WASHINGTON
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday approved legislation to temporarily avert looming pay cuts for doctors under the government’s Medicare health insurance program for older Americans and the disabled.
The measure was approved in a voice vote.
Tuesday 18th February 2014 | 18:38
Labour party press release
Jamie Reed MP, Labour’s Shadow Health Minister, responding to reports that plans to share health records will be delayed until later this year, said
“This is another NHS shambles of this Government’s own making.
“It’s right that NHS England has now decided to delay the introduction of Care.data – a decision which looked increasingly inevitable after the Government was unable to answer key questions about their plans.
“Along with health professionals, we raised concerns about the security of the data to be shared. Patients need to be assured that their records will be genuinely anonymous and that they have had the opportunity to opt-out.
“Ministers need to ensure these safeguards are in place and that it is the Secretary of State who is accountable for the use of patients’ data.”
Good morning. It’s Tuesday, February 11, the birthdays of inventor Thomas Edison, former governors Jeb Bush and Sarah Palin, Sen. Tammy Baldwin, actor Burt Reynolds, singer Sheryl Crow, and professional surfer Kelly Slater.
An 11-time world champion, Slater blew the judges’ minds—they gave him a perfect 10—for his artistry in the pipeline at a pro tour event in Hawaii last week. Today he turns 42. Happy birthday, dude.
When George Washington was a boy in Virginia, he would have celebrated February 11, 1731, as his birthday. But in 1752 Great Britain and its colonies switched from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar, which made the future general one year and 11 days “younger”—as Washington’s birthday is now demarked as February 22, 1732.
Tonight, Barack and Michelle Obama host a state dinner in honor of Francois Hollande, the president of France. Yesterday, Obama took his counterpart on a trip to Monticello, the estate of France’s former ambassador and good friend Thomas Jefferson. The president showed Hollande a sweeping view of the Virginia countryside from a Monticello terrace normally barred to tourists. “That’s the good thing as a president,” Obama quipped. “I can do whatever I want.”
Monday was perhaps not the right day to offer that witticism, as White House officials were simultaneously confirming that the administration had unilaterally executed yet another delay in implementing key components of the Affordable Care Act. But in the morning note this week we are concentrating on other historical events, namely, interesting mileposts in the relationship between France and the United States this week.
In that spirit, we note that 60 years ago today, President Eisenhower convened a top-secret meeting of the White House National Security Council. The subject: how the U.S. could assist the French in their quest to hold onto its colonial empire in Vietnam.
I’ll have more on that ominous meeting in a moment, after first pointing you to our front page, where we aggregate stories and columns spanning the political spectrum. We also offer a complement of original material from RCP’s staff and contributors:
* * *
GOP Irked by New Delay of Obamacare Mandate. Republicans expressed outrage Monday after the administration again extended deadlines for employers to comply with the law. Alexis Simendinger has the story.
Do Demographics Really Work Against the GOP? Sean Trende takes issue with a fellow analyst’s commentary that Republicans need to heed demographic trends and “reach groups that have not traditionally been supportive” of the party.
Nonbeliever PAC Gets Into the Midterm Game. Jose Gonzalez reports on a new political action committee dedicated to supporting humanist ideals and candidates opposed to religious influence on government policy.
Christie-Led RGA Sets Fundraising Record. Adam O’Neal has the numbers.
Clay Aiken Running for Congress as Defense Hawk. The onetime “American Idol” celeb surprised many observers by announcing his candidacy. But as Adam reports, the openly gay political novice had another surprise in store in his first campaign video.
Poll: Coloradans Say Pot Law Hurts State’s Image. Adam has the details here too.
10 Surprising Facts About the Sochi Games. RealClearSports reprises this info-graphic.
Was Mantle Was Better Than Mays? Also in RCS, Sheldon Hirsch lays out his case.
* * *
More than eight years after the end of World War II, the situation was deteriorating rapidly for the French forces in Indochina. France had requested—and had been given—American military assistance in the form of 200 U.S. airmen, various warplanes, and some replacement parts and mechanics.
It wasn’t proving nearly enough, and at the White House, Dwight D. Eisenhower convened a top-secret war council that included three cabinet officials, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and top presidential advisers.
“The President commented on the extraordinary confusion in the reports which reached him from the area of Indochina,” according to the now-declassified notes of the meeting taken by the NSC staff. “There were almost as many judgments as there were authors of messages. There were, nevertheless, only two critical factors in the situation. The first was to win over the Vietnamese population; the other to instill some spirit into the French.”
