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For League of Women Voters, prison system is a shambles By BARBARA TAORMINAUnion Leader Correspondent Residents packed a small meeting room at the Hollis Social Library Wednesday night to hear the first of three lectures about the plight of women in New Hampshire's state prison.Sponsored by the Hollis Women's Club, "Take the Keys and Lock Her Up," is the result of three years of research by members of the League of Women Voters of New Hampshire, who are now sharing what they've learned. The talks offer some background on the state's decision to defend against a lawsuit filed by four women inmates at the State Prison for Women in Goffstown, alleging the state is violating their constitutional rights by failing to treat them the way male inmates are treated. "There's a vast expanse of difference in how we are treating men and women," said league co-president Liz Tentarelli, who headed up the study with league vice president Peg Fargo. According to Tentarelli and Fargo, men at the state prison on Concord have access to medical care when they need it. But at Goffstown, state budget cuts now mean there's no back up for a staff that's already stretched thin. If the Goffstown nurse calls in sick, there's no infirmary that day and inmates who are sick stay in their cells.At Concord, a mental health staff provides consistent care for male inmates with structured group treatment and activities, crisis intervention and a special unit for the mentally ill. "They are not providing adequate treatment for mental health and substance abuse at the Goffstown women's prison," said Tentarelli. Fargo said there's a tremendous need for those services.As many as 90 percent of the women in the prison have drug- or alcohol-related issues, said Fargo. A large majority have trauma-related problems. They have been abused physically or emotionally at some time in their lives. At Concord, men can attend classes and study for high school diplomas four days a week. Teachers spend the fifth day at Goffstown. An industrial training program at Concord offers inmates a chance to learn trades such as building wooden furniture, upholstering, graphic arts and cooking. "This is what women learn for skills," said Tentarelli as she clicked a button on a laptop that flashed an image of crocheted baby blankets and hand-painted birdhouses on the screen above her head. For the women there is no training for skills that would provide a competitive wage, she said. Part of the problem is the old building at Goffstown, which doesn't have space for those types of programs. It also doesnt have space for the inmates. The building has room for 105 inmates. There are currently 127 women there but, in the past, there have been as many as 140. At one point there were 60 women sharing three toilets, said Fargo. The League of Women Voters is the fourth group to study the conditions at Goffstown, and no one denies there are problems. And just about everyone agrees that a new system with better services is the key to helping inmates rebuild their lives and avoid returning to prison once they are released. But for years, the state Legislature has voted against spending $37 million to build a new women's prison, Fargo said. The cost of construction has risen to $42 million, and the state is waiting to hear from a consultant hired to review bids from private companies interested taking over the entire prison system. The League is researching the privatization of prisons and, so far, members aren't optimistic about what they've learned. "It's our great hope that this might be our year," said Tentarelli. "We are hoping that a new group of legislators will begin to look at a better solution. It's still a very punitive system when you put people in a facility where there is no hope." The League has looked at different solutions and when members return to Hollis on Feb. 6, they will talk about alternative sentencing for non-violent offenders. The last talk of the series will focus on the option of privatizing prisons and on education and training and how to help women become self-sufficient. For Fargo, the immediate goal is to start the conversation on the impact incarcerating women has on those individuals, their children and families, and their cities and towns. "This is a time when New Hampshire should be sitting down as a group trying to figure out what we want to do here," she said. "What do you want to do?" she asked the small crowd in Hollis. "These women will be released and they are coming back to your community."btaromina@newstote.com

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Obama decides not to extend term of jobs council By JOSH LEDERMANAssociated Press AP FILE PHOTO General Electric Chairman and CEO Jeff Immelt listens at right as President Barack Obama meets with the Council on Jobs and Competitiveness. WASHINGTON, D.C. — President Barack Obama is letting his jobs council expire, cutting off one source of input from business leaders while unemployment remains stubbornly high. Obama formed the Council on Jobs and Competitiveness in January 2011, when unemployment was about 9 percent. It’s now 7.8 percent, though more than 12 million people are out of work. Obama’s executive order establishing the council said it would go out of business Jan. 31, 2013. The White House said Thursday that Obama had no plans to renew its charter. “The work of the jobs council was very valuable,” White House spokesman Jay Carney said. “While the president didn’t agree with all of its recommendations, he agreed with many of them and acted on a number of them.” White House officials said Obama intended for the council to fulfill its mission and then wind down, and that he would seek input about the economy from business leaders in other ways. Among the steps Obama plans to pursue are expedited permits for public works projects, plus programs to boost entrepreneurship and workforce development. Even before Obama’s decision was clear, Republicans seized on the council’s likely expiration as evidence the president hadn’t spent enough time on trying to create jobs, which is a priority for Americans. The Republican National Committee called it part of “the failed Obama record,” while the House Republicans’ campaign committee, in an online petition, accused Obama of laying off his own jobs council. Adding to the concern about the job market’s vulnerability, the Commerce Department said Wednesday that the U.S. economy shrank at an annual rate of 0.1 percent from October through December of last year, the first quarterly drop since 2009. The Federal Reserve said the economy appears to have “paused in recent months.” The jobs council was a successor to an economic advisory board Obama created at the onset of his presidency. The panel was chaired by General Electric CEO Jeff Immelt and included prominent business leaders and economists. Immelt said Thursday that progress has been made on putting in place 90 percent of the council’s recommendations. Obama met with the council only a few times. During the last meeting, in February 2012, the president and the council highlighted an engineering education initiative alongside school deans. “The president treated his jobs council as more of a nuisance than a vehicle to spur job creation,” said Brendan Buck, a spokesman for House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio. The council’s main product was a report, “Roadmap to Renewal,” that was released in January 2012. The council also organized a series of meetings across the country last year with business owners, elected officials and academics; Obama didn’t attend those election-year sessions. Critics have argued that the council’s primary purpose was to create the appearance of action at a time when the nation was pining for something to rein in soaring joblessness. The administration acted on many of the council’s recommendations, including suggestions to streamline permitting and small business loans, increase tourist visas and boost energy efficiency. But the White House was at odds with several council members on tax policies, particularly a proposal to exclude overseas corporate earnings from U.S. taxes. That idea divided even the jobs council, whose membership included labor and Obama’s political allies. “It was helpful in terms of putting a spotlight on a variety of issues, but particularly helpful in the area of entrepreneurship,” said AOL co-founder Steve Case, a member of the panel, in an interview. “There’s still work to be done, but we did make good progress.” The council’s dissolution also comes as White House aides are optimistic about the prospects for a second-term detente with business. During Obama’s first term, business leaders bristled at his harsh depiction of “fat-cat bankers” and his efforts to impose regulations, tax policies and spending initiatives they argued were unfriendly to business. Obama aides hope the warming of ties between the president and the business world can benefit the White House in future fiscal debates with Republicans. White House officials said the president made a fresh effort to reach out to business in the days following his re-election. Between the November election and the end of 2012, in the height of negotiations to avert the “fiscal cliff,” more than 400 business leaders, ranging from CEOs of large multinational companies to small business owners, met with Obama or his aides at the White House, officials said.

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New London mayor favors new approach to taxation Hartford - The idea of taxing land at a higher rate than the buildings on it is coming up for discussion again under a proposal from the Municipal Opportunities Regional Efficiencies Commission.Buildings and land currently are taxed at the same rate for property tax purposes. The new model is called "land value taxation," commonly shortened to LVT.Joshua Vincent, executive director of the Philadelphia-based Center for the Study of Economics, presented LVT information to the M.O.R.E. commission and worked with New London several years ago when it explored applying LVT to city properties.He said raising tax rates for land and lowering them for buildings would provide a municipality with the same amount of revenue but would encourage development. Some owners of multiple properties don't revitalize or take care of their buildings, he said."(LVT) would discourage easy holding of vacant land," Vincent said. "The higher tax on land would encourage people to sell and enter the market."The proposal being discussed would create a pilot program for up to three municipalities.The legislature passed, and the governor signed into law, a similar program in 2009 in which the City of New London would have been the pilot municipality if the process had not stalled at the city level.This time around, there are many interested cities, including Norwich, Waterbury, Bridgeport, New Haven and Hartford, according to Vincent.Those selected for the pilot program would need to create a process for implementing the differing tax rates, designate a geographic area for the program and identify legal and administrative issues.Past resistanceArt Costa, former chairman of the New London committee charged with evaluating the benefits of adopting the LVT pilot program three years ago, said the original plan was to apply LVT throughout the city. The majority of committee members, some of whom owned large parcels of land in the city, voted against the program in 2010.The New London City Council asked for a six-month extension, but Costa said the city never received an answer from the state.Gian-Carl Casa, spokesman for the Office of Policy and Management, said OPM told the committee it did not have the authority to make an extension and that the committee would need a legislative "fix" to get the extension.Much of the resistance to the program three years ago came from people who said LVT would hurt owners of large lots, such as car dealerships, New London Mayor Daryl Justin Finizio said.But Finizio, who took office in 2011, said that if New London were chosen to participate this time, he would focus on the downtown area and exempt waterfront properties and large lots."I support it because I believe it will remove one of the largest disincentives to revitalization in downtown New London," Finizio said Tuesday.There are buildings downtown with collapsing roofs or crumbling façades and other buildings being sold because owners aren't paying taxes on them, Finizio said.Developers take a look at a property and assess how much it would cost to renovate and how much the market value of the property would increase afterwards. Often, they decide that property taxes on the newly renovated building would be too high, negating the benefit of renovation, Finizio said.He said banks often refuse to finance renovation projects because of estimated poor returns.Right time for New LondonThe latest LVT proposal came out of the M.O.R.E. commission's Municipal Tax Authority working group. The commission is made up of state legislators, local officials, advocates and concerned citizens and is responsible for finding ways to reduce municipal costs and save taxpayers money.The working group's final recommendations will be reviewed by House Speaker Brendan Sharkey, D-Hamden, and other commission chairmen, said state Rep. Elissa Wright, D-Groton, a member of the group.The LVT proposal is one idea that working group chairman, state Rep. Jeffrey Berger, D-Waterbury, said he would like to see passed this session.Wright said she has some reservations about the proposal because without a uniform tax rate, it might be more difficult to compare the tax impact on different properties. But, she said, the topic warrants discussion for urban areas."(Lower taxes on buildings) is going to provide a greater return on investment after tax," Wright said.If it becomes law, a newly renovated building would still be taxed more than if the building hadn't been renovated, but the spike in taxes would be much smaller, Finizio said."This is an opportune time, with other developments in New London such as the National Coast Guard Museum," Finizio said. These new developments, combined with the tax program, would be an excellent way to spur revitalization, he said.Vincent said there were some lessons learned from New London's prior attempt. For instance, this new proposal would require more of the committee stakeholders to be from the city government, he said.Primarily property owners comprised the former committee, Costa said.j.somers@theday.com Taking a different approach to local taxation Land value tax would benefit New London NL should not pass on tax-reform chance New London puts off tax-reform decision New tax idea draws supporters, foes to NL hearing Panel opposes tax overhaul Property Tax Shift Could Invigorate New London

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Tea party may lose local members to 'less partisan' group Editor's note: This is corrected from an earlier version.Hartford - Some local members are considering abandoning tea party groups and instead joining Americans for Prosperity, a grassroots organization aimed at educating and mobilizing citizens around economic policy issues."In the last 2½ years, the liberal press and Democrats have demonized the tea party to the point where when someone mentions it, they kind of roll their eyes and say 'those' people," said Norbert "Bud" Fay, chairman of Waterford Tea Party Patriots, which will be ending its alliance with the Tea Party Patriots.Each tea party group and member will have to make its own choice as to whether to switch to the Americans for Prosperity group, stay with the tea party or become members of both.Supporters of the change say that Americans for Prosperity has a better connotation, can raise funds and advertise, and is about issues and not a particular political party. However, Americans for Prosperity is said to have worked with the tea party, and several tea party locals say the two groups' philosophies are quite similar.Fay said he is moving to Americans for Prosperity and plans to serve as chairman of Americans for Prosperity Shoreline.The 55 to 60 members of the Waterford Tea Party Patriots group, members of Americans for Prosperity in New London County and the public are invited to the new group’s meeting at 7 p.m. on July 24 at the Waterford Public Library, Fay said.He said Americans for Prosperity has more than 6,000 members in New London County.The last meeting of the Waterford Tea Party Patriots will be from 7 to 9 p.m. today at the library, Fay said. At the meeting, members will discuss termination of the group's alliance with the Tea Party Patriots and ask whether anyone wants to take over as chairman, Fay said in an email.Mike Hannan, member of the Waterford Tea Party Patriots group, said he is switching to Americans for Prosperity because there are more fundraising opportunities and more the potential to get more people involved.As a 501(c)4, Americans for Prosperity may collect tax-deductible funds and use them for advertising, fliers and getting out the vote, he said.He said he also favors the group because it has a local and state focus and "seems to be non-partisan."Fay said, "We are more inclined to have an organization that is not Republican or Democrat. It is a non-political, political organization."The group was founded in 2004 by David H. and Charles G. Koch of Koch Industries. It has worked closely with conservative groups, according to news reports.Joseph Romano, state director for Americans for Prosperity-Connecticut, said the Connecticut chapter's aim is to educate voters and advocate for issues such as economic freedom, cutting taxes, school choice and right to work."These are issues that tea party people share," he said.Jen Ezzell, organizer of the Second District Tea Party Patriots, said not all tea party groups in Connecticut would switch. She said she has an email list of 1,500 people and it would be up to each of them to decide for themselves.She said she didn't think local tea party groups would disappear. She said her group has been encouraging members to make an impact by serving on school boards, state central committees and town committees."The tea party movement is about keeping people informed and close to the source (of information) as possible," she said.Americans for Prosperity plans to create legislative score cards on particular issues."We are about policy, not politics," Romano said.Hannan, of the Waterford Tea Party Patriots group, said he hopes Americans for Prosperity would help inform people in southeastern Connecticut and would have an impact on elections, local to gubernatorial."(Residents) could tell you more what is going on with Beyonce or TMZ than local government," Hannan said. "It's discouraging sometimes because you feel like you are banging your head against a wall."j.somers@theday.com

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Councilman Sees No Need For Town Subcommittees Posted on 05/28/2009 by Staff Writer OCEAN CITY – Joe Hall might be the only one vocalizing it, but he might not be alone in thinking that town commissions are “inefficient” and “useless.” It could be noted as ironic that one of Joe Hall’s main campaign promises leading up to his October election was to shrink the local government, thus giving more power and a stronger voice to the business community. What’s ironic about it, however, is that at Tuesday’s work session of the Mayor and City Council, Hall called for the potential dismantling of departmental committees, which often include the business community, citing that he wants council to hear all the information and make all the final decisions. “The commission process is broken,” said Hall. “It creates an inefficiency rather than an efficiency, and when we are dealing with big ticket items, I think the discussion should be had at the council level rather than up in the convention center with only a handful of the council present.” After each election, the mayor appoints members of the council to several different committees, which essentially help to micromanage large areas of concern for the town, all while bringing in representatives from the town’s partners throughout the community for their feedback on issues that effect them as well. For instance, the tourism commission, which meets at the Roland E. Powell Convention Center, consists of three council members (Mary Knight, Margaret Pillas and Lloyd Martin), the mayor and representatives from various groups including the Chamber of Commerce, Hotel-Motel-Restaurant Association and the Economic Development Committee. Hall claimed that most of the discussion involving “essential information for making the right decision” pertaining to issues such as the recent recommendations from the tourism commission to grant MGH the $178,000 website contract for the redesign of www.ococean.com and the recommendation to extend MGH’s advertising contract for 15 months (both recommendations Hall denied when it came before council); took place without the full council’s presence. “I want to be privy to the same information as they were while they were making that decision,” said Hall. “My only obligation is to the people who voted for me, and I want to have all the information as it’s presented, and not get some predetermined recommendation by the time it gets to council.” Mayor Rick Meehan, on the other hand, vehemently disagreed. “I couldn’t disagree with Joe (Hall) more,” said Meehan. “Look, we didn’t invent this process; it’s proven to work and will continue to work effectively. In Annapolis, they break up into smaller subcommittees to investigate more issues and can attend to matters that way much more efficiently.” The mayor went on to imply that Hall’s issue might be one of trust. “I trust my colleagues up here, and I know if they come back from a committee meeting with a recommendation, I am going to take a good look at it, and consider their thoughts,” said Meehan. “It’s not like they have the whole HMRA up there, they send a representative who speaks on their behalf. These committees will continue to work if people just put some trust in their colleagues.” Hall might not be alone in his thought process, however, as Councilwoman Margaret Pillas mirrored some of his thoughts concerning the committees. “If we are going to talk about big money issues or controversial ones, I think it should be done in front of the full council, rather than just on the committee level,” said Pillas. “There’s always a possibility that someone could see things from a different point of view. All this would do is provide more transparency in government, which I think is always a good thing.” Hall hinted that he would like to see the restructuring of the tourism commission to resemble the Ocean City Development Corporation (OCDC), which in his mind, would create and “authority rather than just a commission” to address the town’s number one asset: tourism. Councilwoman Mary Knight, who also sits as the chairperson on the tourism commission, also frowned upon Hall’s claims and idea. “These committees are in place so we don’t become full-time micromanagers as a council,” said Knight, “I fully respect all those entities at the table to the Nth degree. Why would we empower department heads to make decisions if we are just going to make all the decisions for them?”

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Sides Agree Divided Body Needs Better Relations Posted on 11/23/2011 by Staff Writer SALISBURY — Tensions continue to mount between Salisbury’s administration and the City Council majority. With conflicts beginning to disrupt meetings, the question of how to address the problem remains open. Ever since the changing of the guard that took place last spring when the council saw the induction of two new members and the election of a new president, the council majority and Mayor Jim Ireton have been at odds. “They’re pushing buttons on both sides,” said Councilwoman Laura Mitchell, a member of the council minority. Ireton has made a number of allegations against the council majority and President Terry Cohen specifically. He has accused the group of attempting to obscure facts and cut the public out of government. Additionally, Ireton claims the majority has purposefully been dragging their feet on a number of perennial city issues, such as defining a police towing ordinance and making decisions regarding the intersection of Onley Rd. and Bateman St. Sparks flew Monday when, after asking Cohen to clarify some facts about Firehouse 16, a publically owned property, Ireton was vocal about his dissatisfaction with the response, calling it “long-winded.” The comment snowballed into an argument between Ireton and Cohen, with Cohen eventually calling an unscheduled recess. “At this last council work session, the mayor took council’s limited time away from discussion with its invited professional guest and would not yield the floor when asked by the chair. His outburst was unprovoked,” Cohen said. It was just the latest in an ongoing serious of clashes between the administration and council majority. Two weeks ago, Ireton issued a press release denouncing the majority for missing an opportunity from Wal-Mart to use off-duty police officers as security on Black Friday. According to Ireton, the majority delayed because of political reasons to a point where Wal-Mart withdrew the offer. Cohen immediately responded with her own press release calling out Ireton for a number of misrepresented facts in his statement. She also denied his allegation that there were any politics involved in the majority’s decision not to immediately accept the offer from Wal-Mart. According to Cohen, the majority has been open in its practices and does not seek to keep anything hidden from the public. She also asserted that the conflict is one-sided, and it is Ireton’s constant accusations that are becoming disruptive to government. “From the beginning of its term in April, the council has made clear its desire to work collaboratively with the mayor and made numerous accommodations,” Cohen said. “The answer in the short term is for the mayor to refrain from unprofessional behaviors that hinder the work of the council.” While Mitchell acknowledged that Ireton is usually the one to make accusations, she expressed displeasure with the way Cohen and the majority often respond and said in some cases she considers it passive-aggressive. “It’s unprofessional and it’s a disappointment,” she said. “We’re the city’s leaders. We were elected to be city leaders. We cannot act like children. We need to lead by example.” Ireton could not be reached for comment. Mitchell recommended both sides come together to seek some form of conflict resolution counseling. The conflict between the two sides is surfacing more often and Mitchell stressed that some kind of truce needs to be reached before government efficiency is impaired, whether that ceasefire be found through group conflict resolution attempts or some other strategy.

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NEW FOR THURSDAY: Fire Company Denies Role In Berlin Mayor Write-In Effort Posted on 10/11/2012 by Staff Writer BERLIN — While a surprise write-in candidate for mayor shook up what was expected to be a quiet election in Berlin this week, the last-minute effort was not successful enough to change the composition of the council. <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office"> After voters hit the polls Tuesday, Mayor Gee Williams, District II Councilmember Lisa Hall and District III Councilmember Elroy Brittingham emerged victorious in their re-election bids. Of the three, Hall was the only one to have an official opponent on the ballot, Ronald Marney, who achieved 68 votes to her 169. Brittingham ran completely unopposed. The big surprise of the day came in the mayor’s race, however, with write-in candidate Ellen Lang managing to secure 122 votes. Williams earned 335 votes, but still expressed deep irritation at the manner in which Lang came out of nowhere to almost perform an election upset. According to Williams, it wasn’t an underdog story but an unethical attempt by a special interest in the town to purposefully setup an uncontested election and then take advantage of low voter turnout to throw a coup for mayor. Williams accused the Berlin Fire Company (BFC) of attempting to “ambush” him by not finding a candidate to declare an official run for mayor and campaign but instead waiting until the election appeared all but won before conducting a massive write-in effort. “It has been verified that the Berlin Fire Company is campaigning today to have another town resident,” claimed Williams in a statement posted to his Facebook, “who has not filed for election, be elected by write-in vote as Mayor of the Town of Berlin. Rather than openly encourage and support a candidate to run against me, they are trying this underhanded and behind the scenes tactic, to eliminate me as Mayor.” Williams went on to call for all residents who care about “responsibility, respect, and the truth,” to head to the polls and vote their support in what they likely thought was supposed to be an uncontested election. He went on to describe the entire situation as a “sneak attack” and labeled it “not only unorthodox but unprecedented around here.” A few days after Williams’ accusations, the BFC issued a statement denying any involvement in the election. “The Mayor’s accusation is false,” read the statement. “The fire company has not participated in support of any political campaigns, as is our formal policy.” The statement went on to note that individual members of the company are free to support any candidate they wish but that the BFC doesn’t ever lend “organizational support” to any member’s campaign efforts. “Mayor Williams should recognize the distinction,” continued the statement. “The fire company’s policy of non-involvement in elections is clear and long-standing. … Of further concern is the fact that individual fire company members were approached by candidates at the polls, asked their names and asked to disclose for whom they voted – and going so far as to take pictures – merely because they wore a fire company tag or had a fire company sticker on their vehicle. No candidate should be entitled to press any voter for such information.” Williams was skeptical that the campaigning for Lang by BFC members happened without the knowledge and consent of company leadership, which Williams has repeatedly called “irresponsible” in the way they are handling the situation between the agency and the town. The public issues between the town and the BFC are relatively recent. Allegations of employee harassment last February in the company led the town to step-in and conduct an investigation which resulted in the eventual dismissal of a veteran member of the BFC and an increase in involvement by the town in day-to-day company operations. This in turn didn’t set well with BFC leadership, which claimed the council’s presence was interfering with the company’s first priority of public safety. The BFC then severed all authority the council held over it, prompting the council to cut all town funding to the company to the tune of about $600,000 a year. It is Williams’ belief that this split was the basis of the BFC’s alleged covert campaign to oust him. “It was a referendum, as I see it, on Berlin’s future,” said Williams, who later said “a lot of people went to the polls to make a statement … I think many citizens who voted are appalled by the tactics and intent of the fire company.” However bumpy the election might have been, Williams said that he has already put it behind him and is excited in approaching his new term. He outlined three early goals that he would like the council to work toward including expanding parking downtown, fighting to lower the non-residential electric rate, and setting up a stormwater utility to deal with Berlin’s long-running flooding issues. Coming off her own recent victory, Hall also announced that she believes stormwater is a priority issue in Berlin, though she didn’t go so far as to advocate for a separate town utility as is Williams’ plan. This article was written by Staff Writer, Travis Brown. Bookmark the permalink.Posted inTop Stories Top Stories - Home One comment on “NEW FOR THURSDAY: Fire Company Denies Role In Berlin Mayor Write-In Effort” WAGS on 10/11/2012 at 6:36 am said: Is a write in legal? If so, shut up Mayor, you won. You can’t tell people how to vote. If enough people chose to write in a person and they beat you, so be it.

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Egypt suffers economic losses from violence against women Published November 9th, 2011 - 07:57 GMT Violence against women has been and is still exercised as an old and prolonged phenomenon in Egypt. Violence against women has been and is still exercised as an old and prolonged phenomenon in Egypt. It is largely expanding, often due to low cultural or social environments. Dr. Azza Karim, professor of sociology at the National Center for Social and Criminological Research stresses that by accepting violence, and tolerating it as normal or natural, encourages the continuance of violence against women. A recent study noted that the Egyptian economy lost about 150 billion pounds over the last 50 years due to violence against women. This figure does not include the loss of direct materials or the moral losses compounding the social environment. Dr. Hamdi Hinawi, the leader of the study, affirmed that there is an annual $3 billion and 322 million pound bill borne by society due to violence against women. The study aimed to assess the economic costs of the violence, which includes not only the financial burden on the community’s budget, or the allocation of its resources to address the effects of violence, but also the loss to society, production and national income that could have been achieved if the violence was not part of the community. Dr. Hinawi’s study shows that the culture of the community is to look down on women, which leads to the poor treatment of women including a combination of coercion and/or beatings, which begins in childhood, training subservience and submissiveness, later decreasing their access to opportunities. Dr. Hinawi notes that economic costs resulting from violence against women are either direct costs represented in the treatment of injuries incident because of violence, the disruption of women’s work, the cost of disruption to family members who need to take off work to take care of the women, or indirect costs such as lack of productivity, the low contribution to GDP, and a low income community. (Source: www.yallafinance.com [1]) © 2011 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com [2]) Source URL: http://www.albawaba.com/business/egypt-suffers-economic-losses-violence-against-women-400323 Links:[1] http://www.yallafinance.com

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IRCA in Retrospect: Guideposts for Today’s Immigration Reform By Muzaffar Chishti and Charles Kamasaki Tackling Brain Waste among Immigrant Professionals: Initiatives to Improve the Recognition of Foreign Qualifications Top 10 of 2013 – Issue #6: Faced with a Growing Global Talent Pool, Governments Review their Strategies Top 10 of 2013 – Issue #7: As Bill to Overhaul U.S. Immigration System Stalls in Congress, Immigration Reform Movement Broadens, Ups the Ante By Claire Bergeron Skilled Immigrants in the Global Economy: Prospects for International Cooperation on Recognition of Foreign Qualifications By Madeleine Sumption, Demetrios G. Papademetriou, and Sarah Flamm Migration and Development: Policy Perspectives from the United States Eight Policies to Boost the Economic Contribution of Employment-Based Immigration The Role of Immigration in Fostering Competitiveness in the United States Immigrants in the United States: How Well Are They Integrating into Society? By Tomás R. Jiménez Evolving Demographic and Human-Capital Trends in Mexico and Central America and Their Implications for Regional Migration By Aaron Terrazas, Demetrios G. Papademetriou, and Marc R. Rosenblum Filipino Immigrants in the United States Immigrants from the Philippines made up 4.5 percent of the 40.4 million immigrants in the United States in 2011. Although this population—1.8 million strong in 2011—has grown 17 times its size since 1960, its share among Asian immigrants overall has decreased since that year. This article examines the latest data on Filipino immigrants in the United States, including population size, geographic distribution, admission categories, and demographic and socioeconomic characteristics. Online Journal As Congress Tackles Immigration Legislation, State Lawmakers Retreat from Strict Measures State-level immigration laws have gradually softened in tone since the Supreme Court in 2012 affirmed federal primacy in immigration enforcement in a landmark Arizona case — a trend further solidified by a changed post-election political calculus on immigration reform. This article examines this unanticipated shift away from restrictive state immigration actions as well as the recent new trend in the passage of immigrant-friendly laws regarding in-state tuition and the granting of driver's licenses to unauthorized immigrants. Online Journal Counting the Uncountable: Overseas Americans The immigration debate in the United States often focuses on how many foreign born enter and reside in the country. Much less attention is paid to Americans who live abroad—a population estimated at anywhere from 2 million to 7 million. This article examines the challenges of enumerating this population and also explores top destinations for American expats, their livelihoods, and motivations for leaving the United States. South American Immigrants in the United States Immigrants from South America made up 2.7 million (about 7 percent) of the United States' foreign-born population of 40.4 million in 2011. While the share may seem small, this population has grown 30 times its size since 1960, when about 90,000 South American immigrants resided in the country. This article examines the latest data on South American immigrants in the United States, including population size, geographic distribution, admission categories, and demographic and socioeconomic characteristics. Sweeping Senate Bill Sets the Stage for Fundamental Overhaul of U.S. Immigration System After months of negotiations, a bipartisan group of U.S. senators informally called the "Gang of Eight" in mid-April introduced long-awaited legislation for sweeping reform of the U.S. immigration system. This article provides a summary of the Senate bill's provisions and outlines the main critiques and obstacles ahead, including a tight legislative calendar, a difficult political dynamic in the House of Representatives, and an early stumbling block precipitated by the Boston Marathon bombing. Video, Audio January 31, 2011 Delegation and Divergence: 287(g) State and Local Immigration Enforcement 287(g) programs have surged into the public consciousness in recent years. Now operating in 72 jurisdictions, the 287(g) program authorizes state and local law enforcement officers to screen people for immigration status, issue detainers to hold unauthorized immigrants on immigration violations, and begin the process of their removal from the United States. Video, Audio January 13, 2011 Does Low-Skilled Immigration Hurt the U.S. Economy? Assessing the Evidence In a report by MPI's Labor Markets Initiative, noted economist and Georgetown University Public Policy Institute Professor Harry J. Holzer examines the economic reasoning and research on these questions and looks at the policy options that shape the impact of less-skilled immigration on the economy. The discussion is on what policy reform would best serve native-born American workers, consumers, and employers, as well as the overall U.S. economy. Video November 30, 2010 Diasporas: New Partners in Global Development Policy Over the past year, MPI has partnered with the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation to examine how diasporas contribute to – or detract from - development efforts in their countries of origin. MPI and USAID have published an edited volume of the research. Please join us for the release of the book where speakers will discuss new thinking on the role of diaspora engagement in U.S. foreign and development policy. Video, Audio October 14, 2010 U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Alan Bersin Discusses His Vision for CBP Commissioner Bersin details his agenda for his agency and discusses illegal immigration, border enforcement, the impact to the economy on migration flows, the future of the Secure Border Initiative, drug trafficking, and other topics in this wide-ranging conversation with MPI Senior Fellow Doris Meissner and the audience. Video, Audio September 20, 2010 Still an Hourglass?: Immigrant Workers in Middle-Skilled Jobs This important MPI report challenges the conventional wisdom about the immigrant workforce, using a sophisticated new method of analysis that permits deeper examination of how workers – immigrant and native-born – fare by economic sector, the skill level of their jobs, and educational attainment. Pages« first‹ previous…67891011121314next ›last » Audio July 14, 2011 Labor Standards Enforcement and Low-Wage Immigrants: Creating an Effective Enforcement System This Migration Policy Institute webinar discusses labor enforcement laws during the Clinton, Bush and Obama administrations and chronicles gaps in labor protection. Audio June 13, 2011 Migration and Great Recession: The Transatlantic Experience This Migration Policy Institute event was held to discuss the release of MPI'sbook, Migration and the Great Recession: The Transatlantic Experience, which reviews how the financial and economic crisis of the late 2000s marked a sudden and dramatic interruption in international migration trends. Audio March 23, 2011 Discussion on the Situation of Colombian Refugees in Panama and Ecuador Please join us for this discussion on the situation of Colombian refugees in Panama and Ecuador; their living situations; legal status; their access to employment, health care, or education; and the treatment of groups of particular concern, like Afro-Colombian refugees, unaccompanied Colombian minors, and refugee women. Is the United States Bad for Children’s Health? Risk and Resilience among Young Children of Immigrants This report summarizes new data on the health of the children of immigrants, who represent nearly one-fourth of all children in the United States under the age of 18, finding that those with Mexican immigrant parents in particular tend to experience greater childhood health risks than most of their peers. This brief examines how the Senate's 2013 comprehensive immigration reform legislation would reshape the legal immigration system through its admission policies and creation of a new merit-based visa stream and points-based system. It also offers estimates of future migration flows, where they can be determined. Shaping Our Futures: The Educational and Career Success of Washington State’s Immigrant Youth This report examines the high school completion, college access, and postsecondary success of immigrant youth (ages 16 to 26) in Washington State, where one in four young adults is an immigrant or child of an immigrant. The report provides one of the first cross-system analyses of the educational experiences of first-generation (foreign-born) and second-generation (U.S.-born with immigrant parents) youth in the state. Health Care for Immigrant Families: Current Policies and Issues Low-income immigrant children are less likely than their U.S.-born citizen counterparts to see a doctor even when they are insured. Similarly, immigrant adults are less likely to use emergency rooms than low-income natives. This report examines health care coverage and usage among immigrants and the U.S. born. A Demographic, Socioeconomic, and Health Coverage Profile of Unauthorized Immigrants in the United States This issue brief provides updated data, based on the Census Bureau's 2011 American Community Survey, on unauthorized immigrants in the United States, their demographic and socioeconomic characteristics, and their health care coverage. The analysis marks the first time that self-reported data on LPR status have been used to generate a national profile of unauthorized immigrants.

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Timothy Spangler: The Iron Lady's enduring legacy Any assessment of Margaret Thatcher's legacy in Britain and around the world will always be made more difficult by the intense divisiveness that she inspired, both among her more obvious opponents, as well as within the political party she led. More so than any other British leader in recent memory, she was the ultimate "Marmite politician" – you either loved her or you hated her. Indifference was not an option. As she did during her time in office, Thatcher still invokes broad praise and bitter resentment upon her passing. She had a tendency to "handbag" those she felt stood in the way of the changes that were necessary to fix Britain. Although she was more prone to compromise and deft action than her critics often acknowledge, she would not step back from a fight if a fight was necessary to accomplish her goals. When she first came to national prominence as Education Secretary – the only woman in Ted Heath's government – she soon became known as "Thatcher the milk snatcher" for taking away universal free milk for British schoolchildren. Few would have picked her out at this stage as eventually reaching the highest public office in British politics. Thatcher also made it to the top table of international leaders. Interestingly, her eventual political demise came from her own party and the men whose careers she had developed during her time in office. Her opponents in the Labor Party and other left-wing groups were not able to displace her at the ballot box. In the end, she was too powerful a

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One, Maybe Two, Cheers for Glenn Greenwald Jonah Goldberg Lord knows that I have deep disagreements with Glenn Greenwald (not least on his extremely low opinion of me), but in fairness you’ve got to credit him with consistency. He hated Bush’s War on Terror policies, and he didn’t stop hating them just because Barack Obama became president. What I particularly appreciate is that Greenwald isn’t merely outraged by the intellectual hypocrisy of Obama’s supporters, he also acknowledges what might be called the emotional hypocrisy of those who admit the double standard exists. It’s not just that Bush’s critics opposed his policies, they cast his policies as anti-constitutional warmongering that posed a near-existential threat to the rule of law and human decency. When you listen to most of the handful of liberals who criticize Obama for what he’s doing, they almost uniformly criticize him more in sorrow than in anger. They’re intellectually troubled by what Obama is doing, but they see no reason to get worked up since there’s no real threat involved. It’s like they’re dismayed they have to concede a debating point, not that there’s anything to get really worked up about. As Jennifer Granholm puts it, no one really cares because liberals like her “trust” Obama. Now, as someone Greenwald wouldn’t hesitate to dub a “warmonger,” I will admit that I think Obama’s drone policy is basically right, though I think there’s room for updating and reforming how we do this sort of thing. A little more transparency and accountability would be a healthy thing. But if you saw Bush’s actions as a fundamental threat to the fabric of democracy and the rule of law, it’s hard for me to see how you can yawn at what Obama is doing. No doubt there are examples of hypocrisy on the conservative side of the scale, but it does seem to me that in the main this sort of double standard hits Republicans hardest. Woodrow Wilson abused his presidency far more than Richard Nixon ever dreamed, but it is considered a kind of crackpot obsession to point it out. FDR, too, was vastly more of an imperial president than Nixon or Reagan. But he is a saint. More to the point, the abuses of the Nixon presidency were largely made possible by the mechanisms established by Wilson and Roosevelt. It reminds me of one of my favorite quotes from the liberal Democratic senator Alan Cranston during the Watergate hearings. “Those who tried to warn us back at the beginning of the New Deal of the dangers of one-man rule that lay ahead on the path we were taking toward strong, centralized government may not have been so wrong.” Two final observations. I think one of the interesting things about moments like this is how they illuminate a fundamental dynamic of American politics. When Bush was in office, it was very difficult to distinguish the far leftist from the mainstream liberal. Michael Moore was treated like a hero by the Democratic establishment in Washington. Maureen Dowd celebrated Cindy Sheehan’s “absolute” moral authority and Code Pink was treated with respect and deference by many outlets. The ACLU had no problem placing experts and quotes in frontpage stories and nightly news broadcasts. But when Democrats are in power, most liberals bend to the man in charge. Suddenly the ACLU is cast as more of a benignly idealistic and irrelevant force. Cindy Sheehan and Codepink haven’t changed their views, but they are now a fringe outfit. People like Greenwald, who were treated as the voice of the opposition under Bush, are now treated like problematic gadflies by the same liberals who once eagerly fell in line behind them. A similar phenomenon took place under Bush to be sure. Whatever position Bush took, all too often became the de facto conservative position. The key difference is that conservatives control precious few mainstream outlets and so the conversation looked very different from the average voter’s perspective — because it was. Second, whatever the merits (and I think there are few) to the claim that conservatives and/or the GOP reflexively oppose ideas they would otherwise favor just because Obama supports them, this drone policy is a good counterexample. Despite some initially gleeful taunting of liberals over their hypocrisy — and Obama’s — most conservatives eventually came around to supporting Obama on his drone policy, at least in broad brushstrokes. I’m sure someone like Greenwald would dismiss this fact as nothing more than proof that warmongers care more about war than they care about partisanship (though we should remember these policies remain popular with the American people). But the conservatives have at least been consistent “warmongers.” The liberals who once denounced Bush’s actions as objectively evil and outrageous warmongering have switched simply because their guy is in the White House.

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Christie touts N.J.'s strong spirit post-Sandy; defends economic record in State of State speech Democrats criticize speech as high on rhetoric, short on details Gov. Chris Christie delivers his State of the State speech in Trenton. (Aaron Houston, NJBIZ) Gov. Chris Christie declared that the "spirit of New Jersey has never been stronger" in a State of the State address that focused mostly on the recovery from Hurricane Sandy. The governor praised the bipartisan cooperation in Trenton in the wake of Sandy and called on Congressional leaders in Washington to adopt the same spirit and pass a federal aid package for Sandy's victims."One thing I hope everyone in America now clearly understands – New Jersey, both Republicans and Democrats, will never stand silent when our citizens are being short changed," said Christie noting that its now been 72 days since the storm, nearly seven times the amount of time it took to get an aid package for victims of Hurricane Katrina.Christie also used the speech to defend his economic record. He said unemployment is on its way down and 2011 was the best year for private-sector job growth in 11 years. He said income tax receipts were exceeding the budgetary expectations prior to Sandy, though overall revenue was far below Christie's projections before Sandy, and was hurt even more by the storm.The governor said the state has added 75,000 private-sector jobs since he took office, while cutting 20,000 jobs. He said a property tax cap on municipalities resulted last year in the lowest average increase in more than two decades."We've held the line on taxes," he said. "We also have held the line on spending. And we have made New Jersey a more attractive place in which to grow a business, to grow jobs and to raise a family."The governor did not mention income taxes after last year proposing an across-the-board income tax cut. That plan was stalled when Democrats called the governor's revenue projections over-optimistic.After the speech, Sen. Pres. Stephen Sweeney (D-West Deptford) criticized the governor, saying the economy was in poor shape before Sandy, not because of Sandy. He said Christie's speech was high on rhetoric but contained little detail."Obviously he wants to erase the blackboard," Sweeney said. "He wants to erase it because it's bad. He's got a three-year history and it's not good."Assembly Speaker Sheila Y. Oliver (D-East Orange) called on the governor to approve the jobs package she and her fellow Democrats approved last month."New Jersey's economy was in turmoil before the storm and remains so with a 9.6 unemployment rate and economic growth that ranked 47th in the nation," Oliver said in a press release. "That's why Assembly Democrats passed numerous job creation bills in December and look forward to them finally getting the governor's attention and support."Senate Minority Leader Tom Kean Jr. (D-Westfield) said it would be wrong to draw conclusions from the omission of specific tax cut proposals. He said the governor has made clear he won't support tax increases, and that he generally would like to cut income taxes."But that's a specific that's best left for the budget address that's coming in a couple weeks where you actually put the parts of the New Jersey budget together," he said.Kean said the state is still waiting on second quarter revenue figures, so he said there's not yet enough information to offer specific proposals."This is a context to say Sandy was real, it impacted all of us," Kean said. "We are resilient and we are stronger going forward." Before the speech, business groups were looking for specifics from the governor on how he will lead both the recovery from Hurricane Sandy and the wider economic recovery. It had been widely expected that Sandy would be the dominant theme of the speech.Phil Kirschner, president of the New Jersey Business and Industry Association, said a focus on Sandy was important because the recovery is so closely tied to the state's economy."We feel very strongly that you cannot have a full recovery in New Jersey unless the tourism and hospitality industry in this state is up to par," he said. "And time is of the essence."Marilou Halvorsen, president of the New Jersey Restaurant Association, said many of her members are still at the starting gate when it comes to the recovery. She'll be listening for word of targeted tax relief and other legislation to help Sandy-impacted businesses both in the short and medium terms.Before the speech, Halvorsen said she's also hoping for a plan to encourage tourists to return."Unfortunately, New Jersey has been the focus of a lot of negative publicity," she said. "And I think there's a misconception that our shores and beaches are devastated. So (we'd welcome) anything they can do to promote New Jersey as a tourist destination."John Galandak, president of the Commerce and Industry Association of New Jersey, said earlier he was interested to see Christie's vision for how the recovery will unfold."Lots of people have lots of good ideas about not just restoring the shore but going a step further and preventing a future catastrophe," he said. "It's really just a question about priorities and what gets fixed first."Dean J. Paranicas, president and CEO of the HealthCare Institute of New Jersey, a life sciences industry trade group, said before the speech he was interested in how the governor plans to continue his efforts at improving the business climate."We certainly understand that the governor's immediate and most pressing priority is going to be recovery from Superstorm Sandy, but we also hope to hear from the governor regarding initiatives to continue to improve business climate in New Jersey," he said.Galandak said before the speech he would also be listening for tax relief, but he said much of that will depend on state revenues, which currently are lagging behind expectations. He said he expects more specifics on taxes next month when Christie gives his budget address, since by then more will be known about federal aid and about Sandy's longer-term impact on state income.Regardless of the revenue picture, Galandak said there are opportunities to improve the business climate by cutting red tape. He said he's been pleased thus far with how swiftly the commission's recommendations have been implemented."Every time the Red Tape Review Commission has come up with something that's needed a legislative fix, it's happened very quickly and had bipartisan support."Kirschner said he's hearing positive things from Washington regarding the Sandy relief package, so he expects it will come through despite an unexpected delay when the House of Representatives failed to vote on the matter last week.Kirschner said he's been impressed by the bipartisanship displayed by the state's Congressional delegation post-Sandy and by Sandy-related bipartisanship at the Statehouse. However, Kirschner said that spirit may not hold as the fall election draws near, when the governor and all 120 legislative seats are up for grabs.While the Sandy recovery is likely to remain a source of bipartisan agreement, he said before the speech, "I don't anticipate the same level of bipartisanship on other issues."

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Palestinian indifference to Palestinian suffering Tuesday, January 8, 2013 Tags: Editorial Comments Like a string of three shining pearls held up against the sun, three discrete reports last week from Palestinian sources cast new revelations, if not actual new light, on the way their leaders treat their own people and truth. • Each for different reasons, Hamas and the Palestinian Authority (PA) have spurned requests from the United Nations to take in some of the Palestinians fleeing for their lives from Syria. Ismail Haniyeh, the Hamas leader of Gaza, justified his refusal on ideology: he wants his suffering brethren to resettle in Israel. The PA explained its shrug of the indifferent shoulder on the basis of funds: it cannot afford to receive them. • Yasser Arafat’s widow, Suha, told Dubai TV that her husband had indeed planned the second intifadah all along. The Palestine Liberation Organization leader would not agree to the pleas and entreaties of U.S. president Bill Clinton and Israeli prime minister Ehud Barak to finally, peacefully, end the conflict. As Suha disclosed, her much venerated husband viewed negotiation and compromise as “betray[ing] the Palestinian cause.” • The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics published figures stating that by the year 2020, there will be more Arabs than Jews in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza. The Palestinian figures may or may not be accurate. But they are the proverbial red herring: the only figures that count are the number of Jews in the State of Israel. Israel has already separated from Gaza. The majority of Israelis wish to separate from the West Bank, too. They know it is the moral and pragmatically correct solution for truly ensuring the safety, security and Jewish majority of the Jewish state. But they seek a means of doing so that very distinctly does not follow the Gaza withdrawal precedent. That means separation, that is, a two-state solution, must be negotiated. However, the PA refuses to negotiate. Over the past four years, the PA has demanded the right to dictate the terms under which negotiations must begin. And it has cleverly manipulated world opinion into providing diplomatic cover for its own refusal to sit at the table with Israel. Thus it is especially disingenuous and exceptionally cloying to read former PA official Hanan Ashrawi say: “If the situation [the demographic trends according to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics] carries on this way, at the end we’ll be a majority, but we’re giving the Israelis a chance to understand the Palestinians could have their own democratic country that would neighbour Israel.” Her statement is entirely hollow. It is aimed at a fawning foreign media and diplomatic corps. It is her very own PA of Mahmoud Abbas (and Arafat before him) that has refused from the first to give birth through peaceful means of a democratic country. Indeed it even refuses today to provide safe harbour for the wretched Palestinians trying to flee Syria. Palestinian leaders continue to ill serve their people.

