The Earlybird: Today's headlines

Energy policy revealed, family planning ban upheld, market gained, Hanssen indicted, Lieberman prepared, York mayor surrendered, Bush daughter sentenced:

• Today President Bush will unveil his plan for a national energy policy, the Houston Chronicle reports. "A special energy task force led by Vice President Dick Cheney will recommend the government ease oil and gas companies' access to federal lands, examine ways to avoid gasoline supply disruptions and prod Americans to conserve."
• Bush "will warn... that the United States faces 'the most serious energy shortage since the oil embargo of the 1970s,'" CBSNews.com reports. He will "travel to Iowa and Minnesota, two key states during presidential campaigns, to promote his plan" today, and he "will discuss hydroelectric power in Pennsylvania on Friday."
• The New York Times has an "overview" of the policy.
• Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., said Wednesday that "some of Bush's expected recommendations, such as expanded drilling on federal land and taking private land for power lines, 'will be hotly debated' on Capitol Hill," AP reports. "Democrats launched a pre-emptive strike Wednesday."

• On Wednesday Bush "spoke to a meeting of the U.S. Sub-Saharan Africa Trade and Economic Cooperation Forum" and "announced that he will host an October meeting in Washington of finance and trade ministers from sub-Saharan Africa," the Washington Post reports.
• The list of "people who have spent the night at the White House or Camp David since President Bush took office" contains "no people he knows primarily as contributors, and the list isn't studded with celebrities," USA Today reports.

• Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, said Wednesday that he plans to file a lawsuit against a Department of Health and Human Services grant program that offers "federal grants to prevent HIV and drug abuse... only to religious groups," AP reports. The program was "put in place before Bush took office in January."
• The California-based Traditional Values Coalition, a group of "43,000 churches," sent Bush a letter Wednesday asking him to "withdraw his pick to head the Securities and Exchange Commission because of legal work the nominee once did for a sex firm," Reuters reports.

• The Senate will begin debate on the tax bill today, the New York Times reports. "A vote is planned for Monday." Next week "a few senior Republicans and representatives from the White House will meet in a private conference committee to work out the differences between the House and Senate bills."
• On Wednesday the House voted 218-210 "to preserve President Bush's policy of banning aid to foreign organizations that discuss or advocate abortion rights abroad," AP reports.
• National Journal News Service reports on the markups of more than 20 bills that saw House or Senate committee action yesterday.

• On Wednesday "the Dow Jones industrial average closed above the 11,000 mark for the first time in eight months -- as investors wagered yesterday that an aggressive rate-cutting campaign by the Federal Reserve would soon revive corporate profits," the Baltimore Sun reports.
• "The major stock indexes will be hard-pressed to surpass the performance they gave Wednesday," CNNfn.com reports.
• In April inflation "rose a smaller-than-expected 0.3" percent, the Wall Street Journal reports.

• "China repeated on Thursday its refusal to allow a damaged U.S. Navy spy plane to fly home and said it had not received a formal request to remove the plane by cargo aircraft," Reuters reports.
• China has charged Li Shaomin, an American business professor teaching in Hong Kong, "with spying for Taiwan," AP reports.
• "China is preparing to conduct large-scale military exercises in the South China Sea from Hainan island and on Woody Island," the Washington Times reports.
• "A confidential Pentagon strategy review has cast the Pacific as the most important region for military planners and calls for the development of new long-range arms to counter China's military power," the New York Times reports.

• Yesterday in Colombia, "kidnappers were holding as many as 207 captives snatched while returning from work on a plantation," AP reports. It was "the country's biggest mass kidnapping."
• "The Israeli army says it is establishing outposts in a number of buildings in Palestinian territory to prevent their use for attacks on Israeli targets," BBCNews.com reports. Meanwhile, the New York Times reports, the Bush administration is considering "ways to become involved in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict."
• "In the first concrete step toward overhauling UN sanctions against Iraq, Britain and the United States will propose lifting controls on most civilian goods headed toward the Middle Eastern country," the Boston Globe reports.

• On Wednesday -- the day Timothy McVeigh was originally scheduled to be executed -- FBI Director Louis Freeh "took responsibility for the mistakes that led U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft to delay McVeigh's execution until June 11," the Oklahoman reports.
• Former FBI agent Robert Hanssen was indicted Wednesday "on one count of conspiracy to commit espionage, 19 counts of espionage and one count of attempted espionage," AP reports. "The conspiracy count and the espionage charges carry a maximum penalty of death or life imprisonment."

• California Gov. Gray Davis (D) "has launched a new offensive, taking aim at a single firm: Houston-based Reliant Energy, whose executives believe the governor may be building a case to confiscate the company's power plants," the Los Angeles Times reports.
• The Sacramento Bee reports that the California public is being warned that "tap water could turn cloudy or contaminated during a prolonged power outage at the utilities' well pumps."

• Sen. Joseph Lieberman, D-Conn., "recently huddled with close advisers and top Democratic lobbyists in an effort to chart his future," Roll Call reports. "These meetings are being viewed by some Democrats as preliminary steps by Lieberman to make sure he is prepared to run for the White House should former Vice President Al Gore decide not to seek the Democratic nomination again."
• William Welsh II, chairman of the nation's largest voting-equipment company, "says delays in Congress and state capitals have cost the nation its chance of replacing all antiquated punch-card voting machines in time for the 2004 presidential election," USA Today reports.
• Roll Call reports that "the total amount of money raised and spent on Congressional races last year broke the $1 billion mark for the first time ever."

• With a month to go before the special election in Virginia's 4th District, the Virginia GOP is "running new radio and TV ads that hit state Sen. Louise Lucas (D) for her vote on taxing seniors' medical costs," Roll Call reports.
• Hayne Hipp, the South Carolina "Democratic favorite for the U.S. Senate race in 2002, contributed money to Republican candidates the last 10 years," including Rep. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., "the lone Republican seeking the GOP nomination for the Senate seat now held by Strom Thurmond -- the same race Hipp is interested in entering," the Columbia State reports.
• Former Rep. Rick Hill, R-Mont., said yesterday he will not challenge Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., in 2002, the Billings Gazette reports.
• Former Arkansas state Rep. Jim Von Gremp (R) "said Wednesday he will not be a candidate to replace" Rep. Asa Hutchinson, R-Ark., in the 3rd District, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reports. "Von Gremp was Gov. Mike Huckabee's [R] first choice for the job."
• North Carolina state Rep. Wayne Goodwin (D) is considering running for Congress in 2002. Before redistricting, "Goodwin is in the 8th Congressional District, which is represented" by Robin Hayes (R), the Raleigh News & Observer reports.
• The Richmond Crusade for Voters, "a black voter organization," has endorsed Democrat Mark Warner in his Virginia gubernatorial bid, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reports.

• York, Pa., Mayor Charlie Robertson (D) "said he will turn himself in today for the 1969 murder of Lillie Belle Allen," the York Daily Record reports.
• "After 12 hours of deliberations over three days, jurors" in West Palm Beach, Fla., found Nathaniel Brazill guilty of second-degree murder in the May shooting of his teacher, "sparing the 14-year-old from a mandatory sentence of life in prison," the Palm Beach Post reports.

• Jenna Bush "pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor charge of being a minor in possession of alcohol" Wednesday. Her sentence includes "a six-hour alcohol awareness class, eight hours of community service and a $51.25 court fee," the Austin American-Statesman reports.
• Rep. Gary Condit, D-Calf., "has told D.C. police the missing intern they are looking for," Chandra Levy, 24, "had visited his apartment," the New York Daily News reports.