San Bernardino killers reportedly buried in small funeral

Muslim cemetery

The Muslim couple who killed 14 people when they opened fire at a San Bernardino, Calif.  holiday party earlier this month were buried Tuesday at a funeral guarded by FBI agents, Reuters reported Wednesday.
Syed Farook and Tashfeen Malik were reportedly buried in a Muslim cemetery hours away from San Bernardino in a ceremony attended by about 10 people, including members of Farook’s family and people who used to pray with the couple at mosques.
An attendee told Reuters it took a week to find a graveyard willing to accept the bodies of the jihadi couple who were killed in a gun battle with police.
According to Reuters, the funeral followed traditional Islamic rituals, where the bodies were cleansed and wrapped in white cloth and buried.
Most Muslims in the San Bernardino community refused to attend burial or perform funeral prayer.
“I don’t forgive him myself,” a mosque-goer who did not attend the funeral told Reuters. “I pray mercy for him, and we Muslims know God is merciful. But he’s also just.”
Farook and Malik’s rampage on Dec. 2 killed 14 and wounded 22 others at a holiday party for county workers at a Southern California social services center.
The Inland Regional Center in San Bernardino said Wednesday that repairs to two buildings should be completed by Jan. 4. But the building that houses a conference center where the shooting took place has substantial damage, and is closed indefinitely.
The other buildings received some damage as police searched them. They were locked down after the Dec. 2 shooting for repairs and a subsequent investigation.

Pharmaceutical CEO Martin Shkreli arrested on securities fraud charges

Martin Shkreli

The outspoken pharmaceutical CEO made famous for dramatically increasing a drug used by AIDS patients was arrested early Thursday on securities fraud allegedly connected to a separate firm he started in 2011.
Bloomberg News reported that Martin Shkreli, 32, was arrested in his New York City home. Prosecutors reportedly allege that he illegally took stock from Retrophin Inc. and used it to pay off other, unrelated dealings.
The report notes that Shkreli was later sued by the Retrophin board. Federal prosecutors accuse Shkreli of employing a complicated shell game after his fledging hedge fund lost millions. The arrest had nothing to do with drug pricing, the report said.
The Bloomberg report noted Shkreli’s meteoric rise from being raised by immigrant parents who worked as janitors in Brooklyn. Bloomberg said "Shkreli both epitomizes the American Dream and sullies it."
Public outrage boiled over this fall after news that Turing increased by more than 5,000 percent the price of Daraprim, a drug used to treat a life-threatening infection, jacking it up from $13.50 to $750 per pill.
Daraprim, a 62-year-old drug whose patent expired decades ago, is the only approved treatment for a rare parasitic infection called toxoplasmosis that mainly strikes pregnant women, cancer patients and AIDS patients.
After the outcry in September over Daraprim, Shkreli said the company would reduce the $750-a-pill price. Last month, however, Turing reneged on its pledge. Instead, the company is reducing what it charges hospitals for Daraprim by as much as 50 percent. Most patients' co-payments will be capped at $10 or less a month. But insurance companies will be stuck with the bulk of the tab, potentially driving up future treatment and insurance costs.
The drug price increase prompted an investigation by the Senate Special Committee on Aging on Turing Pharmaceuticals and other companies.
"The Turing and Valeant price spikes have been egregious," Sen. Susan Collins, the Maine Republican who heads the panel, said at a hearing last week.
A spokesman for Turing said the company was declining to comment on the hearing. Turing, with offices in New York City and Switzerland, had said in reference to the Senate panel's investigation that it looked forward "to having an open and honest dialogue about drug pricing."

