Biden to Dems: "We Could Lose" to Ted Cruz

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Biden to Dems: "We Could Lose" to Ted Cruz

Obama: Putin will lose — eventually

Obama has dismissed Russia as a ‘regional power.’ | Getty

BRUSSELS — President Barack Obama said Wednesday that Vladimir Putin is just the latest in a series of history’s losers, comparing the Russian leader to those who came up short in World War I, World War II, the Cold War, the American civil rights movement, apartheid, and other major 20th century struggles.

Time’s on his side, Obama argued. People always struggle to be free and eventually succeed — and they will in Russia too, even if for now it’s ruled by a flouter of international law and obstinate believer in “that recycled maxim that might somehow makes right.”

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Of course, Putin — who waited six years between the last time he grabbed land from another country and marching into Crimea — seems to feel the clock’s in his corner. His grand ambitions to reunite all ethnic Russians under one flag and reassert Russian dominance in the world are clear — but as a man who’s 61 and been in power for 14 years straight already, he has time to wait for Western passions to fade, and the next opportunity to arrive.

(Also on POLITICO: Obama: ‘Not another Cold War’)

Putin waited six years between the last time he grabbed land from another country and marching into Crimea. His grand ambitions to reunite all ethnic Russians under one flag and reassert Russian dominance in the world are clear — but as a man who’s 61 and been in power for 14 years straight already, he has time to wait for sudden Western interest in Kiev to fade, and the next opportunity to arrive.

A day after dismissing Russia as a “regional power,” Obama’s speech — delivered in the Palace of Beaux-Arts in Brussels, full of aspirational rhetoric and billed by the White House as a major address — focused on the global challenge that Putin has created in Ukraine.

“Russia’s leadership is challenging truths that only a few weeks ago seemed self-evident: that in the 21st century, the borders of Europe cannot be redrawn with force, that international law matters; and that people and nations can make their own decisions about their future,” Obama said.

(PHOTOS: 20 great quotes on Putin and Obama)

Putin might have hoped that the world wouldn’t care or will eventually stop paying attention, Obama said, but “that kind of casual indifference would ignore the lessons that are written in the cemeteries of this continent. It would allow the old way of doing things to gain a foothold in this young century. And that message would be heard — not just in Europe, but in Asia and the Americas, in Africa and the Middle East.”

The president used the platform of the European capital to deliver his rebuttal to the anti-Western speech to the Russian Duma Putin delivered last week, fresh off of signing the paperwork on Crimea. Obama knocked back Putin’s argument that the circumstances surrounding the Iraq War were the same as those in Crimea, even as he acknowledged that he himself had opposed the war as wrong. He called Russian claims of American instigation in Maidan Square “absurd,” adding, “no amount of propaganda can make right something that the world knows is wrong.”

And in a direct smack at Putin’s ego, Obama dismissed the idea of a new Cold War, because “unlike the Soviet Union, Russia leads no bloc of nations, no global ideology.”

(Also on POLITICO: McCain: Russia is a ‘gas station’)

“Russia,” Obama said at a press conference with the presidents of the E.U. Council and European Commission, “stands alone.”

A 21st Century tear-down-this-wall speech this wasn’t. For all his condemnation, while Obama ruled out military force as an option in Russia, he didn’t do much to explain precisely what he or the world should do next, other than threatening even more intense sanctions and isolation which, he insisted, must come “together” — a word he repeated six times — from the international community.

POLITICO – TOP Stories

Obama: Putin will lose — eventually

We Did Not ‘Lose’ Iraq But it is America’s job to help Baghdad beat back the new threat from al Qaeda

James Jeffrey
foreignpolicy.com
February 10, 2014

Editor’s note: It’s not called forever war for nothing.

Iraq has made an unwelcome return to the American public consciousness. In late December, the al Qaeda-linked Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) seized considerable territory in the predominantly Sunni Anbar province. Its gains included neighborhoods in the city of Fallujah, the site of an epic U.S. battle against al Qaeda in 2004, rekindling American fears that its old enemies have gained the upper hand in a region where the United States sacrificed so much blood and treasure.

President Barack Obama’s administration is doing the right thing by increasing intelligence and operational cooperation with the Iraqi government, sending weapons to the Iraqi army, and moving forward on attack helicopter transfers. At the same time, the administration is correctly pushing Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki to govern more inclusively, as his marginalization of the Sunni Arab minority has contributed to al Qaeda’s appeal among the community.

