‘Very dangerous’: Pentagon says armed Chinese jet did ‘barrel roll’ over US aircraft

Bailey: "Whenever Americans buy Chinese products they're not helping to feed or cloth the poor Chinese people. They're supporting a communist government, so what the hell do you expect?"

The Pentagon said Friday that a Chinese fighter jet made “several passes” by a U.S. Navy aircraft earlier this week off the coast of China in international airspace, baring its weapons and coming within mere feet of the U.S. plane.
Pentagon Press Secretary Rear Adm. John Kirby said Washington has lodged a protest to China through diplomatic channels, calling the maneuver “very close” and “very dangerous.”
“Not only is it unprofessional, it’s unsafe,” Kirby said.
Kirby said the Chinese jet made several close passes by the Navy P-8 Poseidon plane, coming within 30 feet of it. He said the Chinese jet did a “barrel roll” maneuver over the top of the Poseidon and also passed across the nose of the Navy plane, exposing the belly of the fighter in a way apparently designed to show that it was armed.
Kirby said it happened about 135 miles east of Hainan Island.
“We have registered our strong concerns to the Chinese about the unsafe and unprofessional intercept which posed a risk to the safety and the wellbeing of the air crew and was inconsistent with customary international law,” he said. “Also … this undermines efforts to continue developing military-to-military relations with the Chinese military.”
The Washington Free Beacon first reported on the incident, saying the P-8 was conducting routine surveillance when the Chinese Su-27 interceptor carried out a barrel roll over the U.S. plane.
As reported by the Free Beacon, this is the second such encounter this year with a U.S. surveillance aircraft – following an incident in April involving a Russian Su-27 flying close to a U.S. Air Force aircraft north of Japan.

Food stamp fraud rampant: GAO report

People receiving food stamps were caught selling and bartering their benefits online for art, housing and cash, according to a new federal report that investigates fraud in the nation’s largest nutrition support program.
Complicating the situation is the fact states around the country are having trouble tracking and prosecuting the crimes because their enforcement budgets have been slashed despite the rapidly-rising number of food stamp recipients, according to the Government Accountability Office report.
Under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, 47 million people have been awarded $76 billion in benefits. State agencies are responsible for addressing SNAP recipient fraud under the guidance and monitoring of the Food and Nutrition Service.
“Such rapid program growth can increase the potential for fraud unless appropriate agency controls are in place to help minimize these risks,” the investigators said in their report.
The GAO report resulted from a review of 11 state and federal efforts to fight food stamp fraud, effectiveness of certain fraud detection tools and how FNS oversees state anti-fraud efforts.
The report found that “most of the selected states reported difficulties in conducting fraud investigations due to either reduced or maintained staff levels while SNAP recipient numbers greatly increased from fiscal year 2009 through 2013.”
The report also said some of the state officials interviewed suggested “changing the financial incentives structure to help support the costs of investigating potential SNAP fraud.”  
As for the actual fraud itself, during a 30-day testing period of the automated tool for e-commerce websites, the GAO report found “28 postings from one popular e-commerce websites that advertised the potential sale of food stamp benefits in exchange for cash.”
The GAO also found limitations on the effectiveness of recommended replacement card data and website monitoring tools for fraud detection.
It also said states have different thresholds for prosecuting food stamp fraud.
In Tennessee, for example, $100 in benefits must be fraudulently obtained before officials will consider prosecuting, but in Texas it is a $5,000 level.
Allegations of fraud and abuse have long-plagued SNAP and have been used by lawmakers in Washington to argue that the program has spiraled out of control.

