Category: Politics

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Politics

Conservative Rabbi Blast Fox News – Bashing Gays Is Not a Religious Act

Shmuel “Shmuley” Boteach, a conservative rabbi who ran for office as a Republican and was endorsed by House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA), on Tuesday blasted Duck Dynasty reality star Phil Robertson for doing “tremendous damage to religion” with his anti-LGBT comments.

During a religion panel on Tuesday, Fox News host Gretchen Carlson asked CBN’s Wendy Griffith if she approved of a Bible study curriculum that was being branded with the “Duck Dynasty” name.

“I think it’s perfect,” Griffith replied. “They are just being who they are. They are people of faith. They realize that their fame could be short-lived and they’re making the most of it. They’re saying, you know, ‘We want to take a lot of people to heaven with us when we go so we’re going to do this, we’re going to bring it into the churches.’ I think it’s great.”

While Giffith seemed to have forgiven the recent remarks comparing homosexuals to terrorists, Boteach clearly had not forgotten.

“Amanda’s comment is very telling,” Boteach said. “The religious person hears a calling. It’s not career, it’s not about them, it’s about the wider contribution they can make to society in general. And that breeds humility.”

“But on this with Duck Dynasty, they’ve done tremendous damage to religion,” he added. “We have to stop making religion in America about bashing gays. They just have to forswear that stupid comment about comparing homosexuality to bestiality.”

And Boteach was just warming up: “You see the problem in America is we overlook all the heterosexual guys who are raping women, one in five, on the campus. We saw this terrible statistic that in Alaska…”

The rabbi was probably going to make a point about Alaskan women being raped at a rate three times the national average, but Carlson and Griffith cut him off.

“I don’t think that’s what they’re about,” Griffith argued.

“Bashing gays is not religion!” Boteach shot back. “What is religion is family dinners and combating the divorce rate.”

“If Christians want to buy this from somebody who’s made very bigoted and very stereotypical and very awful comments about women and African-Americans that’s their choice,” American Atheists Managing Director Amanda Knief pointed out. “But I am certainly going to find my moral leanings from someone else, not from reality TV characters.”

“Well, if people are interested, this church curriculum comes out in May,” Carlson said in conclusion.

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Politics

Rush Limbaugh Should Be Happy – Sandra Fluke is Running for Office

Thanks to Rush Limbaugh, for putting the spotlight on Sandra Fluke. Her desire to run for office is a positive step forward for Democrats and the women’s movement.

Women’s rights activist Sandra Fluke appears to be moving forward with a run for Congress.

Fluke has filed with the California state Democratic Party to seek its endorsement in the race for retiring Rep. Henry Waxman’s (D-Calif.) seat, according to the state party Web site.

A state party delegate confirmed to Post Politics that Fluke has filed and paid the fee to appear on the ballot this weekend.

Fluke hasn’t officially announced her campaign or filed with the Federal Election Commission, and she didn’t immediately return a request for comment. But filing for the state party’s endorsement means she’s now officially part of the process.

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Politics

A Human Skull, A Suicide Bomber’s Vest, Guns – What TSA Agents Found in 2013

TSA agents at Fort Lauderdale Airport in Florida came across a human skull in checked luggage last year

We may not all agree with some of the ways the TSA does its business, but it seems like they’re doing something right.

A shocking number of guns, weapons and explosive devices were pulled from checked luggage at airports by the Transportation Security Administration last year.

Some 1,813 firearms were seized at U.S. airports by TSA agents in 2013 – an increase of more than 16 per cent on 2012, according to the authority’s yearly report.

The weapons, discovered in carry-on bags at checkpoints, amounted to an average of five per day being found – and eight out of ten guns discovered were loaded.

Firearms were found by TSA agents at a total of 205 airports with Atlanta top of the list for the most firearms intercepted (111) in 2013.

After Atlanta, the top airports for weapon interceptions were Dallas/Fort Worth International in Texas (96 guns found); George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston (68 guns); Phoenix Airport (66 guns) and Denver International (51 guns).

Among the terrifying cache was a loaded .380 pistol with eight rounds, discovered on the lower left leg of a passenger at Bradley Hartford Airport in Connecticut.

In Pittsburgh, a loaded .45 with six rounds was found strapped to the ankle of a traveler. 

But it’s not just guns that TSA agents come across – there have been a number of alarming weapons – including one or two that appear straight out of the history books.

At Chicago Midway, a mace was found in a passenger’s bag. The weapon is a spiked metal ball on a chain attached to a wooden stick used to bludgeon victims.

In Indiana, authorities were faced with an inert suicide vest which was a training aid used by an explosives instructor.

While searching clay pots in a checked baggage location at Fort Lauderdale, officers discovered human skull fragments. Although not a threat to security, the area had to be cordoned off as a crime scene.

Ten canisters containing 24-pounds of black powder were discovered in checked baggage at Chicago Midway. 

A live blasting cap was found with an M60 fuse lighter in a passenger’s checked bag at the Manhattan Regional Airport in Kansas.

