The GOP-controlled House passed legislation Tuesday to cut Amtrak’s budget by $242 million, though lawmakers added new funding for video cameras inside locomotive cabs to record engineers and help investigators get to the bottom of crashes such as last month’s deadly derailment in Philadelphia.
Amtrak announced last month it is going to install the cameras after years of delays. The transportation and housing measure approved by a narrow 216-210 vote contains $9 million approved last week to fund the inward-facing camera initiative in the budget year starting in October.
Amtrak is among many domestic programs whose budgets are cut or frozen by the GOP measures, as automatic spending curbs known as sequestration are again hitting federal agencies after two years of relief. Previous House GOP attempts to cut Amtrak over the years have been reversed, and Tuesday’s transportation measure is but an opening move in a longer chess match with the White House over spending levels for agency operating budgets passed annually by Congress.
A grand jury has indicted a former South Carolina police officer in the April shooting of an unarmed black man, the prosecutor announced on Monday.
Former North Charleston Police Officer Michael Slager, 33, has been charged with murder in the death of Walter Scott, 50.
“I think the people of the 9th circuit elected me to be accountable to them, and that’s what we intend to do,” Charleston County Solicitor Scarlett Wilson said during a news conference following the announcement of the indictment Monday. “They have to know they have someone prosecuting the case who is accountable to them.”
FIFA, the international soccer governing body, could strip Russia and Qatar of their World Cup hosting rights if evidence comes to light there was corruption in the bidding process, a FIFA official said Sunday.
Domenico Scala, the chairman of FIFA’s audit and compliance committee, said that 2018 World Cup host Russia and 2022 World Cup host Qatar could be in trouble if allegations of bribery turn out to be true, Reuters reported.
“If evidence should emerge that the awards to Qatar and Russia only came about thanks to bought votes, then the awards could be invalidated,” Scala told the Swiss newspaper SonntagsZeitung Sunday. “This evidence has not yet been brought forth.”
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When the Obama administration approved strong new net neutrality rules earlier this year, advocates rejoiced. “We have won on net neutrality,” Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak told The Guardian. President Barack Obama declared victory and thanked Reddit, the self-proclaimed “Front Page of the Internet” for its community’s activism on the issue.
But these celebrations may have been premature. Telecom and cable companies, which provide broadband access to the vast majority of Americans, are challenging the Obama administration’s actions in court. If they get their way, a federal appeals court will soon delay some rules that aim to protect net neutrality, the principle that all internet traffic should be treated equally. Open-Internet advocates fear that an unfavorable decision may open the door for harmful business practices while the court battle—which could take years—plays out. A stay on part of the new rules would also likely embolden Republicans on Capitol Hill who seek to pass laws gutting the rules.
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China-based hackers are suspected of breaking into the computer networks of the U.S. government personnel office and stealing identifying information of at least 4 million federal workers, American officials said Thursday.
The Department of Homeland Security said in a statement that data from the Office of Personnel Management and the Interior Department had been compromised.
“The FBI is conducting an investigation to identify how and why this occurred,” the statement said.
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Former FIFA executive Chuck Blazer admitted in 2013 to accepting bribes related to South Africa’s 2010 World Cup bid, according to court filings released Wednesday.
Blazer, who worked with the Department of Justice to single out other FIFA officials in connection to corruption charges, told the Eastern District New York Court that he and others on FIFA’s executive committee agreed to take bribes from South Africa in relation to the country’s World Cup bid.
“Among other things, I agreed with other persons in or around 1992 to facilitate the acceptance of a bribe in conjunction with the selection of the host nation for the 1998 World Cup,” he told Judge Raymond J. Dearie.
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Russia and Qatar lost the strongest supporter of their bids to host the next two World Cups when FIFA President Sepp Blatter resigned his post on Tuesday, casting further doubt on whether the controversy-marred tournaments would be played as scheduled.
FIFA is now likely to face further calls for a revote on both tournaments, or a transparent probe into how they were awarded.
Qatar and Russia were both named hosts in a joint bidding process in 2010, the first time countries have been awarded the quadrennial event at the same time.
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Divers pulled three people alive from inside an overturned cruise ship and searched for other survivors Tuesday, state media said, giving some small hope amid an apparently massive tragedy with well over 400 people still missing on the Yangtze River.
Fifteen people were brought to safety and at least five people were confirmed dead after the Eastern Star capsized in Hubei Province during a severe storm Monday night with 458 people aboard, the official Xinhua News Agency said. The cruise was from Nanjing to the southwestern city of Chongqing, and many of those aboard were elderly.
“Looks like we are in trouble,” tour guide Zhang Hui, 43, recalled telling a colleague. In an interview with Xinhua from his hospital bed, he said rain pounded the ship, seeping into cabins, and that heavy listing sent bottles rolling off tables before the ship suddenly went all the way over.
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Rescue workers stand on the capsized ship, center, on the Yangtze River in central China’s Hubei province Tuesday, June 2, 2015. The small cruise ship sank overnight in China’s Yangtze River during a storm, leaving nearly 450 people missing, state media said Tuesday. (Chinatopix via AP)
Citing Malaysia’s abysmal slavery record, Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) urged the House on Monday to ensure his provision blocking the country’s membership in the Trans-Pacific Partnership makes it into final legislation that would give the president fast-track authority on such agreements.
The bill in question would give President Barack Obama expedited powers to push through Congress trade deals like TPP, which he hopes to seal with 11 Pacific nations.
It’s a change of tune for Menendez, who had worked out a deal with Obama to include modified language in the Senate bill. The newer language, which didn’t make it into the Senate-passed bill, would have allowed Tier 3 nations — the lowest rank that a country engaged in modern-day slavery can receive from the State Department — into Obama’s trade deals.
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Joseph “Beau” Biden III, the son of Vice President Joe Biden, has died of brain cancer, the White House announced Saturday evening. He was 46.
“More than his professional accomplishments, Beau measured himself as a husband, father, son and brother,” Joe Biden said in a statement, calling him “quite simply, the finest man any of us have ever known.”
Beau Biden served as Delaware’s attorney general for eight years from 2007 to 2015. In 2010, he suffered a mild stroke, but recovered and went back to work.
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Film and Writing Festival for Comedy. Showcasing best of comedy short films at the FEEDBACK Film Festival. Plus, showcasing best of comedy novels, short stories, poems, screenplays (TV, short, feature) at the festival performed by professional actors.
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Image: Breaking News and Opinion on The Huffington Post
Image: Breaking News and Opinion on The Huffington Post
Image: Breaking News and Opinion on The Huffington Post
Image: Breaking News and Opinion on The Huffington Post
Rescue workers stand on the capsized ship, center, on the Yangtze River in central China’s Hubei province Tuesday, June 2, 2015. The small cruise ship sank overnight in China’s Yangtze River during a storm, leaving nearly 450 people missing, state media said Tuesday. (Chinatopix via AP)
Image: Breaking News and Opinion on The Huffington Post
James' World 2 