The Genetic Reason Some Of Us Are Happier
September 28th, 2011
The Huffington Post
By: Michael Sigman
I once dated a woman who was happy. She slept well, ate when she was hungry and exercised when her body needed it. I had insomnia, ate gallons of chocolate chip ice cream and ran eight miles a day. She felt good when something good happened and bad when something bad happened. I felt anxious no matter what happened. She shared her dreams of verdant meadows and flowing rivers. After a time, I stopped sharing my naked/unprepared for the final exam reruns.
We both had plenty to be thankful for, and she experienced more real-world tragedy than I. I didn’t want her to be neurotic, but it seemed unfair that she got to be so much happier.
A new study by UCLA life scientists found that the oxytocin receptor gene (OXTR) is a strong predictor of optimism and self-esteem. Apparently, if you’re missing certain nucleotides at a specific location on that gene, you’re much more likely to see the glass as half full. If you have ‘em, the researchers say, you’re likely to have “substantially lower levels of optimism, self-esteem and mastery, and significantly higher levels of depressive symptoms” than your more fortunate brethren.
This survey has been hailed as a breakthrough, but its basic message — that humans are born with a tendency toward a “happiness quotient” — comes as no great surprise. Google the phrase “happy gene” and you’ll get various older citations pointing to the conclusion that about half of our sense of well-being is inherited. Other scientists claim that a different gene (5-HTTLPR) regulates the neurotransmitter serotonin, aka the “happy hormone.”
And then there’s the “happy hour gene,” which may explain why some of your friends can drink you under the table and still wake up on the right side of the bed the next morning.
Some reacted to the UCLA findings by connecting the news with the desire — presumably among the happy-gene deprived — to achieve better living through chemistry. One blogger led with, “Happy Gene Discovered by UCLA Researchers (And It’s Not Called Cocaine).” And there was a spirited Facebook thread which confused oxytocin with OxyContin, a powerful narcotic that makes people so happy that if it weren’t also highly addictive, we could just put it in the water supply and forget the whole discussion.
I’m convinced, of course, that I possess the glass-half-empty gene — a certainty that may be evidence I’m right. But the survey results also brought a sense of relief that my default state of mind isn’t some kind of weakness.
In fact, scientists behind the UCLA survey emphasize that the effects of the happy gene are far from determinative. If you have the gene for green eyes, you will have green eyes. But the happiness gene appears to be more malleable. Myriad factors — a mother’s nurturing, good sex, close friendships, therapy, exercise and meditation practice — can improve your oxytocin levels and facilitate optimism and self-esteem.
I mentioned this to a Type-A friend whose basic feeling-state is a cocktail of dread mixed with self-laceration. He was too busy multi-tasking to give a considered reply, but managed to blurt, “No time for sex, meditation or exercise! Perhaps I can do all three at once.”
It does no good to fret about our genes. Besides, happiness is in the eye of the beholder. As one of my favorite Genes — Pitney — observes in song, “To you it may seem like misery but, for me, this is happy.” Self-pity may be counterproductive, but I would have been unhappy growing up in a town without Pitney.
After reading about the UCLA study, I resolved to find out more about how the other half lives. So I visited the Facebook page, Happy Gene. This did not make me happier because I ran head-on into the message, “Happy only shares some information with everyone. If you know Happy, add her as a friend or send her a message.”
If you’re lucky enough to have the happiness gene, no need to ruminate about the whys and wherefores. You’re probably not reading this anyhow. You’re having too good a time white-water rafting, marveling at a sunrise or just basking in the wonderfulness of your own company.
Click here for the full report from The Huffington Post
Vitamin C Provides Beautiful Skin, Enhanced Immunity And Cancer Prevention
September 28th, 2011
Natural News
By: Danna Norek
Vitamin C is one of the most well known, cost effective and universally beneficial antioxidants that we know of today. This vitamin topically and internally encourages beautiful skin, helps boost the immune system, and aids in the prevention of several types of cancer.
Vitamin C and skin health
Vitamin C is a key component of collagen and elastin synthesis in our bodies. Collagen and elastin are proteins that make up our skin, muscles and other connective tissue.
