2 At start, stimulus vehicle for Obama's priorities
By CHARLES BABINGTON, Associated Press Writer
1 hr 4 mins ago
| WASHINGTON - The economic crisis that will dominate Barack Obama's first 100 days as president, and beyond, will give him a rare chance to enact big portions of his agenda that otherwise might have languished for months or years.
Not since Franklin D. Roosevelt has a new president been poised to pack so many ambitious, costly - and, under more normal circumstances, highly contentious - projects into one fast-moving bill. As in 1933, a frightening economic collapse makes the quick political work possible, choking off longer debates and possible opposition that many of the initiatives would have faced in better times.
Congress is working on a mammoth stimulus bill, costing $825 billion or more, to treat the sick economy. Obama is using it as a vehicle for an array of priorities, including billions of dollars for renewable energy, education and health care innovations. |
Chuck. Another idiot.
3 Major troop decisions for Afghan war await Obama
By LOLITA C. BALDOR, Associated Press Writer
Sat Jan 17, 8:05 am ET
| WASHINGTON - Lingering decisions on how quickly the Pentagon can get U.S. forces out of Iraq and into Afghanistan are being pushed off until after the Obama administration takes over next week as military commanders continue to wrangle over where the troops are needed most.
By the end of this month, Defense Secretary Robert Gates is expected to approve sending more Marines to southern Afghanistan, effectively lowering their numbers in Iraq's western Anbar province, and he may also endorse deploying an Army brigade equipped with armored Stryker vehicles. Senior military officials say there is general agreement to cut back on the 22,000 Marines in Iraq, but Army officials have concerns about how to free up the Stryker unit.
As the Pentagon looks to double the existing force in Afghanistan, the overall cast of the military's growing force in Afghanistan is becoming clearer: Commanders want to beef up the expeditionary units and trainers in the south and east with enough new troops to stem the violence without becoming an occupying force that would alienate the Afghan population. |
4 Sources: Obama ready to end harsh interrogations
By LARA JAKES and PAMELA HESS, Associated Press Writers
Sat Jan 17, 8:07 am ET
| WASHINGTON - President-elect Barack Obama is preparing to prohibit the use of waterboarding and harsh interrogation techniques by ordering the CIA to follow military rules for questioning prisoners, according to two U.S. officials familiar with drafts of the plans. Still under debate is whether to include a loophole that would allow exceptions in extraordinary cases.
The proposal Obama is considering would require all CIA interrogators to follow conduct outlined in the U.S. Army Field Manual, the officials said. The plans would also have the effect of shutting down secret "black site" prisons around the world where the CIA has questioned terror suspects - with all future interrogations taking place inside American military facilities.
However, Obama's changes may not be absolute. His advisers are considering adding a classified loophole to the rules that could allow the CIA to use some interrogation methods not specifically authorized by the Pentagon, the officials said, although the intent is not to use that as an opening for possible use of waterboarding. |
5 Police probe Fla. fraud claim, missing fund leader
By SUZETTE LABOY, Associated Press Writer
1 hr 2 mins ago
| MIAMI - A Florida hedge fund manager accused of defrauding investors out of millions is missing and his family is worried because he left a note indicating he was "distraught," police said Saturday.
Authorities were interviewing investors and looking into claims that Arthur G. Nadel stole from them, said Sarasota Police Capt. Bill Spitler. It was too soon to say exactly how much was invested, but there were reports the hedge fund could be out $350 million.
"The victims that I know of, I know some of them personally, they have no reason to lie," Spitler said. |
Who says it's not jumping out of windows time?
6 Oprah 'disappointed' by debunked Holocaust story
By JIM SUHR, Associated Press Writer
Sat Jan 17, 5:38 am ET
| Oprah Winfrey broke her silence Friday about former guest Herman Rosenblat, saying she's "very disappointed" in his now discredited story about meeting his future wife in a Nazi concentration camp.
"That's what happens with lies," Winfrey said on an episode of "The Oprah Winfrey Show" that aired Friday. "They get bigger and bigger and bigger."
Rosenblat, a 79-year-old resident of North Miami Beach, Fla., and his wife Roma have appeared twice on Winfrey's show. Winfrey said he had planned to appear again to "explain himself," but the man's lawyers scuttled that. |
7 Stimulus plan repeals big tax break for banks
By STEPHEN OHLEMACHER, Associated Press Writer
Sat Jan 17, 4:53 am ET
| WASHINGTON - House Democrats' version of the $825 billion recession rescue package would end billions of dollars in tax breaks the Bush administration quietly gave to banks last fall.
