Army suicides hit grim milestone: most self-inflicted deaths in a single month

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Photo credit: expertinfantry

Army suicides hit a new single-month record in July, when 38 active-duty and reserve soldiers took their own lives, according to official figures released Thursday.

The toll, up from 24 in June, prompted a wave of renewed anger and frustration among Pentagon leaders and veterans advocates.

“I was pretty shocked when I saw the number,” said Tom Tarantino, legislative director for Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. “This has been a continuous problem. This really stems from the military, and the [Department of Veterans Affairs], for that matter, basically the entire military and veteran community, really coming to this issue several years late.”

“It really wasn’t until 2007-2008, really 2009, that they started thinking about it at the level they need to be thinking about it,” he said.

Despite efforts from high-profile military leaders — including Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, Army Chief of Staff Gen. Ray Odierno, former Joint Chiefs Chairman Adm. Mike Mullen and former Army Vice Chief Gen. Peter Chiarelli — the wider Army is losing this battle, critics say.

Read more from this story HERE.

40% of US electorate will stay home in November, vast majority support Obama

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Stay-at-home nonvoters are more likely to support President Barack Obama than Mitt Romney, according to a new USA Today/Suffolk University poll out today.

Eighty million Americans — 40 percent of the possible eligible electorate — won’t vote this Election Day. And 59 percent of them say there’s no point, since nothing ever gets done and politicians continue to make empty promises, according to the poll.

Forty-three percent of nonvoters are Obama supporters, the survey found, while 20 percent of the nonvoters support Romney, 18 percent back a third-party candidate and 15 percent are undecided.

“This poll is a good news-bad news story for Barack Obama,” poll director David Paleologos said in a statement. “The good news is that there is a treasure chest of voters he doesn’t even have to persuade — they already like him and dislike Mitt Romney. He just needs to unlock the chest and get them out to vote. The bad news is that these people won’t vote because they feel beaten down by empty promises, a bad economy and the negativity of both parties. Obama has lost time — and the key — to open that treasure chest.”

Read more from this story HERE.

MoveOn.org viciously attacks Rep. Paul Ryan

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Courtesy of MoveOn.org, we’ve reproduced one of the latest emails from the lie-filled left’s smear campaign against Rep. Paul Ryan below.

After reading the email, ask yourself how MoveOn can expect anyone outside their ever-shrinking “progressive” echo chamber to take them seriously. Not only are their assertions about Paul Ryan based on misrepresentations, distortions and outright falsehoods, the only “supportive evidence” provided are links to MoveOn.org and other “progressive” sites like Center for American Progress (funded by George Soros), Think Progress, Daily Kos, Huffington Post and The Advocate. There is no question that these sources are solidly biased in favor of “progressives” and are devoted to spreading their propaganda.

If MoveOn’s attack on Ryan  is not a clear cut case of “I’m right because I said so” vapidity, then 2 + 2 does not equal 4.

Incredibly, MoveOn even lies to its own supporters, stating that MoveOn receives “no big checks from CEOs.” Apparently Moveon counts on an ignorant membership unaware of the massive donations received over the years from billionaire George Soros.

In any event, here’s the anti-Ryan email from MoveOn:

Dear MoveOn member,

Paul Ryan is bad for America. He’s anti-choice, and would give big tax cuts for millionaires, while raising taxes on the middle-class. He’s a Tea Party favorite who takes donations from the billionaire Koch brothers, and he introduced one of harshest and most inhumane budgets in recent history. His ideological hero for many years called selfishness a virtue and charity an abomination.

But most people don’t know just how bad Paul Ryan is. So we made this list of 10 things to know about Mitt Romney’s Vice Presidential pick, Paul Ryan. Read it, then click here to share this list as an image on social media, or just forward this email! The future of America is on the line—from a woman’s right to choose to our economy.

10 Things to know about Paul Ryan

1. His economic plan would cost America 1 million jobs in the first year. Ryan’s proposed budget would cripple the economy. He’d slash spending deeply, which would not only slow job growth, but shock the economy and cost 1 million of us our jobs in 2013 alone and kill more than 4 million jobs by the end of 2014.1

2. He’d kill Medicare. He’d replace Medicare with vouchers for retirees to purchase insurance, eliminating the guarantee of health care for seniors and putting them at the mercy of the private insurance industry. That could amount to a cost increase of more than $5,900 by 2050, leaving many seniors broke or without the health care they need. He’d also raise the age of eligibility to 67.2

