So the University of Louisville is moving its athletics programs to the Atlantic Coast Conference, leaving behind the hard scrabbled Big East and heading toward Tobacco Road and such.

The reaction has been positive in the 24 hours or so since the ACC's presidents and chancellors unanimously invited UofL -- except in certain pockets, specifically in Connecticut and in parts (but not all) of ACC country.

The No. 1 priority for the Kentucky House in 2013 is set: Tackling recommendations from a recent report that found that special taxing districts have big budgets and little oversight.

Auditor Adam Edelen recently finished a report on the districts, detailing billions of dollars in spending with little to no oversight in most areas. Special taxing districts include the Metropolitan Sewer District and library boards.

The Metropolitan Housing Coalition has found that, among other things, vacant properties unequally plague western Louisville. Read the report here:

Leading up to the fiscal cliff negotiations, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell reportedly reminded President Obama about his 24-point thumping in Kentucky in a private phone call.

The conversation typifies the icy relationship between McConnell and the president—the two have rarely met, spoken or been seen in public together.

As Politico reports, the GOP leader was warning Mr. Obama early to cool on the campaigning if he wants to make progress with lawmakers.

From Politico:

Don Stewart, McConnell’s chief spokesman, said McConnell’s comments to Obama “were in the context of trying to find a solution” to the budget crisis. The GOP leader told the president that continuing to engage in a public-relations blitz against Republicans “could have the opposite effect of what he was trying to accomplish,” the spokesman said.

Stewart added: "This, by the way, is sound advice."

The White House declined to comment.

Speaking on the House floor Wednesday, Democratic Congressman John Yarmuth says lawmakers can provide certainty during the fiscal cliff negotiations by extending the Bush era tax cuts to middle-class Americans.

Yarmuth mentioned Republican Congressman Tom Cole of Oklahoma as an example of finding bipartisan cooperationg. Cole has been in the news this week for breaking with his party leaders and advocating the GOP should make a deal with Democrats to raise taxes on the wealthiest two percent.

Check Yarmuth's floor speech:

The U.S. economy grew at a 2.7 percent annual rate in the third quarter, the Bureau of Economic Analysis says. That's a sharp upward revision in its estimate of gross domestic product growth from mid-summer into the fall. In its first look at the quarter's GDP, the agency estimated growth at a 2 percent annual rate.

According to BEA, consumer spending, inventory investment, exports and federal spending all contributed to growth from July 1 through Sept. 30.

The Metropolitan Housing Coalition will release its annual housing report Thursday, the same day Network Center for Community Change—or NC3—will hold a public meeting in Smoketown, addressing a key criticism of vacant property highlighted in the report.

For the past few months, residents and NC3 volunteers have been walking the Smoketown neighborhood and taking notes on vacant properties. The group similarly mapped the Shawnee neighborhood earlier this year.

Former Massey Energy CEO Don Blankenship tells the Wall Street Journal that despite incorporating several companies in Kentucky, he doesn't have plans to return to the coal business.

In an interview with CNN, U.S. Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., warned that the Republican Party is in danger of becoming a "dinosaur" unless it adopts more libertarian policy positions.

Watch: