Washington, DC, United States (AHN) – Beneficiaries of a $1.25 billion settlement of a discrimination case between the government and black farmers have begun receiving notifications, bringing a decades-old class action lawsuit a step closer to conclusion.

The Agriculture Department settled the historic case, known as Pigford II, in early 2009 but appropriation from Congress was delayed over Republican concerns about fraudulent claims and the costs of the settlements during a recession.

The settlement is the second one reached with black farmers, led by Timothy Pigford, who filed a class-action suit in 1997 alleging racial discrimination in farm loan programs dating back to 1983.

The government paid out $1 billion in 1999 to more than 15,000 farmers in the settlement known as Pigford I. However, about 72,000 missed the filing deadline for claims, leading to another settlement and allegations of fraud from conservatives.

Lawmakers appropriated $100 million for the Pigford II case in 2008 through a farm bill, leaving $1.15 billion that still required approval. Last December, a bill appropriating the remaining amount was signed into law despite GOP opposition.

House Republicans led by Reps. Michelle Bachman (R-MN) and Steve King (R-IA) had sought to withhold funding, citing fraud in the claims process and in spite of assurances from Agriculture Sec. Tom Vilsack that the bill includes protections against abuse.

A December 2010 report from the Congressional Research Service also confirmed arguments by black farmers that the USDA census on farmers in the period covered by the case was inaccurate. According to the report, the census failed to account for farmers who rented farmland and those who were not actually farmers because they tried to farm but were denied loans.

The Pigford II settlement still requires final court approval, which will be handed down during a hearing on Sept. 1. Following the ruling, each claim will be reviewed, making payments unlikely before late 2012.

The filing deadline for claims may be as early as the end of February next year. Beneficiaries who oppose provisions of the settlement may file their objections by Aug. 12.

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Washington, D.C., United States (AHN) – The Obama administration has found an unexpected ally in a ratings agency in the White House’s battle with Republican legislators over spending cuts and hiking the federal debt limit. On Thursday, Moody’s warned that it may downgrade Washington’s credit rating if the U.S. debt ceiling is not hiked soon.

Moody’s said that the U.S. credit rating could downgraded because of a very small, but increasing risk of a short-lived default, which would likely translate into higher interest rates at a time when the country’s recovery is again on the slow lane.

The ratings agency anticipated there would be a political battle between the Obama administration and Republican legislators before the debt ceiling would be lifted, but Moody’s said that it failed to consider the worsening conflicting positions between the two parties. Washington wanted to raise the debt limit to $16.7 trillion from the current $14.3 trillion, but with no major spending cuts.

Moody’s warning came on the heels of a lower outlook by Standard & Poor’s of the AAA U.S. debt rating to negative from stable because of the political wrangling.

The House voted on Tuesday not to hike the federal debt limit without major spending cuts. At the Wednesday White House meeting of Republican legislators with U.S. President Barack Obama, the legislators asked the administration for a detailed plan on budget cuts to solve the impasse.

House Speaker John Boehner justified the lower house’s refusal to give in to Obama’s request because raising the debt limit beyond spending cuts would cost jobs for Americans. Obama, however, warned that failure to hike the debt limit soon would lead to dire consequences for the fragile, but recovering U.S. economy.

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Washington, D.C., United States (AHN) – The Republican-dominated U.S. House of Representatives, as expected, rejected a proposal to increase the federal debt limit without budget cuts on Tuesday.

On a 318-97 vote, the House turned down a proposal from the Obama administration to increase Washington’s debt limit to $16.7 trillion from the current $14.3 trillion.

All Republican legislators voted against the measure that would have hiked the federal debt limit to an amount enough to cover government bills until the end of 2012.

In rejecting the measure, the GOP said they would push for sharp spending cuts and binding budget process reforms, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor said.

Cantor cited survey results that majority of American voters do not favor increasing the debt limit without spending cuts. The legislator said American families and businesses want the federal government to live like the rest of the country does – that is to tighten their belts and step relying on credit.

Even some Democrats voted against the measure after some party members criticized the bill as a Republic political strategy because the Republic leaders brought the bill to a vote and then asked caucus members to vote against it.

The defeat of the measure was imminent despite the warning by the U.S. Treasury Department that the U.S. faces defaulting on its debt if Congress does not allow the federal government to borrow more by August.

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Last Vegas, NV, United States (AHN Sports) – Frank Mir won a unanimous decision over Roy Nelson in a battle of heavyweight contenders at UFC 130 Saturday night in Las Vegas.

Mir dominated on his feet and on the ground as Nelson tired quickly in the three round fight.

The two fighters exchanged punches in the early going as the fight looked to be an entertaining brawl. Nelson charged in early and scored the first takedown of the bout before Mir quickly reversed.

As Nelson tried to throw punches, Mir tied him up against the cage and battered Nelson’s body and head with knees.

