We are enjoy Nobel Prize may not help Obama's Fed nominee

Nobel Prize may not help Obama's Fed nominee

AP – FILE -- In a June 18, 2004 file photo Professor Peter A. Diamond smiles prior to the start of a meeting
WASHINGTON – You'd think that having a Nobel Prize under your belt would be a clincher for getting a promotion or a job change. But it may not help economist Peter Diamond win a coveted seat on the Federal Reserve.
Diamond, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, won a Nobel Prize in economics with two other economists on Monday.
Only trouble is, Senate Republicans have so far blocked his nomination. Why? They suggest he lacks the experience to serve on the Fed's board of governors.
Given the partisan rancor that permeates U.S. politics these days, and GOP disdain for some recent Nobel awards, the news from Stockholm won't necessarily lead to a confirmation nod for Diamond.
"While the Nobel Prize for economics is a significant recognition, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences does not determine who is qualified to serve on the Board of Governors," said Sen. Richard Shelby of Alabama, the senior Republican on the Senate Banking Committee.
Diamond and the two other economists won the prize for their insights into unemployment and the impact of government policies on helping people to find jobs or cushioning their periods of joblessness.
That's certainly a prime topic right now with the jobless rate stuck at 9.6 percent and nearly 15 million Americans out of work from the worst recession since the Great Depression of the 1930s.
Their research found, in part, that programs such as government unemployment benefits can help the process of lining up job seekers with jobs that match their skills and abilities.
"How can economic policy affect unemployment? This year's laureates have developed a theory that can be used to answer these questions," the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said in a statement.
Republicans in this election cycle have railed against the administration's spending, suggesting the tens of billions of dollars in bank and auto bailouts and stimulus programs have done little to produce jobs. Many have fought extensions of unemployment benefit programs pushed by President Barack Obama and the Democratic-controlled Congress, arguing that the extensions have reduced incentives for finding work.
Some of Diamond's research findings may run up against GOP campaign dogma.
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US court rules against Barack Obama's stem cell policy

We are saw this US court rules against Barack Obama's stem cell policy



WASHINGTON: A US district court issued a preliminary injunction on Monday stopping federal funding of human embryonic stem cell research, in a slap to the Obama administration's new guidelines on the sensitive issue.

The court ruled in favor of a suit filed in June by researchers who said human embryonic stem cell research involved the destruction of human embryos.

Judge Royce Lamberth granted the injunction after finding the lawsuit would likely succeed because the guidelines violated law banning the use of federal funds to destroy human embryos.

"(Embryonic stem cell) research is clearly research in which an embryo is destroyed," Lamberth wrote in a 15-page ruling.

The Obama administration could appeal his decision or try to rewrite the guidelines to comply with US law.

The suit against the National Institutes of Health, backed by some Christian groups opposed to embryo research, argued the NIH policy violated US law and took funds from researchers seeking to work with adult stem cells.

The US department of justice, White House and NIH had no immediate comment.

Key to the case is the so-called Dickey-Wicker Amendment, which Congress adds to budget legislation every year. It bans the use of federal funds to destroy human embryos. That was not an issue for the NIH until the discovery of human embryonic stem cells in 1998.

In 2001, then-President George W Bush said he could only allow federal research money to pay for work done using a few batches, or lines, of the cells.

Many stem cell researchers objected, saying they could not do work needed to fulfill the promise of the powerful cells, which can give rise to all the tissues and cells in the human body.

Privately funded researchers could do as they pleased, but federal funding is the cornerstone of such basic biological research.

New policy

As one of his first acts after taking office, Obama overturned that decision and the NIH set up a careful process for deciding which batches of human embryonic stem cells could be used by federally funded researchers.

The new guidelines do not allow the use of federal dollars to create the stem cells but do allow researchers to work with them if they are made by another lab.

Dr. James Sherley of Boston Biomedical Research Institute and Theresa Deisher of Washington-based AVM Biotechnology, who both work with adult stem cells, filed the original suit saying the guidelines would harm their work by increasing competition for limited federal funding. They both oppose the use of human embryonic stem cells.

