Friend No More: Crony Capitalist Google fades into background in fight to save open Internet

7/11/2014

WASHINGTON — Google, once boastful that it was the leading defender of a free and open Internet, has gone into the shadows.

Since the Federal Communications Commission proposed in May to let cable and telephone companies offer special Internet fast lanes for companies willing to pay extra, lobbyists for Google haven’t visited the agency to intervene, FCC records show. Facebook, the largest social network, also has been absent.

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"Squatter's Rights", nothing a few thousand ticks can't cure

7/11/2014

Squatter nanny tells her side of the bizarre tale

In late July, the family sat down with ABC and told their side of the story. / ABC

The California nanny-turned-squatter breaks her silence and tells her side of this odd tale.

The Bracamante family hired 64-year-old Diane Stretton, whom they hired off of Craigslist. The agreement was for the exchange of free room and board in exchange for nanny services.

But a few months after her hire, the nanny refused to work, and refused to leave.

In late June, the family sat down with ABC and told their side of the story.

Stretton quit working, and began to spend all of her time behind her locked door.

By law, the Bracamante family said they weren't allowed to enter her room. The family has gone to court several times, but Stretton is claiming that she's a legally protected tenant.

The family also found her name on dozens of lawsuits across Southern California - apparently, Stretton likes to sue.

Now, CBS sat down with Stretton to hear her side of the story.

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Anchor Baby Prowlers Caught After Placing Public Safety in Jeopardy

7/11/2014

AMARILLO, TEXAS -- Two male suspects were apprehended after being seen prowling an Amarillo neighborhood in the early morning hours of July 9.

At 2:18 a.m. on July 9, Amarillo police officers were dispatched to the 2100 block of SE 38th on someone prowling in the area.

Upon arrival, officers learned that two young males were seen by residents walking between houses and looking into cars.

Officers tracked a suspect down to another residence in the block and apprehended one male subject hiding in the backyard.

Followup investigation by field officers led to the recovery to the recovery of numerous items that are believed to have been stolen.

Officers recovered items from at least five different auto burglaries that occurred earlier in the night.

Officers recovered a small amount of money, personal identifiers such as credit cards, and several small electronic devices.

Some of these items were returned to the property owner and other items were booked into evidence until the owner can be located.

The suspect is identified as Ernesto Manuel Ponce Jr, 17. He was arrested and booked into Randall County on a charge of Criminal Trespass and Possession of Narcotic Paraphernalia.

Another male juvenile was located in the area.

The juvenile was identified and released back to the parents pending further investigation.

This investigation is ongoing and additional charges are anticipated.

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Fugitive Finder: Rudy Reyna

7/11/2014

AMARILLO, TEXAS -- This week's Fugitive of the Week is Rudy Reyna, 35.

He's wanted out of Randall County for bond forfeiture - 3rd or more DWI Felony.

Reyna was born Jan. 11, 1979. He's 5'9", 173 lbs., with brown eyes and black hair.

Information leading to the arrest of this person may be eligible for up to a $300 reward.

Contact Amarillo Crime Stoppers at (806) 374-4400 or www.amapolice.org. All tips are anonymous.

 

Baby Zetas Caught with Vids Depicting the Butchering of their Victims

7/11/2014

 Brutal Teens ages 16 and 13 led the kidnapping gang

Two minors who led a kidnapping cell of  "Los Zetas",  had in their possession eight videos showing victims of kidnappings being butchered, despite having  paid transom demands, police said today Tamaulipas.

On Thursday, July 3, members of the State Police captured the gang  of "Los Zetas" who were respeonsible for kidnappings on the  streets of Colonia Moderna, Cd. Victoria after an "anonymous complaint advised of the likely disappearance of two people."

The Ministry of Public Security of the state arrested three of the members of the unlikely band of kidnappers, which eventually led to the arrest of  seven other members,” said an official statement from the agency.

The police seized a total of ten members of "Los Zetas" who were led by Francisco Garate Alexis Aguilar, 16 years old, and his girlfriend Karina Isabel García Conde, 13.

