Dear President Obama, the Loss of Glen Doherty’s Life is Not a Fake Scandal, America Doesn’t Take it Lightly

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Photo Credit: Irish CentralThe President referred to scandals that are plaguing his administration as “fake scandals” in his speech the other day … as if by denigrating them they will lose their gravity and importance.

But many Americans are incensed by the cuffing aside by the President, to what they believe are attacks on the very foundation of what our country stands for.

Using powerful and feared tools of the government to attack political opponents is a gross abuse of power by the executive branch.

As each day rolls by, it is becoming evident the IRS was unleashed on groups and individuals that politically oppose the President. Evidence so far goes right up to the White House’s political appointees having full knowledge of this abuse.

The wiretapping and snooping of email accounts by the Justice Department of members of the press who write unfriendly pieces about the administration, is an astounding abuse of power and the Attorney General still has not been held accountable for this.

There are many other scandals simmering and being dragged out because the administration fights investigators trying to get to the truth…every step of the way.

But what is particularly galling to many Americans, is President Obama’s brushing aside the tragic death and injury of Americans during the attack on our consulate in Benghazi Libya.

No, these deaths and injuries are not just a “fake scandal” and cannot be swept under the rug.

America wants answers as to why Glen Doherty, Tyrone Woods, Sean Smith and Ambassador Stevens were killed that night in Benghazi.

Americans want to know exactly how many Americans were wounded as a result of this attack and simply, what are their names? Even that information is being withheld from the public. Why are you forcing everyone connected with the attack to sign non disclosure agreements?

Glen Doherty’s friends and family loved him and miss him very much and want to know why he heroically gave his life. A new video with him in it was just released to the public by his family… Perhaps this will personalize it for you Mr. President. See the video courtesy of Fox News.

Something smells bad in Benghazi Mr. President…Step up and be a leader, give us the truth, don’t hide behind underlings, executive privilege and the letter of the law. We demand answers and so do the family members of the dead and wounded.

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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.

Accused Fort Hood Shooter Releases Statement Saying US at War With Islam

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Acting as his own attorney, accused Fort Hood shooter Major Nidal Hasan has released a statement to Fox News claiming that the U.S. military is at war with his religion.

However, he does not directly address the shooting at the Texas Army Base in November 2009 that killed 13 and injured more than 30 others.

“My complicity was on behalf of a government that openly acknowledges that it would hate for the law of Almighty Allah to be the supreme law of the land,” the 42-year-old Army psychiatrist said. Hasan then apparently asked if this was a war on Islam. “You bet it is,” he said. “I participated in it.”

The statement, which begins “In the name of Almighty Allah, the most gracious and the most merciful, my name is Nidal Hasan, Major Nidal Hasan, and I would like to convey a message to the world,” runs more than six pages.

Hasan also says he regrets his years in the Army, claiming that his service was inconsistent with his religious beliefs. “I would like to begin by repenting to Almighty Allah and apologize to the (Mujahideen), the believers, and the innocent. I ask for their forgiveness and their prayers. I ask for their forgiveness for participating in the illegal and immoral aggression against Muslims, their religion and their lands,” he said.

Read more from this story HERE.

Half of Americans Supposedly Approve of NSA Surveillance Program

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Photo Credit: APBy James Arkin. Most Americans are suspicious they aren’t being told the full truth about the National Security Agency’s surveillance program, but half still approve of the program overall, according to a new poll released Friday.

Fifty percent of Americans approve of the NSA program while 44 percent disapprove, according to the poll from the PEW Research Center.

Despite the overall approval, 70 percent of those surveyed said they thought the government uses this data for purposes other than investigating terrorism. Similarly, 63 percent of those surveyed said they believed the government was collecting information about content of communications, not just metadata. Of that group, 27 percent said they thought the government had listened to their calls or read their emails, while 28 percent did not. Read more from this story HERE.

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Photo Credit: Michael Reynolds/EPANSA surveillance critics to testify before Congress

By Paul Lewis. Congress will hear testimony from critics of the National Security Agency’s surveillance practices for the first time since the whistleblower Edward Snowden’s explosive leaks were made public.