Sherley was not immediately available for comment.

"There is no after-the-fact remedy for this injury because the Court cannot compensate plaintiffs for their lost opportunity to receive funds," Lamberth wrote.

He found that the injunction would not seriously harm researchers who focus on human embryonic stem cells because it would preserve the status quo and not interfere with their ability to get private funding.

With the preliminary injunction in place, the two sides will likely present arguments and case history to the judge over whether the guidelines can be permanently blocked or be allowed to go into effect.
Coppied by http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/us/US-court-rules-against-Barack-Obamas-stem-cell-policy/articleshow/6423597.cms

Domestic expediency dictates Obama's Middle East policy

Watches this enjoy Domestic expediency dictates Obama's Middle East policy

Obama ran for president on the slogan of taking the government back to the people from the grip of "special interests". Image Credit: DWYNN RONALD V. TRA ZO/ Gulf News
Shackled by special interest groups and fundamentalist lobbies, the pro-change leader needs to play for time

In order to understand President Barak Obama's present Middle East policy, it is necessary to review his initial agenda for "change" and to understand the pragmatic American political mentality that always looks at the world from two basic points of view:
Serving first and foremost the American national interest and the American national security.
"Politics is the art of possible", and what is "possible", is what is primarily suitable to domestic politics.
"Serving the national interest" became distorted by the US Congress into "serving the special interests" of those who pay for the bills of their election to Congress. National security has become subservient to "the special interests" entities who control the US Congress.
Obama ran for president on the slogan of taking the government back to the people from the grip of "special interests". This is "the change" promised by Obama to the American people. Indeed, he is the first president, who was not dependent on "special interest" money to get elected to the presidency. The people of the United States sent him $5 (Dh18) and $10 donations by the millions to free him from "special interests" money.
Obama came to power in the midst of an economic crisis, which had literally bankrupted America. The surplus of $1 trillion left by Bill Clinton was transformed by George .W. Bush into $1.5 trillion in the red. The US continues fighting the unfinished wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, in addition to its war against terrorism. President Obama's agenda was set "to take the American government back to the American people", through the following steps:
Recovery of the American economy moving in full gear.
A health care plan passed in Congress.
A bill passed in Congress restricting the greed of "Wall Street", so America and the world can never be robbed again.
Implementing "the change" in the American policy in the Middle East to influence the course of the war in Iraq, Afghanistan and the fight against international terrorism of Al Qaida in a way that favours the National Security of America.
Some of President Obama's closest aides (who did the impossible of getting him elected) are liberal adherents to the Jewish faith. And like many American politicians and thinkers, they have concluded that the Palestinian/Israeli conflict is turning into "a fight till death" between Jewish fundamentalism and Islamist fundamentalism. The Jewish fundamentalists (Israeli colonisers) are helped by Christian fundamentalists, the power base of the Republicans, who are now backed by "the special interests" against Obama — America is the Arena for this "fight till death". This view is held by many in the American intelligence community and the military establishment, and it will affect US in a catastrophic way. The failure to reach a peaceful settlement in the Middle East would determine the course of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the security of the oil fields in the Middle East, the blood line of Western economy. The Obama "change" was announced in Cairo. Then, how can any observer reconcile what was said in Cairo with what is actually happening on the ground now with America's appeasement policy favouring Israel against the whole world?
A lot has happened in America. The Obama "change" created a huge number of deadly enemies, hell bent on destroying the present American administration to prevent the taking of Congress back to the American people from the "special interests". Some are openly producing extreme hate against Obama on "talk shows" to encourage his assassination (political assassination in the least) to end his presidency. The command of this campaign is being headed by "the far right" of the Republican Party who elected Bush and their natural allies, the Israeli far right, who are dominating the present Israeli government. This campaign focus is on taking back Congress from the Democratic Party in order to prevent Obama's re-election.

coppied by http://gulfnews.com/opinions/columnists/domestic-expediency-dictates-obama-s-middle-east-policy-1.670918

