"One police officer is dead and three suspects are in custody after a shooting during a routine traffic stop in Hatch, New Mexico, authorities said.
According to local news station KOAT-TV, Mayor Andy Nunez confirmed Officer Jose Chavez, 45, was shot in the neck Friday and died around 9 p.m. after emergency surgery at the University Medical Center in El Paso. Chavez was shot near I-25, north of Las Cruces, the Doña Ana County Sheriff’s Office reported."
Texas Leads 13 States Suing Obama For Transgender Bathrooms | The Daily Caller:
"Texas and a dozen other states will seek an injunction Friday blocking Obama administration rules concerning bathrooms for transgender students in public schools.
...“This President is attempting to rewrite the laws that were enacted by the elected representatives of the people, and is using the threat of losing federal funding to get schools to fall into line.
That cannot be allowed to continue.”
The administration sent guidance to school districts across the country in May, advising them to allow trans students to use the bathroom consistent with their gender identity. “A school’s failure to treat students consistent with their gender identity may create or contribute to a hostile environment in violation of Title IX,” the letter said, in reference to the federal law banning gender discrimination in education. (RELATED: Obama Decrees ALL Public Schools Must Allow Transgender Bathroom Use)
The Department of Justice (DOJ) claims that the policies are merely recommendations lacking the force of law (meaning plaintiffs lack standing to ask for an injunction), a claim vigorously disputed by the objecting states.
“Though Defendants repeat ad nauseum that they are ‘impos[ing] no independent legal requirements on plaintiffs,’ there has been ‘no enforcement action threatened or taken,’ or their guidance documents ‘are not legally binding,’ they are nonetheless culpable for re-writing Congressional text in fact by their actions,” their brief reads.
The states accuse DOJ and DOE of promulgating new rules by means of regulatory “dark matter,” a deluge of agency directives, notices, memoranda, guidance documents, and even blog posts which effectively create new policy without congressional legislation or Administrative Procedure Act protocols. The states claim that this strategy allows agencies to evade judicial review and achieve their policy objectives — because the guidance stems from so-called “dark matter,” and it technically lacks the force of law, and therefore cannot be reviewed by the courts.
Nonetheless, districts who do not abide by the guidance are targeted for punishment by the agencies, ensuring district compliance with the new agency “rules.”
“This regulatory shell game, where the federal government’s actions are purposefully designed to dodge accountability and transparency, must be stopped,” they argue..."
History for August 14 - On-This-Day.com Ernest Thayer 1863, John Galsworthy 1867, Steve Martin 1945 - Actor comedian Gary Larson 1950 - Creator of "The Far Side", Earvin "Magic" Johnson 1959 - Basketball player, Tim Tebow 1987 - Football player 1888 - A patent for the electric meter was granted to Oliver B. Shallenberger. 1896 - Gold was discovered in Canada's Yukon Territory. Within the next year more than 30,000 people rushed to the area to look for gold. 1919 - About 1 million tons of ice and rock broke off of a glacier near Mont Blanc, France. Nine people were killed in the incident. 1935 - U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Social Security Act into law. The act created unemployment insurance and pension plans for the elderly. 1945 - It was announced by U.S. President Truman that Japan had surrendered unconditionally. The surrender ended World War II. 1947 - Pakistan became independent from British rule. 1953 - The whiffle ball was invented. 1980 - People for Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) was incorporated.
"Don’t look for our first gold medalist Kim Rhode to be invited anytime soon to the White House.
The Olympic Gold Medalist is a pro Second Amendment sharpshooter who doesn’t shy away from speaking her mind about gun control, America’s national security issues, and the right of every law-abiding American, the right of self-protection."
Volkswagen Created A 'Backdoor' To Basically All Its Cars... And Now Hackers Can Open All Of Them | Techdirt:
"And... for our latest example for why requiring companies to build backdoors into encryption or similar technologies is a bad idea comes from automaker Volkswagen. Researchers are now revealing that approximately 100 million VW vehicles can be easily opened via a simple wireless hack.
The underlying issue: a static key used on basically all of the wireless locks in VWs.
...“You only need to eavesdrop once,” says Birmingham researcher David Oswald.
