US Nuclear Commander Suspended Over Gambling, Officials Say

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Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

The No 2 officer at the military command in charge of all US nuclear war-fighting forces has been suspended and is under investigation by the naval criminal investigation command for issues related to gambling, officials said on Saturday.

The highly unusual action against a high-ranking officer at US strategic command was made more than three weeks ago but not publicly announced.

Air force general Robert Kehler, who heads Strategic Command, suspended the deputy commander, navy vice admiral Tim Giardina, from his duties on September 3, according to the command’s top spokeswoman, navy captain Pamela Kunze. Giardina is still assigned to the command but is prohibited from performing duties related to nuclear weapons and other issues requiring a security clearance, she said.

Kehler has recommended to defense secretary Chuck Hagel that Giardina be reassigned, Kunze said. Giardina has been the deputy commander of strategic command since December 2011. He is a career submarine officer and prior to starting his assignment there was the deputy commander and chief of staff at US pacific fleet.

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Exxon to Offer Benefits to Married Same-Sex Couples

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Photo Credit: David Duprey/AP

Photo Credit: David Duprey/AP

Exxon Mobil Corp. said on Friday that it will begin offering benefits to legally married same-sex couples in the United States starting next week.

The company says it will recognise “all legal marriages” when it determines eligibility for health care plans for the company’s 77,000 employees and retirees in America.

That means if a gay employee has been married in a state or country where gay marriage is legal, his or her spouse will be eligible for benefits with Exxon in the United States as of 1 October.

Exxon, which is facing a same-sex discrimination complaint in Illinois, said it was following the lead of the US government. In June, the US supreme court struck down the Defense of Marriage Act, which had allowed states to refuse to recognize same-sex marriages granted in other states. In recent months, federal agencies have begun to offer benefits to legally married same-sex couples.

“We haven’t changed our eligibility criteria. It has always been to follow the federal definition and it will continue to follow the federal definition,” said an Exxon spokesman, Alan Jeffers, in an interview.

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A Small President on the World Stage

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Photo Credit: Chad Crowe

Photo Credit: Chad Crowe

The world misses the old America, the one before the crash—the crashes—of the past dozen years.

That is the takeaway from conversations the past week in New York, where world leaders gathered for the annual U.N. General Assembly session. Our friends, and we have many, speak almost poignantly of the dynamism, excellence, exuberance and leadership of the nation they had, for so many years, judged themselves against, been inspired by, attempted to emulate, resented.

As for those who are not America’s friends, some seem still confused, even concussed, by the new power shift. What is their exact place in it? Will it last? Will America come roaring back? Can she? Does she have the political will, the human capital, the old capability?

It is a world in a new kind of flux, one that doesn’t know what to make of America anymore. In part because of our president.

“We want American leadership,” said a member of a diplomatic delegation of a major U.S. ally. He said it softly, as if confiding he missed an old friend.

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Photo: Ted Cruz Kneels in Prayer Outside the White House

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Photo Credit: CBN News

Photo Credit: CBN News

Here’s a shot of Sen. Ted Cruz praying in front of The White House yesterday.

No, he’s not praying that Barack Obama will overturn Obamacare and no, he’s not praying that he will occupy the presidency one day. Instead, he’s alongside Rev. Rob Schenck (from Faith and Action) and Rev. Frazier White (a Democrat and Obama supporter) praying for Saeed Abedini, who has been in an Iranian prison for one year. He is being persecuted for his faith to Jesus Christ.

Who says Ted Cruz isn’t bipartisan?

I have not only interviewed Ted Cruz many times, but I have spent time with him and his family. He is true Bible-believing Christian who is not ashamed of the Gospel. Of course the liberals don’t want to hear that nonsense. They’ll now be busy trying to figure out how to distort this picture in Adobe Photoshop.

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DHS Adviser to Persecuted Christians: You Incited Muslims

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Photo Credit: WND

Photo Credit: WND

An adviser to the Department of Homeland Security has used his Twitter profile to defend the Muslim Brotherhood while accusing Egypt’s persecuted Christian minority of inciting against Islam.

Earlier this month, Mohamed Elibiary, who was appointed to the Department of Homeland Security Advisory Council by then-secretary Janet Napolitano in 2010, tweeted that he was reappointed and even promoted.

The Investigative Project on Terrorism reported Elibiary’s tweets about Egypt’s Coptic Christians.

“For decade since 9/11 attack extremist American #Coptic activists have nurtured anti #Islam & anti #Muslim sentiments among AM RT wing,” Elibiary wrote.

Earlier, Elibiary attacked the U.S. Coptic community for its protests against a wave of Muslim attacks on their relatives in Egypt.

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Healing: White House Compares Republicans to Terrorists, Kidnappers, Arsonists (+video)

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Photo Credit: TownHall

Photo Credit: TownHall

If you’re surprised by this administration’s poisonous rhetoric, you haven’t been paying attention. And once again, the self-appointed civility policy are strangely off duty. Go figure. Which brings us to Dan Pfeiffer, one of our beloved Post-Partisan Prince’s spokesmen. Pfeiffer’s name may sound familiar; he’s the brilliant messaging guru who informed the country that “the law is irrelevant” in regards to the ongoing IRS scandal. Now this jackass wants Americans to know precisely how his boss views his political opposition in the current budget disputes:

White House senior adviser Dan Pfeiffer likened House Republicans to suicide bombers, kidnappers and arsonists in a single interview on Thursday. “What we’re not for is negotiating with people with a bomb strapped to their chest,” Pfeiffer told CNN’s Jake Tapper in laying out the president’s refusal to compromise with the GOP to win an increase in the nation’s debt limit…

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Obama: Republicans Would Own Government Shutdown

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Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

President Obama on Friday pushed Republicans to pass a spending bill and warned that he would not give in to their demands to defund Obamacare as Washington careened closer to a shutdown.

“If Congress chooses not to pass a budget by Monday, they will shut down the government,” Obama told reporters at a hastily-arranged press conference from the White House briefing room.

Obama said blame for a shutdown would rest solely on Republicans whom he accused of undermining the recovery because they “can’t get their way.”

The White House and Congress are facing an Oct. 1 deadline to keep the government funded and have achieved scant progress on a compromise thus far. In addition to the government-shutdown fight, leaders are up against an Oct. 17 deadline to increase the nation’s borrowing limit.

Conservatives are using the fiscal fights to try to block Obama’s healthcare reform law. Last week the House GOP passed a short-term spending bill that defunded Obamacare.

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Continued Support for Keystone XL Pipeline

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Most Americans (65%) continue to favor building the Keystone XL pipeline, perhaps the most politically contentious energy issue in Barack Obama’s second term. Yet when it comes to another issue making headlines – a proposal to tighten greenhouse gas emissions from power plants – the public favors stricter limits, by exactly the same margin as the Keystone pipeline (65% to 30%).

Opinions on these two hotly debated issues underscore the complexity of public attitudes on U.S. energy policy. Support for increasing energy production from some traditional sources remains strong: 58% favor increased offshore oil and gas drilling in U.S. waters.

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Yet over the past year, opposition to the drilling process known as fracking has increased, as has opposition to nuclear power. Just 38% favor promoting the increased use of nuclear power while 58% are opposed, the highest level of opposition since the question was first asked in 2005.

The national survey by the Pew Research Center, conducted Sept. 4-8 among 1,506 adults, finds that, as with other energy-related issues, there is a sharp partisan divide on the Keystone pipeline. But while an overwhelming majority of Republicans (82%) favor construction of the pipeline, so too do 64% of independents and about half of Democrats (51%).

President Obama’s decision about whether to go ahead with the pipeline is expected in the next few months. Environmental groups staunchly oppose the project, while GOP lawmakers are stepping up pressure on Obama to approve it.

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McConnell to Newsmax: Defunding Obamacare Not ‘Waste of Time’ for GOP

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mcconnell64283Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell told Newsmax in an exclusive interview on Friday that Republicans weren’t fighting a lost cause to defund Obamacare as part of legislation to prevent the federal government from shutting down next week.

“I don’t think it was a waste of time,” the Kentucky Republican said. “The American people do fully understand that still, not a single Republican in the House or Senate favors this awful new law — and if they will send us enough additional new members to get rid of it, we will.”

The Senate voted 54-44 along party lines on Friday to temporarily finance the government through mid-December and pay for the troubled healthcare law for the next year. Independents Angus King and Bernie Sanders voted with the Democrats. Republicans Orrin Hatch and Jeff Flake did not vote.

The vote came after an amendment was approved to remove the language that defunded Obamacare, on the same party-line vote.

The House of Representatives had sent the legislation — a “continuing resolution” — to the Senate last week. The House bill included language to defund the Affordable Care Act.

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Kansas School Board Brings Back Student-Led Prayer

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Photo Credit: Biz Pac Review

Photo Credit: Biz Pac Review

A rural Kansas School Board courageously defied 50 years of U.S. Supreme Court rulings by allowing student-led prayer at all school activities, even broadcasting them on the school’s public address system.

What began as an unscheduled, impromptu suggestion at a Monday ISD No. 480 School Board meeting ended up as a motion that was immediately seconded, discussed and unanimously approved, according to the Leader and Times.

“I think that’s one of the greatest things we’ve ever done,” said Board Member Tammy Sutherland-Abbott, who seconded Board Member Nick Hatcher’s motion.

Hatcher had spontaneously introduced the idea.

“I would like to see us bring prayer back to the games,” he told his fellow board members. “I have struggled with that — not having prayer at our activities — because it’s ‘not the thing to do,’ but if the board thought it was important enough that they would support it, and defend it if the time came, I’d like to ask that we do that at our next meeting.”

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