KBR improperly billed ($103 million) for security guards, senator says

Source: Houston Chron/Bloomberg

KBR, the largest contractor in Iraq and Afghanistan, improperly billed the Pentagon and was paid about $103 million for armed security guard services, a U.S. senator says.

In a Nov. 6 letter to Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., who chairs a contracting oversight panel, wrote that the Pentagon has recovered $42 million of the payments.

McCaskill said she was concerned the Defense Department "is not moving quickly enough to recover the remaining $61 million” and asked Gates for a status report by Dec. 1.

KBR officials have not seen the McCaskill letter but “the assertion KBR has engaged in 'improper' billings is false,” said company spokeswoman Heather Browne in an e-mail. “KBR has previously addressed billing issues and worked with the government to answer questions raised,” she said.

The billings were part of the Houston-based company's $34 billion contract to provide housing, food, laundry, mail delivery and fuel. The Defense Contract Audit Agency first identified the billings in August 2007. McCaskill said the failure to recover all the money by now “raises questions about the sufficiency” of Pentagon efforts “to recover disapproved costs on other contracts.” LinkHere

Jon Stewart Catches Sean Hannity Falsifying Footage To Make GOP Protest Appear Bigger

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Sean Hannity Uses Glenn Beck's Protest Footage
http://www.thedailyshow.com/
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Crisis

The Men Who Stare at Votes

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
The Men Who Stare at Votes
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Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Crisis

2,266 Veterans Died In 2008 Because They Were Uninsured

According to a study released by the Harvard Medical School, 2,266 veterans under the age of 65 died last year as a result of not having health insurance. Researchers emphasize that "that figure is more than 14 times the number of deaths (155) suffered by U.S. troops in Afghanistan in 2008, and more than twice as many as have died (911 as of Oct. 31) since the war began in 2001."

The 1.46 million working-age veterans that did not have health insurance last year all experienced reduced access to care as a consequence, leading to "six preventable deaths a day."

Like other uninsured Americans, most uninsured vets are working people -- too poor to afford private coverage but not poor enough to qualify for Medicaid or means-tested VA care," said Dr. Steffie Woolhandler, a professor at Harvard Medical School. [...]

Dr. David Himmelstein, the co-author of the report and associate professor of medicine at Harvard, commented, "On this Veterans Day we should not only honor the nearly 500 soldiers who have died this year in Iraq and Afghanistan, but also the more than 2,200 veterans who were killed by our broken health insurance system. That's six preventable deaths a day."

The study's authors warn that the health care legislation "would do virtually nothing for the uninsured until 2013" and would "leave at least 17 million uninsured over the long run when reform kicks in," leaving many veterans still without care.

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Oh, to be a fly on the wall at President Barack Obama’s closed-door meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

What a friking sleeze bag!!!!!!!!

Posted on Nov 9, 2009
White House / Pete Souza
President Obama and Prime Minister Netanyahu exchange greetings at the United Nations earlier this year.

Oh, to be a fly on the wall at President Barack Obama’s closed-door meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The two administrations have been at odds over Israel’s settlement construction, a disagreement that might have had something to do with Obama’s snubbing of Netanyahu by holding a meeting that lacked the usual fanfare.

Haaretz reports that the prime minister was prepared to be “generous” but stop short of a total freeze on construction and any perceived compromise on Israel’s security.

Netanyahu has called on his Palestinian counterpart, President Mahmoud Abbas, to “seize the moment to reach an historic agreement,” but his own policies have made that exceedingly difficult. —PZS

AFP via Yahoo:

Netanyahu on Monday urged moderate Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas, who last week announced he would not run for re-election in January, to immediately renew peace negotiations.

“I say today to Mahmud Abbas, the leader of the Palestinian Authority, ‘let us seize the moment to reach an historic agreement. Let us begin talks immediately,’ ” he told a conference of North American Jewish leaders.

But Washington’s efforts to relaunch Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, a goal the US administration has made the cornerstone of its Middle East policy, have recently encountered serious setbacks.
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Google says Murdoch stories can be taken off

Dump The Bum, who friking cares!!!!!Just keep him in the USA, we sure as hell don't want him

Google said on Tuesday, in response to threats by Rupert Murdoch to ban the search engine from listing content from his news empire, that any company could ask to have stories taken off.

