12A NEWS
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
THURSDAY, APRIL 26, 2007
Evergreen's Elk
Ed Andrieski/ASSOCIATED PRESS
Eik stand in a snow-covered yard in Evergreen, Colo., where they were foraging for food Wednesday. Evergreen and other mountain towns had more than two feet of snow in Tuesday's storm.
BY ANNA JOHNSON ASSOCIATED PRESS
Bin Laden may be to blame
CAIRO, Egypt — A top Taliban commander said al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden was behind the February attack outside a U.S. military base in Afghanistan during a visit by Vice President Dick Cheney, according to an interview shown Wednesday by Arab broadcaster Al-Jazeera.
Bin Laden planned and supervised the attack that killed 23 people outside the Bagram base while Cheney was there, said Mullah Daddullah, the Taliban's main military commander in southern Afghanistan who has had close associations with al-Qaida.
"He planned that operation and guided us through it. The operation was a success," Dadullah said of bin Laden.
A U.S. counterterrorism official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the information's sensitivity, said al-Qaida would likely have used more than a single explosion outside the base's main gate if it were targeting Cheney.
TERRORIST ATTACK
He did not say how he knew bin Laden planned the attack, and it was not clear when the interview took place.
In addition, the official said, it takes bin Laden significant time to communicate from where he is hiding. That wouldn't offer him the flexibility to order an attack on Cheney, whose stop at Bagram was kept secret in advance of his arrival, the official said.
The Feb. 27 bombing killed 20 Afghan civilians, a U.S. soldier, a U.S. contract worker and a South Korean soldier outside Bagram while Chenee was meeting with officials inside the base. The Taliban claimed the attack was aimed at Cheney, but officials said it posed no real threat to him.
The U.S. military had said previously it was unclear whether the Taliban knew about Cheney's visit or whether the timing of the attack was a coincidence.
The attacker did not try to penetrate even the first of several U.S.-manned security checkpoints at Bagram, instead detonating himself among a group of Afghan workers outside the base.
Dadullah insisted bin Laden was alive and well. "Thank God he is alive. We get updated information about him. Thank God he planned operations in both Iraq and Afghanistan," he told Al-Jazeera in excerpts that were translated into Arabic.
U. S. officials have said they assume bin Laden is alive.
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2008 PRESIDENTIAL RACE
McCain defends candidacy
Senator attempts campaign revival tries second time for White House
BY LIZ SIDOTI ASSOCIATED PRESS
Presidential hopeful Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), addresses a McCain 2008 campaign rally in Manchester, N.H., on Wednesday evening. McCain officially announced his candidacy for president during a campaign rally in Portsmouth on Wednesday afternoon.
PORTSMOUTH, N.H. — It wasn't supposed to be this way.
John McCain was the presumptive Republican front-runner, the next in line for the nomination in a party that historically respects hierarchy.
Now, he's trying to revive his troubled campaign. He is making the case for his candidacy by stressing his decades of experience in wartime and Washington and claiming he has the will to make tough, and sometimes unpopular, choices to heal the nation's woes.
A loser in 2000 to George W. Bush, McCain chose to officially enter the presidential race in New Hampshire — the state's primary was the political high point of his last bid. He selected Prescott Park, which sits across the Piscataqua River from the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard.
"I am qualified. I am ready to serve. I need no on-the-job training. And I have the vision and capability," the four-term Arizona senator, ex-Navy pilot and former Vietnam prisoner of war, said Wednesday after formally declaring his second attempt to win the White House.
As McCain talked of the country's challenges at home and abroad, the shipyard served as a backdrop and a reminder of his military past.
"I know how to fight and how to make peace. I know who I am and what I want to do," he said in his speech. "I'm not running for president to be somebody, but to do something; to do the hard but necessary things not the easy and needless things."
Simply a formality, the event did, however, give McCain an opportunity to lay his vision for the
country's future and jump start his campaign after months of struggle. He had spent years building an unrivaled national organization and positioning himself as the inevitable GOP nominee — only to see his campaign falter.
"It's John's last chance to make a first impression again," said Ken Duberstein, a White House chief of staff under President Reagan. "He has to wipe the slate clean from the last several months. That's easier said than done, but I think he has the chance to do it."
McCain's popularity has fallen in national polls; he trails former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani. He
struggled to raise money, coming in a disappointing third in fundraising and cash-on-hand among Republicans in the first test. Rival Mitt Romney, in single digits in most polls, finished first. McCain revamped his finance operation and trimmed staff as a result.
He's been dogged by a few verbal gaffes, an ever-present danger of his straight-talking persona. He's perhaps forever linked to the Iraq war as the top pitchman for Bush's troop increase. The decline in his popularity has mirrored the waning public support for the four-year-old conflict.
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