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 | March 4, 2015 |
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| NETANYAHU SPEECH TO CONGRESS |
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WSJ: Israel’s Netanyahu Urges Congress To Block ‘Bad Deal’ With Iran
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in a dramatic and highly public showdown with a U.S. president, told a joint session of Congress Tuesday that an emerging diplomatic agreement with Iran would not only fail to stop Tehran from acquiring nuclear weapons, but virtually ensure it gets them. “This is a bad deal. It’s a very bad deal. We’re better off without it,” Mr. Netanyahu said in a 40-minute address that drew repeated standing ovations in a House chamber packed mostly with Republican lawmakers. President Barack Obama , in remarks from the Oval Office a short time later, accused Mr. Netanyahu of sounding an alarm on a deal that isn’t final while failing to offer “any viable alternatives” to the current negotiations involving the U.S., U.K., France, Germany, Russia and China. Those talks began two years ago after Mr. Obama personally launched an initiative to engage Iran despite 34 years of frozen ties. Read more..
Washington Post: Decrying ‘Insult,’ House Democrats Seethe After Netanyahu Address
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was met with rounds of applause and repeated standing ovations Tuesday while addressing a joint meeting of Congress but make no mistake: Democrats were by no means joining in the acclaim. With their hands, their feet and their mouths, Democratic members made clear during and after the speech that they had significant objections to Netanyahu’s remarks — both in how they were delivered and in what they contained. ... House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) wore a fierce expression during much of the speech and left the House floor before Netanyahu did, without greeting him, and saying later that she was insulted by the speech. In a statement, Pelosi said she was “near tears” throughout the speech, “saddened by the insult to the intelligence of the United States . . . and saddened by the condescension toward our knowledge of the threat posed by Iran and our broader commitment to preventing nuclear proliferation.” Read more..
The Hill: Lindsey Graham Mocks Pelosi's 'Surgeries,' Apologizes
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) apologized for mocking House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi’s physical appearance during a closed-door fundraiser following Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech to Congress. While noting that she had appeared irritated on the House floor, he speculated that she had undergone plastic surgery, Bloomberg View columnist Josh Rogin reported Tuesday. “Did you see Nancy Pelosi on the floor. Complete disgust,” he said, according to the Bloomberg report. “If you can get through all the surgeries, there’s disgust.” NBC News' Frank Thorp tweeted that Graham had apologized. "I made a very poor attempt at humor to talk about [Pelosi’s] reaction, and for that I apologize," Graham was reported as saying. Read more..
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| CLINTON E-MAIL CONTROVERSY |
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NYT: Using Private E-mail, Hillary Clinton Thwarted Record Requests
In 2012, congressional investigators asked the State Department for a wide range of documents related to the attack on the United States diplomatic compound in Benghazi, Libya. The department eventually responded, furnishing House committees with thousands of documents. But it turns out that that was not everything. The State Department had not searched the email account of former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton because she had maintained a private account, which shielded it from such searches, department officials acknowledged on Tuesday. It was only last month that the House committee appointed to investigate Benghazi was provided with about 300 of Mrs. Clinton’s emails related to the attacks. That was shortly after Mrs. Clinton turned over, at the State Department’s request, some 50,000 pages of government-related emails that she had kept on her private account. Read more..
Washington Post: White House Says Clinton Did Not Heed E-mail Policy
Former secretary of state Hillary Rodham Clinton appears to have operated in violation of what the White House said Tuesday was “very specific guidance” that members of the Obama administration use government e-mail accounts to carry out official business. Clinton did not have a government account at the State Department but instead used her personal e-mail account. That was permissible only if all e-mails relating to government business were turned over and archived by the State Department, White House press secretary Josh Earnest said at his daily briefing. “Very specific guidance has been given to agencies all across the government, which is specifically that employees in the Obama administration should use their official e-mail accounts when they’re conducting official government business,” Earnest said. “However, when there are situations where personal e-mail accounts are used, it is important for those records to be preserved, consistent with the Federal Records Act.” Read more..
