Murder Charges for Suspected Gunman in LAX Shooting

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Photo Credit: Fox News Federal prosecutors announced Saturday that they have filed charges of murder and commission of violence at an international airport against the man suspected of carrying out the deadly shooting at Los Angeles International Airport in which a TSA officer was fatally shot, and several others were wounded.

If convicted, 23-year-old Paul Anthony Ciancia could get the death penalty. He was arrested Friday after authorities say he barged into a terminal, pulled an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle from his duffel bag and opened fire. The bullets killed a Transportation Security Administration officer and injuring four others before Ciancia was gunned down by airport police.

The killing was “believed to be a premeditated act of murder in the first-degree,” U.S. Attorney Andre Birotte Jr. said in announcing the charges.

The announcement comes after authorities say they have found a note handwritten by Ciancia in which he describes his intent to kill TSA employees and “pigs,” a law enforcement official told The Associated Press.

Federal authorities said Ciancia had “a bunch of threatening language directed at the TSA and lots of anti-government rants.”

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Iran Calls for Continued Use of ‘Death to America’ as Official Slogan

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Photo Credit: EPAThe Revolutionary Guards, the elite Iranian regime’s army, said Saturday they are committed to the slogan “Death to America,” chanted at official ceremonies, just days before the 34th anniversary of the storming of the American Embassy in Tehran.

“The slogan Death to America is the symbol of strength and determination of the Iranian nation against the dominance of the United States, which is an oppressive and untrustworthy nation,” said the Revolutionary Guards on their official website.

In recent weeks, a debate was launched in Iran on the merits of continuing to chant “Death to America ” during official ceremonies, while some relaxation occurred in relations between Tehran and Washington since the election in June of moderate President Hassan Rohani.

“Telephone espionage by the United States government against the people of other countries are proof that you can not trust the leadership of the White House”, the military group said.

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Gun Rights Groups Throwing their Weight Behind Efforts to Rein In NSA

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Photo Credit: Getty ImagesThe National Rifle Association (NRA) is among a number of groups that have signed on to an American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) lawsuit against the secretive government agency.

The NRA has also endorsed bipartisan legislation proposed by House and Senate Judiciary committees that would end the NSA’s collection of bulk phone records.

Another Second Amendment advocate, the Gun Owners of America, expects to back NSA legislation as well.

“There are issues that, maybe at first blush, wouldn’t seem like a gun issue, but once you start looking closely at the issues, they really do affect our gun rights,” said Erich Pratt, the director of communications for Gun Owners of America.

Gun groups fear the NSA could have the authority under a section of the PATRIOT Act to collect information that could be used to create a federal gun database. They also fear the government could be spying on, or eventually targeting, gun owners.

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Senate Republicans Pushing for Federal Ban on 20-Week Abortions

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Photo Credit: APSenate Republicans, led by South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, are pushing for a federal ban on abortions after the end of the 20th week of pregnancy.

Graham is expected to introduce the bill this upcoming week, reports The Washington Examiner, and the legislation will be a companion bill for the Pain Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, passed in the House earlier this year.

The planned legislation, though, will face many challenges, not only from the Democratic-controlled Senate, but from some Republicans like Sen. Mike Lee, Utah, who has concerns about Congress’ authority to regulate commerce as the law’s basis.

Back in 2003, a partial-birth abortion plan based on the Commerce Clause was upheld by the Supreme Court, with Justices Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia emphasising that the “court’s abortion jurisprudence has no basis in the Constitution.”

Graham is up for re-election in South Carolina next year, so his push on the late-term abortion ban may help him fight challengers in the Republican primary. He holds the lead by 51 percent, according to current surveys, but several conservative groups, including the Senate Conservatives Fund, for one, have in an effort to oust the veteran senator.

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Scuba Divers to Monitor NYC Marathon

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Photo Credit: Richard Drew/APSunday’s New York City Marathon will be the best-protected race that runners can enter as a result of enhanced security measures and police presence on land and by sea, according to New York City Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly. Helicopters, scuba divers, police boats, K-9 dogs with explosive-detection capabilities and hundreds of cameras are among the precautionary measures that will be deployed along the marathon route and throughout the city’s five boroughs.

Kelly said that while security planning for the event typically takes several months, the New York Police Department began preparing for this year’s marathon the day after the Boston Marathon bombing in April, which killed three people and wounded more than 260 others.

“Planning for the marathon is always a major undertaking and I can assure you this year was no exception,” Kelly said Friday at a security briefing on the marathon, which is expected to draw more than 45,000 runners.

