North Korea: 2 U.S. journalists pardoned

From Yahoo! News:

SEOUL, South Korea – North Korean media say leader Kim Jong Il has pardoned two American journalists and ordered their release during the visit of former U.S. President Bill Clinton.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — Former President Bill Clinton met Tuesday with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il on the first day of a surprise mission to Pyongyang to negotiate the release of two Americans, holding "exhaustive" talks on a wide range of topics, state-run media said.

Clinton "courteously" conveyed a verbal message from President Barack Obama, the official Korean Central News Agency said in a report from Pyongyang. Kim expressed his thanks, and engaged Clinton in a "wide-ranging exchange of views on matters of common concern," the report said.

White House spokesman Robert Gibbs, however, denied Clinton went with a message from Obama. "That's not true," he told reporters.

Clinton was in communist North Korea on a mission to secure the freedom of Americans Euna Lee and Laura Ling, reporters for former Vice President Al Gore's Current TV media venture who were arrested along the Chinese-North Korean border in March and sentenced in June to 12 years of hard labor for illegal entry and engaging in "hostile acts."

His landmark visit, which was not announced in advance by North Korea or the U.S., comes at a time of heightened tensions between Washington and Pyongyang, foes during the Korean War of the 1950s, over the regime's nuclear program.

North Korea in recent months has conducted a nuclear test and test-fired an array of ballistic missiles in violation of U.N. Security Council resolutions, with Washington leading the push to punish Pyongyang for its defiance.

It's only the second visit to Pyongyang by a former U.S. leader. Jimmy Carter traveled to North Korea for talks with Kim's father, Kim Il Sung, in 1994 in a groundbreaking meeting during a time of similar tensions.

Clinton's meeting with Kim would be the notoriously reclusive North Korean leader's first with a prominent Western figure since Kim reportedly suffered a stroke a year ago, sparking questions about the future of the nation he controls with absolute authority.

Kim, said to have a taste for fine wines and fancy gourmet food, also is believed to suffer from chronic diabetes and heart disease. The man who once sported a noticeable pot belly has appeared gaunt and gray in recent months.

Though Clinton was in North Korea on a private basis, his visit was treated by North Korea as a high-profile visit, with senior officials — including Kim Kye Gwan, the vice foreign minister who serves as the country's chief nuclear negotiator — meeting him on the tarmac.

Footage from the APTN television news agency showed the arriving Clinton exchanging warm handshakes with the officials and accepting a bouquet of flowers from a schoolgirl.

Kim later hosted a banquet for Clinton at the state guesthouse, Radio Pyongyang and the Korean Central Broadcasting Station reported.

Photos in state-run media of the visit showed Kim, with a broad smile, standing next to a solemn-looking Clinton. The two also posed with Clinton's party in front of a mural, and another picture showed the men and others seated around a conference table.

Though Clinton does not hold office, his stature and good relations with Pyongyang could yield positive results, analysts said.

"This is a very potentially rewarding trip. Not only is it likely to resolve the case of the two American journalists detained in North Korea for many months, but it could be a very significant opening and breaking this downward cycle of tension and recrimination between the U.S. and North Korea," Mike Chinoy, author of "Meltdown: The Inside Story of the North Korean Nuclear Crisis," said in Beijing.

There was no word in state media on the status of Clinton's negotiations to secure the release of Ling, 32, and Lee, 36. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton last month urged North Korea to grant the women amnesty, saying they were remorseful and that their families were anguished.

Lee, a South Korean-born U.S. citizen, is married and has a 4-year-old daughter in Los Angeles; a native Californian, Ling is the married younger sister of TV journalist Lisa Ling.

Clinton's administration had rocky but relatively good relations with Pyongyang, and both he and Gore, his vice president, had been named as possible envoys to bring back Lee and Ling. Also mentioned was New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, who in the 1990s traveled twice to North Korea to secure the freedom of detained Americans.

However, the decision to send the former president was kept quiet. A senior U.S. official told reporters traveling Tuesday with Hillary Rodham Clinton that the White House would not comment on the trip to Pyongyang until the mission was complete.

"While this solely private mission to secure the release of two Americans is on the ground, we will have no comment," Gibbs, the White House spokesman, said later in a statement from Washington. "We do not want to jeopardize the success of former President Clinton's mission."

In New York, the Committee to Protect Journalists said it was encouraged by reports about Clinton's trip.

