links for 2009-03-05

Clovis voters soundly defeated a one-cent sales tax measure Tuesday night.

But City Council incumbents Lynne Ashbeck and Nathan Magsig, supporters of Measure A, beat challenger Douglas Foster, who ran a campaign in opposition to the sales tax measure. Two seats were up for grabs in Tuesday's election.

Clovis city officials had hitched their future to the passage of Measure A, which was expected to raise nearly $13 million a year to restore city services that have been cut over the past two years. But the nation's economic downturn and California's recent tax hikes, including another one-cent sales-tax increase, created challenges for the measure.

Former Secretary of State Colin Powell urged President Barack Obama and Congress not to allow U.S. diplomatic efforts and "smart power" to suffer at the hands of a sinking economy that is consuming the nation's attention.
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Colin Pwell's influence should be zero.

A new Fairleigh Dickinson poll in New Jersey shows leading GOP challenger Chris Christie (R) defeating Gov. Jon Corzine (D), 41% to 32%, in a likely fall gubernatorial match up.

Key finding: Just 40% of voters approve of the job Corzine is doing while 46% disapprove — a reversal from January when 46% approved and 40% disapproved.

In addition, Christie's name recognition continues to climb, from 40% in September to 44% in January and to 57% this month.

US Secretary of State Hillary CLinton on Wednesday accused Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei of clear "interference" following his call to world Muslims to join the Palestinian "resistance" against Israel.

While recognizing that many Canadians believe that we have one of the best health care systems in the world, the founders of Timely Medical Alternatives Inc. also recognize that there are some 875,000 Canadians currently on the waiting list for referrals to specialists or for medical procedures.

Our organization was formed in 2003 to help Canadians from coast to coast, to "Leave the queue" and take personal responsibility for their own private medical services.. Since then we have helped hundreds of Canadians obtain second medical opinions, MRI's / CT scans / PET scans (within days) and surgery (within weeks). We have helped our clients to regain their mobility, to get relief from chronic pain, to get diagnoses of illnesses and we have, in some cases, helped to save the lives of a number of our fellow Canadians.

South Africa says it will take over any land allocated to black farmers which is not being used effectively under a land redistribution programme.

The measure, which takes immediate effect, was announced by Agriculture Minister Lulu Xingwana, who warned farmers should "use it or lose it".

She said confiscated land would go to emerging farmers and co-operatives.

After apartheid, the government set a target to give 30% of all agricultural land to the black majority by 2014.

Political operatives in the White House are trying to divert attention away from the challenges facing our economy, the sinking stock market, and the irresponsible spending binge they are presiding over. This diversionary tactic will not create a single job or help a single family struggling in today’s economic crisis. That’s where our focus should be. President Obama has said we must change the way Washington operates in order to address the challenges we are facing. In the midst of a deepening recession, White House staff should have higher priorities than this cynical strategy.

It's not just the TV appearances that have some Republicans worried.

Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele's dust-up with Rush Limbaugh has brought to the fore so-far unspoken concerns about Steele's performance in his early days as head of the GOP. A number of Republican politicos around Washington, many of whom supported Steele's bid to become party chairman, are worried that key jobs at the RNC are unfilled and the party's mission is unfocused, while Steele makes appearance after appearance on television, with sometimes controversial results. The result, they say, is a party that is losing its already scant momentum at a critical time.
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Get off the tube Michael and fill those positions.

Many of us looked forward to Michael Steele’s leadership at the RNC after two successive national defeats as a breath of fresh air, a chance to reorganize and have a recognizable, media-savvy figure at the head of the Republican Party. After the first month, though, even Steele backers wonder whether the former talk-show host and Lieutenant Governor is in over his head. Byron York notes that the worries go beyond Steele’s disastrous media appearances, which are bad enough all on their own:

The California Supreme Court may reveal Thursday whether it intends to uphold Proposition 8, and if so, whether an estimated 18,000 same-sex marriages will remain valid, during a high-stakes televised session that has sparked plans for demonstrations throughout the state.

