Star of Discovery’s ‘Storm Chasers’ Show Among Dead in Oklahoma Tornado

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Photo Credit: Discovery Channel

A star of the Discovery Channel show “Storm Chasers,” his son and a colleague have been identified as three of the 13 people killed after an outbreak of tornadoes struck the Oklahoma City area on Friday.

Tim Samaras, 55, died with his son Paul, 24, and friend Carl Young, 45, in Canadian County chasing down a tornado that wreaked havoc along Interstate 40, Fox 25 reports.

“We are deeply saddened by the loss of Tim Samaras his son Paul and their colleague Carl Young,” the Discovery Channel said in a statement to FOX411. “Our thoughts and prayers go out to their families.”

The channel added that it would be dedicating Sunday night’s show on the tornadoes in their memory.

Read more from this story HERE.

China Taking Over the World … Economically

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Photo Credit: Victo Ngai

The combination of a strong, rising China and economic stagnation in Europe and America is making the West increasingly uncomfortable. While China is not taking over the world militarily, it seems to be steadily taking it over commercially. In just the past week, Chinese companies and investors have sought to buy two iconic Western companies, Smithfield Foods, the American pork producer, and Club Med, the French resort company.

Europeans and Americans tend to fret over Beijing’s assertiveness in the South China Sea, its territorial disputes with Japan, and cyberattacks on Western firms, but all of this is much less important than a phenomenon that is less visible but more disturbing: the aggressive worldwide push of Chinese state capitalism.

By buying companies, exploiting natural resources, building infrastructure and giving loans all over the world, China is pursuing a soft but unstoppable form of economic domination. Beijing’s essentially unlimited financial resources allow the country to be a game-changing force in both the developed and developing world, one that threatens to obliterate the competitive edge of Western firms, kill jobs in Europe and America and blunt criticism of human rights abuses in China.

Read more from this story HERE.

Americans Feeling the Pain of the Left’s Misguided Energy Policies

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Photo Credit: Irish Central

A few years ago Americans were introduced to “Green Companies” with cutting edge and promising names like: Solyndra, Fisker, Abound Solar and many others. All of them were the recipients of government backed loans and almost all of them have gone bankrupt leaving the American taxpayer holding the bag for billions. See Heritage.

Not only were these “green companies” the recipients of outright taxpayer loans which they never repaid, they were also on the receiving end of tax breaks and subsidies designed to give them an edge.

For instance Tesla can get $45,000 for each car it sells in state and federal subsidies. The Tesla S starts at $69,000, so about 40% of its total cost is subsidies See: WUWT article.
See Tesla loses $10,000 Per Car: Profit Made From Government Subsidies, Loans and Incentives: Stephen Frank’s California.

But to even tilt the playing field farther in their favor, the government under the guise of the EPA and other agencies was busy punishing the competition of the favored “green energy industries.”

Obamas first Energy Secretary Stephen Chu said his stated goal was to get Americas gasoline prices in line with Europe’s. In California last week a gallon of supreme was 4.45.

The Keystone Pipeline has been delayed for years. More red tape and delay is greeting energy producers on federal lands. The war on the technology of fracking has delayed the capture of vast new resources of energy.

The administrations war on coal has been nothing short of a genocidal campaign against one of Americas most abundant and cheap sources of energy. Ignoring the fact huge advances have been achieved in the clean burning of coal and more advances are on the way. The government has decided to crush this industry with unreasonable timelines to impose their regulations.

Of course wind energy and solar subsidy campaigns are costing consumers billions and the unreliable power produced by these sources is far more expensive than conventional fossil fuel sources. Sometimes 3 times as much, when you count the hidden costs.

California has already warned consumers their electric rates will rise dramatically this year now that mandated renewable energy is coming on line. Other states will feel the pinch of higher utility rates, as coal fired power plants are shut down and renewable mandates start to kick in. See can’t afford to use the air conditioner.

America is suffering unnecessarily from high energy prices due to policies designed to punish them and foist on citizens forms of energy that are prohibitively costly and unreliable…..When at the same time America is sitting on an ocean of relatively cheap energy. See high cost of renewable electricity mandates by Hoover Institute.

Many European countries have embraced alternative energy at the behest of their left leaning governments and the citizens are now suffering as a result. Some households in the UK have to make a choice between buying food or paying their electric bill. See story in the UK Guardian.

