b34nz.com BEE THREE FO IN ZEE

15Sep/10Off

Big night for tea party: O’Donnell wins Delaware

-It's tea time in America.
Conservative Christine O'Donnell pulled off a stunning upset over nine-term Rep. Mike Castle in the Republican Senate primary in Delaware Tuesday, propelled by tea party activists into a November showdown with Democrat Chris Coons. After a primary season shaped by economic pain and exasperated voters, the grass-roots, anti-establishment movement can claim wins in at least seven GOP Senate races, a handful of Republican gubernatorial contests and dozens of House primary campaigns, and it influenced many others.
In the fight for New Hampshire's Republican Senate nomination, a second insurgent trailed in vote counting that was still going on Wednesday. After lagging in early returns, former Attorney General Kelly Ayotte moved ahead of Ovide Lamontagne with a lead of roughly 1,000 votes, with results tallied from 85 percent of precincts. Ayotte was backed by establishment Republicans and Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin; Lamontagne, a former chairman of the state Board of Education, campaigned with the support of tea party activists.
In New York, tea party ally Carl Paladino dealt another shock to the GOP establishment, defeating former Rep. Rick Lazio in the race for the party's nomination for governor. Paladino will face state Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, the prohibitive favorite.
The Delaware outcome reflected the energy and enthusiasm of the tea partiers, but O'Donnell also enters the race against Coons as an underdog, putting GOP control of the Senate further out of reach. Former George W. Bush political adviser Karl Rove told Fox News Channel, "This is not a race we're going to be able to win."
Speaking at an Elks Lodge in Dover, Del., O'Donnell thanked Sarah Palin for her endorsement as well as the Tea Party Express, a California political committee that spent at least $237,000 to help her defeat Castle, a moderate and a fixture in Delaware politics for a generation.
"Never underestimate the power of 'We the People,'" said O'Donnell, who predicted the general election campaign would focus on jobs and rising national debt. "'We the People' will have our voice heard once again in Washington, D.C."
Her victory set off a round of accusations and fingerpointing inside and outside the GOP.
Republican Party officials who saw Castle as their only hope for winning the Delaware seat once held by Vice President Joe Biden made clear they will not provide funding for O'Donnell in the general election. The Republican state chairman, Tom Ross, has said O'Donnell "could not be elected dogcatcher," and records surfaced during the campaign showing that the IRS had once slapped a lien against her and that her house had been headed for foreclosure. She also claimed — falsely — to have carried two of the state's counties in a race against Biden six years ago.
In Minneapolis, former President Bill Clinton said the Republican Party is pushing out pragmatic voices in favor of candidates that make former President George W. Bush "look like a liberal." Democratic National Committee Chairman Tim Kaine said in a statement that O'Donnell harbors "extreme views on the economy, health care, and women's and reproductive rights."
The victories by O'Donnell and Paladino are the latest evidence of the influence of the tea party movement, a loose-knit coalition of community groups that advocate limited government, tightfisted spending and free markets.
