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Unidentified Ugandan men believed to be homosexual were brutally beaten to death and one was burned alive in December as children, men and women including police just watched.

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Brandon Medina

Julian Christopher Flores

Grady O'Brien, Jesus Delgado and Andron Gazarov

(Gazarov's photo courtesy of Wirednixon dot com)

The Mexican military reported that 61 undocumented Immigrants from South and Central America, including three Mexican nationals were rescued from a safe house in Reynosa. In Texas, ICE detained 71 undocumented immigrants being held in several safe houses and a suspect (Coyote).

Joaquín Archivaldo Guzmán Loera, aka, El Chapo
A fingerprint expert with the newly formed Criminal Investigation Agency (AIC - Agencia de Investigación Criminal) with Mexico's Federal Attorney General's Office (PGRF) takes fingerprint samples from Joaquín Archivaldo Guzmán Loera, 56, aka, El Chapo shortly after his arrest on February 22, 2014 in Mazatlán,  Sinaloa,  Mexico. DNA test came out positive that the suspect taken into custody is the Sinaloa Cartel druglord El Chapo, the PGRF has confirmed. He remains in isolation, 24-hour suicide watch and has no contact with inmates at the Altiplano federal prison in the state of Mexico. Posted by Hispanic News Network U.S.A.

Juanito2014

Brandon Medina

by: Les Carpenter
Rational Nation USA
Purveyor of Truth

America seems to be in perpetual campaign mode. No sooner than things start to settle in following a mid term or presidential election than the pols start preparing for the next election and the spinning starts in earnest. Leaving one to wonder just when our elected officials are actually working on our behalf. Call me the cynic but I cannot help but believe our politicians and leaders spend more time working to create the "world of smoke and mirrors" they want us to exist in for their sake than actually representing us and taking care of crucial matters that affect our nation and each and every one of us.

So, today, I'm joining in the American Political Merry-Go- Round and predicting that Americans will once again get exactly what they (in their apathy) vote for. America, with its dismal voter turnout, low information voters, and political sound bite junkies, will pull the levers once again for those politicians with the slickest slogans or those who wrap themselves in the flag holding the Bible in one hand and their six shooter in the other. It is my prediction that few is any will actually be holding the Constitution in on hand and the Bill of Rights in the other and be advocating for what the Founding Fathers actually enshrined in our Declaration of Independence.

Having expressed my predictions I will turn to the "professional pundits view" of were we're headed for in the 2014 elections.

The battle for control of the U.S. Senate is where the action is this year in American politics. Right now all signs point to a near standoff in the U.S. House elections. Barring a major change in the political environment in the next few months, the 114th House is expected to closely resemble the 113th House with a slightly larger or slightly smaller Republican majority. In contrast, party control of the next Senate is definitely up for grabs this year.

The main reason why Democrats are at risk of losing control of the Senate in November is not because of public discontent with the Affordable Care Act, continued weakness in the economy or President Obama’s mediocre approval ratings. All of these issues may have an impact on the Senate elections. But the Democrats’ biggest problem this year is that they were so successful in the 2008 Senate elections. While Barack Obama was capturing the White House in 2008, Democrats gained eight net seats in the Senate, winning 20 of the 35 seats at stake.

Now Democrats must defend all of the seats that they won six years ago, including several in states that usually support Republicans. Of the Democratic seats up for grabs this year, seven are in states that were carried by Mitt Romney in 2012, including six that Romney won by a double-digit margin. In contrast, Republicans are only defending one seat in a state that was carried by Obama in 2012 — Sen. Susan Collins’ seat in Maine. And Collins is so popular that she isn’t a credible Democratic target.

A simple model based on a large body of political science research allows us to make fairly accurate predictions of seat swing in midterm U.S. Senate elections. This model is almost identical to one that I have used to accurately forecast seat swing in midterm House elections. The three predictors are the results of the generic congressional ballot question in national polls in early September; the difference between the number of Republican seats and the number of Democratic seats at stake in the election; and a dummy variable for the president’s party.

A simple model based on a large body of political science research allows us to make fairly accurate predictions of seat swing in midterm U.S. Senate elections. This model is almost identical to one that I have used to accurately forecast seat swing in midterm House elections. The three predictors are the results of the generic congressional ballot question in national polls in early September; the difference between the number of Republican seats and the number of Democratic seats at stake in the election; and a dummy variable for the president’s party.

The generic ballot question provides a measure of the mood of the electorate two months before the election. Even though it asks specifically about House voting intentions, the generic ballot question predicts Senate voting as well. The seat difference variable is a measure of party exposure in the election: The more seats a party has at risk relative to the opposing party, the more seats it tends to lose. Finally, the dummy variable for the party of the president reflects the tendency of the president’s party to lose seats in midterm elections even after controlling for the other predictors in the model.

