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HOLLYWOOD, California—A planned protest over the lack of diversity in the film industry by Al Sharpton’s National Action Network (NAN) has been canceled. The group will instead seek direct dialogue with Hollywood’s central authority, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Muslim Brotherhood-linked Muslim Students Association behind the effort In a move described as an initiative to promote “religious pluralism,” Duke University announced Tuesday it would broadcast a weekly call to prayer for Muslims from the Duke Chapel bell tower each Friday at 1 p.m. Yesterday, however, the University reversed itself. “Duke remains committed to fostering an inclusive, tolerant and welcoming campus for all of its students,” said Michael Schoenfeld, vice president for public affairs and government relations. “However, it was clear that what was conceived as an effort to unify was not having the intended effect.” Thus Duke takes a...

DURHAM, N.C. — Two days after announcing that Islamic students would be broadcasting a weekly call to prayer from the Duke Chapel bell tower, Duke University officials abandoned that plan Thursday, citing the furor the move had created.

Have Republicans disrupted Democrats’ demographic advantage?Working-class white voters continued their decadeslong defection from the Democratic Party. The president was a major drag on his party, particularly given a challenging Senate map. Turnout was historically low, even for a midterm election. The 2014 Republican landslide has both parties poring over the data, hoping to glean insights about the current state of the electorate before the 2016 elections. But it might take until the next presidential cycle to answer the most pressing question: Is Republicans’ 2014 success the result of significant changes in how voters view the two parties, or is the...

Streaming service Netflix has postponed a Bill Cosby comedy special in the wake of allegations of sexual assault that have resurfaced in recent weeks. Bill Cosby 77 was to have been streamed from 27 November. It is not clear when or if the special will now be shown. Netflix's announcement came shortly after Tuesday's airing of an interview with a model and TV host who claimed Cosby sexually assaulted her in 1982. Cosby's lawyer previously said the comedian would be making no comment. John P Schmidt said the allegations were a "decade-old [and] discredited" and that he did not intend...

HONOLULU (AP) - Two Honolulu city councilmen have dropped plans to rename a popular beach for President Barack Obama. The Honolulu Star-Advertiser reports Councilman Stanley Chang and Council Chairman Ernie Martin decided to withdraw the proposal after hearing from the public.

Maryland to Drop Obamacare Exchange: 'Broken Beyond Repair' Cash wasted on this clunker. Geoffrey Norman March 29, 2014 10:45 AM The state of Maryland has encountered many setbacks in its attempt to get a health care website up and running smoothly. (Sound familiar?) And now, it has run up the white flag. As Mary Pat Flaherty and Jenna Johnson of the Washington Post report: … [Maryland] officials are set to replace the state’s online health-insurance exchange with technology from Connecticut’s insurance marketplace, according to two people familiar with the decision, an acknowledgment that a system that has cost at least...

Sandra Fluke, the controversial birth control advocate who became an icon of women's rights during the 2012 presidential election, has pulled out of the race to replace retiring Rep. Henry Waxman in California's 33rd congressional district. The Los Angeles Times reports that Fluke will be running for the state Senate instead, adopting the district being vacated by Democrat Ted Lieu, who joins others in the race for the 33rd district.

The Trader Joe's grocery-store chain has dropped a plan to open a new store in the heart of the city's historically African-American neighborhood after activists said the development would price black residents out of the area. The grocer, whose stores are found in urban neighborhoods across the nation, said Monday it wouldn't press its plan, given community resistance, The Oregonian ( http://bit.ly/1n7Jyqb) reported. "We open a limited number of stores each year, in communities across the country," it said in a statement. "We run neighborhood stores, and our approach is simple: If a neighborhood does not want a Trader Joe's,...

New York governor Andrew Cuomo came under fire for criticizing pro-life and pro-Second Amendment citizens of his state -- and saying "that is not who New Yorkers are." Their problem is not me and democrats, their problem is themselves. Who are they? Are they these extreme conservatives, who are right to life, pro assault weapon, anti-gay, is that who they are? Because if that is who they are, and if they are the extreme conservatives, they have no place in the state of New York. Because that is not who New Yorkers are. Now his office is backtracking and insisting...

Phil Robertson, the patriarch of A&E's Duck Dynasty clan who was suspended from his hit reality series on Dec. 18 following some incendiary comments about gay people, won't be put on hiatus after all.

Looks like he's back, jack. "Duck Dynasty" patriarch Phil Robertsonwill be back on the A&E show when filming cranks up again following the holidays, according to sources quoted by Entertainment Weekly. "Everybody will take a break for the holidays and regroup afterward. That’s probably the smartest thing for everyone to do. Time heals a lot of wounds,” EW's source said. A&E announced the suspension last week after comments he made to GQ magazine stirred controversy.

Debacle: The woman who got a shoutout from President Obama last month for her fan letter for ObamaCare finds out her exchange quote was a computer mistake and she doesn't qualify for a tax credit after all. In one of his famous photo-ops in the Rose Garden last Oct. 21, with an array of touted beneficiaries of the Affordable Care Act behind him, President Obama read a letter from Jessica Sanford of Federal Way, Wash., to explain why the Affordable Care Act, with all its rollout flaws, was still needed. The letter told a sad tale of a grateful single...

You know that smiling woman who was featured on the home page of Healthcare.gov? She asked for her picture to be removed after she was cyber-bullied. She's hiding where nobody can see her — at Healthcare.gov. ~ Conan It turns out that a lot of children could lose their dental insurance under Obamacare. So kids might not be able to go to the dentist. Parents were really upset, while kids said, “Four more years! Four more years!” ~ Fallon According to a new report, over a million Californians are losing their health insurance due to Obamacare. In fact, some...

WASHINGTON — Barack Obama won the presidency by exploiting a political environment that devoured George W. Bush in a second term plagued by sinking credibility, failed legislative battles, fractured world relations and revolts inside his own party. President Obama is now threatened by a similar toxic mix. The disastrous rollout of his health care law not only threatens the rest of his agenda but also raises questions about his competence in the same way that the Bush administration’s botched response to Hurricane Katrina undermined any semblance of Republican efficiency.... ..... For the first time in Mr. Obama’s presidency, surveys suggest...

President Obama had pledged publicly at least 36 times that his health care plan, known as Obamacare, would not force people who liked their current coverage to lose it before "tweaking" that promise Nov. 4...

Just hours after President Obama announced changes to his health care law to give insurance companies the option to keep offering consumers plans that would otherwise be canceled, Washington state Insurance Commissioner Mike Kreidler says those changes will not be allowed in our state.

http://mobile.bloomberg.com/news/2013-11-14/obamacare-is-whatever-obama-says-it-is.html

…nevermind

This is an easy conclusion to come to. The reality of Obamacare is that it started off as a total mess and is only getting worse. There are those of you who will read this who have joined in the clamor of trying to tell people just how bad the legislation really was. Many of us tried to tell the rest of America the program would not work, that it was designed to fail. We were told to shut up and were accused of racism because we dared challenge President Obama and the lies he was telling. Senator Ted Cruz...