FBI probing suspect's recent conversion to Islam in Oklahoma beheading

FBI officials are investigating a beheading at an Oklahoma food distribution center after co-workers said the suspect tried to convert them to Islam after his recent conversion.
The alleged suspect, Alton Nolen, 30, was recently fired from Vaughan Foods in Moore prior to Thursday’s attack. Moore Police Department Sgt. Jeremy Lewis told KFOR that Nolen drove to the front of the business and struck a vehicle before walking inside. He then attacked Colleen Hufford, 54, stabbing her several times before severing her head. He also stabbed another woman, 43-year-old Traci Johnson, at the plant.
Lewis said Mark Vaughan, the company’s chief operating officer and a reserve county deputy, shot Nolen as he was stabbing Johnson, who remains hospitalized in stable condition Friday.
“He’s a hero in this situation,” Lewis told the station. “It could have gotten a lot worse.”
Nolen was apparently attacking employees at random, authorities said. The motive for the attack is unclear, but FBI officials confirmed to Fox News that they were assisting the Moore Police Department in investigating Nolen's background and whether his recent conversion to Islam was somehow linked to the crime.
The police department issued a statement saying, "After conducting interviews with Nolen's co-workers, information was obtained that he recently started trying to convert several employees to the Muslim religion. Due to the manner of death and the initial statements of co-workers and other initial information, the Moore Police Department requested the assistance of the FBI in conducting a background investigation on Nolan."
Nolen, according to state corrections records, was convicted in January 2011 of multiple felony drug offenses, assault and battery on a police officer and escape from detention. He was released from prison in March 2013.
Saad Mohammad, a spokesman for the Islamic Society of Greater Oklahoma City, told NewsOK.com that leaders of the society’s mosque are taking security precautions to protect Muslims who gather there from any potential retaliatory violence.

Mohammad said anti-Muslim sentiments local residents may have could be heightened due to the beheadings and violence overseas by Islamic State militants.

“They have this ISIS thing on their minds and now this guy has brought it to America,” Mohammad told the website.

Lewis said he does not yet know what charges will be filed against Nolen, adding that police are waiting until he's conscious to arrest him. Authorities said he had no prior connection to either woman.
Moore Police Department officials have released 911 calls from the incident, OKCFox.com reports. During the recording, a caller tells an operator that a person is attacking someone in the building. Several gunshots can be heard in the background at the end of the call. 
A Vaughan spokeswoman said the company was "shocked and deeply saddened" by the attack.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Holder Cartoon

