Missing Plane Investigation, Search Shifts

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Missing Plane Investigation, Search Shifts

NSA debate shifts in favor of surveillance limits

FILE – This June 6, 2013 file photo shows the sign outside the National Security Agency (NSA) campus in Fort Meade, Md. The case of a Baltimore purse-snatcher who got nabbed after crank-calling his victim in 1976 laid the legal groundwork for today’s worldwide government surveillance of telephone records in the name of protecting the U.S. from terrorists. The NSA has argued that people forfeit privacy rights when they voluntarily give their phone numbers and Internet IDs to businesses. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky, File)

FILE – This June 6, 2013 file photo shows the sign outside the National Security Agency (NSA) campus in Fort Meade, Md. The case of a Baltimore purse-snatcher who got nabbed after crank-calling his victim in 1976 laid the legal groundwork for today’s worldwide government surveillance of telephone records in the name of protecting the U.S. from terrorists. The NSA has argued that people forfeit privacy rights when they voluntarily give their phone numbers and Internet IDs to businesses. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky, File)

FILE- In this Wednesday, Dec. 11, 2013, file photo, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., presides over his committee’s hearing on “Continued Oversight of U.S. Government Surveillance Authorities,” on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta, File)

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WASHINGTON (AP) — In a sharp and unexpected shift, the national debate over U.S. government surveillance seems to be turning in favor of reining in the National Security Agency’s expansive spying powers at home and abroad.

It’s happened suddenly, over a span of just three days. First, a federal judge ruled that the NSA’s bulk collection of telephone records was unconstitutional, and then a presidential advisory panel recommended sweeping changes to the agency. Together, the developments are ratcheting up the pressure on President Barack Obama to scale back the controversial surveillance programs.

Even Russian President Vladimir Putin chimed in on Thursday. He said U.S. surveillance efforts are necessary to fight terrorism and “not a cause for repentance,” but he, too, said they should be limited by clear rules.

Obama is in no way obligated to make substantial changes. And, countering the public criticism he faces, he hears internal appeals from intelligence officials who insist the collection of phone and Internet data is necessary to protect the U.S. from terror attacks.

But even that argument has been undermined in the course of an extraordinary week. Federal Judge Richard Leon said in a ruling on Monday — its effect stayed, pending appeal — that even if the phone data collection is constitutional, there is little evidence that it has prevented terror attacks. The intelligence advisory panel, which had access to significant amounts of classified information and counted as a member a former acting director of the CIA, came to the same conclusion in its 300-page report.

Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., a fierce critic of the NSA programs, concluded, “What this says to the millions of Americans who have been concerned that the government knows who they called and when they called and for how long, this says it wasn’t essential for preventing attacks.”

The White House has already rejected one proposal from the task force, which would have allowed for a civilian to head the NSA. While Obama spokesman Jay Carney said Thursday that the president was open to each of the panel’s other 45 recommendations, a U.S. official familiar with the deliberations said that Obama rejected a handful of the proposals out of hand when he met with the panel members this week.

The president indicated he was comfortable with about half of the recommendations but thinks some others need further study, according to the official. That official commented only on condition of anonymity because the official was not authorized to discuss the process by name. Obama is expected to announce his decisions in January.

Congress has been jarred by the new focus on government surveillance. For years, lawmakers had shown little interest in curtailing the programs, but an unusual coalition of conservative Republicans and liberal Democrats has now taken up the issue.

However, Capitol Hill appears stuck over how to proceed. A broad bipartisan coalition in the House is backing legislation that would prohibit the NSA from collecting hundreds of millions of telephone records every day from U.S. phone companies. But congressional leaders, who have been briefed for years on the classified terrorist-tracking programs, generally support more modest changes to the surveillance systems and have sidelined the House measure.

The chairs of both the House and Senate intelligence committees have also championed more-limited legislation that would call for greater court and congressional oversight of the NSA.

At least before the review group’s report, the Obama administration was backing the intelligence committees’ bill. However, the review group’s recommendations — if Obama accepts some of them — could change the dynamic once again.

The mere consideration of rolling back the government’s vast surveillance powers marks a psychological shift for a nation that was set on edge by the terror attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. President George W. Bush faced little resistance from Congress when he implemented the USA Patriot Act, the law Congress approved that covers the surveillance programs. And opinion polling at the time indicated Americans were broadly willing to give up privacy for the sake of security.

But in the 12 years following the attacks, there has been no comparable large-scale terror incident in the U.S. The public has also learned much more about the government’s surveillance activities, most recently in a wave of disclosures from former NSA contractor Edward Snowden.

“The further out we are from 9/11, the more the American public begins to ask the tough questions about the basics of liberties and civil rights,” said Anthony Romero, the executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union. “The question for the president is whether he gets in front of the reform effort, shapes it, directs it and owns it, or whether he gets dragged along.”

NSA supporters worry that curtailing the surveillance programs would leave the country vulnerable to threats.

“Any intelligence collection reforms must be careful to preserve important national security capabilities,” said Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee.

Obama — who ran for the White House in part on promises to curtail government powers that expanded after Sept. 11 — has said he welcomes the public debate. Yet it’s all but certain he would not have launched that debate on his own had Snowden not leaked his trove of secret documents.

Snowden’s most explosive disclosures focused on the NSA’s bulk collections of Americans’ phone and internet records. The agency says it does not listen to the content of the calls, nor does it read Internet messages without specific court approval to do so on a case-by-cases basis. It says it does, however, collect and store records of the time and date calls are made, how long they last and the phone numbers that are used.

It was also revealed in recent months that the U.S. was monitoring the communications of friendly foreign leaders, including German Chancellor Angela Merkel. The disclosures incensed allies, and Obama’s advisers say they have negatively impacted the president’s relations with some world leaders.