Pentagon broke law with Bergdahl prisoner swap, government watchdog says

A nonpartisan government watchdog agency said Thursday that the Pentagon broke the law when it swapped five Taliban leaders for Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl earlier this year.
The Government Accountability Office, in a legal opinion issued at the request of congressional lawmakers, said the Defense Department violated the law by failing to notify key Capitol Hill committees at least 30 days in advance.
Further, the report said the Pentagon broke another law by using funds that were not technically available.
Defense Department press secretary Rear Admiral John Kirby told Fox News Thursday night,  "the operation to retrieve Sgt. Bergdahl was lawfully conducted and that was also the judgment of the Justice Department. Nothing has changed about our view that this was a lawful recovery operation."
The GAO said the law in this case is "clear and unambiguous." The agency said that while the Defense Department defended the legality of the controversial swap, "in our view, DOD has dismissed the significance of the express language" in the law.
The report comes several months after the Obama administration released five senior Taliban members from Guantanamo Bay in exchange for Bergdahl, who had disappeared in 2009. Under the exchange terms, the five Taliban are to remain in Qatar for a year.
Lawmakers at the time complained about the security implications of releasing Taliban leaders from Guantanamo, but also about the late notification by the Pentagon that they were going forward with the swap.
Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, among the lawmakers who requested the report, said Thursday that the president “clearly defied” the law.
“We have all seen the President decide to override the concept of checks and balances in many questionable executive actions, but the GAO opinion confirms that by doing so in connection with the release of Bowe Bergdahl, he engaged in a clear violation of the law,” she said in a statement. “I hope this opinion by the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office sends a clear signal to the President that his recent shift towards unilateral action is not consistent with this nation's principles and our carefully designed separation of powers."
Whether the finding will result in any formal legal complaint remains to be seen. The House Armed Services Committee has prepared a “resolution of disapproval” potentially to be considered later this year about the swap, but such a measure is nonbinding.
At issue were recent laws passed by Congress. The latest Defense spending bill states that no money can be used to transfer Guantanamo prisoners to another country "except in accordance" with a separate, related Defense law. That law requires the secretary of Defense to notify key congressional committees at least 30 days before such a transfer.
The swap occurred May 31 of this year. However, the GAO report said those committees were only notified between May 31 and June 2.
"When DOD failed to notify specified congressional committees at least 30 days in advance of its transfer of Guantanamo Bay detainees to Qatar, DOD used appropriated funds in violation of section 8111," the report said.
It also said DOD violated the Antideficiency Act, which bars spending by agencies above the amount of money that Congress has obligated. In this case, the report said the Defense Department spent nearly $1 million more than it had.

Ryan says he'd love to see Romney run for president again

U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan said Thursday he would love to see Mitt Romney run again for president and teased the GOP's former nominee at one point that the "third time's the charm."
Appearing with Ryan at a public event for the first time since their ticket lost two years ago, Romney offered his own good-humored praise by saying that Ryan "wouldn't be a bad president" himself.
Ryan, R-Wis., has said he will wait until after the midterm elections to decide whether to pursue his own presidential campaign in 2016. Romney has repeatedly denied any plans for another campaign for president. He failed to win the nomination in 2008 and then lost the election to President Barack Obama in 2012.
Romney interviewed Ryan about his new book, "The Way Forward: Renewing the American Idea," on the brink of the fall election season. Republicans are driving for the six-seat gain required to grab the Senate majority. Success would put the GOP in control of Congress and dramatically shape the final two years of Obama's term.
They took turns criticizing Obama's record on domestic issues, including the economy, health care and immigration, with Ryan warning that Obama will "poison the well" on immigration compromise if he takes any unilateral action. Romney said Obama sent a message to Russia when he did not act in Syria and that there has been "an explosion of very bad things in the world" since then.
Romney said Obama's foreign policy is "based on his belief that everyone has the same interests" while he himself believes that some world leaders "want to dominate and some are fundamentally evil."
They also blamed Obama and the Democratic-led Senate for doing too little to reach out to Republicans and to act on important issues.
"If people want to actually see action in this country and dealing with problems from education to health care, immigration to our fiscal needs ... they're going to have to vote for Republican senators and ... a Republican president, as well," Romney said.
Ryan told reporters after the question-and-answer session with Romney that he would "love to see Mitt Romney run for president again."
Long before Romney and Ryan took the stage at the Union League Club of Chicago, Democrats said the pairing is a reminder of failure. In a statement, the Democratic National Committee listed what it called their memorable political gaffes, including Romney being caught on video telling donors that 47 percent of Americans would automatically vote for Obama because they don't pay income taxes and are "dependent upon government."
Romney has been campaigning for GOP candidates across the country, most recently for Rep. Tom Cotton this week in Arkansas, and Ryan has been promoting his book. Romney himself reviewed Ryan's manuscript and offered notes. And Ryan even sought advice from former Romney speechwriters and advisers during the writing.
The conversation Thursday centered on policy issues and didn't touch on the more personal parts of Ryan's book, including the fullest account yet of how Ryan, at 15, found his alcoholic father dead in bed from an apparent heart attack. Ryan told The Associated Press recently that the event shaped him as a politician and family man, and figures heavily into whether he'll seek the presidency in 2016.
Although writing a book often is seen as a prelude to a presidential campaign, Ryan has said he's not sure he's ready to spend more time away from Janesville, the small Wisconsin town where he grew up and where he and his wife, Janna, have raised their three children.