Defense Secretary Carter used personal email in first months on the job

Pentagon admits Ash Carter used personal email for business

Defense Secretary Ash Carter used his personal email account to conduct some of his professional correspondence during his first months on the job earlier this year, the Pentagon admitted late Wednesday.
Carter's use of the personal account was first reported by The New York Times, which said that he had been confronted about his email habits by White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough this past May, three months after Carter took office as defense secretary.
Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook released a statement saying that Carter believes his use of personal email for work-related business was a mistake. Cook declined to say whether it was a violation of Pentagon email policies. Cook also said Carter stopped the practice, but Cook did not say when.
Carter also acknowledged the move was a mistake in an interview with CBS' “This Morning” on Thursday. He said he occasionally used his iPhone to send messages to immediate staff, but stressed no classified information was involved.
The Times reported that Carter was assigned a government email account when he assumed his office in February, but continued to conduct most of his business on his private account, often sending messages via his iPhone or iPad. According to the paper, a former aide to Carter said that his boss used his personal account so often during that period that staffers feared he would be hacked.
Pentagon policy since 2012 has been to bar all employees from conducting government business on personal email. Last year, a law signed by President Obama barred federal officials from receiving or sending emails from personal accounts unless the messages were either copied or forwarded into government accounts within 20 days. It was not immediately clear whether Carter followed that directive.
The Times report comes in the midst of an FBI investigation into whether Hillary Clinton mishandled classified information by using a private account for all her emails while secretary of state. According to the Times, Carter continued to use his personal email at least two months after Clinton's practices were revealed in March.
The Times said the emails it received under the Freedom of Information Act were exchanges between Carter and Eric Fanning, who was his chief of staff at the time and is now the acting secretary of the Army.

The emails were on a variety of work-related topics, the Times said, including speeches, meetings and news media appearances. In one such email, Carter discussed how he had mistakenly placed a note card in a "burn bag," the Times reported. Such bags are typically used to destroy classified documents.

Cook said Carter "does not use his personal email or official email for classified material. The Secretary has a secure communications team that handles his classified information and provides it to him as necessary."

Carter "takes his responsibilities with regard to classified material very seriously," Cook said.

Trump and Cruz Cartoons

GOP debate: No one trumps Trump and six other takeaways from Las Vegas

We’ll get to the GOP debate momentarily. But first, a word about the Republicans’ odyssey and oddity this past year.
Per this Fox News Poll released on Dec. 16, 2014:
Romney 19%
Bush 10%
Christie/Huckabee/Paul 8% each
Walker 7%
Carson/Ryan 6% each
Cruz 5%
Rubio 4%
The most recent Fox News Poll:
Trump 28%
Carson 18%
Cruz/Rubio 14% each
Bush 5%
Christie/Fiorina/Huckabee 3% each
Kasich Paul 2% each
Welcome to the most volatile Republican presidential race in modern times. The upper 66 percent of last year’s field is either out of the running or running on fumes. The top 74 percent in the current field is five times larger than its 15 percednt share of a year ago.
And 2016? It may only add to the confusion.
On to the main event and what transpired Tuesday night at The Venetian Las Vegas.
The good news: It was smaller grouping than the last time CNN/Salem Radio ran the show (nine candidates, down two from September’s gathering at the Reagan Presidential Library). And it was truncated – 40 minutes less than September’s three-hour debate from hell).
Still, CNN was plagued by the same problems as before: a candidates’ forum that was too long, too lumbering, and too laxly herded.
Here are seven observations from this, the final Republican debate of 2015:
1. No One Trumped Trump. It wasn’t for a lack of effort. Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul ripped into Donald Trump less than 30 seconds into the debate’s start over Internet policy. Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush tut-tutted: “You’re not going to insult your way to the presidency.”
What they don’t get: Trump didn’t earn the center spot on the stage courtesy of profound thinking or refined elegance. Better to construct one’s own case, rather than try to deconstruct The Donald.
Blame it on the candidates’ approach and Wolf Blitzer’s herky-jerky style of questioning (like watching a 16-year-old drive a stick-shift for the first time): how many of Trump’s rivals made a lasting impression as to how they’d defeat ISIS and protect the homeland?
2. The Cage Match.  At various points, Paul took swings at Trump, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie. The libertarians in the crowd loved it, but the candidate came across as desperate – for attention and a lifeline for a campaign struggling to stay afloat.
The dust-up that the media wanted but didn’t get: Trump and Texas Sen. Ted Cruz. Both were too smart to take the bait.
Cruz didn’t expound on his differences with Trump over the Muslim immigration ban or a previous comment suggesting he thought Trump lacked a presidential temperament. Trump expressed “great respect” for the other candidates on the stage and ruled out an independent run (the night’s biggest news).
Time will tell whether what Trump said in Vegas stayed in Vegas.
Cruz did have some momentary tussles – with Rubio over Senate votes (always a good way to put an audience to sleep). And Trump: his testiest moments came in a personal back-and-forth with Bush over demeanor and poll numbers.
3.  Executive Order. It was a national security debate long on tough talk about leadership skills, which would seem an opening for the two sitting governors looking for a leg-up in this race: Christie and Ohio Gov. John Kasich.
Did either succeed? Not quite.
For Christie, the problem was numbers. Yes, he had some good moments connecting national security to his New Jersey heritage. However, nine candidates and a round-robin style of Q&A too often reduced Christie to interjecting himself into the debate to remind viewers of just how vapid senators can be (Carly Fiorina also went down this path, at several points jumping into the cross-talk to bemoan the awfulness of the political class).
As for Kasich, it’s a matter of rhetorical substance abuse. Three governors past and present have departed the race. A fourth, Bush, is struggling to stay relevant. It’s a political climate in which the Republican base isn’t impressed by resumes, yet Kasich continues to recite a long Washington biography. Oh(io) the humanity.
4. Auld Lang Syne. And so ends the GOP’s debate circuit for 2015. Next up: a Jan. 14 debate in North Charleston, S.C., hosted by the Fox Business Network.
5. At a time when many a college student is taking semester finals, this debate had the vibe of that last exam of the week before an extended break. Tempers were short; the candidates seemed tired of sharing the same oxygen.
6.  Debate winners, if we must: Trump and Cruz, for playing mostly error-free ball.
7. Debate losers: anyone who lost their place in line for the “Star Wars” premiere by staying home to watch a mostly uneventful debate.

