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Frist: Deal likely over ban on use of torture

By wire services
Published December 12, 2005

WASHINGTON - The Senate and the White House will reach agreement on a proposal to ban the use of torture in gaining information from suspected terrorists, Majority Leader Bill Frist predicted on Sunday.

The ban's sponsor, Sen. John McCain, has said he would refuse to yield on his demands that the Bush administration agree with his plan, which passed the Senate by a 90-9 vote.

McCain, R-Ariz., is insisting on his language that no person in U.S. custody should be subject to "cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment."

"I think that there will be - you say a deal," Frist told Fox News Sunday .

But McCain supporter Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said, "We're not close to a deal," adding that the U.S. policy on interrogating detainees "has been confusing, misleading, and our own troops have suffered because they don't know what's in bounds and what's not."

New York Sen. Chuck Schumer, a Democratic member of the Judiciary Committee, said, "Sen. Frist has thrown down the gauntlet at a time when the country least needs it. The American people know that checks and balances are an integral part of our government."

With 280 bears killed,

New Jersey's hunt ends

About 280 bears were killed in New Jersey's six-day hunt aimed at thinning out the burgeoning population. The hunt ended shortly after dusk Saturday.

More than 100 protesters, chanting and waving signs that read "I'd take a bullet for a bear," gathered at Wawayanda State Park in Vernon, where hunters brought their dead bears to be weighed and inspected.

"I believe we'll now see a reduction in nuisance complaints, a reduction in serious complaints and that we'll get more information about these bears because of this" hunt, said Martin McHugh, director of the state's Division of Fish and Wildlife.

HONOLULU - Using radar equipment along a wall of a landmark Hawaiian building, military specialists Saturday quickly located a time capsule buried Feb. 19, 1872 - more than two decades before the kingdom was annexed by the United States - by King Kamehameha V.

Historians knew the capsule contained priceless pieces of the islands' history, but until now its exact location was unknown.

"We found it within the first 10 minutes we were here," said Larry Conyers, a University of Denver professor who used ground penetrating radar to find the hollow spot in the northeast corner of the Aliiolani Hale building. "It never happens like this," he said.

The capsule was left undisturbed. Digging it up would destroy the building above, which is also a historic treasure, experts said.

BREWSTER, Mass. - More than two dozen whales and dolphins became stranded on the shores of Cape Cod Bay last week, and experts say the snowstorm may have contributed to their deaths.

In all, at least nine pilot whales and 24 dolphins died. Five of the whales and seven of the dolphins had to be euthanized, while the rest were found dead, according to Kristen Patchett of the Cape Cod Stranding Network.

[Last modified December 12, 2005, 01:11:08]