NPR 2008-07-19

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama's planned trip to the Middle East drew faint praise today from his Re:publican rival John McCain. Sarah Hulett  of Michigan Radio reports.

Senator McCain told an audience at a General Motors facility in suburban 1 Detroit that he's glad Obama plans to meet with General David Petraeus in Iraq. But he also suggested Obama should have asked for a briefing with the top US commander sooner. McCain also criticized Obama's oppostion to the troop surge in Iraq. He said Obama would be going to a very different Iraq if the US had not boosted its military presence there. "There would be an increase in sectarian violence, there would be widening Iranian influence, and we would be facing disaster, certainly, if not disaster, a lost war. " McCain also predicted that al-Qaeda would attempt another spectacular attack before the election to try to erode 2 support for Iraq's government. For NPR News, I'm Sarah Hulett.

US and Iraq have agreed to what is being described as “a general time horizon” for the further reduction of US combat forces there, though the White House is also saying today there will not be, what it termed, “an arbitrary date for withdrawal”. The White House confirms the agreement was hammered out yesterday in a discussion between Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and President Bush via video link. Administration officials say the timing 3 of a troop reduction would be tied to security concerns in Iraq.

Officials in Houston say the collapse 4 of a huge crane at one of the nation's largest refineries 5 has claimed the lives of four people and left half a dozen others injured today. Fire Department officials say a several-hundred-foot-long section of the crane at the LyondellBasell Refinery 6 toppled over. According to a spokesman for the company, all of those killed and injured were contract employees. The accident apparently 7 took place as the workers were preparing to do maintenance work at the refinery which is located in southeast Houston.

NPR has learned that White House overruled a senior official's advice to fire Scott Bloch, the man in charge of representing government whistle-blowers. Many people in and outside the government have urged Special Counsel Bloch to leave. NPR's Ari Shapiro reports.

Scott Bloch has been under fire for a long time. Whistleblower and government watchdog groups have sued him. His deputy resigned, saying Bloch put political agendas and personal vendettas 8 above the office’s integrity. The FBI is investigating him, and now, NPR has learned that the White House rejected a senior executive branch official's advice to fire Bloch. That official is Clay Johnson at the Office of Management and Budget. According to people familiar with the conversations, Johnson advised the White House to fire Bloch, but was overruled. Johnson's spokeswoman said in an email, Mr. Johnson has not given nor been asked for a recommendation regarding Scott Bloch. People who’ve spoken directly with Johnson say he is pained by the situation of the Special Counsel's Office. Ari Shapiro, NPR News, Washington.

On Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed up 49 points, The S&P was up a fraction.

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The nation's largest airline, Fort Worth-based American Airline, said today it is eliminating 1,500 jobs in its maintenance division. The latest cuts at the airline come at a time the carrier is reducing the size of its fleet and taking other actions to cut costs as it grapples with record high fuel prices and a weak economy that has cut into the travel.  AMR, American's parent company, two weeks ago said the company plans to eliminate around 8% of its total workforce 9 or upwards 10 of 6,800 jobs.

Jo Stafford has died. The 90-year-old singer died from congestive heart failure at her home in Century City, California. A frequent presence on the pop charts during the 1950s, Stafford also won a Grammy for a comedy album and sold more than 25 million records in her career. NPR’s Felix Contreras has this report.

 Jo Stafford's vocal 11 talents were such that her son has said she “graduated from  high school on a Friday, and by Monday, she was doing soundtracks on RKO sound stages”. She started her professional singing career with the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra in 1939. She recorded with singers Frankie Laine  and Perry Como  among others, and placed over 70 songs on the pop charts between 1944 and 1954. "See the pyramids along the Nile, watch the sunrise on a tropic isle 12." In 1960, Jo Stafford and her husband Paul Weston won the Grammy for Best Comedy Album for their parody 13 of less-than-talented entertainers. Felix Contreras, NPR News.

 Crude oil prices moved lower at week’s end. The near-month contract for benchmark grade crude fell 41 cents a barrel to end the session at $128.88 a barrel in New York.