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Russia’s FSB has foiled a terror attack in Moscow as they managed to kill two and detain one of the militants planning it, the National Anti-Terrorism Committee said. The three men are “Russian citizens, arrived from Afghani-Pakistani region, where they have been trained,” the committee said. All three are said to practice Islam. Some reports suggest that the militants underwent training in Pakistan's Northern Waziristan, however, it is unknown which group they belong to. According to Russian special services, Waziristan is a hotbed of Taliban extremism. "There are also training camps for terrorists who come from all over the world....

WASHINGTON — Last year, the Obama administration announced to the world that it was planning to pursue a new Asia/Pacific-oriented national security strategy. Since then, North Korea has countered with a strategy of its own. In December, Pyongyang successfully launched a multistage intercontinental ballistic missile capable of carrying a warhead-sized payload to the U.S. mainland. On Feb. 12, the North Koreans tested an improved-design nuclear weapon. After the test, Pyongyang announced that despite tightened United Nations sanctions that theoretically went into force last month, its latest nuclear test bolstered its defenses against U.S. "hostility." In a lengthy broadcast on the...

A tax bill that would raise revenue $2.1 billion by boosting taxes on high-wage earners, smokers and corporations is headed for debate by the Senate. The bill, which also helps support a development plan pushed by the Mayo Clinic in Rochester officials say could bring thousands of jobs to Minnesota, is expected to be on the agenda once state Senators return to chambers at 11 a.m. The bill passed the state House by a 69-65 vote early Monday morning, May 20. It is one of the last major tax and spending bills the Legislature is taking up as it finalizes...

Just how extreme is the pro-abortion group NARAL? The organization is now on record opposing a new bill in Congress that would ban abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy because scientific evidence shows unborn babies feel pain by at least 20 weeks. Why does NARAL oppose a modest ban on late-term abortions? Its president Ilyse Hogue wraps the opposition in language about women’s rights and claims banning late-term abortions will drive up illegal abortions that hurt women. (Never mind that Kermit Gosnell went from the back alley to main street and killed and injured women in legal late-term abortions). “We...

Democrats in the House and Senate are looking to stop what they say are deceptive advertising practices by anti-abortion health clinics that imply they offer abortion services, but instead encourage birth and promote adoption. The legislation is aimed at crisis pregnancy centers (CPCs), which are clinics often set up by a church or other anti-abortion groups. Democrats in Congress and other pro-abortion groups say these clinics are known to indicate they can perform abortions in order to attract pregnant women patients, and then try to convince them to carry their babies to term. Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.), the House sponsor...

In a bitter fight, Colorado Democrats recently muscled through the Statehouse a massive elections reform bill that allows voters to register up until Election Day and still cast their ballots. It’s the latest—and most substantial—development in a nationwide Democratic Party effort to strike back at two years of Republican success in passing measures to require identification at polling places and purge rolls of suspect voters. Democratic-controlled states like California, Connecticut and Maryland also all have sought to make it easier to cast a ballot as late as possible. They recently passed versions of same-day voter registration measures, which traditionally help...

"In two weeks the naysayers will find out just how wrong they have been" - Mike Zullo

Fewer groups sught recognition as 501 (c)(4) social welfare organizations that year than in 2009, according to the Treasury Department. ...

Daniele Perazzi, president of the Italian Perazzi Shotguns firm, was taken into custody yesterday by Adams County Deputies [see update, below] along with several prototype shotguns. The executive was picked up in the parking lot of the Denver Merchandise Mart, hosting the high-end Colorado Gun Collectors show this weekend, after a taxi driver, likely reacting to a suspicious activity reporting outreach program conducted by law enforcement, told authorities he thought he could be transporting an armed “foreign speaking” terror suspect. “He loaded prototype shotguns into the cab on the way to the Merchandise Mart,” gun rights activist and newly-elected National...

Government Overreach: The Internal Revenue Service official in charge of tax-exempt organizations when the unit targeted Tea Party groups now runs the IRS office responsible for enforcing ObamaCare. As bad as the IRS scandal was, with the taxing body of government using its unequaled authority to intimidate and harass the president's political opposition to aid his re-election, it got worse with the news that the IRS official, Sarah Hall Ingram, who served as commissioner of the Tax-Exempt and Government Entities Division from 2009 to 2012, is now serving as director of the IRS' Affordable Care Act division. Ingram was so...

