Word: billion
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...damage done to Toyota by its recall of more than 5.3 million autos is clearly accumulating: U.S. sales dropped 16% in January, and the company's stock surrendered $21 billion in value in a single week. The latest development is the automaker's admitting to design problems with the brakes in its prized Prius. The Department of Transportation is threatening the company with fines for being slow to react to the problems - a pair of faults that can cause sudden, dangerous acceleration - though the DOT itself is being criticized for the same reason. Lawyers, who are never slow to react...
...President Obama's limited spending freeze won't in itself do much to address that disconnect, Elmendorf suggests. The CBO director projects that even if such a spending cap were to extend to all discretionary government outlays (Obama would exempt national security), it would save only $10 billion in the next fiscal year, less than 1% of the budget. Nor is it likely that Congress will make much of a dent in the problem, at least not in the short term. (See 10 players in health care reform...
...given it a thumbs-up.) The President has focused even more attention on the CBO's numbers by insisting that any bill reaching his desk not add to the deficit over the next 10 years. Obama has even set a target - an overall price tag of $900 billion or less - that has put lawmakers in the position of tweaking and twisting every line of the health care bill so that it comes in under that amount. (Read "How to Understand a Trillion-Dollar Deficit...
...feel a very personal sense of responsibility for each and every one of them," he said. "And one of the reasons I've stayed on is that I worry that whoever comes next won't care as deeply, won't do the MRAPs, isn't willing to spend $30 billion to save our kids' lives and limbs. And that is very emotional...
...credit, Gates is mindful that the U.S.'s diplomatic assets pale in comparison to its military power. The Pentagon budget is still $660 billion, compared with State's $51 billion. To audiences, Gates often bemoans the fact that the State Department's foreign-service officers would barely crew one aircraft carrier. "We joke that Gates is the best surrogate for the State Department. He always makes the point that we are underfunded and underresourced," says a Clinton staffer. At the same time, the Pentagon has assumed more of the burdens of diplomacy and statecraft. The building contains its own mini...