Dozens of intelligence analysts reportedly claim assessments of ISIS were altered

Dozens of intelligence analysts working at the U.S. military's Central Command (CENTCOM) have complained that their reports on ISIS and the Nusra Front in Syria were inappropriately altered by senior officials, according to a published report.
The Daily Beast reported late Wednesday that more than 50 analysts had supported a complaint to the Pentagon that the reports had been changed to make the terror groups seem weaker than the analysts believe they really are. Fox News confirmed last month that the Defense Department's inspector general was investigating the initial complaint, which the New York Times reported was made by a civilian employee of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA).
The assessments in question are prepared for several U.S. policymakers, including President Obama.
The Daily Beast report, which cited 11 individuals, claimed that the complaint being investigated by the Defense Department was made in July. However, several analysts reportedly complained as early as this past October that their reports were being altered to suit a political narrative that ISIS was being weakened by U.S.-led airstrikes in Syria.
"The cancer was within the senior level of the intelligence command," the report quotes one defense official as saying.
According to the report, some analysts allege that reports deemed overly negative in their assessment of the Syria campaign were either blocked from reaching policymakers or sent back down the chain of command. Others claim that key elements of intelligence reports were removed, fundamentally altering their conclusions. Another claim is that senior leaders at CENTCOM created a work environment where giving a candid opinion on the progress of the anti-ISIS campaign was discouraged, with one analyst describing the tenor as "Stalinist."

More on this...

• Exclusive: Kurdish soldier on ISIS chemical weapon attack

• Failed US policy against ISIS to blame for refugee crisis?

The report alleges that when the analysts' complaints were initially aired, some of those who complained were urged to retire, and did so. Facing either resistance or indifference, other analysts self-censored their reports, the Daily Beast claims.
The defense official quoted by the Daily Beast said that some who spoke up did so out of guilt that they did not express doubts about former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein's alleged chemical weapons program in the run-up to the Iraq. War.
"They were frustrated because they didn’t do the right thing then," the official said.
The House and Senate Intelligence Committees have been advised of the complaint that prompted the inspector general's investigation, which is required if Pentagon officials find the claims credible.
Government rules state that intelligence assessments "must not be distorted" by agendas or policy views, but do allow for legitimate differences of opinion.
Central Command spokesman Col. Patrick S. Ryder said in a statement Wednesday that they welcome the IG's "independent oversight."
"While we cannot comment on ongoing investigations, we can speak to the process and about the valued contributions of the Intelligence Community (IC)," he said, adding that intelligence community members typically are able to comment on draft security assessments. "However," he said, "it is ultimately up to the primary agency or organization whether or not they incorporate any recommended changes or additions. Further, the multi-source nature of our assessment process purposely guards against any single report or opinion unduly influencing leaders and decision-makers."
Earlier this summer, on the eve of the anniversary of the launching of airstrikes against Iraq, the Associated Press reported that U.S intelligence had concluded that the airstrikes had helped stall ISIS after sweeping gains in the summer of 2014. However, the report also said the terror group remained a well-funded army that could easily replenish its numbers as quickly as fighters were eliminated.

Ben Carson Cartoon

Hillary Clinton offers first apology for private email server

Hillary Clinton offered her first apology for using a private email server while secretary of state, calling it a “mistake” in an interview that aired Tuesday.
“Even though it was allowed, I should have used two accounts. One for personal, one for work-related emails,” she told ABC News. ”That was a mistake. I’m sorry about that. I take responsibility.”
The comments came just a day after Clinton told the Associated Press she did not need to apologize for her actions because “what I did was allowed.”
At the State Department's request, Clinton has turned over 55,000 pages of work-related emails last year, while the FBI has also taken possession of the server after Clinton resisted giving up until last month.
When asked by ABC News if she could survive the ongoing FBI investigation, Clinton cited her lengthy existence on the political stage.
“As you might guess I’ve been around a while, lots of attacks, questions raised. I can survive it because I’m running to be president, to do what the country needs done,” Clinton told ABC. “I believe the American people will respond to that.”
But just as the interview aired, Clinton’s apology already came under fire.
“The only thing Hillary Clinton regrets is that she got caught and is dropping in the polls, not the fact her secret email server left classified information exposed to the Russians and Chinese,” RNC National Press Secretary Allison Moore said in a statement. “Hillary Clinton’s reckless attempt to skirt government transparency laws put our national security at risk and shows she cannot be trusted in the White House.”
Clinton became emotional after she was asked about her mother’s influence on her campaign.
“She told me every day, you got to get up and fight for what you believe in no matter how hard it is,” Clinton said. “And I don’t want to just fight for me. I mean I can have a perfectly fine life not being a president. I want to fight for all the people like my mother who cares who needs somebody in their corner.”
The former secretary of state restated her apology in a note to supporters on her Facebook page late Tuesday, but also called her use of a personal e-mail account  "aboveboard and allowed under the State Department's rules.
"Everyone I communicated with in government was aware of it," Clinton added. Later in the note, she said, "I know this is a complex story. I could have—and should have—done a better job answering questions earlier."
Clinton’s latest efforts to explain the private email server controversy has continued to sometimes overshadow her presidential campaign, with multiple polls showing a majority of Americans don’t find her honest and trustworthy.
In a recent Quinnipiac University poll, 61 percent of voters said they did not consider Clinton honest and trustworthy compared to 34 percent who did ascribe those qualities to her.
Clinton also has her status as the Democratic front-runner on the line, as the latest NBC News/Marist polls released Sunday showed Sen. Bernie Sanders with a 9-point lead over her in New Hampshire.
The polls also showed Sanders, a Vermont Independent, gaining ground on Clinton in Iowa.
The states -- Iowa and New Hampshire -- are the first and second, respectively, to hold 2016 primary vote, where the outcomes of those ballots often determine the future of the presidential campaigns.

Ben Carson calls for guest-worker status for immigrants

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Republican presidential hopeful Ben Carson jabbed Tuesday at front-runner Donald Trump's proposal to deport everyone who is in the country illegally, calling the plan impractical.

"People who say that have no idea what that would entail" legally and otherwise, Carson said, adding: "Where you going to send them?"

The retired neurosurgeon spoke before The Commonwealth Club of California on Tuesday in a 75-minute event in which he took questions from the audience on topics ranging from abortion to immigration, taxation to race relations.

Carson's longshot candidacy is buoyed by humor and a self-deprecating demeanor that some would-be voters say they find refreshing. Trump, the brash front-runner in the GOP nomination fight, has made immigration a centerpiece of his candidacy. Trump says he would deport those living in the country illegally — estimated at 11 million people.

Carson said he would secure the border, but also grant guest-worker status to people who are in the country without documentation. That way, they can pay taxes and come out from the shadows, he said.
Mass deportation, he said, would be expensive and impractical, and crippling to the hotel and agriculture industries.

San Francisco venture capitalist Scott Russell, an unaffiliated voter, called Carson charismatic, yet positive.

"He wasn't trying to attack other candidates or trying to say negative things," Russell said. "I like people who describe their policies, but don't spend their minutes trying to attack others."

Carson is scheduled to attend a rally in Anaheim, California, on Wednesday.

White House considering ‘resettlement,’ other options for refugee crisis

The White House has to be Kidding us, right? We can't control our own borders as it is!