America is about to have its day of reckoning with the reckless green energy policies foisted on them by the left……Elections do have consequences.

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Ed Farnan is the conservative columnist at IrishCentral, where he has been writing on the need for energy independence, strong self defense, secure borders, 2nd amendment, smaller government and many other issues. His articles appear in many publications throughout the USA and world. He has been a guest on Fox News and a regular guest on radio stations in the US and Europe.

Integrity in a Post-Christian America

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Photo Credit: Art ~ 4ThGlryOfGod

America is now called a post-Christian place; its government is overtly attacking Christian beliefs about birth control, abortion, and gay marriage. The threat to these beliefs is a small though telling symptom of the larger social changes that, though little considered, are proceeding as traditional Judeo-Christian integrity departs. The problem is, abandoning America’s traditional religion discards its related moral behavior, too. And societies without a strong moral order are very unpleasant places to live — try Afghanistan, Somalia, or Mexico.

It’s instructive to compare two dictionary definitions of “integrity” from the same source, Merriam-Webster, in 1943 and in 2013.

1943 definition: Moral soundness, honesty, purity, freedom from corrupting influences or practices. (Webster’s New International Dictionary of the English Language, Second Edition, 1943)

2013 definition: Firm adherence to a code of especially moral or artistic values : incorruptibility. (Free Merriam-Webster.com, 2013)

Both definitions agree on the avoidance of corruption. But the older definition implicitly assumes a shared single standard of morality, while the current definition implicitly assumes the existence of more than one such, and thereby equates them. The first was intended to reflect an objective standard applicable uniformly to all; the second, multiple standards of equal validity.

Read more from this story HERE.

Some 100,000 Christians Killed Per Year Over Faith, Vatican Says

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Photo Credit: Fox News

A staggering 100,000 Christians are killed annually because of their faith, according to the Vatican — and several human rights groups claim such anti-Christian violence is on the rise in countries like Pakistan, Nigeria and Egypt.

“Credible research has reached the shocking conclusion that an estimate of more than 100,000 Christians are violently killed because of some relation to their faith every year,” Vatican spokesman Monsieur Silvano Maria Tomassi said Tuesday in a radio address to the United Nations Human Rights Council.

“Other Christians and other believers are subjected to forced displacement, to the destruction of their places of worship, to rape and to the abduction of their leaders, as it recently happened in the case of Bishops Yohanna Ibrahim and Boulos Yaziji, in Aleppo [Syria],” Tomassi said.

While several human rights groups could not comment specifically on the Vatican’s number, organizations, like Persecution.Org, said the persecutions of Christians have been on the rise in places like Africa and the Middle East over the last decade.

“Two-hundred million Christians currently live under persecution. It’s absolutely on the rise,” Jeff King, the group’s president, told FoxNews.com.

Read more from this story HERE.

Maori Legend of Man-Eating Bird is True

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Photo Credit: independent.co.uk

A Maori legend about a giant, man-eating bird has been confirmed by scientists. Te Hokioi was a huge black-and-white predator with a red crest and yellow-green tinged wingtips, in an account given to Sir George Gray, an early governor of New Zealand. It was said to be named after its cry and to have “raced the hawk to the heavens”. Scientists now think the stories handed down by word of mouth and depicted in rock drawings refer to Haast’s eagle, a raptor that became extinct just 500 years ago, shows their study in The Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology.

Haast’s eagle (Harpagornis moorei) was discovered in swamp deposits by Sir Julius von Haast in the 1870s. But it was at first thought to be a scavenger because its bill was similar to a vulture’s with hoods over its nostrils to stop flesh blocking its air passages as it rooted around inside carcasses.

But a re-examination of skeletons using modern technology, including CAT scans, by researchers at Canterbury Museum in Christchurch and the University of New South Wales in Australia showed it had a strong enough pelvis to support a killing blow as it dived at speeds of up to 80kph.

With a wingspan of up to three metres and weighing 18kg, the female was twice as big as the largest living eagle, the Steller’s sea eagle.

Read more from this story HERE.

Alaska May Events from Space

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Following an April which was the coldest on record in many locations (including Fairbanks), May was a month with more record events. Anchorage saw it’s second latest measurable snowfall on May 18th which made the 2012-2013 snow season on record. The record cold also delayed the river breakup, which set the stage for the severe ice jam flooding in Circle and Galena.

