Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano urged Americans on Wednesday to join a "collective fight against terrorism" that combines the efforts of individuals, companies and local, state and foreign governments.

Answering critics who have accused the Obama administration of downplaying the risk of terrorist attacks, Napolitano said the threat has not abated and outlined an approach that emphasizes burden-sharing as federal spending and political support for post-Sept. 11 security measures wane.

"I am sometimes asked if I think complacency is a threat. I believe the short answer is 'yes,' " Napolitano said, speaking to the Council on Foreign Relations in New York before visiting the World Trade Center site destroyed in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

"But I think a better question is this: Has the U.S. government done everything it can to educate and engage the American people? The answer is 'no,' " she said.
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I thought after Bush there was no more war on terror?

The U.S. Treasury sold $39 billion in five-year debt Wednesday in an auction that drew poor demand, raising worries over the cost of financing the government's burgeoning budget deficit.

The so-called generic ballot question was also very close. Asked whether they would support a Democrat or a Republican for Congress in 2010 if the election were held today, 42 percent said they would choose a Democrat and 43 percent a Republican, a difference well within the poll's margin of error (plus or minus 3.4 percentage points for each number in each question).

Forty-four percent of Americans believe a new healthcare reform law would improve medical care in the U.S., contrasted with 26% who say it would improve their personal medical care. Forty-seven percent of Americans believe reform will expand access to healthcare in the U.S., while 21% say it will expand their own access to healthcare.

In recent months, former Bush speechwriter and NewMajority.com editor David Frum has taken on conservative talkers like Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh — the latter who became the subject of a Newsweek cover story.

And yesterday, Frum described talk show host Mark Levin's book, "Liberty and Tyranny," as "suffused with this message of doom" under the headline: "Stop Whining!"

That didn't go over well with Levin, who blasted Frum on the air today as a "complete and utter fraud" and boasted about selling more copies of their latest books (900,000 to 5,000).

"You sit there with that permanent smirk on your face and contribute nothing," Levin said.

The White House may only have one of its top officials to blame for its difficulty in passing healthcare, one liberal California Democrat asserted Tuesday.

Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) blamed now-White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel's work as head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC), during which he worked to recruit many centrist candidates, resulting in landslide Democratic victories, for difficulties facing House leaders trying to pass reform legislation.

"That may be difficult for Rahm Emanuel, because remember, he recruited most of them," Waters said during an interview on MSNBC when asked if the White House could lean on centrist, Blue Dog Democrats to pass reform legislation.

"Now the chickens have come home to roost," she added.

Facing the first real rough patch of his presidency, President Obama and his supporters are once again resorting to a tried-and-true tactic: attacking George W. Bush and Dick Cheney.

In his White House press conference last week, Mr. Obama referred to the Bush era at least nine times, three times lamenting that he "inherited" a $1.3 trillion debt that has set back his administration's efforts to fix the economy.

With the former president lying low in Dallas, largely focused on crafting his memoirs, Mr. Obama has increasingly attempted to exploit Mr. Bush when discussing the weak economy, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the difficulty closing the military prison at U.S. Naval Base Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

As he took power, Mr. Obama promised a "new era of responsibility" that would transcend partisan politics.

Barack Obama may prefer European-style socialized health care. He may consider himself a citizen of the Earth and sometimes address his audiences as “people of the world,” as though he were born not in another country but on another planet. Like Bruce Springsteen, he has a lot of bad political ideas; but he was born in the U.S.A.

Alaska’s now former Governor is coy about her future political plans, but radio is at least one option she’s leaving on the table. While not exactly shopping the GOP’s 2008 vice presidential candidate, sources say Palin representatives have been quietly testing the waters to see how much interest radio syndicators have for her.

Sources say Palin hasn’t committed to radio either, but rather it could be a possible next step for her. It isn’t unusual for a defeated national candidate to turn to radio. Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee’s short-form commentaries air on more than 400 stations via Citadel Media. He remains among the names circulated for a potential presidential run in 2012.

Coming to radio would be an ironic twist for Palin, whose position on the media is pretty clear. “Quick making things up,” she told reporters in her final speech as Governor last week.