Table 1: Results of regression analysis of Senate seat swing in midterm elections

Source: Data compiled by author

Table 1 above presents estimates for the effects of the three predictors on change in Republican Senate seats based on data for all 17 midterm Senate elections since World War II. The estimated coefficients for all three predictors are in the expected direction and highly statistically significant. Moreover, the model explains an impressive 75% of the variance in Senate seat swing. This is substantially less than the 90% of variance in seat swing explained by the House forecasting model. However, that is to be expected given the much smaller number of Senate seats at stake in each election and the larger proportion of competitive contests in Senate elections. There is simply more random variation in Senate seat swing because of the effects of campaigns and candidate quality. The only way to produce a more accurate forecast of the outcome in November is to factor in these seat-specific characteristics based on in-depth information from on-the-ground sources — the sort of information used by the Crystal Ball in making its exceptionally accurate final predictions.

Even at this early stage, however, estimates for two of the predictors in our model make it clear that 2014 is likely to be a difficult year for Democrats in the Senate. First, based on the fact that there are six more Democratic than Republican seats at stake this year, Democrats would be expected to lose 2.4 Senate seats compared with an election in which there were equal numbers of Democratic and Republican seats at stake. Second, the fact that there is a Democrat in the White House means that Democrats can expect to lose about four more seats than they would expect to lose in a midterm election with a Republican in the White House.

When we add together the effect of the seat exposure variable and the effect of the midterm dummy variable, and factor in the intercept of -0.9 in the regression equation, Republicans start off the 2014 campaign with an expected gain of 5.7 seats. That is very close to the six seats that Republicans need to regain control of the Senate.

My advice is twofold; 1) educate yourself on the issues and 2) be very careful of who and what you vote for.

And keep in mind there is ALWAYS the alternative party. Libertarian...give it a look-see. You just might like what you encounter.

Please read the rest BELOW THE FOLD.

Via: Memeorandum

by: Les Carpenter
Rational Nation USA
Purveyor of Truth

Arizona Governor Jan Brewer, using her Executive pen, vetoed SB 1062, the anti gay bill that would have given businesses the right to refuse services to LGBT couples on religious grounds. While this site agrees with the Governor's veto decisions many do not.

In an op-ed piece this morning Rich Lowry, writing in POLITICO, puts forth an opinion and his argument that the veto was both unnecessary and foolish. His reasoning is arguably based on sound logic.

Here then is Rick Lowry:

In addition to the federal government, 18 states have such statutes and about a dozen other states interpret their state constitutions as extending the same protections, according to the letter. The statutes, the scholars write, “say that before government can burden a person’s religious exercise, the government has to show a compelling justification.”

The letter argues that, properly interpreted, the federal law that inspired the Arizona statute covers cases that don’t directly involve the government and covers businesses. So Arizona’s changes weren’t radical but in keeping with a federal law once championed by none other than Sen. Ted Kennedy.

A religious freedom statute doesn’t give anyone carte blanche to do whatever he wants in the name of religion. It simply allows him to make his case in court that a law or a lawsuit substantially burdens his religion and that there is no compelling governmental interest to justify the burden.

For critics of the Arizona bill, the substance was almost an afterthought. They recoiled at the very idea that someone might have moral objections to homosexuality or gay marriage.

The cases that have come up relevant to the Arizona debate involve small-business people declining to provide their services to gay couples at their marriage ceremonies. A New Mexico photographer won’t take pictures. A Washington state florist won’t arrange flowers. An Oregon bakery won’t bake a wedding cake.

It’s easy to see how offensive these decisions were to the gay couples involved. An entirely understandable response would be for the couple to say, “I’m sorry you’re so narrow-minded and I hope you evolve one day. In the meantime, I’ll take my business elsewhere.”

The market has a ready solution for these couples: There are other bakers, photographers and florists. The wedding business is not exactly bristling with hostility to gay people. If one baker won’t make a cake for gay weddings, the baker across town can hang a shingle welcoming all couples for all types of weddings.

This is how a pluralistic society would handle such disputes...

Mr Lowry makes several interesting points. Continue reading BELOW THE FOLD.

Via: Memeorandum

At least 20 people were detained after water bottles were tossed at police when they attempted to disperse the crowds in Culiacán.
(News video) 1,000 people marched to free El Chapo in Culiacán

US Government Moves To Control News
News The Government Approves!
A Commentary by J. D. Longstreet
**************
First, allow me to offer this warning: Do not, for one moment, believe the FCC has backed off it's CIN (Critical Information Needs) initiative. It WILL be back, in another guise, most likely as a study to determine if minority ownership of broadcast stations is at a satisfactory level.  Of course, it is not -- at least not in the eyes of the Democratic Party.

It has been a while in coming but, as an old retired broadcaster, I have been expecting this move by the government for a very long time.  Once "The Dictator," Obama, moved into the White House it was but a matter of time.

Ajit Pai, a commissioner on the Federal Communications Commission, was so upset about this move by the government to filter the news we get daily from the broadcast -- AND -- print media that he wrote an article about if for the Wall Street Journal Online.  Here are HIS words:

"... The government has no place pressuring media organizations into covering certain stories."  --SOURCE:  http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304680904579366903828260732

Commissioner Pai continues:  "Last May the FCC proposed an initiative to thrust the federal government into newsrooms across the country. With its "Multi-Market Study of Critical Information Needs," or CIN, the agency plans to send researchers to grill reporters, editors and station owners about how they decide which stories to run. A field test in Columbia, S.C., is scheduled to begin this spring.

