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NEWS     FRIDAY, MAY 18, 2012     NEWS

EARLY EDITION

Obama Campaign Going After Veterans’ Votes
Democrats lost the veterans' vote by big margins in the last two presidential elections, but Obama campaign officials said Thursday they intend to reverse that trend by arguing that Mitt Romney would cut veterans’ benefits. “It really seems like Romney just doesn’t care about our veterans community,” said Rob Diamond, the Obama campaign’s outreach director for veterans and military families, in a conference call with reporters. He said the presumptive Republican nominee cut veterans services as governor of Massachusetts and supports a House GOP budget that would “slash” veterans funding by $11 billion. Washington Times
VOA VIEW: Wishful thinking - veterans will stick with Repoublicans.

Senators Target Facebook Co-Founder For Giving Up Citizenship, Seek To Impose Taxes
Two top senators went after Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin Thursday over his decision to renounce U.S. citizenship, unveiling a proposal they claim would bar him -- or anyone -- from de-friending the United States in order to avoid taxes. Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., who unveiled the proposal alongside Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., said their so-called "Ex-Patriot Act" would subject high-earning ex-Americans to a steep capital gains tax. The bill was their answer to the move by Saverin last year to renounce his citizenship and move to Singapore. The decision, made public in a recently released IRS list, came ahead of Facebook's initial public offering, and fueled speculation that Saverin cut ties with America in order to cut down his tax bill. Singapore does not impose capital gains taxes. Fox News

Study Finds Nearly 1 In 10 State Prisoners Is Victim Of Sexual Abuse
Nearly one of every 10 state prisoners is sexually victimized during confinement, according to a Justice Department study released Thursday. The Bureau of Justice Statistics examined data collected in surveys of former prisoners about their time behind bars. The officials found that most of the victims had been abused while they were in state prisons, but a small percentage were molested in local jails or halfway houses. The victimization rate of 9.6% is more than double the rate cited in a report on the subject in 2008. However, the Bureau of Justice Statistics, an arm of the Justice Department, cautioned that the previous study was based on a survey of current inmates in both state and federal institutions. CNN

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FBI Director Refuses To Say Whether 9/11 Mastermind KSM Is 'Enemy Combatant'
FBI Director Robert Mueller on Wednesday refused to tell a Senate committee whether confessed 9/11 terrorist mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM) is an "enemy combatant." The Bush administrated designating a captured terrorists as "enemy combatants" so that they could be detained in a military prison and tried by a military commission or tribunal rather than detained in a civilian prison and tried in civilian courts. KSM is being tried in military commission at Guantanamo Bay, along with four co-conspirators. The Obama administration recently reversed a decision to try him in civilian court in New York City after city officials objected to it and Congress refused to cover the costs of housing Mohammed on the mainland. CNS News

Postal Service To Close, Consolidate 140 Mail Sites
The Postal Service will proceed with a plan this summer to shut mail-processing facilities as part of its cost-cutting effort but will spread out the closings to maintain overnight delivery of local mail. The agency said on Thursday it would consolidate processing at 140 of its 461 sites by February 2013, moving processing from small facilities to larger ones, and shrink the area where customers can expect mail to be delivered the next day. It uses the word "consolidate" and not "close" because many of the small processing centers also house retail windows and other services for post office customers. A second round of closings, which would begin in February 2014, would consolidate an additional 89 processing sites, USPS Chief Operating Officer Megan Brennan said. Reuters

Drowning Still A Leading Cause Of Death For Toddlers
Drowning remains the leading cause of death in children under age 4 other than birth defects, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. From 2005 to 2009, about 3,880 people died from drowning each year in the United States, and more than 5,700 received emergency care for near- drowning incidents, the CDC says. Death rates were highest for children between ages 1 and 4. In this age group, about 2.5 deaths occurred for every 100,000 children in the population, the report said.  Overall, there were 1.3 deaths per 100,000 people in the United States. More than half of all people treated in emergency rooms for near drowning were less than 4 years old, the report said. CNN