A woman weeps over the coffin containing the body Obama's exit strategy from Iraq under threat once again of her nine-year-old son

A woman weeps over the coffin containing the body of her nine-year-old son at his funeral in Najaf, south of Baghdad, Iraq. As the US winds up combat operations in Iraq this month, terror has returned to the country. Photograph: Alaa Al-Marjani/AP
Watches this Obama's exit strategy from Iraq under threat once again
Christopher Hill's departure from Iraq after a stint as US ambassador has eerie parallels with that of Paul Bremer, with both leaving the country at a tipping point
For the second time since the fall of Baghdad, America's main man in Iraq has ended a year-long stay by talking up a country on the wrong side of a tipping point. US ambassador Christopher Hill's departure last weekend was a much lower-profile exit than the dash to the airport in 2004 of unpopular post-invasion viceroy Paul Bremer, but it did have eerie parallels.

Bremer left claiming he had helped make Iraq sovereign and to establish the foundations of a functional state. His prophecy was in tatters long before George W Bush gave him America's highest civilian honour, for his role in running post-Saddam Iraq in the shambolic early days of the occupation.

Hill arrived in Iraq 16 months ago on a mission to turn things around. Sectarian chaos had ravaged the country in the interim. Bush's democratic project here looked stillborn, far from being central to the birth pangs of a new Middle East. And, more important for a US diplomat, America's standing both in the region and around the world had taken a pounding.

Like Bremer, Hill also claims to have made gains. But in mid-2010, it is difficult to find any trend or tangible evidence to support his optimism. Indeed, the country looks in worse shape than when Hill arrived.

Over the past month, US officials have been trying hard to push the incumbent prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki, and Iyad Allawi, the man who edged him out in a general election five months ago, into a power-sharing arrangement that would end a dangerous political deadlock.

Like a pair of bull walruses fighting, neither man has given ground as the fragile security gains of the past two years threaten to unravel. At the same time, the mood on the street has palpably soured.

Throughout this most brutal of summers (where the daytime temperature in Baghdad has rarely been below 48C), Iraqis have been getting by with around four hours per day of electricity (usually too weak to run more than one air conditioner). Even more concerning is the creeping return of terror; almost daily assassinations, a spike in bombings and rocket fire. This was not the way it was supposed to be when the conquerors left town.

The US-sponsored deal would mean Maliki could hang on to the prime minister's chair, but with diluted powers, while Allawi would take a newly formed position as head of a national security council, which would give him an executive overlord role across the security forces.

All stakeholders here were thought to have been satisfied. In Allawi, the restive Sunni centre of the country would get a strongman who had their interests at heart. His return to real power would also likely win over Saudi Arabia and Egypt. Iran, meanwhile, was believed to be appeased by the reinstallation of Maliki and his Shia Islamic backers.

Last week, however, the proposal somehow found itself back on the drawing board. Not for the first time had the machinations of power-sharing confounded those who come here to make sense of it all. All sides seem to have retreated to positions that are not far beyond the postures they struck shortly after the results of the 7 March poll, which gave Allawi a narrow 91 to 89 seat victory, but in need of a coalition to help him form a government in the 325-seat parliament.

After much post-poll jousting, the ballot was deemed to have been fair and transparent. Little since then has met the same standards. The intractable stalemate seems to point to far more than the stubborn wills of the two opponents. Neighbouring Iran is as much to blame; it wants to entrench Shia majority rule in the heartland of Arabia, and of Saudi Arabia, which remains horrified by such a prospect.

All of this, while Obama, his departed ambassador and a number of US generals continue to insist that their job in the land that the US has occupied for seven years is nearly done. There are many in Iraq who are far from convinced; the Sons of Iraq leadership, the chief of the Iraqi military and even Saddam Hussein's most loyal deputy, Tariq Aziz, who said Obama would leave Iraq to the wolves if he continued the pull-out.

In truth, the much-vaunted 31 August combat withdrawal deadline is largely about symbolism and emotional detachment from a war that Obama reluctantly inherited.
Coppied by http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/aug/15/christopher-hill-iraq-obama