Christie Calls Boehner's Sandy Decision 'Disgusting'

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New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said today that it was "disgusting" that the House adjourned without voting on a $60 billion relief package for the victims of superstorm Sandy and put the blame squarely on a fellow Republican -- House Speaker John Boehner.


Christie, who is considered a possible Republican presidential candidate four years from now, said there was "only one group to blame, the Republican Party and Speaker Boehner."


The blunt talking New Jersey governor joined a chorus of Republicans from New York and New Jersey fuming over his decision to pull the bill at the last minute.


Christie in an angry news conference decried the "selfishness and duplicity," the "palace intrigue," "the callous indifference to the people of our state."


"Unfortunately people are putting politics ahead of their responsibilities... You do the right thing. Enough with all the politics," he said.


Christie said that when it comes to natural disasters, "We respond as Americans, at least we did until last night... it was disgusting to watch."


"In our hour of desperate need, we've been left waiting for help six times longer than the victims of Katrina with no end in sight," said Christie. "Sixty-six days and counting, shame on you. Shame on Congress."


The governor said his four calls to Boehner Tuesday night went unanswered, but he said he spoke to the House speaker today. Christie would not disclose any details of the conversation, but clearly his anger over the no-vote was not mollified.


Following Christie's press conference Republican representatives from New York and New Jersey announced that the speaker promised a vote on the bill on Jan. 15.


"Getting critical aid to the victims of Hurricane Sandy should be the first priority in the new Congress, and that was reaffirmed today with members of the New York and New Jersey delegations," Boehner said in a statement released late this afternoon.








Rep. Peter King Blasts Speaker Boehner on House Floor Watch Video









Boos as House Adjourns Without Hurricane Sandy Relief Watch Video









'Fiscal Cliff' Deal Passes House Despite GOP Holdouts Watch Video





Rep. Peter King, R-NY, whop spent much of the day criticizing Boehner, met with the speaker this afternoon and was confident that the speaker would keep his word and hold a vote later this month and offered for the first time a reason for why the bill was pulled.


"[Boehner] said there was much confusion and so much fighting going on over the fiscal cliff bill it would be damaging to the Republican caucus" to have voted on the relief bill Tuesday night.


Lawmakers were initially told by Boehner, R-Ohio, that the relief bill would get a vote on Tuesday night following an eleventh hour vote on the fiscal cliff bill. But in an unexpected switch, Boehner refused to put the relief bill to a vote, leading to lawmakers from parties yelling on the floor of the House.


Congress historically has responded to natural disasters by promptly funding relief efforts. It took just 11 days to pass a relief package for victims of Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The Senate already passed its version of the bill that would replenish an emergency fund set to run out of cash next week and which will help repair subways and tunnels in New York City and rebuild parts of the New Jersey shore devastated by superstorm Sandy.


Time is particularly pressing, given that a new Congress will be sworn in Thursday. The Senate will therefore have to vote on the bill again before it comes to the House, which could be as late as February or March.


"This was a betrayal," Rep. Michael Grimm, R-N.Y., told ABC News.com. "It's just reprehensible. It's an indefensible error in judgment not have given relief to these people that are so devastated."


Rep. King, took the floor of the House and to the airwaves and aimed his outrage squarely at Boehner, accusing him plunging "a cruel knife in the back" of storm-ravaged residents "who don't have shelter, don't have food," he said during a House session this morning.


"This is not the United States. This should not be the Republican Party. This shouldn't not be the Republican leadership," King said on the floor of the House.


He made no attempt to hide his anger, suggesting that residents in New York and New Jersey should stop sending money to Republicans and even questioning whether he could remain a member of the party.


"Anyone who donates one cent to the Republican Congressional Campaign Committee should have their head examined," King, a staunch conservative and Republican congressman for 10 years, told CNN.


"They have written off New York and New Jersey. They've written me off…. Party loyalty, I'm over that. When your people are literally freezing in the winter… Then why should I help the Republican Party?" he added.


He said that Boehner refused to talk to Republican members from New York and New Jersey when they tried to ask him about the vote Tuesday night.


"He just decided to sneak off in the dark of night," King said.






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First Meteor Shower of 2013 Peaks Tonight

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Kick off the New Year with the annual Quadrantid meteor shower, which will peak tonight into tomorrow morning.

During the peak period between 3 a.m. and dawn local time, as many as a hundred shooting stars per hour will be visible from dark locations in the Northern Hemisphere. (Read about the 2011 Quadrantids.)

While the glare of the waning moon will mute the display somewhat, "don't let that stop you from stepping outside, as intense activity is limited to only six hours," said Jim Todd, planetarium manager at the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry.

There's also no need for binoculars or telescopes to catch this sky show, according to Geza Gyuk, astronomer with the Adler Planetarium in Chicago.

Early Thursday morning, "find a site with a clear northern horizon where the shower appears to radiate out from—just off the handle of the Big Dipper—and bundle up and bring a friend," said Gyuk.

"A meteor shared is a meteor squared. One gets so much more pleasure when one can compare notes, gripes, and wonder!" he added.

Quadrantids Named for "Missing" Constellation

During a meteor shower Earth passes through a cloud of sand-grain-size particles left behind by a passing comet. The particles get ionized in the upper atmosphere in a bright flash of light—some of which are brighter than others.

Tiny fragments from the comet slam into the Earth's atmosphere at 90,000 miles per hour (1.4 million kilometers per hour) and burn up 50 miles (80 kilometers) above Earth, "creating the spectacular display we know as a meteor shower," Todd explained.

Like other meteor showers, the Quadrantids (pronounced Kwa-drun-tids) get their name from the constellation from which the meteors appear to radiate.

Dubbed Quadrans Muralis in the 19th century, this shower's namesake pattern of stars isn't found in any map of the heavens today.

Overcrowded star charts forced the removal of the constellation in 1922.

Astronomers decided to have Quadrans Muralis absorbed by the neighboring constellation Boötes, the Herdsman.

As for the Quadrantids keeping their name, it's likely that astronomers at the time decided to maintain it to avoid any confusion with the already established Bootid meteor shower.

Quadrantids Overlooked But Impressive

Historically the Quadrantid meteor shower is overlooked simply because of its brevity and timing—right in the middle of the most frigid winter nights in the Northern Hemisphere, where they are best seen.

But the Quadrantids are worth a look.

For one, they're prolific: "Nearly as many Quadrantid meteors will fly as can be seen during the larger August Perseid and December Geminid meteor showers," said the Oregon museum's Todd.

(Related pictures: "'Beautiful' Geminid Meteor Showers Grace Skies.")

The Quadrantids are also "well known for producing fireballs—exceptionally bright meteors which can also at times generate persistent trails," Todd said.

What's more, the meteor shower's parent object holds some mystery—it appears to be a recently discovered asteroid dubbed 2003 EH1.

And observational evidence is mounting that this object is most likely an extinct comet nucleus, said Todd, which appears to be the remnant of a larger object that broke apart about 500 years ago.

This unusual cosmic heritage makes sense, as the Quadrantids don't appear in older records.

"Other meteor showers, such as the Perseids and perhaps Leonids, seem to be fairly old, with historical documentation suggesting that they have been observed for thousands of years," said Gyuk.

"For the Quadrantids, there is good evidence to suggest that the shower didn't really start until about 500 years ago—making this also consistent with its very narrow peak in activity."


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After a ‘fiscal cliff’ deal, what next?

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The “fiscal cliff” was designed by Washington for Washington — it was intended to set up a scenario so severe that the president and Congress would, at last, have to take on the nation’s major tax and spending problems. Instead, lawmakers again found a way to sidestep many of the prickliest issues and in the process set up other, potentially more severe, showdowns in the new year.


The Senate approved a deal with the White House early Tuesday morning that would spare the middle class from an income tax increase, extending tax breaks first enacted under President George W. Bush for individuals making less than $400,000 and couples making less than $450,000.


It would also delay for two months the deep automatic spending cuts that were set to hit the military and domestic programs Wednesday.

Assuming the deal is approved by the House, it will nevertheless give way to a nearly continuous series of fights that will consume the first part of the year, even as President Obama might hope to shift Congress’s attention to immigration reform and gun control.

“It’s become less like a fiscal cliffhanger and more like a journey over the fiscal mountains,” said Rep. Jeff Fortenberry (R-Neb.).

The next big deadline is likely to come around the end of February, when the Treasury Department will exhaust the measures now in place to extend the nation’s $16.4 trillion debt ceiling. At that point, the government will not be able to pay its bills unless Congress votes to raise the nation’s legal borrowing limit.

Republicans hope to use that moment to force Obama and congressional Democrats to agree to major spending cuts in return for the increase — in what could be a sequel to the contentious face-off over the debt limit in the summer of 2011.

Provided Monday’s deal is approved, in early March would come another deadline: the $110 billion cut in spending, half from the Pentagon, delayed as part of this deal.

A month or so later — on March 27 — a short-term measure that funds government agencies will lapse. Without a renewal, the government will shut down, setting up another possible showdown.

