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WASHINGTON — The Obama administration adopted a strict definition of affordable health insurance on Wednesday that will deny federal financial assistance to millions of Americans with modest incomes who cannot afford family coverage offered by employers. In deciding whether an employer’s health plan is affordable, the Internal Revenue Service said it would look at the cost of coverage only for an individual employee, not for a family. Family coverage might be prohibitively expensive, but federal subsidies would not be available to help buy insurance for children in the family. The policy decision came in a final regulation interpreting ambiguous language...

**SNIP** The president says that he is "under no illusions" about the situation in Syria, where government forces and rebel groups have clashed for two years. But he says Syrian President Bashar Assad's regime continues to weaken and will eventually come to an end.

HOUSTON (KTRK) -- There's a good news update on a home ransacked and spray painted by a pair of teen burglars in northwest Houston. While the burglars are now in custody, community members and Marines stepped in to help the homeowner -- a 93-year-old World War II veteran. The Marines quickly marched into the defaced home of WWII veteran Elbert Wood, eager to help. "It's important that he knows we're here for him and that we're always his brothers," Major Roberto Rodriguez said. The presence of these local Marines is just one example of the outpouring of support for Wood...

Can anyone name the countries that sent aid to the United States after Hurricane Sandy? I am asking this because I got an e-mail from a friend that I am trying to fact check. Here it is ... ____________________________________ As you know, America is always the first country to send aid to other countries when they are in trouble. It is highly appropriate that we Americans, must now send our "THANKS" to all those countries that reciprocated our help with their disasters, misgivings, social turmoil, & poverty when they returned to the USA monetary and physical help after Hurricane Sandy...

New Delhi - Its healthcare system crippled by international economic sanctions, Iran has asked India for help to procure life-saving drugs for patients battling critical illnesses in that country. Tehran has put in an urgent request to New Delhi for drugs to treat lung and breast cancers; brain tumours; heart ailments; infections after kidney, heart and pancreas transplants; meningitis in HIV patients; arthritis; bronchitis and respiratory distress in newborns; and epilepsy, South Block sources told The Indian Express. On December 27, the sources said, the government forwarded the request for 28 essential medicines to Indian pharmaceutical companies. The required quantities...

Greetings! I just published an invention on Quirky, and would like to get some up votes, and other positive thoughts from the FR community. Thanks in advance, FRiends.

There are no plans to withdraw aid to the Palestinian Authority following the United Nations vote to recognize Palestine as an independent state, a White House spokesman said Friday. Josh Earnest told reporters traveling on Air Force One that the U.S. opposed the resolution to give the Palestinian Authority nonmember observer state status because the Israel-Palestinian conflict should be resolved “only through face-to-face negotiations, not unilateral actions,” according to the White House pool report. A bipartisan group of senators had threatened to cut off millions in U.S. financial aid to the Palestinians if the vote succeeded. Earnest said there were...

Israel Pitches In With Disaster Relief After Hurricane SandyMembers of various NGOs put Israeli knowhow to work, getting food, fuel and other supplies to emergency workers and victims.New York --- When ISRAEL21c spoke with Israel relief volunteer Joel Leyden in New York yesterday, he had just received a phone call from the Nassau County Office of Emergency Management on New York’s Long Island. “They confirmed that there is a police escort waiting to bring in Israel Flying Aid’s delivery of fuel, which will go to county hospitals to be dispensed to doctors and nurses so they will be able to...

Israel Flying Aid Gives Food, Generators, Gas To Hurricane Sandy New York, New Jersey Victims(photo) Roger Parrott, Jacob Parrott and Joel Leyden deliver a generator and gas to a Hurricane Sandy New York victim. Photo: Rebecca McCann / INA By Karen Levy Israel News AgencyNew York, NY --- November 4, 2012 ... Israel Flying Aid, the Israeli global humanitarian organization which was first to land in Haiti following the 2010 earthquake, has been distributing large supplies of gas to hospitals, food, batteries and generators to Hurricane Sandy victims. "We have many years of disaster relief experience," said Israel Flying Aid...

Living near the coast in the Northeast, I see the devastation wrought by Hurricane Sandy firsthand. Many have been without power for days; there are long lines at gas stations; some supermarket shelves are bare; and, more to the point here, some in vulnerable areas lost their homes. And because the storm is such a horrible, high-profile disaster, government aid to rebuild is in the offing. But should it be? This question may seem heartless. And, don't worry, you won't hear a politician asking it anytime soon, as doing so might very well cost him the next election. But political...