Democrat congressman Alan Grayson, who is leading a bipartisan group of congressman organising the hearing, told the Guardian it would serve to counter the “constant misleading information” from the intelligence community.

The hearing, which will take place on Wednesday, comes amid evidence of a growing congressional rebellion NSA data collection methods.

On Wednesday, a vote in the House of Representatives that would have tried to curb the NSA’s practice of mass collection of phone records of millions of Americans was narrowly defeated.

However, it exposed broader-than-expected concern among members of Congress over US surveillance tactics. A majority of Democrat members voted in support of the amendment. Read more from this story HERE.

FBI Letter to Rand Paul Reveals Drones Used 10 Times in US (+video)

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Photo Credit: Daily CallerBy Alec Hill. The Federal Bureau of Investigations has used unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), or drones, at least ten times in the United States, a letter from the agency to Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul revealed on Thursday.

“Since late 2006, the FBI has conducted surveillance using UAV’s in eight criminal cases and two nationals security cases,” the letter reads. A footnote at the end of the sentence noted that in three additional cases, drones were authorized, but “not actually used.”

In addition to their public response, the FBI also sent Paul’s office a different, classified version of their letter containing more details.

The FBI sent the letter to Paul’s office after Paul’s insistent and much-publicized stand against drone use on American citizens both at home and abroad, which dates back to a filibuster Paul conducted on March 6. On that date, Paul, assisted by a bipartisan group of senators, protested the Obama administration’s use of drones by holding up John Brennan’s nomination for CIA director for almost 13 hours. Read more from this story HERE.

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Photo Credit: APRand Paul maintains hold on FBI nominee

By Burgess Everett. The FBI has used domestic drones for surveillance in eight criminal and two national security cases since 2006, an FBI official wrote in a letter to Sen. Rand Paul, who is maintaining his hold of the nominee to lead the agency.

The letter came in response to a list of questions Paul sent to the director about domestic drone use. Paul had said he would delay the nomination of FBI Director Robert Mueller’s potential successor, James Comey, until he received specifics on the domestic drone program.

Now, Paul says the answers are “insufficient” and he sent a follow-up with additional questions, meaning the hold remains in place. Paul’s been known to get drone answers before, filibustering the nomination of CIA Director John Brennan for 12 hours over the question of whether the government could kill Americans not engaged in combat on U.S. soil.

Stephen Kelly from the FBI’s Office of Congressional Affairs said drones — or unmanned aerial vehicles — have been used in the United States in “very limited circumstances,” such as locating a missing 5-year-old child held in an underground Alabama bunker earlier this year. Kelley also said the FBI does not arm its drones, nor does it have plans to do so, and does not conduct “bulk surveillance.” Read more from this story HERE.

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Photo Credit: telegraph.co.ukEU planning to ‘own and operate’ spy drones and an air force

By Bruno Waterfield. The European Union is planning to “own and operate” spy drones, surveillance satellites and aircraft as part of a new intelligence and security agency under the control of Baroness Ashton.

The controversial proposals are a major move towards creating an independent EU military body with its own equipment and operations, and will be strongly opposed by Britain.

Officials told the Daily Telegraph that the European Commission and Lady Ashton’s European External Action Service want to create military command and communication systems to be used by the EU for internal security and defence purposes. Under the proposals, purchasing plans will be drawn up by autumn.

The use of the new spy drones and satellites for “internal and external security policies”, which will include police intelligence, the internet, protection of external borders and maritime surveillance, will raise concerns that the EU is creating its own version of the US National Security Agency.

Senior European officials regard the plan as an urgent response to the recent scandal over American and British communications surveillance by creating EU’s own security and spying agency. Read more from this story HERE.

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Why Do Women Disapprove of Drone Strikes So Much More Than Men Do?

Photo Credit: the atlantic

By Alexis C. Madrigal. Pew’s out with an international poll that shows, across countries and overall levels of support, a striking gender gap exists on support for American drone strikes.

Women were much less likely to approve of “the United States conducting missile strikes from pilotless aircraft called drones to target extremists in countries such as Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia.”

In Japan, for example, support for drone strikes was 30 percentage points lower than their male counterparts. The smallest gaps — in France, South Korea, and Uganda — were 14, 14, and 13 percentage points, respectively. On average, there was a 22-point gap between male and female support for drone strikes, and it didn’t matter if there was considerable overall support for strikes or not.

“Gender gaps are also often seen in global surveys over the use of military force, with women far less likely than men to say that force is sometimes necessary in the pursuit of justice,” wrote Bruce Stokes, Director of Global Economic Attitudes at the Pew Research Center’s Global Attitudes Project, in introducing the data. “But the gender difference over drone strikes is unusually large.” Read more from this story HERE.

No Recovery For the Middle Class

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This has been an uneven recovery, with the benefits accumulating to the rich and the corporate sector while regular folks have largely been left behind amid stagnant wages, rising living costs, mediocre job gains and persistent long-term unemployment.

And none of this is new. The recession merely exacerbated trends that started in the late 1970s: lost manufacturing prowess, an important source of good-paying jobs; a shift to generally lower-paid service jobs; freer global trade, which deepens these employment problems; and increased reliance on finance, credit and debt as families try to hold on to the American dream…

While Americans are working harder and are far more productive then they used to be, for a variety of reasons they are not sharing in the prosperity their work creates. This is a reversal of the situation enjoyed from the 1950s through the 1970s, when the middle class prospered amid strong demand for labor, widespread unionization and the ability to demand pay raises.

You can see this in the way median household income has badly lagged behind the per-capita share of economic output, as shown in the graphic above. Both measures are adjusted for inflation. While the available income statistics run only through 2009, it’s doubtful that they’ve improved much since…

One main problem is that since the recession ended, the economy has been creating low-quality, part-time, no-benefit positions…

Read more from this story HERE.

U.S. Prison Populations Decline, Reflecting New Approach to Crime

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Photo Credit: Tim Pearce, Los GatosThe prison population in the United States dropped in 2012 for the third consecutive year, according to federal statistics released on Thursday, in what criminal justice experts said was the biggest decline in the nation’s recent history, signaling a shift away from an almost four-decade policy of mass imprisonment.

The number of inmates in state and federal prisons decreased by 1.7 percent, to an estimated 1,571,013 in 2012 from 1,598,783 in 2011, according to figures released by the Bureau of Justice Statistics, an arm of the Justice Department. Although the percentage decline appeared small, the fact that it followed decreases in 2011 and 2010 offers persuasive evidence of what some experts say is a “sea change” in America’s approach to criminal punishment.

“This is the beginning of the end of mass incarceration,” said Natasha Frost, associate dean of Northeastern University’s school of criminology and criminal justice.

About half the 2012 decline — 15,035 prisoners — occurred in California, which has decreased its prison population in response to a Supreme Court order to relieve prison overcrowding. But eight other states, including New York, Florida, Virginia and North Carolina, showed substantial decreases, of more than 1,000 inmates, and more than half the states reported some drop in the number of prisoners. (Figures for three states were estimated because they had not submitted data in time for the report.) The population of federal prisons increased slightly, but at a slower rate than in previous years, the report found.

Read more from this story HERE.

Costco backs Obama, Obama touts Costco

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In his nationally televised speech Wednesday, Obama sang the praises of retail giant Costco, whose founder Jim Sinegal gave Obama the maximum contribution in two elections and hosted fundraisers for his reelection. Costco has also lobbied for many of Obama’s legislative priorities, including higher minimum wage, Obamacare, and price controls on financial processing fees…

Sinegal contributed the maximum $35,800 to the Obama Victory Fund last year and also held a $35,800-a-plate fundraiser for Obama. In the 2008 election, Sinegal gave $43,500 to the DNC (here and here), which is, in effect, a contribution to Obama. On top of that, the Costco founder gave the maximum $2,300 to Obama’s campaign. So that’s more than $80,000 personally to Obama. Add in $100,000 to Obama’s SuperPAC, Priorities USA, plus the $2 million the July 2012 fundraiser reportedly brought Obama, and you’ve got a healthy amount of support…

Sinegal lobbied for Obamacare in 2009. His company has supported a higher minimum wage. Both of these regulations impose proportionally greater costs on the company’s smaller competitors — and almost every competitor is smaller, because Costco is the nation’s No. 2 retailer behind only Wal-Mart. Sinegal also spoke in Obama’s favor at the 2012 convention.

