University of Vermont Professor Charged With Faking Grant Info, Fabricating Data
Mood:  chatty
Now Playing: Prominent Women's Health Researcher Accused of Fabricating Data
Topic: Lib Loser Stories

BURLINGTON, Vt. - A former medical school professor was accused Thursday of fabricating research data on closely watched topics such as menopause, aging and hormone supplements to win millions of dollars in grant money from the federal government.

Prosecutors said Eric T. Poehlman, 49, a former tenured professor at the University of Vermont College of Medicine, would fabricate his research to make his proposals look more intriguing, in the hope that the government would be more likely to dole out grants to him.

"Dr. Poehlman fraudulently diverted millions of dollars from Public Health Service to support his research projects," U.S. Attorney David V. Kirby said Thursday. "This in turn siphoned millions of dollars from the pool of resources available for valid scientific research proposals. As this prosecution provides, such conduct will not be tolerated."

Poehlman has agreed to plead guilty to federal charges of making false statements in an application for a $542,000 grant he received, federal prosecutors said. He faces up to five years in prison. He is also barred by the federal government from receiving Public Health Research funds and must retract or correct 10 articles.

Poehlman is accused of requesting $11.6 million in federal funding using false data. Although he did not receive many of the grants, the National Institutes of Health and the U.S. Department of Agriculture used $2.9 million in research funding based on the faulty applications, prosecutors said.

His lawyer, Robert B. Hemley, said Thursday that he was unwilling to comment on the case until at least after the sentencing.

In a paper on published in the Annals of Internal Medicine in 1995, Poehlman said he had tested 35 healthy women and retested the same women six years later in the "The Longitudinal Menopause Study: 1994-2000" when he actually falsified and fabricated test results for 32 of the women.

In applications for federal grants, Poehlman lied about the number of subjects he had tested in "The Longitudinal Study of Aging: 1996-2000" and changed the data about their physical characteristics and test results to create trends that did not occur in the research.

Poehlman also made up the results from a 1999-2000 Hormone Replacement Therapy study to seek federal funding.

UVM started to investigate Poehlman in December of 2000 when one of his research assistants accused him of scientific misconduct.

During the two-year investigation, Poehlman deleted electronic evidence of his falsifications, presented false testimony and documents and influenced other witnesses to provide false documents, the U.S. attorney's office said.

Poehlman resigned from the medical school in 2001 and moved to Montreal, Canada to work as a researcher. He has since left his job in Canada.

Poehlman has also agreed to pay $180,000 to settle a civil complaint.

Yahoo News ~ Associated Press ** Professor Charged With Faking Grant Info

Media Missed Millionaires' Liberal Scam
Mood:  loud
Now Playing: BUYING 'REFORM'
Topic: Lib Loser Stories

Campaign-finance reform has been an immense scam perpetrated on the American people by a cadre of left-wing foundations and disguised as a "mass movement."

But don't take my word for it. One of the chief scammers, Sean Treglia, a former program officer of the Pew Charitable Trusts, confesses it all in an astonishing videotape I obtained earlier this week.

The tape - of a conference held at USC's Annenberg School for Communication in March of 2004 ? shows Treglia expounding to a gathering of academics, experts and journalists (none of whom, apparently, ever wrote about Treglia's remarks) on just how Pew and other left-wing foundations plotted to create a fake grassroots movement to hoodwink Congress.

"I'm going to tell you a story that I've never told any reporter," Treglia says on the tape. "Now that I'm several months away from Pew and we have campaign-finance reform, I can tell this story."

That story in brief:

Charged with promoting campaign-finance reform when he joined Pew in the mid-1990s, Treglia came up with a three-pronged strategy: 1) pursue an expansive agenda through incremental reforms, 2) pay for a handful of "experts" all over the country with foundation money and 3) create fake business, minority and religious groups to pound the table for reform.

"The target audience for all this activity was 535 people in Washington," Treglia says ? 100 in the Senate, 435 in the House. "The idea was to create an impression that a mass movement was afoot ? that everywhere they looked, in academic institutions, in the business community, in religious groups, in ethnic groups, everywhere, people were talking about reform."