“How many times did I knee him in the face?” Mir asked after the fight. “What’s with that guy’s chin?”

Much like Nelson’s previous fight–a loss against Junior Dos Santos–he took a great deal of punishment but impressed observers by continuing to come back for more.

As Mir’s knees sapped Nelson’s energy, Mir began to score takedowns against the former winner of The Ultimate Fighter, almost at will.

He finished round one with a trip takedown, then scored a half dozen more in the last two rounds of the fight.

“I expected to win the grappling aspect,” Mir said. “It went even better than I’d planned. I won every aspect of the fight.”

“Wrestling was my main focus in camp, and I think it worked out well for me tonight,” Mir added.

Nelson appeared to be fatigued by the end of the second round, and his punches had very little power on them. Mir also seemed to tire as the final round wore on, but the former UFC champion kept taking Nelson down, and Nelson, to his credit, kept battling back to his feet.

“His wrestling was something I wasn’t expecting, and I just got tired,” Nelson said.

Scores were 30-27, 30-27, and 30-26. AHN’s unofficial scorecard had it 30-27.

Mir won his second straight and improved to 15-5. Nelson lost his second straight, dropping to 15-6.

Mir was taken to the hospital afterward, reportedly because of a possible broken jaw.

On the undercard, Travis Browne scored the Knockout of the Night over Stefan Struve in a battle of skyscrapers.

The 6’7″ Browne is usually the tallest man in the cage, but he faced someone four inches taller Saturday night.

Browne got an early takedown, then fought off two Struve choke attempts as they grappled on the mat.

When the fighters returned to their feet, Browne finished the fight with a right-handed Superman punch that landed squarely on Struve’s chin. Struve was out before he hit the canvas, and the fight ended at 4:11 of the first round.

Browne’s ninth career knockout was also his sixth straight win by knockout. He moved to 11-0-1. Struve dropped to 21-5. Four of his five losses have been by knockout.

Browne’s performance probably cost Brian Stann the Knockout of the Night bonus, although Stann’s second round TKO of Jorge Santiago was named Fight of the Night.

Stann nearly finished the fight in the first round, as he dropped Santiago with a left hook, but the round ended before he could get the stoppage.

In the second, Stann landed an uppercut that appeared to hurt Santiago. He dropped Santiago with another power shot and finished the bout with ground and pound. The fight was stopped at 4:29 of the second.

Stann earned his second straight knockout and eighth of his career. He won his third straight and moved to 11-3. Santiago, a former Sengoku champion, lost his UFC debut, dropping to 23-9 on his career.

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Los Angeles, CA, United States (AHN Entertainment) – Lee DeWyze won last year’s “American Idol” but his involvement in this year’s finale was, well, zilch. But while Nigel says the Season 9 winner refused, DeWyze himself says he wasn’t asked.

“I was so upset Lee DeWyze wouldn’t present the winners trophy to Scotty,” “Idol” executive producer Nigel Lythgoe wrote on Twitter wrote. “Especially as he’d been on the show this Season. I guess he was shy.”

When fans started to ask DeWyze about his non-appearance on the show, DeWyze says he wasn’t actually invited to participate on the show until literally minutes before they wanted him on stage.

“Just for the record… I was not asked to be involved in the Finale. It wasn’t until about 2 minutes before they announced that Nigel had approached me and asked if he could “borrow” me for a second,” DeWyze said. “I didnt feel a last second jump on stage was appropriate.”

“It was Scotty’s moment,” DeWyze continued. “I appreciate ‘American Idol,’ and the opportunity it has given me. And the people who have made that show possible. I am not angry, or bitter etc. It was an amazing Finale, and I would have loved to be a part of it. I just wasnt asked.”

DeWyze wasn’t the only “Idol” alum seemingly absent from the finale proceedings, which used to be an “Idol”-made-star-studded affair. The only winner to hit the stage was Carrie Underwood, who performed alongside Lauren Alaina.

Season 8 winner Kris Allen was also in the audience but not invited to come on stage, as was that season’s runner-up, Adam Lambert, a fan favorite. While they could argue they were pressed for time, they had Beyonce perform twice.

DeWyze could have used the exposure. His album, “Live It Up,” is the lowest-selling album by an “Idol” winner.

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Tokyo, Japan (AHN) – Sony Corporation has temporarily suspended on Wednesday its webpages in Canada, Thailand, Indonesia and Greece following another unauthorized intrusion into its portal.

The fresh hacking involved the theft of personal data of Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications in Canada. The hackers stole 2,000 names, phone numbers and email addresses, but failed to get any credit card details.

They also altered a Sony webpage in Thailand to make it easier to send phishing email and stole web codes from Sony’s music unit’s portal in Indonesia. The Greek intrusion affected about 8,500 customers’ information.

Sony said the hacked websites were externally hosted by third parties and not linked to its main network.

