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December 01, 2011 | | ATTACK It looks like Ron Paul beat Mitt Romney to the punch, releasing an ad calling Newt Gingrich a “serial hypocrite.” The stark black-and-white video shows Gingrich blaming the government for the mortgage crisis while commentators attack him for his lucrative ties to Freddie Mac. He’s “flipped and flopped,” says a source in the video. Earlier today, The Washington Post reported that Romney’s team is still debating whether to attack Gingrich or to stand back and hope he implodes. Politico reported the Romney team is prepping attack ads. ATONEMENT Looking to repair the damage in the wake of the Jerry Sandusky child-sex-abuse scandal and the firing of football coach Joe Paterno, Penn State promised Thursday that it will donate $1.5 million in bowl-game proceeds to sex-crime advocacy organizations. University president Rod Erickson and other administrators appeared at a town-hall forum organized by students and faced tough questions from the audience. Penn State finished the season 9-3 and ranked in the top 25 of college teams, and will likely head to the Insight Bowl. But there is still talk that the team could be barred from the postseason. If the school accepts a bowl invitation, Erickson said the proceeds will go to the Pennsylvania Coalition Against Rape and the National Sexual Violence Resource Center. HISTORIC Secretary of State Hillary Clinton met with human-rights activist and Nobel peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi on Thursday, only hours after meeting Suu Kyi’s oppressor, Burmese President Thein Sein. Clinton has called Suu Kyi a personal inspiration, and while they have spoken by telephone, they had never met before because Suu Kyi has been under house arrest in Burma for much of the past two decades. Prior to the meeting with Suu Kyi, Clinton said the U.S. would reward Burma’s leaders if they kept “moving in the right direction.” She also urged Burma to cut “illicit ties” to North Korea and to end ethnic violence. Clinton is the highest-ranking American diplomat to travel to Burma in more than 50 years, and she is there to test how committed the new civilian government is to its promises of reform. CRACKDOWN With international pressure on Syria growing, the United Nations is saying the death toll has risen above 4,000 and is likening the situation to a civil war. The Arab League has warned of international intervention if Syria doesn’t stop its violent repression of protests. Nabil el-Araby, the secretary-general of the Arab League, said the Syrian regime can "avoid the dangers of a foreign intervention" if it agrees to an Arab League plan to allow observers into the country to monitor its handling of the unrest. Earlier this week the League voted to sanction the Syrian regime and cut ties to its central bank. The U.N.’s Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights said it is raising the death toll to 4,000, but the figure is probably much higher, and that it is characterizing the conflict as a civil war. FINANCE Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley is going after the banks, filing suit against Bank of America, Wells Fargo, JPMorgan Chase, Citi, and Ally Financial for unlawful mortgage practices. A statement from her office said the “lawsuit seeks accountability for the banks’ unlawful and deceptive conduct in the foreclosure process, including unlawful foreclosures, false documentation and robo-signing.” Last month Coakley said she was no longer confident that settlement negotiations between lenders and an alliance of attorneys general would be successful. | | 
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