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Showing posts with label demoratic. Show all posts
Showing posts with label demoratic. Show all posts
Sunday, May 16, 2010
Thursday, May 6, 2010
Britain General Election 2010: voters go to the polls in tightest election in decades
elford and Wrekin Council employees prepare the Iron Bridge Toll House in Shropshire as a polling station for the Parliamentary and Local Election
Millions of people across Britain will today go to the polls in the most tightly-contested General Election in a generation.
A string of eve-of-election opinion polls gave David Cameron's Conservatives a clear lead over Labour and the Liberal Democrats, but suggested that the Tories will not reach the level of support they need to claim an overall majority in the House of Commons.
With around 50,000 polling stations opening at 7am today, there was more uncertainty about who would eventually emerge as Prime Minister than in any election since 1992 and a real expectation of a hung Parliament for the first time since 1974.
On Wednesday night David Cameron urged the public not to allow fear to “triumph over hope” as he sought an outright victory with a final appeal to millions of undecided voters.
The Tory leader completed a gruelling 36-hour campaigning drive across the country with a pledge that he could make Britain better.
Friday, April 30, 2010
Labour fights on after debate blow
David Cameron, Nick Clegg and Gordon Brown shake hands after the TV debate
Labour has vowed to carry on fighting to polling day after Gordon Brown failed to make the party's hoped-for breakthrough in the final leaders' debate.
A clutch of instant polls following the last of three televised head-to-heads made David Cameron clear winner, with the Prime Minister again trailing in third place.
With just a week to go and Labour still behind in the overall opinion polls, the party had been hoping desperately that Mr Brown would put in a performance that would change the dynamics of the campaign.
Mr Cameron cautioned that the election was "far from won" for the Conservatives and said that he would spend the next six days concentrating on winning every vote.
Labour election co-ordinator Douglas Alexander also insisted that the result of the election remained "wide open", and said that Mr Brown would carry on fighting until the end.
Monday, April 26, 2010
Election 2010: Tories to target Labour heartlands
The Conservatives hope to build on their opinion poll lead
The Conservatives are to step up campaigning in seats where Labour are defending healthy majorities, in the wake of the Lib Dem poll surge.
Tory strategists have identified a number of seats where they believe support for Labour is ebbing away.
Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg has said first-past-the-post votes made "no sense at all" in a three-party system.
Lord Mandelson has warned Labour voters in Labour/Tory marginals: "Vote Nick, get Dave and George".
Labour will focus campaigning on its plans for the NHS on Monday, while the Lib Dems are highlighting their plans for a pay rise for junior ranks in the armed forces.
BBC political correspondent Ben Wright said the surge in the polls for the Lib Dems, in the wake of TV prime ministerial debates, had upset both the Tories' and Labour's election strategies.
Friday, March 12, 2010
Democrats pare differences over health overhaul- Alleged funding of abortion cause big differences.
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House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of Calif. speaks during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, Friday, March 12, 2010
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nev., left, along with Gina Owens from Seattle, Wash.,left, whose daughter, Tiffany Owens died after losing her job and health care, Senate Majority Whip Richard Durbin of Ill. center, and others, arrive for a health care news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, March 11, 2010.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of Calif. speaks during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, Friday, March 12, 2010.
President Barack Obama delayed next week's Asian trip on Friday to seize on suddenly improved prospects for his sweeping health care legislation, as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi forecast final passage of the overhaul in days.
"It's going to be historic," she said as House and Senate leaders and the White House reached for final agreement on the measure.
Pelosi said it appeared a second administration priority, far-reaching changes in the student loan industry, would be added to the legislation. The measure would have the government originate assistance to needy college students, ending a system that has allowed banks and other private lenders to do so at a fee.
The change is estimated to save tens of billions of dollars over a decade, money that would be plowed back into higher Pell Grants and other student aid.