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Search Program TextShowing 1 - 20 of 185,037 Show 100 Future of Conservatism Panelists talked about how conservative principles could be applied to contemporary issues, as well as potential challenges facing Republican presidential candidates in 2016, including how… Book Discussion on The Case Against the Supreme Court Erwin Chemerinsky talked about his book The Case Against the Supreme Court, in which he argues that while Supreme Court justices have a reputation for being objective, evidence shows that… Henry Ford's Publications on Jews Professor Jonathan Sarna talked about how industrialist Henry Ford founded and supported a newspaper that published anti-semitic articles. This class was from his course called… Inside the Supreme Court Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan talked about her career, her approach to law, and her experiences serving on the Supreme Court. She spoke about diversity and collegiality in the high… Book Discussion on Outpost Christopher Hill talked about his book, Outpost: Life on the Frontlines of American Diplomacy, about his career as a diplomat. He appeared on Colorado Public Radio’s… Communicators with Amy Mitchell Amy Mitchell talked about political polarization and its relationship with media-viewing habits. She discussed a recent study from the Pew Research Center that showed committed… Weekly Republican Address Senator-Elect James Lankford of Oklahoma delivered the weekly Republican address. He talked about the spirit of love and peace at Christmas and about supporting the men and women… Weekly Presidential Address President and Mrs. Obama delivered the weekly presidential address. They thanked the troops for their service. Presidential Campaign of 1864 Panelists talked about factors that had an impact on President Lincoln’s re-election campaign in 1864. They spoke about President Lincoln’s expansion of presidential war powers… Panel Discussion on Corruption Zephyr Teachout, author of Corruption in America: From Benjamin Franklin’s Snuff Box to Citizens United, and Janine Wedel, author of Unaccountable: How Elite Power Brokers Corrupt our… Interview with Jonathan Yardley Jonathan Yardley spoke about his life and career. A former book critic for the Washington Post, Mr. Yardley retired after a 33-year tenure and having written approximately 3,000… Telephone lines were open for viewers to comment on the question “Should civics education be mandatory?” The question was inspired by an article in the Wall Street Journal that… Collegiate Sports Programs Steve Berkowitz talked about issues affecting colleges with major sports programs, including reforms suggested by college and governmental policymakers. Topics included the movement to… Federal Tax Preparation Advice Kevin McCormally talked about year-end strategies taxpayers could employ in preparing for filing their 2014 tax returns, as well as new tax provisions in effect for 2015. Headlines from the day’s newspapers were read and telephone lines were open for viewer comments on the minimum wage increases in 20 states and the District of Columbia slated for 2015. Biodiversity and Consumerism Panelists talked about biodiversity, rainforests, islands, and climate change. Topics included reducing islands' dependence on fossil fuels, protecting tropical rainforests to combat… Food and Climate Change Speakers talked about food policy, sustainability, and climate change. Christiana Wyly talked about water and land resources used for livestock and argued that climate change can be… Fresh Water and Climate Change Panelists talked about the future of fresh water and clean water policy. American Rivers President Bob Irvin said there wass a fresh water crisis in the U.S. and around the world. br/… A group of scientists talked about climate change. The discussed the increasing number of Category 4 hurricanes, storm surges such as the one New York City faced during Hurricane… Renewable Energy and Climate Change Lester Brown and Mike Phillips talked about renewable energy and climate change. Lester Brown spoke about a worldwide shift to solar and wind power, and Mike Phillips talked about… Load 20 More

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Murphy blasts NRA in first floor speech as senator By KELSEY DENTINGER Special to The Day Connecticut's freshman U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy gave an impassioned speech from the floor of the Senate Wednesday, calling for support of gun control legislation in the wake of the Dec. 14 Sandy Hook Elementary School tragedy.In his first speech on the Senate floor, Murphy stressed, "The worst reality is this: If we don't do something, right now, it's going to happen again."Murphy illustrated the vast public support of gun control reform, producing statistics such as "87 percent of Americans think we should have universal background checks. … Two-thirds of Americans think we should restrict these high-capacity ammunition clips. … 76 percent of Americans believe that we should crack down on people who buy guns legally and go out and sell them in the community illegally."He accused some in Congress of being out of step with the American public because "members of Congress have been listening to the wrong people," singling out the NRA for not advocating for its members and gun owners but rather, advocating for the gun industry that largely funds the NRA.Murphy also spoke about how Congress has failed to hold a proper forum about rights, a focal point of the gun reform debate. Citing "rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness," he added, "Liberty has got to also be about the right to be free from indiscriminate violence."Listing his policy points, Murphy stated that guns should be available to people of sound mind without criminal records, that a "small number of guns are just too dangerous for retail sale," and that certain ammunition "too easily enables mass-slaughter."Many Senate Republicans have pledged to filibuster the gun control bill, but U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., said he believed the filibuster threat would not come to pass. Blumenthal attributed his confidence to the lobbying efforts of Newtown families: "The families of Newtown have been profoundly and dramatically effective in impacting my colleagues in their direct face-to-face conversations, they've given a voice and face to gun violence that is moving and powerful beyond words. They've helped to turn the tide on ending the filibuster threat, which is the procedural obstacle to go forward."Blumenthal told The Day that he is optimistic about the bill itself but also asserted that he is listening to his constituency."There are some details that need review, but I believe it will meet with positive reaction, and I am listening," he said. "I will be making my decisions, as I have in the past, by listening to law enforcement groups, Newtown families, and other victims as well as public safety advocates."Blumenthal praised Wednesday's announcement that a bipartisan compromise on gun reform may have been struck, saying, "It seems to be a positive step in the right direction, and I am very encouraged by this bipartisan compromise."He also applauded the leadership and bipartisanship of Connecticut's recent gun reform legislation."I am very proud and grateful that Connecticut is helping to lead the nation, in this specific provisions of this measure, which is now the strongest in the nation, but also in its bipartisan compromise, which I think we need here in Washington," Blumenthal said. "We need Republican votes in Washington and we have a real opportunity to achieve it."

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Federal workers would be paid retroactively under House bill A House bill would guarantee that all federal employees receive retroactive pay for the duration of the government shutdown.U.S. Rep. Joe Courtney, D-2nd District, is one of more than 50 co-sponsors of the Federal Employee Retroactive Pay Fairness Act, which was introduced late Monday by Rep. Jim Moran, D-Va., to pay both employees who were furloughed and those required to work. Rep. Frank Wolf, also of Virginia, is the lead Republican co-sponsor.Most federal civilian employees were furloughed Tuesday after Congress failed to reach an agreement on a spending bill to fund the government. The Republican-controlled House of Representatives passed a continuing resolution to extend the current spending rates for six weeks but also to delay the Affordable Care Act, which Senate leaders said they would not agree to.The emergency furloughs affect about 750 of the 1,300 Defense Department civilians who work at the Naval Submarine Base in Groton and 540 technicians who work for the Connecticut National Guard, which combined is 1 percent of the workforce in southeastern Connecticut.Federal employee pay is suspended in the event of a funding lapse or government shutdown. Retroactive payment for non-essential and essential employees must be approved by Congress. Retroactive pay was approved for federal employees after the last government shutdown in late 1995.“These workers and their families, many of whom were already impacted by sequestration furloughs over the summer, should not have to suffer because irresponsible House Republicans are on a crusade against the Affordable Care Act,” Courtney said in a statement. “This bill would restore lost pay to talented workers who have been used as a political football for far too long.”Members of the military and some Defense Department civilians continue to receive paychecks because the Pay Our Military Act passed the House and Senate without opposition and President Obama signed it into law late Monday.The Pentagon and White House are evaluating whether the law’s provision to pay those who are providing support to members of the Armed Forces could be broadly interpreted to bring furloughed civilians back to work.In a letter sent to Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and Acting Homeland Security Secretary Rand Beers, Courtney argued for the broadest possible implementation of the Pay Our Military Act.“While I am hopeful for a quick resolution, it is possible that a shutdown could continue for at least a few days, if not longer,” Courtney wrote. “In that event, I urge that you use all authority available to you to enact the broadest interpretation possible when implementing any furloughs under the government shutdown, with the goal of keeping as many of our hard working civilians in the Department of Defense and the Department of Homeland Security at work in support of our military and our nation’s security.”Courtney again called on House Speaker John Boehner to allow for a vote on a “clean” continuing resolution, which would not seek to change the Affordable Care Act.j.mcdermott@theday.com

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Does China Plan To Establish �China Cities� And �Special Economic Zones� All Over America? TEC ^ | Michael Snyder Posted on 01/27/2013 6:15:47 AM PST by SeekAndFind What in the world is China up to? Over the past several years, the Chinese government and large Chinese corporations (which are often at least partially owned by the government) have been systematically buying up businesses, homes, farmland, real estate, infrastructure and natural resources all over America. In some cases, China appears to be attempting to purchase entire communities in one fell swoop. So why is this happening? Is this some form of "economic colonization" that is taking place? Some have speculated that China may be intending to establish "special economic zones" inside the United States modeled after the very successful Chinese city of Shenzhen. Back in the 1970s, Shenzhen was just a very small fishing village, but now it is a sprawling metropolis of over 14 million people. Initially, these "special economic zones" were only established within China, but now the Chinese government has been buying huge tracts of land in foreign countries such as Nigeria and establishing special economic zones in those nations. So could such a thing actually happen in America? Well, according to Dr. Jerome Corsi, a plan being pushed by the Chinese Central Bank would set up "development zones" in the United States that would allow China to "establish Chinese-owned businesses and bring in its citizens to the U.S. to work." Under the plan, some of the $1.17 trillion that the U.S. owes China would be converted from debt to "equity". As a result, "China would own U.S. businesses, U.S. infrastructure and U.S. high-value land, all with a U.S. government guarantee against loss." Does all of this sound far-fetched? Well, it isn't. In fact, the economic colonization of America is already far more advanced than most Americans would dare to imagine.So how in the world did we get to this point? A few decades ago, the United States was the unchallenged economic powerhouse of the world and China was essentially a third world country.So what happened?Well, we entered into a whole bunch of extremely unfavorable "free trade" agreements, and countries such as China began to aggressively use "free trade" as an economic weapon against us.Over the past decade, we have lost tens of thousands of businesses and millions of jobs to China. When the final numbers for 2012 come out, our trade deficit with China for the year will be well over 300 billion dollars, and that will be the largest trade deficit that one country has had with another country in the history of the world.Overall, the U.S. has run a trade deficit with China over the past decade that comes to more than 2.3 trillion dollars. That 2.3 trillion dollars could have gone to U.S. businesses and U.S. workers, and in turn taxes would have been paid on all of that money. But instead, all of that money went to China.Rather than just sitting on all of that money, China has been lending much of it back to us - at interest. We now owe China more than a trillion dollars, and our politicians are constantly pleading with China to lend more money to us so that we can finance our exploding debt.Today, the U.S. government pays China approximately 100 million dollars a day in interest on the debt that we owe them. Those that say that the U.S. debt "does not matter" are being incredibly foolish.So thanks to our massive trade deficit and our exploding national debt, China is systematically getting wealthier and the United States is systematically getting poorer.And now China is starting to use a lot of that wealth to aggressively expand their power and influence around the globe.But isn't it more than a bit far-fetched to suggest that China may be planning to establish Chinese cities and special economic zones in America?Not really.Just look at what has already happened up in Canada. It is well-known that the Chinese population of Vancouver, Canada has absolutely exploded in recent years. In fact, the Vancouver suburb of Richmond is now approximately half Chinese. The following is an excerpt from a BBC article... Richmond is North America's most Asian city - 50% of residents here identify themselves as Chinese. But it's not just here that the Chinese community in British Columbia (BC) - some 407,000 strong - has left its mark. All across Vancouver, Chinese-Canadians have helped shape the local landscape. A similar thing is happening in many communities along the west coast of the United States. In fact, Chinese citizens purchased one out of every ten homes that were sold in the state of California in 2011.But in other areas of the United States, the Chinese are approaching things much more systematically.For example, as I have written about previously, a Chinese group identified as "Sino-Michigan Properties LLC" has purchased 200 acres of land near the town of Milan, Michigan. Their stated goal is to build a "China City" that has artificial lakes, a Chinese cultural center and hundreds of housing units for Chinese citizens.In other instances, large chunks of real estate in major U.S. cities that are down on their luck are being snapped up by Chinese investors. Just check out what a Fortune article from a while back says has been happening over in Toledo, Ohio... In March 2011, Chinese investors paid $2.15 million cash for a restaurant complex on the Maumee River in Toledo, Ohio. Soon they put down another $3.8 million on 69 acres of newly decontaminated land in the city's Marina District, promising to invest $200 million in a new residential-commercial development. That September, another Chinese firm spent $3 million for an aging hotel across a nearby bridge with a view of the minor league ballpark. Toledo is being promoted to Chinese investors as a "5-star logistics region". From Toledo it is very easy to get to Chicago, Detroit, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, Columbus and Indianapolis... With a population of 287,000, Toledo is only the fourth largest city in Ohio, but it lies at the junction of two important highways -- I-75 and I-80/90. "My vision is to make Toledo a true international city," Toledo's Mayor Mike Bell told the Toledo Blade. But some of these deals appear to be about far more than just making "investments". According to the Idaho Statesman, a Chinese company known as Sinomach (which is actually controlled by the Chinese government) was actually interested in developing a 50 square mile self-sustaining "technology zone" south of the Boise airport... A Chinese national company is interested in developing a 10,000- to 30,000-acre technology zone for industry, retail centers and homes south of the Boise Airport. Officials of the China National Machinery Industry Corp. have broached the idea — based on a concept popular in China today — to city and state leaders. The article suggested that this "technology zone" would be modeled after similar projects that already exist in China, and that Chinese officials were conducting similar negotiations with other U.S. states as well... Sinomach is not looking only at Idaho.The company sent delegations to Ohio, Michigan and Pennsylvania this year to talk about setting up research and development bases and industrial parks. It has an interest in electric transmission projects and alternative energy as well.The technology zone proposal follows a model of science, technology and industrial parks in China — often fully contained cities with all services included. Thankfully the deal in Idaho appears to be stalled for now, but could we soon see China establish special economic zones in other communities all around America?The Chinese certainly do seem to be laying the groundwork for something. They have been voraciously gobbling up important infrastructure all over the country. The following comes from a recent American Free Press article... In addition to already owning vital ports in Long Beach, Calif. and Boston, Mass., the China Ocean Shipping Company is eyeing major ports on the East Coast and Gulf of Mexico. China also owns access to ports at the entry and exit points of the Panama Canal.And due to fiscal woes plaguing many American cities and states, U.S. legislators have been actively seeking out Chinese investors. In one of the worst cases, Baton Rouge, La., Mayor Kip Holden offered the Chinese government ownership and operating rights to a new toll way system if the Chinese would provide the funding to build it. Does it make sense for the Chinese to own some of our most important ports?Isn't there a national security risk?Sadly, there isn't much of anything that our politicians won't sell these days as long as someone is willing to flash a lot of cash.The Chinese have also been busy buying up important real estate on the east coast as a recent Forbes article explained…. According to a recent report in the New York Times, investors from China are “snapping up luxury apartments” and are planning to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on commercial and residential projects like Atlantic Yards in Brooklyn. Chinese companies also have signed major leases at the Empire State Building and at 1 World Trade Center, the report said. But it is not only just land and infrastructure that the Chinese have been buying up.They have also been purchasing rights to vital oil and natural gas deposits all over the United States.There have been two Chinese companies that have been primarily involved in this effort.The first is the China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC). According to Wikipedia, CNOOC is 100 percent owned by the Chinese government CNOOC Group is a state-owned oil company, fully owned by the Government of the People’s Republic of China, and the State-Owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council (SASAC) performs the rights and obligations of shareholder on behalf of the government. The second is Sinopec Corporation. Sinopec Group is the largest shareholder (approx. 75% ownership) in Sinopec Corporation. And as the Sinopec website tells us, Sinopec Group is fully owned by the Chinese government Sinopec Group, the largest shareholder of Sinopec Corp., is a super-large petroleum and petrochemical group incorporated by the State in 1998 based on the former China Petrochemical Corporation. Funded by the State, it is a State authorized investment arm and State-owned controlling company. So whenever you see CNOOC or Sinopec, you can replace those names with the Chinese government. The Chinese government essentially runs both of those companies.And as you can see from the following list compiled by the Wall Street Journal, those two companies have been extremely aggressive in buying up rights to oil and natural gas all over the nation... Colorado: Cnooc gained a one-third stake in 800,000 acres in northeast Colorado and southeast Wyoming in a $1.27 billion pact with Chesapeake Energy Corp.Louisiana: Sinopec has a one-third interest in 265,000 acres in the Tuscaloosa Marine Shale after a broader $2.5-billion deal with Devon Energy.Michigan: Sinopec gained a one-third interest in 350,000 acres in a larger $2.5 billion deal with Devon Energy.Ohio: Sinopec acquired a one-third stake in Devon Energy’s 235,000 Utica Shale acres in a larger $2.5 billion deal.Oklahoma: Sinopec has a one-third interest in 215,000 acres in a broader $2.5 billion deal with Devon Energy.Texas: Cnooc acquired a one-third interest in Chesapeake Energy’s 600,000 acres in the Eagle Ford Shale in a $2.16-billion deal.Wyoming: Cnooc has a one-third stake in 800,000 acres in northeast Colorado and southeast Wyoming after a $1.27 billion pact with Chesapeake Energy. Sinopec gained a one-third interest in Devon Energy’s 320,000 acres as part of a larger $2.5 billion deal.Gulf of Mexico: Cnooc Ltd. separately acquired minority stakes in some of Statoil ASA’s leases as well as six of Nexen Inc.’s deep-water wells. So why is the U.S. government allowing this?That is a very good question.For a nation that purports to be pursuing "energy independence", we sure do have a funny way of going about things.Unfortunately, the sad truth is that China is absolutely mopping the floor with the United States on the global economic stage. China is rising and America is in an advanced state of decline. Global economic power has shifted dramatically and most Americans still don't understand what has happened.The following are 44 more signs of how dominant the economy of China has become...1. A Chinese firm recently made a $2.6 billion offer to buy movie theater chain AMC.2. A different Chinese firm made a $1.8 billion offer to buy aircraft maker Hawker Beechcraft.3. In December it was announced that a Chinese group would be purchasing AIG's plane leasing unit for $4.23 billion.4. It was recently announced that the Federal Reserve will now allow Chinese banks to buy up American banks.5. A $190 million bridge project up in Alaska was awarded to a Chinese firm.6. A $400 million contract to renovate the Alexander Hamilton bridge in New York was awarded to a Chinese firm.7. A $7.2 billion contract to construct a new bridge between San Francisco and Oakland was awarded to a Chinese firm.8. The uniforms for the U.S. Olympic team were made in China.9. 85 percent of all artificial Christmas trees are made in China.10. The new World Trade Center tower is going to include glass that has been imported from China.11. The new Martin Luther King memorial on the National Mall was made in China.12. In 2001, American consumers spent 102 billion dollars on products made in China. In 2011, American consumers spent 399 billion dollars on products made in China.13. The United States spends about 4 dollars on goods and services from China for every one dollar that China spends on goods and services from the United States.14. According to the New York Times, a Jeep Grand Cherokee that costs $27,490 in the United States costs about $85,000 in China thanks to all the tariffs.15. The Chinese economy has grown 7 times faster than the U.S. economy has over the past decade.16. The United States has lost a staggering 32 percent of its manufacturing jobs since the year 2000.17. The United States has lost an average of 50,000 manufacturing jobs per month since China joined the World Trade Organization in 2001.18. Overall, the United States has lost a total of more than 56,000 manufacturing facilities since 2001.19. According to the Economic Policy Institute, America is losing half a million jobs to China every single year.20. Between December 2000 and December 2010, 38 percent of the manufacturing jobs in Ohio were lost, 42 percent of the manufacturing jobs in North Carolina were lost and 48 percent of the manufacturing jobs in Michigan were lost.21. In 2010, China produced more than twice as many automobiles as the United States did.22. Since the auto industry bailout, approximately 70 percent of all GM vehicles have been built outside the United States.23. After being bailed out by U.S. taxpayers, General Motors is currently involved in 11 joint ventures with companies owned by the Chinese government. The price for entering into many of these “joint ventures” was a transfer of “state of the art technology” from General Motors to the communist Chinese.24. Back in 1998, the United States had 25 percent of the world’s high-tech export market and China had just 10 percent. Ten years later, the United States had less than 15 percent and China’s share had soared to 20 percent.25. The United States has lost more than a quarter of all of its high-tech manufacturing jobs over the past ten years.26. China’s number one export to the U.S. is computer equipment.27. The number one U.S. export to China is "scrap and trash".28. The U.S. trade deficit with China is now more than 28 times larger than it was back in 1990.29. Back in 1985, the U.S. trade deficit with China was just 6 million dollars for the entire year. For the month of November 2012 alone, the U.S. trade deficit with China was 28.9 billion dollars.30. China now consumes more energy than the United States does.31. China is now the leading manufacturer of goods in the entire world.32. China uses more cement than the rest of the world combined.33. China is now the number one producer of wind and solar power on the entire globe.34. Today, China produces nearly twice as much beer as the United States does.35. Right now, China is producing more than three times as much coal as the United States does.36. China now produces 11 times as much steel as the United States does.37. China produces more than 90 percent of the global supply of rare earth elements.38. China is now the number one supplier of components that are critical to the operation of U.S. defense systems.39. A recent investigation by the U.S. Senate Committee on Armed Services found more than one million counterfeit Chinese parts in the Department of Defense supply chain.40. 15 years ago, China was 14th in the world in published scientific research articles. But now, China is expected to pass the United States and become number one very shortly.41. China now awards more doctoral degrees in engineering each year than the United States does.42. According to one study, the Chinese economy already has roughly the same amount of purchasing power as the U.S. economy does.43. According to the IMF, China will pass the United States and will become the largest economy in the world in 2016.44. Nobel economist Robert W. Fogel of the University of Chicago is projecting that the Chinese economy will be three times larger than the U.S. economy by the year 2040 if current trends continue.Without the "globalization" of the world economy, none of this would have ever happened. But instead of admitting our mistakes and fixing them, our politicians continue to press for even more "free trade" and even more integration with communist nations such as China.In fact, according to Dr. Jerome Corsi, the U.S. government has already set up 257 "foreign trade zones" all over America. These "foreign trade zones" are apparently given "special U.S. customs treatment" and are used to promote "free trade" Corsi noted that the U.S. government has created 257 foreign trade zones, or FTZs, throughout the United States, designed to extend special U.S. customs treatment to U.S. plants engaged in international-trade-related activities.The FTZs tend to be located near airports, with easy access into the continental NAFTA and WTO multi-modal transportation systems being created to move free-trade goods cheaply, quickly and efficiently throughout the continent of North America.“There is nothing in the U.S. government’s description of FTZs that would prevent a foreign government, like China, from operating a shell U.S. company that is in reality owned and financed by the Chinese government and operated through a Chinese government-owned corporation,” Corsi wrote. Sadly, we are probably going to see a whole lot more of this in the years ahead.According to Corsi, a professor of economics at Tsighua University in Beijing named Yu Qiao has suggested the following plan as a way to transform the debt that the United States owes China into something more "tangible"... China would negotiate with the U.S. government to create a “crisis relief facility,” or CRF. The CRF “would be used alongside U.S. federal efforts to stabilize the banking system and to invest in capital-intensive infrastructure projects such as high-speed railroad from Boston to Washington, D.C.China would pool a portion of its holdings of Treasury bonds under the CFR umbrella to convert sovereign debt into equity. Any CFR funds that were designated for investment in U.S. corporations would still be owned and managed by U.S. equity holders, with the Asians holding minority equity shares “that would, like preferred stock, be convertible.”The U.S. government would act as a guarantor, “providing a sovereign guarantee scheme to assure the investment principal of the CRF against possible default of targeted companies or projects”.The Federal Reserve would set up a special account to supply the liquidity the CRF would require to swap sovereign debt into industrial investment in the United States. Apparently the Bank of China really likes this plan and would like to see something like this implemented.In the years ahead, perhaps many of you will end up working in a "special economic zone" for a Chinese company on a project that is being financially guaranteed by the U.S. government.If that sounds like a form of slavery to you, the truth is that you are probably not too far off the mark.The borrower is the servant of the lender, and we should have never allowed ourselves to get into so much debt.Now we will pay the price.To get an idea of how much the world has changed in recent years, just check out this incredible photo which contrasts the decline of Detroit over the years with the amazing rise of Shanghai, China.Things did not have to turn out this way. Unfortunately, we made decades of incredibly foolish decisions and we wrecked the greatest economic machine that the world has ever seen.Now the future for America looks really bleak. TOPICS: Business/Economy; Society KEYWORDS: china; chinacities; specialzones; uschina; uschinacities Here’s one instance” http://www.boiseweekly.com/boise/red-potatoes-investigating-the-truth-behind-chinas-takeover-of-idaho/Content?oid=2436095 by WCH Their initial effort has worked very well for them.. Washington, D.C.Thefts of U.S. technology boost China’s weaponry Here: China’s government also uses influence operations designed to advance pro-Chinese policies in the United States and to prevent the U.S. government from taking tough action or adopting policies against Beijing’s interests, FBI officials said. Rudy Guerin, a senior FBI counterintelligence official in charge of China affairs, said the Chinese aggressively exploit their connections to U.S. corporations doing business in China. “They go straight to the companies themselves,” he said. Many U.S. firms doing business in China, including such giants as Coca-Cola, Boeing and General Motors, use their lobbyists on behalf of Beijing. “We see the Chinese going to these companies to ask them to lobby on their behalf on certain issues,” Mr. Guerin said, “whether it’s most-favored-nation trade status, [World Health Organization], Falun Gong or other matters.” The Chinese government also appeals directly to members of Congress and congressional staff. U.S. officials revealed that China’s embassy in Washington has expanded a special section in charge of running influence operations, primarily targeting Congress. The operation, which includes 26 political officers, is led by Su Ge, a Chinese government official . . . . 3 by WilliamofCarmichael (If modern America's Man on Horseback is out there, Get on the damn horse already!) Washington is probably partnering up with Beijing to reduce the US to the same amount of slavery the Chicoms have- using their labor and military force. These are just the forward bases. (You have chosen dishonor to avoid war; you shall have war also.) I support lower taxes, less regulation and increasing industry in America, as anyone who wishes prosperity for America should do. This resonates because people are coming to understand that freedom from federal oppression of all kinds is required for prosperity to return to America. I have no doubt that if this were true, it would be economically successful. by RFEngineer But...but....the Free Trader Communists who pushed Free Trade with Communist China said all this Free Trade would be good for us... (GOP = Greenlighting Obama's Programs) A Chinese national company is interested in developing a 10,000- to 30,000-acre technology zone for industry, retail centers and homes south of the Boise Airport. "I owe my soul to the Company store." (POLITICIAN...............a four letter word spelled with ten letters.) The Chinese are beating us at our own game. Their taxes are lower, they have less regulation, their military ONLY gets involved in areas of vital national interest, they INVEST in productive capacity not providing welfare for the entire world etc. etc. etc. . . Kind of like what we did 100 years ago? Jimmy Rogers saw all this coming a few years ago and moved to Singapore. Maybe he knew something we all did not know. The one thing that is promising in all of this is if they come here, they will be Americanized to some degree. High powered, capable people will NOT live under the opressive yoke of the Chicom system. The caveat here is the power of the puppetmasters . . . remember: Jimmy Rogers’ buddy was George Soros. by Macoozie (1) Win the Senate 2) Repeal Obamacare 3) Impeach Roberts) I made the statement once that imports must be paid for with exports or paid for with our property and had some posters tell me how they knew better. Right. But is the U.S. buying up China or the reverse? So I’ll repeat: Either we pay for imports with exports or we’ll pay for imports with our farms, businesses, factories and jobs. And that,simply put, is exactly what is happening. (you don't have to be brilliant, not being stupid is enough) To: WCH The Chinese population exploded in Vancouver because they fled Hong Kong before it reverted back to Chinese control. Author is stringing together facts to paint a picture, but is leaving out facts that might negate his premise. by Liberty Tree Surgeon (Mow your own lawn!) To: RFEngineer My NE totally “blue” city NEEDS a “ special economic zone.” China smartly learned - set up places with good infrastructure, low taxes, that are free from political and bureaucratic interference, and business and employment and investment will boom. by PGR88 Seems to me that China is doing what any wealthy country will do with its colonies. It is constructing special economic zones that will facility the development of the destitute territory (i.e., the US, once our dollar crashes). We should be thanking them for seeing ahead, rather than being paranoid about it. by BobL Should we be learning Spanish, Arabic or Chinese? (We've passed the point of no return. Welcome to Al Amerika.) The unbalance is now absurd. America either balances trade, or we are through. Sell stuff. Or stop buying from abroad. Make up your minds. Take 1 minute of your time and watch this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TYKAbRK_wKA (Wish I’d made it...) by Road Glide Well we can take some solace that eventually all the idiot liberals with useless liberal degrees and the welfare people will be forced to work in the Chinese factories right alongside us... The U.S. has a great incentive not to attempt a trade balance if such a thing were possible. Buying with borrowed money helps to mask the loss of real wealth of the U.S. We need to arrive at a real, sustainable balance of payments. Or we will collapse. One or the other. And coming right at us. I think the collapse is already occuring in slow motion as the debt holders wonder just what to do. But who cares? Wall St. asks how the next quarter will produce profit and Washington worries about the next election cycle. They’re buying homes? I want to sell them mine. Who do I talk to? by Poison Pill (Take your silver lining and SHOVE IT!)

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My Turn: Voters must understand POMV plan Posted: Friday, April 09, 2004 By SEN. GENE THERRIAULT For the past six years, the Trustees of the Alaska Permanent Fund have advocated for changes to the fund's management system to modernize the fund and inflation-proof its principal into the future. With these goals in mind, the trustees have requested consideration of a percent of market value system similar to that used by most large trusts and endowments across the nation. The trustees propose basing the annual payout on the total value of the fund and limiting the possible draw to no more than five percent. Permanent Fund administrators expect the $28 billion fund to grow at a rate of about 8 percent annually, while the inflation rate is expected to be about 3 percent a year. With surplus earnings retained in the fund, future inflation proofing will be automatic, without relying on legislative transfers. This will make the permanent fund truly permanent and multi-generational. Under the current wording of the Alaska Constitution, the Legislature has access to approximately $4.5 billion in earnings of the permanent fund. Except for dividends, the Legislature has left the earnings virtually untouched since 1982. However, with the fiscal gap widening and the Constitutional Budget Reserve dwindling, pressure is mounting. As part of ongoing discussions regarding the state's fiscal future, I proposed language to the Senate Finance Committee March 19 for possible changes to the percent of market value idea that would limit the Legislature's access to the earnings and protect the principal. I believe before voters approve any changes to the constitution, they must understand and have confidence in the plan put before them. As a result, I drafted my proposal to address concerns I have heard over the past three years during discussion of the trustees' concept. My proposal would amend the Alaska Constitution to maintain the protected principal of the fund. All income of the fund would be deposited into a constitutionally protected earnings reserve account. The Legislature would be allowed to withdraw up to five percent of the total value of the fund each year, but only from the money in the earnings account. Withdrawals could go only towards dividends and public education. In order to move forward, this plan would have to be approved by two-thirds of the Legislature and go to a vote of the people. To further assure voters that their dividend will be protected, I have proposed that legislators place into law how the earnings would be split between education and dividends before voters decide on the constitutional amendment. I made this proposal to assure that the principal value of the fund cannot be spent in a prolonged down market, that tapping earnings will not lead to draining the fund, and that using earnings does not threaten the dividend program. Regrettably, the details of how my plan would protect the dividend and principal of the fund were overshadowed by comments I made about a possible one-time bonus check. At the same Senate Finance meeting, I also discussed an idea to send out a second dividend check in December, if voters approved the plan, that would represent the difference between how much checks would be under the current system and how much they would be under a proposed market value split. The idea was just that "an idea" and not part of the bill that I asked the Finance Committee to consider. The proposal stands alone and I find it unfortunate that, just like "Grinch" stole Christmas, the holiday bonus stole the headlines. Ultimately, the most important goal is preserving the Permanent Fund for future generations of Alaskans. This plan provides constitutional protection without hamstringing the ability of those Alaskans to respond to circumstances we have no way to predict. • Sen. Gene Therriault is a Republican from North Pole. FINANCE COMMITTEE CHRISTMAS ALASKA PERMANENT FUND SENATE FINANCE COMMITTEE BUSINESS_FINANCE GENE THERRIAULT USD CONTACT US

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Money and politics: when the fix makes it worse By Lester Graham Feb 21, 2012 ShareTwitter Facebook Google+ Email Jimmy Stewart's character in "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" receives a lesson on the role of special interests in politics. Many voters suspect politicians are corrupted by money. Campaign contributions and cozy relationships with lobbyists make voters wonder if their elected officials have their best interests at heart. That’s led to attempts to fix the problem in Michigan, but observers say sometimes the ‘fix’ makes the problem worse. Politicians need money to run campaigns to win elections. And often that money comes from the rich and powerful. But what do those politicians get in return? Remember that scene from Frank Capra’s 1939 film Mr. Smith Goes to Washington? A mover and shaker lets the Jimmy Stewart character, a naïve new Senator, know if he cooperates with a deal the guy’s got going, he can write his own ticket. “Now what do you like? Business? If you like business, you can pick any job in the state and go right to the top. Or politics. If you like being a Senator, there’s no reason why you can’t come back to that Senate and stay there as long as you want to. If you’re smart.” Many voters think money from well-heeled sources corrupts politicians in a similar manner. “That leads you to the knee-jerk reaction that they’re all a bunch of corrupt politicians; throw the bums out. Get term limits. Get them out of there. Right,” suggest Rick Hall. He's a political science professor with the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan. He says in 1992 Michigan voters took that ‘throw the bums out’ strategy. They approved term limits in an attempt to get better people in office. But, there have been unintended consequences: elected officials with little or no experience. “You know, it takes you two terms just to figure out what in the hell is going on, to develop any expertise, to learn what the statutes are, to learn who’s interested in what and so on and so forth. And about the time you basically develop any expertise and your staff does, you’re out.” Out after only six years in the House or eight years in the Senate. That’s not a lot of time to not only understand but run the complicated business of the state. But there are those who offer to help. Lobbyists. They’ve been around. They understand many of the state’s policies better than the new legislators. They hold the institutional knowledge, the history of government policy. So, those inexperienced lawmakers are often grateful for the lobbyists’ help. Bill Ballenger is a former legislator and the editor of the newsletter Inside Michigan Politics. He says once a lobbyist helps a legislator through one tough issue, trust is built and those new legislators call on them again. "And they can become very influential on a group of legislators who, let’s face it, can have no more than three two-year terms in the House experience or two four-year terms of experience in the Senate under term limits.” And, the lobbyists can also help with raising money. Dependence grows. Joe Schwarz is a former Member of Congress and a former state legislator. He says term limits have left legislators dependent on outside interests, special interests, to guide them instead seasoned legislators who could keep them on the right path. “They have no mentors. In my day, three years of service in the legislature, you’d still be looking for the men’s room or the ladies’ room.” So, are we worse off since term limits started taking effect? “A lot of people would like to say so.” Again, Bill Ballenger with Inside Michigan Politics. He says a lot of people think the process of legislating in Lansing looks uglier and messier than it’s ever looked. But, Ballenger says it really all comes down to this question: ”What are the laws like; how to they read; are they good; are they bad? No matter how they’re made, the laws, how long it takes, how ugly the process looks, the bottom line is: is the public policy good or bad? And frankly, there’s not that much evidence that the performance of the legislature and the legislation that they produced in the last 20 years since term limits began to take hold is a lot worse than it was before that.” So, term limits changed some things, but it’s not clear that it has accomplished anything at all when it comes to concerns about money and politics. Tags: lobbyingterm limitsInside Michigan Politicsmichigan politicsMichigan Watch Money Talks: But is it free speech? 2 years ago Political calls: no disclosures, almost no limits 3 years ago View the discussion thread. © 2014 Michigan Radio. All rights reserved.

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Monday, October 26, 1998 Published at 17:48 GMT What's this all about? By American affairs specialist Gordon Corera The United States holds elections every two years. Once every four years there is a presidential election as well as congressional elections. Mid-term elections take place in-between presidential elections, in the middle of the presidential term. [an error occurred while processing this directive]Unlike the British system where the executive (the government) is part of the legislature (parliament), the US has separate branches of government: The Executive is made up by the president, who is elected every four years, and his cabinet, who are not elected and are normally not members of Congress. (They have to leave Congress to join the cabinet.) The Legislature consists of two chambers - the House of Representatives and the Senate. Senators are the more senior and tend to be less partisan. For legislation to be passed it has to be approved by both chambers of Congress and then agreed to by the president. The Judiciary is made up by three levels of courts. The famous Supreme Court has nine judges which decide constitutional issues. The entire House of Representatives - the lower House of Congress - comes up for election every two years. It has 435 members representing districts across the United States. The upper house of Congress, the Senate, has 100 members. There are two Senators to represent every state in the United States. Its members serve for 6 years but their election is staggered, meaning one-third come up for re-election every two years. In total, 36 governorships, 34 Senate seats and all 435 seats in the House of Representatives will be up for grabs on November 3. Unlike the British system, the executive (the White House) can be run by a different party to that which controls the legislature (Congress). Bill Clinton has been in the White House since 1993 but his Democratic party lost control of Congress in the 1994 mid-term elections. The current make-up of the House of Representatives is 228 Republicans, 206 Democrats and one Independent. In the Senate the Republicans have 55 to the Democrats 45 seats. This divided government can lead to legislative gridlock as the two sides battle each other for control of legislation. The Republicans have only a small majority and at the start of the year Democrats thought they might be able to regain the House of Representatives. But the Monica Lewinsky scandal has made that look almost impossible. If Republicans do well in the mid-term elections they will take this as a mandate to press on with impeaching Bill Clinton. If they do badly then they may decide to cut their losses and end the inquiry. Surprise gains for Democrats Clinton: People before politics Impeachment process in spotlight Analysis: Lewinsky leaves voters cold What they said: Quotes and soundbites Hillary: America's most popular politician Al Gore: On the trail for 2000 Black America backs Clinton From the House to the White House? Bush brothers celebrate George W Bush: Front-runner for 2000 Jeb Bush: Third way Republican Fred Tuttle: Man with a plan? Smear tactics in New York race Finding the Right way Democrat women running to stand still Hillary fan club stands by its woman Lewinsky in Loveland California prize for Democrats Close second for dead sheriff

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In Ukraine's Corridors Of Power, An Effort To Toss Out The Old Share Tweet E-mail Print By Ari Shapiro Originally published on Thu May 8, 2014 9:57 am An activist waves the Ukrainian national flag at Independence Square on April 6. Valentyn Ogirenko Ukrainian activists stage a rally in Kiev's Independence Square on April 6. The slogan reads: "Law on lustration [or cleansing, of the political and business elites] now!" Mikhail Pochuyev ITAR-TASS/Landov The first time I saw the word "lustration," I thought it was a case of bad translation from Ukrainian. In Kiev, a flyer advertised a talk by the head of parliament's "lustration" committee. "What does this word mean in English?" I asked a press aide. "I don't know the English word for it, but it will be an interesting speech," he replied. And indeed, it was. Weeks later, Sam Greene, director of the Russia Institute at King's College in London, explained to me that lustration actually is an English word. "It comes from Latin. It means to shed light on something," he said. Lustration has the same root as the words "illustrate," and "luster." "It is bringing something that was hidden or in the dark, in the shadows, out into the open," Greene explained. For a country that has just gone through a revolution, lustration is a sort of government-wide housecleaning. It's a process of rooting out people who are tainted by the old regime. Those people could include judges, cops, bankers, even newspaper editors. In Ukraine, lustration may provide one way of addressing the deep corruption that reaches every level of government. Although many former communist countries have done it, every attempt in Ukraine over the last 20 years has failed. A Tough Sell Agnieszka Piasecka is from Poland, where the lustration process took years. "Convincing society that this process is needed was very, very difficult," she told me. Piasecka is now based in Kiev, with a group called the Open Dialog Foundation. She's trying to help Ukraine figure out what its housecleaning process will look like: how deep into society it should reach, and what the consequences should be for involvement with the old regime. "You need to face the reality that nobody is absolutely clean here, which is normal in plenty of post-Soviet republics," she explained. "Well then, what do you do?" I asked. "How do you clean house if everybody is dirty?" "You find people who are less dirty, and you work with them," she replied. One of those people is Yehor Sobelev. He's the head of parliament's Lustration Committee, the man who gave that talk in Kiev. Sobelev is pushing a very aggressive lustration program. There are other, less sweeping proposals are out there, too. In one of the most striking lines of his speech, Sobolev said, "The big challenge is to make parliament vote for this bill, because according to this legislation at least half the lawmakers will be lustrated." In other words, lose their jobs. Asking people to vote themselves out of government is a tall order. Yevhen Hilbovytsky is a Kiev lawyer who advises companies doing business in Ukraine. "Probably this particular vote will be a loss," he said. "But this is the beginning of a very long process." Ukrainians are preparing to choose new leaders in elections on May 25. That won't begin to address the deep-seated problems that lustration hopes to solve, though. No matter who is at the head of government, the underbrush remains full of the same corrupt officials who have been there for decades. The old guard is deeply entrenched. They may have to be excised bit by bit, over many years. Lustration Gone Bad Even if this process gets off the ground, there are huge risks, and not everybody is sure it's a good idea. Lustration can be a perfect opportunity for blackmail and witch hunts. "The process that was meant to be lustration that Americans are probably most familiar with historically is the McCarthy hearings," said Greene, the King's College professor. Sen. Joe McCarthy's hunt for American communists is a prime example of lustration gone bad. "That was meant to be a process of bringing all of this out into the light," said Greene. "Finding these hidden communists and hidden un-Americans and enemies of the state in power — in Hollywood, in banking, in publishing, in all these other parts of American life, and making sure they had no place there." Another example of misguided lustration was the de-Baathification process early in the Iraq war. It was supposed to get rid of people with ties to Saddam Hussein's government. Instead, it inflamed sectarian divisions and fueled the insurgency. Even in the best scenario, there are always casualties, said Piasecka. "I call it collateral damage. When you do a housecleaning, you will always have some collateral damage," she said. "But I would not call it a witch hunt. Because if you do it too gently, if you do it too smoothly, you will have no result at all." So this is one of many tough decisions Ukraine's government faces today: Start the lustration process, and risk sliding into a pattern of vengeance and score-settling? Or leave the old system in place, even though it is corrupt to the core?Copyright 2014 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/. Public Radio Tulsa 14th Annual Natalie Warren presentation of Handel's "Messiah" At Boston Avenue Church

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Blue Ridge Now - Meadow Says He Tried to Avert Shutdown, Offset Damage By: Mark Meadows Date: Oct. 18, 2013 Location: Washington, DC By Nathaniel Axtell Despite being portrayed by CNN as an "architect" of the federal government shutdown, Congressman Mark Meadows said Thursday he fought up to the final hours to prevent it from occurring and worked hard over the last 16 days to stave off its impact on his district. In a phone interview Thursday as he drove home from Washington, Meadows said he spent 30 minutes with an Obama administration aide at the Capitol the night before the Oct. 1 shutdown "trying to work things out, seeing if there are some areas we could make tweaks to Obamacare and avoid a shutdown." Meadows said he "got a lot of raised eyebrows from people in my party, because they knew who he was." The White House congressional liaison "expressed a willingness to work together, but honestly, for political reasons, there was going to be a shutdown regardless," Meadows said. Along with fellow N.C. Reps. Walter Jones, Virginia Foxx and Richard Hudson, Meadows voted no on Wednesday evening to a measure that reopened the federal government and extended the nation's debt ceiling. "My concern was two-fold," Meadows said, explaining his vote. "One, we should've funded the government for a year. To have to go back through this in 90 days is not what any of us want to do. And we should've gotten rid of the congressional subsidy." Under the Affordable Care Act, members of Congress and their staffs can no longer get their health insurance through the Federal Health Benefits Program beginning in 2014. Instead, they'll have to get insurance through ACA health exchanges, Meadows said. "But unlike the average American, who doesn't get a subsidy if they're making the money we're making, we're getting a special subsidy to match the old federal program," he said. "So we're essentially getting a special subsidy that you, if you go on the program, don't get. That's not fair." Meadows also objected to special provisions attached to the bill ending the partial government shutdown. Though it was "supposedly a clean bill," he pointed out language allowing the government to spend $2.9 billion upgrading a 1920s-era lock and dam project on the Ohio River. In late September, Meadows made national headlines after CNN reporter Leigh Ann Caldwell wrote a profile of him that called him "one of the most prominent developers of the plan that could shut the government down." Meadows said Caldwell "took great liberties, took words out of context and cut off parts of quotes to tell her story. It was unfortunate." Even before that, the freshman Republican had quickly made a name for himself, grilling administration officials about their handling of the Benghazi terrorist attacks as a member of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs. President Obama also named him to represent Congress in the 68th session of the U.N.'s General Assembly. But it was a letter circulated by Meadows urging House Speaker John Boehner and Majority Leader Eric Cantor to "defund the implementation and enforcement of (Obamacare) in any relevant appropriations bill ... including any continuing appropriations bill" that garnered him the brightest national spotlight. The letter, signed by 80 House colleagues, has been credited for spurring the GOP's hard-line stance that brought the federal government to close national parks and other "non-essential" services. Meadows insisted Thursday that was never his intention, adding his role has been "greatly exaggerated" by the some media sources. "The truth of the matter is we all have consequences of taking a leadership role," he said. "Some could say if I had never drafted the letter, that wouldn't have been the case. It is what it is. And time will hopefully show that even in the midst of a very difficult thing with the shutdown, my No. 1 priority was to listen to the people back home." At the start of the budget impasse, Meadows said, calls and emails to his congressional offices were "tracking about 60/40 in terms of being in favor of what we were doing. Toward the end, it was more evenly divided." He took many of the phone calls himself, even when they were from citizens who disagreed with his stance on Obamacare. "I do care, and there are times when my heart knows that I'm fighting for the long-term benefit of our country," he said. "But at the same time, it's not about politics, it's about people -- even the people I don't agree with." Following the shutdown, Meadows said he and his staff "were scrambling to make sure (with) the government agencies that get federal funds, we didn't have people in our district getting hurt." Meadows said he intervened on behalf of a Pisgah Inn concessionaire who was forced to shut down his hotel, restaurant and retail stores on the Blue Ridge Parkway. He also encouraged Gov. Pat McCrory to ante up $75,000 to help reopen the Great Smoky Mountains National Park on Wednesday. House Republicans, he pointed out, floated several appropriations bills that would have reopened parks, allowed new veteran benefits to be processed, and restored funding for social programs such as Head Start and WIC, a nutritional supplement program for women and children. "And they never got voted on by the Senate," he said. The results of the shutdown "obviously, are not something that any of us can applaud or feel good about," Meadows said. But he remains committed to altering the Affordable Care Act, which he strongly believes places undue burdens on American workers and the economy. "If there's an apology that needs to be made, it's that I should've been more persuasive," Meadows said, telling the story of "hard-working American taxpayers" who are being saddled with rising insurance premiums and job-stifling bureaucracy. Having failed to force a defunding of the Affordable Care Act, Meadows said there are four areas of the law he hopes the Obama administration will agree to alter, including the law's definition of part-time workers and eliminating an independent payment advisory board tasked with Medicare cost-cutting if spending exceeds targets in 2015. "One of the big concerns most people have right now is with wanting to make sure that decisions are between a doctor and them and not some government agency or bureaucrat," Meadows said. "There seems to be a little bit of an open window there to address that." He admits Republicans have lost some leverage after the government shutdown. But Meadows pointed out there are legislative goals Obama "wants to get through the House that won't cause a shutdown," including immigration reform, that need the support of Republicans to move. "Honestly, I'm having to take the president at his word," Meadows said. "He said after this shutdown was over and the debt ceiling raised, he'd be willing to negotiate." Source: http://www.blueridgenow.com/article/20131017/ARTICLES/131019872/1151?Title=Meadows-says-he-tried-to-avert-shutdown-offset-damage

