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Thursday, October 05, 2017

Breaking: DirecTV Delivers Devastating News to NFL

If you really want to get someone’s attention, hit them where they feel it: Their wallet.

That’s exactly what many football fans are doing to the NFL in the wake of the growing disrespect by playersduring the national anthem.

In an unprecedented turn of events, one of the biggest premium TV providers in the nation has just made a stunning announcement: They’re providing full refunds to customers who cancel their NFL Sunday Ticket packages because of the protests.

The ESPN network — hardly a bastion of conservatism — confirmed on Tuesday evening that DirecTV is altering its own policy which normally prevents package cancellations after a sports season has started, and will return the full amount of money for any viewer who wants to cancel their NFL bundle.

Those viewership packages allow die-hard sports fans to watch games that are outside their local viewing area, and run about $280 per season.

DirecTV’s surprising move came after President Donald Trump spoke out about professional players who kneel or make other disrespectful gestures during the national anthem.

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Report: That Grocery Store Salmon You Bought May Be Subsidizing North Korea’s Nuclear Weapons Program

It may look like an ordinary package of salmon, but according to a new investigative report, that fish you bought for dinner may actually be funneling money into the pockets of the North Korean government, and possibly supporting less than ideal working conditions for factory workers in the process. 

American Optimism about the Economy Hits all-time High

The four-quarter average for every economic metric in the poll is at a record 10-year high.

But just 38 percent of the public approves of Trump's job as president, up 1 point from June, while 52 percent disapproves, also up 1 point.

Overall, the Republican and Democratic pollsters described the president's rating as "sticky" and unlikely to move much no matter how sensational the story.

The public's views on the economy continue to cruise at lofty levels but the optimism does not appear to be lifting the president's approval rating.

The third-quarter CNBC All-America Economic Survey found 43 percent of the public believes the economy is excellent or good, a record high in the 10-year history of the survey. Thirty-six percent believes the economy will get better, down a couple of points from last quarter, but just 23 percent say it will get worse, down 6 points.

The four-quarter average for every major economic metric in the poll --- the outlook for the economy, housing, wages and the stock market --- is at a record 10-year high. Those four quarters cover the time span since President Donald Trump's election.

However, just 38 percent of the public approves of Trump's job as president, up a point from June, while 52 percent disapproves, also up a point.

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NJ Mega Car Dealer pulls TV Ads over NFL Protests

RARITAN TWP. -- In response to the ongoing controversy surrounding NFL players kneeling during the national anthem, the owner of Flemington Car and Truck Country has pulled the dealership's ads from broadcasts of games for the remainder of the 2017 season.

"The National Football League and its owners have shown their fans and marketing partners that they do not have a comprehensive policy to ensure that players stand and show respect for America and our flag during the playing of the national anthem," Steve Kalafer said in a statement. "We have cancelled all of our NFL advertising on the Optimum and Infinity (cable) networks."

Kalafer is also part of the Somerset Patriots' ownership group, an independent professional baseball team based in Somerset County.

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Kirstie Alley Blames Las Vegas Mass Shooting on Psychiatric Drugs

Kirstie Alley spoke about the Las Vegas shooter Stephen Paddock, who killed at least 58 people and injured more than 500 others at the Route 91 Harvest Festival on Sunday, October 1, in the most lethal mass shooting in modern U.S. history.

The Cheers alum, 66, sparked controversy on social media when she blamed 64-year-old Paddock’s actions on prescription medication. “We have to solve the mystery of why there are no ‘shooters’ or almost 0 before the 1980s. I know one common denominator other than guns,” Alley tweeted on Monday, October 2. “One additional common denominator of ‘shooters’ is U.S.A.’s mass usage of psychiatric drugs. A % do have side effects of violence and suicide.”

“Did you really just say that? Sit down. 58 people are dead,” Florida-based ABC reporter Derek Shore told Alley.

“Yes I did say it,” she responded. “It happens to be a common denominator in shooters..one that didn’t exist before the ‘80s.. not my opinion. Statistic based.”

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Las Vegas gunman reportedly was prescribed anti-anxiety medication in June

Stephen Paddock, the gunman who opened fire on a crowd at a country music concert on the Las Vegas Strip on Sunday, was prescribed an anti-anxiety drug in June, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported.

The paper, citing records from the Nevada Prescription Monitoring Program, reported Tuesday that Paddock was prescribed 50, 10-milligram diazepam tablets by a physician on June 21. The brand name of the drug is Valium. The report said the drug could trigger aggressive behavior.

Authorities investigating the mass killing may look to a “psychological autopsy” to try to uncover what led Paddock to open fire into a crowd at a country music concert.

Jim Clemente, a retired FBI profiler, said in an interview that if Paddock's suicide did not destroy his brain, experts could find some kind of neurological disorder or malformation.

“The genetics load the gun, personality and psychology aim it, and experiences pull the trigger, typically,” Clemente said. He pointed out that Paddock’s father — a bank robber — was diagnosed a psychopath.

Clemente speculated that there was “some sort of major trigger in his life — a great loss, a breakup, or maybe he just found out he has a terminal disease.”

New York forensic psychiatrist James Knoll in 2008 described a ”psychological autopsy” as a procedure that originated in 1958 that “involves a thorough and systematic retrospective analysis of the decedent’s life, with a particular focus on suicide risk factors, motives, and intentions.”

