Barack Obama Takes Selfie at Nelson Mandela Memorial, Cruz Walks Out on Castro

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Photo Credit: smh.com

Photo Credit: smh.com

By smh.com.au with AFP.

US President Barack Obama may have moved the masses attending Nelson Mandela’s memorial service with his stirring eulogy, but it was his grinning “selfie” with the Danish and British premiers that set social networks abuzz.

In a candid moment captured by a photographer, Denmark’s Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt can be seen holding up her smartphone, with Obama lending a helping hand, as they pose for a picture with David Cameron, all three of them smiling broadly in their seats at Soweto’s World Cup stadium.

First Lady Michelle Obama, sitting to the left of her husband, does not join in with the lighthearted moment, keeping her eyes firmly trained on the podium where world leaders were paying tribute to South Africa’s anti-apartheid hero.

The event was a memorial service and not a funeral for Mandela, who died last week aged 95, and the mood was one of joy and hope as mourners sang, danced and chanted their way into the stadium.

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Cruz Walks Out on Castro Speech at Memorial Service for Mandela

By Jim Geraghty.

Senator Ted Cruz (R., Texas) walked out of the memorial service for Nelson Mandela when Cuban “president” Raúl Castro began speaking.

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Lawmakers Unveil Tentative Budget Deal, Call for Rolling Back Sequester

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Photo Credit: Fox News

Photo Credit: Fox News

By Fox News.

Congressional negotiators on Tuesday announced a tentative budget deal that would avoid a partial government shutdown, but also begin to unravel hard-fought spending cuts.

The lead negotiators — Senate Budget Committee Chairwoman Patty Murray, D-Wash., and House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan, R-Wis. — detailed the specifics of the proposal at an evening press conference.

“I’m proud of this agreement,” Ryan said. “It reduces the deficit—without raising taxes. And it cuts spending in a smarter way. It’s a firm step in the right direction, and I ask all my colleagues in the House to support it.”

But the measure could face a tough climb, particularly in the House which is expected to take up the bill first. Ahead of Tuesday’s announcement, fiscal conservatives raised alarm that lawmakers were proposing to roll back sequester cuts.

The proposal would restore about $63 billion in funding that had been cut by the so-called sequester. Officials said the increases would be offset by a variety of spending reductions and increased fees elsewhere in the budget totaling about $85 billion over a decade, leaving enough for a largely symbolic deficit cut of $23 billion over the next decade.

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capital-buildingdome-insideBudget Deal A “Significant Step Backwards” In Efforts To Rein In Overspending

By Steve Foley.

Today, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.) and Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) announced a budget deal that would abandon the bipartisan spending limits agreed to in the 2011 Budget Control Act for two years, while seeking to offset that new spending with tens of billions in additional revenue.

Gretchen Hamel, executive director of Public Notice, issued the following statement:

“This deal amounts to a significant step backwards in the effort to rein in overspending and a complete abdication of responsibility in Washington to set priorities and make responsible decisions with our tax dollars. Given the opportunity to make the smart cuts and reforms we need, Washington instead focused on a short-term political fix that opens the door to more spending increases down the road. Members of Congress should listen to their constituents, live up to their promises and do better than this deal. The last thing Americans wanted to see from Washington was more money for more spending.”

Key Findings From Public Notice’s Latest Poll On Government Spending:

As Washington nears its Dec. 13 deadline for a budget deal, Public Notice recently released the results of a national survey of registered voters focusing on the key fiscal issues currently being debated. The survey was conducted by the Tarrance Group via landline and cell phone from Dec. 1-5, 2013, among 803 voters with a margin of error of +/- 3.5 percent.

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As Obama Turns: How the President’s Political Fortunes Predict his Economic Message

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Photo Credit: Aude Guerrucci/Getty Images

Photo Credit: Aude Guerrucci/Getty Images

When President Obama said this week that ending income inequality was “this generation’s task,” his aides noted he was consciously echoing themes he’d raised in a speech two years earlier in Osawatomie, Kan. The trail actually goes back even farther than that. The president has given several significant economic speeches since becoming a national politician. The first was a commencement address at Knox College in 2005, five months after he joined the Senate. Two others include a September 2007 speech he gave at Nasdaq and one he gave three years ago Friday at Forsyth Technical Community College.