“From that point on you can make a clone of the original remote control that locks and unlocks a vehicle as many times as you want.”
In other words, VW created a backdoor, and assumed that it would remain hidden. But it did not.
...On a related note, the article points out that the researchers who found this vulnerability are the same ones who also found another vulnerability a few years ago that allowed them to start the ignition of a bunch of VW vehicles.
And VW's response... was to sue them and try to keep the vulnerability secret for nearly two years. Perhaps, rather than trying to sue these researchers, they should have thrown a bunch of money at them to continue their work, alert VW and help VW make their cars safer and better protected."
Ten Most Troubling Finds Inside House Probe of Pentagon’s ‘Distorted’ Intel on Islamic State TEL AVIV – A damning investigation by House Republicans released on Wednesday has found that the intelligence arm of the U.S. Military’s Central Command (CENTCOM) routinely produced intelligence that “distorted, suppressed, or substantially altered” the results of the campaign against the Islamic State.
Breitbart Jerusalem reviewed the House report and herein presents the ten most troubling finds, in no particular order.
1 – Top CENTCOM leaders modified intelligence assessments to present an “unduly positive” assessment of combating the Islamic State and training the Iraqi Security Forces (ISF).
The complaint alleges that senior leaders within the CENTCOM Intelligence Directorate and JIC, including the Director of Intelligence and other senior intelligence staff, violated regulations, tradecraft standards, and professional ethics by modifying intelligence assessments to present an unduly positive outlook on CENTCOM efforts to train the ISF and combat ISIL.
Media outlets have also raised allegations of possible reprisals against individuals within the CENTCOM Intelligence Directorate. …
According to multiple interviewees, operational reporting was used as a justification to alter or “soften” an analytic product so it would cast U.S. efforts in a more positive light. No interview provided any instances where operational reporting was used as a justification to come to a more pessimistic conclusion. Additionally, numerous interviewees indicated that analytical products which conflicted with operational reporting were routinely subject to more stringent scrutiny than those that did not.
2 – Intelligence analysts declined to be interviewed, possibly out of fear of reprisals from CENTCOM leadership, while the interviews that did take place were under the watchful eyes of DOD officials.
Additionally, the Joint Task Force requested interviews with four more analysts whose positions provided them with visibility into the allegations. These analysts declined to be interviewed. Although they did not express their reasons for declining, the Joint Task Force is concerned that some of the analysts may have done so out of fear of potential reprisals for their testimony.
For example, as the Joint Task Force’s interviews were commencing, the Director of the DIA publicly characterized reports of the whistleblower’s allegations as exaggerations.
It must also be noted that, pursuant to longstanding arrangements between DOD and the Armed Services Committee, DOD insisted on having department officials present during Joint Task Force interviews.
3 – CENTCOM intel agents operated within a ‘toxic’ leadership environment.
"And, despite overwhelming and growing evidence of misconduct, President Obama in 2014 told Fox News there was "not even a smidgen of corruption" at the agency. So when in June a lower court dismissed the case, it looked done.
The D.C. court's decision revives the case and suggests, at minimum, that there's more than a "smidgen" of corruption.
There will be more revelations to come. As the case goes forward, attorneys for the plaintiffs will use the process of legal discovery to dredge up memos, emails and other documents. You can bet that many of them will be damning — as they already have been."
Half of Those Remaining at Gitmo are Cleared for Release - The DENISE SIMON EXPERIENCE Blog There remains a key question to be asked: If those remaining are not a risk or a threat then why has it taken a more than a decade to form this conclusion? Additional questions include how much are we paying other countries to take a detainee as no agreements or conditions have ever been published.
Is this the right time to be doing this? Not so much as noted here:
Key takeaways in this month’s Terror Threat Snapshot include:
– There have been 24 ISIS-linked plots or attacks against Western targets in the first half of 2015, up from 19 in all of last year.
– The number of homegrown terror plots since 9/11 has reached 116, tripling in just the past five years.
– Foreign fighters continue to flow into Syria and Iraq. There has been an 80 percent increase in fighters traveling to the conflict zone since ISIS declared its “caliphate” one year ago.
