From the Trenches World Report

New York Times – by JEREMY W. PETERS

Michael R. Bloomberg, making his first major political investment since leaving office, plans to spend $50 million this year building a nationwide grass-roots network to motivate voters who feel strongly about curbing gun violence, an organization he hopes can eventually outmuscle the National Rifle Association.

Mr. Bloomberg, the former mayor of New York, said gun control advocates need to learn from the N.R.A. and punish those politicians who fail to support their agenda — even Democrats whose positions otherwise align with his own.   Continue reading “Bloomberg Plans a $50 Million Challenge to the N.R.A.”

IB Times – by Meagan Clark

Mother Jones – by Molly Redden

Conservative activists and media outlets have generally embraced the cause of Cliven Bundy, a Nevada cattle rancher who inspired a gang of protesters—many of them armed—to face off with federal law enforcement this weekend. But one figure on the right has taken a surprising stand against Bundy’s supporters: former Fox News host Glenn Beck.   Continue reading “Everyone on the Far Right Loves Militia-Backed Rancher Cliven Bundy—Except Glenn Beck”

Police State USA

EXTON, PA — Police followed an innocent man into his home, believing that he was a fleeing suspect.  When the man protested being handcuffed on his own floor with strangers searched his home, an officer cussed at him and stomped on his head, causing multiple facial fractures and shattered teeth.  The scene was so gruesome that a cop testified against a fellow cop.   Yet instead of being fired, that stomping officer was later promoted, and now has been officially cleared of violating the victim’s civil rights.   Continue reading “Trooper cleared after stomping on innocent man’s skull while handcuffed”

WIVB News 4 – by Rachel Kingston

BUFFALO, N.Y. (WIVB) – Gun owners and Second Amendment rights advocates gathered in downtown Buffalo’s Niagara Square Tuesday afternoon to protest the NY SAFE Act by shredding gun registration forms.

April 15, 2014 marked the deadline for when people who owned assault weapons prior to the passage of the SAFE Act were supposed to register them with New York State.   Continue reading “Gun owners shred documents to protest SAFE Act”

Wow, THEIR constitution laid out for all to see!!! Look how THEY are implementing it all with the land grabs, agenda 21, gun confiscation, etc.

World Parliament

Activist Post – by Devon Douglas-Bowers

Currently being debated by the Senate, but rarely discussed on mainstream television, is the Shield Law. While on the surface it may seem to be rather innocuous, some of the language in it and its implications are quite problematic for journalists.

A Shield Law is a law which “provides statutory protection for the ‘reporters’ privilege’— legal rules which protect journalists against the government requiring them to reveal confidential sources or other information.”[1] Generally, this is a positive occurrence as journalists are much more able to conduct their work and bring information to public light if they do not need to worry about having to reveal their sources. While Shield Laws have occurred in the past, they have only been on the state level. This currently proposed Shield Law is the first one to reach the federal level and the main goal is to protect journalists from having to reveal confidential sources in federal cases.[2]    Continue reading “‘Shield’ing the People From Independent Journalism”

Mail.com

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — A ferry carrying 459 people, mostly high school students on an overnight trip to a tourist island, sank off South Korea’s southern coast on Wednesday, leaving nearly 300 people missing despite a frantic, hours-long rescue by dozens of ships and helicopters. At least four people were confirmed dead and 55 injured.

The high number of people unaccounted for — likely trapped in the ship or floating in the ocean — raised fears that the death toll could rise drastically, making it one of South Korea’s biggest ferry disasters since 1993, when 292 people died.   Continue reading “292 missing, 4 dead in South Korea ferry disaster”

RT News

The first-ever scientific study that analyzes whether the US is a democracy, rather than an oligarchy, found the majority of the American public has a “minuscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy” compared to the wealthy.

The study, due out in the Fall 2014 issue of the academic journal Perspectives on Politics, sets out to answer elusive questions about who really rules in the United States. The researchers measured key variables for 1,779 policy issues within a single statistical model in an unprecedented attempt “to test these contrasting theoretical predictions” – i.e. whether the US sets policy democratically or the process is dominated by economic elites, or some combination of both.   Continue reading “Oligarchy, not democracy: Americans have ‘near-zero’ input on policy – report”

RT News

No city or county in Oklahoma will be allowed to set their own mandatory minimum wage or employee benefits, according to a law signed by Republican Governor Mary Fallin on Monday.

The new law, formerly known as Senate Bill 1023, comes amid a nationwide movement pushing lawmakers to raise the minimum wage across the US. The federal minimum wage is $7.25 per hour, although a number of states have raised their standard and US President Obama proposed raising the national minimum to $10.10.   Continue reading “Oklahoma prohibits towns from setting own minimum wage standards”

RT News

​It’s been two-and-a-half years since the United States government unveiled an insider threat program to keep classified networks and sensitive intelligence secure, but the officials in charge would literally rather storm away than speak about it.

From the floor of Congress last Thursday, US Senator Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) acknowledged that the interagency Insider Threat Task Force established in 2012 “for deterring, detecting and mitigating” future potential risks “was intended to train federal employees to watch out for insider threats among their colleagues.” But media reports in the years and months since, as the senator put it, have suggested “that this program might not do enough to distinguish between true insider threats and legitimate whistleblowers.”   Continue reading “FBI agents storm out from Senate hearing to avoid testifying on Insider Threat program”

Paul Craig Roberts

The CIA director was sent to Kiev to launch a military suppression of the Russian separatists in the eastern and southern portions of Ukraine, former Russian territories for the most part that were foolishly attached to the Ukraine in the early years of Soviet rule.

Washington’s plan to grab Ukraine overlooked that the Russian and Russian-speaking parts of Ukraine were not likely to go along with their insertion into the EU and NATO while submitting to the persecution of Russian speaking peoples.  Washington has lost Crimea, from which Washington intended to eject Russia from its Black Sea naval base. Instead of admitting that its plan for grabbing Ukraine has gone amiss, Washington is unable to admit a mistake and, therefore, is pushing the crisis to more dangerous levels.   Continue reading “Washington Drives The World To War”