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POLITICS: 80 Years Ago This Week, Marijuana Prohibition Began With These Arrests

The first thing you notice about the mug shot of Samuel R. Caldwell is that the man is wearing overalls. The balding, middle-aged Caldwell’s brow is furrowed, his lips tightly pursed. “Colo State Pen 18699” hangs around his neck, snug to the top of his tightly cinched denim shoulder straps. His eyes stare defiantly into the prison photographer’s lens, just shy of seething. A few years after the photo was taken, the serially incarcerated Caldwell would be picked up by police at a Denver flophouse and sent to federal prison in Leavenworth, Kansas. There he served four years for an act that had become a federal crime just a few days before his arrest on October 5, 1937: selling marijuana.

In the decades since, Caldwell has become an unlikely poster child for cannabis legalization advocates. His mug shot adorns t-shirts, posters, and coffee cups canonizing Caldwell as “The First Pot POW.” Although Caldwell was undeniably early collateral damage in America’s war on drugs, his story isn’t a straightforward march to marijuana sainthood. In fact, it’s quite messy.

A laborer with an 8th grade education and a lengthy rap sheet, Caldwell was hardly the innocent farmer that his overalls might suggest. He was, in the words of one of his prison evaluations, a “career criminal” and former bootlegger who owned more than just the four pounds of cannabis found in his Lothrop Hotel room on Denver’s Laurence Street. Caldwell also possessed a comically bad sense of timing. According to one of his friends, the 57-year-old Caldwell had only begun selling marijuana a few months before the new federal law kicked in. It was a pure financial play—he never smoked the stuff. Four years earlier, in January 1933, federal agents arrested Caldwell for selling a gallon of contraband whiskey for $5—less than a year before the 21stAmendment overturned Prohibition. Caldwell’s first tour in Leavenworth was for peddling white lightning, not Panama Red.

This much is true: Sam Caldwell was one of the earliest targets of the 1937 Marihuana Stamp Act. But in point of fact, he was not the first.

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Counties grapple with symbols of the Confederacy

After the violence in August in Charlottesville, Va., where one person died during white supremacist rallies protesting the city’s plan to remove a statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee, counties around the country are coming face to face with what to do about symbols of the Confederacy in their own hometowns.

There are more than 1,500 such monuments in public spaces, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center. In all, there are 718 monuments and statues, mostly in the South but scattered across 31 states, as well as 109 public schools named for Confederate war heroes.

In some states, county officials do not have any say over what happens to war memorials due to state laws designed to preserve them. In some states, they do.

A polarizing vote on local control of a 109-year old statue

In Loudoun County, Va., a motion to ask the General Assembly to give local government authority over war memorials was met with a tie vote Sept. 20, with one member abstaining. Twenty residents spoke out on the issue in a meeting that went on past midnight. Some residents are calling for the removal of a statue of a Confederate soldier that stands on the county courthouse grounds there, while others say it should stay. The statue was spray-painted with graffiti Aug. 17.

“I think it should be up to the locality to decide,” said Phyllis Randall, chair of the Loudoun County Board of Supervisors, who introduced the measure that was voted down.

If given local authority, “I’d hope to have an open community dialogue,” she said. “And at the end of that process, then we could decide.”

As for a suggestion by a fellow supervisor that other statues be added to the lawn? That would be up to residents to decide, she said. But Randall, the first African American elected to the Loudoun County Board of Supervisors, said she “personally” would find it offensive to have a statue of a slave next to the statue of a Confederate soldier.

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Worcester County Sheriff’s Office Press Release

On September 27, 2017 members of the Worcester County Criminal Enforcement Team, with assistance from the below listed allied agencies, executed search and seizure warrants at four individual locations in Pocomoke, Worcester County, Maryland. These search and seizure warrants along with the indictments of several individuals from Pocomoke, stems from an undercover cocaine distribution investigation that has transpired over the last three months.

The success of this operation was the result of the combined effort of all the following agencies; Ocean City Police Department Narcotics and Special Enforcement Unit, Maryland State Police Gang Unit East, Maryland State Apprehension Team, Worcester County Sheriff’s Office STAR Team, Worcester County Sheriff’s Office Patrol Division, Worcester County Bureau of Investigation, Homeland Security Investigations, Somerset County Narcotics Task Force, Wicomico County Narcotics Task Force, Pocomoke Police Department, and Worcester County States Attorney’s Office.

Approximately 36 grams of cocaine was recovered, along with 30 grams of marijuana and 1 gram of MDMA. $1,404.00 in US Currency was recovered along with two loaded firearms. During the search of one residence, various items of stolen property were recovered as well. Members of the Worcester County Bureau of Investigation were also on scene and are currently conducting a parallel investigation regarding burglary and thefts.

The following individuals have been arrested or currently wanted on an outstanding indictment.

