The Daily Banter Headline Grab. From Reuters:

The U.S. economy could take a big hit from automatic government spending cuts even if Congress only leaves them in place for a month or two.

The cuts were meant to be so painful that they would force Congress to find a more thoughtful way to tighten the budget.

But many analysts assume they will take effect as scheduled, forcing federal offices to furlough some of their 2.8 million workers and trim spending on everything from paper clips to missiles.

It is anyone’s guess, however, how long lawmakers will be able to stomach the economic pain. The duration of the austerity measures will determine the force of the blow to the economy. Some analysts think having the cuts in place for more than a few months could trigger a brief recession.

The Congressional Budget Office said on Tuesday the cuts would translate into $42 billion less in federal spending between the beginning of March and the end of September.

If $6 billion in spending is cut in March – which would be the average decline over a seven-month period – economic growth would be stunted by roughly seven-tenths of a percent in the first quarter, said Omair Sharif, an economist at RBS in Stamford, Connecticut.

“You are going to feel the pain right away,” Sharif said.

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The Daily Banter Headline Grab. From TPM:

The Violence Against Women Act first became law in 1994 and has since been routinely reauthorized without controversy. By providing resources for law enforcement to combat spousal abuse, it has protected countless women from domestic violence.

But the 2012 re-authorization, like many initiatives of the just-concluded Congress, fell prey to House Republican resistance — in this case, to expanding the Act to cover more women. In the end, House GOP leaders refused bring to a vote a bill that passed the Senate with a bipartisan supermajority.

“The House Republican leadership’s failure to take up and pass the Senate’s bipartisan and inclusive VAWA bill is inexcusable,” Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA), a Democratic leadership member, told TPM. “This is a bill that passed with 68 votes in the Senate and that extends the bill’s protections to 30 million more women. But this seems to be how House Republican leadership operates. No matter how broad the bipartisan support, no matter who gets hurt in the process, the politics of the right wing of their party always comes first.”

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Image released by Monroe County Sheriff”s Office of William Spengler

Seven homes on a narrow stretch of land beside Lake Ontario were destroyed by the fire. Another two firemen and an off-duty police officer were wounded in the attack.

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Super Salmon: Coming to a supermarket near you

The Daily Banter Headline Grab (From the Independent):

A GM salmon which grows twice as fast as ordinary fish could become the first genetically-modified animal in the world to be declared officially safe to eat, after America’s powerful food-safety watchdog ruled it posed no major health or environmental risks.

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The Daily Banter Headline Grab. From The Washington Post:

Hawaii Democratic Sen. Daniel Inouye has died at age 88, his office confirmed Monday night.

His last words, according to a statement released by his staff, were “Aloha”.

Inouye has been hospitalized since early December due to respiratory problems. His cause of death was “respiratory complications”.

Inouye had served in the Senate since 1962 and represented Hawaii since 1954. He served as the Senate pro tempore — the designation for the chamber’s longest serving Senator — and the person third in line to the presidency. He also chaired the powerful Senate Appropriations Committee at the time of his death.

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The Daily Banter Headline Grab. From TPM:

Comedy Central star Stephen Colbert is the most popular choice among South Carolina voters to replace retiring Sen. Jim DeMint (R), according to a new poll from Democratic-leaning Public Policy Polling. DeMint is leaving the Senate to lead the conservative think tank the Heritage Foundation in January.

Colbert is the choice of 20 percent of registered South Carolina voters polled, Rep. Tim Scott (R-SC) sees 15 percent of the total, Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC) merits 14 percent and former South Carolina first lady Jenny Sanford is fourth with 11 percent. The rest of the field is in single digits. Twenty-two percent of Republicans desire Scott, and 21 percent of the GOP wants Gowdy. But the rest of the electorate is pro-Colbert.

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US economy adding jobs slowly but surely

The Daily Banter Headline Grab. From the WaPo:

The unemployment rate dipped and job creation remained steady in November, as the U.S. economy shrugged off any major impact from Hurricane Sandy and showed surprising resilience in the run-up to the fiscal cliff.

The November jobs report, released Friday morning, was a pleasant surprise to analysts who had braced for some ugly numbers for a period when much of the Northeast was reeling from the superstorm. In fact, the national unemployment rate fell to 7.7 percent from 7.9 percent, and the nation added 146,000 jobs, not the mere 85,000 that forecasters had expected.

The report contained some ominous elements, as well, however. The jobless rate dropped in large part because the labor force fell by 350,000, suggesting people gave up looking for work. The number of people saying they had a job actually fell by 122,000. And the Labor Department revised downward its estimates of job creation in September and October by a combined 49,000.

Add it all up, and the conclusion is this: The trend that we thought was underway — of a U.S. economy growing steadily but at an unspectacular pace — remains underway, and was not undone either by the hurricane or by anticipation of looming austerity, the tax hikes and spending cuts scheduled to take effect Jan. 1, barring a compromise deal to avert them.

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Disorder erupts in Tahrir square in CairoFrom the BBC:

From the BBC:

Egypt’s supreme court has caused widespread alarm by calling for the dissolution of the lower house of parliament and for fresh elections.

Two days before Egyptians choose a new president, it has declared last year’s parliamentary vote unconstitutional.

Muslim Brotherhood presidential candidate Mohamed Mursi said the decision “must be respected”.

But other political figures have expressed anger amid fears that the military wants to increase its power.

Another senior Muslim Brotherhood politician, Essam Al-Arian, said the ruling on parliament would send Egypt into a “dark tunnel”.

The Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice party won 46% of the vote in the three-month parliamentary poll and Mr Arian warned that the decision would leave the incoming president without a parliament or a constitution.

Islamist Abdul Moneim Aboul Fotouh, who took part in the first round of the presidential vote in May, said that dissolving parliament amounted to “a total coup, anyone who imagines that the millions of youths will let this pass is dreaming.”

Protesters gathered in Tahrir square in the centre of Cairo after the ruling.

The Salafist Al-Nour party, which has the second biggest representation in parliament, said the ruling showed “a complete disregard for the free will of voters”.

Parliament speaker Saad El Katatny was equally scathing, arguing that no-one had the authority to dissolve parliament.

‘Historic ruling’

In a separate ruling, the supreme court also decided that former Prime Minister Ahmed Shafiq could continue to run for president in the June 16-17 presidential run-off election, rejecting as unconstitutional a law that would have barred him from standing.

Under the Political Exclusion Law, passed by parliament, senior officials from former President Hosni Mubarak’s regime were banned from standing for office.

Mr Shafiq is standing against Mr Mursi in a tight run-off. He told supporters that the court had made a “historic ruling and verdict that meant there was no way for anyone to do particular laws for particular people.”

Egypt’s ruling military council (Scaf) held an emergency meeting after the two court rulings and later confirmed that the election would go ahead as planned, and urged Egyptians to vote

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Children's virtual games: Not so innocent

From Channel 4 News:

Seemingly innocent, Habbo Hotel, with its bright colours, pink teddy bears, flashing lights, and roaming ponies, is one of a growing number of virtual worlds created for kids. And with 10 million unique visitors a month, it is “the world’s largest social game and online community for teenagers”.

The game is set in a virtual hotel, where kids create avatars with which they can move around rooms, chat to other users in public or privately and even buy credits in the real world to furnish their virtual hotel room.

Channel 4 News producer Rachel Seifert spent two months playing this seemingly innocent game posing as a young girl. She found alongside the balloons and teddies, chats and interactions of an explicit sexual nature. The ease with which this happened was shocking.

Rachel said: “The chat was very sexual, perverse, violent, pornographic, overtly sexual acts, people saying they were going to do things to others, and it was very graphic.

“Within two minutes I was being asked individually ‘do you have a webcam?’, ‘can we chat on (instant messenger service) MSN, on Skype?’ I was also within a couple of minutes asked to strip, fully naked, and asked what would I do on a webcam.”

Rachel played the game 50 times and on each occasion had similar experiences.

Watch the shocking report from the UK’s Channel 4 below:

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