The IRS scandal keeps getting closer and closer to the top of the White House food chain as Obama officials desperately try to spin their way out of mounting evidence and foul play. The Wall Street Journal is reporting President Obama's top attorney knew about the IRS targeting weeks ago before news broke, but of course, Obama still didn't know about it until he learned about it "from the news." The White House's chief lawyer learned weeks ago that an audit of the Internal Revenue Service likely would show that agency employees inappropriately targeted conservative groups, a senior White House...

The scandals appearing in the news are merely symptoms of THE most important problem at hand, which has yet to explode on the scene. The Democrats stole the last presidential election (they first tried with Gore) and have probably stolen many legislative elections. Evidence seems to be mounting as one reads about the many precincts in Philadelphia having not a single Romney vote (statistical impossibility) and then the latest news were "True the Vote" was harassed by not only the IRS, but the FBI, OSHA AND the ATF. Since no charges were filed, WHO sicced four Federal agencies on an...

“For me, it’s about collaboration.” — National Treasury Employees Union President Colleen Kelley on the relationship between the anti-Tea Party IRS union and the Obama White House Is President Obama directly implicated in the IRS scandal? Is the White House Visitors Log the trail to the smoking gun? The stunning questions are raised by the following set of new facts. March 31, 2010. According to the White House Visitors Log, provided here in searchable form by U.S. News and World Report, the president of the anti-Tea Party National Treasury Employees Union, Colleen Kelley, visited the White House at 12:30pm that...

Under President Obama, “justice” is anything but blind. Neither is it deaf. In fact, based on recent revelations, it appears to be watching your every move and listening to your every word. Still, if you happen to be a federal employee, now it’s even listening for your silence. The only thing this Obama White House seems to generate is scandal. Well, here’s yet another to add to the growing list. In addition to the Benghazi cover-up, IRS targeting of political dissenters and the illegal seizure of media phone records, whistleblowers within DOJ have contacted Liberty Counsel to express grave concerns...

A senior adviser to President Obama mounted a combative defense of the administration on Sunday, saying that the controversies enveloping the White House were the result of Republican lawmakers trying to “drag Washington into a swamp of partisan fishing expeditions, trumped-up hearings and false allegations.”

A former "top cop," who had the honor of sitting next to first lady Michelle Obama during a televised presidential speech four years ago, is facing rape allegations. Richard DeCoatsworth left a party with two women on Thursday, according to authorities. The women called authorities and said once they arrived at a second, undisclosed location, the retired officer pulled a gun on them, the Philadelphia Police Department said in a statement. He allegedly forced them "to engage in the use of narcotics and to engage in sexual acts," the statement said. He was charged with rape on Saturday.

The Internal Revenue Service scandal may be the worst of all the current Obama administration fiascoes. It is an easily understood gross misuse of the powers of government to target opponents of the president. What is more, the administration’s supplicants in the lefty punditocracy can no longer claim this is just an IRS scandal. The Post reports: J. Russell George, the Treasury Department’s top tax watchdog, said Friday he had informed top Treasury officials starting last spring about problems related to the special attention the agency was paying some conservative organizations seeking tax-exempt status. George said he shared the information...

George Soros-Funded Groups Prod IRS to Investigate Conservative Organizations Women walk out of an Internal Revenue Service office in New York, April 18, 2011. By Melissa Barnhart , CP Contributor May 16, 2013|6:07 pm Amid the uproar over shocking revelations that the Internal Revenue Service strategically targeted conservative groups that sought tax-exempt status are new findings that George Soros-funded organizations are sending letters to the IRS prodding them to investigate conservative groups, such as Karl Rove's Crossroads GPS. President Obama on Wednesday announced the firing of acting IRS Commissioner Steven Miller, who will leave the IRS in June, following the...

The president and chief executive officer of The Associated Press on Sunday called the government's secret seizure of two months of reporters' phone records "unconstitutional" and said the news cooperative had not ruled out legal action against the Justice Department. Gary Pruitt, in his first television interviews since it was revealed the Justice Department subpoenaed phone records of AP reporters and editors, said the move already has had a chilling effect on journalism. Pruitt said the seizure has made sources less willing to talk to AP journalists and, in the long term, could limit Americans' information from all news outlets.

As negotiations for the US withdrawal from Afghanistan have once again come to a halt, the Taliban Supreme Council has offered to level the playing field by sending a group of 400 battle-hardened Taliban peacekeepers to the U.S. city of Chicago, to help pacify one of the most violent regions in the Great Plains area of the North American continent. With many years of combat experience in violent areas of their own country and having fought rebels, insurgents, villagers, urban militias, rival drug lords, as well as Soviet and American occupying forces on foot, horses, camels, donkeys, and trucks, they...

