Posts Tagged ‘from’
May 19th, 2011
(CNN) – U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords is “recovering well” after skull surgery Wednesday, officials at Memorial Hermann-Texas Medical Center in Houston said.
The Arizona Democrat had a cranioplasty procedure, officials said.
Doctors will discuss the procedure and Giffords’ next step in rehabilitation at a Thursday morning press briefing.
March 31st, 2011
From the outset on Libya David Cameron has set out a position based on what looked to be refreshingly clear-cut principles. When Abdelbaset al-Megrahi was set free by the Scots with – we discovered subsequently – the help of Gordon Brown’s government, the then Leader of the Opposition made plain his revulsion at the idea of doing cosy deals with mass murderers.
News » Politics
March 25th, 2011
Canada's about to get another election — the eighth in my career as a political journalist. Here, a loose collection of lessons I've learned from those eight campaigns, mostly revolving around what I know best — how the media cover elections.
1. The politicians don't decide the elusive "ballot question." The voters do.
2. After a flurry of headlines and front-page news for the first week, the election goes quiet in the second week. It is entirely possible to forget (unless you're in the middle of it) that we're actually having an election. Campaign stories slip off the front pages and sometimes off the nightly news all together. Public attention doesn't pick up again until after the televised leaders' debates, which usually take place around Week 3.
3. About those debates. Everyone resolves not to talk about "knock-out punches," because they are a hackneyed cliche and rarely happen in real life. When the debates happen, everyone talks about "knock-out punches" and whether they happened. Everyone forgets that it takes a few days to determine what was the "defining moment" of the debates; it's often not what the commentators said it was that evening.
4. Reporters will make "fit to govern" judgments based on how well the tour buses perform in the area of feeding and accommodating the media. Campaign buses that get lost or break down or fail to provide three square meals a day to reporters will be pronounced abject failures at political leadership/competence.
5. All media will declare that they're going to not report on polls in the same old way and will break that promise by Day 2.
6. All media will say that they're going to talk to "real people," not strategists and communications advisers. The "real people" they ask for opinion will quickly turn into armchair strategists and communications advisers.
7. Applies to all parties: Policy announcements will be made in the morning, the rest of the day will be a flurry of reactions while the campaign planes/buses travel, and the evenings will be devoted to rallies. This means that the reporters aboard the planes actually only have news to file in the mornings and people watching TV are more up to date than the tour reporters about what's happened that day in the campaign.
8. There will be arguments on the tours about the price of seats aboard the planes/buses. Reporters will say that their money should guarantee a minimum number of scrums with the leaders, which is sort of like paying for access, an ethical no-no, but we'll argue the point anyway, with some enthusiasm.
9. All politicians will say they're going to win. They are not lying to us. Every politician has to believe they're going to win, just to get out of bed every morning and do the hard work of campaigning every day. Journalists will persist in trying to get the politicians to say they're going to lose/falter, however.
10. Some of the best stories of the campaign will be produced by people off the buses. Which will make us all wonder whether we should revisit the idea of mass coverage of the tours, but at the next election, we'll all hop aboard those leaders' buses again anyway.
Hope that helps. Welcome to Campaign 2011.
March 19th, 2011
Washington (CNN)- President Obama recognized the conflicts in the Middle East and North Africa as well as natural disasters in Japan in the opening of his weekly address Saturday, but the economy and his trip to Latin America quickly became the focus of his message.
“As we respond to these immediate crises abroad, we will also not let up in our efforts to tackle the pressing, ongoing challenges facing our country,” he said.
Obama will visit Brazil, Chile and El Salvador on the trip designed “to strengthen economic partnerships abroad so that we create good jobs at home.”
Obama described Latin America as a “part of the world where the economy is growing very quickly.”
Citing increased demand for goods and services from this region, he said that he wants to make sure the products that will be in demand are made in America.
“I want to open more markets around the world so that American companies can do more business and hire more of our people,” he said.
The president quoted statistics to support his plan, saying that every billion of goods and services that are exported from the United States support more than 5,000 jobs within the nation. And his goal to “double our exports by 2014" is based on the idea that “the more we sell overseas, the more jobs we create on our shores.”
He highlighted the result of existing partnerships by asserting that America now exports more than three times as much to Latin America than to China, and that exports to Latin America will soon support more than 2 million jobs.