Collagen essentially creates a “foundation” for our skin. When it begins to deteriorate with age, we start to see the sagging and wrinkles that are customary signs of aging.
Collagen and elastin are the two main reasons our skin remains smooth and resilient in our youth. Elasticity provides the ability to “bounce back” after repeated movements. Years of facial expressions, exposure to excessive UV light and other damaging dietary or environmental factors really start to show when this elasticity is compromised.
Boosting vitamin C intake can help you regain some of the lost collagen and elastin by encouraging the body to produce more. Since vitamin C is also a very important antioxidant, it helps the body to eliminate the free radicals, which compromise healthy skin cells.
In addition to its internal benefits vitamin C is also useful in external applications. It helps reduce age spots and darker pigmentation from sun exposure. It also helps to provide better skin tone and color.
This is due to its mild exfoliating capabilities, which help rid the skin of dead skin cells to reveal a fresher layer of healthy skin cells. It also helps reduce the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles.
Vitamin C and immunity
Aside from its skin health benefits vitamin C also enhances immune function. It has been shown to stimulate the production and enhance the function of white blood cells.
White blood cells are essentially our front line defense against infection and they protect us from bacterial and viral invaders. Vitamin C has also demonstrated protective qualities over white blood cells which may lengthen their life span.
Vitamin C and cancer prevention
Numerous studies have linked higher vitamin C intake to a lower occurrence of several types of cancer. In mice, these studies have shown that the vitamin can inhibit or slow the growth of cancerous tumors. These include cancer of the lung, stomach, mouth, throat, and breast.
These studies primarily point to a benefit in eating fresh fruits and vegetables that are rich in numerous vitamins and minerals as well as vitamin C. Eating the whole food offers the greatest benefit since the vitamins and minerals complement one another and enhance overall absorption.
It is important that we replenish this vitamin every day. This vitamin is flushed out of the system daily by our natural bodily functions. Since the human body is not capable of synthesizing this vitamin on its own, it is replenished solely through diet and supplementation.
Preferably it is received via the diet as this is the most complete way to get your daily dose. Some great ways to include this in your diet include adding freshly squeezed lemon juice to your water, consuming citrus fruits and eating a variety of raw or minimally cooked fruits and vegetables.
However, you may also take a supplement. Since vitamin C is water soluble, it does not build to toxic levels in the body. Vitamin C also has the unique capability to “recycle” other antioxidants like vitamin e. This adds even more value to daily supplementation.
Click here for the full report from Natural News
Decade After Anthrax Attacks, Worry Over Stockpile
September 27, 2011
Yahoo news
By: Lauran Needgaard
Anthrax vaccine — check. Antibiotics — check. A botulism treatment — check. Smallpox vaccine — check.
Ten years after the anthrax attacks brought home the reality of bioterrorism, the nation has a stockpile of some basic tools to fight back against a few of the threats that worry defense experts the most.
These defenses are not just gathering dust awaiting the next attack. In August, a Minneapolis hospital dipped into the stockpile to treat a critically ill patient — a tourist who, somewhere on his Midwest vacation, had the extraordinary bad luck to breathe anthrax spores that naturally linger in the dirt in parts of the country. The man, who survived, received a kind of medication not available in October 2001 when anthrax spores sent through the mail killed five people and sickened 17.
But there’s wide concern that the nation’s arsenal hasn’t grown fast enough. A decade later, there are no treatments for a number of bugs on the worry list, and little to offer for other threats like a radiation emergency. Even a long-promised next-generation anthrax vaccine, that would be easier to produce, hasn’t arrived yet. Nor is there information on how to treat children.
“Where are the countermeasures?” advisers to the Department of Health and Human Services asked in a critical report last year.
There are some: There’s enough smallpox vaccine for everyone, plus some of a specially formulated version safe for cancer patients and others with weak immune systems. There’s an improved version of the decades-old anthrax vaccine used in 2001. There are a few treatments for the toxins produced by anthrax and botulism, and a smallpox treatment is due soon.