– More than 200 Americans are believed to have traveled—or attempted to travel—to fight in Syria, a 33 percent increase overall since the beginning of this year.
Official expects 1 in 4 people to be infected with Zika virus in US territory of Puerto Rico by end of year:
"A HEALTH expert has warned he expects one in four people in the US territory of Puerto Rico to be infected with the Zika virus before the year’s end. The Caribbean island has reported 1,914 new cases of the disease in the last week, and there are said to be 10,690 cases there altogether.
The Zika virus is thought to be linked to ‘shrunken heads’ in babies born from infected mothers
The island’s Health Secretary Ana Rius has said that of the total cases 1,035 involve pregnant women.
Officials say 90 people in Puerto Rico have been hospitalised by the virus.
Roughly 30 of them are said to have been diagnosed with the temporary paralysis condition Guillain-Barre which is linked to the condition."
"By now, it should appear to everyone that Clinton believes she is not like everyone else — that she is somehow special. After all, she can get away with many things that the average American could face jail time for.
It’s a shameful and embarrassing. However, Clinton has spent her entire life misrepresenting herself. Perhaps she has told the lie that she is an “everyday American” long enough that she believes it.
Perhaps. But the rest of us don’t believe it. While Clinton’s health issues are a serious concern, we are reminded of one of her other sicknesses — hypocrisy, which is a characteristic most unfitting for the president of the United States."
Good Grammar in Text Messages Might Make You Look Like a Jerk | Intellectual Takeout: "When it comes to texting, the period, full stop, point – whatever you call it – has been getting a lot of attention.
People have begun noticing slight changes to the way our smallest punctuation mark is deployed, from declarations that it’s going out of style to claims that it’s becoming angry. What they’re actually noticing is written language becoming more flexible, with texting possessing its own set of stylistic norms (sometimes informally called “textspeak” or “textese”).
The period is merely one example of this shift, a change that has opened up new possibilities for communicating with written language.
Just as we have different styles of speaking in different situations, so do we have context-dependent styles of writing...
...For some, this can appear angry or standoffish..."
THE number of migrants living in the Calais “Jungle” has risen by 2,000 in the last month alone amid fears the refugee camp has been infiltrated by Islamic State jihadis.
The Jungle's population has soared to 9,000 amid fears of ISIS infiltration
The Jungle's population has now topped 9,000, which comes after a recent controversial court ruling by a judge declaring 72 restaurants, cafes and shops at the sprawling site should not be torn down.
A census carried out by two charities working in the region reported the population of the camp has rocketed to 9,106 inhabitants – an increase of 29 per cent within a month.
A judge ruled 72 illegal shops, restaurants and cafes in the camp should not be shut down
Hillary's Relationship with Russia is Approved Espionage - The DENISE SIMON EXPERIENCE Blog "Dealing with evil, the evil empire as President Reagan declared. ...Then there was the red line threat by Obama where it was later dismissed and handed over to Putin to handle those chemical weapons in Syria for removal. Then we heard about the Bill and Hillary deal with the Canadian operative on Uranium One giving over rights of U.S. uranium supply to Russia. But now we have yet another operation concocted by the White House and the Hillary State Department and this one is a blockbuster as noted by going back in history through the original WikiLeaks cables. It is highly suggested to read the full document below, as it summarizes how Hillary allowed trade secrets and professional Russian espionage within the United States. ****
NYPost: Key players in a main component of the reset — a Moscow-based, Silicon Valley-styled campus for developing biomed, space, nuclear and IT technologies called “Skolkovo” — poured tens of millions of dollars into the Clinton Foundation, the report by journalist Peter Schweizer alleges.
As the Obama administration’s top diplomat, Hillary Clinton was at the center of US efforts on the reset in general and Skolkovo in particular, Schweizer argues.
Yet, “Of the 28 US, European and Russian companies that participated in Skolkovo, 17 of them were Clinton Foundation donors” or sponsored speeches by former President Bill Clinton, Schweizer told The Post.
“It raises the question — do you need to pay money to sit at the table?”
In one example cited by Schweizer, Skolkovo Foundation member and then-Cisco CEO John Chambers donated between $1 million and $5 million in personal and corporate cash to the Clinton Foundation, the report says.
