The New York Times leads with a debate over the consequences of U.S. troops’ eventual exit from Iraq, with all sides predicting increased violence, albeit to different extents. The Los Angeles Times leads with the rift in the Republican Party over immigration legislation. The Washington Post leads with the controversy over a government study on new emergency medical treatments, which are being tested on patients without their consent.
The NYT reports that most experts expect escalating violence in Iraq if the U.S. pulls out or significantly scales back its forces in the next year or so. The debate is over what will follow the chaos: Does hightened violence force the Iraqi government to assert its authority over the nation, leading to stability or does the country devolve into anarchy and genocide? The paper reports that nearly two-thirds of Iraqis favor an extended U.S. military presence in their county, though they do not see Americans as liberators or allies.
The debate within the Arizona Republican Party over the Senate’s immigration bill mirrors a conversation being held nationwide, reports the LAT, which some believe could chart the fate of the party for a generation. Arizona’s party chair has denounced the state’s two Republican senators for backing a bill that provides a means for illegal immigrants to eventually gain citizenship. Some believe the party must court Latino voters in order to stay relevant. Others argue that backing a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants will alienate the party’s base. Inside, the NYT runs a similar story with a slightly narrower scope, focusing on the debate’s ramifications for Arizona officials. The WP goes inside with a look at the immigration bill’s revised point-based system for visa preference, which favors immigrants with advanced degrees.
The WP reports that trauma victims are being used as test subjects in a $50 million, five year study testing different emergency medicine techniques to determine which is most effective. Tests are run randomly on patients as young as 15 years old. Due to the nature of their injuries, the subjects are being experimented upon without their knowledge or consent. While some bio-ethicists are outraged by the idea of performing medical experiments without consent, many say obtaining permission for a study of this kind would be impractical.
On the day before Memorial Day, the WP off-leads with a report on the void left in small Minnesota towns by the Minnesota National Guard’s nearly two-year deployment to Iraq. The guard’s deployment was extended by four months earlier this year to accommodate President Bush’s troop surge stratagem.
The LAT off-leads with a look at an impending lawsuit against U.S. pesticide makers, whose product may have sterilized fruit plantation workers in Central America 30 years ago. The paper points out that the legal ambiguities which surround the proceedings are every bit as much a product of globalization as the fruit trade that spawned the case.
Fox News hoped that by airing a Democratic presidential debate it would soften the network’s image as a partisan mouthpiece, reports the NYT. At the same time, the Congressional Black Caucus hoped that sponsoring a debate on a major news network would help them draw attention to minority issues. With the first tier of Democratic candidates declining to participate in this fall’s debate, however, neither side may get what they wanted.
The NYT fronts the story of a small town in Alaska that’s slowly sinking, as the permafrost it’s built on melts due to climate change. The town hopes to relocate to another nearby island, a process the Army Corps of Engineers estimates will cost $130 million.
The WP reports that a private security firm, working in Iraq under contract from the State Department, was involved in two Baghdad shooting incidents in as many days last week, with one of the incidents leading to a confrontation with Iraqi security forces after an Iraqi driver was killed. The paper does what it can to reconstruct the incidents, the details of which remain foggy. The confusion underscores the paper’s point, however, that private security contractors, while deeply enmeshed in the conflict in Iraq, have questionable legal status and little oversight.
The NYT reports that some of America’s best colleges are retooling their admissions process to give applicants from low-income backgrounds a leg up. These initiatives are separate from traditional affirmative action programs, which tend to benefit mostly middle-class minorities.
While Islam is often depicted as the most powerful force of the Arab world, the LAT reports that in Yemen, tribal ties still guide nearly every aspect of daily life.
The WP reports that man’s overwhelming victory over sharks continues unabated- so successfully in fact, that some species are now threatened with extinction.
As advertisers grow more desperate to the attention of increasingly jaded consumers, some marketers are taking the next logical step: monitors on urinals, among other atypical locations. The LAT has the story.
