Senator Sanders

This Week President Obama on Tuesday night delivers his major Afghanistan address to the nation from West Point. Will he have Republican support and will liberals back the strategy?  In a "This Week exclusive," Sens. Lindsey Graham and Bernie Sanders take on the tough questions: How many troops?  How much will it cost?  Can Afghanistan be saved?  Also, the healthcare debate: Graham declared healthcare reform dead on arrival, but will insistence on a public option by liberals like Sanders kill the bill?  Graham and Sanders debate the healthcare impasse. LINK 

Health Care If Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is forced to jettison the public option he could face fallout from liberal senators like Sens. Sanders and Roland Burris, Reuters reported. But some question whether liberals would bring down a healthcare overhaul that would expand coverage to more than 30 million uninsured people because it did not include a public option that would serve only 3 million to 4 million. Syndicated columnist Helen Thomas wrote that Sanders expects a number of senators would not support the Senate bill unless it includes such a public option LINK and LINK

Too Big As legislation on restructuring the banking industry moves forward, attention on Capitol Hill is increasingly drawn to the issue of bank size. Should our biggest banks be made smaller? Senator Bernard Sanders, an independent from Vermont, introduced the "Too Big To Fail Is Too Big to Exist" bill in early November; this helped focus attention, according to a New York Times blog. LINK

Credit Cards Rep. John Tierney is pushing legislation that would cap credit card interest rates at 16 percent. The Salem Democrat yesterday announced plans to file the Renewing America's Commitment to Consumers Act, a bill that would also cap any contingency fees, such as charges for late payments, at $15 per fee. Vermont Sen. Bernard Sanders, an independent, tried to get a similar provision through the Senate last May. It failed by a 60-33 vote, according to The Salem News in Beverly, Mass.

Northern Border A border gate has now been installed on Ball Street, between Stanstead and Derby Line ...To get to this point has been a long process...U.S. Sen. Sanders even traveled to the border where, from the stage of the Haskell Opera House, he addressed an international crowd. Changes were soon initiated at the Derby Line customs, with a noticeable improvement in the attitude of agents on duty. A second lane was added for overflow traffic, and signage was improved, according to the Sherbrooke Record.

Sanders' Voice "Bernie is right to attack the spurious GOP policies that wrap an elitist agenda in populist phrases. We can be proud that he has the audacity to say what he actually believes and has goals that would benefit the average Vermonter and American," Lou Magnani of Wells wrote to the Rutland Herald. LINK

International

Troop Increase Skeptics President Obama will reveal his new Afghanistan war strategy in a speech Tuesday, but his most skeptical audience is likely to be the powerful Democrats on Capitol Hill who oppose a troop buildup. Top Democrats have made it clear to Obama that he will not receive a friendly reception should he announce what is considered the leading option: sending 30,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan. A request for more money to finance a beefed-up war effort will be met with frustration and, perhaps, a demand to raise taxes, The Washington Post reported. LINK

U.S. Seeks 10,000 Troops From Its Allies in Afghanistan The United States is scrambling to coax NATO allies to send 10,000 additional troops to Afghanistan as part of President Obama's strategy for the region. Those countries appear willing to provide fewer than half that number, American and allied officials told The New York Times. LINK

China Joins U.S. in Pledge of Hard Targets on Emissions The Chinese government announced Thursday that it had set a target to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 relative to economic development. China is aiming to reduce what it calls so-called carbon intensity by 40 to 45 percent compared to 2005 levels, according to Xinhua, the state news agency.  The announcement came the day after President Obama pledged a provisional target for reductions in greenhouse gas emissions in the United States, The New York Times reported. LINK

National

Jobs and Economy President Obama and a top House Republican acknowledged in holiday messages Thursday the economic struggles facing Americans this Thanksgiving but offered starkly different recipes for relief. Obama said his administration has acted by cutting taxes for nearly all working men and wineb, Rep. Mike Pence, chairman of the House Republican Conference, said in the GOP's weekly address that Obama had promised the economic stimulus package would keep unemployment, now at 10.2 percent, below 8 percent, The Associated Press reported.  LINK

Vermont

Land Mines Jody Williams, the native Vermonter who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1997 for her work on banning land mines, called President Obama's apparent decision this week not to join the Mine Ban Treaty "shameful." Sen. Patrick Leahy agreed. "It is not a rational decision," he told The Burlington Free Press. LINK