Immigration has split Congress, the Republican Party and public opinion. Conservatives want the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants to be classified as felons and a fence built along the Mexican border.

Others, including President George W. Bush, want a guest worker program and a path to citizenship. Most agree some reform is needed to stem the flow of poor to the world's biggest economy.

"We want full amnesty, full legalization for anybody who is here (illegally)," Rodriguez said. "That is the message that is going to be played out across the country on May 1."

Organizers of the May Day marches, which have strong support from big labor and the Roman Catholic church, vow that America's major cities will grind to a halt and its economy will stagger as Latinos walk off their jobs and skip school.

Teachers' unions in major cities have said children should not be punished for walking out of class. A spokeswoman for the Los Angeles Unified School District said school principals had been told that they should not try to keep students in class but instead should walk with the children to help keep order.

In Chicago, Catholic priests have helped organize protests, sending information to all 375 parishes in the archdiocese.

CRITICS CHARGE INTIMIDATION

Chicago activists predict that the demonstrations will draw 300,000 people -- compared to the 100,000 who turned out on March 10 to clog downtown streets. Minneapolis-based agribusiness giant Cargill Inc. said it will close seven meatpacking plants so workers can participate.

In New York, leaders of the May 1 Coalition said a growing number of businesses had pledged to close and allow their workers to attend a rally in Manhattan's Union Square.

But some Latinos have expressed ambivalence about the boycott and marches, saying they could stir up anti-immigrant sentiment amid an incendiary atmosphere surrounding the issue.

Cardinal Roger Mahony of the Los Angeles archdiocese, who has emerged as an outspoken champion of immigrant rights -- even calling on priests to defy laws aimed at those who would help illegals -- has lobbied against a walkout.

"Personally I believe we can make May 1st a 'win-win' day here in Southern California," Mahony said in a statement. "Go to work, go to school, and then join thousands of us at a major rally afterward."

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, the son of a Mexican immigrant who has long fought for immigrant rights, has taken a low profile on the issue. A Villaraigosa spokeswoman said the mayor expects protesters to be "lawful and respectful" and wants children to stay in school.

Critics have accused pro-immigrant leaders of stirring up uninformed young Latinos by telling them that their parents were in imminent danger of being deported and accuse them of trying to bully Congress.

"It's intimidation," Jim Gilchrist, founder of the Minuteman volunteer border patrol group, said of the May 1 events. "It's intimidation when a million people march down main streets in our major cities under the Mexican flag."

"It angers the people you are trying to impress," he said. "This will backfire just like the Mexican flag parades backfired."

"It's one day ... for immigrants to tell the country peacefully, 'We matter ... (we're) not invisible,'" said Senate Majority Leader Gloria Romero, D-Los Angeles, the resolution's chief author. She said immigrants make up a third of California's labor force and a quarter of its residents.

Opponents said the nonbinding resolution was misleading because it failed to mention a goal of the boycott was pressuring Congress to legalize millions of undocumented people.

"It is a disingenuous effort to put the government of California on record supporting open borders," said Sen. Bill Morrow, R-Oceanside.

The boycott, also called "A Day Without Immigrants," grew out of huge pro-immigrant marches across the United States in recent weeks. Organizers are urging people to stay home from school and jobs and avoid spending money on Monday to demonstrate their importance to the U.S. economy.

California's top education official appeared with school officials in several cities Thursday to urge students to stay in school on Monday.

State Superintendent for Public Instruction Jack O'Connell encouraged students interested in the immigration issue to voice their opinions by participating in protest activities but only after attending their classes.

"If students need to protest, they should feel free to do so after school," O'Connell told students and reporters at San Jose High Academy. "We want students to exercise free speech, but not at the expense of their education."

Rallies are planned for Monday in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Gardena, Bell, Santa Ana, Sacramento, San Jose, Oakland, Concord and other cities.

School officials in San Leandro, meanwhile, said Thursday that rising tensions over the immigration issue may have contributed to a series of brawls between Hispanic and black teenagers.

Over a dozen San Leandro High School students were taken into custody Wednesday following the fights that started on campus and spilled over into the parking lot of a nearby convenience store.

While educators theorized that the stress children of immigrants are under while the immigration debate roils may have played a role in the violence, students said that racial tensions predated recent developments.

Several senators equated the protest with the civil rights movement of the 1960s and other major events in American history.

Segregation was ended in part because of the public bus boycott by blacks in Montgomery, Ala., in 1955, said Romero.