The next ‘top cop’? Race to replace Holder begins

Attorney General Eric Holder’s resignation announcement has set off a flurry of speculation over who might replace him – and, perhaps more importantly, who could survive the bruising confirmation process on Capitol Hill.
“I have a hard time coming up with anyone the president could trust who would have an easy road,” said Holder critic Hans von Spakovsky, who published the book, “Obama’s Enforcer: Eric Holder’s Justice Department,” in 2013.
The president did not offer any hints when he formally announced Holder’s decision to step down after six years on the job. He said Holder would stay on until a successor is named.
Several prominent names could be in the mix, though, and already are starting to get some buzz. Among them are Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick, Solicitor General Donald Verrilli and California Attorney General Kamala Harris.
Within hours, a few of the possible prospects were busy knocking down the speculation.
Harris released a written statement saying: "I am honored to even be mentioned, but intend to continue my work for the people of California as Attorney General. I am focused on key public safety issues including transnational gangs, truancy and recidivism."
Patrick, 58, a former Justice Department official in the Clinton administration, has been floated as a potential successor since as far back as 2012. He is serving his second and last term as governor.
Tom Whalen, presidential historian and associate professor of social science at Boston University, suggested Patrick could meet an important test.
“Attorney generals tend to be consigliere, people who defend the president’s interests” first, he said. “That is why the president usually picks someone who is a close friend who is beyond doubt loyal to him or her. Deval Patrick fits that to a T.”
Patrick and Obama are close friends and political allies, having campaigned for one another over the years. Earlier this year, Obama said his friend would make “a good president or vice president,” stoking speculation that Patrick had his sights more or less on the White House. But on Thursday, the media seized upon news that the governor had plans to arrive in Washington that day.
Patrick, though, also quelled some of the speculation when he spoke to reporters at a morning event.
“First of all I want to say of Eric Holder that he has distinguished himself and the role of the attorney general, as attorney general, and I thank him for his service to the administration and his service to the nation,” Patrick said, according to the full statement released by his press secretary. “That’s an enormously important job but it’s not one for me right now.”
Jesse Rhodes, associate political science professor at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, still said Patrick’s commitment to enforcing civil rights law was “clear” and that in this way he was “substantively quite similar” to Holder.
Von Spakovsky, a judicial and legal expert at the Heritage Foundation, predicted that the hearings will be tough on any nominee, considering the unfinished business over the Fast and Furious scandal and the ongoing IRS scandal. He said Patrick's own record heading the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, which von Spakovsky called spotty and “extreme,” would be under the microscope if he were nominated.
Others under consideration could include: Preet Bharara, U.S Attorney in Manhattan; Deputy Attorney General James Cole; and former White House Counsel Kathryn Ruemmler. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, a former Rhode Island attorney general, and other Democratic senators also have appeared in some reports as possible prospects.
Aside from Patrick, speculation on Thursday centered fairly heavily on Verrilli, 57, who is the administration's top representative to the Supreme Court.  He successfully defended the Affordable Care Act -- but other landmark cases including one on voting rights and the Hobby Lobby challenge over ObamaCare’s contraceptive coverage did not break in the administration’s favor. Critics say his record is mixed as a defender of the Obama administration.
Meanwhile, Harris, despite her statement on Thursday, is a staunch ally of Obama and had also been mentioned in the top tier of potential nominees. Having taken on the banking industry, Harris is popular among progressives and would be only the second female AG – after Janet Reno.
On the other side of the country, Bharara has emerged as one of the most colorful and ambitious officials in New York politics -- making Wall Street corruption, cybercrime and terrorism his signature issues as U.S. Attorney for New York’s Southern District. More recently, he has entered a battle with Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo over the governor’s decision to shut down a corruption panel. 
Whalen said the call to “top cop” would be a tough request to resist. On one hand, “you make enemies everywhere, not just on the opposite political aisle but in your own party because you prosecute people.
“But if the president calls and says I need you in this post, it would be difficult to turn down this office.”

Michigan SEIU branch allowed to keep millions taken from home health care workers

A Michigan court ruled that the state branch of the powerful Service Employees International Union does not have to pay back tens of millions of dollars in dues taken from home health care workers who were forced into unionization.
The Michigan Court of Appeals ruled last week that the SEIU Healthcare Michigan does not have to pay back more than $34 million in dues collected from over 40,000 home health care workers. Many were forced into the union under state requirements that they join because they were taking care of sick family members at home.
The SEIU successfully lobbied for the plan in multiple states that classified unpaid family members as "home health care workers." Dues were then automatically collected from the care recipients' Medicare or Medicaid checks.
The Court of Appeals ruling was in favor of SEIU Healthcare Michigan’s motion to have the case dismissed because the union had paid back dues to Patricia Haynes and Steven Glossop, who had filed suit demanding dues they were forced to pay be returned. The court noted that Haynes and Glossop were paid back more than they requested in their lawsuit.
The Court of Appeals also said it dismissed the case because the law had changed and “to allow appellants to proceed with this appeal to vindicate the possible interests of third parties would improperly allow them to litigate abstract questions of law in which they are no longer interested parties.”
Officials at the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, which represented the two, said the overpayment was a devious move by the union in an attempt to hold onto the millions it took from the others.
“The SEIU overpaid our clients to prevent a full review by the court,” Patrick J. Wright, vice president of legal affairs for the Mackinac Center, said in a statement provided to FoxNews.com. “It was pretty obvious the SEIU did not want the court to take a close look at its tactics. Unfortunately, that means the union gets to keep the money it took from the other approximately 39,998 people who were caught up in this scheme. We’re going to review our legal options and look at other possible ways to vindicate all of these victims.”
The ruling comes after the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 in June, that public sector unions in Illinois cannot collect fees from home health care workers who don't want to be part of a union.
The SEIU had sent checks to the Mackinac Center on behalf of Haynes and Glossop after that ruling.
The forced unionization ended in 2013 in Michigan and enrollment in the SEIU’s Michigan chapter plummeted the next year.
According to reports the union filed with the U.S. Department of Labor, over 44,000 home-based health care workers left SEIU Healthcare Michigan after learning they did not have to join the union or pay dues.
The Michigan Court of Appeals also said that the Michigan Employment Relations Commission does not have a platform for allowing class action matters.
Officials for the Mackinac Center say they are still weighing their options.
“It’s unfortunate,” said Ted O’Neil, spokesman for the legal group. “The SEIU wanted to make this go away as quietly as possible. If this had continued in court it would have brought the issue to the public spotlight. It’s also unfortunate because of the statute of limitations there was a limit to what anyone could have gotten back.”
O’Neil noted that despite the fact the SEIU “siphoned” $34 million, in the future it will no longer be able to collect money for “basically doing nothing.”
“Hopefully, that is somewhat comforting to those that were ripped off,” he said.
Officials at SEIU Healthcare Michigan said to FoxNews.com that they did not have a comment immediately available.

