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It took a shouting match and tears to get the health-care bill through the House, according to some present, but Speaker Nancy Pelosi emerged victorious for her efforts in getting the needed votes. Though known for her liberal activism and support of reproductive rights, Pelosi also proved to be a ruthless numbers cruncher. Late Friday, Pelosi announced that she would concede limiting insurance coverage for abortion, an issue that had caused a stalemate among members of the House. The move may have alienated Pelosi's closest allies in the House, for whom abortion rights are tantamount, but in the end it was a strategy that worked. One representative told another that there are “more pro-life votes in the House than pro-choice and that abortion-rights advocates had better acknowledge that reality."
It seems that a political crisis has been averted for now. On Sunday, Iraq's parliament finally passed a law scheduling national elections for January 23. Members of parliament had struggled over representation of the Kirkuk region, an area held predominantly by Arabs and Turkomen, and Kurds who returned to the area in large numbers after the fall of Saddam Hussein. Lawmakers appeased Kurds by agreeing to the use voter lists from 2009 rather than from 2004, before many Kurds had returned. Within the next year, a panel will investigate and compare 2004 voter lists in Kirkuk and other disputed areas. For now, the compromise means that the planned U.S. troop withdrawal for next summer will "proceed as planned," which is a boost to the Obama administration as it debates sending more troops to Afghanistan.
President Barack Obama is close to making a decision to add 34,000 troops to Afghanistan but will hold off on making an announcement until later this month, administration and military officials tell McClatchy Newspapers. The first group of soldiers would be sent in March, and the last would not arrive until the end of 2010. Obama is said to be waiting to consult with allies when he visits Asia this month. The plan falls well below the 80,000 troops requested by Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal earlier this month. Currently there are 67,000 American troops and 42,000 troops from other countries serving in Afghanistan.
The violence continues in Pakistan: A suicide bomber killed an anti-Taliban village mayor and 11 others in a crowded Peshawar marketplace Sunday. Islamist militants have launched a bevy of attacks in recent weeks as the Pakistan army has moved into South Waziristan, a former refuge on the Afghan border. The army reports that it has killed 478 fighters since its offensive began there.
The trustee appointed to recoup losses for investors in Bernard Madoff's Ponzi scheme has dropped a $279 million claim against J. Ezra Merkin's Ariel and Gabriel funds. Irving Picard nixed the charge after determining that the funds weren't functioning as a "conduit for money," as he had originally suspected. Even with the reduced charge, Merkin's balance still stands at $564.4 million, which will mean seeking an increase in repayment from a third fund, Ascot. Ascot withdrew more than $500 million in fake profits from Madoff's firm from 1995 to 2008, according to the suit. Lawyers for Ariel and Gabriel say the funds' managers didn't know about Madoff's scheme, and also say they withdrew only 10 percent of their holdings.
The passing of the health-care bill in the House has given one politician a bit of instant celebrity: Rep. Joseph Cao of Louisiana voted a quick and decisive “yes” on the bill, the only Republican in the house to do so. "I have always said that I would put aside partisan wrangling to do the business of the people. My vote tonight was based on my priority of doing what is best for my constituents," said Cao, who represents areas around New Orleans with the highest rates of poverty in the U.S. and which were hit hard by Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Cao isn’t the only one in D.C. in the spotlight after yesterday’s vote: Harry Reid is now under pressure after changing positions to support the controversial public option, and faces an uphill battle to bring together moderate and liberal Democratic senators to combine a Senate version of the bill with the one from the House. “No one was going to be perfectly happy with anything done—stronger public option, no public option, no one was going to be completely happy,” said Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) in support of Reid’s efforts. Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA) summed up the coming negotiations, saying, “I think a showdown is going to happen no matter what.”
In the 20 years since the fall of the Berlin Wall, the dirty little secret among German politicians is that East Germany would still have a hard time standing on its own two economic feet, says Wolfgang Hummel, deputy director of the State Ministry of Finance for Berlin. Hummel writes in The Wall Street Journal that "East Germany is still fed intravenously by its western half." West German aid to the east has totaled $1.9 trillion since 1990, yet East Germany still produces very little. After the wall came down, the West German government tremendously overvalued the eastern mark. Labor costs soared, effectively diminishing the competitiveness of the East German workforce. Lost jobs followed, and today most East German companies have fewer than 50 employees. Hummel advocates for wage subsidies, which have proven effective, as opposed to job-creation programs, which bloat the public sector, and warns against a cushioned welfare system.
President Barack Obama acknowledged Saturday’s milestone health-care breakthrough in a brief speech on Sunday, thanking House members for their “courageous vote” and warning the Senate that a lot of work will follow the decision to revolutionize the country’s health-care system. “Now it falls on the United States Senate to take the baton and take this effort to the finish line for the American people,” said the president. Only one Republican voted for the $1 trillion bill, and the remaining members who opposed sat quietly when the final vote came in, as the Democrats who voted in favor of the bill cheered and slapped high-fives. “This is our moment to revolutionize health care in this country,” said Rep. George Miller (D-CA), who played a lead role in shaping the bill. Meanwhile, still-determined Republicans vowed to fight the bill’s future legislative process: “This government takeover has got a long way to go before it gets to the president’s desk, and I’ll continue to fight it tooth and nail at every turn,” said Representative Kevin Brady (R-TX). “Health care is too important to get it wrong.”
There may now be proof that texting is the way of the future. Text messages in the U.S. increased more than 80 percent over the 12 months ending in June, according to a recently released industry report. New technology doesn't explain the surge, as text-capable phones grew by only 7.3 percent over the same period. Text subscriptions may account for some of the increase. A spokesperson for the authors of the industry report attributes part of the explosion to enthusiastic teenage texters from the past decade; as they've aged, so have the population of total texters.
Jamie Dimon's newest hire at J.P. Morgan is a familiar figure: his father. Theodore “Ted” Dimon, the 78-year-old father of the J.P. Morgan chief, is quitting his post at Merrill Lynch to join his son's firm, Bloomberg News reports. A company spokesman said the elder Dimon was one of 70 brokers added this year to a Bear Stearns brokerage, which has been owned by J.P. Morgan since its March 2008 takeover. “I love the retail broker business because my dad is a broker and my grandfather was a broker and it was the first job I ever had,” Dimon said at an industry meeting last month. “So if you are really, really good, call J.P. Morgan. We’d be happy to hire you.”
Lock up, Lindsay! A search warrant released in the case of Hollywood’s now-infamous teen burglary gang states that the suspected thieves entered the homes of Lohan, Paris Hilton, and Megan Fox not by outwitting fancy security systems, but by simply waltzing through unlocked doors, People magazine reports. The document also states that suspect Nicholas Prugo, 18, who has confessed to the robberies and told police at least some of his cohorts, including suspect Rachel Lee, 19, broke into the homes of Paris Hilton and Rachel Bilson multiple times, and that Lee wanted to “own the designer wardrobes of the Hollywood celebrities she admired.” Other victims of the unusually classy band of robbers include Orlando Bloom, Audrina Patridge, Brian Austin Green, and Ashley Tisdale. At least $3 million in luxury goods were stolen, and $2 million have been recovered so far, according to police.
As Obama works on his strategy for Afghanistan, he may find himself visited by the ghost of Afghanistan occupiers past now that Mikhail Gorbachev, former leader of the Soviet Union, is weighing in. Gorbachev, who assumed Soviet presidency shortly after Soviet troops withdrew from the wartorn nation—prompting a loss of interest from Cold War-minded America, which had been supporting Afghan resistance fighters—thinks the "long-suffering people" of Afghanistan deserve independence. "Of course, when we are facing a dangerous concentration of terrorism—and we see that in this situation—certainly, terrorists must be defeated. But the overall emphasis must be on dialogue," Gorbachev said. "Yes, withdrawal from Afghanistan should be the goal." The ill-fated Soviet occupation of Afghanistan resulted in millions of civilian casualties and refugees, and has been cited as evidence of the notoriously difficult-to-govern nation's intractability.
