Police: Pregnant teen beaten to force miscarriage

By The Associated Press

NAPLES, Utah (AP) — A man in Utah beat a pregnant teenager who asked him to do so in an effort to induce a miscarriage, police said Friday.

Arron N. Harrison, 21, was jailed in lieu of $10,000 bail for allegedly beating a 17-year-old girl whose name authorities haven’t released. She is also in custody.

“I haven’t decided who’s more at fault,” Mark Watkins, police chief of Naples, 130 miles east of Salt Lake City, told The Associated Press. “She was just as cold as the assailant — we’re not going to treat her as a victim.”

Uintah County deputy attorney Mark Thomas said he plans to file a second-degree felony charge of attempted homicide against Harrison on Friday. Harrison is expected to appear in court Tuesday and faces one to 15 years in prison if convicted.

Harrison pummeled the girl’s abdomen in an effort to cause a miscarriage, Watkins said.

“Her intention was, in fact, to abort the child — to terminate the pregnancy,” he said.

The six-month-old fetus survived, but doctors won’t know for certain what injuries it may have sustained until it is born.

Story:
http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Wo.....41-ap.html

So tell me again what Roe vs Wade is supposed to prevent…?

‘Toronto 18′ member gets 2.5-year sentence

By Maria Babbage, THE CANADIAN PRESS

BRAMPTON, Ont. – A man convicted of terrorist offences following the high-profile takedown of a homegrown terror cell bent on wreaking havoc in Canada was sentenced Friday to 2 1/2 years in prison and walked free just hours later based on time already served.

The man, who cannot be named, was the first member of the so-called Toronto 18 found guilty in the plot, though his lawyer said his role was minimal at best.

“He’s somebody who’s essentially found guilty of shoplifting, somebody who went to a second (training) camp that was essentially benign,” Mitchell Chernovsky said outside the court.

“He’s somebody who’s young, has no prior record, has a positive pre-sentence report.

“Maximum sentence for the offence is only 10 years.”

Story:
http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Ca.....31-cp.html

…sigh

FoxNews excerpt from Newsweek
Obama Says Security, Spotlight Will Complicate Daughters’ Dating Lives
President Obama told Newsweek magazine that dating might be an issue for his two daughters “because I have men with guns surrounding them at all times.”

President Obama says he doesn’t worry about daughters Malia and Sasha because they are “happy, normal kids” despite living in the public eye. But wait until they become teenagers and start dating.

“Now, I worry about them when they’re teenagers where, you know, you’re already embarrassed about your parents and even more embarrassed on TV all the time,” Obama told Newsweek magazine. “And dating I think will be an issue because I have men with guns surrounding them at all times, which I’m perfectly happy with, but they may feel differently about it.”

Malia is 10; Sasha is 7.

Asked whether he had spoken with any former presidents or celebrities about raising young children in the spotlight, Obama gave a roundabout answer.

“The truth of the matter is that the campaign was the equivalent of me being the frog in the saucepan of water and the temperature slowly being turned up,” the president said. “By the time the inauguration had taken place, we had pretty much gotten accustomed to it.”

http://www.foxnews.com/politic.....ing-lives/

WASHINGTON – Forty-eight terror suspects currently held at Guantanamo Bay are waiting to be released to other nations, the Obama administration said Thursday.

In a speech defending his plans to close the detention facility at the U.S. naval base in Cuba by early next year, Obama described the 50 detainees as prisoners who “can be transferred safely to another country.”

The government has been negotiating with nations like Yemen and Saudi Arabia for months to deal with some of the detainees. Obama is seeking to place up to an estimated 100 Yemeni detainees in Saudi rehabilitation programs.

… Many nations, however, are reluctant to take detainees who remain at Guantanamo because they are seen as higher security risks than those who were cleared earlier.

And the U.S. is leery about transferring many detainees to other nations, like Yemen, where they may be released despite the threat they may pose.

The two detainees who have been transferred to other nations since January are:
_Ethiopian national Binyam Mohammed, a former resident of Great Britain,…was sent back to Britain in February…

_Lakhdar Boumediene, an Algerian, was sent to France earlier this month…. Boumediene’s whose landmark 2008 Supreme Court case gave the Guantanamo detainees the right to challenge their imprisonment.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200....._detainees

New Hampshire House opposes governor on same-sex marriage

May 20, 2009

(CNN) — New Hampshire’s move to become the most recent state to legalize same-sex marriage hit a bump Wednesday, after the state House of Representatives failed to agree to changes made by the governor.

The House and Senate have approved allowing gay couples to marry.

But Gov. John Lynch, a three-term Democrat, said last week he would sign a same-sex marriage bill only if it provides “the strongest and clearest protections for religious institutions and associations, and for the individuals working with such institutions.”

Lynch said any such measure needs to “make clear that [clergy and other religious officials] cannot be forced to act in ways that violate their deeply held religious principles.”

The House on Wednesday fell two votes short of approving Lynch’s language, 186-188.

