Former WBOC Meteorologist Dennis Ketterer Submits 4 Page Statement To FBI On Extramarital Affair With Julie Swetnick

Witnesses supporting and doubting Julie Swetnick's allegations against Brett Kavanaugh submit statements to the Judiciary Committee as the FBI investigation is rumored to be wrapping up

Two witnesses have submitted sworn statements regarding Julie Swetnick's allegations against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh and his friend Mark Judge as the FBI supplemental background investigation into Kavanaugh is reported to be drawing to a close.

Dennis Ketterer, a former weeknight meteorologist for Channel 7 in Washington DC, submitted a 4-page statement to the Senate Judiciary Committee stating he had an extramarital affair with Swetnick in the early 1990s, and did not find her allegations against Kavanaugh and Judge to be credible based on his experience with her.

"Julie told me that she...tried sex with multiple guys in high school and still liked it from time-to-time," he said. "Julie never said anything about being sexually assaulted, gang raped, or having sex against her will. She never mentioned Brett Kavanaugh in any capacity."

Ketterer, who won an Emmy award for his reporting in 1995, said while he was watching Kavanaugh's testimony on Thursday and "saw Mrs. Kavanaugh looking so sad, I felt she needed to know in this instance, her husband was being mischaracterized...based on my direct experience with Julie, I do not believe her allegations."

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Garris: Public School Teachers Are Not Underpaid

It seems like the media will never stop promoting the myth that public school teachers are “underpaid.” The most recent example is the front-page story in Time, “This Is What It’s Like to Be a Teacher in America.”

Time tells of a woman who makes $55,000 per year teaching but works two other jobs in order to “pay the bills.” The article includes complaints about a teacher making almost $70,000 per year and even suggests that sexism is partly to blame for deficient pay because there are more women teachers than men.

It is no surprise that the media promotes these sorts of stories. They want public elementary and secondary school teachers to make more money. Unfortunately, it is probably not for the reason they want us to think. For if the media cared about teachers as a class, they would also advocate for private school teachers (who make far less than public school teachers on average). There is something about public education that concerns them.

The likely explanation for why the media constantly tell us that public school teachers should be paid more is that teachers unions and the media are political allies. It is no secret that the teachers unions have strong ties to the Democratic Party . And the mainstream media, including publications like Time, leans to the political left.

What About Private School Teachers?

Of course, the media can successfully push for greater pay for public school teachers because they are paid through taxation, while private school teacher pay is dictated by consumer demands. This is the difference between taxation and voluntary exchange. The amount of money raised by taxation can be almost unlimited regardless of the utility provided, while the government’s subsequent expenditure is arbitrary in both quality and quantity, without any connection to consumer valuation.

This is the great irony of the claim that public school teachers are underpaid. By socializing education, state governments have removed the very market forces that determine wages. So there is no way to measure what a teacher actually 'should' be paid.

There are private schools in America, but these schools are an imperfect measure of teacher pay because the government’s quasi-monopoly on education decreases demand for private education. Parents are much less likely to pay for private schools when “free” public schools are readily available. Those who send their children to private schools effectively pay double tuition, as they must continue to pay property taxes for public schools that they do not use.

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Who's protecting Georgetown prof who wants to castrate white GOP Senators and feed them to pigs?

Georgetown University's provost's distinguished associate professor in the Security Studies Program at its Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, Christine Fair, is at it again, standing out.

Here's her latest tweet regarding the Senate hearings of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, since deleted:

So far, so typical – just another crazy lefty non-full professor popping off? She certainly has a violent orientation, rather like the Muslim societies she purports to be an expert on on her Georgetown bio page, where, curiously, she is listed as Carol C. Fair. I do not know if that was a recent change in a bid to avoid Google keywords or some secretary's typo or what. But notice the Islamic flavor of that sort of fantasy described in the tweet. And notice how she doesn't seem to ever get into any trouble for it. She's not your ordinary crazy left-wing loony professor.

Now, usually, the loony-left professors we see at this game are wretchedly marginal in the university world, total losers from the womyn's studies programs and other zero-value academic programs of political correctness, and usually, they get forced into resigning after their stupidities get out. Think Melissa Click at Mizzou, or George Ciccariello-Maher at Drexel University, or Michael Isaacson at John Jay University. We usually don't see this kind of wild raving lunacy from the distinguished professors, although they are just as left-wing.

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Blasey Ford's Kavinaugh Testimony Unravels After Ex-Boyfriend Refutes Key Claims

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) fired off an intriguing letter to Christine Blasey Ford's attorneys on Tuesday, requesting several pieces of evidence related to her testimony - including all materials from the polygraph test she took, after her ex-boyfriend of six years refuted statements she made under oath last week.

Grassley writes: "The full details of Dr. Ford's polygraph are particularly important because the Senate Judiciary Committee has received a sworn statement from a longtime boyfriend of Dr. Ford's, stating that he personally witnessed Dr. Ford coaching a friend on polygraph examinations. When asked under oath in the hearing whether she'd ever given any tips or advice to someone who was planning on taking a polygraph, Dr. Ford replied, "Never." This statement raises specific concerns about the reliability of her polygraph examination results."

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NBC Airs Interviews With Julie Swetnick Without Corroborating Her Story

NBC News aired an interview with a woman who said she saw Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh at as many as 10 teen parties where young women were drugged and gang-raped, although the network was unable to corroborate her account.

“This morning, [Julie] Swetnick provided four names of friends she says went to the parties with him,” NBC News correspondent and weekend anchor Kate Snow said at the end of her interview Monday with Swetnick.