The Obama administration is "actively considering" options for addressing the global refugee crisis, including the possibility of "refugee resettlement," the White House said Tuesday. 
Without going into specifics, White House officials said the State Department is leading a "reconsideration" of how best to deal with the flood of refugees into Europe and elsewhere.
"There is no denying that the situation that many of our European partners are confronting right now is a significant one," Press Secretary Josh Earnest said. National Security Council spokesman Peter Boogaard also said the administration is in "regular contact" with countries in the Middle East and Europe grappling with the influx of more than 340,000 people from the Middle East, Africa and Asia.
"The Administration is actively considering a range of approaches to be more responsive to the global refugee crisis, including with regard to refugee resettlement," he said in a statement.
The comments come as the U.S. government faces rising international pressure to accept more refugees, many of whom are fleeing the civil war in Syria and areas in Iraq under the control of Islamic State militants.
Countries like Jordan and Turkey have absorbed the bulk of the refugees, and European countries are now facing a huge influx. The U.S. so far has accepted a limited number of Syria refugees -- a State Department spokesman last week said they likely would admit up to 1,800 refugees for permanent resettlement by the end of the fiscal year.
Without issuing any new estimates for refugee resettlement, White House officials on Tuesday stressed that the U.S. has provided over $4 billion in humanitarian assistance since the Syrian crisis began, and over $1 billion in assistance this year.
Any consideration of allowing more refugees into the United States, though, will be accompanied by concerns in Washington about security.
Presidential candidate Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, said in a statement Tuesday that "it doesn't make sense from a logistical or a security standpoint to move large numbers of them to far-off countries like the United States."
"Ultimately, we need to address the cause of this crisis or we will just have more and more migrants displaced," he said.
Earnest acknowledged Tuesday that safety and security would be taken into account in any resettlement effort.
The U.S. has sometimes expedited resettlement, as it did in 1975, when it helped tens of thousands of refugees from South Vietnam and other nearby areas settle in the United States after the fall of Saigon.
But for fiscal year 2015, which began Oct. 1, the U.S. government authorized 70,000 refugees to be resettled in the United States. The cap is set by the White House, which works with Congress and takes into account funding and the potential social and economic impact of refugees in the country.

Report: Patriots' Spygate scandal was bigger in scope than first realized

An ESPN story claims Bill Belichick and the Patriots videotaped opposing coaches signals as far back as 2000.  …

As it turns out, Spygate had a larger scope than we realized.

ESPN had a huge story on Tuesday, saying when the league investigated the New England Patriots in 2007 they were found to have "a library of scouting material containing videotapes of opponents' signals, with detailed notes matching signals to plays for many teams going back seven seasons." There were 40 games worth of tapes, ESPN said.
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The tapes and notes were found, and then destroyed on commissioner Roger Goodell's orders: league executives "stomped the tapes into pieces and shredded the papers inside a Gillette Stadium conference room," the ESPN story said.
And this all leads us back to deflate-gate, and Goodell's overreaction to it.
The story said owners were upset with how Goodell handled Spygate. It's no secret to anyone anymore that Patriots owner Robert Kraft has been one of Goodell's biggest allies. In an emergency session at the league's spring meetings in 2008, Goodell told the owners that cheaters would be dealt with forcefully, ESPN wrote. One owner told ESPN that deflate-gate was "a makeup call" for the spying scandal.
Goodell, on ESPN Radio less than an hour after the Spygate story was published, said he hadn't seen the story but Spygate had nothing to do with the current scandal.
"I’m not aware of any connection between the Spygate procedures and the procedures we went through here," Goodell told ESPN Radio. "We obviously learn any time we go through a process, try to improve it and get better at it, but there’s no connection in my mind to the two instances."
The ESPN story goes into detail about how the Patriots allegedly used the taped information, highlighting a 2000 game against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. In the preseason, the Patriots allegedly taped the Buccaneers' defensive signals. New England played Tampa Bay in the season opener. Backup quarterback John Friesz was told to memorize the signals in the preseason film, watch the Bucs' signals from the sideline during the regular-season game, relay the defensive play to offensive coordinator Charlie Weis who would relay them to then-starting quarterback Drew Bledsoe, ESPN reported. Although the Patriots lost that game, ESPN said the Patriots knew 75 percent of the Buccaneers' defenses that day and the Pats "realized that they were on to something." A former Patriots assistant, who wasn't named, told ESPN the system of videotaping signals and cataloging signals "got out of control."
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Maybe the most shocking tale comes deep in the story, after all the descriptions of the Patriots' spying, when former New England coaches and employees are cited as describing an even more effective cheating system:

"Several of them acknowledge that during pregame warm-ups, a low-level Patriots employee would sneak into the visiting locker room and steal the play sheet, listing the first 20 or so scripted calls for the opposing team's offense."

Maybe you thought deflate-gate was dying down. Nobody figured on Spygate getting more fuel, eight years after the fact.
UPDATE — The Patriots responded to the ESPN story. Here's the team's statement, via CSNNE:
“The New England Patriots have never filmed or recorded another team’s practice or walkthrough. The first time we ever heard of such an accusation came in 2008, the day before Super Bowl XLII, when the Boston Herald reported an allegation from a disgruntled former employee. That report created a media firestorm that extended globally and was discussed incessantly for months. It took four months before that newspaper retracted its story and offered the team a front and back page apology for the damage done. Clearly, the damage has been irreparable. As recently as last month, over seven years after the retraction and apology was issued, ESPN issued the following apology to the Patriots for continuing to perpetuate the myth: ‘On two occasions in recent weeks, SportsCenter incorrectly cited a 2002 report regarding the New England Patriots and Super Bowl XXXVI. That story was found to be false, and should not have been part of our reporting. We apologize to the Patriots organization.’
“This type of reporting over the past seven years has led to additional unfounded, unwarranted and, quite frankly, unbelievable allegations by former players, coaches and executives. None of which have ever been substantiated, but many of which continue to be propagated. The New England Patriots are led by an owner whose well-documented efforts on league-wide initiatives – from TV contracts to preventing a work stoppage – have earned him the reputation as one of the best in the NFL. For the past 16 years, the Patriots have been led by one of the league’s all-time greatest coaches and one of its all-time greatest quarterbacks. It is disappointing that some choose to believe in myths, conjecture and rumors rather than giving credit for the team’s successes to Coach Belichick, his staff and the players for their hard work, attention to detail, methodical weekly preparation, diligence and overall performance.”

