Dems, GOP play game of chicken as shutdown looms

Washington (CNN) -- What looked last week like a game of political hot potato has become a high-stakes game of chicken, with continued operation of the federal government and possible wider impact on the overall economy hanging in the balance.

In a move that makes a shutdown appear very likely, House Republicans approved a spending plan early Sunday morning that would delay Obamacare for a year and repeal its tax on medical devices.

The temporary budget resolution now goes back to the Senate, where Democrats have consistently said any changes to President Barack Obama's signature health care law would be a deal-killer.

On top of that, Obama has already issued a veto threat.

If Washington can't reach a deal, a government shutdown will begin at 12:01 a.m. Tuesday.

Congress could avert a shutdown by passing a temporary spending measure while the two chambers work out their differences.

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Obamacare premium rates lower than expected

The Obamacare premiums will cost less than predicted, according to data released Wednesday by the Obama administration.

The release provided the first look into rates for consumers buying individual insurance on the 36 federally run exchanges.

The national average premium for the benchmark plan will be $328 a month before subsidies, 16% less than projected by the Congressional Budget Office. The benchmark is the second-lowest cost "silver" policy for 48 states, upon which federal subsidies are based.

Subsidies will offer maximum caps for low- and moderate-income Americans in the benchmark plans. But for those who opt for other levels of coverage, or make too much to qualify for subsidies, prices vary widely based on one's age, income and state.

For instance, a 27-year-old living in Dallas making $25,000 could pay as little as $74 a month for the cheapest "bronze" plan after subsidies, according to the Department of Health and Human Services.

But a 60-year-old in Wyoming who makes more than $46,000 a year -- too much to get a tax credit -- could pay as much as $758 for a similar plan.

The majority of people uninsured today will be able to find a policy for $100 or less a month, taking into account subsidies and Medicaid eligibility, the administration said

Work it out: Main Street fed up over Beltway shutdown battle

Washington (CNN) -- As the country spirals toward a possible government shutdown in less than a week, most Americans, according to polls, are frustrated by the partisan stubbornness and don't want that shutdown to happen.

"Our country was founded on a great compromise," Casey Fos, a lawyer from New Orleans suburb of Covington, Louisiana, tells CNN.

In this showdown toward the shutdown, public opinion is a crucial factor, and the latest national surveys also suggest that Democrats and Republicans have numbers to bolster their arguments.

Shutdown showdown moves to Senate

A shutdown of the government would kick in if Congress doesn't hammer out a new spending plan by Tuesday, the start of the new federal budget year. Republicans in the House have tied any deal to defunding the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare.

Americans want compromise

Two polls released Monday indicate that a majority of Americans want their lawmakers to compromise rather than stick to their principles. Fifty-seven percent of those questioned in a Pew Research Center poll say they want lawmakers to compromise with one in three saying members of Congress should stand by their principles even if the government shuts down.

And the public, by a 53%-25% margin, say it is more important for political leaders in Washington to compromise rather than sticking to their beliefs, according to a Gallup poll.
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Navy Yard Shooting Photos, Video Of Aaron Alexis Released By FBI

WASHINGTON -- Aaron Alexis was prepared to die and held onto the delusional belief that he was being controlled by extremely low-frequency electromagnetic waves when he shot and killed 12 people during his attack on Washington Navy Yard earlier this month, FBI officials said at a press conference Wednesday.

FBI officials on Wednesday released a series of photos and a video from the Washington Navy Yard that show Alexis preparing to carry out the attack. Alexis is not believed to have been targeting any specific individuals, and apparently did not know any of his victims, Valerie Parlav, assistant director in charge of the FBI's Washington Field Office, said at the press conference.

Alexis carved “End to the torment!” “Not what yall say!” and “Better off this way!” on the weapon he used.

Authorities released this timeline of the attack:

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John Kerry Set To Talk With Iran, As Hopes Rise For Obama-Rouhani Handshake

WASHINGTON -- The White House on Monday confirmed that Secretary of State John Kerry plans to meet face to face with Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif later this week, the latest sign of a possible diplomatic thaw between United States and Iran after 34 years of hostility.