Massachusetts Sen. Scott Brown, who was aided by spending by the Tea Party Express, became an overnight Republican star in January when he claimed the seat held for decades by the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy. Brown's win set the stage for a year of outsider candidates, and the tea party has scored prominent primary election wins in Utah, Nevada, Kentucky, Colorado and Alaska.
But can they win in November?
O'Donnell and other tea party candidates have called for an abrupt turn toward austere government, and the question will be how far voters want to go to reshape Washington.
The movement's spirited rallies have attracted tens of thousands of people, and they've made their presence felt at the polls: Republican turnout in the primary season has well outpaced Democratic. Even in races where the tea party has been less visible, its influence is evident in candidates' arguments. In the California race for governor, Democrat Jerry Brown is depicting himself as a tax-cutter who keeps his eye on the bottom line.
But for all its enthusiasm, the tea party has elevated sometimes unpolished or flawed candidates who — in some cases — will be more vulnerable in November, particularly in states or districts that are more moderate. The movement has also opened fissures with the GOP establishment. In Alaska, Sen. Lisa Murkowski, who was defeated by tea party favorite Joe Miller, is considering a write-in candidacy and says the Alaska Republican party was "hijacked" by the Tea Party Express, which she calls an "extremist group." The committee, based in California, endorsed Miller and ran ads supporting him.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada once appeared headed for near-certain defeat in the state that has the nation's highest unemployment, but he's now running even with tea party favorite Sharron Angle, a Republican who wants to phase out Social Security for younger workers, opposes abortion in all cases, including rape and incest, and would break up the federal Education Department.
In Colorado, Republicans tried to get their nominee for governor, tea party favorite Dan Maes, to quit the race after embarrassing missteps. He's claimed he worked as an undercover police officer in Kansas — statements that have not been corroborated by authorities — and he once suggested that a Denver bike-sharing program is part of a U.N. conspiracy to control American cities.
For the GOP, the tea party "is a mixed blessing," said Bill Whalen, a fellow at the conservative Hoover Institution.
The movement's voters are energized but "anyone but Sharron Angle would have Harry Reid dead to rights. Abolishing the Education Department, it's a little too much," Whalen said.
The loosely connected movement, which took shape in early 2009 in reaction to bailouts and rising government debt, has no central organization that endorses candidates. There are thousands of local chapters, some of which are tethered to national groups.
Tea party candidates have been aided by support from conservative political committees that share the movement's limited government, free market agenda, including the Tea Party Express, FreedomWorks, Club for Growth and South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint's Senate Conservatives Fund.
The financial arm of the Tea Party Express — the Our Country Deserves Better PAC — has spent about $1.6 million in advertising and mailings in a handful of races, including $237,000 in Delaware. It pumped $588,000 into the GOP primary in Alaska to lift Miller over Murkowski.
The Tea Party Express' biggest investment has been in Nevada, where it has spent $790,000 on Angle's behalf. It also spent about $350,000 in Massachusetts to help Brown win.
—
Associated Press writers Jim Kuhnhenn in Washington and Becky Bohrer in Juneau, Alaska, contributed to this report.

Big night for tea party: O'Donnell wins Delaware

Tagged as: , , , , , , , , , No Comments
3Sep/10Off

Earl weakens but still powerful as it scoots by NC

BUXTON, N.C. -Hurricane Earl churned past the North Carolina Outer Banks and its powerful gusts and driving rains were starting to be felt in southeastern Virginia early Friday, the beginning of at least 24 hours of stormy, windy weather along the East Coast.
Residents and officials of North Carolina's barrier islands were waiting for daybreak to see how much damage the storm's winds and waves had left behind. But National Weather Service meteorologist Chris Collins said Earl had produced little storm surge and only minor flooding in some coastal counties. Predictions of storm surges between 2 and 4 feet may be too much, he said.
Earl had weakened all day Thursday, winding down from a Category 4 storm with winds of 140 mph to a Category 2 storm with winds of 105 mph. But it still packed enough of a punch to send rain sideways and shake signs in Buxton, the southeasternmost tip of the Outer Banks.
In Nags Heads, with the eye the closest it was expected to get to the North Carolina coast, the rain lashed against window panes and the wind kicked up. At about 2 a.m., the tops of small trees were bending in the howling gusts and beach grass was whipping back and forth on dunes leading to the ocean. A couple hundred power outages were reported.
While more than 30,000 residents and visitors were ordered to leave the Outer Banks, more hardy residents gassed up their generators and hunkered at home behind their boarded-up windows, even though officials warned them that it could be three days before they could expect any help.
"It's kind of nerve-racking, but I've been through this before," said 65-year-old Herma De Gier, who has lived in the village of Avon since 1984. De Gier said she will ride out the storm at a neighbor's house but wants to be close enough to her own property so she can quickly deal with any damage.
The eye of the hurricane was expected to get only about 100 miles east of the Outer Banks, not any closer, said Collins.
During its march up the Atlantic, it could snarl travelers' Labor Day weekend plans with several flights already canceled. Forecasters said that a kink in the jetstream over the eastern U.S. should push the storm away from the coast, guiding it like a marble in a groove. Earl is expected to move north-northeast for much of Friday, staying away from New Jersey and the other mid-Atlantic states, but also passing very close to Long Island, Cape Cod and Nantucket, which could get gusts up to 100 mph.
The most likely place Earl will make landfall is on Saturday in western Nova Scotia, Canada, where it could still be a hurricane, said hurricane center deputy director Ed Rappaport.
Federal, state and local authorities were waiting for daylight to begin patrolling the North Carolina coast to check for damage. The Coast Guard planned to fly over the exposed barrier islands and was prepared for search-and-rescue helicopter flights.
The emergency management chief for one coastal North Carolina county said that high tide and the storm combined to wash over a portion of the Outer Banks highway N.C. 12 near Rodanthe. Dare County Emergency Management Director Sandy Sanderson said it was closed, but that the overwash was expected and nobody was out driving in the storm, anyway.
In Buxton, a two-story Comfort Inn had become a makeshift hurricane hostel for those who want to stay close to their homes but know they need better shelter.
Billy Parker, 55, choice to stay so he could keep an eye on his treasured property, but wasn't taking any chances with his family. He sent his wife, mother-in-law and two daughters to Elizabeth City — two and a half hours away on the mainland.
"I don't want them here," Parker said. "I'd fear for their lives."
Most of the hotel guests said they would rather get trapped on Hatteras Island than off it and prepared themselves for weeks without contact with the outside world.
Farther up the coast, governors in Massachusetts and Rhode Island declared states of emergency, joining North Carolina, Virginia and Maryland.
Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick urged people living in low-lying areas prone to flooding to consider leaving their homes by Friday afternoon, although no officials evacuations had been announced outside of North Carolina. Officials on Nantucket Island, Mass., planned to set up a shelter at a high school on Friday.
"We're asking everyone: Don't panic," Patrick said. "We have prepared well, we are coordinated well, and I'm confident that we've done everything that we can."
Much of New England should expect strong, gusty winds much like a nor'easter, along with fallen trees and downed power lines, forecasters said.
"This is the strongest hurricane to threaten the Northeast and New England since Hurricane Bob in 1991," said Dennis Feltgen, a meteorologist with the National Hurricane Center.
In New York City, officials were on alert but said they expected to see only side effects of the storm — mostly rain and high winds, with possible soil erosion on the beaches and flooding along the oceanside coasts of Brooklyn and Queens.
"It's going to stay out in the open water, but we're going to have some effects here," said Joseph Bruno, commissioner of the city's Office of Emergency Management.
The National Hurricane Center said Earl will keep chugging to the northeast, eventually striking western Nova Scotia, Canada, where it could still be a hurricane.
—
Associated Press Writers David Fischer in Miami; Martha Waggoner, Emery Dalesio, Tom Foreman Jr. and Gary Robertson in Raleigh, N.C.; Tom Breen in Morehead City, N.C.; Bruce Smith in Jacksonville, N.C.; Jeffrey Collins in Columbia, S.C.; Mark Pratt in Boston; David Porter in Trenton, N.J.; David Koenig in Dallas; Sara Kugler Frazier in New York; and Frank Eltman in Stony Brook, N.Y., contributed to this report.