Arron Brown :    Arrested –          Possession of MDMA
                                                       Distribution of Cocaine 2 Counts
Marvin Handy:  Arrested –          Possession of Cocaine
Wayne Collins:  Arrested –          Possession of Cocaine 
       Possession with intent to Distribute
Laquan Townsend: Arrested –   Possession of Cocaine
                                                                Possession with intent to Distribute Cocaine
                                                                Possession of Marijuana
                                                                Possession with intent to Distribute Marijuana
                                                           Possession of a firearm by prohibited person (2                   Counts)
                                                               
                                                                Possession of short barreled rifle
                                                                Possession of firearm during drug trafficking   

Taking Back Our Community

Salisbury, MD - The opioid crisis has touched the lives of many in our community. Wicomico County officials will host a community opioid forum, “Taking Back Our Community,” to share with residents what is being done about the opioid crisis in Wicomico County. Community members will be given the opportunity to share what they feel needs to be done.

The forum will take place on October 19, 2017 from 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. in the Midway Room of the Wicomico Youth and Civic Center, 500 Glen Ave., Salisbury, MD.

Panel participants include County Executive Bob Culver, Health Officer Lori Brewster, Acting State’s Attorney Ella Disharoon, and Sheriff Mike Lewis.

The public is encouraged to be part of the solution to the opioid situation in Wicomico County by participating in this forum.

School Busses Return to Ocean City Roadways

OCEAN CITY, MD – As summer vacation ends and Worcester County students return to the classroom, the Ocean City Police Department is reminding drivers to be cautious while traveling near school busses.

School busses should be expected on the roadways of Ocean City between 7 a.m. and 8:15 a.m. then again between 2:45 p.m. and 4 p.m. to pick-up and drop-off students. While on Coastal Highway, motorists traveling in the same direction as the school bus must stop when the bus activates flashing red lights. Violators could face a hefty fine and several points on your driver’s license.

The Ocean City Police Department will be conducting enforcement details in reference to school bus safety throughout the school year. Drivers are reminded to slow down and be alert in residential neighborhoods and school zones. Parents should also remind their children to stay on the sidewalk while waiting for the bus and wait for the bus driver’s signal before crossing in front of the bus.

Maryland board waives tuition rule for Amazon employees

ADELPHI, Md. (AP) — To help entice a second Amazon headquarters to Maryland, a state board has voted to waive a 12-month residency requirement to qualify for in-state tuition for any Amazon employees who move to the state, if a new headquarters is established.

The University System of Maryland’s Board of Regents voted to waive the residency rule on Tuesday.

It also would apply to spouses and children of employees at the system’s 12 degree-granting institutions.

Chancellor Robert Caret says the board acted to support Maryland’s economy.

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Republican Attorney General Pam Bondi Moves To Block Paroled Killer OJ From Living in Florida

The lawyer of OJ Simpson has been knocking Florida’s attorney general, with a claim that she might be ‘possibly the stupidest person on the planet,’ after she had gone ahead and tried to reject the former football player from coming into the state. The Attorney General is Pam Bondi, and she had been working to get the Nevada penitentiary from which Simpson was belong held, to prevent him from attempting to become a resident of Florida.

Malcolm Lavergne is Simpsons legal attorney, and came undone during an interview with Tampa Bay Times. He came unglued when he used his profanity laced anger against Bondi:

‘What a complete stupid b—-. F— her.’

Oh yes, there is more:

‘She has zero standing to even talk about Mr. Simpson’s case. She’s the attorney general, she has nothing to do with it. It’s virtually a foregone conclusion that Simpson will be moving to Florida when he chooses and once Nevada approves it. That’s handled by the Nevada Division of Parole and Florida department of corrections, not the attorney general.’

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Partisan Gerrymandering: How Much Is Too Much?

Chief Justice John Roberts warned Tuesday that the Supreme Court's "status and integrity" could be jeopardized if a majority of the justices declare that there is a constitutional limit to partisan gerrymandering. At the same time, the court's four liberal justices warned that failing to act poses a threat to democracy.

With the court apparently split 4-4 along liberal-conservative lines, the man in the middle is Justice Anthony Kennedy, who in a 2004 court opinion left the door open to declaring extreme partisan gerrymandering unconstitutional if "manageable standards" could be developed for identifying which ones are extreme.

Partisan gerrymandering is the practice of drawing legislative and congressional district lines to maximize and perpetuate the power of an incumbent political party.

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OC Elected Officials Talk Tough On ‘Unacceptable’ Weekend Antics

OCEAN CITY — In the wake of arguably the worst motorized special event weekend ever, Ocean City’s elected this week promised bold action and perhaps painful solutions to ensure it doesn’t happen again.

While the official H2O International (H2Oi) car show held for years at Fort Whaley west of Berlin was cancelled two weeks ago, thousands of the enthusiasts came anyway as planned last weekend. To be sure, there was a percentage of attendees that obeyed the town’s laws and ordinances and respected their host community, but many came on a mission of racing up and down the streets, snarling traffic, littering and instigating the Ocean City Police Department (OCPD) officers and their allied partners attempting to maintain some semblance of order. The chaos reached a crescendo on Saturday night when a vehicle intentionally drove into two police officers, forcing the officers to fire their service weapons at the suspects, before the driver was ultimately caught swimming in the bay.

On Monday afternoon, OCPD Chief Ross Buzzuro issued a statement calling the behavior of some of the weekend event’s participants appalling. On Monday night, the Mayor and Council had the opportunity to weigh in echoed the chief’s sentiments. The town’s elected officials for years have struggled with how best to handle the motorized special events so prevalent in the shoulder seasons and the solution has always been an increased police presence with the OCPD and its allied law enforcement agencies from around the region.

