October 17, 2001 Diary: America Strikes Back

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Anthrax cases probed for similarities, links
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
A letter mailed to Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle contained a potent form of anthrax that appeared to be the work of experts, the senator and other officials said Tuesday while hundreds of people took precautionary doses of antibiotics. The FBI was investigating similarities in handwriting and threats between the spore-spiked letter sent to Daschle in Washington and a letter containing anthrax sent to NBC in New York.

House to shut down to sweep for anthrax
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
(Updated Wednesday at 5:05 p.m.) More than 30 Senate employees were exposed to anthrax when white powder fell from mail addressed to Majority Leader Tom Daschle, officials said Wednesday. The disclosure spread concern and confusion across Capitol Hill and quickly curtailed official business.

Terrorism takes spotlight at economic conference
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
With the U.S.-led bombing of Afghanistan stirring unrest in parts of the Muslim world, APEC ministers met today and were working on a statement against terrorism — but apparently with no mention of Osama bin Laden.

White House tries to rein in spending
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
The Bush administration is trying to stanch the flood of tax-cut and spending plans in response to the September terror attacks, fearful that they could overwhelm the budget, damage the economy and saddle President Bush with a big-government legacy.

Pakistan meeting concludes agreeably
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
Secretary of State Colin Powell and Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf agreed Tuesday that moderate officials from Afghanistan's radical Taliban regime should be allowed to serve in a post-Taliban government.

Errant missiles strike agency
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
U.S. strikes set Red Cross warehouses afire near Afghanistan's capital Tuesday, sending workers scrambling to salvage desperately needed relief goods during a bombardment that could be heard 30 miles away.

Students send bears to NYC
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
By Mindie Paget

Students at Quail Run School are hoping 250 teddy bears will bring comfort and cheer to East Coast children touched by the Sept. 11 tragedy. Tuesday afternoon, those students gathered in a Quail Run classroom to listen to patriotic music and tie messages of friendship and sorrow around the necks of little brown bears clad in white T-shirts that say "Kansas Cares."

Sites entice fearful
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
As fears about bioterrorism escalate, medical groups are warning anxious consumers to steer clear of Internet sites aggressively trying to sell the antibiotic Cipro as a treatment for anthrax. In the past week, as many as 50 to 100 Web pages pushing Cipro have sprung up on the Internet.

Dean: Hoarding anthrax drug doesn't do anyone any good
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
By Terry Rombeck

Jack Fincham shakes his head when he hears reports of people hoarding Cipro, the antibiotic used to treat anthrax. "It isn't going to do anyone any good unless they have anthrax," said Fincham, dean of the Kansas University School of Pharmacy. As the number of anthrax cases continued to increase Tuesday, pharmacies and Internet sites were filling more orders than usual for the antibiotic, which typically is used to treat urinary, skin and respiratory infections.

Misplaced blame
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
Journal-World Editorial

The blame for any civilian deaths in Afghanistan lies not with the United States but with Osama bin Laden and his followers.

Special ops forces positioned for new assaults on Taliban
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
(Updated Wednesday at 3:13 p.m.) The United States has positioned special operations forces for another kind of assault on terrorism following several days of bombing against the Taliban military, defense officials said Wednesday.

Redistricting revives partisanship
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
By David Broder
Washington Post Writers Group

Out of sight but not out of mind is the apt description for politics in America at this moment. The focus on terrorism has made partisanship unfashionable.

Bin Laden can't hide forever
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
Osama bin Laden uses misdirection, look-alike decoys and fake caravans to foil pursuit. He is thought to have moved around Afghanistan hidden in an ambulance. U.S. intelligence officials believe bin Laden has remained in Taliban-controlled areas of Afghanistan since Sept. 11, the day jetliner hijackers allegedly sent by bin Laden attacked the United States.

European, Mideast links investigated
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
French authorities launched an inquiry into a suspect in U.S. custody in connection with the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks while officials in Turkey and Jordan said Tuesday that planned attacks on U.S. consulates and embassies have been thwarted in recent weeks.

College-bound students staying closer to home
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
Sixteen-year-old Bennett "Beano" Zylber is starting to think about college. He is not sure about a major — psychology, maybe — but he is certain of this: He is sticking close to home.

Regulations cut risks of anthrax years ago
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
Anthrax has been making many Americans nervous lately, but it is rare in this country, in part because of measures taken on ranches and in factories, experts say. From 1900 to 1976, only 18 cases of the inhaled version — the most dangerous — were reported in the United States.

Authorities crack down on anthrax hoaxes
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
Federal and state authorities declared a crackdown on anthrax hoaxes Tuesday as police and medical teams around the United States strained to cope with frantic 9-1-1 calls from a citizenry spooked by four confirmed cases of the rare illness.

U.N. to take greater role in Afghan government
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
The United States and its allies have begun drawing up plans for a Muslim peacekeeping force that would restore order in the Afghan capital of Kabul and prevent any one faction from taking power if the current Taliban leadership collapses, diplomats said Tuesday.

Embassy bombers await sentences this week
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
The first men convicted of carrying out Osama bin Laden's 1998 edict to kill Americans wherever they are found will be sentenced under extraordinarily tight security Thursday in the deadly 1998 bombings of two U.S. embassies in Africa.

