Morning News Roundup (22 May)

• The Bush administration is “shunning pressure from allies for direct dialogue with Iran [and] shifting toward a more confrontational stance and intensifying efforts to undercut the country’s ruling clerics.” Under pressure from the United States, “four of the biggest European banks have started curbing their activities in Iran.” [ThinkProgress' ThinkFast]
  
  
• The Bush administration is moving to establish a new antimissile site in Europe that would be designed to stop attacks by Iran against the United States and its European allies.
  
  The administration's proposal, which comes amid rising concerns about Iran's suspected program to develop nuclear weapons, calls for installing 10 antimissile interceptors at a European site by 2011. Poland and the Czech Republic are among the nations under consideration. [NYTimes]
  
  
• Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki pledged "maximum force against the terrorists" on his first full day on the job Sunday, while bombs targeting predominantly Shiite Muslim neighborhoods of Baghdad killed at least 30 people. Across the country, more than 40 people were killed in attacks. [WaPo]
  
  
• While the Republican culture of corruption runs strong throughout the party, the Democrats aren't completely clean: Rep. William J. Jefferson (D-La.), the target of a 14-month public corruption probe, was videotaped accepting $100,000 in $100 bills from a Northern Virginia investor who was wearing an FBI wire. [WaPo]
  
  
• Former Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage has emerged as a key witness in the CIA leak probe, the Daily News has learned. Armitage has been questioned several times, but is not expected to be indicted by the federal grand jury investigating who outed CIA spy Valerie Plame to journalists in 2003, sources said.
  
  Two sources familiar with the case said Armitage, Rove and Libby all had contacts with the press about Plame. Unlike Rove and Libby, Armitage appears to have tried to dissuade reporters from writing about her. Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald recently had to sneak Armitage into a Washington courthouse to get past reporters - a sign of his value in the case, according to one source. [NYDailyNews]
  
  
• “There is no official Category 6 for hurricanes, but scientists say they’re pondering whether there should be as evidence mounts that hurricanes around the world have sharply worsened over the past 30 years — and all but a handful of hurricane experts now agree this worsening bears the fingerprints of man-made global warming.” [ThinkProgress' ThinkFast]
  
  
• Since leaving office in 2004, John Edwards has traded political fundraising for the picket line. The former North Carolina senator has spent much of the past 17 months courting the labor community -- a powerful force within the Democratic party -- while devoting significantly less time to the nuts and bolts of collecting campaign cash to fuel his 2008 presidential ambitions. [WaPo]
  
  
• Another good reason to vote for Washington's junior Democratic Senator, Maria Cantwell: Republican Senate candidate Mike McGavick has a plan to persuade Iran to abandon its nuclear ambitions: Bar its national team from the soccer field. McGavick, who is challenging Sen. Maria Cantwell in November, wants the international soccer federation to disinvite Iran from the wildly popular World Cup soccer tournament.
  
  The initial reaction to McGavick's proposal among some politicians, local blogs and Iranian students in views posted on the Web ranged from laughter to outrage. [SeaTimes]
  
  
• Speaking of international competitions...oh Lordi: A Finnish "horror rock" group who dress in monster costumes have pulled off a surprise win at the 51st Eurovision Song Contest in Athens. European viewers voted for Lordi's song Hard Rock Hallelujah in a show that is normally associated with catchy pop and big ballads.
  
  Lordi's masks, armour and jets of flame attracted widespread attention before the contest - but many thought they were too outlandish to win.
  
  The band had been accused by some conservative Greek organisations of promoting Satanism but said they had no connection with the occult. [BBC]