Spending Cartoon

Congress returns to tight deadlines, key votes on Iran deal, Planned Parenthood

Congress returns Tuesday to face several key decisions and short-term deadlines -- including votes on the Iran nuclear deal and a spending bill that if connected to efforts to defund Planned Parenthood creates the potential for another government shutdown.
The House and Senate could vote as early as this week on the Iran deal.
Both GOP-controlled chambers are expected to pass motions of disapproval for the deal. But President Obama is expected to veto the motions and ultimately complete his historic foreign policy deal because neither chamber has the two-thirds majority to override the presidential veto.
Republicans argue the deal, in which Iran will curtail its nuclear development program in exchange for the easing of billions of dollars worth of economic sanctions, gives too many concessions to the rogue nation.
GOP leaders are playing down talk of a government shutdown that's being driven by conservative lawmakers determined to use the spending legislation to strip funds from Planned Parenthood.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, in fact, suggested last week that such an effort is pointless because Obama would reject any such bill.
“The way you make a law in this country (is) the Congress has to pass it, and the president has to sign it,” McConnell told WYMT-TV, in his home state.
“The president's made it very clear he's not going to sign any bill that includes defunding of Planned Parenthood -- so that's another issue that awaits a new president hopefully with a different point of view.”
The president must sign a stopgap spending bill by Sept. 30 to keep the federal government fully operational.
Still, Texas GOP Sen. Ted Cruz, a 2016 presidential candidate and one of Congress’ most conservative members, appears to be going ahead with a defunding effort, asking McConnell not to schedule a vote on the issue.
Republicans were blamed for the Cruz-led partial shutdown in 2013 over ObamaCare, but neither party wants to risk being blamed for another one in a presidential election year.
Planned Parenthood is under intense scrutiny after secretly recorded videos raised uncomfortable questions about its practices in procuring research tissue from aborted fetuses.
The first days for Congress, after a roughly eight-week summer break, also are expected to include efforts to increase the government's borrowing authority and avoid a first-ever federal default.
Members also will try to reach a deal on a long-sought highway bill, consider extending roughly 50 tax breaks, pass a defense policy bill that Obama has threatened to veto and renew the Federal Aviation Administration's authority to spend money.
House GOP leaders are expected to try to strip Planned Parenthood of its federal funding without creating the possibility of a shutdown, as Pope Francis plans to speak on Capitol Hill on Sept. 24.
They have been considering separate legislation this month cutting Planned Parenthood's funds, a GOP aide and a lobbyist said.
The leaders hope such a bill, which would advance free of a filibuster threat by Senate Democrats, would satisfy Planned Parenthood's opponents and free up the temporary government funding bill.
Obama would almost certain veto that bill, too. But it would allow Republicans to vote for the changes and make a case for electing a GOP president to institute them.
Facing demands for negotiations to lift domestic agency budgets hit by the return of automatic spending cuts, known as sequester, McConnell has signaled that he is open to talks on a deal that would pair increases for domestic programs with budget relief for the Pentagon.
To get to an agreement, however, Republicans must strike a deal with Obama and his Democratic allies over companion spending cuts elsewhere in the budget to defray the cost of new spending for the Pentagon and domestic programs.
There's a limited pool of such offsets, at least those with an acceptable level of political pain, and considerable competition over what to spend them on.
For instance, McConnell helped assemble a 10-year, $47 billion offsets package to pay for a Senate bill with small increases for highway and transit programs. Democrats are eyeing the same set of cuts to pay for boosting domestic agencies.
No one is underestimating the difficulty in reaching an agreement.
Speculation is growing that Republicans will try to advance a bill that would keep most federal agencies operating at current budget levels, with only a few changes for the most pressing programs. The White House has pledged to block that idea.
One potential glimmer of hope for the talks is that earlier this year Republicans reversed a position they held in talks two years ago and declared that additional defense spending doesn't require companion spending cuts.
Congress also needs to raise the government's $18.1 trillion borrowing cap by mid-November or early December, an uncomfortable prospect for GOP leaders already facing potshots from Tea Party purists and Republican presidential candidates as next year's nomination contests loom.

Hundreds of police officers attend funeral for slain Illinois lieutenant

ANTIOCH, Ill. –  Several hundred police officers from around the country attended a funeral Monday for a suburban Chicago lieutenant shot and killed last week, and residents of the area turned out by the thousands to watch the hearse go by.
Charles Joseph Gliniewicz, who was 52 and on the cusp of retirement after more than 30 years with the Fox Lake Police Department, was shot and killed shortly after he radioed in that he was chasing three suspicious men on foot.
His more than mile-long funeral procession wound through small-town Fox Lake and lakeside forests that were the focus of a manhunt for the still at-large suspects. Fox Lake is a close-knit village of around 10,000 people and located about 50 miles north of Chicago.
Many of those looking on from the roadside applauded as the procession went by. Blue ribbons — a mark of respect for police — were tied to trees along the way. Pictures of the officer were placed along the route. And one person held a up a sign that read, "You will never be forgotten."
Gliniewicz's wife, Mel, wore a police badge on a necklace at funeral services earlier at a high school auditorium in Antioch, her husband's hometown not far from Fox Lake. Mourners walked by his flag-draped coffin, many hugging his wife and their four sons.
Fox Lake's recently retired police chief recalled Gliniewicz's fondness for the phrase "embrace the suck," about dealing with difficult tasks. "Now we're doing it today," Michael Behan told the packed auditorium about Gliniewicz's funeral.
While most people run from danger, Gliniewicz ran toward it, Joliet Police Officer Rachel Smithberg said.
"Every day he put on his uniform and said, 'Send me,'" she said, a few feet away from Gliniewicz's open casket.
Gliniewicz, who also served in the U.S. Army, told dispatchers last Tuesday that three men ran into a swampy area and requested a second unit. He died from a gunshot wound shortly after backup officers found him about 50 yards from his squad car.
Attendees at the service included Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner and his wife, Diana, both of whom also hugged Gliniewicz's wife and kids.
On a stage next to the coffin was a policeman's uniform and medals pinned to it. Part of the display included a statue of a soldier, standing at attention and clutching a rifle.
Bagpipers performed as pallbearers placed the casket in the hearse at the start of the 18-mile procession to Fox Lake and then back to Antioch, where Gliniewicz was to be buried later Monday at Antioch's Hillside East Cemetery.

Military selects rarely used charge for Bergdahl case

Military prosecutors have reached into a section of military law seldom used since World War II in the politically fraught case against Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, the soldier held prisoner for years by the Taliban after leaving his post in Afghanistan.
Observers wondered for months if Bergdahl would be charged with desertion after the deal brokered by the U.S. to bring him home. He was — but he was also charged with misbehavior before the enemy, a much rarer offense that carries a stiffer potential penalty in this case.
"I've never seen it charged," Walter Huffman, a retired major general who served as the Army's top lawyer, said of the misbehavior charge. "It's not something you find in common everyday practice in the military."