Cruz-Rubio feud flares as GOP candidates battle for tough-on-terror mantle

The rivalry between Sens. Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio flared Tuesday at the final Republican primary debate of the year, as all the leading GOP candidates battled to show their tough-on-terror credentials.

Donald Trump, as in past debates, sparred sharply with his rivals on stage over his controversial proposals, notably his call to ban Muslims from entering the country. But the changing dynamics in the race appeared to drive frequent clashes between the senators from Texas and Florida – who are now battling to be the Trump alternative in the race as Ben Carson slides in the polls.

With the terror attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, Calif., refocusing the race squarely on security issues, Cruz from the outset tried to sound a tough message against radical Islam.

“We will utterly destroy ISIS,” Cruz vowed, later adding: “ISIS and radical Islamic terrorism will face no more determined foe than I will be.”

But he repeatedly was challenged by Rubio over his Senate positions – including for legislation reining in NSA metadata collection. Rubio accused Cruz of helping take away a “valuable tool” for security officials, while Cruz said: “Marco knows what he’s saying isn’t true.”

Rubio later cited a budget vote by Cruz to say: “You can’t carpet bomb ISIS if you don’t have planes and bombs to attack them with.”

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie used the arguing to contrast his own executive experience against the senators’ legislative history. He described their jobs as “endless debates about how many angels on the head of a pin from people who have never had to make a consequential decision.”

But Rubio and Cruz returned to the fray later on as they tried to cast each other as soft on illegal immigration. “I led the fight against [Rubio’s] legalization-amnesty bill,” Cruz charged.

Some analysts had expected the tensions Tuesday to flare between Trump and Cruz, as the Texas senator surpasses Trump in Iowa polls and is surging nationally. But Cruz avoided taking on Trump in favor of Rubio – he even jokingly backed Trump’s plan to build a border wall.

“We will build a wall that works, and I’ll get Donald Trump to pay for it,” Cruz said.

Later on, Trump backed off comments where he said Cruz acted in Congress like “a bit of a maniac.” Trump said Tuesday, “He’s just fine, don’t worry about it.”

Instead, Trump took heat mostly from former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who slammed Trump’s plan to ban Muslims from entering the United States as “not a serious proposal.”

