It had all come down to abortion.
Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.), the last Democratic holdout on health care, excused himself for a tense phone call with a Nebraska anti-abortion activist. But what was supposed to be a short break in the negotiations Friday night turned into a 90-minute nail-biter. 
With less than 12 hours until Majority Leader Harry Reid needed to introduce the revised bill, the chief domestic policy priority of the White House and Congress was still wobbling on the brink of collapse.
Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) milled around Reid’s office, popping Christmas cookies and fudge. Reid slumped in his chair. Two top administration aides raced back to the White House screening room to catch part of the Montana-Villanova football game, but had returned to the Capitol, where they were now waiting with a pair of nervous Democratic leaders.
Soon enough, Nelson walked through the doors.
“We can live with this,” he announced to the group.
And with that, Reid secured the 60th vote for the most sweeping social legislation in decades, all but assuring passage in the Senate this week.
It came at a high cost, and exposed the enduring truth of the Senate, where one senator can hold up legislation and bargain his way to “yes.”
Nelson certainly availed himself of the privilege. 
His objections already had helped kill the government-run insurance option in the bill. He won an agreement that the federal government will forever pick up Nebraska’s share of a proposed Medicaid expansion, a deal worth about $100 million in the first decade, according to a Senate aide. He carved Nebraska’s non-profit insurers out of a proposed industry tax.
And he built new restrictions on federal financing of abortions into the bill, infuriating groups on both sides of the emotional issue and almost certainly touching off a withering fight over the limits when House and Senate Democrats hash out a final compromise. 
Already, a leading abortion opponent in the House, Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.), is saying he doesn’t think the language Nelson won in the Senate bill goes far enough. The co-chairs of the House abortion-rights caucus, Democratic Reps. Diana DeGette (Colo.) and Louise M. Slaughter (N.Y.), left open the possibility of opposing Nelson's change as well, saying they believe it might be unconstituional — all signs of how abortion might still emerge as an obstacle to a final deal on reforming the U.S. health system.
Nelson – like Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.), who picked up a $300 million Medicaid fix to ease her into supporting the bill last month– made no excuses Saturday for what Republicans blasted as a sweetheart deal.
“I always put Nebraska first,” he told POLITICO in an interview after his announcement. “But I looked at this through the standpoint of Nebraskans and the country.” 
Asked how much he got, Nelson said, "Most. Enough. I didn't get exactly every penny I was after." 
"There is a difference between holding out for something and holding up," he added. "I was holding out for something to make it better." 
But some Republicans suggested that Nelson held out on abortion to advance the deal for his home state on Medicaid. "You gotta compliment Ben Nelson for playing, 'The Price is Right.' He negotiated a Medicaid agreement for Nebraska that puts the federal government on the hook forever," said Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) 
Nelson started with a list of must-have changes that he provided to Schumer. 

Nelson said some were specific to Nebraska, like the Medicaid fix. Others, he said, would benefit people across the country, like an inflation adjustment to the $2,500 cap on tax-exempt contributions to Flexible Savings Accounts.

Nelson and Reid quietly opened their negotiations Wednesday night. At times on Thursday, Schumer was calling Nelson every 15 minutes, as part of what the Nebraskan called pre-negotiations. By nightfall, with progress being made, Reid asked Nelson to join a round of intensive talks Friday morning at 9:30.

Unlike during the talks in the House, where White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel took the lead, the administration would be represented by two Senate veterans with deep ties to Nelson’s part of the country. Senior adviser Pete Rouse once worked for former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.), and deputy chief of staff Jim Messina remains close to his former boss, Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.) Nelson had personal relationships with both of them.

Schumer also had developed a bond with Nelson in recent years. The senator from Brooklyn traveled to Nebraska last month to hunt with Nelson. It was the first time Schumer shot a gun, and he bagged three pheasants.

“We hunt together,” Nelson said, visibly delighted by the irony. “We may be an odd couple in a lot of respects but we share some of the same qualities in trying to solve things.”

By around noon Friday, Reid and Nelson came to agreement in four areas: the Medicaid carve out for Nebraska, the exemption for Nebraska non-profit insurers, an exemption for Medicare supplemental insurance providers, and indexing the Flexible Savings Accounts.