Hagel defends disclosure of secret, failed raid to free US hostages in Syria

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel on Thursday defended the decision to formally acknowledge a failed mission to rescue American journalist James Foley and others held in Syria earlier this year, amid criticism from Republicans over the disclosure.
The White House and Defense Department, in a rare public confirmation of a covert mission, acknowledged late Wednesday that President Obama sent special operations troops to Syria this summer on a secret mission to rescue American hostages held by Islamic State extremists. The mission was not successful.
Hagel echoed White House and State Department claims, though, in saying the only reason they acknowledged the mission was because media outlets already knew about it.
“There were a number of news outlets that were aware of the action, of the raid,” he said Thursday. “It was a decision made by the administration, which we concurred with, to address the mission.”
The statement follows criticism from Republicans, regarding both the formal acknowledgement and the apparent leak beforehand to some members of the press.
Rep. Buck McKeon, R-Calif., chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, on Thursday called for an investigation into the leak.
“Successful or not, such operations are incredibly sensitive, even after they have concluded. Disclosure of these missions puts our troops at risk, reduces the likelihood that future missions will succeed, and risks the lives of hostages and informants alike,” he said in a statement. “While I believe it was unwise for the White House and Department of Defense to formally acknowledge this operation; it is outrageous that someone would be so selfish and short sighted to leak it to the media.”
He urged Hagel and other officials to investigate the matter “immediately and thoroughly.”
The disclosure prompted comparisons to past leaks from the administration, regarding details of the successful Usama bin Laden raid and other operations.
“This is sort of the same thing,” Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., told Fox News. “One can't help but assume that this is sort of [to try] to help the PR, that they tried to rescue the hostages.”
In some cases, the administration has launched investigations into security leaks -- and has come under criticism from free press and whistleblower groups for aggressively prosecuting the leakers. 
In this case, critics voiced concerns that the disclosure jeopardizes other hostages.
Hagel said Thursday “there’s always risks” in any decision they make.
State Department spokeswoman Marie Hard said the administration had no intention of making the mission public, but was forced to do so because reporters were preparing to publish stories about it.
Officials, in disclosing the raid, said earlier that the rescue mission was authorized after intelligence agencies believed they had identified the location inside Syria where the hostages were being held. But the several dozen special operations forces dropped by aircraft into Syria did not find them at that location and engaged in a firefight with Islamic State militants before departing, killing several militants. No Americans died but one sustained a minor injury when an aircraft was hit.
The administration revealed the rescue operation a day after the militants released a video showing the beheading of Foley and threatened to kill a second hostage, Steven Sotloff, if U.S. airstrikes against the militants in Iraq continued.
The disclosure of the rescue mission marks the first time the U.S. has revealed that American military personnel have been on the ground in Syria since a bloody civil war there broke out more than three years ago. Obama has resisted calls to insert the U.S. military in the middle of Syria's war, a cautious approach his critics say has allowed the Islamic State to strengthen there and make gains across the border in Iraq, where the U.S. is now conducting airstrikes.

Holder says he understands mistrust of police as Ferguson protests dwindle

I am the attorney general of the United States. But I am also a black man.

