US Politics Mega-thread - Page 771

On January 09 2014 18:34 Velr wrote:


Let alone that "Values: Knowledge" just doesn't fit into the "Police State" + "Free Market" which run into an entirely diffrent direction?

On January 10 2014 01:22 JonnyBNoHo wrote:

Depends what Joe Employee does. Some are linear, some non-linear and work tends to be moving in the direction of more becoming linear as technology and standardization become more prevalent.

The U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of New Jersey confirmed to TPM on Thursday that it was evaluating whether federal laws were broken in the George Washington Bridge lane closing scandal.

"The Port Authority Office of Inspector General has referred the matter to us, and our office is reviewing it to determine whether a federal law was implicated,” U.S. Attorney's Office spokesperson Rebekah Carmichael said in an emailed statement.

Gov. Chris Christie, saying he was “embarrassed and humiliated” by the first major political scandal of his career, apologized to the public Thursday and fired his deputy chief of staff, Bridget Anne Kelly, “because she lied” about the September closings of traffic lanes on the George Washington Bridge.

Emails from Kelly, leaked Wednesday, showed she participated in the closings, as political retaliation against the mayor of Fort Lee.

“I am stunned by the abject stupidity that was shown here,” Christie said, repeating that he had no personal knowledge of his aide’s actions until Wednesday morning, when he read the first accounts of Kelly’s emails in The Record. “I was blindsided yesterday morning,” Christie said, adding that he immediately realized “action was necessary.”

The governor said his earlier responses to the affair, which included joking about personally placing traffic cones at the bridge, would never have been made if he had not been assured by Kelly and other members of his staff that his office had had no involvement in the closings.

“What I was told is that it (the lane closing) was a traffic study,” the governor said.

Nonetheless, Christie said, “I am responsible for what happened. I am sad to report to the people of New Jersey that we fell short. . . of the expectations that we’ve created over the last four years for the type of excellence in government that they should expect from this office.”

The governor also said he would go to Fort Lee later Thursday to apologize to Mayor Mark Sokolich and “the people of Fort Lee.”

Meanwhile, sources also said that the U.S. Attorney for New Jersey, Paul J. Fishman, will announce an inquiry into the lane closings Thursday. And the Assembly Transportation Committee was expected to hear from another key figure in the controversy, David Wildstein, Thursday afternoon. Wildstein was the Port Authority official who directly ordered the lane closings and was forced to resign as a consequence in December. Wildstein’s bid to quash a subpoena from the committee was rejected by a state judge Thursday morning. He later appeared at the hearing and invoked his Fifth Amendment rights in declining to answer any questions.

The press conference, held in the Governor’s Outer Office at the State House in Trenton, was packed with New Jersey media, as well as national media reporters drawn by Christie’s status as a frontrunner for the 2016 GOP presidential nomination.

They saw and heard an uncharacteristically contrite Chris Christie, who told them he was “heartbroken” by the behavior of Kelly and his former campaign manager, Bill Stepien. Stepien, who was on his way to becoming chairman of the Republican State Committee, is also implicated by the “Bridgegate” emails.

Christie said he phoned Stepien Wednesday night and instructed him to withdraw his candidacy for the party position and disassociate himself from Christie’s new national role as head of the Republican Governors Association. The governor said he was “disturbed” by Stepien emails displaying “callous indifference” to those affected by the serious traffic disruptions caused by the lane closings.

Defending his reputation for “honesty and directness and blunt talk,” Christie initially deflected questions about whether the incident reinforced an image of him as a “bully.” But he then seemed to address the issue more reflectively.

“It makes me think about me,” Christie said. “What did I do wrong to make these folks think it was okay to lie to me. “I’ve been doing a lot of soul-searching. I’m sick over this.”

The governor also apologized repeatedly during the press conference, hitting a note critics said was missing from the initial statement his office released Wednesday, after stories about the emails first broke.

On January 10 2014 05:47 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:
So it is now a, possible, traffic study? Kind of odd seeing how the press debunked that explanation a couple of weeks ago. That and his joking sarcasm about it in December so he can't deny he didn't know about it.

The governor said his earlier responses to the affair, which included joking about personally placing traffic cones at the bridge, would never have been made if he had not been assured by Kelly and other members of his staff that his office had had no involvement in the closings.

WASHINGTON -- Certain medications that are intended to prevent breast cancer will be fully covered under Obamacare, in new guidance set to be issued by the Department of Health and Human Services Thursday morning.

Women at increased risk of breast cancer can receive so-called chemoprevention drugs, including tamoxifen and raloxifene, without a co-pay or other out-of-pocket expense.

Under Obamacare, most health insurance companies and employer plans must offer certain preventive services at no cost to patients.

The American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network praised the announcement in a statement Thursday.

Some of it appeared innocuous, perhaps a slip-of-the-tongue during the most tense press conference of Christie's political career. At one point, Christie said he'd endured two sleepless nights over the revelations, even though the documents causing him such a headache had only been released a little more than 24 hours earlier. Given the chance to clarify, Christie acknowledged that it had been a slip.

President Barack Obama on Thursday announced the first of five "Promise Zones," part of a White House initiative to combat income inequality and spur economic mobility in areas of the country that have been slow to feel the effects of the economic recovery.

Five communities — San Antonio, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, southeastern Kentucky and the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma — will receive comprehensive assistance from multiple federal agencies with the goals of creating jobs, expanding educational opportunities, increasing access to affordable housing and improving public safety.

In announcing the first five zones, Obama referenced President Lyndon B. Johnson’s announcement of the War on Poverty 50 years ago, in which he spoke of blighted communities “on the outskirts of hope” where residents had scant opportunities to improve their lots.

Obama — who last month called income inequality “the defining challenge of our time” — acknowledged that wrenching changes in the economy had created similar conditions today, but said the administration was willing to consider any and all policy proposals to address those problems.

“Everyone in this country who works hard should have a fair shot of success,” he said. “A child’s course should not be determined by the ZIP code she’s born in but by the strength of her work ethic and the scope of her dreams."

Under the Promise Zone initiative, each city or region has a specialized plan to address issues specific to its population, with the federal government serving as a partner, expediting access to existing resources, extending grants and offering tax incentives to businesses that hire within the zone.

How Silicon Valley Became The Man

Silicon Valley has been taking a lot of heat lately for its power and elitism. That’s only natural for a region that has rapidly gained enormous economic and cultural clout. But it seems especially ironic that this is happening in the San Francisco Bay area, that one-time headquarters of flower power where entrepreneurs have long fashioned themselves as rebels and iconoclasts battling robotic rivals (Microsoft, IBM) and liberating workers from the hierarchical ways of corporate life. ...

On January 09 2014 11:54 JonnyBNoHo wrote:

This is the US megathread, not the eurocrisis one...