Nation in brief

Report shows climb in abuse of Muslims

WASHINGTON - Muslims in the United States experienced more than 1,000 incidents of alleged harassment, violence and discriminatory treatment in 2003, a jump of 70 percent over the previous year, according to a report released Monday by a major Islamic advocacy group.

The report by the Council on American-Islamic Relations, known as CAIR, attributed the increase to such factors as Muslim-bashing on radio talk shows and tensions surrounding the war in Iraq.

The group said it received 1,019 complaints from Muslims last year about discriminatory or violent actions, up from 602 the year before. The biggest number of incidents had to do with employment and the refusal to accommodate religious practices.

"We are definitely facing an uphill battle in the struggle for civil rights in this country, especially with regard to the American Muslim community," said Mohamed Nimer, the author of the report, "Unpatriotic Acts."

Nimer, who is director of research for CAIR, said one reason for the jump in complaints last year might be that Muslims were more likely to report incidents, because of the growth of his organization. The council, based in Washington, has two dozen offices and chapters nationwide.

WASHINGTON - Former Medicare administrator Thomas Scully trampled on past court rulings and Congress' intent last year when he ordered his agency's top actuary to withhold estimates from lawmakers about the Medicare prescription drug bill's costs, Congress' in-house analysis group reported on Monday.

But Scully's gag order on Richard Foster, chief actuary at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, probably can't be prosecuted, the Congressional Research Service concluded, because only individual lawmakers, not a congressional committee, sought Foster's estimates.

Foster, in estimates shared at the time with top Health and Human Services officials and White House health policymakers, had determined that the drug benefit would cost between $500-billion and $600-billion over the first 10 years, far more than the $395-billion figure, provided by the Congressional Budget Office, on which many lawmakers based their votes.

NASHVILLE - Marvin Runyon, the nation's postmaster general in the 1990s who stressed customer service, tight budgeting and automation and other workplace reforms, died Monday (May 3, 2004). He was 79.

Mr. Runyon, a one-time Ford assembly-line worker who rose to be a top auto executive before entering government service, died of lung disease at his home in Nashville, said Vicki Kessler, spokeswoman for the Atkinson Public Relations firm founded by Mr. Runyon's wife.

In a sometimes stormy tenure overseeing the nation's mail system from 1992 to 1998, Mr. Runyon trimmed management jobs by 23,000 while adding letter carriers and other employees to improve customer service.

The staffing moves and a new stress on computer automation kept the Postal Service's work force about the same even as the volume of mail grew by 11 percent. With more than 765,000 workers, it was the nation's largest civilian employer at the time.

During Mr. Runyon's tenure, he helped put the Postal Service's budget back in the black for the first time since 1989.

Before becoming postmaster general, Runyon held executive positions at Ford, Nissan and the Tennessee Valley Authority.

President Ronald Reagan in 1988 named Runyon chairman of the TVA, a job he held until becoming postmaster general. While at the federal utility, he earned the nickname "Carvin' Marvin" for slashing the payroll by one-third.

Ruled 6-3 against a Texas calculator thief sentenced to 16 years in prison. The court could have used Michael Haley's case to give people sentenced as habitual offenders a new way to appeal their sentences in federal court.

Refused to consider an appeal from two musicians who say they were cheated by rocker Ozzy Osbourne. Bassist Robert Daisley and drummer Lee Kerslake sued in 1998 seeking royalties for their work on Osbourne albums Blizzard of Ozz and Diary of a Madman.

Refused to consider whether a Montana man's foul language to a law enforcement officer was free speech protected by the Constitution. Malachi Robinson, was fined $50 for calling a deputy a "(expletive) pig."

Refused to consider whether the government-owned Tennessee Valley Authority had the authority to disregard a demand from Washington to clean up its coal-fired power plants. The justices had been asked by the Bush administration to step into a dispute over the authority of the Environmental Protection Agency.

TRAIN CRASH: Two freight trains collided early Monday on a Union Pacific track south of downtown San Antonio, Texas, and three people were injured, a UP spokesman said. Two locomotives and 12 freight cars of the southbound train derailed, and both engines and five of the cars fell into the river, spilling about 5,600 gallons of their diesel fuel.

CALIFORNIA WILDFIRES: One of three blazes burning on the first day of Southern California's wildfire season destroyed a home and a university building Monday, and hundreds of people were urged to evacuate. Three fires separated by dozens of miles broke out in 100-degree heat, burning a total of more than 2,000 acres.

NEW OKLA. FEDERAL BUILDING: A new federal building in Oklahoma City was dedicated Monday by Attorney General John Ashcroft, nine years after its predecessor was destroyed by a bomb.

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