Obama: Kenya at a ‘crossroads’ between peril and promise, says country faces ‘tough choices’
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — Declaring Kenya at a “crossroads” between promise and peril, President Barack Obama on Sunday pressed the nation of his father’s birth to root out corruption, treat women and minorities as equal citizens, and take responsibility for its future.
Closing his historic visit with an address to the Kenyan people, Obama traced the arc of the country’s evolution from colonialism to independence, as well as his own family’s history here. Today, Obama said, young Kenyans are no longer constrained by the limited options of his grandfather, a cook for the country’s former British rulers, or his father, who left to seek an education in America.
“Because of Kenya’s progress — because of your potential — you can build your future right here, right now,” Obama told the crowd of 4,500 packed into a sports arena in the capital of Nairobi. But he bluntly warned that Kenya must make “tough choices” to bolster its fragile democracy and fast-growing economy.
Obama’s visit here, his first as president, captivated a country that views him as a local son. Thick crowds lined the roadways to watch the presidential motorcade speed through the city Sunday, some climbing on rooftops to get a better view. The audience inside the arena chanted his name as he finished his remarks.
The president left Kenya Sunday afternoon, pausing longer than normal atop the stairs to Air Force One to wave to the crowd, a huge grin on his face. He arrived two hours later in Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian capital, where he met with diplomats at the U.S. Embassy in the evening.
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Future of some state-run health insurance markets threatened by low enrollment, high overhead
WASHINGTON — State-run health insurance markets that offer coverage under President Barack Obama’s health law are struggling with high costs and disappointing enrollment. These challenges could lead more of them to turn over operations to the federal government or join forces with other states.
Hawaii’s marketplace, the latest cautionary tale, was awarded $205 million in federal startup grants. It has spent about $139 million and enrolled 8,200 customers for individual coverage in 2015. Unable to sustain itself, the state marketplace is turning over sign-ups to the federal HealthCare.gov for 2016.
Twelve states and the District of Columbia fully control their markets. Experts estimate about half face financial difficulties. Federal taxpayers invested nearly $5 billion in startup grants to the states, expecting that state markets would become self-sustaining. Most of the federal money has been spent, and states have to face the consequences.
“The viability of state health insurance exchanges has been a challenge across the country, particularly in small states, due to insufficient numbers of uninsured residents,” said a statement from the office of Hawaii Democratic Gov. David Ige, announcing last month that his state’s sign-ups were being turned over to the federal government.
Now that the Supreme Court has ruled the Obama administration can keep subsidizing premiums in all 50 states through HealthCare.gov, no longer is there a downside for states turning to Washington. If the decision had gone the opposite way, state exchanges would have been a leaky lifeboat for preserving a major expansion of taxpayer-subsidized coverage under the law.
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Senior Senate Republicans rebuke Sen. Cruz over his criticism of Majority Leader McConnell
WASHINGTON— Senior Senate Republicans lined up Sunday to rebuke Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz for harshly criticizing Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, an extraordinary display of intraparty division played out live on the Senate floor.
As the Senate met for a rare Sunday session, Sens. Orrin Hatch of Utah, Lamar Alexander of Tennessee and John Cornyn of Texas each rose to counter a stunning floor speech Cruz gave on Friday accusing McConnell, R-Ky., of lying.
None of them mentioned Cruz by name but the target of their remarks could not have been clearer. The drama came as the Senate defeated a procedural vote to repeal President Barack Obama’s health care law and took a step toward reviving the federal Export-Import Bank, both amendments on a must-pass highway bill.
“Squabbling and sanctimony may be tolerated in other venues and perhaps on the campaign trail, but they have no place among colleagues in the United States Senate,” said Hatch, the Senate’s president pro tempore. Cruz is running for president.
“The Senate floor has even become a place where senators have singled out colleagues by name to attack them in personal terms, to impugn their character, in blatant disregard for Senate rules,” Hatch said. “Such misuses of the Senate floor must not be tolerated.”
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Texas county where black woman died in jail has long history of racial tension and violence
HEMPSTEAD, Texas — In the searing 100-degree Texas heat, Sylvester Nunn uses three worn beach umbrellas to protect himself and the produce piled in the bed of his old Chevy pickup truck as he carries on a generations-old summer tradition.
The 78-year-old is selling watermelons by the roadside just outside Hempstead, where the perfect combination of sandy soil and rainfall make this the watermelon capital of Texas. During the first half of the 20th century, the area was the nation’s largest shipper of the sweet red fruit.
But it’s a more troubling tradition — of racial strife — that has resurfaced here in the days since a black woman named Sandra Bland died in the county jail after a traffic stop by a white state trooper.
Video of the confrontational stop ignited long-simmering passions and caused some blacks to raise their guard around law enforcement in Waller County and the county seat of Hempstead, once known as “Six Shooter Junction” because of white supremacist violence in the 1800s.
“I’ve lived here my whole life,” said Nunn, who is black. “I know how it could happen, but nothing’s happened to me. It’s been all right with me.”
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Turkey calls for NATO meeting to discuss security threats, recent airstrikes
ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — Turkey on Sunday called for a meeting of its NATO allies to discuss threats to its security and its airstrikes targeting Islamic State militants in Syria and Kurdish rebels in Iraq.
The move came as Turkey’s state-run media reported that Turkish F-16 jets again took off from the country’s southeastern Diyarbakir air base to hit Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK targets across the border in northern Iraq.
There was no immediate confirmation of the report by TRT television, which came hours after authorities said PKK militants detonated a car-bomb near Diyarbakir, killing two soldiers and wounding four others.
NATO announced that its decision-making body, the North Atlantic Council, will convene Tuesday after Ankara invoked the alliance’s Article 4, which allows member states to request a meeting if they feel their territorial integrity or security is under threat.
The Turkish Foreign Ministry said Turkey would inform allies about the airstrikes which followed an IS suicide bombing near Turkey’s border with Syria that left 32 people dead, and an IS attack on Turkish forces, which killed a soldier.
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Unveiling her climate change plan, Clinton urges tax credits as way to promote renewable fuel
AMES, Iowa — Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton planned to unveil a plan Sunday aimed at combating climate change that includes revisions in the tax code to promote renewable energy.
In Iowa, the nation’s second-leading wind energy producer, Clinton said people are “just not paying attention” if they don’t acknowledge climate change.
Clinton said she supported renewing the wind energy tax credit and getting other tax incentives “fixed” to promote renewable fuel.
Though Clinton hinted that under her plan the coal industry would face changes, she said the federal government would help the industry.
Climate change has become a key issue in the Democratic presidential primary, where Clinton is the heavy favorite. Billionaire Tom Steyer has led an effort to promote the issue. Steyer hosted a fundraiser for Clinton in May.
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Saudi-led airstrikes halt as 5-day humanitarian cease-fire begins in Yemen
SANAA, Yemen — Saudi-led coalition airstrikes came to a halt in Yemen early Monday after a five-day humanitarian truce went into effect, witnesses and security officials said.
However, ground fighting broke out almost immediately in the restive city of Taiz following random shelling by Shiite Houthi rebels in three neighborhoods, they said.
Security officials said ground fighting has also erupted in Marib province and in the area surrounding the strategic al-Anad military base in Lahj province.
Random shelling by Houthis and their allies hit northern and western areas of the port city of Aden after the cease fire, security officials and witnesses said.
The Saudi-led and U.S.-backed coalition of mainly Gulf Arab countries has been waging an air campaign since March against the Iran-supported rebels, who control most of northern Yemen and the capital, Sanaa.