‘Sarkozy wants to marry ex-model’

PARIS, France (CNN) — New opinion polls show the French public is tired of speculation surrounding President Nicolas Sarkozy’s private life after a newspaper claimed he is about to marry ex-supermodel Carla Bruni.

The French weekly paper Le Journal Du Dimanche reported Sunday the French leader is planning to wed Bruni on February 8 or 9 and has already given her an heart-shaped diamond engagement ring.

A spokesman for the presidential palace told CNN they were offering no comment on the reports, which quoted unnamed sources.

The spokesman also refused to comment on media reports that Sarkozy would answer questions on his private life during his first presidential press conference of the New Year set for Tuesday.

Speculation about the French leader and Bruni has been rife ever since the two were photographed together during a day trip to Disneyland Paris last month.

However, opinion polls suggest the French public is growing weary of the intense media focus on the private life of Sarkozy — who only divorced his previous wife, Cecilia, in October.

French media published photos of Sarkozy with Bruni, a former supermodel turned singer whose previous boyfriends include Mick Jagger and Eric Clapton, in Petra, Jordan over the weekend.

A survey conducted for the French daily newspaper Liberation found 63 percent of those questioned believed Sarkozy was too ready to put his private life on public display.

The same poll showed 54 percent approval ratings, a two point drop in support for the French leader since December. A separate poll for Le Parisien newspaper showed a seven point drop in support since last month, with only 48 percent of voters backing him.

Sarkozy’s 11-year marriage to Cecilia ended in October by mutual consent. The couple was dogged by persistent rumors of infidelities following a highly public separation in 2005.
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Bloomberg stirs speculation over presidential bid

NORMAN, Oklahoma (AP) — New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg turned up the volume on a possible independent bid for president on Monday, arguing that partisanship is limiting the nation’s progress at a summit of Republicans and Democrats that stole a bit of the spotlight from the candidates in New Hampshire.

Amid talk about Washington riven by partisanship, Bloomberg gathered with some current elected officials, others out of office for years to discuss bridging the divide between the two parties. The summit came on the eve of the first-in-the-nation primary.

People have stopped working together, government is dysfunctional, there’s no collaborating and congeniality, Bloomberg said to applause from the crowd. America is being held back, he said.

The panel also included Nebraska Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel, who is often mentioned as an ideal running mate for Bloomberg.

Every one of us in this group this morning believes there are opportunities to turn things around for our country, our future, our children, the world, Hagel said.

A long line of people — students, political junkies and Bloomberg backers — stretched down the street before the event began.

The opportunity to remove partisan politics from the dialogue is a wonderful idea, said Dennis Ryan, 74, a lawyer from Oklahoma City.

But the national media who traveled to Oklahoma University, and some in the crowd of about 1,000, were there to see Bloomberg more than anyone else. The multibillionaire mayor switched his party affiliation from Republican to independent last summer, increasing the political chatter about a potential third-party bid for the presidency.

Some of the event’s organizers themselves have bluntly billed the gathering as a warning to the major party candidates that they are prepared to back an independent candidate — someone like Bloomberg — if they do not see more cooperation among the declared contenders.

Several of the candidates have already made bipartisanship part of their campaign messages.

Democrat Barack Obama, who won the Iowa caucuses, referred to that theme several times during his victory speech, telling his supporters: You came together as Democrats, Republicans and independents, to stand up and say that we are one nation… you said the time has come to move beyond the bitterness and pettiness and anger that’s consumed Washington.

The Republican winner in Iowa, Mike Huckabee, also referred to a desire for bipartisan unity.

What Americans want, he said in his speech, is for their president to bring this country back together, to make Americans, once again, more proud to be Americans than just to be Democrats or Republicans, to be more concerned about going up instead of just going to the left or to the right.

The group in Oklahoma spent several hours Sunday night and Monday morning drafting a joint statement about the urgency of drawing the parties to work together in addressing issues such as health care, climate change, homeland security and the economy. It urged the presidential candidates to provide clear descriptions of how they would establish a government of national unity, and specific strategies for reducing polarization and reaching bipartisan consensus.

