10/ 1/03 Wednesday
Iraqi police opened fire in downtown Baghdad after demonstrators
demanding jobs stormed a police station and threw stones at
officers. Commentator Rush Limbaugh resigned from ESPN, three days
after sparking outrage by saying Philadelphia Eagles quarterback
Donovan McNabb is overrated because the media wanted to see a black
wanted to see a black quarterback succeed. Three U.S. troops were
killed in action in three attacks, in Iraq: 1) on patrol in the
al-Mansour district of W Baghdad; 2) roadside bomb exploded about
300 yards from the main U.S. base in Tikrit; 3) RPG's on convoy
near Samara, about 60 miles N of Baghdad.
10/ 2/03 Thursday
Chief U.S. weapons searcher David Kay reported he had found no
weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, in a report to Congress.
Democrat Bob Graham said that he would abandon his struggling
presidential bid. ABC reported that radio star Rush Limbaugh is
being investigated for allegedly buying illegal prescription drugs
near his Palm Beach, Fla., home.
10/ 3/03 Friday
U.S. Labor Department announced that businesses had added new jobs
for the first time in eight months. President Bush, defending his
decision to go to war in Iraq, said that a search for weapons o
mass destruction made clear that Saddam Hussein was "a danger to
the world" even though investigators have failed so far to find any
illegal arsenal. NASA targets next fall for its next space shuttle
launch, saying there are too many post-Columbia modifications to
fly any sooner. One U.S. troop was killed and one was wounded in
an attack in SE Baghdad, in Iraq.
10/ 4/03 Saturday
A Palestinian woman blew herself up in a crowded beach-front
restaurant at lunchtime, in port city of Haifa in Northern Israel,
killing 19 people. President Bush said of Iraq, that the
the transition to self-government "is a complicated process" but
steady progress is being made. Former Iraqi soldiers, angry over
rumors their pay would be cut off, clashed with coalition troops in
Baghdad and in the southern city of Basra in riots that left two
Iraqis dead and dozens injured.
10/ 5/03 Sunday
Syria demanded that the U.N. Security Council condemn Israel's
airstrike against purported terrorist training camp near Damascus;
the U.S. said it would not support any resolution that does not
also criticize attacks against Israel. In California recall
election campaigning, Arnold Schwarzenegger said he sensed "an
unbelievable momentum", despite new allegations of sexual
harassment and signs of a tightening race. Weapons hunters in Iraq
are pursuing tips that point to the possible presence of anthrax
and Scud missiles still hidden in the country, said chief searcher
David Kay.
10/ 6/03 Monday
Bob Graham said he was ending his campaign: "I'm leaving because I
have made the judgment that I can not be elected president of the
United States." Looming over the California recall race are the
allegations of 16 women who have come forward over the past week to
say Schwarzenegger groped them and sometimes made crude comments
during encounters dating from 1970 to 2000. The 15-member U.N.
Security Council met, but little progress on bridging divisions
over how and when to hand over power to the Iraqis, was made.
10/ 7/03 Tuesday
President Bush voiced doubt whether it will be possible to find out
who leaked the identity of an undercover CIA officer. Turkey's
parliament voted overwhelmingly to allow troops to be sent to Iraq,
a move that could lead to the first major contingent of Muslim
peacekeepers there - Iraq's Governing Council said it opposes any
deployment of Turkish soldiers. One U.S. troop was killed and
another wounded in a bombing about 9:50 p.m. just W of Baghdad, in
Iraq. About an hour later, another roadside bombing killed two U.S.
troops and their Iraqi translator, in Baghdad. Schwarzenegger wins
in California, Davis recall passes easily.
10/ 8/03 Wednesday
Pennsylvania politicians from both parties demanded that the FBI
explain why it apparently planted secret bugging devices in the
offices of Philadelphia's mayor just weeks before he is up for re-
election. A Spanish military attache was shot to death outside his
home in Baghdad, in Iraq. "America did the right thing," President
Bush said before a gala fund-raiser for the Republican National
Committee; "There's a lot more to investigate,...Yet, it is now
undeniable - undeniable - that Saddam Hussein was in clear
violation of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1441."
