WIND ADVISORY IN EFFECT FROM MIDNIGHT TONIGHT TO 4 PM EST MONDAY

Event:    Wind Advisory

Alert:    ...WIND ADVISORY IN EFFECT FROM MIDNIGHT TONIGHT TO 4 PM EST
MONDAY.

The National Weather Service in Wakefield has issued a Wind
Advisory...which is in effect from midnight tonight to 4 PM EST
Monday.

* AREAS AFFECTED: LOWER MARYLAND AND VIRGINIA EASTERN SHORE.

* HAZARDS: STRONG WIND GUSTS.

* WINDS: BECOMING WEST TO NORTHWEST 20 TO 30 MPH WITH GUSTS OF 45
MPH.

* TIMING: LATE TONIGHT THROUGH MIDDAY MONDAY.

* IMPACTS: STRONG WINDS MAY BLOW DOWN LIMBS...TREES...AND POWER
LINES. SCATTERED POWER OUTAGES WILL BE POSSIBLE.

Instructions:    A Wind Advisory is issued when sustained winds are forecast to be 31 to 39 mph or gusts will range between 45 and 57 mph. Winds of these magnitudes may cause minor property damage without extra precautions. Motorists in high profile vehicles should use caution until the winds subside.

Target Area:   
Dorchester
Inland Worcester
Maryland Beaches
Somerset
Wicomico

Forecast Office:    NWS Wakefield (Eastern Virginia and Southern Maryland)

President Trump Weekly Address 2/10/17

Trump's line of home furnishings has disappeared from Sears' and Kmart's websites

Sears' and Kmart's websites no longer sell products from the Trump Home line, which is owned by the Trump Organization.

As of Friday, a search for Trump Home items on both retailers' sites yielded no results, except items sold by third-party sellers.

"As part of the company’s initiative to optimize its online product assortment, we constantly refine that assortment to focus on our most profitable items," a Sears Holdings spokesperson told Business Insider. "Amid that streamlining effort, 31 Trump Home items were among the items removed online this week. Products from the line are still offered online via third-party Marketplace vendors."

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Right-to-work court case could have national impact on unions

A landmark right-to-work lawsuit playing out in Illinois has captured widespread attention amid expectations the case could land before the Supreme Court – and potentially have national implications for an estimated 20 million government workers.

Pat Hughes, who’s representing the three plaintiffs in the Illinois case, predicted a ruling in their favor could even establish right-to-work policies coast-to-coast.

"This decision would ostensibly make all of the country right-to-work because you couldn't force people to affiliate with a union,” Hughes said.

Right-to-work laws make it illegal for unions to force workers into paying dues. Because Illinois is not a right-to-work state, it remains legal there for unions to automatically take out a ‘fair-share’ fee from a worker’s paycheck, which typically happens when a union represents the majority of employees. Unions argue they negotiate a better wage, health care and working environment for all employees so the fair-share fee is a small price to ask.

“Some fee to cover those representational costs is imminently reasonable and rational,” said labor expert Dr. Robert Bruno of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/02/10/right-to-work-court-case-could-have-national-impact-on-unions.html

Indiana Officer's Outtakes From Portrait With K-9 Dog Partner Go Viral

An Indiana conservation officer had a little trouble posing for his recent staff photo. But that’s because his K-9 partner, Kenobi, refused to stop licking his face.

The outtakes from officer Levi Knach’s photo shoot are going viral thanks to Kenobi’s wonderful attempts to steal the show.

“Kenobi is cute, but make no mistake - he is a trained, working officer and can track people and locate a variety of objects ranging from venison to ginseng,” Indiana State Parks wrote in a Facebook post, which now has 2,400 likes.

The post said that one of Kenobi’s jobs is to find ginseng when someone has illegally harvested it.

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Our Overly Sanctified Judiciary

As you might have heard, Donald Trump tweeted at a judge.

The commentariat shuddered at the effrontery of it, and some worried that the foundations of the separation of powers had been shaken. Trump’s slam of Judge James Robart was undeniably crude and ill-considered, but it wasn’t a threat to our Republic.

In fact, it is a symptom of our distorted and overly sanctified view of the judiciary that a criticism of a judge with a lifetime appointment is greeted with such pearl-clutching. It is entirely appropriate that the political branches have their own view of the law and the Constitution and robustly contest — and even deny the legitimacy of — court decisions that they consider erroneous.

