The Tampa Tribune – by Howard Altman

Stuck in a two-hour traffic jam on the Selmon Crosstown Expressway Tuesday morning, Mike Willingham became more convinced than ever that his idea to create a drone- based research and development operation at Sebring Airport is on the money.

A small, drone-flown camera could have provided a feed that drivers could link to, allowing them to avoid massive tie-ups.   Continue reading “Sebring airport might become home for drones”

Man Gets 7 Years for Stealing Obama's TeleprompterNBC Chicago – by Larry O’Dell

A career criminal who stole a truck containing President Obama’s audio equipment was sentenced Thursday to seven years in federal prison.

Sentencing guidelines called for a term of about three years, but Eric Brown of Richmond, Va., agreed to the longer sentence to avoid prosecution for 14 similar truck thefts in three localities. However, he could still face charges in Stafford County, which did not join Chesterfield, Hanover and Henrico counties in the agreement.   Continue reading “Man Gets 7 Years for Stealing Obama’s Teleprompter”

Idaho Governor C.L. "Butch" Otter speaks to the media during the second day of the Sun Valley Conference in Sun Valley, Idaho July 7, 2011. REUTERS/Anthony BolanteYahoo News – by Laura Zuckerman, Reuters

SALMON, Idaho (Reuters) – Idaho’s Republican governor signed a law on Thursday that restricts use of drone aircraft by police and other public agencies as the use of pilotless aircraft inside U.S. borders is increasing. The measure aims to protect privacy rights.

In approving the law, which requires law enforcement to obtain warrants to collect evidence usingdrones in most cases, Idaho becomes the second U.S. state after Virginia to restrict uses of pilotless aircraft over privacy concerns.   Continue reading “Idaho restricts drone use by police agencies amid privacy concerns”

WNCN – by Associated Press

RALEIGH, N.C – The North Carolina House has approved a bill mandating background checks for welfare recipients.

The bill that passed 106-6 Thursday requires all social services employees to perform background checks to bar applicants and recipients with outstanding warrants or other active violations from welfare and food stamp programs. Employees would have to report them to law enforcement.   Continue reading “NC House approves bill on background checks for welfare recepients”

Jon Rappoport

Why? It’s simple. The scientists don’t know what they’re doing. They have no clear objectives, and the notion of building an accurate picture of a few trillion neurons in action is as far from reality as a flea painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.

The utopian technocrats, who’ve been predicting that, by the middle of this century, they will create an artificial brain that outstrips the one inside the skull, are suddenly on vacation. They’re mumbling and backing away.   Continue reading “Obama’s new brain-mapping project is already a Lilliputian disaster”

scenereistershtg.jpgOregon Live – by Maxine Bernstein

Portland Police Officer Dane Reister should lose his job for suddenly firing a beanbag shotgun that he mistakenly loaded with lethal rounds at a man obviously suffering from a mental illness, a federal lawsuit filed Thursday says.

The attorney for William Kyle Monroe, wounded by Reister on June 30, 2011, accuses the officer, Police Chief Mike Reese and the city of Portland of violating Monroe’s civil rights through false arrest, assault and negligence.   Continue reading “Federal lawsuit demands Portland Officer Dane Reister be terminated for a 2011 shooting”

Cell phone video shot by a neighbor shows officers surrounding a man on the ground. (Courtesy WSB-TV)Infowars – by Adan Salazar

Two Atlanta police cars were pelted with bricks, rocks and hammers Tuesday night after they cruised into a neighborhood where residents were already angered over cell phone footage that captured a man being beaten by several officers.

According to WSBTV, that man and another woman were questioning why a separate arrest was taking place. Instead of answering their questions, witnesses say police responded with “direct violence.”   Continue reading “Two Atlanta Police Cruisers Hit by Bricks, Rocks After Police Beat Man and Pepper Spray Kids”

NBC News -by Miranda Leitsinger

A former Marine has been arrested in the beating of two men outside a popular gay bar in Southern California last year and will face hate-crime charges for using anti-gay slurs during the attack, the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office said Thursday.