Huffington Post: Colin Powell Also Used Personal Email While Serving As Secretary Of State, Aide Confirms
Following Monday's New York Times report that Hillary Clinton may have violated federal records laws by using a personal email account for all of her work messages while serving as the U.S. secretary of state, an aide to Colin Powell said the Republican also used personal email for work while serving in the same position. "He was not aware of any restrictions nor does he recall being made aware of any over the four years he served at State," the aide said in a statement sent to Politico. "He sent emails to his staff generally via their State Department email addresses. These emails should be on the State Department computers. He might have occasionally used personal email addresses, as he did when emailing to family and friends." Read more..
The Hill: Hillary's E-mails 'Not Technically Illegal'
Hillary Clinton's exclusive use of a personal email account to conduct official business as secretary of State caused seems to have stayed within the law, experts say. “What she did was not technically illegal,” said Patrice McDermott, a former National Archives staffer and the head of the Open The Government coalition, a transparency group. However, “it was highly inappropriate and it was inappropriate for the State Department to let this happen,” she said. The New York Times on Monday reported that Clinton did not use an official government email account while serving in Obama’s Cabinet, nor did she back up the messages to a government server. John Wonderlich, the policy director at the Sunlight Foundation, agreed that the practice “seems like it’s not unlawful, which suggests to me that we’re in pretty serious need of a legal reform.” Read more..
USA Today: Gowdy: Clinton E-mails Prove Need For Benghazi Probe
The special House committee investigating the 2012 terror attacks in Benghazi, Libya, on Tuesday asked that former secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton's personal e-mails be preserved as part of the committee's investigation. Committee Chairman Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., said panel members knew Clinton used personal e-mail accounts during her tenure but didn't learn until recently that all of her State Department business was conducted outside normal government e-mail channels. ... Gowdy, backed by most other Republicans on the special Benghazi committee, told reporters the revelation regarding Clinton's e-mails proves he was right to protest that some documents relevant to the Benghazi attacks haven't been turned over to congressional investigators. "You do not need a law degree to understand how troubling this is," Gowdy said. Read more..
The Hill: Clinton Doesn't Address Emails In First Public Speech Since Controversy
Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton made no mention of her use of personal email while she was in office in her first speech since the fracas broke, avoiding the topic in a Tuesday night speech to a gala of pro-choice Democrats in Washington, D.C. Clinton, who teased her likely presidential run throughout her speech, declined to touch upon the controversy surrounding her use of a personal email account rather than an official government one during her time as secretary of State. She instead focused on calls for more women in office and more economic fairness in her addressed to crowd of 1,700 Democratic office-holders, donors and activists gathered for the 30th anniversary of EMILY's List. The audience was remarkably subdued given how close the organization is with Clinton, though the gala dragged on an hour longer than planned. But the likely candidate got a roar of applause when she teased her likely run. Read more..
Buzzfeed: Rand Paul: Clinton Foundation Taking Foreign Money, Benghazi Worse Than Hillary’s Private Email Usage
Sen. Rand Paul, a potential presidential candidate in 2016, says he’s more bothered by the Clinton Foundation accepting donations from foreign governments than Hillary Clinton using a private email address in her capacity as secretary of state. The Kentucky Republican also said he was bothered more by Clinton’s oversight as head of the State Department during the lead up to the 2012 attack on the American consulate in Benghazi, Libya. “The emails don’t bother me as much as several other things. The main thing that bothers me, and I think should preclude her from being considered for the presidency, is that she didn’t defend our mission in Benghazi. She was asked repeatedly for security, didn’t defend the consulate there and I think as a consequence I think lost our ambassador there,” Paul told NewsMaxTV during an appearance on Tuesday. Paul furthermore said foreign donors giving money to the Clinton Global Initiative gave the appearance of buying influence, saying it “really bothers” him. Read more..
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| MORE POLITICAL NEWS |
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NYT: House Approves Homeland Security Budget, Without Strings
The fight over funding the Department of Homeland Security that began with Republicans thundering about a lawless president abusing power to change immigration policy ended with a quiet capitulation Tuesday when the House voted to fund the agency and avert a partial shutdown. In the end, Speaker John A. Boehner was forced to build a majority on Democratic votes to pass the bill, 257 to 167, with just 75 Republican supporters. But although the uprising among conservatives burned hot into the week, there was no suggestion that Mr. Boehner’s leadership was imperiled. Instead, many Republicans expressed a sense of resigned relief. The bill, which President Obama will sign, dealt only with an appropriation for the department. Republicans agreed to drop their push for provisions that would have gutted Mr. Obama’s executive actions on immigration. Read more..
