Copyright 2002 St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Inc. St.
Louis Post-Dispatch
June 28, 2002 Friday Five Star Lift
Edition
SECTION: NEWS ; Pg. A9
LENGTH: 659 words
HEADLINE:
NATION/WORLD
BYLINE: From News Services
BODY: WASHINGTON
House GOP scrambles
for Medicare bill votes
House Republicans hunted Thursday for the final votes
needed to pass Medicare prescription drug legislation. They
brushed aside Democratic charges that the bill was crafted to help the GOP at
the polls rather than older adults at the pharmacy.
"No
bill before its time," Rep. Bill Thomas, R-Calif., quipped as the GOP high
command sought to coax a dwindling band of rebels into the fold.
The legislation would commit $320 billion over the next decade to
establish a system of Medicare prescription drug coverage
through the private insurance industry. Costs would be heavily subsidized for
low-income Medicare beneficiaries. Under a typical plan, others would pay a
monthly premium of roughly $33 and an annual deductible of about $250. The
government would pay 80 percent of the next $1,000 of drug costs and 50 percent
of the subsequent $1,000.
WASHINGTON
Panel accuses Traficant
of ethics
violations
The House Ethics Committee issued a 10-count
list of alleged violations Thursday against convicted Rep. James Traficant and
set a public hearing for next month.
The charges allege
that the Ohio lawmaker engaged in a "continuing pattern and practice of official
misconduct," including acceptance of kickbacks, encouraging the destruction of
evidence, defrauding the United States and filing false income tax returns.
The eight-member panel, which includes two fellow Ohio
lawmakers, said it would hold a public hearing on July 15 to determine whether
any of the charges "have been proven by clear and convincing evidence."
WASHINGTON
Blood banks
urgently
seek summer donations
Blood banks are issuing urgent appeals for people to donate this
summer, warning that dire blood shortages could hit hospitals within weeks.
Summer shortages are common as frequent donors go on
vacation and school blood drives dry up. But blood banks told the government
Thursday that this summer slump started earlier and seems worsened by post-Sept.
11 donor apathy as well as a decrease in people eligible to give because of new
precautions against mad cow disease.
Almost half of the
American Red Cross' blood donor regions and one-third of the nation's
independent blood banks have tight supplies - a day's supply of blood or less on
hand. The Red Cross provides about half the nation's blood supply, and
independent banks represented by the group America's Blood Centers supply the
other half.
SWITZERLAND
China,
Russia propose
ban on weapons in space
In a challenge to U.S. plans for a missile defense shield, China and
Russia on Thursday submitted a joint proposal to the Conference on Disarmament
for a new international treaty to ban weapons in outer space.
It marked the first joint Russia-China initiative on the issue, which
has long been a priority for Beijing because of its fears that U.S. development
of a missile defense will inevitably involve outer space.
The proposal seems certain to deepen the divisions that have dogged the
conference - the world's main body for negotiating arms-control treaties - since
1996. The Russian-Chinese plan followed the U.S. withdrawal from the 1972
Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in order to permit development of defense systems
to guard against terrorist threats.
FRANCE
U.S. Air Force plane
crashes,
killing pilot
A U.S. Air Force A10 on a training
mission crashed Thursday in a forest in eastern France, killing the pilot, the
Air Force said.
The plane, a single-seat anti-tank
"Warthog," crashed in a forest near the towns of Domptail and Saint-Pierremont,
south of the city of Nancy, said Staff Sgt. Cindy York, a spokeswoman for the
Air Force public affairs office in Spangdahlem, Germany.
The Air Force said the name of the pilot, who was with the 81st Fighter
Squadron, was being withheld until next of kin have been notified. The plane was
not carrying either live or depleted-uranium munitions.