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Rwandan ruling party headed for huge poll win President's coalition has scored 76 percent of the vote with three-quarters of the ballots counted. The ruling party of Rwandan President Paul Kagame is headed for a widely-predicted landslide win in parliamentary elections, officials have said. Rwanda's National Election Commission on Tuesday said the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), which has dominated the central African nation since ending the genocide nearly 20 years ago, has scored 76 percent of the vote with three-quarters of the ballots counted. Analysts said the RPF faced no serious opposition in Monday's poll, with only a handful of small parties or independent candidates hoping to scrape a few seats in parliament, and prominent opposition figures sidelined. Out of the 80 seats in parliament, 53 are directly elected. The remaining 27 are reserved for women, the youth and handicapped, and will be indirectly appointed by local and national councils on Tuesday and Wednesday. This configuration has ensured that Rwanda has the only parliament in the world where women are in a majority - 56.3 percent after the last elections. At the school where Kagame cast his vote security was tight, with a sniffer dog on hand to inspect bags and security checks for voters going through a metal-detector gate and an x-ray machine set up specially for the occasion. Asked whether he expected the RPF to win comfortably, Kagame said: "I guess so. I don't see any reason why the RPF should not win with a big margin." Questioned about accusations of political repression in Rwanda, Kagame retorted: "Is that what you see around you in the voting? You have eyes. Use them to see what is happening and you'll get the answer." Orderly voting Voting was marked by orderly lines outside booths draped in the sky blue, green and yellow of the Rwandan flag, with some playing music. I don't see any reason why the RPF [Rwandan Patriotic Front] should not win with a big margin. Paul Kagame, Rwandan president and leader of RPF Cars with loudspeakers cruised the pristine streets of the capital, neatly lined with palm trees, reminding voters not to forget their ID cards. This relative calmness was despite the explosion of two grenades that killed two people over the weekend in a market in Kigali, a city reputed to be among Africa's safest. The Rwandan government blamed dissidents linked to the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), a rebel group operating from across the border in Democratic Republic of Congo. The FDLR includes remnants of Hutu militia who carried out the 1994 genocide in Rwanda but who were pushed out by Kagame's RPF, at the time a rebel army. With Rwanda's economy one of the continent's fastest growing, the government is keen to show off the elections as a badge of national unity and democratic health. The small nation was left in ruins by the brutal genocide of 1994, in which close to a million people, mostly from the ethnic Tutsi minority, were butchered by Hutu fighters before RPF rebels managed to take control of the country. Rwanda has undergone a dramatic transformation in the past two decades, with robust economic growth and the strangling of corruption credited to the strong rule of Kagame. Critics say the economic growth and security have come at the expense of freedom of expression. Paul Kagame Rwandan government Hutu militia Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) Hutu Patriotic Front

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Obama Blames Congress for Spying; Snowden Seeks Asylum in Ecuador 55 comment(s) - last by Kumo77.. on Jun 29 at 1:17 PM Sources say leaker has left Hong Kong Edward Snowden, the man who let loose secrets on U.S. National Security Agency spying, has escaped the grasp of U.S. authorities bearing down on Hong Kong, flying on Sunday from Hong Kong, China to Moscow, Russia. The flight comes just days after the self-proclaimed "whistleblower" was charged on two counts of espionage. I. Icy Chinese Let Snowden Flee to Russia On Friday U.S. authorties released a criminal complaint dated June 14, which formally charged Mr. Snowden with two offenses -- unauthorized communication of national defense information and willful communication of classified communications intelligence information to an unauthorized person. Both charges fell under the auspice of the Espionage Act of 1917 (18 U.S.C. § 792). The use of the Espionage Act is not terribly surprising -- the Obama administration has charged more than twice as many whistleblowers with Espionage Act offenses as all the previous administrations before him (since the Act was passed in 1917) combined. Both charges carry 10 years in prison, for a maximum sentence (if served consecutively) of twenty years, plus fines. But the question remains whether the U.S. will be able to catch Mr. Snowden who appears intent -- at least for now -- in avoiding extradition and U.S. charges. Hong Kong officials let Mr. Snowden fly to Moscow without detention. [Image Source: Reuters] U.S. prosecutors failed to serve a provisional arrest warrant in the Chinese nation, according to Chinese officials. Much to the Obama administration and its Congressional allies' chagrin, a Chinese government spokesperson wrote: Mr Edward Snowden left Hong Kong today (June 23) on his own accord for a third country through a lawful and normal channel. The US Government earlier on made a request to the HKSAR Government for the issue of a provisional warrant of arrest against Mr Snowden. Since the documents provided by the US Government did not fully comply with the legal requirements under Hong Kong law, the HKSAR Government has requested the US Government to provide additional information so that the Department of Justice could consider whether the US Government's request can meet the relevant legal conditions. As the HKSAR Government has yet to have sufficient information to process the request for provisional warrant of arrest, there is no legal basis to restrict Mr Snowden from leaving Hong Kong. In a coincidentally timed editorial by the state-run Xinhua news agency, editor "Mengjie" attacks U.S. spying efforts, writing: In the past few months, U.S. politicians and media outlets have thrown out Internet spying accusations one after another against China, trying to make it as one of the biggest perpetrators of Internet spying activities. And those claims were even highlighted during a highly anticipated summit between Chinese President Xi Jinping and his U.S. counterpart Barack Obama held earlier this month in California, which had been designed to help the world's two biggest economies to build a new type of major power relations. All this has seemed to go relatively well until the revelation of the U.S. National Security Agency's PRISM surveillance program. According to Snowden, the U.S. government has engaged in wide-ranging dubious spying activities not only on its own citizens, but also on governmental, academic and business entities across the world. After landing in Moscow, Mr. Snowden reportedly was picked up by the Ecuadorian ambassador. II. Ecuador Confirms Asylum Request Mr. Snowden has filed an asylum request, which Ecuador is considering, according to Ecuador's foreign minister: El gobierno del Ecuador ha recibido solicitud de asilo de parte de Edward #Snowden. — Ricardo Patiño Aroca (@RicardoPatinoEC) June 23, 2013 Currently Ecuador is providing asylum to Wikileaks executive editor Julian Assange, who is holed up at the Ecuadorian embassy in Britain. The country has become a popular destination for foreign whistleblowers, due to its willingness to fight extradition requests. Edward Snowden, NSA whistleblower [Image Source: Reuters] It is thought that Mr. Snowden might reach to Ecuador by way of Cuba or Venezuela -- states which are hostile to U.S. requests. However, early reports that he had boarded a plane to Cuba proved false. White House Press Secretary Jay Carney seemed optimistic that the Russians might prove more cooperative than the Chinese regardin extradition. He's quoted as saying, "We have a strong co-operative relationship with the Russians on law enforcement matters. We have known where he is and believe we know where he is now." III. Republicans Attack Each Other Over Snowden Statements Meanwhile as the mystery regarding Mr. Snowden's whereabouts grows, the leaks are exposing divisions in the Republican party, among those who largely embrace a common agenda with Democratic President Barack Obama, and those who represent a true counterpoint. Rep. Peter King (R- N.Y.) -- a fiery critic of Mr. Snowden -- on Monday lashed out against colleague Sen. Rand Paul (R-Kentucky), commenting, "I think it is important for the American people to realize that this guy is a traitor, a defector, he’s not a hero. And I heard Senator Rand Paul this morning actually compared Snowden to General Clapper. What’s happened to our country? This is a traitor, and for anyone to be comparing him to a U.S. military hero is absolutely disgraceful." Also breaking is revelations concerning the Government Accountability Office's (GAO) "Boundless Informant" tool, which tracked NSA internet spying requests. The tool's statistics, leaked by Mr. Snowden, reveal that the U.S. captured 97 billion pieces of information (including so called "metadata"). While much of this information was harvested in Iran (14 billion) and Pakistan (13.5 billion), a substantial portion (2.9 billion) was captured domestically. IV. DNI -- Caught in a Lie to Congress? The 2.9 billion seized messages in the U.S., do not include the data from seized telephone records (which is likely a much larger set). Reportedly the U.S. is seizing 99 percent of telephone metadata, allowing it to track its citizens' locations on a daily basis and check up on who they're calling. The information profiled by Boundless Informant includes seized emails and chat logs from "computer networks". Boundless Informant reveals that the NSA has a pretty good idea how much spying is going on, even though it claims it doesn't. [Image Source: Guardian] The information appears to expose that James Clapper, the director of national intelligence (DNI) lied to Congress. Questioned by Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) who asked, "Does the NSA collect any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans?" Director Clapper responds, "No sir." Director Clapper, seen here with President Obama, appears to have lied to Congress while under oath. [Image Source: AP] Refusing to produce documents to Congress can lead to contempt of Congress charges (2 USC § 192), which carry a sentence of up to a year in jail, plus up to $1,000 USD in fines. So far no charges have been raised against Mr. Clapper. In response to the growing criticism, President Obama seemingly blamed Congress, saying only Congressional oversight can prevent abusive spying. He comments, "These are the folks you all vote for as your representatives in Congress and they are being fully briefed on these programs." Obama blames Congress for the spy programs. [Image Modifications: Jason Mick/DailyTech] Ironically, though, members of Congress like Sens. Paul, Wyden, and Mark Udall (D-Colo.) have complained consistently about the NSA not providing them sufficient briefings. In a letter last year to NSA director Gen. Keith Alexander, Sens. Wyden and Udall wrote, "the intelligence community has stated repeatedly that it is not possible to provide even a rough estimate of how many American communications have been collected under the Fisa Amendments Act, and has even declined to estimate the scale of this collection." Ironically it appears that the agencies indeed had this information via Boundless Informant, but simply chose to lie to Congress to keep up their charade of ignorance. Sources: South China Morning Post, Hong Kong [gov], Reuters, Guardian Comments Threshold -1 You dug your own grave, Obama, now sleep in it As if you need any more reasons not to enrage your detractors to the point such that they utterly hate you to death, this is it.Everyone in the Obama Administration is an hypocrite. They want every other nations to adhere to the rule of law, when they themselves will not do the same. Now they're whining how Sino-US relations are under attack because China refused to play ball re: extradition request of Snowden. "If you can find a PS3 anywhere in North America that's been on shelves for more than five minutes, I'll give you 1,200 bucks for it." -- SCEA President Jack Tretton

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When the tea party jumped the shark Dana Milbank, November 1 If Ken Cuccinelli II loses his bid to be the next governor of Virginia on Tuesday, as polls suggest he will, the date of the Republican defeat will be traced back to May 18. That was the day the commonwealth’s Republican Party took what had been a sure thing and instead allowed the tea party to give the Democrats an opening. Supporters of Cuccinelli, the state attorney general, had scrapped the GOP gubernatorial primary, which probably would have resulted in the nomination of Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling, a mainstream conservative who likely would have cruised to victory. But Cuccinelli’s supporters forced the party to cut the electorate out of the process, replacing the primary with a convention. There, a smaller number of tea party activists handed the nomination to Cuccinelli, a man so conservative he had supported legislation that would have allowed the banning of the pill and other forms of birth control. Unfortunately for Republicans, the convention chose not just Cuccinelli but also, as the lieutenant governor nominee, E.W. Jackson, a man who has said that gays are “very sick people” whose “minds are perverted”; who has argued that Planned Parenthood has been worse for blacks than the Ku Klux Klan; and who has also said that non-Christians practice “some sort of false religion.” Suddenly, Democrats were in contention. The off-year elections in Virginia and New Jersey have, in the past, been national bellwethers, measuring the sentiment of the electorate. This year, there are no clear national trends in either election, but the pattern in Virginia and New Jersey does suggest a pivotal moment in the Republican Party: the moment the tea party jumped the shark. In New Jersey’s gubernatorial race, highly popular incumbent Chris Christie, who conspicuously spurned the tea party wing, is cruising to reelection. In Virginia, a seat that should be safely Republican has been put in jeopardy. The tea party has caused Republicans to lose other races in recent cycles, including Senate contests in Delaware, Nevada, Indiana and Colorado. But the Virginia race, following a federal government shutdown forced by the tea party, could finally provide some impetus for what remains of mainstream Republicans to reclaim their primaries. The tea party has been in steep decline from its 2010 peak, but it retains power where it matters: in the ability to force the nomination of far-right candidates and to defeat Republican officeholders who aren’t sufficiently extreme. The primary process is the sole source of power for the tea party, but it has become a stranglehold. Certainly, Cuccinelli has problems that aren’t related to the tea party: the gifts scandal surrounding Gov. Bob McDonnell, the fundraising advantage enjoyed by Democrat Terry McAuliffe and Virginia’s overall shift toward Democrats driven by growth in the Washington suburbs. But pretty much everything else that has gone wrong for Cuccinelli can be attributed to the tea party. Republicans were up against a weak Democrat in a strong year (in the past nine gubernatorial elections, Virginians chose the party that didn’t control the White House), but they tossed away their advantage. I’ve known McAuliffe for almost 20 years, and I admire his boundless enthusiasm. But he shouldn’t have a chance in this race. He’s a liberal from New York, a McLean millionaire, a former Democratic National Committee chairman who served as chief moneyman to Bill and Hillary Clinton. A company he led as chairman until last year, GreenTech, is under federal investigations

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SUBSCRIBE LATEST in Gina Nahai From Tehran to Tel Aviv Coming to terms with ‘need’ this Yom Kippur Mommy dearest The myth of the Iranian-American Jew This one’s for our children — the teens and 20-somethings who were born in this country or who’ve lived here most of their life, who have no memory of Iran except what’s been passed on to them or what they’ve constructed with their imagination. The kids who speak Persian with an accent or not at all, crack up at the way their parents pronounce their w’s and th’s, become wide-eyed and incredulous when they discover that we grew up without frozen yogurt, nonfat milk and broccoli. And who, more and more these days, find themselves having to define and defend that tangled nexus of nationality and religion, of likeness and singularity, of being and becoming that is their Iranian heritage. I am speaking, of course, of the uproar within the Iranian community in reaction to a certain reality show over the past few weeks. I don’t know about everyone else, but it pains me to see our young people cringe and shudder at the thought of what the rest of the country is going to think of us after having seen this show. They’re in a strange predicament, these children of hyphenated parents. Iranian-American. Iranian-Jew. Iranian-American-Jew. Already, they’ve had to walk the tightrope from one component to the other every hour of every day. But for too long they’ve also had to endure the harsh judgment of Los Angeles’ larger society, fight negative misconceptions, shrug off the myth of what Iranian-Americans are like because they feel they have little power to change it. Why else would they be so hurt and offended by the pitiful portrayal of a handful of Iranians on a less-than-second-rate television show? Once upon a time, an army of rich, spoiled and ill-mannered Jews, having exhausted all the sources of glee and merriment in Iran, sat around and hatched a plan to conquer the idyllic city of Beverly Hills, destroy its library and public schools, and lay waste to adjacent Westwood Corridor and Sinai Temple. One bright summer day in 1978 they packed up all their jewels, cash and “attitude,” traveled some 7,581 miles, and descended en masse onto the unsuspecting inhabitants of said city. Overnight, they evicted, expelled and dislodged the rightful owners of Beverly Hills by paying too much for their land, paying all cash, opening short escrows. The natives who weren’t forced to sell by outsized offers sold anyway, perhaps out of fear of the jewel-slinging Jews and their all-night displays of libertinism on Shabbat. Sound familiar? It didn’t start with the TV show; it started more than 30 years ago, within the “native” American community of Beverly Hills and Los Angeles. Having planted their flag onto the “natives’ ” land, these Iranian Jews set out to expand their sphere of influence by infiltrating the four pillars of Beverly Hills’ community — the schools, synagogues, professional offices and Neiman Marcus. They spoke Persian to each other even when there were “natives” around. They invented shallowness, materialism, large houses and questionable business practices, and kept it all to themselves. All those unscrupulous bankers on Wall Street who rip off their own clients, the homeowners and real estate speculators who developed and built Brentwood Park and Holmby Hills, the international fashion houses and clothing stores that charge the equivalent of a midsize car for a wallet or a blouse — they must all be Iranian Jews. So must all the women prancing around this city with fish lips and Brazilian buttocks. And all the Americans who, no matter where they are in the world, speak English and expect everyone else to understand. I shouldn’t have to, but I feel I must clarify that the above is, indeed, a myth. As with all myths, it has a kernel of truth buried somewhere within: Yes, a handful of Iranian Jews came to this country with a lot of money, though that’s hardly a crime; a few of their children own BMWs and drive too fast; a few come across as, or really are, impetuous and unpleasant. Advertisement But there are infinitely more rich, obnoxious, BMW-driving “natives” in this city than there are Iranians of that sort, and no one’s going around resenting their presence and blaming them for all the ills in the country. The difference is, when one of the “natives” commits a wrong, we blame him. When an Iranian commits the same wrong, we blame them all. Sound familiar? It’s like what the world has done to Jews through the ages, except in this case, many of those wagging the finger and perpetuating the myth about the frightful Iranian-American Jew are — alas — “native” American Jews. At best, this is divisive and unhelpful. So I’m here to tell you, lest it goes unsaid, that the real story of Iranian-Americans in Los Angeles is vastly different from the one that’s being told — on television and off. The real story is that by far the great majority of Iranian Jews who settled in Los Angeles in the late 1970s and in the ensuing decade were anguished and traumatized refugees escaping the very real threat of extinction in a homeland where their roots stretched back thousands of years. Most got away with only the proverbial shirt on their back. What money they had made in Iran was the result of decades of hard work and ingenuity; whatever part of it they managed to bring to the United States, or to make here, helped contribute to the health and vibrancy of this economy. The real story is that nearly no one, not even the most fortunate, was spared emotional loss and psychological hardship in the turmoil of migration. From the owners of the closet-size stalls on Santee Avenue who worked seven days a week selling quinceañera dresses, to the wives who took a job for the first time in their life because their husband couldn’t find one, and the children who were sent here alone to become the ward of a sibling, an aunt or a Jewish charitable entity — just about every Iranian here has earned whatever living he’s managed to make. To this day, most of them are not rich — not by Los Angeles standards. They don’t live in Beverly Hills, but in Pico-Robertson, Sherman Oaks, Van Nuys and Northridge. Their kids don’t go to private school; they work nights and weekends, take loans to finance their higher education. That they manage to get into Ivy League colleges and succeed in medicine and art and law and technology puts the lie to the idea that they live and breathe to party, drink and spend their parents’ money. They’re a splendid bunch, these young people who know, perhaps better than many “natives” of their generation, what a gift it is to wake up every day under the American sky. They take little for granted. They’ve learned to appreciate the salient parts of each piece of their identity and to tolerate the rest. That’s a gift they’ve been blessed with and a cross they’ll have to bear. But this other cross — being singled out as “foreign” by their fellow Americans, held to account for the flaws and failures of others, having the good in them overlooked and their faults magnified — this is a burden they’ve neither earned nor deserve. Gina Nahai is an author and a professor of creative writing at USC. Her latest novel is “Caspian Rain” (MacAdam Cage, 2007). Her column appears monthly in The Journal. Opinion: L.A.‘s Muslims, Jews must join against hate

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Give 'citizen warriors' the support they need at home » Editorials BY JOHN V. GREEN South Carolina has done something remarkable in the last two years. In the fall of 2011, the unemployment rate of our state's National Guard Service members stood at a staggering 14 percent. Through a combination of government programming and private support, we've wrestled that figure down to 3.9 percent. It is a tremendous transformation, especially as the national unemployment rate for National Guard, and their fellow Citizen Warriors in the Reserve, remains at 11 percent. But our state's good work cannot stop here. Now we must ensure our employers are providing these service members the ongoing support they will need as they continue to play a critical role in both combat and humanitarian operations. Members of the National Guard and Reserve are civilians who remain trained and ready to serve our nation. Their commitment means that they may be assigned to a year-long deployment in a war zone on the other side of the world, or called upon with little notice to respond to a domestic emergency. Each time these citizen warriors answer the call to duty, they leave behind their families and friends, and their civilian jobs. The Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USSERA) was created to ensure Guard and Reserve members do not suffer employment setbacks because of their military service; the Act also contains protections for employers. USSERA cases are often used to measure the strength of the relationship between local employers and service members. According to the 2012 Year in Review from Employer Support of the Guard and Reserve (ESGR) — the Department of Defense's lead on USERRA — 2,793 USSERA cases were filed last year, nationwide. This number has decreased two years running — another sign that our collective efforts are having a positive effect — yet we still have more work to do. As a retired officer of the 315th Airlift Wing, Air Force Reserve in Charleston and State Chair of the South Carolina ESGR committee, I've learned that many USERRA cases are rooted in a lack of understanding of the law rather than a lack of military support. Many South Carolina employers offer shining examples of how to encourage Guard and Reserve employees. In fact, 59 South Carolina National Guard and Reserve members nominated their employers for the 2013 Secretary of Defense Employer Support Freedom Award, the DoD's highest recognition for supportive Reserve Component employers. Employers nominated for this honor go to such lengths to show their support as arranging child care for deployed employees, cooking meals for their families and taking care of their homes while they are away, and setting veteran hiring goals. Employing a member of the Guard and Reserve can present some challenges. Employers must remain flexible and adapt to training schedules and lengthy deployments. Yet the vast majority of military employers find that the benefits of hiring a Guardsmen or Reservists far outweigh the occasional inconvenience. Guard and Reserve Service members are tested leaders with integrity and global perspective. They are well trained in their professions, which include agriculture, engineering, law, medicine, transportation and logistics. And they have performed these professions in the toughest environments, under the most challenging circumstances. For employers looking to strengthen their military hiring and employment practices, South Carolina ESGR provides free resources, training and mediation for Guardsmen, Reservists and their employers. We appreciate that both our citizen warriors and those who employ them are critical to protecting our nation. Our state should take pride in the actions we are taking to lower Guard and Reserve unemployment. Let us then forge ahead in finding ways to continue that tremendous support once our service members are back in the workforce, as together, we all serve. John V. Green is the state chair of South Carolina Employer Support of the Guard and Reserve (ESGR), a Department of Defense operational committee.

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Election Day liquor ban should be repealed, House panel says Jeremy Borden @jeremy_borden Mar 5 2014 9:48 pm POLLDo you think the S.C. law requiring liquor stores to be closed on Election Day should be repealed? Find this story on postandcourier.com to vote. COLUMBIA -South Carolinians should be able to buy liquor on Election Day, state Rep. Todd Rutherford, D-Richland, said Wednesday as a House subcommittee advanced a bill that would address the issue. The House has passed versions of the bill several times before, Rutherford said in an interview, but it has been bogged down in the Senate in past years by other issues. One House member said that the law dates back to when saloons were used as polling places. Rutherford, who sponsored the bill, said that every other state has repealed the law. It's an antiquated tradition that needs to be taken off the books, he said. Rutherford said few have raised concerns with doing away with the Election Day prohibition. "The only concern is they have to be closed on Election Day, and that's just stupid," Rutherford said. Liquor stores in South Carolina lose an estimated $1.1 million in revenue, meaning the state loses around $105,000 in sales tax collections, said Ben Jenkins, a spokesman for the Washington, D.C.-based Distilled Spirits Council of the United States, a trade association. Since 2008, Kentucky, West Virginia, Indiana, Utah, Idaho and Delaware have repealed the Election Day ban, Jenkins said. The proposed bill also strips a clause that allows the state's governor to close liquor stores for reasons of "morals and decorum," said Rep. Dan Hamilton, R-Greenville, who opposes Rutherford's measure. He said he could imagine a scenario where the governor might need to close a liquor store, such as when looting occurs. Hamilton's primary objection, however, is what he calls a trend in bills being pushed in the Legislature by large alcohol retailers at the expense of smaller stores. Doing away with the state's traditions could hurt small businesses in the long run, he said. Last year, the S.C. Senate debated a measure that would increase from three to seven the number of retail liquor-store licenses a business could have. The measure was pushed by Total Wine and other large retailers. Rutherford said that because the House has passed the Election Day liquor store measure before, he believes that chamber has a good chance to pass it again. He's not sure, though, whether the Senate will look differently at the matter this year. Reach Jeremy Borden at 708-5837 or on Twitter @Jeremy_Borden.

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Jeb Bush will soon boost his profile ahead of 2016 presidential race MICHAEL J. MISHAK His schedule may hint at a 2016 presidential run. Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush spoke in January in Hollywood, Fla. The former Florida governor says he’s undecided about a presidential campaign in 2016, but some Republicans are urging him to run. Photo: Wilfredo Lee • Associated Press, Star Tribune photo galleries MIAMI – Jeb Bush gets the question at just about every public appearance these days: Will you run for president? The former Florida governor gives a well-worn answer: “I can honestly tell you that I don’t know what I’m going to do.” It’s an answer that won’t satisfy the GOP faithful for much longer. The scion of the Bush political dynasty will likely be asked the question many times in the coming weeks as he raises his profile with appearances in Tennessee, New Mexico, Nevada and Texas — where he’ll bump into another possible 2016 presidential candidate, Hillary Rodham Clinton. Bush’s “yes” or “no” is one of the most significant factors looming over the 2016 Republican presidential contest. A White House bid by the brother and son of presidents would shake up a wide-open GOP field, attract a legion of big-money donors and set up a showdown with the influential Tea Party movement. Bush has said he’ll make a decision by the end of the year. With New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie facing multiple investigations, many Republicans see Bush as a potent alternative: a two-term GOP governor who thrived in the nation’s largest swing state and could make the party more inclusive. Serious consideration Friends and advisers say he is seriously considering a presidential run. His schedule will do little to quiet speculation. This month, Bush is expected to visit New Mexico and Nevada to campaign for Republican governors there, even though both incumbents are widely expected to cruise to re-election. In Las Vegas, he’ll address leaders of the Republican Jewish Coalition, an influential group backed by casino magnate and GOP megadonor Sheldon Adelson. Bush is scheduled to co-host an education conference in Dallas next week, where Clinton is also set to appear. With no clear front-runner for the GOP nomination, Bush’s standing is rising in early presidential polls and among donors. “Jeb is striking a chord amongst many thoughtful donors,” said Fred Malek, finance chairman of the Republican Governors Association. “He’s a proven conservative,” Malek said. “But at the same time, he is not viewed as extreme or an ideologue and therefore can appeal to the moderate element of the party as well.” Bush would carry both the benefits and the baggage of one of the most prominent U.S. political dynasties. Its patriarch, George H.W. Bush, was elected to one term in 1988; his son George W. Bush served two presidential terms beginning in 2001. The family’s vast fundraising network and political connections, in addition to Jeb Bush’s own constellation of donors and advisers, could fuel a formidable campaign. His mother has doubts But the shadow of his older brother’s controversial presidency still looms. The family’s matriarch, former First Lady Barbara Bush, has repeatedly spoken of the potential for Bush fatigue, saying, “If we can’t find more than two or three families to run for high office, that’s silly.” A Washington Post-ABC News poll this month found that nearly half of all Americans said they “definitely would not” vote for him for president. Nevertheless, friends and advisers say, he is considering a bid. “He is seriously considering this, but he is not following the timeline that the pundits or the press would like him to follow,” said Sally Bradshaw, Bush’s former chief of staff. Bush briefly considered a presidential campaign in 2012 but declined to run. more from politics

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With George W. Bush looking visionary about Hispanic vote, Jeb may get a boost Tuesday, December 18, 2012 7:55pm Beth Reinhard of National Journal writes about a reassessing of President George W. Bush, who espoused a more inclusive approach to Hispanics before the GOP drifted to the right, and finds an upside for Jeb Bush. These signs of wear and tear to the Republican brand are prompting some of Bush’s critics to acknowledge his political foresight and ability to connect with a diverse swath of Americans, although the economic crash and unpopular wars on his watch make it unlikely he will ever be held up as a great president. “I think I owe an apology to George W. Bush,” wrote Jonah Goldberg, editor-at-large of the conservative National Review Online, after the election. “I still don't like compassionate conservatism or its conception of the role of government. But given the election results, I have to acknowledge that Bush was more prescient than I appreciated at the time.” The ebb in Bush-bashing could help pave the way for a 2016 presidential bid by his brother, former Gov. Jeb Bush of Florida, another proponent of immigration reform with proven appeal in the Hispanic community. “The Bush family knows how to expand the party and how to win,” said GOP consultant Mark McKinnon, a former George W. Bush political aide, when asked about a possible Jeb Bush campaign. Voter wariness toward a third Bush administration could ease if the former president and his father, who served one term, are remembered less for their failures and more for their advocacy of “compassionate conservatism” and “a kinder, gentler nation.” Full story here. [Last modified: Tuesday, December 18, 2012 7:55pm]

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Right call to deal for American POW President Obama confronted two conflicting ideals in addressing the case of Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl.On the one hand, the United States has a stated policy of not negotiating with terrorists groups, a policy based on the premise that rewarding their illegal acts via some form of negotiated compensation will only encourage more bad acts.On the other hand, the U.S. military has a policy of not leaving its soldiers behind. With President Obama having just recently announced a winding down of combat operations in Afghanistan, the administration confronted the prospect of violating this fundamental article of faith if it left Sgt. Bergdahl to die in the hands of the Taliban.Given the circumstances, the president picked the right ideal to pursue.The United States has been at war in Afghanistan for a dozen years and the enemy during that time has been primarily the Taliban. After 9/11, the United States invaded Afghanistan to wrest the Taliban from power there. Our military did so because the Taliban regime had provided sanctuary to the al-Qaida training camps from which the attacks on the U.S. were born.So while the Taliban uses the terrorist tools of attacking civilian targets to generate fear and intimidation in furtherance of its goal of forced compliance with its radical and intolerant religious dogma, it is also the enemy the United States came to fight, the enemy with which the country had to negotiate to recover a captured soldier.There is a long tradition of prisoner swaps in times of war. The only thing different this time is the nature of the war. In releasing five high-level Taliban prisoners from Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, the administration paid a high price, agreeing to an unequal trade. Did anyone expect a fair trade? The Taliban knew of this nation's fierce loyalty to its soldiers and exploited it. We suspect the trade terms were far more egregious when the talks began.Then there is the argument that the swap will encourage terror groups to capture U.S. soldiers. Realistically, with the withdrawal from Afghanistan, our military is not likely to confront terrorists again on a traditional battlefield anytime soon. If such a scenario does arise, is it necessarily bad that the enemy might be motivated to capture, rather than kill, our military personnel?What of the president's failure to comply with a law requiring a 30-day notice to Congress in advance of a prisoner release from Gitmo? Constitutionally, this law is unenforceable. The president is Commander in Chief, the U.S. Constitution is clear on that. As commander he has the authority to pursue and execute a prisoner exchange without inviting congressional meddling that could undo a fragile arrangement.Adding to the complexity of this situation is the unusual circumstances surrounding Sgt. Bergdahl's capture. Soldiers who served with him have come forward to say they are convinced he deserted his post in 2009, prior to his capture. Vital resources were used and, some contend, lives lost searching for Sgt. Bergdahl. While the allegations are troubling, they are irrelevant as to whether the nation should have pursued the sergeant's release.President Obama said it well on Tuesday: "Regardless of circumstances, whatever the circumstances may turn out to be, we still get an American prisoner back. Period." Until an investigation and military judicial proceeding provide evidence of misconduct, Sgt. Bergdahl remains a soldier in good standing, entitled to make his case. The Army promoted him to his current rank while held as a prisoner.The circumstances of his capture deserve investigation. The administration should resist any urge to make Sgt. Bergdahl a hero for purposes of political optics, if he is not. We are encouraged by the comments of Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, stating that there will be a review to determine whether Sgt. Bergdahl left his post in 2009. The president's decision would have been easy and roundly applauded if Sgt. Bergdahl had been snatched from a battlefield in a traditional war. Instead President Obama faced a tough decision in murky circumstances. He made the right one. Soldier's hometown awaits his return Obama defends swap of Taliban detainees for Army Sgt. Bergdahl Bergdahl seen as a deserter by many soldiers Debate stirs over U.S.-Taliban captive swap US soldier freed from captivity in Afghanistan

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The Change in Cuba Policy Is a Nod to Reality Katrina vanden Heuvel on December 23, 2014 - 12:18 PM ET American and Cuban flags hang side-by-side on a balcony in Old Havana, Cuba. (AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa) Editor’s Note: Each week we cross-post an excerpt from Katrina vanden Heuvel’s column at the WashingtonPost.com. Read the full text of Katrina’s column here. President Obama’s decision to normalize relations with Cuba is a decision to recognize reality. For fifty years, the United States has pursued a policy that has failed. The embargo hurt the Cuban people it claimed to help and bolstered the regime that it intended to undermine. The effort to isolate Cuba has been increasingly isolating the United States both in the hemisphere and across the world. And as the president concluded, “I do not believe we can keep doing the same thing for over five decades and expect a different result.” To believe that would be, as Albert Einstein taught us, the very definition of insanity. The best evidence that this change was long overdue was provided by the hysterical and incoherent reactions of its opponents. Senator Rand Paul (R-KY), a potential presidential contender, embraced the initiative, making an indisputable comment about the embargo: “If the goal is regime change, it sure doesn’t seem to be working.” Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) replied that Paul “has no idea what he’s talking about.” Rubio argued that the United States gets nothing in return for normalization: no free elections in Cuba, no free press, no democratic progress of any sort. But while we don’t know what the product of the new opening will be, we do know that the half-century of the embargo hasn’t produced free elections or a free press in Cuba either. By making Cuba David against Goliath, the US embargo provides the regime a rationale for its internal crackdowns while elevating its stature across the hemisphere and the developing world. Normalizing relations with Cuba enables the United States to advocate for individual liberty, without being seen as a bully trying to club a small neighbor into submission. Read the full text of Katrina’s column here. show moreRelated Topics: Foreign Policy | Regions and Countries

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Petraeus: Help 'Leavenworth 10' get clemency Posted By Diana West On 03/28/2013 @ 7:34 pm In Commentary,Opinion | No Comments Talk is cheap, Gen. Petraeus. You may not agree. After all, your Washington, D.C., “super lawyer,” Bob Barnett, charges you something like $900 an hour for a kind of talk best described as “reputation reconfiguration” or “image management,” and that’s not cheap. Still, you probably consider it effective. Judging by your recent coming-out party at a University of Southern California dinner to honor the military – your first public foray since you disappeared in a cloud of Paula Broadwell – whatever advice you’ve been buying seems to be working. You came, you apologized, you received a standing ovation. The media melted all over again into a puddle of admiration, further obscuring the real reasons you should not be apologizing before a gala crowd, but rather testifying before the American people: those national scandals you have so far successfully left in your dust. I have previously addressed such scandals and will do so again: lying to the House Intelligence Committee about Benghazi twice; causing death and dismemberment of U.S. forces by directing them to walk the IED-packed roads of Afghanistan as part of a counterinsurgency, or COIN, strategy to win Afghans’ “trust”; and your see-no-Islam COIN strategy itself. For the moment, though, as you seek and already seem to have received public forgiveness, there is something else to consider: What you can do to give meaning to your words. It’s not enough to time your first public address in five months to coincide with an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal this week to make the case, in subtext, that it’s not just your own next act that concerns you but also the plight of some 3 million returning veterans who may find themselves, as you write, at the bottom of the corporate ladder, underemployed or in dead-end jobs. In conclusion, you write, “Now it is our turn to do our part to help (veterans) build promising futures for themselves and their families.” Here’s an idea – gratis – to make us trust the sincerity of your call to help veterans and their families build those promising futures. Take that apparently bulletproof reputation of yours and use it to seek clemency for the so-called “Leavenworth 10.” This tag refers to a group of American soldiers now serving long prison terms mainly at Fort Leavenworth, Kan., for “crimes” committed on your COIN battlefield in Iraq, and also Afghanistan. Across time and space, from desks in orderly offices peering into ghastly battlefields, obsessed military prosecutors have been able to see “murder” and even “premeditated murder” in the eyes of these soldiers who were blinded by the densest fog of war. Since it was you who ordered these young men into the hostile urban combat zones in Iraq to win “hearts and minds,” since it was you who set them up, unable to tell friend from foe, to earn “trust and confidence” amid hostile outposts in Afghanistan, it should now be you who leads them out of their living hells. Long after the U.S. government has released tens of thousands of insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan – including Hezbollah mastermind Musa Daqduq, for example – it is time for you, the leading general in these wars, to declare that these young Americans, these American prisoners of COIN, have been punished enough. I refer, for example, to 1st Lt. Michael Behenna, the elite Army Ranger whose last-ditch interrogation of an al-Qaida terrorist ended when, as forensic evidence indicates, he killed the detainee he was questioning in self-defense. Michael has served roughly four years behind bars, but that’s only a dent in his 15-year sentence. There is Pvt. Corey Clagett, the most junior and the only imprisoned member of an Army squad implicated in following direct orders to shoot captured Iraqi insurgents in Operation Iron Triangle. Corey was sentenced to 18 years; cruelly and unusually, he has already spent nearly seven years in solitary confinement. There is Sgt. Evan Vela, the first-tour Army sniper whose commander ordered him to kill a captured Iraqi struggling to blow the squad’s cover behind enemy lines. He was sentenced to 10 years. There is also Sgt. Derrick Miller, an Army National Guard veteran of Afghanistan, who, during a harsh interrogation, killed in self-defense an Afghan who had penetrated his squad’s defensive perimeter. He received life in prison, with the possibility of parole in 10 years. There are more such men whose names you should know – Marine Sgt. Lawrence Hutchins (sentenced to 11 years), Army Master Sgt. John Hatley (sentenced to 40 years) – whose tragic stories should in truth keep you awake at night, whose families will need your help if ever they are to get a chance to build those “promising futures” you glibly wrote about. All of these young Americans marched into the crosshairs of COIN, the place where your “hearts and minds” strategy blew up, the place where living among, loving, respecting and bribing Iraqis and Afghans according to COIN’s see-no-Islam tenets became life-or-death propositions. These men managed to stay alive. According to COIN, that’s their main offense. You, Gen. Petraeus, could go a long way to change that by pleading for their clemency in the name of healing, even as you plead your own. The war is over in Iraq; it is winding down in Afghanistan. Such humbling efforts would represent a new beginning for them – and for you. Receive Diana West's commentaries in your email BONUS: By signing up for Diana West's alerts, you will also be signed up for news and special offers from WND via email. Name*FirstLastEmail*Where we will email your daily updatesPostal code*A valid zip code or postal code is requiredClick the button below to sign up for Diana West's commentaries by email, and keep up to date with special offers from WND. You may change your email preferences at any time. URL to article: http://www.wnd.com/2013/03/petraeus-should-help-leavenworth-10-get-clemency/

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John Edwards' Might've Walked But Trial Still A Warning For Politicians Share Tweet E-mail Print By Frank James Originally published on Fri June 1, 2012 5:48 pm Former Democratic U.S. Sen. John Edwards (center) and his daughter Cate Edwards leave the federal court Thursday. Sara D. Davis With a not guilty verdict on one count and the jury deadlocked on five others, it appears John Edwards' federal trial on campaign-finance charges ended with a whimper, certainly from the Justice Department's point of view. At first blush, it can be argued that how the trial of the former U.S. senator from North Carolina ended may do little to deter politicians. They'll still be able to go forward and rake in money from supporters and, with some sleight of hand, spend that cash on practically anything. After all, if a married presidential candidate, as Edwards was in 2008, can get away with supporters paying nearly $1 million to hide his mistress and the baby from that affair, it strains the imagination to come up with what isn't possible. Some analysts have certainly described the case as a pre-Citizens United relic; that's the 2010 Supreme Court decision that made the giving of unlimited money to superPACs relatively easy. Wealthy donors can now readily shovel unlimited money toward their preferred candidates, even if they have to maintain the polite fiction of doing it indirectly. But while the Edwards trial was clearly a loss for the prosecutors, some analysts believe that it wasn't a total loss for the notion of campaign-finance law. That's because despite the outcome, they view the trial as sending a powerful message that while prosecutors might fail to secure a criminal conviction, they can make life miserable for any politician they target. In other words, the fact that it may keep many politicians anxiously looking over their shoulders is a good thing. Richard Hasen, a law professor at the University of California at Irvine who writes the Election Law Blog, said by email: "...The very fact that he was prosecuted is what matters — and is already causing candidates and their campaigns to be very careful. We've seen high profile campaign finance-related prosecutions from Edwards to Ted Stevens to Don Siegelman to Tom DeLay. "A prosecutor looking to make a name for himself or herself has a reason to stretch the campaign laws and prosecute prominent prosecutions criminally." While Edwards' acquittal could make prosecutors less likely to bring such cases, it doesn't mean it's impossible that they will, he said. And that possibility stands out as a stark warning to politicians of what could happen if they decide to walk right up to the edge of the existing law, even with all its ambiguities as to what constitutes a campaign contribution or "willful" and "knowing" violations of the law by a political candidate. Meredith McGehee, policy director, for the Campaign Legal Center, said despite the surprising weaknesses in the prosecution's case, the effort was worth it. "I'm glad that they brought it. Otherwise it would be sending the signal that this kind of behavior [goes] unpunished and unexamined." McGehee doesn't buy the argument that Citizens United has turned campaign finance law so upside down that anything goes. Edwards' wealthy supporters Rachel "Bunny" Mellon and the late Fred Barron would have still had some constraints on what they could spend on, she said: "It's true that Mellon and Barron could have given large and unlimited amounts to a superPAC. But that's very different than paying off a mistress. That's where I think the argument falls apart. "I think even for a superPAC to some degree they have to abide by bona fide campaign expenses. Do I think they would get away with it. Hey, with this (Federal Elections Commission) they would get away with murder." Because the six-member FEC has an even partisan split, it often deadlocks on enforcement measures, making it in many instances little more than a paper tiger. Like Hasen, McGehee believes the Edwards trial will make politicians think twice before doing anything that would expose them to the sort of treatment the Democrat received: "The public flogging, if you will, will serve as a deterrent for anyone not looking to be publicly humiliated. And his family who's humiliated. For me, the most heart-wrenching spectacle through this whole thing was watching his daughter going to court every day and hearing what was going on with him, what was going on with her parents marriage. I don't think how any sane individual could say, 'Oh, he didn't get convicted. Maybe I'll try going this route.' "Obviously, politicians clearly have big egos and the blind spots those egos create. But I don't think anyone would look at what Edwards has gone over the last few years and say, 'Oh, he got away with it, so therefore I don't need to be careful.'" Of course, there's other fallout from the Edwards trial that goes beyond its effect on other politicians. That would be its contribution to the public's already very low opinion of politicians. Edwards, from the time he emerged onto the national political scene in 1999 as a fresh-faced senator with a powerful personal story of great success and personal tragedy, seemed almost too good to be true. It turned out he was, becoming another in a long line of politicians who voters trusted only to feel betrayed.Copyright 2013 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/. Public Radio Tulsa

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Tue September 3, 2013 Boehner, Pelosi Unite Behind President On Syria Share Tweet E-mail Comments Print By Mark Memmott Originally published on Tue September 3, 2013 2:30 pm President Obama met with more than a dozen lawmakers, including House Speaker John Boehner and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, at the White House on Tuesday to press his case for a military strike in Syria. Carolyn Kaster President Obama's call for Congress to give him the go-ahead to strike targets in Syria has put House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., on the same side of an important issue for one of the few times in recent years. Calling Syrian President Bashar Assad's alleged use of chemical weapons "a barbarous act," Boehner emerged from a meeting at the White House to say he supports Obama's request. Assad and others with weapons of mass destruction need "to understand we're not going to tolerate this type of behavior," Boeher added. Pelosi said that by using chemical weapons, Assad "crossed a line" — but not one that President Obama drew. It's a line that "humanity drew decades ago," she said, in a reference to the post-World War I international agreement to prohibit the use of chemical weapons. Earlier, as we reported, 2008 Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain of Arizona was making the rounds of the morning news shows to elaborate on his reasons for supporting the Democratic president's request. Obama said earlier Tuesday that he's convinced Congress will support a resolution that authorizes the type of military action that would send a "clear message" to Assad and cripple the Syrian leader's "capability to use chemical weapons not just now but in the future." But the president's request does face opposition in the House — from some in his own party as well as from some of Boehner's fellow Republicans. Many of those lawmakers do not believe that striking Syria is in the USA's national interest. CNN, by the way, is tracking House members' public positions on the president's request.Copyright 2013 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/. View the discussion thread.