The forum included former Republican Sen. Bill Brock of Tennessee, former Defense Secretary William Cohen, former Democratic Sen. Bob Graham of Florida, former Democratic Sen. David Boren of Oklahoma, former Democratic Sen. Sam Nunn of Georgia and former New Jersey Gov. Christine Todd Whitman.

We come together to appeal to all presidential candidates to tell us how they plan to bring us together: Hear our plea, bring us together, Boren said.

Asked what he would do if the candidates did not respond, Bloomberg demurred.

I think all the members of the panel are optimistic that the candidates will listen to us and will understand that there is a deep need in this country and a deep desire among the electorate to have the candidates face the issues, he said.

The billionaire mayor, who is in his second term, says publicly that he will not run, but his denials have weakened as his aides more boldly explore a potential candidacy.

The mayor has been entertaining presidential speculation for more than two years, but time is closing in — he needs to make a decision within about the next several months in order to begin the exhaustive and complicated process of collecting signatures to get on the ballot, a process that differs state by state.

The earliest deadline now is Texas; he would need to collect about 74,100 signatures by May 12, and can only begin the petitioning there on March 5. A number of states follow with June deadlines, including Arizona, Colorado and North Carolina.
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Candidates talk change on the campaign trail

(CNN) — A narrowed field of White House hopefuls is fighting to show New Hampshire who can be the agent of change.

Candidates from both sides of the aisle are jumping on the campaign trail’s latest buzzword, one day before the state holds its first-in-the-nation primary.

Democratic contender Barack Obama, who has opened up a double-digit lead over rival Sen. Hillary Clinton, told supporters the theme of his campaign has remained constant.

We talked about change when we were up; we talked about change where we were down, the Illinois senator said at a rally in Claremont, New Hampshire, on Monday. This change thing must be catching on.

Obama, who won last week’s Iowa caucuses, led Clinton 39 percent to 29 percent in a CNN/WMUR poll conducted Saturday and Sunday, a sharp difference from a poll out Saturday that showed the Democratic front-runners tied at 33 percent.

The CNN/WMUR poll, conducted by the University of New Hampshire, surveyed 341 Democrats and 268 Republicans likely to vote in Tuesday’s New Hampshire primary. It had a sampling error of plus or minus 5 percentage points.

Clinton holds a comfortable advantage in the area of experience, but 61 percent of likely Democratic voters in New Hampshire say what matters most is the ability to bring about change, according to the survey. Watch what’s at stake in New Hampshire

In the aftermath of a third-place finish in Iowa, Clinton’s camp is sending thousands of e-mails to supporters saying her campaign is about action. Clinton has been focusing on her record while trying to downplay Obama’s experience.

I think it’s time for people to say, ‘Wait a minute. Let’s get real here.’ There is a big difference between talking and acting, Clinton told CNN on Sunday.

Former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards, a distant third, has been trying to differentiate himself from the front-runners by pushing his plan for the middle class. He says while Obama promises change, he would be more effective at taking on special interests in Washington. Watch Edwards talk about his plans to create jobs

You can’t just nice these people to death and bring them to the table. You have to actually be willing to battle them and fight them, he said Sunday in New Hampshire. That is the difference between us.

Edwards is on a 36-hour, 15-stop tour. He told an audience in Nashua that he’s showing the determination as a candidate that he would have as president.

Gov. Bill Richardson, polling fourth in the Granite State and harping on the same theme, has set his sights on the undecided voters.

With Bill Richardson, you get change and you get experience. You have to have experience to change things. I have a record, he said Monday on CNN’s American Morning. Watch Richardson explain why he represents change

On the Republican side, Sen. John McCain, insists he’s the one with the gumption to deliver change.

My friends, I am most proud of the change that I brought about in Iraq that saved Americans’ lives, he said.

McCain, who finished in a tie for fourth in Iowa, leads the GOP pack in New Hampshire, according to the latest poll. McCain has more than doubled his numbers from where he was six months ago. He won New Hampshire in the 2000 primary.

