Here’s a story from last week that’s still worth noting: “Poor people supporting poorer people.”

It was on the radio, on Marketplace, American Public Media’s show on business, economics and money.

It reported on a new study on money sent worldwide by migrant workers to relatives back home.

How much do you think moves among countries? Last year, the amount topped $300 billion. That’s right — $300 billion.

As Marketplace noted, it’s the biggest anti-poverty program in the world. Three times the total foreign aid budget.

What’s more, it’s a global phenomenon. India got $24 billion from abroad last year, more than Mexico. And Mongolia got remittances too.

You can read more about it here.

The Innocence Project released its report on wrongful convictions today in New York City and for me, this paragraph stood out:

“In most of the 23 New York cases, prosecutors resisted defendants’ attempts to obtain new evidence post-conviction, and courts denied appeals from people claiming they were innocent.”

To those who believe the exonerations proved the system worked, the Innocence Project responded: “If that were true, then justice is not being dispensed by police, prosecutors, defense lawyers or courts — but by law students, journalism students and a few concerned lawyers, organizations and citizens.”

The report, called Lessons Not Learned, urged a series of reforms to guard against innocent people being convicted for crimes they did not commit. Here are some of them:

— Mandate preservation of some biological evidence, as 22 other states already do.

— Allow defendants to compare crime scene evidence to forensic databases to try to match DNA to another suspect.

— Require police and other law enforcement agencies to record interrogations to protect against coercion.

Read the report here.

PHOTO: Ronald Taylor, left, leaves jail with Barry Scheck of the Innocence Project last week in Houston. Taylor spent 14 years in prison for a rape that DNA evidence later proved he did not commit. (AP Photo/Pat Sullivan)

New York outpaces almost every other state in the number of wrongful convictions overturned by DNA testing, according to a new report from the Innocence Project.

That’s the group that helped Jeffry Deskovic get out of prison and cleared of charges that he raped and murdered a classmate in Peekskill in 1989.

But the report, to be released tomorrow, also argues that New York lags behind other states in implementing reforms that could prevent new cases.

And here is a frightening detail: It describes five murders and seven rapes that it says occurred after innocent people were convicted for earlier crimes those same perpetrators had committed.

The 119-page report is called “Lessons Not Learned.”

PHOTO: Jeffery Deskovic speaks to reporters in front of the Westchester County Courthouse in May. ( Elizabeth Orozco / The Journal News )

If you watched “Cheney’s Law” on Frontline last night, you might be curious about David Addington, the vice president’s former legal counsel and now chief of staff.

I know I was.

So here are some articles I found about him.

There’s this one from The New Yorker called “The Hidden Power: The legal mind behind the White House’s war on terror.” It’s by Jane Mayer, who appeared in the documentary.

And this one from U.S. News & World Report.

And this from the Washington Post.

They all explore his belief that the Constitution gives the president extraordinary powers as commander in chief. What none of them offer is an interview with Addington himself. He declines requests for interviews.

It’s even more fascinating given Michael Mukasey’s testimony today before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Mukasey, Bush’s nominee for attorney general, told the senators that the president did not have the authority to allow the torture of terrorism suspects.

But the Washington Post in a series of articles about the vice president in the summer wrote that Addington has argued the opposite: the president as commander in chief may authorize any method of interrogation.
PHOTO: By David Bohrer, White House via AP

Today I wrote about the Heart Gallery, a exhibit of photographs of children waiting to be adopted. It will be on display at the Westchester County Center in White Plains beginning tomorrow through Saturday.

But if you’re not interested in adopting a child, Westchester is also looking for more foster parents.

They are needed to provide temporary homes for brothers and sisters who want to stay together, for babies and for children 10 and older.

You can apply if you are at least 21 and have enough income to take care of your family.

There is no upper age limit, you may be married, single or living with a partner, and children may share bedrooms. And you would receive a monthly allowance for the children in your care.

If you’re interested, call 914-995-5316.

There’s more information here.

Welcome back.

Our blogs are working again after a being down for a few days.

Here’s a smart, funny column about all of the free speech clashes we’ve been having.

