Punching Holes in Internet Walls On one side are the governments that have restricted Web access. In some countries, like Singapore, most of the banned sites are pornographic. Many of these countries also block the sites of political dissidents, but the censorship may be much broader than that. In the Middle East, for example, anti- Islamic sites and gay sites are often off- limits. In China, the prohibition includes the sites of Western publications, human rights organizations and Falun Gong, the banned spiritual movement. And Saudi Arabia also blocks sites for financial reasons: its ban on Internet telephony favors its own state-run telephone monopoly. Countering such government restrictions are services, some free, that are provided by companies like SafeWeb (www.safeweb.com), Anonymizer (www.anonymizer.com), SilentSurf.com (www.silentsurf.com) and the Cloak (www.the-cloak.com). During the conflict in Kosovo in 1999, for example, Anonymizer, based in San Diego, set up free services so that Kosovo residents could communicate with less fear. http://www.nytimes.com/2001/04/26/technology/26SAFE.html?pagewanted=all

Supreme Court Limits Scope of a Main Civil Rights Law The Supreme Court today substantially limited the effectiveness of one of the most important civil rights laws as a weapon against discrimination in the way federal grant money is used. The case before the court was a class-action lawsuit contending that the State of Alabama violated federal law by requiring applicants for drivers' licenses to take the written examination in English. Alabama, which like all states receives federal law enforcement and highway money, is the only state to limit its drivers' license exams to English. Two lower federal courts ruled that the policy had the prohibited effect of discriminating on the basis of national origin. But the Supreme Court said today that private lawsuits were not authorized under the law at issue, Title VI, which itself prohibits only intentional discrimination. The law authorizes federal agencies to issue regulations that bring their own programs into compliance with Title VI, and many regulations go beyond intentional discrimination to also bar the use of federal money in programs with discriminatory effects. The court said today that the "private right of action," the ability of private plaintiffs to go to court to enforce Title VI, extended no further than the law itself and did not apply to the regulations. The decision reflected a major battle on the court, and the hard feelings were evident in the courtroom today. In a dissenting opinion, Justice John Paul Stevens said "it makes no sense" to differentiate for the purposes of private Title VI lawsuits between intentional discrimination and discriminatory impact. "There is but one private action to enforce Title VI, and we already know that such an action exists," he said. Justice Stevens read portions of his dissent from the bench, a step justices take only rarely to call attention to developments they regard as particularly wrongheaded. He criticized the majority not only for its decision, but also for reaching out to take the case in the first place in the absence of any conflict among the lower federal courts on the issue. http://www.nytimes.com/2001/04/25/national/25DISC.html?pagewanted=all

Back in Texas, Bush's Legacy Comes Under Fire �George W. Bush is having an unusually tough time with the Texas Legislature. Many of the same lawmakers who passed tax cuts championed by Mr. Bush are now talking about future tax increases. Legislators in both parties agree that the state's charter schools, one of Mr. Bush's pet programs, need to be fixed. His signature environmental initiative is regarded as weak, and legislators are debating how much it should be toughened. Lawmakers also are considering easing enrollment requirements in Medicaid � a move resisted during Mr. Bush's tenure � so more poor children can be covered. And lawmakers are moving forward on several death penalty fronts, including a bill similar to one Mr. Bush vetoed two years ago that sponsors say would help provide better lawyers for indigent defendants. Just today, the Texas House of Representatives gave preliminary approval to a bill that would ban the execution of mentally retarded inmates, a measure that failed in the House two years ago after Mr. Bush spoke out against it. http://www.nytimes.com/2001/04/24/politics/24TEXA.html?pagewanted=all

U.S. Crew Says It Tried to Block Attack in Peru The unarmed American tracking plane � a Cessna Citation jet owned by the Air Force � was flown by a crew of three Americans under a C.I.A. contract; they were a pilot, a co-pilot and a technician, officials said. Also on board was the Peruvian officer, whose job was to direct Peru's military interceptors to suspicious planes. The tracking aircraft, one of many United States planes that are used in a longstanding program to help Peru and Colombia choke off the cocaine trade, played a crucial role in spotting the missionaries' plane and raising suspicions about its flight, according to the American officials. But they insisted that Peru's military was in command and control of drug interceptions, despite considerable support from the American military, anti-drug and intelligence agencies. http://www.nytimes.com/2001/04/23/world/23PLAN.html?pagewanted=all

Despite Sub Inquiry, Navy Still Sees Need for Guests on Ships Two targets of the inquiry � the Greeneville's captain and a sailor who failed to manually plot the location of the Japanese ship � have reversed their accounts on whether the presence of civilians in the control room was a factor in the crash. "In my opinion the investigation is not complete," said Eugene R. Fidell, the president of the National Institute of Military Justice, in Washington. "Never to summon 16 witnesses jammed into that control room is bizarre. "The Navy, I think, is collectively desperately concerned not to give up the distinguished visitor program," Mr. Fidell added. "They don't even want to talk about this. This is a real big deal to the Navy. To some people here, it seemed an implied threat that, if Commander Waddle were to go to a court-martial, Mr. Gittins would raise the presence of civilians as part of his defense and might produce embarrassing material about the visitor program. Commander Waddle, in his testimony � given voluntarily after he had been denied immunity � said the 16 civilians crowded into the control room did not interfere with operations. Asked twice by different admirals if the civilians were a factor in the accident, Commander Waddle each time replied, "No, sir." But last Monday, the main article on the front page of The Honolulu Advertiser quoted Mr. Gittins as saying that Commander Waddle had changed his mind and now believed that the presence of the civilians broke the crew's concentration at a crucial time. The article also noted that the visitors program "could figure prominently in the unlikely event of a court-martial and prove an embarrassment for the Navy." That same day, Time magazine published an interview with Commander Waddle that said the skipper had "reversed his previously benign view of the presence of civilians on board." Time quoted Commander Waddle as saying, "Having them in the control room at least interfered with our concentration." But Petty Officer First Class Patrick T. Seacrest changed his account in the opposite way. http://www.nytimes.com/2001/04/23/national/23VISI.html?pagewanted=all

U.S. Identified Baptists' Plane as Drug Carrier The United States Customs Service flies surveillance planes into what it calls the "source zone" for drugs, but a spokesman, Dennis Murphy, said today that his agency's planes were not involved in tracking the missionaries' plane on Friday. A Customs Service radar plane based in the Caribbean was flying in Colombia on Friday, but it was far north of the path taken by the Cessna 185 and did not observe it, Mr. Murphy said. The Customs Service has a P-3, a four-engine turboprop, the same kind of plane that the Navy uses to track enemy submarines, based in the Caribbean. Normal practice for the Customs Service is that once a radar plane locates a suspicious plane in flight, it radios for a Citation, a smaller plane that can fly at low speeds, to observe the target visually. Both the radar plane and the observation plane carry a representative from the host country, said Mr. Murphy, who communicates directly with the air force of the country involved. http://www.nytimes.com/2001/04/22/world/22PLAN.html?pagewanted=all