Monthly Archives: July 2013

Illinois Legislative Leaders Sue Governor Over Vetoing Lawmakers’ Pay Raise

"The Democratic heads of the Illinois House of Representatives and Senate on Tuesday filed a lawsuit challenging Governor Pat Quinn's veto of lawmakers' pay during a legislative impasse over pension reform. Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan and state Senate President John Cullerton said in a letter to fellow lawmakers that the purpose of the litigation 'is to protect the independence of the legislature and preserve the separation of powers.' 'It is our hope that the court will remedy this constitutional violation and that future governors will not feel empowered to use such coercive tactics,' the legislative leaders wrote." Continue reading →

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Obama’s Next Big Blunder

"Many believe Janet Yellen, the Fed’s current vice chairman, is the best option because she’s been involved in all major recent monetary policies. But I won’t be taken aback if Obama picks Summers. He’s perfectly qualified for the job. If you have a terrible track record of predicting the economy and like to favor big banks at the expense of everyone else, then you’ve got a good shot at becoming the Fed chief. Because that’s precisely what the Fed does. It punishes savers and helps make bankers rich. And it fails to predict all major economic developments. That’s why Obama is considering Summers." Continue reading →

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Ride-sharing companies like Uber may lose ‘bandit cab’ stigma in California

"The draft rules to govern companies that already operate under such names as Lyft, SideCar and Uber, allowing passengers to electronically hail rides through smartphone applications, were unveiled by the state Public Utilities Commission (PUC). Among the proposed regulations are requirements for ride-share operators to obtain a license with the PUC to do business in California, to submit their drivers to criminal background checks and to carry liability insurance of at least $1 million per incident. Taxi drivers registered their disapproval by staging a noisy demonstration against the ride-sharing services on Tuesday, circling San Francisco City Hall in their cabs." Continue reading →

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CFR Steps Up Attack on the Second Amendment Using Discredited Statistics

"In 2007 and 2008, some 29,000 weapons of various types and varieties were recovered at crime scenes by Mexican authorities. Of those, only 11,000 of them had serial numbers on them that would allow them even to be traced by the BATFE. And of those 11,000, just 5,114 were successfully traced back to sources in the United States. That’s 17.6 percent, not 70 percent or 90 percent. Just 14 percent of the 203,300 prisoners serving time in a state or federal prison in 1997 obtained their weapons from a gun shop, pawnshop, flea market, or gun show. An updated study by the DOJ in 2004 showed that the number dropped to 11 percent." Continue reading →

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Who Really Started the Korean War?

"We were fighting on behalf of Syngman Rhee, the US-educated-and-sponsored dictator of South Korea, whose vibrancy was demonstrated by the large-scale slaughter of his leftist political opponents. For 22 years, Rhee’s word was law, and many thousands of his political opponents were murdered: tens of thousands were jailed or driven into exile. Whatever measure of liberality has reigned on the Korean peninsula was in spite of Washington’s military presence. When the country finally rebelled against Rhee, and threw him out in the so-called April Revolution of 1960, he was ferried to safety in a CIA helicopter as crowds converged on the presidential palace." Continue reading →

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Secret DARPA Mind Control Project Revealed: Leaked Document

"What if the government could change people's moral beliefs or stop political dissent through remote control of people's brains? Sounds like science fiction, right? Well, a leaked document reveals that the US government, through DARPA research, is very close to accomplishing this. Activist Post was recently contacted by an anonymous whistleblower who worked on a secret ongoing mind-control project for DARPA. The aim of the program is to remotely disrupt political dissent and extremism by employing 'Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation' (TMS) in tandem with sophisticated propaganda based on this technology." Continue reading →

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Indiana education commissioner made sure GOP donor’s charter school got top marks

"The new grading system had initially given Christel House a 'C' grade, because of the school’s poor test scores in algebra. 'This will be a HUGE problem for us,' Bennett wrote in a Sept. 12, 2012 email. At the urging of Bennett, the grading system was quickly altered so that Christel House ended up with an 'A' grade. Bennett told the Associated Press that he wasn’t trying to tilt the system in favor of Christel House because of DeHaan’s contributions. He said Christel House was a top-performing school and its 'C' grade indicated the grading system was flawed. Bennett is currently serving as Florida’s education commissioner." Continue reading →

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Disturbing Video Shows Court Officer Sexually Assaulting, Then Arresting Mother, Judge Does Nothing

"The initial events took place in 2011, when Monica Contreras was led from the court into a waiting room for a supposed, though unexplained, drug search. She then says a court marshal named Ron Fox touched her and ordered her to lift up her shirt. When she fled back into the courtroom and complained to the hearing master, asking at least for a female marshal, Fox had her arrested for 'making false accusations against a police officer.'" Continue reading →

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‘Hacker heroin frame plot’ foiled by security blogger

"A respected US-based internet security expert says he has foiled an attempt to frame him as a heroin dealer. Brian Krebs says the administrator of a Russian cybercrime forum hatched a plan to order heroin to his home, then tipped off the police, making it look as if the call had come from a neighbour's house. In March he was visited by a heavily armed police unit tricked into responding to a 911 call that had been made to look as if it originated from his home. Mr Krebs says he opened the front door to find a squad of policemen pointing a battery of guns at him. After being hand-cuffed and questioned, he managed to persuade the police they had been hoaxed." Continue reading →

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Court Eases Prosecutors’ Burden of Proof in Leak Cases

"In a new interpretation of the Espionage Act, a federal judge made it easier for prosecutors in leak cases to meet their burden of proof, while reducing protections for accused leakers. Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly ruled that the prosecution in the pending case of former State Department contractor Stephen Kim need not show that the information he allegedly leaked could damage U.S. national security or benefit a foreign power, even potentially. Her opinion was a departure from a 30-year-old ruling in the case of U.S. v. Morison, which held that the government must show that the leak was potentially damaging to the U.S. or beneficial to an adversary." Continue reading →

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