By ALAN FRAM, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON – Senate Republicans learned early Thursday that they will be able to kill language in a measure altering President Barack Obama’s newly enacted health care overhaul, meaning the bill will have to return to the House for final congressional approval.

It appeared initially that deleting the provisions, dealing with Pell grants for low-income students, should not cause major problems for Democrats hoping to rush the bill to Obama and avoid prolonging what has been a politically painful ordeal for the party. Democrats described the situation as a minor glitch, but did not rule out that Republicans might be able to remove additional sections of the bill.

Mar 2, 6:21 AM (ET) By JIM KUHNHENN

WASHINGTON (AP) – More than a year after Lehman Brothers’ collapse set off a financial panic, Senate negotiators appear close to resolving a narrow dispute that was holding up broad legislation to set new rules for Wall Street.

At issue was whether a government consumer watchdog should be free from bank regulators to write rules that govern everything from credit card and overdraft fees to payday loans and mortgages.

After a flurry of offers and counter proposals over the past three days, the Senate Banking Committee was closing in on a deal that would house a government consumer entity inside the Federal Reserve but give it autonomous power to write regulations, three people familiar with the talks told the Associated Press Monday night.

By Joshua Rhett Miller December 04, 2009
Military impostors, beware: A Web site has been launched to root out fraudulent veterans and fakers in fatigues.

ReportStolenValor.org aims to expose people who fabricate or embellish military accomplishments by making it easier to report suspected Stolen Valor Act offenders to federal authorities and local media outlets.

AMVETS, an organization representing more than 250,000 veterans, unveiled the site Friday.

“As a veteran myself, it’s deeply offensive when someone claims to have served in uniform when they have not,” said Jay Agg, AMVET’s national communication director. “It’s just fundamentally wrong and an affront to all veterans.”

By Christopher Booker Published: 6:10PM GMT 28 Nov 2009

Our hopelessly compromised scientific establishment cannot be allowed to get away with the Climategate whitewash, says Christopher Booker.

A week after my colleague James Delingpole , on his Telegraph blog, coined the term “Climategate” to describe the scandal revealed by the leaked emails from the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit, Google was showing that the word now appears across the internet more than nine million times. But in all these acres of electronic coverage, one hugely relevant point about these thousands of documents has largely been missed.

David Lawder Fri Nov 27, 2009
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Treasury and Federal Reserve on Friday delayed the implementation date for a new Internet gambling payment ban for six months, a move that gives lawmakers time to overturn it or end confusion over illegal practices.

In a joint statement, the Treasury and Fed said the December 1 implementation date for the law passed in 2006 would not be achievable for some financial institutions. They set a new compliance deadline of June 1, 2010.

“Commentators expressed concern that the act and the final regulation do not provide a clear definition of ‘unlawful Internet gambling,’ which is central to compliance,” the two agencies said.

Release Date: November 20, 2009 Release Number: HQ-09-143

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Department of Homeland Security’s Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) today announced a final rule enabling host states that shelter residents evacuated from presidentially declared disaster areas to receive reimbursements from FEMA more quickly and efficiently.

‘Public Assistance Eligibility’ edocket.access.gpo.gov/2009/pdf/E9-27883.pdf takes effect December 21, 2009, and finalizes the 2006 interim rule that first introduced the current process for federal assistance to host-states. A significant improvement to this rule allows for host-states to be directly reimbursed by FEMA for the base salary costs for state and local employees providing assistance as part of the host-state sheltering grant from FEMA. Previously, host-states had to be reimbursed for these straight-time costs via a mutual aid process. This applies when a host-state receives direct reimbursement from FEMA through a grant, pursuant to FEMA policy.

Jun 29, 2:20 PM (ET) By MARK SHERMAN

WASHINGTON (AP) – The Supreme Court ruled Monday that white firefighters in New Haven, Conn., were unfairly denied promotions because of their race, reversing a decision that high court nominee Sonia Sotomayor endorsed as an appeals court judge.

The ruling could alter employment practices nationwide and make it harder to prove discrimination when there is no evidence it was intentional.

New Haven was wrong to scrap a promotion exam because no African-Americans and only two Hispanic firefighters were likely to be made lieutenants or captains based on the results, the court said Monday in a 5-4 decision. The city said that it had acted to avoid a lawsuit from minorities.

Jun 20, 6:52 AM (ET) By BEN FELLER

WASHINGTON (AP) – President Barack Obama is warning critics of his vast financial overhaul plan that he has no patience for debate from hard-line defenders of a system that has exploited bewildered consumers. Pushing for a law this year, Obama said: “While I’m not spoiling for a fight, I’m ready for one.”

Obama used his weekly radio and Internet address on Saturday to defend a proposal, unveiled last week, that would impose and enforce new rules for the nation’s embattled financial system. The goal is to prevent a repeat of the breakdown that has sent the U.S. economy reeling, but such a complex rewriting of the rules faces a fight in Congress and opposition from some leaders in the banking and insurance world who have found fault with some details.