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My colleagues need to do health-care reform the right way and stop trying to ram through a proposal that is struggling to attract even 60 Democratic votes in the Senate. There is still an opportunity to pass legislation that would garner broader support. Providing affordable, meaningful insurance to all, supporting innovation and choice, and ensuring that our children and grandchildren will be able to afford the government they inherit are principles that we should all be able to rally around.

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When your own outfit is trying to put you in jail, it’s time to go.” Those are the words of Robert Baer, once a CIA operative in the Middle East, describing the days in 1995 when he found himself under investigation by the Clinton administration, the FBI, and the CIA’s own inspector general. Baer’s crime? Daring to talk to Iraqi dissidents who were plotting to assassinate Saddam Hussein.

If the administration’s top economists can’t agree on something as fundamental as knowing when a recession has ended, how can they possibly be certain that they know how to end it?

The 2012 Republican field is arguably as wide open as any in recent cycles. So it’s curious that Tim Pawlenty’s visit to New Hampshire tonight is among the first by any would-be candidate this year, even if it is more than two years until the first-in-the-nation primary.

PRINCETON, NJ — Americans remain opposed to closing the Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba and moving some of the terrorist suspects being held there to U.S. prisons: 30% favor such actions, while 64% do not. These attitudes could present a significant roadblock for President Obama at a time when he seeks congressional approval to move terrorist suspects from Guantanamo to a converted state prison in northwestern Illinois.

Sanders offered the amendment and asked to dispense with the reading of it, which is almost always agreed to by unanimous consent. But Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) objected – it takes only one senator – forcing the reading.

Sanders called it a “bit absurd” that Coburn was objecting. And Coburn insisted he wasn’t intentionally stalling the bill. “We’re going to understand what single payer is all about and read the bill,” he said.

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A new Rasmussen reports telephone survey in the state shows state Attorney General Bill McCollum, a Republican, ahead of Democrat Alex Sink 44% to 39%. In October, McCollum had a 46% to 35% lead.
Five percent (5%) like some other candidate, and 12% are undecided.

Sink, the state’s chief financial officer and the best-known of the Democrats who have announced for the race, is hoping to be Florida’s first woman governor. McCollum was a member of the U.S. Congress for 20 years before quitting to run unsuccessfully for the GOP Senate nomination in 2004. He faces little opposition so far for his party’s nomination.

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The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey in Florida finds former state House Speaker Marco Rubio leading Democrat Kendrick Meek 49% to 35%. Governor Charlie Crist leads Meek 42% to 36%.

Climate talks at Copenhagen have reached a standstill despite a warning from Gordon Brown that world leaders must not “duck” the challenge of reaching a deal.

The 26-year-old man, from Turin, parked his car in the underground car park of the Milan hospital where Mr Berlusconi has been recuperating since he was assaulted on Sunday.

At around 2am, he took the lift to the eighth-floor ward where the prime minister has been treated for a broken nose, two smashed teeth and cuts to his face.

Ngozi Pole, 39, was named today in a six-count felony indictment filed in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C.

This holiday season, you have several options of where to donate your money: Salvation Army, Toys for Tots, soup kitchens.
But have you considered the Miami Herald?

WASHINGTON (AP) - President Barack Obama has written a personal letter to North Korean leader Kim Jong Il as part of an intense effort to draw the reclusive nation back to nuclear disarmament talks, a senior State Department official said Tuesday.

CHICAGO - One of Rod Blagojevich’s attorneys said Wednesday it was possible the defense could call President Obama to take the witness stand if the corruption charges against the former governor go to trial, but added that it wasn’t clear that doing so would be necessary.

The Arab states of the Gulf region have agreed to launch a single currency modelled on the euro, hoping to blaze a trail towards a pan-Arab monetary union swelling to the ancient borders of the Ummayad Caliphate.

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