But federal health officials are working to jumpstart production of more countermeasures and they say that more than 80 candidates are in advanced development. Over the past year, the goal has evolved into a push for more multiuse therapies, products that work not just for biodefense but for everyday health problems, too.
That’s a major shift that should entice more big drug companies to the field, says Dr. Robin Robinson, who heads the federal Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, or BARDA. It funds late-stage research of promising countermeasures.
Consider: BARDA just agreed to help pay for drug giant GlaxoSmithKline’s testing of a novel antibiotic that might fight bioterrorism germs like plague — as well as certain hospital-spread bacteria that cause such problems as pneumonia in the already seriously ill.
So-called broad-spectrum antibiotics that can kill more than one kind of bacteria aren’t unusual — this one just targets some hard-to-treat types in a new way.
The next step: Scientists are beginning to create the first broad-spectrum antivirals, medicines that would treat more than one kind of virus. Rather than having an anti-flu drug and a separate anti-AIDS drug, the goal is to have a single injection that could treat those viruses plus the gruesome Ebola virus and a few more for good measure.
It’s early work, still years away, cautions Dr. Michael Kurilla, biodefense research chief at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. But one of the antivirals is a direct result of biodefense research to understand how viruses infect — specifically, the Nipah virus that was the model for the even-scarier fictional bug in the new movie “Contagion.”
And these multipurpose antivirals are a huge goal because if they pan out, the next time a brand-new virus emerges — like the respiratory SARS bug in 2003 — treatments might not have to be started from scratch.
“We feel very excited and confident that what we’re working on … can change the whole paradigm of how we approach infectious diseases,” Kurilla says.
The U.S. has invested $67 billion in biosecurity since 2001, according to research by the Center for Biosecurity at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center.
Most of that wasn’t solely for biodefense but went to broader health programs that are as crucial for dealing with natural crises — like the 2009 swine flu global epidemic — as for dealing with manmade ones, says center director Dr. Thomas Inglesby. These include scientific research, beefing up struggling public health departments to better detect and treat emerging outbreaks, and training hospitals in disaster preparedness.
Inglesby worries that the economic crisis imperils those gains — public health funding already has been cut — and will further slow the countermeasure hunt. A program named BioShield that buys countermeasures for the stockpile expires in 2013 unless Congress reauthorizes it. It’s time, he says, for the government to spell out its countermeasure priorities and how to reach them.
Meanwhile, what if another anthrax attack happened? No more scrambling to buy antibiotics: 60 million 60-day treatment courses are stockpiled, Robinson says, and the plan is for the U.S. Postal Service to deliver some of those first doses to people’s homes.
Sometimes antibiotics aren’t enough. In a severe infection, the germs can produce dangerous toxins that spread in the bloodstream. So also in the stockpile are two experimental toxin-clearing treatments, to be used if the immune system alone can’t battle the toxin.
In August, Minnesota’s sick tourist became the 19th person in the world ever treated with one of them — immune globulin culled from the blood of anthrax-vaccinated soldiers, says Dr. Mark Sprenkle of Hennepin County Medical Center. It’s hard to know how much the drug contributed to the man’s recovery, Sprenkle says, but his patient’s toxin levels did drop more quickly after he began using it.
Click here for the full report from Yahoo News
Obama Takes Shots At Perry, GOP Debates
September 27, 2011 by Danny
Filed under Government
September 27, 2011
Associated Press
By: Erica Werner
President Barack Obama is swiping at Texas Gov. Rick Perry, criticizing him as “a governor whose state is on fire, denying climate change.”
Obama also poked at the audience reactions at recent GOP presidential debates, singling out those who cheered at the prospect of someone dying because he didn’t have health insurance – and those who booed a gay service member.
The president said “that’s not reflective of who we are.”
He made the comments Sunday at a fundraiser at the Silicon Valley home of John Thompson, chairman of Symantec Corp.
Click here for the full report from Associated Press
Efforts At Euro Zone Solution Bolster Wall St
September 37, 2011
Reuters
By: Chuck Mikolajczak
Stocks extended their rally on Tuesday, sparked by euro zone officials’ efforts to solidify the region’s rescue fund in an attempt to alleviate the debt crisis.
