States Ditch Electronic Voting Machines

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Photo Credit: Getty Images

Photo Credit: Getty Images

By Cory Bennett.

States have abandoned electronic voting machines in droves, ensuring that most voters will be casting their ballots by hand on Election Day.

With many electronic voting machines more than a decade old, and states lacking the funding to repair or replace them, officials have opted to return to the pencil-and-paper voting that the new technology was supposed to replace.

Nearly 70 percent of voters will be casting ballots by hand on Tuesday, according to Pamela Smith, president of election watchdog Verified Voting.

“Paper, even though it sounds kind of old school, it actually has properties that serve the elections really well,” Smith said.

It’s an outcome few would have predicted after the 2000 election, when the battle over “hanging chads” in the Florida recount spurred a massive, $3 billion federal investment in electronic voting machines.

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Voter-ID backer catches Dems in the act

By Drew Zahn.

In the debate over requiring photo identification to vote, advocates claim it will help prevent voter fraud, while opponents dismiss fraud as too infrequent to justify such laws.

So imagine the surprise of a North Carolina Republican and voter-ID proponent when he reportedly caught the attorney suing the state to overturn its voter-ID rules violating election law.

Molotov Mitchell, also a WND video columnist, is running as the GOP nominee for North Carolina State Senate District 16 against incumbent Democrat Josh Stein. Stein’s father, Adam Stein, is part of a team of attorneys suing the state to overturn its voter-ID law, set to go into effect in 2016.

A new video released by Mitchell purports to show a polling place with signs clearly marked forbidding the distribution of election materials, but a photo reveals Adam Stein well beyond the signs handing out voter guides.

“Two Republican candidates were there witnessing him handing out those flyers,” Mitchell told WND. “A Senate candidate, Mary Lopez Carter, took the picture because she saw him standing there handing out voter guides. She didn’t know it was Adam Stein until her husband asked the guy his name and then [Stein] started bragging about his son, Josh.

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Bombshell Memo: Dem Senator Jeanne Shaheen Conspired With Lois Lerner

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Photo Credit: Daily Caller

Photo Credit: Daily Caller

Democratic New Hampshire Sen. Jeanne Shaheen was principally involved in a plot with Lois Lerner and President Barack Obama’s political appointee at the IRS to lead a program of harassment against conservative nonprofit groups during the 2012 election, according to letters exclusively obtained by The Daily Caller.

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) did not want to publicly release 2012 correspondences exchanged between the IRS and Jeanne Shaheen at her personal Washington office: the agency delayed releasing the information to a major conservative super PAC multiple times, even threatening to see the super PAC in court, according to emails.

“The IRS is aware of the current public interest in this issue,” IRS chief counsel William J. Wilkins, a White House visitor described by insiders as “The President’s Man at the IRS,” personally wrote in a hand-stamped memo to “Senator Shaheen” on official Department of the Treasury letterhead on April 25, 2012.

The memo, obtained by TheDC, briefed the Democratic senator about a coordinated IRS-Treasury Department plot to target political activity by nonprofit 501(c)(4) groups. The plot was operating out of Lois Lerner’s Tax Exempt Government Entities Division.

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Mom Blames Daughter's Paralysis on Flu Shot (+video)

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Photo Credit: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers photo by Carol E. Davis / Creative Commons

Photo Credit: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers photo by Carol E. Davis / Creative Commons

A Florida woman says her daughter became paralyzed after getting a routine flu shot.

Carla Grivna says her child was happy and healthy until getting the flu shot just before the Thanksgiving Day holiday last year. Three days later, however, her daughter Marysue could not move or talk, Grivna said. The child is now a bedridden 10-year-old diagnosed with a rare viral infection of the brain called Acute Disseminated Encephalomyelitis, or ADEM. Carla Grivna believes what happened is directly tied to the flu shot.

“The doctors won’t confirm it or deny it,” the mother told “Fox & Friends” Sunday. “Her father Steven and I are certain, due to all of our research, that this was what caused Marysue’s condition. She was a happy, healthy, running and playing 9-year-old then this happened.”

