NPR News 2012-11-28 加文本

NPR News 2012-11-28

From NPR News in Washington, I'm Lakshmi Singh.

The small business in Hatfield, Pennsylvania will be the backdrop of President Obama's latest appeal to middle-class America to back his plan to avert the “fiscal cliff.” Mr. Obama says the Bush-era tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans should be allowed to expire at year's end, but those making 250,000$ or less should continue to be protected. That's been a major sticking point between the White House and leading Republican lawmakers.

The man who got Republicans to sign the no-new-tax pledge is refuting claims that some members of the GOP may be breaking ranks. Grover Norquist, head of the group Americans for Tax Reform tells NPR that some, such as Senator Lindsey Graham, may say they are open to revenue increases. But in the end, he says it won't happen.

“He imagines that the Democrats will agree to fundamental reform of entitlements, something they haven't done in, oh, I don't know, 60 years, but we imagine that they're going to, we imagine a pink unicorn.”

On the Senate floor, Democratic Leader Harry Reid said he was pleased to see a few Republicans distancing themselves from Norquist accusing the anti-tax activists of bullying lawmakers for years.

The Conference Board says consumer confidence in the US is at its highest level in nearly five years. Details from NPR's Dave Mattingly.

Although the nation's unemployment rate is still near 8%, economist Hugh Johnson says the slow steady gains in hiring are helping consumers feel better about their own situation.

“We do have employment growing. Consumers do believe that the odds of having a job, keeping a job are better today than they were, and they certainly know that things are getting better in the housing end of things and at least until recently on the stock market side of things.”

The economy added 171,000 jobs in October as home sales, prices and builder confidence continue to show gains. Dave Mattingly, NPR News, Washington.

Local officials in New Orleans are preparing to take control of the nation's premier flood control structure. NPR's Debbie Elliott reports it's meant to replace the fractured system of levees that failed during Hurricane Katrina seven years ago.

Next year the US Army Corps of Engineers will hand over operation of a rebuilt system of levees, walls and floodgates. The nearly 13-billion-dollar project has been compared to the kind of urban flood control systems found in Dutch cities. It will be up to local officials to maintain, and upkeep is expected to run about 38 million dollars a year. Earlier this month, New Orleans voters renewed a levee tax, but officials are concerned it might not generate enough revenue to operate the new levee system for the long term. Robert Turner of the Southeast Louisiana Flood Protection Authority says there's a price to pay for resiliency. Debbie Elliott, NPR News.

Dow was down 62 points at 12,906.

This is NPR.

The president of Venezuela reportedly plans to return to Cuba for additional cancer-fighting treatment. Today Hugo Chavez formally requested approval from the legislature. The 58-year-old Venezuelan leader first underwent cancer treatment in Cuba last year. This year Chaves declared he had recovered from pelvic cancer, and he was reelected last month.

Rebels in Democratic Republic of Congo are refusing to withdraw from the strategic eastern border city they captured last week, unless a raft of conditions are met. NPR's Ofeibea Quist-Arcton reports the announcement follows an earlier one by the mediator Uganda that the rebels were prepared to pull out.

During exploratory talks over the weekend, regional leaders ordered the Congolese M23 rebels to retreat from the city of Goma. Uganda's military chief said the M23 commander had agreed to the deal. But at a later news conference, the rebels' political chief insisted on direct negotiations with the Congolese President Joseph Kabila before they consider withdrawing from Goma. He also set out a string of political demands, including government troops in rebel-held areas of eastern Congo being disarmed. The government has dismissed the demands as farcical. Ofeibea Quist-Arcton, NPR News, Accra.

Marvin Miller, the union leader who led baseball players in a series of legal challenges and strikes, has died at the age of 95. Miller is credited with paving a way to the creation of free agency for the players. Miller's daughter says her father who was diagnosed with liver cancer in August passed away at his New York City home this morning.

I'm Lakshmi Singh, NPR News.