Denver Water gives few details on Dillon Dam decision
Denver water authorities citing unspecified security concerns suddenly close a crucial dam road in booming Summit County. Residents erupt in protest. The Denver water authorities concede there’s no immediate threat, saying they based their move on a new vulnerability analysis by a federal security agency they could not name. Are jihadists able and likely to target a relatively unknown mountain dam?
Privacy advocates worry that officers’ snooping will entangle innocent people.
Hundreds of police, firefighters, paramedics and even utility workers have been trained and recently dispatched as “Terrorism Liaison Officers in Colorado and a handful of other statres to hunt for “suspicious activity” - and are reporting their findings into secret government databases. U.S. intelligence and homeland security officials say they support the widening use of TLOs - state-run under federal agreements - as part of a necessary integrated network for preventing attacks. But the vague nature of TLOs’ mission and their focus on reporting both legal and illegal activity has generated objections from privacy advocates and civil libertarians.
Local-hire Iraqi interpreters maimed during U.S. combat missions can’t fathom why the nation won’t pay for the high-tech prosthetics.
Maimed Iraqi interpreters showing up in U.S. cities such as Denver wonder why nobody — neither the government nor its contractors — is assuming long-term responsibility for them and hundreds of other seriously wounded interpreters who served U.S. forces in Iraq.
Consider the case of Diyar al-Bayati, who risked his life as the eyes and ears for soldiers on more than 200 combat missions, coaxing suspicious Iraqis, forging alliances and — beyond his interpreter duties — regularly taking up arms to fight alongside U.S. troops. When a roadside bomb in a 2006 ambush blew off his legs, al-Bayati kept firing at his unit’s attackers until he lost consciousness.
Today fellow refugees ferry al-Bayati around Salt Lake City, hoisting him in and out of a van. The military won’t pay for maimed interpreters to get the same high-tech prosthetics provided to U.S. soldiers. Al-Bayati, 22, has learned America may give only limited citizenship, housing and medical treatment.
“They say ‘limited,’ ” he said. “Why was our service in Iraq not ‘limited’? When they asked us to do missions, we didn’t say: ‘Our job is limited.’ ”
Yet al-Bayati acknowledges he’s lucky, one of a dozen or so wounded interpreters who’ve found shelter in U.S. cities including Denver. Hundreds more are hiding or running for their lives in Iraq and neighboring Jordan.
A movement to buy locally grown meat hits schools, and students are chowing the burgers. Is it worth the cost?
The growing movement that advocates buying and eating locally-produced food gains momentum in schools with the introduction of homegrown beef. Proponents contend switching from unknown industrial providers to local suppliers — not just of beef but vegetables, fruits, bread and milk — would be better for kids and build a system where people can know where their food comes from and control it. Boosting local capacity to produce food makes long-term sense, they say — despite prices up to twice as high — because rising oil prices worldwide may mean even higher food costs in the future.
As much as 15 percent of the U.S. Paralympic team will be drawn from the 31,000 men and women disabled by the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Out of the carnage of roadside bomb blasts in Iraq, U.S. Paralympics recruiters are finding new competitors for world-class sports in Beijing and beyond. Foremost among those heading to China this summer: Army 1st Lt. Melissa Stockwell. She made her first mark on history four years ago when she became the war’s first female combat amputee. Now she has etched a new distinction as the first disabled Iraq war veteran to qualify for this summer’s Games in China.
Tibetans from around the United States converge on San Francisco to try to stop China’s Olympic torch. Street action. For Tibetan-Americans, the day became a strategic battle of controlling tempers. They find they must draw on every bit of Buddhist teaching they had and the warning of their leader, the Dalai Lama, who has threatened to resign if pre-Olympic protests turn violent.
Edwin Lara’s circuitous final journey began in Denver’s Funeraria Latina, then went by air to his home country of El Salvador, and finally he was driven on a road past a volcanic lake — nearly a month after he died — to the village where he was born.
“He always wanted to go back,” his sister, Cecelia, said at a visitation. “It was his dream to save money and then be with his children in El Salvador.”
Journeys such as this are increasingly common as the families of immigrants in Colorado, and throughout the United States, arrange for deceased loved ones to be transported back home. It’s a reverse migration of sorts that requires a new body-shipping dimension in the multibillion-dollar business of caring for the dead.
Frequent flying by Russian strategic bombers near American airspace — drawing U.S. fighter jets — has military officials at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs on guard and angling for greater openness and cooperation. While odds are low that these increasing Russian forays will cause a catastrophe, “there’s more of a risk of something accidental happening,” Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Adm. Mike Mullen said Monday after meeting here with homeland defense commanders.
“We will clearly watch this evolution,” Mullen said of the Russian flights — not detected in such numbers since the Cold War. “We’ve got good military-to-military relations with the Russians. My sense is there’s no strategic intent to threaten the United States.”
To prevent problems, the Colorado-based North American Aerospace Defense and Northern commands initiated joint exercises with Russian counterparts here and in Alaska — a return to Cold War-era efforts to manage tensions.
Soldier trains for his shot to compete in Beijing Games
By any measure, Army Sgt. 1st Class Christopher Downs would appear a long shot to join the U.S. Olympic Boxing team at the Summer Games in Beijing. He’s 33, the oldest on record for the team, a father of two and, until the Iraq war began, he had never entered a boxing ring. On top of all that, he first had to survive 13 months in combat to get where he is now. Saturday, Downs leaves for a fight in Trinidad and Tobago that could qualify him for China. Regardless of whether he makes it, Downs will resume his Army infantry duties when he’s finished with his Olympic effort.
Some 625 China-bound U.S. athletes are targeted in a growing campaign by activist group Team Darfur to persuade athletes worldwide to use their voices in China to make a political point. U.S. Olympic Committee officials this year instituted mandatory “ambassador” seminars that teach about China and encourage athletes to think carefully about how best to represent their country. Yet USOC officials say they’ll let athletes decide for themselves whether to speak out on sensitive issues — as long as they stay mum at official Olympics sites, in accordance with International Olympic Committee rules.
The USOC stayed firm as government and Olympics officials in Europe, Britain and New Zealand recently moved toward silencing China-bound athletes. Freedom of speech and expression are “values of our country,” USOC spokesman Darryl Seibel said. “As an Olympic committee, we would not restrict values that are consistent with what we stand for as a country. . . . It’s up to the athletes to make individual choices.”
Journalist Bruce Finley has 
investigated local, national and international issues around the world with on-site reporting in more than 40 countries. He works as a staff writer for The Denver Post.
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