FNC: Reverend Jesse Jackson has weighed in on the controversy surrounding Duck Dynasty, comparing Phil Robertson to the driver who had ordered Rosa Parks to sit in the back of the bus.
The 67-year-old Robertson family patriarch and star of the mega-hit A&E reality show has unleashed a firestorm earlier this month after making anti-gay remarks in a interview with GQ.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The government shutdown entered its second week with no end in sight and ominous signs that the United States was closer to the first default in the nation’s history as Speaker John Boehner ruled out any measure to boost borrowing authority without concessions from President Barack Obama.
The uncompromising talk rattled financial markets early Monday with the Dow dropping more than 100 points in early trading.
Just 10 days before the threat of default would be imminent, animosity among congressional leaders marked the stalemate and resolution seemed elusive.
A statement from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., accused Boehner of a credibility problem and called on him to allow a vote on a straightforward bill to re-open the government.
“There is now a consistent pattern of Speaker Boehner saying things that fly in the face of the facts or stand at odds with his past actions,” said Adam Jentleson, a spokesman for Reid. “Americans across the country are suffering because Speaker Boehner refuses to come to grips with reality.”
In response, Michael Steel, a spokesman for Boehner, said it was “time for Senate Democrats to stow their faux outrage and deal with the problems at hand. The federal government is shut down because Democrats refuse to negotiate, and the debt limit is right around the corner.”
A defiant Boehner insists that Obama must negotiate if the president wants to end the shutdown and avert a default that could trigger a financial crisis and recession that would echo 2008 or worse. The 2008 financial crisis plunged the country into the worst recession since the Great Depression of the 1930s.
“We’re not going to pass a clean debt limit increase,” the Ohio Republican said in a television interview Sunday. “I told the president, there’s no way we’re going to pass one. The votes are not in the House to pass a clean debt limit, and the president is risking default by not having a conversation with us.”
Boehner also said he lacks the votes “to pass a clean CR,” or continuing resolution, a reference to the temporary spending bill without conditions that would keep the government operating.
Treasury Secretary Jack Lew has warned that the budget brinkmanship was “playing with fire” and implored Congress to pass legislation to re-open the government and increase the nation’s $ 16.7 trillion debt limit. Lew reiterated that Obama has no intention to link either bill to Republican demands for changes in the 3-year-old health care law and spending cuts.
The shutdown has pushed hundreds of thousands of workers off the job, closed national parks and museums and stopped an array of government services.
The one bright spot on Monday is a significant chunk of the furloughed federal workforce is headed back to work. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel ordered nearly 350,000 back on the job, basing his decision on a Pentagon interpretation of a law called the Pay Our Military Act.
Those who remain at home or are working without paychecks are a step closer to getting back pay once the partial government shutdown ends. The Senate could act this week on the measure that passed the House unanimously on Saturday.
Democrats insist that Republicans could easily open the government if Boehner simply allows a vote on the emergency spending bill. Democrats argue that their 200 members in the House plus close to two dozen pragmatic Republicans would back a so-called clean bill, but the Speaker remains hamstrung by his tea party-strong GOP caucus.
“Let me issue him a friendly challenge. Put it on the floor Monday or Tuesday. I would bet there are the votes to pass it,” said Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.
In a series of Sunday television appearances, Lew warned that on Oct. 17, he exhausts the bookkeeping maneuvers he has been using to keep borrowing.
“I’m telling you that on the 17th, we run out of the ability to borrow, and Congress is playing with fire,” Lew said.
Lew said that while Treasury expects to have $ 30 billion of cash on hand on Oct. 17, that money will be quickly exhausted in paying incoming bills given that the government’s payments can run up to $ 60 billion on a single day.
Treasury issued a report on Thursday detailing in stark terms what could happen if the government actually defaulted on its obligations to service the national debt.
“A default would be unprecedented and has the potential to be catastrophic,” the Treasury report said. “Credit markets could freeze, the value of the dollar could plummet, U.S. interest rates could skyrocket, the negative spillovers could reverberate around the world.”