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Election Officials Attacked From All Sides on Purging Voter Rolls

Local and state election officials have long faced the difficult task of facilitating one of democracy’s central tenets: figuring out who to take off outdated voter rolls without disenfranchising eligible voters.

Increasingly, though, officials find themselves caught in the middle as competing interest groups from the right and left work — often through the court system — to influence how thousands of local election officials do their jobs.

The latest case, involving Ohio, goes before the Supreme Court this fall. It again pits conservative and liberal advocates against each other but it also promises the possibility of judicial guidance on how to maintain both access and integrity in local voter rolls.

“I can tell you why there are so many lawsuits,” said Gary Bartlett, a former executive director of the North Carolina State Board of Elections and Ethics Enforcement. “It’s because there are a lot of differences of opinion, and groups are trying to get an advantage — whether it’s a political party or association or some nonprofit that thinks they’re doing the Lord’s work.”

The resulting turbulence is costly and frustrating, and it brings about, as several groups of local and state officials point out in a recent filing at the Supreme Court, “a dizzying number of challenges.”

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The Shocking Truth About Government Debt

Dear Reader,

Is the post-recession “recovery” actually a depression obscured by the false prosperity of debt?

A scandalous question… with perhaps a scandalous answer.

Today, we penetrate the “squid ink of official truth”… scatter the statistical fog… and let in an illuminating shaft of light.

Between 2010 and 2016, nominal U.S. GDP expanded an average 2.1% per year.

Some years it expanded more than others. But each year, nominal GDP expanded — officially.

Meantime, the national debt has nearly doubled since 2010. It now floats above $20 trillion.

And the Federal Reserve has nearly quadrupled its balance sheet to nearly $4.5 trillion.

So… how much of the post-recession growth is real… and how much is a debt-spun mirage, a shadow, a phantom?

What would GDP look like absent the artificial stimulus?

Financial advisory firm Baker & Co. Inc. recently hatched a study to answer these questions.

Their findings are illuminating…

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Congressman Attacks "Disloyal" John Kelly For Quashing Possible Trump-Assange Deal

As we reported last week, California Rep. Dana Rohrabacher earlier this year tried to broker a deal between the Trump administration and Wikileaks founder Julian Assange whereby Assange would furnish purportedly conclusive evidence that Russia wasn’t responsible for the DNC leaks in exchange for a presidential pardon.

Well, apparently Trump isn’t an avid reader of the Wall Street Journal (the newspaper that originally reported on the Rohrabacher-Assange deal), because when asked about it over the weekend, he responded that he’d “never heard” of the deal.

That’s not surprising. As WSJ initially reported, Rohrabacher was stymied by Chief of Staff John Kelly when he tried to take the deal to the president. Trump’s chief of staff, who’s efforts to impose “discipline” on the West Wing in part by limiting access to the president have been widely publicized, suggested that Rohrabacher first clear the deal with the intelligence agencies, which, of course, would be a non-starter.

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Convicted killer seeking $1 million after punching lawyer

A convicted killer in New Jersey who punched his attorney in the face in court is accusing sheriff's officers of using excessive force to subdue him.

NJ.com reports that Randy Washington sued this month, claiming a Mercer County sheriff's officer broke his hand when his knee came down on his wrist after he punched the woman in court. He is seeking $1million.

The 36-year-old was sentenced to 70 years in prison in the 2014 killing of Silas Johnson, who had just gotten off a train. He has maintained he's innocent.

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Tribute: 11 Amazing Tom Petty Songs You Have Probably Never Heard

Kids today. The older you get, the more you find yourself starting a sentence with those words — kids today. From me those words do not come from a bitter place, a place about howkids today have it so easy. Actually, I do not think kids todayhave it so easy. There is nothing easy about an Internet that is forever, helicopter moms, pressure from social justice warriors, and a dearth of unpretentious musical icons like Tom Petty.

Tom Petty never told anyone how to feel, he already knew how we felt — especially when it came to wanting, wooing, waiting, having, and losing the girl. Tom Petty never told you what to do, he merely provided the soundtrack to what you did — whether it was having a good time or nursing something a little more serious.

He mercilessly mocked phonies like Spike and whoever that was with the “David Bowie haircut and the platform shoes,” and he also expressed an extraordinary faith in people — most especially women, including American Girls.

Born in Gainesville, Florida, in 1950, Petty always considered himself a Southerner and never stopped using the fantastic Heartbreakers or his lyric to remind us of the little things that make everyday life lyrical — primarily rebellion, a good laugh, rock n’ roll, and those dogged memories of the one who got away.

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Federal judge tells Pennsylvania county to drop the Christian cross from its seal

A federal judge has ordered a Pennsylvania county to remove the cross from its seal, saying it violated the Constitution.

Lehigh Valley County, which is about 40 miles north of Philadelphia, will have to redesign its seal after U.S. District Judge Edward Smith ruled in favor of the plaintiffs, the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF), an organization that promotes separation of church and state and which filed the lawsuit against the county, according to The Morning Call.

