Two parent chaperones have been accused of spraying Lysol on students during a Colorado high school prom because teen’s “dirty dancing” looked like “they were advertising butt sex.”

Louisiana is the world's prison capital. The state imprisons more of its people, per head, than any of its U.S. counterparts. First among Americans means first in the world. Louisiana's incarceration rate is nearly triple Iran's, seven times China's and 10 times Germany's.

Fox News hit a new low today by openly hoping for more pain for the American people in the form of gas prices reaching $5 a gallon before the presidential election.

For the third year, a majority says gay/lesbian relations are morally acceptable. The slight majority of American adults, 54%, consider gay or lesbian relations morally acceptable. Public acceptance of gay/lesbian relations as morally acceptable grew slowly but steadily from 38% in 2002 to 56% in 2011 and is now holding at the majority level.

This Gallup trend mirrors the growth in public support for legalizing gay marriage, which has risen from 42% support in 2004 to 50% or greater support in the last two years. Americans' support for gay rights on both questions leveled off in this year's Values and Beliefs poll, conducted May 3-6.

Gallup's longer-term question measuring U.S. attitudes about gays asks whether gay or lesbian relations should or should not be legal. The 63% now saying gay relations should be legal nearly matches the record-high 64% of a year ago, which came after a long-term increase in support for legality from 32% in 1986.

A police officer in Georgia is under criminal investigation for allegedly kicking a woman who was nearly nine-months pregnant in the stomach before charging her with obstruction of justice.

In an incident report filed on Dec. 12, 2011, Dekalb County Police Officer Jerad Wheeler wrote that he gave "three verbal commands to 'Get back'" to Raven Dozier. The woman was in her third trimester at the time and visibly distraught over witnessing Wheeler taser her brother, Darius Usher, in response to a domestic disturbance.

Marissa Alexander, the 31-year-old Florida woman who fired what her family calls a warning shot at her abusive husband, was sentenced Friday morning to 20 years in prison.

A monthly newsletter published by the Greene County Republican Committee in Virginia is raising eyebrows for including a column in its March edition that calls for an "armed revolution" if President Barack Obama is elected to a second term in November.

WASHINGTON (CN) - Republicans and Democrats took frequent shots at each other for nearly six hours during a House Judiciary Committee markup meeting to amend the Violence Against Women Act Reauthorization.

 

Maggie Gallagher, former Chairman of NOM, the National Organization For Marriage, says that if gay marriage becomes the law of the land it will make any anti-gay person seem “like a racist.” So, it also seems Gallagher has just redefined NOM’s mission, admitting her overriding motivation is not so much “to protect marriage,” but to protect the reputations of people in “the faith communities that sustain it.”

Freedom From Religion Foundation has several suits going through the courts, some dating back to November 2008 and others filed recently against cities in Florida, Texas and Arkansas.

Brett Harvey, senior counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund, told The Christian Post that his organization vows to fight the legal efforts of FFRF.

"In recent years the Freedom From Religion Foundation has filed several lawsuits challenging the National Day of Prayer and similar public proclamations," said Harvey. "In 2011, the United States Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit dismissed their lawsuit challenging both the federal law creating the National Day of Prayer and President Obama's prayer proclamation."

Harvey explained that these efforts by the FFRF are continued even after the group loses a court case, using as an example the organization's suit against Arizona Governor Jan Brewer.

"The United States District Court for Arizona threw out their lawsuit against Arizona governor's announcement of the Arizona Day of Prayer," said Harvey. "Despite being thrown out of federal court, in January 2012, Freedom From Religion Foundation again sued Governor Brewer in state court."

THE biggest forum for sex trafficking of under-age girls in the United States appears to be a Web site called Backpage.com.

This emporium for girls and women — some under age or forced into prostitution — is in turn owned by an opaque private company called Village Voice Media. Until now it has been unclear who the ultimate owners are.

A study released by the Aflac insurance company showed the real reason that Americans hate the healthcare mandate. It also shows the real reason behind Republicanism. It seems that with exceptions for terrorism, Iran, the Bird Flu and the rapture (which, I guess is a good thing), bad things only happen to other people.

Sehar Hekmati (pictured, center), a Republican activist from Georgia who came to the United States from Afghanistan as a child, filed a lawsuit last week (PDF) against several county level Republican officials, accusing them of slandering her as a “terrorist” and a “felon” in a recorded conversation, emails circulated to other Republicans and posts on Facebook.

As part of an undercover news investigation, WND used alias Facebook profiles and located dozens of child-porn images after “friending” many likely pedophiles and predators who trade thousands of pornographic photos on the social network.
During the investigation, entire Facebook predator communities were easily spotted. Child pornographers use groups as meet-up points to find others with similar interests. Many of the offenders would list similar interests on their profile pages, including terms such as “Thirteen,” “Lolita,” “Justin Bieber,” “incest” and “PTHC (preteen hard-core pornography).” Their activities might include “Receiving nude pics,” and they subscribe to explicit Facebook fan pages posted in plain sight.

A top political appointee at the state Department of Natural Resources chose not to send a complaint against an Oconomowoc waste hauler to the Department of Justice for prosecution despite findings by agency staff that the company was treating fields with so much human waste from septic tanks it risked poisoning nearby wells, DNR records show.

There is a party in the pants of “Exodus International,” and nobody wants to come! And that is why the group has canceled its upcoming “Love Won Out” convention, in which ex-gay ladies show off their human male husbands, and ex-gay men show off Michele Bachmann

To bring down the high rate of chlamydia among teenagers in Tennessee, an anti-choice pregnancy center in Athens, Tenn., has proposed spending federal tax dollars on a life-sized version of the Game of Life.

“Dump Starbucks,” a boycott of the coffee retailing giant by NOM, the National Organization For Marriage, is a tremendous failure. After 50 days in action, by their own measurement, NOM has managed to attack only 35,709 “pledges.” That’s a little more than 700 anti-gay people a day — around the world, including some countries where being gay is a crime punishable by death.

