Tag: Weekend News Digest

Incidents around the country referring to President-elect Barack Obama are dampening the postelection glow of racial progress and harmony, highlighting the stubborn racism that remains in America.

From California to Maine, police have documented a range of alleged crimes, from vandalism and vague threats to at least one physical attack. Insults and taunts have been delivered by adults, college students and second-graders.

A manifesto published Sunday – subtitled “Oui, nous pouvons!”, the French translation of Obama’s campaign slogan “Yes, we can!” – urges affirmative action-like policies and other steps to turn French ideals of equality into reality for millions of blacks, Arabs and other alienated minorities.

“Our prejudices are insidious,” Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, a singer and wife of President Nicolas Sarkozy, said in an interview with the Journal du Dimanche newspaper, which published the manifesto. She said she hoped the “Obama effect” would reshape French society.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said in a letter to Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson that the administration should consider expanding the $700 billion bailout to include car companies.

“A healthy automobile manufacturing sector is essential to the restoration of financial market stability, the overall health of our economy, and the livelihood of the automobile sector’s work force,” they wrote. “The economic downturn and the crisis in our financial markets further imperiled our domestic automobile industry and its work force.”

Yassin Majeed said the U.S. will respond to Iraq’s amendments to the pact after Tuesday’s elections so the new president-elect can be informed of the status of the talks.

Since May, U.S. and Iraqi officials have been trying to hammer out a new security agreement by the end of the year that would keep U.S. troops in the country until 2011.

A hundred canvas tents pitched on a weed-choked airfield to house an army of lawyers and journalists stand mostly empty, even as air conditioning blasts through them to keep iguanas and large rodents at bay.

Only three reporters showed up this week for the trial of Osama bin Laden’s alleged communications specialist, in contrast to the dozens who attended earlier hearings.

The growing interest among merchant fleets to hire their own firepower is encouraged by the U.S. Navy and represents a new and potential lucrative market for security firms scaling back operations in Iraq.

But some maritime organizations told The Associated Press that armed guards may increase the danger to ships’ crews or that overzealous contractors might accidentally fire on fishermen.

Beginning at the Republican National Convention in August, the McCain-Palin ticket has touted the pipeline as an example of how it would help America achieve energy independence.

“We’re building a nearly $40 billion natural gas pipeline, which is North America’s largest and most expensive infrastructure project ever, to flow those sources of energy into hungry markets,” Palin said during the Oct. 2 vice presidential debate.

In the cross hairs of the campaign carried out by DCI of Washington were Republican senators and a regulatory overhaul bill sponsored by Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb. DCI’s chief executive is Doug Goodyear, whom John McCain’s campaign later hired to manage the GOP convention in September.

Freddie Mac’s payments to DCI began shortly after the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee sent Hagel’s bill to the then GOP-run Senate on July 28, 2005. All GOP members of the committee supported it; all Democrats opposed it.

The large turnout points to trouble ahead for the U.S.-Iraqi security deal as Sunni and Shiite lawmakers weigh the political risks associated with the far-reaching agreement.

Waving Iraqi flags and green Shiite banners, protesters chanted slogans condemning the pact. The demonstration in the mostly Shiite eastern part of Baghdad was staged under tight security, with army soldiers and police manning checkpoints along the route.

“Although we in the United States are taking many extraordinary measures to ease the crisis, we are not pursuing policies that would limit the flow of goods, services or capital, as such measures would only intensify the risks of a prolonged crisis,” he said at a meeting of the World Bank’s policy-setting committee.

U.S. lawmakers, meanwhile, called for fast action – by the administration on a plan for the government to take direct stakes in certain big troubled banks and by Congress on a new economic aid plan.

Every 20 years, voters can force a convention during which delegates can rewrite the entire constitution. It’s a long, painstaking process that could cost millions and, by coincidence, it’s on the ballot this November.

“This is our one opportunity for the people to have a voice, for the people to be heard, for them to decide whether marriage will be protected as between a man and a woman,” said Peter Wolfgang, executive director of the Family Institute of Connecticut.

Moscow faces a Friday deadline for pulling back its troops under the terms of a deal brokered by French President Nicolas Sarkozy on behalf of the European Union. Hundreds of EU observers began monitoring Russia’s compliance last week.

A pullback would likely mean at least a mild reduction of tensions between Russia and the West following their worst confrontation since the Soviet collapse. But substantial points of dispute remain.