Earl weakens but still powerful as it scoots by NC

Tagged as: , , , , , , , No Comments
8Jul/10Off

Russian, US spy suspects brace for possible swap

MOSCOW -Special riot police beefed up security around Moscow's Lefortovo prison Thursday and a gaggle of TV cameras and photographers jostled for the best position as the world braced for what could be largest spy swap since the Cold War.
A convoy of armored vehicles arrived in the morning at the prison, thought to be the central gathering point for people convicted of spying for the West, including nuclear researcher Igor Sutyagin, serving a 14-year sentence for spying for the United States.
Sutyagin's brother and lawyer say he was transferred to Lefortovo earlier this week to take part in the swap and could be flown out to freedom as early as Thursday. They said Sutyagin saw a list of 11 prisoners in Russia who are being traded for 10 people arrested in the United States for being unregistered Russian agents.
In New York, a federal court was to decide the fate of those 10 suspects later Thursday.
Officials in neither country would confirm an exchange was planned. But the machinations — including a meeting in Washington between U.S. officials and the Russian ambassador on Wednesday — had all the hallmarks as the two former Cold War antagonists moved to tamp down tensions stirred up by the U.S. arrests.
"A swap seems very much on the cards. There is political will on both sides, and actually by even moving it as far as they have, Moscow has de facto acknowledged that these guys were spies," intelligence analyst Pavel Felgenhauer said.
Five suspects charged with spying in the U.S. were hurriedly ordered to New York on Wednesday, joining five others already behind bars there, after Sutyagin, a Russian arms-control researcher, spilled the news of the swap after being transferred to Moscow from his forlorn penal colony near the Arctic Circle.
Dmitry Sutyagin said his brother was told he was among a dozen convicted spies to be exchanged for Russians arrested by the FBI. He said his brother could be sent to Vienna, then London, as early as Thursday.
Defense lawyers in Moscow and New York have expressed confidence that their clients' fates would be settled very soon.
In a federal indictment unsealed Wednesday, the ten suspects in New York and an 11th person, who was released on bail by a court in Cyprus and is now a fugitive, were formally charged.
The indictment charged all with conspiring to act as secret agents and charged nine of them with conspiracy to commit money laundering. It demanded that those accused of money laundering return any assets used in the offense.
Attorney Robert Baum, who represents defendant Anna Chapman, said the case might be settled when she and the other nine people arrested in the United States appear Thursday for arraignment on the indictment, raising the possibility of guilty pleas to the lowest charges and deportation from the U.S..
"Of certain events tomorrow that might occur, the fact the indictment is minimal makes perfect sense. This is a crazy situation," said Robert J. Krakow, an attorney for defendant Juan Lazaro.
Prosecutors released a copy of the indictment as federal judges in Boston and Alexandria, Virginia, signed orders directing that five defendants arrested in Massachusetts and Virginia be transferred to New York. All were charged in Manhattan.
The defendants were accused of living seemingly ordinary lives in America while they acted as unregistered agents for the Russian government, sending secret messages and carrying out orders they received from their Russian contacts.
All have remained in custody except for a man identified as Christopher R. Metsos, the 11th suspect who is charged with being the spy ring's paymaster. Metsos, traveling on a forged Canadian passport, jumped bail last week after being arrested in Cyprus.
U.S. District Judge Kimba Wood in New York signed an order Wednesday requiring that defendant Vicky Pelaez, Lazaro's wife, remain detained until the judge can hear an appeal Friday by the U.S. government of a $250,000 bail package approved last week. Pelaez is a U.S. citizen.
Sutyagin, who worked as an arms control and military analyst at the Moscow-based U.S.A. and Canada Institute, a think tank, was arrested in 1999 and convicted in 2004 on charges of passing information on nuclear submarines and other weapons to a British company that investigators claimed was a CIA cover. Sutyagin has all along denied that he was spying, saying the information he provided was available from open sources.
His case was one of several incidents of Russian academics and scientists being targeted by Russia's Federal Security Service and accused of misusing classified information, revealing state secrets or, in some cases, espionage.
—
AP writers Misha Japaridze, Vladimir Isachenkov, Jim Heintz and Khristina Narizhnaya in Moscow, Calvin Woodward, Pete Yost and Matt Lee in Washington, Matt Barakat in Alexandria, Va., Denise Lavoie in Boston and Larry Neumeister and Tom Hays in New York contributed to this report.

