Contractors in Afghanistan say US hasn’t shared escape plan in case of major attack

Contractors in Afghanistan say US hasn’t shared escape plan in case of major attack | Circa News - Learn. Think. Do.:
"Surrounded by increasing violence and instability, U.S. contractors left behind in Afghanistan are raising alarm about the potential for another Benghazi tragedy, saying the State Department isn't sharing with them a plan to evacuate if insurgents launch a debilitating attack.
The concerns are heightened by the fact that many of those civilians doing the security and nation-building work of the U.S. government hold sensitive security clearances, making them an attractive target for the enemy.
 And the situation could become even more precarious after the U.S. military in Afghanistan draws down to just 8,400 troops by year's end.
"It's not just a political nightmare for somebody, it's people's lives at stake," said Kevin Ofchus, head of Georgia-based firm Host Nations Perspectives Southwest Asia (HNPSWA) that has security contracts in Afghanistan..."

AM Fruitcake

History for August 21

History for August 21 - On-This-Day.com
William Count Basie 1904, Wilt Chamberlain 1936 , Kenny Rogers 1938 - Country singer 


Clarence Williams III 1939 - Actor ("The Mod Squad," "Purple Rain"), Jackie DeShannon 1944 - Singer, Jim McMahon 1959 


1831 - Nat Turner, a former slave, led a violent insurrection in Virginia. He was later executed.


1841 - A patent for venetian blinds was issued to John Hampton.


1878 - The American Bar Association was formed by a group of lawyers, judges and law professors in Saratoga, NY.



1888 - The adding machine was patented by William Burroughs.


1923 - In Kalamazoo, Michigan, an ordinance was passed forbidding dancers from gazing into the eyes of their partner.


1943 - Japan evacuated the Aleutian island of Kiaska. Kiaska had been the last North American foothold held by the Japanese.


1959 - Hawaii became the 50th state. U.S. President Eisenhower also issued the order for the 50 star flag.


1996 - The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 was signed by U.S. President Clinton. The act made it easier to obtain and keep health insurance.

Judge Rejects Request for Clinton Deposition in Email Suit, Orders Candidate to Testify in Writing | TheBlaze.com

Judge Rejects Request for Clinton Deposition in Email Suit, Orders Candidate to Testify in Writing | TheBlaze.com:

"A federal judge rejected a request for Hillary Clinton to submit to a sworn deposition in a suit related to her use of a private email server during her tenure as secretary of state.

According to U.S. District Court Judge Emmet Sullivan, the request, submitted by conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch, did not produce enough to warrant an in-person deposition to establish whether Clinton set up the private server to avoid complying with the Freedom of Information Act, Politico reported Friday."

Black Lives Matter cashes in with $100 million from liberal foundations

Black Lives Matter cashes in with $100 million from liberal foundations - Washington Times:
"For all its talk of being a street uprising, Black Lives Matter is increasingly awash in cash, raking in pledges of more than $100 million from liberal foundations and others eager to contribute to what has become the grant-making cause du jour.
The Ford Foundation and Borealis Philanthropy recently announced the formation of the Black-Led Movement Fund [BLMF], a six-year pooled donor campaign aimed at raising $100 million for the Movement for Black Lives coalition.
That funding comes in addition to more than $33 million in grants to the Black Lives Matter movement from top Democratic Party donor George Soros through his Open Society Foundations, as well as grant-making from the Center for American Progress.
...In doing so, however, the foundations have aligned themselves with the staunch left-wing platform of the Movement for Black Lives, which unveiled a policy agenda shortly after the fund was announced accusing Israel of being an “apartheid state” guilty of “genocide.”"