Hundreds of cameras will be monitored in real-time by the NYPD’s Domain Awareness System, he said. The department has also located more than 1, 400 privately owned cameras along the 26.2-mile route that can be tapped for additional security footage if necessary.

NYPD scuba divers began sweeping the shoreline and surrounding infrastructure on Thursday “to safeguard all five bridges that the runners will cross on their way ultimately to Manhattan,” Kelly said.

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Parents Jailed After Allegedly Confronting Bus Full of Children After Son Reported Bullying

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Photo Credit: MYFOXPHILLY.COMTwo parents were arrested and charged after police say they unlawfully entered a school bus and threatened children when their son told them he was being bullied.

Christina and Christopher Gring allegedly got on their bus after their son came to them crying, and began yelling and cursing at the other children, MyFoxPhilly.com.

“I was crying because I was worried and I was like I don’t know what happened. I didn’t do anything,” an 8-year-old student told MyFoxPhilly.com.

“They started yelling curse words at us and yelling to tell them what happened,” the student said.

A spokesperson for the North Penn School District said an investigation found no reports of bullying involving the accused couple’s child.

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Pro-Amnesty Organizations Campaigning Heavily for Democrat Terry McAuliffe

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Photo Credit: APPro-amnesty organizations are campaigning heavily for Democrat Terry McAuliffe, the former chairman of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and a close ally of former President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in Virginia’s gubernatorial election on Tuesday.

“Latino groups are intensifying get-out-the-vote efforts in the Virginia governor’s race against a national backdrop of a congressional struggle over immigration reform,” NBC News Latino reports. “The groups said Thursday immigration reform is a critical issue on which candidates will be measured by Latino voters in the race.

As the groups work to have a strong showing of Latino turnout in Tuesday’s race, pressure has intensified on House Republicans to move immigration reform legislation in the waning days of this congressional year. That has helped keep the issue in the forefront as the Virginia candidates head to Election Day and groups try to turn out Latino voters in the state, home to the 16th largest population of Hispanic-eligible voters.”

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Crews Clear Huge Alaska Landslide At Denali National Park Road

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Photo Credit: Arthur Chapman/FlickrCrews at Denali National Park in Alaska have cleared a massive landslide from a road that is a popular tourist destination each summer.

The landslide discovered last week covered 200 feet of the Denali Park Road with tons of rock and soil.

Crews taking advantage of unseasonably mild weather finished clearing the road at day’s end Monday, and some snow has since fallen, park spokeswoman Maureen Gualtieri said Friday. It’s not clear if instability of the terrain will affect visitors next summer, park officials have said.

Gualtieri said the affected section of road, 37 miles from the park entrance, appears intact. That part of the road already was closed and there were no reported casualties from the slide, which officials believe occurred recently.

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More Lipstick on the ObamaCare Pig

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Photo Credit: Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.comThe White House PR machine keeps trying to put lipstick on the ObamaCare pig. According to Whitehouse.gov, “there’s some great news from a Department of Health and Human Services report… Thanks to Obamacare, half of young adults between age 18 and 34 who are single and uninsured can get health coverage for $50/month or less.”

There are two problems with the claim. First, the actual percentage, according to HHS figures, of 18-34 year olds who qualify for the $50/month rate is not “half” but 2.9%. The numbers are 1.3 million out of 44.2 million.

Secondly, the $50/month rate is not a market price but one that is subsidized by an expanded government entitlement.

The White House statement is not technically another ObamaCare lie, but it requires reading the fine print for interpretation. The full “caveated” statement in the report from the Office of The Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation at HHS reads as follows:

Nearly 5 in 10 (46 percent, or 1.3 million) uninsured young adults in single-person households who may be eligible for the Health Insurance Marketplace may be able to purchase a bronze plan for $50 per month or less after tax credits, based on analysis of data in 34 states.

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West Point Hosts First Marriage Ceremony for Homosexual Men

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Photo Credit: Mike Groll, APTwo West Point graduates were married Saturday in the military academy’s first wedding between two men.

Larry Choate III, class of 2009, married Daniel Lennox, class of 2007, before about 20 guests.

Choate, 27, taught Sunday school at the U.S. Military Academy’s Cadet Chapel and said he always thought of it as the place he would get married if he could.

West Point hosted two same-sex weddings of women in late 2012, more than a year after New York state legalized gay marriage. But Saturday’s wedding was the first time two men wed at West Point.

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