After a break for lunch, Reid turned to abortion.

Nelson and Chief of Staff Tim Becker, who had flown in from Nebraska, set up shop in one room of Reid’s suite. Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) and her aides settled into another wing with Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), the two senators there to represent Democrats who favor abortion rights.

The opposing senators never spoke with each other or sat at the same table. They negotiated through Reid and Schumer.

Through the afternoon and early evening, they appeared deadlocked. Both sides, in consultation with advocacy groups, rejected various offers.

They couldn’t get beyond differences between the so-called Stupak amendment in the House bill, which would require women who receive federal subsidies for insurance to seek out a separate abortion rider, and a proposal by Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.) requiring policyholders to opt-out of abortion coverage.

“I don’t know if we can do this,” Nelson said he told Reid at one point. “I’m running out of ideas.”

As he spent the day munching on almonds, peanuts and potato chips, Nelson said he eventually had what he described as a breakthrough. He turned over a piece of paper, and drew a line down the center.

“Why don’t we have two policies?” Nelson asked. “One with and one without.”

Nelson proposed that every state insurance exchange offer at least one plan that does not cover abortion, and policyholders could choose a plan with or without abortion coverage, unless states choose to ban it. Also, people who receive federal subsidies would need to write two separate checks as a way to ensure that none of the federal dollars went toward the abortion premium.

Nelson asked for a break. He left Reid’s office and called Julie Schmit-Albin, executive director of Nebraska Right to Life.

He spent 40 minutes walking her through the proposal, but didn't convince her. In fact, she was beside herself. Nebraska Right to Life endorsed Nelson in 2006, and rallied around him as he emerged as the lone Senate Democrat prepared to filibuster unless the bill included Stupak-style language.

Nelson described the compromise to Schmit-Albin as “Stupak-plus,” since it also includes tax credits to encourage adoption and benefits to help unwed mothers cope with their pregnancy. She didn’t buy it.

“If this is so good for pro-life, why would Sen. Boxer and Sen. Schumer agree to this?” Schmit-Albin said she asked Nelson. “I am personally devastated.”

It was a glimpse of the fury that groups on both sides of the abortion battle would soon unleash. But by that point, Nelson appeared to have his mind made up.

Back in Reid's office, however, Schumer thought they had lost him.

"We had been working on this so long," Schumer said in an interview Saturday. "I had been talking to Ben 10 or 12 times a day, and of course the week before we had the meetings of the Group of 10. Nine months, all of this work, all these compromises, down the drain, for one thing -- that would just be awful."

With snow beginning to fall, Nelson returned to Reid's office, and accepted the deal. They shook hands – and hugged, first with Reid, then Schumer. Boxer and Murray signed off on it, too.

Minutes later, President Barack Obama was on the line from Air Force One, flying from Copenhagen to Washington. With his signature issue rescued, the president wanted to offer his congratulations.

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WASHINGTON (AFP) –
The United States issued a new strategy Wednesday for dealing with a rising threat from biological weapons but stopped short of measures to give teeth to an existing international convention.

Instead, the White House said it would step up protections against biological attacks by increasing vigilance and global access to information on disease outbreaks and strengthening norms of scientific conduct.

"We will continue to face new and emerging biological threats that will require the coordinated and concerted efforts of a broad range of domestic and international partners," President Barack Obama said in releasing the strategy.

The White House paper said risks traditionally associated with state-run germ warfare programs have spread in recent years to extremist groups as technological advances have made it easier and cheaper to produce biological agents.

While the United States has made strides over the past eight years in recognizing and responding to acts of bioterrorism, it said less attention has been paid to developing strategies to prevent attacks.

"Although it is entirely feasible to mitigate the impact of even a large-scale biological attack upon a city's population, doing so incurs a significant cost and effort," the paper said.

"We therefore need to place increased priority on actions to further reduce the likelihood that such an attack might occur."

The paper sets out a series of objectives for the new strategy, broadly aimed at protecting against "the misuse of the life sciences to develop or use biological agents that cause harm."

