Graham threatens to cut funds to UN if Obama bypasses Congress on Iran sanctions

South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham is throwing down the gauntlet, warning the White House he’ll move to cut funding to the United Nations if the administration turns to the international body to lift sanctions on Iran as part of a nuclear deal.
Graham made the comments Thursday during an appearance on Fox News’ “On the Record With Greta Van Susteren.”
Graham, a Republican, is chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee’s Subcommittee on State, Foreign Operations and Related Programs. In that role, he says he can block U.S. funding for the United Nations -- $654 million is earmarked for 2015 alone.
“Twenty-two percent of the funding for the United Nations comes from the American taxpayers, and I’m in charge of that account,” a defiant Graham told Fox News. He acknowledged he'd also need other lawmakers to sign onto any effort to suspend that funding.
Graham is worried that the administration, should it strike a nuclear deal with Iran, might get the U.N. to lift sanctions without going through Congress to lift U.S. sanctions.
Graham, who says the worst possible outcome would be for Iran to get a nuclear weapon, vowed:  “I’m not going to allow the United Nations to be used as a way to get around the United States Congress for a deal that affects the very existence of Israel and our own national security.”
When pushed on the issue, Graham said, “If they go to the U.N. Security Council, and the U.N. Security Council lifts all sanctions before we ever get a chance to look at this deal, absolutely I would suspend funding the United Nations, because I don't think your money should go to an organization that irresponsible.”
Graham strongly admonished the Obama administration.
“They are about to make a mistake for the ages,” Graham said. Earlier this month, Graham made a similar threat during a speech he gave at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. At that event, he said he’d slash U.N. funds if the U.N. marginalized Israel.
International nuclear talks with Iran are expected to resume next week, following some disagreements -- reportedly over the sanctions issue -- on Friday.
Asked about the talks on Friday, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said he did not want to speculate on what an actual deal might look like. But he said President Obama does not believe it makes sense to remove "a large number of sanctions at the front end of this agreement" -- as the Iranians reportedly want.
Earnest stressed the importance of existing congressional sanctions. But he indicated the administration, should there be a deal, might be able to waive them down the road. "One of the most powerful tools that we have in these negotiations are the congressional sanctions that Congress has passed, that those are some of the toughest sanctions that have ever been put in place against any country by the United States," he said. "And the president believes that we should leave those sanctions in place for -- not just for a few weeks to verify Iranian compliance."
He added: "He believes that we should leave those sanctions in place over the longer term, and that the president can use the waiver authority that Congress has already given him, to relax some of those sanctions."

North Korean ambassador claims country has nuclear missiles

North Korea has nuclear missiles and is prepared to use them at any time, an envoy for the country said in a recent interview.
North Korean Ambassador to Britain Hyun Hak Bong told Sky News that his government would use the missiles in response to a nuclear attack by the U.S.
Asked whether North Korea has the ability now to launch a nuclear missile, Hyun replied: "Any time. Any time. Yes."
"If the United States strike us, we should strike back," he said.
The ambassador reaffirmed that the country does not “want war, but we are not afraid of war.”
North Korea is thought to have a handful of crude nuclear bombs and has conducted tests since 2006. However, experts are divided on how advanced the country’s technology is and is unsure if they could miniaturize warheads so they can be placed on missiles.
The spokesman for South Korea's Defense Ministry, Kim Min-seok, said Saturday that while North Korea might have advanced its technologies for miniaturizing nuclear warheads so they can be installed on missiles, Seoul does not believe they have succeeded yet.
Kim pointed out that the North has conducted only three nuclear tests so far and it's unclear how successful they were.
The Institute for Science and International Security estimated that North Korea has between 10 and 16 nuclear weapons, some based on plutonium and others on uranium. The agency concluded that the country has weapons small enough to mound on medium-range intercontinental-range missiles.
The United Nations has imposed sanctions on North Korea over its nuclear and missile programs.
Hyun's comments come as rival South Korea and the United States conduct annual springtime military drills that North Korea says are aimed at preparing to topple its government. Seoul and Washington say the exercises are purely defensive.
The U.S. stations about 28,500 soldiers in South Korea to deter possible aggression from North Korea.