"I've never seen it charged."
- Walter Huffman, a retired major general

Bergdahl could face a life sentence if convicted of the charge, which accuses him of endangering fellow soldiers when he "left without authority; and wrongfully caused search and recovery operations."
Huffman and others say the misbehavior charge allows authorities to allege that Bergdahl not only left his unit with one less soldier, but that his deliberate action put soldiers who searched for him in harm's way. The Pentagon has said there is no evidence anyone died searching for Bergdahl.
"You're able to say that what he did had a particular impact or put particular people at risk. It is less generic than just quitting," said Lawrence Morris, a retired Army colonel who served as the branch's top prosecutor and top public defender.
The Obama administration has been criticized both for agreeing to release five Taliban operatives from the Guantanamo Bay prison and for heralding Bergdahl's return to the U.S. with an announcement in the White House Rose Garden. The administration stood by the way it secured his release even after the charges were announced.
The military has scheduled an initial court appearance known as an Article 32 hearing for Bergdahl on Sept. 17 at Fort Sam Houston, Texas. The proceeding is similar to a civilian grand jury, and afterward the case could be referred to a court-martial and go to trial.
Misbehavior before the enemy was used hundreds of times during World War II, but scholars say its use appears to have dwindled in conflicts since then. Misbehavior before the enemy cases were tried at least 494 times for soldiers in Europe between 1942 and 1945, according to a Military Law Review article.
Legal databases and media accounts turn up only a few misbehavior cases since 2001 when fighting began in Afghanistan, followed by Iraq less than two years later. By contrast, statistics show the U.S. Army prosecuted about 1,900 desertion cases between 2001 and the end of 2014.
The misbehavior charge is included in Article 99 of the military justice code, which is best known for its use to prosecute cases of cowardice. However, Article 99 encompasses nine different offenses including several not necessarily motivated by cowardice, such as causing a false alarm or endangering one's unit — the charge Bergdahl faces.
The complexity of Article 99 may be one reason it's not frequently used, said Morris, who published a book on the military justice system.
"It is of course more complicated than the desertion charge, not as well understood, a higher burden on the government to prove," he said.
Huffman, now a law professor at Texas Tech University, said another reason may be that different parts of military law already deal with similar misconduct, including disobeying orders and avoiding duty.
Recent prosecutions under the misbehavior charge include a Marine lance corporal who pleaded guilty after refusing to provide security for a convoy leaving base in Iraq in 2004. A soldier in Iraq was charged with cowardice in 2003 under Article 99 after he saw a mangled body and sought counseling, but the charges were later dropped.
The specification that Bergdahl faces appears in the 1971 case of an Army captain accused of endangering a base in Vietnam by disobeying an order to establish an ambush position. The captain was found guilty of other charges including dereliction of duty.
Another case cited in a 1955 military law journal says an Army corporal was convicted under Article 99 of endangering his unit in Korea by getting drunk on duty. The article says he "became so drunk that it took the tank company commander thirty minutes to arouse him."
For Bergdahl, the Article 99 offense allows the prosecutors to seek a stiffer penalty than the desertion charge, which in this case carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison.
Bergdahl's attorney, Eugene Fidell, has argued his client is being charged twice for the same action, saying in a previous television interview that "it's unfortunate that someone got creative in drafting the charge sheet and figured out two ways to charge the same thing."
The scholars say that's a valid issue for Fidell to bring up in court, but it may not sway military authorities.
"The question is: Is it a piling on?" said Jeffrey K. Walker, a St. John's University law professor, retired Air Force officer and former military lawyer. "It does almost look like you're trying to get two bites at the same apple."

Hungary Prime Minister calls on Germany to stop taking refugees

Hungary's prime minister called on Germany late Monday to close its doors to thousands of refugees from the Middle East, Africa, and Asia who have poured into Eastern Europe in an effort to reach more prosperous nations.
Viktor Orban warned in an interview with Austrian television that millions of refugees would descend upon the continent if what he called Germany's "open door" policy continued. He also claimed that many who had passed through his country via the so-called "Balkan Corridor" were not in dire straits, but rather imrefugees attracted by Germany's generous benefit programs. For that reason, Orban warned, the refugee surge risked placing an intolerable financial burden on members of the 28-nation E.U.
"As long as Europe cannot protect its external borders it makes no sense to discuss the fate of those flowing in," Orban said.
Germany, with the largest economy in Europe, is expecting to take in 800,000 refugees in 2015, more than four times last year's total. An estimated 20,000 refugees entered Germany via Hungary by train, bus, and on foot this past weekend alone.
"I am happy that Germany has become a country that many people outside of Germany now associate with hope," Merkel told a Berlin news conference Monday. But as she has done before, the German leader pushed other E.U. nations to accept refugee quotas for those still trying to enter.
"What isn't acceptable in my view is that some people are saying this has nothing to do with them," Merkel said. "This won't work in the long run. There will be consequences although we don't want that."
Despite Merkel's steadfast support for letting in refugees, the episode has exposed tensions not only within the E.U., but within Merkel's own coalition government.
"There is no society that could cope with something like this," Bavarian premier Horst Seehofer, leader of the conservative Bavarian Christian Social Union, told Reuters. "The federal government needs a plan here."
Late Monday, Upper Bavaria government spokeswoman Simone Hilgers told the Associated Press that a total of 4,400 people have arrived in Munich, and a further 1,500 refugees were routed to other cities in Germany, including Dortmund, Hamburg and Kiel.
Reuters reported that European President Jean-Claude Juncker would unveil new plans for distributing refugees throughout the member states. Under the plan, Germany would take on more than 40,000 and France 30,000 of the 160,000 asylum seekers the European Commission says need to be relocated from Italy, Greece and Hungary, the main entry points for refugees into the E.U.
French President Francois Hollande has already pledged that his country would accept 24,000 refugees. Later Monday, Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve announced that France would immediately take in 1,000 refugees currently in Germany who are in "urgent need of protection." Cazeneuve said a French asylum team was currently at the border of Germany and Austria, near Munich, to identify the 1,000 — who had to be Syrian, Iraqi or Eritrean.
The 1,000 will be briefly lodged in the Paris region in the coming days while their asylum demands are processed, the minister said. They will then be sent to towns around France where mayors have said they are willing to take in refugees. The lodgings will be state-owned buildings, he said, and "very temporary." Cazeneuve will meet with the mayors on Saturday.
It was not immediately clear if the 1,000 counted toward the 24,000 specified by Hollande.
British Prime Minister David Cameron also said Monday that the U.K. would re-settle up to 20,000 Syrian refugees from camps in Turkey, Jordan and Syria over the next five years.
Late Monday, Hungarian Defense Minister Csaba Hende resigned amid delays in the construction of a border fence meant to keep refugees from crossing into Hungary via the country's border with Serbia.
A statement from Orban's government didn't explicitly blame Hende for the failure to complete the building of the planned 13-foot fence along the 110-mile frontier, but it was supposed to be completed by the end of last month and remains largely unfinished. Only several strands of razor wire have been placed along the full length of the border, while the higher barrier is standing only in a few areas.

Labor Day Cartoon

Memorial for Darren Goforth comes at a cost for local gas station where he was killed

Texas deputy Darren Goforth took his last breaths at pump #8, filling his cruiser up with gas as his assailant walked up behind him at a Harris County Chevron station and unloaded 15 bullets.
The police officer’s Aug. 28th murder shocked the nation, and particularly affected the Harris County community members who came to the pump at West Road and Telge to pay tribute with signs, balloons, American flags and flowers.
But the cathartic expressions have come at a cost for the owners of the gas station and convenience store, who’ve shut down part of their business to allow the remembrances to go on, according to KHOU. The owners have also planned a permanent tribute for Goforth at the station and, in another sign of respect, they shut down the registers during Goforth’s funeral.
“It’s our honor, because that’s a tragic moment,” station manager Amjad Latief told KHOU. Latief was the manager the night Goforth, 47, was killed.
The pump #8 memorial was started by Christine Bossi. Bossi didn’t know Goforth, but her brother is a policeman and she said she felt the need to do something. Now she feels the need to do something for the station's owners. She’s seen the sacrifices they've made and Bossi has urged the community to recognize the gesture.
“Since they have lost much business, we’re gonna ask all the community to come out for a day or for a weekend,” Bossi told KHOU. “Come fill up your gas tank. Come in and buy something from the store.”
Shannon Miles, 30, has been charged with capital murder in Goforth’s killing. Cops continue searching for a motive in the shooting.

