Michael Needham (political Advisor)
Michael Austin Needham (born December 22, 1981) is an American political advisor who has been the 37th and current Counselor of the Department of State since 2025. Early life Needham was born on December 22, 1981, in Manhattan, and grew up in New York City. His father ran a boutique investment bank and his mother was an executive for Saks Fifth Avenue. He attended the Collegiate School in New York City and then Williams College in Massachusetts, where he majored in political science, edited the school newspaper, and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in 2004. Between 2008 and 2010, he attended the Stanford Graduate School of Business, where he graduated with a Master of Business Administration. Career After graduating from Williams College in 2004, fellow Williams graduate and California politician Bill Simon helped him secure a job at the Heritage Foundation, a Washington, D.C.-based conservative think tank, where he later became chief of staff to Edwin Feulner, the foundation ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Counselor Of The United States Department Of State
The Counselor of the United States Department of State is a position within the United States Department of State that serves the Secretary of State as a special advisor and consultant on major problems of foreign policy and who provides guidance to the appropriate bureaus with respect to such matters. The Counselor conducts special international negotiations and consultations, and also undertakes special assignments from time to time, as directed by the Secretary. Currently, the Counselor holds under law a rank equivalent to that of Under Secretary of State. Unlike the other Under Secretaries of State, the Counselor currently does not require Senate confirmation. Historically, the role was appointed by the President, by and with the advice and consent of the United States Senate as authorized by 22 U.S. Code § 2651a as one of four "other senior officials." The Secretary of State created the position of Counselor for the Department of State in 1909 as part of a general Depart ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Bill Simon (politician)
William Edward Simon Jr. (born June 20, 1951) is an American businessman and politician. In 2002, Simon campaigned unsuccessfully for Governor of California as a Republican against Democratic incumbent Gray Davis. Billed as a "conservative Republican," the virtually unknown Simon's campaign was significantly boosted by support from better-known Republican officeholders from outside California, including former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani. Background Simon was born in Neptune, New Jersey, the son of Carol (Girard) and William E. Simon Sr., the 63rd Secretary of the Treasury under Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford. Simon Sr., also served as director of the Federal Energy Office. Coincidentally, Simon was a childhood friend of former Democratic party chair Howard Dean. Simon earned a BA from Williams College in 1973, and a JD from Boston College in 1982. At Boston College Law School, "Billy" Simon was widely popular and respected. He was a Moot Court Champion and repres ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Capitol Hill
Capitol Hill, in addition to being a metonym for the United States Congress, is the largest historic residential neighborhood in Washington, D.C., stretching easterly in front of the United States Capitol along wide avenues. It is one of the oldest residential neighborhoods in Washington, D.C., and, with roughly 35,000 people in just under , it is also one of the most densely populated. As a geographic feature, Capitol Hill rises near the center of the District of Columbia and extends eastward. Pierre (Peter) Charles L'Enfant, as he began to develop his plan for the new federal capital city in 1791, chose to locate the "Congress House" (the Capitol building) on the crest of the hill at a site that he characterized as a "pedestal waiting for a monument." The Capitol building has been the home of the Congress of the United States and the workplace of many residents of the Capitol Hill neighborhood since 1800. The Capitol Hill neighborhood today straddles two quadrants of the ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Wall Street Journal
''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published six days a week by Dow Jones & Company, a division of News Corp. The newspaper is published in the broadsheet format and online. The ''Journal'' has been printed continuously since its inception on July 8, 1889, by Charles Dow, Edward Jones, and Charles Bergstresser. The ''Journal'' is regarded as a newspaper of record, particularly in terms of business and financial news. The newspaper has won 38 Pulitzer Prizes, the most recent in 2019. ''The Wall Street Journal'' is one of the largest newspapers in the United States by circulation, with a circulation of about 2.834million copies (including nearly 1,829,000 digital sales) compared with ''USA Today''s 1.7million. The ''Journal'' publishes the luxury news and lifestyle magazine ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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2013 United States Federal Government Shutdown
From October 1 to October 17, 2013, the United States federal government entered a shutdown and curtailed most routine operations because neither legislation appropriating funds for fiscal year 2014 nor a continuing resolution for the interim authorization of appropriations for fiscal year 2014 was enacted in time. Regular government operations resumed October 17 after an interim appropriations bill was signed into law. During the shutdown, approximately 800,000 federal employees were indefinitely furloughed, and another 1.3 million were required to report to work without known payment dates. Only those government services deemed "excepted" under the Antideficiency Act were continued; and only those employees deemed "excepted" were permitted to report to work. The previous U.S. federal government shutdown was in 1995–96. The 16-day-long shutdown of October 2013 was the third-longest government shutdown in U.S. history, after the 35-day 2018–2019 shutdown and the 21-day ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Affordable Care Act
