The Earlybird: Today's headlines

Bush's veteran visit, Dem budget attack, sagging economy, Joint Chiefs speculation, busy Virginia gov race, potential Gramm replacements, Condit's plans to speak:

• President Bush today will visit Milwaukee, where he will speak to the Veterans of Foreign Wars, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports.
• Bush will use the speech "to honor the service of the veterans and pledge to clear up a backlog in health care claims," Reuters reports.

• Lawrence Lindsay, Bush's chief economist, said on "Meet the Press" Sunday that the White House "will not use the Social Security or Medicare portions of the budget surplus for spending increases or tax cuts," AP reports.
• House Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt, D-Mo., told "Meet the Press" that "he is prepared to implement across-the-board spending cuts in domestic programs to ensure a balanced budget and avoid dipping into the Social Security trust fund," the Washington Times reports.
• Democrats this week are planning a campaign, including protests, TV ads and "town hall meetings," charging Bush's budget taps into Social Security, USA Today reports.

• Bush has signaled that his proposed immigration reforms will be "a slow, piecemeal process that likely won't make sweeping changes until after the 2002 elections," the Washington Post reports.
• Bush also is "developing a series of proposals to take to the next international round of global-warming talks, in a bid to demonstrate its recognition of the global-warming problem and commitment to finding a solution," the Wall Street Journal reports.

• A Justice Department study released Sunday found that the number of people charged with drug trafficking is on the rise, AP reports.
• Two law professors disputed part of the study that said changes in the law have led to longer prison sentences for drug offenders, the Washington Times reports. They said "average prison terms have decreased 'steadily and dramatically' since 1991."
• A new report from the Congressional Research Service says international arms sales are on the rise, the New York Times reports.
• Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee released a study arguing "that the federal government should require states to meet minimum national voting rights standards and should pay for the costs," the New York Times reports.

• "The world economy, which grew at a raging pace just last year, has slowed to a crawl as the United States, Europe, Japan and some major developing countries undergo a rare simultaneous slump," the New York Times reports.
• And "almost a year after a slump in high tech and manufacturing began, many of the other pillars that had been supporting the economy are starting to weaken," the Wall Street Journal reports.

• "U.S. warships carrying 6,500 sailors docked in Hong Kong Monday, the most to use this former British colony as a port of call since the recent spy plane drama strained U.S.-Chinese relations," UPI reports.
• Military sources told USA Today that "the Navy's top admiral and the current vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff are the front-runners to succeed Gen. Hugh Shelton as the Pentagon's top commander."

• The Israeli army killed two Palestinians yesterday, "while Jewish settlements came under repeated mortar fire on a day marked by gun battles, helicopter raids, and grenade attacks," AP reports. Three more Palestinians died Sunday night during fighting.
• Appearing on "Fox News Sunday," Hanan Ashrawi, a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, accused Bush of "being virtually absent from the escalating crisis in the Middle East and failing to take steps to end nearly 11 months of violence between Israel and the Palestinians," Reuters reports.
• Today the United States plans to veto a United Nations Security Resolution "dispatching international monitors to anguished areas" like the Middle East, the Christian Science Monitor reports.

• "The reclusive leader of Macedonia's ethnic Albanian guerrillas stepped into the open yesterday, inviting reporters to his mountain hideout to declare that his fighters will hand over their weapons to NATO soldiers and honor a peace deal," AP reports.
• Thirty-six people died after an explosion in a coal mine in Ukraine Sunday, AP reports.
• The space shuttle Discovery is expected to begin its return to Earth today, the Houston Chronicle reports.

• GOP strategists "fear" that Virginia gubernatorial hopeful Mark Earley's (R) planned "six-week blaze of money and message" could "arrive too late and too muffled to continue the party's eight-year lease on the Executive Mansion," the Washington Post reports.
• Earley and Democrat Mark Warner differ on education testing standards, AP reports. Earley "strongly supports the accountability standards developed by the Republican administrations of George Allen and James S. Gilmore III," while Warner wants revisions that "would increase the cost of grading each exam."
• Warner visited Southside Virginia on Saturday and said he would ensure "that every corner of Virginia participate in the new economy," the Martinsville-Bulletin reports.
• Massachusetts state Sen. Cheryl Jacques (D) yesterday picked up endorsements from black and Latino members of the state Legislature in her bid for the 9th District seat, and she "blasted" state Sen. Stephen F. Lynch (D) "for his defense of youths charged with hate crimes," the Boston Globe reports.

• In Texas, "two popular Hispanic Democrats, former San Antonio Mayor Henry Cisneros and one-time state Attorney General Dan Morales, emerged as clear favorites" should Sen. Phil Gramm (R) "be tapped to replace retiring Texas A&M University President Ray Bowen," the Washington Times reports.
• Illnois' "contentious Republican governor's race" is "spilling into the already arduous task of redrawing the General Assembly's boundaries," with some Republicans angry at state Attorney General and gubernatorial hopeful Jim Ryan's (R) "decision to appoint Democrats to defend the state in a high-stakes battle over legislative redistricting," the Chicago Tribune reports.
• Former Attorney General Janet Reno (D) put "campaign politics aside and focused on statesmanlike themes of honesty and bravery at a youth banquet Saturday," AP reports. Reno "said she plans to announce by Labor Day or mid-September whether she will seek the party's nomination" for governor.
• At the Florida Hispanic Chamber of Commerce in Orlando, Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R) said "that the state's growing Hispanic population plus the growing number in the state's colleges will soon bring that ethnic group more power" and that his initiative to end affirmative action in the state has led to "more Hispanic enrollment" in Florida's universities, AP reports.

• Richard Ross, who has run the campaigns of Rep. Gary Condit, D-Calif., since 1982, said in an ABC interview that the congressman plans to speak publicly to his constituents this week, Reuters reports. Ross said, "He has to acknowledge to them what he feels, which is they're going to come first before he starts talking to a broader or national audience."
• Fresh out of jail "after serving 90 days for protesting against U.S. Navy bombing in Puerto Rico," the Rev. Al Sharpton plans to announce today that he is forming an exploratory committee for a 2004 presidential run, Reuters reports.
• Newsweek has reviewed the contents of transcripts between former President Bill Clinton and former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak discussing the Marc Rich pardon. "The transcripts offer no 'smoking gun' showing that the former president was motivated by large donations to his presidential library or by generous campaign contributions."
• Kennedy cousin Michael Skakel's "lawyers say murder charges should be dismissed before trial because a five-year statute of limitations was in effect at the time of the slaying," AP reports. A judge in the trial is currently considering the defense's motion for dismissal.