Former EPA official charged with stealing nearly $900K

WASHINGTON –  A former high-ranking official with the Environmental Protection Agency was charged Friday with stealing nearly $900,000 from the agency over 13 years.

John C. Beale, a former deputy assistant administrator in the Office of Air and Radiation, is accused of stealing a total of $886,186 between 2000 and April of this year.

A document filed by the Justice Department says Beale stole the money by collecting bonuses and extra salary.

Beale, 64, of Arlington, Va., faces a maximum of 10 years in prison and financial penalties if convicted. He worked at the EPA for at least two decades under several presidents. He was a top deputy to EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy, who headed the Air and Radiation office from 2009 until taking over the agency last month.

An agency spokeswoman said the EPA is coordinating closely with its inspector general and the Justice Department on the complaint

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Louisiana Sen. David Vitter, the top Republican on the Senate Environment Committee, called the accusations appalling.

"This fraud was occurring for many years at the EPA's critical Air office, and during a period of time that Gina McCarthy was the administrator of the Air office," Vitter said in a statement. "It's clear that further investigations are necessary."

A spokesman for U.S. Attorney Ronald Machen declined to comment.

Via: Fox News Politics

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Egyptian Islamist groups seek truce

CAIRO (AP) — Two of Egypt's former militant groups are offering an initiative to halt the country's political violence, in which supporters of the ousted Islamist president will stop street protests if the military-backed government stops its crackdown on them, the groups' leaders said Monday.

The initiative led by Egypt's Gamaa Islamiya and Islamic Jihad movements, which waged an insurgency in the 1990s, aims to bring dialogue between the military and the Muslim Brotherhood, from which toppled President Mohammed Morsi hails. Morsi was overthrown by the military on July 3 after millions took to the street demanding that he step down.

Morsi's allies had previously insisted that he be restored to power as starting point for any talks, but Islamic Jihad leader Mohammed Abu Samra told The Associated Press that negotiations had no "red lines."

The groups do not speak for the Brotherhood, but the initiative is a new sign of flexibility from the pro-Morsi alliance of mostly Islamist groups. It comes as the Islamists' protest campaign wanes and numbers at their formerly massive rallies dwindle. Hundreds of Brotherhood leaders and organizers have been arrested in the crackdown.

Egypt's worst bout of violence in its 2 ½ years of turmoil was set off when security forces backed by snipers and armored vehicles moved in to break up two sprawling pro-Morsi protest camps on Aug. 14. More than 1,000 people were killed in the raids and other violence over the next several days, mostly Morsi supporters.

"We are paving the way for talks," Abu Samra said over the phone. "We can't hold talks while we are at the points of swords in the midst of killings and crackdowns." He said the groups were "extending their hands" to avoid a bloodier confrontation with the military.

He said that the Islamists will stop demonstrations so long as the military halts its crackdown and stops defaming the Brotherhood in mosques and in the media. Asked if Islamist groups would accept talks without demanding Morsi's reinstatement, he said, "Blood is more valuable than the seat of power."

Via: Yahoo News

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Scarborough's Surprising Support For Voter ID Laws

Joe Scarborough is frequently panned in these parts for his propensity to pummel his presumably fellow Republicans.  So it's noteworthy when the Morning Joe host goes after the left for a change.

It happened on today's show, when Scarborough defended voter ID laws, saying most Americans don't think it's racist to require a photo ID when you show up to vote. and scalding the left for trying fit to politicians in North Carolina and Texas with symbolic KKK hoods.   Scarborough even forced a clearly reluctant Mike Allen of Politico to ultimately acknowledge his point.  View the video after the jump.

Via: Newsbusters

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Morning Bell: Should We Delay or Defund Obamacare?

Conservatives are united in one idea: Obamacare is devastating policy for America. To halt its destructive effects, some are saying Congress should merely delay the law. But to truly stop it, Obamacare must be defunded.

Some conservatives are arguing for postponing the individual mandate and employer mandate for one year. Others add that Obamacare’s new entitlements should be delayed.

Delay is not enough.

Obamacare is far more than the individual mandate, the employer mandate, and the new entitlement spending. It’s a massive, government-centered restructuring of American health care.

Simply delaying Obamacare:

• …doesn’t stop Obamacare from harming people. Regulators could continue to enforce the Health and Human Services (HHS) anti-conscience mandate and issue new Obamacare rules that raise costs and premiums for struggling businesses and families alike.
• …is a gift to the Obama Administration. Federal bureaucrats have missed nearly half of their self-imposed deadlines to get the law up and running. Why provide them more time to make sure thousands of regulations are entrenched in the private health care sector?
• …doesn’t stop Obamacare programs from launching. A 53-page Obamacare timeline shows that in 2014 alone, 27 separate Obamacare programs and requirements are scheduled to take effect.

Via: The Foundry

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A Guide To The Nation's Most Vulnerable Governors

If you're looking for the most interesting gubernatorial races to watch in the coming year, the nation's biggest states are a good place to start.

Democrats Jerry Brown and Andrew Cuomo look like safe bets for re-election in California and New York, respectively. And, despite the pending retirement of Rick Perry, Republicans are confident of maintaining their hold on the governor's mansion in Texas.

But Florida, Pennsylvania and Illinois all feature embattled incumbents whose reelection campaigns will easily cost tens of millions of dollars. Michigan GOP Gov. Rick Snyder could also face a real contest.

In all, 36 states will be voting for governor in 2014. All but a handful will feature incumbents favored for re-election.

List of current United States governors

Two states are holding gubernatorial contests this year. New Jersey Republican Chris Christie is considered close to a lock for a second term, while the open race in Virginia between Republican Ken Cuccinelli and Democrat Terry McAuliffe remains a toss-up.