Russian, US spy suspects brace for possible swap

Tagged as: , , , , , , , , , , No Comments
21Jun/10Off

NYC car bomb suspect pleads guilty, calls it `war’

NEW YORK -Calling himself a Muslim soldier, a defiant Pakistan-born U.S. citizen pleaded guilty Monday to carrying out the failed Times Square car bombing and left a sinister warning that unless the U.S. leaves Muslim lands alone, "we will be attacking U.S."
Faisal Shahzad entered the plea in U.S. District Court in Manhattan just days after a federal grand jury indicted him on 10 terrorism and weapons counts, some of which carry mandatory life sentences. He pleaded guilty to them all.
Widely circulated snapshots of Shahzad — a U.S.-trained financial analyst and married father of two — show him with a neatly trimmed beard, all smiles and looking carefree behind sunglasses or with his American wife. When led into court Monday, he had on a white skull cap and prisoner's uniform, his beard shaggy and his demeanor serious.
U.S. District Judge Miriam Goldman Cedarbaum challenged Shahzad repeatedly with questions such as whether he looked at the people in Times Square, especially the children, to see who they were or whether he really built the bomb by himself. He repeatedly insisted he acted without help from others in the U.S. and built the bomb "all by myself."
"One has to understand where I'm coming from," Shahzad said calmly. "I consider myself ... a Muslim soldier."
The 30-year-old described his effort to set off a bomb in an SUV he parked in Times Square on May 1, saying he chose the warm Saturday night because it would be crowded with people he could injure or kill. He said he conspired with the Pakistan Taliban, which provided more than $15,000 to fund his operation and five days of explosives training late last year and early this year, just months after he became a U.S. citizen.
He explained that he packed his vehicle with three separate bomb components, hoping to set off a fertilizer-fueled bomb packed in a gun cabinet, a set of propane tanks and gas canisters rigged with fireworks to explode into a fireball. He also revealed he was carrying a folding assault rifle for "self-defense."
Shahzad said he lit a fuse and waited 2 1/2 to five minutes for the bomb to erupt.
"I was waiting to hear a sound but I didn't hear a sound. ... So I walked to Grand Central and went home," he said.
The judge repeatedly interrupted Shahzad, including when he said his plot was to retaliate against the U.S. and the forces of up to 50 other countries that had "attacked the Muslim lands."
Cedarbaum said: "But not the people who were walking in Times Square that night. Did you look around to see who they were?"
"Well, the people select the government," Shahzad said. "We consider them all the same. The drones, when they hit ... "
Cedarbaum interrupted again: "Including the children?"
Shahzad answered: "Well, the drone hits in Afghanistan and Iraq, they don't see children, they don't see anybody. They kill women, children, they kill everybody. It's a war, and in war, they kill people. They're killing all Muslims."
Later, he added: "I am part of the answer to the U.S. terrorizing the Muslim nations and the Muslim people. And, on behalf of that, I'm avenging the attack. Living in the United States, Americans only care about their own people, but they don't care about the people elsewhere in the world when they die."
Cedarbaum asked him if he understood some charges carried mandatory life sentences and that he might spend the rest of his life in prison. He said he did.
At one point, she asked him if he was sure he wanted to plead guilty.
He said he wanted "to plead guilty and 100 times more" to let the U.S. know that if it did not get out of Iraq and Afghanistan, halt drone attacks and stop meddling in Muslim lands, "we will be attacking U.S."
Sentencing was scheduled for Oct. 5.
The Bridgeport, Conn., resident was arrested trying to leave the country May 3, two days after the bomb failed to ignite near a Broadway theater.
Authorities said Shahzad immediately cooperated, delaying his initial court appearance for two weeks as he spilled details of a plot meant to sow terror in the world-famous Times Square when it was packed with thousands of potential victims.
The bomb apparently sputtered, emitting smoke that attracted the attention of an alert street vendor, who notified police, setting in motion a rapid evacuation of blocks of a city still healing from the shock of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attack on the World Trade Center.
According to the indictment issued last week, Shahzad received a total of $12,000 prior to the attack from the Pakistani Taliban through cash drop-offs in Massachusetts and Long Island.
Attorney General Eric Holder said after the plea: "Faisal Shahzad plotted and launched an attack that could have led to serious loss of life, and today the American criminal justice system ensured that he will pay the price for his actions."
FBI New York Acting Assistant Director-in-Charge George Venizelos called the plea "right on the mark" and praised the work of "ordinary citizens who alerted law enforcement of suspicious activity."
Shahzad was accused in the indictment of receiving explosives training in Waziristan, Pakistan, during a five-week trip to that country. He returned to the United States in February.
The indictment said he received $5,000 in cash on Feb. 25 from a co-conspirator in Pakistan and $7,000 more on April 10, allegedly sent at the co-conspirator's direction. Shahzad confirmed the payments in court Monday and said the Pakistan Taliban also gave him more than $4,000 when he left training camp, where he spent 40 days.
Shahzad, born in Pakistan, moved to the United States when he was 18.
Pakistan has arrested at least 11 people since the attempted attack. An intelligence official has alleged two of them played a role in the plot. No one has been charged.
Three men in Massachusetts and Maine suspected of supplying money to Shahzad have been detained on immigration charges; one was recently transferred to New York.
Federal authorities have said they believe money was channeled through an underground money transfer network known as "hawala," but they have said they doubt anyone in the U.S. who provided money knew what it was for.