“One of them says he does not recall a Julie Swetnick. Another of the friends she named is deceased,” Snow said. “We reached out to the other two and haven’t heard back. Swetnick says after the alleged attack on her when she was 19, she never returned to those big house parties.”

Kavanaugh has called Swetnick’s allegations a “joke” and a “farce.”

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Democrats Wanted FBI Investigation on Kavanaugh but Now It's Not Good Enough

Top Democrats repeatedly called for an FBI investigation into the sexual misconduct allegations leveled against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh in recent weeks, but shortly after they got their way, they were already criticizing it.

The White House bowed to pressure from Sen. Jeff Flake (R., Ariz.) on Friday and ordered a limited FBI probe to last up to one week before getting a final confirmation vote, after weeks of Democratic demands for such an investigation.

Sen. Mazie Hirono (D., Hawaii) had joined Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D., N.Y.) in wondering what Kavanaugh had to hide by not wanting an FBI probe, but Hirono said the limited scope of the probe was a "farce" on Sunday in an interview with ABC.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D., Conn.) said the FBI was hamstrung by a "tight" and "arbitrary" deadline. Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D., Minn.) fretted on Sunday about the White House "micromanaging" the process, even though she previously said you could "do a lot" in "one week" with the FBI investigating. Blumenthal earlier said the FBI was an organization of "consummate skill and integrity" that "will follow the facts."

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Coincidence?

Bill Tanner Jr.
September 24 ·

Senator Feinstein’s husband Richard Blum has served the university of Palo Alto as a member of the University of California Board of Regents since 2002. Kinda ironic that Christine Blasey Ford is a psychology professor at Palo Alto.

Ernst: Support of Kavanaugh Says ‘That We Are Innocent Until Proven Guilty in This Great Country’

“What message that sends to women in America is that we are innocent until proven guilty in this great country. And I have absolutely no doubt after reviewing Dr. Ford's testimony that she has suffered from something very traumatic in her lifetime.” -- @SenJoniErnst pic.twitter.com/7htHj5JgTD
— CBS This Morning (@CBSThisMorning) October 2, 2018

Tuesday, Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA) said her support of Supreme Court justice nominee Brett Kavanaugh amid sexual misconduct accusations sent a message to women in the United States that Americans are innocent until proven guilty.

Ernst made it known on “CBS This Morning” that she will continue to support Judge Kavanaugh unless his accuser, Dr. Christine Blasey Ford, has her allegations corroborated.

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Nolte: Gallup Hides Big News that Hillary Clinton’s Favorability Just Hit Record Low

Hillary Clinton’s favorability rating hit a record low of 36 percent, Gallup reluctantly reports — even though the polling firm has measured Clinton’s favorability going all the way back to 1992.

Gallup’s laughable attempt to bury this bad news for Madam Hillary can be found in its ridiculously generic headline: “Hillary Clinton’s Favorable Rating Still Low.”

Obviously, that is not the news in this poll; the news is that Hillary has hit a record low.

Gallup’s sub-headlines also bury the lede. The first reads, “Hillary Clinton’s favorable rating at 36%.”

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Why Leftists Feel Entitled to Block Highways, Shut Down Speakers, and Harass Public Officials

When I was in graduate school, I learned a lot about the left.

One lesson was that while most liberals and conservatives abide by society’s rules of order and decency, most leftists do not feel bound to live by these same rules.

I watched the way leftist Vietnam War protesters treated fellow students and professors. I watched left-wing students make “nonnegotiable demands” of college administrations. I saw the Black Panthers engage in violence—including torture and murder—and be financially rewarded by leftists.

Today, we watch leftist mobs scream profanities at professors and deans, and shut down conservative and pro-Israel speakers at colleges. We routinely witness left-wing protesters block highways and bridges, scream in front of the homes of conservative business and political leaders, and surround conservatives’ tables at restaurants while shouting and chanting at them.

Conservatives don’t do these things. They don’t close highways, yell obscenities at left-wing politicians, work to ban left-wing speakers at colleges, smash the windows of businesses, etc.

Why do leftists feel entitled do all these things?

Democrats Don't Always Believe Democrat Women

“An allegation standing alone is not necessarily sufficient to conclude that conduct occurred,” stated Susan Ellingstad, the attorney hired by the Minnesota Democrat Party to investigate the allegations of domestic violence against DNC Deputy Chairman and Rep. Keith Ellison. Recall back in early August, Ellison’s ex-girlfriend and leftist activist Karen Monahan accused him of physically and emotionally abusing her. Ellison, who is currently running for Minnesota attorney general, welcomed Ellingstad’s findings from what he termed an “impartial” investigation.

Ellison’s opponent, Republican Rep. Doug Wardlow, quickly blasted the notion that the Democrats’ in-house investigation was “impartial,” asserting, “As predicted, the sham ‘investigation’ led by the DFL (Democrat-Farmer-Labor) party attorney’s legal partner has concluded in favor of the party’s Attorney General candidate. But the publicly available evidence contradicts that conclusion.”

University of Minnesota political science professor Larry Jacobs echoed Wardlow’s sentiments, stating, “I don’t know why anyone would be surprised by that. The Democrat Party hires lawyers close to the Democratic Party to investigate a sensitive candidate, and they come back saying ‘not enough here.’ I don’t think that was surprising.”

Meanwhile, Democrats and their cohorts in the mainstream media continue to parrot completely unsubstantiated and uncorroborated allegations against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh as justification for assuming his guilt.

