Tuesday morning’s Washington Times online has an article headlined Ex-presidents may get Secret Service for life.

The article reports that Congress is considering amending or repealing the 1994 law which limited protection to ten years after leaving office.

What do you think?  Should former presidents and their spouses get lifetime Secret Service protection?  If so, why, and if not, why not?

According to the Coeur d’Alene Press skewspaper article this morning, about 25 students from Coeur d’Alene High School were standing on a street corner, waving signs, and protesting because, “… their AP Government class was requiring them to participate in eight hours of a government-related activity.”

One of the students was quoted saying, ” This is more fun than going to a school board meeting.”

What does standing on a street corner waving signs teach students about government?

This morning’s Coeur d’Alene Press skewspaper got it wrong.  Again.

In an unattributed article headlined Brannon seeks another hearing, the Press wrongly stated as fact:  “Jim Brannon, who lost the 2009 Seat 2 election to incumbent Mike Kennedy by 3 votes, petitioned for a rehearing Tuesday on grounds that the Supreme Court erred in its decision not to toss out five votes from people living abroad despite not knowing for whom the voters voted.”

Brannon’s Petition for Rehearing Pursuant to I.A.R. 42 clearly states, “The [Supreme] Court’s reasoning in determining this issue is based upon a misperception that the five “UOCAVA” votes are the ones that are relevant to the asserted Idaho Code § 34-2001 (6) error in counting and declaring the election result.  They are not.”  [emphasis mine] (more…)

Jason D. Brown, like Bernie Madoff, is a predator.   Madoff didn’t kill anyone, at least not directly, to steal their money.  Brown did.  And now the FBI is suggesting that Brown may be using his upbringing as a Mormon to hide among either witting or unwitting Mormons.

The story is reported in today’s Salt Lake Tribune online story headlined FBI:  most wanted fugitive hiding among Mormons?

The important point about the story isn’t that Brown is a Mormon.  It’s that he may be willing and able to exploit that connection to gain sympathy from other Mormons.

When it’s done to defraud, as in Bernie Madoff’s case, it’s called affinity fraud.  In Brown’s case, he is simply a killer, an affinity predator.

It looks like a Michigan Supreme Court Justice may be looking for work.

According to the story from today’s The Detroit News online, “The U.S. government is seeking forfeiture of Michigan Supreme Court Justice Diane Hathaway’s posh second home in suburban Orlando, Fla., claiming she and her husband hid the asset to defraud a bank and escape $600,000 in mortgage debt.”

The US Attorney filed a civil forfeiture complaint, however it alleges criminal conduct was involved.

How do you feel about the quality of reporting in the news you receive?

Here is a newspaper story from the Ridgewood-Glenmont [NJ] Patch.

Here is the story as reported by NBC News4 in New York.

Here is the story as reported by Fox News.

Comments?

Election fraud does happen, but it’s often not prosecuted.   When it’s more economically or politically beneficial for state attorneys general, secretaries of state, and county clerks and prosecutors to turn a blind eye to it, it happens more easily.  The lack of prosecution does not mean violations don’t occur.

On Thursday, November 15, 2012, a federal judge sentenced a West Virginia county commissioner to 21 months in federal prison “… for lying to an FBI agent about absentee ballot applications, which prosecutors say were part of a scheme to sway Lincoln County’s 2010 Democratic primary.”  The scheme involved collusion with an employee of the county clerk’s office.

The conviction was reported in a press release from the US Attorney’s Office of the Southern District of West Virginia.  The details were reported in a Seattle P-I online article headlined  Ex-W.Va. county official sentenced to 21 months.

The investigation was conducted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and investigator Jim Wise of the West Virginia Secretary of State’s Office.   It appears that West Virginia has an honest and diligent Secretary of State.