All five of these speeches have been big, strained for historical sweep, and touched on a central theme: the need for government intervention at a time when the economy has gotten out of whack. But they are not all the same in emphasis. In those eight years, Obama has oscillated between two kinds of economic messages based on his most pressing political needs. When appealing to business interests and independent voters, he has addressed the need for collective action to compete in the global marketplace. When appealing to his party’s base, he has addressed the need for collective action to right the inequities of income inequality.

In 2005 at Knox College, Obama called on the students to do more than strive to make a buck when they graduated. Instead, he called on them to contribute to a national cause: upgrading the economy for the modern age. He told the story of the previous times America had decided to repair the inequities in the market. After the Civil War and during the New Deal, lawmakers set the rules for commerce and the nation thrived.

Obama said that this was a moral good, but he had a larger point: It was a competitive necessity. His speech was about global competition, not inequality. America had to improve the mix of winners and losers in the economy so it wouldn’t fall behind. He quoted Thomas Friedman and spoke of the quiet revolution in technology and global trade. “Countries like India and China realized this,” he said of the changes. “They understand that they no longer need to be just a source of cheap labor or cheap exports. They can compete with us on a global scale.” He cited statistics showing how China was graduating more engineers than the United States. America needed to upgrade its talent pool in order to compete in the new century.

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We Are Drilling, Baby! U.S. Passing Saudi Arabia in Oil Production

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Photo Credit: Glen Stubbe/Minneapolis Star Tribune/MCT

Photo Credit: Glen Stubbe/Minneapolis Star Tribune/MCT

What do you know—“Drill, baby, drill” is working.

Thanks to new smart-drilling and production technologies (including hydraulic fracturing), the U.S. is the leading liquid fuels producer in the world and will soon be the world’s largest producer of petroleum. And we would be even further in the lead if we had pro-growth federal energy policies.

The latest news shows that Texas oil production doubled in just the last three years and is the highest it’s been since at least 1981. North Dakota is now the second-largest oil-producing state and sets a new production record virtually every day, and the U.S. is set to surpass Saudi Arabia as the world’s largest petroleum producer. This new production provides a cushion that helps insulate oil markets from the price spikes we might have seen with the continuing turmoil in the Middle East—from the Arab Spring to the nonstop threats from Iran.

According to President Obama, our newfound oil leadership must be a mirage, since he has consistently downplayed the benefit of increased domestic oil production.

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Proposed State Law Aims to Nullify Obamacare

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Photo Credit: WND

Photo Credit: WND

South Carolina lawmakers have a proposal in their legislative pipeline that would nullify the federal Obamacare law.

Observers say the state likely will be the first in the nation to exempt citizens and businesses from participation in Obama’s Affordable Care Act.

Critics already have declared the bill is racist and argue that federal law trumps state law. They charged that state lawmakers can’t opt out of the law because they don’t like President Obama.

The South Carolina bill prohibits state agencies and officers from implementing any portion of the federal mandate, outlaws state insurance exchanges and directs the state attorney general to sue over selective enforcement of the Affordable Health Care Act.

Supporters of the bill contend it aligns with a Founding Father’s solution for states confronted by an unwarranted federal law.

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Video: Jon Stewart Skewers NSA Doublespeak

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Photo Credit: Peabody Awards/flickr

Photo Credit: Peabody Awards/flickr

…It’s the latest fodder used by The Daily Show’s Jon Stewart in his comedic offensive against government overreach. In his latest bit, Stewart lampoons the NSA’s repeated claims that it respected the rights of American citizens, while in reality the truth is, well, somewhat different.

Hit up the video below for the most depressing laugh you’ll have today.