McCain leads former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney 32 percent to 26 percent, CNN’s survey found. Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, whose upset win in Iowa came after being outspent by millions of dollars by Romney, passed former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani to gain third place.

Romney, who won the Wyoming Republican caucuses on Saturday, has purchased two minutes of New Hampshire airtime Monday night to make his closing arguments.

There’s a tide of change sweeping New Hampshire and America, Romney says in the ad. Everywhere I go people say Washington is broken. And they know that those who’ve spent their careers in Washington can’t change Washington.

It’s long past time to bring real change to Washington, he says.

Romney on Monday questioned McCain’s ability to do so. Frankly, I don’t think Sen. McCain — despite his service and his length of experience — that that’s going to be able to stand up to the message that Barack Obama has brought forward, he said.

Others have put less emphasis on New Hampshire. Giuliani has largely skipped New Hampshire and is pinning his hopes on Florida and the Super Tuesday states.

Huckabee says he’s not expecting a first-place finish in New Hampshire.

If we come in anywhere in the third or fourth spot, we are going to be doing great, he said on CNN Monday. Watch Huckabee describe his hopes for New Hampshire

Among other Republicans, anti-war Texas congressman and onetime Libertarian Party presidential nominee Ron Paul was in fifth place at 10 percent in the poll, with Rep. Duncan Hunter of California and former Sen. Fred Thompson of Tennessee both at 1 percent.

New Hampshire’s independent voters, who make up about 40 percent of the state’s electorate, could throw a surprise in tomorrow’s primary.

A growing number of independents say they will vote for Paul, who was excluded from Sunday night’s Republican forum on Fox, saying his campaign has done a tremendous job. Watch Paul respond to recent attacks

How far we go in the campaign, we don’t know, Paul told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer on Sunday. The American people, and there’s this large segment sending money to our campaign, that are determined that this revolutionary spirit will continue.
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Police look for links in cases of missing hikers

BLAIRSVILLE, Georgia (CNN) — Police are trying to determine whether the suspect in the disappearance of a missing Georgia hiker may be linked to the presumed killings of an elderly North Carolina couple.

Investigators have charged 61-year-old Gary Michael Hilton with kidnapping with intent to cause bodily injury to hiker Meredith Emerson, a 24-year-old who vanished after venturing into the Georgia mountains with her dog.

Vernon Keenan, director of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, said Georgia authorities were comparing notes with their North Carolina counterparts looking into the case of John and Irene Bryant, an elderly couple who were found dead after going for a hike in the North Carolina mountains last October 21.

Georgia and North Carolina law enforcement officials planned to meet Monday in Cleveland, Georgia to discuss the case, Georgia Bureau of Investigation spokesman John Bankhead said.

Irene Bryant’s body was found November 9 near where the couple’s vehicle was parked in Pisgah National Forest, according to a report in the Asheville Citizen-Times. Her husband remains missing.

The paper reported that a person wearing a yellow jacket was shown on surveillance video trying to use the Bryant’s credit card at a Tennessee bank.

Witnesses said Emerson was seen with a man wearing a yellow jacket before she disappeared on New Year’s Day while hiking on Georgia’s Blood Mountain in Vogel State Park.

A warrant says Hilton attempted to use one of Emerson’s credit cards at a Regions Bank Branch in Canton, Georgia.

There are similarities that we’re certainly wanting to look more closely at — nothing that we can release at this point, Sheriff David Mahoney of North Carolina’s Transylvania County told AP on Monday.

Authorities arrested Hilton after finding bloodstained clothes, and they said Sunday that the chances are slim that Emerson is alive.

Despite the similarities, Harold Young Jr, a special agent for the U.S. Forest Service, told the Asheville paper on Friday that evidence of any link was meager.

We’re not ruling it out, but right now, it does not appear that it’s related whatsoever, other than they both happened on U.S. Forest Service [property], the Citizen-News quoted Young as saying.

Keenan said that on Monday Georgia law-enforcement officers and trained search crews will conduct a target-specific search for more evidence in the Emerson case.

