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Yellow powder in Iraq, health trouble at home
Oregon’s money race is closer as vote nears It’s a shift from years past and may affect District 54 By Nick Budnick The Bulletin
SALEM — All those campaign mailers, TV and radio ads that have been flying in recent weeks don’t come for free — and if money were missiles, the political arms race for the state Legislature would be moving closer to an even match. And that, in turn, could affect the hotly contested election for Bend’s House District 54. Compared with two years ago, Republicans are raising more money for legislative races around Oregon — meaning far more races are in play than in 2008. Republicans say that with the political war being waged on more fronts, the state Democratic Party may not have as much money to defend incumbent Rep. Judy Stiegler, D-Bend. She is battling Republican Jason Conger and unaffiliated candidate Mike Kozak for the district, which includes the city and Deschutes River Woods. “Nobody has limitless amounts of money,” said Nick Smith, a campaign strategist and spokesman for the House Republicans’ political arm, called the Promote Oregon Leadership Political Action Committee. The PAC has raised more than $720,000 this year. “The Democrats have been so successful the last two (election) cycles that they’ve become overexposed,” Smith said. Michele Rossolo, who holds a similar post with the House Democrats’ political arm, Future PAC, admits that this year is more challenging. She remains confident, noting that Democrats still enjoy a fundraising edge. Future PAC has raised more than $1.17 million so far this year. See Money / A4
ELECTION
Rob Kerr / The Bulletin
Oregon National Guard veteran Aaron St. Clair, of Redmond, stands outside of the Bend Armory on Friday morning. St. Clair is among 26 Oregon veterans who are suing war contractor KBR Inc., seeking damages in connection with exposure to a cancer-causing chemical in 2003 in Iraq.
A Redmond veteran is one of 26 in a lawsuit seeking damages from a military contractor By Erin Golden The Bulletin
Aaron St. Clair was nearly home from Iraq when he got the bad news. The Redmond soldier was at Fort Lewis, Wash., with other Oregon National Guard troops, filling out paperwork and marking the last few days of a long deployment when a lieutenant pulled him aside. Months earlier, he said, there had been a problem. In the spring of 2003, Oregon soldiers had
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been assigned to provide security to private contractors surveying the country’s ruined infrastructure. They’d ride along in SUVs, usually two soldiers to a vehicle, and then keep watch for anyone looking to put a stop to the work. For many soldiers, one of the stops was at a water treatment plant in Basra, a city in southern Iraq. St. Clair, who spent two days there, remembers that there were industrial-size bags stacked all over the site. Some had been slashed open, and a bright yellow powdery substance had
The new spy game: trafficking in trade secrets to foreign buyers By Christopher Drew New York Times News Service
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spilled over the ground. A contractor mentioned something to some of the workers about staying away from the bags. It wasn’t until the conversation at Fort Lewis that St. Clair figured out why the man was worried: The bags were filled with an anti-corrosive chemical that contains hexavalent chromium, a toxic substance that has been linked to a long list of health problems, including cancer. Six years after he returned home, St. Clair, now 36, says he suffers from skin rashes, digestive problems and gets short of breath without much effort. And he — along with more than two dozen other Oregon soldiers who are suing the contractor, former Halliburton subsidiary KBR Inc., in federal court — says he wants someone held accountable. See Veteran / A5
Huang Kexue, federal authorities say, is a new kind of spy. For five years, Huang was a scientist at a Dow Chemical lab in Indiana, studying ways to improve insecticides. But before he was fired in 2008, Huang began sharing Dow’s secrets with
Chinese researchers, authorities say, then obtained grants from a state-run foundation in China with the goal of starting a rival business there. Now, Huang, born in China and a legal U.S. resident, faces a rare criminal charge — that he engaged in economic espionage on China’s behalf. See Espionage / A5
On the front lines of saving lives, tradition meets high-tech By David Brown The Washington Post
FORWARD OPERATING BASE WILSON, Afghanistan — The first sign this isn’t a routine pickup is the rhythmic right and left banking of the helicopter. It’s the kind of thing kids do on bikes to feel Linda Davidson The Washington Post a thrill. Only this is done to make the aircraft a A wounded Afghan tougher target. child holds a lollipop At 6:09 p.m., Dustoff as Sgt. Cole Reece, 57 has just left this base a 28-year-old flight deep in Taliban-infil- medic, checks the trated Kandahar prov- boy’s vital signs. ince, headed for a POI, or point of injury. On board are two pilots, a crew chief and a flight medic, as well as two litters for carrying the wounded and numerous nylon bags stuffed with ultramodern medical gear. That combination of new and old is key to keeping gravely wounded soldiers alive in the minutes before they get to the hospital. It’s also the basis of evolving strategies that may trickle down in modified form to civilian ambulances, ERs and trauma centers. See Medevac / A2
Desk jockeys rising up, trashing chairs (and improving their health?) By Michael S. Rosenwald The Washington Post
Some people can’t stand working. Mark Ramirez works standing.
He is not a waiter or a factory worker. He is a senior executive at AOL. Ramirez could, if he wanted, curl into the cushiest leather chair
in the Staples catalogue. No, thanks. He prefers to stand most of the day at a desk raised above stomach level. “I’ve got my knees bent, I feel to-
tally alive,” Ramirez said. “It feels more natural to stand. I wouldn’t go back to sitting.” See Standing / A4