It’s by Kurt Andersen in New York magazine and here’s how it begins: “For awhile now, I’ve fretted that we’re turning into a nation of weenies and permanently enraged censors…”

So if you were annoyed by the hysteria surrounding Columbia University’s invitation to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad or by Verizon refusing to send NARAL’s abortion-rights text messages or by politicians wanting to condemn — take your pick — MoveOn.org over its “General Betray Us” ad or Rush Limbaugh over his “phony soldiers” comment, read it.

More evidence that Americans don’t like the mass media — especially if they are Republicans.

A new Gallup poll found that 3 in 4 Republicans said it was too liberal.

Contrast that with what Democrats think. A little more than a fifth of Democrats thought it was too conservative.

Twice as many Democrats, 66 percent, had some faith in the media compared with Republicans, 33 percent.

And fewer than half of all Americans had a great deal or fair amout of trust in the media.

PHOTO: President Bush is framed by television cameras in the Rose Garden of the White House this week. (AP Photo/Ron Edmonds)

Westchester’s legislators not using their noggins?

You’d think not judging from the reception they got last night from bicycle riders.

The Board of Legislators wants to require all riders to wear helmets. Not only children but adults too.

Only a handful showed up at the public hearing, but most thought the legislators should not interfere. Whether they wear helmets is their business, they said.

Here was the Greenburgh police chief’s verdict:
“I think it’s a lot of baloney,” Chief John Kapica said.

New York City is planning to install up to 500 bike racks a year and have more than 400 miles of bike land and paths by 2009. But will the riders have to wear helmets?

PHOTO: A helmetless bicyclist rides past full bicycle racks in the Williamsburg section of the Brooklyn last month. (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews)

Here’s a speech I’d like to hear: Rudy Giuliani before the conservative religious group, the Family Research Council, later this month.

The former mayor isn’t giving ground. He’s trying win over some social conservatives despite his pro-choice, pro-gay rights stances.

It’s not surprising given Giuliani’s personality. He didn’t give ground when he won in Democratic New York City either.

Giuliani agreed to go before this group just as its president and other Christian evangelicals threatened to back a third-party candidate if he got the Republican nomination.

The group’s president, Tony Perkins, had this to say on the Christian Broadcasting Network’s Web site:

“There is absolutely no way that we will go with a candidate that is pro-abortion. It’s an issue of principle and conviction. It’s what we’ve worked for, what we’ve fought for.”

Of course, what does the former mayor stress? Terrorists and Hillary Rodham Clinton. He’s got the experience to take on both, he says. The question, from that viewpoint, will be how many conservatives care more about Clinton taking the White House than Giuliani’s support for abortion rights.

Could conservative Christians vote for Giuliani? There’s this from a New York Times/CBS News poll of white born-again or evangelical Republican primary voters taken last month. Thirty percent said they could vote for a candidate whose views they didn’t share on such issues as abortion and gay rights; fifty-nine percent said they could not.

Giuliani continues to lead among Republicans nationwide. The Washington Post reported last week that Republican voters described him as the most electable candidate with double the support of his nearest competitor. It cautioned though that his support among Republicans was softer than Clinton’s among Democrats.

On the other hand, Giuliani doesn’t fare as well in Iowa, where he is about even with Mike Huckabee for third, according to a poll released Sunday by The Des Moines Register. Mitt Romney tops the field, followed by Fred Thompson.

Perkins rejects the idea that Giuliani is the candidate to beat Clinton. In fact, a Giuliani victory in the primary would hand Clinton the White House, Perkins predicted.

“If by some chance Giuliani were to gain the Republican nomination it would set up a very similar scenario that we had last November,” he said earlier to the Christian Broadcasting Network Web Site. “A unenthusiastic Republican base which will suppress turnout and set up a Democratic victory.”

But something else struck me about the Web site: how much it focuses on the fear of Islamic terrorism. Today one of its main stories is “Former Muslims Preach Christ to Islam.”

“Kamal Saleem came to America to recruit terrorists, but instead became a convert to Christ,” it reads.

And it links to these headlines:

“Radical Islamists Setting Up Compounds in the Rural United States?”

And “Terrorists Training in Rural America?”

Terrorism. Exactly Giuliani’s issue.

PHOTO: Giuliani addresses the Americans for Prosperity Foundation in Washington last week. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)