After being captured, police confiscated eight videos that show footage of  the murders. In their first statement to authorities, detainees confessed  to belonging to the Zetas operating in the capital city,

They then  admitted to engaging in the  kidnapping and killing of people. Also saying they have killed seven of their hostages. The videos leave no doubt that the children are personally responsible for dismembering kidnapping victims.

As a result of the the videos, authorities were able to identify two of the victims. They were two merchants whose remains were found in a “narco grave” located in the ejido El Olivo.

In recent months, "Los Zetas" have focused their activities on kidnappings in the area, but  authorities in Tamaulipas are notorious for concealing true figures or even that the crime is an issue.

Nuevo Laredo en Vivo

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Unlike Israel, Russia Not Scorned Over Rise of Civilian Deaths in Ukrainian Conflict

7/11/2014

KIEV – Clashes between Government troops and pro-Russian rebels in eastern Ukraine have claimed the lives of 478 civilians in the past three months, the Ukrainian Health Ministry reported on Thursday.

At least “478 civilians have died, including 30 women and seven children,” Deputy Health Minister Vasily Lazorishinets said in a press conference.

The figure more than doubled the number of Ukrainian military casualties on the battlefield since fighting broke out in April with the separatist rebels in the east, which Lazorishinets put at 173.

He added that 1,392 civilians, including 104 women and 14 children, and 446 troops had been injured in the same period.

No figures of casualties have been released on the rebel side, as most of their dead were buried in a hurry on the spot, especially those fallen after Government troops retook the city of Sloviansk last week, or were sent back to Russia, their country of origin, according to pro-Russian separatist sources.

The rebels announced on Thursday that they had killed 22 Ukrainian troops overnight near the towns of Sloviansk and Kramatorsk, which were retaken a week ago by Ukrainian forces.

Kiev last April launched an anti-terrorist operation to recover the eastern regions of Lugansk and Donetsk, under control of the separatists.

The Ukrainian National Security and Defense Council has said that Kiev was planning to besiege the cities of Donetsk and Lugansk to “force the separatists and criminals to disarm.”

A spokesman for Ukraine’s Interior Ministry, Stanislav Rechinski, said last night that the two cities, which together have 1,4 million inhabitants, could be in the hands of Government forces within a month.

Meanwhile, Russian authorities declared a state of emergency on Thursday in six southern regions of the country, due to the number of refugees arriving from neighboring Ukraine.

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SHOCKER: Corruption charges fly south of the border

7/11/2014

Mexican Judiciary Suspects Judge of Mob Ties

MEXICO CITY – The top administrative body of Mexico’s judiciary said it found evidence that a judge suspended two years ago after a series of controversial rulings has connections to organized crime.

Jesus Guadalupe Luna Altamirano and members of his family “made unusual banking transfers” in the amount of nearly 5 million pesos ($385,000), some of it in U.S. currency, the CJF said in a statement.

The sums involved did not appear on the judge’s official financial disclosure reports.

Some of Luna’s rulings from the bench appear to have contravened statutes and precedents handed down by Mexico’s Supreme Court, the CJF said.

Luna, who presided over a criminal court in Mexico City, was suspended in June 2012 pending an investigation of alleged irregularities.

The judge’s 2008 decision acquitting the son of then-fugitive drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman on money-laundering charges sparked controversy.

In 2011, Luna upheld the acquittal of alleged drug trafficker Sandra Avila Beltran, a flamboyant figure known as the “Queen of the Pacific.”

Luna will be given the chance to respond to the findings of the investigation before the CJF decides whether to refer the matter to the Attorney General’s Office for possible criminal prosecution.

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165 Migrants Rescued from Kidnappers in Northern Mexico

7/11/2014

MEXICO CITY – Police rescued 165 Central American and Cuban migrants from kidnappers in the northern border state of Tamaulipas, Mexican authorities said Thursday.