In an interview in his native Australia, Murdoch accused Google of stealing stories from News Corp. newspapers for the Google News service, and said he might ban them once he introduces charges for the papers' online editions.

Google said it was up to individual news organisations to decide whether they wanted their stories listed on Google News, and there were "simple technical standards" that would remove them if they wished.

"News organisations are in complete control over whether and how much of their content appears in search results," it said said in a statement issued in London.

"Publishers put their content on the web because they want it to be found, so very few choose not to include their material in Google News and web search. But if they tell us not to include it, we don't."

It added: "If publishers want their content to be removed from Google News specifically all they need to do it tell us."

Google said its news listings service and web searches were a "tremendous source of promotion" for news organisations, sending them "about 100,000 clicks every minute".

It added that Google News's approach was "fully consistent with copyright law", as it only showed the headline, short snippet of the story and a link to the publishers' site where readers could read the full version.

News Corp owns an enormous number of newspapers around the world including The Australian, the New York Post and The Times of London, and is planning to soon charge all its online readers.
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Marine reservist chases, assaults Greek Orthodox priest who he mistook for an Arab terrorist.

COProgressive says:
Isn’t it great what being feed a constant diet of hate and fear can do for you critical thinking ability?
“Collective fear stimulates herd instinct, and tends to produce ferocity toward those who are not regarded as members of the herd.” – Bertrand Russell

Alexios Marakis, a Greek Orthodox priest visiting the U.S., got lost in Tampa and tried to stop and ask directions from Marine reservist Jasen D. Bruce. But instead of offering help, “Bruce struck the priest on the head with a tire iron.” The reservist believed Marakis, who spoke limited English, was an Arab terrorist. Bruce chased the priest for three blocks, “and even called 911 to say that an Arabic man tried to rob him.” According to a news release:

“During the chase, the suspect called 911 and claimed an Arabic male attempted to rob him and he was going to take him into custody,” a Tampa Police Department news release states. “When officers arrived, the suspect claimed the man was a terrorist.”

Police arrested Bruce for “aggravated battery with a deadly weapon” and are investigating whether he committed a hate crime.
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Lawsuit alleges that New York Post DC bureau chief’s goal was ‘to destroy’ Obama

The Huffington Post’s Sam Stein reports today that a fired New York Post employee, Sandra Guzman, has filed a complaint against the Post, the paper’s parent company News Corp., and Post editor-in-chief Col Allan “alleging harassment as well as ‘unlawful employment practices and retaliation.’” Stein reports that Guzman “paints the Post newsroom as a male-dominated frat house and Allan in particular as sexist, offensive and domineering. Guzman alleges that she and others were routinely subjected to misogynistic behavior.” But in addition to horrible workplace conditions, the Post’s news division is operating with a clear partisan bias, according to Guzman. She said the Post’s Washington D.C. bureau chief vowed to bring down President Obama:

She says that hiring practices at the paper — as well as her firing — were driven by racial prejudices rather than merit.

And she recounts the paper’s D.C. bureau chief stating that the publication’s goal was to “destroy [President] Barack Obama.”

Guzman’s revelation isn’t all that surprising considering that a Senior Vice President at Fox News, also a News Corp. subsidiary, admitted earlier this year that the network is consciously aiming to be “the voice of opposition” to the Obama administration “on some issues.”
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Narrow, Surprising Victory in Seattle Mayor’s Race

Source: NY Times

SEATTLE — A former Sierra Club leader who rode his bicycle to campaign events and relied heavily on volunteer support claimed a narrow and surprising victory on Monday in the race for mayor of this environmentally friendly city.

“You cared, you believed, and we’ve got a lot more work to do,” Mike McGinn told supporters after the city’s mail-in election showed him winning 51 percent of the vote, by a margin of 4,939 votes out of about 190,000 cast in the mayor’s race.

He was met by the same chant he heard on the campaign trail: “We like Mike!”

* * *

Mr. McGinn, who was outspent more than 3 to 1 and did not receive endorsements from major political and business leaders, defeated Joe Mallahan, a vice president with T-Mobile who contributed more than $200,000 to his own campaign.
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Halliburton, KBR named in suit over 'burn pits'

Source: Houston Chron/AP

LOUISVILLE, Ky. — A pair of Kentucky men who served in Iraq and Afghanistan are suing two U.S. military contractors and accusing the companies of exposing them to toxic fumes and ash from “burn pits.”

