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Colombia VP urges U.S to ratify trade agreement
The U.S. should ratify a free trade agreement with Colombia that was negotiated in 2007, but still awaits congressional approval, Colombian Vice President Angelino Garzon said Wednesday at a Newsmaker event at the National Press Club. Garzon's statement came a day after President Barack Obama announced that he intends to continue pursuing pending trade negotiations with Colombia and Panama. Obama mentioned the Colombia free trade agreement in his State of the Union message Tuesday, but did not propose a deadline for congressional ratification. During his Washington visit, Garzon also…
Type: News
Heart disease will increase over next 20 years, heart association head says
The American Heart Association(AHA) predicts that about 40% of the U.S. population will have some type of cardiovascular disease. AHA Chief Executive Officer Nancy Brown announced the organizations projections, based on a study on the future costs of care for hypertension, coronary heart disease, heart failure and stroke, at a Jan. 24 Newsmaker event at the National Press Club. Cardiovascular disease remains the nation’s most prevalent and costly disease, amounting to 17% of total health expenditures and annual direct and indirect costs of $444 billion, Brown said. Based on these new…
Type: News
Bregg photographs on exhibit at NPC transport viewers to Iranian hostage crisis
Canadian Photojournalist Peter Bregg was there when 52 Americans, held hostage in Iran for more than two years, stepped off a plane in Algeria, en route to freedom. "Nothing had the juices flowing like those moments," Bregg said Friday at the opening of his National Press Club exhibit. "I had goose bumps." Bregg's photographs transported NPC members and guests back 30 years when the nation was transfixed by the fate of the 52 hostages held captive in the U.S. Embassy from Nov. 4, 1979 to Jan. 20, 1981. Soon after Iranians seized the U.S. embassy, the Iranian government expelled all American…
Type: News
Pawlenty: Downward Drift Threatens U.S. Security
The nation is in a downward spiral that could deepen its economic crisis and threaten its security, former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty told a Jan. 13 luncheon audience packing the ballroom. "There is something amiss," Pawlenty said. Americans are losing their "sense of hope in the future," as result of the federal government's huge and mounting debt. He left no doubt that he would make deficit and debt reduction his prioity if he became president. He said he would decide in the next two months whether to seek the Republican Party's 2012 nomination. Pawlenty would try to end what he called the…
Type: News
Opponents Say Venezuelan President Chavez Violates Constitution
Three Venezuelan opposition political leaders from different parties told a Jan. 12 Newsmaker that "anti-democratic" actions by President Hugo Chavez and the National Assembly have led to "the alarming weakening of...Venezuelan democracy, alterations to the constitutional order and...disrespect for popular will as expressed in parliamentary elections" in September. The speakers were Omar Barboza, congressman and president of the Un Nuevo Tiempo (A New Time) political party; Ismael Garcia, congressman and general secretary of the Podemos (We Can) party; and Ramon Jose Medina, international…
Type: News
Red Cross Chief Executive Outlines Haiti Relief
Raising nearly $500 million for Haiti relief, erasing a budget deficit and strengthening its ability to generate donations through social media are among the accomplishments of the American Red Cross over the last year, according to its chief executive. “The depth and breadth of what we do continues to amaze even me,” said Gail McGovern, president and CEO of the American Red Cross, at a Jan. 12 National Press Club luncheon. The event was held on the first anniversary of the devasting Haiti earthquakes, which was also McGovern's birthday. The American Red Cross raised $479 million and spent $…
Type: News
Journalist tells Newsmaker how smuggled 'Animal Farm' translations buoyed DPs
Andrea Chalupa, a Ukrainian-American journalist, explained at a March 5 Newsmaker how George Orwell’s iconic satire on the Soviet system, “Animal Farm,” was translated into Ukrainian and smuggled into and distributed free to displaced persons (DPs) in Soviet-controlled refugee camps in East Germany after World War II. Describing how she obtained one of the rare translations, Chalupa said that one of her uncles was among the incarcerated DPs who received a smuggled copy. Decades later, Chalupa said, "I was having dinner at the home of another uncle, Vitalji Keis, a retired literary professor…
Type: News
Former Afghan deputy president urges women's voices in negotiations with the United States
Women now occupy 27 percent of the seats in the Afghan parliament but are denied voices in the government's key negotiations with the Americans, former Afghan Deputy President Sima Samar said at a March 8 Newsmaker on the eve of International Women's Day. "Women should be a part of those discussions,'" she said and urged a focus on "the rule of law" before the American pullout in 2014. But not everyone wants the rule of law, she added. Samar, a medical doctor, said U.S. policy makers should leave enough troops in Afghanistan after 2014 to ensure the country's safety. "We must have frank…
Type: News
People still try to bring guns on planes, TSA’s Pistole tells NPC
More than a decade after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, people are still trying to bring guns onto airplanes, John Pistole, administrator of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), told a Luncheon March 5. Over the recent President’s Day weekend, 19 guns were found in carry-on baggage nationwide, Pistole said. It is not believed that any of the people carrying these weapons were doing so with a malicious intent, he added. TSA matches 100 percent of all travelers in the United States against watch lists created by other agencies, Pistole said. TSA also screens all cargo…
Type: News
Mallon says Alice Longworth took John Dean's real estate in Watergate book
Although Thomas Mallon knew the story of his book, "Watergate," its characters and, thanks to the famous tapes, some of its dialogue, it didn't turn out as he expected he told the audience at a club Book Rap March 2. He thought that John Dean, White House counsel under former President Richard Nixon, would be a prominent figure in the book and Alice Roosevelt Longworth, “Mrs. L,” would be a “fairly minor” player. When Mallon finished writing, Dean was the bit player and Mrs. L was a major figure. “Maybe she took up Dean’s real estate,” Mallon said. “I just enjoyed writing about her. She ended…
Type: News