The American Dental Association (ADA) agrees with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's (FDA) decision not to place any restriction on the use of dental amalgam, a commonly used cavity filling material.

The FDA ruling issued today categorizes encapsulated dental amalgam as a class II medical device, placing it in the same class as gold and tooth-colored composite fillings. The ADA has supported a class II designation for dental amalgam since 2002 when first proposed by the FDA.

"The FDA has left the decision about dental treatment right where it needs to be—between the dentist and the patient," states ADA President Dr. John Findley. "This decision underscores what the ADA has long supported—a discussion between dentists and patients about the full range of treatment options to help patients make educated decisions regarding their dental care."

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said on Tuesday silver-colored dental fillings that contain mercury are safe for patients, reversing an earlier caution against their use in certain patients, including pregnant women and children.

"While elemental mercury has been associated with adverse health effects at high exposures, the levels released by dental amalgam fillings are not high enough to cause harm in patients," the FDA said, citing an agency review of roughly 200 scientific studies.

Still, in final regulations issued on Tuesday as part of an earlier legal settlement, it said the fillings were now considered "moderate risk" devices and will include details about the risks and benefits of the products. They will also carry warnings against their use in patients with mercury allergies or in poorly ventilated areas.

The International Agency for Research on Cancer announced Wednesday that it had elevated sunbeds, used by tens of millions of people for tanning, to its highest cancer risk category.

Classified in 1992 and a "probable" cancer agent, research since then has left no doubt that soaking up UV rays at tanning salons significantly enhances the chances of developing the disease, the World Health Organisation (WHO) agency found.
"The use of sunbeds is carcinogenic to humans. It causes melanoma of the skin, and melanoma of the eye," said Vincent Cogliano, an IARC researcher who led the new assessment.

"I cannot see any reason why a healthy person should use them," he told AFP by phone.

The risk of melanoma — the most lethal form of skin cancer — increases by 75 percent when use of tanning devices starts before the age of 30, according to the findings, published in the British medical journal The Lancet Oncology.

U.S. House Democratic leaders, struggling to reach an accord with party dissidents on health care, said they’re likely to miss President Barack Obama’s August deadline for legislation overhauling the medical system.

“It doesn’t look like it to me,” House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles Rangel said in an interview. “I really hoped that we could have gotten a bill out of here by now,” he said, adding that he has a “heavy political heart.”

Have you left your air conditioner in the closet this summer, and worn long pants more often than shorts? If so, you may not be surprised to find out that Chicago is seeing its coldest July in more than 65 year

Most Britons believe the increasingly bloody war in Afghanistan is "unwinnable" and want troops pulled out, a poll suggested on Tuesday, as more soldiers' bodies were flown home.

The dead servicemen were set to be honoured a day after the government announced the end of a deadly offensive in southern Afghanistan and outlined a change of strategy there following a sharp spike in deaths.

Foreign Secretary David Miliband signalled on Monday that Britain would back talking to moderate Taliban representatives in a bid to isolate militant insurgents who have killed 191 British troops since 2001.
A total of 22 have been killed this month alone after British forces went on the offensive in Operation Panther's Claw, just weeks before crucial presidential elections.

Four more fallen soldiers' bodies were flown home to RAF Lyneham near Swindon in Wiltshire, before a solemn procession through the village of Wootton Bassett.

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Let Britain go.

They are becoming an unreliable ally.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Tuesday is expected to use his line-item veto power to make additional cuts to the California's latest spending plan – a move advocates fear could hurt the poor.

Social service advocates worry the Republican governor has little choice but to go after money counties receive to administer welfare and social service benefits. Likely targets include welfare-to-work assistance, in-home support, foster care and health insurance for poor families.

With much of state spending tied up by federal and constitutional requirements, the Schwarzenegger administration believes more cuts are necessary to provide a cash cushion for the state in case of emergencies such as earthquakes and wild fires.

"I just want to assure everyone that we will build up our reserve. We will make the necessary cuts," the governor said Friday in announcing he'll sign the budget passed by the Legislature.
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About time……too much welfare and too few taxpayers