Private economists generally agree that a default on the U.S. debt would be extremely harmful, especially if the impasse was not resolved quickly.
“If they don’t pay on the debt, that would cost us for generations to come,” said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics. He said a debt default would be a “cataclysmic” event that would roil financial markets in the United States and around the world.
Zandi said that holders of U.S. Treasury bonds would demand higher interest rates which would cost the country hundreds of billions of dollars in higher interest payments in coming years on the national debt.
Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, a force in pushing Republicans to link changes to the health care law in exchange for keeping the government running, spelled out his conditions for raising the borrowing authority.
“We should look for three things. No. 1, we should look for some significant structural plan to reduce government spending. No. 2, we should avoid new taxes. And No. 3, we should look for ways to mitigate the harms from ‘Obamacare,’” Cruz said, describing the debt ceiling as an issue that is among the “best leverage the Congress has to rein in the executive.”
Boehner and Schumer were interviewed on ABC’s “This Week,” and Lew and Cruz on CNN’s “State of the Union.” Lew also appeared on CBS’ “Face the Nation,” ”Fox News Sunday” and NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
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Associated Press writer Martin Crutsinger contributed to this report.
The House will continue Wednesday to try to pass small-bore spending bills to reopen slices of the federal government, as a shutdown with no end in sight enters its second day.
Bills to reopen some national parks, fund veterans affairs and allow the District of Columbia to use local revenue to fund government failed Tuesday under a fast-track procedure that required a two-thirds majority for passage. House Republican leaders will bring those bills up again on Wednesday with time for more floor debate, and a lower, simple-majority threshold for passage. The House GOP will also try to fund the National Institutes of Health, after reports surfaced Wednesday that children with cancer would be turned away from clinical trials.
Speaker John Boehner’s (R-Ohio) decision to bring these bills to the floor is not without risk for Republicans. Democrats would like to use a procedural maneuver — called a motion to recommit — to force a vote on a so-called “clean” continuing resolution. That legislation could re-open government, and fund the health care law. If given the opportunity to bring that bill up, just 16 Republicans would have to join with 200 Democrats to pass the bill through the House. But aides in both parties say such a bill is likely to not be germane to these targeted spending bills.
The action in the House is mostly stagecraft, since Democrats in the Senate and White House say they want to fund the whole government, not just a few agencies. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) would move to block the House GOP legislation if they are approved by the lower chamber.
Washington is still frozen with partisanship, as the government shutdown continues.
Republicans in the House are hampered by roughly one to two dozen hard-line conservatives, who insist on changes to the health care law as a price of funding the government. Democrats say they aren’t going to negotiate health care policy on a bill that funds the federal government for just a few months.
The next 24 to 48 hours may prove critical in the resolving the impasse. So far, Boehner and his top lieutenants, Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) and Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), have been able to keep any large groups of their members from bolting. Roughly a dozen House Republicans have already announced publicly – and individually – that they are ready to give up the fight over Obamacare.
(POLITICO’s full government shutdown coverage)
Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), a leader in the defund Obamacare movement, suggested the government funding fight may not be the place to try to derail President Barack Obama’s signature legislative accomplishment. And Senate Minority Whip John Cornyn (R-Texas) has also signaled his uneasiness with the shutdown, telling conservative bloggers on Tuesday that “any opportunity to defund Obamacare through the CR, if there was such an opportunity, is now gone,” according to the Washington Examiner.
If the House GOP unity starts to crumble, then Boehner may be forced to cave in to Democratic demands. So far, he has shown no signs of doing so. Boehner may keep the House in all weekend, GOP leadership aides said, knowing that if members go home and get hammered by constituents angry about the shutdown, they will return to demand a clean funding bill.
Republicans and Democrats are hauling reporters and cameras all over the Capitol to show the effects of a shutdown. The GOP had eight negotiators sit alone at a conference table Tuesday, saying they are ready to work with Democrats to solve this budgetary impasse. Senate Democrats have refused to negotiate, saying they want a clean CR. And on Wednesday, Senate Democrats will bring furloughed federal workers to the Capitol, in an attempt to humanize the shutdown.