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Home | Video | Senate The HillTube McConnell criticizes Democrats for tax votes By Ramsey Cox - 07/26/12 02:29 PM EDT “They’re not even pretending to care about the economy anymore,” McConnell said Thursday on the floor. “I say that because two years ago, Democrats agreed that the higher taxes they’re now fighting for would hurt the economy. At a time when economic growth was 3.5 percent, 40 Democrats voted to keep rates where they were on the grounds that it was the best thing for jobs.ADVERTISEMENT“Yet now, when the growth rate is 2 percent, and 13 million Americans still out of work, they’re voting to slam nearly a million businesses with a tax hike.”Democrats voted for, and approved by 51-48, their own tax plan, the Middle Class Tax Cut Act, which extended tax rates for family income up to $250,000 a year. That measure isn’t expected to pass in the Republican-controlled House.The Republican argument against raising taxes on the wealthiest Americans is that they are the job creators.“So it’s one of two things: Either Democrats don’t even care about the economy and jobs anymore, either they’re just embracing ‘Thelma and Louise’ economics and hoping people support them for some other reason — or their economic worldview is so far outside the mainstream of everyone else who has looked at the situation that they think 2 percent growth and 13 million unemployed is good enough,” McConnell said. “That’s where this ideological crusade of theirs is taking them.” Share on Twitter More in Senate Mitch McConnell already running the show for the GOP

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Pickering Demands Rangel Apology By: Charles Pickering, Jr. Date: Nov. 9, 2006 Location: Unknown PICKERING DEMANDS RANGEL APOLOGYRepudiates incoming Democrat chairman's insult to Mississippi (PEARL, MISS) - Charles B. Rangel (D-NY) is expected to be the next chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee which oversees tax legislation. Today's New York Times quoted him saying, "Mississippi gets more than their fair share back in federal money, but who the hell wants to live in Mississippi?" Today Congressman Chip Pickering responded, "Mr. Rangel owes the people of Mississippi an apology. I hope his remarks are not the kind of insults, slander, and defamation that Mississippians will come to expect from the Democrat leadership in Washington, D.C." Pickering continued, "I have friends and colleagues from New York that are fine people and I've visited their state and think it is a wonderful place. But I love Mississippi. I would rather live in Mississippi, raise my family in Mississippi, and serve Mississippi - and there are millions of Mississippians who agree with me." "From the Coast to the Delta to the Pinebelt to the Hills and across Mississippi, there is beauty in every city, charity in every heart, love in every church, and majesty in every countryside. When I travel this state I see it in the resolute handshakes, the hospitable smiles, and the sincere prayers of our neighbors: we love Mississippi and we are proud and happy to live here," Pickering said. Pickering concluded, "Last year, Hurricane Katrina devastated the Mississippi Coast. We have been working hard not only to rebuild our own homes and communities, but also to repair and protect the network of refineries, pipelines, and transmission grids that supply energy, gas, and oil to the rest of the country, including New York. If Mr. Rangel believes those efforts required more than our fair share of federal money, he is welcome to send that energy back to our state and find an alternative supply. At the very least, he should send us an apology," Pickering said. http://www.house.gov/pickering/releases/nov06/insult.htm

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Energy and Water Development and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2012 By: Jerry Moran Date: Nov. 15, 2011 Location: Washington, DC BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT Mr. MORAN. Reserving the right to object, Mr. President, I am a member of the Appropriations Committee, and a member--in fact, the ranking minority member--of the Financial Services and General Government Subcommittee. The amendment the majority leader offered, that excluded the provisions related to Cuba, was an amendment that was adopted by the full Appropriations Committee in a very bipartisan way. In fact, the vote was two-thirds to one-third--20 votes in favor, 10 votes against. The provisions that have been struck by the procedure that has occurred today are the final implementation of legislation that was passed by this Congress in 2001 in which we provided for the first time the sale for cash upfront of agricultural commodities, food, and medicine. It has always been my view, when we fail to sell agricultural commodities to Cuba, we only harm ourselves. Again, the amendment that has been eliminated from consideration today, through this process, would implement the ability for money to be transferred to the United States by a Cuban bank for purposes of paying for that sale upfront. We have worked closely with the administration, with the Treasury Department, to make certain that nothing contained or nothing that would be contained in this provision would be objectionable to the security or the financial safety and soundness of our country. So with the process that has occurred, while there could have been many rule XVI points of order made today, one was made that defeats the will of the majority of our committee, and I do object. BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

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[Brisbane Times | Text-only index] Why Labor can win in 2013 Date: October 30 2012 Geoff Gallop Many of the nation's political analysts and commentators think the next federal election is a foregone conclusion and will bring with it a Coalition Government. The case most make is not that the country is in dire straits but rather that the Labor Government has failed miserably in "the politics department". The argument goes like this - there has been and there remains instability over leadership, there is ongoing scandal in Labor's ranks and amongst those who support them, the Government hasn't prosecuted the case for a price on carbon and mining tax well enough, there has been too much inconsistency on key issues, most notably asylum-seeker policy, and a trust deficit has been created following the decision to pursue a price on carbon after saying it wouldn't happen. The Liberals of course, have their own version of all this case – the Government is unstable and untrustworthy, incompetent and mired in scandal and ideological and out-of-touch. Day in and day out they say the same thing. However, the question remains - will the Liberal critique resonate with the electorate when they are in the polling station pencil in hand and poised to vote? One can question the performance of the Government on many issues – and I have through this column – but there are important factors which help its cause, particularly when we look at the uncertainties related to what is happening in Europe and North America. Australia's economic performance overall has been good, the triple-A credit rating is intact, the challenges of tax, middle-class welfare and climate aren't being ignored, reform of the nation's health and education systems is in train, a good framework has been established for Commonwealth/State collaboration and employees and their unions aren't being shut out. For economic radicals keen on productivity, social radicals keen on fairness and environmental radicals keen on a low carbon economy it's not a perfect record but if you believe in the triple bottom-line it's a solid performance and worthy of commendation. Add to this the continuing concerns about what a Coalition Government will look like with a N

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Last Night On Live TV, A Politician Called For An Economic Disaster — And Hardly Anyone Noticed John Boehner, Flickr It was a fairly standard State Of The Union night in America last night. President Obama outlined an aggressive progressive vision for America that is almost certainly DOA. The Republicans offered up a rising star, Marco Rubio, to deliver a rebuttal that was written even before the President's speech had been released. It was mostly a speech composed of generalities. And although there was a brief awkward moment with a water bottle, Rubio looked pretty good. But there was one statement from Rubio that really stands out: The President loves to blame the debt on President Bush. But President Obama created more debt in four years than his predecessor did in eight. The real cause of our debt is that our government has been spending 1 trillion dollars more than it takes in every year. That’s why we need a balanced budget amendment. The weird thing about this line is that it's a call to enact an amendment which would destroy the economy. What's even weirder is that hardly anyone cared that a politician would call for it on live TV! Sure, some people (mostly on Twitter) pointed out that a balanced budget amendment is not wise, but most people commenting didn't really care one way or another about it. First let's establish that it's a horrendous idea. A balanced budget amendment would require austerity on a historic level. In recent years, we've had deficits ranging between seven and 10 percent of GDP. Just the upcoming "sequester" (which doesn't come anywhere close to "balancing the budget") is expected to cost 750,000 jobs this year. Beyond that, if we actually tried getting the deficit to zero, which is what a balanced budget amendment would require, we'd never get there, because the ensuing GDP contraction, would devastate the economy and cause tax revenues to shrivel. The futility of austerity as a means of deficit reduction has recently been shown in Europe, where a continent obsesses with austerity continues to miss deficit targets. And in Japan, history shows that periods of austerity are associated with larger deficits. See the parts of this chart from Richard Koo that refer to the Hashimoto and Koizumi periods of fiscal reform. Deficits rose and tax revenue shriveled. It's also important to understand the relationship between government savings and private sector savings. As the chief economist of Goldman Sachs explained to us in an interview, a core chart to understanding the economy is the one below, which shows that government deficits are the mirror image of private sector savings. When the government "saves" more, the private sector saves less. When the government saves less, the private sector can save more. It's precisely the leveraging of the government sector in recent years that has enabled households to pay down debt. Note how the black line and the light grey line are almost perfect mirrors of each other. A world where the government is unable to go into deficits is a world where the private sector is unable to save — a situation that would result in economic catastrophe. Note that none of the above arguments even rest on the easy/standard Keynesian argument that a Balanced Budget Amendment would prevent the government from dealing with a recession using counter-cyclical fiscal policy. That is of course true, but it dramatically understates the arguments against such an amendment. It's hard to imagine what an equivalently bad idea would be in another realm. Certainly if a politician called for disbanding the military, most people (even neutral journalists) would feel comfortable pointing out that the politician was advocating something massively irresponsible. So why the meh reaction to Rubio? Basically because on deficit and spending issues, almost everyone who covers Washington has swallowed one view of the debate hook, line and sinker. That's why a mainstream guy like Joe Scarborough can say that nobody agrees with Paul Krugman on the deficit — a statement that is provably false. It's also why George Will, when advocating a Balanced Budget Amendment, can state that the only good counterarguments are that it won't work very well, or that it might result in tax increases. As if those were the only good counter-arguments! Anyway, the GOP is making a new push on the Balanced Budget Amendment, a drive that's almost certainly going to end in failure. It will not pass. But beyond that, it will likely be covered as though it's just a debate about two different sets of values (big vs. small government, or whatever) rather than a debate about whether or not we want to hit the Constitutional Self Destruct Button. SEE ALSO: The full text of the Marco Rubio State Of The Union rebuttal --> Blame media bias.

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Campaigns sunk to new lows 12:00 AM, Wednesday, November 06 2002 | 188 views | 0 | 1 | | Please, no runoffs. Please, no runoffs.We're not certain we can stomach more campaigning.And at the rate this year's campaigns deteriorated from run-of-the-mill rhetoric to just out-and-out sleaze, a few more weeks of the posturing may end in fisticuffs.Some of the worst offenses came in the waning days of this election season, and one of them was right here in Arkansas.As of Sunday night, voters across this state were able to access campaign information from a bastion of accurate reporting, the Web site of Matt Drudge.We hope they assessed that information's source as well.It seems that Drudge received some tales about Mark Pryor, candidate for one of the state's U.S. Senate seats. The information came from the state Republican Party, which claimed that Pryor had hired an illegal immigrant to do housework. When Pryor refuted that contention, the party claimed that he hadn't paid taxes on her wages and so forth and so predictably on.Sen. Tim Hutchinson claimed he knew nothing of the allegations or the ad. We're left to assume that the people making the claims happened upon the information minutes or hours before they released it. Surely the fact that the information came out two days before election day is just a coincidence. Another coincidence would be the fact that the party almost immediately unveiled a campaign advertisement on the matter.Hmmmm ...Make no mistake, Republicans aren't the only ones who will use whatever they can to try to secure an electoral advantage. Minnesota Democrats have done a remarkable job of turning Sen. Paul Wellstone's death into a campaign tool.Sad.Almost makes us long for the old days, when candidates just bought people's votes.- Rick Fahr Arkansas lawmakers to discuss new ethics rules 2014 highlighted by GOP sweep in Arkansas | 2 hrs 52 mins ago

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At CPAC gathering, Romney advocates strong U.S. military By PAUL WESTTribune Washington Bureau Former Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney puts his hand to his heart as supporters cheer him upon taking the stage to speak at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) at National Harbor, Md. (REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque) Ayotte has harsh words for Obama OXON HILL, Md. - Returning to a public stage for the first time since losing the presidential election, Mitt Romney called on Republicans Friday to put a powerful U.S. military at the top of their agenda.The 2012 Republican nominee had a distrustful relationship with some conservatives during his presidential run, but he was warmly received by hundreds of activists at the Conservative Political Action Conference, the annual meeting of activists from that wing of the party.Romney's call echoed his 2012 campaign promise to expand the Pentagon budget.Romney advised anyone who would be President to "do whatever you can to keep America strong, to keep America prosperous and free and the most powerful nation on earth." He added that "American's pre-eminent position is not guaranteed," mentioning China, Russia and "the jihadists" as forces that could surpass the United States this century.Although he singled out his former running mate, Paul Ryan, for praise, Romney did not address the spending plan that the House Budget chairman released this week. It would devote $2 trillion less for defense over the next 10 years than Romney and Ryan proposed in the campaign.Greeted by loud applause and cheers of "Mitt, Mitt," the former Massachusetts governor, who has said he is done with elective politics after two unsuccessful presidential runs, began by thanking the conservative crowd for its past support."Of course, I left the race disappointed that I didn't win," he said, adding that setbacks in the past had paved the way for future Republican victories. "It's up to us to make sure that we learn from our mistakes, and my mistakes."Romney said he rejected the "fashionable" pessimism about the future of the conservative movement and the Republican Party."Like you, I believe a conservative vision can attract a majority of Americans," he said, acknowledging that, "as someone who just lost the last election," he is probably not the best source of advice on a way forward.His 15-minute speech was largely thematic and sidestepped divisions within the GOP over efforts to broaden the party's appeal. In a nod to the isolationist sentiment that runs through much of the young, libertarian crowd, he leavened his praise for U.S. military interventions in Iraq and elsewhere by injecting the phrase "whatever you think of them."Republicans would do well to look to its state governors for solutions to the nation's problems, Romney said. He singled out several, including Georgia's Nathan Deal, for promoting charter schools, and Michigan's Rick Snyder, who signed legislation designed to weaken the power of labor unions.Romney has often sought out CPAC as a venue for important appearances, even though many of those attending the annual events remained suspicious of the depth of his conservatism. In 2008, he pulled out of the Republican primary campaign at a CPAC conference. Four years later, in another CPAC speech, he declared himself "severely conservative," a description that struck some as a ham-handed appeal to the ranks.This time, he appeared to flub a date likely to go down as the most pivotal of his life, his defeat in the Nov. 6. election. "We may not have carried on Nov. 7, but we haven't lost the country we love and we haven't lost our way," Romney said.

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April 10. 2013 12:06PM Key U.S. senators announce deal on background checks for gun buyers By JOHN WHITESIDES and RICHARD COWANReuters WASHINGTON - A Democratic and a Republican senator said on Wednesday they had struck a deal to expand background checks for gun buyers, boosting prospects for passage in the U.S. Senate of at least some of President Barack Obama's gun-control proposals.The deal by Democrat Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania set the stage for a likely Senate debate on the gun-control package starting on Thursday, when the Senate is expected to defeat an attempt by conservative Republicans to block the bill from reaching the floor.The proposal for expanded background checks appears to be Obama's best hope for meaningful gun-control legislation in the aftermath of the December massacre of 20 children and six adults at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn.The senators said their measure would expand criminal background checks for prospective gun buyers to include sales made at gun shows and online, although sales among friends or family members would still be exempt from the requirement.The agreement, which the senators said would help keep guns out of the hands of dangerous criminals and the mentally ill, would close one major loophole in a system that analysts say allows as many as 40 percent of gun buyers to avoid background checks.More controversial parts of the president's plan - such as a ban on rapid-firing "assault" weapons like the one used in Connecticut and limits on the capacity of ammunition magazines - appear to have a slim chance of clearing the U.S. Senate.Even if the Senate passes a package of gun-control measures, it would still face a tough road to approval in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives."Today is just the start of a healthy debate that must end with the Senate and House hopefully passing these common sense measures and the president signing them into law," Manchin told reporters in announcing the agreement on Capitol Hill.He said Democratic leaders have promised the background checks agreement will be the first amendment offered to the gun-control bill on the Senate floor.Obama's proposals to curb gun violence have been strongly opposed by the powerful gun lobby the National Rifle Association, which did not immediately respond to the agreement.The president's plan has been the focus of intense lobbying by gun-rights supporters such as the NRA and by gun-control advocates such as Mayors Against Illegal Guns, a group backed by Michael Bloomberg, the media magnate and New York City mayor.Obama, who has described the day of the Dec. 14 Newtown shooting as the worst of his presidency, has used a campaign-style approach to pushing for gun-control legislation. No major gun-control legislation has passed the U.S. Congress since 1994.Several family members of victims from the shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown flew to Washington on Air Force One on Monday to urge lawmakers to take action, and First Lady Michelle Obama was scheduled to give a speech on guns on Wednesday.Manchin's participation in the deal on background checks could bolster the prospects for the legislation. The freshman senator from West Virginia represents a state where gun ownership has long been passionately protected and where attempts to regulate guns have been strongly opposed.Toomey, a conservative Republican from Pennsylvania, said he did not believe expanding background checks amounted to gun control."It's common sense," he said. "What matters to me is doing the right thing, and this is the right thing."Senators Mark Kirk of Illinois, a Republican, and Chuck Schumer of New York, a Democrat, also participated in the negotiations.On Thursday, the Senate is scheduled to hold its first test vote on a gun-control bill. More than a dozen conservative Republican senators have threatened a filibuster aimed at preventing consideration of any gun restrictions.But with public opinion polls showing up to 90 percent of Americans favor expanded background checks, other Republicans have said Obama's proposals should get a Senate vote.The measure likely to pass the Senate could also include funding for school security and tighter restrictions on gun trafficking.That package would fall short of what Obama had pressed for, but would be far more extensive than the NRA would like.

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State House faced many battles in 2013 In making NH laws, not everything is a hot-button issue CONCORD - The 2013 Legislature was finally able to approve a medical marijuana program after years of trying, but unable to reverse many of the controversial initiatives of its immediate predecessor.With the defeat of many Tea Party Republicans, the newly empowered Democratic majority sought to reverse education tax credits for private schools, the stand-your-ground law, abortion restrictions and the photo ID law, only to have the Republican-controlled Senate block the repeals.However, the House and Senate exhibited a bipartisan spirit in overwhelmingly approving a $10.7 billion two-year operating budget that began to restore much of the higher education funding and programs the previous Legislature had eliminated.The Senate and House came to loggerheads on how additional money should be raised for highways, higher education, social service programs and economic development.No casinoBefore the budget passed in June, the House killed a Senate-approved bill, which had Gov. Maggie Hassan's support, to establish a casino in the state's southern tier, while the Senate killed a House-approved plan to raise the gas tax 12 cents over three years. The gas tax increase would have paid for the final phase of Interstate 93 expansion between Salem and Manchester, among other road and bridge projects.And the issue of whether New Hampshire should expand its Medicaid eligibility under the Affordable Care Act dragged through the summer and into the fall before the Senate killed the House-passed bill to add about 49,000 to the state-federal health insurance plan for the poor, elderly and disabled.Supporters said the state's most vulnerable residents would receive needed health services and the state's medical providers would receive $2.4 billion over the next seven years. But opponents said the state could not sustain the costs over time and private insurance needed to take over the risks instead of the state.The 2014 Legislature will revisit those three issues beginning Jan. 8.Medical marijuanaAlong with the budget, lawmakers came together to pass a law to allow a medical marijuana program to be implemented in New Hampshire. Gov. Hassan signaled support early on, but she agreed with law enforcement officials who opposed a provision that would have allowed patients to grow their own marijuana plants, and the provision was removed.The Senate, however, killed a bill that would have legalized the possession of a small amount of marijuana.A law stemming from House Bill 482 delineates parameters for eradicating bed bug infestations and the responsibilities of landlords and tenants to solve a problem.Proponents said the new law allows infestations to be dealt with rapidly, before the pests can quickly multiply, while fairly distributing the cost and responsibilities for solving the problem. With much fanfare and little debate, the Senate and House - with the backing of Hassan - doubled the research-and-development tax credit from $1 million to $2 million annually and made it permanent. A year earlier, the credit was a victim of maneuvering between the House and the Senate.After months of investigations last year, lawmakers passed several laws revamping the state Liquor Commission. Under the changes, the agency will have a single commissioner and a deputy commissioner, and the Executive Council's approval will be needed for contracts of more than $10,000.Attempts to restrict the commission's ability to transfer funds within the agency failed.Lawmakers wanted to change the way public insurance risk pools were handled, but after finding little agreement, they eventually settled on forming a study committee to consider the Local Government Center's organization and its retention of millions of dollars in reserve funds to cover medical claims. The committee's recommendations will be acted on during the 2014 session.Auto dealers' rightsAuto dealers won a convincing victory over manufacturers in the 2013 session. The auto dealers' bill of rights changes business practices between manufacturers and their dealers, giving local auto and construction and farm equipment dealers more flexibility to run their franchises. All other states have similar laws.Supporters say the law will level the playing field for the dealers, who testified they are often held hostage to the manufacturers' demands. Opponents say the law overturns existing business contracts and, rather than leveling the playing field, tilts it significantly in favor of the dealers. They also say it will drive up costs for consumers.Equipment manufacturers sued over the new law in September, asserting it is unconstitutional. The suit is pending.If you buy a new car, however, you can now legally drive it 70 mph on a section of Interstate 93 from Plymouth to parts north. Attempts to raise the speed limit statewide and on I-89 were not successful, but lawmakers will revisit the issue during the 2014 session.Older and taller children will have to be in child restraint seats in autos. Beginning Jan. 1, children must be in car seats until they are 7 years old or 57 inches tall.Currently, children have to be in car seats until they reach age 6 or are 55 inches tall.The new law moves the state closer to federal guidelines and does not jeopardize the state's share of federal highway money. Lawmakers also provided more protection for children in child care facilities by requiring background checks for all employees who work with the children.No lead sinkersFishermen will no longer be able to use lead sinkers and jigs beginning June 1, 2016. Conservationists and environmentalists pushed for the law, saying lead sinkers and jigs are the leading cause of adult loon deaths in the state and the law would finish the work that began more than a decade ago when the state was the first to prohibit small lead tackle.Sportsmen and tackle shops opposed the change and urged lawmakers to wait until a commission of stakeholders completed its work, but the House and Senate approved the prohibition by large margins.Landowners who allow the public to use their property for hunting, fishing, hiking and other recreational activities are afforded greater legal protection under a law approved this year.The law protects people who own, lease or manage land open for public use from lawsuits by someone injured on their property. The law does not exempt a landowner's liability for a malicious act or if the owner charges a fee for use of the property.The law was prompted by a lawsuit filed by a Manchester resident injured when he fell from a tree stand in 2009. He sued the Epsom landowner, but later dropped the lawsuit.Lawmakers did decide former Gov. John G. Winant should have a memorial, just not on State House grounds.And finally, with the urging of students from the Derry Village School, lawmakers made the humble white potato the state's official vegetable. grayno@unionleader.com

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Agency Information United States Centennial Commission [Record group 230-1] Agency Function Administrative Subunits The committees and offices of the United States Centennial Commission were: Executive Committee & Director-General Sub-Committee on the Fourth of July Centennial Athletic Contests Committe Committee on History, Literature and Popular Education Committee on Plans and Architecture Executive Department of the United States Government Department of the Press Secretary's Office; Classification and Catalogue Agency History In accordance with the Act of 1871 creating the Centennial Commission, the Commission held its first session on 4 March 1872. Meetings were held periodically throughout 1872 and, beginning in 1873, annually. Representing vitually every state and territory in the Union, the Commission was charged with the oversight of the planning, construction and operation of the Exhibition. The need for day-to-day direction led to the appointment of a Director-General who was the chief operating officer of the Commission. Subsequent to this appointment, the Commissioners met annually in a round of sessions which would last up to a week. . As the preparations for the Exhibition advanced, it was foun

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Under fire, Boehner sets House votes on Sandy aid By DAVID LAWDER and IAN SIMPSONReuters WASHINGTON - House Speaker John Boehner made a U-turn on Wednesday to clear the way for approval of $60 billion in Superstorm Sandy relief by mid-January after drawing withering fire from fellow Republicans, including New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, for canceling an earlier vote.The Republican-controlled House of Representatives will now vote on Friday on a $9 billion down payment for storm-related aid to the National Flood Insurance program.Boehner also assured New York and New Jersey lawmakers that the House will take a second vote on Jan. 15 on the $51 billion remainder of the Sandy package."This procedure that was laid out is fully acceptable and fully satisfactory. It provides the full $60 billion that we require," said Representative Peter King, a high-ranking House Republican from Long Island, New York.King had earlier condemned Boehner's adjournment of the House before the Sandy vote, telling CNN it was a "knife in the back." Sandy, the second-costliest storm in U.S. history, devastated the northeastern United States on Oct. 29, with New York and New Jersey hardest hit.Christie, seen as a potential Republican presidential candidate in 2016, said the vote's cancellation reflected the "toxic internal politics" of Republicans in the House."There is only one group to blame for the continued suffering of these innocent (storm) victims - the House majority and the speaker, John Boehner," Christie told a news conference in Trenton, New Jersey.Christie tried to telephone Boehner four times after House Majority Leader Eric Cantor told him at 11:20 p.m. the vote was canceled. The speaker declined to take his calls, the governor said.President Barack Obama also urged House Republicans to vote on the Sandy package on Wednesday.In a joint statement issued on Wednesday afternoon, Boehner and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor said: "Getting critical aid to the victims of Hurricane Sandy should be the first priority in the new Congress, and that was reaffirmed today with members of the New York and New Jersey delegations."

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Back in NH, Forbes talks immigration, Romney and 2016 By JOHN DiSTASOSenior Political Reporter Businessman and former GOP candidate Steve Forbes chats during a meeting at the New Hampshire Union Leader on Friday. (DAVID LANE/UNION LEADER) 3/15/13--Businessman Steve Forbes sat down with the New Hampshire Union Leader editorial board including Publisher Joseph W. McQuaid in Manchester on Friday. DAVID LANE/UNION LEADER MANCHESTER - With immigration viewed as the next big thing to hit Capitol Hill in the coming weeks and months, publisher and former two-time Republican candidate Steve Forbes says it doesn't have to be a losing issue for his party.Donald Trump last week called immigration reform "a suicide mission" for the GOP, but Forbes, in New Hampshire on Friday to speak to the Concord and Merrimack County Republican committees, disagreed, saying in a wide-ranging interview that thoughtful reform may not immediately gain votes for Republicans, but it "will stop losing votes" for the GOP."Stop the bleeding first," he said, "and then you can start appealing to voters."Forbes, who was last in the state in May 2012 to campaign for state GOP candidates, said he was "shocked" by the results of the last election."For all the mistakes that Mitt Romney made, I still thought people wouldn't want another four years of this pessimism and fighting," he said.Forbes faults Romney and his campaign for allowing themselves to be defined by President Barack Obama and the Democrats.Yet, he is optimistic about the state of the economy and the GOP, predicting that among those who will at least consider running for President in 2016 will be Chris Christie, Rand Paul, Marco Rubio, Bobby Jindal, Jeb Bush, who Forbes called "a given," and Paul Ryan, but definitely not himself.On immigration, Forbes said the Republicans are right to insist on a "guest worker" program in which foreign workers are granted temporary entrance to the United States to do mostly difficult low-paying tasks."You can't pretend you don't need agricultural workers or hotel workers as the economy gets back on its feet," he said. "If you need them, have a program so you know who's here."He said the GOP should also insist on reform of the H1-B visa, which also allows temporary admission to the country for certain occupations, "to show we're in tune with the times."These should be available for high-tech jobs, and the number of H1-Bs should be dictated by the market "instead of putting artificial caps on them."This is why companies put facilities overseas; they can't bring capable people here," said Forbes. "Part of that is if you get your advance degree here, you should get a green card with your diploma. Why are we educating them and then sending them home?"Forbes said Democrats were successful in the last campaign because "they defined all the issues. On immigration, it was, 'the GOP hates you.' We were waging 'a war against women,' and, because the Romney campaign never responded effectively, it stuck."Not to re-hash the past," he said, "but the idea that for three months, you could allow $300 million in trash ads run against you and not respond and not do anything," said Forbes. "At the convention, you put your five-point program at the end of your acceptance speech, looking like an after-thought. What were they thinking?"Forbes said Romney "came off as sort of defensive" about his own success, giving an impression "that he wasn't quite savory."Roger Ailes has said that if you look like you're defensive about it, words don't matter," he said. "If you look like you're proud, then people say, 'Maybe there is something to that.' But he never did it."Despite the big Democratic win, Forbes said "the country is adrift" and looking for leadership.That is why, he said, there was positive grassroots response to Sen. Rand Paul's filibuster of the John Brennan nomination to head the CIA over the Obama administration's policy on the drones strikes within U.S. borders."He actually went against the grain and did something _ that's what they're yearning for," Forbes said.On Medicare and Social Security, Forbes said the GOP should more effectively frame calls for reform as matters of personal choice.Forbes predicted a 2014 "up-rising" similar to 2010. Within the GOP, there will be hard-fought primaries, and, "the message will be that no matter how glorified your name is, you will be challenged. I don't care if you call them coffee parties or tea parties or vodka parties, the base is ready to be roused."Forbes, a long-time advocate of the flat tax, said he views Ryan's plan for two tax rates, 10 and 25 percent, favorably, but only as "a way-station to one rate.""The bench of the party is good," said Forbes, citing Christie's "two-fisted" approach and soaring popularity in mostly Democratic New Jersey, Ryan's "intellectual firepower" and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker successes.And when the GOP presidential field firms up, Forbes said, New Hampshire and Iowa will continue to play vital roles in the nominating process.Despite the ever-increasing glut of broadcast advertising and social media campaigning, Forbes sees a continued value in retail campaigning."It's educational for candidates," said. "This is an under-appreciated side of American politics."Forbes said that "in normal times," Iowans force candidates to articulate their stands on social issues, while Granite States force debate on economic issues."As a candidate, you get right up front a vivid lesson in American national politics in a retail way, and it's a good thing to get early on."It's a test of your skills," he said. "You couldn't have two better states."

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Public Administration News Share Obama To Make History With Myanmar Visit http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/afp_asiapacific/view/1238101/1/.html YANGON: US President Barack Obama headed to Myanmar on Monday for a historic visit aimed at encouraging a string of dramatic political reforms in the long-isolated state.Obama will be the first serving US president to set foot in the country also known as Burma, in the starkest illustration yet of its emergence from a long period of isolation and repression.He is expected to praise President Thein Sein for ending an era of junta rule and for welcoming opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi into mainstream politics, but also to prod the former general to go much further towards genuine democracy.Obama will use a major speech at Yangon University to hail "the flickers of progress" in Myanmar, the White House said."Today, I have come to keep my promise, and extend the hand of friendship," Obama will say, according to excerpts of his address. "But this remarkable journey has just begun, and has much further to go."The setting for the speech will be rich in symbolism as the university was the scene of past episodes of pro-democratic student unrest, including mass demonstrations in 1988 that ended in a bloody military crackdown."Instead of being repressed, the right of people to assemble together must now be fully respected," Obama was to say. "Instead of being stifled, the veil of media censorship must continue to be lifted."In a nod to a recent wave of deadly sectarian violence in western Rakhine state, Obama will urge Myanmar to "draw on diversity as a strength, not a weakness".In a scene that would have been unthinkable until recently, Obama will on Monday stand side-by-side with democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi at the lakeside villa where his fellow Nobel laureate languished for years under house arrest.The White House hopes Obama's visit to Myanmar will boost Thein Sein's reform drive, which saw Suu Kyi enter parliament after her rivals in the junta made way for a nominally civilian government -- albeit in a system still stacked heavily in favour of the military.US officials said Obama would announce a $170 million development aid pledge to Myanmar to coincide with the formal opening of a US Agency for International Development (USAID) mission in Myanmar, which was suspended for years over the junta's repression of the democracy movement.The money, spread over a two-year period, will target projects in civil society designed to build democratic institutions and improve education as Myanmar lays the groundwork of a political system based on freedoms.Some human rights groups said Obama should have waited longer to visit, arguing that he could have dangled the prospect of a trip as leverage to seek more progress such as the release of scores of remaining political prisoners.Myanmar unveiled new pledges on human rights on the eve of the visit, saying it would review prisoner cases in line with "international standards" and open its jails to the Red Cross, as part of efforts to burnish its reform credentials.The United States on Friday scrapped a nearly decade-old ban on most imports from the country, after earlier lifting other sanctions.But it continues to call for the release of scores of political prisoners still in Myanmar's jails, as well as an end to sectarian bloodshed between Buddhists and Muslims in Rakhine state.Obama fever has swept Myanmar's biggest city Yangon, with his image emblazoned on T-shirts, mugs and even graffiti-covered walls."I would like to tell President Obama to push the Myanmar government to walk the path to democracy bravely and to aim for full human rights which our country needs," said 28-year-old shopkeeper Thant Zaw Oo.Obama's trip to Asia, coming less than a fortnight after his re-election, is the latest manifestation of his determination to anchor the United States in a dynamic, fast-emerging region he sees as vital to its future.The Hawaii-born US president is making his fifth official visit to the region, where he spent four years as a boy in Indonesia, and is diving back into foreign policy after a year spent on the campaign trail.Later on Monday Obama will fly to Cambodia, where he is likely to face a tense encounter over human rights with Prime Minister Hun Sen, ahead of the East Asia Summit, the main institutional focus of his pivot of US foreign policy to the region.-AFP/ac Obama To Make History With Myanmar VisitYANGON US President Barack Obama headed to Myanmar on Monday for a historic visit aimed at encouraging a string of dramatic political reforms in the long-isolated state

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Home / Top News Mousavi announces new political party TEHRAN, Aug. 16 (UPI) -- Mir Hossein Mousavi, the defeated presidential candidate who has become the focus of the Iranian opposition, announced his new political party Saturday. Mousavi told the Islamic Association of the Iranian Medical Society the party's name is the Green Path of Hope Association, Press TV reported. "The color green is the symbol of this movement; its slogan is demanding the impeccable implementation of the constitution, and innumerable self-motivated independent societies form the body of this movement," Mousavi said. Mousavi is a former prime minister who was close to Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the founder and first Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was re-elected June 12 in an election many observers say was blatantly rigged. The official results gave the president a 2-1 margin around the country, even in areas where Mousavi had a lot of support. Comments

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Topic: Martin O'Malley SEN. CLINTON RECEIVES ENDORSEMENT FROM GOV O'MALLEY IN ANNAPOLISPresidential candidate Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY) speaks alongside Gov. Martin O'Malley (D-MD), in Annapolis, Maryland on May 9, 2007. O'Malley gave his official endorsement for Clinton's presidential run today. (UPI Photo/Kevin Dietsch) | License Photo Maryland A.G. seeks life for one of four Death Row inmates Jody Lee Miles, one of four inmates still on Maryland's Death Row, should be given a life sentence with no parole, the state attorney general said Thursday. Poll: Romney leader of the large Republican 2016 pack Mitt Romney, who has said he has no plans to run for president again, leads the field of potential Republican candidates for 2016 in a new poll. Bachmann: Don't count me out for 2016 Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn., is retiring from Congress at the conclusion of this term, but said she is considering a presidential run in 2016. Beretta ditches Maryland for Tennessee over tough gun control laws Beretta announced Tuesday that it will move its U.S. plant from Md. to Tenn., citing increasingly restrictive gun control laws in the Mid-Atlantic state. Maryland offshore wind auction scheduled Sixteen companies are cleared to take part in an upcoming lease sale to develop wind energy off the Maryland coast, the U.S. government announced. Gov. Martin O'Malley plays banjo in streets of Annapolis Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley (D) was spotted enjoying his Memorial Day in cargo shorts and flip-flops, playing the banjo in the streets of Annapolis. Maryland criminalizes discrimination against transgender citizens Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley has the Fairness for All Marylanders Act, banning discrimination against transgender individuals in his state. Maryland raises minimum wage to $10.10 Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley signed into law a hike in the state's minimum wage from the current federal $7.25 to $10.10 by July 2018. Maryland legislature approves state minimum wage increase Gov. Martin O'Malley praised the Maryland legislature Monday for approving an increase in the state's minimum wage to $10.10 an hour. The Issue: Year of action? Doubtful. U.S. President Barack Obama may have declared 2014 a year of action in his State of the Union address but lawmakers last week moved quickly after returning from their recess to knock down expectations. Democrats overwhelmingly back Hillary Clinton in 2016 presidential bid An overwhelming 80 percent of Democrats want Hillary Clinton to run for president in 2016, says the New York Times/CBS News poll released Wednesday. Bipartisanship of governors meeting turns into shouting match Bipartisanship at the National Governors Association's winter meeting in Washington vanished Monday when several leaders talked smack during a news conference. GOP governors likely to draw most attention at national gathering Embattled Republican governors may pull the media focus to the GOP this weekend as governors from both parties meet in Washington. At least 18 dead in winter storm across U.S. South, Northeast A storm blamed for at least 18 deaths in the United States, most of them in the South, dumped a foot of snow in the Northeast, officials said Thursday. Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley announces he is exploring a 2016 presidential run [VIDEO] Democratic governor of Maryland, Martin O'Malley, told the Washington Post in an interview that he is exploring a 2016 presidential run. Martin Joseph O'Malley (born January 18, 1963) is an American Democratic politician who is currently serving as the 61st Governor of Maryland. Previously, he served as the mayor of Baltimore from 1999 to 2007. He is currently the chairman of the Democratic Governors Association. O'Malley grew up in the Washington, D.C. suburb of Potomac, Maryland, the child of an attorney. O'Malley attended the Our Lady of Lourdes School in Bethesda and Gonzaga College High School, the same school of such political notables as Patrick Buchanan. He went to college at The Catholic University of America, graduating in 1985. Later that year he enrolled at the University of Maryland School of Law in Baltimore, earning his J.D. in 1988 and passing the bar that same year. In December 1982, while still in college, O'Malley signed on with the Gary Hart presidential campaign for the 1984 election. In late 1983, he volunteered to go to Iowa. He phone-banked, organized volunteers, and played guitar and sang at small fundraisers and other events. FULL ARTICLE AT WIKIPEDIA.ORG This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Martin O'Malley." This legislative session, we passed tough new laws to improve safety on our roadways by cracking down on drunken driving, speeding and texting Md. gov bans cell phone use in state cars Maryland's horse industry not only generates tens of thousands of jobs Maryland works to keep Preakness While it is not the full repeal that we had hoped for, I want to thank the Maryland House of Delegates for voting to strengthen Maryland's death penalty law Maryland restricts death penalty I'm going to lobby people on the merits of the issue O'Malley targeting Maryland death penalty Health insurance reform has never been closer, and it couldn't come at a more critical time for states as we work to balance our budgets and families are forced to pay higher and higher costs for health insurance and uncompensated care Democratic govs urge action on healthcare

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Time for human trafficking but not for Iran crisis? Posted By Jerome R. Corsi On 09/25/2012 @ 8:40 pm In Politics,U.S. | No Comments UNITED NATIONS – Was Obama’s schedule in New York so demanding there was no time to meet Middle East leaders? Not even a few minutes early or late in the day to meet with Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu amid a crisis emerging with Iran? Or a visit with Egypt’s new Islamist president Mohamed Morsi, despite the praise Obama lavished in his U.N. speech on the Arab Spring? After delivering a 40-minute speech this morning to the General Assembly, Obama skipped the traditional State Luncheon headed by Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, deciding to motor instead cross-town to give a half-hour speech to the Clinton Global Initiative. At the Clinton venue, Obama decided to focus on the evil of human trafficking – an important issue internationally but hardly a burning campaign topic in his election battle with Republican Mitt Romney. Referencing the Emancipation Proclamation signed by President Lincoln during the Civil War, Obama explained how the United States has struggled to make illegal all forms of slavery – including human trafficking in the international slave trade. “But for all the progress that we’ve made, the bitter truth is that trafficking also goes on right here, in the United States,” Obama explained. “It’s the migrant worker unable to pay off the debt to his trafficker. The man, lured here with the promise of a job, his documents then taken, and forced to work endless hours in a kitchen. The teenage girl, beaten, forced to walk the streets. This should not be happening in the United States of America.” In his 4,000-word speech at the U.N., Obama did not even once mention the word “terrorism” nor did he offer any new practical solutions to a wide range of foreign policy crises, including how the U.S. and its allies, including Israel, are going to stop Iran from developing a nuclear weapon by simply continuing diplomacy and extending sanctions. But when it came to the Clinton group and the subject of human trafficking, Obama was long on specific solutions. “We’ll strengthen training, so investigators and law enforcement are even better equipped to take action – and treat victims as victims, not as criminals,” he said to applause. “We’re going to work with Amtrak, and bus and truck inspectors, so that they’re on the lookout. We’ll help teachers and educators spot the signs as well, and better serve those who are vulnerable, especially our young people.” If only saving the life of U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens had been so easy, Obama would never have had to apologize to the U.N. for a 14-minute amateurish movie-trailer offensive to Muslims that received limited viewing on the Internet. In speaking to the U.N., Obama made not a single reference to God, yet to the Clinton group, he felt faith-based solutions might help combat the human trafficking problem. “This coming year, my Office of Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships will make the fight against human trafficking a focus of its work,” Obama said, again to applause. “They’re doing great work.” He recounted several melodramatic stories – undoubtedly heroic – he reassured two of the victims he mentioned, Ima and Sheila, that he was working in the spirit of Lincoln and the Emancipation Proclamation. “In the darkest hours of your lives, you may have felt utterly alone, and it seemed like nobody cared. And the important thing for us to understand is there are millions around the world who are feeling that same way at this very moment,” he said with great emotion. “Our fight against human trafficking is one of the great human rights causes of our time, and the United States will continue to lead it – in partnership with you. The change we seek will not come easy, but we can draw strength from the movements of the past. For we know that every life saved – in the words of that great Proclamation – is ‘an act of justice,’ worthy of ‘the considerate judgment of mankind, and the gracious favor of Almighty God.’” Traffic in New York City was ground to a standstill of cordoned-off streets amid beefed-up security during Obama’s presidential visit. But there is no worry for a sitting president, who was shuffled off to the 34th Street heliport for a short ride to JFK International Airport, where Air Force One was fueled up and standing ready. The schedule circulated by the White House assured reporters Obama would be back at the White House by no later than 3 p.m. The remainder of Obama’s day was free of appointments, apparently so he could rest after a grueling schedule of appearing on nationally televised glitzy talk shows and reading two speech writer-crafted addresses from teleprompters. Unfortunately, there wasn’t even time for a Broadway fundraiser – but maybe next time. URL to article: http://www.wnd.com/2012/09/time-for-human-trafficking-but-not-for-iran-crisis/

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Combat over,
the war goes on Posted on September 2, 2010 | By Jay Jochnowitz, Editorial page editor Print Today’s editorial: The President declares the combat mission in Iraq is over, yet 50,000 troops remain. The complexity of our wars makes it hard to define their end. _________________________ It was a historic moment. A milestone. And yet, the official end of Operation Iraqi Freedom, declared by President Obama in an Oval Office speech Tuesday night, felt all too much like just another day in one of America’s longest wars. A nation that can still remember, if not firsthand then second, the end of World War II, might be forgiven if it feels a little uncertain about how to mark this moment. There are no ticker tape parades, no kiss in Times Square immortalized in a photo, no images of a humbled enemy signing a surrender. And the reality is this war has not engaged Americans in the way that past wars did, when rationing or drafts made for a sense of shared sacrifice. Even the financial cost is put off for another day. And the very language is awkward; it misses the simplicity of past wars. The President didn’t announce the end of the Iraq war, only “the end of the combat mission.” In truth, 50,000 troops remain. A nation might fairly ask what was accomplished at a cost of 4,416 American lives, and tens of thousands of wounded. A war based on a wrong premise — that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction — did, to be sure, oust a brutal, dangerous dictator regarded by many as a madman. But so far, this conflict has failed to replace his regime with a stable government or conditions that inspire Iraq’s citizens to see a brighter future. One war’s winding down, meanwhile, only shifts the focus to another. Many of the troops are going to Afghanistan, where the nation’s longest war continues. Where the mission was once so clear — avenge the 9/11 attacks on America and oust the Taliban regime that harbored Osama bin Laden and allowed his al-Qaida terror operation to flourish — but is now more complex. Reluctant to simply leave and risk the resurgence of the Taliban, the United States pours more effort into a war on behalf of a corrupt regime, even as it plans to begin phasing out the combat mission there next summer. Whether that will be long enough in a country where the financial system is teetering and where schoolgirls are succumbing to poison gas whose origin remains a mystery is unclear. As with the Iraq war, though, Americans should not expect some cathartic climax — the last such moment in either of these wars, it seems, was the capture of Saddam Hussein on Dec. 13, 2003. And they should beware of anyone who promises them one in exchange for dragging this war out even longer than is now planned. Mr. Obama in his address to the nation said it’s time to turn the page, and perhaps that image captures this moment in a way he hadn’t intended. We can’t close the book just yet. We can only stick with the story, hoping for, if not something spectacular, if not a happily-ever-after, at the very least, an end. That would be a glorious day.

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Swaziland: Peace Corps Swaziland: The Peace Corps in Swaziland: September 18, 2002 - University of Central Oklahoma Vista: Swaziland RPCV Ron Beeson says Peace Corps volunteers increased since attacks By Admin1 (admin) (pool-151-196-48-41.balt.east.verizon.net - 151.196.48.41) on Saturday, October 11, 2003 - 1:06 pm: Edit Post Swaziland RPCV Ron Beeson says Peace Corps volunteers increased since attacks Swaziland RPCV Ron Beeson says Peace Corps volunteers increased since attacks Peace Corps volunteers increased since attacks by Timber Massey September 18, 2002 Dr. Ron Beeson, retired UCO political science professor and Peace Corps returned volunteer, said the number of Peace Corps applicants has dramatically increased since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Jesus Garcia, Peace Corps public affairs specialist, said two factors have caused an increased interest in the Peace Corps. "Post-Sept. 11 feelings of making the world a better place have caused many people to apply," said Garcia. "President Bush proposed to double the Peace Corps within the next five years during the State of the Union address on Jan. 29." Garcia said since Jan. 29 there has been a 70.52 percent increase in new visitors to the Peace Corps website and applications have increased by 16.03 percent. Beeson said returned Peace Corps volunteers feel there are both pros and cons to Bush's request for an increase in volunteers. "Peace Corps volunteers do not want to be associated with any information-gathering activities. We are serving in countries to help people, not to gather information." Beeson said many people are under the misconception that it is not difficult to join the Peace Corps because it is a volunteer organization. "Only about one in five people who apply to the Peace Corps are actually admitted. It is far more competitive for people with liberal arts degrees to be admitted than people with business or agriculture degrees," Beeson said. Beeson served in the Peace Corps from 1971-1981 in Swaziland, a country in South Africa. He is now on the board of directors for the Friends of Swaziland and is a member of the Oklahoma Returned Peace Corps Volunteer Association. Beeson said the Peace Corps is considering placing volunteers in Afghanistan. "I have always said that the Peace Corps will not put you in the oven, but they will put you close enough to feel the heat," said Beeson. Beeson said most of the Peace Corps volunteers who have lost their lives while serving died in automobile or motorcycle accidents. Garcia said, the Peace Corps only enters friendly countries which have extended an invitation to the agency to start a developmental program. "An Assessment Team looks into the safety and security of the region before the Peace Corps will accept the invitation," said Garcia. "All countries are equipped with a Peace Corps office that has a trained staff who monitor the volunteers." Sarah Powers, biology senior, plans on applying for the Peace Corps after graduation. "I think that you run just as much of a risk serving in the Peace Corps as you do walking across campus," she said. "Accidents can happen anywhere and you shouldn't let that stop you from making a difference in the lives of others." Beeson said people who live in countries where Peace Corps volunteers have served no longer hate Americans. "A volunteer serving in Singapore was held hostage for a week and she said the only thing she was worried about while being held captive was being caught in a crossfire," said Beeson. "Her captors never harmed her because she was a member of the Peace Corps." Garcia said, "Locals appreciate volunteers who choose to live among them, not behind some embassy wall. They respect that volunteers are willing to live a modest life to help develop their communities." Glenn Freeman, UCO International Student Advisor who applied for the Peace Corps, said, "The Peace Corps is very much still a worthwhile administration and it is aware of the precautions that need to be taken in order to protect its volunteers." Freeman said he would feel completely safe joining the Peace Corps under today's conditions. About 97 percent of all Peace Corps volunteers have a bachelor's degree, but it is not required. Volunteers are placed in countries where their skills are most needed. Peace Corps assignments last two years in addition to 12 weeks spent in training. Volunteers are trained in the country where they will be serving by Peace Corps staff. Volunteers are taught everything from personal safety to an emergency evacuation plan. Beeson said, "I am sixty-eight years old and my time spent serving in the Peace Corps was the most rewarding thing that I have ever done in my entire life." Anyone interested in joining the Peace Corps may call 1-800-424-8580 or visit their website at www.peacecorps.gov. Some postings on Peace Corps Online are provided to the individual members of this group without permission of the copyright owner for the non-profit purposes of criticism, comment, education, scholarship, and research under the "Fair Use" provisions of U.S. Government copyright laws and they may not be distributed further without permission of the copyright owner. Peace Corps Online does not vouch for the accuracy of the content of the postings, which is the sole responsibility of the copyright holder. Story Source: University of Central Oklahoma Vista This story has been posted in the following forums: : Headlines; Recruitment PCOL1066 48 .

