Iran reportedly confronts US officials at Geneva nuclear talks over GOP letter

Iranian officials reportedly have confronted their U.S. counterparts twice over an open letter from Republican senators to Tehran that warned any agreement on Iran's nuclear program would be unlikely to last beyond President Barack Obama's term of office.
The Associated Press, citing a senior U.S. official, reported that the letter, which was signed by 47 of  54 GOP members, first came up in negotiations on Sunday and was raised again Monday in discussions led by Secretary of State John Kerry and Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif.
Zarif was quoted by Iranian state media after the meeting as saying the topics included the potential speed of a softening of U.S. economic sanctions and the new issue of the letter from the senators. "It is necessary that the stance of the U.S. administration be defined about this move," he was quoted as saying.
Kerry and Zarif met for nearly five hours in Lausanne, the start of several planned days of discussions. Most of the Iranians then departed for Brussels, where they were to meet with European negotiators.
In Brussels, EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini said that "we are entering a crucial time, a crucial two weeks." And German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said that after "more than 10 years of negotiations, we should seize this opportunity."
"There are areas where we've made progress, areas where we have yet to make any progress," British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond said. "But the fact that we're all here talking shows the commitment on both sides to try to reach an agreement."
In Lausanne, the U.S. official wouldn't say how much time the sides spent talking about the letter drafted seven days ago by freshman Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark. The Iranians have called the letter a propaganda ploy, and Zarif joked last week that some U.S. legislators didn't understand their own Constitution. The Obama administration has called the letter "ill timed" and "ill advised," coming weeks before the deadline for a preliminary agreement with Iran on its nuclear program.
Cotton isn't backing down. In his maiden speech in the Senate, Cotton reiterated his view that the deal being discussed would pave Iran's path to a nuclear bomb.
"Iran is an outlaw regime. ... Unsurprising, Iran is only growing bolder and more aggressive as America retreats from the Middle East," Cotton said, adding that Iranian leaders continue to call for Israel's elimination and that Iran is meddling in other nations, including Syria and Iraq.
The U.S. official in Lausanne, who wasn't authorized to speak publicly on the matter and briefed reporters only on condition of anonymity, said that in the end, the talks and a potential agreement depend on Iran showing the world that its nuclear program is exclusively peaceful.
The goal for a full agreement is the end of June.
Republicans argue that a deal would be insufficient and unenforceable, allowing Iran to eventually become a nuclear-armed state. To that end, they've delivered a series of proposals to undercut or block an agreement, including ones that would require Senate say-so on a deal and order new sanctions against Iran while negotiations are underway.
Cotton's letter, the administration and congressional Democrats argue, went further, interfering in the president's execution of U.S. foreign policy. The letter, styled as a U.S. civics lesson, warned Iranian leaders that any deal negotiated by the current administration could be tossed by Obama's successor.
Obama and other officials insist they're not going to make any deal that would allow Iran to acquire nuclear weapons.
The agreement taking shape would limit Iran's uranium enrichment and other nuclear activity for at least a decade, with the restrictions slowly lifted over several years. Washington and other world powers also would gradually scale back sanctions that have crippled the Iranian economy. Tehran says it is only interested in peaceful energy generation and medical research, but much of the world suspects it harbors nuclear weapons ambitions.
Kerry and Zarif plan to regroup in Lausanne on Tuesday. The U.S. secretary of state is to return to Washington by week's end for talks with Afghanistan's leaders, and the Iranians plan to break for the Persian New Year. Officials say talks might restart sometime next week, if necessary. A deal would also require the approval of America's negotiating partners: Britain, China, France, Germany and Russia.
With little time remaining before the end of March, some officials have said the persistent differences mean negotiators will likely settle for an announcement that they've made enough progress to justify further talks.
Such a declaration would hardly satisfy U.S. critics of the Obama administration's efforts. But the senior American official said the goal was to determine by the end of March "if we can get to a political framework that addresses the major elements of a comprehensive deal."
Back in Washington, Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said his panel will likely vote on a bill next week that would require a congressional review of any nuclear deal. The measure would require the president to submit the text of any pact to Congress and bar the administration from suspending congressional sanctions on Iran for 60 days. In that time, Congress would hold hearings and have a chance to approve, disapprove or take no action on the agreement.

Clinton camp issues clarification on deleted emails, claims ‘every’ message was reviewed

Hillary Clinton’s camp late Sunday issued a significant clarification about the steps they say were taken to review thousands of personal emails before they were deleted, claiming her team individually read “every email” before discarding those deemed private.
Clinton spokesman Nick Merrill made the clarification in a written statement to Fox News. This comes after the former secretary of state’s office revealed last week that while more than 30,000 “work-related” emails were turned over to the State Department, nearly 32,000 were deemed “private” and deleted.
This admission raised questions over how her team decided to get rid of those messages. Merrill on Sunday clarified an earlier fact sheet that described some of those methods but did not say every email was read.
“We simply took for granted that reading every single email came across as the most important, fundamental and exhaustive step that was performed.  The fact sheet should have been clearer in stating that every email was read,” Merrill said.
Clinton, a likely Democratic presidential candidate, tried to tamp down the controversy over her exclusive use of personal email while secretary of state during a press conference last week. But the admission that she deleted thousands of messages, and her insistence that her personal server remain private, stirred the ire – and curiosity -- of lawmakers who want greater access to her communications as secretary and complain much of it may be gone forever.
Whether the assurance that “every email” was read before being either deleted or turned over eases those concerns remains to be seen.
“I have zero interest in looking at her personal emails,” South Carolina GOP Rep. Trey Gowdy said on “Fox News Sunday.” “But who gets to decide what’s personal and what’s public? And if it’s a mixed-use email, and lots of the emails we get in life are both personal and work, I just can’t trust her lawyers to make the determination that the public’s getting everything they’re entitled to.”

Racially Fueled Cartoon

White House delivers new warning to Senate on Iran legislation

The White House sent a new warning to the Senate late Saturday saying to stay out of negotiations with Iran over the country’s nuclear program, asserting that potential legislation would have a “profoundly negative impact” on current negotiations.
President Obama’s chief of staff Dennis McDonough told Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker in a letter that legislation sponsored by Corker would go beyond ensuring a role for Congress in a deal with Iran.
"Instead, the legislation would potentially prevent any deal from succeeding by suggesting that Congress must vote to 'approve' any deal," McDonough said. He criticized a provision that would eliminate Obama's authority to lift some sanctions on Iran as part of any agreement.
Talks are set to resume Sunday in Switzerland with the U.S. and other world leaders facing a looming March deadline to reach a framework deal.
"The administration's request to Congress is simple: Let us complete the negotiations before the Congress acts on legislation," McDonough said, adding that he does expect a robust congressional debate if a final deal is struck by the end of June.
McDonough echoed Obama’s threats to veto the legislation should Congress pass it.
Corker and other senators in both parties believe Congress should be able to vote on any agreement to block Iran from developing a nuclear weapon.
"On this issue where Congress has played such a vital role, I believe it is very important that Congress appropriately weigh in before any final agreement is implemented," Corker said in a statement late Saturday.
McDonough’s letter follows one this week that was signed by 47 Republican senators and addressed to Iran’s leaders warning that any agreement with the U.S. could expire once Obama leaves office.
The White House slammed the letter saying it was politically motivated and an attempt to undermine the president’s ability to conduct foreign policy and advance U.S. national security interests.
The GOP letter follows a controversial March 3 speech to a joint meeting of Congress by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in which he warned that the emerging nuclear agreement would all but guarantee that Iran gets nuclear weapons. House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, invited the prime minister to speak without input from the White House and State Department, in what the White House said was a departure from protocol.