___

Associated Press Intelligence Writer Kimberly Dozier and National Security Writer Lara Jakes contributed to this report.

___

Follow Julie Pace at http://twitter.com/jpaceDC

Associated Press

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

Politics Headlines

NSA debate shifts in favor of surveillance limits

Senate passes budget deal, focus shifts to spending

By David Lawder and Richard Cowan

WASHINGTON Wed Dec 18, 2013 7:03pm EST

1 of 9. Senators John McCain (R-AZ) (L) and Thomas Carper (D-DE) talk outside of the Senate chamber after voting on the U.S. budget bill in Washington December 18, 2013.

Credit: Reuters/Gary Cameron

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Senate passed a two-year budget deal on Wednesday to ease automatic spending cuts and reduce the risk of a government shutdown, but fights were already breaking out over how to implement the budget pact.

By a vote of 64-36, the Senate sent the measure to President Barack Obama to be signed into law, an achievement for a divided Congress that has failed to agree on a budget since 2009.

The deal, passed in the House of Representatives last week by an overwhelming margin, restores overall fiscal 2014 spending levels for government agencies to $ 1.012 trillion, trimming the across-the-board budget cuts that were set to begin next month by about $ 63 billion over two years.

Now, there will be a mad dash by the House and Senate Appropriations committees to cobble together a massive spending bill that implements the deal and carves up the funding pie among thousands of government programs from national parks to the military.

Without the new spending authority, the federal government on January 15 could partially shut down, as it did for 16 days last October.

Not surprisingly, one of fights ahead involves funding of President Barack Obama’s healthcare law, according to Republican and Democratic aides in the House and Senate.

“It’s one of many flashpoints,” said a House Republican aide who asked not to be identified, adding, “But it’s not insurmountable.”

Republicans are warning that they will not tolerate any increase in funding for administering the troubled healthcare program.

Democrats hope to maintain or add small amounts of money for the program they say will provide insurance for millions of previously uninsured people.

As is the case with all spending bills in a deeply divided Congress, there are plenty of other disagreements besides the Obamacare funding level.

Among the most difficult will be money for the Internal Revenue Service, the nation’s tax collector; funds for western wildfire fighting and for the Yucca Mountain, Nevada, nuclear waste repository.

Separate battles also could be waged over policy proposals that House Republican leaders are likely to attach to the funding bill.

These could include forcing the Obama administration to approve a controversial Keystone oil pipeline from Canada to the U.S. Gulf of Mexico.

There also could be moves to stop the Environmental Protection Agency from enforcing carbon emissions regulations that the coal industry hates and to block federal money for building a California high-speed train.

Given all of the disagreements, one House Democratic aide familiar with the appropriations process that is under way warned: “Nobody should be getting ahead of themselves; it’s not a given that we’re out of the woods” in passing the bill that would carry out the budget deal and avoid a January 15 government shutdown.

The budget plan negotiated by Democratic Senator Patty Murray and Republican Representative Paul Ryan won overwhelming support from House Republicans, including some of the chamber’s most conservative ones.

Murray said the deal “breaks through the partisanship and gridlock, and shows that Congress can function when Democrats and Republicans work together to make some compromises for the good of the country.”

But congressional aides said there nonetheless are worries that some of those conservatives might balk at the prospect of voting for a $ 1 trillion spending bill that wraps a slew of controversial programs into one gigantic package.

“There was broad bipartisan support for the (budget) deal. There should be the same broad bipartisan vote for the package implementing that deal,” said the House Democratic aide, adding, “This is a very open question.”

The House Republican aide echoed those concerns.

(Editing by Fred Barbash, Cynthia Osterman and Vicki Allen)

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Reuters: Politics

Senate passes budget deal, focus shifts to spending

OHIO CLOCK TICK-TOCK: ANATOMY OF A SHUTDOWN – The Shutdown Winners Club – McConnell: No repeat in January – COOK REPORT SHIFTS 14 RACES IN DEMS" DIRECTION – Panda Cam is back!

(swong@politico.com or @scottwongDC)

OHIO CLOCK TICK-TOCK: ANATOMY OF A SHUTDOWN – POLITICO’s John Bresnahan, Manu Raju, Jake Sherman and Carrie Budoff Brown spoke to dozens of sources on Capitol Hill and at the White House for this behind-the-scenes account: “House Speaker John Boehner just wanted to sneak out of the White House for a smoke. But President Barack Obama pulled him aside for a grilling. Obama wanted to know why they were in the second day of a government shutdown that the speaker had repeatedly and publicly pledged to avoid. ‘John, what happened?’ Obama asked, according to people briefed on the Oct. 2 conversation. ‘I got overrun, that’s what happened,’ Boehner said. …

– “It became clear almost from the moment the government closed Oct. 1 that it would stay that way for awhile. The White House received intelligence from an unlikely source: Boehner’s former chief of staff Barry Jackson. A lobbyist who spoke with Jackson passed on a detailed download to top administration officials. Chief among the insights was that Boehner would have to fight right up to the Oct. 17 debt limit deadline. Shortly after the White House meeting Oct. 2, a ragged Boehner filled in his closest allies about his talk with Obama, telling them that the president had confronted him in the room that former President George W. Bush called the ‘Lewinsky suite.’ …

– “Sitting around a conference table in the Roosevelt Room, Obama hammered the Republicans about reopening the government, demanding repeatedly to know ‘what is it going to take’ to get it done. A frustrated Ryan finally stood up and urged them to come together and craft something lasting. But what senior administration officials aides heard was a Freudian slip. ‘We’re going to have six weeks to negotiate the debt limit,’ Ryan said. Nobody challenged him, but White House aides mentally filed it away. …

