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EL Pais reports Spanish Public Debt Threatens to Exceed 100% of GDP in 2014 Via translation General government debt accumulated through February was 987.945 billion euros, an amount that represents 96.5% of gross domestic product (GDP). This represents a new record in the amount of money the state, communities, and the municipalities have to return to financial institutions and investment funds. In February alone, the government liabilities increased by 8.130 billion, up 8% from the previous month. The debt problem is not just that you have to pay, but the difficulty to stop the frenzied pace to growing-has risen from...

New Jersey Governor and potential 2016 presidential candidate Chris Christie said during a speech at a forum on drug and alcohol abuse that he is pro-life and he tied his opposition to abortion to his respect for human life, chrischristie4saying he is pro-life both before and after birth. Christie was a featured speaker at the conference, held at Saint Peter’s University. His comments on abortion came during a conversation with former Gov. Jim McGreevey. “It’s great to be pro-life, but you need to be pro-life after they get out of the womb, too,” Christie said to applause. Video and transcript...

I heard a rumor that some sensitive folks on the religious right are concerned about the possibility of the GOP 2016 convention being held in my beloved hometown, that den of iniquity known as Las Vegas. I have to admit, I’m puzzled. Sure, there’s sin in Vegas, but last time I checked, there was sin in Dallas, Cleveland and even (gasp) River City. Believe it or not, there are hundreds of churches and hundreds of thousands of Christians in Vegas. We can and DO live the same lives people live anywhere. We work, go to school and church, take...

On Wednesday, H.B. 305, authored by Representative Frank Hoffmann (R-Monroe), passed through the Louisiana House of Representatives by a bi-partisan vote of 91-6. The bill had 35 Representatives join as co-authors. prolifestudents33H.B. 305 states that no individual or organization that performs elective abortion or its affiliates may provide instruction or materials in public elementary and secondary schools or in charter schools that receive state funding. Benjamin Clapper, Executive Director of Louisiana Right to Life, said the following about the vote: “We commend the Louisiana House of Representatives for passing H.B. 305 to protect the children in our state-funded school system....

Let’s do a thought experiment. If Charles or David Koch got invited onto NBC’s Today show to talk about their efforts to advance their political agenda, would either or both get partnered with Savannah Guthrie for a softball interview? Would their interview include suggestions that one of them should run for President? Kyle Drennen at Newsbusters notes that two weeks prior to Michael Bloomberg’s appearance on Today, the network took a much different approach to money in politics: (VIDEO-AT-LINK)The clip just provides the highlights. Newsbusters has the whole transcript up, but let me just note the tough questions asked by...

Listening to Attorney General Eric Holder and President Barack Obama address Al Sharpton’s National Action Network 16th annual convention last week, one would think Americans were living in the year 1964 not 2014. Holder pulled the race card blaming Republicans for criticizing him and Obama, merely because they’re black. Speaking prior to Obama, Holder suggested to the all black crowd that both he and the president had been treated badly by Republicans because they are black. “It has nothing to do with me, forget that. What attorney general has ever had to deal with that kind of treatment? What president...

I was listening to a financial guru/talking head of one of the local radio money shows recently. He was pontificating about the opportunities that were being presented in the stock market if only you knew where to look. What caught my attention, however, was his pronouncement about the problem with recent IPO offerings, most notably Ally (formerly the bankrupt GMAC). He kept warning people away from this stock which put him in my camp. However, when a caller asked him if they should short the stock he immediately went to my “Are you kidding me?” list. It wasn’t whether...

MEXICO CITY — Gabriel Garcia Marquez, the Nobel laureate whose novels and short stories exposed tens of millions of readers to Latin America's passion, superstition, violence and inequality, died at home in Mexico City around midday, according to people close to his family. He was 87. Widely considered the most popular Spanish-language writer since Miguel de Cervantes in the 17th century, Garcia Marquez achieved literary celebrity that spawned comparisons to Mark Twain and Charles Dickens. His flamboyant and melancholy fictional works — among them "Chronicle of a Death Foretold," ''Love in the Time of Cholera" and "Autumn of the Patriarch"...

As a supporter of genuine capitalism, which means the right of contract and the absence of coercion, I don’t think there should be any policies that help or hinder unions. The government should simply be a neutral referee that enforces contracts and upholds the rule of law. Similarly, I also don’t have any philosophical objection to employers and employees agreeing to “defined benefit” pension plans, which basically promise workers a pre-determined amount of money after they retire based on factors such as average pay and years in the workforce. After all, my money and property aren’t involved, so it’s not...