US Embassy in Saudi Arabia halts operations amid 'heightened security concerns'

U.S. officials said Sunday they will halt operations at the embassy and consulates in Saudi Arabia for the next couple of days, in response to “heightened security concerns.”
Embassy officials in Riyadh issued the statement, saying telephone lines at the facilities will be down Sunday and Monday and encouraging U.S. citizens in Saudi Arabia to “be aware of their surroundings and take extra precautions when travelling throughout the country.”
The message did not cite a specific security concern or threat nor call for the evacuation of the facilities.
However, an intelligence source told Fox News that it was a car bomb threat that triggered the measures, and was serious enough that the facilities will have only essential staff over the next two days.
The U.S. Consulate Generals in Saudi Arabia are in the cities of Dhahran and Jeddah.
In addition to the embassy directive, the State Department is urging U.S. citizens to “carefully consider the risks of traveling to Saudi Arabia and limit non-essential travel within the country.”
The agency also warned: “Regardless of where you are, it is always advisable to keep your security and situational awareness levels high.”

Muslim college co-founded by anti-Israel firebrand receives accreditation

A California school co-founded by a firebrand who once called for an "intifada" in the U.S. has become the nation's first accredited Muslim college.
Zaytuna College, which operates out of two rented buildings in Berkeley, Calif., and had an enrollment of 30 in 2013, was officially accredited earlier this week by the Western Association of Schools and Colleges—one of the six academic organizations responsible for authorizing public and private colleges and universities in the United States. The certification means the school can apply for various federal and private grants, issue visas to international students and allow students to transfer credits to or from other accredited schools.
“Five years ago, we introduced an undergraduate liberal arts program inspired by the idea of restoring the holistic education that had been offered in the great teaching centers of Islamic civilization,” co-founder and President Hamza Yusuf stated in an open letter on the school’s website on Monday. “Today, Zaytuna’s accreditation roots this vision in a reality recognized within American higher education. It gives our community its first accredited academic address in the United States. And we hope, God willing, that there will be more such Muslim colleges and universities to come.”

“I am curious to know what level degrees Zaytuna will be allowed to offer, since its course catalog is limited and does not encompass the breadth of a standard liberal arts education.”- Stephen Suleyman Schwartz, Center for Islamic Pluralism

The school offers one Bachelor of Arts, in Islamic Law and Theology. Course offerings include various courses on Islamic law, Introduction to the Koran, Ethics, Mathematics and History of the United States.
Yusuf, an Islamic Studies advisor at both Stanford University and University of California Berkeley, is known for being an outspoken critic of extremism. He drew a death decree from ISIS earlier this year for condemning the Charlie Hebdo massacre, in which workers at a French satirical magazine were killed by Islamist fanatics for publishing caricatures of Prophet Mohammad.
But the school's other co-founder, Hatem Bazian, who serves as the school’s chairman of academic affairs, has been accused of whipping up anti-Semitism on campuses across the nation through another organization he helped establish, the anti-Israel Students for Justice in Palestine. And at an April, 2004, rally in San Francisco in support of the Iraqi insurgency, Bazian appeared to call for an uprising in the U.S.
"Are you angry?" Bazian shouted to protesters. "Well, we've been watching intifada in Palestine, we've been watching an uprising in Iraq, and the question is that what are we doing? How come we don't have an intifada in this country? …and it's about time that we have an intifada in this country that change[s] fundamentally the political dynamics in here. And we know every — they’re gonna say some Palestinian being too radical — well, you haven't seen radicalism yet!"
Critics say any school associated with Bazian, who is a senior lecturer at University of California Berkeley, is suspect.
“He’s an anti-Israel activist and he uses academia to further his agenda,” Nonie Darwish, founder of Arabs for Israel and a human rights advocate, told FoxNews.com.

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 (Zaytuna College Facebook Page)

Neither Bazian nor other Zaytuna officials responded to multiple requests for comment.
Some critics who monitor higher education say the idea of a Muslim-centric school is fine in principle. But they are wary of Bazian's links to Students for Justice in Palestine.
"The blend between education and religion is nothing new, Caleb Bonham, editor-in-chief of higher education blog CampusReform.Org, told FoxNews.com. “College is supposed to be a time where the free exchange of ideas is explored. America, throughout our history, has encouraged diversity of thought and the freedom to worship as one desires.
"But Students for Justice in Palestine has proven itself to be an anti-Semitic, anti-Israeli organization since its founding," he added. "Our campuses must remain bastions of freedom of expression. I hope the founders uphold the principles of freedom that are inherent to all men and women."
The school, a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization founded in 2008, received more than $11 million in contributions and grants from 2011 to 2012. However, specific donors were not listed on 990 forms filed with the IRS and the school's website only mentions 12,000 donors without any further detail.

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Officials for Zaytuna recently purchased this building in the Holy Hill neighborhood of Berkeley as part of a $7 million campus expansion program.

The Zaytuna College website details a $7 million plan to build a new campus, a project that includes the recent purchase of a new building, but was put on hold until the accreditation came. According to officials for the Western Association of Schools and Colleges, any academic institution that gains accreditation becomes qualified to distribute federal aid to its students.
“Zaytuna may elect to do this, though they are also seeking for their students to graduate without owing debt,” Richard Winn, senior vice president of the WASC Senior College and University Commission said in a statement to FoxNews.com.
While Zaytuna and its students may benefit from the accreditation, the fact that the school offers only one degree program has some questioning the decision.
“I am surprised that Zaytuna College has received accreditation from the Western Association of Schools and Colleges,” Stephen Suleyman Schwartz, executive director of the Center for Islamic Pluralism, said in a statement to FoxNews.com. “I am curious to know what level degrees Zaytuna will be allowed to offer, since its course catalog is limited and does not encompass the breadth of a standard liberal arts education.”

Obama, first lady fly to Los Angeles on same day but take separate flights

President Obama and first lady Michelle Obama flew to Los Angeles on Thursday for TV appearances but took separate flights, collectively costing taxpayers at least $1 million.
The president went to appear live on comedian Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night show on ABC, while the first lady went to Warner Bros.’ studios in nearby Burbank to tape an appearance on Ellen Degeneres’ popular daytime show that is scheduled to air on Monday.
Obama traveled on Air Force One, which reportedly costs taxpayers at least $200,000 per flight hour. So the price of his five-hour, coast-to-coast trip will be roughly $1 million.
The cost of an Air Force flight like the one the first lady took reportedly costs more than $28,000 an hour.
After appearing on “Late Night with Jimmy Kimmel,” the president attended a Democratic National Committee fundraiser, then left Friday morning for Phoenix to visit a veterans’ hospital before returning to Washington.
The first lady returned directly to Washington.

