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Friday, during an interview with nationally syndicated radio host Hugh Hewitt, former Vice President Mike Pence, a candidate for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, reacted to his opponent and former boss, former President Donald Trump’s federal indictment. Pence called the indictment “deeply troubling.” “I think it’s important to note that we don’t know the facts in this case,” Pence said. “No one does. But you know, after years of politicization at the Justice Department, two and a half years in our administration where we fought against the Russia hoax that the Durham report recently confirmed, was an investigation that should...

Former President Donald Trump dismissed Kanye West on Saturday as “seriously troubled” after the controversial rapper visited his home at Mar-a-Lago in Florida last week. “So I help a seriously troubled man, who just happens to be black, Ye (Kanye West), who has been decimated in his business and virtually everything else, and who has always been good to me, by allowing his request for a meeting at Mar-a-Lago, alone, so that I can give him very much needed ‘advice,'” Trump wrote on social media, referring to West’s multiple antisemitic rants that prompted major companies to exit from their media...

Vice President Harris on Tuesday condemned the treatment of Haitian migrants at the southern border after images circulated appearing to show border patrol agents on horseback grabbing individuals seeking to enter the U.S. "What I saw depicted, those individuals on horseback treating human beings the way they were was horrible," Harris told reporters after an event to promote the White House's economic agenda. "I fully support what is happening right now, which is a thorough investigation into what is going on there. But human beings should never be treated that way, and I’m deeply troubled about it," she said.

Former President Barack Obama says he's troubled by the onslaught of new state election laws that have passed in the wake of the 2020 presidential election, adding that rhetoric delegitimizing the voting process is a "threat to democracy." In a Friday interview with Good Morning America, Obama said, "We're now seeing state legislatures try to further suppress the vote or allow partisan politics to infect voting results and election results. That troubles me." A number of Republican-led states, such as Texas and Georgia, have introduced new legislation tighten or restricting rules around voting, arguing that these measures would protect the...

SAVANNAH, Ga. — Lawmakers can expect face-to-face meetings with Girl Scouts from across Georgia next month at the state Capitol, where the young scouts plan on treating legislators to a milk-and-cookie reception. These girls bearing gifts of Thin Mints and Samoas will also come packing an agenda. They want to see Savannah's towering suspension bridge renamed in honor of Juliette Gordon Low, who founded the Girl Scouts in the coastal Georgia city more than a century ago. The Girl Scouts saw an opening last fall when Savannah's city council formally asked state lawmakers during their 2018 session to strip the...

The federal government and state insurance regulators are coming up with new rules in response to unexpected bills that have resulted from narrower choices, constricted coverage, and misunderstandings over insurer networks, The New York Times reported. A number of insurers have sought to reduce their costs by excluding cancer treatment centers and children's hospitals in their networks. Some consumers signed up for the cheapest plans without reading the fine print about provider network limits. And staff working in some doctors' offices are confused about what networks their physicians were in. Even consumers who tried to sign up with insurers that...

Canadian provincial health officials last year fired the parent company of CGI Federal, the prime contractor for the problem-plagued Obamacare health exchange websites, the Washington Examiner has learned. CGI Federal’s parent company, Montreal-based CGI Group, was officially terminated in September 2012 by an Ontario government health agency after the firm missed three years of deadlines and failed to deliver the province’s flagship online medical registry. The online registry was supposed to be up and running by June 2011. Officials at the U.S. government's Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services awarded six technology contracts worth $87 million to CGI Federal for...

The United States said Sunday it is "deeply troubled" over clashes on the Syrian border with Israel that reportedly resulted in 14 deaths, and called for calm on both sides. Israeli troops opened fire as protesters from Syria on Sunday stormed a ceasefire line in the occupied Golan Heights. "We are deeply troubled by events that took place earlier today in the Golan Heights resulting in injuries and the loss of life," the State Department said in a statement. "We call for all sides to exercise restraint. Provocative actions like this should be avoided." The US statement emphasized that "Israel,...

RIO DE JANEIRO (AFP) – US President Barack Obama held up emerging powerhouse Brazil on Sunday as a model of economic and democratic transformation that leaders in the troubled Middle East should try to copy. Obama's keynote address in Rio de Janeiro was the highlight of his visit to Brazil, the first stop on a three-nation Latin America tour overshadowed by US-led military action in Libya. The speech came after France, the United States and Britain launched missile and bomb attacks on Libyan air-defense targets to prevent Moamer Kadhafi's forces from crushing a month-old uprising against his rule. Obama did...