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Home » categories events WILPF Protests Testing of Nuclear Warhead Delivery Systems Disarm WILPF Action Alerts Join Us on June 5 – International Nuclear Weapons Abolition Day WILPF is proud to partner with the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) to protest ICBM missile test launches and call for a real commitment to nuclear abolition through a Nuclear Weapons Convention. Despite President Obama’s promises in Prague to pursue a nuclear weapons free future, the U.S. military is still testing and upgrading Minuteman III ICBMs designed to carry thermonuclear warheads. Two ICBM test launches (with dummy warheads) are scheduled for June 2010 from Vandenberg Air Force base / Space Command near Lompoc, California to the Kwajalein atoll in the Marshall Islands. The exact date of the launch tests are not known, and June 5 provides a great opportunity to expose them; most of the world is unaware that these tests are still being carried out routinely. Protest of Unmanned Drones Held at CIA Headquarters on Jan 16 Disarm A protest was held January 16th at the CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia. The focus was the increased use of CIA armed drones in Afghanistan and now the Pustun areas of Pakistan. The event was organized by Peace of the Action and Cindy Sheehan Cindy@CindySheehansSoapbox.com. WILPF Had a Presence at Camp Hope 2009 in Chicago US WILPF Advancing Human Rights More than 200 years ago, the American revolutionary Thomas Paine epitomized the spirit of WILPF when he said: “The world is my country, all [hu]mankind are my brethren, and to do good is my religion.” With the inauguration of Barack Obama, the world truly is our country and there is much good work for all of us to do. People from around the country went to Hyde Park, IL for Camp Hope (http://www.camphope2009.org/), a historic gathering of activists pushing for positive transformation. » Read more Midwestern Branches' Events Celebrated Jane Addams Day events Famous Hull House in Chicago, Illinois "Peace is not merely the absence of war." -- Jane Addams, first woman to win the Nobel Prize for Peace December 10, 1931 What do we do now!! Foreclosures, Economic Breakdown, Credit Meltdown Turning a win into a victory On December 6-7, WILPF Midwestern Branches came together in Chicago to engage in political discourse - to advance Peace and Justice in our communities. Starting with a meeting on Saturday December 6 at Hostelling International from 2:30 - 5:00 p.m. with an overnight stay at the Hostel. Sunday December 7 brunch at Hull House Museum from 10:00 - 11:30 a.m. followed by Hull House festivities to celebrate Jane Addams Day in Illinois. . » Read more

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Fujimori's daughter sees Humala as rival in 2011 April 8, 2009 - Reuters By Terry Wade and Teresa Cespedes LIMA (Reuters) - Former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori's conviction on human rights crimes will backfire, his daughter said on Wednesday as she eyes a tough race for the presidency in 2011 against leftist Ollanta Humala. Keiko Fujimori, a popular lawmaker, said many voters in Peru will start flocking to her family's party to protest the 25-year prison sentence her father received on Tuesday. He was found guilty of ordering two massacres that killed 25 people in the 1990s, when he was battling Maoist insurgents. Despite the verdict, polls show a third of Peruvians still support the man credited with defeating the Shining Path guerrillas and enacting free-market economic reforms that helped generate years of growth. "This sentence, which was so extreme, will be like a boomerang for people who think the Fujimori movement has been defeated," Keiko Fujimori, 33, told Peru's foreign press club. "Lots of people, especially poor people, are thinking of getting involved in politics because they think the verdict is unfair." She said her 70-year-old father's sentence essentially condemned him to life in prison -- the punishment given to Shining Path leader Abimael Guzman. Already a front-runner for the 2011 presidential race, Keiko Fujimori said that if she runs her rival would be Humala, who spooked financial markets when he nearly won the 2006 election. Each would compete for votes from the poor in a country with a poverty rate of nearly 40 percent. "The poorest classes are the ones that support the Fujimori movement, and in the last election they also supported Humala," she said. "This is something that can't be avoided." Humala, a former military general, opposes free trade and is an ally of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. He has made inroads among poor voters with nationalistic speeches against the United States and neighboring Chile. Keiko Fujimori has said she would follow the programs of her authoritarian father. The elder Fujimori styled himself as a right-wing populist, opening Peru to foreign investment and rolling out education, health and food programs that made him wildly popular among the poor. Though several other candidates will likely join the race, Fujimori and Humala are two of the strongest front-runners. If no candidate wins a majority of the vote they could end up in a runoff against each other. The current president, Alan Garcia, is barred by the country's constitution from running for re-election in 2011. He has told foreign investors he will do his best to derail Humala's candidacy by persuading Peruvians to reject leftist models that have regained popularity in Latin America.

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Many conservatives are aghast at Sen. John Warner for having introduced a compromise resolution opposing President Bush's troop "surge" in Iraq, but without any force. Many deride Warner as having gone "wobbly," which implies weakness of spirit or lack of martial valor, but it is really a question of strategic logic. When push came to shove, Warner voted on the right side, rejecting the Democrats' resolution. "Just two Republicans, Norm Coleman (Minn.) and Susan Collins (Maine), voted with the Democrats." (Both are up for reelection next year.) See Washington Post. As I've said before, I think the surge is a mistake, offering only a small chance of meaningful victory, while raising the risk of a strategic setback. Nevertheless, Bush is our commander in chief, we are at war, and all we can do for now is hope for the best. * In today's Washington Post, however, David Ignatius says we should "Expect The Worst In Iraq." He lays out the brutal assessment in the recent National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq, which raises the possibility of a catastrophic outcome. He recommends a series of contingency measures to stave off the worst consequences, and I suppose there is someone in the Pentagon who is doing such planning work. I don't envy that guy's job. On the other hand, John Krenson argues "The Moral Case for a Surge," emphasizing our duty to finish the job we set out to do. It's an impassioned plea, and well thought out, but I remain skeptical. I do agree with him on one crucial point, however: An abrupt withdrawal from Iraq, as advocated by Howard Dean and Nancy Pelosi, is out of the question. * Some local folks are promoting a "win the war" campaign, and while I admire their optimism, to be perfectly blunt, I don't share it. In a messy, complicated milieu such as Iraq, "victory" is a nebulous concept. Personally, I don't think the prospects would have been so awful if President Bush had heeded more of the recommendations in the Iraq Study Group, which basically called for cutting our losses and hastening the transfer of responsibility to the Iraqis themselves -- ready or not. That was probably the best we could reasonably hope for, but that chance is fading away fast. My general approach in life is to expect the worst and hope for the best, and that certainly applies to the situation in Iraq. Let us pray... Islamic Mein Kampf This ought to get your blood boiling: an extended Flash multimedia presentation on the Islamic Mein Kampf, from the Terrorism Awareness Project. (Hat tip to Michael Oliver.)

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WASHINGTON—On the eve of the December 5-6 OSCE Ministerial Council taking place in Kyiv, Ukraine, Helsinki Commission Chairman Senator Ben Cardin (MD) issued the following statement: “As a long-time supporter of the democratic aspirations of the Ukrainian people, I am deeply distressed by the recent violence on the streets of Kyiv. The brutal dispersal of peaceful protests and beatings of dozens of journalists constitute serious violations of Ukraine's OSCE commitments on freedom of assembly and freedom of expression. I am particularly concerned by reports that the whereabouts of more than a dozen protesters cannot be determined. In light of these developments, this is not the time to mince words or engage in obfuscation. Ministers should take advantage of this opportunity to act in support of Ukrainian democracy. I urge the representatives of the participating States meeting in Kyiv to address these human rights issues in a clear and unequivocal manner. I commend the representatives of civil society who have met in advance of the Ministerial. Their voices are critically important for the protection and promotion of human rights and deserve to be heard as part of this meeting. Ukraine should take immediate steps to fulfill the human rights commitments that all the participating States have freely undertaken by investigating reports of excessive use of force by police and thugs and ensuring that freedom of assembly and association are respected. Ukraine should also implement the standards on the protection of journalists embodied in the draft Ministerial Decision that has been shepherded by the Ukrainian chairmanship. Finally, I urge the Ukrainian Government to act on the Civil Society Parallel Conference Appeal to establish an international group of experts on these issues and to follow up in the OSCE under next year’s Chair-in-Office, Switzerland. This would be a singular act of leadership in Ukraine’s final days as Chair of the OSCE. It would also be a meaningful step towards addressing the damage to Ukraine’s reputation and restoring confidence in Ukraine’s long-term commitment to human rights and democracy.” ### The Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe, also known as the U.S. Helsinki Commission, is an independent agency of the Federal Government charged with monitoring compliance with the Helsinki Accords and advancing comprehensive security through promotion of human rights, democracy, and economic, environmental and military cooperation in 57 countries. The Commission consists of nine members from the U.S. Senate, nine from the House of Representatives, and one member each from the Departments of State, Defense, and Commerce. 202.225.1901

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89 Price to Australian Government Letter CANBERRA, 15 January 1949IMMEDIATE SECRET With further reference to my letter of the 11th January [1] about Indonesia I have been asked to send you the following extract from a telegram from our Ambassador at The Hague [2]:- 'Minister for Foreign Affairs informed me today that instructions to Van Royen would permit the latter to announce to the Security Council tomorrow that: (a) A Federal Interim Government would set up within one month. (b) Elections would be held throughout Indonesia before October next. (c) Full facilities would be provided to observers to supervise these elections if desired and to watch events generally. (d) United States of Indonesia to be set up if possible by 1st January, 1950, but in any case transfer of sovereignty to be accomplished in the course of 1950.' In the light of recent developments instructions have now been sent to the United Kingdom delegate [3] somewhat amending the instructions summarised in my letter of the 11th January to the following effect: [this is on the assumption that Mr van Royen makes a statement on the lines indicated above]:- The delegate was to express regret at the delays which render it still impossible at this date for the Security Council to determine to what extent the resolution of the 24th December has been implemented in relation to the cease-fire and the release of political prisoners. 2. He should go on to say that he welcomes the statement [4] of the Netherlands representative as showing a real desire on the part of the Netherlands Government to carry out the programme outlined in the recent speeches of their Prime Minister and subsequently of the Queen of the Netherlands. [5] 3. Since the United Kingdom Government are anxious that the Dutch should not rest upon Mr. Van Royen's statement and do little to fulfil its terms, he should express the hope that it will be followed by energetic steps on the part of the Netherlands Government to convert what is at present only a plan into a reality. 4. He should express the view that in the circumstances the Council should invite the Committee of Good Offices (or the Consular Commission) to furnish early reports on the operation of the cease-fire as a result of the investigations now being made by the Military observers, and upon the release of the political prisoners who it is understood are to be visited by the United Nations representatives. The Council should not lose sight of the main object, which is that the Republican leaders should be free to take part in the negotiations for the initiation of the various stages in the creation of the United States of Indonesia outlined by the Netherlands representative. 5. On the question of withdrawal, it will be clear from Batavia telegrams that if pressure for this is successful the only result is likely to be chaos. There is a very real danger that if the Indonesian leaders have any reason to believe that the Dutch will withdraw they will from fear of intimidation and reprisals be afraid to come forward and to participate in the formation of the Interim Government. There may then be a stalemate and a recrudescence of the terrorism which ever since Indonesia became an issue has undoubtedly militated against a settlement. 6. The United Kingdom Government very much hope therefore that it will be possible to avoid any kind of resolution relating to withdrawal. If, however, a resolution is proposed he is to seek for an adjournment, and telegraph for further instructions basing his action upon the view that the Council should await the reports of the Military observers. 1 Document 60. 2 Sir Philip Nichols. 3 Sir Alexander Cadogan. 4 See Document 50. 5 See notes 4 and 11 to Document 48. [AA : A1838, 402/8/1/1/1, ii]

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... Council OKs recommended pay increases for key employees City council members on March 25 revisited City Manager Scott Koenig's interim proposal to increase the salaries of four members of the city staff, but ultimately decided to go along with Koenig's recommendations. By Jeff Brown City council members on March 25 revisited City Manager Scott Koenig's interim proposal to increase the salaries of four members of the city staff, but ultimately decided to go along with Koenig's recommendations.The discussions came during a routine vote to accept a March 11 Legislative, Finance and Administration Committee Report that recommended the full council approve the pay increases.Responding to council members who questioned whether the raises were completely justified, City Manager Scott Koenig said he suggested the salary increases under the interim managerial plan to compensate four senior personnel for taking on additional responsibilities of people who had left city government and had not replaced.In the case of information technology director Andy Siegel, that individual received an extra increase to compensate him for the experience he gained during two years as interim director, Koenig said.The largest raise was for the city's planning director, Ann Marie Townshend, who took on the responsibilities of the city's parks and recreation director, allowing that position to be eliminated from the budget and realizing a savings of $81,000. Townshend was compensated $11,370, in addition to her regular salary, for taking on the parks and recreation job, which includes oversight of the new city library.Third District Councilman Sean Lynn, who chairs the legislative committee, noted he considers the salary hikes fair compensation for those persons, particularly in that the city is saving money by not hiring replacements."This is not a rush to spend money," Lynn told council members, adding, "It's not fair to ask these individuals to work for free.""We have talent here," he said. "Let's don't lose it."In general, however, council members seemed to be looking ahead to upcoming budget talks and a chance to revisit the salary issue. Second District Councilman William F. Hare said, "come hell or high water," council will need to look at salaries for other city workers, many of who have not received raises in recent fiscal years due to budget constraints.The eight-member council – First District Councilwoman Beverly C. Williams was not present – approved Koenig's recommendation by a 5-3 vote. Council members David Anderson, William Hare and Wallace Dixon voted in the negative.After the meeting, Lynn said he felt the pay increases under Koenig's interim managerial plan were justified."We're getting more bang for our buck by having one employee do the jobs of two people and paying two people plus benefits," he said.Under the interim plan, Townshend will receive $107,315 annually; Siegel will be paid $82,059; water/wastewater supervisor Ralph McDougall will be compensated $61,000; and Finance Reporting and Accounting Manager Tracey Lisiecki will receive $71,600.These salaries will be subject to review again during the FY 2014 budget negotiations.Page 2 of 2 - During the Legislative, Finance and Administration Committee meeting that preceded the regular council session, committee members considered a plan about how to deal with extended absences of council members, particularly due to illness, or in the case of Fourth District Councilman David Anderson, a projected military deployment.In general, the plan defines reasons for such absences and sets up a procedure for excusing the absence.The major objection to the plan came from Hare, who felt council persons should not receive their salaries if they do not attend scheduled meetings for extended periods."I don't think it's right for the citizens to pay people when they're not doing anything," he said.Council members currently receive $7,416 per year in compensation.Hare then amended the plan with a requirement that council members have their salaries suspended if they miss more than three meetings, even if those absences are excused.The full committee agreed to release the plan to council, but without a recommendation for its adoption.The legislative committee also agreed to Koenig's request for a study of space requirements for the city's administrative staff with an eye toward replacing the present City Hall. Currently, the city's administrative functions are split between the City Hall building and Weyandt Hall, located next to the old city library.Council President Thomas Leary supported the idea."You owe it to your taxpayers to take care of your physical plant," he said. "Even a casual observer will tell you it's looking a bit tired. There's a multitude of reasons. Maybe we won't do it, but at least we'll know where we stand."The cost of the study, approximately $20,000 to $30,000, will be included in the Fiscal Year 2014 budget.The committee also approved and passed on to the full council a request to set up a system that allows city code enforcers to work at night and on weekends. Many code violations take place and thus are unreported during those hours, Townshend said. Hare moved to amend the request so the code enforcement could be done without incurring overtime costs.In other actions, council heard the annual report of the city's Human Relations Commission, presented by Chairman Roy Sudler Jr. It also presented awards on behalf of the Downtown Dover Partnership for the annual St. Patrick's Day Parade.The next meeting of the Dover City Council will be held at 7:15 p.m. Monday, April 8.

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European ParliamentChoisissez la langue de votre document : en - English (Selected) Procedure : 2011/2947(RSP)Document stages in plenaryDocument selected : B7-0717/2011Texts tabled : Debates : Texts adopted : MOTION FOR A RESOLUTION See also joint motion for a resolution RC-B7-0712/2011 PE479.416v01-00 B7-0717/2011 with request for inclusion in the agenda for the debate on cases of breaches of human rights, democracy and the rule of law pursuant to Rule 122 of the Rules of Procedure on Tunisia, recent breaches of human rights Charles Tannock, Marek Henryk Migalski, Ryszard Antoni Legutko, Tomasz Piotr Poręba, Valdemar Tomaševski, Ryszard Czarnecki, Adam Bielan, Michał Tomasz Kamiński, Geoffrey Van Orden on behalf of the ECR Group NB: This motion for a resolution is available in the original language only. European Parliament resolution on Tunisia, recent breaches of human rights B7‑0717/2011 The European Parliament, - having regard to its previous resolutions on Tunisia, in particular the one of 3 February 2011, - having regard to its resolution of 7 April 2011 on the review of the European Neighbourhood Policy - Southern Dimension, - having regard to the conclusions of the Foreign Affairs Council of 14 November 2011 on Tunisia, - having regard to the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, signed and ratified by Tunisia and its Optional Protocol, - having regard to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, signed and ratified by Tunisia, - having regard to Rule 122(5) of its Rules of Procedure, A. Whereas, on 13 November 2011, Zacharia Bouguira, a Tunisian national, witnessed at the Tunis-Carthage airport acts of violence by the police against a group of Moroccans who had attended an African Champions League football match in Tunis and who were arrested by the police forces; B. Whereas Mr. Bouguira began to film the scene on a mobile phone with the intention of distributing the video on the internet but was immediately stopped from filming the scene by the police and suffered acts of violence himself; C. Whereas Mr. Bouguira was subsequently detained for at least three hours alongside the Moroccans and continued to suffer acts of violence by the police forces; whereas at the same time the police forces continued to use acts of violence, intimidation and other forms of inhuman or degrading treatment against the Moroccans; D. Whereas the arrest of the group of young Moroccan football supporters was also announced by TV stations Al-Watania, Hannibal and Nesma; E. Whereas on 17 November 2011 Mr. Bouguira filed a complaint against members of the Tunisian security forces in the office of the Attorney General and was subsequently heard on 8 December 2011 by the prosecutor's office; F. Whereas Tunisian human rights and advocacy organizations report continued use of torture, inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment by the Tunisian security forces; G. Whereas it is essential for the emergence of a Tunisian state based on human rights and the rule of law, and the Arab Spring to be successful and to bring lasting change, that this and other cases of torture, inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment are prosecuted in a fair and transparent manner and an end is made to impunity in this regard; 1. Welcomes the commitments made by Tunisia since the end of Ben Ali's regime, particularly in terms of cooperation with special procedures and mechanisms of the United Nations in the fight against torture, inhuman and degrading treatment; therefore urges the Tunisian authorities to deal with the case brought by Mr. Zacharia Bouguira in a fair and transparent manner and according to the rule of law and its international commitments; 2. Furthermore urges the Tunisian authorities to guarantee an independent investigation into the alleged use of torture, inhuman and degrading treatment of the Moroccan nationals implicated in this case; 3. Requests to be kept informed by the HR/VP of the steps taken by the Tunisian authorities concerning this event; 4. Is aware of the challenges facing Tunisia in its process of democratic transition and calls on the Constituent Assembly and the future government to engage in a reform process with a view to establishing a deep and strong democracy based on human rights and the rule of law and to engage civil society in this process; 5. Calls on the Tunisian authorities to pay particular attention to the establishment of an independent judiciary, reforming the security forces and ending impunity; 6. Reiterates its support for and commitment to the legitimate democratic aspiration of the Tunisian people and welcomes the first democratic elections held on 23 October 2011 for a Constituent Assembly and the first to have come from the events of the Arab Spring; 7. Requests the HR/VP and the European Commission to support Tunisia in the process of democratic transition wherever possible, including through its Neighbourhood Policy, and to set up a programme aimed specifically at supporting reform efforts concerning the Tunisian security forces and the establishment of an independent judiciary; 8. Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the Council, the Commission, the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, the governments and parliaments of the Member States, the Tunisian authorities and the Tunisian Constituent Assembly. Last updated: 30 May 2012Legal notice

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Top > Economic Affairs > World Economic Forum > World Economic Forum Annual Meeting 2009 > Address by H.E. Mr. Taro Aso, Prime Minister of Japan at the Informal Gathering of World Economic Leaders on "The Climate Change Puzzle: Assembling the Pieces" Address by H.E. Mr. Taro Aso, Prime Minister of Japan at the Informal Gathering of World Economic Leaders on "The Climate Change Puzzle: Assembling the Pieces" Davos, SwitzerlandJapanese Thank you, Chairman, for being very nice. Now, this year, the year 2009, will be the one of "`make` or `break`." Are we going to `make` it, or are we going to `break` it? Which side are we on? We are at such a crossroads of a very, very historic nature. My friends and colleagues, let's put pressure, strong pressure, on each other, on you and me, for the completion of the Copenhagen process. Take, for a moment, a look at the Kyoto Protocol. It is a half-way house, hence short of effect, because the Kyoto Protocol covers just 30% of the world-wide emission. For me, Kyoto is about refinement and everlasting beauty. The Kyoto process has not lived up to its brand name. Why? What was the root cause for its under-achievement? The reason is, there was not an esprit de corps at all. So here today, I am asking you to join me, first to call President Barack Obama of the United States to come and jump on board. "Welcome America!" I will say, "we have been waiting for you for quite some time." I for one will do whatever it takes to work closely with him on this matter and others. Let me also ask you to join me in calling on President Hu Jintao of the PRC to join us on board, to make the Post-Kyoto framework all inclusive with all the big emitters, developed and developing, joining to become responsible partners. And I am sure the Europeans will continue to be committed. Last year, at Hokkaido-Toyako, Japan at the G8 meeting my country hosted, we reached a milestone, an important one indeed. The goal we set is to reduce at least by half the global emission by the year 2050. We reached an agreement also to share that goal with the member nations of the UNF-Triple C. This is no small matter. Yet a milestone is there to be stepped over for us to go beyond it. Down the road, those of us developed should lead the way in making promises to cut emissions. For fairness, some of those developing nations, if their emissions are on the rapid rise, should commit themselves in curbing the rise in a bold fashion. Of vital importance will be to revisit the principle that this being our problem. We must all advance, each in its capacity and responsibility, in an utmost, yet equitable fashion. As for me, I will announce, by this June, the mid-term goal of Japan, considering environment, economy and energy, all in one, and based on scientific analyses. All of us will be better off if we can use all the power to set the train in motion heading for Copenhagen. Let me give you an example, which is about Japan's initiative called Cool Earth Partnership. In that program, we are helping the developing nations tackle the challenge of climate change while helping to build their good governance as well. Or, if you take a look at the Pacific, Tuvalu, the great island nation, is gradually losing its dry shores. My government is lending hands to them. Those of us who surround the Pacific should join forces. Now, we are in an era of pessimism. Some will go on to say that with the economy going downhill, it will be difficult for the international community to tackle climate change as it will generate little money. Nothing could be farther from the truth. My country is a case in point. Take the hybrid car, that's with battery and gas. It's among the best selling in Japan. Take also the air conditioners whose power efficiency is much greater now thanks to the technologies. Japan can grow by growing those technologies that have made the nation already among the best achievers of carbon efficiency. I am a big believer that we can both grow and emit less with the help of the technologies new and still untapped. Of late, in preparation in my country is a new chart, mapping where the new technologies are, the ones that are strategically important. Over the next 20 to 25 years, the Japanese will be doing a lot on innovation for the solar power technologies, brand new battery technologies and the nano-technology, that's the backbone of emerging technologies. Japan should pride itself as becoming a center of excellence where great minds and brains come together. With the US its ally and China its close neighbor, my country could work with both of them. Once again to President Obama, I should urge that Japan and America work together on the cutting-edge technologies like fuel cell, super conductivity and so on. To the Chinese, the Japanese have been saying that you come over here, take a look at how the Japanese have succeeded in reducing toxic waste and environmental damages. Much, much more, it is obvious that Japan and China can do together. With that positive note, I should perhaps now finish. Let's move on together.

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Print Citizens United v. FEC Democracy For All Amendment - Activist Toolkit In this toolkit, you will find many ways you can get involved in the movement to amend our Constitution to get big money out of politics. From writing letters to the editor to calling your representative to hosting an event, we need your voice in the fight to reclaim our democracy. Read more Edit Memo: Senator Udall’s Constitutional Amendment Proposal Would Restore the First Amendment and Strengthen Our Democracy On June 3, 2014, the Judiciary Committee of the United States Senate held a hearing on the need to amend the Constitution to overturn the Supreme Court’s decisions in Citizens United v. FEC, and related cases. In particular, the Committee examined Senator Tom Udall’s amendment proposal SJRES 19, which seeks to restore the constitutional authority to regulate the raising and spending of money to influence elections, so that the American people, and not corporations, billionaires and special interests, hold the power in our elections. Read more How The Supreme Court's McCutcheon Decision Could Balloon Spending In State Elections The Supreme Court’s decision in McCutcheon v. FEC opened the floodgates for yet more money to be spent in federal campaigns. Yet the effects of the McCutcheon decision are not limited to federal elections. Eleven states and the District of Columbia have aggregate limits on the books that will soon be toppled, if they have not already been nullified, in the wake of McCutcheon, leading to ballooning campaign spending in those states. Read more Money Out, Voters In: A Guide to Democratic Reform Americans today face twin threats to the integrity of our democracy: unlimited spending to influence elections and voter suppression. Find out what you can do. Read more Citizens United v. FEC Constitutional Remedies: List of local and state resolution efforts Here's a list of federal, state and local bills and resolutions which have been introduced or passed in support of amending the Constitution to undo the harm of Citizens United. Read more Amending the Constitution for Government Of, By, and For The People The American public and a growing number of public officials are calling for a constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United and related cases to redefine the role of corporate power in the political sphere and place the election process where it belongs – in the hands of the people. Read more United For the People Featured at this year's Netroots Nation, check out our new United For the People web portal featuring all the organizations that are united in the belief that the Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United must be remedied by a Constitutional amendment in order to restore the democratic promise of America. Read more Resources A new PFAW Foundation report examines how the Supreme Court's conservative majority is working to reshape our Constitution and elevate corporate interests above the rights of individual Americans. Beginning with the 2010 decision in Citizens United, the Roberts Court has handed down a steady stream of decisions that allow enormous corporations to use their significant resource advantage to influence the law in their favor. Read more Sample State/City Resolution Supporting a Constitutional Amendment Ask your town, city, or state to pass a resolution in favor of an amendment to correct Citizens United by sharing our sample resolution with your local councilmember or state legislator. Read more 1 attachment People For the American Way and Allies Issue Joint Statement Pledging to Counter Threats to Free and Fair Elections People For the American Way joined with more than fifty organizations to express their concern about two critical threats to our democratic system: corporate influence in elections and laws and official actions that suppress the vote. Under the banner “Money Out, Voters In,” the organizations issued a joint statement pledging to fight special interest money in politics and to support the rights of all voters. Read more Share this page: Take Action Tell congressional leaders to support and pass a constitutional amendment to ensure the government has the authority to limit corporate influence in elections. Amending the Constitution so Corporations Can’t Buy Elections on Facebook Contact Us | Privacy Policy | Copyright & Disclaimer | RSS

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Officials Weigh Proposed Gas Tax Increase Posted on 10/27/2011 by Shawn J. Soper BERLIN — With last week’s special session out of the way, pre-posturing for the 2012 General Assembly session, still months away, is already heating up with a couple of significant increases to taxes and fees recommended this week including a 15-cent hike on the state’s gas tax. This week, the governor’s Blue Ribbon Task Force on Transportation Funding recommended, among other things, a 15-cent increase in the state’s gasoline tax, phased in five-cent increments over the next three years. Maryland’s current gas tax rate at 23.5 cents per gallon has not been raised since 1992. The blue ribbon panel suggests raising the gas tax now will help close an $870 million deficit between revenue and funds needed to keep the state’s transportation infrastructure up and running. In addition to the transportation package, including the proposed gas tax and other increases, state lawmakers this week were also urged to consider raising Maryland’s “flush tax” by 300 percent during the coming General Assembly session. While local representatives will not have to make a decision on the proposed hikes to taxes and fees for at least a couple of months, already they are forming strong opinions on the issues. “The real dilemma is this economy, which continues to be stagnant,” said Sen. Jim Mathias (D-38). “Every day working people are suffering and to ask them to consider paying more for gasoline is a very difficult proposition.” Mathias acknowledged raising some taxes and fees might be inevitable in order to keep the state’s crumbling infrastructure intact, but it doesn’t make it any easier to sell to an already weary public. “The condition of our roads and the condition of our infrastructure is deteriorating and we can’t let that go to heck,” he said. “We’re really caught between a rock and a hard place. On top of that, it looks like the appropriation from the federal government will continue to decline.” One recommendation by the task force would guarantee the revenue derived from a gasoline tax increase would be dedicated to roads and infrastructure. In recent years, state lawmakers have used the Transportation Trust Fund (TTF) to make up for shortfalls in the General Fund, a situation that is unacceptable to Delegate Mike McDermott (R-38B). “They can’t continue to come back to the same well over and over again and ask people to trust them,” he said. “They’ve taken a billion dollars from the Transportation Trust Fund to cover items in the General Fund, and that’s not even the full amount.” While it did not see the light of day, a bill was introduced during last week’s special session that would have prevented the TTF from being raided for other purposes. It will almost certainly reappear during the regular session early next year, according to McDermott. “There are no guarantees,” he said. “What happened to the last guarantee? How big of a hasp do we have to put on this box? Trust is the key word in Transportation Trust Fund. The government is the only entity I know of that can violate a trust anytime they want to.” McDermott said many state lawmakers will likely attempt to sell the gas tax hike to the public on the promise of improved roads and infrastructure. “They’re going to use that to get public support for the tax increase, then they are going to turn around and use the money for something else,” he said. “I want to introduce a bill making it against the law to use the word trust when creating a fund because the government simply is not trustworthy.” Mathias acknowledged the TTF has been used for unintended purposes in recent years and hoped safeguards could be put in place to avoid a similar situation with revenue derived from the proposed tax increase. “The working criticism for a number of years has been the raiding of the Transportation Trust Fund for other projects,” he said. “My hope is that we can protect that from happening and that the money that goes in there stays in there for its intended purpose.” Route 113 is a project near and dear to Worcester residents and could stand to benefit from a gas tax hike, but McDermott contends the project should have been completed years ago. “Route 113 is going to turn into a 50-year project,” he said. “If they paved just one mile a year, it would have been done 20 years ago. Doesn’t Worcester County rate one mile of four-lane a year?” However, Mathias said the only reason Route 113 is still moving forward is because of the tough decisions on tax increases years ago. “We’re very fortunate to have Route 113 still going forward right now,” he said. “They cut $2 billion from the transportation plan and that project stayed in there. That’s because Norm Conway made some very tough decisions when he voted for certain tax increases back in 2007.” Nonetheless, getting people to buy into the need for a gas tax increase when everything else is going up is going to be a tough sell. “To talk to people about paying more right now is not desirable. I get that. I’m a parent and a homeowner and a taxpayer and an employee. I don’t want to pay even a nickel more in gas tax, but I also don’t want to take a long detour around a road that collapsed,” Mathias said. This article was written by Shawn J. Soper, . Bookmark the permalink.Posted inTop Stories Top Stories - Home One comment on “Officials Weigh Proposed Gas Tax Increase” Barney on 11/02/2011 at 1:05 am said: The public can do nothing about a legislature that spends what tax dollars have been put into the Transportation Trust Fund but used for other purposes. Throwing more tax money at this won’t change anything. As for the Toll increases, they hurt the Eastern Shore residents to drive to jobs on the Western Shore. To the vacationers who drive from the Western Shore over here, it’s just an occasional inconvenience. Reply ↓ Leave a Reply Cancel reply

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E-mail Print Comments Share Tweet Google+ All Politics are Local Lawmakers Question Mayoral Fund Leaders of the Louisville Metro Council are voicing concern about purchases made from a discretionary fund by Democratic lieutenant governor candidate Jerry Abramson during his tenure as mayor. Council members have suggested a number of possible actions regarding the mayoral fund, from tighter restrictions on the current administration, calling Abramson to testify before the Government Accountability and Ethics committee and contacting state Auditor Crit Luallen to examine the account. Each year council members approved a $41,000 account that the mayor could access, but city records show many expenditures made by the Abramson administration lacked any invoices or receipts. Several procurements went to innocuous charitable organizations, however, other purchases include: $3,400 at an upscale steakhouse in Washington, D.C. for “Louisville business leaders”; $7,500 to Insight Media for “census outreach”; and another $2,378 to the Baltimore-based Cordish Cos., developer of Fourth Street Live, for a football game celebration. The funds were spent without any internal review or approval from lawmakers, and no receipts were turned in for several purchases, though that is not required. Council President Jim King, D-10, says the city auditor needs to examine the fund and report back to the council. “The council is responsible for appropriating taxpayer dollars and if we give a fund to the executive branch to spend we do expect it to be spent wisely and to be documented,” he says. “I certainly think the council would have appreciated a report from internal audit to the extent documentation was not there.” View the discussion thread. At Lexington Children's Theatre Family and Community Events Gallery & Gifts Holiday Market November 6 - December 20, 2014 At Arts & Cultural Center

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Senate immigration bill boosted by border deal By DAVID ESPO and ERICA WERNER Associated Press Jun 21 2013 8:09 pm AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite Sen. John Hoeven, N.D., leaves the Senate chamber on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C. WASHINGTON, D.C. — Supporters of bipartisan immigration legislation smoothed the way Friday for likely Senate passage of their handiwork, overcoming last-minute disagreements at the bill’s controversial core and tacking on other items certain to build support. A test vote was set for Monday on the bill, which calls for a military-style surge to increase security at the U.S-Mexican border. At the same time it sets out a 13-year pathway to citizenship for millions of immigrants living in the United States unlawfully. Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska became the 11th Republican to announce her support for the legislation in the Democratic-controlled Senate. More were expected to follow, possibly enough to produce 70 votes or more and easily overwhelm its critics. Some Democrats said a heavy show of support at the end of next week could alter the bill’s trajectory in the House, where majority Republicans strongly oppose citizenship for immigrants who came to the country illegally or overstayed their visa. “Hopefully as congressmen look how their senators voted, they will be influenced by it,” said Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., who has played a major role for Democrats on the issue. The bill’s critics made no claim they could block it in the Senate, but said their position would be vindicated in the long run. Republican Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama said the measure’s claims of border security were no different than previous assurances. “Time and again, politicians have promised, promised, promised. But they never delivered, delivered, delivered. And that’s a fact,” he said. With immigration at the top of President Barack Obama’s second-term domestic agenda, White House spokesman Jay Carney labeled the Senate agreement a breakthrough. He refrained from issuing an outright endorsement of the legislation, even though Cabinet secretaries were consulted on some portions of it and administration officials drafted others. The day’s developments marked a victory for the Senate’s so-called Gang of Eight, four Democrats and four Republicans who spent months working out the basic framework of immigration legislation. They then warded off unwanted changes in the Senate Judiciary Committee last month, and in recent days, negotiated significant alterations with a group of Republicans who were uncommitted but willing to swing behind the bill if it were changed. The principal demand was for tougher border security, particularly after the Congressional Budget Office estimated this week the bill would fail to prevent a future buildup in the population of immigrants in the country illegally. Republican Sens. John Hoeven of North Dakota and Bob Corker of Tennessee, who had spent about a week negotiating with members of the Gang of Eight for changes, announced the agreement on Thursday. A day later, Corker said in the Senate the bill is a chance to deal with “the issues of security many of our citizens across the country care about, but at the same time allow 11 million people to come out of the shadows and work in the light and be a part of this great, great nation.” The result of the negotiations was a series of expensive and highly detailed steps to guard against future illegal immigration across the 2,000-mile border with Mexico. For the so-called Yuma and Tucson sectors in Arizona, for example, the bill requires installation of 50 fixed towers; 73 fixed camera systems; 28 mobile surveillance systems; 685 unattended ground sensors, including seismic, imaging and infrared; and 22 handheld equipment devices, including thermal imaging systems and night vision goggles. There are similar specifications for points of entry from Mexico. At the one in San Diego, the government is mandated to install two nonintrusive inspection systems; one radiation monitor and one detection and classification network. The legislation also requires a doubling of the Border Patrol, with the hiring of 20,000 new agents, the purchase of 12 new unmanned surveillance drones and the construction of 350 miles of new fencing, to bring the total to 700 miles. Other provisions in the bill would require employers to verify the legal status of their workers, before they are hired and then periodically afterwards. A biometric system would be phased in at 30 airport crossings to track the comings and goings of foreigners. Most controversially, the measure creates a chance at citizenship for immigrants who are in the country illegally. It also sets up a new temporary program for farm workers, and new visa programs for workers recruited for the technology industry and those of lesser skills. The new security provisions would be put in place over a decade, in line with the 10-year path to a permanent resident green card that the bill sets out for immigrants in the U.S. illegally. During that time, the immigrants could live and work legally in a provisional status. As part of late negotiations, the bill makes clear that no immigrant can get credit for payroll taxes paid when they lacked legal status. Credits are used to determine the level of Social Security benefits workers are entitled to in retirement. Sen. Bernie Sanders, a Vermont independent, joined by several Democrats, secured a $1.5 billion temporary jobs program for low-income youth. The funds will come from a temporary $10 surcharge imposed on visa applications from companies hiring guest workers and international workers who receive green cards. Officials said a separate provision permits Alaska’s seafood processors to hire foreign students visiting the United States on so-called J-1 visas. The effect is to overturn a recent ruling by the departments of State and Labor that banned the practice. It was not clear who sponsored the change, although both of the state’s senators, Mark Begich, a Democrat, and Murkowski, added their names overnight to the list of supporters of the legislation.

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Al-Qaida in Iraq calls on Egyptians to fight army Sep 1 2013 12:31 am AP Photo/Khalil Hamra A supporter of Egypt’s ousted President Mohammed Morsi, holds a national flag as he stands next to burning tires during a protest in Cairo, Egypt, on Friday. CAIRO (AP) — A leader of al-Qaida’s Iraqi branch is calling on Egyptians to fight their army and deriding the Muslim Brotherhood for seeking power through democracy. The official spokesman of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, Abu Mohammed al-Adnani, said in an audio message posted on the Internet on Saturday that the Egyptian army should be targeted for trying to “prevent God’s rule.” In a 32-minute audio, al-Adnani said the Brotherhood is “a secular party with an Islamic cloak, worshipping power and parliaments, and their jihad is for democracy and not for God’s sake.” The audio could not be independently verified but appeared on a website commonly used by militants. The Egyptian military ousted President Mohammed Morsi, who hails from the Brotherhood, in a July 3 coup. Al-Qaida calls on Egyptians to fight army

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State’s constitutional ‘crisis’ bubbles over 09:45 AM, Tuesday, February 11 2014 | 1531 views | 0 | 3 | | slideshow In a bloodless coup the leader of the Arkansas Senate occupied the office of the lieutenant governor last week, just in time for the fiscal session of the General Assembly, which started Monday at the state Capitol.Although most of us thought that the future of the “private option” health care plan would be the major item of business for our lawmakers, we apparently have a constitutional crisis to resolve.Sen. Michael Lamoureux, R-Russellville, the duly elected Senate president pro tempore, declared himself president of the Senate and therefore the proper authority to supervise the four employees in the lieutenant governor’s office.Those four public servants had been cast adrift since the forced resignation of Lt. Gov. Mark Darr of Springdale, who had been caught by himself and others violating various state laws involving use of campaign funds and expense reports. That left open the question of whether Gov. Mike Beebe should call a special election to replace an officer who had almost no duties.The consensus seems to be that he should not.But that, in turns, raises a question as to whether the taxpayers should continue footing the annual bill of more than $250,000 for a vacant office, when its four staff members now have even less to do and no one to direct them.You’d think the fiscally conservative Republicans would say no and the tax-and-spend Democrats would say yes. But you’d be wrong.The politics cannot be ignored.Darr is a Republican and so had appointed political friends to the four staff positions, whose annual salaries range from $33,660 to $75,132. They now face an uncertain future, a situation that term limits might not have brought on for another five years. And some Republicans don’t think they should be dumped.However, Gov. Beebe, a Democrat, said he isn’t sure the taxpayers will appreciate funding four positions. He also indicated he would sign a special law leaving the office vacant for the rest of the year.Therefore, Lamoureux, a public defender, got a friendly legal opinion from the Senate’s legal counsel, Steve Cook, who said that he could assume the duties of the president of the Senate, which include running the office and supervising those four employees. They are apparently hungry for some direction, and Lamoureux conceivably could put them to work lobbying for the extension of the private option, which he happens to support. So do the Democrats, by the way.That indeed would be one final kick in the teeth to Darr, who won the office by declaring that he would work to abolish “Obamacare.”Lamoureux’ position didn’t impress Attorney General Dustin McDaniel, whose duties include interpreting the law for public officials. He issued a statement saying that the president pro tempore does not simply become president of the Senate because the office of lieutenant governor becomes vacant. The state Constitution provides only that the lieutenant governor be replaced through a special election.Details in our laws can be troubling to politicians.Granted, our 1874 Constitution is not clear on a lot of things. For example, it mixes up the terms “President of the Senate” and “President Pro Tempore.” I could find only one mention of the latter, perhaps because few of us speak Latin today and wouldn’t know that it means temporary president.Amendment 6 specifies that the lieutenant governor shall be President of the Senate and shall succeed to the governorship in case of vacancy. But there is no provision for a succession to the lieutenant governorship in case it should become vacant. Another amendment lists it as one of the offices that must be filled by special election and not by appointment of the governor.But there are also references to the “President of the Senate” succeeding to the governorship in case of vacancy in both offices, meaning that the president pro tempore is third in line of succession, followed by the speaker of the House.Another provision calls for the Senate to elect the President of the Senate at the beginning of each regular session.Someone with legal expertise will have to sort all this out. Part of the problem is that we’ve amended our Constitution to the point that it’s maddening to read.But one conclusion we could draw is that Arkansas has little use for a lieutenant governor, much less a well-paid staff. And certainly we could do without ethics battles involving the office.Lamoureux would surely rather be governor — it pays much better — but there is no vacancy.The real debate should be over abolishing the office. If we don’t want the president pro tempore to be first in line of succession, we could make it the attorney general or secretary of state, both of whom have real duties to justify a staff.After the 1874 Constitution passed, we didn’t even have a lieutenant governor until a 1914 amendment, and then the office was vacant until 1927 because of confusion over whether the amendment passed.Meanwhile, though, several people actually want to be lieutenant governor so the annual salary of $41,896 and lack of duties don’t seem to be a deterrent. This week 2nd District Congressman Tim Griffin will apparently be the third Republican to get into the race.A better solution would be for no one to run.Roy Ockert is editor emeritus of The Jonesboro Sun. He may be reached by e-mail at royo@suddenlink.net.