US to keep more troops in Afghanistan than planned, officials say

The Obama administration is reversing its plans to cut the amount of U.S. troops in Afghanistan to 5,500 by the end of the year, appeasing military leaders who want to keep more troops into 2016, U.S. officials say.
Officials have said the administration is poised to slow the withdrawal of forces and probably will allow most of the 9,800 American troops to remain in the embattled country, although no final decision on numbers has been made yet.
There have also been discussions to keep counterterrorism troops into 2015 and keep some in the country or be near Afghanistan in 2016.
There are about 2,000 U.S. troops conducting counterterrorism missions and military leaders have argued that they will need to continue their efforts to pursue remnants of Al Qeada and to monitor the Islamic State.
Officials expected President Obama to use a Washington visit by Afghan President Ashraf Ghani this month as the time to announce his decision on a new withdrawal timeline.
U.S. officials familiar with the debate said it's not clear yet whether the White House will agree to a small, symbolic decrease by the end of this year or insist on a larger cut. They note that there is some stiff opposition to any change, largely from national security adviser Susan Rice.
In recent weeks, Pentagon leaders, including Defense Secretary Ash Carter, have acknowledged the discussions about slowing the pace of troop withdrawal. But they increasingly are confident that the military will get its way and keep a robust force in Afghanistan beyond year's end.
The administration, however, has shown no inclination so far for going beyond 2016; that's a hard line drawn by the president when he announced the withdrawal plan.
The 2016 deadline is considered to be cruicial for Obama, who promised to remove all troops out of Afghanistan by the end of his presidency, ending America’s longest war.
Military leaders want to keep what they consider a "modest" number of troops in Afghanistan longer in order to protect America's investment and provide as much training and advice possible to Afghan forces. Maintaining a more stable number of troops, military leaders have argued, would allow better support of the Afghans during this summer's fighting season and better prepare them for 2016 battles.
Members of Congress, including Sen. John McCain, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, also have expressed concerns about a sharp drawdown this year. During a hearing last month, McCain, R-Ariz., said a lack of presence in Afghanistan would create a vacuum and "allow terrorists to foment the same disaster in Afghanistan as we have seen in Iraq -- growing instability, terrorist safe havens and direct threats to the United States."
Obama’s original plan was to reduce the number of U.S. troops to 5,500 by the end of 2015 and take embassy-based security forces out by the end of 2016.
When Carter was in Kabul for meetings with his military leaders in February, he told reporters that the new thinking on troop levels was fueled by the improving relations between the U.S. and Afghan governments.
The unity government of Ghani and the chief executive, Abdullah Abdullah, offers new promise for a more effective partnership with Washington in stabilizing the country, Carter said during the visit. U.S. officials grew impatient with the former president, Hamid Karzai, who sometimes publicly criticized the U.S. military and took a dimmer view of partnering with it.
Afghan leaders have made it clear that they would like to have U.S. troops present for as long as possible because of concerns raised by the growing threat of ISIS in Afghanistan.
In testimony before McCain's committee last month, Gen. John Campbell, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, said he has seen evidence of recruiting by IS and signs that that some Taliban members are breaking off and declaring allegiance to that group.
Campbell also told reporters during the Carter visit last month that the withdrawal timeline options he presented were in line with Obama's commitment to withdraw all troops by the end of next year.
Campbell has argued that reducing the force to 5,500 by the end of the year would disrupt efforts to train and advise the Afghan military.
Military leaders also worry that cutting the overall force to that degree would reduce support to the counterterrorism mission and probably force a cut in those efforts.

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Lindsey Graham on Iran negotiations: ‘Obama wants a deal so bad he can taste it’

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C. said Tuesday on “Special Report with Bret Baier” that President Obama’s eagerness to sign a deal with Iran over its nuclear program might not produce the best outcome to the international community’s concerns.  
“This president, Barack Obama, wants a deal so bad he can taste it,” Graham said, adding, “Barack Obama could get a better deal if he wanted one. And I don’t believe he wants a better deal. He just wants a deal.”
Graham advised negotiators to be firm with the Iranians.
“I would tell the Iranians I will guarantee you a fuel supply but you will not be allowed to enrich because we don't trust you,” he said, “And if you really want a bomb, we'll go to war over that. If you want a nuclear power program for peaceful purposes, you can have it.”

Krauthammer: If Obama convinces UN security council to agree to Iran deal, 'sanctions regime will be over'

Syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer said Friday on “Special Report with Bret Baier” that if President Obama gets the United Nations Security Council to agree to a deal the United States, along with its P5+1 partners, negotiates with the Iranians, the sanctions regime will, in essence, be over.

“What's going to happen overnight… the Europeans, the Chinese and the Russians are going to end their sanctions,” he said. “And that means even if we retain our sanctions, it will make little difference, the sanctions regime will be over.”

Krauthammer went on to describe this scenario as the “worst of both worlds.”

“The Europeans will have suspended their sanctions, Iran will be progressing economically, and we will have given Iran an excuse not to honor the agreement. So we'll have no inspections, no control, and nothing,” he said.

In short, if the president goes to the  Security Council, Krauthammer says he’ll have “utterly defeated Congress,” and moreover, “completely overstepped his own authority” by taking an action regardless of the legalities.

