Bush blames Congress for gas prices
WASHINGTON, July 11 (UPI) -- U.S. President George W. Bush Saturday said "Democrats in Congress" are largely to blame for higher fuel prices.
In his weekly radio address, the president said "one of the factors driving up high gas prices is that many of our oil deposits here in the United States have been put off-limits for exploration and production."
"Past efforts to meet the demand for oil by expanding domestic resources have been repeatedly rejected by Democrats in Congress," he said.
Bush said, however, that rising fuel costs have "caused some to rethink their long-held opposition to opening up more areas for domestic production."
"If this change of heart is real, we can work together on four steps that will expand American oil and gas production and eventually relieve the pressure of rising prices."
Bush called on Congress to increase access to offshore exploration on the Outer Continental Shelf. He said U.S. oil production could be expanded by exploiting oil shale, but he said Democrats are blocking oil shale leasing on federal lands.
The president repeated his call for Congress to drop its opposition to oil exploration in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge -- which he did not specifically name, but referred to only as "northern Alaska."
He also called for increased oil refining capacity in the United States.
Germany: Not pressured on Obama appearance
BERLIN, July 12 (UPI) -- The German government says it is not being pressured by the White House to keep U.S. Sen. Barack Obama from speaking at Berlin's landmark Brandenburg Gate.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel has made clear her opposition to using the symbolic gate as a backdrop for partisan political events. That includes an upcoming visit this month by Obama, the likely Democratic U.S. presidential nominee, to Europe and the Middle East. But a Merkel aide says she isn't being asked by the Bush administration to do so, The Washington Post reported Saturday.
German government spokesman Ulrich Wilhelm Friday called "inaccurate in every way" German media reports that U.S. Deputy Treasury Secretary Robert Kimmitt asked Merkel's foreign policy adviser, Christoph Heusgen, to declare the Brandenburg Gate off limits to Obama.
The gate symbolizes the unification of Germany, and is seen by some as sacred. But the final say on the matter belongs to Berlin Mayor Klaus Wowereit, a political rival of Merkel's, who has said Obama can speak wherever he pleases, including the gate, the Post reported.
U.S. Senate passes housing crisis bill
WASHINGTON, July 12 (UPI) -- The federal government would assume the costly, exotic mortgages of 400,000 distressed homeowners under a housing crisis relief bill passed by the U.S. Senate.
The measure, passed Friday by a 63-5 vote, would pump money into the Federal Housing Administration, allowing it to purchase up to 400,000 adjustable-rate mortgages whose rapidly rising monthly payments are forcing many foreclosures, The Washington Post reported. Current mortgage holders, however, would have to write off a part of the loan in return.
The legislation would beef up and revamp the FHA in an effort to deal with the housing crisis and credit crunch. Under the bill, it would gain increased authority to regulate the financially troubled, quasi-public Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac mortgage guarantors, the Post said.
Also included are $14.5 billion in tax breaks, such as a credit of up to $8,000 for first-time homebuyers. However, a move to provide $3.9 billion in emergency funds for local governments to purchase vacant, foreclosed properties is likely to be stripped because it has drawn a veto threat from U.S. President George Bush, the newspaper said.
The bill still has to be reconciled with a U.S. House version passed earlier.
Woman on ER floor died from blood clots
NEW YORK, July 12 (UPI) -- A mentally ill woman who died on the floor of a New York hospital emergency room was killed by blood cots, medical officials say.
The New York City medical examiner's office said Esmin Green died from clots, generated from in her leg veins from a long period of inactivity, that moved into her lungs, CNN reported Saturday.
Security camera video from June 18 showed Green, a Jamaican immigrant, lying on the floor of Kings County Hospital in Brooklyn, New York, after being involuntarily admitted for what the hospital described as "agitation and psychosis." The footage showed hospital employees and other patients passing her by without helping, CNN said.
The broadcaster said Green's blood clots came from deep vein thrombosis, which complicated her chronic paranoid schizophrenia.
Ex-Bush spokesman Tony Snow dies at 53
WASHINGTON, July 12 (UPI) -- Former White House press secretary and Fox News Channel host Tony Snow died Saturday from cancer at age 53, the network said.
Snow retired as U.S. President George W. Bush's third press secretary last September, revealing he was battling colon cancer, and was succeeded by current White House press secretary Dana Perino.
Fox officials said Snow's 30-year media career included stints as a columnist, editor, TV anchor, radio show host and musician. He joined Fox in 1996 as the original anchor of "FOX News Sunday" and hosted "Weekend Live," as well as "The Tony Snow Show" radio program.
Snow was also an occasional fill-in host for Rush Limbaugh and was a speechwriter for former President George H.W. Bush.
"It's a tremendous loss for us who knew him, but it's also a loss for the country," Roger Ailes, chairman of FOX News, said Saturday about Snow, calling him a "renaissance man."
Hurricane Bertha nearly stationary
MIAMI, July 12 (UPI) -- Hurricane Bertha did an unusual thing Saturday by almost stopping its forward motion in the Atlantic Ocean 220 miles south-southeast of Bermuda.
The storm had sustained winds of 90 mph and gusts up to 115 mph, forecasters at the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami said. Their report said Bertha had been stationary for several hours, although they predicted a resumption in movement in a north-northwesterly direction at about 5 mph later in the day.
The report said the full force of Bertha was likely to pass the eastern side of Bermuda, whose weather office posted a tropical storm watch Friday. The Miami forecasters said they expected that to be upgraded to a tropical storm warning soon.
Little change in Bertha's strength was forecast.
Hurricane force winds extended outward up to 35 miles and tropical storm force winds reached 140 miles, the hurricane center's report said.
Large waves from Bertha's outer bands began hitting Bermuda Thursday, and the island was expected to see as much as two inches of rain in the next two days, forecasters said.
