Wednesday, October 4, 2017
Hero Marine stole truck, drove Vegas shooting victims to hospital
U.S. Marine veteran Taylor Winston, 29 |
U.S. Marine veteran Taylor Winston,
29, reportedly stole a utility truck and used it to drive several
people, injured in the Las Vegas shooting attack, to a local hospital.
(Facebook)
A U.S. Marine vet helped rescue more
than a dozen people during the Las Vegas shooting attack Sunday with
quick thinking he credited to his military training.
Taylor Winston, 29, stole a utility
pickup truck he found on the concert grounds and transported several
injured people to the hospital before ambulances could arrive on the
scene, The Orange County Register reported.
Winston was reportedly at the concert with his
girlfriend and friends when attacker Stephen Paddock began shooting at
the crowd from his hotel room on the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino in Las Vegas, Nev., he told CBS News.Paddock killed at least 58 people and injured more than 515 others in the shooting spree.
“The shots got louder and louder, closer to us and saw people getting hit, it was like we could be hit at any second,” Winston said. “It was a mini war zone but we couldn’t fight back.”
The vet said they ran for cover and hopped a fence to get to safety. Once he landed on the other side, he said he reportedly saw a bunch of white trucks.
“I tested my luck to see if any of them had keys in it, first one we tried opening had keys sitting right there,” he said. “I started looking for people to take to the hospital. There was just too many and it was overwhelming how much blood was everywhere.”
Winston and his friend reportedly made two trips to Desert Springs Hospital Medical Center, squeezing “probably 20 to 30” victims in the backseat and in the bed of the truck, CBS News said. When they returned to the shooting scene for a third pick up, he said it looked like emergency responders had it under control, The Orange County Register reported.
The vet reportedly returned the truck, parking it a few blocks away from the venue.
Winston, who served two tours in Iraq before being honorably discharged from the Marines, said he thought his military training helped him snap into action, CBS News reported.
But he added that there were a lot of “courageous people” on the scene helping each other out and said he was “glad that I could call them my country folk.”
Professor blames Las Vegas massacre on 'Trumpism,' 'narrative of white victimization'
Drexel University professor George
Ciccariello-Maher tweeted that "white people and men" will go on
shooting sprees "when they don't get what they want."
Extreme "Trumpism" and "white
victimization" motivated the Las Vegas shooter who killed 59 and injured
at least 515 others, according to a Drexel University professor.
Associate Professor George
Ciccariello-Maher tweeted just hours after the massacre “white people
and men” will go on shooting sprees “when they don’t get what they
want.”
Stephen Paddock used a perch inside the Mandalay Bay
Resort and Casino to rain down fire on a crowd at a country music
concert Sunday night.Drexel University told Fox News the professor’s tweets don’t represent the university’s views.
“The recent social media comments by George Ciccariello-Maher, associate professor of Politics and Global Studies at Drexel University, are his own opinion and do not represent the University’s views,” the university said in a statement. “Drexel is deeply saddened by the tragic shooting in Las Vegas. The thoughts and prayers of the Drexel community are with the families of those affected by this senseless act of violence.”
This professor has a history of controversial tweets. In 2016, he tweeted “all I want for Christmas is white genocide.”
Cicariello-Maher began a Twitter thread Monday morning with a three word message: “A White Man.”
“It’s the white supremacist patriarchy, stupid,” he tweeted.
Cicariello-Maher continued:
"But liberals will drown out all discourse with a deafening chorus screeching 'gun control.' To believe that someone who would shoot down 50 people wouldn't circumvent any gun law you pass is the height of delusion. But liberal escapism means talking about easy questions and proposing easy non-solutions rather than talking about who kills and why.
"White people and men are told that they are entitled to everything. This is what happens when they don't get what they want. The narrative of white victimization has been gradually built over the past 40 years. It is the spinal column of Trumpism, and most extreme form is the white genocide myth. Yesterday was a morbid symptom of what happens when those who believe they deserve to own the world also think it is being stolen from them."
He ended with this tweet several hours later:
“Here's a wild idea: white supremacy in the U.S. is a bipartisan project, & *both* the gun lobby *and* the anti-gun lobby are racist as f---.”
Trump on Puerto Rico's debt: 'We're going to have to wipe that out'
President Trump told Fox News Tuesday
that "you can say goodbye" to Puerto Rico's debt as the island
struggles to recover from the devastation left by Hurricane Maria.