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House GOP Passes Tax Reform 2.0

With everyone’s attention seemingly focused on the circus surrounding Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation, GOP House members were busy passing Tax Reform 2.0. On Friday, House Republicans, joined by three Democrats, passed the bill by a vote of 220-191. The legislation, should it pass the Senate (which will be a tall order), makes permanent the tax cuts established by last year’s Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.

As usual, Democrats came out complaining that the legislation favored the rich. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) lamented, “The GOP’s priorities have been laid bare. How can we milk the public, exploit the taxpayer by adding to the wealth of the wealthiest 1%?”

Ironically, it has been Democrats who are most guilty in seeking to carve out tax breaks for the wealthy.

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5 South Carolina police officers shot; suspect in custody

FLORENCE, S.C. (WPDE) - Three Florence County deputies and two Florence city officers were shot in an incident in the Vintage Place subdivision off Hoffmeyer Road in Florence, according to the Florence County Sheriff's Office.

Information on their conditions was not immediately available.
 
According to the Florence County Emergency Management Department, the active shooting situation is now over and the suspect is in custody. It is asking everyone to stay away from Vintage Place, as there is still an active crime investigation in progress.

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Pakistan Slashes Chinese Belt and Road Project by $2 Billion as Debt Fears Mount

Officials in Pakistan announced on Monday that China’s massive Belt and Road railway project will see its $8.2 billion budget slashed by $2 billion as concerns over Pakistan’s debts to China mount under new Prime Minister Imran Khan.

The railway project was conceived as a modern upgrade to the antique railroads running between Karachi and Peshawar, financed by loans from China under the umbrella of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), which is the Pakistani component of China’s effort to rebuild the fabled Silk Road trade route from centuries ago.

Khan’s administration quickly grew much more nervous about borrowing huge sums from China than his predecessor.

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Democrats Fight Trump to Preserve Cartels’ Migrant-Smuggling Business

Democrats have drafted a bill to preserve the cartel-operated smuggling business which has been used to deliver 180,000 Central American children and working-age youths to migrant parents and their employers in the United States.

The bill comes as President Donald Trump has begun shutting down the “Unaccompanied Alien Child” smuggling route by identifying and arresting the resident illegals who try to pick up — or “sponsor” — their smuggled migrant children or young workers.

The UAC children and youths are delivered by cartel-approved coyotes to the border patrol, which then must send the UACs to the shelters operated by the Department of Health and Human Services. In turn, since 2010, the HHS has fulfilled the coyotes’ smuggling contracts by delivering the UACs to their illegal-migrant parents, relatives or employers throughout the United States.

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Candace Owens: ‘Liberals Believe’ that Blacks ‘Are Their Slaves

Turning Point USA spokesperson Candace Owens said leftists feel a sense of ownership over blacks, offering her remarks in a Tuesday interview with Breitbart News Editor-in-Chief Alex Marlow on SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Daily.

Owens highlighted actor Chris Evans’ denigration of West as illustrative of how “white liberals” view blacks as their political property, echoing comments she shared Monday via Twitter:

Nothing pisses white liberals off more than finding out that “their blacks” refuse to behave the way they want them to.

Both @LanaDelRey and @ChrisEvans reacted poorly when they learned Kanye wasn’t their property. https://t.co/hcZxXdEH8d

— Candace Owens (@RealCandaceO) October 1, 2018

By the way, @ChrisEvans— since you seem to suggest that black people who don’t agree with you are “stupid”, I openly challenge you to a debate. @Politicon is in a couple of weeks.
Why don’t you put your racist sentiments on full display and debate a black conservative? https://t.co/hcZxXdEH8d

— Candace Owens (@RealCandaceO) October 1, 2018

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Kavanaugh Drank Beer?

While liberals express outrage over the fact that Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh drank beer -- reportedly sometimes to excess -- in high school and college, they and the leftist media have largely ignored the extensive partying of former President Barack Obama, who has confessed to heavy pot smoking and cocaine use in high school and college.

Given the drinking limits being set retroactively for Kavanaugh by his leftist critics and arguments therefrom that he is not suited for the high court, it is reasonable to conclude that Barack Obama's extensive illegal drug use would preclude him from a seat on the Supreme Court, or on any federal bench.

From Dreams From My Father by Barack Obama:

“I [Obama] blew a few smoke rings, remembering those years [in high school]. Pot had helped, and booze; maybe a little blow [cocaine] when you could afford it. Not smack, though – Micky, my potential initiator, had been just a little too eager for me to go through with that…. He had pulled out the needle and the tubing, and I’d looked at him standing there, surrounded by big slabs of salami and roast beef, and right then an image popped into my head of an air bubble, shiny and round like a pearl, rolling quietly through a vein and stopping my heart."

“Junkie. Pothead. That’s where I’d been headed: the final, fatal role of the young would-be black man. "

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GOP Senator: Criminal Referral Should Be Sent for Swetnick’s ‘Apparently False Affidavit’

Sen. Bill Cassidy (R., La.) tweeted on Tuesday that a "criminal referral should be sent to the FBI" after Julie Swetnick backtracked on some allegations she levied against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh in a sworn statement.

Swetnick's attorney, Michael Avenatti, provided the Senate with her sworn statement in which she alleged Kavanaugh was complicit in "gang rape" parties in the 1980s. Swetnick, however, appeared to backtrack on some of her initial claims in an interview with NBC on Monday night.

"A criminal referral should be sent to the FBI/DOJ regarding the apparently false affidavit signed by Julie Swetnick that was submitted to the Senate by @MichaelAvenatti," Cassidy tweeted.

