From AP, Oct. 3:

LONDON – Super spicy chili sauce sparked road closures and evacuations in central London after passers-by complained that a chemical emanating from a Thai restaurant was burning their throats, police said Wednesday.

Well, it seems that James B. Comey, the man who threatened to subpoena WW4 Report, was actually the progressive within the context of the Bush Justice Department. From the front page of the New York Times, Oct. 4 (links added):

Secret US Endorsement of Severe Interrogations
WASHINGTON — When the Justice Department publicly declared torture “abhorrent” in a legal opinion in December 2004, the Bush administration appeared to have abandoned its assertion of nearly unlimited presidential authority to order brutal interrogations.

Award-winning journalist Bill Weinberg will give a report-back from an international conference on building solidarity with the Iraq Freedom Congress (IFC) held in Tokyo this past summer. The IFC is a coalition of trade unions, women's organizations, neighborhood assemblies and other civil society groups which have come together to oppose the US-led occupation and demand a secular government in Iraq. The IFC is leading a campaign against the pending law that would privatize Iraq's oil, and has established self-governing zones, which both occupation forces and sectarian militias are barred from accessing, in neighborhoods in Baghdad and Kirkuk. Recently, their leaders have been targeted for attack by US forces. The Japanese anti-war group Zenko last year raised $400,000 for the IFC to start its own satellite television station, Sana TV, which began broadcasting in April. Can anti-war forces in the US similarly organize effective political and material support for Iraq's civil resistance?

On Sept. 26, some 2,000 people rallied at City Hall in Irving, Texas, a suburb west of Dallas, to demand that Irving officials stop handing over people held at the city's jail to immigration authorities. Demonstrators waved US flags and chanted "We are America." Irving police have turned over at least 1,600 people to ICE since June 2006 under the"Criminal Alien Program," which targets immigrants accused of crimes. Opponents of the program say the Irving police engage in racial profiling; that people stopped for minor traffic infractions are being handed over to ICE; and that the policy has made local residents fear contacting police. The week of Sept. 17, Mexican Consul Enrique Hubbard Urrea warned immigrants from his country to avoid Irving. Community leader Carlos Quintanilla said he would organize a boycott of Irving businesses if the city persisted in the policy.

Maricopa County Sheriff's deputies arrested nine day laborers on Sept. 27 near the Good Shepherd of the Hills Episcopal Church in the town of Cave Creek, Arizona, north of Phoenix. For more than six years the church has been a safe haven for laborers looking for work. Sheriff Joe Arpaio ordered the arrests after the town passed two new ordinances on Sept. 24 targeting day laborers: one toughens the town's ban on loitering; the other prohibits cars from stopping on town streets. The new laws are set to take effect on Oct. 24. Arpaio praised the new regulations, but said: "We're not waiting for the 30 days for these ordinances to be implemented."

ICE agents raided homes on Sept. 24 in the Nassau County towns of Westbury, Glen Cove, Hicksville and Port Washington on New York's Long Island, with support from two sergeants and six officers of the Nassau County police. On Sept. 26, ICE raided homes in Freeport and Hempstead, assisted by four Nassau County police officers. A total of 82 immigrants were arrested in the raids.

On Sept. 21, New York governor Eliot Spitzer announced new rules under which the state Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) will issue driver's licenses without regard to federal immigration status. The new rules reverse a policy change adopted four years ago under governor George Pataki that made it virtually impossible for immigrants to obtain driver's licenses if they could not prove legal status. Under the new rules, the DMV will accept a current foreign passport as proof of identity without also requiring federal immigration documents. The policy does not require legislative approval and will be phased in starting in December. It will be tied to new anti-fraud measures including the authentication of foreign passports and the use of photo comparison technology to ensure that no driver has more than one license. The State Department of Insurance estimates that the new rules will save New York drivers $120 million each year by reducing premium costs associated with uninsured motorists by 34%.

Masked assailants gunned down Marco Tulio Ramirez Portela, a leader of the Izabal Banana Workers Union (SITRABI), on Sept. 23 as he leaving his home for work on a banana plantation in the northeastern Guatemalan department of Izabal. Human rights organizations are calling on the Guatemalan government to investigate the murder, bring those responsible to justice and work to prevent future attacks against union leaders; people can support this call through a website link. [Guatemala Human Rights Commission/USA]