John Kelly O’Leary, 21, was arrested Monday by police in Evergreen Park, Ill., Deputy District Attorney Gretchen Ford of the hate crimes unit said in a statement. O’Leary was discharged from the Marines on Oct. 19, about six weeks after the attack, Marine Corps’ spokesman Master Gunnery Sgt. Mark Oliva told NBC News. He will be extradited from Illinois to California to face the charges.   Continue reading “Ex-Marine arrested in alleged hate crime in attack outside California gay bar”

Think Progress – by Igor Volsky

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) embarrassed government regulators during a Senate Banking Committee hearing on Thursday morning as she demanded to know why they won’t reveal how frequently big banks illegally foreclosed on homeowners. In January, regulators abandoned a case-by-case review of foreclosure fraud conducted by some of the nation’s largest banks in favor of a $9.3 billion settlement. Under the deal, most of the 4.4 million homeowners who were foreclosed on in 2009 or 2010 received less than $1,000 each.   Continue reading “Elizabeth Warren Tears Into Federal Regulators For Shielding Big Banks”

Sixteen Republicans split with their party leaders and voted Thursday to end the GOP filibuster of gun control legislation and begin what will be a contentious Senate debate on the issue.

The final vote was 68-31.

The 16 GOP senators that voted to stop the gun control filibuster were:   Continue reading “16 GOP Senators agreed to participate in Sedition”

Town Hall – by Heather Ginsberg

The legislation to curb gun violence is now heading to the floor of the Senate for debate after there was a lot of talk of a potential filibuster from GOP senators. The Senate voted 68 to 31 to proceed with debate on the new legislation. This will be the beginning of what many believe will be a several week argument of what kind of action to take on gun control.

Sixteen Republicans joined with 52 Democrats to approve the motion to proceed to debate. And only two Democrats joined 29 Republicans opposing the motion.   Continue reading “Gun Debate Moving Forward: Filibuster Fails”

The Blaze – by Billy Hallowell

There’s an investigation unfolding in Missouri after it was revealed that the Missouri State Highway Patrol handed over concealed carry data to federal authorities. On at least two occasions – the latest of which was January — weapons data was delivered to the feds, according to an article published in the Columbia Daily Tribune.

In looking into the matter, officials noted that in Nov. 2011 and this past January, the patrol asked for the entire list of 185,000 concealed carry residents from the state’s Division of Motor Vehicle and Driver Licensing. Then, this information was apparently shared beyond the state’s boundaries.   Continue reading “Investigation Reveals: MO Highway Patrol Gave Feds Confidential List of Concealed Carry Gun Permit Holders”

The Hill – by Brendan Sasso

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has claimed that agents do not need warrants to read people’s emails, text messages and other private electronic communications, according to internal agency documents.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which obtained the documents through a Freedom of Information Act request, released the information on Wednesday.   Continue reading “IRS: We can read emails without warrant”

Photo from twitter.com user @GAwebguyRT News

The man who took five firefighters hostage in his foreclosed-upon Georgia home has been killed by police. With one hostage released earlier in the ordeal, the remaining four are safe with minor wounds sustained in the SWAT team operation to free them.

The gunman, who had barricaded the house, has been allegedly killed by a SWAT team trying to free the Gwinnett County firefighters. Police Cpl. Edwin Ritter told a press conference that authorities decided there was an imminent threat to the hostages’ lives and ordered the SWAT team to move in.   Continue reading “Georgia hostage-taker killed as police stormed house”

Stop the Drug War – by Phillip Smith

A police officer in the suburban Dallas community of Richardson, Texas, shot and killed a woman with outstanding drug arrest warrants as she fled from an attempted traffic stop Monday morning. Emily Krumrei, 32, becomes the 9th person to die in US domestic drug law enforcement operations so far this year.

According to the Dallas Morning News, citing Richardson police spokesperson Sgt. Kevin Perlich, an officer “was attempting to get a violator to pull over in a parking lot” for reasons that are yet unclear, but Krumrei fled in her Lexus. Shortly thereafter, an officer in a squad car saw her and attempted to stop her, but she refused to pull over.   Continue reading “Police Kill Texas Woman Fleeing Drug Warrants”