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Pierre Dorbes of the Red Cross, has Hamas agreed to anything you asked for regarding Gilad Shalit? Israel News | Haaretz Pierre Dorbes of the Red Cross, has Hamas agreed to anything you asked for regarding Gilad Shalit? By Amira Hass | Pierre Dorbes of the Red Cross. Photo by Emil Salman Text size Anytime the issue of Palestinian prisoners is raised, especially in a week in which Israel marks the fourth anniversary of Staff Sgt. Gilad Shalit's kidnapping, the subject of the Red Cross' mandate is raised. Pierre Dorbes is the deputy head of the International Committee of the Red Cross in Israel and the Occupied Territories. What is the greatest achievement of the Red Cross in the occupied territories over the last 40 years? This is a tricky question. One of our main achievements is that we have been able to visit nearly everyone detained in connection to this conflict, with the exception of Gilad Shalit. We have regular access to all the security detainees held by Hamas, the Palestinian Authority and Israel. But visiting detainees and prisoners is a cornerstone of your mandate as a watchdog for international humanitarian law. Why present it as an accomplishment? True, but access to detainees is not a given. For example, since 2005 we have not been allowed to visit detainees in Burma. And what is your biggest failure? I don't know whether to call it a failure or a lack of results. The Red Cross, like the entire international community, believes that Israel is obligated as an occupying force in Gaza and the West Bank by the prohibition on the transfer of its population to the occupied areas. That is, the settlements are a violation. This is not only a lack of results on your part. There is almost nothing that we are doing alone. One thing concerns the way hostilities are being conducted by the different parties. We have an ongoing dialogue with the IDF and the other sides with the aim that they will respect the provisions of international humanitarian law. There is a certain amount of progress in contrast to a total lack of respect for these provisions. But I would not like to go into details because we keep this dialogue confidential, and confidentiality contributes to progress. I expected you to say that the failure is the continued detention of Palestinian prisoners in Israel. How is this our failure when it is Israel's decision? It is true that Israel is obligated to hold prisoners in occupied territory, an obligation that it is violating. But let's be pragmatic: It is possible to visit the prisoners. My concern at the moment is the 806 Palestinian prisoners from Gaza who have not received visits for three years. They are not completely cut off from their families, because we are allowed to transfer postcards from them to their relatives. How many prisoners are included under your mandate in the occupied territories and Israel? About 200 security prisoners in Palestinian prisons in Gaza, 900 in Palestinian prisons in the West Bank, and 8,967 in Israel. Of these 2,401 are [being held on] on common-law [charges], and the rest security, including 218 administrative detainees. The goal is to visit as many as possible in the first critical stage, when the family still lacks all information, and then afterwards in the regular prison. Two visits a year are enough to insure that the conditions and treatment meet minimum requirements. Many Hamas leaders were allowed our visits when they were imprisoned, and perhaps for that reason Hamas has allowed us from the beginning to visit their security prisoners. The obvious exception is Gilad Shalit. Aside from Gazans, many other Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails do not receive regular family visits. More than 90 percent of West Bank prisoners receive family visits. But some receive one visit a year, and there are family members who receive new clearance months after the old one expires. How many do not receive regular visits? The dialogue about this issue is also confidential. Is there no obligation about the frequency of family visits? There are Palestinians who complain that you act only as a postman for Israeli prohibitions and as a bus service. As far as I know there is no obligation as to frequency of visits, but rather to maintaining family links. Our role is to be a humanitarian intermediary but also a humanitarian actor pushing Israel to be as generous as possible. Sometimes it works, sometimes it does not. Yes, we do our best, and yes, we do care. We are constantly following this issue with the Israeli side - the army, the coordinator of government activities in the territories, the civil administration. With which levels of Hamas leadership do you meet about Shalit? How often? We meet with all levels. In Damascus we are in direct contact with [Hamas political leader Khaled] Meshal himself, the last meeting was six months ago, and with officials in the Hamas offices. A few weeks ago was the last time we met with them. In Gaza we are in touch with the government, we have met with [Hamas prime minister in Gaza] Ismail Haniyeh at times, with the movement and its representative Mahmoud al-Zahar, and also with members of the military arm. How many meetings have you had? Do you deliver messages? Since the end of 2008 when I began my assignment, I know of dozens of meetings in which the subject of Shalit was raised. We are not involved in negotiations. We remind Hamas of its humanitarian obligation to dignified conditions. In order to evaluate this, we suggested a number of times that we visit Shalit. We also suggested that he be allowed to communicate with his family via letters. They refused. Hamas is a non-state party to the conflict. As such, it is not obligated to allow family visits or visits by the Red Cross, but it is obligated to make family ties possible. On what grounds do they explain their refusal? They offer no explanation. They just say no. Have you received a promise from Israel that you will not be under surveillance if you do visit Shalit? Hamas did not ask us to investigate this with the Israelis. And if they do? We will consider it. Has Hamas agreed to anything you have asked for regarding Gilad Shalit? Did you expect more generosity on Hamas' part? We are very disappointed by the lack of a positive answer regarding family ties. Where is the danger in exchanging paper [a letter] from a mother to a son? We do not understand. It is extremely disappointing. Have you mentioned when you have met with the Shalit family that the conditions of Palestinians detained in Israel are not that of a hotel, as many Israelis like to think? No. In conversations with the Shalits we focus on their son. But what you are implying is an Israeli debate on reciprocity. And here I must be perfectly clear. In international humanitarian law, the principle of reciprocity does not exist and should not exist. If one party violates its obligations, that does not absolve the other side from respecting them. We wait a long time before determining in public that one side is violating its obligations. Last week the Red Cross headquarters in Geneva published an official announcement about the blockade on Gaza, calling it collective punishment for the first time. For example, for a year and a half we have been struggling to allow the entrance into Gaza of VHF radio equipment for ambulances. Our request was refused. It has been almost a year that we are waiting for electrodes for heart monitors. No answer. We do not understand this. We have also determined that Hamas violates international humanitarian law when it does not permit Shalit to have continued ties to his family. Many times, even though a violation is thought to exist, we don't want to say so in public, because we assume that there is still room to maneuver to have discussions and make changes. So do you feel that you've reached a deadlock? About the blockade, we hope things will change now. But about Shalit, yes. It is a deadlock. Erdogan's rants about Gaza aren't just aimed at Israel Of pens and swords in Egypt A tale of love, a menorah and olive branches By Nir Hasson The classified treasure Israel will never fully reveal

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Paul Loeb Author, 'Soul of a Citizen' and 'The Impossible Will Take a Little While' Call for Coakley: How Three Votes Can Tip an Election Posted: 03/18/2010 5:12 am EDT Updated: 05/25/2011 3:15 pm EDT Share On election day 2004, I was canvassing in my home state of Washington, alternating between knocking on doors for gubernatorial candidate Christine Gregoire and breaking to call Ohio and Florida. After three recounts, Gregoire won by 129 votes. I had no idea my state election was so close, but I did get three people who wouldn't have otherwise voted: One forgot it was election day. One needed a ride to the polls. A third didn't know how to turn in her absentee ballot. If you multiply my efforts by those of thousands of other volunteers, we clearly helped make the difference. Had more volunteered on the other side, the results would be reversed.I'm thinking about this in terms of the election to fill Ted Kennedy's seat. The Democrats have disappointed many of us. But Kennedy fought for progressive change the bulk of his life. Martha Coakley may not be a great campaigner, but she's worked and voted for the same causes, while her opponent, Scott Brown, is a right wing Republican who's opposed everything Kennedy ever stood for. If people are pissed at Obama and the Democratic Senate for not doing all they promised, electing Brown adds yet another right wing Senator for three years or longer. With turnout likely to be low, Republicans motivated, and polls showing a toss-up or even a slight Brown lead, it would be a tragedy if he slipped in on resentment backlash, and the demoralization of progressive voters and volunteers.Many of us know that, and we're hoping Coakley will pull it out, but that's not enough. We can donate, and should. But we can also call, as so many of us did, in 2006 and 2008. And those calls do make a difference, and even more in an off-year election where turnout is likely to be low, where the positions of the candidates can be blurred, and where there's a third party, unrelated conservative Kennedy on the ballot. Imagine if we each convinced three additional voters, or one or two, and 20,000 other volunteers did the same, and the margin ended up a thousand votes, five hundred votes, or the 312 votes that elected Al Franken over the execrable Norm Coleman in 2008. I remember calling in 2006 through MoveOn's Call for Change program, contacting voters in Virginia, Missouri, Montana, and other states with key Senate and Congressional races. Grabbing spare moments where I could, I dialed my way across the country, convincing maybe 20 people who wouldn't have otherwise to back the Democratic challengers. Some initially resisted saying, "They're all the same. They're all corrupts." Or "My vote won't matter so why bother." But I convinced them to vote, and added a few with election-day reminders. Later I read that MoveOn had 120,000 volunteers. If each had half the impact of my efforts, that meant over a million votes, in a season when US Senate seats swung on margins as close as Montana's 3,500 votes, Virginia's 9,000, Rhode Island's 29,000, or Missouri's 48,000, our common efforts tipped the balance. Many of us made a key difference calling states like Minnesota, Ohio, North Carolina and Indiana in 2008. And the Senators we elected in 2006 and in 2008 have been good ones, and by and large supported decent agendas, in contrast with ones like Lieberman, Nelson, and Baucus. They haven't been the problem.It's easy to think of our individual election volunteering as insignificant. But when enough of us act even in small ways, we can have a powerful impact. Studies have found that if you talk to a dozen people by going door-to-door, you'll likely add at least one new voter for your candidate, a ratio that tends to hold true from local to federal elections, so long as you're working in reasonably receptive neighborhoods. Phone outreach can have a similar impact, though you need to talk with more people for a comparable result. We all have more than enough demands on our time, but even if we just each spend a hour, it could tip the difference. I had no idea my efforts would be so critical in 2004. They may well be again. Paul Loeb is the author of Soul of a Citizen: Living with Conviction in Challenging Times, which St Martin's will publish April 5 in a wholly revised edition, and The Impossible Will Take a Little While: A Citizen's Guide to Hope in a Time of Fear, named the #3 political book of 2004 by the History Channel and the American Book Association. See www.paulloeb.org To receive Paul's articles directly email sympa@lists.groundwire.org with the subject line: subscribe paulloeb-articles Follow Paul Loeb on Twitter: www.twitter.com/paulloeb Scott Brown Edward Kennedy Massachusetts Election

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Jewish families leave Migron outpost September 3, 2012 | 11:11 am Israeli police remove Jewish settlers from a roof during the eviction of the unauthorised Israeli settler-outpost of Migron, near the West Bank city of Ramallah Sept. 2. Photo by REUTERS/Nir Elias All of the Jewish families living in the West Bank outpost of Migron reportedly have evacuated. Families began moving out Sunday morning, as border police went door to door in the outpost handing out eviction notices. Some of the 50 families living on the hilltop reportedly left Saturday night. At least 40 families had vacated by mid-afternoon. Israel's Supreme Court ruled last week that the outpost must be evacuated by Sept. 4. The ruling was in response to a petition filed by the families requesting a delay in the eviction until the modular homes being built for the evacuees are completed. They reportedly will not be habitable for several weeks. The families are expected to go to temporary housing in a nearby college dormitory until the modular homes are available. The outpost's homes must be razed by Sept. 11, with the exception of the homes of the 17 families who claimed in a petition to the court that they have purchased or repurchased the plots on which their homes are located. That apartment building reportedly will be allowed to stand, empty, until the claim is investigated. In March, the Supreme Court ruled against an attempt by the government to postpone to 2015 the demolition of Migron, which the Palestinians say is built on their land. Deferrals against the demolition stretch back to 2006. The families reportedly decided that they will leave the outpost peacefully, though some will wait for police to remove them. But on Sunday morning dozens of young demonstrators came to Migron and took over a building that had already been evacuated, in a show of protest. Police were removing them forcibly by mid-morning Sunday. Some 70 teens living in nearby settlements were forcibly removed from Migron on Sunday, at least four were detained by police. Graffiti painted by the settlers on their homes included: “Migron we shall return” and “the eternal people does not fear the long road," and “Begin = Sinai, Sharon = Gush Katif, Bibi = Migron. Only the Likud can.” israelis migron Democratic convention picks Rabbi Wolpe

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You are hereHome › Countries › Occupied Palestinian Territory and Israel Occupied Palestinian Territory and Israel Poverty takes many forms. In the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT), (the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip) nearly a quarter of the people live below the poverty line, with their prospects for work, and a safe, healthy life severely limited by living under Israeli occupation.The burden of the decades-long conflict with Israel, and the ongoing occupation, are causing debilitating hardship for these communities.Oxfam works to help communities in the OPT to earn a living and to ensure that they have access to food and water as well as education. We respond in humanitarian crises. And we are helping to build a strong civil society so that human rights will be upheld and communities will have a say in the decisions that affect them.Our workOxfam has been working in the OPT and Israel since the 1950s, and established a country office in the 1980s. We work in the most vulnerable communities in Gaza, East Jerusalem, and Area C, the 61% of the West Bank where the government of Israel maintains full military and civil control. In the past we have also worked with impoverished communities in Israel.Oxfam works with more than 60 Palestinian and Israeli partner organizations. Together we are finding ways to improve the livelihoods and rights of these communities.In Gaza, home to 1.7 million Palestinians, the 7-year Israeli blockade limits their mobility and access to jobs, and access to even basic necessities such as food, water and fuel. The blockade has devastated the economy - there is a 40 percent unemployment rate in Gaza, exports have fallen to just 3 percent of the pre-blockade levels, and 80 percent of the population relies on aid.In the West Bank, Israeli settlements, which are illegal under international law, deprive rural farming and herding communities of their traditional livelihood because farmers are unable to build or access their land and water. Palestinians are rarely allowed to build, and their properties are confiscated and frequently demolished to make way for Israeli settlements.Restrictions on movement, land and resources cost the Palestinian economy around $3.4 billion a year according to the World Bank and leave many families unable to support themselves.Poverty in the Occupied Palestinian Territory is exacerbated by poor governance and gender inequality. Oxfam is sharing its respected rights-based approach to make progress.Our 2014 budget in the OPT and Israel is around €22 million. Our major donors include: the European Union (EU), the European Commission Humanitarian Aid and Civil Protection (ECHO), the World Food Programme, and the governments of the Netherlands, the UK, Canada, Belgium, Denmark, Switzerland, Sweden, and Italy.West Bank/East JerusalemIn the West Bank Oxfam helps olive farmers improve the quality of their produce and get it to markets, and we help herders to care for their animals. We advocate for the rights of communities to stay on their land, and we promote the rights of women and marginalized groups to participate in the decision-making that affects their lives. In East Jerusalem we help women start small businesses, help local partners to improve school buildings, and ensure legal support to help residents stay in their city.GazaWe work with farmers and fishermen who are prevented from accessing their livelihoods. We supply safe water and sanitation, and run a food-voucher project that ensures families have enough to eat and supports the local economy. We help local producers improve the quality of their produce and get it to market. We help local civil society to advocate for their rights, and have provided emergency aid during military escalations and floods.Oxfam condemns all violence against civilians by all sides. We want to see peace, security and prosperity for both Israelis and Palestinians. We believe that real progress towards justice and the elimination of poverty in the OPT and Israel can only be achieved through an end to the occupation and a just and durable solution to the conflict.Oxfam supports a two-state solution, as called-for by the international community. Share this page:Tweet Permalink: http://oxf.am/EY2 Latest about Occupied Palestinian Territory and Israel Helping families in Gaza prepare for winter floods From grove to market: Palestinian olive harvest in Farkha Gaza: Food vouchers provide a lifeline for families who have lost everything Gaza: Despite the ceasefire, huge needs remain Palestinian refugees from Syria: a story of perpetual displacement You may also like … Crisis in Gaza After seven years of Israeli blockade, 1.7 million Palestinians continue to be trapped in the Gaza Strip, largely cut off from the outside world. Cease Failure: Rethinking seven years of failing policies in Gaza27 August 2014 The most recent escalation of violence in Gaza and southern Israel has come at terrible human cost. The recent ceasefire announcement is certainly a welcome one, but is only the first step on a long road toward lasting peace. What is Oxfam's position on the Israel-Palestine conflict? What does Oxfam do in the Occupied Palestinian Territory and Israel (OPTI)? Countries Afghanistan Algeria Armenia Azerbaijan Bangladesh Benin Bolivia Brazil Burkina Faso Burundi Cambodia Central African Republic Chad Chile China Colombia Cuba Democratic Republic of Congo Dominican Republic Ecuador Egypt El Salvador Ethiopia Georgia Ghana Guatemala Haiti Honduras Indonesia Ivory Coast Kenya Laos Lebanon Liberia Malawi Mali Mauritania Mexico Morocco Mozambique Myanmar (Burma) Nepal Nicaragua Niger Nigeria Occupied Palestinian Territory and Israel Pakistan Papua New Guinea Paraguay Peru Philippines Russia Rwanda Senegal Sierra Leone Somalia South Africa South Sudan Sri Lanka Sudan Tajikistan Tanzania Thailand Timor-Leste (East Timor) Uganda Vietnam Western Sahara Yemen Zambia Other countries in East Asia

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Home » News » Politics » Primary Plus No action taken on Gingrich automated calls CONCORD — The New Hampshire Attorney General's Office investigated the campaign of presidential candidate and former U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich, a campaign official confirmed Thursday night.R.C. Hammond, spokesman for Gingrich's campaign, said the investigation involved automated calls made in December. He said the Attorney General's Office took no legal action against the campaign.Attorney General Michael Delaney could not be reached Thursday night for comment.

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Paul Ryan's leadership: Filling the vacuum Republican budget proposes deep cuts in domestic programs On Tuesday U.S. House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan released his latest "Path to Prosperity" alternative budget for the federal government. Though The New York Times already characterized it as slashing spending for social programs, and some conservatives will say it leaves the government too bloated, we have a different take. Why is Paul Ryan the only one sticking his neck out to present credible alternatives to the President's Spend It All, Bill The Kids program?Ryan — who should have run for President in 2012 — has been the Republican Party's budget "idea guy" since shortly before the death of his mentor, Jack Kemp, in 2009. Ryan introduced his "Roadmap for America's Future" in 2008. It was reminiscent of Newt Gingrich's Contract With America in its optimism and its daring. But it exceeded Gingrich's ambition by putting a detailed budget plan before the voters.Since then, Ryan has been the party's undisputed leader on federal budget issues. In fact, he is the only leader. Why?Washington is supposed to be where the nation's "best and brightest" gravitate. Among 535 elected officials, Ryan is the only one with the combination of brains and guts to offer voters a realistic, detailed alternative budget plan? In New Hampshire, Republicans saw leaders like former House Speaker Bill O'Brien, Senate President Chuck Morse, and former Senate President Ted Gatsas all put forward serious budget proposals. In Washington, there is only one guy? No wonder the federal budget is such a disaster.

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andrea mitchell doris kearns goodwin jack jacobs jonathan capehart julian epstein kristin welker brzezinski they already agreed to that. i think you heard john boehner say that already. we've had votes in the senate where we've actually gotten rid of tax credits. i think that's a given. and i think the vast majority of americans agree with that. the question is how do you do that and how do you allow taxes to rise at the same time you fix the real problem? and the real problem is uncontrolled entitlement spending and a government that has grown massively. not just under this administration, under republican administration. >> let me turn to senator schumer on this point. >> so you have to approach both sides of it. >> let me turn to senator schumer. i'm going to ask you the same question. if the mandate is compromised, what do democrats have to be prepared to accept as a painful outcome in order to achieve compromise? >> well, i agree with you, the mandate is compromise. that's why we have a divided house and senate. and i think if the house stands for anything it's cut government spending, as tom coburn said, and i think we're going to have to do more of it. we heard the mandate in 2010, where i × election? >> no, not at all. in fact, after election day the president, speaker boehner, senate ma minority leader mitch mcconnell all talking about the facecle life, what they were going to do, not going to do, what they wanted to negotiate, not negotiate, but on friday, as news exploded out from the cia thanks to our own andrea mitchell that the president accepted the resignation of the cia director, general david petraeus, all of that -- you have to add that plus all the things you talked about, fiscal cliff, to what the president has to deal with. as you said, no honeymoon, indeed. >> and added to what jonathan just said, julian, there are some concerns over this that this is just the tip of the iceberg. i want to play you something senator feinstein said to andrea mitchell this afternoon. >> this thing came so fast and hard. since then it's been like peeling an onion. every day another peel comes off and you see a whole new dimension to this. so my concern has actually escalated over the last few days. >> it's clear she's suggesting this is going well beyond the realm of a personal mat × Nov 14, 2012 12:00pm EST . john boehner still in the house for the time being at the treasury. the president is back in the white house and harry reid is in the senate with a few more seats. why should i believe this would end any more positively than the summer of 2011? >> because again i'm not going to try to talk to you in optimism but let's look at what's changed. you have republican leadership acknowledging for the first time in this debate in public that it's agreed to increase in revenues as part of an agreement that helps restore fiscal balance. that's a very important change. you can debate on what motivated that change, and of course it's true that approach has been a popular very substantial support among the american people. you have a much greater recognition that the economy would benefit on a carefully designed balanced agreement on fiscal reform and putting it off indefinitely is not good for the country. that's important, too. and i also think again if you listen carefully to what people are saying and what many politicians are saying with many elected representatives are saying there's a lot of × years later, what moment are we in as boehner enters? >> this is a magic moment, i really do. it is a moment when our generation has a chance to do something about this problem that we created. it is our generation that got us into this mess, and we ought to get ourselves out. we got a good chance. you got a second-term democrat president who has come out and said he is willing to put entitlements on the table. big deal. you've got a speaker, a republican speaker, who really gets at, who really understands the depths of the problems we face, and he has come out and said we are going to put revenues on the table. big move. he got at least half the members of the senate already saying they will support a balanced plan, which makes a lot of sense. we have got the business community lined up firmly against -- for doing something smart, and i guess most importantly, we got this fiscal cliff where if we go over it, we are going to face the most predictable economic crisis in history. fortunately for all of us, it is also the most of voidable. this is the magic moment to get somethi × it off track when there were in fact very close. i think boehner has been very clear. i think revenues are on the table. they are at the moment drawing a line on tax rates, but we will see where that goes. the last time, you are right, didn't work and we were not facing quite the same set of circumstances we are facing today so i'm cautiously optimistic although i will offer to say lastly that people sometimes say okay, it looks like simpson-bowles, everything in between zero and $4 trillion we could end up with all kinds of outcomes that may be less than i would like and maybe less than all of you would like but at least something. i'm hoping it is more over here but i don't know. >> and steve, so we are gathered here to talk about u.s. global competitiveness. how important is resolving these issues to the american position on the global economy? >> first of all i think it's important not just our position in the global comment about our position in the world. admiral mullen who was the previous chairman of the joint chiefs of staff said our greatest national security threat was our f Search Results 0 to 11 of about 12 (some duplicates have been removed)

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Tonight From Washington Today in Washington Apr 18th (Thu) Apr 19th (Fri) Apr 23rd (Tue) Apr 21st (Sun) Apr 16th (Tue) Apr 17th (Wed) Apr 20th (Sat) mr. reid flynn mr. durbin mr. mcconnell toomey baucus dunford . obama's four horsemen, as you can see. other pop -- apocalyptic. i think a lot of the books that are out have come out in the past few months have talked about america at a crossroads or america at a point where we have a big decision to make. david who is a terrific writer and spokesperson basically says the we have crossed that point. it is too late to avoid some of the disasters that we are facing. now we just have to buckle down and figure how to get through. >> the last book you have, you're holding a galley right here. >> holding a little one. this book is not even get out. this is our next big book coming in april. it's called the ultimate obama survivor get -- survival guide. this is a terrific read. very fine. also very practical. the first part of the book tells us all the terrible things we're facing under a second term abroad, and the second half of the buck is a very practical survival guide. everything from how to buy gold coins to how to stop your house -- stockier house of food and water down to buy a gun and what ammunition to stack upon. he has covered all the bases in × Apr 23, 2013 12:00pm EDT , there is no limitation. president obama says this. some members of my party say the battle has no geographic limitations, and the laws of war apply. it's important to know that the law of war that they're talking about means no due process. boyleston street sure looked -- "i quote from the" wall street journal "editorial." boyleston street sure looked like a battlefield on monday and so did watertown on thursday night. the artificial distinction arises from undue focus on geography. the vital distinction for public safety is between common criminals who deserve due process protections and enemy combatants at war with the united states wherever they are. as for due process, the greatest danger to liberty would be to allow more such attacks that would inspire an even greater public backlash against muslims or free speech or worse. the antiterror types on the left and g.o.p. senators who agree that the u.s. isn't part of the battlefield are making the united states more vulnerable. americans erupted in understandable relief and gratitude on friday with the rapid capture of the terrorist brothers, but we sh × secretary janet napolitano anytime at our website, c-span.org. the president obama released a statement earlier today on that explosion in west, texas. he said quote today our prayers o out to the peoplest my aatdmin, through fema and other agencies, is in close contact with our state an lalrsk sure there are no unmet needs. again,the president in a statement earlier today. nancy pelosi holding her weekly legislative briefing. that was a bit early. she discussed yesterday's failed vote on bipartisan gun legislation in the senate. she was joined by congressman mike thompson who chairs the gun violence prevention task force. they're proposing a house version of a compckgroundck this is 20 minutes. >> good morning. >> good morning. >> as we gather here this morning, people are gathering in boston for a prayer service. we joined them, our prayers and thoughts are with the people of boston, the families of all of the victims of this senseless tragedy, wherever they are from. we pray for the recovery of the injured and as americans and members of congress. words are always inadequate for time × to michelle obama for raising the national conversation about obesity and health and nutrition. on the one side. on the other hand, too, these products are so compelling. i like to call them the foods we hate to love because, you know, it's hard to talk about something that you love to eat in negative, in negative tones. >> host: michael moss, what was the reception from the food companies when you approached them about "salt sugar fat"? >> guest: i think that they were actually -- i mean, i was surprised by how willing they were to talk to me. and i started off with a trove of internal documents which helped tremendously. these thousands and thousands of pages put me at the table as the largest companies were plotting and planning and formulating their way to creating new products. those documents enabled me to convince their top scientists, marketing officials, ceos in some cases to talk to me and reveal even more secrets. and so -- and i was really surprised by how many companies have a cabal of insiders who are genuinely concerned about obesity and health issues associated with their p × subcommittee held a hearing tuesday on the constitutionality of the obama administration, using drugs to target terror suspects overseas. this has included u.s. military officials, constitutional law professors and again the activist whose villages had by a stream to strike causing civilian tragedies. [inaudible conversations] >> return of the subcommittee on the civil rights and human rights will come to order. today's hearing is entitled drone wars, the counterterrorism institutions of killing. senator cruises on its way from another hearing. there are conflicting schedules we face here. this is the first-ever public hearing in the senate to address the use of drones and targeted killing. we are pleased to have such a large audience for today's hearing that demonstrates the importance and timeliness of this issue. thank you to those hearing person, those watching live on c-span and is following a hearing on twitter and facebook you stand the hash type drone wars. the rules of the semiprivate outbursts, popular demonstrations of any kind. please be mindful of the service as we conduct this hea × examine. the third emerged during the last ten years of president obama's first term. over this period, the president, as we remember, vividly, i'm sure, faced relentless pressure from benjamin netanyahurc wi conress and wi the poe eny i this pressure forced the president into humiliating retreats from positions on a settlement freeze, on the potential borders of a palestinian state and urgent need of a state staked out first two years in office. as anybody's who's followed this conflict knows, these were positions previously taken by succession of the u.s. president, but this president was obliged to abandon them. it was not palestine on which he focused almost interly in the first two years in office, but the question of iran's nuclear program, benjamin netanyahu's preferred subject, in exchange ever since. the climb down was complete, and i argue that was seen, yet again, in the bulk of the speech therntly in jerusalem. s writing on the subject, and, aain, the corrupt language played a crucial role. for decades, the repeated man tray of a peace process served to obscure reality. thi × Apr 18, 2013 6:00am EDT .m. eastern, the u.s. senate returns for work on firearms legislation. >> president obama and the first lady will be in boston today to honor the victims of the boston marathon bombing. the first couple will attend the interfaith service at the cathedral of the holy cross. see it live starting at 11 a.m. eastern on our companion network, c-span3. >>> attorney general eric holder is on capitol hill today for a hearing on the 2014 justice department budget request. he's also expected to speak about the bombing at the boston marathon. see this hearing live starting at 2 p.m. eastern on c-span3. >> when the war began, the congress came into session in july, and it issued a statement ever since known as the createn done resolution that articulated the consensus war goals of the united states. and it was very simple, very clear. the purpose of this war is to restore the union. and it is not, and it is not to disrupt the social institutions of the south. and everybody knew what that meant. it meant not to disrupt slavery. >> the evolution of president lincoln's views on slavery. university of texas × church. the obama administration knew about it and actually reported about in the state department religious freedom, which is still the gold standard for human rights reporting. but at the time it was happening they said nothing and did nothing. so on our watch this has happened. the bush administration, two-thirds of the christians in iraq were driven out. we have it in the book about conversations we had about secretary rice at the time saying please protecting. again, we had 100,000 troops on thground and she said no, we cannot get involved. it's sectarian here. meanwhile, the united states had just installed a shiite government in iraq and was negotiating on the path of sunni leaders to get sunni appointments in the government. so it just rang true. >> it does seem as i listen because i'm being educated on this, some rights are more equal than others, right? in other words, if we're talking about universal concept or standard of let's say women's rights, then we can speak out against them. but it seems like there's been a shining a we're doing that with regard to religious lib × with the global terrorist threat. on taking office, president obama declined to undertake an official study of what happened. senator leahy introduced legislation to establish a truth commission, and congress failed to act on it. so in many respects, this task force, this report is the comprehensive examination of the treatment of suspected terrorists that official washington has been reluctant to conduct. task force members believe that having an understanding of what occurred during this period of serious threat and willingness to acknowledge any shortcomings strengthen the nation and equip us to better cope with any future crises. it knowing what happened, our reputation, as an exemplary practitioner of the rule of law, will clearly be damaged. the task force is made up of as jenny said, a broad cross-section of folks have been in government, who understand government, who understand military, who understand the role of intelligence. the bios are in your folder but i would like to take just a minute to introduce them at this time. dr. gerald thomson, the former, our professor emeritus at × . the report put out by the constitution project is critical of both bush and obama administration's. it includes former members of congress. this is 50 minutes. >> thank you for your leadership on the task force and i want to express my thanks to the constitution project, but also to all of my fellow task force members what they brought to the table in terms of experience, wisdom, public service really made a difference in the development of this project and important report. as jim mentioned, there's more than 24 findings and recommendations. we can't cover all of those this morning that we want to hit some of the highlights. we hope he will take the entire report, study it through and look at each of those recommendations. why is this report important? it's important because we as a nation have to get this right. i looked back in history to the time during world war ii that we in turn to some japanese-americans. at the time it seemed like the right and proper thing to do but in light of history, it was an error. as of today this report will hopefully put into focus some of the a × come about a year after my, my trip to drc to do my basic reporting when president obama announced that 100 u.s. military special operations forces would go to the drc and neighboring countries to work directly with native armies to hunt and hopefully destroy the lord's resistance army. but when i was there three years ago, that announcement had yet to come, and the ingredients of that intervention were still sort of bubbling in the pot. so i looked at it. it was an unmade thing, and i asked myself could this, could this be a new -- it's not necessarily a new way of war. there have been plenty of armed interventions, plenty of armed interventions by and for humanitarian reasons. but could this represent a kind of military strategy is not the right word, but a grand strategy? an answer to the question what is america's role in the world postiraq? postafghanistan? could we leave a decade of bad war behind us and fight good warsesome now, there's going to be lots of caveats to that question. is u.s. military intervention in africa, to say nothing of congo, can that be a good war? the × of global warming the unusual photograph of president obama and governor right before the election. in the united states there's a large contingent of climate change doubters. what do you say to that part of the tows persuade them that climate change is real? >> would be take a look at me. i'm the picture of obama and governor chris christie. [laughter] because according to the ground rules of u.s. presidential campaigns, such an embrace three days before election day was an absolute taboo. and talk to the people new jersey or new york that had their homes destroyed and their communities destroyed due to the extreme weather events. look up on the map side, the report of china in january or february. one example, just to give you a visual image is the melting of the arctic sea ice in my part of the world. the consequence -- [inaudible] so whether we call it climate change or not, that's a political concept, which i know has positive or negative connotations, but the ice melting is a reality. and the consequences of the ice melting in my part of the world is extreme weather in united × believe, later we deuced by president obama. i have a question to you about this. was the russian government consulted or informed that the united states was considering this decision before the decision was made, and if so, when did that occur? >> the answer is not to my knowledge. it was not russian government who was not consulted in any way, and it was not that decision, that policy was not decided based on any consideration of the russian government. incidentally, i addthat those als not yeally lasted, but some ar in -- california. >> okay. to your tog, they were not cop culted? if the department decides additional missile defense systems were needed to be deployed for the protection of the united states, whether domestically or abroad, would the russian government be consulted or informed before that decision was made? >> well, first, i can't answer for the president. that would be a decision for the president to make. i suspect have to reinvolve around treaty obligations, and we have before with other issues might be. >> in mah, the government requested meetings to take ac × , president obama's has the power to go to united nations again, tomorrow. he has -- president clinton. given the recognition which was a vote of 100, 120 something, 149. i think that would be difficult may be defined those nine next hundred and people know that. you may find four or five but you won't find the nine. so given that, he is restrained from doing that. that is designed of good faith at this moment, too. he would like to see if we could get this process moving. so everybody needs to kind of not react normal sort of tit-for-tat, stereotypical way. give peace a chance and by providing the opening here for the politics and diplomacy to work. that's what both sides need to do. that's what i believe both sides are prepared to do, and the proof will be in the pudding. >> we go now to mr. khan of arkansas. >> mr. secretary, thank you for your time today. thank you for your service to our country. including your service as a young men in uniform in the non. >> thank you. >> the united nations recently approved united arms treaty article v of the treaty requires nations to great a national × the economy was so messed up by george bush that obama struggled mightily to overcome this horrible situation he inherited. the second reason is most americans believe republicans only care about rich people. and those are branding problems that the republican party has to to overcome. and it's hard to overcome it because you've got three obstacles; academia, hollywood and our major media, all of which are overwhelmingly liberal. when you say something, it's got to be interpreted through the filter of those three entities, and often it's been distorted. >> host: larry elder is our guest, this is booktv on c-span2 live from the los angeles times festival of books, campus of usc. mike's in fort worth, texas. hi, mike. >> caller: how's it going, larry? my -- pretty good. i'm a african-american democrat, but i agree with you one of the big problems in the african-american community is lack of fathers in the house. but i think, larry, when you say that, you kind of come off kind of harsh on black people. now, what's the reason behind the lack of a lot of fathers being in the house, drinking or in × minutes will be 10 minutes to 2:00. [inaudible conversations] >> president obama and the first lady will be in boston thursday to honor the terms of the boston marathon bombing aired the first couple will attend the cathedral of the holy cross. see it live at 11:00 a.m. eastern on ark pinon not her, c-span 3. >> she came into the white house is a 47-year-old lady who is well known hated politics. she was obviously deeply did press at the death of her last surviving son, especially under the terrible circumstances in which she died. she didn't have any men friends, but she did have a family who kept her going and always seem to be somebody fair. i don't think she did very much. she was this very intellectual woman, highly educated. they seemed wasted on some way. >> homeland security janet napolitano testified before the senate homeland security committee on her department's 20. as they are in the secretary and the boston marathon. see the testimony on c-span and any time a c-span.org. >> i'm a former prosecutor and i've got a question that i just can't keep from coming out. based on × , president obama is to blame for these delays. he had very little choice if we don't change things. and this is a way to change things. so if you want to get rid of these delays which we all very much want to on both sides of the aisle, i would propose to my colleagues the solution proposed by the majority leader is the best way to go given the political necessities on the other side, the desire not to have any revenues, even closing certain tax loopholes. and so i would hope we could come together and vote on this. i would hope that this solution, which, by the way, cutting the o.c.o. has been supported by republicans. i remember senator kyl, the former senator was arizona, was advocating this late last year to deal with the doc fix and the d.r.g.'s and other things. the people will come together on it. so i would hope we could vote for this proposal, put the air traffic controllers back to wo work, off their furloughs, get rid of these delays and then come together in a grand agreement in time for the september budget. i yield the floor. a senator: mr. leader? mr. reid: i ask una × president obama commander in chief is committed to the spending plans help get these capabilities contract o lre further delays. >> to include extended deterrence and our capability and to maintain a safe and secure and reliable stockpile. i said that in my confirmation here. >> it's good to see you. there is talk around a result of us passing the defense appropriation for the rest of the fiscal year. there is now talk that you can reduce the furlough days for the defense civilians from 14 to seven is that true? >> they send out notification to the congress to comply with the law that we were considering furloughing the take on it was maybe as much as 21 days we are going to be required we have now got that down to 20 or 14. we are still reviewing what actions we may have to take. we are probably a couple of weeks away from coing ta determination on whatt furlough would be and the congress of course will be fully informed, kept informed on any decisions we need to make to comply with the budget restraints. with that let me ask the comptroller if he has anything. >> we haven't made a decision × committee on veteran's affairs. president obama has requested $150.7 billion for the veteran's affair department in 2014. a 10.2 increase over 2013 funding level. the hearing is two hours. [inaudible conversations] a hearing on the way. i want to welcome everyone to the hearing on the fiscal year 2014 budget and the fiscal year of 2015 advanced appropriation request for the department of veterans affairs. earlier in year, i think we will recall we heard from nearly all the veteran surface organizations. these groups shared with us our priority which reflect the needs of the men and women who have served our country. i want to thank all of the organizations not only for the important testimony but the great work they do every single day. protecting the interest of america's veterans. if there's anything that many of us have learned in recent years, it is that the real cost of war is far, far greater than simply paying for the tank and gun and plane and the manpower to fight those wars. inlt that we unmore fully than we have in the past that soldiers who come home from war are often ver × to the number originally planned during the bush administration with president obama. i have a question for you with the russian government consulted or informed that the united states was considering this decision before the decision was made and if so, when it that occur? >> well, the answer is not to my knowledge. it was not russian government was not consulted in any way. it was not decision that policy was not decided based on any consideration of the russian government. incidentally i would add that those gbi also not only really alaska but some are -- california. >> okay. to your knowledge they were not consulted. the department were to dpd that additional missile defense systems were needed, to be deployed domestically or abroad. would the russian government be informed before the decision was made? >> first, i can't answer for the president. will they include any of our nato allies as part of our discussion? >> again, senator, i don't know about those talks that would be in the per view of the secretary of state and the white house. i have not been consulted on on the possibility what × the intelligence community's assessment of those attacks and whether you are the dni rich president obama or secretary clinton about the preceding attacks and his chariot and security situation benghazi prior to september 11. >> i did not personally briefed on, but we reported those polled for intelligence vehicles. >> your intelligence vehicles would've included the attacks on the consulate? >>es >> we had a general idea of the situation in eastern libya. we probably didn't have those fidelity on the exact situation in benghazi, but we certainly know what the lack of control the central government had over the militia is not part of the country. that's an historical tradition and continued even after the fall of gadhafi. >> he said the intelligence briefings prepared by the dni talked about the prior attacks by reference in april and june prior to september 11 attack. but they also include the assessment of the british closing a facility? >> yes. >> is the intelligence at the chain of command despite not having a specific conversation with the prside just to be played enough conversation × in the obama administration. this is a military procedure in terms of the trial of this gentleman and i want to make sure the record is clear, even though the gentleman is a great member and has every right to question that is not something the department of justice's handling. >> i appreciate that. the only reason i bring it up is because mr. mchugh set in this interview that i'm not attorney and i don't buy the end, there were told the purple heartwarwon the ability to conct a fair trial.thansw by the secretary of themmpies the justice rtnthte no, we as i know come in the decision is to not influence in any way anything the justice department said, but i would look at that to the extent that had interaction with the defense department relay that to you. i think what congressman fattah has said is correct. this is a military investigation were not involved in making purple heart determinations. i'm just not aware of it. >> mr. rooney is accurate. mr. mchugh is that i'm not an attorney and i don't in the justice department. i think he's right before they did anything, they went to the justi × are the tni briefed president obama or secretary clinton about the two preceding 11.cks in benghazi prior to >> i did not personally rifed on come but we certainly were porticos of all of our intelligence vehicles. >> are your intelligence vehicles included the prior attacks on the consulate? >> yes. >> do believe the intelligence community of the situation in benghazi? >> we had a general idea of the situation in eastern libya. we probably didn't have the fidelity on the exact situation in benghazi, but we certainly know the lack of control the central government had over the militias and not part of the country. that continued even after the fall of gadhafi. >> he said that briefings prepared by the tni talked about the prior attacks a reference in april and june prior to sebettack al inclu thesmen the british closing their facility. e those thef intelligence reported that the chain of command despite not having a specific conversation? just to be clear,e didn't have any specific conversations with secretary clinton about this issue? >> we had many conversations about it. i don't recall × obama's administration officials surprised in recent weeks with an amended approach to syria. we don't want an outright rebel military victory right now because in the words of one senior official quote the good guys may not come out on top. >> well, if that depends on your definition of good guys. certainly the jihadist the sunni dominated groups, the fighting groups and the opposition most notable on its way to terms of size have recently pledged allegiance to al qaeda. that is a great concern. they are present in 13 of the 14 provinces in iran and are starting to establish municipal services providing humanitarian aid, food, hospitals and sharia law. >> do you think all this might've been avoided if we hadn't sat by and watched it happen? i thank you mr. chairman. >> thank you senator mccain. senator reid. >> thank you very much . chrman and thank you gentlemen for not only her testimony but your service. the issue at front and center is sequestration and i just have a more procedural question. first of all as i understand it your appropriation is part of the defense of her patien × the advisory he was taught by the wars outside the war zone. early on the obama administration. and he said in contrast to the wars in iraq and afghanistan where the united states has used a hammer, he said we, the obama administration, can use a scalpel. it was an idea i had that scalpel certainly applied a sos free. surgery without obligations. but we see that's not the case in a lot of places. so i thought i would take his analogy and make it a nice because nice fights are a lot messier. >> host: steve, california, you're on with mark mazzetti from "the new york times." >> caller: this. the united states has not declared war in over 70 years. the wars we thought, korea, vietnam, iraq, afghanistan have all been basically unconstitutional. we seem to have given up any a semblance of pretending to declare war, congress seems to have no stomach to declaring war but obviously no problem fighting them. i'm wondering whether or not you think that the militarization of the cia, potential conflict between the different agencies and the defense department might in fact said whether that we return × that their subordinates comply with the laws of war. president obama has committed to observe the geneva conventions through an executive order, but a future president could change it by the stroke of a pen. congress, one of our recommendations, needs to work with the administration to strengthen the torture statute, the war crimes exact the uniform code of military justice to remove loopholes that allow torture to occur. in terms of cia, we did not have access to classified information. this is the reason we're asking the administration to review much of the classified information to see what can be released without compromising national security and to provide more transparency and light on how the policy decisions were made. dr. david gushy would be happy to answer questions when we conclude about the responsibility and how the absence of clear standards left troops on the front line in an untenable position. on the question of effectiveness of torture, there is no persuasive evidence in the public record that the widespread use of torture against suspected terrorists was necessary; that is, that × the white house on their way to boston. president obama speaking at the holy cathedral, the holy cross cathedral i believe it is in the south boston cathedral of the holy cross, that's the name of the. we also understand that romney, former governor romney will be there in a memorial, interfaith memorial service for the victims in the boston marathon. our live coverage of the president's remarks beginning at 11 a.m. on c-span3. also today on c-span3 we have attorney general eric holder testifying in front of the senate foreign relations committee, talking about the president's 2014 budget. we will have that like for you today at 2:00 eastern. also on c-span3. >> you are watching c-span2 with politics and public affairs. weekdays featuring live coverage of the u.s. and. on weeknights watched key public policy events. every weekend the latest nonfiction authors and books on booktv. you can see past programs and get our schedules at our website, and you can join in the conversation on social media sites. >> and we go live now to the u.s. senate where we are continues work on a gun violenc Search Results 0 to 26 of about 27

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Presidential Race Fri September 21, 2012 Obama, Ryan Talk Medicare At AARP Convention Share Tweet E-mail Print By Ina Jaffe Originally published on Fri September 21, 2012 4:53 pm Transcript ROBERT SIEGEL, HOST: This is ALL THINGS CONSIDERED from NPR News. I'm Robert Siegel. AUDIE CORNISH, HOST: And I'm Audie Cornish. In New Orleans today, thousands of senior citizens were treated to two different visions for their future. President Obama and GOP vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan each addressed the AARP. As NPR's Ina Jaffe reports, they took questions on topics ranging from Medicare to Social Security, and back to Medicare. INA JAFFE, BYLINE: There's a simple reason why both men wanted to talk to this crowd: more than half of the electorate is 50 years old or more, and older voters are more likely to vote. (APPLAUSE) PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: Thank you, AARP. (APPLAUSE) JAFFE: The president joined the crowd via satellite from northern Virginia, where he would later hold a rally. It didn't take him long to take a shot at Mitt Romney's criticism of the 47 percent who pay no income taxes. Many of those are seniors on Social Security and Mr. Obama let the AARP members know he saw them differently. OBAMA: Medicare and Social Security are not handouts. You've paid into these programs your whole lives. (APPLAUSE) OBAMA: You've earned them. And as president, it's my job to make sure that Medicare and Social Security remain strong for today's seniors and for future generations. JAFFE: The AARP is nonpartisan, but the organization does support the president's Affordable Care Act, often called ObamaCare. And the audience cheered and stood and applauded frequently even though Mr. Obama couldn't see or hear them. The president warned them that contrary to what they'd hear in a little while from Congressman Ryan, the Affordable Care Act has strengthened Medicare. And the president said they shouldn't believe Ryan when he says that ObamaCare robs $716 billion from Medicare. OBAMA: That is simply not true. What we did was... (APPLAUSE) OBAMA: ...we went after waste and fraud and overcharging by insurance companies, for example. JAFFE: Paul Ryan had to take the stage after President Obama had told everyone what a disaster Ryan's plans for Medicare would be. But it's really the other way around, said Ryan. (APPLAUSE) REPRESENTATIVE PAUL RYAN: The first step to a stronger Medicare is to repeal ObamaCare... (SOUNDBITE OF BOOING) RYAN: ...because it represents the worst of both worlds. (SOUNDBITE OF BOOING) RYAN: I had a feeling there would be mixed reactions, so let me get into it. (SOUNDBITE OF BOOING) JAFFE: In this closely divided crowd, Ryan was heckled and booed as much as he was applauded. He argued that ObamaCare would use Medicare as a, quote, "piggy bank," cutting $716 billion from the program. He didn't mention that his own plan would also rely on the same $716 billion in reduced costs. One thing that his plan would not do, he said, is put crucial decisions about Medicare in the hands of an advisory panel, as he argued ObamaCare would. RYAN: We propose putting 50 million seniors, not 15 unaccountable bureaucrats, in charge of their own health care decisions. (APPLAUSE) JAFFE: He denied that amounted to a voucher program, as the president has charged. RYAN: That's a poll-tested word basically designed to scare today's seniors. JAFFE: Ryan also spoke briefly of his plans to save Social Security by, among other things, gradually raising the retirement age. He said that his and Mitt Romney's plans for Medicare and Social Security include bipartisan proposals that have been around for years, and that their administration would reach across the aisle. President Obama also said he wanted to work with Republicans to strengthen Social Security and Medicare. And he, once again, gave credit to Mitt Romney for pioneering the Massachusetts health care law that inspired the president's own. Ina Jaffe, NPR News, New Orleans. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright National Public Radio.

