Washington – Beer, wine and other alcoholic-beverage labels would be loaded up with mandatory nutrition and alcohol-content information under a new Bush administration proposal.
For the first time, all alcohol labels would list calories, fat, protein and carbohydrates. They would include the percent of alcohol by volume. And with separate “serving facts” panels, alcohol labels would more closely resemble those found on other foods.
“We believe that this information should be presented to consumers in a uniform, standardized format that is prominent on the label, so that consumers may easily avail themselves of this important information,” the Treasury Department said when posting its proposed rule in the Federal Register.
Additional nation/world news briefs:
OROVILLE, Calif.
Overpass being built collapses; two hurt
A highway overpass under construction collapsed Tuesday, crushing a delivery truck and seriously injuring a construction worker who clung to a steel beam as it tumbled 50 feet to the ground.
Firefighters swarmed the Fed Ex delivery truck to cut its driver from underneath a large steel beam that crushed the hood but missed the cab. A second beam landed on the back of the truck.
The driver suffered only a sprained ankle and minor cuts.
The construction worker was in serious condition with a broken pelvis, left elbow and lower left leg, a hospital spokeswoman said.
The overpass was being built over Route 149 where it intersects with California 70, about an hour north of Sacramento.
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla.
Shuttle cabin leak could delay launch
A week before Endeavour’s planned liftoff, NASA was analyzing a cabin leak in the space shuttle Tuesday.
The leak was detected over the weekend. NASA officials thought they had fixed the problem by tightening a bolt, but testing Monday night confirmed air was still escaping, said NASA spokeswoman Tracy Young.
Engineers have yet to pinpoint the leak, which could delay NASA’s planned launch of Endeavour on Aug. 7.
WASHINGTON
Study: More spending on English lessons vital
Spending on English instruction must be quadrupled to more than $4 billion a year for the next six years to make legal and illegal adult immigrants proficient in skills crucial to their assimilation and to the economic future of a country whose population is increasingly foreign- born, a new national report says.
In the first nationwide study of its kind, the nonpartisan Migration Policy Institute estimates that an additional $200 million a year is needed to improve legal immigrants’ English skills enough for them to pass a citizenship test and “fully participate in the country’s civic life.”
An additional $2.9 billion a year is required for illegal immigrants to meet those standards, the report says.
Federal and state governments currently spend about $1 billion a year on English as a Second Language instruction for adults, most of which comes from the states.
ATLANTA
Car dealer admits killing two over raises
The owner of a car dealership killed two employees because they kept asking for raises, police said Tuesday.
Rolandas Milinavicius was charged in the shooting deaths of Inga Contreras, 25, and Martynas Simokaitis, 28. Milinavicius, who was having financial problems, told police he shot the two Thursday after they kept asking for more pay, said police in East Point, just outside Atlanta.
Milinavicius, 38, turned himself in and confessed to the killings two days later, telling police he was under a lot of stress, East Point police Capt. Russell Popham said.
BERLIN
One-ton WWII bomb unearthed by workers
Construction workers on Tuesday unearthed a 2,200-pound Soviet bomb from World War II in a Berlin suburb, forcing authorities to evacuate more than 4,000 people before defusing it.
The bomb, which was buried 13 feet underground, was found Tuesday morning.
Unexploded bombs, relics of Allied bombardments before Nazi Germany’s surrender in May 1945, are still found regularly in the country.