To have intense aversion for, or extreme hostility toward, a group or person is uniquely human and undoubtedly the impetus for myriad atrocities on the human race. Since the election of Barack Obama as the first African American President, the level of hate inherent in a specific segment of the population has elevated to such a high degree that one begins to question what kind of country America is becoming that blatant enmity supersedes civility as a matter of course. 

Since posting the first part of this trilogy, I’ve received many comments; the most prevalent has been “This was written by a straight guy?!” My favorite has been that the “shellfish gambit” is old and worn out. First, I would like to assure you, dear reader, that, yes, I am straight. I just spent a lot of time learning the ins and outs (hur hur hur) of homosexual life. It’s a useful thing to know if you spend a significant amount of time with a significant amount of homosexuals. And second, I can repeat, ad nauseam, that the sky is blue for one hundred years and the sky will not be any less blue and bigots hiding behind religion will not be any less insincere in their “beliefs.”

If you're a state hellbent on turning corrections over to the for-profit prison industry, what do you do when an annual survey shows that private jails are often more expensive than the old fashioned public variety? Especially if, by law, the state may contract for private prisons only if they prove to be less expensive? Simple, just eliminate that pesky study.

By Booth Gunter

Michael McIntosh couldn’t believe what he was hearing. He had come to visit his son at the Walnut Grove Youth Correctional Facility near Jackson, Miss., only to be turned away. His son wasn’t there.

“I said, ‘Well, where is he?’ They said, ‘We don’t know.’”

Thus began a search for his son Mike that lasted more than six weeks. Desperate for answers, he repeatedly called the prison and the Mississippi Department of Corrections. “I was running out of options. Nobody would give me an answer, from the warden all the way to the commissioner.”

 

News Corps Chief Executive Rupert Murdochlashed out at the incivility of the Twitter medium on Saturday afternoon.

Dear reader, in the course of going about your day today did you somehow manage to forget that we are inching ever closer towards some sort Handmaid’s Tale style dystopian nightmare run by sexist racist morons? First, let us congratulate you, and then shake you out of your reverie by telling you about the latest horrible thing that has happened in (duh) Florida.

Conservatives are taking ideological purity to a whole new level: ideologically segregated email accounts.  Really, I’m not kidding.

They don’t call him the Motor City Madman for nothing. Ted Nugent sat down with talk radio host Mike Broomhead today to explain his… unique interview on CBS this morning where he basically tore into his interviewer, Jeff Glor, for telling him he is not a moderate. 

Georgia Bar owner Patrick Lanzo says he isn't a racist, he just chooses to use incredibly racist terms in road signs to make a political point.

A full three months before what police said was his fatal rampage this week, Arizona white supremacist JT Ready spilled his guts to TPM.

Wow. Rarely are we privileged to witness such a moronic convergence of right wing bigotry, as Lou Engle of The Call says the religious right should model themselves after the Confederacy to fight “the homosexual agenda.”

The Marine Corps, the most male of the armed services, is taking its first steps toward integrating women into war-fighting units, starting with its infantry officer school at Quantico, Va., and ground combat battalions that had once been closed to women.

Ted Nugent recently said presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney’s campaign “expressed support” after the musician made comments that caused the U.S. Secret Service to wonder if he had threatened the life of President Barack Obama.

Six anti-tank grenades designed to be fired from a launcher were discovered on Wednesday at the scene of a horrific Arizona mass murder-suicide, which authorities said was carried out by well known white supremacist JT Ready.

In a letter found among Osama Bin Laden’s correspondence, al-Qaida American spokesman Adam Gadahn demonstrated that even terrorists know Fox News isn’t really news.

Yesterday, J.T. Ready, a neo-Nazi and member of the anti-immigrant Minutemen Civil Defense Corps, reportedly strapped on body armor, grabbed several firearms, and then killed four people in Gilbert, Arizona.

Longtime white supremacist and border vigilante JT Ready saw himself as part of a war that few others would fight. He amassed weapons. He donned a uniform. He formed his own brigade of volunteers to walk alongside him as he hunted what he described as “narco terrorists” flowing across the Arizona-Mexico border.

You guys, Chief Executive magazine, the #1 magazine for Chief Executives by Chief Executives that isn’t Forbes, has studied each and every one of the states of this great union of ours to determine which one is best, for Chief Executives?

George Zimmerman, the man charged with second degree murder in the Trayvon Martin case, has been identified by his lawyers as the creator of a seven-year-old MySpace page that may prove to be damaging in court. The page, last updated in 2005, offers a glimpse into Zimmerman’s low opinions of Mexicans and women.

The U.S. Marshal Service announced Tuesday that it had captured one of America’s Most Wanted fugitives who is accused of creating a fake charity for Navy veterans that funneled some of the $100 million collected to Republican candidates.

Nearly eleven years after terrorists brought down the Twin Towers, the World Trade Center can again boast of itself as New York City’s tallest building.

Video of a North Carolina man firing a shotgun at a sign against the state’s proposed amendment banning same sex marriage has gone viral, even after he removed it from YouTube.

Bryan Fischer, the public face of the certified anti-gay hate group, American Family Association, yesterday on his radio program suggested that homosexuals are inherently immoral, and “it’s perfectly appropriate to discriminate against immoral conduct.” Fischer actually had the gall to quote Martin Luther King, Jr., as the basis for his claim.

A board member of the Ohio River Valley Council of the Boy Scouts of America has resigned to protest the ouster of Ohioan Jennifer Tyrrell, the leader of her son's Tiger Cub group who was forced out last month because she is gay.

Board member David J. Sims, a lawyer and longtime Democrat serving on the Ohio County (W.Va.) Commission, said he did not know Tyrrell. He learned of her ouster from an email the board circulated Thursday, did some research and announced his resignation Friday.

"I felt that it was wrong that she was removed as the Tiger Cub leader solely based on her sexual orientation," Sims told the Los Angeles Times yesterday.

Sims had served on the board since the start of the year and said he was not fully aware of the policy barring gay leaders — a policy officials cited when they asked Tyrrell to resign April 10 as leader of her 7-year-old son's pack.

...Tyrrell, 32, reached at home in Bridgeport, Ohio, yesterday, told the Times that she had read Sims' letter and was "very moved."

...So far, Tyrrell said, Scouting officials have refused to meet with her. She posted an online petition at Change.org against the policy that surpassed a quarter-million signatures this weekend.

Last year, NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre made the odd claim that President Obama intentionally avoided gun regulation during his entire first term as part of a “massive Obama conspiracy to deceive voters and hide his true intentions to destroy the Second Amendment in our country.” 

Yesterday in Dearborn, Michigan, noted anti-Muslim activists Pamela Geller and Robert Spencer hosted a conference promising to advocate for “human rights” in one of the largest Muslim communities in the United States. 

Conservative radio host Matt Barber say that the federal government’s requirement that all health insurance cover contraception for women is comparable to Muslim terrorists forcing you to “kill your family.”

Carmen Pate: Homosexuality, those who are struggling with that lifestyle and are desiring to leave it, are hungry for truth, John. And so it’s so important when we consider that our government ignores the truth and instead supports an agenda that really keeps them in bondage. It’s important that we speak truth so they might find that healing and restoration.

John Rabe: It’s absolutely true, Carmen, there is liberation for people who are enmeshed in slavery, and this is a form of it. It really is an agenda; this didn’t just sort of happen by chance, there is an agenda here.

Michael Brown: So their creativity, energy, gets them in high places in Hollywood, so kids are watching shows like Glee on TV and that pervasive message is coming. We have many politicians fighting these things, our own government says, ‘this is now a civil rights issue and we’re going to stand for this, we’re going to fight for this,’ major businesses are championing it. Across the board, court cases, decisions being made, homosexual activism has become the principal threat to religious freedom, freedom of conscience, freedom of speech, in America and in other countries around the world. If we don’t see it now, we’re going to have to apologize to our kids and our grandkids.

During the war in Iraq, battalion commanders were allocated packets of $100 bills and authorized to use them for anything from repairing a schoolhouse to paying off ex-rebels and paying blood money to the families of innocents killed by U.S. forces. But a new audit finds that in some cases that cash made its way to the pockets of the very insurgents the United States was trying to fight.

Balloons, signs, tears, and joy may not be unusual sights on military bases when family and friends await their returning veteran's safe return home from a long deployment, but a wedding proposal by a boyfriend to his Marine boyfriend is. That's what happened Tuesday at Camp Pendleton, when San Diego resident, Cory Huston, himself a Navy veteran once assigned to the Marines as a hospital corpsman asked Marine Avarice Guerrero to marry him. It is believed to be the first proposal of marriage and engagement between two gay men – not to mention two war vets – on a US military base. In an exclusive, San Diego LGBT Weekly was there to photograph the historic proposal.

April 24, under a bright Southern California sky at Camp Pendleton's Camp Del Mar near Oceanside, Calif., a full two hours before his boyfriend's return from the badlands of Afghanistan, Cory Huston waited nervously. Huston, who was discharged under the former Don't Ask Don't Tell policy, chain smoked as he rehearsed the simple proposal he would deliver when Guerrero would arrive.

CNN has a video interview with the couple: Gay Vet Proposes to Boyfriend on Base.

In a stunning rejection of celebrated author Ana Castillo's offer to read and speak with Tucson high school students next week, Tucson Unified School District administrators added a new chapter to the nation's most troubling censorship crackdown and dismissed any overtures for healing in the torn community.

A widely sought speaker on the national lecture circuit, the renowned poet and novelist, whose beloved stories are read throughout schools in Tucson and Arizona, had offered to waive her honorarium and travel to Tucson on her own dime, as part of a special effort to bring "healing to all sides."

According to Tucson High School literature teacher Curtis Acosta, whose now outlawed Mexican American literature courses drew praise on CNN for their healing role in the aftermath of the tragic Tucson shooting last year, TUSD Assistant Superintendent Abel Morado turned down Castillo's extraordinary opportunity over concerns that the national media would accompany the author.

 

Howell, Michigan public high school student Daniel Glowacki gained notoriety when he disrupted teacher Jay McDowell’s Spirit Day presentation with anti-gay hate speech.

These veterans probably are engaging in survival driving habits for a war zone, such as not stopping in traffic, driving fast and making sudden, unpredictable turns, experts said. But those same driving practices create havoc back in the United States.

A 45-year-old driving instructor picks up an 18-year-old girl for her first lesson, takes her to an isolated road, pulls her out of the car, wrestles her out of one leg of her jeans and rapes her. She courageously tells her parents. They help and support her in pressing charges, leading to the perpetrator's arrest and prosecution. He is convicted of rape and sentenced to jail.

He appeals. The case reaches the Italian Supreme Court, which overturns his sentence and releases him. "Because the victim wore very, very tight jeans," the Court notes in their decision, "she had to help him remove them, and by removing the jeans it was no longer rape but consensual sex."

For people around the world appalled by the way criminal justice systems treat survivors of sexual assault, the judges' words became a rallying cry. Within hours, the women in Italy's Parliament organized a protest: they wore jeans to work. Not long after, California's State Legislature wore jeans to their legislative session. And in April of 1999, during Sexual Assault Awareness Month, Peace Over Violence held the first official Denim Day in Los Angeles. Denim Day now spans the nation and has grown into a powerful national movement about sexual assault prevention and education. A movement committed to empowerment.

• April 25—1T Day: Break the link between higher education and the banks on the day student loan debt passes $1 trillion. Students across the country will demand affordable education by taking direct action against banks as well as administrators/regents/trustees who are in the pockets of big banks. 
• April 25—GE Shareholder Meeting: For the last three years, General Electric has received billions of dollars in tax refunds while spending millions on lobbyists who write loopholes into the tax code.
• May 1—May Day: People are organizing an international day of action for May Day—a people's holiday—Everyone from Occupy, immigrants rights groups, and labor unions will be organizing actions around the country for the 99%.
• May 3—Verizon Shareholder Meeting: From the pay raise of $7 million to $23 million for CEO Lowell McAdam, to the poor treatment of workers and the communities where they operate, Verizon continues to profit off the 99%. 
• May 5—Connect the Dots: It's time to connect the dots between extreme weather and climate change caused by the influence of dirty fossil fuel corporate interests in politics.
• May 9—Bank of America Shareholder Meeting: Bank of America's profits-over-people-and-planet business model has foreclosed on millions while simultaneously leading as the biggest funder of coal, from mining to power plants, in the U.S. 
• May 24—Sallie Mae Shareholder Meeting: Sallie Mae has rigged and grossly profited off of the student debt crisis, leaving many students with crushing debt. 
• June 1—Walmart Shareholder Meeting: The Waltons make billions a year off of Walmart, while many Walmart associates struggle for respect on the job and enough pay just to make ends meet.

Marissa Alexander is another victim of Florida’s infamous Stand Your Ground law, proving that Florida statute 776.013 is not for battered women or people who won’t shoot to kill. When attacked by her husband in her home, with an order of protection in place, Marissa Alexander shot into the ceiling, instead of into his body, to scare him away. She is now sitting in a jail cell, awaiting sentencing for assault with a deadly weapon.

Ms. Alexander is black and a mother of three. She had given birth nine days earlier to a premature infant, allegedly as a result of battering during her pregnancy. She is a licensed gun owner, with concealed carry permit. She was in her own home. Her husband had a documented history of domestic violence. She reasonably believed that her life was in danger and her husband was violating an order of protection.

 

Glenn Beck’s radio presence continues to shrink. As of today he is off the air in Los Angeles, the second biggest market in the country.

The Newton County Sheriff’s Office is investigating why a couple was confronted at gunpoint by neighbors and then arrested and forced to spend the night in jail when they tried to move into the home they had just purchased, Channel 2 Action News reported.

The Kalonji family had just closed on a foreclosed home and were told by their real estate agent they should go over to the house and change the locks.

But when Jean Kalonji and his wife, Angelica, started working at the home, an armed man and another person who appeared to be the man’s son allegedly confronted them.

 

As part of a new advertising campaign for the candy, ‘Mike and Ike’ have announced that they are divorcing so Ike can pursue a career in the arts and Mike can fulfill his dream of becoming a “music legend.” 

Last week, the order came down from the Vatican. The Leadership Conference of Women Religious (LCWR), an organization that represents 80% of the nuns in the US, was chastised for “focusing its work too much on poverty and economic injustice, while keeping ‘silent’ on abortion and same-sex marriage.” The LCWR is having none of it.

Election time is coming up and it seems that the two candidates are striving for the goal for the most coveted position of President of the United States: Governor Mitt Romney and President Barack Obama. Romney’s plan is to shrink government and allow the corporations to take control of the commons, and would love to see Medicare, Social Security, welfare, WIC, highway, schools, EPA and other government programs eliminated or privatized.

If trouble comes in threes, then right-wing singer Ted Nugent’s recent problems may have begun a week ago, when he entered a plea agreement in the illegal killing of an Alaskan black bear.

Richard Parsons, the former chairman of mega-bank Citigroup (who stepped down from his post just a few days ago), said yesterday that the repeal of Glass-Steagall — the Depression-era regulation separating investment and commercial banking — helped precipitate the financial crisis of 2008.

The earliest skirmishes in the War on Woman were on the state level, long before an all-male panel was assembled in the House to discuss whether birth control should be covered by employee insurance plans. In 2011 alone, the Guttmacher Institute chronicled a record number of bills designed to restrict abortion — and 2012 isn’t over yet.
In the meantime, the number of women legislatures has stagnated since the early nineties. In 2009, the number of women state senators was just 22.1 percent and the number of state representatives was 25 percent, according to a report from the Center for American Women and Politics. Women of color make up just 5 percent of all state legislators. And, of course, 2010 was the first year that the number of women in Congress fell, rather than rose.

On Tuesday, 50-year-old Francis Grady pleaded not guilty to trying to burn down a Planned Parenthood in Grand Chute, Wis., on April 1. Earlier this month, however, during his first court appearance, Grady sang a different tune, telling the U.S. district judge he did it because “they’re killing babies there.”

Last year, after Hispanic farm workers fled the state because of a far-reaching anti-immigrant bill the Georgia legislature passed, Gov. Nathan Deal (R) suggested replacing them with inmates. The plan only had mixed success, with many inmates walking off the job early, and farmers still lost millions because of crops that rotted in the field before they could be harvested.

The National Organization for Women has announced a campaign to hit Rush Limbaugh in the wallet by pressuring local businesses and radio stations to stop doing business with him.

Women make less by industry: Women tend to work in lower-paying industries: 68 percent of jobs in education are held by women, as are 78 percent of health and social assistance jobs. But even within those industries where they are the vast majority of employees, women are paid significantly less than their male counterparts...

Black and Latina women are still struggling much more than their white counterparts: While women make less than men, black and Latina women make significantly less — black women make just 69 cents, and Latinas just 60 for every dollar made by men. At the same time, women of color are more often single mothers and thus the primary earners for their families...

Women with higher education face a larger pay gap: ThinkProgress has learned that women face the largest pay gap on Wall Street, and that even CEOs of lobbying firms get paid less if they're women. But there's a greater trend. The more that women pay into their education, the less they get out compared to their male peers. According to an analysis from the Center for American Progress, "The lifetime wage gap for a woman who did not finish high school is $300,000, while the lifetime wage gap for a woman with at least a bachelor's degree is $723,000."

WASHINGTON, April 17 (UPI) -- U.S. President Barack  Obama announced an initiative Tuesday to strike at manipulation in the oil  market.

"We can't afford a situation where some speculators makes millions while  millions of Americans get the short end of the stick," Obama told reporters in  the White House Rose Garden.

Among the steps in the administration's proposal, "more cops on the beat to  monitor activity in energy markets," an increase in civil and criminal penalties  for manipulation and a requirement to have a greater margin -- more money -- to  back up trading in oil futures, Obama said.

The Miami-Dade Fire and Rescue Department opened an investigation into a racist post on one of its captains’ Facebook page. According to The Grio, Brian Beckmann, a captain in the Miami-Dade fire department, posted a rant on his Facebook page suggesting that Trayvon Martin shooter George Zimmerman was unjustly accused and that Martin’s killing can be blamed upon poor parenting by “urban” parents who are “welfare dependent”.

When Southwest Dekalb High School (Decatur, Ga.) holds its graduation next month, one of the school’s top students won’t attend because the ceremony is being held in a church.

In a Russia Today segment broadcast Thursday, progressive satellite radio host Thom Hartmann confronted Family Research Institute chairman Dr. Paul Cameron and asked him an unusually pointed question: “Does it concern you that many of your colleagues in the anti-gay movement may actually be closeted gays?”

With the (USDOJ) United States Department of Justice coming down hard for racial profiling against folks of Hispanic descent, the latest arrest from tips snagged 31 suspected illegal immigrants at 21st Century Healthcare  in Tempe.  Working on a tip, Deputies from the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Department investigated and arrested 31 undocumented workers and now the state may put sanctions on 21st Century Healthcare possibly for knowingly hiring  “illegals” thus violating both SB1070 and 18 USC § 4.

Fox News has attacked the struggling Republican presidential candidate, Newt Gingrich, after an outburst in which he blamed the network for the failure of his campaign and claimed it was biased in favour of Mitt Romney.

The anniversary of the Titanic’s sinking and release of ‘Titanic 3D’ has apparently inspired Truth in Action Ministries, formerly Coral Ridge Ministries, to produce a new short film presenting the “radical homosexual agenda” as an iceberg that could potentially destroy the United States.

[Quotes from the film:]

The “homosexual agenda is the moral iceberg that we need to steer clear of”

The “homosexual agenda” is “one of those icebergs that if we don’t navigate around them correctly, will take us under.”

“We’ve already hit the iceberg and the ship is already going down.”

“We’re taking on water, the only question is whether or not we’re going to be able to survive and the ship won’t sink.”

According to several experts in Florida law, Sean Hannity could be compelled to testify about his conversations with George Zimmerman. 

When it comes to America's racial past and present, lies and snake oil are sold in many colors.

In the wake of the Trayvon Martin tragedy, conservatives in media have sought to deflect from the racism and racial profiling that precipitated his untimely death by referencing the broader social malaise of supposed "black-on-black violence."

On last week's episode of This Week on ABC, Washington Post columnist George Will said that despite the Trayvon tragedy, "150 black men are killed every week in this country," and "about 94 percent of them by other black men."

Will parroted arguments made by many conservatives, his intended point being that black-on-black crime remains the real problem our nation should address. The half-truth he spoke went curiously unchallenged by the panel -- including former White House adviser Van Jones -- largely because the meta-narrative of black-on-black violence is widely accepted in journalistic and political circles.

20 years of study has concluded that marijuana smokers may actually be getting a bad rap and that they may actually have fewer accidents than other drivers. There have been several studies done over the past 20 years and every one of them has revealed that using marijuana actually has a very minor, if any, effect on the ability of a person to drive a car or other vehicle.

In a Phoenix courtroom filled with fellow lawyers and some of his biggest critics on Tuesday, the former Arizona prosecutor who served for years as Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s right-hand man was stripped of his license to practice law.

What we need in the United States is not division; what we need in the United States is not hatred; what we need in the United States is not violence and lawlessness, but is love, and wisdom, and compassion toward one another, and a feeling of justice toward those who still suffer within our country, whether they be white or whether they be black.

Suspected Planned Parenthood Wisconsin clinic bomber Francis Grady is no longer "suspected," as the man admitted in today's court hearing that he was in fact responsible for Sunday night's bombing...

...After being arrested, the complaint states Grady admitted to officers, "I lit up the clinic.”

It's called a neighborhood "WATCH".

 You don't use a gun to "WATCH".

Black in America: Trayvon Martin like all black men carry the heavy weight of “white suspicion.” “The idea that some of us are less than the rest of us, that some are roaches, vermin, viruses, parasites, infestations, beasts or sub-humans to whom no one owes no duty of human decency or commiseration, didn’t start with the Nazis. It is as old as Cain, and as widespread as the common cold.” —Leonard Pitts, columnist for The Miami Herald.

The state of Texas wants the discussions their Republican legislators had about passing a voter ID law to stay secret.

Ryan J. Reilly

Sunday’s incident [in Grand Chute, WI] comes on the heels of a firebombing at the office of Texas Sen. Wendy Davis’ (D) in March. Officials said they don’t have a motive for the attack, but the news site Think Progress pointed out that Davis is a vocal supporter of Planned Parenthood. The attack came just after Texas announced it would cut funding to Planned Parenthood clinics.

In January, the Pensacola, Fla.-based Ladies Center Clinic, which provides abortions, was similarly firebombed by a homeless man, also in the wake of antiabortion measures being pushed in the state legislature…
Login | Signup

Did a reporter for ABC News inadvertently leak the existence of secret audio of a 911 call made by 17-year-old Trayvon Martin the night he was shot to death in Sanford, Florida?
On Tuesday night, several ABC affiliates aired video footage of an ABC7 news report which claimed the FBI had in its possession an audio of a 911 call made by Trayvon moments before he was shot by overzealous neighborhood watch person George Zimmerman.

All speak of many American soldiers, from 15 to 20 according to the initial Afghan parliamentary investigation report shortly after the massacres. President Obama said "it appeared you had a lone gunman who acted on his own," not wanting it compared to the My Lai massacre in the Vietnam war.

Internal documents acquired by Climate Progress reveal that the Flatland Institute is planning to indoctrinate infants with a “Baby Inhofe” series of DVDs and videos. Flatland is a right-wing, anti-science think tank funded by the Koch brothers, the Resources Development Administration, and other corporate pollutocrats.