The MODIS instrument on NASA’s Terra satellite captured the aerial extent of the flooding in Galena from space. Below is the extent of the Yukon River last year on May 27, and the second picture is the widespread flooding behind the ice Jam on May 28th of this year.

Photo Credit: NASA images courtesy LANCE MODIS Rapid Response. Caption by Adam Voiland.



Photo Credit: NASA images courtesy LANCE MODIS Rapid Response. Caption by Adam Voiland.

Above is the Yukon River flooding Galena May 28, 2013.

More information and images can be found HERE.

While erupting volcanoes along the Aleutian Range are not uncommon, there were some views of Pavlof Volcano taken from the International Space Station (ISS) that are worth a look.

Photo Credit: ISSA Crew, NASA

Above is the erupting Pavlof Volcano on May 18, 2013 taken from the ISS. It is located between Sand Point and Cold Bay on the Alaska Peninsula. The Volcano just to the right of Pavlof is Pavlof’s Sister, and is also a volcano.

A summary of the recent Pavlof eruption with a few more ISS photos can be found HERE.

This most recent eruption of Pavlof Volcano was downgraded by the Alaska Volcano Observatory on May 28th as activity subsided.

Obama Desecrating the US Military’s Sacred POW Code of Conduct

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Forty years ago, President Nixon finally succeeded in having Secretary of State Henry Kissinger complete the negotiation for the repatriation of the Vietnam POWs from North Vietnam. On the weekend of May 23rd, for the last time, the surviving Vietnam POW’s solemnly celebrated the 40th anniversary of their release, at the Nixon Presidential Library.

If you have ever read any of the many books published, articles printed in newspapers, or read interviews given by Vietnam POW’s, you will understand that the common thread that helped get them through their very difficult period of captivity was their faith in God, their religious worship away from the eyes of their captors, and the support the Prisoner of War Code of Conduct that was inculcated in them.

Here’s how the Prisoner of War Code of Conduct, Article VI, reads:

“I will never forget that I am an American, fighting for freedom, responsible for my actions, and dedicated to the principles which made my country free. I will trust in my God and in the United States of America.”

The US military tries to instill the Code of Conduct in all US military personnel to remind them of their “character and heritage,” and in order to emphasize to them that as American fighting men and women they have inner strengths to rely on, in face of the mental and physical abuses they will have to endure if they are ever captured. “Character” was emphasized in American’s youth at home each day by parents, by teachers in both public and parochial schools, by the leaders and coaches of the various organizations they belonged (such as the Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts, YMCA, YWCA, 4H, athletics, etc.), by religious leaders in the churches/synagogues they attended, by service academies where they were instilled with the Honor System/Honor Code and love of country, by boot camp where military indoctrination emphasized the service branch heritage and love of country, and by military leadership training programs for officer and noncoms.

While Character was being instilled in most Americans by these means, Barack Obama’s character was developed, as he relates in his book “Dreams,” every day after school in Hawaii, by his mentor, Frank Marshall Davis, the Secretary of the Communist Party USA. He previously went to school in Indonesia where American values weren’t taught, went on to Columbia under the name of Barry Soetoro, where his character was further developed by his two roommates who took him to Pakistan in the 1980’s to be indoctrinated in a philosophy that was not typically American.

Obama’s unvarnished “Character” is different from that of most of the US military personnel, most of whom were born and bred in America, and the true color of his “Character” has been revealed by his actions over the last four years. Most intelligent and forthright Americans realize that he has never said he loves this country or praised the heritage of the Republic; his actions speak louder than words.

By his actions (look at what he has done, not what he says), Obama has demonstrated that he doesn’t support the US Military Code of Conduct which instills in the American fighting man and women their faith in God and their love of the heritage of the United States of America. The Code of Conduct was developed to give US Prisoners of War (POW) the inner strength to believe in something bigger than themselves, even when they were being tortured or mentally abused by his captors (even after resisting, they may have been broken by such severe torture, but their love of country survived).

Instead of emphasizing the concepts of the US Military Code of Conduct to strengthen the faith of US military personnel, the Obama administration has been emphasizing Obama’s Social Experiment on Diversity, and has been forcing his radical Social Experiment on Diversity into regulations of the captive US military that must follow those regulations and policy directives issued by Obama’s civilian appointees at DoD. Those radical policies are damaging the Combat Effectiveness of the US Armed Forces.