After an alarm went off at Anchorage airport in Alaska, officers found a 3.2oz flask of black powder, 22 feet of fuse, a large empty CO2 cartridge, and miscellaneous ammunition in a passenger’s bag.

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Politics

Fox News Joins The Racist Against Coke – “This Diversity Thing” Ticked off a Lot of People – Video

Well this shouldn’t come as a surprise, so I wouldn’t spend too much time talking about Fox News and the role they’ve played in dividing this country, putting whites against blacks, rich against the poor, citizens against immigrants, straight folks against ‘The Gays’ and everyone against women and their right to make their own choices.

I will go straight into the present controversy – an inclusive Super Bowl ad by Coke that caused racists people in their mom’s basement all over this country, to rush to their keyboard and tweet their disgust. Fox News is following these people, warning Coke that their inclusive commercial will not be tolerated!

Eric Bolling from Fox apparently had a problem with Coke and their attempt at diversity, what he called “this diversity thing,” explaining that ‘America The Beautiful’ was “the wrong song” to use for their inclusiveness.

 “For whatever you gain in this diversity thing you’re going for, Coke, you blew it with a lot of people who are very, very patriotic about that song.”

“The problem here, and it’s not even bad if you have all the different cultures singing a song, showing America is a mix of different cultures, but don’t put it to ‘America the Beautiful.’ You used the wrong song. You ticked off a lot of Coke drinkers, you ticked off a lot of Americans.”
Shhhhh. Let’s not tell them that the song was actually written by a lesbian.

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New York Politics

Bill de Blasio to Corporations – Time to Pay a Living Wage

New York City’s new mayor, Bill DeBlasio, has had enough of big corporations taking advantage of the city’s welfare system by paying notoriously low wages.

“If we’re subsidizing companies, we have every right to demand a living wage for the people they pay,” DeBlasio told WNYC’s Brian Lehrer on Monday.

DeBlasio is referring to the fact that millions of low wage workers depend on public assistance, like food stamps, to get by. A report in October found that American taxpayers shell out $3.8 billion per year to subsidize worker pay at the country’s top 10 largest fast food chains.

In October, de Blasio stood with fast-food workers in New York City who were protesting for higher wages. “The bottom line is, this is an unsupportable situation where every day hard-working people can’t make ends meet, and the companies involved certainly can do more,” he said.

The mayor is expected to soon introduce legislation expanding living wage protections in New York. Under a proposal introduced during his campaign this past summer, de Blasio would raise the wage for employees at companies receiving city subsidies — including some retail and fast-food restaurants — to $11.75 an hour with benefits.

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Bridget Kelly Politics

Bridget Kelly Invokes 5th Amendment – Will Not Produce Documents

Governor Christie’s former deputy chief of staff, Bridget Kelly, will not turn over documents in response to a legislative subpoena, her lawyer said Monday, making her the second person to invoke constitutional protections against self-incrimination.

The information demanded by a legislative committee about the George Washington Bridge lane closures “directly overlaps with a parallel federal grand jury investigation,” a letter from attorney Michael Critchley, Sr. to the committee’s special counsel states. The letter, obtained by The Record, also cites her right to privacy.

“Moreover, providing the Committee with unfettered access to, among other things, Ms. Kelly’s personal diaries, calendars and all of her electronic devices amounts to an inappropriate and unlimited invasion of Ms. Kelly’s personal privacy and would also potentially reveal highly personal confidential communications completely unrelated to the reassignment of access lanes to the George Washignton Bridge,” Critchley wrote.

Already released records show that Kelly sent an e-mail to a Port Authority executive weeks before the lane closures: “Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee,” it said. Christie fired Kelly last month after the e-mail surfaced. He also cut ties with his former campaign manager, Bill Stepien, whose attorney last week also declined to produce the documents requested by a subpoena

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Politics

Chris Christie Shows Up at Boomer Esiason’s Roast

Roast… Roast… Roast… No, this is not a cheap joke about food because I’m talking about Chris Christie, I just love saying the word Roast.

Roast…

Video.

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Nelson Mandela Politics

Contents of Mandela’s Last Will Revealed

Nelson Mandela left portions of his roughly $4.1-million estate to his wife Graca Machel, family members, staff, schools and the ANC, according to a summary of his will released Monday.

Two months after the death of the 95-year-old South African statesman, lawyers said wife Graca was entitled to half the estate, but may opt to receive only specified assets, including four properties in Mozambique.

Royalties from his books and other projects, as well as his homes in Johannesburg, Qunu and Mthatha were left to a family trust.

The home in Houghton, Johannesburg where Mandela died on December 5 will be used by the family of his deceased son Makgatho.

“It is my wish that it should also serve as a place of gathering of the Mandela family in order to maintain its unity long after my death,” the former statesman wrote.

Mandela’s children each received $300,000 in loans during his lifetime and will have that debt scrapped if it has not been repaid.