On the first part of the journey I was looking at all the life There were plants and birds and rocks and things There was sand and hills and rings The first thing I met was a fly with a buzz And the sky with no clouds The heat was hot and the ground was dry But the air was full of sound.-America The year 1985 saw the beginning of a new dawn in technology, which would see the exploitation and evolution of a defense department project, develop into the worldwide web - the Internet. Building out the pipes and...

WASHINGTON -- Last week a national treasure spoke. That would be Charles Krauthammer, syndicated columnist, television commentator and all around public sage. He also is a chess player. Krauthammer noted that two months ago a petition bearing the signatures of some 110,000 tyrants was sent to the Washington Post -- from where did it come, I would like to know -- demanding that the Post discontinue publishing articles that deny global warming or -- who knows -- take even a skeptical view of global warming. Yet Krauthammer assures us that precisely a day later his column containing the exact heresy...

F. Reid Buckley, a novelist, columnist, founder of a school of public speaking and, in family lore, the most literary of Aloise and William F. Buckley Sr.'s 10 children, including former Senator James L. Buckley and the conservative commentator William F. Buckley Jr., died on Monday in hospice care in Columbia, S.C. He was 83. The cause was cancer, his son William Huntting Buckley said. Mr. Buckley had lived in Camden, S.C., since the early 1970s. He was often mistaken for his brother William, the founder of the conservative magazine National Review. The brothers not only looked alike. They also...

Unpublished research by university scientists is exempt from the Virginia Freedom of Information Act, the Virginia Supreme Court ruled Thursday, rejecting an attempt by skeptics of global warming to view the work of a prominent climate researcher during his years at the University of Virginia. The ruling is the latest turn in the FOIA request filed in 2011 by Del. Robert Marshall (R-Prince William) and the American Tradition Institute to obtain research and e-mails of former U-Va. professor Michael Mann.

GOP presidential hopefuls are largely steering clear of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy’s fight with the federal government. The showdown, which left armed militia members and feds staring each other down last week, has captivated talk radio and cable news shows, turning Bundy into a conservative cause célèbre. Yet Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Mike Huckabee, a former Arkansas governor and 2008 presidential candidate, are the only big-name Republicans to have spoken out on the dispute so far. Tea Party favorite Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) has been silent, and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) have also not...

Major Garrett got a rather unique opportunity, especially these days, for a White House beat reporter. The CBS reporter actually got an interview with the President, an honor which has largely gone to local TV stations and entertainment-journalism reporters over the last couple of years, or to anchors of national news broadcasts. Garrett got a bonus when Vice President Joe Biden joined Barack Obama briefly, which prompted Garrett to ask about Obama’s endorsement for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination race. And the answer was … necessarily awkward: CLICK ABOVE LINK FOR THE VIDEO “I don’t necessarily want to jam them...

NASA will hold a live news teleconference on Thursday, April 17, at 2 p.m. EDT (11 a.m. PT/1800 GMT) to unveil a new discover by the Kepler space telescope, which hunts alien planets beyond our solar system. Full Story: Found! First Earth-Size Planet That Could Support Life, Gallery Video: New Earth-Size Planet Could Have Water Complete Coverage Top Story: Found! First Earth-Size Planet That Could Support Life Video: New Earth-Size Planet Could Have Water Earth-Size Planet Kepler-186f, a Possibly Habitable Alien World (Gallery) Exoplanet Kepler-186f: Earth-Size World Could Support Oceans and Life (Infographic) From SETI Astronomer Seth Shostak: Cousin of...

Darkness fell across the land and the man they thought would be their savior cried out in a loud voice, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Soon after, he breathed his last. The people standing at the foot of the cross beat their breasts and stumbled away. From a distance, his mother and friends watched in silent despair. His disciples were broken in spirit—no doubt confused, hurting and angry. They had followed this man for years, left their work and their families for him. They thought he would change everything. But in the course of one day,...

Remember when colleges prided themselves on the diligence and depth of their research? Frederick Lawrence, president of Brandeis University, apparently does not. He offered an honorary degree to Ayaan Hirsi Ali. Then, at the last minute, he rescinded the offer because, he claims, he became aware of “past statements” by her “inconsistent with Brandeis University’s core values.” Hey Scholar-in-Chief, ever hear of Google? Ms. Hirsi Ali, of course, is an intrepid women’s rights advocate who has focused on Muslim women, raising questions, as she has phrased it, on “the role of Islam in legitimizing” female genital mutilation, “honor killings,” forced...

Attorney General Eric Holder said hate crimes are an affront to what the United States stands for in comments at a memorial service Thursday for three people killed in a shooting at a Jewish community center in Kansas. “Every alleged hate crime, no matter the intended target, is an affront to who we are – and who we have always been – both as a country and as a people,”

U2 frontman Bono talks about his faith and answers the question "Who is Jesus?" in the video below. Click play to watch. Link Here with Video (2 mins 46 secs)