3. He’d pickpocket the middle class to line the pockets of the rich. His tax plan is Robin Hood in reverse. He wants to cut taxes by $4.6 trillion over the next decade, but only for corporations and the rich, like giving families earning more than $1 million a year a $300,000 tax cut. And to pay for them, he’d raise taxes on middle- and lower-income households and butcher social service programs that help middle- and working-class Americans.3

4. He’s an anti-choice extremist. Ryan co-sponsored an extremist anti-choice bill, nicknamed the ‘Let Women Die Act,’ that would have allowed hospitals to deny women emergency abortion care even if their lives were at risk. And he co-sponsored another bill that would criminalize some forms of birth control, all abortions, and in vitro fertilization.4

5. He’d dismantle Social Security. Ironically, Ryan used the Social Security Survivors benefit to help pay for college, but he wants to take that possibility away from future generations. He agrees with Rick Perry’s view that Social Security is a “Ponzi scheme” and he supported George W. Bush’s disastrous proposal to privatize Social Security.5

6. He’d eliminate Pell grants for more than 1 million low-income students. His budget plan cuts the Pell Grant program by $200 billion, which could mean a loss of educational funding for 1 million low-income students.6

7. He’d give $40 billion in subsidies to Big Oil. His budget includes oil tax breaks worth $40 billion, while cutting “billions of dollars from investments to develop alternative fuels and clean energy technologies that would serve as substitutes for oil.”7

8. He’s another Koch-head politician. Not surprisingly, the billionaire oil-baron Koch brothers are some of Ryan’s biggest political contributors. And their company, Koch industries, is Ryan’s biggest energy-related donor. The company’s PAC and affiliated individuals have given him $65,500 in donations.8

9. He opposes gay rights. Ryan has an abysmal voting record on gay rights. He’s voted to ban adoption by gay couples, against same-sex marriage, and against repealing “don’t ask, don’t tell.” He also voted against the Hate Crimes Prevention Act, which President Obama signed into law in 2009.9

10. He thinks an “I got mine, who cares if you’re okay” philosophy is admirable. For many years, Paul Ryan devoted himself to Ayn Rand’s philosophy of selfishness as a virtue. It has shaped his entire ethic about whom he serves in public office. He even went as far as making his interns read her work.10

If there was ever any doubt that Mitt Romney’s got a disastrous plan for America—he made himself 100% clear when he picked right-wing extremist Paul Ryan as his running mate. Paul Ryan is bad for America, but we can’t beat him if Americans don’t know everything he stands for. Share this list with all your friends by clicking here, or simply forward this email.

Thanks for all you do.

–Justin, Carrie, Steven, Stephen, and the rest of the team

Sources:

1. “Ryan’s Budget, Robin Hood in reverse,” Economic Policy Institute
https://www.moveon.org/r?r=278939&id=48819-18317182-fpqNWbx&t=4

2. “12 Things You Should Know About Vice Presidential Candidate Paul Ryan,” Think Progress, August 11, 2012
https://www.moveon.org/r?r=278662&id=48819-18317182-fpqNWbx&t=5

3.”Ryan Budget Would Raise Some Taxes; Guess Who Gets Hit?,” Off the Charts, April 12, 2012 https://www.moveon.org/r?r=278692&id=48819-18317182-fpqNWbx&t=6
“Middle class could face higher taxes under Republican plan, analysis finds,” The Washington Post, June 19, 2012
https://www.moveon.org/r?r=278693&id=48819-18317182-fpqNWbx&t=7

4. “Statement on Mitt Romney’s Selection of Rep. Paul Ryan for His Vice-Presidential Running Mate,” NARAL, August 11, 2012
https://www.moveon.org/r?r=278694&id=48819-18317182-fpqNWbx&t=8
“Paul Ryan’s Extreme Abortion Views,” The Daily Beast, August 11, 2012
https://www.moveon.org/r?r=278695&id=48819-18317182-fpqNWbx&t=10
“Paul Ryan Sponsored Fetal Personhood Bill, Opposes Family Planning Funds,” Huffington Post, August 11, 2012
https://www.moveon.org/r?r=278852&id=48819-18317182-fpqNWbx&t=12

5. “12 Things You Should Know About Vice Presidential Candidate Paul Ryan,” Think Progress, August 11, 2012
https://www.moveon.org/r?r=278662&id=48819-18317182-fpqNWbx&t=13
“Ayn Rand would have HATED Paul Ryan,” Daily Kos, August 12, 2012
https://www.moveon.org/r?r=278853&id=48819-18317182-fpqNWbx&t=14