Please review 15 of Obama’s policies or directives, listed below, that are overtly hostile toward Christians in the US Armed Forces. For four years the Obama administration has been trying to eliminate the influence of Christianity in the US Armed Forces, concepts that were first instilled in the US military culture by General George Washington in 1776, and it has given US military personnel the inner strength that sustained them in combat and in captivity.

Just before a combat operation, military personnel flock to the Chaplains for their blessing, or meditate quietly in their own solitude; when they become Prisoners of War, they lean on their faith and the Code of Conduct to give them strength. Obama’s Social Experiment on Diversity, outlined in new regulations, has been forced upon members of the US Armed Forces, military chaplains, and the civil service employees that support the US military programs. They have attempted to diminish the fundamental Judeo/Christian concepts that have been the foundation upon which the US Armed Forces was built to strengthen it for 238 years.
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Aggressive anti-Christian actions by the Obama Administration are real, documented, and are escalating:

1. January 2010 — Department of Defense orders removal of tiny Bible references on military scopes and gun sights.

2. June 2011 — The Department of Veterans Affairs forbids references to God and Jesus during burials at National Cemetery.

3. August 2011 — The Air Force stops teaching the Just War theory because it is based on a philosophy of St. Augustine.

4. September 2011 — Air Force Chief of Staff prohibits commanders from notifying airmen of religious programs.

5. September 2011 — The Army issues guidelines to Walter Reed Medical Center stipulating that no religious items (i.e. Bibles, reading materials) are to be given to the wounded.

6. November 2011 — The Air Force Academy rescinds support for Operation Christmas Child because it is run by Christians.

7. November 2011 — The Air Force Academy pays $80,000 for a Stonehenge-type worship center for pagans, druids, and witches.

8. February 2012 — The U.S. Military Academy disinvites decorated war hero LTG William “Jerry” Boykin, USA (Ret), and FRC Executive VP, because he is an outspoken Christian.

9. February 2012 — Army orders Catholic chaplains not to read archbishop’s letter from pulpit (Pilgrims fled England because they were prevented from free speech from pulpit)

10. May 2012 — Obama administration opposes legislation to protect the rights of conscience for military chaplains who do not wish to perform same-sex “marriages.”

11. June 2012 — Obama administration revokes the long-standing U.S. policy of allowing military service emblems to be placed on military Bibles.

12. August 2012 — Lt. Col. Jack Rich, USA e-mails subordinates saying they should be on the lookout for people who share FRC’s values because they are not “Army Values.”

13. January 2013 — Obama announces his opposition to a provision in the 2013 National Defense Authorization Act protecting the rights of conscience for military chaplains.

14. April 2013 — Officials briefing for U.S. Army Reservists states examples of “religious extremism” includes “Evangelical Christianity”, “Catholicism”, and “Islamic Jihadist Terrorism” in organizations like Al-Qaeda, the Muslim Brotherhood, and Hamas.

15. May 2013 — The Pentagon meets with Mikey Weinstein and the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) who is trying to establish new rules which would restrict the religious freedom of Christian and Jewish military personnel (they shouldn’t have even given such a radical anti-Christian an audience).

On November 5, 2009 at Fort Hood, a devout Muslim, Maj Nidal Malik Hasan, USA (A. K. A. “Abu Wali”), who had been communicating with Al Qaeda terrorist cleric, Anwar Al-Awlaki, in a series of 20 E-mails, shouted at the top of his lungs, “Allah Akbar”, and used two hand guns to kill 12 US military personnel, while wounding 31 US military and law enforcement personnel. It was a radical Islamic terrorist attack against American Christian military personnel executed on a US military base; Al Qaeda spokesman, Adam Gadahn, praised “Abu Wali” as a Mujahid Brother. The Obama administration through its spokesman, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Martin Dempsey, insisted it was not terrorism at all, but work place violence. The US military personnel who were killed and wounded that day, should have been awarded the Purple Heart Medal for coming under a military assault by a Islamic Terrorist and traitor. An attempt has been made for nearly 4 years to cover up this Islamic Terrorist assault perpetrated on US soil (like the failed Terrorist attacks on US soil including the failed bombing in Times Square, the Terrorist bombing at the Boston marathon, and the Al Qaeda Terrorist attack on US soil/the US Mission in Benghazi that killed 2 Navy SEAL’s). We will not remain compliant for another of the Obama administration’s cover ups; we will endeavor to continue to bring that Terrorist attack to the attention of the American people until those murdered and wounded US military personnel receive the Purple Heart Medals they so rightly deserve.