America to hand off Internet in under two months

America to hand off Internet in under two months | Washington Examiner:
"The Department of Commerce is set to hand off the final vestiges of American control over the Internet to international authorities in less than two months, officials have confirmed.
The department will finalize the transition effective Oct. 1, Assistant Secretary Lawrence Strickling wrote on Tuesday, barring what he called "any significant impediment."
The move means the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority, which is responsible for interpreting numerical addresses on the Web to a readable language, will move from U.S. control to the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, a multistakeholder body based in Los Angeles that includes countries such as China and Russia.
Critics of the move, most prominently Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz, have pointed out the agency could be used by totalitarian governments to shut down the Web around the globe, either in whole or in part..."

Watch State Dept. Spox Try to Define ‘Ransom’ After $400M Iran Payment Admission | Video | TheBlaze.com

Watch State Dept. Spox Try to Define ‘Ransom’ After $400M Iran Payment Admission | Video | TheBlaze.com:

"State Department spokesman John Kirby attempted to define the word “ransom” while discussing the Obama administration’s controversial $400 million cash payment to Iran during an interview Thursday on CNN.

TheBlaze previously reported that the U.S. State Department admitted that the payment to Iran earlier this year was contingent upon the release of American prisoners."

Will the Fight for Fifteen knock out 9 million jobs?

Will the Fight for Fifteen knock out 9 million jobs? « Hot Air:
"Will a new minimum-wage law trump the law of supply and demand in the labor market?
Despite recent experiences in Seattle, California, and other places that have hiked the minimum wage, activists lobby through the “Fight for Fifteen” movement still agitate for a drastic increase in the base rate.
In a new Heritage Foundation “issue brief,” James Sherk estimates that the impact of such an increase would be the loss of seven million jobs nationwide.
The most obvious problem is a sudden increase in costs for businesses that force an evaluation of staffing (via Jeff Dunetz):
Companies hire workers when the additional earnings their labor creates exceeds the cost of employing them.
Starting wages of $15.00 per hour mean full-time employees must create at least $38,700 a year in value for their employers (including wages, employer payroll taxes, and Obamacare-mandate penalties).[4]
Such a high hurdle would make it much harder for less-experienced and less-skilled workers to find full-time jobs.
Many of these workers are not yet productive enough to create that much value for their employers and businesses will not hire them at a loss.
Consequently, many businesses might respond to a $15 mandate by eliminating positions, cutting hours, and looking for new ways to implement labor-saving technology.
Some companies might have to face shutting down or leaving America entirely to cope with the additional expenses.
...Nationwide, such state minimum-wage hikes would result in the loss of approximately 9 million jobs."

EPA's Newest Global Warming Reg Targets Big Rigs, Buses

EPA's Newest Global Warming Reg Targets Big Rigs, Buses | The Daily Caller:
"The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced Tuesday a new set of fuel emission standards for work trucks, vans and over-the-road semi-trucks under the guise of protecting the climate.
The new standards, released by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), will affect engine performance standards for truck model years 2018-2027, and for semi-trucks, large pickup trucks, vans, and all types and sizes of buses and work trucks.
The EPA and NHTSA said the new rules will also lower carbon emission levels by 1.1 billion metric tons, save vehicle owners $170 billion, and ratchet down oil consumption by two billion barrels over a vehicle’s lifetime.
The agency also claimed the rules will provide $230 billion in societal benefits, including benefits to our climate. The benefits will also outweigh costs by about an eight to one ratio.
“These standards will not only benefit our climate, but also modernize America’s trucking fleet, cut costs for truckers, and help ensure the U.S trucking industry is a global leader in fuel efficient heavy duty vehicle technology,” EPA’s head administrator, Gina McCarthy, said in a press statement announcing the rule.
McCarthy does admit the regulations will likely increase the cost for a new truck, but suggested the additional cost would be “recouped within 2-4 years, saving truck owners more over the long haul.”"

Lunch video-----Living With ISIS - Documentary 2016

Noon-toon

Board Memo: Soros Tried To Influence Supreme Court Ruling | The Daily Caller

Board Memo: Soros Tried To Influence Supreme Court Ruling | The Daily Caller:

"Open Society Foundations, Hungarian-born billionaire George Soros’ stated vehicle for progressive social change, orchestrated a well-funded attempt to secure a desired outcome in a U.S. Supreme Court case on illegal immigration enforcement, according to a newly discovered memo between the organization’s top U.S. officials and board members."