WSJ: Chief Justice John Roberts In Hot Seat In Health-Law Case
The most uncomfortable seat at Wednesday’s Supreme Court argument on health-law insurance subsidies might be the one held by Chief Justice John Roberts. Both sides will be trying to sway his vote on the assumption the court is otherwise split 4-4 along ideological lines, as it was three years ago when it heard an earlier challenge to the law. At the time, Chief Justice Roberts cast the deciding vote to uphold the Affordable Care Act’s individual insurance mandate requiring people to carry insurance or pay a penalty—a decision that allowed the 2010 law to take root nationwide and angered fellow conservatives. This time around, legal experts think the court is again likely split between conservatives and liberals, presenting Chief Justice Roberts with a decision that could shape his long-term reputation. Read more..
NPR: David Petraeus Enters Into Plea Deal With Justice Department
Former CIA Director and retired Gen. David Petraeus, whose military career has been overshadowed by charges that he provided classified data to his mistress, has made a deal with the Justice Department in which he will plead guilty to one count of unauthorized removal and retention of classified material. The deal will allow Petraeus, who rose to the rank of a four-star general before becoming director of the CIA, to avoid a trial and plead guilty to a misdemeanor. He'll also avoid a prison sentence, if a federal court agrees with the plea deal's terms. The charge's maximum possible punishments include a fine of $100,000 and a one-year prison sentence. Instead, prosecutors agreed that Petraeus should serve a two-year probation and pay a fine of $40,000. Read more..
AP: Officials: US Report Finds Racial Bias In Ferguson Police
A Justice Department investigation found sweeping patterns of racial bias within the Ferguson, Missouri, police department, with officers routinely discriminating against blacks by using excessive force, issuing petty citations and making baseless traffic stops, according to law enforcement officials familiar with its findings. The report, which Ferguson city officials said would be released Wednesday, marks the culmination of a months-long investigation into a police department that federal officials have described as troubled and that commanded national attention after one of its officers shot and killed an unarmed black man, 18-year-old Michael Brown, last summer. Read more..
NPR: Alabama Supreme Court Again Halts Gay Marriage
The Alabama Supreme Court once again has instructed probate judges not to issue marriage licenses. In a 134-page opinion, seven of the nine justices said the U.S. Constitution "does not require one definition of marriage." "As it has done for approximately two centuries, Alabama law allows for 'marriage' between only one man and one woman," the court wrote. "Alabama probate judges have a ministerial duty not to issue any marriage license contrary to this law. Nothing in the United States Constitution alters or overrides this duty." Of course the big conflict here is that a U.S. District Court judge struck down Alabama's ban on gay marriage. That was appealed, but the Supreme Court refused to put a hold on that ruling while it decides on the issue of same-sex marriage itself. Read more..
WSJ: Yellen Says Effective Supervision Of Big Banks One Of Fed’s Top Priorities
Federal Reserve Chairwoman Janet Yellen raised concerns about the state of Wall Street’s culture and ethics on Tuesday, echoing similar comments from other regulatory officials and increasing pressure on the biggest U.S. banks to improve. “It is unfortunate that I need to underscore this, but we expect the firms we oversee to follow the law and to operate in an ethical manner,” Ms. Yellen said in remarks prepared for delivery to the Citizens Budget Commission in New York on Tuesday night. “Too often in recent years, bankers at large institutions have not done so, sometimes brazenly.” She didn’t mention specific incidents, but other regulatory officials have pointed to continuing probes of banks for currency-market and interest-rate manipulation, tax evasion and efforts to skirt international sanctions among the reasons to be concerned about Wall Street’s culture. Read more..
The Hill: Carson Launching Exploratory Committee
Tea Party darling Ben Carson is launching a formal presidential exploratory committee, he announced in a new video posted to his website Tuesday. "If I believe that I have your support and your commitment to help, I will run for president to lead this great country to a brighter future," he said in the video. "If I run, it will be because I know the very survival of our great country depends on strong leadership to address our real concerns about security, about jobs, about America's standing in the world." Read more..