Egyptian security forces clear a sit-in by supporters of ousted Islamist President Mohammed Morsi in the eastern Nasr City district of Cairo, Egypt, Wednesday, Aug. 14, 2013. Egyptian security forces, backed by armored cars and bulldozers, moved on Wednesday to clear two sit-in camps by supporters of the country’s ousted President Mohammed Morsi, showering protesters with tear gas as the sound of gunfire rang out at both sites. (AP Photo/Ahmed Gomaa)
Egyptian security forces clear a sit-in by supporters of ousted Islamist President Mohammed Morsi in the eastern Nasr City district of Cairo, Egypt, Wednesday, Aug. 14, 2013. Egyptian security forces, backed by armored cars and bulldozers, moved on Wednesday to clear two sit-in camps by supporters of the country’s ousted President Mohammed Morsi, showering protesters with tear gas as the sound of gunfire rang out at both sites. (AP Photo/Ahmed Gomaa)
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CAIRO (AP) — Egypt entered a new phase of uncertainty Wednesday after security forces drove out supporters of President Mohammed Morsi from two sprawling encampments where they had been camped out for six weeks demanding the Islamist leader’s reinstatement. The move, which left dozens of protesters dead and saw the arrest of several leaders of Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood, has left the fundamentalist movement dangerously isolated. It also prompted Vice President Vice President Mohamed ElBaradei, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate and pro-reform leader in the interim government, to resign in protest over the violent crackdown as the military-backed leadership imposed a monthlong state of emergency and nighttime curfew.
WHY NOW?
The interim administration that took over after Morsi was toppled on July 3 has been warning for days that it planned to crackdown on the tent cities, which clogged intersections on opposite sides of the Egyptian capital. The government accused the protesters of frightening residents in the neighborhoods, sparking violence and disrupting traffic. Military chief Gen. Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, who ousted Morsi, called for mass rallies last month to show support action against the protesters. Millions turned up on July 26 to declare their support. The government later said diplomatic efforts had failed and the decision to clear the sit-ins was “irreversible.” Morsi’s supporters fortified their positions and even more people flooded the camps after plans for a crackdown on Monday morning were leaked to the media. Police announced they were postponing the decision but did not give a new date.
WHAT LED TO THIS?
Morsi was Egypt’s first democratically elected leader after winning the first post-Hosni Mubarak presidential election with just under 52 percent of the vote. His rise to the helm of power was a sharp reversal for the Muslim Brotherhood, repressed for decades under Mubarak’s rule, and it was part of a general rise to power of Islamists following the Arab Spring wave of revolutions that led to the ouster of Mubarak and autocratic leaders in Tunisia and Libya. But Morsi faced a backlash as liberal and secular activists accused him and the Muslim Brotherhood of trying to monopolize power and failing to implement much-needed social and economic reforms. Morsi and his backers argued they were doomed to fail because of constant protests and efforts to undermine his government. His government also drew criticism over a series of charges and complaints against activists, journalists and TV personalities, including well-known satirist Bassem Youssef, for insulting Morsi and even sometimes for insulting Islam. An activist group called Tamarod, or Rebel in Arabic, drew millions to the streets to call for Morsi’s ouster on June 30, the anniversary of his inauguration. The powerful military responded by taking Morsi into custody on July 3 and forming an interim civilian leadership.
WHAT ARE THE MAIN STICKING POINTS BLOCKING NEGOTIATIONS?
The Muslim Brotherhood, which rose to power and won a series of elections after Mubarak’s ouster, backs Morsi and had vowed to maintain the protest camps until he was reinstated. The Islamists have rejected the military-backed political process, which calls for amending the constitution adopted last year and holding parliamentary and presidential elections early next year. International diplomatic efforts to promote reconciliation, including phone calls and visits by senior U.S. and European diplomats, have failed.
The interim administration and liberal and secular activists who led the drive to oust Morsi say the move against Egypt’s first democratically elected president was justified because he was abusing his power and the country needed a second chance at democracy. Authorities also have cracked down on Muslim Brotherhood leaders, detaining several key figures and accusing them of inciting violence.