The Night JFK Airport Went Mad

The Night JFK Airport Went Mad - Hit & Run : Reason.com:
"It seemed like a major story at first, and then it seemed like one of those news-of-the-weird tales that shuttle through Facebook for a day or two and then get forgotten.
Sunday night there were reports of gunshots in two terminals at New York's JFK Airport.
Fear swept through the crowds, and the areas were evacuated; eventually it turned out that no one had fired any weapons after all.
An odd interlude, made odder by the fact that something similar had happened at a mall in North Carolina the day before, but not the sort of news-dominating event that an actual attack with perps and corpses would have been.
But it was a big story.
It was a burst of hysteria that shows our capacity to generate our own terror even in the absence of actual terrorists, especially when the authorities are actively spreading the flames.
I recommend reading David Wallace-Wells' vivid account of that night at JFK, and not just because it's a gripping dispatch from a writer who happened to be there when the fear took hold.
Decades of sociological research have shown that, no matter how many Hollywood clichés to the contrary you may have seen, it is rare for a disaster to produce a mass panic; spontaneous cooperation and emergent order are the norm.
But there is little spontaneous cooperation or emergent order in Wallace-Wells' story—not until the apparent danger has passed:
After that second stampede, out on the tarmac, passengers moved in to comfort and inform each other, as best they could.
Those who've lived through real disasters and those who study them often talk about the improvised communities of support that spring up in real time to help.
But last night, in a false disaster, it took the complete passing of a threat before that variety of kindness sprang up.
Why?
We'll need more than one man's account before we can get anything approaching a full answer to that question.
But one theme running through Wallace-Wells' report is that the people policing the airport intervened in heavy-handed ways that made the situation much worse.
"Not only did police and security fail to prevent the spectacle of mob hysteria," he writes at one point; "on some level, given the way they pressed a hysterical crowd right back into a compressed space, they staged it."
There is also this:
Read on!

Tax dragnet on second homes snags billionaires, others

Tax dragnet on second homes snags billionaires, others:
"Thousands of summer cottages and second homes in Michigan have lost a valuable tax break in recent years amid state Treasury Department audits aimed at cracking down on improper exemptions.

...Removing the tax breaks is having an unintended consequence in Detroit, he said.
...“It seems unfair to dun people who have, in many instances, worked hard to obtain that second home or cottage,” said Michael LaFaive, director of fiscal policy for the Mackinac Center for Public Policy. “I don’t think many of them were born with silver spoons in their mouths."
...The experiences of several property owners atop a bluff in New Era also illustrate the impact the state’s attempt to boost tax revenue has had on generations of family members.
Until recently, Cathy Houlihan and four siblings were second-generation owners of a blue cottage, built by hand in the 1970s by their father, 100 steps above the Lake Michigan shore.
...Her mother lived in the cottage year-round and received the tax break.
In 2013, the year the widow died, property taxes totaled $2,552.
The state audit removed the tax break in 2014 since none of the siblings lived there full time.
The move sent property taxes soaring 273 percent – to $9,509 a year.
After losing the exemption, and facing the heftier tax bill, two brothers sold their stakes to the sisters.
Retaining the $381,000 cottage has been a financial burden.
“It’s been a hardship and we’ve made some major adjustments throughout the family to make this work,” Houlihan said...”

Juanita Broaddrick Wants To Be Believed

Juanita Broaddrick Wants To Be Believed - BuzzFeed News
VAN BUREN, Arkansas —
"...In September, Clinton tweeted that every sexual assault survivor had “the right to be believed.”
In November, she reiterated that “every survivor of sexual assault deserves to be heard, believed, and supported.”

