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WASHINGTON — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was travelling to Washington on Friday for urgent talks with U.S. President Barack Obama. According to a senior Israeli official, Netanyahu was disappointed with Obama’s remarks on Israeli-Palestinian peace in his Middle East speech delivered to the State Department on Thursday.
Aboard the plane taking Netanyahu to Washington on Friday, the official said: “There is a feeling that Washington does not understand the reality, doesn’t understand what we face”. He continued: “The prime minister’s tough response expresses the disappointment with the absence of central issues that Israel demanded, chiefly the refugee [issue]“.
In his speech, Obama said for the first time that Israel’s boundaries before the 1967 Arab-Israeli war should be the basis for Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. In response, Netanyahu said he would not agree to such an approach, calling the 1967 lines “indefensible” and noting that they would leave out Israeli settlements in the West Bank
Count David Letterman among the celebrities who are now linking Donald Trump’s recent comments about President Obama’s birth certificate and ivy league worthiness to flat out racism.
In a preview of tonight’s interview with Dr. Phil, Letterman offers his opinion on the “Celebrity Apprentice” host, saying the birther drama was amusing and all, but the questions about his academic record is another issue altogether.
“It’s all fun, it’s all a circus, it’s all a rodeo until it starts to smack of racism,” said Letterman. “And then it’s no longer fun.”
Letterman suggests that if Trump comes back to The Late Show — “and I’m not sure that we want him back” — the tycoon “ought to be prepared to apologize.”
n response to recent reports of up to 800,000 government employees facing furlough due to a federal government shutdown, one organization has taken steps to lend a helping hand. The Low Income Housing Authority, through their web site at LowIncome.org, is helping people learn about their financial options.
The website is an online tool that offers valuable information, resources, and tips on how to find and apply for low income housing, food stamps, and other government assistance programs. It features a searchable database of more than 3,000 programs in all 50 states.
Those who are going through a financial crisis can use the site to find an affordable place to live, to be informed about what their options are, and to be encouraged that there is help available. In addition, the site can be used as a resource on how to best deal with evictions, foreclosures, bad credit, child support, and college funding for low-income students.
For more details, visit www.lowincome.org.
About the National Low Income Housing Authority
Launched in 2010, this organization was created to educate and empower people who have encountered financial difficulties. The mission is to offer as much helpful information and resources as possible.
The 2010 census report coming out Tuesday will include a boatload of good political news for Republicans and grim data for Democrats hoping to re-elect President Barack Obama and rebound from last month’s devastating elections.
The population continues to shift from Democratic-leaning Rust Belt states to Republican-leaning Sun Belt states, a trend the Census Bureau will detail in its once-a-decade report to the president. Political clout shifts, too, because the nation must reapportion the 435 House districts to make them roughly equal in population, based on the latest census figures.
The biggest gainer will be Texas, a GOP-dominated state expected to gain up to four new House seats, for a total of 36. The chief losers – New York and Ohio, each projected by nongovernment analysts to lose two seats – were carried by Obama in 2008 and are typical of states in the Northeast and Midwest that are declining in political influence.
Democrats’ problems don’t end there.
In essence, Republicans succeeded in playing on fears (some real and some imagin*ed) which scared substantial segments of the voting population away from the president’s economic policies and liberal agenda.
Those most affected by the scare tactics were older voters, wealthy voters and independent white voters who “surged to the polls” on November 2 to help return control of the U.S. House of Representatives to the Republicans and reduce the size of the Democratic Party majority in the U.S. Senate.
The report was released by Project Vote, a nonpartisan, nonprofit group, which also found that turnout by pro-Democratic blocs such as African-Americans, young people and Latinos dropped sharply from 2008 levels, leaving what it labeled “a lopsided pro-Republican electorate to dominate the national landscape.”
Compared with 2008, voting dropped off this year particularly among pro-Democratic groups:
o Young voters were down by 55 percent.
o African-Americans were down by 43 percent.
o Hispanics were down by 40 percent.
Of those voters who did show up this year, 4 out of 5 were white, 1 in 10 was African-American and 1 in 13 was Latino. The analysis is based primarily on exit poll data and preliminary estimates from the U.S. Elections Project.
The results strongly suggest that if Obama wants a second term as president, he will have to rely heavily on getting young whites, Blacks and Hispanics to the polls. Currently, however, the president and his advisors appear to be spending more time trying to work out deals with Republicans and appease their conservative base.
President Barack Obama slipped unannounced into Afghanistan on Friday, one year after widening an ever deadlier war and just days before a pivotal review about the 9-year-plus conflict. Plans for a face-to-face meeting with Afghan President Hamid Karzai were scrapped at the last minute due to weather.
Under intense security, Obama landed in darkness after a clandestine departure from the White House on Thursday, where plans of his trip into the war zone were tightly guarded. Obama stepped off Air Force One just after 8:30 p.m. local time, clad in a leather jacket.
He was to personally thank U.S. troops for their service during the holidays.
The White House said rough weather forced the president to abruptly drop plans to meet Karzai in Kabul. The White House determined the wind, dust and cloud cover made it unsafe for the president to fly by helicopter from the huge military complex here to the presidential palace.
In a rapidly changing sequence of events, the White House then said they would speak by secure videoconference — but later said that, too, was dropped. Instead, the two leaders were expected to speak by phone.
In total, Obama was to spend three hours on the ground in Afghanistan, about half the time he had scheduled.
His visit to thank troops and civilian workers came ahead of an upcoming full review of his war plan later this month. He planned to visit embassy workers and wounded soldiers and speak to troops at a hangar here. On the flight, the White House said Obama’s war review would include no major policy changes.