"This is welcome news and we are pleased to see movement in this case," said Bob Dietz, the group's Asia program coordinator. "The fate of these two women should not be linked to broader issues on the Korean peninsula, and to see both sides make a move toward the release of these reporters will bring some relief to them, their families and friends."

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Walter Cronkite Passes Away at 92

From Yahoo! News:

NEW YORK – Walter Cronkite, the premier TV anchorman of the networks' golden age who reported a tumultuous time with reassuring authority and came to be called "the most trusted man in America," died Friday. He was 92. Cronkite's longtime chief of staff, Marlene Adler, said Cronkite died at 7:42 p.m. at his Manhattan home surrounded by family. She said the cause of death was cerebral vascular disease.

Adler said, "I have to go now" before breaking down into what sounded like a sob. She said she had no further comment.

Cronkite was the face of the "CBS Evening News" from 1962 to 1981, when stories ranged from the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. to racial and anti-war riots, Watergate and the Iranian hostage crisis.

It was Cronkite who read the bulletins coming from Dallas when Kennedy was shot Nov. 22, 1963, interrupting a live CBS-TV broadcast of the soap opera "As the World Turns."

Cronkite was the broadcaster to whom the title "anchorman" was first applied, and he came so identified in that role that eventually his own name became the term for the job in other languages. (Swedish anchors are known as Kronkiters; In Holland, they are Cronkiters.)

"He was a great broadcaster and a gentleman whose experience, honesty, professionalism and style defined the role of anchor and commentator," CBS Corp. chief executive Leslie Moonves said in a statement.

CBS has scheduled a prime-time special, "That's the Way it Was: Remembering Walter Cronkite," for 7 p.m. Sunday.

His 1968 editorial declaring the United States was "mired in stalemate" in Vietnam was seen by some as a turning point in U.S. opinion of the war. He also helped broker the 1977 invitation that took Egyptian President Anwar Sadat to Jerusalem, the breakthrough to Egypt's peace treaty with Israel.

He followed the 1960s space race with open fascination, anchoring marathon broadcasts of major flights from the first suborbital shot to the first moon landing, exclaiming, "Look at those pictures, wow!" as Neil Armstrong stepped on the moon's surface in 1969. In 1998, for CNN, he went back to Cape Canaveral to cover John Glenn's return to space after 36 years.

"It is impossible to imagine CBS News, journalism or indeed America without Walter Cronkite," CBS News president Sean McManus said in a statement. "More than just the best and most trusted anchor in history, he guided America through our crises, tragedies and also our victories and greatest moments."

He had been scheduled to speak last January for the 50th anniversary of the U.S. Space & Rocket Center in Huntsville, Ala., but ill health prevented his appearance.

A former wire service reporter and war correspondent, he valued accuracy, objectivity and understated compassion. He expressed liberal views in more recent writings but said he had always aimed to be fair and professional in his judgments on the air.

Off camera, his stamina and admittedly demanding ways brought him the nickname "Old Ironpants." But to viewers, he was "Uncle Walter," with his jowls and grainy baritone, his warm, direct expression and his trim mustache.

When he summed up the news each evening by stating, "And THAT's the way it is," millions agreed. His reputation survived accusations of bias by Richard Nixon's vice president, Spiro Agnew, and being labeled a "pinko" in the tirades of a fictional icon, Archie Bunker of CBS's "All in the Family."

Two polls pronounced Cronkite the "most trusted man in America": a 1972 "trust index" survey in which he finished No. 1, about 15 points higher than leading politicians, and a 1974 survey in which people chose him as the most trusted television newscaster.

Like fellow Midwesterner Johnny Carson, Cronkite seemed to embody the nation's mainstream. When he broke down as he announced Kennedy's death, removing his glasses and fighting back tears, the times seemed to break down with him.

And when Cronkite took sides, he helped shape the times. After the 1968 Tet offensive, he visited Vietnam and wrote and narrated a "speculative, personal" report advocating negotiations leading to the withdrawal of American troops.

"We have been too often disappointed by the optimism of the American leaders, both in Vietnam and Washington, to have faith any longer in the silver linings they find in the darkest clouds," he said, and concluded, "We are mired in stalemate."

After the broadcast, President Johnson reportedly said, "If I've lost Cronkite, I've lost middle America."

In the fall of 1972, responding to reports in The Washington Post, Cronkite aired a two-part series on Watergate that helped ensure national attention to the then-emerging scandal.

"When the news is bad, Walter hurts," the late CBS president Fred Friendly once said. "When the news embarrasses America, Walter is embarrassed. When the news is humorous, Walter smiles with understanding."