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GOP, Dems Pound Points Home In Presidential Race
Both sides in the race for the White House are covering some familiar ground. On Wednesday, Republicans continued a coordinated effort to pin the nation's debt on President Obama. And Democrats described Mitt Romney as out of touch with the financial problems of most Americans. In the battleground state of Florida, Romney told a crowd in St. Petersburg, "I'm concerned about the debt. I'm concerned about the spending." Standing in front of a ticking debt clock, Romney argued that Washington's out-of-control spending, and what he calls Mr. Obama's failure to curb it, are responsible for the nation's debt. CBS

‘Born in Kenya': Obama's Literary Agent Misidentified His Birthplace In 1991
A possible source of the so-called "birther" issue--or at least a potential cause of the rumors that have dogged President Barack Obama--has been identified. Obama's former literary agency misidentified his birthplace as Kenya while trying to promote the then-Harvard Law grad as an author in 1991. According to a promotional booklet produced by the agency, Acton & Dystel, to showcase its roster of writers, Obama was "born in Kenya and raised in Indonesia and Hawaii." Miriam Goderich edited the text of the bio; she is now a partner at the Dystel & Goderich agency, which lists Obama as one of its current clients. ABC

Facebook Raises $16 Billion In Record Technology Offering
Facebook Inc. (FB) raised $16 billion in the biggest initial public offering by a technology company in history, pricing the shares at the top end of an increased range. The social network sold 421.2 million shares at $38 each, a statement today shows. That values Facebook at $104.2 billion, making it the largest company to go public in the U.S. by market capitalization, according to data compiled by Bloomberg and Dealogic. Facebook, led by 28-year-old Mark Zuckerberg, this week expanded the IPO to meet demand, allowing investors Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Accel Partners to reap more gains. Bloomberg

Court Rules NY Town’s Prayer Violated Constitution
An upstate New York town violated the constitutional ban against favoring one religion over another by opening nearly every meeting over an 11-year span with prayers that stressed Christianity, a federal court of appeals ruled Thursday. In what it said was its first case testing the constitutionally mandated separation of church and state, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruled the town of Greece, a suburb of Rochester, should have made a greater effort to invite people from other faiths to open monthly meetings. The town's lawyer says it will appeal. From 1999 through 2007, and again from January 2009 through June 2010, every meeting was opened with a Christian-oriented invocation. In 2008, after residents Susan Galloway and Linda Stephens complained, four of 12 meetings were opened by non-Christians, including a Jewish layman, a Wiccan priestess and the chairman of the local Baha'i congregation. Las Vegas Sun

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Treasury Weighs Selling TARP Bank Shares In Pools
The U.S. Treasury may pool stakes in small banks bailed out during the financial crisis to entice potential investors as the Obama administration winds down the Troubled Asset Relief Program. “Some of the investments are smaller and it may not be possible to auction them individually,” Tim Massad, the Treasury Department’s assistant secretary for financial stability, said in an interview. “So one of the things we’re looking at is pooling those investments together.” The Treasury’s plan reflects the challenge of unwinding holdings in lenders that are still trying to recover from the six-year residential real estate slump. By combining stakes of small banks, the department may be able to attract investors who would not want to buy shares of those banks individually. Bloomberg

GOP Measure Freezes Lawmakers’ Office Budgets
Even as they press cuts to foreign aid, food stamps and a host of domestic programs, Republicans running the House of Representatives are opting against any further cuts to their own office budgets. In draft legislation supported by Republicans and Democrats alike, the House Appropriations Committee would instead freeze the $574 million budget for lawmakers' staff, travel and office expenses. The spending freeze announced Thursday comes as Republicans are rewriting last summer's budget accord to press cuts to non-defense agency budgets by about 5 percent on average. The overall $3.3 Capitol Hill funding bill would absorb a 1 percent cut that comes from cutting back the budget for repairing the Capitol dome. Las Vegas Sun