Major indexes rose for a third straight session, with the S&P 500 up more than 5 percent over the period, its largest three-day percentage gain since mid-August.
European officials considered various approaches to maximize the bailout fund and to recapitalize banks.
“Nothing has drastically changed. We get conversations around how we can get out of this mess — and those are good. We need those,” said Michael Sansoterra, portfolio manager of the RidgeWorth Large Cap Growth Fund in Atlanta, Georgia.
“But we’ve yet to see any concrete action. Actions speak louder than words, so we’ll flail about until we get some action.”
Stocks also got a boost as investors rebalanced their portfolios in the last days of the quarter. The wide gap in performance between equities and bonds, favoring government debt so far this quarter, may partly reverse.
Market volatility could remain as traders react to headlines and attempt to gauge the commitment of governments and institutions as they work to prevent a Greek default.
The Dow Jones industrial average gained 257.70 points, or 2.33 percent, to 11,301.56. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index climbed 26.38 points, or 2.27 percent, to 1,189.33. The Nasdaq Composite Index advanced 53.49 points, or 2.13 percent, to 2,570.18.
The S&P materials sector was up 3.2 percent and energy stocks added 2.9 percent as commodity prices rallied on hopes Europe would avoid a recession. Mining and energy shares were the top performers among large-cap stocks.
Copper prices jumped more than 5 percent, helped by a drop in the dollar index, while U.S. crude futures jumped 4.3 percent.
Apple Inc, which is expected to unveil its new iPhone next week, edged up 0.6 percent to $405.52.
In the latest economic data, U.S. consumer confidence was little changed in September and a gauge of labor market conditions deteriorated to its worst since 1983.
The S&P/Case-Shiller survey found U.S. single-family home prices were unchanged in July on a seasonally adjusted basis but the housing market showed little sign of stabilizing.
Click here for the full report from Reuters
Many In US Get Too Much Medical Care: Survey
September 27, 2011
Yahoo News
Forty-two percent of US doctors believe that their patients are getting too much medical care, according to a survey published Monday which suggests fears of malpractice suits may be to blame.
A total of 28 percent said they felt they were treating their patients too aggressively, while 45 percent said one of every 10 patients they saw daily had issues that could have been dealt with by phone, by email or by a nurse.
Fifty-two percent said they felt their patients were receiving just the right amount of care and six percent said their patients were receiving too little, said the study in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
“Our findings show that many primary care physicians believe there is substantial unnecessary care that could be reduced, particularly by increasing time with patients, reforming the malpractice system, and reducing financial incentives to do more,” it said.
The United States has the world’s highest health spending per capita among developed nations, at $5,475 compared to the next-highest country, Switzerland at $3,581, according to a separate US study published in 2007 in the journal Health Affairs.
Health care in the United States is a hot political issue, and President Barack Obama’s moves to reform the system and extend insurance coverage to an extra 32 million people has faced opposition from Republicans and sparked court challenges.
Seventy-six percent of survey respondents said that concerns about possible malpractice suits were the main reason why they gave patients more aggressive treatment.
“Physicians believe they are paid to do more and exposed to legal punishment if they do less,” said the article.
“The extent to which fear of malpractice leads to more aggressive practice (so-called defensive medicine) has been hotly debated; based on our findings, we believe it is not a small effect.”
Forty percent said they did not have enough time to spend with patients.
While only three percent said their own style of practice was influenced by financial considerations, 39 percent “believed that other primary care physicians would order fewer diagnostic tests if such tests did not generate extra revenue,” said the study.
“Almost two-thirds (62 percent) said that medical subspecialists would cut back on testing in the absence of a financial incentive.”
The results are based on a mail survey that was filled out by 627 doctors in the United States.
Seventy percent of the doctors included in the initial mailing replied, which the authors called “exceptional for a survey of American physicians.”
The study was led by Brenda Sirovich and colleagues from the VA Outcomes Group in Vermont and the Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice in New Hampshire.