Bill Maher on Friday once again exposed himself as a total hypocrite. Minutes after telling his HBO Real Time panel "the Second Amendment is bulls--t," he admitted having two firearms in his house - "one upstairs and one down" - claiming, "As long as we live in the gun country, I ain’t giving up my gun"

The shoe drops. This mug shot of Democratic state Treasurer Martha Shoffner appeared on the Pulaski County sheriff's office jail intake page late this afternoon. (She looked a little distracted when I saw her looking over the cottage cheese in a case at Kroger's earlier this week.) Sorry: I originally called her auditor incorrectly. I have many calls out for more information. Shoffner has been under scrutiny for a variety of issues including charges of favoritism in handling of state investments with a securities firm and also in sloppy reporting and spending of state campaign finance money. She's been subject,...

Well, Harry Reid is resorting to desperate measures in order to try and regain some power in the Senate. Reports say that he is getting ready to use the so-called “nuclear option” to change the senate rules so that 60 votes are no longer needed to block a filibuster. And it looks like President Obama will support Reid’s efforts if the Republicans try to block upcoming nominations. “If Senator Reid decides to do something on nominations, the president has said he’ll be there to support him,” a Democratic aide told the Post. "This would take away the right to...

USBC News Wire- Rather than being a single instance of scandalous targeting of citizens by the IRS, questions are arising as to whether the scandal has merely exposed a more institutionalized abuse of the power in the Internal Revenue Service. In 2012, Senators Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Al Franken (D-MN), both urged the IRS to clamp down on 501(c)(4) organizations, which are precisely the types of conservative organizations the IRS revealed it has been targeting for increased scrutiny during the Obama administration. Former comedian, Sen. Al Franken is reportedly said to have commented on the ability of groups to form...

Planned Parenthood’s new advertisement asserting that aborted babies will thank their would-be mothers evidences a shift to macabre honesty in the organization’s messaging. “There’s nothing worse for a child than being unwanted,” claimed PP spokeswoman Adora Slaughter. “Add to this the burdensome tedium of motherhood and you have a formula that maximizes unhappiness. Abortion rescues all the participants from this fate.” “Previously, we have invested almost all our energy on advising women to carefully consider the responsibilities they could avoid by aborting a potential child they don’t want,” Slaughter said. “I mean, having a baby you don’t want is like...

This must be part of that new civility Democrats promised us. Rep. Ed Markey (D-MA) has a gun firing off at the head of GOP opponent Gabriel Gomez in his latest campaign ad. Coincidence?

First Lady Michelle Obama has expanded her anti-obesity campaign to museums, enlisting them to offer “healthy food options,” and change their menus. Mrs. Obama’s “Let’s Move!” initiative is now calling for museums, zoos, gardens, science and technology centers to “join the call to action,” to decrease obesity among children. The first lady is recruiting these institutions to join the “Let’s Move! Museums and Gardens” project because of their power to “influence real and sustained behavior change” on the eating habits of kids. “With their impressive reach and great potential for impact, museums and gardens can launch community efforts to create...

An explosive, feature-length documentary hitting an expanded roster of theaters nationwide on May 17 offers a captivating look at the larger-than-life personality of the late Andrew Breitbart – a controversial new media pioneer whom the left vilified and the right hailed as an American hero. Coming more than a year after the sudden and mysterious death of the crusading 43-year-old journalist, the film Hating Breitbart was initially screened in a few theaters in October shortly before the presidential election, but is expanding to 10 markets nationwide on Wednesday, along with the film’s simultaneous release on DVD and video-on-demand.

Today, the Thomas More Society offered over 150 pages of analysis and evidence to the House Ways and Means Committee about repeated IRS harassment of pro-life organizations. At the request of Congressman Aaron Schock (R-IL), Thomas More Society President Thomas Brejcha, Executive Director Peter Breen, and Special Counsel Sally Wagenmaker, prepared the legal memorandum with solid evidence of IRS harassment of pro-life organizations dating back to 2009. Shock asked the IRS commissioner today if this discrimination is appropriate and he was unable to say yes or no. The memo details the history of IRS misconduct in the cases of three...