The migrants were being held at two residences in the Gulf port city of Tampico, according to a statement from the Tamaulipas Coordination Group, a multi-agency security task force.

Police discovered the captives thanks to tips from anonymous informants.

The cops arrested three suspects and seized two automatic pistols.

The migrants told authorities that the suspects executed three people in front of them.

Other migrants said they were beaten during their two-week captivity, while some of the women endured sexual assaults.

Separately, seven Honduran migrants were rescued from a hotel in Reynosa, Tamaulipas, just across the border from McAllen, Texas. The owner of the establishment was taken into custody.

The Hondurans had been held captive for more than three weeks.

All of the migrants were turned over to immigration authorities, who contacted their respective home-country governments and notified their families that the former captives were safe, the Tamaulipas Coordination Group said.

A group of 74 migrants was headed toward the U.S. border on Aug. 21, 2010, when armed men intercepted their bus and took them to a ranch outside the town of San Fernando, Tamaulipas.

Migrants headed for the United States are often targeted by Mexican criminal organizations, which kidnap them or try to forcibly recruit them to join their gangs.

In this case, when the migrants refused to join, their abductors decided to kill them.

One of the two survivors notified Mexican marines of the killings.

Marines found the bodies of the 58 men and 14 women after a shootout with gunmen at the ranch that left a marine and three criminals dead.

Mexican authorities blamed the San Fernando massacre on Los Zetas, the country’s most violent drug cartel.

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Gaza's aggressive behavior turns into to sissification after Israeli retaliation

7/11/2014

Playing The "Civilian Card": Gazans run and hide behind mother's skirt like a child on the schoolyard who hit an older kid. Seemingly never to learn that agressive behavior has it's consequences. And using innocent lives of Gazans whom they have placed in jeopardy will not excuse them from the consequences of their own stupidity.


Death Toll from Israeli Operation in Gaza Rises to 81
The Gaza Health Ministry said at least 567 people have been wounded since the start of Operation Protective Edge on Tuesday, 20 of whom are in critical condition

GAZA – At least 81 Palestinians have died and more than 500 have been wounded since Israel launched a major military operation this week in the Gaza Strip, Palestinian officials said on Thursday.

The Gaza Health Ministry said at least 567 people have been wounded since the start of Operation Protective Edge on Tuesday, 20 of whom are in critical condition.

The fatalities include seven people – four women and three children – who died when several homes in the southern town of Khan Younis were hit by an Israeli airstrike, in what was the deadliest single bombing raid since the offensive began.

Three youths also died in an Israeli airstrike while traveling through the Jabaliya refugee camp, in the northern Gaza Strip.

Two-thirds of the fatalities have been women and children who were killed in Israeli attacks on civilian infrastructure, according to witnesses and Israeli human rights group B’Tselem.

Health Ministry spokesman Ashraf al-Qedra added that the number of civilian casualties had increased over the past 48 hours as the Israeli military pounded residential buildings from the air and groups of people gathered along the coast from the sea.

Israel’s air and naval artillery forces launched more than 108 airstrikes on Thursday and have struck 750 targets since the operation began, according to the Israel Defense Forces.

Israel says it launched Operation Protective Edge to prevent rocket attacks from the Gaza Strip.

The IDF says Hamas and other Palestinian militant groups have fired 360 rockets at Israel, 67 of which were intercepted by its Iron Dome missile defense system.

The Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas’ military wing, on Thursday morning claimed responsibility for the rocket attacks against Tel Aviv.

No casualties have been reported in the Palestinian attacks, which on Thursday activated alarm sirens in Tel Aviv and for the first time in the northern Israeli city of Haifa, 165 kilometers (100 miles) from Gaza, and in Dimona, a city in the Negev desert where Israel has a nuclear reactor.

But dozens of Israelis have been treated for anxiety and panic symptoms.

On Wednesday, Israel’s defense minister, Moshe Ya’alon, vowed to increase attacks on Gaza.

“We will continue to hit Hamas and other terror groups in the Strip with heavy blows from the air, from the sea and from the ground so as to ensure the security of Israeli citizens,” Ya’alon said, according to the online version of Arutz Sheva.

Israel has been massing troops on the border with the Gaza Strip and has called up 40,000 reservists as it prepares to launch a ground offensive.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon warned of the dangers of escalation and said the peace process was at stake, as the Security Council prepared to meet on Thursday in an emergency session to discuss the situation.

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Bergdahl Pictured Smiling With Taliban While in Captivity

7/11/2014

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — In a new salvo in the propaganda war with the West, a previously unseen photograph of what appears to be Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl smiling alongside a senior Taliban commander was posted to a Twitter account associated with the Afghan Taliban.

A slew of tweets posted late Wednesday claimed that the former Taliban captive, who appeared thin and pale in the image, was treated well during his five years in captivity.

A Pentagon spokesman dismissed the photo as “100 percent propaganda.” It is not uncommon for captors to release such photos for that purpose, and Bergdahl may have been forced to pose for the camera. NBC News has not been able to determine exactly where and when the image was taken.

Bergdahl, Now Back in US, Requests Peanut Butter

NIGHTLY NEWS

 
 
 

The commander with Bergdahl appears to be Badruddin Haqqani, the son of a former Afghan commander Maulvi Jalaluddin Haqqani and the former operational head of the most powerful Taliban faction. He was killed by a U.S. drone strike in August 2012 in Pakistan’s restive North Waziristan province while filling an explosives-laden pickup truck.

“Bowe #Bergdahl was really impressed when he saw the hospitality of #Taliban He first thought that he will be tortured But he was wrong,” one tweet says. Another explains that after a failed escape attempt “he was seriously expecting #WaterBoarding Electric Shocks & Other Tortures But No ...”

The Pentagon spokesman, Col. Steve Warren, could not confirm that the man in the photo was Haqqani. In an apparent attempt to play down any interpretation of the photo, Warren stressed that Bergdahl was held captive by “terrorists, thugs and killers” for five years, suggesting that Bergdahl had no control over his environment.

A Taliban official told NBC News the terror group did not own the Twitter account that posted the picture, but that it was run by a known sympathizer who worked at an Afghan university and had copied the photo from militants’ Facebook accounts. The picture is tagged with the words "Jundul Haqqani" - Haqqani group.

The account also repeats previous Taliban claims that Bergdahl had accused the United States of lying and that he was ashamed of being American.

Bowe Bergdahl released from hospital

TODAY

 
 
 

Bergdahl disappeared from his post in eastern Afghanistan in June 2009 and was controversially exchanged for five Taliban commanders being held in Guantanamo Bay on May 31.

The military is conducting an investigation into the disappearance after members of Bergdahl’s own unit said he walked away from his post and should face desertion charges. If charged and convicted, he could be forced to forfeit $200,000 in pay accrued during his captivity.

More than five weeks after the U.S. swapped the Taliban prisoners, Bergdahl is in the final phase of his reintegration at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio. On June 25, officials told NBC News that he had not been read his legal rights but anything he said during his medical “reintegration” process could be used against him in a court-martial.

Chuck Hagel: Bowe Bergdahl swap was ‘tough call’

TODAY

 
 
 

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Southern Poverty Law Center via CBS News: Left wing extremists claim Right wing extremists emboldened after Nevada ranch standoff

7/11/2014

Far right wing extremists have been emboldened by the standoff earlier this year between Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy and the federal government,according to a study released Thursday by the Southern Poverty Law Center.

The report, entitled "War in the West" examines the conflict between the U.S. Bureau of Land Management and militiamen who supported Bundy, who owed more than $1 million in grazing fees and fines to the government, despite insisting that he had "preemptive rights" to let his cattle graze on the federally owned land.

The incident came as a result of a U.S. District Court ruling that he had to pay the fees just as any other rancher would. Federal agents rounded up around 400 cattle on the public land, leading to an armed standoff that lasted weeks until authorities released the cattle and withdrew. That action was seen as a victory among anti-government circles, particularly the "Patriot" movement, the study says.

