Hi Mike,
I only have a minute as I am heading out on a little vacation (I will make a separate post about that) but just a couple comments from my visual perspective.
If someone told me that greens and oranges would be the predominant coloring ahead of time I would wonder if it would work..however in my opininion it looks fine..actually very good.
The copyright area at the bottom and the link back to your site are a little bit hard to distinguish..maybe somehow a little more contrast there.
The clock and date..I actually like that but am wondering a little about the actual location..not sure where it would look best..but maybe immediately below the news header before the additional text might work.
It really looks attractive, clean, and sharp though!