Henry Cabot Lodge Jr., Eisenhower’s recently appointed U.S. ambassador to the U.N., who had had a great deal of experience dealing with the French, said “that if you get behind them and push hard enough they will do what is required.”
Eisenhower responded to this sentiment indirectly, according to the minutes of the meeting, and in two ways. First, he said he’d concluded that it was probably time for a change of ambassadors in Vietnam, which is ironic, because John F. Kennedy would later give that thankless job to Lodge.
Ike also subtly reminded his advisers that he himself had some experience with the French—and with war—by offering a prescient thought:
“The President commented that the mood of discouragement came from the evident lack of a spiritual force among the French and the Vietnamese. This was a commodity which it was excessively difficult for one nation to supply to another.”
Carl M. Cannon
Washington Bureau Chief
RealClearPolitics
Twitter: @CarlCannon
We update throughout the day at www.realclearpolitics.com.
U.S. companies allowed to delay disclosure of data breaches
http://s1.reutersmedia.net/resources/r/?m=02&d=20140116&t=2&i=830102560&w=580&fh=&fw=&ll=&pl=&r=CBREA0F1J7H00
NEW YORK
People shop at a Target store during Black Friday sales in the Brooklyn borough of New York, November 29, 2013. Black Friday, the day following Thanksgiving Day holiday, has traditionally been the busiest shopping day in the United States.
Credit: Reuters/Eric Thayer
NEW YORK (Reuters) – A decade of lawmaking by U.S. states to ensure consumers are told when their data has been hacked still lets companies such as Target Corp wait weeks or even months to disclose security breaches.
Forty-six of 50 U.S. states have passed laws requiring disclosure, starting with California in 2002, but the laws vary in terms of when and how notice must be given, and most states allow for delays to investigate the intrusion.
Calls for federal action, including by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, have gone unheeded by Congress. And guidelines to safeguard investors in public companies also do not give clear guidance on timing and do not require disclosures that would compromise a company’s cyber security.
Consumer advocates have criticized Target, where data from 40 million credit and debit cards and 70 million other records containing customer information was stolen.
State attorneys general are probing the breach. Target says it acted quickly after taking defensive action.
“It’s a judgment call,” said Joseph DeMarco, a former head of the cyber crime unit at the U.S. Attorney’s office in Manhattan, citing the time it takes for companies to find out what happened.
“A breach investigation could take weeks or months before you know enough to have a legal obligation to disclose.”
Target, the third-largest U.S. retailer, said on December 19 that hackers had stolen data from up to 40 million credit and debit cards of shoppers who visited its stores between November 27 and December 15.
Chief Executive Gregg Steinhafel said that Target made its announcement four days after it “confirmed that we had an issue.” The retailer has not said when it first learned of the break-in.
Then, on January 10, the company said the breach was bigger than initially thought: that hackers also stole personal information of 70 million customers.
Another retailer, Neiman Marcus, said last Friday that it was warned about a possible breach in mid-December and that an outside forensics firm confirmed the intrusion on January 1.
Both the Target and Neiman Marcus breaches were first revealed publicly by an independent blogger.
In addition, three other retailers suffered breaches during the holiday shopping season that have yet to be publicly disclosed, according to sources familiar with the attacks.
PATCHWORK OF LAWS
California was the first state to pass a law requiring disclosure of a hack, and its rules remain among the toughest.
The state requires notification when unencrypted personal information is reasonably believed to have been taken by an unauthorized person. The notices must describe the information at risk, give the date of the intrusion, say whether the notice was delayed, and provide the name and contact information for the company.
Still, California’s statute gives some leeway. It demands disclosure in “the most expedient time possible and without unreasonable delay,” taking into consideration law enforcement needs and time for the company to restore the integrity of its system.
“The first order of business regardless of any state law is to plug the hole, protect the user and then worry about reporting,” said Albert Gidari, a lawyer who has helped companies deal with dozens of security breach investigations and issue notices to consumers.
Only a handful of states require notice by a specific deadline. Florida, Vermont and Wisconsin, for example, give entities 45 days from the date of discovery. But even those states allow exceptions, such as when disclosure could hinder a police investigation.
Some states require that consumers be notified once certain types of information are accessed without authorization, while a greater number let companies evaluate the risk of identity theft and other harm to consumers in deciding whether to notify.
Susan Lyon-Hintze, another lawyer who works with victimized companies, said it was risky to disclose too early, which would tip off hackers to investigations. “That can actually lead to more harm for consumers in the long run,” she said. “They’ll shut down their operations and move onto the next company.”
PROTECTING SALES?
Jamie Court, president of Los Angeles-based public interest group Consumer Watchdog, said the timing of the Target and Neiman Marcus announcements raises questions about whether the retailers wrongly delayed telling consumers. He called on state attorneys general to look into whether companies failed to disclose their breaches to maintain sales over the holidays.
Target spokeswoman Molly Snyder said the company acted as quickly as it could. “As soon as we confirmed the point of access to our system, closed it and eliminated it, we moved swiftly through the notification process,” Snyder said in an email. Ginger Reeder, a spokeswoman for Neiman Marcus, denied its disclosure timing was influenced by sales considerations.
Connecticut Attorney General George Jepsen, who is helping to lead a coalition of more than 30 states probing the Target attack and possibly others, may look into whether Target unreasonably delayed its announcement.
“One of the issues we look at in data breach investigations is the timeliness and adequacy of notification to appropriate government authorities and to consumers,” the attorney general’s spokeswoman, Jaclyn Falkowski, said.
Penalties for failing to disclose breaches vary by state. Some have a maximum penalty for each attack and depend on how many people are affected. In Michigan, for example, fines can range up to $ 250 per failure and $ 750,000 per breach.
In 2011, health insurer WellPoint Inc agreed to pay Indiana $ 100,000 to settle a lawsuit the state attorney general filed under its data-breach notification law. WellPoint took months to notify consumers of a breach and failed to tell the attorney general, despite operating under a law that requires both “without unreasonable delay.”
According to Patrick Fowler, another lawyer who advises companies on security breaches, some states allow consumers to file lawsuits for unreasonable delays, while others leave it to the attorney general.
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission issued guidelines in 2011 that public companies such as Target must follow in connection with cyber attacks. The SEC said the companies may need to tell investors if an attack occurred and its potential costs and other consequences.
Typically, the disclosures come in the company’s next filing, whether it is a quarterly or annual report.
But since the SEC guidance came out, “companies have tended to include generic risk factors rather than disclose specific incidents,” said Todd Hinnen, a former acting assistant attorney general at the U.S. Justice Department.
(Reporting by Karen Freifeld; Additional reporting by Ross Kerber and Jim Finkle in Boston; Editing by Eddie Evans and Steve Orlofsky)
Monte Paschi shareholders delay cash call, top executives may quit
http://s1.reutersmedia.net/resources/r/?m=02&d=20131228&t=2&i=825023489&w=580&fh=&fw=&ll=&pl=&r=CBRE9BP1MI800
SIENA, Italy
People are reflected in the window of a Monte Dei Paschi Di Siena bank in Rome January 29, 2013.
Credit: Reuters/Max Rossi
SIENA, Italy (Reuters) – Italy’s third-biggest bank Monte dei Paschi di Siena was forced to delay a vital 3 billion euro ($ 4.1 billion) share sale to raise capital until mid-2014 because of shareholder opposition, plunging its turnaround plan into uncertainty.
The bank’s chairman and its chief executive may now resign after their plan to launch the cash call in January was defeated at an extraordinary shareholder meeting on Saturday due to the vote of Monte Paschi’s top shareholder.
The world’s oldest bank needs to tap investors for cash to pay back 4.1 billion euros in state aid it received earlier this year and avert nationalization after being hammered by the euro zone debt crisis and loss-making derivatives trades.
The unprecedented clash between the lender’s executives and its main shareholder – a charitable banking foundation with close links to Siena politicians – casts a pall over a tough restructuring meant to revive its fortunes.
Chairman Alessandro Profumo, a strong-willed and internationally respected banker who was formerly the chief of UniCredit, said he and CEO Fabrizio Viola would decide in January whether to step down.
“These are decisions one takes in cold blood and in the right place,” Profumo said at the meeting.
“What I have on my mind is a 3 billion euro cash call because we need to pay back 4 billion euros to taxpayers. Today this is uncertain and at risk,” he told a press conference.
Viola, sitting at his side, told reporters he would do everything “so that the ship does not sink”, but that he could not take responsibility for mistakes made by others.
A board meeting is scheduled for mid-January, a bank spokesman said.
Profumo and Viola had already secured a pool of banks ready to guarantee the rights issue, but only if it was carried out by the end of January.
They said delaying it would make fundraising harder because it would likely coincide with a string of cash calls by other Italian and European lenders triggered by a sector health check, and could precipitate the Tuscan bank’s nationalization.
