National Journal Online


Pawlenty Adviser Defends Against Allegations of Fundraising Troubles Trying to defuse another round of negative publicity, Tim Pawlenty's campaign insisted Thursday that the willingness of a handful of top staffers to work for little or no money does not reflect broader fundraising problems. The campaign was responding to a Washington Post story that said at least five top advisers are foregoing the big paychecks typical of a national campaign. Posted: Thursday, June 23, 2011 - 11:40am
Mullen Initially Wanted Slower Afghan Drawdown Just hours after President Obama announced his plans to begin bringing U.S. forces in Afghanistan home, the military’s top officer told Congress that the pace of the commander-in-chief’s withdrawal plans is faster than he initially wanted. “The president’s decisions are more aggressive and incur more risk than I was originally prepared to accept,” Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Adm. Mike Mullen told the House Armed Services Committee on Thursday morning. Posted: Thursday, June 23, 2011 - 11:40am
House Panel Unanimously Endorses New Government Spending Oversight Board The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee passed a bill Wednesday that would create a government-wide spending oversight board and better reporting mechanisms based on programs developed to track the Obama administration's stimulus spending. Posted: Thursday, June 23, 2011 - 11:40am
Today's e-Reads: Google Reaches Milestone, and This Is Your Brain On the Internet Google becomes the first website to reach 1 billion visitors a month. Can Internet use physically change the structure of your brain? The hacker group LulzSec grabs headlines -- and enemies. Posted: Thursday, June 23, 2011 - 11:40am
Stocks Tumble in Response to Weak Jobless Claims, IEA Announcement Major U.S. stock indexes fell over 1 percent Thursday morning following a surprise gain in weekly jobless claims and an announcement that the International Energy Agency would release crude oil from its strategic reserves. The Dow Jones industrial average fell 200 points just after the opening bell. Energy stocks and oil prices fell after the U.S. Department of Energy announced Thursday that it will release 30 million barrels of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve as part of the International Energy Agency’s decision. Posted: Thursday, June 23, 2011 - 11:40am
Larry Summers to Help Build the Future of Money Square is chasing an aggressive goal to replace credit cards, and Larry Summers can offer them a short cut. Fast Company reports that the Harvard professor will join Square's board along with Sun Microsystems co-founder and prominent venture capitalist Vinod Khosla. "Square is at a key point in our trajectory," said Square's founder and CEO Jack Dorsey in announcing the addition of Summers to their board. Posted: Thursday, June 23, 2011 - 10:40am
Cantor Pulls Out of Biden Talks Thursday Following on a decision by House Majority Leader Rep. Eric Cantor, R-Va., to pull out of the White House-led debt and deficit talks on Thursday, the other Republican negotiator, Sen. Jon Kyl of Arizona, has also dropped out of the negotiations and the new GOP position appears to be that they will not negotiate any further until Democrats take tax increases off the table. That position seem to reflect their assessment that there are not the votes in the House to pass any deal that includes tax increases. Posted: Thursday, June 23, 2011 - 10:40am
White House Agrees to Let Congress Codify some Cybersecurity Policies Obama administration officials say they will let Congress make permanent in statute some cybersecurity policies the White House initially had wanted the executive branch to authorize, to more quickly implement the law. Posted: Thursday, June 23, 2011 - 10:40am
Five Best Thursday Columns Elizabeth Dickinson on the New Mafia: Drug Cartels Drops in the cocaine trade between Mexico and the U.S. "would be excellent news" if it didn't correlate with a rise in drug violence near the border, explains Elizabeth Dickinson at Foreign Policy. Legalizing and regulating the U.S. Posted: Thursday, June 23, 2011 - 10:40am
Lieberman and Rubio on Libya Debate: Get Over It and Move On As the House continues to challenge the administration on the U.S. engagement in Libya, Sens. Joe Lieberman, ID-Conn., and Marco Rubio, R-Fla., say it’s time to accept reality and move on to ending Muammar el-Qaddafi’s regime. Posted: Thursday, June 23, 2011 - 10:40am

Pawlenty Adviser Defends Against Allegations of Fundraising Troubles

Trying to defuse another round of negative publicity, Tim Pawlenty's campaign insisted Thursday that the willingness of a handful of top staffers to work for little or no money does not reflect broader fundraising problems.

The campaign was responding to a Washington Post story that said at least five top advisers are foregoing the big paychecks typical of a national campaign.

Posted: Thursday, June 23, 2011 - 11:40am

Mullen Initially Wanted Slower Afghan Drawdown

Just hours after President Obama announced his plans to begin bringing U.S. forces in Afghanistan home, the military’s top officer told Congress that the pace of the commander-in-chief’s withdrawal plans is faster than he initially wanted.

“The president’s decisions are more aggressive and incur more risk than I was originally prepared to accept,” Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Adm. Mike Mullen told the House Armed Services Committee on Thursday morning.

Posted: Thursday, June 23, 2011 - 11:40am

House Panel Unanimously Endorses New Government Spending Oversight Board

The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee passed a bill Wednesday that would create a government-wide spending oversight board and better reporting mechanisms based on programs developed to track the Obama administration's stimulus spending.

Posted: Thursday, June 23, 2011 - 11:40am

Today's e-Reads: Google Reaches Milestone, and This Is Your Brain On the Internet

Google becomes the first website to reach 1 billion visitors a month.

Can Internet use physically change the structure of your brain?

The hacker group LulzSec grabs headlines -- and enemies.

Posted: Thursday, June 23, 2011 - 11:40am

Stocks Tumble in Response to Weak Jobless Claims, IEA Announcement

Major U.S. stock indexes fell over 1 percent Thursday morning following a surprise gain in weekly jobless claims and an announcement that the International Energy Agency would release crude oil from its strategic reserves. The Dow Jones industrial average fell 200 points just after the opening bell.

Energy stocks and oil prices fell after the U.S. Department of Energy announced Thursday that it will release 30 million barrels of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve as part of the International Energy Agency’s decision.

Posted: Thursday, June 23, 2011 - 11:40am

Larry Summers to Help Build the Future of Money

Square is chasing an aggressive goal to replace credit cards, and Larry Summers can offer them a short cut. Fast Company reports that the Harvard professor will join Square's board along with Sun Microsystems co-founder and prominent venture capitalist Vinod Khosla. "Square is at a key point in our trajectory," said Square's founder and CEO Jack Dorsey in announcing the addition of Summers to their board.