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ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia (AP) - U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry straddled the diplomatic boundary this weekend between presenting the best face of America and a misleading one. In a question-and-answer session with young Ethiopians on Sunday, Kerry exaggerated the U.S. record on climate change, appeared to conflate past U.S. policy on drones with President Barack Obama's new policy and gave an incomplete account of how he opposed the Iraq war. A day earlier, he struggled with economic data as well as the contents of his own department's terrorism blacklist. Here's a look at how some of his statements measured...

A man suspected of staging a terrorist attack that left a British soldier dead near a military barracks in London, was caught on camera clutching a meat cleaver and knife in hands apparently covered in the blood of his victim, as he justified the violence as part of a jihadist-inspired fight against the west. The incident happened in broad daylight, 400 metres from the perimeter of the Royal Artillery barracks, in Woolwich, south-east London, sparking a terrorist alert that saw the government crisis committee Cobra convene in emergency session. Hours later, David Cameron described what had occurred as "an absolutely...

Palestinian Authority Arabs have accused Jews from Bat Ayin of carrying out a price tag attack last week on an old Arab farmer’s vineyard and olive grove. The accusation came in a report published on the website of the Stop The Wall organization under the self-described “Palestinian Grassroots Anti-Apartheid Wall Campaign,” subtitled “Settlements, Land and Resource Theft, Destruction of Land.” According to the report, residents of the Judean Jewish community of Bat Ayin allegedly cut and destroyed “dozens of trees on the land of farmer Hamad Abdul Hamid Jaber” last Thursday morning, including 55 grape vines, 1 quince tree and...

During his March 28 comments on "gun violence," President Obama once again claimed that 40% of gun purchases take place without a background check. The claim is meant to apply to new gun sales and is patently false, as Breitbart News demonstrated when Obama first used the 40% figure during a speech on Jan. 16. As Breitbart News explained then, many gun grabbers get the "40%" figure from a 2011 study by NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg, titled: "Point, Click, Fire: An Investigation Into Illegal Online Gun Sales."

The grind lower in initial jobless claims continues, which from an upwardly revised 342k (was 340K) last week, declined to 332K in the most recent week ended March 9, on expectations of an increase to 350K. This was the third consecutive beat in a row and the lowest total print since January, which in turn takes it all the way back to January 2008. Continuing claims were also better than expected, dropping from an upwardly-revised 3113K, to 3024K, on expectations of a 3090K print. According to the BLS, unlike the last time we had an abnormally low print, no states...

The number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits unexpectedly fell week, the latest indication the labor market recovery was gaining traction. Initial claims for state unemployment benefits dropped 10,000 to a seasonally adjusted 332,000, the Labor Department said on Thursday. That was the third straight week of declines. The prior week's claims figure was revised to show 2,000 more applications than previously reported. Economists polled by Reuters had expected first-time applications last week to rise to 350,000. Read more: http://www.foxbusiness.com/economy/2013/03/14/jobless-claims-labor-department-unemployment-insurance/#ixzz2NWEw2gn4

LOS ANGELES - The Los Angeles Unified School District has agreed to a multimillion-dollar settlement with 58 current and former students at a school where an ex-teacher was accused of taking bondage-style photos of pupils, a lawyer for the district said on Tuesday. The settlement would resolve nearly half of the 129 claims filed by former students of Miramonte Elementary School, attorney David Holmquist said. **SNIP** Mark Berndt, the first of two former Miramonte teachers accused of molesting students there, made headlines when he was charged in January 2012 with 23 counts of lewd acts on children, all aged 10...

The number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits dropped for a second straight week last week, unwinding some of the storm-related surge, which has muddled the labor market picture. Initial claims for state unemployment benefits dropped 23,000 to a seasonally adjusted 393,000, the Labor Department said on Thursday. The prior week's figure was revised up to show 6,000 more applications than previously reported. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast claims falling to 390,0000 last week. The four-week moving average for new claims, a better measure of labor market trends, increased 7,500 to 405,250, the highest level since October...

Hamas has made a number of extraordinary claims in recent days. Let's go through some of them.