6. “Pell Grants For Poor Students Lose $170 Billion In Ryan Budget,” Huffington Post, March 27, 2012
https://www.moveon.org/r?r=278696&id=48819-18317182-fpqNWbx&t=15

7. “Ryan Budget Pads Big Oil’s Pockets with Senseless Subsidies,” Center for American Progress, March 20, 2012
https://www.moveon.org/r?r=278697&id=48819-18317182-fpqNWbx&t=16

8. “Koch brothers have Paul Ryan’s back,” Politico, August 11, 2012
https://www.moveon.org/r?r=278940&id=48819-18317182-fpqNWbx&t=17

9. “Paul Ryan as VP Matches Mitt Romney on Homophobia,” The Advocate, August 11, 2012
https://www.moveon.org/r?r=278698&id=48819-18317182-fpqNWbx&t=18

10.”Paul Ryan And Ayn Rand”, The New Republic, December 28, 2010
https://www.moveon.org/r?r=278699&id=48819-18317182-fpqNWbx&t=19

Want to support our work? We’re entirely funded by our 7 million members—no corporate contributions, no big checks from CEOs. And our tiny staff ensures that small contributions go a long way.

************************

Michael Fell is a former MCA recording artist from the seminal punk rock era who toured America from coast to coast. Today, he’s a leading voice in the L.A. Tea Party movement, active since the February 2009 inception. Mr. Fell currently chairs the Westwood Tea Party, is a founding member of the L.A. Metro Tea Party Coalition, serves as the Vice Chairman of the Westside Republicans Club in L.A. CA, and is an elected Republican delegate to the L.A. 47th AD Central Committee. He’s been Campaign Manager for a primary winning Congressional candidate, as well as Santa Monica and L.A. City Council candidates. Mr. Fell is a contributing writer for https://conservativedailynews.com/, https://rightwingnews.com/, https://www.hollywoodrepublican.net/, https://beforeitsnews.com, https://www.redcounty.com/, https://www.uspatriotpac.com and, https://westsiderepublicans.com/. His opinions on today’s news events and political climate can be found on his blog: https://mjfellright.wordpress.com/

Obama accuses GOP of trying to “Swift Boat” him over bin Laden killing, leaks (+video)

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By Mark Hosenball. Barack Obama’s re-election campaign on Wednesday accused Republicans of trying to “Swift Boat” the president, a reference to hardball smear tactics used to attack the war record of Democratic Senator John Kerry when he unsuccessfully challenged George W. Bush for the White House in 2004.

Reuters reported on Tuesday that a group of former U.S. intelligence and Special Forces operatives was preparing to launch a media campaign, including TV ads, that scolds Obama for taking credit for the killing of Osama bin Laden and accuses his administration of leaking U.S. secrets for political advantage.

The group, the Special Operations OPSEC Education Fund Inc, unveiled a documentary-style video featuring interviews with former spies and U.S. military commandos on Wednesday.

The Obama campaign hit back.

“The Republicans are resorting to ‘Swift Boat’ tactics because when it comes to foreign policy and national security, Mitt Romney has offered nothing but reckless rhetoric,” said campaign spokesman Ben LaBolt. Read more from this story HERE.

Here’s the alleged “Swift Boat”-type documentary that Obama is so concerned about:

Obama defends Biden’s “chains” remark, rejects Palin’s advice to replace him with Hillary (+video)

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(by FoxNews.com) President Obama defended Vice President Joe Biden on Wednesday against criticism of his remarks that Republican repeal of Wall Street regulations would put voters “back in chains.”

Obama also brushed off Sarah Palin’s suggestion on Fox News that he drop Biden from the ticket in favor of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Palin, the 2008 GOP vice presidential nominee and a Fox News contributor, had said Biden’s comments are the latest example of how he “really drags down that ticket.”

“If that’s not the nail in the coffin, really, the strategists there in the Obama campaign have got to look at a diplomatic way of replacing Joe Biden on the ticket with Hillary,” Palin said. “And I don’t want to throw out that suggestion and have them actually accept the suggestion because then an Obama-Hillary Clinton ticket would have a darn good chance of winning.”

But Obama, in an interview with “Entertainment Tonight,” downplayed Palin’s comments: “We don’t spend a lot of time worrying about the chatter and the noise and this and that,” he said. “The country isn’t as divided with gaffes or some stray remark as Washington is. Most folks know that’s just sort of a WWF wrestling part of politics. It doesn’t mean anything, just fills up a lot of air time.”  Read more from this story HERE.