But Skolkovo wound up making America less safe, Schweizer argues, because it shared advanced US technology that Russia can develop for both civilian and military applications, a concern raised already by Army and FBI officials.
...“Particularly noteworthy is Atlant’s ability to deliver military cargoes,” including “radar surveillance, air and missile defense and delivery of airborne troops,” the Skolkovo Foundation bragged in a document Schweizer cites.
Hillary Clinton personally launched the State Department’s efforts toward a Russian reset, presenting her Russian then-counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, with a prop reset button in Geneva in 2009.
The reset petered out by the end of 2011, when Russian President Vladimir Putin accused Hillary of fomenting Russian protests over suspicions of fraud in that year’s parliamentary elections.
"He’s also unique and extremely brave, unique in that he doesn’t follow the prescribed orthodoxy which is prevalent within the African-American community, and brave because he publicly speaks out about race relations, that goes against the grain of those race hustlers and political opportunists, who have used race to enrich themselves by creating and exploiting a culture of victimization."
The Olympic diving pool was closed Friday morning as the water continues to be a disturbing, murky shade of green. The concern for those who have been diving into the pool has grown as the problem persists.
The states claim that this strategy allows agencies to evade judicial review and achieve their policy objectives — because the guidance stems from so-called “dark matter,” and it technically lacks the force of law, and therefore cannot be reviewed by the courts.
"Don’t look for our first gold medalist Kim Rhode to be invited anytime soon to the White House.
Researchers are now revealing that approximately 100 million VW vehicles can be easily opened via a simple wireless hack.
Researchers are now revealing that approximately 100 million VW vehicles can be easily opened via a simple wireless hack.
The complaint alleges that senior leaders within the CENTCOM Intelligence Directorate and JIC, including the Director of Intelligence and other senior intelligence staff, violated regulations, tradecraft standards, and professional ethics by modifying intelligence assessments to present an unduly positive outlook on CENTCOM efforts to train the ISF and combat ISIL.
The complaint alleges that senior leaders within the CENTCOM Intelligence Directorate and JIC, including the Director of Intelligence and other senior intelligence staff, violated regulations, tradecraft standards, and professional ethics by modifying intelligence assessments to present an unduly positive outlook on CENTCOM efforts to train the ISF and combat ISIL.
"And, despite overwhelming and growing evidence of misconduct, President Obama in 2014 told Fox News there was "not even a smidgen of corruption" at the agency. So when in June a lower court dismissed the case, it looked done.
The Caribbean island has reported 1,914 new cases of the disease in the last week, and there are said to be 10,690 cases there altogether.
"By now, it should appear to everyone that Clinton believes she is not like everyone else — that she is somehow special. After all, she can get away with many things that the average American could face jail time for.
"When it comes to texting, the period, full stop, point – whatever you call it – has been getting a lot of attention.
As the Obama administration’s top diplomat, Hillary Clinton was at the center of US efforts on the reset in general and Skolkovo in particular, Schweizer argues.
Yet, “Of the 28 US, European and Russian companies that participated in Skolkovo, 17 of them were Clinton Foundation donors” or sponsored speeches by former President Bill Clinton, Schweizer told The Post.“It raises the question — do you need to pay money to sit at the table?”In one example cited by Schweizer, Skolkovo Foundation member and then-Cisco CEO John Chambers donated between $1 million and $5 million in personal and corporate cash to the Clinton Foundation, the report says.But Skolkovo wound up making America less safe, Schweizer argues, because it shared advanced US technology that Russia can develop for both civilian and military applications, a concern raised already by Army and FBI officials....“Particularly noteworthy is Atlant’s ability to deliver military cargoes,” including “radar surveillance, air and missile defense and delivery of airborne troops,” the Skolkovo Foundation bragged in a document Schweizer cites.Hillary Clinton personally launched the State Department’s efforts toward a Russian reset, presenting her Russian then-counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, with a prop reset button in Geneva in 2009.The reset petered out by the end of 2011, when Russian President Vladimir Putin accused Hillary of fomenting Russian protests over suspicions of fraud in that year’s parliamentary elections.But by then, the damage had already been done..."