Sen. Gil Cedillo, D-Los Angeles, likened the debate over immigrant rights to the fights over slavery, women's suffrage, the internment of Japanese during World War II, and the Vietnam War.

America wouldn't have been created without illegal action, said Sen. Richard Alarcon, D-Van Nuys. "They dumped a bunch of tea in Boston harbor, illegally. God bless them," he said.

But Sen. Dave Cox, R-Fair Oaks, said lawmakers should not encourage lawbreakers even if they disagreed with the law.

"It is irresponsible for this body to advocate that students leave school for any reason," Cox said.

He introduced a bill that would require a special school attendance audit on Monday, so that schools would not receive state aid for any student who was truant. School funding is based on attendance levels. O'Connell said the state would not grant waivers to schools that lose funding if students were absent while out protesting.

The debate was personal and emotional for some senators.

Sen. Nell Soto, D-Pomona, recalled watching as a child as immigration police swept up brown-skinned farmworkers, "not even asking if they were legal or illegal."

Sen. Martha Escutia, D-Norwalk, described how her grandfather remained in the country illegally after overstaying a work permit during the 1940s, when he picked fruits and vegetables while American men were fighting World War II.

"This happened 60 years ago. And you know what? The story still continues," Escutia said, choking up as she described her 11-year-old son asking her about the controversy. She said the Great American Boycott should be renamed "the Great American Secret, and that is we all rely on someone who is here illegally."

Sen. Tom McClintock, R-Thousand Oaks, while citing immigrants' contributions, said the nation's goal should be assimilation: "From many people, one people, the American people. One race, the American race."

"The agreement indeed will enhance our cooperation, allowing the shared use of Bulgarian training facilities and strengthening our ability to operate militarily," said U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice after a signing ceremony on the sidelines of a meeting of NATO foreign ministers in Sofia.

Bulgaria, an ex-communist country of 7.7 million, has been eager to repay Washington for supporting its 2004 NATO membership. It has backed the U.S. in Iraq despite widespread public opposition to the war.

The 10-year agreement includes the Bezmer airfield and Novo Selo shooting range, both near Bulgaria's border with Turkey, and the Graf Ignatievo airfield in central Bulgaria.

U.S. forces will also have access to a storage facility near Bulgaria's port of Bourgas. The total number of soldiers may double for short periods during rotations every six months.

The U.S. said the first troops would most likely arrive next year. Under the arrangement, Washington may launch attacks against third countries from the bases after consulting Bulgarian authorities. Both sides have said the facilities will be shared and used mainly for training.

The agreement must still be ratified by Bulgaria's parliament, in which the three-party Socialist-led coalition holds a commanding majority.

A recent opinion survey showed 60 percent of Bulgarians were against the bases which are expected to bring tens of millions of dollars in badly-needed foreign investment and create jobs.

Bulgaria's far-right opposition Attack party has been one of the loudest opponents. It mustered around 5,000 people in protests in Sofia on Thursday.

Rights groups have expressed concern over the bases following allegations the United States may have used installations in Romania, Poland and other European states as secret CIA jails.

The plan closely resembles a deal signed in December between Washington and Bulgaria's northern Black Sea neighbor Romania.

SOCOM is exactly what it's advertised to be: the world's most highly skilled warriors.

Becoming a Navy SEAL, to give one example, takes two and a half years of training of such intensity that only one in five who start the program complete it. If military operations were the key to eliminating threats to our well-being in the years ahead, or at least reducing them to the level of irritants, SOCOM would be the folks you would want riding point.

If military operations were the solution to groups like al-Qaida, the war on terror would have been over years ago, given that U.S. spending on defense roughly matches the rest of the world combined.

The United States is not, however, meeting military forces on the field of battle, but facing a collection of various guerrilla and anarchist groups whose motivations are primarily economic, political, social, and most of all, religious.

Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida, for example, survive because they can convince large numbers of people that their religion and way of life are under attack by Western nations with a Christian, Jewish, or worst of all, secular agenda.

As evidence, they cite the West's military involvement against Muslims -- as bin Laden reiterated this week -- and U.S. support of non-democratic regimes that have invited the infidels in. Paradoxically, military operations, even successful ones by SOCOM, reinforce bin Laden's message.

The problem in areas of the world that harbor such groups is the economic, political, and social structures, or lack thereof. The United States could go in and take out terrorists, assuming there was intelligence of suitable quality, but if the society does not change, it will simply spawn more.

