Thursday, April 30, 2015
Former commander: Take US, Russian nukes off high alert
WASHINGTON
Taking U.S. and Russian missiles off high alert could keep a possible cyber- attack from starting a nuclear war, a former commander of U.S. nuclear forces says, but neither country appears willing to increase the lead-time to prepare the weapons for launch.
Retired Gen. James Cartwright said in an interview that “de-alerting” nuclear arsenals could foil hackers by reducing the chance of firing a weapon in response to a false warning of attack.
Essentially adding a longer fuse can be done without eroding the weapons’ deterrent value, said Cartwright, who headed Strategic Command from 2004 to 2007 and was vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff before retiring in 2011.
Activists report chemical attack
UNITED NATIONS
Syrian activist groups reported Wednesday another suspected chemical attack in the northwestern province of Idlib, with one group tweeting that a dozen people were “suffocating.”
Several Idlib-based groups said government helicopters dropped at least two barrel bombs containing chlorine on the town of Saraqeb, triggering cases of suffocation.
The reports could not be independently verified.
High court debates execution drugs
WASHINGTON
Supreme Court justices engaged in an impassioned debate Wednesday about capital punishment, trading unusually combative words in a case involving a drug used in several botched executions.
The justices are considering the plea of death-row inmates in Oklahoma to outlaw the sedative midazolam. The inmates say it is ineffective in preventing searing pain from other drugs used in lethal injections.
But Wednesday’s session, lasting just over an hour, featured broader complaints from conservative justices that death-penalty opponents are waging what Justice Samuel Alito called a “guerrilla war” against executions by working to limit the supply of more-effective drugs.
On the other side, among the court’s liberals, Justice Elena Kagan contended that the way states carry out most executions amounts to having prisoners “burned alive from the inside.”
Japan PM offers sympathy for deaths
WASHINGTON
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe offered condolences Wednesday for Americans killed in World War II in the first address by a Japanese leader to a joint meeting of Congress, but stopped short of apologizing for wartime atrocities.
Abe came to Capitol Hill after a morning visit to a Washington memorial to more than 400,000 American service members who died in the conflict. His remarks to a packed chamber a day after meeting President Barack Obama were warmly received by lawmakers.
Pope calls for equal pay for women
VATICAN CITY
Pope Francis added his voice Wednesday to the feminist anthem of equal pay for equal work, saying it’s “pure scandal” that women earn less than men for doing the same job.
Francis also lambasted the attitude of those who blame the crisis in families on women getting out of the house to work. He said such attitudes are a form of “machismo” that shows how men “want to dominate women.”
Associated Press