But despite Maliki’s flaws, the United States should wholeheartedly work with him in combating the jihadist threat. He is, after all, the elected leader of a critically important country, and the aid we are providing serves the vast majority of the Iraqi people in a desperate fight against a merciless enemy. It is obviously a core U.S. national interest to block al Qaeda from establishing yet another base in an ungoverned territory. This is particularly true in the case of Iraq, which if stable can provide oil exports of 6 million barrels a day by 2020 — an output that would have a hugely positive impact on the global economy. Moreover, given the American sacrifice there, failure to help defend Iraq against a sworn enemy would further undercut U.S. credibility in the Middle East.

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This article was posted: Tuesday, February 11, 2014 at 1:49 pm

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Infowars

We Did Not ‘Lose’ Iraq But it is America’s job to help Baghdad beat back the new threat from al Qaeda

Oil, Natural-gas Futures Lose Ground

LOS ANGELES –  New York-traded oil and natural-gas futures lost ground in electronic trade Monday, with a slightly firmer U.S. dollar among the factors weighing on the contracts. Benchmark U.S. crude oil for March delivery fell 21 cents, or 0.2%, to $ 97.28 a barrel, extending a 0.8% retreat Friday on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Brent crude for March , however, was little changed, adding 2 cents to trade at $ 106.42 a barrel. March natural gas extended its sharp downward trend, losing 11 cents, or 2.3%, to $ 4.83 per million British thermal units, with the loss coming on top of a 1.4% drop Friday.

Copyright © 2014 MarketWatch, Inc.

FOX Business

Oil, Natural-gas Futures Lose Ground

Turning down the thermostat can help you lose weight, study says

Americans love to crank up the thermostat, especially in bitterly cold times like these.

But a new study suggests turning it down a few degrees could actually help you lose weight.

We know. Not what you wanted to hear right now.

More from GlobalPost: What is a polar vortex? (And when is it going away?)

But Dutch researchers say regular exposure to mildly cold temperatures can make your body burn more calories to keep warm.

“Since most of us are exposed to indoor conditions 90 percent of the time, it is worth exploring health aspects of ambient temperatures,” lead author Wouter van Marken Lichtenbelt told CNN. “What would it mean if we let our bodies work again to control body temperature?”

Lichtenbelt and his team have been studying the phenomena for the past 10 years.

While most animals (humans included) shiver to stay warm, another type of shivering — called non-shivering thermogenesis — occurs when the temperature is cool but not cold, according to the research.

More from GlobalPost: US job growth falters as cold weather grips the nation

That type of shivering, activating what’s called “brown fat,” can burn up to 30 percent of the body’s energy and contribute to weight loss.

Brown fat, discovered in adults in 2009, burns calories instead of storing them like white fat.

So does this mean you should crank the heat down to 55 degrees and frolic about in a tank top and underwear?

Not necessarily. It’s more theory at this point, but researchers also said it wouldn’t hurt.

“It would do no harm,” Dr. Mitchell Lazar, chief of the division of endocrinology, diabetes and metabolism at the University of Pennsylvania, told HealthDay. “It’s worth a try for someone who is having trouble losing weight by diet and exercise alone.”

http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/health/140122/turning-down-thermostat-can-help-lose-weight-study

GlobalPost – Home

Turning down the thermostat can help you lose weight, study says

Texas Republicans Lose 3 Major Donors in 2013

The deaths this year of three major Texas Republican donors could signal a generational change for party kingmakers in the nation’s largest GOP stronghold.

Dallas billionaire Harold Simmons, who died Saturday, helped transform Texas to a Republican stronghold. Two other major contributors, homebuilder Bob Perry and businessman Leo Linbeck Jr., also died this year.

Republican operatives say it leaves a question mark for Republican candidates and political organizations that have relied on them in the past.

The deaths also come as six of the state’s top seven officeholders are moving on.

Experts say the changes are expected to help grass-roots and tea party activists battle for control of the Texas GOP beyond 2014. They also note that oil discoveries are producing a whole new generation of wealthy Republican donor.

© Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Newsmax – Politics

Texas Republicans Lose 3 Major Donors in 2013

CNN: Obamacare Is Causing Americans To Lose Access To Their Doctors, Face Higher Costs

CNN: Obamacare Is Causing Americans To Lose Access To Their Doctors, Face Higher Costs

CNN reports on insurers dumping doctors from their networks and other Obamacare woes.