More recently, in a syndicated column, Cronkite defended the liberal record of Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry and criticized the Iraq war and other Bush administration policies.

But when asked by CNN's Larry King if that column was evidence of media bias, Cronkite set forth the distinction between opinion and reporting. "We all have prejudices," he said of his fellow journalists, "but we also understand how to set them aside when we do the job."

Cronkite was the top newsman during the peak era for the networks, when the nightly broadcasts grew to a half-hour and 24-hour cable and the Internet were still well in the future.

As many as 18 million households tuned in to Cronkite's top-rated program each evening. Twice that number watched his final show, on March 6, 1981, compared with fewer than 10 million in 2005 for the departure of Dan Rather, Cronkite's successor.

A vigorous 64 years old, Cronkite had stepped down with the assurance that other duties awaited him at CBS News, but found little demand there for his services. He hosted the shortlived science magazine series "Walter Cronkite's Universe" and was retained by the network as a consultant, although, as he was known to state wistfully, he was never consulted.

He also sailed his beloved boat, the Wyntje, hosted or narrated specials on public and cable TV, and issued his columns and the best-selling "Walter Cronkite: A Reporter's Life."

For 24 years he served as on-site host for New Year's Day telecasts by the Vienna Philharmonic, ending that cherished tradition only in 2009.

After the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Cronkite was selected to introduce the postponed Emmy awards show. He told the audience that in its coverage of the attack and its aftermath, "television, the great common denominator, has lifted our common vision as never before."

Cronkite joined CBS in 1950, after a decade with United Press, during which he covered World War II and the Nuremberg trials, and a brief stint with a regional radio group.

At CBS he found a respected radio-news organization dipping its toe into TV, and it put him in front of the camera. He was named anchor for CBS's coverage of the 1952 political conventions, the first year the presidential nominations got wide TV coverage. From there, he was assigned to such news-oriented programs as "You Are There" and "Twentieth Century." (He also briefly hosted a morning show, accompanied by a puppet named Charlemagne the Lion.)

On April 16, 1962, he replaced Douglas Edwards as anchor of the network's "Evening News."

"I never asked them why," Cronkite recalled in a 2006 TV portrait. "I was so pleased to get the job, I didn't want to endanger it by suggesting that I didn't know why I had it."

He was up against the NBC team of Chet Huntley and David Brinkley, which was solidly ahead in the ratings. Cronkite lacked Brinkley's wry wit and Huntley's rugged good looks, but he established himself as an anchorman to whom people could relate.

His rise to the top was interrupted just once: In 1964, disappointing ratings for the Republican National Convention led CBS boss William S. Paley to dump him as anchor of the Democratic gathering. Critics and viewers protested and he was never displaced again.

Cronkite won numerous Emmys and other awards for excellence in news coverage. In 1978, he and the evening news were the first anchorman and daily broadcast ever given a DuPont award. Other honors included the 1974 Gold Medal of the International Radio and Television Society, a 1974 George Polk journalism award and the 1969 William Allen White Award for Journalistic Merit, the first ever to a broadcaster.

His salary reportedly reaching seven figures, he was both anchorman and star — interviewed by Playboy, ham enough to appear as himself on an episode of "The Mary Tyler Moore Show." But Cronkite repeatedly condemned television practices that put entertainment values ahead of news judgment.

"Broadcast journalism is never going to substitute for print," he said. "We cannot cover in depth in a half hour many of the stories required to get a good understanding of the world."

The evening news program expanded from 15 minutes to half an hour in September 1963, 17 months after Cronkite took over, but it never got to the full hour he said he needed to do a proper job.

Cronkite denied rumors that he had been forced out by Rather, but chastised him upon his 2005 departure as anchor in the wake of a disputed "60 Minutes" story about President Bush's military service.

"Dan gave the impression of playing a role, more than simply trying to deliver the news to the audience," Cronkite said. He apparently felt more warmly about Katie Couric, providing a voiceover to introduce the former "Today" show host when she debuted as the CBS anchor in 2006.

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Neat: Yahoo! News Lists "Dumbest Moments in Business 2009," Including the Obama Administration Twice

Looking at a list of the "ten dumbest moments in business 2009" from the Main Stream Media, I hardly expected anything about the President's agregious spending and "cuts." But lo and behold Yahoo! listed two of the Prez's biggest blunders. Sure, they didn't mention his truly biggest, like the Porkulus bill or the Crap & Trade bill, but anything is a start:

From Yahoo! News:

9. Geithner gives few details, tanks the market

In February, President Obama used his first White House press conference to alert the public to a momentous event. "Tomorrow, my Treasury Secretary, Tim Geithner, will be announcing some very clear and specific plans for how we are going to start loosening up credit once again," he said.

