More Deplorable Cartoons :-)

Who does Hillary find more deplorable -- jihadists or Trump supporters?

By Todd Starnes
Who does Hillary Clinton find more deplorable - the Islamic radicals or Donald Trump supporters?
I read a transcript of her remarks on Sept. 19th in the aftermath of the terror attacks in Minnesota, New York and New Jersey - and to be honest - it's hard to tell.
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“We will defend our country and we will defeat the evil, twisted ideology of the terrorists,” she declared.
Notice that she condemned the ideology of the Muslims bad guys – but she did not actually condemn the Muslim bad guys.
As a matter of fact, she carefully suggested that we not make any generalizations regarding Muslim-Americans.
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“There are millions of law-abiding peaceful Muslim-Americans,” she said.
Heaven forbid anyone would make gross generalizations in the aftermath yet more terrorist attacks committed in the name of Allah.
Although just last week Mrs. Clinton make some gross generalizations about Donald Trump and his supporters.
Let’s refresh the Mainstream Media’s memory, shall we?

“You could put half of Trump’s supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables,” she told a bunch of supporters at a LGBT fundraiser. “Right? The racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic – you name it.”
She went on to call all of us deplorables “irredeemable” and “not American.”
But on Sept. 19th she chided us – urging us to refrain from hateful rhetoric.
“Let’s not get diverted and distracted by the kind of campaign rhetoric we hear coming from the other side,” she said.
Well, ma’am – that train has already left the station.
Instead of condemning the Islamic radicals, she attacked Mr. Trump – accusing him of aiding and abetting the Islamists.
“We know that Donald Trump’s comments have been used online for recruitment of terrorists,” she said.
Mrs. Clinton went on to say “the kind of rhetoric and language that Mr. Trump has used is giving aid and comfort to our adversaries.”
She accused the Republican nominee for president of treason – treason!
And yet there was not a disparaging word about the real jihadists – the one who tried to blow us to kingdom come. There was not a peep about the one who stabbed 10 Americans in Minnesota.
So who does Hillary Clinton find more revolting – Islamic Radicals or American Deplorables?

Can a voting machine be hacked?

It took a $4 computer chip, and an Ivy League Ph.D, to apparently hack a voting machine.
"If you replace the computer program in a voting machine, then it will add up the votes in a different way," said Princeton University Professor Andrew Appel.
Appel, who is the Eugene Higgins professor of computer science and until last year the director of the graduate program, focuses on computer security and voting systems -- and says he needs just "seven minutes alone" with a voting machine to tamper with it.
"[Replacing the program] could shift votes around from one candidate to another, before the polls close ... There is the potential for fraud in touch-screen voting machines that are still used in six to ten states," he said.
Appel in 2008 first conducted a demonstration on how to hack a touch-screen voting machine, as part of a lawsuit against New Jersey officials. His test, though, recently has gained renewed attention in the wake of the hacks of Democratic National Committee emails, and the suspected hacking of state election systems in Arizona and Illinois this summer.
While Appel notes there has been no documented case of a voting machine actually being hacked in the manner that he did, he warns it could happen simply by replacing the machine's computer chip -- which costs about $4 -- with one that is pre-programmed to change the votes. In his demonstration, he changed the votes by swapping out the machine's computer chip for one that he was able to reprogram to display another tally.