– “Even though [Sen. Susan] Collins was picking up support, she never had the full buy-in of party leaders from either side. It was a veteran Republican senator, Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, who McConnell instead leaned on closely for some critical advice. Several sources said that Collins was upset when she learned Alexander was given this role, given that she had been working aggressively to cut a deal. McConnell aides later said Collins was critical to the end-result and nothing was meant as a slight against her. But Alexander was important because his politics are more conservative than Collins’ and he has a tight relationship with Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), Reid’s closest ally.” http://politi.co/H4RcE8

– POLITICO Editor in chief John Harris declares President Obama and the Democratic and Republican leaders of the House and Senate as members of the “Shutdown Winners Club.” “The past three weeks are widely, and correctly, understood as a reflection of the weakness of Washington leaders, who in both parties hoped to avoid the confrontation that just ended but proved powerless to prevent it. At the same time, however, the episode clearly highlighted that these leaders got to their positions for a reason — through skill at partisan maneuver and acutely sensitive instincts for self-protection.”  http://politi.co/18s33Wp

– The end of the shutdown means the Senate’s beloved Ohio Clock is ticking again: http://politi.co/19b7yEv

– And the National Zoo’s Panda Cam is back: http://wapo.st/15LVLfb. Watch the pandas here: http://bit.ly/1dQ9PEI

** A message from TransCanada: Tired of the U.S getting energy from unfriendly countries halfway around the  world?   The TransCanada Keystone XL pipeline can provide  energy from a  friendly, reliable neighbor, and with increased domestic production can end reliance on unstable energy sources.  Learn more at www.Keystone-XL.com.

McCONNELL: CRUZ STRATEGY ‘WAS NOT A SMART PLAY’ – Manu Raju caught up with the Senate Republican leader a day after the deal: “At the end of the day, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell says he had no good option in the 16-day government shutdown fight. House Speaker John Boehner’s strategy collapsed. Ted Cruz’s push to use a shutdown to defund Obamacare was ‘not a smart play’ and a ‘tactical error,’ he said. And the country was staring at the threat of a prolonged shutdown and a potentially disastrous default on a nearly $ 17 trillion national debt. Using a football analogy, McConnell said he got the ball on his own two-yard-line with a ‘shaky’ offensive line and had to cut a last-ditch deal with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to end the crisis, no matter how unappealing to many in his party. Despite acting as a chief deal-maker in recent years during government crises, it was unclear the role McConnell would play until the final days of the bitter fight.

– “‘Given the card I was dealt at that point, what I had hoped to have achieved was to punt the ball to a better place on the field without raising taxes or busting the [spending] caps,’ McConnell told POLITICO in a phone interview Thursday. ‘We got off track with a tactical error earlier starting in July and August that diverted our attention away from what was achievable,’ McConnell said bluntly of the defund Obamacare push. ‘And so we’ll be back at it in January and February, which is why the best you can say is, ‘It’s a punt.’’” http://politi.co/1atqJar

– McConnell told National Review’s Robert Costa that Republicans will not push another shutdown in another few months: “One of my favorite sayings is an old Kentucky saying, ‘There’s no education in the second kick of a mule.’” http://bit.ly/19UvQW3

BUT TED CRUZ refused to rule out another shutdown in an interview with ABC News’ Jonathan Karl: http://bit.ly/1i1t9Rz

– National Journal’s Beth Reinhard and Alex Roarty have dueling stories titled: “Ted Cruz is Finished” and “Ted Cruz is Just Getting Started”: http://bit.ly/18qaa1M and http://bit.ly/18qacGN

MINORITY LEADER NANCY PELOSI asks if the GOP “temper tantrum” was worth a $ 24 billion hit to the economy. The Hill: http://bit.ly/17wsoLv

CAN BUDGET CONFERENCE DELIVER? – Jonathan Weisman and Jackie Calmes write on A1 of the New York Times: “Congressional negotiators on Thursday plunged into difficult budget talks to avoid a repeat crisis within months, and quickly agreed to lower their sights from the sort of grand bargain that has eluded the two parties for three years. After approval late Wednesday of the agreement ending the standoff, the deal-making mantle shifted overnight from the leaders of the Senate to the Budget Committee leaders, Senator Patty Murray, Democrat of Washington, and Representative Paul D. Ryan, Republican of Wisconsin, two less senior lawmakers who nonetheless could make very effective salespeople since they command loyal followings in their parties. The political pressure lifted as well, for now.  … The question of what a new House-Senate budget conference can deliver by its Dec. 13 deadline — in time for Congress to act by Jan. 15 on funding to keep the government open — remained the subject of deep skepticism, well earned by past failures at reaching so-called grand bargains for deficit reduction and spending investments in the past three years.” http://nyti.ms/1c1BHdP

GOOD FRIDAY MORNING, OCT. 18, 2013, and welcome to The Huddle, your-play-play preview of all the action on Capitol Hill. Send tips, suggestions, comments, complaints and corrections to swong@politico.com. If you don’t already, please follow me on Twitter @scottwongDC.

My new followers include @LaurenTrager and @jamesoliphant.

TODAY IN CONGRESS – The House is out and will return next week. The Senate is on recess until Monday, Oct. 28.

COOK REPORT SHIFTS 14  HOUSE RACES IN DEMS’ DIRECTION – Cook’s David Wasserman writes: “Mostly as a result of the damage House Republicans sustained during the 16-day government shutdown, we are making changes to our ratings in 15 House seats, all but one in Democrats’ direction. Democrats still have a very uphill climb to a majority, and it’s doubtful they can sustain this month’s momentum for another year. But Republicans’ actions have energized Democratic fundraising and recruiting efforts and handed Democrats a potentially effective message.”