<p>Long before the Internal Revenue Service revealed it had improperly targeted conservative 501(c)(4) groups, a group of Democratic senators led by New York Sen. Chuck Schumer urged the IRS to do just that.</p> <p>The IRS’s admission last Friday that it had singled out tea party and other groups for extra audits and delays has raised concerns that President Barack Obama’s administration quietly attempted to stymy opponents through intimidation. But many prominent Democrats — including Montana Sen. Max Baucus, Americans United for the Separation of Church and State and the New York Times editorial board — had been publicly calling for tighter restrictions on 501(c)(4) groups affiliated with the tea party and conservatives.</p>

'It made him look like a butler': Retired general blasts President Obama for ordering U.S. Marine to break military rules by holding an umbrella The President unwittingly forced two U.S Marines to break protocol and regulations as he ordered them to use umbrellas Former United States Air Force Lieutenant Thomas McInerney criticized the President for making the officers look like butlers By DAVID MARTOSKO, JAMES NYE and DANIEL BATES 16 May 2013 President Obama humiliated the marine who he asked to hold his umbrella by making him ‘look like a butler’, a respected military general claimed today. Thomas McInerney, a...

Dan Sometimes it's what they neglect to mention that's more revealing than that was. Disgraced former CBS anchorman Dan Rather, now broadcasting from obscure AXS TV on the high triple-digit end of the cable dial, told Rachel Maddow of an incident back when he was a reporter devoted to hounding Richard Nixon. (Video after page break). Rather appeared on Maddow's MSNBC show Tuesday to divert attention from President Obama's ongoing scandals involving the Benghazi attack, IRS targeting of tea party groups, and Justice Department spying on the Associated Press, Rather serving the transparent purpose of recounting the good old days...

Long before the Internal Revenue Service revealed it had improperly targeted conservative 501(c)(4) groups, a group of Democratic senators led by New York Sen. Chuck Schumer urged the IRS to do just that. Last year, Schumer, along with Democratic Sens. Michael Bennet, Sheldon Whitehouse, Jeff Merkley, Tom Udall, Jeanne Shaheen and Al Franken, penned a letter calling on the agency to cap the amount of the political spending by groups masquerading as “social welfare organizations.”

Among the criticisms leveled at the new Senate immigration bill is the secretive manner in which it was written. And given the details, it's hardly any wonder that the eight senators overseeing the proceedings - the "Gang of Eight" - refused to hold hearings or debate until after the bill's release. Tucked away in the measure are two sections that would route a combined $150 million or more to "public or private, non-profit organizations" that are "community, faith-based or other immigrant-serving." Recipient groups could use funds to aid potentially tens of millions of illegal immigrants and family members to obtain...

If President Obama were to stand before the magic mirror and chant, “Mirror, mirror, on the wall, whose is the most jobless recovery of them all?” the mirror would answer, “Yours is, Master.” We are now 46 months into our third jobless recovery since 1991, and this one is the most jobless by far. But wait! First quarter GDP growth was up from 4Q2012, and the stock market is hitting new highs almost every day. Doesn’t that mean that there is finally hope for the labor market? No, it does not. With current economic policies, the employment picture is not...

**Welcome Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion readers! Thanks Prof. Jacobson for making this your ‘post of the day’!** **Updated–see below** The IRS scandal is a very tangled web and I think it will be a while before we realize the depths of the issue. Just how many IRS officials are involved and how many organizations were targeted? The President is feigning ignorance while Steven Miller, the acting IRS commissioner, resigned earlier this week. For critics of this administration, this means little, as Miller was apparently resigning next month anyway. Today we learned of a second resignation. An internal IRS memo says Joseph Grant,...

I watch Bob Beckel on the Five and he asserts that we're "out to get Hillary" because we think we can keep her from running for president if we pin the Benghzi scandal on her. This is premised on the notion that she wants to run and the Democrats want her to run. What if she does not want to run, and the Democrats don't really want her to run, or not nearly as much as they pretend to want her to run? I don't think they love Hillary as much as they FEAR her. They don't seem to be...

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said Thursday that Republicans are using scandals coming out of the White House to undermine President Barack Obama out of "fear," because he is “such a great president.”

More than $92 million in bonuses averaging $5,500 per employee have been handed out by IRS executives to thousands of the tax agency’s employees since 2009, according to data obtained by The Washington Examiner. The average annual salary of the employees receiving at least one bonus during the four-year period between 2009 and 2012 was slightly less than $94,000, indicating that the extra tax dollars mostly went to managers and executives eligible for performance-based incentives. The IRS’s overall workforce includes more than 97,000 employees. According to the data, which the agency provided in response to the newspaper’s Freedom of Information...

