AP Network News. I’m Craig Smith.
Despite a year in prison, Saddam Hussein apparently remains defiant. His lawyers, one of whom met with Saddam Thursday, say he’s urging supporters to stay united against what was called the American occupation. Saddam also allegedly warned that next month’s elections could be used to divide Iraq into factions.
Iraq has known many bloody days in recent months, but today was one of the worst. At least 60 people died from car bombs in two cities. Correspondent Paul Garwood in Baghdad reports one was in Najaf.
--- The target was apparently a funeral procession. A tribal sheik. A large group of people had gathered in the streets watching the funeral procession pass. It was during this procession that one loud, large car bomb explosion detonated and killed many of the people watching the procession and in nearby shops.
At least 47 people killed. In Karballah, a suicide car bomb left 13 people dead.
Defense secretary Rumsfeld was a hot topic on the Sunday interview shows. On CBS’s Face the Nation, Republican senator Chuck Hagel of Nebraska says he’s amazed by reports that Rumsfeld is only now personally signing letters to families of dead soldiers.
--- My goodness. That’s the least that we could expect of the secretary of defense, is having some personal attention paid by him.
But Rumsfeld has supporters, even if it’s lukewarm. Republican senator Dick Lugar of Indiana says now is not the time to replace Rumsfeld.
--- He should be held accountable, and he should stay in office. He needs, at this point, to listen and he is listening.
Lugar appeared on NBC’s Meet the Press.
Time magazine has tapped President Bush as its person of the year. Editor Nancy Gibbs says it’s not just because he was reelected.
--- His campaign was very different than it was four years, this, four years ago. This was not a sort of pragmatic compassionate conservative, reach out to the middle, unite and not divide campaign.
Time says Bush has reshaped the rules of politics.
This is AP Network News.
A last minute hiring for the movie version of a Broadway hit may have created a new star. Warren Levinson explains from New York.
--- The early reviews of the film version of Phantom of the Opera have been mixed, but not about Emmy Rossum as Christine. Phantom director Joel Schumacher says Rossum showed up at his doorstep at the last possible moment. (We’ve been casting for six months. The eleventh hour and 59th minute, this beautiful girl arrived at my house in LA, 16 years old, that face, that figure, those eyes, that hair, and she casually mentioned she’s been singing at the Metropolitan Opera since she was seven years old.)
Schumacher says he told Phantom composer Andrew Lloyd Webber he wanted very young performers in the leads. You can have anybody you want, he says Lloyd Webber told them, they just have to sing for themselves. Warren Levinson, New York.
If you’re an opera fan, you likely know this voice. Soprano Renata Tebaldi singing La Moniera. Tebaldi died today in San Marino in northern Italy at age 82.