VA program to provide private care stumbling out of the gate

A year after explosive accusations that patients had died waiting for appointments at the VA Medical Center in Phoenix, Arizona, the administration’s path to making health care more accessible for America’s veterans remains on shaky ground.
Critics say a program rolled out to give certain veterans the option of government-funded private care is experiencing serious bumps: according to reports, only 27,000 vets have taken advantage of the Choice Card program since it was launched in November.
Technically, to be eligible to see a non-VA doctor, a veteran must be at least 40 miles away from the nearest VA hospital, or have waited at least 30 days for an appointment.
But veterans groups say confusion about eligibility remains the big problem – not everyone qualifies, but some vets who thought they would reported they were turned away. Some say the process isn’t clear, and bureaucratic red tape has led to conflicting messages to veterans about whether or not they can access the system. Others have just gotten responses that weren't very helpful.
Air Force veteran Pat Baughman, for example, told Fox News he lives about 50 miles away from the nearest VA hospital in Bay Springs, Miss. -- approximately a one-hour drive. But when Baughman called the Choice Card phone number last November, he was told to drive more than three hours away to a hospital in Natchez, Miss.
“It didn’t make sense at all. I told them that’s longer than what I’m driving now. So they said they’d get back with me,” Baughman said, adding he received a call the next day and was told to drive to another location instead -- two hours away.
Baughman told FoxNews.com he finally gave up on the program and is using Medicare to pay his medical bills at a local doctor.
He's not alone in his frustration. According to a survey conducted by the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) in February, 80 percent of the 1,068 respondents who believed they were eligible to see a private doctor in lieu of VA care found out they were not. It's unclear whether this is due mostly to misperceptions about the program by veterans, or missteps by VA officials.
“Here we are in March and there is a lot of confusion,” said Garry Augustine, executive director of the Disabled American Veterans (DAV), which is advocating with other major veterans organizations for some clarity in the legislation. “I think when you rush into a new program you are going to have growing pains.”
President Obama made his first visit on Friday to the scandal-scarred Phoenix center and referenced Choice Card -- praising the program, while acknowledging there was more to do in restoring trust in VA programs overall. Congress passed that Choice Card legislation last July, after an inspector general report on mismanagement and manipulation of wait-time data fueled calls for VA reform. The scandal also resulted in the resignation of VA Secretary Eric Shinseki in May.
Cards went out to eligible vets first, and then to all 9 million vets who currently receive VA care as of Aug. 1 -- in case they, too, meet the eligibility standards. It is up to the card holder to call the VA to see if they qualify and if so, they are then sent to a third-party administrator for a list of participating doctors.
One area of confusion is that according to the rules, a veteran must be 40 miles away from the nearest VA -- “as the crow flies.” But this can lead to unequal treatment, since residents in areas with winding roads, or simply crowded roads, could face a longer drive than others.
Augustine said about 500,000 should be eligible under the distance requirements, but the "as the crow flies" standard is throwing everything off. He and others are behind legislation that would clarify the rule to accommodate a 40-mile driving distance.
"The VA is construing the eligibility criteria as it relates to the 40-mile rule so narrowly that it is excluding too many who are far away from the care that they need,” wrote a group of senators to VA Secretary Robert McDonald on Feb. 25, urging him to not only consider tweaking the distance requirement, but to look at reports that veterans who need specialty care should be able to access that, even if there is a VA clinic that does not provide specialists within the 40-mile spectrum.
This was a problem for Minnesota veteran Paul Walker, who has cancer. He told local KARE-11 that he was turned down for private care for cancer treatment because there was a VA clinic within 20 miles of his home -- but the closest VA hospital which offers the treatment he needs reportedly is more than 50 miles away.
"I tried using it and I got flatly turned down," said Walker, who told the network that at the clinic, "all they do is dental work there and eye work and some basic kinds of different minor things... but I have cancer stage 4."
So, he said, "I don't get a choice. I get to die. So, to me that's not a choice."
Rep. Tim Huelskamp, R-Kan., has 63 counties and no VA hospital in his district. He also is joining members in moving legislation that could help people like Walker. He told McDonald in a recent hearing that he has been fielding complaints from veterans on this issue, too.
“I got an email by a veteran who drives 340 miles one way for cardiology,” he said. “If the VA choice program can’t provide something closer for him then we have to re-look how we are implementing” the program.
The Choice Card program was allocated $10 billion and is supposed to be temporary until the system gets up to speed with taking care of veterans in house, which would mean getting through the backlogs plaguing the nation’s VA hospitals. Aside from the Choice Card, there are other separate options for veterans to access private care, but veterans have to be referred by the VA directly, said Augustine.
Sen. Jerry Moran, R-Kan., who was one of the senators on the recent letter to McDonald, says he doesn’t feel the VA’s heart is into providing private care.
“The concern I have is that the VA has a mentality against outside care, even in the circumstances of (when veterans) can’t get care within 30 days or within 40 miles,” Moran said in a statement.
For his part, McDonald has said he, too, is not satisfied with the low number of veterans accessing the new program and has agreed the complaints are valid.
“We’re talking about how we can do a better way of marketing it,” he said in the February hearing at the House Veterans Affairs Committee. Further addressing the distance issue in relation to specialty care, he said, “distance from the place where you can’t get the service seems like a relatively weak measure." As for the “crow flies” issue, “we can look at the 40 miles, change the interpretation ... so we can make the program more robust. I am for whatever it takes to satisfy veterans.”
A representative with the VA did not return a request for comment on Friday.
Augustine says that consistency and communication and anything they can do to end the confusion –

Gitmo detainees 'splash' guards daily with human waste, Marine general tells lawmakers

Hard-core detainees at Guantanamo Bay routinely hurl their waste and vomit at their guards in daily, stomach-turning acts of defiance, a top Pentagon official told lawmakers.
"Splashing," as Marine Gen. John Kelly, the commander of U.S. Southern Command, called the practice in testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee, is just one of the occupational hazards faced by the men and women guarding some 122 prisoners who remain at the compound. Kelly later elaborated that the term referred to throwing "a little cocktail" of "feces, urine, sperm, vomit" at the guards.
Guards have also been assaulted by prisoners and kneed in the groin, according to Kelly.

"If they can assault the guards physically, they'll do it."- Marine Gen. John Kelly

"If they can assault the guards physically, they'll do it," he said, vowing "I will not back off" from protecting the guards.
Abusive prisoners are restrained and sometimes moved to single cells, he said.
Kelly also said he was troubled by recent rulings from two military judges restricting female guards from dealing with several prisoners - including 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who complained that it was against Islam.
"Call me crazy -- that sounds like gender discrimination," Kelly said. "I'm also ashamed that I'm doing it," he said of limiting the duties of female guards."

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Lt. Gen John Kelly told lawmakers he will protect the men and women who serve under him. (Fox News Photo)

Word of the disgusting practice of terrorists throwing their bodily fluids at guards first surfaced last year, when Army Col. David Heath, the Guantanamo camp commander, said "splashing" by the prisoners was a near daily occurrence.
"In my experience, in the last four months it happens probably once a day," Heath told Agence France-Presse. "They don't discriminate in splashing. If you are at the right place at the wrong time, they'll splash whoever they can splash."
President Obama has vowed to close Guantanamo Bay, freeing dozens of detainees, including five who were traded for accused deserter Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl. Of those still at the facility, 55 have been cleared for repatriation or release to another country that will accept them, a Pentagon spokesman told Military.com.
Kelly said that the recidivism rate for those released from Guantanamo ranged as high as 30 percent, though the White House and State Department have maintained that the rate was closer to six percent.

Lawyers say Canadian-born Cruz eligible to run for president

While questions about Canadian-born Sen. Ted Cruz’s eligibility to be president haven’t drawn much attention, two former Justice Department lawyers have weighed in with a bipartisan verdict: Cruz, they say, is eligible to run for the White House.

Neal Katyal, acting solicitor general in the Obama administration, and Paul Clemente, solicitor general in President George W. Bush’s administration, got out in front of the issue in a Harvard Law Review article.

“There is no question that Senator Cruz has been a citizen from birth and is thus a ‘natural born Citizen’ within the meaning of the Constitution,” they wrote.  

Anti-Cruz “birthers” had questioned the Texas Republican senator’s eligibility to be president, challenging his citizenship status because he was born in Canada.  Two years ago, Cruz released his birth certificate showing his mother was a U.S. citizen born in Delaware, presumably satisfying the requirements for presidential eligibility as a “natural born citizen.”