US considers softening demands on Iran nuke deal, report says

Bailey: " It would be a stupid move on the government's part, as Iran already looks upon the Americans as being weak and stupid!"

The United States is considering softening demands that Iran scales back its uranium enrichment program, instead agreeing to a new proposal that would allow Tehran to keep almost half of the program intact, diplomats say.
The initiative, reported late Thursday by The Associated Press, comes as Iranian President Hassan Rouhani has sought to leverage the crisis in the Middle East to ease sanctions on his country as part of nuclear talks, suggesting in a United Nations address that security cooperation between Iran and other countries could only occur if they struck a favorable nuclear deal.
While focusing in large part on Islamic extremists in the region, Rouhani made clear Iran’s cooperation in addressing these threats hinges on the outcome of ongoing nuclear talks – as he once again urged other nations to drop what he described as “excessive demands.”
The U.S., fearing Tehran may enrich to weapons-grade level used to arm nuclear warheads, ideally wants no more than 1,500 centrifuges left operating. Iran insists it wants to use the technology only to make reactor fuel and for other peaceful purposes and insists it be allowed to run at least the present 9,400 machines.
The tentative new U.S. offer attempts to meet the Iranians close to half way on numbers, diplomats told The Associated Press.  They said it envisages letting Iran keep up to 4,500 centrifuges but would reduce the stock of uranium gas fed into the machines to the point where it would take more than a year of enriching to create enough material for a nuclear warhead.
That, they said, would give the international community enough lead time to react to any such attempt.
Rouhani said a deal could mark the “beginning of multilateral cooperation” and allow for “greater focus on some very important regional issues such as combating violence and extremism.”
Iran insists it does not want atomic arms but the West is only willing to lift nuclear-related sanctions if Tehran agrees to substantially shrink enrichment and other activities that Iran could turn toward making such weapons.
The diplomats emphasized that the proposal is only one of several being discussed by the six powers -- the U.S., Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany -- and has not yet been formally submitted to the Iranians.
The new proposals reflect Washington's desire to advance the talks ahead of a Nov. 24 deadline that was extended from July.
They are running up against a Nov. 24 deadline to reach a comprehensive agreement to curb Iran’s nuclear activities in exchange for easing sanctions.
GOP lawmakers have also warned that the Obama administration may be willing to give too much ground to Iran in pursuit of an agreement.
Failure to seal a deal could see a return to confrontation, including U.S. and Israeli threats of military means as a last resort to slow Iran's nuclear program.
"My message to Iran's leaders and people is simple: Do not let this opportunity pass," President Obama said Wednesday in his own address to world leaders.
At the same time, Rouhani has been critical of the U.S. bombing campaign of Islamic State group strongholds and the growing coalition of countries seeking to stop the extremists by military means. "Bombing and airstrikes are not the appropriate way," Rouhani said in his address to the United Nations, warning that "extraterritorial interference ... in fact only feeds and strengthens terrorism."
There are other issues that could further complicate negotiations. American officials are furious with Iran for detaining Jason Rezarian, a Washington Post journalist who has both American and Iranian citizenship, as well as his wife.
Iranian officials have not specifically said why the couple is being held, and Rouhani has dodged questions about their fate. Asked again Wednesday about Rezarian, he said he would be freed if he is innocent of any crime.