As an aside, the requirement for quality intelligence should not be taken lightly -- consider the problems the United States and coalition forces are having stopping insurgents in Iraq, a country they have occupied for three years with 130,000 troops. Although SOCOM will be effective tactically -- that is, their operations will likely work -- the strategic effect will be disappointing, like stabbing the sea with a very sharp sword.

Where might SOCOM's expertise prove useful? Perhaps it would be useful against the "resentful state leaders" labeled by journalist Robert Kaplan in a recent Washington Post article as the greatest threat to our well-being.

Kaplan posits that characters like Presidents Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran, Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, and Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus may acquire nuclear weapons and pay "terrorists" to use them against the United States and our allies. This scenario is not as far-fetched as it might sound. As Iraq demonstrated, countries without a nuclear deterrent are indeed at the mercy of anyone with a modern army, which Western countries undeniably have.

Let's postulate that for some reason -- say to deter what he fears is impending regime change - Mugabe wants the ability to threaten to set off a nuclear weapon in Washington and have his threat taken seriously. He might strike a deal with al-Qaida or some other "terrorist" group to plant the thing.

But if he were clever enough to get his hands on a working device, he also has the much more straightforward option to rent his own apartment within a few miles of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. Would he risk giving a nuclear weapon to a third-party "terrorist" group and hope they meet high standards of business ethics?

Nuclear blackmail may well be a legitimate threat, although it isn't "terrorism" so much as it is a logical evolution in state versus state warfare, a poor man's strategic bombing campaign. SOCOM could be effective in a scenario like this, where they might mount a raid of some size to disrupt preparations for the attack and perhaps remove the perpetrator from the scene.

It would require superb intelligence, but good intelligence on Zimbabwe is easier to come by than on shadowy non-state groups like al-Qaida. On balance, SOCOM will likely be effective at the tactical level -- as with a counter-terrorism raid -- and there is also a possibility for success at the strategic level, that is, for positive and lasting effects.

But it is just a possibility, because if we operate as we have in the past and say we will in the future, there is no chance of success. In fact, by advertising that the primary tool in this war is a force of assassins and kidnappers 66,000 strong, the United States could be making itself less safe. In doing so, the world has been divided up into one zone where the norms of international law are obeyed and another where the Pentagon can strike at will.

Should the United States expect the House of War -- to use that deliciously ironic phrase from Islam -- to sit around waiting to get whacked? Or has the U.S. government given the Mugabes and Lukashenkos of the world the moral cover to actually do what Saddam was accused of -- take concrete action to protect themselves from the world's only remaining superpower?

And since nobody can be sure who's on the list or off the list, the U.S. government may also have given someone an incentive to provide the weapon.

On the other hand, a counter-proliferation raiding force could -- and the emphasis is on could -- have a positive impact. For example, if U.S. allies recognize that the state in question is a danger not only to the United States but to the democratic world, they will be more likely to support military action.

After the bombings in Madrid and London, it should not be hard to convince these governments to cooperate if the case is solid. Obviously the United States crying "Wolf!" in Iraq didn't help.

Another consideration is whether the American public and U.S. allies accept military force as appropriate for the situation. For many people, military force is only justified when all other options have been exhausted. It will mean that the U.S. SOCOM force needs to be viewed as the cavalry riding to the rescue and not as cowboys gallivanting around the world. Statements like

"We do not need ambassador-level approval," as reported by Ann Scott Tyson in Sunday's Post, do not help. With patience, honesty and some good intelligence work, objections can be overcome. If not, then perhaps the United States should be listening to what its allies are trying to say.

Finally, SOCOM operations have to be professionally executed, and then the military must get out, quickly. The reason such a raid would prove necessary in the first place is that the target country's economic, social, and political systems are dysfunctional. Military forces cannot help with any of those, but they can catalyze an insurgency.

The "what happens next?" problem is one for the world's diplomats and development experts to consider, and everybody needs to understand that the military is only involved in order to make their jobs possible. Regime change, with the resulting obligation to nursemaid a new one -- even if we can figure out how to do it -- may not be the best option.

Designating SOCOM as DOD's lead element in the "war on terror" makes sense if for no other reason than the other elements of DOD play virtually no role. However, SOCOM is not a panacea -- bin Laden and Mullah Omar have not been found, don't forget. These are difficult operations fraught with military risk but also, given the nature of their targets, with political, social, and religious implications.

To ensure that the first phase of an operation, even if successful, doesn't compromise the other three, the vast majority of our efforts must go into solving the "what next?" issue before the trigger is pulled. As the great 6th Century BC Chinese military strategist Sun Tzu once observed, victorious warriors win first, then go into battle.

