GOP Wants More Time For Gitmo

By Celia Canon- Talk Radio News Service

It was a day of confrontation for Senate Republicans today as more members of the GOP decided not to back President Obama on his decision to close the Guantanamo Bay detention facility.

Sen. Sam Brownback (R-Kan.) and Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) recently returned from a visit to the Cuba-based facility.

Both agreed that the detention center is the best solution for the allocation of the Guantanamo prisoners, at least for the moment.

“It is a remarkable facility, it really seems to be the perfect facility for these detainees,” Barrasso said. “The facility that they have there is remarkably equipped, it is safe, it is secure, there has been no escape from that area and the treatment these detainees are receiving was surprising to me because it is so good.”

In terms of Human Rights, Barrasso argued that the medical treatment in the prison is “Health care at the level that you’d want for the people of this country.”

Calling to all Republicans, Brownback said “ I think it’s important for us to send a signal and hopeful that we get an affirmative vote in the Senate not to have detainees to the U.S. and I think we should have that vote and do it on the supplemental this week.”

Additionally, Barrasso warned that “I would challenge the President to go to Guantanamo Bay. Look at this facility before you make your final decisions and determinations, I think you should take a look at this
facility.”

“When you say I want to close it if you choose to still do that, I recommend that you have a specific plan before coming to the senate and this specific plan should say what you want to do with the detainees, but it shouldn't be bring them to the U.S.,"said Barrosso in his message to President Obama.

Congress Protects Pork

Coffee Brown, MD, University of New Mexico, Talk Radio News

Please don’t call it “swine flu” anymore.

That was the main message at the Senate Appropriations Committee Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration and Related Agencies Subcommittee hearing on the 2009 H1N1 virus.

Witnesses, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and Dr. Joshua Sharfstein, acting Commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, answered
questions from Sens. Herb Kohl (D-Wis.), Sam Brownback (R-Kan.), Robert Bennett (R-Utah) and Mark Pryor (D-Ariz.) about the commercially regrettable naming of the 2009 H1N1 virus and about vaccines.


Vilsack said the USDA has been aggressively campaigning with trading partners to protect pork’s image as a safe food, but China and Russia
have suspended purchases of American pork. Prices have fallen about 20 percent, he said, versus about 45 percent during the 1976 swine flu
scare.

Brownback asked whether there should be more surveillance of animals, since several recent infections have been zoonotic, or transmitted from
animals to humans. Vilsack said that such surveillance is ongoing but that funding has been flat. He stressed that while the last round of bird flu was from birds to humans, this flu has so far only gone from humans to animals. “We should really be calling this the human flu,” he said.

Kohl wanted to know if vaccines would be ready for a possible reoccurrence of the current atypical flu in the fall, and mentioned previous estimates at similar hearings of four to six months to prepare such a vaccine. Sharfstein responded by emphasizing the uncertainties: time to develop the vaccine, time to test it, and the final decision whether full production was merited. He said that full production would not significantly reduce production of the usual seasonal vaccine, as that version will have almost finished the year’s order by the time a decision has to be made.

Kohl asked Sharfstein whether this strain would prove to be dangerous, and Sharfstein replied that it doesn’t look bad now, but viruses mutate, so he couldn’t make predictions about future behavior.

Unemployment high in March, Officials say

By Michael Ruhl, University of New Mexico – Talk Radio News Service

A day after President Barack Obama's budget was passed by a Congress boiling with partisanship, the Bureau of Labor Statistics released a report showing unemployment at its highest since 1983. There are now 13.2 million Americans out of work.

The pouring rain in Washington mirrored the sobered mood in the room, as the Joint Economic Committee heard the testimony of Keith Hall, the Commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

March was one of the worst Months on record for unemployment, and when asked outright, Hall told the committee that there were no "bright spots" in the report.

National unemployment climbed to 8.5 percent in March, rising from the level of 8.1 percent in February and 7.6 percent in January.

Hall said that two-thirds of the job loss has happened in the past 5 months. Every state is in recession for the first time in 30 years, according to Carolyn Maloney (D-NY).

Official unemployment numbers do not encompass underemployed Americans or those who have officially left the workforce. It is reported that 16 percent of the country is out of work or underemployed. One in four of those unemployed have been out of work for more than six months, and of those, half have been looking for work for over a year, Hall said.