10/ 9/03 Thursday
A suicide car bomber crashed into a police station in Iraq's
largest Shiite Muslim enclave, killing eight people. Two U.S.
troops were killed and four wounded in an ambush on a routine
patrol in Baghdad, in Iraq. Bush warns that the danger of
terrorism "has not passed," and says: "The challenges we face today
cannot be met with timid actions or bitter words. Our challenges
will be overcome with optimism and resolve..."
10/10/03 Friday
U.S. V.P. Cheney told the conservative Heritage Foundation: "We
could not accept the grave danger of Saddam Hussein and his allies
turning weapons of mass destruction against us or our friends and
allies." The International Red Cross reiterated its criticism of
Washington for ignoring repeated appeals to give legal rights to
U.S. military detainees at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Former Muslim
chaplain Capt. James Yee, at the Guantanamo Bay prison for
terrorism suspects, was charged with two counts of failing to obey
a lawful order, for improperly handling classified information.
10/11/03 Saturday
Conservative commentator Rush Limbaugh told listeners of his nation
wide radio show that he's hooked on painkillers and is checking
himself into rehab. Iraqi firefighters extinguished a blaze at a
pipeline in northern Iraq, where officials suspected sabotage.
President Bush told of Iraq as a country where life is returning to
normal after war, insisting that "Iraq is making progress" despite
a steady drumbeat of bad news. But Democrats countered, "The
president did not plan well for winning the peace and rebuilding
the Iraqi nation."
10/12/03 Sunday
A car bomb attack at a hotel used by members of Iraq's Governing
Council, as well as by many Americans, killed the bomber and six
other people and wounded more than 35 others. Dallas doctors
sucessfully separate 2-year-old Egyptian twins joined at the top of
joined at the top of their heads.
10/13/03 Monday
Three American soldiers were killed N of Baghdad, in land mine, RPG
and roadside bomb attacks. Before the independent commission
studying the terror attacks of Sept. 11, James B. Steinberg, deputy
national security adviser in the Clinton administration, said that
he supports making two new entities: an independent director of
national intelligence and a domestic security service modeled after
Britain's MI5. President Bush defended the administration's Iraq
strategy in a series of interviews with regional television outlets
with regional television outlets that allowed Bush to take his
message directly to people outside Washington.
10/14/03 Tuesday
A car bomb exploded near the Turkish embassy in Baghdad in Iraq,
killing the driver and wounding more than a dozen others. China
fired its first astronaut into orbit without any visible hitches,
becoming only the third nation capable of manned spaceflight. In
the northern Gaza Strip, along the main north-south road, a massive
explosion ripped through a U.S. diplomatic vehicle, killing at
least three American security guards in the first attack on U.S.
targets in the past three years of Israel-Palestinian fighting.
10/15/03 Wednesday
About 3:20 PM EDT, a Staten Island ferry slammed into a pier as it
was docking, killing 10 people and injuring at least 42. China's
first astronaut returned safely to Earth when his craft touched
down on time and as planned after 21 hours in orbit. In a 9-to-6
vote, an advisory panel to the Food and Drug Administration
recommended that silicone breast implants be allowed back on the
market after an 11-year hiatus.
10/16/03 Thursday
In a diplomatic victory for the U.S., the U. N. Security Council
unanimously adopted a resolution aimed at attracting more troops
and money to stabilize Iraq and putting it on the road to
independence. But at a summit in Brussels, some European leaders
ruled out any immediate commitments of financial or military aid.
Three American soldiers and at least eight Iraqis were killed in a
midnight clash at the offices of a local senior Shiite Muslim
cleric, Mahmoud al-Hassani, which were guarded by at least 20
gunmen, in Karbala, in Iraq. Ailing Pope John Paul II celebrated
his 25 years as head of the Roman Catholic Church, asking tens of
thousands of pilgrims, his admiring Polish countrymen and the men
who help run his church to pray for him, saying his future rested
in the hands of God.
10/17/03 Friday
President Bush was in the Philippines and told the joint session of
the Philippine Congress: "Murder has no home in any religious faith
and these terrorists must find no home in the Philippines." Bush
promised to help the nation defeat terrorism by modernizing its
under-equipped military. A replacement crew for the International
Space Station roared into space atop a Russian rocket, the only
means of getting there after the U.S. shuttle program was halted in
February. U.S. combat deaths since President Bush declared the end
of major fighting passed the 100 mark after one U.S. troop was
killed and two were wounded by a roadside bomb near Baghdad; also,
nine U.S. troops were wounded in a roadside bombing in the northern
city of Mosul, in Iraq.
