- US News & World Report, December 14th 2007 – Senate Passes Energy Bill Sans Tax Hike …
The Los Angeles Times reports the Senate “overwhelmingly passed a broad energy bill that would impose the most significant increase in vehicle fuel-economy standards I three decades and the White House said President Bush would sign it.” The bill pass on a vote of 86-8 after “Democratic leaders gave in to the president’s demand that they preserve oil-industry tax breaks and drop a requirement that utilities generate more electricity from cleaner sources.”
The AP says the Senate “passed a trimmed-back energy bill Thursday that would bring higher-gas mileage cars and SUVs into showrooms in the coming decade and fill their tanks with ethanol.” The Washington Post says the bill “represents a major setback for the automobile industry, which had fought a losing battle to blunt new fuel efficiency standards.”
The bill now will go to the House where it is expected they will vote on it in one week. Bush had promised a veto if the oil industry taxes were not removed.
- In California, according to the San Diego Union-Tribune [December 12th 2007] …
Vista City Council yesterday approved a plan to nearly double the size of the city’s redevelopment areas, including commercial corridors and the Townsite neighborhood. To expand the redevelopment areas, the land must be designated as blighted. … The proposed change would boost that to 37 percent. … A final plan could go before the council sometime in June. The city plans to hold public forums in January and May.
- The UK has similar problems with illegal immigrants as the BBC News reports [December 13th 2007]…
As many as 11,000 illegal immigrants may have been cleared for UK security jobs, the home secretary has told MPs. …
Last month it was thought only 5,000 people had been wrongly cleared. Jacqui Smith said that after checks, it appeared 6,553 people were not allowed to work in the UK, and 4,447 others had not yet proved their right to do so. …
She said licences given to many employers were not being revoked.
- There are those in America who think that President Bush and other nation’s leaders are pushing Iraq too far, but an Israeli official said that the United States is not doing enough, since it is Israel where the first nuclear strikes will take place Haaretz-Israel, December 13th 2007 …
A senior Israeli official has fiercely criticized U.S. President George Bush’s administration for the way it has dealt with the Iranian nuclear issue. The official said that the administration was not doing what was required of it to create an international coalition and wide agreement to pressure Iran over its nuclear program. Criticism from senior members of Israel’s political echelon with regard to U.S. policy on the matter is rare, The official mainly spoke out against Bush’s failure to enlist support from China, Russia and, to a certain extent, India, for increasing pressure on Iran and North Korea. According to the official, the Bush administration has insisted on stressing matters such as human rights in China and its policy on Taiwan, and as a result, has neglected to gain its support in the struggle against Iran.
- Here is a good reason why you should get a second opinion [FoxNews, December 13th 2007 …
A jury awarded $2.5 million in damages Wednesday to a woman who received HIV treatments for almost nine years before discovering she never actually had the virus that causes AIDS. In her lawsuit against a doctor who treated her, Audrey Serrano said the powerful combination of drugs she took triggered a string of ailments, including depression, chronic fatigue, loss of weight and appetite and inflammation of the intestine. Serrano, 45, said she cried after hearing the verdict in Worcester Superior Court and was gratified that the jury believed her … Serrano’s attorney, David Angueira, said Dr. Kwan Lai, who treated his client at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center in Worcester’s HIV clinic, repeatedly failed to order definitive tests even after monitoring of Serrano’s treatment did not show the presence of HIV in her blood.
And that’s the snippets of what in the news for December 14th, 2007.