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Senator Will Not Seek Re-Election Posted on 08/07/2009 by Shawn J. Soper BERLIN – After representing Worcester County and the lower shore for 19 years, State Senator J. Lowell Stoltzfus (R-38B) yesterday announced he would not seek re-election to his District 38B seat in the upcoming election in 2010. Stoltzfus was set to make the formal announcement last night at a press conference and dinner at The Fountains in Salisbury. Prior to that formal announcement, however, he shared his future intentions with The Dispatch in an interview yesterday. “This will be my last term,” he said. “I will complete my current term, which runs for about another year and a half, but I will not seek re-election.” Citing family concerns and health issues with his wife, Stoltzfus, who has represented Ocean City, Worcester County and entire lower shore in the Senate since 1992, said the time was right to announce he was not seek re-election the next time around. “After 19 years, I’m ready to step aside,” he said. “It’s been a great 19 years, a whole lot of good, but sometimes difficult, which is how it should be. It’s been a very rewarding experience and I am a better person for having done it.” For several months, really since the last General Assembly session, there has been considerable speculation about the senator’s long-range intentions as another election cycle nears. A handful of potential candidates have hinted at making a run for the District 38B Senate seat in 2010, although most are basing their plans on the popular senator’s future plans. “There’s been a lot of speculation about what I intend to do,” he said. “There are a bunch of people out there planning on running for office in the next election, and it’s only fair at this time to make known my intentions so that they can make preparations for their own campaigns. I respect that, which is why I’m announcing this now.” Stoltzfus said his announcement does not signal an intention to seek a different, maybe higher office. There had been speculation he might make a run at a seat in Congress or the U.S. Senate, but Stoltzfus dismissed those notions yesterday. “This is it for me,” he said. “I have some family considerations to consider. My wife has some health issues we’ve been dealing with, so it’s a good time to finish out my term and then walk away.” Of course, yesterday’s announcement does not close the book on Stoltzfus’ career in the State Senate. Next January’s General Assembly session promises to be one of the most contentious in recent memory with massive budget cuts on the table in the wake of the ongoing recession. Stoltzfus said yesterday his lame-duck status will not dissuade him from the work yet to be done, and that means continuing to go to bat for the citizens of District 38B. “My motivation has never come from re-election, but rather from my constituent work,” he said. “I will continue to enjoy the work I do on behalf of the constituents. It’s the most gratifying thing I can do as a senator. My wife would tell you there are many days when I come home and I tell her I feel really good. I really helped somebody today.” Over the years, Stoltzfus has been a staunch advocate for the agriculture industry and he often found himself in the middle of fights over farming, conservation, development and the environment. Yesterday, he called his work on farming issues some of the most rewarding of his career. “One of the things I’m most proud of during my career is the work I’ve done over the years to protect the agriculture industry,” he said. “Because of the rural nature of our district, I’ve been at the fore on a large number of agriculture issues over the years and I’m proud of the work I’ve done there.” Stoltzfus said he also proud of his leadership role in the battle to redraw legislative districts in Maryland that came to the fore several years ago. “The redistricting fight is something I’m also very proud of,” he said. “It really changed the political landscape across the state, particularly in Baltimore City, and that wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t challenged some of those things.” From 2001 to 2006, Stoltzfus was the Senate Minority Leader, often tangling on key issues with Democratic heavyweights, such as Senate President Mike Miller and Speaker of the House Michael Busch, battles he recalled fondly yesterday. “I’m extremely proud of my leadership role in the Senate,” he said. “You’re elected to those positions by your peers, which makes it very special and also very important.” This spring, the State Senate honored Stoltzfus with the First Citizen Award. “I’m extremely proud of that honor,” he said. “It’s awarded each year by the Senate. Often it goes to a legislator, but sometimes over the years it has gone to a private citizen. It’s really a recognition of what you’ve accomplished, a lifetime achievement award of sorts.” While he has much work yet to do in the Senate, Stoltzfus said he is looking forward to his private life. “I’ll continue running my nursery business,” he said. “There are a lot of things I enjoy that I’ll have more time for now. I love fishing and I like fishing in tournaments, so I’ll get a chance to do more of that. I was supposed to fish in the White Marlin Open this year, but that didn’t work out. We plan on doing a lot of traveling, hopefully to warm, sunny places. There are a lot of opportunities out there and I plan to take advantage of them.” This article was written by Shawn J. Soper, . Bookmark the permalink.Posted inTop Stories Leave a Reply Cancel reply

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Search Program TextShowing 1 - 20 of 185,037 Future of Conservatism Panelists talked about how conservative principles could be applied to contemporary issues, as well as potential challenges facing Republican presidential candidates in 2016, including how… Book Discussion on The Case Against the Supreme Court Erwin Chemerinsky talked about his book The Case Against the Supreme Court, in which he argues that while Supreme Court justices have a reputation for being objective, evidence shows that… Henry Ford's Publications on Jews Professor Jonathan Sarna talked about how industrialist Henry Ford founded and supported a newspaper that published anti-semitic articles. This class was from his course called… Inside the Supreme Court Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan talked about her career, her approach to law, and her experiences serving on the Supreme Court. She spoke about diversity and collegiality in the high… Book Discussion on Outpost Christopher Hill talked about his book, Outpost: Life on the Frontlines of American Diplomacy, about his career as a diplomat. He appeared on Colorado Public Radio’s… Communicators with Amy Mitchell Amy Mitchell talked about political polarization and its relationship with media-viewing habits. She discussed a recent study from the Pew Research Center that showed committed… Weekly Republican Address Senator-Elect James Lankford of Oklahoma delivered the weekly Republican address. He talked about the spirit of love and peace at Christmas and about supporting the men and women… Weekly Presidential Address President and Mrs. Obama delivered the weekly presidential address. They thanked the troops for their service. Presidential Campaign of 1864 Panelists talked about factors that had an impact on President Lincoln’s re-election campaign in 1864. They spoke about President Lincoln’s expansion of presidential war powers… Panel Discussion on Corruption Zephyr Teachout, author of Corruption in America: From Benjamin Franklin’s Snuff Box to Citizens United, and Janine Wedel, author of Unaccountable: How Elite Power Brokers Corrupt our… Interview with Jonathan Yardley Jonathan Yardley spoke about his life and career. A former book critic for the Washington Post, Mr. Yardley retired after a 33-year tenure and having written approximately 3,000… Telephone lines were open for viewers to comment on the question “Should civics education be mandatory?” The question was inspired by an article in the Wall Street Journal that… Collegiate Sports Programs Steve Berkowitz talked about issues affecting colleges with major sports programs, including reforms suggested by college and governmental policymakers. Topics included the movement to… Federal Tax Preparation Advice Kevin McCormally talked about year-end strategies taxpayers could employ in preparing for filing their 2014 tax returns, as well as new tax provisions in effect for 2015. Headlines from the day’s newspapers were read and telephone lines were open for viewer comments on the minimum wage increases in 20 states and the District of Columbia slated for 2015. Biodiversity and Consumerism Panelists talked about biodiversity, rainforests, islands, and climate change. Topics included reducing islands' dependence on fossil fuels, protecting tropical rainforests to combat… Food and Climate Change Speakers talked about food policy, sustainability, and climate change. Christiana Wyly talked about water and land resources used for livestock and argued that climate change can be… Fresh Water and Climate Change Panelists talked about the future of fresh water and clean water policy. American Rivers President Bob Irvin said there wass a fresh water crisis in the U.S. and around the world. br/… Climate Science A group of scientists talked about climate change. The discussed the increasing number of Category 4 hurricanes, storm surges such as the one New York City faced during Hurricane… Renewable Energy and Climate Change Lester Brown and Mike Phillips talked about renewable energy and climate change. Lester Brown spoke about a worldwide shift to solar and wind power, and Mike Phillips talked about…

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McCain's June 20, 2007, address on Latin AmericaNext Article in Politics » MIAMI, Florida (CNN) -- "It is pretty difficult for a politician to resist an invitation to speak before a room full of broadcasters - especially during an election campaign. But I am not here to talk about politics but about our neighbors which have been too neglected for too long. We are all of the New World, united by a common history and a common quest for justice and freedom that began with our struggle for independence. Don't Miss Election Center 2008 "Four and a half decades ago, John Kennedy described the people of Latin America as our 'firm and ancient friends, united by history and experience and by our determination to advance the values of American civilization.' Never was this truer than today. With globalization, our hemisphere has grown closer, more integrated, and more interdependent. Latin America today is increasingly vital to the fortunes of the United States. Americans north and south share a common geography and a common destiny. I would like to share with you today my vision about where our hemisphere is headed, and how, as President, I would lead our region. "The countries of Latin America are the natural partners of the United States, and yet it hardly feels that way today. Anti-Americanism is on the rise in much of the region. The attention of U.S. leaders and the media have shifted toward Iraq, Afghanistan, the broader Middle East and the war on terror. As we have devoted attention and energies to other regions, other, dangerous forces have moved into the breach. Hugo Chavez has used the cloak of electoral legitimacy to establish a one party dictatorship in Venezuela, breathed new oxygen into the decaying Castro regime in Cuba, allied with Iran and other American enemies, and supported populist, anti-American forces throughout the hemisphere. While the United States has been pre-occupied elsewhere, China has launched a diplomatic and economic offensive in the region, with uncertain intentions and outcomes. And there is a growing rejection among some Latin Amer icans of the free-market democracy that has been so painfully achieved. "We can and we must do better. I have seen the difficult journey this region has made since the 1970s and 80s, a time of war and dictatorship, of hyperinflation and economic stagnation. The Latin America I know is a hopeful place, which prizes its hard won freedom, seizes new economic opportunities and remains a firm partner of the United States. If I am elected president, the United States will forge a new policy toward Latin America and the Caribbean Basin founded on peace and security, shared prosperity, democracy and freedom, and mutual respect. "There are several areas of concern. The undergoverned tri-border region of Brazil, Argentina, and Paraguay is a haven for smugglers and radical groups. Iran has launched terrorist attacks in Argentina. Hamas, Hezbollah and similar groups are active in the region. Several states in the Caribbean and elsewhere are small, weak, and vulnerable to narcotics trafficking, money laundering, and even terrorist activity. Trinidad is home to a radical Islamic group that has been implicated in the recent plot to attack New York's JFK Airport, and several individuals involved in that plot are from Guyana. "Our security priority in this hemisphere is to ensure that terrorists, their enablers and their business partners, including narcotraffickers, have nowhere to hide. One element of this effort requires a new approach to the region's ungoverned areas. We must help governments establish sovereignty over the land, sea, and air, through broader partnerships with willing countries. This means defense assistance, but also measures designed to accelerate broad economic growth, build the rule of law, and extend the scope of government authority to lawless areas. "Another element of this approach must include bolstering the new democracies of the hemisphere. Polls increasingly show that populations are losing faith with democracy, and blame it for failing to provide security from crime and corruption or a way out of poverty. We should help consolidate democratic gains by helping Latin American countries build the capacity of the state, train political parties, bolster the electoral process, and press for more transparency and accountability. "There is also great potential for a closer partnership with many Latin American countries at a regional and even a global level. Mexico, Brazil, Chile, and others represent truly international partners of the United States, countries committed to values we hold dear, including an embrace of human rights, the expansion of freedom, economic development, and an orderly and rules-based international engagement. "There has been much talk of a leftward tilt in Latin America, but there are two 'lefts' - there are those center-left governments with whom we can work closely and cooperatively, and there are the few populist, statist governments who oppose much of what the United States and its democratic partners stand for. We should be careful not to overreact to the former, and we must ensure that the latter are marginalized. "Hugo Chavez is driving Venezuela toward disaster and trying to take others along with him. Since his election, he has overseen the dismantling of Venezuelan democracy. After undermining the parliament and the independence of the courts, he is now targeting the media, free labor unions, and private enterprise. Chavez closed Radio Caracas Television after some 53 years on the air, and is even going after small cable networks. He is calling for the creation of a common defense pact between Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua and Bolivia, to oppose the United States. In his spare moments, he has found the time to meet with the Holocaust-denying President of Iran. "We have seen this story before. Hugo Chavez, like Fidel Castro before him, embraces authoritarianism and aggression and statist economic policies - a time-worn recipe for disaster. Only today's high oil prices keep him from swiftly joining previously discredited leftist dictators on the ash heap of history. Too many dictatorships are enriched by our reliance on foreign oil. That is why it is a matter of U.S. national security to reduce our reliance on imported oil. "Nor can we forget the people of Cuba. It is in the United States' national interest that the Cuban people live in freedom. A hostile state, a sponsor of terror, a regime that harbors fugitives from U.S. justice and shoots down unarmed American civilian aircraft is a national security threat. As President, I will not passively await the long-overdue demise of the Castro dictatorship. My administration will press the Cuban regime to release all political prisoners unconditionally, to legalize all political parties, labor unions and free media and to schedule internationally monitored elections. And, the embargo will stay in place until those terms are met. I would provide more material assistance and moral support to the courageous human rights activists who bravely defy the regime every day, and increase Radio and TV Marti and other means to communicate directly with the Cuban people. My Justice Department wo uld vigorously prosecute Cuban officials implicated in the murder of Americans, drug trafficking and other crimes. "Cuba's transition to democracy is inevitable, and we need to begin planning now for that day. While our Cuba policy does not always accord with that of our hemispheric and European partners, we should begin an active dialogue with them to develop a plan for post-Castro Cuba, a plan that will spark rapid change and a new awakening in that country. The Cuban people have waited long enough. "We can do this by standing not just against the negative designs of despots, but for a positive vision, for a better future of promise and prosperity and equality that is not American alone, but that constitutes a future shared by all of the hemispheric partners. "We trade as much with Latin America and the Caribbean as we do with the European Union, and yet there is enormous untapped potential. Brazil and Mexico are together as populous as the United States, while Brazil alone is comparable in geographic size. Many governments in the region have abandoned the excessive spending and statist economic controls that fueled economic crises for decades. Inflation is down, growth is up, and the hemisphere has been free of an emerging market financial crisis for the past five years. "We need to build on the passage of the Central America Free Trade Agreement by expanding U.S. trade with the region. Let's start by ratifying the trade agreements with Panama, Peru, and Colombia that are already completed, and pushing forward the Free Trade Area of the Americas. Too many Democrats have embraced economic isolationism, paying off special interests by opposing trade agreements with our democratic neighbors. They could not be more wrong. My administration would reduce barriers to trade and press for renewed Trade Promotion Authority. "Opening new and integrated world markets does not automatically translate into a higher quality life for everyone. Latin America's income inequality poses a threat to stability and free market democracy. As we pursue liberalized trade, we must work with Latin American governments to open up real opportunities for the millions of citizens in this hemisphere trapped in the underground informal economy, without access to credit, with no titles to their property, and no ability to harness their energies and work ethic in an entrepreneurial economy. The power of global capital markets dwarfs the importance of foreign assistance in financing economic expansion. Capital markets do not, however, automatically seek out those who have been left behind - and my administration would work to ensure that those marginalized have an opportunity for a better life. "Trade offers opportunity; aid can help ensure that those opportunities are available to all. The United States should launch a major program designed not to increase handouts but rather to build capacity, improve education, cut red tape, and reduce the corruption that is the foremost impediment to economic growth. We should target assistance and micro-lending to the economically isolated and often indigenous populations among our free trade partners. We need to help governments do these things not only because extreme inequality threatens the future of market democracy, but also because helping Latin America expand growth and opportunity at home is an important element in curbing illegal immigration and expanding American markets. "Mexico must be a vital partner in stopping illegal immigration. President Calderon has shown strong leadership in confronting drug crime throughout his country. By extraditing drug kingpins to the United States, deploying Mexican troops to enforce order in cartel-dominated areas, and by taking on the narcotics trade so directly, he has embarked on a courageous and vital course. The Mexican government must win this war. Should the gangs and cartels prove victorious, our security will be weakened and more drugs will flow into the United States. Mexico needs more help from the United States in this effort, and in a McCain Adminstration, that help will come. "We need a strong ally and partner in Mexico, and forging this relationship would be a top priority in my administration. I would hope to return U.S.-Mexico relations to the bright days at the beginning of the Bush administration, when the relationship between our President and President Fox held untold promise. "There is great potential for progress in relations with other key countries as well. The U.S. recently agreed to work with Brazil in an effort to expand sugar production toward ethanol use. This is a good start, but we can go much further toward establishing close ties with South America's biggest economy, a country that is a leader in the region and beyond. Brazil's leadership in the U.N peacekeeping force in the troubled nation of Haiti is a model of how to foster regional security and cooperation. "Colombia continues to face enormous challenges, and we have seen some real successes in fighting narco-terror and establishing its authority. Unfortunately, these successes are endangered by Democrats who oppose providing military aid to a democracy under siege and want to turn their back on the free trade agreement negotiated with our strongest ally in Latin America. I intend to fight for Plan Colombia and for a free trade pact with Colombia. You don't build strong alliances by turning your back on friends. Colombia is a country too big and too important to fail, and we need to ensure success. "In Chile and Peru, the potential to expand ties offers much hope as well. And we should encourage Argentina to choose a course of cooperation based on mutual respect. In Central America, what was once a war-torn region is now a vibrant, democratic success story. Who could have imagined in the 1980s that one day El Salvador, Nicaragua and Honduras would send military forces to serve with Americans in Iraq? "For decades, in Republican and Democratic administrations alike, the United States has treated Latin America as a junior partner rather than as a neighbor, like a little brother rather than as an equal. Latin America is not our backyard; Central and South America are not 'beneath' the United States. As a resident of a state that borders Mexico, I am acutely aware of the extraordinary contributions that our neighbors make to the United States - from trade to culture to a commitment to democracy and human rights. We share with our Latin American neighbors a deep regard for faith, family, and hard work. We share a civilization and a hemisphere. And we should work - together - to create in the Americas a new model of relations between the developed and the developing world. "If elected I will work to create a new global League of Democracies that would give Brazil, Colombia, Mexico, Chile, Peru and other great nations in the region a voice in confronting common problems based a shared values - a voice that they are denied in the United Nations Security Council. "I will also revitalize our public diplomacy in Latin America - and the world. In 1998, the Clinton Administration and Congress agreed to abolish the United State Information Agency and place its public diplomacy functions into the Department of State. This was a mistake. Dismantling an agency dedicated to promoting America and the American message amounted to unilateral disarmament in the struggle of ideas. Communicating our government's views on day to day issues is what the State Department does. But communicating the idea of America, our purpose, our past and our future is a different task. We need to re-create an independent agency with the sole purpose of getting America's message to the world. This would aid our efforts in the global struggle against Islamic extremism. It would aid our efforts to communicate accurately with the people of Latin America when some try to propagandize them. Our values of liberty, equality and opportunity are universal. We know our country has been the greatest force for good the world has ever known. Our story is a story of hope, optimism, freedom and compassion. It is a story that must be told effectively and professionally - something this audience knows very well. "Let me speak from the heart: To the people of Cuba, who have been robbed of their freedom and their dreams: My administration will support the future, freely elected government of YOUR choice. Commissars and jailers will not dictate your future. "To the people of Venezuela: We will always respect your democratic choices - but we stand against those who seek to corrupt and hijack your democracy. "To the people of our southern neighbor, Mexico: Our differences are real, but small compared to our common bonds and mutual interests. We will support your president's campaign to advance the rule of law - and the dreams of freedom, opportunity and justice for which your ancestors have struggled for five hundred years. "To all of the people and governments of our shared hemisphere: No portion of this earth is more important to the United States. My administration will work relentlessly to build a future with liberty and justice for ALL. "To the druglords and demagogues: You will lose. "Relations with our southern neighbors must be governed by mutual respect, not dominated by an imperial impulse, nor by anti-American demagoguery on the other. The promise of North, Central, and South American life is too great for that. I believe the Americas can and must be the model for a new 21st century relationship between North and South. Ours can be the first completely democratic hemisphere, where trade is free across all borders, where security and opportunity are defended and advanced for all, where the rule of law and the magic of the marketplace allow all peoples, north and south, to reach their God-given potential. That will be my vision as your President. Together, we can realize it. Thank you." E-mail to a friend From the Blogs: Controversy, commentary, and debate

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China to raise defense budget by 11% updated 9:07 PM EST, Sun March 4, 2012 Chinese paramilitary police undergo a drill to prepare for the upcoming National People's Congress in Beijing. The planned increase would lift spending to some 670 billion yuan ($106.4 billion) It follows similar rises in defense spending in years past The move is sure to stoke concerns among some of China's neighbors Beijing (CNN) -- China said Sunday it plans to increase its defense budget by 11.2%, following similar increases in years past and coming on the heels of a renewed U.S. push in the region. The planned increase would lift spending to some 670 billion yuan ($106.4 billion) in 2012, which is almost 68 billion more than 2011 spending, said Li Zhaoxing, spokesman for the National People's Congress. By comparison, the proposed U.S. defense budget for the 2013 fiscal year is $613.9 billion, including $525.4 billion in base spending. That budget cuts half a trillion dollars in spending increases over the next 10 years. Li spoke a day before the annual session of the Chinese legislature is scheduled to start in Beijing. "The Chinese government follows the principle of coordinating defense development with economic development. It sets the country's defense spending according to the requirement of national defense and the level of economic development," he said. Last year, China announced it would increase its defense budget by close to 13%. It reported a 7.5% increase the year before. China boosts military spending What in the world Li stressed that China's defense spending will go primary toward living expenses, training, maintenance and equipment, China's state news agency Xinhua reported. Given the country's population, long coastline and large territory, the outlays are low, he said. "The limited military strength of China is solely for safeguarding its national sovereignty and territorial integrity, and will not pose a threat to any country," the news agency reported Li as saying. Still, China's announcement is sure to stoke concerns among some its neighbors. China regards Taiwan as part of its territory and has vowed to use force against the island if it ever formally sought independence. China also has claimed a significant portion of the South China Sea as its own territorial waters, putting it in conflict with other nations that have made claims on portions of the region. The move is similarly sure to raise eyebrows in Washington, where President Barack Obama is pursuing a more aggressive approach in the region. During last year's Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit, the president stressed the importance of the Pacific to global economic security. And this year, Obama and top defense officials unveiled a new U.S. defense strategy that focuses heavily on the Asia-Pacific region, a fast-growing economic powerhouse with numerous potential flashpoints that the administration has identified as crucial to U.S. interests. The strategy calls for the United States to increase its military's "institutional weight and focus on enhanced presence, power projection, and deterrence in Asia-Pacific," said Defense Secretary Leon Panetta. Xinhua, while welcoming a peaceful U.S. role in the region, cautioned in a commentary then against the United States acting like a "bull in a china shop." CNN's Steven Jiang contributed to this report.

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Afghanistan says U.S. special forces may be behind torture, murder updated 5:25 AM EST, Mon February 25, 2013 U.S. toops patrol in Wardak province of Afghanistan in 2010. NEW: "Such actions have caused local public resentment and hatred," Karzai's office says An armed group is torturing and killing innocent people, Afghanistan's government says The group is "named as" U.S. special forces, according to the Afghan president's office The U.S. military says it is investigating (CNN) -- The Afghan government says armed individuals who may be U.S. special forces carried out acts of torture and murder, allegations that spurred it to demand that members of the elite American military units leave a key province west of Kabul. The U.S. military says it is investigating. NATO's International Security Assistance Force must stop all special force operations out of Wardak province, an area west of the Afghan capital where the alleged horrors took place, Afghanistan's National Security Council demanded. And all U.S. special forces must be gone from the province within two weeks. At a meeting of the council, led by President Hamid Karzai, "it became clear that armed individuals named as U.S. special force stationed in Wardak province engage in harassing, annoying, torturing and even murdering innocent people," Karzai's office said in a statement. It did not indicate who "named" the group a U.S. special force. Nine people "disappeared in an operation by this suspicious force," according to the president's office. And in another incident, a student was taken from his home at night, and his "tortured body with throat cut was found two days later under a bridge." Who is calling the shots in Afghanistan? Obama: Troops will be home by end of '14 Afghanistan's war history "Such actions have caused local public resentment and hatred," Karzai's office said. It added that the United States rejects any suggestion that its special forces carried out any such operation. Afghan forces must protect people in the province "by effectively stopping and bringing to justice any groups that enter peoples' homes in the name of special force and who engage in annoying, harassing and murdering innocent people," the statement said. "We take all allegations of misconduct seriously and go to great lengths to determine the facts surrounding them," U.S. Forces-Afghanistan and the International Security Assistance Force said in a statement. Until military officials speak with Afghan officials about the issue, "we are not in a position to comment further," the statement added. "This is an important issue that we intend to fully discuss with our Afghan counterparts." Last April, the United States and Afghanistan signed a deal giving Afghan authorities an effective veto over controversial special forces missions. The agreement prevents ISAF from conducting such operations without the explicit permission of Afghan officials, said a senior NATO official. And special operations forces will operate under Afghan law, said a statement from Karzai's office. The complex system fully"Afghanized" such operations, putting Afghan commandos in the lead and giving American special forces a "training and support role," a senior Afghan official said. Under the deal, U.S. special forces would be on the ground but would not enter the home of an Afghan unless specifically asked to do so by the Afghan commandos leading the operation, or by other Afghan officials, according to a senior NATO official. This pact followed months of recriminations against special operations raids, particularly at night, that have deeply offended some Afghans angry about foreigners entering their homes. U.S. officials have said such raids are vital to NATO's operation against insurgents. CNN's Greg Botelho, Barbara Starr and Nick Paton Walsh contributed to this report.

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Obama vows to flex presidential muscle Julie Pace/The Associated Press Photographer: The Associated Press President Barack Obama gives his State of the Union address on Capitol Hill in Washington on Tuesday as Vice President Joe Biden and House Speaker John Boehner listen. WASHINGTON — Seeking to energize his sluggish second term, President Barack Obama vowed Tuesday night in his State of the Union address to sidestep Congress "whenever and wherever" necessary to narrow economic disparities between rich and poor. He unveiled an array of modest executive actions that included increasing the minimum wage for some federal contract workers and making it easier for millions of low-income Americans to save for retirement. "America does not stand still and neither do I," Obama declared in his annual prime-time address before a joint session of Congress and millions of Americans watching on television. Draped in presidential grandeur, Obama's address served as the opening salvo in a midterm election fight for control of Congress that will quickly consume Washington's attention. Democrats, seeking to cast Republicans as uncaring about the middle class, have urged Obama to focus on economic mobility and the gap between the wealthy and poor. His focus on executive actions was greeted with shouts of "Do it!" from many members of his party. For Obama, the address was also aimed at convincing an increasingly skeptical public that he still wields power in Washington even if he can't crack through the divisions in Congress. Burned by a series of legislative failures in 2013, White House aides say they're now redefining success not by what Obama can jam through Congress but by what actions he can take on his own. Indeed, Obama's proposals for action by lawmakers were slim and largely focused on old ideas that have gained little traction over the past year. He pressed Congress to revive a stalled immigration overhaul, pass an across-the-board increase in the federal minimum wage and expand access to early childhood education — all ideas that gained little traction after he proposed them last year. The president's one new legislation proposal calls for expanding an income tax credit for workers without children. Republicans, who saw their own approval ratings fall further in 2013, have also picked up the refrain of income inequality in recent months, though they have cast the widening gap between rich and poor as a symptom of Obama's economic policies. "Republicans have plans to close the gap, plans that focus on jobs first without more spending, government bailouts and red tape," said Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., in the Republicans' televised response to the president's speech. The economy and other domestic issues, including health care, dominated the president's address. He touched only briefly on foreign policy, touting the drawdown of American troops from Afghanistan this year and reiterating his threat to veto any new sanctions Congress might levy on Iran while nuclear negotiations with the Islamic republic are underway. Even as Washington increasingly focuses on income inequality, many parts of the economy are gaining strength, with corporate profits soaring and the financial markets hitting record highs. But with millions of Americans still out of work or struggling with stagnant wages, Obama has found himself in the sometimes awkward position of promoting a recovery that feels distant for many. "The cold, hard fact is that even in the midst of recovery, too many Americans are working more than ever just to get by, let alone get ahead," Obama said. "And too many still aren't working at all." The president's speech drew an eclectic mix of visitors to the House chamber. Among those sitting with first lady Michelle Obama were two survivors of the Boston Marathon bombing, as well as Jason Collins, an openly gay former NBA player. Republican House Speaker John Boehner brought business owners from his home state of Ohio who say Obama's health care overhaul is hurting their companies. Willie Robertson, a star of the television show "Duck Dynasty," also scored a seat in the House gallery, courtesy of the Republicans. Though Obama sought to emphasize his presidential powers, there are stark limits to what he can do on his own. For example, he unilaterally can raise the minimum hourly wage for new federal contractors from $7.25 to $10.10, as he announced, but he'll need Congress in order to extend that increase to all of America's workers. The executive order for contractors, which Obama will sign in the coming weeks, is limited in its scope. It will not affect existing federal contracts, only new ones, and then only if other terms of an agreement change. Republicans quickly panned the executive initiative as ineffective. Said Boehner: "The question is how many people, Mr. President, will this executive action actually help? I suspect the answer is somewhere close to zero." White House officials countered by saying many more working people would benefit if Congress would go along with Obama's plan to raise the minimum wage across the board. "Give America a raise," Obama declared. Among the president's other executive initiatives is a plan to help workers whose employers don't offer retirement savings plans. The program would allow first-time savers to start building up savings in Treasury bonds that eventually could be converted into traditional IRAs. Obama is expected to promote the "starter" accounts during a trip to Pittsburgh on Wednesday. The president also announced new commitments from companies to consider hiring the long-term unemployed, the creation of four "manufacturing hubs" where universities and businesses would work together to develop and train workers, new incentives to encourage truckers to switch from dirtier fuels to natural gas or other alternatives and a proposed tax credit to promote the adoption of cars that can run on cleaner fuels, such as hydrogen, natural gas or biofuels. The president's go-it-alone strategy is in many ways an acknowledgment that he has failed to make good on two major promises to the American people: that he would change Washington's hyper-partisanship and that his re-election would break the Republican "fever" and clear the way for congressional action on major initiatives. Some Republicans have warned that the president's focus on executive orders could backfire by angering GOP leaders who already don't trust the White House. Obama isn't abandoning Congress completely. He made a renewed pitch for legislation to overhaul the nation's fractured immigration laws, perhaps his best opportunity for signing significant legislation this year. But the odds remain long, with many Republicans staunchly opposed to Obama's plan for creating a pathway to citizenship for the 11 million people already in the U.S. illegally. Seeking to give the GOP some room to maneuver, Obama did not specifically call for a citizenship pathway Tuesday, saying only, "Let's get it done. It's time." Opening a new front with Congress, the president called for an extension of the earned-income tax credit, which helps boost the wages of low-income families through tax refunds. Obama wants it broadened so that it provides more help than it does now to workers without children, a view embraced by some Republicans and conservative economists. Obama singled out Republican Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, who has proposed replacing the tax credit with a federal wage supplement for workers in certain low-paying jobs. Unlike Obama, however, Republicans have suggested expanding the tax credit as an alternative to increasing the minimum wage. $VAR2 = '/mailfriend/72/78255/a28e7bd31c/'; $VAR4 = 'Obama vows to flex presidential muscle';

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China Tries to Silence American Advocacy Site With Attacks, FBI Fires Back 54 comment(s) - last by Skywalker123.. on May 8 at 12:45 PM Chinese artist Ai Weiwei has been imprisoned since the start of April after he called the Chinese government out on internal corrruption. (Source: Extravaganzi) Angry protestors have filled China's streets. (Source: Kin Cheung / Associated Press) China has focused cyberattacks on Change.org trying to silence the American site's free speech in protest of Ai Weiwei's detainment. (Source: Chinese Defense Mashup) It remains to be seen whether President Obama and Congress will do what it takes to protect U.S. free speech in the face of unprecedented, unbridled foreign cyber-aggression from China. (Source: REUTERS/Jim Young) (Source: Asia News) Pressure is on President Obama and Congress to protect American free speech against unbridled Chinese cyber-agression In the definitive cyberpunk novel Neuromancer, published in 1984, author William Gibson prophetically envisioned that wars of the future would be fought over the internet -- a new construct at the time. Today that prediction appears on the verge of coming true as we stand on the threshold of a vast digital battle. Agents in China, believed to be working for, or endorsed by the Chinese federal government are carrying out a secret cyberwar against the U.S. government and U.S. businesses. And that war appears to be escalating.I. An Imprisoned ArtistChange.org, a progressive, for-profit advocacy group, recently launched a campaign to free imprisoned Chinese artist and activist Ai Weiwei. The site now has found itself the subject of a dedicated internet attack by the legion Chinese hackers.So who is Ai Weiwei and how did this mess get started?Weiwei, 53, rose to prominence in China's artistic community in the 1970s and 1980s as a founding member of the art collective "Stars" (not to be confused with the similarly named Canadian indie rock band). Ironically the Chinese government initially embraced the provocative multi-dimensional artist, even contracting Weiwei to help design Beijing National Stadium, which housed part of the 2008 Summer Olympics.But Weiwei's probing into the corruption of the Chinese government and his provocative work made him many enemies in the communist nation's bureaucratic ranks. And on April 3 Weiwei was arrested and imprisoned, in part for his alleged support of the Jasmine protests -- a series of pro-democracy protests sweeping across China earlier this year.Change.org took up the issue of Weiwei's imprisonment and called upon the Chinese government to release the iconic art figure, who today is internationally recognized as one of the world's top artists.The petition currently has over 130,000 signatures making it the group's second highest profile petition. The petition also is drawing a great deal of attention in the media [1][2][3].II. China AttacksThe advocacy group didn't get a kind response from China. Soon after the campaign began, distributed denial of service attacks began on the site. Describes Brian Purchia, Communications Director for Change.org, "Change.org has been under a cyber attack for about 2 weeks after a campaign to free Ai Weiwei went viral."We interviewed Mr. Purchia on the nature of these attacks. He describes:The original attack was a DoS Attack from two IP addresses in China. It started Monday, 4/18. It is still ongoing, but is now a bot.net attack. We are working with an online security services provider to keep our site up and protect our organization.The downtime associated with the cyber-attack on Change.org has cost our company tens of thousands of dollars in revenue, and we've had to spend tens of thousands of dollars more to ensure the site doesn't suffer from the ongoing attacks.The group, which has seen its fair share of controversy and challenges in the past is working with an experience online services provider and thus far has been able to maintain partial service to its website, even in the midst of the heavy attack. However, the costs are threatening the organization, so it's calling on the government to intervene and defend U.S. interests.III. FBI Fires BackThe government appears responsive to the group's plea for help. The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigations opened a formal investigation into the attacks last Wednesday and has began devoting resources to a response."We were contacted by a special agent from the FBI cyber squad, which has opened an official investigation into the DDoS attack on Change.org initiated on April 18. We are currently working with them to assess the various elements of this attack and mitigate its impact on our platform," Ben Rattray, Change.org founder describes.Andrew J. Laine, spokesman for the U.S. State Department issued a statement last week, commenting, "Secretary Clinton has been a leading voice for Internet freedom around the world, and has elevated the issue to the top tier of American foreign policy. The State Department condemns all cyber attacks designed to stifle free speech on the Internet, including via 'distributed denial of service,' or DDOS."The State Department stand comes after U.S. Representative Rosa L. DeLauro (D-Conn.) wrote a letter to State Department Secretary Hillary Clinton urging her to take a stand against the attacks. The letter received endorsement from U.S. House of Representatives Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).Mr. Rattray praised the State Department's ensuing response, commenting, "This shows how seriously the State Department is taking the attacks on Change.org. We ask Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to condemn the ongoing attacks on the world's leading platform for social change and stand with Ai Weiwei. Americans should be allowed to freely organize online without foreign interference."IV. China Tells U.S. to Censor the MediaChina's government has issued a statement attacking Change.org and, in effect, demanding the nullification of the American media's Constitutionally-guaranteed right to free speech."The issue is under investigation and the outside should not comment on this issue habitually," ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu, "We hope that the outside can respect China's judicial sovereignty and judicial authorities handling the issue in accordance with law."China, in the midst of a massive crackdown on dissents and alleged human rights violations, appears to be looking to flex its cyber-muscle to shut up the noisy American media.In China, reporters who covered the imprisonment of Ai Weiwei have begun to disappear. Critics of the Chinese government fear that these reporters may be residing in Chinese prison -- or worse.V. Pending LegislationChange.org is calling on Congress to pass legislation that would give additional prosecution powers to combat foreign cyber-attackers. Mr. Purchia comments, "In terms of legislation to stop foreign cyber-attacks, Change.org is definitely interested in seeing Congress make cyber security a priority -- we've heard for years about how future wars will be fought online -- that future is now. We need our leaders to stand up for the right to organize online without foreign interference."A recent survey by antivirus software firm McAfee found that the U.S. is among the worst industrialized nations in terms of protecting its companies and advocacies from foreign cyberattacks. Many fear that without further action not only will U.S. media be actively suppressed on issues like Chinese protests and Tibet, but that China may be able to carry out catastrophic attacks on the power grid, water supply, or natural gas lines.President Obama has vowed to get tough on cyber-security, much as he has on terrorism. But it remains to be seen whether the President and members of the U.S. Congress will be willing to put aside their partisan differences and get tough on China, putting America's strength behind rebuffing the Asian giant's direct digital assault on American free speech. Reality check...when Bush threw away the surplus, he threw away America's ability to stand up to China. The world is in the grip of a country prepared to do what it takes to suppress dissent both locally and now globally. Folks we are in serious trouble... (1 Hidden) RE: Wake Up The surplus in Clinton's last years was an illusion created by a spike in tax revenue caused by the tech bubble. While spending did drop, it didn't drop below the average spending (as percent of GDP) for the latter half of the 20th century. If you average out the revenue line between the tech bubble and 2000-2002 recession, there is no surplus.http://reason.com/assets/mc/ngillespie/2010_12/rev...Likewise, Bush's spending wasn't outlandish. Federal spending during his 8 years was about the same as under Clinton's 8 years. What caused the deficits under Bush were the recession following the tech bubble coupled with the economic blow of 9/11, and Bush's ill-thought out tax cuts. Parent Do you even understand the difference between an economic boom and a bubble? The surge in technology from the late 70s through late 1990s was not a bubble, but was caused by a great deal of innovation and advances. What caused the bubble was when a large number of technically incompetent business people decided they wanted to get in on the tech BOOM, and because they had access to venture money, they were able to start businesses. Yes, there was a bubble, caused by these incompetent idiots who thought they could found a technical company with ZERO technical knowledge, but up until 1998 or so, what we had was a true boom that would NOT have collapsed if the business people had stuck with what they knew, and stayed out of the tech industry.Now, when it comes to spending, the Bush era was about not putting the military into the budget, and just sending them to war without having it PROPERLY financed. As a result, you can't say that spending was the same, because George W. spent a LOT more. Having more income during the Clinton era did HELP a lot, but you can't ignore the sudden drop in overall tax revenue that came from the tech CRASH. Parent China Slows High Speed Trains Amid Reports of Shoddy Construction U.S., Britain Doing Little to Protect Power, Gas, Water From Cyberattacks Microsoft IE Flaw Exploited by Hackers to Steal Info From Google Report: Foreign Cyberspies Attack Electrical Grid

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Democratic Senators Block Republican-led Net Neutrality Repeal 94 comment(s) - last by ekv.. on Nov 23 at 4:41 AM Even if the repeal had passed the Senate, President Obama had promised to veto it After months of threats and debating, the Republican leadership in Congress moved forward with plans to block the U.S. Federal Communication Commission (FCC) from rolling out basic net neutrality rules, which prevent landline internet carriers from throttling the user's connection, charging on a per website basis, or engaging in other tactics designed to slow some sites' load times and speed others' up. I. Republicans Push for Net Neutrality Ban As Republicans control the House of Representatives, the key battleground in the repeal effort would be the Senate. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas) sponsored the repeal resolution, S.J. Res. 6. Sen. Hutchinson took a hard stance, arguing that ISPs should be allowed to charge users on a per-site basis and throttle as they wish, without regulation. She comments, "The internet and technology have produced more jobs in this country than just about any other sector. It has been the cradle of innovation, it does not have a problem, and it does not need fixing." Others in her party took a softer approach. Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) wrote a "dear colleague" letter to her fellow Republicans. In it she wrote that she felt that net neutrality regulation was necessary to protect consumer abuse. But she argued the proper place for it was through the Senate, not the FCC. But if "pro-net neutrality" Republicans senators had an alternative plan they failed to propose it in concrete form. And it was unclear when or if a replacement to the current rules would be drafted if repeal was pass -- or for that matter whether a net neutrality bill could past muster in the House and Senate given many Republicans absolute opposition to anything standing in the way of ISPs' efforts to increase profits by cutting back and restructuring regional internet services. The hardline Republicans like Sen. Hutchinson who flatly opposed any regulation argued that regulation would kill jobs. Sen. Hutchinson pointed to industry studies that claimed net neutrality regulation would slow infrastructure deployment, and by proxy reduce jobs. The Republican-controlled House had passed a net neutrality repeal measure in February 2011. President Obama threatened to veto S.J. Res. 6 II. Democrats Warn That Repeal Would Kill Innovation, Free Speech The repeal had Democratic President Barack Obama concerned enough that he threatened to veto the bill [PDF] if it should pass, with his office writing in a release, "If the President is presented with S.J. Res. 6, which would not safeguard the free and open Internet, his senior advisers would recommend that he veto the Resolution." But this dramatic game of political theater end rather mundanely as the Democratic majority in the Senate rallied together in opposition of the resolution. Sen. John "Jay" Rockefeller IV, the great-grandson of famous oil tycoon John D. Rockefeller, led the opposition commenting: There's still 53 of us, and if we stay together we'll win. I think we're going to prevail. Even if they don't, they'll still have the backing of the White House, which has already threatened to veto the resolution, should it survive past the Senate floor. It would be ill-advised to threaten the very foundations of innovation in the Internet economy and the democratic spirit that has made the Internet a force for social progress around the world. III. Wednesday's Fiery Debate Here's some video coverage of Wednesday's debate, which preceded a vote: Democratic Perspective (~3 min) Republican perspective (~17 min, but starts off strong) IV. Democrats Emerge Triumphant Sen. Rockefeller's stand paid off. The final vote was tallied yesterday and showed all 52 Democrats voting opposing the measure, and all 46 Republicans voting in favor of the measure. The bill was thus defeated, clearing the way for the FCC's new net neutrality rules to go into effect next week. Two senators did not vote -- Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Senator Dan Inouye (D-Haw.). It appears that Sen. Inouye was at an event in Washington, D.C. honoring a Japanese veteran of World War II. It was unclear why John McCain -- who had previously led the charge against net neutrality -- did not vote. V. Legal Challenges Remain The rejection of the repeal resolution now leaves the various lawsuits against the rules as the only thing standing in their way. Interestingly, advocacy groups have also opposed the rules claiming they do not go far enough, and unfairly exempt mobile devices from their provisions. Several groups have pursued legal action. The Media Access Project, who had been suing on the grounds of the lax approach to mobile regulation, dropped its legal action after it saw its case assigned to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. Policy Director Andrew Jay Schwartzman explained that his organization feared a hostile atmosphere in that particular court would kill the case. He comments, "The D.C. Circuit Court is a very hostile forum. [It would be a] very close case." That leaves The Free Press, who is suing on similar grounds. Strangely The Free Press's President and CEO Craig Aaron -- leading the suit against the rules -- cheered the Democratic success in block their repeal in the Senate. He comments, "The Senate sent a strong signal today to would-be gatekeepers that the free and open internet needs to stay that way. The American public doesn't want phone and cable companies undercutting competition, deciding which websites will work or censoring what people can do online." Most public advocacy groups lauded the vote, while saying the rules still should be extended farther. Among them is the American Civil Liberties Union. In a post entitled "It Was Close, But We Won: Viva Net Neutrality!" ACLU Washington, D.C. staffer Sandra Fulton writes: Though the FCC’s rules are not great, they do offer some protections for net neutrality on the wired Internet and overturning them would have been a huge setback for free speech on the web. During debate on the Senate floor yesterday supporters of the resolution railed against government regulation while opponents defended the rules saying they were necessary to maintain the openness and innovation that has allowed the Internet to thrive. On the other side of the spectrum, there's also a suit from Verizon Wireless, the joint venture between Verizon Communications Inc. (VZ) and Vodafone Group Plc. (LON:VOD). It's hard to understand why Verizon decided to sue the FCC, given that the Commission's proposal closely mirrors that which a Verizon - Google, Inc. (GOOG) pact proposed in Aug. 2010. The rules offer virtually no regulation on mobile internet service providers -- just as Verizon requested. Verizon's lawsuit will be heard in the Spring or Summer. In the meantime Verizon could request in court that the rules be suspended pending the outcome of the lawsuit. The FCC has already taken a preemptive strike, moving to dismiss Verizon's lawsuit on legal technicalities. The Democratic-majority FCC under the Obama administration has been quite busy. It is currently in the process of finalizing a spectrum auction, an effort carriers laud but some TV broadcaster loathe. It's also assisting the U.S. Department of Justice in its case against AT&T, Inc. (T) who is trying to engulf T-Mobile USA -- a subsidiary of Deutsche Telekom AG (ETR:DTE) -- a move which would grant it a virtual monopoly on 3G GSM technology in the U.S. Sources: Senate, The White House, Engadget, ACLU Comments Threshold -1 RE: that's not democratic Actually democracy is just majority rule. If the majority wants it, it's democracy.If the rich are in a position to count for more and thus get a majority faster, well that's your problem.Probably the reason why the USA has always been a republic. Or atleast, is supposed to be one. Parent electoral systems and democracy By Larry Jay Diamond, Marc F. Plattner:Democracy is generally defined as a form of government in which all adult citizens have an equal say in the decisions that affect their lives.[1] Ideally, this includes equal (and more or less direct) participation in the proposal, development and passage of legislation into lawIt says equal say, not richer can get majority, not some has a say and others don't. it's equal say, that's democracy. it's about equality, fairness. Parent Cerin218 Man, I REALLY wish people that live in this country actually understand the country and what it was founded as and WHY.Do some reading people, educate yourselves.http://www.lexrex.com/enlightened/AmericanIdeal/as... Parent alphadogg Or, try http://thisnation.com/question/011.html also, for a more balanced, less blinders-and-worship article. Parent FCC Files Paperwork to Dismiss Verizon's Anti-Net-Neutrality Suit Verizon Sues the FCC for "Capricious" Net Neutrality Rules AT&T Admits Consumers May See Some Harm if It's Granted GSM Monopoly U.S. House Votes to Allow Cable Providers to Throttle Internet FCC Gives Internet Firms the Gift of Net Neutrality

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Print Email Font ResizeAbduction, attacks mar run-up to Pakistan electionBy REBECCA SANTANA and MUNIR AHMED Associated PressPosted: 05/09/2013 02:37:41 PM MDTClick photo to enlargePeople visit Pakistan's former Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani, center, at his residence in Multan, Pakistan, Thursday, May 9, 2013. Gunmen attacked an election rally in Pakistan's southern Punjab province on Thursday and abducted Ali Haider Gilani, son of a former prime minister, intensifying what has already been a violent run-up to Saturday's nationwide elections. «12345»ISLAMABAD—An especially violent spate of killings, kidnappings and bombings marred the run-up to Pakistan's nationwide election, capped Thursday by the abduction of the son of a former prime minister as he was rallying supporters on the last day of campaigning before the historic vote. Saturday's election marks the first time in Pakistan's military coup-riddled history that a civilian government has finished its term and will hand over power to another. But the significance of the occasion has been overshadowed by the relentless violence targeting mostly liberal, secular parties. More than 125 people have been killed by a series of bombings and shootings that can mostly be traced to Taliban militants who have vowed to disrupt a democratic process they view as un-Islamic.A Pakistani supporter of former cricket star-turned-politician, and leader of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party, Imran Khan, wearing a pin bearing Khan's image, takes part during a rally in Islamabad, Pakistan, Thursday, May 9, 2013. Pakistan is scheduled to hold parliamentary elections on May 11, the first transition between democratically elected governments in a country that has experienced three military coups and constant political instability since its creation in 1947. The parliament's ability to complete its five-year term has been hailed as a significant achievement. ((AP Photo/Muhammed Muheisen)) Separatists in the southwestern province of Baluchistan have also attacked candidates and their supporters across the political spectrum. There was no claim of responsibility for the abduction of 25-year-old Ali Haider Gilani, but suspicion immediately fell on the Taliban. Gilani is running for a provincial assembly seat under the banner of the Pakistan People's Party, one of three parties the Taliban has singled out for retribution because they supported military operations against Taliban insurgents in northwestern Pakistan. His father, Yousuf Raza Gilani, is a longtime member of the PPP who served as prime minister while many of those military operations were carried out.Advertisement The younger Gilani was leaving an election event in the city of Multan in southern Punjab province when attackers pulled up in a car and motorcycle, sprayed the area with bullets, threw him into one of the vehicles and drove off, officials and witnesses said. "One of the gunmen grabbed Haider, who had blood splashed on his trousers," said rally participant Shehryar Ali in comments aired by Pakistani television broadcaster Geo News.Pakistan Election Commission staff load ballot boxes on a truck en-route to polling stations in Peshawar, Pakistan, Thursday, May 9, 2013. Pakistan is scheduled to hold parliamentary elections on May 11, the first transition between democratically elected governments in a country that has experienced three military coups and constant political instability since its creation in 1947. ((AP Photo/Mohammad Sajjad)) The former prime minister has been campaigning heavily in Multan to help his three sons, who are all running for elected office in the district, but he was not at the rally when his son was taken. Appearing shaken, the elder Gilani said in televised comments that two bodyguards were killed in the attack, but he did not know whether his son was wounded. "His two guards were shielding him, and they died," the former premier said. "I urge all of my party supporters to remain peaceful and participate in the vote." Gilani was forced out of office last summer by the Supreme Court after refusing to pursue a corruption case against President Asif Ali Zardari.Pakistan army troops are seen for election duties in Nowshera, Pakistan, Thursday, May 9, 2013. Pakistani authorities decided to deploy army troops to sensitive areas during next week's general election to avert any attempt of terrorism and violence. Candidates restricted their election campaigns to small meetings of constituents and social media due to ongoing attacks by Taliban on their offices and rallies of various political parties. ((AP Photo/Mohammad Sajjad)) Although his ouster from office meant he could not run in this election, the Gilani family is still heavily represented in the Multan district races. In addition to the son who was abducted, the former prime minister has two sons running for national assembly seats. The Pakistan People's Party, along with the Karachi-based Muttahida Quami Movement and the Awami National Party, have been singled out for attack by the Taliban. All were part of the outgoing government during a time when there were repeated military offensives against Taliban militants in the tribal areas. The threat has forced all three to severely curtail their election events. Instead of the large, outdoor rallies the PPP used in 2008 to whip up support among thousands of voters, the party has relied on television and newspaper ads and smaller indoor gatherings where security is more manageable. In northwest Pakistan, candidates from the Awami National Party held election events inside private homes under heavy security or reached out to voters via social media and by telephone. Officials with the PPP lashed out Thursday after Gilani's abduction, saying the security forces have done little to protect them. "We were screaming that we need security for our candidates. We were saying that we have received threats, but no one heard our pleas, and we did not get security," said a party spokeswoman, Sharmila Farouqi. "Now see what has happened. The son of a former prime minister has been kidnapped." There is also concern that the inability of the three parties to properly campaign will unfairly tilt the race in the favor of parties who have a more favorable view toward the Taliban and oppose military operations in the tribal areas. The Pakistani Taliban has been waging a bloody insurgency in Pakistan for years to enforce Islamic law in the country and break the government's alliance with the United States in fighting militants. They have killed thousands of civilians and security personnel in scores of gun and bomb attacks. But in recent weeks even those parties favoring negotiations have not been immune. On Thursday, a bomb targeting an election office of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam in the North Waziristan tribal area near Afghanistan killed one person, according to two Pakistani intelligence officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media. Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam is considered more favorable to the Pakistani Taliban and has supported negotiations with the militants over military operations. It was the third attack on the party this week. On Monday, 25 people died when a bomb exploded at an election rally, and 13 people died Tuesday in two separate attacks targeting party representatives. Regardless of the security threats, the PPP is expected to fare poorly in the vote after presiding over a five-year term that saw inflation skyrocket and widespread electricity blackouts become the norm across the country. The Pakistan Muslim League-N, headed by two-time former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, is seen as the front-runner, while the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, headed by former cricket star Imran Khan, is considered a wild card who could gain significant seats. Khan may also benefit from widespread sympathy following a fall Tuesday during an election rally in the eastern city of Lahore while he was being raised by a forklift to a stage to address his followers. The 60-year-old Khan fractured a vertebra in his neck and two in his back, cracked a rib and cut his head in the accident, which kept him from participating in the last days of the campaign. On Thursday, Khan addressed a rally of at least 25,000 flag-waving supporters in Islamabad via video link from his hospital bed, asking them to make sure to vote for his party on election day. —— Associated Press writers Asif Shahzad in Islamabad, Zaheer Babar in Lahore and Rasool Dawar in Peshawar contributed to this report. —— Follow Santana on Twitter (at)ruskygal.Print Email Font ResizeReturn to Top RELATED STORIES Devlin: Break up the Centennial League, because it's too doggone goodDevlin: Joe Strain Sr. was an old-school legend in prep sportsDevlin: Arvada mourning, praising Jim Banich Related Stories

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East Jerusalem newspaper Al Quds backs Gaydamak for mayor Israel News | Haaretz East Jerusalem newspaper Al Quds backs Gaydamak for mayor A high turnout of Palestinian voters on election day could tip the scales in Russian billionaire's favor. Lily Galili | Arcadi Gaydamak With a little over two weeks left before municipal elections, two questions are becoming increasingly important: Will the Palestinians in East Jerusalem come out to vote, and, if so, will they cast their ballots in the thousands for Arcadi Gaydamak? A yes on both counts could completely change the voting results in the capital. The East Jerusalem press now gives the unmistakable impression that Palestinian officials are trading in their overt, official boycott of the elections for a show of understanding or even open support for voting, for the good of the Palestinian cause. Missing from the most recent issues are references to those who voted in the municipal elections as collaborators or even traitors. Saturday's edition of the important East Jerusalem paper Al Quds featured articles on and interviews with the mayoral candidates, in which Gaydamak was presented as the one preferred by the Palestinians. The ultra-Orthodox candidate, Meir Porush, was described as a "Jewish extremist," while Nir Barkat's past as a paratroops officer was mentioned and he was described as an "extreme nationalist businessman." In contrast, the paper called Gaydamak a "billionaire of Russian origin," without even mentioning the fact that he is Israeli and Jewish. Gaydamak's intensive campaigning in East Jerusalem has included a secret meeting with the grand mufti of Jerusalem, Muhammad Ahmad Hussein. On Sunday he is scheduled to meet with a number of other public figures, including the journalist and independent political activist Hanna Siniora. A separate campaign headquarters is working to get out the East Jerusalem vote. Its main figure is Akram Abu Shalbak, a confidant of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Other features of Gaydamak's quiet campaign among Palestinian voters include a weekly election newspaper in Arabic. East Jerusalem politicians were quoted in Saturday's edition of Al Quds as being impressed by the practical tone taken by Hatam Abd al-Qadir, Abbas' advisor on Jerusalem affairs. Just one month ago Abd al-Qadir called on all Jerusalem residents to boycott the elections. Now he is being quoted by the French press agency as saying that although voting in the election does deepen the recognition of Israeli sovereignty in the city, if the working assumption of the peace talks changes to a dialogue for the establishment of a binational state, "I will call on all Jerusalemites to vote, even for the Tel Aviv municipality." The politicians said this was not a call to vote, and also not a call for a boycott. They also noted that PA officials are waging a battle against the decision by city hall and the Interior Ministry not to open polling stations in Palestinian population centers beyond the separation fence, despite the presence of inhabitants with Jerusalem residency permits who are eligible to vote in the city elections. Siniora argues that East Jerusalem Palestinians must vote in the municipal elections in order to stop Jewish settlement and demolitions of Arab homes in East Jerusalem. To get the latest from Haaretz

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Member's Press Release Contact: Senator Foster (304) 357-7831 and Delegate Moore (304) 340-3189 Senator Foster Delegate Moore Public Hearing Held to Discuss Herbert Henderson Office of Minority of Affairs Legislation CHARLESTON--Monday evening a public forum, chaired by Delegate Charlene Marshall (D-Monongalia), was held to discuss House Bill 2161, which would create the Herbert Henderson Office of Minority Affairs. “The primary objective of creating the Office of Minority Affairs is to have a place where research and data are collected,” Delegate Marshall stated. “This office will add to the economic vitality of the state and act as a support system for minority-owned businesses.” Other objectives and responsibilities of this office would be to provide a forum for the state’s minorities. The office would provide recommendations to the governor and the Legislature regarding the most appropriate means to administer programs and services to support minority groups. Additionally, members anticipate acquiring grants, loans and loan guaranties for minority affairs programs and activities in West Virginia. The Interim Committee on Minority Issues has pushed for this bill over the past few years and continues to bring it to the forefront. Delegate Clif Moore (D-McDowell) and Delegate Meshea Poore (D-Kanawha) were both present at Monday’s hearing and spoke in support of the bill. Delegate Moore explained that in the past he was told it was simply not economically possible for the state to establish the office at that time. There is a $300,000 fiscal note, which would be just enough money to get a body in the office and get things started. However, Moore stated, “This is not new money, it is a redistribution of existing dollars.” The committee is also seeking federal funding to create and expand the scope of the Herbert Henderson Office of Minority Affairs. Delegate Poore said that the office will provide the state with the opportunity for job creation, as well as, a safe and trusted resource for the state’s minorities. “The Office of Minority Affairs will be used as an umbrella institution to make sure minority-owned businesses are taken care of and not ignored,” Poore said. “[The office] will make our state’s industries more desirable to outside companies and will allow for West Virginia to grow as a state.” The House Finance Committee will continue to discuss this issue during the 2011 regular session. For more information please contact Senator Foster at (304) 357-7831 or Delegate Moore at (304) 340-3189. Senate News Releases | House News Releases

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Candidates Ready to Face Gibson; But Which Ones? By Chris Ariens on December 26, 2007 12:42 PM ABC will be setting aside a Saturday night of entertainment programming next week and will air back-to-back Republican and Democratic candidate debates. Moderated by ABC’s Charles Gibson, the debates will take place in New Hampshire Saturday, Jan. 5 and are being produced in conjunction with Facebook and WMUR-TV. During the debates, Facebook users will be able to participate in groups, which will “provide a companion to the televised debates.” As for who’s taking part in the debate, ABC says, “candidate participation will be contingent upon objective criteria established by the debate hosts.” ABC News spokesperson Cathie Levine tells TVNewser the criteria includes how the candidates finish in Iowa and their place in national polls. That decision will come a week from Friday, which is one day after the Iowa caucuses. Click continued to read the ABC News press release… ABC NEWS, FACEBOOK & WMUR-TV TO HOST DEMOCRATIC AND REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE DEBATES IN NEW HAMPSHIRE ON SATURDAY, JANUARY 5 Debates to Air in Primetime on ABC Days before the New Hampshire Primary ABC News, Hearst Argyle’s WMUR-TV and Facebook will host back-to-back Democratic and Republican Presidential debates in New Hampshire on Saturday January 5th. With the country focused on the upcoming New Hampshire Primary and the Iowa Caucuses just concluded, the two 90-minute debates will air in primetime on national television starting at 7:00 p.m., ET/PT on the ABC Television Network. Republicans will debate from 7:00-8:30 p.m., ET and Democrats will follow from approximately 8:45-10:15 p.m., ET. Both debates will be held on the campus of Saint Anselm College in Manchester, New Hampshire. ABC News Anchor Charles Gibson will moderate and will be joined in the questioning by WMUR Anchor and Political Director Scott Spradling. Before, after and during the debates, Facebook users will be able to participate in Debate Groups, providing a companion to the televised debates. Following each debate, “Good Morning America” host Diane Sawyer will anchor live reports, providing a re-cap and analysis of the evening’s events. She will be joined by “This Week” anchor George Stephanopoulos. Bianna Golodryga will report from the ABC News/Facebook desk. “Coming on the heels of the Iowa Caucuses, these back-to-back primetime events will let voters in New Hampshire and throughout the country see the candidates challenge each other at a moment in the campaign when the stakes couldn’t be higher,” said ABC News President David Westin. “WMUR is proud of its tradition of informing New Hampshire voters,” said WMUR President and General Manager Jeffrey Bartlett. “We’re excited to once again produce these important debates, Bartlett added. Candidate participation in the debates will be contingent upon objective criteria established by the debate hosts. President Obama’s Year-End News Conference Features 'Naughty or Nice' ListGreta the Diplomat'Oh, God, It's Mom': Political Strategist Brothers Scolded by Mom on C-SPANBarack Obama Becomes Stephen Colbert Being Bill O'Reilly: 'How Hard Can This Be?' << PREVIOUSDeitch Leaves NBC News NEXT >>Will U Party With FNC On New Years? Mediabistro Course

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To: Your Email: Your Name: Subject: May 5, 2011 4:00 AM Our Pakistan Problem Now that we found Osama bin Laden relatively out in the open, what should we do? An NRO Symposium Archive ALEX ALEXIEVThe circumstances of Osama bin Laden’s demise and his ability to survive as long as he did require a heroic reality-denial act on the part of Washington in order not to see the clear complicity of the Pakistani military in the terrorist-in-chief’s remarkable longevity. A related delusion popular in the State Department is that, if there are terrorist sympathies in the Pakistani military, they’re limited to a few rogue elements in the Inter-Services Intelligence. Nothing could be further from the truth. The ISI is very much part of the military, run by a line officer and seconded army personnel serving at the pleasure of the Chief of Army Staff. It was set up as a political police to serve the domestic interests of the military, and it in turn set up the Taliban and numerous other terrorist groups as proxies of the military. It is, thus, the Pakistani military — which sees itself as the only legitimate authority in the country — that is and will continue to be our problem. Pakistan will continue this alliance charade with us as long as we let them, providing a modicum of support to our efforts in exchange for huge financial injections. But we should immediately let them know that they are by no means an indispensable, let alone a strategic ally, and that our fundamental regional interests are an independent Afghanistan, a stable and prosperous India, and, last but most important, draining the jihadist swamp that Pakistan has become. If they cannot support these goals, our unhappy marriage of convenience is heading for a nasty divorce and Pakistan, already close to a failed state, risks falling into the precipice.— Alex Alexiev is a visiting fellow at the Hudson Institute in Washington, D.C. jonathan foremanI think it is time to do what some of the better Pakistani analysts have long suggested, and cut off aid to the Pakistani armed forces. As so often with badly conceived welfare systems, America’s generosity to Pakistan’s military has had the perverse effect of provoking resentment among the beneficiaries: not just among Pakistani liberals but among the Pakistani military itself. Talk to Pakistani officers and you will hear an endless litany of American crimes: the suspension of aid over the nuclear program, the withholding of promised F-16s, the “betrayal” involved in America’s handling of India’s nukes, America’s “abandonment” of its vital, brave, selfless ally — and indeed the whole region — in the fight against the Soviets once that war was won, America’s secret Islamophobic desire to make Pakistan weak. . . . It goes on. The real history of Pakistani-American relations is of course very different. America earned lasting Indian enmity by backing Pakistan when it came to the crunch in 1971 and Nixon ordered the 7th fleet into the Bay of Bengal. And it was Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto who, despite that support, turned away from America in the early Seventies and made Red China the country’s main backer and arms supplier. As for betrayals, what could be more of a betrayal than Pakistan’s active support — including training and leadership by Pakistani special forces — of the Taliban campaign against American, Coalition, and Kabul-government forces in Afghanistan? However, the narrative that has America abandoning Pakistan after the defeat of the USSR and its puppet regime in Kabul has become gospel throughout Pakistan. (Never mind that Pakistan’s role in the war against the Soviets was hardly disinterested: It wanted the pro-Indian USSR out of Afghanistan even more than we did. And when the U.S. and the Saudis outsourced almost all the arming, recruiting, and training of the Mujahedin to Pakistan’s ISI intelligence agency, it was very much to the benefit of Pakistan and its regional ambitions.)

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What Is There To "Negotiate?" Negotiate....1) 'try to reach an agreement or compromise by discussion with others.' "his government's willingness to negotiate". 2) find a way over or through (an obstacle or difficult path)."there was a puddle to be negotiated" The communication rascals are claiming this morning that President Obama is willing to "negotiate" with Iran's new president but not with John Boehner. Obama, these rascals insist, negotiates with Vlad Putin, but is unwilling to do so with the GOP Speaker. Why won't President Obama negotiate with Leaders in his own country....when he is always willing to "negotiate" with shadowy, cunning and untrustworthy foreign leaders? GOP Small-Ballers Almost Forgot To Bash Women Another reminder that one cannot be cynical enough theses days. What I don't quite understand is why House Republicans didn't include a repeal of Roe in their hostage-taking-spree vote last night..... "A Struggle Within One Party" The Villagers tell us that the defunding and debt ceiling arguments pit Obama and the Democrats against "fiscally responsible" Republicans. That is hogwash. James Fallows explains.... This isn't "gridlock." It is a ferocious struggle within one party, between its traditionalists and its radical factions, with results that unfortunately can harm all the rest of us -- and, should there be a debt default, harm the rest of the world too. To read more or comment... "Not Negotiating With Terrorists" Obama yesterday.... “No Congress before this one has ever, ever, in history been irresponsible enough to threaten default, to threaten an economic shutdown, to suggest America not pay its bills, just to try to blackmail a president into giving them some concessions on issues that have nothing to do with a budget,” Mr. Obama said before a friendly audience in suburban Washington. Pitiful Clowns Move To Big Tent Debt Ceiling Show Yesterday, Ted Cruz....the Republican senator who had vowed to prevent a closure vote to proceed to debate and a vote on the House continuing funding bill......voted along with the other 99 senators to.....proceed to debate and vote on the House CR. The vote was 100-0 to proceed to debate. Wait, what? Time For Teas To Take Personal Responsibility By The Reverend Ya' really have to love the Hillbilly Orwellianism currently in vogue amongst Republicans keen on doing further damage to the nation's economy leading up to the 2014 midterms. I'm sure by now you've heard the conservative confabulated horseshite about how it will be the Democrats who will be shutting down the government if a Continuing Resolution fails in Congress. Here's a prime example from RNC Chairman Reince Priebus..... Republicans want to keep the government running. Democrats claim they want the same, but they aren’t acting like it. By denouncing the House bill, Harry Reid has already said that he’s willing to shut down the government to save face for the president and to defend a failed law. "The Starbucks Experience" "For these reasons, today we are respectfully requesting that customers no longer bring firearms into our stores or outdoor seating areas—even in states where "open carry" is permitted—unless they are authorized law enforcement personnel," Mr. Schultz wrote in the letter. "We're not anti- or pro-gun, but we don't believe guns should be part of the Starbucks experience." To read more or comment... Gambling And Losing On Obamacare Freedom in America means that citizens or groups of citizens can behave badly, and with impunity as long as agreed-upon laws are not violated. Sometimes citizens talk and act crazily, protest almost anything, disagree loudly and campaign obnoxiously. That is how it is in the U.S., and we like it that way. But what Americans see today's Republicans doing is not simply noisy or obnoxious expressions of free speech. What today's GOP is doing is unprecedented, at least since the Civil War era. What today's GOP is doing is not normal, nor should it be embraced or celebrated as part of our American tradition. Not Their Fault, Not Their Job Village Governor and progressive-pretender, Ed Rendell, had a chat the other day with NBC's Chuck Todd over seemingly wide spread opposition to Obamacare. Rendell suggested the opposition was being caused by misinformation about the ACA. Misinformation coming exclusively from Republicans. Chuck Todd must have experienced a guilty conscience after Rendell said that...so he proceeded to say this.... GOP Votes To Punish Children, Elderly, Disabled The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the House legislation would deny benefits to 3.8 million Americans next year and save $39 billion over 10 years, or roughly 5 percent of the SNAP program's cost in that time. Enrollment doubled to 47 million in the wake of the Great Recession as incomes plummeted and more Americans qualified for benefits, which average $133 per month. Most beneficiaries are children, elderly or disabled. Read that last line again very slowly. Loving The Smell Of Burning Tea In The Morning Freshman greenhorn Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) has anarchist leanings. I'm not sure why that is...but it is. Cruz didn't run for the Senate in order to legislate because Ted Cruz doesn't believe in government. He was sent to D.C. by Tea voters who believed he would blow the place up with his Gingrichian bombastic and anarchist-loudmouthed style. Only in office about a year, Cruz has already alienated senior GOP senators with his 'everybody look at me' antics. A couple of months back, Senator Cruz did what he does best......ran his mouth loosely despite the tadpole nature of his ...umm.....status...... Goldilocks & The Harsh, Partisan Obama Bear Yesterday, many Village Elders and Elder-ettes nearly collapsed from shock....perhaps due to their unusually hyperactive clutching of their pearls or wringing of their hands. You see, Important people, like Joe Scarborough, Mika Brezinski, Willie Giest, Martha MaCallum, Mike Barnicle, etc.....are the self-appointed room mothers of Villagedom. These Very Important People in Media were shocked at the rudeness of the Democratic president's partisan words on the very day that people were gunned down in yet another mass gun killing spree. Morning Blow, himself... Renacci Shares Faith-Based Economic Views Conservative policy on tax cutting most closely resembles a religious belief. Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the assurance of things unseen....according to the Christian New Testament......and that is an accurate description of conservative tax policy. Hoping for things that remain invisible.....to become real. GOP Rep. Jim Renacci, now The Reverend's representative because Gov. Kasich and his GOP State Legislature decided to drop acid and then redraw Ohio's voting districts, has faith in conservative tax policy. He stated as much last night in Wadsworth.... "Patriotic" Sabotage Eric Cantor....last week.... ObamaCare is hurting small businesses and stifling job growth. That is why Congressman Cantor continues to work to repeal and/or defund it. To read more or comment... Latest Poll: Americans Now Oppose America It has been quite amusing listening to Republicans tout popular opinion poll numbers on U.S. military action against Syria. These same Republicans previously wailed that the 2012 presidential polling numbers before the election were being outrageously "skewed." And who can forget the GOP's patriotic and solemn respect for public opinion during the universal-background-checks-for-gun-purchases debate? Yep. when The Reverend thinks of the GOP and popular opinion, he envisions conservative and libertarian politicos thoughtfully and patiently monitoring the pulse of the People, eager to write and pass legislation which will reflect that popular opinion to the letter. Or, you know, not. Hard Working Boot Strappers Make 30% More During Recession From 2009 to 2012, income for the 1 percent grew by 31.4 percent, while everyone else only saw it grow by 0.4 percent. That means the 1 percent “captured 95% of the income gains in the first three years of the recovery,”..... Let's see......100% minus 95% equals 5%.....therefore, 99% of American income earners have earned 5% of all income gains nationally in the last 4 years. Meanwhile, inflation has averaged about two percent per year over the last four years (inflation chart here)....which means that 99% of American income earners have seen their incomes as related to purchasing power.....go down over the last four years. Only the top 1%....and all during modern America's worst economic recession.....have seen their incomes, wealth and purchasing power rise significantly these past four years. Putin Responds To "American Exceptionalism" Vladimir Putin, President of Russia, had an op-ed in the NY Times yesterday. The piece outlines his preference for international reliance on the UN security council before war is launched.....not just in Syria, but anywhere. Putin favors diplomacy over unilateral U.S. aggression. In his last paragraph, Putin chose to provoke Obama in particular, and Americans in general, about our peculiar version of "American exceptionalism." Humanitarianism? George W. Bush March 19, 2003, announcing the U.S. attack on Iraq had begun..... “We will bring freedom to others and we will prevail.” Hijacking The 9-11 Commemoration The Reverend has never fully understood turning 9-11-01 into a national yearly commemoration. Many will disagree here and that's fine.....yet, still, it has always struck me as odd. Whatever your opinion, the national commemoration of 9-11 is happening again tomorrow. It's our 12th commemoration. But this year.....there's something brand new for Teas and many conservatives to commemorate. On a sunny morning twelve years ago, hijackers commandeered 4 U.S. commercial flights, ran them into buildings, killing a total of 2996 people in Washington, New York and a field in Pennsylvania. It was the largest ever attack of the "homeland." The infamous day, in my opinion, wrongly, changed our entire nation. The Fall War Product Marketing Rollout From the Way Back Machine.... ''From a marketing point of view, you don't introduce new products in August.'' Andrew H. Card Jr., White House chief of staff, on why the Bush administration waited until September to press for public support of its Iraq policy. To read more or comment... Making the "Long War" Longer The AUMF.....the Authoritization to Use Military Force....passed immediately after 9-11, to "legalize" what's turned into 12 years of U.S. military occupation of Afghanistan....will lose it's potency at the end of 2014. That is when President Obama says most of our combat troops will leave the Afghan region. In effect, removing our combat troops from Afghanistan, will render the AUMF null and void. What that means is that the U.S.......if the War on Terror is to continue another decade or two as we've been told by those in the know......needs another Authorization to continue the "long war." Yes, We're Being Fooled Again What we have heard from President Obama and John Kerry about Syrian leader Assad's alleged use of sarin gas on his own people on August 21.......doesn't make any sense. In fact, The Reverend actually agrees with what Vladimir Putin had to say about this issue.... .....it would be "utter nonsense" for government troops to use such tactics in a war it was already winning. Bushification Of Obama Administration Complete George W. Bush, Richard Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Condi Rice couldn't have said it any better than John Kerry did yesterday..... "The use of chemical weapons in Syria is not only an assault on humanity – it is a serious threat to America’s national security interests and those of our closest allies," he said. Lone Superpower Suffering Psychological Insecurity Somewhat out of the loop over the weekend...however, I read enough to determine that Obama, the military-intelligence complex and Congress are about to, once again, attack (punish) a middle eastern nation which poses absolutely no threat to the United States. It's what we do now.....and it could be all that the United States government is capable of agreeing on doing in the first half of the 21st century. Attacking nations who pose no threat to the United States appears to be the lone bipartisan policy around which Democrats and Republicans can agree.

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Mitt Romney's 'Repeal and Replace' Dodd-Frank Plan Leaves Major Gaps Email By Ben Weyl Oct. 4, 2012, 1:55 p.m. Obama Asks Where 'Real Mitt Romney' Went on Debate Night Mitt Romney Recasts His Tax Plan, but Creates New Problems for Himself TiVo, Twitter Agree: Big Bird Is Fascinating Mitt Romney Tweaks Plans, Lands Punches Against Barack Obama Mitt Romney sharply criticized the Dodd-Frank financial regulatory overhaul in Wednesday night's presidential debate, but he gave little indication of what financial restrictions and oversights he would maintain should he win in November. The Republican presidential nominee repeated his promise to "repeal and replace" the 2010 financial regulatory law, saying that the measure passed in the wake of the 2008 financial industry crisis is harming small banks and is constricting mortgage lending. Echoing a common complaint from GOP lawmakers, Romney targeted the law's provision directing federal regulators to designate certain financial institutions as systemically important, which he said gave them permanent protected status as "too big to fail." "They're effectively guaranteed by the federal government," Romney said. "This is the biggest kiss that's been given to New York banks I've ever seen. This is an enormous boon for them." In fact, Wall Street strongly disagrees with that characterization, saying Dodd-Frank also gives it enhanced supervision from the Federal Reserve, as well as higher capital standards and liquidity requirements, which it opposes. The law also requires the biggest banks to craft "living wills," or detailed plans the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. could execute so that failing firms are liquidated in an orderly manner rather than bailed out as they were at the height of the 2008 financial crisis. Romney also went after the law's housing components, blasting the administration for having yet to issue the "qualified mortgage" rule, which will require lenders to verify that consumers are able to repay their loans before extending credit. The rule is expected to fundamentally reshape the future of the mortgage market by setting new lending standards, and the housing industry is eager to see how the rule will end up. "It's been two years. We don't know what a qualified mortgage is yet. So banks are reluctant to make loans, mortgages," Romney said. "It's hurt the housing market." The housing sector remains fragile, but most analysts believe it is slowly improving and that a recovery has picked up speed this year, with home prices rising across the country as mortgage rates have hit record lows. And although the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which is tasked with writing the qualified mortgage rule, has deliberated slowly, the bureau has not missed its statutory deadline of January 2013 to finalize the rule. Despite his criticism of certain Dodd-Frank provisions, Romney did not say which parts he would try to keep if he became president. "We're not going to get rid of all regulation," Romney said. "You have to have regulation. And there are some parts of Dodd-Frank that make all the sense in the world." He mentioned a need for transparency and leverage limits for financial institutions. Even with a GOP-controlled Congress, Romney as president would have difficulty fully repealing the Dodd-Frank law; a more likely scenario would be a piecemeal legislative assault with some elements remaining. In the debate, President Barack Obama questioned whether Romney was changing his position on the law.

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June 28. 2013 12:23AM SB 41's aim is to spur economic development Legislation updating and revising the state statutes governing business corporations was signed into law Thursday by Gov. Maggie Hassan.Supporters of the new laws say it will make New Hampshire more attractive to companies and help create jobs."Our focus remains on supporting New Hampshire's existing businesses and attracting new companies so we can create good jobs and build a more innovative economic future," Hassan said at a bill signing ceremony in the Executive Council Chambers. "(Senate Bill) 41 is an important part of these efforts, providing much-needed updates to the New Hampshire Corporations Act that will help spur economic development, create jobs and make New Hampshire an even more desirable place to do business."The overhaul was the top legislative priority of the N.H. Business and Industry Association, as well as Republican and Democratic leaders in the Senate and House this session."SB 41 had many Democratic and Republican co-sponsors and supporters," said BIA President Jim Roche. "In fact, I believe it is a shining example of bipartisan cooperation from the 2013 session."The bill updates laws governing how corporations form, do business and dissolve in the state.The N.H. Corporations Act was originally passed in 1993, but few changes have been made to the statute since that time.The legal changes in SB 41 reflect current methods of doing business and best practices by drawing on other states' experiences while tailoring the updates to New Hampshire.Several years ago, the BIA formed a group of corporate counsels, CPAs and business attorneys to review the act, identify problem areas and draft up-to-date language using the American Bar Association model corporations act as a guide.The bill was the Senate's priority in 2012, but failed to pass the House.The bill's prime sponsor, Senate Majority Leader Jeb Bradley, R-Wolfeboro, introduced it again this session with bipartisan co-sponsors."This is just the right fit for New Hampshire," Hassan said. "It is one thing to have a goal, and another thing to get there."The revised act will go into effect Jan. 1.grayno@unionleader.com

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< > President calls secret meeting to pitch CAFTA Controversial trade bill vote could come today, sources say Sarah Foster Sarah Foster is a staff reporter for WorldNetDaily. Subscribe to feed With Congress scheduled to adjourn at the end of the week, the Bush administration and Republican leadership on Capitol Hill are working around-the-clock in an all-out effort to secure passage of the Central American Free Trade Agreement before the August recess. The Senate approved the controversial trade bill 54-45 on June 30, but opponents of the measure within the House of Representatives have maintained a steady resistance. Critics include not only Democrats, but Republicans concerned about CAFTA’s threat to U.S. independence and its potential to draw American manufacturing jobs south of the border. To rally support within Republican ranks, House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., has requested “full attendance” of all members of the GOP Conference to attend a special meeting at 9 a.m. today, at which George W. Bush will speak. As is the conference’s policy, no staffers, no media, and no Democratic members of the House will be admitted to hear the president. The House Republican Conference, made up of GOP members, exerts strong control over the legislative agenda, according to the watchdog group Citizens Against Government Waste. “The conference holds closed-door meetings to explicitly detail the party’s message on issues and to ensure that members vote accordingly,” CAGW reports. No one knows when the vote on CAFTA will occur, but it could come as early as this afternoon. Or – as Tom DeLay put it – “it could come at 4 in the morning, “whenever we have the votes.” Some 218 votes are needed for passage, and critics and proponents predict the outcome will be extremely close. Indeed, it could be decided by just one vote. The insider publication Congress Daily reported yesterday that 123 House members plan to vote “yes” or are leaning toward “yes,” with 172 members planning to vote or leaning to vote “no.” That leaves 138 members who are undecided or not saying. “That’ why President Bush is making a special effort to talk to House Republicans behind closed doors,” Kent Snyder, executive director of the Liberty Committee, told WorldNetDaily. “They know how close this vote is going to be. They know the grass-roots constituents from around the country are rallying against it, so they’re doing everything they can – selling bridges, giving away bridges, making promises they’ll never keep, they’re doing everything they can to get this through. “Bush is going to put on the heavy hand, and if the leadership feels they have the votes they will walk out and give House members short notice that the vote is coming up. They want the whole thing over within 15 minutes.” Snyder and the Liberty Committee have played a major role in mobilizing opposition to CAFTA within Republican ranks. The group is a nationwide network of grass-roots activists dedicated to restoring constitutional, limited government – using the Internet as a way to make their concerns known to their representatives in Congress. For months it has been urging opposition to the trade agreement, which the committee maintains would cause irreparable harm to the independence of this country. Rep. Paul, R-Texas, founder of the Liberty Committee, says he opposes the treaty because it undercuts and circumvents the Constitution. “I oppose CAFTA for a very simple reason: It is unconstitutional. The Constitution clearly grants Congress alone the authority to regulate international trade. The plain text of Article I, Section 8, Clause 3 is incontrovertible. Neither Congress nor the president can give this authority away by treaty, any more than they can repeal the First Amendment by treaty. This fundamental point, based on the plain meaning of the Constitution, cannot be overstated. Every member of Congress who votes for CAFTA is voting to abdicate power to an international body in direct violation of the Constitution.” Last week Snyder made the unusual move of letting the public know how each representative intends to vote on CAFTA before the bill comes to the floor. A tally showing the members’ intentions had been compiled by the print publication Congress Daily, which polled each representative. But since Congress Daily is not posted on the Internet, Snyder retyped the list and sent it out via the Internet to the thousands of Liberty Committee members. An updated list was posted late yesterday on the committee’s website. “I figured the public would like to know some of this inside information which they never get,” Snyder says. He has heard that the phones in the members’ offices have been ringing non-stop ever since. Recent stories: Treaty opponents link vitamins to trade deal Free-trade pact a threat to U.S. sovereignty?

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Home > Israel to Announce 5,000 New Settler Homes Israel to Announce 5,000 New Settler Homes JERUSALEM -- Israel will announce construction plans for about 5,000 new housing units in eastern Jerusalem and the West Bank. The plans include the 1,500 housing units announced Tuesday night to be constructed in the eastern Jerusalem neighborhood of Ramat Shlomo, Ha'aretz reported Thursday, as well as 2,500 new units throughout the West Bank in major settlement blocs and isolated settlements. Lots for some 860 housing units will be sold to contractors for immediate construction in Ariel, Maaleh Adumim, Givat Zeev, Betar Ilit, Karnei Shomron and Elkana, which are part of the major settlement blocs. Plans for the construction of 1,400 new units throughout the West Bank will be submitted to the Civil Administration’s planning committee. Construction would take several years. Another 1,100 units, which had already been submitted to the Civil Administration’s planning committee, will be advanced, though it will take at least a year before construction begins, according to Haaretz. Plans also were announced Tuesday to build a national park in areas east of the Hebrew University’s Mount Scopus campus between the Palestinian neighborhoods of Isawiyah and A-Tur; and the Kedem Center, a tourism and archaeological center in the Palestinian village of Silwan opposite the entrance to the City of David. Ophir Akunis, the Likud deputy minister for liaison with the Knesset, provided details of the settlement plans in a government meeting Wednesday that was picked up by the Israeli media. The construction projects are meant to appease those who were against the release of 26 Palestinian prisoners as part of the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. The freed prisoners had participated in terror attacks that killed Jews. The plans were condemned by the Palestinian Authority and the U.S. State Department, as well as by United Nations General Secretary Ban Ki-moon and the European Union foreign affairs chief Catherine Ashton. Source URL: http://jewishexponent.com/israel-to-announce-5000-new-settler-homes

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You are hereHeadlinesNational What They Feel About His Decision May 7, 2009 By: Bryan Schwartzman Posted In NationalComment0TweetPrint Commemorative stamps, issued in honor of the papal visit, are being sold at post offices throughout Israel. Pope Benedict XVI is scheduled to arrive in the Middle East next week. RNS Photo/Reuters Less than a year ago -- but what now seems like a political lifetime -- the Republican Party hoped it was on the verge of making serious gains among Jewish voters in Pennsylvania and nationwide. U.S. Sen. Joseph Lieberman (I-Conn.), considered highly popular among American Jews, had decided to back John McCain for president, and was considered a top prospect to become the Republican nominee's running mate. Poll numbers suggested that many Jewish voters were reticent about Democratic candidate Barack Obama. Of course, we all know how that story ended. For his second in charge, McCain chose Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, a social conservative -- a move that many said sank his chances with moderates. For his part, Obama engaged in major outreach efforts to Jews (and picked popular Delaware Sen. Joseph Biden as his running mate); he also went on to score a decisive win in November, capturing some 78 percent of the Jewish vote nationally, according to exit polls. Now that U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter -- perhaps the GOP's most prominent Jewish politician -- has bolted parties, the question is: What happens to the Jewish role in the Republican camp? Do the GOP and the Republican Jewish Coalition have to return to square one to attract Jews? Specter himself weighed in on the issue. "I believe that the Republican Party will continue outreach to the Jewish voters," Specter said on May 1, during his first news conference in Philadelphia after announcing that he'll run in the 2010 Democratic primary. "I'm just sorry that I couldn't continue to be part of the effort to build a two-party system due to the realities of the day." The political winds had clearly shifted since the last time Specter faced Republican primary voters in 2004, with Democrats now outnumbering Republicans by more than 1 million registered voters in the Keystone State. Specter himself noted that in 2008, roughly 200,000 Republicans had switched their registration to vote in the Democratic primary. Many of those who reidentified themselves hailed from Philadelphia's suburbs, where the GOP always stood the best chance of making inroads with moderate Jewish voters. Tracey Specter, who chairs the Republican Committee of Lower Merion and Narberth, and is married to the senator's son, Shanin Specter, wrote in an e-mail: "It was a sad day for Republicans in Pa. when my father-in-law switched parties, especially moderates." She gave no hint that she plans to leave her own position with the GOP. "I do believe [his] changing parties is a wake-up call to the Republican Party," wrote Tracey Specter, adding that Jewish Republicans generally favor fiscal restraint, and are less liberal on social issues than Jewish Democrats. "I believe the Republican Party must be open and welcoming of all points of views if we are to begin to reverse the current trend." Scott Feigelstein, director of the Republican Jewish Coalition's Philadelphia chapter, acknowledged that the chips may be down for Jews in the GOP, but noted that the tables can turn quickly. "The reports of our demise have been written so many times during the years," said Feigelstein. "There are some very clear issues that sharply define the issues in the party," including Israel and foreign policy. Feigelstein said that local RJC members have expressed a range of reactions to Specter's shift. Some members, he said, may even continue to support him, depending on who else enters the race. U.S. Rep. Jim Gerlach and former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge are now reportedly mulling a run in the Republican Senate primary against former Rep. Pat Toomey, the conservative candidate whose lead in the polls was a key factor in Specter's decision to defect. Nationally, the RJC has tried to downplay the significance of Specter's announcement. Matthew Brooks, who directs the Washington-based operation, disputed the notion that Specter was a Republican Jewish standard-bearer. He asserted that Norm Coleman -- who's still fighting to hold on to his Minnesota Senate seat -- and U.S. Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Va), the only Republican Jew in the House of Representatives, were better-suited to that role. Still, Brooks lamented that Specter is leaving the GOP at a crucial time, when it is trying to rebrand itself and broaden its appeal. "Rather than staying and helping to move the party in the direction" he wanted it to go, Brooks said that "he's leaving precisely at the time the party is embarking on an effort to remake the party." Francine Lipstein, an RJC member and local Specter donor -- who belongs to Har Zion Temple in Penn Valley, as does Specter -- said that she has mixed emotions about Specter leaving the party. She said that she and others from the Philadelphia suburbs who have long known and supported him feel angered. At the same time, she said, Specter had already cast his lot with Democrats by initially expressing support for the Employee Free Choice Act, legislation pending in Congress that would strengthen workers' rights (he later opposed it), and by voting for the $800 billion stimulus package. "I don't really understand what Arlen stands for," said Lipstein. Still, she left open the possibility that she might continue to support him. Responding to reports that longtime donors have asked for their contributions back, Lipstein, for one, noted that she didn't plan to do the same. To underscore the bitterness some feel, one man screamed out, "I want my money back," as the senator spoke with reporters last week at Philadelphia's 30th Street Station. Specter said that he wasn't sure if any contributors had asked for refunds; however, he did pledge to honor such requests. Michael Livingston, a law professor at Rutgers University-Camden who had challenged U.S. Rep. Chaka Fattah (D-District 2) before dropping out last summer, said that Specter's announcement didn't represent a political sea change as much as a "ratification of something that had happened already anyway." Livingston, an RJC member and blogger (www. pa2010.com), said that he had never been a big fan of Specter because of what he called the senator's lack of ideological consistency. But he did say that losing a member of Specter's stature "reduces the influence of Jews in the Republican Party." Morton Klein, national president of the Zionist Organization of America who has long been close to Specter, echoed the sentiment of many when he said that it was "a bit disconcerting" to see Specter "switch parties in midstream." But he sees a silver lining. Klein said that he hoped Specter would now have "more influence on President Obama to ask him to stop pressuring Israel to make one-sided concessions." Comments on this Article

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Home | Blogs | Floor Action | House Floor Actionicon Floor Action feed March 05, 2013, 01:20 am Dems say sequester will hurt blacks, women more than others By Pete Kasperowicz Members of the Congressional Black Caucus said Monday night that the $85 billion in cuts to federal spending, known as the sequester, will disproportionately affect blacks and other minorities, in part because they are more likely to work for the government."Sequestration will impact everyone, but it will have a particularly harmful effect on communities of color who were hit first and worst by the great recession, and have yet to significantly feel the effects of the recovery," Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) said Monday.ADVERTISEMENT"Federal budget cuts under sequestration would quickly mean cuts to federal, state and local public-sector jobs, which disproportionately employ women and African-Americans."Lee said in 2011, employed blacks made up 20 percent of the federal, state and local public-sector workforce, and that women were 50 percent more likely to work in the public sector.Lee was joined by Del. Donna Christensen (D-Virgin Islands), who agreed that cuts to public-sector jobs would hurt blacks disproportionately."African-Americans are more likely to work in the public sector, where the jobs are going to be cut," she said. "We already have the highest unemployment, and will be severely hurt by the reduction in unemployment benefits."Lee cited several other reasons why the sequester will hurt, from a study conducted by the Center for American Progress. That study said minorities would be hurt by cuts to long-term unemployment benefits, workforce development programs, early childhood grants, youth job programs, healthcare research and home heating assistance under the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP). Share on Twitter More in Senate Franken: SNL is more fun than Senate

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Ex-S.C. Gov. Sanford officially announces run for Congress In this Aug. 28 photo, former S.C. Gov. Mark Sanford talks to a reporter in the floor at the Republican National Convention in Tampa, Fla. Nearly four years after his affair with an Argentine woman was exposed, Sanford announced his return to politics and will run for his old congressional seat. CHARLESTON — Former South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford confirmed Wednesday he is running for his old seat in Congress after a break from politics that followed his affair with an Argentine woman. The Republican, who was a strong fiscal conservative before the advent of the Tea Party, said Wednesday he wants to go back to Washington because spending is threatening the nation's future. Sanford is seeking the 1st District seat on the state's coast. Its former occupant, U.S. Rep. Tim Scott, was appointed to the U.S. Senate seat left vacant by the resignation of Sen. Jim DeMint.Sanford was considered a possible Republican presidential contender until he revealed in 2009 that he had an affair with an Argentine woman to whom he has since become engaged. He finished out his second term in 2011 and did not run for another office. The two-term governor was seen as a possible contender for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination before he vanished from South Carolina for five days in 2009 to visit his mistress in Argentina. Reporters and others were told he was hiking the Appalachian Trail. When he returned, Sanford was confronted at the airport by a reporter for The State newspaper, leading him to ultimately confess the affair in a tearful State House news conference. He later called Maria Belen Chapur his “soul mate” and the couple got engaged last summer. The international affair ended any hopes Sanford had of running for president and destroyed his marriage, which ended in divorce from his wife, Jenny. Jenny Sanford said Monday that, after considering the race, she will not seek the 1st District seat, saying being at home with her family was more important. “The idea of killing myself to run for a seat for the privilege of serving in a dysfunctional body under (House Speaker) John Boehner when I have an eighth-grader at home just really doesn't make sense to me,” she said. As for her ex-husband, she said “he did a good job as congressman and he has as much right as anybody else to run for Congress, and we'll see what happens.”� But, she added, “my ex-husband's going to have a number of questions to answer, and how he deals with them will make or break his campaign.” Before leaving office, Sanford avoided impeachment but was censured by the Legislature over state travel expenses he used for the affair. He also had paid what is still the largest ethics fine ever in South Carolina at $70,000. Sanford was elected to the 1st District seat in 1994 and served three terms before voters chose him as governor in 2002 and again in 2006. The district reaches south along the South Carolina coast from Charleston to the Georgia state line. Filing doesn't open until Friday, but another famous name got into the contest on Tuesday. Teddy Turner, the son of media magnate Ted Turner, announced he's holding a reception on Thursday to kick off his campaign for the GOP nomination. “Spending in Washington has gotten way out of control with no real efforts to cut spending while thousands go without jobs. It's frustrating and I believe I can bring fresh ideas to provide a path of creating jobs while fighting to control spending in Washington,” Turner said.

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Home > Press Room > Press Releases and Statements > 2009 > AILA Mourns the Loss of Senator Ted Kennedy AILA Mourns the Loss of Senator Ted Kennedy Cite as "AILA InfoNet Doc. No. 09082666 (posted Aug. 26, 2009)" FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: George Tzamaras gtzamaras@aila.org WASHINGTON, DC - Today the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA) recognizes the sad passing of Senator Ted Kennedy, the lion of the Senate, by honoring his heroic contributions to our nation. A lifetime public servant and distinguished leader of the Senate chamber, Senator Kennedy tirelessly worked to promote and protect the rights of all Americans and to welcome immigrants in pursuit of the American Dream. In 1965 during his first term as a U.S. Senator, Kennedy championed legislation to eliminate the existing immigration quotas that made it practically impossible for non-western Europeans to live, work, and thrive in the United States. Beginning with the 1965 bill, which removed discriminatory quotas and opened the doors to persons of all nations including immigrants from Latin American and Asian, up until the end of his life, Kennedy remained the Senate's most impassioned advocate for widening opportunities for America's newcomers. His conviction that America is a land of dreams, optimism, and opportunity was evident in his lifelong fight for real and meaningful immigration reform. He once said, "From the windows of my office in Boston … I can see the Golden Stairs from Boston Harbor where all eight of my great-grandparents set foot on this great land for the first time. That immigrant spirit of limitless possibility animates America even today." AILA President Bernard Wolfsdorf expressed his deep respect and admiration for Kennedy's leadership when he said, "From the refugees he helped resettle in 1980, to the workers whose status he helped adjust in 1986, to the highly skilled workers he helped bring to America in 1990, to the tens of millions of current and future Americans he wanted to help live the American dream in his 2006 legislation the Senator never gave up his crusade to maintain our great country as a nation of immigrants." "Like Ted Kennedy's family, I too came to America for a better life and Senator Ted Kennedy's commitment to protecting and preserving this great American ideal meant so much to me. He was my hero. His gifted speeches and determined, often bi-partisan, approach to lawmaking served as constant reminder that America is a place where all can thrive and contribute to building this great nation." The American Immigration Lawyers Association is the national association of immigration lawyers established to promote justice, advocate for fair and reasonable immigration law and policy, advance the quality of immigration and nationality law and practice, and enhance the professional development of its members.

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McCain, other US senators tour Mexico border Wednesday, Mar 27 at 1:37 PM NOGALES, Ariz. (AP) — A group of influential U.S. senators shaping and negotiating details of an immigration reform package vowed Wednesday to make the legislation public when Congress reconvenes next month as negotiations reopened between union workers and business groups over visas for low-skilled workers. The visa talks were left in limbo Friday as Congress went into recess, but the senators said both sides had signaled they were open to compromise and were finalizing details Wednesday. The reassurances came after the four senators — Republicans John McCain and Jeff Flake of Arizona and Democrats Chuck Schumer of New York and Michael Bennet of Colorado — toured the U.S.-Mexico border in Arizona to get a firsthand look at security issues affecting the region. They are all members of the so-called Gang of Eight — a bipartisan group that has spent recent weeks trying to craft proposed immigration legislation. "You can read and you can study and you can talk but until you see things it doesn't change reality," Schumer said. "I'll be able to explain it to my colleagues. Many of my colleagues say, 'Why do we need to do anything more on the border?' and we do." The trip came as the lawmakers wrap up a bill designed to secure the border and put 11 million illegal immigrants on a path to citizenship. President Barack Obama has urged Congress to pass immigration reform this year, and border security is critical to McCain and other Republicans who contend that some areas along the border are far from secure. The senators toured the border Wednesday by ground and air, reviewing manned and unmanned drones and different types of fences. They also watched as vehicles going and coming into Mexico were scrutinized by border agents at the checkpoint in Nogales, Arizona. "In so many ways, whatever your views are on immigration, Arizona is ground zero," Schumer said. "What I learned today is we have adequate manpower, but not adequate technology." With top Republicans and Democrats focused on the issue, immigration reform faces its best odds in years. The proposed legislation will likely put illegal immigrants on a 13-year path to citizenship and would install new criteria for border security, allow more high- and low-skilled workers to come to the U.S. and hold businesses to tougher standards on verifying their workers are in the country legally. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the AFL-CIO, negotiating through the Gang of Eight senators, had reached significant agreement Friday on a new visa program to bring up to 200,000 lower-skilled workers a year to the country, but talks were temporarily put on pause after the groups did not reach consensus on how much the workers would be paid. Flake said both sides were showing new signs of flexibility and multiple phone calls were being exchanged on the issue Wednesday. The bill is expected to be lengthy and cover numerous issues, including limiting family-based immigration to put a greater emphasis on skills and employment ties instead. McCain and Schumer promised that it would pay for itself, while cautioning that their proposed border security package will be costly. "Nobody is going to be totally happy with this legislation, no one will be because we have to make compromises," McCain said. Bennet said the Gang of Eight has agreed to place border security before a path to citizenship, but no one supports double-sided fences along the length of the U.S.-Mexico border. Some lawmakers in Arizona want more border fences. "There is not one simple solution to the issue of border security," Bennet said. "This isn't as simple as someone on the East Coast saying 'We need a fence everywhere or we don't.'" The senators stressed only comprehensive immigration reform, not piecemeal solutions, had any hope of passing both chambers of Congress. "We are not going to slice it up," McCain said. The legislation was initially promised in March. Immigration proponents have said the group needs to introduce legislation soon, while some Republican lawmakers complain the process has moved too quickly. If passed, the legislation could usher in the most sweeping changes in immigration law in nearly 30 years. Cristina Silva can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/cristymsilva

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Topics Government Pat Quinn Pat Quinn Pat Quinn became governor of Illinois on Jan. 29, 2009, after Gov. Rod Blagojevich was impeached and removed from office on corruption charges. Quinn was elected to a full term Nov. 2, 2010. The Democrat was lieutenant governor of Illinois from 2002 to 2009. He served as state treasurer from 1991 to 1995, was a commissioner on the Cook County Board of Property Tax Appeals and revenue director for the city of Chicago. Quinn, who was raised in Hinsdale, has degrees from Northwestern University School of Law and Georgetown University School of Foreign Service. He has two sons. Related "Pat Quinn" Articles Clout Street Diana Rauner, Illinois' next first lady, to stay focused on early education Michelle Manchir A few days before the election, a Chicago radio host introduced Bruce Rauner and wife Diana, telling listeners "behind every great man is a great woman." "In front sometimes too," replied Bruce Rauner, laughing. Diana Rauner is... Come Thursday, enjoy the raise you won Nov. 4 Congratulations on your raise! On Thursday, the four-year income tax hikes that Gov. Pat Quinn signed into law will begin to roll back. You'll keep more of the money you earn. Your raise also is a victory because you won it. The Nov. 4 election for... Illinois, protect your wildlife As a former Illinois resident currently (and unfortunately) residing in Wisconsin, I urge all Illinois residents to be outraged over the proposed bill before Gov. Pat Quinn to allow the resumption of the trophy hunting and/or trapping of bobcats. As the... Second Take Photos I'll remember from 2014 Brian Cassella As many people do at the end of a year, I took time today to collect my best work. Some might be worth entering in a contest, but others represent moments I'll remember most from a busy twelve months. My year started off with a career highlight as I...

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