The commander in chief of the American armed forces today forced a violation of Marine Corps regulations, so he wouldn’t get wet. According to Marine Corps regulation MCO P1020.34F of the Marine Corps Uniform Regulations chapter 3, a male Marine is not allowed to carry an umbrella while in uniform. There is no provision in the Marine Corps uniform regulation guidelines that allows a male Marine to carry an umbrella. Nevertheless, during a press conference under a light drizzle with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan this morning, President Obama allowed the First Head to be protected from the...

Sarah Hall Ingram, the IRS executive in charge of the tax exempt division in 2010 when it began targeting conservative Tea Party, evangelical and pro-Israel groups for harassment, got more than $100,000 in bonuses between 2009 and 2012. More recently, Ingram was promoted to serve as director of the tax agency's Obamacare program office, a position that put her in charge of the vast expansion of the IRS' regulatory power and staffing in connection with federal health care, ABC reported earlier today **snip** High-ranking career federal civil servants like Ingram are eligible for recognition through citations known as Distinguished and...

The woman who ran the Internal Revenue Service's tax-exempt organizations division has been promoted, and now heads the agency's health-care office, ABC News reported. Sarah Hall Ingram was commissioner of the embattled IRS office from 2009 to 2012, roughly the period that the agency is accused of singling out Tea Party and conservative groups for extra scrutiny, based on nothing but their political bent. As a firestorm grows around the IRS, Ms. Ingram quietly left the tax-exempt office and was made director of IRS Affordable Care Act Division...

NBC's Lisa Myers reported this morning that the IRS deliberately chose not to reveal that it had wrongly targeted conservative groups until after the 2012 presidential election:

Senior Democratic Sen. Max Baucus, who recently slapped Obamacare as a "train wreck," believes that the IRS scandal is just beginning and that "a lot more" damaging information will be revealed, likely at congressional hearings. "I have a hunch that a lot more is going to come out, frankly," Baucus, whose pending retirement seems to have freed him up to speak bluntly, told Bloomberg Government's " Capitol Gains " TV show. "It's broader than the current focus. And I think it's important that we have the hearings, and I think that will encourage other information to come out that has...

The Internal Revenue Service official in charge of the tax-exempt organizations at the time when the unit targeted tea party groups now runs the IRS office responsible for the health care legislation. Sarah Hall Ingram served as commissioner of the office responsible for tax-exempt organizations between 2009 and 2012. But Ingram has since left that part of the IRS and is now the director of the IRS’ Affordable Care Act office, the IRS confirmed to ABC News today. Her successor, Joseph Grant, is taking the fall for misdeeds at the scandal-plagued unit between 2010 and 2012. During at least part...

insult to Americans IRS Official in Targeting Scandal Now Overseeing Obamacare Unit

The Venezuelan government has seized a U.S. flagged ship and detained its captain for more than a week. The ship Ocean Atlas has been at port in Maracaibo, Venezuela since August 29. After four hours in port, the ship was boarded by armed security personel, and the captain was detained on suspicion of trafficking in arms or drugs. The rest of the crew of 16 Americans has remained on board under guard. According to a well-placed source arrest warrants have been issued for all of the crewmembers, who are to be taken off the ship for questioning. Incredibly, my Forbes...

The bill, the Personalized Handgun Safety Act of 2013, mandates within two years that newly manufactured handguns be equipped with the technology that allows the guns to only work in the hands of their owners or other authorized users. Manufacturers that do not meet the standards could be held liable. And individuals or businesses selling older handguns must have them retrofitted with personalization technology within three years after the bill is enacted, at the expense of the federal government. Acknowledging the difficult political climate for new gun legislation, Tierney remained optimistic, calling his bill a “common sense” reform to save...

Maryland citizens had their Second Amendments rights infringed on Thursday when Gov. Martin O’Malley signed more gun control into law. Mr. O’Malley became the third liberal governor this year — after New York and Connecticut — to ram through pointless laws that will do nothing to reduce crime by exploiting the Newtown tragedy. However, Mr. O’Malley’s scheme was secretly watered down a little before it became law. The governor was fixated on banning “assault weapons,” even though only two people were murdered by rifles of any type in Maryland in 2011. However, O’Malley’s “assault weapons” is less stringent than the...

With Soros funding, anything is possible. The growing scandal where the IRS unfairly targeted politically-conservative groups can be traced back to a lobbying effort begun by George Soros-funded liberal groups in 2010, after the Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling.