Beet L. Jooz

Obamacare was sold to the American people under false pretenses and upheld by a dishonest Supreme Court ruling. Now it's coming apart, and it's about time.

Carol Boardman died in 2016

'Incredibly detailed' prints include texture of skin and scales

Comey, dubbed 'amnesiac with incredible hubris,' back on Hill for new round of grilling  Fox News

Former FBI Director James Comey is back on the Hill for an encore, after a controversial appearance more than a week ago in which he told lawmakers seeking ...

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The Saudi government on Monday slammed a U.S. Senate resolution that blames Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman for the death of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

Antiquities official say they'll dig deeper into tomb in search of priest's sarcophagus

DAILYWIRE President Trump on Sunday vowed to review the case of a former Army Green Beret who has been charged [READ MORE]

The post Trump Pledges To Review Case Of Former Green Beret Charged With Murder Of Suspected Taliban Bombmaker appeared first on The Savage Nation.

Mika is sorry, and she sort of apologized

During Fox News Channel’s “Sunday Morning Futures,”  Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) predicted the conviction of President Donald Trump’s former national security advisor Michael Flynn, would be overturned because the FBI “tricked him into not having a lawyer, when, in fact, he was not only a suspect, but a target, and they had transcripts.” “I would not be surprised a bit that the conviction of Flynn is overturned because of the Justice Department and the FBI’s misconduct, and that, in fact, we go potentially all the way to Supreme Court with new protections when the FBI and the Department of Justice lies to somebody and tricks them into making statements, and then charges them with a lie that they entrapped them in,” Issa said to host Maria Bartiromo. He later added, “[F]or the first time ever, I believe, in the next Congress, the Senate might actually have to go to a federal judge and say, let’s talk about the lies you were told because we’re getting stonewalled by this Department of Justice.” Follow Trent Baker on Twitter @MagnifiTrent

A judge has blocked an illegal immigrant's deportation on the basis of “human rights” concerns despite conceding that the Iranian man — said to pose a “serious threat” to the public after raping a 17-year-old girl — only pretended to become Christian as a ploy to stay in Britain.

(AFP) -- The French government is set to rush tax cuts and a rise in the minimum wage through parliament in a bid to end the "yellow vest" protests which appear to be waning after a month of disruption.

Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said House Democrats will act "boldly and decisively" to pass gun reform legislation when they take the majority in the House when Congress gets back in session next year....

President Trump on Monday tweeted that any Democrat who says the U.S. can have border security without a wall can be written off "as just another politician following the party line."Trump tweeted the remark days b...

Fox News senior judicial analyst Andrew Napolitano dismissed claims that FBI agents “entrapped” former national security adviser Michael Flynn when they interviewed him at the start of the Trump administration.

On Fox Business Network, a panel addressed former FBI director James Comey‘s claim that agents were able to interview Flynn because of how disorganized the Trump White House was.

“Which is why the [Wall Street] Journal called it ‘entrapment,'” Bartiromo said, referring to an editorial in the Journal that inaccurately described the tactics used by the FBI to interview Flynn as “entrapment.”

Napolitano pointed that out to Bartiromo: “It’s actually — I saw your interview with General [Michael] Mukasey, in my opinion he’s absolutely correct: though they trapped [Flynn], it’s not entrapment. Entrapment is when you resist and resist and resist and they push and push and push.”

“But they did trap him, I agree with that,” Bartiromo replied.

Flynn plead guilty to lying to federal agents about his contacts with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak. Prosecutors have pushed back on Flynn’s claim he was tricked into lying last week, by outlining his pattern of lies not only to agents, but also the media and members of the Trump administration.

Fox Business then aired clips of Republican Rep. Darrell Issa claiming Flynn was entrapped, alongside the aforementioned clip of Mukasey explaining the legal meaning of entrapment.

“I wish that Darrell Issa were correct, and that General Mukasey were wrong,” Napolitano said. “But it’s the other way around.”

