Military perks come under congressional scrutiny

CORAL GABLES, Fla. - Marine Gen. John F. Kelly works in a fortresslike headquarters near the Miami airport. Starting this fall, he will live in Casa Sur, an elegant home with a pool and gardens on one of the area?s swankiest streets.

The five-bedroom residence, across the street from the famed Biltmore Golf Course, is provided rent free to Kelly as head of U.S. Southern Command, which oversees military operations in Latin America and the ?Caribbean. The cost to the government? $160,000 a year, plus $402,000 for renovations and security improvements now underway.

Casa Sur is one of hundreds of high-end homes, villas and mansions where senior generals and admirals are billeted, according to a Pentagon report prepared for Congress last month but not publicly released.

Gen. Philip M. Breedlove, the Air Force four-star who commands NATO, gets a 15,000-square-foot 19th-century ch?teau in Belgium. Lt. Gen. Steven A. Hummer, head of Marine Forces Reserve, enjoys a 19th-century plantation house in New Orleans listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The Joint Chiefs of Staff and their deputies inhabit historic quarters in and around Washington ? all staffed with chefs, drivers, gardeners and security teams.

The perks for top military brass, a Pentagon tradition, are under increasing scrutiny in Congress at a time when budget reductions and the mandatory spending cuts known as the sequester have forced the Pentagon to cut services, close facilities, cancel training and missions, and furlough 680,000 civilian workers.

?There is no good news,? Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel told hundreds of defense workers at Joint Base Charleston in South Carolina on Wednesday after one woman, who was forced to take 11 days without pay, said she had to take a second job to support her children. ?It breaks my heart.?

In the annual appropriations bill for military construction approved by a House committee last month, lawmakers criticized the Pentagon for the ?excessive cost? of maintaining ?large and aging? homes and for the ?apparent unwillingness on the part of the [military] services to seek less expensive alternatives.?

All active-duty military personnel and their families receive free housing on bases or allowances to defray the cost of renting or buying in nearby communities. It costs the Pentagon $1.5 billion a year.

Generals say it?s necessary

Generals and admirals say they need large houses with high security ? as well as cooks and gardeners ? because they often host visiting dignitaries or preside at ceremonial events. Keeping pricey properties makes fiscal sense, they argue, because the Pentagon either already owns them or would waste money finding a suitable rental every time a senior officer is moved to a new command.

Yet changes are underway.

Source: http://www.startribune.com/world/216377481.html

URI Facebook Home Ncaa Basketball Tournament 2013 Robert Ebert chelsea handler hannibal Lena Headey

Windows Phone 8 i?in Here Drive+ uygulamas? yay?nland?

[unable to retrieve full-text content]

Source: www.donanimhaber.com --- Monday, July 22, 2013
Nokia'n?n harita hizmetlerini tek bir kategori alt?nda toplayarak Here ?eklinde yeniden yap?land?rmas?n?n ard?ndan, bu hizmetler yava? yava? Nokia cihazlar?na ?zg? olmaktan ??k?yor. D?nyada 95 ?lkede ?evrimd??? ve ad?m ad?m sesli navigasyon sunan Here Drive+, art?k t?m Windows Phone 8 kullan?c?lar?na sunulmaya ba?lad?. ...

Source: http://www.donanimhaber.com/Windows_Phone_8_icin_Here_Drive_uygulamasi_yayinlandi-48362.htm

scotty mccreery megan fox pregnant metta world peace suspension apple earnings report john l smith apple earnings the glass castle

How we're renegotiating our marriage with our yearly "relationship ...

Homie Cassandra left this awesome comment on our post about long-term relationships. So of course we asked her to elaborate and turn it into an awesome guest post.

When I was in my 20s I went to acting school in NYC. I had a terrible and abusive teacher whom I ended up despising. Despite that, she mentioned something one day that had a great influence on me. She was approaching her 35th wedding anniversary and offhandedly said that she and her husband renegotiated their marriage each year on their anniversary. I loved the idea and 13 years later, when I started dating my husband, incorporated it on the anniversary of our first date.

So for our anniversary we have our "relationship summit" or our "State Of The Union" address. We talk about where we are and what we want and if changes need to be made. This can be anything from "I don't want children, and if you do I love you and don't want to deprive you of them, so maybe we should part ways" (dating anniversary #2), to "pick up your socks" (somewhere around wedding anniversary #3 or 4), to "I see recurring patterns that cause you suffering. And even though this isn't about me, I don't want to get to old age and still see you suffering. Will you please think about getting some counseling, for the both of us?" (last year).

But what's more important is the time when we come to "I want to stay married to you for another year." It really is optional. A few years ago when mid-life crisis hit my husband and I was afraid he was thinking about leaving I reminded him that he had re-upped for at least another 10 months and he owed it to me to hang and see if we could work it out. We did.

We shared this practice at our wedding, which was on our anniversary (which happens to be Valentine's Day). We even had a wedding "intermission" where we went off into seclusion to do the summit. It was a great opportunity to be alone for 15 minutes and to really center ourselves.

These are the big issues. Ones that can't be solved when things are heated and doors are slamming. Ones that won't resolve themselves with makeup sex.

I remember once talking to a younger person about it in our early years and he said "That's great. That means you actually talk about stuff." It may seem like an artifice but we do, indeed, talk about stuff. Usually over a nice dinner (before drinks). And it's not just limited to that once a year.

A few weeks ago, after I had a disturbing dream where my husband told me he was leaving for greener pastures, I talked to him and said "I don't want to be just the greener pasture, I want to be the greenest pasture. And I want you to think about it for our next summit." These are the big issues. Ones that can't be solved when things are heated and doors are slamming. Ones that won't resolve themselves with makeup sex.

So even though that teacher wasn't great she did teach me som'n. Wasn't about acting but it was about life. And though I still wouldn't thank her to her face I will spread her lesson. Think about it. It works for us. We've been together for 19 years now and married for 13 and I see a long future ahead. One that we'll live without feeling terminally trapped but with freedom of choice.

Source: http://offbeathome.com/2013/06/how-were-renegotiating-our-marriage-with-our-yearly-relationship-summit

Kids Choice Awards 2013 Joe Weider Florida Gulf Coast Golf Channel Andy Enfield La Salle University Denny Hamlin

Kerry pledges US help for India's massive higher ed needs | MinnPost

On a visit to?India,?US Secretary of State John Kerry?pushed today for greater bilateral cooperation on higher education, stating that his host's education system is facing "gigantic challenges."

With the world's advanced economies facing a graying workforce, India will head into the next decade with a median age of 29 and two-thirds of its people of working age. That's a huge potential boon for India ? but only if those workers are educated. Currently, only 18 percent of its youth get any higher education.?

Addressing the third round of the Singh-Obama Knowledge Initiative in Delhi, Secretary Kerry announced eight institutional partnerships and pledged to help with skill development of Indian youth. "We need to make sure that next generation of innovators and entrepreneurs have the skills and training," he said.

India had set itself a goal of?building 1,000 universities and 50,000 colleges in this decade, something the Monitor?devoted a cover story?last year to exploring. Given the enormity of that task in a short time frame, the country is also looking for quicker, less traditional means of spreading post-secondary education including online education and community colleges. For the latter, India is looking to the US as a model, with plans of establishing 200 large American-style community colleges.

"The quality of higher education in India is a matter of concern and cooperation with the?United States?can help with that. We seek to increase our higher education enrollment ratio to 30 percent by 2020 and skill development will be a key part of it," says Ashok Thakur, secretary of higher education in the Indian government.

Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and President Obama had announced their joint Initiative in November 2009, pledging $5 million each for higher education cooperation through projects that will work on educational reform, foster economic growth, generate shared knowledge to address global challenges, and develop junior faculty at Indian and American institutions of higher learning.?

The eight memoranda of understanding signed between the two countries today included the Harvard-India Nutrition Initiative between Harvard School of Public Health and St. John's Research Institute, Bangalore; between Aligarh Muslim University and Ohio State University, and between Assam Agricultural University and Washington State University.

Next month, new Indian rules will go into effect that open the door to US universities opening campuses in India. The offer is only open to the most prestigious nonprofit institutions, which will diminish the impact of the ruling.?