-Joe Romm

Cenk talks to USC law professor Jody David Armour about the Trayvon Martin shooting. Citing the cases of Rodney King and Bernie Goetz — the vigilante acquitted after the 1986 shooting of four black youth who were running away from him in the New York City subway — Armour hypothesizes that a fear of black men in hoodies might be found a reasonable justification.

“The only question is, does the jury sympathize with the defendant?” Armour says. “If they feel sympathy and empathy with [George Zimmerman], they’ll acquit.”

WASHINGTON – Syed Ghulam Nabi Fai, 62, a U.S. citizen and resident of Fairfax, Va., was sentenced today to 24 months in prison, followed by three years of supervised release, for conspiracy and tax violations in connection with a decades-long scheme to conceal the transfer of at least $3.5 million from the government of Pakistan to fund his lobbying efforts in America related to Kashmir.

I am an " Angry Black Man".

I did not know I was an angry black man, until the winter of 1996, my very first winter outside of the very beautiful Caribbean island of my birth. I had never experienced 60 degrees in my entire live, outside of a walk in fridge at my high school cafeteria. Needless to say, I was freezing my tropical "ass" off.  My roommate, from Minnesota and very white, felt sorry for me and lent me his black, Chicago bulls jacket and taught me the art of layering.  I was able to purchase hooded sweatshirts and sweaters with my university's logo on it for what I thought was an amazing price of buy one get two free. Not knowing that it was still late September, and they were clearing out last years stock, so that they could bring in this year's new winter line up, once the summer was done. So that is how I would go to class, hooded sweatshirt, bulls jacket, blue jeans and high top shoes. As I slowly shuffled from one class to the next, I would notice the many other students running, jumping, playing volleyball and swimming in the various pools and I did notice that many actively avoided me in the hallways and walking paths. Eventually, I met other Caribbean and West Indian students, who were freezing like myself, and of course we began to congregate.

Since the others were completely enjoying the remains of the summer weather at 50 degrees, we would gather inside at student public areas. Many of us had common classes or would be required to walk in a common direction from and to another class and so we would walk together. My amazing sale find, was of course passed along to everyone and eventually we were all mostly dressing very much alike. A care package from home, brought a couple of sets of dominoes and fresh island music, which became the daily afternoon ritual in one of the many campus public game rooms. These were mostly empty because of the fantastic summer weather that was now stretching into October.

By November, when the first sign of snow arrived, we were the "Jamaican Mafia". Most of us were not from Jamaica, nor was there a real majority from any particular Caribbean nation, religion, region or social affiliation for us to be considered a mafia. The real and only unifying factor between most of us was that we were cold. If you have ever spent a little time in the Caribbean, or around West Indian people you would know that we really do not like each other very much. We are social and polite, but one island nation usually has several reason to hate another island nation. We argue about food, tourism, colonialism, language, dance, music, cricket, soccer vs. futbal and especially rules concerning dominoes.

I found out that I was apparently the Gang leader and the angriest of all the angry black Jamaican Mafia, when I was called in for a discussion about my grades, after thanksgiving break. I had taken organic chemistry and received a C- on my mid-term report. My advisor thought this was cause to bring me in for a meeting with her , a psych professor, a dean, the administrator for my scholarship and the residential life advisor. What they neglected to find out was that I was one of only eight students to actual pass the midterm organic chemistry exam, in a class of 65 students.  I will add that my organic chemistry professor was enraptured and overjoyed that so many had passed.

I learned a lot at that meeting. I learned that I was the most feared individual on the entire campus and that my anti-social tendencies were a concern, especially since I did not participate in any of the picnics or outdoor sporting events. That I and my Friends were being watched and observed . Apparently some kid had been caught with a massive supply of drugs on campus and had claimed he was working for and with the Jamaican Mafia, but they had no real evidence to approach us with. That we were preventing other students from using the games rooms through fear and intimidation, though there were eight game rooms on campus. We were alienating other student by speaking  to each other in a secret code language or slang that they thought were gang related. ( If you must ask, this was a very private and very expensive catholic university, with not a lot of diversity.)  Oh and my personal favorite, everywhere we went together smelt like marijuana was being smoked after we had left.

We all were F-1 status foreign exchange students. The rumor of any illegal activity would be enough for a review by INS. An unpaid parking ticket, that resulted in a suspended driving license could get us deported. Regardless of those facts, most of us were scholarship students trying to maintain GPAs high enough to keep our scholarships. We all were paying three to four times the price per credit as the average local student was paying, and when you are paying 300-400 a credit you do not waste your time. There was not a single car amongst us and at the the time none of us were old enough to drink legally.

It took my very amused, white, drug dealing, meth head, biker roommate to explain to me why I was so feared and suspect number one on campus. It was the way I dressed. The big black jacket and hoodie were frightening. Also being six feet tall and 300 pound did not hurt much for the image and being his roommate. He told me to get use to it, and use it to my advantage.

I bring all this up, because it all rushed back in to my mind today after watching FOX news. Geraldo basically explained that the young man Trayvon Martin may not have been shot dead had he not been wearing a hoodie. Geraldo continued to suggest that all African American and Latino parents should have a conversation with their kids about how wearing hoodies and such other clothes makes them look.

http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/03/23/10830530-geraldo-rivera-blames-hoodie-for-trayvons-death-critics-tell-him-to-zip-it-up

The bottom Line was not that we were dressed a certain way, but the fact that we were black and different that made us the Jamaican Mafia. I eventually came to understand this late one night on campus. I was walking back to my dorm after midnight, on a cold, clear December night. There were other students around me, leaving the closing library as I was. I had a university logo-ed backpack, a huge organic chemistry and biology text book in my arms, and a half empty coke bottle in the other. I had just crossed the street in front of the library when two state trooper vehicles pulled up rather quickly , and three officers jumped out and started asking me rapid fired questions. Many of which I would have been able to answer had they not immediately told me to shut up every time I attempted to speak. The other students had stopped to watch and even began to gather around the cars. They were in the process of removing my back pack force-ably from me to search it and pushing me to toward the ground. When I was rescued by my roommate and his friends, who were very much high and drunk at the time. I was released after they vouched that I was a student at the school and was in fact his roommate. I had my college I.D. in my wallet, and my passport in my backpack, but no one had asked for either. 