“He’s a chaos candidate, and he’d be a chaos president,” Bush said.

Trump fired back that “Jeb doesn’t really believe I’m unhinged” and only went after him because he’s “failed in this campaign.”

The Trump-Bush acrimony simmered throughout the debate, with Bush later telling Trump he can’t “insult your way to the presidency,” and Trump once again reminding Bush that his poll numbers have plummeted while Trump is leading.

Whether Bush’s attacks will help the struggling candidate remains to be seen. Perhaps more consequential is whether Rubio or Cruz can present himself as more capable of taking on the country’s security challenges.

All the leading candidates, though, focused on the terror threat throughout the CNN-hosted primary debate Tuesday night in Las Vegas – an event held just hours after Los Angeles closed its school system over a terror threat.

Citing that closure, which is now thought to have been prompted by a hoax threat, Christie said children will be going back to school filled with anxiety. And he said the country’s overall security environment has been hurt by President Obama and Hillary Clinton’s policies.

“America has been betrayed,” he said.

Christie cited his experience as a federal prosecutor, and governor, in saying that under a Christie presidency, “America will be safe.”

Carson also dismissed “PC” concerns about some of his own plans for taking on the terror threat.

“We are at war … We need to be on a war footing,” Carson said, while later making an argument against toppling foreign dictators. He compared the situation to being on a plane, where passengers in an emergency are advised to use oxygen masks themselves before helping others.

“We need oxygen right now,” Carson said, adding the government needs to think of the needs of the American people before solving everyone else’s problems.

Trump also sparred at times with other lower-polling candidates.

As before, Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul questioned Trump’s policy proposals, including to restrict the Internet to clamp down on ISIS’ social media use. “Do you believe in the Constitution?” Paul said of Trump supporters. Trump clarified he’s only talking about restricting the Internet in parts of Iraq and Syria.

And when Trump suggested that the money spent toppling Mideast dictators could have been better spent on building America’s roads and bridges, former HP CEO Carly Fiorina compared him to Obama.

“That’s exactly what President Obama has said. I’m amazed to hear that from a Republican presidential candidate,” she said.
Ohio Gov. John Kasich also took issue with suggestions from Cruz and Trump that the priority in Syria is not to remove Bashar Assad.

“We can’t back off of this,” Kasich said. “He must go.”

CNN also hosted a debate Tuesday for the second-tier GOP candidates -- former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham and former New York Gov. George Pataki. Graham was particularly critical of Trump’s Muslim ban plan at that debate, accusing him of declaring war on Islam and delivering a “coup” for ISIS.

Graham: Trump's proposed ban on Muslims a 'coup' for ISIS

The GOP presidential candidates in the lower tier debate Tuesday pounced on frontrunner Donald Trump’s plan to ban foreign Muslims from the U.S., with Lindsey Graham calling it a 'coup' for the Islamic State.
Graham and the others argued that targeting the Islam religion will only fulfill the terror group’s prophecy of fighting a future holy war.
“ISIS would be dancing in the streets, but they don’t dance,” said the South Carolina senator. “Declaring war on a religion will only help ISIS.”
Graham’s comment follows a series of deadly bombing attacks last month in Paris and the Dec. 2 massacre in San Bernardino, Calif., in which the attackers appear to have at least been inspired by the Islamic State.
Trump, in response, last week called for a temporary ban on Muslims coming into the country, at least until the U.S. intelligence community can improve its screening process.
Rick Santorum, another GOP White House candidate and former Pennsylvania senator, said in the lower tier debate that he disagrees with Trump’s sweeping plan, but added, “We also have to take this country from those who want to harm us.”