The chamber then voted to send the legislation to a committee to be considered further.

The language would specify that religious organizations can decline to take part in any marriage ceremony without incurring fines or risking lawsuits.

Source: http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITI.....index.html

And here’s a telling response as to why the governor’s additions were so opposed:

State Representative Steve Vaillancourt, a gay Republican from Manchester, was a leading voice against the amendment securing religious liberties, saying that the House should not be “bullied” by the governor.

Vaillancourt said an earlier bill that did not provide protections to clerics or religious groups was the one that should have been passed, adding that the amended bill would allow discrimination to be written into state law.

Source: http://ace.mu.nu/archives/287557.php

So now it’s “discriminatory” to protect religious institutions from being harassed, sued, or forced to perform “marriages” contrary to their beliefs. But it’s not discriminatory to thwart the First Amendment rights of such persons or groups.

Further proof that the gay-marriage movement is not about equality, but about forcing groups – especially and specifically religious groups – to violate their beliefs in the name of political correctness and “tolerance.”

Upset with outsourcing, union won’t give up raise

By Jason Stein

One major state workers union is saying “no thanks” to Gov. Jim Doyle’s call for them to give up a promised raise to help fill a gaping state budget hole.

The workers won’t give up the 2 percent raise scheduled for June as long as the state continues to outsource additional work to contractors, said Bryan Kennedy, president of AFT-Wisconsin. The union has roughly 10,000 white-collar state workers including computer staff, public defenders and university teaching assistants.

“As long as the state continues to contract out, we will not discuss giving back the pay increase,” said Kennedy, arguing that state workers are cheaper for taxpayers than contractors. “It’s a non starter.”

Earlier this month, Doyle said he would rescind a pay raise for 9,500 non-union state workers to help fill a $1.6 billion hole in the state budget opened by falling tax collections and the struggling economy.

If the state’s 38,600 union workers don’t agree to give back their pay raises as well, Doyle has said that he could seek the savings by laying off up to 400 of them. Those layoffs would come on top of up to 700 layoffs and 16 days of unpaid leave for state workers also being sought by Doyle to solve the budget gap. …

http://www.madison.com/wsj/mad/latest/451976

So, give back your raise and you all keep your jobs, or keep it and 400 of you get fired.

Of course the union would rather see the 400 fired.

Par for the course.

From the Madison, WI Capital Tmes:

Wisconsin poised to become 1st state to mandate hearing implant coverage

By Shawn Doherty

The Legislature recently passed a bill that would make Wisconsin the first state in the country to require insurers to cover the costs of giving deaf children cochlear implants, but some members of the deaf community are waging a furious last-minute battle to try to persuade Gov. Jim Doyle to veto it this week.

Deaf critics of the bill say that the implants are dangerous, expensive and a threat to their unique community’s identity, culture and sign languages, and nearly 500 have signed a petition asking Doyle not to sign it.

Being deaf is not a medical disorder, and they do not need to be fixed, they say. “The notion that being deaf is an affliction and an abomination which alienates one from society and leaves (one) dependent and isolated is a myth,” the petition reads.

Several of these critics and an interpreter were expected to show up at Doyle’s office Tuesday with the petition. “We really have to make a lot of noise, to let people know who we are,” said Darrell Roby, a Middleton landscaper and the president of the Madison Association of the Deaf, in an interview. “We want people to understand what deaf culture is about.”

The bill has reignited a bitter divide within the deaf community over exactly what deaf culture is really about, however.

It is a debate that first gained national attention with the 1986 release of the movie “Children of a Lesser God,” in which a hearing teacher, played by William Hurt, fell in love with a young deaf student, starring deaf actress Marlee Matlin, and tried to persuade her to learn oral language and join the hearing world. The conflict portrayed in that movie is at the heart of the dispute today over the Wisconsin bill.

The mandate would require insurance companies to pay not only for children’s implants, but for their hearing aids and related treatments. The bill would affect only the third of Wisconsin’s population currently covered by private insurance. Self-funded insurance plans are not subject to the state law, and most public insurance plans already cover the devices. …

http://www.madison.com/tct/mad/topstories/451696

The arguments are just incredible:

Yet the most powerful arguments made by those in the deaf community who oppose the bill are not economic. They are personal.

Mat Fowler, a 32-year-old carpenter who lives in Rothschild, was the second child to receive a cochlear implant in Wisconsin way back in 1990, he said in a videophone interview. He was 14 and did not want the implant, but agreed to try it. “I wanted to prove my love for my parents,” he said. His parents are not deaf. Receiving the implant was a “culture shock,” Fowler said. Suddenly he felt tremendous pressure to succeed and communicate in entirely new ways. When he was 18, he said, he took the external part of the implant off. Just last year, he underwent surgery in Milwaukee to remove the internal portion. He and his wife, who is deaf, have three sons. All three can hear and are doing well. They are bilingual, able to communicate in both spoken and sign languages.