Fox Business host Dagen McDowell added this episode demonstrates people should never speak with the FBI: “If the FBI shows up to talk to you, you say ‘Get out, bye, not talking to you, ever.'”

Bartiromo concluded the segment by claiming “insiders” are saying Flynn “just wanted this over with because they were threatening his son. They said they were going to threaten his son, throw the book at his son… And he’s out of money, he sold his house because he needed money to pay his legal bills. So that’s one of the reasons he said, ‘Yeah, I lied.'”

“They did ruin him, but was there a legal basis for bringing a complaint about the son, I don’t know,” Napolitano said.

Watch above, via Fox Business.

President Donald Trump expressed frustration with the FBI prosecution of his personal lawyer Michael Cohen, wondering why they never did the same to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Malaysia filed criminal charges against Goldman Sachs Monday in connection with a scandal that could result in more than $3 billion in fines.

On the eve of Wednesday's Fed decision, President Trump is once again bashing the Federal Reserve over its plans to raise interest rates at a time when markets are already in chaos and the "world is blowing up" thanks in part to the central bank's "double-barreled blitz" of higher rates and tighter liquidity.

But instead of insinuating that Fed Chairman Jerome Powell is trying to undermine the administration, the president ticked off a reasonable list of factors that should give a truly "data-dependent" Fed reason to reconsider.

Instead of moving ahead with more rate hikes, Trump said the Fed should "Take the Victory!" Trump said.

It is incredible that with a very strong dollar and virtually no inflation, the outside world blowing up around us, Paris is burning and China way down, the Fed is even considering yet another interest rate hike. Take the Victory!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 17, 2018

Trump's Monday tweet follows a widely discussed op-ed published by investor Stanley Druckenmiller and former Fed Governor Kevin Warsh, who became the latest establishment heretics to side with President Trump over the economic establishment by urging the Fed to stop raising interest rates - for now, at least - due to "recent economic and market developments." The two authors wrote that the Fed should have stopped QE years ago before the easy money policies helped blow a massive asset-price bubble that could collapse as liquidity is withdrawn and borrowing costs are raised.

In a first-best world, the Fed would have stopped QE in 2010. It might then have mitigated asset-price inflation, a government-debt explosion, a boom in covenant-free corporate debt, and unearned-wealth inequality. It might also have avoided sowing the seeds of future financial distress. Booms and busts take the Fed furthest from its policy objectives of stable prices and maximum sustainable employment.

In a second-best world, on Mr. Powell’s arrival in February 2018, the Fed would have shrunk its balance sheet with speed and determination before raising rates. The economic expansion was still gaining traction at home and abroad. Tax and regulatory reforms were jolting the supply side of the economy from its slumber. Accelerated Fed QT, in the absence of rate rises, would have been much less disruptive to the real economy. Asset prices could then have found a more durable equilibrium and laid a stronger foundation for future growth.

The time to be dovish was when the crisis struck and the economy needed extraordinary monetary accommodation. The time to be more hawkish was earlier in this decade, when the economic cycle had a long runway, the global economy ample momentum, and the future considerably more promise than peril.

This is a time for choosing.

We believe the U.S. economy can sustain strong performance next year, but it can ill afford a major policy error, either from the Fed or the rest of the administration.

Given recent economic and market developments, the Fed should cease - for now - its double-barreled blitz of higher interest rates and tighter liquidity.

Powell himself recently acknowledged that Trump might have a point by shifting his rhetoric to note that the Fed funds rate is just below the policy range, and the market is increasingly in Trump's camp - expects just 10bps of rate hike in 2019 and expects 10bps of rate cuts in 2020.

Though some were still eager to pin the selloff on Trump and his 'irresponsible' fiscal policies.

The President just doesn't know when to let go when it comes to his attacks on the Fed. He just ran up the biggest fiscal deficit on record for a November ($205 bn) but somehow this is all on Powell.

