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Penny Manis
AC360° Senior Producer
President Obama has kicked off his term with a flurry of action including meeting with his top economic and military advisers, plus issuing the first of his executive orders. Earlier today in a press conference he announced a “new era of openness in our country” and tightened ethics guidelines for administration staff members.
Tomorrow, there is more to come – a lot more. CNN has confirmed that President Obama plans to issue three executive orders: the closure of the U.S. military detention facility at Guantanamo Bay within a year; a ban on torture (by requiring the Army field manual is used as the guide for terror interrogations); and a review of detention policies and procedures. Candy Crowley and Ed Henry will follow these first presidential moves and bring you the latest on the second full day of the Obama administration.
Plus all this:
Randi Kaye will be Keeping Them Honest by looking at a contentious issue President Obama has promised to tackle: The “Don’t ask, Don’t tell” policy that some say has prevented homosexual and bisexual men and women from serving openly in the U.S. military. Critics suggest this campaign promise is one that may not get fulfilled. Can the 44th president overturn federal law? What is the potential impact on the military - and is this really a good idea? Randi will have answers.
Ali Velshi follows the state of the economy. Jobless claims are out tomorrow, and already this week we’re seeing dramatic layoffs worldwide. Just today, several corporations announced they are slashing thousands of jobs. And it’s only mid-week! Ali will put it all in perspective.
Finally, Tom Foreman may look more deeply into the ancestry of the First Family. You may be surprised to learn just how diverse their family tree is – on both sides.
See you tomorrow night at 10 pm ET!
Secretary of State Hillary Cllinton is sworn in after her Senate confirmation on Wednesday afternoon.
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US President Barack Obama steps on First Lady Michelle Obama's dress during the Obama Home States Inaugural Ball at the Washington Convention Center in Washington, DC, January 20, 2009. AFP PHOTO / Saul LOEB.
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Ali Velshi
Chief Business Correspondent
Worldwide layoffs this week is now 28,150 - and it's only Wednesday. Keep in mind ACTUAL jobs losses are always a HUGE multiple of what is announced, so this is pretty serious.
Here's the count:
– Eaton Corporation 5,200 jobs
– Warner Bros. 800
– Rohm and Haas 900
– United Airlines 1,000
– Clear Channel 1,850
– Ericcson 5,000
– BHP 6,000
– Intel up to 6,000
– Williams Sonoma approx. 1,400
[cnn-photo-caption image=http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2009/images/01/21/art.srilanka.street.jpg caption="An elderly Sri Lankan man sits under posters on a street in Colombo on January 4, 2009, featuring an image of Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse and hailing the military's capture of the Tamil Tiger political headquarters." width=292 height=320]
M.I.A.
Musician
While there is no room in the world for terrorist organizations, their defeat cannot come at the expense of thousands of innocent civilian lives.
The greatest failing of the Bush administration's "war on terror" is not its inability to meet its prime objectives (e.g. capturing Osama Bin Laden, eradicating the threat of WMDS in Iraq, and removing Al Qaeda from Afghanistan). Rather, it is that America has given credibility to the act and the notion of pursuing terrorists at all costs.
The Bush administration has decided to ignore the very tenets of democracy (the U.S. constitution, Geneva convention, among others) in pursuit of winning the "war on terror." In doing so, it sent a very clear message to the rest of the world: all bets are off where terrorism is involved.
Today, we can clearly see the ripple effect. In Sri Lanka, my home country, the Colombo government has massacred hundreds of thousands of civilians in order to eliminate the threat posed by a small yet defiant group widely known as the Tamil Tigers (also known as the LTTE or Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam). Make no mistake, the LTTE have engaged in reprehensible terrorist activities that have needlessly taken the lives of both civilians and heads of state. The LTTE's use of child soldiers and suicide bombers is unconscionable, and has rightly been condemned by the international community. But now the eyeglass must turn to the Colombo government as the conflict enters its 25th year. The war has resulted in what many humanitarian groups are now calling genocide. And sadly, for the Tamil people, time is running out.
[cnn-photo-caption image=http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2008/POLITICS/10/14/bailout.congress/art.frank.gi.jpg caption="U.S. Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA)."]
Note from reporter: Congressman and Senators love to get a lot of press when initiating bold, new legislation, tough talking amendments or major initiatives. One of the reasons they seek media attention on the "front-end" is because they know, as do those of us who cover them, that it is very rare anything ever really gets done on the "back end". Most new legislation winds up going nowhere. In our continuing effort to "Keep Them Honest" here is a look at one of those bold proposals that went nowhere almost immediately upon its introduction.
Drew Griffin
CNN Special Investigations Unit
When those auto makers flew to congress in corporate jets to ask for a taxpayer bail out, no one was more upset than the powerful chairman of the house financial services committee, Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA).
So irate over the use of corporate jets, Frank was determined to make sure it never happened again. His plan, no corporate executives coming to Washington asking for bailout money would be allowed to travel in those multi-million dollar symbols of excess.