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FBI’s Previous Probes Would Have Looked Into Kavanaugh’s Drinking

Previous FBI background checks should have determined whether Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh had a substance abuse problem, former Attorney General Michael Mukasey told reporters Tuesday.

Senate Democrats initially called for an FBI investigation into allegations of sexual misconduct by Kavanaugh. After that update of six previous background investigations commenced, however, many of the same senators insisted it be expanded to look into Kavanaugh’s drinking habits.

“Background investigations generally determine the suitability of a nominee for public office and inquire into several subjects that includes questions about substance abuse and other relevant matters,” Mukasey said in a conference call with reporters.

The current probe is the seventh FBI background investigation on Kavanaugh since 1993, conducted for various federal jobs, including working for President George W. Bush’s White House and serving on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals since 2006.

More than likely, if Kavanaugh had a drinking problem, as some have charged in recent weeks, it would have emerged by now, Gregg Nunziata, former chief nominations counsel to the Senate Judiciary Committee, said.

“There have been half a dozen FBI investigations,” Nunziata said on the press call. “This is a standard question for every witness. Questions about alcohol and substance abuse would have been asked of hundreds of people who know the judge.”

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Obama's Anti-Discipline Policies Set Our Students Up for Failure

President Barack Obama’s first education secretary, Arne Duncan, gave a speech on the 45th anniversary of “Bloody Sunday” at the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, where, in 1965, state troopers beat and tear-gassed hundreds of peaceful civil rights marchers who were demanding voting rights.

Later that year, as a result of widespread support across the nation, Congress passed the Voting Rights Act. Duncan titled his speech “Crossing the Next Bridge.” Duncan told the crowd that black students “are more than three times as likely to be expelled as their white peers,” adding that Martin Luther King would be “dismayed.”

Gail Heriot, a law professor at the University of San Diego and a member of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, and her special assistant and counselor, Alison Somin, have written an important article in the Texas Review of Law and Politics, titled “The Department of Education’s Obama-Era Initiative on Racial Disparities in School Discipline” (Spring 2018).

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Official Trump @War: Full Movie

Trump Admin Seeks Investigation Into New Claims of Secret Iran Nuclear Sites

The Trump administration is pushing international nuclear inspectors to launch a new investigation into evidence Iran has been stockpiling nuclear weapons technology and materials at a secret undisclosed site, according to U.S. officials who spoke to the Washington Free Beacon.

Evidence of this previously unknown nuclear site was presented last week by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during an address before the United Nations General Assembly.

The disclosure sent shockwaves through the international community and prompted the Trump administration to push for a renewed investigation into the claims by the IAEA, or International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N. body tasked with performing oversight on the Islamic Republic's nuclear program.

The United States is expected to spearhead efforts to further expose what Netanyahu described as a massive atomic warehouse in Iran, according to U.S. officials and senior congressional sources familiar with the Trump administration's strategy, which aims to further isolate Iran economically and diplomatically.

"We look to the IAEA to continue to act in a responsible and timely manner in pursuit of any credible information, including the information presented by [Prime Minister] Netanyahu, that could indicate Iran has fallen short of the nonproliferation obligations the IAEA is charged with verifying," a senior State Department official told the Free Beacon.

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Sen Spartacus: Whether Kavanaugh Is ‘Innocent or Guilty,’ Let’s ‘Move Onto Another Candidate’

Sen. Cory Booker (D., N.J.) said Tuesday that "whether he is innocent or guilty," it is time to "move on" from Brett Kavanaugh to another Supreme Court nominee.

"Ultimately – not whether he is innocent or guilty, this is not a trial – have enough questions have been raised that we should not move on to another candidate?" Booker asked, before saying, "Move on to another candidate."

Booker, speaking during a press conference on Capitol Hill, said "partisan rancor" aside, Kavanaugh is not the right person for the Supreme Court.

"So my hope is," he said, "beyond the vicious partisan rancor that is going on, beyond the accusations, we don't lose sight of what this moral moment is about in this country. And ultimately, we ask ourselves the question, is this the right person to sit on the highest court in the land for a lifetime appointment?"

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Why Low-Yield Nuclear Warheads Are Critical to Preventing Nuclear War

Last month, Rep. Ted Lieu, D-Calif., introduced a bill that if approved would stop the administration’s plans to modify select warheads on submarine-launched ballistic missiles to give them a low-yield option.

Such a step is unwise, considering the compelling rationale that drove the Pentagon to initiate the effort.

The bill argues that U.S. low-yield options would “increase a likelihood of a nuclear war.” But the truth is just the opposite.

If an adversary thinks the U.S.’ only option in response to an adversary’s limited nuclear use is to use U.S. high-yield nuclear weapons, an adversary might be tempted to use his low-yield nuclear weapons thinking that U.S. response options are not credible.

As the 2018 Nuclear Posture Review states, the development of a low-yield nuclear warhead for a U.S. submarine-launched ballistic missile is the fastest way to prevent this miscalculation.

The sense of urgency is justified.

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He needs to be hit with a broom

OMG, I Thought Liberals Didn't Drink!

Do You Know These Thieves? (Laurel, DE.)

Envelope believed to contain ricin sent to Trump at the White House

An envelope containing what appeared to be the deadly poison ricin was sent to President Trump, but never made it to The White House, a report said Tuesday.

The piece of mail sent to Trump appeared to beconnected to two other letters which were sent to the Pentagon, according to CNN.