A debate with tough terror talk: Trump deflects while Cruz and Rubio clash

From the opening moments of the Las Vegas debate, Wolf Blitzer tried to make it about Donald Trump, whether he wants to isolate America, and whether he is “unhinged.”
Jeb Bush, languishing in the polls, took the bait. Ted Cruz, surging into second place, did not. Marco Rubio, doing well in the polls, also did not.
And Trump, with a huge lead in the national polls, calmly deflected the first attack. As I had predicted on the air, Trump generally avoids bonking his rivals over the head in debate settings, saving his tougher language for interviews and speeches.
The CNN moderators gave the candidates every opportunity to bash each other, and the two Cuban-American senators were happy to answer the call, starting with a spat over NSA surveillance. Trump, defying some pundits’ predictions that he would smack Cruz around, didn’t engage in fisticuffs.
Some takeaways: Blitzer did a solid job in keeping the debate firmly focused on terrorism, a reflection of how fundamentally the Paris and San Bernardino attacks have transformed the presidential campaign. This was a high-stakes encounter on dead-serious subjects.
The entire debate was about projecting strength: against ISIS, against lone-wolf killers, against the Obama administration’s approach.
The debate did nothing to dent Trump’s lead, and Cruz and Rubio lived up to their reputations as the best orators in the field, probably fighting to a draw. Jeb got in a few licks, and Ben Carson wasn’t much of a presence.
After Trump finessed Blitzer’s opening question about his plan to temporarily bar Muslims from entering the country—he shifted to attacking the Iran nuclear deal as “horrible” and “disgusting”—Wolf tried again. Why, he asked Bush, did you call Trump’s plan “unhinged?”
Jeb, rather than seize the moment, began with a wordy response, but then delivered his practiced line: “Donald is a chaos candidate, he’d be a chaos president.” But he looks slightly uncomfortable taking such swings.
Trump was almost dismissive in response, saying “Jeb doesn’t really believe I’m unhinged,” and adding that the former Florida governor was only trying to revive his failing campaign.
Conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt tried, and failed, to entice Cruz into criticizing Trump’s Muslim plan. The senator shifted to President Obama engaging in “double-speak” on Islamic terrorism. Hewitt tried again, but Cruz stuck to his game plan of speaking no evil of The Donald so as not to alienate his supporters.
Cruz tried to sidestep a Dana Bash question on his vote to limit NSA surveillance by saying “the premise of your question is not accurate.” When Rubio criticized Cruz’s vote, the Texan hit back: “Marco knows what he’s saying isn’t true.”
Rand Paul, who barely made the debate cutoff, also whacked Rubio by saying he has more of an allegiance to Sen. Chuck Schumer and his fellow liberals.
That gave Chris Christie, back on the main stage, an opening to take on the squabbling senators, saying: “If your eyes are glazed over like mine…”
Trump’s only moment of agitation came when he scolded Bush for interrupting him, then said he was “a very nice person, but we need toughness.”
“Donald, you’re not going to be able to insult your way to the presidency,” Jeb said, sounding annoyed.
“With Jeb’s attitude, we will never be great again,” Trump said evenly.
The Donald chided CNN in the second hour, though not with Newt Gingrich-like force, calling it “very sad” that the moderators kept feeding the others lines that “Mr. Trump said this”—and were doing it for ratings. He seemed annoyed only when Bush said he doesn’t get his information “from the shows,” Saturday morning or Sunday morning—a reference that most of the audience missed because Jeb didn’t explain it was an old Trump comment.
“I’m at 42 and you’re at 3!” Trump proclaimed, wielding polling numbers as a weapon.
No question the CNN team asked could get the GOP candidates to retreat a centimeter from the tough terror talk.
Would Trump close down the Internet to stop ISIS?
He said it wasn’t a question of freedom of speech: “I don’t want them using our media,” before clarifying that the efforts would be narrowly targeted.
Had Cruz said he would carpet-bomb ISIS until the sand glows in the dark?
He would bomb until we “utterly and completely destroy ISIS,” Cruz said, before clarifying he didn’t mean cities.
Even Carson didn’t flinch when Hewitt, in a question that drew boos, asked: “You are okay with the deaths of thousands of innocent children?”
At times, there was so much tough talk that the rivals’ rhetoric seemed to blur and they canceled each other out.
No one dominated the stage, as in some past debates. Trump went to Las Vegas with a huge lead and leaves the same way. Cruz and Rubio showed up in second and third place, and if their counterpunching changed that equation, it was not immediately evident. None of the other contenders had a breakout moment. And the country got a powerful reminder that we are at war.