The following month, she was asked at a campaign event whether the handful of women who’ve accused her husband, former President Bill Clinton, of sexual harassment and assault — Juanita Broaddrick included — deserved to be “believed” as well.
“Well, I would say that everybody should be believed at first until they are disbelieved based on evidence,” Clinton replied with a smile that was just one awkward beat too slow.
Broaddrick oozes genuine, sweet-as-sweet-tea Southern hospitality, but she went “ballistic” when she heard Clinton’s statements on sexual assault, she recently told me.
It had been years since Broaddrick had spoken publicly about the Clintons. Sitting at home, alone and fuming, Broaddrick thought to herself,
What can I say to make this believable to people, that this really happened to me? She signed back in to her dormant Twitter and started typing. In January, one tweet went viral:
“I was 35 years old when Bill Clinton, Ark. Attorney General raped me and Hillary tried to silence me. 
I am now 73….it never goes away.”...

Voter Fraud Is Real. Here Are 4 More Cases.

Voter Fraud Is Real. Here Are 4 More Cases.:
"As the old adage goes, we are entitled to our own opinions, but not to our own facts. These cases—along with the hundreds of other convictions Heritage has documented—are the inconvenient facts many on the left choose simply to ignore. Reasonable Americans should not follow their lead.

Elections—our most direct means of political participation—should be fair and untainted by fraudsters. Every time a vote is cast illegally, it nullifies a legitimate vote and undermines the entire system by eroding public trust in our political institutions. It is imperative that this not be allowed to happen."

End of civilization-----Store security camera records man allegedly masturbating in women's shoe department

Store security camera records man allegedly masturbating in women's shoe department | MLive.com: "JACKSON, MI – Police are investigating a report of a man pleasuring himself in a Jackson store surrounded by ladies shoes Wednesday afternoon.
At 12:55 p.m., Aug 17, police were called to the Kohl's department store in the Jackson Crossing mall for a report of a man exposing himself inside the store, said Jackson Police Deputy Chief Elmer Hitt.
A loss prevention employee monitoring security cameras inside the store noticed an older white man in the woman's footwear section acting strangely, Hitt said.
While continuing to monitor the security footage, the employee discovered the man was masturbating and immediately called police, Hitt said.
The man left the store prior to police arrival.
Reviewing outdoor security footage, police said they were able to obtain the suspect's vehicle license plate number and have identified the owner, Hitt said.
Police have not been able to make contact with the man yet, Hitt said.
No customers reported witnessing the man masturbating in the store. Police have requested a copy of the security footage, Hitt said.
The incident is still under investigation."

AM Fruitcake

History for August 20

History for August 20 - On-This-Day.com:
Benjamin Harrison (U.S.) 1833, Jacqueline Susann 1921 - Author, Don King 1931


Ron Paul 1935, Isaac Hayes (Isaac Lee Hayes, Jr.) 1942 - Singer, songwriter, actor, producer, Al Roker 1954 - Telvision personality


1866 - It was formally declared by U.S. President Andrew Johnson that the American Civil War was over. The fighting had stopped months earlier.


1882 - Tchaikovsky's "1812 Overture" debuted in Moscow.


1939 - The National Bowling Association was founded in Detroit, MI. It was the first bowling association in the U.S. for African-Americans.


1940 - France fell to the Germans during World War II.


1955 - Colonel Horace A. Hanes, a U.S. Air Force pilot, flew to an altitude of 40,000 feet. Hanes reached a speed of 822.135 miles per hour in a Super Sabrejet.


1964 - A $1 billion anti-poverty measure was signed by U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson.

1997 - Britain began voluntary evacuation of its Caribbean island of Montserrat due to the volcanic activity of the Soufriere Hills.


1998 - Canada's Supreme Court announced that Quebec could not secede without the federal government's consent.

Clinton Claims She’s a ‘No-Excuse Person’ and Is Immediately Rebutted With Video | Video | TheBlaze.com

Clinton Claims She’s a ‘No-Excuse Person’ and Is Immediately Rebutted With Video | Video | TheBlaze.com:

"Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton told listeners at a speech in Cleveland Wednesday, “I don’t want any excuses. I’m a kind of no-excuse person.”