A Secret Service spokesperson confirmed the receipt of a suspicious envelope addressed to the president on Oct. 1, CNN said.

“The envelope was not received at the White House, nor did it ever enter the White House,” the spokesman said.

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Rape charges against 4 California dentists dismissed after video contradicts woman's story

LAS VEGAS (KSNV) - Four dentists from California, including three brothers, who faced rape charges for the alleged assault of a woman at the Wynn Las Vegas, had all charges dismissed in court Monday.

Charged were Ali Badkoobehi and brothers Poria Edalat, Saman Edalat and Sina Edalat. The charges included sex assault, conspiracy to commit sex assault and first-degree kidnapping for the late July incident.

Prosecutors dropped all charges during a very brief hearing Monday before Las Vegas Justice Court Judge Eric Goodman.

"After a review of the facts of the case, it was clear that the allegations were completely fabricated," lawyer Robert Draskovich, who represented Badkoobehi, said in a prepared statement. "The (video) evidence confirmed the men's innocence, and the state has cleared them of all charges."

The unnamed woman alleged that the four men raped her repeatedly in a room at the Wynn early July 28 after she met one of the men at a Wynn bar.

"We are so grateful to the justice system for recognizing that we were the victims in this case," the men said in a statement. "We knew when the facts came out that the vicious allegations would be exposed as lies and our good names would be cleared. We want to thank our families, friends and lawyers for sticking by us through this horrific ordeal.

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USPS retiree health fund is in jeopardy

The money set aside for the Postal Service Retiree Health Benefits Fund will run out by 2030 if the U.S. Postal Service fails to keep making payments to the fund, according to a Government Accountability Office report publicly released Oct. 1.

As of fiscal year 2017, the agency is behind by $38.2 billion in required payments to the fund, but USPS has said that its current financial outlook has made filing those payments unaffordable.

And USPS finances aren’t projected to get any better. For more than a decade the agency has experienced large operating costs, while finding few ways to increase revenue or cut costs, according to the report.

“If the fund becomes depleted, USPS would be required by law to make the payments necessary to cover its share of health benefits premiums for current postal retirees. Current law does not address what would happen if the fund becomes depleted and USPS does not make payments to cover those premiums,” the report said.

“Depletion of the fund could affect postal retirees as well as USPS, customers and other stakeholders, including the federal government. About 500,000 postal retirees receive health benefits and [the Office of Personnel Management] expects that number to remain about the same through 2035.”

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A Viewer Writes: Car accident flips truck

Teacher beats up student who owed him money for weed

A Bronx charter-school teacher recruited a student to help him score $4,000 worth of marijuana — and he beat the teen senseless when he found out the kid pocketed the cash, police sources said Friday.

Kevin Pope, 48, also stole the teen’s iPhone and wallet and threatened to sexually assault his mother if he didn’t get his money back, the sources said.

“I will kill you if I don’t get my money!” Pope allegedly told the student after pummeling him. “I want my money in a month!”

Pope, a science teacher at the John V. Lindsay Wildcat Academy in Hunts Point, was arrested at the school Friday morning and charged with assault and robbery in the attack a day earlier.

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Congressman Andy Harris Update on Response to Aggressive Protesters Outside of Washington, D.C. Office

WASHINGTON, DC: Congressman Harris, M.D. (MD-01) made the following statement on aggressive marijuana protesters outside of the D.C. office on October 2, 2018:

"After I was physically confronted by protestors attempting to physically force their way through a private doorway into my office in Washington, D.C., the same violent protesters then attempted to forcibly open the main door to the office.

In potentially dangerous situations like this, especially when a physical confrontation has already occurred, staff and Members of Congress are instructed by the Sergeant at Arms and the Capitol police to immediately lock down the entire office suite, and to call for Capitol police support. And that's exactly what my staff did, despite the efforts of the protesters to force the second door open as well. Some of these same protesters have participated in, and disrupted, town halls by talking over other constituents. I commend my staff for keeping a level head during dangerous circumstances.

Yesterday’s events were truly shocking, and I strongly condemn those who promote physical confrontation as an appropriate response or solution to policy disagreements.

Despite the protestor’s aggressive confrontation, I remain committed to pursuing legitimate medical research into marijuana through legislation in a bipartisan effort that I have sponsored alongside some of Congress’ leading marijuana proponents.”

'FULL SCALE': Sen. Lindsey Graham Says He'll Launch Investigation Into Who Leaked Kavanaugh Accuser's Letter

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) announced Sunday that he plans a "full scale" investigation into who among his Democratic colleagues leaked Dr. Christine Blasey Ford's letter, accusing Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh of sexual assault, to the Washington Post.

Graham appeared on ABC News' "This Week" to discuss Thursday's Senate Judiciary Committee hearings, and doubled down on harsh comments he made during his opportunity to question Kavanaugh, accusing Democrats of malfeasance, and implying that Dr. Ford was railroaded by operatives.

"We’re going to do a wholesale, full scale investigation of what I think was a despicable process to deter it from happening again," Graham said.

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Marijuana activists arrested outside Rep. Andy Harris's office

Two pro-marijuana activists were arrested Tuesday after advocates tried to confront Rep. Andy Harris at his Capitol Hill office in an incident that left the congressman with a bruised wrist.

U.S. Capitol Police officers responded at about 12:15 p.m. to a report of “unlawful demonstration activity” outside Mr. Harris’s office in the Longworth House Office Building and two of the demonstrators smoked marijuana in the hallway near his office, according to Capitol Police.