I am not talking about the media. Corporations control the mainstream, and honest debate and reporting of the facts and the truth has been marginalized. Even PBS has become a disappointment.

But it is what it is. And it will inevitably change.

What I am talking about is simply conversations on a golf course. Grassroots debate, if you will pardon the pun - the basic exchange of information and ideas that keeps a free democracy healthy from the ground up.

I remember many lively fairway debates, and many sharp witty follow-up exchanges the following week on the group email. Jokes. Insults. Weblinks and amusing pictures. Sarcasm, irony, truths and half-truths, red herrings and deliberate lies, back-and-forth, give-and-take, points conceded and points stuck to, argued confidently or spuriously clung to.

And next Saturday morning we would all be smiling and shaking hands once again on the 1st tee.

Early this year I sent my final "debate" email to the group. It was titled "no more politics". And I have stuck to my promise.

Why? Am I a coward? Do I not have the courage of my convictions? Am I afraid?

No. It was because debate had ceased. I remember the exact day. I had sent a picture of Bush holding hands with the Crown Prince and pointed out that the 9/11 hijackers were Saudi Arabian, the Wahabbis finance a great deal of world terrorism, Osama is Saudi Arabian, that the country is a dictatorship and treat women inhumanely. And that Saddam and Al Qaeda were sworn enemies. Simple facts.

The stream of vitriol I received was shocking. Caps. Colors. Limey Go Home! Hypocrite! America-Hater!

So I had a choice. Keep banging my head on a brick wall, or shut up and keep my friends.

It was never like this before. How did it happen?

Is America now so polarized that reasoned debate is obsolete? Have facts and nuance and shades of opinion become irrelevant, buried in the putrid mountain of right-wing soundbites and blatant lies pounded at us repeatedly until we acquiesce, aching head in our hands or in blind acceptance of every word, every half-truth, every spin?

I remember the Bush-Gore debates. I remember Bush with his earpiece, blinking in the headlights, repeating Rovian soundbites, while Gore reasoned, strung logical thoughts together, tried to debate. And I remember the opinion poll afterwards. Majority for Bush, because Gore "came across as arrogant" and Bush "a man of the people". I knew then we were in big trouble. It had worked. And boy have they taken it to the limit.

This is becoming a polarized and divisive nation. A nation of Us vs Them. Of Rich vs Poor. "Immigrants" vs "The People". Christians vs Liberals. False premises all.
A nation of You're With Us Or You're Against Us, of investigative journalists and Democratic dissenters tagged as traitors, of unquestioning faith in the right and might of Bombs Bursting In Air and The Rocket's Red Glare.
Of Christianity vs Islam. Of "Bring 'Em On". Of permanent war and fear.

In a time when grassroots debate has become almost irrelevant to the outcome of elections, in a time of rampant gerrymandering, Diebold machines, televised faux-debates with earpieces and teleprompters, and winners winning because they have the most money, perhaps this dearth of debate no longer matters.

But it matters to me. To millions of regular Americans. Diehard rightwingers like my friends seem to have adopted the tactics of their beloved leader. When faced with Facts and Truth and Alternatives - first ignore or deny - then spin and attack. No debate.

These are sad times indeed. The day I sent that last email was a sad day.

There's no arguing with them anymore. Can anyone say let's nuke Iran? Fore!

Mark Lloyd is a working stiff in Minneapolis. He grew up in Yorkshire, England during the socialist 70's and Thatcher & Reagan's 80's and disliked both mobs. His fierce interest in politics, history and The Truth combined with the appalling start to the 21st century have finally convinced him to start writing again.

The man was identified by the Cuyahoga County Coroner's office as Kenneth Callaway, 38, of Willowick in suburban Cleveland.

The shootings at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport followed a disturbance earlier Thursday morning involving the same man in an airport parking garage, city Safety Director Martin Flask said.

Callaway then tried unsuccessfully to buy a ticket at the Delta Air Lines counter. After arguing with a Delta employee, he went to the adjacent United Airlines ticket counter and bought a ticket to Chicago, Flask said.

The United workers called police about the man, who then got into a confrontation with two officers, authorities said.

Authorities would not give any details on the argument at the ticket counter or the incident in the parking garage.

Flask said the man had a criminal record that included prison stays for burglary and drugs.

The shooting, shortly after 10 a.m., was in an area before security check points. The airport remained open and no flights were delayed. Airport officials led passengers arriving for flights around the crime scene to ticket counters.