Here’s what Palin said on Fox about replacing VP Joe Biden with Hillary:

Homosexual volunteer carrying Chick-fil-A material open fires in pro-traditional marriage FRC office in DC

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Man carrying Chick-fil-A  materials shoots guard at Family Research Council

By Pete Williams. A gunman who shot a security guard Wednesday at the Family Research Council office in Washington, D.C., was carrying a handgun and several additional rounds of ammunition, federal investigators told NBC News.

Washington, D.C., police say the man walked into the headquarters of the conservative Christian lobbying group around 10:45 a.m. When challenged by the security guard, the gunman shot the guard in the arm with a Sig Sauer 9 mm handgun he pulled from a backpack.

The wounded guard, identified as Leo Johnson, wrestled the gun away from the shooter and prevented him from hurting anyone else, police said. …

The suspect’s name has not been released, but two law enforcement officials told NBC News he is Floyd Corkins, 28, from nearby Herndon, Va.

Federal officials said the suspect the backpack also contained materials about Chick-fil-A restaurants.  Read more from this story HERE.

FRC Shooter was “volunteer at  a ‘gay’ and lesbian center, made negative comment about center before shooting

By WND. Law enforcement officials in Washington have identified the man who shot a security guard at the Family Research Council early today as 28-year-old Floyd Corkins II, a volunteer at a “gay” and lesbian center in Washington, and have hinted that the motive may be linked to the FRC’s conservative Christian viewpoint regarding marriage and homosexuality.

According to a report from the Associated Press, a law enforcement official confirmed that the suspect made a “negative reference” about the FRC’s work before shooting and injuring guard Leo Johnson, who was hospitalized and in stable condition.

While no specific connections were confirmed by law enforcement authorities with the District of Columbia police and FBI, which responded to the case, the FRC had been vocal in recent days in its support of Chick-fil-A President Dan Cathy, whose company was attacked by homosexual advocacy organizations after he publicly stated his support for traditional marriage. Read more from this story HERE.

White House took Five Hours to Respond to FRC Shooting

By Steven Ertelt. The White House is coming under criticism from pro-life advocates for not issuing a condemnation of the shooting of a security guard at the offices of the Family Research Council, a pro-life group.

UPDATE: Not until after 6:30 p.m. ET did the White House respond. Obama finally commented, saying “this type of violence has no place in our society.”

While President Barack Obama has yet to comment — several hours after the incident — presidential candidate Mitt Romney was swift in his response to it.

Romney commented on the shooting, saying: “I am appalled by the shooting today at the offices of the Family Research Council in our nation’s capital. There is no place for such violence in our society. My prayers go out to the wounded security guard and his family, as well as all the people at the Family Research Council whose sense of security has been shattered by today’s horrific events.”

Meanwhile, CNN took hours to finally issue a report on the shooting and it provided no live coverage of it as other television networks did. Hours later, CNN tweeted, “Shooting wounds guard at Family Research Council. on.cnn.com/OYEXq9.” Read more from this story HERE.

West Nile virus outbreak in Texas kills 17, Dallas mayor declares “state of emergency”

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Photo credit: dr_relling

West Nile virus kills 17 in Texas, sickens hundreds

By AFP.  The US state of Texas is battling an outbreak of the West Nile virus, with 17 deaths being blamed on the mosquito-borne disease, authorities said Wednesday.

Throughout the state, 381 people have been sickened since the start of the year, according to the Texas Department of State Health Services.

“Texas is on track to have the most cases of West Nile illness since the disease first emerged in the state in 2002,” it said in a statement.

The county incorporating Dallas, the ninth-largest city in the United States, has been the hardest hit, prompting the mayor to declare a local state of disaster.

“The City of Dallas is experiencing a widespread outbreak of mosquito-borne West Nile virus and has caused and appears likely to continue to cause widespread and severe illness and loss of life,” Mayor Michael Rawlings said in the proclamation of emergency that takes effect Wednesday.  Read more from this story HERE.

Dallas Mayor declares state of emergency, orders aerial spraying for first time in almost 50 years

By Sarah Kutah.  Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings on Wednesday declared the city’s recent West Nile virus outbreak to be a state of emergency and authorized the first aerial spraying of insecticide in the city in more than 45 years.

Dallas and other North Texas cities have agreed to the rare use of aerial spraying from planes to combat the nation’s worst outbreak of West Nile virus so far this year. Dallas last had aerial spraying in 1966, when more than a dozen deaths were blamed on encephalitis.