More than 250,000 Filipinos fought for the United States during the war and were promised equal treatment as American veterans after the war. Weeks after Obama took office in 2009, Congress approved a stimulus package that included one-time payments of $15,000 to Filipino veterans in the United States and $9,000 to those living in the Philippines. Obama's administration yesterday created a working group to look into the plight of Filipino veterans.... presidential assistant Chris Lu.

So first time claims for Unemployment Insurance dropped by 30,000 last week, as reported yesterday??? Oh, the numbers for "one large State" were omitted??? Oh, the Wall Street Journal reported that State was Kalifornia??? Well if you go to the URL above, you will be taken to the California Employment Development Department "Quick Statistics" chart, scroll down to the Unemployment Insurance (UI) Statistics section. Then click on the "Initial Claims Filed" link. (Im sorry to say I've forgotten how to get the PDF into the body of this thread) I went back 13 years (1999) and added the claims filed...

Jobless claims were little changed at 374,000 in the week ended Aug. 25, matching the upwardly revised figure from the prior week, the Labor Department reported today in Washington. The four-week moving average, a less volatile measure, climbed to a six-week high. In fact, jobless claims are at December 2011 levels, indicating fear of new taxes from Obamacare and the dreaded fiscal cliff. Continuing jobless claims are stuck at March 2012 levels, not a good sign this far after the end of the recession. On the other hand, Consumer spending in the U.S. climbed in July for the first time...

The Department of Labor inadvertently released initial jobless claims numbers on an agency website a day prior to its official Thursday release. According to a Labor Department press release, the news announcing jobless claims data was placed in an automated software system on August 8 in preparation for being posted on the Internet on August 9. Two weeks ago, new testing procedures were implemented for the automated system. "A test of the automated system that was conducted on Thursday inadvertently triggered the release of the unemployment claims report," the release said.

Witness a humble taxi curing some poor guy who just  left the welfare office with his disability check! -HERE-

Court tosses law about false claims on medals Published June 28, 2012 Associated Press WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court on Thursday struck down a federal law making it a crime to lie about receiving the Medal of Honor and other prized military awards, with justices branding the false claim "contemptible" but nonetheless protected by the First Amendment. The court voted 6-3 in favor of Xavier Alvarez, a former local elected official in California who falsely said he was a decorated war veteran and had pleaded guilty to violating the 2006 law, known as the Stolen Valor Act. The law, enacted...

Palestinian Authority Arabs’ claims to land in Judea and Samaria are often meaningless, says Moshe Zar, one of the main land salesmen in the region. The reason goes back to King Hussein’s distribution of land decades ago, he said. “Hussain wanted to compensate the Palestinian families whose relatives he had murdered, so he gave them free land,” Zar told Arutz Sheva. “In reality, the distribution of land cannot be considered to be in effect, because it does not match the conditions on the ground.” The land was given out randomly by drawing lines on a map, he explained, and many...

The Washington Post reports that Mohamed Nasheed, the former president of Maldives, claims the United States has given legitimacy to the Islamist coup which deposed him. Mohamed Nasheed won the presidency in Maldives’s first multiparty elections in 2008, after a lifetime advocating democracy and human rights and several long stints in jail. Less than three years later, he was forced to resign by an angry mob of police officers and soldiers, in what he says was a coup engineered by his autocratic predecessor. “We have to have an election,” he said in an interview while visiting the Indian capital, New...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - New claims for unemployment benefits rose last week to their highest level since January, a development that could raise fears the labor market recovery was stalling after job creation slowed in March. Initial claims for state unemployment benefits increased 13,000 to a seasonally adjusted 380,000, the Labor Department said on Thursday. The prior week's figure was revised up to 367,000 from the previously reported 357,000. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast claims falling to 355,000 last week. The four-week moving average for new claims, considered a better measure of labor market trends, rose 4,250 to 368,500. The...

In recent weeks, Democratic congressional candidate Darcy Burner has touted her Harvard degree in economics when talking about the nation's financial crisis and her opposition to the bailout package passed by Congress. At two debates this month, she brought up her academic background in her opening statement. "I loved economics so much that I got a degree in it from Harvard," she said at an Oct. 10 debate at KCTS-TV. "Now everywhere I go in this district, the only thing people want to talk to me about is the economy." But while she took courses in economics, Burner doesn't have...

The number of Americans who filed applications for unemployment benefits inched down by 1,000 last week to 404,000...