Marc Dreier said all his relatives live in the U.S. and only a few of his business associates or friends live abroad.

Dreier, 58, has been jailed without bail since he was arrested in early December as he returned from Canada. He could face up to 20 years in prison if convicted.

Dreier's lawyers have proposed that he be released on $10 million bond, secured by the signatures of his son and mother, and kept under house arrest with electronic monitoring and armed security guards approved by the government. He would be denied computer access and have only preapproved visitors.

The conditions would be similar to those of Bernard Madoff, who has confessed to losing up to $50 billion in a giant Ponzi scheme and is holed up at his multimillion-dollar penthouse.

Dreier, who led a law firm with more than 200 lawyers before his arrest, told a magistrate judge who will consider the bail issue that he no longer controls any money or assets in the United States or abroad.

From Kenya and Indonesia, where Barack Obama has family ties, to areas around the world, Obama represented a volcanic explosion of hope for better days ahead.

The ascendance of the first African-American to the presidency of the United States was heralded as marking a new era of tolerance and possibility.

It was a reflection of Obama's sprawling, complex family tree that villages in places as diverse as Ireland and Kenya held special parties to celebrate their link to the new president.

An Irish village called Moneygall covered itself in red, white and blue bunting Tuesday in honor of Obama's connections, via a great-great-great grandfather named Fulmouth Kearney who emigrated to the United States in 1850. Road signs read "Moneygall welcomes our President, Barack Obama."

The findings, released to lawmakers Sunday, call into question the effectiveness of congressional Democrats' efforts to pump up the economy through old-fashioned public works projects like roads, bridges and repairs of public housing.

Less than half of the $30 billion in highway construction funds detailed by House Democrats would be released into the economy over the next four years, concludes the analysis by the Congressional Budget Office. Less than $4 billion in highway construction money would reach the economy by September 2010.

The economy has been in recession for more than a year, but many economists believe a recovery may begin by the end of 2009. That would mean that most of the infrastructure money wouldn't hit the economy until it's already on the mend.

The CBO analysis doesn't cover tax cuts or efforts by Democrats to provide relief to cash-strapped state governments to help with their Medicaid bills. But it illustrates just how difficult it can be to use public investment to rush money into the economy. It usually takes bids and contracts to announce such developments, which invariably take time.

Overall, only $26 billion out of $274 billion in infrastructure spending would be delivered into the economy by the Sept. 30 end of the budget year, just 7 percent. Just one in seven dollars of a huge $18.5 billion investment in energy efficiency and renewable energy programs would be spent within a year and a half.

And other pieces, such as efforts to bring broadband Internet service to rural and underserved areas won't get started in earnest for years, while just one-fourth of clean drinking water projects can be completed by October of next year.

Ramzi Binalshibh and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the self-proclaimed architect of the terrorist attacks, casually admitted taking part in the attacks during a series of outbursts as the translators struggled to keep up and the judge repeatedly sought to regain control.

"We did what we did; we're proud of Sept. 11," Binalshibh announced at one point in proceedings that dealt with a number of legal issues, including whether he is mentally competent to stand trial on charges that carry a potential death sentence.

Mohammed, who is representing himself, switched back and forth between Arabic and English, insisting at one point that a uniformed military lawyer assigned to assist him be removed from his defense table. The man, he said, represents the "people who tortured me," he said.

Mohammed shrugged off the potential death sentence he faces for charges that include the murder of nearly 3,000 people in the Sept. 11 attacks.

The U.N.'s highest court said the U.S. remains obliged to review the cases of about 50 other Mexicans on death row because they were denied access to their consulate after they were arrested.

But it rejected Mexico's request that Washington guarantee that each case will be reviewed and reconsidered.

Both Mexico and the United States said they were satisfied with elements of the decision.

"It was a mixed result," said John Bellinger III, the legal adviser to the U.S. State Department.

He said the court refused Mexico's main request to spell out the U.S. obligations toward the arrested Mexican nationals, which likely would have led to heightened demands on the U.S. courts. But he was "disappointed" the tribunal declined to acknowledge efforts by the Bush administration to comply with international law and with the court's order.

The Mexican government applauded the ruling in a statement and urged U.S. President-elect Barack Obama to "take concrete actions" to comply with the ruling and "respect the rights of all Mexican nationals." Obama takes office Tuesday.

The judgment ended a five-year cascade of proceedings in the wake of a 2004 decision by the same court that the U.S. had violated an international treaty by failing to advise 51 Mexicans of their consular rights. The court required that each case be reviewed to determine whether the lack of diplomatic access could have affected the outcome of their cases.

Workers in the 27-nation European Union cannot lose the right to a paid vacation just because they are ill, the European Court of Justice ruled.

Its ruling clarified the meaning of the EU labor legislation at the request of a German and a British court hearing cases of workers denied paid leave due to illness.

The EU's Working Time Directive requires governments to ensure national paid vacation rules do not end up eroding the right to paid leave, the EU court said. It said that right cannot evaporate because of illness and workers must be able to take a paid leave in another period.

The ruling immediately drew criticism. Letting workers accrue paid vacation benefits while on sick leave "will have serious and practical" problems for employers, said Tim Marshall, a partner and head of employment at DLA Piper LLP in London, one of the world's largest law firms, which represents many multinational corporations.

"In these difficult times further constraints could prove too much for some employers," he added.

Earthjustice, an environmental law firm based in Washington, sued the Environmental Protection Agency in 2007 on behalf of activist groups. The firm said existing federal regulations that exempted older cement kilns failed to impose adequate mercury pollution controls.

Nine states, including New York and Michigan, also joined the suit, contending the agency had not based its standards on the latest pollution control technology.

About 150 kilns around the nation generate nearly 23,000 pounds of airborne mercury a year, according to Earthjustice. Mercury, a toxic metal that can damage the brain and nervous system, is generated from the raw materials and some fuels used in cement-making.

The agency had issued mercury regulations for cement plants three years ago, but they applied only to kilns built after Dec. 2, 2005. Most operating kilns, however, were built earlier and were exempt.

Under the settlement, the agency will propose a mercury rule for all plants by March 31 and make a final decision within a year.

"EPA is carefully considering what an appropriate standard should be for mercury emissions from cement kilns," spokeswoman Cathy Milbourn said.