Obama described Brazil as a country that imports more goods from the U.S. than from any other nation; Chile as “a country with a growing economy, and increasing demand for American goods;” and El Salvador as a nation with promise for growth. Citing a “special bond with our neighbors to the south,” that is “strengthened by the millions of Americans who proudly trace their roots to Latin America.”
“In an increasingly global economy, our partnership with these nations is only going to become more vital,” the president said. “It’s a source of grown and prosperity – and not just for the people of Latin America, but for the American people as well.”
The Republican weekly address also centered on the economy and job creation, but through a different lens. Freshman Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler from Washington opened the address by describing her position as “a tale of two Washingtons.”
She compared the “hard-working communities of southwest Washington state” with the “powers-that-be” in Washington, D.C.
Criticizing leaders for enlisting an “army of lobbyists” to block efforts made to address the nation’s debt, Beutler also charged those in power with “throwing a wrench into the gears of job creation.”
But she asserted that the new Republican majority is “hard at work on eliminating regulatory barriers to job creation” and listed actions including the House vote to repeal the 1099 mandate of health care reform law, and an upcoming vote that will “stop the EPA’s backdoor national energy tax that would drive up gas prices.
The congresswoman representing Washington’s 3rd district said that the GOP is working to send a signal that “Washington is going to stop using our small businesses as piggy banks and focus on helping them get back to creating jobs.”
Linking job creation with spending cuts, Beutler urged the need to cut spending beyond billion. She also slammed Senate Democrats and the president by charging Obama with staying on the sidelines while calling for the chamber to “step up and follow us in passing a bill so we can prevent a government shutdown and support job growth by reducing spending.”
“If we want to get our economy back to creating jobs, we can’t duck our responsibility to rein in spending.”
January 30th, 2010
(CNN) – Former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker is stepping down as chairman of President Obama’s outside economic advisory panel, according to Democratic sources familiar with the move, as the reshuffling of the White House’s economic team continues.
The announcement comes as senior officials say Obama is expected on Friday to make a much more substantial move by officially naming Gene Sperling to replace Larry Summers as the chairman of the National Economic Council, the key policymaking office inside the White House.
Sperling currently serves as a counselor to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and won high marks inside the administration for his negotiating skills with Congressional Republicans that helped seal the tax deal during the lame duck session of Congress in late December.
Sperling previously served in the NEC job during the Clinton administration and top Democrats close to the White House say his expected hiring shows the President is leaning more and more on Clinton veterans to gear up for working with a closely divided Congress. Obama also huddled Wednesday at the White House with former Clinton Commerce Secretary Bill Daley, who is a leading contender to become White House chief of staff.
The maneuvering could also signal a less aggressive White House posture toward Wall Street, since Daley has most recently served as a top official for JP Morgan Chase in its Midwest offices.
In addition, Volcker had been a strong advocate for much tougher regulations for Wall Street in the wake of the financial crisis, although his position as chairman of the president’s Economic Recovery Advisory Board (PERAB) gave him little clout to actually enact policy.
While the president has publicly expressed his admiration for Volcker’s counsel, the former Fed chairman clashed with other administration officials who were not so eager to pick more fights with Wall Street.
But his departure is not unexpected since the chairman of PERAB only serves a two-year term and Volcker was coming up to the expiration of his term. A successor to Volcker is not expected to be named when Obama announces other economic staff moves Friday.
November 19th, 2009
The Jeremy Vine Show is not generally thought of as a bear pit. Politicians tend to regard it as rather cuddly – at least, by comparison to the forensic ferocity of the Today programme. So Ed Miliband must have been taken aback by the aggressive line of questioning that poured from the mouths of those usually benign [...]
News » Politics
November 6th, 2009
In an interview, Carlos Morales Gil, the head of production and exploration for Pemex, acknowledged that the state oil company has had to shut in gas production of 150,000 cubic feet/day in the Burgos basin south of the Texas border because of the inability to ensure the security of some of the gas wells. (At US.50 per cu.ft., the lost production is the equivalent of US5,000 per day.) Morales said there had been no news of the six Pemex employees who were kidnapped on May 23d. “We’ve increased security, together with the Ministry of Defense, in the installations in the northeastern zone of the country, which has allowed us to partially recover the production that was reduced. However, there are zones where it is not safe to go, because of the crime threats to our people,” he said. (Reforma 11/10)
November 6th, 2009
I am now led to devote my life to the re-union of the British empire, as the best and only means to dry up the streams of misery that have deluged this country. They may be assured, that concious of the rectitude of my intentions, I shall treat their malice and calumnies with contempt and neglect.