First Step Cartoon

Climate change? China rebuts Obama

EXCLUSIVE: While President Obama challenged China at the United Nations to follow the U.S. lead in pushing for drastic reductions in national carbon emissions to save the planet from “climate change,” it appears that China has dramatically different ideas. As in: no.
According to a document deposited at the Geneva-based U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in advance of a planned meeting next month, China -- now the world’s largest source of greenhouse gases -- insists that the U.S. and other developed countries endure most of the economic pain of carbon emission cutbacks, and need to make significantly more sacrifices in the months ahead.
Carbon emission cutbacks by China and other developing countries, the document says, will be “dependent on the adequate finance and technology support provided by developed country parties” to any new climate accord.
In other words, only if Western nations pay for it.
More specifically, only if Western taxpayers ante up.  Among other things, the Chinese communist regime insists that the incentive payments it demands must come from “new, additional, adequate, predictable and sustained public funds" -- rather than mostly private financing, as the U.S. hopes.
In addition, the Chinese state:
-- A promised $100 billion in annual climate financing that Western nations have already pledged  to developing countries for carbon emission control and other actions by 2020 is only  the "starting point" for additional Western financial commitments that must be laid out in a "clear road map," which includes "specific targets, timelines and identified sources;"
--In the longer run, developed countries should be committing “at least 1 percent” of their Gross Domestic Product — much more than they spend on easing global poverty” into a U.N.-administered Green Carbon Fund to pay for the developing country changes;
--In the meantime, the $100 billion pledge to the same fund should be reached by $10 billion increments, starting from a $40 billion floor this year;
--Western countries also need to remove “obstacles such as IPRs [intellectual property rights]” to “promote, facilitate and finance the transfer” of “technologies and know-how” to developing countries in advance of any future climate deal;
CLICK HERE FOR THE PAPER
The Chinese submission is part of the paperwork submitted by a variety of nations in advance of negotiations on a new global climate treaty, which is slated to be unveiled at a grand climate summit meeting in Paris at the end of 2015. This week’s ballyhooed climate summit in New York City was intended to kick-start the diplomatic process that will wend toward the Paris finale.
The Paris 2015 treaty is supposed to replace the tattered Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2020, and which the U.S. never ratified — in large measure because huge greenhouse emitters like China and India were given a pass from most of its strictures.
Since then, countries like Canada and Russia have left the protocol, and others, like Japan, have declined to tighten the screws further on carbon emissions in a time of faltering economic growth.
But while President Obama was telling the summit attendees in New York that “nobody can stand on the sidelines on this issue,” and advising world leaders that he had told China’s top delegate at their meeting that “we have a special responsibility to lead,” China has staked out its much tougher position  in a nine-page position paper drearily titled, “Submission on the Work of the Ad Hoc Working Group on Durban Platform for Enhanced Action.”
The working group, part of the UNFCCC process, is pulling together international positions to develop a consensus starting point for the Paris treaty negotiations, which will supposedly be unveiled at a meeting in Lima, Peru, in December. The Chinese paper, however, went to an earlier preparatory meeting slated to begin in Bonn on October 25.
According to the Chinese, all of the additional Western action is necessary because developing countries have already done their part at greenhouse gas cutbacks—or, as the position paper has it, in typical U.N. climate-speak, “have already communicated and implemented ambitious nationally appropriate mitigation actions.”
Indeed, the paper continues, “Their contribution to global mitigation efforts is far greater than that by developed countries.”
That conclusion appears to largely draw on the fact that China believes that Western countries are “responsible for the current and future concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere because of their historical, current and future emissions,” while “developing countries have the right to equitable development opportunities and sustainable development.”
That was largely the logic behind the faltering Kyoto Protocol, in which China pledged only to reduce the “carbon intensity”—the relative greenhouse gas efficiency-- of its industrialization, without any effort at actual cutbacks.
Optimists now believe that China will move in the new round of climate negotiations toward an actual trajectory of cutbacks, but there is no sign of that ambition in the current position paper.
In fact, the paper argues that any new agreement should “be based and built” on the structures of the old Kyoto deal, with “developed country Parties taking the lead in greenhouse gas emission reduction.”
There is perhaps one major exception: “Commitments by developed country Parties [to the new treaty] on providing finance, technology and capacity-building support to developing country Parties shall be of the same legal bindingness as their mitigation commitments.”
In other words:  pay-as-you-go on “climate change”  means that so far as China is concerned, the U.S. and other advanced countries should do all the paying, and most of the going.