— David Rosenberg (@EconguyRosie) December 17, 2018

Google announced Monday it will spend more than $1 billion on a new campus in New York City, near where Amazon will set up a new headquarters.

A report prepared for the Senate on Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election says that the way in which Google complied with requests for information made it harder to analyze the role played by YouTube …

more…

The post Google made it harder to analyze Russian interference in US presidential election, says Senate report appeared first on 9to5Mac.

Hawaii is arguing before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that its ban on the open carry of firearms is constitutional because it’s been around so long.

But Gun Owners of America, GOA has filed a friend-of-the-court brief pointing out that for most of the century and a half of the law’s existence, Hawaii either was a monarchy or a constitutional monarchy.

The brief argues Hawaii’s claim to be in a similar situation as New Jersey in a previous case fails, because New Jersey has been a state for 231 years and was a colony before that.

The dispute is between George K. Young Jr., who is challenging the state’s latest version of a ban on the public carry of weapons, and the state.

A panel at the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against the state, and officials petitioned for another hearing.

Lawyers Herbert Titus, Robert J. Olson, William J. Olson and others with William J. Olson P.C. filed a brief on behalf of Gun Owners of America, the Heller Foundation, Virginia Citizens Defense League, Conservative Legal Defense and Education Fund and others opposing the state’s demand for another hearing.

“Hawaii’s petition for rehearing triumphantly declares that ‘Hawaii has regulated the public carry of firearms for over 150 years,’ pointing to various enactments in 1852, 1927, and 1934,” the brief explains.

The state argues such restrictions have been widespread and longstanding.

“This is quite an assertion. … For most of Hawaii’s history, the island nation had no republican form of government – rather, it was a monarchy, ruled by kings and queens. Even after later transitioning to a constitutional monarchy, the Kingdom of Hawaii Constitution of 1940 did not recognize a right of the people to bear arms.”

“The Hawaii stranglehold on arms was easy to accomplish, since native Hawaiians had no experience with firearms prior to the arrival of Europeans in the late 1700s. Indeed, traders and settlers selectively doled out firearms in order to ‘unite Hawaii’s eight main islands into a single kingdom [under] Kamehameha 1.’

“This is hardly a noble pedigree to apply when determining the right of a sovereign people to keep and bear arms as a bulwark against tyranny,” the brief explains.

Hawaii became a U.S. territory in 1898 and a state in 1959.

“Hawaii’s antiquated firearms regulatory scheme should be rejected out of hand – a relic of history, not unlike the sovereign prerogatives of King George, against which this country’s Second Amendment was designed to protect,” the groups argue.

The groups point out the Second Amendment states the right to bear arms “shall not be infringed.”

And they note that the U.S. Supreme Court already has affirmed the right of individuals to keep and bear arms.

The Second Amendment Foundation also has opposed Hawaii’s petition.

“The 9th Circuit panel ruling was proper recognition that the right to bear arms extends beyond the confines of someone’s home,” noted SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb. “Clearly, anti-gunners in Hawaii do not want that to stand, so they’ve requested an en banc hearing before a full panel.

“This case is one of many in recent years that looks at the carrying of firearms in public for personal protection,” he continued. “It is of great interest to SAF members and supporters all over the country, because the Second Amendment right to bear arms is no less a right than any of the other rights enumerated and protected by the Bill of Rights. After all, nobody would argue that a citizen’s First, Fourth or Fifth Amendment rights stop at the front door of their home.”

The Hawaii Firearms Coalition also pointed out that the state’s vast rural land areas create regions that have dangers, yet police response times are measured in hours, not minutes.

They said that means the safety of one’s family and friends is up to the individual.

The post Hawaii: Gun-carry ban legitimate because it's century old appeared first on WND.

California is being sued for maintaining the DNA of people who are arrested but never convicted of a crime.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation is representing the Center for Genetics and Society and the Equal Justice Society along with one individual, Pete Shanks, in the case.

“One-third of people arrested for felonies in California are never convicted,” explained Marcy Darnovsky of the Center for Genetics.

