The Earlybird: Today's headlines

Bush stumps, Dems push patients' rights, Warner decries Web site, Condit confers with Levys, New York restricts in-car calling, House holds up faith-based bill and GOP ballplayers win big.

• President Bush was in Birmingham, Ala., on Thursday, where he spoke at Oak Mountain State Park and opened "his remarks with a plug for" Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., the Birmingham News reports. Bush's speech "was designed to plug his conservation plans, but it turned quickly to states' rights and other themes both dear to Southern hearts and reminiscent of Bush's fall campaign."
• Bush said during the speech that "he is spending a record amount on the outdoors but is letting states decide where much of the money should go," the Washington Post reports.
• Bush also used the speech to tell Congress "not to act on its own big spending ideas," AP reports.
• Bush will spend a three-day weekend at his Texas ranch, AP reports.
• AFL-CIO Chief John Sweeney said Thursday that "organized labor is frozen out of White House deliberations while on many issues... the door is wide open to corporate America," USA Today reports.
• An unidentified Ohio man was arrested Thursday "after he appeared at the White House with ammunition and led" police "to two guns nearby," AP reports.

• On Thursday, Bush renewed his threat to veto the patients' rights legislation favored by Senate Democrats, Cox News Service reports. Bush's statement "listed 'serious flaws' in the" McCain-Edwards-Kennedy bill and "warned that the president would sign the legislation only if its rules for lawsuits are tightened."
• House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., said that Bush "might eventually have to accept a bill that went further than he wanted in allowing patients to sue health maintenance organizations for denial of care," the New York Times reports. Hastert's statement was "a sign of the shifting political winds."
• Meanwhile, the Senate voted 52-45 to defeat a Republican amendment to the bill "that would have given tax breaks to the self-employed," Reuters reports. The vote "was a key victory for Democrats."
• National Public Radio reports that the amendment would have violated the constitutional requirement that all tax legislation originate in the House.

• The House voted 247-164 on Thursday "to thwart Bush administration efforts to explore for oil and gas in environmentally sensitive areas," AP reports.
• The Senate voted Thursday to "restore $389 million the House had cut a day earlier from the disaster relief fund Texans are using to recover from Tropical Storm Allison," the Houston Chronicle reports.
• The House Ethics Committee on Thursday "rebuked" Rep. Earl Hilliard, D-Ala., for "admitting to a multi-year pattern of improperly funneling campaign funds into family businesses," the Birmingham News reports.
• The House Ways and Means Committee on Thursday "postponed passage" of Bush's faith-based initiative plan "amid legal questions and lack of bipartisan support, jeopardizing hopes for the targeted Fourth of July passage," the Washington Times reports.
• The Senate Appropriations Committee yesterday approved "a $6.5 billion fiscal 2001 supplemental spending package that would beef up the Defense Department," National Journal News Service reports.

• After a meeting with Vice President Dick Cheney on Thursday, Senate Armed Services Chairman Carl Levin, D-Mich., said that "the Bush administration is moving away from efforts to quickly deploy a ballistic missile defense system and abrogate the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty," UPI reports.
• Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld testified before the House and Senate Armed Services committees Thursday and said "that the armed forces' overriding requirement to fight two wars at once 'can't be said to be working,' and said his staff is now developing a new strategy to counter 21st-century threats," the Washington Times reports.
• White House adviser Karl Rove "planned to meet today with top Pentagon officials concerned about the Vieques bombing range issue, but he abruptly canceled his attendance at the session after the Washington Times questioned him about the upcoming meeting."

• The Justice Department "has begun contacting major tobacco companies to set up settlement talks about its massive lawsuit against the industry, and Philip Morris on Thursday became the first to say it would meet with government lawyers," Reuters reports.
• Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Christie Whitman is expected to issue rules today to "clamp down on old coal-fired power plants that are the chief culprits in the haze that has spoiled the vistas in many national parks and wilderness areas," New York Times News Service reports.
• The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported Thursday that "the nation is facing another fall of flu vaccine shortages" but said that "the problems won't be as severe as last year," the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports.
• "The federal government is moving toward imposing stricter fuel economy standards on popular sport-utility vehicles, minivans and other light trucks for the first time in 26 years," the Washington Post reports.

• A federal grand jury on Thursday indicted 13 "Saudi members of the Hezbollah movement and an unnamed Lebanese" on "19 counts of murder and related crimes for the June 25, 1996, truck bombing of the Air Force housing complex in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia," the Houston Chronicle reports.
• The Supreme Court on Thursday delayed the execution of Alabama death row inmate Glenn Holladay "after his lawyer pleaded that his life be spared because he is mentally retarded," the Birmingham News reports.
• The International Labor Rights Fund filed a lawsuit in Washington on Thursday accusing oil company ExxonMobil "of actively abetting human rights abuses in Indonesia," BBCNews.com reports.
• Postinaugural resignations have left "82 of the 93 U.S. attorneys' offices empty," the Wall Street Journal's "Washington Wire" reports.