The suit was filed in U.S. District Court in Louisville on Monday by former Air Force Sgt. Sean Alexander Stough of Stanton and Charles Hicks of Bellevue. It accuses Houston-based Halliburton Co. and KBR Inc. of burning everything from human remains to tires in open air pits, exposing everyone nearby to toxic ash and fumes.

KBR spokeswoman Heather Brown said the company denies the allegations and follows military regulations on the disposal of waste.

Halliburton didn’t immediately return a call for comment on Tuesday.
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George W. Bush: The Worst President Ever!

George W. Bush's vacation time (grand total)
487 days at Camp David
490 days at Crawford Ranch
43 days at Kennebunkport Compound

Total: 1020 days, more than 1/3rd of his presidency. Bush set the record for most vacation time taken by any president.

Carter took 79 days in 4 years.
Clinton took 152 days in 8 years.

Reagan took 335 days in 8 years.
Bush Sr. took 543 days in 4 years!

So much for the mythological Republican hard worth ethic.
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Obama Ft. Hood Speech:

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Weiner Takes Lieberman On For "Audacity" Of Filibuster

Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.) took on Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) on "Morning Joe" Monday, chastising the former Democrat for pledging to join a filibuster against health care reform if it contains a public option.

"It's inconsistent with common sense to say I oppose something that will hold down costs for the taxpayers and residents of Connecticut," Weiner said. "The insurance industry is a powerful force in Washington and so is the status quo, but the audacity to saying, and I think he backed away from it, 'I will not permit a vote on the concept?' Let's let the majority decide this issue."

Weiner offered to debate the senator, saying "If you want to bring Lieberman here, I think that I can talk him into it." LinkHere

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Ft. Hood Victim's Family Speaks Out Against Anti-Muslim Sentiment

Army Chief Of Staff Warns Of Backlash... Conservative Group: Time To Purge Muslims From Military... Resolute Soldiers Injured At Ft. Hood Ready To Return

Army chief of staff Gen. George Casey said this weekend that he is concerned that the deadly shooting at Ft. Hood last week could "cause a backlash against some of our Muslim soldiers."

"I've asked our Army leaders to be on the lookout for that," Gen. Casey told CNN on Sunday, stating that "as great a tragedy as this was, it would be a shame if our diversity became a casualty as well."

On Monday, the family of one of the victims offered a hand of support to the Muslim community. Michael Cahill, a physician's assistant at the base, was the only civilian to be killed in the attacks, and his family spoke to CBS News to denounce the scapegoating of Muslims.

"You can't blanket a whole group of people. There's extremists in every religion, and there's extremists all over the world," said Cahill's daughter, Kerry. "And I don't think that we can blanket a whole group of people when this man obviously was ill, I think."

Cahill's other daughter, Keely Vanacker, expanded: "The death of our father, or any of these victims, shouldn't be an excuse or reason to begin to hate an entire group of people."
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Complicated Suicide considered in Census Workers death

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Fort Hood tragedy.

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Revealed: FBI warned CIA repeatedly about interrogation

Previously censored documents released late Friday by the Department of Justice have shed more light on the FBI investigation into CIA interrogation tactics. Part of the record shows how FBI officials understood that the 'battleground tactics' used by the Pentagon were ineffective and wouldn't lead to prosecutions. As early as 2003, the Federal Bureau of Investigations sent repeated warnings to the Department of Defense, but abusive interrogations occurred for 4 more years.

These latest documents were part of an ongoing Freedom of Information Act lawsuit being conducted by the American Civil Liberties Union. Last week, newly released memos indicated that the FBI began to conduct an investigation into CIA interrogation techniques and secret prisons, but was denied regular access to prisoners. Department of Justice officials decided that there was not enough evidence to prosecute CIA interrogators.

This week, fresh documents in the ACLU lawsuit go deeper into the conflict between the FBI and the Pentagon. The belief at the Bureau was that though the Army-based interrogation tactics were useful for battlefield information gathering, "the reliability of information obtained using such tactics is highly questionable, not to mention potentially legally inadmissible in court.” This memo from May 2003 brings important questions to mind: Did the Office of Legal Counsel lawyers drafting later memos for the CIA not know about these early warnings? Did the CIA dismiss these warnings altogether, or were they told to ignore them?