Colin Powell, Wasserman Schultz support Iran nuclear deal

Another Idiot.

President Obama’s Iran nuclear deal on Sunday got some largely unexpected support -- from former Secretary of State Colin Powell and Florida Democratic Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz.
The deal, which is expected to receive a vote this week in the Republican-led Congress, has essentially no other GOP support.
Still, Obama late last week secured enough support from Senate Democrats to ultimately complete the deal, despite the Republican opposition.
Powell, who served in the Republican administration of President George W. Bush, said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that the international agreement is "a pretty good deal" that would reduce the threat of Iran gaining a nuclear weapon.
Wasserman Schultz, chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee, joins about half of the roughly two-dozen congressional Jewish lawmakers in supporting the deal, which Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu strongly opposes.
New York Sen. Charles Schumer, expected to be the next Senate Democratic leader, is among a handful in that group who opposes the deal. And his decision in early August was among the first.
Powell said Sunday that Iran's nuclear program "has been thrown into a detour," decreasing the likelihood that it can produce a nuclear weapon to be used against Israel or other countries.
"So that's pretty good," he said.
The international deal would lift billions of dollars in crippling economic sanctions on Iran in exchange for the rogue nation curtailing its nuclear development program.
Wasserman Schultz made her announcement in The Miami Herald, saying the decision to endorse the agreement was the most difficult one she has made in nearly 23 years in elected office.
She expressed concerns about the agreement, but argued it "provides the best chance to ensure" security for the U.S., Israel and other allies.
"Under the agreement Iran will not be able to produce a nuclear bomb for at least 10-15 years," she said, while the U.S. and its allies "will be able to more closely concentrate on stopping Iran's terrorist activity."
The White House already has enough Senate votes to ensure that Congress will uphold the deal even if Obama has to veto a disapproval resolution set for a vote in the week ahead.
But with that support in hand and more piling up, the White House and congressional backers of the deal have begun aiming for a more ambitious goal: enough commitments to bottle up the disapproval resolution in the Senate with a filibuster, preventing it from even coming to a final vote.
That effort suffered a setback on Friday as Sen. Ben Cardin of Maryland, who is Jewish and top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said he opposed the deal.

Kentucky clerk appeals order putting her in jail

LEXINGTON, Ky. –  A Kentucky county clerk has appealed a judge's decision to put her in jail for refusing to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples.
Attorneys for Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis officially appealed the ruling to the 6th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on Sunday. The three page motion does not include arguments as to why Davis should be released but amends Davis' earlier appeal of the judge's order.
Davis objects to same-sex marriage for religious reasons and stopped issuing all marriage licenses in June after the U.S. Supreme Court legalized gay marriage nationwide. Two gay couples and two straight couples sued her. U.S. District Judge David Bunning ordered Davis to issue the licenses and the Supreme Court upheld his ruling.
But Davis still refused to do it, saying she could not betray her conscience.
Thursday, Bunning ruled Davis was in contempt of court for disobeying his order and sent her to jail. Her deputy clerks then issued marriage licenses to gay couples Friday with Davis behind bars.
"Civil rights are civil rights and they are not subject to belief," said James Yates, who got a marriage license on Friday after having been denied five times previously.
Mat Staver, one of Davis' attorneys, said the marriage licenses issued Friday are "not worth the paper they are written on" because Davis refused to authorize them. But Rowan County Attorney Cecil Watkins says the licenses are valid. Bunning said he did not know if the licenses were valid but ordered them issued anyway.
Bunning indicated Davis will be in jail at least a week. She could stay longer if she continues to not obey the judge's order. Bunning had offered to release Davis from jail if she promised not to interfere with her deputy clerks as they issued the licenses. But Davis refused.
Staver called the contempt hearing "a charade" saying that Bunning had his mind made up before the hearing began.
Kentucky law requires marriage licenses be issued under the authority of the elected county clerk. Davis views issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples as a stamp of approval of something she believes is a sin. She has said she will not issue marriage licenses until the state legislature changes the law so the licenses can be issued under someone else's authority.
The state legislature is not scheduled to meet again until January and Democratic Gov. Steve Beshear has refused to call a special session. Davis has refused to resign her $80,000-a-year job. As an elected official the only way she could lose her job is to lose an election or have the state legislature impeach her, which is unlikely given the conservative nature of the state General Assembly.
"She's not going to resign, she's not going to sacrifice her conscience, so she's doing what Martin Luther King Jr. wrote about in his Letter from the Birmingham Jail, which is to pay the consequences for her decision," Staver said.
Davis' plight has reignited the gay marriage debate and the limits of religious freedom. Her imprisonment has inspired spirited protests from both sides in this small eastern Kentucky community known mostly as the home to Morehead State University.
Saturday, about 300 people rallied in support of Davis at the Carter County Detention Center where she is being held. Another rally is scheduled for Tuesday with Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee.

Closing doors: Austria to phase out emergency measures after thousands of refugees reach Germany

Austria's leader said late Sunday that the country would begin phasing out emergency measures that helped thousands of refugees make their way to Germany over the weekend.
Austrian Chancellor Werner Faymann told reporters he had made the decision following what he called " intensive talks" with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban.
"We have always said this is an emergency situation in which we must act quickly and humanely," said Faymann. "We have helped more than 12,000 people in an acute situation. Now we have to move step-by-step away from emergency measures towards normality, in conformity with the law and dignity."
Austria's national railway company told the Associated Press it plans to end special service to the Hungarian border town of Hegyeshalom on Monday. Direct service between Vienna and Budapest will take its place will take their place, spokeswoman Sonya Horner said.
Refugees from the Middle East, Africa, and Asia who often have spent weeks traveling through Turkey, Greece and the Balkans to reach Hungary, a popular back door into the European Union, found to their surprise they were permitted Sunday to buy tickets to take them all the way into Austria and Germany. Hungary had insisted last week they would no longer be allowed to do this.
Fourteen trains from Hungary's capital of Budapest arrived at the Hegyeshalom station Sunday, disgorging refugees onto the platform. Police didn't check travel documents as passengers walked a few yards to waiting Austria-bound trains, which typically left less than 3 minutes later. Austrian police said more than 13,000 refugees had passed through their country to Germany over the past two days, far more than expected.

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• Pope Francis urges Catholics to help refugees