10/18/03 Saturday
In two new messages broadcast by Al-Jazeera, a voice purported to
be Osama bin Laden threatened countries helping the American
occupation of Iraq and warned of new suicide attacks "inside and
outside" the United States. It was the first tape since one
released on the eve of the 2nd anniversary of the Sept. 11 terror
attacks and the new message came as President Bush was on a tour of
Asian nations, rallying allies in the anti-terrorism campaign.
President Bush rejected North Korea's demand that the United States
sign a non-aggression pact in exchange for nuclear concessions.
10/19/03 Sunday
Under pressure to meet a U.N. deadline, Iran began negotiations on
allowing U.N. inspectors unfettered access to its nuclear
facilities. Palestinian gunmen ambushed an Israeli army patrol in
a West Bank town, killing three Israeli soldiers. In Iraq,
attackers killed two U.S. soldiers in a clash outside Kirkuk; an
ambush on a U.S. convoy in the town of Fallujah set off spectacular
explosions from an ammunition truck. It was reported that every
day guerrillas launch an average of 22 attacks on coalition forces
in Iraq.
10/20/03 Monday
President Bush pressed for closer Asian partnerships in the war on
terror, carrying his appeal to free-trade partner Singapore and
planning for a visit to Bali, Indonesia. Cleared to defend himself
against capital murder charges, John Allen Muhammad fired his
lawyers and told jurors he had "nothing to do with" last year's
Washington-area sniper attacks. Assailants ambushed a U.S. Army
foot patrol outside Fallujah, in Iraq, killing one American and
six others in the second day of attacks in this anti-U.S. hotbed.
10/21/03 Tuesday
In Bali, Indonesia, President Bush offered firm words, dismissing
North Korea's rejection of a U.S. plan to end a nuclear stalemate
and urging Iran to prove it isn't making nuclear weapons. In a
decision seen as a gauge of world opinion, the U.N. General
Assembly overwhelmingly approved a resolution demanding that Israel
tear down a barrier that it says is needed to protect it from
suicide bombers, but that Palestinians call a land grab. Iraq's
ambush bombers struck in the center of Baghdad and in the tense
Sunni Muslim area west of the capital, rocking U.S. Army convoys
with roadside bombs, wounding at least 4 U.S. troops.
10/22/03 Wednesday
Sniper suspect John Allen Muhammad changed his mind and stopped
acting as his own lawyer at his trial after only one day of cross
examining witnesses. Heckled inside and outside Australia's
Australia's Parliament, President Bush offered a pointed answer to
those who say the war with Iraq wasn't worth fighting: "Who can
possibly think that the world would be better off with Saddam
Hussein still in power?" Bush said. Senate Democrats blocked
Republican efforts to limit the amount of damages paid in class
action lawsuits across the country, mustering enough votes against
the bill to likely kill it for the year.
10/23/03 Thursday
Palestinian attackers killed three Israelis and wounded two others,
after infiltrating a Jewish settlement in Gaza. One U.S. troop was
killed N of Baghdad, in Iraq, in convoy ambush incident. Federal
agents raided Wal-Mart's headquarters and 60 of its stores across
the country, arresting more than 300 illegal workers in immigration
crackdown at the world's biggest retailer. British Airways' last
Concorde flight for fare-paying passengers landed in New York, a
day before scheduled supersonic service ends. U.S. President and
Mrs Bush visited Pearl Harbor naval base in Hawaii. Mr Bush spoke
to veterans from World War II, the Korean War and survivors of the
attack on Pearl Harbor.
10/24/03 Friday
A wind-driven wildfire closed in on several Southern California
communities east of Los Angeles, destroying four houses. Iraq's
postwar reconstruction received pledges of $13 billion from nations
from Japan to Saudi Arabia, on top of more than $20 billion from
the United States; but figure fell well short of the estimated $56
billion needed to rebuild the country. Two U.S. soldiers were
killed and four were wounded in a mortar attack on their base N of
Baghdad, and another American died in a shootout in the northern
city of Mosul, in Iraq.
