Unamused Chinese censors have been at work to stop people sniggering over the new Beijing headquarters of the People’s Daily newspaper, which bear an unfortunate resemblance to a giant penis. Photos of the imposing tower, which is still under construction, had Internet users tittering away,…
Boy Scouts: Still wrong on LGBT rights
It’s not really progress – or even compromise – if your gentle, glacial-paced attempts at moving into the 21st century reek of condescension and open up a whole big can of outright bigotry. So let’s try this again, shall we, Boy Scouts?The famously LGBT-averse organization has in recent months been taking awkward steps toward becoming more inclusive, thanks to a series of high-profile challenges and increasing pleas for greater tolerance within its ranks. In January, it announced it was “potentially discussing” changing its restrictions on gay members. Then, last month, it unveiled a new survey it’s sending to its members that will feel them out on a few scenarios that “could happen if the Boy Scouts keeps or changes its policy” – scenarios that bear no small resemblance to recent high-profile stories involving gay Scouts and adult leaders who’ve been shut out because of their orientation. It was a peculiar move – one that had the appearance of progress but the suggestion that equality toward those oddly classified “open homosexuals” is something that can be dictated by the tastes of an organization’s members.Continue Reading… … Read More
Dzhokhar Tsarnaev charged with conspiring to use WMD, may face death penalty
Follow RT’s day-by-day timeline on Boston Marathon bombingsThe Justice Department said on Monday that 19-year-old Dzokhar Tsarnaev had been charged with one count of using a weapon of mass destruction and one count of malicious destruction of property resulting in death.The charges are punishable by death, life in prison, or any other indeterminate prison sentence, the department said in a statement.According to the affidavit of Special Agent Daniel R. Genck, a Massachusetts Registry of Motor Vehicles photograph of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev bears a “close physical resemblance” to video images of “Bomber Two,” who was seen near the Boston Marathon Finishing line at the time of the attack. The agent continues that the footage reveals the suspect using a cellphone after setting down a knapsack near the blast site.“Approximately 30 seconds before the first explosion, he lifts his phone to his ear as if he is speaking on his cell phone, and keeps it there for approximately 18 seconds. A few seconds after he finishes the call, the large crowd of people around him can be seen reacting to the first explosion.” The complaint does not elaborate whether Dzhokhar Tsarnaev allegedly used his cellphone to detonate the explosive device, though it describes as “calm” as those around him are in a state of “bewilderment and alarm.”On Monday, during a bedside court hearing in the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center Dzhokhar Tsarnaev has been read his Miranda rights by a US judge. He also reportedly told investigators that he and his brother worked alone, and that Tamerlan had organized and led the attacks out of a drive to “defend” Islam.Read the full transcript of the hearingTsarnaev, a naturalized US citizen of Chechen origin who remains hospitalized after sustaining serious injures during the course of his arrest, agreed to “voluntary detention,” but declined to answer questions regarding bail, the court record reads. A probable cause hearing – the preliminary hearing which usually takes place before arraignment and before a major crime goes to trial – was set for May 30.“Although our investigation is ongoing, today’s charges bring a successful end to a tragic week for the city of Boston, and for our country,” said Attorney General Eric Holder. “We will hold those who are responsible for these heinous acts accountable to the fullest extent of the law,” he continued.On Monday, the White House announced that the surviving brother implicated in the deadly Boston Marathon bombing will not be tried as an enemy combatant, but will rather be prosecuted in the federal court system.“He will not be treated as an enemy combatant,” White House Spokesman Jay Carney said a media briefing. “We will process this terrorist through our system of justice,” he said.Noting that other terrorists had been tried and convicted in federal court, Carny stressed: “The system has repeatedly proven that it can successfully handle the threat that we continue to face.”He continued that as a naturalized US citizen, Tsarnaev cannot be tried before a military commission. Carny added that US President Barack Obama has been and will continue to be updated regularly on the progress of the investigation.Tsarnaev is being represented by three attorneys from the federal public defender’s office.Following his arraignment, it was earlier reported that Tsarnaev is now awake and responding to investigators’ questions in writing, a law enforcement official not authorized to comment on the matter said.The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said “substantive” information had been collected during the course of questioning, though he declined to elaborate further, the Detroit Free Press cites him as saying. He further said the neck wounds Tsarnaev sustained may have been self-inflicted, based on the positioning of the entry wound and exit wound.According to the unsealed indictment, Tsarnaev further suffered gunshot wounds to the head, legs and hand. The High-Value Detainee Interrogation Group – a multi-security agency unit tasked with interrogating high-value suspects – had previously been unable to question Tsarnaev following his capture on Friday night due to the extent of his injuries. A primary goal of investigators is to determine if the brothers acted alone and whether there are any unexploded bombs yet to be accounted for. Previously, Boston Mayor Thomas Menino expressed his doubts the brothers were part of a larger terror network. “All of the information that I have, they acted alone, these two individuals, the brothers,” he said on ABC News’s ‘This Week’. Menino had also stated that due the extent of Dzhokhar’s injuries, “we don’t know if we’ll ever be able to question the individual.” Ruslan Tsarni, an uncle of the accused and his late brother and co-suspect Tamerlan, told the Associated Press that Dzhokhar Tsarnaev had been “used” by his older brother to carry out the bombing. “He’s not been understanding anything,” Tsarni said. “He’s a 19-year-old boy.”‘Mama, I love you’ Meanwhile, Anzor Tsarnaev, the father of the two suspected Boston bombers, is set to travel from Russia to the United States to seek “justice and truth.” Tsarnaev told AP that he had “lots of questions for the police” and he wants “to clear up many things.” Zubeidat Tsarnaeva, the suspects’ mother, said her husband plans to travel on Wednesday, adding that their family would try to bring the body of their elder son back to Russia. Speaking with ABC News, Tsarnaeva recounted her final conversation with her slain 26-year-old son Tamerlan Tsarnaev, which occurred just moments before a deadly standoff with police in the streets of Watertown, Massachusetts, early Friday morning. ”The police, they have started shooting at us, they are chasing us,” Tsarnaeva recalled her son as telling her.He said “Mama, I love you ” as his mother became frightened and begin to sob and shout. Just as the line cut off, Tamerlan Tsarnaev apparently told his mother that his younger brother was with him.Her daughter later called her to tell her that Tamerlan Tsarnaev had been killed.On Monday, Tsarnaev’s widow said she learned about her husband’s alleged role in the Boston Marathon bombing by watching TV, the New York Daily News reports. After federal investigators visited Katherine Russell Tsarnaev at her parents’ home in Rhode Island, her attorney said he had spoken with authorities and is currently “deciding what we want to do and how we want to approach this.”Details of the fatal standoff emerged on Sunday, beginning on Thursday night when the brothers allegedly ambushed and killed a Massachusetts Institute of Technology police officer, then hijacking a Mercedes-Benz SUV The carjack victim, who asked not to be identified, told police that his life was spared because “he wasn’t American,” NBC news reports. According to the criminal complaint, one bomber asked the carjacking victim if he had heard about Monday’s bombings, saying “I did that.” Police believe the pair might have been headed to New York. For some time the elder brother drove the carjacked vehicle while the younger brother drove his own Honda. After forcing the victim to withdraw $800 dollars from an ATM, he was later able to escape while the brothers stopped in a convenience store. Police used the victim’s cellphone to track the car, Watertown Police Chief Edward Deveau told ABC.The fierce shootout erupted when the pair was spotted by a Watertown cop, who was told not to approach the suspects until backup arrived.”Unfortunately, they brought their fight to us. They stopped their car because they knew he was behind them. And immediately started shooting at my police officer,” Deveau said.Deveau said they were still attempting to determine the extent of the arsenal used by the brothers.“My understanding is that there were firearms and there was a long rifle,” he said.”Our other officers were responding immediately. They were seconds behind him. So immediately we had three or four Watertown police officers in a gun fight with these two brothers,” Deveau continued.”At some point they go behind the Honda, open the trunk and start heaving a device at our officers. And there was a huge explosion. We believe that was the pressure cooker bomb that went off. We found the pressure cooker lid embedded into a car further down the street,” he said.The unsealed indictment also revealed that a 3rd pressure cooker improvised explosive device (IED) was discovered by the FBI in an abandoned car.Boston Police Commissioner Edward Davis told CBS’s Face the Nation on Sunday that another attack was imminent.”We have reason to believe, based upon the evidence that was found at that scene – the explosions, the explosive ordinance