“Historic thaw in U.S., Cuba standoff”

A political standoff that spanned five decades and 10 presidents began to crumble Wednesday with President Barack Obama's move to normalize relations with Cuba. The announcement was the product of a year of clandestine back-channelling between the U.S. and Cuba. "Today, America chooses to cut loose the shackles of the past, so as to reach for a better future for the Cuban people, for the American people, for our entire hemisphere and for the world," Obama said. Obama has instructed Secretary of State John Kerry to immediately begin discussions with Cuba to re-establish diplomatic relations, and that the U.S. will re-open an embassy in Havana. The administration will also allow some travel and trade that had been banned under a decades-long embargo instated during the Kennedy administration. "Neither the American nor Cuban people are well-served by a rigid policy that's rooted in events that took place before most of us were born," Obama said. Speaking at the same time from his own country, Cuban President Raul Castro lauded (praised) the move. Obama and Castro spoke on the phone for about an hour, this reflected the first communication at the presidential level with Cuba since the Cuban revolution (1953).

In Other News NASA can see your Christmas lights http://www.cnn.com/video/?/video/tech/2014/12/18/pkg-orig-see-holiday-lights-from-space.cnn&hpt=hp_t2&from_homepage=yes&video_referrer=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.cnn.com%2F#/video/tech/2014/12/18/pkg-orig-see-holiday-lights-from-space.cnn The Secret Service is stretched "beyond its limits" and needs more training, more staff and a director from outside its ranks -- and the White House needs a better fence -- an independent review has found. An eight-page executive summary of the report, produced by a panel of four outside experts appointed by the Department of Homeland Security, was released Thursday. The report said the congressional budget process has left Secret Service directors guessing how much more they might be able to squeeze out of appropriators each year and building their plans around that -- without looking at "how much the mission, done right, actually costs.” It said the Secret Service likely needs a funding bump, and that its handling of its budgetary process has led to fewer and fewer hours for training. The average special agent on the President's protective detail received just 42 hours of training in 2013, while its Uniformed Division officers got an average of just about 25 minutes of training each, the report said.