Obama to unveil plans for financial sector overhaul

President Barack Obama will unveil on Wednesday his plans for reshaping US financial regulation, with proposals to close one bank regulator and create new overseers for big-picture economic risk and consumer financial product safety.

In a package of reforms that takes on many tough jobs while avoiding at least one, the administration will call for tighter oversight aimed at preventing a repeat of the severe banking and capital markets crisis that has shaken economies around the world.

Months of debate in the US Congress lie ahead. Committees of both the Senate and the House of Representatives have scheduled more than a dozen hearings on regulatory reform between now and mid-July. Conservative House Republicans have already offered their own rival plan.

Obama will present his proposals at 12:50 pm EDT on Wednesday, the White House said. Treasury secretary Timothy Geithner, members of Congress, regulators and representatives from the financial industry

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Will Michelle oust Jackie to become Fashion’s First Lady?

Fashionist as world over are closely monitoring Michelle Obama,the US First Lady to be, to see whether she manages to out do her sharp dressing on the campaign trail with husband Barrack Obama.

Designers including Rodarte, Halston and previous White House favourite Marches a have all submitted sketches for 45-year-old Michelle’s inaugural ball on Tuesday.

The designer of her gown, however, remains a secret, although grapevine reports suggest that the First Lady in waiting would most probably go for an unknown designer or even a High Street label.

Michael Flowers, from Chicago, who has been styling Michelle’s hair since she was 18, was flown into Washington on Sunday to prepare the tresses of his most famous client for Tuesday’s inauguration ceremony.

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Pranab rules out military action: Rice arrives Wednesday

India has said it was not contemplating military action against Pakistan in the wake of the Mumbai terror attack. “Nobody is talking of military action,” external affairs minister Pranab Mukherjee told reporters. Mukherjee’s statement comes on the eve of the arrival of US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice in New Delhi on Wednesday.

Rice has expressed confidence that there will not be any conflict between the two neighbours. But she told reporters a day earlier that the US government wants Pakistan to ensure total transparency in sharing any details on the 26/11 attacks with India. Pakistan has now offered India a joint team to probe the Mumbai attacks and underlined that it would “frame a response” to New Delhi’s demand for handing over 20 of India’s most wanted men.

“The international community is behind us, including the newly-elected US president, Barack Obama,” Mukherjee said. In response to a query on US President-elect Barack Obama’s remarks that every country had the sovereign right to “protect” its citizens from such terror attacks, Mukherjee said, “What will be done, time will show.”

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Indian industry to gain from energy, environment policies

Change, Barack Obama’s theme, will also resonate through the spectrum of India’s engagement with the US after the 44 th President of the United States of America takes over on January 20.

There is a sense of uncertainty here about the stand the new US administration will take on several issues that affect India.

An analysis of Obama’s position, detailed in his ‘Blue Print for Change’, shows his stance on environment and energy, for instance, may give India a long-term boost. A 35% reduction in US oil consumption by 2030, as he envisions, would soften the world’s oil demand. India’s coal- and import-dependent energy economy stands to gain more from Obama’s plan to invest $150 billion in clean energy over the next decade and double fuel economy standards within 18 years.

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McCain, Obama battle over economic prescriptions

Republican presidential nominee John McCain used his final debate with Democrat Barack Obama to attack his rival over taxes,spending and past associations, while Obama countered by stressing his approach to the economic and health- care issues that dominate voters'concerns.

McCain, 72, trailing in most polls, took the offensive almost from the first moments of the debate at Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York, last night.

He portrayed Obama as a tax and-spend Democrat whose policies would damage small businessmen -- including would be Ohio entrepreneur Joe Wurzelbacher. McCain repeatedly invoked him, calling him “Joe the plumber,'' triggering a debate within a debate over which candidate was on Joe's side.

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Salman Rushdie calls Palin a joke

British author Salmond Rushdie branded US vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin as a “joke” Sunday and said naming her as Republican John McCain’s running mate was a “colossal misjudgment”.

Rushdie, a vocal supporter of Democratic White House candidate Barack Obama, told Ireland’s TV3 channel that Palin was extreme and incompetent.

“I think she’s a joke. I mean I always thought, she’s a bad joke,” he said. “But I always thought it was a colossal misjudgment of McCain’s to appoint her as his running mate because she’s not even borderline competent and what we know about her, or increasingly what we are beginning to know about her, is how very, very, very far to the right she is.”

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