that was unexploded and the firepower that they had – that they were going to attack other individuals,” he said. ”That’s my personal belief at this time,” Davis continued.He said that more than 250 spent rounds of ammunition were found at the scene, and that the ground was “littered with unexploded improvised explosive devices that we had to point out to the arriving officers.” Tamerlan Tsarnaev, reportedly got within three meters of police officers before he ran out of ammunition and was tackled. He later died from wounds sustained in the shootout.His injured younger brother Dzhokhar Tsarnaev fled the scene, forcing officers to conduct a house to house search in Watertown. He was arrested late on Friday when he was found seriously injured in a boat in the backyard of a private residence. ”He was very slow and lethargic in every move that he made and they could see that there was no device on his chest. They kept creeping closer to him and then they felt it safe enough to pull him away from the boat,” Deveau continued.FBI drops the ball? The twin bombing near the finish line of the Boston Marathon last Monday killed three people, including an eight-year-old boy, and wounded up to 183 people. Prior to the bombings, neither brother had been flagged by the government as potential terror suspects, nor was there any intelligence that the Boston Marathon might be the target for an attack. The FBI confirmed Friday that agents had interviewed Tamerlan Tsarnaev and other family members in 2011 at the request of a Russian intelligence agency but “did not find any terrorism activity, domestic or foreign,” they agency said in a statement on Friday.”There just wasn’t anything there,” said a federal law enforcement official who has been briefed on the matter. “We ask that the government get back with us if they develop new information, but they did not. The Russians seemed satisfied, so we closed it.” An official further said it would take “some time” before agents are able to review information in the possession of Russian authorities which prompted their request that the FBI look into the activities of Tamerlan Tsarnaev. US lawmakers have slammed the FBI for what has been characterized as an intelligence failure, claiming the agency failed to react appropriately to Russia’s warnings.Lawmakers also accused the FBI of an intelligence failure, questioning whether the bureau had responded forcefully enough to Russia’s warnings.House of Representatives Homeland Security Committee Chairman Michael McCaul wrote to the FBI and other officials asking why Russia’s request to look into Tamerlan Tsarnaev did not raise red flags at the agency.”Because if he was on the radar and they let him go, he’s on the Russians’ radar, why wasn’t a flag put on him, some sort of customs flag?,” McCaul, a Texas Republican, said on CNN’s ‘State of the Union’ program.”And I’d like to know what intelligence Russia has on him as well.” Republican Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina was more equivocal, saying”the FBI or the system dropped the ball” on the elder suspect.Democratic Senator Charles Schumer of New York told the network”There’s certainly a lot of questions” about the agency’s handling of Tsarnaev. When asked to address legislators’ concerns, the FBI said it had no further comment beyond Friday’s statement. … Read More
Rand Paul tries to outrun the Civil Rights Act at Howard
Give Rand Paul some credit for attempting to do what several decades of elections have shown is a tall order: Get African Americans to vote Republican. But in order to make his point today at Howard University, he asked the crowd to not only look past his own brief opposition to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, but to willfully ignore the fact that law fundamentally remade American political parties to the point that bear little resemblance to their 1950s versions.In a jammed-packed auditorium at the historically black college in Washington, D.C. Paul gave the hard sell, arguing that the Republican message of smaller government, school choice, and individual freedom should appeal to minorities who have been victims of state-sponsored oppression, crumbling schools, and general subjugation.But most of his speech was a history lesson, as he spent the first 20 minutes insisting that Democrats, and not Republicans, are responsible for every ill that has befallen blacks in the United States, from the preservation of slavery to Jim Crow. “The story of emancipation, voting rights and citizenship, from Fredrick Douglass until the modern civil rights era, is in fact the history of the Republican Party,” Paul said. “The horrible Jim Crow in the 1930s, 40s, and 50s was all Democrats.” Continue Reading… … Read More
The New York Times Issues a Press Release for ObamaCare
Over the weekend, The New York
Times published an unsigned
editorial defending President Obama’s health care overhaul. The
headline describes the piece as a “report card” on the health law
on its third anniversary, but it does not attempt to grade
ObamaCare so much as extoll its virtues; it’s barely
distinguishable from an administration press release.
The editorial offers a litany of facts and statistics in support
of the law, pointing out the “considerable benefits” it has already
delivered. But there’s less than meets the eye to many of these
supposed benefits—and, perhaps more importantly, the editorial
completely ignores the cost of providing them.
The piece notes, for example, that “private insurers are now
required to cover children with pre-existing conditions, which
means that an estimated 17 million such children have been
protected against being uninsured.” The fact that the Times points
only to the entire class of people who have been “protected”
suggests that it cannot determine how many, if any, have actually
taken advantage of the benefit. Certainly it directly affects far
less than 17 million children. Initial estimates indicated that
somewhere between 31,000 and 72,000 would be covered as a result of
the new requirement.
The Times also declines to note that at
least half a dozen insurers ;responded to the requirement
by simply refusing to offer child-only health policies. How many
children benefited from this side-effect of the regulation?
The editorial also cites the statistic that “some 71 million
Americans have received at least one free preventive service, like
a mammogram or a flu shot, and an additional 34 million older
Americans got free preventive services in 2012 under Medicare.”
Here the resemblance to an administration press release becomes
even sharper; this was literally the subject
of a Health and Human Services press release last week. And like
that press release, the Times
fails to note that the allegedly “free” preventive services
mandated by the law raise the price of health insurance
premiums—and, according to most studies, are of the sort that tend
to raise overall health spending.
It does, however, claim that the law is “saving consumers
money.” In support, the piece points to the law’s medical loss
ratio ((MLR) requirement, which requires insurers to spend 80
percent of health premium revenue on medical services or rebate the
difference, but unsurprisingly fails to note the fairly
strong reasons to believe ;that the requirement is actually
causing premiums to rise by creating incentives to charge high up
front premiums that can perhaps be rebated later.
The editorial also points to the law’s rate
review provisions, which it says have reduced the number of
insurance plans seeking large rate hikes. But once again, the
Times overstates its case. A 2012 review of the
rate-review provisions by the Kaiser Family Foundation found that
one in five rate requests ended up lower in states performing their
own review of rate increases, but also notes that because many of
those states already had rate-review programs in place prior to
ObamaCare’s passage, it’s not possible to fully attribute that
effect to the health law. And in states where rate-review was
conducted entirely by the federal government, and thus entirely
attributable to the law, it seems to make little difference: Kaiser
analyzed 48 federally administered rate-increase reviews; of the 37
rate hikes deemed “unreasonable” by HHS, only one was subsequently
withdrawn by the insurer—and it was later resubmitted at exactly
the same rate.
The Kaiser report also notes that insurers justified large rate
increases by saying that if necessary, they would make it up with
the rebates provided under the MLR rule—further suggesting that
insurers are acting on the incentives the provision provides to
charge high up front premiums.
