French police battle protesters with water canons, right, and tear gas, left, in the Place de Republique in Paris.

Hundreds of Thousands Protest French Labor Law

PARIS, March 28 — Hundreds of thousands of people poured into the streets of cities across France today in the biggest show of force to date against Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin and his new labor law targeting youth.

The police said that 450,000 people turned out nationwide, not including Paris, where hundreds of thousands more people marched in a colorful, mainly peaceful demonstration marked by scattered incidents of violence.

One of the country's largest unions, the CGT, put the nationwide figure at 3 million, a turnout that the CGT secretary general, Bernard Thibault, hailed as "historic."

Incidents erupted in Paris and several other cities, including Nantes, La Rochelle, Grenoble and Bordeaux, Europe 1 radio reported. In Paris, about 100 hooded youths clashed with the police in midafternoon, the radio and witnesses said, and toward the end of the march the police fired tear gas to disperse hard-core elements.

The marches were part of a nationwide day of action against the Villepin legislation, which was intended to encourage hiring by making it easy for companies to fire workers under age 26 during their first two years on the job.

President Bush said Sunday he was encouraged by the progress toward forming a unity government in Iraq.

Bush Bluntly Defends Iraq Strategy, but Admits Problems

President Bush gave a blunt defense of the American strategy in Iraq today, while acknowledging that ordinary Iraqis had been left exposed to the horrors of terrorism during the war's earlier stages.

As the debate continued over where the war is headed at its third anniversary, a leading Democrat, Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr., called on Mr. Bush to throw himself into an all-out effort to forge a government of national unity in Iraq and to begin planning for a civil war that was likely to follow if the effort failed.

Mr. Bush delivered an account from the Iraq war today that was both uncharacteristically grim and characteristically optimistic. Speaking to the City Club in Cleveland, the president told how Tal Afar, a city in western Iraq, had been freed from the control of Al Qaeda in Iraq, which had taken over after a too-brief military operation by American forces in 2004.

Tornados Kill 10 but Unfortunately Come Nowhere Near Me

Scores of tornadoes whipped across the midwestern United States, killing at least 10 people, while a massive wildfire left seven people dead in Texas, officials and local media reported.

"There was a storm system that moved through the central US that brought everything from tornadoes to heavy snow to flooding in some areas," Pat Slattery, a spokesman for the National Weather Service, told AFP.

"Missouri had more tornadoes in one day then they usually have in a season," he said, adding that the weather service had not yet confirmed the state's 110 tornado reports.
- The Drudge Report (3/13/2006)


Yeah, I stayed up all night Sunday waiting for the supercell that was tearing through Missouri. It had a history of large hail and strong rotation and for hours was prompting tornado warnings from Oklahoma to the Ozarks in Missouri. I was almost praying that it would hit me. (I'm not crazy, I just wanted to get in my car and chase it.) As soon as it got within 50 miles, the rogue cell which was ahead of the main squall line began to turn in a more northeasterly direction straight towards not only my county but my town. I was so happy for a few minutes until the tornado warnings started getting replaced with severe thunderstorm warnings and finally no warning at all. As the light rain began to fall, I cursed the random workings of our climate.

Dubai Gives Up

WASHINGTON (AP) - Bowing to ferocious opposition in Congress, a Dubai-owned company signaled surrender Thursday in its quest to take over operations at U.S. ports.

"DP World will transfer fully the U.S. operations ... to a United States entity," the firm's top executive, H. Edward Bilkey, said in an announcement that capped weeks of controversy.

Relieved Republicans in Congress said the firm had pledged full divestiture, a decision that one senator said had been approved personally by the prime minister of the United Arab Emirates.

"The devil is in the details," said Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid of Nevada, reflecting a sentiment expressed by numerous critics of the deal.

South Dakota Bans Abortion, Setting Up a Battle

Gov. Michael Rounds of South Dakota signed into law the nation's most sweeping state abortion ban on Monday, an intentional provocation meant to set up a direct legal challenge to Roe v. Wade, the 1973 United States Supreme Court decision that made abortion legal.

President Bush shaking hands with President Karzai during a joint news conference.

President Bush Makes Surprise Visit to Afghanistan

NEW DELHI, March 1 - President Bush made a surprise five-hour visit to Afghanistan on Wednesday to meet with President Hamid Karzai and to see for the first time the country created after the United States went to war against the Taliban in retaliation for the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

In a news conference with Mr. Karzai, Mr Bush said he remained confident of the capture of Osama bin Laden, the mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks, as well as the apprehension of the Taliban leader Mullah Muhammad Omar. “It’s not a matter of if they’re captured, it’s a matter of when they’re brought to justice,’’ Mr. Bush said.

The president deflected a question about the increasing violence from Al Qaeda and Taliban militants in Afghanistan and also played down the possibility of announcing a nuclear power agreement with India on a visit to New Delhi, where he was expected to arrive Wednesday night.