Debt-reduction supercommittee talks appear to be at an impasse
Posted in Main Blog (All Posts) on November 4th, 2011 4:35 am by HL
Debt-reduction supercommittee talks appear to be at an impasse
Washington’s latest exercise in debt reduction appeared to be at an impasse Thursday, as members of a special congressional committee barreled toward a Thanksgiving deadline with no movement on the fundamental question of whether to raise taxes.
Talks continued between congressional leaders and members of the supercommittee, but the panel had no further meetings scheduled and no path to compromise on a plan to slice at least $1.2 trillion from projected borrowing over the next decade.
Federal union workers join Occupy protesters
What do a bunch of protesters camped out in city parks nationwide have in common with people who are the backbone of the government establishment?
Enough that members of at least four federal labor unions rallied in support of the Occupy movement in a Lafayette Square demonstration Thursday.
On the day that a House committee approved legislation that would cut the federal workforce by 10 percent and during a time when federal employees are in a battle to protect their pay, benefits and jobs, federal union members gathered with other labor organizations to back the national Occupy movement’s call for economic justice.
Cain camp considering legal action against Politico
A Herman Cain aide said Thursday that the Cain campaign is considering its legal options over the original Politico story, which revealed that the former head of the National Restaurant Association was accused of sexually harassing at least two women during his tenure in the 1990s.
“This is likely not over with Politico from a legal perspective,” a campaign official told the Post, stopping short of explaining what exactly he meant by taking legal action against the publication.
Senate blocks $60 billion infrastructure plan, another part of Obama jobs bill
The Senate shot down another piece of President Obama’s $447 billion jobs bill Thursday, as a stalemated Congress goes through the motions of attempting legislation to spur economic growth largely as a mechanism to allow each party to blame the other for the failure to act.
The chamber failed to advance a measure to spend $50 billion on highway, rail, transit and airport improvements and another $10 billion as seed money for an infrastructure bank designed to spark private investment in construction. The vote was 51 to 49 in favor, but the measure needed 60 votes to proceed to a full debate.
Bulk of U.S. troops out of Iraq by mid-December
The U.S. military will not have to “rush to the exits” in Iraq, and should have the vast majority of troops out by the middle of December, with a little time to spare, a senior American miliary commander said Thursday.
With just under two months before American forces must leave Iraq, the U.S. military still has 33,000 service members, 12 bases and 600,000 pieces of equipment in the country.