WASHINGTON — Republican Sen. Pete Domenici of New Mexico intends to retire at the end of his term next year, closing out a 36-year career in Congress, Republican officials said Wednesday. These officials said the 75-year-old Domenici intends to make a formal announcement today in his home state. Domenici would be the fifth Republican senator to decline to seek a new term, giving Democrats an opportunity to expand their majority in the 2008 elections.
Four fires in Senate offices
U.S. Capitol police reported four fires in Senate office buildings Wednesday. All were extinguished, but an investigation continued. “They are suspicious in nature,” an officer said. She said two fires in the Dirksen Senate Office Building and one in the Hart building next door were reported in women’s bathrooms and were extinguished before 12:30 p.m. A fourth, also in a Dirksen restroom, was reported later and extinguished by mid-afternoon, she said. Capitol police sent out an e-mail noting “a series of small fires,” and asking for tips.
U.S. eases rules for power lines
The U.S. Department of Energy on Tuesday designated all of Southern California, parts of Arizona and much of the Northeast as “national interest” energy transmission corridors, an action that allows regulators to approve new high-voltage towers and lets private utilities condemn homes and land even if a state agency won’t. As California utilities face fierce opposition to proposed transmission lines that would stretch for hundreds of miles, they are up against a state deadline to change 20 percent of their power to renewable sources by 2010, which means shipping in wind, solar or geothermal power from elsewhere.
California: Background checks
A federal judge in Los Angeles denied a request Wednesday by more than two dozen workers at one of NASA’s research labs to block a Bush administration directive requiring background checks and access to personal information. NASA maintained it was following a governmentwide policy applying to millions of civil servants and contractors. Lab workers have until Friday to fill out forms authorizing the background checks. Those who don’t will be barred from the 177-acre campus east of Los Angeles and be “voluntarily terminated” as of Oct. 27.
Illinois: Train derailment probe
Federal officials are investigating two rush-hour commuter train derailments on separate tracks near the same station in Chicago, a week after 30 railroad spikes were found missing from tracks on the same line. The cars remained upright after Tuesday’s derailment and no injuries were reported, officials said. The FBI and Joint Terrorism Task Force are looking into the incidents, a Metra spokeswoman said. “It’s rare to have two derailments at the same location,” she said.
Maryland: Hybrids are too quiet
Gas-electric hybrid vehicles are coming under attack from a constituency that doesn’t drive: the blind. Because hybrids make virtually no noise at slower speeds when they run solely on electric power, blind people say they pose a hazard to those who rely on their ears to determine whether it’s safe to cross the street. Officials with the Baltimore-based National Federation of the Blind are quick to point out that they’re not advocating a return to gas guzzlers. They’d just like the fuel-efficient hybrids to make some noise.
Illinois: Muslim ex-inmate sues
A former inmate who says federal prison workers in Illinois defiled his Quran and tortured him with a nightstick when he complained has filed a civil rights lawsuit alleging he and other Muslims were mistreated at the prison in Marion. Guards allegedly placed Hakeem Shaheed’s Quran on a spit-stained floor, then assaulted him with a baton in 2005 when he reported alleged abuses to Justice Department investigators, according to the lawsuit filed last week in U.S. District Court in East St. Louis. Shaheed, 48, was transferred by wheelchair the next day to another prison.
South Africa: 3,000 miners stuck
About 3,000 gold miners were trapped a mile underground Wednesday when falling pipe damaged the elevator, but the company began rescuing workers through a smaller shaft and estimated it would take 10 hours to get them all out. There were no injuries and no immediate danger to any of the workers in the Elandsrand Mine, officials said. A union spokesman said the first 74 men reached the surface early this morning.
India: Women die in stampede
At least 13 elderly women traveling to a Hindu festival were trampled to death and 42 others were injured Wednesday in railway station when two trains arrived on adjacent platforms, officials said. The stampede occurred at the station in Mughalsarai. The 13 dead women had tripped in the crowd and “people just trampled over them,” a police official said. The women were on their way to the holy city of Varanasi to bathe in the Ganges River.
From Herald news services
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