– Ratings Changes: CA-31 Gary Miller (R) Toss Up to Lean D; CA-41 Mark Takano (D) Likely D to Solid D; CO-06 Mike Coffman (R) Lean R to Toss Up; FL-22 Lois Frankel (D) Likely D to Solid D; MI-03 Justin Amash (R) Solid R to Likely R; MI-07 Tim Walberg (R) Likely R to Lean R; MT-AL Steve Daines (R) Solid R to Likely R; NE-02 Lee Terry (R) Likely R to Lean R; NJ-02 Frank LoBiondo (R) Solid R to Likely R; NJ-03 Jon Runyan (R) Solid R to Likely R; NM-02 Steve Pearce (R) Solid R to Likely R; NY-23 Tom Reed (R) Likely R to Lean R; OH-06 Bill Johnson (R) Likely R to Lean R; PA-08 Mike Fitzpatrick (R) Likely R to Lean R; WV-03 Nick Rahall (D) Lean D to Toss Up. Subscription required: http://bit.ly/19V18w4

DCCC CITES SHUTDOWN IN RECORD SEPTEMBER HAUL – Alex Isenstadt reports for the hometown paper: “The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee raised an eye-popping $ 8.4 million in September, the month preceding the government shutdown, according to figures provided to POLITICO and to be made public Friday. The figure stands as the DCCC’s best September ever in a year before an election, and is nearly double the committee’s August haul. Of the total, $ 3 million came from online donations — making it the top off-year online month for any party committee in history. Some $ 2 million alone came in the six days after Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) launched his 21-hour anti-Obamacare marathon speech.” http://politi.co/H1kOC9

HUDDLE FIRST LOOK: NRSC HITS LANDRIEU FOR OBAMACARE SPEECH – Republicans will blast a news release later this morning knocking Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) for a floor speech this week in which she suggested her 2014 race will be a referendum on Obamacare – a law she voted for. “We did not wake up one morning and declare this the law. The people of the United States declared this through us as their Representatives. If they do not like it, they can unelect us. Believe me, they will have a great chance because I am up for reelection right now. They will be able to do that. But that is the way you do it,” she said. The NRSC cites polls that show more than 60 percent of Louisianans oppose Obamacare. Here’s the release: http://bit.ly/1bDcTo5.

CONSERVATIVE GROUPS RALLY AROUND COCHRAN TEA-PARTY CHALLENGER – The Washington Post’s Sean Sullivan: “A trio of conservative groups announced Thursday they will back Mississippi state Sen. Chris McDaniel (R), who is running for the seat held by Sen. Thad Cochran (R). The Club For Growth, Senate Conservatives Fund and the Madison Project each announced endorsements. ‘Chris McDaniel is a constitutional conservative who will fight to stop Obamacare, balance the budget, and get America working again,’ said Senate Conservatives Fund executive director Matt Hoskins. Added Club For Growth President Chris Chocola: ‘Senator Chris McDaniel represents the next generation of conservative leadership that Mississippi Republicans are waiting for.’ Cochran has not yet definitively said whether he will run for reelection.”

THE ROGERS REPORT: RETURN OF THE CHAIRMEN? – David Rogers explains how we got into this big mess in the first place: “The rise of the modern House speaker began 40 years ago as party caucuses became more unified and members demanded stronger central leadership — often at the expense of committee chairmen. The late Tip O’Neill, the first of the modern speakers, approached this task with caution. Newt Gingrich went a huge step further, even channeling Oliver Cromwell. Nancy Pelosi created her own global warming panel. And upon becoming speaker in 2011, John Boehner wasted no time before kicking the House Appropriations Committee out of its Capitol offices.

– “But this concentration of power in the speakership comes at a price. It diminishes not just the chairmen but the speaker’s identity as a constitutional officer for the whole House. It tilts the scales more in favor of party interests and away from the institution. Instead of presiding over legislation, speakers take ownership. More and more, measures are rewritten on the second floor of the Capitol, not committee offices. … All this history comes to bear, looking back at the bedlam of the past few weeks. And what Washington saw was the concentrated power of the modern speakership turned onto itself — reduced to dysfunction by deep divisions inside the GOP.” http://politi.co/1gpD1ZW

PAUL’S SOFTER SIDE EMERGES IN SHUTDOWN FIGHT – Katie Glueck reports for POLITICO: “Rand Paul is no wacko bird. Just ask Lindsey Graham. ‘Rand Paul’s been incredibly responsible,’ Graham (R-S.C.), who has clashed with Paul in the past, said just before the Senate voted to end the government shutdown. ‘I’ve seen a side of Rand I haven’t seen before. That’s one of the pluses of this whole deal. He’s been great.’ According to many moderate GOP observers, the Kentucky Republican and likely 2016 contender has deftly maneuvered the past several weeks of shutdown politics, toeing the conservative line without alienating the rest of the party — especially compared to his frequent sidekick, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas). A key challenge for Paul if he runs would be to make himself acceptable to — if not win over — traditional Republicans. His low-key approach to the shutdown and debt limit drama could help that cause.” http://politi.co/1gQGvm3

OBAMA TO TAP EX-PENTAGON LAWYER AS HOMELAND SECURITY CHIEF – The AP’s Alicia Caldwell writes that the pick marks a shift from immigration to national security: “President Barack Obama’s selection of a former top Pentagon lawyer to head the Homeland Security Department suggests the agency will be stepping back from its preoccupation with immigration to focus more on protecting the nation from attack. Jeh C. Johnson, if confirmed by the Senate, would replace Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, who left the DHS last month to become president of the University of California system. Obama was expected to announce Johnson’s nomination [at 2 p.m.] Friday. Unlike Napolitano, Johnson has spent most of his career dealing with weighty national security issues as a top military lawyer. Issues he handled included ending the military’s don’t-ask-don’t-tell policy for gay service members and changing military commissions to try terrorism suspects rather than using civilian courts. He also oversaw the escalation of the use of unmanned drone strikes during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as general counsel at the Defense Department.” http://bo.st/17Q7aHE

THURSDAY’S TRIVIA WINNER – Neil Townsend was first to correctly answer that the brother of President William Howard Taft, former Rep. Charles Phelps Taft, was an owner of the Chicago Cubs the last time they won the World Series in 1908.

