Gulf Oil Disaster Prompts Bill to Raise Damage Cap
The existing $75 million cap on offshore liability payments would be lifted under a bill responding to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Sens. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) and Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) jointly announced the legislation. "A $75 million cap would not even touch the economic devastation that has already occurred," Nelson said. Senators could not come to an agreement over whether to accept BP's assurances that it will pay any and all legitimate claims associated with the spill. "I tend to take people at their word until they take some ...
Pelosi Says She'll Cooperate With Massa Ethics Probe
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Thursday that she will cooperate with an ethics committee investigating sexual misconduct allegations against former Rep. Eric Massa, and will speak before the panel if asked to do so. She took questions on the ethics probe and immigration legislation at a wide-ranging news conference before sitting down to chat with a group of kids in her Capitol Hill office on Take Your Daughters and Sons To Work Day. In addition to agreeing to cooperate with ethics investigators, Pelosi backed Majority Leader Steny Hoyer's (D-Md.) plan to review procedures for dealing ...
House Republicans Want Ban on Pork Projects -- Dems Scoff
House Minority Leader John Boehner said Thursday that he wants a one year ban on congressional earmarks – those costly projects often slipped into legislation at the request of special interests -- as a way of reducing the federal budget deficit. Boehner and several other House Republicans, including his minority whip, Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Va.), called for bipartisan support for a resolution clamping down on government spending for special projects, often derided as "pork." "We are not the same Republican party that was fired in 2006," Cantor said. "Not only are we dedicated to ...
Feds Would Govern Health Insurance Rates Under Feinstein Bill
WASHINGTON -- The chairman of the Senate Health Committee threw his support behind a proposal by Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) to give the federal government authority over health insurance rate increases. "This health care bill is not written in stone for eternity," said Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), committee chair. "It was a bill passed here and we will be modifying and changing it as we go forward. This is another modification we need to make to the bill." The health care reform bill passed by Congress last month requires insurers to explain "unreasonable" premium increases but ...
Justices Split Over College Rejection of Christian Student Group
U.S. Supreme Court justices seemed to split along ideological lines Monday in a case that pits anti-discrimination policies in public universities against the First Amendment rights of students. Christian Legal Society sued the University of California Hastings School of Law in 2004 when the school denied the group's application to become an officially recognized student organization, which would give it access to funding, priority access to campus space and official listings. The group requires members to sign a statement of faith, which includes language barring homosexuals and ...
Supreme Court: Christian Student Group Seeks Campus Recognition
On Monday the Supreme Court will hear arguments in a case that, on its face, is about the touchy relationship between the First Amendment and anti-discrimination policies, but it is also a dispute that has reignited tensions connected with the exercise of religious beliefs in publicly-funded schools. The case, Christian Legal Society v. Martinez, began in 2004 when the University of California's Hastings School of Law denied an application by the Christian Legal Society to become an officially recognized student organization. The group requires members to sign a faith statement, which ...
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