Senior officials from the Criminal Investigative Task Force “lamented the fact that many DHS [Defense Human Intelligence Services] interrogators seem to believe that the only way to elicit information from uncooperative detainees is to use aggressive techniques on them.”
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Brave teenager rescues one, then another

Source: The Age
LACHLAN Edwards, 15, had already rescued one man when he swam straight back into the rip at Point Impossible on the weekend to save a drowning woman. Struggling behind the break of the waves, she had taken in a lot of water and was too exhausted to keep fighting the current. ''She was a bit panicky, she was like 'someone please help me', and I said, 'I'm here now. You can hold on to me if you want','' Lachlan said.

He grabbed her arm and tried to swim her through the pounding waves. She realised how young he was and told him to swim back to safety without her. ''I kept assuring her that I could get back with her and she kept saying, 'leave me here, swim back, don't put yourself in danger' From the small crowd on the beach near Torquay, someone phoned police.

When leading senior constables Justin Joseph and Kelly Wray arrived, they saw Lachlan and the woman about 70 metres out. Leading Senior Constable Joseph stripped to his underpants and socks and ran into the water. He said he was surprised to see such a young rescuer and was immediately impressed.

''She was distraught; she kept saying 'I'm going to drown, I'm going to drown'. He was beyond his years, he relaxed her,'' Leading Senior Constable Joseph said.

The water was about four metres deep and Lachlan was becoming exhausted, trying to break through the rip with the woman. Police believe the woman had swum out to try to rescue the first man, who was being helped by another man when Lachlan initially responded to his scream. ''They got a bit stuck so I went out to help them,'' Lachlan said. ''I brought him back in but then I realised there was another woman who'd already gone to help this guy.'' LinkHere

Lieberman Pledges To Filibuster House Health Care Reform Bill, "As A Matter Of Conscience"

THE USUAL SUSPECTS
Graham: House Bill Would Be DOA In Senate, Lieberman Pledges Filibuster

They're such a SCUMBAG!!!!!!!

cactusfractal

Deport Lieberman to Israel. n/t

Lieberman showed no sign of dropping his filibuster threat on Sunday morning, when he pledged to help kill any health care reform that includes a public option.

The Hill reported last week that the Connecticut senator had reached a "private understanding" with Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.) to let the bill pass. Both he and Democratic leadership denied the report, and publicly Lieberman is only increasing his commitment to the filibuster.

"A public option plan is unnecessary. It has been put forward, I'm convinced, by people who really want the government to take over all of health insurance," he told Chris Wallace on "Fox News Sunday." "If the public option plan is in there, as a matter of conscience, I will not allow this bill to come to a final vote."

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Sen. Joe Lieberman calls Fort Hood massacre a 'terrorist' act

Source: NY Daily News

Sen. Joe Lieberman called the Fort Hood massacre an act of "Islamist extremism" - even as top Army brass warned Sunday against guessing at a motive, fearing backlash against Muslim soldiers.

"There are very, very strong warning signs here that Dr. Hasan had become an Islamist extremist and, therefore, that this was a terrorist act," Lieberman (I-Conn) told Fox News on Sunday.

"If the reports that we're receiving of various statements he made, acts he took are valid, he had turned to Islamist extremism."
***
Lieberman's comments were in stark contrast to U.S. Army chief of staff George Casey, who told CNN he's deeply worried "that the speculation could cause something that we don't want to see happen." LinkHere

Can An Unstable Pakistan Keep Safe Its Nuclear Arsenal?

Defending the Arsenal
America’s dealings with Pakistan may be increasing the risk of radicalization.

In the tumultuous days leading up to the Pakistan Army’s ground offensive in the tribal area of South Waziristan, which began on October 17th, the Pakistani Taliban attacked what should have been some of the country’s best-guarded targets. In the most brazen strike, ten gunmen penetrated the Army’s main headquarters, in Rawalpindi, instigating a twenty-two-hour standoff that left twenty-three dead and the military thoroughly embarrassed. The terrorists had been dressed in Army uniforms. There were also attacks on police installations in Peshawar and Lahore, and, once the offensive began, an Army general was shot dead by gunmen on motorcycles on the streets of Islamabad, the capital. The assassins clearly had advance knowledge of the general’s route, indicating that they had contacts and allies inside the security forces.

