Fox News

MELBOURNE, Fla. –  A 22-year-old student pilot suspected of boarding a vacant passenger plane at a central Florida airport early Thursday has been charged with criminal attempt to steal an airplane, officials said.

The Joint Terrorism Task Force is investigating and trying to determine a motive in the case, according to Orlando-Melbourne International Airport spokeswoman Lori Booker. She told news outlets the student pilot, identified as Florida Institute of Technology student Nishal Sankat, also faces a visa violation and criminal trespassing charges.  Continue reading “Florida student pilot charged with attempt to steal plane”

Fox 5 News

FORESTVILLE, Md. – Two police officers were shot in Forestville Wednesday night, Prince George’s County police say.

The shooting happened at around 10:30 p.m. at the Lorring Park Apartments on Lorring Drive as a team of officers was executing a search warrant related to a drug investigation at an apartment.   Continue reading “2 officers shot in Prince George’s County, police say”

Zero Hedge – by Tyler Durden

As more information about the downing overnight of a Russian reconnaissance plane by aging Syrian antiaircraft weapon becomes available, the Russian Defense Ministry has issued a shocking claim that will undoubtedly ratchet up tensions between Russia and Israel. While Russia had previously blamed Israel for the downing of the plane, which resulted in the deaths of 15 Russian servicemen, the MoD is now saying that Israel intended to use the Russian plane as “cover” during the attack.   Continue reading “Moscow Accuses Israel Of Using Downed Russian Jet As “Cover” During Syrian Attack”

RT

Russia and Turkey have agreed a “demilitarized zone” between militants and government troops in Syria’s Idlib, President Vladimir Putin said after hours-long talks with Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan focused on solving the crisis.

“We’ve focused on the situation in the province of Idlib, considering presence of large militant groups and their infrastructure there,” Putin said at a press conference after the talks.   Continue reading “Putin & Erdogan agree Idlib buffer zone to avert new Syria crisis”

The Wichita Eagle – by Jaime Green

A 12-year veteran of the Sedgwick County Sheriff’s Office was shot and killed Sunday in western Sedgwick County.

Robert Kunze was shot while responding to a suspicious character call, Sedgwick County Sheriff Jeff Easter said during a Sunday evening news conference. A second person, the suspect, was also killed.   Continue reading “Kansas deputy killed during suspicious character call, sheriff says”

Yahoo News

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Trump administration will send a message to all U.S. cellphones on Thursday to test a previously unused alert system that aims to warn the public about national emergencies.

The messages will bear the headline “Presidential Alert”, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) said in a statement this week. Phones will make a loud tone and have a special vibration, said FEMA, which will send the alert.   Continue reading “Trump administration to send U.S. cellphones a test alert on Thursday”

Yahoo News

HOUSTON (AP) — A U.S. Border Patrol agent suspected of killing four women was arrested early Saturday after a fifth woman who had been abducted managed to escape from him and notify authorities, law enforcement officials said, describing the agent as a “serial killer.”

Juan David Ortiz, an intel supervisor for the Border Patrol, fled from state troopers and was found hiding in a truck in a hotel parking lot in Laredo at around 2 a.m. Saturday, Webb County Sheriff Martin Cuellar said at a news conference in the border city about 145 miles (235 kilometers) southwest of San Antonio.   Continue reading “Sheriff: Border Patrol agent suspected of killing 4 women”

CNBC

LAKEWOOD, Colo. (AP) — A Trump administration advisory committee on Thursday recommended a change in the way energy companies calculate how much money they owe taxpayers for pumping natural gas from public lands.

But the U.S. Interior Department’s Royalty Policy Committee first had to clear up an apparent misunderstanding over how much leeway the companies would have in determining how much they owed.   Continue reading “Trump panel wants changes in royalties from public oil, gas”

Autoblog – by Zac Palmer

A 75-year old Cleveland man ended up trapped in his 2006 Cadillac XLR for 14 hours last month, according to a story reported by the Detroit Free Press. The owner of the car, Peter Pyros, hopped into his roadster to back out onto his driveway, but he quickly learned that the battery was dead. He was “trapped” because the doors use an electric button to activate the door latch to open the door. Since the battery was dead, the buttons did nothing. Continue reading “Man trapped in Cadillac XLR for 14 hours after battery dies”

The Hill – by Miranda Green

The Forest Service plans to submit a rule that would make it easier to explore oil and gas drilling, as well as mineral mining, in National Forests.

The Department of Agriculture (USDA), which oversees the Forest Service, is planning to revise the contents of the agency’s oil and gas resources regulations, according to one advance notice of proposed rule-making submitted to the Federal Register on Wednesday.  Continue reading “Administration announces plan to streamline oil and gas extraction in national forests”

Yahoo News

BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (AP) — A gunman killed five people, including his wife, before turning the gun on himself as a Kern County sheriff’s deputy closed in Wednesday, authorities said.