The law review article, “On the Meaning of ‘Natural Born Citizen”, asserts that the interpretation of the term was settled in Cruz’s favor as early as the 1700’s. The lawyers wrote that the Supreme Court has long used British common law and enactments of the First Congress for guidance on defining a “natural born citizen.”
 
“Both confirm that the original meaning of the phrase ‘natural born Citizen’ includes persons born abroad who are citizens from birth based on the citizenship of a parent,” they wrote. They concluded someone like Cruz had “no need to go through naturalization proceedings,” making him eligible. Cruz is still weighing a presidential run.

Last month, Cruz addressed the citizenship issue during a question-and-answer session with moderator Sean Hannity, of Fox News, at the Conservative Political Action Conference.  “I was born in Calgary. My mother was an American citizen by birth,” Cruz said.  “Under federal law, that made me an American citizen by birth. The Constitution requires that you be a natural-born citizen.”

Hillary Cartoon

Professors: US flag symbolizes racism, should not be displayed on campus

A group of university professors has signed a letter showing their solidarity with students who tried to ban the American flag at the University of California, Irvine – because they said Old Glory contributes to racism.
“U.S. nationalism often contributes to racism and xenophobia, and that the paraphernalia of nationalism is in fact often used to intimidate,” read a letter obtained by the website Campus Reform.

A group of Californian lawmakers is working on a bill that that would prohibit publicly funded universities from banning the American flag.

Hundreds across the nation have signed the letter – including some U.C. Irvine professors, Campus Reform reported.
"We admire the courage of the resolution's supporters amid this environment of political immaturity and threat, and support them unequivocally" the letter stated.
How those professors can sleep at night knowing their salaries are paid for by a bunch of xenophobic racists is beyond me.
On March 3 the U.C. Irvine student government association voted 6-4-2 to remove Old Glory from a campus lobby for the sake of cultural inclusivity.
The un-American knuckleheads blathered on about how "the American flag has been flown in instances of colonialism and imperialism."
Breitbart quoted an unnamed student who said the student government association feared the flag might hurt the feelings of illegal aliens.
“There were people who were like, ‘the flag triggers me’ – that was their exact wording, too,” the student said.
Over the weekend, the executive leadership of student government met and vetoed the legislation and by Monday the flag was once again posted in the campus lobby.
“Our campus is patriotic and proud,” student government President Reza Zomorrodian told me. “We did something right for our campus.”
A March 10^th legislative meeting to discuss the controversy was canceled after the university received a “viable threat of violence.”
While the threat was not specific, university officials said they were taking the threat seriously and urged students to be diligent.
“Regardless of your opinion on the display of the American flag, we must be united in protecting the people who make this university a premier institution of higher learning,” Chancellor Howard Gillman wrote in a statement posted on the university’s website.
Meanwhile, a group of Californian lawmakers is working on a bill that that would prohibit publicly funded universities from banning the American flag.
Here's how it should work: you ban the flag -- we ban your student loans.
I'm old school. Where I come from, you salute Old Glory, you don't toss it in a closet. You don't ban it.

Convicted illegal immigrants arrested in ICE sweep kept in US under Obama action

WASHINGTON –  Federal agents in a sweep targeting the most dangerous criminal immigrants arrested 15 people who have been allowed to remain in the U.S. under President Barack Obama's executive action intended to protect children who came to the U.S. years ago with their parents, The Associated Press has learned.
Fourteen of the 15 had been convicted of a crime, the Homeland Security Department confirmed late Thursday. In at least one case, the Obama administration renewed the protective status for a young immigrant after that person's conviction in a drug case, a U.S. official briefed on the arrests said.
One of the eligibility requirements for the program is that immigrants not have a criminal history. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because this person was not authorized to discuss the matter by name.
It was not immediately clear when 13 of the immigrants were convicted or what their crimes were. They were arrested by U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement. The answers to those questions could undermine the integrity of the government's program, since eligibility is reserved for ambitious, young immigrants enrolled in school or who graduated and who would benefit American society.
None of the names of the immigrants was disclosed. One of the young immigrants arrested hadn't been convicted of a crime, but was arrested after being found armed with a gun, the official said.
Homeland Security spokeswoman Marsha Catron said eight other people arrested during the sweep had received the protective status at one point, including three who had it revoked. Catron did not provide additional details.
Under the program, known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, more than 675,000 young immigrants since August 2012 have been granted a work permit and reprieve from deportation.
"With few fraud detection measures and effective background checks in place, it's no surprise that ICE arrested over a dozen DACA recipients last week, most of whom had already been convicted of a crime," said House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte. "I and other members of the House Judiciary Committee have expressed concern about this for years."
Goodlatte, R-Va., and other Republicans have long decried Obama's executive immigration as a form of backdoor amnesty that circumvents Congress.
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, said the case "sheds light on what appears to be a haphazard and risky vetting process by an administration that is very interested in finding creative and possibly unconstitutional ways for people to stay in the country."
Catron said U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services "is examining these cases to determine the appropriate course of action, which may include a denial or termination of deferred action."
The sweep also captured five immigrants with protective applications pending and 19 others who had already been denied protection from deportation under the program.
Earlier this week ICE Director Sarah Saldana said the operation focused on "the worst of the worst criminals."
"This was a targeted enforcement operation, aimed specifically at enhancing public safety," Saldana said. "It exemplifies our core mission, by taking dangerous criminals off the streets and removing them from the country we are addressing a very significant security and public safety vulnerability."
ICE agents arrested 2,059 convicted immigrants, including more than 1,000 people who had multiple convictions. More than 98 percent of those arrested in the weeklong operation were a top priority, Saldana said.
In November, Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson announced new deportation priorities as part of Obama's planned expansion of programs to shield millions of immigrants from deportation.
The top priority includes immigrants suspected of being terrorists, gang members, convicted felons and those caught crossing the border illegally. The second priority includes immigrants convicted of three or more misdemeanors or a single serious misdemeanor, such as drunken driving or domestic violence.
Homeland Security Department documents say participation in the program can be revoked at any time. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, which approves applications, reported to the House Judiciary Committee last year the government stripped that protection from 113 people as of August. The revocations included one case of gang membership, one aggravated assault, 11 driving-under-the-influence cases and 11 errors by USCIS, according to the committee.
Obama's planned expansion of the protection programs has been put on hold by a federal judge in Texas presiding over a lawsuit filed by 26 states to stop the effort. In February Judge Andrew Hanen temporarily blocked the expansion plans, which included granting protections and work permits to parents of U.S. citizens and legal permanent residents. On Thursday the U.S. government asked an appeals court to lift the temporary hold on the expansion.