Maloney highlighted that last month, 8,000 jobs were lost in the news publishing industry. Those losses total 70,000 job cuts since Dec. 2007, Hall said, adding that most job losses have been see in the manufacturing, construction, and temporary services industries. The only area to see any growth in March was the Healthcare industry, Hall said.

Ranking Committee member Senator Sam Brownback (R-KA) noted that the impact of the ongoing recession was not severe for almost a year after it began in December 2007. Brownback attributed recent dramatic jumps in job losses over the past five months to the lockup in the credit markets and the government bailouts that followed.

The Federal Reserve believes that unemployment will peak at 8.8 percent this year, but Ranking House Committee Member Kevin Brady (R-TX) said that the unemployment rate is already higher than what the administration anticipated for 2009. Brady said that the Obama Administration's "optimistic assumptions" would not get the country out of its current mess.

President Obama’s Economic Stimulus package was passed by Congress earlier this year, and saw an unprecedented amount of money placed into public works meant to put people back to work. Obama has pledged the legislation will save or create three to four million jobs over the next two years.

Read the report here: Bureau of Labor Statistics Report

Iraq ambassador/nominee dodges fire on the hill

By Michael Ruhl, University of New Mexico – Talk Radio News Service

The U.S. may be one step closer to sending a new ambassador to Iraq. The Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee convened on Wedneday to vet Ambassador Designate Christopher Hill. Committee Chairman John Kerry (D-Mass.) recognized the importance of getting a new ambassador to the region with expedience, but certain Senators have expressed concerns about Hill’s past.

Senator Sam Brownback (R-Kan.), who should be noted is not on the Committee, several weeks ago promised a fight in the Senate confirmation process because of actions that transpired while Hill was heading the six-party talks concerning North Korean nuclear disarmament. Brownback felt that Hill had misled Congress on his intentions to confront the issues of Human Rights with North Korea during the negotiations, since those issues ended up not being addressed.

Hill responded to Brownback’s concerns during the hearing today, and said that although he had agreed before Congress to address human rights, the process was stalled before the issue could be discussed. Human rights would have been on the table during the restoration of diplomatic ties with North Korea, Hill said, but that phase would have come only after the verification of North Korea's nuclear assets, and that verification never took place. Hill had planned on supporting initiatives from then-Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to put together a human rights program to tie progress in human rights reform to better diplomatic ties. Hill said today that America’s relationship with North Korea would not be normalized until North Korea completely did away with its nuclear stockpiles, and Hill could not fulfill his promise to Congress until the stockpiles had been eliminated.

It’s uncertain when the Senate confirmation vote will take place. There has been talk concerning delaying the vote until after the upcoming Congressional recess.

Breaking America’s addiction to oil

A news conference was held introducing the Open Fuel Standard Act, which would require that starting in 2012, fifty percent of new automobiles, and starting in 2015, eighty percent of new automobiles, be flex fuel vehicles made to operate on gasoline, ethanol, and methanol. Sen. Sam Brownback (R-Kan.) began by saying that the U.S. urgently needs to lessen its dependence on foreign oil. Brownback said that the solution is an easy one which would require no need for new inventions, but simply a switch to flex fuel vehicles. He explained that this enhancement comes at a reasonable price and would only add $100 per vehicle during creation. Brownback said that this is the “way to do it” -- the way to start ending America’s addiction to oil.

Brownback explained that if more flex fuel vehicles were put out on the market, distribution would increase. He explained that the price of methanol is forty percent less than the current price of gasoline. Brownback also said that by giving Americans a choice between gasoline, methanol, and ethanol, the nation’s dependence on oil would most definitely lessen.

Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Chairman Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) agreed with Brownback and said that mandating flex fuel vehicles is a very important step forward in breaking a long time dependence on foreign oil. Lieberman said that the U.S. spends $700 billion a year on foreign oil, a dependence that is weakening to the nation. He explained that the American public is angry and he hopes Congress is ready to take bold action.

Sen. Ken Salazar (D-Colo.) said that this act is not a Republican or Democratic agenda, but rather an American agenda. He called the act a “diamond in the rough” because it is a very possible solution to a great problem. Salazar said that mandating flex fuels would open the door for the “bio-fuel revolution.” He also said that he hopes, as the week unfolds, that Congress will be able to find “sweet spots” in the middle to unite the different parties and get bipartisan support.