TODAY’S TRIVIA – Claude Marx has one more question for this week: The son of President Theodore Roosevelt’s secretary went on to become a newspaper publisher and power broker. Name the father and son, as well as the newspaper? The first person to correctly answer gets a mention in the next day’s Huddle. Email me at swong@politico.com.

GET HUDDLE emailed to your Blackberry, iPhone or other mobile device each morning. Just enter your email address where it says “Sign Up.” http://www.politico.com/huddle/

** A message from TransCanada: Along with increased domestic energy production, the TransCanada Keystone XL pipeline can help end America’s reliance on energy from  unfriendly countries.  It will also create thousands of jobs and boost the American economy by $ 20 billion.  All with 21,000 remote sensors and 24/7 monitoring that can cut off the flow of oil within minutes. The choice is clear: the TransCanada Keystone XL pipeline means a more secure energy future for the United States.  Let’s get it done.  Learn more at  www.Keystone-XL.com

POLITICO – Top 10 – Huddle

OHIO CLOCK TICK-TOCK: ANATOMY OF A SHUTDOWN – The Shutdown Winners Club – McConnell: No repeat in January – COOK REPORT SHIFTS 14 RACES IN DEMS" DIRECTION – Panda Cam is back!

Focus of shutdown negotiations shifts to Senate

Speaker of the House John Boehner, R-Ohio, arrives at the Capitol to meet with fellow Republicans at an early closed-door caucus, in Washington, Saturday, Oct. 12, 2013. The federal government remains partially shut down and faces a first-ever default between Oct. 17 and the end of the month. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

Speaker of the House John Boehner, R-Ohio, arrives at the Capitol to meet with fellow Republicans at an early closed-door caucus, in Washington, Saturday, Oct. 12, 2013. The federal government remains partially shut down and faces a first-ever default between Oct. 17 and the end of the month. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., arrives to join Speaker of the House John Boehner, R-Ohio, and fellow Republicans for an early closed-door meeting in the basement of the Capitol in Washington, Saturday, Oct. 12, 2013. The federal government remains partially shut down and faces a first-ever default between Oct. 17 and the end of the month. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer of Maryland gestures towards the House floor as he gathers with House Democrats in Statuary Hall before they file onto the House chamber to sign a petition to re-open the government on Capitol Hill in Washington, Saturday, Oct. 12, 2013. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

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WASHINGTON (AP) — Talks to end the government shutdown and prevent a federal default have begun between Senate leaders, but negotiations between the GOP-run House and President Barack Obama have stalled, lawmakers said Saturday.

The developments marked a shift in focus from the House to the Democratic-controlled Senate as the partial shutdown reached its 12th day and five days were left before the time when administration officials have said the government will deplete its ability to borrow money, risking a first-time federal default that could jolt the world economy.

GOP senators said the talks between Senate Majority Leader Reid, D-Nev., and the top Republican, Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, had started Friday.

“The only thing that’s happening right now is Sen. Reid and Sen. McConnell are talking. And I view that as progress,” said the second-ranking Republican senator. John Corny of Texas.

Word of those talks came as the Senate prepared to derail a Democratic measure to lift the government’s borrowing cap through the end of next year. Republicans were poised to reject it.

House Republicans said Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, had told them at a closed-door meeting Saturday morning that his talks with Obama had grinded to a halt.

“The Senate needs to hold tough,” Rep. Greg Walden, R-Ore., said Boehner told House Republicans. “The president now isn’t negotiating with us.”

Conservatives said Obama was to blame.

“Perhaps he sees this as the best opportunity for him to win the House in 2014,” said Rep. John Fleming, R-La. “It’s very clear to us he does not now, and never had, any intentions of negotiating.”

“It doesn’t have to be this way. It’s not supposed to be this way,” President Barack Obama said in his weekly radio and Internet address Saturday. “Manufacturing crises to extract massive concessions isn’t how our democracy works, and we have to stop it. Politics is a battle of ideas, but you advance those ideas through elections and legislation — not extortion.”

A bipartisan group of senators, closely watched by Senate leaders, is polishing a plan aimed at reaching compromise with Obama.

An emerging proposal by Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and others would pair a six-month plan to keep the government open with an increase in the government’s borrowing limit through January.

Obama has turned away a House plan to link the reopening of the government — and a companion measure to temporarily increase the government’s borrowing cap — to concessions on the budget.

In the face of disastrous opinion polls, GOP leaders have signaled they will make sure the debt limit is increased with minimal damage to the financial markets. But they’re still seeking concessions as a condition for reopening the government.

Obama met Senate Republicans on Friday and heard a pitch from Collins on raising the debt limit until the end of January, reopening the government and cutting the health care law at its periphery.

The plan also would strengthen income verification for people receiving subsidies through the health care law and set up a broader set of budget talks.

The Collins proposal would delay for two years a medical-device tax that helps finance the health care law, and it would subject millions of individuals eligible for subsidies to purchase health insurance under the program to stronger income verification.

Collins said Obama said the proposal “was constructive, but I don’t want to give the impression that he endorsed it.”

___

Associated Press writers Alan Fram and David Espo contributed to this report.