The state troopers had been called that night by campus security, after a young lady had complained of a suspicious person lurking in the library parking lot , several hours before.  I guess being the only black person leaving the library that night was pretty damn suspicious. Maybe it was what I was wearing?

Trayvon Martin was buried in Miami with a gunshot wound to his chest. But otherwise, according to Richard Kurtz, the funeral director who prepared Martin for burial, his body showed no injuries.

"We could see no physical signs like there had been a scuffle [or] there had been a fight," he said. "The hands -- I didn't see any knuckles, bruises or what have you. And that is something we would have covered up if it would have been there."

• Written by  Devin Burghart
• Wednesday, 28 March 2012 11:07

In the month since the tragic shooting in Sanford, Florida of 17-year old Trayvon Martin, sustained pressure by the NAACP and local civil rights advocates has brought national attention to the killing, and the way the incident was handled by local law enforcement. More than two million signatures have been collected on an online petition seeking justice for Mr. Martin. Rallies for justice in Florida have been amplified by scores of rallies in cities and towns across the country. A renewed discussion of race and racism has emerged in this presidential election year.

Into this increasingly complex situation, white nationalists have sought to inject their poison. They have defamed Martin, concocted false allegations and amplified racial stereotypes of young black men—in effect, putting the victim on trial in the court of public opinion. Even before Florida officials started leaking negative "information" about Trayvon Martin, white nationalists were portraying Mr. Martin as a scary black man who deserved what he got.

Whether or not it is truly the case, it appears as if some local and state officials in Florida are following a script written by white nationalists. The official's attempt to deflect attention away from their mishandling of the case has augmented racism and demeaned all those who care about human dignity. In order to more fully understand the circumstances in which justice for Trayvon Martin will be sought, IREHR has examined the white nationalist propaganda campaign. It is not a pretty picture.

There is a reality in our nation that lies just beneath the surface of what we see. Having seen the documentary "Food, inc", I have come to thoughts about many of our industries in the U.S. And to remain non-slanderous, I will speak about the industries in general.

First reality:The food industry is owned and run by only a handful of companies, which own all of the perceived variety in our stores. Also, one particular crop is used to create a large majority of the food we consume, from the meats down to the cereals. The use of this one crop is known to contribute to diabetes in our nation, as complex sugars are very expensive to avoid. Also, food standards have been deregulated by food industry advocates that have attained positions in our government, having fiscal and business ties to the prevailing companies. The industry as a whole makes massive profits off of lowered standards, and in some cases use legal force through patent law to maintain their hold on particular parts of the industry. This, all from control of basic need: Food.

Next reality: Healthcare can and probably should be considered a basic need for a society. There is not a person who lives that, living a full life in whatever capacity, won't need to go to the hospital for one reason or another. The recent healthcare fight comes really on the back of this reality: Insurance companies take advantage of the basic need of the people for healthcare, and make huge profits off the system through manipulation, monetarily and through legalities. Massive profits by the insurance industry lie contradictory to the claims of the poor making costs rise by use of hospitals without being insured. In recent history, attempts to pass a public option for healthcare were denied, though it would alleviate this perceived issue. The claim seems to be that companies do not want to pay for people who are uninsured, but an option to have that covered was denied. Paying, thus, is inevitable, not matter the path we take.

Next reality: Our system of energy is a majority based on oil and coal. Private companies sell their oil and coal to energy companies that receive charters and claims to geographic regions, with little to no competition in their area. Oil fluctuation is blamed on middle east unrest, but the reality is that the nation in question produces 2% of the worlds oil, and doesn't supply our market, but the price of oil shoots through the roof inexplicably, and particularly during this time of political unrest in our nation. Attempts to shift our energy consumption to renewable sources has been blocked in legislation, while numerous oil industry ads are being played across the airwaves, propagating the building of a pipe line that will destroy a lot of land.

Next reality: Pharmaceutical companies buy up the patent rights to certain drugs, and sell them at a premium that is often not affordable by the average American. After taking in massive profits during their monopolization of a drug, the drug is then turned over and sold in generic form, years after it is made, despite numerous side effects.

Next reality: Education has become an industry unto itself. The standard for getting a good job is raised more and more by the year, with high school diplomas and bachelors degrees not having enough weight to get you a career.  Meanwhile, the standardized test craze has created an entire industry unto itself. Student loans put students into debt for a majority of their adult life, while tuition costs continue to rise exponentially, while at the same time, many schools make record profits off of their athletic programs and endowments. The textbook industry charges students exorbitant amounts of money for text books, while selling cheaper, paperback versions overseas. This money making system is juxtaposed with the decline in our public school systems, and a lag in competitiveness by our students, with the quality of their education falling behind the world, with their creative being trained out of them. Our industrial education system falls behind the world instead of leading it.

Five industries, five basic needs. Five situations where profiteering has adversely affected our way of life. True competition in an open market is intended to keep prices down, but the gradual takeover of our industries has created a near monopoly in all of them. Regulation in itself is not the cause of higher prices, as industry leaders suggest. It is the pure greed of our business leaders that drives the prices up.

So the real question is this: should these industries be for-profit industries, or should they fall into the category of non-profit industries that provide a basic need and service to the nation. Profit is a good thing, but at the expense of the stability of our nation, it does not seem to be worth it. So, let's start the debate. Would a non-profit status help balance the system or is that wishful, ill-advised thinking on my part? Is there another way to adjust our system for the betterment of our nation? 

Idaho's Republican-controlled Legislature is backing away from a bill requiring women seeking an abortion to get an ultrasound first, capping weeks of Capitol demonstrations, a live Senate ultrasound exhibition on pregnant women and threats against at least one lawmaker.

The legislation passed the Senate, but stalled in the state House after Rep. Tom Loertscher announced Tuesday he wouldn't schedule a committee hearing.

Consequently, anti-abortion activists' push to include Idaho among seven other states that require ultrasound procedures before an abortion will likely be put off until 2013.