10/25/03 Saturday
A wildfire leaped through dense housing tracts in the foothills of
the San Bernardino Mountains in California, destroying more than 50
homes. To chants of "Impeach Bush," thousands of anti-war
protesters rallied in Washington, D.C. and delivered a scathing
critique of President Bush and his Iraq policy. Up to eight
rockets were fired at the Hotel al-Rashid, one of the most heavily
guarded sites in Baghdad, in Iraq. A US soldier was killed and 15
15 other people, 11 of them American, were wounded. Visiting U.S.
Deputy Defence Secretary Paul Wolfowitz escaped unhurt.
10/26/03 Sunday
In Baghdad, in Iraq, a suicide bomber drove an ambulance packed
with explosives into security barriers outside the international
Red Cross building, killing about 10 people in the blast. Also,
car bombers struck three police stations across Baghdad, bringing
the death toll up to almost 40. Wildfires that have burned for
days merged into walls of flame stretching across miles in parts of
Southern California, leaving 13 people dead and burning more than
800 homes.
10/27/03 Monday
U.S. President Bush said that U.S. progress in Iraq is making
insurgents more "desperate" and spurring attacks. Four American
soldiers were wounded near the northern city of Mosul, in Iraq, in
two ambush incidents. California's deadliest outbreak of fires in
more than a decade has destroyed at least 1,134 homes, killed at
least 15 people and consumed more than half a million acres,
stretching from the Mexican border to the suburbs northeast of Los
Angeles. Microsoft Corp. gave detailed look at the next version of
Windows, code-named "Longhorn," which promises new methods of
storing files, tighter links to the Internet, greater security, and
fewer annoying reboots.
10/28/03 Tuesday
U.S. President Bush held press conference in am - blamed both
loyalists to Saddam Hussein and foreign terrorists for the recent
rash of devastating attacks in and around Baghdad. "Basically what
they're trying to do is cause people to run. ... That's what
terrorists do," Bush said in the Rose Garden. With wind-driven
flames threatening the densely populated San Fernando Valley in Los
Angeles, firefighters dug in for another brutal day battling one of
the most destructive and deadly wildfire outbreaks in California
history. Two American soldiers were killed when their Abrams
battle tank was damaged by resistance fighters, 45 miles north of
Baghdad, in Iraq.
10/29/03 Wednesday
In Califoria, in the San Bernardino Mountains, flames engulfed
hundreds of homes on a wind-driven march toward the resort towns of
Big Bear and Lake Arrowhead - thousands of people were evacuated.
Pentagon sources said a former Iraqi general in Saddam Hussein's
inner circle is believed to be financing and coordinating attacks
against U.S. troops in Iraq - suspect number one is Izzat Ibrahim
al-Duri the Iraqi military's former northern regional commander, to
be the key figure behind the attacks, possibly with help from Iraqi
regime loyalists and "foreign fighters." The United Nations has
started to temporarily pull its staff out of Baghdad, while it
evaluates the security situation.
10/30/03 Thursday
Companies awarded $8 billion in contracts to rebuild Iraq and
Afghanistan have been major campaign donors to President Bush, and
their executives have had important political and military
connections, according to a released study. Insurgents blasted a
freight train west of Baghdad in Iraq and exploded a bomb near a
convoy in a northern city, injuring a U.S. soldier. Third quarter
statistics said that the economy grew at a speedy 7.2 percent
annual rate in the strongest pace in nearly two decades - consumers
spent more and businesses increased investment - new evidence of
improved economic conditions.
10/31/03 Friday
A roadside bomb killed two U.S. soldiers in Mosul, in Iraq; and
leaflets attributed to Saddam Hussein's party warned of a "Day of
Resistance" against the U.S. occupation, and called for a three-day
general strike. For the first time in days, California fire
fighters took a break from battling a massive blaze creeping
eastward toward the resort town of Big Bear Lake, as a welcome
chill helped their cause and temperatures were expected to fall
even further into the low 20s. At evacuation and disaster relief
centers, those affected by the wildfires took time to celebrate
Halloween with donated costumes and candy. According to a
realeased USDA report, despite the nation's struggle with obesity,
more and more American families are hungry or unsure whether they
can afford to buy food.
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