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"I figured out how to make a slightly different computer program that just before the close of the polls shifts some votes around from one candidate to another, and I wrote that computer program onto a memory chip ... and now to hack the voting machine, you have to get seven minutes alone with it with a screwdriver."
Appel's video shows that while voters cast ballots for the candidate of their choice, the machine allotted different results when the votes were counted.
John Brzozowski, the deputy superintendent of elections in Hudson County, N.J., insists that in real life, such chip-switching cannot really be done.
"In our experience here in this office, we all concur that we have not seen one documented case of a machine being compromised," he said.
"I believe that you would have to go through an enormous amount of time and energy, and I don't know how you could possibly do that to 500 machines and get the secrecy and time to do so. I don't believe that's possible," he said.
Brzozowski and his staff took Fox News on a tour of the security area of their Jersey City headquarters where machines are stored. He pointed to multiple safeguards and safety procedures that protect machines. They are locked in secure areas, under 24-hour 7-day-a-week camera surveillance. Broken security tape on vital parts would show any violation of a machine.
For security reasons, he would not detail all the measures that authorities take to protect the machines and the integrity of the voting process.
"We have so many security measures I don't see how it would be possible," he said. "We have a product that works, and is reliable and is secure."
But the professor insists he exposed a loophole.
"While the machines are stored in a voting machine warehouse, the doors are locked and they have security cameras, but many people have to have access to those machines to maintain them," he said, noting that machines are often delivered days before an election to various polling sites. He worries about the level of security at polling locations.
Officials insist those machines are properly protected as well.
The Bergen County, N.J., Board of Elections said, "We take great security measures in New Jersey. We are very confident in our system and in our machines."
The voting machine company, Dominion Voting Systems, issued a statement to Fox News faulting Appel's demonstration, citing his use of a "de-commissioned machine."
The company says it "is not a realistic assessment of the security of a voting terminal as it is used in actual elections. The physical and operational security of voting devices and the overall election platform is paramount -- regardless of the technology ... a hack of any voting terminal that is not conducted in a real-world election environment -- with its physical security, pre-election testing and audit processes in place, is simply not a credible test."
But even the 'winner' of Appel's vote-changing demonstration thinks he is onto something.
Former Congressman Dennis Kucinich won the rigged vote tally. For the purposes of his demonstration, Appel used some of the 2008 presidential candidates' names as samples. In the machine that was compromised, Kucinich received four votes to 16 for former New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson.
But the professor's reprogrammed computer chip simply changed the results, so that the machine counted a tally that put Kucinich on top, 12 votes to Richardson’s eight.
"Once again we learn that the integrity of the election process can be put at risk through manipulating technology," said Kucinich, who is now also a Fox News contributor. "This story indirectly makes a case for paper balloting, with the count occurring on the spot as soon as the polls are closed."
"The good news is that it is not something that you can easily do from Russia," Appel said. "But the bad news is that it really is possible to do locally."

Democratic lawmakers pushing 'public option' amid ObamaCare woes

In the first year of President Obama’s administration, Congress overhauled the American health care system. Before his second term has ended, Democrats already are calling for significant changes to ObamaCare.
Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and more than two dozen Senate Democrats are now pushing the “public option” – the creation of government-run insurance entities designed to compete with private companies. It’s something liberals advocated for, unsuccessfully, during the original debate over the law. Conservatives say Democrats are only reviving the call now as a last resort, as major private insurers scale down their involvement considerably, up-front costs rise and doctor choices narrow.
“I think we're seeing the public option come back out of desperation,” said Douglas Holtz-Eakin, president of the conservative American Action Forum. “We’ve seen UnitedHealthcare groups, the Aetnas of the world withdraw from exchanges.”
Last month, Aetna announced it was withdrawing from 11 of the 15 states where it offers ObamaCare plans. The company said it made the decision “following a thorough business review and in light of a second-quarter pretax loss of $200 million and total pretax losses of more than $430 million since January 2014 in our individual products.”
UnitedHealthcare and Humana announced similar intentions, citing widespread losses in their ObamaCare insurance businesses.
“As a result, the kinds of people buying insurance there have very expensive medical bills -- insurers are losing money, as they try to cover those bills, jacking up the premiums, people move to other policies so it’s turning into the death spiral that everybody worried about,” said Holtz-Eakin.

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ObamaCare has insured millions through Healthcare.gov – the website where those buying health insurance can shop for a plan offered by insurance companies. Based on income, the government can offer shoppers federal subsidies. Critics charge that even with subsidies to help customers pay, ObamaCare insurance plans are still too expensive, too few customers are signing up and the system is unsustainable.