Holder Calls For U.S.-Russia Cooperation
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, speaking Thursday at a legal forum in Russia, said the two countries need to work together. "Our government leaders and law enforcement officials have worked together to identify and dismantle transnational organized crime networks, illegal human trafficking rings, and global financial fraud schemes," Holder said. "We've made meaningful strides in combating gang violence, cybercrime, intellectual property theft, government corruption, and child exploitation. And as we've bolstered our joint crime-fighting efforts, we've also opened new channels for communication and cooperation in upholding the rule of law, and protecting essential civil rights." UPI

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U.S. Slams Chinese Solar Panels With New Tariffs
The U.S. Commerce Department announced stiff tariffs on Chinese-made solar panels Thursday, a move critics said could raise costs for consumers and further inflame trade tensions with Beijing. The preliminary ruling came as a result of a finding that Chinese solar cell manufacturers are "dumping" their products on the American market below production costs. Print CommentThe issue has divided the U.S. solar industry, with some manufacturers complaining that Chinese trade practices are driving prices down artificially and smothering U.S. production. U.S. manufacturer Solyndra became the highest-profile victim of plunging panel prices last year, forced to file for bankruptcy despite receiving $535 million in federal loan guarantees. CNN

Pelosi: No To Provision Protecting Chaplains From Being Ordered To Act Against Faith
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said she stands with the White House in opposing a provision in the House defense authorization bill that would prohibit anyone in the military from ordering a chaplain to act against his or her "conscience, moral principles, or religious beliefs" or against the religious beliefs of the denomination to which he or she belongs. Pelosi described the conscience-protection provision as a “fraud." The provision is broadly written to deny anyone in the armed forces the authority to "direct, order, or require a chaplain to perform any duty, rite, ritual, ceremony, or function" that is contrary to his or her conscience, moral principles or religious beliefs or the principles or beliefs of his or her religious denomination. CNS News

New York Judge With Cancer Makes Case For Marijuana
A cancer-stricken judge in New York has become an unlikely voice in support of legalizing the use of medical marijuana with the admission that he smokes pot to ease the side-effects of his treatments. Brooklyn Supreme Court Justice Gustin Reichbach, who is being treated for pancreatic cancer, wrote in a New York Times article on Thursday that he had been using marijuana provided by friends at "great personal risk" to help him cope with the nausea, sleeplessness and loss of appetite from chemotherapy treatments. "This is not a law-and-order issue; it is a medical and a human rights issue," wrote Reichbach, 65, who has spent 21 years on the bench in Kings County Supreme Court, and continues to hear cases even as he receives cancer treatment. Reuters

Consult Doctor Before Stopping Zpak
U.S. health regulators said patients should not stop taking Pfizer Inc's Zithromax antibiotic without consulting a doctor, after a study showed a slightly higher rate of death among patients taking the drug compared to those on other antibiotics. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said it was aware of the study, which was published in the New England Journal of Medicine, comparing Zithromax to Bayer's Cipro and Johnson & Johnson's Levaquin. Pfizer's antibiotic showed a slightly higher rate of death due to heart complications. CNN

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Conservative Billionaire Knocks Down Supposed Plan To Air Obama-Wright Ads
The billionaire conservative who reportedly was considering a proposal to fund ads reconnecting President Obama with his controversial former pastor distanced himself from the proposal Thursday and said through an aide it would not move forward. The proposal was reportedly commissioned by Joe Ricketts, the founder of the TD Ameritrade brokerage firm, and targeted for a run in September. The $10 million campaign, according to The New York Times, would have highlighted Rev. Jeremiah Wright's controversial comments which first surfaced during the 2008 presidential campaign. "The world is about to see Jeremiah Wright and understand his influence on Barack Obama for the first time in a big, attention-arresting way," said a copy of the proposal, obtained by the Times. Fox News