Kristin Furnish, 28, from Salisbury, and Rachel Ramone Donlan, 46, from Washington, D.C., were charged with illegally possessing a controlled substance and consuming marijuana in a public place.

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Life in a Gynocracy

The performance of women this week – from Senator Dianne Feinstein to Christine Blasey Ford to the howling mobs on Capitol Hill – made me seriously consider surgically altering my sex. They are demanding special treatment because of their sex and in the process placing all of us – male and female alike – at peril of witch hunts against men and then, in time, against all who will not bow to their rule.

My Facebook friend Alex Bensky reminded me of the advantage to me of transgendering:

Ah, then we'd be unable to criticize your politics, your social viewpoints, your choice of teams to root for, and anything else you say because we'd be transphobic.

‪As a footnote, I've seen an estimate that the transgender population is about 0.05% of the population. This is hardly a warrant for beating up people but it is not clear to me why unless we substantially alter social arrangements that have existed in almost every known human society and celebrate...not just accept but celebrate...transgenderism, we are mean, hateful people.

Victor Davis Hanson offered up the most succinct summary of Blasey Ford's testimony:

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Democrats ask for the FBI and now they’d better be prepared for the consequences

Over the next week the FBI will collect evidence and report back to the Senate what they could find out about in any discrepancies in the testimony of both Brett Kavanaugh and Christine Ford.

In the course of their hurry-up full field effort very interesting heretofore hidden information previously posted on social media sites will be captured and reviewed.

Additionally any electronic information (e-mails) discussing how to orchestrate such a shameful last minute attacks to destroy a human being will be reviewed and analyzed. There can be no compromise on that point thanks to Senator Graham’s historic moment:

GRAHAM: If you wanted a FBI investigation, you could have come to us. What you want to do is destroy this guy's life, hold this seat open and hope you win in 2020. You've said that, not me.

America will live through this week long FBI “sprint” trying to shed as much light on the most infamous “He said/She” said moment in American history.

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Kavanaugh Stole My G.I. Joe When I Was Six Years Old

Merkel Fights For Globalism, Warns Trump Against ‘Destroying’ UN

‘Global governance’ a form of ‘coercion and domination’ that ‘responsible nations must defend against,’ Trump said during speech

FRANKFURT AM MAIN (AFP) – German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Sunday warned U.S. President Donald Trump against “destroying” the United Nations.

“I believe that destroying something without having developed something new is extremely dangerous,” Merkel said at a regional election campaign event in Bavaria.

The veteran leader — a close ally of Trump’s bugbear Barack Obama while he was president — added that she believed multilateralism was the solution to many of the world’s problems.

Donald J. Trump

✔@realDonaldTrump

The people of Germany are turning against their leadership as migration is rocking the already tenuous Berlin coalition. Crime in Germany is way up. Big mistake made all over Europe in allowing millions of people in who have so strongly and violently changed their culture!

9:02 AM - Jun 18, 2018

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Trump failed to see the possibility for win-win solutions, she said, instead seeing only one winner from any international negotiation.

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INCREDIBLE HUGE Trump Rally CROWD in MS Shouts "WE WANT KAVANAUGH"

How Public Pension Boards Are Making a Crisis Worse

Because of the way they're structured, they have incentives to ignore the retirement plans' long-term health.

For the last decade, analysts have been arguing over whom to blame for America's state and local pension crisis. Politicians? Public employee unions? Financial markets? Amid the din, the detrimental role of public pension boards has been overlooked.

There is a mounting body of evidence that pension boards, which oversee the funds created by employer and employee contributions, are partly to blame for the underfunding problem. Pension board members' incentives lead them away from a focus on the plans' long-term fiscal health. In a new report, I document those incentives and their consequences and recommend ways to mitigate -- and even eliminate -- the governance issues.

The long-term costs of failing to act to deal with mounting pension debt are enormous. In 2015, the Federal Reserve estimated that states' and localities' pension funds had accumulated $5.52 trillion in liabilities but had set aside only $3.7 trillion in assets. To ensure that public employees receive the benefits promised by their plans, state and local governments are spending more every year on their pension systems. According to census data, those governments contributed $40.1 billion to their pension systems in 2000; by 2016, that number had skyrocketed to $140.5 billion. In addition, pension funds are making riskier investments in an effort to catch up.

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You Gave Facebook Your Number For Security. They Used It For Ads

Add “a phone number I never gave Facebook for targeted advertising” to the list of deceptive and invasive ways Facebook makes money off your personal information. Contrary to user expectations and Facebook representatives’ own previous statements, the company has been using contact information that users explicitly provided for security purposes—or that users never provided at all—for targeted advertising.

A group of academic researchers from Northeastern University and Princeton University, along with Gizmodo reporters, have used real-world tests to demonstrate how Facebook’s latest deceptive practice works. They found that Facebook harvests user phone numbers for targeted advertising in two disturbing ways: two-factor authentication (2FA) phone numbers, and “shadow” contact information.

Two-Factor Authentication Is Not The Problem

First, when a user gives Facebook their number for security purposes—to set up 2FA, or to receive alerts about new logins to their account—that phone number can become fair game for advertisers within weeks. (This is not the first time Facebook has misused 2FA phone numbers.)

But the important message for users is: this is not a reason to turn off or avoid 2FA. The problem is not with two-factor authentication. It’s not even a problem with the inherent weaknesses of SMS-based 2FA in particular. Instead, this is a problem with how Facebook has handled users’ information and violated their reasonable security and privacy expectations.