“The reality is we had to pass this bill to watch its collapse in order for us to get to single-payer government health care,” said Jeffrey I. Barke, a doctor and supporter of Republican nominee Donald Trump. “That is the only thing that makes sense to me, with this ObamaCare demise death spiral that we’re currently seeing.”
Democrats blame insurance companies for exiting ObamaCare markets, claiming the companies serve their shareholders over patients. More than two dozen Senate Democrats joined a resolution declaring that “giving all Americans the choice of a public, nonprofit health insurance option would lead to increased competition, reduced premiums, cut wasteful spending on administration, marketing, and executive pay, and ensure consumers have the affordable choices they deserve.”
Obama says Democrats’ efforts to change ObamaCare amount to improvements to a functioning system, and weeks ago published a column opening the door to the public option idea. “Policy makers should build on progress made by the Affordable Care Act by continuing to implement the Health Insurance Marketplaces and delivery system reform, increasing federal financial assistance for Marketplace enrollees, introducing a public plan option in areas lacking individual market competition, and taking actions to reduce prescription drug costs,” Obama wrote in the Journal of American Medicine.
Dr. Henry Aaron, a senior fellow of economic studies at the Brookings Institution, says the government should focus on regulatory changes, noting the Republican Congress opposes any public option plans. Aaron said he supports state insurance commissioners requiring insurance companies to sell all their individual plans on the ObamaCare exchanges to broaden the insurance pool, and ending special enrollment periods allowing customers to sign up for insurance once they find out they need health care.
“I think these measures would sustain competition at an adequate level within the health insurance exchanges,” said Aaron. “Over time, I think competition can and should grow because there are going to be new entrance into the health insurance exchanges by companies that have been standing on the sidelines and waiting to see how things play out.”

Federal charges filed against NY, NJ bombings suspect

Federal authorities formally charged 28-year-old Ahmad Khan Rahami Tuesday with planting a number of bombs in New York City and New Jersey over the weekend.
Rahami is accused of use of weapons of mass destruction, bombing a place of public use, destruction of property by means of fire or explosive, and use of a destructive device during and in furtherance of a crime of violence. Criminal complaints against Rahami were unsealed in New York and New Jersey Tuesday.
Investigators believe Rahami planted bombs in New York City, as well as in Elizabeth and Seaside Park, N.J. One of the devices exploded in Manhattan's Chelsea neighborhood Saturday night, wounding 31 people.
The court filings allege significant premeditation by Rahami. An affidavit claims that he began buying bomb components in June, purchasing citric acid, circuit boards, ball bearings and electric igniters on eBay.
In a statement, the online auction site said it was "proactively working with law enforcement authorities on their investigation." The company later added, "The types of items bought by the suspect are legal to buy and sell in the United States and are widely available at online and offline stores."
In addition, video recorded two days before the bombings and recovered from a family member's phone shows Rahami igniting incendiary material in a cylinder, then shows the fuse being lighted, a loud noise and flames, followed by billowing smoke and laughter, the complaint said.

The court filings also include excerpts from a handwritten journal found on Rahami following his arrest Monday. Investigators say Rahami accused the U.S. government of "slaught[er] against the mujahidean [sic] be it Afghanistan, Iraq, Sham [Syria], Palestine ..."
The journal also lauded Anwar al-Awlaki, a U.S.-born cleric killed in a 2011 drone strike, and Nidal Hasan, the former U.S. Army major who went on a 2009 rampage at the Fort Hood military installation.
Prosecutors say the document ends: "The sounds of the bombs will be heard in the streets. Gun shots to your police. Death To Your OPPRESSION."
Before the federal charges were filed, Rahmani was already being held on $5.2 million bail, charged with the attempted murder of police officers during the shootout that led to his capture Monday outside a bar in Linden, N.J.
Ealier on Tuesday, Rahami's father claimed he called the FBI on his own son two years ago -- but a source told Fox News that he immediately recanted. And according to a neighbor, the father said in 2014 that his son may have been in contact with people overseas collecting explosives, ABC News reported.