It's a stark admission, but perhaps Treglia should be thanked for his candor.

(Treglia, contacted by The Post yesterday, was singing a different tune about Pew, saying it would be "incorrect to suggest that the organization would attempt to deceive or mislead about its funding efforts." Pew's president, Rebecca Rimel, calls the charge "false" in a written statement.)

Treglia's revelations help put in context a report just out from a group called Political Money Line, "Campaign Finance Lobby: 1994-2004," which follows the money behind campaign-finance reform.

That cash, it turns out, was the one thing about the "movement" that was masssive: From 1994 to 2004, almost $140 million was spent to lobby for changes to our country's campaign-finance laws.

But this money didn't come from little old ladies making do with cat food so they could send a $20 check to Common Cause. The vast majority of this money ? $123 million, 88 percent of the total ? came from just eight liberal foundations.

These foundations were: the Pew Charitable Trusts ($40.1 million), the Schumann Center for Media and Democracy ($17.6 million), the Carnegie Corporation of New York ($14.1 million), the Joyce Foundation ($13.5 million), George Soros' Open Society Institute ($12.6 million), the Jerome Kohlberg Trust ($11.3 million), the Ford Foundation ($8.8 million) and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation ($5.2 million).

Not exactly all household names, but the left-wing groups that these foundations support may be more familiar: the Earth Action Network, the NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund, People for the American Way, Planned Parenthood, the Public Citizen Foundation, the Feminist Majority Foundation...

What did this liberal foundation crowd buy with its $123 million?

For starters, a stable of supposedly independent pro-reform groups, with Orwellian names you may have heard in the press: the Center for Public Integrity, the William J. Brennan Center for Justice, Democracy 21 and so on.

Plus, favorable press coverage. Here, the story ? as laid out in the Political Money Line report ? gets really ugly. Some highlights:

* In September of 2000, less than two years before the passage of McCain-Feingold, the liberal magazine The American Prospect put out a special issue devoted to campaign-finance reform. With incredible hypocrisy, the magazine failed to tell its readers that the "Checkbook Democracy" issue was paid for with a $132,000 check from the Carnegie Corporation ? which, again, has spent $14 million promoting the regulation of political speech in the last decade.

* Since 1994, National Public Radio has accepted more than $1.2 million from liberal foundations promoting campaign-finance reform for items such as (to quote the official disclosure statements) "news coverage of financial influence in political decision-making." About $400,000 of that directly funded a program called, "Money, Power and Influence."

NPR claims that there has never been any contact between the funders and the reporters. NPR also claims that some of the $1.2 million went to non-campaign-finance-related coverage. But at least $860,000 can be tied directly to coverage of money in politics.

* Lastly, the Radio and Television News Directors Foundation accepted $935,000 between 1995 and 2001 from liberal foundations promoting campaign-finance reform for things like a "training initiative to help television, radio and print journalists provide better news coverage of the influence of private money on electoral, legislative and regulatory processes."

The president of RTNDF, Barbara Cochran, assured me that "We did not receive money to promote campaign-finance reform." Cochran also made clear that RTNDF does not provide news coverage, it only trains journalists. But she wouldn't provide The Post with any of the training materials it produced with the foundation money.

The press as a whole, of course, wasn't bought off. But most journalists were either too ill-informed or too unconcerned to figure out the fraud.

Back to the videotape, where an unidentified (but apparently sympathetic) individual asks Treglia: "What would have happened had a major news organization gotten a hold of this at the wrong time?"

"We had a scare," Treglia says. "As the debate was progressing and getting pretty close, George Will stumbled across a report that we had done and attacked it in his column. And a lot of his partisans were becoming aware of Pew's role and were feeding him information. And he started to reference the fact that Pew had played a large role in this ? that this was a liberal attempt to hoodwink Congress."

"But you know what the good news is from my perspective?" Treglia says to the stunned crowd. "Journalists didn't care . . . So no one followed up on the story. And so there was a panic there for a couple of weeks because we thought the story was going to begin to gather steam, and no one picked it up."

