Judicial Watch: Feds Give Housing Grant to ACORN Affiliate Despite Federal Ban

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ACORNA spinoff of the scandal-ridden community organizer group ACORN received more than $200,000 in federal housing grants despite a ban on money going to ACORN affiliates, watchdog organization Judicial Watch announced Thursday.

ACORN, which officially folded in 2009 after a string of scandals, rebranded into more than 100 spinoff groups, including Affordable Housing Centers of America — also now defunct — and Mission of Peace, an affordable housing nonprofit.

In February, the Department of Housing and Urban Development transferred $201,222.07 from AHCOA to Mission of Peace “specifically to pay for the activities of former AHCOA affiliates,” according to a memo obtained by Judicial Watch through a Freedom of Information Act request.

HUD approved the transfer despite a federal ban on tax dollars being used to fund any ACORN affiliate.

“None of the funds made available under this Act or any prior Act may be provided to the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), or any of its affiliates, subsidiaries, or allied organizations,” according to the 2010 budget appropriations act.

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Video: City Council Meeting Erupts in Applause After Retired Marine Issues Dire Warning About U.S. ‘Building a Domestic Army’

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Photo Credit: katesheets

Photo Credit: katesheets

A retired Marine, testifying before his local city council this week, called out the federal government for the militarization of domestic law enforcement.

In the course of his testimony he revealed that Homeland Security is equipping its agents with exactly the same equipment he used in Iraq, and for no other reason than it is afraid of its own people. Why?

He ended his testimony by asking, “Is everybody blind?” Apparently not, given the response.

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Conservative Group Comes Out Against Mitch McConnell

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McConnell_A national conservative group says they are preparing to run negative ads against Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell, accusing him not being supportive of the new conservative strategy to defund Obamacare.

In an email to supporters Friday, Senate Conservatives Fund Executive Director Matt Hoskins said the organization is “preparing to launch a statewide media campaign in Kentucky to expose McConnell’s record on this issue and to persuade him to lead the fight.”

“Mitch McConnell is telling people he opposes Obamacare while he refuses to oppose its funding,” Hoskins said. “We can’t let him have it both ways.”

A group of conservative senators — led by Utah Sen. Mike Lee, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio — are pushing a strategy to not vote for a continuing resolution to keep funding the federal government unless President Barack Obama’s healthcare law is defunded as part of the legislation.

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Democrat Senators Warn That NSA Violations ‘Tip of the Iceberg’

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udall_wydenTwo Democratic senators warned Friday that a new report detailing thousands of instances in which the National Security Agency broke laws while spying was only “the tip of a larger iceberg” of surveillance violations.

“We have previously said that the violations of these laws and rules were more serious than had been acknowledged, and we believe Americans should know that this confirmation is just the tip of a larger iceberg,” said Sens. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and Mark Udall, D-Colo., in a prepared statement.

The senators’ comments follow a Washington Post report Friday that detailed the NSA breaking privacy rules or overstepping its legal authority thousands of times each year since Congress granted the agency broad new powers in 2008.

Wyden and Udall said that while Senate rules prohibit them confirming or denying some of the details in media reports, “the American people have a right to know more details about of these violations.”

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Summer Dystopia: 75% of Americans Unhappy with Nation’s Direction

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GALLUP-politics-Obama-Holder(CNSNews.com) – “Three-quarters of Americans are now dissatisfied with the nation’s course, up from 68 percent in July,” an August 12 Gallup poll found.

The Gallup results were echoed by a Rasmussen poll, which found that only 29 percent of likely voters believe “the country is heading in the right direction.”

And Americans don’t trust Congress or the news media to help turn things around.

“Confidence in the country’s direction” peaked the week just before Election Day and has been “gradually decreasing ever since,” Rasmussen reports. But public opinion on the performance of Congress is even more negative, according to the latest polling data.

Pollsters report growing disapproval of President Obama’s handling of economic and national security issues, with only 45 percent of Americans currently approving of his job performance and 47 percent expressing their disapproval.

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Egypt Sending Diplomatic Mission to Russia

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putin_As the situation in Egypt escalates, a source with very close ties to the Egyptian government tells Breitbart News that the country is preparing to send a diplomatic mission to Russia. While the Obama Administration sends conflicting messages about the conflict, Russia, China and Saudi Arabia have issued strong statements in support of the government’s crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood. America’s influence in the region is waning.

“They’re terrorists,” the source told Breitbart News in reference to people protesting in support of the Muslim Brotherhood. “They have machine guns, they have weapons…Hamas and other outside groups are pushing guns to them. Where is America?”

Breitbart News has also learned that Russia is offering the Egyptian government fighter jets and other military equipment. This week, President Obama announced that the US is suspending its planned joint military exercise with the Egyptian army. It seems the Russians are jumping in to fill the void left by the Americans.