But never mind all that. ObamaCare, the NYT editorial
says, is “a start toward reforming the costly, dysfunctional
American health system,” which is just what one would expect an
administration press release to say. ; … Read More
The Other Brother bedevils Obama
This production may well work as a proselytizing device for the average reality TV consumer. Pop-productions, courtesy of the star of “Touched by an Angel,” however, are less effective with those who’ve studied the Hebrew Bible—perhaps the greatest literary work ever—in the language in which it was written.Interesting, though, are the recognizable facial features of the actor who plays the antagonist in the series.James Poniewozik of Time magazine has pointed out, sarcastically, that “A raft of viewers–including noted Biblical scholar Glenn Beck–have claimed that the show’s version of Satan bore a striking resemblance to” Barack Obama.Their dark foreboding excepted, the facial features of the actor who plays Satan in “The Bible” do resemble Obama’s.Moroccan actor Mohamen Mehdi Ouazanni is well cast in the role of “The Bible’s” Prince of Darkness. As expected, Mehdi Ouazanni as Satan looks sinister. However, while the contours of Ouzaani’s face bear a striking likeness to Obama’s, the president usually takes care to face Americans—a people who take everything at face value—sunny side up only.He may be a man of many masks, but President Obama’s face is generally bereft of the pall of evil that blankets Beelzebub’s face in “The Bible.”There was an exception big media failed to notice, because of the providential prism through which they view (and filter) Barack Obama. Quite recently, Obama let the very darkness that blackens Ouzaani’s face in “The Bible” deform his own features. This happened during the National Prayer Breakfast, in the course of Dr. Ben Carson’s keynote address. The Breakfast took place before the Republicans commenced a “slobbering love affair” with Dr. Carson, an accomplished and affable African-American, who serves as director of pediatric neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. The “Shock Doc,” as Ben Carson has since been dubbed by media, launched his Republican political career by “diagnosing the spiritual condition of the country,” his words, at the National Prayer Breakfast, with an unsuspecting President Obama in attendance. Needless to say, political sermonizing crept into Carson’s splendidly accessible narrative. The good doctor spoke stirringly against unanimity of speech and thought (political correctness), and for a return to a unity of purpose to be found in the country’s founding principles. Was anyone watching the president’s face during The Other Brother’s Prayer-Breakfast remarks? Well before Dr. Carson addressed the collapse of other “pinnacle nations” before America, through “moral decay” and “fiscal irresponsibility,” an ugly expression enveloped the president’s features, Dorian-Gray style. See for yourself.The more uplifting, inspiring and inclusive Dr. Carson’s message grew, the more ominous Obama’s face became. Adjacent to the president, two manicured hands applauded wildly throughout the first 18 minutes of Dr. Carson’s remarks. Those slender fingers belonged to first lady Michelle Obama, who had not been caught in the beam of the camera.Abruptly, Mrs. Obama ceased clapping—washing her hands of the rapt Dr. Carson—when he evoked Jesus Christ as his role model.Indisposed as I am to superstition or conspiracy, the dynamics at that National Prayer Breakfast were nevertheless intriguing.For all his faults, Martin Luther King—no hero of mine—was nothing like the bent and brutally divisive Mr. Obama and the black community’s other corrupt race agitators and hustlers.Said Martin Luther King:“It is a simple matter of justice that America, in dealing creatively with the task of raising the Negro [MLK's words] from backwardness [MLK's words], should also be rescuing a large stratum of the forgotten white poor.” Said Dr. Ben Carson on America’s system of racial subsidies and subventions:“If we’re talking about applying to Yale University and, you know, my son is applying and, you know, the son of coal miner who got killed in a mine, who’s been working since he was 12 to help support the family, is applying, and they have similar academic records, I’m going to give the edge to the coal miner’s son because he’s had a much harder road … It should not be attached to any ethnicity.” So what was it that bedevilled Barack Obama during the 2013 National Prayer Breakfast? What, do you suppose, accounted for the president’s splenetic expression on that day?Perhaps Barack Obama recognized in Dr. Carson a certain fairness and goodness he is without. … Read More
Barack Obama doppelganger plays Satan in “Bible” miniseries: conservatives react
The History Channel has had a smash hit with “The Bible,” a miniseries dramatizing the Good Book — the premiere episode garnered 13.10 million viewers. That audience, last night, got their first peek at the Devil — played by Mohamen Mehdi Ouazanni, an actor with a strong resemblance to President Barack Obama.Glenn Beck was among the first to pick up the resemblance:[embedtweet id="313120671297306624"]The hashtag #ObamaSatan has taken off among conservative Twitter users:[embedtweet id="313673168348930048"][embedtweet id="313676128210522112"][embedtweet id="313672814911684608"]The idea of the president — any president — being a biblical force for evil is not a new one: WorldNetDaily called Bill Clinton “the Antichrist” in 2001, urging readers: “Reject him. Reject the mark of the beast.” It’s part and parcel of the swirling conspiracy theories that surround anyone in a position of power.Continue Reading… … Read More
