Archive for June 11th, 2009
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Marines will come out of Iraq by spring 2010 (AP)
AP – All but a few dozen of the 16,000 Marines now in Iraq will be out by next spring, the Marine Corps commandant said Thursday, putting a solid end date on a long-anticipated exit. Gen. James T. Conway said his Marine commanders are already moving equipment out of Anbar Province, where his forces have largely been concentrated. But the larger exodus will begin shortly after the Iraqi elections. -
Obama takes health care plan to the people
President Obama took his health care reform push on the road Thursday, saying in Green Bay, Wisconsin, that those concerned with high costs and rising deficits should be proponents of change to an ailing system.
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Obama taps more big donors for ambassadorships (AP)
AP – President Barack Obama on Thursday tapped four big Democratic Party donors for plum ambassadorships in Europe and Latin America while naming six career diplomats to posts in Africa, the Mideast and the Pacific.
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Voting starts in Iran’s presidential election (Reuters)
Reuters – Iranians began voting on Friday in a closely-fought presidential election pitting conservative President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad against more moderate rivals seeking better ties with the West. -
U.S. congressional negotiators back war funding bill (Reuters)
Reuters – U.S. congressional negotiators on Thursday approved a $106 billion compromise bill largely backing President Barack Obama’s missions in Afghanistan and Iraq, but restricting his effort to quickly close the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. -
Questions Over Lobbyist Meetings Complicate Health Care Negotiations (CQPolitics.com)
CQPolitics.com – Health care lobbyists met Thursday with Senate Republicans despite what some characterized as warnings from Democratic staffers against undermining overhaul legislation.
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House ethics panel reviewing campaign money (AP)
AP – Lawmakers who steer money and contracts to favored companies and receive campaign contributions in return could face a House ethics committee investigation.
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Obama ‘created by Jews,’ museum killing suspect wrote
The 88-year-old white supremacist charged with killing a guard at the Holocaust Memorial Museum left a note proclaiming President Obama a tool of “Jew owners,” according to court records released Thursday.
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Court blocks release of detainee photos
The U.S. government can keep pictures of detainee abuse secret while it asks the Supreme Court to permanently block release of the photographs on the grounds they could incite violence.
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Commentary: Hate groups threatened by diversity
Last Saturday, a young African-American president used eloquent prose to challenge the world to learn from the horrors of the Nazi Holocaust at Germany’s Buchenwald concentration camp: “To this day, there are those who insist that the Holocaust never happened — a denial of fact and truth that is baseless and ignorant and hateful. This place is the ultimate rebuke to such thoughts; a reminder of our duty to confront those who would tell lies about our history.”