How does the FCC plan to dig up all that information? First, the agency selected eight categories of "critical information" such as the "environment" and "economic opportunities," that it believes local newscasters should cover. It plans to ask station managers, news directors, journalists, television anchors and on-air reporters to tell the government about their "news philosophy" and how the station ensures that the community gets critical information." -- SOURCE:  http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304680904579366903828260732

Before we go on, allow me to explain for those of you who have never been involved in the broadcast business --  the FCC is basically the same to broadcasters as the IRS is to all taxpayers.  Only worse. The FCC holds the life of a broadcast station in it's hands.  They can revoke the station's license when they choose and that station, that business, is kaput! 

So.  Understand this:  When the FCC makes a "suggestion" it is taken as a commandment from on high.  If they say: Jump." The station licensee says: "How high?" Then, without waiting for a reply, jumps as high as he can.
I was in broadcasting in one of the training areas of the FCC for nearly two decades.  I had far more dealings with FCC inspectors than I ever --- ever --- wanted.  Working in pairs they'd hit a station in the early morning and spend most of the day going over that station's logs -- transmitter logs, program logs, and such.  The entire building became a pressure cooker during those hours. 

In a training area, as we were, we knew the "new guy" was going to attempt to impress his trainer, so, we expected, and got, everything short of a body cavity search by the trainee.  It was brutal.

So when the FCC says they are going to ask the station personnel to "tell the government about their news philosophy and how the station ensures that the community gets critical information." That's not EXACTLY how it will work.  Allow me to translate that for you into the language every broadcaster knows:  It means the FCC is going to tell the broadcaster that these are eight categories of critical information the licensee WILL begin covering immediately, and, I am sure, make reports to the FCC as to what was aired, when it was aired , the name of the person broadcasting the coverage, etc..  As I said above -- a suggestion from the FCC is understood to be a commandment.

Commissioner Pai goes on:  "Participation in the Critical Information Needs study is voluntary—in theory. Unlike the opinion surveys that Americans see on a daily basis and either answer or not, as they wish, the FCC's queries may be hard for the broadcasters to ignore. They would be out of business without an FCC license, which must be renewed every eight years."  --SOURCE: http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304680904579366903828260732

The democrats have been trying to reestablish the old Fairness Doctrine which shackled broadcasters for decades -- dating back to 1949.  The FCC stopped enforcing the policy in 1987 and finally took it off the books in 2011.  There had been scads of lawsuits filed by broadcasters and broadcasting associations pleading that the Fairness Doctrine did not serve the public interest and did, indeed,  infringe upon freedom of the press.  What it DID do was cause a lot of dial turning as people switched stations to get away from the dry public affairs topics and banal discussions of topics they hadn't the slightest interest in.

You may remember that near the beginning of this piece, I noted that this policy would affect both the broadcast and the PRINT media.  Note please: the PRINT media.  The FCC has no control over the print media, only the broadcast media.  So, if this is just a fact finding incursion into the broadcast newsrooms, then what, pray tell, is a broadcast regulation agency doing in a newspaper newsroom? 

No.  There is more here, dear reader, than meets the eye.  It is, I believe, the first step in the government take over of the news organizations in America.  The government bureaucrat dreams of control of the press.  THAT'S where this is all headed.

This is, in my opinion, a violation of the First Amendment.  But it doesn't matter.  The Obama Regime has already completely trashed the constitution. 

If the FCC is allowed to carry through with this plan, it will not be long before government monitors will take up residence in newsrooms all across America and every piece of script, every article of news for print, will be approved or disapproved by them!  America's free press will be dead.

I would hope this would be a wake-up call for the liberal media in America.  We have warned for many, many, decades that the progressive Marxists they (the liberal media) run interference for, for which they shuck and jive on a daily basis, once in control of the government would come after them – FIRST!  They didn’t believe us.  I suspect they will not believe it when those government “minders” take up positions in their newsrooms and dictate to them the news they will -- and will not -- broadcast or print.    

This is another glaring reason we need to clean out the US Senate in November and put a conservative in the Oval Office in 2016.  As long as a Democrat occupies the Oval Office, the Democratic Party will have control of the FCC.   That's the way it works.  Control changes with the party in the Oval office.

In the meantime, I intend to speak with my Congressman and insist that he do what he can to stop this government takeover of America's newsrooms. 

I think Byron York of the Washington Examiner summed it up best.  He said: "If the FCC goes forward, it's not clear what will happen to news organizations that fall short of the new government standards. Perhaps they will be disciplined. Or perhaps the very threat of investigating their methods will nudge them into compliance with the administration's journalistic agenda. What is sure is that it will be a gross violation of constitutional rights." -- SOURCE:  http://washingtonexaminer.com/article/2544363?slideout=1 

J. D. Longstreet