But the cash-strapped Monte dei Paschi foundation – whose stake in the bank is big enough to veto any unwanted decision – forced a postponement until at least mid-May to win more time to sell down its 33.5 percent holding and repay its own debts.
An aide described the 56-year-old Profumo, who quit UniCredit in 2010 after clashing with that bank’s foundation shareholders and joined Monte dei Paschi in April 2012, as “very annoyed”.
Italian newspapers said former European Central Bank policymaker Lorenzo Bini Smaghi and Carlo Salvatori, chairman of the Italian unit of German insurer Allianz, were among possible candidates to replace him if he stepped down.
Antonella Mansi, a feisty 39-year-old businesswoman recently appointed head of the Monte dei Paschi foundation, said her insistence on a cash call delay did not amount to a no-confidence vote in the bank’s management.
But she said that carrying out the capital increase in January would massively dilute the foundation’s holding, leaving it with virtually nothing to sell to reimburse debts of 340 million euros.
“We have a precise duty to ensure (the foundation’s) survival. You can’t ask us to let it collapse,” she said.
Analysts however said a delay, and the possibility of Profumo resigning, might undermine the whole rescue of the bank.
“It’s important to carry out the capital increase as early as possible,” said Roberto Lottici, fund manager at Ifigest. “The risk is that the bank finds itself rushing into a cash call later at a lower price than what it could achieve now.”
UMBILICAL CORD
The rights issue, along with a painful restructuring plan, is among the conditions the European Commission imposed before giving its green light to the state aid for Monte dei Paschi.
But in Siena, where the bank is known as “Daddy Monte” and is the biggest employer, fears that the cash call might sever the umbilical cord between the lender and the city run high.
Siena mayor Bruno Valentini, whose city council is the top stakeholder in the Monte dei Paschi foundation, said on Friday a postponement might help keep the bank in Italian hands.
“We cannot let the third biggest bank in this country fall prey to foreign interests,” he said. “Monte dei Paschi is not just an issue in Siena, it is a big national issue.”
Several small shareholders at the meeting echoed that view, although one, Luigi Barile, accused the foundation of pushing the lender “to the edge of a precipice”.
Under the agreement with Brussels, if Monte dei Paschi cannot complete the capital increase by the end of 2014 the Treasury would convert the bonds it bought from the bank into shares, effectively nationalizing it.
The bank, which is cutting 8,000 jobs and shutting 550 branches, said a delay in the cash call would cost it at least 120 million euros in interest payments owed to the state on the bonds. ($ 1 = 0.7303 euros)
(Additional reporting by Danilo Masoni; Editing by David Evans)
Fed could delay rate hikes with inflation "floor": Fed study
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SAN FRANCISCO
An eagle tops the U.S. Federal Reserve building’s facade in Washington, July 31, 2013.
Credit: Reuters/Jonathan Ernst
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – The Federal Reserve could bolster its commitment to ultra-low interest rates by ruling out a rate hike until inflation heads closer to its 2-percent goal, according to research published Wednesday by the Cleveland Fed.
The study plunges the usually low-profile regional Fed into one of the most pressing debates among U.S. central bankers: how best to keep market rates from rising to potentially growth-sapping levels once the Fed begins to withdraw its massive monetary stimulus.
Fed policymakers fret that when they begin to reduce their $ 85-billion-a-month bond-buying program, investors will conclude that rate hikes are not far behind, and will push up market rates farther and faster than the Fed believes is healthy for the economy.
Policymakers are therefore keen to find ways to convince markets they are serious about keeping rates low for a long time.
Wednesday’s research may add weight to arguments for adopting a so-called inflation floor. Edward Knotek II, who co-authored the study with fellow Cleveland Fed researcher Saeed Zaman, said he believes they are among the first to publish a study assessing the benefits of an inflation floor.
The study shows not just that a floor can delay the likely timing of the Fed’s rate hike, but also that “the choice of the floor matters,” he said in an interview.
Adopting an inflation floor of 1.75 percent, a promise that the Fed will not even consider raising rates until inflation is projected to breach that level, would likely delay any rate hike until the first quarter of 2016, the research showed.
An inflation floor of 1.5 percent would likely keep the Fed from raising rates only until the second quarter of 2015.
By contrast, the Fed’s current pledge to defer any rate hike until either the unemployment rate falls to at least 6.5 percent or inflation threatens to rise above 2.5 percent could result in rates rising as early as the first quarter of 2015, according to the research published Wednesday.
That’s earlier than a number of Fed officials believe is either likely or desirable.