The health care legislation is designed to extend insurance to millions who lack it, while banning insurance company practices such as denying coverage to people who have been sick. Most Americans would be required to get coverage under law, and many would receive subsidies to make insurance more affordable.
Republicans are implacably opposed to the measure, which they say would amount to a government takeover of the health care system, financed by cuts to Medicare and higher taxes.
As a result, the prospect of a party-line vote on such far-reaching legislation ensures that the issue will reverberate into the fall elections for control of Congress.
At the White House, a senior administration official said Obama's scheduled trip to Indonesia, Guam and Australia will be pushed back from March 18 to March 21 and the president will return on March 26, instead of March 24. The official divulged this information on the grounds of anonymity because Obama's change in travel plans had not yet been announced.
Press secretary Robert Gibbs had insisted earlier that Congress act by March 18 — Obama's original departure date. But the White House seems to have backed off of that as Democratic leaders scurried to round up votes.
Additionally, the White House announced Obama would travel to Ohio on Monday — the third in a string of campaign-style appearances since he vowed several days ago to do everything in his power to assure enactment of his top domestic priority.
Pelosi spoke with reporters after a closed-door meeting of the Democratic rank and file, a session that she said left her feeling "very exhilarated" about the prospects of passing the legislation.
"We stand ready to stay as long as necessary" to finish it, she said. A two-week Easter break is scheduled to begin March 26.
"I think that we're at a very good place," she said, adding that a revised measure, complete with a cost estimate from the Congressional Budget Office, will be sent to the Budget Committee and posted on the Internet within a week.
The health care bill appeared on the cusp of passage in early January, but was derailed when Senate Republicans gained the strength needed to sustain a filibuster and prevent final approval.
In the weeks since, leaders have come up with a two-part rescue strategy. It calls for the House to pass legislation that cleared the Senate in December, despite numerous objections, and for both houses to follow immediately with a second bill that makes changes to the first.
The second, fix-it bill would be drafted under rules that prevent Republicans from demanding Democrats produce a 60-vote super-majority, a threshold now beyond their reach.
House Democrats continued private meetings Friday to review elements of the still-emerging fix-it bill, but few details were immediately available.
In general, though, it would provide additional assistance to lower-income families who are unable to afford insurance, help states that already provide above-average benefits under Medicaid, the state-federal health care program for the poor, as well as gradually close a gap in coverage under the Medicare prescription drug program.
Thursday, September 10, 2009
South Carolina Rep. Joe Wilson yells 'You lie!' to the president
The hollerer was Wilson, a four-term Republican from South Carolina and former aide to the late Sen. Strom Thurmond. A lawyer with four sons who have served in the military, two in Iraq, Wilson has long aspired to statewide office. "I think Joe's very confrontational," said House Majority Whip James E. Clyburn. Wilson held his first health-care town hall forum last month in Clyburn's district, three blocks from his home.
It was a perfect storm of hot buttons that evoked an utterance of such negativity that it turned heads. President Barack Obama was giving a speech to Congress and he started talking about healthcare and illegal immigrants and money, and unexpectedly, Rep. Joe Wilson of South Carolina spoke up.
"You lie!" the Republican congressman blurted out on the floor of the House immediately after the president said: "the reforms I’m proposing would not apply to those who are here illegally."
It was Rep. Wilson who had been reinforcing the belief that the healthcare reform would include the so-called Death Panels. He called it an "end-of-life counseling program, which has been correctly highlighted by former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as a program which could lead to seniors being encouraged to seek less care in order to protect the government´s bottom line."
Minutes before Wilson's wail, the president had debunked the theory that grandma's plug would be pulled in order to save federal dollars. "It's a lie, plain and simple," he said, which brought most of the attendees to their feet.
After the speech, the criticism for Wilson was bipartisan. "I've never seen anything like that before," said Rep. Earl Pomeroy (D-N.D.) "We do not invite the president of the United States into the House of Representatives and hurl insults."
Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said the outburst was "totally disrespectful" and demanded that Rep. Wilson apologize to the president. "No place for it in that setting or any other, and he should apologize for it immediately," McCain told Larry King on CNN.
Wilson apologized shortly after the speech for how he acted out: “This evening I let my emotions get the best of me when listening to the president’s remarks regarding the coverage of illegal immigrants in the healthcare bill. While I disagree with the president’s statement, my comments were inappropriate and regrettable. I extend sincere apologies to the president for this lack of civility.”
Stepping into a fray that still threatens to kill plans for national health care overhaul, President Barack Obama declared Wednesday that "the time for bickering is over" and outlined principles for Congress to follow in the debate:
• People who have coverage through their employers should be able to keep it; at least, there's nothing in his proposal that would force that to change.
• People who don't have coverage would have to get it, and they'd have the option of buying through an exchange set up to increase competition and hold down rates.
• Insurers couldn't cap benefits, throw people off rolls once they get ill or exclude them for preexisting conditions.
• Plan would not insure illegal immigrants
• Federal funds would not pay for abortions
•Would not cause Death Panel where end of life counseling program will encourage old folks to seek less care to protect government bottom line.Will encourage "Grandma plug" to be pulled to save Federal money.
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Sunday, September 6, 2009
Obama's "green jobs" guru Jones resigns after uproar-Van Jones resignesigned amid controversy over past inflammatory statements
Van Jones resigned his post in the Obama administration in the midst of controversy,an administration official specializing in environmentally friendly "green jobs,"
White House environmental adviser Van Jones resigned late Saturday after weeks of pressure from the right over his past activism.
"On the eve of historic fights for health care and clean energy, opponents of reform have mounted a vicious smear campaign against me," Jones, special adviser for green jobs at the White House Council on Environmental Quality, said in a statement announcing his resignation just after midnight Saturday. "They are using lies and distortions to distract and divide."
He continued: "I cannot in good conscience ask my colleagues to expend precious time and energy defending or explaining my past. We need all hands on deck, fighting for the future."
Van Jones, an administration official specializing in environmentally friendly "green jobs" with the was linked to efforts suggesting a government role in the 2001 terror attacks and to derogatory comments about Republicans.The matter surfaced after news reports of a derogatory comment Jones made in the past about Republicans, and separately, of Jones' name appearing on a petition connected to the events surrounding the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks. That 2004 petition had asked for congressional hearings and other investigations into whether high-level government officers had allowed the attacks to occur.
Jones issued two public apologies in recent days, one for signing a petition that questioned whether Bush administration officials "may indeed have deliberately allowed 9/11 to happen, perhaps as a pretext for war" and the other for using a crude term to describe Republicans in a speech he gave before joining the administration.
Jones flatly said in an earlier statement that he did not agree with the petition's stand on the 9/11 attacks and that "it certainly does not reflect my views, now or ever."As for his other comments he made before joining Obama's team, Jones said, "If I have offended anyone with statements I made in the past, I apologize."His apologies did little to quiet Republican demands that the resign called for Jones to quit, saying in a statement, "His extremist views and coarse rhetoric have no place in this administration or the public debate."Congress to investigate Jones's fitness for his White House position.
Joint chairperson of the council, said in a statement released early Sunday that she accepts Jones resignation and thanked him for his service.
"Over the last six months, he had been a strong voice for creating jobs that improve energy efficiency and utilize renewable resources," she said. "We appreciate his hard work and wish him the best moving forward."
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Tuesday, August 11, 2009
World Leaders Blast Burma for Suu Kyi Sentence
U.S. citizen John Yettaw, seen here in 2005, was arrested in Myanmar for entering the compound of Myanmar pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
May 6, 2002: Aung San Suu Kyi is seen at a press conference after being freed from 19 months under house arrest.
Jan. 30, 2008: Burma's pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi is seen in Yangon
-Aug. 11: Activists holds a banner calling for the release of detained pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi outside the Burmese Embassy in Bangkok.-
European leaders sharply condemned the sentencing Tuesday of Burma's most prominent pro-democracy leader to an additional 18 months of house arrest.