Treglia's right. While he admits Pew specifically instructed groups receiving its grants "never to mention Pew," all these connections were disclosed (as legally required) in various tax forms and annual reports. "If any reporter wanted to know, they could have sat down and connected the dots," he said. "But they didn't."

So shame on Pew for undertaking a sustained campaign to mislead the public and Congress. And shame on all of the journalists who let them slide.

Above all else, looking ahead: Shame on any news organization that lets the campaign-finance-reform lobby keep on portraying itself as a "movement" now that the facts have come out.

Now we'll see if sunlight is indeed the best disinfectant.

A partial transcript of the Treglia tape is available at...
http://www.nypost.com/postopinion/opedcolumnists/transcript0.htm

NY Post ** BUYING 'REFORM'

Marines snub UAW olive branch
Mood:  caffeinated
Topic: Yahoo Chat Stuff

Tony Camilleri of Dearborn Heights covered up the Chevrolet logo on his Silverado with a Toyota sign as a tribute to the Marines. The UAW has a longstanding policy prohibiting foreign makes from its parking lots.

Reservists will park elsewhere, although union admits mistake banning nonunion cars, Bush stickers.

DETROIT -- The United Auto Workers union waved a white flag Monday in its parking skirmish with neighboring reservists, but the 1st Battalion, 24th Marines are not accepting surrender.

Facing intense criticism, UAW President Ron Gettelfinger reversed his decision to ban Marine Corps reservists driving foreign cars or displaying pro-President Bush bumper stickers from parking at the union's Solidarity House headquarters in Detroit.

"I made the wrong call on the parking issue, and I have notified the Marine Corps that all reservists are welcome to park at Solidarity House as they have for the past 10 years," Gettelfinger said in a statement.

Wounded by what they consider an unpatriotic ambush, the Marines rejected the union's olive branch and secured an alternative parking lot.

"I talked to Ron; I let him know that I understand he has rescinded his decision," said Lt. Col. Joe Rutledge, a top-ranking officer at the reserve infantry rifle battalion. "However, I've made my decision -- either you support the Marines or you don't."

The Detroit News reported the controversy Sunday.

The UAW has a longstanding policy prohibiting nonunion-made vehicles from the parking lots at its plants and meeting halls.

Until last week, the union made an exception for the Marines who parked at Solidarity House on the weekends. The battalion's headquarters is nearby on East Jefferson.

While both sides say the dispute has been overblown, it revealed the depths of the UAW's antipathy toward the Bush administration and its concern over the rise of foreign automakers in the U.S. market.

Gettelfinger and other top UAW International officials say Bush is blatantly anti-labor and has opposed measures that could have benefited working men and women.

UAW leaders backed Democratic challenger John Kerry and his running mate John Edwards in last year's election.

The UAW's reversal Monday followed a barrage of criticism from both union members and nonunion members. The dispute became instant fodder for such Web sites as The Drudge Report and various radio programs.

The News received hundreds of e-mails Sunday and Monday about the controversy, the majority criticizing the UAW's decision.

"I have never belonged to the unions, but I've always bought (domestic) brand cars," Jenny Pulcerm 74, of Harrison Township. "Right now, I'm driving a Chrysler. But the next car will definitely not be union-made."

Outside the Marine reservists headquarters, it wasn't hard to find signs of hard feelings. A Toyota pickup truck parked in front of a phalanx of military Humvees sported three bumper stickers. One touted Semper Fi, the Marines' motto, the second was a Bush/Cheney campaign sticker and the third an anti-UAW sign.

The UAW decision to ban Marines struck a nerve with many who say U.S. armed forces deserve more respect, especially during a time of war.

And certainly, some said, Marines should be able to support their commander in chief, President Bush, without facing repercussions.

"The Marines who fought at Iwo Jima -- including yours truly -- and those who are now in Iraq, took an oath to defend this country and its citizens," said Russ Paquette, an 87-year-old lawyer from St. Clair Shores and former commanding officer of the 1st Battalion, 24th Marines. "There is nothing in the oath which indicates that we Marines will only fight for citizens who drive certain automobiles, or who voted in the last election for a certain president."