US, allies target ISIS oil supplies in Syria

The U.S. and Arab allies unleashed a new round of airstrikes against Islamic State militants in eastern Syria late Wednesday, targeting a dozen small oil refineries.
U.S. officials told Fox News the latest round of strikes was designed to target a dozen so-called “modular oil refineries”-- essentially small, ISIS-built refineries that the terror group uses to fuel its vehicles and to fund its operations. “This is not going to look like the oil fields burning in Iraq,” one official said, referring to the Gulf War.
A Department of Defense official said ISIS made roughly a $2 million a day profit from the modular oil refineries, which produced 300 to 500 barrels a day.
Officials said all the aircraft made it back safely from the strikes.
The U.S. Central Command said in a statement partner nations in the mission included Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates and the 13 airstrikes were conducted by both piloted aircraft and drones. Initial indications were the strikes were successful, the statement said.
U.S. officials said the goal was to leave the refineries largely intact, so they eventually could be used again, but to destroy the support facilities used by ISIS.
Earlier airstrikes Tuesday and Wednesday in Iraq and Syria were carried out by a mix of attack, bomber and fighter aircraft.
Two airstrikes west of Baghdad destroyed two ISIS armed vehicles and a weapons cache. Another two airstrikes, southeast of Irbil, destroyed ISIS fighting positions.
A fifth airstrike damaged eight ISIS vehicles in Syria in an area northwest of the Iraqi town of Al Qa'im, according to U.S Central Command.
All aircraft exited the area safely.
A senior defense official told Fox News that Jordan also conducted an airstrike against ISIS in Syria on Wednesday.
In a separate statement, Pentagon spokesman Rear Adm. John Kirby said the strikes in eastern Syria hit a staging area used by the militants to move equipment across the border into Iraq.
He did not specify exactly where the air raids took place, but the Iraqi town of Al Qa'im is across the border from the Syrian town of Boukamal, where Syrian activists reported at least 13 airstrikes on suspected Islamic State positions on Wednesday.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said it was not immediately clear who carried out the airstrikes in and around Boukamal, but it cited locals as saying the intensity of the air raids was similar to that of strikes on the town early Tuesday by the U.S.-led military coalition.
To date, the U.S. Central Command says it has conducted 198 airstrikes against ISIS in Iraq and 20 in Syria – with the help of partner nations.
In the opening salvo of the campaign, the U.S. on its own also hit Al Qaeda's Syria branch, known as the Nusra Front. American officials said the strikes targeted the so-called Khorasan Group, which the U.S. says consists of hardened jihadis who pose a direct and imminent threat to the United States.
On Wednesday, the Nusra Front said it was evacuating its compounds near civilian areas in Idlib province in northwestern Syria. The announcement, made on a Facebook page associated with the group's Idlib operations, follows a U.S. airstrike on a Nusra Front base in the village of Kfar Derian that killed around a dozen fighters and 10 civilians, according to two activists.
Another Syrian rebel group, Ahrar al-Sham, was also clearing out of its bases, weapons workshops and offices, according to the Observatory. It said the group issued a statement calling for fighters to limit the use of wireless communication devices to emergencies, to move heavy weapons and conceal them, and to warn civilians to stay away from the group's camps.
An activist in Idlib who goes by the name of Mohammed confirmed that Ahrar al-Sham was evacuating its bases throughout the northern area. He said he was not aware of any strikes against the group, but said the fighters thought they would be targeted by the coalition because of their ultraconservative Islamic beliefs.
Ahrar al-Sham has been among the steadiest and most effective forces fighting to oust President Bashar Assad in Syria's civil war. It has also been on the front lines of a nine-month battle in northern Syria against the Islamic State group. But the U.S. has long looked at Ahrar al-Sham with suspicion, considering the group too radical and too cozy with the Nusra Front.
The U.S.-led campaign in Syria has drawn a mixed response from the country's multitude of rebel brigades, many of whom cooperate with the Nusra Front and have been locked in a deadly fight with Islamic State militants since January. But the rebels' ultimate goal is to topple Assad, while the U.S. is focused on defeating the Islamic State group.
On Wednesday, the main Western-backed Syrian opposition group criticized the American-led airstrikes for being limited to the Islamic State group and other extremists while leaving Assad's government untouched.
"We regret that the international community has come up with partial solutions to the Syrian conflict in which hundreds of thousands were killed or detained by the Assad regime," said Nasr al-Hariri, secretary general of the Syrian National Coalition.
In a statement, al-Hariri also said that any effort other than helping Syrians overthrow Assad will only fuel extremism.