But when Geithner appeared at Treasury the next day, on Feb. 10, he offered few plans of any sort, let alone clear and specific ones, which helps to explain the stock market's 5% plunge that day.

10. Obama's spending cuts...a ways to go

You're eight months behind on your $500,000 mortgage, your bank is demanding a meeting, and you respond by telling them there's nothing to worry about. Why not? Because you just saved $40 by canceling your newspaper subscription.

That, essentially, is the kind of fast budget talk President Obama trotted out in April when he made a big to-do out of instructing his cabinet to cut $100 million from their budgets.

$100 million may sound like a big number, but the cut would only reduce the United States' projected $1.8 trillion budget deficit by 0.005% -- less than what you'd save for your mortgage by giving up the daily paper.

If this stuff keeps up, we may one day have an unbiased Media. Well, maybe not.


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Michael Savage Blacklisted from Britain

According to Yahoo! News, the government of Britain recently released a report in which it blacklists several "radicals." These crazies include people from Hamas, Jewish extremists...and popular talk show host Michael Savage.

According to the Home Secretary of Britain, Jacqui Smith, "If you can't live by the rules that we live by... we should exclude you from this country and, what's more, now we will make public those people that we have excluded."

I will be the first to say that I love Great Britain. They are a symbol of rights and freedom throughout the world and one of the United States' greatest ally. But what can you say when they are banning people from their country because of their opinions? You can't truly say anything.

Free speech, something that apparently cannot cross the Atlantic. But then again, we must be watchful against the so-called "Fairness Doctrine," which will limit our freedom. We must be vigilant not to lose our own free speech.


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Chavez Wins Bid to Get Rid of Term Limits

That's right, ladies and gents, the world is coming to freedom and seeing the light, just like President Obama said would happen. Oh, wait, the opposite is happening... hmm, I wonder who's going to break the news to him.

From Yahoo News:

"CARACAS, Venezuela – President Hugo Chavez won a referendum to eliminate term limits

Sunday, enabling him to run again in 2012 and beyond in what critics fear is an attempt to become president-for-life.

Fireworks exploded in the sky and caravans of supporters celebrated in the streets, waving red flags and honking horns. Thousands of people gathered outside Miraflores Palace, where the former paratroop commander appeared on a balcony to sing the national anthem and address the crowd.

"Today we opened wide the gates of the future," proclaimed Chavez, who has governed for a decade and vowed to rule for at least a decade more. "In 2012 there will be presidential elections, and unless God decides otherwise, unless the people decide otherwise, this soldier is already a candidate."

Chavez called the victory — which allows all public officials to run for re-election as many times as they want — a mandate to speed his transformation of Venezuela into a socialist state.

"Those who voted 'yes' today voted for socialism, for revolution," he said.

With 94 percent of the vote counted, 54 percent had voted for the constitutional amendment, National Electoral Council chief Tibisay Lucena said. Forty-six percent had voted against it, a trend she called irreversible. She said turnout was 67 percent.

At their campaign headquarters, Chavez opponents who say the amendment pushes Venezuela closer to dictatorship hugged one another, and some cried. Several opposition leaders left without speaking, but several who remained said they wouldn't contest the vote.

"We accept this result," said student leader David Smolansky, 23. "We're still standing. We're committed to Venezuela."

Voters on both sides said the referendum was crucial to the future of Venezuela, a deeply polarized country where Chavez has spent a tumultuous decade in power channeling tremendous oil wealth into combating gaping social inequality.

Venezuela's leftist allies in Latin America have followed the model. Ecuador pushed through a new constitution in September and Bolivia did so in January. Both loosened rules on presidential re-election. Nicaragua's ruling Sandinistas also plan to propose an amendment that would let Daniel Ortega run for another consecutive term.

Opponents say Chavez already has far too much power, with the courts, the legislature and the election council all under his influence. Removing the current 12-year presidential term limit, they say, makes him unstoppable.

"Effectively this will become a dictatorship," opposition leader Omar Barboza told The Associated Press. "It's control of all the powers, lack of separation of powers, unscrupulous use of state resources, persecution of adversaries."