"No check, no problem," said Reza Wafai, a 19-year-old from Bamiyan, Afghanistan, who hopes to join relatives in Dortmund, Germany. He displayed his just-purchased ticket to Vienna costing 9,135 forints ($32.50). He was traveling without a passport, carrying only a black-and-white Hungarian asylum seeker ID.
EU rules stipulate asylum seekers should seek refuge in their initial EU entry point. But virtually none of the refugees want to claim asylum in Hungary, where the government is building border defenses and trying to make it increasingly hard for asylum seekers to enter.
Hungarian government spokesman Zoltan Kovacs told The Associated Press that Hungary had decided to drop visa checks on train ticket customers, a measure introduced only Tuesday, because of the sudden drop in refugee numbers made possible by Germany and Austria's breakthrough decision to take thousands of asylum seekers stuck in Hungary. The country used 104 buses to clear Budapest's central Keleti train station and Hungary's major motorway of more than 4,000 refugees and deliver them to the border.
Sunday's free movement for refugees on trains represented an effort "to return to normality, whatever that is," Kovacs said.
The refugee crisis, Europe's most severe since the end of World War II, has exposed deep divisions in the 28-member bloc over how to handle the situation. Germany, which was expected to receive an estimated 800,000 refugees this year, said it was putting no limit on the number displaced people it would accept. Other countries, like the United Kingdom, have said they would take in thousands more refugees than they had previously said they would.
But E.U. foreign ministers failed to agree practical steps to solve the crisis during a meeting in Luxembourg on Saturday, and despite allowing thousands to travel to Austria and Germany, Hungary has provided an otherwise lukewarm welcome, with thousands of refugees being sent to camps.
"While Europe rejoiced in happy images from Austria and Germany on Saturday, refugees crossing into Hungary right now see a very different picture: riot police and a cold hard ground to sleep on," Amnesty International researcher Barbora Cernusakova told Sky News.
Hungary is also constructing a fence along its southern frontier with Serbia in order to keep out, while Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced on Sunday that a fence would be constructed along his country's border with Jordan to prevent Syrian refugees arriving.
Amnesty International figures show the influx of refugees into Europe pales in comparison to the numbers taken by Lebanon (1.2 million), Jordan (650,000) and Turkey (1.9 million).
Division also remains on how to tackle the root cause of the mass migration from Syria, with reports that the British government is seeking to persuade opposition Members of Parliament to back airstrikes in Syria. France is also set to make a decision on airstrikes this week.

Mount McKinley to Denali Cartoon

Donald Trump’s presidential campaign boosted by private air fleet

Donald Trump’s presidential campaign has a big advantage hidden in plain sight: Trump Air.
Mr. Trump’s fleet of private aircraft, which includes a Boeing 757, a Cessna Citation X and three Sikorsky helicopters, whisks the billionaire executive to Republican primary events in far-flung locales, some of them difficult to reach by commercial planes.
The fleet also allows Mr. Trump to promote his brand. He garnered valuable publicity at the recent Iowa State Fair, for example, by giving children free rides in one of his helicopters with a huge Trump logo on the side.
“It’s a massive, unbelievable competitive advantage,” said Dave Carney, a GOP campaign consultant who was chief strategist for Rick Perry’s 2012 presidential primary campaign. “Having access to a private jet is the single most important asset to any national political campaign. It’s hugely expensive, but it gives you the ability to set your own schedule.”
The two Trump jets logged at least 71 campaign-related flights between April 1 and Aug. 31, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis of Federal Aviation Administration flight records on Flightwise.com and FlightAware.com. The flights included at least 26 stops in airports serving Iowa, New Hampshire or South Carolina, all of them early primary or caucus states. As of Sept. 1, Mr. Trump’s jets have been blocked from being tracked by commercial aviation sites, which is permissible.
In an interview, Mr. Trump said other campaigns might charter planes, but his 757 has amenities such as two bedrooms and a shower. It also features a 57-inch TV, pillows emblazoned with the Trump family crest and gold-plated seat belt buckles and bathroom faucets, according to a 2011 promotional video of the jet provided by his campaign.
“It’s like living in a beautiful home,” Mr. Trump said. “The advantage is that I’m able to fly nicely, quickly and on time.” He said he owns the aircraft outright and has no mortgages on them.
Flyovers with his Trump-branded planes, such as a recent one when his 757 circled over a campaign rally at an Alabama stadium, maximize his impact, Mr. Trump said. “We flew over the center of the stadium and the place went wild. It gave impact to the stadium and it gave impact the following day when everybody carried it” on television, he said.
Many of his GOP rivals, meanwhile, are flying commercial flights for all or much of their travel. Florida Sen. Marco Rubio typically flies commercial; he and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush sat next to each other on an American Airlines flight from Miami to Nashville, Tenn., for a National Rifle Association event in April.
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie has flown commercial of late, although he racked up a hefty private-jet tab last year when flying as chairman of the Republican Governors Association. While former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum reported $10,000 in commercial airline expenditures for the second quarter, his campaign emails have asked supporters to “fill up the tank,” seeking per-mile donations to fund his visits to all 99 counties in Iowa by car.

Police recover 'significant' new evidence in hunt for killers of a northern Illinois police officer

Investigators revealed Friday they found “significant” new evidence in a wooded, marshy area where a northern Illinois police officer was gunned down during a pursuit of three suspicious men.
The discovery came after investigators used weed trimmers and machetes to clear the spot where Fox Lake Lt. Joe Gliniewicz, 52, was found shot to death Tuesday and then searched the ground on their hands and knees, MyFoxChicago reported.
“We did recover a significant piece of evidence,” George Filenko, Commander of the Lake County Major Crimes Task Force, told reporters, according to the station. “I know your next question is going to be what is it? I'm not at liberty to tell you.”
The recovered evidence could be very crucial to the case if and when it gets to the point of prosecution, the station reported, adding that investigators seemed encouraged, if not excited, about what was found.
The station said the search of the crime scene was being conducted in a painstaking manner.
“They've basically gotten it down to almost bare earth. They're on their hands and knees literally today doing grid to grid searches,” Filenko said.
Earlier in the week investigators sent to the crime lab DNA evidence that they hope could lead to the killers.
MyFoxChicago also reported Friday that police obtained videos from homes and businesses that show the three suspects, described only as two white men and one black man, before and after Gliniewicz was murdered.
On Thursday police said a homeowner gave them video of the three men. The new videos could provide more clues, the station said.
The videos were turned over to the FBI which is compiling a timeline of the suspects movements, Filenko said.
The investigators believe the three suspects are probably still in the Fox Lake area, 45 miles north of Chicago.
“We are expecting a high volume of people out on the chain of lakes with it being a holiday weekend and there is no cause for concern for the people coming into town. There's no cause for concern for the residents within the town,” said Detecive Chris Covelli with the Lake County Sheriff’s Department.
A local company Motorola Solutions has announced a $50,000 reward for help in finding the killers.
Gliniewicz, a 30-year police veteran who was planning to retire at the end of the month, contacted dispatchers about the three suspicious men run and requested a second unit. Dispatchers soon lost contact with him, and backup officers found him about 50 yards from his squad car with a gunshot wound. He died soon after.

Clinton acknowledges paying State Department staffer to maintain private email server

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton on Saturday confirmed that she and her family personally paid a State Department staffer to maintain the private email server that Clinton used when she led the agency.
“We obviously paid for those services and did so because during a period of time we continued to need his technical assistance,” the former secretary of state told reporters after a campaign stop in Portsmouth, N.H.
She also said the payments to former agency IT specialist Bryan Pagliano are “in the public record.” And she commented on Pagliano’s reported decision to plead the Fifth Amendment if called to give closed-door testimony before the GOP-led House’s Select Committee on Benghazi.
"We encouraged everyone to cooperate,” Clinton said. “Facts are facts. I would very much urge those who are asked to cooperate to do so."
A congressional source told Fox News on Friday that committee investigators hope to question Pagliano over possible destruction of evidence. Clinton turned over emails from the private server that she deemed official and deleted those she considered personal.
The Washington Post first reported the payments to Pagliano, citing an unnamed campaign official.

More on this...