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http://www.foxnews.com/us/2017/09/29/federal-judge-tells-pennsylvania-county-to-drop-christian-cross-from-its-seal.html

Weekly Fishing Report: Oct. 4, 2017

The recent cold evenings this week are beginning to have an effect on water temperatures in the Chesapeake Bay and tidal rivers. Bay surface water temperatures are down to about 70 degrees Fahrenheit and the tidal rivers are in the mid to upper 60s.

As a result, the upper bay region striped bass fisheries are starting to see some water temperature-dependent changes in fish behavior.

Spot are still available this week at the Sandy Point area, and also the mouth of the Magothy and Chester rivers but are showing signs of being on the move so this week may be your last chance to fill a dockside pen with some live spot to take you through the next week or so for your live lining trips.

If you do, make sure to wire your lid down to protect your spot from a four legged bandit — river otters are very skilled at slipping in and out of lids held down with bungee cord! 

Coverup? FBI, DOJ Refuse To Comply With Congressional "Trump Dossier" Subpoena

In what looks like a naked coverup meant to obscure the fact that the Department of Justice's decision to launch a criminal investigation into possible Russia-Trump collusion was based on a lie, Reuters reports that the DOJ and FBI are resisting a Congressional subpoena from to turn over documents that would reveal details about how the infamous "Trump dossier" factored into their decision to launch said investigation.

Despite receiving the subpoena from US Intel Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, the FBI is steadfastly refusing to turn over the documents because the agency says they would purportedly compromise an ongoing criminal investigation (the FBI’s investigation into Mueller). More likely, the agency’s intransigence stems from fears that the one Russia collusion narrative that Democrats have actively worked to suppress could come back to haunt them.

The U.S. House of Representatives Intelligence Committee issued subpoenas in August seeking “any and all documents” about both agencies’ dealings with former MI6 officer Christopher Steele, according to a letter seen byReuters from committee chairman Devin Nunes, a Trump supporter.

Steele compiled the so-called Trump dossier, which Trump was told by FBI director James Comey contained salacious material about the businessman-turned president. Trump and his associates have said the dossier’s contents were false.

As we noted earlier this month when the subpoenas were first filed, the now-infamous Trump dossier was provided to the FBI even though it contained knowingly inaccurate allegations. Russia-born financier and Putin opponent Bill Browder revealed as much during an explosive piece of testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee over the summer that was multilaterally ignored by the media, when he claimed that the document was indirectly financed by a “senior Russian government official.”

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Puerto Rico situation becomes political versus humanitarian

Those ill winds blowing out of the Caribbean are blowing somebody good, or at least there’s somebody who thinks they’re good. There’s always profit in somebody else’s misery.

Some Democrats in Washington see opportunities to make hay with Puerto Ricans who would settle for a drink of clean water and something to eat. Hurricane Maria, now safely out to sea, has so ruined the island that many Puerto Ricans are encouraged to resettle in Florida, a swing state with the partisan numbers so narrow that only a few more of them could swing it permanently to the left and to the Democrats.

Republicans see opportunities, too. Puerto Ricans, usually Roman Catholic and socially conservative (male brides, however lovely, and orange blossoms make an uninviting mix) have only a superficial attachment to the party of anything goes, as long as it goes to the weird and noisy.

Democrats relish the arrival of younger than usual imports. These are not immigrants, but settlers as American as Texans, Californians or Pennsylvanians, American citizens by a 1917 act of Congress. They can’t vote in federal elections and they have no representation in Congress, but once here all they have to do to vote is to register in their new states. If Puerto Rico can’t have statehood, it can move Puerto Rico to the mainland. Over the past five years Puerto Rico has lost 7 percent of its population of 3.4 million.

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Jim Kunstler's Solution To Uniting American Citizens - Overturn 'Citizens United'

Poor old Karl Marx, tortured by boils and phantoms, was right about one thing: History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce.

Thus, I give you the Roman Empire and now the United States of America. Rome surrendered to time and entropy. Our method is to drive a gigantic clown car into a ditch.

Is anyone out there interested in redemption?

I have an idea for the political party out of power, the Democrats, sunk in its special Okefenokee Swamp of identity politics and Russia paranoia: make an effort to legislate the Citizens United calamity out of existence.

Who knows, a handful of Republicans may be shamed into going along with it.

For those of you who have been mentally vacationing on Mars with Elon Musk, Citizens United was a Supreme Court decision — Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission 558 U.S. 310 (2010) — which determined that corporations had the right, as hypothetical “persons,” to give as much money as they liked to political candidates.

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House committee approves $10 billion to fund border wall

The House Homeland Security Committee passed legislation Wednesday that would provide $10 billion toward President Trump's wall on the U.S.-Mexico border, a step toward possible consideration on the House floor.

The committee passed Wednesday afternoon in a party-line vote, after dismissing all Democratic amendments.

The committee vote is a significant step toward implementing President Trump's goal of building a border wall, which otherwise has been stalled. Trump himself agreed to delay money for the wall last month in order to quickly resolve a fight over raising the debt ceiling and extending federal spending for the first few months of the new fiscal year.

It's still not clear when or whether House Republicans will bring the bill to the floor. However, House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy said last week that Trump was receptive to the idea of including some form of border security in a bill creating a program to protect immigrants who were brought to the U.S. as children.

Committee Chairman Michael McCaul, R-Texas, introduced the bill in July, and it has more than 70 Republican co-sponsors, but no Democratic support.