Attorney General Eric Holder said Wednesday that he understands why many black Americans distrust the police as he made a one-day swing through the St. Louis suburb of Ferguson, Mo., where a black teenager was fatally shot by a white police officer almost two weeks earlier. 
Holder made the comments during a meeting with about 50 community leaders at the Florissant campus of St. Louis Community College in which he heard about their own issues with law enforcement officials. 
Ferguson has endured more than a week of unrest since the August 9 death of 18-year-old Michael Brown, who was shot by Ferguson Police Officer Darren Wilson. The Obama administration intended the trip to underscore its commitment to civil rights in general and the Ferguson case in particular.
"I understand that mistrust," Holder said. "I am the attorney general of the United States. But I am also a black man." The attorney general then described how he was stopped twice on the New Jersey Turnpike and accused of speeding. Police searched his car, going through the trunk and looking under the seats.
"I remember how humiliating that was and how angry I was and the impact it had on me," Holder said.
Holder also described how once, while living in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, he was running to catch a movie with his cousin when a squad car rolled up and flashed its lights at the pair. The officer yelled, "Where are you going? Hold it!" Holder recalled.
His cousin "started mouthing off," and Holder urged him to be quiet.
"We negotiate the whole thing, and we walk to our movie. At the time that he stopped me, I was a federal prosecutor. I wasn't a kid," he said.
While in Ferguson, Holder met with federal officials investigating the case, as well as Brown's parents. He also met with Missouri Highway Patrol Capt. Ron Johnson, who has been in charge of security in Ferguson for nearly a week. The National Guard is also helping to keep the peace.
On Wednesday night, a diminished number of protesters marched around a single block in Ferguson as a thunderstorm filled the sky with lighting and dumped rain. Police still stood guard, but many wore regular uniforms rather than riot gear.
Johnson said there were six arrests Wednesday, compared to 47 the previous night. He called it "a very good night," and said Holder's visit had let people know their voices had been heard. 
In nearby Clayton, a grand jury began hearing evidence to determine whether Wilson should be charged in Brown's death. A spokesman for St. Louis County Prosecutor Bob McCulloch said there was no timeline for the process, but it could take weeks.
Outside the St. Louis County Justice Center, where the grand jury convened, two dozen protesters gathered in a circle for a prayer, chanted and held signs urging McCulloch to step aside.
McCulloch's deep family connections to police have been cited by some black leaders who question his ability to be impartial in the case. McCulloch's father, mother, brother, uncle and cousin all worked for the St. Louis Police Department, and his father was killed while responding to a call involving a black suspect.
The prosecutor, who is white, has insisted his background will have no bearing on the handling of the Brown case, which has touched off days of nighttime protests during which authorities used tear gas and rubber bullets to clear the streets.
On Wednesday, police said an officer had been suspended for pointing a semi-automatic assault rifle at demonstrators, then cursing and threatening to kill one of them. A protester captured the exchange on video Tuesday and posted it to YouTube and other websites.

Hamas says three top commanders killed by Israeli airstrike in Gaza

Hamas said that an Israel airstrike in Gaza killed three of its senior military leaders early Thursday. 
The Palestinian militant group claimed that the men -- identified as Mohammed Abu Shamaleh, Mohammed Barhoum and Raed al-Attar -- were killed along with three other people in a strike on a four-story building near Rafah, a town in the southern part of the coastal territory. 
The Israeli security agency Shin Bet confirmed the deaths of Shamaleh and al-Attar in an email, but did not mention Barhoum. The three Hamas leaders are considered to be at the senior levels of its military leadership and were involved in a number of high profile attacks on Israeli targets.
"The strike was the result of intelligence and operational activities, which led to the detection and attack on two central operatives from the heart of Hamas’s military leadership," Shin Bet said in a statement. 
The strike, one of 20 the Israeli military said it carried out early Thursday, came one day after another strike in Gaza City aimed at Hamas' senior military leader, Mohammad Dief. Israeli intelligence sources have told Fox News that they believe that Dief was killed in that operation, but Hamas has claimed that he survived. 
Israel says the airstrikes are in response to a resumption of Hamas rocket fire that on Tuesday scuttled a six-day cease-fire. The military says that only one rocket launch was registered since midnight, compared to more than 210 over the previous 30 hours.
In a nationally televised address Wednesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu showed little willingness to return to the negotiating table after six weeks of war with Hamas.
"We are determined to continue the campaign with all means and as is needed," he said, his defense minister by his side. "We will not stop until we guarantee full security and quiet for the residents of the south and all citizens of Israel."
The Egyptian Foreign Ministry expressed "deep regret" over the breaking of the cease-fire. It said in a statement Wednesday that it "continues bilateral contacts" with both sides aimed at restoring calm and securing a lasting truce that "serves the interest of the Palestinian people, especially in relation to the opening of the crossings and reconstruction."
An Egyptian compromise proposal calls for easing the Gaza blockade but not lifting it altogether or opening the territory's air and seaports, as Hamas has demanded.
While the plan does not require Hamas to give up its weapons, it would give Western-backed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, whose forces were ousted by Hamas, a foothold back in Gaza running border crossings and overseeing internationally backed reconstruction.
The Gaza blockade has greatly limited the movement of Palestinians in and out of the territory of 1.8 million people, restricted the flow of goods into Gaza and blocked virtually all exports.
Israel says the blockade is needed to prevent Hamas and other militant groups from getting weapons. Critics say the measures amount to collective punishment.

Islamic State militants threatened journalist's death in email to family, CEO says

In the days before journalist James Foley was brutally beheaded by a member of the Islamic State militant group, an e-mail sent to Foley's family threatened his execution in "vitriolic" terms, the CEO of the international news service Foley had worked for said Wednesday. 
Philip Balboni told a news conference that the e-mail, which was received sometime last week, did not contain any demands, in contrast with previous missives dating back to last fall. Balboni said the company had hired an international firm shortly after Foley disappeared in November 2012, and the New Hampshire native was located in September 2013. Balboni added that Foley was always kept in Syria, though his captors moved him around often.
Foley was abducted in northern Syria while covering that country's civil war and had not been heard from since. On Tuesday, Islamic State, the militant group formerly known as ISIS, released a video showing a militant beheading Foley in apparent response to U.S. airstrikes against militant positions in Iraq. At the end of the video, the militant is shown threatening to behead another missing American journalist, Steven Sotloff.  
Citing a representative of Foley's family and a former hostage, the New York Times reported that ISIS militants had pressed the U.S. to pay a multi-million dollar ransom in exchange for Foley's release. That demand was refused. The Times also reported that ISIS is holding at least three other Americans hostage, including Sotloff, and has threatened to kill all of them if their demands are not met. 
In addition to money, the militants' demands also reportedly include prisoner swaps. One prisoner specifically named in the Times report is Aafia Siddiqui, a neuroscientist with ties to Al Qaeda who has been imprisoned in Texas since 2010 after a conviction for attacking U.S. agents in Afghanistan. 
In a rare move Wednesday, the Pentagon revealed that U.S. special forces had attempted to rescue hostages held by Islamic State, including Foley, earlier this summer. Pentagon spokesman Rear Admiral John Kirby said in a statement that the mission had targeted a "captor network" inside the militant group, and included air and ground elements, but was unable to locate the hostages. 
Meanwhile, new details were being reported in the British press about the identity of the militant who beheaded Foley in the video. American and British intelligence officials were working to firmly identify the man, who speaks in the video with a distinct British accent and is believed to be from London or southeast England. 
A former hostage told The Guardian that the man was the head of a group of three British militants whose main job is to guard foreign captives in the northern Syrian city of Raqqa, an ISIS stronghold. The hostage said the man called himself "John" and described him as intelligent, educated, and devoted to radical Islamic teachings. The hostage said that his fellow captives referred to their three British overlords as "The Beatles." 
The Guardian also reported that "John" is a point man for hostage negotiations and has had discussions about possible ransoms with families of several foreign nationals via Skype. 
The British government has estimated that up to 500 citizens of that country have traveled to Syria and Iraq to join up with ISIS and other militant groups since the beginning of the Syrian civil war in 2011. British intelligence officials also reportedly believe that those nationals have developed into particularly dangerous fighters, willing to carry out suicide attacks and, as in the case of Foley's death, beheadings. According to The Daily Telegraph, approximately half of those 500 have returned to the United Kingdom.