The fundamental point is that it is not just the executive or Congress that can abuse its power and overstep its bounds. The courts can, too, and no one is obligated to meekly accept their decisions.

More here

Arby's warns of data breach affecting 350,000 customers

ATLANTA, GA (WCMH) — Arby’s is warning customers to keep an eye on their credit card and debit card statements for unusual activity after a data breach.

According to CNN, the company says a data breach may have affected more than 355,000 customers’ credit and debit cards.

It’s the same kind of malware attack behind earlier breaches at Target and Home Depot.

The breach occurred between Oct. 25 and Jan. 19.

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Undermining Our Republic, One Lawsuit After Another

In 1996, California voters approved a ballot initiative known as Proposition 209. It banned all preferential treatment based on race, ethnicity and gender in public education, employment and contracting. The decision was anathema to the progressive bean-counters and quota-mongers who did what progressives always do when the will of the people conflicts with their agenda: they found U.S. District Judge Thelton Henderson, who issued a temporary restraining order preventing the law’s implantation. Henderson’s reasoning? Because the elimination of preferences disadvantaged women and racial minorities, it violated the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause.

Henderson’s affront to logic was eventually overturned, but this saga illustrates two things that afflict the nation to this very day: Leftists remain utterly contemptuous of the democratic process when the results of that process conflict with their “enlightened” worldview; and far more important, Americans have becoming increasingly inured to Abraham Lincoln’s warning that “if the policy of the Government upon vital questions affecting the whole people is to be irrevocably fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court … the people will have ceased to be their own rulers.”

Read more here

Families beg to close beach where 3 died as sand gave way

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. (AP) — Relatives of three people who died when the sand at a New Jersey beach gave way beneath their feet begged a judge to permanently close the beach, saying it’s only a matter of time before someone else dies there.

Relatives of Brad Smith asked Superior Court Judge Julio Mendez on Friday to order a section of the beach in North Wildwood, along the Heferord Inlet, closed to the public following the July 2012 death of Smith.

Although they are not part of the litigation, relatives of Jamila Watkins and Shayne Hart, who died in a similar 2009 accident, also called for the beach to be closed.

North Wildwood and the state say the deaths were due to natural conditions that government has no obligation to fix.

“Everyone knows that this will happen again; it’s just a matter of time,” said Nicole Gaeta, Smith’s oldest daughter. “It would destroy all of us.”

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Mexican Drug Cartel Operating in U.S. Suburb More than 1,500 Miles from Border

Illustrating that the Mexican drug crisis is having a far-reaching impact on the U.S., a heroin ring operated by a Mexican cartel was recently busted in an American suburb more than 1,500 miles from the southern border. In the last few years Judicial Watch has reported extensively on the massive amounts of drugs—especially heroin—that get smuggled into the U.S. by Mexican traffickers who later use street, prison and outlaw motorcycle gangs to distribute them throughout the country. Undoubtedly, these enterprises benefitted tremendously from the Obama administration’s open border policies.

Now we have confirmation that these illicit drug operations have penetrated areas far from the border. This case comes out of Rowan County, North Carolina where a local news report reveals that authorities began targeting large-scale heroin distribution in 2013. Last week three people with ties to a Mexican drug cartel were arrested in the county. Large quantities of heroin, handguns, a rifle, ammunition, numerous telephones, cash and drug paraphernalia was confiscated by police. Authorities say the Mexican heroin trafficking ring was based in the Charlotte-Matthews area and has been supplying heroin to Rowan County for more than a decade. “Over the past two months, investigators purchased large amounts of heroin from two people working for this Mexican National Drug Trafficking Organization,” the news report states.

This is hardly earth-shattering news. A number of federal audits have documented the enormous amounts of drugs that annually enter the U.S. through the porous southern border, even as Obama’s Homeland Security Secretary famously proclaimed the region to be as secure as it’s ever been. One report, published just a few months ago, referred to western states as a “heroin transit zone” because Mexican cartels move such large amounts of drugs through the Southwest border. That government assessment disclosed that there at least eight major Mexican drug trafficking organizations operating in the United States with the Sinaloa Cartel being the most active.