Impact Of Super PACs Felt In GOP Senate Primary Races
Super PACs — the outside fundraising groups expected to play a big role in the November elections — already have been involved heavily in GOP Senate primary races, in which they have boosted the campaigns of underfunded insurgents. While super PACs have showered cash on establishment candidates, the groups have been credited with helping push some long-shot contestants to recent victories, including Nebraska state Sen. Deb Fischer’s improbable win Tuesday in her state’s Republican Senate primary. Nebraska Attorney General Jon Bruning, who had been considered the Republican favorite for the seat that will be vacated by retiring Democratic Sen. Ben Nelson, enjoyed a huge fundraising advantage in the GOP primary, collecting more than $3.5 million through April 25 — the latest data available from the Federal Election Commission. Mrs. Fischer had raised about $395,000 during the same time period, while GOP primary rival and tea party favorite Don Stenberg raised about $700,000. Washington Times

HP Poised To Cut As Many As 30,000 Jobs
Hewlett-Packard Company (HPQ) is poised to eliminate as many as 30,000 jobs to compensate for dwindling demand for personal computers as more people connect to the Internet on smartphones and tablets, according to reports published Thursday. The looming cuts cited by Bloomberg News and the technology blog All Things D would trim as much as 9 percent of HP's workforce, based on the 349,600 people employed by the Palo Alto, California, company as of last October. A breakdown on HP's website listed 324,600 employees, but company spokesman Michael Thacker said the information was wrong. He pointed to the October figure listed in HP's annual report as the most accurate head count. CBS

John Edwards ‘Was A Bad Husband' But Did Not Violate Law, Defense Says
Closing arguments were delivered in the John Edwards corruption trial on Thursday in Greensboro, N.C., with prosecutors telling the jury that Edwards knew exactly what he was doing in 2008 when in using nearly $1 million in campaign funds to cover up his affair with Rielle Hunter, and lawyers for the former presidential candidate arguing that while he may have been a " bad husband," he did not violate any federal laws in doing so. "John was a bad husband," Edwards' lawyer Abbe Lowell said. "But there is not the remotest chance that John did or intended to violate the law." ABC

U.S. Military Prepared For Iran Strike
The United States is militarily ready to carry out a strike on Iran, U.S. ambassador to Israel Daniel Shapiro told an Israeli audience. Speaking before the Israeli Bar Association in Jerusalem earlier this week, Shapiro said the United States is prepared to militarily stop Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons although it "would be preferable to solve this diplomatically and through the use of pressure, than to use military force." He added: "But that that doesn't mean that option isn't fully available. Not just available, it's ready. The necessary planning has been done to ensure that it's ready." The Obama administration has insisted on the availability of all options in dealing with a possible Iranian nuclear threat, but Shapiro's speech went further in mentioning the American military's preparations, ABC News said Thursday. UPI

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Barak Thanks Panetta For US Aid On Iron Dome
The defense minister said that US assistance will allow Israel to strengthen its defense against missiles.  The United States will provide Israel with $70 million in immediate aid for the purchase additional Iron Dome rocket defense batteries, Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta announced on Thursday. Panetta made the announcement following a meeting with Defense Minister Ehud Barak at the Pentagon. Barak was in Washington for talks aimed at coordinating strategy with the US ahead of the second round of talks between western powers and Iran scheduled to open next week in Baghdad. Panetta said that President Barack Obama had directed him to provide Israel with the $70 million, which Barak had told him was needed for Israel to meet its fiscal requirements for 2012. Jerusalem Post

Campaign Calls For Americans In Israel To Vote
Uncle Sam wants you to vote in the November 6 American election. Or at least a group of well-funded American immigrants to Israel do. They started the iVoteIsrael Campaign, which its organizers describe as “an issue-based campaign, expressing their desire to see a Congress and administration who will support and stand by Israel in absolute commitment to its safety, security and right to self-defense, without endorsing any specific candidate or party.” A campaign spokesman said the project is funded by charitable contributions raised in the United States, mainly in small increments from individuals and foundations within the Jewish community and the Christian communities. Jerusalem Post