Mandela’s other bequeathments reflected a life in politics and championing education.

Mandela gave around $4,500 each to members of staff, including long-time personal aide Zelda la Grange.

The will also gave around $9,000 each to Wits and Fort Hare Universities, and the same amount to three other schools.

The African National Congress, which Mandela led to victory in the first democratic elections in 1994, will receive a portion of his royalties, between 10 and 30 percent of his royalties.

The cash will be used specifically to promote “policies and principles of reconciliation amongst the people of South Africa.”

The will was first written in 2004 and last amended in 2008.

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Politics

Why I Left The Republican Party

Former Nevada Lieutenant Governor Sue Wagner is not alone in her courageous decision to exit the Republican Party. Just last August, I made the same decision and resigned my position as Polk County Republican Party of Iowa Co-Chair. I immediately changed my party affiliation to Independent and later moved forward to officially switch my party affiliation to Democrat. Just as Sue Wagner said, I also stated that the Republican Party has left me. Back in 1996 when I registered to vote as a Republican and supported Robert Dole in the Iowa caucuses, I did not expect to some day welcome the opportunity to vote in the Democratic Party of Iowa caucuses, but that is precisely what I did on Tuesday, January 21 of this year.

Several reasons led me to my decision, and they’re similar reasons to why Wagner says she left the GOP. Republicans misread the electorate in 2012, and I became increasingly aware that I needed a change because the GOP no longer shared my values. The Iowa GOP holds views that are increasingly out of touch and are too extreme for me, and their unwillingness to compromise is on full display every day from local, state and national Republicans.

More.

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pat robertson Politics

Pat Robertson Explains When It’s Okay to Have Genocide – Video

I would say Pat Robertson is at it again, but I’m afraid he never did stop.

In a recent show on his 700 Club,  Robertson took a call from a viewer who asked, “where God told his people to wipe out cities and take their lands, sounds like Islam to me.” Robertson answered that sometimes,  wiping out an entire group of people is okay.

Assuming you have a culture that has 1,000 really bad people in it — they’re murderers, they’re thieves, they’re rapists, they’re having incest, you name it they are doing everything horrible — now if they have children, what’s going to happen? Instead of having 1,000, you’ll have 3,000 or 4,000; then — nothing has changed them — then they’ll pass it on to the next generation and the next thing you know you’ve got 10,000 or 20,000 of them and if it keeps on going you’re going to have a million of them. So what’s the most merciful thing for a loving God to do? It’s to take the thousand and get rid of them. And that’s what He did.

“It sounds cruel but in the long run it’s more merciful,” he continued. “Further, He didn’t want his people to be contaminated by those people…. They had sex with animals, they had incest, they did all of these terrible things and they offered their children as sacrifices to their gods, it was horrible what they did.”

Video

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gun Politics

Gun Nut Pulled Gun on Girl Scout Selling Cookies

Authorities in Temecula, California say that a man pulled a gun on a Girl Scout who was going door-to-door selling cookies on Sunday.

Police responded to an assault with a deadly weapon call. According to CBS Los Angeles, Officials said the victim, a minor, was selling cookies door-to-door when a resident opened his door and pointed a gun at the girl.

The Girl Scout’s father witnessed the entire incident then promptly called police.

The suspect has been identified as 59-year-old John Dodrill. Authorities said Dodrill was taken into custody without incident and a weapon was then seized as evidence in the case.

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Abortions Politics

American Abortion Rate Lowest in Three Decades – Thanks Obama!

The report did not say conclusively that the lowest abortion rate in over 30 years is due to the growing use of contraceptives, but come on. If you prevent the pregnancy in the first place, you obviously have no use for abortions in the future, right? It’s that simple. The report however, is trying to be politically correct. They’re not trying to anger the Republicans who, as you know, are against contraception.

Here’s a Republican talking point you’ve probably already heard – that Obama’s policies encourages abortions. Well if that’s the case, what happened here?

The abortion rate among American women declined to its lowest level in more than three decades in 2011, according to a new report released Monday that is widely considered the country’s most definitive examination of abortion trends.

The 1.1 million abortions reported in 2011 represented a rate of 16.9 per thousand women of childbearing age, down from 2008, when a similar study estimated that 1.21 million abortions were performed at a rate of 19.4 per thousand women.

Resuming a long-term downward trend that stalled in the middle of the last decade, the 2011 rate was far below the peak, in 1981, of 29.3 per thousand, according to the report from the Guttmacher Institute, a private research group that supports abortion rights.

The decline in abortions from 2008 to 2011 was mirrored by a decline in pregnancy rates. The report did not include a detailed analysis of the reasons for these trends, which pose complicated research issues.

But the decline in abortions, the researchers said, appears in part to reflect the growing use, especially among younger women, of nearly foolproof long-term contraceptives like intrauterine devices. It may also reflect the impact of the recession and economic uncertainty, which can lead to fewer pregnancies, births and abortions, according to the authors, Rachel K. Jones and Jenna Jerman.

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