Photo Credit: Red StateThe challenger who narrowly lost a Republican primary runoff to incumbent U.S. Sen. Thad Cochran is taking his quest to view original voting records to the Mississippi Supreme Court.
State Sen. Chris McDaniel is trying to prove that some people who voted in the June 24 runoff also voted in the June 3 Democratic primary, which would be illegal. His goal is to force another runoff.
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Photo Credit: Jahi Chikwendiu / The Washington PostDallas Northington spent nearly eight years working for Target in loss prevention, roaming the stores and scanning the surveillance cameras. In an episode at the Leesburg Target store in May that he said was typical, a man was allegedly captured twice on video shoplifting, and Northington responded as he said he always did: He called the Leesburg police, made a report and provided them the videos of the two incidents.
But the man in the video may have been a Fairfax County sheriff’s deputy, Northington said he soon learned. And within days, two things happened: The deputy retired from the sheriff’s office and Target fired Northington, 29, a married father of two with a third child on the way.
Northington said Target officials told him that he had violated procedure by not filling out the proper paperwork before contacting the police, though he said his office had operated the same way for years. He said he also was told that he had been insubordinate for not seeking approval before calling police, though he said the standard practice was for him to act as needed.
But the man Northington said he and his supervisors identified as a deputy has not yet been charged with a crime though Northington said he had provided the man’s name and two color videos of him in action, his face clearly visible, to Leesburg police on May 27, the date of the second incident.
A Leesburg police spokesman said investigators were still trying to confirm the suspect’s identity. Northington said Leesburg police typically filed similar cases against shoplifters within a few days. He also said a Leesburg police sergeant investigating the case said while watching the surveillance video on May 27 that he recognized the man from a local gym where the two worked out. Store supervisors also knew the man, Northington said.
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Photo Credit: ScreenshotBy Joshua Levitt.
Jewish human rights group the Simon Wiesenthal Center on Monday demanded that social media platform Twitter do more to stem anti-Semitic hate from supporters of Hamas, after online magazine BuzzFeed reported on Sunday how the #HitlerWasRight hashtag was gaining widespread usage on the site.
“Twitter needs to articulate a coherent policy in dealing with hate and terrorism and live up to those standards,” SWC dean Rabbi Abraham Cooper told The Algemeiner. “The freedom of speech fig leaf doesn’t cover such hatred in the private domain.”
Cooper said that as part of the SWC’s Digital Terrorism and Hate Project, the organization grades social networking platforms for their responsiveness in dealing with digital terrorism and hate.
“Facebook usually earns A-, YouTube C,” Cooper said. “Last year, after meeting with senior Twitter officials in San Francisco, we upgraded Twitter to a D-. Previously it received an F.”
Cooper said SWC is scheduled to meet Twitter executives again later this month. But that “even without this pornographic anti-Semitic hate, Twitter was well on its way to another F as it remains the social networking platform of choice of terrorists and their supporters around the world.”
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Photo Credit: REUTERS / CHRISTIAN HARTMANNNeo-Nazis, Islamists declare ‘You Jews are beasts’ during protest of Israeli operation
By Benjamin Weinthal.
A demonstration in Frankfurt against Operation Protective Edge erupted into violence, with protesters tossing stones at the police.
According to the Frankfurter Rundschau paper, about 2,500 protesters appeared in downtown Frankfurt, screaming “God is great,” and slogans such as “freedom for Palestine” and “children-murderer Israel.”
Eight police officers were injured. One sign at the rally was titled, “You Jews are Beasts.”
German media reported that after the protests, groups sought to locate Jewish institutions. The Frankfurt police said Jewish institutions would be protected. It is unclear if the goal was to attack said institutions.
According to the Rundschau, student organization Left-SDS, Islamists and some members of the Neo-Nazi group National Socialists Rhein-Main attended the anti-Israel protest. Flags from Turkey, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Hamas were on display at the protest. Banners compared Prime Minister Netanyahu with Adolf Hitler.
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Photo Credit: WNDRepresentatives of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, or UNHRC, are “intensely discussing in meetings” the possibility of extending U.N. protection to the thousands of Central Americans crossing the U.S. border with Mexico illegally by defining them as “refugees” who are seeking asylum from political and domestic violence in their home nations, WND has confirmed.
Officials privy to the U.N. discussions have explained to WND it’s “a tricky situation,” because the Central American immigrants are not part of any group the U.N. has designated as victims of political or religious persecution.
A UNHCR official confirmed Monday to WND via email that a 10-nation meeting in Nicaragua of ministers of the interior from the U.S., Mexico and various Central American countries was held Thursday and Friday.