NYC car bomb suspect pleads guilty, calls it `war'

Tagged as: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , No Comments
14Jun/10Off

Kennedy docs show death threats as late as 1985

WASHINGTON -FBI records show there were death threats against then-Sen. Edward Kennedy even five years after his failed 1980 White House bid.
Previously secret files released Monday showed that on May 23, 1985, the U.S. Capitol Police passed onto the FBI a copy of a letter sent to the Secret Service, ostensibly by a Warren, Mich., resident. The sender, whose name was redacted, declared: "Brass tacks, I'm gonna kill Kennedy and (President Ronald) Reagan, and I really mean it."
The FBI considered the sender armed and dangerous, but an accompanying psychological analysis said she was "merely ventilating her frustrations and projecting her inadequacies." The late Sen. Kennedy, who served in the Senate for nearly half a century, died in August 2009 after a yearlong struggle with brain cancer.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Most of the secret FBI files on the late Sen. Edward Kennedy being released Monday concern death threats against the longtime senator.
Alex Brown of the FBI's records management division said the FBI would post some 2,000 pages of previously secret pages about the Massachusetts Democrat on the agency's website.
The release of the documents has been highly anticipated by historians, scholars and others interested in the life and long public career of one of America's most prominent and powerful politicians.
The Associated Press and other media organizations requested the documents through Freedom of Information Act requests.
Kennedy faced death threats when he ran for president in 1980 and before that in the years following the assassinations of his older brothers.
President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas on Nov. 22, 1963. U.S. Sen. Robert F. Kennedy was slain in Los Angeles on June 6, 1968.
The deaths of his two older brothers cast a long shadow on Kennedy's life, and prompted fears he too would be targeted by an assassin's bullet.
After his brothers' assassinations, Kennedy wrote in his memoir "True Compass" released last year, that he was easily startled at loud sounds, and would hit the deck whenever a car backfired.
Kennedy, who served in the Senate for nearly half a century, died in August 2009 after a yearlong struggle with brain cancer. He was 77 and the last surviving brother of the famed political family.
—
Online:

Kennedy docs show death threats as late as 1985

Tagged as: , , , , , , , , , , , , , No Comments
   

Categories

Archives

Tags

afghanistan alabama ass city columbus columbus-police congress country democratic democrats FAIL family government hot house huntsville investigation lindsey-connell local news madison-county MMA News nice ass north obama office party people pics police politics president press school sexy sheriff shooting street tech time united-states victim video white wife