Grivna added: “There was no underlying condition. I mean so many tests at the hospital to try and find something else that could have caused it and they could not find anything.”

Marysue’s father has to carry her to get around.

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Americans Now Agree: Guns Make Homes Safer

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Photo Credit: Getty Images

Photo Credit: Getty Images

Bang! For the first time, a growing — and already substantial — majority of Americans now believe having a gun in the home makes it a safer place to live.

Put that in your chamber and cock it.

Gallup, which has been surveying the politically volatile question for a generation, announced this morning a new poll revealing that nearly two-out-of-three Americans (63%) now say having a firearm there makes a home safer.

That’s nearly twice the number who said that just before 9/11.

And the explosion of support has come across all political boundaries. Back in the fall of 2000, barely a third thought that (35%), while a majority (51%) said guns made homes more dangerous.

But the number who say guns increase home safety has been steadily increasing while the number who see them as increasing danger has been steadily declining — from 35% in 2000 to 42% four years later to 47% in 2006 and now a jump all the way up to 63%.

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Supreme Court Takes Up Potentially Disastrous Obamacare Case

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Photo Credit: Daily Caller

Photo Credit: Daily Caller

The Supreme Court decided Friday that it will hear a challenge to the legality of premium subsidies in the federal exchange.

The court decided to hear the appeal in King v. Burwell, in which the Fourth Circuit Court ruled that Obamacare premium subsidies to customers in HealthCare.gov states were legal. The D.C. Circuit had ruled hours before in the best-known case, Halbig v. Burwell, that the text of the law restricts subsidies to state-run exchanges only– creating a circuit split that made it possible the Supreme Court would issue a final ruling.

At issue is the repeated requirement in the law that premium subsidies go to exchanges “established by the state.” Four lawsuits have cropped up that argue that the requirement makes subsidies in HealthCare.gov-run states illegal.

The Obama administration had asked the Supreme Court to wait to decide whether to take up the case until the D.C. Circuit Court issued a new ruling in Halbig v. Burwell. A December en banc hearing will force all judges on the circuit to rule on the case instead of the typical three-judge panel; and given the number of Democratic-appointed judges, the court is expected to find the federal exchange subsidies legal.

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Obama Authorizes 1,500 More Troops for Iraq

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Photo Credit: AP / Evan Vucci

Photo Credit: AP / Evan Vucci

A senior military official says that American military advisory teams will now go to Iraq’s western Anbar province where Islamic State militants have been gaining ground and slaying men, women and children.

The teams are part of President Barack Obama’s new directive to expand the U.S. mission in Iraq by deploying another 1,500 U.S. troops to serve as advisers, trainers and security personnel.

The official said it is likely that the bulk of the additional troops will be in Iraq by the end of the year. This would bring the total U.S. forces in Iraq to about 3,100, and would mark their first return to Anbar since the war ended.

The official was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly so spoke on condition of anonymity.

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Islamist Medical Student Reports Pro-Israel, Anti-ISIS Doctor to General Medical Council for 'Islamophobia'

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Photo Credit: Breitbart

Photo Credit: Breitbart

A London doctor is being investigated by the General Medical Council (GMC) for alleged Islamophobia after posting criticism of ISIS and support for Israel on his private Facebook page. He was reported to the council by Faisel Alam, who described himself on the complaint form as a “concerned member of the public” but in reality has links to both Islamic and leftist organisations, as well as the Council itself.

Breitbart London has seen a copy of the complaint, the substance of which reads in full “This man is viciously Islamophobic and has used his Facebook to espouse his hatred towards this particular religious group (See attached file). I fear that his highly intolerable views towards this group of people will compromise his Duty of Care.”

But we have found a number of links between Mr Alam and extremist groups, mostly through his involvement with university campus Islamic Societies which have come under widespread scrutiny over recent years for hosting extremist speakers, creating terrorists, and taking millions of pounds in funding from Saudi and Middle Eastern sources.