WHAT IS THE U.S. POSITION?
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry joined other Western and mainly Muslim countries in condemning the violence. He said it had dealt a “serious blow” to political reconciliation efforts and urged Egypt’s interim leaders to take a step back and calm the situation. But Obama administration officials signaled no change in their policy toward Egypt. Washington has avoided declaring Morsi’s ouster a coup, a move that would force the administration to suspend $ 1.3 billion in annual military aid to the nation. White House and State Department officials said the U.S. role was largely to encourage the interim government to fulfill its promises to enact political reform.
HAS THE VIOLENCE GENERATED ANY SYMPATHY FOR MORSI’S SUPPORTERS?
Most Egyptians are Muslim, but there is widespread antipathy toward the Muslim Brotherhood among moderates who feared Morsi and his allies were trying to impose a stricter version of Islamic law in the country. Still many object to the brutal crackdown and argue stability cannot be restored without participation of Islamists in the political process. ElBaradei’s resignation was the first sign of a crack in the government’s position. The former head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency was named only last month as interim President Adly Mansour’s deputy for foreign relations. In his resignation letter, he wrote that he is not prepared to be held responsible for a “single drop of blood,” and lamented that Egypt is more polarized than when he took office, according to a copy that was emailed to The Associated Press.
WHAT’S NEXT?
It’s hard to tell. Several more Muslim Brotherhood leaders, including the powerful Mohammed el-Beltagy and Essam el-Erian, were arrested after security forces swept away the two protest camps and the movement may struggle to regroup as pro-Morsi protesters from the camp were scattered. The government has declared a state of emergency and imposed a nighttime curfew in a bid to stem the violence, but sporadic clashes continued through the evening. Anger over Morsi’s ouster already has led to an increase in Islamic militant violence in the northern half of the Sinai Peninsula that borders Israel and the Gaza Strip, and growing anger over the crackdown and deaths of scores of civilians could be exploited by extremists to stoke low-level violence there and elsewhere in the country.
BOSTON (AP) — Businessman John Henry, the principal owner of the Boston Red Sox, has entered into an agreement to buy The Boston Globe for $ 70 million, a massive drop from its record $ 1.1 billion price two decades ago.
The impending purchase from The New York Times Co. marks Henry’s “first foray into the financially unsettled world of the news media,” the Globe said Saturday. The deal will give Henry the 141-year-old newspaper, its websites and affiliated companies, it said.
The Times announced in February it was putting the Globe and related assets up for sale four years after calling off a previous attempt to sell it. The company’s CEO said at the time selling the Globe would help the company focus attention on The New York Times brand.
Times spokeswoman Eileen Murphy confirmed the planned sale of the Globe and other media properties to Henry. The Times said the all-cash sale, expected to close in 30 to 60 days, includes BostonGlobe.com, Boston.com, The Worcester Telegram & Gazette, Telegram.com, the direct mail marketing company Globe Direct and the company’s 49 percent interest in Metro Boston, a free daily newspaper for commuters.
Henry, in a statement published by the Globe, cited the “essential role that its journalists and employees play in Boston, throughout New England, and beyond.”
“The Boston Globe’s award-winning journalism as well as its rich history and tradition of excellence have established it as one of the most well respected media companies in the country,” Henry said.
Henry, who also owns the English Premier League soccer club Liverpool F.C., said he would reveal details about his plans for the Globe in the next few days.
The Times bought the Globe from the family of former Globe executive Stephen Taylor in 1993 for what it said was the highest price paid for an American newspaper. The price Henry is paying is less than 7 percent of the 1993 price.
The Globe and other newspapers have faced difficulties in recent years as readers have fled to the Internet and advertisers have cut spending on newspapers and moved more ads online. Still, the Globe is a journalistic institution in New England and was lauded for its coverage of the deadly Boston Marathon bombings in April.
A 2009 round of cost-cutting, involving pay cuts, helped put the Globe on better financial footing and prompted the Times to call off a planned sale. In late 2011, the Globe started charging for access to its online version at BostonGlobe.com, which helped to boost circulation revenues.
The Times company doesn’t separate Globe revenue from The New York Times revenue in its financial statements. But the Globe had an average weekday circulation of 230,351 in the six months through September, according to the Alliance for Audited Media. The newspaper’s increase in digital subscriptions more than offset declines in print. But the total is still down significantly from the nearly 413,000 it boasted in September 2002.
BOSTON (AP) — Businessman John Henry, the principal owner of the Boston Red Sox, has entered into an agreement to buy The Boston Globe for $ 70 million, a massive drop from its record $ 1.1 billion price two decades ago.
The impending purchase from The New York Times Co. marks Henry’s “first foray into the financially unsettled world of the news media,” the Globe said Saturday. The deal will give Henry the 141-year-old newspaper, its websites and affiliated companies, it said.
The Times announced in February it was putting the Globe and related assets up for sale four years after calling off a previous attempt to sell it. The company’s CEO said at the time selling the Globe would help the company focus attention on The New York Times brand.
Times spokeswoman Eileen Murphy confirmed the planned sale of the Globe and other media properties to Henry. The Times said the all-cash sale, expected to close in 30 to 60 days, includes BostonGlobe.com, Boston.com, The Worcester Telegram & Gazette, Telegram.com, the direct mail marketing company Globe Direct and the company’s 49 percent interest in Metro Boston, a free daily newspaper for commuters.
Henry, in a statement published by the Globe, cited the “essential role that its journalists and employees play in Boston, throughout New England, and beyond.”
“The Boston Globe’s award-winning journalism as well as its rich history and tradition of excellence have established it as one of the most well respected media companies in the country,” Henry said.
Henry, who also owns the English Premier League soccer club Liverpool F.C., said he would reveal details about his plans for the Globe in the next few days.
The Times bought the Globe from the family of former Globe executive Stephen Taylor in 1993 for what it said was the highest price paid for an American newspaper. The price Henry is paying is less than 7 percent of the 1993 price.
The Globe and other newspapers have faced difficulties in recent years as readers have fled to the Internet and advertisers have cut spending on newspapers and moved more ads online. Still, the Globe is a journalistic institution in New England and was lauded for its coverage of the deadly Boston Marathon bombings in April.
A 2009 round of cost-cutting, involving pay cuts, helped put the Globe on better financial footing and prompted the Times to call off a planned sale. In late 2011, the Globe started charging for access to its online version at BostonGlobe.com, which helped to boost circulation revenues.
The Times company doesn’t separate Globe revenue from The New York Times revenue in its financial statements. But the Globe had an average weekday circulation of 230,351 in the six months through September, according to the Alliance for Audited Media. The newspaper’s increase in digital subscriptions more than offset declines in print. But the total is still down significantly from the nearly 413,000 it boasted in September 2002.
LONDON |
LONDON (Reuters) – British satellite TV firm BSkyB (BSY.L) will cut prices for its broadband packages in response to competition from BT’s (BT.L) new sports channels, the Sunday Telegraph reported.
The price cuts, which will apply to internet and television bundles sold by the Rupert Murdoch-owned firm, will be announced early this week, said the paper, citing unnamed sources.
Last month, BT said it would screen free English Premier league soccer matches to its broadband customers, having splashed out on the rights to show 38 live matches. Available from August when the new season starts, it will be the first time such matches have been aired free in more than 20 years.
The BT announcement triggered a fall in the shares of both BT and BSkyB, as well as smaller broadband providers such as TalkTalk (TALK.L), over fears a potential bidding war would eat into their profits.
Sky has dominated the British pay-TV market in the last decade and still retains the rights to 116 live matches. It has expanded into BT’s territory to offer broadband and telephone services to its 10.7 million households.
BT, a former state monopoly, fought back by developing an online TV service designed to persuade customers they should upgrade to its superfast broadband in order to watch it.
Analysts have been expecting BSkyB to make some tactical discounts in order to counter a marketing push by BT.
BSkyB declined to comment.
(Reporting by Rosalba O’Brien and Kate Holton; Editing by Louise Heavens)