With no discernible "wave" as yet looking likely to break in favor of one party or the other next year, the overall partisan breakdown — currently favoring the GOP by 30 to 20 — is not likely to change terribly much.

Each contest matters, however. Within each state, the governor is the main political actor and can largely set the agenda as he or she sees fit.

Via: NPR

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MORE GUNS EQUAL LESS CRIME AGAINST WOMEN

Concealed carry laws not only benefit society by lowering violent crime, they benefit women especially by lowering violent crimes most often directed toward them. 

As Breitbart News reported on August 25, concealed carry laws prove guns are part of the solution to gun violence. 

During the early 1990s, as concealed carry laws were being instituted around the country,gun scholar John Lott used FBI stats to show the value of such laws at the county level. For example, in counties where concealed carry laws went into effect, "murder fell by about 8 percent, rapes fell by about 5 percent, and aggravated assaults fell by 7 percent."

Lott also demonstrated that while the passage of concealed carry laws benefit both men and women, they actually benefit women more.

For example, in the category of murder, Lott used FBI crime stats to find that "one additional woman carrying a concealed handgun reduces the murder rate for women by 3-4 times more than one additional man carrying a concealed handgun reduces the murder rate for men."

Lott claimed, "This occurs because allowing a woman to defend herself with a concealed handgun produces a much larger change in her ability to defend herself than the change created by providing a man with a handgun."

Criminals target those whom they believe will be the easiest victims; for this reason women are especially targeted for certain crimes because criminals believe they can physically overtake women easier than men. But a gun in a woman's hand changes this scenario completely. 

A woman who can shoot back is not a victim, and she could be a criminal's worst nightmare.

Via: Breitbart

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[Flashback] ‘Nothing More Impeachable' Than War Without Authorization, Says Constitutional Scholar

(CNSNews.com) - Louis Fisher, a scholar in residence at the Constitution Project who served for 40 years as a constitutional law expert at the Library of Congress, says Americans and members of Congress should understand that President Barack Obama committed a “very grave offense” against the Constitution in taking military action in Libya without congressional authorization.

“I am not going to recommend that the House Judiciary Committee hold impeachment hearings, but I would like members of Congress and the public to say that nothing would be more impeachable than a President who takes the country to war without coming to Congress, who does it unilaterally,” Fisher told CNSNews.com’s Online With Terry Jeffrey.

“So, I would like people to be educated, including members of Congress, to be educated that that is a very grave offense,” said Fisher.

On March 19, President Barack Obama ordered the U.S. military to take actions against the Libyan regime of Muammar Gadhafi.

The day before that, Obama had given a speech stating that a resolution passed by the U.N. Security Council on the previous day that authorized the use of military force in Libya would justify U.S. action there.

Via: CNS News

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Coulter slams media for hyping rare white-on-black crime while ignoring black-on-white crime

On Saturday’s broadcast of “Justice with Judge Jeanine” on the Fox News Channel, conservative commentator Ann Coulter took aim at the media for its handling of interracial crime, accusing it of playing up rare white-on-black crime while ignoring the more prevalent black-on-white crime.

Coulter, author of “Mugged: Racial Demagoguery from the Seventies to Obama,” blamed President Barack Obama for the phenomenon and cited Justice Department statistics on interracial rape to make her case.

“It was much worse in the ’70s, ’80s,” Coulter said. “We’re getting back to it. Obama brought it all back and that’s this racial etiquette from the media. They don’t report on the much more common black-on-white crime, but the very rare man-bites-dog story of white-on-black crime — that gets covered hysterically not because it is a man-bites-dog story, but they act as if, ‘No, this is all too common, it’s the racism in America.’ No, it is very rare. In one example of my book — rape cases, interracial rape cases, the number of black-on-white rapes going back 15 years, 15 years there are about 1,000-to-2,000 a year black-on-white rapes. For 15 years according to the Department of Justice victimization surveyd, the number of white-on-black rapes are either 0.0 or sample too small for a number.”

Coulter referenced the beating death of 88-year-old World War II veteran Delbert “Shorty” Belton and the lack of coverage of it in places beyond the Drudge Report and Fox News as evidence that the media tend to ignore white-on-black crime.

Watch:

Via: Daily Caller
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Barack Obama, Rush Limbaugh and the politics of blame

President Obama blamed some of his problems on Rush Limbaugh the other day. And that may not be a brilliant strategy.

In an interview with CNN anchor Chris Cuomo, the president said that some congressional Republicans tell him privately that they believe defunding ObamaCare is a bad idea, but say they are “worried about what Rush Limbaugh is going to say about me on the radio.”

Really? A guy with a microphone is preventing the president of the United States from getting his way on Capitol Hill? Is Rush that powerful?

Cuomo, to his credit, pressed Obama: “How much of the lack of action in Washington do you put on yourself in terms of blame?” he asked. Obama went Trumanesque, saying “the buck stops with me” but that he is “frustrated” by GOP intransigence.

Let’s unpack this a bit. As the nation’s most powerful radio broadcaster, Limbaugh is an unquestioned force on the right. But when Republicans (who probably do want to defund ObamaCare but don’t want the political risks of a government shutdown) invoke him, what they’re really saying is they fear a backlash from conservatives powered by the likes of Limbaugh.

They don’t want a Tea Party primary challenger. They don’t want their fundraising to dry up. They don’t want leading conservative pundits to turn on them.

So Obama was indulging in a bit of shorthand by saying his problem is El Rushbo—and in the process elevated Limbaugh to his level.

Via: Fox News Politics

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