Moreover, the file of evidence submitted by Alam to the GMC shows no evidence that the work of Dr Destree, an emergency medical practitioner from London, is anything less than satisfactory, leading to fellow doctors questioning why the investigation is going ahead at all.

The evidence submitted against Dr Destree consists of just five posts made to his private Facebook page, and two comments on another doctors’ page. One example consists of a photo of gun-wielding jihadists, some wearing marks, taking aim at around 50 fellow Muslims in a clear execution, to which he added the comment “VOILA – The true face of (sunni) Islam!”

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World's Largest Solar Plant Applying for Federal Grant to Pay Off Federal Loan

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Photo Credit: Fox News

Photo Credit: Fox News

After already receiving a controversial $1.6 billion construction loan from U.S. taxpayers, the wealthy investors of a California solar power plant now want a $539 million federal grant to pay off their federal loan.

“This is an attempt by very large cash generating companies that have billions on their balance sheet to get a federal bailout, i.e. a bailout from us – the taxpayer for their pet project,” said Reason Foundation VP of Research Julian Morris. “It’s actually rather obscene.”

The Ivanpah solar electric generating plant is owned by Google and renewable energy giant NRG, which are responsible for paying off their federal loan. If approved by the U.S. Treasury, the two corporations will not use their own money, but taxpayer cash to pay off 30 percent of the cost of their plant, but taxpayers will receive none of the millions in revenues the plant will generate over the next 30 years.

“They’re already paying less than the market rate,” said Morris, author of a lengthy report detailing alleged cronyism and corruption in the Obama administration’s green energy programs. “Now demanding or asking for a subsidy in the form of a grant directly paying off the loan is an egregious abuse.”

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Eric Holder Email: ‘Some People Can Kiss My A**’

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Photo Credit: Daily Caller

Photo Credit: Daily Caller

Frustrated with U.S. Attorneys who disagreed with a decision to force a fellow U.S. Attorney to resign in the aftermath of the failed Operation Fast and Furious gun-walking scandal, Attorney General Eric Holder advised in an email that his critics “can kiss my ass.”

Holder sent the email Aug. 30, 2011 in response to a Department of Justice deputy who relayed the news that around 25 U.S. Attorneys throughout the country were “upset” with how the forced resignation was handled.

The exchange is included in nearly 65,000 pages of emails related to Fast and Furious that DOJ was forced to turn over this week to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. The Wall Street Journal published the newest release on Friday.

The documents have been at the center of a multi-year battle between DOJ and Oversight chairman Darrell Issa. Though Holder has claimed to have had no knowledge of the failed operation until well after it was started, he has refused to turn over documents requested by Issa.

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Food Stamp Recipients, Advocates Sue Over Work Requirements

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Photo Credit: Joe Raedle / Getty

Photo Credit: Joe Raedle / Getty

Most Americans agree that able-bodied adults should be required to do some type of work to receive welfare assistance. But two nonprofit groups and a handful of food stamp recipients in New Mexico are suing the state for trying to encourage just that.

Last Friday, a New Mexico district judge placed a temporary hold on the work requirements, which were set to go into effect Nov. 1. On Wednesday of this week, Republican Gov. Susana Martinez announced that the state would restart the process of putting the work requirements into place rather than going through the litigation process. The state will pursue the same work requirements.

While the food stamp program doesn’t have much of a work requirement, it does have a modest one for able-bodied adults without children (or other dependents). Able-bodied adults without children are limited to three months of food stamp benefits unless they work or participate in some type of work activity for at least 20 hours a week. However, since 2009 New Mexico—along with many other states—has received a federal waiver allowing them to bypass the work requirement. But New Mexico has decided to forego the waiver. The state also plans to insert modest work requirements for other able-bodied adults who don’t have young children (under age 6), requiring them to look for work or participate in community service.

But the New Mexico Center on Law and Poverty and the Southwest Organizing Project say that work requirements are unfair and are suing the New Mexico Human Services Department.

Read more from this story HERE.