Associated Press

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

Politics Headlines

Focus of shutdown negotiations shifts to Senate

Focus of shutdown negotiations shifts to Senate

Speaker of the House John Boehner, R-Ohio, arrives at the Capitol to meet with fellow Republicans at an early closed-door caucus, in Washington, Saturday, Oct. 12, 2013. The federal government remains partially shut down and faces a first-ever default between Oct. 17 and the end of the month. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

Speaker of the House John Boehner, R-Ohio, arrives at the Capitol to meet with fellow Republicans at an early closed-door caucus, in Washington, Saturday, Oct. 12, 2013. The federal government remains partially shut down and faces a first-ever default between Oct. 17 and the end of the month. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., arrives to join Speaker of the House John Boehner, R-Ohio, and fellow Republicans for an early closed-door meeting in the basement of the Capitol in Washington, Saturday, Oct. 12, 2013. The federal government remains partially shut down and faces a first-ever default between Oct. 17 and the end of the month. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer of Maryland gestures towards the House floor as he gathers with House Democrats in Statuary Hall before they file onto the House chamber to sign a petition to re-open the government on Capitol Hill in Washington, Saturday, Oct. 12, 2013. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

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WASHINGTON (AP) — House talks with President Barack Obama over ending the partial government shutdown and preventing a federal default have stalled, Speaker John Boehner told fellow Republicans on Saturday, shifting the focus to Senate efforts to end the twin stalemates.

“The Senate needs to hold tough,” Rep. Greg Walden, R-Ore., said Boehner told House Republicans who met in a Capitol basement meeting room for an update on negotiations. “The president now isn’t negotiating with us.”

The closed-door Republican session came as the shutdown began its 12th day. Saturday also marked just five days from when administration officials have warned the government will deplete its ability to borrow money and risk a first-time federal default that could jolt the world economy.

Conservatives said Obama was to blame for the standoff.

“Perhaps he sees this as the best opportunity for him to win the House in 2014,” said Rep. John Fleming, R-La. “It’s very clear to us he does not now, and never had, any intentions of negotiating.”

“It doesn’t have to be this way. It’s not supposed to be this way,” President Barack Obama said in his weekly radio and Internet address Saturday. “Manufacturing crises to extract massive concessions isn’t how our democracy works, and we have to stop it. Politics is a battle of ideas, but you advance those ideas through elections and legislation — not extortion.”

Across the Capitol, senators planned to vote Saturday on a Democratic measure to lift the government’s borrowing cap through the end of next year. Republicans were poised to reject it.

But more importantly, a bipartisan group of senators, closely watched by Senate leaders, is polishing a plan aimed at reaching compromise with Obama.

An emerging proposal by Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and others would pair a six-month plan to keep the government open with an increase in the government’s borrowing limit through January.

Obama has turned away a House plan to link the reopening of the government — and a companion measure to temporarily increase the government’s borrowing cap — to concessions on the budget.

In the face of disastrous opinion polls, GOP leaders have signaled they will make sure the debt limit is increased with minimal damage to the financial markets. But they’re still seeking concessions as a condition for reopening the government.

Obama met Senate Republicans on Friday and heard a pitch from Collins on raising the debt limit until the end of January, reopening the government and cutting the health care law at its periphery.

The plan also would strengthen income verification for people receiving subsidies through the health care law and set up a broader set of budget talks.

The Collins proposal would delay for two years a medical-device tax that helps finance the health care law, and it would subject millions of individuals eligible for subsidies to purchase health insurance under the program to stronger income verification.

Collins said Obama said the proposal “was constructive, but I don’t want to give the impression that he endorsed it.”

___

Associated Press writers Alan Fram and David Espo contributed to this report.

Associated Press

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

Politics Headlines

Focus of shutdown negotiations shifts to Senate

Focus of shutdown negotiations shifts to Senate

Speaker of the House John Boehner, R-Ohio, arrives at the Capitol to meet with fellow Republicans at an early closed-door caucus, in Washington, Saturday, Oct. 12, 2013. The federal government remains partially shut down and faces a first-ever default between Oct. 17 and the end of the month. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

Speaker of the House John Boehner, R-Ohio, arrives at the Capitol to meet with fellow Republicans at an early closed-door caucus, in Washington, Saturday, Oct. 12, 2013. The federal government remains partially shut down and faces a first-ever default between Oct. 17 and the end of the month. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., arrives to join Speaker of the House John Boehner, R-Ohio, and fellow Republicans for an early closed-door meeting in the basement of the Capitol in Washington, Saturday, Oct. 12, 2013. The federal government remains partially shut down and faces a first-ever default between Oct. 17 and the end of the month. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer of Maryland gestures towards the House floor as he gathers with House Democrats in Statuary Hall before they file onto the House chamber to sign a petition to re-open the government on Capitol Hill in Washington, Saturday, Oct. 12, 2013. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

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WASHINGTON (AP) — House talks with President Barack Obama over ending the partial government shutdown and preventing a federal default have stalled, Speaker John Boehner told fellow Republicans on Saturday, shifting the focus to Senate efforts to end the twin stalemates.

“The Senate needs to hold tough,” Rep. Greg Walden, R-Ore., said Boehner told House Republicans who met in a Capitol basement meeting room for an update on negotiations. “The president now isn’t negotiating with us.”

The closed-door Republican session came as the shutdown began its 12th day. Saturday also marked just five days from when administration officials have warned the government will deplete its ability to borrow money and risk a first-time federal default that could jolt the world economy.

Conservatives said Obama was to blame for the standoff.

“Perhaps he sees this as the best opportunity for him to win the House in 2014,” said Rep. John Fleming, R-La. “It’s very clear to us he does not now, and never had, any intentions of negotiating.”