Already almost exclusive beneficiaries of a $700 billion Wall Street bailout, banks are largely left out of the House stimulus package that President-elect Barack Obama wants passed quickly through Congress. Those getting financial bailout money wouldn't even be eligible for one of the main business tax breaks aimed at priming the economic pump.
Homebuilders, manufacturers, retailers and low-income families share the bulk of the $275 billion in proposed new tax cuts. |
8 Crawford TX, back to normal after Bush term ends
By ANGELA K. BROWN, Associated Press Writer
46 mins ago
| CRAWFORD, Texas - For the first time in eight years, this one-stoplight town is getting back to normal.
The school is abuzz about its sports teams - not the next world leader President Bush will bring to campus from his 1,600-acre ranch outside town.
Only one souvenir shop remains open full time on Main Street - still hawking coffee mugs and Christmas ornaments emblazoned with "The Western White House" logo - and there are no more war protesters clogging the streets or news reporters clamoring for interviews. |
9 MLK's dream also included economic justice
By DEEPTI HAJELA, Associated Press Writer
2 hrs 8 mins ago
| NEW YORK - The focus of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s acceptance speech for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964 wasn't what had been accomplished - but rather his view of what still needed to be done.
More than four decades later, King scholars say he would take the same approach at this historic moment - the inauguration of the first black president at a time when the nation is facing its greatest economic crisis since the Great Depression.
The crisis could widen the already large financial gaps between whites and blacks and make it more difficult to attain King's dream of economic equality in America. |
10 Kellogg's recalls more peanut butter products
By HOPE YEN, Associated Press Writer
2 hrs 53 mins ago
| WASHINGTON - First it was bulk peanut butter shipped to nursing homes and institutional cafeterias. Now the salmonella case has touched the Kellogg Co., which has recalled 16 products as federal officials confirm contamination at a Georgia facility that sent peanut products to 85 food companies
Kellogg had asked stores this week to pull some of its Keebler crackers from shelves as a precaution. But in a statement late Friday, the Battle Creek, Mich., company said voluntarily was recalling the crackers and other products.
The nationwide outbreak has sickened hundreds of people in 43 states and killed at least six. |
11 Top U.S. banks post huge losses as BofA gets aid
By Jonathan Stempel and Dan Wilchins, Reuters
Fri Jan 16, 5:37 pm ET
| NEW YORK (Reuters) - The U.S. government extended $20 billion of new aid to Bank of America Corp hours before both the largest U.S. bank, and the country's third largest, Citigroup, reported multibillion-dollar losses from the ongoing global credit crisis.
Bank of America posted its first quarterly loss in 17 years on the heels of the government's midnight announcement that it would help the bank absorb its January 1 purchase of troubled brokerage Merrill Lynch & Co.
The U.S. Treasury will provide the new aid in exchange for preferred stock, and along with the Federal Reserve and Federal Deposit Insurance Corp, agreed to limit Bank of America's potential losses on $118 billion in tainted assets. |
12 Bomb and helicopter crash kills 2 U.S. troops, 4 Afghans
By Hamid Shalizi, Reuters
1 hr 25 mins ago
| KABUL (Reuters) - A suicide car bomb killed a U.S. soldier and four Afghan civilians in the Afghan capital on Saturday, and one other U.S. soldier was killed when a helicopter crash-landed in eastern Afghanistan, officials said.
The bomber penetrated tight security in the heart of Kabul, blowing himself up outside a U.S. base and the German embassy days before the inauguration of U.S. President-elect Barack Obama who has pledged to make Afghanistan a foreign policy priority.
One U.S. soldier died in hospital of injuries received from the blast, and six U.S. soldiers and a U.S. civilian were wounded, the U.S. military said in a statement. Four Afghan civilians were killed and 19 wounded, the Interior Ministry said. |
13 Older Americans postpone retirement as economy sags
By Andrea Hopkins, Reuters
Sat Jan 17, 9:02 am ET
| CINCINNATI (Reuters) - Miriam Gorman wanted to retire more than a year ago, but steep financial losses in her retirement savings mean the 71-year-old bookkeeper now plans to work on indefinitely.
"I would have preferred to retire at the end of 2007, and then I was thinking at the end of this year, and now maybe it's next year. I really don't know," said Gorman, who's been with an advertising company in Bethesda, Maryland, for 15 years.
Across America, older workers are postponing retirement plans, dismayed by huge losses in the value of the investments they had depended on to fund their retirement. The U.S. recession has compounded the problem, with home values too low to provide the nest egg many seniors need and interest rates on safer assets close to zero. |
14 Inflation slows to half-century low in 2008
By Lucia Mutikani, Reuters
Fri Jan 16, 4:56 pm ET
| WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Inflation slowed to a half-century low last year and industrial output fell for the first time since 2002, data showed on Friday, as the recession deepened toward year-end, raising the specter of deflation.
With consumer confidence remaining at depressed levels, the reports suggested the economy could take longer to pull out of a downturn that is on track to be the longest and possibly deepest since World War Two.
"We seem to be digging an economic hole of major proportion which will only add time to the turnaround," said Kevin Giddis, head of fixed-income sales, trading and research at Morgan Keegan in Memphis, Tennessee. |
15 GE Capital cutting jobs but won't say how many
Reuters
Fri Jan 16, 2:46 pm ET
| NEW YORK (Reuters) - General Electric Co said on Friday its GE Capital unit is cutting jobs as part of an effort to save about $2 billion this year, but declined comment on a report that as many as 11,000 positions would be eliminated.
"We are doing some layoffs within GE Capital," spokesman Russell Wilkerson said, but he added neither GE corporate nor the capital unit would comment on the total number of people affected.
"We leave that to the business leader to communicate that," Wilkerson said. |
16 EU piles pressure as Kremlin hopes for gas crisis deal
by Olga Rotenberg, AFP
1 hr 15 mins ago
MOSCOW (AFP) - Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said on Saturday he was hopeful of a breakthrough at key talks in Moscow on Europe's gas crisis but the EU said it was "not satisfied" by the negotiations so far.
"I want this to happen as soon as possible, literally in the next few days," Medvedev said at international talks in the Kremlin, referring to the resumption of gas supplies to Europe that have been cut off for 11 days.
"I am sure we will in the near future resolve the question of transit." |
17 Opposition leader returns to Zimbabwe ahead of talks
AFP
1 hr 1 min ago
| HARARE (AFP) - Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai on Saturday returned to Zimbabwe for the first time in more than two months, ahead of new talks with President Robert Mugabe to revive a long-pending power-sharing deal.
The leader of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) left Zimbabwe in November for a summit in Johannesburg, where regional leaders tried and failed to push the rivals into a compromise on forming a unity government.
Since then, he has travelled across Africa and Europe to build international support, while his country plunged deeper into crisis with a cholera epidemic raging unchecked and the economy disintegrating at a breath-taking pace. |
18 British PM urges banks to come clean over bad assets
AFP
41 mins ago
| LONDON (AFP) - Prime Minister Gordon Brown told British banks Saturday they must own up to the extent of their bad assets amid more reports his government could launch a fresh bail-out of the struggling sector.
In a Financial Times interview, Brown did not rule out the possibility that banks could get a further injection of taxpayers' money after big names including Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) were bailed out last year in a 37 billion pound recapitalisation.
His comments came after shares in RBS and Barclays plunged Friday after US giant Citigroup announced an 8.29 billion dollar fourth quarter loss and Bank of America got a 20 billion dollar state bail-out. |
19 German banks face billions more in losses
AFP
Sat Jan 17, 10:02 am ET
| BERLIN (AFP) - German banks face further losses running into the billions of euros as only a quarter of their toxic assets have been written off, a report said Saturday.
Germany's respected Der Spiegel weekly based its report on a survey of 20 banking institutions carried out by Germany's central bank, the Bundesbank, and the financial market watchdog Bafin.
The survey revealed that German banks possess 300 billion euros (400 billion dollars) in toxic assets and have so far only written off the most rotten, which represent a quarter of the total, the report said. |
20 Obama refuses to surrender Blackberry (AFP)
AFP
Posted on Fri Jan 16, 2009 9:12PM EST
| WASHINGTON (AFP) - Despite legal and security hurdles, president-elect Barack Obama says he has a plan to retain his beloved Blackberry once he moves into the White House next week.
Interviewed by CNN Friday, Obama said the smartphone was among the tools that he would use to stay in touch with real Americans and avoid becoming trapped inside the presidential "bubble."