Trump spoke to Fox News' Geraldo
Rivera in an interview that aired exclusively on "Hannity" Tuesday
evening. The president spend the day touring the damage left by Maria,
the strongest hurricane to hit Puerto Rico in nearly a century.
"They owe a lot of money to your friends on Wall Street
and we're going to have to wipe that out," Trump told Rivera. "You can
say goodbye to that."Puerto Rico was facing a $74 billion public debt load prior to Maria and was struggling to recover from a decade-long recession that has caused hundreds of thousands of residents to leave for the U.S. mainland.
Trump also defended his administration's response to the storm, saying "we may have done our best work here, but it hasn't been appreciated."
"We’ve done a fantastic job," the president told Rivera. "This was a very tough one. You know, I say we got an A+ in Texas [and] we got an A+ in Florida [after Hurricane Harvey and Hurricane Irma]."
But actually, if you see over the last couple of days, now people are really seeing what we’ve done," Trump added. "The runways are open, the ships are pouring in and a lot of things are happening, so it’s great."
‘He was not happy’: Menendez pushed for rule change in doc's dispute, Obama officials testify
Top health officials from the Obama administration
testified Tuesday that Sen. Robert Menendez pressured them to change a
long-standing Medicare policy in a way that would benefit the Florida
ophthalmologist at the center of the New Jersey Democrat’s corruption
trial.
Menendez is accused of accepting
campaign donations, gifts and vacations from his friend Dr. Salomon
Melgen. In return, Menendez allegedly used his Senate powers to lobby on
behalf of Melgen’s business interests.
Then-Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen
Sebelius, the highest-level Obama official to testify in the case, took
the stand Tuesday to describe a meeting she had with Menendez in the
office of then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev. Prosecutors’
previously filed brief said that meeting was held in August 2012 and
alleged Menendez “personally pressured” Sebelius to intervene over a
Medicare payment policy, though Sebelius balked.Giving her side of the story, Sebelius testified Tuesday that the “gist” of the conversation involved Menendez’s “unhappiness” over the policy, which he felt was “unclear” and “unfair” to providers. The policy happened to be at the center of a billing dispute involving Melgen.
She added, “To me it was pretty simple,” and noted that she didn’t think it was a “very satisfactory meeting” for Menendez.
Sebelius also said it was “unusual” for Reid to invite her to a meeting involving another member of Congress. It was “actually the only time in five and a half years that this occurred,” she said.
But Sebelius wasn’t the only Obama health official with whom Menendez met. Two months earlier, Menendez met with then-Acting Administrator for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Marilyn Tavenner, who also testified Tuesday.
Their meeting apparently ended on a similar note – with the health official pushing back, and Menendez allegedly dissatisfied.
“What he was asking me was to take a look at the policy, and the policy went back for a few years,” Tavenner testified. “And he was questioning the clarity of the policy and [asked] if I would take a look.”
She suggested that when Menendez determined Tavenner would not be altering the policy, he seemed to want to take his request up the ranks.
“I think he was not happy. He told me he was disappointed, that he felt there should have been changes,” Tavenner testified. “And that he did not intend to let it stand. He intended to take it to the next steps.”
Tavenner, who worked for CMS for five years, explained that those “next steps” would include bringing the issue to Sebelius.
According to court documents filed in 2016, CMS in 2009 suspected Melgen had overbilled Medicare for $8.9 million from 2007-2008 by “engaging in a prohibited practice known as ‘multi-dosing.’” According to court documents, the Medicare policy required that each patient receiving the drug Lucentis be treated using a separate vial, but Melgen “routinely” used the extra solution from a single vial to treat multiple patients. CMS believed Melgen was paid for more vials of the drug than he actually used.
According to Tavenner, the changes to the Medicare payment policy Menendez allegedly proposed would have benefitted Melgen, though she did not recall Melgen’s name coming up in the June 2012 meeting.
HARRY REID EXPECTED TO BE CALLED TO TESTIFY IN MENENDEZ TRIAL, SOURCE SAYS
Menendez has proclaimed his innocence in the case. When the trial opened last month, his lawyers said the case is not about corruption or bribery but about a long-term friendship.
Reid also is expected to be called to testify in the Menendez trial. The former Senate Democratic leader’s name re-emerged weeks ago in the case, when prosecutors said he was “first enlisted” by Menendez in November 2011 to advocate for Melgen in the ongoing dispute with Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS.)
Reid already has met with the Justice Department and the FBI in connection with the investigation, back in 2015.