Pakistan has been a nuclear power for two decades, and has an estimated eighty to a hundred warheads, scattered in facilities around the country. The success of the latest attacks raised an obvious question: Are the bombs safe? Asked this question the day after the Rawalpindi raid, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said, “We have confidence in the Pakistani government and the military’s control over nuclear weapons.” Clinton—whose own visit to Pakistan, two weeks later, would be disrupted by more terrorist bombs—added that, despite the attacks by the Taliban, “we see no evidence that they are going to take over the state.”

Clinton’s words sounded reassuring, and several current and former officials also said in interviews that the Pakistan Army was in full control of the nuclear arsenal. But the Taliban overrunning Islamabad is not the only, or even the greatest, concern. The principal fear is mutiny—that extremists inside the Pakistani military might stage a coup, take control of some nuclear assets, or even divert a warhead.

On April 29th, President Obama was asked at a news conference whether he could reassure the American people that Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal could be kept away from terrorists. Obama’s answer remains the clearest delineation of the Administration’s public posture. He was, he said, “gravely concerned” about the fragility of the civilian government of President Asif Ali Zardari. “Their biggest threat right now comes internally,” Obama said. “We have huge . . . national-security interests in making sure that Pakistan is stable and that you don’t end up having a nuclear-armed militant state.” The United States, he said, could “make sure that Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal is secure—primarily, initially, because the Pakistan Army, I think, recognizes the hazards of those weapons’ falling into the wrong hands.”

The questioner, Chuck Todd, of NBC, began asking whether the American military could, if necessary, move in and secure Pakistan’s bombs. Obama did not let Todd finish. “I’m not going to engage in hypotheticals of that sort,” he said. “I feel confident that the nuclear arsenal will remain out of militant hands. O.K.?”

Obama did not say so, but current and former officials said in interviews in Washington and Pakistan that his Administration has been negotiating highly sensitive understandings with the Pakistani military. These would allow specially trained American units to provide added security for the Pakistani arsenal in case of a crisis. At the same time, the Pakistani military would be given money to equip and train Pakistani soldiers and to improve their housing and facilities—goals that General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, the chief of the Pakistan Army, has long desired. In June, Congress approved a four-hundred-million-dollar request for what the Administration called the Pakistan Counterinsurgency Capability Fund, providing immediate assistance to the Pakistan Army for equipment, training, and “renovation and construction.” LinkHere

The Night They Drove the Tea Partiers Down

Rage At Wall Street Against Background Of Despair

By FRANK RICH
Published: November 7, 2009
FOR all cable news’s efforts to inflate Election 2009 into a cliffhanger as riveting as Balloon Boy, ratings at MSNBC and CNN were flat Tuesday night. But not at Fox News, where the audience nearly doubled its usual prime-time average. That’s what happens when you have a thrilling story to tell, and what could be more thrilling than a revolution playing out in real time?
As Fox kept insisting, all eyes were glued on Doug Hoffman, the insurgent tea party candidate in New York’s 23rd Congressional District. A “tidal wave” was on its way, said Sean Hannity, and the right would soon “take back the Republican Party.” The race was not “even close,” Bill O’Reilly suggested to the pollster Scott Rasmussen, who didn’t disagree. When returns showed Hoffman trailing, the network’s resident genius, Karl Rove, knowingly reassured viewers that victory was in the bag, even if we’d have to stay up all night waiting for some slacker towns to tally their votes.

Alas, the Dewey-beats-Truman reveries died shortly after midnight, when even Fox had to concede that the Democrat, Bill Owens, had triumphed in what had been Republican country since before Edison introduced the light bulb. For the far right, the thriller in Watertown was over except for the ludicrous morning-after spin that Hoffman’s loss was really a victory. For the Democrats, the excitement was just beginning. New York’s 23rd could be celebrated as a rare bright spot on a night when the party’s gubernatorial candidates lost in Virginia and New Jersey.
The Democrats’ celebration was also premature: Hoffman’s defeat is potentially more harmful to them than to the Republicans. Tuesday’s results may be useless as a predictor of 2010, but they are not without value as cautionary tales. And the most worrisome for Democrats were not in Virginia and New Jersey, but, paradoxically, in the New York contests where they performed relatively well. That includes the idiosyncratic New York City mayor’s race that few viewed as a bellwether of anything. It should be the most troubling of them all for President Obama’s cohort — even though neither Obama nor the national political parties were significant players in it
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The LONE Republican To Vote For Health Care Reform

One Republican lawmaker out of 177 crossed party lines to support the health care reform legislation offered by Democrats.

Rep. Anh "Joseph" Cao, the Louisiana Republican who hails from a decidedly Democratic New Orleans district, voted yea on the final passage of legislation. He joined 219 Democrats to make the final margin 220 to 215 in favor of reform's passage.

Cao was a major (and possibly the lone) target for Democrats hoping to get even a semblance of bipartisan support for the bill. He said after the vote that he had obtained a "commitment from President Obama that he and I will work together to address the critical health care issues of Louisiana."

In the past, Cao has been touted by House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) as "the future" of the GOP. Republicans clearly went the distance to keep him in the fold for the health care vote. House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-Va.), who promised protesters at a Tea Party rally this week that "not one Republican will vote for this bill," was standing beside Cao as the historic vote unfolded.

After the vote, Cao put out a long statement explaining his vote and emphasizing the fact that he also voted in favor of a key anti-abortion amendment, presumably to try to stave off the heavy incoming attacks from conservative activists.

Of his vote, Cao said: "Tonight, I voted to keep taxpayer dollars from funding abortion and to deliver access to affordable health care to the people of Louisiana.

Cao said: "I read the versions of the House [health reform] bill. I listened to the countless stories of Orleans and Jefferson Parish citizens whose health care costs are exploding - if they are able to obtain health care at all. Louisianans needs real options for primary care, for mental health care, and for expanded health care for seniors and children. [...]

Cao said: "Today, I obtained a commitment from President Obama that he and I will work together to address the critical health care issues of Louisiana including the FMAP crisis and community disaster loan forgiveness, as well as issues related to Charity and Methodist Hospitals. And, I call on my constituents to support me as I work with him on these issues.

Cao said: "I have always said that I would put aside partisan wrangling to do the business of the people. My vote tonight was based on my priority of doing what is best for my constituents.
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Ahahahahahahah the goons are going to be apoplectic tonight, Thank you Beck, Limbaugh, Palin, Bauchman, Pawlenty, and all the rest of you, Thank You!!

One cool move President Obama!!!!

The newest member of Congress speaks:

My district needs this. Speaking on the floor of the House of Representatives for one of, if not the, first time since being elected to office, Rep. Bill Owens (D-N.Y.) made it clear that he would vote for health care reform and viewed the legislation as a boon for small business.

"My district needs one thing: jobs," said the newly elected Democrat. "In upstate New York, small businesses are the jobs engine. Over the past 15 years, they have been responsible for nearly two-thirds of all the jobs created in [the area]. But the cost of health care is grinding the engine down. Over the last decade, small business insurance premiums are up 129 percent. That means much higher expenses, more businesses dropping coverage, and a sicker, more financially-strapped work force, and enormous pressure on small business owners...

"This bill can change that. It creates a competitive marketplace where individuals and small businesses can shop for polices at fair rates. It guarantees preventive care for a healthier, more productive work force, and it encourages Americans to start businesses of their own because the cost of health care will no longer tie them to the same job. The people of my district need jobs. They need me to vote yes. I came to congress to move America forward. This will do that."

Owens' vote, in the end, likely won't be the deciding margin if the House passes health care legislation Saturday evening. While the margin of the final vote seems likely to be small, it's mainly because Speaker Nancy Pelosi will have allowed a group of moderate Democrats to vote against the legislation for electoral purposes.

But Owens' vote is indeed a potent symbol in the eyes of Democratic leaders. Earlier in the day, President Barack Obama pointed to Owens' victory in upstate New York earlier this week as a reason that the party should rally behind the House's legislation.

"He said to look at Bill Owens," a senior Hill aide who was at the meeting recalled. "There is a House seat that's been in Republican hands for more than one hundred years. But Owens didn't run away from reform. He campaigned on it. And he still got elected."
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