• Clinton server scandal: Timeline of key events

The official also told the newspaper that the arrangement also ensured that taxpayers weren’t paying for the upkeep of the server that was shared by Clinton, her husband, the former president, and their daughter as well as former aides.
Clinton, who was secretary of state from 2009 to 2013, is under scrutiny for using the private server and personal email accounts to conduct official business.
The Justice Department is investigating the matter and has a server. Among the questions are whether Clinton knowingly sent or received classified information and whether the setup resulted in any security breaches. Clinton, the Democratic frontrunner in the 2016 White House race, has said she never knowingly sent or receive classified information.
Pagliano served as the IT director of Clinton's 2008 campaign committee, then on her political action committee, according to The Post. He installed and managed her server and left his IT job at the State Department in February 2013, the same month Clinton stepped down as secretary.
The Post reports the Clintons paid Pagliano $5,000 for “computer services” prior to him joining the State Department, according to a 2009 financial disclosure form he filed. After he arrived on the State Department’s staff in 2009, he continued to be paid by the Clintons to maintain the server, a campaign official and another person familiar with the arrangement told The Post.
When asked about whether the former IT specialist had been paid privately to maintain the server, a State Department official said the agency “found no evidence that he ever informed the department that he had outside income,” The Post reported. This week, a different State Department official, couldn’t clarify to the newspaper Pagliano’s pay situation.
Pagliano reportedly didn’t list any outside income in the required personal financial disclosures he filed each year. The Post reports he remains a State Department contractor doing work on “mobile and remote computing functions,’ according to the State Department.
It’s not known exactly when or who “wiped” Clinton’s personal email server. However, it seems clear the move came after October 2014, when the State Department requested personal emails be returned as part of her business records.
Committee Republicans have long argued they don’t have all the documents that should be available to the investigation, after Clinton, using her personal discretion, purged some 30,000 emails.
Fox News put additional questions to Pagliano’s attorney, Mark J. MacDougall, Friday about whether his client played a direct role or had knowledge of the server scrub, but MacDougall said there was nothing further to add beyond the letter.
An intelligence source who confirmed to Fox that the FBI’s “A-team” was handling the Clinton email case, described the investigation as “moving along well,” adding investigators remain “confident” deleted records can be recovered because whoever did the scrub may “not be a very good IT guy. There are different standards to scrub when you do it for government vs. commercial.”

Republican disappointment with renaming of Mt. McKinley sparks petition drive to rename Reagan airport

President Obama returning the name of the United States’ tallest mountain from Mount McKinley to Denali has sparked a name-game feud, most recently Republicans under attack by an influential liberal PAC that is setting its sights on Ronald Reagan National Airport.
The group, CREDO Action, the political arm of San Francisco-based cellphone company Credo Mobile, is behind the effort with a petition drive.
“Tell John Boehner: Rename Ronald Reagan Airport,” the group writes on its webpage seeking petition signatures. “President Obama just took a small but important step for recognizing the history, culture, and human rights of America’s Native Americans when he decided to rename …. Mount McKinley in Alaska. But right-wing extremists in the Republican party, including House Speaker Rep. John Boehner, don’t see it that way.”
Within hours of the Obama administration announcing late Sunday that the president was removing the name of William McKinley, American’s 25th president and an Ohio Republican, Boehner and other Ohio Republicans were expressing their disapproval.
Boehner said he was “deeply disappointed” in this decision.
And Ohio GOP Sen. Rob Portman tweeted that he also was “disappointed” with Obama’s decision, announced ahead of the president's trip this week to Alaska where he tried to garner support for his climate change agenda.
The PAC raised $4 million during the 2014 election cycle. Of the $400,062 spent in connection with congressional races, $355,000 was against Republican candidates, according to OpenSecrets.org.
Credo Action states on its homepage that its mission is in part to fund progressive nonprofits.
The groups also states that during its 4-year history it has raised more than $79 million for hundreds of nonprofits including Democracy Now! and Planned Parenthood -- “efforts made possible by the revenues from our mobile phone company.”
The group had more than 52,400 signatures as of Saturday afternoon, toward its goal of 75,000.
News of the petition was reported first by the Washington, D.C.-based blog PrinceofPetworth.com.
This is not the first time the airport’s name, or renaming, has sparked partisan disagreement.
Just this spring, The Washington Post conducted a survey of area residents on the issue. It found 72 percent of Republicans said they refer to the airport as “Reagan” or “Reagan National,” while only 35 percent of Democrats acknowledged the airport by that name.
“Given Speaker Boehner’s current outrage and disappointment at President Obama’s decision to rename Mount McKinley, it’s time to give him the opportunity to make up for his own past mistakes,” the petition drive also states. “Sign the petition and tell John Boehner he needs to be consistent when it comes to naming America’s landmarks.”
The group also says its “history-making Pledge of Resistance … was a major factor in delaying the approval of the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline.”

Black Lives Matter Cartoon

Kentucky clerk's same-sex marriage refusal divides 2016 GOP field

WASHINGTON –  The case of Kim Davis, the defiant Kentucky clerk thrown in jail for refusing to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, has divided the 2016 Republican presidential field -- pitting social conservatives championing her cause against others who suggest she's gone too far.
Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee is planning a rally Tuesday in support of Davis, and says he’s offered her “prayers and support.” The Southern Baptist minister, who won the 2008 Iowa caucuses with the help of a social conservative coalition but is struggling in the polls this time around, argues Davis is on sound legal footing and commended her Friday for “not abandoning her religious convictions and standing strong for her religious liberty.”
On his campaign website, Huckabee posted a “Free Kim Davis” petition and demanded “we must end the criminalization of Christianity!"
Former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum also has come out strong in support of Davis, as has Texas Sen. Ted Cruz.
Cruz called Davis’ jailing an act of “judicial tyranny” and encouraged “every believer, every constitutionalist, every lover of liberty to stand with Kim Davis.” And he criticized any 2016 candidate not doing so.
Indeed, several other candidates have walked a fine line, and at least hinted they think Davis has overstepped now that gay marriage has been ruled legal nationwide.

More on this...

• Rick Santorum wades into same-sex marriage license debate

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush said "she is sworn to uphold the law."
Former HP executive Carly Fiorina told conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt on Tuesday, "I think that we must protect religious liberties with great passion and be willing to expend a lot of political capital to do so now because it’s clear religious liberty is under assault in many, many ways."
She added: "Having said that, when you are a government employee, I think you take on a different role. When you are a government employee as opposed to say, an employee of another kind of organization, then in essence, you are agreeing to act as an arm of the government. And, while I disagree with this court’s decision, their actions are clear."
Fiorina told the host it was now up to Davis to make a personal decision about what is required of her at her job.
“Is she prepared to continue to work for the government, be paid for by the government, in which case she needs to execute the government’s will … or sever her employment with the government and go seek employment elsewhere where her religious liberties would be paramount.”
Whether voters and caucus-goers will see the clerk's case as a litmus test for candidates' social conservative credibility remains to be seen. But the case drags on.
With the clerk herself in jail, the county clerk’s office started to issue same-sex marriage licenses through Davis’ deputy clerks. Davis’ son, Nathan Davis, was the lone holdout from the office.
The first couple to get the license Friday was William Smith Jr. and James Yates.
“I just want the licenses given out,” Yates said. I don’t want her in jail. No one wanted her in jail.”
During a hearing Thursday, U.S. District Judge David Bunning told Davis she would be released if she promised not to interfere with her employees issuing licenses, but she refused.
In Louisiana, presidential candidate and Gov. Bobby Jindal says the Davis case is exactly like ones where business owners – like florists and bakers -- have refused their services for same-sex ceremonies.
Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., told CNN, “I think it’s absurd to put someone in jail for exercising their religious liberty.”
Others, like New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and Marco Rubio, searched for a middle ground.
“While the clerk’s office has a governmental duty to carry out the law, there should be a way to protect the religious freedom and conscience rights of individuals working in the office,” Rubio told The New York Times.
Christie told radio host Laura Ingraham the situation is different when it comes to public employees.
“What I’ve said before is for someone who works in the government has a bit of a different obligation than someone who’s in the private sector or obviously working for education institutions that’s religiously based or others,” he said, adding, “but my point is we have to protect religious liberty and people’s ability to be able to practice their religion freely and openly, and of course we have to enforce the law too.”
During another radio interview with Hugh Hewitt on Wednesday, South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham said despite Davis’ conviction, “the rule of law is the rule of law.”
Also on Thursday, Marion County Circuit Judge Vance Day, a former chairman of the Oregon Republican Party, began taking steps to create a legal defense fund in response to his decision not to perform same-sex ceremonies.