Cleveland Fed chief Sandra Pianalto, who has announced plans to retire early next year, has not herself publicly embraced an inflation floor.
But the idea has a “few” supporters at the Fed, minutes of the central bank’s October meeting show, including most vocally St. Louis Fed chief James Bullard.
Asked about an inflation floor in September, Fed Chair Ben Bernanke said that it was “one possibility.”
Fed policymakers next meet in about two weeks.
Other policy options aimed at underscoring the Fed’s commitment to low rates include lowering the unemployment threshold for considering a rate hike to at least 6 percent and lowering the interest paid to banks on their excess reserves.
The chiefs of the Minneapolis and Chicago Feds have strongly supported the first idea; the latter has the backing of San Francisco Fed President John Williams.
More popular among policymakers, the October Fed meeting minutes suggested, is to leave the thresholds be and to instead offer qualitative guidance to markets about what conditions would prompt it to raise rates.
Providing such details, San Francisco Fed’s Williams told Reuters on Tuesday, would reassure investors rates will stay low for a long time even after the Fed stops buying bonds.
(Reporting by Ann Saphir; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)
Ten Senate Democrats have signed on to a letter crafted by Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) urging the Obama administration to extend the open enrollment period for the recently launched health-care exchanges.
Shaheen called for the extension this week in light of myriad problems with the HealthCare.gov Web site.
As of now, Americans are required to obtain health insurance by March 31 or will face a penalty under the individual mandate. Some have suggested the penalty could be delayed, given the problems with the Web site might prevent people who otherwise want insurance from obtaining it.
The White House on Wednesday announced it would give Americans six weeks longer than previously thought – until March 31 — to enroll before facing a penalty, but also said the change had nothing to do with the Web site problems.
“Extending this period will give consumers critical time in which to become familiar with the website and choose a plan that is best for them,” the letter states. “Individuals should not be penalized for lack of coverage if they are unable to purchase health insurance due to technical problems.”
The letter doesn’t state how long the senators would like to extend open enrollment, only that it should be beyond March 31. One of the signers,
Sen. Kay Hagan (D-N.C.), called for a two-month delay in remarks on Thursday. Separately, another Democratic senator, Joe Manchin (W.Va.), has called for a one-year delay in the individual mandate.
The signatories to the letter are Shaheen and Sens. Mark Begich (D-Alaska), Mark Pryor (D-Ark.), Mary Landrieu (D-La.), Hagan (D-N.C.), Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), Mark Udall (D-Colo.), Tom Udall (D-N.M.), Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) and Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.).
Begich, Pryor, Landrieu and Hagan are all top GOP targets in red states in 2014, and Bennet is likely to be targeted in 2016. (Shaheen and Mark Udall face reelection in swing states in 2014 but aren’t considered among Republicans’ top targets.)
Feinstein stands out as a long-time liberal senator from California. Tom Udall is considered largely safe for reelection in New Mexico next year and Heinrich was just elected in 2012 in the same state.
Here’s the text of Shaheen’s letter:
Dear Secretary Sebelius:
When fully implemented, the Affordable Care Act represents a bold step forward in reforming our nation’s health care system. It has the potential to improve the quality of care we all receive and provides the opportunity for millions of Americans to purchase quality, affordable health insurance.
The newly created federal and state health insurance marketplaces are intended to allow consumers the opportunity to compare health insurance options and find a plan that fits their needs and their budgets. For three years, we have been eagerly waiting for the launch of these marketplaces. However, now that the marketplaces are open, we have become discouraged and frustrated with the problems and interactions that are occurring with the Affordable Care Act’s federally-administered website, healthcare.gov.
As long as these substantial technology glitches persist, we are losing valuable time to educate and enroll people in insurance plans. Our constituents are frustrated, and we fear that the longer the website is not functional, opportunities for people to log on, learn about their insurance choices, and enroll will be lost.
Given the existing problems with healthcare.gov and other state-run marketplace websites that depend on the federally-administered website, we urge you to consider extending open enrollment beyond the current end date of March 31, 2014. Extending this period will give consumers critical time in which to become familiar with the website and choose a plan that is best for them. Individuals should not be penalized for lack of coverage if they are unable to purchase health insurance due to technical problems.
The Affordable Care Act has already had a significant impact on the lives of millions of Americans; seniors are now paying less for their prescription drugs, critical preventive care services are available for free and important work is being done to improve the quality of care we receive. Americans will now have the opportunity to receive tax credits to purchase quality health insurance, and starting in January 2014, insurance companies will no longer be able to deny health coverage because of a pre-existing condition or drop coverage if someone is sick.
