Washington, D.C.
GOP snubbed on health-care bill?
Democratic leaders shape a plan to create sweeping legislation without Republicans
Removing a major obstacle to the sweeping health-care legislation sought by President Barack Obama, senior Democrats on Capitol Hill have agreed to deny Republicans the power to block action by filibustering in the Senate, according to Democratic congressional officials.
The maneuver — which Democrats hope to formally approve in a budget resolution next week — threatens to spark a revolt by GOP lawmakers and could complicate Democratic efforts to push through other high-priority proposals on their agenda.
But the president and his allies on Capitol Hill believe their decision to use so-called budget reconciliation will make possible the passage of the most ambitious overhaul of the nation’s health-care system in generations.
Obama reiterated that position Thursday night in a meeting with congressional leaders, according to officials in the White House and on Capitol Hill.
And Friday, Democratic lawmakers closed in on a final deal to push through a budget resolution that would allow them to pass health-care legislation with 51 votes in the Senate instead of the 60 votes normally required to avoid a filibuster.
With at least 58 Democrats in the Senate, that would all but guarantee that Democrats would not need a single GOP vote in the House or the Senate.
— Noam Levey, Tribune Newspapers
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CALIFORNIA
Marchers chide Obama for statement on Armenian deaths
Thousands march Friday in Hollywood to commemorate the deaths of more than 1 million Armenians during the last days of the Turkish Ottoman Empire, while chiding President Barack Obama for failing to use the word “genocide” in his statement on the killings. As a presidential candidate, Obama called on Turkey to acknowledge the genocide, a term many Turks find offensive. Obama recalled his past comments Friday but stressed support for talks between Armenian and Turkish officials.
Paraguay
President apologizes
President Fernando Lugo asked for forgiveness Friday for a paternity scandal in which three women claim the former Roman Catholic bishop fathered their children.
Reading to reporters from a written statement, Lugo acknowledged “personal errors” and portrayed himself as a “father who is prepared to share his love and care.”
But Lugo, who has acknowledged fathering a 2-year-old boy born to a former parishioner, did not recognize the two children involved in two other paternity claims.
“I am a human being, and therefore nothing is foreign to me,” Lugo said. “Asking forgiveness for these circumstances, I want to stress that my version will always be the truth.”
Washington, D.C.
Gore urges climate action
Former Vice President Al Gore, the leading American voice on climate change, urged lawmakers Friday to overcome partisan differences and take action to reduce greenhouse gases, but Democrats and Republicans sparred even more vigorously over the cost of dealing with global warming.
Gore, who won a Nobel Peace Prize for his work on climate change, told a congressional hearing that “the dire and growing threat” of a warmer Earth requires the parties to unite. He endorsed a House Democratic bill that would limit pollution linked to warming.
“It is a challenge that this Congress must rise to,” Gore said. “I wish I could find the words to get past the partisan divide that both sides have contributed to. … It shouldn’t be partisan. It should be something we do together in our national interest.”
PAKISTAN
Militants leave district
PESHAWAR — Taliban militants packed up their grenade launchers Friday and vacated a district they overran outside the country’s capital last week. The move did little, however, to quell the alarm of the U.S. and Western allies.
U.S. officials are concerned that Pakistan is unable or unwilling to forcefully deal with militants slowly expanding into the heart of the country from lawless areas close to the Afghan border.
The retreat from Buner, just 60 miles from the capital, Islamabad, came after talks between the militants and authorities, who had threatened to attack them and reconsider the peace agreement in the adjoining Swat Valley region that critics say has given Taliban and Al Qaeda-linked militants a haven.
Witnesses said scores of militants had effectively taken control of Buner.
Michigan
Mother charged in death
A 9-year-old quadriplegic girl whose body was found in a storage unit suffered from “severe, ongoing malnutrition and neglect” before her death, a prosecutor said Friday after charging her adoptive mother with murder.
Genesee County Prosecutor David Leyton charged Lorrie Thomas, 39, of Flint with six crimes, including second-degree murder, child abuse, tampering with evidence, removing a dead body and welfare fraud.
Shylea Myza Thomas weighed 33 pounds at her death — about half her weight in August 2007, Leyton said. The girl had untreated bedsores and bones sticking through skin, he said.
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