The fresh attack followed last month’s hits on Sony’s network, which involved the data of over 100 million customers. Besides crippling Sony’s PlayStation Network, last month’s cyber attack cost the Japanese firm, which expects a third year of loss, $171 million (JPY 4 billion).

The intrusions also places doubt on Sony’s online security systems. Following the fresh round of hacking incident, Sony’s shares fell 1.5 percent on Wednesday at the Tokyo trading floor.

Sony said it is investigating if the fresh attacks on its webpages are linked to last month’s hacking into the company’s PlayStation Network. The company said it has so far found no evidence connecting the two incidents.

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London, United Kingdom (AHN) – China’s first credit rating agency, Dagong Global Credit Rating Co. Ltd., on Tuesday downgraded the United Kingdom’s credit rating.

Dagong downgraded the U.K.’s sovereign debt credit rating one notch from AA- with a negative outlook to A+, which puts it on par with Dagong’s rating of indebted Belgium, Chile and the United States.

The reason Dagong gave for downgrading the UK’s credit rating was that its forecasts predict tepid growth of 1.3 percent to 1.5 percent for the next two years, which Dagong said will harm the government’s finances and impede the UK’s ability to repay debt. In addition, it pointed to the UK’s budget deficit, which is 9.8 percent of gross domestic product.

In addition, Dagong kept its negative outlook for the UK’s credit, which means it might make further downgrades.

Dagong was founded in 1994. By contrast, the world’s other and older credit rating services–Moody’s, Standard and Poor’s, and Fitch–kept ratings for both the UK and the US at an AAA.

However, Fitch, Moody’s and S&P were all criticized for being partially responsible for the global financial crisis. Critics charged the agencies had rated the risky mortgage securities and other debts that later turned out to be toxic higher than they deserved, creating a false sense of security for investors who put money into those toxic securities.

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Tel Aviv, Israel (TML) – Western powers and their allies in the Middle East hope to grease the wheels of democracy and political stability as they begin to release billions of dollars in loans and other financial aid to the region’s Arab Spring economies.

The economies of countries like Egypt, Tunisia and Jordan are facing a near-perfect storm of political unrest combined with negative growth and rising prices for imported energy and food. But the emerging aid pipeline may be clogged by domestic opposition inside donor countries. Recipients may balk at the conditions placed on much of the aid.

Aid could ease the way for Egypt and Tunisia to evolve into Western-friendly democracies as well as give a boost to beleaguered friends like Jordan’s King Abdullah. Without it, deteriorating economic conditions risk strengthening the hand of already powerful Islamic movements and undermining public confidence in the free markets and private business that economists say are needed to ensure long-term prosperity.

“These countries, particularly Egypt, face a financial hole and their economies have come to a standstill. The way out is to spend money which their governments don’t have,” said Paul Rivlin, author of Arab Economies in the Twenty-First Century. But the recipients will have to show they are taking the right political and economic measures. “The U.S wants to draw them back into a Western orientation. But the political systems in these countries may draw them elsewhere.”

Egypt, as the biggest of the Middle East’s troubled economies and the country most likely to set the direction of the region political, is the focus of the aid.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) kicked off the effort May 12, saying it would respond to Egypt’s request for as much as $12 billion. That amount has since has been lowered to $4 billion. But in the meantime, U.S. President Barack Obama last week offered to forgive some $1 billion in Egyptian debt and. Egypt is reportedly close to an agreement with the World Bank to receive loans worth $2.2 billion.

But the biggest largesse of them all may come from Saudi Arabia, which on Saturday pledged $4 billion in the form of soft loans, deposits and grants, the Egyptian Middle East News Agency (MENA) reported, citing Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi, the head of Egypt’s ruling military council, as saying.

Egypt won’t be the only beneficiary of international aid.

On Saturday, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), which was formed to smooth eastern Europe’s transition to free market democracies, is working on a program that may eventually lead to investment of as much as 2.5 billion euros ($3.5 billion) a year in the Middle East. The EBRD said it is considering a request by Egypt to become a country of operations. Morocco, another EBRD shareholder, has also expressed an interest in qualifying, it said.

On Monday, the Group of Eight (G-8) – a forum for many of the world’s biggest economies – will discuss how they can contribute to modernizing the economies of the Middle East, without pledging dollar amounts for assistance. A special session will be devoted to Tunisia and Egypt.

Tunisia plans to attract $5 billion a year in foreign aid, loans and private investments over the next five years during meetings at the G-8 summit, Finance Minister Jelloul Ayed said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal Friday. Tunisia would apply for a $500 million standby loan, possibly from the World Bank.

Obama told a visiting King Abdullah that he would provide Jordan with several hundred millions of dollars in aid, channeled through the Overseas Private Investment Corp. (OPIC). Obama said the funds would “leverage ultimately about $1 billion for economic development in Jordan.”