Proponents, including Right to Life of Idaho, asked for a chance to change the bill Tuesday morning, but Loertscher, R-Bone, decided there wasn't time left in this session to resolve concerns among the House's majority Republicans that the bill allowed government to intrude too deeply into women's private lives.

"They were still holding out some hope for amendments," Loertscher said. "They agreed it's probably so late, they should step back and make another run at this next year."

Idaho is among eleven states that already require verbal counseling or written materials on abortion include information on ultrasound, according to the Guttmacher Institute.

Supporters hoped adding a new mandate could help convince more women not to terminate their pregnancies.

Jason Herring, president of Right to Life of Idaho, said misconceptions about Idaho's measure — and lack of time — ultimately worked against his group's efforts to convince a majority of representatives to get behind the bill.

Among amendments under consideration were the addition of an explicit exemption for medical emergencies and clarification that an invasive vaginal ultrasound couldn't be forced on unwilling women, as some lawmakers feared could have been required.

Still, Herring said exceptions for rape or incest victims weren't among concessions his group would have supported.

"We don't believe women need less information and less care when they are victims of crime. They need more care," Herring said, adding his group would be back in 2013. "The debate is far from over."

If an ultrasound bill does return, the public outcry will be the same, predicted Monica Hopkins, director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Idaho.

"There's a fierce sense of independence here," Hopkins said. "Politicians and legislators saw this as government intrusion and had a problem with mandating something that was a clear overreach and didn't adhere to the constitutional principles of equality and liberty."

Throughout the debate, the passion from both sides was apparent.

A live ultrasound exhibition in the Capitol last week, billed as "Voices from the Womb," featured six women who underwent abdominal ultrasounds before an audience of more than 150 people.

One opponent after another was escorted from the room by Idaho State Police troopers after making their objections to the bill heard.

And the 100-year-old Statehouse's front steps became a battle theater for sign- and American flag-carrying carrying advocates, including demonstrations from both sides that stretched into Monday evening.

Heading into an election year, some Republicans got cold feet after hearing from women in their districts that the bill was a bad idea. Rep. Steve Hartgen, R-Twin Falls, described how he sent out 15 letters to women polling them on the bill. Twelve replied, and only one supported the measure.

"They (Republicans) recognized that when you kick the bee hive, bees come out," said House Minority Leader John Rusche, D-Lewiston, calling the measure "terrible medicine, terrible public policy and an assault on personal freedom."

There was also turmoil surrounding the measure's Senate sponsor, Chuck Winder, R-Boise, who became a lightning rod after comments he made on the Senate floor on March 19 that suggested a doctor should ask a woman who says she's been raped if the pregnancy could have been "caused by normal relations in a marriage."

Though Winder clarified he wasn't questioning the truthfulness of rape victims or women, his email account, Facebook page and telephones were subsequently barraged with messages from foes of the bill.

On Tuesday, Winder said he couldn't repeat many of the comments, which he said included threats of violence against him and his family.

"Passion is great," Winder said Tuesday. "But disrespect devalues the opposition's argument."

Just a comment on logic. If Geraldo believes the hoodie being worn by someone is somehow responsible for their death, then could it not follow that, Geraldo wore a hoodie while sitting with Bill O'Riley which was seen by millions so Geraldo was promoting wearing hoodies. With this logic everyone that likes to emulate famous people and what they wear would have taken this as Geraldo's endorsement of the hoodie.

So in this reality, Geraldo is responsible for those that wear them. Sure this is stupid but so was Geraldo's statement. It avoids the real root cause of any-ones death.

As a nation we were not there at the time of this young mans death and much more will have to come out before any of us can make a rational judgement of all the facts. No matter what they are, minimizing the real root cause before it is even known is irresponsible and does not do anything to advance our dialogue in this country.

The next time someone dies wearing a T'shirt do we blame it on the shirt, Fruit of the Loom, or Anderson Cooper? Or can people like Geraldo who's words get spread easily (not sure why in Geraldo's case) focus on the real and hard issues such as prejudice and fear that actually drive these types of tragic events?

So until Geraldo has something well thought out to say on the subject, I will continue to think he is responsible.

T1Truth

It is Easy and Free, Join Newsvine Now:

https://www.newsvine.com/_nv/accounts/register

Yesterday at 3 p.m., just outside San Diego, a family of Iraqi immigrants ended the life support that had been keeping their mother, 32-year-old Shaima Alawadi, alive since Wednesday, when she was found beaten bloody in the dining room of her El Cajon home, with the house's glass door smashed apart. She'd been repeatedly hit in the head with a tire iron, her 17-year-old daughter told local news sources, and next to her body a note was found: "Go back to your own country." While police say they are investigating the possibility of a hate crime and are calling it an "isolated incident," Alawadi's tragic death has already become part of the increasing furor surrounding the "self-defense" killing of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin, who was carrying nothing more threatening than a bag of Skittles and iced tea, by a still-free (and still gun-carrying) neighborhood watchman.

On Twitter, hashtags #RIPTrayvonMartin and #RIPShaima are showing up together in hundreds of messages like "hood or hijab — this needs to stop." One Million Hijabs for Shaima Alawadi groups are being organized while One Million (and One Hundred) Hoodie marches are planned for Illinois and New York today. Racism and hate, the signs and commenters say, are to blame in both tragic cases.

Indeed, the national conversation has largely boiled down to the two items of clothing that Trayvon and Saima were wearing at the times of their deaths: the hoodie that Geraldo Rivera now infamously said was "as much responsible for Trayvon Martin’s death as George Zimmerman was," and Shaima's hijab.

Killer Vigilante George Zimmerman 'Lynched' Trayvon Martin For Carrying a Bag of Skittles and Iced Tea

In no state can a minimum wage worker afford a two-bedroom unit at Fair Market Rent, working a standard 40-hour work week.

Take a look at the info graphic. See where your state ranks.

After more than three weeks of public outcry over the shooting death of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin by a man some have called a vigilante, the Sanford, Fla., city commissioners passed a "no confidence motion" in the city's police chief.