Chavez supporters say their president has given poor Venezuelans cheap food, free education and quality health care, and empowered them with a discourse of class struggle after decades of U.S.-backed governments that favored the rich.

"This victory saved the revolution," said Gonzalo Mosqueda, a 60-year-old shopkeeper, sipping rum from a plastic cup outside the palace. "Without it everything would be at risk — all the social programs, and everything he has done for the poor."

Chavez took office in 1999 and won support for a new constitution the same year that allowed the president to serve two six-year terms, barring him from the 2012 elections. Sunday's vote was his second attempt to change that; voters rejected a broader referendum in December 2007."

Plane that Crashed Near Buffalo was on Autopilot

From Yahoo News:

"BUFFALO, N.Y. – The commuter plane that crashed near Buffalo was on autopilot until just before it went down in icy weather, indicating that the pilot may have violated federal safety recommendations and the airline's own policy for flying in such conditions, an investigator said Sunday.

Federal guidelines and the airline's own instructions suggest a pilot should not engage the autopilot when flying through ice. If the ice is severe, the company that operated Continental Flight 3407 requires pilots to shut off the autopilot.

"You may be able in a manual mode to sense something sooner than the autopilot can sense it," said Steve Chealander of the National Transportation Safety Board, which also recommends that pilots disengage the autopilot in icy conditions.

Automatic safety devices returned the aircraft to manual control just before it fell from the sky, Chealander said.

During a Sunday briefing, Chealander described the flight's frantic last moments, which included a steep drop and rollercoaster-like pitching and rolling.

Chealander said information from the plane's flight data recorder indicates that the plane pitched up at an angle of 31 degrees in its final moments, then pitched down at 45 degrees.

The plane rolled to the left at 46 degrees, then snapped back to the right at 105 degrees — 15 degrees beyond vertical.

Radar data shows Flight 3407 fell from 1,800 feet above sea level to 1,000 feet in five seconds, he said. Passengers and crew would have experienced G-forces up to twice as strong as on the ground.

The plane crashed belly first on top of a house Thursday night, killing all 49 people on board and one person on the ground.

Just before they went down in a suburban neighborhood near the Buffalo airport, the pilots discussed "significant" ice buildup on their wings and windshield. Other aircraft in the area told air traffic controllers they also experienced icing around the same time.

The Dash 8 Q400 plane operated by Colgan Air was equipped with a "stick shaker" mechanism that rattles the yolk to warn the pilot if the plane is about to lose aerodynamic lift, a condition called a stall.

When the stick shaker engaged, it would have automatically turned off the autopilot, Chealander said.

Chealander said the plane's deicing system was turned on 11 minutes after it took off from Newark, N.J., and stayed on for the entire flight. Indicator lights showed the system appeared to be working.

Investigators who examined both engines said they appeared to be working normally at the time of the crash, too.

In a December safety alert issued by the NTSB, the agency said pilots in icy conditions should turn off or limit the use of the autopilot to better "feel" changes in the handling qualities of the airplane.

Colgan Air operates a fleet of 51 regional turboprops for Continental Connection, United Express and US Airways Express.

Chealander said Colgan, like most airlines, had begun following NTSB recommendations that pilots use deicing systems as soon as they enter conditions that might lead to icing.

Federal Aviation Administration spokeswoman Laura Brown said the agency advises pilots to disengage the autopilot when ice is accumulating, but the guidance is not mandatory.

She also said some planes are certified to be flown on autopilot in icing conditions because doing so "may actually keep the aircraft at a steadier speed and altitude than a pilot could flying it manually."

Brown said the agency considered making the guidance mandatory, but others in the aviation community argued against it, citing the capabilities of such advanced planes.

She did not know if the 74-seat Q400 Bombardier aircraft that crashed Thursday was certified to be on autopilot during icing conditions.

By Sunday, authorities had recovered the remains of 15 people from the wreckage as crews raced to finish their work before a storm arrives later in the week.

Erie County Executive Chris Collins said recovery efforts intensified after the arrival of additional federal workers. A storm forecast for Wednesday added to the urgency.

The storm could hamper recovery efforts, but "the investigation will continue snow, rain or shine," said David Bissonette, the town's emergency coordinator.

Recovery crews could need as much as four days to remove the remains from the site. Chealander described the efforts as an "excavation."

"Keep in mind, there's an airplane that fell on top of a house, and they're now intermingled," he said.

DNA and dental records will be used to identify the remains, he said.

Once all the remains are recovered, the focus will turn to removing wreckage of the 74-seat aircraft from the neighborhood."