Politico: Gov. Scott Walker Would Sign 20-Week Abortion Ban
Shifting his tone to reassure social conservatives, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker declared Tuesday that he intends to sign a state law in the coming months that bans abortion after 20 weeks. In an open letter to the Susan B. Anthony List, the likely Republican presidential candidate also said that he supports “similar legislation” now stalled in Congress. “My policies throughout my career have earned a 100 percent rating with pro-life groups in Wisconsin,” Walker writes. “As the Wisconsin legislature moves forward in the coming session, further protections for mother and child are likely to come to my desk in the form of a bill to prohibit abortions after 20 weeks. I will sign that bill when it gets to my desk and support similar legislation on the federal level.” Read more..
Baltimore Sun: O'Malley Won't Seek Mikulski's Senate Seat
Former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley said Tuesday he will not run for Senate in 2016, taking himself out of what could be a messy Democratic primary race to replace retiring Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski. O'Malley, who is considering a run for president in 2016 and has been talking to voters in Iowa and New Hampshire, complimented Mikulski's long record of service in a statement Tuesday morning. "I am hopeful and confident that very capable public servants with a desire to serve in the Senate will step up as candidates for this important office," the former governor said. "I will not be one of them." The decision was a surprise for some observers who noted O'Malley faces an uphill challenge making headway against the presumed frontrunner for the Democratic presidential nomination, Hillary Clinton. For O'Malley, the Senate seat would likely have been an easier lift. Read more..
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| TWITTER TAKES ON THE ISLAMIC STATE & OTHER STORIES FOR THIS WEDNESDAY MORNING... |
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NYT: Iraqi Campaign To Drive ISIS From Tikrit Reveals Tensions With U.S.
Tensions between Iraq and the United States over how to battle the Islamic State broke into the open on Tuesday, as Iraqi officials declared that they would fight on their own timetable with or without American help, and as United States warplanes conspicuously sat out the biggest Iraqi counteroffensive yet amid concerns over Iran’s prominent role. On Monday, Iraq launched a politically sensitive operation to oust Islamic State militants from Tikrit, the birthplace of Saddam Hussein, without seeking American approval, officials said. Even as Iraq was taking a first step into a bigger battle to oust the Islamic State from the northern city of Mosul, it was also signaling that its alliance with the United States might be more fraught than officials had let on. American officials, for their part, voiced unease with the prominent role of Iran and its allied Shiite militias in the Tikrit operation. Shiite militia leaders said that their fighters made up more than two-thirds of the pro-government force of 30,000, and that the Iranian spymaster Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani was helping to lead from near the front lines. Read more..
ABC News: Twitter Escalates Its Own ISIS Battle: 2,000 Accounts Suspended Last Week
ISIS has been under attack in the last few days from Twitter, which has quietly suspended at least 2,000 accounts linked to the terror group and its supporters, according to people with knowledge of the operation. The sites shut down include some of the most important distributors of ISIS messages in a major escalation against ISIS’s propaganda and recruitment efforts, according to J.M. Berger, a terrorism analyst who monitors ISIS online messaging. "Twitter has been doing a whole lot over the past week. They've slammed them pretty hard, including the official media distribution guys," Berger said. He said 13 of the 16 major ISIS distribution accounts were among those shut down. Read more..
The Guardian: US Military Chief Backs Arming Ukraine Against Separatists
The US military’s top-ranking officer has called for Washington to arm Ukraine in its battle with pro-Russian forces, saying he favours doing so through NATO. It was the first time General Martin Dempsey had spoken out in support of arming Ukraine’s army against the separatists and follows similar comments by the Pentagon’s new chief, Ashton Carter, and the director of national intelligence, James Clapper. “I think we should absolutely consider lethal aid and it ought to be in the context of NATO allies because [Russian President Vladimir] Putin’s ultimate objective is to fracture NATO,” Dempsey told the Senate armed services committee. Read more..
NYT: Memorial for Nemtsov, Assassinated Critic Of Putin, Draws Thousands
The funeral on Tuesday for Boris Y. Nemtsov, the assassinated Kremlin critic, drew a gloomy band of politicians and supporters from the faltering liberal opposition, with mourners grieving that they were burying not just a friend, but also their dream for a different Russia. “Now that he is in the grave, the last hope for Russia is in the grave,” said Vladimir N. Voynovich, a famous Russian novelist who, like Mr. Nemtsov, has been outspoken in criticizing Russia’s role in the war in Ukraine. “He was one of the last optimists in this country.” Thousands of Muscovites bearing flowers and red votive candles lined up early in the morning to pay their final respects to Mr. Nemtsov, 55, whose body lay in an open coffin at the Sakharov Center. By early afternoon, hundreds still clogged the sidewalk outside as the coffin was transferred to a hearse for the long ride to the pine-covered Troyekurovskoye Cemetery, filled with the black granite headstones favored by the city’s elite. Read more..
Washington Post: Jury Selected In Boston Marathon Bombing Trial
It took two months to seat a jury in the Boston Marathon bombing case, but today the ten women and eight men were finally selected after the prosecution and defense in the trial spent an hour passing back and forth, in near silence, a form on which they could take turns crossing out the jurors they did not want. The sides each got to strike 23 jurors off a preliminary list of 64 people the court had found “provisionally qualified.” At the end, ten women and eight men, including six alternates, were left standing – and were asked to remain briefly for a discussion of “logistics,” as the judge put it. The 46 people who were struck from the roster left the building in what seemed like giddy silence. Only one man whispered “thank god” when the elevator doors opened downstairs. The resulting jury appears to be all white, and, like the original jury pool, mostly middle-aged. State and city employees seem overrepresented, possibly because they do not risk their livelihood by serving on a jury for several months. Read more..
USA Today: Lawyer: Snowden Willing To Return To U.S. For Trial
Former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden is willing to return to the U.S. if he is guaranteed a fair trial, his lawyer says. "Edward Snowden is ready to return to the U.S., but on the condition that he be given ... a fair and impartial trial," lawyer Anatoly Kucherena said, according to the Russian news agency TASS. Kucherena said he received a letter from the U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder promising Snowden would not face capital punishment should he return. "That is, they guarantee that Snowden will not be executed, not that he will receive a fair trial. And it is guaranteed by the attorney general who cannot even influence court decisions according to law," Kucherena said. Kucherena spoke at a news conference in Moscow while promoting a book he has written about Snowden. Read more..
Washington Post: U.S. Faces 90,000 Doctor Shortage By 2025, Medical School Association Warns
The United States faces a shortage of as many as 90,000 physicians by 2025, including a critical need for specialists to treat an aging population that will increasingly live with chronic disease, the association that represents medical schools and teaching hospitals reported Tuesday. The nation's shortage of primary care physicians has received considerable attention in recent years, but the Association of American Medical Colleges report predicts that the greatest shortfall, on a percentage basis, will be in the demand for surgeons — especially those who treat diseases more common to older people, such as cancer. Read more..
AP: Official Says China To Boost Military Budget By 10 Percent
China’s legislative spokeswoman says the country’s military budget will grow by about 10 percent in the coming year. That would be a slightly smaller rise than last year, but would be the fifth year in a row of double-digit increases, despite slowing economic growth that fell to 7.4 percent last year and is expected to further decline in 2015. The increase would bring the total military budget to about $145 billion. Fu Ying, spokeswoman for the National People’s Congress, says this year’s military budget figure — to be confirmed Thursday — is in line with an overall increase in government spending of about 10 percent. Read more..
WSJ: NBCU Plans Subscription Comedy Video Service
Comcast Corp. ’s NBCUniversal is aiming to launch a comedy-focused subscription Web video service later this year, people familiar with the plans say, signaling the company’s growing interest in reaching young viewers online as its traditional cable-TV business stagnates. The comedy service would likely feature full episodes of NBC shows such as “The Tonight Show” starring Jimmy Fallon and “Saturday Night Live.” The company also plans to invest in original series for the service and may enlist its TV stars to create exclusive content, according to the people familiar with the plans. NBCU is considering various possible price points—one range under consideration is $2.50 to $3.50 per month, one of the people said. Read more..
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