WWII Vet, Beaten by Teens Outside Eagles Lodge, Dies

/8 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: kxly

Photo Credit: kxly

WWII veteran Delbert Belton survived being wounded in action during the Battle of Okinawa only to be beaten and left for dead by two teens at the Eagles Lodge in Spokane on Wednesday evening.

Belton, 88, succumbed to his injuries Thursday morning at Sacred Heart Medical Center.

Witnesses say Belton was in the parking lot of the Eagles Lodge at 6410 N. Lidgerwood, adjacent to the Eagles Ice-A-Rena, around 8 p.m. Wednesday when the two male suspects attacked him as he was about to head inside to play pool.

Police responded with K-9s to track the suspects’ scent but were not able to locate them.

“It does appear random. He was in the parking lot, it appears he was assaulted in the parking lot and there was no indication that he would have known these people prior to the assault,” Spokane Police Major Crimes Detective Lieutenant Mark Griffiths said.

Read more from this story HERE.

Ted Cruz: Eric Holder ‘Working to Undermine the Integrity of our Elections’

/7 Comments/in , /by

eric_holder1177Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas accused Attorney General Eric Holder of “working to undermine the integrity of our elections” in response to a Justice Department lawsuit that would block Texas voter ID and redistricting laws and require the Lone Star State to seek federal approval for other election changes.

“Today’s decision by the U.S. Department of Justice to sue Texas is, sadly, only the latest manifestation of the DOJ’s increasing politicization under this Administration,” Cruz said in a statement.

“Americans overwhelmingly support voter ID laws because they understand that voter fraud weakens our democracy, and unfortunately it is often minority voters who are the victims of that fraud. The Department of Justice should not be working to undermine the integrity of our elections.”

Read more from this story HERE.

Bradley Manning Seeks Gender Change

/4 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

Pfc. Bradley Manning said Thursday that he wants to live his life as a woman and be known as Chelsea Manning as he begins a 35-year prison sentence for leaking classified government information to WikiLeaks.

Less than 24 hours after being sentenced for being the source of one of the biggest classified leaks in U.S. history, Pfc. Manning said he wants to begin hormone therapy and be known by a new name.

“As I transition to the next phase of my life, I want everyone to know the real me,” he said in a statement made on NBC’s “Today” show. “I am Chelsea Manning.”

Pfc. Manning’s sexuality became a focal point of his defense during the court-martial at Fort Meade, Md.

His defense team argued that the 25-year-old former Army intelligence analyst suffered from gender-identity issues that were largely ignored by commanders who should have removed him from the position in Iraq, where he had access to classified U.S. documents.

Read more from this story HERE.

Were Hackers Behind NASDAQ Chaos? Experts Say Technical Difficulties that Shut Market Resemble ‘Denial of Service Attack’

/0 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

Officials say the Nasdaq stock exchange outage on Thursday was likely due to a technical difficulty, though some experts say the incident resembles recent cyber attacks against U.S. banks and other financial institutions.

‘My first thought is that it is a denial-of-service attack, but I’m not sure,’ Gartner banking security analyst Avivah Litan told USA Today. ‘It’s a very attractive target. It’s very visible, and that’s what these Iranian state attacks are all about, making a political statement by disrupting a visible website.’

A wave of denial-of-service attacks started last September, knocking several banks offline including Wells Fargo, U.S. Bank, Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase and PNC Bank.

The attacks were attributed to Cyber Fighters of Izz ad-Din al-Qassam, an Iranian hacking collective.

The second wave of denial-of-service attacks came in January, shutting down the websites of credit unions and mid-level banks. A third wave, in March, targeted credit card companies and financial brokerages.

Read more from this story HERE.

Feds are Building a Detective Squad to Target Consumers and Companies that Don’t Follow Obamacare’s Rules

/2 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

More than 1,600 new employees hired by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Resources in the aftermath of Obamacare’s passage include just two described as ‘consumer safety’ officers, but 86 tasked with ‘criminal investigating’ – indicating that the agency is building an army of detectives to sleuth out violations of a law that many in Congress who supported it still find confusing.

On the day President Obama signed the Affordable Care Act into law in 2010, HHS received authority from the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) to make as many as 1,814 new hires under an emergency ‘Direct Hiring Authority’ order.

The Obama administration ordered that employment expansion despite a government-wide hiring freeze.

A total of 1,684 of those positions were filled. An analysis by MailOnline shows that at 2010 federal government salary rates, the new employees’ salaries alone cost the U.S. at least $138.8 million every year.

Had the agency filled all its available jobs, that cost would have been a minimum of $159 million.

Read more from this story HERE.

Muslim Brotherhood’s Bid to Scapegoat Christians Failing, say Egyptians

/0 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

As their nation descends into violent chaos, Egyptians are increasingly blaming the Muslim Brotherhood, despite attempts by the Islamist group to scapegoat Christians and the military, according to several sources who spoke to FoxNews.com from Cairo.

“The Muslim Brotherhood has lost all sympathy with their points due to their violence,” said a Long Island, N.Y., Egyptian-American, who is in a Cairo suburb for a family wedding.

The man, a Coptic Christian who asked that his name not be used until he and his family are safely back in the U.S., told FoxNews.com he arrived in the Cairo suburb of Heliopolis last weekend, just days after Muslim Brotherhood supporters began clashing violently with security forces. Since then, nightly curfews, angry mobs and closed roads that cut off supplies to restaurants and groceries have made his homeland unrecognizable.

“We see very few people after 7 p.m. in the streets,” he told FoxNews.com.

The violence began when, more than a month after the military stripped President Mohammad Morsi of power and took him into custody, authorities cleared camps of protesters in Cairo.

Read more from this story HERE.

Authorities: Iowa Couple Shot, Killed Escaped Inmate (+video)

/3 Comments/in , /by

iowaLaw enforcement authorities said Tuesday that an Iowa couple shot and killed an escaped inmate after being held in their home for four hours.

Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation Special Agent Mitch Mortvedt said Rodney Long forced his way into the couple’s home at 2609 Highland Avenue about 10:15 p.m. and held them for the next four hours.

Jerome and Carolyn Mauderly said Long was armed with a semi automatic handgun. He had also taken their phones.

Jerome, 71, and Carolyn, 66, decided to defend themselves, Mortvedt said. Jerome shot Long with his shotgun. They were not seriously hurt in the incident.

Read more from this story HERE.

Top ‘LGBT Friendly’ Colleges Offer ‘Gender-Free’ Bathrooms, ‘Queer Studies’ Minor

/2 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

Campus Pride, a gay rights advocacy group, released its annual list of the “Top 25 LGBT Friendly Colleges and Universities” on Tuesday, which includes schools with gender-neutral bathrooms and a minor in “queer studies.”

The top 25 schools had to achieve five stars in overall, sexual orientation, and gender identity/expression categories in order to be listed in the top 25. Each school also had to be 4.5 stars or above in eight LGBT-friendly factor areas.

The final Top 25 had the highest percentage ratings and reflects colleges with student populations from 2500 to over 25,000, both public and private schools.

The University of Oregon is the only institution in the state to offer Queer Studies as a minor in their Department of Women’s and Gender Studies.

“Help change the world with your newfound critical thinking skills by promoting respect in the workplace. Aid a city as it institutes its new gay-marriage law. Promote diversity in adoption rights. You’ll be able to create and foster a culturally responsive community wherever you go,” the university said its website.

Read more from this story HERE.

Thanks to New START Treaty: Russians Inspect Missile Defense Base

/0 Comments/in , /by

Photo Credit: Boeing

Photo Credit: Boeing

Russian officials this week carried out a secret inspection of the U.S. strategic missile defense base in California as part of the New START arms treaty, according to Obama administration officials.

The inspection of five missile defense interceptors is the only one allowed under the 2010 arms accord. The treaty requires cuts of U.S. and Russian deployed strategic warheads to 1,550.

A defense official said the visit was a treaty verification visit hosted by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency.

A State Department official declined to comment on the inspection but confirmed it was related to New START. “Implementation activities under New START are confidential,” the official said.

However, Thomas Moore, a former Senate Foreign Relations Committee professional staff member, said the inspection of the base was a controversial part of U.S. and Russian arms talks leading up to New START that was ratified by the Senate in December 2010.

Read more from this story HERE.

Editors Note: Both of Alaska’s US Senators voted in favor of the ill-advised New START Treaty.

America the Trivial

/2 Comments/in , /by

trivialityTwo quite different 21st-century Americas are emerging. The nation is not so much divided by “wars” between the rich and poor, men and women, or white and non-white. Instead, there is the world of reality versus that of triviality.

In the vast plains of the Dakotas and the American West, thousands of men and women of all classes and colors are fracking oil and gas to create new energy for millions of homeowners and commuters — while giving America a second chance at strategic energy independence.

Yet the beneficiaries mostly ignore these elemental efforts. They instead prefer to fixate on the alleged sexual creepiness of big-city political mediocrities like Bob Filner and Anthony Weiner.

As we sleep, 7,000 miles away there are still thousands of American soldiers of all races, ages, classes, and genders in godforsaken conditions fighting the Taliban to allow millions in Afghanistan the chance for an alternative to medieval theocracy and to deter terrorists.

Meanwhile, back home, the nation is focused not on such existential struggles but is transfixed by racial melodramas.

Read more from this story HERE.