• New Jersey gubernatorial hopeful former Rep. Bob Franks (R) yesterday "proposed freezing tax assessments for as long as people own their homes," the New York Times reports. Such a change "could revolutionize the way municipalities and school districts finance operations."
• New Jersey state election officials decided yesterday that Jersey City Mayor and gubernatorial candidate Bret Schundler (R) did not illegally use "his charitable education foundation to run $885,000 worth of political TV ads," the Trenton Times reports. (Schundler has been airing campaign ads defending his appearance in the foundation spots.)
• And Democratic candidate Jim McGreevey was in Atlantic City Thursday to pick up the "coveted endorsement" of the AFL-CIO, the Philadelphia Inquirer reports. "While his Republican counterparts are locked in a bitter primary contest, McGreevey has no serious Democratic opposition, a fat bank account for the fall campaign, and a message that seems tailor-made for New Jersey voters."

• Virginia gubernatorial candidate Mark Warner (D) is accusing Mike Larson -- who bought the domain name of www.markwarner2001.com and "launched a site highly critical of Warner" -- of "cybersquatting," the Richmond Times-Dispatch reports.
• Warner's opponent, Republican Mark Earley, "is joining the Richmond office of Troutman, Sanders, Mays & Valentine," an Atlanta-based law firm, to "tide him over unless voters decide otherwise in November," the Richmond Times-Dispatch reports.
• Judge Stephen J. Culliton "is giving up a coveted seat... on the bench" to run the Illinois gubernatorial campaign of Attorney General Jim Ryan (R), in "the strongest indication yet that Jim Ryan will run for governor regardless of what the incumbent does," the Chicago Tribune reports.
• Massachusetts acting Gov. Jane Swift (R) has been "personally calling supporters, asking some of them to hold fund-raising events so she can arm herself for a likely 2002 campaign for a full four-year term," the Boston Globe reports.
• Rep. Martin Meehan, D-Mass., on Thursday "turned back widening speculation that he may take a pass on the 2002 gubernatorial race, saying it's 'a compliment' that his rivals for the Democratic nomination want him out so early," the Boston Herald reports.
• Republican Mike Taylor, who is running for Senate in Montana, "told supporters during an announcement swing" that Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., "follows a liberal agenda and does not reflect Montana values," the Havre Daily News reports.

• Eight "storm-ravaged" Wisconsin counties have been declared federal disaster areas, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports.
• On Thursday night, New York became the first state "to ban the use of hand-held cell phones while driving," the New York Post reports.

• "Mexican Foreign Minister Jorge Castaneda said Thursday that the United States and Mexico will open bilateral negotiations on immigration issues that will include a controversial Mexican proposal granting legal status to all Mexican migrants working in the United States," the Houston Chronicle reports.
• Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams "said Thursday the peace process in Northern Ireland is moving forward despite riots in Belfast and the uncertain future of the region's fledgling government," AP reports.
• "Three severed heads were found yesterday in an area where Muslim extremists claimed to have killed an American hostage last week," AP reports. The American hostage is not believed to be one of the victims found.
• An 11-day-old cease-fire in Macedonia has ended, BBCNews.com reports, and "the Macedonian army is continuing a ferocious offensive against a key village held by more than 700 ethnic Albanian rebels."
• "Israel will receive $74 million in compensation for costs incurred by Iraqi Scud missile attacks during the Persian Gulf War, but a U.N. panel rejected most of a $1-billion military-related claim," AP reports.

• Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., who will visit Iowa on Sunday, "said he is leaving the door open to a 2004 run for the White House, regardless of what former Vice President Al Gore decides to do," the Des Moines Register reports.
• Former Sen. Bob Dole, R-Kan., "will undergo a medical procedure next week to treat an aneurysm," AP reports.
• On Thursday, missing intern Chandra Levy's parents "had a face-to-face meeting with" Rep. Gary Condit, D-Calif., the Washington Post reports. The Levys, along with attorney Billy Martin, requested that Washington police "upgrade the missing persons investigation to a criminal matter."
• Carroll O'Connor, who played Archie Bunker on "All in the Family," died Thursday, AP reports. He was 76. Bluesman John Lee Hooker, 80, also passed away, E! Online reports.
• The Wall Street Journal's "Washington Wire" points out a Web site for "foes" of Sen. Robert Torricelli, D-N.J.: www.torricellideathwatch.com, which "offers prizes for picking the indictment date."
• Former Nebraska lawmaker John DeCamp, "who said he represents a group of Vietnamese, on Thursday threatened to sue" former Sen. Bob Kerrey, D-Neb., "over his revelation that he led a 1969 military raid that killed 21 Vietnamese women and children," Reuters reports.
• Roger Clinton on Thursday "vehemently denied claims that he received money for promises of winning presidential pardons," CNN.com reports.
• Forbes "found 538 billionaires from 46 countries this year," with Bill Gates still topping the list.
• Jacqueline Jackson, wife of the Rev. Jesse Jackson, "was thrown into solitary confinement after refusing to be strip-searched at the Puerto Rican jail where she is protesting U.S. naval bombings off the island of Vieques," the Chicago Sun-Times reports.
• On Thursday, Andrea Pia Yates, in a "zombie-like fashion," told "police how she methodically drowned her five children one by one in a bathtub," the Houston Chronicle reports. Yates "is scheduled for arraignment early today on a charge of capital murder."

• Republicans beat Democrats "9-1 in the 40th annual congressional baseball game" on Thursday, AP reports.