Tag: Alexander the Great

Tennessee Republican Sen. Lamar Alexander, who announced this week that he will retire when his term is up in 2020, is one veteran politician who won’t have to die to get a positive story written about him. Bush administration, president of the University of Tennessee and three-term U.S. senator from Tennessee. His eight years as governor and 18 years as senator will make him the longest serving governor and senator in Tennessee history. As chairman of the important Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, Alexander built a distinguished record. I came of age at a time when you called them as you saw them: A politician did something wrong, you reported it; a politician did something right, you reported that, too. With today’s media over-emphasis on the bad, and the eagerness to stoke and trumpet partisan rancor, it is little wonder that most Americans think all politicians are bums. But at the same time, public trust in the news media is nothing to brag about: An October Gallup Poll found just 45 percent of Americans trust the news media to report fully, fairly and accurately. Having covered Alexander from when he was governor through his early years in the Senate, I gave him a phone call when I heard he would not seek re-election in 2020. That, he said, would take away from the important work he still has to do in the Senate. So, he decided to forego another run.

Theresa May has been told that it is up to her to deliver a “creative solution” to break the impasse that threatens to leave Wednesday’s “moment of truth” Brexit summit of EU leaders collapsing around her. Michel Barnier, the EU’s chief negotiator, said the UK government had also failed to meet the conditions necessary for a special November Brexit summit to be called. “And as I see it, the only source of hope for a deal – for now – is the goodwill and determination on both sides. Tomorrow, I am going to ask prime minister May whether she has concrete proposals on how to break the impasse. The ex-foreign secretary’s suggestions that the EU was seeking to annex Northern Ireland or divide the UK were “of course, not the truth”, he said. Theresa May chairs Brexit cabinet as EU says no deal 'more likely than ever before' - Politics live Read more “Since there is no agreement on the Irish backstop there will not be an outline of joint political declaration on the table on Wednesday evening … [that] will not change before Wednesday,” a senior EU official said. Asked what his message to May would be, he said: “Take responsibility and be constructive.” A December summit is now being seen as the likely last chance for a deal, although senior UK officials have suggested that such a timetable could make it all but impossible to get the necessary Brexit legislation through parliament in time for 29 March 2019. In his update to the EU’s 27 EU affairs ministers, Barnier ran through the calendar, counting backwards from Brexit day on 29 March 2019. Barnier told ministers at the closed-door meeting he wanted to reassess the progress of Brexit talks in about two weeks. The option of a “no-deal” summit in November is still open and will be discussed by leaders on Wednesday.