"I think we're going to be able to hang on to one of these. My working assumption, and this is not new, is that anything I write on an email could end up being on CNN," he said. |
21 EU threatens new Zimbabwe sanctions as crisis spirals
AFP
Fri Jan 16, 12:39 pm ET
| HARARE (AFP) - The European Union on Friday threatened new sanctions against Robert Mugabe's government in Zimbabwe, blamed for political deadlock, a surging cholera epidemic and runaway inflation.
With no sign of an end to the crisis, Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg, whose country holds the EU presidency, said that European nations were considering new sanctions against Mugabe and his inner circle.
In Geneva a UN agency said Friday cholera has claimed 2,225 lives since August, warning that prevention efforts have failed to stop it while the nation's economic collapse has left public hospitals empty. |
22 Methane raises hope that Mars is habitable
AFP
Fri Jan 16, 10:45 am ET
| WASHINGTON (AFP) - Plumes of methane gas detected on Mars could be a sign of geological or biological activity -- and possibly the latest indication that life can be sustained on the Red Planet, according to a study.
The presence of methane implies active geological, or possibly even biological, processes on Mars, and the amount of methane observed on the "Red Planet" is comparable to some active sites on Earth, the study published in the journal Science found late Thursday.
"We believe this definitely increases the prospects for finding life on Mars," principal researcher Michael Mumma told The Washington Post. |
23 Citigroup divides to conquer after 8.29 bln dlr loss
AFP
Fri Jan 16, 3:34 pm ET
| NEW YORK (AFP) - US banking giant Citigroup abandoned its "supermarket" model Friday in the face of a deepening global financial crisis, announcing a split into two businesses as it retrenches in the face of massive losses.
The New York banking group reported a hefty 8.29 billion dollar loss in the fourth quarter. The loss per share was 1.72 dollars, dwarfing most analysts' predictions of a 1.19 dollar loss.
Fourth-quarter revenue fell 13 percent to 5.6 billion dollars. |
24 Euro rebounds after Trichet rules out zero rates
AFP
Fri Jan 16, 3:08 am ET
| TOKYO (AFP) - The euro rebounded in Asian trade on Friday after European Central Bank chief Jean-Claude Trichet ruled out following the United States and Japan in cutting interest rates to zero.
The euro firmed to 1.3219 dollars in Tokyo afternoon trade from 1.3121 late Thursday in New York, and jumped to 119.43 yen from 117.89. The dollar strengthened to 90.36 yen from 89.86.
The European currency rose from one-month lows against the greenback after the remarks by Trichet, who said however that the ECB may have room to reduce borrowing costs in the eurozone further from the current level of 2.0 percent. |
25 Israel's last surge before a Gaza cease-fire?
By Ilene R. Prusher and Joshua Mitnick, The Christian Science Monitor
Fri Jan 16, 3:00 am ET
| JERUSALEM and Tel Aviv - The Israeli military on Thursday shelled the main United Nations aid compound in Gaza, struck a building that houses foreign news organizations, and caused a fire at a hospital. The attacks sparked global condemnation even as efforts to reach a cease-fire continued.
Later in the day, Hamas struck the Israeli city of Beersheba with a salvo of Qassam rockets, injuring five people, two of them seriously.
The Israeli strikes on what political officials said were unintended targets in the Gaza campaign underscore what some analysts see as a furious drive by the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) to achieve as many last-minute blows to Hamas as possible before a cease-fire is reached. And at this stage of the war, fissures are emerging within the Israeli civilian and military leadership. |
26 As atheists roll out London ads, believers unruffled
By Robert Marquand, The Christian Science Monitor
Fri Jan 16, 3:00 am ET
| Paris - It's the first mass marketing of atheism in Britain - and many in the community of faith say that's just fine.
On Jan. 6 some 800 British red "bendy" buses carried the sign: "There is probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life."
The Atheist Bus Campaign organizer, a young comedienne named Ariane Sherine, took exception last June to several London buses swathed with biblical quotes, placed by Christian fundamentalists. |
27 Scramble for solutions as foreclosures rise at record speed
By Alexandra Marks, The Christian Science Monitor
Fri Jan 16, 3:00 am ET
| New York - Foreclosures jumped a record 80 percent last year, according to a new report by consulting firm RealtyTrac. The rise comes despite state and federal programs designed to stem the tide of home losses.
This week, Congress was expected to again intensify its efforts to address the issue, this time by voting on a bill requiring at least $50 billion of the Troubled Asset Relief Program's remaining $350 billion to be used to prevent foreclosures.
The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) also announced this week the launch of a public service campaign designed to help individuals at risk of losing their homes. |
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Reform Immigration -
March on Washington
