Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/315759448?client_source=feed&format=rss
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Saturday, June 29, 2013
Living Large in 140 Square Feet
Chris Tack made seven unloading trips to Goodwill before moving into the tiny home he and his wife Malissa designed and built. Constructed on a trailer bed and parked in Snohomish, Washington, the house is more than enough space for them, the couple says. And one advantage of an abode on wheels is that you can always move, says Malissa.
Source: http://www.npr.org/2013/06/28/196594976/living-large-in-140-square-feet?ft=1&f=1007
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Jamie Dupree's Washington Insider: Documents show IRS looking at "anti-Republican" groups
As the IRS released an 83 page internal review of the political targeting of Tea Party groups, Democrats in Congress leaked out documents which appeared to show the IRS keeping tabs on "anti-Republican" groups as well.
"Common thread is the word "progressive," notes the internal lookout list, which noted that the groups "are partisan and appear as anti-Republican."
In some of the same documents, both progressive and Tea Party groups are listed by the IRS for scrutiny, along with groups that focus on medical marijuana, the Arab-Israeli dispute, the Obama health reform law and more.
The discovery of such "Be On the Look Out" lists (BOLO) aggravated Democrats, as they demanded to know why the internal watchdog at the IRS so forcefully said that only conservative-leaning groups were given the once-over by tax agents.
"The American public expects competent, impartial, unbiased, and non-political treatment from the IRS," said Rep. Sander Levin (D-MI) in a letter to IRS inspector general J. Russell George.
"That same standard is also applicable to you and your organization," Levin fumed.
Republicans said just because the word "progressive" was found on a BOLO list didn't mean that somehow Democratic-leaning groups had been harrassed.
Still, the documents did give Democrats something to push back with, after weeks of a seemingly one-sided investigation that dealt mainly with Tea Party complaints.
As for the 83 page report from the new Acting IRS Chief, you can read that here.
Here are links to a series of IRS "BOLO" lists that were posted by Democrats from the last four years:
Aug. 12, 2010
Nov. 9, 2010
Nov. 16, 2010
Feb. 2, 2011
Feb. 8, 2012
March 23, 2011
June 15, 2012
June 16, 2012
June 25, 2012
Feb. 8, 2012
July 10, 2012
July 11, 2012
April 4, 2013
April 10, 2013
April 19, 2013
One more thing about the 83 page internal IRS review - here are the takeways as authored by the IRS on what they found:
FINDINGS??????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? ACTIONS
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Our unlikely man in Moscow takes on Putin over human rights, spying and Snowden
Yuri Kochetkov / EPA file
U.S. Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul leaves the Russian Foreign Ministry headquarters in Moscow, Russia, May 15 2013.
By Jim Maceda, Correspondent, NBC News
MOSCOW -- As fugitive National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden evaded capture in Hong Kong and fled to Moscow, disappearing in an airport transit lounge, U.S. Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul was on the front lines of efforts to arrest him.
?
According to multiple accounts, McFaul tirelessly worked the phones and social media, focusing pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin to "do the right thing" and hand over the 29-year-old?former NSA-contractor. Putin ? typically defiant ? refused.
It was an odd, confrontational role for a diplomat ??but then again, McFaul isn't a typical one.
Ever since the former Stanford University academic and Russia expert arrived?? about a year and a half ago ??in the Spaso House, the traditional residence for U.S. ambassadors, McFaul has been a lightning rod for Russian anger against the West, and specifically, America.
McFaul, a laid-back, 49-year-old Californian as fluent in Los Angeles Lakers basketball as he is in strategic nuclear arms, likes to say he is "no Cold War soldier."
But he hadn't even unpacked his bags when Russia?s main, Kremlin-controlled TV station Channel One ran a lead story about a group of opposition leaders lining up outside Spaso to meet the man who wrote a book titled "Russia?s Unfinished Revolution."
The reporter suggested McFaul had been appointed by President Barack Obama to finish that business.
McFaul has taken it all in stride: the angry chants of "Down with the U.S. Embassy" at pro-Putin demonstrations; the growing anti-Americanism of Putin?s third term as president; his crackdown on U.S. institutions like USAID and Voice of America; the evisceration of the anti-Putin movement and the jailing of its key leaders.
Recently, there has also been a?tit-for-tat over human rights, with Russians accused of abuses being banned from travel to the United States and Americans prohibited by the Kremlin from adopting Russian children.
Above it all is Russia?s military and financial support for Syrian strongman President Bashar Assad.
But, while many in the Obama administration have been criticized for doing little in the face of Putin?s surge, McFaul has turned into a prodigious blogger and tweeter, slowly winning over the hearts and minds of young Russians with his jovial chatter ??he often tweets in Russian.
For example, the tweet below in Russian says: "President Putin on Snowden: 'the faster he chooses the final destination point, the better it will be for us and for him.'"
?
At the same time, McFaul also knows how to pick his fights. When a group of so-called "private security" agents raided the offices of the non-governmental organization For Human Rights and forcibly evicted 71-year-old activist Lev Ponomaryov, leaving him covered in cuts and bruises, McFaul took to Twitter and called the move "another case of intimidation of civil society."
The Putin regime has responded in kind. In May, just as the U.S. ambassador had launched the#AskMcFaul hashtag, a question-and-answer session on Twitter, he was bombarded with questions -- too many to be unplanned -- about the news that Russian authorities had detained a U.S. Embassy employee named Ryan Christopher Fogle.
Fogle allegedly tried to recruit a Russian intelligence agent for the CIA. McFaul managed to ignore the online harassment and focus for a full hour on the positive: good cooperation in law enforcement; the "reset" in U.S.-Russia relations; and his love of the opera. Fogle was later released.
