In the past two years, more than 300 cities and four states have passed resolutions calling on Congress to repeal or change parts of the USA Patriot Act that, activists say, violate constitutional rights such as free speech and freedom from unreasonable search and seizure.

Congress passed the USA Patriot Act swiftly in October 2001, 45 days after the Sept. 11 attacks, easing restrictions on the government's ability to dig up personal information about citizens and non-citizens, and obtain wiretaps and search warrants. Only one senator, Russ Feingold (D-Wisconsin), and 61 House of Representative members voted against the legislation.

Under the act, federal investigators can obtain individuals' library, financial, health and education records from cities while barring municipal workers from letting anyone know authorities have seized the documents. Officials can also monitor the activities of people who have not been identified as suspects and search a home or office without prior notice.

Secretary Donald Rumsfeld authorized the expansion of a secret program that encouraged physical coercion and sexual humiliation of Iraqi prisoners to obtain intelligence about the growing insurgency in Iraq, The New Yorker reported Saturday.

According to the story, which hits newsstands Monday, the initial operation Rumsfeld authorized gave blanket approval to kill or capture and interrogate "high value" targets in the war on terrorism. The program stemmed from frustrating efforts to capture high-level terrorists in the weeks after the start of U.S. bombings in Afghanistan.

The program got approval from President Bush's national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, and Bush was informed of its existence, the officials told New Yorker reporter Seymour Hersh.

Under the program, Hersh wrote, commandos carried out instant interrogations -- using force if necessary -- at secret CIA detention centers scattered around the world. The intelligence would be relayed to the commanders at the Pentagon.

Election officials in San Bernardino County say they will defy a ban on electronic voting ordered by Secretary of State Kevin Shelley in November's presidential election.

In Orange County, about 2,000 voters cast ballots in the wrong races after being given the wrong computer access codes. In San Diego County, an equipment malfunction prevented more than half the polling places from opening on time. And in San Bernardino County, a vote tally was delayed for three hours because election staffers improperly entered data into their main computer.

Ten of the 14 California counties that use electronic voting, including Riverside and San Bernardino counties, could reapply for certification if they meet 23 security conditions, which county officials have said would be costly and time-consuming.

The remaining four counties -- San Diego, San Joaquin, Solano and Kern -- are banned from using their Diebold touch-screen systems in November.

US-led forces in Iraq have issued new casualty figures confirming that the country has seen the bloodiest period of fighting since Saddam Hussein fell.

US Brig Gen Mark Kimmitt said about 70 coalition troops had been killed in Iraq since 1 April, while casualties among insurgents were 10 times as high.

President Bush, speaking after talks with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, told reporters: "The situation in Iraq has improved. But... it was a tough week, because there was lawlessness and gangs that were trying to take the law in their own hands."

Department officials say they will send "ripples" through an industry that has proliferated on the Internet and grown into an estimated $10 billion-a-year colossus profiting Fortune 500 corporations such as Comcast, which offers hard-core movies on a pay-per-view channel.

It is unclear, though, just how the American public and major corporations that make money from pornography will accept the perspective of the Justice Department and Attorney General John Ashcroft.

In a speech in 2002, Ashcroft made it clear that the Justice Department intends to try. He said pornography "invades our homes persistently though the mail, phone, VCR, cable TV and the Internet," and has "strewn its victims from coast to coast."

Ashcroft, a religious man who does not drink alcohol or caffeine, smoke, gamble or dance, and has fought unrelenting criticism that he has trod roughshod on civil liberties in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks, is taking on the porn industry at a time when many experts say Americans are wary about government intrusion into their lives.

The Bush administration is eager to shore up its conservative base with this issue. Ashcroft held private meetings with conservative groups a year and a half ago to assure them that anti-porn efforts are a priority.

Clicking on a link for a file transfer protocol site belonging to voting machine maker Diebold Election Systems, Harris found about 40,000 unprotected computer files. They included source code for Diebold's AccuVote touch-screen voting machine, program files for its Global Election Management System tabulation software, a Texas voter-registration list with voters' names and addresses, and what appeared to be live vote data from 57 precincts in a 2002 California primary election.

Harris discovered that she could enter the vote database using Microsoft Access -- a standard program often bundled with Microsoft Office -- and change votes without leaving a trace. Diebold hadn't password-protected the file or secured the audit log, so anyone with access to the tabulation program during an election -- Diebold employees, election staff or even hackers if the county server were connected to a phone line -- could change votes and alter the log to erase the evidence.

In addition to glitches, there are concerns about the people behind the machines. A few voting company employees have been implicated in bribery or kickback schemes involving election officials. And there are concerns about the partisan loyalties of voting executives -- Diebold's chief executive, for example, is a top fund-raiser for President Bush.

Washington (AP) -- President Bush poked fun at his staff, his Democratic challenger and himself Wednesday night at a black-tie dinner where he hobnobbed with the news media.

Bush put on a slide show, calling it the "White House Election-Year Album" at the Radio and Television Correspondents' Association 60th annual dinner, showing himself and his staff in some decidedly unflattering poses.

There was Bush looking under furniture in a fruitless, frustrating search. "Those weapons of mass destruction have got to be somewhere," he said.

Bush showed himself playing cards on Air Force One and cracked that he was on his way to an international summit and using a special deck to help him bone up on the names of the leaders he was about to meet.

The White House has dismissed charges by a former top US security aide who claims President George W Bush did a "terrible job" in tackling terrorism.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan denied the claims, accusing Mr Clarke of political opportunism ahead of November's presidential poll.

"See if Saddam did this. See if he's linked in any way," Mr Clarke quoted Mr Bush as saying.

"The entire conversation left me in absolutely no doubt that George Bush wanted me to come back with a report that said Iraq did this," he added.

Mr Clarke also told CBS that the day after the 11 September attacks, Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld called for retaliatory strikes on Iraq, even though al-Qaeda was based in Afghanistan.

The US government has sent a stiff note to the dictators in China telling them not to stop the importation of wireless equipment.

The letter, from Colin Powell, commerce secretary Don Evans and trade rep Robert Zoellick follows howling from US high tech companies which have complained about Chinese plans to make imports conform to its own home grown encryption standards.

The WSJ reports that the letter is the latest move in trade skirmishes between the US and China. China has rules which may breach World Trade Organisation (WTO) rules on free trade.

The Chinese government has a number of tweaks to WTO rules that cause foreign countries to pass through a series of import hoops.

The Journal says the US trade deficit with China currently amounts to a staggering $124 billion.

Mr Bush said he was a "war president" and the top issue for voters should be the use of American power in the world.

He said he had not called Saddam Hussein an "imminent threat" but said it would have been too late if the US had waited until the danger was that close.

"I'm a war president. I make decisions here in the Oval Office in foreign policy matters with war on my mind," he said.

Challenged by interviewer, Tim Russert, that no weapon had been found, Mr Bush replied: "What wasn't wrong was the fact that he had the ability to make a weapon."

On his own military service, Mr Bush criticised the senior Democrats who have suggested that he did not show up for duty in the Alabama National Guard in 1972 where he served during the Vietnam era.