Houston-area sheriff's deputy remembered during funeral

 

HOUSTON –  Thousands of law enforcement officers stood at attention to form a wall Friday outside one of Houston's largest churches as a 21-gun salute and flyover by police helicopters were carried out in honor of a slain sheriff's deputy.
The symbolic gestures followed the funeral for Harris County Sheriff's Deputy Darren Goforth, who was gunned down at a gas pump a week ago.
"We come to this place with heavy hearts, and have questions we don't really understand," Lt. Don Savell, the sheriff's department chaplain, said as the ceremony began. "We gather to share the grief we all feel and perhaps to find the strength to bear our sorrow and to look for seeds of hope."
Second Baptist Church, which holds 7,000 people, was filled. Some officers stood outside and watched the nearly two-hour service on big-screen televisions, while other spectators gathered outside the suburban convenience store where Goforth was killed to view the funeral on screens set up there. Flowers, balloons, posters and written messages in memory of Goforth still surround the pump where he was shot.
Goforth, 47, was in uniform when he was killed while putting fuel in his patrol car. A 30-year-old Houston man is charged with capital murder. Investigators are still trying to determine a motive.
"Darren Goforth was one of the good guys, one that made a difference," Sheriff Ron Hickman said during the funeral. He said Goforth's life was taken "senselessly and in an act of cowardice" the night of Aug. 28 but that he and others "will answer calls in Darren's honor."
He said about 11,000 officers from "coast to coast" had come to pay respects.
Outside the church after the service, Hickman gave Goforth's wife, Kathleen, the flag that had been draped over the casket.
A line of patrol cars formed a large cross in the parking lot, and two Houston fire trucks with ladders extended formed an arch with a flag extended at the top. People lined streets as the funeral procession drove away. A private burial was planned.
Officers at various Texas law enforcement departments held moments of silence outside their buildings around the time of the funeral.
The killing brought out strong emotions in the law enforcement community, with Hickman suggesting last weekend that it could have been influenced by heightened national tension over the treatment of blacks by police. Goforth was white and the man charged with killing him, Shannon Miles, is black.
The Rev. Ed Young told those at the funeral that he fears evil has reached an "almost epidemic stage" with attacks on those who "wear the blue" — a reference to the police uniform.
But he said he's seen signs of hope in the wake of Goforth's death, with people being supportive of officers and openly praying for them.
"Things are changing," Young said. "There will be a new Houston, a new Texas, a new America.
"And you can write it down. We have your back," he told officers as the funeral crowd stood and applauded.

Pandora's Box: New Orleans prof says Confederate purge would target Andrew Jackson, too

Why not? The PURGE has begun on all offensive History. 

If New Orleans intends to purge all symbols of the Confederacy, it must take down its famous statue of Andrew Jackson, too, according to a Big Easy professor, who says his tongue-in-cheek demand is meant to show the absurdity of measuring historical figures by contemporary standards.
With rebel symbols under fire around the nation in the wake of the mass shooting in June of black worshipers at a Charleston, S.C., church by a white supremacist who embraced the stars and bars, New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu has called for the removal of statues of Confederate stalwarts Robert E. Lee, Jefferson Davis and PGT Beauregard. But a local university dean says a longstanding city ordinance being invoked by Landrieu would just as easily apply to the seventh president, known as "Old Hickory" and famous for defeating the British in the War of 1812's pivotal Battle of New Orleans.

“If they [keep] going down this route, they will open Pandora’s box.”
- Richard Marksbury

The ordinance allows city officials to remove any statue or monument deemed a nuisance if, among other things, it "honors, praises, or fosters ideologies which are in conflict with the requirements of equal protection for citizens as provided by the constitution and laws of the United States." Taken at its word, and without the benefit of historical context, the ordinance would mandate the removal of the statue of Jackson on horseback that has marked Jackson Square since 1856, said Tulane University Prof. Richard Marksbury.
“I don’t want to see any statues taken down," Marksbury told FoxNews.com. "I’m trying to prove a point.”
Marksbury, who has called New Orleans home for more than 40 years, said he is dismayed at the calls for removal of historical statues. Jackson owned slaves, battled fiercely against Seminole Indians in Florida, ordered the Cherokee nation onto reservations and signed the Indian Removal Act, all actions that could put his statue at odds with the ordinance. But he was of a different time, and a significant historical figure, said Marksbury. Monuments may be seen as marking history, not necessarily venerating individuals, he said.

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Tulane University Dean of Continuing Studies Richard Marksbury is proposing the statue of Andrew Jackson be taken down - but he is not serious.

Last week, a public commission in the French Quarter voted to remove a 124-year-old obelisk monument dedicated to the White League's brief, and bloody, overthrow of a biracial Reconstruction government after the Civil War. The fate of 35-foot-high monument, which stands on the edge of the old historic district, now awaits a decision from the City Council, as do the Confederate statues.
“If they [keep] going down this route, they will open Pandora’s box,” Marksbury said, explaining why he proposal, first made in a letter to local newspaper The New Orleans Advocate in late July. “My position is that if you remove one, you have to remove them all."
Landrieu's office in New Orleans did not immediately return requests for comment.
Jackson died 16 years before the Civil War but made military history in the War of 1812. When New Orleans was under threat, Jackson took control of the defenses, including militia for various western states and territories. In the Battle of New Orleans in 1815, his 5,000 troops successfully fought off nearly 8,000 British troops, saving the city.

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Jackson Square, New Orleans (Wikipedia/Aashish Lamichhane)

Next on the chopping block is an engraving of the Confederate flag that is part of a mural near the entrance of City Hall according to local TV station Fox8.
"Across our state and our country, there has been broad consensus that confederate flags should not fly over government buildings,” Landrieu said. “Staff is currently researching the history of the etched marble at the entrance of City Hall to determine the process for removing the Confederate flag crest, as well as alternatives to represent the Civil War period of our city's history in this mural."
Orleans Parish Councilman James Gray is in favor of taking down the Confederate monuments in the city, but he does not believe the Confederate engraving should be removed.
"I think it's a real difference in having a mere historical account than having a statue that is set in a place of honor and being maintained by taxpayer dollars," Gray said to Fox8.