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DE State Police Investigating Robbery of Shawnee Country Store

Milford, De. – The Delaware State Police are investigating a robbery of a Milford area store that occurred last evening.

The preliminary investigation determined the incident occurred at approximately 7:45 p.m., Friday, February 10, 2017, as a male suspect armed with an unknown type handgun entered the Shawnee Country Store located at 6994 Shawnee Road, Milford. The suspect approached the store employee and demanded cash. The victim complied with the demand and turned over an undisclosed amount of cash. The suspect then exited the store and fled in an unknown direction. The clerk was not injured.

The suspect is described as a male approximately 6’00” tall with a thin build. The suspect was wearing a dark hooded sweatshirt and dark pants with his face covered armed with an unknown type handgun. (photo attached)

If anyone has any information in reference to this incident they are asked to contact Detective M. Doughty at 302-752-3794. Information may also be provided by calling Delaware Crime Stoppers at 1-800-TIP-3333, via the internet at www.delaware.crimestoppersweb.com, or by sending an anonymous tip by text to 274637 (CRIMES) using the keyword “DSP.”

Missing Juvenile in Salisbury 2-11-17

Watters' World: NYC student walkout edition

Jesse Watters asks high school students why they are protesting the travel ban on 'The O'Reilly Factor'

Judicial Watch Files Suit For ‘Refugee Travel Loans’ Information

Tightening our immigration and refugee programs is a matter of national security (despite what some out-of-control judges may think), and it is also a matter of cost.

In this regard, we have filed a lawsuit against the State Department for records on the number of “Refugee Travel Loans” issued by State’s Bureau for Population, Refugees, and Migration to the United Nation’s International Organization for Migration from 2010 to the present.

We are also seeking the number of loans defaulted upon and the amount of money written off on each defaulted loan. We filed the suit on January 24, 2017, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia (Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of State (No. 1:17-cv-00157)).

Judicial Watch filed the suit after the State Department failed to respond to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request on February 5, 2016, seeking the following:

All records reflecting the number of Refugee Travel Loans furnished by the State Department’s Bureau for Population, Refugees, and Migration (PRM) to the International Organization for Migration (IOM) per year; the number of travel loans that are defaulted upon per year; and the amount of money written off per defaulted loan.

The Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration provides funding for aid and relief work abroad and the bureau’s admissions office handles settling refugees in the United States. According to the agency’s website, it spent nearly $545 million “to provide new beginnings to the world’s most vulnerable refugees” in 2016 and more than $2.8 billion to “humanitarian assistance overseas.” It provided $103 million directly to the UN’s International Organization for Migration.

The International Organization for Migration, headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, has an annual budget of $1.4 billion and (as of 2014) a staff of 9,000 throughout the world. According to the International Organization for Migration website, the organization provides interest-free loans “furnished by the Department of State” to “all refugees arriving in the United States:”

All refugees arriving in the United States are offered interest-free travel loans by IOM. Refugees who accept these travel loans are required to sign a promissory note prior to departure, committing themselves to repayment of the debt within 46 months after arrival in the United States.

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Army Denies Claims For Aberdeen Blimp Damage

The U.S. Army is denying 35 claims for more than $1.5 million in damage caused when a blimp broke loose in Maryland and came to rest in the Pennsylvania countryside in 2015.

Army Spokesman Dov Schwartz said in a statement Friday that the Army had determined that no government employees or agencies were responsible or negligent in the incident.

The decision was first reported by pennlive.com.

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$8.5 Billion U.S. Counter-Narcotics Effort in Afghanistan BOOSTS Opium Production

The U.S. government’s multi-billion-dollar effort to counter narcotics in Afghanistan is a humiliating failure that’s resulted in a huge increase in poppy cultivation and opium production. Despite the free-flow of American tax dollars to combat the crisis, opium production rose 43% in the Islamic nation, to an estimated 4,800 tons, and approximately 201,000 hectares of land are under poppy cultivation, representing a 10% increase in one year alone.

