China continues to insist that Ma’s self-governing island of 23 million people is part of its territory, to be brought back into the fold by persuasion if possible, by force if necessary. But Taiwan, backed by a United States that is re-engaging in Asia after a decade-long preoccupation in the Middle East, has no desire to give up its de facto independence.

Analysts say that Ma, who won re-election over a more China-wary opposition, probably won’t be pressed by Beijing anytime soon, but might toward the end of his second four-year term.

Since Ma took office in 2008, trade volumes between Taiwan and China have soared. Commercial barriers have tumbled, and tourism and other exchanges have become commonplace.

That may not be enough for Beijing, which says concrete progress toward formal unification is the most useful metric for measuring Ma’s performance. On that point, Taiwan and the authoritarian mainland remain far apart.

In 1992, informal representatives of the two sides acknowledged that there is only one China, but took no clear position on whether it is the People’s Republic of China on the mainland or the Republic of China on Taiwan.

Taiwan’s mass circulation United Daily News said Wednesday that Beijing appears to hope that Ma’s overtures will eventually “go beyond the 1992 Consensus, and reach the more concrete formula that ‘both sides belong to one China.’”

If Ma ever accepted that formula, it could be seen as signaling his acceptance that Taiwan must eventually be ruled by Beijing.

During his re-election campaign, Ma raised the prospect of a formal peace treaty between the two sides, his first clear political move in Beijing’s direction. But he quickly drew back after popular opposition to the idea spiked, an illustration of how he is constrained by Taiwan’s boisterous electorate.

Despite supporting the president’s efforts to engage China economically, that electorate strongly resists political integration, amid a growing tendency to define itself as Taiwanese and not Chinese at all.

“People are open to dealing with China economically and even going there to work,” said political scientist Ketty Chen of Taipei’s National Taiwan University. “But they still consider themselves Taiwanese and see China as just another foreign country, even though they speak the same language.”

Public opinion polls have repeatedly shown that no more than 10 percent of Taiwan’s people want political integration with the mainland, while 60 to 70 percent favor the status quo. The remainder support formal independence, a step that China says would lead to war.

Political scientist Alexander Huang of Taipei’s Tamkang University said Beijing appears to appreciate the political constraints under which Ma is operating.

“I suspect that China will not push Ma too hard during the coming four years,” Huang said. “It has an increasingly good understanding of Taiwanese politics, and understands the pressures that Ma is facing.”

Another reason to expect a moderate Taiwan policy from Beijing, Huang said, is China’s preoccupation with its own problems. Its once overheated economy has cooled abruptly, and political troubles seem to be cascading in the wake of unspecified allegations of malfeasance against one-time Communist Party high-flyer Bo Xilai.

“I just don’t think it’s wise for China to take on a big issue like Taiwan at this juncture,” Huang said.

Political scientist George Tsai of Taipei’s Chinese Culture University said Beijing will have to determine if it wants to take advantage of Ma’s weakened political standing at home, which has come to the fore in recent weeks following a series of conspicuous missteps on economic policy.

“They can either take advantage of his position, or they can decide to not apply pressure on him,” Tsai said.

Chen said she expected that China would hold off on pressing Ma during the next year or two, but could change its tune after that, even at the risk of reinvigorating Ma’s political opponents.

“After the dust settles China will put more pressure on Taiwan,” she said. “China will try to extract concessions from Ma that could put his own party in a difficult position in future election campaigns.”

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Feraro joined the bank in November 2008.

“The entire Concord Bank family mourns the loss of Tony,” said Concord Bank chairman Earl Gates in a statement. “Our thoughts and prayers are with his wife and four children, and our deepest sympathies go out to them. He will be greatly missed.”

Funeral arrangements are pending.

Concord Bank is located at 12040 Tesson Ferry Road.

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Reid, who filed a procedural motion today, said the U.S. needs a

In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Chesapeake (, Fortune 500) said it may have to postpone some previously planned sales of assets, such as oil and gas wells, because they are used to secure its revolving credit line.

Such sales are seen as critical for the company. Chesapeake has been hurt by falling natural gas prices and currently has $12.6 billion in long-term debt.

It hopes to sell as much as $14 billion in assets this year to help pay down this sum, but may be limited in its ability to do so by the terms of its revolving credit line.

Chesapeake also said it has yet to finalize this year’s planned asset sales, and may be forced to choose alternative properties to sell if its original plans are hamstrung by the terms of its credit line.

"There are so many uncertainties around the company’s funding in 2012," said Mark Hanson, an equity analyst with Morningstar.

Chesapeake shares were down 14% at the end of trading on Friday.

