Government shutdown becomes longest in US history

Agencies
January 12, 2019

Washington, Jan 12: The US government shutdown that has left 800,000 federal employees without salaries as a result of President Donald Trump's row with Democrats over building a Mexico border wall entered a record 22nd day Saturday.

The Democrats' refusal to approve $5.7 billion demanded by Trump for the wall project has paralyzed Washington, with the president retaliating by refusing to sign off on budgets for swaths of government departments unrelated to the dispute.

As a result, workers as diverse as FBI agents, air traffic controllers and museum staff, did not receive paychecks Friday.

The partial shutdown of the government became the longest on record at midnight Friday (0500 GMT Saturday), when it overtook the 21-day stretch in 1995-1996, under president Bill Clinton.

Trump on Friday backed off a series of previous threats to end the deadlock by declaring a national emergency and attempting to secure the funds without congressional approval.

"I'm not going to do it so fast," he said at a White House meeting.

Trump described an emergency declaration as the "easy way out" and said Congress had to step up to the responsibility of approving the $5.7 billion.

"If they can't do it... I will declare a national emergency. I have the absolute right," he insisted.

Until now, Trump had suggested numerous times that he was getting closer to taking the controversial decision.

Only minutes earlier, powerful Republican ally Senator Lindsey Graham tweeted after talks with Trump: "Mr. President, Declare a national emergency NOW."

It was not clear what made Trump change course.

But Trump himself acknowledged in the White House meeting that an attempt to claim emergency powers would likely end up in legal battles going all the way to the Supreme Court.

Opponents say that a unilateral move by the president over the sensitive border issue would be constitutional overreach and set a dangerous precedent in similar controversies.

The standoff has turned into a test of political ego, particularly for Trump, who came into office boasting of his deal making powers and making an aggressive border policy the keystone of his nationalist agenda.

Democrats, meanwhile, seem determined at all costs to prevent a president who relishes campaign rally chants of "build the wall!" from getting a win.

Both Democrats and Republicans agree that the US-Mexican frontier presents major challenges, ranging from the hyper-violent Mexican drug trade to the plight of asylum seekers and poor migrants seeking new lives in the world's richest country.

There's also little debate that border walls are needed: about a third of the frontier is already fenced off.

But Trump has turned his single-minded push for more walls into a political crusade seen by opponents as a stunt to stoke xenophobia in his right-wing voter base, while wilfully ignoring the border's complex realities.

For Trump, who visited the Texas border with Mexico on Thursday, the border situation amounts to an invasion by criminals that can only be solved by more walls.

"We have a country that's under siege," he told the local officials in the White House.

Some studies show that illegal immigrants generally commit fewer crimes than people born in the United States, although not everyone agrees on this.

More certain is that while narcotics do enter the country across remote sections of the border, most are sneaked through heavily guarded checkpoints in vehicles, the government's own Drug Enforcement Administration said in a 2017 report.

It said that most smuggling is done "through US ports of entry (POEs) in passenger vehicles with concealed compartments or commingled with legitimate goods on tractor trailers."

Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic leader in the House of Representatives and a key figure in opposing Trump's agenda, said money should be spent in many areas of border security, but not on walls.

"We need to look at the facts," she said.

But Trump accused the Democrats of only wanting to score points against him with a view to the 2020 presidential elections.

"They think, 'Gee, we can hurt Trump,'" he said. "The Democrats are just following politics."

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News Network
January 17,2020

New Delhi, Jan 17: Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia does not have any car on his name, according to information shared in the poll affidavit filed by him for Delhi elections.

In the affidavit, it is also shown that while his self-acquired immovable property remained roughly the same as in 2015. His wife's self-acquired immovable property is worth roughly about Rs 65 lakh, as per his latest affidavit.

In the papers submitted during the nomination for 2015 Delhi polls, the senior AAP leader had declared that he owned a Maruti Swift car of make 2013.

However, in his 2020 affidavit, he has mentioned "nil" in the column for motor vehicles and other means of transport.

In the affidavit submitted on Thursday, his moveable assets were declared worth Rs 4,74,888 for 2018-19, as against Rs 4,92,624 for 2013-14.

In 2015, Sisodia had informed in his affidavit that he had bought a property in Vasundhara, Ghaziabad, worth Rs 5.07 lakh in April 2001. The approximate current market value of self-acquired property in 2015 was Rs 12 lakh.

In his current affidavit, the AAP leader has mentioned the same property. However, the approximate current market value of self-acquired property in 2020 has increased to Rs 21 lakh.

In his affidavit for the 2015 polls, Sisodia had also said that his wife had purchased a property in March 2008 costing Rs 8.70 lakh. At that time, the approximate value of her self-acquired property was Rs 20 lakh.

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News Network
February 28,2020

Feb 28: The best economic tonic for the coronavirus shock is to contain its spread and worry about stimulus later, said Raghuram Rajan, former head of the Reserve Bank of India.

There’s little central banks can do, and while more government spending would help, the priority should be on convincing companies and households that the virus is under control, he said.

“People want to have a sense that there is a limit to the spread of this virus perhaps because of containment measures or because there is hope that some kind of viral solution can be found,” Rajan told Bloomberg Television’s Haidi Stroud Watts and Shery Ahn.

“At this point I would say the best thing that governments can do is to really fight the epidemic rather than worry about stimulus measures that comes later,” said Rajan, who is currently a professor at the Chicago Booth School of Business.

The spread of coronavirus is pushing the world economy toward its worst performance since the financial crisis more than a decade ago.

Bank of America Corp. economists warned clients Thursday that they now expect 2.8% global growth this year, the weakest since 2009.

“We have moved from extreme confidence in markets to extreme panic, all in the space of one week,” said Rajan, who previously was chief economist at the International Monetary Fund.

The virus outbreak will force companies to rethink supply chains and overseas production facilities, he said.

“I think we will see a lot of rethinking on this, coming on the back of the trade disruption, now we have this,” Rajan said. “Globalization in production is going to be hit quite badly.”

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Agencies
January 16,2020

Moscow, Jan 16: Russia's government resigned in a shock announcement on Wednesday after President Vladimir Putin proposed a series of constitutional reforms.

In a televised meeting with the Russian president, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said the proposals would make significant changes to the country's balance of power and so "the government in its current form has resigned".

"We should provide the president of our country with the possibility to take all the necessary measures" to carry out the changes, Medvedev said.

"All further decisions will be taken by the president." Putin asked Medvedev, his longtime ally, to continue as head of government until a new government has been appointed.

"I want to thank you for everything that has been done, to express satisfaction with the results that have been achieved," Putin said.

"Not everything worked out, but everything never works out." He also proposed creating the post of deputy head of the Security Council, suggesting that Medvedev take on the position.

Earlier Wednesday Putin proposed a referendum on a package of reforms to Russia's constitution that would strengthen the role of parliament.

The changes would include giving parliament the power to choose the prime minister and senior cabinet members, instead of the president as in the current system.

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