Rena McCarter of Kenner, La., pleaded guilty Friday, Oct. 26, to wrongly taking $8,600 in disaster relief funds from the federal government after Hurricane Katrina. She was residing in Minnesota when the storm hit. McCarter, 62, admitted in her plea deal that in 2005, she told the Federal Emergency Management Agency that her apartment and personal property had been damaged by the disaster in Louisiana, and that she needed emergency help for housing, food and clothing. In fact, McCarter was living in housing subsidized by the Metropolitan Council from October 2004 through September 2009, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office...

Before the bailout of General Motors, it was well understood that the world’s largest automaker was losing huge amounts of money in the US and was staying afloat thanks to stronger performance in overseas markets. Since the bailout, however, that dynamic has been turned on its head. Thanks to a leaner manufacturing footprint, debt eliminations and steadily recovering sales, GM’s US operations have generated the lion’s share of the company’s profit since the bailout. And now, as the rest of the world economy slows, GM is spending more and more of its taxpayer-enhanced cash pile to shore up its faltering...

By waiving provisions of Kerry-Lugar-Berman Act to provide Pakistan full financial assistance, the Obama Administration has erred gravely According to a newspaper report, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in a message to the US Congress on September 13 said she was waiving provisions of the Enhanced Partnership with Pakistan Act 2009, also known as the Kerry-Lugar-Berman Act, that would have blocked the $2 billion in US economic and military assistance to Pakistan. Disbursing the funds, she reportedly told Congress that it was “important to the national security interests of the United States”. Without the message, the State Department would...

An Army lieutenant colonel who was on the fast track until Muslim groups complained about a course he taught on radical Islam has a legal foundation in his foxhole. Attorneys for Lt. Col Matthew Dooley, a West Point graduate and highly-decorated combat veteran, was an instructor at the Joint Forces Staff College at the National Defense University, where by most accounts he won praise from students and faculty alike. But when Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Martin Dempsey excoriated Dooley during a Pentagon press conference in May, characterizing his course, “Perspectives on Islam and Islamic Radicalism” as objectionable,...

I just watched Romney's speech at the Global Initiative Conference and I was blown away. Foreign aid should be tied to getting people employment. All free enterprise - all the time. It was impressive. He even got a few digs in about Obama. It is a must see.

Americans strongly believe that there is too much government dependency in the country today. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 64% of Adults think there are too many Americans dependent on the government for financial aid. Just 10% think not enough Americans are dependent on the government, while 16% say the level of dependency is about right. The survey of 1,000 Adults was conducted on September 18-19, 2012 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence.

Suspicions by Pakistan's powerful army that the country's civilian leadership is growing too close to the United States are fueling a political crisis that analysts here believe threatens the survival of the government and could divert attention from the battle against Islamic extremists. Military officials believe that secretly taped conversations between Pakistani President Asif Zardari and his ambassador in Washington, prove that it was at Zardari's insistence that a $1.5 billion U.S. aid package passed by Congress in September contained several provisions that angered the Pakistani military. The military publicly protested the aid package last month. "The reaction (from the...

Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas received Quartet representative Tony Blair in Ramallah on Tuesday and called to support the PA financially. The PA-based WAFA news agency reported that Abbas briefed Blair on the latest political developments and the dilemma the peace process is facing, due to what he termed the Israeli government’s intransigence and refusal to abide by the international law. The report said that Abbas insisted on the importance of providing financial support to PA, especially during the critical financial situation it is going through. .....

President Barack Obama erroneously exaggerated the amount of money his administration has provided to an Israeli missile defense program Friday while signing a bill meant to boost U.S.-Israeli security ties. Obama, who has been criticized for weakening the U.S.-Israel alliance, was attempting to tout his administration’s commitment to the Jewish state when he incorrectly stated that Israel will receive “$70 billion dollars” for its missile defense program. “I’m very pleased that this week we are going to be able to announce $70 million spending…$70 billion, excuse me, in additional spending for Iron Dome,” Obama said, inflating the actual dollar amount...

Washington, DC - The US House of Representatives has passed an amendment unanimously that cuts down $650 million in military aid to Pakistan as Republicans sought to tamp down demands for still deeper reductions. Congressman Ted Poe had demanded a $1.3 billion cut, but later settled for the 650 million cut. "Pakistan is the 'Benedict Arnold' to America in the war on terror. They are disloyal, deceptive and a danger to the United States," Poe, who had moved the amendment, said. "This so-called ally continues to take billions in US aid, while funding the militants who attack us. And we've...