And, this week, even as his boss, Deputy Secretary of State Bill Burns, was named point man for U.S. efforts to arrest Snowden, McFaul has unleashed his rapid-fire tweeting during the latest stand-off over Snowden?s fate. ?
Reacting to Putin?s claim that he couldn't extradite the American because there was no such treaty between the United States and Russia, McFaul fired off this reminder: "Over last 5 yrs US has returned 1,700 Russian citizens to Russia w/ 500+ of them being criminal deportations" ??a?shrewd talking point followed by more chatter about basketball.
In the end, Snowden may well escape, finding asylum in Ecuador or elsewhere. But it won?t be for lack of effort from America?s unlikely man in Moscow, battling ??and taking the knocks ??from behind the scenes.
Jim Maceda is an NBC News correspondent based in London, currently on assignment in Moscow.?
Related:?
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Snowden's stealthy exit: How WikiLeaks and maybe Russia helped
The NSA leaker is traveling to Moscow en route to a third country. Russian President Vladimir Putin's spokesman told journalists Sunday that he knows nothing of Snowden's travel plans.
A giant screen at a Hong Kong shopping mall shows Edward Snowden, the former contractor accused of leaking information about NSA surveillance programs. He left Hong Kong on Sunday.
Vincent Yu/AP
EnlargeThe fugitive National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden has sprung yet another surprise. He's on the move, and reportedly traveling to Cuba, and then perhaps on to Venezuela or Ecuador, via Moscow.
Skip to next paragraph Fred WeirCorrespondent
Fred Weir has been the Monitor's Moscow correspondent, covering Russia and the former Soviet Union, since 1998.?
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Mr. Snowden left his temporary refuge in Hong Kong?Sunday?morning, just one day after the US government charged him with espionage and launched an urgent effort to extradite him from the former British colony. He boarded an Aeroflot flight to Moscow, and news reports say he has an onward ticket with the Russian national airline to fly to Cuba?on Monday.
In addition to the clear suggestion of official Russian aid with the fleeing whistleblower's logistics, Snowden appears to have received help from a more kindred source. WikiLeaks tweeted?Sunday?that it had "assisted Mr. Snowden's political asylum in a democratic country, travel papers and safe exit from Hong Kong."
Kremlin authorities earlier hinted that Russia might be willing to grant asylum to Snowden. But President Vladimir Putin's spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, told journalists?Sunday?that he knows nothing about the NSA leaker's travel plans.
Authorities in Hong Kong announced Snowden's departure?Sunday?in an official statement?that noted he had left "on his own accord for a third country through a lawful and normal channel," and added that US authorities had already been informed.
The statement said the urgent US warrant to arrest Snowden could not be carried out "since the documents provided by the US Government did not fully comply with the legal requirements under Hong Kong law.... ?As the HKSAR [Hong Kong] Government has yet to have sufficient information to process the request for provisional warrant of arrest, there is no legal basis to restrict Mr Snowden from leaving Hong Kong."
The statement included an extraordinary passage that may go far toward explaining why Hong Kong, which does have an extradition treaty and good relations with the US, appears to have turned so uncooperative in Snowden's case: "Meanwhile, the HKSAR Government has formally written to the US Government requesting clarification on earlier reports about the hacking of computer systems in Hong Kong by US government agencies. The HKSAR Government will continue to follow up on the matter so as to protect the legal rights of the people of Hong Kong."
Wikileaks founder Julian Assange said in a statement?Sunday?that his organization was providing legal and logistical help to move Snowden to a safe haven in a "democratic country."
"Mr. Snowden is flying in an Aeroflot aircraft over Russian airspace, accompanied by WikiLeaks legal advisers," Mr. Assange said.
Upon arrival in Moscow he will be "met by diplomats from the country that will be his ultimate destination. Diplomats from that country will accompany him on a further flight to his destination," he added. The third country is still not named, but experts say it's most likely to be Venezuela or Ecuador.
"Owing to WikiLeaks' own circumstances, we have developed significant expertise in international asylum and extradition law, associated diplomacy and the practicalities in these matters," Assange said.?"I have great personal sympathy for Ed Snowden's position. WikiLeaks absolutely supports his decision to blow the whistle on the mass surveillance of the world's population by the US government."
Snowden's latest revelations, published in Hong Kong's South China Morning Post?on Sunday, indicate that US intelligence agencies have been hacking Chinese mobile phone companies to steal millions of text messages.
Russian security expert Andrei Soldatov, who edits Agentura.ru, an online journal that focuses on the secret services, says that in addition to granting Snowden safe passage to Cuba on an Aeroflot jetliner, Russia may have played a deeper role in helping to arrange his flight.
He suggests that the Kremlin's English-language satellite news network, RT, which enjoys very close relations with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, could have used its offices to help Wikileaks hook up with Snowden in Hong Kong,?
"There are reports that Assange's assistant, Sarah Harrison, is flying on the same plane with Snowden," says Mr. Soldatov.?"Involvement of RT would make sense, since RT has close cooperation with Assange, and he did a series of programs for them last year [Russia gives WikiLeaks' Julian Assange a TV platform]. The involvement of WikiLeaks requires no explanation. It wants to maintain itself as the key center for all disclosures of the kind that Snowden brought to the world," he adds.?
Soldatov says Russian assistance is also logical, for wider reasons than just an opportunity to stick it to Uncle Sam.
"Russia and China have been involved in a so-far unsuccessful struggle to change the rules of the Internet, by taking control of it away from the US-based Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) and giving its functions to a wider, non-US-based entity," he says.