In the highest-level face-to-face between U.S. and Iranian officials since 1979, Kerry and Zarif will meet in New York to talk about Iran's nuclear program, along with representatives from five other countries. For the last several years, under a framework known as P5 Plus One -- for the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council plus Germany -- the U.S., the U.K., China, Russia, France and Germany have exchanged proposals on this topic with Iran.

Shortly after the White House confirmed the Kerry-Zarif meeting, State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki issued a statement reaffirming the United States' readiness "to work with Iran," provided the administration of newly sworn-in Iranian President Hassan Rouhani will "choose to engage seriously.

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Gun Control Polls Find Support Sliding For Harsher Laws

Support for stricter gun laws has dropped since reaching a peak just after the school shooting in Newtown, Conn., according to two polls conducted immediately following this week's Navy Yard shooting in Washington, D.C. However, both surveys found that support for stricter laws remains higher than it was before the Newtown shooting.

In a new HuffPost/YouGov poll, 48 percent of Americans said they think gun laws should be made more strict, while 16 percent said they should be made less strict and 29 percent said they preferred no change. Support for stricter gun laws in the poll is down from a high of 60 percent in a YouGov/Economist poll conducted in January, weeks after the Newtown shooting. And when it comes to ways to reduce the likelihood of future violence, many people didn't look to gun laws. By a 57 percent to 29 percent margin, the HuffPost/YouGov poll found that most people think better mental health care is more likely to prevent future mass shootings than stricter gun laws. Similarly, the Gallup poll found that 48 percent of Americans place a "great deal" of blame for mass shootings on the "failure of the mental health system to identify individuals who are a danger to others," compared to 40 percent who said the same of "easy access to guns."

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Al-Shabaab grew amid Somalia's lawlessness

(CNN) -- Al-Shabaab, an al Qaeda-linked militant group based in Somalia, claimed responsibility for the deadly attack at Kenyan mall on Saturday. Here is a Q and A that looks at this group:

What is Al-Shabaab and what are its aims?

Al-Shabaab is a Somalian group that was designated as a foreign terrorist organization by the U.S. government in March 2008. It is seeking to turn Somalia into a fundamentalist Islamic state, according to the Council on Foreign Relations, which published a backgrounder on the group in July.

The group is believed to be responsible for attacks in Somalia that have killed international aid workers, journalists, civilian leaders and African Union peacekeepers.

It has struck abroad, too. It was responsible for the July 2010 suicide bombings in Kampala, Uganda, that killed more than 70 people, including a U.S. citizen, as they gathered to watch a World Cup final soccer match.

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Somali jihadists recruit in U.S., Canada, Europe

CNN) -- The weekend massacre at an upscale shopping center in Kenya is shining a new light on an old concern for Western counter terrorism officials: the recruitment of jihadist fighters from Somali communities in the United States, Canada, and Europe.

It's a concern all too familiar for many Somali-American families in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where young men have been slipping away to join the al Qaeda-affiliated guerrilla group Al-Shabaab for the past few years, sometimes in groups. Several have died, their relatives learning of their deaths in cryptic phone calls or in messages posted online.

One of those killed was Burhan Hassan, who was killed fighting in Somalia. His uncle, Abdirizak Bihi, told CNN that members of the city's Somali community have been trying to counteract the recruitment efforts.

"What we have learned for the last five years is we have to speak out against this," Bihi said.

Al-Shabaab breaks new ground with complex Nairobi attack

In a message on its now-suspended Twitter page, Al-Shabaab named nine people it said were among the gunmen who stormed Nairobi's Westgate Mall on Saturday. Three of them were from the United States and one each was from Canada, Finland and the United Kingdom, it said.

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Government shutdown gears in motion

Experts agree: A federal government shutdown would be a dumb way to go.

Yet the risk of a shutdown on Oct. 1 is now a distinct possibility. And federal agencies have been instructed to make plans for one just in case.

The House on Friday will vote on a short-term government funding bill that will include a provision todefund Obamacare. That provision is a no-go for Senate Democrats and President Obama.

If they can't work out a compromise, many functions of the federal government will be shut down indefinitely on Oct. 1.

Besides causing inconvenience and delays, a shutdown could have larger consequences.

A long, broad shutdown could weaken an already modest economic recovery, Congressional Budget Office Director Douglas Elmendorf said Wednesday.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, meanwhile, noted that "a government shutdown and, perhaps even more so, a failure to raise the debt limit could have very serious consequences for the financial markets and for the economy."

To say nothing of the fact that a shutdown wouldn't come cheap. Federal agencies have to use up time, energy and resources to plan for one. Shutting down, and then reopening the government, also costs money. Two shutdowns in the mid-1990s cost an estimated $1.4 billion, according to the Congressional Research Service.

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Facebook ‘liking’ is protected free speech, federal court says

A federal appeals court ruled Wednesday that ‘liking’ something on Facebook is a form of protected free speech in a closely watched Virginia case that tested the limits of the First Amendment in the digital age.

The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond rejected a lower court’s opinion that clicking the ubiquitous “thumbs up” icon was not “actual speech,” an opinion that would have had wide-ranging implications for millions of Facebook users and other new forms of expression on the web if it had stood.

“[Liking] is the Internet equivalent of displaying a political sign in one’s front yard, which the Supreme Court has held is substantive speech,” the three judge panel wrote in their 81-page opinion.

The ruling grew out of a lawsuit brought by Hampton sheriff’s deputies, one of whom claimed he was fired for liking the campaign page of his boss’s opponent. Daniel Ray Carter, Jr. said the dismissal violated his First Amendment rights in the 2011 suit.

But U.S. District Court Judge Raymond A. Jackson issued a summary judgement against Carter in January 2012, saying ‘liking’ didn’t rise to the level of protected speech. Jackson said Carter needed to have made actual statements to make such a claim.

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E-ZPasses Track Vehicles In NY Even Off Toll Roads

New York's E-ZPass uses a radio-frequency identification sensor, or RFID tag, which allows residents of the Big Apple to pay road tolls electronically. But most drivers don't know that the state is using the passes to gather data far from toll booths, according to an article in Forbes.

Internet hacker "Puking Monkey" wanted to see where his RFID tag was being scanned. He rigged the E-ZPass so a light would turn on and a toy cow would moo every time the RFID tag was read. He found his pass being read several times on short trips around New York, far from any tollbooths.

While speaking at the hacker convention Defcon, Puking Monkey called his findings "intrusive and unsettling." Tag readers on the streets are part of New York's traffic initiative "Midtown in Motion", which uses the passes to track traffic movement to improve flow. The New York Department of Transportation wasn't forthcoming about the program, but TransCore, the manufactures of the RFID tags used in E-ZPasses, told Forbes via email "The tag ID is scrambled to make it anonymous ... the system cannot identify the tag user and does not keep any record of the tag sightings."

Still, it's an unsettling reminder that if the state of New York can track drivers without notifying them, potentially anyone can. Puking Monkey told the crowd at Defcon that drivers can protect themselves by keeping their E-ZPasses in a bag and bringing them out when driving through tollbooths. Laws governing electronic information gathering are hazy and undefined in most states. Californians have their cars photographed and tracked by police, with no transparency on how that data is being used.

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Miss America Nina Davuluri brushes off racist remarks

Social media was abuzz overnight in the wake of Nina Davuluri being crowned as Miss America 2014.

And a lot of the tweets were attacks on the fact that she is the first woman of Indian descent to win the pageant and wear the crown.

She was referred to as "the Arab," by some and other commenters noted "This is America, not India." One called her "Miss 7-11."

There were those who huffed about it being inappropriately close to 9/11.

Some mentioned ties to al-Qaeda and at least one flat-out called her a terrorist.

Buzzfeed collected many of them. Some have already been deleted.

Davuluri brushed it all off in her first news conference after winning the crown.

"I'm so happy this organization has embraced diversity," she said, according to AP. "I'm thankful there are children watching at home who can finally relate to a new Miss America."

As for the negativty, she said, "I have to rise above that. I always viewed myself as first and foremost American."

Meanwhile, Davuluri, 24, started her reign having to apologize and explain about a different story entirely.

On Good Morning America Monday, she answered questions about a story that surfaced several days before Sunday night's pageant.

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Arkansas School Tells 3 Students Not To Return After Finding They Could Be HIV-Positive

Three students in Arkansas have been barred from attending school after administrators began to suspect they might be HIV-positive, according to local Arkansas outlet 5 NEWS.

Pea Ridge Public School officials told the students, who are siblings, that they could not attend school until they provided documentation regarding their HIV status. Officials had previously found records suggesting that one of the students and the biological mother may be HIV-positive, according to a press release from The Disability Rights Center (DRC) of Arkansas last week.

The students, two of whom have disabilities, returned to school the next day without documentation regarding their HIV status. When they arrived, they were kept from class, and officials asked their foster parents to bring the students home, the press release stated.

The Americans with Disabilities Act prohibits schools from excluding students based on their HIV status.

“The actions taken by the Superintendent of Pea Ridge School District are appalling and is reminiscent of times past and the case of Ryan White,” Tom Masseau, executive director of DRC, said in a press release. “The fact that the foster families have to provide documentation that the children are HIV negative before entering the school is unlawful and immoral.”

On Monday, the school district released a statement confirming that it was requiring the siblings to provide documentation of their HIV status, local outlet KNWA-TV reports. The statement reads, in part:

As reported in the media, the district has recently required some students to provide test results regarding their HIV status in order to formulate a safe and appropriate education plan for those children. This rare requirement is due to certain actions and behaviors that place students and staff at risk.

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Washington Naval Yard Attacked, 13 dead including one shooter

Washington (CNN) -- The FBI has identified the dead suspect in Monday's shooting rampage at the Washington Navy Yard as Aaron Alexis, a 34-year-old military contractor from Texas.

But authorities are still searching for more information about him, and they're asking members of the public for help.

If you have information regarding Aaron Alexis or the Navy Yard shooting, call 1-800-CALL-FBI or visit the FBI's website.

"No piece of information is too small," said Valerie Parlave, assistant director in charge of the Washington FBI Field Office. "We are looking to learn everything we can about his recent movements, his contacts and associates."

In addition to the gunman, authorities said at least 12 people were killed and about 12 others were injured in the shooting, which put government buildings on lockdown and sent police SWAT teams rushing to the scene.

It's unclear whether another gunman also opened fire at the headquarters for Naval Sea Systems Command -- and why the shooting occurred, Washington Mayor Vincent Gray told reporters.

"We'll continue to seek information about what the motive is. We don't have any reason at this stage to suspect terrorism," he said, "but certainly it has not been ruled out."

Police said one other gunman may be on the loose. Authorities earlier said there could be two gunmen at large, but later said one of them had been cleared.

The other possible suspect described by police -- a black male, between 40 and 50, wearing an "olive drab-colored" military-style uniform -- has not been ruled out, Gray said.

"We still don't know all the facts. But we do know that several people have been shot and some have been killed," President Barack Obama said earlier Monday afternoon. "So we are confronting yet another mass shooting. And today it happened on a military installation in our nation's capital."
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If elected, McAuliffe faces showdown with Va. House Republicans over Obamacare

RICHMOND — Terry McAuliffe has made Medicaid expansion central to his bid for governor, saying it would provide health insurance to 400,000 needy Virginians, create thousands of jobs and provide the state with a $2 billion a year windfall.

Some Republicans say his push to expand the health-care program could lead to something less appealing: a government shutdown.

 “I will not sign a budget in Virginia unless it includes the Medicaid expansion,” McAuliffe said this summer in an interview with AARP. He made a similar comment at a dinner with Loudoun County Democrats, the Loudoun Times reported in June.

Given overwhelming opposition to expansion in the GOP-dominated House of Delegates, that campaign promise amounts to a threat to hold the state budget hostage to McAuliffe’s Medicaid goal, some Republicans say. Critics say it also shows that McAuliffe, who has billed himself as a bipartisan consensus builder, would take a highly partisan, autocratic approach to governing.

“Terry McAuliffe wants to paint himself as a bipartisan problem-solver, but he’s already drawing red lines and threatening Washington-style government shutdowns here in Virginia,” said House Speaker William J. Howell (R-Stafford).

McAuliffe’s campaign said he was not threatening a shutdown, just expressing the importance he places on expansion.