Improvements seen in U.S. security
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
There is no guarantee against more terrorist strikes, but America is secure and getting safer, Tom Ridge, the nation's first director of homeland security, said Tuesday. "The greatest fear is the fear of the unknown," he said.

Letters may hold clues
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
The anthrax-laden letters that infected two Americans and pushed an already edgy nation to even higher anxiety can offer investigators a treasure trove of new clues. The envelopes, mailed to NBC News anchor Tom Brokaw in New York and Sen. Tom Daschle in Washington, show similar handwriting and postmarks, FBI Director Robert Mueller said Tuesday.

Anti-globalization movement quieted
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
Before Sept. 11, the anti-globalization movement had caused considerable turmoil, sending armies of noisy and sometimes-violent protesters onto the streets of Seattle, Philadelphia and Quebec City and setting its sights on Washington.

Taliban, foes battling over northern city
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
(Updated Wednesday at 9:19 a.m.) Aided by U.S. bombing, opposition forces closed in Wednesday on a key northern city. U.S. jets struck fuel dumps in Kabul, setting off a huge fire, and the Taliban claimed U.S. planes hit two trucks, killing seven civilians trying to flee the onslaught.

Bush: U.S. not alone in struggle against terrorism
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
(Web Posted Wednesday at 2:59 p.m.) En route to China, President Bush said Wednesday he would use an economic summit in Shanghai to recruit more allies in the war against terrorism. "We are not alone in this struggle," Bush said.

Probable anthrax found in New York governor's Manhattan office
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
The midtown Manhattan office of Gov. George Pataki showed the presence of anthrax in an initial test, the governor announced Wednesday. No workers were known to be exposed.

Patriotic expressions differ
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
By Philip Terzian
Providence Journal

Poor Samuel Johnson. The only one of his aphorisms nearly everybody knows — "Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel" — is not only widely misunderstood, but may never have been uttered at all: We are entirely reliant on James Boswell's word, in his famous "Life of Johnson."

Adjutant general warns Kansans to be prepared
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
By Dave Ranney

Emergency personnel across Kansas have been so busy the past five days responding to reports of substances thought to be anthrax that the commander of the state's emergency management office is worried they're being overtaxed.

Terror victim honored
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
By Joel Mathis

She hadn't lived in Lawrence for years when hijackers steered the plane she was riding into the Pentagon. But those who remember Leslie Whittington from her years at Centennial School in the 1960s remember her fondly. They've started a book memorial at the school in her honor.

School trips not giving in to terror
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
By Tim Carpenter

The Lawrence school district has yet to put the brakes on student travel in response to September's terrorist attacks on the East Coast. Lawrence High School's A Capella Choir has been waiting three years to travel to a national competition, and the group's road trip to Salt Lake City in January is still a go.

War demands action, compassion
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
By Myriam Marquez
Orlando Sentinel

As Alice might say, America's first war of the 21st century gets curiouser and curiouser. Bombs competing with food drops, presidential offers of second chances to those who harbor "evil-doers" and a plea for American children to help suffering kids in Afghanistan.

Crisis changes priorities
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
By Robert Reno
Newsday

For the past two decades Americans have embraced the theory that free markets would cure everything but warts. And even warts were an annoyance better suffered than the idea of government providing a remedy instead of the marketplace.

CBS pulls anthrax episode of CIA drama 'The Agency'
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
CBS has yanked Thursday's episode of "The Agency" because of its too-timely plot: a CIA effort to fight an anthrax threat to the United States. "We certainly don't want to do anything to add to the country's fears about anthrax," network spokesman Chris Ender said Tuesday.

Osama bin Laden thought to still be in Afghanistan
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
(Web Posted Wednesday at 6:46 a.m.) Osama bin Laden uses misdirection, look-alike decoys and fake caravans to foil pursuit. He is thought to have moved around Afghanistan hidden in an ambulance.

Bayer triples production of antibiotic Cipro
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
(Updated Wednesday at 6:56 a.m.) After anthrax was found at NBC, Tom Brokaw held up a prescription bottle during a newscast and declared: "In Cipro we trust." On Capitol Hill, politicians lined up for the small white pills after a scare there. The word on everyone's lips: Cipro.

Briefly
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
• Los Angeles: Emmy Awards rescheduled
• Washngton, D.C.: Senator: Don't forget Iraq
• New York: McDonald's worker accused of stealing victims' fund
• Washington, D.C.: New board aims to protect information systems

Nation Briefs
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
• Washington, D.C.: Parents who smoke urged to do so outdoors
• Houston: Smog-reduction plan reduces speed limits
• New York: Plaque honors victims of Sept. 11, 1942, crash
• Wisconsin: School board allows Pledge of Allegiance

6News video report: Local supply of CIPRO is good
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
Josh Garber reports on the local availability of the antibiotic CIPRO, which is used to treat Anthrax.

6News video report: Around the world
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
Josh Garber reports on news from around the world.

6News video report: Quail Run Elementary students show they care
Wednesday, October 17, 2001
Tina Terry reports on a group of Lawrence school children that are reaching out to other children directly affected by the September 11 terrorist attacks in New York City.