So the Washington Free Beacon posted a video mashup of Clinton doing exactly that over the years:"

Porn star teaches UCLA students how to have sex

Porn star teaches UCLA students how to have sex - The College Fix:
"Jessica Drake, whose recent filmography includes “Sexbots: Programmed for Pleasure,” “Magic Mike XXXL: A Hardcore Parody,” and “Supergirl XXX: An Axel Braun Parody,” recently swung by a summer psychology course on human sexuality at UCLA to give the undergrads some professional advice on how to have sex.
“Jessica Drake teaches modern sex ed to rousing ovation in UCLA,” declares a press release from her management company, which included pictures of the Aug. 11 guest lecture and a quote from its instructor, David Frederick, who gushed: “I always do a little jump for joy when she is coming because she is an engaging and thoughtful presenter who really knows how to keep students’ attention.”
Drake reportedly discussed sexual consent, communication and pleasure in bed.
“There is a definite call for available sex education and Jessica is in a unique position to respond with equal parts understanding, compassion, education and experience,” added Frederick, who has made a habit out of inviting Drake to speak to his human sexuality classes..."

This is How the Obamacare Story Will End

This is How the Obamacare Story Will End | Foundation for Economic Education
"The ACA was supposed to guarantee that every American could afford health insurance.
Not only has it failed to do so, but a more spectacular failure is imminent.
It’s about to get a whole lot harder to be sick and poor in America.
Health insurance company Aetna is pulling out of Obamacare in most states.
After announcing a $300 million loss, the company joins UnitedHealth Group Inc. and Humana Inc. which also lost hundreds of millions of dollars by participating in Obamacare exchanges. Anthem and Cigna have also complained about losses from participation.
Why are they leaving?
The ACA only helps the very poor and very sick.
To make insurance affordable for those people, the ACA subsidizes their insurance premiums.
Very sick people cost a lot more to insure but don’t bring in any more revenue because Obamacare outlaws that.
To do this, the poor and sick buy their insurance on state-run exchanges.
Obamacare made state governments act as insurance brokers.
It also forced every American to become a customer of a health insurance company, though they could choose which one.
In exchange for this tremendous handout from the federal government, insurance companies agreed to sell Obamacare through the state governments.
Obamacare’s subsidies made very generous insurance affordable for poor, sick Americans.
The subsidies meant that millions of Americans were insured for the first time in decades.
But the ACA didn’t make insuring poor, sick Americans profitable for insurance companies.
The ACA doesn’t force companies to sell insurance to poor, sick Americans.
So you have to buy it, but the companies don’t have to sell it to you.
The vast majority of the people who are buying insurance from Aetna, UnitedHealth Group Inc., and Humana Inc. on the exchanges are very sick.
Very sick people cost a lot more to insure but don’t bring in any more revenue because Obamacare outlaws that.
That leaves Aetna with two choices.
It cannot continue to insure these people until they bleed the company dry and then declare bankruptcy even if they wanted to because they’re obligated to shareholders. 
Their only options are to raise premiums significantly or dump most of their 850,000 exchange customers.
What’s next?...
Read on!!!

Air Force Officials Remove Open Bible From Major’s Desk, Investigation Launched | TheBlaze.com

Air Force Officials Remove Open Bible From Major’s Desk, Investigation Launched | TheBlaze.com:

"Base officials also are investigating if allowing the Bible on the desk was a reasonable accommodation of the officer’s religious beliefs or if it violated the separation of church and state, the Colorado Springs Independent reported.

“The basic premise of the Air Force instruction [on religious freedom], grounded in Department of Defense policy, grounded in law is, people have an inherent right to free exercise of religion within boundaries,” Col. Damon Feltman, 310th Space Wing commander, told the Independent. “At the same time, people have freedom to be left alone. It’s finding that right balance. The challenge of the commander is to be sure both people are treated fairly.”"