RED STATE GATHERING DAY 1 AND DAY 2

Via: Red State

[VIDEO] Conservatives grapple with surprise Trump snub

ATLANTA — Michael Pemberton, a 65-year-old conservative from Kentucky, started the day in a good mood. He was attending his second RedState Gathering, and ready to hear from 10 of the Republican Party's presidential candidates. He dug into breakfast — coffee and fruit — and sat down with another conference-goer.

"One of the chaps across me asked, 'Did you hear the news?'" recalled Pemberton. "I thought he was going to tell me that a sinkhole opened up in Kentucky and I couldn't go again. But no: He said, they disinvited Donald Trump. I lost my appetite."

The TV news confirmed it. RedState's outgoing editor-in-chief, Erick Erickson, made an 11th hour call to disinvite Trump after the GOP presidential front-runner told CNN that Fox News's Megyn Kelly had "blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her wherever" when she grilled him during Thursday's presidential debate.

[Erickson: Trump’s words about Kelly simply went too far]

Pemberton grabbed a sharpie and a note card and scrawled out "I AM DONALD TRUMP." He affixed it to his jacket with an American flag pin and grudgingly walked into the conference, determined never to come again.

More than 700 activists had signed up for the gathering, and up to a thousand of them had been expected to join Trump at a Saturday night party at the College Football Hall of Fame. On Saturday morning, the reaction to Trump's exclusion was mixed — and distracting. Annoyance at what seemed to be a politically correct purge competed with annoyance at Trump himself.

"It was really inappropriate to attack Megyn Kelly," said Richard Fonte, 70, an activist who split his time between Texas and Illinois, and strongly supported Gov. Scott Walker (R-Wis.) for president. "That and the fact that he's taking the position that he might run as a third party — that would automatically elect Hillary Clinton."

Fonte's wife, Dulsey, 68, was even happier to see Trump gone: "I find him crude," she said. "I have no sympathy for his candidacy."

Those sentiments had been burbling up on the right, but even 12 hours earlier, Trump's Republican critics had started to soften their tone, and say that the billionaire candidate had tapped into a well of legitimate voter anger. Saturday's burst of anger at Trump was jarring; not everyone at the conference could agree what Trump had even said. Was he making a crude joke about menstruation or wasn't he?

"It's wrong to exclude him and insult him on what people interpret he said as opposed to what he said," said Pemberton. "He was saying that Megyn was seeing blood, in her eyes. As far as 'blood coming out all over,' the first thing I think of is not a woman's menstrual cycle. I think of Jesus Christ, thorns on his head, nail holes in his hands, stigmata."

Via: Washington Post

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Target: Customers’ encrypted PINs were obtained

ATLANTA — Target says that customers’ encrypted PIN data was removed during the data breach that occurred earlier this month.

The company issued a statement Friday that additional forensic work has shown that encrypted PIN data was removed along with customers’ names and card numbers. But Target says it believes the PIN numbers are still safe because the information was strongly encrypted. It says the PIN can only be decrypted when received by its independent payment processor.

Via: Chicago Sun-Times

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Illegal immigrants blockade Atlanta office to halt deportations

Illegal immigrants blockaded a federal office that handles deportations in Atlanta Tuesday morning, and soon after a group of 12 illegal immigrants in Chicago chained themselves to the wheels of a bus they said was headed to the airport to finish deport people.

The moves mark the latest escalation in a campaign by activists to pressure President Obama to use his executive authority to stop almost all deportations. They argue he’s targeting rank-and-file illegal immigrants rather than those with criminal records.

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SEE ALSO: Biden: Feds easing Panamanians’ entry into U.S.

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The activists targeted the Chicago bus in part because it had two high-profile illegal immigrants who have been the subject of an effort to halt their deportation: Octavio Nava-Cabrera, who was put into deportation proceedings after being arrested in a traffic stop, and Brigido Acosta Luis, who the activists said has two U.S. citizen daughters.

Late last week the Obama administration said it would allow illegal immigrant relatives of U.S. troops and veterans to apply for “parole in place,” which would allow them to remain in the country — and the activists Tuesday said they want the same considerations for all illegal immigrants.

“Undocumented, unafraid,” the Atlanta protesters chanted. “No papers, no fear.”

The protests were part of the Not One More campaign, which has staged similar protests in Arizona, California and Louisiana, broadcasting the action on the web.

Via: Washington Times

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Report: IRS refunded $4B to identity thieves

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Internal Revenue Service issued $4 billion in fraudulent tax refunds last year to people using stolen identities, with some of the money going to addresses in Bulgaria, Lithuania and Ireland, according to an inspector general’s report released Thursday.

The IRS sent a total of 655 tax refunds to a single address in Lithuania, and 343 refunds went to a lone address in Shanghai.

In the U.S., more fraudulent returns went to Miami than any other city. Other top destinations were Chicago, Detroit, Atlanta and Houston.

The IRS has stepped up efforts to fight identity theft, but thieves are getting more aggressive, said the report by J. Russell George, Treasury’s inspector general for tax administration. Last year, the IRS stopped more than $12 billion in fraudulent refunds from going to identity thieves, compared with $8 billion the year before.

“Identity theft continues to be a serious problem with devastating consequences for taxpayers and an enormous impact on tax administration,” George said in a statement. The fraud “erodes taxpayer confidence in the federal tax system.”

Thieves often steal Social Security numbers from people who don’t have to file tax returns, including the young, the old and people who have died, the report said. In other cases, thieves use stolen Social Security numbers to file fraudulent tax returns before the legitimate taxpayer files.

The IRS, which takes pride in issuing quick refunds, often sends them out before employers are required to file forms documenting wages, the report said.

“The constantly evolving tactics used by scammers to commit identity theft continues to be one of the biggest challenges facing the IRS, and we take this issue very seriously,” the IRS said in a statement.

“The IRS has a comprehensive and aggressive identity theft strategy that focuses on preventing refund fraud, investigating these crimes and assisting taxpayers victimized by it.”

Via: News-jounral.com

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Catholic Archdiocese: No More Money to Komen Because It Supports Planned Parenthood

(CNSNews.com) – The Catholic Church’s Atlanta archdiocese said that Catholic parishes, missions, and schools that support the Susan G. Komen for the Cure should no longer do so because of the group’s reestablished partnership with the country’s largest abortion-provider, Planned Parenthood, “a group whose goals and activities are in direct opposition to the teachings of the Catholic Church on the sanctity of human life.”

In an Oct. 1 “Statement on Non-Support for Komen Foundation” to priests, deacons, sisters, brothers, principals, business managers, parish secretaries and chancery staff, the archdiocese said: “Until recently, donations to the greater Atlanta affiliate of the Komen fund did not constitute a direct cooperation with evil, because none of the money they raised went to Planned Parenthood. However, the local affiliate was involved in recent events which had the Komen fund initially ceasing all assistance to Planned Parenthood and then reversing itself.”

“According to news reports and Facebook postings by Komen Atlanta, they worked behind the scenes to encourage the national Komen office to resume funding for Planned Parenthood – this public declaration of support for Planned Parenthood is an occasion for scandal,” reads the statement.

“In light of these actions by both the national and the local Komen fund, the Archdiocese of Atlanta has reached the conclusion that support for Susan G. Komen for the Cure by Catholic parishes/missions/schools should be brought to an end,” says the statement.  “We no longer support the Komen fund in any manner because of this very public display of pro-abortion conformity. We found the action of the Komen fund disappointing, discouraging, and we do not see how continued support is possible at this time.

Via: CNS News

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Obama praised Supreme Court affirmative action ruling in 2003, applauded racial ‘set aside plans’

In a June 25, 2003 interview with the Chicago Defender, an urban newspaper serving the city's African-American community, President Barack Obama praised the U.S. Supreme Court for preserving the practice of affirmative action in U.S. university admissions.

Nine years later, Obama's Department of Justice filed an amicus curiae brief with the Supreme Court on Aug. 13, arguing in favor of racial preferences in the admissions department of the University of Texas.

Speaking at Columbia University on Feb. 23, Attorney General Eric Holder said affirmative action may never become obsolete. “The question," Holder said, "is not when does it end, but when does it begin. ... When do people of color truly get the benefits to which they are entitled?” (RELATED: In Harvard essay, young Michelle Obama argued for race-based faculty hiring)

Obama, a state senator and a candidate for U.S. Senate in 2003, praised the late Maynard Jackson in the Defender interview. Jackson, an African-American mayor of Atlanta, died on the day the high court ruled race could be a factor in college admissions. Mayor Jackson, Obama said, was “the architect among big city mayors of effective affirmative action and set aside plans.”

"He structured it in ways that other mayors across the country ended up emulating," said Obama. "His passing is enormous to all of us, but, it is fitting that on the same day he passed we had a Supreme Court that narrowly did the right thing by affirming the basic principle of affirmative action.”