Click here for the full report from Yahoo News
Coffee Cuts Depression Risk In Women
September 27th, 2011
The Huffington Post
By: Catherine Pearson
Coffee may provide more than a momentary pick-me-up, says new research suggesting daily java consumption is tied to a lower risk of depression in women.
Researchers from Harvard University found that women who consumed two to three cups of caffeinated joe per day had a 15 percent lower risk of depression than non-coffee drinkers, while those who drank four-plus cups daily had a 20 percent lower risk. In general, women are more likely than men to be diagnosed with depression.
“Our results support a possible protective effect of caffeine, mainly from coffee consumption, on risk of depression,” the researchers wrote Monday in the Archives of Internal Medicine. The researchers followed more than 50,000 participants in the Nurses Health Study — one of the largest women’s health studies in the U.S — for 10 years.
But the study’s authors cautioned that their results must be replicated before it’s possible to draw any firm conclusions about caffeine and depression risk — particularly in terms of any causal mechanisms that might be at play.
“Caffeine is known to affect the brain,” study co-author Dr. Albert Ascherio, a professor of epidemiology and nutrition at the Harvard School of Public Health, offered as one possible explanation. “It modulates the release of mood transmitters.” He pointed out that previous studies have shown a link between coffee and decreased suicide risk, though as the National Institute of Health points out, caffeine may cause or worsen anxiety issues.
Dr. John Greden, executive director of the University of Michigan’s Comprehensive Depression Center, agreed that the Harvard study — as well as others that have come before it — suggest interesting possibilities in terms of a link.
“Clinical depression is found in one out of every six people, roughly, and caffeine is one of the most widely used stimulants in the world,” he said. “If you put those two together, it has always been a logical question to ask, ‘Is there a connection?’”
But Greden cautioned that the current study has its limitations, too, particularly in terms of the participant pool.
“The women they studied had an average age of above 60, and most depressions start young,” he said. “So in a strange way, this is probably a very protected group, given the fact that none had depression at the start of the study.”
The results of the new study center on the potential impact of caffeine from coffee — not caffeine in general — namely because among the participants, the amount of caffeine consumed from other sources was too small for any stable results.
Ascherio said this should be just one of many additional considerations in future research that looks at possible caffeine and depression links.
In the meantime, he said the study should not prompt non-coffee drinkers to take up the habit. It could, however, offer current coffee drinkers some reassurance.
“I’m not saying we’re on the path to discovering a new way to prevent depression,” he said. “But I think you can be reassured that if you are drinking coffee, it is coming out as a positive thing.”
Click here for the full report from The Huffington Post
Consumers Face Rising Bank Fees, Fewer Perks
September 27th, 2011
DailyFinance
By: Dawn Kawamoto
Consumers’ wallets are really getting the squeeze. Free checking is becoming even rarer, and fees for banking services and penalties for bounced checks are on the rise, according to Bankrate’s checking study released today.
Free checking free fall
According to the survey, this year, only 45% of non-interest checking accounts offered were free, down substantially from the 65% offered last year and 76% two years ago. And the hurdles to qualify for fee waivers have gotten substantially higher.
For non-interest accounts, the average monthly fee jumped a staggering 75.5% this year to $4.37 over last year. One way to avoid the fee is to maintain a minimum balance in your account, but that minimum has jumped to $585 — more than double from a year ago.
On accounts that pay interest, the average monthly fee rose 8.5% to $14.15. The requirement to avoid paying such fees is to hold a substantially higher balance of $5,587, up 44% from the previous year.
There are an increasing number of fee waivers, like signing up for direct deposit, Greg McBride, Bankrate’s senior financial analyst, said in a statement. He added that 92% of non-interest accounts can become free or are free when factoring in these waivers.
ATM extortion
If paying a fee to park your cash in the bank isn’t painful enough, consider what consumers are paying to get to their money. Fees for using an ATM operated by a bank other than your own are continuing to rise to record levels.
ATM fees hit a new high for the seventh consecutive year, reaching an average fee of $2.40 per transaction for non-customers of a bank’s ATM, according to the survey. That average fee is 3% higher than last year.
