From the Trenches World Report

SF Gate – by Kevin Fagan, Jaxon Van Derbeken, Victoria Colliver and Vivian Ho

A fast-moving fire that consumed a large apartment building under construction in San Francisco’s Mission Bay neighborhood burned into the night Tuesday, but firefighters were able to keep the blaze from spreading to nearby structures.

The five-alarm fire engulfed the building on Fourth Street near China Basin Street just before 5 p.m., sending black smoke thousands of feet into the sky. Scaffolding melted as chunks of the six-story, 80-foot-tall building fell away. Fire Chief Joanne Hayes-White called it the city’s largest blaze in several years.   Continue reading “Huge fire destroys Mission Bay construction project”

Stop the Drug War – by Philip Smith

The District of Columbia Board of Elections announced this morning that it had approved a marijuana legalization initiative for signature-gathering. That means voters in the nation’s capital could vote to free the weed in November.

The Board rejected warnings from the city’s attorney general, who said that the initiative would put DC in conflict with federal law if it passed.   Continue reading “DC Marijuana Legalization Initiative Approved for Signature-Gathering”

CenturyLink

ANGOLA, La. (AP) — A man who spent nearly 26 years on death row in Louisiana walked free of prison Tuesday, hours after a judge approved the state’s motion to vacate the man’s murder conviction in the 1983 killing of a jeweler.

Glenn Ford, 64, had been on death row since August 1988 in connection with the death of 56-year-old Isadore Rozeman, a Shreveport jeweler and watchmaker for whom Ford had done occasional yard work. Ford had always denied killing Rozeman.   Continue reading “Man who spent decades on La. death row is freed”

Jon Rappoport

Senator Dianne Feinstein, head of the Senate Intelligence Committee, blows up.

She claims the CIA made efforts to sabotage her Committee’s investigation of illegal CIA interrogation/torture of detainees.

The CIA vehemently denies it did anything wrong.   Continue reading “Snowden, Feinstein, CIA, NSA: the internal war”

Question # 1:
How much does a house weigh?

Question # 2:
How much weight can a rural two-lane bridge hold?

and    Continue reading “Three Questions for Engineers”

Jon Rappoport

Surveillance is coming at us from all angles. Chips, drones, TSA checkpoints, smart meters, back-doored electronic products, video cameras, spying home appliances; our phone calls and emails and keystrokes and product purchases are recorded.

The government and its allied corporations will know whatever they want to know about us.

What then?   Continue reading “Final goal of the Surveillance State”

90 Miles from Tyranny

Congressman Frank Lucas, March 5, 2014

Washington, D.C. – Congressman Frank Lucas today made the following statement after the U.S. House of Representatives passed H.R. 4118, the SIMPLE Fairness Act. This legislation passed the House today with a 250 to 160 vote.

“As Americans continue to struggle with President Obama’s Affordable Care Act, it is important that we continue to work in Congress to provide relief from the flawed law,” said Lucas. “The Administration has already admitted the law is unworkable and delayed the employer mandate for a year. Now, it is time to provide the same relief for American families and individuals, and I am pleased the House passed the SIMPLE Fairness Act to help accomplish this goal.   Continue reading “Lucas Statement on H.R. 4118, the SIMPLE Fairness Act”

The Hill – by Pete Kasperowicz

Twenty-seven Democrats on Wednesday sided with House Republicans on a bill to delay tax penalties for failing to buy health insurance this year under ObamaCare.

The vote, which reflects growing Republican frustration with President Obama’s selective implementation of the law, again shows some level of Democratic support for a legislative change to the law. Several House bills aimed at making the health law more transparent have also received support from a few dozen Democrats.   Continue reading “27 Democrats support House GOP measure to delay ObamaCare penalty”

Gun Owners of America

At GOA’s request, Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) has bypassed Harry Reid’s stranglehold on the Senate by bringing a pro-gun bill directly onto the Senate calendar.

The bill is H.R. 4118, and it was approved by the House of Representatives on Wednesday by a 250-160 vote.  (See the vote here, with “Yea” being the pro-gun vote.)  The bill would suspend the individual mandate of the anti-gun ObamaCare program for one year, thus protecting the privacy of gun owners.   Continue reading “Gun Owners Prepare to Seize Senate from Harry Reid”

Aesop’s Fables

An ass, having put on the Lion’s skin, roamed about in the forest and amused himself by frightening all the foolish animals he met in his wanderings. At last coming upon a Fox, he tried to frighten him also, but the Fox no sooner heard the sound of his voice than he exclaimed, “I might possibly have been frightened myself, if I had not heard your bray.”

Clothes may disguise a fool, but his words will give him away.

CounterPunch – by ANDREW LEVINE

George Washington warned against “foreign entanglements.”  Was it because he had a premonition of the cluelessness and ineptitude of his successors in the Bush years and in the Age of Obama?

If so, the Bush-Cheney – now Obama — War on Terror shows how right he was.  It might as well have been concocted deliberately to encourage Islamists to attack Western targets.  The ill will it has created will be a factor in world politics for generations to come.   Continue reading “Crimea, This Time”

Zero Hedge – by Tyler Durden

The Libyan defense minister took over duties as prime minister this morning as the Libyan parliament voted “no confidence” in the current prime minister after a North-Korea-flagged tanker broke the “blockade” from a rebel-held port. The ouster of the PM appears to have bolstered confidence in the anti-rebel oil-stealing that we discussed yesterday, and resulted in

• *LIBYA NAVY FIRE HIT TANKER AS IT FLED TO INTL WATERS: SKYNEWS   Continue reading “North Korean Tanker Burning In Libya After Navy Opens Fire”

Daily Mail – by James Rush

Missing flight MH370 made a u-turn near where it was last logged by air traffic controllers and was then tracked for an hour by military radar, a Malaysian air force general has revealed.

The aircraft was last detected by military technology near Pulau Perak, at the northern approach to the strait of Malacca – where the search for the Boeing 777 is now concentrating.   Continue reading “Military tracked missing plane for at least 100 miles after it vanished from civilian radar – and are sure it made it to Malacca Strait, Malaysian source reveals”

Ever walk into a room with some purpose in mind, only to completely forget what that purpose was?

Turns out, doors themselves are to blame for these strange memory lapses.

Psychologists at the University of Notre Dame have discovered that passing through a doorway triggers what’s known as an event boundary in the mind, separating one set of thoughts and memories from the next. Your brain files away the thoughts you had in the previous room and prepares a blank slate for the new locale.   Continue reading “The Door”

Prepared Housewives – by Michelle Boyken

Scraped knee, minor cut, bruise, splinter and mosquito bite. This sounds like typical injuries your child may be sporting right this very moment. But would you believe this happened to me all within 2 weeks last summer? Lucky for me I had just whipped up a bottle of DIY Neosporin Ointment which I affectionately nicknamed my Boo-Boo Stick!

This homemade ointment consists of 3 powerful essential oils that quickly address pain and stinging while reducing the risk of an infection. I can tell you from personal experience, wounds heal much quicker with this remedy than with typical over-the-counter first aid creams. The bonus is all of these ingredients are natural – no chemicals or synthetic additives!   Continue reading “DIY Neosporin Ointment”