Valentine's Day Kisses

Valentine's Day Kisses
NEW YORK -- Kisses, a Maltese, above, sits for a grooming session by her owner, Manny Comitini of Stroudsburg, Pa. They were preparing Monday for competition at the 130th Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show in New York's Madison Square Garden.
Study: Military policy ongays has cost $363M
WASHINGTON -- Discharging troops under the Pentagon's policy on gays cost $363.8 million over 10 years, almost double what the government concluded a year ago, a private report says. The report, to be released today by a University of California Blue Ribbon Commission, questioned the methodology the Government Accountability Office used when it estimated that the financial impact of the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy was at least $190.5 million. Congress approved the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy in 1993 during the Clinton administration. It allows gays and lesbians to serve in the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps as long as they abstain from homosexual activity and do not disclose their sexual orientation.
Greenspan to write book
WASHINGTON -- Alan Greenspan is planning to write a book about his 18 years as chairman of the Federal Reserve system. Representing Greenspan is Robert B. Barnett, a Washington lawyer who negotiated a $12 million book deal for former President Clinton's memoir and an $8 million contract for Hillary Rodham Clinton's book about her White House years. Greenspan's tenure as the world's most influential central banker ended Jan. 31. Throughout his time as Fed chairman, Greenspan's often-cryptic pronouncements were watched closely by investors for clues to future direction of interest rates, as well as the health of the economy.
U.S. tortured detaineesin Cuba, U.N. report says
UNITED NATIONS -- A U.N. investigation has found that the United States committed acts amounting to torture at Guantanamo Bay, including force-feeding detainees and subjecting them to prolonged solitary confinement, according to a draft report obtained Monday. U.S. officials rejected the draft report, saying the experts who wrote it made many errors and treated statements from detainees' lawyers as fact. The United States had invited the experts to Guantanamo but would not let them interview detainees, so they refused to go. The report recommended the United States close Guantanamo Bay and revoke all special interrogation techniques authorized by the Defense Department.
Election protests in Haiti
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti -- Supporters of Haitian presidential candidate Rene Preval erected smoldering roadblocks across the capital and occupied a luxury hotel Monday. At least one protester was killed, but U.N. peacekeepers denied witness accounts that they had shot him. As Port-au-Prince descended into chaos, Preval returned to the capital for the first time since the election last Tuesday. He was the clear winner with about 90 percent of the votes counted, but supporters claimed electoral officials were tampering with results to prevent him from getting the majority he needs to avoid a runoff. Barricades made of old tires were ablaze across the capital, sending plumes of acrid black smoke into the sky. Protesters let only journalists and Red Cross vehicles pass.
Tests aim at quellingJoan of Arc mystery
GARCHES, France -- A team of scientists hopes to crack one of the layers of mystery surrounding 15th-century French heroine Joan of Arc: Could a rib and other fragments recovered after she was burned at the stake be hers? Eighteen experts plan a battery of tests to determine whether the few remains reportedly recovered from the pyre where the 19-year-old was burned alive for heresy -- including a rib bone and some skin -- really could have belonged to her. The tests, which will take six months, will not be able to say with certainty that the remains are Joan of Arc's, because there is no known DNA sample from her to compare them with, said Dr. Philippe Charlier of the Raymond-Poincare Hospital in Garches, west of Paris. But the analyses will determine with "absolute certitude" if the remains could not be hers, Charlier said at a news conference.
Associated Press