McCaul's committee on Wednesday rejected every Democratic amendment before voting to approve the bill.

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Vietnam Shows How To Clean Up The Banking System: Ex-Banker Sentenced To Death For Fraud

The lack of prosecution of US bankers responsible for the great financial crisis has been a much debated topic over the years, leading to the coinage of such terms as "Too Big To Prosecute", the termination of at least one corrupt DOJ official, the revelation that Eric Holder is the most useless Attorney General in history, and of course billions in cash kickbacks between Wall Street and D.C. And, naturally, the lack of incentives that punish cheating and fraud, is one of the main reasons why such fraud will not only continue but get bigger until once again, the entire system crashes under the weight of accumulated theft, corruption and Fed-driven malinvestment. But what can be done? In this case, Vietnam may have just shown the way - sentence embezzling bankers to death. Because if one wants to promptly stop an end to all financial crime, few things motivate as efficiently as a firing squad.

According to the BBC, the former head of a major Vietnamese bank has been sentenced to death for his role in a fraud case involving some 800 billion dong (which sounds like a lot of dong, but equals roughly $35 million) of illegal loans. Nguyen Xuan Son, who served as general director of OceanBank, was convicted of embezzlement, abuse of power and economic mismanagement. Bank founder, tycoon Ha Van Tham, and dozens of other banking officials are also on trial, accused of lending violations.

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Most Mass Shootings Linked to SSRIs, But MSM Ignores in Vegas Coverage

Virtually every mass shooter was on psychiatric drugs, a compelling fact the mainstream media – which is funded by Big Pharma ad revenue – is ignoring while covering the Las Vegas shooting.

But it’s a fact worth investigating: the suspect, 64-year-old Stephen Paddock, was “a normal guy who must have snapped,” according to his brother – and his father was described as a “psychopath” who was once on the FBI’s most-wanted list.

So the suspect just “snapped.” Now where have we heard this before? This is the default description given by nearly every friend or relative of a mass shooter.

Why is that? Because most mass shooters were on anti-depressants which contributed to the “snapping.”

“SSRIs, or selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, are the pharmaceutical companies latest cash cows,” wrote Dr. Moira Dolan. “Their use has skyrocketed in the last 10 years.”

“Nicknamed ‘Chemical Babysitters’ and designated anti-depressants, they are causing dozens of murders, thousands of psychoses and are altering the minds of millions of users.”

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Chuck Schumer: During Our Negotiations Trump Said ‘OK, We Won’t Do the Wall’

This week on the “Pod Save America” podcast, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) detailed the debt ceiling and Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) policy negotiations he had with House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and President Donald Trump earlier in the month.

Schumer said, “On DREAMers, he said, you know, that he understood that they didn’t come in through any fault of their own, that they’re good Americans, good kids. And then he said he wants the wall in return. And we said ‘No. No wall, Mr. President.’ And he tried that for about 15 minutes, but he’s not going to push me around verbally or any other way.”

He added, “And he finally said, “OK, we won’t do the wall. We’ll do some other kind of border security.”

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Antidepressants Are a Prescription for Mass Shootings

Before the late nineteen eighties, mass shootings and acts of senseless violence were relatively unheard of. Prozac, the most well known SSRI (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor) antidepressant, was not yet on the market. When Prozac did arrive, it was marketed as a panacea for depression which resulted in huge profits for its manufacturer Eli Lilly. Of course other drug companies had to create their own cash cow and followed suit by marketing their own SSRI antidepressants.

Subsequently, mass shootings and other violent incidents started to be reported. More often than not, the common denominator was that the shooters were on an antidepressant, or withdrawing from one. This is not about an isolated incident or two but numerous shootings. The question is, during the past twenty years is the use of antidepressants here a coincidence or a causation?

There have been too many mass shootings for it just to be a coincidence. Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold killed twelve students and a teacher at Columbine High School. Eric was on Luvox, an antidepressant. The Virginia Tech shooter killed thirty-two people and he was on an antidepressant. While withdrawing from Prozac, Kip Kinkel murdered his mother and stepmother. He then shot twenty-two classmates and killed two. Jason Hoffman wounded five at his high school while he was on Effexor, also an antidepressant. James Holmes opened fire in a Colorado movie theater this past summer and killed twelve people and wounded fifty-eight. He was under the care of a psychiatrist but no information has been released as to what drug he must have been on.

Psychiatrists generally will tell you that these people were mentally ill and they weren’t treated in time or didn’t get enough help to prevent the tragedy. However, Dr. Peter Breggin, who is a psychiatrist, stated that depression rarely leads to violence and that it’s only since the SSRI’s came on the market that such mass shootings have taken place.

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Swiss Parliament Votes to Ban Foreign-Funded Mosques and Arabic Preaching

Switzerland’s legislature has voted to ban the foreign funding of mosques, including from Saudi Arabia, as well as to force mosques to use local languages instead of Arabic or other foreign tongues.

The Swiss National Council, the parliament’s lower house, voted by a narrow majority to ban the financing of mosques from abroad and for generally increasing the transparency of how mosques are funded.

If the law passes the Senate, individual mosques will need to declare who they are backed by as well as preach in one of Switzerland’s official languages, namely German, French, Italian, or Romansch, Neue Zuercher Zeitung reports.

The vote took place on Tuesday, and according to the Federal Assembly’s website, 94 members of the parliament voted in favour, and 89 voted against.

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Every Mass Shooting Shares One Thing In Common & It’s NOT Weapons

Nearly every mass shooting incident in the last twenty years, and multiple other instances of suicide and isolated shootings all share one thing in common, and its not the weapons used.

The overwhelming evidence points to the signal largest common factor in all of these incidents is the fact that all of the perpetrators were either actively taking powerful psychotropic drugs or had been at some point in the immediate past before they committed their crimes.

Multiple credible scientific studies going back more than a decade, as well as internal documents from certain pharmaceutical companies that suppressed the information show that SSRI drugs ( Selective Serotonin Re-Uptake Inhibitors ) have well known, but unreported side effects, including but not limited to suicide and other violent behavior. One need only Google relevant key words or phrases to see for themselves. www.ssristories.com is one popular site that has documented over 4500 “ Mainstream Media “ reported cases from around the World of aberrant or violent behavior by those taking these powerful drugs.

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What do you remember about this popular spot in Delmar?

The Delmar Drive-In opened April 8, 1950 with Robert Young in “Relentless”. This single screen drive-in had a capacity for 750 cars. The Delmar Drive-In closed around 1985. (Cinema Treasures)

Hannity Beats Maddow in First Week at 9 P.M. Hour

In Sean Hannity's first week battling Rachel Maddow in the 9 p.m. time slot, Fox News' Hannity beat MSNBC's Maddow in both overall viewers and in the key 25-54 age demographic.

On Tuesday, MSNBC announced "The Rachel Maddow Show" had finished the preceding quarter as the top cable news program overall and in the 25-54 demographic, Politico reported.

Fox's decision to move Hannity up an hour from 10 p.m. is part of an effort to counter MSNBC's ratings surge since the election of President Donald Trump.

During the first week of the face off, the Fox News host averaged 3,498,000 viewers from Monday through Thursday, while Maddow averaged 2,649,000.

In the key segment, Hannity beat Maddow 713,000 viewers to 599,000.

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Speaker Ryan and Congressman Harris to Tour Eastern Shore Manufacturer

WASHINGTON, DC: On Thursday, October 5, House Speaker Paul Ryan (WI-01) and Congressman Andy Harris (MD-01) will visit Dixon Valve & Coupling Company as part of the speaker’s tax reform tour. The visit will include a tour of the factory, an employee Q&A, and a press conference. Portions of the factory tour, the employee Q&A, and the press conference are open to credentialed members of the media.

“It is a pleasure to welcome Speaker Ryan to Maryland’s First Congressional District. Our district is rich with industry and agriculture, and our small businesses and family-owned farms will flourish under Congress’ new tax reform framework,” Congressman Harris stated. “Our nation’s tax code has not seen major reform since 1986, and this framework will bring long-overdue financial relief to families and to small businesses that create jobs in America.”

Thursday, October 5, 2017 at 2:00 PM
Dixon Valve & Coupling Company
800 High Street, Chestertown, MD 21620

DOJ Files Lawsuit Accusing Company of Discriminating Against American Workers

Sessions: 'Where there is a job available, U.S. workers should have a chance at it before we bring in workers from abroad'

The Department of Justice has filed a lawsuit accusing an agricultural company of discrimination for refusing to hire American citizens for seasonal positions.

John G. Gore, acting assistant attorney general in the Civil Rights Division, filed the lawsuit on Thursday. The lawsuit claims Crop Production Services Inc., a company based in Loveland, Colo., violated the Immigration and Nationality Act.

The complaint states that Crop Production Services discriminated against three Americans, Ramiro Torres, Ramiro Salinas, and Javier Salinas, "based on their citizenship status."

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Hospital Ship USNS Comfort Heading to Puerto Rico

The Military Sealift Command hospital ship USNS Comfort has left port in Norfolk, Va. and is heading to Puerto Rico to help with hurricane relief efforts on the island.

The U.S. Navy vessel and its medical teams will serve as an offshore hospital for people in need of care in hurricane-ravaged Puerto Rico, which is working to recover in the wake of Hurricane Maria. USNS Comfort will be on scene for at least 30 days or until ordered to return home with its approximately 800 crew and medical staff.

Comfort can provide virtually any form of medical care necessary. It takes a few days to get the ship ready for sea once it is ordered into action. Once the ship arrives in Puerto Rico, patients will be ferried to it by sea or by helicopter.

The ship is not a commissioned naval vessel, but is owned by the Navy and run by mostly Navy medical personnel.

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Fed-up Illinois homeowners consider moving: 'It’s not just the property taxes on my home; it’s all of them'

Even after watching Hurricane Irma wreak havoc on Florida, Rik Mallin is sticking to his plan.

Mallin is fixing up his Villa Park home so that he can sell it, move to the Florida Panhandle and escape Illinois’ rising taxes.

“I’m getting out,” said Mallin, 67. “It’s not just the property taxes on my home; it’s all of them.” He figures his taxes in Florida, where there is no personal income tax, will be about a quarter of what he’s paying now.