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- Driven by expanding problems with commercial real estate loans, the number of distressed banks in the U.S. rose to 702 in the fourth quarter, marking the highest level in 16 years, according to a report released Tuesday by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. That's up from 552 at the end of September and 416 at the end of June. This is the largest number of banks on the FDIC's "problem list" since June 30, 1993. Based on the result, roughly one in 11 of the approximately 8,000 U.S. banks are on this list, with regulators expecting a...

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama hailed Wednesday's one-year-old economic stimulus law as an accomplishment that staved off another Great Depression and kept up to 2 million people on the job. Still, with millions still out of work and losing patience, Obama acknowledged that to them, "It doesn't yet feel like much of a recovery." Marking the anniversary of the $787 billion American Economic Recovery and Investment Act, Obama aimed his message at people skeptical about the expensive relief measure and Republican lawmakers who voted against it and continue to hammer him about it. ... "One year later, it is largely...

VANCOUVER (AFP) – The Winter Olympics suffered a miserable start on Saturday when the men's skiing downhill was postponed and protests turned violent in Vancouver, but the luge went ahead despite the death of a Georgian slider. A day after a dazzling ceremony opened the Games, the first gold medal was claimed by Switzerland's Simon Ammann, who won the normal hill ski jump ahead of Poland's Adam Malysz and Austria's Gregor Schlierenzauer. Ammann wants Miami ice ... and more girls Dutchman Sven Kramer took out the 5,000 metre men's speedskating gold, finally capturing a title that had eluded him four...

Nancy-Ann DeParle, one of President Obama's chief advocates for the health care reform bill wending its way through Congress, earned more than $6.6 million as a paid director for health care firms, some of which were targeted in government investigations or whistleblower lawsuits on suspicions of billing fraud and other legal problems.

LOL!

In a town that thrives on scandal, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa hasn't disappointed. But he struggled Friday to turn a page after facing weeks of questions about his shattered marriage and the girlfriend who covered him as a TV newscaster. "It's time to move on and move on we will," Villaraigosa told reporters who peppered him with questions about the affair and his dented reputation. A day earlier his girlfriend, Telemundo anchor Mirthala Salinas, was slapped with a two-month unpaid suspension for having a relationship with someone she reported on - the mayor. In June, she announced on air the mayor...

Mitt Romney is said to be troubled by Mormonism's polygamous past. No mentions however about that whole black people being directly descended from Cain thing. Brigham Young, the 2nd Prophet of the Mormon sect said: "You see some classes of the human family that are black, uncouth, uncomely, disagreeable, sad, low in their habits, wild, and seemingly without the blessings of the intelligence that is generally bestowed upon mankind. "Shall I tell you the law of God in regard to the African race? If the white man who belongs to the chosen seed mixes his blood with the seed of...

...The attention quickly shifted -- to Robert Byrd. The 89-year-old West Virginia Democrat, beginning his ninth term, wore a red-white-and-blue tie and punctuated the opening prayer with shouts of "Yes!" and "Mmmhmmm!" and "Yes, Lord!" and "Yes, in Jesus's name!" When he was sworn in, he twice cried out "Hallelujah!" and then "Amen!" Minutes later, he was installed as Senate president pro tempore, the majority party's most senior member. "Yeah, man! Yeah, man!" he shouted. "Hallelujah!" "I do, so help me God!" he shouted when the oath was administered. "Yeah, man!" His colleagues were amused. Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.) at...

WASHINGTON - A congressman who admitted to having an affair and a senator accused of using racial slurs will get some political help from President Bush next week. Bush will make campaign stops Thursday in Pennsylvania and Virginia to help the two troubled Republicans as the GOP struggles to maintain its endangered grip on the House and Senate. "The President has made a commitment, and he's going to fulfill the commitment," White House press secretary Tony Snow said Friday. Bush's appearances are intended to give a boost to four-term Rep. Don Sherwood (news, bio, voting record), R-Pa., and Sen. George...

Aided by a governor who has promised to preserve the coast, California is expanding its network of areas where fishing and other marine harvesting are banned or restricted. The idea is to better safeguard the diversity and abundance of marine life by limiting those activities in key habitats such as lagoons, bays, kelp forests, rocky reefs and the edges of marine canyons. California already has 80 “marine protected areas” covering about 4 percent of state waters, but scientists agree that most of those sites are too small to help depleted species rebound. “No other state in the Union has done...

Former President Ford said Friday he is troubled by the efforts of retired generals to force the ouster of Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld. Ford, who appointed Rumsfeld as his White House chief of staff and then chose him to be defense secretary during his administration, said in a statement that President Bush was right to keep Rumsfeld in his post. The statement was released by spokeswoman Penny Circle as Bush arrived in California for the weekend. Ford, 92, said the decision on keeping Rumsfeld is the president's alone. "Allowing retired generals to dictate our country's policies and its leadership...