But Mr Bush is particularly vulnerable to charges of buying the election. He has raised a record$67m already, far more than any of his opponents, Democrat or Republican.Democrats accuse him of letting big business run the state while he was Governor of Texas. And after the fund-raising scandals of the Clinton administration, the seamy side of campaign finance is finally starting to raise America’s concerns.Texans for Public Justice, a lobby group, has calculated that Mr Bush received $3m from just 100 wealthy businessmen and women for his Texas governor’s campaigns in 1994 and 1998.”A small group of business tycoons were instrumental in putting George Bush in the Governor’s mansion,” said Craig McDonald, director of Texans for Public Justice. George W Bush, the leading Republican candidate for the American presidency, has built his political career on donations from a small group of wealthy corporate donors, a new report alleges.
All the presidential candidates have raised large sums from business and all are subject to charges of pandering to corporate interests.

George W Bush, the leading Republican candidate for the American presidency, has built his political career on donations from a small group of wealthy corporate donors, a new report alleges. Most ominously for the defendants, the new indictment includes the rarely used count of “providing material support to terrorists”. That charge carries the potential life sentence.The trial is likely to become a stage for Fred Haddad, a well-known defence lawyer who has fought charges in similar cases concerning the IRA in Florida, including a case six years ago involving the alleged smuggling of Stinger missiles to Northern Ireland.Mr Haddad has already indicated he plans to argue that the four were justified in their actions because they were engaged in civil war in Ireland and their aim was eject British imperialists from the North.. Mr Mullan was arrested in Philadelphia and the others around Fort Lauderdale.The 59-count indictment, handed down by a grand jury convened in Fort Lauderdale to investigate the case, includes several new details of what is said to have happened. The names of the wiring banks in Northern Ireland are not provided. The four are accused of sending 90 weapons, including high-velocity rifles, and armour-piercing rounds, paying for them with funds wired from banks in Northern Ireland.Over weeks, Mr Claxton and Mr Mullan were said to have withdrawn $13,000 from NationsBank and First Union to buy the guns, most of which came from Big Shot Firearms in nearby Boynton Beach. Prosecutors said British police intercepted packages at West Midlands Airport.One of the four, Conor Claxton, 26, had admitted the guns were for the IRA, said prosecutors.

Allegedly, he also said IRA commanders had no long-term commitment to the ceasefire in Northern Ireland and were trying to restock their arsenal.Officials in Miami said a trial set for 31 January could slip perhaps by several weeks.The delay may be needed to allow prosecutors more time to gather evidence against Mr Claxton, and Anthony Smyth, 42, Siobhan Browne, 34, and Martin Mullan. Four men accused last summer of sending arms and ammunition by regular post from Florida to the Irish Republican Army face life sentences after prosecutors in Miami unveiled fresh charges against them, including intent to aid terrorism and to commit murder.
They were charged with buying arms and ammunitionand sending them to the Republic and Northern Ireland in packages labelled as containing toys. Manufacturers have also said there are no plants in Canada able to produce cigarette packaging with colour photographs.Research for the government suggested pictures were 60 times more likely than words to discourage smoking.. Four men accused last summer of sending arms and ammunition by regular post from Florida to the Irish Republican Army face life sentences after prosecutors in Miami unveiled fresh charges against them, including intent to aid terrorism and to commit murder. Other images proposed are lung tumours and damaged hearts.”Let’s take on smoking for the national evil that it is,” Mr Rock said “With these … messages and compelling graphics, we will reach smokers directly and effectively.”The tobacco industry is likely to challenge the proposals on grounds that the government is overstepping its authority.

There would also be printed messages, some about the risks of impotence One would read: “Warning: tobacco use can make you impotent. Cigarettes may cause sexual impotence due to decreased flow to the penis. This can prevent you having an erection.” With the text there would be a picture of a cigarette drooping.It would be first time that cigarette makers anywhere would be forced to print pictures on their packs. The Canadian government plans to make the tobacco industry print colour photos of the effects of smoking, including tumours and other growths, on all packets of cigarettes.
Under the measure, outlined by Allan Rock, Health Minister, companies would have to cover 50 per cent of packs with the warnings. Last May police raided the apartment where he lived with his parents at 6.15am after they claimed he had gone through a red light.His mother said there had been a number of anonymous telephone calls threatening to kill him unless he stopped writing about corruption.. The Canadian government plans to make the tobacco industry print colour photos of the effects of smoking, including tumours and other growths, on all packets of cigarettes. It is the first case since the time of the dissidents [in the Soviet Union].” Mr Khinshtein has gone into hiding.This was not the first time he had suffered from the attentions of the Interior Ministry.

His mother says he was disqualified for a spinal injury.Mr Martynov said it was necessary to take Mr Khinshtein to Vladimir “taking into account his place of work, his connections and hindering the process of investigation”. The real reason, says Mrs Regerer, is that the hospital in Vladimir is known as “Rushailo’s clinic” and is controlled by the Interior Ministry.Mr Martynov confirmed that the official charge against Mr Khinshtein – for which they wanted the psychiatric examination – was to do with adriving-licence offence committed in 1997.Mr Khinshtein’s lawyer, Andrei Muratov, said: “I can’t think of any case in the last 10 years of journalists being taken to a psychiatric hospital. The practice stopped after the fall of communism.During this week’s raid the Interior Ministry official leading it would not at first give Mr Khinshtein, who was ill in bed, time to phone his lawyer, saying it was a long drive to Vladimir, his mother, Inna Regerer, said yesterday.She believes the reason for the action was Mr Khinshtein’s attacks in the daily Moskovsky Komsomolets on Vladimir Rushailo, the Interior Minister, for acting illegally, and on the financier Boris Berezovsky for his alleged links to criminals and Chechen warlords.Mr Khinshtein, 25, one of Moscow’s best-known journalists, stood for the Duma in last month’s elections.Vladimir Martynov, the Interior Ministry spokesman, said in a statement to The Independent that investigatorshad decided “to give Mr Khinshtein a psychiatric examination” because he had been previously treated in special clinics and disqualified from military service. Many are too old or sick to leave the city, while young men are frightened of being taken for guerrillas.. Russian police are threatening, for the first time since the fall of the Soviet Union, to take journalists who report on official corruption to distant psychiatric hospitals. Russian police are threatening, for the first time since the fall of the Soviet Union, to take journalists who report on official corruption to distant psychiatric hospitals.
This week police raided the flat of Alexander Khinshtein, a journalist and broadcaster living in Moscow, armed with a warrant saying he must accompany them to a psychiatric clinic in Vladimir, a city four hours’ drive from the capital.The attempt to detain Mr Khinshtein failed when his lawyer arrived at the last moment with film crews alerted by the Moscow television station where the journalist presents a programme called Secret Materials.In the Soviet Union the security forces frequently locked up dissidents in psychiatric hospitals to blacken their reputation.