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Photo Credit: WNDIn his new full-length documentary film, “There’s No Place Like Utopia,” Joel Gilbert found Peggy Joseph, the Florida voter who became infamous during the 2008 presidential campaign for saying Barack Obama would “pay for my gas and my mortgage.”
Surprisingly, some six years into the Obama presidency, Joseph has turned against the president, disappointed that he did not deliver on his “hope and change” campaign promises.
“Peggy reminded me of Dorothy from ‘The Wizard of Oz,’ who thought the magical wizard would solve all her problems,” Gilbert told WND in an interview.
He provided an excerpt of Joseph in the film.
“When I finally found her address, I knocked on her door and brought her a pair of ruby slippers. When I interviewed Peggy, I was astonished that Peggy explained that she was now anti-Obama. She told me, ‘He was not who we thought or expected him to be.’”
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Photo Credit: AP / Jacquelyn MartinWhite House press secretary Josh Earnest said Monday the Obama administration’s foreign policies in a number of areas have enhanced the world’s “tranquility” – a word that raised eyebrows as reporters pointed to situations in Gaza, Syria, Iraq, Iran, Ukraine and the South China Sea.
More than one reporter during Monday’s press briefing referred to a front-page Wall Street Journal article highlighting some of those crises, and citing security strategists as saying “the breadth of global instability now unfolding hasn’t been seen since the late 1970s.”
“How does the White House react to the notion that the president is a bystander to all these crises?” asked Fox News’ Ed Henry, citing the widening gaps between the sides in the Iranian nuclear talks, the conflict in and around Gaza, and the Syrian civil war.
“I think that there have been a number of situations in which you’ve seen this administration intervene in a meaningful way, that has substantially furthered American interests and substantially improved the, uh, you know, the – the tranquility of the global community,” Earnest replied.
ABC News’ Jon Karl quoted Attorney General Eric Holder’s assessment in an interview aired Sunday that the terrorist potential arising from Westerners returning home after fighting in Syria was “more frightening than anything I think I’ve seen as attorney general.”
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Photo Credit: IJ Review Michael Hartmann, a German Minister of Parliament (MP), is only the latest politician to experiment with hard drugs (see Rob Ford, pictured above) – but he said he used crystal meth only so he could be more efficient as a public official.
The Social Democratic Party member, age 51, admitted to the drug abuse only after being accused by a prosecutor who’d gained evidence from surveillance, according to reports.
Hartmann, the interior policy expert for the Social Democratic Party (SPD), admitted to using the drug for about a month.His lawyer said on Wednesday that 51-year-old Hartmann had hoped the substance would “improve performance” at work.
The lawyer went on to say his client bought and consumed a small amount of crystal meth in autumn 2013, but had not been addicted to it. He’s stressing that psychological tests for addiction have come back negative to the substance.
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I support the Second Amendment. I have guns and, because we have some lunatics on the loose in this state, I conceal carry. But I didn’t support the so-called “Stand Your Ground” law that allows people to shoot those they fear without trying to retreat first. If you can retreat safely, you should — rather than take someone’s life.
It was a controversial bill that many believed would lead to more violence, so you can imagine my happy surprise when Sarah Palin’s then-attorney general, Dan Sullivan, opposed the bill and helped kill it in 2010. I was impressed that Sarah Palin had actually hired an attorney general willing to stand his ground against insane gun laws.
Maybe bringing in a guy from Ohio or D.C. or Maryland, or wherever Dan is from, to be our chief law enforcement officer — one who had seen first-hand too much gun violence Outside — was going to benefit Alaska.
But now I’m watching as Ohio Dan tries to rewrite the history of his opposition to Stand Your Ground. In a recent radio ad, Sullivan claims, “As Alaska’s attorney general, (I) successfully fought to protect our Second Amendment rights and passed ‘Stand your Ground.’ ”
This claim is just plain false, according to the nonpartisan, Pulitzer Prize-winning website Politifact.com. Come on, Dan, don’t weasel on this. Embrace your decision to do the right thing and kill what really was a bad bill.
As a Marine, Dan Sullivan is a chain-of-command guy. As attorney general, he made sure the troops under him — directors, assistants and others — toed his line. In fact, just last March, in front of a tea party audience, Dan bragged that he was responsible for “everything” done by the Department of Law while he was AG. That’s what makes Sullivan’s lie about Stand Your Ground so blatant.
How do we know he’s running from the truth? For starters, there’s a March 15, 2010, letter to the House Judiciary Committee expressing “serious concern” about House Bill 381, the Stand Your Ground bill. The letter went on to say the law would be “a bad idea for our state.” The letter is signed, “Sincerely, Daniel S. Sullivan Attorney General” and “By John Skidmore Assistant Attorney General.”
