U.S. News
During last year's presidential campaign, Republican candidate John McCain turned heads when he stated: "We have to strengthen our global alliances as the core of a new global compact — a League of Democracies — that can harness the vast influence of the more than one hundred democratic nations around the world to advance our values and defend our shared interests."
The New York Times calls the Edward M. Kennedy Serve America Act the "largest expansion of government-sponsored service programs since President John F. Kennedy first called for the creation of a national community service corps in 1963." As anything that's created under the Kennedy name, the bill involves ever-bigger government. It authorizes what President Obama ominously calls an "army of 250,000 Corps members" who will serve in paid positions of national service, more than triple the 75,000 now in AmeriCorps.
President Obama’s nominee to head the Office of Legal Counsel, Yale-educated Dawn Johnsen, was approved by the Senate Judiciary Committee on March 19, after a hearing that lacked true intensive questioning. She awaits a full Senate vote before leading the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel as the assistant attorney general.
Thanks to President Barack Obama, the family of Sgt. Brian McDonnell of the San Francisco Police Department may finally get justice. The Weather Underground, led by Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn, police believe, murdered McDonnell when they detonated a bomb at the city's Park Police station on February 16, 1970.
Taxing Our Health
Written by William P. Hoar
ITEM: The Financial Times (London) reported on March 5:
Barack Obama on Thursday pledged to "fulfil the promise of healthcare in our time" as he launched a fresh push to overhaul the US health system....
But he has refrained from setting out a detailed plan, vowing to work with Congress and interest groups to draw up legislation.... "The status quo is the only option not on the table," he said.
