Friday, August 2, 2013

Obama nominates Senate aide for FCC Republican commissioner

By Jeff Mason and Alina Selyukh

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama plans to nominate Senate aide Michael O'Rielly to fill the second Republican seat on the Federal Communications Commission, the White House said on Thursday, bringing the agency closer to operating at full capacity.

The Senate has yet to confirm Democrat Tom Wheeler as the FCC's chairman and Senate Republicans have indicated they wanted to wait for O'Rielly's nomination to pair the two for a confirmation vote after the chamber returns from an August recess in September.

The White House on Thursday also said Obama plans to nominate J. Christopher Giancarlo, an attorney and currently the executive vice president of GFI Group, as a commissioner for the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and Patrick Pizzella, a former assistant secretary of labor, as a member of the Federal Labor Relations Authority.

Giancarlo would be the first commissioner from the swaps industry, a market dominated by investment banks, with brokers such as GFI playing an essential role as trading platforms.

The CFTC was given extensive new powers to overhaul the $630 trillion swaps market after the 2007-09 credit meltdown, and has been writing scores of new rules to change the structure of the opaque market.

FCC, meanwhile, has been in a holding mode on the most controversial and critical issues such as planning for the upcoming large auction of airwaves under acting Chairwoman Mignon Clyburn.

Wheeler, tapped to become the new permanent chairman, received a vote of approval from the Senate Commerce Committee on Tuesday, although Republican Senator Ted Cruz warned he might hold up Wheeler's confirmation until the nominee voices a more specific opinion on the power of the FCC over disclosure of political donors behind election TV ads.

The nomination of O'Rielly is expected to speed up the confirmation of Wheeler, an industry veteran who is an Obama fundraiser and adviser, and a former cable and wireless lobbyist.

O'Rielly has spent nearly two decades as a Republican staffer in Congress, most recently serving as a top aide to Senator John Cornyn of Texas. He has also advised former Senator John Sununu of New Hampshire and former House Commerce Committee Chairman Tom Bliley of Virginia on telecommunications issues.

Industry insiders, noting that much of O'Rielly's work has been done outside of the spotlight, described him as deeply knowledgeable about the issues he would address at the FCC thanks to years of experience on Capitol Hill. But several also chose the word "prickly" in talking about his personal style.

O'Rielly, who had in the past been on the short list for FCC commissioner, would join Ajit Pai as the second member of the Republican minority on the five-member panel, replacing former Commissioner Robert McDowell.

"The challenge for the next Republican commissioner is going to be trying to find the balance between being effective and shaping policy versus making a statement and laying the groundwork for a court appeal or congressional action," said McDowell, who is now at the Hudson Institute think tank.

"That always breeds a tension between principles and pragmatism and he will have to balance that."

(Reporting by Jeff Mason and Alina Selyukh; Additional reporting by Douwe Miedema; Editing by Eric Walsh and Eric Beech)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/obama-nominates-senate-aide-fcc-republican-commissioner-013221102.html

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NASA's Curiosity nearing first anniversary on Mars

[unable to retrieve full-text content]NASA's Curiosity rover will mark one year on Mars next week and has already achieved its main science goal of revealing ancient Mars could have supported life. The mobile laboratory also is guiding designs for future planetary missions.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/~3/hxANKZSJIBw/130802151626.htm

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In protest, man repays insurance money with 4 tons of coins - U.S. ...

Paul Newton, AP

Workers unload dozens of bags full of coins from a Brinks Security truck on Wednesday. Four tons of quarters were delivered by Roger Herrin, who was paying off a portion of a court-ordered legal settlement ? related to a car accident in which his teenage son died ? with quarters packed into dozens of bags.

By Jim Suhr, The Associated Press

ST. LOUIS ??An Illinois businessman outraged by a court order that he return more than $500,000 in insurance money related to a 2001 wreck that killed his teenage son wanted to pay the money back in pennies in protest. But he soon recognized that was unfeasible.

So, Roger Herrin settled on quarters ? four tons of them.

Packed in 150 transparent sacks each weighing about 50 pounds, the $150,000 in coins were nearly one-third of the money an appellate court required Herrin to pay back to resolve years-long legal feuding among the crash's survivors over how $800,000 in insurance proceeds were apportioned.

Obtained from the Federal Reserve in St. Louis, the backbreaking load of quarters were brought in Wednesday by an armored vehicle and delivered on a flatbed truck to two law firms that represented other victims of the wreck.

"There was no satisfaction from doing that," Herrin, who also serves on the Southern Illinois University system's governing board, told The Associated Press on Thursday. "The loss of a child is the loss of a child, and all the money doesn't replace that.

"I just wanted to draw attention to what went on here," the 76-year-old man added before mustering a laugh. "I really wanted to do it in pennies."

It ended the legal wrangling that's happened since Herrin's 15-year-old son, Michael, was killed in June 2001. He was a passenger in a Jeep Cherokee that was broadsided by a truck that blew through a stop sign near Raleigh in southern Illinois' Saline County. Three other occupants of the Jeep were injured.

Roger Herrin got $1.6 million compensation through his own coverage. Of an additional $800,000 paid out through other insurance, the Herrin estate got the bulk of it because of Michael Herrin's death, with the remainder of that money distributed to survivors.

Those survivors appealed and won when the Mount Vernon, Ill.-based 5th District Appellate Court ruled against Roger Herrin, a retired foot surgeon whose business holdings include three southern Illinois nursing homes. Herrin has owned seven community banks, but he's sold those off in recent years.

Herrin complied in paying back the money, but "obviously in protest" with the plastic-sacked quarters he called "heavy as hell."

"I've had 10 years to think about this a little bit, and I'm very, very bitter at this ruling," he said. "It's wrong, and everybody knows it's wrong."

Mark Prince, an attorney for the Jeep's driver and her son, who was also a passenger, declined to discuss the case's merits Thursday, calling that "counterproductive" and a potential violation of a confidentiality agreement.

While saying Herrin's choice of repayment method was his prerogative, Prince said he did find the unannounced delivery "surprising" ? and a burglary risk for his law firm in Marion, Ill., given the media attention instantly foisted onto the thousands of dollars in coins.

"We've been on pins and needles because we had a lot of cash suddenly laying around [and] it was publicized," Prince said. "We don't have safes or vaults, and we lock our front door. Advance notice would have been nice, because we could have made arrangements to have it delivered to the bank."

Douglas Dorris, an attorney for the Jeep's fourth occupant, agreed.

"I am not going to criticize a man who lost his son, who is obviously upset with the decisions of the court," he said. "But I believe the decisions of the appellate court follow the law correctly."

? 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Source: http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/08/01/19820706-in-protest-man-repays-insurance-money-with-4-tons-of-coins?lite

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Thursday, August 1, 2013

Goodell satisfied Browns owner handling probe

BEREA, Ohio (AP) ? NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell says he's satisfied with Browns owner Jimmy Haslam's handling of the federal investigation into fraud at his family-owned business, and said the league has no plans to intervene at this time.

Goodell, who was at Browns training camp Thursday to launch a youth football initiative on safety, called Haslam a "man of great integrity." Goodell says Haslam has been working hard to fix the problems at Pilot Flying J, which had its headquarters raided in April by the FBI and IRS as part of a probe into fraud at the company.

Goodell said the will continue to monitor the situation, but doesn't think "it's a matter for us at this moment."

Goodell said Haslam has been in constant contact with the league to provide updates throughout the investigation.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/goodell-satisfied-browns-owner-handling-probe-205831997.html

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