Since that time, other standoffs have taken place in other parts of the West including Idaho, Texas, New Mexico and Utah, where a gunman pointed a weapon at a BLM agent while holding a sign that said "You need to die," according to the report.

Bundy actually enjoyed some high profile support among conservatives as the standoff developed, but lost that support after making some overtly racist comments targeted at African-Americans.

However, Mark Potok, an SPLC senior fellow and co-author of the study warns that this incident and other that have taken place since are a foreshadowing of things to come if the federal government doesn't gain an understanding of what he says is the volatile nature of right wing extremist movements.

"The Bundy ranch standoff may be a preview of things to come if the federal government doesn't come to terms with the true nature of this volatile extremist movement," wrote Potok on the SPLC's website. "Two decades after the deadly debacle at the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, federal officials continue to struggle with their approach to radical-right extremists who threaten and use violence to achieve their political goals."

Ryan Lenz, also a co-author of the study said that the Bundy incident was not spontaneous, but rather intentional and was the largest manifestation of anti-government activity since President Obama was elected.

"What happened in Nevada was not an organic plot, it was a really well thought out plan," he told CBS News in a phone interview. "It was a coordinated effort to bring the threat of violence to the federal government.

"The point we're making is that the government needs to take this seriously, that bloodshed will happen."

Lenz also said the report praises the Department of Justice for bringing back its Domestic Terrorism Executive Committee which originated after the 1995 bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City.

The study also looks at the murder of two police officers by Jerad and Amanda Miller, a married couple who spent time at Bundy's ranch during the standoff and sympathized with the radical right. After the two killed the cops at pizza restaurant in Las Vegas, they left a "Don't tread on me" flag draped over one policeman's body. They then entered a nearby Wal-Mart and engaged in a shootout with police, killing one officer before Amanda Miller fatally shot her husband and then herself.

The SPLC cites the Millers as an example of a movement flamed by wild conspiracy theories, conservative politicians and commentators who they agree with.

"The Millers were only two of the hundreds of militia members, conspiracy theorists and other angry government extremists who responded to Bundy's call for a 'range war,'" reads the report.

Lenz said the Bundy incident was a significant line in the sand for far right extremists because of the issue of land use. Despite being publicly owned land, Bundy felt the area on which his cattle grazed is an area he felt belonged to him through ancestral legacy.

"This particular issue is something the movement has attached itself to," said Lenz. "It seemed to them that the federal government was restricting civil liberties. So this movement is attracting people who are willing to be violent to defend their principles."

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Sellout, Traitor, Establishment Puppet: Boehner disagrees with call for Obama impeachment

7/10/2014

WASHINGTON (AP) — House Speaker John Boehner says he disagrees with calls to impeach President Barack Obama, but asserts that others can make a determination on their own whether the chief executive deserves it.

He made his comments as Sarah Palin and others have come out in recent days for impeachment. Asked what he tells Republicans who ask him, Boehner said he answers that he disagrees with the calls.

Boehner is leading a drive to have the House file a lawsuit challenging some of Obama's actions. He wrote fellow House members recently that the president has declined to faithfully execute the laws of the country. Instead, he wrote, Obama has ignored some completely, selectively enforced others, and at times, created laws of his own.

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‘WHAT A FREAKIN’ LIE’! Reuters, Yahoo busted for bogus headline about Obama at border [pics]

7/10/2014

President Obama really gets around. After all, those funds aren’t gonna raise themselves! In a short span of time this week, the president has spent time in Denver, Dallas, and Austin, where he’s shot pool and raised money for the DSCC, DCCC, and DNC.

But if you ask Reuters, he’s been busy at “the border”:

That photo was taken in Denver. As in, Colorado. As in, not even a border state.

Scroll through Reuters’ slideshow posted at Yahoo! News, and you’ll see pictures Obama in several places — none of which could remotely be considered “the border”:

Lapdogs gonna lapdog!

Editor’s note: The original lead tweet has been replaced for clarity.

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