Fowler says he opposes the bill, but can see the arguments on both sides.

I can understand an adult making this decision, but parents making the decision that by hearing their kids might miss out on “deaf culture?”

Of course this will raise insurance costs for Wisconsin residents exponentially, but that’s OK, Obama will fix all that…

From an appreciative AP:

Pentagon reports no longer quote Bible

The Pentagon said Monday it no longer includes a Bible quote on the cover page of daily intelligence briefings it sends to the White House as was practice during the Bush administration.

Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said he did not know how long the Worldwide Intelligence Update cover sheets quoted from the Bible. Air Force Maj. Gen. Glen Shaffer, who was responsible for including them, retired in August 2003, according to his biography.

For a period in 2003, at least, the daily reports prepared for President George W. Bush carried quotes from the books of Psalms and Ephesians and the epistles of Peter. At the time, the reports focused largely on the war in Iraq.

The Bible quotes apparently aimed to support Bush at a time when soldiers’ deaths in Iraq were on the rise, according to the June issue of GQ magazine. But they offended at least one Muslim analyst at the Pentagon and worried other employees that the passages were inappropriate. …

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/.....332D31.DTL

Well, if one Muslim analyst was offended, we must put a stop to things immediately.

Of course our friends on the left don’t recognize irony when they step into it:

The Rev. Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, on Monday said U.S. soldiers “are not Christian crusaders, and they ought not be depicted as such.”

“Depicting the Iraq conflict as some sort of holy war is completely outrageous,” Lynn said in a statement. “It’s contrary to the constitutional separation of religion and government, and it’s tremendously damaging to America’s reputation in the world.”

The irony being of course that it is a holy war – that’s what jihad means – just not on our side.

But that’s beside the point – a Bible quote on the cover page somehow makes our soldiers into “Christian Crusaders” but yet we must go out of our way to avoid offending a Muslim.

Got it.

From the AP:

Michael Douglas: No-nukes world would be good deal

WASHINGTON (AP) — Greed is good. A world without nukes is better.

Actor Michael Douglas, whose performance as the conniving Gordon Gekko in “Wall Street” won him an Oscar in 1987, spent part of Wednesday evening focused on a more critical cause – ridding the world of nuclear weapons.

Douglas moderated a panel of Washington experts on the issue – former Sens. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., and Sam Nunn, D-Ga., and Robert Gallucci, a former U.S. diplomat who was chief negotiator during the nuclear crisis with North Korea in 1994.

Douglas questioned Hagel about whether the new Obama administration has provided a transformational opportunity for the world’s nuclear-armed nations to address the issue. He pressed Nunn on recent multinational conferences and his recent White House meeting with other former diplomats and President Barack Obama.

Gallucci told the forum gathered at the Italian Embassy that recent discussions between the United States and Russia hold promise, but the threat of nuclear terrorism is a legitimate concern, given the unrest in Pakistan. …

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/s.....EL_DOUGLAS

Don’t get me wrong – the idea of a nuclear weapon-free world is lovely.

But it’s not at all realistic.

Say China, Russia and the US gave up theirs.

North Korea, India, Pakistan and all too soon Iran will stand by and laugh hysterically.

As will al Qaeda – not that our nukes would deter them – who would the US attack? – but nothing’s going to stop them from using a nuke as soon as they can get their hands on one.

There is no other option than to release or shoot them.

After, a revengeful Obama chose Ft. Sill in Oklahoma as a possible place of release prisoners, knowing of Inhofes ongoing battle to stop the release and close of Gitmo prison. Two doctors for evey prisoner. Low cost to the U.S. of 4000 a year. Inhofe has led the way for 27 other states to adopt legislation, and also won battle to build monument of Ten Commandments, though citizens must pay for it.

Watch Senator Inhofe tell it like it is.

From the RealClearPolitics CNN vidio
http://www.realclearpolitics.c.....oners.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....annel_page

May 20, 2009 Contacts: Matt Dempsey 202-224-9797 Elizabeth French 202-224-8260

Recently, acting Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chair Michael Copps asserted that the “Fairness” Doctrine is “long gone” and that “it’s not coming back,” and that those concerned about its re-imposition are “issue mongering” and “conspiracy theorists.” Yesterday, Media Research Center President Brent Bozell issued a statement in response to Copps’ statements, requesting that House speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid allow a vote on the Broadcaster Freedom Act, legislation that would prohibit the FCC from reinstituting the Fairness Doctrine.

Senator Inhofe commended Mr. Bozell’s request, saying, “We must not allow ourselves to believe that the Fairness Doctrine has gone away. The sheer number of Democrats who have recently called for the re-imposition of the Fairness Doctrine is proof positive that this remains at the forefront of their agenda. Furthermore, new proposals such as broadcast localism and diversity in media ownership requirements continue to threaten the First Amendment rights of broadcasters across our nation.”

http://inhofe.senate.gov/publi.....08d719b99a