Gettelfinger, himself a former Marine Corps reservist, said his initial decision should not be looked on as a lack of support for the military.

"That certainly was not my intention. ... I fully appreciate the sacrifices and contributions made by America's reservists, National Guard members and active duty military personnel and their families," his statement said.

Gettelfinger also acknowledged the decision reflected poorly on the UAW, which has historically supported the U.S. military.

"The controversy over this decision has overshadowed the many good things the UAW and our members are doing to support and express our appreciation to America's servicemen and -women and veterans," he said.

Some supported Gettelfinger's call.

"It took a lot of guts," said Phil Davis, a 58-year-old realtor in Tampa, Fla. "It was based on principle."

Dominic Roti, a 64-year-old Farmington retiree who worked 37 years for Chrysler, credits the UAW with setting the benchmark for America's standard of living.

"They're the ones who are putting bread on the table," Roti said. "We're accustomed to live a certain way. ... You have a car to go from work, to home, to the stores -- not like in a lot of European countries. ... The UAW made it that way for us. We're thankful to them."

But many of those who weighed in said the episode changed their opinion of the UAW. Bill Reiber of Vista, Calif., whose son is serving in Iraq, is trading in his Chevrolet S-10 pickup for a vehicle made by a foreign automaker.

"I'm looking at the Toyota Tacoma," he said. "What (the UAW) did, it just wasn't right. These are Marines and they have a right, like anybody else in America, to express their First Amendment rights."

Lt. Col. Rutledge said he's anxious to get past the dispute and get back to business. Owners of a nearby apartment complex have agreed to allow reservists to park on their premises.

"I know people are incensed by this thing," Rutledge said, "but in the big scheme of things, what I do is train Marines and I'm preparing these guys to go overseas."

Detriot News ** Marines snub UAW olive branch

New Jersey Secretary of State Regina Thomas Sparks Racial Tension at Local Catholic School
Mood:  irritated
Topic: Lib Loser Stories

** White Students Walk Out At Local Catholic School **

Many Students Felt Like The Were Called Racist

HADDON TOWNSHIP, N.J. -- Some white students at a South Jersey Catholic school walked out of classes Tuesday in protest over a speech by the New Jersey Secretary of State Regina Thomas.

Tensions have been building up at Paul VI High School since Thomas' speech on racial justice last week.

Many students and faculty members walked out of the speech offended. They said that she lambasted one student for not knowing his black history and that she insinuated that the students were racist.

"It's, like, really crazy right now. Teachers are just standing by the doors. Kids are trying to get out. Kids are in the hallway, they won't go to class," one female student said.

"It was chaotic in there. Nobody went to class first and fourth period," another student said.

Several dozen students walked out after an assembly Tuesday in which the principal offered prayer for healing the rift between students.

"A lot of people are confused, and stuff. I think that's half the problem, there's a lack of communication," a student told NBC 10 News.

Many of the white students and faculty members were offended by what they called an overly confrontational and unprofessional speech by the secretary. Some felt she was calling them racist and a backlash on some black students fueled the fire.

"They don't know what it is like to open up your locker and see a KKK letter there. It's not the most comfortable feeling at all," said African-American student Kristen Minoh.

Minoh said the tension was too much Tuesday.

Many students said the racial problems began only after the secretary's speech.

"I think she just started up a bunch of stuff and basically tried to start something," a student said.

"There's an issue at every school, it's no more of an issue at this school than any other school," another student countered.

Thomas issued a statement Tuesday in which she said that she is passionate about the topic of diversity and wanted to raise the level of awareness. She said that she never meant to be personal or critical of the students or the school.

The Diocese of Camden said it has listened to the views of students and parents on both side of the issues. It said that a majority of those students and parents were offended by the speech and the diocese was going to tell the secretary of state that it felt the tone was inappropriate for a high school setting and that a majority of the students felt disrespected by the speech.