When adding in the typical fee customers’ banks charge them when using another bank’s ATM, the total bill is an average $3.81 per transaction for an out-of-network ATM, Bankrate says.
“The ATM surcharge is almost universal, and it’s been that way for years,” McBride said. “The fee increasing every year is a function of somebody planting a flag every year and moving their fee up to that next threshold.”
Consumers, however, can lessen the sting by placing an ATM-locator app on their smartphone or mobile device to point them to their own bank’s money machine to avoid the out-of-network fees, or consider using their debit card to get cash back when making a purchase at a grocery store for a much smaller transaction fee, McBride noted.
Overdraft ouches
ATM fees aren’t the only thing on the rise. Consumers with bounced checks or trying to access more funds than they have in their checking accounts with debit cards are also encountering higher overdraft or nonsufficient funds charges.
Overdraft fees reached a record for the 13th consecutive year this year, climbing 1% to $30.83. But if it’s any consolation, the rate of the increase is slowing and still less than the Consumer Price Index that climbed 3.6% in the year prior to the study, McBride says.
Consumers also have an easier time these days avoiding such fees, because banks are now required to ask customers to opt into an overdraft protection program for their ATM and debit cards, rather than automatically signing them up.
If customers have insufficient funds and are not enrolled in an overdraft protection program, they’ll be turned away at the cash register when trying to make a purchase, rather than being allowed to go forward with the transaction and later receive an overdraft protection fee hit.
McBride suggests that if you’re not comfortable with the possibility of being declined at the register, many banks allow you to link your checking account to a savings account or line of credit, and they charge a lesser fee to draw money from those sources to cover a shortfall.
Bounced checks, however, are a different matter, and consumers will still have to pay lofty overdraft fees.
Click here for the full report from DailyFinance
Senate Leaders Announce Bipartisan Agreement To Avert Government Shutdown
September 27, 2011 by Safa
Filed under Government
September 27th, 2011
The Washington Post
By: Paul Kane and Rosalind S. Helderman
Senate leaders agreed to a deal Monday evening that is almost certain to avert a federal government shutdown, a prospect that had unexpectedly arisen when congressional leaders deadlocked over disaster relief funding.
After days of brinkmanship reminiscent of the budget battles that have consumed Washington this year, key senators clinched a compromise that would provide less money for disaster relief than Democrats sought but would also strip away spending cuts that Republicans demanded. The pact, which the Senate approved 79 to 12 and the House is expected to ratify next week, is expected to keep federal agencies open until Nov. 18.
“It will be a win for everyone,” said Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.).
Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) called the plan “a reasonable way to keep the government operational.”
Aides to House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) said he will support the compromise.
The spending battle marked the third time this year that congressional acrimony has brought the government to the edge of calamity. In April, Boehner and President Obama reached a deal on funding for 2011 about 90 minutes before a government shutdown was to begin. On Aug. 2, just hours before the deadline, Congress gave final approval to legislation lifting the government’s borrowing authority, averting a partial shutdown and the potential for a default on the federal debt.
Although this week’s fight ended with days, rather than hours, to spare, it drained many in Congress, who thought it was a senseless fight. Reid summed up the feeling of many lawmakers when he quoted Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.), who said there was too little money in dispute to raise the specter of a shutdown and to halt payments to those affected by natural disasters.
“Let’s fight when there’s something to fight about,” Reid quoted Isakson as saying during a speech on the Senate floor.
At issue was a dispute over how to fund disaster relief, a concern that was heightened in late August after an earthquake struck central Virginia and Hurricane Irene caused flooding in the Northeast.
Although Democrats said the Federal Emergency Management Agency needed more funding, they agreed to accept a Republican plan to spend $3.65 billion in disaster relief money, $1 billion of which would have gone toward the budget for the current fiscal year, which will end Friday. Republicans, concerned about adding to the budget deficit, refused to support the funding without $1.6 billion in accompanying cuts. Their largest target was an auto loan program popular with Democrats, leading to the standoff.
The showdown between the two sides was averted on Monday, when FEMA said it could make ends meet through the end of the week. That led to an agreement that calls for the agency and other government disaster relief programs to forgo the $1 billion in proposed funding for this week. Beginning Saturday and running to Nov. 18, FEMA can begin to tap the remaining $2.65 billion for ongoing efforts.
