Congress’s Secret Plan to Pass Obamacare

by Brian Darling

President Obama and liberals in Congress seem intent on passing comprehensive health care reform, even though polls suggest it is unpopular with the American people. And despite the potential political risks to moderate Democrats, the President and left-wing leadership in Congress are determined to pass the measure using a rare parliamentary procedure.

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Treemometers: A new scientific scandal

By Andrew Orlowski

At least eight papers purporting to reconstruct the historical temperature record times may need to be revisited, with significant implications for contemporary climate studies, the basis of the IPCC's assessments. A number of these involve senior climatologists at the British climate research centre CRU at the University East Anglia. In every case, peer review failed to pick up the errors.

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Sound of Music | Central Station Antwerp (Belgium)

More than 200 dancers were performing their version of "Do Re Mi", in the Central Station of Antwerp. with just 2 rehearsals they created this amazing stunt!

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N.Y. Health Care Workers Revolt Over H1N1 Vaccine

Jennifer McLogan

New York is the first state in the country to mandate flu vaccinations for its health care workers. The first doses of swine flu vaccine will be available beginning next week. Much of it is reserved for state health care workers, but there is growing opposition to required innoculations.

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Immigration Crackdown With Firings, Not Raids

By JULIA PRESTON

LOS ANGELES — A clothing maker with a vast garment factory in downtown Los Angeles is firing about 1,800 immigrant employees in the coming days — more than a quarter of its work force — after a federal investigation turned up irregularities in the identity documents the workers presented when they were hired.

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Public-prayer battle lines drawn in Lodi

By Loretta Kalb

Lodi is just a small city in the heart of California's Central Valley. But tonight, it takes center stage for one of the nation's hottest issues.
The question is: Should the City Council allow invocations that call on Jesus at its public meetings?
Intense interest prompted the council to move tonight's meeting to Lodi's 900-seat theater in Hutchins Street Square.

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NYC terror suspect pleads not guilty, kept in jail

By TOM HAYS

NEW YORK -- As a suspected al-Qaida operative pleaded not guilty Tuesday to plotting a bomb attack in New York, the city's police commissioner pronounced the threat neutralized and said there is nothing to fear from the defendant's three alleged accomplices.
The terror scheme "has been broken up," said Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly. "I see no danger emanating ... from the people involved in this investigation."

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A few thousand trial lawyers have a lock on Democrats, who refuse to consider any legal reform.

By PHILIP K. HOWARD
Eliminating defensive medicine could save upwards of $200 billion in health-care costs annually, according to estimates by the American Medical Association and others. The cure is a reliable medical malpractice system that patients, doctors and the general public can trust.
But this is the one reform Washington will not seriously consider. That's because the trial lawyers, among the largest contributors to the Democratic Party, thrive on the unreliable justice system we have now.

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The IRS says it will fine or jail you for not paying Obama's mandate levy

Chairman Max Baucus's bill includes the so-called individual mandate, along with what he calls a $1,900 "excise tax" if you don't buy health insurance. (It had been as much as $3,800 but Democrats reduced the amount last week to minimize the political sticker shock.) And, lo, it turns out that if you don't pay that tax, the IRS could punish you with a $25,000 fine or up to a year in jail, or both.

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Cap & Trade's Creators Say It Won't Solve Global Warming

Written by Heritage.org

The first is that carbon emissions are a global problem with myriad sources. Cap-and-trade, he says, is better suited for discrete, local pollution problems. "It is not clear to me how you would enforce a permit system internationally," he says. "There are no institutions right now that have that power."

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Criminal anarchy on America’s doorstep

By: Bernd Debusmann

When Mexico’s president, Felipe Calderon, ordered 2,500 troops and federal agents into border city Ciudad Juarez 17 months ago to tamp down drug violence, the monthly murder rate ran at an average of 66. In retrospect, those were the days of peace and calm.

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Europe’s Socialists Suffering Even in Downturn

By STEVEN ERLANGER

Even in the midst of one of the greatest challenges to capitalism in 75 years, involving a breakdown of the financial system due to “irrational exuberance,” greed and the weakness of regulatory systems, European Socialist parties and their left-wing cousins have not found a compelling response, let alone taken advantage of the right’s failures.

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World Bank Head Sees Dollar’s Role Diminishing

By EDMUND L. ANDREWS

“The United States would be mistaken to take for granted the dollar’s place as the world’s predominant reserve currency,” the World Bank president, Robert B. Zoellick, said in a speech at the School for Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins. “Looking forward, there will increasingly be other options to the dollar.”

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Suspected flag burner pilloried

By BOB GARDINIER AND HUMBERTO MARTÍNEZ

VALLEY FALLS -- The young man was given three choices: get turned over to the police, go one-on-one in a fight with a seasoned war veteran, or be duct-taped to a flagpole for six hours with a sign around his neck identifying his alleged crime: flag burning.

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20 easy ways to boost your memory

BY PAULA SPENCER

Worried about fading brain power? If you’re older than 27, you have good reason. That’s the age when cognitive skills start to decline, according to new University of Virginia research. But while some changes in thinking and memory are inevitable as we age, the good news is that lifestyle seems to be able to blunt those effects — and keep many minds working sharply well into old age.

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Rigging the route to a 51st state

By EDDIE GARCIA

Since 1967, Puerto Ricans have voted three times against becoming a US state and in favor of maintaining their status as an independent commonwealth in association with America. The last time was 11 years ago.
But now a bill moving in Congress would have Puerto Ricans vote on the issue of statehood yet again. And this time, the process is rigged to favor statehood.

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Federal Reserve Scandal Bigger than ACORN

By Cliff Kincaid

For the first time, a hearing is being held on Rep. Ron Paul's Federal Reserve Transparency Act of 2009 (H.R. 1207) by the House Committee on Financial Services. Grass-roots pressure has been credited with forcing the hearing into what has happened to trillions of dollars supposedly spent by the Federal Reserve on the stabilization of the financial system.

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The Un-Aborted Obama

by Mike Adams

A Democrat historian once told me that, during its history, the mostly Democratic KKK lynched almost 5000 blacks. Today, the mostly Democratic pro-choice movement applauds (and even defends as a “right”) the mutilation of over 9000 blacks on a weekly basis. You probably think it is unfair to compare pro-choicers to the KKK. But unfair to whom? Klansmen were never such prolific killers.

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U.S., Allies Say Iran Has Secret Nuclear Facility

By Karen DeYoung and Michael D. Shear

President Obama's charge that Iran is constructing a secret nuclear fuel facility brought years of confrontation over the country's alleged nuclear weapons program to a new crisis point Friday, as he joined with the leaders of Britain and France to warn that international patience is waning fast.

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Review Ordered of Video Showing Students Singing Praises of President Obama

FOXNews.com

The commissioner of New Jersey's Department of Education ordered a review on Friday following the posting of a YouTube video depicting school children singing the praises of President Obama.

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US May Face 'Armageddon' If China, Japan Don't Buy Debt

By: JeeYeon Park

"It's almost Armageddon if the Japanese and Chinese don't buy our debt,” Robertson said in an interview. "I don't know where we could get the money. I think we've let ourselves get in a terrible situation and I think we ought to try and get out of it."

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(No background music) School kids taught to praise Obama

British Co Fines Workers For Emissions

Ben Webster

People who emit more than their fair share of carbon emissions are having their pay docked in a trial that could lead to rationing being reintroduced via the workplace after an absence of half a century.
Britain’s first employee carbon rationing scheme is about to be extended, after the trial demonstrated the effectiveness of fining people for exceeding their personal emissions target.

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Medicare and Gag Orders

Maybe Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus should put a gag order on Douglas Elmendorf too. On Tuesday, the Congressional Budget Office director told Mr. Baucus's committee that its plan to cut $123 billion from Medicare Advantage—the program that gives almost one-fourth of seniors private health-insurance options—will result in lower benefits and some 2.7 million people losing this coverage.

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Current Health Insurance Reform Proposals

Karen A. Campbell

Abstract: Current proposals for health care reform
would exacerbate existing problems in the U.S. health
system and weaken the economy. In particular, the proposed
surtax on high-income individuals would impose
deadweight losses on the economy, depressing employment
and slowing economic growth. True reform would change
outdated rules and regulations to give consumers greater
choice and autonomy in their health care spending.
reforms would lead to a more efficient and more effective
health care system without harming the economy.

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Obama Will Spend More on Welfare in the Next Year Than Bush Spent on Entire Iraq War

By Fred Lucas

(CNSNews.com) – As a candidate for president, Barack Obama decried the financial toll that the Iraq war was taking on the economy, but Obama’s proposed spending on welfare through 2010 will eclipse Bush’s war spending by more than $260 billion.

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Potato farmer holy grail: McDonald's french fries

By JOHN MILLER

KIMBERLY, Idaho – From the fields of Idaho to tasting rooms in suburban Chicago, potato farmers, researchers and industry representatives are in the midst of an elusive hunt: finding a new spud for McDonald's french fries.

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America armed, but guns not necessarily loaded

By MARY FOSTER

NEW ORLEANS – Bullet-makers are working around the clock, seven days a week, and still can't keep up with the nation's demand for ammunition.
Shooting ranges, gun dealers and bullet manufacturers say they have never seen such shortages. Bullets, especially for handguns, have been scarce for months because gun enthusiasts are stocking up on ammo, in part because they fear President Barack Obama and the Democratic-controlled Congress will pass antigun legislation

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Risky Business: New York Taxes the Rich at Some Peril

ALBANY, N.Y. (AP/ 1010 WINS) -- This year, the deep pockets of New York's rich were tapped like never before. The state's wealthiest pay new higher income tax rates, higher taxes for limousines and yachts, more to enter a horse in a race and more to dabble in real estate.
Meanwhile, many are losing millions from the closing of business tax loopholes and those making over $1 million are losing tax deductions others get.

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Seasonal flu shot may increase H1N1 risk

Preliminary research suggests the seasonal flu shot may put people at greater risk for getting swine flu, CBC News has learned.
"This is some evidence that has been floated. It hasn't been validated yet, it's very preliminary," cautioned Dr. Don Low, microbiologist-in-chief at Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto.

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Dollar under scrutiny at G20 summit

by P.Parameswaran

The dollar issue is bound to surface at the two-day meeting in Pittsburgh as US President Barack Obama and other leaders of the Group of 20 economies debate a new framework for tackling the so called global "economic imbalances" blamed for fuelling the latest financial crisis.

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Pelosi Seeks to Make Health Reform Bill More Liberal

Posted by Stephanie Condon

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) is planning to include in the bill a tax on wealthy Americans, as well as a more robust government-run health insurance plan (or "public option"), abandoning the compromises leaders in a key committee worked out with the moderate Blue Dog Democrats,

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School kids taught to praise Obama

U.N. climate meeting was propaganda: Czech president

By Louis Charbonneau

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Czech President Vaclav Klaus sharply criticized a U.N. meeting on climate change on Tuesday at which U.S. President Barack Obama was among the top speakers, describing it as propagandistic and undignified.
"It was sad and it was frustrating," said Klaus, one of the world's most vocal skeptics on the topic of global warming.

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A Secret White House Power Grab Is In Full Swing

Phil Kerpen

It’s one thing for President Obama to surround himself with the advisers he’d like to have, but it’s another to bestow on them sweeping powers to broker secret negotiations and push forward vast new regulations that could cost American families thousands of dollars.

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The rules murdering our troops

Ralph Peters

In Afghanistan, our leaders are complicit in the death of each soldier, Marine or Navy corpsman who falls because politically correct rules of engagement shield our enemies.
Mission-focused, but morally oblivious, Gen. Stan McChrystal conformed to the Obama Way of War by imposing rules of engagement that could have been concocted by Code Pink:
* Unless our troops in combat are absolutely certain that no civilians are present, they're denied artillery or air support.

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Gay marriage gone wrong creates Catch-22

Daniel Dale

Trapped in a bad marriage?
Sorry, really. But you've got nothing on Larissa Chism and Tara Ranzy, a divorce-seeking Indiana couple doomed to live unhappily ever after and after and after by a legal Catch-22.
Chism, a psychiatrist, and Ranzy, an educator, wed in Toronto in January 2005. In March of this year, they filed a divorce petition.

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House Democrats considering insurance tax

By ERICA WERNER and RICARDO ALONSO-ZALDIVAR

WASHINGTON (AP) -- House Democrats are considering an insurance tax to help pay for their health care overhaul plan, even though such a funding scheme is bitterly opposed by labor unions that are among the party's most loyal constituencies.

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Fidel Castro praises Obama on climate change

By PAUL HAVEN

HAVANA — Barack Obama's call for action on climate change and his admission that rich nations have a particular responsibility to lead has received strong praise from an unusual source — U.S. nemesis Fidel Castro.
The former Cuban leader on Wednesday called the American president's speech at the United Nations "brave" and said no other American head of state would have had the courage to make similar remarks.

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Obama to world: Don't expect America to fix it all

By JENNIFER LOVEN

UNITED NATIONS – President Barack Obama challenged world leaders Wednesday to shoulder more of the globe's critical burdens, promising a newly cooperative partner in America but sternly warning they can no longer castigate the U.S. as a go-it-alone bully while still demanding it cure all ills.

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ACORN Community High School: Where Your Child Can Learn Social Change Techniques to Solve Real Life Problems

When they're not involved in defending themselves from accusations of voter fraud or promoting child prostitution on videotape the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) also run radio stations in Dallas and Little Rock and high schools in New York City.The AP reported on thiss diverse organization on Saturday:
Its affiliates include nonprofit radio stations KNON in Dallas and KABF in Little Rock. The stations and ACORN work closely together, share a common mission and have offices in the same buildings, Kettenring said.

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Barack Obama ready to slash US nuclear arsenal

Julian Borger

Obama has rejected the Pentagon's first draft of the "nuclear posture review" as being too timid, and has called for a range of more far-reaching options consistent with his goal of eventually abolishing nuclear weapons altogether, according to European officials.
Those options include:
• Reconfiguring the US nuclear force to allow for an arsenal measured in hundreds rather than thousands of deployed strategic warheads.
• Redrafting nuclear doctrine to narrow the range of conditions under which the US would use nuclear weapons.
• Exploring ways of guaranteeing the future reliability of nuclear weapons without testing or producing a new generation of warheads.

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Here's your 'demonstration project,' Mr. President -- it's called Mississippi

By: David Freddoso

Since passing tort reform in 2004, Mississippi has seen the number of medical malpractice claims plummet by 91 percent from its peak. The state's largest medical liability insurer dropped its premiums by 42 percent, and has offered an additional 20 percent rebate each year since tort reform went into effect.
That is the story that Mississippi's Republican, governor, Haley Barbour, offered on Friday, speaking at the Heritage Foundation. He also made an observation about President Obama's decision to offer only token "demonstration projects" on lawsuit abuse rather than address it meaningfully in his health care reform proposal.

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MacEachern: Tucson schools create race-based system of discipline

Doug MacEachern

On a certain emotional level, it is a good thing for a minority student with few incentives to achieve much academically to see others who have.
But, as always, TUSD's race-obsessing board of governors is taking racial bean-counting to preposterous extremes.
This summer, the TUSD board adopted a "Post-Unitary Status Plan" that it expects will help the district escape a decades-old federal desegregation order.
The plan includes increasing the number of minority teachers - per the summer hiring spree, which netted 14 special-education teachers and one math-science teacher.

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Presidential Approval Ratings -- Barack Obama

Barack Obama's Most Recent Weekly Approval Rating Average
52%
(Sep 7-13, 2009)
Barack Obama's Term Average:
60%
Barack Obama's High Point:
69%
(Jan 22-24, 2009)
Barack Obama's Low Point:
50%
(several times;most recent:Aug 27-29, 2009)
Average for U.S. Presidents Since Franklin D. Roosevelt:
55%
Average for Elected Presidents' Third Quarter:
64%

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UN plans 'shock therapy' for world leaders on environment

Suzanne Goldenberg

"We need these leaders to go outside their usual comfort zones," said one diplomat. "Our sense is that leaders have got a little too cosy and comfortable. They really have to hear from countries that are vulnerable and suffering."

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Why everyone is saying no to Obama

By AMIR MIZROCH

So why is everyone saying no to Obama?
It's the economy, stupid.
Everyone has worked it out by now: The great secret is out. America's economy has made Obama a weak president, and he will likely remain weak throughout his first term. He has about two years to pull the American economy out of its free-fall before he begins his reelection campaign. If he can do it, and that's a big if, chances are good that he'll get reelected, and in his second term he can try to pull some geopolitical strings. But for the next three years, expect to see a world that says no to Obama. No meaningful and dramatic diplomatic initiative can come out of the White House in the next three years, as long as Obama remains weak.

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US-EU rift clouds climate summit

By Fiona Harvey in London, Joshua Chaffin in Brussels and Edward Luce in Washington

A growing rift between the US and Europe is overshadowing Tuesday’s United Nations climate change summit in New York, further damping hopes for a breakthrough at the Copenhagen talks in December.
Connie Hedegaard, the Danish environment minister, lowered expectations, saying: “Things are looking difficult and too slow, that is the fact.”

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U.S. to push for new economic world order at G20

By Alister Bull

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States will urge world leaders this week to launch a new push in November to rebalance the world economy, but there are doubts national governments will bow to external advice.

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Democrats' quest for balance in 2009

Debra J. Saunders

Democrats seem to have shifted their thinking on a number of issues since President Obama took the oath of office.

Figure some Dems have more faith in government with a like-minded man at the helm, and besides, circumstances have changed. But also figure that some Democrats were just looking for sore spots - and their anti-Bush rhetoric was based not on principle, but raw opportunism.

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