NJ - WNBC 10 News ** White Students Walk Out At Local Catholic School

Anti-war liberals turn against Pelosi
Mood:  spacey
Now Playing: San Francisco Bay Guardian News -- Pelosi waffles on war
Topic: Lib Loser Stories

While cities and states around the country are scrambling to cut essential services to stem red-ink hemorrhaging, President George W. Bush is asking Congress for another $82 billion to continue the war in Iraq. The money's on the fast track and will almost certainly be approved.

But Democratic leaders in Congress need to make a clear statement against Bush's priorities – and so far, San Francisco representative Nancy Pelosi, the House minority leader, is refusing to oppose the allocation.

Pelosi and other Democrats have come up with all sorts of justifications for going along with Bush's war spending: they want to "support the troops," they want to make sure there's money for armor and supplies. But the truth is, the $82 billion is a blank check to continue a war that should never have been started.

A few progressive House members, led by Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-Petaluma), are calling for an immediate plan to begin withdrawing the troops; at the very least, Congress ought to refuse to spend any more money until Bush shows how he intends to pay for it.

The San Francisco Labor Council passed a resolution in February calling on Pelosi to endorse Woolsey's resolution and to vote against the war-spending bill. The resolution even mentions "informational pickets" to persuade Pelosi to take the right stand.

The rest of the local Democratic Party, which seems to support Pelosi no matter how far out of touch she is with her constituents, should join labor and demand she take a real stand here and vote against the war.

March against the war: the protest begins 11 a.m., March 19, at Dolores Park, S.F.

San Francisco Bay Guardian News ** Pelosi waffles on war

Barbeque Grill
Mood:  silly
Topic: Funny Stuff

A man and his wife were working in their garden one day and the man looks over at his wife and says: "Your butt is getting really big, I mean really big. I bet your butt is bigger than the barbecue."

With that he proceeded to get a measuring tape and measure the grill and then went over to where his wife was working and measured his wife's bottom.

"Yes, I was right, your butt is two inches wider than the barbecue!!!"

The woman chose to ignore her husband.

Later that night in bed, the husband is feeling frisky. He makes some advances towards his wife who completely brushes him off.

"What's wrong?" he asks.

She answers: "Do you really think I'm going to fire up this big-ass grill for one little weenie?"

The teacher & her student
Mood:  party time!
Topic: Funny Stuff

A first grade teacher explains to her class that she is a liberal Democrat. She asks her students to raise their hands if they were liberal Democrats too.

Not really knowing what a liberal Democrat was, but wanting to be like their teacher, their hands flew up into the air.

There was, however, one exception. A girl named Lucy had not gone along with the crowd. The teacher asks her why she has decided to be different.

"Because I'm not a liberal Democrat," she answers.

"Then," asks the teacher, "What are you?"

"Why I'm a proud conservative Republican," boasts the little girl.

The teacher, a little perturbed and her face slightly red, asked Lucy why she is a conservative Republican.

"Well, I was brought up to trust in myself instead of relying on an intrusive government to care for me and do all of my thinking. My Dad and Mom are conservative Republicans, and I am a conservative Republican too."

The teacher, now angry, loudly says, "That's no reason! What if your Mom was a moron, and your dad was a moron. What would you be then?"

She pauses, and lets out a smile. "Then," Lucy says, "I'd be a liberal Democrat."

Supreme Court Scalia Slams Juvenile Death Penalty Ruling
Mood:  bright
Topic: News

Supreme Court Associate Justice Antonin Scalia speaks on the topic of Consitutional Interpretation, Monday, March 14, 2005 at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington. \/

WASHINGTON - Justice Antonin Scalia criticized the Supreme Court's recent decision to strike down the juvenile death penalty, calling it the latest example of politics on the court that has made judicial nominations an increasingly bitter process.

In a 35-minute speech Monday, Scalia said unelected judges have no place deciding issues such as abortion and the death penalty. The court's 5-4 ruling March 1 to outlaw the juvenile death penalty based on "evolving notions of decency" was simply a mask for the personal policy preferences of the five-member majority, he said.