More than 200 cases of West Nile and 10 deaths linked to the virus have been reported across Dallas County, where officials authorized aerial spraying last week. State health department statistics show 381 cases and 16 deaths related to West Nile statewide.

“The number of cases, the number of deaths are remarkable, and we need to sit up and take notice,” Rawlings said during a city council briefing. “We do have a serious problem right now.”

Aerial spraying for mosquitoes could begin Thursday evening, depending on weather conditions. The state health department, which will pay for the $500,000 aerial spraying with emergency funds, has a contract with national spraying company Clarke. Clarke officials have said two to five planes will be used in Dallas County.  Read more from this story HERE.

Normalizing the unthinkable: RFID implants begin in Washington (+video)

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Photo credit: Forbes.com

Amal Graafstra snaps on a pair of black rubber gloves. “Do you want to talk about pain management techniques?” he asks. The bearded systems administrator across the table, who requested I call him “Andrew,” has paid Grafstra $30 to have a radio-frequency identification (RFID) chip injected into the space between his thumb and pointer finger, and as Graafstra describes Lamaze-type breathing methods, Andrew looks remarkably untroubled, in spite of the intimidatingly high-gauge syringe sitting on the table between them.

Graafstra finishes his pain talk, fishes a tiny cylindrical two-millimeter diameter EM4012 RFID chip out of a tin of isopropyl alcohol, and drops it into the syringe’s end, replacing the RFID tag intended for pets that came with the injection kit. He swabs Andrew’s hand with iodine, carefully pinches and pulls up a fold of skin on the top of his hand to create a tent of flesh, and with the other hand slides the syringe into the subcutaneous layer known as the fascia, just below the surface.

Then he plunges the plastic handle and withdraws the needle. A small crowd of onlookers applauds. The first subject of the day has been successfully chipped.

Over the course of the weekend, Andrew would be one of eight people to undergo the RFID implantation among the 500 or so attendees of Toorcamp, a hacker conference and retreat near the northwest corner of Washington State. Graafstra’s “implantation station” was set up in the open air: Any camper willing to spend $30 and sign a liability waiver could have the implantation performed, and after the excitement of Andrew’s injection, a small line formed to be next.

And why volunteer to be injected with a chip that responds to radio signals with a unique identifier, a procedure typically reserved for tracking pets and livestock? “I thought it would be cool,” says Andrew, when we speak at a picnic table a few minutes after his injection. (The pain, he tells me, was only a short pinch, followed by a “weird feeling of a foreign body sliding into my hand.”)

Read more from this story HERE.

Romney calls Obama ‘angry and desperate,’ but still won’t ask for college records

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Photo credit: DonkeyHotey

Mitt Romney lashed out at President Obama with some of the harshest rhetoric of his campaign at a Tuesday night rally here, accusing Obama of leveling “wild and reckless accusations that disgrace the office of the presidency.”

The already divisive presidential contest took on an even uglier tone after Romney seized on the latest campaign-trail skirmish — a comment at a Virginia rally by Vice President Biden that Romney’s plans to loosen Wall Street regulations would “put y’all back in chains” — to go after his opponents.

“This is what an angry and desperate presidency looks like. President Obama knows better, promised better, and America deserves better,” Romney told a roaring crowd of about 5,000 supporters in Chillicothe. “His campaign strategy is to smash America apart and then try to cobble together 51 percent of the pieces. If an American president wins that way, we all lose.”

Romney added, “Mr. President, take your campaign of division and anger and hate back to Chicago and let us get about rebuilding and reuniting America.”

Throughout the summer, Romney has taken umbrage at the tone of the Democratic advertising barrage, but this week he ratcheted up his criticism. He and his advisers wrote much of the speech Tuesday on his campaign bus riding between stops in Ohio.

Read more from this story HERE.

Federal Appellate Court: No warrant needed to track you in real time by your cell phone

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Photo credit: from_ko

A federal appeals court ruled on Tuesday that police do not need a warrant to track the location of a suspect’s phone.

The United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit ruled that the Drug Enforcement Administration did not violate the constitutional rights of Melvin Skinner when they collected his phone’s GPS data.

DEA agents tracked Skinner’s pay-as-you-go phone as he transported drugs between Arizona and Tennessee. They arrested him at a rest stop in Texas with a motorhome filled with more than 1,100 pounds of marijuana.

Skinner’s lawyers argued that the police violated his Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable searches by collecting his phone’s GPS data without first obtaining a warrant.

But the appeals court ruled that Skinner has no reasonable expectation of privacy for his cellphone’s location data.

Read more from this story HERE.