We appreciate your efforts to fully implement this law and look forward to working with you to accomplish that goal. Thank you for considering our requests to extend the open enrollment period if the healthcare.gov substantial technology glitches continue.
With a government shutdown less than three days away, the House is charging toward delaying Obamacare for one year and repealing the medical device tax in exchange for funding the government, several sources tell POLITICO.
A plan is expected to be finalized Saturday morning during a rare Saturday in session in the Capitol.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has said the Senate will not accept any Obamacare-related changes to the Senate-passed government funding bill. So a House move in that direction would be a step toward a government shutdown.
(QUIZ: How well do you know the news: Shutdown edition)
The government shuts down Tuesday if Congress doesn’t pass a government-funding bill before then. Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and his top lieutenants have told Democrats there could be a vote on a continuing resolution or CR on Saturday, although that timing is still tentative. Republicans have not said what will be in that package or whether Democrats would be inclined to support it.
Boehner will meet with other House GOP leaders at 11 a.m. The House Republican Conference will hold a meeting at noon in the Capitol. The House has passed a funding bill to keep government open until Dec. 15 — but to defund Obamacare. The Senate has passed a funding bill that keeps government open until Nov. 15, but funds the health care law.
As of Saturday morning, top GOP sources said the most likely scenario was that the House would pass a CR this weekend that would delay Obamacare for one year and repeal the medical device tax. That move would, almost certainly, result in a government shutdown. Republicans could avoid a shutdown by passing a short-term CR, which would allow more time for negotiations. They could also take up the Senate’s bill, which Republican leaders have said is unlikely.
(PHOTOS: 17 government shutdowns)
Following the Senate’s passage of a two-month funding resolution on Friday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) warned Boehner and House Republicans that Democrats will not accept any GOP attempts to delay or defund Obamacare.
Boehner, though, is being pushed by a large bloc of Republican conservatives to do just that.
It’s a small group of conservatives that have tied the hands of Boehner, Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) and Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) — just enough Republicans to prevent the leadership from being able to exert its will.
That explains the fits and starts of the past few weeks. Republicans have cycled through several fiscal strategies, all of them proving flawed in the eyes of the conservative base.
Boehner tried to avert a government shutdown by seeking to direct angst over Obamacare to the debt ceiling fight, where he thought Obama would want to cut a deal that would include replacing the sequester. He first proposed using the debt ceiling vote as a backstop — something Republicans could look forward to if they didn’t get their way in the CR fight. But the rank-and-file rejected that strategy. Then, leadership sought to have a debt ceiling vote before the one on government funding. Rank-and-file Republicans rejected that as well, saying they wanted to see what the ultimate resolution in the CR battle before committing to raising the debt ceiling.
When Congress resolves this fiscal fight, another one is just a few weeks away. The debt ceiling must be lifted by Oct. 17.
GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: Congressman Amash, let me bring this to you. The president talking about these looming showdowns over the potential government shutdown this week. We hit the debt limit on October 18, I believe.
And you saw the president; he pushed back a few times. He certainly seems to be saying he is not going to negotiate at all over the debt limit despite the precedence. Are you, and he’s banking, I believe, on Republicans in the House either falling apart or caving.
REP. JUSTIN AMASH (R-MICHIGAN): Well we have to have compromise. The president himself is arguing that we’re not willing to compromise. We’re willing to compromise. And part of that compromise means when you want to borrow more money, we’re going to have to have some cuts in government. And that’s all Republicans are asking for.
And we’re not talking about draconian cuts–
STEPHANOPOULOS: Well there’s a strong faction asking for defunding Obamacare though.
AMASH: We’re talking about delaying Obamacare for a year, which is something the president has asked for with the Employer Mandate. So let’s delay it for everyone. I think we’re doing the president a favor if we delay it.
(LAUGHTER)
AMASH: The president is not ready to be implemented. If anything the president should be asking us to delay it because it’s better for him politically.
GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: Congressman Amash, let me bring this to you. The president talking about these looming showdowns over the potential government shutdown this week. We hit the debt limit on October 18, I believe.
And you saw the president; he pushed back a few times. He certainly seems to be saying he is not going to negotiate at all over the debt limit despite the precedence. Are you, and he’s banking, I believe, on Republicans in the House either falling apart or caving.
REP. JUSTIN AMASH (R-MICHIGAN): Well we have to have compromise. The president himself is arguing that we’re not willing to compromise. We’re willing to compromise. And part of that compromise means when you want to borrow more money, we’re going to have to have some cuts in government. And that’s all Republicans are asking for.