Costco’s founder did all these favors for Obama over five years, and on Wednesday, Obama returned the favor:

We’ll need our businesses, the best in the world, to pressure Congress to invest in our future, and set an example by providing decent wages and salaries to their own employees. And I’ll highlight the ones that do just that – companies like Costco, which pays good wages and offers good benefits; or the Container Store, which prides itself on training its workers and on employee satisfaction – because these companies prove that this isn’t just good for their business, it’s good for America.

Read more from this story HERE.

Feds Move to Seize Web Firms’ User Account Passwords

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Photo Credit: James MartinThe U.S. government has demanded that major Internet companies divulge users’ stored passwords, according to two industry sources familiar with these orders, which represent an escalation in surveillance techniques that has not previously been disclosed.

If the government is able to determine a person’s password, which is typically stored in encrypted form, the credential could be used to log in to an account to peruse confidential correspondence or even impersonate the user. Obtaining it also would aid in deciphering encrypted devices in situations where passwords are reused.

“I’ve certainly seen them ask for passwords,” said one Internet industry source who spoke on condition of anonymity. “We push back.”

A second person who has worked at a large Silicon Valley company confirmed that it received legal requests from the federal government for stored passwords. Companies “really heavily scrutinize” these requests, the person said. “There’s a lot of ‘over my dead body.'”

Some of the government orders demand not only a user’s password but also the encryption algorithm and the so-called salt, according to a person familiar with the requests. A salt is a random string of letters or numbers used to make it more difficult to reverse the encryption process and determine the original password. Other orders demand the secret question codes often associated with user accounts.

Read more from this story HERE.

Obama Hosts Ramadan Dinner at White House

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Photo Credit: ABCPresident Barack Obama saluted Muslim Americans on Thursday for their contributions in helping build the nation as business entrepreneurs, technology innovators and pioneers in medicine.

Obama spoke at a White House dinner he hosted to celebrate the Islamic holy month of Ramadan. The meal, or iftar, breaks the day of fasting when Muslim families and communities eat together after sunset.

Obama said Ramadan is “a time of reflection, a chance to demonstrate ones devotion to God through prayer and through fasting, but it’s also a time for family and friends to come together.”

He said it is a White House tradition to celebrate sacred days of various faiths, adding that these occasions celebrate diversity that defines the country and reaffirms the freedom to worship.

Read more from this story HERE.

College Republicans, Deemed Security Threat, Denied Admittance to Obama Speech

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Photo Credit: The College FixTen College Republicans were dubbed a security threat and refused admittance to President Barack Obama’s speech at the University of Central Missouri on Wednesday.

Despite the fact that the students had tickets to the event, security personnel turned them away at the door to the recreation center where Obama gave a speech on economic policy, telling the group it wasn’t about their politics but the president’s safety, State Treasurer of the College Republicans Courtney Scott told The College Fix.

The students, some of whom donned Tea Party T-Shirts and others who wore patriotic or Republican-inspired clothing, had protested the president earlier in the day on campus, but had put away their signs and said they were ready to simply listen to Obama when security shut them down – and even told them to leave the vicinity and stay several hundred yards away from the rec center.

The students had waited in a long line and under the hot sun to wind their way to the front of the line two hours in advance of Obama’s scheduled 5:30 p.m. remarks. Still, they were rejected.

“It just didn’t make any sense,” Scott told The Fix. “A lot of us traveled several hours to watch the speech. We were very disappointed not to be able to attend.”

Read more from this story HERE.