"If you think aficionados of a living Constitution want to bring you flexibility, think again," Scalia told an audience at the Woodrow Wilson Center, a Washington think tank. "You think the death penalty is a good idea? Persuade your fellow citizens to adopt it. You want a right to abortion? Persuade your fellow citizens and enact it. That's flexibility."

"Why in the world would you have it interpreted by nine lawyers?" he said.

Scalia, who has been mentioned as a possible chief justice nominee should Chief Justice William Rehnquist retire, outlined his judicial philosophy of interpreting the Constitution according to its text, as understood at the time it was adopted.

Citing the example of abortion, he said unelected justices too often choose to read new rights into the Constitution, at the expense of the democratic process.

"Abortion is off the democratic stage. Prohibiting it is unconstitutional, now and forever, coast to coast, until I guess we amend the Constitution," said Scalia, who was appointed to the court by President Reagan in 1986.

He blamed Chief Justice Earl Warren, who presided from 1953-69 over a court that assaulted racial segregation and expanded individual rights against arbitrary government searches, for the increased political role of the Supreme Court, citing Warren's political background. Warren was governor of California and the Republican vice presidential nominee in 1948.

"You have a chief justice who was a governor, a policy-maker, who approached the law with that frame of mind. Once you have a leader with that mentality, it's hard not to follow," Scalia said, in response to a question from the audience.

Scalia said increased politics on the court will create a bitter nomination fight for the next Supreme Court appointee, since judges are now more concerned with promoting their personal policy preferences rather than interpreting the law.

"If we're picking people to draw out of their own conscience and experience a 'new' Constitution, we should not look principally for good lawyers. We should look to people who agree with us," he said, explaining that's why senators increasingly probe nominees for their personal views on positions such as abortion.

"When we are in that mode, you realize we have rendered the Constitution useless," Scalia said.

Scalia, who has had a prickly relationship with the media, wasted no time in shooing away photographers from the public event five minutes into his speech.

"Could we stop the cameras? I thought I announced ... a couple are fine at first, but click click click click," Scalia said, impatiently waving the photographers off.

During a speech last year in Hattiesburg, Miss., a deputy federal marshal demanded that an Associated Press reporter and another journalist erase recordings of the justice's remarks.

The justice later apologized. The government conceded that the U.S. Marshals Service violated federal law in the confrontation and said the reporters and their employers were each entitled to $1,000 in damages and attorneys' fees.

___

On the Net: The Supreme Court

Associated Press ** Scalia Slams Juvenile Death Penalty Ruling

Hitler 'Tested Small Atom Bomb'
Mood:  caffeinated
Topic: Odd Stuff

A German historian has claimed in a new book presented on Monday that Nazi scientists successfully tested a tactical nuclear weapon in the last months of World War II.

Rainer Karlsch said that new research in Soviet and also Western archives, along with measurements carried out at one of the test sites, provided evidence for the existence of the weapon.

"The important thing in my book is the finding that the Germans had an atomic reactor near Berlin which was running for a short while, perhaps some days or weeks," he told the BBC.

"The second important finding was the atomic tests carried out in Thuringia and on the Baltic Sea."

Mr Karlsch describes what the Germans had as a "hybrid tactical nuclear weapon" much smaller than those dropped on Hiroshima or Nagasaki.

** 'Bright light' **

He said the last test, carried out in Thuringia on 3 March 1945, destroyed an area of about 500 sq m - killing several hundred prisoners of war and concentration camp inmates.

The weapons were never used because they were not yet ready for mass production. There were also problems with delivery and detonation systems.

"We haven't heard about this before because only small groups of scientists were involved, and a lot of the documents were classified after they were captured by the Allies," said Karlsch.

"I found documents in Russian and Western archives, as well as in private German ones."

One of these is a memo from a Russian spy, brought to the attention of Stalin just days after the last test. It cites "reliable sources" as reporting "two huge explosions" on the night of 3 March.

Karlsch also cites German eyewitnesses as reporting light so bright that for a second it was possible to read a newspaper, accompanied by a sudden blast of wind.

The eyewitnesses, who were interviewed on the subject by the East German authorities in the early 1960s, also said they suffered nose-bleeds, headaches, and nausea for days afterwards.

Karlsch also pointed to measurements carried out recently at the test site that found radioactive isotopes.

** Scepticism **

His book has provoked huge interest in Germany, but also scepticism.

It has been common knowledge for decades that the Nazis carried out atomic experiments, but it has been widely believed they were far from developing an atomic bomb.

"The eyewitnesses he puts forward are either unreliable or they are not reporting first-hand information; allegedly key documents can be interpreted in various ways," said the influential news weekly Der Spiegel.

"Karlsch displays a catastrophic lack of understanding of physics," wrote physicist Michael Schaaf, author of a previous book about Nazi atomic experiments, in the Berliner Zeitung newspaper.

"Karlsch has done us a service in showing that German research into uranium went further than we'd thought up till now. But there was not a German atom bomb," he added.

It has also been pointed out that the United States employed thousands of scientists and invested billions of dollars in the Manhattan Project, while Germany's "dirty bomb" was allegedly the work of a few dozen top scientists who wanted to change the course of the war.

Karlsch himself acknowledged that he lacked absolute proof for his claims, and said he hoped his book would provoke further research.

But in a press statement for the book launch, he is defiant.

"It's clear there was no master plan for developing atom bombs. But it's also clear the Germans were the first to make atomic energy useable, and that at the end of this development was a successful test of a tactical nuclear weapon."

BBC News ** Hitler 'tested small atom bomb'

Union says Marines in foreign cars, displaying Bush stickers unwelcome
Mood:  irritated
Now Playing: Marines driven out of UAW lot
Topic: Lib Loser Stories

The UAW no longer will allow Marine reservists who work out of a base in Detroit to park at the Solidarity House lot if they have foreign cars or display pro-Bush bumper stickers.

DETROIT - The United Auto Workers says Marine reservists should show a little more semper fi if they want to use the union's parking lot.

The Marine Corps motto means "always faithful," but the union says some reservists working out of a base on Jefferson Avenue in Detroit have been decidedly unfaithful to their fellow Americans by driving import cars and trucks.

So the UAW International will no longer allow members of the 1st Battalion 24th Marines to park at Solidarity House if they are driving foreign cars or displaying pro-President Bush bumper stickers.

"While reservists certainly have the right to drive nonunion made vehicles and display bumper stickers touting the most anti-worker, anti-union president since the 1920s, that doesn't mean they have the right to park in a lot owned by the members of the UAW," the union said in a statement released Friday.

Shocked and disappointed, the Marines are pulling out.

"You either support the Marines or you don't," said Lt. Col. Joe Rutledge, commanding officer of the battalion's active duty instructors. "I'm telling my Marines that they're no longer parking there."

At a time when U.S. armed forces are fighting and dying in Iraq and Afghanistan, quibbling over parking privileges is "silly," Rutledge said.

The UAW has a long history of barring foreign-made cars from its parking lots. The subject is touchier than ever as Detroit's Big Three loses market share, driving down union membership.

The pro-Bush bumper stickers are another sore spot after last year's election.

UAW President Ron Gettelfinger opposed President Bush, accusing him of ignoring calls for labor law reform and failing to combat unfair business practices in China - a growing threat to U.S. manufacturers.

The dispute arises as the UAW, using laid-off workers for labor, is building a $300,000 home for the Veterans of Foreign Wars. The home in Eaton Rapids will operate a residential program for children of veterans who don't have parents, or whose parents can't care for them.

"We do not think it is unreasonable to expect our guests to practice the simple principle of not insulting their host," the UAW statement said.

Rutledge is unmoved...

"I don't see it as a snub against them," he said, adding no conditions were set when the union first began allowing the Marines to park in the lot several years ago. "We're appreciative of what they've done, but you don't come into my office and say, 'OK, we're not going to support some of your Marines.' I don't know what a foreign car is today anyway. BMWs are made in South Carolina now."

The Detroit News ** Marines driven out of UAW lot