It's A Holiday; Glad To See Government Motors Public Relations/Investor Relations At Work Today -- January 1, 2015; President Obama's Iraq Mission Expands As The JV Team Moves Closer

GM announced another huge recall today, allowing owners to stew for 24 hours, not even able to call their service dealer to schedule an appointment. The Detroit News is reporting another 83,000 vehicles recalled. [Update: in fact, the recall is really "three recalls."]

Other stories I never got around to as 2014 came to an end.

Gruberized:

President Obama’s health care adviser Jonathan Gruber said that the Affordable Care Act would definitely not be affordable while he was writing the bill with the White House.

As Gruber continues to withhold documents while he awaits a call-back for more testimony before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee in the new year, more shocking information is coming to light detailing the deceptions that went into the writing of the health-care law.

Gruber: "And I think, once again, I’m amazed politically that we got this bill through.”

Super-size it:

Sea Ice Extent – Day 363 – Highest Global Sea Ice and Highest Antarctic Sea Ice For The Day.

Elementary, My Dear Watson:

Tropical forests are growing faster than scientists thought due to rising levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. A Nasa-led study has found that tropical forests are absorbing 1.5 billion tons of carbon dioxide every year as they photosynthesise and grow. And this is far more than is absorbed by the vast areas of boreal forest that encircle the Arctic.

By the way, that CO2 story? That validates the research I did on photosynthesis in the Arctic during my college days.

And now the stories that open 2015.

It's cold, really cold.

A storm that brought rare snow to Southern California and the Southwest at midweek will spread a swath of snow, ice, rain and travel problems from Chicago to Boston this weekend.

The storm will strengthen and take a track toward the lower Great Lakes this weekend.

What's shaking? California, Napa Valley, wine country -- fracking country is quiet:

A magnitude 5.1 earthquake struck in the Pacific Ocean off the Northern California coast on Thursday, about 70 miles (113 km) west of the town of Ferndale.

The JV team is getting closer and closer:

In Iraq’s western Anbar province, more than 300 U.S. troops are posted at a base in the thick of a pitched battle between Iraqi forces, backed by tribal fighters, and well-armed Islamic State militants.

The militants, positioned at a nearby town, have repeatedly hit the base with artillery or rocket fire in recent weeks. Since the middle of December, the U.S.-led military coalition has launched 13 airstrikes around the facility.

U.S. troops have suffered no casualties as a result of the attacks. But the violence has underlined the risks to American personnel as they fan out across Iraq as part of President Obama’s expanding mission against the Islamic State, even as he has pledged U.S. operations will not “involve American combat troops fighting on foreign soil.”

Tet-tet.