"The Russians and Chinese have been posing, for these purposes, as big defenders of Internet freedom. This political context helps to explain RT's close relations with WikiLeaks as well.... So, it makes sense for them to help Snowden too. Russian authorities see an opportunity to present themselves as the new center of refuge for whistleblowers against US dominance in Cyberspace. It's a coup for them," he adds.??
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Past US ambassador troubled by embassy security
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) ? As President Barack Obama prepares to visit East Africa, nearly 15 years after terrorists bombed two U.S. embassies here, a former U.S. ambassador to Kenya says he worries that security at the Nairobi embassy has become "complacent."
Obama is scheduled on Monday to visit Dar es Salaam, the commercial capital of Tanzania, which along with Nairobi was the site of near-simultaneous embassy attacks in August 1998. The bombings combined killed 224 people, mostly Kenyans. A dozen Americans died.
Scott Gration, the immediate past U.S. ambassador in Nairobi and a retired U.S. Air Force major general, said that during one period of his yearlong tenure as ambassador he didn't think that security was had the priority it should have been given. He said he thinks the problem has been rectified.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/past-us-ambassador-troubled-embassy-security-141745027.html
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Energy and roads get share of ?100bn
27 June 2013
Last updated at 09:05 ET
Danny Alexander: "We are putting long-term priorities before short-term political pressures"
Plans for a ?100bn modernisation of the UK's infrastructure, including new homes, road repairs and improved flood protection, have been announced.
The package, of which ?50bn will come in 2015-16, is also aimed at boosting new sources of energy like shale gas.
Treasury Minister Danny Alexander said the plans put "long-term priorities before short-term political pressures".
But Labour said projects must start now and capital investment in the engine of the economy was actually falling.
The announcement of the government's infrastructure plans came a day after Wednesday's Spending Review, in which ?11.5bn of cuts to Whitehall departments were spelt out.
While the first ?50bn is committed to infrastructure projects starting in 2015-16, the rest is for the period from 2016 to 2020.
The main funding commitments include:
- ?3bn to build 165,000 new affordable homes
- ?28bn for road improvements, including ?10bn for essential maintenance
- ?10bn to clear a "backlog" of school building repairs
- 850 miles of railway to be electrified as part of ?30bn rail investment
- ?250m for extended super-fast broadband to rural areas
- ?370m for flood defences. Agreement with industry to provide affordable insurance for flood-hit homes
- ?800m extra funding for Green Investment Bank
- ?150m for health research including into dementia
- ?100m for a new prison in Wales
"This is an ambitious plan to build an infrastructure that Britain can be proud of," Mr Alexander told MPs.
The road building programme was the largest for 40 years and the support for new homes the most substantial for more than two decades, he said.
As part of efforts to boost home building, government-owned land will be sold to the private sector and together with sales of other government assets, including the Student Loans book, would raise ?15bn.
There will be new support to help the building of new nuclear plants, including Hinkley Point in Somerset, a guaranteed price for offshore wind energy and tax incentives brought in for shale gas projects.
Continue reading the main storySpending Review Documents
Spending Round 2013[1.9 MB]
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His speech came as a report was being published showing that the UK's shale gas reserves were greater than previously thought.
The transport plans focused mainly on roads and railways.
'Road decay'Mr Alexander said ?10bn would be spent on dealing with the UK's "decaying" road network, with 21,000 miles of roads to be resurfaced and new lanes to be added to the busiest stretches of motorways.
Among the most significant projects, the ?1.5bn upgrading of the A14 between Huntingdon and Cambridge will be brought forward by two years to 2016.
Mr Alexander said the spending on roads was equivalent to the cost of filling 19m potholes.
On rail, he restated plans to electrify large parts of the network and increased the budget for the proposed HS2 line connecting London and seven of the largest ten UK cities, to more than ?42bn.
Osborne: "We've got a long-term plan now as a country to up our national game"
He also confirmed that ?2m feasibility funding would be provided for London's proposed Crossrail 2 project, but said Mayor Boris Johnson's challenge was to work out how the private sector could meet at least half the cost of the scheme.
He also said the basis of an agreement had been reached with the insurance industry for it to pay for a new scheme to help 500,000 homeowners in areas prone to serious flooding to get cover at reasonable prices.
Earlier, Mr Osborne told BBC Breakfast that "you cannot just build a road in a week" but new homes, schools and roads were already finished and the coalition had a "long-term plan" rather than the "stop-start" approach of previous governments.
On energy, he said shale gas was "environmentally safe" and could provide "cheap energy" for many years to come - but that projects - criticised by environmental campaigners - would need to get the appropriate planning approvals.
'Act now'But shadow chancellor Ed Balls said most of the projects would not begin for four years.
"They should do an immediate boost for housing and transport this year and next," he told ITV's Daybreak.
Ed Balls: "The international monetary fund says a ?10bn boost is needed now"
"George Osborne talks about capital spending but he's not actually acting.
"I don't think the public buy into this at all - I think people see their living standards falling, tax cuts for millionaires, the economy flatlining, unemployment high. The plan has completely failed."
The ?50bn for 2015-16 represents a real-terms fall of 1.7% from the infrastructure budget for 2014-15 but the coalition says the figure is still higher than the one Labour was planning when it lost power in 2010.
'Rarely delivered'Green Party MP Caroline Lucas said spending was being directed towards "polluting high-carbon infrastructure" such as roads and shale gas instead of prioritising jobs in renewable energy and energy efficiency,
The British Chambers of Commerce welcomed the announcement but said it must quickly be translated into action.
"Infrastructure projects are too often promised and too rarely delivered in this country, and that cycle must be broken," director of policy Adam Marshall said.
"The Whitehall machine must be judged by the number of diggers on the ground, not strategies and press notices."
