U.S. Medicare chief defends proposed Part D drug benefit reforms
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Obama administration’s top Medicare official on Tuesday defended proposed changes to the popular Part D drug benefits program for the elderly and disabled that are fiercely opposed by a broad network of drugmakers, insurers, …
Christian metal singer pleads guilty in California murder plot
SAN DIEGO (Reuters) – The lead singer for the heavy metal Christian rock band As I Lay Dying pleaded guilty in California on Tuesday to a charge of soliciting an undercover detective posing as a hit man to kill his estranged wife.
U.S. hate groups in decline as radical ideas go mainstream
ORLANDO, Florida (Reuters) – The number of radical-right hate and militia-type “patriot” groups in the United States, which peaked in 2012 after four years of explosive growth, fell significantly last year due in part to the mainstreaming of right-wing…
RSA chief faults NSA for security industry mistrust
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – The U.S. National Security Agency blurred its spying and cybersecurity missions, and that led to a broad collapse in trust between the private security industry, its customers and the government, the head of security pioneer R…
Pentagon war budget request to follow Afghan policy decisions
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Department of Defense will submit a supplemental war funding request to Congress after its next steps in Afghanistan become clearer, Acting Deputy Defense Secretary Christine Fox said on Tuesday.
Veterans healthcare bill advances in U.S. Senate
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – An expansion of healthcare and education programs for veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan cleared its first procedural hurdle on Tuesday, as Democrats in the U.S. Senate attempted to win passage of the legislation this w…
House oversight panel seeks documents on Target breach
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A House of Representatives committee with broad investigative jurisdiction has turned up the heat on Target Corp, demanding that the No. 3 U.S. retailer turn over internal documents and messages describing how and when it learned…
Asiana fined $500,000 for slow aid to crash families
(Reuters) – U.S. regulators fined Asiana Airlines Inc $500,000 on Tuesday for failing to assist the families of passengers on a flight that crashed in San Francisco in July in which three people were killed and more than 180 injured.
Obama hosts Boehner for rare, private Oval Office chat
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama and Republican House Speaker John Boehner met for about an hour on Tuesday in a rare, one-on-one Oval Office discussion between two leaders who have fought bitterly during fiscal crises over the past severa…
Pressure mounts on Arizona governor to veto bill dubbed anti-gay
PHOENIX (Reuters) – Pressure mounted on Arizona’s governor on Tuesday to veto a controversial bill described by critics as anti-gay, with at least two advisers to Republican Jan Brewer saying they had urged her to nix the measure.