There are many types of 2FA. SMS-based 2FA requires a phone number, so you can receive a text with a “second factor” code when you log in. Other types of 2FA—like authenticator apps and hardware tokens—do not require a phone number to work. However, until just four months ago, Facebook required users to enter a phone number to turn on any type of 2FA, even though it offers its authenticator as a more secure alternative. Other companies—Google notable among them—also still follow that outdated practice.

Even with the welcome move to no longer require phone numbers for 2FA, Facebook still has work to do here. This finding has not only validated users who are suspicious of Facebook's repeated claims that we have “complete control” over our own information, but has also seriously damaged users’ trust in a foundational security practice.

Until Facebook and other companies do better, users who need privacy and security most—especially those for whom using an authenticator app or hardware key is not feasible—will be forced into a corner.

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Christine Blasey Ford ex-boyfriend says she helped friend prep for potential polygraph; Grassley sounds alarm

In a written declaration released Tuesday and obtained by Fox News, an ex-boyfriend of Christine Blasey Ford, the California professor accusing Brett Kavanaugh of sexual assault, directly contradicts her testimony under oath last week that she had never helped anyone prepare for a polygraph examination.

The former boyfriend, whose name was redacted in the declaration, also said Ford neither mentioned Kavanaugh nor mentioned she was a victim of sexual misconduct during the time they were dating from about 1992 to 1998. He said he saw Ford going to great lengths to help a woman he believed was her "life-long best friend" prepare for a potential polygraph test. He added that the woman had been interviewing for jobs with the FBI and U.S. Attorney's office.

He further claimed that Ford never voiced any fear of flying (even while aboard a propeller plane) and seemingly had no problem living in a "very small," 500 sq. ft. apartment with one door -- apparently contradicting her claims that she could not testify promptly in D.C. because she felt uncomfortable traveling on planes, as well as her suggestion that her memories of Kavanuagh's alleged assault prompted her to feel unsafe living in a closed space or one without a second front door.

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https://www.foxnews.com/politics/christine-blasey-ford-ex-boyfriend-says-she-helped-friend-prep-for-potential-polygraph-grassley-sounds-alarm

Citing Racial Harassment, Vermont's Only Black Female Lawmaker Resigns

The only black woman in Vermont's Legislature has resigned, citing racially-charged harassment and ongoing family health concerns.

Rep. Kiah Morris, D-Vermont, announced the move Tuesday on Facebook and further explained her motivations in interviews this week. Morris represented the town of Bennington.

“There was vandalism within our home ... We found there were swastikas painted on the trees in the woods near where we live. We had home invasions," she told the New York Times on Sunday. She did not provide the publication a timeline for the crimes.

Morris had announced in August that she would not seek reelection, citing "divisive" discourse on social media. In Tuesday's announcement, she accelerated her departure, citing family challenges.

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Burt Prelutsky: 'Racism' as a Tool of Racists

Never in human history has a word been used as often and as incorrectly as “racism” is used these days in America.

For years, it was used to condemn those who wore white sheets and lynched black men. Then it was used to condemn those who used Jim Crow laws to subjugate black people, forcing them to attend sub-standard schools; use separate bathrooms, water fountains and lunch counters; and to sit in certain sections of movie theaters, buses and trains.

Today, it is used to trash white people who oppose socialists and globalists. It is tossed around as freely as rice at a wedding. It has nothing to do with how white people actually treat black people. Instead, it is used as an all-purpose curse word, the equivalent of calling someone a bastard or an s.o.b., intended to deny the person’s humanity.

As we all know, the most openly racist individuals in America are blacks. Some people, such as Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, Louis Farrakhan, Elijah Cummings, John Lewis and Maxine Waters, have carved out successful careers based solely on their racist words and actions.

Black racists keep talking about the Ku Klux Klan, a group that can barely round up a dozen knuckle-dragging, slack-jawed, imbeciles for a rally. But Black Lives Matter hold massive demonstrations in one city after another and nobody even says “Boo.”

Barack Obama, arguably the worst and most anti-American president in our nation’s history, has a history of labeling those who objected to his words and actions as racists.

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Caroline C. Lewis: The Barbarism of the Democrat Party

On Thursday, in Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s testimony, the American people saw a man fighting for his reputation, his integrity, and his family. His moving words felt less like a testimony and more like the last cries of an innocent animal before it is slaughtered.

This is what the confirmation process has become for the Democrats: a slaughtering of innocent people who obstruct the political goals of their party. Through intimidation, psychological warfare, character assassination, and public shaming, they behead their opponents and hang their remains on pikes at the city walls — as a barbaric example to all who seek public office.

For Democrats, politics does not create better lives for the American people but instead serves as a power war justified in employing any tactic, at any time, anywhere. In their wake, Democrats leave the bodies of defamed leaders, politicians, and their traumatized families. This they cloak as “civic duty.”

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A Guide to Dry-Aged Beef

You’ve probably been to a fancy steakhouse where dry-aged steaks were on the menu. But if you’re like me, you likely passed on them because 1) dry-aged beef is a bit pricier, and 2) you didn’t exactly know what it meant for a steak to be “dry-aged” in the first place.

After today you’ll understand what happens to a steak when it’s dry-aged (and why an aged steak consequently costs more).
What Is Dry-Aged Beef?

The steak you typically eat is fresh. It’s red and full of moisture, which makes it nice and juicy.

A dry-aged steak is, as you surely guessed, aged before eating. You can find steaks that have been dry-aged from 7 to even up to 120 days. The most common timeframe for a steak to be dry-aged is 30 days. The meat doesn’t spoil during this time, because you age it in conditions that tightly control the levels of moisture and bacteria.

