Across the Nation

Teamster locals offer Bradley support

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. - It was a sudden show of support, a standing ovation followed by an impromptu endorsement from the floor packed with Teamsters representing locals from South Carolina to Maine.

The backing was unofficial for Bill Bradley, who has walked picket lines in his campaign for union support. The national Teamsters organization remains neutral in the Democratic presidential race, and front-runner Al Gore carries most Big Labor support, including an AFL-CIO endorsement.

But searching for a crack in Gore's wall of labor backing, Bradley basked in the moment.

He had just addressed about 400 union leaders attending the 13-state Eastern regional meeting of the Teamsters at a casino hotel here.

''I know that the AFL-CIO has endorsed Al Gore,'' Bradley told the delegates. ''But that doesn't decrease my commitment to working people in this country.

''My position on labor law reform, my position on health care, my position on the minimum wage, my position on all of these issues is not related to whether I got an endorsement or not from the leadership of the AFL-CIO. It's related to my commitment to what a just society should be and to the working people of the country.''

As Bradley shook hands and prepared to leave, Teamsters vice president Thomas O'Donnell entertained a motion to endorse the former New Jersey senator. It passed by acclamation, although many in the audience were talking or crowding around Bradley.

''We did not know it was coming, and I think it's pretty significant,'' said Bradley spokesman Eric Hauser.

But Chip Roth, a spokesman for the Teamsters attending the conference, said the ''spontaneous expression of support'' carried no official weight.

Suspected hackers sought by agents

WASHINGTON - Federal agents chasing the hackers who brought down a string of high-profile Websites are preparing to question several suspects in the case, sources familiar with the investigation said Monday.

One of those people, "Coolio," is located in the United States, the sources said. That is also the name used by a person who early Sunday defaced a company Website for one of the most trusted names in the security business. A second is allegedly a Canadian teen known online as "mafiaboy." And a third is a male who allegedly "confessed" to a staff member of the popular security site Attrition.org.

Law enforcement officials and independent cyber-sleuths have been able to link the online aliases to real names and addresses, and FBI agents were expected to begin questioning them as early as yesterday.

Meanwhile, representatives of some of the biggest high-tech businesses are scheduled to gather at the White House at 11 a.m. The companies have agreed to jointly call for a voluntary, industry-led coalition that will share information on cyber-attacks and how to respond to them - a step that security experts hailed as critical to discouraging future attacks.

The person suspected of mounting the first attacks was named in a three-page e-mail sent to FBI agents late last Wednesday by two computer experts, David Brumley of Stanford University and Joel de la Garza of Securify.com, a security company.

The two men analyzed the log files from several of the recent "denial of service" attacks - which involved bombarding Web sites with so many requests for information that legitimate users were effectively shut out - and traced them back to a single individual. Brumley, a 24-year-old security administrator for the school, says they were able to quickly discover the person's online alias and his physical location down to the city.

He said the attacker appeared to have significantly modified programs that are widely available on the Internet.

"I think this guy is more sophisticated than a script-kiddie," Brumley said Monday. "But he's not a computer-science genius. . . . Chances are it's someone who is either in college and has taken several computer-science classes or is a professional in the industry. We are seeing that the guy knows what he's doing." Brumley also said his analysis shows that it's likely that the attacks _ which in addition to Yahoo and eBay hit sites including Amazon.com, CNN.com and Buy.com - were carried out by at least two groups because they used different strategies.

Lobbyists: Religious tenets curb violence

BALTIMORE - Hoping it has found an antidote to school violence and moral decay, an increasingly successful evangelical Christian lobby is campaigning to have the Ten Commandments displayed in classrooms and public buildings.

And despite some protests, a rising number of state legislatures seem to be buying their argument.

The Washington, D.C.-based Family Research Council calls its effort to put the Commandments on walls in schools, courtrooms and other public buildings "Hang Ten." Nine states are considering legislation to allow the display.

and bills could be introduced soon in two states.

"Our kids live in a world where they have disconnected choice and consequences. ... We send our kids off to school, and we worry that they'll come home in a body bag," said Janet Parshall, a spokeswoman for the Family Research Council. "What we're trying to remind them with the hanging of the Ten Commandments is there is a moral code of behavior."

"The Ten Commandments have certainly passed the test of time as well as universality," said the Rev. Rob Schenck, who leads a similar effort, the Washington, D.C.-based Ten Commandments Project. "In other words, Jews, Christians, Muslims and virtually every other religious tradition at least countenance the Ten Commandments, if not explicitly endorse them. They bring us together. They don't divide us."

Civil liberties and liberal advocacy groups are distressed by the campaign and are fighting it one battle at a time across the nation. They contend that Ten Commandments displays are intended to have the government promote religious ideals - something that the U.S. Constitution, as they read it, does not tolerate.

Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, calls the trend "nothing short of appalling."

"This is all driven by looking for some kind of magic fix to school violence," he said. "If the mere presence of religious material stopped sin, the presence of Gideons Bible in hotel rooms would have stopped adultery long ago."