Today's News-Monday, November 5th

Tomorrow is the General Election. After nearly 9 months of campaigning, candidates for County Commissioner and six other row offices, and numerous borough council, school board and township races, will let the voters decide who takes office in January. Two county judges are seeking retention, and candidates for state Superior and Supreme Court will be elected.
According to Betty Dries, county Election Bureau Director, registered Republicans number 45-thousand-896, registered Democrats 36-thousand-896, and non-partisan 6-thousand-39. Twenty-eight other parties make up the remaining voter base, which totals 91-thousand-547 people. Seventeen-hundred-86 absentee ballots were cast. The touch screen voting systems have been tested and are ready to go for tomorrow’s election. Listen for continuing coverage of Election ’07 tomorrow night after the polls close at 8pm.

Two men were hurt in an early Saturday morning crash in Walker Township. 33-year-old Peter Howard of Mahanoy Plane was driving east on Route 443, near the intersection with Route 309 after midnight when he failed to negotiate a left curve. The car left the road, struck guiderails and went down an embankment. Howard was thrown from the vehicle. He was flown to St. Luke's Hospital in Bethlehem for treatment of unknown injuries. His passenger, 58-year-old David Griffith of Lehighton had a cut on his left arm and was taken to Gnadden Huetten Hospital for treatment. A Shenandoah Heights juvenile is in trouble with the law following a theft from an Ashland woman's car. Approximately 50 music CD's were stolen from Angela Smith's car in the parking lot at Trinity Mission Friday afternoon. A 13-year-old from Shenandoah Heights will be charged with the theft through county juvenile justice authorities.

Schuylkill County is known for the exemplary service of its men and women in the armed forces. On Saturday, 15 who have received the Medal of Honor will be recognized with a monument dedication in Pottsville. The city, the Pottsville Joint Veterans Council and the Pottsville Lasting Legacy have worked together to bring the project to fruition. The monument is displayed at the General George Joulwan Park on the city's East Side. Saturday at noon, the monument will be dedicated. General Joulwan will be the featured speaker. The Medal of Honor is the nation's highest award given for valor on the battlefield. Of Schuylkill County's 15 honorees, 8 are from the Civil War, two from the Indian Wars, One from the Boxer Rebellion, one from World War One and three from World War Two. The ceremony is open to the public.

A Schuylkill Haven man is facing charges following incidents early Thursday morning. Borough police now say that 34-year-old Barron Belsak was involved in an altercation with a woman on West Columbia Street early in the evening. Belsak then damaged a window at a business on St. Charles Street, then returned home to his apartment, lighting a fire in his living room. Belsak was taken into custody, charged him with arson and criminal mischief. He was taken to Schuylkill County Prison, then was released.

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) - Cargill Incorporated's recall of more than one million pounds of ground beef due to a possible E. coli contamination is affecting one Giant grocery chain in the eastern United States but not another. Giant Food Stores, based in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, is not impacted by the recall announced Saturday, according to spokesman Denny Hopkins. He says the grocery chain has not sold Cargill ground beef recently in its stores. Giant Food Stores operates the Giant stores in Pennsylvania. It operates stores under the name Martin's Food Markets and Foodsource in Maryland, Virginia, and West Virginia. However, a sister grocery chain -- Giant Food of Landover, Maryland, -- is affected by the recall. That's according to Andrea Astrachan, vice president of consumer affairs for Stop-n-Go Supermarket Co. and Giant Food, which operates stores under the name Giant in Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C. Both Giant of Maryland and Giant of Carlisle are owned by the same parent company, Royal Ahold of the Netherlands. No illnesses have been immediately reported due to Cargill's
recall.

PITTSBURGH (AP) - Embattled former Allegheny County Coroner Doctor Cyril Wecht is asking a federal judge to rule whether an 84-count federal indictment against him is politically motivated. Wecht's attorneys submitted the motion late Friday. The attorneys ask the judge to determine whether Republican U.S. Attorney Mary Beth Buchanan is going after Wecht because he is a Democrat. Buchanan has repeatedly denied her moves are political. The latest Wecht motion is linked to an ongoing congressional investigation of last year's firing of nine U.S. attorneys. Buchanan has been questioned about her involvement in the contentious layoffs, which Democrats say was a Bush administration purge. The 75-year-old Wecht is accused of using his county staff to do work for his private pathology practice. The coroner resigned last January after being indicted by a federal grand jury.

WASHINGTON (AP) - The top Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee says he is bothered by Michael Mukasey's refusal to say whether waterboarding is torture but will support his nomination for attorney general anyway. Senator Arlen Specter is joining two key Senate Democrats in saying he will back Mukasey because the retired judge has said that if Congress passes a law banning waterboarding, "the president would have absolutely no legal authority to ignore such a law." The Republican from Pennsylvania says the Department of Justice is dysfunctional and that every day that passes, we do not have someone in charge of the investigation against terrorism, the fight against violent crime." The Senate Judiciary Committee is set to vote on Mukasey's nomination Tuesday.

HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) - Candidates for a pair of open seats on Pennsylvania's highest court are winding up a more than 5 million dollar race that revealed little about their judicial philosophies, but looked and sounded more than ever like a conventional political campaign. The Supreme Court race is the marquee attraction in Tuesday's election. There is also a contest for three open seats on the state Superior Court, up-or-down "retention" votes on seven appellate judges, and a much longer list of races for county and local judgeships and other elective offices. The Supreme Court race is shaping up as one of the most expensive judicial campaigns in state history. Of the Supreme Court candidates, Superior Court Judge Seamus McCaffery of Philadelphia has raised the most - 1.9 million dollars as of October 22nd. Republican Mike Krancer, a Montgomery County lawyer and former chief judge of the state Environmental Hearing Board, raised 1.4 million dollars. Superior Court Judge Maureen E. Lally-Green, a Republican from Butler County, built a 1.2 million dollar war chest, and Democrat Debra Todd, also a Superior Court judge from Butler County, relied heavily on lawyers and organized labor to raise more than 930,000 dollars.

JOHNSON SPACE CENTER, Houston (AP) - Discovery has pulled away from the international space station to begin its trip back to Earth. The space shuttle's crew now includes astronaut Clayton Anderson, who is returning after five months in orbit. Landing is scheduled Wednesday.

LOS ANGELES (AP) - The late-night talk shows could be in reruns soon, now that film and TV writers are going on strike. The late-night shows that aren't taped far in advance depend on
monologues driven by current events. Pickets will be up this morning in New York and Los Angeles.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) - Hundreds of lawyers have been rounded up today as Pakistan remains in a state of emergency. The lawyers have clashed with riot police in three major cities. One says Pervez Musharraf's government is bent on silencing "those who are against dictatorship."

NEW YORK (AP) - The nation's largest bank is getting a new chairman and looking for a new CEO. Charles Prince is out at Citigroup, as it takes another hit of at least eight billion
dollars from investing in bad debt. Former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin will be the new chair at Citigroup.

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (AP) - Oprah Winfrey's expected to have something to say this morning about an investigation at her school for disadvantaged girls in South Africa. There's also word today that the dormitory matron accused of abusing students at the school has been freed on bail.