Clinton has received $16 million in post-presidency benefits

Former President Bill Clinton has received nearly $16 million in taxpayer funds since leaving the White House, covering everything from his pension to personnel to benefits -- and renewing questions over how much taxpayers really should spend on ex-presidents who make millions after leaving office.
A new Politico report and analysis examined the payments since he left office in 2001, and claimed it amounts to more than any other ex-president has received. Meanwhile, Politico points out, Clinton has a personal annual income that beats all the other living former presidents. His $15 million advance -- then a record -- for his 2008 memoir was just a sliver of his earnings. According to reports he's made more than $106 million in speaking fees alone since 2001.
Clinton’s wife, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, also has earned millions in speaking fees -- and released a memoir, for which she reportedly got a $14 million advance, last year. In the first 16 months after leaving Foggy Bottom in 2012, she made at total of $12 million in personal income, according to Bloomberg.
This is a far cry from the picture of destitution that lawmakers feared might face ex-presidents if they did not pass the Former Presidents Act in 1958. Many former commanders-in-chief were in fact personally wealthy, but some were not. Harry S. Truman, according to a report by the Congressional Research Service, had numerous financial problems after he left office in 1953, which became the impetus for the act. The FSA affords a pension and money for numerous expenses, including for personnel, travel costs, health benefits and office space, for as long as the former presidents live.
From 2001 to 2014 Clinton has received a roughly $200,000 annual pension (all presidents received the same level of pension in 2014). Politico reported that the federal money, though, has also gone toward boosting the salaries of some employees of the Bill, Hillary and Chelsea Clinton Foundation. And nearly $1 million went toward equipment and communications-related costs, according to Politico.
While Clinton has gotten the most since 2001, ex-President George H.W. Bush is catching up, according to CRS. He received the second-highest amount of benefits -- $14 million since 2001. Meanwhile, George W. Bush, who has received $7 million from the government since 2009, spent marginally more than Clinton on office space in 2014 -- $420,000 for an office in Dallas, Texas, compared with Clinton’s $415,000 digs in Manhattan.
Criticism of the FSA might someday lead to reform of the law. Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, has already introduced a bill that would cap the full package of annual benefits at $400,000.

ISIS accepts Boko Haram's allegiance pledge

A spokesman for the ISIS terror group said Thursday that it had accepted a pledge of loyalty from Nigeria-based Boko Haram that was made last weekend.
ISIS' media arm, al-Furqan, released an audio statement by spokesman Abu Mohammed al-Adnani that claimed the group's self-proclaimed caliphate had expanded to West Africa. al Adnani had previously urged fighters from around the world to migrate and join Boko Haram.
The announcement came as both groups struggled against increased military pressure in recent days. ISIS is battling against Iraqi forces seeking to recapture Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit, while coming under fire from U.S.-led coalition air strikes in other parts of the country and in Syria.
Boko Haram, meanwhile, has been weakened by a multinational force that has dislodged it from a score of northeastern Nigerian towns. But its new Twitter account, increasingly slick and more frequent video messages and a new media arm all were considered signs that the group is now being helped by ISIS propagandists.
Then on Saturday, Boko Haram leader Abubakar Sheka posted an audio recording online that pledged allegiance to ISIS.
"We announce our allegiance to the Caliph of the Muslims ... and will hear and obey in times of difficulty and prosperity, in hardship and ease, and to endure being discriminated against, and not to dispute about rule with those in power, except in case of evident infidelity regarding that which there is a proof from Allah," said the message.
J. Peter Pham, director of the Africa Center at the Atlantic Council, a think tank in Washington, noted ISIS' quick acceptance of Boko Haram's allegiance and said that the bond highlights a new risk.
"Militants finding it increasingly harder to get to Syria and Iraq may choose instead to go to northeastern Nigeria and internationalize that conflict," he said.
The Boko Haram pledge of allegiance to ISIS comes as the militants reportedly were massing in the northeastern Nigerian town of Gwoza, considered their headquarters, for a showdown with the Chadian-led multinational force.
Boko Haram killed an estimated 10,000 people last year, and it is blamed for last April's abduction of more than 275 schoolgirls. Thousands of Nigerians have fled to neighboring Chad.
The group is waging a nearly 6-year insurgency to impose Muslim Sharia law in Nigeria. It began launching attacks across the border into Cameroon last year, and this year its fighters struck in Niger and Chad in retaliation to their agreement to form a multinational force to fight the militants.
Boko Haram followed the lead of ISIS in August by declaring an Islamic caliphate in northeast Nigeria that grew to cover an area the size of Belgium. ISIS had declared a caliphate in vast swaths of territory that it controls in Iraq and Syria.
The Nigerian group has also followed IS in publishing videos of beheadings. The latest one, published March 2, borrowed certain elements from IS productions, such as the sound of a beating heart and heavy breathing immediately before the execution, according to SITE Intelligence Group.
In video messages last year, Boko Haram's leader sent greetings and praise to both ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and leaders of Al Qaeda. But Boko Haram has never been an affiliate of Al Qaeda, some analysts surmise because Al Qaeda considers the Nigerians' indiscriminate slaughter of Muslim civilians as un-Islamic.
Recent offensives have marked a sharp escalation by African nations against Boko Haram. An African Union summit agreed on sending a force of 8,750 troops to fight Boko Haram.
Military operations in Niger's east have killed at least 500 Boko Haram fighters since Feb. 8, Nigerien officials have said.
Members of the U.N. Security Council proposed Thursday that the international community supply money, equipment, troops and intelligence to a five-nation African force fighting Boko Haram.

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ISIS assault on civilization targets relics once saved from looters

When Jabbar Jaafar watched video of ISIS members with sledge-hammers smashing artifacts as old as antiquity, the Iraqi-born cultural activist was outraged over a loss he described as immeasurable.
Jaafar's anger at the destruction of Iraqi artifacts, relics and statues by terrorists prompted him and his colleague, Iraqi archeologist Abdulamir Al Hamdani at Stonybrook University, to protest outside the White House Tuesday with 100 other cultural activists. Jaafar and Al Hamdani work with the group Saving Antiquities for Everyone, or SAFE, an organization founded in 2003 in response to the looting of the Iraq Museum during which thousands of objects were taken -- some 3,000 to 7,000 are still missing.
"I couldn't sleep that night," Jaafar said, after watching the videotaped destruction by ISIS of artifacts in Mosul last month. "These objects are as old as civilization."

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A protester is seen Tuesday outside the White House to urge the administration to stop ISIS from destroying ancient artifacts in Iraq and Syria. (Marie Helene Carleton/Four Corners Media)

"ISIS is destroying the heritage of mankind," said Jaafar, who came from Iraq to the U.S. in 2008 and worked for the Iraqi Cultural Center in northern Virginia. "These pieces -- more than 3,000 years old -- are gone forever. They can never be replaced."

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Protesters are seen Tuesday outside the White House to urge the administration to stop ISIS from destroying ancient artifacts in Iraq and Syria. (Marie Helene Carleton/Four Corners Media)

The latest target of the Islamic State is Hatra, a 2,000-year-old city and archaeological site in northern Iraq that had parts demolished by ISIS militants last week, according to Kurdish officials. The terrorists damaged and looted the city one day after bulldozing the historic city of Nimrud.
Hatra, located 68 miles southwest of the city of Mosul, was a large fortified city during the Parthian Empire and capital of the first Arab kingdom. A UNESCO world heritage site, Hatra is said to have withstood invasions by the Romans in A.D. 116 and 198 thanks to its high, thick walls reinforced by towers. The ancient trading center spanned 4 miles in circumference and was supported by more than 160 towers. At its heart are a series of temples with a grand temple at the center — a structure supported by columns that once rose to 100 feet.