The Affordable Care Act (ACA), formally known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and colloquially known as Obamacare, is a landmark U.S. federal statute enacted by the 111th United States Congress and signed into law by President Barack Obama on March 23, 2010. Together with the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010 amendment, it represents the U.S. healthcare system's most significant regulatory overhaul and expansion of coverage since the enactment of Medicare and Medicaid in 1965. The ACA's major provisions came into force in 2014. By 2016, the uninsured share of the population had roughly halved, with estimates ranging from 20 to 24 million additional people covered. The law also enacted a host of delivery system reforms intended to constrain healthcare costs and improve quality. After it went into effect, increases in overall healthcare spending slowed, including premiums for employer-based insurance plans. The increased coverage was du ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid digital subscribers. It also is a producer of popular podcasts such as '' The Daily''. Founded in 1851 by Henry Jarvis Raymond and George Jones, it was initially published by Raymond, Jones & Company. The ''Times'' has won 132 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any newspaper, and has long been regarded as a national "newspaper of record". For print it is ranked 18th in the world by circulation and 3rd in the U.S. The paper is owned by the New York Times Company, which is publicly traded. It has been governed by the Sulzberger family since 1896, through a dual-class share structure after its shares became publicly traded. A. G. Sulzberger, the paper's publisher and the company's chairman, is the fifth generation of the family to head the p ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Tea Party Movement
The Tea Party movement was an American fiscally conservative political movement within the Republican Party that began in 2009. Members of the movement called for lower taxes and for a reduction of the national debt and federal budget deficit through decreased government spending. It urges the return of government as intended by some of the Founding Fathers. It also seeks to teach its view of the Constitution and other founding documents. Scholars have described its interpretation variously as originalist, popular, or a unique combination of the two. Reliance on the Constitution is selective and inconsistent. Adherents cite it, yet do so more as a cultural reference rather than out of commitment to the text, which they seek to alter. Two constitutional amendments have been targeted by some in the movement for full or partial repeal: the 16th that allows an income tax, and the 17th that requires popular election of senators. There has also been support for a proposed Repe ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Heritage Action
Heritage Action for America, more commonly known simply as Heritage Action, is a conservative policy advocacy organization founded in 2010. Heritage Action, which has affiliates throughout the United States, is a sister organization of the conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation. Heritage Action has been called a "powerhouse in a new generation of conservative groups" and "perhaps now the most influential lobby group among Congressional Republicans." Executive director Jessica Anderson has led the organization since April 2020. Heritage Action launched a campaign in August 2013 to link the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, also known as the ACA or "Obamacare", with laws to keep the federal government open or to increase the federal debt limit. The organization played an instrumental role in the government shutdown of October 2013. Background and history Heritage Action was first announced in April 2010 by Ed Feulner, the then president of The Heritage Foundat ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Rudy Giuliani 2008 Presidential Campaign
The 2008 presidential campaign of Rudy Giuliani began following the formation of the Draft Giuliani movement in October 2005. The next year, Giuliani opened an exploratory committee and formally announced in February 2007 that he was actively seeking the presidential nomination of the Republican Party. At the onset of the campaign, Giuliani held a significant lead in the nationwide polls. The candidacy of Senator John McCain faltered, and Giuliani maintained his lead in both national polls and fundraising throughout 2007. Political observers predicted that Giuliani would lose support, and he was criticized for a lack of substantive policy stances. Eschewing the common strategy of focusing on early-voting states such as Iowa and New Hampshire, Giuliani focused instead on larger states. He campaigned in Florida throughout the primary season, hoping a win in that state's primary would propel him to victory in other primaries on Super Tuesday (February 5). On January 29, 2008, Gi ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Rudy Giuliani
Rudolph William Louis Giuliani (, ; born May 28, 1944) is an American politician and lawyer who served as the 107th Mayor of New York City from 1994 to 2001. He previously served as the United States Associate Attorney General from 1981 to 1983 and the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York from 1983 to 1989. Giuliani led the 1980s federal prosecution of New York City mafia bosses as U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York. After a failed campaign for Mayor of New York City in the 1989 election, he succeeded in 1993, and was reelected in 1997, campaigning on a "tough on crime" platform. He led New York's controversial "civic cleanup" as its mayor from 1994 to 2001.Whether lionized or criticized, "Giuliani's cleanup", especially of Manhattan, most famously Times Square, is widely recognized: B. McKee, "Rules and regulations alone can't revive America's downtowns", ''Architecture'' (American Institute of Architects), 1998 Mar;811 Jane E. Jef ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Edwin Feulner
Edwin John Feulner Jr. (born August 12, 1941) is a former think tank executive who founded the conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation and served as its president from 1977 to 2013 and again from 2017 to 2018. Feulner's positions have included advisor and chairman of the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, from which he received the Truman-Reagan Medal of Freedom in 2006. Early years and education Edwin John Feulner Jr. was born in Chicago, Illinois, to Helen Joan (née Franzen) and Edwin John Feulner, the owner of a Chicago real estate firm. He has three sisters: Mary Ann, Joan, and Barbara. The family comes from a line of devout Roman Catholic German Americans. Three of his maternal uncles were parish priests. Feulner attended Immaculate Conception High School (Elmhurst, Illinois) and graduated from Regis University with a bachelor's degree in English in 1963.Miller, John. "Feulner's Farewell" ''National Review''. 2013. After receiving an MBA from the Universit ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |