Actor Leslie Nielsen Dies At 84, Nephew Says

Star known for comic successes in 'Airplane,' 'Naked Gun,' 'Police Squad'

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Actor Leslie Nielsen, star of such comedies as "Airplane" and the "Naked Gun" series, died Sunday of complications from pneumonia, a nephew told a Canadian radio station. Nielsen was 84.

Nielsen died in hospital in Fort Lauderdale with family and friends by his side, Doug Nielsen told CJOB radio in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Nielsen, a native of Regina, Saskatchewan, had been hospitalized for nearly two weeks, his nephew told CJOB.

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Found Dog #1

I found a husky/husky mix dog in the parking lot at Macy's on Sunday, 11/28/10.  Very sweet and well taken care of dog...I know someone must be looking for them.  Please call if you have any info...410-430-3859.

Donation Of Police Dog Keeps Child's Memory Alive (Sarah Foxwell)

Maryland State Police Sgt. Eric Fogle holds his new partner, Sarah. The 12-week-old bloodhound was donated by Blackrock Kennels in Reisterstown after Fogle’s 8-year-old bloodhound, Christopher, died recently of cancer.

Last year, Maryland State Police Sgt. Eric Fogle helped spearhead the search for Sarah Foxwell, an 11-year-old girl reported missing from her Salisbury home Dec. 22.

Sarah was found dead Christmas Day.

 

Mourning his own loss this month when Christopher, his 8-year-old bloodhound, died of cancer, Fogle wasn't without a canine partner for long.

 

Wes King of Blackrock Kennels in Reisterstown donated a dog to follow in Christopher's footsteps within days.

 

Fogle named his new partner Sarah, in memory of the slain Salisbury child. Police bloodhounds are often named for murdered children, he said.

 

Christopher was named in remembrance of Christopher Ausherman Jr., a 9-year-old Frederick boy murdered by Elmer Spencer Jr. on Nov. 19, 2000, just days after the serial pedophile was released from prison. Spencer later died in prison after he was convicted in Christopher's death.

 

A registered sex offender charged in Sarah's death is awaiting trial.

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Everyday Investors Wonder If Market Is Rigged

Wild fluctuations, Madoff scandal, 'flash crash' have them pulling their money

NEW YORK — The Wall Street insider trading investigation may lead everyday investors — already rattled by a stock market meltdown, a one-day "flash crash" and the Madoff scandal — to finally conclude that the game is rigged.

"A large part of trading has to do with trust, and I don't have it," says Mark Swenson, a 43-year-old plumber from New Hampshire who refuses to buy individual stocks.

"When a stock moves up 10 percent, you don't know why," he added. "We can pretend that everyone has access to the same information, but they don't."

Even before news broke that federal investigators were looking into whether hedge funds traded on inside information, small-time investors were pulling their money out of stocks — despite a remarkable run for the market since the spring of 2009.

Hedge funds are speculative funds which make large bets on market movements and are usually used by wealthy private investors or institutions.

Americans have pulled $60 billion out of U.S. stock funds this year, according to the Investment Company Institute, a trade group. Meanwhile, investors have piled money into Treasurys and bond funds that are considered safer investments. And at the same time, banks like Wells Fargo have reported that money is moving into checking and savings accounts.

To be sure, it's natural for people worried about their jobs or the falling value of their homes to sock cash into more conservative investments. But this has been no garden-variety recession.

It has coincided with turmoil in the stock market that goes back a decade, to the collapse of the Internet bubble and portfolio-draining scandals involving high-flying companies such as Enron and WorldCom.

More recently, investors have lived through the housing bubble, the collapse of Wall Street firms such as Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers and stomach-churning days when it wasn't clear whether capitalism would survive. On top of that came news that financier Bernard Madoff had bilked investors out of billions.

"Virtually everyone on the Street believes there are significant improprieties, and I think there is an even more important point for the massive number of investors who are not Wall Street players," says former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer, once known as the "sheriff of Wall Street" for aggressively prosecuting white-collar crime as state attorney general. "And that is for most of us, you can't beat these guys at their own game."

People are nervous about the state of their assets in part because their homes are worth so much less these days, not to mention job insecurity and slow economic growth overall.

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Playing Chicken With China

The Federal Reserve has already injected hundreds of billions of new dollars into the economy since the recession started. Normally, when the government prints up more money, dollars are worth less and that is what we call inflation. But inflation has been surprisingly low.

One measure of the money supply, M1, which includes currency as well as checking accounts, soared by 26 percent between August 2008 and September this year. The amount of currency more than doubled. But prices barely changed.

As Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke goes forward with plans to print up another $880 billion, someone has to ask why the past increases didn't produce the inflation that everyone thought they would.

So where did all that new money go? Many blame businesses for hoarding cash. Obama recently said: “corporate profits are doing just fine. [But] they're holding onto a whole bunch of cash -- they're kind of sitting on it.”

But that isn’t happening. Companies don't just keep huge piles of cash lying around. Even if they aren't spending the money, they are putting it in the bank or they buy bonds. In either case the money is recirculated to others, not hoarded. Companies are indeed wary of starting projects and with all the uncertainty they face. And who can blame them? Yet, they are not the ones making the money disappear.

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WikiLeak Drop Shows U.S. Fighting Increasingly Chaotic Global Relations

Some of the diplomatic papers stolen from the State Department and leaked Sunday by Wikileaks show more than just potentially embarrassing revelations about U.S. views of allies but disturbing developments among alleged friends as well as foes and competitive states.

The details from the cables being released -- among 250,000 illegally taken from secret State Department records -- include discussions on the U.S. being unable to stop Syrian arms to Hezbollah, its disappointment in Qatar to stop funding terrorism and hacking by the Chinese government of U.S. computers.

Samples of some of the thousands of documents that were to be released by Wikileaks Sunday night began leaking out midday after the German newspaper Der Spiegel and The New York Times released excerpts earlier than planned.

The Wikileaks website tweeted out a copy of an article that appeared on the Gawker website taken out of Der Spiegel, which posted copies of its newspaper ahead of time. Moments later The New York Times released some of the details of documents it had acquired. The Guardian followed suit.

The massive dump began after Wikileaks announced that it had been the victim of a "denial of service" attack but that it was still releasing documents via its international newspaper partners.

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AFP's "Common Sense": Around The World On $69 Million In Welfare Funds

Bomb Suspect Found Perfect Attack Location

Somali-born Oregon college student who is in custody for trying to set off a car bomb during Portland's Christmas tree lighting ceremony tells FBI agent he had dreamed of carrying out an attack for years.

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Black Is Thinning?

Cheaters Just Sidestep Higher Taxes

The underground tobacco market is spreading like a fast-growing cancer in the wake of tax hikes that make New York cigarettes the most expensive in the nation -- and it's costing the state tens of millions a month in lost tax revenue, a Post analysis has found.

Illegal cigarettes are pouring into neighborhood bodegas by the truckload from neighboring Indian reservations, lower-tax states in the South and even as far away as China, authorities say.

Government data show that New York state is being smoked out of as much as $20 million a month from all these illegal cigarette purchases -- an estimated 7.3 million packs a month sold off the state tax radar.

"It's an unfortunate side effect of the taxes, creating this black market," said Ron Turk, special agent in charge of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms' New York field office.

Sales of taxed cigarettes have plummeted 27 percent since July, when state lawmakers raised the excise tax to $4.35 a pack on top of the city's tax of $1.50, making the average price of Marlboros here $11.60, with some shops charging as much as $14.

About 30 million packs are being sold legally each month -- down from 41 million packs a month before July.

The plunge far exceeds tobacco-control experts' predictions that sales would fall 8 to 10 percent, indicating that smokers are finding other means to get their nicotine fix.

In fact, the New York Association of Convenience Store Owners estimates that as many as half of all cigarettes consumed in the state lack proper tax stamps.

And law enforcement is also worried that the easy cash will spark rivalries among criminal gangs, just as drugs have.

"We see lots of [rip-offs] and violence with drug trafficking, and you will see a rise of that in tobacco, too. As volume and money go up, the stakes get higher. And certainly, a concern of ours is violence will spill out of this," Turk said.                               

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Lawmakers Not On Sidelines As Health Law Repeal Gains Momentum In Courts

A decision this week by a federal judge in Ohio marks at least the third time a legal challenge to Democrats' healthcare law has been allowed to go forward, underscoring the extent to which the legal push for repeal is gaining momentum.

While top-ranking Republicans have acknowledged that they won't be able to fulfill their campaign promise to “repeal and replace” the law so long as a Democrat sits in the White House, many see promise in the court fight against it. A number of Republicans have signed onto a 21-state challenge to the law that seems almost certain to end up at the Supreme Court.

Newly elected governors in at least five states are also preparing to join the fray, even as advocates of the law push back.

Robert Alt, a senior legal fellow at the Heritage Foundation, said the interest from Republicans in the lawsuit stems partly from the midterm elections.

"Don't underestimate the fact that the election results really created a strong impetus for the Republicans to demonstrate that they're taking an active role" in repealing the law, Alt said.

He added that the legal challenges could have repercussions in Congress over the next two years, especially for Democrats in conservative districts where Tea Party groups are hosting regular readings of the Constitution.

"If you start to see a drumbeat from the courts that yes, some of these provisions are unconstitutional, that's going to create very uncomfortable circumstances for some members."

The Ohio decision came down on Monday. Judge David Dowd of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio issued a split ruling in a case brought by the conservative U.S. Citizens Association. Dowd rejected three claims but agreed to hear arguments that the law's individual mandate — the requirement that people buy insurance — violates the Constitution's Commerce Clause.

In his ruling, Dowd made clear that he expects the Supreme Court to get involved. "It is apparent to the undersigned," Dowd wrote, "that the controversy ignited by the passage of the legislation at issue in this case will eventually require a decision by the Supreme Court after the above-described litigation works its way through the various circuit courts."                         

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Pentagon To Test 2nd Near-space Strike Craft

Defense Department scientists are set to conduct a second test launch next year of the Falcon HTV-2 experimental superweapon after the first flight this year ended when the autopilot deliberately crashed the unmanned glider into the ocean as a safety measure.

The Falcon Hypersonic Test Vehicle is designed to skim the top of the atmosphere just below space, and is a key element of the Pentagon's Conventional Prompt Global Strike (CPGS) capability — a program to build non-nuclear strategic weapons that can strike conventionally anywhere in the world in less than an hour.

In a statement last week, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) revealed for the first time that the first test flight April 20 ended when the autonomous onboard control system — the computer autopilot flying the futuristic superweapon — "commanded flight termination."

"When the onboard system detects [undesirable or unsafe flight] behavior, it forces itself into a controlled roll and pitchover to descend directly into the ocean," DARPA spokesman Eric Mazzacone explained in e-mail to The Washington Times.

The DARPA statement said that an independent engineering review board found that the flight was terminated after the plane began to roll so violently that it "exceeded the available control capability" of the onboard autonomous piloting system.

Specialists say such problems are expected in test flights.

DARPA said the board "reviewed and concurred with" a series of remedial measures proposed for a second test flight next year, but some analysts said the results of the first one raise questions about the way the program has been run.

The $308 million Falcon HTV-2 is a suborbital near-space vehicle launched on a Minotaur rocket, a solid-fuel booster built from a decommissioned ballistic missile. On the very edge of the atmosphere, in a procedure called "clamshell payload fairing release," the launch missile deploys the plane, which is then supposed to glide above the Earth at more than 13,000 miles per hour — more than 20 times the speed of sound.

The Pentagon is developing a generation of such hypersonic weapons as a way of being able to strike quickly at urgent threats — such as preparations by terrorists or rogue states to use nuclear weapons.         

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[NASA has used the Minotaur rocket in launches from Wallops--  Editor]

Ex-CIA Spy To Congress: Help Iranians Topple Regime

A former Iranian Revolutionary Guards officer who worked for nearly a decade and a half as a CIA spy has advice for the incoming Republican majority in the House: Help the people of Iran overthrow the tyrannical regime ruling their country or face a catastrophic war fought on Tehran’s terms.

“It is essential for us to understand that the establishment ruling Iran is truly committed to belief in the end of times and the reappearance of Imam Mahdi, the 12th Shiite Imam,” said Reza Kahlili, who uses that pseudonym and recently penned “A Time to Betray,” a memoir of his days as a CIA Spy.

When that happens, “Iran’s rulers believe Islam will conquer the world and kill all the remaining nonbelievers,” he says.

If the Iranian regime is allowed to acquire nuclear weapons, it will initiate a worldwide conflagration, Kahlili believes.

“Millions will die and millions of others will suffer unimaginable horrors. We will witness one of the greatest depressions and greatest destructions in human history. It is time that we take action and help the Iranians free themselves before it’s too late for all of us.”

In an exclusive interview with Newsmax this week, Kahlili urged Congress and U.S. allies in Europe to intensify pressure to isolate the Iranian regime, prosecute its leaders for crimes against humanity, and open a “channel of communication” with the Iranian people to help them organize a nationwide revolt.

“Once the loyalists see that the West is serious, they are going to abandon ship,” he says. “As you saw during the uprising, many Iranian diplomats and others defected, thinking it was the end of the regime. So if we can emphasize that, there will be many more high-level Iranian officials who will defect, which would further weaken the government and embolden the opposition.”

During the past 18 months, dissent has reached the inner circles of the regime in unprecedented ways, Kahlili says.

On Wednesday, Kahlili appeared, wearing a surgical mask and speaking through a voice modulator, at a forum on Iran policy that Freedom Watch and the Foundation for Democracy in Iran sponsored at the National Press Club.

Freedom Watch founder and President Larry Klayman, said, “The policy of the Obama administration and the European Union has simply not worked. We are calling on the new Congress to push the administration and the European Union to pursue a more rational approach toward Iran, toward removing the regime.”

Appearing with them, former CIA Director R. James Woolsey compared the state of Iran’s military power with Hitler’s military buildup in the years before he invaded Poland and started World War II.

“By 1936, when Germany moved into the Rhineland, it still would have been possible with strong British and French support for there to have been a coup in Germany, probably led by the Junkers, the Prussian aristocrats,” Woolsey said.

“But the world stood by. The world was in a terrible depression. The economies of Britain and France were such that they felt they couldn’t take a strong stand. And so appeasement was what there was.”

Kahlili had some concrete suggestions for the 112th Congress:

MURDER SUSPECT SURRENDERS

DSP News Release:

Murder Suspect Obadiah D. Miller Surrenders to Delaware State Police

Resume:

On Sunday, November 28, 2010 shortly after midnight, Obadiah D. Miller turned himself in to Delaware State Police Troop 3. 

Obadiah D. Miller was charged with Murder 1^st, Possession of Firearm During Commission of Felony, Carrying Concealed Deadly Weapon.

Miller was arraigned and committed to James T. Vaughn Correctional Center (DCC), where he is being held without bail on Murder 1^st.

Father Charged For Leaving Infant Son In Car

Location:  Sears Outlet 500 Eagle Run Road Newark, Delaware

Date of Occurrence:  Saturday, November 27, 2010 6:27 p.m.

Victim:  4 month old infant, male

Defendant: William Moultrie-40, Newark, Delaware  

Charges:  Endangering the Welfare of a Child

Resume:   

Newark- The incident occurred on Saturday evening at approximately 6:27 p.m. as Troopers responded to the parking lot of the Sears Outlet 500 Eagle Run Road Newark, DE for a report of an infant left alone in a vehicle with the engine running.  Upon arrival, Troopers located the car and observed the 4 month old infant locked inside with the engine running.  At approximately 6:50 p.m. the infant’s Father, William Moultrie, 40, of Newark, returned to the car where he stated that he was returning an item, and thought it was only going to take 5 minutes.  Troopers estimated that the 4 month old infant was left alone for at least 25 minutes in the vehicle.

William Moultrie was arrested and charged with Endangering the Welfare of a Child.  He was arraigned and released on $200.00 Unsecured Bond.

The Division of Family Services was contacted and the infant was turned over to a relative.

Tea Party May Target Major Companies That Back Obama Agenda, Poll Shows

According to a new poll, Tea Party activists and conservatives are willing to put their money where their mouths are and stop purchasing products from companies that promote President Barack Obama’s agenda.

The results of the survey led the pollster to conclude that Tea Partiers could “realistically” lead a boycott of such companies.

The poll was commissioned by the National Center for Public Policy Research and FreedomWorks, the latter a conservative organization whose chairman, Dick Armey, is often closely associated with the Tea Party movement.

The pollsters asked 800 conservatives and Tea Party supporters about their view of Johnson & Johnson and General Electric, two large conglomerates that have spent money lobbying for the passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, or health care reform, and the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the $787 billion stimulus bill.

Next, the pollsters informed respondents of the association between the companies and Obama’s legislative agenda. As a result, the poll showed, the favorability of those companies plummeted among Tea Partiers and conservatives at large, with many saying they would likely boycott those businesses.

From Oct. 10 to 14, Republican polling firm Wilson Research Strategies, which conducted the poll, identified 801 people who described themselves as “somewhat” or “very conservative” and asked them about the companies.

Among them, GE’s image was 51 percent favorable and 25 percent unfavorable; but then, the respondents were told about GE’s support for the stimulus plan, under which they received federal dollars, and their support for a hypothetical cap and trade bill.

Their numbers flipped, with just 20 percent of the people surveyed then viewing them favorably and 50 percent unfavorably.

J&J was originally viewed even more favorably, at 69-5, but after learning that the company spent money to help lobby for Obama’s health care plan, the company’s favorability collapsed more than 50 points to 16-49.

Worse for the two companies, 60 percent of the conservatives said they would be less likely to purchase goods from a company that “actively lobbied to pass health care reform, Obama’s seven hundred and eighty seven billion dollar stimulus plan, or cap and trade,” as the pollster phrased it.                

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Fatah Decides: No Recognition Of Israel As Jewish State

The faction that is led by Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas and which leads the PA has officially declared its refusal to recognize Israel as a Jewish State.

The Fatah Revolutionary Council voted to “affirm its rejection of the so-called Jewish state or any other formula that could achieve this goal” at its fifth convention in Ramallah over the weekend.

“The Council also renews its refusal for the establishment of any racist state based on religion in accordance with international law and human rights conventions,” the council said in a statement issued at the end of the convention.

In addition, the statement said Fatah was opposed to the concept of swapping land for peace, because “illegal settler gangs cannot be placed on an equal footing with the owners of the lands and rights.”

The latest efforts by the United States to bring Israel and the PA back to the negotiating table did not help the cause of peace, opined the Council, because it could “harm Palestinian rights and prolong the occupation… and such gifts to the occupier will only make the occupier more stubborn and radical.”

The Council also condemned the new Israeli law that mandates a full nationwide Israeli referendum prior to ceding land from within Jerusalem or the Golan Heights, saying it violated international law. Fatah Council members urged the PA leadership to fight the measure in the United Nations plenum and in U.N. Security Council.            More

GM's Union Recovering After Stock Sale

General Motors Co.'s recent stock offering was staged to start paying back the government for its $50 billion bailout, but one group made out much better than the taxpayers or other investors: the company's union.

Thanks to a generous share of GM stock obtained in the company's 2009 bankruptcy settlement, the United Auto Workers is well on its way to recouping the billions of dollars GM owed it — putting it far ahead of taxpayers who have recouped only about 30 percent of their investment and further still ahead of investors in the old GM who have received nothing.

The boon for the union fits the pattern established when the White House pushed GM into bankruptcy and steered it through the courts in a way that consistently put the interests of the union ahead of many suppliers, dealers and investors — stakeholders that ordinarily would have fared as well or better under the bankruptcy laws.

"Priority one was serving the interests of the UAW" when the White House's auto task force engineered the bankruptcy, said Glenn Reynolds, an analyst at CreditSights. The stock offering served to show once again how the White House has handsomely rewarded its political allies, he said.

The union's health care and pension trust fund earned $3.4 billion through the sale of one-third of its shares in GM last week. Analysts estimate that it would break even if it sells the remaining two-thirds of its shares at an average price of $36 — close to where the stock traded shortly after the offering hit the market. GM shares closed at $33.45 on Wednesday.         
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