Critics blast new Obama regs for fracking on federal lands

A new regulation announced Friday by the Obama administration -- requiring fracking companies who drill on federal lands to disclose what chemicals they use in the controversial process -- was blasted as "yet another attack on American jobs" by GOP lawmakers, who said the mandate could slow the U.S. energy boom.
The Bureau of Land Management rule, which would take effect in June, also updates requirements for well construction and disposal of water and other fluids used in hydraulic fracturing, a drilling method that has spurred jobs and economic growth in natural gas and oil production. It would not apply to privately owned lands, but roughly 10 percent of the U.S. energy sector's work takes place on land leased from the federal government. Much more federally-owned acreage could potentially be fracked for oil and gas, if made available for lease, claim energy company advocates.
“Today’s proposed federal regulations on hydraulic fracturing represent yet another attack on American jobs by President Obama, and continue his attack on American-made energy,” said Rep. Steve Scalise, R-La. "Considering that states already successfully regulate fracking, the last thing the American people need is the heavy hand of the federal government killing good jobs and stifling American energy production with more of their radical regulations.”

“Today’s proposed federal regulations on hydraulic fracturing represent yet another attack on American jobs by President Obama, and continue his attack on American-made energy.”- Rep. Steve Scalise, (R-La.)

The rule has been under consideration for more than three years, drawing criticism from the oil and gas industry and environmental groups. The industry fears the regulation could hinder the drilling boom, while some environmental groups worry that it could allow unsafe drilling techniques to pollute groundwater.
The final rule closely tracks a draft first proposed by the Obama administration in 2013. The rule relies on an online database used by at least 16 states to track the chemicals used in fracking operations. The website, FracFocus.org, was formed by industry and intergovernmental groups in 2011 and allows users to gather well-specific data on tens of thousands of drilling sites across the country.
Companies will have to disclose the chemicals they use within 30 days of the fracking operation.
Interior Secretary Sally Jewell said the rule will allow for continued responsible development of federal oil and gas resources on millions of acres of public lands while assuring the public that "transparent and effective safety and environmental protections are in place."
Jewell, who worked on fracking operations in Oklahoma long before joining the government in 2013, said decades-old federal regulations have failed to keep pace with modern technological advances.
"I've personally fracked wells, so I understand the risk as well as the reward," Jewell said. "We owe it to our kids to get this right."
Fracking involves pumping huge volumes of water, sand and chemicals underground to split open rocks to allow oil and gas to flow. Improved technology has allowed energy companies to gain access to huge stores of natural gas underneath states from Wyoming to New York but has also raised widespread concerns about alleged groundwater contamination and even earthquakes.
Brian Deese, a senior adviser to President Obama, said the rules for public lands could serve as a template that the oil and gas industry could adopt to help address the public's concern about the health and safety of fracking.
"Ultimately, this is an issue that is going to be decided in state capitals and localities as well as with the industry," he said.
The Interior Department estimated the cost of complying with the rule would be less than one-fourth of 1 percent of the cost to drill a well.
But critics say anything the complicates, or adds to the cost of extracting gas and oil hurts America's economic competitiveness. U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, said the federal government should follow laws regulating private land, not the other way around.
“The energy renaissance is largely a story about state and private land, but vast resources remain inaccessible and untapped in federal areas, particularly in the West,” Murkowski said. “This administration has already taken unprecedented steps to block development in Alaska. Given its anti-development approach, we should expect this rule to make it even harder to produce oil and gas on federal lands. The fact remains: if Interior was half as interested in new production as it is in new regulation, our nation would be in a far better place.”
Advocates say hydraulic fracturing and directional drilling have triggered an unprecedented upswing in domestic oil and natural gas production over the past six years, with oil production more than doubling to 9 million barrels a day. They also say fracking is a safe and proven method.
"The Obama administration's hydraulic fracturing rule is a solution in search of a problem," said Thomas Pyle, president of the pro-industry Institute for Energy Research.
The rule will make the Interior Department's Bureau of Land Management the largest customer of FracFocus, a website that has taken on increasing prominence in recent years as it collects data on drilling sites. Nearly 95,000 wells nationwide are registered with FracFocus, which is managed by the Ground Water Protection Council and Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission. Both groups are based in Oklahoma. The groundwater council is a nonprofit organization while the oil and gas commission is a collection of state officials from energy-producing states.
Jewell said that BLM will have representation on FracFocus' board, adding that the group has taken steps to improve its platform, including adopting a new format that allows data to be automatically read by computers.