RealClearPolitics Video Log

CNN: Obamacare Is Causing Americans To Lose Access To Their Doctors, Face Higher Costs

Bankers Win, Workers Lose

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Bankers Win, Workers Lose

In 2010 Obama Admitted 8 or 9 Million Americans Would Lose Health Care Plans

President Obama admitted in 2010 that 8 or 9 million Americans will lose their health care plan due to Obamacare.
Obama made the comments during a White House summit on Obamacare.

The Daily Caller reported:

President Barack Obama admitted in 2010 that 8 or 9 million Americans would lose their existing health insurance plans under Obamacare.

“The 8 to 9 million people that you refer to that might have to change their coverage — keep in mind out of the 300 million Americans that we’re talking about — would be folks who the CBO, Congressional Budget Office, estimates would find the deal in the exchange better,” Obama said to Rep. Eric Cantor at a February 25, 2010 White House summit on health insurance regulation.

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The Gateway Pundit

In 2010 Obama Admitted 8 or 9 Million Americans Would Lose Health Care Plans

Germans lose trust in US, see NSA whistleblower Snowden as hero – poll

Published time: November 08, 2013 17:34

A supporter of the Anonymous group wearing a Guy Fawkes mask holds up a placard featuring a photo of US intelligence leaker Edward Snowden and reads “A true American Hero!” during a rally in front of Berlin’s landmark Brandenburg Gate on November 5, 2013. (AFP Photo / DPA / Florian Schun / Germany out)

Germans’ confidence in the US as a trustworthy partner has plummeted following the NSA scandal, while Edward Snowden, who exposed America’s spying on its allies, is considered a hero by 60 percent of the population, a poll shows.

The recent chain of scandals over US global snooping has seriously damaged the opinion of Germans about their longtime ally.

Only 35 percent still see Washington as a reliable partner – a drop of 14 percent since July, according to a survey conducted by public broadcaster ARD and Die Welt daily. This year’s figures are a massive drop from the situation at the start of President Barack Obama’s presidency, when he was given an enthusiastic welcome on his first official visit to Berlin, and 76 percent of Germans said they trusted the US government in a Nov. 2009 poll. 

US President Barack Obama’s personal approval rating with Germans has also plummeted. Once a highly popular foreign politician, now Obama enjoys support from only 43 percent of Germans, while over half are unhappy with his performance. 

German Chancellor Angela Merkel – whose private mobile phone was also allegedly bugged by American security services – warned earlier that spying among friends was unacceptable. She made it clear to Obama that if the information was proven to be true, it would represented a “grave breach of trust.” Merkel also demanded that Washington sign up to a ‘no-spying’ agreement with Berlin and Paris by the end of this year.

But most Germans are not about to be fooled a second time around, it seems. Over 90 percent think that the Americans would breach a no-spying agreement anyway and continue their surveillance activities, the survey found.

Meanwhile, six out of 10 Germans consider NSA whistleblower Snowden a hero, with only 14 percent of those polled saying that the 30-year-old security specialist was a criminal. However, respondents were fairly evenly split on whether he should be given asylum in Germany: 46 percent were in favor, and 48 percent against.

German officials have ruled out granting Snowden political asylum, arguing that the NSA whistleblower is “not a political refugee.”

Merkel reaffirmed Monday the importance of Berlin’s ties with Washington, making it clear that Germany would not take any steps that might harm relations with the US. 

“The trans-Atlantic alliance remains for us Germans of exceptional importance,” Merkel’s spokesman Steffen Seibert told reporters in Berlin. “There is hardly a country that has profited as much from this partnership and friendship as Germany… and this will guide the chancellor in all future decisions.”

However, Germany wants Snowden to testify concerning espionage allegations against the US and the UK. Currently, Germany is considering the possibility of questioning Snowden in Moscow, where he has been since June. 

Snowden, who faces espionage charges in the US, was provided with temporary asylum in Russia in August.

RT – News

Germans lose trust in US, see NSA whistleblower Snowden as hero – poll

900,000 to lose health insurance in California as Obamacare disaster spreads

(NaturalNews) “If you like your plan, you can keep it.” These famous words, which were literally stated by Usurper Obama dozens of times during his Affordable Care Act hawking days, have proven to be a blatantly bald-faced lie. As reported by SFGate, some 900,000 Californians are expected to lose their existing healthcare coverage come December 31, adding to the millions of others from other states who will also reportedly lose their plans.