Court documents claim that Reid reached out to the White House deputy chief of staff in 2011 about Menendez being “upset about how a Florida ophthalmologist was being treated” by CMS. Prosecutors said the White House deputy chief of staff “demurred” as it involved a “dispute between a single doctor and an administrative agency, not a policy matter.”
In June 2012, Melgen also apparently flew Reid on his company’s private plane from Washington to Boston and back, but Menendez was not present, according to a source with knowledge of the situation.
Reid did not respond to Fox News’ request for comment.
Tuesday, October 3, 2017
Comedy writer Megan Amram jokes Las Vegas shooter fits typical profile because he is a 'white man'
Comedian Megan Amram responded to a TMZ story that Las Vegas massacre gunman Stephen Paddock doesn’t fit the typical mass shooter profile by tweeting, “White man? Sure does.”
TMZ published an article
making a case that Paddock is unique for a mass shooter, as he is older
(64), lived in a retirement community and didn’t have a known criminal
record. The comedian's tweet to her 759,000 followers resulted in a series of responses mocking white males.
Amram’s comment was retweeted over 1,000 times and
favorited over 5,000 times in the first three hours after she published
the tweet. She followed up her response to TMZ with a pair of jokes
related to the massacre in Las Vegas in which Paddock opened fire at the
Route 91 Harvest Music Festival in Las Vegas, killing at least 58
people and sending more than 500 others to hospitals.“If only there was a way to have known he was going to use that rifle for assault,” Amram wrote, follow by, “Trump, please ban Americans from traveling to the United States. They are far too dangerous to let in.”
Amram’s Twitter feed is filled with anti-Trump messages, including one --“Today was the day Donald trump finally became president,” -- that she adds on an almost daily basis.
“I agree with republicans because I too want millions of people to die so that I can get revenge on Black President,” she wrote back on Sept. 21.
“There should be a dating app for people who have been fired from trump's administration,” she wrote back on July 31.
Amram was a writer for the 2011 Academy Awards and has worked on popular shows including “Billy on the Street with Billy Eichner,” "Parks and Recreation” and “Silicon Valley," according to IMDB. She is also a contributing writer for The New Yorker and recently wrote a spoof of Jared Kushner’s Harvard admissions essay.
The Boston Globe and Huffington Post have both profiled Amram’s Twitter account in the past, although it remains unverified. Amram is hardly the only person to make polarizing comments on social media on Monday, as a CBS executive said she is “not even sympathetic” to victims of the Las Vegas shooting because “country music fans often are Republican” in a Facebook message.
The New Yorker and Amran did not immediately respond to Fox News’ separate requests for comment.
White House backs bill criminalizing abortions after 20 weeks
President Donald Trump walks from
Marine One across the South Lawn of the White House in Washington,
Wednesday, Sept. 27, 2017, as he returns from Indianapolis. (AP
Photo/Carolyn Kaster)
A House bill banning abortions after 20 weeks on Monday received the official backing of the Trump administration.
The White House “strongly supports”
the Republican efforts to “secure critical pro-life protections” and
believes “America’s children deserve the stronger protections” that the
bill would provide.
“The bill, if enacted into law, would help to
facilitate the culture of life to which our Nation aspires,” the
statement said. “Additionally, the bill would promote a science-based
approach to unborn life, as recent advancements have revealed that the
physical structures necessary to experience pain are developed within 20
weeks of fertilization”Arizona Republican Rep. Trent Franks is sponsoring the bill and it is scheduled to come up for a vote on Tuesday in the House.
The bill would criminalize abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy, introducing fines and jail sentences - up to five years – for those who perform or attempt an abortion.
The measure would not penalize women seeking abortions after 20 weeks and would allow the procedure in the case of rape, incest, or to save the life of the mother.
Pro-choice groups have come out in staunch opposition to the bill, calling it “cruel” and “unconstitutional.”
"20 week abortion bans are: unpopular, unconstitutional, part of the agenda to ban ALL abortion,” tweeted Planned Parenthood.
The Guttmacher Institute's director of public policy, Heather Boonstra, wrote in an op-ed for The Hill, saying the bill’s claim that unborn children can feel pain after 20 weeks “is not supported by the preponderance of scientific evidence.”
She also slammed the bill’s "particularly callous and cruel rape and incest exceptions" that require women to wait 48 hours and have two doctor visits with two different abortion providers before being allowed an abortion.
A similar bill passed the House back in 2015 but was later blocked by Senate Democrats, The Hill reported.
The new abortion bill is likely to pass the Republican-majority House but it might face opposition in the Senate where the rules require larger majority – meaning Republicans would need to sway at least eight Democrats to pass the bill.
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