Authorities searched for any signs of Emerson on Sunday in Forsyth County, Georgia, where the woman’s dog was found in a grocery store parking lot three days after her disappearance.

They made a point to look behind churches as a result of a 2004 case in which someone apparently kidnapped a hairdresser in Forsyth County. Her remains were later found behind a church, said Capt. Frank Huggins of the Forsyth County Sheriff’s Office.

There is no evidence to link the disappearance Patrice Endres, the hairdresser, to Emerson’s case, but investigators looked behind churches out of an abundance of caution, Huggins told CNN.

Meanwhile, Emerson’s relatives clung to hope despite the Georgia Bureau of Investigation’s insistence that search-and-rescue efforts have given way to trying to find Emerson’s body.

Please have everyone search their minds to recall any evidence that could help bring our daughter home, the woman’s father, Dave Emerson, said at a news conference Monday, The Associated Press reported.

Emerson’s mother is focused on waiting and hoping that word comes soon and on sharing good memories of Meredith, a family friend, Peggy Bailey, said at a Sunday press conference.

Emerson’s roommate, Julia Karrenbauer, said you have to … keep going and that there’s always the possibility of a miracle, especially with Meredith. Watch as Emerson’s roommate discusses ordeal

Investigators found Emerson’s black leather wallet containing her identification cards in a convenience store trash bin in the Forsyth County city of Cumming. They also found bloodstained clothing consistent with what she had been wearing, according to a criminal warrant filed Saturday.

The QuikTrip Dumpster is next to a grocery store parking lot where Emerson’s Labrador mix was found wandering Friday, the warrant said.

The warrant alleges that Hilton made a phone call Friday from a pay phone at the QuikTrip.

The animal was positively identified through an implanted microchip.

Hilton was taken into custody Friday at a convenience store in suburban Atlanta. He made his initial court appearance in Union County on Monday.

Hilton was not cooperating in the investigation, Bankhead told The AP.

When Hilton’s 2001 minivan was searched, agents determined that the rear seat belt had been cut out, the warrant said. Hilton was attempting to vacuum the vehicle and wash portions of it with a bleach and water solution.
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Lethal injection goes before Supreme Court

WASHINGTON (CNN) — The U.S. Supreme Court appeared divided along ideological lines Monday over whether lethal-injection execution methods in about three dozen states are being properly and humanely applied.

At issue are the standards to determine whether the most common method of capital punishment can cause excruciating pain, violating the Constitution’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

I am terribly troubled, said Justice John Paul Stevens, referring to the use of one type of drug in the lethal injection mixture that is designed to paralyze a condemned prisoner.

If it is properly administered, would you have a case here? asked Justice Anthony Kennedy, whose vote could swing a ruling to either side.

The justices have never directly addressed the fundamental question over the use of the chemical cocktail of drugs used to execute convicted killers. All but one of the states that perform such executions use the three-drug mixture at issue in this appeal.

Kentucky inmates Ralph Baze and Clyde Bowling Jr. brought suit in federal court three years ago, questioning that state’s chemical mixture and the procedures used to administer it. Watch how the drugs work

They claim the first drug — sodium thiopental — which renders the prisoner unconscious, wears off too quickly. Some prisoners are awake and able to feel pain as the procedure continues, the condemned men contend.

The second drug — pancuronium bromide — paralyzes all muscle movement, then prevents the condemned person from speaking out and expressing awareness of the pain, according to the men’s attorneys.

The third drug, potassium chloride, which induces cardiac arrest, is excruciatingly painful in a conscious person, the inmates and lawyers say in their court papers.

Baze, 52, admits killing Powell County Sheriff Steve Bennett and Deputy Arthur Briscoe in 1992 while the lawmen were trying to serve him with arrest warrants.

Bowling was convicted of killing Edward and Tina Earley in Louisville in 1990. Their 2-year-old son was wounded in the attack in the parking lot of the couple’s dry-cleaning business. Bowling’s attorneys have alleged prosecutorial misconduct in the case and say their client has a low IQ.