These include efforts to increase access to knowledge and products that can reduce the impact of outbreaks of infectious disease.

It calls for activities to reinforce "a culture of responsibility, awareness and vigilance" in the life sciences, and steps to safeguard scientific knowledge and capabilities that could be vulnerable to misuse.

Other objectives are to obtain timely and accurate information on bio threats; expand US capacity to identify and stop those who might carry out an attack; and to promote an international discussion of the threats and steps needed to counter it.

But, following in the footsteps of his predecessor, Obama refrained from reviving negotiations on a protocol to enforce the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention, which though ratified by 163 countries has no verification mechanism.

"We have carefully reviewed previous efforts to develop a verification protocol and have determined that a legally binding protocol would not achieve meaningful verification or greater security," said Ellen Tauscher, a US undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, in Geneva.

At BWC talks in 2001, the Bush administration scuttled negotiations for such a protocol, saying that intrusive checks could compromise US security and trade secrets.

TEHRAN (Reuters) –
Iran said on Tuesday it intended to take unspecified legal action over an IAEA rebuke of its nuclear activities and would provide Iranians with enough gasoline in order to trump any further U.N. sanctions.

The IAEA board angered Iran last week when it censured it for covertly building a second uranium enrichment plant near the holy city of Qom, in addition to its main IAEA-monitored one at Natanz, and calling for a halt to construction.

Tehran said on Sunday it would build 10 more uranium enrichment sites in retaliation for the vote by the 35-nation board of the U.N. nuclear watchdog, which had rare Russian and Chinese backing.

"(Foreign Minister Manouchehr) Mottaki will declare the Islamic Republic's appreciation or opposition to the (position of) members of the governing body in separate letters," Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said at a news conference reported in official news agency IRNA.

He said Iran would complain to the countries that supported the resolution but that it would not cause a change in Iran's relations with Russia and China, often seen as allies.

"We will confront the resolution legally," he said, according to student agency ISNA, without giving more details.

The United States and its allies fear Iran's nuclear energy program could allow the Islamic Republic to develop nuclear weapons, thought Tehran says it has no such intention.

Iran has resisted a deal with Western powers that would see its low-enriched uranium sent abroad for processing into uranium for making fuel.

Though Russia has said it was "seriously concerned" at the announcement of 10 planned new sites, it said this week it still planned to start up Iran's first nuclear power station in March.

"I don't think Russia will face any problem. That's what's agreed upon," Mehmanparast said, reiterating that "all our nuclear activities will be under IAEA supervision."

Western countries are threatening more U.N. sanctions on Iran which could targets its imports of gasoline. Though one of the world's biggest producers, Iran does not have refining capacity to meet current domestic demand.

Iran says it will expand its own production and plans to cut costly subsidies in a bid to reduce public consumption.

"Our plan is still being pursued, we must be on our own and provide our fuel ourselves," Mehmanparast said.

(Reporting by Andrew Hammond; Editing by Alison Williams)

