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<p>Citigroup announced on Wednesday that it would cut 11,000 jobs, reducing its work force by roughly 4 percent in an effort to cut costs.</p> <p>Under the reduction, 1,900 jobs will be eliminated in the institutional clients division. Another 6,200 positions will be removed from the bank’s consumer banking business, along with 2,600 jobs in the operations and technology group.</p>

Taxes on the wealthy are going up, House Speaker John Boehner conceded on Wednesday in challenging President Barack Obama to sit down with him to hammer out a deal for avoiding the fiscal cliff. The statement to reporters reflected how negotiations on reducing the nation's chronic federal deficits and debt have evolved since Obama's re-election last month. Republicans once opposed to any new revenue in their quest to shrink government now realize Obama's victory and public support for the president's campaign theme of higher taxes on the wealthy leave them with little negotiating leverage. Less than four weeks from the...

A bill to allow undocumented immigrants to obtain an Illinois driver’s license passed the Illinois Senate today by a vote of 41 to 14. One Democrat voted “present.” The bill is SB957. The 10 Republicans who joined the Democrats in rewarding non-citizens who are already breaking our laws, were: Bill Brady (Sponsor), Kirk Dillard, Tom Johnson, John Millner (Sponsor), Matt Murphy, Carole Pankau, Senate Minority Leader Christine Radogno (Sponsor), Sue Rezin, Ron Sandack (Sponsor), and Suzi Schmidt. Two Republicans, Pamela Althoff and Dale Righter, took the ultimate lily-livered approach and just didn’t vote on the bill. That’s as bad as...

(Reuters) - Egyptian police battled thousands of protesters outside President Mohamed Mursi's palace in Cairo on Tuesday, prompting the Islamist leader to leave the building, two presidential sources said. Police fired teargas at demonstrators angered by Mursi's drive to hold a referendum on a new constitution on December 15. Some broke through police lines around his palace and protested next to the perimeter wall. Several thousand people had gathered nearby in what they dubbed "last warning" protests against Mursi, who infuriated opponents with a November 22 decree that expanded his powers. "The people want the downfall of the regime," the...

House Speaker John Boehner and GOP leadership have removed several conservative House members from their respective powerful committee positions, Breitbart News has learned. Effective next Congress, leadership pulled Kansas Republican Rep. Tim Huelskamp, Michigan Republican Rep. Justin Amash and Arizona Republican Rep. David Schweikert off committees from which they could exert conservative pressure on fiscal matters. Amash and Huelskamp were pulled from the Budget Committee and Schweikert from the Financial Services Committee. Huelskamp, a freshman elected during the 2010 tea party wave, thinks the leadership move to pull him from the powerful committee is revenge for him standing up for...

<p>U.S. manufacturing unexpectedly contracted in November, falling to its lowest in over three years in a sign the sector may be struggling to gain traction, according to an industry report released on Monday.</p> <p>The Institute for Supply Management (ISM) said its index of national factory activity fell to 49.5 in November from 51.7 the month before. The reading was shy of expectations of 51.3, according to a Reuters poll of economists.</p>

Israel has asked Jordan twice in the last two months for a green light to attack chemical weapons facilities in Syria, according to a report by journalist Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has sent representatives of the Mossad intelligence agency to Amman twice already, to coordinate the matter with the Jordanians and receive their "permission" for the operation, Goldberg wrote.

The Talk Shows December 2nd, 2012 Guests to be interviewed today on major television talk shows: FOX NEWS SUNDAY (Fox Network): Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner; House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio.MEET THE PRESS (NBC): Geithner; Sens. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., and Bob Corker, R-Tenn.; Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md.; Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform.FACE THE NATION (CBS): Geithner; Sens. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.; Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich.THIS WEEK (ABC): Geithner; Reps. Tom Cole, R-Okla., and Keith Ellison, D-Minn.STATE OF THE UNION (CNN): Geithner; Sens. Mark Warner, D-Va., and Kelly Ayotte, R-N.H.; Gov. Brian Schweitzer, D-Mont.

Video at link (CNSNews.com) - House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said on Friday that Congress should hand over to President Barack Obama personal, unilateral authority to increase the limit on the U.S. government's debt. At a Friday press conference, a reporter asked Pelosi if she agreed with a proposal made by Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner that Congress give Obama the power to unilaterally increase the debt limit. "Yes," she said. When he met with members of Congress on Thursday to discuss a deal to avoid the so-called fiscal cliff that is set to occur at the end of this year,...