Mallin’s not the only one leaving the state. In 2016, Illinois lost 37,508 people, putting the state’s population at its lowest level in nearly a decade, according to U.S. census data. It was the third consecutive year the state lost more residents than any other state. The state’s population count for 2017 won’t be released until December.

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Menendez has set a new low for blatant corruption in the US

The bribery trial of senior New Jersey Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez has it all.

Menendez is facing charges that he sold his US Senate office to a Palm Beach, Fla., eye doctor, his co-defendant Salomon Melgen, for bribes in the form of private jets stocked with Menendez’s favorite beverages, a private villa at one of the lushest resorts in the Caribbean, and a Paris hotel suite for which Melgen spent 650,000 American Express points.

The two men met in 1993 when Melgen contributed $500 to Menendez’s first House re-election campaign at a South Florida fundraiser — his first political contribution. In the decades since, Melgen became a major high-dollar Democratic donor, and when Menendez was appointed to the Senate in 2006, they already had an extraordinarily close relationship.

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Our Situation Report

By Anna Von Reitz 

Truly understanding where we are requires a knowledge of where we have been in the past--- and that is not easy to come by, both because the facts have been obscured by guilty parties and because most people have not been motivated to learn. 

So that we can hit the highlights and get up to speed in the present---- 

Part I -- We Begin 

1. The government of this country is vested in its people. "People" means "militia" in Hebrew. There is no doubt that the Founders meant for the government to be created and controlled by the same militia men who defended the country then and who defend it now. 

2. The actual government is an unincorporated business known as a Body Politic. 

3. The name given to this Body Politic on September 9, 1776, was: The United States of America. 

4. This is a totally unique unincorporated entity and we hold its Declaration of Independence and its Letters Patent and its sacred name under Common Law Copyright in perpetuity. 

5. The United States of America is not a sovereign nation. It is a consortium known as a "union" of sovereign nations. 

6. Thus, when you look at this country, what you are actually seeing are fifty smaller countries, each with their own history, their own geographic boundaries, and their own natural government. In America the words "state" and "nation" are interchangeable. Thus, the "interstate commerce clause" can also be read as the "international commerce clause" and "Ohio State Bank" can also be read "Ohio National Bank". 

7. For their mutual benefit, these independent small countries banded together and formed the union called The United States of America and they delegated their international jurisdiction (also known as "territorial jurisdiction"), both on the land (organized as Federal Postal Districts) and on the sea (organized as US Districts) to it. 

8. The unincorporated union of sovereign states called "The United States of America" holds and exercises all their combined international "powers". 

9. The United States of America then delegated nineteen of these international powers to the British-backed United States organization, lodged in the District of Columbia. 

10. Neither of these organizations were incorporated originally. Each had its own population and its own geographical territory. This was the practical result of The Definitive Treaty of Peace 1783, which describes the two populations as "the free, sovereign and independent people of the United States"

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The Mother of All Fake News

How a windowless room in the basement of the Capitol was set up to look like a fake congressional hearing.

Watchers of Ukraine’s NewsOne television channel on September 25 were treated to what was suggested to be a congressional hearing in Washington about corruption in the National Bank of Ukraine (the NBU), which is the Ukrainian equivalent of the Federal Reserve Board.

The event, which took place in the basement of the U.S. Capitol, Room HC 8, wasbilled by the Ukrainian television channel as a meeting of the “US Congressional Committee on Financial Issues.” NewsOne teased it this way:

The highest levels of corruption in the NBU are known by the US Congressional Committee on Financial Issues.

Only thanks to the systematic work of the team that collected evidence of corruptions of the most important officials of the National Bank, the strongest of the world will find out about it.

Shocking details and resonant details—live streaming on NewsOne! Turn on at 21:00—live from Washington DC

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David Stockman: Tax reform plan is pipe dream, stocks to plunge 40-70%

David Stockman is warning about the Trump administration's tax overhaul plan, Federal Reserve policy, saying they could play into a severe stock market sell-off.

Stockman, the Reagan administration's director of the Office of Management and Budget, isn't stepping away from his thesis that the 8½-year-old rally is in serious danger.

"There is a correction every seven to eight years, and they tend to be anywhere from 40 to 70 percent," Stockman said recently on CNBC's "Futures Now." "If you have to work for a living, get out of the casino because it's a dangerous place."

He's made similar calls, but they haven't materialized. In June, Stockman told CNBC the S&P 500 could easily fall to 1,600, which at the time represented a 34 percent drop. This week, the index was trading at record levels above 2,500.

Stockman puts a big portion of the blame on the Federal Reserve, and its ultra-loose monetary policy.

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Alan Dershowitz: “I’m going to sue Berkeley if they don’t allow me to speak”

On Thursday morning, Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz told Fox News that he would sue the University of California, Berkeley if they restrict his First Amendment right to free speech.

“I’m going to sue Berkeley if they don’t allow me to speak,” Dershowitz said.

Dershowitz told Fox News that he had been invited to speak at UC Berkeley, but the university administrators told him due to his “high profile” status he would have to wait at least eight weeks. The loophole, Dershowitz said, is that if a department of the university rather than an on-campus organization invites a “high-profile” speaker, the guest gets to bypass the eight-week delay.

“Departments invite anti-Israel speakers all the time so they don’t have to go through the eight-week thing, but they don’t invite pro-Israel speakers,” Dershowitz told Fox News.

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