“Round two’s coming,” said Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.). “And we’re going to have one hell of a contest about the direction and the vision of this country.”

Many Republicans believe they’ll have more leverage then than they do now because the debate over tax rates on the wealthy will be settled.

In their view, Obama has been wielding a powerful rhetorical weapon: that Congressional Republicans were blocking a deficit-reduction deal and preventing tax cuts for the middle class because they refused to allow taxes to rise for the wealthy. But the deal reached late Monday, which allows rates to rise for individuals making more than $400,000 a year and couples earning more than $450,000, would remove the issue from discussion.

Republicans figure that will tilt the debate toward spending cuts.

Graham said he anticipates forcing Democrats to give in on a long list of the GOP’s top spending priorities in the new year: raising the eligibility age for Medicare, increasing premiums for its wealthier beneficiaries, and trimming Social Security benefits by using a new method to calculate inflation.

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Motorcycle bomb kills four in Pakistan's Karachi

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KARACHI: A motorcycle bomb exploded Tuesday near the venue of a major political rally in Pakistan's largest city Karachi, killing four people and injuring 42 others, officials said.

The bombing appeared to be targeted at buses carrying supporters of the city's dominant political party, the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), which organised the rally attended by thousands of people.

"The latest report we have collected from hospitals said that four people have been killed and 42 are injured," provincial health minister Saghir Ahmad told AFP, updating the earlier toll of two dead and 25 injured.

Another health official at Karachi's Abbasi Shaheed hospital confirmed the new toll.

"The bomb was planted in a motorcycle," said Asif Ijaz, a senior police official.

Imran Shokat, a police spokesman in the southern Sindh province of which Karachi is the capital, said the motorcycle was parked in a congested neighbourhood near the venue of the rally.

"Bomb disposal experts are investigating but preliminary reports said it was a remote-controlled bomb," Shokat told AFP.

Karachi, the commercial capital of Pakistan with an estimated population of 18 million, is in the grip of a long-running wave of political and sectarian violence.

Its Arabian Sea port is used by the United States and NATO to ship supplies to the war in neighbouring, landlocked Afghanistan.

- AFP/jc



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Tourism ministry to set up multi-lingual helpline

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NEW DELHI: Tourism ministry will set up a multi-lingual helpline to provide tourism-related information and local assistance to foreign travelers.

Initially, the helpline will be in French, German, Spanish, Korean and Italian besides Hindi and English. The helpline will be a 1800 number that will be accessible from anywhere in India and should start functioning in the new calendar year.

The primary objective of the proposed helpline is to provide tourism-related information. The proposal was mooted at a meeting with the representatives of leading travel trade associations held in the ministry of tourism.

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Space Pictures This Week: Ice “Broccoli,” Solar Storm

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'Fiscal cliff' deal talk, Apple lift US stocks at year-end

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WASHINGTON: US markets closed out the year on Monday with a sharp jump on news that Congress was close to a deal to avert the fiscal cliff - but also on a 4.4 percent gain by market giant Apple.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average finished up 166.03 points (1.28 percent) at 13,104.14.

The broad-market S&P 500 gained 23.79 points (1.69 percent) at 1,426.19, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite surged 59.20 points (2.00 percent) to 3,019.51.

The gains reversed losses of the previous week when cliff worries were strong, and left the main indices with respectable gains for the year: 7.3 percent for the Dow, 13.4 percent for the S&P 500, and 15.9 percent for the Nasdaq.

With a midnight deadline looming to avert the sharp tax hikes and spending cuts aimed at slashing the fiscal deficit - but which could force a recession - the White House and congressional leaders said a deal was nigh that would mitigate the worst effects.

Nothing was certain: while the Senate was expected to pass the compromise legislation after it is finalised, possibly before the midnight Monday deadline, in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, where resistance could be tougher, the vote would not be before Tuesday.

But the markets pushed higher in expectation that the immediate threat of more than $400 billion in tax increases would mostly be avoided.

"A compromise over taxes and spending would be an important step that supports economic growth in the year ahead," said Gary Thayer, strategist at Wells Fargo Advisors.

Major shares were nearly all in the green, led by Apple's surge.

The world's most valuable company by market capitalisation - an even $500 billion at the end of trade on Monday - was a major driver of the markets ruing the year. Even though its price at Monday's close, $532.17, was well below the year's high of $705.07, Apple shares still racked up a 25.8 percent gain for 2012.

Other major gainers on Monday included ExxonMobil, up 1.8 percent; General Electric (2.6 percent); and Caterpillar (2.8 percent).

