AIDES TRADED INFORMATION ABOUT CIA BEFORE LEAK

Aides traded informationabout CIA before leak
WASHINGTON -- Top White House aides Karl Rove and I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby discussed their contacts with reporters about an undercover CIA officer in the days before her identity was published, the first known intersection between two central figures in the criminal leak investigation. Rove told grand jurors it was possible he first heard in the White House that Valerie Plame, wife of Bush administration Joseph Wilson, worked for the CIA from Libby's recounting of a conversation with a journalist, according to people familiar with his testimony. They said Rove testified that his discussions with Libby before Plame's CIA cover was blown were limited to information reporters had passed to them. Some evidence prosecutors have gathered conflicts with Libby's account. Rove is deputy White House chief of staff and President Bush's closest political adviser. Libby is Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff. Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald must determine whether the contacts between the two men concerning Plame's CIA work were part of an effort to undercut her husband's criticism of the Iraq war or simply the trading of information and rumors that typically occurs inside the White House.
Situation at dam stable;more heavy rain looms
TAUNTON, Mass. -- Water pressing against a battered wooden dam continued to recede Wednesday, and officials planned to pump more out, in hopes of doing repairs before an expected second weekend of heavy rain. The dam's status remained "critical," and a state of emergency was still in effect in this working-class city about 40 miles south of Boston, Mayor Robert Nunes said. Officials fear a dam break would send a 6-foot wall of water surging through downtown Taunton, about a half-mile downstream. Nunes said evacuations would remain in effect for thousands of people living below the 173-year-old Whittenton Pond Dam, and the downtown business district would remain closed. Schools were closed for a second day Wednesday. The mayor said pumps would remove more than 32,000 gallons of water a minute from an area upstream of the dam, piping it around the dam to the river below.
Beer deliverymen's striketests St. Louis' loyalties
ST. LOUIS -- It just wasn't Bill Deida's night. Seated at his usual barstool and wearing a red St. Louis Cardinals shirt, Deida watched the home team lose a playoff game to the Houston Astros. Worse, his mug was filled with Miller Lite. "It's nothing like Budweiser," complained Deida, a unionized telephone-company technician. Some beer drinkers in the land of Budweiser are being served other brands these days in the name of union solidarity. Teamsters on strike against an Anheuser-Busch distributor are urging people in St. Louis to boycott the hometown brew. But drinking anything but Bud is practically heresy in St. Louis, the home of Anheuser-Busch Cos. The city's blue-collar sympathies notwithstanding, Bud is still very much the King of Beers in this realm. In fact, the strike has been the least successful labor action in St. Louis in at least 30 years, said Neil Bernstein, a law professor at Washington University in St. Louis. Twenty-five drivers belonging to Teamsters Local 600 went on strike in May against Lohr Distributing Co. after talks collapsed over salary and health care payments.
Leaders of field tripfind body along trail
DELAWARE WATER GAP, Pa. -- Adults leading a seventh-grade field trip on the Appalachian Trail stumbled upon the body of a fugitive who had fatally shot himself, authorities said. Most of the 140 Bangor Area Middle School pupils on Tuesday's hike in the Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area didn't see the body, but some saw it from a distance, school district Superintendent John Reinhart said. Police identified the man as Russell A. Good Jr., 45, of Allentown, who was wanted by police there on a rape charge. Good died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head, according to the Monroe County coroner's office, which ruled the death a suicide. State police were also investigating the death.
Hubble takes look at moonto aid future prospectors
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- The Hubble Space Telescope has taken a rare look at the moon to gauge the amount of oxygen-bearing minerals in the lunar soil that could be mined by astronauts and used in a new moon mission. NASA said Wednesday that the telescope's ultraviolet observations of two Apollo landing sites and an unexplored but geologically intriguing area will help scientists pick the best spots for robot and human exploration. The space agency hopes to return astronauts to the moon by 2018 using Apollo-like capsules and rockets made of shuttle parts. The data also will benefit a lunar reconnaissance spacecraft to be launched in 2008. NASA scientist Jim Garvin described the August observations as "'CSI' does the moon through Hubble." "We're going to try to do forensic science using places on the moon we know, two of the Apollo sites particularly noteworthy for their soils," he said.
Associated Press