Officials in Kentucky say their procedures are in line with other states, and a doctor is on site and available to provide any pre-execution medical care to the inmate.

A Texas inmate was put to death the day the high court accepted the Kentucky cases. Since then, the justices have stepped in and imposed a de facto moratorium nationwide. Depending on how the justices rule, capital punishment could effectively be delayed for a year or more.

Twenty-six people were executed last year, the lowest total in more than a decade.

In oral arguments, the justices debated the threshold when execution procedures become unconstitutional. No consensus was reached, although both sides of this politically charged issue are hoping for clear guidelines from the Supreme Court.

Baze and Bowling’s attorney, Donald Verrilli, said inmates run the risk of a cruel and inhumane death from a flawed execution method. Watch what the lawyers had to say

Of course, there is risk of human error, said Justice Stephen Breyer. But can we say there is a more serious problem here than other execution methods?

Verrilli suggested a single drug — a strong barbiturate used on animals — might be a more preferable alternative.

It’s never been tried on humans, said Chief Justice John Roberts. Can we establish it doesn’t cause pain?

Verrilli replied the second drug of the current mixture is just an anti-convulsant designed to ensure the audience witnessing the execution is not personally in discomfort seeing a dying person’s body reacting to the drugs by twitching uncontrollably.

But using this drug also enhances the dignity of the inmate, Roberts asserted. He also said he wondered whether a fresh round of legal appeals would start if a single drug was used to perform executions.

Stevens reiterated his concern that the second drug seems totally unnecessary.

Arguing the other side for the state, Roy Englert said Kentucky has excellent procedures and safeguards, including trained technicians who specialize in inserting needles in veins, and monthly practice sessions at the correctional facility housing death row. He also said technicians are always in close proximity to the gurney where the inmate is placed.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginbsurg said she wondered why technicians were not next to the prisoner to ensure there were no last-minute problems. Englert explained it was to preserve the anonymity of the technicians, who might be subject to harassment or threats as the official executioners.

Stevens and Justice David Souter suggested the high court postpone a decision on the application of lethal injection until lower courts can fully investigate alternative methods of death that might be more acceptable.

Stevens told Englert that Kentucky’s procedures with the three-drug mixture were very persuasive in your favor but wondered whether other states could apply them without risk of lengthy legal challenges.

Justice Anthony Scalia said he worried about endless litigation if the issue is not settled soon. This never ends, he said.

Various states and judges have applied different standards over whether an inmate can make a challenge to the method of execution.

In September, U.S. District Judge Judge Aleta Trauger stopped a planned execution in Tennessee, saying correction officials’ new method of execution in that state presents a substantial risk of unnecessary pain.

And in 2005, then-Florida Gov. Jeb Bush issued a moratorium in his state after complaints over the length of time needed to execute prisoner Angel Nieves Diaz. A two-year review was completed, but executions were halted further by the high court’s current review of the issue.

The Supreme Court has not ruled directly on the cruel and unusual aspect of lethal injection, but it did conclude in 2006 that prisoners can make last-ditch legal challenges to the method of execution, using claims that they would suffer a painful death.

The question before the court is how much risk of unnecessary pain is too much risk of unnecessary pain under the Constitution, said Edward Lazarus, an appellate attorney and Supreme Court legal analyst.

There is evidence to show that this is somewhat of an inhumane way to approach this, but there’s going to be a group of justices who really think we shouldn’t be in the business of micromanaging the death penalty, he added.

A ruling in the case is expected by late June.
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U.S. F/A-18 fighter jets crash in Persian Gulf

WASHINGTON (CNN) — Two U.S. Navy F/A-18 Super Hornets — flying off the aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman — crashed Monday night in the Persian Gulf, U.S. Navy officials said.

The aircrafts’ three aviators were recovered safely after they ejected from the jets — a single-seat F/A-18E and two-seat F/A-18F.

The U.S. Navy did not immediately know the cause of the F/A-18 crash.

There is no indication of hostile fire action, the officials said.

The incident is not related to Sunday’s confrontation between three U.S. Navy warships and five Iranian boats, Navy officials said.
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