Bibi Gun Cartoon

Student group demands California university rename building after convicted cop killer

A black student organization at the University of California at Berkeley is demanding the university rename a building on campus after Assata Shakur, a former Black Panther, convicted cop killer and the first woman named to the FBI's Most-Wanted Terrorist List.
A jury convicted Shakur of killing a New Jersey State Trooper in 1979. She escaped prison and fled to Cuba. The FBI calls her a domestic terrorist. In 2013, the agency added her to the FBI's Most Wanted Terrorist List, alongside several members of Al Qaeda, airline hijackers and bombers.
But to the Black Student Union at Berkeley, Shakur is an "icon of resistance within oppressed communities (who) represents black resilience in the face of state-sanctioned violence." They demanded the university rename Barrows Hall, named after former Chancellor David Barrows, "Shakur Hall." In 2013, Shakur declared her innocence and called her trial in 1979 a legal lynching by an all-white jury. Shakur, formerly known as Joann Chesimard, belonged to the Black Liberation Army at the time of the shooting.
"We want the renaming for someone -- Assata Shakur -- who we feel like represents us as black students," said Black Student Union spokesman Cori McGowens. "Black students on campus have a feeling of isolation, marginalization. We're at a crisis on campus."
The renaming of Barrows Hall is just one of 10 demands the Black Student Union delivered to Berkeley Chancellor Nick Dirks last month.
They're also demanding a meeting place solely for black students, $300,371 for two black admissions staff focused on black recruiting, $113,932 for another staffer to handle black retention, two black psychologists who understand the "racially hostile campus," two black advisers to mentor black athletes and a fully-funded 'Get into Graduate School' mentoring program.
"I came to Berkeley and I thought that it was a progressive liberal environment, but the N-word was written on the dorm wall and my white professors were openly using the N-word," said senior Blake Simons. "So that's part of my experience here is feeling marginalized."
University officials met with the groups last week. While not agreeing to honor Shakur, Chancellor Dirks did apologize, saying, "Too many (black) students have told us about being excluded from study groups, ignored during class discussions, verbally harassed at parties and social events, and feeling, in a general sense, vulnerable, isolated and invisible. This is something we deplore."
African-American students at Berkeley already have 33 campus organizations dedicated to their well-being, from fraternities and sororities, to a African Theme Program, an African American Studies Department, an African Arts Society, a Black Campus Ministries, Finance Guild and  Pre-Law Society.
 But that isn't the point, say students.
"We definitely need more resources for underrepresented minorities on campus," says senior Amanda Burke. "I know personally people who suffer micro-aggressions on a daily basis at Cal and it's something that's kind of gone ignored by a lot of people."
 Some black students cite a mock lynching last year at one fraternity. However, a police investigation later revealed the hanging effigy on Halloween was meant to be a zombie, not an African-American.
Still, McGowens said it was difficult to succeed academically because of the anti-black atmosphere.
"There are a lot of black students that apply --get into Cal -- who don't want to come for that reason," he said. "Because the environment isn't welcoming. It isn't safe for black students. So we feel like as black students we are the most marginalized on campus."
After Chancellor Dirks "defaulted" on the group's March 6 deadline, the Black Student Union said it would "persevere" until they get what they "deserve."
Of UC Berkeley's 36,000 enrolled students, roughly 3 percent are black, 40 percent are Asian, 30 percent are white and 13 percent are Hispanic. By comparison, the statewide population is 7 percent black, 14 percent Asian, 37 percent Hispanic and 42 percent white.