During the dry-aging process, moisture is drawn out of the meat. This causes the beef flavor to become even beefier and more flavorful. What’s more, the aging process causes the beef’s natural enzymes to break down the connective tissue in the meat, making it more tender. A crust of fungus which grows on the outside of the meat while it ages furthers this tenderization process, while adding a nice, corn-like flavor to your beef (you scrape this fungal crust off before cooking).

Dry-aging is basically a controlled decomposition of the meat, which sounds kind of gross, but results in a meat that is 1) more flavorful and 2) more tender.

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Mike Pento Warns Global Central Banks Are Entering The Danger Zone

Investors are experiencing huge moves in commodities, currencies, equities and in sovereign debt across the globe. And now the fall has arrived. Expect the volatility currently witnessed in markets to only surge.

This is because global central banks have overwhelmingly turned hawkish in a vain attempt to gradually let the air out of the massive bubbles they have spent the last decade recreating. Unfortunately, that is not the nature of asset bubbles—they don’t end with a whimper--and they are about to burst in violent fashion.

First off, our central bank hiked rates for the 8th time since December 2015 at the September FOMC meeting. While the Fed did remove the word accommodative from its policy statement, it also raised the neutral rate to 3%, from 2.9% on the Fed Funds Rate. And, most importantly, predicted it would stay above that neutral rate for two years—keeping it at the 3.4% level. It also indicated that December would be the next rate hike and that three more hikes are on the agenda for 2019.

Nevertheless, the Fed is now caught in a hydraulic press of its own making; and is completely unaware of the predicament it is in. An inflation rate of 2% has been its goal for the past decade. And now inflation, when measured by core CPI, is up 2.2% y/y and is up 2.7% y/y on the headline rate. Even though the Fed emphasizes the Personal Consumption Expenditure inflation rate rather than Consumer Price Inflation, it is still aware that inflation is rising above its target.

Therefore, its own inflation models - however irrelevant and useless they may be - are compelling the Fed to keep on raising rates. But because inflation is a lagging indicator, the Fed will keep on hiking rates until the next economic downturn is well underway. However, since asset bubbles and debt levels have never been more disconnected from reality, the next economic downturn should quickly morph into a depression rather than just a normal recession.

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Minnesota Democrats’ Keith Ellison Investigation Concludes Abuse Allegation ‘Unsubstantiated’: Report

An attorney hired by Minnesota Democrats to investigate domestic abuse allegations against Minnesota Democratic Rep. Keith Ellison reportedly concluded the accuser’s claim was “unsubstantiated.”

Ellison’s ex-girlfriend, liberal activist Karen Monahan, accused Ellison of physically and emotionally abusing her during their years-long relationship.

Ellison, the deputy chair of the Democratic National Committee, has been dogged by Monahan’s accusations in his campaign for Minnesota attorney general.

Monahan’s refusal to produce a video she claimed proved Ellison’s alleged abuse led Minnesota attorney Susan Ellingstad “to conclude that the allegation is unsubstantiated,” according to a draft version of Ellingstad’s report obtained by The Associated Press.

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Kunstler: Imaginary Monsters And The Uses Of Chaos

The Kavanaugh hearing underscored another eerie condition in contemporary USA life that offers clues about the combined social, economic, and political collapse that I call the long emergency: the destruction of all remaining categorical boundaries for understanding behavior: truth and untruth, innocent and guilty, childhood and adulthood, public and private.


The destination of all this confusion is a society that can’t process any quarrel coherently, leaving everyone unsatisfied and adrift, and no actual problems resolved.

One element of the story is clear, though. The Democratic party, in the absence of real monsters to slay, has become the party devoted to sowing chaos, mainly by inventing new, imaginary monsters using the machinery of politics, the way the Catholic Church manufactured monsters of heresy during the Spanish Inquisition in its attempt to regulate “belief.”

“I believe her” is the new totalitarian rallying cry, conveniently disposing of any obligation to establish the facts of any ambiguous matter. It was stealthily inserted in our national life during the Obama years, when Title IX “guidelines” originally written to correct imbalances in college sports funding for men and women were extended to adjudicate sexual encounters on campus.

The result was the setting up of officially sanctioned kangaroo courts where due process was thrown out the window — by people who have should have known better: college presidents, deans, and faculty. That experiment produced not a few spectacular injustices, such as the Duke Lacrosse team fake rape fiasco, the University of Virginia fake rape fraternity incident (provoked by a mis-reported storey in Rolling Stone Magazine), and the Columbia University “Mattress Girl” saga — all cases eventuating in punishing lawsuits against the institutions that allowed them to spin out of control.

The spirit of the kangaroo court has since graduated into business and politics where it has proven especially useful for settling scores and advancing careers and agendas dishonestly. Coercion has replaced persuasion. Coercion is at the heart of totalitarian politics. Do what your told, or else. Believe what we say, or else. (Or else lose your reputation, your livelihood, your friends….) This plays neatly into the dynamics of human mob psychology. When the totalitarians set up for business, few individuals dare to depart from the party line. It’s the perfect medium for cultivating mendacious ideologies.

And so many Americans may be wondering these days whether the ideas and principles that have held this country together, even through a disastrous civil war, can endure through a long emergency of exogenous events so overwhelming that we dare not even debate them publicly. These are climate change, the crack-up of a debt-based money system, the winding–down of techno-industrial economy, and the ecological destruction of the only planet that human beings call home.

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