The company, America’s second-largest natural gas producer, has been roiled by controversy in recent weeks following revelations that CEO Aubrey McClendon has taken out more than $1 billion in loans backed by personal stakes in the firm’s wells.

Reuters has also reported that McClendon ran a $200 million hedge fund that traded in the same commodities that Chesapeake produces, raising further questions about a conflict of interest. McClendon remains as CEO at the company but has been removed as chairman in response to the controversy.

Shares are down almost 30% in the past month. 

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Gross domestic product will rise 1 percent in 2013 after declining 0.3 percent in 2012, the commission said today. While Greece will have the deepest slump this year, with GDP declining 4.7 percent, the economy may be unchanged in 2013. Italy and Portugal will return to growth next year. Spain

The Fed board announced Wednesday it was approving the application of the Industrial and Commerce Bank of China Limited, China’s largest bank, and two other Chinese firms to purchase The Bank of East Asia U.S.A., located in New York City.

The Fed also approved an application by the Bank of China to set up a branch in Chicago and an application by the Agricultural Bank of China Limited to establish a branch in New York City.

All three applications were approved after high-level talks last week between the United States and China.

In those talks, which were overshadowed by a dispute involving a Chinese dissident, China agreed to let foreigners including U.S. companies have bigger stakes in its securities firms and make other concessions designed to give foreign firms greater access to the U.S. market.

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, who along with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton headed up the U.S. side for the annual discussions, said at the conclusion of the talks Friday that China had made “important steps” that would translate “into greater opportunities for U bad credit unsecured personal loans.S. workers and companies.”

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke also participated in last week’s discussions in Beijing. The approval by the Fed board, which oversees U.S. bank holding companies, came on unanimous votes. The Chinese applications had been pending for as long as nearly two years.

The Fed said it would have no comment when asked whether the board actions were linked in any way to progress that had been made at last week’s talks.

The Industrial and Commerce Bank, China’s largest bank with total assets of approximately $2.5 trillion, is 70.7 percent owned by the government of China. The government of China holds similarly large stakes in the other two banks.

The Fed gave the Industrial and Commerce Bank and its two partners approval to acquire up to 80 percent of The Bank of East Asia U.S.A. This bank has 13 branches in New York and California and deposits of approximately $621 million.

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April’s report, which follows lackluster numbers for March, is particularly bad news for President Obama’s campaign staff in Chicago.

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Obama battles job crisis

The U.S. lost 4.3 million jobs in President Obama’s first 13 months in office. Track his progress since then.

Election forecasters have long argued that a swiftly improving economy in the months leading up to Election Day represents Obama’s best chance for an easy re-election romp.

After all, that’s the playbook Ronald Reagan used to steamroll Walter Mondale in 1984. Reagan was able to capture a whopping 525 electoral votes, in part because the economy was rapidly climbing out of a recession as voters went to the polls.

But now, it looks like the Obama team will have to set aside hopes of a Reaganesque recovery. That’s because job growth is following a familiar pattern: strong in the winter, weak in the spring.

A few months ago, it looked like the labor market was starting to gain some traction. The economy added 200,000+ jobs from December through February.

That momentum appears to be lost as the economy added only 154,000 jobs in March, and 115,000 in April.

Even worse, the portion of the adult population participating in the job market is now at its lowest level since 1981.

The slowdown mirrors trends that were also seen in 2010 and 2011, when job growth registered several months of solid gains before slowing.

Things were different in 1984.

In April 1984, the economy added 363,000 jobs. In the first four months of 1984, employment growth hit 1,564,000. This year, the first four months have brought about half that amount.

And the Reagan recovery sustained its momentum through the election, averaging 300,000 new jobs a month from May to October.

Job market dropouts

For the full year leading up to November 1984, the economy added 4.1 million jobs. To match that total, Obama would have to add 440,000 jobs every month between now and Election Day.

Republicans, of course, are eager to cite the employment report as evidence that the president’s economic policies aren’t working.

"We should be seeing numbers in the 500,000 jobs created per month," Mitt Romney said Friday morning. "This is way, way, way off from what should happen in a normal recovery.

But this isn’t a normal recovery — and it wasn’t a normal recession.

Campaign 2012: Bring on the cash money

Reagan had an advantage over Obama: The recession of the early 1980s was caused by runaway inflation, which the Federal Reserve countered by hiking interest rates. When inflation dropped, the Fed lowered rates and a massive economic boom resulted.

The major causes of the recent recession were a banking crisis and housing bubble that exploded during President George W. Bush’s final months in office.

Another difference: With comparatively small debt loads, Reagan was able to push through a 23% across-the-board cut of individual income tax rates. Obama, meanwhile, entered the presidency with substantial budget deficits and an economy contracting at a rate of 6.7%.

Obama is unlikely to match Reagan on another key measure often used in political rhetoric: the unemployment rate.

Where unemployment is tumbling

In April, the unemployment rate dropped to 8.1%, and almost a full 2% has been lopped off the indicator since it peaked at 10% in October 2009.

At at this point in Reagan’s first term, the unemployment rate was 7.8%, down from a peak of 10.8%. He ultimately was elected when unemployment was 7.2%.

Of course, some political scientists say a more useful predictor of electoral success is the general economic trend and how Americans feel about the economy.

And there, the White House has both good and bad news to consider.

According to a CNN/ORC International survey conducted last month, the number of Americans who think things are going well in the country is on the rise.

According to the poll, 43% say things are going well, up a slight three points from February, but up a dramatic 19 points from last August.

But the survey also indicated that nearly six in ten still say that conditions are bad and that most people don’t believe the economy has started to recover. 

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It was the second time this week that clashes have erupted near the ministry, after mainly Islamist protesters holding a sit-in there were attacked on Wednesday by still-unidentified assailants, sparking street battles that left nine dead.

The unrest threatens to escalate the confrontation that has centered between the ruling military and Islamist groups but is expanding to bring in other groups who sharply oppose the generals. Originally, the protesters at the Defense Ministry were a relatively small group of ultraconservative Islamists known as Salafis, angered over the disqualification of their favored candidate from the presidential race. But Wednesday’s violence fueled anger at the military and now more groups are taking to the streets.

Earlier Friday, thousands of demonstrators massed in Cairo’s downtown Tahrir Square, including the powerful Muslim Brotherhood, Salafis and leftist movements. They demanded the generals hand over power to civilians and warned of possible vote-rigging in the presidential vote, due to start May 23. In the afternoon, they marched to the Defense Ministry, several miles away across Cairo in the district of Abbasiyah.

The clashes erupted when protesters in Abbasiyah tried to cut through barbed wire between them and troops blocking access to the ministry. Live footage on state TC showed troops snatching one protester, beating him with metal sticks, tearing his clothes and leaving his back bloody.

The troops fired water cannons at protesters and hurled stones at them to keep them from advancing. The protesters took shelter behind metal sheets snatched from a nearby construction site and hurled back stones. Others climbed the roof of a nearby university and showered soldiers with rocks from above. The troops then opened up with heavy volleys of tear gas that pushed the demonstrators back.

The Health Ministry reported eight protesters were injured.

The violence has thrown the first presidential election since last year’s ouster of President Hosni Mubarak into turmoil, with several candidates suspending their campaigns in protest against the military’s handling of the situation.

On Thursday, members of the military council repeated their pledge to hand power once one of the 13 presidential candidates wins, an apparent attempt to assuage concerns that they would use the violence as an excuse to stay on.

But they also warned demonstrators against holding Friday protests near the Defense Ministry and said soldiers have the right to defend their positions, sparking fears of renewal of violence.

The circumstances of the deadly clashes that took place in Abbasiyah on Wednesday remain unclear.

Protesters believe the assailants were hired thugs or plainclothes police and troops, similar to past attacks on protests. They say the military allowed Wednesday’s attack to take place, noting troops nearby did nothing to stop fighting for hours.

But the Abbasiyah protests appear also to have drawn in local residents, angry at the week-long sit-in that have shut down their neighborhood. Locals complained that the Islamists sealed off streets.

The incident also highlighted what appears to be an emerging street force of more confrontative Islamists. Until now, most Islamist demonstrators have been affiliated with larger movements that steered them away from rallies likely to lead to clashes with the military or police.

Several Abbasiyah residents claimed to have seen bearded men among the protesters firing automatic weapons in the air during Wednesday’s violence. If anti-government demonstrators begin to openly brandish firearms at a rally, this would be a dangerous new development in Egypt’s post-Mubarak unrest.

The protesters in Abbasiyah were predominantly supporters of hardline Islamist Hazem Abu Ismail, a lawyer-turned-preacher, who was disqualified from the race because his mother allegedly held American citizenship, making him ineligible under election laws.

Abu Ismail has encouraged his followers to take the streets. “We are in the face of a plot to abort the revolution,” Abu Ismail’s spokesman Gamal Saber told the Al-Jazeera network on Friday.

But his supporters are not part of a disciplined movement like the Muslim Brotherhood, and he says that he has no control over the actions of protesters who are not from among his backers.

Members of non-Islamists, including members of the left- and liberal-leaning youth groups which led the 2011 uprising against Mubarak, have joined the Islamists in solidarity against the generals. However, others have accused Abu Ismail of dragging the whole nation to a disastrous confrontation with the military generals over his disqualification.

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