US Relaxes Some Burma Sanctions, Appoints Ambassador
The United States has eased some sanctions on investment and relations with Burma in response to political reform there. But Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said broader laws on sanctions against Burma would remain in place to safeguard against "backsliding". Restrictions on investments have been relaxed and the first US ambassador in 22 years has been announced. The move follows limited democratic reform in Burma. A nominally civilian government was elected in 2010 and, in April of this year, opposition politicians entered parliament following historic by-elections. However, the government is still dominated by the military and concerns over political repression and human rights abuses continue. BBC

Spanish Banks Have Credit Ratings Cut By Moody's
Ratings agency Moody's has cut the credit ratings of 16 Spanish banks, a further blow to a country that is struggling to deal with the bad debts of its banking sector. It also cut the debt rating on Santander UK, a subsidiary of the Spanish banking giant. It comes after shares in struggling lender Bankia fell another 14%. They have almost halved in value this month. Fears about losses at Spanish banks has hit shares across Europe. The banks include Banco Santander and BBVA, the biggest banks in Spain. Ten of the 17 banks were also put on negative credit watch, meaning that further downgrades are possible. "The change to Moody's credit rating of Santander UK plc has no impact on our businesses in the UK or our plans for future growth," Andy Smith, a spokesman at Santander said about the downgrade. BBC

US Commerce Department Brings Heavy Tariffs Against Chinese Solar Panels
The Obama administration imposed heavy tariffs on Chinese solar panels on Thursday, after finding that China is flooding the market with government subsidised products. The preliminary decision, that China had dumped solar products on the US for less than the cost of manufacture, will result in tariffs of between 31% and 250% on Chinese imports. It was seen on Thursday as a mixed blessing. US solar panel makers, who brought the original complaint, are expected to benefit. But the tariffs, by forcing up prices, are expected to slow the adoption of solar power more generally. There were also fears the move could lead to a broader US-Chinese trade war. Guardian

David Cameron Calls For World Trade Boost Before G8 Talks
David Cameron has flown to Washington for critical talks with world leaders, urging them to act urgently to boost world trade and describing trade deals as "the one big stimulus" that would make a real difference in lifting the world from recession. He is due to join the leaders of the G8 at Camp David for two days of informal talks. It will be the first world summit outing for the new French president, François Hollande, who has spoken of the need to stimulate demand. Cameron's remarks suggest the focus should be on launching EU trade deals next year with the US, Canada and Japan. He accepts that the idea of a world trade deal is dead in the water. Guardian

Ed Miliband: David Cameron Is Part Of The Problem
In a speech to business leaders in Manchester this morning, David Cameron defended the government's series of welfare cuts and tax rises saying it was the right policy to cut the deficit. However, Labour leader Ed Miliband accused the prime minister of causing Britain's slow economic recovery. "David Cameron isn't part of the solution, he is part of the problem. He promised Britain there would be recovery and he has delivered a recession," he said. Mr Miliband added: "All of Europe's leaders, including David Cameron, bear responsibility for the fact that over the last two years they haven't sorted out the problems of the eurozone and they haven't had a proper plan for growth and jobs in Europe." Telegraph

On Anti-Homophobia Day, UN Calls For Repeal Of Discriminatory Laws
Marking International Day against Homophobia and Transphobia, senior United Nations officials today drew attention to laws around the world which discriminate against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people, and called for equality and the repeal of such laws. “When I raise these issues, some complain that I’m pushing for ‘new rights’ or ‘special rights’ for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. But there is nothing new or special about the right to life and security of person, the right to freedom from discrimination,” said the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, in a statement. UN News

New Paradigm Needed To Ensure Global Job Creation And Economic Progress
United Nations senior officials today stressed the importance of establishing a new paradigm for growth that ensures social inclusiveness, job opportunities for all, and more accountability from the financial sector to tackle the ongoing global economic crisis. “It is time to recognize that human capital and natural capital are every bit as important as financial capital,” said Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in his remarks to the General Assembly’s high-level thematic debate on The State of the World Economy and Finance and its Impact on Development, taking place at UN Headquarters in New York. UN News
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