By now, the court already has drafted a decision on the case, with an author and at least three other justices willing to sign it. Oral arguments sometimes result in changes to the draft, but rarely do they change the majority position. The ruling is due in 90 days.

Arnold Schwarzenegger's dream of becoming the first "post-partisan" governor has finally come true – he's equally disliked by Republicans and Democrats.
"He's reached his goal. Both sides view him the same way," said Mark DiCamillo of the Field Poll. "Negatively."

Overall, the action-star-turned-budget-bedraggled-compromiser scored a 38 percent approval rating in a statewide Field Poll of 761 voters taken after the recent budget deal was reached.

Schwarzenegger's abandonment of the Republican mantra of no new taxes cost him dearly among his own party. The number of Republicans who approve of his job performance is down to 39 percent, versus 56 percent who disapprove, the Field Poll showed.

Iranian missiles can reach Israeli nuclear sites, a top military commander said on Wednesday, amid persistent speculation that Israel could target facilities involved in Iran's atomic work.

"All the nuclear facilities in different parts of the land under the occupation of the Zionist regime are in the reach of Iran's missile defences," the commander-in-chief of the Revolutionary Guards, Mohammad Ali Jafari, said according to ISNA news agency.

Las Vegas casino legend Sheldon Adelson launched a quest for America's most boring city on Tuesday in a comeback to President Barack Obama's criticism of bankers who hold meetings in the famous gaming capital.

Obama last month warned companies that get bailout cash against spending it on activities potentially seen as perks — sparking a row with hotel and resort operators who say they are already struggling to fill rooms and may have to cut jobs.

"The good news is that Las Vegas has become a synonym for a good time for adults. Let me not say adults, I'll say grown-ups, I don't want to give the wrong impression," Adelson, majority owner of casino operator Las Vegas Sands, said.

"The bad news is that because it is a place for a good time, President Obama says that he doesn't want taxpayer's money to go there," Adelson told the Reuters Travel and Leisure Summit.

If you're inclined to believe Igor Panarin, and the Kremlin wouldn't mind if you did, then President Barack Obama will order martial law this year, the U.S. will split into six rump-states before 2011, and Russia and China will become the backbones of a new world order.

Panarin might be easy to ignore but for the fact that he is a dean at the Foreign Ministry's school for future diplomats and a regular on Russia's state-guided TV channels. And his predictions fit into the anti-American story line of the Kremlin leadership.

"There is a high probability that the collapse of the United States will occur by 2010," Panarin told dozens of students, professors and diplomats Tuesday at the Diplomatic Academy — a lecture the ministry pointedly invited The Associated Press and other foreign media to attend.

China is to increase official military spending by almost 15 per cent this year as it seeks to upgrade its smart technology and improve the living standards of its soldiers.
The 14.9 per cent rise to 480.7 billion yuan (£50 billion), up 62.5 billion yuan from 2008, was announced in advance of the annual meeting of the rubber-stamp parliament, the National People's Congress.

It is slightly smaller than the increase in recent years, suggesting that the government is focusing its spending on boosting the wider economy.

But after rises of 17.8 per cent in 2007 and 17.6 per cent in 2008, it still amounts to a rise of more than half since 2006.

Top Democrats believe they have struck political gold by depicting Rush Limbaugh as the new face of the Republican Party, a full-scale effort first hatched by some of the most familiar names in politics and now being guided in part from inside the White House.

The strategy took shape after Democratic strategists Stanley Greenberg and James Carville included Limbaugh’s name in an October poll and learned their longtime tormentor was deeply unpopular with many Americans, especially younger voters. Then the conservative talk-radio host emerged as an unapologetic critic of Barack Obama shortly before his inauguration, when even many Republicans were showering him with praise.
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Retribution for the Bill Clinton impeachment?