Americans Paid All-Time Highs In State and Local Taxes in 2nd Quarter

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Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

Revenues from state and local individual income taxes, general sales and gross receipt taxes, motor fuel taxes, motor vehicle taxes and taxes on alcoholic beverages each hit all-time highs in the second quarter of this year, according to data released today by the Census Bureau.

That means that in no quarter of any year since the Census Bureau first started tracking state and local tax revenues in 1962 have Americans paid more in each of these categories of state and local taxes then they did in the quarter that ran from April through June of 2013.

Americans paid a record of $114.032 billion in state and local individual income taxes in the second quarter of this year, according to the Census Bureau. That was up $7.787 billion—or 7.3 percent—from the previous all-time record of $106.245 billion in state and local individual income taxes that Americans paid in the second quarter of 2008.

Americans also paid a record of $82.212 billion in state and local general sales and gross receipts taxes in the second quarter of this year. That was up $1.85 billion—or 2.3 percent—from the previous record of $80.362 billion in general sales and gross receipts taxes American paid in the second quarter of 2008.

Americans paid a record of $11.254 billion in state and local motor fuels taxes in the second quarter of 2013. That was up $135 million—or 1.2 percent—from the previous record of $11.119 billion paid in the second quarter of 2012.

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See the Brazilian President’s U.N. Speech Excoriating the United States: ‘Totally Unacceptable’ (+video)

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Photo Credit: REUTERS

Photo Credit: REUTERS

Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff used her position as the opening speaker at the U.N. General Assembly to accuse the United States of violating human rights and international law through espionage that included spying on her email.

Rousseff had expressed her displeasure last week by calling off a high-profile state visit to the United States scheduled for October over reports that the U.S. National Security Agency had been spying on Brazil.

In unusually strong language, Rousseff launched a blistering attack on U.S. surveillance, calling it an affront to Brazilian sovereignty and “totally unacceptable.”

“Tampering in such a manner in the lives and affairs of other countries is a breach of international law and, as such, it is an affront to the principles that should otherwise govern relations among countries, especially among friendly nations,” Rousseff told the annual gathering of world leaders at the United Nations.

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Number of Dutch Killed by Euthanasia Rises by 13 Per Cent

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Photo Credit: ALAMY

Photo Credit: ALAMY

Voluntary euthanasia or physician assisted suicide, where a doctor is present while a patient kills themselves, usually by drinking a strong barbiturate potion, has been legal in the Netherlands since 2002.

Requests have risen steadily since 2003 when 1,626 people applied for medically administered euthanasia, in most cases by a lethal injection, or assisted suicide.

As previously controversial “mercy killings” have become socially and medically acceptable, the number of cases, the vast majority of medical euthanasia, have more than doubled over the decade to 2012.

One explanation for the steep rise of Dutch cases is the introduction last year of mobile euthanasia units allowing patients to be killed by volunatry lethal injection when family doctors refused.

Around 80 per cent of people who request euthanasia die at home and are killed by doctors on the grounds that they are suffering unbearable pain and are making an informed choice. The opinion of a second doctor is also required.

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Iranian President Rejects Meeting with President Obama

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Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani declined to talk to President Barack Obama after White House aides offered to arrange “an encounter” between the two leaders.

“What we indicated was we were open to the two leaders having an encounter here on the margins, officials said,” according to the White House pool report.

“The Iranians have an internal dynamic that they have to manage and the relationship with [the] United States is clearly quite different than the relationship that Iran has with other Western nations,” the pool report quotes a senior administration official as saying.

The official explained that the meeting was just “too complicated for Iranians to do at this point.”

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7.7 Magnitude Quake in Pakistan Just Created a New Island

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Photo Credit: io9

Photo Credit: io9

A massive, 7.7 magnitude quake struck south-central Pakistan on Tuesday afternoon local time. The USGS warns that there will high casualties and economic losses, requiring international response. Seismologists have also confirmed that the quake raised a new island, about 30-40 feet high, off the coast.

The island is about half a mile off the coast of Gwadar, in the Arabian Sea. Already, reports the International Herald Tribune, crowds have gathered to see the mountainous, rocky island. Some are claiming it is 100 feet long.

t’s not unusual for earthquakes of this magnitude to change the coastline, or even deform the shape of the planet. In 2010, an 8.8 magnitude quake in Chile created new coastlines in that country and changed the shape of the Earth enough to shorten our days by a fraction of a second.

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U.S. Military’s Battlefield Network Vulnerable to Hackers

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Photo Credit: Musadeq Sadeq

Photo Credit: Musadeq Sadeq

The Pentagon’s main battlefield intelligence network in Afghanistan is vulnerable to hackers — both the enemy or a leaker — and the U.S. command in Kabul will cut off from the military’s classified data files unless the Army fixes the defects in 60 days, according to an official memo obtained by The Washington Times.

The memo says the Army’s Distributed Common Ground System (DCGS) flunked a readiness test and does not confirm the source of outside Internet addresses entering the classified database.

The Sept. 5 warning notice from the U.S. command in Kabul is another blow to the intelligence network, commonly called “D-Sigs.” It already had suffered a wave of bad news, such as soldiers panning its performance as unreliable and the Pentagon’s top tester judging it as not operationally effective.

