Special Interests...EXPOSED!!!

Hezbollah on the Mexican Border

Fort Hood Targeted for Second Terrorist Attack

by IPT News

Naser Jason Abdo made an initial court appearance in Waco, Tex. Friday, where he was charged with possessing an unregistered weapon.

Press reports indicate that Abdo defiantly invoked the name of 2009 Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hasan as he was taken out of the courtroom. "Nidal Hasan Fort Hood 2009," spectators heard him shout.

Hasan is charged with killing 13 people during a shooting spree at a readiness center at Fort Hood in November 2009. Hasan had been in contact with American-born al-Qaida cleric Anwar al-Awlaki before the attack, and Awlaki hailed Hasan as a hero after the shooting.

Investigators have not found evidence that Abdo had similar communication with terrorists, but he did have a copy of an article from al-Qaida's English-language magazine, Inspire, with instructions on home-made bombs. Abdo, who had been granted conscientious objector status, claimed he could not kill fellow Muslims if deployed to Afghanistan.

His target and his shouting of Hasan's name indicate he felt no hesitation killing his fellow soldiers.

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Full Civic Literacy Exam

Are you more knowledgeable than the average citizen? The average score for all 2,508 Americans taking the following test was 49%; college educators scored 55%. Can you do better? Questions were drawn from past ISI surveys, as well as other nationally recognized exams.

Click Here to test your knowledge!

Israel Palestinian Conflict: The Truth About the West Bank

Did White House Snub Fraud Fighter?

Spenditol

Defending the Faith Part 9: The Art of Asking Questions

by Greg Koukl

Christians find themselves in many different situations where they want to influence people for the greater good, or defend their faith. When defending the faith, one of the most important tactics that we can use in conversation is the asking of questions (Columbo). Like other tactics, asking good questions and asking the right number of questions is a skill that takes practice. In his book, In But Not Of, Hugh Hewitt, gives us some practical advice as to how to do this: Ask at least a half-dozen questions in every conversation

This skill at inquiry will immediately mark you as different and attractive. . . . When you ask questions, you are displaying interest in the person asked and in most settings this is a great boon to the pride and self-worth of the person being asked. Most people are not queried on many, if any, subjects. Their opinions are not solicited. To ask them is to be remembered fondly as a very interesting and gracious person in your own right.

Once developed, the habit of asking questions will inevitably give you advantages in every setting. You will obviously leave most situations with more information (and friends) than when you arrived, and being an asker allows you control of situations that statement makers rarely achieve. Once you learn how to guide a conversation, you have also learned how to control it. You can express your own opinions as questions, and every human emotion can be conveyed this way.

An alert questioner can judge when someone grows uneasy. But don't stop. Just change directions.

Asking questions and marking yourself as fair minded and interested in others will do a lot to keep the conversations civil and you in control of your message rather than having to defend assertions that you have made. Questions disarm people and lower their defenses so that a conversation can be a useful exchange of ideas rather than a battle of wills.

Next time: The Suicide Tactic - when an arguments holds the seeds of it's own demise

For more extensive tactics training go to www.str.org and look for Tactics in Defending the Faith Mentoring Series or STRi DVD interactive training in our online store or call Stand to Reason at 1-800-2-REASON.

Disapproval Rate for Congress at Record 82% After Debt Talks

by Michael Cooper and Megan Thee-Brenan

The debate over raising the debt ceiling, which brought the nation to the brink of default, has sent disapproval of Congress to its highest level on record and left most Americans saying that creating jobs should now take priority over cutting spending, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News Poll.

A record 82 percent of Americans now disapprove of the way Congress is handling its job — the most since The Times first began asking the question in 1977, and even more than after another political stalemate led to a shutdown of the federal government in 1995.

More than four out of five people surveyed said that the recent debt-ceiling debate was more about gaining political advantage than about doing what is best for the country. Nearly three-quarters said that the debate had harmed the image of the United States in the world.

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Secret Service Secrets

Elaborate Welfare Housing Project

U.S. Government Bureaucracy

All You Need To Know About U.S. Government Bureaucracy:

Pythagorean theorem................................................24 words.

Lord's prayer..............................................................66 words.

Archimedes' Principle................................................67 words.

10 Commandments...................................................179 words.

Gettysburg address...................................................286 words.

Declaration of Independence....................................1,300 words.

US Constitution with all 27 Amendments..................7,818 words.

US Government regulations on sale of cabbage......26,911 words.

I guess cabbage must really be complicated....

Rand Paul Smackdown!

Rufus Roo - No Extra Baggage In Flight Now

Air Force Bugbots

GE Moves Healthcare X-Ray Unit Headquarters To China

by Mamta Badkar

General Electric's health-care unit is moving the headquarters of its x-ray business from Waukesha, Wisconsin to Beijing to gain from Chinese growth, according to Bloomberg.

The company said only a few of its top managers would move to China, and that it expects no job losses at its Wisconsin office, that has 120 employees. GE Healthcare will however hire 65 new engineers and other staff at the new Chengdu facility.

This is part of the parent-company's broader plan to invest $2 billion in China. General Electric expects its health-care revenue in China to rise 20% annually through 2015.

Earlier this year GE Healthcare launched a three-year "Spring Wind" initiative that aims to helps the Chinese government by developing affordable healthcare products, boost medical distribution network across China and offer training for Chinese healthcare professionals. In 2010, GE Healthcare also committed to sending 500 members into rural China to help grassroot medical institutions.

While the company reported no job losses in the U.S. stemming from the move, President Obama and Jeffrey Immelt are likely to face flak, since Obama appointed Immelt the top outside economic adviser and charged him with running a jobs-focused panel to help bring the U.S. economy back on track.

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Abortion Drug Kills 14 Women, Injures 2,200

by Steven Ertelt

The Food and Drug Administration has quietly released a new report about the deaths of and injuries to women from the dangerous RU 486 abortion drug and the Obama administration has done nothing to make the information available to women.

Following its approval during the Clinton administration, the FDA released a report in 2006 that received widespread attention for showing more than 1,100 women had been subjected to “adverse effects” resulting from their taking the abortion drug mifepristone, commonly known a RU 486. Pro-life advocates have waited five years for the FDA to come out with a new report of problems associated with the drug — despite mounting evidence that the abortion drug continues to kill and injure women across the globe.

The FDA, with no fanfare, has released a new report, dated April 30, 2011. The report indicates 14 women in the United States alone have died from using the mifepristone abortion drug and 2,207 women have been injured by it.

Of the women experiencing medical and physical problems resulting from the abortion drug, 612 women required hospitalizations, 339 experienced blood loss significant enough to require a transfusion, 256 experienced infections and 48 women experienced what the FDA labeled as “severe infections.” Given that the RU 486 abortion drug caused sepsis, a potentially lethal infection that resulted in the deaths of women from around the world, the “serious infections” were very likely life-threatening situations.

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U.S. Gov. Ends Chrysler Investment With $1.3 Billion Loss

by FoxNews.com

The U.S government has sold its shares in Chrysler LLC at a likely loss of $1.3 billion in taxpayer money, the Treasury Department said Thursday, announcing the end of a controversial investment that resurrected the troubled auto company.

Italian automaker Fiat SpA, which has run the company since it emerged from bankruptcy protection in June 2009, purchased the U.S. government's remaining 98,000 shares in the auto company for $560 million.

The financial loss irritated Republican lawmakers.

"I am deeply disturbed to learn that the Obama administration left $1.3 billion taxpayer dollars on the table in resolving its bailout of Chrysler," said Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

"The administration has sold out an American icon to a foreign company using TARP funds underwritten by taxpayers. Now they are essentially give that same company $1.3 billion of taxpayer money," he said.

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Tracking Isn’t Just for Our Feds Any More

Raising the Debt Ceiling?

Defending the Faith Part 8: The Power of Columbo

by Greg Koukl

Once you’ve learned the Columbo tactic, you’ll be amazed at how deftly you can navigate through a discussion. Many people you talk to will struggle when you turn the tables and they’re being asked to provide evidence for their views. They will try to change the subject or simply reassert their views, sometimes because they haven’t thought much about the issue you’re discussing. Dodging your question may be their only recourse.

It is critical that you “narrate the debate” at this point. Take a moment to stop and describe what’s going on in the conversation. This will help your friend (and others listening in) to see how she’s gotten off course. You can say, “Hold on. First you made a fairly controversial statement, which I challenged you to clarify and defend. So far, you haven’t done that. You’ve just taken off in another direction. Before we move on to a new topic, can we finish this one?”

Don’t let your friend get off the hook by dodging the issues. This approach keeps the pressure on while keeping the conversation cordial. Encourage your opponent to clarify herself. Forcing her to face the music may be the first step toward a change of mind.

The Columbo tactic can also help keep you out of the “hot seat.” Sometimes the fear of getting in over our heads is enough to keep us from saying anything at all. We especially dread the possibility of some aggressive critic blasting us with arguments, opinions, or information we are not equipped to handle.

The Columbo tactic questions help control the conversation when you fear being overmatched by the person opposing you. To buy yourself some thinking time, simply switch into fact-finding mode. Begin by slowing them down with, “Hold on a minute; this is new to me.” Next say, “I want to understand your point, so can you carefully tell me what you believe and why you believe it?” (the first two Columbo questions.) Finish by saying, “Then let me think about it.” Then work on the issue later at your leisure when the pressure is off.

Think for a moment how useful this approach is. Instead of trying to resist the force of another’s attack, practice a little verbal Aikido; just step aside and let him barge right in. Give him the floor and invite him to make his case. However, he must do it slowly and carefully so you’ll have an opportunity to fully understand his point.

When you are being overwhelmed, this move to fact-finding mode takes you completely out of the hot seat. It deftly shifts control of the conversation back to you while shifting the spotlight and the pressure back on him. You are no longer under any obligation to answer, refute, or even respond because you’ve already said you need to give the issue more thought.

This is easy. Essentially you’re saying, “Oh, you want to beat me up? Fine with me. Just do it slowly and thoroughly.” This is a move that even the most delicate, retiring, shy, bashful, skittish, timid, or reserved personality can employ with great effect.

The advantage of the Columbo tactic is not having to assert something you want someone else to believe in. You aren’t taking the burden of proof on yourself. Instead, your question makes the point for you. This accomplishes your goal in an entirely different and much more powerful way.

Next time: The art of asking questions

For more extensive tactics training go to www.str.org and look for Tactics in Defending the Faith Mentoring Series or STRi DVD interactive training in our online store or call Stand to Reason at 1-800-2-REASON.

Global Warming - Whose to Blame?

Three sons strangle mom on Christmas over Yahtzee

by Pat Pheifer

Tamara Lee Mason wanted to play Yahtzee with her three sons after they all returned home from Christmas dinner at a friend's. When the boys wouldn't, she got mad, grabbed a few things and stormed out of the house.

That's the story Mason's oldest, Dylan C. Clemens, told investigators back on Dec. 27, according to criminal charges filed in Stevens County District Court. A much stranger story is laid out in criminal charges filed Tuesday against Clemens, 25. His half-brothers Andrew Q. Cobb, 18, and Jacob S. Cobb, 17, were charged Friday.

Mason's decomposing remains were found Thursday buried in the back yard of her home in Alberta, a town of about 130 people in far western Minnesota.

The charges said Jacob Cobb strangled his mother on the living room floor. Then he or his brother Andrew put a plastic bag over her head and tightened a belt around her neck. Clemens allegedly drove her body west to South Dakota, then east to Glenwood, Minn., before storing the corpse in a garbage can in a shed for months until the ground thawed enough for the two elder brothers to bury it.

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Poverty in the US: Cell Phones, Cable TV, and Xbox

by Robert Rector and Rachel Sheffield

For decades, the U.S. Census Bureau has reported that over 30 million Americans were living in “poverty,” but the bureau’s definition of poverty differs widely from that held by most Americans. In fact, other government surveys show that most of the persons whom the government defines as “in poverty” are not poor in any ordinary sense of the term. The overwhelming majority of the poor have air conditioning, cable TV, and a host of other modern amenities. They are well housed, have an adequate and reasonably steady supply of food, and have met their other basic needs, including medical care. Some poor Americans do experience significant hardships, including temporary food shortages or inadequate housing, but these individuals are a minority within the overall poverty population. Poverty remains an issue of serious social concern, but accurate information about that problem is essential in crafting wise public policy. Exaggeration and misinformation about poverty obscure the nature, extent, and causes of real material deprivation, thereby hampering the development of well-targeted, effective programs to reduce the problem.

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First Lady Now Requires 26 Servants

by Dr. Paul L. Williams

“In my own life, in my own small way, I have tried to give back to this country that has given me so much,” she said. “See, that’s why I left a job at a big law firm for a career in public service,”— Michelle Obama.

We were wrong.

Michelle Obama, as we reported on July 7, is not served by twenty-two attendants who stand by to cater to her every whim.

She is served by twenty-six attendants, including a hair dresser and make-up artist.

The annual cost to taxpayers for such unprecedented attention is approximately $1,750,000 without taking into account the expense of the lavish benefit packages afforded to every attendant.

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