Archive - Apr 17, 2009

• NSA involved in heavy domestic spying
• Administration releases torture memos, avoids prosecuting
• Cuba’s “presence” at the Summit of the Americas
• Xavier Becerra weighs in on Obama’s visit to Mexico
• South American leaders decree new currency
• Afghans take to the streets over controversial new law

• G20 protest death probe reveals important new evidence
• Israeli troops kill protester in West Bank
• EPA says greenhouse gases pose health risk
• Troy Davis appeal fails
• Failed appeal means border wall construction OKed on Texas woman’s property
• West Virginia activists cited following coalmine action

The National Security Agency spied on the communications of people living in the U.S. at a level far exceeding the broad guidelines set by Congress. Several intelligence officials told the New York Times that the agency was significantly over-collecting emails and phone calls, even in recent months. The Justice Department says it only sought renewal of the surveillance program after new safeguards were put in place. The activities are under review.

The Justice Department has been praised for its release Thursday of Bush-era torture memos. Human rights advocates say it illustrates the Obama Administration’s commitment to transparency. But as Tanya Snyder reports, they also wish the Administration was more willing to bring those responsible to justice.

President Obama travels today to the Summit of the Americas in Trinidad and Tobago, where he will meet with 33 leaders from the hemisphere – that meeting won’t include Cuba’s Raul Castro. The tiny island nation was barred from the Organization of American States in 1962, after the Cuban Revolution. Many of those in attendance are left-leaning Latin American presidents, including Hugo Chavez, Lula da Silva, Michelle Bachelet and Evo Morales, and while Cuba will not be directly represented, its presence will be known at the summit. Secretary of State Hilary Clinton today welcomed President Castro’s comments that he is ready to begin talks with the U.S. – including on the topic of human rights.

Obama takes off to Trinidad and Tobago from Mexico, where he met with his counterpart President Felipe Calderon on Thursday on a state visit thick with symbolic diplomacy. Obama and Calderon sought to establish a common agenda and a shared responsibility on combating the narco-fueled violence that is plaguing Mexico after eight years of neglect under the Bush administration. Ten thousand people have died in the violence since Felipe Calderon, a conservative, dispatched the Mexican military to fight the country’s major drug-trafficking organizations. Daniel Hernandez is in Mexico City, where he caught up with Congress member and Vice Chair of the House Democratic Caucus Xavier Becerra, one of a handful of lawmakers accompanying Obama on this trip to Latin America and the Caribbean – Hernandez asked the Congress member what Obama’s administration hopes to attain from the trip to Mexico.

The Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas, or ALBA for its Spanish acronym, was created five years ago between Cuba and Venezuela as an option to the US-backed Free Trade Area of the Americas.  Since its founding, three more nations have joined, and ALBA has implemented numerous social programs and cooperation agreements, including the recently-founded ALBA bank. On Thursday, in advance of the Summit of the Americas, Latin America’s most progressive governments met in Venezuela at the seventh ALBA summit.  There, they prepared their positions for the Trinidad summit, and signed the decree for a new South American currency. Mike Fox has more from Cumaná, Venezuela.