“Sadat threw Russia out of Egypt,” the source told Breitbart News. “Peace came from that. If Russia reenters Egypt, they reenter the world.”

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Texas ‘Garden of Eden’ Owner Claims SWAT Raided Her Property Under ‘Guise’ of a Drug Bust and Took 20,420 Pounds of Material (+video)

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swat_raidThe owner of sustainable farm in Texas claims a SWAT team came onto her property “under the guise that we were doing a drug trafficking, marijuana-growing operation” and ended up taking more than 20,000 pounds of material and allegedly violated personal rights, according to WFAA-TV.

“There were 15 to 20 blackberry bushes. There were sunflowers for our bees and gifting. Lots of okra, and we had a sweet potato patch that they whacked down with a Weed-Eater. The weeds that we used to shade our crops are also gone,” owner of the Garden of Eden Shellie Smith told WFAA of the scene after authorities came through.

The SWAT team had a probable cause search warrant to come onto the Arlington farm August 2. A code enforcement team also entered the property with an abatement warrant, which allowed them to take nearly “20,420 pounds of nuisance materials” from the property.

WFFA reported these materials including two dozen tires with stagnant water and “compost, wooden pallets and furniture.”

“The purpose was to improve the quality of life, to resolve life safety issues within neighborhoods and to hold the property owner responsible for creating blight conditions on their property,” the City of Arlington’s spokeswoman Sana Syed wrote in a statement of the raid.

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Blowback: Group Planning 9-11 Million Muslim March on DC Blasted (+video)

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million_muslim_marchCritics say a Muslim group picked the wrong day – Sept. 11 – to march on Washington to complain about religious profiling and President Obama’s handling of an investigation into the terror attacks that rocked America 12 years ago.

The mass demonstration, called the “Million Muslim March,” was changed to a more mainstream-sounding event, “Million American March Against Fear,” but the name did not seem to gain much traction and has apparently reverted back to its original title.

American Muslim Political Action Committee (AMPAC), which is organizing the march, claims Muslims nationwide have been the victims of anti-Islamic bigotry in the years following the Sept. 11, 2001, Al Qaeda terrorist attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people on American soil.

“On 9.11.01 our country was forever changed by the horrific events in New York. The entire country was victimized by the acts done on that day,” the group said in a statement. “Muslim and Non Muslim alike were traumatized but we as Muslims continue 12 years later to be victimized by being made the villains. To this day every media outlet and anti Islamic organization has committed slanderous and libel statements against us as Muslims and our religion of Islam.”

“Yet our Government either sits idly by and does nothing to protect our freedoms or it exacerbates the problem with its constant war on terrorism in Islamic countries, congressional hearings on Islam in America, and its changes to the NDAA law,” the statement says.

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Noonan: What We Lose if We Give Up Privacy

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surveillance_stateWhat is privacy? Why should we want to hold onto it? Why is it important, necessary, precious?

Is it just some prissy relic of the pretechnological past?

We talk about this now because of Edward Snowden, the National Security Agency revelations, and new fears that we are operating, all of us, within what has become or is becoming a massive surveillance state. They log your calls here, they can listen in, they can read your emails. They keep the data in mammoth machines that contain a huge collection of information about you and yours. This of course is in pursuit of a laudable goal, security in the age of terror.

Is it excessive? It certainly appears to be. Does that matter? Yes. Among other reasons: The end of the expectation that citizens’ communications are and will remain private will probably change us as a people, and a country.

Among the pertinent definitions of privacy from the Oxford English Dictionary: “freedom from disturbance or intrusion,” “intended only for the use of a particular person or persons,” belonging to “the property of a particular person.” Also: “confidential, not to be disclosed to others.” Among others, the OED quotes the playwright Arthur Miller, describing the McCarthy era: “Conscience was no longer a private matter but one of state administration.”

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Heritage Action CEO Calls Out House GOP

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house_leadershipHeritage Action for America CEO Michael Needham on Thursday cast House Republicans as gutless for backing down on Obamacare and the farm bill.

“Washington loves to play this game of saying something can’t be done,” he said. “Politicians like to set expectations as low as possible so they can’t help but trip over them.”

During a C-SPAN “Newsmakers” interview with CQ Roll Call’s Niels Lesniewski and The Hill’s Bob Cusack, which will air Sunday, Needham said Republicans don’t know what is possible because there are still seven weeks until Sept. 30, when the government will need new spending legislation to avoid a shutdown.

Lawmakers have been asking what Heritage Action’s strategy would be if the government shut down, and they say Heritage doesn’t have an answer.

But Needham shrugged off that concern.

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