Hawaiian tropic: Are Obamas privately eyeing Magnum, P.I. home?

Magnum, P.I. is not on the case, but plenty of amateur sleuths are trying to figure out if the mysterious buyer of the Hawaiian mansion where the 1980s detective show was shot is none other than President Obama.
The 11,054-square-foot home on three acres of Honolulu beach front was sold Monday for $8.7 million in a tricky transaction that includes some tantalizing clues. The official buyer is listed as "Waimanalo Paradise," which turns out to be a Delaware corporation set up by a Chicago attorney and longtime Obama supporter. The deed and mortgage are signed by Judy Grimanis, an executive assistant at a a Chicago private equity firm run by another Obama pal, and a former employee of Penny Pritzker, the real estate millionaire Obama tapped to be Secretary of Commerce in 2013.

“It is hard to imagine a president living there."- Linda Ryan, Magnum, P.I. actress

No one is confirming that the home known as "Pahonu" will be the First Family's post-Pennsylvania Avenue address, but then no one would be expected to, either. The Obamas own a home in Chicago, but recent reports have said they may relocate to New York when his second term ends. Hawaii, however, where the president lived his teenage years, has been a recurring vacation spot for the Obamas since moving to Washington.
A spokesperson for the administration would only say they had no comment because the President is not a party to the transaction.
Pahonu is one of Oahu's most recognizable properties, even if it is a fixer-upper at this point.
“It is hard to imagine a president living there,” Linda Ryan, who appeared on several episodes of the show, told FoxNews.com.

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Actor Tom Selleck, (l.), starred in the hit 1980s show Magnum, P.I., on which Linda Ryan appeared several times. Now there is speculation the Obamas are the buyers of the spectacular estate where the show was set. (Linda Ryan, AP)

The home, with five bedrooms and 6 bathrooms, was originally designed in a European style by Louis Davis, and includes a tennis court, fireplace, 3-car garage, boathouse, bathhouse and maid’s quarters. The home is located on Kalanianaole Highway, at the edge of a white sand beach with stunning turquoise waters fronted by a rare historic turtle pond that formed a protective salt pool. In the TV show that starred Tom Selleck, the property was portrayed as “Robin's Nest,” an oceanfront estate owned by fictitious novelist Robin Masters.
“It’s gone into disrepair since Magnum P.I. days. It’s an 80-year-old house that has not been cared for for a while – an $8 million fixer upper,” said Michael W. Perry, Hawaii’s most well-known radio personality of KSSK’s Perry & Price Show. “However, it is a great area, between Sea Life Park and Kailua, with the most spectacular views you can possibly get. If the place was good enough for Magnum and his friends, then it is definitely good enough for a President.”
Waimanalo Paradise was formed Feb. 6 with the help of Chicago lawyer and Obama supporter Seth Madorsky, who specializes, according to his web site, in commercial real estate and counseling real estate investors, real estate investment funds and sponsors on capital investment and the formation of joint ventures to develop, own and operate commercial real estate.
Grimanis, now an executive assistant at The Vistria Group, signed the deed and $9.5 million mortgage, a larger amount than the sale price and one which could allow for repairs or security upgrades befitting a retired leader of the free world. Martin Nesbitt, founder of Vistria, served as national treasurer for Obama’s two presidential campaigns and is a board member of the Barack Obama Foundation. One more possible clue is that the realtor who brokered the deal is Joel Cavasso, the same realtor who helped facilitate the rental of the so-called “Winter Whitehouse” in Kailua, where the President has stayed while on Oahu.
Scott Carvill, principal broker of Carvill Sotheby's' International Realty, who sold one of the $10 million homes that Obamas’ friends rent while in Hawaii with the First Family, said the beachfront properties in the area are coveted.
“Waimanalo and windward Oahu have some of the best beaches in Hawaii sought by people all around the world," Carvill said.
The home was purchased from former Republican state representative and environmental activist, Eve Anderson, a well-known figure in the political and windward communities, who is the step-daughter of Cox Communications heiress Barbara Cox Anthony. Anderson’s grandfather was the original owner of the property.