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Captain Joseph R. John, a combat veteran, is a 1962 graduate of the United States Naval Academy who retired from the US Navy after a long and distinguished career. He currently is the President of the Combat Veterans Training Group and is the founder of the Combat Veterans for Congress PAC.

Your Tax Dollars at Work: IRS Turns Over Idiotic Line Dance, Star Trek and Gilligan Island Videos to Congress

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By Fox News. In the wake of the scandal over the Internal Revenue Service’s targeting of conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status, the embattled agency has provided lawmakers with a video featuring about a dozen of its employees line dancing on a stage.

The video of the IRS workers practicing their dance moves, which lasts just under three minutes, comes weeks after it was revealed that agency workers produced two other videos parodying the “Star Trek” and “Gilligan’s Island” TV shows.

All three videos were given to Congress on Friday in response to a request issued by Rep. Charles Boustany, R-La., a senior member of the House Ways and Means Committee, after learning that the videos were recorded at IRS offices in New Carrollton, Md., outside Washington, D.C.

The latest recording cost about $1,600 and was produced to be shown at the end of a 2010 training and leadership conference held in Anaheim, Calif., said IRS spokeswoman Michelle Eldridge. Read more from this story HERE.

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GOP says report will expose lavish spending at 2010 IRS conference

By Bernie Becker. The House Oversight Committee is holding another hearing on the IRS — but not one dealing with the agency’s targeting of conservative groups.

The panel, led by Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), will hear on Thursday from Treasury’s inspector general for tax administration about “excessive spending” at IRS conferences.

“The IRS is an agency in crisis,” Issa said in a statement. “The American people expect that their tax-dollars will be used responsibly and not for financing lavish hotel suites and entertainment for government employees. The Oversight Committee will examine these egregious abuses of the public trust and an IRS culture that shuns accountability.” Read more from this story HERE.

Congressman’s Chief of Staff Tied to Absentee Ballot Vote Fraud Effort

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Photo Credit: Getty

Congressman Joe Garcia’s chief of staff implicated in phantom absentee-ballot requests scheme

By Patricia Mazzei. Congressman Joe Garcia’s chief of staff abruptly resigned Friday after being implicated in a sophisticated scheme to manipulate last year’s primary elections by submitting hundreds of fraudulent absentee-ballot requests.

Friday afternoon, Garcia said he had asked Jeffrey Garcia, no relation, for his resignation after the chief of staff — also the congressman’s top political strategist — took responsibility for the plot. Hours earlier, law enforcement investigators raided the homes of another of Joe Garcia’s employees and a former campaign aide in connection with an ongoing criminal investigation into the matter.

“I’m shocked and disappointed about this,” Garcia, who said he was unaware of the scheme, told The Miami Herald. “This is something that hit me from left field. Until today, I had no earthly idea this was going on.”

Jeffrey Garcia, 40, declined to comment. He also worked last year on the campaign of Democrat Patrick Murphy of Jupiter, who unseated tea-party Republican congressman Allen West. Murphy has not been implicated in the phantom-requests operation. Read more from this story HERE.

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Congressman denies involvement in staffer’s alleged vote fraud attempt

By Gregory Wallace. U.S. Rep. Joe Garcia said Saturday he was saddened and disappointed by absentee ballot fraud allegations leveled against his former chief of staff.

The congressman said at a press conference he asked for the staffer’s resignation and called for fixes to the “flawed voter absentee process” which left the system vulnerable.

Garcia said he demanded the resignation of chief of staff Jeffrey Garcia (no relation, according to local media reports), then fired him shortly after learning of the allegations Friday afternoon.

No fraudulent ballots were cast as a result of this alleged plot, the congressman said.

“I’ve asked an attorney to investigate what went on and interview the people. I have asked all of my staff to fully cooperate with any investigation,” he said. “Here’s the good part about this – from my conversations thus far, no ballots were tampered with, no ballots were touched. Read more from this story HERE.