In Wednesday's Spending Review, the chancellor said the economy was "out of intensive care" and announced several measures aimed at saving money, including:
Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-23074245#sa-ns_mchannel=rss&ns_source=PublicRSS20-sa
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Friday, June 28, 2013
Protests near Mandela hospital over 'disappointment' Obama's South Africa trip
President Obama is heading to South Africa from Senegal as part of his African tour, where Nelson Mandela's daughter says he might visit Mandela if doctors approve. NBC's Keir Simmons reports.
By Stacey Klein and Ian Johnston, NBC News
Barack Obama said Friday that he did not need a ?photo op? with Nelson Mandela, saying the ?last thing? he wanted to do was be intrusive at a time when the anti-apartheid icon?s family are concerned about his health.
However, the president did not rule out a meeting with Mandela, whose ex-wife Winnie Madikizela-Mandela said Friday had made a ?great improvement? compared to a few days ago.
On Tuesday, Mandela's daughter Zindzi said that her father ?opened his eyes and gave me a smile? when she told him Obama was coming.
Speaking about her ex-husband Nelson Mandela, Winnie Mandela says, 'From what he was a few days ago, there is great improvement' in the former South African president's condition.
Speaking on Air Force One as he flew to South Africa from Senegal, Obama said that ?we?ll see what the situation is when we land.?
?I don't need photo op," he said. "The last thing I want to do is be intrusive at a time when the family is concerned? with Mandela?s condition.
He said the main message he wanted to deliver was ?profound gratitude? for Mandela?s leadership and to say that ?the thoughts and prayers of the American people are with him, his family and his country.?
This message could be delivered to his family and not directly to Mandela, the president said.
On Thursday, Obama said he had already had the "privilege of meeting Madiba [Mandela's clan name] and speaking to him."
"And he's a personal hero, but I don't think I'm unique in that regard," Obama added. "If and when he passes from this place, one thing I think we'll all know is that his legacy is one that will linger on throughout the ages."
Madikizela-Mandela, speaking outside Mandela's former home in the Johannesburg township of Soweto, said her ex-husband seemed to be getting better.
?I?m not a doctor but I can say that from what he was a few days ago there is great improvement," she said.
When asked by NBC News Special Correspondent Charlayne Hunter-Gault?whether the family would welcome a visit by Obama, Zindzi Mandela said Thursday she wasn't aware of any formal request. However, she added that decision would be left with doctors treating the Nobel Peace Prize laureate.
Ahead of his arrival in Johannesburg on Friday, an anti-Obama protest was held not far from the hospital where Mandela is being treated with one demonstrator claiming the U.S. president had been a ?disappointment.?
Siphiwe Sibeko / Reuters
Protesters protest the visit of President Barack Obama in Pretoria Friday. One said he viewed Obama as a "disappointment" and thought Nelson Mandela would too.
Reuters reported that nearly 1,000 trade unionists, Muslim activists, South African Communist Party members and others marched to the U.S. Embassy where they burned a U.S. flag, calling Obama's foreign policy ?arrogant and oppressive.?
"We had expectations of America's first black president. Knowing Africa's history, we expected more,? Khomotso Makola, a 19-year-old law student, told Reuters. He said Obama was a ?disappointment, I think Mandela too would be disappointed and feel let down.?
South African critics of Obama have focused in particular on his support for U.S. drone strikes overseas, which they say have killed hundreds of innocent civilians, and his failure to deliver on a pledge to close the U.S. military detention center at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba housing terrorism suspects.
However, Nigerian painter Sanusi Olatunji, 31, had brought portraits of both Mandela and Obama to add to a growing number of flowers, tribute notes and gifts outside the hospital.
?These are the two great men of my lifetime,? he told Reuters. ?To me, Mandela is a prophet who brought peace and opportunity. He made it possible for a black man like me to live in a country that was only for whites.?
/
View images of civil rights leader Nelson Mandela, who went from anti-apartheid activist to prisoner to South Africa's first black president.
In the latest statement on Mandela?s condition, South African President Jacob Zuma said the 94-year-old was ?much better? on Thursday than he had been the previous night. "The medical team continues to do a sterling job," he added.
A statement issued by Zuma?s office said he and Obama would hold ?crucial bilateral talks that will take forward relations between the two countries? on Saturday.
?South Africa values its warm and mutually beneficial relationship with the United States immensely. This is a significant visit which will take political, economic and people to people relations between the two countries to a higher level, while also enhancing cooperation between U.S. and the African continent at large,? it said.
The statement noted Obama?s visit was being made as South Africa prepares to celebrate ?20 years of freedom? ? 1994 saw the first elections in the country in which all its citizens were eligible to vote. Mandela voted for the first time in his life in that year and was elected the country?s first black president, serving until 1999.
?South Africa greatly appreciates the solidarity provided by the Anti-Apartheid Movement in the United States during the struggle for liberation,? the statement said.
Reuters contributed to this report.
Related:
This story was originally published on Fri Jun 28, 2013 5:05 AM EDT
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Video: Paulson: We Need More Action From Congress
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Source: http://www.nbcnews.com/video/cnbc/52333999/
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Thursday, June 27, 2013
Student loan deal seems on edge of falling apart
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Efforts to keep interest rates on new student loans from doubling appeared to be falling apart Wednesday as the Democratic leader of the Senate declared a bipartisan proposal unacceptable.
With just days to spare before a July 1 deadline sends subsidized Stafford loan rates up from 3.4 percent to 6.8 percent, a group of senators from both parties announced a plan that would link interest rates on new federally backed loans to the financial markets. The deal would avert a costly rate hike for now but could spell higher rates in coming years.
The proposal seemed to stall even before it had a chance to be considered.
The chamber's top Democrat, Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada, said it could never pass. The Democratic chairman of the education panel said he couldn't back a plan that doesn't include stronger protections for students and parents.
