Russian President Dmitri Medvedev announced today “that he had ordered a halt to his country’s military operation in Georgia, although he did not say that troops were pulling out and Russian forces were still authorized to fire on enemies in South Ossetia.” Medvedev said “the goal of the operation has been achieved. The security of our peacekeepers and civilians has been ensured.”
A new GAO report has found that “two-thirds of U.S. corporations paid no federal income taxes between 1998 and 2005.” The GAO “said about 68 percent of foreign companies doing business in the U.S. avoided corporate taxes over the same period.”
“The number of low-income workers living in poor neighborhoods rose in 34 of 58 metro areas, mostly in the Northeast and Midwest,” between the years 1999 and 2005, according to a new study by the Brookings Institution.
In an interview with Larry King, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) criticized Sen. John McCain’s (R-AZ) call to bring Congress back into session for an offshore drilling vote. “Well, it’s interesting to hear Sen. McCain talk about bringing Congress back,” Pelosi said. “He wasn’t even in Congress when we had two very important bills on energy.”
On the trail today: Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) continues his week-long vacation in Hawaii and will hold a fundraising event tonight in Honolulu. McCain will visit York County, Pennsylvania today to host a town hall-style meeting with former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge.
A new Congressional Budget Office report finds that “one out of every five dollars spent on the war in Iraq has gone to contractors for the United States military and other government agencies.” This $100 billion spent on contractors is “far larger than in any previous conflict, and it has fueled charges that this outsourcing has led to overbilling, fraud and shoddy and unsafe work.”
A new report from the University at Albany finds that the “number of women in state government leadership positions is on the rise, with the percentage nearly mirroring their representation in the general population in six states … Of the governor-appointed posts in all 50 states last year, 35 percent were held by women, up from 28 percent a decade earlier.”
“Health care costs are expected to rise more than 10 percent into next year, according to a survey of insurers by Aon Consulting Worldwide. But that increase is the smallest that Aon has seen in six years. Experts say it shows that efforts to tame costs, such as employee wellness or disease-management programs, may be paying off.”
The wording of a California ballot initiative that would “amend the state Constitution to ban same-sex marriage” will remain unchanged. The group sponsoring the measure had said the summary description that would appear on the ballot was “designed to encourage voters” to vote against adopting the ban, but “after two defeats in court” said that “it would not appeal to the state Supreme Court.”
And finally: On Sunday, a “quiet riot” broke out near the Pepsi Center in Denver, CO, the site of this month’s Democratic convention. These “protesters, police and counter-protesters clubbed one another mercilessly,” but they were using “peace bats” — inflatable red, white, and blue bats with bumper stickers reading, “Make Fun, Not War!” Although group was just “aiming to poke a little fun with some political street theater,” some on-lookers became worried and called the police.
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