Uncle Sam’s embarrassing counter narcotics effort is part of a broader and costly failure involving the reconstruction of Afghanistan. More than $100 billion have been dedicated to help rebuild the war-torn country and much of it has been lost to waste, fraud and abuse not to mention corruption. The drug initiative is a recent example, documented by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) in a quarterly report to Congress. The document is painful to read because it goes on for 269 pages, but Judicial Watch created a link for the counter narcotics section, which is around 19 pages and includes informative charts, graphs and the latest available statistics.

As of December 31, 2016, the United States has spent an astounding $8.5 billion for counter narcotics efforts in Afghanistan since 2002, the report reveals, making it clear that the cash will continue flowing. “Nonetheless, Afghanistan remains the world’s leading producer of opium, providing 80% of the global output over the past decade, according to the United Nations,” SIGAR writes.

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[Opium is, of course, refined to make heroin-- the substance destroying so many lives in the US and elsewhere. --Editor]

Worcester County reaffirms opposition to septic system changes

The Worcester County Commissioners voted unanimously Tuesday to send a letter opposing state legislation to re-establish pre-treatment requirements for septic systems outside watershed areas.

Bob Mitchell, county environmental programs director, presented background on the measures SB 266 and HB 281, which look to reinstitute septic system regulations the Hogan administration abolished last November through its Regulatory Reform Commission.

Among the commission’s multitude of findings was that the state’s 2012 expansion of stringent septic system requirements could add as much as $15,000 to the cost of building a home or business by requiring all new systems to employ nitrogen-reduction technology.

“This is basically undoing the work of the Regulatory Reform Commission and re-instating pre-treatment of septic outside of the critical area,” he said.

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Sanctuary cities caving in face of funding threats

Several towns, cities and counties around the nation are caving to President Trump's threat to pull funding, and abandoning their "sanctuary" pledges to shield illegal immigrants from federal authorities.

Dayton, Ohio, dropped a policy that restricted the city’s cooperation with immigration officials pursuing illegal immigrants arrested for misdemeanors or felony property crimes, according to the Dayton Daily News. Police Chief Richard Biehl said federal authorities will no longer be impeded by the city when pursuing illegal immigrants being held by his department.

Other communities that have dropped policies of shielding illegal immigrant suspects from Immigration and Customs Enforcement include Miami-Dade and Dayton, are Saratoga, N.Y., Finney County, Kan., and Bedford, Penn., according to The Center for Immigration Studies, which keeps a list of sanctuary communities.

“We are reviewing policy changes at a multitude of other jurisdictions as well,” said Marguerite Telford, CIS’s director of communications, who said the organization is “being inundated” by officials on its sanctuary map who want to be taken off.

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WOCO Schools: Opioid lesson plan aimed at eighth graders

Worcester County schools announced the addition of a new anti-heroin pilot program for eighth graders at Stephen Decatur Middle School, a move designed to combat a nationwide increase in illegal drug use and overdoses.

The opioid lesson plan is one small piece in a larger plan to bridge the gap in health education between middle and high schools, according to district Coordinator of Instruction Tamara Mills.

“The specific unit on heroin came about because of [the] opioid epidemic we are seeing across the country, our state and our county,” Mills said. “If we can change and improve children’s behaviors early on, we can all hopefully reap the benefits of that in future generations.”

This year, the middle school has partnered with Atlantic General Hospital to continue the health-literacy program that educates students on making healthy lifestyle choices. The program started in 2013 in Ocean City Elementary, and then expanded to lower grade levels.

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Republicans plan to kill Obama's order on taxpayer funding of Planned Parenthood

House Republicans will vote next week to liberate states from an Obama rule requiring them to subsidize Planned Parenthood.

In one of his last actions, Obama effectively forced states to fund Planned Parenthood. Many states have policies barring state funds for the abortion giant, and Obama's 11th-hour executive order prohibited such policies.

Next week, the House plans to use the Congressional Review Act to repeal that Obama regulation — a first salvo in their fight to roll back Obama's legacy on abortion.

According to congressional aides, the vote is scheduled for late next week and will specifically axe Obama's Title X rule. During his final weeks in office, Obama finalized the regulation, explicitly barring states from pulling federal grant money from clinics that provide abortion.

Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., told The Washington Examiner that the effort is about "protecting life and stopping the federal government from forcing states to support abortion."

"The federal government should not be sending taxpayer dollars to abortion providers, and it shouldn't force states to do so either," McCarthy said in a statement.

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