House Speaker John Boehner, Ohio Republican, made it clear that any bill that came to the House from the upper chamber as a result of Senate Democrats changing the rules on the filibuster would be "dead on arrival." In a statement released from Speaker Boehner's office, the Ohio GOP'er remarked: “Senate Democrats’ attempt to break Senate rules in order to change Senate rules is clearly designed to marginalize Senate Republicans and their constituents while greasing the skids for controversial partisan measures. I question the wisdom of this maneuver, especially at a time when cooperation on Capitol Hill is critical, and...

Mitch McConnell, the Senate Republican leader, says he “burst into laughter” Thursday when Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner outlined the administration proposal for averting the fiscal cliff. He wasn’t trying to embarrass Geithner, McConnell says, only responding candidly to his one-sided plan, explicit on tax increases, vague on spending cuts. Geithner’s visit to his office left McConnell discouraged about reaching a “balanced” deal on tax hikes and spending reductions designed to prevent a shock to the economy in January. “Nothing good is happening” in the negotiations, McConnell says, because of Obama’s insistence on tax rate hikes for the wealthy but unwillingness...

In a 1986 book by U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice, the future diplomat argued for the aggressive inclusion of a black history curriculum in American schools, claiming that its omission had “crippling effects” by “providing a child with no more than … a white interpretation of reality.” The 86-page book, “A History Deferred,” served as a guide for secondary and elementary school teachers wanting to teach “Black Studies,” and was published by the Black Student Fund, an advocacy group where Rice had an internship. “Susan’s interest in the study of Black history evolved from her desire to...

<p>Last week I was told by very knowledgeable sources in the State Capitol that Obama Care was a lock to be implemented in Michigan because of the heavy handed pressure by Governerd Rick " Jennifer" Snyder, his bought and paid for minion Speaker of the House Jase Bolger and the Godzilla of health care insurance companies, Blue Cross/ Blue Shield of Michigan. I was told they were demanding the passage of Health Care Exchanges so Obama Care can be implemented ASAP.</p>

House Republicans said on Thursday that Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner presented the House speaker, John A. Boehner, a detailed proposal to avert the year-end fiscal crisis with $1.6 trillion in tax increases over 10 years, an immediate new round of stimulus spending, home mortgage refinancing and a permanent end to Congressional control over statutory borrowing limits. The proposal, loaded with Democratic priorities and short on detailed spending cuts, was likely to meet strong Republican resistance. In exchange for locking in the $1.6 trillion in added revenues, President Obama embraced $400 billion in savings from Medicare and other entitlements, to...

White House press secretary Jay Carney said Thursday there will be no deficit deal unless Republicans agree to raise tax rates on the wealthiest households.[snip]The president wants tax rates extended on all households below that threshold, but says rates above it should be phased out.

One of the earliest fears about tax-favored savings accounts like IRAs and 401(k) plans was that when this pool of savings grew large enough Congress would not be able to resist tapping it to help solve the nation’s debt problems. We’re about to find out if those fears—persistent for decades—have been justified. Everything including the sacred mortgage deduction is on the table as lawmakers wrestle with the fiscal cliff, a year-end avalanche of scheduled spending cuts and tax increases. With a combined $10 trillion sitting in IRAs and 401(k) plans, retirement accounts make a juicy target. Some of this money...

UNITED NATIONS — The United Nations voted overwhelmingly Thursday to recognize a Palestinian state, a long-sought victory for the Palestinians but an embarrassing diplomatic defeat for the United States.

Susan Rice, the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations whose name has been floated as a possible secretary of state nominee, may soon face opposition from the environmental lobby over what the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) called a potential financial conflict of interest on Wednesday. According to her May 2012 financial disclosure, Rice has an investment in TransCanada Corporation worth between $300,000 and $600,000. TransCanada is angling for the State Department’s permission to build the final portion of the Keystone XL pipeline — a 1,700-mile conduit for crude oil between Canadian deposits and Texas refineries. If she were confirmed...

(Reuters) - The U.N. General Assembly is set to approve an implicit recognition of Palestinian statehood on Thursday despite threats by the United States and Israel to punish the Palestinian Authority by withholding funds for the West Bank government. - clip -- U.N. set to vote within the next few hours.

The Democratic chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence committee has commissioned a federal report to identify prison facilities in the U.S. that are suitable for housing Guantanamo detainees, a document exclusively reviewed by Fox News shows. In the internal document, the Government Accountability Office refers to “Source of Work: Ms. Dianne Feinstein, Chair, Select Committee on Intelligence, U.S. Senate” and lists the “Gist of Work” as an investigation into whether domestic facilities could house the approximately 170 detainees remaining at the controversial facility in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Two hours after Fox News' inquiry about the report, Feinstein's office posted the report...