John Kerry Busts Out Some French

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This made me smile. Olivier Knox of Yahoo News:

[W]hile Kerry seemed a bit rusty, his opening remarks at a joint press conference with the French foreign minister sounded pretty solid to this native speaker... And he poured on the charm to please his audience. “We’ve just finished one of those wonderful French lunches that have never ceased drawing Americans to Paris for centuries,” he said, seemingly reading from notes or prepared remarks. And he also joked about anti-French sentiment in the United States. “And now I’ll speak in English because otherwise they won’t let me return home.” Kerry’s gesture thrilled the French, who appreciate it when visiting dignitaries make an effort to speak their hosts’ language.

What the White House Looks Like Completely Gutted

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Brian Resnick, at Mashable writes:

The social events of the 1948 holiday season had to be canceled. And with good reason: Experts called the third floor of the White House “an outstanding example of a firetrap.” The result of a federally commissioned report found the mansion’s plumbing “makeshift and unsanitary,” while “the structural deterioration was] in ‘appalling degree,’ and threatening complete collapse.” The congressional commission on the matter was considering the option of abandoning the structure altogether in favor of a built-from-scratch mansion, but President Truman lobbied for the restoration. [Please click through the link to check out the pictures. They're worth it. I wouldn't ever link to Mashable, otherwise.

Eric Cantor Will Propose Federal Law That Ends Overtime Pay For Hourly Workers

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Someone who goes by the username TeamSarah4Choice, at Daily Kos writes:

In Eric Cantor's February 2013 speech, he said he wanted to propose Federal Law that would end overtime pay for hourly workers. Currently, the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 (FLSA), signed into law by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, mandates that certain workers get paid "time + 1/2" for overtime work. Eric Cantor wants to eliminate that law. Because -- ya know -- workers not getting paid for overtime hours worked out so good for workers before FDR enacted that Law. Eric Cantor is a real piece of work.

Why A One-Room West Virginia Library Runs a $20,000 Cisco Router

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Nate Anderson, at Ars Technica writes:

In total, $24 million was spent on the routers through a not-very-open bidding process under which non-Cisco router manufacturers such as Juniper and Alcatel-Lucent were not "given notice or any opportunity to bid." As for Cisco, which helped put the massive package together, the legislative auditor concluded that the company "had a moral responsibility to propose a plan which reasonably complied with Cisco's own engineering standards" but that instead "Cisco representatives showed a wanton indifference to the interests of the public in recommending using $24 million of public funds to purchase 1,164 Cisco model 3945 branch routers." After having dealt with Cisco personally at my current job, this doesn't surprise me.

White House Offers Republicans Deal For 80% Of Their Demands To Avoid Sequester; Republicans Refuse It

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Ezra Klein, at The Washington Post writes:

As I understand it, the GOP has five basic goals in the budget talks: 1) Cut the deficit. 2) Cut entitlement spending. 3) Protect defense spending, and possibly even increase it. 4) Simplify the tax code by cleaning out deductions and loopholes. 5) Lower tax rates. The White House is willing to cut a deal with Republicans that will accomplish 1, 2, 3 and 4. But Republicans don’t want that deal. They’d prefer the sequester to that deal. That means they will get less on 1, basically nothing 2, 4, and 5, and they will actively hurt themselves on 3. So, rather than accomplishing four of their five goals, they’re accomplishing part of one. Some trade. Also, watch this bullshit:

App.net Launches Free Tier

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Dalton Caldwell, at the App.net Blog writes:

Although App.net has had only paid account tiers thus far, we initially conceived of App.net as a freemium service. It took some time to get to this point, but we are now ready to make this vision a reality. Sorry folks but I've already sent out my existing invites. You must have an invite to create a free account, or you can just subscribe like the rest of us.