote on a $1.97 trillion budget outline was delayed... after it was found that some pages were missing from the House-Senate compromise," CNN.com reports. "Debate will continue Tuesday."
• On Thursday House Republicans "trimmed $6 billion from next year's spending plans," AP reports.
• "House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., skipped a Republican campaign committee's conference for business contributors yesterday after the group sent out an unauthorized fax promoting the workshop under his name," the Washington Post reports.

• On Thursday Democrats walked out of a Senate Judiciary Committee meeting on judicial nominations, the Dallas Morning News reports. "Democrats contend that with a Republican newly installed in the White House, GOP lawmakers are rewriting the rules by which the Senate provides input on prospective judges in a bid to limit the ability of individual senators -- read Democrats -- to reject Mr. Bush's nominees."
• Bush may "nominate Appeals Court Judge Roger L. Gregory to a permanent seat when he makes his first judicial nominations next week," AP reports. Republican senators "strangled" Gregory's appointment last year.
• Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., may call Clinton as a witness on "making the confirmation process for presidential appointees less onerous," the Wall Street Journal's "Washington Wire" reports. "The two men have talked privately about the need to decrease the paperwork and background checks nominees face."

• Congress continued debate on Bush's education plan Thursday, but the "bill no longer looks like" Bush's, the New York Times reports. "Lawmakers from both parties have picked apart many important provisions that Mr. Bush promoted on the campaign trail."
• The Senate voted Thursday to increase funding for special education by $120 billion, the Boston Globe reports.
• On Thursday some members of Congress "took steps to provide funds for a popular national reading program that President Bush deleted from his budget proposal," the Houston Chronicle reports.

• This morning "the April employment report -- expected to show anemic job growth and a rise in the unemployment rate" -- will be released, CNNfn.com reports.
• Meanwhile, "stocks gave back a big piece of the week's gains," the Wall Street Journal reports.

• A Pentagon official said Thursday that "U.S. technicians need more time to wrap up their inspection of a downed U.S. Navy surveillance plane, an effort hampered by the Chinese military's refusal to supply power for the work," AP reports.
• Chinese officials yesterday were "unsure whether the Pentagon's reversal of an order to sever military contacts with China was a gaffe or a calculated move to further distance Washington from Beijing," the Boston Globe reports.
• White House officials said Thursday "that they were involved in the Pentagon's decision" to retract the order to suspend military contact with China, the Washington Post reports.
• "The United States, backed by the European Union, blocked Thursday a request by China for a new round of World Trade Organization entry talks in late May," UPI reports.

• North Korea said today that it will extend a moratorium on missile testing and "will launch no ballistic missiles until at least 2003," the Washington Post reports.
• "Eight minority students from the United States" will go to medical school for free in Cuba, the Boston Globe reports.
• In Zambia yesterday "two legislators filed a motion... to impeach President Frederick Chiluba on charges of gross misconduct, days after he was nominated to seek an unconstitutional third term," Reuters reports.
• Yesterday Pope John Paul II visited Greece, where "hundreds of conservative Greek Orthodox believers have joined protests against the visit, with banners calling the Pope the 'anti-Christ' and 'persona non grata,'" CNN.com reports.

• Virginia gubernatorial candidate Mark Warner (D) "is readying an early burst of television advertising" that will start today, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reports.
• A poll released yesterday in the New Jersey governor's race shows former Rep. Bob Franks (R) and Jim McGreevey (D) "even with 42 percent of the vote each," the Newark Star-Ledger reports.
• New York Gov. George Pataki (R) "will head to the West Coast next week" on a fund-raising trip. Last week, Andrew Cuomo (D) "spent four days in California, seeking funds from Hollywood bigwigs for his bid for the Democratic nomination" as well, the Albany Times Union reports.

• St. Paul, Minn., Mayor Norm Coleman (R), in Washington to help kick off a new group called "CEOs for Cities," said his trip "was strictly focused on St. Paul, not a likely U.S. Senate race," the St. Paul Pioneer Press reports.
• The Boston Herald reports that Massachusetts Democrats are "optimistic" Sen. John F. Kerry, D-Mass., "will cruise to an easy re-election next year, either unopposed or facing just token opposition," which "could be a boon for Kerry's presidential ambitions, permitting him to target his Senate campaign resources towards a potential 2004 White House run."
• Sen. Zell Miller, D-Ga., said he has "no plans at this time of changing parties," responding to speculation that he "is considering becoming a Republican, resigning his seat next year and running for it as a Republican in a special election," Cox News Service reports.
• Virginia's 4th District Democrats will hold their convention this weekend to nominate either state Sen. L. Louise Lucas (D) or Alberta Town Council member Jo Ann Walthall (D) to face state Sen. J. Randy Forbes (R) in the June 19 special election, the Norfolk Virginian-Pilot reports.

• The California Supreme Court decided yesterday that Medicare patients "may sue health maintenance organizations for denying necessary but expensive medical treatment," the Los Angeles Times reports.
• The National Capital Planning Commission "yesterday unanimously voted to reopen the debate on the design and location of a World War II memorial," the Washington Times reports. Two public hearings will be held June 13 and 14.

• Yesterday Al Gore finished up his semester as a guest lecturer at Columbia University, where some students "said they were frustrated by the rather shapeless nature of the course," the Daily Telegraph reports.
• Donna Brazile, Gore's WH 2000 campaign manager, said she expects the former vice president "will surface publicly to speak out on issues by this fall," AP reports.