As the investigation continues into the Fort Hood shooting last week, it’s been discovered that Major Nidal Malik Hasan worshipped at a Virginia mosque at the same time as two of the September 11 hijackers. Britain's Sunday Telegraph reports that the only suspect in the killing of 13 U.S. soldiers in Texas attended the Dar al-Hijrah Mosque, where the imam Anwar al-Awlaki presided. A former Homeland Security official has called al-Awlaki an "al Qaeda supporter, and former spiritual leader to three of the September 11 hijackers ... who targets U.S. Muslims with radical online lectures encouraging terrorist attacks from his new home in Yemen."
After weeks of buzz and a coveted Oprah endorsement, Precious lived up to the hype and shattered box-office records, bringing in $1.8 million at just 100 screens across the U.S. Fellow buzz-generator This Is It beat out new releases to take the No. 3 slot, just behind Jim Carrey’s latest update on holiday classic A Christmas Carol, which brought in a lower-than-expected $31 million. George Clooney’s The Men Who Stare at Goats brought in a solid $13.3 million. A Hollywood mainstay that didn’t fare so well? Cameron Diaz, whose thriller The Box made just $7.9 million.
Whatever you call him, Lloyd Blankfein says he’s just a banker “doing God’s work.” The Sunday Times profiles money-making machine Goldman Sachs, and the result is maddening, inspiring, or amusing, depending on where you fall on the populist-rage scale. The newspaper says that for Blankfein, Goldman’s CEO, “the credit crunch has rekindled his innate passion for moneymaking.” Learn how the bank makes its money and how its alums end up with choice political appointments, all in their own words: "We didn’t f*** up like the other guys… So, now we’ve got a bigger and richer pot to piss in." “We don’t club baby seals. We club babies." Adds a rival, "They’re a clever gang—of thugs." Oddest factoid: Goldmanites must check their voicemail frequently for Blankfein’s “mind bullet” messages—as well as those of his wife, who is officially an executive office, but unofficially the camp counselor.
Is Susan Boyle a double threat? The Scottish singer is set to appear on an upcoming episode of Dancing With the Stars, her first U.S. television appearance since visiting America’s Got Talent last September. Boyle, who stunned YouTube viewers around the world with her stirring performance last spring on Britain’s Got Talent, will reportedly stick to singing on the show in order to promote her album, I Dreamed a Dream, which hits shelves on November 24. “She loves America and loves the people,” said her brother, John Boyle. “She appreciates their honesty.”
Sarah Jessica Parker must be gunning for a Mother of the Year Award. The actress, who recently had twins via surrogate with husband Matthew Broderick, told Elle magazine this month, “I love the smell of diapers.” Not stopping there, Parker added, “I even like them when they’re wet and you smell them all warm like a baked good.” Steel yourself for her next perfume launch. The mother of 7-year-old James Wilkie also said of the new arrivals, “I have a fear that they’re not going to like me.” But they’ll probably manage: “The only tragedy would be if [the twins’] feet are bigger than mine,” she said with an eye to her coveted collection of designer shoes.
High-school students pushing dress-code norms at their schools are raising questions of gender identity—think boys with long hair and lip gloss, and girls in baggier-than-normal jeans or suits. “This generation is really challenging the gender norms we grew up with,” said one psychologist. “A lot of youths say they won’t be bound by boys having to wear this or girls wearing that. For them, gender is a creative playing field.” The most famous example of the new dress-code conflict was an openly gay Mississippi teen girl whose graduation photo was taken out of the yearbook after she posed in a tuxedo. Other schools have had a mixed response to the recent shift in gender expression: Some are accepting (one gay male student was elected prom queen in California), some send students home to change requiring them to dress “in keeping with their gender,” and others claim it’s difficult to protect teens from harassment.
Sarah Palin said Friday that if policymakers allow abortion rights, "perhaps the same mind-set applies to other persons," warning that the government might end health care for elderly patients or special-needs children. Palin's message came in Wisconsin where she was the star speaker at a pro-life fundraising event. Attendees were offered a chance to donate $1,000 in exchange for an autographed copy of the former vice presidential candidate's forthcoming memoir. Palin said, “It is so bogus that society is sending a message right now and has been for probably the last 40 years that a woman isn’t strong enough or smart enough to be able to pursue an education, a career and her rights and still let her baby live.”
As soon as next week, and after months of negotiations, Russia and the U.S. may sign a successor to the most extensive nuclear-weapons treaty before it expires December 5. National Security Adviser Jim Jones’ trip to Moscow late last month is what has fueled the diplomatic optimism—Jones offered a package of proposals called the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, or START, and the Russians reacted positively, if not formally. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said Saturday that the two countries “have every chance” to sign a treaty by the year’s end. Nailing down a replacement for the expiring 1991 treaty is a key first step in President Obama’s arms-control agenda, and as the December deadline loomed, analysts had feared a lapse in the complex procedures that verify both sides conformed to the rules. The new START agreement will contain modest cuts in the number of deployed warheads each side is allowed. The new ceiling will be 1,500 to 1,675 city-annihilators for each nation, down from the 1,700 to 2,200 agreed to seven years ago.
As if being caught between the Phillies and the Yankees weren't enough, New Jersey now has another battle to look forward to: gay marriage. After the issue went down in defeat in Maine Tuesday, activists on both sides are eyeing the state as the next battleground in the fight over same-sex matrimony as the Democrat-majority legislature is pressured to legalize gay marriage before Republican Chris Christie—who opposes the idea—replaces Democratic Gov. Jon Corzine. New Jersey already recognizes same-sex civil unions, but activists remain unsatisfied with the separate term. Maggie Gallagher, president of prominent anti-gay marriage group the National Organization for Marriage, says, "New Jersey is at the very top of our list," (though some gay-rights advocates have indicated their focus is shifting to other issues, like the federal Employment Non-Discrimination Act, which would ban gender- or sexuality-based discrimination at work). Gallagher also said her group will back anti-gay marriage candidates in Iowa and New Hampshire, two states that recently recognized same-sex marriages. Leslie Gabel-Brett of the gay-rights organization Lambda Legal said that while Maine felt like a setback, "We now have five states where same-sex couples can marry. Six years ago, we had none."
Afghanistan's foreign ministry has accused the United Nations of illegally meddling in the country's internal affairs by suggested that the newly reelected Hamid Karzai should appoint ministers who will ease the country's corruption. The Afghan government issued a sharp statement saying that the U.N.'s stated wishes "have violated respect for Afghanistan's national sovereignty." The statement also seemed to be pointed at British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and President Barack Obama, both of whom have been outspoken in recent days about the problem of corruption in Afghanistan.
After an in-person push by President Obama and his fellow Democratic leaders kicked off an intense, daylong debate, the trillion-dollar health-care legislation was passed by House Democrats with a final vote of 220-215 late Saturday night. Thirty-nine Democrats voted against the health-care bill, along with every Republican except Joseph Cao of Louisiana. Meanwhile, the controversial abortion compromise passed with a vote of 240-194. The amendment to bar federal funding for most abortions was put in front of the House after Speaker Nancy Pelosi helped negotiate with two dozen anti-abortion Democrats over the bill. As expected, the Republican alternative health-care plan failed earlier in the night on a vote of 176-258, and Timothy Johnson of Illinois was the only GOP lawmaker to cross party lines. The historic vote ended with a triumphant Pelosi proclaiming "That was easy" as she left the floor, and after her tooth-and-nail fight for the bill, many are hailing health-care reform as more of a victory for the Speaker than for President Obama. "I think this is probably the biggest win she'll have in all the years she serves," said Rep. John Murtha.
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