MCLEAN, Va. — On the eve of the unveiling of the nation’s new Afghanistan policy, former Vice President Dick Cheney slammed President Barack Obama for projecting “weakness” to adversaries and warned that more workaday Afghans will side with the Taliban if they think the United States is heading for the exits.
In a 90-minute interview at his suburban Washington house, Cheney said the president’s “agonizing” about Afghanistan strategy “has consequences for your forces in the field.”
“I begin to get nervous when I see the commander in chief making decisions apparently for what I would describe as small ‘p’ political reasons, where he’s trying to balance off different competing groups in society,” Cheney said.
“Every time he delays, defers, debates, changes his position, it begins to raise questions: Is the commander in chief really behind what they’ve been asked to do?”
Obama administration officials have complained ever since taking office that they face a series of unpalatable — if not impossible — national security decisions in Afghanistan and Pakistan because of the Bush administration’s unwavering insistence on focusing on Iraq.
But Cheney rejected any suggestion that Obama had to decide on a new strategy for Afghanistan because the one employed by the previous administration failed.
Cheney was asked if he thinks the Bush administration bears any responsibility for the disintegration of Afghanistan because of the attention and resources that were diverted to Iraq. “I basically don’t,” he replied without elaborating.
Obama will announce a troop buildup in Afghanistan in a speech Tuesday at West Point, and he’s expected to send at least 30,000 more U.S. troops to the country. The White House also has said that Obama will outline a general time frame for the United States to begin withdrawing from Afghanistan.
But Cheney said the average Afghan citizen “sees talk about exit strategies and how soon we can get out, instead of talk about how we win.
“Those folks ... begin to look for ways to accommodate their enemies,” Cheney said. “They’re worried the United States isn’t going to be there much longer and the bad guys are.”
During the interview, Cheney laced his concerns with a broader critique of Obama’s foreign and national security policy, saying Obama’s nuanced and at times cerebral approach projects “weakness” and that the president is looking “far more radical than I expected.”
“Here’s a guy without much experience, who campaigned against much of what we put in place ... and who now travels around the world apologizing,” Cheney said. “I think our adversaries — especially when that’s preceded by a deep bow ... — see that as a sign of weakness.”
Specifically, Cheney said the Justice Department decision to try Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the accused mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks, in New York City is “great” for Al Qaeda.
“One of their top people will be given the opportunity — courtesy of the United States government and the Obama administration — to have a platform from which they can espouse this hateful ideology that they adhere to,” he said. “I think it’s likely to give encouragement — aid and comfort — to the enemy.”
The former vice president is splitting his time among his houses in Virginia, in Wyoming and on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, with a place at each for working on his memoir, to be published in the spring of 2011. His eldest daughter, former Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Liz Cheney, is collaborating on the writing and overseeing research.
During the campaign, Cheney recalled, he saw Obama as “sort of a mainline, traditional Democrat — liberal, from the liberal wing of the party.” But Cheney said he is increasingly persuaded by the notion that Obama “doesn’t believe in American exceptionalism — the idea that the United States is a special nation, that we are the greatest, freest nation mankind has ever known.”
“When I see the way he operates, I am increasingly convinced that he’s not as committed to or as wedded to that concept as most of the presidents I’ve known, Republican or Democrat,” he said. “I am worried. And I find as I get out around the country, a lot of other people are worried, too.”
Cheney said his worries extend to Obama’s domestic agenda: “He obviously has a very robust agenda of change — health care system, cap and trade, redistribution of wealth. I rarely hear him talk about the private sector.”

Cheney charged that Obama’s plans for Afghanistan are based on political calculations by “a guy who campaigned from one end of the country to the other, saying Afghanistan was the good war ... so that he could come across as somebody who’s not against all wars.”

“Now, things have changed. Iraq’s going significantly better because of the decisions we made in the Bush administration — the surge and so forth,” the former vice president added. “And he’s having to deal, sort of up close and personal, with the Afghanistan situation. And it’s tough — it’s hard. ... Sometimes I have the feeling that they’re just figuring that out.”

Looking ahead to 2012, Cheney said the likely midterm congressional losses for Democrats next year “point in the direction of a very competitive situation in 2012 — a very respectable shot for the Republicans of taking back the presidency.”

“There’s a lot of churning and a lot of ferment out there in the party today, and that’s basically a healthy thing,” he said. “Our adversaries — our Democratic adversaries — like to be able to portray the Republican Party as a bunch of wingnuts — narrow based, always have some agenda that’s not attractive to the public. ... That’s easier for them, and more fun, than dealing with their own problems. And I think their problems are significant.”

Cheney said “it’s far too soon to be handicapping” his party’s presidential nominee. “We’ve got a lot of folks, I’m sure, who will want to pursue it. I haven’t committed and don’t expect to anytime soon,” he said. “I think we’ve got a lot of interesting people in the Republican Party.”

Cheney at first declined to make any comment about Sarah Palin, but finally said: “I like her, personally. ... She’s charming, engaging. She’s got as much right to be out there as anybody else. Will she be a candidate at some point? How would she do as a candidate? Those are all questions that only time will tell.”

And what does he think about the movement to draft him to seek the top job himself?

Cheney says he sees no such scenario. “Why would I want to do that?” he replied. “It’s been a hell of a tour. I’ve loved it. I have no aspirations for further office.”

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