“Medicaid expansion is a top priority for Terry and a goal shared by mainstream Republicans in Virginia and across the country,” McAuliffe spokesman Josh ­Schwerin said in an e-mail. “Nobody is arguing for a government shutdown. Terry hopes to work in a bipartisan way to get this mainstream accomplishment done

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Colorado floods: Over 500 unaccounted for as 'devastating' rain looms

Boulder, Colorado (CNN) -- Colorado residents are keeping a wary eye on the sky as more rain is forecast for Sunday. As dawn broke, officials worried about continued rescue operations.

"We're going to be in for some steady rain over the next 12 hours," said Kim Kobel, a spokesperson for Boulder's Office of Emergency Management. It shouldn't total more than 1 to 2 inches though. "So that's the good news," Kobel said.

Still, authorities worry that any additional water on ground that's already soaked by up to 15 inches of rain will cause more flooding and dislodge mud and debris. Also, the omnipresent clouds pose a problem for aerial rescue efforts. "It's unlikely at this point that we'll be able to reach those who are stranded in the hard-to-reach areas," Kobel said.

Hundreds unaccounted for

At least four deaths have been blamed on the flooding, and a fifth person is presumed dead. More than 500 were unaccounted for, although authorities cautioned that designation included people who simply have not yet contacted concerned relatives elsewhere.

Elected officials were looking past the crisis to plan the recovery.

Gov. John Hickenlooper said he spoke by phone with U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx, who "was adamant that the $5 million that was released Friday was just the beginning" of federal assistance.

"We're going to come back and rebuild better than it was before," the governor said.

Hickenlooper said experts from Vermont will arrive next week to share lessons about improved road-building learned in the wake of Hurricane Irene.

More than 1,100 have cancer after 9-11

Reggie Hilaire was a rookie cop on September 11, 2001. He worked at ground zero for 11 days beside his colleagues -- many of them, including Hilaire, not wearing a mask. He was later assigned to a landfill in Staten Island, where debris from the World Trade Center was dumped.

For about 60 days between 2001 and 2002, the New York police officer was surrounded by dust.

In 2005, Hilaire was diagnosed with thyroid cancer. He underwent surgery and radiation. Just months later his doctor told him he also had multiple myeloma, a blood cancer that multiplies the body's plasma cells to dangerous levels.

It's a cancer that usually strikes much later in life. Hilaire was 34.

More than 1,100 people who worked or lived near the World Trade Center on 9/11 have been diagnosed with cancer, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

A few months ago Hilaire received a letter from the CDC's National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, officially offering him medical insurance under the World Trade Center Health Program. About 1,140 people have been certified to receive cancer treatment under the WTC Health Program, a representative told CNN.

These are the first numbers released since the program was expanded a year ago.

In September 2012, federal health authorities added 58 types of cancer to the list of covered illnesses for people who were exposed to toxins at the site of the World Trade Center in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks.

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John Kerry: U.S., Russia Reach Deal On Syrian Chemical Weapons

GENEVA — After days of intense negotiations, the United States and Russia reached agreement Saturday on a framework to secure and destroy Syria's chemical weapons by mid-2014 and impose U.N. penalties if the Assad government fails to comply.

The deal, announced by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in Geneva, includes what Kerry called "a shared assessment" of the weapons stockpile, and a timetable and measures for Syrian President Bashar Assad to follow so that the full inventory can be identified and seized.

The U.S. and Russia agreed to immediately press for a U.N. Security Council resolution that enshrines the chemical weapons agreement under Chapter 7 of the U.N. Charter, which can authorize both the use of force and nonmilitary measures.

President Barack Obama made clear that "if diplomacy fails, the United States remains prepared to act."

Russia, which already has rejected three resolutions on Syria, would be sure to veto a U.N. move toward military action, and U.S. officials said they did not contemplate seeking such an authorization.

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WASHINGTON — President Obama is prepared to move ahead with a limited military strike on Syria, administration officials said Thursday, despite a stinging rejection of such action by America’s stalwart ally Britain and mounting questions from Congress.

The negative vote in Britain’s Parliament was a heavy blow to Prime Minister David Cameron, who had pledged his support to Mr. Obama and called on lawmakers to endorse Britain’s involvement in a brief operation to punish the government of President Bashar al-Assad for apparently launching a deadly chemical weapons attack last week that killed hundreds.

The vote was also a setback for Mr. Obama, who, having given up hope of getting United Nations Security Council authorization for the strike, is struggling to assemble a coalition of allies against Syria

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