And we’re not talking about draconian cuts–
STEPHANOPOULOS: Well there’s a strong faction asking for defunding Obamacare though.
AMASH: We’re talking about delaying Obamacare for a year, which is something the president has asked for with the Employer Mandate. So let’s delay it for everyone. I think we’re doing the president a favor if we delay it.
(LAUGHTER)
AMASH: The president is not ready to be implemented. If anything the president should be asking us to delay it because it’s better for him politically.
U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC), (R), makes remarks to the media as U.S. Senator John McCain (R-AZ), (L), listens, after meeting with U.S. President Barack Obama at the White House, on possible military action against Syria, in Washington September 2, 2013.
Credit: Reuters/Mike Theiler
FRANCESCA FREEMAN and BEN WINKLEY
Wall St Journal
Sept 2, 2013
LONDON—Crude oil and gold pared overnight losses in London Monday but both remained lower for a third successive session as U.S. plans to delay a possible military strike in Syria eased concerns about the oil supply while upbeat manufacturing data from China and the euro zone briefly pushed traders out of gold.
A positive tone prevailed in foreign exchange, with currencies in emerging markets and others perceived as risky bets such as the commodity-linked currencies of Australia and New Zealand gaining ground against the dollar.
Brent crude for October delivery fell 0.3% to $ 113.70 a barrel on ICE Futures Europe. U.S. crude-oil futures were down 0.9% at $ 106.71 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
Spot gold was down 0.04% at $ 1,394.70 a troy ounce.
This article was posted: Monday, September 2, 2013 at 6:19 am
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GOP: In the Weekly Republican Address, Senator Mike Enzi, R-WY, calls for a permanent delay of Obamacare for everyone, not just businesses. The law, he says, is so “massive, burdensome, bureaucratic and confusing” that it’s collapsing under its own weight.
“We need to give the failed law’s proponents a way out by searching for positive changes,” says Enzi , who helped lead the fight against passage of Obamacare when he was the ranking member of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee. “We can start by dismantling the worst parts of the law first and replacing them with reforms that actually work.”
Photo by NASA
Right now, NASA is planning at least one EVA—extra-vehicular activity, or spacewalk—for an astronaut on the International Space Station to investigate and hopefully repair a coolant leak. NASA says the crew is not in danger, and the ISS is otherwise operating normally. Pete Harding at NASASpaceflight.com has a detailed article on this situation.
Basically, turning solar energy into power for the station generates heat, which must be removed. A cooling system is used that is essentially a series of ammonia-filled pipes; they run over the heated area, warming up the ammonia, which is then pumped away from the hot spot so it can radiate that heat away into space.
A small leak in one of the pipes has been known for years. It was so tiny it wasn’t a huge concern; a mission a few years back brought more ammonia to the station to refill the pipes. But on May 9, ground controllers noticed the leak had increased suddenly, and astronauts on board ISS saw flakes of frozen ammonia leaking out into space. Because of this, a spacewalk is being scheduled most likely for Saturday, May 11, to take a look and identify the culprit. A second, later EVA will probably then be needed to swap out the faulty part.
This situation is serious, but being handled. Everything on the ISS has redundant backups, so the pipe is being shut down and the backup unit getting prepped for use.
This does throw a monkey in the wrench of the schedule; Commander Hadfield, Tom Marshburn (a likely candidate for at least one of the spacewalks), and Roman Romanenko were already preparing for their return to Earth on Monday. That’s now on hold for a while, probably until the situation is under control. It’s not clear how long the delay will be, or what this will mean for the launch of the next crew of three astronauts to the station, due for late May.
Spaceflight enthusiasts are discussing this on the NASASpaceflightNow forum, and it’s fascinating to read. It’s clear NASA is taking this very seriously, as you’d expect, but it doesn’t sound like this is a life-or-death situation. Still, any time a contingency (extra) spacewalk is added in, there are inherent dangers. Hopefully the engineers on the ground and the astronauts on-board the ISS will take care of this quickly and efficiently.