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Nevada Dad Praised for Using Innovative Ways To Keep Family Safe for 2 Days in -16 Degrees

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Photo Credit: Fox News

Photo Credit: Fox News

A Nevada father is being credited with keeping his girlfriend and four children alive and well by using innovative methods like heating up rocks and burning tires to help them survive two days trapped in the snow.

The desperate search for the group, who were reported missing after they failed to return from a mountain trip near Lovelock, turned jubilant Tuesday when all six were found in good spirits.

“They stayed together and that was the key that allowed them to live through this experience. You don’t see that that often in search and rescue,” said Paul Burke, search-and-rescue coordinator for the state. “They did some pretty unusual things, heating up rocks and things. Staying together, that was a big deal.”

About 200 people had joined in the rescue effort for James Glanton, 34; his girlfriend, Christina McIntee, 25; their two children, Evan and Chloe Glanton; and Shelby Fitzpatrick and Tate McIntee, a niece and nephew of McIntee’s. The children range in age from 3 to 10.

The family told authorities their Jeep had overturned just off a road. A member of the rescue team said the engine would no longer start, but the group stayed in the upside-down vehicle for shelter, burning the spare tire to keep warm as temperatures dipped to 16 degrees below.

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Wasserman Schultz on Not Yet Enrolling in Obamacare: ‘I’m a Little Busy, So’ (+video)

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Photo Credit: AP photo/Charles Dharapak

Photo Credit: AP photo/Charles Dharapak

Four days before the legal deadline, Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) said she had not yet signed up for Obamacare, but was still mulling over the plans and what might work best for her family. As of Dec. 9, the deadline for members of Congress, Wasserman’s office had not responded to CNSNews.com’s inquiry on whether the lawmaker had enrolled.

In a CNN interview on Dec. 5, host Wolf Blitzer asked Rep. Wasserman Schultz, “Because you’re a member of Congress, you have to go to the healthcare.gov website. Have you done that already?”

The congresswoman said, “Yes, I’m in the middle of comparing plans for my own family right now.”

Blitzer then asked, “Why are you waiting so long? It started October 1st. It’s December.”

Wasserman Schultz said, “I’m a little busy, so—”

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Common Core Assignment: Think Like a Nazi and Explain Why Jews Are Evil (+video)

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Photo Credit: thefederalistpapers.org

Photo Credit: thefederalistpapers.org

Students in some Albany High School English classes were asked this week as part of a persuasive writing assignment to make an abhorrent argument: “You must argue that Jews are evil, and use solid rationale from government propaganda to convince me of your loyalty to the Third Reich!”

Students were asked to watch and read Nazi propaganda, then pretend their teacher was a Nazi government official who needed to be convinced of their loyalty. In five paragraphs, they were required to prove that Jews were the source of Germany’s problems.

The exercise was intended to challenge students to formulate a persuasive argument and was given to three classes, Albany Superintendent Marguerite Vanden Wyngaard said. She said the assignment should have been worded differently.

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Wait Until You Hear How Many Farm Subsidies Are Going to Groups in…the City of Chicago — Including One Associated With Louis Farrakhan

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Photo Credit: Getty Images

Photo Credit: Getty Images

Between 2008 and 2011, the U.S. government awarded roughly $6.12 million in federal farm subsidies to several groups in the Chicago area, including a charity owned by Louis Farrakhan’s The Nation of Islam, according to a report released by government watchdog group Open the Books.

The report, titled “Farm Subsidies and the Big Dogs,” is based on data released by the U.S. Department of Agriculture & information obtained through the Freedom of Information Act. The report examines total farm subsidies that have been paid into selected cities and urban areas.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, federal farm subsidies are being poured into several non-farming metropolitan areas, including New York City and Chicago, according to the report.

Several entities in Chicago, for example, “receive the federal subsidies at their downtown loop office buildings or residential mansions,” the report reads. “Nearly every neighborhood in the city receives federal farm subsidy payments — including the Gold Coast, Downtown — Loop, Lincoln Park, and even the President’s neighbors in Hyde Park.”

A total of 930 entities in the Chicago area received farm subsidies between 2008 and 2011.

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