State Department Spokeswoman: ‘We Have Determined That We Do Not Need to Make a Determination’ on Egypt (+video)

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State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki told Matt Lee of the Associated Press Tuesday that the U.S. had “determined that we do not need to make a determination” over whether or not the ousting of Mohamed Morsi in Egypt was a coup.

Sen. John McCain (R., Ariz.) called it a coup Tuesday, but the Obama administration has deliberately avoided using the word:

LEE: In response to the first question about Senator McCain’s comments, you gave — you said, our position has not changed, as you just did with Morsi. On McCain’s comments, though, our position has not changed — then you said the U.S. government has stated what our position is. Could you remind us all of what your position actually is? Because as I recall, your position was that you don’t have a position, and that’s not quite — is that correct?

PSAKI: Matt, I think you know our position, which is that –

LEE: I — tell me.

PSAKI: There was a determination made that we need to — not need to make a designation.

LEE: So then — so your position is that you do not have a position, correct?..

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Southern Poverty Law Center: ‘Our Hate Map Doesn’t Cause Anybody to Attack’ (+audio)

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Photo Credit: APCo-founder of the Southern Poverty Law Center Morris Dees said his group’s “Hate Map” “doesn’t cause anybody to attack,” despite Floyd Lee Corkins’ admission that he targeted the Family Research Council (FRC) after going to the center’s website.

As Corkins told the FBI after his arrest, he learned of the FRC online, “It was a, uh, Southern Poverty Law, lists, anti-gay groups. I found them online. I did a little bit of research, went to the website, stuff like that.”

Corkins attempted a mass shooting on Aug. 15, 2012, opening fire at the Family Research Council and wounding Security Guard Leo Johnson.

Armed with more than 95 rounds of ammunition and 15 Chick-fil-a sandwiches, Corkins told the FBI that he chose the FRC as his first target after looking at a list of “anti-gay” groups on the SPLC’s website.

The Family Research Council is still listed on the Southern Poverty Law Center’s “Hate Map” as “anti-gay.”

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Obamacare Months Behind in Testing IT Data Security

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Photo Credit: TownhallThe federal government is months behind in testing data security for the main pillar of Obamacare: allowing Americans to buy health insurance on state exchanges due to open by October 1.

The missed deadlines have pushed the government’s decision on whether information technology security is up to snuff to exactly one day before that crucial date, the Department of Health and Human Services’ inspector general said in a report.

As a result, experts say, the exchanges might open with security flaws or, possibly but less likely, be delayed.

“They’ve removed their margin for error,” said Deven McGraw, director of the health privacy project at the non-profit Center for Democracy & Technology. “There is huge pressure to get (the exchanges) up and running on time, but if there is a security incident they are done. It would be a complete disaster from a PR viewpoint.”

The most likely serious security breach would be identity theft, in which a hacker steals the social security numbers and other information people provide when signing up for insurance.

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ABC Newsman who Switched Genders Wants to Switch Back

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Photo Credit: NY PostHe thought he was a woman trapped in a man’s body — but it turns out he’s “just another boring straight guy.”

ABC News editor Don Ennis strolled into the newsroom in May wearing a little black dress and an auburn wig and announced he was transgender and splitting from his wife. He wanted to be called Dawn.

But now he says he suffered from a two-day bout of amnesia that has made him realize he wants to live his life again as Don.

“I accused my wife of playing some kind of cruel joke, dressing me up in a wig and bra and making fake ID’s with the name ‘Dawn’ on it. Seriously,” Ennis wrote in a memo he posted to the newsroom bulletin board Friday, explaining his shock after he woke up from what he called a “transient global amnesia” last month.

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Marathon Bombing Suspects Met Conspiracy Theorist

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Photo Credit: Getty Images Boston Marathon bombing suspects Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev befriended a brain-damaged anti-U.S. government conspiracy theorist through their mother’s health care aide job years before the deadly attack, a lawyer said Tuesday.

Attorney Jason Rosenberg, who represents the family of Donald Larking, said Larking shared publications with the brothers, especially Tamerlan, and discussed theories including that the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks and the Newtown, Conn., elementary school shooting didn’t happen or the U.S. government was behind them.

The attorney said the Tsarnaev family had a relationship with the Larkings that started years ago when the brothers’ mother began working as a personal care assistant for Larking’s wife, a quadriplegic since birth.

Rosenberg said Larking, who lives in West Newton, just west of Boston, was shot in the head in 1974 in an attempted robbery while working in a convenience store. He said Larking suffered brain damage that led to problems with his decision-making and judgment.

Authorities say the Tsarnaev brothers orchestrated the April 15 marathon bombing, in which two pressure cookers loaded with shrapnel exploded near the race’s finish line, killing three people and injuring more than 260 others. Dzhokhar Tsarnaev pleaded not guilty last month to charges including using a weapon of mass destruction to kill. Tamerlan Tsarnaev died after a shootout with police a few days after the bombing.

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Senator Lee Says Young Americans Think They Are ‘More Likely to See Elvis Alive in This Lifetime Than Get a Dime From Social Security’

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(CNSNews.com) — While speaking about Social Security, Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) asked the audience at the Young Americans for Liberty Conference on July 31, “Most of you probably believe you are more likely to see Elvis alive in this lifetime than to get a dime from Social Security, am I right?”

Judging from the applause and cheers, it seemed that a large majority of the audience agreed with the senator. At the event, Lee was asked, “You mentioned Social Security and I would say probably most of the room on the way to the airport had to go through TSA and probably opted-out of TSA. So we were all trying to opt-out of TSA security, but what about Social Security? Would you allow our generation to opt-out of Social Security and say, ‘Look, we won’t take a dime from Social Security, we’ll take care of ourselves, let us keep our money.’ Is that a viable option, is that something that can be proposed?”

Lee responded, “Let’s talk about Social Security opt-out. The reason that that is so appealing probably to every single person in this room — and tell me if I’m right — is because most of you probably believe you are more likely to see Elvis alive in this lifetime than to get a dime from Social Security, am I right?”

After the audience applause, Lee said, “That’s about what I thought. So, the reason for that it’s not arbitrary, it’s not irrational that you feel that way. You have good reason to feel that way. You’ve seen the government set up this program, set it up in the 1930s. It was set up as an investment program, an income security program.”

“It was kind of like insurance, it was kind of like a savings plan,” said Lee. “The government told the people — even though none of us were born when this happened — the government told the people this can never be taken away. You’ll pay into it, the government will safeguard it, we’ll put it into a really safe box, and then we will give it to you when you retire.”

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FBI Informants Given Green Light to Break the Law

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Photo Credit: GOP USAThe FBI gave informants permission to break the law at least 5,658 times in one year, according to newly disclosed documents that show how often the nation’s top law enforcement agency enlists criminals to help it battle crime.

The Justice Department ordered the FBI to begin tracking crimes by its informants more than a decade ago, after the agency admitted that it had allowed Boston mobster James “Whitey” Bulger to operate a brutal crime ring in exchange for information about the Mafia. The FBI submits that tally to top Justice Department officials each year but has never before made it public.

Agents authorized 15 crimes a day on average — from drug sales to bribery and plotting robberies. FBI officials have said that permitting informants, who are often criminals, to break the law is an indispensable part of investigating criminal organizations.

“It sounds like a lot, but you have to keep it in context,” said Shawn Henry, who supervised criminal investigations for the FBI until he retired last year. “It’s not taken lightly.”

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Video: Texas Man Shoots His Abductors

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Photo Credit: SkleyAuthorities say a Houston-area man turned the tables on two bank robbery suspects who had abducted him and his wife by pulling a gun on the unsuspecting duo and shooting them both, killing one of them.

The suspects apparently knew that the woman worked at the First National Bank of Eagle Lake in Columbus, and they abducted her and her husband at gunpoint at their residence north of the city on Thursday and drove them back to the bank, Columbus County Sheriff’s Sgt. Andrew Weido told Houston television station KHOU.

The suspects forced the woman to taken an undisclosed amount of money from the bank, then forced the husband to drive them in his truck down Highway 71, Weido said. It was then that the husband grabbed a gun that was in the truck and fired at the suspects, he said.

Officers who responded to a 911 call found both suspects lying on the ground near the truck suffering from gunshot wounds.

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RNC Threatens Boycott of CNN and NBC Over Hillary Clinton Shows

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Photo Credit: Getty ImagesThe Republican National Committee has threatened a boycott of CNN and NBC in the runup to the next presidential election unless the networks cancel films they have planned on Hillary Clinton.

Reince Priebus, chair of the RNC, wrote to the heads of CNN and NBC on Monday. He warned both networks that he would seek a binding committee vote next week to “neither partner with you in 2016 primary debates nor sanction primary debates which you sponsor”, unless they cancel the Clinton shows.

Last week NBC announced plans for a four-hour mini-series on Clinton, with Diane Lane in the starring role. Two days later CNN revealed it had commissioned its films division to make a big-budget documentary on Clinton to air in 2014.

“I’m writing to express my deep disappointment in your company’s decision to air a miniseries promoting former Secretary Hillary Clinton ahead of her likely candidacy for the Democratic nomination for president in 2016,” Priebus wrote to NBC Entertainment chairman Robert Greenblatt. The opening of his letter to CNN president Jeff Zucker substituted “miniseries” for “film” but was otherwise identical.

Priebus accused both networks of a “thinly-veiled attempt at putting a thumb on the scales of the 2016 presidential election”. The programming would be unfair to others who might compete for the Democratic nomination, he said, “and to the Republican nominee, should Clinton compete in the general election”.

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Florida Police: Maintenance Man Uses Dying Man’s ATM Card before Calling 911

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Photo Credit:GainesvilleThe maintenance man at a Gainesville apartment complex has been arrested after police allege he found a tenant either dead or dying and, before calling 911, used the man’s ATM card to withdraw more than $600.

Police did not learn of the theft until three weeks after the man’s death on July 1, when the tenant’s brother called to say that on the day of his brother’s death, ATM charges were posted against his Bank of America account minutes before paramedics arrived.

Clarence Davis, 52, of 106 NE Rally Ave. in Micanopy, called authorities on July 1 to report a death at the University Commons apartment complex on Southwest Archer Road, the Gainesville Police Department reported. Shortly after police arrived, emergency medical personnel pronounced J.W. White dead of an undisclosed medical condition, police said.

On July 22, White’s brother contacted police to report the ATM transactions, which took place across the street from White’s apartment at 8:19 a.m. and 8:20 a.m., eight minutes before White was found dead.

Video footage from the ATM showed Davis conducting a balance inquiry and making two withdrawals from the victim’s account for a total of $611.90 including transaction fees, police reported.

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