Peter Lee, Executive Director of “Covered California,” California’s Obamacare health insurance exchange, recently told the editorial board of the San Fransisco Chronicle that the individual market for health insurance is “changing dramatically.” Lee admitted, though sheepishly and with his own heavy dose of glossy rhetoric, that Usurper Obama essentially lied about people being able to keep their coverage and that many people will have to choose new plans.

When asked if the nearly 1 million Californians losing their coverage will have to pay more under Obamacare, Lee ‘fessed up that “some individuals will pay more.” But he was unable to delineate who would have to pay more, and how much more they would have to pay. Instead, he quickly changed the subject to Obamacare’s other alleged improvements over private insurance, which are all presumably lies just like the “if you like your plan, you can keep it” nonsense.

Usurper Obama’s rhetoric “may have been an inarticulate way of describing what the realities are,” Lee is quoted as saying, in what may be the grossest political understatement of the year.

Meanwhile, U.S. Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius is taking the fall for the ongoing Obamacare nightmare. During a recent testimony before Congress, Sebelius told the listening crowd to blame her, not Obama, for all of Obamacare’s problems, which she openly admitted will only get worse. She actually referred to Obamacare’s “disruption of the existing health insurance market” as being “far broader than recent media coverage implied.”

But it gets worse. A recently unearthed report that was quietly filed in the Federal Register back in 2010 explains how the Obama administration knew all along that the illegal legislation would create massive chaos. In fact, the report explains that Obama officials were fully aware some three years ago that nearly one-third of all Americans would lose their coverage, which means that Usurper Obama has repeatedly lied under oath with his infamous statement about people keeping their existing coverage.

“It turns out that in an obscure report buried in a June 2010 edition of the Federal Register, administration officials predicted massive disruption of the private insurance market,” writes Avik Roy for Forbes. “As to the number of people facing cancellations, 51 percent of the employer-based market plus 53.5 percent of the non-group market (the middle of the administration’s range) amounts to 93 million Americans.”

So much for keeping your coverage if you like it. In reality, Obamacare will force tens of millions of Americans to either sacrifice their existing health coverage or pay far more for a rough equivalent. If ever there was a time to impeach the Usurper for his egregious offenses against the working and middle classes of America, this time is now.

“If private insurance was already unaffordable for many — which it was — then how could anyone with a brain imagine that adding layers of government bureaucracy, and subsidizing those who can’t afford insurance, could possibly do anything except cause premiums to go up drastically, and cause some insurers to drop out of providing individual coverage entirely?” asks one articulate commenter at SFGate.com.

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http://www.forbes.com

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900,000 to lose health insurance in California as Obamacare disaster spreads

Bondholders lose bid to lift stay in Argentina litigation

Bondholders lose bid to lift stay in Argentina litigation
http://currenteconomictrendsandnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/f91bf__p-89EKCgBk8MZdE.gif

NEW YORK | Fri Nov 1, 2013 11:45am EDT

NEW YORK (Reuters) – A U.S. appeals court declined Friday to lift a freeze on an order requiring Argentina to pay $ 1.33 billion in favor of bondholders suing for repayment in the wake of the country’s 2002 default.

The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York denied a motion to lift a stay it issued in favor of Argentina pending U.S. Supreme Court review of a ruling in favor of holdout bondholders.

The request to lift the stay was made October 15 by bondholders led by hedge funds Elliott Management Corp’s NML Capital Ltd and Aurelius Capital Management LP.

(Reporting by Nate Raymond in New York; Editing by Gerald E. McCormick)

Reuters: Business News

Read more about Bondholders lose bid to lift stay in Argentina litigation and other interesting subjects concerning Business at TheDailyNewsReport.com

Eminem - Just Lose It Backwards

Learn about the Mysteries in Music:

How to Lose Friends and Influence in the Middle East

The Obama administration’s foreign policy line in Egypt has been nothing short of disastrous. While the Arab Spring began as a homegrown protest movement, with thousands of foreign citizens demanding very American values, the White House has continued to firmly side with Islamist parties instead of more moderate voices. The latest step is punishing Egypt’s transitional military-led government through large cuts in U.S. aid.

The scene was one of tragic irony. As millions of Egyptians protested in Egypt’s Tahrir Square last July, those holding anti-American signs were the young, educated, and normally Western-leaning, while bearded pro-Morsi supporters carried banners praising Obama’s Egypt policy. Egypt’s young politically active generation, religiously moderate and valuing greater political freedoms, should be the generation closest to the U.S. These are the young Egyptians that flocked to hear a recently inaugurated President Obama speak in Cairo in 2009. The fact that the opposite is true shows how backwards things have become.

Four years after Obama’s famous ‘speech to the Arab world,’ Obama and America’s credibility have taken a turn for the worse in Egypt. The current anti-Americanism among Egyptians is largely due to a failure to respond effectively to the Arab Spring. Few accurately predicted the scale and momentum of the phenomenon, where grassroots protests ousted dictators in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya (the latter with a little help from the rest of the world) and destabilized authoritarian regimes to a greater or lesser extent in Bahrain, Yemen, Syria, Iran, and Morocco.

Despite the suddenness of the Arab Spring, however, the movement held great potential for the U.S. to re-engage a region where anti-American sentiment has dominated for the past decade. After 8 years of attempting unsuccessfully to force our ‘American values’ on the Middle East in Iraq and Afghanistan, the entire region suddenly seemed to rise up demanding direct democracy, freedom of speech, and economic liberty. It was a neoconservative dream come true. But following the first Egyptian election, which brought the Muslim Brotherhood to power in 2012, the Obama administration made a series of bad decisions.

How did we get here?

Shortly after Mohamed Morsi was declared President of Egypt on June 17th, 2012, it became clear that the Muslim Brotherhood was taking Egypt in the wrong direction. Three months after he was sworn in, President Morsi issued a decree conferring himself with the power to bypass his country’s judicial system and pass laws directly. He later came under fire for convicting NGO workers, including 19 Americans, of secretly working for the foreign governments and looking the other way when sectarian violence against Egyptian Christians occurred.

These troubling trends, combined with the fact that the Muslim Brotherhood refused to compromise with opposition parties and persistent political and economic instability, led millions to demand the end of Morsi’s calamitous rule last July. One would think that the United States would welcome a popular uprising against an increasingly dictatorial Morsi. However, in words and deeds, the Obama administration has made clear that its support lies with the Muslim Brotherhood, and is now punishing Egypt for deposing Morsi.

Standing with the wrong side

The White House has continually supported Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood because of their legitimate victory in the 2012 Egyptian elections, which is understandable. While Morsi did hold democratic legitimacy in the technical sense, winning a slim 51.7% of votes, it would be a stretch to make him out to be a champion of democracy. A refusal to partake in discussions with political opponents and decreeing oneself the powers of a “Pharaoh” is hardly democratic, and Morsi was and is not someone deserving of blind American support.

Anger has especially been directed to U.S. ambassador to Egypt, Anne Patterson, who discouraged street protests against the Morsi regime in June 2013 and met with senior Muslim Brotherhood officials during the country’s ‘second revolution’. Now, Patterson is in line for a promotion within the State Department.

The most recent development in American foreign policy towards Egypt is the gravest. President Obama has ordered a cut in aid for the Egyptian military to punish a government crackdown on extremist islamists. Although the prospect of paying less out to countries that hate us seems appealing to most Americans, the Egyptian military is all that is currently holding Egypt together, and to let it fall apart without U.S. aid money would most likely see Egypt fall both into chaos and outside our orbit of influence for the foreseeable future.

The risk that the military, which currently holds political power in Egypt, may never step aside for the emergence of a truly democratic state is real, but so far they have given us no reason to think this. The U.S. should give Egypt’s new set of political players at least half the chance it gave the Muslim Brotherhood, which most knew were trouble from the start.

Aaron Kovac is an EU affairs analyst currently based in Brussels, Belgium.

American Thinker

How to Lose Friends and Influence in the Middle East

Liberals Should Lose This Affirmative Action Case

(Newser) – The Supreme Court has another high-profile affirmative action case on the docket this year, and it likely won’t fare well with the court’s conservative majority. But liberals shouldn’t fret, writes Emily Bazelon at Slate, because this is actually the right decision in the march toward equal-opportunity education. “The current huge fairness problem in university admissions isn’t race-based,” she argues. “It’s class-based.” This year’s case, Schuette v. Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action, is about whether states have the right to ban schools from using affirmative action policies.

Ten states have such a ban, and it is at schools in those states “where the most interesting socioeconomic alternatives are unfolding,” writes Bazelon. “The Supreme Court won’t stand in the way of those experiments. And it shouldn’t.” What the court should do, however, is encourage all states to get more poor kids into higher education, no matter their color. “That’s the fairness we need most.” Click for her full column. (For a dissenting view on how the court should decide in the upcoming case, click for a New York Times editorial.)

Politics from Newser

Liberals Should Lose This Affirmative Action Case

Lamestream Media: TV titans lose US viewers over slanted stories

Lamestream Media: TV titans lose US viewers over slanted stories

Monty Python lose "Spamalot" court battle

Monty Python members Eric Idle (R) and Terry Jones return to the High Court after a lunch break in central London December 4, 2012.

Credit: Reuters/Andrew Winning

By Li-mei Hoang

LONDON | Fri Jul 5, 2013 10:48am EDT

LONDON (Reuters) – The surviving members of the British comedy troupe Monty Python lost a High Court battle on Friday over tens of thousands of pounds in royalties from their hit Broadway musical “Spamalot”.

Mark Forstater, who helped produce the 1975 film “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” on which the stage show was based, said he had not received his fair share of the profits from the spin-off.

Despite hearing evidence from three Pythons – Eric Idle, Michael Palin and Terry Jones – the judge, Justice Alastair Norris, sided with the producer.

“I have always been adamant I was correct. I have been proved right – justice has prevailed,” Forstater said.

Inspired by the film, the musical opened on Broadway in 2005 and has also enjoyed a successful run in Britain. Idle wrote the lyrics and collaborated on most of the music.

Forstater, an American based in Britain, argued that he was entitled to one-seventh of the profits from the “Holy Grail” film and any merchandise or spin-offs.

His lawyer told the court that for the purposes of profit-sharing, it had been agreed in 1974 that Forstater was “the seventh Python”.

However Palin, along with Jones and Idle, who formed Monty Python with John Cleese, Terry Gilliam and Graham Chapman, dismissed this suggestion.

“The idea of a seventh Python just doesn’t happen … I don’t think there was ever any suggestion this man was going to be a ‘seventh Python’,” said Palin, giving evidence in December.

In his judgment, Norris said Palin had been a “balanced and trustworthy” witness but had admitted his recollection was “hazy”, while evidence from Jones had been “suffused with a sense that Mr Forstater had done very well out of his brief connection with the Pythons”.

“Eric Idle was frank enough to acknowledge that he now disliked Mr Forstater, but he expressed the hope that, in his evidence, he was being honest and that his dislike did not affect his honesty,” Norris said.

“He undoubtedly regarded Mr Forstater as ungrateful.”

“SOFT LOT”

His ruling also made reference to the Pythons’ lack of business acumen, highlighting a diary entry from Palin in 1975.

“As we are a soft lot and not at all businesslike, I think it would be in the finest traditions of Python irrationality if we gave Mark an extra 1,000 pounds and a silver tray with some cut-glass sherry glasses and told him to stop writing to us for more money,” Palin wrote.

“Beyond that even I am not prepared to go. Oh, all right, some cheese straws to go with the sherry glasses.”

The judge added: “As I assess the evidence, the Pythons continued at that point to be ‘a soft lot and not at all businesslike’.”

No members of the Python group were present in court to hear the ruling.

Final figures will be worked out at later hearings but Forstater told reporters he was entitled to more than 200,000 pounds ($ 300,000) including interest, the Press Association reported.

“There is a sadness, though, about having to face people who were my friends in court,” he said. “The friendship has gone.”

Forstater said he did not think the litigation would damage the Pythons’ reputation. “They’re an institution,” he said. “I still think they are very funny.”

(Editing by Michael Holden and Janet Lawrence)

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Monty Python lose "Spamalot" court battle

VIDEO: Lucy Liu: How She Lost Those Last 5 Pounds!

You wouldn’t think this martial arts vixen would have a problem with her weight. But tough girl Lucy Liu reveals her biggest battle was losing those last five pounds. And she won thanks to a combo of Pilates, running and a little help from the cast of Downton Abbey! The 44-year-old star of the CBS show, Elementary, tells Fitness Magazine she’s been carrying an extra five pounds for years, and although it may not sound like a lot, for her height, it makes a big difference.

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VIDEO: Lucy Liu: How She Lost Those Last 5 Pounds!