The warning comes as the U.S. military is on heightened alert against unlawful entry into classified computer networks, not only by the enemy but also by “friendlies” such as Army Pvt. Bradley Manning and former National Security Agency contractor Edward J. Snowden. Both illegally downloaded reams of classified data that got widespread dissemination in the news media and, officials say, greatly damaged America’s security.

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EPA Seeks Definition of ‘Bodies of Water’ for Clean Water Act

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Photo Credit: Getty Images

Photo Credit: Getty Images

The EPA took a giant step toward finally defining which bodies of water are subject to regulation under the Clean Water Act last week, when it filed a draft rule with the White House regulatory czar designed to settle the confusion created in recent years by a series of court decisions.

The legal battles have centered on the definition and scope of a seemingly innocuous phrase — what exactly are “waters of the United States”?

Judges and regulators have wrestled over how to interpret the term in the absence of legislative action to clarify it. Now, the EPA is not only proposing a regulatory solution — which is not yet publicly available — but is also conducting a scientific review to accumulate evidence to back up the penultimate rule.

That approach to implementing the Clean Water Act (PL 95-217) is the latest example of the Obama administration’s philosophy on environmental policymaking: Act when Congress doesn’t and take steps to shore up the approach against future legal challenges.

“We’re not likely to get that clarity from Congress anytime soon,” said Bruce Myers Jr. of the Environmental Law Institute. “Further clarity from the agencies is beneficial.”

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Finding Life in Death: Nathan’s Story

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Photo Credit: Live Action News

Photo Credit: Live Action News

According to Texas law, he wasn’t old enough or heavy enough to need a death certificate, but he got a proper burial anyway.

Allison’s son was 13 weeks and 4 days when she lost him. Her husband Daniel and two-and-a-half-year-old son Matthew, along with their family, laid Nathan Isaiah to rest on September 12.

Nathan’s story is one of life and death – and ultimately life. Allison and Daniel, both 28, rejoiced in the news of their pregnancy and looked forward to February 28, 2014, their due date. After suffering a miscarriage about a year after Matthew’s first birthday, they knew they wanted more children, despite the pain of losing Matthew’s younger brother a day after discovering their pregnancy. “I did not have time to even get used to the fact that I was pregnant before blood and pain flooded our happy reality with loss,” Allison said.

Then in June, joy returned as they learned that Nathan was on his way. Excitedly they shared the news with their toddler. “We asked my son, Matthew, which he wanted, a little brother or a little sister, to which he quickly replied, ‘I want a pickle.’ (He had been on a pickle kick.) So the nickname stuck, and Nathan became known as ‘our little pickle.’”

For two months, Allison endured an exceptional case of morning sickness that often left her in bed, but she was delighted when the small baby bump formed in her belly. The whole family rejoiced at seeing this life develop.

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10 Commandments Monument Toppled, Reagan Statue Torched

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Photo Credit: Breitbart

Photo Credit: Breitbart

10 Commandments monument toppled in Washington

By Jessica Gresko.

A stone monument of the Ten Commandments that sits on a street behind the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington and was the subject of controversy in the past has been toppled by vandals.

The 3-foot-by-3-foot granite monument weighs 850 pounds and sits out front of the headquarters of Faith and Action, a Christian outreach ministry. The group installed the tablets in a garden outside its offices in 2006, and the group’s president said the tablets were angled so that justices arriving at the high court would see them.

The Rev. Robert Schenck, who heads the organization, said the damage to the monument happened sometime between Friday night and Saturday night. A minister who works in the area alerted the group to the damage around 9 p.m. Saturday.

The monument had been pushed over so that the words of the Ten Commandments are now face down. Vandals bent a steel rod that secures the monument to a thick concrete base to an almost 90 degree angle. The monument itself is not damaged, Schenck said.

“Whoever did this was determined to get it done because it’s not something you could easily do,” Schenck said, adding that the vandals also installed a “For Rent” yard sign by the monument and that the vandalism was reported to police.

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Photo Credit: Ronald Reagan Library

Photo Credit: Ronald Reagan Library

Vandals torch Ronald Reagan statue at California park

By Cheryl K. Chumley.

Vandals set fire to a life-size statue of Ronald Reagan at a Southern California sports park that bears the name of the 40th president, authorities reported Monday.

The bronze statue stands at the Ronald Reagan Sports Park in Temecula, Calif., the very same site praised by Reagan in the 1980s as a solid example of what volunteerism and fundraising can accomplish — rather than government regulation and taxpayer dollars.

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During Jihadists’ Kenyan Mall Massacre, Jihad Flag was Flying Proudly over the Streets of New York City (+video)

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Photo Credit: Urban Infidel

Photo Credit: Urban Infidel

At the same time as devout Muslims were separating Muslim children from non-Muslim children and executing them in cold blood in an upscale mall in Kenya, Muslims marched down Madison Avenue under the flag of jihad (the same flag the Muslims in Kenya were killing under).

muslim officersAt the same time as devout Muslims were bombing and attacking the historic All Saints Church and over a hundred Christians in Peshawar, American Muslims marched down Madison Avenue under the flag of jihad (the same flag the Muslims killing Christians in Peshawar were attacking under).

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