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The home offers stunning views such as this one. (FoxNews.com)

Ryan recalled shooting five episodes of the show, but said filming was done outside the house, and all interior scenes were shot in a studio. Still, she remembers the home fondly.
“It was a beautiful setting and an exquisite property,” Ryan said.
There may be security concerns, however, should the President live at the home, because it sits on the heavily-trafficked Kalanianaole Highway and on a public beach and is easily accessed from either.The home is just five minutes from the popular Sea Life Park, Makapuu Beach and Makapuu Light House trail, popular tourist attractions.
The surrounding Waimanalo community, home to many native Hawaiians, is diverse in terms of income of its residents, with some of the state’s most impoverished people living just behind some of the island’s wealthiest.
While no official ties to the Obamas have been confirmed, because all people involved in the transaction reportedly signed confidentiality agreements, analysts speculate this could be a similar deal to one hatched on behalf of the Clintons, whose 11-room Dutch Colonial home in Chappaqua, N.Y., was purchased for $1.7 million in 1999 with the help of Clinton's chief fund-raiser, Terry McAuliffe, now the governor of Virginia.

Judge: Sanctions possible in Obama immigration court case

BROWNSVILLE, Texas –  A federal judge who has blocked President Obama's immigration executive action suggested on Thursday that he could order sanctions against the Justice Department if he rules it misled him about when exactly the administration began implementing one of the measures.
During a sometimes testy court hearing, U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen went back and forth with the Justice Department over whether it had mislead him into believing that a key part of Obama's program would not be implemented before he made a ruling on a request for a preliminary injunction. In fact, federal officials had given more than 108,000 people three-year reprieves from deportation before that date and granted them work permits under a program that protects young immigrants from deportation if they were brought to the U.S. illegally as children.
Obama's executive actions would spare from deportation as many as 5 million people who are in the U.S. illegally. Many Republicans oppose the actions, saying only Congress has the right to take such sweeping action. Twenty-six states led by Texas joined together to challenge them as unconstitutional. Hanen on Feb. 16 sided with the states, issuing a preliminary injunction blocking Obama's actions.
Hanen chided Justice Department attorney Kathleen Hartnett on Thursday for telling him at a January hearing before the injunction was issued that nothing would be happening with regard to one key part of Obama's actions, an expansion of the 2012 Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, known as DACA, until Feb. 18.
"Like an idiot I believed that," Hanen said.
A flustered Hartnett repeatedly apologized to Hanen for any confusion related to how the reprieves and work permits were granted.
"We strive to be as candid as possible. It truly became clear to us there was confusion on this point," she said.
Hartnett continued to insist that the 108,081 reprieves had been granted under 2012 guidelines, which were not stopped by the injunction, and that government attorneys hadn't properly explained this because they had been focused on other parts of the proposed action.
But Hanen pointed out that the 2012 guidelines only granted two-year reprieves and that three-year reprieves are being proposed under the program now on hold.
"Can I trust what the president says? That's a yes or no question," Hanen asked.
"Yes your honor," Hartnett replied.
The states asked that Hanen consider issuing sanctions because Justice Department attorneys had made "representations (that) proved not to be true or at a minimum less than forthcoming," said Angela Colmenero, a lawyer with the Texas Attorney General's Office, the lead attorney for the states.
Colmenero said the three-year reprieves that were granted might have caused the states economic harm as the states may have already issued various benefits, including driver's licenses, to immigrants who received a reprieve.
"There is absolutely no basis for sanctions here," Hartnett said. "The government is absolutely trying to do the right thing."
Hanen said he would issue a ruling "promptly" on what action, if any, he will take against the Justice Department.
The federal government has asked the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans to lift Hanen's injunction while the case is appealed.
The other states seeking to block Obama's orders are Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah, West Virginia and Wisconsin.