“The government has no legitimate interest in retaining DNA samples and profiles from people who have no felony convictions, and it’s unconstitutional for the state to hold on to such sensitive material without any finding of guilt,” she said.

California long has collected DNA from people convicted of felonies. In 2009, the state began requiring DNA collection for anyone charged with a felony, including those later determined to be innocent.

Giving a DNA sample is not optional. Refusal can be punished by a year in prison, and officers are authorized to use “physical force” to obtain a sample.

“The intimate details that can be revealed by a person’s DNA only increases as technology develops, exposing plaintiffs to ever heightening degrees of intrusiveness,” EFF said. “After collection, the DNA is analyzed and uploaded to the nationwide Combined DNA Index System, or ‘CODIS,’ which is shared with law enforcement across the U.S.”

One problem is that cases have shown DNA samples can implicate innocent people for crimes, “ranging from crime-lab sample mix-ups and sample contamination by forensic collectors, to subjective misreading of complex mixtures containing genetic material from multiple donors, to selective presentation of the evidence to juries.”

Racial profiling is another problem, the critics say.

“The failure to promptly expunge profiles of innocent arrestees exploits and reinforces systemic racial and socio-economic biases,” said Lisa Holder of the Equal Justice Society. “We want the court to recognize that California’s DNA collection and retention practices are unfairly putting already vulnerable poor communities and people of color at even greater risk of racial profiling and law enforcement abuse.”

While the state allows people who are not convicted to request that their records be expunged, it is a lengthy process with uncertain results.

An estimated 750,000 people qualify for that program, but only about 1,300 have been successful with their requests, EFF said.

“The indefinite retention of thousands of DNA profiles from people who are acquitted or never charged violates the California Constitution, which affords both a right to privacy and a right against unlawful searches and seizures that are specifically aimed at protecting people from the government’s overbroad retention of personal information,” said EFF.

“Our DNA contains our entire genetic makeup – private and intensely personal information that maps who we are and where we come from,” noted EFF lawyer Jamie Lee Williams. “It’s time for the state to start honoring the privacy rights guaranteed to all Californians.”

The post California sued for keeping DNA of innocent people appeared first on WND.

The weekend festival started off with music, a gumbo competition and the annual bonfire lighting on the levee.

According to Lopinto, the Prius was recognized by a license plate recognition camera as having been stolen out of New Orleans two days ago.

WEST BATON ROUGE PARISH - A grand jury has indicted West Baton Rouge sheriff's deputy Ben Arceneaux after a series of reports by the Investigative Unit uncovered a number of sexual misconduct allegations against the officer.

On Friday, a grand jury unanimously indicted Arceneaux on malfeasance charges. Prosecutors have asked that a felony warrant for Arceneaux be issued.

In a statement released later that same afternoon, Arceneaux's attorney James Manasseh said the deputy plans to resign his position as a sheriff's deputy. When asked if there were plans to fire Arceneaux, the sheriff's office said it would "get back to" us on that.

“He is accepting the decision of the grand jury. He is apologetic of his actions and those who had trust in him," the statement from Arceneaux's attorney read. "Ben has been cooperative and hopes to put this behind him.”

The allegations against Arceneaux first surfaced earlier this year after the WBRZ Investigative Unit spoke with several of his alleged victims. One of those women claimed Arceneaux demanded oral sex from her during a traffic stop.

Station attorneys had to get involved for the West Baton Rouge Parish Sheriff's Office to release their report about the incidents. That report revealed Arceneaux was disciplined earlier this year after being moved to the jail and that he was unpaid for a period of time.

Hours after the indictment, Arceneaux resigned.

Following WBRZ's stories, Sheriff Mike Cazes placed Arceneaux on unpaid leave and called in Louisiana State Police to investigate.

A grand jury had previously met in November, but jurors sought to reconvene in December so more information on the case could be presented.

A trial date has not been announced at this time.

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