W.H.: Obama will veto healthcare repeal
WASHINGTON, July 9 (UPI) -- As the GOP-controlled U.S. House of Representatives prepared to vote on repeal of the Affordable Care Act, the White House said a repeal bill would be vetoed.
As with previous votes, action by the House -- scheduled for Thursday -- to repeal President Barack Obama's signature healthcare policy likely will go nowhere because the Democratic Senate won't consider it. In a statement Monday, the White House Office of Management and Budget said Obama would veto a repeal bill "because it would cost millions of hard-working middle class families the security of affordable health coverage and care they deserve. It would increase the deficit and detract from the work the Congress needs to do to focus on the economy and create jobs."
In a statement, the OMB said repealing the Affordable Care Act would mean "marketplaces where Americans could compare private insurance plans and get tax credits to purchase them would not open."
"Tax credits for small business owners who cover their employees would be eliminated," the statement said. "States would lose substantial Federal assistance under Medicaid to provide coverage for the neediest Americans."
Repeal would mean insured Americans "would lose the benefits and protections they receive under the healthcare law," the OMB said.
It would take a GOP trifecta in the November elections -- winning the White House and control of the Senate and retaining its majority in the House -- to overturn the Affordable Care Act or at least defund portions of it, CBS News reported Monday.
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled last month the individual mandate, the heart of the healthcare law, is constitutional because it is a tax.
Reported violent sex crimes up in military
WASHINGTON, July 9 (UPI) -- Despite a Defense Department crackdown, 20,000 violent sex crimes were committed in the U.S. military last year, statistics show.
The military services had increased investigations and prosecutions, strengthened victim-advocacy efforts and ordered prevention training throughout the ranks after then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld ordered a review in 2004 of how the military handled sex crimes, The Oklahoman of Oklahoma City reported.
The review followed female soldiers' reports of being assaulted by fellow soldiers while serving in Iraq and Kuwait.
Statistics show in the active-duty Army, the number of reported violent sex crimes such as rape, sexual assault and forcible sodomy increased every year between 2006 and 2011. In 2011, the latest year for which statistics are available, 2,290 violent sex crimes were committed in the Army, up 5 percent from 2010 and an increase of nearly 9 percent over 2009.
The increase has been attributed by Pentagon officials to increased reporting rather than more incidents but the military estimates up to 80 percent of sexual assaults go unreported.
A recent Army report said women make up only 14 percent of the Army but comprise 95 percent of all victims of violent sex crimes.
Karzai orders arrest in execution incident
KABUL, Afghanistan, July 9 (UPI) -- Afghan authorities sought the arrest of those involved in the public execution of a woman that was caught on amateur video, officials said.
The video shows the woman, accused of adultery, being shot at several times at close range by a man as she sat on the ground. The incident is believed to have taken place last month in a village in Parwan province near Kabul, and has raised outrage around the world, drawing strong condemnation and raising concerns about woman's rights in Afghanistan as U.S. and NATO officials plan completion of their troop withdrawal from that country by 2014.
President Hamid Karzai Monday ordered security officials to arrest those who participated in the execution, CNN reported. The report said the video showed the burqa-clad woman being shot nine times as a crowd of people cheered.
Karzai said such crimes are "unforgivable both in Islam and under our country's laws." The U.S. Embassy has called the killing a "cold blooded murder."
Afghan officials have blamed the Taliban -- whose violence has escalated in the country in recent months to coincide with the troop withdrawal -- for the execution.
Parwan province Gov. Abdul Basir Salangi was quoted as saying the woman was executed following a dispute over her between two Taliban commanders who, to save face, had accused her of adultery. Salangi told CNN the two "faked a court to decide about the fate of this woman" and executed her within an hour.
A third Taliban commander subsequently killed the two men, Salangi said.
U.S. Gen. John Allen, commander of NATO forces in Afghanistan, in a statement from NATO's International Security Assistance Force, praised Afghan authorities' investigation of the incident and offered assistance of NATO troops to track down those responsible for the killing.
Egypt court reaffirms Parliament decision
CAIRO, July 9 (UPI) -- Egypt's Supreme Constitutional Court Monday reaffirmed a decision to dissolve Parliament, a day after President Mohamed Morsi had ordered the body to reconvene.
The court's decision could lead to a confrontation between Morsi and his Islamist supporters, and Egypt's military council and courts, The New York Times reported.
Before last month's presidential election, the ruling military council ordered Parliament be dissolved after the Supreme Constitutional Court ruled the law under which the body had been elected was partly unconstitutional. The military took over legislative power and significantly reduced the authority of the president.
Some saw the council's move as an attempt to limit the powers of the Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood party, which held about half the seats in Parliament.
Yasser Ali, a presidential spokesman, said Monday Morsi's decree to reinstate the People's Assembly did not contradict the court's ruling against the parliamentary elections law, the Middle East News Agency reported.
Ali said Morsi respected the court's ruling and wasn't seeking conflict with the judiciary.
The current Parliament was to serve only until a new constitution was completed, to be followed by new legislative elections within 60 days, the Times said.
Gamal Eid, a human rights lawyer, called Morsi's decree "100 percent correct."
"It abolishes an executive order, and it is not related to the constitutional court," Eid said. "It negates the decision of the military council. If the choice is between the decree of an elected president and a military council with questionable legitimacy, then we choose the elected president."
Michael Wahid Hanna, a scholar at the Century Foundation -- a think tank in New York that describes itself as progressive and non-partisan -- said the decree amounted to "reinstating an unconstitutional Parliament. I think it's got disastrous consequences."