The secret trip has been in the works for more than a month. National Security aide Ben Rhodes said Obama wanted to go to Afghanistan between Thanksgiving and Christmas.
“It’s always tough to serve in harm’s way but when you’re away from loved ones in the holiday season it’s particularly hard, and the president wanted the ability to come out and have some time with them,” Rhodes said.
Rhodes said the scrapping of the personal visit with Karzai would not have consequences because the two just met at a NATO summit in Lisbon two weeks ago.
Obama’s visit comes at a particularly awkward moment in already strained U.S. relations with Afghanistan. Leaked U.S. cables show American diplomats portraying Afghanistan as rife with graft to the highest levels of government, with tens of millions of dollars flowing out of the country and a cash transfer network that facilitates bribes for corrupt Afghan officials, drug traffickers and insurgents.
A main concern in the cables appears to be Karzai himself, who emerges as a mercurial figure. In a July 7, 2009, dispatch, U.S. Ambassador Karl Eikenberry describes “two contrasting portraits” of the Afghan president.
“The first is of a paranoid and weak individual unfamiliar with the basics of nation building and overly self-conscious that his time in the spotlight of glowing reviews from the international community has passed,” the cable says. “The other is that of an ever-shrewd politician who sees himself as a nationalist hero. … In order to recalibrate our relationship with Karzai, we must deal with and challenge both of these personalities.”
In Afghanistan on Friday, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said weather and technical problems prevented the videoconference with Karzai.
Reporters learned late in the flight that the in-person meeting was canceled. Even Gibbs seemed surprised to learn of it. He was interrupted with the news on the weather problem after he had started a briefing with reporters traveling with Obama toward the end of the flight.
Obama was greeted on the tarmac by the top NATO commander in Afghanistan, U.S. Gen. David Petraeus, and Eikenberry.
President Barack Obama is set to appear on the Discovery show “Mythbusters” in December as part of a White House effort to promote science and math.
In the series, which aims to uncover the truth behind popular myths and legends, a team will answer a request from the president to revisit its 2006 experiment on the effectiveness of a Death Ray.
Obama will help the show’s team members Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman discover whether Greek scientist Archimedes really set fire to an invading Roman fleet using only mirrors and the reflected rays of the sun.
In the 2006 episode, seen below, the team declared the myth “busted” because it took far too long for any reflected light to ignite a fire on a distant ship. Obama, however, requested they make another attempt.
A press release for the show asks, “Will Adam and Jamie be able to pull this off, or will they have to report back to the president that they failed?”
Producers are keeping mum on how exactly President Obama will help prove — or disprove — the myth. The episode is scheduled to air on Dec. 8.
Obama will announce his participation in the show during today’s scheduled White House Science Fair, celebrating the winners of a broad range of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) competitions.
President Barack Obama is hoping a Florida minister will “listen to those better angels” and cancel his plan to engage in a Quran-burning protest to mark the anniversary of Sept. 11th.
In an interview aired today on ABC’s “Good Morning America,” the president said he hopes the Rev. Terry Jones of Florida listens to the pleas of people who have asked him to call off the plan. The president called it a “stunt.”
“If he’s listening, I hope he understands that what he’s proposing to do is completely contrary to our values as Americans,” Obama said. “That this country has been built on the notion of freedom and religious tolerance.”
“And as a very practical matter, I just want him to understand that this stunt that he is talking about pulling could greatly endanger our young men and women who are in uniform,” the president added. [Scroll down to watch interview.]
Obama added: “Look, this is a recruitment bonanza for Al Qaida. You could have serious violence in places like Pakistan and Afghanistan.” The president also said Jones’ plan, if carried out, could serve as an incentive for terrorist-minded individuals “to blow themselves up” to kill others.
“I hope he listens to those better angels and understands that this is a destructive act that he’s engaging in,” the president said of Jones.
Officials said U.S. diplomatic posts have been instructed to convene “emergency action committees” to determine the potential for protests over the congregation’s plans to burn the Quran to commemorate the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. The posts are to warn American citizens in countries where protests may occur.
T.D Jakes Admonishes Rev. Franklin Graham for Questioning Pres. Obama’s Faith. Coming off the success of his hit film “Jumping the Broom,” Bishop T. D. Jakes appears on TV One’s “Washington Week with Roland Martin” Sunday at 11am Eastern.On the show, taped on Friday, host Roland Martin asked Bishop Jakes to respond to comments made by conservative preacher Franklin Graham:
Roland Martin: Rev. Franklin Graham has made some comments on several occasions as recently as three weeks ago really questioning, if you will, the faith of the President. He said the President has told him he’s a Christian, but he basically said that going to church does not make you a Christian. But the President is on record as saying that he walked down that aisle, he gave his life to Christ, so what do you say to folks like Rev. Graham who, frankly, are muddying the water but other people who are questioning the Christianity of this President?
Bishop T.D. Jakes: I find it insulting. We didn’t question the Christianity of President Bush when he said he accepted Christ, and I’m disappointed in Rev. Franklin Graham in that regard. I wish he had the diplomacy of his father, who brought the gospel to people without being nuanced by politics because when you do those things you offend people that you are actually called to save and to serve. And I would hope that he would see the rationale in apologizing for such statements – because if the President’s faith is suspect then all of our faiths are suspect, because the Bible is quite clear about what it takes to be saved and the President has been quite open about his accepting Christ and him openly confessing it before men. And if it’s good enough for the Bible it ought to be good enough for the rest of us.