“It doesn’t have to be this way. It’s not supposed to be this way,” President Barack Obama said in his weekly radio and Internet address Saturday. “Manufacturing crises to extract massive concessions isn’t how our democracy works, and we have to stop it. Politics is a battle of ideas, but you advance those ideas through elections and legislation — not extortion.”

Across the Capitol, senators planned to vote Saturday on a Democratic measure to lift the government’s borrowing cap through the end of next year. Republicans were poised to reject it.

But more importantly, a bipartisan group of senators, closely watched by Senate leaders, is polishing a plan aimed at reaching compromise with Obama.

An emerging proposal by Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and others would pair a six-month plan to keep the government open with an increase in the government’s borrowing limit through January.

Obama has turned away a House plan to link the reopening of the government — and a companion measure to temporarily increase the government’s borrowing cap — to concessions on the budget.

In the face of disastrous opinion polls, GOP leaders have signaled they will make sure the debt limit is increased with minimal damage to the financial markets. But they’re still seeking concessions as a condition for reopening the government.

Obama met Senate Republicans on Friday and heard a pitch from Collins on raising the debt limit until the end of January, reopening the government and cutting the health care law at its periphery.

The plan also would strengthen income verification for people receiving subsidies through the health care law and set up a broader set of budget talks.

The Collins proposal would delay for two years a medical-device tax that helps finance the health care law, and it would subject millions of individuals eligible for subsidies to purchase health insurance under the program to stronger income verification.

Collins said Obama said the proposal “was constructive, but I don’t want to give the impression that he endorsed it.”

___

Associated Press writers Alan Fram and David Espo contributed to this report.

Associated Press

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

Top Headlines

Focus of shutdown negotiations shifts to Senate

‘Dutch sandwich’ grows as Google shifts €8.8 billion to Bermuda

Source: CNBC

Google funneled €8.8 billion ($ 12 billion) of royalty payments to Bermuda last year, a quarter more than in 2011, underlining the rapid expansion of a strategy that has saved the U.S. internet group billions of dollars in tax.

By routing royalty payments to Bermuda, Google reduces its overseas tax rate to about five percent, less than half the rate in already low-tax Ireland, where it books most of its international sales.

The figures were revealed in the latest filings by one of Google’s Dutch subsidiaries, and means that royalty payments made to Bermuda – where the company holds its non-U.S. intellectual property – have doubled over the past three years. This increase reflects the rapid growth of Google’s global business.

The company has been at the center of the international controversy over corporate tax avoidance because it earns “substantially all” its foreign income in Ireland and pays relatively little tax in the countries where its customers are based.

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BlackListedNews.com

‘Dutch sandwich’ grows as Google shifts €8.8 billion to Bermuda

New York Times site hack shifts attention to registry locks

Computerworld – One way that owners of major websites can mitigate the risk of their domains being hijacked like The New York Times’ site
was on Tuesday is to apply what is known as a registry lock on the domain, security researchers say.

A registry lock is basically a mechanism under which any requests for changes to a domain name server have to be manually
verified and authenticated by a top-level domain owner like Verisign and NeuStar, which operate the dotcom and dotbiz domains
respectively.

A registry lock provides an additional layer of protection against DNS tampering and is particularly useful in situations
where a domain name registrar might be compromised, the security researchers said.

On Tuesday, The Times blamed a prolonged website outage on a hacking attack at the company’s Australia-based domain name registrar, Melbourne IT.

The Times said hackers belonging to the Syrian Electronic Army (SEA) gained access to the company’s DNS records by compromising
its domain name registrar. The attackers then used that access to change the paper’s DNS record so it was pointing to systems
in Syria and Moscow.

Melbourne IT, in turn, blamed the outage on one of its resellers, whose account was apparently compromised and used to change several domain names, including
that of The Times, Twitter and others.

H.D. Moore, chief research officer at security vendor Rapid7, said registry locks make it much more difficult to make such
DNS changes.

Typically, changes to name servers are handled directly by domain registrars such as Melbourne IT and not by the top-level
domain owners. A registry lock prevents the registrar from making any changes on its own and instead allows changes to be
made only with the approval of the top-level owner.

“Instead of updating a record through your registrar’s website, you have to contact the [Top Level Domain] owner instead and
go through a secondary form of authentication,” Moore said. “It makes sense for big brands, but does impose a maintenance
penalty on organizations who change DNS providers frequently.”p>

At the time of the attack, many of the major websites hosted by Melbourne IT did not have a registry lock in place, Moore
said. Among the companies using Melbourne IT are Yahoo, Google, Microsoft, Ikea, AOL and dozens of other major site owners.

While there is no evidence that the attackers made changes to any of these domains, they were potentially vulnerable, Moore
said. “In other words, things could have been much worse.”

Since the attacks on The Times, several of the websites using Melbourne IT as a registrar have applied registry locks, Moore
said. Among the websites that appear to have put a lock in place are the Huffington Post, Mapquest, Starbucks and Twitter’s
TweetDeck. However, many other major websites using Melbourne IT have not done so yet, and remain vulnerable.

Matthew Prince, co-founder of CloudFlare, saiddomain registrars generally do not make it easy for website owners to request
registry locks, however. “[Locks] make processes like automatic renewals more difficult,” Prince said in a blog post. “However, if you have a domain that may be at risk, you should insist that your registrar put a registry lock in place.”

Netflash

New York Times site hack shifts attention to registry locks

Focus shifts to Obama if Congress axes immigration bill

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – If immigration reform sputters in the deeply divided U.S. Congress, supporters are planning to push President Barack Obama to act on his own to help 11 million illegal residents, lawmakers and immigration advocates said.

