Senate Democrats To Push For No Confidence Vote On Attorney General Gonzales; Greenhouse Gas Regulation And California's Cement Industry; Man Labeled "Enemy Combatant" Wins Federal Case; Bada Boom Bada ...Blank; The Forgotten War Against Chinese Americans
Senate Democrats To Push For No Confidence Vote On Attorney General Gonzales
Senate Democrats are pushing for a symbolic no confidence today vote in Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. President Bush, at a news conference today in Sofia, Bulgaria reaffirmed his support for Gonzales. "They can have their votes of no-confidence but it's not going to make the determination about who serves in my government. This process has been drug out a long time. ... It's political." No one is predicting that the resolution will survive even a test vote, but not many of the Senate's 100 members are rushing to defend Gonzales. What goodwill remained after the firings of eight federal prosecutors seemed to fade after the attorney general told a Senate committee dozens of times he could not recall key details. Larry Mantle discusses what this vote will mean for the president and the Republicans in the Congress with New York Times Washington correspondent Eric Lipton and Market News International reporter Jack Shaw.
Greenhouse Gas Regulation And California's Cement Industry
State Senator Tom McClintock claims, in a recent column in the LA Daily News that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's crusade against carbon dioxide emissions is at odds with his promise to construct new highways, dams, levees and other public works. All of these construction product use prodigious amount of cement which according to McClintock produce enormous amounts of greenhouse gases. Larry discusses how the Governor plans to reconcile these dueling pursuits with Republican State Senator Tom McClintock and Undersecretary of the California Environmental Protection Agency Dan Skopec.
Man Labeled "Enemy Combatant" Wins Federal Case
A Federal appeals Court ruled that the Bush administration cannot legally detain a U.S. resident it believes is an al-Qaida sleeper agent without charging him. Larry talks to Carol Leonnig of the Washington Post, John Eastman Dean of the Chapman University School of Law, and Mariano-Florentino Cuellar Associate Professor of International Criminal Law at Stanford Law School about this important decision.
Bada Boom Bada ...Blank
The final episode of the Sopranos was one of the most anticipated episodes in television history. And it seems as if David Chase, the show's creator, decided to play a joke with an open ending that had viewers kicking their television sets. Should Chase be praised or whacked? Larry talks with TV critic for Variety, Brian Lowry, about the finale and asks KPCC listeners what they think of the last episode of the hit HBO series.
The Forgotten War Against Chinese Americans
In her new book, Driven Out: The Forgotten War Against Chinese Americans, Jean Pfaelzer documents the Chinese American experience during the second half of the nineteenth century. These immigrants encountered intense racism in California and in the Pacific Northwest including lynchings, and forced mass relocations. Larry talks with Pfaelzer about this long-ignored portion of American history.