There was no immediate word on what sparked the shootings that took place at a home and a business in Bakersfield, which is some 90 miles (145 kilometers) north of Los Angeles.   Continue reading “5 slain in Southern California shootings; gunman kills self”

Zero Hedge – by Tyler Durden

Cigarette stocks dropped (then rebounded), after a Bloomberg report that the Food and Drug Administration is threatening to pull flavored electronic cigarettes like Juul off the market if the tobacco industry doesn’t do more to combat growing use of the products by children and teens.

Citing FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb, Bloomberg notes that the FDA will soon release data that show a “substantial increase” in youth vaping this year compared with 2017.  Continue reading “FDA May Pull E-Cigarettes To Fight Youth Vaping “Epidemic””

Yahoo News

DALLAS (AP) — Attorneys for the family of a black man who was shot and killed by a white Dallas police officer who says she mistook his apartment for hers criticized the officer’s account, saying it was overly sympathetic and contradicted statements from neighbors.

The officer’s account emerged in an arrest affidavit released Monday, shortly after the district attorney announced that the case against officer Amber Guyger would be presented to a grand jury, which could decide on more serious charges than manslaughter.  Continue reading “Attorneys question officer’s account of neighbor’s shooting”

Ron Paul Institute – by Ron Paul

Last week, I urged the Secretary of State and National Security Advisor to stop protecting al-Qaeda in Syria by demanding that the Syrian government leave Idlib under al-Qaeda control. While it may seem hard to believe that the US government is helping al-Qaeda in Syria, it’s not as strange as it may seem: our interventionist foreign policy increasingly requires Washington to partner up with “bad guys” in pursuit of its dangerous and aggressive foreign policy goals.

Does the Trump Administration actually support al-Qaeda and ISIS? Of course not. But the “experts” who run Trump’s foreign policy have determined that a de facto alliance with these two extremist groups is for the time being necessary to facilitate the more long-term goals in the Middle East. And what are those goals? Regime change for Iran.   Continue reading “Why Are We Siding With al-Qaeda?”

Zero Hedge – by Tyler Durden

Russian state media channels, in a near simultaneous blitz of information, have issued breaking alerts this morning that anti-Assad insurgents in Idlib have begun filming “fake footage of chemical attacks” based on Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) statements.

The Russian Center for Syrian Reconciliation says the “fake footage of chemical attacks”  is expected to be delivered to various TV channels and Western journalists before the end of the day Tuesday.   Continue reading “Staged Filming of False Flag ‘Chemical Attacks’ Has Begun in Idlib: Russian MoD”

Yahoo News

WASHINGTON — The Department of Interior is quietly preparing to offer hundreds of thousands of acres of public land for leasing to energy companies, a move critics have charged is being undertaken with minimal public input and little consideration for ecological and cultural preservation.

According to data compiled by environmental groups, the Bureau of Land Management will put 2.9 million acres up for potential leasing in the next four months. Because the land in question — in states including New Mexico, Colorado and Arizona — lacks designation as a national park or monument, it can be used for commercial purposes such as mining for minerals and drilling for oil and gas. Supporters say that bolstering the extractive industries will ensure energy independence for the United States, though shifting energy preferences and falling oil prices appear to undermine that assertion.   Continue reading “Trump administration rushes to lease federal lands”

AlJazeera

The United States launched a blistering verbal attack on the International Criminal Court (ICC) and threatened sanctions against its judges if they proceed with a probe into alleged war crimes by Americans in Afghanistan.

President Donald Trump‘s national security adviser, John Bolton, made the announcement in a speech to the Federalist Society, a conservative group, in Washington, DC, on Monday.   Continue reading “John Bolton threatens ICC judges with sanctions”

Yahoo News

Workers for U.S. Steel will head back to the bargaining table on Monday, armed with a nationwide strike authorization vote.

With corporations awash in tax cuts and protected from competition by Trump administration tariffs, United Steelworkers (USW) leaders say members want a contract deal that provides them with a portion of that windfall.   Continue reading “Steelworkers Vote To Strike If They Don’t Get Piece Of Corporate Windfall”

Zero Hedge – by Tyler Durden

President Trump has continued to threaten Syrian and Russian forces planning to take back the terrorist-controlled stronghold of Idlib in northwestern Syria, potentially bringing the world to the brink of World War III, as we explained yesterday. But Trump’s tweets about the potential “humanitarian catastrophe” have exposed a guiding principle of the US’s involvement in Syria (and indeed across the Middle East): A chemical weapons attack isn’t a “catastrophe” if it’s carried out by the US.  Continue reading “Russia Accuses US Of White Phosphorus Attack In Syria”