Undeterred, Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., said Wednesday he would introduce the legislation on Thursday, along with Republican collaborators Sen. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma, Sen. Lamar Alexander of Tennessee and Sen. Richard Burr of North Carolina. Sen. Angus King of Maine, an independent, also signed on to the plan.
Aides to Manchin said he expected to have Democrats on board, as well.
"This deal shows the American people that bipartisanship and common sense are alive in Washington," Manchin said.
Alexander, the top Republican on the Senate education panel, said: "This proposal is fair to students and fair to taxpayers, and combines the best ideas from the president's budget, the House-passed bill and the work of this bipartisan coalition of senators. There's no reason Congress shouldn't pass it and the president shouldn't sign it before July 1."
Republicans have long sought to link student loans to the financial markets instead of letting Congress set the rates for federal lending. President Barack Obama included a variation of that market-based approach in the budget he sent to Congress earlier this year, leaving his fellow Democrats grousing and trying to thwart those efforts.
"Why Senate Democrats continue to attack the president's plan is a mystery to me, but I hope he's able to persuade them to join our bipartisan effort to assist students," said Don Stewart, a spokesman for Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.
McConnell had kept tabs on the Manchin-led talks and GOP aides suggested the resulting proposal might be the best ? if not only ? way to the Senate to advance legislation that would prevent a rate hike that Congress' Joint Economic Committee estimated would cost the average student borrower an extra $2,600.
Under the Manchin-led deal, interest rates would be based on the 10-year Treasury note plus an added percentage rate.
For loans taken this fall, that means all undergraduate borrowers would pay 3.6 percent interest rates, graduate students would pay 5.2 percent and parents would pay 6.2 percent. In future years, those rates could climb and there was not a cap on how high they could go.
Undergraduates who receive subsidized Stafford loans make up a quarter of all borrowers and they currently pay 3.4 percent interest. Undergraduates who do receive unsubsidized Stafford loans pay 6.8 percent and make up another half of borrowers. Graduate students and parents borrow from the government at 7.9 percent interest under the current system.
But if the Congressional Budget Office estimates for 10-year Treasury notes hold, students might be better off if rates double as scheduled to do. The low-at-first undergraduate rates would rise to the current 6.8 percent for the 2017 year and reach 7.2 percent the next year under the compromise proposal.
There is no limit to how high interest rates could go.
That, Democrats and student groups have warned, will hurt students worse than no deal at all.
"Any proposal that lacks a cap is a nonstarter and indicates that its proponents are putting their ideology above students and their families," said Allison Preiss, a spokeswoman for the Democratic-led Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee that Sen. Tom Harkin leads.
And a group of coalition of student groups wrote Senate leaders earlier this week: "No deal is better than a permanent bad deal."
For now, there seemed to be no vote imminent.
"There is no deal on student loans that can pass the Senate because Republicans continue to insist that we reduce the deficit on the backs of students and middle-class families, instead of closing tax loopholes for the wealthiest Americans and big corporations," said Reid spokesman Adam Jentleson. "Democrats continue to work in good faith to reach a compromise but Republicans refuse to give on this critical point."
The bipartisan proposal would save the government $960 million over a decade. Republicans have said they want any savings to go toward paying down the national deficit while Democrats insist any money generated from the program should go back to students and not to reduce red ink.
Students loans issued this year were set to bring in $51 billion net gain over the next decade.
The compromise plan would keep the cap on a students' annual loan repayment at no more than 15 percent of a graduate's income. When students start paying back their loans, they could consolidate them at a rate no higher than 8.25 percent.
The Republican-led House earlier passed legislation for student loans but let the interest rates shift every year, meaning loans taken at one interest rate to pay for freshman year could have higher rates by graduation day.
The White House threatened to veto that bill, although top officials later told lawmakers they were open to a compromise that could win congressional approval and avoid an embarrassing and avoidable rate hike.
Democrats in the Senate earlier tried to push through a measure that would extend current rates for two years while lawmakers rewrote the law that governs all higher education institutions that receive federal dollars. That process was slated to being this fall ? too late to help students returning to campus this fall.
Those efforts to keep rates at 3.4 percent fell apart under Senate rules but Senate Democrats said late Wednesday they would try again. Senate Republicans, too, failed to advance their own earlier student loan bill.
Some leaders in the Republican-led House said they were likely to pass whatever the Senate sends them. While the House already passed its own version of student loan legislation, the principles included in the Senate compromise were acceptable and GOP officials were not eager to revisit the issue.
If lawmakers don't formally act before the July 1 deadline, officials say they can pass the bill when they return from the July 4 holiday and retroactively set the rates. Officials say few students are expected to sign loan documents in July and instead were looking to finalize the aid packages closer to returning to campus in the fall.
Additionally, Obama left earlier Wednesday for a trip to Africa. He is not set to return until after the July 1 deadline and the White House is likely to want a public signing ceremony.
___
Follow Philip Elliott on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/philipelliott
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/student-loan-deal-seems-edge-202519301.html
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Sharp announces first THX-certified 4K TV, the $8,000 Aquos Ultra
Sharp has just revealed the Aquos Ultra at CE Week, a 70-inch Ultra HDTV the company says is the only THX-certified 4K model on the market. Calling it the company's "best designed TV ever," Sharp said that it put the model through "four hundred rigorous performance tests" to gain the THX nod, which is meant to assure that programming is reproduced as closely as possible. On top of the 3,840 x 2,160 pixel count, the model features advanced HD upscaling tech via a dual-core signal processor, pre-calibrated THX Movie viewing modes, a dual subwoofer system with 35 watts of sound output, Sharp's SmartCentral Smart TV platform and a flash-enabled web browser. You'll also be able to change channels or send video directly from your smartphone via the Beam app, and watch 3D films at 4K with the set's passive technology. If you're not dissuaded by the $8,000 price tag, it'll be up for grabs in mid-August -- check the PR after the break for more.
Filed under: Home Entertainment
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ICBMG 2013 : 2013 2nd International Conference on Business ...
2013 2nd International Conference on Business, Management and Governance - ICBMG2013 is the premier forum for the presentation of new advances and research results in the fields of theoretical, experimental, and applied Business, Management and Governance. The conference will bring together leading researchers, engineers and scientists in the domain of interest from around the world. Topics of interest for submission include, but are not limited to:
Accounting
Advertising Management
Business & Economics
Business Ethics
Business Intelligence
Business Information Systems
Business Law
Business Performance Management
Business Statistics
Change Management
Communications Management
Comparative Economic Systems
Consumer Behavior
Corporate Finance and Governance
Corporate Governance
Cost Management
Decision Sciences
Development Planning and Policy
Economic Development
Economic Methodology
Economic Policy
Economic Systems
Entrepreneurship
Finance & Investment
Financial Economics
Global Business
Growth; Aggregate Productivity
Household Behavior and Family Economics
Human Resource
Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering
Information Systems
Information Technology Management
International Business
International Economics
International Finance
Labor Economics
Labor Relations & Human Resource Management
Law and Economics
Management Information Systems
Management Science
Market Structure and Pricing
Marketing Research and Strategy
Marketing Theory and Applications
Operations Research
Organizational Behavior & Theory
Organizational Communication
Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles
Product Management
Production and Organizations
Production/Operations Management
Public Administration and Small Business Entrepreneurship
Public Choice
Public Economics and Finance
Public Relations
Public Responsibility and Ethics
Regulatory Economics
Resource Management
Strategic Management
Strategic Management Policy
Stress Management
Supply Change Management
Systems Management
Systems Thinking
Taxes (related areas of taxes)
Technological Change; Research and Development
Technology & Innovation
Time Management
Total Quality Management
Travel/Transportation/Tourism
Welfare Economics
Digital Government Application Domains:
courts, crisis management
education, emergency response
government statistics
grants administration
intelligence
international initiatives and cooperation
health and human services
law enforcement and criminal justice
legislative systems
natural resources management
open government (o-government)
regulation and rulemaking
security, tax administration
transportation systems
urban planning.
Information Technology and Tools to Support Government
cloud computing for digital government domains
collaboration tools
digital libraries and knowledge management
geographic information systems
human-computer interaction
intelligent agents
information integration
interoperable data, networks and architectures
large scale data and information acquisition and management
mobile government
multiple modalities and multimedia
national and international infrastructures for information and
communication
service-oriented architectures
semantic web
social networking, mashups, and software engineering for large-scale
government projects.
Law and economics
Financial system and economic development
Economic reforms and growth
the world economy
State governance and economic policy
History
Human and Social Evolutionary Complexity
Human Development based on psychological and social concepts
Human Rights Development
Human-Computer Interactions
Human-Environment Interactions
Information and Communication Systems
Innovation, Technology and Society
Interdisciplinary Research and Studies
International Relations & Collaborations
Journalism
Knowledge Management and Knowledge Economy
Land-Use Modeling Techniques and Applications
Law and Justice
Learning and Behavioral Modeling
Management
Management Information Systems
Mathematical Modeling in Social Science
Media and Communications, Technology
Open Learning and Distance Education
Organizational Decision Making
Physics Methods for Analyzing Social Complexity
Policy/Public Administration/Public Health
Political Science and Decision Making
Politics, society, and international relations
Population and Development
Preservation and Green Urbanism
Psychology
Public Administration
Public Governance
Race/Ethnic Studies
Social and Organizational Networks
Social Complexity
Social Computing
Social Network Analysis
Social Systems Dynamics
Social Work
Social-Psychological, Social, Organizational, and Technological
Systems
Socio-Cognitive-Technological Systems
Sociology
Sociology and Social Computation
Sport and Physical Education
Standards for Metadata, Ontologies, Annotation, Curation
Sustainable Development
Sustainable Economic Development
Sustainable Human and Social Development
Sustainable Urban Neighborhoods
Sustainable Urban Transport and Environment
Technology and Education
Technology, Society, Environmental Studies
Urban and Regional Planning
Urban Studies
Violence, Extremism, and Terrorism
Virtual Communities and Communications
SUBMISSION METHODS:
Formatting Instructions (DOC)
1. Electronic Submission System; ( .pdf)
https://www.easychair.org/account/signin.cgi?conf=icbmg2013
If you can't login the submission system, please try to submit through method 2.
2. Email: icbmg@iedrc.org ( .pdf and .doc)
Source: http://www.wikicfp.com/cfp/servlet/event.showcfp?eventid=31427©ownerid=13881
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AP Interview: UN Iraq rep urges exile cooperation
BAGHDAD (AP) ? The United Nations envoy to Iraq said Wednesday that residents of an Iranian dissident camp are denied freedom of movement by the exile group, and that efforts to relocate them outside Iraq are being stymied in part by lack of cooperation from the residents themselves.
Martin Kobler made the comments in an interview with The Associated Press in Baghdad as he prepares to leave the country at the end of his term. The U.N. has been involved in relocating members of the Mujahedeen-e-Khalq dissident group to a camp on the outskirts of the Iraqi capital while it works to resettle them abroad.
The MEK is the militant wing of a Paris-based Iranian opposition movement known as the National Council of Resistance of Iran that opposes Iran's clerical regime and has carried out assassinations and bombings there. They fear persecution if sent back to Iran.
About 3,100 MEK members live in Camp Liberty, a former U.S. military base near Baghdad airport. The Iraqi government wants the group's members out of the country. So do Iranian-backed Shiite militants, who have claimed responsibility for deadly rocket strikes on the camp.
Kobler acknowledged that a major problem in resettling camp residents is a shortage of countries willing to accept them. He repeated his call for U.N. member states, including the U.S., to do more.
"We do not have enough recipient countries. ... There is also reluctance from the side of the Liberty residents to cooperate with the UNHCR," he said, referring to the U.N. refugee agency.
Albania has agreed to take 210 camp residents, but only 71 have made the move so far. Germany has also offered to take 100 residents.
Kobler also cited concerns about what he called "human rights abuses inside Camp Liberty done by the MEK themselves."
Residents are not free to move between different sections of the camp without approval, and some are denied Internet and mobile phone access by MEK officials, he said. Medical treatment outside is also often blocked by the group, he alleged.
"There are, of course, MEK residents who probably would like to disassociate themselves from the MEK," he said. "Everybody who wants to go out of the camp ... should have the chance to do so."
The NCRI, the MEK's affiliated Paris-based group, has repeatedly criticized Kobler. He retains the backing of U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, and was recently appointed the U.N. envoy and head of the U.N. peacekeeping mission in Congo.
NCRI spokesman Shahin Gobadi dismissed Kobler's comments as baseless and intended to "cover up the failure to provide minimum security provisions" at the camp.
"The only purpose they serve is they set the stage for more attacks," he said, insisting that residents cooperate with the U.N. Gobadi also charged that "Kobler has never been an impartial person and does not represent the values of the U.N."
Iraq gave foreign diplomats as well as journalists from AP and Iraq's state-run TV a rare glimpse of the camp in September. Diplomats on the tour described conditions as acceptable.
The MEK fought alongside Saddam Hussein's forces in the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war, and several thousand of its members were given sanctuary at a facility known as Camp Ashraf near the Iranian border. The MEK renounced violence in 2001 and was removed from the U.S. terrorism list last year.
Iraq's Shiite-led government, which has close ties to Iran, considers the MEK a terrorist group. Iraqi security forces launched two deadly raids since 2009 on Camp Ashraf, and in 2012 most residents were moved to Camp Liberty, which is meant to be a temporary way station.
Ali al-Moussawi, a spokesman for Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, said Baghdad also has concerns that MEK leaders are preventing residents from leaving.
"There is intimidation being practiced by some MEK leaders against their fellow people," al-Moussawi said. "Some MEK members are willing to leave the country, but they are being threatened by a minority preventing them."
The exiles say their new home is unsafe, and they want to return to Camp Ashraf. Several residents were killed in a Feb. 9 rocket strike on the camp, and two others died in a similar attack this month.
In another development Wednesday, Iraqi electoral officials said the Kurdish-backed al-Taakhi list won the largest single bloc of seats in provincial elections in the restive northern province of Ninevah. It claimed 11 of 39 provincial council seats up for grabs.
Ninevah borders Iraq's largely autonomous Kurdish region and has a sizable Kurdish minority. Many of the remaining seats went to Arab parties, with Iraqi parliament speaker Osama al-Nujaifi's Sunni Arab-backed United bloc coming in second, with eight seats.
Residents in Ninevah and neighboring Anbar province voted last week in local elections that were delayed due to security concerns.
Also Wednesday, Iraqi authorities said two policemen were killed in a bomb blast in the Ninevah provincial capital Mosul. Four others died in an explosion in a small cafe in Baghdad's Dora neighborhood, They spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to release the information to journalists.
___
Associated Press writer Qassim Abdul-Zahra contributed reporting.
___
Follow Adam Schreck on Twitter at http://twitter.com/adamschreck
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/ap-interview-un-iraq-rep-urges-exile-cooperation-163517746.html
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Jackson's teenage son describes upbringing, death
FILE - In this Oct. 8, 2011 file photo, Prince Michael Jackson appears on stage at the Michael Forever the Tribute Concert, at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff. An attorney for Michael Jackson?s mother, Katherine Jackson, says the singer?s eldest son, Prince, will testify in a Los Angeles courtroom in the negligent hiring case against AEG Live LLC on Wednesday, June 26, 2013. Prince, 16, is a plaintiff in the case against concert promoter AEG Live. (AP Photo/Joel Ryan, File) *Editorial Use Only*
FILE - In this Oct. 8, 2011 file photo, Prince Michael Jackson appears on stage at the Michael Forever the Tribute Concert, at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff. An attorney for Michael Jackson?s mother, Katherine Jackson, says the singer?s eldest son, Prince, will testify in a Los Angeles courtroom in the negligent hiring case against AEG Live LLC on Wednesday, June 26, 2013. Prince, 16, is a plaintiff in the case against concert promoter AEG Live. (AP Photo/Joel Ryan, File) *Editorial Use Only*
FILE - In this Oct. 8, 2011 file photo, Prince Michael Jackson appears on stage at the Michael Forever the Tribute Concert, at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff. An attorney for Michael Jackson?s mother, Katherine Jackson, says the singer?s eldest son, Prince, will testify in a Los Angeles courtroom in the negligent hiring case against AEG Live LLC on Wednesday, June 26, 2013. Prince, 16, is a plaintiff in the case against concert promoter AEG Live. (AP Photo/Joel Ryan, File) *Editorial Use Only*
LOS ANGELES (AP) ? Michael Jackson's oldest son described the frantic efforts to revive his father to a jury, a scene of tears and agony that ended a dozen idyllic years being raised by one of pop music's superstars.
Michael Joseph "Prince" Jackson Jr. told the panel Wednesday how he knew there was trouble in the singer's rented mansion when heard screaming upstairs and went into his father's bedroom. His father was laying halfway off the bed, eyes rolled up into the back of his head as his physician tried CPR.
His sister Paris screamed for her father and Prince, now 16, told jurors that he was crying. On the ride to a hospital, the teenager recounted how he tried to calm the fears of his sister and younger brother by telling them that angels were watching over their father and everything would be fine.
It wasn't until his father's doctor, Conrad Murray, came out of the emergency room and said he had died that Prince knew his father was gone.
"Nothing will ever be the same," the teenager told jurors. He said while his younger brother doesn't totally realize the loss, his sister has had the hardest time of them all and he has had many sleepless nights since his father died four years ago.
His voice wavered at times and tears appeared to form in his eyes, but Prince remained composed as he publicly recounted for the first time what he saw the day his father died.
The re-telling of the scene in Jackson's bedroom came after nearly an hour of Prince describing happier times, showing photos of him and his sister when they were younger and a series of videos of the children filmed by their father.
He testified in a lawsuit accusing concert promoter AEG Live LLC of negligently hiring Murray, who was later convicted of involuntary manslaughter for giving Jackson an overdose of the anesthetic propofol.
AEG denies it hired the physician or bears any responsibility for the entertainer's death.
Wearing a black suit with a dark grey tie and his long brown hair tucked behind his ears, Prince testified that he saw AEG Live CEO Randy Phillips at the family's rented mansion in a heated conversation with Murray in the days before his father died. The teenager said Phillips grabbed Murray's elbow.
Phillips "looked aggressive to me," Prince testified.
His father wasn't at home at the time and was probably rehearsing, he said.
He said he saw his father cry after phone conversations with Phillips, and wanted more time to rehearse and was unhappy with pressure to perform his 50 scheduled comeback concerts titled "This Is It."
Murray's attorney Valerie Wass and AEG defense attorney Marvin S. Putnam later denied outside court that the meeting Prince described ever happened.
Putnam said Prince would be re-called to the witness stand during the defense case later in the trial.
"I think as the testimony will show when he is called in our defense that's not what happened," Putnam said. "He was a 12-year-old boy who has had to endure this great tragedy."
The testimony began with the teenager showing jurors roughly 15 minutes of private family photos and home videos.
He described growing up on Neverland Ranch and narrated videos of the property's petting zoos, amusement park and other amenities. After his father's acquittal of child molestation charges, Prince described living in the Middle East, Ireland and Las Vegas.
Prince is the first Jackson family member to testify during the trial, now in its ninth week. On Thursday his cousins, TJ and Taj Jackson, who are Tito Jackson's sons, will take the witness stand.
Prince Jackson, his sister Paris-Michael Katherine Jackson and brother Prince Michael "Blanket" Jackson are plaintiffs in the case against AEG, which their grandmother and primary caretaker filed in August 2010.
Another image showed Michael Jackson playing piano with his son while Prince was still a toddler.
Plaintiffs' attorney Brian Panish asked Prince whether he was interested in pursuing a career in music. "I can never play an instrument and I definitely cannot sing," Prince said to laughter from the jury.
He said he wanted to study film or business when he goes to college.
His testimony also included details that AEG's lawyers will likely point to later in the case to bolster their contention that Jackson was secretive about using propofol as a sleep aid.
Prince said none of the household staff were allowed upstairs at the mansion, and the singer kept his bedroom locked while receiving treatments from Murray.
During cross-examination, Putnam played a clip from a deposition of Prince in which the teen said he discovered the bedroom was locked when he and his siblings were playing hide-and-seek and couldn't get inside.
Prince also said his father gave him and his sister Paris a stack of $100 bills on a few occasions to give to Murray. He said his father told him that Murray wouldn't take the money from him, and the doctor wouldn't take the full amount from the children.
The teenager said his understanding was that the money was meant to tide Murray over until he got paid by AEG Live.
He never saw or knew how Murray was treating his doctor.
"I was 12. To my understanding he was supposed to make sure my dad stayed healthy," Prince testified.
___
Anthony McCartney can be reached at http://twitter.com/mccartneyAP
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How Reading Makes Us More Human - Karen Swallow Prior - The Atlantic
www.theatlantic.com:
A battle over books has erupted recently on the pages of The New York Times and Time. The opening salvo was Gregory Currie's essay, "Does Great Literature Make Us Better?" which asserts that the widely held belief that reading makes us more moral has little support.
Read the whole story at www.theatlantic.com
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? "); window.HPAds.ad_reload('conversation_300x250_req', 'conv_overlay_ads'); } }, login_prompt: function() { if ( window.HPConnect ) { window.HPConnect.Login(); return true; } return false; }, get_user_token: function() { if ( window.huff && window.huff.units && window.huff.units.user && window.Conversations.phpjs && window.Conversations.phpjs.md5 ) { return window.Conversations.phpjs.md5(window.huff.units.user.id); } } }; var Conversations = window.Conversations.require('Conversations:Conversations'); window.Conversations.app = new Conversations(); window.Conversations.app.initialize(config); // If the app did not initialize properly, display a message and exit if ( window.Conversations.app.isInitialized() === false ) { window.Conversations.app.die(); } }); "; var coords = [-5, -78]; if( HPConfig.current_vertical_name == 'homepage' ) { coords = [-5, -70]; } else if( HPConfig.current_vertical_name == 'mapquest' ) { coords = [-5, -68]; } FloatingPrompt.embed(this, html, undefined, 'top', {fp_intersects:1, timeout_remove:2000,ignore_arrow: true, width:236, add_xy:coords, class_name: 'clear-overlay'}); });?
Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/25/how-reading-makes-us-more_n_3495955.html
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