Rivlin said Washington will lead the aid drive and should America judge that the Arab Spring economies aren’t meeting its conditions it “will be difficult” for Europe and international institutions to provide it either.

The Arab Spring economies are in bad shape by almost every measure. The five countries hit hardest by turmoil will show a combined drop in economic output of about 2.3% this year, according to figures based on a forecast by the Institute for International Finance (IIF) released in early May.

Egyptian Finance Minister Samir Radwan estimates his country’s budget deficit will top 10% of gross domestic product in the coming fiscal year, up from a previous forecast of 7.9% and has to borrow to cover the gap. Its official foreign currency reserves have fallen to $28 billion, but some economists think the drop is bigger than being report.

Uri Dadush and Marwan Muasher, from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, expressed concern that it will be difficult to convince the leaders of Egypt and other recipient countries to undertake the economic reforms needed to rekindle economic growth and enable them to eventually get off aid.

So far, the transitional governments of the region, as well as veteran leaders trying to retain power, have increased subsidies for consumer goods and promised to create jobs, all at a cost to badly strained budgets and economic efficiency. But Dadush and Muasher add that the bigger problem may be convincing Arab public opinion that free markets are beneficial.

“Change in the Middle East is about refusing an autocratic political system and calling for democracy – without a clear vision for what economic system should be put in place,” they wrote in the National Interest on April 13. “There is a significant possibility that the governments that ultimately emerge out of this crisis will renounce previous economic reforms as misguided.”

Indeed, many analysts think Egypt won’t agree to the economic reforms the IMF typically demands in exchange for its aid, such as subsidy cuts, for fear that they will spark another round of mass protests like the kind that brought down President Husni Mubarak in February.

“For understandable political reasons, the Egyptian government says that it is unthinkable to cut subsidies for food or energy. But can the IMF simply extend a loan without any conditionality? I doubt it,” Gideon Rachman wrote in the Financial Times last week.

Back at home, both American and European leaders will have to make a case for sending billions of dollars overseas at a time when they are experiencing severe economic difficulties of their own. Europe is trying to put out debt fires in Greece, Portugal and Ireland.

In the U.S., President Barack Obama is battling Congress over increasing the country’s debt ceiling. He faces opposition from a Republic-controlled House of Representatives to helping countries whose allegiance to America is more in doubt as long-time pro-Western despots are replaced by governments whose views are yet to be fully articulated.

The U.S. budget is weighed down by $14 trillion in debt as the White House and Congress fight over raising the national debt ceiling.

“Considering our own national debt, we cannot afford to forgive up to $1 billion of Egypt’s debt,” Elena Ros-Lehtinen, the chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said last Thursday. “The U.S. should only provide assistance to Egypt after we know that Egypt’s new government will not include the Muslim Brotherhood and will be democratic, pro-American and committed to abiding by peace agreements with Israel.”

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Fairhaven, MA, United States (AHN Sports) – One of the most prominent golf companies in the United States, the Acushnet Golf company, has been sold by Fortune Brands to Fila Korea Ltd. and Mirae Asset Private Equity Group.

The sale was announced Friday by Acushnet and Fortune Brands.

Acushnet is the manufacturer of Titleist golf balls and Foot Joy shoes and clothing along with the highly respected line of Titleist golf clubs and Vokey wedges.

Fila Korea owns the Fila line of clothing and Mirae is the largest private equity group in South Korea.

Titleist is the No. 1 brand golf ball in the world and Foot Joy is the top brand in shoes, gloves and outerwear.

The company had sales of $1.2 billion in 2010.

Titleist will remain as a stand-alone company and there were no immediate plans to move the company from its corporate headquarters in Fairhaven, MA.

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Quezon City, Metro Manila, Philippines (AHN) – The Philippine National Food Authority’s losses reached $2.3 billion (PHP 100 billion) over a 10-year period, according to a report on the grains agency recently released by the 2009 Commission on Audit.

COA said the losses were incurred because of excessive imports at a time when price was high and the products were sold low. The audit agency also blamed the long storage period of rice for the losses.

Because of these policies, the sale of rice and collection of fees by the NFA was not enough to cover the agency’s operations, which led officials to borrow to finance NFA’s operations and pay its debts. NFA’s debt has ballooned to $4.1 billion (PHP 177 billion).

Current NFA Administrator Angelito Banayo described the previous administration’s excessive rice imports policy as tantamount to smuggling because buyers of the cheap rice at 58 cents (PHP 25) a kilo did not pay taxes on the grains since it was imported by a government agency.

For the years 2000 to 2009, NFA registered net losses of $2.3 billion, while for the same period it received a $780 million (PHP 33.7 billion) subsidy from the national government.

The COA report recommended for NFA to maximize its income and minimize costs to reduce the agency’s losses.

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