Bond prices fell. The 10-year US Treasury yield rose to 1.76 percent from 1.71 percent Friday, while the 30-year moved to 2.95 percent from 2.88 percent. Bond prices and yields move inversely.

- AFP/de



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Delhi gang-rape: Nirbhaya case rarest of rare, Krishna Tirath says

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NEW DELHI: Favouring imprisonment till death for the six accused in the Nirbhaya gang rape, Union minister Krishna Tirath on Monday said that the case was an exceptional one and should be treated as "rarest of rare".

Following hectic consultations last week with over 40 NGOs, social and women's rights activists, the ministry plans to consult with the ministries of home and law to recommend life term without parole till the natural death of all accused, including the juvenile offender.

Speaking on the issue, Tirath, who holds the charge for the ministry of women and child development, said, "I am of the opinion that an exception should be made in this case keeping in view the sheer brutality of the crime. My view is that the accused should be subjected to harshest punishment possible. This could be life imprisonment without parole till the natural death of the accused. The juvenile offender in this case should also be treated as an adult."

Tirath will meet home minister Sushilkumar Shinde and law minister Ashwani Kumar on January 4 to finalize the government's recommendations before they are submitted to the Justice Verma Committee. Incidentally, when a court awards life imprisonment to a convict in a heinous crime, it means the guilty is to spend the rest of his life behind bars.

But given the reformative sentence system operational in India, the state has been vested with the discretion of commuting the sentence if the prisoner exhibits good conduct for a prolonged period erasing any perception of being a threat to society. A prisoner can apply for release from jail on grounds of good conduct after completion of 14 years in prison.

Over the past several years, the discretionary power has been utilized to grant relief to everyone across the board even in cases where a person is sentenced to life after being found guilty of heinous crime.

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Space Pictures This Week: Ice “Broccoli,” Solar Storm

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Fiscal Cliffhanger: Tax Deal 'Within Sight,' Not Done

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President Obama said an 11th-hour agreement to avert year-end tax hikes on 98 percent of Americans is "within sight" but not yet complete with just hours to go before the nation reaches the so-called fiscal cliff.


"There are still issues left to resolve but we're hopeful Congress can get it done," Obama said at a midday White House news conference. "But it's not done."


Congressional and White House negotiators have forged the contours of an agreement that would extend current tax rates for households making $450,000 or less; raise the estate tax from 35 to 40 percent for estates larger than $5 million; and prevent the Alternative Minimum Tax from hammering millions of middle-class workers, sources said.


The deal would also extend for one year unemployment insurance benefits set to expire Tuesday, and avert a steep cut to Medicare payments for doctors.


"I can report that we've reached an agreement on the all the tax issues," Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said in an afternoon speech on the Senate floor.


But Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., was among the less conciliatory Republicans.
Rather than staging a "cheerleading rally," he said, the president should have been negotiating the finishing touches of the deal.






Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images











'Fiscal Cliff': Lawmakers Scramble for Last-Minute Deal Watch Video









"What did the president of the United States just do? Well, he kind of made fun, he made a couple of jokes, laughed about how people are going to be here for New Year's, sent a message of confrontation to the Republicans," McCain said. "I guess I have to wonder, and I think the American people have to wonder whether the president really wants this issue resolved or is it to his short-term political benefit for us to go over the cliff?"


McCain said the president's speech today "clearly will antagonize members of the House," and "that's not the way presidents should lead."


Both sides remained at odds on what to do about the other significant piece of the "fiscal cliff" -- the more than $1 trillion of automatic cuts to defense and domestic programs set to begin tomorrow.


The White House has proposed a three-month delay of the cuts to allow more time to hash out details for deficit reduction, while many Senate Democrats want a flat one-year delay. Republicans insist that some spending cuts should be implemented now as part of any deal.


"In order to get the sequester moved, you're going to have to have real, concrete spending cuts," Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., said. "[Without that], I don't know how it passes the House."


Vice President Joe Biden and McConnell, R-Ky., have been locked in behind-the-scenes negotiations for much of the day, sources said, following several "good" conversations that stretched late into Sunday night.


"We are very, very close," McConnell said today. "We can do this. We must do this."


If a deal is reached between Biden and McConnell, members in both chambers would still need to review it and vote on it later today. Passage is far from guaranteed.


"This is one Democrat that doesn't agree with that at all," Iowa Democratic Sen. Tom Harkin said of the tentative deal. "No deal is better than a bad deal, and this looks like a very bad deal the way this is shaping up."


"I don't see how you get something voted on today," Rogers said. "Even if they get a handshake deal today, you have to put the whole thing together and that's probably not going to happen before midnight. So it would make sense to roll into tomorrow to do that."






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