Rahami's father, Mohammad, spoke to reporters outside his home in Elizabeth, N.J. "Two years I called the FBI, my son, he's doing very bad, OK? But they check it almost two months... They say he's not a terrorist. I said, 'OK.' Now they say he is a terrorist. I say, 'OK.'"
Rahami's father said that two years ago, his son "was doing bad. Yeah, he stabbed my son, he hit my wife and I put him to jail two years ago."
Mohammad Rahami added that Ahmad stabbed his brother Nasser "for no reason." Later Tuesday, he told reporters that FBI agents "[did] not do their job."
The FBI's Newark field office looked into the accusations, a federal law enforcement source told FoxNews.com. Ahmad Khan Rahami was in jail on an assault charge at the time, the source said, but agents interviewed his father.

"He recanted immediately – he left that part out. He said he didn’t mean his son was a terrorist, just that he was interested in gang activity and watching violent videos. There was no derogatory information on him, and no basis to continue the investigation," the source said.
FBI's scrubbing of the allegations made against Rahami at the time did not turn anything up -- or as a law enforcement source close to the investigation described, the lead "washed out." Fox News is told a full-blown investigation into Rahami was not opened.
Rahami was arrested for stabbing a person in the leg and possession of a firearm in 2014. But a grand jury declined to indict him, despite a warning from the arresting officer that Rahami was likely "a danger to himself or others."
While the hunt for Rahami has ended, the investigation into his alleged path from server at a family restaurant to terrorist bomber is just beginning. Friends of Rahami’s who spoke with media outlets trace the roots of his radicalism to his trips to jihadist hotbeds in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
“It’s like he was a completely different person,” a friend of Rahami’s, Flee Jones, told the Times. “He got serious and completely closed off.”
Rahami’s first documented trip to Pakistan was in 2005, when he visited Karachi as a 17 year old, The New York Times reported. Rahami stayed in Karachi, known as a jihadi hotbed, for a few months before returning to New Jersey in January 2006. In 2011, Rahami made another lengthy trip, visiting Kandahar, Afghanistan, and Quetta, Pakistan. He again visited Quetta from April 2013 to March 2014. Multiple sources told Fox News that Rahami visited Afghanistan at least three times. Rahami was stopped on one trip for secondary screening, but he satisfied the questions and was cleared, a source told Fox News.
Rahami’s activities in Afghanistan and Pakistan are unknown, and authorities said the excursions didn’t raise any red flags at the time. Officials said at a Monday news conference they didn’t know if Rahami had received any weapons or explosives training. He did have a firearms license, however, The Washington Post reported.
But regardless of what he did during these trips, Rahami’s demeanor changed when he came back to New Jersey. Rahami began wearing traditional Muslim robes after one trip to Afghanistan, two friends, Amarjit Singh and Jonathan Wagner, told the New York Times. He grew a beard and began praying in the back of his family’s chicken restaurant.
Rahami also exhibited anti-Western and anti-military sentiment when he was around his young daughter, a former girlfriend, Maria, told FoxNews.com.
“One time he was watching TV with my daughter and a woman in a [military] uniform came on and he told [her], ‘That’s the bad person,’” she said.
There are family influences on Rahami, too. Rahami’s dad, Mohammad, told Wagner that he fought the Soviet Army in the 1980s as a member of the mujahedeen, the same group he same group that spawned Usama bin Laden and a generation of terrorists. Wagner said the elder Rahami didn’t approve of the current U.S.-led fighting in Afghanistan. One of Rahami’s brothers, Mohammad K., posted at least one jihadist message on Facebook, The Daily Beast reported. While Rahami had little presence on social media, his brother posted a meme in 2013 showing extremist fighters with the quote: “I bring men who desire death as ardently as you desire life.” The same brother also posted a 9/11 conspiracy theory video last month.
Rahami’s social life also was upended.
He stopped seeing Maria, allegedly ceased paying child support and in 2014 married a woman in Pakistan. He wrote to New Jersey Rep. Albio Sires that year seeking a visa to get his wife into the U.S. Sires said Rahami was “kind of nasty.”
“At the time she was pregnant and in Pakistan,” Sires said on MSNBC. “They told her that she could not come over until she had the baby, because she had to get a visa for the baby.”
The wife, who has not been identified, was eventually allowed into the U.S. She returned to Pakistan just days before the New York and New Jersey bombings and was detained by authorities in the United Arab Emirates on Monday, a U.S. official told The Los Angeles Times.
Separately, a sister of Rahami's accused him of trying to stab her but later recanted, Rep. Peter T. King, a member of the House Homeland Security Committee, told The Washington Post.
Rahami was born in Afghanistan in 1988 and came legally to the U.S. in January 1995, several years after his father arrived in America as an asylum seeker, CNN reported. Rahami became a naturalized citizen and was known as a “class clown” in high school, Maria told FoxNews.com. Maria said Rahami got along with his classmates; however, he still criticized American culture, comparing Western values to the strict version of Islam practiced in Afghanistan.
Rahami majored in criminal justice at Middlesex County College in Edison, N.J., but he dropped out of school before finishing his degree, according to media reports.
Mohammad reportedly opened First America Fried Chicken in 2002 on the ground floor of a home in Elizabeth. Family members lived on the second floor. It’s unclear when Rahami last lived at the address, but the location was raided by authorities on Monday during their dragnet for Rahami.
Zobyedh Rahami, who said she was a sister of Ahmad's, wrote online, "I would like people to respect my family's privacy and let us have our peace after this tragic time. I would not like to answer any questions."