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In this July 27, 2005 file photo, the face of a woman stares down at visitors in the Hatra ruins, 200 miles north of Baghdad, Iraq. Iraq's minister of tourism and antiquities told the AP on Saturday that the government is investigating reports that the ancient archaeological site of Hatra in northwestern Iraq is being demolished by militants from the Islamic State group. (AP)

"The destruction of Hatra marks a turning point in the appalling strategy of cultural cleansing under way in Iraq," said Irina Bokova, the director-general of UNESCO, and Abdulaziz Othman Altwaijri, director general of the Islamic Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (ISESCO) in a joint statement.
"With this latest act of barbarism against Hatra, [the IS group] shows the contempt in which it holds the history and heritage of Arab people."
The Sunni extremist group, which currently controls about a third of Syria and Iraq, is bent on demolishing any symbols it says promotes idolatry and violates its interpretation of Islamic law.
A video ISIS released last week shows militants smashing artifacts in the Mosul museum -- the majority of which came from Hatra. In January, the terror group also burned hundreds of books from the Mosul library and Mosul.

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In this July 27, 2005 file photo, a temple to the Shamash sun god still stands over 1,750 years after the Sassanian empire razed the Mesopotamian city of Hatra, 200 miles north of Baghdad, Iraq. (AP)

On Friday, the group looted artifacts from Nimrud, a 3,000-year-old city in Iraq, and bulldozed it in a move United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon declared "a war crime."
"Ancient Mesopotamia is really the cradle of civilization -- where we saw the first farming, the first cities, the first writing," Jack Green, chief curator at the Oriental Institute Museum at the University of Chicago, told FoxNews.com.
"There's a huge amount of knowledge and that knowledge is being destroyed systematically," Green said. "They’re not only destroying images of things – like artwork – but they're also looting artifacts and then smuggling them away."
The black market for ancient artifacts is a profitable avenue for ISIS as it continues to build its funds.
Green is urging people worldwide not to purchase antiquities, saying, "You may be acquiring objects that were taken from these sites."
"If so, you are supporting ISIS," Green said.

"ISIS is destroying the heritage of mankind."- cultural activist Jabbar Jaafar

The international group The Antiquities Coalition on Wednesday called for the U.S. and other nations to crack down on the sale of looted artifacts, acts considered war crimes under international law.
“ISIS is arming its campaign of terror in part by selling the past and robbing future generations of our history,” said Deborah Lehr, co-founder of The Antiquities Coalition. “We must constrict the terrorists’ ability to profit from the sale of plundered antiquities.
“If we don’t act now, there may be no past left to protect," she added. "With each artifact looted and sold onto the international market, only criminals, insurgents, terrorists — and the most unscrupulous of collectors — profit. The rest of us all lose.”
The Islamic State's push to demolish history hasn't hit Baghdad, where officials reopened Iraq's National Museum on Saturday -- more than a decade after some 15,000 objects were stolen during the U.S. occupation of the country. According to the AFP, the museum opened its doors earlier than expected in response to the destruction of artifacts in Mosul last month by ISIS.
"The events in Mosul led us to speed up our work and we wanted to open it [the museum] today [Saturday] as a response to what the gangs of IS did," Qais Hussein Rashid, the deputy tourism and antiquities minister, told AFP.
"This is a very happy day," he said.
The museum, also known as the Baghdad Archaeological Museum, contains exhibits ranging from bone and stone tools used 100,000 years ago by Stone Age hunter-gatherers in modern-day northern Iraq, artifacts from the Sumerian and Old Babylonian dynasties, including 5,000-year-old carved limestone statues, and numerous relics and treasures from Babylon, the rise of Islam more than 1,000 years ago and modern times.
Iraqi museums, mosques, churches, schools and government buildings are awash in priceless artifacts, but the embattled nation's historians and archaeologists fear for what is being lost every day. The Baghdad Museum's website features a terse indictment of the terror group on an all black homepage.
"2015: ISIS destroys what is left of ancient history," it reads.

Jews in Baltics fear creep of anti-Semitism

Jews in the Baltics fear a series of disturbing events in the three-nation region of Eastern Europe may be signaling a revival of the Holocaust-era hatred that once nearly wiped out their numbers.
Across the countries of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, Jewish leaders say their communities are feeling increasingly uncomfortable as anti-Semitism once again appears to be on the rise. An Estonian museum exhibition mocking the Holocaust, a stage musical celebrating the life of a notorious Latvian Nazi mass murderer and the repatriation of the remains of a Lithuanian leader  long linked to Nazis have all contributed to a climate of hate that has Jews on edge.
“We have to say that the support of Hitler and rewriting history to turn Hitler into a liberator of this area is not a western value,” Yiddish scholar Dovid Katz, founder of the DefendingHistory.com website, told FoxNews.com. “If you’re repatriating Nazi war criminals to be re-buried and honored as part of national history, that is not behavior compatible with western ethics and values.”

“We have to say that the support of Hitler and rewriting history to turn Hitler into a liberator of this area is not a western value.”- Dovid Katz, Yiddish scholar

Katz has been amongst the most vocal objectors to a growing list of questionable events in the Baltics, including the 2012 repatriation from the U.S. to Lithuania of the body of wartime leader Juozas Ambrazevicius Brazaitis. He was re-buried with full honors, endorsed by the Lithuanian government, despite having been a Nazi puppet during his brief tenure. Brazaitis was accused of overseeing the establishment of a concentration camp, and also signed off on the establishment of the Kaunas ghetto.
Although a 1975 U.S. posthumous investigation into Brazaitis’ wartime activities cleared him of Nazi activities, critics suspected his record was scrubbed to spare the U.S. of embarrassment for having granted him citizenship.
After complaints from Jewish groups, Lithuania’s much heralded Museum of the Genocide in the capital, Vilnius, only recently created a section acknowledging the annihilation of the once flourishing Lithuanian pre-war Jewish community of more than 200,000 that was very nearly wiped out, many at the hands of Lithuanians. March 11 marked 25 years of Lithuanian independence from the Soviet Union and a parade by far-right groups took place in Vilnius, prompting uneasiness on the part of Jews.
In Talinn, Estonia, a highly controversial Holocaust-themed exhibition caused outrage last month when, among its exhibits, was a picture showing the iconic Hollywood sign replaced by the word "Holocaust," which some perceived as a suggestion the genocide was an entertainment event. Another sick exhibit recreated a gas chamber and had 20 naked actors pretending to be Jews playing tag, seemingly suggesting there was humor in the gas chambers experience. The exhibits were eventually withdrawn.
In October 2014 a Latvian musical ‘Cukurs, Herbert Cukurs’ premiered celebrating the life of the ‘Butcher of Riga,’ Herbert Cukurs, who was tracked down and killed by Israel’s Mossad intelligence service in Montevideo, Uruguay, more than 20 years after he fled Europe. He had overseen the murder of many thousands of Jews in his native Latvia where he had been a pre-war national hero. He was witnessed personally shooting more than 500.
Last month’s Estonian general elections saw the far-right EKRE party break the electoral threshold and gain seven of the 101 seats in parliament. Considered by some to have Fascist-Neo-Nazi sympathies similar to many other flourishing nationalist parties in the Baltics and Eastern Europe, the EKRE’s leader Mart Helme is a controversial figure, especially after the party’s “If you’re black, go back” slogan was attributed to him.
Efraim Zuroff, chief Nazi hunter of the Simon Weisenthal Centre in Jerusalem, has been monitoring a series of “Nuremberg-esque” marches in the Baltics in recent weeks and has been dismayed by the fact that no western media have shown up to report on the worrying trend.
“The European Union… does not appear to be particularly perturbed by genuinely disturbing phenomena in the Baltic countries and elsewhere, which, of course, in no way would justify Russian aggression, but deserve to be handled seriously and promptly before they get out of hand,” Zuroff wrote in the International Business Times.
Zuroff accused Helme’s party of racism under its slogan ‘Estonia. For the Estonians’ but Helme flatly rejected that interpretation.
“This is a wrong translation of a slogan which was used during our demonstration,” Helme told FoxNews.com. “The slogan really is ‘For Estonia.’ A Russian TV channel mistranslated this because in Estonian it sounds very similar. They use this in their propaganda against us.”
Helme also rejects any accusation of anti-Semitism in his party, pointing out there are very few Jews left in Estonia, and “there is no hatred against Jews in Estonia today”. He admitted though that his party is generally against Muslim and African immigration. “We have seen what happened in France and in Sweden, in Malmo for example, so we don’t want similar slums in Estonia’s cities.”