In the area of online education, India is laying a high-bandwidth network of fiber optic cables between the nation's top universities. Officials here are looking to the US for ideas on how to deliver high-quality lessons online. A memorandum of understanding signed today between the Indian Institute of Technology, Mumbai and the?Massachusetts Institute of Technology?will bring to India the edX online course platform founded by MIT along with Harvard University. edX offers free university-level courses worldwide.?

The United States is also encouraging its students to study in India's elite educational institutions. There are currently 5,000 American students in Indian Universities, and the number is expected to triple in the next five years. Yet that number is a fraction of those heading to more mature and internationally recognized institutions in Europe.

"Ultimately India has to focus on institution building and giving its students the best teachers,"??says Prof. Yash Pal, who chaired a 2009 commission that advised structural changes in India's higher education system. "There's only so much that outsiders can help."

Source: http://www.minnpost.com/christian-science-monitor/2013/06/kerry-pledges-us-help-indias-massive-higher-ed-needs

WrestleMania 29 Lilly Pulitzer Ben And Jerrys Accidental Racist Lyrics Mad Men Jenna Jameson melissa mccarthy

Police dog killed, officer shot in Indiana standoff

By Elisha Fieldstadt, NBC News

A K-9 officer was shot and killed in Sellersburg, Indiana at the start of a nine-hour police standoff with a man who fled from and shot at?officers trying to serve him with a warrant on Monday, police said.

Sellersburg police officers approached a man with a warrant and he ran away and then fired several shots, said Sellersburg Police Trooper Brock McCooe. The shots?hit a police dog and a deputy.

The human officer was shot in the leg and was in stable condition at a nearby hospital, but the K-9 officer was fatally wounded, said McCooe.

According to NBC affiliate Wave 3 News, the dog's name was Kilo, and he had assisted with numerous drug busts.

The suspect ran into a house? that was empty at the time and barricaded himself inside, officials said.

Judy Frazier lives three houses away from where the suspect holed up, and said she had not been able to leave her own home for most of the afternoon and evening.

?The SWAT teams are on roofs they?re in yards, they?re everywhere,? she said while the standoff continued.

McCooe said the suspect finally responded to commands through a loudspeaker a little after 9:30 p.m. ?He just walked out and gave up,? he said.

In a statement following the suspect?s surrender, Sellersburg Police Chief Russ Whelan said the man came out of a closet and then emerged out of the backdoor wearing a torn up t-shirt and his boxer shorts. He was unarmed and not injured even though Whelan said police had thrown about 40 tear gas canisters into the house.

?Now the work starts as far as processing the scene and collecting the evidence and building our case,? said Whelan.

Authorities on Monday night had not yet released the name of the captured man.

The wounded officer, Chris Proctor, is a member of the Clark County SWAT team, who were early to the scene to assist Sellersburg police. Clark County Sheriff Daniel Rodden said Proctor will have surgery on his knee on Tuesday morning but is ?in good spirits.?

Source: http://feeds.nbcnews.com/c/35002/f/653381/s/2dbc132b/l/0Lusnews0Bnbcnews0N0C0Inews0C20A130C0A60C240C191195180Epolice0Edog0Ekilled0Eofficer0Eshot0Ein0Eindiana0Estandoff0Dlite/story01.htm

Arlen Specter Winsor McCay Amanda Todd washington nationals Gary Collins bus driver uppercut Alex Karras

Christian Rocker Slams Kanye West as Blasphemous, False God

Source: http://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/2013/06/christian-rocker-slams-kanye-west-as-blasphemous-false-god/

Gangnam Style Ryan Lanza Sandy Hook Univision josh hamilton Susan Rice the Who

Page Not Found - Yahoo!

Please check the URL for proper spelling and capitalization. If you're having trouble locating a destination on Yahoo!, try visiting the Yahoo! homepage or look through a list of Yahoo!'s online services.

Please try Yahoo Help Central if you need more assistance.

Source: http://rss.news.yahoo.com/rss/weightloss

berkshire hathaway ufc 144 james jones james jones black forest aladdin ufc 144 fight card