Homeland Security Cartoons

Watchdog: Feds wrongly granted citizenship to hundreds facing deportation

Report: Immigrants set for deportation granted citizenship

More than 800 illegal immigrants from countries of concern who were set for deportation were mistakenly granted U.S. citizenship because the Department of Homeland Security didn’t have their fingerprints on file, according to an internal audit released Monday.
The Homeland Security Department’s inspector general found the immigrants used different names or birthdates to apply for citizenship with the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration. In the case of 858 immigrants from "special interest countries or neighboring countries with high rates of immigration fraud," the discrepancies weren’t caught because their fingerprints were missing from government databases.
A few even managed to get aviation or transportation worker credentials, though they were later revoked. One became a law enforcement officer.
The findings were released, incidentally, as authorities were investigating a string of weekend attacks, allegedly connected to foreign-born suspects.
The inspector general report could further fuel warnings about immigration security. The report warned that when immigrants become naturalized, "these individuals retain many of the rights and privileges of U.S. citizenship, including serving in law enforcement, obtaining a security clearance, and sponsoring other aliens’ entry into the United States."
The tally in the report was provided by the administration in mid-2014.
But the problem could be even worse. According to the audit, as of November 2015, the administration has found 953 more "who had final deportation orders under another identity and had been naturalized," some of whom were from countries of concern.
DHS Inspector General John Roth also found fingerprints missing from federal databases for as many as 315,000 immigrants with final deportation orders or who are fugitive criminals. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has not reviewed about 148,000 of those immigrants' files to add fingerprints to the digital record.
“This situation created opportunities for individuals to gain the rights and privileges of U.S. citizenship through fraud,” Roth said. “To prevent fraud and ensure thorough review of naturalization applications, USCIS needs access to these fingerprint records.”
Roth added that DHS has agreed to the recommendations made in the audit and that ICE has plans to “review the eligibility of each naturalized citizen whose fingerprint records reveal a deportation order under a different identity.”
The gap in fingerprints was created because older, paper records were never added to fingerprint databases created by both the now-defunct Immigration and Naturalization Service and the FBI in the 1990s. ICE, the DHS agency responsible for finding and deporting immigrants living in the country illegally, didn't consistently add digital fingerprint records of immigrants whom agents encountered until 2010.
The government has known about the information gap and its impact on naturalization decisions since at least 2008 when a Customs and Border Protection official identified 206 immigrants who used a different name or other biographical information to gain citizenship or other immigration benefits, though few cases have been investigated.
Roth's report said federal prosecutors have accepted two criminal cases that led to the immigrants being stripped of their citizenship. But prosecutors declined another 26 cases. ICE is investigating 32 other cases after closing 90 investigations.
ICE officials told auditors the agency hadn't pursued many of these cases in the past because federal prosecutors "generally did not accept immigration benefits fraud cases." ICE said the Justice Department has now agreed to focus on cases involving people who have acquired security clearances, jobs of public trust or other security credentials.
Mistakenly awarding citizenship to someone ordered deported can have serious consequences because U.S. citizens can typically apply for and receive security clearances or take security-sensitive jobs.
At least three of the immigrants-turned-citizens were able to acquire aviation or transportation worker credentials, granting them access to secure areas in airports or maritime facilities and vessels. Their credentials were revoked after they were identified as having been granted citizenship improperly, Roth said in his report.
A fourth person is now a law enforcement officer.
Roth recommended that all of the outstanding cases be reviewed and fingerprints in those cases be added to the government's database and that immigration enforcement officials create a system to evaluate each of the cases of immigrants who were improperly granted citizenship. DHS officials agreed with the recommendations and said the agency is working to implement the changes.