Suu Kyi, the 64-year-old Nobel Peace laureate, has been in detention in Myanmar, also known as Burma, for 14 of the last 20 years, mostly under house arrest. She has now been ordered to serve an 18-month sentence for allowing an uninvited American to stay at her home.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown decried what he called a "sham trial." Sweden, which holds the presidency of the European Union, promised tighter sanctions against Burma's leaders. Amnesty International's secretary general called the verdict "shameful."
Aung San Suu Kyi, head of Burma's National League for Democracy, was found guilty Tuesday of violating the conditions of her house arrest by allowing an uninvited American to stay at her home.
The U.S. man on trial in Myanmar alongside Aung San Suu Kyi was Monday night discharged from the hospital where he had been recovering from epileptic seizures, an official source said.
American John Yettaw's departure from Yangon General Hospital, where he spent a week undergoing treatment, means a verdict in Suu Kyi's court case could now go ahead on Tuesday morning as scheduled at Insein prison's court.
Diplomats and officials had said a judgment could be postponed once again if her co-defendant Yettaw - who sparked the case by swimming to her lakeside home in May - had remained hospitalized after suffering repeated epileptic fits.
But an official source confirmed to AFP on Monday night, on condition of anonymity, that Yettaw had been discharged from the city hospital, having been taken there from the prison a week ago.
Yettaw faces charges of abetting Suu Kyi's breach of security laws, immigration violations and a municipal charge of illegal swimming.Yettaw, 53, of Falcon, Mo., swam across a lake, entered Suu Kyi's home uninvited and asked to spend two nights before trying to secretly swim back. He told his lawyer that he swam to Suu Kyi's residence to warn her of an assassination attempt that he had seen in a vision.
The court sentenced him to three years in prison for breaching Suu Kyi's house arrest, three years in prison for an immigration violation and to another year for swimming in a restricted zone.
Yettaw was hospitalized last Monday after suffering seizures. He reportedly suffers from epilepsy, diabetes and other health problems, including post traumatic stress disorder from his service in the U.S. military.
The head of the military-ruled country ordered her to serve an additional 18-month sentence under house arrest. Suu Kyi, a 64-year-old Nobel Peace Prize, laureate has already been in detention for 14 of the last 20 years.
International criticism was swift in coming.
"This political trial had just one aim: to prevent Madame Aung San Suu Kyi from leading her fight in favor of a free and democratic Burma," he said in a statement issued in Paris.
Burma, also known as Burma, has been ruled by the military since 1962.
The current junta came to power in 1988 after crushing a pro-democracy uprising. Suu Kyi's party won 392 of 495 parliament seats in 1990 elections, but the military ignored the results. Suu Kyi became a symbol of Burma's suppressed democracy and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991.
Irene Khan, Amnesty International's secretary general, said Suu Kyi had faced a maximum sentence of five years.
"The Burma authorities will hope that a sentence that is shorter than the maximum will be seen by the international community as an act of leniency," added Khan. "But it is not, and must not be seen as such."
She said Suu Kyi should never have been arrested in the first place.
For now, the 64-year-old Nobel Peace Prize laureate, arguably the world's most famous prisoner, will likely return to her daily meditation, listening to radio news broadcasts and waiting for the occasional censored mail, including letters from two sons she last saw a decade ago.
During her 86-day trial, diplomats and supporters were impressed by Suu Kyi's grace under pressure, rebuking those who called Yettaw a fool, sharing her birthday chocolate cake with prison guards and thanking envoys for their support.
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VOA Burmese reporter Ronnie Nyane met John Yettaw's wife Betty Yettaw and police chief Richard Wrinkles to find out background and life of John William Yettaw, who secretly swam across the Inyar lake and got into pro-democracy leader Daw Aung San Suu Kyi's house, and currently being detained by the military regime in Burma.
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