Complaints About President Obama's National Intelligence Council Pick

Now some fresh pickings from the Political Grapevine:

Intelligent Choice?

The Obama administration is pleading ignorance over complaints about the president's pick to head the National Intelligence Council.

Chas Freeman is a former U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia who now runs a Saudi-funded Washington think tank. A bipartisan congressional group wants a review of Freeman's ties to the Kingdom to guard against a conflict of interest.

House Minority Whip Eric Cantor says "Freeman's past associations and positions on foreign policy are deeply alarming."

One of those foreign policy issues is an e-mail Freeman sent in 2006 where he called the 1989 Chinese government crackdown at Tiananmen Square — in which at least 2,500 are believed to have died — "overly cautious." ABC News reports that when asked if administration officials were aware of such concerns, Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said, "I've not read those."

Really Universal Healthcare

While many lawmakers are struggling to revamp the nation’s health care, one North Carolina congressman is working to improve the free health care provided to illegal aliens.

Cybercast News reports Democrat David Price wants upgrades for the free services provided to those detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Price cited some media reports about "detainee deaths that appear to have been preventable had (they) been given appropriate and timely medical attention."

But ICE says the number of deaths was four times lower last year compared to 2004 and funding for illegals' medical care is up 47 percent, including several bypass surgeries.

Sidwell Friends in High Places

Two siblings who attend Sidwell Friends School with President Obama's daughters are at risk of losing their tuition money for the pricey private school.

The New York Post reports Illinois Democratic Senator Dick Durbin has put a provision into spending legislation that could allow the scholarship program that funds the siblings' education to expire at the end of the next school year.

Virginia Walden-Ford, executive director at DC Parents for School Choice, wants the first dad to step in. She says, "I'd like to see a reporter stand up at one of those nationally televised press conferences and ask President Obama what he thinks about what his own party is doing to keep two innocent kids from attending the same school where he sends his?"

Please Hold

A new study says global warming is on hold. Discovery News reports scientists are puzzled that temperatures have flat lined since 2001 despite rising greenhouse gas concentrations.

Scientist Kyle Swanson from University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee says, "This is nothing like anything we've seen since 1950. Cooling events since then had firm causes… This current cooling doesn't have one."

In fact, the study predicts global cooling for the next 20 to 30 years. But, Swanson adds once that hiccup is over, "warming will return and be very aggressive."

— FOX News Channel's Zachary Kenworthy contributed to this report.