FILE – In this Jan. 31, 2013 file photo Sen. Lindsey Graham, D-S.C., questions former Nebraska Sen. Chuck Hagel, President Barack Obama’s Secretary of Defense nominee, during Hagel’s confirmation hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington. On a Sunday, Feb. 10, 2013, talk show Graham threatened to hold up Hagel’s Senate confirmation, and that of John Brennan as CIA director, until the White House provides more answers about the deadly September 11 attack against a US diplomatic facility in Benghazi, Libya. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh, File)
FILE – In this Jan. 31, 2013 file photo Sen. Lindsey Graham, D-S.C., questions former Nebraska Sen. Chuck Hagel, President Barack Obama’s Secretary of Defense nominee, during Hagel’s confirmation hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington. On a Sunday, Feb. 10, 2013, talk show Graham threatened to hold up Hagel’s Senate confirmation, and that of John Brennan as CIA director, until the White House provides more answers about the deadly September 11 attack against a US diplomatic facility in Benghazi, Libya. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh, File)
FILE – In this Dec. 21, 2012, file photo Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., speaks during a Capitol Hill news conference in Washington about the investigation of the deadly Sept. 11 attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi. On a Sunday, Feb. 10, 2013, talk show Graham threatened to hold up Hagel’s Senate confirmation, and that of John Brennan as CIA director, until the White House provides more answers about the deadly September 11 attack against a US diplomatic facility in Benghazi, Libya. (AP Photo/Ann Heisenfelt, File)
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WASHINGTON (AP) — A leading Republican senator said Sunday he would hold up Senate confirmation of President Barack Obama’s nominees to head the Pentagon and the CIA until the White House provided more answers about the Sept. 11 attack against a U.S. installation in Benghazi, Libya.
The White House took aim at South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, a persistent critic of Obama’s response to the terrorist assault, by urging quick approval of the president’s second-term national security team and scolding any lawmakers trying to “play politics” with critical nominations.
Graham accused the White House of “stonewalling” requests to release more information about the attack that killed four Americans, including the U.S. ambassador to Libya. “We’re going to get to the bottom of Benghazi,” he told CBS’ “Face the Nation.”
A Democratic colleague branded Graham’s threat to stall the nominations of former Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., to be defense secretary and John Brennan, Obama’s top counterterrorism adviser, to be CIA director as “unprecedented and unwarranted.” Senators should have the chance to vote on the fate of those nominees, said Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island.
The White House did not address Graham’s demand for more information, but did note that Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Army Gen. Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, testified Thursday before Congress about the chaotic day of the Sept. 11 attack.
In January Graham had signaled he would delay Brennan’s pick and told Fox News he would “absolutely” block Hagel unless Panetta and Dempsey testified about the Benghazi attack. The senator said he was “happy as a clam” when he learned the hearing with Panetta and Dempsey had been scheduled.
Republicans have accused the Obama administration of an election-year cover-up of the attack and at the hearing several suggested the commander in chief was disengaged as Americans died.
“We know nothing about what the president did on the night of September 11th during a time of national crisis, and the American people need to know what their commander in chief did, if anything, during this eight-hour attack,” Graham said on CBS.
Graham contended that a six-person rescue team was delayed from leaving the Benghazi airport because of problems “with the militias releasing them and a lot of bureaucratic snafus,” and he said he wants to know whether Obama called any Libyan officials to expedite their mission.
“I don’t think we should allow Brennan to go forward for the CIA directorship, Hagel to be confirmed to secretary of defense until the White House gives us an accounting,” Graham said, adding, “What did he do that night? That’s not unfair. The families need to know, the American people need to know.”
Tommy Vietor, a spokesman for the White House’s National Security Council, said, “We believe the Senate should act swiftly to confirm John Brennan and Sen. Hagel. These are critical national security positions and individual members shouldn’t play politics with their nominations.”
Reed said that “to dwell on a tragic incident and use that to block people is not appropriate. To try to find information, to ask legitimate questions, as Senator Graham is doing is completely appropriate. But then to turn around and say, ‘I’m going to disrupt, essentially, the nomination of two key members of the President’s Cabinet,’ I don’t think that’s appropriate, I don’t think it’s warranted, I think it is an overreaction that is not going to serve the best interest going forward of the national security of the United States.”
Graham would have none of it.
“In a constitutional democracy, we need to know what our commander in chief was doing at a time of great crisis, and this White House has been stonewalling the Congress, and I’m going to do everything I can to get to the bottom of this so we’ll learn from our mistakes and hold this president accountable for what I think is tremendous disengagement at a time of national security crisis,” he said.
At the Senate hearing, Panetta testified that he and Dempsey were meeting with Obama when they first learned of the Libya assault. He said the president told them to deploy forces as quickly as possible. Graham asked whether Panetta spoke again to Obama after that first meeting. Panetta said no, but that the White House was in touch with military officials and aware of what was happening. At one point, Graham asked Panetta if he knew what time Obama went to sleep that night. The Pentagon chief said he did not.