With the House out of session this week, the Senate approved a resolution that will keep the government open through next Tuesday. The House is expected to approve that extension in a voice vote Thursday, which does not require all members to be present, and then approve the longer-term bill next Tuesday.
Some lawmakers from hard-hit states are unhappy with the compromise, saying that it would result in a slight delay in processing aid to victims, and that the overall total of FEMA funding wouldn’t be enough to account for the damage caused by the disasters.
“They would delay the process by punting back to the House,” said Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.). The deal “also stripped $1 billion in disaster relief and provides less emergency funding for Missourians in the wake of record flooding and tornadoes,” he added.
The debate over the budget bill turned on sharp — and familiar — political lines that scuttled earlier talk that the two parties were going to tone down their attacks.
Republicans, particularly House conservatives, said they were unwilling to add to the federal deficit, even for disaster funding, and accused Democrats of overspending. Democrats used the debate to portray Republicans as “holding hostage” relief checks for those struck by tornadoes, flooding, forest fires and droughts, focusing much of their criticism on House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R), who represents Mineral, Va., the epicenter of the earthquake.
Although the agreement lifts the imminent specter of a government shutdown, it will not resolve the fight over how much FEMA needs to help disaster victims and whether that money must be offset with spending cuts.
The White House has said FEMA will need $4.6 billion for the next fiscal year — a figure many Democrats say underestimates the agency’s needs.
Democrats will push to fully fund FEMA’s request and perhaps broaden it during negotiations over spending for the rest of the year, but they were split Monday over what the compromise would mean for future funding battles.
“This is a very big and important move. It says we met each other halfway. We saved the jobs,” said Sen. Barbara Boxer (Calif.), referring to the the auto loan program. “We figured out a way to fund FEMA that was acceptable to them. It’s a template. We have to figure out how to meet each other halfway here.”
Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (Vt.), whose state was hit hard by flooding from Hurricane Irene, said the deal would solve the disaster issue — but only temporarily.
“I’m concerned about the fact that we give blank checks to Iraq and [Afghanistan] and we don’t want to take care of America for Americans,” he said. “It’s wrong, it’s foolish and it will come back to haunt us.”
Click here for the full report from The Washington Post
The Super Lie Behind The Super Congress
September 27, 2011 by Safa
Filed under Government
September 27th, 2011
The Huffington Post
By: Ryan Grim
The 12-member super committee created to slash the federal deficit is powered by the threat that if it doesn’t come up with $1.2 trillion in savings, automatic, across-the-board cuts will be instituted to reach that same goal, with half of those cuts hitting the Pentagon.
Don’t believe it.
The supposed across-the-board cuts aren’t slated to go into effect until January 1, 2013. Put more simply: They might not ever go into effect.
The automatic cuts — known as sequestration — are often discussed in Washington as if they’re certain, an inevitability that Congress won’t be able to prevent. But on the same day those cuts would go into effect, the Bush tax rates, which President Obama extended for two years, are set to expire, leading to an “automatic” tax hike that is treated in Washington as anything but inevitable. (That the two coming policy changes are approached so differently — cuts are expected; expiring tax breaks for the wealthy are brushed aside — is a window into Washington’s priorities.)
A host of other tax cuts and credits will expire on the same day, including the alternative minimum tax, ethanol tax credits, renewable energy credits and others important to businesses, the wealthy and the middle class.
A lame duck Congress would have two months after the 2012 election to stave off the expiration of both that tax policy and the super committee’s “automatic” cuts.
The most likely scenario: The super committee locks up along partisan lines and, after the 2012 election, bipartisan negotiators deal with the tax cuts and the super committee’s sequestration cuts, along with a basket of other expiring provisions, in one set of negotiations. Democrats will be pressured by the coming sequestration, while Republicans will be motivated by the expiration of the Bush tax cuts. And all of their negotiations will take place in a political and economic climate impossible to predict today.