Terror Threat Clash: Trump, Clinton accuse each other of boosting enemy

Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton clashed sharply Monday in the wake of weekend attacks across three states that rocketed national security back to the forefront of the campaign, with the Democratic nominee accusing her opponent of giving “aid and comfort” to the enemy – and Trump saying terrorists are “praying” Clinton gets elected.
The Republican nominee, at a rally Monday afternoon in Florida, went on to say the attacks in New York City, New Jersey and Minnesota “were made possible because of our extremely open immigration system” – and accused Clinton of pushing “the most open-borders policy” of any presidential candidate in history.
“Immigration security is national security,” Trump said.
The rally followed a full day of political crossfire -- as the candidates balanced statements of gratitude for the hard and effective work of law enforcement responding to the incidents with hard-edged attacks on each other’s national security credentials.
Clinton, speaking earlier in New York, said she’s the only candidate in the race who was part of the “hard decisions” to take terrorists off the battlefield.
She repeated her call for an intelligence surge, and at a separate speech in Philadelphia said the “fast-moving situation” is a “sobering reminder that we need steady leadership in a dangerous world.”

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But she drew a fierce response from the Trump campaign after saying in New York that her opponent's rhetoric has been “seized on by terrorists,” and used to cast the West’s fight as a war against Islam. She cited past statements from other intelligence and counterterror officials in claiming Trump’s comments are used for recruitment -- and “the kinds of rhetoric and language that Mr. Trump has used is giving aid and comfort to our adversaries.”
Trump’s running mate, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, responded during an interview with Rush Limbaugh, saying, “the only thing that gives comfort to our adversaries is weakness.”
He questioned whether Clinton and President Obama “know we’re at war.”
In a blistering statement on Facebook, Trump said:
“Hillary Clinton's weakness while she was Secretary of State, has emboldened terrorists all over the world to attack the U.S., even on our own soil. They are hoping and praying that Hillary Clinton becomes President - so that they can continue their savagery and murder.”
The attacks continued Monday afternoon between the candidates’ aides, with statements and counter-statements being blasted out at a steady clip that underscored how close Election Day – seven weeks off – really is.
Trump spokesman Jason Miller called the attacks a “wakeup call,” and said: “Our enemies neither fear nor respect Hillary Clinton, and as a nation, that is dangerous, and it is disgraceful.”
He also described Clinton's earlier comments as tantamount to an accusation of “treason,” saying her remarks were “beyond the pale” and an effort to “distract from her horrible record on ISIS.”
Clinton spokesman Brian Fallon said: “For most of his campaign, Donald Trump has made dangerous and irresponsible statements that experts say play directly into the hands of ISIS and its perverse ideology.”
Amid the political war of words, authorities on Monday were able to capture suspect Ahmad Khan Rahami, who was wanted in connection with the Saturday bombing in New York's Chelsea neighborhood, as well as an explosion the same day in New Jersey’s Seaside Park and a foiled attack Sunday night near a train station in Elizabeth, N.J.
Separately, a young Somali man went on a stabbing spree in St. Cloud, Minn., over the weekend, injuring eight. The Islamic State claimed responsibility via ISIS-related media, though President Obama said that at this stage, officials see “no connection” between that attack and what happened in New York and New Jersey.
Trump, meanwhile, pointed to the incidents to renew his call for “extreme vetting” of immigrants from turbulent regions. He told Fox News’ “Fox & Friends” the threat is a “cancer from within.”