Hope to advert government shutdown

President Obama is expected to announce today that the shutdown had been averted.

Some progress towards the adverting of the shutdown has been made on Thursday evening, when Obama had a meeting with the Republican speaker, John Boehner, and the and the Democrat Senate leader, Harry Reid. The President was optimistic at the end of the meeting, saying he is hoping the differences have been narrowed.

800,000 federal staff risk to be suspended without pay and a range of government services will be withdrawn as hundreds of agencies either continue with a reduced operation or close altogether, if a deal is not reached between the two sides.

The President said: "I have just completed another meeting with the speaker. We made some additional progress this evening. I am not prepared to express wild optimism, but I think we are further along today than we were yesterday."

Boehner and Reid confirmed Obama's statement, their joint position says some differences have been narrowed,  and their staff is still working to reach an agreement.



Reid said: "The numbers are basically there. But I'm not nearly as optimistic – and that's an understatement – as I was 11 hours ago. The numbers are extremely close. Our differences are no longer over how much savings we get on government spending. The only thing holding up an agreement is an ideology."

The Republican controlled House passed a bill that would keep the federal government going for at least another week, but the Democrat-controlled Senate is not going to pass, also President Obama is expected to veto it.

While the Republicans oped for a cut in the federal deficit of $40bn, the Democrats made a compromise offer of $34.5bn on Wednesday.

US Congress is sending warning letters to staff saying they will be suspended from this weekend. Hundreds of thousands of other workers will also be affected by the government shutdown. From this letters, people in the staff find out whether they are regarded as essential or not. The White House, the Pentagon and the federal agencies applied the same procedure with their staff. If the agreement is not reached, the government will begin stopping everything, including payments to troops in Afghanistan, Iraq.

Justin Bieber joins FC Barcelona ...

... for a training session.

After last night's amazing game against(5-1 against Shaktar Donetsk), FC Barcelona today's training session included international music star Justin Bieber.

 Bieber has been at the first team training session and took part in a training match with some players.

 As he is approximately the size of Leo Messi, Bieber is expected to be the new sensation of FC Barcelona.

Italian Prime Minister In Court

Silvio Berlusconi goes on trial today on charges he paid for sex with a teenager then abused his powers to cover the case.

This is just one of the legal issues of the Conservative leader, he is already a defendant in three other separate trials which relate to his business empire.

Leaked legal dossiers revealed that the Italian prosecutors will introduce pictures of half-naked young women at the "bunga bunga" orgy, hosted by Silvio Berlusconi as evidence in the upcoming trial where the Italian Prime Minister is accused of corruption and paying for prostitution.

Further details about the so called "RUBY CASE", along with the facts that the Italian Prime Minister is accused of the following facts:

- Moroccan nightclub dancer Karima El Mahroug, also known as "Ruby", has been paid for attending Berlusconi's "bunga bunga" orgies, the prosecutors say;

- "Ruby" was 17 years old when Mr. Berlusconi paid her for sexual favors;

- charges against Silvio Berlusconi involve abuse of powers while trying to  hide his relationship with underage Karima and putting preassure on local police to release her after she was detained for allegationsof theft;

Silvio Berlusconi rejects the charges of paying for sex and claims he did not have sex with Ruby, though he also mentioned that she lied to him, saying her age was 24. Mr. Berlusconi admits calling police in May 2010, but he claims he was trying to avoid diplomatic relations issues with Egypt, as he had been told that Karima El Mahroug was a relative of Mr. Hosni Mubarak, the President of Egypt.

The other three cases Berlusconi is involved are, the MEDIASET case, the MEDIATRADE case and the Mills case.

In the Mediaset case, AC Milan president, Silvio Berlusconi along with executives of Mediaset holding are accused of inflating prices they paid for acquisition of television rights using offshore and skimming off part of the sum to create illegal slush funds. Italy's constitutional court lifted Berlusconi's automatic immunity from prosecution, so the trial resumed on February 28.

Prime Minister's son, Pier Silvio Berlusconi, deputy chairman of Mediaset, is also involved in the Mediatrade case, they are accused of fraud on acquisition of television rights for inflated prices.

In the Mills case, Berlusconi is accused of bribing British lawyer David Mills to give false testimony in court and withhold incriminating details of business dealings. Mr. Mills was convicted of taking the bribe, but a higher court effectively shelved the case by ruling that under Italy's statute of limitations, the offence was committed too long ago for him to be punished.

Spain at Coppa America .. ?

The 11 March earthquake and tsunami that followed it along with the ongoing nuclear crisis have stopped Japan's national soccer team from joining the other teams in the Coppa America competition.


The tournament will take place in July, and will be hosted by Argentina. Japan were drawn in group A, along with Argentina, Colombia and Bolivia.



The organizers of the tournament turned to Spain as a replacement. Spanish football federation president promised to provide an answer after discussing it with the board.

"Next week or the week after we will determine at a meeting of the board of directors whether we will accept the invitation. I don’t rule anything out when the request is made with affection and love, but at the same time taking into account the difficulties. That doesn’t mean we are going or not, but as president I have the obligation to take it to the board" said Angel Maria Villar, president of the Spanish soccer federation.

Japan Nuclear Threat: Increased radiation level in USA, Minnesota

Fukushima radiation cloud is being more and more felt inside territories far from Japan. A increased radiation level was detected in rainwater samples collected in Saint Paul, twin city of Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Despite Environmental Protection Agency reassures that are below a dangerous level, citizens of the Twin Cities still fell worried about the air they breath or the water they drink daily.

According to EPA spokesperson, Phillippa Cannon: "EPA scientists routinely test precipitation samples from more than 30 sites in the U.S., that includes rain, snow, and sleet. Since the Japanese nuclear incident, EPA has accelerated that routine precipitation sampling." EPA said that increased radiation levels have been detected in the states of Idaho and California.

During its regular radiation testing, Minnesota Department of Health included testing around the power plants in Prairie Island and Monticello. Samples from the roof of St. Paul's Freeman Building have been analyzed.

Sue McClanahan, radiation specialist with the Minnesota Department of Health said: "All of the readings that we have gotten up to this date have been significantly lower than anything that we have to be concerned about. [...] One of the things about radiation no matter where it is or where it’s coming from, you can’t see it, smell it or feel it.”

Despite the low level of concern, EPA increased monitoring of rain and drinking water.

Richter 6 quake rocks India

New Delhi: An Richter 6 earthquake having its epicenter was in Nepal rocked parts of northern India, including Delhi and suburbs of Dehli on Monday night.

The first reports coming from Noida and Delhi said the quake was strong enough and made furniture in buildings tremble.

The quake was recorded by India seismic monitoring network at 5.01 PM ET and its depth was 10 km.

Obama reelection campaign launched

President's Obama's reelection campaign for the elections in November 2012 has been launched today.

Within this very well planned and calculated step, which tallies with the the second fundraising quarter of the year, president Obama said he filled the paperwork for the Federal Elections Commission to allow him begin the fund raising. After filing the paperwork, he will be allowed to start the raising money.
Obama e-mail campaigns directed his supporters to the new campaign website www.barackobama.com to see the elections campaign launch video:



Obama seems to be exploiting the global crisis issue in his campaign, as he claims that his politics creed is to be close to the people and spread the word through the mouth of people, rather than spending precious money on TV ad or fancy advertising campaign, as his email to supporters states: "We're doing this now because the politics we believe in does not start with expensive TV ads or extravaganzas, but with you -- with people organizing block-by-block, talking to neighbors, co-workers, and friends. And that kind of campaign takes time to build".