Sen. Cotton fires back at Clinton on Twitter over Iran nuke letter fallout

Republican Sen. Tom Cotton sparred Wednesday with Hillary Clinton on Twitter, after the former secretary of state slammed an open letter he and other GOP senators sent to Iran's leaders about ongoing nuclear talks.
The Republican senators' statement has become the subject of immense controversy, as it challenged President Obama's authority to strike a nuclear deal and cautioned Iran's leaders that any agreement would need congressional approval in order to necessarily last beyond Obama's term.
Clinton, who is widely expected to enter the presidential race in the coming months, tweeted a warning to those potential Republican candidates who have praised the letter.
Hillary Clinton        ✔ @HillaryClinton Follow

GOP letter to Iranian clerics undermines American leadership. No one considering running for commander-in-chief should be signing on.

2:11 PM - 11 Mar 2015

Arkansas Sen. Cotton fired back.  Tom Cotton        ✔ @SenTomCotton Follow

No, .@HillaryClinton, letter to Iran helps protect USA from bad deal. No CINC should allow world’s worst regimes to get world’s worst weapon

3:00 PM - 11 Mar 2015

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal also entered the fray, tweeting: Gov. Bobby Jindal        ✔ @BobbyJindal Follow

.@HillaryClinton No one who allows Iran to become a nuclear power should consider running.

2:38 PM - 11 Mar 2015

Democrats have slammed the Republicans' letter as a diplomatic no-no, claiming they effectively undermined the U.S. president on the world stage. Vice President Biden said earlier this week that "the decision to undercut our President and circumvent our constitutional system offends me as a matter of principle."
Secretary of State John Kerry echoed those concerns during congressional testimony on Wednesday, while also disputing the senators' assertion that U.S. lawmakers could simply alter any nuclear agreement years later -- because, he said, it is not technically a "legally binding plan."
Rather, he described the pending deal as an executive agreement, which needs no congressional approval.
Republicans, though, have stood by their decision to fire off the letter -- part of a campaign to demand a vote in Congress on any nuclear deal. A bipartisan bill is pending in Congress that would do just that. The senators claimed in their original letter that while the administration is pushing an "executive agreement," the agreement would have more heft if it were approved by Congress.
Clinton, meanwhile, has weighed in on the letter controversy at the same time she's dealing with her own controversy about her use of personal email while secretary of state. She opened her press conference on Tuesday about the email issue by, first, condemning Republicans over the Iran letter.

Two officers shot, seriously injured outside Ferguson police department

Not enough jobs. The Welfare System at it Best.

 You can't work and also have enough time to protest all night long.

Two police officers were shot and seriously wounded early Thursday outside the police department in Ferguson, Mo. amid protests that followed the resignation of the town's police chief.
St. Louis County Police Chief Jon Belmar told a news conference that a 41-year-old officer from St. Louis County was shot in the shoulder at around midnight local time, while a 32-year-old officer from suburban Webster Groves was shot in the face. Both victims were taken to a local hospital. Belmar said both men were conscious, but had no further word about their condition except to describe the injuries as "very serious."
Belmar said that at least three shots were fired and were believed to come from a house across the street from the police department.
"I don't know who did the shooting, to be honest with you," Belmar said, adding that he could not provide a description of the suspect or gun.
He said his "assumption" was that, based on where the officers were standing and the trajectory of the bullets, "these shots were directed exactly at my officers."
The shooting was first reported by the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
Marciay Pitchford, 20, was among the protesters outside the police department. He told The Associated Press the protest had been mostly peaceful until he heard the shots ring out.
"I saw the officer go down and the other police officers drew their guns while other officers dragged the injured officer away," Pitchford said. "All of a sudden everybody started running or dropping to the ground," he said.
Belmar said that some officers had begun to leave the area due to the lack of activity prior to the shooting.
"I've said many times we cannot sustain this [unrest] without problems and that's not a reflection of those expressing their First Amendment rights," Belmar told the Post-Dispatch. "But this is a very dangerous environment for our officers to work in."
KTVI reported that as many as 200 people had gathered to demand more changes in the city's government after the resignation of Police Chief Tom Jackson Wednesday afternoon. The station reported that at least one person had been arrested and that protesters blocked traffic on nearby Florissant Road.
Jackson was the sixth Ferguson employee to resign or be fired after a Justice Department report cleared white former officer Darren Wilson of civil rights charges in the shooting of black 18-year-old Michael Brown this past August, but found a profit-driven court system and widespread racial bias in the city police department.
Mayor James Knowles III announced Wednesday that the city had reached a mutual separation agreement with Jackson that will pay Jackson one year of his nearly $96,000 annual salary and health coverage. Jackson's resignation becomes effective March 19, at which point Lt. Col. Al Eickhoff will become acting chief while the city searches for a replacement.
Jackson oversaw the Ferguson force for nearly five years before the shooting that stirred months of unrest across the St. Louis region and drew global attention to the predominantly black city of 21,000.
Jackson had previously resisted calls by protesters and some of Missouri's top elected leaders to step down over his handling of Brown's shooting and the weeks of sometimes-violent protests that followed. He was widely criticized from the outset, both for an aggressive police response to protesters and for his agency's erratic and infrequent releases of key information.
In addition to Jackson, Ferguson's court. clerk was fired last week and two police officers resigned. The judge who oversaw the court system also resigned, and the City Council on Tuesday agreed to a separation agreement with the city manager.

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