Iran nuclear talks reportedly hit snag over lifting of sanctions as Obama makes appeal to Iran's people

A dispute over when international sanctions against Iran would be lifted following a potential nuclear agreement reportedly is the latest issue to bog down negotiations.
According to The Wall Street Journal, Iran's negotiators say that sanctions must be lifted almost immediately after a deal is concluded. U.S. and European diplomats, for their part, hold that sanctions should only be lifted once Tehran accounts for its past nuclear activity and is confirmed to be using nuclear energy for peaceful means by the United Nations' nuclear watchdog.
One European diplomat was quoted by the Journal as saying there was "no way" Western negotiators would budge from their position, which the diplomat said the Iranians considered a "deal-breaker. They don't want it at all."
According to the paper, both sides believe that the U.S. and European Union can lift some of the sanctions each has unilaterally imposed on Iran's energy and finance sectors. However, the issue of lifting sanctions imposed by the U.N. is more complex and according to negotiators, is likely to take years, not weeks or months, to accomplish.
For its part, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) says that Iran has failed to turn over key documents about its nuclear program, and has also denied access to scientists and nuclear sites.
Both sides are working to meet a March 31 deadline to construct the framework of a permanent agreement. The final deadline for all the details to be worked out is June 30. On Thursday, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and his Iranian counterpart, Foreign Minister Javad Zarif met face-to-face for the fourth straight day in Lausanne, Switzerland.
The Associated Press reported late Thursday that elements of a draft deal had been agreed that would commit Iran to a 40 percent cut in the number of machines it could use to make an atomic bomb. In return, the Iranians would get quick relief from some crippling economic sanctions and a partial lift of a U.N. embargo on conventional arms.
Officials told the AP that the tentative deal imposes at least a decade of new limits on the number of centrifuges Iran can operate to enrich uranium, a process that can lead to nuclear weapons-grade material. The sides are zeroing in on a cap of 6,000 centrifuges, officials said, down from the 6,500 they spoke of in recent weeks.
That's also fewer than the 10,000 such machines Tehran now runs, yet substantially more than the 500 to 1,500 that Washington originally wanted as a ceiling. Only a year ago, U.S. officials floated 4,000 as a possible compromise.
It's unclear how complete the draft is. Iran's deeply buried underground enrichment plant remains a problem, officials said, with Washington demanding the facility be repurposed and Tehran insisting it be able to run hundreds of centrifuges there. Iran says it wants to use the machines for scientific research; the Americans fear they could be quickly retooled for enrichment.
A planned heavy water reactor will be re-engineered to produce much less plutonium than originally envisioned, relieving concerns that it could be an alternative pathway to a bomb. U.S. officials believe they can extend the time Tehran would need to produce a nuclear weapon to at least a year. Right now, Iran would require only two to three months to amass enough material to make a bomb.
President Barack Obama appealed directly to Iranian citizens in a message commemorating Nowruz, the Persian New Year.
"Our negotiations have made progress, but gaps remain," Obama said Thursday in a video message posted online.
"If Iran's leaders can agree to a reasonable deal, it can lead to a better path — the path of greater opportunities for the Iranian people," he said.
The pressure in Congress on the administration over Iran remained intense, with the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee saying he would move ahead with legislation giving lawmakers a say over any nuclear deal. And 360 House Republicans and Democrats — more than enough to override any presidential veto — sent a letter to Obama saying if an agreement is reached, Congress will decide on easing sanctions it has imposed.
"Congress must be convinced that its terms foreclose any pathway to a bomb, and only then will Congress be able to consider permanent sanctions relief," the lawmakers wrote.
Rep. Eliot Engel of New York, the top Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, told administration officials at a hearing Thursday that Congress cannot be marginalized and "any attempts to sidestep Congress will be resisted on both sides of the aisle."