As reported by the Daily News, Sullivan now claims “it’s not my letter,” that it was written by a “staffer,” he had no idea about it and disagrees with it. President Harry Truman, also a military man, famously had a sign on his desk that said, “The buck stops here.” Apparently, Dan left his sign back in Ohio.
So let’s assume Sullivan managed his department in such a way that he had no idea what his assistant attorneys general were writing to the Legislature under his signature. Surely he knew what testimony they were giving to the Legislature on high-profile legislation, right?
So wouldn’t he have known that Anne Carpeneti, an assistant attorney general, Legal Section, Criminal Division, Department of Law, was requested to appear before the House Judiciary Committee on March 15, 2010, “to offer us the point of view of the Department of Law”?
Carpeneti started her testimony by saying, “I represent the Criminal Division of the Department of Law.” She apologized for the late delivery of the March 15 Sullivan/Skidmore letter, explaining, “We were working on it all morning.”
She went on to testify: “We are confused and concerned about this bill … The way the department reads this bill, it would really contribute to violence in this state.” She testified again on March 29, 2010, before the House Judiciary Committee. She noted that the Department of Law “still has concerns” about the bill.
The bill passed out of the committee and advanced to the House Finance Committee. Before Finance, on April 8, 2010, Carpeneti again testified that the law department was concerned that HB 381 would increase violence in Alaska. Nonetheless, HB 381 passed the House, 32-8, that same day.
As the discussion moved to the Senate, the Department of Law sent Susan McLean, the director of the Criminal Division of the Department of Law, to testify before the Judiciary Committee. On April 16, 2010, she pulled no punches, forcefully declaring, “I want to make our position very clear here, which is, we are opposed to the law.” The bill died a few days later. The bill didn’t become law until three years later — long after Dan Sullivan had left the Department of Law.
Does Dan really expect us to believe he had no idea Assistant Attorney General Skidmore was writing under his name that HB 381 was a “bad idea”? That Assistant Attorney General Carpeneti was testifying before multiple committees about the Department of Law’s “concerns” about promoting violence? That his Criminal Division director testified that the department flat out opposed the law?
What does this tell us about Dan Sullivan’s ability to run a department of state government? Did the Department of Law simply go rogue while supposedly under his control? I don’t think so. I think the real question is:
Does U.S. Senate candidate Dan Sullivan have the integrity to tell Alaskans the truth and suffer the consequences?
The answer seems to be no. Sullivan is trying to deceive Alaskans, and he appears willing to turn anyone who gets in the way into a speed bump.
Oh, there’s one more document Dan hasn’t explained. It’s a “fiscal note,” dated March 30, 2010, detailing the expected costs of the Stand Your Ground bill: $400,000 a year for two new attorneys because “this bill will make prosecution of homicide cases more difficult … and it will probably result in more jury trials.” The note was “Approved by: Daniel S. Sullivan, Attorney General.”
To quote Dan’s former boss, Sarah Palin, “How ’bout ya quit makin’ stuff up.”
Shannyn Moore is a radio broadcaster. You can hear her show, “The Last Word,” Monday through Friday 4-6 p.m. on KOAN 95.5 FM and 1080 AM and 1480 We Act Radio in Washington, D.C., and on Netroots Radio.
This article was published in-full on Restoring Liberty with permission from the author.
Photo Credit: APThe Obama administration is expanding its online data search of Americans to find potential civil unrest — like the 2010 Tea Party movement — and squash it before they take root, a prominent financial advisor has warned clients.
David John Marotta compared the administration’s efforts to those used by former FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover against his critics and 1960s activists. “Targeting activists isn’t anything new. J. Edgar Hoover made it his life’s work. What has changed is the vigor with which the government has assumed its own activism against certain groups,” he said.
“If you wonder why the National Security Agency is collecting so much online traffic information, it is because you can use such metadata to determine patient zeroes in the intellectual pandemic of beliefs like the Tea Party movement. The idea is that, if they could identify the potential origin of such movements, they could eliminate the threat merely by silencing the source,” he wrote on his blog.
Marotta, based in Charlottesville, Va., often blogs for Forbes.
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Photo Credit: AFP / Kenzo TribouillardClashes erupted in Paris on Sunday as thousands of people protested against Israel and in support of residents in the Gaza Strip, where a six-day conflict has left 168 Palestinians dead.
Several thousand demonstrators walked calmly through the streets of Paris behind a large banner that read “Total Support for the Struggle of the Palestinian People”.
But clashes erupted at the end of the march on Bastille Square, with people throwing projectiles onto a cordon of police who responded with tear gas.
The unrest continued early Sunday evening as police announced six arrests had been made.
A small group tired to break into two synagogues in central Paris, a police source told AFP.
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