Reuters: Top News

Focus shifts to Obama if Congress axes immigration bill

On Martin case, Obama shifts from passion to calm

President Barack Obama speaks during a ceremony to present the 5,000th Daily Point of Light Award to Floyd Hammer and Kathy Hamilton, from Union, Iowa, in the East Room of the White House in Washington, Monday, July 15, 2013. White House spokesman Jay Carney says it would be inappropriate for President Obama to express an opinion on how the Justice Department deals with Zimmerman after the neighborhood watch volunteer’s acquittal in the shooting of the unarmed 17-year-old last year. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

President Barack Obama speaks during a ceremony to present the 5,000th Daily Point of Light Award to Floyd Hammer and Kathy Hamilton, from Union, Iowa, in the East Room of the White House in Washington, Monday, July 15, 2013. White House spokesman Jay Carney says it would be inappropriate for President Obama to express an opinion on how the Justice Department deals with Zimmerman after the neighborhood watch volunteer’s acquittal in the shooting of the unarmed 17-year-old last year. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

An image of Trayvon Martin and a bullet shell keychain hanging from a protester’s lanyard are seen during a demonstration in reaction to the acquittal of neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman on Monday, July 15, 2013, in Los Angeles. Anger over the acquittal of the U.S. neighborhood watch volunteer who shot dead an unarmed black teenager continued Monday, with civil rights leaders saying mostly peaceful protests will continue this weekend with vigils in dozens of cities. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

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WASHINGTON (AP) — When President Barack Obama first addressed the death of Trayvon Martin last year, he did so passionately, declaring that if he had a son, he would look like the slain 17-year-old. His powerful and personal commentary marked a rare public reflection on race from the nation’s first black president.

But now, with the man who fatally shot Martin acquitted and the burden of any future charges squarely on his own administration, Obama is seeking to inject calm into a case that has inflamed passions, including his own. In a brief statement, the president called Martin’s killing a “tragedy” but implored the public to respect a Florida jury’s decision to clear George Zimmerman, the man charged in the teen’s death.

“I know this case has elicited strong passions. And in the wake of the verdict, I know those passions may be running even higher,” Obama said Sunday. “But we are a nation of laws, and a jury has spoken.”

The president’s restrained response underscores the complicated calculus for the White House as it grapples with the fallout from the racially charged case. Obama faces inevitable questions about the verdict, given his previous statements on the matter and his own race. But as the head of a government considering levying federal charges against Zimmerman, he must also avoid the appearance of influencing an ongoing Justice Department investigation.

“Barack Obama is a lawyer and I think his legal sense is that he should do nothing that would interrupt or disrupt any future matters involving George Zimmerman,” said Charles Ogletree, a law professor at Harvard University and longtime friend of the president.

As the nation’s first black president, Obama is frequently pressed about questions of race, though he often refrains from weighing in. And on the occasions where he had, he’s had uneven results.

Obama’s speech on race as a presidential candidate in 2008 was widely praised as an honest — and politically risky — handling of the tricky topic. But his 2009 comments about the arrest of a black Harvard professor in his own home turned into a political firestorm and the president was forced to retract his statement that police had “acted stupidly” in detaining Henry Louis Gates.

Much of the furor over the president’s criticism of Gates’ arrest centered on the fact that his comments targeted law enforcement. Perhaps learning a lesson from that experience, the president and his advisers have purposefully avoided weighing in on the handling of the Zimmerman case by police, the courts and his own Justice Department, which is reviewing the prospect of filing criminal civil rights charges.

“He will not comment on a Department of Justice investigation or on a decision that the Department of Justice will make on how to proceed, if to proceed,” White House spokesman Jay Carney said.

Instead, Obama’s comments — both in the weeks after Martin’s death and following the verdict — have been more personal, focusing in part on his role as a father.

“If I had a son, he would look like Trayvon,” Obama said when he first addressed the case in March 2012. “When I think about this boy, I think about my own kids.”

Despite White House efforts to carefully avoid weighing in on legal aspects of the case, Republicans have criticized the president for commenting at all, saying his words helped a local legal matter morph into a national spectacle.

“President Obama politicized this at the beginning of it, I believe, unfortunately, by injecting himself into it,” said Karl Rove, former political adviser to President George W. Bush.

Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, said the president turned a law-and-order matter “into a political issue.” Rove and King both spoke Sunday on Fox News.

Zimmerman was acquitted Saturday in the February shooting death of Martin, who was unarmed when he was killed. Martin’s parents and civil rights leaders said Zimmerman racially profiled the teenager when he followed him through a gated community and shot him, but Zimmerman said he was physically assaulted by Martin and shot the teenager in self-defense.

The Justice Department can still launch criminal civil rights charges against Zimmerman. Attorney General Eric Holder is reviewing evidence to determine whether to proceed on such charges after stepping aside to allow the state prosecution to run its course. However, legal experts say there are major hurdles to federal prosecution, including the burden of proving that Zimmerman, a former neighborhood watch leader, was motivated by racial animosity.

Holder, the nation’s first black attorney general, said Monday that Martin’s killing was a “tragic, unnecessary shooting.” The Justice Department, he said, will follow “the facts and the law” as it reviews evidence to see whether federal criminal charges are warranted.

The NAACP and other civil rights organizations dismayed by the Florida jury’s verdict are calling on the Justice Department to open a case against Zimmerman. As of Monday evening, more than 17,000 people had signed a White House petition supporting DOJ charges.

Senior White House officials have discussed the case with NAACP leaders in recent days, the organization said. But the White House insisted Monday that the president would not personally be involved in the decision to levy charges, nor would he weigh in personally on whether he supported that step.

“Cases are brought on the merits,” Carney said. “The president expects, as in every case, that the process will be handled in the way it should be, at the Department of Justice, and certainly not here.”

___

Follow Julie Pace at http://twitter.com/jpaceDC

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

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On Martin case, Obama shifts from passion to calm