World and Nation

WASHINGTON [HTML_REMOVED] A two-week standoff over documents in the White House domestic spying program ended yesterday when Attorney General Alberto Gonzales agreed to turn over to Congress classified material about secret eavesdropping

The Bush administration last month said it would put its surveillance of potential terrorist activities under supervision of a federal court but did not disclose details of its new eavesdropping program. A key Senate panel, newly controlled by Democrats, demanded access to the records to gauge whether the administration was going too far or breaking any laws in tracking terror suspects.

The decision to share information with Congress was the latest concession by the Bush administration, which has argued that it had the right to conduct its "war on terror" as it deems necessary and that secrecy is vital to national security.

The documents, which include applications for electronic wiretaps and orders from the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act court, will be made available to congressional committees only and not released to the public.

"We obviously would be concerned about the public disclosure that may jeopardize the national security of our country," Gonzales said. "But we're working with the Congress to provide the information that it needs."

Some documents were made available to Congress yesterday, according to a Capitol Hill source.

Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said his panel would review the records before, "deciding what further oversight or legislative action is necessary." Only then, he said, "can the Judiciary Committee determine whether the administration has reached the proper balance to protect Americans."

Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, a moderate who is the ranking Republican on the panel, had joined the Democrats in demanding the records be turned over. At a feisty hearing last month, he criticized Gonzales for his refusal to release the documents even though the FISA court's presiding judge had no objections.

Yesterday, Specter thanked the administration for releasing the records to the committee but said he might make them public, as long as the materials do not violate privacy rules or jeopardize ongoing federal investigations.

"They will not be made public until I've had a chance to see them," he said. But, Specter said, "My own view is that there ought to be the maximum disclosure to the public consistent with national security procedures."

WASHINGTON [HTML_REMOVED] The Government Accountability Office yesterday added food safety to its list of critically flawed federal programs, saying that splintered jurisdiction among 15 agencies has left the United States vulnerable to outbreaks of food-born illness or, worse, a terrorist attack.

Meanwhile, a senior administration official said President Bush would seek an increase of about $11 million for food safety in the fiscal year 2008 budget he is scheduled to release next Monday. Much of the funding would be aimed at reducing the risk from produce outbreaks, such as the E. coli-contaminated California spinach that caused three deaths and sickened more than 200 last Fall.

Consumer and industry groups, however, said the increase would not stop the Food and Drug Administration's inspection staff from continuing to shrink. The FDA's budget has not kept pace with the rising cost of federal salaries and benefits, so the agency has had to eliminate hundreds of field inspector jobs, along with scientific and technical positions.

"We are at a critical moment for the nation's food safety," said Rep. Henry A. Waxman, D-Calif., chairman of the House Government Reform Committee. "I could not agree more with GAO's conclusion that we are in need of a fundamental reexamination of our food safety system."

The GAO, the nonpartisan investigative arm of Congress, said it added food safety to its so-called "high-risk" list of federal programs because the system is out-of-date, often unscientific, and lacks accountability. The list, created in 1990, serves as a kind of tip sheet for Congress, alerting lawmakers and their staffs to problems simmering below the surface of the federal bureaucracy. One agency just off the list: the Postal Service.

It may be stretching it to refer to a federal food safety "system," a senior GAO official said.

"It is a collection of 15 agencies trying to administer some 30 laws, and that results in inefficient use or resources, inconsistent oversight and overlap and duplication," said Lisa Shames, director of food and agriculture issues, urging that a solution "be approached system-wide."