The patrolman, Steve Walker, 52, was alert and talking to his wife Thursday afternoon, said Dr. Charles Yowler, a trauma physician at MetroHealth Medical Center. A Cleveland police officer for 18 years, including 10 at the airport, Walker had cracked ribs, a damaged lung and a bullet lodged in his back, the doctor said.

Bernice Walker said her husband of 21 years is a devoted father of two daughters.

Walker was not wearing a bulletproof vest. Police Chief Michael McGrath would not say whether that violated police rules.

Forty Cleveland police officers are assigned to the city-owned airport.

The project has been held up by bickering between city and state agencies and the project's chief developer, and by objections, mostly from Sept. 11 family members, to the design of the trade center memorial.

But a breakthrough came this week when the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which owns the site, reached an agreement with developer Larry Silverstein, who held the lease on the twin towers.

The agency had been pressing Silverstein to give up control over the $2.1 billion Freedom Tower, for fear he would not have the financial means to complete the project. Silverstein agreed to surrender control of the skyscraper and a second building, but will build three other office towers at ground zero.

The Freedom Tower is scheduled to open in 2011, and officials said Wednesday's deal means all five towers could be built by 2012. Construction has also begun on the memorial.

The project will return millions of square feet of office space, shops and people to downtown's financial district.

"Everybody had a smile on their face and everybody understands - if you're not happy with the design, you had your chance, if you're not happy with the deal, you had your chance," Mayor Michael Bloomberg said. "We've finally all come together and said what we're going to do, so now we're going to do it."

Business and civic leaders have wondered whether there is demand for that much office space downtown, and said that the Freedom Tower has not attracted tenants yet because of its height and its potential as a terrorist target.

But Pataki said: "We are not going to just build low in the face of a war against terror."

The Freedom Tower will be as high as the 110-story World Trade Center towers. But an illuminated spire will stretch the building to the symbolic 1,776 feet envisioned in the original Freedom Tower design. That would be taller than any building in existence, although even taller skyscrapers are planned in Chicago and the United Arab Emirates.

Thursday was the second time officials tried to start construction on the tower, which has been designed three times. Architect Daniel Libeskind drew the first Freedom Tower, a twisting glass skyscraper with an off-center spire meant to evoke the Statue of Liberty.

David Childs produced a sleeker version of Libeskind's design, then reworked it again last year after police expressed concerns that the building was not sturdy enough to withstand a truck bomb.

Politicians broke ground on July 4, 2004, with a 20-ton granite cornerstone that has remained encased in blue plywood at the site since construction stalled.

Crews began relocating utilities around the Freedom Tower site weeks ago, and plan to do other work to prepare to lay the foundation over the next month.

Officials said they do not expect any major changes to the Freedom Tower's design or construction schedule now that the Port Authority is taking over

But Childs said the price is likely to go up because of the rising cost of steel and concrete.

The teenager also agreed to meet with Adrianne Reynolds' family and explain his role in her death.

"That goes a long way to show his remorse," Terronez said.

Prosecutors say Gregory and Sarah Kolb, 18, killed Reynolds in Kolb's car over their school lunch hour at a fast-food restaurant on Jan. 21, 2005, then took the body to Kolb's grandparents' farm and burned it.

The pair returned two days later and sawed the body into pieces, dumping some remains on the farm and burying the rest in Black Hawk State Park in Rock Island, according to prosecutors.

Gregory faces 20 to 40 years in prison at his sentencing July 10, plus two to five years for an earlier plea to concealing a homicide.

Kolb was convicted of murder at her second trial in February and faces more than 60 years in prison.

Prosecutors said Kolb was angry because Reynolds, who had recently moved to the state, was taking her friends and had shown interest in Kolb's boyfriend and Gregory.

Kolb said Gregory killed the girl. In her first trial, which ended in a mistrial, Kolb testified that Gregory strangled Reynolds, then hit Kolb in the face and threatened to kill her, her family and her cats if she reported the crime. She did not testify in her second trial, when the defense rested without presenting a case.

Gregory denied Kolb's account in a television interview.

Defense attorney Steve Hanna said Gregory agreed to the plea deal because the evidence against him was "overwhelming." Under the deal, approved less than a week before his murder trial was to begin, he will not face additional dismemberment charges that could have added 50 years to his sentence.

Gregory's mother wept as the plea was announced and left the courthouse without comment.

The victim's adoptive father, Tony Reynolds, said he asked for the meeting with Gregory.

"I guess I just want to know what happened, why," he said. He said he doesn't know yet what he will say to his daughter's killer.