“All of this at some point comes together,” said Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) of the Bush tax cuts and the sequestration. “One thing about this place, the paces just keep repeating themselves.”
While many have portrayed the super committee as having some sort of automatic axe, other observers haven’t bought the idea. Stan Collender, a Democratic budget expert and consultant to Wall Street and Washington lobbyists, saw through it quickly, writing a report for Qorvis Communications downplaying the likelihood of the automatic cuts.
“There is a high probability that the super committee won’t be able to agree on a deficit reduction deal and that the across-the-board spending cuts that are supposed to be triggered if that happens will NOT go into effect as scheduled in 2013,” he wrote. “Federal budget agreements have seldom, if ever, gone the distance. Instead, they have always been changed, waived, ignored or abandoned.”
Former Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.), who is running again for an Orlando seat, noted in a blog post Monday that the Constitution is not on the side of those pushing for automatic cuts.
“Under Article I, Section 7 of our Constitution, each Congress has the same right as another other Congress to legislate. This includes ‘raising Revenue’ and ‘Appropriation of Money,’” he wrote. “So our 112th Congress can ‘pass a Bill’ setting the federal deficit for this year and next year, but that’s about it. Anything that goes beyond the first week of January, 2013, when the 113th Congress will be sworn in, is subject to change by that Congress, and every subsequent Congress.”
Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.), chair of the Senate’s tax-writing committee and a member of the super committee, told HuffPost that the panel is looking at the Bush tax cuts as well as other expiring credits.
“The committee is sure talking of those provisions and there are others too, and we are talking about all of them,” he said.
Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), whose more than two decades in the Senate have made him witness to his share of negotiations, said that both the Bush taxs cuts and the sequestration cuts will be negotiated as one large piece during the lame duck session. “At that time, at that time,” Harkin said. “Not now. At that time.”
Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), who recently resigned from leadership so he can spend more time on bipartisan legislating and less on partisan messaging, agreed with HuffPost that the automatic cuts were not necessarily automatic.
“That’s a good point,” he said. “Congress can always pass a law if it chooses to do that, but the president can veto it, and 40 senators can stop it. So I think while it’s technically possible for that to happen, I think there’s the fact that 38 senators of both parties signed a letter encouraging the committee to think even bigger. It’s a very good sign that something is likely to happen here.”
Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), the Senate minority whip and a super committee member, also saw roping the tux cuts and sequestration together as an option.
“I don’t think sequestration will take place, for one thing,” he said, saying there are “lots of different options, possibilities. Who knows?”
Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.) said that the committee should think of the possibility of automatic cuts as motivation, but agreed that they’re heavily dependent on Congress.
“The automatic spending cuts take effect not based upon the joint committee; it’s based upon congressional action,” he said.
Dealing with the spending cuts and expiring tax cuts together will give Democrats a negotiating advantage, highlighting how tax policy has contributed to budget hole, Democrats said.
“Since those tax cuts and Bush deregulation and the two wars and the bailout to drug and insurance companies in ’03/’04 created almost all the deficit, clearly that should be part of the solution,” said Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio).
“Speaking for the Democrats, we want to see a comprehensive approach,” said Cardin. “We think the revenue issues need to be on the table. We have been pretty clear about what we think about the Bush-era tax rates for the higher income.”
There may also be political will to prevent the automatic cuts from going into effect, if only to save the Pentagon’s budget.
“I am very concerned about broad cuts across the board, particularly as it relates the Department of Defense,” Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.) told HuffPost.
And the cuts already agreed to earlier this year, as part of the bargain that created the super committee, may end up being just as fantastical.
“[T]he approximately $900 billion in spending reductions put in place by the Budget Control Act are far more likely to be projected rather than realized,” Collender wrote in his report. “Although the agreement put spending caps in place every year through fiscal 2021, only the $30 billion or so projected for fiscal 2102 — which will start in about a month on October 1 — should be considered likely to occur. The presumed spending reductions for fiscal 2013 and beyond will occur after the 2012 presidential and congressional elections and during the time frame when virtually all other federal budget agreements have fallen apart or changed. In all probability, that will happen in this case as well.”
Click here for the full report from The Huffington post
